by Clay Gilbert
And they’d had hard times right from the beginning of the war. Some of the Oldtimers said they heard noises at night from the other side of the Wall—whether it was people wantingto join them or people wantingto attack them, it was hard to tell.
Isaac hadn’t been caught on film since the night Shadow died, and Eternity still hoped he’d fallen in the crash outside the Wall, too. Dead or alive, the things Isaac had done had whipped up the people on his side of the Wall into a frenzy of fear. Skylar’s unauthorized broadcast, well-intentioned though it was, had probably been the event most responsible for tipping civil unrest into a full-scale war. That, and Shadow’s death.
They hadn’t seen Skylar, in person or anywhere else, since the night of the broadcast. He hoped—and he knew Angel did, too—that she’d managed to stay alive, and she’d find her wayto the Forgotten Cityin time. Eternity expected that, in time, still others would follow. He wouldn’t be surprised, he thought, to discover that if people in the Black City had figured out at least a general idea of their location by now. As of yet, though, the screencasts, which Eternity and the others kept carefully monitored, had said nothing official.
Their own people were getting harder to control, too. Eternity had begun the raids again, mainly for the purpose of getting badly-needed supplies from storehouses in Busisec and Western Sector, areas that would encompass the least risk of casualties on either side and the greatest probability of achieving the aim of the raid itself. There were a couple of carefully-coordinated raids on Studio Block—Angel planned and led those herself, since she knew more about that part of the City than anyone else. They tried to disable the Providers’ screencasting operations, or at least slow down the propagandamachine a bit. A couple of days’worth of silence was, in the end, all it bought them, and then the Black City’s airwaves returned to business as usual.
Those operations were all well and good, Eternity thought. They were well-controlled, and no one was hurt, but he’d begun to hear whispers on Crown Avenue and elsewhere that, a few at a time, people were beginning to take justice into their own hands and going across the Wall to deal out a little medicine to the ‘domes’. Medicine that Eternity suspected tasted more like revenge.
I can’t prove anything yet, he thought, but when I can, it’s going to stop. “We’re gonna have to be careful, man,” Eternitysaid. “More careful than Ace was. I don’t want the citizens over there,” Eternity rarely used the term ‘domes’ himself anymore, although he heard more and more of his people using it, “to hate us. We’re only fighting whatever or whoever it is that’s in the Towers. Only the Providers. We’ll avoid the citizens as much as we can, but the time’s gonna come when we’re going to have to try to talk to them and get some of them over to our side if we can. For now, though, try to find me more people here. And be careful.”
“All right, man,” Brain said, hugging Angel and clasping Eternity’s hand in the familiar streetrider handshake. “You guys, take care, too. I’ll let you know what I hear.”
Eternitywaited until he heard the elevator doors shut outside before he turned back to Angel and pulled her close to him. “Shadow should still be here, youknow,”he said. “We really need him right now.”
“I know,” she said, “but you know, all the same. He is here. Don’t let Them, or this war, make you forget that. He’s here. Everyone we’ve lost is as long as we remember.”
* * * * The Forgotten City can be as cold as its nights , the nineteenyear-old man thought as he wandered the length of Crown Avenue. The roar of the speeding cycles on the Avenue made him want to cover his ears, but he just grimaced and pulled up the collar of the long black coat he wore, hoping it would muffle the sound. At least my body’s warm, if nothing else.
Two weeks. Two weeks he’d been in the Forgotten City. Two weeks of hiding, and waiting. Hiding because he was afraid They would be searching for him; waiting because he had to find someone to tell his story to. Someone who’d listen.
Eternity. The leader. The streetrider who ran the whole show. He was the one who’d listen. But with no friends, no one else he could trust, how would he survive long enough to make contact with Eternity? With a war going on, who knew if he’d even be able to get close enough? If the rebels discovered where he came from before he got through to Eternity, there was a chance he might be killed. If They—or someone from the City who was doing their work—found him, he’d be killed for sure. This was his choice. Was his life worth the price others might pay if he kept silent?
