Ice Station Wolfenstein

Chapter 8

"Mr. Cleave?"

Sam felt a gentle pressure on his shoulder as the young woman shook him back to consciousness. He turned his head on the pillow, rubbed the matter from his eyes and squinted at her, trying to wake up enough to focus on her glossy blonde hair and sweet, regular features. He had caught a glimpse of her just as he had drifted off to sleep and cursed his brain for letting him think for a moment that it was Patricia.

"We're just starting our descent into Ushuaia, Mr. Cleave," she said softly. "Time to sit up and fasten your seatbelt."

"Thanks." As Sam spoke he noticed how dry his mouth was. "Could I have another whisky?"

"It's 7:00 am local time, Mr. Cleave," the stewardess pointed out, the merest hint of disapproval in her voice.

"That makes it 10:00 am Scottish time. Perfectly acceptable time for whisky in my culture."

The young woman nodded, confirmed his order and moved away. Somewhere behind him, Sam heard her waking Nina. He dragged himself into an upright position and fumbled with the seatbelt until it clunked into place around his waist. Beyond the window he could see a vast expanse of cloud tinted pink by the early morning sun. Objectively he knew that it was beautiful, but after more than twenty hours on the plane he had lost his ability to be impressed by clouds.

"Good morning, good morning!" Dave Purdue glided into the cabin, clearly firing on all cylinders. Sam wondered whether the man ever slept. "I hope you both slept well? Not long to go now! I'm sorry you won't get a chance to explore Ushuaia, but I've had a message to say that the others have all arrived safely and are waiting for us on the boat. We had best not keep them waiting."

As Purdue settled into one of the plush plane seats and proceeded to talk about his previous experiences of visiting Ushuaia, Sam noticed that he did not seem to be bound by the same rules as his guests regarding seatbelts. Even Ziv Blomstein, Purdue's bodyguard, was safely strapped in at the far end of the cabin, but Purdue himself was unfettered. Must be an unrewarding task, being bodyguard to a hardcore thrill-seeker, Sam thought. Yet if Blomstein found his job a hardship, he did not show it. He was completely inscrutable and almost always silent, a tall, taciturn figure usually found at Purdue's shoulder.

The stewardess reappeared with Sam's whisky along with coffee for Nina and Purdue. As they drank and half-listened to Purdue, both Sam and Nina watched the changing view from their windows as the plane dipped below the clouds and they caught their first glimpse of the world's southernmost city. From their vantage point it looked like a small handful of colorful buildings arranged haphazardly on a fragmented piece of land, surrounded by snow-capped mountains. The airport's landing strip jutted out into the ocean, giving Sam the unpleasant feeling that the plane was going to drop straight into the freezing water. His heart rate did not return to normal until they were all off the plane and speeding away from the airport in a hired car, destined for the port in the center of town.

"Enjoying yourself?" Sam asked Nina. "If you keep pressing your nose against the window like that it'll stick."

Nina didn't even glance at him. She was determined not to miss a thing. "This place is amazing," she said. "Just look at it! This is the End of the Earth, the Land of Fire — Darwin sailed from here, and there use to be a penal colony that was considered to be the most remote in the world. Can you imagine being sent here to live out the rest of your days? It's so bleak, but it's so beautiful. I hope we get to spend a little more time here on the journey home."

For a moment Sam remembered when he had experienced that same romantic sense of wonder. There had been a time when he had been unable to believe his luck at having a job that took him to all sorts of interesting places. In fact, he had always felt that way, even when he had simply been discovering new areas of London. Investigative journalism had spoken to the adventurer in Sam — but now, that adventurer was gone. Now all that remained was an apathetic, broken man who would rather be dragged along on some hare-brained Antarctic caper than spend Christmas with his sister.

After such a long flight on Purdue's luxurious private jet and a short trip in the hired limousine, the ship that they boarded was something of an anticlimax. It was a sturdy vessel, clearly intended for work and harsh conditions rather than for pleasure cruises. It looked like an overgrown fishing boat covered in tarnished blue paint, with its name picked out in white on the prow. Unfortunately, since the name was in Russian, Sam could not decipher it.

"What's this thing called?" he asked Purdue, as they climbed the metal steps to the deck.

" No idea" Purdue replied. "I don't speak Russian! Ask Alexandr, he'll know — he's the one who hired it."

"Alexandr?"

"Yes!" Purdue reached the top of the stairs and stepped aboard, turning back to face Sam and Nina. "Here he is. Alexandr Arichenkov — this expedition's fearless leader!"

"May the gods help you all," Alexandr smirked, then lunged forward and grasped Purdue's hand, shaking it firmly. He did the same to Nina, then to Sam. At once Sam noticed the familiar tang of spirits on the man's breath. He knew that he ought to find that alarming, but instead he found himself oddly comforted. The Russian man was wiry, a little on the short side, with pale blue eyes and a deep scar across his left cheek. He turned to Purdue, flipped him a mock salute and clicked his heels together. "Ready when you are, sir!"

Purdue clapped his hands, his long face alight with schoolboy glee. "Then let's get going at once! The sooner we leave, the sooner we'll be there! Sam, Nina, come with me." He strode off toward the deckhouse while Alexandr turned away and began yelling orders at the crew.

