Then, with an effort that made him grunt and the sweat pop out afresh on his forehead, he lifted the Sleeve with his other arm as high as he could, and then let it fall.
“Perhaps my friend, had you not been acting alone, you and I would not now be—hey!”
For the briefest of instants, as his superweighted arm smashed through the grate, Valerian allowed himself to snicker in triumph. But, too late, he realized that not only did the Sleeve pull him down to the next level—it took him through the next level.
And the next… and the next…
Crash.
Crash.
Crash.
By the fourth floor, Valerian had figured out that he needed to align the rest of his plunging body with the implacably weighted Sleeve arm. By the fourteenth, he had almost mastered the position. But by the time he landed hard on the twentieth, and had realized, somewhat to his surprise, that he wasn’t going to be treated by a twenty-first floor awaiting him, he was more than grateful that the unexpected and painful ride had come to a halt— jarring though that halt had been.
Valerian caught his breath and looked around. Still slightly addled from the twenty-story-floor-smashing spree, he tried to orient himself and get his bearings. Which, Valerian discovered, was kind of hard to do when you were in the middle of a virtual reality toy store, which in itself was a whole other world.
He felt positively bombarded by color. Swirls of purple, blue, green, fuchsia, bright yellow, orange, and every single combination of color therein assaulted his eyes. Clothing that he assumed to be costumes of some sort hung on a rack on one wall. Mimic masks, which took a scan of one’s face and turned it into a variety of alien faces, were piled on another shelf. A floating scooter of some sort hummed along six feet over his head. Figurines of various galactic heroes cluttered one wall, while toy weapons were stacked up against another. Games, balls, spaceships, candy, you name it, if it appealed to anyone under the age of ten—and, he had to confess while looking at some of the figurines, a little over ten—it was here in rainbow-vomit glory.
His dizzy gaze and bemused brain were both sharply redirected when something soft, squishy, and foul-smelling landed on his visor with a plop.
A sound that was unmistakably alien, and also unmistakably giggling, reached his ears as he wiped it off, wrinkling his nose at the stench. It was, lamentably, exactly the substance he had suspected.
He turned to regard the small Da child, who gazed at him, still giggling. He looked like a toy, too, about two feet tall, round, soft, and peachy-pink. His eyes were very tiny, as was his mouth, and there was no noticeable nose. He wore a yellow hat, and orange and yellow overalls. His three-fingered hands were closed about a bright orange and red toy gun. It operated, on a much simpler scale, the same way as the Mül converter did. You put something in the top, and it came out the barrel of the gun in large quantities.
In this the “something” was—
“I got you!” the child said triumphantly, his tiny mouth barely moving. “You’re all poopy now!”
Valerian forced a smile. “Very funny,” he said, wiping his hand on the floor, “but I’ve got something even better. Watch this.”
Fishing inside his shorts pocket, he took out a small device. One-handed, he maneuvered the scanner. In two seconds, it had analyzed the cluster of ball bearings on his arm and reproduced one. Valerian tossed the small metallic ball to the young prankster, who caught it deftly with his mitten-like hands.
“Here you go, kid,” he said, grinning. “Put this in your gun. It’s way more fun.”
Elated, the child did exactly that, and just in the nick of time.
Junior came barreling through the door. Almost three times as tall as the small Da, he was fast and he was angry. His small remaining eye glowed with rage, and he would be on Valerian in a heartbeat. Junior was so focused on killing Valerian with his bare hands—or at least roughing him up pretty severely before handing him over to Pops— that he didn’t draw his weapon.
But the kid, the wonderful, marvelous, poop-gun-toting child, turned to the intruder and gleefully opened fire. Though much healthier looking than his father, Junior appeared to lack Igon’s sinister cunning, because all he could do was stare in slack-jawed confusion as thousands of tiny ball bearings sped through the air to fasten themselves on his metal armor. He grunted, baffled, as the weight forced him to drop to his knees.
“So long, Junior!” Valerian exclaimed cheerfully.
