Zodiac Station

Fifty-two

My coat and trousers were hung on a hook in the stairwell, mostly dry, though the coat zipper was still broken. I Velcroed it shut the best I could. The hard edges of the notebook in the inside pocket pressed against my chest.

I noticed again the DAR-X logo stencilled on the creature’s jacket. ‘Where did he get that? Another “overreaction”?’

A tight look from Pharaoh told me I was on the money. ‘An unfortunate encounter last September.’

They suited up, and led me down a long corridor lined with corrugated plastic to a heavy door in a concrete wall. Pharaoh unlocked it, stepped through some small sort of vestibule that smelled of sawdust, and out through another door. Daylight hit me, and I wondered what time it was. How many hours had passed in the tunnels, in the mine, listening to Pharaoh speak? It must be at least mid-morning. I’d gone through the night without sleep or food, and I felt it. I found my sunglasses in my coat pocket and put them on.

We were at the top of a narrow mountain valley, looking down at a cluster of tin-roofed buildings joined together by chutes and covered walkways.

‘Vitangelsk?’ I guessed. I’d only ever seen it on the map.

‘Mine Eight.’

We skidded down the slope, following soft tracks in the snow. At the bottom of the complex we came to a large building jacked up on stilts. It seemed to be the terminus for some sort of cable car or chairlift. In the space underneath, hidden behind sheets of rusting corrugated iron, Pharaoh pulled tarpaulins off two gleaming snowmobiles.

‘Get on.’

All I remember about the ride is the cold. No spare helmet or goggles — they never expected guests — so I had to keep my head down and clench my eyes shut. With the zip broken, I could only Velcro my jacket shut and keep close to Pharaoh. He kept his rifle in a sort of holster attached to the saddle — I could probably have reached it, if I’d wanted. But what would have been the point? We were beyond that.

Any hope that the video might have been a fake, some warped practical joke, died ten miles from Zodiac. Pharaoh paused at the top of a rise; I opened my eyes, and saw a column of oily smoke polluting the sky. We went on; the wind cut my eyes and made me weep, but I couldn’t stop looking at it. Wishing it would disappear.

We came down the Lucia glacier and saw the whole horror show. The Platform had blown open like a ruptured artery; several of the nearby huts had burned, and some of the further ones had been torn apart by shrapnel. You could see bare rock where the fire had melted away the ice around the Platform. The snow that survived was black and cratered with wreckage.

No chance to get into the Platform. Fires still burned inside; even as we dismounted the snowmobiles, another strut gave out and collapsed in a shower of sparks and screaming metal. We could feel the heat twenty metres away. No one could have survived.

Louise voiced the obvious question. ‘Why?’

I thought of the video, Quam taking the gun from his holster and calmly putting a flare into a pile of high explosives and oil drums. I remembered that night I met him in the corridor, the dead look in his eyes. This island’s trying to kill us. Was it the pressure that had got to him? The endless funding threats; the egos and the sniping; something in his personal life?

I think it was this place. Surrounded by nothing, his mind had expanded so fast it shattered, like brittle ice drawn from a deep hole.

We wandered around the base, opening doors and checking the cabooses for survivors. If only, I kept saying to myself. If only Greta and I had stopped Quam when we had the chance. If only we’d guessed. If we hadn’t rushed off to the Helbreen.

If we hadn’t gone to the Helbreen, we’d have been on the Platform and we’d be dead. That’s the truth.

The mag hut was far enough from the Platform that it had survived unscathed. I drifted towards it and peered in the door. The machines had stopped. All I smelled inside was dust and darkness.

But there was something else. A sound, a shadow, a sense of movement at the back of the room. It was too dark to see. I took off my sunglasses, but the contrast was so stark it made no difference. Could there be survivors? And if there were, did I want to give them away to Pharaoh? I hesitated on the threshold.

A shout spun me back around. Fifty metres away, Fridge stood in the open doorway of Star Command. His hair was wild and burnt away in patches; smoke smudged his cheeks. He leaned on a ski pole, but the pole was too short for his height so he listed like a drunk. His right leg hung bent at a painfully unnatural angle. I couldn’t understand what he was shouting.

I still don’t know if I heard the shot. If I did, I thought it was just another pop from the burning Platform. I’d started to run to Fridge. He’d seen me and turned, dragging himself towards me, still shouting. Then he suddenly fell backwards. I thought he’d dropped his stick, or skidded on a patch of ice. It was only when I knelt beside him that I saw the hole in his jacket. Round as a ten-pence piece, straight over the heart, blood pumping out through the hole.

I took off my hat and pressed it over the hole, trying to staunch the bleeding. It wouldn’t work. I tried anyway. Holding it in place, I looked up. The creature stood about ten metres away, rifle in hand. No emotion on his face.

‘What have you done?’

Pharaoh looked as stricken as me. He ran over and grabbed the gun by its barrel, twisting it out of the creature’s hands. He must have let it go. Pharaoh threw the gun on to the snow and stared up at his creation. There were tears in his eyes. They rolled down his cheeks and froze in his beard.

‘What have you done?’ he repeated.

Overshadowed by the creature, Pharaoh didn’t look like the unstoppable tyrant I’d always known. He’d grown small, an old man whom time had caught up.

‘Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay to mould me man?’ said the creature.

Pharaoh squinted up at him. ‘What?’

He said it again. Shreds of black smoke blew around his face.

‘Where did you learn that?’

‘Careful.’ Louise had backed away. I didn’t know who she was speaking to. ‘Don’t do anything—’

My hat was soaked through. I pulled off my neck-warmer and laid it on top. A drop of blood squeezed out from the hat and trickled down on to the Zodiac badge.

‘I made you,’ Pharaoh said. A trace of the old arrogance, holding out against a changing tide. ‘You owe me everything. Every cell in your being.’

‘And you? Does a father owe his son nothing, except the fact of his existence?’

Pharaoh took a step back. ‘I’m not your father, Thomas.’

‘What, then? A god?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘Why are you talking like this?’ said Louise.

‘My master? Am I your slave?’

‘Of course not. You’re—’

Whatever life might be, it goes in an instant. One moment, Pharaoh was living, a being of infinite capacities. The next — nothing. Those big, disproportionate arms he’d created reached out and clutched him in an embrace. One arm went around his head, the other held his shoulders fast. Almost as if he was trying to comfort him.

One arm moved; the other didn’t. The neck cracked. Pharaoh slumped to the ground.

Louise screamed. I was too far away. Thomas picked up the rifle where Pharaoh had thrown it, aimed and fired. Blood sprayed from her neck and fell on the snow like rain as she twisted away and fell hard. Her body jerked as a second shot went into her.

I moved towards her, but a hand on my shoulder spun me back. He held me there, his fingers digging into my collarbone.

‘Come with me.’