Below Zero

6 OUTPOST ZERO, ANTARCTICA ^NOW

At home, Zak had this book called It’s A Strange World. It was a heavy, bright green hardback with a fuzzy lenticular photo on the front – the kind that changes when you move it. From one angle, the picture was of a weird reptilian monster’s head, green and leathery, with a huge mouth and small black eyes. But if you twisted it the other way, it turned into a human skull.

The book was full of photos and stories about the Unexplained. Bigfoot, the Tennessee Wildman, the Mothman, UFOs, stuff like that. One of Zak’s favourite things was to sit in bed and study the pictures, trying to think of explanations for some of the weird things that happen in the world. One of the stories was about a ship called the Mary Celeste that was found drifting in the Atlantic Ocean. There was nothing wrong with the ship, and everyone’s belongings were still on board, but the passengers and crew had disappeared. Gone.

Zak reckoned that when the sailors who found the Mary Celeste went on board, they must have felt the same way he did when he walked into The Hub. Everything about it was wrong. It was like stumbling into a spooky old graveyard at night.

When Dad closed the door, shutting out the howl of the wind, they stood in the darkness, no one saying anything. There wasn’t enough light to see more than a few centimetres in front of them, and it was way colder than it should have been. There air was clammy and damp, and the smell was… Zak made himself breathe deeper, tasting the air… yeah, it was like a mixture of over-ripe fruit and raw meat. Like the greengrocer’s and the butcher’s at the end of a long, hot summer day.

And Zak wasn’t the only one to notice it. He could tell everyone sensed something bad had happened here.

‘Hello?’ Dad’s voice died as soon as it came out of his mouth. ‘Anybody home?’ There was no echo at all, as if something had snatched the sound away. ‘Hello?’

Zak thought it was weird the way people did that, call ‘hello’ into the darkness. They always did it in films, as if the monster in the shadows was going to step out and wave with a smile. Hello!

‘There are torches,’ Dima said. There was a shuffle of boots followed by a patting sound. ‘Here.’ A click to Zak’s left, and a bright beam pierced the darkness.

Dima shone the light at the wall beside the door, illuminating a rack with two torches still in it. Beside them, a red fire extinguisher hung from a bracket, and next to it was a chunky orange rifle that looked like the Nerf Elite Alpha Trooper Zak had at home.

Mum and Dad took a torch each. They switched them on and swept the beams around The Hub.

The room was a rectangle, with a door in each wall leading to different sections of the base. On the wall beside each door, there was a fire extinguisher and one of those orange rifles. In front of them, a spiral staircase corkscrewed up through the ceiling. To the right, red plastic chairs were pushed away from square tables. One chair lay on its back like someone had kicked it over in a struggle. There were paper napkin dispensers, plates glistening with congealed food, overturned mugs with their contents drying on the tabletops.

As the torch beams swept across the room, Zak caught sight of someone standing by the last table. He saw the figure for a fraction of a second but it was enough to notice the old-fashioned windproof clothes. It wore large fur mittens, with a bulky hood shrouding its head. A dark balaclava covered its face so no skin was visible, and goggles hid its eyes, giving it the appearance of a giant, bloated insect. It wasn’t doing anything; just standing there. Watching them.

‘What’s that?’ Zak grabbed Mum’s hand and swept the torch back.

Where the figure had been standing, the room was empty. But it had felt so real; exactly as Zak imagined Scott of the Antarctic would look.

‘Is something there?’ Mum asked. ‘You see something?’

‘No.’ Zak let go of her hand and told himself to get a grip. ‘Just a shadow.’ This trip was going to be a nightmare if he jumped at every shadow in the dark. First the bear, and now this? They had been so real, though. What was wrong with him?

‘We’re going to be OK,’ Mum said. ‘You know that, right?’

‘Yeah. Of course,’ Zak said. ‘I know.’

