More Stories from the Twilight Zone (34 page)

Though while it's true that His design allows for some of the most unheard-of coincidences, many of which have been accepted as bona fide miracles in the past, I felt the celestial actuarial tables were weighted rather against this. More likely the demon had felt my earlier aversion to Graceland fanatics, and chose that face to reveal based on the belief that I would think far less of its abilities. Maybe it was right. Remember what I said about the power of suggestion and the weapon that may be fashioned by belief? It works both ways.

Considering all of this (and taking a few extra seconds to wish for a final cocktail before reaching any ultimate destination), it took me a moment to realize that I was, in fact, still breathing, and Elvis had not taken a step forward into the first-class cabin. He was caught behind the line of my making, which glowed about his feet, soft and white and sugar-free. It gave me another moment to breathe, and think. To see a few of the coach-class passengers (newly converted to the call of a false Graceland) spreading out behind him. And to remember the guy with the gun at my back.

The air marshal's mouth moved up and down, without sound, like a fish gasping for air. Finally, he managed: “What. The. Hell.”

“Yep,” I said.

At some point the brain simply recognized evil no matter what kind of face it wore. The guy had to start coping with that. In the years to come (assuming we had years), this kind of thing would grow more and more common. Creation would be left on its own, running out of control, with no subtle hand or small, quiet voice guiding us forward. There would be a great deal of work to do for people like me. Policies to sign (and enforce) from the only remaining carriers who would matter. Despair and the betrayal of being left behind would test the faith of even the most righteous. Opium would be a more likely opiate of the masses. Elder religions would come back into their magicks. Public television would lose its funding.

There might be no more wasabi nuts.

No more Chopin!

The blanket of anguish and apathy that had settled over me with smothering force was suddenly ripped away, and I saw what Elvis had tried to do. Too bad for him he had pushed it a step too far.

There were things that needed to be done, and things that needed to be said. Unfortunately I once again wouldn't be given time to go about this the easy way. Not as the senator had flipped his coin again, then reached out and swiped at the temporary wall I had built.

Disappointing, sure, but haven't we all come to expect about as much from our public servants?

With a howl (and a quick hip gyration), Elvis leaped forward. And as much as He allows me an occasional peek at the gears and underpinnings, the mechanics of His design, I was fairly certain at that moment that I was a dead man. I stumbled back, right into the grasp of the air marshal, who seized me by the back of my neck and held me with great (and painful) newfound strength.

So we both stood there, watching, as it was the ten-year-old
who stepped into the aisle, hands on her hips, and shouted at Elvis with that perfect, self-righteous indignation only a ten-year-old flying first class could muster, “You don't belong here!”

Elvis pulled up short, and his aura lost a few watts of brightness. He loomed above my little savior with fire and brimstone burning in his black eyes. Maybe he would have rallied quickly with his followers from coach and the senator creeping up in his shadow, but before he could, the girl's mother had joined her daughter, putting one protective hand over her shoulder.

“Leave her alone!”

Now others were moving. Taking some measure of faith in the defiance of others. Not many, but enough. The businessman in the wrinkled suit. An Asian twentysomething with enough electronics hanging on him to open his own tech-support company. They stood, stepped into the aisle, and blocked Elvis from reaching me. Even my Halliburton neighbor strode forward now, and I felt my heart leap with joy (or at least the hope of survival) when she pointed and actually shouted, “Get thee gone!”

I don't think Elvis expected that. I know I hadn't.

Salvation. Redemption. Mysterious ways. All that jazz.

Which put me in the very advantageous position of having the air marshal's ear right when the demon's power was at an ebb, confronted by the strength some of my traveling companions had managed to muster. Young indignation. Protective motherhood. First-class righteousness.

Law and order?

He had the shot, right over the small stature of the golden-haired girl. “He's trying for the cockpit,” I warned the air marshal, and hoped that it would be enough.

It was. A gun, pulled on an airplane, wants to go off.

The report was deafening, much louder than it should have been, even in the tight confines of a 737. It seemed very familiar. Thunderous, even.

Elvis screamed, belting out from the diaphragm. His aura flared bright and brilliant and burning, folded back in on itself, and with a final hip-bump he disappeared in a flash of the whitest light. Purple spots swam in front of my eyes. When I blinked them clear, I saw that the demon had also taken with him his coach-class followers and the senator, too. How the mighty had fallen.

And in the distance, did I hear the dying, plaintive note of a trumpet?

Something we still had to take on faith, I suppose. Even now.

 

 

When the world as we know it ends, what does come after? A question left for the remaining passengers of Flight 1602, who have yet to reach their final destination. Who are learning that faith, like so many things, is not an absolute. And while it may remain true that what goes up must certainly come down, there is no guarantee that, when it happens, you will not find yourself . . . in the Twilight Zone.

