Chapter Three

I'm more MLG than you!

I continued having weird dreams interrupted by more weird dreams until I was woken by an angry call from our 'glorious' brigade leader.

I jumped in the shower, got ready and left to the closest airport in Nishinomiya, where I was greeted by an apoplectic Haruhi at the gate.

"About time! Even you're guests showed up before you! Come on you lazy ass, get in! We've got twenty minutes until the plane leaves!"

I sighed and followed her inside, it was packed! Everywhere I turned, people were squeezing through one another trying to get to their destination on time. I bet none of these people are going to Antarctica. Lucky bastards...

"Ah good morning, Kyon." Koizumi greeted as he sat on a bench with Miss Mori and Mister Arakawa.

You jackass! You brought two guests because you thought I'd only bring one. Trying to make me look bad as always. damn overachiever!

I traded greetings with everyone in the group as we waited to board our plane.

Looks like Miss Asahina brought Tsuruya.

Great... this is going to be a long trip. It's not that I don't enjoy Tsuruya's company, it's just that once she starts laughing, she goes on and on like a motor, driving needles into my brain. And it doesn't take much to get her started. Not only that but she's easily excited and gets into bouts of high speed chattering.

"Like oh my god! Hiyas Kyon-kun! Can you believe we're about to go to Antarctica?"

Honestly, I don't even know what to believe.

"At first I was like, Antarctica! wouldn't that be totally cold, nyoro~n? And then I was like, a secret unveiling! no way! I got to see this!"

And so the cute motormouth revved up and broke the sound barrier, she was talking so fast I had trouble following along.

"And I told my dad, I'm going to Antarctica for a week! And he said 'serendipitous'!"

Why does she even want to talk to me anyway?

"And then I got all packed up and the maid was like, are you going somewhere? And I said Antarctica! And she was like 'Oh my gosh! That's so cool!"

Her mouth is a universe unto itself...

"Alright Tsuruya, settle down!" Haruhi scolded as she turned her attention to Nagato and Asakura.

Even Haruhi has her limits. Hey I learned something today! Fancy that...

"Yuki-chan, you didn't bring anyone! That's a penalty, I can let it slide for Ryoko since she's new, but you're a veteran!"

What is this, the army now? Nagato's more of a veteran than you know, Haruhi. And how can you penalize her? You know that her only friends are in the brigade anyway!

I was about to open my mouth to unleash a tirade of reprimands on Haruhi when Asakura came to Nagato's defense.

"Miss Suzumiya, Miss Nagato doesn't have many friends, won't you reconsider?"

At that moment, the rarest of rare and unexplainable phenomena occurred, I saw Haruhi express empathy.

"Is that true, Yuki?" Haruhi asked, with a look that might be akin to shame.

Nagato only responded with a simple nod.

"Well... alright then, I guess I can't fault you for that."

she turned around and did a quick head count

"Okay so is this everyone?"

why did you do a head count if you don't know how many people are supposed to be here!

As we lined up to get on the plane I stopped in front of Koizumi.

"Something wrong, Kyon?" the ever smiling esper asked.

What was wrong? I took a few seconds to think about it and then it hit me.

"It's just that... when I get on this plane, I'll be further from home than I've ever been"

"That's very understandable, be brave, Kyon"

apparently it wasn't understandable to Haruhi, who was in front of me, and very agitated.

"So what? Your a brigade member! We set forth to find the wonders of the world! We do the impossible and kick reason to the curb!"

yeah, that pretty much sums up everything you do.

She grabbed me by the wrist and dragged me on the plane.

"And sometimes you have to go beyond your comfort zone! So move you're ass, Samwise!"

Samwise?

"What a clever reference Miss Suzumiya!"

one of these days, Koizumi and I need to have a little talk about not encouraging her...

I sat in the back with Koizumi, behind Asakura and Nagato, while everyone else was scattered all around the plane.

