The Skids Read online

  “We’re in a lost node,” Torg drawled.

  Bian considered this, then her stripes tilted. “Could be worse.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure,” Bian sniffed. “Lost is better than dead.” When they stared at her, she added, “What? Am I the only one who thought that we might be dead and all this was just the Hole?”

  “You’re not dead,” Betty said, studying Bian with a contemplative look. “Though the Skidsphere thinks otherwise.” The hollas around her booth spun and a single image jumped out to hover just above Betty’s head. It was a replay of the Pipe: a black void swallowing the white surface as the words, “JOHNNY DROP, THOUSANDS OF SKIDS MISSING!” scrolled across the image.

  “Nice to be missed,” Albert spat, staring at the holla. “Thousands of skids,” he added, his voice dripping contempt.

  “Don’t be snide, Albert,” Betty laughed. “Johnny didn’t write the tag. Besides, they mentioned you and Torg in the broadcast.”

  “Really?” Torg said.

  “Really,” Betty said, winking at the Nine.

  “I don’t get it,” Johnny said.

  “What do you mean?” Torg grinned. “I’m very marke-table.”

  “Not you, gearbox. This.” He looked at Betty. “You said this place was called the Thread? So is this like another version of the Skidsphere?”

  “No, Johnny,” Betty said. “The Skidsphere is part of the Thread. A small part.”

  He stared at her. The Skidsphere is small? The Rainbow Road alone was five hundred kilometers long. Then he remembered columns-upon-columns of hollas, buildings stretching up and down . . .

  “Can I ask a question?” Torres asked.

  “Certainly, Torres,” Betty said.

  The orange stripe glowed with pride. “She knows my name,” she whispered to Albert.

  “I’ll bet she knows a lot of things,” Albert said, wincing. His colour was coming back, but the scar still marred his body.

  Torres looked at Betty Crisp, blinked once, and said, “Why aren’t you dead?”

  The sound of Torg choking on his tongue. All three of Johnny’s eyes went wide as Bian murmured, “Torres . . .”

  “What?” Torres protested. “She’s like . . . ancient! She is,” she added, when Aaliyah nudged her treads. “I mean, if you’re alive then you’re . . . you’re . . .”

  “I’m fifty-five years old, relative to the Skidsphere,” the ancient skid said, amused.

  “See!” Torres nudged Aaliyah back, staring at Betty. “What level are you now?”

  “I’m afraid levels don’t really exist out here. Not in the way you think.”

  “Oh,” Torres said, disappointed. “Still, if they did . . . you’d be higher than Level Ten, right?”

  Betty smiled. “A little higher than Ten, yes. I suppose I would be.”

  “Cool . . . can I call you Betty?”

  “I’d like that very much, Torres.”

  Torres looked at Albert and beamed. “She’d like that very much.”

  “Torres?”

  “What?”

  “She didn’t answer your question yet.” As the purple-orange skid worked that out, Albert said to Betty, “It’s a good one. How are you still alive? And how did you get here? Did you fall through the black like we did?”

  Betty took a long, shaky breath. “Those are good questions, Albert.” A beat, then she added, “Would it be all right if I didn’t tell you at this exact moment? I will, but . . .” her smile came back, “it’s not really a first date story.”

  Albert held her gaze, then winced and bobbed an eye.

  “Can you at least tell us what happened to the Skidsphere?” Bian asked. “Thousands missing? That’s horrible.” She bit her lip. “Did . . . did anyone else . . . survive like we did?” Unconsciously, her trail-eye scanned the entire room.

  “No,” Betty said softly. “The only skids that came through what hit the Pipe are the ones Johnny and Albert brought with them. The rest, unless they somehow fell right off my grid . . .” she tapped an eye at the bank of hollas, “. . . the rest are dead.”

  “Crisp Betty,” Torg whispered, then cast a guilty glance at Betty.

  “It’s all right, Torg. I’ve had fifty years to get used to it.” Betty took a deep breath, her gaze still on Bian. “Thank goodness the break finally stopped. Although not before it took out ninety percent of the Pipe and a chunk of the Rainbow Road.”

