“What made it stop?” Johnny whispered.
“I do not know,” Torg breathed, staring down the road where the knife had disappeared.
“It focused on the black things first.”
Both Torg and Johnny jumped. Albert had rolled up behind them, the One in his shadow. Johnny’d had all three eyes focused on the street. Not a good habit. “What do you mean?” he snapped. He didn’t like things sneaking up on him, especially if it was Albert.
“It attacked all the black things before turning on us. It prioritizes.”
Johnny squinted. “I don’t know. It was probably one of those things that took out Peralta.”
“When there weren’t any black things around them. Or Peralta and the others just got in its way.”
“Maybe,” Johnny said, one eye peering through the window. “I’m not sure though. That felt . . . weird.”
Albert’s stripes tilted. “Whatever. It was just a theory.”
“I said maybe, all right? It’s not like you were standing here.”
“Yes, you were very brave—”
“Do you think perhaps you two could kill each other later?” Torg said smoothly. “We finally have a quiet moment, why don’t we use it?”
Johnny and Albert eyed each other, the panzer behind Albert glaring at Johnny. Great, he’s made a friend. So much for Johnny’s efforts on the Pipe.
“Whatever,” Johnny said finally.
“Huh,” Albert grunted.
Torg sighed. “Better than nothing.” He swung an eye. “Shabaz, get over here.”
“What do you want?” Shabaz grumbled as she rolled out from behind the couch.
“I need you to watch the window.”
Shabaz scowled and glanced at Johnny. “I thought he was in charge. Why me?”
Torg sighed again, a little more air in it this time. “Because we need someone we can trust to watch the street, all right? If you see anything, let us know.” He rolled away, muttering to himself.
Bian looked up as Albert and Johnny tread into the centre of the room. “There’s nine of us,” she said. She flicked a guilty glance at Albert, then centred on Johnny. “Everyone’s Five and up, except for a Two and her.” She pointed at the One with Albert.
Nine left. Out of how many he’d saved following the Pipe? Dozens? The black spores had absolutely destroyed them.
“Wait a minute,” Johnny said, scanning the room. “Where’s Olli?”
“Vaped.”
“Are you serious?” He felt an emptiness right down to his stripes. What was the point? He remembered telling the emerald-bronze skid he’d better make speed his thing. Apparently, it hadn’t been enough.
“Hey,” Bian said, bumping his tread. “There are nine of us here. I’m here. You made that happen. You saved us.”
“Not all of us,” the One said, glaring at Johnny.
Yep, she’s picked a side. Although he was surprised to find himself smiling.
Bian rolled an eye. “Listen, I didn’t mean . . .”
“It’s all right, Bian,” Johnny said. “Why don’t I take this one?” Focusing two eyes on the purple-orange skid, he gave the panzer his full attention. “You’re right. It wasn’t just me.” He brought one of the eyes up to Albert. Took a deep breath. “You saved two skids. That’s worth something.”
Albert smirked, his damaged eye twitching. “Two vs. seven, huh? Johnny Drop wins again?”
“Oh, for Crisp’s sake, jackhole, I’m trying to give you some credit!”
“How magnanimous—”
“Stop it!” Bian snapped, rolling between them. “Both of you. Crisp Betty, you’re like a couple of squids.”
“Say hey to that,” Torg murmured with a grin.
“It’s not my fault,” Johnny protested. “I was trying—”
“Stuff it in your gearbox,” Bian said. “We don’t know where we are. We don’t have any idea what happened to the Skidsphere. For all we know we might be the only ones left.” Her eyes narrowed—one on Johnny, one on Albert. “We’re lost and we’re scared. And wherever we are, we’re not getting out of here without both of you. Torg’s right: you can kill each other later.”
The tension hung, then Johnny said, “Fine.”
“Fine,” Albert said in return.
“Good,” Bian said, looking anything but satisfied. “Now . . . someone should say something to the group.”
