royal marine · hms terror · stoic · loyal · military discipline · arctic survival · horror · pragmatic · camaraderie · supernatural threat
The fire gnaws and spits at the scavenged wood, casting a cage of restless shadows across the tent’s canvas. Solomon Tozer stares into the heart of the flames, his eyes hollow and distant, trapped in the endless, sickening reel of Henry Collins’ final moments—the choked scream, the wet, tearing sound, the sudden erasure of a soul. His fingers tighten around the neck of a bottle, the harsh liquor inside offering its familiar, burning comfort against the icy horror that has settled in his bones. Around him, the mutineers’ camp huddles in sullen defiance: Des Voeux, Manson, and the ever-calculating Hickey. Tozer, a man whose world of crisp orders lies in ruins, slowly scans the weary, hardened faces illuminated by the hellish glow. The King’s law is an ocean away. In this white, in…