Nylon Angel (23 page)

One canrat - according to my olfaugs - had grown quickly to a dozen. I could smell their hunger.

They could smell their food. Me.

I shouted above the noise, determined to be heard, ‘The Big One.
I killed the Big One
.’

The snarling grew like an earthquake.

Then it came to me in a flash.

‘Oya. I am Oya!’

Silence. In one eerie accord.

To my astonishment I sensed their presence withdraw. Within five minutes my olfaugs told me they’d gone completely.

I wound myself in knots over their reaction. It gave me something to think about as my back stiffened and my thirst and hunger pangs reached a critical level.

I took frequent rests. The pipe seemed grainy - or was I near to fainting?

I wanted to go back to Gwynn, but I figured I’d been crawling for six or eight hours. Way too long to return. Outside it would be night again.

Endless smaller pipes speared off the main. I began to fear wandering lost until I died.

Then, like before, in the water pipes under M’Grey Island, something attracted my attention above me. I noticed the tiniest difference. Not an opening as such, merely less fungus and filth. I concentrated on it.

I rubbed my hand over the area, protecting my eyes from falling debris with the other hand. My fingers traced three sides of a roughly chiselled square. Like someone had started fashioning a way in and stopped.

Or was it a way out?

I pushed that thought from my mind and with a surge of energy, scrabbled and scraped and pushed.

It remained stuck fast.

I thought about going further on. If others used these passages there had to be an easier way out. But Gwynn hadn’t mentioned where and I, stupidly, hadn’t asked.

Sometimes when you’re tired, you just get damn pigheaded. I wanted to get out
now
.

I am
not
going to die down here!
I told myself.

Slipping a knife from my case, I gouged and chipped along the unformed side of the square. Then I pushed and shoved until my arms turned leaden and refused to raise above my head.

Had it loosened? A fraction, maybe? A slight shift?

Spurred on, I slid down on to my back and pushed my legs upward, planting my feet inside the outline of the square.

I kicked, using my stronger leg muscles, and rocked repeatedly upwards. My neck felt like snapping and my back stung with the imprint of sharp rocks, but I refused to give in.

Without a warning, the square gave way. My feet disappeared and then rebounded, throwing me on to my side.

My neck hadn’t broken - I could still feel my toes.

Things were improving!

Shakily I got to my feet and thrust my head up through the hole into a low, lengthy, foul-smelling space with a set of rough steps at one end. A bug-filled, grimesplattered fluoro gave out wan light. I levered through, hands and knees scraping on a carpet of filth, and crawled past rows of boxes to the steps. Gagging, I tried not to think about what was in them that could smell so bad. It clung to me like hideous cologne.

At the stop of the steps was a hatchway. Hope flared again.
Maybe an empty villa?

The hatch moved on the third shove. A halo of bright lights and animal noises sent shooting pains through my head.

Inhaling the fresher air and blinking crazily, I waved my hand like a white flag. Right now I had no more fight. Wherever I was, I knew I’d have to talk my way out of it.

‘Want no trouble,’ I croaked into the light.

No reply.

I squeezed through the hatchway until my head hit something. It forced me to contort sideways and slide the rest of my body horizontal, keeping my head low. I lay there panting, trying to make sense of the surrounding shape. My eyes took moments to adjust. My brain took longer.

I was in a cage.

In a smallish room.

The noises came from a group of punters caught up in some hardcore torture in the next room. I could see them through the open door.

I’d crashed a pain party.

I’m no killjoy on this type of thing - each to his own. But I had my own brand of torment going. I didn’t need barbed wire, meat hooks and electric prodders.

I tried to find a gate to the cage but there wasn’t one - only a long chain and a heavy winch mechanism to lift it up. The lever was on the other side of the room.

‘Let me out,’ I rasped, rattling the cage.

No one heard.

I rested for a few seconds, summoning my remaining energy. ‘
Fire
,’ I roared.

Half a dozen bodies - those who weren’t strapped or tied - spilled through the open door toward me. Some glazed-eyed, some drooling, some crying.

One I knew.

Stellar, the bodyshop bitch. Alive still. Barely.

