by Aline Riva
“And don't worry about Ryan,” she added, “I'm so through with him! I'm telling him it's over as soon as we get back from this trip.”
Then the door handle turned, the door rattled and they both turned around, sharing a look of alarm as Ryan Henderson called out from the other side.
“Who locked the door? I want a shower!”
“Quick!” said Samantha, reaching over to the nearby sink and turning on the cold water.
Justin got the plan right away as he stood over the sink and she unlocked the door and then opened it quickly for her boyfriend.
“Why did you lock yourself in?” Ryan demanded, then he looked to Justin, back at Samantha and for a second, a flicker of suspicion was there in his eyes as his gaze threatened to become aggressive. But then Justin splashed his face with water again, turned off the tap and grabbed a towel.
“Oh I do feel rough!” he complained, “I'm burning up, it just won't stop!”
“And the door wasn't locked, it got stuck!” Samantha added, “I was grabbing a shower and next thing I hear is Justin puking up over by the sink! And don't look at him like that, he's not well!”
The anger that had simmered in his gaze faded as Justin dried his face, breathed heavily and then broke out in a sweat once more.
“I really need a lie down...”
“You do that,” said Samantha, exchanging a glance with him that was too subtle for Ryan to catch, then Justin left the wash room, smiling despite the aches and chills that swept through his body as he made is way back to his room.
As he walked down the corridor he heard Samantha also leave the wash room area, but she firmly told Ryan she was going back to her own room, and then they parted company.
Justin didn't bother to look back, now wanting only his bed and rest as he hoped a warm bed might kill the aches and pains the same way the hot shower had - at least for the time he was under the water...
Then he entered his room, saw the vodka was half drunk now and Alex was snoring on top of the covers on the other side of the room. The lamp was on because the skies were darkening. He checked his watch, realising something as his dark eyes widened in alarm.
“I've been gone two hours?” he exclaimed, then he ran to the window, looking out across the cold landscape.
“No!” he whispered under his breath, then he turned around and ran from the room, tearing up the corridor towards the other end, fighting against the aches and the chills as he headed for David Harley's room. Two hours had passed by, Matt had been gone all that time – and there was no sign of him outside - he was gone from the settlement...
Matt had been awe struck by the sights and colours of the formerly white snowy land as the acid made the sinking sun change the colours all around him. Even the dark shades as night approached had never looked so bright....
And it was cold. So very cold, it was taking the edge off his high as he looked up to skies that had been streaked with such wonder to see they were darkening now, the colours fading and running together like bleeding paints, making ugly shades. As he looked down, a jagged ridge of snow seemed to loom forward, almost reaching for him as he stepped back, dragging in icy air that hurt his chest as he wondered if he ought to head back.
He turned around and saw a field of ice, then turned again, saw the ridge, to the side of it was a pathway, so as he gasped for air and tried not to panic on seeing no sign of the way back, he scrambled for it, his boots slipping as they hit the icy slope. Suddenly he was down with a hard thump and then sliding as he gave a yell, feeling certain he was about to be buried under ice, buried deep. Oh shit, he was doing to die when this fall stopped...
He came to a hard stop, crunching against a wall of solid snow as he lay on his back, in the dark, turning his head he saw nothing but ice and snow, piled above him, trapping him.
Matt started to scream for help.
David was warm in bed, having just let go of sheets crushed in his grip as he lost all control and gave a gasp, his mind and body flooded with pleasure. Then Tara had come up from under the sheets, kissing him as the bliss faded and he returned to earth, his heart pounding, his pupils dilated and his face flushed with the rush of sensations.
“Oh you do magic to me,” he murmured, “You really do, Tara...”
Then as someone hammered on the door they exchanged a look of alarm as they flew apart, Tara got out of bed first and as David did the same, she grabbed his clothing and tossed it to him.
“Just a minute!” David called out.
As they hastily dressed in panic, Justin's voice was heard from the other side of the locked door.
“Mr Harley...something's happened....Matt went out on the ice...he's not come back...I think he might have been a bit high...please, help! I think something's happened to him!”
Tara straightened her clothing as David pulled up his zip and they exchanged a glance across the messed up bed.
“Shit,” Tara said.
“How long has he been gone?” David called out as he reached for his outer wear, putting his boots on first.
“About two hours...”
“We have to find him! Tara exclaimed.
David hurried to the door and opened it, noticing at once that Justin looked terrible.
“Do you know where he went?”
“He said he was going to take a wander around the settlement,” he replied, “I...must have been asleep. I just happened to notice the time and I saw he wasn't back.”
David kept his voice low as he joined him in the corridor, pausing to look about first to be sure the place was empty before he spoke again.
“You said he was high?”
“He took ecstasy. I swear the rest of us didn't touch it!”
“Do you know where his stash is?”
Justin nodded.
“Then do me a favour and flush it, Please,” David replied, “Then get yourself off to bed – you look awful and I don’t mean to cause offence by saying that... Leave the search party to us.”
“You want me to flush it?” Justin said again, but they had turned away, both heading for the stairs.
Justin went back to his room. Alex was out cold from the booze and as he staggered over to the window and looked out, Justin felt weak as hot and cold ran through his body and he started to sweat again.
