“But the most important thing we can do right now is, you guessed it, stay calm. Going ballistic when we have no way of reaching the outside world isn’t going to help matters. Blaming me or the admin staff might feel good in the short term, but it’s not going to restore our satellite uplink. I called all of you in here today so you could see we’re doing our best to solve the problem. We are still in a safe, stable environment”—a snort met his statement, but he bulled on—“and we’re just a short time away from returning everything back to normal.”
He felt the gazes of Taylor, Keene, Ayres, and Deb boring into him, but he refused to look in their direction. They’d all agreed—with dissension on Ayres’s part, but eventual capitulation—that it would be in everyone’s best interests to maintain the fabrication that the communications failure was an accident and that normal comms would be restored soon. They could continue spooling out excuses for weeks if they had to, but the truth, he knew, would start a riot. End with a positive message .
“In the meantime,” he began, but—Jesus Christ —just as he was set to launch into his message the lights in the gym went out, plunging the room into darkness.
For one startled moment, he thought he could still see thanks to the impression burned on his retina. Then someone screamed and he was jostled as people began moving, shouting, gasping.
“Taylor!” he shouted, though he had no idea what his security chief could do in the absolute blackness.
Just as the pitch of the voices began climbing the ramp to hysteria, the lights came back on as suddenly as they’d gone out. The forty-some crew members froze in place, looking around wild-eyed and frightened.
Hanratty dove into the pause as though nothing had happened. “In the meantime , please return to your duties as posted or required. I know it’s a difficult thing to do, but bear in mind that the early South Pole crews went all nine months without contact. Even just a few decades ago, the base passed the winter without a single radio broadcast. We are no less capable than any of those brave explorers. We’ve got technology, the accumulated experience of decades, and our ability to work together, all on our side. As Ernest Shackleton himself said, ‘Difficulties are just things to overcome, after all.’”
But the crowd was unmoved and he soon found himself pressed by a half-dozen scared and angry Polies. At his signal, Taylor, Keene, Deb, and even a reluctant Ayres moved forward to mingle with the crowd and start damage control while he fielded questions from the angriest crew members, willing to be the lightning rod if it meant keeping the crew at large calm.
The worst part, he thought as he nodded sympathetically to a red-faced Dave Boychuck, was that someone in the room—someone he’d be talking to, reassuring, and making empty promises to—knew exactly what had happened, why, and what was coming next.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
“Do I have to remind you that midwinter comes but once a year? Please don’t make me come dig you out of that filthy garage.”
Cass smiled. “Oh, you won’t have to.”
Biddi looked at her in the mirror above the sink. “You sound so sure of yourself. Are you a social butterfly now?”
“Pete said they’ve been hoarding goodies for months to celebrate. And I, for one, am tired of eating white lettuce and Wonder bread for every meal.”
“I hear you. What was last night’s dinner supposed to be, again? It was disgusting.”
“Beef stroganoff.”
“The hamburger was the color of used bubble gum.”
“Stop right there,” she said, pointing the toilet bowl brush at her friend. After four months of living in a confined space, the crew at Shackleton had become a little lax in their personal hygiene and bathroom habits. It was her turn to clean commodes and she didn’t need any more grotesque thoughts in her head.
“And the noodles were like the insides of a fish’s belly, all wiggly and white.”
She started to laugh. “Oh my God.”
“And the gravy? It was like they had dumped a tub of man juice over the top—”
“Biddi! For Christ’s sake.” Cass leaned against the side of the stall, shoulders shaking with laughter. Clad in rubber gloves, she had to use her forearm to wipe the tears away.
Biddi turned around. “It’s good to see you laugh again, lady. You’ve been as sober as a judge for weeks now, and I don’t mean in a good way. You should get out more.”
The comment was meant as a question, but Cass gently deflected it. “You’re making up for both of us.”
Biddi harrumphed, taking the hint. “What do you think of Hanratty’s little hootenanny in the gym?”
“About the fact that all of our communications are down or the way in which he told us?”
“Both. Either. Whatever suits your fancy.”
“Comms going down is terrifying in one way, but, as much as I hate to admit it, Hanratty had a point. None of the explorers who came before us had anything like our safety nets.” Cass squirted blue cleaner into the toilet and swirled her magic wand around the bowl. “We’ll have a few nervous days, they’ll fix whatever’s wrong, and in a month we won’t even remember that it happened.”
Biddi grunted. “It doesn’t bother you a tad that half of those explorers died?”