The Island Of Lost Girls

by Manjula Padmanabhan

Genres: General Fiction

Synopsis

This is the story of Meiji - the only girl who has remained untouched and unmutilated in a country that has savaged its entire female population. Having saved her from certain death in the new Dark Age that has come upon their homeland, her guardian, Youngest, has transported her to the only place where she can remain safe - an Island where wounded girls are, sometimes literally, stitched back together and given a new life. But the Island itself is a menacing place, and Meiji may be in more danger than ever before. Now Youngest must find a way to infiltrate its odd environs to see what has become of his beloved girl, and escape once more...The Island of Lost Girls showcases, yet again, Manjula Padmanabhan's genius at creating searing landscapes and alternate, sometimes brutal, worlds while reaffirming the beauty and the ugliness, the cruelty and the tremendous compassion, that essentially makes us human.

Release date: July 20, 2015

Publisher: Hachette India

Print pages: 360

Sample

2

The ferry terminated at Confluenza Junction, the glittering deep-water port. Passengers disembarked at the lowest of six levels. The air was thick, steamy and vomit-flavoured. Hyenas snickered in the alcoves. Vultures perched in the overhead beams.

Passengers were released one at a time into the ferry’s luggage hold to extract their cargo. Then they swarmed out with their enormous loads and up the ramp that would ultimately lead to the Ascensor bays, on Level One far above. They used their luggage like battering rams to force their way forward. They had to hurry. Any traveller too weakened by the journey to leave the dock in a timely fashion was dispatched by the animals.

Youngest had two cases with him. Both were shoulder-height, thick and flat-sided, steel-rimmed and mounted on wheels. He sandwiched himself between them with one on either side. Using their bulk, he thrust himself forward, moving slowly but doggedly one finger-length at a time, until he was buried in the middle of the column of cursing, snarling, brawling men. After that it was just a question of being processed forward along with the rest of the mob.

Announcements were made in three languages following one after the other in strict rotation: Unida, Arabic and Mod¡Kung. As they advanced up from one floor to the next, advertising jingles began squawking from floating speakers: cloning services, prosthetic advice, beast management. Bright holograms flashed on and off offering the latest in swords, spears, double-handed axes and steel-tipped whips. Images from the playing fields of the area known as the Zone flickered on the walls: severed heads, twitching limbs, slimy mounds of gut.

Youngest looked neither left nor right.

The filth in his hair and the wounds in his nose and ears were only a small part of his benumbed state. The much bigger part was the plan he had conceived two years ago. The plan he had set in motion, step by desperate step. The closer he came to its completion, the farther he wanted to be from it; from what he had become; from what he had done to reach this position.

Now that he was at the very threshold of culmination, there was nothing left to feel but a deathly stillness. Nothing left to hear but an audio chip.

Permanently embedded in his upper jaw.

It produced a loop of sound that only he could hear. They were instructions in another man’s voice, delivered in a soft, purring monotone. It was not loud so much as it was relentless: sell-the-girl. find-the-Island. in-the-name-of-all-true-men. do-your-duty.

On and on, it went. On and on. It never stopped. He could ignore it but there were times when the words filtered up into his consciousness with fresh force.

Tiny robotic cameras buzzed and hummed, weaving above the crowd exactly like flies. He swatted them away or crushed them between his fingers, without noticing that they were machines, not insects.

At the next level up, the ramp became a moving walkway. Promotional messages about the famous terminus blared from loudspeakers.

THREE THOUSAND PASSENGERS PER HOUR!

TWENTY-FOUR-HOUR BROTHEL!

MARINE ANIMAL GLADIATORIUM!

CLONING FACILITIES FOR ONE AND ALL!

Travellers were packed five shoulders abreast now. Some, in addition to their goods, carried live animals strapped to themselves. Most were goats or sheep, but one man bore, on either shoulder, a pair of horned creatures with spotted skins. Hybrid antelopes or horned cheetah, it was hard to tell.

A traveller carrying stacks of plastic panels on his back blocked Youngest’s forward view. On his left was a clone warrior transporting stinking animal pelts. To his right was a leather-goods trader wearing strips of coloured beads instead of clothes. Strapped to the man’s front and facing him was a white goat with luminous rosy eyes. Youngest registered something distasteful about the creature, but avoided looking directly at it until a slurping sound caused him to turn his head. He saw the man with his mouth fused to that of the goat. The creature had full soft lips and a long tongue that slithered in and out of the kiss with restless energy. He stared without really intending to until the goat disengaged to focus its glowing eyes upon him.

