Chapter One


On one of the many Range Roads, somewhere in Northern Alberta…

The rental pickup truck rumbled down the remote logging road, shiny new paint job getting caked in the muddy gravel that the makeshift road was build from. The man in the driver's seat looked over at his passenger briefly as they sailed down the tree-lined road, concern evident in his eyes.

"So, uh…What…What should I call you, miss?" He said awkwardly, keeping both his eyes on the road. A moose could jump out at any moment, and he had to be ready to swerve.

The woman sitting next to him was…something else. Six feet tall, with long blonde hair and a full figure, she looked like she was more than capable of kicking anyone's ass. Her blue eyes darted over to the man in the passenger seat, thinking on his question.

"Depends. How much of a fuck do you give about decorum, Nathan?" she said, turning to look out the window.

The driver, Nathan, paused. "I don't care in the slightest."

She nodded. "Right. Well, you can call me Alberta."

That prompted a raised eyebrow. "Like…?"

She turned to look at him, reaching up to adjust her cowboy hat. It was large and white and very obvious, and in the crisp fall air this far north, utterly silly. Nathan himself was wearing a thick woolen toque his mother had made him years ago, something with earflaps and cords to keep his head warm.

"Yeah. I- Yeah. I'm sure you've already figured out what I am?" Alberta said, pulling her phone out of her thick jacket and checking the time. It was early afternoon, not that anyone would know that under the thick roiling blanket of clouds, and she nodded in satisfaction. They were right on schedule.

Nathan went quiet for a few minutes, continuing to drive.

"…You're one of those people, aren't you?" he said, "The soul of the province, or something? My grandfather used to talk about some guy like that in Calgary-"

"That'd be my brother." Alberta said evenly, "And the word we like to use is 'personification', but that's a fuckin' mouthful, so whatever. I'm just Alberta."

The young man nodded, reaching up and scratching at his neck.

"So…Why would they be sending you to this site, anyway?" He said, "Me, it makes sense. I'm the safety officer for this plant, I inspected it, all that jazz. Why the hell did my supervisor make you come along, then?"

Alberta looked away in silence for just long enough that Nathan thought he was being ignored.

"…Reasons." She said finally, quietly, "Just…in case, I guess."

That was obviously some kind of deflection tactic, but Nathan wasn't in the mood to go chasing her around to try and get an answer. All that mattered was that the government of Alberta had dispatched the two of them to investigate one of the largest and most remote gas plants in the province. Far away in the northern forest, tucked inside an ocean of trees, they were sure to see the prominent red-and-white flarestack rising above the greenery any minute.

"Whatever. I just wanna get this job done so I can get home. My daughter's got a hockey game and I really can't miss it." He said with a small smile. Alberta glanced over at his jacket- smooth black material, with COACH NATHAN embroidered onto the shoulder in fiery red.

She smiled at him and nodded. "Yeah. Your kid plays hockey? What position?"

"Ah, you play too? She plays left wing."

"A winger, eh? That's what I play too. My brother actually plays left wing himself."

Nathan nodded, feeling fatherly pride swell in his breast. "She wants to play for Team Canada, actually. I'm sure she'll make it- you should see that kid handle the puck. It's like she's floating on the ice, her skates don't even touch the ground. You know what I mean?"

Alberta nodded. "Oh god yeah. I know like…thirteen people like that. Not!" She added hastily, "To say that the grace on the ice is a-dime-a-dozen. They're all freaks. Your daughter sounds like she's got a hell of a talent."

Nathan just chuckled and nodded. "I know what you mean. I'm real proud of her, anyway."

Silence reigned in the vehicle for a few minutes afterwards, the only sound the rumbling of the truck's wheels on the gravel and the sound of small pebbles bouncing off the undercarriage and bodywork.

"Hey, there's the flarestack." Alberta said, pointing ahead of her. Nathan just nodded, lifting the truck's sun visor to get a better look- and there they were, the slim contours of the column, poking out just above the sea of trees.

"You got the file?" Nathan asked abruptly, "I didn't have time to look over it. They called me at 5 AM and told me to get up to Fort Macmurray, and- yeah. Here I am."

