The Keith Laumer MEGAPACK®

by Keith Laumer

  The train slowed, came to a shuddery stop. Through the window he saw a cardboardy-looking building with the words BAXTER’S JUNCTION painted across it. There were a few faded posters on a bulletin board. An old man was sitting on a bench, waiting. The two old ladies got off and a boy in blue jeans got on. The train started up. Brett folded his jacket and tucked it under his head and tried to doze off….

  * * * *

  Brett awoke, yawned, sat up. The train was slowing. He remembered you couldn’t use the toilets while the train was stopped. He got up and went to the end of the car. The door was jammed. He got it open and went inside and closed the door behind him. The train was going slower, clack-clack…clack-clack…clack; clack…cuh-lack…

  He washed his hands, then pulled at the door. It was stuck. He pulled harder. The handle was too small; it was hard to get hold of. The train came to a halt. Brett braced himself and strained against the door. It didn’t budge.

  He looked out the grimy window. The sun was getting lower. It was about three-thirty, he guessed. He couldn’t see anything but some dry-looking fields.

  Outside in the corridor there were footsteps. He started to call, but then didn’t. It would be too embarrassing, pounding on the door and yelling, “Let me out! I’m stuck in the toilet…”

  He tried to rattle the door. It didn’t rattle. Somebody was dragging something heavy past the door. Mail bags, maybe. He’d better yell. But dammit, the door couldn’t be all that hard to open. He studied the latch. All he had to do was turn it. He got a good grip and twisted. Nothing.

  He heard the mail bag bump-bump, and then another one. To heck with it; he’d yell. He’d wait until he heard the footsteps pass the door again and then he’d make some noise.

  Brett waited. It was quiet now. He rapped on the door anyway. No answer. Maybe there was nobody left in the car. In a minute the train would start up and he’d be stuck here until the next stop. He banged on the door. “Hey! The door is stuck!”

  It sounded foolish. He listened. It was very quiet. He pounded again. The car creaked once. He put his ear to the door. He couldn’t hear anything. He turned back to the window. There was no one in sight. He put his cheek flat against it, looked along the car. He saw only dry fields.

  He turned around and gave the door a good kick. If he damaged it, it was too bad; the railroad shouldn’t have defective locks on the doors. If they tried to make him pay for it, he’d tell them they were lucky he didn’t sue the railroad…

  * * * *

  He braced himself against the opposite wall, drew his foot back, and kicked hard at the lock. Something broke. He pulled the door open.

  He was looking out the open door and through the window beyond. There was no platform, just the same dry fields he could see on the other side. He came out and went along to his seat. The car was empty now.

  He looked out the window. Why had the train stopped here? Maybe there was some kind of trouble with the engine. It had been sitting here for ten minutes or so now. Brett got up and went along to the door, stepped down onto the iron step. Leaning out, he could see the train stretching along ahead, one car, two cars—

  There was no engine.

  Maybe he was turned around. He looked the other way. There were three cars. No engine there either. He must be on some kind of siding…

  Brett stepped back inside, and pushed through into the next car. It was empty. He walked along the length of it, into the next car. It was empty too. He went back through the two cars and his own car and on, all the way to the end of the train. All the cars were empty. He stood on the platform at the end of the last car, and looked back along the rails. They ran straight, through the dry fields, right to the horizon. He stepped down to the ground, went along the cindery bed to the front of the train, stepping on the ends of the wooden ties. The coupling stood open. The tall, dusty coach stood silently on its iron wheels, waiting. Ahead the tracks went on—

  And stopped.

  He walked along the ties, following the iron rails, shiny on top, and brown with rust on the sides. A hundred feet from the train they ended. The cinders went on another ten feet and petered out. Beyond, the fields closed in. Brett looked up at the sun. It was lower now in the west, its light getting yellow and late-afternoonish. He turned and looked back at the train. The cars stood high and prim, empty, silent. He walked back, climbed in, got his bag down from the rack, pulled on his jacket. He jumped down to the cinders, followed them to where they ended. He hesitated a moment, then pushed between the knee-high stalks. Eastward across the field he could see what looked like a smudge on the far horizon.