‘Come on, we need to find out what happened here.’ Dad ventured further into the room. ‘Looks like they left in a hurry.’

‘Left where, though?’ May wondered. ‘Where would they go? We’re literally in the middle of nowhere.’

There was a pool table further over to the right; the balls and cues still out on the blue baize, casting long shadows as the torch beams passed over them. Close to it, an L-shaped sofa faced a screen on the back wall. There were deep impressions in the cushions where someone had been sitting.

‘Ewww, what’s that smell?’ May said. ‘It’s like something died in here. Some holiday this is turning out to be.’

Zak stuck close to her. ‘I thought you liked scary stuff.’ He couldn’t help glancing over at the place where he had seen the figure.

‘Yeah, whatever. I like scary films, not real scary stuff. Remind me why this place is called Outpost Zero. No, wait, I remember. It’s because there’s zero reason to come here.’

‘Actually…’ Zak imitated his dad by removing nonexistent glasses, pinching the bridge of his nose, and deepening his voice. ‘It’s because Outpost One is being built on Mars. This base, right here, is what you might call Ground Zero for the Project.’

May snorted. Zak always did a pretty good impression of Dad.

‘That’s enough from you two,’ Mum warned.

‘Hello?’ Dad called again as he led the group towards the spiral staircase.

‘Hello!’ Zak whispered in return. ‘Who is it?’

May sniggered, but Dad ignored him.

‘Is anyone there?’ As Dad came closer to the stairs, something hard crunched under his boot and he stopped. ‘What’s that?’ He aimed the light at his feet. ‘Is that egg shells?’

‘No, it’s more like… I don’t know.’ Mum shone her torch at the floor and swept it around to illuminate more of the broken pieces. ‘Insects?’

‘Can’t be.’

‘No, you’re right,’ Zak said. ‘They’re like crushed insects. All dried up.’ As the torchlight played over them, they shimmered in different colours.

‘Nu-uh,’ May said. ‘There aren’t any insects in Antarctica. Nothing but penguins, remember.’

‘We’ll find out soon enough.’ Dad moved on towards the staircase.

On the first floor, one side of The Hub had a circular table with four computers on it. The other side was kitted out with a couple of treadmills, some weights, and gym equipment.

‘Where is everyone?’ May whispered. ‘This is proper creepy.’

‘No it isn’t.’ Mum spoke loudly, trying to break the atmosphere.

‘Dr Reeves is right,’ Dima agreed. ‘Everything will be horror show.’

‘What does that even mean?’ May asked. ‘You keep saying it, “horror show”, and, honestly, it doesn’t sound good.’

‘Hmm? Oh, khorosho?’ Dima chuckled. ‘It is Russian. It means “fine”. Everything is fine.’

‘Yeah, well it doesn’t sound like it,’ May muttered.

‘What we need is power,’ Mum said. ‘We need light and we need heat. It’s already cold in here, and it’s only going to get colder.

‘I’ll second that.’ Dad raised his eyebrows at Dima, waiting for his agreement.

‘Da. Sure.’ Dima shrugged. ‘We’ll go and look at the generators, see if we—’

Screeeeee!

A screeching, tearing sound came from somewhere outside. Sudden and sharp, it broke through the quiet like a scream.

‘Oh my God.’ May was the first to speak. ‘What… was that?’

Screeeeee!

It was the shriek of metal being twisted and ripped apart. This time it went on for longer. Zak and May stared at each other, both of them with their eyes wide like they were going to pop right out of their heads.

‘My plane!’ Dima snapped into action, breaking away and sprinting for the stairs. His torch beam bobbed about, jittering through the darkness in a jerking, confusing flicker of light.

‘Wait,’ Dad called after him, but Dima was already thumping down the spiral staircase.

‘Come on; stick together,’ Dad said, but before they had taken more than a few steps, they heard a sharp yelp followed by a series of bumps.