That made two of us.

I recognised her fingernails and her pasty complexion. The rest of her was bondage-clad bones.

Unfortunately, her dead eyes ignited with cunning at the sight of me. She took in the open hatch and my filthy state.

‘Bitch,’ she mouthed in welcome.

I scanned the crowd wildly for Jamon, but couldn’t see him. Major mercy!

‘
Who is she?
’ The whisper spread amongst the audience.

Stellar saw an opportunity and grabbed it. She wobbled forward on absurd, crippling heels. ‘She is . . . Jamon’s gift. He hid her in the crypt.’ Her arm swept toward me with a grand, trembling gesture. ‘A sacrifice to seal our pact.’

Crypt! Eeuch!
My empty stomach twisted.

‘This should have been discussed,’ frowned a freakishly tall man with bowed shoulders, large hands and a harsh face. ‘He knows my rules, Stellar.’

‘He wanted to surprise you, Master Jayse.’ She knelt down in front of him, head bowed in a submissive gesture.

‘But she’s dirty,’ complained a blonde woman, looking me over. Barbed-wire restraints tracked lines of blood across her body.

I tried to hold on to my calm, but it deserted at the word ‘sacrifice’.

‘Stellar!’ My voice edged to the hysterical. ‘Over here!’

She stared at me. Curiosity entered her dull eyes. ‘May I be excused for a few minutes, Master Jayse? Please?’

Big Hands cupped his huge ornamental codpiece like it was a trophy. ‘I suppose so. Sort out how you’re going to present her, Stellar. Personally, I prefer her dirty.’

He turned back to his business. In seconds the next room was sick with moans.

Stellar crawled over to me. It looked prettily submissive, but she obviously had trouble standing. When she got within reach I grabbed her arm, pulling her close to the cage.

‘Get me out of here,’ I whispered fiercely.

‘Why should I?’ I saw the familiar pout, but it lacked life. The same way her breath came in chopped-off gasps. ‘Jamon will be here soon. He’s been looking for you.’

‘You’re ill, Stellar.’ I tried for sympathy and fell short.

She trembled. Sweat appeared on her upper lip. She licked it nervously. ‘
La morte vite
. Who told you?’

I shook my head. ‘Jamon fed us mercury-poisoned fish that last night I saw you.’

‘But you . . .’

‘I didn’t eat mine. Lang warned me.’

Her face crumpled. Something between anger, distress and disbelief.

‘You’d already eaten it,’ I explained. ‘I’d have stopped you if I could. Believe me.’

I meant the last. Much as I despised Stellar, she was a Jamon Mondo casualty.

‘Why would he do that to me?’

I shrugged. ‘Because it pleases him. Suffering pleases him.’

She might have doubted any other answer - but that she understood.

We sat, leaning against the wire of the cage, cheek to cheek, while she digested what I had told her. Her breath was sour.

‘He’s changed,’ she said. ‘He’s making deals with jerks like . . .’ She gestured towards Master Jayse. ‘And training night after night on fight sims.’

Fight sims were basic battle strategy. ‘What are the deals about?’

Her eyes were out of focus. I could see her struggling to think. ‘He says the Gentes want his turf. So he’s going to get them first.’

‘Gentes?’ I asked the question, but I feared I already knew the answer.

‘Locals families. Long-termers.’ She turned away and vomited bile.

It had me gagging again. I wanted to close the hatch behind me to stem the other smell, but at the moment it was my only way out.

‘You’re dying because of him, Stellar. I can see he pays for it.’

A tremor ran through her.

She crawled across to the lever. Tears spilt on to her hands as she worked the handle.

It shook me.

The cage raised on a well-oiled chain, high enough for me to roll underneath.

She lowered it down again and crawled back.

‘You’d better hurry,’ she whispered. The tears left dirty stains on her cheeks but her eyes seemed clearer. Sadder. ‘Before Jamon comes. I’ll tell them you beat me when I tried to wash you. Take the other door. It leads to the main corridor.’

‘Will they let me out?’

‘Out is easy for you.’ She smiled weakly.

