written: May 28th, 2026.
"What does the temp gun say, Said?" Vinz chirped suddenly, cleanly. Words folding over neat in the cheap electric transmission. Audio waves that bobbed up and down with the bob of their speedboat, trundling through the icy reaches of the Indian Ocean. Their little aluminum hut gave them the simulacra of shelter, shielding against the pelting of antarctic spray. The steady patter drimdrum synching with the radio static, a low hum encompassing. Inside, they were safe. Them and all their audiowaves.
"Holding steady, everythings still a normal temperature. We should be good." Even from a hundred kilos away, the Calamity Gray had turned the air from negative fifty to temperate and climbing fast. In any other scenario such a warmth would have been welcomed with open arms. But in this circumstance, it was a harbinger above all else.
"Okay, we're gonna be feeling it pretty soon. Double check your suits, make sure everythings sealed. we're probably near the outer edge."
It felt more than a little ridiculous for Vinz, as he watched Said slide the temp gun back into their belt. Staring at a group of reflective cylinder headed humanoids, like they were bound to harvest volcanic samples off the coast of Hawaii. Who was the idiot that sent a shipment of proximity suits to a place fifty below? They were rated for 300 degrees, it must have been some monster of a bureaucratic boondoggle. Some barely functioning octogenarian on a makework program in the Ministry of Science stamping out forms with 20/50 vision and inch thick glasses. Probably the same clerk that moved his departure date four weeks from when it ought to have been, stranding him here with these losers. A case of fifty subzero parkas must be sitting in a jungle longhouse somewhere, an angry researcher screaming at their satphone trying to wrangle the nimrod responsible through five timezones. Their team of grad students awkwardly standing off to the side, sweat and tanktops and malaria pills. A mercury thermometer stuck permanently on 40 as an orbweaver takes in the show from the thatch roof rafters. Down the road some natives of the land must be laughing at the irate sunburned white man and his valley-wide screaming match over administrative errors. Vinz smiled at the thought. They must have been cursing high heaven when the Calamity Gray came down on them, their last thoughts filled maybe with the idea they could have survived if only they had their equipment. Heat resistant godsuits that had long been bound for the South Pole. Vinz tugged at his suit reassuredly, shining like a suit of armor. Whatever the idiocy, it hardly mattered now. Finally, Hubert turned to them from the wheel, speaking for the first time since their departure.
"Alright, I see her. She's just left the fog. A kilo away, maybe."
Said stopped their fidgeting, them and Vinz looking out of the window as Hubert kept the wheel steady. The structure slowly took shape, distinguishing itself from the cloud as its sharp edges and straight lines cut through the formless expanse. It was much larger than they initially thought, only having seen it out from their perches on the North coast. Lookouts spotted it a week ago. At first, they thought it was just the jutting up of some faraway rock formation that hid in the Gray, some unclaimed piece of granite from colonial days that would as soon dissapear back as it appeared. But rocks don't move like that. And in a day they could see the bow, peaking out from the clouds. Stories upon stories of shipping containers stacked high to the sky. Bobbing into and then out of sight again, each retreat leaving the Dumont citizens wondering if it would ever return again, or if it was bound to scorch up spectacular in some hotspot out at sea. Inevitably though, it would always peak out a stern or command tower, a finger reaching out as skeletal hands shooting from the skin of the passed over world. An oddity to glance over at most, to most. But the three were not most.
"Vinz... Are you sure this is a good idea?" Said eeked out, barely picking up on the mic. The boat sped closer and closer to the behemoth, the scale of it establishing just how ill-prepared a single speedboat and a three man crew were to tackle this kind of mission. Vinz only glared at Said's tincan head through his own. No one thought it was a good idea. The entire laboratory division refused anything to do with it, even the prospect of collecting samples from the Gray's cloud particles wasn't enough to coax them out of the halls of Dumont, or to so much as lend any expertise. They must have thought Vinz incredibly bored or incredibly stupid to suggest such an idea, turning their noses as they continued their measurements. Continued them as if nothing had ever happened, as if they would all be returning to the South of France at the end of their contracts. Next came the maintenance wing, Vinz's home tribe, gearturners and tool rattlers. Vinz sauntered into the active vehicle bay with a kind of swagger only a one year apprentice could have. This was his stomping grounds afterall, if the labrats wouldn't listen to him then surely the workmen would. Getting tools and gear together would be no problem, no problem at all. Gregor lifted his welding mask as Vinz explained himself, arms crossed as he recounted the spoils of wealth that surely laid in the cargo tanker, just waiting for a spry enough crew to claim it. He only looked down at him, like a child asking to go play hopscotch in the middle of a lightning monsoon. Cutting him off, he slammed his visor back down and returned to work. Not even dignifying him with a response, much less manpower or supplies. Next was the temp gun, Said's idea. It was on loan from the kitchen, and thats only because Said's meekness meant no one noticed them slink away with it at the end of the dinner rush. Meanwhile the spearguns were just plainly stolen, lifted from the fishing team after they came back from the hunt bound immediately to the wine cellar. And if Vinz never chanced upon that box of prox suits in the vacuum closet while looking for a left handed screwdriver, then maybe this fantastic voyage would have only stayed fantastical. Hubert was the unexpected assistance, the only one who had the keys to the speedboats and the mind to pilot one without capsizing. Not out of his own charity, Vinz's last bottle of crown royal laid in Hubert's dorm room, impatiently waiting for his return.
