Welcome to Elk News

Each month we post one of the true stories, that we used to create Welcome To Elk. If you follow them, playing Welcome To Elk will be like hanging out with old friends. Reading the stories will give you no hints on how the game will end or how we will use the story in the game



We called him “A Tall Whiskey a Day”, he worked at the weather station, I think he had been an actor back in Denmark. A good man with a lot of humor who could drink a whole bottle of whiskey a day and still do a good job at the weather station.

I was in Greenland back then, in the early 80’s working as a carpenter. On the day where Tall Whiskey was supposed to be traveling back home to Denmark. Martin and I had been cleaning after a painting job, and we were driving the trash to “dumpen” – the junkyard. It was basically just a big hole filled with trash, they would set it on fire or simply cover it with dirt. It was early morning, still night and about 30° below zero (celsius).

When we were driving back towards the barracks – it was the last barracks before the icecape, the thin winter daylight was starting to break through the night. We had been back and forth to dumpen a couple of times this morning, but it was first now, with the grey morning light, that we could see a car with an open door at the bottom of the children’s skiing slope. The slope stretched from the top where Tall Whiskey lived, and down to the bottom where the americans had their barracks.

It was the Martin who saw the car first, “Someone’s had a car accident down the ski slope” he said, and then we hurried to help.

When we arrived at the car, the door to the driver’s seat was open, a glove was lying on the ground and we could see a man lying on his stomach a few meters up the ski slope.

The slope was all hardened and slippery from the kids playing. He had tried walking up the slope, even though the American barracks was only about 100 meters from his car.

I walked towards the man lying in the frozen snow. He was wearing; jeans, thin shoes, a nylon jacket and a shirt. Nylon freezes to the skin when it’s something like -30. He was not dressed as a person who lived in Greenland, but as someone would dress on a spring day in Denmark.

I put a hand on his shoulder to turn him around. He was stuck at first, but with a firm pull I got him turned around – or most of him. His shirt had been open and his chest skin was frozen to the skiing slope. His eyes were frozen, and his mouth was open, where his front teeth would normally have been there was instead two icicles of blood, he looked a bit like dracula.

You could smell the alcohol on him, even through the cold frozen air.

Martin and I called the Baltic Sea Baber, he was the doctor. His first reaction was that we should have tried first aid, checked if there was a pulse or if his hips could move. I told the Baltic Sea Barber that the man was deep frozen and dead for sure. Also I did not really want to check one more time as a the man looked quite terrifying.

It was on the day where A Tall Whiskey a Day was supposed to leave and go home to his wife in Denmark, instead Martin and I would spend the afternoon building him a chest, for his last journey. It would take a couple of months before he would be back in Denmark, as dead people traveled by boat and not plane. It was still winter and a couple of months before the first ship from Copenhagen would arrive.

It was a different life there, we have all done stupid things drunk, biking home or similar. But accidents like this can take such a quick turn for the worst when it’s 30° below zero outside. Had it happened back home in Denmark he would just have left the car and walked the last 500 meters home.

The men living at the american barracks just next to where Tall Whiskey’s car had ended up, later told me that they had heard the car struggling in the snow, but when it went silent they had assumed the car got loose and all was fine. Maybe they could have saved him – maybe not, the doctor told me that a drunk and heavy person like him would only last about 15 minutes in the cold night.

Story Teller: Jan Christensen


Story Writer: Astrid Refstrup

Each month we post one of the true stories, that we used to create Welcome To Elk. If you follow them, playing Welcome To Elk will be like hanging out with old friends. Reading the stories will give you no hints on how the game will end or how we will use the story in the game



Anders lived up in the woods in the trailer that his parents had left his sister Annie and him. Each day he would walk through the woods to the Hermit bar when they opened around 12 noon. He would stay until the bar closed and before going back home he would buy himself some more beers for the walk.