  “The Road as well?” Johnny said, stunned.

  “Yes,” replied the skid who had once performed the Leap, her face grim. “They won’t be running either of those for some time.”

  Johnny frowned. “Why not? I mean, Bian’s right, that many skids vaped is . . . is insane . . . but GameCorps can repair the structural stuff within a few hours.” He didn’t like the response he got at all. “Can’t they?”

  Betty held his gaze. “They should. But this might be a little bigger than GameCorps.”

  An ugly feeling was starting to build in Johnny’s gut, one that had nothing to do with any residual effects of getting tagged by the Vies and Antis. “Betty . . .” he said slowly. “One of the first things Wobble said to us was: ‘Your world is going to die.’ Is that . . . is that what’s happening?”

  “Yes, Johnny,” Betty said. “That could be happening.”

  “Snakes . . .” Aaliyah whispered, her eyes wide with terror. “We aren’t going to be safe even if we go home?”

  Betty gazed at her with a strange look for a skid, something very much like affection. “Well, Aaliyah, I have good news and bad news. The bad news is that no . . . you can’t go home. The good news is that the Skidsphere won’t be dying anytime soon.”

  “Why not?” Bian said suspiciously. “What’s to stop another one of those black things from hitting the Slope? Or a packed sugarbar?”

  Betty looked back at her. “Me.”

  Bian blinked. “I’m sorry?”

  “Me,” Betty said. “I stopped it. I stopped the Skidsphere.”

  A deep silence. “Uh . . .” Torg said. “You want to clarify that a bit?”

  Betty pointed at the bank of hollas. “Six hours after the break on the Pipe ground to a halt, there was a corpsquake. A big one. Unfortunately, corpsquakes are poorly named: they have nothing to do with GameCorps. They’re a symptom of a sick and broken system, breaking more. Things were happening too fast. I couldn’t take any chances.”

  She rose on her treads and her whole body seemed to swell until it filled the room. “Five minutes after the quake, I did something I never, ever wanted to do. I placed the entire sphere into stasis. If everything is shut down then, in theory, nothing else should break.” The single pink stripe radiated like a star as her eyes swept the group.

  “My world is not going to die,” Betty Crisp declared. “Not on my watch.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  “You . . .” Johnny started to say. Stopped. He couldn’t wrap his mind around what he was trying to ask. He tried again. “You stopped . . . the Skidsphere?”

  “Think of it as a holla on pause,” Betty said helpfully.

  I can’t, his mind protested. A flutter of panic surged through his stripes as he glanced at Wobble, quietly humming to himself as he healed in the corner. Sweet snakes, what if they’re both insane?

  “How?” Torg said, bringing Johnny back. His magenta skin had paled.

  “How did I do it?” Betty asked. “Or: how could I do such a horrible thing?”

  “Start with the first one,” Torg said levelly.

  Betty swung an arm. “Look around. Everything you see is information. Those boxes whizzing by outside? Information. This booth?” She rapped a finger loudly off the booth’s surface. “Information. That storm you hid in, every line of golden light, the Vies, the Antis: everything’s a metaphor for some specific collection of data.
Including the Skidsphere. Including the skids.”

  “What am I a metaphor for?” Aaliyah whispered.

  Instantly, Betty’s expression softened. “For a skid,” she said, smiling. “A good one.” She reached out and placed her hand on Aaliyah’s stripes, held it there, then looked back at Torg.

  “If you know where to look and how to do it, you can manipulate the data. Theoretically, with the entire Thread. I’ve spent the last twenty years focusing on anything related to the Skidsphere. So I can protect it.” She glanced at Johnny, hesitated, then said: “Six months ago, something happened that scared the sugar out of me. So I came up with a last-chance scenario: if I thought the sphere was going critical, I’d put it in stasis to try and save it. After the Pipe and the quake that followed . . . I did it.”

  No one had to ask what happened six months ago. Sitting at the back of the group, his scar bright against his silver skin, Albert steadfastly refused to look Johnny’s way.

