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2 Interruptions and Early Arrivals

(Narrator)

As the couple journey south toward the tree line and winters shelter the sled driver(Luki) reflects both the weather and on his recent meeting with one of the fine Ministers of Parliament (universally known as MPs in Canada).

(Luki)

In the years of my life I had never seen a storm like this, my wife of now two years and I headed south away from the white man’s Naval Station. I have my dogs in the trances, my wife and our supplies ride the sled. Why the MP had to meet me here I do not understand, perhaps he wanted to impress me with the works around us, but the navy base is an abomination to both the land and the arctic sea. The sea and land will raise up to reclaim from man the white vistas of undisturbed tundra. Perhaps it was a better place to meet, as the MP was at ease, expecting nothing but the satisfaction of passing platitudes and the pain of patting one’s own back.

The MP who came is not of the same feelings to the land as the MP who now waits for her flight south. The ancient works of some long lost African mystic resided in the legionary medallion that rode in a pouch on my side. Its power had again been demonstrated and the former Minister of Parliament is now in custody of company security who doubt the sanity of the small, aged Inuit male, while her body is now maintained by the soul of one of our own. We have not the money, nor the voting block to influence parliament so our tribes are now taking a covert means to represent ourselves in the country’s houses of power, since 1867, only two senators and five MPs of Inuit origin have sat in the Canadian Houses of Parliament.

(Narrator)

As if destined by demented spirits, the destruction of all who travel on this storm sweep land, the sudden arrival from the sky of torn and rent structures of metal, disrupted and devastated the sled bound couple and their loyal companions. Of the seven dogs, only four remained, the others having been chewed upon by the turbine driven fan of a detached engine pod. Neither sign nor scent was now to be found of the lead dog’s mate. Luki’s wife of but just two summers was now a red garnish on the blackened land to the right of the sled. If she had not needed to stretch her legs for a bit she might have survived, the sled its self had been barely touched by the slap of the gods. Oddly enough there was an occupant strapped to a seat, which in turn resided in the wreckage of the fuselage. The existence to anyone or thing living through the destruction and subsequent arrival of earth bound debris had been unlikely and nature was now in the process of correcting this aberration.

(Luki)

In the dark heavens above, lighting flashed and frozen rain in the density of buckshot at full velocity enveloped us. As I stopped to prepare a shelter my wife left the sled to stretch. With a scream heard above the storm, hell descended upon us. I saw my wife receive the weight of the rent remains of an airplane, as it impacted to the right of the sled. Most of the fuselage then tore apart and traveled on in pathways abhorrent to nature or man. I saw a body in a chair, which no longer had legs or arms, suggestions of tissue on the wreckage around which indicated that they had kept traveling even though the body had not. Of any others, there could be no survivors as no remains larger than a truck engine in size remained.

I ran to see if the soul still survived and heard a groan among the death gurgles of it’s ruptured chest. My wife’s lap robe still in my arms and the medallion in my pouch, I lay the medallion upon the torn chest and covered the poor soul with the robe in hope that the robe in its residence of protecting my wife from the elements had become imbued with her nature. Leaving the medallion and the robe to do what they would do, if possible. I turned to survey the destruction. Part of my team of dogs had been dispatched while those who survived were pinned in place by the thrust of an anonymous shaft through part of the sled’s traces. I now have a team of four dogs, my lead dog and three others. Of his mate, the only bitch in the team, no sign remains. If indeed this poor soul survives, I will need to shed supplies to leave this consecrated and dammed land in its repose. Why I bother trying to save the soul as it lays in what is left of the plane, I do not know. If I shed supplies, I will have too few supplies to reach either the base or the closest encampment of my people with two human souls and my four legged crew to feed. Of my wife and dogs, I would grieve later.

I removed one of the emergency locater beacons from its travel case and activate it. I do not know if the black boxes from the craft survived, if they are in the remains that now litter this portion of tundra, or even if the craft contained them. I could care less but there is little need for more lives to be put to risk looking for this missing craft and fresh ice and snow will cover the site before this storm is over.

(Passenger)

Pain, knifes and needles, as my nerves protested the stresses of our falling craft, a flash of white light within a tunnel lead away, suddenly darkness as a flat weight spreads itself over me, much like a blanket when I was a child followed by a shock then…nothing.

(Narrator)

Under the sled robe, the broken sample of humanity, still strapped into what had once been a plush seat in the corporations aircraft, underwent changes that would make practitioners of medicine around the world envious and the masses of humanity more fervent believers of their deities. The gaping wounds in the chest and groin shrank and closed meanwhile the stumps of legs and arms sealed on their bleeding ends and started to elongate. While growth occurred overall, the overall mass and dimensions of the corpus decreased.

(Luki)

I set camp in the lee of a ridge of ice, snow and earth, creating a simple snow cave. I had not planned a half day stop but If I am to save the soul still strapped in the seat I would need the time to stabilize it and prepare it for what is to come. At this point it seemed that it would initially survive. The movements I have seen would not have occurred were life not present. With my umiuk I cut the belts still binding this soul to the remains of the fuselage and with them enfolded within the robe I bring them into my shelter. I returned to the wreck to recover the carry-on case I had seen when removing the lone survivor, perhaps the contents will be of some help later. Once back in the shelter, I commence to warm snow for hot water, I will prepare a broth mixed with herbs that will infuse energy and at the same time ease the users mind, a native tranquilizer and hallucinogen to ease the troubled thoughts sure to occur.

(Passenger)

I’m awake, my stomach calls me to move from the warm embrace of my robe. As I stand a charm falls to my feet. From where came this torn and strained clothing, light weight rags, I wonder. Looking around for something familiar, I twig as I see a pack, it feels wrong yet seems correct I proceed to strip, and find myself dressing in the clothing contained within, after which I accept the bowl he hands to me. My hunger slowly abates and the tension I had not realized was within me had dissipated. I feel off, even wrong but now it no longer seems to bother me.

(Narrator)

Indeed the medallion adapted and rescued this soul from its eminent demise, however confusion reigned, in the pending pain of death the thought processes that should reside within corpus recovered, has tarried behind the recovery of the body and ghostly memories still residing in the neural connections of the predecessors cranium by default become the driving thoughts for the time being, The feeling of wrongness will worry and play with the threads of the damaged soul calling it to come out and play.

(Luki)

To my surprise she awoke and dressed herself, accepting the broth she drank deeply and in Inuktitut, she spoke, asking for more. I quarried as to her memory, of neither a life with me nor that of another did she recall. I tell her that for now her name is Arnatsiq. I tell her to sleep now we will talk later. We slept together, much better to share the heat of our bodies than to waste what we need to stay the cold. The dogs sleep in the entryway, around the bend from the opening, they too share their body heat with each other, perhaps they also commensurate with each other over the loss of their companions. As for myself, my dogs are as much part of my family as is, was, my wife.