Скотт Вестерфельд - Extras

As the humming reached its crescendo, Aya angled gently away from the train, staying within arm's reach, inside the bubble of relative calm that flowed around it. Two meters out was the deadly shock wave zone.

The rushing wind thrashed at her hair, whipping the jackets into a frenzy, but Aya didn't lie flat—she let her body slow her down. The Sly Girl who'd been surfing just behind her shot past on her board, then another went by, then a third.

She was braking faster than all of them!

To her left the train's flank was thundering past now, its magnetic field sending shudders through the hoverboard. Aya fought to keep steady keeping close to the flashing metal wall of the train.

But maybe she was braking too quickly The rear of the train shot past, its wake yanking Aya into the suddenly empty space over the tracks now. Her board spun, earth and sky whirling around her.

She tried to pull herself flat, but the board bucked and twisted in her grip, like a kite in a gale.

"Let go!" someone shouted.

Aya obeyed—the board tumbled away from her. She fell toward the blur of metal tracks The magnets in her crash bracelets kicked in, yanking her up by both wrists. She flipped once head over heels, like a gymnast swinging from two rings, her feet barely missing the ground. She hover-bounced down the mag-lev tracks that way until her momentum was expended.

The bracelets set her down gently, facing the receding lights of the train. She rubbed her wrists, dizzy from spinning.

"You okay?"

Aya looked up to find Eden Maru floating beside her, an amused expression on her face.

"I think so," Aya said.

"You shouldn't brake that fast."

"I noticed." Aya sighed. The night before, she'd watched Eden dismount from the tram. In her full hoverball rig she made it look easy, like rolling off a building in a bungee jacket. "Thanks for telling me to let go, I guess."

"You're welcome, I guess." Eden glanced down the tracks toward the receding train. "Your board will be back soon, along with the others. Slowing down takes longer if you don't wipe out."

Aya glared back at Eden's smile. She was so beautiful, and the only one of the Sly Girls with a big face rank. What did someone so famous get out of skulking around with a secret clique?

Maybe now was the time to find out. Aya straightened her uniform, angling the spy-cam toward Eden. "Can I ask you a question?"

"If it's not too nosey."

"You're not like the rest of them … I mean, the rest of us.

You're a big face in the city."

Eden did a slow midair spin. "That's not a question."

"I guess not." Aya remembered the rumors about Eden's ex-boyfriend. "But don't you and the Sly Girls have sort of a … difference in ambition? You're a hoverball star, and they work so hard to be extras."

Eden snorted. "You would ask something lame like that. I bet you don't even know where that word comes from."

"Extras?" Aya shrugged. "It just means extra people, like superfluous."

"That's what they teach at littlie school. But it had a different meaning back in Rusty times."

"Well, sure," Aya said. "They had billions of extras back then."

Eden shook her head. "It had nothing to do with overpopulation, Aya-chan. You've seen old wallscreen movies, right?"

"Of course. That was how Rusties got famous."

"Yeah, but here's a weird thing: Rusty software wasn't smart enough to make backgrounds, so they had to build everything in the movie. They had whole fake cities for the actors to walk around in."

"Fake cities

?"Aya said. "Wow, talk about waste."

"And to fill these fake cities, they hired hundreds of real people to walk around. But they weren't in the story at all.

Just in the background. And they were called extras."

Aya raised an eyebrow, not sure if she believed any of this. It all sounded so crazy and out of proportion…which was, of course, very Rusty.

"Isn't that how you feel sometimes, Aya-chan?" Eden said. "Like there's a big story going on, and you're stuck in the background?"

"Everyone feels that way sometimes, I guess."

"And you'd do anything to make yourself feel bigger, wouldn't you? Even betray your friends?"

Aya set her jaw. "I'm a Sly Girl now, Eden. Didn't you hear?"

"Yeah, I head your little speech." Eden floated higher, looming over her like a giant. "I just hope you were telling the truth, because real life's not like some Rusty movie, Aya-chan. There's not just one big story that makes the rest of us disappear."

Aya narrowed her eyes. "But you're not in the background. You're famous!"

"You can disappear in front of a crowd, too, you know. Once they start telling you what to do, who to be friends with." Eden spun head over heels, a graceful version of Aya in her crash bracelets.

"Out here with the Sly Girls, I get to keep something for myself."

Aya heard a burst of laughter—the other Sly Girls were gliding toward them down the tracks.

She only had time for one more question.

"So if you don't care about face rank, why did you break up with your boyfriend?"

"Who says I broke up with him?"

"A hundred or so feeds, last time I looked."

"Don't always believe the feeds, Aya. He's the one who couldn't stand people talking about our

'difference in ambition.' So the little moron ran away."

Eden floated a few centimeters lower, reaching out one finger till it was almost touching Aya's nose.

"And that, my Nosey-chan, is what being an extra really means."

As they approached the tunnel mouth, a few of the Sly Girls pulled out flashlights. Beams of red played across the opening, barely piercing the darkness within.

At least Aya wasn't the only one without infrared.

"What happens if a train comes while we're in there?" Pana asked.

Kai shrugged. "Just lie flat on your board, up by the ceiling."

Eden shook her head. "That won't work. The train's wake would pull you down." She hooked her thumb at Aya. "Sort of like what happened to Nosey-chan here."

A few of them laughed. On the way back to the mountain, Eden had demonstrated Aya's hover-bounce down the tracks. Several times.

"Well, it doesn't matter anyway," Kai said. "There aren't any more trains scheduled tonight."

"Don't they run unscheduled trains sometimes?" Pana said.

Kai rolled her eyes. "Maybe once a month. Hardly nervous-making, compared to what we do most nights. Come on!"

She and Eden shot forward into the tunnel mouth. A few of the other Sly Girls stood motionless for a moment, staring after them unhappily.

Aya twisted her flashlight on and urged her board forward. Eden Maru was suspicious of her already; she wasn't about to give the rest of them any reason for doubt.

A one-in-thirty chance wasn't that bad.

In the red light of her beam, dust swirled across the tracks, still unsettled from the train's passage.

A low moan filled the blackness, and her skin prickled. A steady breeze moved through the tunnel, as if the stone walls themselves were breathing.

Aya wondered how they were supposed to find the hidden door. Last night it had looked exactly like the tunnel wall. Maybe surged eyes or Moggle's fancy lenses could tell smart matter and stone apart, but Aya doubted that her normal human vision would be much help.

Miki was already drifting down the tunnel, a flashlight in one hand. She slid her fingers across the wall's surface, peering closely at the stone.

Aya brought her hoverboard alongside. "No infrared, huh?"

"No," Miki sighed. "How about you?"

Aya shook her head. "My crumblies won't let me. But you're sixteen, aren't you?"

"Yeah, but I like my eyeballs."

"They can make them look exactly the same, you know."