Roadmarks

by Roger Zelazny

  resignation."

  The beast halted. The shadow fled from beneath its tail, centimeters ahead of a copious quantity of urine.

  The forelegs twitched.

  "The marquis has already introduced himself," Chadwick stated, throwing his arm about the other man's shoulders, thrusting him forward and stepping behind him. "Marquis, I would now like you to meet my former partner. Red Dorakeen."

  The marquis's smile vanished. The beast shifted uneasily.

  "Take off your hat," the marquis ordered.

  Red doffed his baseball cap and smiled around his cigar.

  "You do look like your photo in the hit file" the marquis acknowledged as Chadwick slipped over and tore the printout from the teeth of SPHINX. "So what are you doing here? That man has designs on your life "

  "Well, yes-"

  Across the room, at the point to which the shadow had lifted, there was an implosion. Writing desks. chairs, oriental rugs, drink carousels were sucked into a dark tornado, along with debris from the walls and ceiling, the remains of a large lunch, a stuffed leopard, an owl and the remains of a cat which had expired some time before in a curtained alcove. The curtains also swirled and were drawn into the vortex. The three men watched with interest, the tyrannosaurus less intelligently, as the door to a concealed refrigerator was torn off and its contents sucked in, along with the door.

  The dark column grew, absorbing the mass of almost every loose item in the room. At some point in its progress, it began to emit a humming noise. This rose in pitch as it increased in volume.

  "I take it this is not a local meteorological effect?" Red inquired. "Hardly," said Chadwick.

  An enormous outline took shape within the mass. The humming noise ceased. A huge figure began to coalesce before them, giant wings outspread. It remained motionless until it had solidified to a point where there could be no doubt as to its nature.

  It was almost the size of the tyrannosaurus, and, while roughly reptilian in appearance, this was of a highly stylized nature. Its coinlike scales ranged from gold on its breast to jet upon its back, running from copper through red down the length of its tail and back across the breadth of its great vanes. Its eyes were large and golden and lovely and disturbing to look upon. A small wisp of smoke curled upward from either nostril. It advanced two meters in a sudden movement and its neck snaked forward. Its voice was delicate,

  strangely nasal, and accompanied by soft gray plumes, and it was neither Red nor Chadwick that it addressed.

  "What have you done to this poor beast?" it asked.

  The marquis shifted uneasily.

  "Sir, or madam," he stated, "I am in phase with his nervous system and I can assure you that he feels no discomfort whatsoever. As a matter of fact, there is an implant in his pleasure center which, if you insist, I will stimulate so as to give him as much joy as the poor beast is capable of—"

  "Enough!"

  "Frazier? Dodd?" said Red.

  "Yes," it replied. "But I am not addressing you now. It was Chadwick that I sought, and you have brought me to him. But first—" Flames rolled about its mouth, subsided. "It is an abomination to have wired this

  handsome creature so!"

  "I agree with you fully," said the marquis, "and I am pleased it was not I that did so."

  "You have compounded the crime against his magnificent person! You manipulate him!"

  "I assure you it is only a brief borrowing. My intentions—"

  Chadwick seized Red's sleeve and tugged him along as he backed slowly toward the door.

  "Your intentions be damned, sir! Release him and apologize to him!"

  "I would do that at peril to my life!"

  "Your life—and more—is already at peril! Release him!"

  Chadwick edged the door open with his foot just as the tyrannosaurus bellowed and lunged toward the dragon, which sinuously avoided its charge. He sidled through, drew Red after him, pulled the door shut and locked it.

  "You're parked out that way, aren't you?" Chadwick asked, gesturing.

  ''Yes."

  "Come on! They could break out of there any minute."

  As they hurried up the corridor, heavy crashing noises were heard and the floor shook.

  "We'd best get this trip under way immediately" Chadwick remarked. "I had not anticipated an employee grievance at this time—or on this scale. We can stop for necessaries sometime else."

