Irregular Verbs

by Irregular Verbs

  Flexing the suit’s stiff fingers Stan opened the gun locker, picked up his Ross Polar III and slung it over his shoulder. He patted his hip pocket to make sure the flare pistol was there and then followed the curve of the heat baffle, emerging halfway up the steep slope that led from the cliff on which Base Hearn sat to the flat top of the island where the flare station was. Out of the shelter he felt the force of the wind on him, blowing pebbly snow hard enough to make him glad of the suit’s extra mass.

  He switched on the light intensifier, the sky almost fully dark at 15:10—this near to the solstice just a few hours passed between dawn and dusk. The island was barren and nearly featureless, a wrinkled rock that rose up high at one end and sloped down to a stony beach at the other; he tuned the contrast on the video feed way up, exaggerating the many creases and fissures in the ground enough so that he could actually see them, turning all into dark lines that looked like they had been drawn on the ground with a felt-tip marker.

  At this end of the island there was no horizon; to his right were the cliffs and the endless, frozen sea, to his left the rocky slope that rose up at an unclimbable angle. He followed the ridge he was on until the first inukshuk came into view. This one they had nicknamed Atii, “Let’s go” in Inuktitut; it looked the most like the inuksuit you saw in the south, a vaguely man-shaped pile of rocks with legs, arms and head, the whole thing about a half-metre tall. They had built eight of these around the island, all different: as well as checkpoints they served as sentries, the thought being that someone unfamiliar with the island would likely stumble over one and knock it over. The first one, built where the lower ridge climbed up towards the island’s flat top, was undisturbed, so Stan sighted the second and headed for it.

  It took him a minute to notice what was wrong: this inukshuk, called Howa-ii or “turn left,” should have one arm longer than the other, pointing to its right. Instead it looked like the first one, arms and legs symmetrical. Someone had been here, someone who did not know how the different inuksuit were supposed to look.

  Stan checked the timer readout on his visor: 15:53, still almost two hours until he had to fire the flare. He left the inukshuk as it was, to warn Gord if he was still out here, and started the climb up to the plateau at the top of the island. This was one of the few possible approaches, and even here it was a rise of nearly forty-five degrees, going up four metres in a distance just over that; he leaned into the climb, keeping his gaze moving back and forth to spot any moving objects or IR sources.

  He was halfway up the slope when he saw something, or thought he did: whatever it was didn’t throw off any heat, and even with the contrast at maximum it was hard to tell a rounded grey shape from the sloping rocks. It might have been Gord, or a Dane, or nothing; before Stan could get a second look his foot caught in one of the island’s deeper folds. He pitched forward, striking the hard ground with a crack before rolling down the slope.

  Not quite unconscious, Stan’s mind swam as he struggled to right himself. The suit’s weight fought against him, making him slide further down the slope before he could get to his feet. Standing uneasily he looked around. To his dismay, none of the inuksuit were in sight. Their third function was as landmarks: each part of the island looked much like every other part, its steep rise and fall making it impossible to see any distance except from the plateau.

  You’re in a house where all four walls face south, he thought. A bear walks by. What colour is the bear? This near to the Pole, a compass was useless; on a clear day he might spot the North Star, but today was far from that. He checked the time readout: 16:20, an hour and a half till the fifteen-minute window during which he needed to fire the flare. He might head straight up, but there were few enough manageable approaches to the plateau that he could spend hours getting there. Better just to follow the path of least resistance: that was where they had placed the inuksuit, at points where anyone walking the island was likely to pass. If he could find one he recognized he would know where he was—assuming it was still intact.

  That reminded him of the figure he had seen, or might have seen, just before falling, and he suddenly wondered whether his fall might have damaged the suit. The head of the suit was able to tilt far enough down for him to see that he wasn’t radiating from the front, but there was only one way to tell if he had a sign that read SHOOT ME in IR on his back; sighing, he lay down on the ground, watched a few minutes tick off. Enough heat would have gotten out to visibly warm the stones by now if he was bright, so with effort he rose again and turned around. Nothing: the million-dollar product of Canadian ingenuity and second-hand NASA technology had survived a fall. Letting out a dry breath Stan started his way downhill, not having to remind himself to take the easy path.

