The Chilling, page 5
‘It can’t be easy being thrown together like that, for days on end.’ To soothe Dustin’s pride, she steered the conversation towards his own research interest: the effects of long-term isolation on polar expeditioners.
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘Close confinement can bring out the worst in people.’
‘If you were on the Petrel now, what would you recommend?’
‘Well …’ He blew the air out of his cheeks. ‘Prevention is always the best cure. It’s important to select the right type of people in advance, to have the best mix of character.’
For their own expedition, she knew, he’d taken precautions to safeguard the welfare of the winter crew. With the help of colleagues at the Antarctic Division, he’d screened for personality traits and selected out for conditions such as neuroticism and alcoholism. He’d assessed for the risk of mental disturbances because they could turn into physical threats, and it would be impossible to evacuate anyone who needed help.
‘But is the screening process foolproof?’ she wondered. ‘Isn’t human interaction more of a vague art than a science? I know I haven’t yet found an algorithm for building successful relationships.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed, ‘but we still have some sense of what works well and what doesn’t. I like to follow Sir Ran’s advice about having good-natured people on expeditions.’ He referred to Ranulph Fiennes, the famous English polar explorer and adventurer. ‘He warned that you don’t want to be in close confines with anyone who turns malicious under pressure. You want to avoid expeditions with anyone who’s quick to anger or becomes sarcastic in moments of vital negotiation. You want someone who’s always even-tempered and who’ll maintain group morale; someone who doesn’t get too excited when things go well, or too depressed when things fall apart.’
‘Gosh, did he ever find anyone to accompany him?’
Dustin burst out laughing, his eyes gleaming. ‘I think it was an aspirational goal, not something he always attained. Expeditioners are only human, after all: tensions arise, people get depressed, people get pissed off.’
‘Are you speaking from personal experience?’
He looked taken aback.
If she’d known him better, she would’ve pushed further. Instead, she retreated. ‘I’m sorry, that was a bit rude.’
‘No, no, it’s fine.’ He looked pensive and continued in a low voice. ‘By the end of my first winter, ten years ago, I was actually in a bad way. We were locked up indoors for at least two months: I had no privacy, no sensory stimulation, and little contact with family or friends. By September, I just felt … empty. There’s no other way to put it. There was nothing I took pleasure in, nothing I looked forward to.’ He shook his head at the memory. ‘It wasn’t boredom: it was something more sinister. In theory, I knew winter-over syndrome was a common phenomenon—Jesus, I’d written a thesis about it—I wasn’t the first to discover that isolation did peculiar things to a man. But it really got to me.’ His mouth thinned to a line.
‘All those gruesome tales of nineteenth-century explorers should’ve warned you,’ she joked, to lighten the mood. ‘There’s a reason those early polar expeditions ended in madness and cannibalism.’
‘Absolutely!’ He grinned. ‘And those were just the tales of survivors.’ He paused for a moment, lost in thought. ‘My friend Eddy used to call it “the chilling point”. If a boiling point is when people can’t control their anger, the chilling is when they can’t suppress their hostility or lack of sympathy. It’s that stage of winter when the smallest tic starts to get on everyone’s nerves, and people lose their sense of fellowship.’ He closed his eyes and rubbed his forehead. ‘Luckily, I didn’t develop any lasting mental health issues. When I got back home, I was fine, I snapped out of it.’
She knew that other polar expeditioners weren’t so lucky—they couldn’t shake the gloom so easily.
‘It’s not all bad,’ he added in haste, ‘don’t get me wrong. The flipside is that isolation can forge the best of friendships. That first winter was when I met Eddy. He was younger than me and we didn’t really have that much in common. He was a plumber, I was a doctor; he was public school, I was private; he drank whisky, I drank beer.’ His face held the ghost of a smile. ‘But he was the only other chess enthusiast on base. When that bleak curtain of winter fell, we played game after game after game. He could see that I wasn’t coping. To keep me distracted, he told stories about his family and his life back home. His mother was Fortunata Sandman—you’ve probably heard of her—she was a well-known mountaineer and polar explorer in the seventies. She once climbed Everest without oxygen, and was the first woman to fly a hot air balloon over the North Pole. She met Eddy’s dad while pulling him out of whitewater rapids in Chile.’