He hit a switch on another small piece of equipment he’d fished out from his kit. All the ball bearings on his Sleeve, every last one of the tiny, cursed things, flew across the room to latch onto Junior’s already laden shoulder plates.
The weight of two rounds of ball-bearing fire, plus Junior’s own weight—which had to have been considerable—was too much for the floor. With a crack that sounded like a groan, it gave way, and Junior dropped down to the floor below. Valerian strained to listen and heard the satisfying sound of another crack, and then, more faintly, another.
After being so horribly weighted, his muscles were quivering on the Sleeved arm, which felt like it was about to float away. Valerian got to his feet and went to the kid, clapping him approvingly on the shoulder.
“You’re right! That was fun! Who do we shoot next?” the child exclaimed gleefully.
“Hey now,” said Valerian sagely, “there’s a time for everything, son. Don’t you have homework to do?”
The child’s face fell. On impulse, Valerian wiped another stinky gob from his visor and dabbed it onto the child’s face. The child gaped, then took a deep breath and let loose a mighty wail and began to sob.
“Go on. Go on home. Run to mommy. Get yourself cleaned up!”
He heard a sound behind him. Turning, Valerian looked up…
…and up. Before him towered a being that was obviously the same species as the poop-anointed, sobbing child. In fact, its proportions were almost identical—right down to the soft shape, large head, and tiny eyes and mouth.
Except it was seven feet larger and probably weighed as much as Junior.
Valerian felt the blood drain from his face as he blurted out, “…Mommy?”
Her tiny mouth went from the size of a fingernail to the size of Valerian’s—no, Junior’s—fist. It occupied the entire lower half of her face, showcasing an impressive set of sharp fangs.
From that enormous mouth came an equally enormous bellow that left Valerian’s ears ringing. He wasted no time pelting out the door as fast as his legs would carry him.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The next several minutes or… however long it was, were a blur.
Igon Siruss’s team was highly coordinated, restricted, apparently, only by the fact that they seemed to want to take the spatio-temporal agent alive. For now, at least. Siruss struck him as someone who could easily change his mind about such niceties.
So for now, Valerian ran. He scrambled onto the virtual representations of expensive antiques, launching his rubber-soled feet off the heads of ancient alien rulers to scrabble atop a roof. He ran across illusionary old tiles, unable to see his own body—well, most of it, anyway. He tried to judge if his single available arm was strong enough to grab onto a thick, dangling creeper and swing from one faux rooftop to another—or in one case, crash through a window right in the middle of what appeared to be a formal ceremony involving priceless dishware, which he shattered.
“It’s okay,” he shouted back over his shoulder, “remember, they’re only virtually real dishes!”
This appeared to be of no comfort to the six-legged gray-green alien merchant, who waved four of her legs at him and grated out something blistering.
Valerian had not had a lot of time to study the map, but it had been enough to let him know this place had vertical subway cars—and where they were located. He wasn’t sure exactly where he was at this point, but “up” was an excellent direction as it would be at least somewhat harder for Igon’s henchmen to give chase. “Up” wou
ld also get him back to the main level, which was the only way to reach the gate and safety. He couldn’t risk getting into a car—but he sure as hell could get on one.
And there was one of the lines, not too far ahead. No convenient car was in sight, though—not yet. “Keep the faith,” Valerian muttered to himself as he kept running. And sure enough, when he was only a few strides away, he was rewarded with the sight of a car crowded with tourists, all with faces—or what served as faces—pressed to the clear sides of the car and oohing and aahing at the view.
They were not oohing and aahing thirty seconds later when Valerian leaped and clung as best he could with his own face pressed to the side of the car. They drew back, startled. Some started to laugh and one of the kids made faces at the Sleeve with both his mouths.
Valerian couldn’t risk craning his neck to look around, as any movement might dislodge his tenuous grip. Nonetheless, he found the fact that he was not being fired upon an encouraging sign indeed.
