“The music and heat should let us talk without scaring them,” she said. She turned to Lyle, briefly, then back to the road. The headlights illuminated dancing snow. Not much beyond that. Dark ground stretched out in front of them. Then a sign emerged on the right. “Slow,” Jerry said. Eleanor slowed. The sign read steamboat, 19 miles.
“Dr. Martin, we’re not going to stop until we get to town,” Eleanor said and punched the accelerator.
“Sounds good to me.”
“Well, look who is suddenly agreeable,” Jerry said.
“Jerry, stop. Listen, Lyle, Jerry and I discussed it and agreed we’ve got to get these passengers somewhere safer and we’ve got to, in general, look for help. We need you to cooperate. It’s too complicated to be divided in a crisis situation.
“But I would welcome your insights. Do you know why these children are immune?”
“I work best at gunpoint.”
“Why don’t you try to knock it out of my hand again?” Jerry said.
Lyle stared straight ahead.
“That’s what I thought,” the first officer said. “Y’know, goddamn if this isn’t exactly why we have a Second Amendment.”
“Jerry, what are you talking about,” Eleanor said and sounded like what she meant was Stop talking. “What’s your medical opinion?” she asked Lyle.
“No, I don’t know why they’re immune.”
“Just hold on, Eleanor,” Jerry said. “We knew the shit was going to go down at some point. We have to be able to protect ourselves.”
“You’re gonna shoot the virus, Jerry?” Eleanor wiped the inside of the window in front of her, smudging the condensation.
“This is just one topic where we’re going to have to agree to disagree, Eleanor,” Jerry said. “I’m sure you’d at least agree we’re lucky to have this with us right now.”
“Jerry, the whole world nearly came apart the last two years. It’s been a shooting gallery in this country.” She paused and gritted her teeth. This couldn’t be more irrelevant and she couldn’t believe she was being drawn into his narrow world.
“Stop, please, the fighting,” Alex said. In the backseat, she had her arm around the girl, who had her hands over her ears.
“Dr. Martin, what’s your latest medical opinion?” Eleanor repeated.
Lyle shrugged, too imperceptibly for them to see. He looked out the right side of the front window at what appeared to be a barn, at least something that shape, no lights, and it quickly disappeared from view.
“What did you see in the plane?” the pilot pressed him.
“More of the same,” Lyle said without elaborating. Then, “Slow down.”
“We already told you, Dr. Martin, you’re not giving orders,” Jerry said.
“Suit yourself.”
Eleanor slowed down.
“Eleanor, I thought…”
“Look.”
She’d come nearly to a stop, and no wonder why: on the other side of the freeway, a car sat flipped on its roof. It looked to be a boxy four-door, like a Honda. The front of the car had slid off the road and tilted into a ditch.
From the backseat, the girl from the airplane let out a sob.
Eleanor put the truck in park and unlatched her belt.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Jerry asked.
“Jerry…” she said.
“What?”
“That’s the last time you’re going to use that tone with me,” she said.
Lyle made sure to keep his head turned forward, fearing that if he turned to see the humiliation on Jerry’s face, the first officer would put a bullet in his head. Eleanor opened the vehicle’s door, bringing in a rush of frigid air. Her foot crunched on the fresh snow. She walked to the overturned car.
“She’s gonna get it herself,” Jerry whispered, barely audible to Lyle. “Eleanor, please…”
The pilot leaned to the side, peered inside the car. She backpedaled.
“Shit, shit!” Jerry spat.
Eleanor turned and nearly ran back to the pickup, slipping as she reached the door, saving herself from falling only by grabbing the door handle. She climbed inside.
“Are you okay?” Jerry said. “Or do you not like that tone, either?”
Eleanor put the truck in drive and punched the accelerator. Her hands gripped the wheel and still shook. The cab felt like it might explode with tension.
“She was…” Eleanor started; she couldn’t seem to get the words out. Her sharp exhales puffed into tiny clouds. “She was—”
“Smiling,” Lyle said. “Was she smiling?”
“Yes, yes. Smiling. Upside down, blood on her face and forehead. But smiling. Jesus. How did you know?”
“I just realized. It just hit me. So were a lot of the people in the plane.”
A sob came from the back. Now it was the boy.
“What, Tyler?” asked Alex. “What’s the matter?”
“My dad. He was smiling.” This seemed to just crush the little guy, the idea that his father could have become comatose with a smile on his face.
“This is a nightmare,” Eleanor said. It wasn’t anything revelatory, except the way she said it, the recognition, finally spoken aloud, that an inconceivable reality had dawned or, rather, that they’d landed inside of it.
“Not usually part of the immune response,” Lyle muttered.
“Maybe they were happy to meet their maker,” Jerry said. “Eleanor, do you feel okay? Seriously, any—”
“No symptoms, if that’s what you mean.”
On the right, they passed a green sign: steamboat springs, elevation 6695. Then a yellow one advertising e.m. light & sons. And then, a half a minute later, an isolated housing development called Heritage Park with houses set back at least a quarter mile from the road. One house had a light on and Lyle could see that Eleanor was tempted to turn down the road, but she persisted.
“Dr. Martin—” Eleanor said.
“Call me Lyle. Was the radio on?” he answered.
“Where?”
“In the car back there.”
“Why do you ask?”
“I…” His voice tapered off. Then he reached into his back pocket and withdrew the golden-colored metallic rectangle he’d found attached to the flight deck door. “Anyone know what this is?” He held it up in front of him.
“Where did you get that?” Jerry asked.
“I found it in the plane.” Lyle decided not to specify; maybe one of these people put it on the door and could explain it. “Do you know what it is?” He directed his question to Jerry.
Jerry took it in his hand. “A memory card or something like that. No idea.”
“So it’s not instrumental in flying?” Lyle asked.
“Was it in the flight deck?” Jerry asked.
“Near there.”
They stared at it. It looked almost like it could be a mezuzah holder, the little rectangular boxes that Jews put inside their front doors. But gold colored. “A good luck charm of some kind?” Lyle muttered.
“May I see it?” Alex asked. “I do the tech thing.”
Jerry shrugged and handed it back to her.
While she looked, Eleanor said, “Lyle, you keep talking about the immune system, immune response. I’m assuming you mean that the body is fighting off something. Do I have this right?”
“Are you asking me if that’s what’s happening now?”
“I guess.”
“I’m not sure. It looks to me like these… bodies are fighting in the way you would if you got a virus. To answer your question more directly, the immune system, obviously, is the body’s defense. It is miraculous. Within seconds, it can sense a foreign organism in a body and begin to mount a defense.”
“What does this have to do with—”
“Please, Jerry, let him talk,” Eleanor said. “I’m sorry, Jerry. I’m asking because I’m trying to figure out what to do when we get to town. What if we see a bunch of these people? Are we worried about infection? Can we help them?”