  “That’s horrible,” Bian protested, staring at Betty. “All those skids. It’s like they’re dead.”

  “It is horrible, Bian,” Betty agreed. “And the worst part is: it might not work. The entire Thread is slowly breaking down. Putting the sphere into stasis should protect it from Vies, but if things keep breaking around it . . .” She took a deep breath. “Still, it should buy us some time to do what we have to do.”

  “And what is that?” Johnny said, his stripes still spinning.

  Betty grinned. “Save the Skidsphere. And not by keeping it in stasis. By repairing the damage that’s been done. Getting rid of any virus that crept in with the break. By making it whole and as healthy as anything inside the Thread can be.”

  “And just how are you going to do that?”

  “Actually, I was hoping you could help me.”

  From the back, Albert groaned. “Great, you’re going to make him a vaping hero.”

  “Actually, Albert, I was hoping to use you both.” Betty’s grin widened. “I’m afraid I need you boys to kiss and make up.”

  Torg barked a laugh. “Yeah, good luck with that.”

  “What about the rest of us?” Bian said, scowling.

  “You’ll stay here. You should be safe. For what I have planned, I only need Johnny and Albert.”

  Ouch, Johnny thought, watching Bian’s stripes darken. “We can help too,” she said, her voice cold, two eyes squarely on Betty. “We’re not invalids.” Then, realizing what she’d said, she sent a guilty glance towards the cells holding Brolin and Shabaz.

  “I didn’t think you were.” Betty sighed. “I’m sorry, that was . . . I haven’t had a lot of experience recently talking with people. Except Wobble, of course.” From the corner, the machine looked up and waved a damaged arm. “You can help. Someone needs to watch over Brolin and Shabaz. Someone needs to care for the younger skids.”

  “Hey,” Torres protested, bumping forward. “Whatever’s going on, I’m in!”

  “Not this time, Torres,” Betty said gently.

  Bian continued to glare. “And just how long are we supposed to sit here while the three of you go save the world?”

  “Actually, it’s four. We’ll be taking Wobble.”

  “Fine, whatever. How long?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know?” Bian said, her voice rising. “So we’re just supposed to—”

  “Stop it!” Johnny barked. Popping a Hasty-Arm, he held up a hand. “Everybody just . . . slow down for a minute. This is . . . this is . . .” He took a deep breath. “Look,” he said to Betty, “thanks for the vote of confidence. I don’t know what you think I . . . Albert and I . . . can do but, hey, great to think we can do it. But why do we need to? Why the hole do we have to fix the problem? That’s insane. Where’s GameCorps? It’s their job.”

  “GameCorps only takes care of the Skidsphere, Johnny. The problem is bigger than that; what’s attacking the sphere comes from outside of the sphere. GameCorps can’t fix the Thread.”

  “Then who takes care of the Thread?” Johnny cried, furious at not being able to understand a single vaping thing.

  Betty had gone stock-still. “That,” she said softly, “is a very good question.”

  “Where’s the Out There in all this?” Johnny demanded. “They exist, right?” His heart was pounding.

  “Yes, Johnny, there is something beyond the Thread. Out there. And whatever they are, we’re pretty sure the Thread is their creation.”

  Thank Crisp, Johnny thought, too emotionally charged to catch the irony. “So . . .” he said, drawing out the word, trying to calm down. “You said everything is information, we’re all information, fine. I don’t understand that at all, but I don’t need to. GameCorps takes care of the Skidsphere. The Skidsphere is part of the Thread. The Thread is broken, sick, whatever. If the Out There created the Thread, why aren’t they fixing it?”

  Betty held his gaze for a long moment. They might have been alone in the room.

  “I’ve spent most of the last twenty-five years trying to answer that question, Johnny. It’s the most important one you could ask. The Thread is huge—I can’t begin to explain how vast it is, how complex. Something, somewhere, invested a lot of effort in creating it. Whoever they were, they were obviously intelligent. Why would they let it break down? What possible reason could they have for letting it decay?”

  A knot of ice began to settle inside Johnny’s stripes.