  He saw the ocean first, the endless frozen waves of Kennedy Channel, almost missed the inukshuk that stood a few metres before the shore. As he neared he saw that the upper stones were leaned against one another to make a V, or a pair of arms held skywards. Now he knew where he was: the southern shore, only about twenty metres and a gentle slope from Base Franklin. Now that he had his bearings he could get there, check on Gord, and still get up to the flare station in plenty of time; knowing where he was he could even see the building, its camouflaged dome barely visible against the curve of the island.

  Before he had covered half the distance he saw that he had been wrong to think the suit had not been damaged. It was not leaking heat, but he could see now that the seal between his breathing mask and visor had been broken: dry as his breath was it was starting to fog up the panel, and before long he would be blind.

  He could not change his plan: there was no use heading for the flare station if he couldn’t see to fire the flare. If he made it to Base Franklin while he could still see, though, he might be able to get a spare, or repair the seal—or Gord might be there, might tell him that he had fired the morning flare and there was nothing to worry about. Then they could both laugh, share coffee and doughnuts and forget about this whole business.

  Stan forced himself to slow down. He had to keep his breathing shallow, slow the frost forming on his visor. The base was so close; it took everything he had to keep his strides even, his heart quiet. Moving this slowly he had too much time to think—about what might have happened to Gord, about the visor, about the Danish rifle that might be pointed at him. Though he knew he was still dark he felt terribly exposed, and could not help letting out a long breath when he reached Base Franklin. Near to the beach end, this base rose up away from the ocean, presenting its rounded grey face to the rest of the island. With stiff fingers Stan flipped up the cover for the keypad, punched in the code for the heatlock.

  It didn’t open.

  Forcing himself to hold his breath, Stan tried again, punching the numbers carefully with the stylus-tip on his right index finger. Again, nothing.

  What was going on here? Frost lacework was creeping in from the edges of his visor; Stan realized he was hyperventilating, forced himself to count to sixty to slow himself down. The timer was covered now, illegible.

  Scanning from right to left, Stan noticed that there was no rifle outside the base. That wasn’t like Gord: he knew to leave his weapon in the gun locker outside—any condensation from a change in temperature would freeze and ruin it when you went back out. Slowly, Stan circled the small, slanted building, confirmed there was no rifle anywhere around it. Gord had left his gun somewhere else, then, or he had been forced to go inside without taking the time to drop it—or whoever was in there wasn’t Gord.

  He was nearly blind now, and realized he would have to leave that question for later. Just about ten metres away, buried in a fissure that ran most of the way across the island, was one of their two bolt holes—caches of emergency supplies, in case they should be caught outside the shelters. Something in there might help him, if he could get to it.

  Though this end of the island sloped more gently it was still a rough climb, especially since he could not see h
is feet. He had to be near the fissure now: he dropped to his knees and began to crawl, feeling the ground ahead of him as the world outside faded to white. Finally it was gone entirely, the only evidence of it the wind howling in his pickups.

  His left hand touched something softer than rock, and he knew he had made it: the fissure was one of the only places on the island where snow collected. Stan thrust his arm into the snow as far as it would go, slowly crawled along the fissure until he felt hard plastic. Still fighting to keep his breathing even he cleared the snow off the bolt hole’s lid and began to pry it open, both arms fighting against the stiff hinge. For a moment all his strength left him; after a second’s rest he tried again, a loud crack telling him that he had not opened but broken it.

  Stan reached into the box, felt around for the tools and supplies that lay inside. There was no question now of repairing the seal, not without being able to see what he was doing. Instead he fumbled for the ice-knife he knew was in there, part of the igloo-building kit, and drew its butt end sharply towards his visor.

