Arctic Series (Book 1): Arctic Cold

by Jason Keizer

  He puts two fingers to his eyes and then points them back and forth between James and to Oliver’s back. “But first, we work.” He gets up and shuffles out the door behind Oliver.

  Jessica stands up and says, “I’ll be trashing the place, so if anyone needs me, I’ll be on the comms in a few. Just gotta run down and get them.” She walks out of the room and closes the door behind her.

  “Well, it is down to just you and me Hammer. Let’s stop by the security room and snag a couple sets of binoculars before we head up to the roof,” James says.

  Captain Hammer stands from his chair, turns towards the door, and replies, “I’ll stop by and get them on my way up if you run down and get the C4 we need from Henry.”

  James replies, “No problem. I guess I kinda got ahead of myself for a second. Can’t do much without that.”

  He walks past the Captain and towards the door, and adds, “I’ll be up in a couple minutes.” He opens the doors and closes it behind him.

  As he walks down the hallway, James grabs his headset from his right cargo pocket and puts it on. He holds down on a button on the left earpiece of the headset.

  After a couple seconds, it lets off a small beep to signal it is on. “Hey Henry, I’m on my way down by you to get the C4 for the silos. Think you will have it ready for me when I make it to you?”

  In his ear, Henry replies, “Yeah. I just got down here and am pulling everything out right now. I’ll have it ready for you, but it will take a min or two to get all of the charges synced with just one detonator.”

  James gets to the stairwell and walks down until he gets to the door labeled B4. He walks through and sees Henry sitting at a desk with the C4, charges, and a couple of detonators.

  “How's it going on these?” He asks as he walks up to Henry.

  Henry has his hand on a small button on both the detonator and a charge. The detonator gives off two short beeps and a small red light flashes on the charge. He let's go of the button and says, “Well, these two are synced up. I have about three charges set to this one so far. I need to sync the next two before we can get them set.”

  James looks around the room and gets on the headset and asks Oliver, “Hey Ollie, any luck with getting the comms up yet?”

  Over the headset, Oliver quietly says, “Not yet. Just a bunch of static, but that’s better than nothing. Shouldn’t take me too long to figure this out.”

  Jessica chimes in, “I think I found a way to cut off the fire alarm and suppression system.”

  Jessica is sitting at the desk in the security room looking through a binder. The file cabinets to her right and behind her are open, its contents of files and folders scattered on the floor and around the desk. She turns a page and scans it, her right index finger moving down the page as she follows it. Her hand stops and she slaps the paper.

  She moves her attention to the computer in front of her and starts up the command prompt. “Yup, I got it. I can’t disable the fire alarm but I can put it on silent and turn off the suppression system. That should work right?”

  James replies, “Yup. That should do it. Thank you for finding that.” James hears another two beeps from the detonator.

  Jessica types in, “service fire-alarm fire-suppression disable to silent”.

  “Well, that should do it,” Henry says as he hands James a charge and a small cut block of C4. “Just make sure you and Hammer get it placed. It’s 4th and goal. No second chances on this one Hammer.”

  Over the headset, Captain Hammer says, “Yeah, I know. I’ll put it where it needs to go.”

  A small chuckle comes from over the radio, followed by Jessica saying, “Yeah, bet you never said that before.”

  A bit more laughter erupts on the headset from everyone, which gets interrupted by James, “I’ll be up in a couple min Hammer.”

  The Captain adds, “As a warning, it’s a little wet out here from the rain. So watch your step.”

  As James leaves the room, Henry stands up and moves to the center of the floor, dragging his chair with him.

  He says to everyone, “Hey, I’m putting my comms on mute. I gotta see if I can find a weak spot in the floor which can be noisy.” He presses a button on his headset.

  Oliver is the only one to respond back, “Gotcha.”

  Henry grabs the back of the chair, lifts it up a couple of inches, and slams it onto the floor. DING. He takes a small step to his right and does it again. DONG. He bends down and pulls out a small marker from his pocket. On the tile, he draws an “X”.

