Unknown body parts threshed and flailed and pumped. The world pinwheeled. Hardness raked along some far-off appendage, and blazing pain smashed up from an area his memory told him was his left shoulder. Belatedly his ears reported a thump and a sepulchral groan that might have come from him. Breath whooshed out of lungs he had not known he had.
He seemed to have fallen from some place higher to some place lower. Grey pillars loomed above him, and the black oblong in the distance became taller and differently shaped.
Memory reported, “Door. It’s a door. You’re under a table, sir.” Memory was being unnecessarily sarcastic.
Whiteness swaddled him, and he struggled. His arms, when he got them free, were fish-gill pale, marked with purple, green, and yellowish bruises, striations, and blotches. Under other circumstances he might have admired his own colorfulness. What was he? A chameleon? A cloisonne vase? A picture came back to him: a weird thing of planes and angles and raw colors. It was a human being, but wildly distorted.
Memory handed him a word: “Louvre.” He was standing somewhere, looking over a red, velvet rope at the picture. He smelled flowers: the scent of the French girl he was with. Who was she? What was her name? Paris! On leave from Angola?
Blankness came back, as Memory scurried off to hunt for more data.
Somebody within his skull commanded him to rise. Who the hell was in charge, anyway? Involuntarily his hands scrabbled for support, and legs he had not known he had contracted, pushed, and lifted. The stone rolled aside, and Lazarus emerged from the tomb. Nice job, Mr. Jesus! Great coordination there, legs! The globe that was the quintessential he rose above the flat surface, and his field of vision perforce went up with it. Those unsung heroes, his lungs, pumped, and frigid air gushed in to make him cough.
His invisible coordinator issued directives, and somewhere far below, distantly connected to his bubble of vision-ego, legs shuffled, arms windmilled for balance, and a hand caught at the edge of the grey table-surface. The white covering fell completely away. This produced a twinge of shame: he was naked. What would his mother say? He knew damned well what she’d say! And Mavis Larson would be there to peek through the basement window while he got his switching.
The black “door” oblong loomed before him. He slumped against it and felt solidity, slickness, and cold. Something hurt him lower down, in the softness named “stomach.” There was a round, hard globe there. It wasn’t part of him; thus it must belong to the black oblong. The thing was frigid, a ball of ice against his skin. He thrust a hand between it and his belly, and it turned. Something clicked.
The black oblong changed, a thing apparently to be expected in a world of unrealities. The round ball slid away, and the surface against which he leaned went with it, sideways, at a slant and all at once, making him stumble. He lurched forward.
Full speed ahead, Captain! Sailors in blue uniforms staggered to and fro on a pitching deck before shiny, brass housings, rain poured in through an open hatch, and a spotlight slashed the waves in the howling, spume-driven night outside. Another goddamn movie! He was getting better at separating the present from the past, the real from the unreal, the men from the boys. This time it was Beverly Rowntree who popped her gum beside him in the movie house. He rubbed a leg against her thigh, and they rolled towards one another simultaneously, two hearts with a single lust! There ought to have been a crescendo of music and a rush of scarlet passion; instead, her front teeth dug a gash in his lower lip, and she nearly broke her big, bony nose on his cheekbone. So much for romance!
Beyond the door was another world, a place of greys and blacks and muted browns. A row of little suns marched away above him, receding into the distance. One or two were missing, spoiling the symmetry. He didn’t care. Esthetic appreciation was beyond him. To hell with trying to appear worldly wise before his little French girl! Or was it Beverly?
His feet moved, and shadowy, grey walls rolled past. More black oblongs appeared and were left behind on either side. He heard a whishing, scraping sound below him. He tripped, and somebody down there sent an urgent pain message up to the bridge. He would have ignored it, but his left foot — he thought it was that — refused to lift and go forward. Action was required. He lowered his head and looked. Past all the lumps and bulges of empurpled, naked flesh, way down at the bottom, he perceived that his right foot was standing upon a small, yellow square. He tried again to lift his left foot. It refused to rise, and the message of pain was repeated. The square was attached to his left big toe. With all the skill he could muster he raised his right foot. This released the square and freed his left foot.
Off balance, he fell heavily against the wall. Shit! If he stopped to investigate the yellow square he’d probably break his neck! On-ward! He let his limbs take over and found himself up again and continuing. Good job, Captain! Off the reef at last!
There was danger. Hazily, he sensed — remembered? — that much. The black oblong, the door, at the end of the path of little suns was where the danger might be. He halted, shut down his engines, issued orders to all hands, and teetered forward to listen.
Nothing.
Door? Open? Yes, he could manage that. He knew how.
Stairs. Up. Amazing how well Memory helped, and his limbs obeyed Citations for all, yes, sir!
What? Something — someone — lying on the stairs, feel up, head down. The mouth and nose were smeared with black. Some of the blackness was puddled in the eye sockets: pools of ebon darkness. Emily Pietrick used to talk like that; he had dated her for a lustful six months in high school, but she was into witchcraft and demons and horror movies. Too weird for him!
Shaking his head cleared away some of the fuzz. He squinted at the body on the stairs. It might have been one of his guards. What was a “guard?” Why had there been “guards?” He wasn’t sure. He twisted his head upside down to see, but the black stuff hid the man’s features. The guy had been dead awhile.
Memory pounded up onto the bridge and announced: “Death stinks, sir! Don’t you smell it?” He sniffed. Nothing. “Out of order, sailor! Report to damage control!” “Aye-aye, sir!” Memory saluted smartly and left again. By God, he ran a tight ship! Geoffrey Archer, who had played the captain in the movie, had nothing on him!
Beverly Rowntree was once more beside him in the theater, she grabbed his hand and stuffed it greedily down inside her blouse. Her nipple thrust up hard against his fingers, and he fell the silky curve of her breast Where could they go? He had to have her. Urgently!
The room at the top of the stairs held two more bodies. These were dressed in khaki uniforms with brown, leather belts and holsters. Their brass buttons gleamed bright in the sunlight slanting in through the windows. The one who lay on his back on the carpet (what a mess: the cleaning bill!) had the shiniest shoes he had ever seen. The other man knelt on his hands and knees, like a Muslim praying. But he couldn’t be a Muslim; his pants were dark with the dried excreta of his dying. A Muslim had to be clean to pray, and this man was not. He wore a mask of blackish jelly, anyhow. Probably a scuba-diver; frogmen were what the ship needed now! He recalled the scene welclass="underline" the captain giving them all a pep-talk, the line of black-clad figures at the rail, the scudding, grey clouds above the steely sea.
The kneeling man was the bigger of his two guards. He still couldn’t think why there had been guards. Memory refused to answer — probably having a quick snort with the guys down in damage control. The other corpse was unrecognizable. He didn’t think it was Sonny — whoever the hell Sonny was; he couldn’t remember.