Shuddering, he looked away at once.

All the while, lithe-bodied vendors had been sidling in and out of the crush, selling compressed meals, sexual services, hand-held toilets and immigration advice. They were all, like Youngest, transies. Some spoke in falsetto voices despite blue-stubbled chins. Others had smooth faces, plucked eyebrows and long false lashes.

It took a while for Youngest to register the persistent tapping that came from behind him. The sensation of someone plucking at his arm continued until he responded by thrusting backwards with the case strapped to his right arm.

‘Owwie!’ yelped the vendor at once. Then he addressed Youngest in pidgin Unida. ‘Hello? Please? I am helping?’

Youngest could understand the language but had never learnt to speak it. He shoved back again, saying nothing.

The man yipped on cue but he didn’t give up.

‘Listen, Mister – or Miss? Please. I am at your service.’

Youngest said, grinding the words out with difficulty, ‘I. Is. Not. Want. Service.’ His voice was deep. Regardless of his appearance, he still sounded like a man.

‘Thank you kind Sir – or Madam?’ said the irritating fellow. ‘Thank you for speak to unworthy myself! Allow to introduce? My name is Aila.’

He pronounced it: Ah-EE-la.

Youngest was wedged in too tight to free his arms, turn around and swat the creature away. No words of adequate force came to his lips.

‘Push on,’ he said over his shoulder, knowing that he must sound ridiculously wrong. ‘Fall off.’

‘Aha! Madam is new to Port? Or is it “Sir”? Well, Sir or Madam – you is super very lucky. Actually, myself is expert in giving the helps.’

‘Run off!’ said Youngest. ‘Die! Shoo!’

‘Just listen me one time, Sir-Madam! If I is wrong, I is go. Is deal?’

‘Go now!’

‘You is first-timer in Confluenza. You is far from home. You is transie. All three is correct?’

‘Wrong, wrong and wrong. Now go.’

‘Really? You is feem, not transie?’

‘Feem? What is …?’ The words fell out before he could stop them.

‘Ha! That is means you must be transie! Very good, Madam, now I is happy.’

‘No! Go away! Go!’

‘Madam, Madam – please. I is one too. Transie. That’s why you is needs me. You is needs helps with Immigration. I is give the verygood tips. Then I is meet you on other side, yes? I is give helps to buy licenses, sexing, whatever-thing, yes? Cheapest and best?’

‘No.’

‘Reaching to Ascensor Bay is super veryslow. We is have time. Please. Let me helps you. You is thanks me.’

‘No.’

‘There is many laws in City. I is find easy permissions.’

‘No.’

‘Just tell me your name. I is find you in City, no problem.’

‘No!’

‘I is have wash-kit.’

Silence.

‘Two wash-kit,’ said Aila at once. The weakness had been found.

Youngest groaned softly. Port vendors were notorious scoundrels, thieves and con-artists. But his need to clean himself was interfering with his sanity. He heard his mouth say, ‘Okay. Yes.’

‘No need to turn around, Madam. Showing me hand is enough. It is perfectly fine. You will not regret. But kit is not for use in queue, please! On Ascensor only. Okay, I is have three wash-kit.’

The mere sound of the words ‘wash’ and ‘kit’ in close proximity had revived Youngest. He breathed in sharply, gagging on the foul air as he cursed himself for his weakness.

‘What is Madam’s team?’

‘Huh? Oh. Uh…nothing. No team,’ said Youngest.

‘Is not possible, Madam! Is must be team. Is Blue-Blue? Yes? You is wearing Blue-Blue colours. Same to mine. Thanks to Heaven. I will give the best helps. Total. Madam is showing hand to me?’ Then he broke off to exclaim, ‘Ohhh! Look, look, Madam! Look up—’

Youngest could not turn around on account of his heavy cases, but he managed to peer over his shoulder.

Aila was almost the same height as himself and leaning in close. He wore the white-and-black chequered cloth of a man’s head-cloth, yet his eyebrows were expertly penciled in. The pronounced prow-like nose and narrow face were remarkably smooth, with no evidence of facial hair. The mouth, which was full and precisely shaped, glistened with maroon lip-gloss. There were traces of colour on the undersides of his luxurious eyelashes.

His eyes were turned up, his whole face transfigured.

Youngest followed his gaze.

High above the overhead bars, he could see the glass tubes of sealed-in walkways. Within one of them, he could make out travellers sauntering along at a leisurely pace.

