Operation Antarctica

by William Meikle

  The circle in which it stood was another matter entirely. Its lines and daubs, primitive though they might be, exerted a definite opposing force against my valves, and it sent out a darkness that tried to dim the pentacle’s brightness and infected the colors with a pinkish-red hue that was almost fiery.

  I picked up my small control box and started to modulate the valves, rotating through various pulses and color combinations, searching for one that might defend, and even repel, the red darkness that tried to ooze from the original circle. But in doing so, I almost brought about my own downfall. I discovered that if I used too little blue, or too much red, the strength of the inner circle swelled ever stronger.

  It pressed hard against the valves, causing all of them to whine and complain even as I tried to switch to a different modulation. It was as I was attempting to turn up the yellow that I saw the thing that worried me.

  The oozing red color thickened inside the original circle, flaring like a raging fire. The demon, no longer quite so static as before, danced in the flame, no longer grinning but screaming soundlessly as if burning in great agony. I felt a blast of heat reach me, even protected as I was by the circles of my electric pentacle. There was also a warm glow on my face, like sun on a hot summer’s day, but it was as nothing compared to what appeared to be hungry fires lapping all around the now thrashing red figure that was imprisoned right in the center of all the commotion.

  As I increased the power to the yellow valve, more demonic figures in the center circle showed solid form. Indeed, it was soon packed tight with them, a throng, a horde, of cavorting, red figures packed together so tightly that they stood shoulder to shoulder, completely filling the space inside the circle, all screaming as they burned in hellish flame. And even as I had the thought, I knew what I was seeing; I was indeed looking beyond a veil to part of the great beyond I had not previously encountered.

  I believe I was being given a vision of Hell itself.

  Not that I believed in a literal Hell of course, but I knew that old tales, religion, and mythology often had their origins in glimpses of compartments or realms of Outer Darkness that the human mind had to try to rationalize to understand them. Perhaps Hell as understood by the wider world was always merely a construct built to make sense of a glimpse of somewhere else, a door through to this burning, red horror I was currently watching.

  Wherever it was, the older, inner circle was still exuding heat and the room was heating up by the second. I was starting to wonder whether the fire that had consumed the cellar ten years before had been intentional at all. I did not have time to dwell on it, for if it got any hotter, I was going to have to beat a hasty retreat to avoid ending up in the northern sanitarium alongside the last man to see the same sight.

  I pushed the yellow valve to as high a brightness as I dared, and that did seem to bring a momentary coolness wafting through the cellar, but any respite was short-lived, and within seconds the red flames lashed harder still against the pentacle. I quickly went through several more permutations of color and modulation as the heat grew almost unbearable and almost cried out in relief when, just as I thought I would have to flee, I set a wave of rapid alternating pulses of blue and yellow washing through the room.

  The fires inside the circle dimmed and faded as if doused by water. The demons screamed soundlessly, threw their limbs around in a jerky, almost comical, dance, then they too dimmed and went quiet, leaving only the original, winged beast standing in the center. It looked at me and it appeared to be smiling as it too finally faded and dissipated before disappearing entirely, leaving me alone in a room awash with blue and yellow and a cool, almost chill breeze that came through the wall of the river beyond.

  I sat still, watching, for the length of time it took to smoke two cheroots, leaving the pentacle running. The only sound was the hum from my battery and the thin whine that came from the valves as they dimmed and faded. The washes of color splashed across wall, ceiling, and floor, but that was the only movement to be seen. There was no reappearance of any demon, dancing or otherwise, in the inner circle.

  After my smokes, I lit my oil lamp again and switched off the pentacle, ready to switch it back on at the first sign of any redness or flame. The cellar remained quiet and cool. And I realized something else. It felt empty, and somehow I knew for a fact that I was the only presence here.

  *

  Banks sat up straight in the chair, suddenly hit by inspiration that had eluded him until now. The golden circles and markings on the floor weren’t the cause of the problems on the base; his reading had just made that clear.

  The circles are attempts to contain the demon, possibly even an attempt to control it. The saucer is sitting in a prison the Germans made for it.

  It had held all these long years from the war until now. But somehow, the bonds that held the demon had been slipped, if only a fraction. And now whatever lived in that prison was trying its best to escape.

  *

  He let the men sleep while he sat at the table, pondering his epiphany. He couldn’t make heads or tails of the talk in the journal of color washes and valves, at least none that would help him. From what he could gather, the man, Carnacki, had a piece of equipment that he used in his work that utilized the color theory mentioned, but as they’d found no sign of any such equipment on the base, Banks didn’t think the Germans had used the same methods.

  He looked for the other bag of papers before remembering that it must still be back in the hut; he hadn’t seen it recently, hadn’t given it any thought, and now that he needed it, it was in the one place he couldn’t, wouldn’t go to fetch. He remembered that it had been occult symbols he hadn’t understood, blueprints for building the saucer, and those, impossible, shots of the saucer in orbit. It all added up to something that he thought he should understand, but which remained too far away from how he’d always understood the world worked.

