Without water he was going to have to turn back. It was a defining moment in his odyssey.
Without letting himself think about it he pulled off his boots, pants and jacket, and slid down the smooth sloping wall. The water was so cold it shocked him, and it was deep; he couldn’t feel the bottom. When he came bobbing back up he was faintly alarmed that he had already been washed some way towards the stump of the bridge. The current must be stronger than it looked.
With a couple of strokes he reached the canal wall. It was smooth, but by pushing his hands against it he was able to resist the current. Feeling safer, he ducked his head and scrubbed his hair clean of dust, and took long deep draughts of the water. It was chill, for it was meltwater from Nightside, and slightly sparkling; Mars’s water was rich in carbon dioxide.
Refreshed, he felt his energy return. There were more cities strung out along the canal like pearls on a necklace. He could hide out for days, and how that would make his parents worry.
But he was starting to feel cold, deep inside. Time to get out. He pushed off from the wall and let himself drift downstream. When he reached the ruined abutment he grabbed at projecting stones. But they were all slick with some green slime, and slid maliciously out of his hands. Scared now, he shoved himself at the protruding stones. He managed to halt his slide down the river, but only by clinging on with all his limbs, like a spider, and the water still plucked at his legs and torso.
He was getting very cold, and tiring quickly, his muscles aching. He had walked along the canal for hours and had seen nothing but smooth walls. If he lost his grip here, he would be washed away until he drowned – or, even worse, the Mist would alert his parents, who would come sweeping down in the family flitter to rescue him. The first real decision he had made had been a stupid one, and all his defiant dreams of showing his parents he was worthy of their respect were imploding.
He was starting to shiver. He had no choice. He prepared to call for the Mist’s help.
‘Up here.’
The voice came from above. Looking up, he saw three heads silhouetted against the sky, three small curious faces peering down. ‘Who are you?’
‘Try there!’ The middle figure leaned over and pointed. It was a girl, a bit younger than he was. She was pointing at a shelf on the canal wall, all but invisible from his position down here. With an effort he lifted up his hand and grabbed at the shelf. It was dry and he grasped it easily, and already felt safer.
‘All right,’ the girl called down. ‘Now see if you can reach that foothold. To your left, just behind that broken stone…’
In this way, with the girl spotting one hand- or foothold after another, he managed to haul himself up out of the water.
Exhausted, he flopped on his belly on the bank.
He got his first good look at the children who had helped him. They were a girl and two boys. The girl looked about twelve, and the boys, wide-eyed, were no more than eight or nine. They wore simple shifts of bright blue cloth that looked oddly clean. They weren’t alike, not like siblings, a family.
One of the boys approached him, and Symat reached out a hand. But there was a soft chime, and his fingers passed through the boy’s palm. The boy yelped and drew back, as if it had hurt.
Symat looked at the girl. ‘You’re Virtuals.’
She shrugged. ‘We all are. Sorry we can’t help you up.’
‘I can manage.’ Not wanting to shame himself before this girl, he rolled on his back and sat up, panting hard.
The Virtuals stared at him. ‘My name is Mela,’ the girl said. ‘This is Tod, this is Chem.’
‘I got stuck,’ Symat said, hotly embarrassed.
Mela nodded, but he saw the corners of her mouth twitch. ‘You ought to put your clothes back on before you get too cold.’
One of the boys, Tod, said in a piping voice, ‘We can’t get them for you.’
‘Sorry,’ said the other, Chem. ‘Would you like some food?’
‘Yes.’
‘We’ll show you.’
Symat towelled himself on his jacket and dressed. His clothes dried quickly, and, sensing his low body temperature, warmed him. The three Virtual children watched him silently.
They led him into the city, away from the canal. They walked with a sound of rustling clothes, even of boots crunching on the scattered sand. But of the four of them only Symat left footprints.
‘We saw you breaking the windows,’ Tod said. ‘Why did you do that?’
‘Why not?’
Tod considered. ‘It’s wrong to break things.’
‘But nobody’s coming back here. People are leaving the planet altogether. What difference does it make?’
‘My parents are coming back,’ Chem said.
Mela said softly, ‘Chem—’
‘I wouldn’t throw stones,’ the boy said. ‘My parents wouldn’t like it.’
‘What parents? … You couldn’t throw stones anyway,’ Symat said. ‘You’re a Virtual.’
That seemed to hurt the boy, and he glanced away.
Mela was slim, thoughtful, grave. She didn’t react to this exchange one way or another. But somehow she made Symat feel ashamed of upsetting the Virtual boy.
They came to a building, an unprepossessing block in a neighbourhood of crystalline spires. It was as unlit as the others. ‘There’s food in here,’ Tod insisted. ‘Through that door.’ They stood waiting for him to open the door.
‘Why don’t you go in? You’re Virtuals. You could just walk through the wall.’
Mela said, ‘Protocol violations. We aren’t supposed to.’
‘It hurts,’ Chem said.
Symat said, ‘I haven’t been around Virtuals much.’ He stepped forward, pushed at the door’s polished surface, and it slid open.
The building was an apartment block. They wandered through suites of rooms. Heavy furniture remained, chairs and tables and beds, but smaller items had been taken away.
‘I’ve seen people take stuff,’ Symat said. ‘Clothes and ornaments and toys, even sets of plates to eat dinner. They carry them in suitcases and boxes when they go through.’
Mela asked, ‘Through where?’
‘Through the transfer booths. Imagine carrying plates and forks and knives into another universe!’
‘What are they supposed to take?’ Mela asked reasonably.
They came to a kind of kitchen, where a nanofood replicator was still functioning. Symat asked it to prepare him something warm, and soon rich smells filled the air.
‘It probably needs restocking,’ Mela said. ‘You can scrape up some algae from the canal, I guess.’
Chem said sharply, ‘If you can keep from getting stuck!’ He and Tod laughed.
Mela reproved the boys. Symat sat at a table and ate in dogged silence. The Virtuals stood around the table, watching him.
Chem said, ‘Of course you won’t have to put more glop in the nanofood box if your parents come for you.’
‘They won’t come,’ Symat said, chewing. Mela watched him with that quiet gravity, and he felt impelled to add, ‘They don’t know I’m here.’
‘Are you hiding?’ Chem asked. ‘Did you run away?’
‘Did you do something wrong?’ Tod asked, wide-eyed.
‘They want me to go into a transfer booth with them. I don’t want to go.’
Chem said, ‘Why not?’
‘Because it would feel like dying. I haven’t done with this world.’