A full exploration league. A decked out repair boat with onboard workshop, a squad of engineers and a team of scientists with enough brainpower to jerry-rig a geothermal generator, and all at his command. Vinz dreamed of this specific plenty, for a moment his begrudged team of three was a platoon of bonafide Gray divers on a battened down scout ship. If only plenty had not already become in such high demand, then Vinz wouldn't have to settle for giving scraps on something that demanded it all.
He looked back at the ship. The three could hardly even see the top, several stories of reinforced steel colored slime green and dark red. Barnacles wrapped alongside the bottom, dissapearing and appearing again as calcified turrets. Sharp enough to rip apart their raft and tear clean through their prox suits with one wrong wave. Hubert's deft hand slowed the boat, smoothly angling it parallel with the ship as he worked the wheel and throttle like a seasoned captain.
This was it now, they were within one or two hundred meters of the cloud walls. They hadn't any means of calculus or algebra, no way to tell if it was safe through numbers. They could only tell that for the first time in days, the full ship was visible from the fog. Stern to Bow, rear to front. It was completely out of the Gray's clutches. Who knew how long before that kind of hour would come again? But sitting there, the scourge of the species was no longer far out from the coast. It wasn't something that could theoretically be ignored while messing with some errand, here its vortex's lay within eyes reach. Up to the heavens. None of them were prepared for it, even Hubert kept double and triple glancing up and around from the wheel of the boat, trying to tell if clouds of firey dust were advancing or staying still. The swirlygigs of ashen debris kept the naked eye from making any kind of reliable estimation, for all they knew the perimeter to instant death could be a meter or a thousand meters behind the first wavy whisps. Hanging there, the backdrop to the subject. For this moment so close, it only served contrast for the cargo tanker, theatre running paper that remained constantly spinning. Precarious curtains behind the actress.
"We're close enough. Said, get your speargun ready" Said looked under their seat, fumbling with the modified tube bearing Vinz's handiwork. Rope ladders were ratcheted to the spear bodies, expanded spikes spot welded to the tips. With any luck, the spear would fly above the edge and snag onto the railings, giving them a direct way up and onto the main deck. Hopefully there was enough rope to reach the bottom, Vinz didn't quite know how much to use.
"I'll go first." Vinz aimed the harpoon up and well over the guardrails. Said followed suit, the gun shaking softly in their hands. It went off quietly, with a soft compressed thrump. They all watched it rise, higher and higher. It would have definitely made it over the railing, definitely, had it not been for an errant gust hitting right at its descent. Hubert's eyes widened, swerving the boat out of the impending trajectory and knocking Vinz and Said to the floor. Within seconds, the spear plunged down within a meter of where they just were, plunking into the Indian Sea, down to the bottom. A blink, and the last few knots of the rope ladder were gone.
"You idiot!!!" Hubert scolded, doing his best to maneuver with the still beating waves. "That could have sunk the boat!!" His eyes were locked with the movement of the cockpit, hopping through the waves as smoothly as he could.
"Well if you held the boat steady I could have made it!! You said you had your license!!" Vinz fired back, throwing the now useless speargun to the floor. But before Hubert could knock him overboard, Said's voice came through the mic.
"Um, guys..." they said, pointing up at the ship. A rope ladder hung clanging to the steel, making muted faraway thunks against the bow.
"Good Said, good..." Vinz looked at it for a second, before fishing the bottom of the ladder out of the ocean, tugging down on it to test its weight bearing. One tug, three tugs, one with all his might. The spikes held. Satisfied, he tied the bottom down to a nearby boathook.
"Okay, we'll go one at a time, just to be safe. I'll go first, then you and Said." Vinz grabbed a ring as Hubert moved the boat in, his tepid first steps finding a hold.
"Hell no. I'm staying right here." Hubert said flatly. "I said I'd drive you to the ship, Vinz. I never said I was gonna climb aboard."
"Fine!" He yelled. "then stay here and keep the boat ready." Vinz started back up, airing his frustrations with every step.
"If it starts crossing into the Gray, I'm not sticking around. You two better be in and out." Vinz didn't respond. He hated it. Hated when people tried to apply their rules to him, as if he needed their authority over his own life. It crosses it crosses, so what? Leave us to die, don't embellish yourself with the likes of a catholic school teacher. Giving us scoldings and spankings at your discretion. Bitter thoughts clouded Vinz's mind, the air still between them as he climbed. The proximity suit crinkled and folded into irregular layers with every pull up. From far enough away, it must have looked like a piece of celophane stuck to the side of a train, clinging on desperately to the 200kmh steel tonner barreling through the countryside. Whoever is on coastwatch must be very confused, not knowing why this sentient trashbag was slowly making its way up the cargo tanker. Its not like anyone thought he would actually do it. Or maybe they just didn't care. Whatever the reason, it mattered not to Vinz, one hand above the other one at a time.
