Chrissie glared around the group. The ice around her seemed to melt faster.
'You've just misplaced them,' said Alex. 'How could someone steal them? You check your pockets a hundred times a day. You probably check your pockets in your sleep.'
Chrissie spun on Alex. 'Turn out your pockets.'
Alex crossed his arms.
'I'm not doing anything with my pockets.'
She's going to explode, thought Carl. Here it comes.
Chrissie surprised him.
She composed herself.
She even sounded friendly as she held up her cigarette lighter.
'Look, Alex, I know teenagers like to smoke. I felt the same at sixteen.'
'I'm seventeen.'
Chrissie’s hand shook, revealing her suppressed emotions.
‘I'm sorry I didn't offer you one before. Let's share them. Let's split one now. We'll both feel better.'
‘I don’t have your filthy lung-darts, Chrissie.’
'Look,' persisted Chrissie. 'I'll chew them, okay? I won't smoke them. I'll give you my lighter. Please, I can't be fairer than that.’
Alex didn’t need to answer because Megan yelled from around the ice.
'I've found them!'
Chrissie ran.
Carl and Alex exchanged relieved glances.
That was close, thought Carl. Chrissie looked ready to lose control and hurt somebody by accident.
Accidentally hurting someone resulted in the worst kinds of injuries. Intentional violence had an end point. A goal. Accidental violence was a loose cannon with no limits except physics and fate. You had little control of the outcome in an accident.
Carl had learned that lesson the hard way.
Thank God Megan found them, thought Carl.
His relief lasted about four seconds.
'Who did this!' screeched Chrissie. 'Which of you fucking bastards did this!'
The steel walls amplified her outrage.
Megan covered her ears.
Chrissie knelt over the drain.
Wet, shredded tobacco clung to its slots. Whoever mashed Chrissie's cigarettes down the drain had rushed. One hadn't gone fully through. Only the butt showed between the slots.
‘Someone just did this,’ said Carl. ‘I just used this drain and it wasn’t like this.’
Chrissie looked up.
‘Megan, get me your tweezers.’
‘No. You’ll drop them down the drain.’
‘GET THEM!’ shrieked Chrissie.
Megan fetched her tweezers. ‘Don’t drop them.’
'Everyone get back,' ordered Chrissie. 'Get out of my light. I can't see!'
She lay down and slowly positioned the tweezers.
Holding her breath, she drew the cigarette from the drain.
Thank Christ, thought Carl. That should calm her down.
But Chrissie drew the short straw.
Only half a cigarette.
Half is better than none, thought Carl.
Chrissie collected all the loose tobacco with the tweezers. She closed her fist around her prize.
'Who did this?'
Megan backed from Chrissie as though another bomb had just appeared.
Victoria asked, 'Why were you around here, Megan?'
Chrissie leapt at Megan.
She snatched Megan's hand and sniffed her fingers.
Megan looked like a child whose parents were making her touch a huge snake at the zoo. She yanked her hand back.
Better count your fingers, thought Carl.
Chrissie pointed at Alex. 'Let me smell your fingers.'
'Smokers lose their sense of smell,' said Alex. ‘Everyone knows that.’
'I'll check him,' said Victoria. 'I've never smoked. I could check them both.'
'Stay out of this,' Carl warned Victoria.
Alex looked thoughtfully at the drain and then up to Victoria. 'Okay, Chrissie. But you smell them, not Victoria.'
Carl felt like he was attending a military camp for wayward teenagers.
Morning fingernail check. Hands out for inspection.
Alex stepped so close to Chrissie they could have smelled each other's bad breath.
He splayed his fingers apart.
Chrissie did everything except taste Alex's fingers, and for a moment Carl thought she might.
Don't lick his fingers, you psycho.
Like a thwarted predator, Chrissie's posture changed. Her radioactive aura dissipated. Her personality seemed fit for human consumption again.
