THE RABBIT WARREN

by

Rus Morgan

With an unidentified sense of foreboding, Doctor Charles Fricke opened his bedroom window. Cold stars and a colder moon hung over the old wooden bridge that stretched between his property and the main road. The pastoral scene did not ease the feeling of dread. Up later than usual, he pulled his robe snug around his rotund middle. He shivered as the light, frigid breeze rustled the leaves of the Sycamore tree outside his window. The midnight breeze fingered the curtains and flowed past him. He only knew something felt wrong. It was a perfectly normal frosty winter's night with nothing but hoar frost on the grass and a shiny spider web hanging from the tree.

It was a month into his retirement from being an EPA Geophysicist and he was having trouble establishing a life without the drudge of daily routine.

Well, tomorrow is just another day in my retirement, he thought.

That's the counsel his daughter, Vera Constantine gave him that day at lunch. She was a Third Grade Teacher at St Ignatius. He had complained of the inactivity while she toyed with her salad.

“Dad, you can travel, you can read – you can volunteer.”

He twirled his wine glass between his fingers. “I'm only seventy puddin. I've always been involved -- I need something more challenging than that…”

She laughed. “You can baby sit the kids anytime you want – that will challenge even you.”

She had hugged him and kissed him fondly on the cheek and made her way back to her afternoon classes.

He looked again at the heavens. They offered no solace. He closed the window and went to bed.

#####

Shortly after he drifted into restless sleep, a small, fiery, pinpoint of light raced across the face of the frigid winter moon.

It arced down, with purpose. It punched a neat little hole deep into the ground. It hit in the middle of the rabbit warren in the back corner of the play yard at the elite St Ignatius Day School .

The shock raised a little mound a couple of inches high like a miniature volcano.

The rabbits scrambled, helter skelter, tumbling over the top of each other in their efforts to escape the impact zone. They fled away from the four inch hole and coalesced into a nipping, squealing pile. After a few moments, when nothing further happened, they spread out, hopping on muscular legs to the pile of left over greens in one corner of the pen.

The night was crisp and just above freezing but not unbearably cold for a fur clad rabbit. They nibbled freely at the greens and peacefully thumped around the fence line looking for the few remaining sprigs of lawn.

A tiny spiral…just a wisp -- of smoky fog trailed up and out of the hole. It caressed a brown and white rabbit who squealed in agony and shot sideways, bouncing violently off the steel mesh that surrounded the pen. The rabbit rolled off the wire onto its side, kicked desperately and then lay still.

Its passing went unnoticed as did the shiny lip that began to form around the mouth of the hole. Like a margarita glass rimmed with salt the hole grew a crystalline crust which slowly began to spread evenly out from the hole. It did not rise above the ground but spread smoothly like a thin coating of frost on the grass. As the frost slowly progressed the grass popped like snapping toothpicks.

At first one rabbit, then another, would raise one foot, then the other as though they had stepped into boiling water or onto frigid ice. They squealed and bounced abruptly away from the advancing sheen. Soon all the rabbits were bounding and squealing in pain. Quickly they began launching themselves against the wire mesh. to get away from the sheen. When they flew back into the middle of the pen they went rigid in whatever position they landed.

A thin mist rose knee high throughout the pen. The creeping frost reached the edge of the warren and the last remaining rabbit stopped and ceased to breathe. Through the mist you could see the floor of the pen littered with the grotesquely posed, shiny little carcasses.

The backyard of St Ignatius turned brutally cold.

#####

At four-thirty that morning Caretaker Lucas Sanduski rolled his battered Jeep to a stop in the front parking lot and thought it was a good thing he had brought his jacket. The weather man had called for crisp but not cold -- but cold it was as he left the Jeep. He looked at the glistening marble steps leading up to the double doors of St Ignatius. He drew a breath of pride as he did every morning when he arrived. He alone was responsible for this building. He alone controlled the air and heat. He alone set the tone and rhythm of this building's existence. For all its twenty years he had been its caregiver and he kept his treasure spotless.

From the Jeep, he pulled a crate of assorted cast off greens from the corner grocery. He carried it over to the service door just to the right and below the big double doors and let himself in through the lower service door.

Ten steps down into the basement and forty steps down the hall was the door to the boiler room. The thermostat was always preset to jump the heat from nighttime conservation to daytime comfort but something was not functioning correctly. It was far too cold. He had to check the furnace. He took off his gloves, marveled at the crispness in the air and found the furnace on and normal. He went to the electric panel and was about to flip the master switch to awaken the sleeping building but the switch was sharply cold. He swore, put his gloves back on and flipped the switch.

The last thing he did in the afternoon was minister to the coffee pot so now he reversed the process and watched it begin to drop it's healthy brew. Although not deeded into his job description making coffee and having it available throughout the day was a simple little voluntary way to let the faculty know how much he liked this job.

Now that there was heat and light his friends had to be cared for. The rabbits were actually a student project but the bulk of the daily labor fell on his willing shoulders. Rabbits needed daily changes of water and rations of feed. These things he handled before the faculty and students arrived so he could be free to minister to any minor ills discovered in the building during the day. The alfalfa rabbit feed was kept in a small room from which he could step right out into the back play yard. He fluffed an armful of the legume on top of the greens and stepped into the yard carrying the crate. The moon, blue white and lonely stared coldly back at him from over the south fence.

Something was wrong, he thought. The grass cracked, crackled and popped as he stepped on it. He knew from experience that live, standing grass only did that when the temperature was in the low double digits. He thought there was no way it was that cold out here in October. He stopped and listened for a few moments, searching for the quiet sounds of activity in the rabbit warren a hundred feet away. At this time in the morning someone was always eating and someone else was always mounting but none of the sounds of munching or rutting reached his ears.

