maybe it was just a projection of him. I can’t explain any of this right now. We should probably have dinner and check on Amber. Then I’m going to get back on the radio. It’s our only hope.”
“What do you think that smell is? In the east sleeping wing?” She did not really need to ask this. After smelling death in the storage bay last night, she was well aware that it was the same smell emanating from the sleeping wing. The more important question she supposed, was what, or who was dead in the sleeping wing? But in the absence of sight, short of feeling the dead body, how would they figure it out?
Soren’s hands gently touched her kneecaps. “I don’t know.”
“Maybe we could tune in a radio station on the shortwave. See what, if anything, is happening in the rest of the world,” she suggested.
Something in Soren’s knees made a popping noise as he rose. “Good idea. I tried once and got only other languages. We’re pretty far north. But why don’t you try again? I’ll get something started for dinner.”
Despite bumped shins, generally stilted movement and falters, they were navigating blind in the station common room reasonably well. It was familiar and enclosed. If they were forced out onto the wide snowy plains and sharp mountains of Ellesmere for any length of time, they would not fare so well. However, Sasha could not shake the creepy feeling that someone could be watching them without their knowledge. But surely the dogs would warn them if someone else was in the station.
Sasha felt about for the small portable radio that she knew occupied the desk in the lab. She turned and pressed knobs until static emerged and then she twisted the dial on the side. Station after station, it was the same panoply of foreign languages that she had never before heard. These, even more than Vincent’s unexplained presence, the crater, the GPS, the blindness, the crazy dragon lady, the dead dogs, the thing that had called her perfect, the disappearance of all the other researchers, and Amber’s breakdown, were what scared her.
It was one thing for there to suddenly be a wormhole from the North to the South Pole, but it was quite another for there to be a wormhole between planets or worlds.
She continued fiddling with the dial. Surely there was one English-speaking station broadcasting somewhere. Or French. She could speak some French.
She leaned over the desk pressing the radio speakers to her ears, listening for even the faintest catch on a station. Then she felt it—the slight puff of warm air on the back of her neck, followed by the scent of cigarettes.
“Soren,” she said sharply.
“Yes?” Soren’s voice came from the kitchen area. He had not breathed on her neck. She had not mistaken the scent of wood smoke for the stench of cigarettes.
The dogs would warn them if someone else was in the station unless it was Kyle—Kyle, with whom they were familiar, even if they did not like him. The dogs, after several stern scoldings from Soren when they initially greeted Kyle with low growls and bared teeth, had lapsed into skirting him with a wary fury in their eyes.
“Timber,” she called.
Timber’s response was a deep threatening snarl.
Sasha leapt up from the desk and turned around. She did not want her back to Kyle. Not that it would do much good. Had he been here all along? Was he brandishing a knife or a gun?
“Soren,” she said again. “I don’t think we’re alone.”
Timber’s growl had intensified and Tundra, who had been lying over beside Soren, came to join him. Sasha heard Soren’s slow movements in her direction.
“Kyle, is that you?” she asked.
There was no response. She could hear the click of Timber’s nails on the floor, and then felt his rump hit her knees as he growled. Timber was shaking . Shivers vibrated through his hindquarters as he pressed his body against hers and continued to emit warning sounds.
What would make a husky shake like that?
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