  He does this a few more times until he makes four marks. He draws a circle around the X’s, then tosses the chair out of the way. “Well, that was easy,” he says to himself.

  He unmutes his headset and says, “All good now. Found the weak spot in the floor. Should make it easier to breach.”

  He walks over to the table and grabs a whole brick of C4. With his knife, he cuts it into four smaller blocks, which he starts to pinch and stretch out into long tubes.

  As he rolls out the C4, over the headset, James says, “That’s weird.”

  James, standing in the doorway to the roof, stares at Captain Hammer, says, “I just got the strangest feeling as soon as I opened up the door. Like a ball in my gut.”

  Captain Hammer walks over to him and hands him a set of binoculars. James takes it and hands over the C4 and the charge, which the Captain puts into a cargo pocket.

  Over the radio, Oliver asks, “You ok? Anything we need to worry about?”

  As James takes a couple steps onto the roof, a small drizzle falls on him. Grey clouds fill the sky as he sees the dim sun try to break through the horizon.

  He stops and says, “No. I think I am good. Just the strangest feeling is all. Kinda like a mix between the nervousness of my first time having sex and the adrenaline of my first firefight. It’s just kinda sitting there.”

  James looks around and sees the train with a little silhouette standing on top of it. He turns to the right and takes a couple more steps towards it and stops again. He stands still and quiet.

  Captain Hammer walks up behind him and puts a hand on his shoulder. “Hey James, are you sure everything is ok?” James turns his head around and looks at him.

  “What in the holy fuck are you?... Get back. Put your hands up,” Captain Hammer yells at James and over the headset.

  Oliver quickly turns around from the terminal and jumps to his feet. Henry drops a desk he is dragging and starts to run for the door to the stairwell. The look of sheer terror fills his face as he catches up with Oliver on the stairs.

  “Hammer, James, both of you, do not move a muscle. We are on our way up.” Oliver says as he and Henry bolt up the stairs.

  Over the headset, Jessica asks, “What is going on? Why is everyone freaking out?”

  Henry, between heavy breaths, responds, “Get to the roof and try to make sure James doesn’t kill Hammer.”

  Captain Hammer, standing about four or five paces from James, both of his arms extended, holding his pistol, pointed at James, shakenly says, “What do you mean, don’t let him hurt me? I’m the one with the gun drawn.”

  Staring into the eyes of James, into those glowing, red eyes, the Captain takes a hard swallow. “I said get down,” he tautly says.

  James just stands there, unmoving, except for a slight smirk pushing through his lips.

  The door to the roof bursts open, spilling out Henry and Oliver. They each pull out their pistols and take a position aiming at Captain Hammer.

  Oliver, to the slight left behind the Captain says, “Put it down Hammer.”

  Henry glances at James and asks, “James, you with us?”

  James keeps silent as the Captain loudly, and wobbly says, “Why are you pointing your weapons at me? Do you see his eyes? They are like that thing on the train. What is he?”

  Before anyone can answer, the door to the roof swings open again. Jessica runs onto the roof and slides to a stop as she takes grasp of the situation. Everyone except fo
r James slightly turns their heads towards her, waiting for her response to what is in front of her.

  BAM! A gunshot goes off.

  Jessica’s face turns pale as she looks at what is in front of her.

  Captain Hammer hovers two feet off of the ground. In front of him is James, with one hand around the neck of the Captain, lifting him in the air. The other hand has a tight grasp around his right wrist. The pistol in Hammer’s hand lets off a little trail of smoke. His red eyes searing themselves into the eyes of the Captain. Henry and Oliver both take their aim from the Captain and move their sights to James.

  “Put him down James. I thought you were stronger than this. More human than this,” Oliver yells over the gurgling gasps of the Captain.

  The pistol drops from the Captain’s hand as James gives him a small shake. It hits the ground, splashing into a small puddle at Hammer’s feet. James lets his grip release from the neck of the Captain.

