Robert Masello - Blood and Ice

“Goddammit!” Darryl cried, and a second later Michael could see why-the quivering fish stopped moving, its body straightened out, and as Michael looked on with amazement, a fine latticework of ice swiftly rippled across its entire length in a chain reaction, turning it as stiff as a board and as dead as a doornail. Slowly it floated, staring and transparent, back to the surface of the tank.

Michael was confused. “But I thought you said these fish had antifreeze in their blood.”

“They do,” Darryl said mournfully, “and that's what keeps them alive in supercool water, at the lower depths. But ice floats, remember, and so it doesn't penetrate the benthic regions. If these fish actually come into contact with ice, the ice crystals act as a nucleus, a propagating agent, and overwhelm their defenses.”

“Geez,” Osmond said, holding his wet cap in his hands now. “I'm really sorry. I never knew something like that could happen.” He looked around at the others to see if he was in serious trouble.

“It's all right, mate,” Calloway said. “If it's no good to the beakers, it's still fine for the bouillabaisse.”

“Not this one,” Darryl said. “I can still thaw it out and drain the blood.”

“The blood,” Calloway said, dubiously. “That's what you want?”

“That blood, my friend, contains secrets the world will be very glad to have one day.”

Calloway tapped Osmond on the sleeve, as if to say ‘Let's leave the loonies to their crazy experiments,’ and they skulked off toward the door. “I'm sure you're right about that, Doc,” he said, then they ducked out into a blast of howling wind and whirling snow.

Darryl picked up a pair of tongs, lifted the icefish out by its tail, and laid it on the counter. It was so hard it actually wobbled in place.

“Now I can see why you don't exactly put out the welcome mat to the lab,” Michael said.

“And why I wanted that lock,” Darryl replied. But then, picking up a scalpel, he plunged right back into his work as if Michael wasn't even there. A minute or two later, Michael pulled on all his gear and went out into the teeth of the gathering storm.

December 15

The gale, rather than passing through, seemed to have settled down over the base, and Murphy's lockdown order, to Michael's frustration, was still in effect. No one was leaving the compound for any reason. “Wherever those bodies are, they're frozen stiff,” Murphy told him, “and the dogs, well, they know how to survive.”

Michael had to take his word on that.

Word of Danzig's death had of course cast a dismal pall over the base, and the memorial service, held in the rec hall, was crowded. The Ping-Pong table was folded up and pushed out into the corridor, and an assortment of desk chairs was wheeled in to join the sofas, but there still weren't enough for everyone to sit on. The rest of the grunts and beakers simply sat around on the threadbare wall-to-wall carpeting, their arms wrapped around their knees, as Murphy stood up in front of the blank plasma-screen TV He was wearing, in acknowledgment of the occasion, a dark necktie over his denim shirt.

“I know a lot of you knew Erik a lot better than I did, so I want to leave time for all of you to say something.”

Michael had almost forgotten that Danzig had a first name; in the fratlike atmosphere of the base, most everyone went by a last name, or a nickname.

“But personally, I never knew a guy who was more up for anything, anytime-except for maybe Lawson.”

There was some low laughter, and Lawson, who was sitting against the wall with Michael and Charlotte and Darryl, smiled shyly.

“And those dogs-man, did he love those dogs.” He lowered his head and shook it sadly. “Whatever went wrong there, whatever happened to make Kodiak go off like that-a brain tumor, a fever-the weird thing is, I know that, even now, Danzig-Erik- would have understood it. Those dogs loved him as much as he loved them.” He ran a hand over his own head. “And that's why we are going to find the other dogs. I promise you-we're going to find them for him.”

“When?” one of the grunts called out.

“Soon as it's safe,” Murphy replied. “And when we know that the other dogs aren't affected in the same way.”

The threat of contagion hadn't actually occurred to Michael. What if the other huskies had contracted something from Kodiak? What if they'd all become killers?

Murphy looked down at some notes he had in his hand. “I don't know how much a lot of you knew about Danzig's life out in the real world, but for the record he was married to a great woman- Maria-who's a county coroner.” The immediate irony of that stopped him for a second. “She's living down in Florida.”

Miami Beach, Michael remembered.

“I've spoken to her a couple of times now, and told her everything she needed to know, and she said she wanted me to give her blessing to everyone down here-especially Franklin, Calloway and Uncle Barney, for all the grits and gravy-and thank you all for your friendship. She said he was never happier than when he was down here, on the back of the sled, with the temperature thirty below.” He glanced nervously at the papers again. “And oh yeah, she wanted me to say a special thanks to Dr. Charlotte Barnes, for trying so hard to save his life-”

All eyes turned toward Charlotte, whose chin was resting atop her folded arms. She gave a small nod.

“-and Michael Wilde.”

Michael was caught off guard.

“Seems he'd been telling her a lot about you, Michael, something about how you were gonna make him famous.”

“I'll still do my best,” Michael said, just loudly enough for all to hear.

“He told Maria there were going to be photographs of him and the dogs-the last dogs, I don't need to remind anyone, that you'll ever see down here-in that magazine of yours, Eco-World.”

It was Eco-Travel, but Michael wasn't about to correct him. “There will be,” Michael said, appropriating the editor's prerogative. In fact, he'd try to persuade Gillespie to put a shot of Danzig and the sled dogs on the cover sometime. It was the least he could do.

While Murphy offered up a few more details about Danzig's life-apparently, he'd worked a million different jobs, from beekeeper to dog catcher to mortuary chauffeur (“that's how he met Maria”)-Michael just kept his head down and thought his own thoughts. For one thing, he meant to get Maria's home address before he left the base; he still had Danzig's walrus-tooth necklace, and he wanted to mail it back to her as soon as he was back in civilization. Maybe with a print of a shot he'd taken of her husband, in all his glory, sledding through a snowstorm.

He also knew he should be calling the Nelsons’ house back in Tacoma; he wanted to hear how the move had gone and whether Kristin had shown any sign at all of being aware that she was back in her old house. He pretty much knew what the answer would be- and he knew that it would be Karen who'd tell him-but still he felt that it was his duty to keep checking in. And he wondered how long that would continue; from what he knew of comas and vegetative states, Kristin could go on indefinitely.

Uncle Barney, sitting a few feet away, blew his nose loudly into a red handkerchief. Murphy was telling a story about some colossal meal Danzig had consumed.

Calloway stood up next and told a long, funny anecdote about once trying to cram Danzig into a regulation-size diving suit, and Betty and Tina talked about how helpful Danzig had been one day when they were trying to unload some ice cores in a driving storm. Michael could hear the blizzard that was raging, whistling around the narrow windows and the corrugated steel walls of the module they were all sitting in. It could abate in an hour, or it could go on for another solid week. At pole, he had learned, all bets were off.