Chapter Text
“You know, we don’t usually allow these kind of flights in the winter? It’s dangerous. Almost impossible to see, the wind kicks up. Fueling gets complicated. You should consider yourself lucky you don’t have to make another drive.”
Link pulled his beanie down over his eyes to blot out the world, grateful that the chatty pilot couldn’t see his exasperation. Hell, the desire for any sort of banter had eked out of him weeks ago, yet he had to endure. Half hoping his mic had a loose cord, he responded.
“How much longer ‘til we land?”
A curt laugh came through his headphones. “I can tell it’s your first time. Sorry, sir. We’ll be landing in just a few minutes. This field site is a bit closer than some of the other ones, so you’re in luck. Almost there.”
Almost there. The words had been rolling around in Link’s head for the better of three days now and didn’t mean anything to him anymore. He was in a limbo of ‘almost there.’ A frigid, merciless, black-skied liminal space he’d grown to hate with every inch of his person. The constant growl of engines were the new soundtrack to which he lived his life--a life he’d spent the last month of in commute from McMurdo Station to Amundsen-Scott, and now further to his designated campsite.
Just because he’d taken this job didn’t mean he had to enjoy the details of it. He wasn’t a bad researcher for hating how miraculously inaccessible and isolated Antarctica was. He was only human.
At the time of the offer, it’d set his sense of adventure on fire. The government wanted to pay him--a little-known professor with a doctorate in ecology--a ridiculous amount of money to join a team. Four scientists on the western ice sheet at the bottom of the world, and he was to be the fifth, one of two in the carbon recording field. He’d been flown in to replace an injured researcher, from what he could remember.
Four months in one of the most fascinating biomes on Earth. The opportunity of a lifetime.
Regret would’ve been too strong a word to condemn this experience with yet, but getting to the field site had been pure hell thus far... and his job hadn’t even started.
Long ago he’d stopped peering out the windows of the vehicles he traveled in. The excitement had turned into a horrifying realization that when there weren’t towns to look at, the horizon was just nothingness. The sun never rose. The cold never eased. Over time he’d learned to bury his nose into his shirt to savor the warmth of his own breath, which escaped the fibers of his long-johns in puffs of vapor.
When the pilot spoke again, it was into a radio.
“Otter 24k to Field Site 466, requesting skiway clearance for landing.”
The words caught and held Link’s attention, and he listened with bated breath.
“Field Site 466 to Otter 24k,” replied a woman’s voice in his ears, “skiway is clear. Exterior lights on. Clear for landing. Please take precautions. Good luck.”
Good luck? Pulling his hat up, Link squinted through the windshield of the passenger plane, challenging the darkness before them. He didn’t realize they were touching down until parallel rows of black flags breached the inky fog on either side of the craft, and the entire thing shook and rattled as it began its lengthy slide to a stop.
Once everything stilled, nothing had changed. The engine cut, and the pilot was moving to unbuckle himself from his seat, but out there in the tundra was still… nothing. The headlights fell onto pristine, untouched stretches of white and more flags.
“We’re here?” Link asked in a daze, plucking off his aviation headset.
“Yep,” the pilot responded boredly, opening the craft and kicking out into the frozen. Link hesitated before following suit, throwing his own door open and landing in the snow with a loud crunch.
Then it was there in front of him. A light in the distance. A glowing orb floating in space, the cut metal door below existing only in a curtain of light in the perpetual night.
Almost there.
Link jolted when the pilot thrust his backpack and duffel bag into his unsuspecting arms.
“Carry these? I gotta haul the supplies.”
“Sorry,” Link breathed, slipping his belongings onto his shoulders. “Can I help?”
“Even if I wanted help, you can’t. Against policy,” the pilot chuckled, slamming a hefty box down onto the ice. “Besides, you should go ahead. Get acquainted with your new housemates.”
Link did a double take between the ethereal door and his busied chauffeur. “I just walk up, and…?”
“Knock. Might feel alien out here, but we’re still human.”
