She hesitated a moment longer, then grabbed the knife, sliced through the cloth strips tying me down, and stepped back warily, holding her weapon at the ready in case I leaped at her.
I couldn’t have leaped from that chair if it had been on fire. Every movement hurt. Very slowly I straightened my stiffened legs and managed to stand, then hobbled over to the door and turned on the light. I surveyed myself in the cracked mirror—not a pretty sight. Dried blood and spit covered my blotchy face and the front of my torn synthileather shirt. Slowly and painfully I pulled it off, washed as best I could in the sink, then toweled off and limped over to my bag for a clean shirt—simple white cloth this time. Meta watched me, never lowering the knife. When I’d finished, I held out my hand. “I think I should carry that.”
For a moment she didn’t move; then, abruptly, she held it out to me, hilt-first. I took it. “You were very brave,” I said.
“I couldn’t let you take it, not after...what I’d seen.”
“Would you have actually used the knife on him?” I held it up so the blade flashed. “Could you do something like that?”
“I—I think I could. To protect a friend.” Her mouth quirked upward. “Anyway, he sure thought I could.”
To protect a friend. I thought again of what I had called her, of everything she’d been through because of me. Some friend. Ashamed to look at her, I slid the knife into its sheath and clipped it to my belt, then closed the bag, picked it up—and stopped, reconsidering. Nothing in it was really important, and I could do without the weight. I opened it again, took out my Andy Nebula credit chip, and kicked the bag under the bed. “Orbital,” I said. “Our next trick is getting past Fat Sloan.”
“Won’t he be asleep?”
“His security systems won’t. He doesn’t like people coming and going without him knowing. Especially us. We’re worth money.”
“So how do we get out?”
“I’m not sure yet.” I looked at the window, toying with the idea of turning the rest of the sheet into a rope, but thought better of it. The tavern across the street would still be full of people and we didn’t want a crowd of witnesses.
So if we couldn’t go down—we’d have to go up. “The roof.”
I turned off the light, slowly opened the door and peered both ways. It was unusually quiet, for Sloan’s; nobody arguing or screaming. I slipped out, Meta behind me, and crept to the stairs as silently as the rickety old floor would let me. Dim yellow light shone into the stairwell from the lobby; I wondered if Sloan was down there, overflowing that stool of his.
I wasn’t about to creep down to find out. Instead, we crept up, step by creaking step. I expected every minute to see Sloan appear at the bottom of the stairs, blocking out the light like an eclipsing moon, but everything remained quiet. Two flights up the stairs ended in a red wooden door with no handle. A single dim glowtube barely lit it.
“Dead end?” Meta glanced down the stairs.
“No,” I said. The door probably had a sonic-activated lock—but the wood around it was as rotten as Sloan’s heart. “Stand back.” I braced myself against the stair railing and kicked as hard as I could. The door crashed open, splinters flying, and from somewhere below us a piercing beep!beep!beep! began. “Oops,” I said, grabbed Meta’s hand and ran out onto the flat roof, toward the fire escape that led down into the back alley.
Sloan had been in the lobby; as we reached the fire escape he appeared, puffing, in the shattered doorway. “Stop!”
“I don’t think so,” I yelled back, grabbing the railing.
Something in Sloan’s hand cracked and spat fire, and a large chunk of the knee-high wooden wall girdling the roof exploded in splinters, one of which scored my cheek, bringing a warm trickle of blood. “Next time I won’t miss!” Sloan shouted.
I pushed Meta onto the fire escape. Crack! Another bullet whined past, so close my insides quivered. “Move!” I shouted to Meta, and swung onto the fire escape myself.
Before I could start down it the gun cracked one more time—and something smashed me over the railing into empty space.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“Kit!” Meta screamed.