With every meter climbed, the temperature rose with him. As treacherous as it was, the ocean was still a stabilizer, and it was getting further and further away with every step. By the time the top of the rail was in sight, It must have already been eighty degrees. Vinz could feel beads of sweat on his forehead, droplets with no where to go baking in the cylinder screen of his suit. Finally, Vinz's gloves wrapped around the rail and his feet swung over the side, boots soon becoming acquianted with the radiant steel heat on all sides. Noticable, but by no means dangerous. Not yet, anyway, there was no telling how long that would last. Hastily, he waved his hands over the side, beckoning Said to start climbing. The tungtung of the laddered boots against the ship walls made for a steady rhythm, as Vinz turned back around to fully actualize what exactly they had boarded.
Deep red and ocean blue, sprackles of corroded green and plenty of stiff gray boxes. The corregated metal walls of the container colony reached several stories high over his head, each brick twice his height. They rose up and above like dead Tokyo skyscrapers, blown out lights leaving only dark spires against the outer clouds of the Gray. But as foreboding as the towers rose, Vinz unfortunately could not define the source. Walls of a great retaining pit lined the main deck, reinforced with painted steel beams keeping the gathered brood from any human pathways. This troubled him, him and whatever few details lay in his plan. The tingting was still sounding, So Vinz tried to crane his neck left and right, up and down, trying to get a full breadth of this arena. He could see that some parts of the ship bore scorchmarks. Others bore melted shipping containers, globs of chewed gum stuck to the top or fallen down to the bottom, lazily oozing over the retaining walls. Others nearer to the halfway point had only crumpled lightly, boxes stacked upon it either melded to the roof or balancing precariously, mid slide and kept standing by friction alone. While some were damaged, others seemed to not be touched at all. And here was one small human, staring up at the endless opportunity that even just one container could hold.
"Vinz!!! you should let me check first!!" seemingly suddenly, Said appeared behind him, waving a thin red lazer up and down in a diameter around them. They swiped up and down at the railing, the floor, the walls. Even at Vinz himself.
"Okay... 100 degrees, we should be fine as long as we keep moving. And as long as the clouds stay where they are." Vinz hadn't even realized, but his feet were heating up fast. Quickly, he picked a direction down the walkway, Said hurrying behind and sweeping the lazer a few meters ahead.
"To the front?" Said asked, keeping the lazer steady in front of Vinz as they approached a short staircase along the deck.
"Ya, look at this wall around the containers." Vinz turned to the left and gestured towards the metal walls and beams, caked in ash and salt rust. "The front of the ship will have a door that cuts through the middle, we'll- STOP
Vinz froze, mid sentence and mid stride. His right foot planted on the concrete, his left hovering in the air a few centimeters from the first step. Said's lazer was locked underneath, nervously shaking, moving the dot up and down in small buzzing lines. Said turned the gun to Vinz, red digits blinking against the screen:
"600c"
He hung his foot over a second longer, suddenly petrified with the knowledge. What would even happen? Would the boot just erupt into flames? Or would it only hurt like hell? Would his nerves have time to register the pain, or burn up immediately? He looked down, crinkling foil boots stuck on an invisible step that hung in the air. Slowly, like a surgeon's scalpel crossing over the aortic artery, he retracted his boot and backed away. Said looked up at him, unsure of what to say.
"Nevermind. The main walkways are probably closest to the command tower." Turning, he began in the opposite direction.
It was just the wind and their bootsteps, little reflective dots trotting along a dead metal beast. Groans from the gale, Groans from the steel. It all vibrated steadily, and then a sudden high frequency metalic tickticktick would emerge from the floor, travelling up from their boots to their brainstem. And just as quickly vanish. The eternal sun did nothing to help the sheer heat of it all, lighting up dark scorchpocked tones that had buried themselves in the metallic outer linings. Everything radiated heat. The walls, the floor, the railings, even the air in the ship's radius shimmered and shaked in an outlined frequency wave. The suits were getting hotter and hotter as minutes within the perimeter marched on. It was unclear just how effective the prox suits would really be, or for how long. It felt as if all the sweat and humidity inside should be shorting out the electronic tubing, or blowing the oxygen lines. They were built for hazardous situations, but were they built for THIS kind of situation? One the designers could never in a hundred years envision? Vinz's questions were interrupted, a sudden curthump caused the two to snap their necks up, eyes set on the stacked towers. Settling bricks, high above.
Reality made itself known as Vinz stared out, trying to surmise if a brick was about to give out and crumple down on them. Where would they even dive out of the way? Was the next step clear, or would they have to jump the fifty stories overboard just so they wouldn't ignite on impact? The more he stared, the more it became abundantly clear that they could give at any moment, and the more that thought nestled into his head. It was no small miracle that the deck remained relatively clear when there were so many variables at play. From the momentum of the bobbing ship to the strength of the wind, to whatever pressure vacuums the Gray must be condensing and expanding. To the fact that for as scolding as it was down here, several stories higher it must be lethal, prox suit or not. What does that kind of heat do to thin aluminum walls and particle board floors? Ones carrying metric tons of melted plastic, collapsing pianos, blown out car tires? The question was already answered by the dozens of toppled gloopy containers in between the towers. The heart in Vinz's chest grew all that more unsteady.
