by Wilson, Tia
“And what then, you get to walk off into the sunset like a cowboy your head held high until a bullet is put in you?” she said.
“Thats the plan,” he said. He felt unburdened, a pressure from behind his eyes seemed to be gone. Saying out loud what had been burrowed scared and hiding in the back of his mind for so long somehow eased the pressure, a valve had been turned releasing a built up head of steam. He slowed the car as he turned and drove onto the rutted road that was the next mark on his map. A green jeep with two blue kayaks strapped to the roof was parked up ahead by a rusting gate. A man in a blue windbreaker and long hair tied in a top knot waved for Brad to slow down as he drew near.
Brad pulled in behind the car and got out. The long haired guy waved at him and said, “Are you here for the walking tour, you’re the first one so far.”
Brad walked over to him and said, “No, sorry I’m just out doing a bit of sight seeing. What kind of tour are you doing?”
“We walk to various points of interest, check out some of the abandoned farms, old settlements and some outdoor hot springs. It’s a three hour hike. You’re welcome to join us if you want, your eh,” he hesitated looking over at the car.
“Daughter,” Brad replied.
“Yes, you and your daughter can join if you want. It’s only ten thousand kronur. It’s well worth it if you ask me,” he said.
“Are you very familiar with this area?” Brad asked, “maybe you can help me with something.”
“Sure thing. I’ll do my best,” the tour guide said.
Brad went to the car and got his map and spread it out on the cars hood. “I’m a photography nut. I’ve been taking pictures of farmhouses, cabins, traditional dwellings stuff like that. A guy in the guesthouse I was staying at told me these roads,” he said pointing at the roads he had marked on the map, “all had cool buildings worth taking pictures of. I’m not so sure how reliable his info is. I hit the first road this morning and it was a dead end. No farm house only a dead end and an old quarry. Took me hours to drive it. I was going to work my way along each of these roads and now I’m not so sure. Am I wasting my time?”
“Let me have a look,” the man said turning the map towards him. “These three roads connect to the highland road running through the centre of the county. You’ll find nothing but natural beauty on those routes. There’s no liveable land and no old structures. What did you say you’re looking for, is it derelict buildings you want to photograph?” the man asked.
“Maybe on the next trip. Currently I’m focusing on places that are liveable working farms, places like that. I’m obsessed with them at the moment,” Brad said.
“I’m a bit of a photographer myself, what are you slinging?” the man asked.
Brad hesitated for a second and said, “I’m old school, its all retro stuff.” Brad pointed at the next road on the map and said, “How far is the farmhouse down this road?”
The man whistled through his teeth and said, “I’m not sure what was up with your guy, he’s given you some bad info. That road leads to some outdoor geothermal pools. No houses there. The next ones leads to some popular hiking trails, again no house there.” He scratched his chin and then pointed at two roads and said, “This road here leads to a farm all right. It’s a cattle farm as far as I remember. They have a huge red barn and some very quaint outbuildings. This second road leads up to a glacier and if memory serves there is a small hunting cabin near to the base of the glacier. It's not as picturesque as the farm, it's a bit ramshackle as far as I remember.”
Brad pointed at the map and said, “So these two roads are the only ones that might yield me some good photos?”
“Yes. Any of the others wont be any use to you if you’re after buildings. Was the guy who gave you the information drunk?” the man asked.
“Something like that,” Brad said folding up the map. He shook the mans hand and said, “you’ve saved me a huge amount of time.”
“Are you sure I cant interest you on my walking tour?” the man asked.
“Another time maybe,” Brad said and walked towards the car.
“Hey what happened to your face?” the man asked.
“An accident, some sheep ran across the road. I hit the brakes and bang, slammed my face into the steering wheel. The sheep were unharmed,” Brad said laughing and getting into the car.
The man waved as they pulled off and Brad nodded in his direction. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he drove back along the coast road. Which of these places are you hiding out in Lana, he thought to himself. He wasn’t a spiritual man, he didn’t believe in any kind of omens or signs from a higher being and yet he couldn't shake the feeling that he had just been handed a lucky break.
They hit the first side road an hour later. The dirt road wound up and over a range of hills and in the distance Brad could see a large working farm. There was no sign of the red pickup parked in front of any of the farm buildings. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and said, “Go down and find out if your friend has turned up at this place in the last day or so.”
“Why should I do that?,” Sara asked.
“You’re a smart girl, you figure it out. The more you help me the more favourable Gus will be to you. You know how this world works. Now get out and ask around. If anyone acts suspicious come straight back. I’ll hang back here, there is only one way out if anyone decides to flee.”
She looked at him, her eyes wide and her face slack and then brightening she said, “Ok I’ll do it,” and got out of the car and headed towards the farm.