Alberta nodded, pulling open the glove compartment and pulling out a thin manila folder. "Yeah, I got it. There's not much, just a page…you want me to read it?"

The driver nodded, brown eyes still locked on the road.

"Right…So, uh, Received tip-off from worker at the Suncor Mildred Lake Sour Gas Processing Site indicating possible H2S safety violations including leaks and exposure of workers to unlawful levels of Hydrogen Sulfide. Suncor Inspectors dispatched to site independent of government inquiry.

"Assume site is contaminated with H2S and proceed with investigation as per the H2S Alive Safety Training Course. Inspectors are to be certified with the H2S Alive! Training course...blah blah blah, we've heard all that before." She said, sighing and slotting the paper back in the centre of the folder.

"We've got our work cut out for us, then." Nathan said with a sigh, "Suncor, eh? They sent their guys out already? Christ, we'll probably have to fend them off with a stick to do a proper survey."

Alberta just nodded stiffly, looking down at the folder. "You think they'll have shut the facility down?"

"Hopefully. I'm not qualified for shutdown procedures. You?"

"Actually, yeah. I am."

Nathan nodded, a small smile on his face. Ah, of course.

"That's why they sent you, then. What I can't get over is the fact that it's this facility that's leaking gas. I mean, it's brand spanking new, nothing like that one up in the Foothills. No fatalities, no injuries, nothing. How come we're just hearing about the H2S leaks now?"

Alberta shrugged, watching as the flarestack continued to rise above the trees as they drew closer. "You got all your gear?"

"Of course. You?"

"Wouldn't dream of leaving home without it." Alberta said, tone strangely stressed. She was staring straight out the window, and closed her eyes, placing both hands on the dashboard.

Nathan raised an eyebrow. "What are you-"

"Shhh."

He shut his mouth and turned his eyes back to the road, glancing over occasionally with a look of concern and confusion on his face. It looked almost like she was meditating on something, and he had no idea what the fuck was going on. Was it something pertinent to his safety? Was there some protocol he hadn't been informed about?

Finally Alberta straightened up just as they were climbing the final hill. "Alright, the place should be empty," She said firmly, "If it's not, then…I don't know what to tell you, buddy. We might be stepping over corpses if there's trucks in the parking lot."

Nathan furrowed his eyebrows.

"Aaaaand you know this….how, exactly?"

Alberta bit her lip and fished a pack of gum from her other pocket, pulling out a minty strip and pulling the wrapper off.

"I, uh. Going back to that point where I'm a personification…?"

"Oh, good Jesus. My grandad was right, you really ARE wizards."

Alberta snorted, nearly choking on her gum.

"No, I'm not a wizard. It's, um…God I don't even know if we really have a word for it…It's like…scanning? I can 'scan' for stuff within my own- uh, within the province. My province. Not- anyone else's. And like. I can only scan for, um, people? And whether or not they're there? And it doesn't work for- for people born outside, uh, outside…"

"Outside Alberta." Nathan finished, looking a bit confused. "So you did your magic mind-scan and it turned up nothing?" he said, voice loaded with skepticism.

"Yeah. I mean, specifically, I did a scan in the area for any Albertans, and like, aside from a guy hunting ten miles that way, there's nothing up ahead, so…"

"You considered that the site might be staffed entirely by Newfies?"

Alberta snorted. "Yes, I did consider that. And yeah, that's…pretty likely. But…Look, we'll see in a minute. If there's pickup trucks in the parking lot, I'm gonna say we get all our gear on before walking up. You got SCBA?" she said, looking suddenly serious.

"Yeah, of course. You think we're actually gonna need it?"

Alberta nodded. "We'll see in a second."

The truck crested the hill, and the two occupants strained to look down at the parking lot two hundred meters away down the narrow road. The forest opened up into a large clearing, the gas plant clearly visible some distance away, surrounded by gas- but it was the gravel lot at the bottom of the hill that Nathan and Alberta cared about.

Alberta sucked in a deep breath.

