Short Fiction - Ray Bradbury (short story to read .TXT) 📗

dead sea bottom near an ancient Martian city and⁠—oh, never mind, dammit, if you hear me, press your boy-scout badge and yell!”

I press the badge intensely, sweating. Hey, captain!

“Halloway! Glory. You’re not dead. Where are you?”

I stopped for popcorn, sir. I can’t see you. How do I hear you?

“It’s an echo. Let it go. If you’re okay, grab the next streetcar.”

That’s very opportune. Because here comes a big red streetcar now, around the corner of the drug store.

“What!”

Yes, sir, and its chock full of people. I’ll climb aboard.

“Wait a minute! Hold on! Murder! What kind of people, dammit?”

It’s the West Side gang. Sure. The whole bunch of tough kids.

“West side gang, hell, those are Martians, get the hell outa there! Transfer to another car⁠—take the subway! Take the elevated!”

Too late. The car’s stopped. I’ll have to get on. The conductor looks impatient.

“Impatient,” he says. “You’ll be massacred!”

Oh, oh. Everybody’s climbing from the streetcar, looking angry at me. Kelly and Grogan and Tompkins and the others. I guess there’ll be a fight.

The captain’s voice stabs my ears, but I don’t see him anywhere:

“Use your r-gun, your blaster, your blaster. Hell, use your slingshot, or throw spitballs, or whatever the devil you imagine you got holstered there, but use it! Come on, men, about face and back!”

I’m outnumbered. I bet they’ll gang me and give me the bumps, the bumps, the bumps. I bet they’ll truss me to a maple tree, maple tree, maple tree and tickle me. I bet they’ll ink-tattoo their initials on my forehead. Mother won’t like this.

The captain’s voice opens up louder, driving nearer:

“And Poppa ain’t happy! Get outa there, Halloway!”

They’re hitting me, sir! We’re battling!

“Keep it up, Halloway!”

I knocked one down, sir, with an uppercut. I’m knocking another down now. Here goes a third! Someone’s grabbed my ankle. I’ll kick him! There! I’m stumbling, falling! Lights in my eyes, purple ones, big purple lightning bolts sizzling the air!

Three of them vanished, just like that!

I think they fell down a manhole.

I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt them bad.

They stole my flashlight.

“Get it back, Halloway! We’re coming. Get your flash and use it!” That’s silly.

“Silly,” he says. “Silly. Silly.”

I got my flashlight back, broken, no good. We’re wrestling. There are so many of them, I’m weak. They’re climbing all over me, hitting. It’s not fair, I’m falling down, kicking, screaming!

“Up speed, men, full power!”

They’re binding me up. I can’t move. They’re rushing me into the streetcar now. Now I won’t be able to go on that hike. And I planned on it so hard, too.

“Here we are, Halloway! Blast ’em, men! Oh, my Lord, look at the horrible faces on those creatures! Guh!”

Watch out, captain! They’ll get you, too, and the others! Ahh! Somebody struck me on the back of my head. Darkness. Dark. Dark.

Rockabye baby on the treetop⁠ ⁠… when the wind blows.⁠ ⁠…

“Okay, Halloway, any time. Just any old time you want to come to.”

Dark. A voice talking. Dark as a whale’s insides. Ouch, my head. I’m flat on my back, I can feel rocks under me.

“Good morning, dear Mr. Halloway.”

That you, captain, over in that dark corner?

“It ain’t the president of the United States!”

Where is this cave?

“Suppose you tell us, you got us into this mess with your eternally blasted popcorn! Why’d you get off the streetcar?”

Did the West Side gang truss us up like this, captain?

“West Side gang, goh! Those faces, those inhuman, weird, unsavory and horrible faces. All loose-fleshed and⁠—gangrenous. Aliens, the whole rotting clutch of ’em.”

What a funny way to talk.

“Listen, you parboiled idiot, in about an hour we’re going to be fried, gutted, iced, killed, slaughtered, murdered, we will be, ipso facto, dead. Your ‘friends’ are whipping up a little bloodletting jamboree. Can’t I shove it through your thick skull, we’re on Mars, about to be sliced and hammered by a lousy bunch of Martians!”

“Captain, sir?”

“Yes, Berman?”

“The cave door is opening, sir. I think the Martians are ready to have at us again, sir. Some sort of test or other, no doubt.”

“Let go a me, you one-eyed monster! I’m coming, don’t push!”

We’re outside the cave. They’re cutting our bonds. See, captain, they aren’t hurting us, after all. Here’s the brick alley. There’s Mrs. Haight’s underwear waving on the clothesline. See all the people from the beer hall⁠—what’re they waiting for?

“To see us die.”

“Captain, what’s wrong with Halloway, he’s acting queer⁠—”

“At least he’s better off than us. He can’t see these creatures’ faces and bodies. It’s enough to turn a man’s stomach. This must be their amphitheatre. That looks like an obstacle course. I gather from their sign lingo that if we make it through the obstacles, we’re free. Footnote: nobody’s ever gotten through alive yet. Seems they want you to go first, Berman. Good luck, boy.”

“So long, captain. So long, Gus. So long, Halloway.”

Berman’s running down-alley with an easy, long-muscled stride. I hear him yelling high and clear, even though he’s getting far away.

Here comes an automobile!

Berman! Ahh! It hit him! He’s fallen!

Berman, get up, get up!

“Stay here, Halloway, it’s not your turn yet.”

My turn? What do you mean? Someone’s gotta help Berman.

“Halloway, come back! Oh, man, I don’t want to see this!”

Lift up my legs, put them down, breathe out, breathe in, swing arms, swing legs, chew my tongue, blink my eyes, Berman, here I come, gee, things are crazy-funny, here comes an ice-wagon trundling along, it’s coming right at me! I can’t see to get around it, it’s coming so fast, I’ll jump inside it, jump, jump, cool, ice, icepick, chikk-chikk-chikk, I hear the captain screaming off a million hot miles gone, chikk-chikk-chikk around the ice perimeter, the ice wagon is thundering, rioting, jouncing, shaking, rolling on big rusty iron wheels, smelling of sour ammonia, bouncing on a corduroy dirt and brick alley-road, the rear end of it seems to be snapping shut with many ice-prongs, I feel intense pain in my left leg, chikk-chikk-chikk-chikk! piece of ice, cold square, cold cube, a shuddering and convulsing, a temblor, the wagon wheels stop rolling,