"Edward Willett - Andy Nebula" - читать интересную книгу автора (Willett Edward)

ANDY NEBULA: INTERSTELLAR ROCK STAR
┬й 1999 by Edward Willett

CHAPTER ONE

Cold wind lashed my face; cold rain dribbled down my back. My fingers throbbed like IтАЯd
slammed them in a door, my toes squished in my waterlogged boots, my throat felt as rough
and red as rusty iron and my nose was both stuffed up and dripping, but I kept playing my
beat-up silver stringsynth and singing the best I could. My hat barely held enough soggy cash
for a mug of bean stew, much less a bed in Fat SloanтАЯs flophouse, and I didnтАЯt fancy a night on
the streets in this weather.
But the few people who splashed by me on their way into the tube station had eyes only
for the dry warmth promised by its flickering blue holosign, not for a skinny, ragged streetkid.
That did it. I broke off in the middle of a soulful, wailing note--it was threatening to turn
into a cough, anyway--and flicked off the stringsynth. If IтАЯd sunk to feeling sorry for myself it
was time to lift. Feeling sorry for yourself is just another way of saying you think somebody
else ought to be taking care of you. First thing IтАЯd learned after I escaped the orphanage seven
years before was that I was the only person I could trust to take care of me.
I fished the thin, dripping handful of feds out of my hat, counted them, and shook my head.
Sometimes I couldnтАЯt even trust myself. Unless I could talk Sloan into a discount, it looked like
IтАЯd have to settle for a mug of stew and a night of shivering.
Lightning flashed, thunder quick-marched across the sky, the rain beat down even harder,
and I decided to give Sloan the chance to be generous. None of the nearby hidey-holes I knew
would be any good at all in this kind of weather--they were mostly under bridges or in
burned-out basements, and I knew from experience that if they werenтАЯt flooded yet they soon
would be. Besides, on a night like this the freespaces would be crawling with rats, both the
kind that squeak and the kind that run around on two legs. I could wake up stripped naked
and robbed blind--if I woke up at all. I knew that from experience, too.
I slapped on the shapeless mass my hat had become, then started down the street, but I
stopped at the first corner and looked back, feeling a strange itch between my shoulder blades.
Under the holosign stood a man in a long black weathercoat, the expensive kind that repels
raindrops a full metre. тАЬCouldnтАЯt be a тАЮforcer, not with that coat,тАЭ I muttered, ducking out of
sight. That wasnтАЯt a comfort. The Fistfight City police generally treated me all right; theyтАЯd only
chase me away from a place when they got a complaint, and they wouldnтАЯt say anything when
I went back a couple of weeks later. But lots of other people took an interest in kids on their
own. I had my music, but a lot of kids had nothing but themselves, and they still had to eat.
Some were on the next street over. They stood in purple-lit doorways, watching for the
occasional slow-moving wheeler, or talking to shadowy figures uncomfortably like the man
in the weathercoat. As I splashed past one of the doorways a girl a year or two younger than
me burst out and clutched my arm. тАЬPlease, youтАЯve got to help me, heтАЯll kill me--тАЭ
I shrugged her off and walked faster. I had my own problems. Behind me I heard a man
cursing, and the sound of a hand meeting flesh, then muffled sobs that broke off as a door
slammed. Nobody else on the street took any notice.
Edward Willett Andy Nebula: Interstellar Rock Star 2


They wouldnтАЯt pay any more attention if that guy in the weathercoat grabbed me, I thought
then, and broke into a run, ducking into the next alley. Several twists and turns later I arrived
at Fat SloanтАЯs, out of breath and shivering. I pushed through the heavy front door into the
sour-smelling warmth of the lobby. Only one man lay unconscious on the shiny lime-green