  He walked until dark, then made himself a nest in the dead stalks, and went to sleep.

  * * * *

  He lay on his back, looking up at pink dawn clouds. Around him, dry stalks rustled in a faint stir of air. He felt crumbly earth under his fingers. He sat up, reached out and broke off a stalk. It crumbled into fragile chips. He wondered what it was. It wasn’t any crop he’d ever seen before.

  He stood, looked around. The field went on and on, dead flat. A locust came whirring toward him, plumped to earth at his feet. He picked it up. Long elbowed legs groped at his fingers aimlessly. He tossed the insect in the air. It fluttered away. To the east the smudge was clearer now; it seemed to be a grey wall, far away. A city? He picked up his bag and started on.

  He was getting hungry. He hadn’t eaten since the previous morning. He was thirsty too. The city couldn’t be more than three hours’ walk. He tramped along, the dry plants crackling under his feet, little puffs of dust rising from the dry ground. He thought about the rails, running across the empty fields, ending…

  He had heard the locomotive groaning up ahead as the train slowed. And there had been feet in the corridor. Where had they gone?

  He thought of the train, Casperton, Aunt Haicey, Mr. Phillips. They seemed very far away, something remembered from long ago. Up above the sun was hot. That was real. The rest seemed unimportant. Ahead there was a city. He would walk until he came to it. He tried to think of other things: television, crowds of people, money: the tattered paper and the worn silver—

  Only the sun and the dusty plain and the dead plants were real now. He could see them, feel them. And the suitcase. It was heavy; he shifted hands, kept going.

  There was something white on the ground ahead, a small shiny surface protruding from the earth. Brett dropped the suitcase, went down on one knee, dug into the dry soil, pulled out a china teacup, the handle missing. Caked dirt crumbled away under his thumb, leaving the surface clean. He looked at the bottom of the cup. It was unmarked. Why just one teacup, he wondered, here in the middle of nowhere? He dropped it, took up his suitcase, and went on.

  * * * *

  After that he watched the ground more closely. He found a shoe; it was badly weathered, but the sole was good. It was a high-topped work shoe, size 10½-C. Who had dropped it here? He thought of other lone shoes he had seen, lying at the roadside or in alleys. How did they get there...?

  Half an hour later he detoured around the rusted front fender of an old-fashioned car. He looked around for the rest of the car but saw nothing. The wall was closer now; perhaps five miles more.

  A scrap of white paper fluttered across the field in a stir of air. He saw another, more, blowing along in the fitful gusts. He ran a few steps, caught one, smoothed it out.

  BUY NOW—PAY LATER!

  He picked up another.

  PREPARE TO MEET GOD

  A third said:

  WIN WITH WILLKIE

  The wall loomed above him, smooth and grey. Dust was caked on his skin and clothes, and as he walked he brushed at himself absently. The suitcase dragged at his arm, thumped against his shin. He was very hungry and thirsty. He sniffed the air, instinctively searching for the odors of food. He had been following the wall for a long time, searching for an opening. It curved away from him, rising vertically from the level earth. Its surface was porous, unadorned, too smooth to climb. It was, Brett
estimated, twenty feet high. If there were anything to make a ladder from—

  Ahead he saw a wide gate, flanked by grey columns. He came up to it, put the suitcase down, and wiped at his forehead with his handkerchief. Through the opening in the wall a paved street was visible, and the facades of buildings. Those on the street before him were low, not more than one or two stories, but behind them taller towers reared up. There were no people in sight; no sounds stirred the hot noon-time air. Brett picked up his bag and passed through the gate.

  For the next hour he walked empty pavements, listening to the echoes of his footsteps against brownstone fronts, empty shop windows, curtained glass doors, and here and there a vacant lot, weed-grown and desolate. He paused at cross streets, looked down long vacant ways. Now and then a distant sound came to him: the lonely honk of a horn, a faintly tolling bell, a clatter of hooves.

  He came to a narrow alley that cut like a dark canyon between blank walls. He stood at its mouth, listening to a distant murmur, like a crowd at a funeral. He turned down the narrow way.

