Outpost (48 page)

He
took a long, shuddering breath.

We've
all got it coming, he reminded himself.

He
turned his back on the heat and light of the refinery. He walked north across
the frozen sea. He pulled back his hood so he could look at the stars.

Jane
ran through the bunker. She found a discarded flare smouldering on the tunnel
floor. She couldn't be far behind Ghost and Punch.

She
reached the bunker entrance. One of the snowmobiles was gone. She pulled the
tarpaulin from the second Skidoo and straddled the bike. She reached for the
ignition. An empty slot. Nikki or Nail must have the key. I'm going to die, she
thought, just because some fool put the key in their pocket instead of leaving
it in the ignition.

She
stood at the bunker entrance and looked south. She saw a gleam in the far
distance like a bright star. The arc lights of the refinery. She tried to judge
distance. Rampart was over fifteen kilometres away.

She
climbed down the rocky shoreline to the frozen sea. She checked her crampons
were securely buckled to her boots. She threw away her flashlight.

'All
right,' she muttered. 'You can do this.'

She
ran, quickly accelerating from a trot to a sprint, and headed for the distant
light.

She
ran in total darkness, eyes fixed on the beacon lights of the rig. Pretend you
are jogging a circuit of C deck, she told herself. Stay calm. Control your
breathing. Get into a rhythm.

She
muttered the lyrics of 'All Along the Watchtower' as she ran.

She
drew closer to the rig. She saw shattering ice. Sweet relief. The refinery had
yet to reach the ocean.

Jane
looked beyond Rampart. The moon reflected in rippling water. The refinery had
reached the edge of the polar ice-field and was about to break into open sea.

Jane
ran alongside the rig. She passed the south legs. She sprinted in front of the
refinery and collapsed, crippled by exhaustion, on the narrow strip of ice
that separated Rampart from the ocean.

Jane
dug in her pockets. She pulled out a couple of flares.

She
stood, lit the flares and waved them back and forth above her head. She
squinted into dazzling arc light. If Sian had left the cab, if she didn't see
Jane standing ahead of the refinery, Jane would be crushed and submerged.

Jane
let the flares fall at her feet. She stood, blinded by searchlights, deafened
by the roar as the oncoming refinery punched through the polar crust. She
closed her eyes. She was enveloped in ice-dust and sea-spray.

Sian
sat in the crane cab. Punch crouched beside her.

'There,'
shouted Punch. He scrubbed away condensation. They saw a solitary figure
standing on the ice. Jane. Two purple flares burning at her feet. 'Drop the
hook.'

Jane
opened her eyes. The massive steel hook descended out of dazzling light. She
stepped forward to meet it.

Jane
was hit by a snowmobile and sent spinning across the ice. She sat up. She
wondered if her hip were broken. She looked around. The snowmobile skidded to a
halt and turned. The bike from the bunker. Nail must have had the key.

Jane
struggled to her feet. She unzipped her parka. Nail drove at her. She jumped to
one side and threw her coat beneath the bike. The caterpillar tread chewed her
coat and jammed. The bike flipped. Nail was thrown across the ice. He got to
his feet.

They
both ran for the hook. Jane got there first. She grabbed the chain. Nail seized
her throat and they fell to the ground. He sat on Jane's chest and began to
throttle. His lips were black and turning to metal. His right eye socket was
burned out.

Contest
of strength. Jane pushed his face away with a gloved hand. She gripped his leg,
tried to tip him from her chest. Something in the utility pocket of his
trousers. Jane's knife. She pressed fingers into his remaining eye. He roared
in pain. He gripped her right arm and tried to snap it. She had the knife in
her left hand. She flicked open the blade and stabbed him in the belly.

Nail
convulsed. She threw him aside. She looked up. Sian had raised the hook. It
hung fifty metres above their heads.

Nail
lay on his back. He saw the hook high above him and realised what was about to
happen. He screamed. His cry merged with the roar of breaking ice.

Sian
hit Release. Gears disengaged. The chain spun free. Jane rolled clear as the
half-tonne hook slammed down like a fist. It punched clean through the ice
leaving nothing of Nail but a fine pink blood-mist.

