War Photographer's Notebook

In the warm cave, a wooden door sealed with a penguin down sleeping bag firmly blocked the biting cold wind outside the cave entrance.

Not far from the edge of the wooden door, the cold wind coming in from the two bowl-sized vents dug out in the rock wall, after passing through an oil drum, just blew in the four water tanks. The stove also carries the heat released by the stove and water tank, continuously supplying vital heat and fresh air to every corner of the cave.

Opposite the stove, on the other side of the inside of the cave, Hanno was controlling the radio to send messages, trying to establish contact with the rear.

Hanno was not the only one who was trying in vain. This was already the third day since they escaped here, but Stern was still lying unconscious on the hospital bed, showing no signs of regaining consciousness.

Farther away at the end of the cave, Dr. Cross held a geological hammer and slowly tapped the exposed rock mass. From time to time, he would pick up the knocked-out stones and observe them carefully, and then put them in his feet. Put it in the wooden box beside you, or throw it aside casually, and continue to hit the rock mass with the small hammer in your hand.

Wei Ran also had something to do. At this time, he was sitting on an airdrop box next to the stove, carefully wiping and maintaining the VZ24 Mauser rifle and all tools including mountaineering picks and skis.

"Are you ready to go penguin hunting?"

Dr. Yog, who had just finished changing the medicine for Carsten's wound, approached Wei Ran and asked.

"Yes, the wind and snow outside have weakened a lot. I plan to wait a little longer before setting off."

As Wei Ran spoke, he tied an extra wrist rope to the Swiss ice ax in his hand to prevent it from falling off.

"Shall I go with you?" Dr. Yog asked proactively.

"No need"

Wei Ran shook his head, "Wait until I find the penguin colony first and then come with me. Your more important job now is to take care of Mr. Carsten. Speaking of which, he"

Before he could finish speaking, Dr. Yog shook his head and lowered his voice and said, "The situation is very bad. I'm very worried. The cause of his high fever and coma is intracranial infection."

Hearing this, Wei Ran's breathing was stagnant. Considering the current conditions, this was almost the worst case scenario. Not to mention he, a half-experienced veterinarian, even Dr. Yog, who seemed to have a professional background, might not be able to do anything about it.

"Victor, let me go with you."

After sending the telegram and getting no response at all as expected, Hanno came over and said, "I know the approximate location of the penguin breeding ground, I can definitely do it."

“There are only two mountain guides in our team now.”

Wei Ran said truthfully, "If both of us leave, do you think Dr. Yog, Dr. Cross, and Mr. Carsten, who is still in a coma, can survive until the summer?"

Before Hannuo could speak, Wei Ran asked additionally, "Also, if you leave with me, who will monitor the radio?"

Han Nuo was stopped by this question, and Wei Ran also sighed secretly in his heart.

In this polar environment, if a person goes out alone, even if he just goes out to take a poop, he will face the fatal threat of being blown away by the wind. It is undoubtedly much safer for two people to go together.

But Wei Ran's family knew about his affairs. If it was just him, he would be able to travel farther with the help of the metal book. But if someone follows him, if nothing else, he won't be able to find an excuse even if he wants to take out the cast iron stove to get warm.

Using enough reasons to stop the two companions who were about to go hunting with him, Wei Ran said while packing up mountaineering equipment and hunting weapons, "I will take away 20 sled dogs and tents later, and there are still two days." supply.

If the weather is good, I expect to be back within 48 hours. If the weather is bad, come back within 12 hours after the weather improves. "

"If you don't come back after the time limit, we will..."

"There is a high probability that we will not go looking for you."

Hanno didn't wait for Dr. Yoger to finish, and gave the answer first, "We will kill most of the remaining sled dogs to use as food reserves to survive this winter."

"no problem"

Wei Ran nodded happily. After all, Hannuo was the captain of everyone. From his perspective, not going to rescue was the best option to ensure that more people survived.

"You better survive," Hanno said.

"certainly"

Wei Ran smiled and said, "Help me load the car. It will be dawn in less than an hour. If the weather is not too bad, I will set off."

Hearing this, Hannuo and the other three looked at each other, helped Weiran lift a 100-liter iron bucket filled with coal onto a sleigh that had been waxed in advance and tied it up, and then tied it up, and then tied it up, which they had used for the sauna a few days ago. The tent and the sleeping bag belonging to Weiyan were packed in.

Finally, he put his rifle on his back and loaded the mountaineering bag and skis onto the sleigh. With the help of everyone, he covered them tightly with waterproof canvas and tied them tightly with ropes.