He was suddenly aware his feet were very cold.

He snapped and popped his way over to the rabbit pen. Before he reached it he noticed that the air began to bite him and the closer to the pen the colder it got. He could see the low mist hanging inside the wire and could just make out rabbit shapes through it. Struck by the lack of activity, he set the crate down and made his usual cluck to the rabbits let them know he was there with food.

Not one moved.

Not one hungry rabbit hit the door eager for the fresh green goodies he always brought.

He twisted the latch and carried the crate into the pen. He bent over and set it on the ground. His breath flowed sluggishly from his mouth in a congealed, heavy mist that suddenly froze. In the same instant the muscles in his legs went rigid. Sharp, mind numbing pain started in his ankles and flew upward to his shoulders. In that instant, before he could draw another breath, his eyes glazed over and his next breath turned solid inside his chest.

#####

Third Grade Teacher Vera Constantine, was a Teacher with a mission which drew her to St Ignatius early this day.

She was taking her Third Graders on a field trip to a nursery so she pulled in at six a.m. to get things ready. With her in the SUV were her own children; Rosemary a proud Third Grader and one very sleepy Cliffy Boy, a First Grader.

Rosemary jumped from the car and ran around the other side to open Cliffy's door. Cliffy roused enough to lock it and muttered something like “I'm staying here.”

Vera said, “Let him be Rosie, we'll wake him up in time for school.”

Vera held the door open for Rosemary and the two went down into the lighted basement. She went to the coffee pot and poured a cup of the fresh brew. She and Rosemany went upstairs to the Third Grade room. Vera sat the steaming mug on her desk, stuffed her gloves into her coat and hung it in the coatroom. She rubbed her hands together, blew on them and wondered at the uncommon cold so early in the year.

Rosemary shuddered in the cold. “Mommy, why is it so cold? I should have worn my heavy coat.”

“Mr. Sanduski must have forgotten to turn up the thermostat,” She said, “I'll go check it.”

She paused at the window overlooking the play yard and her eyes went immediately to the rabbit pen. She knew Mr. Sanduski was here; she had parked alongside his jeep. It was common knowledge he cared for the animals as soon as he arrived so she was not surprised to see him bent over in the mist out in the middle of the pen.

The sky was going to dirty gray just prior to first light. It was light enough to see the mist was heaviest in the enclosure but it also covered a good part of the yard. She turned back to the welcome warmth of the hot cup and sipped it. She rummaged in her desk and found a package of instant chocolate.

“Rosie, take this package and go down to the basement and make yourself a cup of hot chocolate. Fill the cup full of water and set the microwave for a minute and a half. If it boils over be sure to wipe the inside of the microwave clean.”

“I know how to keep it clean just like ours at home,” Rosie said tapping her foot.

Vera affectionately smoothed the child's hair. “I know you do honey but that's what Mom's are for – to remind you. When you get it made come back up here. In the meantime I'm going to slip out into the back yard and check on Mr. Sanduski.”

Vera went back into her desk and came up with colored name badges, pencils, a magic marker and two cheap sets of Walkie Talkies. The Walkie Talkies would be doled out for restroom runs.

She stepped to the window. It was glistening with frost along the bottom edge. She could still see Mr. Sanduski bent over feeding his charges out in the pen but – strange – he hadn't moved. She watched him more intently. In the growing light she realized she saw no movement in the pen. Usually rabbits were hopping around, greeting him with his morning greens and the beginning of another day. She focused all her attention on the pen for thirty long seconds and saw not one sign of movement – and Sanduski was still bent over there in the same position.

She opened the back door to go out into the yard but a blast of cold air gave her second thoughts and she went back into the coatroom for her coat. Outside the grass crunched as she stepped across the lawn. The cold hit her legs instantly and drew up between her thighs. It became more intense and began to bite her as she walked.

She reached the gate gasping for breath. Steam flowed in a solid patch from her mouth. The gate was open and she stumbled in. She tapped Mr. Sanduski on the back. He did not move. He and his rabbits were life sized statues of solid ice. Her last thought was to turn away.

#####

Rosemary came up from the basement with her steaming cup of chocolate. She put it on her mother's desk and noticed Vera's cup of coffee. Rosemary felt the cup. It was still hot enough to drink. Mommy will be so cold out there in the yard she would love it if I took it right out to her, she thought.

#######

At seven-thirty, Betty Morrison pulled into the parking space reserved for ‘The Principle' and stepped out of her car into the very cold air. A timid orange sun was failing in its struggle to shed some warmth. She was pleased to see most of the staff was already present. In her mind it was fitting that Staff arrive before Management. She glanced at the armload of manuals on her back seat and looked around the parking lot for a student to commandeer. Having no such luck she reluctantly picked them up and marched up the marble steps. She immediately noticed how uncomfortably cold the building was.

Sanduski had warned her last year that the combination furnace and air conditioner had always been inadequate and now was on its final journey. She had listened to him but was more than reluctant to yield and include a replacement in her yearly budget to the School Board. A little known fact in her contract was the clause about her bonus being inversely connected to her expenditures. . Good Heavens, it was cold. This might be the year she would have to give in and order the new HVAC

The building yielded no sound but her own footfalls as she marched briskly along the hall toward her office. The oversized golden knob that adorned her door was slick so she pulled her right glove off so she could turn it. The cold knob stung her hand and she drew back in surprise. This was ridiculous. Sanduski must have let the furnace go out. She sat her books down and marched down the hall to the door leading down to the basement. His car was in the lot and this might just be a good time to make an example of his forgetfulness.

Mr. Sanduski was not in his usual haunts. She poured a tepid cup of coffee, tasted it and sat it down in disgust. The least he could do would be to keep the coffee hot. He must be outside. She went to the back yard window and wiped away the frost.