Haruhi sat alone in the very front, ahead of Tsuruya and Miss Asahina, and Taniguchi and Kunikida were in the middle across from Mister Arakawa and Miss Mori. besides the brigade, and our guests, it seemed like we were the only ones on-board. I had yet to see a flight attendant.

"Are you certain you don't want the window seat, Kyon?"

As much as he annoys me, Koizumi's one redeeming quality is that he's very polite. I'm thankful for that much.

"No, nothing I want to see out there"

Koizumi leaned back in his seat and smiled,

"This is you're first flight isn't it?"

yep, and I'm not too excited about it either.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of, I was scared the first time I flew, you'll get used to it once we start going."

Now that he mentioned it, I was a little scared. I hadn't even thought about the fact that we'd be miles up in the sky. I gripped my seat nervously as my stomach did a somersault. Damn you, Koizumi! I was about to open my mouth and and give him an earful when the stewardess's appeared out of nowhere and told us to buckle our seat-belts and gave us the rundown on safety. They must have been in the back the whole time.

Why would we need oxygen masks! is there a chance we'll die! I was seriously freaking out.

"Don't worry Kyon, airplanes are very safe these days, everything will be fine" Koizumi said, trying to reassure me.

I wasn't feeling very reassured, especially when you tempt fate like that by saying everything will be fine!

Asakura turned her head to me and smiled that sunny smile that still makes me want to shit my pants.

"It's okay, Kyon, if anything goes wrong Miss Nagato and I will fix it!"

Miss Asakura, I wish you could inject some of that cheerfulness into me...

...No! Your not going to inject anything into me! You stay far away! Was I just fawning over the girl who tried to kill me like she was Miss Asahina? I think the brigade's finally gotten to my head, I'm starting to lose it. Although I did feel reassured, and I'm certain that if anyone could keep us safe, it's Nagato.

There was a ding on the intercom,

"This is you're captain speaking uh... first I'd like to say welcome aboard to a first class trip all the way to Antarctica uh...We'll be making a short stop in Australia for refueling uh... but after that it's nonstop to the south pole. We'll be heading into some headwinds -gigidy- and you may experience some turbulence uh... don't be alarmed. We will be taking flight momentarily, so be sure you're seat-belts are fastened and please enjoy the flight!"

That was the weirdest speech I've ever heard, and I have to listen to Haruhi's rants.

After waiting for about five minutes, the plane started rolling down the runway, this is it, japan, I knew thee well...

I started shaking nervously. I could almost feel gravity trying to pull me down through the floor, seat and all.

"Kyon? You seem tense, let's talk, keep your mind off things" Koizumi said.

Yeah... that sounds like a good idea. For once I actually wanted to talk to him.

"So... what do you think we'll find in Antarctica?" I asked, trying my best not to think about gravity's sudden jealousy over me.

"That's something I've been wondering myself, I have a few theories if you'd like to hear them."

Alright, shoot.

"Very well, hmm... the first thing that comes to mind is some kind of prehistoric animal"

"You mean like a dinosaur? Don't you think it would be a little cold down there for reptiles?"

Koizumi stretched his arms and yawned,

"true, but as a child I was fascinated by dinosaurs and would read anything I could find about them"

I guess we have something in common, I used to like them a lot too, I had tons of little plastic dinosaur toys when I was a little boy.

"And once when I was reading a science journal in middle school I found that scientists believed they may have had more likeness to birds than reptiles, so I guess if that's true it wouldn't necessarily be out of the question to find one in the south pole."

"But then why would it be considered some amazing find?" I asked, challenging him.

"Well it's just a theory as far as I know, so perhaps it would be considered an amazing find because it proves someone's theory?"

I guess that makes sense.

"Another theory I have is that it could be some forgotten relic of an ancient civilization, perhaps a boat or a spear, something like that"

Soon I had completely forgotten all about the ground being miles below us and was feeling my usual logical self.

"But how would they survive? It's a frozen wasteland!"

"Well, a tribe of native Americans in Alaska once lived in igloos, that's huts made of ice, and survived on a steady diet of marine life among other land mammals, so why not?"

