Survival

by David Fletcher

  Alex knew what was going on here. Roy was very aware of the trauma that his friend had suffered, and his form of post-trauma counselling was a combination of esoteric instruction – if possible, about flags – and as much levity and silliness as he could get away with. And it worked. Alex felt much better in all sorts of ways when, an hour later, he turned up for Captain José’s ten o’clock briefing in the main lounge. He knew he would now be able to apply himself to what was about to happen and not dwell on what had happened. Indeed, he knew he owed it to Debbie and to his friends to focus on what Captain José was about to say, and that in itself would serve as an additional useful therapy. Particularly if Roy was able to succeed in his endeavour to prise out of their leader any details of any communications he might have made. Although that would have to wait until José had dealt with his own agenda. And this started with a recognition of yesterday’s events…

  First there was an expression of regret. Three people had died who would not have died if the world had still been normal. However, as José was at pains to point out, it was not by any means normal, which was why, simply by approaching a moored yacht, one could quite easily get shot at. And everyone in the room, he suggested, knew what might happen then. It was a way of expressing some sincere regret, but at the same time paving the way to giving his thanks for the rapid reactions of those who’d been shot at, and particularly the outstanding performance of sharpshooting Gill. She was standing at the back of the lounge with Stuart, and José clearly wanted her to hear – before the whole ship’s company – that her actions were greatly appreciated and should not be regarded as anything other than entirely proper as well as amazingly skilful. Indeed, to emphasise his point, he invited the audience to consider the possible outcome of yesterday’s events had Gill not been able to defend her colleagues quite so quickly and quite so deftly. They all owed her a huge debt of gratitude. And she should feel rightly proud of her performance, free from any sort of guilt whatsoever.

  Gill looked a little embarrassed at the conclusion of this eulogy, but José spared her any further blushes by moving on briskly – to discuss his immediate plans for the Sea Sprite.

  ‘As I’m sure you’ve all noticed,’ he started, ‘we are still in Cierva Cove, and we will be here until about lunchtime. The chief engineer’s men are currently doing some routine maintenance work, and when that’s finished in about two hours’ time, we will be on our way. And our way will be a south-west course to a place called Danco Island, a little further down the peninsula. There we will moor overnight, ready for a short hop to Paradise Bay in the morning, just in time to relieve another Argentinian research station of its goodies. And that reminds me. I should have told you that our zodiac heroes “liberated” more provisions yesterday than I could ever have hoped for. Although, of course, we can never have too many, which is why tomorrow we will be visiting that next Argentinian takeaway. And let me assure you now that we will take all the care we can to ensure that this visit involves no drama of any sort. And I don’t think it will…’

  ‘How can you possibly know that?’ asked a brave old man from the middle of the room. ‘How do you know there aren’t people at this base as well?’

  Captain José responded like the true leader he had become, and with an explanation that would mean that Roy would not have to quiz him on the subject of communications.

  ‘OK. A very good question. And my answer is that I can’t be sure. There might indeed be another vessel there. And there might even be some people in the base itself. But I very much doubt it. And I very much doubt it because we have picked up no transmissions of any sort that would betray the presence of either. And I know that’s not conclusive. After all, we picked up nothing from the Moldovan yacht. But I still think it is highly unlikely that we will run into anybody else. I mean, it really is very unlikely…’

  The audience reacted to this news with a ripple of murmurs and mumbles, and then José carried on.

  ‘Anyway, talking of transmissions, I need to tell you what else our wireless officer has been up to since we adopted our policy of not communicating with the outside world. You see, even though we have been adhering to our policy of remaining silent ourselves, he has been checking on whether anybody else has been in a more talkative mode. And what he’s found is very interesting and potentially very revealing. And to put it into a nutshell, he has been able to find nothing coming out of anywhere to the north. And by that I mean no transmissions whatsoever from the Falklands – and that includes Mount Pleasant – and nothing from Argentina. Or from Chile, for that matter. It’s all just total quiet. Which might mean that if there are any people up there – still alive – they, just like us, are keeping their heads down. Or it might mean… well, you know what it might mean…’

  Here there was another round of murmurs and mumbles, and then José continued. And his voice had now moved from the solemn end of its spectrum to the very animated, as he abruptly announced that contact had been made with some other human beings…

  ‘Well, on a potentially much brighter note, I can also tell you that we have now – very recently – broken our radio silence. And we’ve done this to make contact with Rothera – which, as some of you may know, is the British Antarctic Survey’s largest base in the Antarctic, and a base that is still very much full of people. That’s why we’ve been so indiscreet. We thought it important that they should know that we are around, just in case we might be of use to them. And vice versa. After all, Rothera has an airstrip, and it is one of the best established and best equipped research stations in the Antarctic. And it just seemed the obvious thing to do. There seemed to be no good reason to hide from what at some point might prove to be an essential refuge.

