Vladimir Todorov - Archipelago N.Y. - Flynn

A new sound made Flynn shift his gaze. The thick suspension cable above his head was now vibrating madly with a low hum. He was in luck today. A cable car was coming right on schedule. Flynn glanced to his left, and there it was, swaying in the air and slowly making its way toward him. The car’s cabin was a rusting shell of a bus, salvaged from the depths of the Archipelago’s waters. It had been stripped clean of its wheels, gears and engine, leaving only its tattered seats inside. An effort had been made to scrub away the thick crust of barnacles which clung to the bus’ sides, but a row of them still remained along its undercarriage.

All of the Archipelago’s cable cars operated on human power. A couple of sturdy bicycle-like frames were welded inside every cabin, with pulley cables running from their gears through a hatch in the roof. The pulley lines were attached to the cable car’s double-wheel cradle, which allowed the cabin to roll along the main suspension line. As it got closer, Flynn could see the sweaty and pained faces of the two drivers who were pushing on the pedals of the bicycle contraption. He pitied the guys… Yes, they worked short shifts, had longer breaks than most, but theirs was one hell of a tough job! Flynn waved his hand and the cable car came screeching to a stop at the platform’s edge. He hopped in and the car lurched forward, starting to move again.

The cabin was half empty, with no more than a dozen passengers inside, but it reeked of their unwashed bodies and hair. Flynn chose to sit closer to the open door where he hoped the air would be fresher. There was an elderly man dozing quietly in the seat next to him. Flynn stole a glance and recognized his face. It was Mr. Chow! The man who made the best fish-skin shoes in the whole Lower Side… Everyone wanted to get a pair from his stall at the market, only he couldn’t make them fast enough to satisfy the demand. Flynn stared at his own feet. Today, he was wearing a pair of Mr. Chow’s sturdy moccasins, a present from his father for Flynn’s sixteenth birthday. Unlike the superb quality of his shoes, Mr. Chow’s own clothes were in a horrific state… even by Lower Side standards… His colorless seal-skin coat had so many holes that it looked like he was draped in nothing but a fraying fish net. Mr. Chow’s bald head wobbled on his thin neck as the cable car went swinging on its way to the next stop. His grubby, knotty hands held on to a big fish-skin bag in his lap. Mr. Chow looked old and tired. It occurred to Flynn that Mr. Chow could be on the List, too… and that there was no one who would be taking over his trade… Both his sons had died when their rubber dingy was sideswiped by one of the Van Zandt’s powerboats.

Suddenly, there were loud gasps from the passengers behind Flynn. They were looking to the right of the cable car. Flynn craned his neck for a better view and saw immediately what had caused all the commotion. In the near distance, a mid-sized roof tower had partially collapsed. It had fallen against an adjacent tower. Luckily, this had stopped the first from falling all the way down into the water… But there was already quite a lot of damage to both structures… Little shack-like units had detached themselves from the main truss frames of the towers and were hanging upside-down, dangling precariously over the waterway below. The bridges and walkways surrounding the towers had also taken a hit. With most now vertical, they were beginning to disintegrate before everybody’s eyes. Rescue Crews and residents were moving like ants around all the carnage, doing their best to help the survivors get out of harm’s way. Nothing new here, Flynn thought… Nothing out of the ordinary for life on the Lower Side… After the Trials, he would be living on the Upper Side where the buildings were solid and safe. People didn’t live in such makeshift extensions. They all had apartments with proper rooms and decent furniture. He had heard that the Upper Side even had running water coming out of taps…

By the time Flynn had finished daydreaming of the life that awaited him, the cable car had moved on. Now, he could see the silhouettes of the Pigeon Towers, shimmering ahead in the morning sun. “Getting off at the next stop!” he shouted to the drivers as he stood up.

The two men slowed down on the pedals, applied the brakes, and the cable car came to a screeching halt alongside another rooftop platform. Flynn hopped off, but he had made no more than a few steps when a loud bang made him jump. He turned, just in time to see the pulley cradle snap in half. It crashed onto the cable car’s roof and tumbled into the canal down below. The cabin hung in mid air for a moment, then lurched forward as its nose lost support and began to tilt. The shift in gravity flung all the passengers toward the front.

Flynn watched in horror as Mr. Chow rolled off his seat and slid out the open door. Somehow, the old man managed to grab hold of the door step with one hand and stop his fall.

But Flynn knew that Mr. Chow was still in grave danger, because his whole body was now outside the cable car, dangling in mid air.

Having run back to the edge of the platform, Flynn threw himself flat on his stomach. He could see Mr. Chow better and couldn’t believe that the man was still clutching his bag with the other hand. “Drop the bag!” Flynn shouted, reaching out over the ledge. “Give me your hand!”

Mr. Chow looked up and their eyes met. He said nothing. The man just kept hanging there, staring at Flynn.

“C’mon! Drop your bag and grab my hand!” Flynn stretched his arm, his fingers now only inches from Mr. Chow. He glanced at the old man’s hand holding the doorstep. Flynn could tell that his grip was weakening… he was losing his hold. Seconds later, Flynn watched helplessly as Mr. Chow, still holding his bag, let go of the step and plummeted toward his death. Flynn heard the faint splash when the man’s body hit the water. “Damn it!” he cried and banged his fist on the platform. “Damn it!”

By now, the cable car was hanging only by a thread. The overhead wire couldn’t hold the weight of the car for much longer… It gave a terrible screeching sound, louder than the screams coming from inside. Flynn stood up and looked around in frustration. There was nothing he could do! Groups of people had gathered on the surrounding rooftops, waiting for the inevitable… There was one final snap, the suspension cable broke, and the car went tumbling down toward the water… Flynn fell to his knees and covered his ears with his hands, blocking out the sound of the cable car as it plunged into the canal…

He had seen plenty of lives being lost over the years, but today’s events had been too close to home… It could have been him. Trying to slow down his breathing and calm his pounding heart, Flynn counted his blessings… He was alive and nothing else mattered! It was the Archipelago’s way of thinking… a philosophy that kept you getting up in the morning and making it through the day. Feeling exceptionally lucky, Flynn headed in the direction of the nearest bridge, his mind already preoccupied with what he had to do next.

Madison Ray sat at the very top of her Pigeon Tower. There were five towers to the farm built on the rooftop of the Rays’ Lower East Side building. Hers was the tallest among them, a good sixty feet tall. It was a conical structure, made from old water tanks and pieces of junk, but it was exceptionally sturdy, able to withstand the strongest gusts of the Archipelago’s easterly winds. Small, round pigeon holes covered the tower from top to bottom. Slowly, Madison wrapped her head in a long scarf, making sure she had covered her face well… especially her nose and mouth… One of the many hazards of her job was breathing in the dangerous dust from all the bird droppings. Right now, Madison had to concentrate on her task for the day, which was to scrub clean all the pigeon poles sticking out of the tower walls.