“But what if GameCorps gives me a different name?”
She’s already assuming she’s going to make Three. Crisp, I like this kid. Aloud, he said, “If that happens, then you’ll switch to the new one.” Johnny was pretty sure she wouldn’t need to switch.
He rolled over to the wall. Switched off the safeties. “You don’t have to hit it at full gas the first time, but don’t go soft. Try three-quarter speed. Think of your colours. Think of the name Onna.”
Another hesitation. Then her stripes went stock-still and a look of determination hardened across her face. She took a deep breath. Geared up.
WHAM!
Her body compressed, started to shake . . . then snapped back into place. She hissed through her teeth.
“That was great,” Johnny said. “Now do it again. Harder.”
“Uh, excuse me?”
A silver skid with green stripes tread forward. He pointed at Onna. “Do you . . . could you teach me how to do that?”
Silver, Johnny thought, suppressing a smile. Watching Onna with his trail eye, he looked over the crowd that was growing by the minute. Snakes, they’re young. Bian had been right, he realized—her and Betty both. They were all so young.
Maybe they didn’t have to stay that way.
Every skid, even if they got their name, still died after five years. That was another number that mattered—the hardest number. But one skid had lived longer than that, more than ten times that long. And if she could do it . . .
Somewhere, Johnny’s friends were looking for that skid; a skid with a single bright pink stripe. He couldn’t help them . . . but there were other skids in the universe.
Through the gap in the roof, the cheering from the Slope rose. Soon, they’d gather at the starting gates, preparing to line up. Not long now. Not long at all.
The silver skid glanced up, towards the sound. “We could do it later, if you want.” He flushed, as if he suddenly realized what he was asking, who he was asking it from. “I mean, we don’t have to, I just—”
“No,” Johnny said. “It’s okay. We can do it now.”
Behind him, a white skid with two red stripes stopped what she was doing. “Don’t you have a game to get to?” she asked.
Johnny listened to the noise coming through the ceiling. It was loud, though not so loud as the skids around him, coming and going, desperate to learn. Living fast . . .
“Nah,” he said, smiling at the skid. Her name was Onna, even if she didn’t know it yet.
“I’m good here.”
Continue Reading for a Preview of The Thread War The Next Chapter in the Johnny Drop Saga
SLAM!
“Again.”
SLAM!
“Again.”
SLAM!
“Again,” Johnny Drop said, watching the pile of panzers and squids moan their way back onto their treads. The Level Ones and Twos rolled back to the starting line. The safeties were still set on the crash pads, but at least the group was hitting them with some authority now. The beige-yellow Level One on the end had a lot of potential. She’d get her second stripe soon.
Letting an eye drift, Johnny took in the entire Combine. Slide-rock filled the massive centre bowl, pounding off the walls. Everywhere, One and Two level skids practiced the skills they needed in the game, desperate to learn how to control their molecules and survive being evaporated. Skids on spin mats spun, skids on treadmills tread, skids on weave-drills weaved.
Next to the crash pads, skids bounced back and forth between bang bars, learning to take a hit. Nothing like what they’d face on Tilt or the Spinners, Johnny thought with a grin, but it was a start. On the pressure pads, huge blocks not-so-gently squeezed skids between them, getting the panzers ready for the more deadly versions in Tunnel. Skids were violently rotated on gyroscopes or thrown about in wave pools. Some worked in the empty spaces just absorbing and popping their Hasty arms, one of the skills that took a skid from level One to Two.
Dozens of skids worked the row of crash pads, many of them glancing nervously at the group working with Johnny. Despite his willingness to help and their desperation to get better, the majority of the Ones and Two still wouldn’t seek his help.
He didn’t blame them: it was weird.
“Again,” he barked, keeping one eye on his trainees even as he let the other two wander. It wasn’t because he wasn’t focused; it was a subtle reminder to any skid watching that they needed to split their vision and focus on multiple things at once. He grinned—the panzer trying the gyroscopes for the first time was still looking at everything with all three of her eyes. She’d be puking sugar in five minutes tops.
He’d been in the Combine every day since they’d returned from the Thread to find a world reset to the moment they’d left. Reset except for no Albert, Torg, Bian, or the others who’d fallen from the Pipe with them that day two months ago. Reset with Johnny a Level Ten and Shabaz a Nine.
But even those numbers might not be right. For the first few weeks, Johnny had at least tried to play the games, only coming to the Combine in his down time. But it had become clear very quickly that Johnny and Shabaz were far beyond anything the Skidsphere had experienced in Johnny’s lifetime. He remembered the day they’d destroyed Tag Box: Johnny and Shabaz in the centre of the carnage, every other skid vaped, with half the time left on the timer. They’d looked at each other and left the game. Johnny hadn’t been back since.
Shabaz had, but not in the same way.
Tag Box had also made Johnny realize he’d moved beyond the games in other ways, too: he couldn’t vape skids any more. He didn’t even like doing it with skids over Level Three who he knew would come back. But the first time he vaped a Two after he’d returned . . . he’d gone out to the woods for a day and broken down, crying the entire time.
