The Spawning (20 page)

Everything seemed fine. Seemed normal.

Frye and Danny Shin came in together arguing about modern cinema. Frye was saying that a good movie had to have guns and explosions and Shin said that was typical American thinking. That European and Asian cinema were far superior because they pretty much steered clear of violence except where it was vital to the plot.

Frye just shook his head. “See? That's where you're wrong, Danny. You're a foreigner. You don't think like an American or you'd like explosions. Ain't that right, Gwen?” he said, taking his seat near the table where the Coven sat. “A good movie needs explosions and tits. Right?”

Zoot looked embarrassed. She looked to Gwen to see how she should feel about that. Gwen sipped her coffee. “Yeah, explosions, tits, and at least one hot shower screw scene. It's not a movie without some hot shower sex.”

“See, Danny? See how fucked-up you are?” Frye said. “It's because you're a foreigner.”

“But we're all foreigners down here,” Zoot said.

“That's right, sweet thing, but Shin, he's a foreigner wherever he goes.”

Shin sighed and toyed with his mustache. “Oh, I get it. Because my parents were Chinese that makes me a foreigner. Well, if I'm a foreigner, then you're a foreigner, Frye.”

“Hell, no. I'm American. I ain't no foreigner.”

“And what were your parents?”

“They were English. Both of ‘em came out of Liverpool after the war. I went to Liverpool once, visited my cousin Bonnie. Me and her got pissing drunk for five days straight. That's what I like about people from Liverpool. When it comes to drinking, they don't fuck around. I respect that.”

This sort of intolerant, ignorant behavior was classic Frye. He was the original blue collar hardcase.

When Coyle rolled out of bed that morning, untangling himself from Gwen, his guts had been knotted like a corset, but now, slowly, they were loosening up. Maybe Locke was nuts. Scratch that. He was nuts. But that didn't mean he was wrong.

Harvey came storming in as he did most mornings, red-faced and fuming, a small, husky, and very round dynamo. He made for Special Ed with his daily list of grievances. Today it was something special. He stood over by Special Ed with his hands on his hips, grinding his teeth. “Somebody stole my piss can,” he said. “Somebody stole it and I want it back right goddamn now.”

There were a few chuckles over that.

Piss cans were kept in the rooms for midnight relief so you didn't have to make that run to the latrine. Some people found them offensive and refused to use them, but sooner or later just about everyone got into the habit.

“Your can was missing when you woke up?” Special Ed said, taking it all very seriously as he did with the most ridiculous complaints. He even had his red Bic out, was ready to log this.

Harvey grunted. “No, there was a piss can there, but it wasn't
mine.”

“This is getting spooky,” someone said. “A counterfeit piss can.”

More laughter.

Special Ed remained composed.

This was dead serious business with possible international ramifications and you could tell that by the look on his face. Something like this needed to be logged. Special Ed was good at stuff like this. He'd been at Clime last winter, too, and Coyle remembered the investigatory zeal he'd practiced while trying to root out the infamous Mystery Smoker in the Showers and the heinous Midnight Coffee Cup Thief or how he'd settled that ugly dispute between the two GA's. GA #1 did not like GA #2 looking at her. But since this bugged the holy shit out of GA #1, GA #2 could not stop doing it. GA #1 was reduced to tears on several occasions and GA #2 simply said, “What? I was just looking at her. God.” Since Special Ed could not catch GA #2 in the act despite his crime-fighting acumen, GA #1 took matters into her own hands and videotaped GA #2 staring at her. This was the smoking gun, GA #1 decided. But GA #2 maintained that just because she was looking into the camera while being filmed—and smiling brightly—this did not mean she stared at GA #1 when the video was not rolling. Special Ed put a restraining order on GA #2. She was not allowed to look at GA #1 or even talk to her.

That was classic Special Ed.

He had a natural talent for the absurd.

Of course, now and again a crime so villainous in nature would occur that it would simply elude even him. Such was the case with the infamous Fucko the Clown last winter. Fucko was stealing women's underwear. Picking the locks to their doors and snatching panties off into thin air, leaving nothing but a pornographic playing card in his wake.

