The Lost Bradbury Page 8

  There was a moment of exhilaration, and then Conda shouted it deep and loud and excited:

  “Submarine! Submarine coming from north, cutting across convoy! German!”

  Richard!

  Alita’s body twisted fearfully as she heard the under-water vibration that meant a submarine was coming in toward them, fast. A dark long shadow pulsed underwater.

  There was nothing you could do to stop a moving submarine, unless you were lucky. You could try stopping it by jamming its propellers, but there wasn’t time for that.

  Conda yelled, “Close in on the sub! Try to stop it somehow! Block the periscope. Do anything!”

  But the German U-boat gnashed in like a mercurial monster. In three breaths it was lined up with the convoy, unseen, and squaring off to release its torpedoes.

  Down below, like some dim-moving fantasy, Helene swam in eccentric circles, but as the sub shadow trailed over her she snapped her face up, her hot eyes pulled wide and she launched herself with terrific energy up at it, her face blazing with fury!

  The ships of the convoy moved on, all unaware of the poisoned waters they churned. Their great valvular hearts pounding, their screws thrashing a wild water song.

  “Conda, do something! Conda!” Alita shivered as her mind thrust the thoughts out at the red-bearded giant. Conda moved like a magnificent shark up toward the propellers of the U-boat, swift and angry.

  Squirting, bubbling, jolting, the sub expelled a child of force, a streamlined torpedo that kicked out of its metal womb, trailed by a second, launched with terrific impetus—at the destroyer.

  Alita kicked with her feet. She grasped at the veils of water with helpless fingers, blew all the water from her lungs in a stifled scream.

  Things happened swiftly. She had to swim at incredible speed just to keep pace with submarine and convoy. And—spinning a bubbled trail of web—the torpedoes coursed at the destroyer as Alita swam her frantic way.

  “It missed! Both torps missed!” someone cried; it sounded like the old woman.

  Oh, Richard, Richard, don’t you know the sub is near you. Don’t let it bring you down to…this, Richard! Drop the depth charges! Drop them now!

  Nothing.

  Conda clung to the conning tower of the U-boat, cursing with elemental rage, striving uselessly.

  Two more torpedoes issued from the mouths of the sub and went surging on their trajectories. Maybe—

  “Missed again!”

  Alita was gaining. Gaining. Getting closer to the destroyer. If only she could leap from the waters, shouting. If only she were something else but this dead white flesh….

  Another torpedo. The last one, probably, in the sub.

  It was going to hit!

  Alita knew that before she’d taken three strokes more. She swam exactly alongside the destroyer now, the submarine was many many yards ahead when it let loose its last explosive. She saw it come, shining like some new kind of fish, and she knew the range was correct this time.

  In an instant she knew what there was to be done. In an instant she knew the whole purpose and destiny of her swimming and being only half-dead. It meant the end of swimming forever, now, the end of thinking about Richard and never having him for herself ever again. It meant—

  She kicked her heels in the face of water, stroked ahead, clean, quick. The torpedo came directly at her with its blunt, ugly nose.

  Alita coasted, spread her arms wide, waited to embrace it, take it to her breast like a long-lost lover.

  She shouted it out in her mind:

  “Helene! Helene! From now on—from now on—take care of Richard for me! Watch over him for me! Take care of Richard—!”

  “Submarine off starboard!”

  “Ready depth-charges!”

  “Torpedo traces! Four of them! Missed us!”

  “Here comes another one! They’ve got our range this time, Jameson! Watch it!”

  To the men on the bridge it was the last moment before hell. Richard Jameson stood there with his teeth clenched, yelling, “Hard over!” but it was no use; that torp was coming on, not caring, not looking where it was going. It would hit them amidship! Jameson’s face went white all over and he breathed under his breath and clutched the rail.

  The torpedo never reached the destroyer.

  It exploded about one hundred feet from the destroyer’s hull. Jameson fell to the deck, swearing. He waited. He staggered up moments later, helped by his junior officer.

  “That was a close one, sir!”

  “What happened?”

  “That torp had our range, sir. But they must have put a faulty mechanism in her. She exploded short of her goal. Struck a submerged log or something.”