He made it to the top and leaped off, threading his way through the unexpected volume of tourists. This level was obviously the equivalent of a checkout line. Bored-looking aliens and several humans wrapped up objects of all shapes and sizes. Once wrapped, each item went into a gray box bolted into the flooring.
“What’s this called again? A transmitter?” came a familiar voice. Just before he high-tailed it in the other direction, Valerian recognized the distinctive voice and bright red hair of the female half of the tourist couple he’d seen earlier.
“A transmatter,” the checkout person said. He was human, angular and tired-looking, with thinning hair and a forced smile. He’d probably had to repeat the words a thousand times a day. Valerian wished him well with the thousand and first.
* * *
“Oh, a transmatter, sorry,” apologized the red-headed human female. She and her husband were among the throngs of shoppers that Laureline passed, scanning the crowd for Valerian.
“It allows any object to be sent from one world to another,” the checkout person said in a monotone. “Please punch in the code you were issued with your ticket, and it’ll be waiting for you safe and sound upon your return after your exciting visit to the magnificent Big Market, the premier place for galaxy-sized bargains.”
The male tourist punched his code into the machine, and the object disappeared, dispatched to Earth, or Alpha, or wherever else the couple called “home.”
“Amazing!” cried the woman. “And so practical!”
The man did not look as enthusiastic as his wife. His face was red and sweating beneath the visor of his yellow and black helmet. “So useless, you mean,” he grumbled. “You don’t even know what you’ll do with the darn thing!”
“Oh, don’t be such a grouch, honey! It’s…” the female fumbled for a word, “…decorative. Try to be civilized for once!”
Her husband looked around. Briefly caught by the domestic drama, Laureline noticed his gaze fastened on one group of aliens, then another, then a third.
“Civilized?” he sneered arrogantly, his lip curling in barely concealed disgust. “Yeah, sure.”
Major Gibson’s voice sounded in Laureline’s ear. It was a diversion from the unpalatable display of bigotry she’d just witnessed, but the instructions were not welcome.
“Sergeant?” Gibson snapped. “Back to base, Sergeant. Immediately.”
“I can’t abandon my partner out here,” Laureline replied, still scanning the crowd.
“That’s an order, Sergeant.”
Laureline bit her lip in frustrated annoyance and concern. Her gaze traveled back to the outer wall. Reluctantly, she started heading in that direction. But as she maneuvered through the press of satisfied, and most likely broke, tourists, she asked, “Valerian? Do you copy? Answer me!”
“I hear you loud and clear,” came a welcome voice. Laureline let out the breath she hadn’t realized she had been holding.
“There you are!” she exclaimed with equal parts annoyance and relief. “It’s about time! What the hell are you doing?”
Laureline headed back toward the outer wall, casually taking a gun off one of the Siirt guards so smoothly he didn’t even notice.
“Shopping,” came Valerian’s voice.
Laureline glanced at the gun she’d just filched and thought it more likely that she was the one doing the “shopping.”
“Are you safe and sound?”
There was a long pause—long enough for Laureline’s heart to resume its previous position in her throat.
“…Almost!” His voice wasn’t quite a squeak, but it was definitely higher than usual. The words were immediately followed by gunfire.
Without breaking stride, Laureline immediately turned around and headed back to help.
But Gibson had, of course, been monitoring her, and her abrupt U-turn had not gone unnoticed. His voice came to her, clipped and angry.
“Turn around, Sergeant. The mission takes priority. We need the converter!”
Laureline lowered her chin in a gesture of stubbornness her wayward partner would have immediately recognized, had he not been, it seemed, in dire need of rescue, and kept going.
“Agent Laureline! What are you doing?”
“I won’t be a minute,” she promised.
“Sergeant! Back to base—it’s an order!”
Agonized, she obeyed. Valerian was close; he’d said so. But she’d be ready to spring into action if she heard anything more from him that warranted it.