What was everyone doing in the play yard clustered around the rabbit pen? Those confounded animals never had been anything but pests and now they were demanding the attention of the whole faculty. She jerked open the outer door and went grumbling toward the glistening crowd. She hadn't taken twenty five steps into the cold before her body gave her rapid signals it was in trouble. Her breath seemed to be a solid thing in the middle of her chest. Her lungs stung and her eyelids began sticking together. Suddenly she was excruciatingly cold: then as quickly a great peace came over her and the world turned into a warm, fuzzy place.

#####

At eight ten the first bus arrived and dumped its load of thirty-two energetic pre teens into the parking lot. They ascended the stairs in a noisy group intent on but one mission. Mr. Sanduski had put out the word yesterday that at least one litter of new bunnies would be ready for viewing and these were the rare chocolate and whites with the floppy ears.

#####

At eight twenty-two the second of three buses curved around the parking lot and came to a stop in front of the gleaming steps. It's twin exhausts belched heavy fog into the air. It disgorged twenty-five boisterous youngsters and drove out of the parking lot toward the bus barn. The children stormed loudly up the cold steps and headed down the hall to the back door leading to the play yard.

#####

A little late but still in time to make the first class the third bus arrived in a cloud of steam and ejected it's eager horde. As children do, they ignored the cold and lack of activity and dashed along the hall and out the back door into the play yard.

#####

The third bus roused Cliffy, who was getting his sleep out. He had just learned to tell time and Mommy had hung a battery driven clock on the front visor so he could check it when he wanted. It read nine o'clock plus ten minutes. His First Grade class started at nine thirty and it was time to go in. He reluctantly climbed down from the SUV and slammed the door.

#######

“Nine-one-one. Can I help you?”

“I'm stuck in the building by myself and I'm cold – and I'm scared.”

The dispatcher checked her caller ID. It put the caller in the elite St. Ignatius private school. It was nine fifteen a.m. “Where are you little girl?”

“I'm not a girl, I'm a boy.”

The dispatcher grimaced. “I'm sorry young man, where are you?”

“St Natius”

“What's your name and how old are you?”

“ Clifton , Clifton Constantine, and I am six and a half. You can call me Cliffy”

The Dispatcher smiled. “Well, Cliffy, where is everybody?”

“They all went out to the rabbit pens. I'm lergic so I stayed inside.”

The dispatcher looked up at her supervisor monitoring the call and shrugged. “I'm sure they'll all be back in again very shortly, honey. In the meantime…”

“…They're not moving.”

A flag went up in the Dispatcher's mind. “What do you mean, they're not moving?”

“Everybody is just standing in the play yard – and they're shiny.”

The Dispatcher stopped for a moment, digesting this information. “You mean every one is just standing there talking?”

The little ones voice began to quiver. “No, they are not ‘just' standing there. They're all standing still like they were talking but nobody is saying anything; and they are all shiny.”

“Now take it easy honey. Where are you?”

“In the Princepuls office.”

“Can you tell me the room number?”

“It says two twenny five on the outside.”

“Thanks sweetheart, I'm going to send a police man over there right away to check, okay? In the meantime I want you to stay on the phone with me – you promise to do that?”

“Yes.”

“Cliffy, honey, can you tell me what you look like?”

“I'm a friccan American, that's what.”

The Dispatcher winced; a foul mouthed tyke was something she really didn't need today.

“Alright sweetie, you stay on the line, okay?”

“Yes.”

The dispatcher punched mute then tapped keys on her console. “This is Dispatch -- any car close to St Ignatius, come back.”

Almost immediately came a laconic reply, “This is four sixty five. We're ETA five minutes…”

“Proceed on a two ten. Caller is Cliffy Constantine, a six year old male with a fifteen year old mouth presently in the Principle's Office. Investigate and report.”

“This is four sixty five on our way.” came the bored reply.

“Roger four sixty five.” The Dispatcher punched mute again and smiled into the headset. “Now, Cliffy a policeman is on the way. How about you tell me about your favorite cartoon character…”

#####

It was five year Patrolman Arnold Frazee's day to drive. His partner, Rookie P'Diddy Larson (whose real name was Lamar; but he was a dead ringer for the Rap Star except he outweighed him by a hundred pounds) finished noting the time in his log book and looked up just as the police car pulled into the hazy parking lot. All the reserved spaces were full indicating that the entire faculty was in the building. The patrolman noted a light fog almost like winter frost standing in the lot and blurring the edges of the cars. The windows of all the cars were hazed making it impossible to see if any were occupied.

Arnold stopped the squad car in front of the steps and left the lights on. He triggered the radio and reported their position. Dispatch came back instantly and still placed the little boy in the Principle's Office. The patrolman opened their doors and stepped out but the frigid air sent both of them scurrying into the back seat for their service jackets..

Arnold shivered and swore as he zipped his jacket, “Jesus! It is cold over here.”

P'Diddy dropped his night stick into the holster on his belt and was already bounding up the steps. Not overly tall but extremely wide, P'Diddy was the newest patrolman and one of only five black cops on the force so he was always quick to move and prove he was capable. He took hold of the handle on the big double doors and noted even through his gloved hands the handle felt exceptionally cold.

The hallway was empty, soundless and a bit hazy and it was only slightly warmer in here than it was in the parking lot. He stopped and spoke into his shoulder mike. “Dispatch, this is four sixty five. We are in the building.”

“Roger, caller is still on the phone in the Principle's Office, Room two twenty five.”

“Roger.”

In spite of being exceptionally cold and exceptionally quiet and having the slight haze in the hall, the building looked normal. The officers fanned to left and right checking the room names and numbers.