  From behind them came a sound like an explosion a moment's silence, then a resumption of noisy activity. Glancing back, they saw a falling wall in the vicinity of the room from which they had fled. Smoke emerged and the air purifiers sucked it away.

  Chadwick hit the door running, with Red close behind him. He immediately collided with a short man wearing a garish shirt, a lightweight kilt and blue sunglasses who had been advancing upon the door. Falling back, the man recovered his footing with amazing agility and reached for the camera case he wore slung over his left shoulder. "For the love of God! No!" cried Chadwick. As the camera came about. Red was beside the man. His left hand caught the strap and jerked, pulling him off balance again.

  "Don't kill him!" Chadwick shouted. "The decade's off! I've sent the cancel order!"

  "Him?" said the smaller man, drawing back as Red took away his camera. "Him? I've no intention of harming him. Ever! The game is over as far as I am concerned, too. My only reason for coming here was to tender my resignation by killing you. But now—" He turned toward Red. "What are you doing here?"

  "I came to straighten things out. They're a lot straighter now. I don't believe that we've met..."

  "We have, but I see that you do not recall. My name is Timyin Tin, and I have this thing about dragons. It is of a religious—"

  A loud series of clumping noises, accompanied by shattering and tearing sounds from within the building, began a steady approach.

  "In that case, stay right where you are," said Chadwick. "You are about to have a profound religious experience." He seized Red's arm. "Let's get the hell

  out of here!"

  He tore off down the stairs, leaving the smaller man standing bewildered before the door. Red stumbled along beside him, nodding toward the blue pickup truck beside which Timyin Tin's small black car stood, its engine idling. The truck's doors flew open upon their approach, and Red slid into the front seat behind the driver's wheel. The engine started as Chadwick got in beside him. The doors slammed and the vehicle began backing up.

  "The Road," Red said.

  "I never had labor problems before," Chadwick commented.

  "Who's the kidnapee?" Flowers asked.

  The wall around the building's door had begun to crumble. Timyin Tin had backed down the stairs. The truck turned and tore off up the street.

  "Strange, yet not strange," Chadwick observed, "and well-timed."

  One

  Speeding down the Road under the big golden arch, Red lit his cigar and regarded his passenger from beneath the shadow of his cap's bill. Chadwick, decked in many colors, his thick fingers heavy with rings, still perspired from the run to the vehicle. Each time he moved, his programmed contour seat underwent a radical readjustment. As he shifted often, the seat suffered constant metamorphosis about him. He tapped his fingers. He looked out of the window. He glanced furtively at Red.

  Red grinned back at him.

  "You're out of shape, Chad," he commented.

  "I know," said the other, lowering his eyes. "Disgusting, isn't it? Considering what I once was..." Then he smiled. "Can't say it wasn't fun doing it, though."

  "Cigar?" Red suggested.

  "Don't mind if I do."

  He accepted it, lit it, turned suddenly and glared at Red.

  "You, on the other hand," he said, gesturing with the fire, "are no longer as old as you once were. Do you wonder why I hate you?"

  "Yes," said Red. "Outside of being out of shape and overweight and covered with paint, I'd say that you are very similar to the person I knew a long while ago. I believe that your condition
and mine are much alike, only yours is masked."

  Chadwick shook his head.

  "Come on. Red! That can't be. Don't you think I'd know it—or my doctors would—if I were growing younger and stronger and healthier?"

  "No. Whatever the process, I feel that in your case it has an awful lot to work against. With you, it's had to run just to stand still. For the life you've led, I'd say you're in remarkably good shape. Even with the finest medical care, anyone else would probably have been dead by now."

  . "I wish I could believe you, but all I can agree on is that I do have a strong constitution."

  ". .. You have an affinity for fire, you have a thing about accumulating wealth—"

  "You're crazy! Everybody likes money, possessions. That doesn't prove anything. As for fire ... ." He drew hard on the cigar, exhaled a cloud of smoke. "Everyone has little peculiarities. Just because my memory is spotty too..."

  "Who was your father?"

  Chadwick shrugged.

  "Who knows? I remember living at an inn."