Since that day, Johnny had been in the Combine continuously, helping any skid who asked. And the amazing thing was . . . he wasn’t the only one.
“Crisp Betty, Akash,” a snarl came from nearby, “stop tickling it and hit the damn thing.”
Suppressing a smile, Johnny let one eye drift towards the far side of the crash pads, where a solitary white skid with four red stripes was helping a solitary mint-green skid with two lemon stripes. Although, the word, “helping” might be highly dependant on your point-of-view.
“I am hitting it, Onna,” the squid protested, visibly exhausted. “Gimme some credit, the safeties are off.”
The senior skid rolled over and bumped the squid’s treads, harder than Johnny would have. “They’ve been off for two hours. And you’ve hit it with the same gas the last six attempts. I said: hit it full.”
“If I do, I could die.”
Onna swung a second eye. Somehow, she made it loom over the other skid; Johnny was going to have to learn how she did that. “Or . . . you might never die again.” She grinned. “At least ’til you’re five.”
The squid they’d started calling Akash let his eyes retract. “Easy for you to say,” he grumbled. “You’ve got your name. Mine’s just pretend.”
Onna’s eyes narrowed. Then she sniffed and swung her whole body, rolling away. “Keep hitting the pad that soft and it’ll stay pretend.” She didn’t even bother trailing an eye.
Ouch, Johnny thought, suppressing another smile as a horrified expression spread across the squid’s face. It was obvious he had a crush on Onna. It was equally obvious that the squid called Akash was on the verge of Level Three and had potential to do a lot more, otherwise Onna wouldn’t have bothered to give him so much time one-on-one.
Well, maybe that last part’s not so obvious, Johnny thought, watching the squid’s face. For a second, Johnny thought Onna had gone too far—the poor kid looked crushed.
Then another expression settled into the Two’s stripes. He rolled back to the start, slowly but with purpose. Sat there a minute, staring at
the pad. Flicked an eye in Onna’s direction.
Then he geared up and tread.
SLAM!!!!
Everyone on the pads turned and looked as the impact echoed through the combine. The mint body compressed and the two stripes appeared to shatter. For a second, Johnny thought it was done; the squid really had hit too hard.
Then the stripes reformed and the mint body returned to something resembling round. Almost round. The poor kid looked like he might throw up.
“Crisp Betty,” one of the panzers working with Johnny breathed.
“About vaping time,” Onna’s voice cut through the chatter of the Combine. Johnny was going to have to figure out how she did that too. When a shaky eye swung in her direction, she added, “Nice work, squid.” What might have been a smile.
Slowly, the mint green body settled into its three lemon stripes. “I’m not a squid. I’m Akash.” He grinned.
Onna sniffed and rolled away. “We’ll see, squid.” This time, there was definitely a smile.
Of the many amazing things that had happened since their return, Onna was possibly the most amazing of all. She was the first skid Johnny had ever helped—he smiled at the memory of her freaking out the day she’d realized who was talking to her in the Combine. He’d been thrilled when she’d made Three, relieved that she would at least survive until her fifth birthday. He’d expected her to do well.
What he had not expected was for her to return to the Combine one week after she’d left.
He’d been helping a group on the pressure blocks when she’d rolled down the ramp, obviously nervous. He watched her sit at the bottom of the ramp, staring at the Combine like it was a foreign country. Then her stripes had flared once and she’d rolled over to the grease pads and started barking orders.
She was a lot more tough love and manipulation than Johnny was, which wasn’t a bad thing—they actually complemented each other. She sometimes got results when Johnny didn’t. And she was only a Level Four, moving up rapidly from Three. She remembered even more than he did what it was like to be a squid.
And she wasn’t the only one. Nigel, the first skid who’d ever asked Johnny for assistance had shown up a week ago, his eyes bowed as he asked Johnny where he was needed. Right now, he was across the centre court, trying to teach the panzers at the tracking station to split their eyes and follow multiple targets.
There were only three of them so far, but they were getting results. Since Johnny had begun training skids in the Combine, more and more Ones had made it to Two, and more and more Twos had made it to Three. A record number of Threes and Fours played the games now; Johnny and Shabaz had begun tracking the data and there were already seven hundred skids over Three. Given that historically there had rarely been more than five hundred, it was an amazing increase.
Shabaz told him they were doing better in the games too, a large percentage of the recent Combine grads jumping from Three to Four in less than two months.
Of course, not everything was sugar. In one of the hollas, he caught a squid he recognized getting shredded on a spike pit in Tunnel. A pain shot through his stripe and he swallowed the grief.
This was the worst aspect of helping at the Combine: he cared. Everyday, he helped dozens if not hundreds of panzers and squids, and every day most of them didn’t make it back to the Combine. He hated watching the highlights now, not because he was no longer in them, but because he’d see some One or Two he recognized getting vaped.
Constantly.
Most of the time it was only a vague feeling of recognition—like he’d passed them on the ramp—but even that was horrible. It was like every squid and panzer in the Combine had become as important as Shabaz.
