“Did you stop that guy from shooting me?” he asked.
Silence.
“Look, I just saved your life, and I think you saved mine. Did you?”
Still no answer. Exasperated, Kendi tried to grab the boy by the shoulder, but the boy backed away. “Bump off. Don’t touch me unless-”
“Hands in the air!” barked a voice.
Both of them spun. A man and a woman in the red and black uniforms of the Unity guard stood in the alleyway, pistols aimed and steady.
Behind them was a sleek patrol cruiser, the only type of ground car allowed in the market. Kendi raised his good arm. The boy raised both of his.
“I said, hands up!” the woman snapped.
“I can’t raise my other arm,” Kendi said. “One of those guys hit it with an energy blade.”
“Take the pistol out of your belt with your fingertips,” the woman ordered. “Drop it on the ground.”
Kendi obeyed. A pang shot through him as he remembered the dermosprays in his pocket. Even the most cursory search would turn them up. Tension made a cold knot in his stomach.
“These men attacked us, officers,” he said. “The gun belongs to them.”
The male guard snorted. His partner eased closer and kicked the gun away. Kendi saw sweat trickle down the boy’s face.
“Both of you put your hands on the wall,” the male officer said. “Now!”
Shakily, Kendi put his good arm on the wall. A dozen possibilities flickered through his mind and were just as quickly tossed aside. No fighting. Kendi had caught the boy’s attackers by surprise. The same approach wouldn’t work with alert Unity patrol guards. Running was out of the question. He’d be gunned down. He couldn’t even call Ara for help-wearing a communicator while making underworld contacts would have spelled his death.
Hard hands landed on his shoulders, feeling his back and moving down his sides.
And then there was a strange jumping sensation, as if the world had leaped to one side. A dizzy spell made Kendi glad he was leaning against the wall. The feeling was the same one he got after he’d been…been…
Shit! he thought. I was possessed! The kid possessed me! Did he possess the guards too?
A harsh grip spun him around and he looked into the face of the Unity patrol officer. The boy was nowhere in sight.
“What the hell did you do?” he snarled. “Where did your little friend go?”
“I don’t know,” Kendi said. “I swear!”
The man smashed Kendi’s face and he fell to his knees. A foot slammed into his stomach, and he vomited over the alley floor. Kendi wondered if Ara would find his body as pain exploded at his temple.
CHAPTER FIVE
SEJAL’S JOURNAL DAY 4, MONTH 10, COMMON YEAR 987
I turned my first trick today.
There. I said it. Or I wrote it down, anyway.
I’ve never kept a journal before. It’s kind of weird. I’m typing because I don’t want Mom to overhear me talking to the terminal. It’s an old, clunky thing, and you have to talk loud to get its attention. We can’t afford a new one, though.
Okay, I’m not a virgin anymore. Or does this not count? It’s not like I let the guy screw me or anything. I’m not into men. Or does this mean I am? I don’t feel any different, and I don’t look any different. I’ll write it all down and maybe then I’ll know if something changed.
I’m kind of scared.
The voices haven’t gone away. I was hoping they would when I lost my virginity. I don’t know why I thought they might. Sometimes I think I’ll go nuts. They whisper and whisper and and I can’t quite understand what they’re saying. Grampy Lon says hearing voices is a sign of Silence, but I haven’t said much about that to Mom. Every time I bring it up, she changes the subject or just clamps her lips together. I know I had the test-twice-when I was little and that it came up negative both times. They take Silent kids away, so I can’t be Silent.
Anyway. I was talking about the other stuff.
I did it for the money. You don’t make much busking, that’s for sure, and there aren’t any jobs for a sixteen-year-old who can’t afford more school, not when slaves do the work cheap. No one gives a shit how many hours you spend studying on the nets, either. So I stood on the corner down by the kelp seller’s with my flute. I’ve been playing since I was six, ever since Grampy Lon decided to give me lessons, and I’m pretty good.
Okay. The kelpies are at the edge of the market, almost into the business district, and there were lots of bureaucrats skulking around under the tall buildings the Unity sprayed up after the Annexation. The traffic was heavy, with both groundcars and aircars. Between them and the people on the street, it’s almost claustrophobic-perfect spot for a busker, I thought.
I thought wrong. After three hours, my fingers ached and I had a quarter kesh — enough to buy lunch if I was careful. That was when Jesse wandered over.
I met Jesse six months ago at the market. By then, Jesse’d been tricking for almost a year. He’s not that good-looking-scruffy black hair, heavy eyebrows, pointy nose, pretty good build-but he doesn’t work for one of the houses, which means he’s cheap and he can usually find a jobber. I think he lives on the street, dodging slavers and goons from the houses. One time the house goons caught up with him and beat him so bad it gave him a permanent limp. He started sucking a lot more jay-juice after that, and I think he tricks to feed his habit.
Anyway. Jesse looked at the two coins in my hat and tossed in fifty kesh. I stopped playing.
“Glory. What the hell is that?” I asked. I don’t talk the same at the market as I do at home. Mom would have a moon fit if she knew how much I swear and how bad my grammar is when I’m on the street-or in this journal.
“Glory. It’s your share.” Jesse hooked his thumbs in his pockets.
I just gave him a blank stare.
“You see that guy across the street?” He jerked his head. “The one in the red shirt.”
Automatically I glanced across the street. An older guy in red was leaning against one of the buildings. Traffic buzzed between us. The guy was lean and looked maybe forty, but for all I knew he had just left a fresh-up and was older than Grampy Lon. He looked nervous.
“What about him?” I asked.
“He asked if I knew anyone for a three-way. Pays fifty each. You in?”
I grabbed the kesh from my hat and thrust it at Jesse. “Forget it.”
“Come on, guy,” Jesse said. His thumbs didn’t leave his pockets, so I was left holding the kesh. “I haven’t had a jobber all day, and he won’t do just me.”
“No.”
“It’s not like he’s gonna fuck you or anything,” Jesse said. “All you got to do is lay back and relax. I’ll do the work.”
“I’m not into guys, okay?”
“What’s that got to do with it? It ain’t sex, Sejal. It’s money. M-O-N-E-Y.” He glanced at my hat. “You been busking here all day for that?”
“Yeah,” I admitted.
Jesse sidled closer. He smelled like sweat and cheap leather and suddenly I flashed on him. I do that sometimes. It started about six months ago, and it isn’t anything I can control or shut off. It scares me shitless. It’s hard enough dealing with my own feelings without someone else’s crowding in, and right then Jess was a real jumble-up. He was hungry for food and he was really hungry for jay-juice. He was nervous and he was hopeful. One thing he didn’t feel was lust. The flash faded.
“Listen,” Jesse said. “This guy’ll give you fifty kesh for half an hour. He probably won’t even last twenty minutes.”
My mouth had gone dry and I snuck another glance across the street. The guy was still there. I tried to sense what he was feeling, but the flash didn’t work. It never does when I’m trying.
“Fifty kesh, Sejal,” Jesse repeated. “You ever earn fifty kesh in twenty minutes?”