Writing from a remote instrument monitoring station on the southeast side of the island. I realize it’s been a few days since I wrote about my experiences and there are certain topics I’ll need to come back and revisit, but this note will be mostly about getting my latest scientific observations down on proverbial paper.

After recovering from the Halloween incident, Professor Lopez and I planned my next major data collection outing. It’s already been almost two months since I arrived, and other than small observations here and there, my only major scientific mission was during the filbospheric churn the day I got here.

For the University’s general purposes, any and all filbospheric phenomena are worth measuring. And the larger the aggregate data collection, the greater the outcome for the University’s mission. The Mavis Island filbospheric churn of September 2009, as it’s already being referred to, was almost literally a gold mine for the University, given the alchemic properties of the belonnium particle when put in a pressure situation of 0.75gt or higher malopites. And we were pushing probably 0.85 if not 0.87, that’s for damn sure. I lost sight of the dapris module at a certain point, though, so the exact numbers aren’t written down.

For my research, I need to collect stimulus exopilis for a number of purposes, the first among which is to artificially induce its defabricative elements and disaggregate the stimuli frederico from the exodontary pilisates, and then extract the byproduct, which is commonly known as farollysanthemum protilidictate, or “fapro.” Once we have the fapro, and what will become my dissertation eventually, is a method for biologically superheating the anti-energy contained in the individual malopitic excrements.

Now, two problems remain for me to solve: first, how can we biologically superheat the anti-energy as outlined above. Second, what manner of filament may be affixed to the module I’m designing that vibrates at the exact correct frequency, when the compound is superheated, to power the half-stilted phorometer (patent pending).

Anyone with half a brain knows that, in answer to the second question, a single fur from the boltus falliver has the requisite elastic properties to conduct inverted malopitic combustion, and at a frequency within the range detectable by the kind of motor found in an instrument such as a half-stilted phorometer. What my research has found, however, is that the while the wave lengths are nearly perfectly aligned, the amplitude is off by a measure of .003gt. I don’t have to tell you how catastrophic it would be to turn on any kind of phorometer overpowered by that many Garret talcs, much less a half-stilted model. Imagine putting all that, raw, in a half-stilted phorometer.

As for the first question, I believe we already have the technology to store the heat produced when we disaggregate the stimuli frederico from the exodontary pilisates, but it’s a matter of doing enough trials to confirm my theory. Put simply: think of a box of cereal, an unopened bag inside, and a box that’s still sealed. If you place a fully induced fapro module on top without the heat retention needed to trigger a Schneider converter, you would open the box and find absolutely nothing in there. If you place a heated fapro module on the cereal box, and in both instances of course it would have to be completely level, you would open the box and find the bag of cereal actually opened but all of it left in there. Of course, this is a silly hypothetical, and the real process is much more complex, but it’s simple enough to explain so that most non-experts understand at least the overall process and the problem the underlying chemical conversion is trying to solve.

For now, therefore, I’m focusing on collecting as much stimulus exopilis as I can so I don’t need to return to an even numbered Instrument Station every time I melt a fapro in testing.

I arrived this morning at 0900 after a two hour trek around the island perimeter in one of the smaller field vehicles. We’re calling a pause on excursions into the island interior for another fortnight for safety reasons. What should have been a one-hour-and-45-minute trip, therefore, turned into a two-hour journey. But I did get close enough to Dagano Bay to see that all remnants of my overnight stay there over a week ago have been washed away by the tides. I think I should be in the clear.

Instrument Station 030 is on a relatively low-lying bluff near the abandoned old Jesuit Lagoon at coordinates 045.612.BX9er-SE. There’s a small hut with a cot and an oil lamp because of the Station’s remote location and exposure to squalls spinning off the South Dalton Sea when Mavis Island is experiencing a relatively low-barometric pressure system. Orders dictate the oil lamp is kept full, but a field researcher sent to a station like this carries two spare lamp oil canisters nonetheless. If they have to use any, they leave behind a full canister.

I didn’t need reminding, but someone should have reminded me anyway: the drop in barometric pressure and temporary destabilization of the lower filbosphere should have been a warning sign. I know what you’re thinking, and Bart Kelvin’s experience was and is, in no way, a concern for me. Yes, he was a Baryllisman like me, but he was using a double-plated delnometer rather than a carbonalturer, as a Baryllisman is best trained to use. There is some precedent for a Baryllisman being dual-activated when the filbospheric conditions don’t support full telerod extension, but at any rate I don’t even have a single-plated delnometer with much, much less a double.

Disaster didn’t ensue for me. But what the weather conditions have meant is that I have to spend a night in a 10’ x 5’ hut with nothing but my pack and an oil lamp.

When I arrived at the Station, there was just a gentle breeze flowing in a northwesterly direction from the Pole. The sky was mostly sunny, except for a smallish cluster of dipulognorfic clouds at low altitude roughly 7 klicks offshore, due south. I unloaded my gear and my pack and checked the logbook in the hut. It said exactly what the book at the Main Camp had said for Instrument Station 030: last data extraction June 30. That meant the primers on the dervick would like need some juice to get moving again.

Station 030 is a typical baryllic exhaust fan, plugged into a fully retractable geoboraster. We have over 200 of these little stations peppered all over the camp. When just one or a handful of them are showing spiking filbo levels, it means that either we have a mechanical malfunction or that location (or those locations) are experiencing a filbospheric downdraft.

The baryllic exhaust fan stations were originally established simply to do that: output potentially toxic anti-energy being produced in the subterranean geoborasters in the center of the island. It’s a minimally polluting vapor and the technique is becoming more eco-friendly with advances in baryllic processor units, but being honest I’m not very supportive of it in current form.

The first geoborasters and original baryllic exhaust fans were established back in the ‘50s by the University team led by the legendary Professor Lars Blåberg. The original theory they were trying to prove was groundbreaking, but seems so rudimentary now: if we engage the island’s subterranean malopitic deposits with enough silver black-liner cable, and route that energy into a local filbospheric mirror, the amplitude of the malopy curves should be compressed enough to transmit the converted energy into a Marr’s conical receptor. I don’t have to tell you the outcome: the trial was an overwhelming success and shaped the field. And today we can’t pick up a spoon or use a toothpick that wasn’t manufactured using some legacy of the patents that came out of Professor Blåberg’s work.

Now, in my specific field of microbarrylistry, we can also study the sediment that collects on the fan for potential defabricative properties. This is where it gets interesting: if I could prove that the malopitic sediment collected from baryllic exhaust fans consistently defabricates the poles of stimulus exopilis excrement when accelerated during a filbospheric downdraft event in a high barometric system, like is common on Mavis Island, and that polar defabrication is reduced when bleeped by a high-polarity carbonalturer, we would no longer to limit the operating time of a half-stilted phorometer five days or fewer. That’s how important flattening the malopy curve is to the whole game.

The exhaust fan itself is shaped more like an inverted traffic cone than a fan as we might ordinarily picture one. It sits on top of a copper wire frame drawn between four 20-foot-tall wooden posts over a simple delvid aperture. There is silver black-liner cable (in bunches of five) extending from the delvid aperture straight up into the fan.