  It did not feel right, swinging a sharp, heavy object at his face, and his first few blows fell lightly. On the fourth try he closed his eyes, brought the knife full force into the blinded visor. At first he could see no effect, but as he kept swinging cracks appeared, lines of darkness crossing the pure white of his vision. He switched hands and swung again, bashing the wooden handle against the plastic until finally it splintered and cracked.

  Now it was truly dark: he had no IR to see by, no night-vision. At least the storm had stopped, just enough light falling from the hazy sky for him to make out the shape of the ground around him. As he stood and looked around, the wind cold on his face, Stan suddenly realized he was bright where the visor had broken. He scooped snow up from the fissure and packed it into his visor and rose again, his face burning, and tried to sight the trail that would lead up to the flare station.

  The flare would be easy enough to find, probably only twenty metres or so away, but it was also the one place a Dane would be sure of finding him. He had no choice: he didn’t know if Gord had succeeded in firing the morning flare, so if he didn’t fire this one nearly a year spent on the island could go to waste.

  Despite his freezing face Stan forced himself to move slowly, again being given unwanted time to think. What could have happened to Gord? If there was a Dane on the island, why now? It wasn’t the longest night of the year, or the coldest day; those had both passed weeks ago. There was nothing he could think of that might have upset the balance of power, unless it was some new technological development—

  “Son of a bitch,” Stan said, cursed himself as his exhalations puffed out like word balloons. That had to be it: the Danes had perfected the heat-silenced gun.

  There were two reasons nobody had expected an attack. The first was that the suits, when they were working, made Stan and Gord almost invisible; since any Danish operation would have to be covert, not an all-out assault, that by itself would probably be enough to prevent it. The Danes probably had similar suits, which brought up the other reason: every time a rifle was fired the barrel got hot, lighting up the shooter in IR. That meant that even if you could sight your target you had just one shot before you made yourself extremely visible, and given the Kevlar layer of the suits one shot was unlikely to finish anybody off.

  Defence had spent a lot of time and money trying to solve the problem but eventually gave up, consoling themselves that the Danes had probably failed as well. But what if they hadn’t? What if the Canadian presence on the island had pushed them to develop some way to instantly cool the gun barrel, or mask its heat signature? With a heat silencer you could fire any number of shots without giving your own position away—and heavy though they were, the suits weren’t made to stand up to serious fire.

  By now Stan’s heart was beating fast, his strides quickening as the flare station came into view. He looked from side to side; seeing nothing in the dark he broke into a run. At the edge of his vision something moved, and he froze: covered his face with his arm, hoping to block whatever heat was coming from his face as the snow melted. The storm had picked up again, making too much noise for him to hear anything else. He turned to face into the wind, dropped his arm and waited until his face began to numb. Then he slowly turned around, watching.

  He started as he saw a shape, tall and clear against the sky; let out a breath when he realized it was the flare station, just a few metres away. Once more covering his eyes with his arm he walked blindly for it, feeling ahead of him with his free hand until he reached it.

  The flare station was a simple structure, mostly wood and stone, a framework tower three metres tall. In the middle sat the flare cannon, just a tube and a foot-trigger; two hourglasses, one red and one blue, were hung from the frame on horizontal spits. They were meant as a backup in case the time displays in their suits failed, as electronic things so often did here, and also as a sign that the flare had been fired: once that was done they turned their hourglass over. Both the glass and the sand inside were made of synthetics that did not expand or contract with temperature, so that they would reliably tick out twenty-four hours every day. The sand was supposed to be luminous as well, but at this time of year it did not absorb enough light to glow. Without his visor, Stan could see neither whether Gord had turned his over nor if his had run out.

  The storm had let up once more, and something on the ground shone with a hint of starlight. Moving slowly, Stan moved to see what it was. He crouched down, felt the smooth barrel of a rifle. Once it was off the ground he could see that it was a Ross Polar, which made it Gord’s: the Danes used Arctic Magnums.

