Paul Theroux - O-Zone

Yet there was too much interference for him to go back on the air and tell them who he was. You're making a mistake, he wanted to say — and he kept thinking of the hideous irony in his having gotten so near to New York, and being burned here, in sight of Coldharbor, mistaken for an alien.

Mr. Blue lay on his side, and Echols near him, and Valda and the others crouched with small pinched faces under the ear-shattering noise. The howl alone seemed lethal, rendering muscles incapable of movement, and smothering the will in its rising pressure. But in his helmet Fisher was more indignant than frightened. He was outraged. How dare they! He had come too far and fought too hard to be wiped out by the dumb sadists in a death squad.

The rifle banged his faceplate as he tried to aim. He fired anyway, but made no impact — what good was this old iron? Yet their sensors must have picked up the slug, because the gunship immediately tilted in a lumbering way and presented the titanium plates of its armored hull.

And still howling, the gunship released a rocket. The slender thing flamed out of a side tube and tore off a corner of the building above them, spilling bricks on them. This was followed by a burst of flechettes.

Fisher was swearing, but before he could fire again he saw the shadow of another rotor diving through the upper air. A missile twisted out of its nose and flashed into the gunship. In that same instant the gunship exploded. It blew sideways and dropped, burning fast. There was no thud — after the howling and the blasts there was only a loose sunflower of flame, coming apart as it fell. Then the great black gunship was simplified to a shower of sparks and bright petals, and fluttered noiselessly to the ground.

Bligh had begun to cry as soon as she had seen the aliens cowering near the building: they were magnified on the ground-screen. Even after the gunship disintegrated and vanished, they had not lifted their heads. She wept at the sight of them in that black ruin among the burned-out houses and the ditches and tracks. Steam rose around them, and bright pellets of rain flecked the smoke. Not even Mr. Blue was standing. She wondered whether they were dead.

Hooper had been shushing her, trying to calm her, for the entire trip, as he had radioed Moura and monitored Godseye. He had been tense for the past half-hour, knowing that Godseye had copied the message from Moura, and fearing that he might be too late. Burn them all down he had heard echoing from the gunship, and he'd flung himself at the missile release.

"Don't cry," he said.

She had sometimes become tearful when they made love. I'm happy, she said, blinking her smeared eyes and licking the tears from her lips. She said nothing now, she only sobbed.

He guessed that it was her shock at seeing the aliens in that terrible place, flattened on the ground, and Fizzy standing over them.

"He looks okay," Hardy said. "He's alive."

Hardy's words meant nothing, and he knew it. The boy was beyond description. It was as though a defiant and slightly taller stranger had slipped into his flying suit and was shaking his iron at the heap of steaming ashes. Yet his faceplate was open; they recognized the boots, the gloves, the helmet; and though the suit was tighter on his body, they could see it was Fizzy. But that raised another question: Who was Fizzy?

"They want to see Bligh!"

It didn't sound like Fizzy. The quack had gone out of his voice. There was a growl in it now, his delivery was slower, with a rumble behind it. His voice had broken: it had dropped from his nose to his throat.

"Is Bligh in there with you?"

Bligh heard him and pushed her face to the window. She looked out, trying to smile and keep her balance in the tipping rotor.

"They wonder if she's all right!"

Bligh heard this over the rotor's loudspeaker and waved. Hooper flew lower, so that they could see.

"Don't come any closer," Fisher said. "You'll spook them."

"Give us instructions for picking you up," Hardy said into his mike.

Fisher stepped back. Who were these people? This was no rescue. He had saved himself.

"They might have warped his judgment," Hardy was saying.

Fisher said, "We want to know who sent that Godseye gunship here."

Hardy said, "Who's 'we'?"

"I'm putting this thing down, Fizz," Hooper said. "Get clear of that building."

"They don't want me to. They don't trust you — especially now, after those howlers and that rocket. They want to make a deal."

Bligh was still crying softly at the sight of them crouching in the mud; and circling in the rotor, she could see the city behind them. It seemed to her now as though that was where the world began.

"What do they want?" Hooper called out.

Fisher did not have to consult Mr. Blue, or any of the others. He knew the terms, he had known them ever since they set out.

"Hand Bligh over," he said. "And some hardware — a rotor, some weapons, some food, and cash. And get me a jelly sandwich."

Hearing this, Hooper brought the rotor to within a meter of the ground. He threw the side hatch open, so that Bligh could be seen. She hung on to the safety clamp and strap-loops, and stayed in the gaping hatchway. She lifted off her helmet and shook out her hair. She was not crying any longer, and yet she looked frightened as she glanced at Mr. Blue and Echols, who were kneeling in the mud in front of the others, as though they had been tossed there. They blinked back at her through the warm drizzle.

Bligh turned toward Hooper, as if imploring him for a verdict.

"It's your life," Hooper said, trying to find the right words, but expressing it better with a gesture — opening his hand and lifting it, as if releasing a bird. "You're free."

She smiled and held on. He had gambled on that. His decision to let her go — to leave the choice to her — was the proof of his love. In freeing her, he allowed her the decision. He now knew her well enough to realize that it was the only basis on which she would stay. She was so young, and he did not want her as his prisoner.

She had not moved; and it seemed certain from the way she was braced, with her legs apart, that she was not going to. The shadows had cleared from her face. She clung to the hatchway, but not in triumph. Her thin flying suit was blown against her body by the draft from the rotors — it was so tight its pressure outlined her nipples and her navel. Her expression showed relief, but her pale eyes showed sorrow and helplessness and eager hope: all the emotions of love — but it was part of her victory that she had never used that word.

"Look at him," Hardy said.

He had not taken his eyes from Fizzy. He was still trying to discern the nature of this beast. There was no doubt that the boy had become a man — he was bigger, hairier, and his voice had a growly authority. He wore his suit and his helmet. Their battered condition made him look wild. But he was calm, and there was something in that terrible patience that made him seem stronger and more dangerous. He was like one of those creatures that Hardy had heard of but never seen, aliens with technology, like the naked cast-out people who had rockets, and the Trolls who had gas, and the Roaches beams, and the Diggers who inhabited whole underground cities, in fabulous caverns — they were mythical almost, but Hardy believed he was looking at the real thing now.

They were asking for surrender, Fisher knew that. But he wanted more than New York — more than to be kept in a room, even one with Pap and his data base. He wanted to lay claim to his own life. So far, he had only had glimpses of what it might be like. He remembered it as triumphing on the ground — walking through O-Zone, blasting through the Red Zone Perimeter, entering the town of Guthrie.

"Batfish," he murmured, and saw himself opening another door and stepping through. "You porker."