“We don’t get paid to ask questions,” Stanton says, as if reading a line from a bad action movie.
“Oh, please. Give me a break. Did you ever talk to colonel directly?”
“Who?” Stanton asks, and I see a similar look of confusion on Abramowitz’s face. But Smalley looks away instantly at the mention of the colonel, as if she’s been slapped in the face.
“No?” I ask, ignoring Smalley’s reaction. “Not friends with the colonel then?”
No one answers, and I can see the conversation is deteriorating. I look away, back out the side window of the RV and ask “So how far can you go?”
Abramowitz narrows his stare in confusion and shakes his head. “What? What are you talking about?”
“I mean on the open road. How far can you go before you come to a blockade like the one on the Maripo River Bridge?”
“They didn’t bother with blockades on this side of the river. At least not that I’ve seen. It’s one thing to block off a couple of bridges in Warren County, but there’s too much road out of this county. So they did something worse to keep us in.”
“Worse than a blockade? What does that mean?”
Abramowitz stands still for a moment and then raises his head and stares at the ceiling. He then turns his back and walks slowly to the front of the RV and sits in the passenger seat next to Jones. He slumps low and stares out the side window.
I stare at him for a moment, waiting, and then I look back and forth to the soldiers beside me. “What just happened?”
The woman—Smalley—sighs and then stands up, seeming to be gathering her thoughts before taking one long stride to a captain’s chair opposite of the couch on which Stanton and I continue to sit. She puts her hands over her face and then slides them up her forehead, straining her fingers through her hair. She sighs again and then takes a peek back to the front before starting the tale. “There was a larger group of us when this first started. Ten of us to be exact. Soldiers who were abandoned and used as guinea pigs in this new snowy world.”
“Ten? Wow. What happened to the rest?”
“Ten is too many people for one car. There’s no sedan or SUV that can carry ten people—at least not comfortably. So we would travel in two separate cars. Always together, but separate, kind of caravan style.”
“Okay.”
Smalley frowns. “Well, of course, like I assume everyone did in the beginning, we started looking for the perimeter of this thing. Where did this nightmare finally end and the old world begin, right?”
I nod. It was the million-dollar question.
“It was the second day after the explosion, do you remember that day, the day the first round of snow stopped falling?”
I did remember. Of course. The day after. It’s a day I would remember for the rest of my life. All that snow that fell that first day and night finally stopped. There must have been three feet on the ground. The group at the diner had quickly come to the conclusion that it was only that first day, that first snowfall just after the blast, that caused the changes. The people who went out in the snow that day were screwed, but the snows that followed—the ones that began again on the third day, were benign. At least so far.
I didn’t know any of this when I was at the college, of course; Naia and I didn’t see the crabs for several days after the blast. But Tom and Stella and Danielle saw them right away, and they figured out quickly how it worked. And Terry must have known the whole time.
“We ventured out to see what had happened,” Smalley continues. “We were told about an experiment too—”
“Hey!” Abramowitz calls from the front, but his body language doesn’t demonstrate the same force. He sits slumped, his fist screwed into his cheek as he continues to stare out the passenger window.
“Screw it, Bram,” Smalley says calmly. “You’re still holding on to some kind of honor for the people who left you? Or do you think if the world ever gets back to normal you’re going to be hit with violating your clearance obligations?
Abramowitz throws up a dismissive hand, defeated.
Smalley continues. “So yeah, we knew something was coming, and like your friends, we got a different version of what was supposed to happen. And then it all went to hell. At the time, we thought we’d genuinely gotten lost inside, that it was all an accident and a search was happening. We thought we’d be found within a day or two, so the group that had formed in the meantime went to investigate. To try to find out what went wrong and how we could help.”
I have so many questions already that it’s burning a hole in my chest. What was their version of what was supposed to happen? the most pressing of all. But I keep the questions to myself for the moment, not wanting to spook the storyteller.
“So we’re driving the interstate, our caravan cruising, hauling ass, and eventually we come to a point, oh, I don’t know, sixty miles or so west of where we are now, out where it’s mostly country, and we start to see that the landscape is really beginning to change. Like really change. The snow suddenly was gone. There was none on the roads or trees. And we could see a whole mountain of foliage in the distance. Mountains that looked so green and alive against a blue sky. It was amazing the change, how stark and sudden it happened.”
“Oh my god,” I mutter. “I can barely remember what leaves look like.”
Smalley nods. “I know. There were four of us at the time: Jones, Bram and I, and another guy Woodson. We hadn’t met up with Stanton here yet. Anyway, we were in the trailing car, some piece of crap Toyota sedan, and the rest of the group was in the lead in an SUV. It could have easily been the other way around. There was no rhyme or reason to who was in the front when we went out, it was just kind of who left first, you know?”
I nod again, beginning to get the idea of how this story was going to end.
