John Varley - Red Lightning

by Red Lightning [lit]

  He waved his hand with the drink in it at the office.

  "It's all this," he said. He paused for so long I thought that was going to be all, but then he sighed and looked at me.

  "They compare us to Charles Lindbergh. Neil Armstrong. Christopher Columbus, for crying out loud."

  "But... what you did was as important as what they did, wasn't it?"

  "What we did was important, there's no point in denying that. But those men, they... they were great men, Ray. They worked hard to get the chance to do what they did. What I did, what we did... it just sort of fell into our laps. It was nothing but luck, being in the right place at the right time. Travis could have gone himself, without any of us, if he'd found that first bubble himself. I mean, I literally stumbled on it. I've felt like... like an imposter ever since." He gave me a wry grin and sipped at his drink. His eyes were far away.

  I thought about it a while. I could just say "You're not an imposter" and leave it at that. But what he had said didn't make sense to me, and I wondered how I could convince him of that. Probably no way, but it was worth a try.

  "Columbus was pretty much a loser, wasn't he?" I said.

  "What do you mean?"

  "Well, he was a big deal for a while, but in history class these days he doesn't come off so good. Sure, he was an adventurer and an explorer. But he and the ones who came after him enslaved and massacred the natives of the New World." I looked around the office. "Don't see any slaves in here."

  Dad laughed.

  "Just wage slaves," he said. "I wonder what would have happened if there had been natives?"

  "We'd have bored them to death with appearances on every television show on Earth, or put them in zoos. Or married them, like Pocahontas. Anyway, there weren't. And from what they told us, Columbus was one lucky fool. Luckier than you. His whole trip was based on the idea that the Earth was a lot smaller than it actually is. He thought he could get to the Orient – which is what he was planning to do, and come to think of it, he died still believing he'd landed in China – by sailing west. If the Americas hadn't been there, he and his whole crew would have starved to death."

  He smiled, but didn't say anything.

  Okay, reality check number two.

  "Lindbergh? Gimme a break. Well-known Nazi. His flight was nothing but a stunt, the Atlantic had already been crossed by air; who cares if he did it solo? He was a media creation, just like you think you are."

  His smile got bigger, and he shook his head a little.

  "Neil Armstrong... well, there you got me. He's a hero in my book. His trip was important, he worked for it, he deserved everything he got. Which, apparently, he didn't want! After he got back he buried himself in Ohio and avoided publicity like the black death. Never tried to cash in on his fame."

  "I did. Big-time."

  "I'd say small-time, from what I know. And so what? Don't you think I know I would­n't be where I am today if you and Mom hadn't..."

  "Sold out?"

  "Sold out what? Cashed in, sure. And what's wrong with that? Your book was a his­torical document. Somebody should complain that you made money off it? Quit kicking yourself over it, Dad. You made one giant leap for mankind."

  He actually laughed then, and shook his head.

  "Okay, son, you've convinced me."

  I could tell that I hadn't, not really, but the look that passed between us was far more important to me. I'd somehow managed to convey to him that, no matter what he thought of himself, I thought of him as a hero. And that that was all that really mattered to either of us.

  God, why can't we have more moments like that?

  Travis and I left the bedroom and I thought we were done, but he put his arm around my shoulder and pulled my head down nearer to his level.

  "I have two words of advice for you, Ray," he said. "You want to hear them?"

  "I guess so."

  "Don't go."

  I didn't say anything.

  "Where we're going, it's no place for a kid, Ray. Now don't take offense, I didn't like being called a kid when I was seventeen any more than you do. But it's a fact. You're a kid. Your sister is almost a kid, too, and she's sure too young and innocent for the Red Zone. Don't even get me started on Evangeline, she's got absolutely no business here. But there's no shame in staying here at the ranch, my friend."

  "I've got to go, Travis."

  "I know you feel that way, but you don't. Not really. We're going to be seeing some things that will stick with you for the rest of your life, and nothing good will be accom­plished by that. We may end up having to do things... well, whatever we have to do. You don't need that, either."