After unloading and pre-juicing the primers on the dervick, I got a harness and rope from the hut and climbed up one of the poles. Then, using copper carabiners, I rocked myself over the copper wires to the fan. There was plenty of violet malopitic sediment left, as the fan hadn’t been scraped since June. I collected five roughly tuna can-sized canisters. That’s generally all we have time to process before the malopy curve actually inverts and the whole sample then has to be transported to the mainland for safe disposal.

After I climbed back down and put away the harness I immediately took the canisters of malopitic setiment to the site’s built-in anti-energy demicalibration apparatus. Located just beneath the doorframe of the hut, the stainless steel interface is cranked upward and then into the proper 35-degree angle. The whole cranking process takes an hour.

It’s best not to stray too far at this point in the extraction process. The hut is grounded, including the anti-energy demicalibration apparatus, so any sudden extreme filbospheric downdraft would be spread out across the island’s entire subterranean silver black-liner web.

While I was waiting for the first canister to complete its dehoromil cycle I noticed on my watch I had lost track of time and it was already 1130. I looked up to see that the minimal dipulognorfic cloud cover was gone, and not far offshore were a row of much denser steriocalulous super cells, overlapping and covering most of the horizon. I knew it would be a very violent storm, and while not the worst the Mavisians had seen on their island, still about ten times as bad as the worst storm you’d see on the mainland. A stiff and consistent onshore breeze augured the arrival of the deep plum storm clouds, so I did what I could to excite the barolectric rods and speed up the process.

I had four canisters through the dehoromil cycle and primed for the polar defabrication module I designed, built, and installed on my personal high-polarity carbonalturer. (The polar defabrication module allows me to reverse the polarity, at whatever percentage I choose, rather than only having the option of performing a basic Woolsey carbonetic defabricism.)

The fifth canister would have to be put through its dehoromil cycle inside the hut, in the portable dehoromizer, because I had to crank the anti-energy demicalibration apparatus back to its vertical position and slide it down into the protective case in front of the hut door before the storm hit. The entire instrument would be lost, costing the University tens of thousands of dollars, and likely my job, if I didn’t button it up and verify that all 135 of the safety sensors were beeping in unity.

With five minutes to spare, I put the four dehoromilized canisters in the custom pelican case I brought for the lot, and returned outside to get the reserve oil lamp canisters and lock down the field vehicle. The smaller Mitsubishi four wheel drives have their turtle button below the dash, next to the Douglas flares and above the Desolomer’s friend.

I pressed the button, and jumped out of the vehicle as the ten-second timer beeped. Air hissed as the hydraulic system allowed the vehicle frame to flatten against the dirt road. Then I heard the jacks thud on the ground below the vehicle, and the stainless louvered shield clicked into position. Just then the wind intensified and it started to rain, one, two, three drops, that seemed as big as water balloons.

I got inside the hut and checked my watch, noting that cranking the site’s anti-energy demicalibration apparatus had taken ten minutes longer than it should have. Something to note in the log and send over to maintenance. It was going to be a long afternoon.

The worst of the storm took two hours to hit, though the rain alone was frightening enough. When the lightning and hail started, I fully understood the safety measures the University had taken to protect its researchers and equipment. The hut had its own auto-turtling system, which was already halfway deployed by the time I buttoned up the field vehicle. The triple-plated stainless walls were now reinforced by cross beams inside the hut extending in six directions like a hexagon. There would be less room to sleep, but it would have to do.

I’m writing as the tempest is at its worst. Storm cells pass nearly daily on the island, and violent storms come at least once a week, depending on which side you’re on. And I’ve been in a storm during a general filbospheric churn, as already told. But this was the first time I was in a storm that intense while onsite at a filbospheric downdraft.

Not only are there occasional Volkswagen-sized chunks of hail ricocheting off the hut or field vehicle at full velocity, I also have to sit through the near deafening whooms that reverberate whenever a filbospheric ray and bolt of lightning shoot within 50 yards of one another. I brought my custom ear plugs, but I can still hear the whooms at a somewhat uncomfortable volume.

It’s neither exactly humid nor dry inside a filbospheric downdraft during a storm. The air is more the opacity of amber, it feels silken on the skin, and makes all my spare silver black-liner cables audibly buzz. It has the scent of freshly-grated nutmeg and honey, repeatedly making my mouth water as I crave gertis gertis tea and the warmth of the Base Camp mess hall. I’m not sure if I’ll be able to get to sleep.

The toughbook battery is dying. I could plug it in but I want to eat my field provisions and then try to get some shut-eye. Once again, here I am singing Weezer to no one. Signing off, it’s 1845.

All glory to the University.

Pierre Delgado

In the garage, I feel safe
No one cares about my ways
In the garage where I belong
No one hears me sing this song
In the garage
In the garage

I don’t know how long the toughbook battery will hold out. I’m going to try to record the events of the last few hours in case I don’t live to tell the tale.

I think I left off my account of the Halloween ambush when Professor Lopez ordered Jacky to stand down that night, and not try to track down Penelope Farris-Washington until the sun came up.

It was a tense few hours. Professor Lopez set up a war room in the conference room. She pulled yanked on several strings hiding pull-down maps that I had never noticed were there, and booted various instruments only some of which I recognized.

We had matcha brought out for our planning session, along with copious amounts of gertis gertis tea to fuel our weary bodies. Professor Lopez was in high gear, directing the undergrads with standard ISO Desolomer hand signals, and barking orders at me and Jacky. We worked until 0500, when Professor Lopez we could all use a nap.

At 0700 I was back at the war room, and Professor Lopez was still barking orders. I don’t know if she even left to nap, or stayed there studying maps and instruments, coordinating our movements in advance of our return. She turned to me and Jacky, giving a directive that almost scared me: “Find CJ and bring him here.”

Outside the conference room, Jacky pointed in the direction of the vehicle depot. “Let’s split up, you check that side of the compound and I’ll go this way.”

I paused. “How do we know he’s not still at the vat of plactowater?” I asked simply.

“Come on Delgado, you think they wouldn’t have checked there? And why would Penelope have run off looking for him if he was there the whole time?”

“We don’t know he was there the whole time,” I reasoned, putting my logical prowess to good use. I crossed my arms and considered the possibilities.

In the corner of my eye I saw Jacky shrug. “Fine, Pierre, go check the vat area,” she said, and wandered toward the radio tower control hut grumbling to herself.

With the thinking out of the way, I uncrossed my arms and took off at a jog across the compound. There were about a dozen vats filled with various liquids, and I believed I remembered the one to which we had run in the heat of the moment after my University lubrication challenge.

As I neared the vats I heard stifled laughter. Around the final one, I saw CJ still on his back, kicking his feet up and down as he guffawed. He looked up and saw me and laughed again, audibly. “Pierre Delgado, that’s you a lotto!” he managed to get out. I stepped over to him deliberately, leaned down, and slapped him across one cheek.

“Snap out of it, CJ!” I hated doing it to my new friend, but he was clearly in some kind of trance. He recoiled and slowly reached up with his left hand, gently touching the red spot where my hand had landed.

“What’s going on?” CJ asked, bewildered, suddenly squinting in the daylight. “What time is it?” I reached out with my right hand to help him up.