  Jameson stood there with salt spraying his face. “I thought I saw something just before the explosion. It looked like a…log. Yeah. That was it. A log.”

  “Lucky for us, eh, sir?”

  “Yeah. Damn lucky.”

  “Depth-charge! Toss ‘em!”

  Depth-charges were dropped. Moments later a subwater explosion tore up the water. Oil bubbled up to colour the waves, with bits of wreckage mixed in it.

  “We got the sub,” someone said.

  “Yeah. And the sub almost got us!”

  The destroyer ran in the wave channels, in the free wind, under a darkening sky.

  “Full speed ahead!”

  The ocean slept quiet as the convoy moved on in the twilight. There was little movement in its deep green silence. Except for some things that may have been a swarm of silver fish gathered below, just under the waters where the convoy had passed; pale things stirring, flashing a flash of white, and swimming off silently, strangely, into the deep green soundlessness of the undersea valleys….

  The ocean slept again.

  DEFENSE MECH

  This is another of Bradbury’s uncollected stories. It came out in the spring of 1946 in Planet Stories.

  * * * *

  Oh, my God, do you realize how far from Earth we are? Do you really think about it? It’s enough to scare the guts from a man. Hold me up. Do something. Give me sedatives or hold my hand or run call mama. A million cold miles up. See all the flickering stars? Look at my hands tremble. Feel my heart whirling like a hot pinwheel!

  The captain comes toward me, a stunned expression on his small, tight face. He takes my arm, looking into my eyes. Hello, captain. I’m sick, if that’s what you want to know. I’ve a right to be scared—just look at all that space! Standing here a moment ago, I stared down at Earth so round and cloud-covered and asleep on a mat of stars, and my brain tore loose and screamed, man, man, how’d you get in a mess like this, in a rocket a million miles past the moon, shooting for Mars with a crew of fourteen others! I can hardly stand up, my knees, my hands, my heart, are shaking apart. Hold me up, sir.

  What are hysterics like? The captain unprongs the inter-deck audio and speaks swiftly, scowling, into it. I hope he’s phoning the psychiatrist. I need something. Oh, dammit, dammit!

  The psychiatrist descends the ladder in immaculate salt-white uniform and walks toward me in a dream. Hello, doctor. You’re the one for me. Please, sir, turn this damned rocket around and fly back to New York. I’ll go crazy with all this space and distance!

  The psychiatrist and the captain’s voices murmur and blend, with here and there an emphasis, a toss of head, a gesture:

  “Young Halloway here’s on a fear-jag, doctor. Can you help him?”

  “I’ll try. Good man, Halloway is. Imagine you’ll need him and his muscles when we land.”

  “With the crew as small as it is, every man’s worth his weight in uranium. He’s got to be cured.”

  The psychiatrist shakes his head.

  “Might have to squirt him full of drugs to keep him quiet the rest of the exp
edition.”

  The captain explodes, saying that is impossible. Blood drums in my head. The doctor moves closer, smelling clean, sharp and white.

  “Please, understand, captain, this man is definitely psychotic about going home. His talk is almost a reversion to childhood. I can’t refuse his demands, and his fear seems too deeply based for reasoning. However, I think I’ve an idea. Halloway?”

  Yes, sir? Help me, doctor. I want to go home. I want to see popcorn exploding into a buttered avalanche inside a glass cube, I want to roller skate, I want to climb into the old cool wet ice-wagon and go chikk-chikk-chikk on the ice with a sharp pick, I want to take long sweating hikes in the country, see big brick buildings and bright-faced people, fight the old gang, anything but this—awful!

  The psychiatrist rubs his chin.

  “All right, son. You can go back to Earth, now, tonight.”

  Again the captain explodes.

  “You can’t tell him that. We’re landing on Mars today!”

  The psychiatrist pats down the captain patiently.

  “Please, captain. Well, Halloway, back to New York for you. How does it sound?”

  I’m not so scared now. We’re going down on the moving ladder and here is the psychiatrist’s cubicle.

