1269_UgliesFreeBook

144 Scott Westerfeld
almost completely submerged, only a few shapeless masses
rising through the grasp of vegetation. But the Rusties had
built solidly, in love with their wasteful skeletons of metal.
The lights on the front of her board stayed bright.
“Until you find one that’s long and flat,” Tally said to
herself. She had memorized the note backward and forward,
but repeating the words hadn’t made their meaning
any clearer.
“One what?” was the question. A roller coaster? A gap?
The first would be silly. Where would be the point of a long,
flat roller coaster? A long, flat gap? Maybe that would
describe a canyon, complete with a handy river at the bottom.
But how could a canyon be flat?
Maybe “one” meant a one, like the number. Should she
be looking for something that looked like a one? But a one
was just a straight line, anyway, kind of long and flat
already. So was I, the Roman numeral for one, except for the
crossbars on top and bottom. Or the dot on the top if it was
a small i.
“Thanks for the great clue, Shay,” Tally said aloud.
Talking to herself didn’t seem like such a bad idea there in the
outer ruins, where the relics of the Rusties struggled against
the grip of creeping plants. Anything was better than ghostly
silence. She passed concrete plains, vast expanses cracked by
thrusting grasses. The windows of fallen walls stared up at
her, sprouting weeds as if the earth had grown eyes.
She scanned the horizon, looking for clues. There was