Blood in the Snow

  BLOOD IN THE SNOW

  Eric S Brown

  www.severedpress.com

  Copyright 2018 by Eric S Brown

  BLOOD IN THE SNOW

  Anders stood puffing on a cigarette. Hawkins stared at him as if he had lost his mind. Both of them were slicked with sweat beneath their clothes despite the temperature inside the tunnels of the cave. Hawkins gauged it at around 38 degrees. That was like the sun burning down on a beach compared to the temperature on the surface. Up there, it was ten below zero and that wasn’t even taking into account the wind chill.

  It appeared they had lost the creature that was after them. Either that or one of the shots that Anders fired at the thing had done more damage to the creature than they thought. Hawkins hoped for the latter. That thing had no right existing in the real world. Monsters weren’t supposed to be real. And there was no other word that could be used to describe the thing that they had run into and do it justice. Regardless, they had been blessed with a moment to catch their breath. Hawkins’ legs ached and his heart was still thundering in his chest. He had no idea how Anders could be so calm.

  “You think we lost that thing?” Hawkins asked.

  Anders snorted. “This place is its home, man. Ain’t no way we lost it. Odds are, it knows exactly where we are.”

  “Then why isn’t it still after us?” Hawkins asked, frowning.

  “Because I bet that thing had never run into one of these before.” Anders waved his Glock at Hawkins. “The first shot didn’t seem to startle it too much but when I kept firing, well…you saw it. That thing panicked.”

  “Maybe it’s bleeding out somewhere right now,” Hawkins hoped.

  “I doubt it.” Anders shook his head. “More likely it was just startled. It’ll be back. Pretty sure we can count on that.”

  “How much farther to the surface?” Hawkins looked around at the two tunnels leading out of the small chamber they were in. He was a geologist, not a soldier. Never in his life would he have believed that a cave system like the one they were in existed beneath the snow and ice of the Arctic but then he hadn’t believed in monsters either. Now he knew that both were very real.

  “You’re the brains here, Doc,” Anders reminded Hawkins. “I’m just your protection. With all the turns we took getting away from that thing… I don’t have a bloody clue where we are right now. The fact that you’re asking me how much farther we have to go scares the crap out of me even more than that thing out there did.”

  “What do you think that thing was?” Hawkins asked.

  “Dang it, Doc,” Anders growled, “how in the heck am I supposed to know?”

  Hawkins didn’t have an answer to Anders’ question. His mind was racing trying to come up with an answer to the question he had asked. There had to be a logical explanation for what the monster was and where it had come from. He needed time to figure it out. Time wasn’t something either one of them had though if Anders was right about the monster coming back. They needed to reach the surface where they had left the rover and get back to Delta Base. Hawkins doubted anyone there was going to believe them about the monster but they were going to have to. As much as it terrified Hawkins to admit it, there was no way that thing existed in a vacuum down here. That meant there had to be more than one of the things… Males and females procreating to keep their race alive beneath the frozen earth above.

  “I can see you’re doing some serious thinking, Doc, but we need to get moving,” Anders ordered him. “Like I said, that thing will be coming back and we need to be gone when it does.”

  “Right,” Hawkins said, nodding.

  “So which way, Doc?” Anders pressed him.

  “Uh…” Hawkins took his tablet out of the case on his belt. It was still powered up from the readings he had been taking before their encounter with the monster. He switched it to show a map of the cave system that they were in. The map was far from complete. Some of it was made from digital imaging and the rest from their own trek into the tunnels. The two of them were the first to venture deeper into the cave system than just its upper area near its entrance. GPS didn’t work when you were as far underground as they were and there was something in the cave system that was messing with the equipment too, making the map even less trustworthy. Still, Hawkins made the best guess he could from the data at hand and was grateful the way it seemed that they needed to head in was in the opposite direction from where he thought the monster was. “That way.”