  He’s pouring lights into my eyes. They revolve like stars on a disc. Lots of strange machines around, attachments to my head, my ears. Sleepy. Oh, so sleepy. Like under warm water. Being pushed around. Laved. Washed. Quiet. Oh, gosh. Sleepy.

  “—listen to me, Halloway—”

  Sleepy. Doctor’s talking. Very soft, like feathers. Soft, soft.

  “—you’re going to land on earth. No matter what they tell you, you’re landing on Earth…no matter what happens you’ll be on Earth…everything you see and do will be like on Earth…remember that…remember that…you won’t be afraid because you’ll be on Earth…remember that…over and over…you’ll land on Earth in an hour…home…home again…no matter what anyone says….”

  Oh, yes, sir, home again. Sleepy. Home again. Drifting, sleeping, oh thank you, sir, thank you from the bottom of my drowsy, sleepy soul. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Sleepy. Drifting.

  * * * *

  I’m awake!

  Hey, everybody, come look! Here comes Earth! Right at us, like a green moss ball off a bat! Coming at us on a curve!

  “Check stations! Mars landing!”

  “Get into bulgers! Test atmosphere!”

  Get into your what did he say?

  “Your baseball uniform, Halloway. Your baseball uniform.”

  Yes, sir. My baseball uniform. Where’d I put it? Over here. Head into, legs into, feet into it. There. Ha, this is great! Pitch her in here, old boy, old boy! Smack! Yow!

  Yes, sir, it’s over in that metal locker. I’ll take it out. Head, arms, legs into it—I’m dressed. Baseball uniform. Ha! This is great! Pitch ‘er in here, ole boy, ole boy! Smack! Yow!

  “Adjust bulger helmets, check oxygen.”

  What?

  “Put on your catcher’s mask, Halloway.”

  Oh. The mask slides down over my face. Like that. The captain comes rushing up, eyes hot green and angry.

  “Doctor, what’s this infernal nonsense?”

  “You wanted Halloway able to do his work, didn’t you, captain?”

  “Yes, but what in hell’ve you done to him?”

  Strange. As they talk, I hear their words flow over my head like a wave dashed on a sea-stone, but the words drain off, leaving no imprint. As soon as some words invade my head, something eats and digests them and I think the words are something else entirely.

  The psychiatrist nods at me.

  “I couldn’t change his basic desire. Given time, yes, a period of months, I could have. But you need him now. So, against all the known ethics of my profession, which say one must never lie to a patient, I’ve followed along in his own thought channel. I didn’t dare frustrate him. He wanted to go home, so I let him. I’ve given him a fantasy. I’ve set up a protective defense mechanism in his mind that refuses to believe certain realities, that evaluates all things from its own desire for security and home. His mind will automatically block any thought or image that endangers that security.”

  The captain stares wildly.

  “Then, then Halloway’s insane!”

  “Would you have him mad with fear, or able to work on Mars hindered by only a slight ‘tetched’ condition? Coddle him and he’ll do fine. Just remember, we’re landing on Earth, not Mars.”

  “Earth, Mars, you’ll have me raving next!”

  The doctor and the captain certainly talk weirdly. Who cares? Here comes Earth! Green, expanding like a moist cabbage underfoot!

  “Mars landing! Air-lock opened! Use bulger oxygen.”

  Here we go, gang! Last one out is a pink chimpanzee!

  “Halloway, come back, you damn fool! You’ll kill yourself!”

  Feel the good sweet Earth! Home again! Praise the Lord! Let’s dance, sing off-key, laugh! Ha! Oh, boy!

  In the door of the house stands the captain, his face red and wrinkled, waving his fists.

  “Halloway, come back! Look behind you, you fool!”

  I whirl about and cry out, happily.

  Shep! Shep, old dog! He comes running to meet me, long fur shining amber in the sunshine. Barking. Shep, I haven’t seen you in years. Good old pooch. Come ‘ere, Shep. Let me pet you.

  The captain shrieks:

  “Don’t pet it! It looks like a carnivorous Martian worm. Man, the jaws on that thing! Halloway, use your knife!”

