Tristan felt Eel's Dohan Lee body responding, a gnawing ache growing in his pelvis, so much stronger than a while ago when he had been Lani. But this was not the time, and certainly not the place.

  “All right.” Why did he feel as if he'd just run a hundred-meter sprint? “Maybe I will try to come back and see you. But right now—”

  “I know. You've got to go.” She kissed him again, just a peck this time. Such a simple human gesture. “Be careful.”

  Then she touched her doorplate and stepped across her threshold. She smiled once before the door slid closed and cut her from view.

  Tristan leaned against the wall and struggled to gather his wits. He felt weak, disoriented—and it wasn't the masque.

  What was happening here? Everything—his assignment, his emotions, his whole worldview—seemed to be spinning out of control. Wonderful feelings flowed through him...but he had to get focused—on the mission, the goal.

  The mission, and Selfhood.

  He pushed away from the wall and shook himself.

  He hadn't thought it possible, but Selfhood had suddenly become even more important than it had been this morning. But to have any sort of future at all, he had to get out of Flagge Quarter. And the sooner the better.

  He headed for ground level.

  Tristan tensed as he stepped from the downchute and spotted a uniformed Security patrolman stationed by the entrance. The helmeted head swung his way as he entered the vestibule.

  Be calm, he told himself. You're Dohan Lee. You live upstairs. You have every right to be here—so act like it.

  Tristan was debating whether it would be more natural to ask the patrolman what he was doing here or simply ignore him, when the patrolman settled it for him.

  “Citizen,” he said, his eyes hidden behind his visor. “What is your name?”

  Tristan knew a full body scan was in progress behind that visor, information blipping onto the interior surface.

  “Dohan Lee. And you are...?”

  “Corporal Eastin.

  “Is something wrong, corporal?”

  “A minor security matter. Do you live here?”

  “Of course.” He rummaged through his memory–what was that apartment number? “Unit 4472.”

  “Just one moment.”

  Corporal Eastin repeated his name and apartment number, then waited. Tristan imagined a complete file of Dohan Lee flashing on the visor’s HUD, confirming him as a resident of this complex.

  The helmeted head swiveled back to him. “You appear to have lost some weight, Mr. Lee.”

  Mute! The scan had picked up his reduced mass. The last thing he needed now: was a hot-shot Security non-com bucking for officer status.

  “Really? I hadn't noticed.” He forced a grin. “After all, my smartsuits still fit perfectly.”

  The corporal didn't attempt even a polite smile at Tristan’s admittedly lame stab at humor. He stared a moment, then held the door open. Tristan expected to be wished a good day, but the patrolman wasn't through with him yet.

  “Please step out to the cruiser so that I can check your IDplant.”

  Tristan managed a casual shrug as he stepped toward the door. “If you wish.”

  But inside, his heart was taching into hyperdrive.

  He could not allow this Security man to check his IDplant—not when it was still a copy of Lani Rouge’s. As soon as Tristan’s finger entered that slot, Corporal Eastin would know something was wrong. His pulser would be out and pointed in Tristan’s face.

  Out on the street, the sun was down. Not dark enough yet to trigger the night lights, but a chill wind was picking up, hurrying the few pedestrians toward their destinations.

  Tristan felt a noose tightening around his throat with each step toward the hovering cruiser. His muscles coiled, readying to spring...

  But which way? He could turn and run, but how far would he get? Ten, twenty steps?

  A desperate situation required a desperate solution. He balled Dohan Lee’s thick fingers and examined the resultant fist. Big, heavy—he could do real damage with this. More a weapon than an appendage.

  And since he couldn't see how the situation could get much worse, what did he have to lose?

  He quickly bobbed his head down to see if anyone else was in the cruiser.

  Empty.

  That decided it.

  He reached out with his left hand and knocked off the patrolman’s helmet.

