Terminal Freeze

3

The trip down the mountain was as silent as the journey up had been chatty. Marshall could guess what they were all thinking. This discovery would change what up to now had been a quiet, unglamorous, even monotonous scientific expedition. Exactly how things would change, none of the scientists could say. But from now on, everything would be different.

At the same time, he knew, everyone was privately asking one question: What the hell was it?

Sully broke the silence. “We should have taken an ice core for testing.”

“How long has it been there, do you think?” Chen asked.

“The Fear’s an MIS-2 glacier,” Marshall replied. “That cave has been buried at least twelve thousand years. Maybe much longer.”

Silence settled over them again. The sun had finally succeeded in burning through the low-hanging clouds, and as it sank toward the horizon it ignited the snowpack into fiery brilliance. Absently, Marshall pulled a pair of sun goggles from his pocket and snugged them into place. He was thinking of the unfathomable blackness of those dead eyes under the ice.

“What time is it in New York?” Sully asked at last.

“Half past eight,” said Faraday.

“They’ll have gone home; we’ll try first thing in the morning. Ang, will you make sure the satphone is fired up before breakfast?”

“Sure thing, but I’ll need to apply to Gonzalez for fresh batteries, because-”

Chen stopped in mid-sentence. Looking up, Marshall immediately saw what made the graduate student fall silent.

The base lay a few hundred yards below, the long, low structure rusted and sullen-looking in the dying sun. They had followed the glacial valley in a gentle curve, and the main entrance to the base was now in view beyond the security fencing. Penny Barbour, the team’s computer scientist, stood on the concrete apron between the guardhouse and the central doors, wearing jeans and a plaid flannel shirt. The air was very still, and her short, mouse-brown hair hung limply over her forehead. Beside her was Paul Gonzalez, the sergeant in charge of the tiny posting that kept Fear Base nominally operational.

Four figures in heavy parkas, trousers of polar bear fur, and animal-skin mukluks surrounded them. One was holding a rifle; the others had spears or bows lashed to their backs. Although their faces were hidden, Marshall was certain these were Native Americans from the small encampment to the north.

As they quickened their steps toward the base, Marshall wasn’t sure whether to feel curiosity or alarm. Although they’d been on-site for a month, the scientists had had no interaction with the Indians. In fact, they only knew of their existence because the soldiers at the base had mentioned it in passing. Why would they choose today, of all days, to pay a visit?

As they passed the fence and empty guardhouse and approached the entrance, the group turned to face them. “This lot knocked on the door not two minutes ago,” Barbour said in her broad North London accent. “The sergeant and I came out to meet them.” Her plain, friendly face was pinched and somewhat worried-looking.

Sully glanced at Gonzalez. “Has this ever happened before?”

Gonzalez was fifty-something and burly, with the clear-eyed fatalism of the career soldier. “Nope.” He unshipped his radio to alert the other soldiers, but Sully shook his head.

“That won’t be necessary, will it?” Then Sully turned to Barbour. “You’d better get back into the warmth.” He watched her head for the main entrance, then cleared his throat, faced their guests. “Would you like to step inside?” he said, slowly enunciating each word and gesturing toward the door.

The Native Americans said nothing. There were three women and a man, Marshall noticed, and the man was by far the oldest. His face was seamed to an almost leathery complexion by years of cold and sunlight. His eyes were a clear, deep brown. He wore large earrings of bone, carved with fantastic detail; there were feathers in the fur of his collar; and his cheekbones bore the dark tattoos of a shaman. Gonzalez had told them the band lived a life of unusual simplicity, but- Marshall thought, staring at the spears and animal skins-he’d had no idea just how simple.

For a moment, an uncomfortable silence settled over the group, the only noise the grumbling of the nearby generators. Then Sully spoke again. “You’ve come from the settlement to the north? That’s a long journey, and you must be tired. Can we do anything for you? Would you like something to drink or eat?”

No answer.

