There’s Something in the Air

Lorcan Campbell squints as he looks through the falling snow at the imposing, forty-foot-high glacier.

Lorcan is leading a year-long expedition for Motherboard, Inc., a private company searching for artifacts in Antarctica’s vast expanse.

Portly, with a thick black beard, bushy eyebrows, ruddy complexion, and a resonant voice, fifty-five-year-old Lorcan is exhausted and counting on this expedition being his last. He’s been with Motherboard, Inc. since its inception 30 years ago and has led expeditions to Singapore, Venezuela, the Congo, Greenland, and Iceland. His last expedition, the search for gold in the wreck of the World War II Australian cruiser Sydney, left him feeling like a guilty grave robber.

Wiry, with greasy, shoulder-length hair, thirty-two-year-old Quay Walker’s darting eyes always seem to be on the prowl for something that will make him rich, famous, or both. With hazy eyes and a nose so big it almost reaches his upper lip, twenty-eight-year-old Nate Hobbs is in Antarctica for adventure, while twenty-five-year-old Harold Wedlock, a muscular six-foot-five, is saving money for a wedding and a house.

“Must be forty feet high,” Lorcan observes.

Wiping the snow off his goggles, Quay replies, “It’s a perfect square. It looks like it’s ice, but it isn’t. It’s made up of an unidentified compound. You don’t see something like this in nature.”

Rounding a corner of the glacier, Nate shouts, “You’ve got to see this!”

Lorcan and Quay fight their way through the blinding snow to where Harold is waiting, smiling like he’s won a prize.

“A door?” Quay notes. “That proves this thing is man-made.”

“I’ve been banging on it loud enough to wake the dead,” Harold says. “Looks like nobody’s home.”

“Whoever is inside isn’t expecting visitors, Harold,” Lorcan returns.

Quay notices a pad built into the door.

“Could be a security device. But there’s no place to type in a code, and I don’t see a port for an access card.”

Quay gives Lorcan a sly side glance, his eyes brightening.

“We’re not breaking in, Quay. If this is a Russian or Chinese base, we could start World War Three.”

“C’mon, Lorcan. Look at this place. There’s not a crack, not a seam in this material. You know the Russians and the Chinese don’t have anything like this.”

“Neither do we,” Lorcan replies.

“Suppose it’s a tomb and we find the coffin of Imo-Instep or King Rootin’ Tootin’ or some other ancient King? Quay asks. “Do you know how much Motherboard would pay us for something like that?”

“Nate, Harold, stay with the snow bus. Quay and I will investigate.”

“Aw, c’mon, Lorcan,” Nate protests. “I want to go with you. I want to ponder this ice cube’s great mystery.”

“Ponder?”

“You know, like finding out if aliens abducted the Roanoke settlers, or where Amelia Earhart crashed? Or where is Bobbie Gentry?”

“Alright. But first we cover our kiesters.”

Lorcan calls the Byrd Station on the radio, apprising them of the situation and instructing them to contact Motherboard.

Moments later, Lorcan’s radio squelches.

“Headquarters approves the mission.”

The radio squeals again when Lorcan replies with his thanks.

A slight rumble at their feet increases the men’s curiosity.

“What the heck is that?” Nate asks.

“Maybe a seismic shift,” Lorcan replies.

The door begins to rise.

“How’d you do that?” Quay asks.

“I think it was the radio,” Lorcan surmises. “The door must be responding to our radio’s frequency.”

A series of lights turn on as the men pass through a hallway. The walls are decorated with stars and planets.

“Might be a road map for E.T.,” Quay jokes.

They cautiously venture into a main room, gasping in awe at their surroundings.

Quay is fascinated by a large display case in the center of the room.

“Holy Moley! Is this what I think it is?”

Lorcan looks over his shoulder. “The skeleton of a Saber-tooth tiger.”

“That’s nothing compared to this,” Nate says, pointing toward a white coffin in the corner of the room.

Its lid is transparent. Inside is a being that scales eight feet tall. It has a powerful, gold-covered body, bat-like wings, and long, sharp talons. Its face also appears to be made of gold. It has almond-shaped emerald eyes and wears a headpiece adorned with a fierce cobra.

