Down Jersey Driveshaft

by William J. Jackson

  He gets the old girl running, and skedaddles.

  "Incoming!"

  Soldiers push into the bank. In on cots come Skinny, and then Larry. The inside is stomped all over by pale bodies. But to their surprise, every soul in the building is knocked flat out.

  "Well I'll be..." Patients bandaged tight and drugged into comas are placed on the floor as GI's scramble about. "Mechanic Crank? Potts!" The GI removes his complicated gas mask with the high antenna headphones and other amenities. "Run over there and snap the docs to life 'cuz we need 'em. Now!"

  Potts, bulky but spry, plays hopscotch for those precious spaces of floor visible between fallen bodies. He scoops up a physician, one handed, placing him in a sitting position. Snap. Snap. "Hey, Doc. Doc? Doc!" Slap!

  The doctor comes to, Crank as well, noticing blood oozing out of her ears. Bewildered. Leaden eyes wobble to and fro.

  "You hear me, Doc?"

  "Mechanic?"

  If vomiting is a positive response, then these two are A-Okay. Soldiers recoil from the outflow. Potts doesn't make it. He wipes off waste as the room awakens.

  Crank finds her feet but not her footing. Boots squeak on scuffed tile. The GI plays third leg as Miss Musa searches for stability.

  "Easy, Mechanic, easy. Take it slow. Potts, get the Doc over to Skinny and Larry!"

  "My ears!" Crank manages to look at the GI square on. "Do you hear the ringing!"

  "No, ma'am. We heard a sound coming in, but we had put on our comm helmets in the truck. Tried to contact the boys at Fort Mott, but no go."

  "What?" Crank is a brilliant woman. Lip reading is not on the long list of her talents. She feels her ears, the blood. The slippery feel brings a startled impression to accentuate the negative vibes of confusion, pain and nausea. "There was a sound, no! A...siren, like a weapon!" Eyes bulge. Brain bangs up against the skull. But, she studies the scene: people recovering, spitting up, blood drops. "It got to all of us! Why not...oh! The fancy comm helmet! Got it!" A weak thumbs up is given before she sees the unbelievable and staggers away...

  "Skinny! No!" She trembles hands over her brother's large body as if it will heal him. The doctor slumps next to Crank. Seeing a pale, beaten man before him offers the physician some spark of life.

  "Excuse me... miss. Have to...ah...work." Doc smacks the spit out of himself. "Bag! I need my bag and...whatever medical...things are...in the truck."

  GI's double time their moves. Physician's bag. Medical kit. White blankets. People shake off the effects of Motherville, absorb the new dilemma unfolding. As they can, hands pitch in.

  "Okay, okay!" Doc runs his head while directing traffic. "To my left, bring Skinny and...lay him on his stomach. Put Larry to my right, face up. And someone please hand me a half dozen Anacin!" The men go down easy on cots, their bandages snipped off. "Fine, fine. You boys versed in first aid can assist, ladies as well. I will...move back and forth...stitch Larry...and Skin...I will start and direct your hands on how to continue."

  Pauses slow the pace. Folks are reeling. Noise. Blackouts. Bloodstains. Get some pep in your step.

  Isopropyl alcohol on cotton swabs cleanses gaping wounds, surgical needles, opens nostrils wide. Doc and nurses wash their hands in it. A small reserve bottle of boric acid is applied to the unsightly laceration on Skinny Bubba. Needles are threaded by nervous but expedient ladies.

  "Doesn't appear to be any damage to the spine..."

  Citizens dart in and out of the bank to vomit, to cry or scream. Tinnitus is king. The World War took a lot from them. This one is rending Salem's soul. But they shake it off, one by one. Lives need saving. The labors begin.

  Chapter Twenty Six: Pincer Movement

  Wilkes straightens his army ant helmet and thanks God. Minutes ago, they exited the old house, full of paranoia. Then came the hullabaloo, a maddening hot jazz one note puncturing the chords of sanity. The Noise. Falling to the ground, Benny reasoned only the helmets were keeping the two conscious, slapping down Wilkes' as he was about to remove it to check on their people. Good save, Brown Bear.

  He nestles into the cockpit of the Helldiver, Doctor Sadie Zafra (so she says; Wilkes isn’t so sure) and Turner KO'd in the back seat, a tight fit but a fit nonetheless. Deep breaths. The Noise manages to still pierce his earlobes, a nagging pig squeal. But it's faltering. Wilkes slaps his chest, waits for the heart to slow. They just about died inside, then outside. Come on, nerves of steel!