  Anders got moving into the tunnel Hawkins had gestured at. Hawkins followed him but not too closely. He wanted to allow Anders space to maneuver if he was wrong and the monster was waiting somewhere ahead of them. Hawkins had watched Anders trade out magazines in his pistol. Anders’ Glock was fully loaded again and ready for action.

  A shrill cry echoed throughout the tunnel. The sudden sound of it made Hawkins’ heart skip a beat. “Anders,” he croaked in warning.

  “Shut up, Doc,” the soldier snapped at him, looking around, apparently trying to discern which way the cry had come from.

  “Frag me!” Anders screamed as both of them turned to see the monster scampering along the ceiling of the tunnel toward them. The thing was moving at an impossible speed for something its size. The claws of its hands gleamed in the light from the LED lamp he carried as they tore free from the ceiling of the cave only to plunge into its rock again, over and over, pulling its body along. The thing’s feet were clawed too, pushing it along as its hands pulled it forward. The monster had to weigh close to half a ton. Thick muscles bulged and rippled beneath the white hair that covered its body. Its eyes glowed a fierce yellow, filled with rage and hunger. Lips twisted in a feral snarl, the monster came at them.

  Anders’ Glock rang out, booming in rapid succession at the approaching monster. Hawkins saw several of the rounds the professional soldier fire hammer into the monster. One grazed the creature’s left cheek, drawing blood that stained its white hair red. Three more hit its shoulders and back. Each drew a grunt of pain from the monster. The monster hurled itself from the ceiling to the tunnel’s floor twisting in the air so that it landed on its feet. Rising up to its full height, the monster stood close to nine feet tall, all muscle and raging anger. Its yellow eyes blazed hotter as it charged at Anders.

  “Run!” Ander yelled.

  Hawkins didn’t argue. He took off, his legs pumping under him as he fled onward through the tunnel that he hoped led toward the surface. Two more shots from Ander’s Glock rang out behind him. Then he heard Anders scream. Hawkins pushed his body harder, picking up his pace. Rounding a bend in the tunnel, the fleeing geologist almost collided with the monster that was waiting for him there. The monster, almost identical to the one that he knew had killed Anders, shot out a clawed hand that sunk into his guts. As the monster ripped it free, red-slicked purple strands of his intestines poured out of him in its wake. Hawkins tried to scream but the monster was so fast that its other hand closed around his throat before he could. It crushed his windpipe inside his throat as blood exploded from his mouth like vomit.

  ****

  Major Burke walked through the corridors of Delta Base, scowling at its current state. Despite the best efforts of Henry and his two-man engineering team, the hastily constructed facility wasn’t faring well. Time and lack of real resupply was taking their toll on it. A light in the corridor ceiling flickered and buzzed as Major Burke passed under it. He shook his head in disgust. Delta Base was never meant to be anything more than a temporary set-up to compose a quick study of what was thought to be an ice lake just over the hill from its location. The unexpected discovery of the vast subterranean tunnel system that ran beneath it and throughout the entire surrounding area had changed that though. The two-month tour of its residents
had been expanded into a six-month-long stay that still had no end in sight. Instead of going home, Delta Base’s original crew had been joined by a supplemental one of experts better suited to the sort of exploration and mapping that they were currently engaged in. The discovery of the tunnel system had come about by accident and only in the week had they stumbled upon the natural entry point into it. The powers that be demanded that they find one rather than making their own due to possible risks of collapsing the vast system of tunnels before their phenomenon could be studied.

  As Major Burke approached the comm. room, he could hear Axl Rose’s voice screaming from inside it. Welcome to the Jungle by Guns and Roses blared as Major Burke opened the door and entered the room. Harrison was spinning around in his chair at the communications console. How the man had any hearing left was a mystery to Major Burke. Harrison went white at the sight of him, whirling his chair back into a proper position at his duty station and killing the music.

  “Sorry, sir,” Harrison croaked, doing his best to appear professional.

  Letting the incident slide, Major Burke asked, “Any word from Alpha Tango?”