“Could be Egyptian,” Lorcan surmises.

“Egyptians? Here in Popsicleville?” Quay wonders.

“Whoever he is, I hope he stays inside that box,” Nate adds.

Lorcan sniffs the air. “Anybody else smell something sweet?”

Quay takes a deep breath. “Yeah, it smells like vanilla cupcakes.”

Looking at the tools and weapons hanging nearby, Nate says, “I think we’re in a museum.”

“Yeah, but whose museum is it?” Quay asks.

Nate picks up a weapon resembling a gun.

“Be careful with that,” Lorcan cautions. “It’s not standard issue.”

Nate snickers, pressing the trigger. A beam of light narrowly misses Lorcan’s head, burning a hole in the wall.

The men watch, dumfounded, as the wall repairs itself.

Quay gives Lorcan another sneaky side glance, his eyes darting gleefully.

“I know what you’re thinking, Quay,” Lorcan says. “We can’t pilfer this site. It’s obviously a sacred place.”

“For whom? We’re in the middle of a blizzard. We’ve only got four hours left before it’ll be dark for the next six months. We can’t leave this goldmine unattended. We have to take this stuff with us.”

***

Dr. Hoagland “Hoge” Hakala looks out of his office window, watching the sun disappear. The setting sun means he’ll be stuck inside the station with nine other Motherboard employees already showing signs of cabin fever.

Many of the crew have worked with the sixty-two-year-old doctor before. Frequently seen wearing a warm smile that accents her blonde bangs, middle-aged archeologist Jewel Plummer also dabbles in ancient history and is one of two women at the station. The other personnel include a pair of maintenance men, Chip Taylor and Ethan Allen, a cook, Rosie Revell, and Tap Boland, a young gamer in charge of communications.

Motherboard, Inc. has invested heavily in sending its staff into a glacial wasteland. They rebuilt a former Cold War Air Force station, refurbishing the offices, dorm, lounge, medical bay, cafeteria, and communications center.

Supplies are brought in every two weeks by airplanes with skis, although landing at night or in frigid temperatures can be hazardous. Landing in a whiteout like the one currently blanketing Byrd Station is now impossible. The station also relies heavily on a large snow bus that can transport all ten workers at once.

Hoge looks at the thermometer outside his window. It registers -46°F. He knows it will get much colder as the snow gets heavier.

***

Safely back at Byrd Station after a harrowing return trek, Lorcan feels he can finally exhale.

“Worst snowstorm I’ve seen since we’ve been here. We got three inches in an hour.”

“Never mind the weather,” Jewel says. “Tell me about the mummy you found.”

“Better yet, I’ll introduce you. Goldie’s in the storage room.”

“Goldie?”

“You’ll see why we call him that.”

The pair don surgical masks and enter the storage room, pausing to look at the Saber-tooth tiger’s bones.

“Those bones look genuine to me. I’d say, they’re ten thousand years old or more,” Jewel comments.

Jewel looks at the mummy’s gold death mask. Gasping, she stumbles backward.

“Soris!”

“What, or who, is Soris?”

“A Yupik god. He’s no one to be messed with,” Jewel replies. “In ancient times, Soris, the God of the darkness, and Gidrick, the god of light, shared the planet, each ruling over Earth for twelve hours. Gidrick was kind, and when he reigned, there was life, love, and happiness. When Soris reigned, there was disease, death, and misery. Soris was a trickster. When he appeared, instead of detecting the scent of death, his victims would smell something sweet. He drew his power from driving his victims mad. Soris wanted Earth for himself and killed his brother in battle, burning his body so he couldn’t return. Gidrick’s son, Norwick, then defeated Soris, but he couldn’t bring himself to kill his uncle, so he imprisoned him in a coffin. Norwick took Soris’ place as a god, and the balance between darkness and light was restored. Soris was banished to Antarctica and sealed in a tomb. Before he was banished, he swore he would return to defeat Norwick and plunge the world into eternal darkness.”