"Put this on," Hanno said, handing a kettle filled with hot coffee to Wei Ran.

Wei Ran did not refuse the other party's kindness. He stuffed the kettle into his arms and let them help him drag the heavy sled out and hook up the sled dogs.

Looking up at the sky, which had little brightness at all, and the snowflakes that were still blown away by the wind from time to time, Wei Ran put on his thick leather hat, and then put a metal bucket on his head to act as a helmet, and then stepped on the sled. He pulled the car, shook the reins vigorously, and shouted at the dogs to start running.

Gradually, the figures behind him became more and more blurred, and Wei Ran also turned a corner along the foot of the mountain and completely disappeared from the worried sight of Hannuo and others.

Leaving the mountainous area in the direction they came from, Wei Ran did not dare to waste time, so he ordered the dogs to turn right and ran towards the direction where Hannuo once mentioned that he had seen egg shells.

About an hour later, the sky had darkened again, and there were still mountains on the right, but he did not see any shadow of penguins in the increasingly dim vision.

The sleigh was fixed with wooden wedges in the lee of a huge ice block. Wei Ran first hung all the mountaineering equipment in the backpack on the belt of the one-piece thermal insulation suit, and then took out the large telescope from the metal book and set it up. , searching for more distant scenes little by little.

After a moment, he decisively put away the binoculars and once again ordered the dogs to run.

During this stop and go, he was getting farther and farther away from the warm cave, and two lit kerosene lamps were hung on the handles of his sleigh.

But when he couldn't see anything even with the help of a telescope, he still couldn't find even a shadow of a penguin.

Looking up at the night sky where there was no aurora at all, Wei Ran shook his head helplessly, and had no choice but to find a piece of blue ice to block the wind again, and hid in the leeward side to set up a tent on a sleigh and a metal book.

After lighting the cast-iron stove and waiting for the charcoal fire to burn completely, he didn't forget to make a brazier for the dogs next door using a tin bucket to keep warm. By the way, he also fed them the last half bucket of penguin meat that he had saved previously.

I’m afraid this return mission will last for just half a year, right?

In the warm tent, Wei Ran lay on the sleigh covered with bearskin and muttered worriedly.

Objectively speaking, he has achieved his goal of entering this period of history, but Metal Book is obviously not prepared to let him go just like that.

Let's start building a hope

Wei Ran stared blankly at the tattoo at the tiger's mouth, but he had no expectations at all for the days to come.

I don’t know how long it took, but the night sky outside the tent gradually began to fill with brilliant auroras. Seeing this, Wei Ran immediately turned over and sat up, set up a telescope in the tent, and sat on the sleigh to slowly observe the situation outside.

After a long time, he waved his hand and put away the telescope, quickly packed up the tent and stove, and the sled cart filled with life-saving supplies. He shouted to the dogs and continued to pull the sled cart close to the mountainous area on the right under the increasingly intense aurora. Running on the edge.

From time to time, he would stop and set up the telescope again and again to observe the surrounding environment.

However, until the strong wind blew around him again, until the strong wind became stronger and stronger, and began to be mixed with fist-sized ice and gravel, he still did not gain anything.

In desperation, he could only find a nearby ice cave with leeward direction and set up his tent again inside.

When the hell do we have to find this?

Wei Ran muttered secretly, this Feng Xue was about to get bigger. Obviously, when the wind and snow stopped again, the only thing he could do was wait patiently.

But according to what I learned from Dr. Cross before setting off, it was now April, and in the coming days, as the polar night fell, snowstorms would become more and more normal.

In other words, there is not much time left for him, maybe only half a month or even a week at most, and even this place will be shrouded in polar night.

When the time comes, trying to find the emperor penguins that take advantage of the polar night to hide and reproduce will be as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack!

But unfortunately, the last bit of time left for him was only about an hour during the day, and it would get shorter and shorter.

That's it, excluding days when the wind blows and makes hunting impossible.

After getting rid of all these troubles in his mind, Wei Ran dragged the sleigh towards the cast iron stove, and soon after lying down in his clothes, he fell into a dreamland full of penguins.

Unfortunately, when he woke up again, although it was already daytime, the cold wind and blizzard outside the ice cave still showed no signs of stopping. Even the entrance of the cave was covered with nearly 30 centimeters of snow. Wei Ran took off one of the bread bags slung around his waist and threw all the half-cooked frozen meat inside to the sled dogs outside the tent. His inner worry became aggravated.

The last bit of penguin meat left yesterday and the animal meat in the two bread bags on his waist were almost the last bit of dog food reserves. He had to rush back before the dogs ate them up—— Or hunt penguins.

