Until he’d turned his head, a bright flash catching the corner of his eye, and he’d seen a thin sliver of sky, down by his left hand. He’d seen what had happened: when the table had gone flying and its edge had hit the tent behind where he’d been sitting, it had torn the stiff fabric loose from the rivets binding it to the platform. A little gap, flapping in the wind this far out from the building’s wall; he’d caught the cold air in his teeth and nostrils. Air, and a section of distant cloud, far off in space.
Air or the tunnel. The table had started to topple back, pulled by the hands on the other side.
And when it fell back, he was gone. Stuck his head out through the gap and wriggled through, the snapped rivets raking his shoulders. Not even caring what was on the other side, a handhold or not, the edge of the platform or the big step below.
There was a rope, one of the tension lines for the big tent. Luckily, as grabbing it had been all that had kept him from plunging headfirst off the platform as he came wriggling out through the gap. For a dizzy second, he goggled at the fleecy ranks of clouds far downwall, one leg dangling over the edge, his other hand gripping the sharp corner of the platform. Behind him, he heard the voices of the mob booming against the fabric. A quick glance over his shoulder, then he let the pithons out from his belt; they snapped onto the rope, sliding along its length as he rolled himself over the edge. He’d held on for a moment, then had followed the loop down underneath the platform.
A crisscross metal forest of support struts and other dangling ropes, shadows forming an abstract grid against the building’s wall. Axxter was still catching his breath – as much of it as he could force past the fright and nausea in his throat – and sorting out the thoughts whirling inside his head, when he heard a voice shouting above him
“Hey! There he is!”
He looked up and saw a face, upside down, greasy braided mustache dangling past a warrior’s forehead. Just that, meters away, the warrior’s body hidden by the platform. The warrior grinned nastily, then lifted his head, shouting back to his comrades. “He’s down here!”
Shit – Axxter let go of the rope as he grabbed another one with his free hand. The pithons whipped around and fastened on.
More shouting from above, several joining in the cry of pursuit. He stretched for and caught one of the struts running into the wall at a forty-five-degree angle. He wrapped his legs around it and inched down.
“Ya little fucker! Your ass is grass!”
Tilting back his head, he could see the warriors clambering over the edge of the platform. Their rage had simmered down to calculation and the expection of more fun to come. He was giving them more enjoyment than they’d expected; a little spirit to this one.
Sonsabitches. A glance over his shoulder, to try to work out where he was heading, had loosed his brain inside his skull, spinning sickeningly. The hinge of his tongue thickened, choking him. Bastards – fear brought out his own anger, his vision blurring with salt. He’d never been this far out before, with nothing around him, neither horizontal floor nor the building’s wall to grab onto.
A loud metallic clang jarred his ears, the noise buzzing up through his fingers where they gripped the strut. From the corner of his eye, Axxter saw one of the warriors, arm swooping around in a follow-through. The knife had zipped past his head, hit the strut, and fastened on. A black wire slid lengthening out of its haft, danced snakelike in the air for a second, then spotted the nearest of Axxter’s pithons.
The knife’s wire sliced through the pithon; Axxter felt himself fall backward until the other lines caught the slack, redistributing his weight among them. A surge of panic, his fingers clutching tighter on the strut; he opened his eyes and saw the black wire weaving back and forth, the sensor at the tip searching for another target.
It struck, darting toward another of the pithons. Axxter forgot his hold, and grabbed for it. The wire wrapped around his hand, burning across his knuckles. The sudden pain jerked his hand back, and the knife popped loose from the metal where it had lodged. A red welt striped his palm as the wire slid away, the knife’s own weight sending it flying from him, then dropping into empty space below.
He remembered where he was – the view of the knife spinning down to the clouds snapped him around, wrapping both arms around the strut, his heart pounding against the metal.
“That’s right, sweetheart.” A leering voice from above. “You just hang on tight, right there, and we’ll be down to get ya. And then – then we can all have a little party. Won’t that be fun?”
Axxter looked up to the platform’s edge. A pair of warriors had already clambered onto the first joint of the struts. The sight pushed away his acrophobia, a bigger fear supplanting that. Palms wet, he loosened his grip enough to slide down to the wall.
The pithons had the right skills built in, overriding his own clumsiness; the boot lines let go of the strut and struck holds on the wall when he was still a meter away. They dug in and contracted, pulling him within range for the belt lines – all but the one clipped by the knife, the stub now waving futilely about – to join them, anchoring him safely to the building. He could hear the warrior’s heavy boots clanging against metal above his head, and their laughter and shouts to each other, as he let go of the strut. His dead weight, palms flat against the wall, triggered the pithons’ abseil mode, the lines whipping down-wall in rotation. He picked up speed in the controlled fall, friction burning the side of his face.
A break: the sentries at the encampment’s main gate had deserted their posts. Probably when the ruckus had broken out up in the big tent, Axxter figured. Didn’t want to miss the fun. He slowed the pithons’ furious motion, braking himself against the wall; he’d already spotted the Norton where he’d left it before. A sigh of relief – the motorcycle could have been off grazing, scraping up lichen for its conversion tanks. The Mass warriors would’ve been on his ass in the few minutes it would’ve taken to whistle the machine back here.
He scrambled over the sidecar and onto the Norton’s seat, the belt pithons locking him into place. Already praying, harder than usual, as he fumbled the key into the lock and hit the ignition. The engine coughed, sputtered – agonizingly; the shouts of the warriors rang in the distance above – then caught, roaring into life. He hit the gears and punched it.
Falling straight down, faster than falling; Axxter rolled the throttle, pouring on more. The wind pulled his face back into a rigid mask, lips bloodless against his teeth. He leaned low over the handlebars, chest pressing on the gauges. Staring downwall, to the clouds far below. The speed made him giddy, the hammer of air down his throat pumping blood into his roar-filled ears. Never this fast before; he’d always been too scared before. But now – I just never got scared enough. The flash of realization banged through his skull and was gone, swirling behind him
He looked over his shoulder, sighting across his bowed spine and the Norton’s rear fender. He saw them, upwalclass="underline" the Havoc Mass warriors, a posse in hot pursuit. It had probably taken them a half-minute or so to sort themselves out, leader and crew, rough strategy shouted to each other, then wheel out their fastest vehicles, then get on and dive toward the target, the throat they wanted to tear out, the limbs they wanted to spread and dance upon. Too far away to see their faces, but Axxter knew they’d be grinning.
All right, all right; just think. Think – he clamped his teeth against the battering wind, commanding his brain into gear. Figure it out…
A shudder ran through the Norton’s frame, jarring his hands. The grappling lines spun in a blur from the front wheel’s hub, locking onto the transit cable, then snapping loose. Axxter turned his head toward the Watsonian. The sidecar had lifted free of the wall, airborne by a few centimeters. Its single wheel struck the metal surface every few meters, spinning through a burst of sparks.