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John Carpenter's
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The Burn Pit
by Todd Cameron
The two men stood
before the grisly funeral pyre. What looked like human remains lay twisted
and steaming in the frigid air, their blackened crimson a sharp contrast
against the white snow.
"What is that? Is that
a man in there…? Or something, or…" Copper mumbled. He found it
hard to look at the abomination of humanity laid out before them. Several
containers marked "Karosin" lay around the mass with other
charred refuse.
"Whatever it is they
burned it up in a hurry." MacReady said curtly. The chopper pilot
looked disgusted. "Help me find a shovel Doc."
MacReady stowed the shotgun
back in the helicopter. He wouldn’t be needing it, there was no danger
here. From their search of the camp all the remaining Norwegians were
dead. The research base was a smoking blackened burned out hulk. A Hell of
a way to start the winter season. The shit was gonna hit the fan all the
way until spring. They’d be still sorting this mess out in October once
the weather closed in on them and shut things down. Mac thought of the
reserve bottle of J&B he had stashed in the rear storage bin, then
thought better of it. The wind was already picking up and the ride back to
their outpost was going to be challenging enough.
Copper was returning from
the side of the camp where he’d been rummaging. He carried a broad snow
shovel and a large ice pick type tool. Mac made a face and scrounged in
the back of the chopper hauling out a large tarp.
Copper eyed the canvas
sheet. "Yeah, that should work." He held out the shovel.
"We’ll wrap it in the tarpaulin."
MacReady’s eyes were
watering from the wind. He pulled on his goggles. "We’ll tie it on
the skid. I’m not bringing that thing inside the chopper."
Copper didn’t say
anything. He didn’t have to. Whatever was in the burn pit he had no
intention to sit close to or smell on the haul back to their outpost.
MacReady approached the
burned remains and surveyed the scene. He kicked aside a kerosene can
sending it flipping across the snow. "Let’s spread out the tarp and
drag…" Mac paused, not knowing how to describe their gruesome find.
"…the body onto it."
"Alright," Copper
swallowed hard. Mac tossed him the sheet and he concentrated on laying the
tarp out. The wind kept catching it, trying to whisk it away across the
snow. Copper he stepped on the corner. Mac did the same with his end. They
were close enough now to smell the horrible stink. The frigid temperatures
hadn’t yet frozen the recently burned remains. A sharp and acrid fleshy
stench that hit them at the same time.
"Jesus," MacReady
held his arm in front of his face. "Argghh, it bloody reeks."
For the first time since his arrival in Antarctica he wished the wind
would blow harder.
Copper’s reaction was
similar. He blew out a breath. The smell wasn’t new to him. He’d
smelled the thick stench of roasted human flesh before. It was all too
familiar and brought back memories of his first experience with burned
bodies. Idaho, 1951, Copper was living just outside a rural small town. In
the middle of the night a thunderous crash and explosion had awoken him. A
car had gone off the dirt road in front of their house and piled head on
into a giant oak tree. The gas tank had erupted and the car burned for
almost an hour by the time the fire truck arrived to hose it down. The
blackened figure in what was left of the driver’s seat looked more like
a monster than a man. Copper would never forget the sickening heavy odor
that blew across their front yard. It seemed to linger for weeks. The
following summer he cut the oak down. The one side of the tree was still
charred… Now he was at the bottom of the world, alone, in the cold, and
face to face with haunting memories.
MacReady used the edge of
the shovel to try and drag the corpse onto the tarp. The body was a lot
heavier than he had thought. He managed to catch the shovel behind an arm
and pulled. The upper torso flipped on its side and the face spun up to
look at the chopper pilot.
"Fuck!" Mac
dropped the shovel and jumped back.
"What?" Copper
asked.
MacReady shook his head.
"Damn it, look at this Copper."
The Doc stepped over. He
realized why the corpse was so big and stretched out looking. It wasn’t
one body, there was two. Or… There were what looked like two faces, or
one that was splitting in two. Copper couldn’t tell. They seemed to be
melting apart…or together.
"What the Hell is that
Doc?"
Copper didn’t have a
clue. He’d never seen anything like it before. Human flesh burns, it
doesn’t melt and run like wax at high temperatures. "Let’s just
get it wrapped up. We’ll take a better look at it back at the
camp."
MacReady couldn’t agree
more. He was starting to get chills. And it wasn’t just from the
sub-zero temperatures. Staying as far back as he could Mac dragged the
burned corpse onto the tarp. The snow was stained a dark red. It reeked of
burnt kerosene and something else. Something bad. The legs were longer
than any Mac had seen before. Standing up this Norwegian would have been 8
feet tall.
Using the ice pick Copper
helped roll the monstrosity onto the sheet and they wrapped it up. Both
men were glad to see the tarp cover up the sickly grinning dual faces.
Together they dragged it over to the chopper.
"There were ten
Norwegians here. Two made it to our camp, plus the guy we found here who
killed himself. That leaves seven." Copper though aloud, "Where
are the others?"
Mac tapped the bundle with
a shovel. "There’s what looks like two in here Doc. And I’m
willing to bet the rest are dead too." He pulled out some cord and
started tying the wrapped body to the chopper skid. Copper flipped through
the papers and notes he had found inside the Norwegian camp. He found a
picture, a black and white group photo. Six of the Norwegians stood behind
the ice block, a bottle of champagne sat on top of it. They raised the
full glasses to the camera in a toast. Copper’s eyes focused on one of
them, second from the right.
"Mac, there was a
woman here."
MacReady looked up from his
work. "What?"
Copper held the photo so
Mac could see, careful not to let the wind whip it away. "They had a
woman down here as a member of the Norwegian team."
MacReady eyed the blond
lady in the picture. He silently wondered if she was now wrapped up in the
tarp he was fastening to the chopper.
A sudden noise made both
the men look up. It came from inside the camp. "You hear that
too?" Mac asked. Copper was silent, listening.
Again the noise, a dull
moan. A shiver went through Mac. It was getting darker now. Just over an
hour of daylight left. Just enough to get back to their camp.
"C’mon Copper, it’s
just the wind. Let’s go." Mac finished tying up their grisly
package and got ready to start the chopper. Copper was still staring back
at the entrance to the camp. The wind was growing stronger and the shadows
were getting longer. It made strange whistling noises as it blew through
the smashed windows of the ruined Norwegian outpost.
Copper turned to look at
MacReady. "Let’s get out of here."
"Hey, I’m with
you," Mac agreed and hit the ignition switch. The whine of the engine
was comforting and cut the howl of the wind. Copper climbed in and they
stowed their gear for liftoff. The chopper blades spun of a white flurry
of snow. Copper leaned over and looked out the side window down at their
morbid package tied to the chopper gear.
Something under the
tarpaulin moved.
Copper’s heart hammered
his chest and he froze. He kept his eyes locked on the sheet. Nothing now,
it was still. He started to say something to Mac but bit his tongue.
MacReady would think he was spooked.
It was the wind, Copper
mused. Just the wind playing tricks. MacReady lifted the helicopter from
the snow and dipped it towards the U.S. camp. Copper sat back and fastened
his seat belt.
Just the wind….
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