Sun at Midnight

by Rosie Thomas

  ‘Let me,’ she muttered to Rook and he understood at once. Pushing Richard and Phil and the gaping Arturo aside, he helped her to roll on to all fours. The door of the shelter stood ajar and beyond it there was black emptiness. She crawled towards the ebony slice of pure air. Rooker’s arm supported her and they broke out of the shelter together. As she stood upright the cold seared her throat.

  ‘What do you need?’

  ‘I want to move around. It’s…’ Another contraction took all her attention. Her face screwed up in concentration and she gasped as it washed over her. But it was easier, better when she was moving around than lying inert and helpless in the smelly hut.

  ‘I’m here,’ he said calmly. ‘Hold on to me.’

  Laure materialised at her other side. Another arm came round her waist. They took one and then two small, delicate steps in the greasy snow.

  A round head bobbed at the door of the generator shed. Russell called out, ‘Santa Ana say that they’ll be airborne as soon as they can. Polar Star’s standing by as well.’

  Alice lifted her head and looked up. The eastern sky was faintly tinged with grey. It would get light soon.

  ‘Aleece?’ Laure urgently whispered. ‘Can you tell me how many weeks you think you could be?’

  ‘I worked it out. You know, when I realised. I thought by now, twenty-six. But I must have been wrong. Two months wrong, probably. It could be…Perhaps thirty-four weeks. Oh…’

  They stopped their pacing and two pairs of arms supported her as the claws of pain dug in again. The receding wave left her gasping for breath.

  ‘What does that mean, Laure?’ Rook demanded.

  ‘I am not certain. I am only a biologist, I know everything about avian embryology, not so much about human gestation. But I believe that a baby at thirty-four weeks has a chance to survive. It will be small, but if there are no breathing difficulties and it can be kept warm…’

  There was a second’s silence.

  Rooker broke their slow stride and placed himself squarely in front of her. ‘We’ll get you out to the ship. There’s a doctor on Polar Star, oxygen, everything. Alice, I promise.’ Laure was still holding her on the other side. Rook took both Alice’s hands in his. ‘I promise that you and the baby will both be safe.’

  The grey light of the rapid polar dawn was flooding towards them over the snow. The glacier and the peaks crowning it were draped with low cloud, but the sea ice and the trapped berg were illuminated, and beyond them, away to the north somewhere, Polar Star was riding on the ice margin.

  Alice held on to Rooker’s hands and looked into his eyes.

  There was enough light for her to see the frown groove between his eyebrows, the dark mole on his forehead where the hood of his parka had pulled back. She could feel the slow vice grip of another contraction beginning and she opened her mouth to breathe. The need for reassurance, his reassurance, made her ask him in a voice that was hardly more than a gasp, ‘How do you know?’

  Rooker didn’t move. He bent his head so he could see her better. Their mouths were almost touching. Laure was right next to them, Russell had come out of the generator shed, Arturo and Phil were close by with empty water containers. Either the piping or the lake itself was now completely frozen and the trickle of water had stopped. There was a ring of faces gazing at them; instead of tactful and obliterating darkness the daylight now seemed bright enough to dazzle him, yet he felt a pressure to speak that was too strong to resist. The urgency of it filled his mouth. He had to tell her something he had never told anyone else.

  He saw Alice’s face beginning to screw up in a mask of concentration as the pain flowered yet again. If he didn’t speak now, this minute, it might be too late and all the blocked avenues and dead ends of the past would come together to make one huge impenetrable dark obstacle, and that would be his life, and there would never be the light and the sunshine that he was stumbling towards in this polar dawn.

  ‘I know, because I love you,’ he said.

  ‘Ah, ah.’ Alice threw her head back and moaned aloud.

  ‘Breathe, Aleece. Breathe big, like this, whoo whooooo,’ Laure gabbled. The endless distorted seconds stretched and then Alice’s shoulders slumped and her head came forward.

  ‘Because I love you,’ Rooker repeated slowly. The words were like a foreign language, scratchy and unwieldy on his tongue, but he had uttered them. Alice never took her eyes off his, she was smiling a wide, drunken smile and her face was wet with tears. There were tears in Laure’s eyes, too, and the watching, dismayed men were stunned into a silent tableau with their jerrycans and their smoke-black ripped parkas and their huge mittened hands.