Special Ed was stumped.

To this day, like Jack the Ripper, the identity of Fucko the Clown remained a controversial mystery . . . though it did have a happy ending. At the end of winter, a lovely collage of women's panties was found in the Community Room touched off by a few of Gwen's leopard thongs. Gut's extremely large “granny underwear” were the centerpiece of this decorative and artistic display. But as Frye had said, “her drawers were so big you could've parachuted safely with them from 20,000 feet.”

So it was here in the ludicrous bosom of Antarctic camp life that Special Ed finally shined bright. When he wasn't investigating grievances, he made a lot of postings. Most of them were authorized postings telling the crew not to make
un
authorized postings.

“Hey,” Gwen said, “you can use my piss can, Harv. Long as you empty it first.”

“Ha, ha, ha. Everybody's a joker.” Harvey's face was getting redder now. “I know my piss pot. I don't trust you people so I mark all my stuff with a special sign so I know. One of you went in my room and swiped it.”

“Your special sign?” Gwen said.

“No! My goddamn pisspot! You know damn well what I mean!” He looked at everyone suspiciously, his face so red that his thinning gray hair was whiter than the frost on the windows. “Now I want it back. Whoever took it puts it outside my door today, I won't ask any questions. But I want that piss can back!”

Frye just lost it. “Hey, you people!” he called out. “This is serious stuff now! Harv wants that fucking piss can back and he means business! He's not pissing until he gets it back!”

“Why don't you shut up, Frye!” Harvey said.

Frye blew him a kiss.

Harvey couldn't take it anymore. He stormed out of the Community Room vowing vengeance on the guilty party. “They wanna keep pushing me?” he said. “Let ‘em push me! But they're gonna find out that I push back!”

That's the way it was at all the stations.

Petty bullshit and foolish gripes and infantile whining all lorded over by a half-ass Mickey Mouse bureaucratic system that encouraged tattling and finger-pointing and would fully investigate the most ridiculous complaint instead of telling the whiners to shut up and get back to work.

Coyle had seen it plenty.

They had an extremely belligerent and homophobic heavy equipment operator at Pole Station one year. He hated gays and openly called for their extermination. A guy like that was asking for it. Somebody painted flowers on his favorite shovel—pansies, of course—and a full-scale investigation ensued. But that only encouraged more of the same. Flowery love letters were slid under his door with openly homosexual romantic poems addressed to him. Then somebody hacked into the station manager's account and sent a pornographic email to the homophobe. But it all reached a crisis point when Frye got sick of the homophobe's whining and called him, “a fucking faggot.”

The HR guy had to talk to Frye about anger management issues and put that in his file. Frye said that was fine, because the homophobe was “nothing but a goddamn fairy anyway.”

Coyle was relieved to see that the crew at Clime was still a bunch of whackos. The Callisto thing and the disappearance of Cassie Malone had not disrupted that. Things seemed okay.

Soon enough everyone was eating and joking and bickering like usual. The food disappeared fast and Coyle got his usual round of compliments. Things were absolutely normal. Nobody mentioned any of the weird things going on, at least that Coyle was able to pick up on. Mount Hobb, Callisto, the possible situation at NOAA Polaris, and even Cassie herself were not mentioned. And was that good or bad? He couldn't be sure. He would have liked it better if these things were discussed instead of hidden away like dirty family secrets.

But he was no psychologist. What did he know?

From what he was able to ascertain, everything was completely normal. Relationships were the same. Plenty of off-color jokes and jibes and funny stories about other years. Just breakfast conversation: light and airy. No deep discussions. Things seemed ordinary at Polar Clime.

He allowed himself to sigh.

But what he didn't know was that this was simply the calm before the storm.

NOAA FIELD STATION POLARIS
—EN ROUTE, MARCH 8

J
UST AS HE FIGURED, Coyle was chosen for the SAR team. Horn and Gwen came along as did Dr. Flagg. The NSF waited several days before launching a SAR, but in the end they had to.

