Red Limit Freeway by John Dechancie

Author:John Dechancie
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 1983-12-31T16:00:00+00:00

13

It wasn't long before I met other souls down in that technological inferno. A fire brigade rushed past me dressed in fireproof suits, carrying equipment. They gave me puzzled glances, but did not stop.

I smiled and waved, limping toward the stairwell they had poured out from. I was hurt, though not mortally. The hamstring muscles of my left leg had been butchered a bit, but not completely severed. My right thigh had taken a puncture wound, and that was really hurting. I reached the stairwell and began to climb, but Nogon in bright uniforms—security guards, it turned out—met me before I'd gotten very far up. They took me into custody.

The hour that followed is a little vague in my mind. I was led back through the basement and into an express elevator. We ascended for an hour, it seemed. We alighted onto an office floor, and there I was bound with itchy leatherlike handcuffs and plopped into a chair in a dark office. Motions were made which indicated that I was not to leave. Two guards were posted. The others rushed out, closing and locking the door. I sat there in a daze for about ten minutes. Then the other security people returned and led me to a different office, sat me down, and went out again. This happened twice more. At that point I began to blank out.

I believe I was taken to some sort of infirmary, but little was done. Doctors—if they were doctors—looked me over and decided I wasn't worth bothering with. I felt basically okay. I just wanted to draw a curtain over my mind and forget. But the stickum all over me and the image of quivering mandibles wouldn't go away. And the sight of intestines that looked like children's plastic building blocks spilling from the body of a creature whose passing glance would stop a child's heart. And the smell of turpentine and almonds.

At some point Susan showed up.

She ran her hand gently over my forehead. She was crying.

“Oh, Jake,” she said.

“Are you all right?” I asked calmly. Then I came out of it. “Susan,” I said, and it all seemed like a dream. “Suzie. My God, Suzie.”

I stood up. Susan buried her face into my filthy jacket and sobbed.

Her voice muffled, she wailed something.

“ ... my fault, it's my fault...” was all I could hear.

“No, no,” I said.

She cried some more then lifted her face up. She looked as if she'd been crying for hours. Had it been hours since I came up from the depths?

“Poor Tivi,” she said, her lower lip quivering. “How can I ever...”

She hid her face again and trembled against me.

“There, there.”

I actually said, There, there.

There was more moving around. Ragna came out of what was apparently some official's office, into the anteroom where Susan and I were sitting.

“The distinguished individual to whom I have just been speaking,” he informed us solemnly, “is wishing to be gazing upon you in person as we are discussing this matter.”

We went into a lavish office that looked more like a bedroom.

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