RIB

Part Eleven

Reno was a little annoyed at Astro for having deserted him for the past few days. During the day he'd been occupied with the seminars, but during his down time he really missed Astro's company. Today, had been a bit different. A cute Afro-American engineer named Rene who'd been attending the seminars had arrived late and instead of sitting up front found a seat next to Reno. The two of them had hit it off right away, discovering they had quite a lot in common, starting with being orphans who'd grown up with unconventional foster parents. She'd been raised by an Asian couple in New York's Chinatown, Reno felt strange telling her that he'd been raised by circus robots.

After the day's sessions had ended, the two of them had decided to check out a new nightclub up in Harlem. Year's ago, during the roaring twenties, Harlem had been N.Y. City's hot night spot. Toward the latter part of the twentieth century, that part of upper Manhattan had been a blight on the city with racial tension, crime, and general urban decay. Now in the twenty first century, Harlem had recovered with big money from urban reconstruction projects, the new Second Avenue subway, and young professionals moving in. The night club Reno and Rene had been given passes to was on the upper west side near City College on 137th street.

Reno meet Rene in the hotel lobby and they entered the subway, taking the IRT Seventh Avenue local uptown. The #1 train was crowded enough that they had to stand, hanging onto the metal hand holds. The train slowly made its way up to 96th Avenue, which was the last express station on the line. From here the #1 continued the rest of the way along Broadway till the end of the line at Van Cortland Park in the Bronx.

Ronald Smith had been a motorman for the NYCTA for over twenty years. He'd handled trains on every division, mostly the former BMT. While he had seniority, and could pretty much pick his own hours and assignment, with two daughters in college he was happy to take whatever overtime he could get. Today he was working the Broadway local on the IRT division, he'd be back on the N train in two days, once again coaxing his charges over the Manhattan Bridge.

Smith was familiar enough with the #1 train's route. The local started at South Ferry at the Southern tip of the island, snaking its way through the financial district under the World Trade Center. It skirted the western edge of Soho and Greenwich Village, along the theater district, and then cut the south west corner of Central Park at 59th Street, heading along Broadway. Up around 120th street the geology of Manhattan begins to show itself. This is the Manhattan valley area where the ground drops down from the average street level. The #1 train climbs out of the tunnel at 122nd Street onto a high El structure as the street drops below it, the tracks staying at a nearly constant grade. The train makes one stop on the El at 125th Avenue before reaching the end of the valley and once again descends below the streets. Now the reverse effect comes into play, with an uplifting of the land at Washington Heights. Here at 191st street the #1 is at the deepest level below the streets in the entire subway system at 180 below street level. The station still has full time elevator operators.

Smith peered out the window of the motorman's cab. The three orange 'holding' lights were illuminated, a signal from master control back at Jay Street that he needed to wait in the station for a connection with an express train on the adjacent track. Five cars back of Smith's position, Reno and Reno found seats as a good chunk of the crowd exited the train to transfer for the express train that had yet to enter the station. About 40 seconds later, a #2 train bound for 141St in the Bronx entered the station. It discharged its passengers, some of whom boarded the waiting local. Smith saw the holding lights go out and his conductor closed the doors on the train. The #1 jerked to a start and continued uptown.

"Yuck!" Jay moaned trying to free his foot from a gooey pile of a steaming plastic like substance. "I just stepped in bug shit!"
Kay panned his flashlight left and right along the subway tunnel. The Two MIB agents had used a 'Batman' like rope gun to lower themselves from the 122st overpass to the subway tracks below to enter the tunnel where the three Bug Blatter creatures had gone to escape from them. The tracks were dimly illuminated by old style 17 watt incandescent lamps every 40 feet or so, just enough light for a workman to keep from tripping and breaking his neck, but not bright enough to see a giant man eating cockroach a few feet in front of you.

"Those mother fuckers move faster than we thought." Kay yelled over to his partner.

"They're huge too!" Jay yelled back. "I think they could eat a bus whole if they wanted to."

"Or a subway train." Kay replied. "We're going to need help with this one."

The #1 train left the 103 Street station and made a slight veer to the left to follow the curve of the tracks. Up ahead was the Cathedral Pkwy station. Ron Smith slowed the train and artfully stopped exactly on the mark to the delight of the commuters who had chosen the exact spots to stand when the doors of the train opened. The jolt of the brakes pushed Reno and Rene closer together, which they didn't mind a bit.

Astro landed near Grant's tomb and looked around. He saw the MIB black Ford parked at a weird angle in the grass with the motor still running and the doors open. Using his infrared vision he could make out the foot tracks of Jay and Kay along 122nd Street ending at Broadway. Astro turned his hearing up all the way and could hear his fellow agents underground about a half a mile north of his current position. Leaping skyward he arched over the subway tracks and entered the tunnel. Astro turned on his eye searchlights and roared southbound over the tracks. In the distance he saw Kay and Jay just about to enter the 116 St station. There was something dark ahead of them.

Right after Smith pulled out of the 110th Street station, the smell hit him. The tunnel ahead was dark, as if a large black mass had filled it from wall to wall. Suddenly huge glowing eyes and glistening white teeth were reflected in the light from his train's headlamps. Smith blinked twice but the sight of the huge open mouth about to swallow his train wouldn't go away. He took his foot off the dead-man switch and ran out of the cab, though the empty first car and into the next, seconds before the front of the train was devoured by a giant roach from outer space.

The train slammed to a halt as the emergency brakes came on. The main lights went out, and the battery backed up emergency lights came on as the third rail shorted out. Rene huddled closer to Reno in fear as a loud moaning and crunching sound echoed through the tunnel, the result of roach teeth bitting into the steel of the first car. Reno fumbled through his pockets, and found the comm link transmitter he'd tuned to Astro's internal radio's private frequency.

"Astro!" he yelled into the transmitter.

Author's note:
(I was thinking of the 1963 Japanese Tetsuwan Atomu episode #114 "Metro Monster" while writing this!)