Swallowing, Link adjusted his grip on his bags and finished the last stretch of his journey home for the next four months.
The metallic door boomed in the hush of whistling winds when he rapped his knuckles against it. Not a full second passed before it swung open and a young woman bundled from head to foot filled the doorway. The only part of her that wasn’t covered were her striking blue eyes, and she looked Link up and down swiftly.
“Doctor Neal. Come on in.”
She shifted to let him pass, putting one foot past the threshold to yell to the pilot as Link limped into the small, warmly-lit foyer. “Thanks, John! I’ll come collect them in a minute.”
With the door shut, suddenly Link was in a different world. The tight space was illuminated with a dim bulb that was blinding compared to the world outside. Snow caked and slumped near the door in preserved piles from boots trekking in. The walls were metal-- everything was metal--but tarps draped across them, padding and protecting them from the elements.
The woman pulled her head from its wrappings and shook out her neat-cut blonde hair. “Welcome, Neal. We’re glad to have you. I’m Jen Matichuk, and I am the lone astronomer at this site.” She offered a thickly gloved hand to Link, which he took and tried his best to squeeze in greeting.
“Nice to meet you, Doctor Matichuk.”
She smiled. “I know you’re exhausted, but the rest of the team is waiting in the common area. They’re excited to meet you. Not often we get a new face.” She crossed her arms and took a long time examining Link’s boots. “You at least have to say hello before turning in for the evening.”
“Okay.” Link didn’t realize he was out of breath until Jen smirked at him and pointed to his duffel bag. “I can take that to your room for you, if you like.”
“Ah, I’ve got it. Thanks though.”
“Suit yourself. If you’ll excuse me, Neal, I have cargo to tend to.”
Hearing his last name without the usual “doctor” tacked on before it would take getting used to, but he’d assumed last names would be preference here. When he’d read the information packet, the first thing he’d noted was that everyone here held a PhD. This was a group of equals--addressing one other with honorifics would get tiresome quickly.
With Matichuk gone, Link turned to face the inner sliding door, flexing his fingers to regain feeling before letting himself in.
The scene he opened it to was jarringly domestic.
A long room stretched before him. It started in a living area, dressed in warm orange lights with a couch and armchairs and a low coffee table--all arranged to face a projection screen on the wall across. Past that was a kitchen and a single picnic-style dining table. Racks of skis and ski poles, blankets, flatware, radios, and various other amenities lined the edges of the room on tall orange shelves, too much for Link to take in before addressing his colleagues.
Three people were here; the remainder of his housemates.
A young man with a round face and wispy brown beard sat on the couch, his limbs spread to lounge and smiling cordially. A second fellow with slight features, a baseball cap, and glasses had stopped doing dishes to gape along his shoulder at Link. And then the third, far too large for his seat at the dining table, who held a steaming coffee cup paused at lip-height. From between his wild, dark-blonde hair and full beard, he stared at the newcomer over reading glasses with profound severity until Link cleared his throat.
“Hello… everyone,” Link offered, sidling into the room with his bags.
“Welcome, Doctor Neal,” sang the boy from the couch, giving an amicable wave. “We’re glad to have you. We all look forward to working with you.”
“Yeah, for sure,” added the man doing dishes, tossing a dishrag over his shoulder. “Not a lot of people would volunteer for emergency night shift in this hellhole, no matter the compensation.”
“Chase Hilt,” introduced the boy from the couch, not missing a beat. “I’m Scherer’s research assistant here for the sequestration readings, despite the fact we have the same credentials.” He shot a humored glance over his shoulder at the one in the kitchen, who pointed back defiantly.
“Says the one who stipulated it that way in the grant request! You know as well as I do that it’s a partnership.”
Link chuckled through his fatigue, resting his bag on the floor. “Hilt, Scherer. Good to meet you, finally.” When he turned his attention to the man at the dining table, his smile ebbed. The guy was hunched forward, reading a book and drinking deep from his mug. Totally disinterested in Link’s grand arrival.