‘I’m picturing her as a brawny Amazonian queen with legs like tree trunks.’
‘You’re spot on. That’s exactly how I picture her too.’ He snorted in amusement, then sighed. ‘Eddy became one of my closest friends.’
Kit watched Dustin with curiosity. When engaged, as he was now, he was more likeable and less of a bore. His shoulders were relaxed and his voice had lost its formality. She could see why others had warmed to him.
But his levity didn’t last for long. Once they stopped chatting, a sadness passed over his features like a cloud. Studying his reflection in the porthole, she saw his face turn slack. It hadn’t skipped her notice that he referred to Eddy in the past tense.
‘What about me?’ she asked in a bright tone. ‘Do you think I’ll cope over the winter?’
‘Yes, you’ll be fine. I’m glad you’re coming along.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘Because, with your help in the surgery, I’ll be free to conduct surveys and interviews. This year, come what may, I plan to complete my project on mood and cognitive performance in winter-over residents.’
During training, he’d told them he wanted to build on Lawrence Palinkas’s famous study of the effects of combined supplements and exposure to bright light. He hoped his research would be beneficial for long-duration space travel—maybe even a trip to Mars.
‘So, you’re determined we’re all going to have a good time?’
‘Oh yes. Everyone will have a good time—even if it kills me.’
While his words were humorous, his expression remained impassive. She shivered as she caught sight of him again in the window.
‘Look there.’ He pointed to a bird hovering in the sky. ‘It’s a diving petrel.’
She gazed at the graceful bird floating effortlessly outstretched on the breeze.
‘They’re also known as firebirds,’ he added. ‘They’re apparently drawn to fire or light.’
‘It’s magnificent.’
The ship began to slow its pace. They were entering an icefield, an extensive area of unbroken pack ice. As the Star crunched its way into the solid mass, there was an appalling grating noise. The sound was unnerving, almost alien.
‘Would you like to take this to Hank on the bridge?’ Dustin held up a printout of their completed inventory.
‘Sure,’ she said. Lord knew, she could do with the distraction.
•
The bridge was a scene of quiet, serious activity. On the starboard side, several men stood with binoculars in hand. Outside, there was nothing but a white expanse, seemingly for miles.
No one seemed to notice Kit’s presence, and she didn’t want to interrupt Hank, who was deep in conversation with Richard. Around the console, a strip of red carpet designated the crew’s work zone; the blue carpet areas indicated where spectators could stand. Kit lingered in the blue near the windows and contemplated leaving the sheet of paper on a bench.
But then Hank received a call from one of the search helicopters. She couldn’t hear the message, but she could see his knuckles turn white as he gripped the radio. ‘Oh shit,’ he cursed into the mouthpiece.
The crew on the bridge snapped to attention. There was a collective intake of breath.
‘Jesusss,’ hissed Hank, his face turned to stone. ‘Okay, let me know what you see when you get closer.’
‘What is it?’ the captain asked.
‘Smoke—the choppers can see thick black smoke coming from the Petrel.’
‘A distress signal?’
‘It’s too massive,’ said Hank. ‘It’s an enormous black cloud over the ship. They think it might be on fire, but they aren’t close enough yet.’
The hair stood up on the back of Kit’s neck. Anxiety rippled through the bridge. Everyone turned in the imagined direction of the Petrel. Those with binoculars clambered for a position at the windows hanging over the water; those without squinted at the horizon.
From his own vantage point, Richard stood silently and peered at the ocean, his mouth a grim line. ‘Okay,’ he said in a calm voice, ‘I need to know the fastest route through the ice.’
A murmured response came from others in the room.
Kit felt conspicuously in the way. Her mind was numb with the reality and the horror of the Petrel’s predicament. She inched towards the door.
‘Kit,’ said Hank without looking at her.