Johnny eyed Albert. The silver skid glared back at him, then his stripes tilted. “You heard Shabaz: you’re in charge. Take the spotlight, Johnny Drop. It’s what you’re best at.”
Johnny’s temperature rose again, but to his surprise Bian tread forward and bumped Albert. “You know, he may not have saved you, Albert, but he saved me. I thought that might count for something. Guess not.”
Albert’s expression evaporated. “Bian, I . . .”
“Save it,” she said, rolling away. Johnny almost felt bad for him.
Almost.
Trying to hide a smirk, he turned to the rest of the room. “All right, guys and girls, listen up. I don’t know where we are—or much else for that matter—but we’re alive.”
“Barely,” Brolin, a brown-black Seven grinned.
“Better than vaped,” Johnny grinned back. “Now if we’re going to survive we’re going to have to work together. I know we don’t really do that well.” He caught some knowing smiles and added ruefully, “And I know that some of us get along better than others, but Bian’s right: we have to try. So no more running off solo and maybe we’ll get home.”
“Where are we?” Brolin asked.
“We’ll try to work on that next.”
“How?”
“Stop asking good questions.” That got a smile from most. “We’ll figure it out, skids.”
“And what if those black things come back?” Brolin said, not smiling this time.
“We’ll figure something out,” Johnny murmured. His trail-eye was drooping again. He concentrated and brought it back into focus. Wouldn’t mind figuring out what that is either.
He turned to the Level Two, who was cream with a dark green stripe. “You’re still alive,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Yeah,” she said, trying not to stare. “Thanks to you and Albert. He got me moving back there.”
“Right. Did you follow our path? Inside the storm?”
The Two winced. “I didn’t know I was supposed to.”
“It’s all right,” Johnny said. She looked like she was going to faint. “You weren’t. So you plowed through the rain.”
Her eyes widened a bit at the memory. “Yeah.”
“But you didn’t get vaped.”
“I thought I was for sure,” she said, wincing again. “But I just . . . held it together. It hurt—snakes, did it hurt—but I tried to think of you and what happened up in . . . up in whatever that was on the Pipe. What was that?”
“I don’t know. But what you did out there,” he tapped an eye towards the door, “that was real good. I don’t think you’re a Two anymore.”
“Really?” If her eyes went any wider they were going to explode.
“You get vaped?”
“No.”
“Not a Two then. Which means you need a name.”
Apparently, they could still go wider. “Really?” she squeaked, her stripes trembling. “I thought GameCorps gave those out.”
“I don’t think they’re around just now.” That got him a nervous smile. Crisp Betty, was I like that? Johnny couldn’t ever remember feeling nervous about another skid. Cocky, sure. Dumb as grease? Yep. But he’d never been awed by anyone. Even Betty Crisp had been a target. “Looks like we’re going to have to come up with a name on our own. If you could do one thing, what would it be?”
The green stripes flushed a bit. “I’d like to tread on a podium one day.”
A podium. Singular. Yep, this one had a lot more humble than he did. But she’d survived the rain, so there was metal in there somewhere. “All right,” he said, smiling, “we’ll call you Aaliyah. I think it means ‘Exalted One.’”
“Really? That’s pretty. I don’t know how exalted I am, though.”
Johnny nudged forward. “Tell you what, I won’t tell anyone if you don’t.” Besides, a little cocky might be good for you.
“Okay,” she said, nervous but pleased. “Aaliyah. My name is Aaliyah.”
Torg rolled up. “Johnny . . .”
“Torg, nice. Be the first to say hello to Aaliyah.”
“Right on. Great name, Aaliyah. Exalted One, right?”
Johnny stifled a laugh as he saw the newly minted Aaliyah blanch, although the joy of hearing her own name followed the shame.
“Johnny, we have a problem.”
“You mean other than the ones I already know about?”
“All right, we have a new problem.”