I probably would have screamed, too, if my breath hadn’t been knocked out when I crashed into the side of the fire escape after my foot caught in the railing. I hung there, gasping soundlessly for air, dangling by one leg over three stories of darkness, and expecting any moment to feel the beginning of pain from the bullet wound, or blood running down past my face. But I didn’t. Oh, there was plenty of pain, not just from my back, where whatever-it-was had hit me, but also from my abused ankle, my bruised chest and face, and everything in between. None of it felt like it had been caused by Sloan’s bullet, though.
I tried to pull myself back up and couldn’t. “Meta, help!”
“You’re alive!”
“I won’t be if you don’t give me a hand!” I could feel my foot slipping. “Hurry!”
With her help and a pulled muscle or two I managed to get a safe grip on the outside of the fire escape, free my foot, and clamber back over the railing onto the stairs—where I discovered the chunk of wood that had smashed into my back after being chipped off the wall around the roof by Sloan’s bullet. Maybe luck hadn’t completely deserted me after all. “Come on!” I said, took two steps down, and stopped so suddenly Meta ran into me.
“Now what?” she cried.
“Sloan’s not here.”
“Good! Now go!”
“But he should be here—all he had to do was cross the roof. That means—” I climbed back to the top of the fire escape, then raised my head slowly over the edge of the roof. No Sloan. “This way! He must be heading for the bottom of the fire escape!”
Back onto the roof we went, back through the door I had kicked open, back down the dark stairs, and out through the lobby. We burst out into the street and ran—or, in my case, hobbled quickly—past a half-dozen men, shouting drunkenly, coming out of the tavern. As we reached the corner I glanced back and saw Sloan emerge from the alley leading behind his flophouse. He shouted something and shook his fist, and I waved at him before grabbing Meta’s hand and plunging into the darkness of a side street.
Every step hurt as we zigzagged from block to block, ignoring and ignored by the shadowy, ragged people we passed. Finally I stopped beneath the flickering blue light of a tube station, panting in time with Meta and counterpoint to the assorted throbbings in my body. “Should be—safe enough,” I gasped out. “Sloan—not one for running.”
“I thought you were dead back there. I thought he shot you!”
“So did I. But no harm done...” To prove it, I ran my hands over my chest—and swore.
“What is it?”
“My pocket is empty!” I checked it again to be sure.
“So?”
“That’s where I put my credchip. It must have fallen out when I went over the railing.”
“You said you couldn’t use it without Qualls or the ‘forcers finding out where you are, anyway.”
“Yeah, but in an emergency...” I shook my head. “Well, better Andy Nebula’s fortune falls three stories than Andy Nebula.”
“You’re not Andy Nebula any more,” Meta said, sounding almost bitter. She looked up and down the empty street. “Now where?”
“Spaceport. We still have to get off this planet, and now—” I patted my pocket. “We have no choice. We have to stow away.”
I led the way along deserted back streets. As we trudged along, Meta kept her head down. Finally she said, “Kit...”
“Yeah? Here, let’s go this way—,” down a narrow, dank alley. Overhead, first light grayed the clouds.
Meta halted. “Stop for a minute.”
“Time’s economic, gladeye.”
“I said stop!”
I stopped.
Meta looked at me. “Are you really all right?”
“Of course I’m all right. The bullet never touched me.”
“I’m
not talking about the bullet.”
I was silent for a moment. “I said awful things, didn’t I?”
She didn’t reply.
“That wasn’t me, it was the flash.” Still nothing. “You do understand that, don’t you?”
“I—I guess so.” She folded her arms over her chest, hugging herself. “But it—you scared me. And before, even before Sloan’s, you’d—one minute you’d be fine, and the next—”
“I know.” I took her shoulders. “Meta, I swear, it was the flash. And it’s over. I’m over it. I’m my old self again.”
She looked down. “Your old self wasn’t always nice either.”
“I didn’t want to get you involved, that’s all.” But that wasn’t all. I just hadn’t wanted to be bothered. I’d been so wrapped up in my plans for my career that she’d been a nuisance I just wanted to be rid of. But then when I’d needed her, I hadn’t hesitated to involve her—in the worst possible way. She could have been the one the bullet hit, back there on the roof, or...
