The Last Vikings

#AnythingIsPossible

Twelve missed calls.

Twelve.

Wasn't that a bit extreme? I'd thought Paulo was intense before, but this?

Had he never learnt that it's not okay to call someone that many times?

I certainly had, and it had been a cruel lesson. Back when I was a naive seventeen year old, this guy in my halls, Jack Sanders, told everyone I was a psycho because I missed-called him five times after we slept together in freshers week. Four years of university, and I swear my reputation never quite recovered.

Granted, my late-night messages to Paulo had themselves been pretty psycho, but he'd clearly retaliated in kind.

Unless...

Unless he wasn't just being crazy. Unless he had a very important reason to call me.

Like he knew something I didn't.

Like he knew I was in danger.

I remembered my suspicions of last night, and a block of ice found its way into my stomach.

Maybe Paulo knew about what was going to happen to Sam. Maybe he was trying to warn me.

I quickly flicked to my messages, to see if there were any from him.

There weren't.

Apart from a handful from my answer machine informing me of my missed calls, all of them were from Suzie, except one, from Ruben.

I called my messaging service just in case Paulo had left a message, but bar a few milliseconds of silence and a click, there was nothing.

What on Earth could he want?

I pulled up my pants awkwardly and sat back down on the toilet, trying to make my aching head work.

Come on, Jennie, think. Think.

It was unlikely that Paulo called me twelve times because he was so overcome with emotion st seeing me again, as much as I'd like to flatter myself that was the case. He'd barely looked at me in the portacabins that night.

Which suggested he had other reasons for trying to contact me so urgently. But what could those be? It had to be something to do with the incident—with Sam—surely? What else could be so important? But how could Paulo know about it? How was he connected?

Mafia ties?

Did he know people in the Argentine government?

He'd met Sam, that night, because of me. Could Paulo have known about Sam's death?

Did he do it?

But how?

And why?

It was all illogical, but I couldn't shake my suspicion.

I knew what I would have to do.

There was only one way to get any answers.

I had to call him back.

I closed my eyes for a moment and took a deep breath before pressing his name on my screen.

The dial tone echoed brashly round my wooden toilet cubicle.

It went straight to answer machine, a plummy woman, the generic recorded message.

"Hi, hi, Paulo," I said stiffly, taken by surprise. I'd been gearing myself up to get answers and wasn't sure what to say after the beep.

"It's Jennie. Returning your call. Calls. Ring me back? Okay. Bye."

I hung up and closed my eyes, agitated, trying to get my nervy thoughts in order.

Could Paulo be involved in Sam's death? Could he be responsible for it? Or was I just being paranoid and turning six into nine?

What evidence did I even have? That Paulo was Argentinian? That he acted suspiciously? That he wore a gold earring, and had called me a few too many times?

It all seemed a little weak when you laid it out like that. But still...

I clicked the Safari app on my phone and typed "Territorial claims Antarctica" into Google. I had to at least work out if the Argentinian government has reason to feel threatened by Russia over this InTrepid thing, if I was going to establish a motive.

Google images showed me the familiar map of Antarctica, but this one was sliced up with dotted lines, like a pie.

I switched to maps, to try and establish which territorial claim the little blue dot denoting me—and thus the ice hotel—fell.

The UK.

My stomach sank with disappointment.

We were in British claimed territory. That told me nada. As far as my theories went, it meant nothing at all.

But wait.

I zoomed in on the map.

Each pie-slice of the continent was a different colour, and what with the overlay, I hadn't noticed it at first.

Overlapping slices.

The UK and Argentina.

They had overlapping slices. Which meant they'd both stuck a flag in the exact same parcel of land and declared it as their own.

A big ol' bit of Antarctica was contested territory, like an icy Israel/Palestine.

And our ice hotel?

It was slap bang in the middle of it.