“On my way!” she replied, trotting back to the wall, thinking, I hope I just haven’t made a terrible mistake…
* * *
Valerian raced to the end of a street that led to a wall that was wonderfully, magnificently solid. Not just any wall— the wall, the outer wall of the compound. He had never thought chunks of rocks piled atop one another could be so beautiful. He almost wanted to kiss it.
He perused the wall, wondering if he could get over it in time. It was old and weatherworn, if thick, so he could easily find footholds…
And then he thought of the oversized shoebox attached to his arm and realized it would be impossible to climb with just his right hand. He swore, colorfully. Nonetheless, he gave it a try. He had no other option. He extended his left arm and pulled himself up, scrabbling for toeholds and bracing himself with the Sleeve-encased arm while attempting to cling and release with the other. It was every bit as frustrating as he had anticipated.
Frustrating, and potentially deadly. Could he reach the gate? He turned, intending to start following the wall, to see how far away it was, and his eyes widened.
The bright sunlight that marked the end of the street was blocked by two familiar silhouettes: the tall, angular shapes of the Kodhar’Khans, and the shorter, compact, scampering ones that meant Pit-Ghors. Even as Valerian stared at them, they saw him, too. They lifted their weapons and began to fire.
Desperately, Valerian turned back to the wall, and his eye fell on something dark. A shadow… in the wall.
A hole.
A beautiful, glorious square hole where someone had removed one of the carved stone bricks. And with a little luck…
He crouched down beside it. Yes! He wriggled inside it. For an instant, he used his free hand to help maneuver, and immediately realized he’d lost the pearl. As if in slow motion he watched it roll back toward the entrance. Swearing under his breath, Valerian lunged forward, his fingers closing around it. He yanked his hand back, feeling hot breath on it as a Pit-Ghor’s gargantuan teeth snapped a bare inch away. Just then he heard a voice next to his ear.
“Need some help?”
Laureline!
She slid down next to him and they pressed tightly together in the hole. Normally, that would be a pleasant thing, but at the moment he had something a bit more important to worry about. “Just want my arm back, thanks.”
The Pit-Ghors made horrible sounds as they were unleashed and hurtled toward Valerian. He squeezed the trigger and a volley of bullets sped towar
d the creatures. They gave the Pit-Ghor equivalent of a whimper and fled back the way they had come.
Laureline opened a small flap in the side of the Sleeve. A bunch of fibers spilled out. She hunkered down and took hold of the jumble of wires and immediately began to repair them.
She was smiling as she said, “I suppose if you’re going to ask for my hand, you’d better get your own hand back first.”
He’d been peering down the various avenues of attack, but now his head whipped back to look at her, a hopeful smile on his face. “Is that a yes?”
Laureline looked up at him with those eyes and said only, “Don’t move.”
He attempted to oblige, but then he realized that the Pit-Ghors hadn’t actually retreated. They had simply run around the block and were now charging at the object they could see—the Sleeve—from the other side. Valerian swiveled his arm and fired at them.
“Cut that out!” Laureline reprimanded. “How can I fix you if you keep moving?”
“If you don’t hurry, there won’t be anything left to fix!”
Valerian fired into the charging pack. They dropped, but then he heard an awful, final click-click and realized with a sinking feeling he’d just run out of ammo. If there were any more, or if the guards came after him—
“There, that’s better! Don’t move!” said Laureline, peering deep into the mechanical entrails of the Sleeve.
Valerian’s gaze darted to each place where an attack might come. It had flickered back to the pile of dead Pit-Ghors when one of them shuddered, gnashed its sharp teeth, and started to drag itself to its feet. It shook itself, then its eyes refastened on the Sleeve, and it started to lurch toward them, gathering speed with every step.
“Faster, Laureline!” Valerian yelped. “There’s one coming this way and I’m out of ammo!”
“I’m doing my best, Major!”
“Do it faster!”
Laureline threw her hands up in the air. “Want to do it yourself?”
“Laureline, dammit, they are coming. Put your hand back on that thing!”
Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets Page 7