“Nice bedtime story. Whether he’s a god or a paperweight, Goldie’s discovery guarantees we’ll all be getting hefty bonuses. You’ll be able to buy boatloads of that perfume you’re wearing.”

“I’m not wearing any perfume.”

***

Nate enters the storeroom, where Quay sits in a chair, a machine gun in his lap, staring at the mummy.

“Ugh. How can you look at that thing, Quay?”

Quay lowers his mask. “Oh, I dunno. I think Goldie’s kind of handsome, you know, regal. Besides, he’s made of gold, which means a big payday for us.”

Quay yawns as he rises from the chair.

Nate takes a deep breath, rubbing his long nose. He coughs at the sweet smell in the air, wondering as he puts on his surgical mask if it will do him any good, since he and the others were exposed to the tomb’s atmosphere.

“Why are we pulling guard duty over a mummy? We found it and had to babysit it for two hours in a blizzard until we could get back here. That should be enough.”

“All us peons have to take a shift,” Quay replies. “What’s the matter? Are you afraid of the dark?”

***

Nate spends his entire shift fighting back nausea and blowing his nose. He never liked the smell of vanilla, and judging by the strong smell, the cook must be drowning her food in it.

Nate struggles to breathe, dragging himself to his room after his shift. His eyesight falters, blurring. He’s so tired that instead of watching the latest installment of “Shetland,” he goes directly to bed, convinced he has the flu.

At 5:30 a.m., Nate wakes up vomiting blood. Pain burns through his joints, and his eyes are so sensitive that he resorts to wearing sunglasses indoors. He goes to Dr. Hogeland twice a day over the next two days, becoming so distressed that Hoge is convinced he’s having a panic attack.

Hoge has seen the symptoms before. He figures Nate is just another sun-deprived crew member feeling paranoid and claustrophobic. A few doses of Diazepam finally calms Nate down.

***

After four days away from guard duty, Nate is able to take his usual shift. It helps somewhat that other members of the crew are experiencing the same physical ailments and strange dreams he’s been having.

The Diazepam proves so effective that Nate nods off while watching over Goldie. He dreams about going home, hooking up with his band, and playing in Malibu for the horny beach bunnies.

The smell of vanilla fills his nostrils.

His dream is replaced by the sight of Goldie running through a devastated landscape as flaming arrows narrowly whiz by him.

Shaking the nightmare from his head, Nate stands over Goldie’s coffin, glaring in anger at his gold-plated body.

He smashes his hand against the transparent coffin lid.

“Stay out of my head! Stay out of my head!”

He bangs his fist against the lid until his hand is bloody.

A minuscule, almost undetectable crack forms in the corner of the lid.

***

Nate is found next to the coffin. Despite forty minutes of resuscitation attempts, Hoge declares Nate dead from cardiac arrest.

Hoge expresses his growing concern over the crew’s health to Lorcan.

“When people start giving up and think about killing themselves, we’re way past cabin fever. Half the crew is complaining of flu-like symptoms, yet they’re not sick. Quay Walker said Nate was having nightmares with a voice taunting him, saying, ‘Release, release.’ Now Quay is having them.”

“I thought Nate loved it here. He said he liked the challenge of taming a frozen wilderness.”

“He changed. He went from being an adventurer to being skittish and sleep-deprived. He reached the point where no number of pills or counseling could alleviate his mental anguish. I can’t medicate this epidemic out of existence, Lorcan. The crew is depressed, barely able to function. The maintenance guys, Chip and Ethan, and Rosey the cook think their nightmares stem from that mummy you’re keeping in the storeroom.”

“There’s not much I can do for now. We can’t fly anyone in or out. We’ve had a few hours of calm weather, but nothing long enough for a plane to land. We’re stranded. And on top of that, there’s something screwy with the ventilation system. People are complaining that the air smells funny. I’ve had Chip and Ethan tear this place apart. The air still smells the same.”

“Maybe it’s connected to everyone’s edginess, but I feel fine,” Hoge says. “How are you feeling?”

“Like I’m giving an epileptic gorilla a piggyback ride.”

“Like I said, everyone thinks Soris is the source of their misery.”