Patting the last bread bag filled with animal meat on his waist, and glancing at the dial of his watch, Wei Ran walked to the entrance of the ice cave and set up his telescope again, trying to find something in the snow and wind.

After wandering around for 10 minutes, he finally gave up the attempt, put away the telescope and got back into the tent, lay down on the sled again, lit a cigarette and passed the time that was starting to become boring and extremely long.

Soon, the long night fell again, and the sound of wind outside the ice cave finally became quieter, but the heavy goose-feather snow that was falling showed no sign of stopping, and the top of the head was pitch black, with no ray of aurora visible at all. shadow.

Why is it getting dark again? Wei Ran muttered a little irritably, but he couldn't sleep.

It would have been better if I had brought this book with me.

Wei Ran muttered regretfully, took out the cigarette case a little irritably, lit another cigarette for himself and took a long puff.

Logically speaking, with his ability to withstand stress, he shouldn't have been able to bear the loneliness so quickly. However, the endless dark night, the howling cold wind and other factors made the negative emotions that had accumulated in him for who knows how long come to an end earlier. Touched the edge of collapse.

After flicking the cigarette butt away, Wei Ran tried hard not to think about the memories that popped up from the depths of his memory for no reason. He drank up the gin in the flask with him in a few sips, then filled the stove with coal, and then took off his clothes. Wearing the smelly jumpsuit and shirt and underwear, I forced myself to lie on the warm bearskin again, and fell asleep with difficulty with the help of wine.

In this dream, he dreamed of a noisy Donald Duck with a swarm of wasps in his mouth, riding a broken motorcycle burning soybean oil, singing an unpleasant song and stepping on the accelerator, one trip after another. Going back and forth over a bumpy washboard road - and myself lying in the middle of the road.

When the noisy duck ran the motorcycle tire over his ear again, Wei Ran finally woke up, and then he heard the sound he heard in his dream again.

After a quick reaction, Wei Ran sat up with a "Soar!", got dressed as quickly as possible, picked up the Czech Mauser rifle and ran out.

He didn't have time to calculate how long he slept, but at this time the wind and snow outside the ice cave had stopped, and it was still a rare daytime.

Not only that, but less than a hundred meters away, there were at least thousands of tall emperor penguins lining up, making short but extremely powerful noises like wasps and Donald Duck arguing with a motorcycle that couldn't catch fire. Penetrating screams, while swaying on the road.

From time to time, the penguins would lie down, push hard with their legs, and slide their bodies against the snow far away. Then they would use their sharp beaks to support their bodies to stand up and take two steps again. Then drop down again and slide out.

Inexplicably, those creatures that were as big as a six- or seven-year-old child, so many that it was impossible to see their heads at a glance, actually made Wei Ran, who had already raised his gun, feel inexplicable fear!

Taking a deep breath, Wei Ran waved his hand and took out the backpack filled with cooking utensils and placed it on the ground. Then he sat down and put the gun in his hand on the backpack. He pushed the bullet, loaded the gun, took aim, and finally pulled the trigger with an expressionless expression!

"boom!"

After the clear gunfire, the indescribable screams stagnated, and then became more noisy after a short period of silence. Those plump innocent lives also fluttered their wings that were almost equivalent to decoration and fled in all directions, sticking to the ground. Sliding, or falling down one after another in panic.

"boom!"

"boom!"

"boom!"

Amidst the gunshots one after another, Wei Ran emptied three magazines of bullets in a row, but the emperor penguins still did not run out of his effective shooting range.

"Sorry, this winter is too long"

Wei Ran murmured silently, filled the weapon with bullets again with an expressionless face, moved the muzzle slightly, and pulled the trigger again.

When he emptied the fifth magazine, which was also the last magazine he brought, this huge group of penguins finally left his effective shooting range.

Putting away the backpack and standing up silently, Wei Ran leaned the empty rifle against the edge of the ice cave, then hitched the dogs to the sled, shouted at them to leave the ice cave, and took the nearest penguin corpse. Shipped it back.

Wei Ran quickly disemboweled the penguin corpse, carefully observed the removed internal organs, then cut them into pieces and threw them to the dogs.

While the dogs were enjoying their meal, he also peeled off the penguin's skin and threw it into the deepest part of the ice cave. Then he removed the less valuable parts and lifted the steaming tutu in his hand. Wrap a layer of snow outside, and then throw it into the deepest part of the tent.

Next, he ordered the dogs to go back and forth between the hunting ground and the ice cave, picking up the huge corpses one by one.

