Flux (25 page)

“What’s the matter?” asked Deller, stepping toward her.

“Dunno,” Nellie muttered, warding him off with her hands. “Something came at me out of that thing, like a breath of fire straight into my brain. Looked like the skull, kind of, but made of fuzzy white light.”

A well of intense breathing rose around her, the boys’ eyes fixed on the skull.

“That never happened before,” Deller said dubiously.

“I never seen nothing,” Snakebite shrilled.

“Didn’t happen when I kissed it,” Pullo mumbled.

“Well, it happened now,” Nellie hissed, “and I’m not kissing it. That skull isn’t dead enough yet. Whatever’s still in it is looking for somewhere else to live. If I kissed it, I could get doubled.”

“I kissed it and I ain’t doubled,” Snakebite screeched, dancing from foot to foot. “I ain’t, I ain’t.”

“That’s because you’re not smart enough,” Nellie snapped. “It’s looking for someone who can carry its vibes. They’re way too fast for you.” The boys’ eyes fixed on her, a circle of fear. “Don’t worry,” she added acidly. “It didn’t double any of you, or it wouldn’t still be in the skull. But you should get rid of it. Throw it in the river. It’s evil.”

“That’s where I found it,” said Gurry, his cheek twitching frantically. “In the riverbank by the Temple of the Blessed Heart.”

Nellie’s eyes widened. “Near the Goddess?” “The Goddess, the Goddess,” Snakebite sang mockingly, breaking into a frantic dance.

“Cut it out,” Deller said sharply. “She’s a Skull now, like the rest of us. She gets all the privileges.”

“We didn’t finish the ceremony,” Pullo said sourly.

“We did enough,” said Deller, setting the skull back in its box. “It’s just a ceremony. Anyway, I have to get home, like I said.”

“Yeah, me too,” said Gurry. “I have to help dad fix the back porch.” Shooting sideways glances at Nellie, the boys drifted one by one toward the entrance.

“You sure you’ll be all right?” The last to go, Deller stood hesitantly in the alcove. “There’s more food by the blankets for later, if you get hungry. You can close this door and push a chair against it. I’ll put the padlock on from the outside. It doesn’t actually lock, but it keeps the tramps from coming in.”

“What if I have to go to the can?” asked Nellie.

“Oh yeah,” said Deller, looking uncomfortable. “But if I leave the lock off—”

“I’ll just hold it,” Nellie said quickly.

Deller frowned, and then his face cleared. “Use that,” he said, pointing to a small plastic bucket in the corner. “You can dump it in the morning. I’ll come by early and take the padlock off. Then I have to go to work, but I can come back in the afternoon.” He paused, outlined in the alcove’s dusky gray-brown light. “I had to tell them, y’know,” he said slowly. “It was the only way they’d let you into the Skulls. They won’t tell anyone else though. They kissed the skull.” His voice quickened. “We could take them with us into the levels to look for Fen. It’d go quicker if there were five of us.”

“That’s a lot of doubles,” Nellie said dubiously. “They’re already stupid enough in this level.”

“They’re not bad,” Deller said, but she could hear the grin in his voice. “Not once you get to know them. Well, see you tomorrow.”

“See you tomorrow,” Nellie echoed as the door closed behind him and the room filled with the rasp of the padlock slipping into place.

Chapter 16

I
MMEDIATELY NELLIE HEADED
for the bag of clothing that sat next to the blankets. Tearing it open she pulled out a soft yellow T-shirt, a pair of blue shorts, some underwear, and a bra. Slowly she turned the bra package in her hands, examining it by candlelight. There on the front was the usual embarrassing picture, but this time the girl looked her own age. Eagerly Nellie opened the box and held up the bra. Swaying in the candlelight, the familiar outline dangled in slim white lines. No mountaintops here. This one was definitely the fried-egg size.

Sliding the straps onto her shoulders, she twisted her arms behind her back and tried to jam the hooks closed. But no matter how she bent and twisted the hooks wouldn’t slide into place. Grunting and puffing, Nellie corkscrewed her body this way and that, warping herself into unimaginable positions.
Who was the moron that invented this thing?
she thought, angrily removing the bra and studying every inch of it. A person needed four hands
and
eyes in the back of her head just to get it on.