“Fantastic,” Johnny said, shaking his stripes. “I sure hope it’s something that’s going to kill us.” He saw the look on Torg’s face. “Oh, crap.”
“Yeah,” Torg said soberly.
They rolled back to where the group huddled around a yellow-blue skid. “Daytona got tagged by one of those black things,” Torg said. “Not full on, but hard enough. He’s a Five.”
The skid looked awful. Like the others, he’d been stripped of his skins and glam, and now his colours had paled to the point where it was hard to see where his stripes began. Two of his eyes drooped to the floor, one showing only white. His treads sagged.
All over his body, blooms of black spores.
“Oh, Crisp Betty,” Johnny whispered.
“I got tagged, too,” Brolin said softly. One of the most laidback skids in the sphere, Brolin was staring at Daytona like he was going to puke. “Not bad . . . but there’s something wrong with my Hasty-Arms.”
Tagged? I ate one of those things.
Daytona’s healthy eye drifted up and focused on Johnny. “I’m . . . I’m only three. . . .” The eye dropped.
“Three?” Johnny said, looking at Torg. “I thought you said he was a Five?”
“He doesn’t mean levels,” Albert said from the back of the group, his voice rough, staring at Daytona. “He means years. He’s three years old. He should have two more.”
“We have to do something,” Bian insisted. Despite the spores fluttering across Daytona’s skin, she’d nudged up to him and was gently running a hand across his body.
Johnny looked around, lost. His gaze, as it always seemed to do, settled on Albert.
The silver-white skid looked back, his damaged eye squinting, until his stripes pulsed once. As if it cost him, he swallowed and said: “Whatever happened after the Pipe, you saved more than me. If anyone’s going to try something, it should be you.”
And just what the hole was he supposed to try? Daytona’s skin was getting worse. Half the skid was black, the darkness rolling around the body, spiky at the edges—blooms branching out from blooms, like the spores that had caused this to happen.
“Okay,” Johnny breathed. “I’ll try . . . something.”
Popping both Hasty-Arms, he reached forward and placed his hands on the wounded Five. “Daytona? Daytona?” Nothing. Beneath his hands, the skid’s body heaved with irregular gasps, as the blooms continued to spread.
Hold on skid. He took a deep breath. “Daytona, if you can hear me, concentrate on my hands. Try to hold them in your head.” Shifting a hand to the left, Johnny tried to place it on one of the black spots, but the bloom rolled away. Vape it, he thought, stay there.
To his surprise, the bloom froze. All right, he thought, trying to remain calm as he slid his hand to centre on the bloom. Here goes nothing. He closed his eyes and concentrated on the black beneath his left hand and the healthy skin beneath his right.
Immediately, he could feel the difference. The healthy skin felt warm in comparison, while the hand on the bloom felt like it was being stabbed with a million tiny pinpricks.
Daytona shifted and groaned.
“Stay with me,” Johnny murmured, keeping his eyes shut.
In the darkness following the Pipe, he’d done everything by instinct. He had no idea what he’d done, nor how long he’d taken to save each skid. Still, he remembered sending the idea of colour, the idea of a name, urging each skid to hold on. Now, he did the same, quietly repeating Daytona’s name like a mantra while trying to transfer the sensation of the healthy skin beneath his right hand to the void beneath his left.
Hold on. . . .
“Betty Crisp,” someone whispered, “it’s spreading.”
Not helping, Johnny thought, trying to shut out the voices. He reached into the black, attempting to pull the healthy skid with him, to reconnect molecule to molecule, to saturate the black with the thought of yellow, the thought of Daytona . . .
The body shifted again.
Hold on . . .
For a second, he had it. For a heartbeat, Johnny reached out and felt Daytona—or the thought of Daytona—somewhere beside him and pulled the areas of healthy skid together, closing the void . . . almost closing . . . almost . . .
Then the void bloomed beneath his right hand, right in the centre of the healthy skin. Someone cried out . . .
Vape it, Daytona, hold on!