  It went straight for a few yards, then twisted. As he followed its turnings the crowd noise gradually grew louder. He could make out individual voices now, an occasional word above the hubbub. He started to hurry, eager to find someone to talk to.

  Abruptly the voices—hundreds of voices, he thought—rose in a roar, a long-drawn Yaaayyyyy...! Brett thought of a stadium crowd as the home team trotted onto the field. He could hear a band now, a shrilling of brass, the clatter and thump of percussion instruments. Now he could see the mouth of the alley ahead, a sunny street hung with bunting, the backs of people, and over their heads the rhythmic bobbing of a passing procession, tall shakos and guidons in almost-even rows. Two tall poles with a streamer between them swung into view. He caught a glimpse of tall red letters:

  ... For Our Side!

  HE moved closer, edged up behind the grey-backed crowd. A phalanx of yellow-tuniced men approached, walking stiffly, fez tassels swinging. A small boy darted out into the street, loped along at their side. The music screeched and wheezed. Brett tapped the man before him.

  “What’s it all about...?”

  He couldn’t hear his own voice. The man ignored him. Brett moved along behind the crowd, looking for a vantage point or a thinning in the ranks. There seemed to be fewer people ahead. He came to the end of the crowd, moved on a few yards, stood at the curb. The yellow-jackets had passed now, and a group of round-thighed girls in satin blouses and black boots and white fur caps glided into view, silent, expressionless. As they reached a point fifty feet from Brett, they broke abruptly into a strutting prance, knees high, hips flirting, tossing shining batons high, catching them, twirling them, and up again ...

  Brett craned his neck, looking for TV cameras. The crowd lining the opposite side of the street stood in solid ranks, drably clad, eyes following the procession, mouths working. A fat man in a rumpled suit and a panama hat squeezed to the front, stood picking his teeth. Somehow, he seemed out of place among the others. Behind the spectators, the store fronts looked normal, dowdy brick and mismatched glass and oxidizing aluminum, dusty windows and cluttered displays of cardboard, a faded sign that read TODAY ONLY—PRICES SLASHED. To Brett’s left the sidewalk stretched, empty. To his right the crowd was packed close, the shout rising and falling. Now a rank of blue-suited policemen followed the majorettes, swinging along silently. Behind them, over them, a piece of paper blew along the street. Brett turned to the man on his right.

  “Pardon me. Can you tell me the name of this town?”

  The man ignored him. Brett tapped the man’s shoulder. “Hey! What town is this?”

  The man took off his hat, whirled it overhead, then threw it up. It sailed away over the crowd, lost. Brett wondered briefly how people who threw their hats ever recovered them. But then, nobody he knew would throw his hat ...

  “You mind telling me the name of this place?” Brett said, as he took the man’s arm, pulled. The man rotated toward Brett, leaning heavily against him. Brett stepped back. The man fell, lay stiffly, his arms moving, his eyes and mouth open.

  “Ahhhhh,” he said. “Whum-whum-whum. Awww, jawww ...”

  Brett stooped quickly. “I’m sorry,” he cried. He looked around. “Help! This man ...”

  Nobody was watching. The next man, a few feet away, stood close against his neighbor, hatless, his jaw moving.

  “This man’s sick,” said Brett, tugging at the man’s arm. “He fell.”

  The man’s eyes moved reluctantly to Brett. “None of my business,” he muttered.

  “Won’t anybody give me a hand?”

  “Probably a drunk.”

  Behind Brett a voice called in a penetrating whisper: “Quick! You! Get into the alley...!”

  He turned. A gaunt man of about thirty with sparse reddish hair, perspiration glistening on his upper lip, stood at the mouth of a narrow way like the one Brett had come through. He wore a grimy pale yellow shirt with a wide-flaring collar, limp and sweat-stained, dark green knee-breeches, soft leather boots, scuffed and dirty, with limp tops that drooped over his ankles. He gestured, drew back into the alley. “In here.”

  Brett went toward him. “This man ...”

  “Come on, you fool!” The man took Brett’s arm, pulled him deeper into the dark passage. Brett resisted. “Wait a minute. That fellow ...” He tried to point.