Sam and Nina hurried along in Purdue's wake, following him into the deckhouse and through its corridors. Soon Purdue flung open a set of double doors and led them into a large room overlooking the prow of the ship. It had clearly been decked out to function as an observation lounge, similar to the one Purdue had at Wrichtishousis, but the overstuffed couches and slick bar setup were at odds with the utilitarian vessel. It seemed strange, Sam thought, to smell expensive spirits and furniture polish mixing with engine oil and salty air. Still, he did not object — there would be plenty of discomfort ahead of them, he knew, so best to make the most of these luxuries while they were still available.

"What the hell is he doing here?" Nina hissed. Sam dragged his attention away from the bar and followed her line of vision over to one end of the vast window. Two men were standing together, both dressed in expensively casual winter clothes. One had white hair, worn slightly long, with a short, neatly trimmed moustache and beard. The other had unnaturally dark hair and craggy features that had clearly improved with age. Sam vaguely recognized them both.

"What's who doing?" Sam whispered back, but before Nina could answer they were interrupted by a tall Arabian woman who rushed over to them and grabbed Nina in a tight hug.

"It's so great to see you!" The woman embracing Nina had a slight American accent, Sam noticed. "It's been way too long!"

"I know," Nina said, not letting go of her friend. "It shouldn't have taken an Antarctic exhibition for us to have a proper catch-up. Thanks for letting us come along, Fatima — though I'm sorry that you seem to have got stuck with a few extra guests along the way."

Fatima grimaced as she released Nina and the two of them glared over at the men by the window. "It's ok," Fatima said. "I'm sure it'll be fine. It's tough terrain, but I've visited worse. Between me and Jefferson we should be able to keep you all straight. I'm just a little nervous about doing this with such a big group, especially when so many of you haven't been to Antarctica before. This Purdue guy does know that it's not a skiing vacation, right?"

"Who knows?" said Nina. "I've been afraid to ask. I've been trying not to think too much about him and his motives for offering to pay for all this."

Fatima snorted derisively. "His motives? Yeah, he made those pretty clear when he told me what the deal was. It's partly the billionaire equivalent of hiring a stretch limo to pick you up for prom, and partly him wanting to be Indiana Jones. He'd like to get into your panties and he thinks that buying you the Antarctic trip that you want is the way to do it. And he wants to be here so he can have an adventure and you can swoon into his arms or some shit. I don't know. No one ever spends that much money trying to get me into bed. The most I ever got from Evan was a steak dinner and a four-star hotel, and I thought I was doing well!" She nodded toward Sam. "Is this the journalist? Purdue said there'd be one."

Nina swiftly introduced Sam to Fatima al-Fayed, telling him how they had once been roommates during their undergraduate years and had stayed friends even though they now lived on different continents. Sam listened to Nina's description of him with a strange sense of detachment. He understood the words—"prize-winning investigative journalist" — but did not feel as if they really applied to him. There was no mention of his drinking, his disorganization, or his inability to run his life. He knew that Nina was aware of these things. She was too smart to have missed them. Yet here she was, introducing him as if he was a functioning human being.

Suddenly Sam realized that Fatima was asking him a question. He shook off his self-critical reverie and did his best to pay attention.

"I asked why you're here," Fatima repeated herself. "Are you writing something for your newspaper or what?"

"I wish I knew," Sam said. "I know it sounds crazy, but Purdue wasn't exactly clear about why he wants me here. Said it was 'to chronicle his adventures,' so I'm guessing it's going to be for a memoir or something. Either that or it's the most extreme profile ever done for a local paper… Mind you, for the amount of money he's paying, I'll do pretty much anything he asks!"

"Well, that makes two of us, at least," Fatima sighed. "He's covering pretty much all of this trip and sprung for a serious upgrade to our equipment, so if he wants it to be a history field trip as well as a virology expedition, then that's what it is."

"You don't sound too happy about it," Sam observed.

"Would you be?" Fatima cast a glance around the room. "You two will be ok, and Jefferson knows how to handle himself. Matlock's pretty fit and at least he's done a couple of mountain climbs. And I guess Purdue's bodyguard isn't going to let him get into too much trouble. Even the change of guides shouldn't be too much of an issue. It's the old guy I'm really worried about." She pointed to a man Sam had not spotted before, sitting alone on one of the couches with a glass of whisky in his hand. He looked frail, pensive, and far too old to be taking his first Antarctic trip.

"He does seem like a strange addition to the expedition," Nina agreed. "Did Purdue bring him aboard?"

"Yes," said Fatima, "but that's all I know — I don't even know the guy's name yet. I tried to talk to him just before you guys arrived, but he just sat there staring at his drink and wouldn't say a word to me. It was kind of weird. I guess he's probably just nervous. He'll loosen up during the trip, I bet. Maybe you can get him talking — it'll beat making small talk with your boss, right?"

As Nina made a small noise of disgust, the pieces fell into place for Sam. Of course, he realized. Matlock. The guy with the white hair. He works at the university, that's why I know his face. But he's the guy who turned Nina down and told her the ice station is a fairy tale? Weird.

Then Purdue strolled over, accompanied by a waiter carrying a tray of drinks, and Sam stopped thinking about the strange old man and the presence of Nina's boss. All his energy was required for ignoring Purdue's flirtations with Nina and Fatima — and, of course, for drinking. He took his champagne and stood alone by the window, tuning out the chatter and watching the horizon as the ship plowed on into the strange half-light that passed for night.