The Gray continued to swirl in the backdrop, whooshing wind reminding them that ashen death could swoop down upon them whenever it wished to do so. Vinz, for the first time, considered all of this in whole. The legitimate boundaries of his plan began to sprout up as tall as the walls and towers, his steps became more cautious. More irregular. The drive was to pick up the pace, but to do so would risk losing a foot or worse. And to slow down completely on the wrong patch could be just as bad. Vinz continued to look ahead. Not where he was going, but where he wanted to go. In the distance, several cornering hallways could be seen splintering off to the right, around where the retaining pit ended.
"So how do we get to the containers?" Said questioned, flashing the temp gun at the lefthand railing beside Vinz. Vague dustings of Gray particles waved lazily through the lazer light from swipe to swipe, here and there in small whisps. Vinz answered with a staggered step.
"I thought we could just walk between them" the words crackled through the microphone, unsuredly. Both of them continued to steal glances up at the pit walls, two meters taller than either of them. "Theres probably a door over there, its gotta lead deeper into the ship."
"And then what? You think they'll just open up? What if they're locked?" Said hurried to catch up to Vinz, trying to outrun the question. But Said persisted.
"You said there would be cars, TV's, guns. Half of them are melted and the rest look completely bolted shut... Can we even open them up?" frustration on their voice, choppy and uneven. Even walking behind Vinz they still felt a few steps ahead of him.
"I don't know." They came to the hallway. Vinz peered around the corner, shutting Said out of his sight.
"You don't know? What do you mean you don't know?" The incredulity of their tone was new, even to Said themself. "I thought you worked in the maintenance wing? Don't you know these things?"
"And what do you ever plan for!!! You're so smart chopping onions all day, aren't you?? You're the one who followed me here! So what does that make you???" Vinz snapped back, spitting into the mic.
"Ya, because look at you!!! You were gonna get yourself killed if I didn't!! You already almost did!!" Vinz marched forward in a haphazard grumble, not even pretending to wait until Said read the temps anymore.
Crossing the corner, they both kept their mouths shut. On a certain level, Said knew it was fruitless to heckle him about any of the advanced concepts of this mission. In their eyes Vinz was doing this anyway, with or without them. They could at the very least make sure he didn't kill himself doing it.
The side deck was long behind the both of them, they were covered on all sides by thick, ungiving sheet walls. What little reprieve the wind had given them had been taken away, radiant heat baking them in their suits from floor, the wall and roof. Slowly, foot by foot, they both travelled further into the tunnel, the degrees climbing higher and higher. Midway through, to turn back would be to destroy all the progress they made. The air became heavier, thicker, bearing down on them. concentrated, there was no where to go for either them or the hanging particles. Reflective panels did little for this kind of heat, the kind that propogated in shine and dark alike. Vinz turned to Said, the meeting of their eyes conveying what they both knew. Suddenly, Vinz broke out of his walk and began to run. Bullish, foolhearty, but to be measured was to be dead. Said followed him, as the heat climbed deeper into their suit. The temp guns lazer was erratic, scanning all over the place. Red limit numbers shined bright in the lightlessness of the tunnel. 150c. 50c. 200c. 100c. 400c. lockwheel doors lined the walls but they didn't dare take the time to try to open them. The only modus of the second was escape. Air trapped in their suits turned sour, haggardly breaths recycling themselves. Gasps as hot going in as coming out; a full body paper bag. Outside their suits the tunnel air wasn't fairing much better. It was wavering in every dimension, visibly boiling. Particles bouncing off eachother, trapped in a long metal oven, microscopic flakes of air speeding up with every bounce. Illusions cast, their already thin nerves now caught in a delirium spiral that captured their very vision. Finally, at the end of the hallway, a chainlink door. And right behind it an exposed stairwell. With how deeply deformed the air had become it was hard to tell if it was even real, or just some last minute fevered mirage before a dead end would spell their last moments on Earth. Sprinting towards it, Said tried to get a read off, But Vinz had already charged it. Lifting his left foot, he kicked it wide open with a horrible screech as they both rushed up the stairs and out of the tunnel.
The open air on all sides. Hot gusty ocean wind fell back over the stairwell but it may as well have been the Coastal Antarctic breeze to the both of them.
"A heat sink..." Vinz blurted out in between breaths. He'd come in choppy and full of static, wires in the comms link overwhelmed without any output for the overcharge. Super hot and struggling to launch electrons the proper distance, his voice came out matching the wires.
"An oven." Said replied, they did not stand up from their haunch. Keeping one hand on one knee, they reset the alarmlock on the temp gun, the lazer beam dying out and flashing before holding steady again. They scanned their surroundings, perforated metal underneath their feet, single pole railings to their sides. Each of their breaths met in the electric wavelengths, four lungs in an intangible exchange.
