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Authors: Christa Faust, Gabriel Hunt
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gently.
“Yes?”
Velda’s voice.
Gabriel pushed open the door to reveal a tiny dorm-like room. Two narrow beds and not much else. Twin footlockers, a small halogen reading lamp burning on one of them. Velda sat on one of the beds, her long legs drawn up beneath her chin like an anxious child. She wasn’t crying, but there had been a flash of vulnerability in her face that quickly submerged when she saw Gabriel enter the room. She unfolded her legs and stood to meet him. Her thick, auburn hair was down around her face
“I was just looking for the…” Gabriel began, hand motioning pointlessly in the direction of the door, but she cut him off.
“Come here,” she said.
She reached out to pull Gabriel into an embrace. Her lips were just inches from his, barely parted and begging for a kiss. Who was he to argue? He gave her what she wanted and she gave it back in spades, her fierce, urgent heat threatening to melt through the polar ice beneath them.
After, they lay entwined and spent in a tangle of blankets, sharing a warm, comfortable silence. Gabriel found himself drifting just on the edge of sleep when Velda spoke, almost too soft to hear.
“I have to know,” Velda said. “I can’t stand not knowing.”
“I understand,” Gabriel replied, reaching down to brush her hair back off her forehead.
He did, too. His own parents had vanished, not in the frozen Antarctic but in the heat of the Mediterranean. They’d been on a speaking tour at the end of 1999 (the theme had been prophecies surrounding the turn of the millennium) when the ship they were traveling on had vanished for three days. When it had appeared again, not a living soul had been on board, just three crew members with their throats cut. Gabriel remembered all too clearly the ache of waiting for news, of not knowing. Every time a body washed up and was identified as one of the other passengers, Gabriel was torn between feeling relieved and feeling resentful that others were being set free to mourn while he and Michael and their sister, Lucy, remained in the purgatory of not knowing. It was a terrible thing to lose hope, but terrible, too, to have it—to carry the burden of hope from day to day, watching as the odds grew slimmer, but being denied the respite of their ever dropping to zero.
In the end, the bodies of Ambrose and Cordelia Hunt had never been found. The U.S. government had declared them dead, a verdict Gabriel had reluctantly accepted—he’d certainly never been able to turn up any evidence to the contrary, and he’d tried. But acceptance wasn’t the same as closure. He understood why Velda wanted closure.
“I begged him to come home,” she said. “When I was here last, six months ago—I told him, Papa, you’re seventy-five years old, you gave up teaching ten years ago, why can’t you stop and come home? But he said no. ‘Now more than ever, with global warming…’ ” She threw up her hands. “He felt his expertise was needed. He said he’d never be able to live with himself if he left the problem to others.”
“Maybe he was right,” Gabriel said.
“But now he’s vanished,” Velda said, “and all his expertise with him.” She turned to Gabriel. “It’s more than just not knowing if he’s alive or dead. I can’t help thinking that my father may have made the discovery of a lifetime. Even if…” Her voice caught, and she stared up at the low ceiling, collecting herself. “Even if he didn’t make it,” she said, finally, her voice steady and controlled, “I feel like the world should know about his discovery. It would be his legacy.”
Gabriel nodded, about to say something reassuring, but Velda didn’t let him speak. She pressed her lips to his and seconds later, what ever thoughts he’d been entertaining went out of his head entirely.
Chapter 9
“There,” Nils said, pointing across the icy wasteland. “On the left, about ten o’clock.”
Gabriel squinted through the Spryte’s frosty
“Yes?”
Velda’s voice.
Gabriel pushed open the door to reveal a tiny dorm-like room. Two narrow beds and not much else. Twin footlockers, a small halogen reading lamp burning on one of them. Velda sat on one of the beds, her long legs drawn up beneath her chin like an anxious child. She wasn’t crying, but there had been a flash of vulnerability in her face that quickly submerged when she saw Gabriel enter the room. She unfolded her legs and stood to meet him. Her thick, auburn hair was down around her face
“I was just looking for the…” Gabriel began, hand motioning pointlessly in the direction of the door, but she cut him off.
“Come here,” she said.
She reached out to pull Gabriel into an embrace. Her lips were just inches from his, barely parted and begging for a kiss. Who was he to argue? He gave her what she wanted and she gave it back in spades, her fierce, urgent heat threatening to melt through the polar ice beneath them.
After, they lay entwined and spent in a tangle of blankets, sharing a warm, comfortable silence. Gabriel found himself drifting just on the edge of sleep when Velda spoke, almost too soft to hear.
“I have to know,” Velda said. “I can’t stand not knowing.”
“I understand,” Gabriel replied, reaching down to brush her hair back off her forehead.
He did, too. His own parents had vanished, not in the frozen Antarctic but in the heat of the Mediterranean. They’d been on a speaking tour at the end of 1999 (the theme had been prophecies surrounding the turn of the millennium) when the ship they were traveling on had vanished for three days. When it had appeared again, not a living soul had been on board, just three crew members with their throats cut. Gabriel remembered all too clearly the ache of waiting for news, of not knowing. Every time a body washed up and was identified as one of the other passengers, Gabriel was torn between feeling relieved and feeling resentful that others were being set free to mourn while he and Michael and their sister, Lucy, remained in the purgatory of not knowing. It was a terrible thing to lose hope, but terrible, too, to have it—to carry the burden of hope from day to day, watching as the odds grew slimmer, but being denied the respite of their ever dropping to zero.
In the end, the bodies of Ambrose and Cordelia Hunt had never been found. The U.S. government had declared them dead, a verdict Gabriel had reluctantly accepted—he’d certainly never been able to turn up any evidence to the contrary, and he’d tried. But acceptance wasn’t the same as closure. He understood why Velda wanted closure.
“I begged him to come home,” she said. “When I was here last, six months ago—I told him, Papa, you’re seventy-five years old, you gave up teaching ten years ago, why can’t you stop and come home? But he said no. ‘Now more than ever, with global warming…’ ” She threw up her hands. “He felt his expertise was needed. He said he’d never be able to live with himself if he left the problem to others.”
“Maybe he was right,” Gabriel said.
“But now he’s vanished,” Velda said, “and all his expertise with him.” She turned to Gabriel. “It’s more than just not knowing if he’s alive or dead. I can’t help thinking that my father may have made the discovery of a lifetime. Even if…” Her voice caught, and she stared up at the low ceiling, collecting herself. “Even if he didn’t make it,” she said, finally, her voice steady and controlled, “I feel like the world should know about his discovery. It would be his legacy.”
Gabriel nodded, about to say something reassuring, but Velda didn’t let him speak. She pressed her lips to his and seconds later, what ever thoughts he’d been entertaining went out of his head entirely.
Chapter 9
“There,” Nils said, pointing across the icy wasteland. “On the left, about ten o’clock.”
Gabriel squinted through the Spryte’s frosty
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