They must be Level One tourists, he thought. Wealthy people. They looked impossibly elegant, clean and orderly.

Then his heart jerked like a puppy on a tight leash.

Slender and languid, dressed in dainty, colourful clothes that swayed alluringly as they walked, these travellers clearly belonged to another species altogether from the sweating, stinking mob around him.

He could hear, as if at a great distance, Aila chittering like an excited squirrel.

‘Yes, yes! Madam is seeing? Maybe for first time?’

‘Who…?’ asked Youngest uncertainly. ‘What?’

Aila replied, ‘Womanses, Madam! Real womanses!’

Youngest stopped breathing.

Memories dimpled his mind like a shower of white jasmines on the still surface of a pond. Tenderness enveloped his being in a sweet mist.

But…

do-your-duty, whispered the audio chip inside his skull. sell-the-girl.

He choked back a cry. Pain and bitterness flooded back into his brain. Steel claws mauled the inner lining of his heart.

find-the-Island. do-your-duty. in-the-name-of-all-true-men. sell-the-girl.

3

Aila had left by the time it was Youngest’s turn to board the Ascensor. ‘I is see you on other side!’ he promised.

Of course you will, thought Youngest cynically. You’ve not been paid. He was grateful, nevertheless, for the various ‘helps’ provided.

Aila had given him precise instructions for boarding the glass-walled cell of the rapid transport system. ‘Is only one cell for each traveller. You is look for overhead handles. If you is use any other handle? Door is not close and alarm is start.’ It obviously happened very often, which was why the queue for the Ascensor was so long and slow-moving. ‘Catch overhead handles, and atomotic you is swing inside, straight into seat. No problem for luggages. They is follow atomotic also.’

And so it was. The instant Youngest grabbed the overhead handles, the cell’s entrance slid open, a mechanical ramp with moving treads extended up from where he stood and he was conveyed effortlessly into the glass-walled travelling chamber. His cases followed suit. Then the door snapped shut and inflation pads puffed out to secure the luggage. His own seat folded up out of the floor around him, positioned so that he faced forward, in the direction of travel.

Meanwhile the entire cell was lifted off its cradle by mechanical arms, raised up towards the continuously moving conveyor belt overhead and locked into place.

Moments later he was off, along with all the other travellers, each in his own individual glass cell.

The conveyor belt travelled within tubes of self-replenishing titanium glass. The tubes led directly towards the Suspended City, 1500 kilometres away.

The port was structured like a gigantic air-filled bell-jar rooted to the sea floor. The glass tubes and the conveyor belts within them radiated up and out of the bell-jar like straws, aimed towards a distant horizon at shallow angles. So for two hours the cells hurtled up out of the lightless depths of the sea, travelling in complete blackness. Gradually, outside the Ascensor’s tubes, colours began to appear, formed by the tortured roux of sea and earth. It writhed and churned, creating fantastical patterns now foaming yellow, now emerald green, now black, now cream.

Then the Ascensor tubes breached the sea’s surface and the vista passed from primordial chaos to Satanic light show as the surface of the water seethed and the air above it fumed. Plumes of dazzling white steam shot up against a backdrop of purple flame-streaked clouds billowing out of the constantly evolving inferno below the waves and up into the air. Bolts of lightning fizzed and sparkled, igniting further blooms of blinding white, saffron and crimson, punctuated by curving black jets.

Twenty-two years had passed since eco-anarchists had detonated underground nuclear devices at the mouth of the Suez Canal. Their aim had been to hasten the collapse of the petroleum industry. But the explosions punctured the Earth’s mantle, spewing molten magma in a furious, untamable geyser that, when it subsided, became the glowering crack now known as the Peace Gorge. In the course of the three years for which the geyser had spewed, the Suez Canal vanished into oblivion and the erstwhile Red Sea was renamed the Poisoned Sea.

Within the cell, an audio-visual presentation played a loop of three languages, detailing the history and physical structure of the region in its current configuration. Youngest tried to follow the Unida as best he could, while scouring his neck and hair, using all four squeeze-paks of compressed water from Aila’s kits. He dabbed the wounds on his nose and earlobes with care.

He had to absorb as much information as he could in these few hours. He didn’t want to draw attention to the fact that he was an outsider to these parts, that he didn’t know the history. Despite the millions of travellers, genuine outsiders were unheard of in this world.