  "Near an entrance to the Road."

  "What does that prove? My father probably was a Road man. I had to come by the talent some way. That doesn't mean he was something like you—" He was silent a moment. Then, "Oh, no," he said. "You are not going to try telling me that you are my father."

  "I never said that—or thought it. But—"

  "This whole thing has to be a fantasy of yours. It's too damned circumstantial. There is too much conjecture, too many wild premises—"

  "That's what I say," Flowers interrupted. "I wish you could have locked him up somewhere and had a therapist of some sort work him over."

  "She's right," Chadwick said. "Too much of your

  thinking these days springs from your very fallible memory and guesswork."

  Red chewed on his cigar and looked away. "All right," he finally said. "Maybe so. Tell me, then

  —Why did you call off the decade and agree to come with me?"

  Chadwick's fingers did a drumbeat on the dashboard. "Partly because you said that you think you are going to die in a very peculiar fashion shortly, and you aroused my curiosity," he said. "And partly after hearing

  —and even helping with—all the garbage and paranoid guesswork I permitted you to feed into the SPHINX, I want to see where this is going to take us. And partly—at the end—because I was in a hurry to get out of there." "You saw that creature appear out of nowhere." "... And I have seen stranger things in a long and colorful career."

  "Exactly. So what is the problem in believing my story?"

  "You've nothing to back it up with. Even if you're right, I'm still right in not believing without evidence. Red, if I'd known you were in the shape you're in, I'd

  never have started the feud. It wouldn't have been worth it."

  "Stop it!" Red turned away.

  "So you do have a few doubts yourself? I suppose that is a healthy sign."

  "You believe nothing I've said?"

  "I believe you are a fool—of unknown origin—and that you are probably headed for your doom."

  "Will someone please feed that tape into my scanner?" said Flowers. "It may take a while to see whether you want me to find you a seacoast in Bohemia."

  "Here," said Chadwick, passing over the printout.

  Red inserted it into a slot. It was digested.

  "I can tell right away," said Flowers, "that this is

  going to be quite a drive." "Ridiculous," said Chadwick, placing his cigar in the

  tray and folding his arms. "You're helping me whether you like it or not." Red

  laid his cigar aside also. "A very long drive. Flowers?"

  "Yes."

  "Then put us to sleep. I don't feel like talking with him the whole time."

  "The feeling is mutual," said Chadwick.

  A soft hissing sound began.

  "I ought to just gas you both permanently and become a Flying Dutchperson, like that car I heard about 'a while back, flitting down the centuries with a pair of skeletons inside."

  "Very funny," said Red, breathing deeply.

  Chadwick yawned.

  "The whole thing..." he began.

  Two

  Randy had changed six flat tires. He had also seen the radiator, the generator and a fan belt replaced. Had a tuneup too, while the brakes were being relined. Leaves had blithely charged it all to Red, with whose account it would sooner or later rendezvous. And who knew how much fuel? He had lost track.

  And they continued on ...

  "Where?" Randy repeated. "When?"

  "I'll know it when I see it," Leila replied.

  "At this rate, you'll run us back to the Ice Age."

  "Not that far, I think."

  "He will show up there, though? You're sure?"

  "I'm afraid so. Hurry."

  "And you want to save him from a death which you say he now desires?..."

  "We've been through all this."

  "... because he believes it will work some transformation?"

  "That's why he ditched me," Leaves said. "I caught

  on to his death-wish before he was ready to admit it." "Then obviously neither of you believe him." "I believe my own visions," Leila said. "If he dies

  there, he dies. Period."

  Randy rubbed the stubble on his chin and shook

  his head. "I don't know that I would attempt to stop him from

  doing whatever he wishes to do most, whether it seems futile or not. All I really wanted to do was meet him. I'm not even certain what I'd say..."

  "You've already met him."

  "You'd better explain."

  "That old couple with car trouble. That was us— Reyd and myself—a long time ago, before we grew younger. You were the one. I didn't remember it until

  then-" "What the hell was that?"

  "What?"

