Under the Dome

Up ahead, fingers of brilliance shone through the trees. They printed an intaglio of shadows on the patched tar of Motton Road.

There were a number of military trucks parked on the other side of the Dome - it was Harlow over there at this edge of town - and thirty or forty soldiers moved hither and yon with a purpose. All had gas masks hooked to their belts. A silver tanker-truck bearing the legend EXTREME DANGER KEEP BACK had been backed up until it almost touched a door-size shape that had been spray-painted on the Dome's surface. A plastic hose was clamped to a valve on the back of the tanker. Two men were handling the hose, which ended in a wand no bigger than the barrel of a Bic pen. These men were wearing shiny all-over suits and helmets. There were air tanks on their backs.

On the Chester's Mill side, there was only one spectator. Lissa Jamieson, the town librarian, stood beside an old-fashioned ladies' Schwinn with a milk-box carrier on the rear fender. On the back of the box was a sticker reading WHEN THE POWER OF LOVE IS STRONGER THAN THE LOVE OF POWER, THE WORLD WILL KNOW PEACE - JIMI HENDRIX.

'What are you doing here, Lissa?'Julia asked, getting out of her car. She held up a hand to shield her eyes from the bright lights.

Lissa was nervously fiddling with the ankh she wore around her neck on a silver chain. She looked from Julia to Barbie, then back to Julia again. 'I go for a ride on my bike when I'm upset or worried. Sometimes I ride until midnight. It soothes my pncutna. I saw the lights and came to the lights.' She said this in an incantatory way, and let go of her ankh long enough to trace some kind of complicated symbol in the air. 'What are you doing out here?'

'Came to watch an experiment,' Barbie said. 'If it works, you can be the first one to leave Chester's Mill.'

Lissa smiled. It looked a little forced, but Barbie liked her for the effort. 'If I did that, I'd miss the Tuesday night special at Sweetbriar. Isn't it usually meatloaf?'

'Meatloaf's the plan,' he agreed, not adding that if the Dome was still in place the following Tuesday, the specialite de la maison was apt to be zucchini quiche.

'They won't talk,' Lissa said. 'I tried.'

A squat fireplug of a man came out from behind the tanker and into the light. He was dressed in khakis, a poplin jacket, and a hat with the logo of the Maine Black Bears on it. The first thing to strike Barbie was that James O. Cox had put on weight. The second was his heavy jacket, zipped to what was now dangerously close to a double chin. Nobody else - Barbie, Julia, or Lissa - was wearing a jacket. There was no need of them on their side of the Dome.

Cox saluted. Barbie gave it back, and it actually felt pretty good to snap one off.

'Hello, Barbie,' Cox said. 'How's Ken?'

'Ken's fine,' Barbie said. 'And I continue to be the bitch that gets all the good shit.'

'Not this time, Colonel,' Cox said. 'This time it appears you got f**ked at the drive-thru.'

14

'Who's he?' Lissa whispered. She was still working at the ankh. Julia thought she'd snap the chain soon, if she kept at it. 'And what are they doing over there?'

'Trying to get us out,' Julia said. 'And after the rather spectacular failure earlier in the day, I'd have to say they're wise to do it on the quiet.' She started forward. 'Hello, Colonel Cox - I'm your favorite newspaper editor. Good evening.'

Cox's smile was - to his credit, she thought - only slightly sour. 'Ms Shumway. You're even prettier than I imagined.'

'I'll say one thing for you, you're handy with the bullsh - '

Barbie intercepted her three yards from where Cox was standing and took her by the arms.

'What?' she asked.

"]The camera.' She had almost forgotten she had it around her neck until he pointed to it. 'Is it digital?'

'Sure, Pete Freeman's extra.' She started to ask why, then got it. 'You tthink the Dome will fry it.'

'That'd be the best-case scenario,' Barbie said. 'Remember what happened to Chief Perkins's pacemaker.'

'Shit,' she said. 'Shit! Maybe I've got my old Kodak in the trunk.'

Lissa and Cox were looking at each other with what Barbie thought was equal fascination. 'What are you going to do?' she asked. 'Is there going to be another bang?'

Cox hesitated. Barbie said, 'Might as well come clean, Colonel. If you don't tell her, I will.'

Cox sighed. 'You insist on total transparency, don't you?'

'Why not? If this thing works, the people of Chester's Mill will be singing your praises. The only reason you're playing em close is force of habit.'

'No. It's what my superiors have ordered.'

'They're in Washington,' Barbie said. 'And the press is in Castle Rock, most of em probably watching Girls Gone Wild on pay-per-view. Out here it's just us chickens.'

Cox sighed and pointed to the spray-painted door shape. 'That's where the men in the protective suits will apply our experimental compound. If we're lucky, the acid will eat through and we'll then be able to knock that piece of the Dome out the way you can knock a piece of glass out of a window after you've vised a glass-cutter.'

'And if we're unlucky?' Barbie asked. 'If the Dome decomposes, giving off some poison gas that kills us all? Is that what the gas masks are for?'

'Actually,' Cox said, 'the scientists feel it more likely that the acid might start a chemical reaction that would cause the Dome to catch fire.' He saw Lissa's stricken expression and added, 'They consider both possibilities very remote.'

'They can,' Lissa said, twirling her ankh. 'They're not the ones who'd get gassed or roasted.'

Cox said, 'I understand your concern, ma'am - '

'Melissa,' Barbie corrected. It suddenly seemed important to him that Cox understand these were people under the Dome, not just a few thousand anonymous taxpayers. 'Melissa Jamieson. Lissa to her friends. She's the town librarian. She's also the middle-school guidance counselor, and teaches yoga classes, I believe.'