Tom Swift and His Dyna-4 Capsule (9 page)

"So that made them kindred spirits, you know? Gar told me a lot about the whole deal on the way here, Beeb."

"Rose Reb, I just remembered another reason why we broke up," said "
Beeb
."

"It’s all sad and crazy, and
now
I know Gar never loved me, never meant anything he said. I was just taken in, like a little fly. Or like washing—you take in washing, don’t you?

"I was just bait—Little Miss Bait to get Bud Barclay away from Shopton and—and his, his
protector
—so Gar could knock you out and
take
you, as Eck wanted."

"The kidnapping bit is getting more than a little old," Bud commented.

"And
he
always rescues you!" It came out as a sudden snarl, instantly dissipated. "Gar took you. He injected you with something—I dunno—you were mostly out during the trip, but now and then you could mumble and we could feed you. The trip—cross-country in the van. This is Wyoming, here. It snows here—that’s why this place is covered over."

"I was wondering. How long did the trip take?"

"Oh, a few days. I didn’t keep track. I was in kind of a state—a
snit
. He had lied and manipulated me, but still, you know, I
had
wanted some structure in my life. He hadn’t yet told me it was over between us."

"Jetz! Reb,
just tell me what this place is!
What does this Eck guy want?"

"Give me time to be myself, Beeb," she replied. "Gar got talky on the way. I think he told me more than he shoulda, especially at night. His goatee—well, forget his goatee. He said something about a will, some kind of inheritance that Mr. Eck wants to get. Money—always. But—something about how
Tom
and his invention can speed up a timelock—"

"I get it," Bud exclaimed, nonetheless quietly. "The time-transformer. I’m a hostage to get Tom’s cooperation."

"Does everything
always
come back to
Tom Swift?
" asked Reb coldly. "But yeah, it’s true. Money and time. The idea is to keep you here for as long as it takes."

"And just where—and
what
—is Here?"

"Oh, it’s ridiculous. This Eck is some kind of fanatic or hobbyist or something." She paused to think. "He has a time obsession. Gar says this, this
place
, is all just like the little town where Eck was, a little boy, where he lived with his parents. Or maybe—was it—where he
wished
he had lived? See? Bringing it all back."

Calm again, Bud smiled at the situation. "It wasn’t so long ago that I met another guy who lived in a cave and wanted to save the
future
! I happen to like the present—mm, maybe not so much at this moment."

Rose Reb continued. "This isn’t
just
a hobby. It’s more than Mommy and Daddy. Gar says the guy, Eck, is kind of a promoter—isn’t that what they’re called? Crooks? He sold investors on the idea that this could be some kind of giant shopping mall, with people also living here full time. Sort of a colony for psychotic nostalgists. Maybe survivalists, too, since you can’t see the real sky. He got the money, had the place built, then went under. Bankrupt."

"There are other places like this. I’ve read about them—underground shopping cities."

"All secret, kept quiet, that thing about gettin’ in on the ground floor. Gar says the main investor owns all the property. I think it’s a sheep ranch. Something like that. But he died."

"Natural causes, I hope."

"Yeah, well,
hope
. I’m not so sure. Gar told me Eck’s willing to kill to get whatever kind of life he wants. That probably means he’s already done it. People think they deserve things, but really..." She looked at Bud curiously. "So you’re dating his sister?"

"We hang out."

"
We
hung out. Doesn’t it make it awkward?"

"Because of you?"

"Because of
him
."

Bud chuckled, with an eye-roll. "Reb, I can’t believe you! Jetz, you’re jealous of my relationship with my
best pal?
"

"It happens," she declared sullenly. "You save each other’s lives, don’t you? I keep up on it. I’ve read those books."

"Right. The fictionalizations. Look, you can’t—"

"Well, let’s just drop the subject. Since it
obviously
makes you uncomfortable." Rose Reb’s attention seemed to drift away. "Sometimes I think... I’m absorbing the black. From my hair. It seeps down and fills my head.
You
have black hair. I thought..." The thought halted there.

At Bud’s initiative they stood up and began to stroll side by side, down a street, aimless in the ersatz night. "So," Bud began, "I’m being held hostage. But why down here?—well, jetz, I guess it was convenient, hunh?"

