And something else again: the thin metal of the trailer tearing open like a cookie box, and out of it begin to pour a million jars of grape jelly.
Crunch and sizzle, and now a whoosh, air and gasoline and fire, ripping through the gas tank of the tractor. A million jars of jelly raining down on and around the wreckage onto the asphalt. Glass jars busting and grape jelly flying through the air with bits of glass, streaming across the asphalt and mixing with gasoline.
Nothing you could write down, not a krak like a mortar or a blam like a firecracker, nothing you could describe unless you were there, pinned under the wreckage, nothing could put a word to the sudden, sharp, lacerating explosive sound of compressed tanks and gasoline making themselves known to the world at large.
Robert Bruce Banner’s feet hit the highway as a wave of flame seared past him and the sweat on his chest erupted in steam. He felt something hot and sticky against his bare feet.
The highway was aflame, gloriously garish. Grape and glass burned and exploded from the jars. As soon as it hit the ground, the wave of glass cooled to the touch of the wet asphalt and hardened into a giant sheet of purple, flaming jelly. The Hulk felt himself slip on the lake of jelly and go sliding for an instant He righted himself and kept moving toward the massive flaming wreckage. The night sounded like a war zone, jelly jars popping ever} second.
Through a curtain of fire and popping glass the Hulk could see a little car, streaming with something dark and on fire and someone was in there screaming.
(Won’t come back from Dead Man’s Cuuuurve, , .. )
The Hulk reached the week and was putting his hands on the hot metal of the underside of the trailer when he stopped. Flipping everything over wouldn’t solve anything—he looked over at the crumpled Escort and realized any more twisting would finally crush whatever was left intact inside. He heard a honking and the screeching sound of rubber and looked over his shoulder to see a Mercedes just reaching the lake of jelly glass. The Mercedes valiantly fought the spin but succumbed, careening over gas and glass towards the wreckage. The Hulk watched the German box spinning towards him and thought, Airbags. He slammed his heels into the still-hot glass and felt traction where the sheet cracked.
As the Mercedes reached arm’s length the Hulk bent down and grabbed the front bumper, slinging the car side ways toward the side of the road, as gingerly as one could reasonably sling an out-of-control Mercedes.
Screams.
In the distance, ne could hear the sound of sirens. Someone had reported the crash. The Hulk looked up at the wedged-in Escort and hopped over the wreck to the other side, getting a clearer view of the windshield.
Two people. One of them was moving, beating at the dashboard, pinned, the other slumped over the wheel.
Robert Bruce Banner owned several doctorates, none of them medical, but he knew that moving people before the paramedics arrived was, in the abstract, a bad idea. Then a rumble and sizzle reported from the tractor, a tank still full and beginning to shake. The Hulk cursed loudly. The hell with the abstract, he had to move them.
The Hulk reached up his giant green arms and grabbed either side of the V in which the Escort lay wedged between the tractor and trailer. He began to push the edges apart, careful not to move too fast.
Moving giant objects for the Hulk could be like surgery for a normal human. Anyone can take a knife and rip a torso in half—the trick is to deny your strength, hone it and wield it carefully. The Hulk pushed the entwined meta! apart as a surgeon would separate tissue and winced when the Escort began to move inside the V. Gas trickled faster, and as the Hulk pushed the V open wider he let the car move gently iown, tumbling almost softly upon his knees. The Hulk grabbed the metal of the car door with one hand and pushed the tractor-trailer back, then began to step away.
The truck began to come with them. The two vehicles had joined one another, were determined to die together, and they had taken their iast few moments to wrap as many little arms of metal around one another as they could. Flames began to snap and rise, and the last tank began to change color. The Hulk grimaced as he found he had to tug and twist the car a bit to dislodge it, until finally there was only some resistance, and then, when what the Hulk thought was the rear axle of the Escort finally tore away, the Escort jerked towards him. A scream shot out of the Escort and the Hulk saw the kid inside, staring at this giant mass of green muscle carrying the car away.
