Alex felt the heat like a giant hand pushing down on his head. Every minute the hand pushed down harder.
Sweat drenched him from head to toe. His mouth felt gummy. He couldn't stand long without swaying.
'Okay,' said Megan, sitting on the ice again. 'We'll wait.'
Alex sat beside her.
I feel like I've missed something.
'Have you got your phone?'
Megan pulled her bag between them. 'Here it is. Why?'
'Just checking.'
Alex began breathing through his mouth again.
Megan breathed through her pullover.
'I can't just sit here thinking about that smell,' she declared. 'Talk to me, Alex. Tell me something. Let's keep talking so we know we're both still okay.'
'Good idea.'
Megan's bag was still open. Alex took out her Rubik’s cube. 'Did you know the Rubik’s cube is the most popular toy ever created?'
Megan shook her head. 'I scrambled mine on my tenth birthday. Dad offered me ten bucks to solve it.'
'And?'
'I couldn't do it,' she admitted. 'I cheated.'
'How?'
'I just reorganized the stickers.'
'Did it work?'
'No. I woke Dad up at midnight crying my eyes out. He let me keep the ten dollars for being honest.'
Alex studied the scrambled cube. 'And you still can't solve them.'
'Everyone but Ericsson tried that one,' said Megan. 'If we couldn't unscramble a toy, how could we solve this place?'
This place wasn't meant to be solved, thought Alex. It was meant to be survived.
And Megan was also wrong about the cube. Alex never gave it his full attention before. In moments he found his old rhythm. His hands began moving quicker, twisting left, right, up, down, spinning and turning. He solved the first two sides quickly. 'I'll solve it for you.'
'Why for me?'
'Looks like you've been trying for years. The stickers are nearly worn off.'
Megan repositioned herself on the melting ice. 'I've never had a proper go. I’ve only touched it twice.'
'Then why carry it in your bag?'
'Because it was Glen's.'
Alex solved the third and fourth side, so focused he took a moment to correct Megan. 'I woke up before Glen. He only had his mail. He didn't have this.'
'Then whose was it?' asked Megan, frowning at the toy. 'It wasn't Victoria or Chrissie's. Was it Carl's?'
'It's almost done.'
'Alex, wait! Where did that cube come from?'
Megan reached for the cube. 'Alex, stop!'
Alex turned away from her, making the final twist and solving the puzzle. He held the cube out sideways, far out of her reach.
'There. Done.’
The exploding Rubik’s cube blew Alex’s hand apart.
MEGAN
Chapter Thirty-two
His body shielded her.
The explosion threw him sideways, knocking her backward and leaving Alex face down.
The impact, the heat, the ringing in her ears — Megan could barely orientate herself.
'Alex! Alex!'
Her own voice sounded distant.
She stood slowly and looked at the chain.
We’re not chained together anymore. The shackle came off his wrist. Oh, my God. What happened to him?
Megan didn't see until she rolled him over.
Oh, Jesus Christ. Jesus...Jesus Christ.
Then she saw the protruding bones and raw flesh.
Half of his hand was missing.
The thumb, index finger and ring finger of his left hand had been blown completely off. Rubik’s cube shrapnel had torn into his side.
Megan scanned the chamber desperately.
A tourniquet. I need a tourniquet!
She spotted Alex’s track pants. She dashed to them and wrenched out the drawstring.
When she got back, Alex was blinking at the ceiling.
‘What happened?’ he croaked.
‘Hush,’ Megan said. ‘Just lie still.’
Before Megan could stop him, Alex lifted his arm and looked at his mangled hand. He stared at his hand as though he’d picked up something awful. Something he couldn’t throw away.
‘Oh, fff…fff…fuck.’
With his other hand, he plucked some plastic from his side and studied it.
‘The cube exploded,’ he said, as though he’d just figured out another complicated puzzle. ‘The stupid fucking Rubik’s cube exploded.’
Megan lashed the drawstring around Alex’s arm below the wrist. She wound it round and round, tighter and tighter, ending with a fierce knot.
‘The bandage,’ Alex said, his voice shaky with shock. ‘In my…hoodie.’
Megan scanned the chamber for the hoodie.
There.
She found the hoodie and tore open the bandage wrapper with her teeth.
‘Quickly,’ Alex urged. ‘It’s starting to hurt.’
Megan worked fast. Alex arched his back and kicked one leg, but he didn’t cry out as Megan wrapped the bandage down tightly on his raw flesh.
So little of Alex’s hand remained that Megan covered the entire wound twice, tying off the bandage at his wrist.
Blood instantly showed through the bandage, but the tourniquet was working.
‘I’m sorry,’ winced Alex. ‘I’m such an idiot.’
‘No,’ said Megan, suddenly feeling light-headed. She braced both hands on the floor as the chamber started spinning.
What’s happening?
Her vision blurred.
Megan managed to reach one hand out toward Alex before she passed out.
#
Tsk…..…tsk…….tsk…
Tsk…..…tsk….…tsk…
Megan came awake.
The air was scorching.