“It’s just past 0700,” I said, “and you’re right here where I left you last night.” In my left hand I was clutching my dinquoi-trouvain sash in a tight ball, not even aware I had removed it. I released it and it fell into the vat of plactowater like the banner of a fallen knight on a ruined ancient battlefield.

“Oh no, that’s not right,” he said, finally taking my outstretched hand.

“Yes, it is,” I said, showing him my watch as I helped him up.

“I mean — where’s Penelope?” His lip was quivering as he held onto the side of the vat for support. I put my hand on his shoulder. He gasped, putting two and two together. “She went looking for me, didn’t she? Did they take her? Lupus dragonicus?”

I nodded solemnly. “We’re going out to get her back. Professor Delgado wants you to come to her war room on the other side of the compound immediately. Let’s go.” I turned in the other direction and took a step, but CJ didn’t follow. “CJ?” I said in bewilderment.

“CJ Lee, that’s me!” he replied nervously. “Come here a second, and don’t tell anyone what I’m about to divulge.”

I don’t have the time to fully explain here what CJ told me in those crucial few minutes, as my battery is low. But the moments that followed were even more critical.

“You know your Castonellan tales, don’t you?” he asked in hushed tones barely louder than a whisper. I nodded. “Yes, I’ve heard you reference those old stories. The bravery of Filip Tutta Dellamarca, you see, this is his moment, per legend. Now I’m going to show you where I believe Penelope must be. But before I do, I need you to remember two digits.”

I waited, finally saying, “yes, CJ, yes, what are the digits?”

He looked over his shoulder. “Number 30,” he breathed. It was the nickname he had given me at Base Camp, but he was the only one who ever used it. And others never seemed to hear him say it, as no one ever asked him what it meant or followed suit and started using it themselves.

“Number… 30?” I asked. He nodded and put his pointer finger to his lips.

“Now, Castonellan brave, kneel and prostrate yourself.” I slowly bent down on one knee, and tilted my head down, regarding his boots. He said nothing else, just touching the back of my neck with a single finger.

In an instant I was whooshing across Mavis Island, on top of Cape Stanwell and everywhere else all at once. I was looking for Penelope but I was distracted by plentiful gertis gertis, as well as stimulus exopilis and drastophus blinnium in my field of vision. It was all within reach.

In that moment, I knew my cerberus planatinum was flashing microwhispers throughout my ejecticus system. There was someone in peril. But opposite that system, my cerberus denonycum was suppressing my biopreferential cryptidium and lowering my subcore body temperature. They’re the two systems that keep the human body in harmony, but in that moment I needed less harmony and more agitation. I agitated myself with a hard slap on the cheek.

When I got fully in tune with my cerberus planatinum, I saw where all my microwhispers were pointing: an old dock the University had previously used, up until World War II, on the other side of the island on a rocky beach labeled Dagano Beach on our older maps. Newer maps just labeled it “Off Limits 250.4.” I had always been curious about those mysterious coordinates.

I channeled my ejectus system and hurtled in my mind toward Dagano Beach. I suddenly fell from my crouched pose, as I had been whilst kneeling before CJ, onto the rocky beach, hitting my head on a large seashell and shattering it. It was nighttime again somehow. I still don’t even know what day it was, when I landed on Off Limits 250.4.

I rubbed my head, which was scraped and slightly bleeding, as I looked up. I was concealed within the shadow of the cliffside. But a dozen yards away, Penelope Farris-Washington was tied to one of the pilings on the old dock, her unconscious body illuminated by the full moon. She didn’t notice me. Nor did they, at first.

There were rows of lupus dragonicus standing at attention around the beach, with a handful reviewing notes written on crude, weatherworn scrolls, and diligently reviewing what appeared to be established procedures for what to do with her. Some seemed annoyed to have been kept up so late and put to this purpose, as many of the older looking lupus dragonicus with graying hair occasionally sighed and shrugged in passive agreement to what others were telling them.

I stepped out of the shadow and immediately one of the junior lupus dragonicus howled at me. I think he was one of the two I saw in the forest, although I’m sure many who were hiding would also have recognized me. Instantly, numerous bright lights from unknown origins circled the beach, finally settling on me and blinding me as though I were staring into the midday sun.

As quickly as they had begun running over to apprehend me, they stopped again. The orderly rows of lupus dragonicus had disaggregated into a chaotic semicircle of howling, snarling, otherworldly beasts, none willing to come closer than ten feet. They reviewed me, some holding their snouts erect and sniffing loudly. I looked near the back of the pack where the still unimpressed older lupus dragonicus were again deep in discussion. One was using his snout and one of his paws to outline what seemed to have been clothing on another.

I looked down at my dinquoi-trouvain suit and sash, which CJ must have retrieved from the vat of plactowater and placed on me before touching my neck, along with my small pack which contained my toughbook and low-polarity carbonalturer.

The lupus dragonicus must have mistaken me for a cursed joursque or a malicious flatfooted brintôt. Despite the fake blood having been mostly cleaned off, Baron Chester Richard of Simpletown must have made quite a frightening impression.

If I knew my Piègais folklore, I knew a cursed joursque could easily fight off most of these beasts. They still had the numbers to take down Baron Chester Richard of Simpleton, but he would weaken their pack to a level from which it would take years to recover. I knew I wasn’t an actual cursed joursque, but I knew enough about the legend to fake it. I would lunge at them with a Choppaise feint while gargling in the mythical beast’s larynx, a most frightening kind of fallorian squawk. Yes, that would get them on their hind paws.

I would then … and suddenly I wondered what I was even talking about. I wasn’t a joursque or even a flatfooted brintôt. I was Pierre. I was Pierre Delgado, just a Baryllisman in training. And, I realized, Pierre Delgado, I was. Not some glue pot from Cavignon or a dewey Grionnaise.

In the time I was standing there, wondering what Baron Chester Richard of Simpletown would do, or what courage, perhaps, a Castonellan knight might muster, the oldest and most disheveled-looking lupus dragonicus stepped to the fore. He motioned with his snout for one of his deputies to bring him a scroll, which he crumbled around a mango-sized rock with two paws, and tossed toward me.

In awe, I picked up the bundled note and unwrapped it from the rock. The message was transcribed in crude characters, but I could recognize many of them easily enough from the ancient Castonellan tomes Maria Francesca had read to me so many times before. The gist was that they wanted me to guess a number. If I guessed correctly, they would take Penelope back to the tree-line near Base Camp and release her. If I guessed wrongly, I, the mysterious beast of the lowlands, and the human would die. And tragically, so would many of their own.

I took a pen from my pack and flipped the scroll over, grateful my knowledge of old Castonellan was enough to write the two digits I needed: 30.

I wrapped up the scroll and tossed it back toward the older lupus dragonicus. A couple of them helped him unwrap it, and they made an odd wheezing sound. The rest of their pack backed even farther away from me. A number of them spread apart and allowed a column I hadn’t seen yet to march up to Penelope. They used their teeth to untie the ropes binding her to the piling, then one of the bigger ones took her limp body onto his back and strode off.

The column bearing Penelope marched into the island as the rest of the lupus dragonicus scampered off one by one. The last to leave was the older one, who looked over his shoulder once with what could only be understood as a glint of recognition in his eye.