Through the flames and grape jelly, not leaping but stepping very fast and very carefully, so as not to slip on the hot glass, the Hulk moved off to the far edge of the .shoulder and prepared to pry the Escort open. An eighth of a mile away, die fire trucks had begun to arrive. The ^mbulances were back there loo, and they were not getting n.
There is an apparatus called the jaws of life. It is a large machine, basically a big wrench used to rip a car open to extract whatever soft bodies might be inside. The jaws are a favorite tool of firefighters and emergency medical teams. The Hulk, who had travelled to distant planets and beaten up sundry weird aliens and world-devouring cosmic beings, found himself momentarily horrified at the thought that for this Escort, he was the jaws of life. He looked over his shoulder and saw the V where the Escort had lain, disappear behind a curtain of fire in the middle of the jelly lake.
The Hulk peered through the driver’s side window and tried to ignore the blood and screams. The Escort resembled not so much a car as a deformed taco shell, the front and back twisted up, the hood crumpled. Mercifully, it was the underside of the Escort that had been in the vise grip of the V, and the roof, while damaged, had not been crushed. The real damage, the Hulk shuddered to think, would have come from the seats themselves, and the dashboard and floorboards.
Overhead the Hulk heard the sound of a helicopter. LifeFlight. Thank God.
Banner grabbed the roof of the car with one hand and pressed down on the bottom of the driver’s side window with the other. The metal protested. As if peeling the top off a sardine can, he tore the metal back, until he pressed the roof down behind the car. He leaned over and put one hand on the driver’s side window and the other on the far window. This meant his arm barely brushed against the dark-haired kid in the passenger seat. The kid wasn’t screaming anymore, and if he was in pain, he didn’t show it. The Hulk could not tel) how badly damaged the kid’s legs were.
An awful, terrible noise came with the widening of the car as the Hulk gingerly pressed the two sides apart, just a bit. Just enough to see the kid’s legs. If they were too badly trapped he would do no more; he would wait like a good little physicist for the real doctors to get here and do their thing.
The Hulk almost cried out in joy, considering. When he pushed the car door away he saw a wonderful sight: the legs were indeed broken, but they were not trapped or impaled or imbedded. The Hulk reached down and picked up what appeared to be a wallet and stuck it in his pocket, and in an instant lifted the dark-haired, bloodied kid into his arms and began to carry him.
“StopI” came an amplified voice from overhead as a searchlight struck the Hulk’s eyes. The helicopter came around and dropped to a height just about equal to the Hulk’s eyes, not twenty feet in front of him. “Stop what you are doing.”
The Hulk stood still, ignoring the bright light. He knew what was going on. He knew what he looked like, a giant, green monster holding a bloody kid in his arms. He knew they were scared to death. After a moment the HuLc nodded to the pilot and waited for the searchlight to dim, and he could see the pilot’s eyes. He held his gaze for a long time, not shouting, because no one would hear, and he would appear to be roaring. He held his emerald gaze and hoped that he could convey enough to say, This boy is in trouble. Come get him. The Hulk gestured with his head for the helicopter to set down. The pilot stared at him from beneath a shiny helmet and then, slowly, did as the Hulk suggested.
In less than six seconds two paramedics jumped from die grounded helicopter and ran to the green giant and lay a stretcher on the ground. In his arms, the kid m
oved, tumbled something. “David ..
The paramedics stopped a few feet short. One of them was a young kid, not more than twenty-two, and he pointed at the stretcher. They don’t know I can talk Mought the Hulk. “I don’t mean any harm,” he heard ionise if say, and he winced at the sound of it because he - sunded like Michael Rennie in The Day the Earth Stood Still. They shot Michael Rennie.
There’s no time,” said the paramedic, shaking his head. "Help us get him on the stretcher.”
As the Hulk lay the kid on the stretcher the paramedic began to strap him in. “Any others?”
The Hulk shrugged. ‘ ‘Driver of the truck is dead. No question.”
The paramedic frowned, looked back at the freeway where the smoking truck lay, then at the Escort. “He keeps asking for someone. Was there someone else in the car?”
“Yeah,” the Hulk nodded. “Yeah.”