Lorcan covers his mouth as he coughs. “What do you want me to do, Doc? The company is salivating over that corpse. I’d like to toss it out in the snow. Then maybe our luck will change.”

***

The voice in Tap Boland’s head repeats the same phrase that’s been hounding him for a week, “Release, release.”

The base’s communications operator passes Hoge in the hallway, his thin features locked in a grimace.

“Hello, Tap.”

Backing down the hallway, Tap lowers his sunglasses, looking strangely at Hoge as if he doesn’t recognize him.

“…Release, release…”

Hoge peeks in the communications office. The console is on fire.

***

Hoge walks with Lorcan toward the lounge.

“Good thing you happened by the comms office. The whole base might have caught fire,” Lorcan says.

“I was too late to keep Tap from destroying the console or himself,” Hoge replies.

“Harold says he saw Tap walk out into the blizzard without protection. A willful suicide. So, no Tap, no radio, no internet, and no phones. We’re deaf and blind.”

“We’ve lost control,” Hoge says. “I think only you, me, Jewel, and Harold are unaffected.”

“That’s why I’m having the staff report to the lounge. Hopefully, we can keep an eye on everyone and keep them safe.”

Quay exits the lounge, holding the door open for them.

“What are you doing with that axe, Quay?” Lorcan asks cautiously.

“What axe?” Quay asks, wandering off.

“Wait, where are you going? I ordered everyone to stay in the lounge.”

“I’m just going outside for a walk.”

Before they can stop him, Quay lets out a mad laugh, running away.

Looking in the lounge, Hoge gently nudges Lorcan.

“What? We’ve got to get after Quay!”

Lorcan scans the lounge. The bodies of Chip Taylor, Ethan Allen, and Rosey Revell lay stacked on top of each other.

***

Quay thrusts open the door to the storeroom. He brings the axe down on Soris’ coffin, hacking at it until the lid shatters.

“There! Are you happy? You’re released! Now, will you leave my mind alone?”

Soris rises from his coffin.

No one hears Quay’s scream.

***

Harold and Jewel rush toward Lorcan and Hoge.

“You’ve got to see this!” Jewel shouts, pulling Lorcan down the hallway.

Lorcan and Hoge follow Jewel and Harold to the storage room.

Soris’s coffin is splintered into pieces.

“Soris is free! We’ve got to get out of here!” Jewel exclaims.

The color drains from Lorcan’s features. “Get to the snow bus.”

Hoge, Jewel, and Harold quickly suit up for the cold.

“Put a suit on, Lorcan! Hoge shouts at him.

“Somebody has to try and stop Soris. If I’m not out in ten minutes, step on the gas and don’t stop until you reach the Amundsen-Scott Station.”

The trio runs for the snow bus. Hoge pauses before getting in. Looking up at the black sky, he curses at the falling snow.

Harold starts the snow bus and checks the gas gauge.

“Half a tank.”

“We need a full tank to get to the Amundsen-Scott Station,” Hoge points out.

“Then we’re in for a long walk,” Jewel replies. “I’d rather face a blizzard than Soris.”

***

Lorcan adjusts the strap digging into his shoulder and creeps down the hallway, looking for a place to ambush Soris.

The sound of a deep, guttural growl followed by a long hiss freezes him.

Roaring, a Saber-tooth tiger charges down the hallway. Lorcan flattens himself against a doorway as it runs by.

What is behind the Saber-tooth tiger frightens him even more.

Soris moves toward him, spreading his wings, his talons ready to strike.

Lorcan raises the flamethrower.

“I’ve got a gift for your coming-out party, Soris!”

***

A rescue team arrives at Byrd Station two days after its last transmission.

Weapons at the ready, the six-member team enters the darkened facility.

Captain Eugene Riker points at his mouth, indicating he can see his breath.

“Heat’s off. Electricity, too,” he whispers to Lieutenant Foster Cook, stifling a cough.

Riker notices the walls are blackened and scorched.

Cook sniffs the air. “Smells like vanilla in here.”

Riker turns his head, thinking he sees something in the shadows.