The Oxford Set
Deep in the heart of Kurrek was a mountain between the Taugaurong and Minjambuttu peoples called Dordordonga. There was a chalet amongst tall tree ferns and ancient Eucalyptus trees.
It was built in 1910 by the European settlers who came to the area for people who wanted to escape into nature for a relaxing weekend of skiing, swimming, and concerts.
Of course, the chalet lay abandoned—an empty shell of a bygone era.
And that was how Kaimana and Catalina Hale found it.
They ate a small picnic in front of the chalet in the formal English-style gardens that the builders of the chalet created to soften the relative harshness of the landscape beyond, making you wonder why they had ever left England.
The Hales were trying to recover from a traumatising incident they experienced earlier that day. Whilst looking out at the Alps behind a black railing, a young blond woman in her early twenties audaciously walked through a gate that authorised personnel could only open.
The Hales tried to call to her, telling her that it was too dangerous to walk towards the edge of the rock and that she could become one of those foreign nationals who went missing in the bush only to be found dead months later.
She ignored them, determined to take the selfie of the century. She stood on the far edge of the rock, put her back towards the precipice, and took a selfie.
But then her foot slipped, and she fell towards the forest floor and her death.
Kaimana and Catalina watched on helplessly before returning to the chalet for lunch.
“I guess that’s why Mount Dordordonga is known as where idiots come to die,” Kaimana said before biting into his sandwich.
“Yeah, but it still sucks though,” Catalina said. “She probably had family who will be devastated.”
“I guess,” Kaimana said. “I just hope that selfie gets fifty billion likes on Instagram; that way, her death wouldn’t have been in vain.”
“Yeah,” Catalina said before laughing darkly.
After they had finished their meal, the Hales packed up and went to have a closer look at the chalet behind them.
“D’you know why the original owners abandoned this place?” Catalina said.
“Beats me,” Kaimana said. “Bushfire, I think. The building became too dangerous to house guests, so it’s been left empty for twenty years.”
They looked through the windows, expecting to find empty, decaying rooms. But what they found was much more bizarre.
“Hey, babe, come look at this,” Kaimana told his wife.
She walked over to him and looked through the window.
Instead of an empty room, she saw a fully furnished one.
Someone had placed a tea set in the room, made the bed, and left the door ajar for whoever entered for a nice cup of tea.
“That’s weird,” Catalina said.
“Maybe this place wasn’t abandoned after all?” Kaimana said.
“More likely, the people here just left it was and never came back,” Catalina said.
As Kaimana looked through the window, he saw a flash of white walk past the door at the room’s far end.
He was sure it was a woman in a long white dress and a white hat with long brunette hair.
“There’s someone in there,” Kaimana said.
“What?” Catalina said.
“A young woman. There are guests in there.”
The young woman walked into the room.
“Look! Look!” Kaimana said as the woman went over to the tea set and poured herself a refreshing cup.
Catalina looked through the window and saw nothing.
“What am I supposed to be looking at?” Catalina said.
“The woman. The woman was making a cup of tea.”
Catalina peered through the window. “I don’t see anybody. You’re just imagining it.”
Katalina glanced back into the room. The woman had gone.
“Well, she’s not there now but was there.”
Catalina sighed before walking away from the chalet.
Kaimana quickly followed after her.
“Perhaps it’s connected to that thing that happened nearby at Anneyelong,” Kaimana said.
“What thing?” Catalina said.
“You know, those girls that disappeared in 1900.”
Catalina sighed.
“You know that was just a movie, right?”
“No one knows for sure, babe, that’s the mystery,” Kaimana said.
They walked over to a dark blue chasm that used to be the swimming pool and looked deep into its depths.
“Those girls may have been transported from Anneyelong to Dordordonga and have stayed there ever since,” Kaimana said.
“It’s just in your head, babe,” Catalina said.
She began to turn back around and walk towards the car.
Kaimana looked up in the window.
There, he saw another young woman dressed in a luminous white gown.
Kaimana rushed over towards his wife.
“There are people in there, Cat,” Kaimana said. “I just saw another one of those girls.”
Catalina turned around and saw no one.
“Your mind is playing tricks on you,” Catalina said.
“But you’ve got to admit that it makes sense,” Kaimana said. “Those girls disappeared from Anneyelong, came to the chalet, and have
been there for the past hundred-and-twenty-four years.”
Catalina glared at Kaimana for a moment.
“If that’s the case, then they’re probably dead,” Catalina said.
She began to make her way towards the car.
“They might not be,” Kaimana said. “Some otherworldly source might have stuck them in a time loop without escape.”
Catalina turned round.
“You don’t believe what you’re saying, are you?” Catalina said.
Kaimana followed her back to the car, but he heard the distant sounds of banging and screaming.
He looked back towards the chalet.
One of the girls looked directly at him, trying to get his attention.
He couldn’t hear her but knew she was calling him for help.
“Come on!” Catalina said. “We’re gonna miss our flight.”
Kaimana looked at the girl for a while longer before following Catalina back to the car, trying to ignore the girl’s cries.
After a while, they were well on their way towards Naarm Airport.
The Hales did not talk to each other for most of the journey, with Kaimana preoccupied with the landscape outside.
Catalina knew that he was thinking about the chalet and those girls.
“They wanted our help,” Kaimana said eventually. “They’re trapped in there and scared.”
“Sure they were.”
“I’m serious. We could have saved the girls.”
Catalina pushed hard on the brake and slowed the car down.
“Do you want me to turn back around?”
“No. It’s too late now, keep going,” Kaimana said.
Catalina sped up once again and drove towards the airport.
After a while, something in the distance caught her attention. Both she and Kaimana gasped.
A large rocky outcrop towered over a forest of gum trees.
“Is that?” Catalina said.
“It can’t be,” Kaimana said.
It was Anneyelong.
The Robinsonverse 