“The shell came from our right. We never even saw the tank or anything, just heard the pop of the main gun.” Smalley swallows and closes her eyes for a moment and then opens them in a flash and continues. “And then we saw that fucking Durango just disintegrate. I mean, it was one of those moments, you know? Like you see in movies? Everything is going perfectly; some guy is having the perfect day, got the promotion at work or the girl’s phone number or whatever, and then the dreaded news that’s going to change everything comes from nowhere and lands like an anchor. Just yanks the freaking rug out from under him. And then his whole life is suddenly shit. That was us. Smiling and laughing, feeling good about our prospects ahead, and then boom.” Smalley pauses again, this time seemingly for effect, before saying, “And then the machine guns started on us. Rat-tat-tat-tat-tat!”
“Holy crap,” I whisper.
“Bram got us out. Me and Jonesy anyway. Woodson took a round in the neck. Nearly blew his head completely from his shoulders.”
“Damn.”
“Ever since then, we travel together. One car. And we got a ride big enough in case we pick up others along the way.”
“So then you’re not working with the colonel?” It’s all I can think to say; I’m still mesmerized by the revelation of the story.
“What colonel?” Stanton asks.
I see ahead of me Abramowitz rise again and he’s now walking back towards me with purpose. His face is stern, focused. “I think you must be ready to continue with your story, huh?” he asks rhetorically. “Now that you know all about our little family tragedy, I think it’s time for your tit to our tat?”
I nod. “Yeah, of course. I’m sorry about your friends.”
Abramowitz nods once to acknowledge my condolences. “So what about this plan you heard? The colonel’s plan you heard on the road?”
“It was always about the crabs,” I start, “the ghosts. Whatever. I don’t know what you guys were told about the experiment, but according to the conversation I heard with the colonel, this whole thing was intentional. They knew the people would change. They knew it all along. And they wanted to see how they would behave afterwards. After the blast. They wanted
to see if they would become violent, aggressive. But make no mistake: they knew these changes would happen. They just didn’t know how they would behave over time, and this experiment, this destruction, was all a test to find out.”
“How could you know about all this?” Smalley asks. “How could you know all of this unless you were a part of it?”
“I wasn’t a part of it. For Christ’s sake. I told you about the research doctor on the exit ramp. The one from the diner who wanted me to stop.” I pause a minute and look back and forth between Abramowitz and Smalley.
“It’s still your turn, professor,” Abramowitz replies. “How do you know what you know?”
I frown. “I overheard this guy—Terry, the doctor—I heard his report to the colonel. At least I think he was a colonel, if my reading of his insignia was correct.”
“And the colonel, he said this? He said the plan was about turning people into these things?”
“The research doctor said it. He said he had collected the data and that the theories were correct, that they became violent. That might not be the exact verbatim, but it’s close enough.”
“So what happened to him? This Terry person?”
I frown and think back to a couple of days ago and the violent end that Terry met. He wasn’t my favorite member of the group, but his death still lingers in my mind, as does Naia’s and Alvaro’s. “He made contact too early, by several weeks apparently, and the colonel killed him for it. It sounded like an excuse to me; it sounded like Terry’s death was always the plan.”
Abramowitz nods slowly, his face showing signs of recognition, that this is the type of thing black ops folks would do.
“And that was when we had our encounter with the tank.”
Abramowitz just stands in place for a moment, staring at me hard, as if processing all of the information I’ve just unloaded. “You were lucky to make it out, I guess.”
“You have no idea...well, maybe you do. But yeah, we took a decent amount of fire.” I sigh and shake my head, breaking out of my reverie, suddenly panicked again about the plight of Danielle and Tom and Stella and James. “Which is another reason why I need to find my friends. I’ve only known them for a couple of weeks and they’ve already saved my life more than once. I owe them. I need to get to a boat.”
Abramowitz holds up a hand towards me, his palm out making a slow pressing motion. “Look professor, I’ll uphold my end of this deal if that is what you still want to do. We’re not far from the spot on the river where you left your friends. Near the bridge, right? So if you still want us to, Jones will drop you at a pier, you can rig a boat, and you can try to get out to them.”
“Good, because that is what I want.”
Abramowitz lets my words stand for a beat, staring into my eyes, searching for a deeper truth. He nods and says, “But I gotta tell you, and you said it yourself professor, they’ve been out there a long time. They either got that boat started or they didn’t. Which means they either got out of there or they were overrun. And you venturing out into the river now isn’t going to change that. It’ll be dark in forty-five minutes. You trying to make it to the middle of the river now is a death sentence.”
I look away, not ready to accept the logic of the soldier’s words. Finally, I say, “I have to know. Either way I have to know what happened. So maybe you’re right about getting out there tonight, but I at least need to get to the bank of the river and see if I can spot their boat from the shore.”
“You won’t be able to see anything in this light. You can barely see what’s on the river at noon, let alone now, at dusk.”
“Well what do you want me to do?” The words come out more forcefully than I intended, but my frustration and shame—shame at spending so much time in the Clam Bake, tending to my personal needs—is at a boiling point.
Abramowitz doesn’t answer, but I know his belief is that I should let them go. At least for the night. And he’s right, of course; by the time we reach a pier and find a viable boat with the keys inside—even if we get lucky and find it immediately—night time will be upon us. And with all the boats on the water, dark and impotent now that their masters have abandoned them, there’s a better-than-average chance that I’ll wreck the craft and drown in the freezing waters of the Maripo River.
