The 9th of December began with a frantic distress signal coming through the Starkweather expedition's radio. The signal, from the Lexington expedition to their ship the Tallahassee, indicated that the Lexington camp was under attack. Quoth Starkweather:
"Well, men--suit up! We have us a little lady to rescue!"By the time they reached the Lexington camp, some of the men undoubtedly felt in need of some rescuing themselves. (Starkweather, Fiskarson, Pulaski, Shaftoe, Driscoll, Wallace, Sykes, and Green were the ones to make the trip.) The 8-mile journey to the camp was difficult at best; Green couldn't make it on his own, and had to hop on one of the sleds. Sometimes, ledges made hand-carrying of the sleds (and even the dogs) necessary. Within 2 hours, they could see smoke on the horizon.
At the camp, things were smoldering more than raging, though the generator tent and radio hut still seemed to be actively burning. Several people could be seen moving around, throwing buckets of snow on a building (half covered in char) in the middle of the camp, and picking up debris. All in all, the situation seemed to be well under control.
Not daunted by such organization in the least, Starkweather barged down into the middle of the camp, barely noticing the invitation that one of the Lexington expedition members extended to him. He left the others standing outside, striding into the mess tent.
The other men decided they could be helpful while waiting for Starkweather, and went down into the camp, looking for wounded and other ways to help out. They were met by Anthony Johnson, a hostile gypsy lad who instructed them to go away. An awkward time passed, and "Tony" eventually directed Dr. Green to the medical tent, and demanded help from the rest. The rest were saved at that point by Chip Hooper, a decidedly more friendly sort.
As they were helping fix radios and put out the fire on the generator, our party got some useful information indeed--that the Lexington expedition had also been having some trouble (and the trouble was blamed on Starkweather, naturally). The fire was caused by snow sickness in two expedition members, Bradbury and Dinsdale.
Various party members managed to meet Tuvinnen, the Lexington dog handler; Sachs, the Lexington Yeti^H^H^H^Hhandy-man; Priestly, the photographer; and the snow-crazed Bradbury himself. Those expedition members daring to venture within 100 feet of the mess tent were treated to the whip-crack sound of an obviously angry woman's voice, punctuated by Starkweather's familiar bluster.
"You are the most irritating, presumptuous man!"....and so forth. As the Starkweather team continued to help, the situation looked grim--all trail radios had been destroyed in the fires, in addition to their only generator. Despite the hardship, Lexington herself seemed to be held in high esteem by most of her expedition. "She's a beginner, but really great for a beginner and willing to trust her men." said one man. Though, they cautioned, she was hard--one had approximately 30 seconds to be classified as an equal or a subordinate. Very few people made the first category.
"Why, I ought to take you right over my knee!"
*sputter* "WHAT?!?!?! We'll see who goes over whose knee!"
Eventually, Black Jack wandered near the medical tent, and was asked by the doctor to "talk to" the now extremely guilty and nervous Bradbury. "I.... I think I'm in a lot of trouble," he said shyly and nervously; a cup of coffee sloshed a bit in his hand. It turned out that Bradbury had been the one with a gun (he managed to shoot one man, Hopewell, in the arm). When we woke up that morning, he had seen spiders everywhere. Having a serious phobia (he had come to the Antarctic to get away from them), he knew immediately that there was only one way to stop them--burn all of the spiders he could see. Crazed, he shot at anyone who tried to stop him. (After setting half the camp on fire, he was overwhelmed and later snapped out of the episode.)
At this point, Bradbury was quite agitated, and Black Jack began to talk to him about other things. Bradbury had been a pilot, and after a half hour or so of chatting about "normal" life, he was much more calm and ready to be handed off to the Lexington expedition doctor, Dr. Curtis.
Wallace also had interesting adventures; he ran into Hopewell and they started chatting. They wandered around the camp a bit, and after wandering a bit too close to the mess tent they started discussing their respective superiors. Hopewell was also positive about Lexington--she was 'like a man', he said. Talk moved to sabotage, and Hopewell mentioned all the troubles they'd had--weird electrical trouble, food spoilage, letters. Hopewell had an interesting encounter on the ship with a man from the crew named Bicks--they were talking, and all of a sudden Bicks' eyes got wider and wider (as though he were terrified), all the while looking at Hopewell. He jumped overboard without saying a word, looking at Hopewell the entire way down.