“I’m guessing… you’re Doctor McLaughlin?” The question was forced out cheerfully, an attempt to make light of the rude reception from the only person yet to speak.
“Mmm,” the man rumbled into his drink, blinking lazily, eyes fixed to his book. It wasn’t even enough to know whether the noise was meant as confirmation, or appreciation of his beverage.
“Don’t let him get to you,” Hilt said coolly, getting up to stand by Link. “Mick’s been here a really long time… way longer than any of us. He’s a good guy once you get to know him. He’s just… like that.”
“I can hear you,” the large one warned, turning a page in his book.
“‘Mick?’” Link echoed, brow furrowed.
“Oh, yeah. McLaughlin is a mouthful, so we shortened it for him.” Hilt grinned and set his hands on his hips. “Not as fun to say as ‘Matichuk,’ you know?”
“Hey, uh, Mick,” Link tried with a halfhearted nod.
When Mick finally looked up from his book and set his mug down, Link’s chest swelled with the satisfaction of acknowledgment… which rapidly deflated once Mick gave him a once-over and picked his mug back up.
“He’s gonna lose it out here,” Mick stated, finding his place in his novel.
Link felt his jaw go slack, indignant as he glanced from Scherer to Hilt. Scherer was quick to react, sweeping in and taking Mick’s coffee from him. “You can’t play nice with the other kids, you don’t get Josh Coffee.”
“Hey!” Mick barked, hands up at a loss. After Scherer dumped his mug into the sink and turned to give him a biting stare, he flopped his arms down onto the table. “Don’t waste supplies like that. I should write you up.”
When Matichuk came back inside carrying a massive box of supplies, she didn’t look perturbed that Scherer and Mick were hot at each other’s throats.
“You’d write me up over a cup of coffee?” Scherer scoffed incredulously, his smile fading fast.
“Damn straight. I was drinking that, you wasteful asshole.”
“It’s 9pm! You don’t need caffeine this late in the evening anyway!”
“I forgot you were the site dietitian. Oh wait--you’re not,” Mick smiled, shutting his book, taking off his glasses, and turning to face the other. “You just think you are.”
Link swallowed and spared another glance at Matichuk. She was watching the ceiling, face tired in a way that could only mean not again .
“You wanna cook the meals? Be my guest,” Scherer shot back. He put his full weight against the counter and watched Mick, tense.
“No one assigned you that responsibility. It’s not our fault you missed your calling for culinary school.”
“Really, you guys?” Matichuk piped up, letting the box in her arms free-fall to the floor in a crash. “Neal just got here. Scherer, don’t antagonize him. Mick, what’s your deal?”
Mick jumped on the question like a wolf presented with fresh game, teeth bared and eyes piercing. “My deal is that they keep sending us these baby-faces to work with, damn well knowing what’s gonna happen to ‘em. I read through ‘Doctor Neal’ here’s background history. You know what he does for a livin’, up north? He’s a professor. They keep feeding people who aren’t ready for this environment into my damned team, and it shows!”
When Mick rose from his seat like a brewing storm, his head nearly hit the ceiling. Dread drove Link back a step into the wall, as if the giant wasn’t halfway across the room.
“Y’all act like you don’t know that’s what happened to Punch, but you do. He broke. Kept it in until he lost it. The kid’d been here longer than all of you!” Mick snatched his novel from the tabletop and headed for the mouth of a hallway at the far end of the kitchen. “I’m sick of them promising glamour to folks naive enough to come searchin’ for some sort of experience out of this shit.”
He vanished into the unit. Seconds later, a door slammed somewhere.
Link swallowed once, twice, looking between the remaining three researchers to read their reactions. When Hilt turned to him with the same, unaffected smile, Link’s eyebrows rose, uneasy.
“Want to watch a movie with us? I’ve got The Thing on my iPod.”
The incident from the common room cycled through Link’s head on loop as bathwater gushed and gurgled into the tub, filling the washroom in an unfathomably pleasant blanket of steam. He shed his dirty clothes to the floor, too distracted to let the sour stench of sweat and dirt from a month of traveling and sink-baths get to him.
