Antarctic Death Shot!

CW: Cannibalism, parasites as garnish

In the unforgiving tundra of Antarctica there is little excitement one can find- especially when your job is to look at ice and frozen soil all day. However this research lab was currently buzzing with more energy than anyone had seen since the lab first opened up.

The eccentric (and erratic) millionaire Draken Von Kalt was coming to pay a visit to his costly investment after they reported a miraculous discovery. The University of Massachusetts's admittedly small but intense team consisting of biologists and anthropologists had been about to give up hope for any funding to their dream study of a seemingly bizarre case of mass death in a reclusive tribe, until Draken had one day waltzed in with the professor spearheading the charge, and told them they were getting every funding need met . . . and only one condition attached.

"Since our time here started, Mr. Von Kalt, we've made some incredible breakthroughs regarding the people who once lived here centuries ago. They're ways of adapting to not only the terrain, but the predators here have been fascinating to study- we're still trying to find out what led to such a mass amount of deaths in the tribe and what diseases they might have faced in such times to account for the significant, er . . . erosion, might be the best word-"

"And one of their predators was a worm?" Draken, who hadn't uttered a word since getting out of his chopper, interrupted the scientist then. His sudden interest now further flusters the scientist.

"Well, there is still more work to be done but, it does appear they had quite a problem with parasitic infections . . . indeed, my colleague Dr. Rosewood- you'll meet them later- thinks that these remains might carry the most evidence of parasites ever seen in human remains before!"

"I'd like to see them." Draken's request sounded a lot like an order, and one that slightly tripped up Dr. Dimseck.

"You- you want to see the remains?"

Draken sighed impatiently. "I want to see the worms. Don't you have any that might have been pulled from the bodies?"

"W-well . . ." Dr. Dimseck dithered, slightly perturbed, but obliged his donor and escorted him through the facility to the forensics team. They slipped past the automatic doors, the hissing hydraulics causing every head to turn to the newcomers.

"Good day all! This is Draken Von Kalt, he is the one who's made it possible for us all to be here!" Dr. Dimseck smiled broadly and raised his eyebrows, wide eyes staring into every one until they caught the message and began to clap. Unaware of Draken's irritation with the useless pleasantries, Dr. Dimseck continued. "He's quite interested in hearing what we've got so far on the parasitic evidence found in the remains. Uh, Lorraine- where are the . . . ?"

Draken wasn't interested in whatever the other man was blathering about, and sauntered over to a cluster of students leaning over a microscope. One, a brunette, looked over their shoulder and startled slightly at how close Draken was. "Uh . . . would you like to take a look? We've got a block of permafrost with some of them inside-"

"Please." Draken interrupted with a charming grin. The student nudged the other two out of the way, and Draken moved forward, leaning down to view the frozen, tiny worms forever stuck in the middle of an ancient dance. "So they're dead?"

"Yeah." A black-haired male student answered this time. "Have been for at least . . . 3000 years, right Marianna?" The brunette nodded, eyes cutting over to Draken to see him looking utterly fascinated with the block of ice no bigger than his hand.

Draken hummed, looking at the ice now with his own eyes. The worms were slight, yes, but still visible to the naked eye. They were about the width of a lead stick in a mechanical pencil, and strangely enough looked no more harmful than a strand of hair on the bathroom floor. But it was obvious that there were at least a dozen or so inside the ice. "Will they be kept in this block of ice?"

The answer came from a still red-faced Dr. Dimseck, who had finished up his conversations and internal pep talk to try and wow Draken with other, more interesting (in his mind) discoveries. "No, we plan on melting the permafrost with some of our warming tech here in the facility. and begin dissection- or at least- observation of the specimens- depending, of course, on their . . . . structure, I-"

"I'd like to take some of these specimens." Draken interrupted. The low din of sound that had previously filled the room, vanished as if the winds outside had broken into the room and carried it out.

Dr. Dimseck found, after repeated tries of opening and closing his mouth, that he had no words. It was Marianna who found the ability to speak, even as Dr. Dimseck and their superiors were still trying to regain their composure.

"You want to . . . take them . . . where?" Marianna asked slowly, turning and slightly shifting to cover the ice from the millionaire's view.

Draken smiled, and they repressed a shiver at the sight. "Home, of course! I have a private museum- of sorts- back home in L.A. and I think they would be utterly fantastic to display. I won't take them all, of course!" Here he turned back to Dr. Dimseck, who's red face was beginning to verge into worrying purple territory. "I understand that the pursuit of knowledge should be placed above all else, so I would only ask for maybe . . . half of these specimens- you did say that there were other remains that had many more of these worms, yes? So taking a few wouldn't impede your investigations in any serious manner."

"Well, I did- but, that is- well, they're parasites sir, are you sure-"

"Dead parasites," Draken slipped in pleasantly. When Dr. Dimseck's mouth shut with an audible click, Draken smiled wider. "I won't be eating them doctor."