After his conversation with Hopewell petered out, Wallace was approached by a man named Kyle Williams. Seemingly the voice of dissent among expedition members, he had nothing good to say about Acacia Lexington and asked repeatedly what Starkweather's plans were. He seemed anxious that Starkweather take over the Lexington expedition, or at the very least give substantial help--Williams seemed to think that either Starkweather had to bail them out, or they would be forced to go home.
At this auspicious point, the door to the mess tent finally opened, and everything within 3 miles heard:
"Help you? I'd rather crawl on my hands and knees to Australia than help you!"At which point the shocked expedition members were treated to a view of an extremely irate Acacia Lexington, glaring after a none-too-happy Starkweather, who announced that the "rescue" party was leaving. To Starkweather's irritation, Sykes and Green announced they were remaining for one day to help. Starkweather basically told them to have fun getting back; concerned, Wallace asked about a sled for Green. Starkweather, clearly irate at this point, threw his ski pole at Wallace, called him a traitor, and drove away with a sled, leaving Green, Sykes, Driscoll, and Wallace to find their own way back.
"Well! I'd rather crawl over hot coals than ask!"
Olaf, Pulaski, Shaftoe, and Starkweather made a silent trip back to their own camp, arriving at 2PM. Once there, Starkweather and Moore holed up in the mess tent discussing things in private. When Acacia Lexington radioed, it was up to La Roche to disturb them; Moore made a half dozen trips from the mess tent to the radio tent that afternoon. Eventually, Starkweather stalked to his own tent, leaving Moore to tell the rest of the expedition that Green, Sykes, Wallace, and Driscoll would return the next day, accompanied by Acacia Lexington.
Upon arrival, Lexington went right to the mess tent. After that, either she or Starkweather would storm out of the tent every ten minutes.
All day.
Eventually, a bargain was struck. Moore announced that Lexington would be borrowing one of Starkweather & Moore's extra generators and a couple of radios; in exchange, Lexington would provide fuel for the Boeing and transportation to Lake's camp and beyond, on her Bell aircraft.
Commandeering a tractor, Lexington took a generator back with her to her own camp. There was a bit of travel between the two camps over the next couple of days, as repairs were made and whatnot. On the 13th of December, things were ready. Starkweather, de Witt, Fiskarson, and Gunnar were transported to a glacier, filming "souvenirs" for the press back home; the rest were transported to Lake's camp.
After four hours of flight, during most of which the Miskatonic Mountains were actually visible (their black smudge was detectable fairly quickly on the skyline), Lake's camp came into view. The mountains were impossibly tall and black, with inky jagged peaks at incredible altitudes. Strange symmetrical shapes were visible on the sides and near the tops of the mountains--seemingly perfect cylinders, stacks of cubes, crevices so deep and straight they seemed to be cut with a world-sized knife. The foothills of this breathtaking and frightening range would be serious mountains elsewhere in the world.
Luck led the pilot to notice the flags leading to the remains of the Lake camp, 12,000 feet above sea level.
Once landed, Moore addressed the group. He let them know that they were first and foremost trying to find out what happened--Moore wanted to know what killed his friends.
The cold at the base of the mountains was a living, malevolent force out to get the skin of unwary expeditioners. The wind was fierce, forcing the group to quickly set up camp and make good wind shelters in front of the aircraft and tents. The Lexington group set up their tents near Moore's group, though visibly separate. The first hot meal was served a bit before 11PM that night. Priestly was everywhere, taking pictures.
On 15 December, the planes continued to make trips; their hangars were finished; the scientific tents were set up. Investigation into Lake's camp began; one strange circle of snow mounds revealed various kinds of garbage. After that, one large group of people went to work on the mounds that were obviously planes, and the other group started on the mound furthest south.
