Saga (11 page)

“I’ll go hit the dance floor.” Nath tore open a jeebie packet, scoffed one, and then looked at us with a grin. “I bet it’s storming up there already.”

“All right, and if we want to hook up, let’s look for each other in the southeast corner of the third.” Athena pointed to the spot on the map so there was no confusion about which corner of the building she meant.

“Class. Have a good time, girls.” Milan saluted and strolled off, happily eyeing up the punk chicks that he passed.

A wide room had been converted into a pretty neat boarder area. Someone had cleverly arranged old benches and tables along the back wall in an ascending series of stacks. So the bolder riders were racing along those, touching the roof at the point where an had been sprayed, and then boarding down via the miscellaneous piles of bricks that had been thoughtfully arranged on the floor of the former ward. The room designer had also gone to the trouble of fixing a long metal pole about one meter off the ground, for a tricky grind.

We watched for a while as the other boarders did their thing. Some of them weren’t bad, but no one could get to the end of the pole; it was badly placed to get a decent run at it. Or was it? Maybe it was meant to be hit only coming off the high drop.

“I’m going for that full grind. See it?” I turned to Athena.

“I think so, but it’s tough.” Then she raised her voice. “Coming through, ladies and gentlemen, the one and only, Ghost!”

She liked to embarrass me.

The boarders twisted and flicked their airboards out of my way to let me have a shot at the grind. I climbed fast and hard, wishing I had the board that Arnie had fixed up for me. Even so, I came off at the roof fast enough, tagging the
sign with my fingers as I did so. Then I did what several of the other boarders had done, which was to use the narrow stub of a former rail fixing to get a further uphit and stay as high as I could. At this point, even the most daring of the others had cut back, trying to catch the start of the pole grind by making an S shape. But the loss of momentum with those two cuts was an insurmountable problem. I had a different idea and tipped myself over, flipping the board right over my head.

Looping the loop outdoors is a good trick. Indoors it is completely insane, because there’s a moment when you get an unwanted push toward the ground from the roof. That kick while you are upside down will shove you off your board and give you a pretty nasty landing, with a good chance of breaking your arms, since you will be holding them out in front of you as you fall. Pretty nimble footwork is called for to work the on/off pad, especially considering you are upside down. I didn’t know any other boarder who risked it. But for me it wasn’t that dangerous. When I was on form, I felt as if the world was stopping and starting, giving me time to figure out my moves.

Athena’s mouth was open, with amazement or concern; it’s hard to say when you are crouched with your knees above your head. Stop. The board’s polarity was off, no kick from the roof, just the momentum of my cartwheel. Start. On again, in time to catch me and set the grind in motion. Easy, really.

At the far end of the pole, I just coasted to a stop and kicked up my board, rather shy now that the action was over. Everyone in the rest of the room was cheering and flashing fingers at me, which was a sign of approval that sort of meant awarding ten out of ten.

“Thanks,” I said, not that anyone could have heard me over the cheers and cries. Then I ducked my head and carried the board back to Athena.

“Nicely done.” She held out her knuckles, and I lightly slapped them with mine.

“Class moves, Ghost, as always.” It was Carter, a big grin on his face.

“Carter!” shrieked Athena, and then looked down, embarrassed. “I thought you’d be in jail or someplace terrible.”

“Nah, I said I was sorry, like, to the Dark Queen herself, and she said: that’s cool dude, don’t do it again and stuff.” He swaggered, delighted with himself.

“The Dark Queen? Incredible. What’s she like?” I was amazed but also worried. Slowly and carefully I scanned the room. I felt as though I had suddenly become the prey of an unseen hunter. Much as I was delighted to see that Carter had avoided serious grief, it troubled me that he had been brought to see the Dark Queen herself and was now walking around without a care.

“She’s all right. A bit old for my taste. Kinda white and powdery with a big velvet dress.”

“And she just let you walk?” Athena was surprised.

I watched his eyes carefully. Had he done some kind of deal?

“Yeah. It was that pirate girl they were asking about. Didn’t care much about the mall. Actually they never even asked me about it at all.”

He was telling the truth, but I still felt nervous. Somewhere an alarm was flashing, demanding my attention. This building had hundreds, maybe thousands, of party people. One of them was a shark. With his cold, dead eyes, he was swimming through the building, searching for me. Don’t ask me how I knew; it was part of the gift that made me a master thief.

The stairwells were
wide, but even so, you had to pick your way through the people sitting on them, talking, drinking, nodding their heads to one of the rhythms that came from deeper inside the building. Carter was gabbling nonstop to Athena. She wanted to know everything about the Dark Queen. I wanted to listen as well but was distracted by the noise and having to look at every face for my enemy.

“What do you mean you’re living underground?”

Milan was lounging on the stairwell with his arm draped around a young girl in a red tartan skirt, her face white with powder, something that made her purple cat’s-eye contacts even more striking. She was genuinely curious. It made me smile; Milan obviously had a new chat-up line.

“Well, you know. Left home, hang out in a squat. Rob factories of gear for credits. That kind of thing.”

“Milan!” Carter saw his old buddy.

“Carter!” Milan jumped up and they did their knuckle thing. “Blood and thunder, mate—you out already?”

“Yeah. I was talking to the Dark Queen, and I think she fancied me.”

The tartan-skirted girl heard this and, with a shake of her head, got up. “There is so much bullshit in you punk guys. Really, why bother? I bet you live at home in your orange house, with your orange parents, doing your homework every night so your parents will let you come here and drink water out of a beer can.”

She stormed off. Athena winked at me.

“Really, mate, the Dark Queen?” Milan pretended to be oblivious to the girl’s departure.