P'Diddy shuddered in the cold. Twin jets of fog flowed from his nose and emphasized his words. “The super must have let the furnace go out last night. This place is like an icebox…”

”…more like a freezer,” Arnold said, “The room has gotta be right over there, I'm just passing two twenty three.”

They stepped warily into two twenty five together and saw a pert black youngster sitting on the edge of an overstuffed chair with a phone stuck in his ear. In spite of the wintertime garb he was wearing, he was shivering.

P'Diddy bent down and asked, “May I have the phone?”

The youngster nodded his head and offered the phone. Paddy said, “Dispatch -- we have just located a handsome little black boy (and he winked at Cliffy) in the Principle's office. He is alive and well. We are continuing our investigation. Out.”

“Roger.” said Dispatch and could be seen to slap herself on the side of her own head – African American was what the little boy had meant.

P'Diddy took Cliffy by the hand. “Show me where all these people are standing and not talking.”

Cliffy led them down the hall to the backside of the building where a set of frosted windows overlooked the play yard. Many times he had glanced up at these windows while playing in the yard and seen Principle Morrison watching the activities.

Arnold and P'Diddy rubbed their gloves over the window and scored a round hole in the thick frost so that each could see out. The play yard was about a hundred fifty feet wide by one hundred feet deep and covered in a thick haze. A weak, totally ineffective sun filtered timidly down through the haze. From the middle of the rabbit pen in the back corner up to within fifty feet of the back door of the school they could see the bleak sunlight glistening on the adults and school children who were clustered in groups.

Most of the adults were in the rabbit pen. On the way to the pen were three groups of children all apparently rushing to the pen. All were caught in mid flight. All were motionless.

There was not a sound in the yard.

P'Diddy ran for the back door and grabbed the door knob but couldn't make it budge. Arnold screamed “Don't open that door” just as Larson was about to throw his formidable weight into it so he could jerk it open and run into the yard.

Arnold leaned back against the wall and triggered his shoulder mike. “Dispatch you are not going to believe this….”

“What's happening Arnold ?”

“Call the lieutenant and I'll tell you.”

“Is the little boy safe?”

“Yes! Dammit! Get me the lieutenant.”

“Hoover here, Frazee what you got out there?”

“Jesus Lieutenant, it's colder than a well digger's hootchie over here and -- you are not going to believe this but P'Diddy will back me up – all the teachers and students are out in the school yard and they are all standing still – and they all look frozen.”

The Lieutenant's voice dripped sarcasm. “Well why don't you go out there and sort it out -- that's what you get paid for.”

“This don't look right Lieutenant. It looks like anybody who enters that play yard stays there. Jesus Christ SIR! There are nearly a hundred children out there and not one of them is making a move or a sound – you gotta get over here.”

“If you are wrong Frazee, your ass is grass, I'm on my way.”

#####

There was a bell ringing somewhere. Somewhere in time he realized it was the telephone. It was unusual to get a call before he was ready to start his day. Irritated, he reached it.

“Yup?”

He could feel the tension and pressure on the other end of the line. It was a living thing that crawled through the line and knocked the sleep out of him. “Charlie, this is

Anson…”

Dr. Fricke looked at his watch. It was ten a.m. Anson Porter was an old friend and the Mayor. They played a round of golf every Saturday and at least one game of Chess each week. Still irritated Fricke asked, “…You usually don't have a crisis until after lunch, what's happening?”

Mayor Porter was babbling. His words ran together like ticker tape. “…Trouble at St. Ignatius. Don't know what but they tell me it's a catastrophe. I need you over there…”

Fricke came abruptly upright in the bed. “My daughter's a teacher there…”

“…I know. Dress Warmly. I'll meet you there.” Porter said lamely.

#####

Fricke hit the first road block three blocks from the school. When he was positively identified the patrolman took his instructions from his radio and motioned Fricke to a police car.

With the lights flashing they wound their way through a variety of vehicles parked where ever space permitted haphazardly along the street: Fire engines, ambulances, city cars, state cars, National Guard cars, HazMat Cars, and some unmarked ones that must have been from the FBI and maybe the CIA. Dr. Fricke saw small knots of grave adults and children lining the road all bundled against the cold. The patrolman told him they were grieving parents and relatives consoling each other.

“Consoling each other for what?” Fricke asked.

“I've been instructed to tell you nothing, Dr. Fricke. They will brief you when you get to the school.”

“Do you know anything about my daughter and my grandchildren?”

“No Sir.”

#####

A block from the school, crime scene tape stopped them and there were no cars beyond the tape. The patrolman was given instructions to escort his charge to the school house on foot.

The parking lot was also encircled with yellow tape making it a part within the larger part of the crime scene which included the whole school building. After the first word came back to the Police Station and Mayor Porter had been advised, he personally assumed command of the scene and called in the states forensic experts. After all, his town had never lost twelve teachers and ninety five school children before. Down the road and on the backside of the school was a swarm of media with their lofty hi angle, hi resolution remote cameras and local anchors running around getting camera time. The Crime Scene tape took in more than two city blocks and the perimeter was patrolled by

heavily clothed National Guardsman although after a short taste of the bitter cold inside that tape no one in his right mind would attempt to breach it

The cold inside the tape was insidious. It hung like an invisible blanket in the parking lot. Fricke said a silent thanks for heavy winter gear but his face was smarting and he was puffing clouds of steam when he reached the top of the steps. Porter was looking at him through the window in the main door and motioned for him to come in.

The cold was slightly less intense inside. But even with the hall full of people behind Porter spouting shafts of fog every time they opened their mouths the temperature was painfully sharp.

“Anson, what's happening here? Where's Vera?” Fricke asked. He looked around,

“Where are all the kids?”