  But merely the fact that the demon could be controlled, even expelled, gave Banks hope, and that was something that had been in short supply this past twenty-four hours.

  *

  He sat there, wide-awake now, idly reading passages from Carnacki’s journal. The man had obviously had dealings with Churchill, and knew something about all this demonic mumbo-jumbo, but it was like reading a fairytale for all the sense it made to Banks. He could see nothing that would be really useful in bringing their situation to an end.

  He was still of a mind to sit this one out, wait for the relief and tell them his theory, but any thought of an easy time of it was thwarted after a few hours of respite. It started, as before, with a high chanting, monks singing in the wind.

  Banks quickly roused the men.

  “Get the plugs full in, lads,” he said, almost shouting so that they’d hear him. “And remember the Gaelic. It’s the only thing that saved us before. Get ready to move.”

  “We’re not going back outside again, surely, Cap,” Wiggins replied. “We’ve only just got fucking warm.”

  It was only on hearing the question that Banks realized he’d come to a decision while sitting in the quiet room.

  “No. We’re not heading out,” he said. “We’re heading in. It’s time to face this thing. This ends now, one way or the other.”

  - 14 -

  He led the men out into the main chamber. As soon as he opened the room door, the sound of the chanting got noticeably louder, even through the earplugs.

  “Dhumna Ort!” he muttered, which helped, but didn’t deaden the sound entirely anymore. He motioned the men forward, and was pleased to see that they had all unslung their weapons, and had fallen into formation behind him. Hynd brought up the rear as Banks led the other three quickly across the large empty space to the double doorway that led to the hangar corridor.

  He realized he had no clear plan, but it felt good to be on the move again, and with a definite goal in mind. The first step was to get to the saucer room. He was hoping something else would come to him by the time they got there.


  *

  The heat in the corridor beyond the double doors was almost stifling, but Banks wasn’t of a mind to divest himself of his outerwear – the experience in the hut had impressed on him just how quickly the temperature might change. It was getting uncomfortably sweaty inside his gear, but it was a small price to pay if it stopped him turning like the dead men he’d seen with the Oberst.

  But they wouldn’t be able to put up with such heat for long, for it was going to sap their strength just as fast as any prolonged exposure to the cold. He headed up the corridor at double time. The chanting got louder, it got hotter, and Banks wasn’t quite sure if he was running into action, or running to answer the call of the dark void of eternity.

  As long as we get to the bloody hangar room, the why of it doesn’t really matter.

  He kept telling himself that, but wasn’t sure he believed it.

  *

  The hangar room glowed as golden yellow, and as warm, as any midday summer sun, and the saucer hummed and vibrated, as if excited at their approach. One thing changed as soon as they entered the hangar – the chanting stopped again, and all compulsion left Banks.

  We’re where it wants us to be. Again.

  Banks pulled out his earplugs, and the squad followed suit when they saw.

  “Cally,” Banks said. “Can we cut the power?”

  “Cut it? I don’t even know where it’s coming from – or going to,” the corporal said.

  Banks nodded toward the saucer.

  “We can assume it’s coming from there,” he said, then walked over to the tall metal containers banked beside the gauges and meters, “and it’s going here, then out to the rest of the base.”

  “I get that much,” McCally said, “but what’s powering yon fucker?”

  Banks looked back at the saucer.

  “I think we are. I think we have been since we got here.”

  “So what’s the plan, Cap?” Hynd asked.

  “There’s two bits of it,” Banks said. “The first is easy – we cool things down around here; cut off the power leaving the saucer, stop it heating this room and the rest of the base. Let’s see if we can stir things up, take the initiative.”

  McCally looked at the tall metal containers again.

  “Breaking stuff and blowing shit up? Aye, I can do that.”

  He took Parker and Wiggins with him and went over to the tall metal containers. It took all three of them, but once they put their combined weight into it, they got the racks of containers on the move. One last effort, a heave from all of them, and the whole row toppled forward and crashed to the floor with an impact that shook the whole hangar and made the saucer wobble where it hovered.

  Another effect was also immediate. The lights went out in the corridor beyond the double doorway, and a cold breeze blew up from the rest of the base. The yellow glow from the circles on the floor faded to their previous gold, the radiated heat from them no longer so oppressive as before.

  “Still too warm by half,” Banks said. He caught sight of shadows moving across the floor and looked up. Snow swirled in spiraling vortices outside the glass of the dome, and now that the chanting had stopped, and his plugs were out, he heard the whistle and roar of the wind.

  “There’s a storm out there, lads,” he said. “Let’s get some of it in here.”

  He raised his weapon, pointing at the dome. As the rest of the squad followed his lead, they heard another sound, not from outside, but from back down in the base itself, a loud metallic clanging.

  “We’re about to have company again, lads,” Banks said. “Let’s give them a welcome.”

  He aimed upward at the glass between the iron supports of the dome and sent three quick shots into it. The rest of the squad fired only a second behind him. The glass shattered immediately, shards falling around them like icicles.

  The storm took full advantage, roaring into the hangar like a caged beast, suddenly freed.

