THE NIGHT BUS DOESN'T STOP DOWNTOWN

by K.C. Ball

Morgan woke to the weary shoosh of airbrakes. The bus jittered as its engine died. Cold glass pressed hard and slick to Morgan's cheek. Blackness lay beyond the window.

Someone shifted in the seat beside him. A man pushed in tight to peer out the window. He stunk of onions and cheap aftershave.

"See them?" he asked.

"Who?"

"Damned pus-heads."

Morgan turned away. He always got the crazies on the night bus. The bus looked different than when he climbed aboard in West Seattle, worn around the edges, as if it had seen more hard use than usual.

The sign on the wall behind the driver's seat caught his attention. When he dozed off, It had showed service schedules for the coming holidays. Now it cautioned passengers to update their booster shots.

"It's the Law," the last line read.

Morgan squinted against the dim interior light, trying to read the sign's date of issue. Time to get new glasses. "Is that dated a year from now?" he asked.

His seatmate ignored him, stood and shouted, "Where's the back-up bus?"

"We need more cops," a woman called. "One of you can't handle transfers."

She sounded close to tears. Around her, other passengers grumbled their assent. Where did all these people come from? Morgan rode the night bus five times a week. It never collected a crowd this big.

A transit cop in riot gear stood near the exit, clutching a shotgun at port arms. "Stay calm," he said. "The transfer bus is almost here."

"'Bout frigging time," a man grumbled.

"Yeah," someone else shouted. "Get us to the wall."

Something smashed into the window next to Morgan's ear. His heart thumped a syncopated rhythm with his breath. A shatter-star the size of a quarter marked the wire-impregnated glass.

"Heartless bastards," a ragged voice shouted, from outside.

"Damn," the man next to Morgan muttered. "It's them."

A bloated face pushed against the window. A man. Green luminescent pus oozed from crusted fissures in his skin. Other half-seen faces showed at every window and the bus began to sway. Morgan's side of the bus lifted from the pavement and his heart took up its ragged thump again. Passengers around him drew handguns from concealment.

"Stow ‘em, folks," the cop barked. "Backup's here."

Lights strobed the night. Sirens wailed. A HumVee squealed into place. Floodlights lit the darkness, exposing a crowd of bloated forms, tight in against the bus.

An armored transit cop popped through a roof hatch on the HumVee. An automatic weapon barked. The bus bounced and quivered, sounding as if it had rolled into the mother of all hail storms.

"They're firing rubber bullets!" Morgan had to shout to be heard above the noise.

"Cowards oughta use steel jackets," his seatmate replied.

The fusillade pinned the crowd to the asphalt. A second bus erupted from a nearby street, lights flashing and horn blaring. The crowd scrambled, on hands and knees, to avoid its wheels. It rocked into place next to Morgan's bus.