Anson said, “Old friend, there is no easy way to tell you this. All the children but one are out there in the play yard. All the teachers, including Vera, are out there with them. The one child that is not out there is your grandson, Cliffy.”

Fricke hurried along side the Mayor down the hall toward the back of the building. “They shouldn't be outside in this frigid weather – they'll freeze. Why don't you get them back in?”

Porter stopped and turned Fricke around so he could look directly down into his eyes. “That's the problem.” He said kindly, “They are all frozen.”

Fricke was a man of science used to unexpected problems, odd situations and bizarre solutions. Even so his mouth dropped open and he was at a loss for words. He stared dumbly at Porter while the words sunk in.

“Where's my grandson?”

“I've got him safe down at the station with a lady policeman. He doesn't know what has happened?

Through the shock and the hurt Fricke's science brought him back to the problem. “Frozen, as in below two hundred seventy three Kelvin's?”

Porter snorted. “For Crissakes, Charlie, talk my language.”

Fricke's eyes went far away. “How cold is it out there – in Fahrenheit?”

Porter said, “We don't know. It's so cold we can't go out there. We've thrown half a dozen thermometers out there and they all blow up. It's below freezing in here with the furnace on high.”

Fricke's eyes focused. “Let me see.”

Porter led Fricke to the end of the hall and the crowd made way for them to reach the window. It was covered with a half inch sheet of ice. One of the troopers chipped a small hole so Fricke could look through.

Fricke looked through the hole for a few moments and his shoulders slumped “Which one is my daughter?”

“She's just behind Mr. Sanduski in the middle of the pen.”.

“Which one is my granddaughter?”

Porter swallowed the lump in this throat before answering. “As near as we can tell Charlie, she is right behind her mother. Her hand is cupped like she was carrying something but the cold has destroyed it.”

Fricke turned abruptly, his eyes full of tears. He pulled out his cell phone. Porter put his hand on his arm. “Charlie I've got everybody here who can help us out except the US Army and they're on the way. Who are you calling?”

“NASA. They've got the only suit which will allow me to go out there and see what's going on.”

#####

Charlie talked to an old buddy, who gave him the phone number of another old buddy. who called the Director of NASA and presented the problem. The Director was a man who lived with difficult decisions and the answer was clear. A helicopter would ferry a suit in within the hour.

Charlie also called his old office at the EPA and requested special measuring equipment and an insulated, onsite trailer lab to do the research.

While Charlie and Anson waited for the bird to arrive an Army Cold Weather Team arrived. Even dressed as they were in Wolverine Parkas and insulated Ski Suits none of them were able to brave the last fifty feet into the rabbit pen. They determined the temperature at the back door of the school was below minus sixty five degrees Fahrenheit and dropped rapidly from there in the direction of the cluster of people around the pen. That explained why the first thermometers thrown at the pen by the local officials simply popped and exploded in the air before they hit the ground.

When the EPA trailer arrived complete with a couple of assistants, Dr. Fricke pulled a funny looking gun out of the truck. From the safety of the window above the yard he aimed it at the rabbit pen. A red light began flashing on top of the barrel.

He snorted, shook the instrument; and pointed it back at the pen but got the same result. He turned to the Mayor. “God! There must be something wrong with this thermometer,

I've never seen anything like this outside a lab.”

Porter was sucking on a dead pipe but his breath made fog as though he was smoking.

“What's the problem, Charlie?”

Fricke was incredulous and pointed to the thermometer. “This is a digital thermometer and it says the temperature in that pen is below a hundred and forty four Kelvin's.”

Porter winced. “Doc we're still operating on Fahrenheit here, translate will you please.”

Exasperated, Fricke scratched his beard. He was obviously calculating in his head but annoyed that he had to waste time explaining to a nonprofessional.

“It's below minus two hundred on the ‘F' scale. Unheard of temperatures out side a lab. I have to bring in broader range equipment. Even those poor souls fifty feet from the door are under minus two hundred.”

Porter took his pipe from his mouth and whistled and was about to comment when one of the EPA crew, Jerry Mason, came rapidly through the back door and addressed Doctor Fricke. “It's progressing…”

“What do you mean Jerry?”

Jerry consulted his clipboard. “Doc, in the time we've been here these low temperatures have spread more than two inches farther away from the epicenter in that pen.”

“Which means?” interrupted Porter.

Fricke's ebony eyes glittered in the cold. He turned to Porter. “Well Anson, it means the cold is advancing. Theoretically, in two weeks this thing will freeze your whole town solid.”

#####

The helicopter brought in the space suit and a technician and a more sensitive thermometer. By request the bird hovered over the hole and dropped a special thermometer straight down to it. Even at one hundred feet above the rabbit pen the temperature inside the chopper dropped to minus twenty degrees. Just above the hole measured a mind boggling minus three hundred and fifty degrees on the ‘F' scale. Or as Doc Fricke put it, very close to absolute zero. He further complicated the issue by venturing the information out loud that the temperature in deep space was only minus three hundred and fifty three degrees.

The Pilot, Thomas Fitz, brought the chopper down on the parking lot about two hundred feet from the building. After it landed Porter stood beside Fricke in the window watching the NASA technician and the pilot unload the cumbersome suit from the idling bird. “I'm not going to let you go out there Charlie.”

Fricke swung around angrily. “Anson, you can't stop me. Two thirds of my family is out there frozen solid and I have a right to see if there is any thing I can do.”

The space suit was now being brought across the parking lot by the technician and the pilot on a small motor driven two wheeler.

Porter shook his head. “NASA called me after you hung up. That's an older suit and it weighs just shy of one hundred and eighty pounds. It's only good down to minus two hundred and ninety degrees. It takes a young man in good physical shape with special training to use it. They said they would send it along only if the technician was the one to wear it. I said yes.”