She stopped moving. A shiver of dread went through her. She was surprised that he’d noticed her.
His voice was flat and expressionless, and he never once took his eyes off the pack ice. ‘Tell your team to prepare for burns.’
5
Kit and Sally heard the Legend’s update later that day. They spoke to him in the passageway as he waited for the choppers to be refuelled. He’d lost some of his usual swagger.
‘Oh man, it was terrifying,’ he said, taking a swig of water. ‘I could see a wall of orange flames all around the deck equipment.’ He gestured with a gloved hand. ‘It was burning the rubber rafts, the shipping containers, the side cranes—you name it, if it was on the deck, it was on fire. We couldn’t get close because flames would shoot in the air every time a fuel tank ruptured. It was a nightmare, a complete nightmare.’ He shook his head.
‘Could you see any of the crew?’ asked Sally.
‘Nah, not a living soul. But they wouldn’t have been on deck anyway, that’s for sure. There was just too much smoke—wouldn’t have been safe.’ He looked up as if he could still see the scene. ‘It was just this tower of black clouds over the ship,’ he said, sweeping his arm into an arc.
Kit and Sally exchanged worried looks.
On the third day following the distress signal, they were able to view the stricken vessel for themselves. The Southern Star’s arrival had been delayed by the maze of dense pack ice. Frustratingly, once they found the Petrel, they couldn’t risk getting closer in case their ship, too, became entrapped. The Star had to keep moving to-and-fro, to avoid being stuck, and they had to be content to view the Petrel from a distance.
It was clear that even if they’d arrived sooner, they couldn’t have fought the fire. Any up-close attempt to salvage the Petrel could have endangered the lives of the Star crew, and any attempt to extinguish the flames from a distance would have been useless and potentially disastrous. The Antarctic winds were fierce and unpredictable. Even if the crew could have prepared a flowing water supply in time—a rather remote possibility in sub-zero conditions—it couldn’t have been directed at the vessel with any accuracy. The winds would have either blown the water off course or fanned the flames back to life.
Everyone desperately scanned the horizon for the Petrel’s crew and passengers. No one could be seen aboard, yet no one could be spotted wandering or stranded—or lying dead—on the pack ice. Two helicopters searched the ice in the surrounding area. But with low cloud and occasional snow showers, visibility was poor. The pilots kept looking until the wind picked up and they were forced to return due to safety concerns.
Hours ticked by. The whereabouts of the crew remained unknown and utterly mysterious.
‘Perhaps they’re in their rooms, in lockdown, till the fire dies out,’ mused Sally to Kit. ‘There’s still smoke coming from the ship. That’s probably why we haven’t heard from them. They’re sensible.’
‘Yes,’ said Kit, wanting to believe her. In her mind’s eye, she envisaged people lying stiff and lifeless in their cabins, their faces ashen, asphyxiated by smoke and toxic fumes. ‘But the emergency procedure would have been to abandon ship, especially if the fire was out of control. They should be on the ice somewhere.’
‘But if they couldn’t get on deck due to the intensity of the fire, perhaps the best thing to do would’ve been to stay below, don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know.’ She didn’t want to tell Sally there had been other, whispered, speculations about the fate of the crew. Earlier Kit had overheard an engineer saying that the Petrel had a temperature-controlled ‘double skin’ for both the engine room and the cargo holds; to maintain a constant temperature, preheated fuel was continuously circulated around the ship. ‘If something ignited that fuel,’ said the engineer, shaking his head, ‘the entire inner ship would have erupted.’
Desperate to find survivors, Hank called a meeting of the SAR team at midday. As everyone gathered in the mess, Kit held her breath. Earlier she’d been told that if the ship were safe enough to enter, she and Dustin would represent the medical staff in an on-board rescue operation. Meanwhile, Dr Sidebottom and his assistant would prep the sick bay in anticipation of casualties.
In an instant, all her fears were realised. ‘We’re going to board the ship,’ said Hank. ‘The engineers have spoken to the chopper crews, and the hull looks sound.’