  “There’s a few possibilities, but in the end . . . there’s only one that makes sense.”

  “Vape me,” Torg whispered.

  “Not possible,” Johnny spat. “It’s not possible.”

  “I’m afraid it is,” Betty said. “The only reason something gets left to rot is because something left it to rot.” She waved a hand at her booth. “I’m sorry, Johnny. The hollas run, but no one is watching.”

  “Not possible.” It came out as a snarl now. “You said it yourself—the highlights are still running!”

  “Because GameCorps is still running.”

  “GameCorps doesn’t watch the highlights!”

  “No,” Betty sighed. “But they do run them.”

  “But . . . but . . .” He was reaching, desperate. There’d been that nervous, empty feeling in the city of hollas, but this . . . “They gave me a name.”

  “Did they?” Betty asked. “Johnny Drop. Was the announcement on the ’lights really the first time you heard that name?”

  “Uh . . .” Johnny flinched with the memory: lying half-vaped on a ledge, his eye flapping in the wind, grinning as he thought about what he wanted to be named.

  “You gave yourself your name,” Betty said.

  “How? I never said it out loud.” When the others swung a stunned eye his way, he explained, “I thought it, though. After the race, I thought the name Johnny Drop.”

  “And GameCorps read his mind?” Torres whispered. “Sweet.”

  “It’s all just information,” Betty said. “I was called Betty Crisp because I used to say it all the time. It was my favourite expression: if something was right, it was crisp. I dreamed of having that name.” Her gaze swept the group. “We are our own program.”

  “Nice,” Torres said. “I’m giving myself a second name.”

  “Why don’t you get comfortable with the first, squid?” Torg drawled.

  “All right, fine,” Johnny said, taking a long, ragged breath. “We name ourselves. That still doesn’t mean no one Out There is watching. I mean, why would the games continue if . . . ?” He threw his hands up, his stripes twisting with a dozen emotions at once.

  The only emotion Betty showed was sympathy. “Because the Skidsphere is practically autonomous. It might be a small part of the Thread, but it’s a sophisticated one. It’s a self-sustaining, self-enclosed entertainment mem. The only one of its kind I’ve found. From what I gat
her, there was a time when it was incredibly popular.”

  “But not now,” Bian said, glancing at Johnny. They all knew how much this mattered to him.

  “Probably not. You need to understand, most of the Thread’s inactive, like that weather-mem you drove into. Other parts are stuck in a permanent loop, some decades long. That block of hollas you passed through? Most of those images happened years ago. In many cases, centuries. Maybe longer.”

  “Vape me,” Torg whispered.

  There was a long silence as they tried to absorb what they were being told. Betty gave it to them. Johnny found himself staring at one of the hollas hovering over Betty’s booth.

  He had absolutely no idea what he was staring at.

  “All right,” Bian said finally. “I don’t understand half of this but I guess we have to trust you. Not much choice. So, fine, we stay here. Polish our treads. Whatever. But before you go, there’s some things we need to take care of. You mentioned sugar. Do you have any, some of us are starving.”

  “There’s no sugar here,” Betty said. “I used to synthesize it at my other safehouse, but I don’t have the equipment here.”

  “Then how did you survive?”

  “I don’t need it. None of us do.”

  Bian stared at her. “Uh, I’m pretty sure I do.”

  “No, you don’t,” Betty insisted. “Haven’t you been listening? Bian, what happens when a skid doesn’t get sugar? How would you even know—GameCorps keeps everyone stripes-up in sweet. You think they die? Who cares: You’ve been dying your whole life. You’ve all died dozens of times and survived. Once you hit Level Three, there’s only one hard death.”

  “Five years,” Torg said quietly.

  “Five vaping years,” Betty said, her voice dripping contempt. “It’s all programming. You’ve got control of every molecule in your body. You don’t . . . need . . . sugar.” Her eyes swung to each of them, then dipped. “But you don’t believe that . . . so of course you do.”

  A beat of silence, then Aaliyah whispered: “I haven’t died a dozen times.”