http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8899597/5/Meg-And-Greg
“Roighta,” Carlos said as the
new arrivals fanned out, “time to get you what you need. Laramie,
get me a first aid kit!” The shirtless young man strode over,
while Carlos sat Meg down on the hood of the police car. Laramie
stood by, looking non-chalantly masculine as he lit up a cigarette.
Meg noticed that the brand was “Laramie”.
Phil looked over his shoulder. “Hey... Hey, she's bit! She's
gonna turn into one of them!”
“Don't be stupid,” Carlos said,
firmly enough for the mechanic to fall silent. “I won't pretend it
ain't bad, but we can take care of it, an' it's not too late...”
“You mean they found a cure?”
Phil said anxiously. “What is it?”
“Penicillin! What'd'ya think?”
He pulled out a bottle from the kit and poured it on, then a little
more after further cleansing. Soon, he had Meg bandaged up.
“George, this place is secure as it gets. Send the signal for the
others to come forward. Give 'er a spare bottle.” The bald man
handed over one of two refillable water bottles at his waist before
returning to the van.
“Drink up, and come with me, long
as you can,” Carlos told Meg. “You too, Phil. What'd you do
here, anyway?”
“I was junior assistant, pretty
much,” Phil said as they walked back to the garage. “Pete was in
charge, but he left most of it to Art, and he left most of the real
work to Dwayne, so he took it out on Dwayne and Jonny took it out on
me. Right before, they were all riding me about was busy about this
crazy back order... Somebody wanted a part for this completely
obscure European thing...”
“Cry me a river,” said Carlos.
“I had an order that was supposed to be in. Think you'd know if
it's in?”
Phil shrugged. “Shipping and receiving's Art's job, mostly,” he
said. “That's what I kept telling Jonny, he's the one who should
be looking for that part...”
“Screw it,” Carlos growled.
“Where's the records?”
Meg's memory was jogged. “There was a clipboard... Over there!”
She pointed where it had fallen off the wall.
“So anyway, let me tell you about
this order,” Phil said to Meg. “It's a transmission part,
basically, 'cept it was kinda part of the steering too, 'cause the
vehicle had front wheel drive. I didn't completely understand it
myself, and they told me don't worry about it, just find the part.
Only, the vehicle's, like, 30 years old, an' it turns out, the whole
company went
under more than 20 years ago.
Obviously, whatever this piece o' crap is, it should have been
junked years ago, but Jonny tells me, it's not our job to tell the
customers what to do. So anyway, what we finally find out is that
the only place in a thousand miles that has this part is in...”
“Moab??” Carlos roared
explosively. He advanced on Phil, thrusting the clipboard in his
face. “The part's in Moab??!!”
“Oh my god,” Phil said.
“That's- it's- you're the guy with the Goliath?”
“Borgward Goliath Express 1100,”
Carlos said. “And you're gonna get real familiar with it!”
The front parking lot was filling up. The strange van had pulled up
behind the Beetle, and the police car was being driven off to one
side to make room for more. A VW Thing pulled in, drawing a
distinctly ghoulish trailer made from the front of a Beetle, followed
by a Bus, a Rabbit pickup and a gray GMC van. Styling indicated that
the Bus was at least five years older than the GMC, but the former
was clearly in better shape by far. Pulling up the rear were a yellow
Jeep Wagoneer with a geometric Indian-blanket pattern for trim and a
vaguely whale-like white camper van.
Meg paused for a closer look at the van's smiley face, which bore the
name “GOLIATH” in metal letters between the headlights and a
semicircular plate with the legend “Express 1100” in a forlornly
exciting lightning-bolt font. The lower body bulged outward, while
the upper part tapered rather precipitously beneath the overhanging
shell. The upper body was painted a peachy hue like desert sand, a
middle section between the windshield and a line of trim over the
headlights and grill was an earthy shade of yellow, and the lower
part was a deep mustard gold.
“That's one weird roof
extension,” Phil said, examining the orange shell that protruded
over the upper body. “It almost looks like an upside-down boat.”