The paramedic nodded again and his partner signaled to the helicopter, which lit and began to move toward the chopper. When it was overhead the paramedics ran the lines from the stretcher to the chopper's underbelly. The other paramedic scrambled up a ladder and the younger one turned to go, then looked at the Hulk. “You did good, mister.” In a moment the paramedic was in the cockpit and signalling with his thumb to the pilot.
The freeway was a nightmare of lights and sound, fire trucks and ambulances and a gathering crowd of onlookers. The Hulk stepped toward the shadows, toward the feeder road, and stepping under the underpass he fished the wallet out of his pocket. He opened the wallet and found a license.
David Morgan. The Hulk sat in the shadows under the overpass, staring at the wallet. He read the address several times. When he was sure he was not mistaken, he shook his head in shame. After a long moment he looked up, peered out from under the overpass, across the freeway to the hill on the other side. There, a man stood, with a pair of binoculars. Watching him. The Hulk was not surprised.
Worse and worse. Worse and worse by day and night.
=41
Inal
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phrase and smiled to herself as she made her way to her dressing room behind the Langley Theater. It was one of those phrases that starts on some clever critic’s lips and ends up in a column, and then, because it was short and clever, starred getting said everywhere. The Americans, especially the “educated” types that frequented Broadway, were as captivated by the appearance of cleverness as they were with art, and so anything clever became conventional wisdom (conventional cleverness?) and got repeated. It didn’t even matter that Nadia wasn’t playing Electra but Antigone—in a revival of Jean Anouilh’s Antigone, no less—the phrase stuck because it was terribly clever, or seemed to be. (Nadia reminded herself that the Americans were captivated with saying “Where’s the beef?” for years.) She knew without doubt that her producer laughed every time he heard the E'lectra phrase, and in his head, if she could listen, would be that distinct ka-ching sound that cash registers used to make.
Nadia Domova, the actress walking through the cavernous hallways behind the Langley, the blonde Russian with the voice and eyes of Dame Judith and the legs of Brigitte Bardot, was on the rise. She stepped through the corridors with more authority than she had in years, watching with a hint of concealed amusement as people looping cables backstage got out of her way as if she were on fire. Antigone was into its fourth straight sold-out month and going strong. People could just keep on being clever.
ouming, the people were saying, became the hell
out of Nadia Domova. Nadia thought about the
Nadia turned a comer and felt her face flush. Her dressing room door was open, and standing in the hall, lit by the yellow lights from the room, were three men. They were speaking in hushed tones and looking up and down the 2orridor as they talked She knew two of them. One Was her director* Richard March, ^nd he was nervous, because he kept rubbing his back at the lumbar region, a reminder tc all that he had aches he wouldn’t talk about. (Everyone in the theater was chronically dramatic.) The ne t man wore a charcoal gray suit that seemed to encase him like a. coffin, and he had a face of stone. Though some of the murmurs came from his mouth, his face barely moved when he spoke. That, Nadia felt sure, was
11 C°P’ ^ if she were at home, she would have called him KGB.
The third man was a breath of fresh air.^Greg?” Nadia tilted her head as she walked and tried to make°the name ask all the questions. Greg Vranjesevic was nodding and had his hand on the shoulder of the cop when he looked up and caught her eye. He smiled, and she felt her stomach twist despite herself, professional that she was.
Greg was not the quintessential Russian politician, the simple gray suit that he wore betrayed a lean, muscular frame, the frame of a man whc had been handpicked to grow up to be a medal-earning Soviet gymnast before a nasty car accident put his career on hold. The story went that he had been studying all along, anything he could get his hands un, just in case he went down for the count. Wijian the time came, he petitioned for removal to the state department. It was a demotion, a terrible shame. His fam-% was horrified at their loss and practically mourned him. By the time he made Ambassador to the United States, Ire was thirty-three, and the gymnast thing was nearly forgotten—except that try as he might, he would never iook the part of a Russian politician, having forsaken the role of a walking testament to vodka and cigarettes for the look of a new breed. He also had a great smile.
