LOSS OF REASON Read online

  “It’s jammed!” There was pain in her face. Her arms were raised overhead in dark sleeves. Hanging from something, he thought.

  “How far over is the doorway?”

  “The doors won’t open,” she yelled back.

  She turned and he heard the muffled sound of words to someone else he couldn’t see. She turned back to face him, “Oh! Yes! Windows—” She looked to Franklin’s left. “Seven or eight feet from the end of the car!”

  He leaned back and looked along the top. A gargantuan slab of street asphalt covered that whole end. No way he and Everon could move it.

  “Blocked!” He moved a finger to the right in a pointing motion. “That way? Doors over there in the middle, aren’t there?”

  “There’s water that way!”

  “Can’t be helped.” He pointed, “It’s blocked on this side.”

  She looked over, then back to him. “About fifteen feet!”

  The Awful Truth

  “Why are we doing this?” Everon asked, hands, triceps straining. “She’s not gonna be down there, you know.”

  “We don’t know that!” But it was only his own desperation Franklin heard.

  Fifteen feet from the first hole, Franklin and Everon struggled to push over a vertical slab of concrete-bonded asphalt the size of a flat panel television.

  As the slab began to move, a breath of air fluttered along the ditch, lifted Everon’s wavy blond hair. “That radiation cloud’s coming,” he grunted. The asphalt’s black upper edge went past vertical, rotating as if encased in glue. “Think of a desert storm. Then realize each grain of sand is poison. A poison once inside, your body can’t ever get rid of.” The slab accelerated as gravity took over until it fell, crashing onto the dirt on the other side of the subway.

  Dirt flew as they began a new hole. Franklin knew it. They didn’t have to do this. They could stop now. “When she left you at the airport, was she taking a cab—or a train?”

  “I left her in a cab.”

  More bricks tossed into the ditch. The train was deeper here. As they dug down, yellow, blue, white tiles were part of the mix.

  “What was Cynthia planning to do?”

  “Go home to her family, watch TV and go to bed.”

  They exposed the upper part of a window; its lower edge, buried in the dirt, became visible. Another narrow one they’d overshot. But this one had no horizontal split. Tight, but possible.

  As they dug out more dirt and debris, the face of a white-haired old man appeared. “Get back!” Franklin yelled at him.

  The face in the window disappeared.

  Franklin pulled a small rock hammer from his climbing belt and smacked the glass. It didn’t break. He hauled back. And smacked the hell out of it. The glass shattered with a loud crash.

  He felt a faint breeze from the window as he used the hammer’s handle to scrape away shards around the edge. It wouldn’t do to rip his skin open on the way in.

  With one hand on the climbing rope, he flipped himself around and slid his legs over. As his chest scraped through, he felt hands lightly grip his feet and guide him inside—moving his feet sideways to where his toes found something hard to stand on.

  And something cold, too.

  Faces stared back at him in his flashlight beam.

  Part of him felt like he’d made a terrible mistake, wasting so much time. Cynthia’s face was not among them.

  The group was smaller than he expected, five men and two women, gathered at the high end of the car, standing, sitting, holding onto silver poles. As if to anchor themselves. Cold was leaking into his climbing shoes. Water! Already an inch over the orange plastic seat he stood on.

  The odor was strong—salt, and the faint smell of ripe sewage. A swollen male body floated in the water, a man in a soggy dark business suit.

  “Are we ever glad to see you, son!” said the man with short white hair Franklin had seen in the window. Blood was smeared across his scalp. He wore an expensive disheveled topcoat and suit. “What happened?” he asked. He bore a calm, kind look on his face. His eyes held wisdom.

  Before Franklin could answer, someone else asked, “Where is everybody?” Another voice: “You’re it?” And then they let loose: “The next car’s—We’ve been here—flooded—Are you—for hours—with the—Train crash?—city . . . ”

  They have a way out now, a voice inside Franklin said. Let these people find their own way off Manhattan. Get to the helicopter. Try again for the top of Cynthia’s building!