Though morning, it was pitch black, and not the blackness of the real, civilized world, but the polar blackness that was infinitely blacker than any night you could imagine until you saw it firsthand. Flakes of snow and crystals of ice spun in the headlights in a swirling thick vortex, blowing and drifting and making the cab of the Spryte shake. They glanced off the windshield as the wipers frantically pumped to clear them. Beyond the headlights it was a white waste, barren and hostile.

Gwen was sitting in the front seat, between Horn who was driving and Coyle who was simply bored. She seemed to be enjoying herself. “This is fun, isn't it?” she said. “Two men squeezing me from either side. Mama likes that.”

“Only you could get turned on out here,” Coyle told her.

“It's the desolation, Nicky. Raw, violent nature. Gets my blood pumping.” Though there was plenty of room for three in the seat, she spread out her legs in her red wind pants so that her knees touched those of her companions. “I got an idea. You boys can be the bread and I'll be the meat. We'll make a nice Gwen sandwich. How does that sound?”

Coyle shrugged. “Well, I am pretty hungry.”

Horn just ignored her as he always did. To him, most people were something you ignored because rarely did anything they say warrant your undivided attention. He cursed under his breath, finally said, “Real sweet morning for a drive, Nicky. I'm loving it.”

“What'd you expect?” Coyle said.

“Oh, quit your whining, Horn,” Gwen said. “You didn't have to come. You volunteered for chrissake.”

He just grunted, guiding the Spryte over the ice and away from Polar Clime and the mountains and out onto the polar plateau itself. Ordinary compasses were pretty much useless on the Ice, but the Spryte had a GPS system that would guide them right to the door of NOAA Polaris.

Horn said, “I volunteered, Gwen, because I wanted to make sure Nicky made it there in one piece. I figured it was better than letting some bimbo drive him. You know, like you for instance.”

“Did he just insult me, Nicky?” Gwen said, enjoying it. Horn had pretty much ignored her since the season began. Finally, she had gotten a rise out of him.

“No, he didn't insult you. That was a compliment.”

Gwen threw her hair over her shoulder. “I thought so. Now admit it, Horn, you weren't worried about Nicky. You were worried about me. You've been hot for me from day one.”

In the backseat, Flagg ignored them, listening to his notes over a headset.

The cab jerked as they passed over a mound of hardpack. Horn kept peering through the windshield.

“I would go after you, Gwen,” he said finally, “but unfortunately I liken women in general to black widow spiders and I have no intention of having you suck me dry.”

“A good sucking never hurt anyone,” she said. “You should try it sometime.”

“I have, dear, I have. I was married once. And I still have the scars from her fangs on my neck. Not to mention other parts.”

Coyle was laughing under his breath. What a couple. Gwen the nympho and Horn the confirmed nihilist. He wasn't hearing wedding bells in the near future.

Horn said, “Let me put it this way, Gwen. You can play the hot-to-trot little camp slut all you want, but I know women. I know how they are. They're always after something and it rarely comes without baggage. Women play headgames. Women are on power trips. Sex to them is a way of controlling men, a way of owning them. You claim you want sex without strings, but I don't buy that. You want strings to pull and men to manipulate. No thanks, I've already been through all that. Nobody owns me and nobody pulls my strings. Sex is just a power game that leads to relationships and relationships are just a way of selling your soul and getting shit in return.”

Either Gwen didn't realize she was being insulted and her gender in general or maybe she just didn't care. “I'm not talking about relationships, Horn. I'm talking about fucking.”

Coyle lost it, starting laughing his ass off.

Horn sighed. “Gwen, you're a UT, right? A Utilities Technician?”

“Yeah. What of it?”

“Well, you're down here to fix things. Washers and humidifiers and furnaces?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I'm not a utility that you can fix. I'm broken and bitter and hateful. Better to stick with your tool belt.”

She smiled and cast him a salacious look. “Oh, mama's very good with tools. You should come and see sometime.”

“Especially if they have batteries,” Coyle said.

“Batteries? Mama don't use no batteries, boys, she plugs right into direct current.”

“Of course. Why not? Every time the lights dim, she's going at it, Nicky.”

“Oh, just sometimes,” Gwen said. “Ask Nicky . . . mama's given him a few presentations he won't forget.”