He learnt that the Ascensor system, Confluenza Junction and the glassed-in city perched directly above the Peace Gorge had all been created as memorials to the cultures and populations from the Time Before that had been lost in the detonation. The shores of the Mediterranean had blackened and died. The planet’s ice caps had melted. The seas had risen. All but the smallest and hardiest species of wildlife on land and air had perished.

The world’s nations had melted away, too, to be reborn as the Whole World Union, the WWU. International travel had trickled to a halt prior to the collapse of the oil industry, but under the WWU the planet was split into four exclusive enclaves. No trade, no travel arrangements, no direct communications, no relocations were possible between the enclaves. Youngest already knew this. Which was why he could not afford to reveal his origin.

The map of the world in its revised configuration was fascinating to him. He knew, in theory, what it was supposed to look like but had not seen one until now. In recognition of changed realities, cartographers had turned the globe sideways. The Equator was the new Zero Meridian. The erstwhile Americas, the Poles and Australia occupied what was called the Ring Enclave. The continents once known as Europe and Asia had become conjoined as the Sunrise Enclave. The Pacific Enclave was a watery dimension all to itself, its island nations having been submerged and all traffic across it halted for lack of fuel.

And in the middle, dominating the planet, was the enclave known simply as The Zone, a giant arena for a continuous, savage and immensely popular cycle of war games.

It appeared as a monstrous, multi-coloured slab filling the centre of the screen. At first glance, Youngest had not recognized the continent he knew as ‘Africa’ because it had been turned on its side. It was sectioned off into countless divisions and subdivisions, colour-coded for the different teams that occupied them.

There was no script in this age of interactive visuals and three spoken languages. Only numerals were still written, in Arabic. Instead of titles on the map, there were points of light activated by a tap, yielding audio information.

Needless to say, the region to which Youngest belonged was missing altogether.

He had known that would be the case. Nevertheless, to see the result presented on an otherwise highly accurate map was shocking to him. An expanse of blank grey ocean stretched from where the Arabian Peninsula would have been all the way to the promontories of Myanmar and Thailand now shown extending sideways, like tusks. When he tapped the body of water shown in place of the land to which he belonged, the audio identified it only as The Void or The Deadly Ocean. The area had been given this name because, said the audio-prompt, radiation pollution was so extreme in these waters that even birds flying over it would sicken and drop out of the sky.

Nothing more was said.

Youngest continued to listen and to watch as he ate the last of his supplies. He had brought just enough for eight days, wearing the heavy sachets in a belt that encircled his waist, growing steadily lighter. Today was the seventh day.

Having cleaned himself, Youngest turned his attention now to renewing his make-up. In the months since the sex-change surgeries, he had found this to be an activity that calmed and soothed him. He thought of it as an act of meditation that returned his face to a smooth and orderly condition. It was like putting a kitchen in order before starting to cook.

He wore only the minimum, enough to establish what he now was, a man with an anatomically correct woman’s body. A touch of gloss augmented the dark plum of his generous lips, mascara lengthened his lashes and a dab of iridescence highlighted his upper lids. He had worn kajal even as a man, but now he used an indigo variety that rimmed both upper and lower lids and didn’t leak down onto the cheeks.

When he was done, Youngest surveyed his appearance in the hand-mirrors, of which he now had four, provided with the wash-kits. He certainly wasn’t beautiful in the strict sense. But the full-featured good looks he’d enjoyed as a man had survived the gender change. He had a rounded, shapely nose, tall forehead, large, heavy-lidded eyes and strongly marked eyebrows.

His hair had always been thick and long. The man who had demanded that he change his body had also demanded that he dye the natural iron grey of his hair to black.

And so he had.

The creases at the outer corners of his eyes that accounted for the forty-four years of his life, suggested a lively sense of humour, a ready wit. Both of these, he believed, were now lost to him. He didn’t think he could ever truly laugh again.

He drew in a deep breath. He would need to repair his wounds before he could wear jewellery once more: a diamond nose-ring, ruby danglers in his ears, perhaps a couple of ornaments in his hair: these were what he liked. When it was all in place and when he could indulge his good taste in brocade silk or organza or filigreed suede, then – yes – he could make heads turn.

He looked at the face reflected in the hand-mirror. He cocked his head to one side and tried to give himself a come-hither look.

Then he flinched and cast the mirror aside.

I’m not free to smile, he thought. I’m not a man dressed in a woman’s body. I’m a pathetic, witless maniac. I should be locked up. I should die.

Still. It hadn’t happened.

He hadn’t yet turned against himself.