With a hiss she slid the straps back onto her shoulders and went at it again, huffing and jitterbugging about the room. When the hooks finally slid into place she was sweaty, red-faced and close to
hyperventilating. Holding her arms straight out from her body, she took a cautious step forward. No jiggle. She took another careful step. Again, no jiggle. A giggle escaped her lips and she stomped toward the door, staring down at her chest. Even in the room’s dim light, she was sure the blobs were squished flat and all the movement had gone out of them. With a triumphant hoot, she began to jump and flail her arms. No more jiggling! She could run, twist and sky-high fly, and with this haircut no one would guess she was a girl unless they got real close. Boys would respect her, and—

Taking another leap, Nellie twisted midair, spinning herself around so she landed facing the table, and saw her double. Seated in one of the three-legged chairs, the girl was wearing the gold-brocaded dress and snapping her pocketknife open and closed. With a yelp Nellie leapt backward, her knees bent and her claws out.

“Keep yelling like that,” her double said casually, “and you’ll bring the whole neighborhood in.”

“There isn’t any neighborhood,” Nellie said scornfully, trying to ignore the kick-ass thud of her heart. Reaching for the yellow T-shirt she pulled it over her head, hiding as long as she could within its freshly laundered scent.

“There’s more going on around here than you think,” her double said drily. “This isn’t the only warehouse that’s been taken over, y’know.”

“I’ve never seen anyone,” Nellie flared. “And I’ve been around here at night.”

“Most of the tramps meet one block over,” said her double, pointing her knife at the south wall. “At a warehouse right on the river.
Most
of them.”

“How d’you know that?” Pulling on the blue shorts, Nellie backed against the wall and slitted her eyes at her double.

“Been busy,” her double said tersely. “Doing what you should be doing, but you’re too busy hanging around with
him
.”

Unaccountably, Nellie flushed. “What’s wrong with Deller?” she asked gruffly, kicking at the blankets heaped on the floor.

“Nothing’s
wrong
with him,” said her double. “You’ve got more important things to do.”

“Like what?”

“Like finding out things.”

“Finding out what things?” Nellie stared, dumbfounded.

Her double sighed. “Finding out what I’m finding out.”

Nellie’s eyes narrowed. “Oh yeah?” she said coolly. “Well, you can keep your secrets. Take them back to your own level. I’ve got enough of my own.”

Her double snapped the pocketknife closed and leaned forward. “Don’t you want to know how I got through the burnt skin where Fen got stolen?” she challenged.

Nellie’s eyes narrowed until she could barely see. This double was just about the weaseliest person she’d met in
any
level. “Did you see Fen in one of those machines?” she asked, trying to keep the interest out of her voice. “When I went into that level, there was a hall with a whole bunch of doors, and then a room with machines that had kids in them. Fen was in one of them.”

“I’m not telling you what I saw,” her double smirked, leaning back again. “At least not yet. There are other things you need to learn first.”

“Like what?” hissed Nellie, stung.

“Like the fact city administration has been put on high alert because the skins have been breached so many times lately,” said her double.

“Skins again.” Nellie rolled her eyes.

“Yeah, skins,” snapped her double. “Lucky for you they don’t know who’s jumping the skins or how, but they’re out looking, and if you keep blundering around the way you do, you’re going to get caught.”

“No one notices me,” Nellie huffed. “I sneak in and out of other levels like I’m invisible.”

“Oh really?” hissed her double, leaning forward. “Burning down a church is being invisible? Letting a doubled priest do a probe on you isn’t being noticed?”

“That was in this level,” shrugged Nellie. “And anyway, hardly anyone travels the levels. Sometimes I think I’m the only one.”

“What about the men who took Fen?” asked her double. “Or the guy from the Interior Police that stepped out of the store wall? All City Hall has to do is ask the Interior to set some trackers on you.”

Nellie blanched visibly. “You travel the levels too,” she sniffed nervously. “What makes you think it’s me they’re after?”

“Because I know what I’m doing,” her double said, flipping the pocketknife into the air and catching it. “I don’t leave the skins quivering and disrupted like you do. The trail you leave vibrates like a rat scream.”

“Oh come off it,” said Nellie. “I can ride flux and shapeshift too, y’know. What makes you so much better than me?”