  "Are you saying you won't take me?"

  "I never said that. I think you're old enough to make your own decision. I just think you're making the wrong one."

  "What about Elizabeth?" I asked, and I'm afraid I sounded a little petulant, even to myself. "I'll bet you won't ask her not to go."

  "You're wrong. I'm going to advise her to stay here with Evangeline. What do you think my chances are?"

  "Zero."

  "Yeah, that's what I figured. I'll ask anyway. So. What do you say?"

  "I have to go," I said.

  "So be it." He patted my shoulder and walked away.

  It was probably the best advice I ever got. But I didn't take it.

  8

  It didn't take long for us all to get a taste of what Travis was talking about, and we got it from the man himself.

  "Listen up!" he shouted from the front of the newly painted Duck. We were all seated under the big canvas tarp with the sun just struggling to make itself seen through the thick haze to the east.

  "There is only one way this thing will work, and that is absolute obedience. Right now this silly little vehicle is a truck, but before we get where we're going it will be a boat, and we will all behave as if it is a boat at all times. A boat has only one captain, and that captain is me.

  Boat captains do not hold elections nor do they conduct polls, except at their own dis­cretion. I may ask you for advice, but once I have received it, my decision in all matters is final, and my orders will be given accordingly, and they will be obeyed. We don't have a brig on this vessel, so flogging will be the punishment of choice. Does anyone have any questions?"

  "No, sir, Captain Bligh!" Mom replied. Travis looked at her and smiled with one cor­ner of his mouth.

  "You will all be allowed one smart-ass remark per day. That was yours, Kelly."

  I could see Mom struggling not to laugh, but she kept her mouth shut.

  "This is your last chance to bail out," Travis went on, unsmiling. "I won't ask for a show of hands, but I'm about to start this thing up, and anybody still aboard when I get moving has agreed to abide by my orders until we get back, or until you decide to jump ship. Believe me, I won't think any the less of anyone who gets off now." He was staring daggers at Evangeline, who squirmed uncomfortably. I had an idea she'd been subjected to a much stronger argument than Travis had given me. But she didn't move. He shifted his gaze to Elizabeth, who sat calmly. Then he glanced at me, shrugged, and turned away. He pressed the starter button and the engine instantly roared to life.

  We were on our way.

  The road dipped down to the lake. Travis did something with the gears, and the Duck eased in and I felt the wheels coming free of the ground. Soon we were afloat, moving at a steady five knots, according to Travis.

  "They lost a lot of these things on D day," Travis told us. "Can everybody aboard swim?"

  Elizabeth swims like a porpoise; she won medals on the school swim team. As for myself, I'm not elegant or quick, but I get there eventually.

  "Good. Now, this is all the shakedown cruise we're going to get, so everybody look around for leaks."

  I did, like an idiot. Then I asked, "What are we going to do if it leaks, Travis?"

  He tossed me something. I grabbed for it, and naturally I reached too high. It would take a while to get my reflexes adjusted to Ear
th gravity, where things fall too damn fast. It hit my wrist and fell into my lap. It was a piece of bubble gum.

  "You walked right into that one, Ray," he said. I tossed it back at him.

  "Got something else for you guys," he said, and dug around in a backpack he had car­ried aboard. He came out with a handful of thin black leather wallets. I opened mine and saw a shiny gold badge that said Volusia County Deputy Sheriff.

  "Badges?" Dak said. "Badges? We don' –"

  "– need no steenkin' badges!" Travis, Mom, and Dad finished with him, and laughed. I looked over at Elizabeth and Evangeline, but they just shrugged. Normally I could have googled the source in about three seconds, but none of our stereos were working, nor would they until we got back to Orlando.

  "Are these any good, Travis?" Mom asked.

  "What do you mean? Why wouldn't they be? I'm a deputy sheriff, and I'm authorized to deputize other people in an emergency."

  "I thought that was honorary."

  "Let's not harp on technicalities. Oh, speaking of technicalities, all a y'all raise your right hands."