'I...I thought it was you,' Chrissie said to Alex.
Alex plucked his hands free.
He pointed to her half-cigarette. 'If it had been me, I wouldn’t have even left you that.’
Chapter Sixteen
After an hour, the smell of Chrissie's cigarette barely lingered.
Carl had spent the hour covering Glen with ice again.
Melting ice.
The cold stopped his palms itching, but three times now the dizzy spells had nearly toppled him. He felt a headache arriving to keep his nausea company.
This is crazy, thought Carl. Reburying the same person again and again. It's like an unending funeral. A burial that undoes itself every night so everyone must return the next day and start again.
Alex, Megan and Chrissie were digging.
Victoria refused to help cover Glen.
She'd rather pour ice over a live bomb than see Glen's face again.
She seemed to expect Glen to surge from the ice, screaming about being buried alive.
'I wish you would, Glen,' Carl thought.
But Carl remembered the Trojan horse torturing Glen, crashing his skull against the steel floor again and again.
Stop thinking about it.
In old movies, people put coins over the dead person’s eyes to pay for their passage into the afterlife.
What a load of crap, thought Carl. They put the coins there so the eyes didn't pop open and scare the shit out of everyone.
Carl didn't have any coins, so he unfolded his handkerchief and covered Glen's face.
I should have done this the first time.
He poured ice chips over the fabric. No one would find Glen staring at them again. As an extra precaution, he used some really big chunks of ice. They would melt slower. Some of the pieces took two hands to move, and he was reminded of old western movies where they buried the dead cowboy under a pile of rocks to keep them safe from coyotes.
I need more ice.
Carl returned to the sounds of arguing.
Their arguments were becoming more and more trivial. Being confined together was taking its toll. Carl had more experience with confinement than the others, but that didn’t make him immune to the affects.
'Just blow your nose,' demanded Victoria.
Alex turned from the abacus he was excavating. 'I'm not sniffing.'
Megan worked nearby on the porcelain plate. She said, 'His knife makes that noise when it hits the ice, Victoria. I can’t hear him sniffing.'
Victoria was collecting ice chips for the bomb. ‘I was a school teacher for nineteen years, Megan. I know the sound of sniffing when I hear it.’
‘Nineteen years? Last time you said you were a teacher for sixteen years. Make up your mind.’
Victoria looked like a cobra the moment before it strikes. She hissed, ‘Don’t tell me about my own life, girl.’
‘Listen, Victoria,’ started Alex. 'Why don’t you just turn your hearing aid off for a while? Do us all a favor.'
Victoria wiped her hands on her gardening apron. 'Your mother did a terrible job raising you, Alex.’
Whoa, thought Carl. You don't talk about people's mothers.
To his credit, Alex ignored her.
Being ignored seemed to irritate Victoria even more than sniffing.
She stood up from collecting the ice, squaring off with Alex.
Here we go again, thought Carl. What is her problem?
Victoria’s mood seemed to pendulum hourly from
incredibly helpful to downright nasty. Since learning the ‘rules’ of the chamber and how important Victoria was to their survival, this worried Carl more and more.
If Victoria stops being helpful, it will cost lives.
Victoria said, 'What kind of a mother raises a child to carry a knife? What gives you the right to threaten and steal from people?’
‘I’ve never threatened or stolen from anyone,’ said Alex, looking confused by Victoria’s sudden hostility. ‘Why do you get so angry so quickly? It’s like you’re two different people. Just pick one and stick with it.’
‘The police should arrest you for carrying that knife around.'
'The police?' scoffed Alex. 'You must be joking. The police carry guns! The police live in exactly the same world as us, except they carry guns to defend themselves. They wear body armor. They have radios to call for more police with more guns. Yet they expect us to defend ourselves with harsh language.'
Alex nodded at his knife. 'Every person has the right to defend himself and his family.’
Carl discreetly gathered his ice, not wanting to get caught up.
