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Andrew Roller Presents
THE FADING UNIVERSE
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Chapter Five
The subway station was jammed with people. Every time a train
pulled in they crowded toward it, pressing themselves into the cars.
Within moments the train would be filled to capacity. Its metal doors
would slide shut and the train would pitch forward into the blackness
of the tunnel, leaving hordes of hopeful passengers stranded on the
brightly lit platform.
Marvin waded through the crowd, Elsa clasping his hand, trailing
behind him. A little further back Frankie, Harrigan, and Flaherty
followed. Perry, just behind Elsa, passed his hands lovingly over the
little girls he passed as the gang wedged its way forward. Anonymous
touchings in a crowd by a stranger whoÕd disappeared by the time the
girl turned her head to look.
They were somewhere in the heart of Ontario, sheep amidst more
sheep, with no shepherd around to protect them from wolves. Here on
the platform were bespectacled businessmen, librarians, city clerks,
all the culturally neutered people so necessary to the efficient
organization of a state. They were without weapons. And they were
without any survival plan. TheyÕd called 911 and no one had answered.
But they still believed in the state, whether it really existed any more
or not. The state, like Tinkerbell, MUST exist. And if they stood here
long enough and mentally clapped their hands surely it would come into
being. Someone would arrive. Someone with a badge, with authority.
They would be told where to go, what to do, how to live, and some of
them, surely, would have to be told how to die...violators, perpetrators,
those that remained uncastrated in modern society. Those that still
had Òballs.Ó
Marvin was uneasy in such a group. HeÕd grown up in the ghetto,
and just by looking at the walls of the subway he could tell he wasnÕt
in his element. There was no graphitti here. No incidental scrawlings
designed to say, ÒWe rule here, and weÕre not the State.Ó No, here the
state ruled. Instead of graffiti there were nicely lettered signs. ÒNo
Littering.Ó ÒDo Not Stand in Front of the White Line.Ó But there was a
sense of desperation in the crowd. An idea had been let loose, and it
simply would not get back in the bottle. It whispered among the people,
rattled in their heads, rattled their nerves. If they did litter, would
anyone arrest them? And if they...well, it was unthinkable. Did they
need a sign now that said, ÒDo Not Rape.Ó ÒDo Not Pillage.Ó ÒDo Not
Murder.Ó And if those signs were properly painted up and hung, would
anyone enforce THEM?
Half an hour passed. Marvin gazed into the abyss of the subway
tunnel, waiting for a train. Behind him Flaherty noisily sucked up the
foam residue of an empty milkshake. Occasionally, when the murmur of
the crowd faded, Marvin could hear a broken pipe dripping water.
Marvin shifted his weight onto his left foot. He licked the beads
of perspiration off his upper lip. His mouth felt dry, like sandpaper.
TheyÕd run with the other captives from Westminster Mall. It had
been total chaos. Their crowd had merged with others, and those into a
larger mass. People, well heeled and well clothed, with perhaps their
last meal already in their bellies, running. Shouting and grabbing and
trying to hold on, as rocket batteries echoed over them and into them.
Death was loose here, swinging his scythe. Death did not have arthritis
now. Marvin had no choice but to seek out the thickest part of the
crowd. Use the bodies as protection from all the firepower that was
going off around them. Alameda had lost control of the mall, but to
whom? And did it matter? Had Alameda merely lost the position
momentarily, suffered a setback, and were they now on the attack?
Whoever was doing the shooting, it seemed to be coming down on the
crowd from all sides. Someone had the bright idea of running down into
a subway tunnel, and the crowd followed. Marvin figured they must be
about on the level of the Westminster MallÕs basement, maybe five or
six blocks over. For all he knew a train would pull in and whoever had
gotten control of the mall would be on it, come to round them all up and
haul them back. ÒThis is your lucky day, shoppers. The mall is open
forever and you get to live there now. Until we decide what to do with
you, anyway. Until we restore Òorder.Ó Our order. Just follow our
orders.Ó Marvin didnÕt like this, being unarmed and among people like
this. It reminded him of Jews being herded off to a concentration camp.
Once you got a lot of people together they seemed worth less to
somebody with a gun, especially somebody with a grudge. They became
just bodies. They became easy to kill. Perhaps fun to kill. Marvin
could imagine Perry setting a bomb off among a group of people like
this. ÒHi, itÕs time to Die!Ó With a grin heÕd unburden himself of some
perceived offence, with luck heÕd cow and enslave the survivors. Well,
theyÕd live better then, that was for sure. But right now they had no
bomb and they were among the crowd, not outside it. TheyÕd die right
along with it if some wiseass did set a bomb off, or started shooting
into it. There would be no special dispensation for Marvin and Perry.
No Òfree passÓ for fellow bandits. They were faceless in a faceless
crowd. A crowd where there were no names, no addresses, just bodies.
