F. Wilson - Dydeetown World

Looked around for her guardians and found two groups of them — a couple of twelve year olds at the corner, and a slightly younger pair fifty meters away in a doorway. If I tried anything cute with her, they'd be on me like a pack of wild dogs.

Pulled off a cheap ring I'd bought just for the occasion.

"Take this," I said, handing it to her. "And tell your friends they can have all the food in this bag if I can have a talk with them."

Her smile widened as she grabbed the ring and ran down the block. Watched her talk to the two on the corner, saw them signal to the two in the doorway. Suddenly another pair appeared from the other direction. Six guards for one little beggar — either she was as valuable as all hell or they were very nervous about losing her. In no time I was surrounded by the whole crew.

Something was up.

"Wan jaw, san?" the leader said in urchin pidgin.

He looked barely thirteen, but he and his friends were all lean and angular, armed and wary, ready to fight.

"Want to ask you some questions."

"Bow wha?"

"About a babe someone left right here three years ago."

"Lookee bag firs, san. Den jaw."

"Sure."

Opened the bag and let them all take a long look at the goodies. A couple of them licked their lips. Hungry kids. Gave me a pang in my gut. Pulled out a bag of cheesoids and unsealed it.

"Here. Pass this around."

"Filamentous!" they chorused.

Their dirty hands dug in, then stuffed the soft creamy balls into their mouths. Noticed that the bigger ones made sure the little blonde got her turn. I liked that.

The leader swallowed his mouthful and said, "Who dis babe? Lookee how? Got pickee-pickee?"

"No. No picture. Guess she'd be her size" — Pointed to the little beggar blonde — "but with black hair."

He shook his head. "No Lost Boy dat."

"'Lost Boys,' eh? Well, do you remember any babe like that three years ago?"

"Nine den. D'know. Probee trade, stan, san?"

Nodded. Traded . Damn! Hadn't thought of that. Obvious though. The older kids took care of the babes until they were old enough to beg. If one urchingang was low on babes or beggars, it would trade for them with another. As the beggars grew older, they became nurturers, then graduated to guards, then to gangleaders, then out into the underworld. An endless cycle.

"Take me to your leader," I said.

It was lost on him.

"Takee halfway. Wendy meetee."

Wendy? Had someone been reading stories to the Lost Boys?

"Fair enough, I guess."

They led me north for a bunch of blocks, then down a stairway into the ancient subway system. Unimaginable that people used to prefer traveling underground to traveling in the air, but these tunnels were real, so I guessed those old stories were, too. The kids all pulled out pocket lights as we made our way along a white-tiled corridor. The leader stopped and faced me after we had descended a second stairway.

"Waitee here, san. Wendy be back. Waitee here."

"Bloaty. How long?"

"N'long, san. Waitee. We takee bag. Giftee. Kay, san?"

Handed over the bag of food.

"Okay. But don't make me wait too long."

"N'long, san. N'long."

They left me one of their lights. As they hurried off into the darkness with my bag of goodies cradled in their midst like the Ark of the Covenant, I listened to the sound of their giggling and it occured to me that maybe I was being played for a Class A jog.

After an hour of sitting alone in that damp, tiled hole with no sign of Wendy, I was sure.

Well, not the first time. Surely not the last. In truth, I'd half expected to be rougued but figured it was worth the risk. After all, the food hadn't cost me much. Felt bad, though. Sort of hoped for better from them.

Headed upstairs and back to my compartment, realizing for the first time what an impossible job this was: Trying to find a kid with no identity, a kid who didn't know who she was, with no picture, not even an identifying characteristic to go by, along a trail that was three years cold.

And to think I'd left being idly rich for this. Sometimes think I'm crazy.

As I turned on the compartment lights, Iggy scrabbled across the floor and chomped on a fleeing cockroach, then retreated to a corner to chew. He wasn't much company. Iquanas aren't known for their warmth.

One minute home and I knew I'd made a mistake. Was feeling down and that was when my resistance was at its lowest. No sooner had I loosened my jump than the buttons began calling me from the back of the drawer where I kept them.

Twenty days now. Twenty full days since I'd snapped on a button. A record. Proud of myself. But felt myself weakening steadily. Hard to resist after that length of deprivation, no matter how much you wanted off.

Began thinking of that group button I had bought with during my first flush with the gold — all those bodies going strong, all funneled into that one little button. Threatened me with overload every time. Very hard to resist. Nothing I would have liked better right now than to snap it on and just lose myself in all that sensation. But was never going to kick this if I didn't show a little more spine.

Maybe I should have gone the cold turkey route and just had the wire yanked and let it go at that. But I'd heard horror stories about guys who'd got themselves dewired that way and went black hole shortly after. Not for me, thanks. This wasn't the greatest life, but it was the only one I had. Chose the wean. And by the Core, it was killing me.

Tried to keep busy tilling the window garden but it wasn't working. Finally closed up and ran out into the night, vowing to find some real flesh, even though I knew it wouldn't help much, even if I had to go to Dydeetown and pay for it.

In the morning I was about to put a call into Khambot to tell him what a lost cause this case was when a kid came through my office door. A skinny little twelve-year old. He had thin lips, dark hair, and dark eyes that darted all over the place. He was wearing the upper half of a blue jumpsuit and the lower end of a brown, and they weren't joined in the middle. He looked dirty and scared.

An urch. No doubt about it. Certainly not the Wendy they'd told me about. Maybe a young lieutenant.

"You Dreyer-san?" he said in a voice that had a good ways to go before it would even consider changing.

"That's me. What can I do for you?"

He took a seat. "Still lookee three-year babe?"

"Maybe, Why didn't Wendy show up yesterday?" I said, leaning back in my chair.

"Din know you, san. So we wait, watch, follow home, then out, then home, then here." He was speaking very carefully. Probably thought he was putting on a good show of Realpeople talk. That was a laugh.

"She satisfied?"

He shrugged. "M'be."

"She send you?"

A nod.

"And you think you can help find this kid?"

Another shrug, another, "M'be. But cost."

"Never any doubt in my mind about that."

"N'hard barter — soft f'soft."

Soft barter ? "Like what?"

"Info for us."

"Who's 'us'?"

"Urchingangs."

"You're an 'us' now? Thought you were always scrapping with each other over begging turf and spheres of influence. Thought you got together for babe trades and that was about it."

"Used t'be. Be again, san. B'now lookee — look for — answer to same question."

"Which is?"

"Dead urches."

"Ah! That means, I take it, that the gangs don't know what happened to them either."

"B'blieve no, san — " He coughed and raised the level of his dialog. "No, but we find out sooner-late."

"If you're so sure of that, why do you need my help?"

"Need Realworld connect."

"You mean to tell me that with all the graduates from the urchingangs floating through the Megalops, not one of them will help out?"