  But he had to tell them: “The City’s been bombed.”

  There were gasps. “I knew it.” “Bombed! What do you mean bombed?” “A bomb!” “Oh my God!” “Bomba! Bomba!”

  “What kind of bomb?” one man’s high voice penetrated, a dark damp toupee half off his head. He was nearly screaming. “What kind of bomb could affect us all the way up here if—” the high-pitched sound froze. His eyes went wide. “Nuclear?” he did scream.

  Franklin gave him a firm look. “We think so. Down by the seaport.”

  People gasped. The screamer shut up.

  In the flashlight’s beam Franklin caught two more corpses, a man and a woman floating at the car’s end. The woman’s dark skirt floated up around her white jacket, their faces already bloated by gas. Water’s about four feet high already, he judged. Coming in pretty fast.

  “What about radiation?” asked a guy with piercing black obsidian eyes and skin, a green ball cap, the words StreetNews! hand-painted on the front in white.

  “Our meter isn’t showing a problem so far around here. My brother’s on the roof with ropes,” Franklin pointed. “We have a helicopter. We can get you out of the city.”

  “I knew it!” said a very dark-skinned man, shaking his head. He had high cheekbones, a dark, bushy mustache, an orange and white New York Transit vest over a blue shirt. “I was up front in the motor when we came off the tracks. We were nearly into Lex and 59th. Wasn’t going that fast.”

  “You’re the engineer?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is everybody?” Franklin disconnected his harness, stepped out of it. “This is the first car?” The cold water had filled his climbing shoes, was rising up his ankles.

  “I put the train in service ten minutes before it hit,” the engineer answered. “Just an eight car hookup.” He pointed down the far end, “I—I couldn’t open the door—I have the key—the water . . . ” his voice trailed off.

  “Got to our car maybe an hour ago,” the old man said.

  Franklin stepped from one seat to the next, grabbing silver overhead handles for balance.

  “You don’t want to LOOK AT THAT!” the engineer’s voice rose in volume as Franklin swung his beam.

  Light hit the window at car’s end. Franklin jerked involuntarily as a face stared back, sightless open eyes through the tall rectangular glass in the car on the other side.

  Halfway up the door, water was leaking through a seal that was holding back a flood. Everyone in there has to be dead. Probably drowned when the subway tunnel collapsed and flooded. Not long after the bomb went off.

  He flashed the beam downward and perceived ripples in the light, a moving current.

  Water coming in from more than one place too.

  Rising Water

  “We have to get out of here now,” Franklin said, gritting his teeth as the icy water bit like needles into his calves.

  The dark-haired woman he’d seen in the window sat sideways, legs across several seats just out of the water’s reach. She appeared to be in pain. Her dark mid-length coat was pulled around her. One of her long, smooth legs was interrupted by what looked like thin tubes of rolled newspaper strapped to her leg’s sides, and an obnoxious-looking knee that bulged under the skin.

  “How’d you get up to the window?” Franklin asked her.

  “I pulled myself up on the bars. Had to.”

  “Are you able to walk?”
r />   “Not much. My leg feels like it’s broken.”

  He sloshed over, examined her knee. “Dislocated, looks like. There’s a man up top who’ll know better. I think we can get you out okay.”

  As she stared up at him, blood matted along the right side of her face, Franklin thought, She doesn’t seem to be bleeding anymore. He frowned at her vague familiarity. Probably looks a lot better without that blood in her hair.

  He looked around. “Anybody else hurt?”

  “Mr. van Patter,” she nodded toward the elderly gentleman, “was unconscious when I woke up.”

  “I’m alright,” van Patter said lightly. “Just a little bump on the noggin. I’ll be fine.”

  “Well I’m not fine!” said the man in the soggy toupee. The screamer. “Tyner Kone,” he announced. “U.S. Department of Commerce! I want answers! How bad is it up there?”

  “No good deed goes unpunished,” a voice echoed from above.