  Blond, blue-eyed Corporal Eastin whirled toward him, and Tristan rammed a fist into his startled face. It struck with a thick smacking sound. The corporal staggered back, blood spurting from his nose, and Tristan followed him, swiftly delivering driving punches to the guard's gut and then again to his face. As the corporal’s knees buckled, Tristan finished him with a right to the temple.

  Flagge Security Corporal Eastin slid to the ground. He would not be doing any further identity checks today.

  Tristan looked around and saw at least half a dozen people at varying distances staring at him in mute shock.

  Yes, good Flaggers, I just attacked one of your dreaded Security men.

  Don't mess with me.

  But no doubt one of the witnesses would report him as soon as the shock wore off.

  Tristan hopped into the cruiser. He felt it list under his weight for an instant, then the stabilizers righted it. He groaned when he looked at the controls: Flagge Security had revamped its console. But he breathed a quick sigh of relief as he recognized the layout. The joystick and accelerator were still in the standard positions.

  He grabbed the controls and zoomed into a steep climb.

  *

  "Lieutenant? Lt. Garmaz!"

  Streig snapped alert.

  That's me, he thought. He'd been posing as Flagge Security Lt. Garmaz since midday.

  "Yes, sergeant."

  "One of the apartment complex's residents just assaulted the guard stationed in the lobby."

  Assaulted? He'd expected the mime to sneak out. Odd…

  "You mean that female datameister—?"

  "No, sir. This was a male—a Dohan Lee."

  Streig checked the HUD inside his Security helmet. Handy things, these, although his had access to far deeper data than a Security lieutenant. He ran this Lee character and—

  Mute me! He's a mime. A gladiator.

  "I'm calling in a couple of cruisers to—"

  "Call them off! I'll handle it. I have a squadron specially trained for cases like this. You just keep your men in reserve, ready to position themselves when ordered."

  "Yes, sir."

  Streig smiled as he activated the pursuit squadron. Full of surprises, aren't you, mime.

  *

  Tristan leveled off at a hundred meters and checked his position. It told him he was flying west. Wrong. He had to go south—to the freezone.

  He checked his surroundings. He’d risen almost to the middle level of the high-rise canyons that ruled this part of Flagge Quarter. Buildings like massive tree trunks inset with reflector windows slipped past on either side. He felt like a bird flitting through one of the fabled redwood forests of old.

  He gained more altitude, slipping into the express level, then gave the cruiser more juice. At the next intersection he banked left.

  All right. He was heading in the right direction. If he was lucky—very lucky—he’d be out of Flagge Quarter before Security could mount pursuit. But to make that happen, he’d have to get everyone out of his way.

  He played with the console switches until the cruiser’s flashers and howler came on, then opened the throttle. He had the helm of a Flagge Security cruiser—why not make the most of it?

  Up ahead, the other floater traffic cleared a path for him. He smiled. The only way to travel.

  But where was he and how far did he have to go? He activated his neuronet.

  “Regis.”

  An American Indian wearing a leather headband and buckskins joined him in the cruiser cabin.

  "Uhn. Regis not here, Kimosabe. Can Tonto help?"

  "What?"

  Where had this old avatar come from? He'd hadn't used Tonto since—

  And then Tristan remembered. He hadn't finished reprogramming his PDA and now it was cycling through all its old avatars.

  He'd deal with that later. Right now—

  “ETA to the freezone?”

  A transparent map popped into view. He saw a tiny glowing red dot moving through the grid of Flagge Quarter toward the sprawl of the freezone.

  “Five-point-two minutes, assuming Kimosabe's horse gallops at present speed.”

  Five minutes to freedom—yes, this just might work. Hard to believe it was going to be this easy. Steal a floater, and five minutes to freedom.

  “What’s the best altitude?”

  “Uhn. Kimosabe will have more maneuverability if fly like eagle above mesas, but attract less attention from cavalry if stay down here between them.”

  “Exactly what I thought. All right. Monitor Flagge Isle and let me know if they're coming after me.”

  Tonto said, “Yes, Kimosabe,” and disappeared.