Fricke watched the two men disengage the suit and carry it up the front steps. “Do they have a video hook up so I can see what he sees?”

“I understand so.”

######

Fricke and Porter watched the NASA technician, Samuel Mackleroy, weave his way slowly through the frozen figures in the foggy back yard. The haze looked like fuzzy water. The surreal fog was now over the heads of most of the children's statues. The monitor clearly showed their frigid features. Most had been flash frozen by the intense cold with their eyes still open and no fear showed in their faces. All of them had a blue, ashen pallor behind the icy glitter.

Mackelroy reached the gate of the rabbit warren. “I'm turning up the heat in the suit. My feet are getting cold.” he said.

“Sam,” Fricke said quietly. “Quickly. Show me the face of that woman standing right behind the man who is bent over. – yes that's the one.”

For far too few moments Sam trained his video camera directly on the woman. She had an oval face with distinct lashes and one tiny ear could be seen peeking from under her hair. Her face expressed concern but no shock or pain.

Fricke moaned and let out his breath. “Well, at least she didn't suffer. Don't touch them, they'll disintegrate. Get on with it Sam, before the cold gets you too.”

Mackelroy leaned over, gripped the form of a rabbit and squeezed. The rabbit disappeared and left a handful of icy dust in his hand. He put the dust into a bag at his waist. “I'm about eight feet from the hole. There seems to be a force coming out of it and it is difficult to move my feet toward it…”

“…See if you can lean over and scoop that thermos right across the hole. I need a sample.”

Sam took a labored step closer to the hole. He acted like he was walking in three feet of sand. His insulated boots crunched the soil and broke the surface slightly. He leaned down and tossed the thermos on the other side of the hole and attempted to draw it back with the lanyard attached to it. The thermos stuck on the edge of the hole and the lanyard drew taut. He flipped it but the cold made it sluggish and the thermos refused to move. He took a step forward and over to the side to change his leverage, The thermos popped loose. He screwed the top on tight and attached it to his belt.

“Sam, while you are that close drop that thermometer and the motion sensor into the hole. I need a second measure.”

Mackleroy leaned over but could not reach the hole. He took a determined step closer and was just near enough to drop the two instruments into the orifice. There was still a slight rise above the surrounding ground and the mound glistened like the Tin Man's Hat. Sam suddenly said, “Myfeethavegonenumb. Gottagetouttahere.”

He sounded like a stroke victim -- his words thick and slurred. Fricke looked at Porter and both yelled into the microphone. “Sam! Get out of there! Now!”

They watched him move in slow motion like he was under water. He swung his body sluggishly around to the left as if to step away but his feet didn't move. He stood there weaving drunkenly. “Ahmstuck. Mahfeetwonmove.” he said dreamily.

Porter turned wildly to the pilot and gave him a shove down the hall. “Fitz! Get in the air quick. Drop him a hook and get him out of there.”

#####

In two minutes Fitz was hovering fifty feet above the rabbit warren. The down blast from the rotors disintegrated half a dozen of the statues. The crowd inside the building watched incredulously as the statues simply turned into a piles of blue gray sand.

Fitz lowered the hook. Mackelroy was no longer responding to radio demands so Fitz rocked the chopper back and forth bouncing the hook off the space suit. As it hit the suit the third time Sam snagged it with a lazy right hand and laboriously hooked it into the ring in his breast plate. His right hand sagged back against his side.

Fitz raised the bird slightly. The cable lost its slack and Mackelroy seemed to come to attention but the suit stood firm. Fitz rocked the chopper back and forth, gently at first, then with more insistence.

Mackelroy's suit was the link between the ground and the steel cable from the chopper. The bird continued to rock but could not break Mackelroy loose.

“Fitz, pull him out of there now!” Porter snapped.

In a moment the blades began to scream in the air as Fitz increased their speed. Mackelroy was stretched out tight from the upward pull of the cable. He still did not come loose.

The pilot increased the RPMs and the chopper strained against the cable. Suddenly Mackelroy's figure jerked and swung up into the weak sunlight. The crowds roar of relief was immediate -- but instantly turned to cries of disbelief and horror. Mackelroy's body had parted just below the waist and his frozen legs were still firmly planted in the middle of the rabbit pen.

#####

The chopper lowered the remains of Mackelroy and the medics removed him from the hook. Fricke's assistant, Mason, grabbed the thermos in the jaws of a special pair of tongs, put it into a canister and brought it to Dr. Fricke.

Fricke beamed it with the Thermometer and the temperature reading was below the scale. He told Jerry to take the canister to the Special Instruments Trailer and examine it with the portable Gas Chromatograph.

Mason had been a lab technician for fourteen years and was elated he was selected to make the examination. He cleared the trailer of all personnel and gingerly placed the canister on the stainless steel lab table next to the GC. He beamed the canister with an Infrared Thermometer. The reading on the outside was minus three hundred and fifty degrees Fahrenheit. He donned a light weight oxygen mask and adjusted the flow for comfort. Next he donned very thick, super insulated gloves. He forced the canister's latch and lifted the thermos out with the tongs. He unscrewed the top. He took his gloves off so he could finger the controls on the portable GC. He positioned the sampling tube in the mouth of the thermos and held the trigger ‘on' for ten seconds. He sat the GC down, picked up the tongs, screwed the thermos top on and carefully reinserted the thermos into the canister. With the tongs he latched the top.

The GC whirred for a few moments than went into labor and came to a grinding halt. In its death throes several pieces flew off. Mason hit the floor as the pieces bounced around the lab. The center section of the instrument belched and laid itself open like a blossoming flower.

