China Miéville - Un Lun Dun

“You have,” he said, “to make a choice. You know we want you here. You…well, you saved UnLondon. We owe you our abcity and our lives. You’re a Suggester, whether you join us officially or not. It would be an honor if you’d stay.

“But your family. Your life. All of these things…we understand. We’ll miss you if you go, Deeba. But you have to choose.”

There was a long silence.

“I can’t stay,” Deeba said at last. “I can’t let my family forget me. Forget I even exist. Can you imagine? I’m going back. You know I have to.”

She looked at each of them in turn.

“You know that,” she said. Hemi looked away.

They all looked sad. Obaday sniffed. Jones dabbed surreptitiously at his eyes.

“The stuff that happened here,” Deeba said, “I’ll never forget. What we did. I’ll never forget you. Any of you.” She paused, looked at each of them in turn.

“And part of the reason I won’t forget you,” she said, “is ’cause I’ll be back all the time.”

Mortar and the Propheseers— the Suggesters— looked up, startled.

“Come on, ” she said, smiling. “What you even talking about, Mortar? It’s easy to get from London to here. I got here by turning a tap, then by climbing shelves. Jones is here, Rosa got here, all the conductors got here. The police came in a digging machine. For God’s sake, Unstible and Murgatroyd put an elevator in. People are always going between, and you don’t see either universe collapsing, do you?

“You just think it’s hard to go between the two ’cause you’ve always thought it must be. You’re just saying that ’cause you sort of think you should.”

Deeba’s friends stared at her, and at each other. “She has a point,” Mortar said eventually.

“You’ve spent all your time wanting to go!” said Jones.

“’Cause I couldn’t get back, ” she said. “Now that I can, I’ll go back and forth all the time. You seriously think I’m not coming to see you again? Not coming to see this place?”

“But such methods,” Mortar said, “they aren’t reliable. They may not always work; the rules aren’t always clear—”

“Well then, I’ll try others. Till one of them does. Look, I’m not even making plans. I’m just saying there’s no way I’m not coming back. There’s things I want to do here.”

“I’ve been thinking,” Jones said. “I’m going to take a trip back to Webminster Abbey. I’m going to find Rosa, and get her out. And I’d be delighted if you’d join me.”

“Of course,” said Deeba. “ Yes. Speaking of which, there’s someone called Ptolemy Yes I was told about who went missing, and I want to find him. And I’d like to go back to the Wordhoard Pit, climb down, see what the libraries are like in other places.”

“There’s people in Wraithtown I’d like you to meet,” said Hemi, still not meeting her eye. “And also, I wondered if maybe you want to go to Manifest Station? We could get a train. See another abcity together…”

There was a pause, and Deeba smiled at him.

“Absolutely,” Deeba said. “ Yeah. And loads of other things. I’m blatantly coming back. And you can come visit me.” She smiled at Hemi again.

He, and then the others, began cautiously smiling back.

“You called it our abcity,” Jones said. “Before the fight. And it is. It’s your home too.”

“And anyway,” Deeba said, “Curdle and the rebrella are coming with me, and they might get homesick.”

“You can’t let feral rubbish cross into London,” Mortar said anxiously. “It belongs in another world.” Deeba looked at him and raised an eyebrow, and his voice dried up. “I suppose one or two can’t hurt,” he mumbled.

“So listen,” Deeba said. “I’m not saying good-bye to any of you. I’ll say ‘See you soon.’ And I mean really soon. Let me explain.

“I told you one reason the Smog grew so strong: ’cause it was getting help. There’s one thing we haven’t dealt with. Mortar, you said the police burrower was gone?”

“Yes. We checked where you said it had been. The officers must have got out and fixed it, gone home yesterday.”

“Right. They threatened my family. It might have been only to scare me— there’s nothing in it for them to actually do anything now. But I don’t like it. And I don’t like who they ally with. For the sake of me, and my mate Zanna, and my family, and London and UnLondon, it needs sorting. So I wanted to make a suggestion. An arrangement. It’s going to involve clearing some rubble in Unstible’s old place, but I think it’s worth it.”

Deeba looked at them all. Jones cracked his knuckles and raised an eyebrow. Hemi pursed his lips thoughtfully. Deeba smiled.

When evening fell, with a huge grinding, the UnLondon-I spun once more. With focus and effort, Mortar and the Suggesters directed the bridge.

Deeba hugged every one of her friends good-bye.

“Oh,” she said to Hemi. She fumbled in her pocket.

“Tell me you ain’t reaching for that money,” he said. She grinned.

“It’s no good to me, ” she said, and held it out. “You might as well…” He took her hand gently, and closed her fingers back over it.

“This way you still owe me,” he muttered. “So this way you got to come back, to pay up.”

Deeba swallowed and nodded and hugged him again. She held her breath, and turned and ran to the edge of the bridge. There was a strain, an effort, a whining in the air, and Deeba felt a membrane split, somewhere in reality. The bridge dipped across the Odd. She ran towards the walkway by her front door, which she could see beyond the girders.

I dunno what might happen, she thought, giddy, head spinning. I could go back. I could live there, in a moil house with walls made out of wallets and windows made out of glasses. Or in a house like a goldfish bowl. I could catch a train from Manifest Station.

But right now…

She stepped off the bridge, and breathed deeply in the London night. She looked all around her. Curdle exhaled at her feet. Deeba smiled.

“Hush,” she told it. “And you.” She held up the rebrella. “Remember. Over on this side, when other people’re around, you stay still.”

She turned. The bridge still soared out across the estate. Standing near its edge, waving at her, were her friends. Joe Jones; Skool; Hemi the half-ghost, biting his lip; Bling and Cauldron, their bodies quite solid; and Obaday Fing, carrying the book.

Deeba blinked through tears and smiled. She raised her hand. The UnLondoners waved back. She and they looked across at each other, from city to abcity.

A cat yowled somewhere. Deeba glanced in its direction.

When she looked back, the Pons Absconditus was gone. Deeba stood alone on the concrete walkway, in the dark. In London.

Deeba gave a long, shaky sigh. She picked up Curdle, put it in her bag. She whispered to the rebrella: “Remember!”

Then she turned and unlocked her front door.

Deeba walked slowly through the living room. She was trembling. She heard voices from the kitchen.

She paused a moment, and looked at a photo on the mantel.

It was of her whole family. Deeba stared at it in horror. There was her mother, her father, her brother, smiling out…and there was she, but it was as if the film was underexposed in that corner of the picture. Or as if she stood in shadow. Or in fact, as if it was just hard to notice her there, smiling, her arms around her parents.