  ‘Walk,’ Alice begged. They resumed their slow, lurching steps.

  ‘I love you too,’ she whispered. ‘Don’t leave me.’

  Warning recollections skewered Rooker’s thoughts. Memories punctured his absorption in this shining moment and all the old black shadows came flooding in on him. ‘I won’t leave you,’ he murmured. ‘Not until you and the baby are safe.’

  Richard unfolded himself from the skidoo shelter. He moved like a marionette, legs and arms jerking and his head pecking backwards and forwards. ‘What’s happening? What’s happening?’ he demanded.

  ‘What do you think? We are taking care of her,’ Laure snapped.

  ‘Out here? Shouldn’t she lie down?’

  ‘Not if she doesn’t want to,’ Laure shouted back.

  Valentin came and draped his huge parka over the top of Alice’s.

  Phil brought his sheepskin hat, the warmest any of them owned, and awkwardly pulled it down over her fleece cap. He tucked her sweaty hair under the flaps and held a cup of water to her mouth. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ he repeated. To be caught without practical resources was hard for him.

  ‘Thank you, thank you,’ Alice dazedly muttered. The familiar faces swam in and out of her sightline. She was grateful but her body was taking over; all her attention becoming fixed on the huge task at hand so that even Rooker and what he had just told her were pushed to the margins of her mind.

  Breathe. Feel the muscular waves inside, wrenching and squeezing, opening up like a mouth to emit a yell of agony.

  Niki burst out of the generator hut with his headset askew. ‘They are airborne, just now,’ he yelled.

  ‘Grâce à Dieu,’ Laure breathed.

  Rooker only nodded. His face was impassive.

  They went on walking, small shuffling steps with Alice supported between Rooker’s and Laure’s linked arms. With each contraction they stopped to let Alice breathe and cry out and roll her head against Rook’s shoulder. Her hands clenched so tightly on theirs that it hurt them even through their mittens. There seemed almost no respite now between the gulfs of pain.

  The time passed, a long unmeasured crawl, as the helicopter steadily flew south towards Kandahar.

  Alice stared down through the fog of agony. Nothing could have prepared her for this, nothing would have convinced her that anything could hurt so much. Her vision blurred, then cleared again. She could suddenly see in minute detail. Between her feet there were snowflakes and crystals, tiny prisms and intricate facets more opulent than the most precious jewels, shirred ice and folds of pure snow, droplets of water that froze into diamonds, and silvery furrows that trapped blue and amethyst shadows. It was a miniature Antarctica that held all the variety and wonder of the harsh immensity that had seduced her.

  Antarctica, Antarctica.

  The syllables formed a new mantra, rolling and tapping in her head as she tried to breathe instead of drowning in the infinite sea of pain. Her knees were buckling, she could hardly lift her feet. Contraction had merged into contraction until it felt as if she would be torn in pieces. She was moaning and sobbing, beyond any shred of pride or dignity.

  Once she caught sight of Valentin biting the knuckles of his own hand, and there was Arturo, watching with his arms wrapped round himself as if for protection against this raw femaleness. Russ and Phil
grimly waited with their faces turned to the pearl-grey sky. Niki was on the radio to the incoming pilot.

  Richard stood to one side, alone, stiff-backed, his face unreadable.

  ‘Listen,’ Phil yelled.

  Alice’s head drooped but the others’ jerked up in unison.

  At first it seemed that they must have conjured the sound out of their collective longing, but then it steadied and swelled. It was the unmistakable distant buzz of the helicopter.

  ‘Thank Christ,’ Phil whispered.

  Rooker allowed himself a backward glance, over his shoulder towards the sea ice and the distance that shrouded Polar Star.

  What he saw, what he didn’t see, almost stopped his heart.

  There was no berg visible in the bay. There was no bay at all, no ice, no ragged glacier tongue or familiar line of serrated peaks. All there was was a wall of thick grey sea mist, stealthily rolling in on them. Moist, cold air that would condense and turn to a layer of ice on whatever it touched.

