Майкл Суэнвик - Tales of Old Earth [A collection of short-stories]

“If you’ll excuse me, ma’am,” I said uncomfortably. “I have to get back to work.”

“I got work for you right here,” she said, grabbing at me. I reached for the doorknob, but she was tugging at my jacket, trying to get it open. I grabbed her by the wrists, afraid of losing a button.

“Please, ma’am.” I was just about dying of embarrassment.

“Don’t you please ma’am me, boy! You know I got what you want and we both know I ain’t got long to use it.” She was rubbing herself against me and at the same time trying to shove my head down into her bosom. Somehow her brassiere had come undone and her breasts were slapping me in the face. It was awful. I was thrashing around, struggling to get free, and she was all over me.

Then I managed to slip out of her grip and straight-arm her so that she fell on her back onto the bunk. For a second she lay there looking rumpled and expectant.

I used that second to open the door and step out into the hall. Keeping a wary eye on the woman, I began to tug my uniform back into place.

When she realized I wasn’t going to stay, her face twisted, and she spat out a nasty word.

“Cocksucker!”

It hurt. I’m not saying it didn’t. But she was under a lot of pressure, and it wouldn’t have been professional for me to let my feelings show. So I simply said, “Yes’m. That’s so. But I’m sure there are plenty of men on board this train who would be extremely interested in what you got to offer. The dining room opens soon. You might take a stroll up that way and see what sort of gents are available.”

I slipped away.

Back when I died, men like me called ourselves “queers.” That’s how long ago it was. And back then, if you were queer and had the misfortune to die, you were automatically damned. It was a mortal sin just being one of us, never mind that you didn’t have any say in the matter. The Stonewall Riots changed all that. After them, if you’d lived a good life you qualified for the other place. There’s still a lot of bitterness in certain circles of Hell over this, but what are you going to do? The Man in charge don’t take complaints.

It was my misfortune to die several decades too early. I was beat to death in Athens, Georgia. A couple of cops caught me in the back seat of a late-model Rambler necking with a white boy name of Danny. I don’t guess they actually meant to kill me. They just forgot to stop in time. That sort of thing went on a lot back then.

First thing I died, I was taken to this little room with two bored-looking angels. One of them sat hunched over a desk, scribbling on a whole heap of papers. “What’s this one?” he asked without looking up.

The second angel was lounging against a filing cabinet. He had a kindly sort of face, very tired-looking, like he’d seen the worst humanity had to offer and knew he was going to keep on seeing it until the last trump. It was a genuine kindness, too, because out of all the things he could’ve called me, he said, “A kid with bad luck.”

The first angel glanced up and said, “Oh.” Then went back to his work.

“Have a seat, son,” the kindly angel said. “This will take a while.”

I obeyed. “What’s going to become of me?” I asked.

“You’re fucked,” the first angel muttered.

I looked to the other.

He colored a little. “That’s it,” he said. “There just plain flat-out ain’t no way you’re going to beat this rap. You’re a faggot and faggots go to Hell.” He kind of coughed into his hand then and said, “I’ll tell you what, though. It’s not official yet, but I happen to know that the two yahoos who rousted you are going to be passing through this office soon. Moon-shining incident.”

He pulled open a file drawer and took out a big fat folder overflowing with papers. “These are the Schedule C damnations in here. Boiling maggots, rains of molten lead, the whole lot. You look through them, pick out a couple of juicy ones. I’ll see that your buddies get them.”

“Nossir,” I said. “I’d rather not.”

“Eh?” He pushed his specs down his nose and peered over them at me. “What’s that?”

“If it’s all the same to you, I don’t want to do nothing to them.”

“Why, they’re just two bull-neck crackers! Rednecks! White-trash peckerwoods!” He pointed the file at me. “They beat you to death for the fun of it!”

“I don’t suppose they were exactly good men,” I said. “I reckon the world will be better off without them. But I don’t bear them any malice. Maybe I can’t find it in me to wish them well, and maybe I wasn’t what you’d call a regular churchgoer. But I know that we’re supposed to forgive our trespassers, to whatever degree our natures allow. And, well, I’d appreciate it if you didn’t do any of those things to them.”

The second angel was staring at me in disbelief, and his expression wasn’t at all kindly anymore. The first angel had stopped scribbling and was gawking at me too.

“Shit,” he said.

Three days they spent bickering over me.

I presented something of a political problem for those who decide these matters, because of course they couldn’t just let me go Upstairs. It would have created a precedent.

The upshot of it was that I got a new job. They gave me a brass-button uniform and two weeks’ training, and told me to keep out of trouble. And so far, I had.

Only now, I was beginning to think my lucky streak was over.

Old Goatfoot looked over his shoulder with a snarl when I entered the cab of the locomotive. Of all the crew only he had never been human. He was a devil from the git-go, or maybe an angel once if you believe Mister Milton. I pulled the bag off of the bottle of rye and let the wind whip it away, and his expression changed. He wrapped a clawed hand around the bottle and took a swig that made a good quarter of its contents disappear.

He let out this great rumbling sigh then, part howl and part belch, like no sound that had ever known a human throat. I shuddered, but it was just his way of showing satisfaction. In a burnt-out cinder of a voice, Old Goatfoot said, “Trouble’s brewing.”

“That so?” I said cautiously.

“Always is.” He stared out across the wastelands. A band of centaurs, each one taller than a ten-story building, struggled through waist-high muck in the distance. Nasty stuff it was—smelled worse than the Fresh Kill landfill over to New Jersey. “This time, though.” He shook his head and said, “Ain’t never seen nothing like it. All the buggers of Hell are out.”

He passed me back the bottle.

I passed my hand over the mouth, still hot from his lips, and took a gingerly little sip. Just to be companionable. “How come?”

He shrugged. “Dunno. They’re looking for something, but fuck if I can make out what.”

Just then a leather-winged monster larger than a storm cloud lifted over the horizon. With a roar and a flapping sound like canvas in the wind, it was upon us. The creature was so huge that it covered half the sky, and it left a stench behind that I knew would linger for hours, even at the speeds we were going. “That’s one ugly brute,” I remarked.

Old Goatfoot laughed scornfully and knocked back another third of the bottle. “You worried about a little thing like that?” He leaned his head out the window, closed one nostril with a finger, and shot a stream of snot into the night. “Shitfire, boy, I’ve seen Archangels flying over us.”

Now I was genuinely frightened. Because I had no doubt that whatever the powers that be were looking for, it was somewhere on our train. And this last meant that all of Heaven and Hell were arrayed against us. Now, you might think that Hell was worry enough for anybody, but consider this—they lost . Forget what folks say. The other side are mean mothers, and don’t let nobody tell you different.