Sian
engaged the gears and raised the chain. The hook rose from the depths,
splitting ice, dripping seawater. Jane stepped on to the hook, and was lifted
upward into the light.

Sian
lowered Jane on to a walkway. Jane stepped from the hook. She stumbled and
fell.

Sian
and Punch climbed from the cab and ran to her. They helped her up.

'Are
you all right?' asked Punch.

'I
hurt my hip,' said Jane. 'I think I'm okay.' She looked around. 'Where's
Ghost?'

Jane
stood at the north railing and watched the Arctic ice slowly recede. A bleak
landscape lit spectral white by moonlight. Jane spoke into her radio. 'Ghost?
Can you hear me?'

'Jane? Where are you?'
A weak signal. Ghost, somewhere
out on the ice, alone in the dark.

'I
made it. I'm on the rig.'

'You're all right?'

'We're
fine.'

'Look after those kids, yeah? That's your mission.
Keep them safe. Get them home
.'

'We're
leaving now. We've cleared the ice. The current is taking us south. I'm so
sorry, Gee. There's nothing I can do.'

'These past few weeks. You and me. I wouldn't have
missed them for the world
.'

'I
love you, Rajesh.'

Ghost's
reply was lost in white-noise crackle as his radio passed out of range.

Jane
saw the pin-prick of a distress flare fired in the far distance. The star-shell
burned intense red for a full minute then died away. Ghost's final salute.

Jane
lay on her bunk and cried. Always dealt the losing hand.

You'll be alone. You'll be alone your whole damn life.

Maybe
she made the wrong choice. Maybe she should have joined Nikki's weird commune.
Become a member of the herd. Or maybe her old, fat self had been right all
along. Why live? Why struggle? Why not jump from the refinery and end it all?

She
stared at the ceiling and tried to think of a reason to keep breathing.

Keep them safe. Get them home
.

Jane
got up. She wiped her eyes and blew her nose. She showered and found fresh
clothes. She limped to the canteen. She looked for Punch and Sian. She saw them
through a porthole. They were standing on the helipad. She joined them outside.
Punch had a black box in his hand. He examined the gauge. 'Geiger counter,' he
explained. 'They used to locate blockages in the treater by flushing isotopes
through the pipes.'

'What's
the reading?'

'Eighty.
Standard background. I'll take a fresh reading every day. Not there's much we
can do if we hit a radiation hot-spot. It's not like we can turn round and head
the other way.'

'How's
the fuel holding out?'

'We
should be able to keep the lights on for a few weeks.'

'Food?'

'Some.
Not much.'

'We'll
make it,' said Jane. 'It'll be tough, but we'll make it.'

Jane
made her way to the observation bubble. She settled herself in a chair and
massaged her injured leg.

She
powered up the radio and scanned the wavebands. Nothing but the pops and
whistles of unmanned transmission equipment, military and civilian, singing to
the ionosphere.

'This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. The
broadcasters of your area in voluntary cooperation with federal, state and
local authorities have developed this system to keep you informed in the event
of an emergency. If this had been an actual emergency the Attention Signal you
just heard would have been followed by official information, news or
instructions. This concludes the test of the Emergency Broadcast System
.
'

Jane
picked up the microphone.

'This
is Kasker Rampart hailing any vessel, over.'

No
reply.

'Mayday,
mayday. This is Kasker Rampart. Can anyone hear me, over?'

No
reply.

'Mayday,
mayday. This is Jane Blanc aboard Con Amalgam refinery Kasker Rampart. Is
anyone out there?'

Midnight
at the top of the world. Darkness. Lethal cold.

The
Aurora Borealis. A flickering ion stream washes across the polar sky.
Iridescent colour. Dancing emerald fire.

Rajesh
Ghosh sits at the centre of the snow plain. A speck in vast white nothing. He
is the last human north of the Arctic Circle now that cities lie in ruin,
mankind has been swept away, and a strange new intelligence rules the earth.

He
kneels on the ice, hands in his lap. He has taken off his coat and gloves. He
sits in T-shirt and shorts. He will never move again.

His
flesh has hardened to rock. His skin is frosted with snow crystals. His eyes
have turned to glass. He is looking up. A white statue, smiling at the stars.