  Ahead, in the direction of Santa Ana, the sky was clouded but the air was still clear. A black dot had materialised against the greyness. Russ and Phil were hastily laying out red canisters and parkas to give an improvised landing square some extra definition for the pilot.

  ‘Just a few minutes now, darling,’ Laure murmured to Alice. ‘We will take you safe to the ship.’

  The roar of the helicopter drowned out their voices. As they gazed upwards, their exposed faces stinging from the whirl of ice crystals whipped up by the blades, the mist was already billowing over the ruins of Kandahar. The machine hovered, then slowly sank to the ground. The others shielded their eyes from the blizzard; Alice’s head was sunk on her chest; Laure and Rooker turned their faces aside as they supported her. The pilot cut the engines and the blades spun to a standstill. Silence descended.

  The pilot leaped out in his red overalls and flying helmet, and ran towards their little group. ‘How is she?’

  ‘I think not long,’ Laure said.

  Rooker hoisted Alice towards the helicopter. He knew that there wasn’t even one second to spare. She stumbled, hanging on to him but trying to help herself. ‘Let’s go,’ he was shouting. ‘Come on, get her in and get it off the ground.’

  The pilot was Andy. He was shaking his head, shouting and pointing over Rooker’s shoulders. Rook didn’t try to catch the words, he already knew what he was saying. He lifted Alice off her feet and somehow ran the last few steps to the Squirrel with her in his arms. The Kandahar people were running in his wake, pushing Andy and Richard aside in the rush. Richard and the pilot were conferring, their heads bobbing and their hands waving as they looked out into the wall of mist and back at the helicopter.

  Alice found herself in the rear seat of the Squirrel. Her head rolled on the seat back, then she shuddered and clenched her fists. A different feeling swept over her, not a pain any longer but an irresistible compulsion. ‘Need to push.’ She thought she was saying it aloud, but the words didn’t escape her mouth. ‘Help me.’

  Andy shouted, ‘I can’t take off now. Look at the mist. Vis can’t be more than sixty metres, it can’t be done. It’s too dangerous.’

  Laure had had one foot on the door sill, ready to scramble in after Alice. Now she turned and looked back at the huddle of parkas and overalls. She hesitated, then slowly stepped back down to the ice. The Kandahar people milled around Richard and Andy. There was a blur of arms and faces and a babble of voices.

  Rooker ran to Andy. He caught him by the shoulders and tried to propel him towards the Squirrel. ‘Get in now. Fly it.’

  Andy swept his hand towards the mist. ‘Look at it. It would be suicide…’

  Richard seemed to wake up. ‘No one goes anywhere. No one flies in these conditions. I am the leader of this expedition and I will lead it. I forbid you to fly.’

  If Alice had heard him she might have reflected that it was Richard’s ironic destiny not to lead them anywhere, but to insist that they stayed put. But Alice was out of earshot and trying with shuddering breaths to control the imperatives of her body.

  The pilot rubbed his beard with the back of his hand, clear regret in his eyes. ‘He’s right, mate. I’m sorry.’

  ‘I’ll fly it myself,’ Rooker shouted.

  He swung round and made for the Squirrel. Inside it he could see Alice’s bent head. Richard and Andy grabbed his arms but he shook them off like flies. A second later he was buckling himself into the pilot’s seat.

  ‘Stop him,’ Richard howled at the Kandahar people. But without any conferring a collective impulse had taken hold of the team. It was Richard they moved in on. Valentin and Phil pinioned his arms, Russ took hold of the collar of his parka, the others blocked his path. Richard fought and struggled but he was outnumbered. The astonished pilot stood aside, his mouth hanging open.

  Inside the Squirrel, Rooker deliberately slowed his mind to make a series of cold calculations.

  Ice. It was ice that could kill them, just as always.

  The helicopter had been on the ground for no more than three or four minutes but already the thick, wet mist was beginning to freeze on the fuselage and blades. Once the Squirrel was iced up, take-off would be impossible. They would all be trapped with no hope of escape until the mist lifted and the machine could be de-iced. There was no food on the base, practically no water, only the supplies that were loaded in the helicopter’s stowage section.