  Shep snarls and shows his teeth. Shep, what’s wrong? That’s no way to greet me. Come on, Shep. Hey! I pull back my fingers as his swift jaws snap. Shep circles me, swiftly. You haven’t rabies, have you, Shep? He darts in, snatches my ankle with strong, locking white teeth! Lord, Shep, you’re crazy! I can’t let this go on. And you used to be such a fine, beautiful dog. Remember all the hikes we took into the lazy corn country, by the red barns and deep wells? Shep clenches tight my ankle. I’ll give him one more chance. Shep, let go! Where did this long knife come from in my hand, like magic? Sorry to do this, Shep, but—there!

  Shep screams, thrashing, screams again. My arm pumps up and down, my gloves are freckled with blood-flakes.

  Don’t scream, Shep. I said I was sorry, didn’t I?

  “Get out there, you men, and bury that beast immediately.”

  I glare at the captain. Don’t talk that way about Shep.

  The captain stares at my ankle.

  “Sorry, Halloway. I meant, bury that ‘dog,’ you men. Give him full honors. You were lucky, son, another second and those knife-teeth’d bored through your ankle-cuff metal.”

  I don’t know what he means. I’m wearing sneakers, sir.

  “Oh, yeah, so you are. Yeah. Well, I’m sorry, Halloway. I know how you must feel about—Shep. He was a fine dog.”

  I think about it a moment and my eyes fill up, wet.

  END EXCERPT

  * * * *

  There’ll be a picnic and a hike; the captain says. Three hours now the boys have carried luggage from the metal house. The way they talk, this’ll be some picnic. Some seem afraid, but who worries about copperheads and water-moccasins and crawfish? Not me. No, sir. Not me.

  Gus Bartz, sweating beside me on some apparatus, squints at me.

  “What’s eatin’ you, Halloway?”

  I smile. Me? Nothing. Why?

  “You and that act with that Martian worm.”

  What’re you talking about? What worm?

  The captain interrupts, nervously.

  “Bartz, lay off Halloway. The doctor’ll explain why. Ask him.”

  Bartz goes away, scratching his head.

  The captain pats m
y shoulder.

  “You’re our strong-arm man, Halloway. You’ve got muscles from working on the rocket engines. So keep alert today, eh, on your hike to look over the territory? Keep your—b.b. gun—ready.”

  Beavers, do you think, sir?

  The captain swallows hard and blinks.

  “Unh—oh, beavers, yeah, beavers. Sure. Beavers! Maybe. Mountain lions and Indians, too, I hear. Never can tell. Be careful.”

  Mountain lions and Indians in New York in this day and age? Aw, sir.

  “Let it go. Keep alert, anyhow. Smoke?”

  I don’t smoke, sir. A strong mind in a healthy body, you know the old rule.

  “The old rule. Oh, yes. The old rule. Only joking. I don’t want a smoke anyway. Like hell.”

  What was that last, sir?

  “Nothing, Halloway, carry on, carry on.”

  I help the others work, now. Are we taking the yellow streetcar to the edge of town, Gus?

  “We’re using propulsion belts, skimming low over the dead seas.”

  How’s that again, Gus?

  “I said, we’re takin’ the yellow streetcar to the end of the line, yeah.”

  We’re ready. Everyone’s packed, spreading out. We’re going in groups of four. Down Main Street past the pie factory, over the bridge, through the tunnel, past the circus grounds and we’ll rendezvous, says the captain, at a place he points to on a queer, disjointed map.

  Whoosh! We’re off! I forgot to pay my fare.

  “That’s okay, I paid it.”

  Thanks, captain. We’re really traveling. The cypresses and the maples flash by. Kaawhoom! I wouldn’t admit this to anyone but you, sir, but momentarily, there, I didn’t see this street-car. Suddenly we moved in empty space, nothing supporting us, and I didn’t see any car. But now I see it, sir.

  The captain gazes at me as at a nine-day miracle.

  “You do, eh?”

  Yes, sir. I clutch upward. Here’s the strap. I’m holding it.

  “You look pretty funny sliding through the air with your hand up like that, Halloway.”