The Outpost

Harriet braces herself for the blast of cold air. Even before she’s stepped out into the blizzard she feels the skin on her face constrict, her eyes squint against the freezing conditions. “Fuck it.”

She shoves the door and immediately the wind shoves it back on her. After a short struggle she’s out and leaning into the wind, trudging towards the main building. It’s almost invisible, just a weird glow of the door light penetrating the morning gloom. Snow pelts into the tiny bit of exposed skin on her face, and she’s happy when she enters the relative calm of the entrance, then the overly warm cavern of the mud room with its moist and stagnant air. The long process of removing the protective layers of clothing, gloves, balaclava, jacket, stomping the icy snow from her boots, is finally finished and she lets herself into the common room.

The main building is the hub of everyday life during winters in the North Zone Research Institute Outpost One, affectionately called NoZ-one by the team that staff it. This is Harriet’s fifth season on, and although she still hates the hot-cold-hot moving between building - ‘why didn’t they just build a fucking closed corridor?’ - she wouldn’t want to do anything else. Besides, the pay was amazing, more than enough to make up for the discomfort of negative 50 and a blizzard that runs 90% of the time. 

The common room is unusually empty for this time of day. Harriet checks the duty roster. Alpha and Bravo team are out collecting core samples. “Idiots. Both out at the same time. Yeah, fuck protocol. We don’t need an emergency team. Nice one, morons.” She’s told them a thousand times not to schedule runs concurrently, but cowboys will be cowboys, and rare earth mineral deposits will continue to tantalise with eye-watering finders fees. Temptation’s too great.

Harriet grabs coffee, black and sugary, to wash down her toast thick with salty-sweet peanut butter. Today is her turn on comms. Technically the teams shouldn’t leave until they are back in range of satellite comms. But hey, fuck protocol again. Rules have become redundant.

Harriet flops into the once-orange office chair, now more chocolatey brown, and flicks several switches, powering up the various comms units. The lights wink on, flashing until the satellite dish finds its target, then holding steady on green. The faint hum of the speaker comes through, followed by beeps as multiple messages from headquarters, thousands of kilometers south arrive hours after being sent. It’s the same usual crap, and Harriet sends a quick ‘all quiet and in order, NoZRI’ before tapping the radio to speak with the research teams.

“Alpha, Beta this is NoZ-One, Come in Alpha Beta. Check in.”

Harriet repeats the message several times until a faint, “This is Beta. All quiet and in order out here. Fucking freezin’ my balls off. Nearly finished core drill number 4. Over.”

“Thanks Beta. Don’t let those balls drop. Your missus will be supremely disappointed. Over.”

“This is Alpha. ALl quiet and in order. Over”

“NoZ-one to Alpha - your balls okay? Over.”

“Alpha balls swinging big. You keen to ride them later NoZ-one? Over.”

“Ha ha, such an alpha Alpha. If you can drill as good as Beta, maybe we can tango later. ALpha Beta I’m heading to the can, too much coffee again. Back in 5. Over”

“Roger that NoZ-one, Alpha over.”

“You got a UTI again NoZ-one? Gotta use more lube babes. Beta, over.”

Harriet chuckles making her way to the bathroom. It’s hard to stay annoyed with the boys. She’s only gone 30 seconds, but as she reenters the comms room the emergency alarm is going. “Fuck.” She thumbs the mic.

“Alpha Beta. What the fuck? We got alarms going off like a fucking brothel on saturday night. You boys okay? Over.”

“Alpha good. Over.”

“Beta good. Over”

Harriet searches for the origin of the alarm. Outpost 2. She realises she failed to check in with them this morning. “NoZRI 2, come in. THis is NoZ-one over.”

Static. Nothing but static comes back. “NoZRI-2 come in. You fells good? Over.”

Again static. Harriet feels a tendril of worry, working into her usually calm centre. “NoZRI-2 you there or what?”

Then a voice, faint and desperate, breaks through the static in patches, “... NoZ-one … two… here… over.”

“Repeat that NOZRi-2, you’re breaking up over.”

More static. Harriet waits, straining her ears, leaning closer to the speaker.

“This is NoZRI-2. They’re here. Tell them… …over.” Then there’s a bang then silence filled with the gentle hum of machinery.

Harriet yells “Who? Who? Damn you!” But NoZRI -2 doesn’t answer.

Frustrated, Harriet contacts the field teams. “Alpha Beta come in. We’ve lost comms with NoZRI-2. I need you to check in. Over.”

A minute later the boys haven’t checked in.

Harriet hears the main building’s door bang. Thinking it must be Alpha Beta returning, she rushes to the mud room to meet them. But it’s not the boys returning.  “What the fuck… ?”

The club hammers into her head and that’s it, lights out.