  There it is. Anger, as necessary to warriors as air, fires up the throat. Remember what happened. Lives lost. Love lost. He taps the jacket before unzipping it to dig into a pocket. Out she comes. A photograph, black and white, crease lines at the bent corners. There's a plane in the photo, a swarthy Ford Tri-Motor, banged up by a dozen adventures. Stepping out the door of the aircraft is a woman. She's vibrant, blonde hair blown over a triangular face, coveralls and leather jacket soiled. The world in the photo holds limitless fun. He can't even recall that world. The two of them shared unbelievable escapades. He can't bring even one to the forefront because the joy is a murky tarpit. Slicks shot it down, shattered them like glass orbs on the street. Who was she? Who was he back then?

  "Kathy...the drinking...so trivial now."

  Rage heats up the blood. Carson feels the hurt load up like rounds of ammo jammed up his spine. There used to be a carefree attitude in the world, one that carried Wilkes and his love around the world. Those paradisiac days were done in by Hitler, by Mussolini and now by Motherville.

  Bastards. Why do you have to take everything?

  He's ready to open fire until everything made of metal within a hundred miles is reduced to poker chips. He shoves the stick of the Helldiver, and the machine takes a step forward.

  "Benjamin, are you ready to push on?"

  There's a snarl in that question.

  The targeting scope sits just left in his line of sight as he gazes out the cockpit. Benny has stared at the city forever, until it ceased to be, became first a blur and then nothing. Wilmington split into a kaleidoscope of radiant pinpoints amidst waves of black anguish. Life is unreal. He stops being. Time lapses to zero. No Earth. No war. No Benjamin Haskins.

  At first he did so to tough out the pain, a trick acquired in the last great War to End all Optimism, but a partial hit of morphine in the mostly cleaned out wound helped that (keeping a vial on him being another trick). But once he groaned from hoisting Traveler Gray into Milkman, thoughts wisped away from the wound, the last shootout, having an aerial legend in their midst. Aggravating ringing of the eardrums. One point mattered above all.

  "Please God, let Frederica be alive."

  He feels it right to speak her birth name, uncertain as he is if the Lord responds to nicknames. Prayer comes easier once dire straits are present. He rubs the many buttons and control stick to come back to the physical world.

  Nothing. Gray. Light. Color. Sound. Touch. City. Plane. Numb pain. Warfare. Get to jumpin'.

  "Benjamin, are you ready to push on?"

  Breathing, the final stage of existence, kicks like a mule. Benny taps his helmet. He remembers a ringing, but it's like recalling a dream from childhood: warning his brother to keep the helmet on, three people passing out, bloody noses. When did these events occur?

  "What?" He realizes right away the tone is vile. In the back, Gray begins to stir and moan in the cubby hole he's jammed into. "Sorry, Corporal. Yeah. Let's make like birds and fly out of this coop."

  Stick shoved. Milkman begins to sprint. There's a lot of ground to cover.

  I need Crank.

  Fevered in the brain but not one to lose his senses, Roy hits La Donna's brakes hard. Rubber burns into the street as he makes a hard turnaround.

  A hand fumbles for the radio handle.

  "Fuse to Crank. Fuse to Crank! Come in!"

  Radio buzzes. White noise hums calm normally, but today it infuriates. Without warning the channels do the Lindy Hop, skipping about every frequency.

  ...we take you now to the Great At
lantic Wall, where an unusual alliance forms. The Nazi regime is opening its gates to let in the Allied forces, desperate to rid France and the Fatherland of a threat much more severe...

  ...oosevelt believed to be hiding in a bunker at an undisclosed...

  Roy supposes the propaganda pieces to calm the public are over. Every fidgety channel is about the effects of Motherville. No big bands to wash away the blues. No comedy acts or serial dramas. Doom and gloom.

  "Crank! Come in, Crank!"

  "I hear you, Roy Fuse."

  Screech! La Donna jerks back and forth on the stop.

  "Motherville." Roy mumbles it.

  "Yes. I dreamt about you last night. You build. You know signals. You move them in waves and beams. A new signal tuning in to my show. Have you seen my growth?"