"There's trucks." She said flatly, and Nathan just nodded. A row of Ford F-150's, just like the one he was driving, parked patiently at the lot. If the plant really was leaking large amounts of H2S, then there was no way the trucks would still be there. The site would have been evacuated after being shut down.

"So, either we've REALLY got a problem, or we've been had." Nathan said, huffing out a small sigh. "Well? They did say you were gonna be my supervisor for the day. What's the plan?"

Alberta was staring at the red-and-white flarestack, the top of which was strangely devoid of flaring gas for a facility that was allegedly running at peak capacity not a week earlier.

"We're taking our SCBA equipment," Alberta said, "And we're getting into our kit in the parking lot. That's how we're doing this."

Nathan nodded in agreement, rumbling his truck into the gravel lot and idling the engine to a much lower speed.

It had been raining the last few days, and Nathan frowned. There were leaves on the windshields of some of the trucks. Actually, most of the trucks. And one of them had a big splatter of bird shit on it.

"Who leaves a turd on their windshield for more than a couple hours?" he said, "Especially if they're leaving the site at the end of their shift?"

Alberta huffed out a shaky breath.

"A dead man," She said quietly, "That's who."

Nathan just nodded, pulling the truck into the farthest corner of the lot and killing the engine.

They sat in silence for a few seconds, listening to the final pops and snaps of the engine as it cooled, and Alberta nodded.

She popped open the door of the truck and stepped out onto the damp gravel, work boots crunching the soft pebbles underfoot- and instantly, her eyes went wide.

"It stinks." She said softly, taking a sniff of the air and turning back to the plant. The air smelled like the scent of rotten eggs- the sulfurous stench of H2S.

Nathan wrinkled his nose. "That's bad. Shit. We're gonna need to go in fully kitted out, aren't we?"

Alberta just nodded. "Yeah. Get your shit on. We're gonna need the masks. I gotta get in there and shut that place down. And. I." she started, and then her voice failed her. Alberta looked at the ground and scrubbed her face with her hands, spitting her gum out onto the gravel.

"-I think everyone's dead." She finished softly, "That's why the last message we got was from a week ago."

The Safety Officer said nothing in reply, and Alberta couldn't blame him. She hoped against hope that they wouldn't be walking in and finding nothing but corpses. And that the facility was actually shut down. The smell of H2S on the wind was faint; not enough to cause any real harm, and it was quite likely it had hung around for a few days. The damp, rainy weather and cloud cover overhead could have trapped the gas under a natural blanket of clouds. It certainly hadn't been very windy, which would have prevented a lethal cloud from wafting out over the northern forest.

She turned her back to the vehicle, letting Nathan open the backseat and unzip his duffel bag so he could get changed into his blue work outfit and standard safety gear. Boots, gloves, insulating layer, hard hat, SCBA gear, and of course, most importantly, the H2S monitor. He checked it- the little battery-powered device wasn't beeping, but it was showing a reading of 1.5 parts per million.

There was definitely hydrogen sulfide gas in the air; just enough to be smelled, and not at dangerous levels. Yet.

At one part per million, you could smell it. Ten parts per million was the upper limit for worker exposure. Five hundred parts per million and up? Death. Death within minutes.

Alberta listened in silence to the rustling of fabric, taking note of a distinct lack of sound in the area. The forest was right nearby, and yet she couldn't hear so much as a woodpecker off in the distance. Not a chirp of birdsong, not a chattering of a squirrel…nothing.

The forest was…silent.

Alberta gulped.

"I'm done. Your turn." Nathan called, pulling out his Self Contained Breathing Apparatus and putting the oxygen tank on. The SCBA was a simple system also used by firefighters and anyone else in an environment where they needed their own oxygen supply. It consisted of a backpack-type harness with an oxygen tank, connected by a hose to a clear faceplate with a rubber mask on the inside. Nathan slipped the harness on and buckled it, adjusting his straps so it was comfortable, and checked the pressure gauge. His tank was full, meaning he had about two hours worth of oxygen on his back, and it looked like he was going to need it.

