The fog along the Southern Reach did not burn off at sunrise. It clung to the black volcanic rocks of Point Sentinel in thick, greasy blankets, smelling of sulphur and wet salt.
Three miles off the coast, where the shallow shelf dropped into the dark trenches of the Southern Ocean, the picket boat Gull sat idling in the swell. Her small steam engine clattered quietly, keeping her nose turned into the gray waves.
Standing on the wheelhouse roof, Ensign Cooper adjusted the brass focus ring of his long glass. His fingers were stiff with salt-frost.
"Anything out there, sir?" the helmsman called up through the open hatch.
"Just fog and drift-ice," Cooper muttered. He swept the lens across the southern horizon one last time before stepping down. Then he froze.
