Page 62 of Under Story

Louis wriggles like a cat. “When did you get so soppy? Do your something and then come to my room. My roommate and I don’t get on. I’ll be the bigger person and invite him to join us.”

The door to the galley opens, and a tall man enters. He wears a walrus mustache and a look of permanent suspicion.

“Evening, Waldrup,” Louis calls.

Waldrup’s wariness intensifies. He inspects the hot dog roller machine before moving to the sandwich station.

“Anyone been using the panini press?” Waldrup asks, unplugging it.

“Not on my watch,” says Louis. He pushes the chocolate into Laurel’s coat pocket.

—

Laurel runs from the galley to the dive locker. Eli stands by the dry suits with his blue-and-yellow backpack.

“Where were you?” he asks.

“I’m sorry,” says Laurel. “I had to find Louis.”

Eli looks shaken. “I thought you weren’t coming.”

“Of course I came,” says Laurel, and they begin to assemble what they need.

—

When Eli starts the PistenBully, the sky is a brilliant cobalt, with wispy dark clouds and softer blue over the mountains. It lightens as they drive. Laurel tries not to think about what might go wrong, or even what could go right. She must maintain boundaries with her own mind. Every so often, she looks over at Eli, whose mouth is a grim line. She stops herself from asking whether he’s all right. It’s a useless question. They’ve committed now.

As they near Cape Evans, Laurel feels a surge of adrenaline. The Arc grows larger with each mile. At last, Eli parks, and she scrambles out.

Only at this nearness does she comprehend its scope and strangeness. The dome sits on the ice like an emerald cut open. At six stories, it looks smaller than she expected—smaller than it should be, given how legible it is from the station. The Arc does not seem to follow the rules of perspective; Laurel even has the sense that it is much larger than it appears.

“Come with me,” she says to Eli, and they walk to the edge.

The boundary is nebulous, as fire mutates in a hearth. Laurel and Eli peer through the Arc as if into a lit house from the sidewalk. Inside are swirling clouds of matter; a cool glint gives the look of liquid metal. It is impossible to see more than five or six feet ahead.

A memory comes into focus: the playgroup Laurel attended as a toddler with her mother. At the end of each meeting, everyone stood in a circle, holding the edges of a parachute. They raised their arms in unison and pinned it to the ground. Inflated, the parachute became a dome. The parents remained outside while the children ran to the center. The impermanence was what thrilled them, what gave the experience charge: at any moment, the shape would collapse.

Laurel’s breath comes in short bursts. Before they dive, she has to see the Arc more closely—touch it. Eli’s mouth drops open as she steps across the threshold.

It is like entering a gas giant. She has the impression of an atmosphere with tremendous density: a great concentration, as the folds of a brain, or strands of hyphae, are packed tightly together. An invisible force presses against her from all sides. She remembers watching Nita lean into a storm, how the wind held her up. This force could support Laurel, too; it could carry her wherever it wanted. She closes her eyes and relaxes her muscles. The pressure is diagonal: it urges her toward the center, and downward.

“What does it feel like?” Eli shouts, and Laurel remembers the ice, her feet—their mission.

Her throat is tight, as if constricted by the same force.

“There’s pressure. It’s hard to explain,” she says.

For seconds, Eli hesitates. Then he follows her inside. She watches him adjust to the sensation, which is not quite unpleasant but could become so, if a gear were turned ever so slightly. Yet he, like Laurel, is grinning. There is reverence on his face; she can see that he is glad she brought him here, and she is glad, too—glad that he is with her. They look at each other as if through stained glass: their bodies are green in reflection.

“We should go,” he says, after a moment. An orange rind of sun hugs the horizon, and the Arc is turning pink.

It is much harder to leave the Arc than it was to enter it. The force drags them back toward the center like a current. Laurel needs all her strength to stagger to the border. When she heaves herself to the other side, it feels like puncturing a skin: there is resistance, a pop, then release. The atmosphere loosens again.

The dive hut is a yellow box with blue windows. In the light of the sunrise, they carry their equipment from the PistenBully. Nita said that the hut sits four hundred feet to the right of the Arc. Laurel notes that distance as they walk, orienting herself, preparing to swim across it. She feels energized, as though the Arc lent her some final spark.

Inside, the hut is utilitarian, with unfinished wooden walls and open shelving. A ladder leads into the dive hole. Feet away, a stove keeps the hole from freezing over.

Laurel places Olga’s hat, with care, on a shelf. Eli tests the buoyancy compensators while she cleans the valves. They kit up in the order they learned from the dive guide. Fins first, then weight belts. They strap into their tanks, making sure the air is on, and connect the hoses to their suits. Two hoods are followed by eye masks; fleece gloves come before rubber ones. Laurel’s pulse speeds as she triple-checks the seal, mindful of Nita’s warning.