He watched as down below, the door opened and the two tutors, along with Sylvia Fischer, went outside. Lights were coming on now, making the settlement bright to stave off the darkness that was swallowing up the icy land, as Sylvia ran off towards a hut further away, where she hammered on a door and set about summoning more help for the search party.
He looked to Matt's open bag left on his bed, remembered David's instructions and grabbed the bag of pills and left the bedroom, heading for the wash room where he planned to lock himself in a toilet cubicle and flush the drugs.
On entering the wash room, he had expected thoughts of Samantha to fill his mind, but instead all he could think about was Matt, out there lost in the ice and snow, out of his mind and probably frightened...
Justin went into a cubicle, closed and locked the door, dumped the stash down the toilet and flushed. Then he slid to the floor, exhaustion taking over as he wondered why he couldn't find the strength to get up. This reaction was wiping him out...
He wrapped his arms about his body as aches intensified, as he shuddered again he drew in a deep breath and slowly got up from the floor. The cubicle seemed to sway and he clung to the door for a moment, then opened it, stepped outside and then made his way out of the wash room.
The walk back to his own room seemed like a very long way to go, because he felt as if his body was about to give up on him. By the time he reached the room he had just enough energy left to make it over to his bed, where he fell on to the mattress gratefully, closing his eyes as he gave in to a shattering, all consuming exhaustion that ran so deep he was sure he had encountered nothing like it ever before.
Tara and David were down the slope, away fr
om the hostel and not far from the metallic buildings. Now the lights were burning brightly it gave a sense of safely out here in the cold, but beyond those lights where the ice and snow stretched on in the dark...Out there, it was a different story, cold wrapped in darkness, deep darkness that was as vast as Antarctica itself...
Tara watched as Sylvia led the way and her search party of six volunteers headed out towards the open ice.
“I hope they find him!” she said.
“Maybe he's not gone that far, maybe he's closer,” David replied, casting a glance about the settlement, then calling Matt's name loudly.
Then he stopped, Tara caught the look in his eyes and she stopped too, they both listened in the silence as the wind whistled by freezing cold, and then they heard it again.
“Help!” whined a muffled voice, it sounded like Matt, and close by, too...
“You wait till I get my hands on that little bastard!”Tara exclaimed, “Getting out of his head on a trip like this!”
“I'm not surprised, like I said before, you don't know them like I do,” David replied as the two of them headed over to a large yellow unit, it was raised above ground, and under the structure, just about under it, cushioned by a snowy landing, was Matt.
They looked down at him. He looked up at them.
“I'm buried in the ice!” he whispered, “I fell down a massive crevasse...it swallowed me! Send down a rope!”
David reached for his hand, pulled him out and on to his feet, where Matt looked back at him in confusion, he looked mildly high and very confused as he realised he was still in the settlement.
“I told you, no drugs on this trip! You're an idiot! You must have gone around in a circle and fallen down the bloody slope!”
“Those pills were shit anyway...it's wearing off now.”
David stepped closer, glaring angrily at his student.
“I don't care if it's wearing off, you're in your room for the next two days, understand me? And no, I don't care how this affects your course work - I won't have anyone under the influence of anything out there on the ice, okay?”
He gave a sigh, shooting his tutor an apologetic look that did nothing to change his mind. Then David grabbed him by his arm, his gloved hand sinking against Matt's snow coat as he turned him around.
“I'll get him back inside,” he said.
“You do that,” Tara replied, loading a flare gun.
Then she took a walk to the furthest point away from the structures, to the place where the ice opened up into the lonely wilderness, raised the gun and sent a flare up to flash the night sky, a clear sign to the others that the crisis was now over.
As they trudged back towards the hostel, David was still furious as he glared at Matt.
“You have caused so much trouble!” he fumed.
Back in the hostel, Alex slept through Matt returning to the room, Justin heard him come in and heard David's stern words, too – but he didn't care any more as he huddled in the dark under the covers, shaking as the aches and the sweats took over again. His skin was starting to feel odd too, like a coat of cold rubber that wobbled with every shiver, as if it could slide off at any moment... He just didn't feel...human any more. It was the only way he could describe it as he tried to make sense of it.
He heard the door close and the main light go off, and he breathed softly under the covers, rubbing the back of his own hand as he wondered why it now felt like a piece of cold rubber, it was almost as if it could slough right off if he wiped his palm across it too hard...cold, uneven rubber that no longer felt like a part of him, that was how his whole body felt... This was getting bad.
Justin was gripped by the strangest notion that perhaps on waking, he wouldn't be human any more... Suddenly he didn't care. He just wanted the pain to stop, even if it meant all of his flesh slid away.
Maybe that would be nice...
He smiled as he lay there with his eyes closed, wondering if this illness was driving him mad, because he had just had the weirdest thought, the most horrible, crazy thought that flesh was probably very tasty...
It didn't bother him that he found it funny, either. He laughed softly in his sleep, turned over, keeping the covers over flesh that felt like it was no longer part of him, sleeping on, laughing again and dreaming of loose flesh that tasted great as what ever had control of his body continued to take it over, he could still feel it happening, but no longer cared...
