FICTION: Arc
When the old Welder tells you a joke, he speaks of fabrication. Apt, given that the industrial hunger to bond two materials together is insatiable.
He looks across the table at you, squinting in the already dim light. "So, is your money going to bond to my hand?" He had already showed you what he was capable of, and the join was neat. He just wanted his side of the deal to be tidy, which was fair.
Expeditions, however, were not fair, they were often paid for in blood, and, behind his piercing, stern eyes, you could not entirely determine his motivations - was it the purpose, or was it the cold, hard cash?
"You might just be the most important man on the crew, apart from the science staff." He grinned at you, knowing he had won.
"Welcome to the team."
His hand, when it shook yours, was rough, calloused, and strong. He would, with any luck, not be doing much welding, but it was important to have someone skilled in the craft, because the expedition depended on it. Your own life depended on it.
A welder isn't much good if a bridge has already collapsed, but they are very useful to proactively repair things that are in disarray. You knew this. He probably thought it was just like any other job.
You passed the money across the able. He thanked you with a gruff word, and rose. "We leave in the morning?" He asked. You give him a nod, and part ways. It would be an early start.
You slept poorly, not knowing what the morning would bring. He'd get more pay out of you, but simultaneously, if he needed to actually do any work, you'd get your moneys worth too.
The welder was on retainer, but for now, all he built was a fortress of cash, and a deep hole in your finances. Perhaps he would be not only good for fabrication, but also for some deconstruction and plasma cutting. Afterall, the tools were similar.
In the muster area, a pile of crates and a collection of haphazardly parked vehicles: the first question you asked him - "You can cut things open as well?"
"For a price." he replied.
"We'll hope there will be no accidents then," you murmur, tapping the flank of the car's engine bay, following the curved edge of the A pillar to its smooth roof.
Bridge? Space or Ocean? Sometimes you pay just for piece of mind and hope it never comes up.
I was thinking Antarctic, with this one - as the original prompt for this text at my writer's group was presented as Arc(tic).
oh, At the Mountains of Madness type expedition, I love it!
I won't lie, this book has influenced my writing a lot lately. I love how detail obsessed it is.
Writing this in 2nd person was response to the fourth book in the above series, as it has some uncanny 2nd person portions throughout.
It is also a perspective I do not read a lot of fiction in, so it was foreign to me.
a) I've only seen the movie, but I'll try to find a copy.
b) I got into an argument with an English teacher in high-school over whether a story could be told from 2nd person well. She really didn't think it could be done. (I wrote several things from 2nd perspective that year just to prove her wrong)
GOOD! I did similar things in school. "You can't do this"
"Watch me!"
I also did the same thing in University, where I wrote a paper about how video games were Art. The tutor, a post-modernist example of artiste, failed the paper. I resubmitted it to the course coordinator, unchanged. He gave it the highest possible grade.
I was working professionally, at the time, for a video game publication - and had published many editorials on the topic, and referenced my own writing in my own paper. He liked that. The tutor did not. :P
that for a price answer says everything about your we;lder, he is both insurance and a reminder of what can go wrong. Keeping him on retainer hurts now, your wallet might wince, but it defintely buys calm when you hit rough moments and need clean cuts or quick fixes before real trouble starts. Framing his place beside the science crew sells the stakes and makes that early roll out feel heavier yet oddly confident.