by Douglas Falk
Seydoux waved the gun in the air and pointed it at them both, back and forth.
“I’ve kept my eyes on you scoundrels the whole time. There is something you’ve not been telling me, and to be honest, I don’t really care. But I have known of your deceitful plans ever since we met by the Perth docks, Monsieur Milton.”
His long red scar that spiralled down all the way from his forehead down to the neck gleamed in the Antarctic morning sun, and he looked more brutish now than ever before.
“My work is not finished until I’ve escorted you back to Monsieur Oscar. After that is done and my payment has been delivered, you are free to do whatever you snotty young men desire. But now, you shall come with me. I always finish what I have started, copains.”
William took one small step forward and tried a Hail Mary attempt to sway the angry assailant. “I am sorry that you got caught up in this mess, Monsieur Seydoux. It was never our intention to besmirch you or your honour, nor did we want to drag Vickers or Barnaby in the dirt. You are fine men and women, from what we can tell. And we also don’t want to scam you in any shape or form. I know you were promised a reward, but such a reward is out of my hands. You’ll have to take it up with my father, for John and I have something important to finish. We have business down South. We will keep walking, whether you like it or not. You can either let us go or shoot us like a coward from behind. The choice is yours.”
That was a brave threat…or a foolhardy one. I have to do something. I have to act. Now or never.
As stealthily as he could, he put his hands down while Seydoux was busy staring down William and prayed a silent prayer that the Canadian would not catch him in the act. He slowly reached for an item in the sled and concealed it with his right hand behind his back. As Seydoux kept the gun pointed at William, he amassed enough courage to take a few steps forward.
“Monsieur Seydoux. Jacques. I think it is time for us all to calm down. You go your way, we go our way, and we’ll forget all about this little pickle of ours. They do say that time heals all wounds.”
“Shut up,” he roared and pointed the gun towards John’s chest. “What’s that you’re holding down there behind your back? Show it to me, and back off. Show it!”
John called his bluff and took another step forward. “Are you normally packing heat during polar expeditions, Monsieur, or is this a special occasion? Feels like a bad habit you’ve got there. Maybe you should see a doctor for paranoia.”
Seydoux aimed the pistol right at his head, and they were now only a few feet apart. “Take one more step. I promise you, child. I will blow your brains off unless you back off and show me your hands.”
John defied him again and took another step forward. “So, there’s nothing we can tell you that will make you let us off the hook?”
“Nothing, child. Nothing at all. You brats are coming with me, mes amis.”
John grimaced and sighed. “Your funeral, Monsieur. I will tell you something now whether you want to hear it or not. You see, William and I are pointed towards greener pastures. Deeper into Antarctica, to be precise. Further south. We are searching for the lands beyond. Lush, hospitable patches of land that Admiral Richard Evelyn Byrd found near this area, some sixty years ago.”
“What…what are you talking about? Stand down! Last warning.” He cocked his pistol.
“There is no easy way of spelling this out, so it’s better to just lay it all on the line. Your whole life is a lie, Jacques Seydoux. Your life, and the lives of everyone else you know and those you don’t know. You are stuck in a Matrix, Jacques. You’ve been outfoxed, just like everyone else. Everything you think you know is a lie—we don’t live on a spinning ball whirling through infinite space, Monsieur. The Earth is flat, and we aim to prove it once and for all.”
Seydoux lowered his guard for a nanosecond and stared at him with a baffled look on his face. “What…what are you talking about? You are insane!”
John saw his chance and plunged himself forward and tackled the old man right in his stomach. Seydoux stumbled around, still standing but clearly in a vulnerable state. John pulled out the item he had concealed behind his back—one of the last logs the sled had to offer, and swung it. He hit Seydoux right in the head with the log, and the roguish beast of a man fell with a thud in the snow. The pistol landed there in the snow, ripe for the taking. John reached for the gun and felt his fingers taking hold of the firearm…when he was struck from behind with such a force that he nearly fainted. Seydoux was standing again and punched him hard. John was out of breath and screamed out loud in pain. He fell to the ground and tried to breathe. He looked up and saw Seydoux’s hands taking a firm grip on his neck.
It’s over now. He’s going to strangle me to death. It is over.
Seydoux strangled him with full force, and John could no longer breathe. He squealed like a stuck pig. The Canadian’s arms pressed hard against his neck, and John tried to remove Seydoux’s firm grip on his throat, but it was all for naught.
He’s too strong. It’s like wrestling a buffalo…it’s over now…
From nowhere, the sound of gunfire echoed through the snowy plains. John felt the pressure on his throat all of a sudden go away, and he looked at Seydoux, who fell over by his side and landed on his belly facing the snow. John gasped for air and tried to breathe normally as he tried to make sense of what had just happened. He saw William holding Seydoux’s gun in his right hand, standing there crouched over the big man. William removed his gloves and put his index finger on the brute Canadian’s carotids.
“He’s dead. He’s dead! I must have shot him right in the heart. From behind. I’ve killed someone. I’ve murdered someone!” said William.