"I guess so. Gar told me the doors are all sealed off. He says it’s hard to even find them. And if you had a radio or locator beacon, the signal would be blocked off."

"So what about you? His true love?"

"Don’t ridicule another person’s vulnerability, please. Yeah, I trusted him and he stole my gem of purity by betrayal. After he dumped you off, he had me stay in a motel overnight while he went to see Eck. When he came back a couple hours ago he pulled a gun on me and held a cloth over my face—he did
both
! Knocked me flat. I woke up on Second Street. Lying there right on the pavement."

"Face it, Reb," said Bud. "You’ve been dumped."

"Bud, I heard you, up there—yelling."

"Guess I’m a little vulnerable too."

"It’s
nice
," she said. But then added sharply, "But you know, Beeb, it’s not what I’d call
masculine
. You’re not a
boy
."

"What am I, Reb?"

"I never found out."

They walked in silence for a time, Bud wondering tensely what Rose Reb was thinking—and becoming fearful of what she might do. The quaint steetlamps were on, and some of the higher-story apartments were softly lit behind drapes and half-closed blinds. Bud thought:
This could almost be romantic.

"This could almost be romantic, Beeb," she purred, taking his hand.

With someone other than Reb!
his thoughts finished.

"I can understand why
I’m
down here," he said. "For all I know it may be a great plan. Who am I to criticize it? But what about you?"

"The wedding’s off."

"Uh-huh."

"I’m just rendering up my feelings. Who knows how I’ll feel tomorrow? Who knows tomorrow at all? I could be dead tomorrow. Or you."

"Is that a New Goth attitude?"

She glared at him. "Check your own attitude,
chum! Flyboy!
Did you ever notice that
he
calls you
boy
, not
man
?—in the books, anyway. If you were any kind of real man, if you didn’t have conflicted impulses—" She shut herself down for a moment. "But... you asked me a question... about something...

"Oh. Why I’m here. Well, really, I don’t know. Not for ransom. My parents, Mr. and Mrs. Alva Truncheon, wouldn’t consider anything like
that
. They wouldn’t pay. Oh no. It wouldn’t be worth the time to make a ransom note, cutting all those letters out of newspapers."

"So you have no idea?"

Reb suddenly giggled, explosively. "Maybe it’s just to torture you!"

"R-Reb, I’m really not worth it. I mean it."

"You don’t have to mean it. Enjoy life. Make peace with Time."

"I’ll sure do my best."

Reb seemed to tug Bud along, and the young flier did not resist. There was a veloured black purse dangling from her arm; when it bounced against her side, Bud could hear pill containers rattling like maracas. After a couple streets and a couple turns, she pointed at a modest two-story hotel, the Bateman Arms. "I woke up in the street right in front, and I know why—it’s the hotel Gar told me about, where they’d stocked food for you. Running water, everything."

"A working phone?"

"Oh, they all
work
. But all you get is a recording."

"That’s ‘working,’ all right." A thought struck. "So how was I supposed to know about this place? Maybe dragging you down here was part of Eck’s plan from the start."

She shook her head. "No. You haven’t checked your pockets?"

Chagrined, Bud dug deep into them, and found a slip of paper. "‘
Your home here in Friendly Village is the Bateman Arms, 412 Second Street. Food in the kitchen. Relax and enjoy a vacation from this obscenity called the modern world. Let’s see how long it lasts.
’"

"And now it’s ours to share," Reb pronounced with glowing embers in her eyes. "We
needed
something to be ours, Bud, just
ours
."

Bud looked away, his face in the shadow of lamplight. "I left a video for Tom. I told him the situation. I told him to leave it to me, to not get involved. I was pretty definite. He’ll understand. Yeah. So it’ll be days, maybe weeks even." He unshadowed his face to show her a defiant look. "But he’ll come for me. I know he will."

"Sure," snapped Rose Reb bitterly. "Doesn’t he always come running?"

It felt like the insult it was intended to be. Bud rose to it almost instinctively. "You missed the point. I’m saying there’ll be a long gap of time before he comes up with some Swift gadget to pluck me out of—whatever this is. And rather than waiting, I’ll get us out on my own."

