Free Fool's Run (v1.1) by Patricia A. McKillip Page A

one would believe you even if you gave your real name. That’s the simplest lie of all.”
    “Is it?” He picked up the roses, let them fall gently. Aaron felt the amiable expression on his face suddenly strained.
    “And,” he added lightly, “no thorns. Nothing to hurt with.”
    “I see thorns,” Sidney said. Aaron looked at him. The powerful, kindly face made him smile suddenly, tiredly.

    “So do I. But if I catch a rose, I take it for what it’s worth, and sometimes it’s worth clinging with one finger to the edge of life for one more day—” He stopped, startled at himself, and picked up his glass. Sidney motioned for a beer.
    “I understand,” he said mildly. “I’m just critical because they clog my vacuums.” He smiled as Quasar, in black leather from head to foot, the heels on her boots impossibly high, strode across the floor toward them. Then he blushed as she flung her arms around him and left a rainbow stain of color on his lips. She turned on her heel to face Aaron, dragged deeply at her cigarette and threw it at his feet. He ground it out, his expression unruffled, as she spun away.
    Sidney wiped his mouth, looking as if one of his pop robot-bands had just broken into opera.
    “Impulsive,” Aaron commented. The rest of Nova scattered around the bar, the Magician at his elbow.
    “I think,” Sidney said, emerging from behind his napkin, “it might actually catch on. A social dinosaur emerging back into fashion, outlasting even the roses.”
    “What’s he talking about?” the Magician asked Aaron.
    “Kissing.”
    “But as a social gesture, the cigarette was bewildering. Does that mean she likes you or she doesn’t like you?”
    “It means she wants to set my boots on fire.”
    “She’ll more likely set my club on fire one of these days.” He added to the Magician, “Will Nova go to the Underworld?”
    The Magician nodded a trifle grimly. “One way or another. The Gambler gets space-sick, and Quasar—does she have a record, Aaron?”
    “Yes,” Aaron said. Then he put down his glass, flushing slightly. “How did you know—”
    “You told me once you even did a status-check on me, when we first met. What kind of a record? Will they give her an off-world passport? Will they let her in the Underworld? Will they let her out again?”
    Aaron nodded. “She had a pretty wild youth in Lumière Sector. She lived underground, in the old sewer and train tunnels. They charged her with a lot of things, but the only things ever proven against her were property damage and disturbing the peace.”
    “She was in prison.”
    “For a couple of months. That was so long ago it shouldn’t be a problem. As long as she doesn’t create problems herself. She doesn’t like patrollers.”
    “I think she likes you,” the Magician said, with an unusual flash of insight. “It’s that she likes you that she doesn’t like.”
    “Come again?”
    “Never mind. It was a brilliant thought but fleeting. Thinking about people scrambles my circuitry. Have you ever been to the Underworld?”

    “Once. I was doing some investigating in their Records Department. They don’t give Earth-access. It’s an amazing place. Quiet as a morgue and as efficient as death.”
    “I had a pleasant conversation with the Chief of the Underworld,” Sidney commented. “We talked about nursery rhymes.”
    “Klyos?” Aaron said amazedly. “Nursery rhymes?”
    “Have you met him?”
    “No. I’ve heard rumors, including one that he’s human.”
    “Is that strange?”
    “In a prison that size, with that potential for disaster, yes.” He shook his head. “Nursery rhymes. How did you get the Underworld Chief even to admit he might have been born?”
    “He didn’t go that far,” Sidney said. The Magician’s head turned toward Nova’s stage an instant before the curtain-light spiraled down around it, then up again, signaling a two-minute warning. The Nebraskan was looking at his watch.
    “Break’s over,” he