tall palace gates the broad Avenue of Triumph bisected the rest of the city. The fashionable west side, with its expensive shops and the villas of the nobility, filled the area between the river and the Avenue of Triumph. Bordering the banks of the river itself stood the Row of Palaces, grand edifices built long ago during the height of the Viis Empire. They were maintained now by the descendants of the Twelve, the original noble houses.
The east side of the city sprawled unchecked out into the dry, flat Plains of Filea. As the capital city of the Viis homeworld, Vir required a spaceport, but the terminal had been located eighty klicks away to spare the city from the noise of ground-space shuttles booming into departure velocity. Vir Station One stood at the farthest rim of the eastern side of the city, handling first-class passengers. Vir Stations Two and Three processed second- and third-class passengers, including military personnel. Vir Station Four handled only cargo, including domestic, intercontinental, and galactic trade. It constantly expanded to accommodate the heavy traffic between it and Port Filea, and many of the loading docks for cargo now extended into the abiru ghetto. Tenants never knew when they might return home from work to find their building marked for demolition. As a result, more and more tenements grew crowded, and more and more of the abiru folk were forced to live in alley shanties.
The ghetto was a place of decaying buildings, abandoned shops, and dirty streets. Sanitation Services came through sporadically. Public comm lines were usually broken, which also meant most of the vids didn’t work. Public transit did not enter the ghetto. Cameras and security sniffers floated constantly along the perimeter dividing the ghetto from the rest of the city, with strong security networks clustered at the gates. The registration ID implanted in Elrabin’s elbow lacked an authorization exit code, which meant he could stand at the barricades all day long and look at the sleek skimmers flying by, the well-to-do Viis citizens hurrying past on their business, the shops with fabulous wares displayed behind shimmering security bars, but he could never pass through the gates into the Viis part of the city. All those wonderful things out there might as well be located on the planet Mynchepop, for all the chance Elrabin had of ever getting closer to them.
Few Viis ventured into the ghetto besides slavers, patrollers, and members of the small religious order that ministered to the Viis Rejects, who were to be avoided at all costs.
Reforms were mentioned occasionally on vid news, but no one in the Viis government wanted to squander money on breaking the endless cycle of poverty, hard labor, and degradation of the inferior abiru races.
To Elrabin, standing at the barricade with his narrow muzzle almost pressed to its crackling energy barrier, there was an entirely unexplored world waiting for him out there. He pressed closer, yearning to experience a type of existence that seemed like a fantasy.
An alarm blared, startling him into jumping back. Heart pounding, he gazed up at the sniffer floating above him. Little frizzles of energy crackled over his skin, and he knew he was being scanned.
“You are too close to the barricade,” a mechanical voice blared. It was scratchy, warbling at the ends of words in a way that would have been funny in other circumstances. “Step back six paces. Warning. You are . . . close to the barr . . . cade. Step back.”
Elrabin scooted back, turned, and headed down the street with his ears cocked back, alert for trouble. The sniffer continued to float over the spot where he’d been, its message repeating itself as though stuck in a loop.
The stupid thing was probably five seconds from a break-down. Elrabin flicked his ears forward. Half the machinery in the ghetto didn’t work. No one maintained it, and anything that did function usually got stolen or cannibalized for
The east side of the city sprawled unchecked out into the dry, flat Plains of Filea. As the capital city of the Viis homeworld, Vir required a spaceport, but the terminal had been located eighty klicks away to spare the city from the noise of ground-space shuttles booming into departure velocity. Vir Station One stood at the farthest rim of the eastern side of the city, handling first-class passengers. Vir Stations Two and Three processed second- and third-class passengers, including military personnel. Vir Station Four handled only cargo, including domestic, intercontinental, and galactic trade. It constantly expanded to accommodate the heavy traffic between it and Port Filea, and many of the loading docks for cargo now extended into the abiru ghetto. Tenants never knew when they might return home from work to find their building marked for demolition. As a result, more and more tenements grew crowded, and more and more of the abiru folk were forced to live in alley shanties.
The ghetto was a place of decaying buildings, abandoned shops, and dirty streets. Sanitation Services came through sporadically. Public comm lines were usually broken, which also meant most of the vids didn’t work. Public transit did not enter the ghetto. Cameras and security sniffers floated constantly along the perimeter dividing the ghetto from the rest of the city, with strong security networks clustered at the gates. The registration ID implanted in Elrabin’s elbow lacked an authorization exit code, which meant he could stand at the barricades all day long and look at the sleek skimmers flying by, the well-to-do Viis citizens hurrying past on their business, the shops with fabulous wares displayed behind shimmering security bars, but he could never pass through the gates into the Viis part of the city. All those wonderful things out there might as well be located on the planet Mynchepop, for all the chance Elrabin had of ever getting closer to them.
Few Viis ventured into the ghetto besides slavers, patrollers, and members of the small religious order that ministered to the Viis Rejects, who were to be avoided at all costs.
Reforms were mentioned occasionally on vid news, but no one in the Viis government wanted to squander money on breaking the endless cycle of poverty, hard labor, and degradation of the inferior abiru races.
To Elrabin, standing at the barricade with his narrow muzzle almost pressed to its crackling energy barrier, there was an entirely unexplored world waiting for him out there. He pressed closer, yearning to experience a type of existence that seemed like a fantasy.
An alarm blared, startling him into jumping back. Heart pounding, he gazed up at the sniffer floating above him. Little frizzles of energy crackled over his skin, and he knew he was being scanned.
“You are too close to the barricade,” a mechanical voice blared. It was scratchy, warbling at the ends of words in a way that would have been funny in other circumstances. “Step back six paces. Warning. You are . . . close to the barr . . . cade. Step back.”
Elrabin scooted back, turned, and headed down the street with his ears cocked back, alert for trouble. The sniffer continued to float over the spot where he’d been, its message repeating itself as though stuck in a loop.
The stupid thing was probably five seconds from a break-down. Elrabin flicked his ears forward. Half the machinery in the ghetto didn’t work. No one maintained it, and anything that did function usually got stolen or cannibalized for
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