Joyride by Patrick Ness

Author:Patrick Ness
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2017-07-20T04:00:00+00:00

FIFTEEN

AN ABATTOIR IN SILHOUETTE

The smell is what wakes him. As Ram struggles to his feet in the dark room, he can’t even begin to imagine what it is that reeks so badly. His glasses have fallen off, so he puts them back on and squints at the purple, shiny lump in front of him, just barely lit by the light through a dirty window. He finally realises it’s a face, and the panicked cry that comes from him is entirely involuntary.

In a way, the low light helps him realise what it is he’s looking at. If the body parts around him had been clear, he might have been distracted by their alienness, but in the semidarkness, the shape and the foul smell is enough for him to realise he’s sitting in the remains of a massacre. They’re clearly not human bodies, but he can recognise the shape of severed limbs when he’s looking at them.

His hands are sticky and he wipes them on the front of the suit he’s wearing, desperate to be clean. How many bodies are there? He just can’t tell—it’s an abattoir in silhouette and he’s never been more desperate to get out of somewhere in his life.

He gets up and carefully walks over to the window, hoping to get a sense of where he is. The glass is so dirty he can barely see through it, just the vague shape of a wall outside and a thin band of sky above. At least it’s not blacked out like the others. He guesses whoever refitted this place didn’t want to come in here, not with all the remains. Maybe that will be useful—could he break the window and get through it before someone comes running? Then he has to remind himself of his new size and wonders if he can get through it at all.

At least he’s not dead, though if he’s stuck in this body for the rest of his (likely now much shorter) life, he’s not entirely sure he wouldn’t prefer to be.

So where did all the dead aliens come from? Did Fletcher kill them? Were they already dead when he found this place? Did Fletcher steal all this stuff? It makes sense that it would be alien; it’s not like you can pop into the Apple Store and buy body-swap kits, and this obviously isn’t an official government setup.

Who knows? Right now, Ram’s not even sure he cares, he just wants to get out. Trapped here, he’s in no position to fix anything. At least if he can get free he might be able to do something, to find some way of forcing them to give him his own body back.

In fact, why haven’t they swapped him back already? The clue’s in the company name, Joyriders; this obviously isn’t supposed to be a permanent deal. Whoever’s riding around in his body, the owner of this annoying bag of bones, is expecting to get his body back. So why hasn’t he already? What’s gone wrong?

They

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