  "Something big—like an airplane—went over." "I didn't see anything." "It was back a ways. I caught it in the rearview

  mirror."

  Leila shook her head.

  "No way. Passing through time as we are, anything like that would only be visible for such a tiny fraction of a second that you wouldn't even be subliminally aware of it. Leaves, did you detect anything?"

  "No."

  "So there-"

  He pointed.

  "Up there! It's back!"

  Leila leaned forward, breaking her cigar on the windshield.

  "Damn!" she said. "It looks like— It's gone again."

  "A dragon," Randy said. "Like in storybooks."

  Leila settled back in her seat.

  "Hurry," she said.

  "This is as fast as we can go."

  The peculiar shadow did not reappear. After about fifteen minutes, they passed a turnoff and Leila raised her hand.

  1/0 KUAUMAKK5

  "What is it?" he asked, touching the brake. "That the place?"

  "No. For a moment it seemed that it might be, but it's not. Keep going. I've a feeling we are getting near."

  They passed a series of exits during the next hour, all of their signs marked with pictures. Then there was a long unbroken stretch. Finally another appeared in the distance. Leila leaned forward, staring.

  "That's it," she said. "Stop. Pull over. The blue ziggurat—The last exit to Babylon. This is the place."

  He drew off onto the shoulder of the Road. Suddenly it was morning, and the sun beat down with a summer-like intensity. Randy rolled down his window. He looked back. He looked around. It seemed that a shadow passed, but he lost it before he could be certain.

  'I don't see anything unusual," he said. "We seem to be the only people around. What now?"

  "We did it," Leila replied. "We're ahead of him in terms of Road-time now. Stay on the shoulder and take the exit. Run up it maybe a hundred meters. Then pull back on the access road and park sideways, blocking it, to give him a chance to brake. Then we get out and walk back to flag him down. We've got to stop him from taking this exit."

  "Wait a m
inute," Leaves said as Randy engaged the gears. "Mightn't we be running a risk of causing what we are trying to avoid?"

  "Good point," Leila said. "Do you have any flares, Randy?"

  "As a matter of fact, yes."

  "We will set several along the way as we head back. Also, leave the car's lights on—and hang your undershirt or sleeve or some damn thing like that out the window."

  "All right."

  He moved forward, made the turn.

  One

  Red rubbed his eyes, glanced to his right. Chadwick

  was stirring also.

  "Whisper mode," he said softly. "How near are we?"

  "Very near. That's why I aroused you. Do you have any idea what you are going to do when you find your magic spot?"

  Red looked at Chadwick again.

  "I want to ditch him before we get there. It's for his

  own—" "No!" cried Chadwick, sitting upright. "You're not

  getting rid of me now! I want to see this crazy thing through to the end!"

  "I was starting to say that it is for your own protection. You want to walk away from whatever happens,

  don't you?"

  "I know what I'm doing. Better than you do, you fool! Your time has not yet come."

  "Just what do you mean by that? I'm trying to do you a favor and all you do is bitch! Flowers! Pull over!"

  Chadwick's hand shot forward, slapped the drive switch from automatic to manual. Immediately, the vehicle drifted to the left. Red seized the steering wheel and turned it back.

  "Crazy bastard! You trying to kill us both?"

  Chadwick laughed wildly at that, then chopped with

  his hand, striking Red's forearm as he reached for the switch.

  Red began to brake. He looked at Chadwick. "Listen! If I'm wrong, I'll pick you up afterwards.

  But if I'm right, you don't want to be aboard. I'm

  going to meet my destiny. I—"

  He had begun cutting the wheel to the right. Chadwick threw himself at him and took hold of it, pushing leftward.

  "Look out! People!"

  Red looked up, saw Leila waving with both arms over her head, a handkerchief in one hand. Far beyond her was a young man, also waving.

  As they shot past, Chadwick struck him a glancing blow on the jaw. Red's head struck against the window frame. Chadwick seized the wheel again.

  "Stop it! Both of you!" Flowers cried. "Someone throw the switch!"