  - 15 -

  The glow from the circles diminished still further, and the saucer sank slowly downward, still hovering, but now merely inches off the ground again.

  “It’s working, Cap,” Parker shouted.

  “Aye, maybe. But is it working enough?”

  They had to zip up their jackets and pull their hoods over their heads – the wind bit hard, with snow flurries spattering in their faces, rasping at their skin like sandpaper.

  “Hynd, you take Cally and Parker and watch that doorway. If those fucking popsicles show up, keep them out in the corridor as long as you can. Only fall back inside the circles as a last resort. Clear?”

  “Aye, aye, cap,” Hynd replied, and gave a mock salute.

  “What about me, Cap?” Wiggins said.

  “You’re with me, lad.”

  “Are we going somewhere?”

  “You might say that, aye,” Banks replied. “Let’s see if your flying is any better than your driving.”

  “What the fuck, Cap?”

  Banks smiled.

  “That’s the second part of the plan. We call its bluff. We’re going in. It wants us to fly the fucker, let’s fly the fucker.”

  He didn’t wait to see if Wiggins would follow him. If the private showed hesitation, it might have weakened Banks’ own resolve, and it was weak enough already. He stepped over toward the outer of the golden circles. The chanting came again, the monks shouting in the wind. This time, he did not put in the earplugs, but welcomed the song into him.

  As he stepped into the circles, he heard Hynd call out from behind him.

  “We’ve got incoming.”

  Wiggins stepped up beside him. The door in the saucer cracked, creaked, and fell open to their touch.

  They stepped up into the saucer at almost the same moment as the squad opened fire in the doorway.

  - 16 -

  Banks didn’t hesitate. He went straight to the pentacles on the floor near the long window and stepped into the right hand one. Wiggins followed him and took the left pentacle.

  The chanting rose in volume. Dark shadows swirled around the two men, thick as velvet drapes, dampening, almost drowning, the sound of shooting from out in the hangar.

  “You weren’t serious about flying this fucker, were you, Cap?” Wiggins asked. He sounded far away, almost as distant as the chanting that continued to grow louder, more insistent.

  “Not if we can shut it off first,” Banks said.

  “How does this fucker work? There’s nae fucking controls, Cap.”

  “We think hard at it – at least that’s the general idea. I ken that’s not your strong point, lad, but help me out here.”

  “Just tell me what to think,” Wiggins said, and Banks laughed.

  “Lad, you’ve been in service for too long. But that’s the easy bit. We want this fucker quiet; dead and still on the floor like when we got here. So, sleepy thoughts, keep it quiet, and let’s get this thing shut off.”

  *

  Banks tried to concentrate on the same thing he’d told Wiggins, but quiet was a long way away. Despite the dampening effect inside the saucer, the sound of gunfire was still clear, and Banks could not erase the worry he felt for the three men he’d left outside.

  It appeared Wiggins felt the same for, unbidden, the saucer moved. It did not descend to the floor, but swung around, so that they looked out of the window at the scene in the doorway.

  “Did you do that, Cap?” Wiggins said.

  “I thought you did.”

  Then both fell quiet. The tall German officer stood in the doorway, and the three dead squad members stood at his shoulder. Hynd, Parker, and McCally backtracked, firing round after round into the iced dead but doing no sign of any damage. The oberst looked up at the saucer, straight at the window, directly at Banks. His eyes were no longer milky, but flaring fiery red, and his skin, once blue, had taken on a hint of burnt ochre. Dark shadows swirled behind him, almost obscuring the dead squad members, shadows that furled and unfurled, like great wings ready to take flight.

>   “What the fuck, Cap?” Wiggins muttered.

  “Steady, lad. We’re seeing what it expects us to see, that’s all. We didn’t start thinking about red-eyed demons until I read about it in that fucking journal. This fucker is in my head. I hope it likes the mess I’ve made in there over the years.”

  The squad continued to backtrack, still shooting while the iced dead came through the doorway, matching their pace to the retreating men. The tall oberst never took his gaze from the window, as if it knew Banks was watching. Banks had another epiphany.

  It wants us all inside the circles. It can draw more power that way.

  The chanting of the monks got louder. Banks felt the call of the dark, saw the shadows swirl darker, and stars appear in the blackness. The void opened out all around the pentacles where they stood.

  Outside, the oberst took another step toward the retreating men. They were almost backed up against the outer circle.

  “Bugger this for a lark. Up,” Banks shouted to Wiggins. “Take us up.”

  “What? Are you daft, man?”

  “That’s a fucking order, Private,” he shouted. “Fly this fucker out of here, right now, before it takes us all.”

  Banks thought about the saucer, glowing brighter, and rising off the hangar floor. It appeared that Wiggins took his order to heart, for it felt like his own thoughts were amplified, boosted, and the view out of the window changed as the saucer rose, slowly at first, then definitely accelerating upward.

  The tall oberst looked into Banks’ eyes. The last thing Banks saw before the view of the hangar slipped out of sight completely was the German’s lips raise in a smile, and a black, forked, tongue slither out between them.