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Lost in Translation

The paperback from DAW Books

Praise for Ed's previous novel, Lost in Translation:

"Edward Willett has arrived, and SF is the richer for it." -  Robert J. Sawyer, Hugo Award-winning author of Hominids

"A believable, absorbing, thought-provoking and highly enjoyable read." - Kathy Tyers, Author of the Firebird trilogy, Star Wars: The Truce at Bakura, and Star Wars: Balance Point

Andy Nebula: Interstellar Rock Star
Published by Roussan Publishers

Nominated for the 2001 Manitoba Young Readers Choice Award
Named to the Our Choice list by the Canadian Children's Book Centre

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Back to Chapter 12

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The next morning I was more-or-less myself, except for a badly scraped shoulder and a torn shirt. But I didn't know how long it would last. With Meta still protesting she wanted to stay with me, I set out for the Spaceport.

"I don't know who Qualls and the Hydras have looking for us," I told Meta as we emerged, blinking in the morning light, onto still-deserted Thrustfire Boulevard. "For all I know the 'forcers on Qualls's payroll. That means back alleys and zig-zags, all the way. Stay close."

"Don't worry," Meta said. I looked at her dirty clothes and face and bedraggled hair, and knew I must look just as bad. Good-bye Andy Nebula, interstellar rock star, hello streetslug Kit.

The trip took half a day. More than once we dodged 'forcers, ducking into dark passages that stank of garbage and human waste, slipping through cracks I used to fit down easily that were now barely wide enough, hiding behind gutted vehicles. As we neared downtown more and more transports and personal vehicles crowded the streets. The people filling the sidewalks didn't give us a second glance after the first one of contempt. "It's like they don't even see us!" Meta complained said after one particularly overdressed female passed us by. "Can't they tell we're in trouble, that we need help?"

"They see people like us all the time." I pointed to a gray-haired woman slumped in a doorway. "If they tried to help us, they might have to help everyone. They're busy people; they don't have the time. Besides, we don't want any notice, remember?"

"I guess not." Meta glared at another woman, who quickened her steps. "But I don't like being treated like a dog left behind."

I shrugged. Nothing had made me feel more at "home" than the way that woman's eyes had flicked past me. Andy Nebula was only skin deep. Under that skin was Kit.

And under Kit's skin was flash. I said nothing to Meta, but I could feel it working away, bursts of tingling traveling from fingertips to spine, phantom itches appearing and disappearing. Less than a day after my first dose, and--I licked dry lips. I wanted more. Right now that was all it was--want--but I knew in a few short hours it would be more than want; it would be need.

I had to get Meta away before then. I began to take more risks, crossing streets at main intersections, counting on the growing crowds to hide us from passing 'forcers. Finally the glass-and-steel facade of the Spaceport terminal came into sight, and I stopped long enough to open my bag and take out Andy Nebula's credit chip. "I don't want to linger," I said to Meta. "We go in, I buy your ticket," (if this thing still works, I thought), "and you head for the departure lounge--I don't care how long it is until you lifts. You'll be safe in there."

"What about you?"

"Don't worry about me. I can look after myself."

Meta said nothing, but looked skeptical.

Down the street, across another, and into the terminal building. Holosigns competed with vidscreens for attention. An old man sat playing a stringsynth--badly--his case open at his feet. Meta in tow, I sought departure information. A vidscreen sensed me passing and burst into life. "Andy Nebula!" it yelled.

I froze and stared at it. My face filled the screen as the voice-over continued, "the Murdoch IV-born teenaged Sensation Single who performed for 30,000 screaming fans at Brankston Memorial Stadium last night, today is on the run. He's the prime suspect in the murder of Marcel Roy, forty-six standard, his stage manager, who was knifed backstage shortly after the concert. Nebula's manager, Samuel Qualls, told 'forcers Nebula and Roy had come close to blows on more than one occasion. Their dispute may have been drug-related, Qualls said; Nebula is a flash-user and Roy may have been his supplier..."