Nathan tried his mask on, making sure it formed a complete seal around his face, and looked around at the cloudy afternoon air through the clear plastic. The rubber facepiece hugged his mouth and nose and formed a complete, comfortable seal, and he nodded in satisfaction, pulling the mask off and turning away so Alberta could get changed into her equipment.

Alberta took off her cowboy hat and carefully rested it on the dash of their red rental pickup truck, before stripping down and getting changed into her blue work fatigues. She shrugged on her SCBA harness when she was ready, buckling it up and adjusting the straps, and of course, checking the pressure. A full tank, two hours of oxygen. Then again, she had a custom rig to accommodate her unusual size; and since it was her personal SCBA rig, why not shell out for an extra hour and a half's worth of oxygen?

When it came to air, it was always, always better to have an extra tank and not need it than need an extra tank and not have it.

She clipped the facemask to her belt after checking for a complete seal, and then reached up and tied back her long blonde hair with an elastic, to conform to safety requirements. With that, Alberta plonked on her white hard hat- but there was one more thing she needed.

An old superstition of hers. A paranoia that would never ever die, to the point where she refused to enter any sour gas plant without one.

Alberta reached into her duffel bag in the back seat and pulled out a book of waterproof matches, carefully slipping the little paper book in her pocket. She checked quickly to make sure all the matches were in place before tucking them away; just in case she needed it.

She nodded to herself as soon as the matches were in place, a little talisman to keep her safe. Alberta, profit-driven as she was, had absolutely no qualms about lighting a multimillion-dollar sour gas plant ablaze if it meant protecting the people who worked there. Her people were always more important than some executive's bottom dollar.

She checked her H2S monitor, and frowned. The reading had gone up- 2 ppm. She sniffed the air again- it smelled the same. But then, the terrible thing about H2S was that it slowly removed your ability to smell it. It was only a temporary thing, but that was long enough to spell death for many an unfortunate soul.

Alberta shook her head. She had a job to do. She slammed the truck's door shut, walking around to the back of the vehicle and gesturing for Nathan to follow.

There was a simple gravel path through the grass, a small guard cabin right beside it. Strangely, the small wooden guard post was empty, and Alberta felt a small shiver down her spine as she stepped onto the damp gravel trail through the grass, towards the plant. Nathan was following a few steps behind her, both of them unsure of what they were going to find when they finally entered the facility.

The plant itself, viewed from the air, was a fairly sprawling affair. Roughly square in shape, with a chain-link fence along the perimeter, the gravel-bottomed gas plant was dotted with buildings of different heights and sizes, huge fans poking out the backs of some and massive steel pipes in woven networks laced all around it. A drilling rig was also set up- as well as processing gas from the surrounding area, they'd built their plant on top of another well, presumably the biggest one in the area. Signage was posted all along the trail warning of a buried natural gas line, as per the government's regulation; hey, the finished product had to get to market somehow, right?

As Alberta and Nathan walked up to the plant, both of them were keeping one eye on their H2S monitors. As they got closer, the concentration sharply increased- if it went above ten parts per million, they'd be at the limit for exposure.

"Shit like this shouldn't happen." Alberta said suddenly, brows furrowed, "Gas plants don't just…start leaking huge amounts of H2S into the air. It's just- that's not how they're designed. I've- I've desgined plants like this myself, for years. If this plant is leaking H2S, it would have been a catastrophic blowout. None of this makes any goddamn sense!"

Nathan just shrugged. "You're the expert on that. I'm just here to take air quality readings and throw the book at them if needs be…Though I still don't know why you, of all people, needed to be here. Wouldn't it make more sense to send somebody from Suncor?"

Alberta took a deep breath and turned around to look at Nathan.

"Look. The reason I'm here and not anyone else is, well, that worker tip-off came in a full week ago. And, well…" Alberta looked at the ground guiltily, then looked back up, "If something really did happen in there, and something happens to you, then, well, I'll be able to tell the tale to whoever needs to hear it. And, this is a brand new plant in a newly-discovered oilfield, so...I need to know what went wrong myself-"

"You requested this job, didn't you?" Nathan said, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes." Alberta said flatly.

Silence. Not even the wind rustling through the grass. There was no wind. There wasn't even the buzzing of insects.

