She pulled her orange goggles up from around her neck and suctioned them to her eyes. “No way we’re staying here, Nelson.”

Her scoot was cold, but she cranked it up and hopped on, slipped her hands through the handle straps, and kicked open a trapdoor in the balcony. She had warmed up Nelson on the way down before—ill-advised, maybe, but not impossible. She felt the soft cushion of energy beneath her as the ion lifts whirred to life. The engine sputtered but hadn’t yet caught when she tipped the nose through the trapdoor. The lifts barely kept her off her neighbors’ roofs as she half drove, half plummeted down the sloped stack of huts. A woman hanging laundry ducked as the nose of the scoot tore several white shirts from the line, scattering them down the stack.

“Watch it!” Mistletoe screamed over her shoulder. Then the lifts fully engaged and she felt the cushion expand beneath her. Near the base of the stack, she nosed up over the crowded street and gave the side of the scoot a swift, hard kick. Static pulled up strands of hair as she sailed over people’s heads. Then the engine turned over and she descended between two staggering drunks with green absynthium stains on their shirts. She skidded hard, ducked beneath their outstretched arms, and bounced around the corner, ignoring their cries to come back. As she cruised alongside the access road, she was suddenly aware that her timeworn engine sounded like thunder next to the eerie silence of the junk transports. The older models still made noise, but the lack of cursing and yelling and laughter gave the entire street—the perimeter of Little Saigon—a solemn desolation that freaked her out. And Jiri was nowhere.

Thank you for your business! said one of the transports.

Keep your eye on the ball, children! said another.

Mistletoe shuddered. Cautiously she eased forward. The transports had been rescued from junk heaps, only to have their A.I. circuitry refitted with mindless programs dooming them to a lifetime of carting endless piles of subcanopy garbage. Where did it all go?

Up ahead she heard sudden bursts of gruff speech: Jiri and someone else.

“Whoa, Nelson,” she whispered, and eased up on the throttle even more. The scoot purred. She followed the sound of the voices into a narrow, badly paved ditch that ran between the main street and the junk-transport road. A forgotten path, littered with bottles and ragged gray lumps she didn’t want to look at very closely. She cut the engine but kept the lifts engaged, and peeked around a pile of rusting scrap. There, in the middle of the road, was Jiri, standing with his back to her, pointing his black pre-Unison handgun at a stocky ESC police officer with a gleaming metallic arm that narrowed to a glowing tip, which was in turn pointed at a boy of about her age who was dressed better than anyone she’d ever seen. His outfit was holo-fashion, an elegant projection of a sharp new suit in the manner of big-time businessmen from up above. His wispy blond hair sparkled, even in the subcanopy shade. He was clearly a long way from home, and his hands were in the air. He shifted his wide eyes from Jiri to the cop.