Before I could believe my eyes, Dagano Beach was empty once again. Small waves were gently lapping on the rocky shore, and the moonlight danced in the small eddies and whirlpools beneath the dock’s remnants, pointing like an arrow: away, away from this place.

But I dared not leave yet. I was a dinquoi-trouvain and a proud Piègais, but I was no joursque or flatfooted brintôt. I was Pierre Delgado, not Baron Chester Richard of Simpletown. I would hide here for the evening, mostly buried in the sand with my bag, and wait until sunrise to make my way back to Base Camp.

My battery is almost dead. Signing off, it’s 0145. I’m humming some Audioslave tonight.

All glory to the University.

Pierre Delgado

In your house, I long to be
Room by room, patiently
I’ll wait for you there like a stone
I’ll wait for you there alone

I want to begin this blog post by saying that I’m ok. Jacky, CJ, Professor Lopez, and nearly everyone else is ok. Tragically, we did lose a researcher last night.

Halloween. It fell on a Saturday night this year. Naturally, basically all the non-Mavisian workers on the island had some familiarity with the holiday. The natives here experienced Halloween when they were growing up more as something they saw in movies from places like America. They largely don’t participate in the research staff’s Halloween festivities each year, so I’m told, because they see the holiday as something that’s celebrated across the South Dalton Sea and beyond.

I didn’t think to bring any Halloween costume to the island, but I still wanted to dress up as I always had. In my home city of Piègeville, I generally wore the combination of the traditional Piègais costume of a dinquoi-trouvain with the spiritual element of a hatless joursque beast, a flatfooted brintôt, or some kind of common hoofed delvier.

Maria Francesca and I actually met one Halloween when I was dressed as the invented character Piotr Dełarcki, the cursed Polish count of the low country, while she was wearing her best demonic Castonellan recertique outfit. I have to say, I was so moved by fear when I glimpsed her at first by the peach bowl I nearly tore off my (false) bloodstained dinquoi sash and made for an exit. I’m glad I stayed, not only because I met the love of my life but also because if she had been a demonic recertique come back to life, I knew standing my ground would have been my best shot at survival.

On Mavis Island, there are many Americans, Australians, British, Argentines, etc., and they mostly dress to whatever degree they could in pop culture outfits such as movie superheroes or simply an old suit with slicked back hair, which they invariably describe as a costume referencing a TV show or movie.

I heard at least two gasps when I entered the pregame party in the mess hall last night in a highly improvised costume: my newest dinquoi-trouvain character, Baron Chester Richard of Simpletown. (The key to picturing these characters is understanding local lore in Piègeville, which typically takes the form of a cautionary tale in which the honorable dinquoi-trouvain’s body is possessed by a foreign noble intent on plundering our cupboards.)

CJ had seen me getting ready in our bunk, so he just laughed in his Indiana Jones costume when he saw me enter. Just one person hadn’t seen me, as she had old walkman headphones on as a part of her costume.

“Mind if I stake this punch bowl, my gorriline comrade?” I asked Penelope Farris-Washington. Her gorilla mask slowly turned and she saw my costume. She quickly pulled a pistol from a banana shaped handbag and flipped off the safety. She was about to raise the gun at me when Professor Lopez ran over waving her arms.

“It’s just Pierre playing a dinquoi-trouvain!” Professor Lopez shouted. Penelope looked at her, then at me, then back at Professor Lopez. Slowly her shoulders relaxed. She flipped the safety on and chuckled.

“Jesus, Pierre, what the fuck is all this,” Penelope sighed. “Why not just go as Buzz Lightyear or something.”

“Well, technically speaking I am in fact a dinquoi-trouvain by birth,” I said, though I knew that wasn’t the most important fact at that moment. Professor Lopez gave me a hard look at returned to the faculty table.

I poured two punches and took Penelope over to a table to help her calm down while I explained in detail the most important dinquoi-trouvain tales from my country. A few minutes later she began to understand my Piègais culture, I think.

After the punch, I turned to my new favorite spirit: cucumber rye. I had possibly a liter of it, and at some point Penelope wandered off and before long Jacky was in my ear talking about practicing 270-jumpouts in the Mitsubishi and other dangerous field maneuvers. I was tipsy enough to not be too alarmed by the mere suggestion, but I was never going to agree to another turtle jump in any state.

“Jacky, you’re a top drawer scholar and one hell of a singer,” I said between sips as hypnotic Mavisian music filled the room, “but the only way I’m getting on that Mitsubishi is condescendingly, insultingly, by taking it down a peg or two. Because at the end of the day I don’t trust that machine. I mean it.”

I didn’t mean it. It was the cucumber talking. Jacky knew.

“Oh Pierre,” she whispered menacingly into the fourth false ear on my dinquoi sash, though I could hear her nonetheless as she was starting to exhibit the effects of cucumber consumption and speaking quite loudly. “If I promised to get you behind the Tertis and in front of some misbehaving boltus falliver, you couldn’t resist, could you?”

I didn’t flinch.

“Or even,” she said so lowly into a different false ear I had to actually lean down to hear her new proposal, “a lupus dragonicus?”

It wasn’t a yes. But it was no longer a no. “I’m going to go listen to the new song CJ wrote,” I said to Jacky at a normal volume, and got up from the table. The Mavisian band was playing the traditional island song I already knew so well, “If I could count your ideas,” and I was feeling adventurous.

Outside, CJ and Penelope were singing a duet of his new song. CJ was on guitar and Penelope had a Michigan noventus flute. “Devil December, I have your number,” he scatted. I always assumed in conversations in the bunk about his music that he was more of a crooner. I remember thinking, well I can get down with scatting, too.

“Your new song sounds great, CJ, it just needs one thing,” I said, trying to sound as earnest as possible.

He looked a bit hurt, but curious to know what I recommended. Maybe he was feeling self-conscious about scatting rather than crooning. “And what’s that, number 30?” I haven’t figured out yet why he calls me number 30.

“A little more… lubrication?” This was a University tradition.

“Ha, no! I’m gonna beat you both!” He put down his guitar and Penelope quickly followed suit with her Michigan noventus flute, and the three of us ran exactly 11 laps around Base Camp before diving at nearly the same time, fully clothed, into a full vat of plactowater. It’s harmless at this temperature. I was second in the lukewarm brew. CJ, as promised, was first. But I think Penelope let us both win.

After an hour of playing drisple, we got out and started letting our clothes dry. Much of the false blood on my costume had washed off, giving me more of the appearance of a mundane delvier rather than a joursque on the hunt, or something else a bit more exciting. But for the non-Piègais party, it was more than enough to impress. CJ had stashed or simply found a bottle of cucumber rye, which we passed around as we speculated what the night’s mysterious main event would be.

It had to have been at least 2100 when I heard gravel crunching in the distance, in a dark patch of the compound between the floodlights mounted above the conference room and mess hall. I reached for the telerod I had in my costume, which was both helping support my dinquoi sash and serving as a reminder to tomorrow-Pierre that I needed to repair it. It wasn’t a weapon, but it was all I had.

Jacky Nelson stepped out into the light and we all burst out laughing. I lowered my telerod. Jacky was walking straight and seemed fine, but had a mostly empty bottle of cucumber rye. “Delgado,” she said cooly. “On the Tertis, let’s go.”