  The Captain drops to his feet, which crumble from under him as he falls to the floor. A large gasp from Jessica cuts through the air around them as she sees James’ face. Through the drops of rain falling, James' eyes look like burning embers starting to flare up into a fire. James turns his gaze to Jessica as he puts his arms back to his sides.

  Oliver takes a couple of steps closer to James as he holsters his pistol. “James, you good?”

  James shakes his head and closes his eyes. He drops his head to the ground before softly saying, “Shiny.” He lifts a leg up and steps over the Captain.

  Henry follows James in his sights as James walks towards the door of the roof. Jessica stumbles to the side and lets him through. As the sound of his footsteps on the stairs start to lighten, everyone turns their attention to Captain Hammer.

  They rush to him as he lay on the rooftop, unconscious.

  “Is he dead?” Jessica asks.

  Oliver puts his fingers to the Captain’s neck and sighs with relief. “No. He is fine. Just blacked out it seems. Should be awake in a minute or so.”

  Jessica drops down to her knees as tears form in her eyes. “What the fuck was that? What is he? Why didn’t you say-”

  Henry cuts her off, “Jessica. We will explain things in a moment. But right now we have to worry about other things.” He looks over to Oliver. “Look around to see what the fuck set him off. I’ve never seen him like this without being pushed into it. Since they were the only two people here, there has to be a reason.”

  Oliver looks around and grabs the pair of binoculars from the ground. He stands up and focuses his attention towards the train and the Baron. “Maybe it had something to do with him,” he says.

  Through the binoculars, the Baron stands still, in the same position he was earlier. Oliver starts to scan around the area and stops when he sees the crowd surrounding him.

  Ice and a small bit of fog are forming around the Arctics. They stand there, quiet and still, except for a few quick shrugs they give to break off the ice forming on them from the rain. They look up at Oliver but seem not to pay him much attention. No screaming, no trying to rush at him and kill him, nothing.

  “Hey, you guys might want to check this out. Both of you. Now,” he says.

  Henry and Jessica both get up and walk over to Oliver at the edge of the roof. They look down to the swarm beneath them. “So what? It’s just a gaggle of Arctics,” says Henry.

  Oliver replies, “Yeah, but look a bit closer at them.”

  Jessica joins in, “Why aren’t they doing anything? They are looking right at us.”

  Oliver points at them and says, “Exactly. Look, they all have collars on.”

  Henry leans forward a little. “Why would they have collars on?”

  Behind them, Captain Hammer starts to cough. They all turn around and walk over to him as he slowly sits up. By the time they get to him, Captain Hammer is pushing himself up to his feet. When he stands, he stumbles a little bit, but is caught by Henry.

  “Hey, slow down there high speed. Catch your breath and take it easy,” Henry says to him.

  Confused, the Captain asks, “What happened? Where did that thing go?” He stands up and takes a couple steps backward.

  Oliver bends down and grabs the Captain's pistol from the ground and slides it into the back of his belt. “Calm down, we will explain everything. You have gone through a lot, and it must be hard to take in. Just don’t try anything stupid.”

  The Captain shakes his head a little, flinging water around him. “We can’t let him go back with us.”

  Henry grabs the Captain by the shoulders. “We said calm down and we sure as hell are taking him back with us.”

  The Captain tries to shake him off. Henry holds on tighter and adds, “We will explain everything. Just calm down.”

  Captain Hammer struggles a bit more and breaks free. He stumbles backward a little and falls back onto the ground with a small splash from the puddle he fell in. “No. When my superiors hear of this…” He stops talking as he sees the barrels of two pistols rise to his face.

  “I told you to calm your ass down Captain. If you would just stop freaking out and let us explain,” Henry exclaims.

  Jessica steps forward and yells, “What are you doing? Put your weapons down.” She tries to go for her pistol but is stopped when Oliver moves his aim from the Captain to her.

  “Hands up! Please, Jessica, we just want to diffuse the situation. We told you we would explain everything. We just can’t have the Captain running down there and starting something he can’t finish,” Oliver says.

