Burning Bright

“Coming down,” the pilot said, her voice distant and professional again. The helicab straightened and slowed to hover, almost motionless. Ransome craned his neck to see through the lower curve of the door, and could just make out the blue concentric lines of the helipad below them. One band of light blinked, as though something had moved across it, and a moment later another one did the same. Kids, probably, Ransome thought, and in the same instant a strong white light flashed from the cab’s underbelly, all but drowning out the landing lines. Ransome saw a last small figure scramble over the low barrier. The pilot smiled, and the helicab began to sink delicately toward the ground. They touched down almost without a thud, and the credit reader unfolded itself from the wall of the passenger compartment, beeping politely but insistently. Ransome fed his card through the reader, winced slightly when the total was presented, but touched the confirmation code without further protest. The door opened, and Ransome swung himself out onto the brightly lit pavement. The cab lifted away as soon as he was clear, trailing a diminishing cone of light.

It was not a long walk from the Underface helipad to Shadows, but Ransome felt his lungs clog and falter, stopped in the mouth of a half-enclosed courtyard to breathe from the cylinder of Mist. He grimaced at the bitter taste, grimaced again as the drug took hold, the cold pain clearing his lungs. He waited a moment longer, listening to a strand of distant music, a single violo drawn against the night, that floated down from somewhere above him, closer to the base of the Dike. The pain faded, and he kept walking. Shadows appeared out of the darkness a few minutes later, all its windows unshuttered and blazing with light, a suppressed excitement humming in the air around it. Even the food shop across the intersection seemed quiet by comparison, both the bouncers, conspicuous in their rusty black jerkins and studded wristbands, sitting comfortably in chairs just outside the doorway, a thermoflask on the ground between them.

There was no trouble gaining admission to the club, despite the crowd that overflowed from the main lobby into the access hall. Most of them wanted only to maintain their view of the large display screens, and were perfectly willing to let Ransome past as long as he showed no desire to linger. He fetched up against the far wall, beside the little office. The dreamy-eyed woman behind the counter only reluctantly took her attention from the display board balanced in her lap.

“What can I do for you?”

“Is Davvi here?”

The abrupt request raised her eyebrows, and then she frowned, visibly searching her memory to match the face in front of her. Ransome smiled, unable to keep the expression from turning sour, and said, “Tell him Ambidexter’s here.”

The dreamy eyes widened almost comically. “At once, N’Ambidexter. It’s good to see you back again.”

A few of the Gamers close to the desk heard the name even over the direct-input sound from the room systems, and turned to look. Ransome met the stares blandly, and turned his attention to the displays overhead. In the screens, Gallio Hazard confronted a figure he didn’t recognize, an enormously fat man in prison clothes. Bricks and stones, a halo of debris, floated in the air around him, and Ransome realized that the fat man was a telekinetic.

“She is good, isn’t she?” Davvi Medard-Yasine had come quietly through the door that led to the session rooms, and smiled at Ransome’s shrug.

“So far, yes,” Ransome answered. “Look, Davvi, I need a favor.”

“You can ask,” Medard-Yasine answered, but his smile widened.

“I want to watch, up close. Can you get me into the control room?”

“I figured,” Medard-Yasine said. “Come on.”