The New World #3 Specials By Vallas

Chapter Six

                                                                                                              ZANE-LA

Zane was still beautiful.

His cheekbones were sharp, his stare hungry and intense, like he was still using calorie purgers to keep himself alert. His lips were as full as any bubblehead's, and as Zane stared at Tally, he pursed them in childlike concentration. His hair hadn't changed at all; she remembered how he'd dyed it with calligraphy ink, turning it a bluish black that was way beyond the Pretty Committee's standards of good taste.

But there was something different about his face. Tally's mind spun, trying to figure out what it was.

"You brought Shay-la with you?" he said as the squeak of grippy shoes came from the window behind Tally. "How happy-making."

Tally nodded slowly, hearing in his voice that he wished she'd come alone. Of course. They had so much to talk about, hardly any of which she wanted to say in front of Shay.

It suddenly seemed like years since she'd seen Zane. Tally felt all the differences in her body - the ultralight bones and flash tattoos, the cutting scars along her arms -  as reminders of how she'd changed in the time they'd been apart. Of how different they were now.

Shay grinned at the interface rings. "Aren't your friends finding that musty old book a little boring?"

"I've got more friends than you think, Shay-la." His eyes swept across the four walls of the room.

Shay shook her head, pulling a small black device from her belt. Tally's sharp ears caught its barely audible hum, a sizzling like wet leaves thrown onto a fire. "Relax, Zane-la. The city can't hear us."

His eyes widened. "You're allowed to do that?"

"Haven't you heard?" Shay smiled. "We're special."

"Oh. Well, as long as it's just us three..." He dropped the book onto the empty chair beside him, where it set Peris's ring jiggling. "The others are off on a little trick tonight. I'm covering, in case the wardens are monitoring us."

Shay laughed. "So the wardens are supposed to believe the Crims have a reading group?"

He shrugged. "It's not real wardens, as far as we can tell, only software. As long as someone's talking, it stays happy."

Tally sat down on Zane's unmade bed slowly, a shiver moving through her. Zane wasn't talking like some clueless pretty at all. And if he was covering for his friends while they did something criminal, then he was still bubbly, still the sort of tricky pretty who could one day become a Special...

She breathed in the familiar scent of him from the bedclothes, wondering what her tattoos were doing - probably spinning halfway off her face

But Zane wasn't wearing an interface ring himself, or a bracelet. How were the wardens tracking him?

"Your new face is about a mega-Helen, Tally-wa," Zane said, his gaze traveling the web of flash tattoos on her face and arms. "It could launch a billion ships. But pirate ships, probably."

She smiled at the lame joke, trying to think of something to say. She'd been waiting for this moment for two months, and suddenly all she could do was sit here like an idiot.