Sometimes if he felt the night was still young when the bar closed, he would walk to Jans trailer, no matter how late at night it was and he would call Jan; “Jan, Jan, come out and have a beer with me”. Often this would only wake up Jan’s wife Ingrid, but she would then wake up Jan “Jan, Anders is here, go have a beer with him”. Jan would then step out of bed, and bring his own beers outside the trailer; Anders only drank Budweiser and Jan would prefer Tuborg. They would drink a few beers and look at the night, until Jan would be too tired and go back to bed. Jan never minded getting up in the middle of the night to drink beers with Anders, guests were always welcome.

One day when Anders was walking home from Jan’s, being a bit more drunk than usual, he passed out next to the road. This had happened before; normally he would wake up when either the sun made the sleep too warm, or when the alcohol would leave his blood and he would start to feel the cold in winter. He would get up, then he would continue his walk home, getting ready for the next day.

This time when the sun came up Anders did not wake up, he continued to lay next to the road not moving at all. A few cars passed by, they didn’t pay any attention as they had seen Anders sleeping next to the road before. But when the sheriff drove past Anders for the second time that day, he got suspicious and stepped out of the car to check if Anders maybe needed a ride home – or to the bar. However no matter how hard the Sheriff tried, he could not wake up Anders and he also could not find a pulse, so with sadness the sheriff realized that Anders was not sleeping this time. He picked Anders up at put him in the backseat of the car. The drive to the morgue was quite long and it was starting to get dark.

It was not the first time the Sheriff drove one of his citizens like this to the morgue. They were all good people up here in the woods, but tough lives and the heavy use of alcohol often made them leave the woods this way. The Sheriff was in his own thoughts when he heard a noise from the backseat “Where the fuck am I?” said Anders with a rusty thin voice, then he sat up. The Sheriff had been sure Anders had left this world and was quite surprised, but he turned the car around, offered Anders a beer from the glove compartment and drove Anders home, relieved that Anders was in fact still alive.

Years later the Sheriff passed by the same spot next to the road, Anders was again lying there sleeping. The Sheriff paid no attention, even after the second time he passed by, remembering the time Anders suddenly woke up in his car, but when he saw the body still lying there the day after, the Sheriff stopped and stepped out. Anders was cold, there was no pulse and the Sheriff could not wake him up. He was still suspicious, so he called the doctor to the come visit.

The doctor arrived and the Sheriff asked him to check if Anders was dead before he would embark on the long drive up to the morgue. The doctor checked Anders and there was no doubt, Anders was dead!

The two men lifted Anders into the backseat of the car, and the Sheriff started the car and drove towards the morgue, when he was almost there, a noise from the backseat broke through the music on the radio and Anders sat up “Where the fuck am I?”. The Sheriff was shocked and almost lost control of the car before he came to his senses and offered Anders a beer, apologised and drove him home.

Anders and his sister Beth were sitting at The Hermit Bar, it was a quiet day, the summer heat had caused the other customers to stay home, so it was only the two of them there, the bartender had gone home and left them the key.

Maybe it was the beers, maybe the heat, but suddenly Anders fell from his chair and lay silently on the floor. Beth stepped down to help him, but Anders did not wake up. Beth knew her brother very well and she was in no doubt her dear brother was dead. Beth was a bit worried as she had paid for all the beers they had that morning. Anders would always pay her back and he was the only person she would lend money for beer – she trusted him. She needed the money back, she was always low on money – life is hard sometimes.

Beth looked around the bar, all was still silent and no one was around. She reached for the pocket in Anders’ vest, but there were no coins, only his checkbook. She took it, went around the bar counter to find a pen, looked over the bar once just to be sure Anders was still dead.

She then wrote a check from Anders to herself, just enough to cover a few months of rent and a nice funeral for her brother.

She then checked one extra time that Anders was still dead, and left The Hermit Bar to get Jan and the Sheriff. All three of them drove Anders to the morgue, there was silence in the car all the way there – not even Anders was talking.

Beth made sure to tell Jan and the Sheriff that her brother had even left her some money in case he should pass away – always looking after his dear sister. Everyone knew that losing Anders was tough on Beth, the siblings had always been close.

Storyteller: Lauge Christensen

Storywriter: Astrid Refstrup