  Franklin looked up to see his brother’s upside-down head wiggle through the now-missing window. Everon winked at the dark-haired young woman. “I wonder if he knows his hairpiece is on crooked?”

  She barked out a high laugh.

  Franklin understood his brother’s strategy. Keep them from going further into shock. The water was rising. Everon looked at him as if to say, Let’s get to what we came for!

  “Your attempt at humor is not appropriate, nor appreciated,” Kone fumed. He straightened his toupee and pointed. “This water is probably loaded with radiation. How do you propose to get us out of here?” Kone pointed to Everon. “How far is it?”

  Everon looked at Franklin. “Chuck and I used the winch to break out that metal grate. We can take everybody straight up.” He wiggled backward and disappeared.

  “Alright then. Pull me up!” Kone said. “Let’s go!”

  Franklin considered the opening—against the bureaucrat’s round shape. Despite Everon’s ability to wiggle through the small tunnel they’d made, it would be too tight for some of them. For sure Kone wouldn’t fit. He wouldn’t even make it through the window.

  “Yeah, let’s go, man! Water’s coming up fast!” StreetNews! Cap’s rising voice was sounding more like Kone’s.

  “If we try to pull you up through that hole, all we’ll succeed in doing is getting you stuck halfway and wind up cutting the rope.”

  Franklin looked at the dark-haired woman. There was no way to get someone with a bad leg through either. He studied the train car doors and knew what he had to do.

  “What’s your name?” he asked.

  “Victoria.”

  “All right, Victoria. We have to move you. I need to get everybody to the other side of the car.”

  “Okay,” she said, despite what he suspected was considerable pain.

  As much as possible they had to avoid the water. Not because it was cold, but because the bomb had exploded only a few miles away, somewhere downtown near the water. He hadn’t brought Chuck’s radiation meter with him. It all depends, he realized, on which way the East River is flowing.

  Franklin heard the word again. “Bomba? Bomba?”

  A man with sandy-brown hair, his arm around a slim blonde woman in a fur-lined coat bunched around her neck, both in their mid-thirties, had remained silent the whole time. Now they whispered frantically to each other. It seemed they didn’t understand what was going on.

  “New York bombili,” Franklin said—the same thing he’d told the others. The couple looked at each other. “Bomba?” the woman asked, staring at him wide-eyed.

  “Bomba! Da! Ya skazal vam!” —Bomb! Yeah! I told you! The man looked back to Franklin, who nodded grimly.

  “What are they speaking?” Mr. van Patter asked.

  “Russian.”

  “What did he say? What did he say?” Kone asked. But Franklin didn’t answer.

  The guy in the StreetNews! cap said, “Let me give you a hand. Name’s Clarence.”

  Franklin and Clarence carefully slid their arms beneath Victoria’s legs. The Russian guy lifted her feet. The dark-haired young woman grimaced as they carried her to a seat on the opposite side. Drew breath sharply as they set her down. It was going to be tough getting her up. Maybe I can help her feel better, Franklin thought. If she’s consciously willing to let me do it.

  Ultimately it would have to be her decision.

  “If I can reduce your pain before we go up, would you go along with it?”

  “What, a pill or something?”

  Half her pain’s internal, Franklin was certain. Induced by fear—of what might be wrong with her knee, wondering if it will heal. A second part caused by wondering whether she’ll even get out of here.

  “No . . . something mental.”

  “Uh—I don’t know. I guess so.”

  But Franklin’s mind was already tuned in to everything about her—a lightning comparison of her vocal accent and vocal tone—her body posture, even what he could see in the limited light of the dilation of her pupils. The swelling of her full lips, down to the nearly invisible tension in the pores of the smooth skin across her cheeks. All of it poured into him, affected him, and was processed.

  Like a well-practiced musician, responding in ways he was barely aware of, Franklin gave himself an inner nod, and in a low insistent voice, whispered in her ear, “Victoria . . . deep inside you can fall asleep, rest, arrive at a deeper . . . place to relax, unwind, chill out, vous dormez, calming . . . ”

  She frowned at him. But underneath, she felt her breathing slow . . .