Mason lay on the floor for a few moments until the onslaught was over. He climbed to his feet and looked into the open belly of his GC. He probed it with the tongs and the metal sloughed off like sand from a beach sculpture. The inside had frozen in the extremely low temperatures and then disintegrated.

He looked at the read out and found the machine had done it's work before the belly disintegrated.

The answer answered no questions.

It was air; common ordinary, garden variety air. The kind of air you'd find in any backyard.

He took his mask off and picked up the canister. In one pain filled instant he watched his thumb and four fingers turn blue, then a dead flesh color, then take on an icy sheen. He gathered his breath to scream and threw the canister. He watched his fingers and thumb, still attached to the canister, sail off into the corner of the truck.

He screamed loud and long and dropped to the floor holding his cauterized stumps with his other hand. Help came in from all sides and the Paramedics led him away. Using the tongs, they pried his fingers and thumb from the deadly canister. In the process, Mason's digits disintegrated into a pile of bloody, frozen debris.

#####

With the Infrared Thermometer Dr. Fricke scanned the pile that had been Jerry's fingers. The temperature had risen to a comparatively mild minus one hundred eighty degrees. He waited thirty seconds and scanned it again. The temperature was up now to minus one hundred degrees.

Fricke shifted the thermometer over to the canister and snorted. “Good God!” and jumped back from the canister.

Porter said. “What's wrong Charlie?”

Without answering Fricke picked up the canister with the tongs and put it into a stainless steel cabinet. He flipped several switches and the sound of quickly sucking air filled the trailer.

He turned to Anson. “That thing was coming out of the canister and freezing the area around it. I've put it into the vacuum chamber…maybe that will stop it.”

The Mayor watched the rotund little Doctor as he stood there drumming his fingers absent mindedly on the lab table. Both were oblivious to the clamoring crowd out side but for different reasons.

Porter had said almost nothing since Mackelroy had died so horribly at his command. He sucked absent mindedly at his dead pipe and never seemed to look squarely at anything or any one.

Dr. Fricke felt the unbearable weight of the guilt on his friend's shoulders but was hyper occupied with the problem of the frozen entity in the Rabbit Warren. He stopped tapping, went to the canister and scanned it. He picked up the thermometer and scanned the pile again.

“Just as I suspected,” he mused. “The pile temperature is almost normal.”

He stepped picked up a glass slide. He slid it across the bloody morass then shook it and placed it in the XY table of a microscope. He focused two or three times, while moving the slide across the table. He made a satisfied grunt as he viewed each change.

He finally turned to Porter. “Anson, this ‘thing' is eating us.”

It was fully thirty seconds before Porter focused on Fricke.

“Explain yourself Doctor.”

Fricke shrugged. “It's very simple.” He indicated the pile of sand which used to be Jerry's fingers and thumb. “There's nothing but carbon left there. That ‘thing' over there in the vacuum chamber has extracted the moisture and all the nutrients from Jerry's flesh. If you go outside and examine each of those poor souls in the school yard you'll find nothing but a pile of sand for your trouble.”

#####

The room was filled with only the top level brass from each of the involved services. The meeting was taking place in a meeting room at the local Blue Roof Inn.

Dr. Fricke agreed to preside simply because everyone knew him. He asked each man to identify himself in turn.

Mayor Porter waved at the table. Everyone knew him already. Next to him was Special Agent Gerald Danski, FBI who had no jurisdiction but was simply sitting in. Next to Danski was Colonel Ronald Spatchel of the National Guard Unit, an accountant in real life who had been called into this on a half hours notice. He was the ranking military officer. Next to him was Captain Hubie Tutwiler from the police department which made him second in command to the Mayor. On his left sat Lieutenant Jackson Hoover of the same police department. Hoover was responsible for any police grunt work needing to be done. Next to Hoover was a Lieutenant Colonel in the United States Air Force and a civilian. Both walked in just before the meeting began.

The Colonel spoke first. “I am Lieutenant Colonel Dulane Marshall from Special Forces, US Air Force.”

The civilian next to him in a rumpled gray suit simply waved and said, “I'm Maxwell Grader of NASA.”

Dr. Fricke spoke. “Welcome Gentlemen. We are dealing with the totally unknown here. Judging from its temperature and the number of people who saw it stream across the heavens I think we have to assume this is ‘something' from outer space. What we do know is that it is so damned cold we can't approach it and it is getting larger. Anybody have any ideas how we can stop it?”

Hoover asked, “How can we fight something we don't understand. If we have a riot or a hostage situation or a bank robbery there are protocols already in place to handle it. They are based on experience. We've never faced anything like this before.”

“We can't even handle it, Christ we can't even get our dead off the battlefield.” Spatchel said.

Fricke looked at the FBI and said, “Don't be afraid to speak.”

Danski shrugged. “I've run this through every data base in this country and overseas including MI-5, Interpol, the KGB and the Mossad and there is no precedent. They all send me back their condolences and a huge question mark.”

The Air Force and NASA looked at each other, each deferring to the other. Finally Colonel Marshall said. “We have had some preliminary stump sessions on this with NASA before either of us (and he indicated Grader) arrived here and we've brought a conclusion with us. We don't know if it will work and we certainly don't like it but it is the only answer we can come up with.”

Marshall paused and looked around the room.

“Well?” said Dr. Fricke.

“A Thermite Bomb” said Marshall .

“It'd blow up the whole school, wouldn't it?” snorted Porter.

Others chimed in but the Colonel held up his hand. “Everything has a downside. But what have you now? A sub zero monster which is slowly but surely eating every bit of protein in the country…” He shuffled a pack of papers and pointed with his finger. “…and by your own figures that ‘thing' out there has already spread out more than four feet from where it started. The President…”

“…The President?” questioned Porter.