A sudden gust of cold night air and the loud thrum of a cycle generator startled him. He looked up to see a hovercycle floating in midair, suspended over the Avenue’s asphalt surface. Its rider was bald, like himself, though the clothes the boy wore were strange, and the stranger’s skin was dark brown.
“It’s cold out tonight,” the boy on the hovercycle said. The young man in the long coat said nothing.
“You from the city?” the dark-skinned boy asked, raising his voice to make himself heard over the combined noise of the wind and his cycle’s generator.
“Not anymore,” the young man replied, looking down at the asphalt road beneath his feet. “My name’s Brain,” said the boy on the hovercycle. “Welcome to the Forgotten City, man.” He put his hand out to the bald-headed young man in the long coat, who shook it with an almost grateful gesture. “You got a name?” The young man thought. His old name—the one he’d gone by in the City—was useless now, a symbol of what he was running from. This was the Forgotten City, and names here were like charms, mystic mirrors revealing aspects of a person that might have otherwise remained hidden.
I’m a traitor, he thought, or so they’d say. Fine. That’s what I’ll be—if taking my life back from them is treachery. “Judas,” he replied, “but you can call me Jude.”
* * * * *
“Why aren’t you helping Eternity?” Jude asked, once seated on the back of Brain’s cycle. “I am,” Brain replied. “We need as many people as we can find now—new people—to help us. You came along at just the right time.”
Jude thought about that. He’d made his choice, but it didn’t change the fact that they might still be looking for him. If they find me, they’ll kill me. I’ll disappear just like the others and they’ll make it sound like an accident, or they’ll blame these people, people I’ve got more in common with than any of those domes back in the City. If I’m going to die, I’d rather die my way.
“You sure you want to take a chance on me?” Jude asked. Brain nodded.
“Sure, I’ll help you, man,” said Jude.
* * * *
The Prophet grimaced at the taste of the dream-herb in his mouth, bitter and seductive as it always was. He closed his eyes, and the room around him fell away. He stared, unblinking, into space until, at last, the fogof the vision-state enveloped him.
Red. The mist is red this time, not white. How did this all start? He couldn’t remember the last time he’d thought back to the beginning, to the first time there was something in his mind besides emptiness or the electronic hum of the neuronet. That’s when it started.
He didn’t know how every other child of the Black City reacted, having his or her mind opened for the first time to the synaptic sea, the free flow of information that was the neuronet. It was the only education anyone got in the City now, although he knew it hadn’t always been that way. He guessed some might not like it. He’d loved it, though.
Information was my first addiction, and I saw my first visions out there, on the electric tether between mindspace and wirespace. I absorbed everything I could, until the evening before my eighteenth birthday: the night my parents told me I’d learned everything, seen everything they needed me to see, and that the next day, I’d be off with them to Govsec, just another gear in the City’s machine. Hell, no! How could I have ever settled for that life, with what I’d seen?
He saw himself through the mist as he’d been—just a boy, before the change, before the Sight. The small, slight, young man
he had been, wandering the darkened side-streets of the Forgotten City in the days before the Renovation, when the great holohouses still stood silent. In one of those sidestreets, he tasted the dream-drug’s force for the first time. He’d fallen in with a group of tubers—one of the Forgotten City’s bands of drug-addicted would-be visionaries—and traveled the Forgotten City with them.
They didn’t do much for me, but they did teach me to pay attention to the things I saw. In one of the visions, he saw Ace, saw what the Forgotten City would become by Ace’s hand. And when I saw him for the first time, in the flesh, I knew it was all true.
He remembered, too, how startled he was to realize the visions the others had were phantoms, lies. He hoped one day to find another to whom the drugs had given the Sight, but he never did. Not even one. Soon after he came to this realization, he set off on his own again.
I’d always been on my own. I just didn’t realize it until then. He laughed to himself, remembering. It was back then they first called me the Prophet. It was, at least in part, a jeer, but maybe it was more, too. You walk alone in the City—even here—and people sometimes treat you strange. In those days, he talked to few and trusted fewer.
Ace changed all that for me. He understood about the visions. He might have been a little scared of me, but he knew I was for real.