I glanced at CJ and Penelope. They were still laughing about Jacky’s arrival, but I don’t think they were thinking entirely straight at that point. “Pierre Delgado, that’s you a lotto!” CJ said, and laughed so hard he stopped making audible noises and laid back, flat on his back, kicking the ground repeatedly as he shook. Things were getting a little weird.

“Sure,” I said to Jacky, getting up, “I’ll come with. But let’s not do anything too crazy.”

Jacky motioned for me to follow as she rolled her eyes. “Relax, Delgado. I’m not taking you up to Cape Stanwell or something. Just a little ride around the compound.”

“What would Professor Lopez think?” I said as I trotted to caught up, realizing I wasn’t even sure if my advisor was asleep or still at the pregame. Or if she had gone ahead to the main event already. I remember noticing how bright the compound’s flood lights seemed at that moment.

Jacky groaned. “Professor Lopez is in the underground lab, as she is this time of night every day we’re out here. Without fail. 2100, she’s in the lab.”

“Oh, that’s right,” I said, badly attempting to feign knowledge of the routine. Jacky stopped and looked at me blankly. She knew I was bluffing. We continued.

I climbed on top of the Mitsubishi and started priming the dapris canisters on the Tertis. I stumbled on something and started to regret my decision, but realized it was just a loose demi-groton CJ had forgotten to deplug during the last loadout.

I couldn’t believe how fast Jacky got the Jess needles calibrated and ready to go, but before I knew it she gave the order: “flaps up, eyes out,” she called through the central hatch. I now think she might have actually calibrated the Jess needles before fetching me from the vat of plactowater. She obviously knew me better than I realized. I wasn’t her first Baryllisman, after all.

Jacky smartly left the floodlights off as she guided the Mitsubishi through the compound, but I could see well enough from the ambient light from the Base Camp, and from the stars. It was a cloudless night. I flipped the Tetris on, just on quiet mode. I was determined not to let Jacky get me into trouble. But I felt like I couldn’t afford to miss an opportunity to impress a field researcher of her stature.

Outside the fence, she flipped on the communication duct, a rudimentary speaking tube which helps us communicate more easily when underway. “Light up that gertis gertis,” she said flatly, slowing down the Mitsubishi in front of a relatively small growth. I bleeped it briefly. Not much happened.

“Oh come on, Delgado. You can do better than that.”

I flashed a leaf for a full ten seconds, watching it wrap into the shape of a barletts vow. Tertis rays are harmless to the plant. It’s just a silly parlor trick field researchers do to kill the time out in the field. Still, Professor Lopez doesn’t like us using the equipment that way.

“That’s better, Pierre. Now go loud and let’s see what you can do.” She pulled the vehicle onto a small dirt track leading from camp. The lights were disappearing behind trees and gertis gertis growths behind us. I was starting to get worried about Jacky. Was there a side of her I needed to know about and watch out for? Maybe I should have followed CJ’s lead back at the plactowater vat, and either been too drunk or acted to drunk to do more than writhe around in my drying dinquoi-trouvain suit, laughing at my own jokes.

I flipped the Tertis on loud mode. It glowed dully in my hands. The Mitsubishi rolled cautiously around a bend in the dirt track and I spun the Tertis to check our six. There huddled two of the biggest boltus falliver I’d ever seen. They were a half a meter high if they were a centimeter.

“Party crashers on our six,” I called quietly through the communication duct, but the Mitsubishi was already slowing.

“Yeah, I see ‘em,” she called back at full volume. “Now would be your time to, how should I put this… shine?”

I clicked the hot switch and levered the demi-groton CJ had left mounted in the side hook of the Tertis before punching out. The instrument rumbled fully to life. I was just about to bleep a warning at the wayward boltus falliver when they stood fully erect. I saw they weren’t boltus falliver at all, but lupus dragonicus. I froze. Even on loud mode this was going to be an ambush. Why the hell were we out there? Stupid, stupid.

The Mitsubishi took off on a side track I hadn’t even seen. Jacky either didn’t trust me to snap into action or knew we were likely outmatched. Two lupus dragonicus showing themselves, fully exposed like that, meant there were two, maybe even three dozen in hiding. They had remained quiet, in order to sneak up on us, but let loose an eerie warning howl. It wasn’t too loud, but it made its point. I suddenly felt very silly up there huddled behind the Tertis dressed as Baron Chester Richard of Simpletown, fake costume blood streaking down my pleated knickers and drying on my sash.

The lupus dragonicus encroachment shocked me. All this seemed very close to the Main Base, but we had taken a couple turns, and we were supposed to respect the rules of the night on Mavis Island. It seemed like I was learning a new one of those.

The lupus dragonicus were hot on our heels and closing in when Jacky made an abrupt turn to the right, into the forest, and back onto another dirt track. Their howling intensified. The lights from Base Camp were starting to light up like fireflies through the trees on the ridge. The lights suddenly got much brighter. Someone must have noticed they were two researchers and one Mitsubishi short. The howling was driving me mad. It was horrible. I couldn’t think straight and I had to remember to breathe. Later when checked the vehicle cameras I saw that in that moment I was I leaned onto the Tertis for support as I plugged my ears, screaming in terror.

We turned back onto the original dirt track we came out on, and just as we were about to exit the forest and speed through the main gates to the Base Camp, Jacky slammed on the brakes. Penelope was standing there in her gorilla costume, holding the gorilla mask under her arm. Her banana sling wasn’t there. She looked confused. Something was up. Jacky had the same thought.

“It’s a lupus dragonicus,” she called through the ventilation duct. “Keep the Tertis trained on it but don’t use it unless you have to. I’ll go around.”

Jacky cocked the steering wheel right and floored it. The vehicle tilted violently to the right. The Mitsubishi was two wheels off the dirt track, splattering through the drainage ditch next to it. The Penelope-looking figure didn’t move. It still looked confused, but didn’t attack or even howl.

The Mitsubishi roared into Base Camp and some undergrads closed the gates and locked them behind us, with Professor Delgado commanding them using standard ISO Desolomer hand signals.

I was still hunkered down on the Tertis when we stopped, partially out of view. “We’re still missing one,” Professor Delgado said to Jacky.

I stood up quickly, glistening in gertis gertis discharge, too tired to shake it off. “I’m here, all good,” I said feebly.

Professor Delgado looked up at me like a disappointed parent. “No, we’re not all good. Penelope Farris-Washington slipped through the gates. She said she thought CJ was with you and ran off before I could stop her. And get down off that Mitsubishi, researcher.”

I automatically climbed down, embarrassed, confused, and feeling somehow perturbed. Why had Penelope gone looking for CJ outside Main Base? Last I saw him, he was lying on his back next to the vat of plactowater, enjoying life to the fullest.

“I saw her,” Jacky said, then corrected it. “We. Saw Penelope. I thought it was a lupus dragonicus that had shape shifted, so I drove around and hot-footed it back to the compound.” She shook her head and said something in a language I didn’t understand that I took to be a swear. “Delgado! Get the Jess needles calibrated, I’ll go back out.”