Dr. Dimcseck spluttered, but Draken pushed harder. "I offered this research team unfettered access to funds, equipment, and whatever your nerdy little hearts desired . . . on one condition. The condition that I could have access to just one thing from the investigation . . . and I would like these funky little guys in convenient, individual ice chips." His smile was brilliant and shameless. "Please."

Two months later in Los Angeles . . .

"So then I said, honey that ain't a Mongolian Death Worm in my pocket!"

Scattered laughter and jeers prompted an offended scoff from the perpetrator of the terrible story ending, the millionaire himself throwing his hands up and leaning back from the table. "Oh, everybody's a critic."

A svelte young woman shook her head and pointed a finger at him, jeweled nail glinting in the lights strung around the pool and table. "I feel like a critique implies some subjectiveness, but that was objectively awful. Nobody liked that. And no one ever will, ever." Some murmurs of assent followed, and Draken barked out a laugh.

"Fuck you Dana. Jules, you agree with her?!" Draken turned to Dana's seatmate, a burly man with wet, slicked back ginger hair and a constellation of freckles on his face. Jules just held one hand up and pointedly shoved a slider into his mouth with the other. "Jeremy?" Draken turned to the man sitting on the pool's edge, legs kicking gently in the water.

"I liked it, man." Jeremy turned to assure Draken with a grin, and Draken returned it with his own beaming smile.

In the luscious oasis of Southern California, Draken's sprawling estate was currently the scene of an intimate "soiree" as he liked to call them. Some of his long-time friends and a few acquaintances he wasn't bored of yet, all gathered to drink, talk shit, and enjoy the Olympic-sized swimming pool. Currently, two twin influencers- Millie and Miley- were going live on a giant flamingo-shaped float in the middle of the pool, and a young green haired man named Rocco was lounging against the edge closest to the table and enjoying a plate of grapes. Behind the pool-side bar was a shaggy haired blonde man with comically large shades shifting around bottles and cups to make the next round of cocktails, while a curvaceous model watched him almost drop every bottle he touched with interest.

Draken turned his head and yelled to the man behind the bar. "Where the fuck is my drink Benny darling?"

"Shut the fuck up honey!" Benny sung back as he placed ice in each glass, the sharp 'clunk!' of ice hitting against glass creating a melody that contrasted the ugly curse from Draken's smiling mouth. Amused, everyone looked towards Benny as he finished up the mix with some grand flourishes and a spin before pouring the shaken mixture into each glass. Each glass was lined up along the bar top filled with whatever drink Benny had looked up on TikTok and decided to inflict upon them.

"Come on and wet your whistles!" Benny called in a heavily done accent, like a cook calling the ranchers to the fire. The guests at the table got up to move in, while the twins in the pool plaintively beseeched their friends to help them get off of their floats. Eventually everyone made their way over, some mockingly pushing at the others and others teasing back, before Draken plopped down on the middle seat and cleared his throat obnoxiously.

"I just want to say," Draken paused when the others began to complain about his long winded tendencies, before pushing on in a louder voice. "That I appreciate all of you taking the time out of your busy schedules of shamelessly filming your morning routines and dancing in front of cameras to come hang out with me . . . it means a lot. It's been a while since we could all do this. Okay, see? Short and sweet! Now, drink up!"

Cheers and gentle clinks of glasses meeting were soon followed by the quick, loud gulps or gentle sips of the others. Draken looked at everyone fondly before turning to his drink and letting his lower lip meet the rim of the glass he was holding. As the pleasantly blue colored drink started to wash over his tongue, it took him a minute to realize what he was looking at. More specifically, what was inside the ice he was looking at. At first, his mind thought about the time Benny had made ice with black pepper in it (a truly not great idea), but . . . that wasn't black pepper . . .

With a shriek, Draken flung the glass away from him and spat out his drink. The sudden movement and sound startled the others, the smash of the glass to the floor prompting shrieks and exclamations of shock.

"What the hell Drake!" Millie gasped out, ringed hand pressing hard into her sternum while her sister clutched her nearly finished drink in both hands.

"St-stop drinking!" Drake coughed out, wiping his mouth. Looking around wildly, he suddenly lurched forward and smacked Dana's barely sipped at glass out of her hand. Jules reacted quickly and pushed Draken back, standing in front of Dana.

"What the fuck is your problem man?" Jules demanded in a low, dangerous tone. Dana, not one to let her business be handled by someone else, stepped around Jules and asked much the same in a far more aggressive tone.

Draken's hands shook as he ran them through his hair. "Just stop! Stop! Benny you asshole!" he whirled on the aghast man who took a step back. "Where the fuck did you get that ice?!"

"I-I got it from . . . from the freezer man, where fucking ice is made!" Benny stuttered out, then flinched back when Draken pounded his fist on the bar top.