  “She’s inbound, sir,” Harrison answered. “Alpha Tango should be here long before the storm rolls in from the west.”

  Major Burke allowed himself a smile. At least something was going right for a change. Alpha Tango was carrying the latest addition to the staff of Delta Base: a doctor named Berkman. Supposedly, the man was a psychic as well as being a noted cryptozoologist and microbiologist. The brass was really scraping the bottom of the barrel from Major Burke’s point of view but even he had to admit that the strange lifeforms his team had found in the cave system so far were extremely weird and beyond normal explanation. God only knew what Anders and Hawkins would bring back with them from the team’s first real push downward into the cave system’s depths.

  “What’s Alpha Tango’s ETA?” Major Burke eyed Harrison as he spoke.

  “Ten minutes, sir,” Harrison reported.

  As if on cue, Captain Dirk entered the comm. room. Dirk was in charge of the base’s security. It was mostly a cushy job until someone got drunk and out of hand. There was nothing soft about the captain though. Major Burke had never met anyone as cold and hard as he was. He wasn’t someone you wanted angry at you, ever. Captain Dirk was a thin man with a nerdish appearance. Dirk moved with the grace of a predatory animal with the eyes to match. The captain wore a holstered pistol on one hip and a large knife sheathed on the other. According to protocol, Captain Dirk was the only member of the personnel that was allowed to be armed. Delta Base contained an armory though it was locked at all times and only the captain and he possessed a key to it. Major Burke had handpicked most of his original team before the discovery of the cave system and the powers that be had added to it. Captain Dirk hadn’t been on his list however. Those above him had assigned Dirk to him. The two of them got on well enough but they were far from being friends. Major Burke wasn’t sure that the captain had friends anywhere. He was the epitome of a soldier who was married to his work. Still, he was glad to have the captain around. If God forbid anything ever did go wrong, Dirk was the man you wanted on the job when it did.

  “Major.” Captain Dirk nodded at him.

  “Captain.” Burke nodded back. “I’m glad you’re here. I would like you to meet Alpha Tango as it lands and escort our new guest inside in the base.”

  “And scope him out.” The captain smirked.

  “That too,” Major Burke agreed. “Dr. Berkman is supposedly more than a bit…eccentric. I want to know how you think he’ll hold up down here.”

  The isolation of Delta Base and its surrounding oceans of ice and snow could play havoc with the minds of men unaccustomed to such things. Delta Base had only had one Section 8 shipped back to the States thus far, but Major Burke knew that they had been lucky in that. Tensions continued to run high among the original team who had been drafted to stay on longer than expected and knew there was still no end in sight to their tour.

  “Consider me on it then.” Captain Dirk grinned and gave him another nod before leaving the comm. room.

  “That guy freaks me out,” Harrison said after Dirk was gone. “I’ve never seen him do anything remotely fun.”

  “We’re not down here freezing our butts off to have fun, Harrison.” Major Burke smirked. “But yeah, I know what you mean.”

  “The storm that’s coming looks to be a bad one, sir,” Harrison commented in the awkward silence that had suddenly filled the room.

  “How bad?” Major Burke asked.

  “Batten down the hatches bad, sir,” Harrison told him. “Once it hits, ain’t nobody going anywhere for a while.”

  Major Burke frowned. “Still no word from Anders and Hawkins?”

  Harrison shook his head. “No, sir. I’ll keep trying them though. It’s likely they are too deep in the tunnels down there to receive anything.”

  “Let me know when you reach them,” Major Burke said and then added, “and no matter what Dr. Hawkins has found down there, tell them to pack it up and get back here before the storm hits.”

  “Yes, sir,” Harrison said.

  “As you were,” Major Burke grunted and headed out of the communications room, closing the door behind him. He had only made it a few steps before music began blasting through it. This time it was Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin. No matter how much it annoyed him, Major Burke was forced to admit that Harrison at least had good taste in the music he listened to.