Victoria pointed beyond the walls. 'The police have guns to protect everyone. They carry guns so we don't need to. That's what we call a civilization.'
Alex raised an eyebrow. 'Where were the police when you were abducted, Victoria?'
She didn't answer.
Alex persisted. 'And where are they now, Victoria? Can you hear them trying to save us? Well, can you?'
Victoria shook her head.
'Exactly,' said Alex. 'You can't hear them. All you can hear is me sniffing, and even that isn't real. Why don't you start thinking for yourself? Or at least start moving the ice so we don't have to bury my friend again tomorrow.'
Carl finished quickly, eager to leave the verbal firing range.
He wasn’t used to this constant conflict.
He’d lived alone since leaving prison.
He liked it that way. Nice and quiet.
His workmates provided enough company, and he had no problem filling his weekends and evenings.
If I was at home, I’d be watching TV right now.
His favorites were the wilderness survival shows. He’d watch the same ones over again if there was nothing else on. The wilderness camping trips with his father and brother were his favorite childhood memories.
He tipped his slipper-load of ice over Glen.
In a way, this chamber is a wilderness. It feels like we’ve crashed our plane into a glacier and lost everything except our clothes.
Instead of bear attacks and broken legs, they risked radiation sickness and deadly traps.
In a wilderness plane crash, Carl would have already hiked out to find help. Not to be a hero, but because he hated sharing every moment with a group.
Groups under stress imploded.
Already they resembled shuffling zombies. It could only get worse.
Carl remembered one particular documentary all about how the human brain reacted in survival situations. Essentially a malnourished human brain switched off its ethical functions. This evolutionary trait allowed people to do normally unthinkable things to survive.
It turned some people into absolute savages by unlocking their primal side.
Carl didn't want to meet his primal side.
Nor anyone else’s.
We're not there yet, he told himself.
A small voice in the back of his mind whispered back, But you're not that far away either.
#
Alex shuffled around carrying a huge chunk of ice.
'Where do you want this, Carl? Quick, my leg’s hurting.’
Finally! thought Carl. I can ask him about last night.
'There,' pointed Carl.
Alex dropped the chunk into place. He slapped icy flakes off his sleeves.
'Right,' whispered Carl. 'Tell me what Glen discovered.'
'It doesn't matter now,' Alex replied. 'We can beat it.'
'Beat what?'
'This place,' said Alex. 'Megan is right.'
Alex meant Megan's theory of detecting traps.
Carl blocked Alex's path. 'Answer my question, Alex. I'm not fucking around.'
'Look, Carl, it's not important now. All that matters is surviving. Teamwork. We're working together now. We can't mess that up.'
Glen learned something really bad, realized Carl. Alex is trying to protect the group by hiding it.
'Alex, I've been in prison. I keep secrets. Now tell me.'
Alex looked at the burial mound. ‘Glen wanted to tell you. He said he trusted you.’
‘But do you?’
Alex nodded.
‘Then prove it.’
Alex looked torn, but nodded.
‘Glen thought we’d all been put in here as punishment.’
Carl sighed. He'd hoped Alex knew something plausible.
'I thought you were smarter than that.’
Alex shrugged and walked around Carl.
Wait, thought Carl. Alex is smarter than that.
He grabbed Alex's arm. 'Why did you believe him?'
'Because he was right,' said Alex.
Carl raised an eyebrow. 'You deserve punishment?'
Alex gave a small nod.
'And Glen?'
Alex nodded again.
Shit, thought Carl. He's not joking.
'Are you sure?' asked Carl, releasing Alex's arm.
'I'm sure you don’t have the only secret worth hiding in a bottle.'
'What about the women? Why are they being punished?'
'I'm not asking,' replied Alex. ‘That sword cuts both ways.’
'We might not have to ask,' said Carl, wondering how quickly Alex would grasp his meaning.
'You’ve found another bottle,' said Alex instantly.