“Yeah, that is weird,” Carlos
said. “It's a boat. Ah, and it's backwards, too.” Meg took a
closer look, openly incredulous, but there could be no mistake. Even
the oddities of its shape made sudden sense. It was a tub-like
affair, with a scalloped bow and boxy stern that were not unlike a
popsicle. The stepped sides that handily held tools and gear were
gunwales and oarlocks, and a shelf-like projection that shaded the
windshield was just right for a place to mount an engine.
“So what, somebody built a boat
to fit on the roof?” Meg asked.
“Nay, the boat was probably built
first, leastways the shell,” Carlos said as he stepped inside.
“And it's not on the roof. F'r all intents and purposes, it is the
roof.” It was easy to see what he meant. The inside had been
reconfigured like a camper, with a counter and cabinets behind the
cab and a three-seat dinette and couch set against the walls to the
rear. The arrangement left an open passage where most of the
original ceiling had been turned into an oversized sunroof. Benches
on either side of the inverted boat were being used for overhead
shelving and a bunk. Carlos opened a cabinet in the right rear corner
and took out a well-worn and moderately stuffed binder. He sat down
at a dinette seat whose back abutted the cabinet, and Phil sat across
from him in a wider seat which faced sideways directly across from
the left passenger door. Meg sat down at the far end of the couch,
which was shaped to fill the space between the side doors and the
left corner.
“I'm going to tell you a bit
about myself, and the people with me,” Carlos said. “Then I'm
going to tell you a story. As you might guess, I'm a geologist, and
I'm from Australia. I also served two tours in your last war, an'
you know how that turned out. After that, I got my doctorate, came
over here, and got a job as a professor. When all this started, Dr.
Carradine- that's George- and I were taking twenty-some students out
on a field trip. I heard about it sooner than most, an' I knew quite
a bit already. So, we rounded up some extra people and a bit more
gear, quiet-like, an' made it a long trip.”
Meg curled up on the couch, idly
listening as Carlos continued, “Our school's middlin', size-ways,
but we make up for it a bit in reputation. We do mining and
engineering, an' we do good work in applied research. Enough of the
right people know it that sometimes, we get funding for a project
that normally would be corporate or gov'ment. About ten years ago,
we got one that was bigger than most. Not my department, literally,
but the way I hear, it was major money, at least for a uni grant, and
nobody really knew where it was coming from. The assignment was to
test new automotive technologies in existing vehicles... technologies
that could reduce the need for petroleum.
“However much money there was,
wherever it came from, it sure didn't go into quality vehicles. Some
were donated by students and faculty. The rest were all straight
from the junkyards. There were four vehicles, that I know about,
that succeeded and survived. There's Moby Ralph out there: It's an
Ultra Van, a line of campers based on the Corvair. Good for 20 mpg,
most fuel-efficient motorhome on the road till the bloody hippies
killed it. The designers tried using the rear engine to heat the
cabin, and the tech boys did one better and set it up for
thermoelectric power generation. That pickup, we call it Thumper,
came later, but it has the same modifications the team performed to
make a 3-door diesel hatchback run off biofuel, which is kitchen
grease. The original was Peter Rabbit; you'll see it, and others
later.
“And, of course, we have this:
Davey the Goliath. The mark was pretty big in Australia when it was
a going concern; I buy one, and take it over here, right hand drive
an' all. It's good for walkabouts, and I take it on field trips now
an' then, till the engine gives out. Right about then the call goes
out, and when I talk to the tech boys about my troubles, they get
real interested. Something about troubles fitting their engine in
vehicles of the right power an' weight class, whereas the Goliath's
built for an engine that's wider than most. Problem solved. I give
them my van, and they agree that if it takes, they'll give it back to
me. 'Bout a year and a half goes by, suddenly there's a big uproar
over the project, something to do with where the money came from, or
the results, or both. Everything's shut down, sudden, an' more'n a
few people get canned. I get a call from one of them, sayin' to come
and pick up my van, an' bring a few friends.
“I come, with Dr. Carradine, my
grad student named Becky, a pipsqueak freshman who goes by Laramie,
an' a friend of mine named Ted, who brings his lady friend Dianna.
She's got 'is ring, but they don't really talk about where they're
at, and quite a few people are keeping an eye on her waistline. We
come out to a spot in the boonies that turns out to be a wrecking
yard. There's at least fifty cars there, done out all kinds of ways.