She pushed herself up.
Alex was lying on his side, lifting his knife up and then striking down onto the ice with what little strength the heat hadn’t sapped away. His side was covered in blood from his armpit to his hip.
‘Alex!’
He turned his head. The heat was so intense he was squinting.
He looked beyond exhausted. Inhumanly exhausted.
‘You passed out,’ he wheezed. ‘I couldn’t wake you.’
She pointed at his side. ‘What did you do?’
He nodded to a little pile of Rubik’s cube shrapnel. He’d pulled all the plastic shrapnel from his side.
None had penetrated deeply. It just looked terrible. The agony from his hand had to feel much worse.
‘How long was I out?’
He rolled onto his back. His body had been blocking her view of the ice.
‘That long.’
The ice was barely an inch thick now — just a shallow frozen puddle. The hatch handle protruded up through the ice.
Alex dropped the knife.
‘Your turn. We’ve only got minutes.’
Megan crawled over to the ice, took the knife and began pounding. Alex had been working at the edge, but Megan used both hands and all her strength to strike the ice in the middle.
Crack!
The shallow ice fractured between her legs.
My bodyweight cracked the ice, not the knife.
Standing, she stomped down on the ice. It shattered under her shoes like glass.
In seconds she kicked all the broken ice away from the hatch.
It’s clear.
Feeling dizzy, she dropped to her knees.
I can’t pass out again. We’re both dead if I can’t do this.
She grasped the hatch handle and pulled.
Nothing happened.
‘Oh, God, no,’ she cried.
It didn't budge.
She wiped stinging sweat from her eyes and looked closer.
A keypad?
A keypad lay recessed under the handle.
A code?
I need a code?
I don't have a code.
The heat
was overwhelming now. Her head was spinning. Every breath burned her lips, her throat, her lungs. She felt the heat pressing into her ears and cooking her eyes. Her skin wanted to shrink and split open like rotten fruit. She felt her entire body broiling in her own sweat. The chamber had truly become an oven. She needed to open this hatch right now, or die.
The code must be hidden.
She couldn't search every artifact for a hidden code. They only had seconds left.
Kneeling on the hatch, Megan yelled, 'What should I do, Alex! It needs a code! Help me!'
She slumped forward, slapping down her hands on the hatch in frustration.
I’m so close.
She lowered her head and tried to remember anything code-like they'd found.
She was swaying, ready to drop.
Think. Numbers. Where have you seen numbers? Keep your eyes open!
‘Megan.’
She looked up.
Alex was pointing at her chest.
‘Your tag.’
She snatched the steel tag swinging on its chain. Just like the first time she’d seen it, only one line was visible.
It read:
EXIT: 3202
The code! I’m wearing it. Oh, please, God, let this work.
Megan entered the code. When she pressed the last button, the keypad lit up bright green.
CLUNK
She hauled on the handle.
Nothing.
She stood and pulled using all the strength in her legs and back.
The hatch began to move…very, very slowly.
Still lying on the floor, Alex reached out and pushed the hatch from underneath with one hand.
Together, they swung the hatch up and open.
It halted upright.
Megan's senses overloaded.
Bright light and cold air engulfed her. She dropped to her knees, gripping the hatch, feeling the fresh air rush around her.
A full minute passed as the cold air slowly restored her senses.
She opened her eyes.
Sunlight?
She squinted down through the hatchway.
They were waiting for her.
Megan counted more than twenty people peering up through the hatch.
They all wore white protective suits and black gas masks. Half of them carried cleaning equipment.
A long metal ladder led down to them.
Where are we?
Megan peered sideways through the hatchway. She saw blue-green waves beyond a ship’s railing. She smelled the ocean. She saw life preservers.
Waves? We're at sea? No wonder they couldn't find us.
Movement near the ladder caught her attention.
It's her. The psycho cleaner from the toilet!
Even from twenty-five feet up, Megan recognized the woman who removed her mask.
'You abducted me!' Megan yelled down.
The woman nodded.
'Why is everyone wearing masks?' Megan yelled again.
The woman waved up at the chamber. 'For their own safety, Megan. We work with dangerous materials to prepare everything. You of all people should know that. Can you climb down? We'll help if you're injured.'
'No,' Megan yelled back. 'I'm just catching my breath.'
The ladder wasn’t directly attached to the chamber. It ended almost a foot short of the hatchway.
Megan asked Alex, ‘Can you climb down?’
He nodded. ‘Just let me cool down for a minute.’
Megan turned and lowered herself awkwardly onto the ladder, being careful with the chain.
I'm out. I'm really out.
She hugged the ladder, peering over her shoulder.
This is a freight ship. We were in a tower on a huge freight ship. But why didn’t we feel the tower swaying? Why couldn’t we feel the waves?
Through the ladder rungs she saw what resembled a giant pendulum anchored to the base of the chamber.
I see what they’ve done.
The tower elevated the chamber from the deck so the counterweight could stabilize the chamber.
The chamber moves on the tower, keeping the floor level. That’s why the ladder doesn’t touch it.