William was in a state of complete shock over what just had transpired and started shaking like a leaf in the wind. John walked up to the body and rolled the corpse over so his face could be seen. Seydoux’s eyes were wide open, and he had a bizarre grimace on his face, making the deceased look eerily ghastly. John spun around and hugged William tight.
“Calm down. Calm down! There’s no worry. There’s no worry; I’ve got you. You saved my life. You did what had to be done, and I’ll be forever in your debt. Feel no guilt for what just happened here. Now is not the time to reflect about moral qualms. We have to get out of here, quickly!”
“Y-yes…but, what about the corpse? Do we bury it?”
“There’s no time,” urged John. “They probably heard the pistol shot from Amundsen-Scott, and they’ll send out a search party to find out what happened here. We are only a couple of hundred feet away from the base! They will come out for sure, very soon. Let’s just leave the bastard here; the snow will cover him within an hour or two. Now let’s move!”
19
Paige Coulson sat by her booth in the entry hall of Amundsen-Scott and haphazardly browsed the internet, passing the time. It was 5:30 in the morning, and she struggled to stay awake.
I hate the night shifts. Next year I’ll make a request to only work daytime hours. I’m done spending my time watching cat videos on YouTube in the middle of the night.
Had she been more alert and observant, she would have been suspicious about the activity going on the past fifteen minutes. First, the two young boys in the group had gallivanted down to the entry hall, and they behaved in a manner most strange. They wanted to leave the facility for a minute or two—which they were allowed. At their own peril.
Winter’s not here yet, after all. But why did they bring that cart thing with them? Why would they need a big bulky sled if they just wanted to breathe some air outside? I was just about to put it away myself in the storage room. It was as if they were taking off for good, those two.
Five minutes after the departure of the two youngsters, another person from the Lockheed Martin crew came lumbering through the dark. It was the roguish Canadian man, and he was also fully dressed and equipped for the outdoors. He barged into the hall and screamed at her, demanding to know the whereabouts of Milton and Wiland
er.
I did help him as best as I could. Pointed him in the right direction…the exit. I don’t know where they went after that! Jeez. What’s going on with these weirdos? Oh well. None of my business. Well above my pay grade.
She returned to her computer and began to plough through the Amundsen-
Scott intranet, bored out of her skull. Just as she had opened a dreadfully long-winded memo from Danielle Browning, the IT expert at the base, she heard an unmistakable sound from outside of the station. The sound of a gunshot.
What the…what the hell? Gunfire? Should I call for security? No…I’ll go see for myself first. These people, as strange as they appear to be, did strike me as rather harmless. Well, apart from that Seydoux fellow.
She grabbed her winter coat, put her boots on, and hurried out of the main gate and looked around.
Nothing out of the ordinary from what I can see. Where did this come from?
She looked down to the ground and saw shoeprints in the snow. Prints of boots on the ground…and a cart being drawn alongside with them. She followed the tracks, and it did not take long until she saw a figure in a brown coat flat on his back.
Oh my God.
She ran as fast as she could to the corpse and cried out loud upon witnessing the macabre sight. There he was, Jacques Seydoux in the snow with blood seeping out of his chest, turning the colour of the snow underneath him into a crimson red tint. She checked his pulse to make sure, but as expected there was nothing. The man was dead, as clear as day. She rushed back to the base, jumped into the booth, and picked up the emergency telephone.
What do I do now? What’s the protocol when a murder has occurred outside the premises? If there is a protocol for polar homicide, I probably slept through that presentation. Things have been so quiet and uneventful here all these years. I never thought I would have to worry about these things.
Her heart raced, and she waltzed nervously around in the booth, trying to come up with the most logical cause of action.
Calm down. Think. Think. Hmm…yes…the MP! The Military Police!
She tore through the drawer in her booth and quickly found the item she searched for, a detailed map of Antarctica.
Call the MP at Vostok or McMurdo?
It was commonly known amongst the residents of Antarctica that McMurdo was the most guarded base of the stations in the area. McMurdo was a militarised station with army barracks and barbed wire encircling it. She had seen it herself.
But it is too far away, way too far off. McMurdo is located by the coast. It will take them days…no, not days! Weeks! Even with Snowcats or other vehicles at their disposal, it would take weeks.
She moved her fingers over the map and placed her thumb on the Vostok Base, situated far closer to Amundsen-Scott than McMurdo. Coulson had never visited Vostok and did not know much about it, other than that the facility supposedly was an old Soviet high-tech research facility, now jointly owned by Russia and the Americans. She did not hesitate, and dialled the number.
“Vostok Station, Antarctica,” answered a male voice on the other end of the line with a Russian drawl.
“This is Paige Coulson from Amundsen-Scott Base.” She paused for a moment and breathed slowly.
“Yes?” said the Russian hurriedly.
“A murder has occurred just outside of here, and we need backup. Of the military kind. I will tell you everything I know about what just transpired, but there is no time to lose now. Send me your very best men!”