And the bodies were pressed together, too close, and the people were
getting edgy. They were beginning to want to kill each other. The guy
next to them who sweated too much, whoÕd stepped on their foot, whoÕd
looked at their wife or their daughter. The crowd itself would turn into
a bomb if something didnÕt happen soon. Something to relieve the
tension. Fortunately, Anacin was on the way. Sometimes drugs do have
side effects, though, Marvin worried, as he caught the faint glimmer of
steel on steel shimmering in the far distance. He cocked his head.
Mentally he began rehearsing how he would handle the situation. HeÕd
gotten them close to the edge, in front of most of the people. One thing
was for sure, he wanted on that train. He felt like he was in a prison
here, like he was in a tomb that maybe somebody had already closed
shut. They were going to get on that train no matter what. Around him,
other ears perked up, heads turned, everyone heard it now. A train!
A low roar echoed from deep inside the tunnel. The crowd came
alive. It pushed forward. Relief at last. SOMETHING, anything to
relieve the terrible tedium. The waiting. God, they could not wait any
longer. A moment later a train pulled into the station, a harsh squeal
permeating the heavy air as its brakes engaged. Marvin half expected to
see Ringo Star emerge.
ÒHullo there,Ó heÕd say, in his proper, clipped British accent. And
he could feel the crowd feeling the same thing. Yes, it would be Ringo,
and heÕd have a pocket watch. And of course the first item on the
agenda would be the proper presentation of tickets. Not that any of
them had any, of course, but Ringo would ask for them all the same. A
matter of procedure, you know, and fill out this form in triplicate if
youÕre without one. Hurry, old boy, people are waiting. We have a
schedule to keep.
The train's pneumatic doors opened with a dull thud. But there
was no Ringo, not even any Leatherjackets. Just millions upon millions
of insects.
Elsa let out a shrill scream of horror, her ululation joining that of
thousands.
###
Marvin sat dazedly in a puddle of blood on the floor of the
speeding train, his back resting against a pair of metal double doors.
He feebly reached up and felt the cloth tourniquet around the bleeding
stump of what had been, just minutes ago, his right arm. His thoughts
still reeled, one scene dominating all the rest. In his mind Elsa stood
just outside the door of the train. Marvin reached out and grabbed her
hand. Without warning, the steel pneumatic train doors closed solidly
on his arm. Elsa fell against the side of the train as it bolted away
from the platform. Then, like a rag doll, she sprawled backward into a
seething mass of abandoned people and rapacious roaches.
Marvin couldn't believe it. He had positioned himself, Elsa, and
the others at exactly the right place on the platform; close to the edge,
but not so near to it that they could be pushed off. And they had
endured the interminable wait, crushed together in the thick damp air
of the tunnel.
Marvin shuddered reflexively as his mind's eye pictured the first
train as it came in, filled with ebony beetles. Almost immediately
afterward a second train had pulled in on the opposite side of the
platform. Behind them. Of course. There were two sides to the
platform, each with its own track, and Marvin had picked the wrong
side. It had been a 50/50 gamble, and (like so often lately) heÕd picked
the losing side. Marvin's mind shifted from the rush across the
platform to the wrenching pain that had shot through his body when his
extended arm, caught in the door and sticking out of the train, had been
ruthlessly clipped off by the cinderblock wall as the train passed into
the tunnel.
"Hey, I think I know who that skinny boy is," a burly passenger
said of Perry, who had awakened from a traumatized fatigue and was
sitting on the floor near Marvin.
"You're right, I know him too," a middle aged man said angrily. "He
was on the evening news last night. That kid is Perry, the head of the
gang that blew up South Haven elementary school!"
"No, you're mistaken," Marvin mumbled, grimacing with pain as he
turned his head. "He's just a high school student at Brownbury. Honors,
in fact."
"And who are you, his mother?" the burly man yelled. "I know a
face when I see one!"
The loss of Marvin's arm had attracted the attention of the entire
train. Someone had bandaged it for him. Someone who claimed to be a
doctor. Marvin couldnÕt remember who now, heÕd been dazed, in shock.
A face in the crowd. A face among faces. And all the faces had been
staring at him.
And someone, staring long enough, had recognized Perry now.
Marvin felt more trapped than ever, and he was in no condition to fight,
to do anything really, except maybe to die.
Suddenly the passengers, pent up and with no one to blame for
their agony, were in a frenzy. The crowd closed in. Fists began to fly.
Blind rage rippled in toward Marvin like some in-sucking whirlpool, and
he was at the vortex. It was as if he were sucking in all the hate in the
world, and he knew it must consume him.
###
Marvin's eyes sprang open. He felt a rush of cool wind all around
him. Suddenly he realized that he was falling through the air,
plummeting down toward a vast blue ocean.
The shoreline, jagged with the metal outcroppings of ruined
tunnels, was directly to his right. Above him a train was crossing a
trestle.
Marvin's mind flashed back to the fight on board the train.
Harrigan, Frankie, and Flaherty had managed to beat back the enraged
passengers long enough for the train to get out over water. Then they
had cast Marvin and Perry out the window.