Sully repeated himself, slowly and emphatically, as if speaking to a half-wit. “You like drink? Eat?”

When there was no response, Sully turned away with a sigh. “We’re not getting anywhere.”

“They probably don’t understand a word you’re saying,” said Gonzalez.

Sully nodded. “And I don’t speak Inuit.”

“Tunit,” the old man said.

Sully turned back quickly. “I’m sorry?”

“Not Inuit. Tunit.”

“I’m very sorry. I’ve never heard of the Tunits before.” Sully patted his chest lightly. “My name is Sully.” He introduced Gonzalez and the scientists by name. “The woman you met is Penny Barbour.”

The old man touched his own breast. “Usuguk.” He pronounced it Oos-oo-gook. He didn’t offer to introduce the women.

“Pleased to meet you,” Sully said, as usual playing his role as team leader to the hilt. “Would you care to step inside?”

“You asked if you could do anything for us,” Usuguk said. Marshall noticed, to his surprise, that the man spoke with a completely uninflected accent.

“Yes,” Sully replied, equally surprised.

“There is something important you can do-very important. You can leave here. Today. And don’t come back.”

This response left Sully speechless.

“Why?” Marshall asked after a moment.

The man pointed toward Mount Fear. “That is a place of evil. Your presence here is a danger to all of us.”

“Evil?” Sully repeated, recovering. “You mean, the volcano? It’s extinct now, dead.”

The Tunit glanced at him, the lines of his face thrown into sharp relief by the setting sun. It was a mask of bitter anxiety.

“What evil?” Marshall asked.

Usuguk declined to elaborate. “You should not be here,” he said. “You are intruding where you have no business. And you have made the ancient ones angry. Very angry.”

“Ancient ones?” Sully asked.

“Normally they are”-Usuguk searched for the word-“benevolent.” He made a semicircular movement with one hand, palm open. “In the old days, all the men here, the ones with guns and uniforms, stayed inside the metal walls they built. Even today, the soldiers never stray into the forbidden place.”

“I don’t know about any forbidden place,” Gonzalez rumbled. “But I keep my keister inside, where it’s nice and warm.”

Usuguk was still staring at Sully. “You are different. You have stepped on ground where no living man should tread. And now the ancient ones are angry, more so than in any memory of my people. Their wrath paints the sky with blood. The heavens cry out with the pain, like a woman in labor.”

“I’m not sure what you mean by ‘crying out,’” Sully said. “But the strange color of the night sky is simply the aurora borealis. The northern lights. They’re caused by solar winds entering the earth’s magnetic field. Admittedly the color is rather unusual, but surely you’ve noticed them before.” Sully was acting the kindly paterfamilias now, smiling, patronizing, like a man explaining something to a young child. “Gases in the atmosphere give off excess energy in the form of light. Different gases emit photons of different wavelengths.”

If this explanation made any difference to Usuguk, he didn’t let on. “As soon as we saw how angry the spirit folk had become, we started on our way here. We have been walking-no rest, no food-ever since.”

“All the more reason for you to come inside,” Sully said. “We’ll give you food, something hot to drink.”

“Why is the mountain forbidden?” Marshall asked.

The shaman turned to him. “Can you not understand? You have heard my warning. You now refuse to heed it? The mountain is a place of darkness. You must leave.”

“We can’t leave,” Sully said. “Not yet. But in a few weeks, two or three, we’ll be on our way. And until then, I give you my word that-”

But the shaman turned away, toward the Tunit women. “Anyok lubyar tussarnek,” he said. One of them began to cry loudly. Turning back, Usuguk looked at each of the scientists in turn, his face filled with such a mixture of sorrow and fear that it curled the hairs on Marshall ’s neck. Then, pulling a small pouch from his parka, the elder dipped a finger inside and daubed a number of signs in the frozen tundra with a dark liquid too viscous to be anything but blood. And finally-intoning something in his own language with a low and prayerful voice-he turned away and joined the others already retreating across the permafrost.