Part 18 (2/2)
It rose so high above the lake you didn't need a respirator at the top.
We walked in grim silence. I knew it wasn't as far as it seemed that night. We'd all been before, for field trips and with our families. But we had been running around all night, and now we were carrying Tick, taking turns to carry him on our backs. I didn't even look up to watch the Cathedral draw near, just kept walking, eyes on my boots as I put them one in front of the other. Every now and then I slipped on the wet path, slick with some fluid that I was too tired to guess about.
When it was my turn to hold Tick I could hear his hoa.r.s.e breathing against my back. It was getting harder and harder to suck air through my mask-I could imagine how he felt. The drugs had only a limited effect. I remembered taking them myself, being tired all the time and wanting desperately to take a full breath but unable to.
It will be better when we get to the Cathedral, I thought, and s.h.i.+fted Tick up a little higher. He snuggled into my back.
When we reached the gap in the cliff where a narrow pa.s.sage had been cut, Tick and I almost didn't fit. My elbows and Tick's feet sc.r.a.ped against the rough rock, and my feet slipped on the shallow steps, worn smooth by the pa.s.sage of so many feet and now running with tiny rivulets of liquid. I went down hard on one knee and Tick gasped and grabbed at my neck, choking me.
”Stop it, Tick!” I said, strangled. ”Not so tight.”
”Randy, I want to go home,” Tick whimpered.
”Stop it. We're almost there.”
”Please, Randy. I'm sorry I asked to come.”
Shut up! I wanted to scream at him, but I had practically no breath left myself. I just grunted, and s.h.i.+fted him again.
We squeezed through the last turn, and at last we were only ten steps away from the top. Dallas, Austin, and Jenn were already at the railing, their masks off and their faces aglow in the light from the lake. As soon as I reached them I sat at their feet, tumbling Tick to the ground and ripping off his mask and then my own. This high up it was like breathing filtered air, the fumes that offga.s.sed from the lake staying low over the surface of the reservoir. I sucked in air, patting Tick on the back while he coughed and gurgled. Gradually his breathing slowed and color came back into his face.
We didn't say much, just looked out over White Lake. Far off in the distance, the fueling s.h.i.+ps sunk their long tubes into the lake, like giant insects hovering around water. Skimmerboats zoomed around them, and we could see the lakefront teeming with activity. Up at the Cathedral it was quiet and peaceful. Even the constant glow was muted and a few stars shone overhead. The air was sweet and a light breeze ruffled our hair. I snuck a look at Jenn's profile, absorbed in the view. She had grown while she was away. Her face had angular planes now where before her cheeks had been round and comfortable. I could see what she would look like all grown up, and I didn't like the way it made me feel. Like I was being left behind.
”Randy, which one's pop's name?” Tick's voice was back to normal. I tore my gaze from Jenn's face. Hundreds of names were inscribed on the Cathedral wall, perpetually lit up by the glow from the lake that killed them. We could read them from here.
”Fourth from the bottom, Tick, middle column.” Four more had died since firs'pop.
I couldn't stall much longer. In a few months I would have to take my place on the lake, earning a living like my parents. The extra cash would come in handy-Tick would get a new pair of lungs that much sooner. Never mind that it would never be enough. There would always be new lungs to buy for someone. Heck, once I started working on the lake, my respirator would never completely protect me from the fumes. We worked first for lungs down there. I turned away from White Lake toward the Cathedral. The Cathedral was part of the ma.s.sive escarpment that blocked White Lake and the s.p.a.ceport from the Glory Sea. It was hard to believe that on the other side of the Cathedral was a whole other world that I had never seen and never would see. It could be on the other side of a jump gate for all the chance I had to go there, anymore. If firs'pop hadn't-I cut off that thought. Sometimes I just got tired of thinking about it.
”What the-” Dallas jumped up, swiping at his jeans. ”I'm wet!”
”Wet!” Jenn scrambled to her feet, checking her uniform. It clung damply to her backside, and I swallowed hard. Then the wet registered and I got up too, looking around. A slow dark patch spread out from the Cathedral Wall, creeping toward the in trail we had just come up. Another rivulet meandered toward the railing and the drop to White Lake. Tick whimpered and I knew what he was thinking. Leaking fuel. But in the next instance my common sense caught up with me. If it had been fuel, we would all be choking from the fumes by now. With the others watching me I knelt and took off my glove and touched a finger to the wet. I brought it to my tongue.