Gn took Nadia’s hands in his and kissed her cheek, still smiling, but she could see the concern in his brown eyes. She had seen that look before. Her late husband
Emil used to have that look. He would kiss her and smile charmingly and then go out and someone would nearly kill him. Then he would come back and kiss her and smile again, repeated until, finally, he didn’t come back. Men lied with their mouths but their eyes were oracles.
He said, “Nadia! How is my favorite defector?” iH-“Something 1 should know?” Nadia asked, tilting her head to make the question sound almost casual.
Greg’s smile lingered for'a moment and then exited stage left. “I’ve been talking' to Richard... :”‘‘
called him, y said March. “He said to call him if there was another.”
“Another?” Nadia frowned. “Another message.^."
“Ms. Dorncva,” said the coffin man, “do you know if there might be someone upset with you? I mean, someone who might want to—frighten you?”
Nadia felt her eyes flash. “I don’t frighten easily, Mr.—?’"
“Timm.”
Nadia breathed and said cooly, .“1 don’t know you; Mr. Timm.”
Greg chuclded. “They’re the same in every country, aren’t they? Mr. Timm doesn’t like to talk much, he prefers to ask questions. He doesn’t like to talk about who he’s with. But he’s been very helpful.’* His voice was cool, his English perfect, with a useful trace of Russian accent about it, which Nadia suspected he left there intentionally.
Nadia raised an eyebrow and smiled wryly. ;“None I can think of,” she said, in answer to the question.
SE‘Well, you know,” said March, “I’ve seen this before, someone becomes a star and there’s bound to be a few fans who’ve gone ’round the bend.'’
.--.‘■■‘What was it?” Nadia asked.
Greg softly grasped her shoulder. “Why don’t we gc for a walk?’ ’
I think she should see it,’ ’ said Timm, as if this were a topic already long running.
See what ? Nadia turned to go in the dressing room door, but Greg stopped her.
“I wanted to erase it, tell you about it later.”
“I agree. ’’ said March,
Nadia nodded again and stepped inside, heels clacking on the linoleum. She looked around for an instant at the cheap chairs, the mountain of expensive flowers and" gpfe After a moment the mirror caught her eye and she almost gasped. Almost.
“But I thought you should see it,” came the voice of Mr. Timm.
There was green putly or makeup, on the mirror. Scrawled in huge, block letters was one word: haughty. ‘‘Haughty?”'
: ‘Does that mean anything to you, Ms. Dornova?”
‘ vh, come on,” said March, “that’s like asking if proud means anything to her.”
Nadia continued to stare at the word and felt for the chair behind her and sat down, never taking her eyes off of the smudgy letters. For the longest time she kept reading it, as if it were some terribly significant name to which she had forgotten ihe face. “I don’t know,’'’ : she said, finally.
ureg said, “I guess it’s not much. ' He was behind her, hands on her shoulders.
x imm stood in front of the mirror, the word haughty hanging over his shoulder like a caption. “It could mean anything.”
“Anything it means, anyway,” said Nadia. “So people think I’m haughty now?”
Greg said, “No one could think that.”
“Very helpful, Greg,” she laughed, putting her hands to her prehead. It was a nervous laugh. After a moment she said, “I think you men are scaring me more than this.”
“It’s not the first message,’-’ said Timm.
This was true. There had been a few notes before, small things that at first Nadia had almost completely ignored. Little notes left in places where she would find them, on her marks on the stage. She had pointed them out to Greg when one appeared in her mailbox at home. Sometimes they went on for paragraphs, in long strings of impossible-to-understand symbols and disconnected words. Sometimes they were short.
“People fixate on Ms. Dornova,” said March. “Fixation becomes Ms. Dornova’s audience, I guess.”
Nadia felt her composure slipping, a distant early warning blinking on the horizon, telling her her hand was shaking, and she calmly bit the edge of her finger. She had been fixated upon, indeed. She had been kidnapped, even, a few years ago. A mad mistake of nature known as the Abomination had scooped her up and taken her below ground and then, as quickly had released her.
Abominations Page 2