The Garbage Chronicles Read Free Page A

saw how to activate the system, but noted to his chagrin that the seeing eyes were a full meter and a half above him. So he hopped as high as he could. That was all he could think to do. He jumped perhaps half a meter on the first try and three-quarters of a meter by the fourth attempt. After that, however, the height of each effort decreased. He grew very weary.
    The little lump of stone took a deep breath and spun around several times. “So weak,” he said sadly. “So weak.” He looked up at the night sky, still half expecting assistance to arrive from that direction. But all he saw over the building tops was a twinkling, unconcerned night blanket, dotted with silvery stars.
    Without warning, a moto-shoer bore down on him from less than a meter away. A skate wheel hit rudely, knocking him through the building entrance just as the electric eye doors swished open.
    “Son of a slut!” the fleshcarrier man who was moto-shoeing said, falling to one knee. “What the Hooverville was that?”
    The comet scurried behind a planter, then peeked around to watch as an angry, wavy-haired man searched the entrance area. Finding nothing, the man soon abandoned his effort.
    As the moto-shoer rolled to the elevator bank, the comet flew along behind, ever so silently. Presently the man and his stealthy pursuer boarded an elevator.
    Two-sixty-one, the comet mentoed as the doors closed, using a knowledge of elevators imparted to him magically by his fireball father. Feeling no click in his brain, the comet quickly realized why. I have no mento transmitter! he thought. Papa Sidney had one when he was human.
    The elevator rose swiftly.
    Only fourteen minutes, thirty-one seconds old, the comet thought. And already I’m facing another crisis!
    The comet was very upset-at this latest development. He had no idea which floor the man had selected. Faint, incomplete thoughts touched the comet’s consciousness. Something about a new autocar, cheerful thoughts.
    What is this? the comet thought. Then he realized with a rush of excitement that the thoughts were not his own. They came from the fleshcarrier standing next to him! The comet’s pulse quickened.
    What floor did you order? the comet wondered. What floor?
    But this thought was nowhere in the man’s mind now. Other thoughts became more clear, however. All concerned new consumer goods purchases the man and his permie were contemplating.
    Time was running out quickly. The elevator rose rapidly through the building’s core, completely oblivious to the pressing concern of the little visitor from another realm.
    Ah, here we are, the man thought, transmitting brain waves to the comet. Floor two-sixty-one
    The elevator doors whooshed open.
    Now what am I doing here? the man wondered. He mentoed the correct floor into the elevator’s computer, unaware of the little magical comet at his shoe tops who was scooting out at floor 261.
    That was a stroke of luck, the comet thought as the doors shut behind him.
    It may very well have been more than that, although no concrete evidence has been found to support such an assertion. This was a building of 450 floors. Even the most foolhardy gamesman would not have bet upon such an occurrence.
    Still, it happened.
    The little comet scooted along a beige-walled corridor decorated with pictures of fleshcarriers and government buildings. He rounded a corner. Through a large window at the end of the hallway he saw something bright and pink flash in the sky over the city. Whatever it was disappeared in the blink of a cat’s eye.
    The little comet found himself at Javik’s synthetic walnut door. Maybe I can squeeze under, he thought, seeing a slender band of light beneath the door.
    In an attempt to get through the crack, he reached about halfway. But he was irregularly shaped, like a lump of coal, with a big bump on his back that held his eye. The bump would not pass through.
    Darn, he thought, wishing he could think of a stronger word. He flipped over and