Salt water.
The Cathedral wall was leaking.
”What do we do?” Austin said, her eyes wide.
”We have to tell someone,” I said with a calm that came out of nowhere.
”So much for sneaking back in,” Dallas said. His voice had an eerie grownupness about it. We all looked at the spreading water heading for the lip. This small amount of water posed no threat. It would vaporize before it fell to the lake's surface. But if the leak grew-I thought of water reacting with the hydrazine in the lake, the heat sending the entire reservoir boiling over into the town. My stomach knotted.
”We should find out where it's coming from. Maybe we can plug it up,” Jenn said. We trooped back to the wall, following the trail. It led us along the base of the Cathedral and we wound around some fallen rocks away the viewing ledge. The paving stones were broken and dusty, and the native plantings were withered. We could follow the water easily through the mess, a dark trail against the dust and rock.
The leak came from a narrow crevice stuck between two folds in the Cathedral's wall. I stuck my hand in as far as it would go, feeling cold salt water on my fingers. I wiggled my fingers and dislodged a piece of rock. Water gushed.
”s.h.i.+t!” I said and withdrew my hand.
”What?” they demanded and I reddened. I couldn't say I had just made it worse.
”Okay,” Jenn said. ”Dallas, Austin, and Tick-you guys try to block this up. Randy and I will head back to town and tell the port authority.”
”I want to go!” Tick said. He started to cry. Jenn knelt.
”Tick, listen. We have to go really really fast. It's better for you if you stay up here where the air is fresh. Don't worry. We'll come back for you guys.”
”With grownups,” I added. ”They'll be able to carry you all the way down and you won't have to walk or breathe hard.”
”Can you get firs'mama to come?” he sniffled.
”I'll try,” I hedged, thinking grimly that it wasn't going to be pretty when I told firs'ma where Tick was.
We left them scrounging for rocks and dirt to block the leak, and headed back to the surface. I hated putting my respirator back on, feeling it clamp off my air and make every breath a ch.o.r.e. The filtered air smelled of sweat and bad breath.
Jenn and I jogged down the trail steadily, not talking at all. The water was running fast. I remembered my fingers wiggling in the crevice and the sudden increase in the flow. I began to run, pa.s.sing Jenn and slipping on the uneasy footing.
”Randy!” she cried as I went down, sliding painfully along the trail. My jeans tore on the rocks, and I skinned my knee. I got up and hobbled painfully a few steps, my breathing tortured.
”We have to hurry,” I gasped, clasping my hand over my stinging knee. It throbbed and blood welled in the scratches. I thought of the fumes from White Lake entering my vascular system through the cuts, and smiled wanly at Jenn. She was as filthy as me, her uniform streaked with dust and mud, and her hair pulled out of her neat braid. She grabbed my hand and we ran on, me limping a little.
The party had died down. Hardly anyone was out on the boardwalk any more, and most of the bars had gone dark. The streetlights were dimmer now, and the throng had thinned almost completely. There wasn't a patrol to be found. Jenn and I banged on doors and ran up to the few stragglers, but no one answered and the drunks were unhelpful. Finally we stopped in the middle of a deserted street, sucking air.
”What now?”Jenn said, throwing up her hands. I kept one gloved hand over my knee.
”Let's go to my house,” I said. ”They might even listen to me before they kill me.”
She didn't laugh. ”No,” she said. ”My s.h.i.+p. Come on.” She dragged me once again.
As it turned out, it was the right move. There were plenty of wharf guards around her s.h.i.+p, not to mention her parents. And Dallas and Austin's parents. And mine and Tick's.
They were milling around, talking wildly, and almost didn't see us as we came up into the floodlights that illuminated the docking bays. We shaded our eyes against the light, and were enveloped in a group of weeping adults. Jenn was doubly unlucky-her parents and what looked like all her senior officers were berating her.
”Randy, what the h.e.l.l is going on?” my second pop bellowed, his eyes red above his mask. ”Where's Tick? Is he all night?”
”He's fi-” I started ”Randy, your knee!” Second ma gasped. ”That needs to be sealed! What happened?”
”Ma-”
Jenn was having no easier time of it but she was more direct.
”There's a leak!” she yelled. Everyone turned to look at her.
”The Cathedral-water's coming through. It's leaking into White Lake.”
”Tick and Dallas and Austin are up there,” I put in. ”They're trying to plug the leak.”
<script>