A lot of them look wrecked for real, but at least a dozen look
more'n fit to run. The guy's waiting beside the Goliath, done up
like this, and gives me the keys. Then he tells everyone else that
they can take any car they like, and he will sign the title.
“Long story short, Dianna and Ted
take Moby for a honeymoon lodge, Becky takes Peter, George picks a
giant home-built motor home we call Monstro, and Laramie makes off
with an old bus some crazy 'ippie turned into an RV. The next day,
the guy's gone for good, completely drops off the map, and within a
week, every vehicle in that yard is so much scrap. Within a year,
more'n half the faculty involved aren't just out of the university,
but no longer doing any significant work in their fields. We know
that a few ended up dead. But there's a few left who give us help
later.”
“Most of the stuff the guys did
was conceptually advanced, but off-the-shelf as far as technology and
materials. That's probably how they got away with handing so much of
their stuff over to us; nothing the sponsors could claim as
proprietary. It also allowed us to replicate a lot of their work
with other vehicles, like Thumper. In fact, we built ourselves a
little fleet of Rabbits, and customized a couple RVs. We couldn't
always do it as well, though. Peter, for example, can burn propane.
We junked a Rabbit trying to replicate it, but we did it with the
diesel on a Dodge Travco we call Flipper. We put in an hybrid
electric transmission, copy of something the tech boys put in
Monstro. Only there were some problems we couldn't fix in the
suspension, there when we got it from what we know now, but our hot
rod job prob'ly made things worse. So, long story short, when it's
rollin', the 'ole bloody thing goes up an' down like Flipper... But
this, this is a whole other can o' worms.” He led Phil outside to
the cab. Meg stretched out on the couch. At a firm push, an arm
rest swung down, giving her room to stretch her legs.
The driver and passenger seats were a single piece, though the seat
cushion was divided in two unequal parts. Carlos yanked back the
larger cushion that covered the passenger seat and a central hump
that split the cab. Beneath it was a cover for the engine
compartment, clearly newer than the rest, with a hinge for convenient
raising. Carlos opened it. Where the various parts of the engine
would have been, there was something like an oversized film can,
completely sealed against tampering or inspection.
Phil nodded. “I think I heard about something like this... It was
supposed to be strictly theoretical. A rotary engine without moving
parts, able to run on a range of fuels...”
Carlos nodded and chuckled. “Try anything remotely resemblin'
fuel. Most of that binder is a record of testing what crazy crap
this thing couldn't burn. Which wasn't much. Mileage isn't great,
horsepower's downright weak... but it will run on most anything.
Petrol. Diesel. Propane. Ethanol. Bloody alcoholic beverages.”
He slammed the hatch and jammed the
cushion into place. “You call this thing a piecea crap, I won't
argue. It means something to me, but I'd junk it in a second. But
this engine is priceless. As long as it keeps running, I can make it
anywhere. As long as the
bloody transmission don't tear itself apart before we replace the one
gear that's wearing out. And
you're gonna do your bloody best to keep it from happenin'. Not
because I'm gonna bust your arse if ya don't, but because there's
things behind us that aren't gonna stay where we been. An' you don't
wanna be there when it all catches up.”
“Hey doc!” Laramie called. “We
searched the station, and we're ready to check out back. It looks
like some nice stuff. I saw a couple Travcos...”
“We want 'em,” Carlos said.
“At least one. We want it if we have to tow it away.”
Laramie smiled. “Can't resist two of something...”
Carlos grinned back. “If it's up
to me, I get two of everything.
Go
check out the back. Take this guy with you. Stay business-like.
Anyone who isn't part of the search is on duty for pumping gas.
Check out that Dodge, too. If it can roll, it goes with us. And if
people start running out of things to do, it's time to get ready to
move on.”
Laramie turned aside, swung open the doors, and paused. The extended
couch was blocking half the doorway. It was filled quite comfortably
by Meg, who was sound asleep.
David N. Brown, David N. Brown Mesa, David N. Brown Arizona, David N. Brown Mesa Arizona, Mesa, Arizona, Mesa Arizona
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