  Stan straightened up, looked around once more. If the rifle was here and Gord was nowhere nearby, then he had probably dropped it after firing, to escape its heat signature. Wishing he could tell whether the barrel was still hot Stan hung the rifle from the tower by its shoulder strap, scanned the horizon once more. Now that the storm had cleared the ocean reflected the dim light from the sky, surrounding the dark rock of the island and stretching out as far as he could see. If Gord hadn’t been able to make it to the base he might have gone out there: in their training they had learned that sea ice was a better place to make a shelter, at least in winter, since the liquid water beneath was warmer than the ground. Even if he had still had his visor, though, it would have been impossible to spot anyone among the endless frozen waves.

  He turned back to the hourglasses. He needed light to see whether his hourglass was near empty, whether Gord’s had been turned, but anything that let him see would let the Dane see him. On the other hand, if someone weren’t expecting light. . . .

  Leaning against the flare station, Stan drew his flare pistol with his left hand while shading his eyes with his free arm. He turned towards the hourglasses and fired the flare away, out into the dark; in the brief light he just had time to see that his hourglass, the blue one, was nearly empty. The satellite was overhead, its eye on the flare station for no more than ten minutes. Hoping the Dane, if he was out there, was still blinded by the flare Stan turned his back on the tower and hit the foot-trigger.

  A sizzling ball of fire flew straight up out of the cannon, for a moment illuminating the whole island. In that second Stan saw a dark shape off to his right, spun towards it and brought up his rifle. His stiff and clumsy fingers found the oversized trigger and he fired without thinking, heard a dull wet sound that told him he had hit his target.

  “Shit!” Stan said, twisting to shrug out of his rifle’s shoulder-strap. Now he had two useless rifles, at least until he could be sure Gord’s had cooled. He circled to the other side of the flare station, keeping his back to it, and tried to slow his breathing. The snow on his face had melted; he was unarmed, visible, and had just marked his position for the world to see. He brought his forearms up together to cover his face and chest, waiting for the volley of shots that were sure to come, forced his stuttering breaths down into his mask so tha
t no wisps of steam would betray him.

  Eventually his heart slowed, and he risked a look out between his arms. Why hadn’t the Dane attacked? He would never get a better opportunity. Unless—Stan remembered the wet sound he had heard when he fired. If Stan’s shot had burst one of the Dane’s gel packs he would be leaking heat, and if the Dane didn’t know Stan’s visor was broken he would think Stan could see him. That was why he hadn’t fired back: a hot weapon could be dropped, but you couldn’t shake a bright spot on your chest.

  Where was he, then? Not still lurking out there, if he thought Stan could see him. He would have to go for shelter, somewhere he thought he could repair his suit or just make a stand. That meant either Base Hearn or Base Franklin. Stan moved slowly around the flare station, keeping his back to it, spotted one of the inuksuit a half-dozen metres away. There was only one of those on the plateau, the one they called Hulla or “turn right,” which pointed the way to Base Franklin. The other way, then, led back to Base Hearn.

  During the storm snow had piled up against the flare station; Stan picked up a double handful and packed it into his broken visor, leaving just enough room to see out. This time he did not feel the cold, his skin numb to the snow’s touch. Now he was invisible again.

  At this end of the island the edge of the plateau was a sharp drop, nearly two metres to the next ridge. Only at the point marked by the inukshuk was the slope manageable, but Stan could not see it: either it had been knocked down or the night was simply too dark. He traced the edge carefully, the ground a murky darkness below, until he felt sure he had sighted the heat baffle that hid Base Hearn. He sat, dangled his legs over the edge and slid down, not knowing how far he was going to fall until his feet hit the ground. His right knee flexed painfully with the impact and he fell onto his side, the wind knocked out of him and rising like a cloud. He stood up carefully, sighted the heat baffle and began limping towards it, once more following the path of least resistance.