  How can she hear me? Radio has no listening capability. He looks beyond the smoke and ruins to the hand antenna in the distance. Ah. Sending and receiving. And controlling...

  "Growth? Yes, we've seen it alright." This invasiveness has caught him flat-footed. It makes him angry. "What is you want, besides killing some of us without cause and abusing others?"

  ...

  "Well? You broke into my call. Answer me, you monster!"

  "The signals are too good. They let me grow. Dreams. I dream here. What should I do with them?"

  Choke on them! "Listen, why don't you find yourself a good psychoanalyst, and leave us alone! Better yet, crawl back down whatever hole you came out of!"

  ...

  "But the signals are too good. You do not understand." A hollow click echoes from the radio. Its dull green-yellow light dies out.

  An impassioned urge to punch the console is held in check by closing the eyes. As a boy, Roy's mother advised against rage. Her remedy for anger involved a close eyed, meditative dwelling on a peaceful locale. Since then, Roy kept calm envisioning the old family tea house out on the farm. Small but empty, simple yet secure, it was the sole representation he once had of perfection and peace. It got harder to picture it once neighbors tore down the 'Jap hideout’, shipped his folks off to the desert. Today, he needed that teahouse of the mind to keep him on the up and up.

  Come on. Come on.

  Nothing appears. Just a once beloved farm field, tended to by stiff men in denim coveralls with eyes of one red lens, one green lens on absent faces. Black pills going into tilled soil.

  "We grow."

  Eyes open! Palms are clammy, breathing shallow. It's stifling in the car. Now he wishes he had a paper bag to breathe in. Roy rolls down the window. Frosty air is a godsend, bringing him back to life.

  He turns the knob on the radio. It glows once more. Eureka.

  "Crank, this is Fuse. Are you there?"

  "Yes. I've been responding for over five minutes now. Where are you? Are you alright?" An accent never sounded so sweet.

  "At the bridge. We need to get to Pennsville fast. Motherville has- -I'm coming to get you."

  "Roger that. I'm ready."

  Foot beats up the accelerator. Fuse steers the car about face, heading for the National Bank, full throttle.

  Loosening and tightening spring joints and metal banging on asphalt should have Slicks raining down on Milkman and its Helldiver partner. But the entire run down the disenchanted streets of Wilmington nets not one patrol unit or even a solitary drone.

  Wilkes finally lowers the titanium shields as they make it, at long last, to this end of the placid Christina River. They see the indicator, a sign dinged by a dozen machinegun rounds but still hanging high:

  DRAVO CORPORATION

  One of many companies contracted across the country to build, build, build for the war machine, today Dravo's giant cranes and torches are dead quiet. On a good day, this place puts out Landing Ship Mediums, LSM's, that transport men and supplies right up to foreign, scarred beaches overseas.

  Right now, it's a blessing. No enemy in sight and no distractions. As the three passengers once laid low by the Noise come to, Benny and Carson eject, double time.

  "Gotta be fifty caliber rounds here somewhere. They had to be putting them in the ships or tanks." Benny talks while uncapping Milkman for a hearty dinner of black crude.

  Wilkes uncaps as well, but focuses on his plane's streaks. Paint job is marred by the gentle caresses of flak on the flyby earlier. "Good thinking. Even better if we load up and store our planes on that LSM out there. Sail it to Salem, guns blazing."

  "Not bad. They said a robot tank is on it. Could use it. But, you ever navigate a ship before?"

  "Boats, plenty. A ship? No."

  "I, uh, we, can help with that." Roscoe Turner just about breaks his neck getting out of the Helldiver. "We learned the ship's workings while doing other projects. She's a real Viking, D-E-One-Seven-X. Took pounds of trial and a ton of error to get her right." He cracks his back, groans, finds the river and points to the sole ship out there. "Lots of bells and whistles."

  Benny drags out a fuel line, attaches it, turns the release valve. The once bright paint of Milkman carrying a basket o' boom on his plane's nose is smudged. It bothers him."Good to know. And, again, pleasure to meet an ace like you and designer, by the way." Walking reinvigorates the leg woes, so Haskins focuses on something cheerful.

  "What? Oh, yes. I apologize. Ringing in my ears..." He inhales deep to give the brain more oxygen. Turner rubs the small moustache under his nose, stretches his lean figure. Seems to do the trick. "But, ah, no fifty caliber ammunition. Not one. Forty millimeter we've got aplenty."

