Harry Turtledove - Aftershocks

Afterwards, however much against the odds, seemed to have arrived. Time returned to its normal flow. Sam suddenly noticed blaring horns and squealing brakes as other drivers somehow missed adding to the accident.

The first thing that ran through his mind was, It wasn’t an accident. I meant to do it. The next thought made a lot more sense: I’d better get the hell out of here before the car catches on fire.

When he tried to open the door, it wouldn’t. He twisted in his seat and kicked at it. At the same time, somebody outside yanked at it for all he was worth. It did open then, with a scream of tortured metal.

“You son of a bitch!” roared the man outside, a stocky, swarthy fellow whose ancestors had come from Mexico if he hadn’t. “You stupid motherfucking son of a bitch! You trying to get me killed? You trying to get yourself killed?”

He must have been driving the other car. Sam was proud he’d managed such a brilliant deduction. “No, I was trying to keep from getting killed,” he answered-literal truth. He realized he sounded mushy. There on top of the dashboard, quite undamaged, sat his upper plate. He reached out with his left hand and stuffed it into his mouth.

“Man, I oughta beat the living shit outta you, and-” The man standing in the intersection suddenly noticed the pistol in Yeager’s right hand. His eyes went enormously wide. He stopped roaring and started backing away.

That let Sam get out of the car. One look at the stove-in front end told him he’d never drive the Buick again. He shrugged. He’d have the chance to drive some other car one day. Almost as an afterthought, he dragged Gordon out of the wreckage. Gordon’s head thumped on the asphalt, but Sam wasn’t about to lose any sleep over that.

A couple of other cars had stopped. Their drivers jumped out to lend a hand. But nobody seemed eager to come very close to Yeager, not with one pistol in his hand and another on his belt. “Don’t do nothin’ crazy, mister,” a tall, skinny blond guy said.

“I don’t intend to,” Yeager said-he’d already been crazy enough to last a lifetime, and to prolong one. “I’m just waiting for the cops to get here.”

He didn’t have to wait long. Siren howling, red lights flashing, a squad car raced up Normandie and stopped in the intersection, which was already a lot more crowded than it needed to be. Two of Gardena’s finest got out and looked things over. “Okay,” said one of them, a burly fellow with black hair and very blue eyes. “What the hell happened here?”

As far as Sam could see, that was pretty obvious. He sighed with relief for a different reason, though-he’d met the policeman before. “Hello, Clyde,” he said. “How are you tonight?”

The Mexican man who’d been driving the station wagon let out a wail of anguish. His car was wrecked-and it was totaled, bent into an L-and the guy who’d rammed him knew the cop by his first name?

Clyde needed a couple of seconds to pull Sam out of his mental card file, but he did. “Lieutenant Colonel Yeager!” he exclaimed. “What the hell happened here?” This time, he asked it in an altogether different tone of voice.

Briefly, as if making an oral report, Yeager told him what had happened. “Yeah, and that’s all a bunch of bullshit, too,” Gordon said from the street. Sam jumped. He hadn’t noticed Straha’s driver coming to. Gordon went on, “This guy kidnapped me, dragged me off the street. He was babbling about ransom money.”

Sam handed Clyde both pistols. “You’ll probably find both our prints on both of them. You want to know where I was going when I left home, call my wife and son. You can check with the formalwear place, too-it’s right down the street here.”

“Whaddaya think?” the other cop asked Clyde.

“Yeager here, he’s had some nasty stuff happen to him that nobody ever got a handle on-nobody this side of the FBI, anyhow,” Clyde said slowly. “You ask me, this looks like more of the same.” He bent down and put handcuffs on Gordon. “You’re under arrest. Suspicion of kidnapping.” Then he pointed at Sam. “But you’re coming down to the station, too, till we find out whose story checks out better.”

“What about me?” cried the man who’d been driving the station wagon.

Nobody paid any attention to him. “Sure, I’ll come,” Sam said. “But please do call my wife, will you, and let her know I’m okay.”

“We’ll take care of it,” the second cop said. He went back to the police car and spoke into the radio. Then he walked back toward the accident. “Tow truck’s on the way. Another car, too, so we can get both these guys to the station.”

“Okay, good,” Clyde answered. “Like I said, we’ll sort it out there.” He hauled Gordon to his feet.

“I want my lawyer,” Gordon said sullenly.

Whoever his lawyer was, he’d be good. Sam was sure of that. But, as he walked toward the squad car, he didn’t worry about it. He didn’t worry about anything. By the odds, he should have been dead, and he was still breathing. Measured against that, nothing else mattered.

Jonathan Yeager fiddled with his tie in front of the mirror in the church’s waiting room. He’d practiced tying a bow tie under a wing collar ever since he’d got the tux, but he still wasn’t real good at it. One side of the bow definitely looked bigger than the other. “I don’t think I’ll ever get it right, Dad,” he said in something close to despair.

His father clapped him on the shoulder and advised, “Don’t worry about it. Nobody’s going to care much, as long as you’re there and Karen’s there and the minister’s there. And you probably won’t have to worry about it again till you’re marrying off your own kid-and nobody’ll pay much attention to you then, believe me.”

“Okay.” Jonathan was willing-more than willing, eager-to let himself be convinced. He glanced at his father. Sam Yeager’s tie was straight. The bulge under the left shoulder of his tuxedo jacket hardly showed at all. Jonathan shook his head. “I wonder when the last wedding was where the father of the groom carried a pistol.”

“Don’t know,” his father said. “Usually it’s the father of the bride, and he’s carrying a shotgun.”

“Dad!” Jonathan said reproachfully. His father grinned, altogether unrepentant. Jonathan shook his head. He and Karen had been careful every single time-no need for Mr. Culpepper to go out and buy shotgun shells. Even so, he changed the subject: “Will you and Mom be okay watching Mickey and Donald while Karen and I are off on our honeymoon?”

“We’ll manage,” his dad replied. “If we really start going crazy, we can call one of the Army’s other Lizard-psych boys, like the fellow who’s babysitting them today. But I don’t expect we’ll need to. They’re getting big enough to be easier than they were even a few months ago.”

Somebody knocked on the door. “You fellows decent in there?” Jonathan’s mother asked.

“No,” his father answered. “Come on in anyway.”

The door opened. Jonathan’s mother came in. “Karen looks lovely,” she said. “She’s wearing the dress her mother got married in, you know. I think that’s so romantic.”

Jonathan hadn’t seen Karen yet. He wouldn’t, not till she came down the aisle. Not everybody followed that old custom these days, but her folks approved of it. Since they were footing the bill, he could hardly argue with them. His father asked, “Everything okay out front, hon?”

“Everything looks fine,” his mother said. “And nobody’s come in who hasn’t been vouched for by somebody. No strangers at the feast.”

“There’d better not be.” Just for a moment, his father’s right hand started to slide toward the shoulder holster. Then he checked the motion. He went on, “The judge refused to let Gordon out on bail yesterday. He was the biggest worry.”