  “Don’t you know yet?” The red-head spoke with a strange accent. “Golems ... You got to get out of sight before the—”

  The man froze, flattened himself against the wall. Automatically Brett moved to a place beside him. The man’s head was twisted toward the alley mouth. The tendons in his weathered neck stood out. He had a three-day stubble of beard. Brett could smell him, standing this close. He edged away. “What—”

  “Don’t make a sound! Don’t move, you idiot!” His voice was a thin hiss.

  Brett followed the other’s eyes toward the sunny street. The fallen man lay on the pavement, moving feebly, eyes open. Something moved up to him, a translucent brownish shape, like muddy water. It hovered for a moment, then dropped on the man like a breaking wave, flowed around him. The body shifted, rotating stiffly, then tilted upright. The sun struck through the fluid shape that flowed down now, amber highlights twinkling, to form itself into the crested wave, flow away.

  “What the hell...!”

  “Come on!” The red-head turned, trotted silently toward the shadowy bend under the high grey walls. He looked back, beckoned impatiently, passed out of sight around the turn—

  Brett came up behind him, saw a wide avenue, tall trees with chartreuse springtime leaves, a wrought-iron fence, and beyond it, rolling green lawns. There were no people in sight.

  “Wait a minute! What is this place?!”

  His companion turned red-rimmed eyes on Brett. “How long have you been here?” he asked. “How did you get in?”

  “I came through a gate. Just about an hour ago.”

  “I knew you were a man as soon as I saw you talking to the golem,” said the red-head. “I’ve been here two months; maybe more. We’ve got to get out of sight. You want food? There’s a place ...” He jerked his thumb. “Come on. Time to talk later.”

  Brett followed him. They turned down a side street, pushed through the door of a dingy cafe. It banged behind them. There were tables, stools at a bar, a dusty juke box. They took seats at a table. The red-head groped under the table, pulled off a shoe, hammered it against the wall. He cocked his head, listening. The silence was absolute. He hammered again. There was a clash of crockery from beyond the kitchen door. “Now don’t say anything,” the red-head said. He eyed the door behind the counter expectantly. It flew open. A girl with red cheeks and untidy hair, dressed in a green waitress’ uniform appeared, swept up to the table, pad and pencil in hand.

  “Coffee and a ham sandwich,” said the red-head. Brett said nothing. The girl glanced at him briefly, jotted hastily, whisked away.

  “I saw them
here the first day,” the red-head said. “It was a piece of luck. I saw how the Gels started it up. They were big ones—not like the tidiers-up. As soon as they were finished, I came in and tried the same thing. It worked. I used the golem’s lines—”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Brett said. “I’m going to ask that girl—”

  “Don’t say anything to her; it might spoil everything. The whole sequence might collapse; or it might call the Gels. I’m not sure. You can have the food when it comes back with it.”

  “Why do you say ‘when ”it” comes back’?”

  “Ah.” He looked at Brett strangely. “I’ll show you.”

  Brett could smell food now. His mouth watered. He hadn’t eaten for twenty-four hours.

  “Care, that’s the thing,” the red-head said. “Move quiet, and stay out of sight, and you can live like a County Duke. Food’s the hardest, but here—”

  The red-cheeked girl reappeared, a tray balanced on one arm, a heavy cup and saucer in the other hand. She clattered them down on the table.

  “Took you long enough,” the red-head said. The girl sniffed, opened her mouth to speak—and the red-head darted out a stiff finger, jabbed her under the ribs. She stood, mouth open, frozen.

  Brett half rose. “He’s crazy, miss,” he said. “Please accept—”

  “Don’t waste your breath.” Brett’s host was looking at him triumphantly. “Why do I call it ‘it’?” He stood up, reached out and undid the top buttons of the green uniform. The waitress stood, leaning slightly forward, unmoving. The blouse fell open, exposing round white breasts—unadorned, blind.

  “A doll,” said the red-head. “A puppet; a golem.”

  Brett stared at her, the damp curls at her temple, the tip of her tongue behind her teeth, the tiny red veins in her round cheeks, and the white skin curving ...

  “That’s a quick way to tell ’em,” said the red-head. “The teat is smooth.” He rebuttoned the uniform, then jabbed again at the girl’s ribs. She straightened, patted her hair.