Interference

Rock Martin is a geologist from Indiana, Pennsylvania who explores the human spirit through his writing. A Penn State graduate, he depicts life’s challenges where the main struggle lies within. Rock enjoys fitness, camping, and hiking with his wife and young son, finding inspiration in nature and resilience.

A rumble shook the compound as the ice shifted beneath the stilts. Mark rubbed the frost from the window, his eyes wide as the generator spat and coughed, choking on heavy snow.

The lights outside pulsed low with each groan, casting a pale reflection against a wall of white, the glow holding back the vast, waiting dark. The flag stood out from the pole, rigid as a sheet of metal in the stiff Antarctic wind.

“Generator is laboring, probably hurting output,” Mark shouted across the facility.

Beth finished writing in the logbook, capped her pen, then looked out the window. “What’s the latest storm update?”

“They said six days, so we got another four coming. Gale force winds. Shelter in place, they said.”

Beth nodded once. “Then we shelter.” She rose from her chair and walked to the whiteboard near the galley. Beneath the crew roster, she wrote the date in careful block letters. She paused, then added a single line beneath it: No Incidents.

Mark followed her gaze. “And winter just started.”

“Three months,” she said quietly. “Everyone leaves in three months.”

Mark opened the logbook and began checking off the lockdown tasks one by one, whispering the sequence to himself.

Beth sipped her coffee, eyes drifting back to the roster. Six names. She counted them without meaning to. Then again, to be sure. “Kill all non-essential functions for now,” she said. “Reduce the load before it decides for us.”

“Will do.” Mark hesitated, glancing at her. “It was in conditions like this that—”.

“Yes,” she said, cutting him off gently. “It was.”

The generator groaned again, the lights flickering.

Beth moved to the window, watching the snow swallow any light. “Download the temperature data from TR-31 and verify the timestamps.”

Mark tossed the logbook on the table and leapt to his feet.

Beth leaned her head back and closed her eyes.

Faint clatter spilled in from another room as Mark’s fingers punched the keyboard. He paused for a moment as a blank spreadsheet suddenly populated with crooked numbers.

“I’ll get TR-37 also,” he shouted.

He quickly finished and waited for the data to appear, clicking his fingers on the countertop.

A minute passed before he entered the command again, which soon failed for a second time. His eyes drifted to the bottom corner of the screen. “Our connection is down.”

Beth sprang from her chair and turned toward the door when she saw the blinking light. “Satellite comms are down, also. Check the HF band.”

Mark’s chair spun around and he rolled the radio dial, only static answering. “Yep, it’s down. Must be a solar storm. Unreal, on top of what we’re already dealing with.”

He killed the radio, the static replaced by the low hum of the generators.

Beth leaned against the wall, checking off the list in her mind. “Shit, we were scheduled for a status call later today. I needed that update.” Beth flicked a quick glance at Mark before turning and checking the logbook. “Did you make the last check-in with MacNurter?”

“Yep, no mention of a solar storm.”

Beth paused, resting her head in her palm. “How long have you been up?”

“Going on 22 hours, I think, but I’m fine.”

“Check in with the rest of the crew, make sure they’re aware. Then check on the generator again. If everything’s stable, I want you to get some sleep. Trust me, the real storm hasn’t even started yet.”

Mark nodded, then hurried toward the back room.

Snow battered the walls of the compound, the window reduced to a white blur. Beth’s eyes closed, and she exhaled deeply.

A moment later, Mark stormed back in. “The crew’s fine; nothing to worry about there. But the generator’s struggling, surging up and down.”

“What’s happening?”

“Diesel’s thickening or the filters are icing. Either way, it’s nearing auto shutdown.”

“Let’s prepare the survival gear, just in case. And move everyone to the main living area. Shut down power to the other areas.”

“Shouldn’t we radio that in to MacNurter?”

“And how are we going to do that?”

“Uhh, yeah. I’m just… not sure we’re there yet, Beth.”

“Mark, do it.”

Before Mark could respond, the lights dimmed as the groan of the generator died.