“You don’t ride flux,” snorted her double. “You find a tiny ittybitty place flux
spit
on, and play games with it. My whole skin is always in flux. There’s always something changing, something new coming through. But then I come from one of the quicker skins. Your skin’s the slowest, so things are pretty fixed here.”

“Slowest?” bellowed Nellie. Who exactly did this double think she was? “And what d’you mean,
fixed
?”

“Fixed in time and space,” said her double coolly. “The next nine skins are fixed and then they break free, at least here in the Out-backs. In the Interior, they’re fixed a lot further up. That’s what they do there—lock you into a fixed pattern, so all your skins are the same. They’re trying to do that in the Outbacks too, but it’s still pretty free here.”

Nellie’s thoughts scrambled, trying to keep up. “Fixed for the next nine levels?” she said. “That makes ten. It was the tenth level where they took Fen. Were they trying to stop him from seeing the levels that aren’t fixed?”

“Maybe,” said her double.

“Well ... “ Nellie paused. If she sounded too interested, her double wouldn’t answer this next question for sure. “What are the unfixed levels like?” she asked in her best bored tone.

“You’ll find out,” said her double in an equally bored tone, “when you’re ready to vibrate that fast.”

Nellie sucked in her breath and tried not to scream. “All this about vibrating faster,” she said accusingly. “I can scan vibrations, y’know. So I can tell you’re not vibrating any faster than me right now. And when I stepped into your level in the store, the vibrations there weren’t that much quicker than they are here.”

“I adjust,” said her double dismissively. “I’m one of the floaters. There’s a few of us. When I feel like it, I can move my whole skin around and adjust the vibes so they’re in sync with wherever I end up.”

About to make another scornful reply, Nellie faltered. “You helped me,” she said slowly, remembering. “At the Jinnet. You broke Ayne’s probe when I couldn’t.”

Her double nodded tersely.

“All my other doubles are always doing the same as me,” Nellie continued thoughtfully. “They dress like me and live in the same place. I guess that means they’re fixed, right?”

Her double nodded again.

“But you carry a knife,” Nellie went on. “You travel the levels and you think different. And there was flux in the store where I first saw you.”

“That’s my home skin,” said her double. “When I float it into a new area, I adjust it to the closest skin so I don’t stick out. I’ve been coming down into the slower skins, investigating.”

“Investigating what?” asked Nellie.

Her double shrugged. “Things that interest me. Like I said, there’s a lot of flux around here. It’s much tighter in the Interior. Those skins are a real bitch to get through.”

“I didn’t travel the levels when I lived in the Interior,” Nellie said hesitantly. “I only started about a year ago. But I know it’s easier to get from one level to the next if there’s flux.”

Again her double nodded. “At least you know that much, but there are a lot of things in the skins that are way past anything you
could imagine. They’re dangerous. It’s not all fun and games. You’ve got a lot to learn if we’re going to pull through this.”

“Pull through what?” Nellie couldn’t help the scornful note in her voice. Maybe her double knew
some
things she didn’t, but that didn’t make her the Goddess’s announcing angel.

Her double leaned forward, her face tense with exasperation. “They’re
after
you, idiot.
Here
, in
this
skin, and the other skins are starting to get interested too. You let that doubled priest probe you, and Ayne. They read your vibes. What d’you think they picked up?” She let out a long suffering hiss. “If they get you, they get the rest of your possibilities too. Not all of us are as stupid as you, but we all get stuck paying for your choices.”

“I thought I copy what you do,” Nellie snapped.

“It’s all relative,” her double snapped back. “The possibilities don’t all have to do exactly what you do, but they’re stuck dealing with the consequences. Except for the ones in flux, of course. Possibilities like me can come and go as we wish, and believe me I’m not here because I’m desperate for your company. I’m just tired of seeing the possibilities suffer because of what you’re doing to the skins, and I’m not going to be caught and hauled back to the Interior over your mistakes. I’m here to smarten you up so we can all live easier.”

“Oh.” Stunned, Nellie wanted to open the closest gate and step through to a level where she didn’t have to face the sense she was hearing. So this was why her doubles always froze when they saw her—they were afraid of whatever dumb stupid thing she was about to do next. “Wait a minute,” she said, a new thought entering her mind. “If the fixed doubles have to do what I do, how come I can travel the levels and they can’t? They don’t even know there are levels.”