"Let's keep going." Nathan said finally, choosing not to comment and instead pulling a notebook and pencil from his pocket. He wrote down the H2S concentration and an estimate of how far they were from the building and snapped it shut again.

"I tell you, Suncor's REALLY getting the book thrown at them for this one, and no mistake. No matter what happened, this concentration of H2S this far from the plant is grounds for criminal negligence."

Alberta just nodded and kept walking, pulling out her phone and checking to see if there was any service. Three bars- the plant obviously had a transmitter. She took a picture, first of the gas plant and then of her H2S monitor and texted them both to the regulator who'd assigned her to Nathan in the first place- a nice woman in an office in Edmonton, far, far away from this nonsense.

She put the device away, not waiting for the reply- it didn't matter. She was here for two reasons- to shut the plant down if needs be, and to gather any evidence in case the worst had happened.

They kept walking in silence, Nathan occasionally pausing to make note of the readings from his H2S monitor, which kept steadily increasing as they got closer and closer to the plant. Alberta felt a sinking feeling in her stomach, and a cold tightness in her chest- any second now, any minute now, they'd step over the threshold, from 10ppm to 15 ppm-

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP

The insistent ringing of two alarms going off in unison was nearly enough to scare the two out of their skins. Alberta jumped at the sound and checked her monitor- 15 ppm.

"Masks." She gasped, taking off her hard hat and quickly pressing hers to her face. She purged the air that was already in the mask and took a deep breath, oxygen from her tank filling her lungs. There. With a proper air supply, she fumbled the straps on, then bent down to puck up her hard hat, jamming it back on.

First rule of H2S safety: Look out for number one.

Nathan had followed suit, she was relieved to find, and the two of them were staring at each other through the plastic screens of their face masks. Nathan's oxygen tanks were just as big as hers, which, good. She had no idea how long it would take to shut down a plant this size, let alone all by herself, but hopefully a brand new facility such as this would be automated to a degree that would make it possible for her to cap the lines and shut down the machines all by herself.

In the meantime, though, the first order of business was shutting her alarm up. Alberta pressed a sequence of buttons and held them for five seconds, resetting the slim monitor to a setting where it would only go off at concentrations 500ppm and above.

The only problem with those alarms is that they were very, very loud.

Alberta kept walking, feeling a strange sensation like she was being watched. The plant was right nearby, and-

Hold on, was the main gate hanging open?

It sure looked like it. The main gate for the workers to enter and leave the facility was hanging open, and Alberta gulped. That wasn't supposed to happen, ever. This far north, curious bears were enough of a problem that leaving those gates unlocked was a huge concern.

They approached the gates and stepped inside, and Alberta could have sworn she saw movement out of the corner of her eye. She grabbed Nathan by the shoulder and pointed to where it was, but-

Nothing. Just a shiny metal pipe next to a dozen others, full to the brim with natural gas in a certain stage of the production cycle. The whole facility was a maze of pipes just like it, stacked on top of each other and all fed into this machine or that machine or whatever else.

"I don't see anything," Nathan said, voice severely muffled so he had to repeat himself. The masks were going to make talking impossible, but taking them off…

Alberta checked her monitor.

250 ppm within the gates.

The masks were all that stood between them and death.

Alberta gestured at Nathan's notebook in his breast pocket, and he offered it to her, along with his pen. She flipped to the back of the slim volume and wrote a small note in her blocky, all-caps handwriting:

WE HAVE TWO HOURS. LET'S GET GOING. I NEED TO FIND THE MAIN CONTROL ROOM.


A/N:

I feel like I should mention the fact that this story is something highly personal to me. Aside from being some Halloween stuff for the spooks: my parents have both visited sour gas sites like the one in the story hundreds of times. it's very safe, but there's always a risk.

The paranoia I felt as a child, the worry and fear that I would lose my dad to H2S...that is why I wrote this fic. My family has been endangered by this stuff. Nothing bad ever happened, but. It could. It always could.

Regardless, this'll be a shorter story than usual. If you liked it, leave a review! Comments are very much appreciated.