Escape Velocity: The Anthology by Unknown Read Free Book Online

was ruffled and humiliated. He glared at the back of the impetuous Earthling, but he said nothing.
           The freak storm perturbed him a great deal more than the hotheaded teen. Rivulets of the poisonous water crawled in serpentine tendrils down his clothes. His wet skin prickled and itched, a danger sign that the water had taxed his immune system to the limit. With increasing dread, he knew there was little time to spare. The bus splashed through the water at a snail’s pace, and then braked with a release of compressed air, blasting it into the Zozoian’s wet face.
           The accordion door swung open.
           Assertive passengers started butting into a better place in line in the column. He was jostled to the tail end of the queue. At last, he reached the door and put a leg into the first step.
           He shivered with his body halfway inside the door, and halfway out. The killing downpour soaked him to the skin, a chill as cold as death.
           He climbed into the bus and dropped the required coins into the slot. The warmth and dryness made the interior a comparative paradise. He brooded on the odds of his dying in the next few minutes. The seats in back held only a few scant passengers. If he were to die now, he decided that the rear of the bus would be a dignified place where he could die simply.
           On one side of the aisle near the back, a fat woman twitched and scratched her nose. On the other side, two pretty teenage girls were giggling at some private joke. At the very rear, the Zozoian saw a geezer who was talking loudly to nobody. He chose a seat directly across from the geezer and sat down. He was dying from his exposure to the rain; he no longer doubted it. His hands were as putty and he could barely move them. As his brain turned to mush, his eyes seemed to be as windows against which floodwaters rose.
           “ Buddy,” the geezer spoke in undertone.
           The Zozoian’s dying thought was the realization that he had another piece of bad luck by drawing the fellow’s attention. Now he probably would not even be able to die in a dignified fashion.
           The old man continued talking to him. “Buddy, I got news for you.” The geezer pointed toward the front of the bus. “See them two girls?”
           The Zozoian melted away like butter; the face sunk in like a plastic doll’s in the heart of an incinerator; the shoulders might now belong to an infirm old lady. Then the coat collapsed like an illusionist’s disappearing act.
           “ Those girls are whores,” the old man explained as he reached up and pulled on the stop cord for the bus.
           The bus pulled over to the curb. The driver braked, and water flowed down the aisle from out of the Zozoian’s lump of clothes and leather shoes.
           The old man spit words out to no one in particular. “This bus. They let whores on.” He got up from his seat, stepped to the middle door, and had a last wistful look at the girls.
           “ Ninth and Main,” announced the bus driver.
           “ Driver,” the old man said. “Why don’t you do something about the water in the aisle, and be quick about it. It ain’t safe.”
           “ I’ve got a mop on board. I’ll take care of it at the next stop. Have to wait ten minutes there.”
           “ Amen.”
           The Zozoian’s life force crept through the water toward the geezer. It soaked the battered shoes; wet the bony feet; penetrated the painful knee throbbing with a fresh livid bruise; the hollow belly with the pitiful heartburn, courtesy of an early morning alcoholic beverage; the tender palms and arms considerably thinned with age; the mouth, tasting of stale cigarette tobacco; and the dry parchment cheeks – the body was so infirm. 
           The middle door fell back. The smell of rain met the old man’s nostrils. He looked wide-awake at the