"Its only 70 here, we should stop for a while." Said said, holstering the gun and putting their hands back on their knees, shaking involuntarily. Stale air puffed and huffed, the oxygen supply trickling lower and lower, each atom working double time to refresh the two as best they could.
It was difficult to tell in the deflection of the helmet visors, coupled with both of them staring down at the ground. But even disconnected their looks grew unsured, gazes bouncing off steel floors into eachother pupils carrying the message identical. They looked at eachother, down through the floor, and through their shared distance they knew only one thing: that neither knew what the other was doing here. If they were both fools, they were fools in their own unique ways.
"We can't stay too long. The Gray won't wait for us." Vinz straightened his back, looking up towards streaks of white paint that had so far gone unscorched. "Lets get into the command tower. Theres gotta be a manifest in there." He put his hand on Said's shoulder, doing his best to reassure them.
Slowly, Said stood back up, meeting Vinz's visor gaze. With one step, it was back to standard procedures. Said scanned each step forward, the two of them walking across the command tower catwalk. The wails of the wind met them fully again, out and off from the coastline. Beating the Gray back, twisting itself around the catwalk floors and whistling through the divet holes beneath them. The streaks of white looked so inviting to Vinz's eyes, like there was still by some vector a way to call this mission a success. What groans of the stressed metal soon became background noise, adaptively tuned for maximum un-uneasiness.
A great big lockwheel door laid flat at the end of the walkway, bulging out noticably from the smooth tower walls. As Vinz approached, his shoulders slumped, and he looked at that door with more apathetic apprehension than excitment. Said, stuck right next to him, began to fiddle with the temp gun. Scanning the door, Vinz scanned the horizon. He already knew the answer, seconds before Said would confirm it.
"600c"
Neither said anything. The spite and anger had already been vented, all that remained now was a tired acceptance. Impenetrable treasure, or so that only glinted with the gold surely buried inside. From the containers to the bridge, it was all equally inaccessible. Said looked up at Vinz, expecting some kind of reaction. Some kind of tell for another part of the plan, maybe a reroute. Maybe finding a passage below deck, it must be cooler there afterall. Said looked up at him, but Vinz only continued to stare out at the Antarctic coast. It was hardly a defeated attitude, just apathetic neutrality at the comings and goings, Like a child losing all interest halfway into the instructions sheet. Said kept their lips shut, and joined Vinz in the quiet runaground.
Dumont was just a dot this far out. The mountains and hills that surrounded Dumont were magnificent, snow dunes piled up around the jutting earth soaring high into the sky. But from the coastal observation deck they too were only dots in the foreground of pale white and oppressive blue. As much as Dumont was to the boarding team. Trickledly, Said's eyes and head turned leftward, towards the West. If they squinted, Said thought that they could just barely see one of leningrad's abandoned old habs jutting out of the cliffside, right at the very edge. Eyeballing it, maybe a thousand kilos from Dumont. Not that that was even viable, in all likelihood it was just the ice sheet playing tricks on him.
"Vinz..." Said started with an exhale. He broke his gaze, turning his head to look at them. "It isn't about the containers, is it?"
Vinz swayed in his suit, side to side like he was compensating for the bob of the waves on a mountain on steel. He stood swaying in between whatever penultimate goals he had spoke of initially, clinging neither to one side or the other.
"Guns, cars and TV's, ya?" Said spoke again. "I'm not as stupid as everyone says, Vinz..." They stared out at the stroke of white across the horizon, floating on the surface.
Vinz sighed, putting his hands on the railing. Said jumped a little, fumbling with the gun for an arbitrary scan. Scolding him wasn't even worth it anymore, for any of the good it would do.
"Its not just the containers, Said." Vinz breathed out in a low confirmation, turning his head to check if the mess of shipping containers was still half melted scrapmetal. The woodchip pile, each holding a potentially deadly splinter.
"This ship Said, it made it from who knows where to right here. It sat in the Fog for weeks, maybe months. And look at it: floating through like nothing ever even happened." Said turned to him, their visor scanning him up and down.
"What do you have in mind Vinz? What do you REALLY have in mind?" Their tone was past ingredulity at this point. Curious they were more than anything else, to drag the both of them miles off the coast to this deathtrap. For what, exactly?
"Everything Said. Everything." Vinz met Said's eyes as best he could, as if to try and even out the vagueness. Two foggy spheres behind humid exhaled breath, peeking out in the seconds of clarity.
"We tow it to the shore Said, somehow. Right by Dumont."
"Batten down the hatches, seal up the windows, recycle the air. Interior insulation, industrial air conditioning, liquid cooling in the walls. Nuclear generator, onboard food production." His eyes turned proud, just about smirking as his tone lept more and more with every word.
"Imagine it Said: A submarine above water. A vessel fit for the new Earth." At the last word he struck down his hands to the rails, grabbing them assuredly as a smile crept beneath the visor. Dreams aflutter, Vinz's true intentions as sparkled chimes hanging between them. They were fantastical gestures, but enticing. It would be foolish to follow them. But certainly not uninteresting.