 

Since the dawn of civilization, when the first men crawled out from their caves and attempted to make some sense of the universe around them, the human race has chosen to believe that all is not chance and chaos; that there is a meaning to the world as well as our lives in it; that each of us, however humble or great, has his destiny. But what happens when what appears precisely that is interrupted? Does this create anarchy, or is there a remote possibility that what seems some cosmic mistake may actually provide the means to fulfilling one's fate? Join us now as a living legend leaves history behind to take a sudden, if surprisingly temporary, side trip into . . . the Twilight Zone.

As the first light of dawn broke over San Antonio on that nasty morning of March 6, 1836, the foreboding sky above appeared to mirror events taking place below. The last of the Alamo's 186 defenders, struggling in the semidarkness to offer the beau geste of a final stand, died on the sharp bayonets of Santa Anna's troops.

The finishing attack, a culmination of thirteen days of brutal siege, lasted less than an hour. After the first wave of General Martin de Cos's advance force slipped close to the undermanned fortress under cover of the starless night, they breached the Alamo's north wall, the Texicans' most vulnerable spot. Once General Castrillón's volunteers reinforced Cos, whose men had suffered a
terrible toll from Kentucky long rifles above, the outcome became frightfully obvious to all.

Travis, the Alamo's young commander, died early on. Bowie, the pioneer who had led so many of these rough-hewn types to the Texas plains from Creole Louisiana years earlier, was discovered weak and ill on his cot. Even so, the bear-sized co-commander, his reddish hair marbled with silver, employed his signature blade to take down three of the enemy before dying.

Now, scattered Mexican patrols sought out any member of the defending force still hiding in the shadows. Their stark and simple orders: Take no prisoners!

So much blackpowder smoke filled the old mission that the advancing lancers could not discern anything clearly. While scouting the chapel area, one group, under Lt. Jesus Ramirez, noticed a tall, rangy figure standing stock still, patiently awaiting them. Something about his stature frightened the men as they inched close. Juarez noticed his buckskin garb, as well as what everyone in the Americas knew to be his “curious” fur cap. “Cwocky, Cwocky!” they screamed. For this was the famed David Crockett: Indian fighter, bear hunter, former U.S. Congressman.

The Mexicans advanced with caution: How many would die trying to take down this tallest Texican? Before they could rush him, a cold, bitter wind swept a smoke cloud between the last defender, ready to use his spent rifle as a club, and themselves.

So this,
Crockett thought,
is the land of the stranger, where I rise or I fall. Always did wonder when and where the final reckoning would occur. Now, I know.

When the smoke dissipated a few seconds later, the seven lancers gasped. No one stood before them. Could they, in their trepidation, have only imagined Crockett? Was he already among the dead, what they'd perceived merely an apparition, the product of their collective fear? That, Lieutenant Ramirez guessed, was
one of those things he'd never know, not for certain. Yet one fact could not be disputed—how glad each man was to remain alive at the end of the battle.

It would be a story each soldier in the unit would tell his children, a tale that they would conclude with the fearful words:
May I never again encounter that indomitable presence!

 

“Welcome to the city of brotherly love.”

Crockett stirred, head pounding, body aching. Never had he experienced such a profound sense of disorientation. He tried to sit up, managing to do so only with great difficulty. Dizzy, he glanced up at the fellow who'd spoken, his tone combining sincere concern with puckish humor. A little chap, he stood beside the couch where Crockett found himself lying.

Am I dead? Them Mexicans was a-closin' in, but I don't recall feeling their lances penetrate my hide. Still, I reckon that's what happened. This fella must be the gate-keeper. Wonder if I made it On High? Or mebbe this—

“My name is Angus McCracken,” the bespectacled soul, whom Crockett guessed to be around thirty-five years old, continued with a smile. “It's an honor to meet you, Colonel.” Crockett took the fellow's hand, which he'd extended for shaking.

“My pleasure, or at least I hope so. You ain't planning on escorting me Down Below, I hope 'n' pray?”

“No, no,” McCracken laughed. “Nor are you dead, sir.”

“Huh! Been in an' outta b'ar traps all m' life, but I sure can't figger how I twisted away from that un.”

“I'll show you,” McCracken replied, placing an arm around Crockett's waist for support. Once the hero known as the Lion of the West had risen, his new companion helped him cross to the small room's far side. Lining the wall was a glass booth covered with meters, bulbs, levers, every sort of technical apparatus and
scientific equipment known to man. Smoke billowed out of the side outlets as well as a release gauge up on top of this mechanical contraption.

“What, in the name of all that's holy, is that?”