"Which freezer!" The roar from Draken made Benny pale as he answered back frantically, "The one in the pool house man!"

"I told you to go into the kitchen for the ice Benny, fuck!"

"I didn't want to walk all that far man, what's the fucking deal!" Benny screamed back.

Draken snatched Benny by the collar of his shirt and bellowed, "THAT ICE IS-" A sudden thud, a smash of glass, and high pitched scream brought him out of his rage. Spinning around, he saw Miley's crumpled form on the ground and her twin sister shaking her shoulder.

"Miley! Oh my God, what's wrong?!" Millie screamed, tears falling from her eyes as she looked at everyone else. "Did you drug my sister you creep?!"

"What- No! No I swear I didn't put anything in these drinks!" Benny swore. Frantically, he looked to his left. "Bianca, you were watching me- oh shit!"

Bianca, the beautiful woman who had been watching him, was currently face down in a puddle of leftover drink from her spilled glass . . . motionless. Rocco made a low, horrified sound in the back of his throat before rushing over to check her pulse and breathing.

"Jesus Christ, you drugged us Benny?" Jules growled, fists clenching tightly where they were wrapped around Dana, her dress slightly bunching from his movements. Before anyone else could gather steam to start hurling vicious barbs at the sweating, teary-eyed man, Draken's cold, sharp words cut through the tension.

"He didn't put drugs in the drinks." Suddenly, as if the rage he had held within also carried him forward, he sagged down again to the barstools, leaning heavily against the mahogany top. The only sounds then were the muffled sobs of Millie still cradling her sister.

"Then what the fuck made them drop like this?!" Rocco pleaded for answers. "And why hasn't anyone called 911!!"

"No! Don't," Draken snapped, hands coming up to rub briskly at his whiskered face. "It wasn't drugs . . . I don't know why they've dropped like that. But, I do know that the ice Benny used wasn't the ice meant for tonight's drinks. Damn it . . ."

Millie's breath shuddered out of her loudly, looking to Draken with beseeching eyes. "Miley's . . . she's getting really cold and I don't know why . . .

"Draken." Dana's trembling, furious voice beckoned the man to look at her, eyes filled with a resignation that sent a chill down Dana's spine. "What the fuck are you talking about."

Draken looked away, unable to meet her gaze as he explained, words slow. "I went to that expedition in Antartica remember? A couple months ago . . . they had found some prehistoric species of worms in ice . . . I thought they'd be cool to display in the museum . . . but my usual person who curates the exhibit is out on vacation for another two weeks and I just stored them in the freezer in the pool house because nobody's stayed there in ages anyway. That's . . . that's the ice Benny used."

For a full minute, there was just a heavy, weighted silence. A ratcheting sense of horror and revulsion that was growing around them like a cloud of poison. And then-

"We just . . . we just drank fucking worms?" Benny whispered, slowly bringing his hands up to his stomach. "Oh fuck-"

Another crash of a body hitting the floor caused a round of screams to begin again. Jerry was now sprawled at Bianca's dangling feet.

"Oh shit." Draken whispered miserably.

"We have to call 911." Jules stated, unease now coloring his previously stalwart tone. Turning he started marching back to the house where their bags and coats had been put into a closet by the door.

Millie looked away from Miley for only a short few seconds, to watch Jules progress, despite Draken's frantic demands for him not to. "Please, tell them Miley's freezing cold and-"

Suddenly, ice cold hands seized Millie around her forearms, the strength of the grip immediately painful. She yelped and looked down, stunned to see Miley suddenly awake. But, her eyes were tinged a disgusting bright shade of yellow, and her skin was far beyond pale- it was more accurate to say she was probably a baby blue now.

"Miley, stop-" Millie began to plead, and that's when her sister reared up with a gurlging croak and latched her mouth onto her left collar bone. And then, Miley's teeth dragged down, ripping flesh and muscle out of her own sister's chest. The gutteral scream that ripped from Millie's mouth was horrific, but the horrors didn't stop, as Miley leaned up and over and knocked her sister over so that she could latch her teeth onto her trachea next. Millie's screams became wet, gurling, and left her coughing blood as her twin continued to chew on her windpipe.

"Oh my GOD!" Dana screeched, turning away and sprinting away. Draken, however, was frozen as he watched whatever creature Miley had become continue to eat her sister, who was twitching minutely now, exhausted dying throes. When a low chitter sounded to his left, he looked over to see Bianca rising jerkily, movements unnatural and stilted. Her once dusky skin was now turning a strange, dark shade of blue, and her slowly opening eyes appeared to carry the same luminous shade as Miley's.

"Oh fuck." Draken whimpered. As Bianca began to reach for him, sense finally returned to his body, and the frightened man leapt up and raced to catch up with his still living friends, leaving them behind. But as he ran, Draken had a horrible thought.

Who else drank the ice?