Professor Lopez grabbed Jacky by the arm. “The hell you are. Hear those howls? We’ll have to go back for her when it’s light. Let’s just hope they don’t give her the cure before we can.”

Jacky pulled her arm away. “The cure? No. This is my fault. I’m going back out.”

“Negative,” Professor Lopez said, “I’m not losing any more researchers tonight. Penelope will probably never croon the same again, but we’ll get her back to her family in one piece. Get some shut eye before sunrise, if you can. We have a long day of planning ahead of us tomorrow.”

Signing off, it’s 1155. Time to get to work. My Chemical Romance.

All glory to the University.

Pierre Delgado

I’m not okay
I’m not okay
I’m not okay
You wear me out

I’m starting to adjust to life on Mavis Island Research Station. It took a while for me to get my bearings. I can’t believe it’s already been three weeks in country. My coworkers and I are settling into a routine both at Base Camp and out on missions.

I’ve adjusted to my bunkmate CJ’s nocturnal comings and goings. He talks in his sleep a fair amount, which doesn’t keep me awake, but I can’t help but listening when I haven’t managed to get to sleep yet. He stands and sit, stands and sits repeatedly, sometimes. There are all sorts of recurring names in his mutterings, such as a woman named Eleanor who he seems to be afraid of or intimidated by.

He keeps telling someone named Chad the same instructions for his motorcycle, but Chad apparently can never remember whatever jargon CJ is telling him. I think the dog he calls Bartok is real, but I don’t want to ask, as I don’t want him to know I can hear his sleep murmuring. It might make him feel sheepish.

CJ is a skilled Journeyman Desolomer and I believe he’ll make a great replacement for Jacky after she graduates. And he’s a funny kind of guy when he’s not in the field. Whenever mail comes around and they call his name, he hops up no matter how tired he is and says, “CJ Lee, that’s me!”

He studied abroad in Germany in undergrad, where he developed a passion for mustard. At the Mavis Island Base Camp mess, whenever he inevitably needs more mustard, and I’m nearest a bottle of it, he shoots me with finger guns and says, “slide me some of that golden goodness, brother!” I think him being the oldest sibling when his parents got in the accident turned him into part leader and part cheerleader for his family.

The amount of knowledge I have about vehicular maintenance could fit a hundred times into CJ’s knowledge on the subject. I warned him I’ll never be turtle man again, but I tag along when he’s working on the Mitsubishi to try to learn more about standard field vehicles. It all sounds like Greek to me. I have no idea what a darren fluctuator is, or a demi-groton. Where I should mount the redantic wolfspill when snow is on the forecast is a mystery to me, but I’m at least learning how to calibrate the Jess needles after ignition. CJ is a good and patient teacher, which is saying something considering I consider myself to be just as bad a student.

Just like me, my bunkmate gets up every morning when the bugle recording crackles through the tinny camp speakers at 0430. I’m glad for this, because when I was overseas for a while I had a glue pot of a roommate who needed me to get him up in the morning and then followed me around like a hungry stray dog. CJ hops out of bed and slides into the shower shoes he places under the bunk in the exact same spot each night. “Water is good, water is wise,” he sings in baritone on the way to the showers.

The undergrad who knew everyone’s names when I returned that first night after the filbospheric churn of September 19-20 is one of the students CJ has TA’ed for. Her name is Penelope Farris-Washington. She’s just an eager learner who wanted to be up to speed on the new team of researchers coming to Mavis Island for the fall ‘09 expedition. CJ said she got a C+ in the first class she took with him, but an A- in the last one. That’s solid improvement. I have no doubt his teaching skills are to thank, not that she isn’t putting in the hours.

At breakfast we usually have some combination of bottom oats, sea salt and lemon kettle cakes, and assorted mangos and junipers. They did not forget to order the matcha, thankfully, and traditional Mavisian gertis gertis tea is in abundance. It has a kind of honeysuckle aroma, but is more coriander on the tongue.

It’s a strange morning drink, but I’m starting to get used to it. The skin lesions I developed on that first night on Cape Stanwell are starting to heal, finally, and the Mavisian employees swear the gertis gertis tea is to thank for it. They tell me it’s a “hair of the dog” kind of remedy.

After breakfast I generally review some of the barks we got on the first night. Of course, the lab back on the mainland will review most of those and do a wholistic study, but I enjoy putting a few under the microscope and taking notes. I managed to get through a whole canister already, and made all kinds of observations.

For instance, when a high-polarity carbonalturer extracts filbospheric excrements from in a high barometric system and at high altitude, the anti-energy actually inverses its polarity and settles towards the bottom of the filbospheric excrements (we call those barks, FYI).

Now, if I had brought my low-polarity carbonalturer, I probably would have observed the opposite, where the anti-energy would become supercharged rise to the top of the bark. This phenomenon has been named (the “Garrett Effect,” after the scientist who discovered it), and I took a whole course in grad school on its implications for filbospheric macroprogeneration. I didn’t have room for a low-polarity carbonalturer, of course, which would have taken up half the plane. I don’t think it even would have made a difference at altitude, for that matter. One day, I’ll have all these tools on hand, I’m sure. It’s a new field and these instruments are both very rare and very expensive.

Lunch back at the mess is generally a collective lunch-and-learn. We share what we’ve been studying on the island, and Professor Lopez prods us with followup questions to get us to think about broader implications and our own blindspots. It’s been very beneficial for me to hear more about Jacky’s work. It’s like being in the mind of a genius.

Her theory of distillification for non-stetious hario clanes will revolutionize the field when she defends her dissertation. Sometimes I find myself with my mouth wide open in awe as she explains how we can actually turn hario clanes feces into a green alternative for non-stetious plactofuel. I keep asking her to explain it again and again, because even though I’m one of seven or eight people in the field, I have trouble wrapping my head around it. I get so excited about the idea of a zero carbon fuel for operating a Tertis or a delnometer that I sometimes have trouble getting to sleep at night.

In another life I could have been a Mavisian. The lunch fare is simple and light, to support peak productivity and mental agility. We are served a single egg and cucumber dumpling and two liters of gertis gertis tea. They tell me to limit my matcha intake to one cup per morning due to the unusual barometric pressure of the island. The egg and cucumber dumpling is naturally served on a large plate with trangonid oil to drizzle on top, but that’s a bit of an outsider embellishment. The Mavisians don’t use trangonid oil in cooking outside the context of a wedding or Belavid celebration.

In the afternoons we drill. There’s a lot of climbing onto and off of the Mitsubishi and preparing the Tertis at a moment’s notice. Professor Lopez has us fire the harpoon gun at least 20 times a day. Since this is my first expedition she also has to train me on the rubber speedboat. For now I’ve just been using the simulator they have set up in the Ops tent in Base Camp. It’s not that I don’t have plenty of seat time with speedboats. But operating one in the Bay back home is totally different from the rough seas around Mavis Island. I’m just glad I’m learning here and not in the aquatic graveyard around the Rable Islands.

The days are getting shorter and the lupus dragonicus are starting to howl at sundown. It’s safe, as they’re in the hills on the other side of the island. I’m with very experienced field researchers, so I’m not overly concerned about our readiness should an attack come.