He marvelled at his own resilience. He had wounds on his conscience, on his heart, on his body. He had the recorded voice whispering in his ears. He had three electronic leashes tying him to the voice that forced him to remain on the path he had created: the twin Satellite Locators, one on his wrist, one over his heart and the pain-radio in his teeth.

Finally, of course, he had the girl. She was the ultimate leash. And talisman. She kept him from losing sight of the mission.

I am throwing her away, he thought. That’s what I’m doing. That’s what I set out to do. That’s the prize I created for myself. O clever me. What a genius I am. What a pearl amongst men.

He shook his head, wishing he could scream or cry or rend his hair. But he could not afford any displays of emotion.

4

Fifteen minutes before the Immigration interview was due to begin, the seat began to pulse with light.

‘Commencing Prep-Guide,’ a nasal, mechanical voice instructed him. ‘Sit forward. Relax. Be honest.’

Aila had told him to anticipate the warning sounds and to be sure to be alert. ‘Cell is not go slow or stop,’ he had said. ‘Interview is happen by remote link. Everything is matter: how you is look, how you is speak. If you is look fearing, they is ask too many questions.’

Youngest unwrapped a strand of penga-weed from the stash he wore as a bracelet on his wrist and folded it into his mouth. The root was bitter and tough, but within twenty pulse beats a crystalline alertness coursed through him. The colours swirling beyond the glass ceased to hold his attention but the staccato voice of the Prep-Guide stitched itself upon the fabric of his memory in threads of steel.

He was directed to ready himself for the interview by placing his forearms along the arm-rests with his hands within the depressions created for them. As soon as he had complied, the material of the arm-rests flowed up and became a sheath that enveloped both hands. The tips of each finger were gripped firmly, just within the threshold of pain.

By the time the Immigration Officer – or rather her virtual presence – appeared as a hologram positioned directly in front of him, he was at peak wakefulness.

‘Name?’ The officer was visibly female, but her voice had a harsh, rattling edge to it, as if she had a cricket lodged in her throat.

‘Yasmine,’ said Youngest.

She gave him a choice of languages and he opted for Unida.

‘Origin?’ The officer was dressed in a body-hugging sheath, dark silver in colour, that left no details of her anatomy to the imagination. Even the hair curling out from under her armpits was visible in tendrils that spread sideways across the tops of her small, tight breasts. She appeared seated within a padded seat positioned upright with writing tablets under each of her palms.

She faced Youngest but it was hard for him to see her eyes. A translucent visor curving right over her head and extending over her eyes provided her with a continuously scrolling display of readouts. The faint light from this display splashed against the taut planes of her face.

‘South Relocation Zone,’ said Youngest. It was the formulation used by anyone who had been displaced by the Peace Gorge. All survivors who did not live in the Zone or in the City lived in these settlements to the South of the City, in the vast toxic bog spawned by the Cataclysm. His response was met by pressure on his nails and pin pricks on three of his fingers. He assumed that blood samples were being taken.

Between him and the Officer, a digital clock counted down seconds in hundredths and tenths, glowing numbers sliding down an invisible vertical plane. The numbers paused and flowed jerkily. The entire interview was slated to last 180 seconds. According to Aila, any unwarranted extension of the time limit could be a cause for refusing entry.

‘Sex?’ barked the Officer.

‘Transie.’

One second ticked by.

‘Complete?’

He wasn’t sure what this implied but he nodded and answered, ‘Complete.’

‘Profession?’

‘Pleasure industry.’

Two seconds ticked by.

‘Cargo?’

‘Animal parts. Plastrium-ion batteries. And…’ He drew in a breath. ‘One body.’

‘Human or animal?’

‘Human.’

‘Whole?’

Unblemished, was what he wanted to say. Perfect. Exquisite. But he didn’t have the vocabulary. ‘Whole,’ he said.

‘Alive or deceased?’

His heart began to pound. The mere thought of the girl, lying coiled up around a life-support system, in deep stasis, caused him to react. ‘Yes. Alive.’ Was she? Could he be sure? The gel that sustained her had a time limit. If he couldn’t get her admitted to the Collectory within the next thirty-six hours, she would slip away forever.

‘Male or female?’

‘Female.’

The officer’s head jerked and he saw the flicker of light on her eyes. It seemed as if for once she had glanced directly towards him. He assumed that for her, wherever her corporeal body was, he too appeared as a hologram. It was a moment’s curiosity. Her gaze dropped away once more.

‘Age? Of live cargo?’

‘Nineteen.’

‘Relationship, if any?’