Soon, more than twenty emperor penguin carcasses were piled up in the ice cave. These carcasses were enough for the more than fifty sled dogs to eat for a while. What's more, he also found the breeding ground of this penguin colony.

After counting the two rows of penguin heads placed at his feet, Wei Ran once again ordered the dogs to set off to find the last three penguins he had just shot.

Thanks to the beautiful tuxedos on these big guys and the bright red blood stains left by the wounds, it is not difficult to find them. The only trouble is that they are getting further and further away.

Easily carrying a stiff penguin corpse onto the sleigh, Wei Ran glanced at the other two corpses no more than 5 meters away, simply knocked on the snowshoes on his feet, and walked directly over.

The two emperor penguins are both over one meter tall. Their plump and round bodies are filled with enough fat to survive the cold winter, making them weigh nearly a hundred kilograms.

Wei Ran bent down and grabbed a penguin's feet, and tried to lift it up. At the same time, he secretly wondered whether the paws of this thing would be more delicious than chicken feet if they were properly marinated.

However, before he could figure out whether the spices in the basket could be gathered together to make a pot of soup, the snow under his feet suddenly sank in!

"broken!"

Wei Ran reacted very quickly and immediately let go of the penguin he had just picked up in his hand, and at the same time subconsciously threw himself to the ground.

However, before his chest touched the blood-stained snow on the ground, his feet collapsed with a crash!

"grass!"

Wei Ran only had time to let out a exclamation before his whole body fell into the deep ice!

Almost subconsciously, he once again grabbed the penguin that fell into the ice crevice with him, pulled it into his arms, and firmly grasped the thick feathers and the sharp and deadly beak.

"Oh!"

Almost at the moment he clenched his feathers, his body and that of the penguin also hit the snowdrift at the bottom of the crevice.

"Pooh"

Wei Ran spit out the smelly liquid that had just spurted out of the penguin's mouth and splashed onto his face and mouth. Then he turned over with a grin on his face, looking at the sky above the narrow gap above his head, and feeling the sensation at the same time. The state of the body.

Based on visual inspection alone, the ice crevice he just fell into was probably nearly ten meters deep, and unlike the ice crevice where Major Schubert was buried, this ice crevice was a structure with a small mouth and a big belly.

Perhaps precisely because of this structure, a thick layer of grave-like snowdrifts accumulated at the bottom of the ice crevice helped him cushion a large amount of impact.

But even so, he could clearly detect that his right elbow seemed to have been dislocated by the fall just now, and his right ankle also seemed to be injured.

What made him even more uncomfortable was that the impact of the pot of coffee he had placed in his arms was almost like a punch to his stomach, almost knocking out his overnight canned rice.

With a sigh of relief, Wei Ran climbed far away with difficulty, then took out an oil drum filled with kerosene, opened the lid and poured some on the penguin's body, then collected the oil drum and lit it with a lighter. .

With a "hoo" sound, the steaming flames illuminated the ice crevice, allowing him to see the surrounding situation.

What he didn't expect was that there were many bird nests made of feathers and moss in the ice crevices. In some nests, there were even unknown birds with white feathers lying down.

At this time, whether it was the firelight or the pungent smell of burnt protein, these beings hiding in the ice cracks made restless screams one after another.

Without daring to waste time, Wei Ran took off his gloves and bit them in his mouth. With a crisp "click" sound, he first restored the dislocated elbow, and then massaged it again. Although it was not dislocated, it did not require any strength at all. ankle.

It wasn't until the flames on the penguin's body were about to extinguish that he struggled to get up, raised his head and began to think about how to climb up.

The only thing he was lucky about now was that in view of what happened to the major, he was extra cautious and always carried the mountaineering equipment with him.

But at this time, one of his feet had no strength, and the elbow of one hand was aching, so he was not sure whether he could climb up.

Taking out a backpack full of cooking utensils, Wei Ran rummaged through it and took out the American oil stove he had obtained in the Shetgen Forest and lit the torch that served as lighting.

Holding the oil stove in one hand and a mountaineering pick in the other, he limped forward for a few hundred meters until he finally came to the end of the ice crevice.

Along the way, the gap above his head had been completely covered by snow, and the light here naturally became extremely dim. But fortunately, it was no longer a structure with a small mouth and a big belly, and he finally had the courage to climb up again. possible.

Wei Ran carefully sat down against the ice wall and put crampons on his feet. Then he rummaged around in his arms and took out a disposable morphine he had stolen from Dr. Yog. Less than half the amount was injected near the injured ankle.

Before the medicine took effect, he put away the oil stove and stood up again, swinging the mountaineering pick hard, and using this force, he climbed up the slippery ice surface with the help of crampons.