Pasha Malla - People Park

The gazebo had become a trap, people climbed onto the roof only to find themselves marooned, while Pearl rubbed her knee and waited, as Griggs, watching the dozen-strong crowd scale the Wheel, waited: she for magic, he with the defenceless surrender of a web-trapped fly, and here come the spiders, scrambling and famished.

FROM AHEAD, murmuring. The current tugged, the door slipped over the water, Sam didn’t need to paddle, it carried him along. The noise amplified, a hundred voices begging one another for quiet. Sam’s breath came easy. He was close, he knew it. With his ducktaped hand he held the remote ready. The door slid toward that rushing, shushing sound, a television on channel 0, the surf of static, a screen sparkling with a nonsense of nothing. This became rumbling, his ears filled with thunder. And Sam was lifted, he seemed to hover for a moment, everything stopped, a clear cool wind hit his face. And then the door angled down sharply and was falling. With his thumb he hit POWER, and held it, and the raft was gone and the water hurtled him down, and he was inside the roaring, and all he could see was white, and he fell and fell and at last Sam crashed grinning into —

THE YACHT POWERED through the Zone, The Know calligraphied on its hull, engines trailing yellow froth. Its single headlight illuminated the hundreds of people stranded atop Laing Towers, they responded with cheers of joy and relief.

Iθa Lanyeθθ, cried Dack, and a chant went up: Lan- yess , Lan- yess , Lan- yess !

Kellogg squeezed Elsie-Anne’s shoulders. There, Annie, you see? Just in time. We’ll be okay. They’ll take us to Mummy and Gibbles, don’t worry.

Edie Lanyess stood at the boat’s prow, hands on her hips, looking every part her mother’s daughter. She spoke in a matronly singsong: We’ve got room for everyone, don’t worry, just stay calm. We’re here! We’re going to get you all out safely!

This inspired a reprise of the Lan- yess chant.

Kellogg went to join the movement shipward, but was held back.

Elsie-Anne pointed in the direction of the IFC billboard, a ridge in the water swallowed even as they watched. There, she said.

Annie, he said, no, the boat’s here. They’re here to rescue us. We’re going to be okay.

But she wouldn’t look.

The first few people were helped onto the yacht’s deck. Boisterous cheers!

Annie, said Kellogg, look, everyone’s leaving, we have to go.

Plenty of room, called the girl, joined now by her mother, beaming, whose beauty, despite the chaos, remained undisturbed. Listen to Edie, whinnied Isa Lanyess, no need to push! Helpers too, Mr. Dack, easy now, there’s room for everyone.

Kellogg reached for Elsie-Anne, caught her arm. Come on, Annie, he said.

But the girl stood fixedly in place. She seemed apart from everything, facing north, almost hypnotized.

What’s out there, Annie? said Kellogg. If you’re looking for Mummy —

With a surprising burst of strength she squirmed from his grasp, stepped into the eavestroughs, and dove off the roof. A frothy channel furrowed the water as she zipped away into the flood.

Annie! Help! Someone, help!

Heads turned, Kellogg was regarded with mild confusion, but the line pressed forward as more folks were rescued. Kellogg peered into the dark. His daughter’s trail was fading. What could he do? He jumped in after her, swallowed a great gulp of bitter water, came up gargling.

His daughter’s purse appeared with a plop.

He splashed toward it. Behind him the yacht’s engines chugged, the stranded became passengers, celebrations abounded. The purse bobbed just beyond reach, the flood’s oily sheen pocked with reflected stars.

A ripple, a pause — and the purse was sucked under.

Annie?

Something brushed his feet. Down in the depths the purse whisked by. Sucking in a lungful of air he dove, swam, saw nothing, surfaced, wheezed, dove again. A shaft of light from the rising moon illuminated the IFC billboard: the screen in some subaquatic drive-in. Beyond it the water was bottomless.

Kellogg swam deeper down, lungs tightening. Far below something wriggled in the gloom, thick and serpentine, and released — what? A jellyfish maybe, which fluttered past. No: an Islandwear sweatshirt. Kellogg snatched it — empty — screamed his daughter’s name, three syllables the water muddied to bubbles. His face and throat had gone taut, his lungs burned. He looked down and up and around and everywhere was the same vast void.

And now the snakish thing appeared again, uncoiling. Was it summoning him? Kellogg’s head tingled, the blood fizzed through his veins, he felt limp and not quite there. Something ropy and thick tightened around his ankle and began almost tenderly towing him down, and the blackness opened up, it was ravenous, he had nothing left, he’d forgotten everything, why was he here, for whom, his vision blurred, and the last thing Kellogg saw, hauled down toward it, were parallel white bands aglow in the darkness. The lights of a bridge maybe. Or were they teeth.

ONE OF THE newscopters flew low over the Museum’s roof, nosing down for a spotlit shot of the two women waving at whoever might be watching, so whoever was watching might wish them saved. The water slavered between the turrets in a black skim, wetting their feet. The camera rolled. One of the women flipped an obscene gesture and the chopper whirled away into the milky night.

Fuggers, said Adine. They’re not going to help us. We have to get higher.

The Grand Saloon, Debbie said, pointing across the street. The clocktower.

Do we swim?

Can you make it?

Stay close to me, said Adine.

I will.

The building dropped into the water, reeflike. Somewhere down there was Orchard Parkway. But now it was a river. The flood had reached the terrace of the Grand Saloon Hotel’s penthouse, emptied into the suite. Copper gables sloped into the old cathedral’s spire, and the bare clockface resembled a tired moon lapsing into the sea.

Hurry, said Adine.

They jumped, twin splashes, neither’s head went under.

Okay? said Debbie

Adine said, Okay.

The current swirled. The flood felt unsure of itself, directionless, waves buffeted them from all sides as they doggypaddled across. The only sounds other than the gurgle and plop of their strokes were the newscopters overhead — though these were fading, heading to the mainland to shoot the escapees as they washed up on the pebbly beach.

THE PIG APPEARED just as Pearl was beginning to slip under. Her knee had failed her, the flood had filled the common, she’d been forced into it with everyone else. All around her people struggled to stay afloat, calling to one another, Keep paddling — Head up — Stay with us now. As the water reached streetlevel some swam off, Pearl wasn’t sure where or why, past small boats loading survivors, kids first, which then shuttled off with promises of a swift return.

But they didn’t come back, and treading water among the abandoned hopefuls she felt her soaked clothes grow heavy. She kicked off her shoes, yet still some invisible weight dragged her down. She wouldn’t last, she was weak.

And then bobbing along: the pig.

It was a hollow thing of pink plastic. Pearl caught it, slung an arm around its neck, clung there with closed eyes, opened them to discover animals all around: a matching pig, two sheep, donkeys, cattle, lions, a whole zoo’s worth of creatures swimming up in pairs.