"Oh, Beeb,
please
don’t feel you have to prove yourself to
me
." But it sounded mocking.

"I’m not proving anything."

"You don’t want a vacation?"

"What I want," Bud declared quietly, "is out."

THE FOOD in the small hotel kitchen was canned or frozen, but not bad. Bud smiled at the various labels. He was sure everything was an authentic replica of 1953, the products of companies that probably had gone out of business decades ago. "But the meat is fresh," he said.

"I don’t think they’d poison us," replied Rose Reb, eating a sandwich. "They need us—you. You’re the hostage for ransom. I don’t know what I’m supposed to be. I guess I was a witness to the plot, to what they did. I’m not so sure what they did was completely legal, you know? So Gar stuffed me down here to eliminate the problem."

"Why didn’t he just shoot you?"

"He’s not that kind of person, Bud," she replied. "You don’t know him. He’s caring."

"I gather that."

At Bud’s insistence, they slept with deadbolts between them. "It’s not that I don’t like you, RR," said Bud.

She looked away from him with small angry eyes. "It’s just that I’m crazy."

"Well... yeah."

"I’m not armed. Do you want to frisk me?"

"Goodnight, Rose Reb."

"I don’t think so."

The morning did not dawn, but it arrived. Bud watched as the stars shut down as one and the sky light came on. Now that he knew what he was seeing, it was obvious that the whole vault of sky was a dome-shaped ceiling, the effects produced by some manner of rear-screen projection.
Tom’s telejector would have done a more convincing job,
he thought. Admittedly, though, it had been good enough to convince
him
.

They spent the day exploring Friendly Village, excised from the flesh of living time like something on a microscope slide. Despite the silent eeriness Bud felt involuntary admiration for the achievement. He had the impression that nearly everything they saw, every detail, every object, was in its way
real
. Their captor, Eck—more likely experts on his payroll—had raided second-hand stores across the nation, carefully refurbishing what they had found, polishing, painting, un-rusting, un-denting. "Man," he said to Reb, "all those old tubes for the radios and TV’s—"

Reb was sullen. "It’s wasted on me. I hate the past."

"Mine was okay."

"Then I hate
your
past,
flyboy
." Her tone shifted from anger to philosophy. "Birth. Time plops us down somewhere and leaves us there. Then we’re supposed to grow up. We’re supposed to make friends. We’re supposed to fall in what they call
love
. And then if you’re lucky time drops something on your plate and tells you to eat."

"If you mean me, I don’t like the metaphor."

"It wasn’t designed for you to like." Click. "That’s me all right. Why do I say those things? I don’t know. The blackness comes raining in. You can forgive me, can’t you?"

"That’s a lot to expect from a ‘boy,’ Reb."

"Maybe we’re all boys. Just little boys."

Second Street curved and led them out of town. The few blocks of the imitation business district ended with unnatural abruptness, and suddenly they were on a residential lane with sleepy overarching trees, tall and alive. "I didn’t know trees could grow under artificial light," Bud remarked.

"I don’t know anything about that," Reb replied. "Gar said something about gardeners and maintenance people coming in now and then."

"How often?"

"I guess not often enough for
us
." Then she smiled mockingly. "You will have sprung us out by then anyway, out into the light of the real sun. Or the moon. I like the moon."

"I’ve been there."

"I tried to see you. You’re too small."

The houses formed neat facing rows. 1953 was a little late for the picket fences and porch swings of old movies. There were neat rectangular lawns, pop-up sprinklers that now and then came on by themselves, walls of stucco, TV antennas—and in some houses the sound of warm televisions endlessly playing the sort of shows a kid would watch staying home from school, belly-down on a throw-rug. They entered a few houses—for in 1953 many doors were not yet habitually locked—and found quaint households complete but for anyone living in them, beds neatly made and empty. They lacked the heap of living that made a house a home. Which left them sad and sterile. But with shag carpet and window-mount air conditioners.

All along, Bud was most interested in the cars. It seemed they all had engines and were mechanically complete and anatomically correct—real cars of the era, carefully restored. "But out of gas," he stated in frustration. "They’re not going any place. Don’t need a full tank where time stands still."