  ‘Anyway, before you get too enthusiastic about this development, I should say that, whilst they have acknowledged our presence, they would not welcome our presence. They have insisted that we stay well away from Rothera, and simply keep them informed of our situation and our condition. And that’s hardly surprising. After all, if any of us here were responsible for the lives of all those hunkered down in an Antarctic research station, the last thing we would want would be a ship-full of… other people turning up to overwhelm our resources.’

  He had chosen ‘other’ here rather than ‘old’, but it was clear to Alex what he meant. A team of young researchers didn’t want their base made into an old people’s home, and one that might run out of provisions before anybody got a great deal older.

  ‘I might also say that their understandable caution also extends to their giving us any information about their own circumstances. They have told us that they are basically in good shape, but they have refused to tell us how many of them are holed up there, what their resources are, or even whether they are in contact with any other bases, including Halley VI. That’s the rather designer British research station on the Brunt Ice Shelf. Oh, and they haven’t told us whether they have access to a plane or a ship. However, given their reluctance to have us anywhere near them, I suspect they may have both. Which can’t be a bad thing. In fact, in due course, it may prove more than useful. For all of us.

  ‘Anyway, that’s what I wanted to tell you. We are not alone. There is at least one station out there with people in it. And whilst those people are currently unwilling to see us, we will keep in contact with them, and we will try to work with them. In any way that helps us all. Meanwhile, however, we will continue to look after ourselves. And that means that tomorrow there will be another exercise in international looting, and I can announce now that this plundering will be conducted by the same zodiac pirates who were so successful yesterday. I’m sure that we can all be confident that they will be equally successful tomorrow. Albeit without having to make another call on Gill’s exceptional skills…’

  That was the end of the captain’s speech, and for many the beginning of their processing everything they had been told. And especially the knowledge that they were now in exten
ded arm’s-length communication with a British research station. It was a lot to take in, and for Alex a lot more on top of the turmoil that had still not abated entirely.

  Nevertheless, there was some help on the way, and it arrived as soon as the Sea Sprite resumed its travels south just after lunch. It was, of course, the indescribable beauty of the Antarctic Peninsula. Here there was a channel that ran down its west coast, formed by a continuous thread of snow-covered islands parallel to the peninsula itself, and capable of immersing all those aboard the Sea Sprite in an almost other-worldly experience. Because it was like being on another planet; an icy, watery planet where colours other than blue, grey and white did not exist. There were no greens, reds, yellows or oranges here, but just that restricted palette of those three subdued tones. And it was all so pristine. And so serene. And so untroubled. And so ‘content’. It was a place at peace with itself; the antithesis of so much of the man-made world with all its manic frenzy, its ugly squalor and its ubiquitous need for excess. Alex found it all extremely soothing, and ultimately decided that it was not a place to come to live, but a place to come to die. But by choice. Not because one had to scurry here to avoid a self-induced global disaster.

  The whole afternoon passed with the soothing balm of more and more beauty, until at seven, it was time to join the meal squad for dinner. Alex, for some unknown reason, just knew it would be a good one.

  It certainly started well, with Roy first of all giving his views on ‘communications’, then on the apparent reserve of the British Antarctic Survey, and finally on what might be assumed to be a substantial boost to the possible mankind-recreation programme.

  As regards communications, he immediately questioned whether silence from the Falklands and from the whole of the south of South America really meant that there was nobody left alive there. As Captain José had rightly conceded, might the hardy Falklanders and their military companions at Mount Pleasant not be doing exactly what the Sea Sprite had been doing: hiding? And in the case of Argentina and even Chile, might they similarly not want to betray their continued existence? Especially if this existence was maybe hanging by a thread? Anyway, there was no way, he maintained, that a death certificate could be signed for the whole of the South American population just yet. Although, if all went to plan, in a matter of weeks this might be possible – and unavoidable – for the entire population of Ushuaia. In the meantime, the subject of the existence or not of living souls further north could be parked, and the second subject – their cold-shouldering by the British residents of the cold continent – could now be addressed.

  When it was, it soon became apparent that Derek agreed with Roy’s opinion, which was that he would have done exactly the same as those researcher types at Rothera. He would have told a ship-load of OAPs to keep its distance. That said, both of them then admitted that they would almost certainly be at a loss as to what to do if the Sea Sprite ignored this instruction and just turned up. There were probably few if any weapons at Rothera, and even if there were, there might be some resistance in the ranks to shooting people who looked and sounded like their now-departed grandparents back in Britain. And even denying their new guests a share of their rations might be a problem. As how could you seek to re-energise the human race when you’ve just starved to death some of its innocent remnants and actually witnessed their pathetic demise?