"And what will the Americans say, Vinz?" Said asked him, reality coming back down beneath their feet. "We're not even supposed to be off the shelf in the first place. We come back with this thing in tow, what then?"
"The Americans..." Vinz's eyes narrowed. His grip tightening on the rails, the ambient heat sinking closer through his palms.
"The Americans won't do a damn thing, Said. And it'll be BECAUSE of this." He gestured his hands out wildly, straddling the whole of the ship in his armspan. "Not that we'll even tell them, anyway."
"But they deliver our food, Vinz. They're bound to find out eventually."
"Let them." Vinz crackled, short and spiteful in his vowels.
"Its them and the Argentinians. They're the only ones with a tanker on the whole planet. And sure sure, they don't do anything with it now, but if they wanted to?" Uncomfortable history crept up between them. The type not even scorching hot dust could wash away.
"If they did it before, they'll do it again Said, you know that better than anyone." Said winced, turning their head back to the coast to try and put it out of their mind.
"It doesn't matter how many cabbages they throw us, Americans are still Americans. Fog or not, we always need to be prepared. Afterall, whos to say they didn't start all this in the first place?"
Said never heard the screams for themself. Never the bombs, never the crumbling concrete or red hot sand or the smell of burning palmtrees. They only knew what their parents told them when they were a child, from what it was like before they fled to Marseilles. But nonetheless the ghosts of their family seemed to be reaching in, tying a thread around their ears whispering in hushed tones: O our dear child of sand and sea, listen: won't you listen?
Vinz looked at them, who only stared out into the coast. Silently. His words may have been too effective, Said only looked outwards in a trance state.
"Hey, c'mon." Vinz grabbed their shoulder reassuredly. "That was the past. We're in the future, now." He rubbed their shoulder, doing his best to bring them back to the present.
"Hey, how bout this! We'll call her the Charles de Gaulle, eh? I'd like to see the Americans try and mess with that!" Vinz exclaimed, his back straightening into a proud stance, doing his best to bring hope back into the mood. Said turned slowly, tepidly.
"Or... maybe the Henri Maillot?" Said peeped. "De Gaulle already had his glory." It was Vinz who was taken aback this time, before he let a chuckle wrinkle in through the wires.
"Sure Said. The Henri Maillot. And you'll be my first mate! Better than standing over the sink cutting pota-
Vinz turned to face the ship, his voice cut short in a sudden slash of silence. The tower was invisible, engulfed in milkwhite dust. They had already been close to it, but he could never imagine the sheer volume of its weight right in front of him like this. Impenetrable uniform swirls of white hot death. He froze, as if the heat wasn't even there. He only breathed in and watched. The fog curved above and overhead, swallowing the whole of the tower's bridge. It was there just minutes before, a grand palisade rising from metal bedrock. Now it wasn't. The line was definite and exact, heavy in its totality. It was like there was some invisible forcefield bubble that kept it from coming down on them immediately, like it was a tidal wave rolling down in slow motion until suddenly stopped in time. But that bubble was giving reign with every moment passing, the sudden stop only after a heartbeat of gain. Meter by Meter, Second by Second. Said, hearing the sudden silence, turned as well. And they too froze.
"RUN" vinz took off down the catwalk, bounding for the stairwell as Said did their best to follow. Shaking themselves out of it, every muscle in their bodies was screaming for them to turn around, to jump off the railing at the opposite end, bellyflop into the Indian ocean and hope for the best. The Gray was stark leering in front of them just begging for a taste of their flesh, no one in their right mind would run right towards it. Ignoring their right minds, their steps beat across the cagemetal walkway vibrating back and forth. Little ping pangs ringing pathetic in the face of its magnitude. It was here, and it was hungry, but it was slow. And whatever work of physics that had not brought it down in one fell swoop was their one advantage. They could see the edge of the stairwell at the end of the deck, peaking up and leading down. It only led back through the tunnel but that was the least of their worries at the moment.
One more heartbeat. In the blink of an eye, the stairwell was engulfed. Good as deleted from reality in a swift and silent swipe. Their boots screeched to a halt, struggling to keep them grounded as they scrambled upright, halfway to go to their now defunct escape. Vinz turned to Said, wild eyes fogged and blurry in the flurry of breath beneath the visor. Then, his head snapped to the railing.
"JUMP" In one motion Vinz grabbed the railing and threw his legs over, leaping from the catwalk onto the tunnel's metal roof below. Four meters of freefall before an echoing thud rocked the surface. He sprawled out like a cat on impact, limbs flaily wildly to any side as he rolled along the surface of the tunnel. He stood shakily. Limping but alive.
Said took one more look at the Gray. It was stationary, for now. Before another blink would send it a meter or ten meters or a thousand in their direction. He grabbed the railing, lowering himself slowly down to the roof feet first. Too slow for the gravity of the situation.
"C'mon, C'mon!!!" Vinz hissed hurriedly in the mic, stealing glances towards the Gray. It was already on the move, cutting off a whole chunk of the tunnel roof from view. Said's legs dangled a meter or two above. Vinz, impatient, grabbed a hold of Said's legs, guiding them down to the surface.