The furthest mound (actually one in a line of similar mounds) seemed to be a cone-- 2 to 4' high, 15' across at the base, and more elliptical than circular. After digging in the cone furthest from the other tents, Betsy, Catherine, and their crew discovered a greenish soapstone star around 1 foot from the "ground". Continuing to excavate underneath the star, a strong organic sea odor grew and grew until finally they got out a (for lack of a better word) pumpkin-like thing. Betsy later recorded its appearance in detail in her notes:
"Eight feet long all over. Six-foot, five-ridged barrel torso three and five-tenths feet central diameter, one foot end dimension. Dark grey-green, flexible, and infinitely tough. Made of five vertical, stave-like ridges. From center of each central, vertical ridge, a system of light-grey flexible arms or tentacles. Single stalks three inches in diameter branch after six inches into five sub-stalks, which branch after eight inches into small, tapering tentacles giving each stalk of twenty-five tentacles. From between each barrel-ridge come seven-foot membranes. Dark-grey, found folded. The framework is tubular or glandular, lighter grey, with orifices at wing-tips. At bottom of barrel, short thick stalk holds greenish starfish arrangement. Tough, muscular arms four feet long and tapering to seven inches in diameter at base to about two and five-tenths at point. To each point is attached small end of greenish five-veined membraneous triangle (eight inches long and six wide at further end). Paddle, fin or pseudo-foot. From inner angle of starfish, reddish tubes tapering from three inch diameter at base to one at tip. Orifices at ends. All parts tough and leathery."Retrieving the pumpkin was difficult; it weighed approximately 300 pounds and had to be ferried back to the Moore camp on a makeshift sled. Betsy spent the rest of the day and into the night examining the thing, and making sketches and notes. She named it a "Lake Pentaform".
While pumpkin discoveries were going on, Rachel and Cole went to find the bodies of the Lake Expedition. Eventually, they found a cairn of stones, with a plank wedged in. On it was carved the date 24 January 1931, and the names of expedition members, along with a quote:
"We have opened the door into a new world, and none know what we shall find."Clearing the stones, they came across the first body and were horrified. It had been..... "played with", much as a two-year-old would play with a doll. (Do fingers move like this or like this? Do knees bend this way or that way? Are there joints in the head?) The second body was covered in blood and seemed to have an entrance wound of some sort on one side. They relayed this to Moore, and Moore was increasingly incensed and worried that Dyer's account of Lake's camp was intentionally misleading and inaccurate.
Meanwhile, Shaftoe, Wallace, and others began excavating Lake's planes. One was twisted nearly in half, one was fairly straight. In one, the cockpit had been tampered with--the radio was notably missing. They found it in the snow near the plane; someone had taken the radio out, disassembled it, reassembled it incorrectly, and left it in the snow.
As they turned away from the strange sight, the radio let out a SHRIEK so loud that even those near the bodies (quite a distance away) could hear it clearly.
Moving on to the other plane, they managed to open a door facing towards the ground. When it was opened, they caught a faint whiff of the organic sea-smell once more. In addition to the radio also being gone in this plane, they noticed that various engine pieces had been ripped out and sometimes reassembled (and tossed in the snow) as well.
That night, the Moore expedition made their report to base camp (the radio, fraught with trouble, was finally working). After they were done, Acacia Lexington requested privacy, and used the radio herself. After quite a long time, the others got curious, and tuned in a trail radio to her frequency. She was speaking in German, which Betsy fortunately understood. The tail end of their conversation:
Lexington: Let me repeat my offer. I can get you there safely; your own equipment will not permit such a flight. It is a reasonable bargain; you have the tanks and the equipment, I have the superior aircraft. What do you have to lose?[PLAYER NOTE: Betsy did NOT divulge this translation to the crowd assembled, saying only that Lexington was talking some Doctor Meyer about planes. People then mentioned that there was another expedition on the ice, the German team Barsmeyer-Falken. Later, she told Moore in private exactly what had been said. ]Man: I agree that it is attractive, Miss Lexington, however the decision is not mine to make. The Professor and Herr Doktor Meyer will decide. I can only pass your urgency on to them.
Lexington: Do so then, if you please. I'm tired of waiting at the mercy of others.
Man: As you wish, Miss Lexington. I will ask them to speak with you as soon as they arrive, once they have determined the situation for themselves.