  Benny stares. Wilkes, awaiting the line for the diesel, spits. "None? But we're spent, bombs and rockets too."

  "Well, rockets we've got." Traveler Gray has come to, assisting Doctor Zafra out of the Helldiver. "HVAR's, the type Milkman carries. Supposed to have gone to the boys in the U.K. Thousand-pound bombs also. We can put one on this remarkable biplane."

  Milkman is topped off. Benny hands Wilkes the hose and a fearsome look. "A handful of Holy Moses and one bomb, in this whole place? Listen, Jack, you cats might be technically adept, but you ain't fighting any battle without a constant stream of hot lead. Not happening." Benny march-limps to the nearest door. "Hope you all are real good with this ship. She better make major waves."

  "Most armaments are shipped out as fast as they come in. Rest assured, Traveler Haskins," Zafra speaks up, "she will do more than that." She wobbles over to Carson Wilkes, staring up at a murky sun as if it were an X factor. "Tell me, Corporal, do either of you understand what Motherville's intentions are?"

  He stares, having not a clue. But by the tone of Zafra's voice, Wilkes has a sinking feeling this lady does.

  Tool bag? Check. Leather work gloves? Check. Friends in good hands? Check. Reports from civilians on street battles? Check. Stability? Well...

  Crank is exposed to the cold, standing on a star built into the corner sidewalk. Her head is clear. The city is silent. Outside, an Army truck is at peace. Debris and white dust blow in a mild breeze. She's thanking God the doctor said Skinny will pull through, with Larry a possibility. Before she walked out the door, Crank slipped Skinny's partner Clarice, clean and loaded, under his pillow. You never know.

  But Benny is on her mind. Benny Haskins feels so near and yet so far. His warm body. His agile lips. His confident voice. Right now she has memories to hug. Whatever has been taken from us, I will repay.

  La Donna screams to a stop. Crank finds her baby driven by Roy, dusted by the pearly white makeup of the universe. He appears as angry as she feels.

  "Fuse!" She waves him ahead, to get the old girl on Market facing north. Crank hops to her baby, scanning every inch of her on the way while Roy switches to shotgun.

  "Mechanic Crank." Roy isn't looking at her. He's someplace else. She knows the look. "Got reports from all over Salem. Everyone from farmers with shotguns to folks on Carpenter Street packing pistols in their socks has struck back at every Slick wandering around. This town doesn't mess around." Still, Fuse is mute.

  "Motherville?"r />
  "Yes. Spoke to me directly, through this radio. Said she...dreamt about me." He shivers. She can empathize.

  Crank shuts off the radio, and floors the accelerator. La Donna is up and out of Salem in seconds. "Why aren't you speaking Japanese?"

  He's startled by her question as much as he is by how relaxed she is driving at over one hundred miles per hour. Roy grips the car door. "Excuse me?"

  "The white stuff. Stardust. Anaesthetic. Space seeds, or whatever. It took me far away, first from here, then from the present. At least, I’m pretty sure it did." She listens to the words coming off her tongue. "Yes, the present. Temporal displacement. First time I've said it out loud. Like something out of Amazing Stories! Hmm. Where was I? Oh, yes. I only spoke Italian until I was seven years old. You experienced it, but show no signs of reversal."

  "I never learned more than a few words in Japanese. My parents wanted me to be full American. But, I was easily angered in my youth, so maybe..."

  "Ah. And you say she dreamt of you? Benny and I each have had some very, disturbing dreams, since coming to Salem." The length of her sigh, the shifting in the seat confirms just how disturbing.

  "Her statement to me seemed, emotive, almost erotic. I think she may be tapping people as power plants, but is inadvertently getting to be irrational."

  Crank looks into Roy. It scares him, that look, her eyes not being on the road. She banks left though, no problem. "How so?"

  Roy catches his breath, his anger is up and gone. "She called me, and humans, signals. We're a narcotic, and an irresistible one at that."

  "And like any host-parasite relationship, we get some of her energy as she gets ours. Signals are crossing." La Donna careens down a winding country road of sparse houses and passive cows. Whole vistas of county life zip by.

  "The dreams. And more power allows Motherville to expand her computational abilities."

  "Which she'd need for the intricate but sporadic global intrigues she's been involved in." Crank slows down her baby at an intersection. Hit the brakes! "We cut through Deepwater and into Pennsville from this way. Hold on."