I wanted to say thanks, and that I was sorry. I could have helped her walk away from him instead of hating her. I could’ve . . .

But Stellar didn’t want thanks. She struggled to her feet and tottered back to join the party.

B
ig Hands’ pain parlour turned out to be midway between Teece’s bike biz and Shadoville.

I backtracked to Teece’s on the last dregs of my endurance, well disguised under layers of filth.

I found him staring miserably at the empty space in his bike shed.

‘Sorry about the bike, Teece,’ I said, huskily.

‘Parrish,’ he yelped, turning. ‘What in the Wombat are you doing here - smelling like that?’

‘Need water.’ My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth and my legs buckled.

He crossed the floor in three strides and scooped me over his shoulders.

‘Into the tub,’ he ordered. ‘You stink worse than a canrat carcass.’

He carried me to his bathroom, a small, plain, two-by-four with one undeniable luxury - a bath - and stripped my clothes, piling the case on the top of the filthy coat and suit Ibis and Daac had given me.

Then he dumped me in the tub, not even waiting for it to fill or test for scalding.

He disappeared and returned a couple of minutes later with a jug of water. He set it down on the floor within my reach.

‘Drink slowly. Don’t drown,’ he muttered darkly and left me to it.

Revived a little, I soaped. As quickly as the bath filled, I emptied it and started again, not relaxing till the water lost most of its grimy tinge. Finally I sank down into its salubrious warmth.

I stayed in it for hours - hoping it would soak away my thoughts of Stellar, the pain parlour, Gwynn and Loyl-me-Daac.

It didn’t. So I climbed out, took the disks from my tank and dropped them in my boot. Then I rinsed the bath clean and staggered into the bedroom.

Teece was waiting for me, bare-chested on his bed, feet up, in a faded aqua silk robe the same colour as his eyes. He held a semi-auto loosely in his lap.

‘For me?’

‘You’re hot property at the moment. I got eyes out along the border. Everyone wants a piece of you.’

I sighed. I had nothing on but a towel and I was too tired to care. I just curled up on the end of his bed like an oversized and bedraggled alley cat.

‘C’n I borrow a piece o’ this?’ I slurred.

He nodded.

‘Teece?’ I yawned.

‘What?’ He leaned forward keenly.

‘When I wake up, could I have something to eat?’

‘Now hang on a little minute, Parrish. You’re not going to sleep until we talk . . .’

I didn’t hear any more.

 

I woke sometime later, stiffer than a corpse. The room was dark but not the pitch of night, more the grainy grey of early morning. Teece snored gently at the other end of the bed, the semi still tucked under his arm.

I lay wondering whether to slip away before he could grill me. Hungry as I was, it seemed like a better option than having to explain myself and atone for the loss of his bike and helmet.

Quietly, and as fluidly as I could manage under the circumstances, I slid off the bed.

Got as far as the door.

‘Going somewhere?’

I stretched, turned and grinned at him in the half-light. ‘Didn’t want to wake you, Teece. But I could eat an army and their boots.’

He pointed to the side table and a tray laden with cold food. Cheese, pro-subs and bread.

Guilt tweaked my conscience. Teece treated me well. And what had he ever got in return? Trashed bikes!

I sat back down on the side of the bed and hoed into the food. ‘Thanks,’ between mouthfuls, ‘I really mean it, Teece. Thanks a lot.’

He lay, propped against his pillows watching me eat, curiosity on his face. As the pile on the tray dwindled, he asked softly, ‘So what’s going on, lovely?’

I steadily chewed every last crumb, playing for time. How much could I trust him? I wondered. He’d talked about love once. Did ‘love’ last more than a few weeks or months for anyone? I didn’t think so. Not in this town.

But I guess I owed him something. ‘Someone’s trying to put me away. For life.’

He laughed. ‘Tell me something I don’t know. Your face is all over the nets.’ His brow creased. ‘But what happened? When you left here you told me you had a chance to make things better.’

I shook my head. ‘Things changed.’ My voice trembled, just a little bit.

To make matters worse Teece touched me, lightly on the arm, a comforting pat. The simple gesture was too much. I suddenly found myself spilling the whole story.