20
William took the lead, and John trailed behind with the sled. They had searched the sled for an item, any item, that could serve as a stick or a staff that would fulfil the idea of drawing a line in the snow in order to keep the course straight. Cameras, blankets, tent pieces, first aid kit, paraffin lamps, sleeping bags, food, water, knife, a pair of scissors, and other tools were scattered in the cart, but they found nothing that would seemingly do the trick. John had searched through the entire inventory until he settled for the lesser of two evils—a camera tripod. He handed it over to William, who now dragged the tripod stick in the ground as he walked onwards in complete silence. They had barely spoken a word ever since the incident.
He’s clearly shaken up. He just killed someone…who wouldn’t be? Even though it was just. But I wish he’d suffer through the post-traumatic stress a later time. Not only are we walking towards a place that may for all intents and purposes not exist, and we are walking fuelled by blind faith that there is truly something monumental out here being concealed by the powers that be…we are also now wanted for murder, for sure. I suppose there is a chance that they did not hear the shot and that Seydoux’s corpse will be covered by snow once the snows start falling again. But I have my doubts about that. Better to assume the worst and hope for the best.
As they marched in complete silence, John’s mind began to wander. His ruminations led him to a conclusion that was morbid at best and terrifying at worst.
Our chances of making it out of here alive are very slim. With a traumatised William and just hoping against hope that we are walking in the right direction. South, further south…and then what? Then what? How do we find our way home if we walk into a place that literally does not exist on the map? Done is done, though. We have come to the point of no return, and the only thing left for us is to walk. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given to us.
They walked and walked. The whole day they walked in silence and only said the odd word to one another about the surroundings. It was an unusually clear and sunny day, which was a small comfort. They walked for as long as the Sun was up without resting breaks, until William halted. The Sun had set so low that they could barely see a thing.
“I guess we’ll set up shop right here,” said William tiredly. “Right here. We’ve walked sufficiently far away from Amundsen-Scott, and we’ll be safe…for now. I don’t think they could catch up with us this quickly, if we are being hunted. Maybe nobody’s coming.”
John agreed. “Help me with the tents before it gets pitch black, will you?”
“All right. Just one tent, though. We’ll both sleep in it. We’ll probably be dead in a day or two, so we could might as well spend our last hours together.”
I’m glad that the leader of his expedition is confident about our chances.
As they were in the thick of setting up the tent, John got to think about the wood. “Should we get a fire going tonight? We have a few logs left in the sled. The very last of the bunch.”
“No, I don’t want to light a fire tonight. Even though I’m positive that any pursuers are still far behind our tail, risking exposure isn’t worth it. Besides, I don’t even know how to get a fire going. It’s a shame that we didn’t involve Jamie in our plot to escape, because she was aces.”
John cackled with laughter. “So, when you were in the Scout Corps, they taught you how to walk in a straight line but forgot to teach you something so elementary like starting a fire?”
“I’m sure they would have taught me, but I left the Scouts after just a couple of months. One could argue that there are some stones left unturned when it comes to my education there.”
“One could argue that…” John said and smiled.
Ten minutes later, the tent was deployed and ready.
“It’s a shame that there isn’t even a hint of a tree to be seen in this frozen, neverending wasteland. It may be calm right now, but during the night trees provide cover for the wind,” said John.
“Well, I promised you many things to reel you in for this escapade. Comfort was not one of those.”
John grimaced. “I didn’t think it would be comfy, and I doubt that either of us could ever call the past month we suffered through as comfortable with a straight face. A little bit of help from the weather gods would only be prudent, I think. The odds are not in our favour right now. Maybe we should get down on our knees and pray. O gods of wind, snow, and hail—be kind on us tonight, for we would hate to wake up to a snows
torm blowing our tent away.”
William laughed. It was the first time John heard him laugh ever since the slaying of Jacques Seydoux. “If Hades is coming to ferry us over to the river Styx, I think he should do it after we’ve finished this…not before.”
“I agree,” said John and walked up to the sled to unload the paraffin lamp.
“Let’s go inside. It’s been a long day, and we deserve a good night’s sleep for the wars to come,” said William.
They went inside the tent and rolled out their sleeping bags next to one another. John kindled the lamp and placed it between the two bedding places. William undressed and tucked in under the sleeping bag.
“Do we have any extra blankets in the sled? Or, better…do we have anything proper to drink? A smoky whiskey or a fiery vodka would warm my body and soul more than a thousand blankets ever could. How’s our portable drinks cabinet doing? Do we have a Stolichnaya in there?” asked William.
“Blankets, yes. Spirits, no. You know more than well that we don’t have any alcohol left, you budding drunkard. It was your idea to sneak off from Amundsen-Scott in the middle of the night. If you wanted booze, couldn’t you have stolen something from their storages before you woke me up?”
“Sorry. I forgot all about that.” William smiled as he spoke, but it was wiped off his face soon enough once the conversation died off.
“I killed someone today,” he continued. “We are doomed…no matter what happens, we are on the brink of annihilation. Oh well. When they put my headstone up at Djursholm, I hope they’ll know that I lived a short but eventful life.”