In the days of the Renovation, when the mammoth holohouses had been restored, Ace had this one set aside— one of the largest left standing in the Deserted Sector—for him. Somehow, Ace knew he wanted to be alone, set apart from the others in the Forgotten City.
That’s what I thought I wanted back then, anyway. I was already alone. Why not just keep things the way they were? He wasn’t entirely an outcast in the Forgotten City, but people treated him as an object. Sometimes an object of fear, sometimes of reverence. The Sight had made him different, and it was this difference—part joy, part obsession—that he couldn’t decide the nature of. Was it a blessing or a curse? Surely his addiction was a curse, but the Sight—at once so beautiful, so terrifying—which was it?
The Prophet closed his eyes, breathed a heaving sigh, and let the visions recede, the colors and visions leaving his head silent now, clear—and leaving him alone.
Empty and alone. Always alone. Always reading the signs for others, and left to find my own fate for myself. He’d known he didn’t belong in Their world, not in a world where people could be seen as traitors for wanting more than a life of blind obedience and duty. But he didn’t know if he belonged here, either, in this shining place where the only limitations on one’s destiny were the boundaries of imagination.
What do I have that’s mine? Something as colorful as the shadows that once played across this stage, something worth believing in? Am I just a vessel for the Sight, or is it part of me? And if I’m just its vessel, what is the vessel to do when it’s empty?
His eyes stung as the visions began to return, welling like tears and spilling into wet darkness in his mind. Eternity … He saw the young leader’s face—only a few years younger than the Prophet himself, though Eternity’s health made the gap in time between them seem much wider. Maybe he could see me for who I really am.
There weren’t many who were able to, but he had to admit, there wereafew. Ace had been kind tohim—had helped him find a place here—but Ace had been awed by his Sight. Brain was the Prophet’s first true friend. He saw beyond the frailty of the Prophet’s body and his strange appearance, and treated him as just another streetrider.
I know Eternity would, too. It might have been the Sight—the Prophet sometimes found it hard to tell whether his feelings were his own or traces of the visions, but he sensed that Eternity was like him, still searching for the secret that made him who he was. Eternity was young—like me, the Prophet struggled to remind himself—but there was the light of knowledge, even perhaps, of wisdom, in his eyes.
Maybe it’s time for me to find my own light, he thought. Perhaps now he could come out of his shadows, and the light that had always illumined the path of others but left him blind would help him see the way to shatter the darkness holding the City in its grip. Perhaps together he, Eternity, Angel, Brain, and—there was another name in his mind, a shadow not yet clear—perhaps, with hope, they might end it.
They will come, the voice of the vision spoke suddenly. Yes, he echoed back in thought. They’ll come, and I’ll help them. And this time, I’ll help myself, too. * * * *
“Eternity, this is Jude.”
Brain and Jude stood in the council room, facing the table where Eternity sat. “Have a seat, man,” Eternitysaid, smilingat Brain, who he’d thought seemed visibly tense from the time he and the new streetrider came into the room. “You too,” he told Jude, pulling out chairs for both of them.
He’s being so cool about this, Brain thought—although he hadn’t expected anything different, really. Except of myself. He asked me to find more people, and what do I find? Only one—and one who looks like he could be a spy for them, even if I’m pretty sure he’s not. Just one? Who knows, though? Maybe one’s enough, this time.
“I’m sorry, man,” Brain said. “He—Jude—he was all Icould find.” Brain’s normally assured manner was gone for the moment.
There was no trace of anger in Eternity’s reply. “It’s okay, man. You did what you could. People are running scared in the City these days, we both know that.”
“Right,” Brain replied.
“So, who are you?” Eternity asked Jude.
The tall, bald-headed, young man stood. He hadn’t taken off his long black coat when he and Brain entered the council room, although he was glad for the warmth of the Leaders’ Hall and a respite from the cold, night air outside. The coat hung open now, though, and Eternity could see the grey of a Citizen’s robe beneath.