“We just lost the generator,” he shouted.

The compound fell silent, and the flow of warm air suddenly halted. Emergency lights cut through the darkness, the howl of the wind the only sound.

Mark peered out the window toward the generators. “Come on, come on.”

A moment later the backup generator roared to life, the light and heat systems rolling back.

Mark gulped. “That’s all we have left now.”

“How cold is it getting out there?”

“A few hours ago it was 80 below, probably colder now.”

“I’m assuming all maintenance and fuel transfer operations are shut down until the storm passes?”

“That’s affirmative.”

“OK. Strip it to essentials. If it doesn’t keep us alive, it goes dark. And check the comms every half hour or so; let me know when they’re back up.” She paused for a moment and pursed her lips. “You better get the coffee going. We’ll be up for a while.”

“Will do.”

Beth leaned back in her chair, mumbling to herself. Thick clouds of snow blocked the outdoor light, momentarily shrouding the windows in darkness. She wrapped her fingers tight around the pendant attached to her necklace, the points of the anchor biting into her skin. For a split second she heard it again, the clipped syllable of her name, swallowed whole by the wind.

Soon Mark returned, handing her a hot cup of coffee. “We have the supplies to wait this out. If the generator dies, we can keep parts of the compound warm enough to survive for a few days on battery power. But we’re on our own until comms come back.” He swirled his cup, the heat rising to his face. “There’s no margin for error now.”

Beth’s head snapped up. “You don’t think I know that?”

“I know you do. I’m just say—”

“You don’t think I know the cost of an error?”

“Beth. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said it.”

Beth exhaled slowly, her head dropping toward the floor. “He said he could see the station lights,” she whispered. “Said they were flickering through the drift.” She gulped. “Then the wind took the signal.”

Mark didn’t answer.

“I should have told him to turn back…  I should have told him… something.”

Mark rested his hand on her shoulder. “Beth, I should’ve been there.”

Beth peered up. “Let’s just get everyone through this alive.”

Mark nodded and sipped his coffee, instantly recoiling from the burn.

The backup generator caught with a hollow thump. The lights returned at half strength. Beth exhaled slowly and stood, rolling the stiffness from her shoulders.

“Alright,” she said. “Sleeping bags out. Layer up.”

The temperature display above the doorway flickered, stalled, then dropped another degree.

Mark lingered by the breaker panel, hand resting on the cold metal. “It’s not going to hold,” he said quietly.

“I know,” Beth replied. “Which is why we stop pretending it will.”

They moved methodically, shutting doors, killing circuits. Entire wings of the station went dark, the silence behind those doors feeling heavier than the storm outside. The hum of the generator surged and faltered.

An hour passed. Then another.

The heater cycled off for good. Frost veined across the windows as the temperature dropped, each degree settling into bone. Their breath fogged the air.

A sharp crack echoed through the station.

Mark looked up. “Pipes.”

Beth nodded. “Let them go.”

By the third hour, the generator sputtered, coughed, and died. The lights blinked, then blinked again, then went out completely. Darkness swallowed the room, broken only by headlamps and the faint glow of emergency LEDs.

They sat wrapped in layers, backs to the wall, listening to the wind batter the compound. Somewhere deep in the station, metal shrank and protested.

Mark checked the radio again. Static.

Beth watched him from across the room but said nothing.

Time stretched, shapeless. Sleep came in short, shallow bursts. When Beth woke again, the cold had sharpened, biting through gloves and wool. She flexed her fingers, wincing.

A violent shudder rippled through the complex, followed by a deep metallic groan from somewhere below.

Then she heard it.

A soft pop, followed by a thin hiss of static.

Beth was on her feet before she realized she’d moved.

She raced back through the communications room, the beam of her headlamp wobbling with each step. The crackle caught her ear, and she froze. A dim light blinked on the receiver.

She pulled the chair close, hands steady despite the cold, and opened her notebook. The static surged, broken by fragments of sound.

“Storm… inside… shelt—”

Beth wrote quickly, whispering the words as she caught them. Her breath hung thick in the air.

