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Summit Day, Plus One

by John Gilbert © 2005

M artin fumbled to remove his oxygen mask, so he could speak to his tent mate. "We need to start moving. Get the stove lighted, and I will get a pan of snow for melting. Then I need to check on Lars and Apa."

Shep gave a non-committal grunt in reply, but his big smile indicated his true state of mind. After spending over a month on the mountain, they would be leaving as the latest masters of Everest.

Martin crawled out into the now still air. The storm that hit just as the group had reached the summit had raged all evening and throughout the night. But even as dawn signaled a new day, the weather acquiesced into a new pattern too. Martin easily found a drift of fresh snow to fill his pan. He saw the industrious Sherpa, Apa, was already hard at work stowing gear for the climb down the mountain.

"Martin," began Apa, "Tenzing and Lhakpa will be up from camp five in about an hour. Camp five is ready for you to have lunch there and then camp four is ready for sleeping if you think Mr. Shep can get that far. Mr. Lars did not make it through the night. What you want to do with his body?"

"How did Lars do last night? Did he ever come around?" asked Martin.

"No, he never wake up. I kept him on new oxygen, we have lots extra since Kate and Donald turned back and Chip, uh, fell. But Lars, he never wake up, he never swallow the water I tried to give him. About three o'clock he stop coughing and I think he is gone" replied Apa.

"We will have to leave his body here" replied Martin. "At least the tough old bastard did reach the summit - they will never be able to take that from him. I'll get Shep to help me with preserving Lars' memories, and we will leave his body inside that tent. Let me know when you are done getting equipment out of that tent."

"It's all done already. I move everything to the other tent" Apa was quick to reply.

Martin returned to the tent he shared with Shep. "Lars didn't make it. Even with fresh oxygen, the edema had gone too far" he said as he handed over the pan of snow. "And thanks, by the way, for all your help getting Lars back to camp last night. In that storm, it is amazing that we got back to camp, let alone getting Lars back too! For a client, you are a helluva strong climber at high altitude. How are your fingers and toes today?"

"The left hand has some pretty bad frostbite. I might lose a finger or two. But my feet are looking okay" replied the still smiling Shep.

"Well I need your help one more time with Lars. If you are up to it. We need to save his memories for transfer into his replacement body. I could get Apa to help with this, but the Sherpas get a little bit superstitious and uncomfortable handling the dead. All we need to do, is take his head back with us. We have this thermite necklace that should make a clean separation, or at least minimize the sawing we might need to do. I had to do this once before, on K2. It isn't messy at all, once the body is frozen."

Shep had somewhat less of a smile as he replied, "Martin, of course I will do whatever I can to help. Lars would have done the same for me. It would be pretty sad to spend all the time, money and effort to climb this mountain and then not remember any of it because they had to use a memory backup from two months ago!"

"Thank you, Shep" replied Martin. "Now I need to call base camp, and see if they had any luck finding Chip." Martin rummaged through his gear until he found the mobile phone. "Sheila, is that you?" he asked to the person answering the call.

"Go ahead Martin, I hear you" answered Sheila, the base camp director.

"Have you had any luck finding Chip's body and saving his memories?" asked Martin.

"We believe he is spotted at the bottom of the Kangshung face, and have a group going to see if they can get him. It should not be a problem to get there, but I have not heard yet what kind of condition the corpse might be in" answered Sheila.

"Well be sure and document every bit of expense we incur doing this, as we are under no obligation to that prick! His trip insurance covers body cloning and memory replacement due to accidents or disasters or unpreventable acts of God. That prick unhooked from the rope and jumped off the Kangshung face on purpose. I want to be sure we charge him fully for every bit of equipment he ruined and for every bit of expense associated with finding and retrieving his body" instructed Martin. "Climbing Mount Everest isn't thrill enough for this guy, he wants to fall off it too. It would not trouble me one bit if he didn't get to remember any of it!"

"Okay Martin, I hear you loud and clear. See you in a couple of days" answered Sheila.

Martin hung up, and looked again at Shep's hands. "You are going to lose your pinky finger for sure, Shep. Your trip insurance will cover body replacement even for that, you know" Martin said.

Shep, again with the big smile, shook his head. "Maybe if it gives me pain. More likely I will keep things exactly the way they turn out. Lot's of people can say they have two pinky fingers. But not so many can say, this is the hand that climbed Mount Everest in a storm."

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