When they found Dima, he was lying on his back at the bottom of the stairs, not moving. His torch had rolled under the table and was shining across the floor in a cone of white light that illuminated him on one side, and threw his shadow across The Hub on the other.

Mum and Dad went straight to him, but May and Zak stayed at the bottom of the staircase, staring.

‘Is he dead?’ Zak wondered.

‘Of course not,’ said May. ‘He can’t be. Can he?’

Mum checked Dima over while Dad shone his torch at him. The pilot’s face was a mask of blood. It was everywhere. Running down his coat, on his hood, on the floor… everywhere.

‘Where’s it all coming from?’ Dad’s breath was like mist in the torchlight.

‘I don’t know. I can’t see a thing.’ Mum held out her torch. ‘May, get some paper napkins from the table.’

May hesitated.

‘Quickly!’

She grabbed Mum’s torch and ran across The Hub, snatching up one of the napkin dispensers. When she returned, Mum pulled out a handful and patted them on Dima’s face to soak up the blood. The napkins were drenched through in seconds, and Mum dropped them on to the floor with a disgusting wet splotch that made Zak’s stomach heave.

She grabbed another handful. ‘Shine the torch here,’ she said to Dad and May, who stood over her like lampposts. ‘And here…’ She worked her way around Dima’s face until she found the large gash on his forehead, then she wadded a pile of napkins together and pressed them hard against the wound.

As she did it, Dima opened his eyes and blinked in confusion. ‘Moy samolyet,’ he mumbled, before closing his eyes again.

‘A wound like that needs stitches,’ Dad said. ‘Or glue, or something. We need a first aid kit.’

‘What we need,’ Mum said, ‘is some power. I can’t see a thing and it’s getting colder by the minute. If we don’t get the generators working, this wound won’t matter; we’ll all free—’

‘Evelyn.’ Dad cut her short but Zak knew what she had been about to say. We’ll all freeze to death. That was the truth of it. It was minus forty degrees outside, and getting colder inside by the minute. They needed heat and light or they were going to die.

Zak stared at Dima, caught in the torch beams like he was under lights on an operating table. Beside him, Mum’s hands were covered in blood as if she was in the middle of some kind of crazy surgery. The sight of it made him sick. It made him think of mad doctors (Zak Reeves? Ah yes, it’s time for your operation. Come along, this won’t hurt a bit…) and sinister hospitals, and the awful thing growing inside his head. It made him think of the electric bone saw he’d seen on TV when he’d walked in on May watching Re-Animator with her friends. It made him think of pain and dying.

And as all those things tumbled through his mind, an ache began behind his right eye, and pulsed across the top of his head.

The ache squeezed and relaxed, squeezed and relaxed, growing more intense. Zak put a hand to the side of his head, where a scar was barely visible beneath his short, dark hair. He traced a finger along the ridge of scarred skin, then a sudden, intense pain seared through his mind. In an instant, the world fell away into nothing. He was hanging in the air over an infinite black sea, its surface shimmering like an oil slick. His ears were filled with the clicking and rustling of endless movement.

This isn’t happening. Zak squeezed his eyes shut. This isn’t happening. He shook his head and opened his eyes to see he was back in The Hub. Mum and Dad were there, Dima was on the floor, and May was standing close by.

But they weren’t alone.

The figure was back. The explorer. It stood beyond the reach of the torchlight, head shrouded, face hidden, eyes covered by those creepy goggles. As Zak watched, the figure raised its right hand and extended it towards him. Its mouth moved beneath the balaclava, and in that moment, Zak was certain the shrouded figure was Death.

Not now, Zak thought. It can’t end here. Not like this. I’m not ready. We need lights and warmth and for everybody to be OK because it’s just supposed to be me and—

And in a blink the figure was gone. It didn’t fade; it disappeared as if it had never been there. The pain in his head switched off, and there was a flicker of light from the ceiling.

Once.

Twice.

Then, in a blaze of light and a blast of warmth, the power came back on across Outpost Zero.