He had a point, but one question popped into my head.

"Okay so I admit that's possible, but how would an ancient civilization get there in the first place?"

He took a piece of gum out and started chewing it, offering a piece to me.

"Here, you should chew this, once we land it would be a good idea to swallow it"

Why would I want to do that? I thought we weren't supposed to eat gum?

"That's very true, but it's an excellent remedy for jet lag, if you swallow it, you're ears will pop and relieve pressure, so you won't feel sick once we land"

jet lag... huh I didn't think of that. Wait, jet lag... we're on a plane, way up in the sky... damn you again Koizumi!

"Oh, I apologize for that, I wasn't thinking" he said with an irritating smile as he handed me some gum. You just love torturing me don't you?

"...Thanks" I manage to squeak out

"Sorry again about that, I'll continue. Hmm... well to answer you're question, there have been a number of seafaring civilizations of the ancient world and empires were known to span the size of several countries. The one civilization that sticks out most to me are the vikings, since there's evidence that they were first to discover America. Although they lived closer to the north pole than the south, so I doubt the possible relics belong to them."

Wow, is there anything you don't know, Koizumi?

"On an unrelated note, their have been archeological findings as far as Iraq with coins and other things belonging to the vikings. Isn't that remarkable?"

Yeah I guess it kind of is. If the vikings could go as far as they did, then who else could?

We continued talking about his various theories until a stewardess brought us menus for dinner.

"So you're saying everything on here is free?" I asked her.

My dad used to say there's nothing scarier than something that's free. Oh dad, sometimes that saying doesn't apply at all, at least when Haruhi's involved.

"Yes, everything on the flight is complimentary, and congratulations on winning the contest, I never even heard of it though."

Yeah me either.

She left us to decide our meals as Asakura turned around,

"Hey guys, I couldn't help but overhear your conversation earlier, what do you think of an alien frozen in the ice?"

An alien? Well I wouldn't put it aside completely, I mean I'm staring at one right in the eye as she speaks.

Koizumi shot her down immediately.

"Hmm, I'll admit it's possible, but Miss Suzumiya is surrounded by aliens already, so I find it unlikely"

I don't.

"Well, that doesn't necessarily mean it has anything to do with Miss Suzumiya"

On that note however, I beg to differ, as we're on a flight to Antarctica because Haruhi won tickets from some obscure contest.

"Well that's true, this part is definitely because of Miss Suzumiya, but that's the only thing I've been able to figure out so far" Koizumi replied.

The only thing she might be responsible for? I gripped the seat nervously again and not because of the flight. Maybe, just maybe we could be in some serious danger.

Koizumi's face shown an expression of complete seriousness.

"I'm aware of that as well, although Miss Suzumiya conjured up this trip in order to get famous, I wouldn't rule out the possibility of outside forces, We all need to keep a close eye on Miss Suzumiya just in case. But my paranoia could be completely unfounded, however I feel it's best to stay on our guard."

"Are you guys saying that there could be aliens out there that want to harm Haruhi?" I asked.

"I'm not sure they'd want to bring any harm to her if there are any, but... something doesn't feel right about this" Koizumi stated.

Nagato was saying something. It sounded important but I couldn't hear her at all.

"Oh, Miss Nagato! I don't think they can hear you, turn around." said Asakura.

Nagato turned towards us and started again in her trademark monotone.

"The entity had noticed approximately twenty thousand years ago, a space-faring race crashed into this planet. However, the likelihood of them still being around is low, but should not be ruled out completely"

So it's possible they landed in Antarctica? I think someone would notice them if they were still wondering around.

"There is not sufficient evidence to prove or disprove that they are still here or if they had survived, but if they crashed into the southern pole of this planet, It is likely that they were frozen and still buried in the ice."

Then... if they did land in Antarctica, they must be what was found! So Haruhi just might see aliens after all, and know it of course.

After that, Asakura and Nagato turned around to leave Koizumi and myself to debate the possibilities until the stewardess took our menus and dinner arrived.