F. Paul Wilson - Nightworld

A guy with glazed eyes and lank, oily brown hair, sporting a stained tee-shirt and torn jeans, followed it through the hole, laughing as he landed and rolled on the pavement. He was white but he had on enough gold chains and necklaces to qualify as a Mr. T runner-up. His fingers were stacked with so many rings he couldn't bend them. Another guy, heavier but dressed identically and sporting an equal amount of gold, made a more traditional exit through the door. They gave each other a metallic high five. Then they spotted the Corvair.

"Hey, man!" the first once said, smiling as he approached the car. "It's a ride!"

The heavier one followed him. "Yeah! Want some gold? We'll give you some gold for a ride downtown. We got plenty!"

Jack couldn't help laughing.

"Yeah, right. And like maybe I'll let you hold my wallet while I drive you around."

As the looters' disarming grins twisted into rage, he gunned the Corvair and pulled away through the red light. The thin one began running after them, screaming. For an uneasy moment Jack thought the guy might catch them. The Corvair was loaded down, its old engine was small, and it did not exactly leap up the slight incline toward Fifth Avenue. But it turned out to be just fast enough to leave a stoned looter behind.

Trouble was, Vicky was now sitting up and alert to her surroundings. After watching the looter through the scarred plastic of the rear window, she leaned forward between the bucket seats.

"Why didn't you give that man a ride, Jack?"

"Because he's one of the bad guys, Vicks. What's called a looter."

"But he just wanted a ride."

"I don't think so, Vicks. You know those silverfish we find crawling in the bathroom every so often?"

Vicky made a face. "Yuck."

"Yeah, well, looters are lower than silverfish. When the good folks are occupied fighting fires or helping earthquake victims or storm victims, looters sneak in and carry off anything that's not nailed down. Those guys didn't want a ride; they wanted Ralph."

"That's not fair!"

"Fair's not a word they care about, Vicks."

"Look!" she said, pointing to her left as they crossed Fifth Avenue. "More looters!"

She was right. Knots of people were jumping in and out of the broken windows all along Fifth, scampering off through the dim dawn light with jewelry, leather, anything they could carry. Someone had pulled a panel truck up on the sidewalk in front of Bergdorf's and was loading it with dresses. As Jack was pulling away, he saw a bearded, professorial type step through the open space that had once been the big front window of the Doubleday shop balancing a two-foot stack of books against the front of his tweed jacket.

"Everybody's getting into the act," he said. "Where the hell are the police?"

"It's anarchy, Jack," Gia said and he could hear the fear vibrating in her voice.

"Not yet. We've still got a police force—somewhere, I think—and we've still got electricity for lights, and we've still got gas to run the police cars. When the sun's all the way up these cockroaches will crawl back under the floorboards."

"But what happens when the gas and electricity go?" she said, reaching over and clutching Vicky's hand.

"Then they'll own the streets. That's when we'll see real anarchy."

"It's only been two days. I never dreamed…" Her voice trailed off.

"What? That things could fall apart this fast? This city's a sewer, Gia. All the garbage wandering around this half of the country seems to end up here. I've been watching it fall apart for years. Its veneer of civilization is about as thick as the layer of gold on the electroplated jewelry they hawk on the streets. A couple of good rubs against your jeans and the base metal underneath shows through."

"What about neighborliness and hanging together in times of trouble?"

"Maybe they'll have some of that out in Iowa where you grew up, and maybe there'll even be a pocket or two of it around here, but not enough to matter. The good folks will be driven into hiding and the slime will be free to do whatever they damn well please."

"I don't believe that. I don't want to believe that. And it disturbs me to know you believe that."

Jack shrugged. "In my work, you get to spend a lot of time hip-deep in slime. You—"

"Oh, my God!" Gia cried, craning her neck and staring up through the windshield.

Jack slowed and glanced up. Something bright in the sky. He struck his head out the window—and stopped the car to stare.

Vicky popped her head out behind him. "Ooooh neeeeat!"

"Jack!" Gia said. "What's happening? What is that?"

"Looks like an apartment building," Vicky said.

Half a mile up, probably over the West Side Highway or the midtown piers, was a heart-stopping sight…a building floating in the air. It hung as if suspended on an invisible wire, turning slowly, its roof canted slightly eastward, its torn underside westward. Light from the rising sun flashed off the few unbroken windows. Masonry that had broken away was floating up with it. Tiny figures leaned out the windows, waving shirts and towels in panicked attempts to attract the attention of the police helicopters that circled it like flies around a corpse.

"Jeez!" Jack said as he stared upward at the slowly dwindling shape. "It's still rising."

Those poor bastards trapped up there were doomed unless they could find a way of transferring to one of the helicopters.

At least now he knew where all the cops were.

"Let's get out of here," Gia said.

Jack flipped the little gearshift lever back into drive and they continued west. He refrained from saying I told you so as he ran red lights all the way to Amsterdam Avenue, then raced uptown to the Isher Sports Shop. Abe was outside, waiting by his panel truck in front of his store's smashed windows. So fixated was he on the flying building that he barely noticed their arrival. Jack screeched to a halt half a dozen feet in front of him.

That got his attention.

"Gevalt!" Abe said, cringing back. "You're trying to squish me or something?"

He was wearing a black jacket; his white shirt and black tie were clean. Obviously he hadn't had breakfast yet.

"Ready to go?" Jack said, pulling Vicky and a suitcase from the back seat.

"Yes, of course." Abe gave Gia a hug and Vicky a kiss on the top of her head. "I should want to keep two such beautiful young ladies waiting? Come with me. I've got coffee, juice, and not-so-fresh bagels in the front seat."

He opened the rear doors of the panel truck, then ushered Gia and Vicky around to the front. He returned as Jack was loading the last suitcase into the rear compartment. He pointed a trembling finger at the building in the sky.

"It's happening like you said, isn't it?" Abe's accent was gone, vanished without a trace. "All rules—man's and God's—pffft!

Jack looked and saw that the building was considerably higher than before. When would it stop rising? Would it stop rising?

"Double-pffft!" Jack nodded toward the shattered storefront windows. "Looters?"

Abe shrugged. "Nothing's missing. Must have been those flying things. Haven't seen any looting."

"Plenty of it going on in the high rent district. They just haven't got this far yet."

Abe reached into his pocket and pulled out a set of keys. He thrust it into Jack's hand.

"Here. These are for the armory. They'll need a cannon to get in without them. You need anything, help yourself."

Jack hefted the keys and stuffed them in a front pocket. "The armory" was the basement of the Isher Sports Shop where Abe stocked his weapons—the illegal ones, plus the legal ones he sold illegally. He carried everything from blackjacks to Claymore land mines. It would be handy to maintain access to that sort of variety.

"I might move in," Jack said.