“Yeah, no lie. They were after that pirate woman. I reckon the rest of us are in the clear.”

“Sweet. But still, living underground, man, it’s the life. You should join us. We’re entering an anarcho-punk airtank in Saturday’s race.”

“Whoa! Count me in.” They did another knuckle slap, delighted in each other.

“Come on, let’s find Jay and split. This place is creeping me out.” The others looked at me, surprised; they were enjoying themselves.

“He’s not on for an hour. Maybe we should pick up Nath?” Athena was looking at the information on the handout.

The dance room was impressive. It was a huge hall whose walls and roof had been painted to make you feel like you were floating in space. Stars, galaxies, and cascades of shooting meteorites drifted around the walls and across the roof, moving animations that enfolded the whole crowd in a celestial embrace.

“Trippy.” Carter gestured at the scene appreciatively.

A band was just coming onstage to whistles and cheers. The lead guitarist acknowledged us with a wave. She struck a chord on her guitar and sustained it, letting the beats and resonance wash over us.

“Feel that beautiful feedback,” she whispered into the mike.

A bass beat so heavy the entire building shook.

The room suddenly darkened. Only the floating constellations on the walls and roof gave out any light; all the windows were covered over, of course, so the mood was not undermined by the streetlamps. Here and there in the crowd, luminous designs on clothing gave a hint of aquamarine coloration to faces and bare arms. More than ever, I felt I was deep, deep, under the sea, with hidden eyes searching for me, looking out of an intensely dark cave. I drifted through the crowd, glancing at the dancers: alizarin-crimson glitter on the cheeks of a boy, chocolate lipstick on a girl, many eyes jittering with heeby-jeebie rush, mouths parted in expectation, shirts damp with sweat from the intensity of the earlier dancing. No shark. No Nathan.

Heads nod. Bubbles descend from the roof, their oily rainbow colors drawing sighs of pleasure and smiles from all around. A boy’s shirt is writhing with manganese-blue coils; it makes me think of underwater fronds, and I find the association disturbing. He sees me watching and smiles, proud, thinking I am admiring him.

Heads nod. The stars glitter in their earrings and in the moist corners of their eyes.

The bass is irresistible now. Everyone is swaying.

“Don’t fight it.” The singer can read our thoughts. Nor do we fight it, but accelerate the swaying of our bodies in time to the beat. The room is densely crowded, yet I can move freely. Everyone is rocking from side to side in his or her own space. I relish the moment and forget that I am hunted. Here we are. Free. Enjoying ourselves in the hidden spaces of the City. A derelict hospital revived for the night to play host to the disaffected, to those for whom the card system offers nothing but a life of boring work and poor reward. I feel a surge of warmth for my fellow dancers. Then I see her again—the pirate, Cindella—and she is dancing beside Nathan.

“Love the outfit. I mean, I really love it.” A boy had come up to her.

“Thanks,” Cindella replied politely.

“Wanna kiss?”

“No, thanks. Actually I’m a boy.”

“No way? No way! You’re kidding, right?”

“It’s a long story.”

“Hey, Cindella.”

“Ghost!” She smiled. “This is a great party. Worth playing the game just for this.”

Nathan gave me a wave, not breaking his rhythm.

“I think we need to talk.”

“Yes. Certainly.”

Nathan came with us, still gently rocking his head to the music as we made our way to the door. For some reason, the sense of threat had receded.

 

A section of the hospital had been turned into a café for the night. It was the third-floor southeast corner that Athena had designated as our meeting point. We sat at a table near a window, which I pulled up until it was as open as it could possibly be. In an emergency, if I boarded through the space, a slide down the outside wall might slow me enough to manage the drop. Maybe. Carter and Milan had stayed to see more of the band; Athena was on my left, Nathan on my right, and all three of us were listening with amazement to what the pirate was saying.

“A dragon?” Athena repeated. “You killed a dragon?”

“Yes, Inry’aat, the red dragon. It took us nearly eight hours.”

“That’s fantastic; well done.” Nathan patted her arm happily. “What else have you conquered?”

“Well, with my friends, let’s see.” She leaned back in her chair, and I caught Athena’s eye. She rolled her eyes in mock alarm.

“A medusa, that was tough. You know what a medusa is?”

“It’s a legendary creature, half-woman, half-snake, whose gaze turned her enemies to stone and whose hair was poisonous snakes,” Athena replied dryly, like a computer encyclopedia.

“Right. It was huge, about two stories high. We’d never fought one before and the worst turned out to be her blood. We’d drunk potions to protect against the petrification, so that was fine. But my friend, B.E., he cut off one of her hands and the stuff that came out was horrible, like steaming acid; it did a huge amount of damage.”

“Thrilling. What else?” Nathan was hypnotized by her. He was leaning forward across the table, his head resting on his arms, with unwavering attention to what the pirate was saying.

“
Tscha!
Stop this stupid conversation right now.” Athena sounded cross. “Let’s get back to the police station. How did you make us invisible, really?”

“I told you, with a potion of invisibility. I guess you don’t have them here. In fact, this is a fairly gloomy world, and I think that, for some reason, it’s making people ill. Today is the first time I’ve really enjoyed myself. Do they have these parties often?”

It was easy to see that Athena was exasperated, but I found Cindella rather endearing, very otherworldly. And, after all, she had rescued us.

“About once a month, perhaps every two months,” Nathan answered her.

“Where are you from?” Athena persisted in her interrogation.

“Ahh, well, there’s, like, two answers to that, depending on what you mean. See, this character, Cindella, she’s a leftover from a game called Epic. But me, I’m from New Earth. Actually, never mind . . . I’m sorry, just a moment; someone wants me. I’ll try to come back.”