  Tristan smiled. He'd all but forgotten about Tonto.

  But he stopped smiling when a bright green, finger-thin beam of light flashed to his right. He turned and saw another Security cruiser on his tail.

  “Reg—I mean, Tonto! You were supposed to warn me!”

  "Hey, pardner," said a scruffy, bearded, toothless old saddle hand. "Gee-willikers! Looks like you got some rustlers hot on your tail."

  Not Gabby! Not now!

  "Weren't you supposed to be monitoring Flagge Security?"

  "Them sidewinders encrypt their telegraphs, pard. I don't have the dad blum key."

  “Bloaty.” Should have known this was going too smoothly to last.

  Another green flash, this time closer. Too close.

  After a little experimentation he found the switch for his rear screen and activated it. It showed he now had two cruisers chasing him.

  His comm screen flickered to life and Tristan immediately cut the video—no sense in giving them a better description of this masque than they already had—but he let the audio run.

  “This is Flagge Security. You are under arrest. Those were warning bursts. Drop to street level immediately or you will be shot down.”

  Tristan shook his head. Being shot down was hardly a threat to a mime agent. Compared to capture, it was a blessing. His neuronet was preprogrammed with two capture options. At the first hint of torture, it would knock out his speech center, leaving him unable to read, write, understand questions, or speak coherently. At the first sign of a memory probe, it would induce massive epileptic seizure that would leave him decerebrate.

  No, a captured mime didn’t pose a problem for the gloms.

  But for the poor mime it was a different story…

  On the surface, the first option sounded preferable, but not to Tristan. Because when Security discovered that the fugitive who punched up one of their own and stole his cruiser was a mime, they’d find some very nasty, bloody games to play with him. Probably bring in a few Security men who specialized in pain. It might take Tristan days, weeks to die.

  No, give me the brain fry.

  Or better yet: Don’t get caught.

  Another flash, another miss—this one sizzled into the wall of a building on his right, frying and shriveling the bark siding. What were they thinking of, shooting at him with other traffic around? In the heart of a residential district, no less. Maybe Flagge citizens became expendable when Security badly wanted to get its hands on someone. The people behind their reflector windows would get quite a show.

  Could be worse, though. The Security cruisers could be firing trackers—one of those little missiles could wreak havoc if it missed and hit a building, or locked onto some hapless non-combatant craft. What was the euphemism for such mishaps?

  T-SEE.

  Sorry, your husband was just blown into a million tiny pieces due to a Terminal Security Enforcement Error.

  Time to climb out of this man-made canyon and get above the buildings where he could maneuver. Otherwise it was only a matter of time before one of those trigger-happy cruiser jockeys hit him.

  Tristan was just pulling back on the stick when a green beam flashed in front of his cruiser. He glanced up through the transparent roof and saw two more cruisers above and ahead.

  "Mute!"

  Swerving left and then right, he dropped into the slower lanes, making himself a tougher target. He saw some people in small floaters look at him, terrified. He spotted a young woman and a child in small two-seater. Maybe out shopping.

  I can’t stay here, he thought.

  He spotted an intersection ahead and frantically began searching the unfamiliar console.

  "Looks like it's time to circle the wagons, pardner."

  “Dammit, Gabby—the wing control. Where the hell is it?”

  "Don't yell at me, you young whippersnapper!" the PDA said, pointing to a toggle by the joystick. "Tarnation, it's right there in front of you!"

  Tristan flipped the switch and extended his cruiser’s wings in time to scream into a ninety-degree left turn. His rear screen showed the first pair of pursuers overshooting the corner, but the high newcomers were still with him, although they'd lost ground.

  As soon as he was level again, he retracted the wings—couldn't make that kind of turn without them but they'd slow him down on the straightway—and maxed the throttle.

  He chewed his lip as he focused total concentration on the traffic ahead. He was moving at such speed that other vehicles couldn't get out of the way fast enough. He ignored all the terrified faces of the floaters he passed. The lanes between the buildings were now an obstacle course. All the bobbing and weaving necessitated by the extra traffic here made it difficult to maintain his speed.