It probably wouldn’t work in high seas, but it had worked so far.
Megan looked over her right shoulder and saw two other towers protruding up from the deck of the modified ship. Both towers had the same counterweight arrangements.
More chambers? More abductees? How many people are they torturing on this ship?
Megan imagined other terrified victims. She imagined acid-corroded faces, electrocutions, toxin-induced fits that caused people to bash their own brains out. God only knew what other horrors they’d invented. Probably things she couldn't even imagine.
The chain weighed heavily on her wrist.
Maybe they turned on each other, like we did.
She turned her face away, looking over her other shoulder.
Land.
Just two or three kilometers away. She could easily swim that far.
But I couldn’t swim wearing a shackle. It would drown me.
She called down, 'You murdered my friends!'
‘No, Megan. We're not monsters.’
‘You were punishing us!’ Megan shouted. ‘You were punishing us for what humans have done to the Earth! For what we’ve done to each other.’
The woman put both of her hands on the ladder as though trying to make contact with Megan through the thick steel.
‘We're trying to save our entire species, Megan. Their sacrifice will save millions of lives.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Climate change, Megan. You’ve been lied to. It isn’t what you’ve been led to believe. It’s not a process. It’s not slow. It’s an event. It’s about to accelerate rapidly. More rapidly than you can imagine. In the next twelve months, civilization as you know it will collapse.’
‘Collapse? From climate change?’
‘Global warming is just the burning fuse, Megan. It’s just the precursor. The real catastrophe is barely months away now. The real catastrophe will start when every crop in the world fails and seven billion people start running out of food. Once the disease outbreaks begin, we’re going to witness entire nations collapsing or going up in flames. We’ll see riots so large they’re visible from space, Megan.’
Megan struggled to absorb what she was hearing.
‘You’re insane,’ she yelled down at the woman. ‘How is torturing us going to save anyone! If this is true, you should be telling people!’
The woman shook her head. ‘We need to know what to prepare for, Megan. We can’t predict how people will react when their entire world begins to crumble apart. That’s why we needed to study you. You were thrust into a world with limited resources that collapsed around you. We saw your confusion. We saw you rally. We saw who gave up and who endured. We saw you turn on each other. We pushed you as hard as we could. We need to know how people will react when the entire world is faced with the same level of suffering you just experienced. We need to know what will happen. What kind of people will survive? Who will be left to work with? This experiment is teaching us. We recorded it all.’
Megan had never heard anything more absurd in her life.
‘That’s crazy!’ she yelled. ‘Torturing the seven of us won’t show you how the world will react! What happened in that chamber is nothing like the outside world!’
The woman nodded.
‘This isn’t our only experiment, Megan. This isn’t our only ship. Our scientists say these studies are vital. We can only pray they are right.’
Alex was right, thought Megan. The chamber was a model of the outside world. But it wasn’t just testing us about the past; it was helping these lunatics try to predict the future.
‘So you weren’t punishing us?’
‘No.’
‘But what about our bottles? Our secrets?’
‘They were just catalysts to speed up the experiment, Megan. During the col
lapse there will be conflict. Distrust. Paranoia. Violence. We planted the secrets in the ice to challenge your group’s cohesion. We needed to witness if you would put the past behind you and work together or turn on each other. Everyone has secrets, Megan. Everyone. Your group had some darker secrets than usual, so I can understand why you thought this was punishment, but we only used them to speed things along. It provided us invaluable data.’
Alex was right about that too, thought Megan. The secrets were just there to cause conflict.
Megan had only one question left. She felt like she was asking for the entire group.
‘Then why did you choose us?’ she yelled. ‘Why me? Why any of us? We were all just normal people!’
‘The entire world is made up of normal people, Megan. It’s normal people who will shape the world when everything falls apart.’
Megan took a moment to comprehend.
‘Wait — we were chosen because we were normal? That’s it? That’s all? Normal?’
The woman nodded.
Megan’s anger was building with every insane answer from this woman’s mouth.
‘What gives you the right to do this?’ Megan yelled. ‘Who even are you people? You should all be in jail. You should be the ones locked inside these chambers, not us!’
The woman waved to all the people behind her, waiting in their white suits and black masks. ‘We work for people with enough power and influence to know the truth. They don’t want to die. They don’t want their families to die. They have all agreed to do whatever it takes to secure their safety. It’s not a selfish motivation, Megan. We will help humanity rebuild before it’s thrust back into the dark ages. Can’t you see how important this is?’
Megan tried to imagine people with ‘power and influence’. Does she mean the government? The President? The richest people in the world?
Probably all of the above. Everyone wants his family to survive.
The woman added, ‘The experiments have another purpose, Megan. They’re giving us survivors. They are giving us people like you who won’t ever again repeat the mistakes of the past. You will ride out the worst of the collapse in one of our safe locations. You might find yourself eating dinner with presidents. You will get to live in safety while the world falls apart. You’ve earned that.’
Megan pointed at the other towers. 'Who else survived?'
MELT: A Psychological Thriller Page 29