"I got you, come on." Said let go of the railing, thomping down. They started again, bootsteps in an uneven tempo, Said now able to keep up with Vinz due to the consequences of his recklessness. Every other second of staggered movement, they threw their heads behind them. It was still approaching, already occupying where they had been moments before. The heat was growing, the proximity suits felt like they were reaching their limits. The world felt darker, encroaching fog stealing the Antarctic's eternal sunshine. It would only be a little more, then they'd be free. A zip down the rope ladder and they'd be bounding back to Dumont in minutes. Said and Vinz hurried as fast as could be allowed.
Finally, they came to the edge of the roof. It was still a drop from here to the main deck, certainly higher than the last. To Vinz it was no problem. But Said stood ramrod stiff.
"Here, you first." Vinz crouched down close to the heatspouting roof, motioning for Said. They glanced back at the Gray, then the edge, then the Gray again. Swallowing, they approached.
"Are you sure you're good for it?" Said asked as he lowered them down gently, Said clinging to his arms dangling down in front of the tunnel. Even with the recent rise in temperature, the radiant heat from the tunnel air still marked itself distinct.
"Please, I'm a cat." Vinz smirked as he got as far as he could. He nodded to Said, who took a breath, and let go, falling smoothly back down to the concrete floor, bending his knees down to the ground for the impact.
Said looked up at him, almost proudly as he raised up from the floor. For pride there was no time though, as Vinz rearranged his limbs and began the process of lowering himself down, Said readying to catch him should he slip. Said was looking up at him with his hands ready, when white gray fog shot out of the tunnel like exhaling breath. Vinz froze at his perch. Said's screams, screams of algiers' burning palm trees. Screams of vitrified sand. The pillar of Gray shot out fifty meters from the edge of the ship as artillery broadside. Vinz couldn't even parse the humanity of it, through the static it was a steady electric singular tone screech before it blipped out coldly. The Gray cleared, and it left only its deafening silence.
"SAID" Vinz screamed, jumping down with a wild crash to his joints. He couldn't register the pain if he wanted to, in erratic limps he rushed to Said's suit lying crumpled and motionless on the floor. Instinctively he went for the release clasps, stopping his hands as he realized what that would entail in heat like this. He then grabbed at their arms, doing his best to hoist them into a carry. The suit was boiling, the heat of the Gray had made a home for itself in every fold and wrinkle. Burning hot even through his own suit. He clenched his teeth, lifting them up in his arms, taking uneasy steps one after the other towards the rope ladder. Said didn't weigh too much, but they may as well have been a glowing hot boulder under Vinz's aching joints. Suddenly, an electric crackle.
"Vinz!! What the hell is going on?? Damnit what kind of range is on this toy!!" Vinz had never been so happy to hear Hubert's voice, decades from civilization wandering in the desert, an oasis string of the outer world lowered down, vibrating gently. Escape rocket to safety.
"Hubert, Said is hurt real bad" There was a pause, Vinz panted and strained as he continued to step towards the ladder.
"Can they move?" His words cut through the wires, slate and authoritative.
"No, they're unconscious."
"Are they dead???" emptiness returned to the comms band momentarily.
Guilt clung on his heart as he the question pierced his headset. "I don't know."
"Damnit Vinz!! I'll undo the rope, you grab it and pull it up. Tie them up tight and lower them down to me quick!! We can't stay here much longer." He could see even from down there, the Gray had swallowed up half the ship and was making steady progress.
"It'll be okay Said, It'll be okay" Vinz mumbled, lowering them down to the concrete floor as relative cold returned to his body. He checked behind him. The tunnel entrance was gone, replaced with a wall of Gray that crept silently along the deck. Breathing sharply, he grabbed the rope and began spinning it up around his arm, acting carefully as to not detatch the anchored in hook. He half expected the rope to burst into flames the second it came into contact with Said's suit, red volcanic flames like a tree falling into lava. But it held laid across them, holding together tightly around their waist. Or atleast as tight as he could get it. He looped another length down and between their thighs and up across the stomach, tying a scraggly knot at the waist. He tried his hardest to remember how the Americans tied their foodcrates down, running months old memories backwards to try and reverse engineer the process. But nothing came of it, fluttering away in the whispy stress of imminent Gray. He repeated the loop for the other side, wrapping it around their chest and tying a final double knot at a length of rope right under their neck.
When he was done Said resembled a piece of tin foil caught by a spindly anaconda, a hunk of junk in a drunk orbweaver's web. Lengths of rope harnessed over their shoulders, up and under their legs and messily wrapping their abdomen. His mind raced through, praying that there was still enough rope to reach the boat.
"Okay, they're coming down. Get ready" Vinz spoke without a response, only the silent anticipation of their escape vehicle. Slowly, he picked up Said's body once again and rolled him over the railing, holding the rope tight.
"their suit is boiling hot, be careful." Vinz said, meeting Hubert's silent confirmation. Inch by Inch, he lowered down Said's body. Right to the end of the rope.
