Скотт Вестерфельд - Uglies

A noise thundered to life on Tally's left, unmistakable even above the roar of the fire. She and the board were caught in a sudden wind, shoved back toward the other shore. Tally leaned hard against it and stuck a foot into the water to slow the board. She clung tightly with both hands, desperately fighting being thrown into the river.

The smoke suddenly cleared, and a familiar shape loomed out of the darkness. It was the flying machine, its thundering beat now obvious above the raging fire. Sparks jumped across the river as the machine's windstorm stirred the fire to a new intensity.

What were they doing? she wondered. Didn't they realize they were spreading the fire?

Her question was answered a moment later when a gout of flame shot from the machine, squirting across the river to ignite another patch of flowers.

They had set the fire, and were driving it on in every way they could.

The flying machine thundered closer, and she glimpsed an inhuman face staring at her from the pilot seat.

She turned her board to fly away, but the machine lifted up into the air, passing right over her, and suddenly the wind was too great.

Tally pitched off and into the water. Her crash bracelets caught for a moment, holding her up above the waves, but then the wind caught the hoverboard, much lighter without her on it, and spun it away like a leaf.

She sank into the deep water in the middle of the river, knapsack and all.

It was cool and quiet under the waves.

For a few endless moments, Tally felt only relief to have escaped the searing wind, the thundering machine, the blistering heat of the firestorm. But the weight of the crash bracelets and knapsack pulled her down fast, and panic welled up in her pounding chest.

She thrashed in the water, climbing up toward the flickering lights of the surface. Her wet clothes and gear dragged at her, but just as her lungs were about to burst, she broke the surface into the maelstrom.

Tally gulped a few breaths of smoky air, then was slapped in the face by a wave. She coughed and sputtered, struggling to stay afloat.

A shadow passed over her, blacking out the sky. Then her hand struck something-a familiar grippy surface….

Her hoverboard had come back to her! Just the way it always did when she spilled. The crash bracelets lifted her up until she could grab on to it, her fingers clinging to its knobbly surface as she gasped for air.

A high-pitched whine came from the nearby shore. Tally blinked away water from her eyes and saw that the Rusty machine had landed. Figures were jumping from the machine, spraying white foam at the ground as they crashed through the burning flowers and into the river. They were headed for her.

She struggled to climb onto the board.

"Wait!" the nearest figured called.

Tally rose shakily to her feet, trying to keep steady on the wet surface of the board. Her hard-baked shoes were slippery, and her sodden knapsack seemed to weigh a ton. As she leaned forward, a gloved hand reached up to grab the front of the board. A face came up from the water, wearing some sort of mask. Huge eyes stared up at her.

She stomped at the hand, crunching the fingers. They slipped off, but her weight was thrown too far forward, and the board tipped its nose into the water.

Tally tumbled into the river again.

Hands grabbed at her, pulling her away from the hoverboard. She was hoisted out of the water and onto a broad shoulder. She caught glimpses of masked faces: huge, inhuman eyes staring at her unblinkingly.

Bug eyes.

They pulled her to the shore and out of the water, hauling her to the flying machine.

Tally's lungs felt full of water and smoke. She could hardly take a breath without a wracking cough shaking her whole body.

"Put her down!"

"Where the hell did she come from?"

"Give her some oh-two."

They flopped Tally onto her back on the ground, which was thick with the white foam.

The one who'd carried her pulled off his bug-eyed mask, and Tally blinked.

He was a pretty. A new pretty, every bit as beautiful as Peris.

The man plunged the mask over her face. Tally fought weakly for a moment, but then cold, pure air surged into her lungs. Her head grew light as she gratefully sucked it down.

He pulled the mask off. "Not too much. You'll hyper-ventilate."

She tried to speak but could only cough.

"It's getting bad," another figure said. "Jenks wants to take her back up."

"Jenks can wait."

Tally cleared her throat. "My board."

The man smiled beautifully and glanced up. "It's headed over. Hey! Somebody stick that thing to the chopper! What's your name, kid?"

"Tally." Cough.

"Well, Tally, are you ready to move? The fire won't wait."

She cleared her throat and coughed again. "I guess so."

"Okay, come on." The man helped her up and pulled her toward the machine. She found herself pushed inside, where the noise was much less, crowded into the back with three others in bug-eyed masks.

A door slammed shut.

The machine rumbled, and then Tally felt it lift from the ground. "My board!"

"Relax, kid. We got it." The woman pulled her mask off. She was another young pretty.

Tally wondered if these were the people in the clue. The "fire-bug eyes." Was she supposed to be looking for them?

"Is she going to make it?" a voice popped through the cabin.

"She'll live, Jenks. Make the usual detour, and work the fire a little on the way home."

Tally looked down as the machine climbed. Their flight followed the course of the river, and she saw the fires spreading across to the other shore, driven by the wind of its passage. Occasionally, the craft would shoot out a gout of flame.

She looked at the faces of the crew. For new pretties, they seemed so determined, so focused on their task. But their actions were madness. "What are you guys doing?" she said.

"A little burning."

"I can see that. But why?"

"To save the world, kid. But hey, we're real sorry about your getting in the way."

They called themselves rangers.

The one who'd pulled her from the river was called Tonk. They all spoke with an accent, and came from a city Tally had never heard of.

"It's not too far from here," Tonk said. "But we rangers spend most of our time out in the wild. The fire helicopters are based in the mountains."

"The firewhats?"

"Helicopters. That's what you're sitting in."

She looked around at the rattling machine, and shouted over the noise, "It's so Rusty!"

"Yeah. Vintage stuff, a few pieces of it are almost two hundred years old. We copy the parts as they wear out."

"But why?"

"You can fly it anywhere, with or without a magnetic grid. And it's the perfect thing for spreading fires.The Rusties sure knew how to make a mess."

Tally shook her head. "And you spread fires because…"

He smiled and lifted one of her shoes, pulling a crushed but unburned flower from the sole.

"Because of phragmipedium panthera, " he said.

"Excuse me?"

"This flower used to be one of the rarest plants in the world. A white tiger orchid. In Rusty days, a single bulb was worth more than a house."

"A house? But there's zillions of them."

"You noticed?" He held up the flower, staring into its delicate mouth. "About three hundred years ago, some Rusty figured a way to engineer the species to adapt to wider conditions. She messed with the genes to make them propagate more easily."

"Why?"

"The usual. To trade them for lots of stuff. But she succeeded a little too well. Look down."

Tally peered out the window. The machine had gained altitude and left the firestorm behind. Below were endless fields of white, interrupted only by a few barren patches.