Dinner is a bit of a celebration on Mavis Island Base Camp. All the field researchers and local guides who made it through the day come together and feast on roasted bellicous, twisted decorals, and a huge loaf of cucumber rye. There are liters of tempus cider on each table.

Generally, a field researcher is invited to tell a story. On my third night, they put me on the spot. I told the story of the first night on the island and the filbospheric churn. There was applause after my story. It was hesitant at first, but after Professor Lopez rose to her feet, Jacky and CJ followed suit and the rest of the room gathered around me, clapping me on the back and saying “boofret cherowah,” the local dialect for “boss of the skies.” It’s not a particularly serious expression, but one of respect nonetheless.

At 2000, CJ and I return to our bunk and either read, play cards, or write to our loved ones. When I have the energy to get out my toughbook, I write a blog entry. CJ and I say goodnight to each other in one of two ways: we either say “see you on the other side,” or, if one of us falls asleep first, the one who is last awake says “boofret cherowah” when he hears the other snore for the first time.

Signing off, it’s 2130. Boofret cherowah. To Maria Francesca and everyone reading, below is ‘our song’ from Yellowcard.

All glory to the University.

There’s a piece of you that’s here with me
It’s everywhere I go, it’s everything I see
When I sleep, I dream, and it gets me by
I can make believe that you’re here tonight
That you’re here tonight

I haven’t had a chance to collect my thoughts since the plane landed a few days ago. As soon as we disembarked that day I saw Professor Lopez hurrying across the airstrip in orange coveralls and University-issued helmet. She was holding a loaded harpoon gun and shouting something about density.

When she got to us she explained that the density in protons over Cape Stanwell was arousing the filbosphere to unprecedented levels. “It’s a churn. Now would be the time,” she told us between breaths, “to get your butts in gear.” I’ll never forget those words.

I’m the most junior researcher on the expedition, but as the only Baryllisman (in training), I’m the default pick for team lead on any kind of filbospheric mission. Their last Baryllisman, a guy named Bart Kelvin, lost his mind one night while monitoring a double-plated delnometer on Mount Beatrice. That’s on one of the Rable Islands, not even half the elevation of Cape Stanwell.

Fortunately the barometric pressure on Cape Stanwell supports a full isorod extension (and that’s straight from Base Camp, so there’s not even a need to install inter-helipods at 30-meter intervals like we trained on). What Bart was dealing with was much more complex from an atomic standpoint.

It’s like this: the problem with calibrating a double-plated delnometer in the field, at elevation, is that in a low barometric system, the bolts holding together the demagnetized tefnus overheat as the energy source comes into contact with organic dizaine molecules. It only takes nine or so molecules before your double-plated delnometer starts actually conducting all the anti-energy that’s being produced into a conical receptor called the blastid.

The leaked report said Bart was laying lupus dragonicus bait on the south face when the blastid filled up. When he returned, the entire machine was glowing gold due to all the anti-energy. He stayed on the summit with the machine all night, but the plactoradiaton poisoning made him actually believe he was a lupus dragonicus, and he started plotting ways to infiltrate their pack to get advanced warning of any hunting expeditions towards the Base Camp on Larropy Bay.

Bart finished his PhD and recovered fully from the plactoradiation poisoning. He’s now enjoying life as a full-time father and homemaker.

My first day on Mavis Island, at elevation above Cape Stanwell, was not nearly that eventful. For starters, as I said, we didn’t need a delnometer, or even daisy-chained inter-helipods. Second, the barometric pressure is high enough on Mavis Island is high enough I could pump my high-polarity carbonalturer at least a thousand times before needing to turn on an anti-energy storage device, much less deploying a device with onboard anti-energy receptor. And third, I always have my Maria Francesca in my heart, propelling me forward. Can’t count that in nanohertz.

I think CJ’s prior trauma was starting to come back. As I started reading filbospheric wave orientation readings to Jacky in the back of the Mitsubishi, his fingers were drumming the steering wheel hard. I think it was an old disco beat, the one you learn CPR to. I tried to keep him focused. “Take the next left slow, the banner readings are high in this storm,” or “can you give me a sitrep on the fanlopic spreads in this rain?” All of this was gibberish of course, but it gave him something to focus his mind on. “You’re the Baryllisman,” he said every time. I don’t think it was sarcastic. I think he was just focusing on what he knew as a way of centering himself.

Jacky was cool the whole time. She has worked with several Baryllismen already in her career, being all-but-dissertation by now. She’ll take the lead on most outings as Deputy Desolomer. Professor Lopez is officially lead Desolomer, of course, but this being Jacky’s last mission before defending, she needs to head the team on certain missions to qualify.

Professor Lopez volunteered to take roof duty, so she was manning the Tertis on top of the Mitsubishi. She lives for this stuff. Before we pulled away from the airstrip she used standard ISO Delsometer hand signals to direct the undergrad assistants to grab our packs and Pelican cases. At least we didn’t have to lug those in by ourselves.

It took us two hours to get to the summit of Cape Stanwell. We had gotten a famous Mavis Island welcome: sideways rain, hail, occasional cloud-to-ground lightning. CJ did great despite his nerves. He’s had loads of vehicle training, way more than me. I don’t even know if I could have handled the Mitsubishi in those conditions with a loaded Tertis on top.

I skimped on vehicle training, to be honest. I didn’t even bother lugging the dapris canisters to the Tertis, if I practiced with one, basically out of laziness. But I made a deal with Professor Lopez when I accepted the assistantship: ever since I got back home, I promised Maria Francesca and myself I’d never pull a 270-jumpout ever again. Won’t even put myself in that situation. It’s someone else’s turn. I’m a Baryllisman, I said. “Well, you’re a Baryllisman in training,” Professor Lopez replied, chuckling, and slapped me on the back. I was in.

On Cape Stanwell, the first thing I noticed were animal tracks. I tipped off the rest of the team, but Professor Lopez said not to worry. They were just from boltus falliver, harmless, and besides, they wouldn’t come out in the storm. Jacky ignored me completely and got to work dismounting the Tertis for recalibration. CJ just said “you’re the Baryllisman” as he checked the Mitsubishi for loose parts.

By midnight the storm was letting up, but we already had the high-polarity carbonalturer humming. Even after the storm, we knew the filbosphere would be elevated, highly elevated even, for hours.

We got so much good stuff that first night. I was logging hundreds of barks per minute. Nothing on the mainland can even come close to this, and most of it’s synthetic anyway. Every five minutes I called out new measurements to Jacky behind the plastic tendrometer. She would then discharge the full canister and pass it to CJ, who took it into the Mitsubishi’s built-in David system.

“The David is full. Lock everything down and let’s get the hell out of here,” Professor Lopez finally said. The storm was over. We didn’t have to yell anymore. It was 0230, and the dull glow of the sun below the horizon was barely visible. CJ exhaled and sat down, his back to the David. “That’ll do, pig,” he chuckled, patting the system over his shoulder.

Jacky was already loading the empty canisters back in the Mitsubishi. Only seven unused canisters. That means we loaded nearly three and a half cases. That’s years of work for her lab techs back at the University. Professor Lopez was right. It was worth getting our butts in gear.

