The Mammoth Book of Apocalyptic SF - Mike Ashley [154]
I am going to shoot the driver and then work my way back. Any movement in a window will be a target. Any likely hiding place will be punctured. I'll tear apart the RV on my way back to grandma, and then I will stop. Maybe I won't waste precious ammunition on her. One cold night with nobody to care for her, and the end won't be long coming for her either.
The RV is still a long, long ways off.
I kneel. I check my guns again. I stand and stomp and use the gun sight, seeing nothing but the machine with its flat face and no hint of a soul.
I kneel.
A moment later, I'm shaking. Hard.
Then comes the rattling roar of an engine, and my first thought is that I know that sound and why is it so familiar? Somewhere behind me, the little engine cuts out. I keep hiding. A block of granite would show more motion that I do right now. I wait and listen, holding my breath for long spells, and then I hear the sound of boots on the road above and then the boots stop and a voice that I know better than my own asks, "What are you doing down there?"
I turn, looking up at Lola.
She smiles, and then decides not to smile. What replaces that first expression is scared and puzzled and then even more scared. In my face, she sees something she has never witnessed before, and when I rise to my feet, she looks at the various guns and my face again and then across the bridge, asking the cold dusk air, "What are you waiting for, Noah?"
"A tiger."
"What tiger?"
"I saw him when I came by before," I say. One weak step doesn't carry me far up the very brief slope. "He's a beauty. He's got a spectacular pelt." I manage another step, saying, "It's been a bad day, and I wanted to give you a gift. Something you wouldn't expect."
The RV is close now. Its driver doesn't seem to notice either person on the far side of the river, the vehicle neither speeding up nor slowing down, it and its loyal trailer rolling close to us and then past, the clatter of gravel on concrete lingering for several seconds. But the rest of the apparition has vanished behind a wall of oak and cottonwoods.
Lola watches me. She has probably never seen a machine like that, but I am the only object of any importance on this landscape. She stares and says nothing, watching me slowly climb up to the old roadbed, and then I start to talk again, to tell her something else that isn't true, and her gloved hand pushes at my face while her face cries, and she says, "I don't want a tiger."
She tells me, "Come home with me. Now."
AND THE DEEP BLUE SEA
Elizabeth Bear
The following story reminds me of both "Damnation Alley" by Roger Zelazny and "The Postman" by David Brin, so we're really getting three for the price of one.
Elizabeth Bear received the Campbell Award as Best New Writer in 2005 and has since won two Hugo Awards for her short fiction, a selection of which was published as The Chains That You Refuse (2006). She has been immensely prolific since her debut. Her first novel, Hammered (2005), which began the Jenny Casey trilogy set in a post-catastrophe North America, won the Locus Award for Best First Novel.
* * *
THE END OF THE WORLD had come and gone. It turned out not to matter much in the long run.
The mail still had to get through. Harrie signed yesterday's papenvork, checked the dates against the calendar, contemplated her signature for a moment, and capped her pen. She weighed the metal barrel in her hand and met Dispatch's faded eyes. "What's special about this trip?"
He shrugged and turned the clipboard around on the counter, checking each sheet to be certain she'd filled them out properly. She didn't bother watching. She never made mistakes. "Does there have to be something special?"
"You don't pay my fees unless it's special,