Chapter 4: Strange Things
It was morning. Outside the snow was gleaming white as the party, led by David and Tara, ventured out beyond the settlement to a flat plan surrounded by icy hills and valleys, armed with their cameras. This was the first day of the big adventure, the learning curve, the taking on of the biggest photographic challenge of their lives, capturing the beauty of the Arctic wasteland. The ice crystals in the air had been captured by the brilliant sunrise, making a perfect sun dog as the halo about the sun shone white and a clear rainbow seemed to cut across it.
But as the team took pictures, the absent members were back at the hostel, the others had been out on the ice for around half an hour by the time Matt woke up, sat up and chugged down a glass of water next to the bed. He felt empty and negative and lousy and silently cursed the mild but shitty come down from the ecstasy. He recalled being told by David that his drugs had been disposed of, and that he was sodding lucky they had not reported him to the authorities...Why would they have done that, as if Mr Harley would have got the uni a bad reputation by mouthing off about a student taking a stash with him to the arctic...
As he got out of bed, Matt was shivering. It was nothing to do with the cold view out the window of the harsh icy morning, nor had he suffered out in the cold last night thanks to his layers of protective clothing. This was the E coming out of his system, it was a weak one and the come down could be summed up in one phrase: He needed water.
“I want to drink it, wash in, drink some more of it...” he murmured, hating the sight of the empty glass next to the bed.
Then he looked over at Justin's bed, where the covers were smiled up in a messy heap and he seemed to be huddled beneath them.
“Oi Justin, have you got over that flu jab yet?” he said, and pulled back the covers.
The sight of the empty bed and blood stains on the pillow made him gasp, he blinked, stared at the crimson stains that looked fresh, then as he remembered he was well off the effects of the drug he knew this was not a bad trip...Must have been a nose bleed. Justin must have had a bad one in the night...but where was he?
That empty feeling was gnawing away at him, making him feel as if his guts were absent. It wasn't a feeling of hunger, just...emptiness. The classic come down, and it sucked, it really sucked, the last thing he had needed was the sight of that blood...
Matt threw on his dressing gown and left the room, went up the corridor and headed for the wash room, the thought of the water reviving him as he imagined all the hydration sinking back into this body and waking his senses properly once more.
The door to the wash room creaked on a dry hinge as he opened it, the sound squeaked and as he thought of dry hinges he was reminded of his own thirst and went over to the sink, turned on the tap and drank from it, gulping down the water until he felt quenched, then he straightened up and gave a gasp as reflected behind him, he saw Justin...
But he wasn't as he remembered him from the night before. His hair was thin and missing in patches, his skin had turned a pale shade of something between grey and white and his eyes were bloodshot. He smiled as green fluid ran from a gap in his lower jaw were two teeth were missing. His nose was blood stained, he was till in his clothing from the night before and they were stained too, with blood from his nose and the green stuff that dried a strange shade of light brown. His fingernails had turned black at the cuticles. His flesh looked like rubber.
“You okay, Matt?” he asked, and his voice rasped like dry leaves in autumn cracking under foot.
Matt turned around, his face pale wi
th shock as he stared at his friend, who was barely recognisable.
“Shit, oh shit you look bad... you've got some sort of disease...keep away from me...you need help, yeah? Let me get you help -”
His words were cut off as Justin stepped closer, blocking his path as he placed a grey, dry skin covered hand on the edge of the sink. As he looked at Matt, Justin's mind was spinning with the fun of it all. Here he was, rubber skin, changed on the inside and wanting to smile so hard his face might split because the thought of how good Matt would taste was thrilling: He had soft flesh, warm blood beneath it. So juicy. So good, no taste like it. He knew it before he even tasted a bite of him, yes this would be so very good....
“Just...get....get out of my way,” Matt stammered, “Please! Let me go, I won't tell anyone, okay? You handle this your way, you go and get some help...or whatever...I just want you to let me go...”
“There's nothing wrong with me,” he rasped, “I feel fine now...just hungry. Very hungry...”
Matt drew in a shaken breath.
“I...I...can get you... some food...”
“Yes, I know.”
Justin's bloodshot eyes shone with glee as he licked his lips.
“I'll...get it now?” Matt said as his voice trembled.
“It's here already,” replied Justin, his eyes glittering darkly.
Matt looked about the empty wash room in confusion.
“Where? Where's the food?”
“Here!” roared Justin, lunging for the kill, grabbing his hair and snapping back his head as his mouth opened wide, so wide his lower jaw took in his exposed throat, clamping down and tearing through flesh and severing vocal cords, shutting off his scream with a crunch as he reached the soft centre where the blood flowed, he drank, and Justin knew he was right:
It really was the best taste ever...
He fed quickly, his first kill was delicious and as the lifeless body slumped pale to the floor, no blood ran from the torn out throat as he looked down at Matt's body and wondered what should be done with it. He was wondering what it would be like to eat more of him, for now the blood and the small amount of flesh he had greedily consumed had barely been noticeable in his thirst for blood, and that need was now satisfied. The corpse was drained and Justin had never felt so good.