  Inevitably, this is where Roy’s thoughts arrived at the process of ‘re-energising’, and in particular the capacity of the staff at Rothera – and maybe at Halley VI as well – to significantly bolster the pocket-sized regeneration team aboard the Sea Sprite. The first point he made was that it was highly unlikely that the tendrils of British gender equality legislation hadn’t reached down to the Antarctic, and consequently there would be a whole nest of prospective mothers tucked away in both British bases. The debate, therefore, should focus on how the regeneration process might work in practice. How would baby-making be conducted?

  It was perhaps the surfeit of new information today – on top of the chilling events of yesterday – but for whatever reason, this was the point at which considered and thoughtful debate was overtaken by unbridled irreverence. All those around the table seemed in need of a dose of no-sense-whatsoever…

  Elaine was the first contributor to this session of the absurd, and her contribution was a proposal that all those with inseminating or inseminatable credentials should be paired off according to their height. This, she said, would avoid the problems associated with the inequality of stature, which could be as acute as that between Mr Bercow and his wife, and which was a source of discomfort for all those who had to observe it. And even a very tall man with a diminutive women was far from ideal.

  Debbie agreed, but thought that pairing itself might warrant a review. What, she asked, would be the problem with officially sanctioned promiscuity, where everyone had a go with everyone else they fancied? Just as long as the lust was mutual. And such an approach, she suggested, would have the added advantage of stimulating shared parenting. If a man didn’t know who was his child, wouldn’t he want to contribute to the well-being of all the children, and therefore to the well-being of the entire new generation?

  Anyway it was now time for a man at the table to put forward his views, and Alex was first to do this – by suggesting that if promiscuity wasn’t a starter and a more traditional approach to child-making prevailed, pairing might be conducted on the basis of IQ. Eugenics was reprehensible, he admitted, but with such a small number of procreators to hand, shouldn’t some be charged with producing the new generation of leaders and thinkers, and others, the wood-gatherers and latrine-diggers? For a few moments, three of the other diners at the table clearly thought he was being serious with these remarks. But it took only the start of a giggle from Debbie to alert her friends to her husband’s buffoonery, and when their laughter died down, Roy made his own contribution to the discussion.

  It was that the elders of the new order (that is to say, himself and possibly his present dinner companions) might have to institute an award system, loosely based on that Soviet ruse of making serial child-bearers heroes of the nation. After all, he said, in kick-starting humanity, there could be no room for a middle-class attitude of ‘two is quite enough’. Indeed, you would have to be regarded as a slacker if you produced fewer than five little wonders. And as for those burly female geologists from Rothera and Halley VI who could manage a dozen or more… well, they’d be feted by the whole community, and statues would be raised in their honour. With maybe some smaller statues for their long-serving partners…

  Then it was Derek’s turn.

  ‘We could just go the vasectomy route,’ he announced. ‘And then everybody could just enjoy themselves – in pairs, or in groups or in a series of huge communal orgies – and all without the prospect of unleashing another wave of humanity on the world. In my mind, this would be as liberating as it would be altruistic. And it might just get my vote…’

  Derek now wore an inscrutable look on his face, and Alex, for one, thought that he wasn’t joking. Even though that inscrutable expression was now being abandoned in favour of a mischievous grin.

  In any event, his comments constituted a suitable full stop to the evening’s proceedings and an end to a day in which Alex’s turmoil had finally receded. All he felt now was the beginnings of trepidation – in preparation for the demands of tomorrow’s raid – and a deep uncertainty about the wisdom of trying to reboot mankind. A world without people would, in many ways, he thought, be a much better place. It might be full of more of the sort of wonder that he’d experienced during his passage down the peninsula earlier today. However, it wouldn’t have people like Debbie, Elaine, Derek and Roy. And that would be a terrible loss.

  It was just as well, he decided, that he would have no part in whatever outcome was achieved or suffered. Even though he would have a part in tomorrow’s zodiac exercise. Which he desperately hoped would not involve the
discovery of a Moldovan flag, or indeed the flag of any other nation…

  thirty-one

  As the Sea Sprite had made its way down the Antarctic Peninsula, Stuart had not been oblivious of the breathtaking beauty of this wonderful part of the world. Indeed, he and Gill had spent much of the afternoon at the stern of the Erikson Deck, savouring what had been a continuous vista of unsurpassed splendour. Nevertheless, his mind had been largely elsewhere, hopping from one demanding thought to another, and all concerning his and Gill’s future – from every possible perspective.

  After Captain José’s earlier presentation, he had more or less reconciled himself to an immediate future aboard the Sea Sprite. He could see no benefit in him and Gill striking out on their own. And Gill, he discovered, agreed. Whilst there was now the theoretical possibility of joining forces with a group of people of their own age (by stealing another yacht) – and this did have its attractions – there were just too many associated risks and too many reasons to stay and help Captain José. In fact, taking the crew and the passengers together, there were about 150 reasons. Furthermore, neither stuart nor Gill had much of an appetite for making a habit of abandoning their mates. Even if they knew only a few of them by name…