Free The Children of the Sky by Vernor Vinge Page A

streaking in from her left, knocking her off her feet. All three Tropicals bounded past. They clambered over each other even as she scrambled to her feet. Maybe they had seen what she was going to do, maybe they were that smart by themselves. In any case, the top one eased its snout under the bar and flipped it loose. The pressure from within swung the gate open, knocking the three’s pyramid in all directions. The crowd within stampeded through, some of them knocking Johanna down again, most flowing smoothly around her. Some even said “Hei” on their way past.
    Johanna curled forward, protecting her face behind her knees and arms.
    Finally the thundering herd had passed. Their shouts and caroling echoed back from the hills as they chased themselves both south and north along the Queen’s Road.
    Jo got back on her feet. The damp ground had been trampled into mud. The open gate hung at an angle. She saw a half dozen figures near the entrance.
    “Guys?” Johanna walked toward the remaining Tines. It wouldn’t be surprising if the departure had left some injured behind.
    Even close up, she didn’t see any blood. None of the Tines were limping, except the one she called Dirty Henrik, and he’d had a bad forepaw ever since the rest of his pack got squished in a rock fall. No, these six just couldn’t decide whether they were staying or going. They milled in and out of the entrance, making nervous noises as they looked out into the dark.
    Jo stood by the gate for a moment, feeling just as uncertain as the remaining Tines, and thinking through her reasoning of moments before—before the Tropicals had put everyone on the other side of the question. Finally she said, “You gotta make up your minds, guys, cuz I’m gonna close this gate.”
    None of them understood Samnorsk, but when she put her hands on the gate and began to push it shut, they seemed to get the message. All but Dirty Henrik quickly slipped inside. Henrik remained half in and half out, his nose twitching as he smelled the night air. His pack had been a lumberjack; maybe he could do all right in the outside. Dirty Henrik wobbled back and forth, then realized the gate was still closing on him. He gave a little squeak and retreated within.
    Jo had to force the gate upwards to overcome the bent hinge, and then it was shut. She left the lock bar on the ground. Hell, if he wanted to badly enough, Henrik could probably push his way out.
    And now … Johanna stood in silence for a moment, trying to make sense of what had happened and decide how she should feel about it. Finally she shook her head and started up the steps that led to the admin building. She had some phone calls to make.
     
•  •  •
     
    The other Children called the events of that night “Jo’s great jailbreak.” Some of them thought it was all very funny. The consequences? Maybe they were as bad as Johanna had imagined, though not quite so obvious and visible. For the next year or so, the back alleys and garbage dumps of villages all around had a surplus of singletons and duos, aimless beggars who importuned and incompetently burgled and robbed. A few came back to the Fragmentarium. A very few found refuge in the new Tropical “embassy,” though the Tropicals seemed much less happy to have recruits than they were to raise hell with the local singletons.
    The majority of the runaways simply disappeared into the awesome wilderness. Pilgrim thought that more than a few of the disappeared had survived and made packs of themselves. “I can tell you from personal experience,” he told Jo some tendays later, when he caught her crying, “when times get really tough, you’ll patch up with parts you could never imagine sharing even a single thought with. Hei, look at me.” That turned her sobs into a hiccupping laugh; she knew what he meant better than most humans. Nevertheless, she was sure that the wide, deep silence of the northern forests had swallowed the lives of most of the