‘Dau—’ began Youngest, but a fist of pain had jammed itself down his throat and his voice failed. He had to swallow a gulp of air before he could force the word out. ‘Daughter.’

Then twenty-one seconds passed during which Youngest could see the officer’s fingers tip-tapping on her separate keypads. His breath squeaked in and out of his nostrils reminding him of nose-flutes from a past so distant he couldn’t focus on it any more.

If he didn’t get clearance, the cell he was in would be swivelled around and switched to one of the conveyor belts returning to Confluenza. There were no authorities to argue with, no courts of appeal. His only option would be to loop around the way he had come and try again. By which time it would be too late. The girl would either have to be released from stasis and revived or …

‘Cleared,’ said the Immigration Officer in her cricket-voice.

As abruptly as she had appeared, she winked out of view. He had passed the interview. Dismay and relief fought to gain the upper hand within him. Neither succeeded.

5

The Suspended City appeared on the horizon as a tangle of glass tubes filled with coloured marbles set against the backdrop of purple-blue sky and ebullient white clouds.

That was when the first twinges of nausea began.

As the Ascensor sped closer, the marbles within the tubes resolved themselves as dwellings, stores, restaurants and businesses. Vertical columns contained buildings. Horizontal pipes were transport channels. Clouds drifted between the glass tubes. Radiating away in all directions were the great, glittering arcs of the Ascensor’s network, from which the entire City was suspended.

At first Youngest had thought the unease in his belly was motion sickness. Six hours of non-stop hurtling might well produce that result.

Until the appearance of the city there had been no landmarks against which to gauge speed. In the final few seconds of the journey, however, Youngest went from gliding across the open sky to careening through a frantic jumble of planes and voids, horizontal slashes, copper coils, slithering beams, flashes of greenery, windows, beams, jutting ledges, plunging depths. Giant hoardings, posters and banners flew past. Gigantic pennants in all colours of the rainbow, each one representing different teams, regions and alliances, fluttered outside the glass tubes.

Then he was falling, safe within his travelling capsule but falling all the same, as cells were peeled off the travelling belt like peas thumbed out of a pod. As each cell fell, it was caught and cradled by gigantic mechanical arms. Then skimmed away sideways. Then whipped down and into the enclosure of the city’s Central Hub.

Youngest didn’t watch the final descent as the nausea suddenly expressed itself with greater force. It was no longer mere unease. More like an internal volcano combined with flying trapeze effects. With eyes shut tight and clutching the support straps around him, he bit off the remaining strands of the penga-weed bracelet from his wrist and chewed the whole thing, his mouth filling with saliva. As the cell spun round and round, gradually losing momentum, he swallowed hard, using the fibrous remains of the dried narcotic like a bung, plugging his own gullet.

The cell finally came to a halt, rocking back and forth a few times before the pneumatic padding began deflating with a harsh, snorting whine. The seat detumesced, too, but at a slower pace. The restraining straps and belts snapped away with loud reports.

Youngest opened his eyes. He was crouched on the floor, like a rabbit caught in a snare. His head was whirling and drool was spooling from his mouth. The volcano in his gut had subsided. For the moment.

The wash-kits, he thought. Trans-dermal drugs. Probably timed to knock him out upon arrival. So he had been conned after all. It was a dismal realization and an inauspicious introduction to the soaring city.

Glancing at the whirling confusion just beyond the cell walls, he was grateful for the privacy, however slight, that the cell afforded him. In the next instant, the walls snapped away and the clamour of the multi-layered transport station pounded down upon him: screeching announcements in three languages, tinkling advertisement jingles, honks, groaning clanks, pneumatic hisses, sub-audible rumbles and the continuous jangling rattle of arriving cells. Landing stages and cell-tracks slanted away and angled down beneath him. The mechanical cradling arms swooped, swung and delivered.

Cells shot by every few seconds, each headed for its own platform. Coloured patches of light and shards of unintelligible images appeared and disappeared like liquid being poured in and out of invisible containers. Even the platforms, which appeared at first glance to be grey, were alive with monochrome images, scrolling continuously, with photographs, speaking videos and streams of numbers in ornamental fonts.

On the walls, on the pillars, on every surface, Zone Warriors were talking, snarling, strutting, displaying scars, pounding their rivals. Wearing face-paint and feathers, masks and steel jewellery. Bleeding, writhing in pain, dying on the sand.

Within the station, robed and turbaned figures strode to and fro. Some, like giant grasshoppers, appeared to leap between platfor