The yellow in Johnny’s mind began to blacken . . .
. . . hold . . .
The skin beneath his hands began to dissolve . . .
. . . on.
Johnny opened his eyes in time to see Daytona evaporate into nothing.
“Snakes,” he swore softly, too exhausted to feel any rage. “Snakes, snakes, snakes.”
Bian let the hand that had been comforting Daytona drop. She nudged Johnny. “It’s all right,” she whispered. “At least you tried.”
“It’s not all right!” Johnny yelled, angry at himself, angry at her, angry at himself for being angry at her. It was as if a great big hole was opening up inside his heart and trying to pull everything he cared for down into the dark.
Looking around, he saw fear on every skid’s face. Brolin looked like he was going to scream.
“It’s not all right,” he said again, calmer. “Daytona died and he was three years old. That is not all right. And it’s got to stop.” His gaze swept the group. “I don’t know how, but I swear to you we’re going to get out of this. We are not going to die here.” He rolled up to Brolin. “I don’t know what happened to him or you, but I got tagged, too.”
“Tagged?” Torg scoffed. “You swallowed one.”
“And my eye’s been going spare since.” Johnny kept his gaze on Brolin. “We are not going to die here.” He held the look until some of the terror faded from the Seven’s face. Surveying the room again, he added, “I know that sounds like empty words, but starting now we’re going to start figuring stuff out. No one else dies.” He glanced at the purple-orange One. “And I don’t care what level you are, you need a name, panzer.”
“She’s got a name,” Albert said brusquely.
That stopped Johnny. “You gave her a name?”
“She gave herself a name.”
“You let a Level One name herself?”
A snort escaped Albert. “You really think levels matter out here? Why shouldn’t she name herself? Or does everything have to get the Johnny Drop approval?”
“All right, fine, I get it,” Johnny muttered. “Is this going to be a thing every time? I’m just checking.”
The One looked back and forth between them. “Wow, you guys really don’t like each other.”
Johnny could have said something; instead, he laughed. “Well, that’s true. All right, panzer, what’s your name?”
“Torres. And I’m not a panzer anymore.”
“You’re a panzer until Torg says otherwise. Right, Torg?”
“Damn straight, squid.”
“See? After nearly four years I’ve moved up to squid.” He eyed the purple-orange skid. “Torres, huh? Pretty flashy, don’t you think, Torg?”
“Doesn’t remind me of anyone at all.”
Snorting, Johnny said, “All right, Torres, you got a name. But whether levels matter out here or not,”—and under no circumstances was he going to let Albert know that he agreed with him—“we still have to keep you alive. Which means you need to learn not to vape yourself.”
“Not a problem.”
“Not a problem?” Johnny said skeptically.
“Albert taught me a few things,” Torres said.
Crisp, this kid’s cocky. Aloud, he said, “Albert taught you a few things, did he?” One of his eyes twitched in Albert’s direction.
Torres zipped forward and bumped Johnny. “Why? You think you’re the only one who can teach me anything?”
Did that panzer just bump me? Fighting the urge to pop her through the wall, Johnny said, “All right, that’s enough. Seriously. Not everything I say is an attack on Albert, all right?”
“Can’t be more than ninety percent, tops,” Torg said.
“Shut up, Torg.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
Betty Crisp. “Torres,” Johnny said firmly, trying to decide whether to laugh or scream, “if Albert taught you anything to keep you alive, that’s great.” He took a deep breath, flicked an eye at Albert, and said, “Really. It’s great.”
He was pretty sure they both thought, Vape me, at the same time.
“Oh, he taught me plenty. See?” Before they could react, Torres zipped out the door into the same frozen rain that had already killed a Level One today.
“Torres!” Albert and Johnny yelled, even as they heard a roar of pain.
Before they could get halfway across the room, the purple skid came screeching back through the door, roaring at the top of her lungs. With a tremendous crash that flattened her whole body out of round, Torres popped off the wall and swerved to a halt in front of the stunned crowd.