"Damn, its like fire!! What the hell did you do??? How do you expect me to untie him???"
That was all the confirmation he needed, Vinz didn't need to entertain a response as he flung himself over the railing, repelling down the ship as Hubert struggled below with grabbing a hold of Said. Hollow little thuds against the steel reminding him of bruised kneecaps and stinging heels. He looked up seeing edges of dust by the rail. It survived Said's suit the whole descent but it wouldn't survive ten seconds in direct contact with the Gray. his jumps grew longer and longer, shocking his bones more and more with every impact. five meters, ten meters, fifteen meters a jump. He raced to make it to the boat before the Gray did. He thought to look down after a series of long pained jumps to see how many more he needed, when his heart stopped.
Hubert had cut the rope. He dangled a few meters above the water as the boat bobbed a short distance away. Short but significant. He looked up. The railing was fully engulfed by the fog, the steel walls of the ship seemingly the only thing keeping it from pouncing on them. The rope was surely growing weaker by the second. Strand by strand by the hundredth strand until he would be dropped straight into the ocean to be cut apart by a scissor wall of barnacles. There was no time.
He got to the very end. priming his legs, he launched his body forward, up and away from the ship with his hands in a wild flurry reaching for handled edges to salvation. His torso hit the rounded tube of the stern, feet splashing into the ocean as his ribs flexed to absorb another bout of damage. He scrambled up, swinging his legs over the edge letting exhausted adreneline glands pump another dose into his veins. Hubert looked up at him from Said's side with a cut up length of rope in his hands, almost surprised to see him as he struggled with Said's restraints.
"GO GO GO" Vinz screamed at Hubert as he ran to the wheel, slamming the throttle and speeding off so suddenly that Vinz was thrown down back to the floor again. Said rolled off to the side before hitting the edge with a dull thud, hardly heard as the buzz of the motor reached a high pitch scream that sent them skipping above the waves, dashing and jumping and cutting the water. Vinz looked back. All he could see was the vague outline of printed livery growing fainter and fainter, as the whole of the ship descended back from where it came.
"CHECK ON THEM RIGHT NOW." Hubert screaming into the mic, blowing out the cheap speakers and clipping into the territory of static noise. Vinz shook himself, rushing over to Said as he unhooked his helmet and threw it to the side. Hubert's knife was to the left, razor edge precariously close to the boat's inflated raft walls. Gingerly, he took it in his hands, cutting up and away from the handiwork wrapped around Said's body. He still hadn't moved an inch, it was difficult to tell if he was even breathing. Every knot cut, every strand seperated, Vinz approached the consequences of his actions. The knife grew heavier and heavier with every slice, until finally Said was free, arms hanging limply to their side, head cocked to the left. Vinz braced himself. He wanted to study the fog, to find out about what it could and couldn't destroy. What could be used against it. As the helmet slid off, he imagined boiled skin, red hot melting features where eyes and ears used to be. Deformed stretched lips stuck in a perpetual scream for all eternity, pitched into the flesh of who was once known as Said and all purely unnecessary suffering by his own hand. He closed his eyes, and pulled it off.
They were drenched, hair sitting in short oily curls on their head. Their eyes closed shut, skin intact. Vinz took his fingers, placing them on their neck. faint badumps, pause, badump. pause. badump. The weight of earth was taken off Vinz's shoulders, as he kept his fingers there to double check, triple check, make absolutely sure that Said's heart was still beating. With a sudden lightning strike excitement, he zipped down the suit and exposed their body to the air, peeling it off, slipping their arms and legs out of the metal confines. They were covered in a visible layer of sweat, clothes soaked to the core and sopping wet. He could swear it was steaming off their skin, but he watched their chest, moving up and down steadily.
"They're okay!!" Vinz breathed relievedly, screaming over the screaming motor trying to get Hubert's attention. He stared out into the ocean like he didn't hear, or maybe just out of razorlock focus. But Vinz was too happy to try and parse it, turning back to Said he started to try for step two.
"Cmon Said, wake up. Wake up, c'mon!!" He shook them gently by the shoulder, slapping their cheeks.
"Here" Hubert's voice came through with the colossal feedback of wind and motor. He held out a silver metal canteen in his free hand, never taking his eyes off the water. "Don't drown them."
Vinz took it and popped the cap, pouring the cold water on Said's bare face in short bursts between shakes. After a few moments, Said stirred. Eyebrows scrunching, head moving all on its own. Another breeze of relief for Vinz, as the Antarctic winds whipped choppily against his shaved head. With one more shake, Said's eyes creaked open. Little slits of white and hazel peaking around a tan embankment, brushes of black eyebrows raising slightly.
"God I thought we lost you..." Vinz said to them, hoping the feedback wasn't interferring. Said looked up at him, into his eyes, before meekly grabbing the canteen and taking a great big gulp. They breathed deeply, steadily, like trying to reconfigure after a total system crash.
"Are you okay?" Vinz asked shakily, helping them to sit against the wall of the boat. Their eyes grew wider, back to normal conditions. Weakly, they opened their mouth and spoke.
"I Saw them Vinz."
"I saw all of them."
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