  “What are you telling her?” Kone said, voice rising again.

  Franklin ignored him. “ . . . down deeper to loosen up, lighten up, usted duerme . . . settle down . . . spat’ . . . feel and sense and experience . . . undergo to change and be allowing . . . you yourself to just let go as . . . you . . . cancel . . . pain.”

  She felt a flow of energy through her calves, down into her feet.

  Since she had given, at least, her conscious agreement, Franklin was using an ultra-abbreviated form of what he’d used to convince Chuck Farndike to set up their Red Cross clearance. But where he’d helped Chuck amplify his uncomfortableness, he did the opposite with “ . . . Victoria . . . relaxing . . . deeper now . . .” Dropping his pitch and volume, his tone deeper still . . .

  The third time he said it he looked suddenly away, gently squeezed her shoulder.

  What’s all that about? she frowned. Then oddly realized she didn’t feel so frightened . . . And the throbbing in her knee was diminishing too . . .

  Canceling her pain, he knew, carries a danger of its own: The pain is there for a reason, a warning: Be careful! Something’s damaged!

  But now he could do what he had to. The water was pouring in at an alarming rate. Franklin pulled the rock hammer from his harness and stepped to one side of the big window in the other door. He waved a hand and spoke to the Russian couple, who immediately stepped back.

  “What’s going on?” Kone asked.

  “You might want to back up,” he told the others.

  They all moved back. Except Kone. “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked, voice bordering on hysteria.

  “Ignore him,” van Patter said.

  Cowed for some reason by the older gentleman, Kone obediently stepped over, up on the seats where Victoria and van Patter sat and the others stood.

  Franklin hauled the hammer back and smacked the glass. A shuddering split appeared in the window’s lower left corner. He swung back to take another swing, but a high rippling sound snaked its way diagonally upward across the window and . . . SNAP! Shattered glass exploded into the car. Pieces of tile and gray cement dust poured in, chips of concrete, red bricks laid down a century ago—splashed into the still rising water.

  A dirt pile rose fast in the water in the center aisle.

  Within seconds, dirt had risen above the water. Then a foot above and still the pile grew. As they scooped it back to make room fo
r more, struggling to keep up, Franklin began to wonder if he’d miscalculated.

  How much can there be?

  Clarence, the Russians and the transit engineer pushed bricks and dirt into the water away from the rising mound. More light poked through. Van Patter moved several smaller bricks then wobbled back to a seat, ready to fall over. Victoria used her sleeve to wipe away the small trail of blood that dribbled down his face.

  Kone stood on the opposite side seat next to Victoria and watched.

  “We didn’t know how much stuff was above us,” Clarence said as they worked. “We should have tried.”

  And then it slowed. The dirt had taken space where the water had been. The water was rising even faster now.

  More chunks of loose rock rolled down. Franklin could hear Everon digging above. The casual refrain of a familiar tune floated down, Everon’s voice off-key, “I’ve been diggin’ on the railroad, all the livelong day . . . ”

  A couple of people smiled.

  Franklin used the short claw of his rock hammer between the door seals and wedged them an inch apart. The Russian guy splashed into the water, grabbed one side of the rubber strip, the engineer’s hands above his. Clarence and Franklin slid their fingers onto the opposing side.

  Slowly they forced the doors wide open. As more dirt poured in, they shoved it to the sides. The pile rose above the seat bottoms, then even with the water. Hands began to bleed. They kept at it until they had a slot up through the dirt, large enough that even Kone could slide through easily.

  They stood on the seats, water to their knees and coming in fast.

  “Normally I’d say ladies and injured people first,” Franklin rushed now, “But we’ll need some muscle up top.”

  Figuring the Russian guy would want to stay until his lady had gotten clear, he looked at Clarence.

  “We’ll take Victoria here up next. Can you help my brother, guide her?”