Once the basin had filled with promises of cleanliness, Link lowered himself into the water and instantly felt the difference on his bruised muscles. He sank down to his chin, letting out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, loving the way the warmth coiled into his nose and lungs.
After the initial soreness had eased, the heat working over his limbs like meat set to thaw, there was nothing to keep Link from obsessing over the apparent work environment nightmare he’d gotten himself into. He’d only just arrived, and already one of the four people he had to work with-- live with--hated him. Mick hadn’t even spoken to him directly, just tried to disengage until the others had made him explode--like cutting the wrong wires on a bomb.
Part of him felt guilty--as if he’d entered a stranger’s house and upset the balance of their home life. The disappointment on Matichuk’s face when she’d returned to find that an argument had riled up the team? He’d caused that.
Another part of him was angry. This field site didn’t belong to Mick. It was a workplace. A hostile one, apparently.
The time he’d spent looking over the federal dossiers about his position and expectations had given him the information he needed to handle a professional job:
You have been assigned to the Carbon Record team, headed by lead researcher Rhett McLaughlin, Field Site 466. All reports and findings must be turned into and/or discussed with McLaughlin; during your time in-field, McLaughlin will act as your direct supervisor.
Or that was everything he’d thought he’d needed to know. They didn’t mention his veteran status at the post, nor any potential emotional or mental instabilities. Maybe he didn’t have any. Maybe it was just Link that had set him off.
Link rested his chin on the side of the tub, regretting it when the bite of cold metal seared his skin. With a resigned sigh he picked up the bar of soap and started scrubbing, washing the filth from his pits and groin.
The last part of him was undeniably wounded. Childish as it was to admit, he had never handled conflict and confrontation well; even problematic students in his classes who got aggressive over grades or attendance issues typically ruined his day--and that had been in the born-and-raised comfort of North Carolina.
Amazing, how even in the most forsaken land in the world, he still had the capacity to be soft-skinned.
Was he really just a glory-hunter? Seeking some sort of self-satisfaction from taking this position? It aligned with the excitement that had coursed through him upon receiving the offer...
He slipped beneath the water’s surface to wet his hair before massaging his roots with shampoo, rubbing too hard and too hurried.
Even if he was, it was too late to feel bad about it. He’d just have to tough it out--both of them would. Like it or not, Mick had to work with him. It was his job. They didn’t have to be friendly with one another to complete the tasks they were here for. Besides, the other team members had been perfectly pleasant right off the bat: Matichuk, with her powerful aura and peacekeeping agenda; Scherer, with his good sense of humor and backbone of steel; Hilt, the spot of unflinching sunshine in a sunless world.
They would get him through this. They’d be his support system for dealing with Mick.
As he unplugged the tub--body more tender than it had been in months--Link envisioned his anxieties draining out with the cloudy water.
“So, this is your room,” Matichuk indicated, opening yet another ubiquitous steel door and allowing Link entry into a space not much larger than a closet.
“Thank you.” Link hauled his bags into the tight quarters.
“Sure. The bed is a twin, so it’ll take some adjusting to get used to. Do whatever you want with your space, just make sure communal areas are kept free of your personal belongings. Wake-up is technically at eight, but since there’s no day or night here, we tend to be pretty leisurely with when we tackle our daily duties. ‘Cept Mick,” she nodded, then gave Link an apologetic look. “Which… I guess that means you get up at eight.”
“Understood. Thanks for everything. I know it wasn’t your job to welcome me, so I appreciate it,” Link admitted, unable to resist plopping down onto his bed in heat-fed exhaustion.
“No problem. I wouldn’t trust those dorks to welcome a stranger properly. And uh… don’t let Mick get to you, yeah? He’s really not a bad guy. He just cares too much.” She watched Link with a sympathetic grimace. “Works too hard.”
Link shrugged listlessly. “I’ll see, I guess. Don’t have much choice.”