I unfolded all the telerods on my high-polarity carbonalturer and squashed the berrot modules together. I was being a little heavy handed, but I was tired. The rig can handle it anyway.

I hadn’t been put to the test like that since I got home in ‘07. Professor Lopez could see it on my face, I think. She knew to keep me busy. “You’re on the Tetris going back to base camp,” she says. Fine by me. Anything but turtle duty.

I put on my helmet and climbed on top of the Mitsubishi. I’m a comfortable Tertis man. Competent. Let’s put it this way: I wouldn’t fuck with Pierre Delgado when he’s behind a Tertis. As the Mitsubishi rumbled down the trail with lights pointed in every direction, I saw occasional boltus falliver coming out of their burrows to drink the rain that had collected on getris getris leaves. I wasn’t going to mess with them, especially after what Professor Lopez had said on the summit. But I did put the Tertis on whisper mode and bleeped one of the bigger guys on the tail. He looked up curiously, and I touched my helmet with a big, stupid smile on my face. Harmless my ass. They’re all harmless, until they’re not.

Back at Base Camp, someone had roused the undergrads ahead of our arrival and they applauded as we got out of the Mitsubishi. I climbed down off the roof and shook a layer of gertis gertis discharge off my clothing. I’m glad I flew down in my field gear. Chinos and a polo would have gotten pretty frigid up on Cape Stanwell surrounded by gertis gertis during a filbospheric churn.

“Welcome back, Professor Lopez, CJ, Jacky, Pierre,” said one of the more bookish looking undergrads, nodding at each of us as she said our names. I felt like a celebrity, wondering how this undergrad I’d never met knew my name already. I hadn’t even fired the Tertis. Well, not on loud mode.

In the mess, hot tins of bread pudding, egg and cucumber dumplings, and bottom oats were waiting for us. It’s sort of the University’s budget take on traditional Mavisian cuisine. I had three plates before Professor Lopez took us into the conference room to debrief. “You’ll always remember your first filbospheric churn,” she said at the end, and winked before striding out the door.

CJ led me to our shared room. I took the top bunk. Jacky would have her room to herself. I had nothing but good dreams that first night. I was in a field with Maria Francesca, counting her fingers and toes while she whispered old stories from Castonella. She loved those tales, centuries old but she always told them in the first person as though she had the life experiences of a Julia de Degonces or Filip Tutta Dellamarca. “And then I landed on the frallico’s back,” she said, donning the voice of the Castonellan braves of old, “and planted my blade into its neck as a flag.”

And at that moment I woke up. CJ was tapping me on my neck. We didn’t know each other that well yet. He didn’t know where else to prod me.

“You were having a nightmare,” he said. I had been sleeping on my stomach. I hadn’t gone to sleep that way. I rolled over on my back and sat up. I nodded my head. “Thank you, CJ. I’ll take the flag back out myself.”

He nodded courteously, but his expression conveyed confusion. I don’t remember what else I dreamed about, and I woke up well rested. But I’ve had a dull pain in my neck since. Hopefully it’s gone in a week.

Signing off, it’s 2130. Today the music is MGMT.

All glory to the University

Pierre Delgado

I’m feeling rough, I’m feeling raw, I’m in the prime of my life
Let’s make some music, make some money, find some models for wives
I’ll move to Paris, shoot some heroin and fuck with the stars
You man, the island and the cocaine and the elegant cars

This is it. The day I’ve been waiting for since undergrad at State. I’m finally getting into the field, for real this time.

Professor Lopez told me I needed more equipment training before the last two outings. “You’re not up to snuff, Delgado,” she’d say. She’s my advisor and I trust her judgment. It gave me time to beef up my Portuguese.

I packed, unpacked, and repacked my gear probably ten times on my bed. Everything for a six-month expedition in a backpack and pelican case: four pairs of quick dry socks, two pairs of thick socks, two pairs of long underwear, four pairs of boxers, four quick dry t-shirts, two pullovers, one winter-weight balaclava, one medium-weight raincoat, two watch caps, one spare pair of Native sunglasses, one pair of medium-weight gloves, one pair of winter-weight gloves, two pairs of work gloves, one toughbook with spare battery and charger cord, one standard devolted oscilloscope, two heavy-duty Klein patch modules, 20 silver black-liner cables (assorted lengths), the Journey Baryllisman Guide (ed. 2007), one high-polarity carbonalturer, two books of matches (in plastic bags), one 9mm Glock, two boxes of 9mm ammunition.

Other equipment, including my Brockman harpoon gun, is already at the site. The pilot the University contracts went through my gear and checked through his list. He noted: nothing new, nothing missing.

It was a rocky takeoff due to the low-pressure system still churning about 20 klicks south-southeast in the Bay. The storm front delayed our takeoff by two hours, but the University gave some money to our contractors to pay off the airfield crew for the extra time.

All I can hear now is the dull roar of the aircraft engine through my apparently inadequate earplugs. My colleagues, Jacky Nelson and CJ Lee, are already asleep. Jacky has done two expeditions already. She’s the rockstar of the department. She’ll be faculty at Harvard or somewhere in less than five years. CJ had some kind of accident in his first expedition. Neither he nor the University will talk about it, but he’s fast asleep now so whatever happened can’t be keeping him up at night.

Me, I’ve been on heavy cargo or transport planes like this loads of times before, pre-grad school. I never could sleep on them. The uncertainty of what’s to come, combined with the hard furniture and engine noise, all make it hard to nod off. The stakes are definitely different this time though.

I’ve timed my matcha consumption so it lasts me until we start descending. The University told me they have matcha rations at base camp, but Jacky said sometimes those reassurances aren’t exactly promises. My fiancee Maria Francesca got me into matcha after I came back home. Now I don’t know if I can live without it. That’s not true. I can adapt to any environment. I’m Pierre Delgado. Jean-Luc and Alexandra Delgado didn’t raise a glue pot.

I’m looking forward to collecting some stimulus exopilis in the wild. It’s, of course, a key component of the energy source for the half-stilted phorometer I’m designing as part of my dissertation research. It’s just a small part of Professor Lopez’s newest model, but she tells me having a way to reduce the polar defabrication by even .09gt would flatten the malapy curve enough to prolong the machine’s output by at least a day before having to initiate a weeklong cooling cycle.

I can’t think about the big picture right now. It’s one foot in front of the other right now, Pierre. Don’t think about Professor Lopez’s newest model. Don’t think about how you’ll find stimulus exopilis or drastophus blinnium, and definitely don’t think about the lupus dragonicus possibly harvesting them to feed their kids.

One last sip of matcha. The copilot poked his head into the room and woke up CJ and Jacky. Get ready to land. There’s a storm over Mavis Island, so strap in tight.

I don’t know when I’ll have internet to upload this, but if you’re reading, I love you, Maria Francesca. I’m going to get the job done and come home in one piece. Thank you for believing in me and my research.

Signing off, it’s a minute before 1645. Enjoy what I’ve been rocking out to below, from OK Go.

All glory to the University.

Pierre Delgado

Just when you think you’re in control
Just when you think you’ve got a hold
Just when you get on a roll
Here it goes, here it goes, here it goes again
Here it goes again
I should’ve known, should’ve known, should’ve known again
But here it goes again
Oh, oh, here it goes again