He's too smart for his own good, thought Carl. He pointed over Alex's shoulder.
Alex saw it. 'Shit. How did I miss that? I've been searching everywhere for them.'
Carl nodded. 'We need to know who these people are.'
'No, we don't,' countered Alex. ‘We have to focus on surviving, not turning on each other.'
‘Then why were you searching for the bottles?’
'To hide them,’ said Alex. ‘Look what happened after we opened your bottle. Everything got worse.’
Carl nodded, understanding, but not completely agreeing. 'I'll get the bottle out. You stop them coming around here. Try to find me a tool.’
Alex nodded, heading back.
'Alex?'
Alex paused, shifting the weight off his bad leg.
'What did Glen do?'
'I didn't ask.' Alex pointed at the burial mound. 'It doesn't matter now. This place got what it wanted from Glen.'
#
Carl couldn’t remember ever feeling more frustrated in his life.
The bottle refused to budge.
Victoria called out, 'Are you coming, Carl?'
Yes, you old witch. I'm coming. He grabbed Glen's empty slipper.
'What took you so long?' complained Victoria.
'I was using the drain.'
'My knee is hurting,' complained Victoria. 'I'll gather the chips into piles so you can move them.'
'Sure,' said Carl, scanning for anything like a tool. He'd already seen inside Megan's bag.
Alex dropped fresh chips into Carl's slipper.
Victoria pushed together Megan and Chrissie’s piles.
Megan asked, ‘How are you feeling now, Carl?’
‘No worse,’ he replied, filling up both slippers.
Damn it! There must be something I can dig with. Think, Carl!
His thinking felt hazy. And not just from the headache.
From the radiation?
He emptied the slippers back at the burial mound.
A silver shape tumbled out.
Carl grabbed it.
A belt buckle?
Ericsson's square belt buckle, Carl realized. It should be under all this ice.
&nb
sp; Alex.
He'd smuggled the buckle to Carl with the ice chips.
Alex is full of surprises today.
Carl tested the tool. Not an icepick, but a lot better than using his fingernails.
It would work.
When Carl next fetched ice, Alex glanced over his shoulder.
Carl gave him a small nod before they returned to business as usual, or unusual, depending on how you looked at it.
#
'I'd like to record a message,' Victoria told Megan.
Megan didn't hear.
She looked absorbed in extracting the plate from the ice.
Victoria touched her shoulder.
'Sorry, what?' asked Megan, lifting her face from her work. 'A message?'
Victoria nodded. 'Can your phone do that? Can I record a message on it?'
Megan's hand dropped to her phone. 'You mean like a goodbye message?'
'It won't be long. Just a minute or two. That's all I need.'
Alex said, 'That's a good idea. We should all record one. Just in case, Megan.'
Megan nodded and set the phone up for Victoria. 'This is the record button. Look in here. If you can see your own face on the screen then you're doing it right.'
Victoria vanished around the ice.
Carl heard murmuring for a few minutes before Victoria returned with the phone.
Megan went next. Then Alex. When Alex returned he offered Carl the phone.
'I'll pass,' said Carl.
'Really?' asked Megan.
Carl nodded.
Alex offered Chrissie the phone.
'I'm not allowed to touch Megan's phone,' said Chrissie.
Megan studied Chrissie doubtfully.
'We all deserve to leave a message,' said Alex.
'Just don't drop it,' instructed Megan. ‘Your fingers are probably numb from the ice.’
Chrissie nodded. She looked genuinely relieved.
She'll be leaving a message for her daughter, thought Carl.
Carl didn’t have children.
He’d only spoken to his brother, Joshua, twice since leaving jail. Once at his mother’s funeral, and once at his father’s.
They only shared surnames now.
But we’re still brothers. The police will have contacted him.
Joshua wouldn’t know anything about Carl’s abduction. It was doubtful the police would learn much from anyone.
MELT: A Psychological Thriller Page 15
