Stephen King – The Dark Tower

“Keystone World America,” Eddie said. “A small town in western Maine called Lovell.

As early in June of 1999 as one-way time allows.”

“Sending me to Connecticut appears to have inaugurated Sheemie’s seizures,” Ted said in

a low voice. “You know that sending you back America-side is apt to make him worse,

don’t you? Or kill him?” He spoke in a matter-of-fact tone.Just askin, gents .

“We know,” Roland said, “and when the time comes, I’ll make the risk clear and ask him

if—”

“Oh man, you can stickthat one where the sun don’t shine,” Dinky said, and Eddie was

reminded so strongly of himself—the way he’d been during his first few hours on the shore

of the Western Sea, confused, pissed off, and jonesing for heroin—that he felt a moment

ofdéjà vu . “If you told him you wanted him to set himself on fire, the only thing he’d want

to know would be if you had a match. He thinks you’re Christ on a cracker.”

Susannah waited, with a mixture of dread and almost prurient interest, for Roland’s

response. There was none. Roland only stared at Dinky, his thumbs hooked into his

gunbelt.

“Surely you realize that a dead man can’t bring you back from America-side,” Ted said in

a more reasonable tone.

“We’ll jump that fence when and if we come to it,” Roland said. “In the meantime, we’ve

got several other fences to get over.”

“I’m glad we’re taking on the Devar-Toi first, whatever the risk,” Susannah said. “What’s

going on down there is an abomination.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Dinky drawled, and pushed up an imaginary hat. “Ah reckon that’s the

word.”

The tension in the cave eased. Behind them, Sheemie was telling Oy to roll over, and Oy was doing so willingly enough. The Rod had a big, sloppy smile on his face. Susannah

wondered when Haylis of Chayven had last had occasion to use his smile, which was

childishly charming.

She thought of asking Ted if there was any way of telling what day it was in America right

now, then decided not to bother. If Stephen King was dead, they’d know; Roland had said

so, and she had no doubt he was right. For now the writer was fine, happily frittering away

his time and valuable imagination on some meaningless project while the world he’d been

born to imagine continued to gather dust in his head. If Roland was pissed at him, it was

really no wonder. She was a little pissed at him herself.

“What’s your plan, Roland?” Ted asked.

“It relies on two assumptions: that we can surprise them and then stampede them. I don’t

think they expect to be interrupted in these last days; from Pimli Prentiss down to the

lowliest hume guard outside the fence, they have no reason to believe they’ll be bothered in

their work, certainly not attacked. If my assumptions are correct, we’ll succeed. If we fail, at least we won’t live long enough to see the Beams break and the Tower fall.”

Roland found the crude map of the Algul and put it on the floor of the cave. They all

gathered around it.

“These railroad sidetracks,” he said, indicating the hash-marks labeled 10. “Some of the

dead engines and traincars on them stand within twenty yards of the south fence, it looks

like through the binoculars. Is that right?”

“Yeah,” Dinky said, and pointed to the center of the nearest line. “Might as well call it

south, anyway—it’s as good a word as any. There’s a boxcar on this track that’s real close

to the fence. Only ten yards or so. It saysSOO LINE on the side.”

Ted was nodding.

“Good cover,” Roland said. “Excellent cover.” Now he pointed to the area beyond the

north end of the compound. “And here, all sorts of sheds.”

“There used to be supplies in them,” Ted said, “but now most are empty, I think. For

awhile a gang of Rods slept there, but six or eight months ago, Pimli and the Wease kicked

them out.”

“But more cover, empty or full,” Roland said. “Is the ground behind and around them clear

of obstacles and pretty much smooth? Smooth enough for that thing to go back and forth?”

He cocked a thumb at Suzie’s Cruisin Trike.

Ted and Dinky exchanged a glance. “Definitely,” Ted said.

Susannah waited to see if Eddie would protest, even before he knew what Roland had in mind. He didn’t. Good. She was already thinking about what weapons she’d want. What

guns.

Roland sat quiet for a moment or two, gazing at the map, almost seeming to commune

with it. When Ted offered him a cigarette, the gunslinger took it. Then he began to talk.

Twice he drew on the side of a weapons crate with a piece of chalk. Twice more he drew

arrows on the map, one pointing to what they were calling north, one to the south. Ted

asked a question; Dinky asked another. Behind them, Sheemie and Haylis played with Oy

like a couple of children. The bumbler mimicked their laughter with eerie accuracy.

When Roland had finished, Ted Brautigan said: “You mean to spill an almighty lot of

blood.”

“Indeed I do. As much as I can.”

“Risky for the lady,” Dink remarked, looking first at her and then at her husband.

Susannah said nothing. Neither did Eddie. He recognized the risk. He also understood why

Roland would want Suze north of the compound. The Cruisin Trike would give her

mobility, and they’d need it. As for risk, they were six planning to take on sixty. Or more.

Of course there would be risk, and of course there would be blood.

Blood and fire.

“I may be able to rig a couple of other guns,” Susannah said. Her eyes had taken on that

special Detta Walker gleam. “Radio-controlled, like a toy airplane. I dunno. But I’ll move,

all right. I’m goan speed around like grease on a hot griddle.”

“Can this work?” Dinky asked bluntly.

Roland’s lips parted in a humorless grin. “Itwill work.”

“How can you say that?” Ted asked.

Eddie recalled Roland’s reasoning before their call to John Cullum and could have

answered that question, but answers were for their ka-tet’s dinh to give—if he would—and

so he left this one to Roland.

“Because it has to,” the gunslinger said. “I see no other way.”

Chapter XI:

The Attack on Algul Siento

One

It was a day later and not long before the horn signaled the morning change of shift. The

music would soon start, the sun would come on, and the Breaker night-crew would exit

The Study stage left while the Breaker day-crew entered stage right. Everything was as it

should be, yet Pimli Prentiss had slept less than an hour the previous night and even that

brief time had been haunted by sour and chaotic dreams. Finally, around four (what his

bedside clock in factclaimed was four, but who knew anymore, and what did it matter

anyway, this close to the end), he’d gotten up and sat in his office chair, looking out at the darkened Mall, deserted at this hour save for one lone and pointless robot who’d taken it

into its head to patrol, waving its six pincer-tipped arms aimlessly at the sky. The robots

that still ran grew wonkier by the day, but pulling their batteries could be dangerous, for

some were booby-trapped and would explode it you tried it. There was nothing you could

do but put up with their antics and keep reminding yourself that all would be over soon,

praise Jesus and God the Father Almighty. At some point the former Paul Prentiss opened

the desk drawer above the kneehole, pulled out the .40 Peacemaker Colt inside, and held it

in his lap. It was the one with which the previous Master, Humma, had executed the rapist

Cameron. Pimli hadn’t had to execute anyone in his time and was glad of it, but holding the

pistol in his lap, feeling its grave weight, always offered a certain comfort. Although why

he should require comfort in the watches of the night, especially when everything was

going so well, he had no idea. All he knew for sure was that there had been some

anomalous blips on what Finli and Jenkins, their chief technician, liked to call the Deep

Telemetry, as if these were instruments at the bottom of the ocean instead of just in a

basement closet adjacent to the long, low room holding the rest of the more useful gear.

Pimli recognized what he was feeling—call a spade a spade—as a sense of impending doom. He tried to tell himself it was only his grandfather’s proverb in action, that he was

almost home and so it was time to worry about the eggs.

Finally he’d gone into his bathroom, where he closed the lid of the toilet and knelt to pray.

And here he was still, only something had changed in the atmosphere. He’d heard no