Marvin slipped into unconsciousness for a moment. The shock of
cold water woke him as he hit the sea. Above him the train exploded.
He stared speechlessly at the pieces of the train as they blew apart and
curved slowly earthward. Marvin squeezed his eyes shut as debris
splattered on the undulating waves all around him.
A while later Marvin was jostled into consciousness by someone
bobbing beside him. It was Flaherty.
"Boy, we sure got out of that train in the nick of time, huh, Marv?"
"Flaherty! You escaped!" Marvin cried.
"Yup. Me, Frankie, and Harrigan jumped out just a few moments
after we threw you overboard." Flaherty let out a silly laugh.
Soon the others joined them. Then they all paddled slowly toward
an extrusion of twisted steel that stood above the waves in the middle
of the bay.
Reseda Island. Once it, along with all the metal corridors that
lined the shore of the sea, had been part of a seamless network of
tunnels. But during the war a pulse bomb had gone off in this area,
gouging out a huge hole, breaking open an encapsulated reservoir. They
would be safe on Reseda Island, at least from the insects, for the bugs
couldn't cross water. It was impossible for them to infiltrate Reseda
from below, either, because water had flooded the portion of the
superstructure that sat beneath the ocean's surface. The bugs could try
crawling across the wide expanse of serrated ceiling that stretched
across the sea, but the drop down on to the uppermost peaks of Reseda
would, Marvin hoped, kill them.
"Say, Marv, do you think there are any sharks in this water?"
Flaherty asked uneasily.
"No, just Piranhas."
###
Marvin sat wrapped in a wooly blanket in front of a blazing fire.
He sipped at a soothing mug of warm ale, reflecting merrily at how
quickly Flaherty had swam to Reseda Island, gullibly swallowing
Marvin's gibe about the caribes. Perry sat next to Marvin, toasting his
bare feet before the iron grate of the hearth.
Casey's pub. Located on Reseda Island, Casey's had long been a
haunt of the fishermen from the clapboard village of Chatsworth that
huddled amidst the mutant-infested ruins along the shore. The bar also
catered to a host of undesirables, as its owner was undiscriminating in
whom he served. As long as one paid his tab, Casey catered cheerfully
to your needs and asked no questions.
"Pretty tough, huh Marv?" Flaherty asked.
"What is?"
"Casey told me Alameda blew up that subway. With a cannon.
Apparently they had issued a warning. If anyone tried to leave Ontario,
they would be killed."
"It's nice to know Alameda keeps its word," Marvin said dully.
"Hey, Casey, how 'bout some more ale, pal?" Flaherty shouted.
When the robust man had re-filled his mug, Flaherty resumed relating
the details of the train wreck, but Marvin had slipped into a troubled
sleep.
###
When Marvin awoke he was slouched in the same chair. His eyes
focused on a mug of hot ale (recently refilled by Casey) and he made to
pick it up. Suddenly he realized that his right arm was missing, and the
pain and horror of the previous day's events came rushing back.
"A group of people just arrived from Chatsworth," Flaherty said,
alarmed. "They say the insects penned in a tribe of mutants along the
shore and those deformities are heading right this way."
"What's that you say?" Casey, across the room, blustered, his
face crimson.
A fisherman, drenched with rain, replied, "I said the mutants
killed four families. Snuck up on their homes without a sound."
"Damn bloody bastards!" Casey cried. "Men," Casey announced,
addressing his patrons, "I cain't require you to remain, but if ye have
any love of God in ye you'll stay and give those foul sewer rat mutants
the licking they deserve! Help those debased slaves home to the devil
in Hell what spawned 'em!"
A roar went up. Men pounded the tables, shouting. The venetian
lamps hanging overhead swayed to and fro. Like revolutionary patriots,
Casey's customers jumped up and began hurrying about, fortifying the
bar and the dock outside, preparing the island against an attack by the
mutants.
###
The boat rocked back and forth amidst the rippling waves. Marvin
hunched in the bow, a blanket pulled over his head to shield himself
against the sheets of rain that buffeted the sea. He wondered absently
when the storm clouds that had formed inside the large interior of the
cavern would dissipate.
To Marvin's right the burning methane from Signal Hill, Ontario's
oil refinery, cast a bright orange glow over the sable waters. When
Marvin had been thrown out of the subway the ocean had been tyndall
blue, illuminated by slender arc lights that traversed the roof. Now a
power failure had cast the cavern into darkness.
Marvin gazed at Reseda Island as the sloop receded from it.
Chunks of the licorice monolith were in flames. Casey's tavern
overflowed with triumphant mutants, hooting and howling in victorious
celebration. The remnants of Casey's customers and the families who
had fled Chatsworth retreated in a motley assortment of dilapidated
fishing vessels.
Marvin's head nodded and a moment later he drifted off to sleep.
NEXT ISSUE:
"Gran'pa, throw these gays o'erboard into the shit! They won't need to
excavate for it if they're swimmin' in it!"
30
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