I grabbed Meta and hurried her away, ducking into a short hallway leading to a cleaning-supply room. Meta shook free and backed away, staring at me. "You don't believe that, do you?" I cried. "I didn't kill Roy. And I'm not a flash-user, either!" Or wasn't, I thought bitterly. "Meta, Marcel came to warn me. He told me to get away before Qualls came--but I didn't make it. Qualls knew I was trying to run, he must have guessed Marcel had warned me, and--" I shook my head at the sick cleverness of it all. "He killed Marcel, made me the suspect, and told them I'd run off, all the while thinking I was locked in my dressing room. He would have smuggled me off to Hydra and no one would have ever known what had happened to me. I would have just dropped out of sight. But you messed things up for him by helping me to get out for real." I looked at the credit chip in my hand. "As soon as I use this, the 'forcers will know. They'll find me in minutes."

"Let them!" Meta cried. "Tell them the truth. Turn yourself in. At least you'll be in their hands and not Qualls's."

It made sense, now I knew the 'forcers weren't working for Qualls--though it was a hard pill to swallow for an old streetslug. "You're right. But first you're getting out of here."

Meta nodded. "I think I'm ready to go home now," she said in a small voice. "In your Single, street life seemed so--romantic--"

"I know," I said. "And it's not. It's dirty and hard and sometimes very short. And you've only seen the surface, Meta. You haven't seen the worst parts of this city, or the worst people."

"Except Qualls."

"Except Qualls. He's as bad as they come." I could hear the newsvid blaring my story again. "Let's get out of here."

I found a bank of vidscreens displaying departures to the Pleasure Planets; there was one late that evening. I memorized the ship number and headed for the appropriate ticket counter.

I'd lost my edge, living as Andy Nebula, or I would have seen them leaning against the mirrored pillars long before I did. I grabbed Meta's arm again. "Stand very still."

Like one of my flash-induced hallucinations, a young man in mirrorcloth materialized in front of me. He was thinner, and his eyes had begun to gray, but his smile was as nasty as ever. "Hey, flashmates," he drawled. "Scan who's back in our orbit."

Meta drew closer to me. "Who--"

"They label me Dry Ice, little X-zome. Maybe this streetslime you're with has told you about me."

"Kit--"

I squeezed her hand reassuringly, and wished someone would do the same for me. "What's powering, Dry Ice?" I didn't have to turn around to know the rest of the Ice Boys were surrounding me.

"You've been playing with radwaste, gladeye. High-level. Our flashman says we take you, he'll power us all for a month." Dry Ice shrugged. "So we take you, gladeye. Or is that Mr. Nebula?"

He hadn't drawn his knife; he was counting on his mates. They were all behind me, blocking the way to the exits--

--to the legal exits.

"No need to call me Mr. Nebula, gladeye," I told Dry Ice. "I'm only Andy Nebula when I'm dancing. Like--so!"

The move was the climax of my Single, the high spinning leap that ended with a snap of my foot into the chest of the dancebot that played the leader of the enemy flashgang. Every time I'd performed it I'd imagined Dry Ice on the receiving end. His eyes barely had time to widen before my foot smashed into him and sent him flying back, tumbling over the stacked luggage of a man who turned on him angrily, then thought better of it as Dry Ice's monomolecular-edged blade hissed from its sheath.

By that time, though, I had grabbed Meta and, with the Ice Boys in pursuit, dashed straight toward the ticket desk. We smashed through the line in a flurry of screams, scrambled madly over the desk itself, scattering datadiscs, charged through the door beyond into another room, and crashed through the door at the back of that into the huge cargo-sorting facility.

To our left I saw daylight, and like a trapped animal I headed for it instinctively, leaping over conveyor belts, almost dragging Meta. Seconds later we burst through a door into the street, running for our lives.

Behind us came the Ice Boys.

#

On to Chapter 14..