  We did.

  "Do y'all solemnly swear to do any dad-gum thing I order y'all to do, and to uphold and respect the laws of Volusia County, the great state of Florida, and the United States of America, such as they are in the present state of emergency, and as long as they don't get in the way of doing what we set out to do?"

  We all agreed, more or less. Dak was looking down at this badge in his hand and shaking his head.

  "Damn. I'm a cop!"

  We held a democratic vote to name the Duck. Final results:

  Donald 3 (Dad, Mr. Redmond, and Dak)

  Daffy 3 (me, Elizabeth, and Evangeline)

  Daisy 1 (Mom)

  Uncle Scrooge 1 (Travis).

  And the winnah is... Scrooge! Well, he warned us, didn't he?

  We came up out of the lake on a narrow country lane. Scrooge handled this as adroitly as it had handled getting into the water. Travis said the thing could go fifty miles per hour on a good road, but we probably would never get a chance to open her up. It was quite a nice vehicle, actually, over thirty feet long and eight feet wide. The seats were comfort­able, the ride was okay. It had only one drawback, and that was the lack of air-condition­ing. As the sun rose the stifling, moist Florida heat closed in on us.

  We were all dressed in Banana Republic safari stuff, supplied by Travis, of good quality but far too heavy for the humidity. I understood the logic. This wasn't a pleasure trip, we needed the soldierlike garments. But I wished for a light cotton aloha shirt, maybe one with blue parrots or something, like Travis usually wore. Within half an hour we were all drenched.

  Come to think of it, Scrooge had a second drawback: no windows. Before long we were swarmed by the kind of mosquitoes you think might actually pick you up and carry you away to devour at their leisure. The only thing I know of worse than being covered in sweat is being covered in sweat and bug dope at the same time. It smelled bad, it was oily and sticky, and many of the mosquitoes seemed to regard it as little more than an inter­esting sauce for the steaming human hot dogs they were feasting on.

  No question, the worst thing about Earth was Earthies. The second worst was gravity. And coming on hard on the rail was bugs. I hate bugs.

  There was an actual boundary to the Red Zone. Starting about seven miles from where the coast used to be, there was an actual wall, from just a few feet high to as much as ten feet, depending on the vagaries of the mostly flat landscape. It was composed of cars and wrecked houses and smashed mobile homes, so common in Florida. It was composed, in fact, of just about anything human beings used in their homes and on their jobs, as if it had all been tossed into a blender, churned on the high setting for a while, and then poured out in a line that cut right across the road we were on.

  On either side of the road we saw groups of people, some in uniform, some civilians, some with heavy equipment, some with cadaver dogs, some simply moving wreckage by hand. The operation was at the point all catastrophes like this eventually reach, where some hardy souls are still holding out hope to find living people buried in the debris.

  "You can't argue with people like that," Travis told us, "because one in a million times a survivor is recovered even this long afterward, and the media jump on the story and write endless pieces about the 'miracle.' " He stopped himself when he saw Mr. Redmond's face, which was leaking tears. We hadn't talked about it much, but Mr. and Mrs. Redmond had about a dozen relatives in the area, in residential areas, the debris of which we were looking at right then. It was questionable if any of them had made it to high ground or a strong, multistory building.

  "I am such a total asshole," Travis said. "I should give asshole lessons. Jim, I am so sorry, I didn't mean..."

  "That's okay, Travis," Mr. Redmond said. "We understand the realities here. We're just praying they got to a safe place."

  "I'll pray right along with you," Travis said.

  There was a big refrigerator truck with a generator humming, and beside it a row of yellow body bags. Some of the rescue and recovery workers waved at us and we waved back. Then Travis got moving again.

