DEADLY CITY
By Ivar Jorgenson
Illustrated by Ed Emsh
[Transcriber Note: This etext was produced from IF Worlds of ScienceFiction March 1953. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence thatthe U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
He awoke slowly, like a man plodding knee-deep through the thick stuffof nightmares. There was no definite line between the dream-state andwakefulness. Only a dawning knowledge that he was finally conscious andwould have to do something about it.
He opened his eyes, but this made no difference. The blackness remained.The pain in his head brightened and he reached up and found the big lumpthey'd evidently put on his head for good measure—a margin of safety.
They must have been prudent people, because the bang on the head hadhardly been necessary. The spiked drink which they had given him wouldhave felled an ox. He remembered going down into the darkness afterdrinking it, and of knowing what it was. He remembered the helplessfeeling.
It did not worry him now. He was a philosophical person, and the fact hewas still alive cancelled out the drink and its result. He thought, withsavor, of the chestnut-haired girl who had watched him take the drink.She had worn a very low bodice, and that was where his eyes had been atthe last moment—on the beautiful, tanned breasts—until they'd waveredand puddled into a blur and then into nothing.
The chestnut-haired girl had been nice, but now she was gone and therewere more pressing problems.
He sat up, his hands behind him at the ends of stiff arms clawing intolong-undisturbed dust and filth. His movement stirred the dust and itrose into his nostrils.
He straightened and banged his head against a low ceiling. The pain madehim sick for a minute and he sat down to regain his senses. He cursedthe ceiling, as a matter of course, in an agonized whisper.
Ready to move again, he got onto his hands and knees and crawledcautiously forward, exploring as he went. His hand pushed throughcobwebs and found a rough, cement wall. He went around and around. Itwas all cement—all solid.
Hell! They hadn't sealed him up in this place! There had been a way inso there had to be a way out. He went around again.
Then he tried the ceiling and found the opening—a wooden trap coveringa four-by-four hole—covering it snugly. He pushed the trap away anddaylight streamed in. He raised himself up until he was eye-level with adiscarded shaving cream jar lying on the bricks of an alley. He couldread the trade mark on the jar, and the slogan: "For the MeticulousMan".
He pulled himself up into the alley. As a result of an orderlychildhood, he replaced the wooden trap and kicked the shaving cream jaragainst a garbage can. He rubbed his chin and looked up and down thealley.
It was high noon. An uncovered sun blazed down to tell him this.
And there was no one in sight.
He started walking toward the nearer mouth of the alley. He had been inthat hole a long time, he decided. This conviction came from his hungerand the heavy growth of beard he'd sprouted. Twenty-four hours—maybelonger. That mickey must have been a lulu.
He walked out into the cross street. It was empty. No people—no carsparked at the curbs—only a cat washing its dirty face on a tenementstoop across the street. He looked up a