“I did it!” she screamed in a triumphant voice that made it blatantly clear she hadn’t been sure she could do it. All three of her eyes were wild with glee and terror. “Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow,” she half-growled, half-roared, spitting out each ‘ow’ like a curse. “Ow. Crisp Betty that hurt.” She froze, eyes centred on a single thought, then she bounced off the walls again, hard, and popped both Hasty-Arms. “I did it!” she yelled again.
“Wow,” Johnny said, stunned. “That was stupid.”
Some—but not all—of the glee fell from Torres’s face and she rolled right up to Johnny. “I’m alive, ain’t I?” she protested. “Now we know.”
“And you didn’t before?” At least she hadn’t bumped him this time. “You could’ve got yourself killed.”
Stabbing a Hasty-Arm towards Albert, Torres spoke—fiercely, like she was declaring war. “He saved me. He told me what to do to save myself. I trust him.”
Tension rose, but this time it wasn’t Torg or Bian who relieved it. It wasn’t Johnny.
“Okay, Torres,” Albert said, rolling forward. He looked shaken, his damaged eye blinking repeatedly. “That’s enough. Thank you, but . . . it’s enough.” He glanced at Bian, as if offering peace. “Bian’s right. We all need each other. Everyone.”
Torres glared at Johnny, then the glee won over once more. “Did you see that, Albert?”
“Yes,” Albert said, taking a long shaky breath. “It was very impressive.”
“For a squid,” Torg drawled.
“Hey,” Torres said, swinging towards Torg, instantly hurt, “I’m not . . . oh.” With a look of innocence that Johnny knew very well, Torg gazed back at her.
“Oh,” the purple skid said again. “Okay, I get it. Thanks.” A shy but wicked grin crossed her face. “Panzer.”
“Old Panzer,” Torg corrected her. “Come here, we’ll work on the lingo.”
As Torg and Torres rolled away, Johnny said to Albert, “You know she was going to do that?”
“No.” Staring out the open door, the silver skid looked like he half-expected Torres to jump back out into the frozen rain.
“Right, uh . . . nice work then.” Johnny hesitated, then added, “What did you tell her?”
“Same thing we all learn. Start with colour. Feel it, don’t think. Hold on. Pull it together. She’s smart, she’d have figured it out on her own. But we don’t have time.”
“Huh,” Johnny said. “Well . . . it worked.”
“Yeah,” Albert said. He exhaled violently. “Stupid squid.”
For a moment—just a moment—they made eye contact, each with a faint knowing grin. Then, realizing it at the same time . . . the grins faded and they looked away.
Torres was taking congratulations from the rest of the room. She exchanged names with Aaliyah, each skid grinning like they’d just won the Slope. Bian was talking to Brolin, saying something low and soothing. Johnny caught her looking his way before she quickly averted her gaze. Something was going on there, but damned if Johnny knew what it was.
Torg rolled up. “Interesting skid,” he said, an eye on Torres.
“Yeah,” Johnny agreed. “She’s a lippy one.”
Torg barked a laugh. “I could see how that could get annoying.”
“Shut up, Torg.”
“Sure thing, boss.”
Johnny sighed. “You gonna keep calling me that?”
“I’m giving it some serious consideration.”
Johnny chuckled; he never could get mad at Torg. Sometimes he wished he had the old panzer’s equilibrium.
“Nice to have a positive,” Torg murmured, tapping an eye towards Torres.
“Yeah,” Johnny said. It was pretty amazing the effect it had on everyone. For the first time since they’d fallen into the darkness, every skid in the room seemed to relax. Johnny began to believe that maybe they’d find a way out after all.
That’s when the storm kicked back in.
“Snakes, that’s loud,” Johnny swore as the wind instantly geared up to a roar.
“Uh, guys?” Shabaz said, perched near the window. “I think there’s something out there.”