Or, under the influence of flash, I could have killed her.
I let go of her. “Meta, I’m sorry for getting you into this—”
“I got myself into it.” She turned away. “Andy Nebula really doesn’t exist, does he? It’s all a big lie.”
What could I say? That’s exactly what it was. “It’s just—show business. You’re not supposed to take it seriously.”
“Not supposed to be as stupid as I was, you mean.”
“That’s not—”
“Oh, it’s all right. My parents always told me I was wasting my time ‘listening to that trash.’ They kept telling me to grow up.” She ran her fingers over the damp stone of the graffiti-stained wall. “I guess I am. But I don’t like it much.”
“I’m sorry,” I said again. I couldn’t think of anything else.
“Yeah, well.” She smiled, just a little. “I wanted to tell Bekka all about my romantic adventures with Andy Nebula. I guess I won’t have to make them up, after all.” Her smile went away. “But tell me the truth. Are you really all right?”
“Yes,” I said, but I wondered. Deep down inside there was still a strange little feeling, a not-quite itch, that made me wonder what would happen the next time someone offered me flash. I hoped I’d never find out. “We’d better hurry. We’ll want to get to the spaceport before it’s full light.”
Ten minutes later we hid in a dark doorway across the street from the terminal, looking for any sign of the Ice Boys. Nothing moved. Of course, they could be hiding and watching like us. That street looked awfully wide and empty. But we had to cross it.
I straightened. “Look nonchalant,” I said, but as we walked into the open, I felt as conspicuous as if I were naked and painted fluorescent green. Still, no shouts—or shots—echoed through the pre-dawn twilight; no mirrorcloth-clad killers came swarming after us; we crossed in perfect safety.
Was that because they were waiting for us inside?
No. The interior of the terminal was almost as deserted as the street had been, except for a few passengers waiting for some early lift-off and a handful of bored personnel yawning behind ticket counters. “It’s too easy,” I muttered.
“Maybe Qualls still thinks Sloan has you,” Meta said.
That made sense. If he thought I’d already been captured, he had no need to set a new trap. And Sloan wouldn’t tell him he’d lost us until he was sure he couldn’t get us back. “Well, then,” I said, “all we have to worry about is sneaking on board a spaceship.” I looked at Meta. “You’re the expert there...”
“Easy. First you find your favorite singer’s dressing room...”
I grinned. “Right idea. But instead of a dressing room, we look for a cargo module.”
On a Pleasure Planet security would have stopped us or shot us half a dozen times in the next few minutes, but I guess nobody on Murdoch IV thought any cargo arriving or departing from Fistfight City could possibly be worth interfering with. We simply found a secluded, unmanned ticket counter—plenty of those at that hour. Of course the door behind it into the cargo area was locked, but a conveyor belt ordinarily took luggage from the counter back through the wall, and the only thing sealing it off was a veil of flickering blue light. “Explosives, drugs and weapons scan,” I whispered to Meta as we crawled through the twinkling beams, feeling nothing. “It couldn’t care less about stowaways.”
We emerged into semi-darkness in another room empty except for a few coveralls and hardhats hung on hooks along the back wall. The conveyor belt continued through that wall, into the large open space we had dodged through while escaping the Ice Boys. Loud clangs and crashes from our right indicated some kind of work in progress. This time we turned that way, deeper into the building’s entrails. We picked our way, banging shins every other step, it felt like, through a spider’s nightmare of conveyor belts, platforms and elevators, finally reaching the entrance of a huge chamber from which spilled the noise and (at last!) enough light to show us where we were putting our feet. Of course, it also showed us the chamber’s metal gate and armed guards, and beyond them, more guards inspecting crates and boxes on one of the conveyor belts. Maybe Murdochians weren’t quite as trusting as I’d thought. “Now what?” Meta demanded.