  Captain Hammer, staring past the pistol pointed at him, looks to Henry and says, “Why should I calm down? He attacked me.”

  From over the headset, ringing in everyone's ears, James says, “I am sorry if I hurt you, Captain. I surely didn’t mean to but saw no other way. If you remember, you were the one to point your pistol at me. I didn't think any way except for disarming and subduing you would work. I didn't want it to play out like that and I understand that what you saw probably scared you. Shit, it still scares me. But please rest assured, that I never was going to hurt you.”

  Jessica, staring at Oliver's pistol pointed at her, asks, “What happened? What are you?”

  “I am just a person. One that has had a few unfortunate events happen to him. Now, Henry, Oliver, are you there?”

  Both men reply, “Yeah.”

  James orders, “Put your weapons down, please. So we can talk like civilized people.”

  As Henry and Oliver slowly bring their weapons down, Captain Hammer says, “Civilized people, yeah right. Are you even human?”

  “I'm human, for the most part. Or at least I used to be. That isn’t something to worry about. I really can’t explain right now what I am and how I came to be. Just think of me human but with a little extra something inside me that makes me different. Now, I am not asking you to trust me. I am just asking you to let me help you get home safely.”

  A small stream of water falls from the Captain's head as he moves to stand up. He keeps one hand up as he does, to show he is no threat. When he stands, he says, “I guess this explains some of the stories about you. But at this moment, I don't see any reason to trust you. I don't see how anyone can.” He slowly puts his hands down and looks at the ground.

  Henry gives a small shake of his head. “Many people trust him. You did, until 10 minutes ago. Dr. Stone trusts him enough to let him come out here and make sure you,” he looks over to Jessica, “and you, make it home safe. And that is all we want.”

  Oliver jumps in, “Well, that and the ADS system.” He looks over at the Captain and asks, “Are we good?”

  Flinging water up and down, the Captain nods his head, “Yeah, sure. We are good for now. Don't think I am just going to let this slide though. I will want my answers James.”

  “That is good enough for me. I understand everyone has questions, and they will be answered in due time. I will need to know that none of this or any mention of my condition gets told to anyone. No reports, n
o rumors, nothing. As you can see from that thing on the train and myself, there are other things in this world besides humans and Arctics. But for today, we can either fight together as we have been, or die, dividing ourselves on our differences.”

  Everything falls silent until Captain Hammer takes a deep breath and lets out, “Fine. This will stay out of any and all reports. Don’t think this means I trust you or your people anymore now.”

  “No problem. I don’t need you to trust me, I just need you to get back safely. Now, what are your thoughts Jessica?”

  Jessica quietly says, “I am not sure. I don’t know exactly what you are, but if the Doctor trusts you to be out here and get us, then I will trust her on that.”

  Henry tries to give a small smile to Jessica, but in return, she gives him a look he knew all too well. The look just like his Grams would give him when he got in trouble as a child. He quickly turns his attention away from her and focuses to the Captain. “Well, now that that is settled. Think you can still throw this?”

  “Yeah, no problem. I’ve been hit harder before.” The Captain responds.

  Henry gives the Captain a pat on the shoulder. “Well, good thing he never hit you then. Now, come on. Show us all those quarterback skills, Romo.”

  He turns the Captain around, and they head towards the silos. As he passes a scowl faced Jessica, he quietly says, “Sorry. Can we talk later?”

  She turns her head away from him and replies, “Yeah, we fucking better.”

  Oliver looks around and then tosses his hands up in the air. “Time to get back to work then. James, how about you help me out a little bit. The Doctor would be happy to hear your voice if we get things working for a bit.”

  “Yup, sure thing. It sure would be nice to hear her voice right about now. I’ll meet you down there.”

  Jessica starts to follow Oliver to the doorway and down the stairs. “So, that's why the Doctor trusts you, huh? There were rumors before we left about her seeing someone. You know how people like to gossip. But, who would have thought it to be the great James Matheson?”

  James gives a small chuckle. “Yeah, but I don't know about how great I am. I’m nothing special.”