The line dissolved into noise again.

Another burst cut through it.

“What was that?” Mark’s voice came from behind her. “I thought comms were dead.”

“I don’t know,” Beth said. “They were.”

The radio crackled again. A thin, distant voice surfaced through the static.

Mark lunged for the speaker. “Russett Station, this is Malloy. Come in.”

Nothing.

He tried again, louder this time. “Russett, come in.”

Dead air answered.

Beth pulled her eyes from the notebook. “Russett? What makes you think it’s from Russet?”

“It’s them. I recognize the voice.”

“Wha… How? How do you hear that?”

He turned toward Beth, his face crooked. “Who else could it be?”

“Literally anyone.”

Then, “We… do… sm—”

Mark froze. “Smoke.”

Beth didn’t look up. “Or interference.”

“You heard it.”

“I heard fragments.”

The radio hissed, then: “Cold… are… saf—”

Mark’s breath caught. “They’re alive.”

Beth closed her notebook. “Hope isn’t data.”

“They’re asking for help.”

“They’re noise, Mark.”

Silence fell heavily between them.

“That’s what you said before,” he said quietly. “You said the models showed a safe window.”

Her jaw tightened. “Don’t.”

“You trusted the data,” he continued. “And he froze out there.”

Beth turned on him, eyes bright. “Because I didn’t chase ghosts.”

The radio flared again. “Here… quick… time…”

Mark stepped closer to the door. “We can reach them.”

“No,” Beth said immediately. “You don’t even know where the signal’s coming from, and in this wind, we wouldn’t make it fifty yards.”

Another burst: “Stay… storm… power… fi—”

“They’re losing power,” Mark said. “Just like us.”

Beth shook her head. “You’re filling in the gaps with what you want to hear. That’s how people die out here.”

“And you’re ignoring it because you’re afraid to be wrong again.”

Her voice broke. “I’m afraid of getting everyone killed.”

“If we do nothing, they die. And we listen to it happen.”

“If we leave,” she shot back, “we die.”

Their eyes locked, the fog of breath bright in the beams of their headlamps.

The radio clicked once, then went silent.

Mark’s shoulders sagged. “Say it,” he said. “Say you didn’t hear them.”

Beth hesitated. “I heard something.”

“That’s not enough for you?”

“No,” she said, her voice rising. “It never is.”

Mark pulled off his glove, the microphone sticking briefly to his skin before tearing free. “You call it caution,” he said. “I call it hiding.”

“I call it trying to keep everyone alive.”

He dropped the microphone. It clattered against the floor, sending a final crackle through the room.

“I’m not staying here to freeze while someone else begs us for help,” he said.

Beth didn’t move. “I’ve made my decision.”

Mark looked at her for a long moment, then turned away.

The radio remained dark.

Mark zipped his parka to his chin and pulled his goggles over his face.

“You said it yourself,” he said. “No margin for error.”

Beth stood motionless.

The wind screamed against the outer hatch.

“Russett is two kilometers away. You won’t make it,” she said.

“Then at least I won’t die wondering.”

He reached for the handle.

The radio crackled.

Both of them froze.

A voice pushed through the static, thin and distorted.

“Russett sec… repeat… no confirm… distress… stand by… poss—.”

The signal wavered, pitch bending unnaturally before snapping flat again.

Mark’s hand remained on the door.

Beth listened to the silence that followed, as if something else might surface beneath it. The storm scraped along the siding, patient.

“You heard that before too,” Mark said.

She didn’t answer immediately. In the quiet, she could almost hear another voice layered beneath the transmission. Memory, or interference, or want.

Her mouth opened.

Closed.

She swallowed.

“Yes,” she said at last. “I did.”

Mark studied her face, searching for certainty.

The radio gave a soft pop and went still.

Beth reached forward and turned the volume down. Then she stood, pulling her gloves tight.

“We hold,” she said.

Outside, the blizzard pressed against the walls, indifferent.

Beth stared back, her eyes glistening. “Eighty-nine days.”