Gillian Anderson - The Sound of Seas

“And, with it, an ancient bacterium for which there is no known cure,” Siem added.

“The price of science,” Mikel replied. “How do you know there aren’t any of those vessels or creatures out here? You yourself, the others—you all saw a burning face.”

“We think we did, which is my point exactly,” Siem said. “The air, the cold, the magnetic pole, the movement of vast oceans around us and under us—the isolation . I’ve listened to the scientists as I work on the gear. It all affects the mind. That’s why we rely on impartial equipment, on data, to tell us what is real and what is not. And there is nothing that confirms a jot of this right now.”

“As I said, there won’t be,” Mikel replied. He was still looking over at the scientists. Two had left, leaving Bundy and glaciologist Dr. Victoria Cummins alone with their laptops. Mikel clapped his good hand appreciatively on Siem’s shoulder.

“Thank you for your advice, my friend,” Mikel said.

“You are welcome,” Siem replied. “Good luck getting out of this with your life,” he added as the archaeologist walked away.

Mikel didn’t know whether the engineer was referring to the impromptu meeting with a hostile scientist or the mission he proposed to undertake.

Probably both , Mikel thought. Siem was not wrong. But Casey Skett had left him no other opitions.

Dr. Bundy was facing Mikel as he approached. The geologist looked drawn but his brown eyes were as lively as ever. His natural frown deepened as Mikel neared.

“Speak of the bloody bête noire,” the middle-aged scientist said.

Dr. Cummins turned. Her gray eyes were pale against skin that was still bronze from a long, very recent research trip down the Amazon River. A glaciologist, she had spent four months studying the drop of sea levels in the region during the last ice age. Dr. Cummins was in her midforties, her dull red hair streaked with gray and pulled into a single tight braid. She said she had used it in Brazil to swat flies, like a horse.

“Doctors,” Mikel said in the conciliatory tone he used when he needed something.

The woman nodded and flashed a thin smile. Bundy looked back at his colleague as though they hadn’t been interrupted.

“Exhausting all preliminary, standard explanations for a jet of flame in the South Pole,” Bundy said, recapping, “and categorizing, for now, as a form of mass hysteria the shape that appeared to be a face of fire we all saw before that , we also happened to be talking—Dr. Jasso—about the way you hijacked my truck just before the explosion, as if you knew the bloody thing were about to happen.”

“I didn’t,” Mikel said. “Not exactly.”

“Meaning?”

“While I was in the caverns, I saw a ball of fire,” Mikel said. “It appeared to be—well, looking for a way out.”

“Consciously seeking an exit?” Dr. Cummins asked.

“It didn’t act like any flame I ever saw,” Mikel said evasively.

Bundy pinned the archaeologist with a look. “To be specific—a quality you seem reluctant to embrace—you referred to that phenomenon as being, and I quote from vivid memory, ‘What a soul looks like when it is sent back to hell.’ Since you happen to be here, despite being uninvited to my table and a private meeting—”

“In a public space,” Mikel pointed out.

“Public for members of this party,” Bundy said. “Putting that aside for the moment, would you care to explain and elaborate, Dr. Jasso?”

Before he could speak, Dr. Cummins said, “Mind you, I am very much inclined, as I just told Dr. Bundy, to ascribe the face to some version of Saint Elmo’s fire.” She tapped her laptop. “There was a coronal discharge and a very strong electric field in the region at that time. The crackling could have been mistaken for a voice.”

“Which supports my theory of collective hypnosis of a sort,” Bundy said, resuming their previous debate as if he had not spoken to Mikel at all. “We heard a voice and, therefore, we saw a face.”

“But Dr. Harvey’s point about rising gas catching and refracting sunlight must also be given consideration,” Dr. Cummins said, more to Mikel than to Bundy. “The motion of the gas and the sun itself would cause it to appear to move.”

Mikel pulled out a chair and sat easily to avoid shocking his bruised posterior. “It was not any kind of gas or luminous plasma, Dr. Cummins. The fire was not an illusion from out there.” He motioned vaguely toward the ceiling and the sky beyond. “The flame was real, it came from below.”

“Bloody rubbish,” Dr. Bundy said. “There is nothing active down there. Nothing that would have caused fire to spit up like that. We are still not reading any kinds of energy bursts, nor are any of the other outposts we’ve contacted. The RAF is looking into a possible missile strike, or space debris.”

“They can look all they want,” Mikel said with confidence that bordered on calculated smugness. “It was geologic.”

“This is not goddamn Yosemite,” Bundy said with rising anger. “We are not sitting on a bloody supervolcano.”

“Not now, no,” Mikel agreed.

Bundy exhaled, loudly. “You know, I keep hoping for bloody science from you,” he said, “and am constantly denied.” Then he spat a series of expletives. Despite his long string of degrees, the man had the mouth of a North Sea oil-rig worker, which is how he put himself through school. It was also the reason he made a point not to mingle with anyone who didn’t have a PhD. That part of his life was done. It was the only reason Mikel was allowed at the table, despite the strikes against him. If not openly blacklisted, Siem and the other engineers were definitely graylisted.

Dr. Cummins turned fully to the new arrival. “I don’t disagree that there is some kind of latent, potential danger out there,” she said quietly. “That is precisely what Dr. Bundy and I have been discussing. But what do you mean? What do you know? As far as we and our very sophisticated, very expensive instruments can tell, there is nothing down there, no caldera, no ancient lava flows, nothing even extinct.”

There was a hint of sarcasm in her voice. Mikel didn’t mind; at least she was asking questions.

“The key phrase is ‘As far as we can tell,’” Mikel said. “There are lava tubes down there. I’ve been in them. There are massive wind tunnels. That is how I got this.” He raised his slinged arm.

“Dormant!” Bundy said. “Not presently active !”

“And, if I have been correctly advised, all of that seen in the dark, in the cold, by a battered and confused man in an environment where the senses might be easily confused!” Dr. Cummins said. She nodded toward Siem. “That, from a man who was with you part of the time.”

“Exactly so,” Bundy said. “Where is the bloody proof ?”

“That, Doctors, is why I am here now,” Mikel said calmly, cutting through the debate. “I want to go out and get it.”

“You want to go back out ?”

“I want to conduct firsthand research,” Mikel said. “That’s what archaeologists do. Research. In the field.”

Bundy laughed. “Brilliant. And you want my blessing?”

“If not that, then at least a conveyance of some kind, even a very modest one.”

Bundy was still laughing. “As much as I would love to be rid of you,” he replied, “what you propose is absurdly unsafe. Even if the winds were calm—and they’re fickle, having just today approached sixty miles an hour and climbing again—we don’t know the status of the ice cover around that crater. It may not hold a vehicle of any kind. Or even a man.”