Brad tilted his chair back and watched her go. He counted three people working on the farm, walking behind buildings carrying tools or pushing wheel barrows. After an hour waiting in the car Brad heard Sara’s shoes crunch in the gravel and his head snapped back and he awoke with a start. He rubbed his eyes and stretched, Sara's expression was blank and his gut told him they weren't holed up at the farm. That left them one more place to check before he was shit out of luck and that would leave him unsure of his next step.
She opened the car door and the pungent smell of manure wafted in.
“Wipe your feet before you get in, I don’t want you stinking up the car,” Brad said.
She complied and got in. “I don't think they passed through here. I spoke to a woman, I think she was the farmers wife. I played the whole wandering tourist role. She brought me in for some fresh milk and a slice of cake. The sweet old lady even gave me a quick tour of the place. I got no sense that anything was up. The pickup wasn’t parked anywhere on the farm either.”
Brad sat in the car for twenty minutes observing the farm. Everything seemed to continue on as before, workers going about their tasks. The farmers wife hanging clothes on a line. He started the car and turned it around and headed back to the main road.
Once he got to his last lead on the map he parked the car across from the gravel road leading up towards the glacier. He checked his map again. There was a single road leading up to the glacier and then it was a dead end backed by the forbidding ice shelf of the slowly advancing glacier. To the right of the road was a hill of loose scree and car sized boulders. The left side was a sharp drop to a wide and flat canyon broken up by a thousand streams of glacial runoff that cut through the earth in a myriad of angles. The place the man had pointed to on the map was right at the end of the road, meaning the cabin was close to the glacier. If they were in the cabin they had trapped themselves into a corner Brad thought. If they saw him coming they had very few choices he thought. They could take him head on and take the gravel road back out to the main coast road and try to escape. All he would have to do was to block the road with his car and they would be screwed. They could climb down into the canyon below and try to make a run for it across flat and open ground. The third choice would be to climb onto the glacier behind the house and cross it to the mountains on the other side. Slow going and just as open as the canyon floor he thought to himself. The only other way was to scale the rock
y hill on the other side of the cabin. Another path that would be tricky going and easy pickings for someone with a good shot. If the whole situation wasn't so grim for his targets he would have laughed. They have sealed their own faith backing themselves into a dead end with no real escape.
If he was back home Brad would have waited until the cover of dark, no such look in the twenty four hours of sunlight of an Icelandic summer. He checked his watch and it was past midnight, the sky above a darkening blue and filled with sea birds circling and calling out. “No time like the present,” he said to Sara as he got out of the car. He popped the trunk open, looked around to make sure no one was about and then checked the rifle again. He put two boxes of bullets in his inside pocket and slammed the trunk shut. Back in the car he said, “Here’s how it’s going to go down,” and he laid the plan out for Sara.
The Midnight Sun
The noise of the cabin door swinging shut woke Lana from a terror filled nightmare. She rubbed her sore and puffy eyes and looked around. Einar was gone and for a second her whole body clenched as if someone had thrown a bucket of ice water over her. He’s here, the killer is here her awakening senses told her. Her fingers dug into the thin mattress of the bed as she waited for the brute to walk through the door. She saw movement at the window and all tension left her body. It was Einar walking by looking at something in the distance. She got out of bed and put her jacket on and pulled on a pair of trainers. It was some time after midnight and she felt disorientated with the ever present sun in the sky.
Einar stood on the porch looking at a distant bloom of dust on the horizon. “Grab me the binoculars off the kitchen table,” he said as he covered his eyes with his hand to block out the rays of the low hanging sun. The dust cloud was heading in the direction of the cabin on the only road that connected the cabin to the coast. Lana unzipped the case and took out the heavy pair of binoculars that had once belonged to Einar's grandfather. I was a fool she thought to herself, who was I kidding playing house out here in the wilds all the while pretending that the world outside didn't exist. You can only outrun the devil for so long and she just knew that it was him barreling towards them in the car. She passed the binoculars to Einar and he thumbed the focus wheel for a clearer view. “It’s him,” he said through gritted teeth and he passed the binoculars to Lana. Her palms sweated as she looked at the approaching car and then a wave of nausea hit her when she saw the driver. As the sun glinted off the windshield she could just make out a figure driving the car who was all dressed in black and with a dark balaclava pulled over his face and who was speeding towards them. The driver was less then ten minutes away at the speed he was travelling. Lana felt faint and reached out and grabbed Einar's arm, dots of light danced in her vision.
“We stick to the plan,” Einar said loudly and everything snapped back into focus for Lana, “grab me my rifle and you get going. I’ll hold him off.”
Lana ran inside and threw on her down jacket and grabbed Einar's rifle leaning against the wall. She looked around at the cabin one last time, the few days they had spent together was now gone, all happiness destroyed by the approaching car and the man inside.