Despite the anger I feel, however, mostly about my own ineptitude, the hope I feel for my friends is strong. They’re a formidable bunch. Tom spoke as if he was comfortable on the water—far more than I, it seemed—so I’m confident he got the boat started somehow. And if he needed time, there was Danielle, who would hold off the crabs until he succeeded. I have to believe that.
“Fine,” I say, filling in the answer to my rhetorical question. “We’ll wait until tomorrow.”
“It’ll be too late tomorrow,” Stanton pipes up.
“I need to know! You get that right? I just need to see if the boat is there or not. If it’s been overrun or not.”
“Okay, okay,” Stanton says, rising now and heading to the bathroom at the back of the RV, leaving me alone now on the bench seat by the window.
Abramowitz frowns and looks to the ground before facing me again. “Look professor, I’m sorry, all right, but this is—”
“Where are we going?” I interrupt.
“There’s a grocery store a couple of exits from here. It’s secure and well-stocked. We make a run about once a week and were due.”
I turn back toward the window and watch the landscape pass in a steady, seemingly endless, tableau of flat, empty ground. Only the occasional road sign appears sporadically, displaying the speed limit or the miles remaining to reach the next town.
And then, as if a giant blimp had suddenly been thrust from beneath the ground, the empty landscape becomes blanketed by a screen of white. I sit up straight now and take in the enormity of the cloud-white structure, a building which sits just off the interstate and stretches on for what seems like miles. I narrow my eyes and touch the tip of my nose against the glass, examining the structure like an architect. I’ve probably passed the building a hundred times, but something about it rivets me now, and I’m only really seeing it consciously for the first time.
The building is tall and curved like the shape of an airplane hangar, except it’s so massive it’s like several hangars that have been lined up side by side, forming an arched white tube that appears large enough to house a small village. I can’t believe I’ve never given the construction a second glance, but it’s so benign in terms of color and design, forming a steady border along the interstate, that it almost blends in with the horizon on either side of it.
The RV finally reaches what I believe is the front end of the structure and I turn my neck backwards, following it with my eyes as we pass, focusing now on the facade of the tube-shaped building.
And then I see the letters.
Painted in huge, faded blue script across the end face of the structure are the letters D&W.
D&W.
At first the writing has no effect on me, but my mind unconsciously takes in the blandly written print, and I look to the floor of the RV, my brain noting a grain of recognition that it wants me to locate.
“There are a couple of waterfront homes right at the base of the bridge,” Abramowitz says, calling from the front of the RV and shaking me from my trance. “They all have boats. We’ll get there early tomorrow and try to find one.”
And then it comes to me. “Wait!” I yell. “Take this exit.”
“The supermarket is off the next exit?” Jones says from the driver’s seat; they’re the first words he’s said since we started driving.
“Did you see something, professor?” Abramowitz asks.
“Just get off here. Please. If I can’t save my friends today, maybe I can get us some answers to what really happened here. Maybe find out who’s responsible for it.”
Chapter 6
The RV pulls into the lot of D&W and I see instantly that what looks like a giant abandoned warehouse from the ro
ad is actually a functioning business. Or at least it was at one time, likely right up until the world came to a stop.
At the end of the caterpillar-shaped tube is a well-designed entrance with blonde wood paneling and windows that rise up about halfway to the roof where they join with a second story front-facing patio. It’s quite gorgeous, actually, the design of someone with unlimited funds. It’s a building you would find on the cover of an architecture magazine, though this whole section of the building is completely hidden from the interstate, a secluded gem in plain sight.
“What the hell is ‘D&W,’” Smalley asks. “Sounds like some kind of root beer or something.”
“That’s A&W,” Stanton replies.
“I just said it sounded like it.”
Abramowitz stares at his two subordinates for a moment and then asks, “Are you two almost done?”
They both shrug and nod, and the four of us—Abramowitz, Smalley, Stanton and I—follow Jones, who is already standing at the base of the structure, staring up toward the roof. “How tall do you think this thing is?” he asks. “Seventy-five feet? A hundred?”
“It’s damn tall,” Abramowitz replies. “Could definitely fit a 747 under this thing. Can you imagine how much it cost to build?”
“No way this is some giant hangar though,” Stanton says. “There’s no airport or airbase anywhere close to here.”
“Maybe they build planes inside,” Smalley suggests. “You know, and then ship them off to somewhere else when they’re complete.”
“That could be,” Stanton concedes.
I stare at the Smalley and Stanton for a long beat, disbelieving, making sure they’re serious about the possibility they’ve just constructed before offering the rebuttal. Finally, I say, “You two obviously are not from this area. Airplane factory? Are you kidding me? If this was an airplane factory it would be the biggest employer in five counties. Maybe the whole state. I pass this building all the time and never give it two looks—I think that’s how the designers intended it. But I know it’s no airplane factory.”
The Melting Page 9