I studied the situation for a minute, then a few minutes more. Meta fidgeted and once muttered something under her breath which I chose to ignore. “I think I have it,” I said finally. “But we’ll need those coveralls we saw...”
Ten minutes later I strode confidently (with only a slight limp) up to the gate. I grinned at the guards. “Hi, guys,” I said, started past them—and felt a meaty hand on my arm.
“Where’s your security badge, kid?”
“Huh? It’s right—” I put my hand on the left side of my chest, glanced down, and swore. “It must have fallen off back in the locker room. I’ll be right back—” I turned to go, and suddenly the conveyor belt on which the crates were being inspected whirred to life. The inspectors shouted and lunged at the crates, but too late to stop the one furthest along from crashing off the end of the belt, spilling glittery bits of something shiny and fragile across the duracrete floor.
The guards and I dashed over to rescue the remaining crates before they joined the first. A wild-eyed woman kept frantically slapping at the controls. I could have told her that was a waste of time, because I’d jammed the controls at the other end of the belt. When we finally got all the crates off the belt and onto the floor, the control-slapping woman led the other inspectors in a heated argument with the guards over whose fault it all was.
“Well, gotta get to work,” I said cheerfully, and walked calmly into the loading area. Once out of sight, I stopped and looked around. “Meta?” I called cautiously.
“Here!” She emerged, somewhat breathless, from between two crates. “I don’t believe it worked.”
“Of course it worked. My ideas always work.” I ignored her withering look. “Come on, let’s see where we are.”
The crashing and banging we’d been hearing came from a single forklift moving hexagonal containers into to a large orange container shaped rather like my dressing room—a cargo module. Just what we were looking for, although that particular one wouldn’t do, since it was packed solid. But a couple of other modules also awaited loading. In fact—I took another look at the wall we were peering around.
“Meta!” I whispered, and moved back from the light. “Do you see a control panel anywhere?” I ran my hands along the wall.
“Here!” Meta pointed to a small, protruding box aglow with a dozen green lights.
“Perfect!” I said. “It’s a pressurized cargo module. Whatever they’re shipping in it doesn’t like vacuum, and since I don’t, either...”
“But how do we get in?”
“We don’t, if it’s locked. But if it’s not fully loaded yet, then—” I touched the control panel, and the door slid open. Blue lights came on inside. I waved Meta in. “After you.”
CHAPT
ER SEVENTEEN
It shouldn’t have been that easy.
It wasn’t.
Inside, the module consisted of a long, narrow aisle with shelving on either side. The shelves were empty.
“No place to hide,” said Meta as the door closed behind us. “Maybe this module isn’t going with the others.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But then why activate it? It takes energy to power it, and energy is money. I think we’re just early.”
“But the first person who opens the door—”
As if on cue, the door opened. I froze and waited to be caught—but no one came in. I could hear voices just around the corner, though, male and indistinct. “All the way to the end,” I whispered to Meta. “Quick!”
“But there’s nothing—”
“Move!” She moved. The module ended in a bulkhead. “Bottom shelves,” I said, and replied to her puzzled look by lying down on the floor and squeezing onto the lowermost shelf, at floor level. It was a tight fit; I could hardly breathe, and had to turn my head sideways to keep my nose from pressing against the cold metal underside of the shelf above me. It gave me a perfect view of Meta wriggling with less difficulty under the shelves on the other side—and an equally perfect view of the steel-toed work boots of the cargo handler who clumped down the length of the module seconds later. A second pair of boots followed.
“Lots of room,” said a voice. “We won’t use half of it.”
“Good,” growled a second, deeper voice. “The fewer of these things I have to carry the better.”
“You got that right. Ugliest critters I ever set my eyes on.”
“Looked in a mirror recently, Pete?”
“Shut up, Dargo.” They went out, but I met Meta’s frightened eyes and shook my head the fraction of a centimeter I could, warning her to stay quiet and stay still. The boots came back. “So what do you suppose they use them for?” said Pete.
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