  ****

  Dr. Leo Berkman sat in the rear of the Mi-8, one of two on loan to the Delta Base project. Its heating system kept the interior of the copter warm but Leo felt cold as he stared out the window at the ocean of white below. Snow and ice stretched onward as far as he could see in every direction. There was simply nothing out there. No buildings, no people, not even any animals that he had caught sight of. Just a barren wasteland of frozen water. Growing up in the rural mountains of North Carolina, Leo was no stranger to snow, but he had never imagined that a place like this could exist in the world. Oh, he had seen pictures and movies but they didn’t hold a candle to the real thing. He had fought tooth and nail against being assigned to Delta Base to no avail. When bribery failed to settle him down, the government and military had turned to thinly veiled threats. Those had done the trick. Leo had given them a list of gear he thought might need and they had spared no expense in getting it for him. The Mi-8 was carrying what amounted to a state-of-the-art microbiology lab aboard it.

  The pilot of the Mi-8 was a young woman in her later twenties named Lieutenant Sarah Warren. Leo had seen her with her flight helmet off before boarding. Her hair was blonde and cropped short. She was fit with a lean body and blue eyes. Both she and her co-pilot were friendly folks, unlike most of the military personnel that had accompanied him to her copter. Lieutenant Warren seemed to always have a smile on her face. Leo could tell from how she spoke that she was an educated lady. There was something about her that made everything seem okay despite his situation.

  “You okay back there, Doc?” her co-pilot, a burly man named John, asked, turning his head to look over his shoulder into the rear of the copter.

  “I’m just peachy,” Leo quipped, unable to stop himself from being sarcastic.

  “Glad to hear it,” John grunted. “Wouldn’t want you freezing to death before we get you where you’re going.”

  John was older than Lieutenant Warren and gruffer too if you pushed him. A long, brown beard, flecked with gray, nearly covered his mouth and hung down from his chin. His voice was deep and loud. Though shorter than the lieutenant, John was all muscle.

  “How long until we get there?” Leo asked.

  He heard Lieutenant Warren laughing. “Look out your window, Doc. I’ll bring us around once so you can get a really good look at your new home.”

  Leo looked out to see the buildings of Delta Base. There were four structures standing amid the white of the endless snow. One was clearly the main b
ase. It was larger than the others and several communications dishes were mounted along its roof. Another had the appearance of a garage. He knew there were two rovers at Delta Base and the building had to be where they were kept. The other two buildings were much smaller in size. He suspected one was a supply depot and the other was home to the base’s main power generator. There was snow blowing about in the air as the copter circled above Delta Base and Lieutenant Warren brought it in for a landing.

  The copter set down on a snow-covered landing pad. Only its lights gave away its presence. Leo couldn’t imagine the kind of skill it took to fly a copter in arctic weather and land as easily as Lieutenant Warren had.

  “Welcome to Delta Base, Doc,” Lieutenant Warren told him as she powered down the copter.

  “Thanks,” Leo managed to say without being too grumpy about it he hoped.

  A man emerged from the main building, coming toward the copter. He was bundled up in a thick parka and wore dark glasses over his eyes. Leo instantly recognized that the man was a boiling keg of anger, narrowly controlled through sheer force of will. He didn’t normally get such strong psychic feelings about people in such a way but this man…he was as cold and deadly as death incarnate. Leo flinched in his seat. Lieutenant Warren must have noticed his reaction to the sight of the man because she frowned at him.

  “That’s Captain Dirk,” she said. “Trust me, you don’t ever want to get on his bad side, but he’s a good person at heart. The major likely sent him out to meet us.”

  The captain reached the copter before Leo was even down unbuckling himself. Captain Dirk opened its side door, allowing the frigid air outside to spill into the bird. Leo shivered as it washed over him.

  “Dr. Berkman?” Captain Dirk asked.

  Leo nodded, unable to speak, still reeling from his psychic impression of the captain.

  “I’m Captain Richard Dirk. I hope you have everything you need with you because there’s a storm rolling in and it will be impossible to fly anything else in for some time.”