Tough guy , thought Eternity, observing the look in Jude’s eyes and realizing for the first time that the newcomer was older than he was. Whatever. Age isn’t everything.
“Like he said, my name’s Jude.” Each word came in a staccato burst of breath, with the force of a bullet fired from a gun. “I’ve been in this place for two weeks now, and no one so much as spoke to me until Brain, here. But don’t worry, I won’t be going back to Them, even if I’m still not sure what I’m doing with you.”
“I’m sorry you had some hard times, man,” Eternity said, “but we’re at war. People are scared, and we can’t have a welcoming committee for every new streetrider that strikes out on his own.” His tone softened, and he put his hand out to Jude. “Don’t take it out on us, man—or me,” he added, as Jude finally clasped his hand, with the slightest of smiles. “Now,” Eternity said, “you got something to tell?” His shield’s back up, Eternity thought, seeing the tough-guy look back in Jude’s eyes.
“Yeah, I do,” Jude began. “I’m nineteen, alright? I used to work in the Towers, as a guard. And I mean on the inside, not out.”
Brain and Eternity exchanged glances. “Ithought it was a good job. Ithought I was doin’ something important.” Jude’s smile was a bitter one. “It was. Important to Them. I worried about the rebels. Thought that with them around, what I was doin’ meant twice as much. Couldn’t have the rebels finding out our City’s secrets, oh no. It was about a month ago, something happened. It was late, and I don’t remember exactly why, but I was by myself in the lobby of one of the Towers, and I happened to be scanning the banks of one of the computers. I wasn’t spying—not really. I was just bored. But I wasn’t supposed to be poking around in there, and they’d call it spying if they ever find out. Anyway, I came across some old vids—real old, from the quality of the image—but it showed—”
“Go on,” Eternity said. “There was a map of this place—a map of the Forgotten City. It must have been a map from before all the new stuff was built, so—what do you call it?—Oldtimer Town was all there was. That, and a great big X in red over the ground in one area.
“The Underground,” Eternity said, his voice calm. “What the hell’s wro
ng with you, man?” Brain burst out. “They know we’re here!”
Eternity ignored Brain—or seemed to. “Go on, Jude.” “There was a voice. It sounded like the voices that come from the Towers when They speak. It sounded like one of them. The voicetalked about achamber that theydidn’t want discovered. An underground chamber.”
Eternity nodded. “This wasn’t a screencast vid, was it?” He already knew the answer before Jude confirmed it. “No. Private access. Not meant for the public. It was meant for their eyes only, and just a few of the workers in the Towers.”
“Thought so. Was there anything else?” “That was the end of the vid. Just phased out to white noise after that. I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to take the elevator up to the top floor and confront them directly— that’s where everyonesaid theywere. Icould have gone, too. But the thought of Them stopped me. They knew—knew about the rebellion, about the danger to the City, and they’d done nothing. Why? I didn’t know what to say to myself— didn’t know the answer—but it didn’t matter. Icouldn’t stay. They’dfind out what Isaw, and then they’d kill me. So Ileft, but before I did, I studied the map on the screen so I’d be able to find this place. It was an old map, but it was good enough. I had to tell you—had to warn you. I wanted to join you, and now you know.”
A stillness spread through the room as the impact of Jude’s words reached everyone. Brain and Jude looked to Eternity, and waited to see what he’d say.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
“I’m not that surprised,” Eternity said. “I’ve been waiting to hear that for a long time. We’ve really all been kidding ourselves to think they didn’t know where we were.”
“What the hell are we supposed to do now, man?” Brain asked. “They could come for us any time.”
“Exactly,” Eternity said, “and they could have already. So why haven’t they? That’s what we’ve got to think about.” “This is gonna scare the shit out of people,” Brain said. “It’d scare people in the City even more,” Eternity said. “Because I bet they don’t know about it, either. And we’re going to use that. Brain, get everyone together at the Prophet’s place. Put the word on the street that we’ve gotta organize. Jude, you go with him, and thanks a lot, man. You’ve helped us out a lot. You really have.” Eternity put out his hand to the older boy, and as Jude clasped it, a slight smile crossed his face.