  And he was heading east, damn it!

  He turned off his flashers and howler—they weren't much help at this point and probably made him an easier target.

  As he approached the next corner, he reached for the wing toggle. He was readying to expand them again for a turn back to the south when a beam flashed from the cross lane. He saw a Security cruiser hovering there, waiting in ambush, cutting off his turn.

  He Tristan had no choice. He kept the wings in and stayed his course, dodging laser fire from the lurker as he passed. The Security cruiser didn’t seem to care if he hit anyone below.

  Lasers from behind, lasers from the side...the obstacle course had just become a gauntlet.

  Flagge Quarter’s night lights came on, glow strips running vertically up the sides of the buildings, brightening the lanes between them.

  And making him easier to spot.

  He made up his mind to take the next right—no matter what was waiting there. He had to head south, had to get out of Flagge Quarter.

  He had no illusions that the Security cruisers would back off once he crossed into the freezone—they'd pursue him into hell. But at least in the freezone he'd only have to worry about danger from one direction—the rear. Here, in the heart of Flagge territory, Security could keep calling in reinforcements from all sections of the quarter and attack him from every muting side, tightening the net.

  Only a matter of time...

  He was fairly sure he could lose them in the freezone, or at least stay ahead of them until Kaze sent out its own cruisers as an escort.

  Tristan hung onto the joystick as he put out the wings and stood his craft on its side to tear into the next turn. Another cruiser was waiting, firing at him. But he ducked under it and left it behind. In his rear screen he saw one of the cruisers chasing him collide with the ambusher. Both dissolved in a ball of flame, a brilliant display reflected by the mirror-like windows of a nearby high-rise.

  A really big T-SEE.

  “Two down,” he whispered as he tucked in the wings. “How many to go?”

  "A good dozen or two by my reckoning," Gabby said. "Them sidewinders is closin' in, partner."

  Tristan had forgot his PDA was still activated.

  He was about to off him when he spotted another cruiser dead ahead, lasers flashing, bearing down as if intending to ram him.

  “You want to be crazy?” Tristan muttered. His fighting blood was up now. “I'll show you crazy.”

  He popped up the sighting screen, locked in on the charging cruiser, and began pressing his own trigger as they closed on each other.

  Closer...

  His laser shots were as wild as everyone else’s—he'd never been much of a marksman—but he kept pressing the trigger, filling the air ahead of him with streaming flashes of deadly light.

  Closer...closer...

  Tristan was not going to change course.

  The other pilot finally must have realized this and veered off at the last second.

  “Thank you!” Tristan whispered.

  He let out a deep breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. That had been too close. He wasn't here to show off his fearlessness. He had a viral sample and a datameister template he was supposed to deliver. That was his assignment—that was why he was here.

  But he was not going to be taken alive.

  A group of cruisers appeared dead ahead. Too many for head-on heroics. He was forced into a west-bound street.

  "Better watch out, pardner," Gabby said. "I reckon they’re boxin' you in."

  "Off!" Tristan said as he quickly found an open cross street and turned south again.

  He fought the urge to climb to where he could spread his pursuit and not have to worry about potshots from the cross lanes—where they'd have to come to him instead of waiting for him to run into their sights. But he knew he'd be approaching the boundary wall soon, and Security would have some heavy fixed batteries there, and certainly some smart missiles. High up and alone, he'd be a perfect target.

  So he dropped his altitude almost to street level, but didn't drop his speed. Teeth clenched, eyes fixed straight ahead, sweaty hands hanging onto the stick, twitching it back and forth, nudging it up and down, Tristan dodged through the air and ground traffic at bullet velocity. He was dimly aware of blaring horns and white faces, terrified or angry or both, staring, glaring open-mouthed through the windows of the vehicles he bumped or cut off from above, below, or the side,