Light Shaper by Albert Nothlit

Author:Albert Nothlit [Nothlit, Albert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: science fiction
ISBN: 978-1-63476-569-5
Publisher: DSP Publications
Published: 2016-08-16T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

BARROW LED Rigel through the rooftops, constantly looking down and expecting to see somebody pursuing them. When the tight-packed buildings started to rise more sparsely and with wider gaps between one and the next, they were forced to go down, out onto street level. Barrow quickly got his bearings and led Rigel straight ahead. There was no public transport in this part of the city, so they walked for nearly two hours before they got to the edge of the slums, where proper buildings ended and a seemingly endless expanse of improvised housing began. Then they paused and had a quick breakfast at a run-down diner before heading back out onto the street.

“Wow,” Rigel told him, walking beside Barrow. “I’ve never actually been this far north.”

“Not many city people do. No reason to come here, really, unless you want something illegal or have nowhere else to go.”

Barrow began to weave his way through the extremely narrow passageways between the boxy and irregular constructions that passed for houses in this area. Rigel followed close behind. Barrow didn’t know the entire zone, but he had accompanied the captain of the Titania many times to this particular section when Barrow had still worked for him. This had been a good place to find illegal, hard-to-come-by fuel whenever they’d had to make unscheduled trips to another Haven. It wasn’t exactly safe to shop in the slums’ Night Market, which was why Barrow had come acting as a bodyguard. At this time of day, though, Barrow did not expect any trouble unless he drew a lot of unnecessary attention to himself. He wanted to go to the tavern strip, a depressing alley full of pickpockets and worse where people like Streaker usually hung out. If anybody could get them an illegal vehicle for the desert, it would be him.

The streets were quiet. By then it was almost noon. Out here in the slums, people did not usually have air-conditioning in their shacks, but the tightly packed houses were built with overhanging roofs, so the streets and alleyways would be in perpetual shadow. The roofs themselves were covered with scavenged bits of highly reflective material, old ceramic tiles, or even discarded solar panels so the merciless sunlight was deflected and people didn’t roast to death during the day. As in the rest of Aurora, however, the real activity began after sunset. The Market farther inside only opened after dark, and the vast majority of the businesses were closed during the daytime.

“Steve?” Rigel said softly as they walked.

“Hm?”

“Someone’s following us.”

Barrow didn’t react outwardly, but he prepared himself for another fight. He hoped it was only a random crook hoping to jump them and get some easy money. If it was somebody more dangerous, it would be a really bad idea to start a big gunfight in here. The people in the slums were extremely poor, but they were also a tightly knit community that did not react well to disturbances from the outside.

“Steve?” Rigel repeated.

“I heard you the first time,” Barrow snapped.

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