  The road had been bulldozed ahead of us for about half a mile. To each side was... it's hard to describe what it looked like. It had been a residential neighborhood and there were houses standing here and there, mostly made of brick, but with all the windows broken out and draped with garbage rotting in the sun. There were some wooden houses more or less intact, but knocked off their foundations by the force of the waves. Instead of the normal grid you'd have seen before the waves, neat little houses and trailer parks all in a row, it looked like somebody had taken a lot of little Monopoly houses and shaken them in a jar and dumped them out on the board. Power poles leaned in every direction. Cars were on their sides or on their roofs or piled up by the force of the water. And over eve­rything, filling all the cracks, was the endless wreckage and mud washed in from loca­tions closer to the ocean.

  Before long we came to a roadblock. There were maybe a dozen men and women there, in different uniforms. There were Florida National Guard, regular United States Army, and one Homelander. There was a guy in the ragged remains of a blue police patrolman's uniform, looking like he hadn't bathed or slept since the wave hit. A guy in a white MP helmet, maybe about twenty-five years old, turned his rifle in our general direction, but pointed at the ground, and held his hand up. Travis stopped.

  "Everyone down from the vehicle, please," he said, motioning with his weapon. Travis lowered the ladder and we eased ourselves out and down to stand in the mud.

  "Deputy sheriffs, Sergeant," Travis said. He was shrugging into an Eisenhower jacket as he spoke, which struck me as the height of insanity.

  "And what is the purpose of your visit, sir?" the guy asked.

  "Rescue and recovery, just like you. Is there a problem?" He pulled an Army cap over his head, and I saw it had two gold metal stars pinned to it. There were stars on each of his shoulders, too. I thought it was sort of pretty, and I wondered if I could wear some stars, too.

  The soldier saw it, and his eyes got very large. He snapped to attention and saluted.

  "No, sir, no problem, sir."

  "At ease, soldier," Travis said, easily. "They put me out to pasture years ago, I'm retired, and I'm not here to screw up your patch."

  "Yes, sir, General Broussard, sir." He must have recognized the famous face, because Travis's name wasn't anywhere on the uniform.

  Travis started questioning the sergeant about conditions up ahead, and the other sol­diers gathered around respectfully, offering information, except for the Homelander, who as usual stayed behind his black plastic mask, aloof and above it all, a law unto himself. I wondered if those black uniforms were air-conditioned, or if a requirement for Homelander service was the ability not to sweat.

  A lieutenant of some sort came up soon in an amphibious Hummer, saluted, and joined the conversation. Everything seemed to be going well between Trav
is and the soldiers, but the lieutenant was looking suspiciously at the rest of us.

  "Look here, General," the lieutenant finally said. "I'm not going to try to stand in your way if you want to go farther, but I don't know if I can take the responsibility for the rest of your party. My orders are, nobody but authorized personnel goes in, and anybody who comes out can't go back. Tomorrow or the next day we're scheduled to start moving in and get the rest of the survivors moving inland toward the refugee camps, but a lot of them don't want to go. I'm afraid it could get ugly."

  "I'm sure it might, Lieutenant," Travis said. "It's a dumb idea trying to get Americans to give up what's left of their homes. They don't want the government putting them in camps, no matter what they call them, unless they have absolutely nothing left. I expect some of them will resist."

  "Between you and me, sir, I agree, but orders are orders. Personally, I don't intend to shoot any citizen who hunkers down in his house."

  "I'm glad to hear it. Meantime, I won't bullshit you. We're on personal errands, and I'm using my political weight to get special consideration." He flashed a big grin at the lieutenant. "I'm willing to take personal responsibility for these people, who, though it may sound ridiculous, are in fact legally sworn deputy sheriffs. It would, in fact, be a felony for them to display those badges if they weren't. If the phones were working I'd call up the governor, who I believe is in charge of this part of this fiasco, technically, though we all know who's really in charge" – he glanced at the Homelander – "and I guarantee you he'd say let that idiot Broussard do whatever he wants to do, so long as you keep him out of my hair. So what do you say, Lieutenant?"

  The lieutenant looked a little stunned – people often do when dealing with Travis – but he finally smiled.

  "Well, since you put it that way."

  We were climbing back aboard when the lieutenant took another look at me.

  "How old are you, son?" he asked.

  My mouth was living a life of its own.