“…Yes THE president is concurrent with this and whatever we can do to contain it. He feels it is vital to National Security that it be stopped here if at all possible.”

Captain Tutwiler held up his hand for recognition. “Tell me more about this -- bomb.”

“The only attack the experts can figure may work is to kill this thing with heat. A thermite bomb is about the hottest thing we have. It burns at about three thousand degrees Centigrade which is hot enough to chew its way through the block of an engine...”

“…How about the resulting explosion?” Fricke asked.

“We can confine it mostly to the impact zone by dropping it straight down the hole. It will, however shake the surrounding ground sufficiently to make piles of sand out of all those unfortunates in the school yard.”

“My God,” exclaimed Porter. “All the relatives will have our heads over this.”

Fricke looked around the room. “My medical people have approached this from every angle and no one has come up with any idea how to keep those unfortunates intact. If there was I would propose it but we've found no method of handling them in this extreme cold. The minute we touch them they will all disappear into a pile of sand.”

NASA's Grader held up his hand. “There is one proviso, however.”

The whole table went silent and looked at him. “What?” Fricke demanded bluntly.

“NASA must have a sample of this ‘thing' for further study. If it lives in outer space we must know about it so we can guard against it wherever our Astronauts happen to be.”

Fricke smiled. “I still have a double insulated thermos canister in my trailer and the last time I scanned it, (he consulted his watch) twenty five minutes ago it was still registering minus three hundred and fifty degrees. I think your sample is alive and well.”

Grader smiled. “When this is all over Doc, NASA would like you to accompany the sample to Houston .”

“First things first.”

Colonel Marshall looked around the table. “Are we in agreement then?”

Porter spoke for the police department and the town. “How soon can you do it?”

Marshall looked at his watch. “We brought a small one with us. We can drop it in thirty minutes.”

“Let's be along with it then.” said Fricke.

#####

. A thermite bomb is triggered by a burning magnesium strip. The Air Force Ordnance people were not sure they could ignite the strip in near absolute zero so decided to fire the fuse before lowering it into the hole. It was also unknown if the thermite would ignite in near absolute zero so the bomb squad decided they had a maximum of thirty seconds after the bomb was lowered into the hole before it had be timed to blow. It was an extremely delicate operation on the best of days. Luckily the extreme cold made for a perfectly calm day but a two rotor Sikorsky was brought in for added stability. The huge chopper had just forty five seconds after lighting the bomb to lower it, drop it into the hole and waft off into the blue. No one knew if the bomb would eat into the ground, blow sidewise or spew out the hole like a roman candle.

All of the officials, the media and the spectators retired behind the perimeter tape two hundred yards behind the school. It was the same macabre view of the hundred and eight ice statues the media had been showing on television.

The big bird sidled up above the rabbit warren like a polar bear waiting for a seal to pop out of the ice. It oscillated a bit, then steadied and became part of the sky. The side door was already open. It was but a few moments before a small canister flowing smoke from its upper end began gliding down toward the rabbit warren. The crowd went silent with apprehension as the canister paused two feet above the fence.

The chopper slid quickly sideways and stopped above the hole.

The canister dropped again, this time straight into the hole. It began an agonizingly slow descent. Fricke glanced at his watch and noted that twenty five seconds had already passed. He began to silently pray.

The crowd released its breath as the line went slack and dropped from the chopper. Instantly the giant blades began to race and beat the air to pull the monster bird out of harms way.

There was a whump like you had hit a ripe watermelon with your bare hand. The ground around the impact zone heaved upward till it was a knee high volcano. Molten plasma poured over the lip and engulfed the figures in the pen. In a moment everything in the pen disintegrated. It took but moments for the crowd outside the tape to be assailed by the gruesome smell of burning protoplasm. The ground shook again, this time over a larger area and you could see the school building shake. In that instant every frozen statue in the yard descended into a pile of sand.

The ground shook a third time and this time the volcano spit forth a seed. A small, fiery pinpoint of light shot out of the hole and arced deep out into the azure sky.

It left a smoking trail until the eye could no longer follow.

NASA's Grader shook his head and turned to Dr. Fricke, “You and that sample are more important now than ever. Now we know that ‘thing' is out there.”

#####

On his way home Dr. Fricke picked Cliffy Boy up at the police station. Cliffy looked around. “Hi Grandpa, where's Mommy and Rosemary?”

Fricke had prepared, and discarded, a dozen answers to that question. With heavy heart he knelt in front of the boy and took him into his arms. “Mommy and Rosemary are making a very important trip to talk to God.”

“When will they get back?”

“I don't know. Until then it's you and me, Cliffy Boy. Think you can deal with that?”

Cliffy Boy shrugged. “I guess so. You and I have fun together, but I wish they had said good-by.”

Fricke kissed the boy on the forehead and turned his head away so his tears would not show. “Sometimes Cliffy God calls you so quickly that you don't have time to say good-by.”

######

Fricke left Cliffy Boy with a sitter while he drove to the old bridge. He did not yet know what to tell the youngster about the purpose of this day. Someday would be a more appropriate time. He leaned over the railing and watched the placid water unfold below him. This ancient span had become a rite of passage for his family. Many years ago, under the watchful eye of his mother, he had walked reluctantly across this bridge to catch the bus to kindergarten. When Vera was old enough he had led her across this same bridge under the watchful eye of his mother. When Rosemary became Kindergarten age he had claimed the right to escort her across the bridge on her first day at school and the same with Cliffy Boy. Now mother was long gone and Vera and Rosemary were with her. It was fitting that this would be the place to say goodbye to his daughter and grand daughter.

He tipped the urn and watched their ashes kiss the water and start their journey to the sea.

End