Chapter Text
If Michael was ever to remember the boat ride to Sannikov land, he would describe it as a foggy affair. The mist over the water hung low and thick, so much so that it seemed to him it should be a great difficulty for their captain to navigate through it.
The captain, however, seemed to thrive on the anonymity it afforded their ship. He would stand on deck, breathing in great mouthfuls of the fog, exhaling the cold air through his nose so that only his pale blue eyes could be seen through the mist. ‘Like a cat’s eyes reflecting in the dark’, Michael had mused to himself.
Michael had been standing at the edge of the railing on the lower deck when Gertrude approached him. He might have remembered her to be solemn or grim in hindsight, but that was not a luxury he would be allowed for much longer. She didn’t speak. That was the oddest thing, the woman who was never at a loss for words didn’t say anything as the island drifted into sight and the smaller rowboat was lowered into the water.
Gertrude sat on the same side as Michael, as his frame was too slight to balance the boat properly. The captain joined them, rowing in long even strokes until they reached the shore. He waited there.
And he waited.
Gertrude and Michael walked for what seemed like hours but when they checked their watches it appeared to have been only minutes. What was more concerning was that, though they had started on a due east course, their compasses now said that they were heading west. ‘This island can’t be that big,’ thought Michael, ‘We must be at the centre, or even passed it by now’.
That was when he heard it. Something whispering his name. He turned to Gertrude and asked if she could hear it too. She nodded slowly, but if Michael had known her better, he would’ve known that she was lying. The whispering was for him, and him alone. Gertrude urged him to follow it, to lead the way. Michael began heading in a new direction, following this distorted sound.
The further they walked, the louder the voice became and the pitch of it travelled higher. It was piercing Michael’s ears and bringing him to the verge of tears with the sickness he felt before all at once it stopped.
And then there was a door.
If he could’ve still heard her, he would’ve heard Gertrude tell him to open the door. He already knew what he was supposed to do. Gertrude was an old woman; he couldn’t let her enter whatever hellish dimension he was about to unleash upon himself. As he turned the handle and let the door swing outward, gravity shifted. The door folded itself over him, swallowing him until he was face down against a carpeted floor.
Colours flashed before his eyes, blinding him and drawing him further in. He heard laughter that wasn’t laughter before realising that he was the one laughing. This was all that he would remember after the fact: feeling another creature’s mortal fear before that creature dove inside him. It entered through his throat; that was the strangest thing. Some perverted tracheotomy filling him with a being that was not him.
Until it was.
That was when the explosion came.
Heat surged from all sides, the walls of the hallway cracked and splintered, and Michael could feel his own bones do the same. He was inside a metal can and it was being crushed by someone’s contemptuous fist. He tried to crawl toward the exit, where had he come in? Had he come in or had he always been here?
Colours were bleeding out of his eyes, his ears, his mouth, but they were not trying to escape him. They were covering him like liquid gold solidifying over his vulnerable form, protecting him. The pressure on his skull became too much and he let the colours take him to sweet unconsciousness.
He came to in the rowboat, this he remembered. His hand drooped over the side of the boat, fingers tracing the waves beneath (how was his arm long enough to reach them?). The old lady was there too, but there was only one colour bleeding from her mouth.
~
“Bouchard!” the voice came, clear as a bell through the institute’s echoing foyer. Elias turned from his conversation with Rosie to see Gerard Keay walking – not quite marching or running, trying to maintain at least a façade of composure – quickly toward him.
“Mr Keay, I wasn’t expecting you. Gertrude isn’t here right now,” He replied.
“Cut the bullshit, Bouchard. I know that the Tundra is back in its dock.”
“Ah,”
“Where is he?”
“Gerard, might I ask that we have this conversation in my offi-” Elias was cut off by Gerard reaching forward to grab at his collar. He lifted Elias with ease and turned to slam him against the wall, several inches off of the ground. Rosie let out a small shriek and picked up her desk phone to call for help.
“Where is Michael?”