At least that one made it, Johnny thought, watching the newest Three make his way out of the Combine. Akash was Shabaz’s to work on now. That had been her solution to their situation: she worked on the skids in the games. It was a good system, she took over where Johnny left off—spotting the skids who might have real potential to advance and working on them in the games, the sugar bars, and more. Johnny had a feeling she was the reason why Onna and Trist had returned to the Combine.
And maybe there’s more help on the way, Johnny thought, as Akash passed a group of skids huddled at the bottom of the ramp, staring into the combine. Most of them were Fives and Sixes from the look of things, although the yellow-black skid in front was a Seven.
Or maybe not help, Johnny thought, catching the expression on the Seven’s face. He did not look happy. Trist—the skid’s name was Trist.
The skid briefly made eye-contact with Johnny. Yeah, definitely not pleased. He muttered something to the teal-plum Six beside him, who bobbed an angry eye in agreement. Then the whole group turned and rolled back up the ramp.
Wonder what that’s about.
Johnny didn’t have time to follow the thought, as the ground beneath his treads began to rumble.
About the Author
Ian Donald Keeling is an odd, loud little man who acts a little, writes a little, and occasionally grows a beard. His short fiction and poetry have previously appeared in Realms of Fantasy, On Spec, and Grain. He’s on the faculty for sketch and improv at Second City in Toronto and likes all forms of tag and cheese. The Skids is his first novel.
Acknowledgements
Welcome to the acknowledgements section! Please don’t stop reading now, you made it this far. The Skids is my first novel, so bear with me because I have many people to thank for helping this weird little dream come true.
In 1982, I read a little book called This Can’t Be Happening At MacDonald Hall, written by a young Canadian writer named Gordon Korman. I was eleven at the time and when I read that Korman was twelve when he wrote his novel, I thought: I can do this! And off I went.
Now I’m forty-five years old and here I am. It’s a cliché, but it really has been a long, strange trip.
So many people kept me going over the years. Simon Donner has been one of my closest friends and supporters since high school. David and Reagan White did the same, including a wild night in Philadelphia when I first got my agent (More on her later). Mary Haynes gave me work and libations, two essential supplements to any writing career. Al Smith and Cary West have been both my business partners and close friends.
I have to thank all the organizations that have supported me over the years, if for no other reason than they allowed me to eat, another one of those essential supplements. I have the privilege of working at The Second City in Toronto, and I’m grateful to everyone there, in particular Kevin Frank, Erin Conway and all the people in the administrative offices that put up with the weird little man prowling their classrooms and theatres. Mysteriously Yours, Theatresports Toronto, and The Bad Dog Theatre have all employed me at various times and have been wonderful places to work.
For a long while, I wandered in the woods when it came to my writing peers, but in 2009 I attended the Ad Astra conference in T.O. for the first time and found my kin. Adrienne Kress and Lesley Livingstone were kind enough to the weird little man following them around—sense a pattern?—and have been kind ever since. Derek Molata and I traded sad stories and beer, a fine combination. Later that year, Suzanne Church and Doug Smith personally took me around Anticipation World Con in Montreal and introduced me to about half the science fiction and fantasy community, for which I am grateful to this day.
It was also at Anticipation that I met Leah Bobet, who has published my short stories, introduced me to my writer’s group, and been a great friend. She was also one of the two major beta readers for The Skids, and the novel is so much better for her input.
The other reader is Chris Szego, who in addition to managing Bakka Books and offering sound and profound notes on The Skids, also deals with the weird little man who keeps barging into her store and demanding coffee. I cannot begin to overstate her importance to the genre community in Toronto, nor how important he
r support has been to me. Thanks to all the staff at Bakka for their support and patience.
I mentioned writer’s groups and I’m fortunate enough to be associated with two. The TorKidLit group that meets once a month at the Bedford Arms has been a great solace to me. And The Stop Watch Gang, my critical writers group, which includes the aforementioned Suzanne Church, but also Richard Baldwin, Brad Carson, Karen Danylak, Costi Gurgu, Stephen Kotowych, Tony Pi, Mike Rimar, Pippa Wysong. All are exceptional writers and all have exceptional patience for dealing with . . . well, you know.
Special thanks must go out to my agent, Miriam Kriss of the Irene Goodman Agency. She was one of the first professionals to show faith in my work and has worked tirelessly for me ever since our hooking up in 2009. Plus, she introduced me to sour beers, which is grand.
Thanks go out to the members of the ChiZine family—and though it is a press, it is a family too. To Sandra and Brett and the incredible effort they bring to the Canadian genre community. To Sam for helping get the final draft in shape. To Erik for a simply outstanding cover—I saw it and thought: oh, that’s what they look like. And to all the ChiZine authors, in particular Michael Rowe, who bought me my first beer as a professional author, which is the best damn beer I ever tasted.
And finally to my family: my mother and my father, my brother David and sister-in-law Kat. I’ve been a weird little man for a long time and they’ve put up with me for the longest. Thank you for everything.
And finally-finally . . . if you’re reading this, thank you. So much. This is my first published novel, and it doesn’t exist without you. I hope you liked it. I hope I write you a better one in the future. Thank you all.
The Skids Page 24