Kit exhaled. She made eye contact with Dustin, who smiled in sympathy. It wasn’t enough to calm her buzzing nerves.
‘There appears to be no major structural damage,’ continued Hank. ‘Helicopter surveillance has detected no cracks in the hull, nothing to suggest the ship’s going to break apart anytime soon—the pack ice has hemmed it in again. We think that with oxygen tanks and firefighting equipment, we should be able to enter the vessel without unduly compromising safety. Time is of the essence. If anyone’s injured on board, they’ll need our immediate assistance. You should keep in mind, however …’
Hank counselled everyone about what they could expect, about how they might be traumatised by scenes aboard the Petrel.
Kit was reminded of the first body she had seen, in her first job as a forensic dentist for the coroner. It was the charred body of a teenager; he’d been killed in a house fire in a neighbouring suburb. The authorities suspected that he and a friend had ignited a homemade bomb. She was required to identify the body from dental records. It smelt of smoke and barbecued meat and something else, something sweet, like scorched hair. The flesh was black and flaky, and the skull gleamed grey through the seared scalp. When she realised she’d have to wrench open the boy’s jaws, panic engulfed her. She turned away before the dry-retching began, surging upwards from the pit of her stomach and wrenching her throat.
Her mentor, a fatherly man in his sixties with a black sense of humour, gripped her shoulders as she leaned over, heaving, with her hands on her knees. ‘After the first body,’ he said, ‘there is no other. Take it in, girl, take it in. This’ll be the only time.’
She took it all in, but he’d been wrong. Body after body, the panic and the nausea never left her. Eventually she’d quit the job, resolving to work with animals alone.
Now, in the mess hall, Kit was in difficulty again. Her breath was coming in short, sharp gasps; her arms felt weak and tingly, and there was acid in her throat. She stared at the floor, trying to regain her composure. Discreetly, she placed a hand over her mouth and pressed a finger against one nostril.
After a while, with some effort and concentration, her normal breathing pattern resumed.
Hank’s voice came back to her. ‘There will be two search parties. We’re going to divide the Petrel into two search zones and allocate each party to check those zones thoroughly. Here’s the layout …’ He held up a large sheet of paper. ‘You’ll each have a smaller one of these.’ His voice boomed with authority. ‘Now, you’ll see we’ve numbered each subsection of the ship. Once you’ve completed searching a numbered section, the party leader will report back to me, to let me know the area is clear—or not. Each party will have a nominated deadline for reporting back. You’ll all be kitted out with oxygen, torches, ropes, whistles and radios. There will be one medic per search group.’
Hank looked at Kit. She looked back at him without blinking. Her face became a mask, calm and composed. Once he looked away, she swallowed in discomfort.
‘If there are any injured parties,’ he continued, ‘the medic will administer immediate first aid. If anyone has life-threatening injuries, they will be transferred here via helicopter as soon as possible.’ He paused and then emphasised, ‘Everyone in the individual rescue parties is to stay together. The party leader should do periodic checks of names and numbers in the group. We don’t want to lose anyone. So, what are you going to do? Repeat after me—stay together.’
‘Stay together,’ repeated everyone.
Alessandra the meteorologist entered the mess. She came up close to Hank and whispered in his ear. He looked at the ground in dismay.
After a while, he spoke up. ‘Okay, everyone. Some bad news.’
The room fell quiet.
‘A storm’s on its way. We’re expecting snow and hurricane winds in a few hours.’
There was a brief period of stunned silence.
‘This shouldn’t affect our mission,’ said Hank. ‘We have maybe two hours till the storm hits. So you go to the flight deck now, you get on board, you do your job promptly, you do it thoroughly, and you get out.’
•
Inside the helicopter, Kit stared out the window. She couldn’t look at her companions. Whenever she glanced in Blondie’s direction, all she could see were the whites of his eyes. One man’s knee kept jiggling up and down. No one spoke. There were five rescuers in total, and they all wore goggles, face masks and gloves. Everyone was dressed in extreme cold weather gear. Jamie, their team leader, stood out in a fluorescent yellow safety vest.