Einar stood behind the large boulder at the side of the road, never taking his eyes off the approaching car. She stepped out of the cabin and Einar spun around as if something had pushed him back with force, then the sound of a rifle shot reverberated around the canyon. Einar fell back against the boulder, the binoculars falling from his hand and sliding over the edge and tumbling towards the glacial run off river below. Another shot rang out and his legs collapsed out from under him, then a third hit the rock where his head had been moments before and kicked up a cloud of dust.
Lana felt all the blood drain from her body and she shouted, “No,” as the rifle slipped from her hands that felt disconnected from her body. She was frozen to the spot until a clod of gravel exploded in front of her as another bullet was fired. Lana looked up to the sloping cliff face that towered over the cabin and saw him, his rifle slung over his shoulder and he was moving nimbly for a man his size as he jumped from rock to rock making his way down towards the road. He was less then two minutes away from the cabin.
“Run,” Einar shouted as he rolled over onto his stomach to see the gunman climbing down. Blood pooled underneath him. They were only ten metres apart from each other, if she went to him now it would be all over. Fear coursed through her body and she stood locked to the spot. “I love you Lana,” Einar shouted and spat out a mouthful of blood, “run” he shouted at her in a bellowing roar. Her stasis was broken and her legs began to pound along the gravel road as her lungs gasped in great burning lungfuls of air. She ran down the thin dirt road towards the lip of the glacier. Her heart pounded as her feet kicked up a cloud of dust, she felt like she was running through thick honey unable to move fast enough.
Another shot rang out and she turned to look back. Her whole world flipped and her mouth filled with dirt as she tripped and fell hard on her knees, her hands breaking her fall and shredding on the sharp flinty surface. The wind was knocked out of her and she looked back down the path towards the cabin. He was standing there all dressed in black and moving like a machine towards her, slow, steady and surefooted. If she didn't get moving he would catch up to her within minutes. Her shoes slid on the ground as she tried to get back up, kicking out behind her. She felt exhausted already and then her feet found purchase and she was up and running again.
Lana’s lungs burned as the path began to slope upwards and then she turned the corner and saw the chiseled steps leading up to the glacier. Something dark brown darted across the path ahead of her, small and low to the ground, and headed into the purple field of lupins flanking one side of the path. She got to the side of the glacier and took the five wide steps up to the top.
Standing on the edge of the glacier she took a moment to look back. He was still coming only at a somewhat slower pace due to the steep incline of the last section of the path. She looked across the shimmering blue expanse of the glacier and started to run towards the other side. She cursed herself after a few steps, I forgot my ice crampons because of the surprise attack she thought to herself as her feet skidded to find a purchase on the ice. She moved as fast as she could, every couple of steps her foot shooting out behind her and nearly causing her to fall. I can do this she told herself, she knew she had two kilometres to cross and then she could easily lose her attacker if she followed Einar's plan.
Lana was a tiny speck of colour against the rippling blue of the glacier. To her right it gently sloped upwards to the wide open plateau that comprised the main mass of the huge ice body. The part she ran across was a two kilometre wide tongue forced between two mountains as the forces of the glacier ripped and shredded the earth making a wide canyon over a span of thousands of years. She avoided any patches of snow as her feet skidded over the icy surface. Parts of the glacier sparkled like a high sheen diamond while other sections where opaque with black volcanic swirls embedded in the icy depths.
She slowed slightly and glanced back, he was still coming but at a slower pace as he tried to traverse the slippery surface. She picked up speed and focused on the patch of grass across from her on the other side of the canyon. She was over half way there and she thought if I can keep up this pace I should beat him. A noise like a clap of thunder booming ricocheted off the canyon walls. Lana stopped running and skidded forward a few steps her arms pinwheeling as she tried not to lose balance. She looked back and her attacker was down on one knee with the rifle pointed in her direction.
All rational thought fled from her body and she turned and ran finding new reserves of energy as her feet seemed to glide over the surface of the ice. I can make it she thought as her muscles ached from exertion. A few feet ahead of her a bullet ripped into the glacier and kicked up a cloud of ice chips, she dodged to the left and her legs slid out from her and she came down hard on the ice, her shoulder taking the brunt of the force. She skidded across the ice for a few more feet, c
old water soaking through her jeans and stinging her shredded palms. Getting up from the ice she looked back and he was coming towards her again with the rifle pointed at her. He walked slowly and sure footed as he covered the ground between them. I can’t go on she thought as she felt the cold of the glacier wrap its icy fingers around her aching body. Her muscles felt slack and drained of any power to move forward. I can’t move anymore she thought throwing her head back and looking at two birds high in the sky above her and totally oblivious to the drama unfolding below them.