  There was no time to unload anything. He had to get airborne right now and up above the mist bank before the air intakes froze up and the engines lost power. He had to fly Alice to the ice margin and get her into the Polar Star’s Zodiac, then bring the Squirrel back to Kandahar. The mist was thickening, but he rated his chances higher than Andy’s. He knew the terrain around the base more intimately, and he had already made the journey to the sea and back.

  Fly. He could fly, it was in him, his first instructor had told him so.

  ‘Rook.’ There was raw desperation in her voice.

  ‘I’m going to pilot us.’

  ‘Do you know how to?’

  ‘Of course I do.’

  He ran his eyes over the unfamiliar instruments and controls in a deliberate slow sequence. Yes. Start it up: switch on batteries and fuel pump, check voltage, start up both engines. The blades shivered and obediently spun, and through the white murk Rooker saw the Kandahar people scatter backwards. Laure’s hands were at her mouth. He gave the engines a thirty-second warm-up and accelerated towards flying speed. The Squirrel shivered on its skids. Even over the roar of the engines he heard Alice give a series of gasping cries. He raised the collective lever and the machine lifted as if it were tiptoeing on the snow. Thank God, the skids were free. Rooker accelerated and lifted into a low hover. They were airborne. Check temperature, pressure and power. Visibility was now down to about fifty metres.

  Alice raised herself into a half-crouch. Her last glimpse of Kandahar was a semicircle of gaping, upturned, familiar faces. Their arms were raised and although she knew in one corner of her mind that they were protecting their eyes from the storm of snow, it looked as if they were waving in a salute or a blessing.

  The helicopter swung in a tight circle and headed out over the sea ice.

  Rooker needed every particle of concentration for flying and navigation by instruments alone. It was like being airborne in a bowl of milk. There was no room for even the faintest flicker of uncertainty or self-doubt. He eased the machine into a steady ascent and at 110 metres a dirty-yellow glimmer began to suffuse the milk. A few seconds later they rose out of the fog bank into thin sunshine. The fog undulated beneath them, a billowing cloud that stretched to the lemon-yellow horizon. Fourteen miles to the northeast somewhere lay Polar Star.

  Rooker lifted the pilot’s headset and pulled it over his head. At once Niki’s thick voice filled his ears with directions. It was good. He was dead on course for the ship. ‘The Zodiac is launched. They look for you on the ice,’ Niki said.

  ‘Thank you, Kan
dahar.’

  He had a second’s respite now to look over his shoulder to Alice. Her eyes were starting, and her face was shiny with sweat and tears.

  ‘It’s coming. Help me.’

  ‘Hold on.’

  ‘I can’t. Stop. Please, stop.’

  The wind was getting up. Below them, the mist was now streaming in thin tatters. Rooker caught a glimpse of the ridged pack ice far beneath. Under his layers of matted clothing a cold sweat chilled his back. He swallowed and eased the Squirrel back into a descent. The ice loomed up to meet him. He glimpsed ragged frozen waves and searched desperately for a smoother trough between them. They were skimming over a solid blue-grey sea. Then he caught sight of a flat grey saucer that measured little more in diameter than the Squirrel itself. Sweating, hardly able to breathe, he hovered and with a wordless prayer put the helicopter down. It rocked alarmingly but the ice surface held.

  Alice was making low noises in her throat. He told her to lie back across the rear seats and bend her knees. Struggling in the awkward space, they dragged down her torn windproofs and soaked underlayers.

  Rooker shouted into the headset mouthpiece, ‘Polar Star, Polar Star?’

  He could see the baby’s head. It was wet and black, and netted with blood and mucus. Alice was staring and pushing and as she did so the oval of head swelled in the birth canal.

  A Spanish voice broke in on him: ‘NZ two-zero, do you read me?’

  ‘I read you.’

  ‘What is happening, please?’

  ‘The baby is being born. I can see the head.’

  ‘Okay. Listen to me. Let her push. Put your left hand on the baby’s head, use your right hand to support the mother’s tissues underneath.’

  It was the Polar Star’s doctor. Rook did as he was told but he could see that Alice’s body knew what to do. She had stopped groaning and the terror had faded out of her eyes. Now there was a fierce light of absolute determination. A contraction passed and she rested with her chin sunk on her chest. The doctor’s voice crackled in his ear but Rooker ignored it.