Eternity Base

Chapter 25

The computer log showed there had been no contact with Eternity Base for almost five hours. A message had been sent more than two hours ago, but no acknowledgment was received. The support team that Parker had dispatched was sitting in New Zealand, unable to go any farther until the weather cleared. Cordon shut down his computer and put on his suit jacket. It was time to get all the information, and there was only one man who could give him that. He made his way down the hall to the corner office of the CEO.

After checking with the secretary, Cordon entered. Parker was busy on the phone and waved for him to take a seat. Cordon settled into the large leather chair that faced the desk and waited impatiently.

Parker finally hung up. “What can I do for you, John?”

“We seem to have lost communications with the Antarctic team. They didn’t acknowledge a message sent a little over two hours ago.”

Parker frowned. “Are you sure the problem isn’t on this end?”

“Yes, sir. I had everything checked. I did notice, though, that there were two messages sent to your access code only, and I was wondering if they might have anything to do with this lack of communication. Perhaps you told them not to make contact?”

“No.” Parker shook his head. “I gave no such instructions.”

Cordon proceeded to play his hand. “There’s something else I’ve found out from one of my sources.” Cordon’s present position was a direct result of those “sources.” He often supplied SNN with information that no one else could. It had not yet occurred to anyone at the news show that Cordon might be a two-way conduit for hard-to-find information, thus increasing the flow from each side. He was known as Falcon to one side and as vice president of operations to the other.

“Seismic detectors have picked up a disturbance in the vicinity of Eternity Base. The cause hasn’t been determined, although my source suspects an earthquake.”

He could see that he had Parker’s full attention now. “An earthquake? Do you mean our team could be in danger?”

“Well, it’s kind of funny,” Cordon replied. “My source told me that an earthquake was the only logical explanation he could think of, but one of his colleagues said it looked more like the signature for a nuclear blast.”

Cordon felt no sympathy as Parker blanched. “Nuclear blast?”

“Yes, sir. Of course no such thing is possible down there, so. .” Cordon paused. “Are you all right?”

“Oh, my God!” Parker turned to his computer and hit some keys. “Come here. I need to show you something.”

Riley felt at home in the dark. Gravity told him which way was up, and that was all he needed. He’d found the shovel still lodged in the ice where Swenson had been digging, and he continued the work. The explosion seemed to have loosened the ice, as it broke free more easily. Riley estimated he had made almost fifteen feet so far. The surface couldn’t be far ahead.

Thirty feet below, the mag light made the tiniest glow as Devlin, Conner, and Sammy cleared away the ice. Riley shoved the steel tip of the shovel upward, and a large block broke free. Riley swung up again and sparks flew as steel hit steel.

“I need the light,” he yelled. A small pinprick of brightness appeared below and grew stronger as Sammy climbed up to join him. Riley reached down for the light and examined the ceiling. It was apparent now why the shaft had filled with ice. The hatch was breached, half open. Riley played the light around. Both hinges on the far side of the hatch had succumbed to time and pressure; they had popped. The problem was that Riley had no idea how much ice was on top of the hatch. He handed the light back to Sammy.

He unhooked himself from the rung and, after warning Sammy, stepped down one rung and then pushed his feet against the near wall and allowed himself to fall across the three-foot-wide tube. He was braced now, in the classic chimney climb position. Inch by inch, Riley edged himself up until the edge of the hatch was at eye level. Cautiously, he kept his balance with one hand while he used the other to probe through the foot-and-a-half opening into the ice. Small pieces fell out, bounced off his stomach, and tumbled below.

“I’m going back down,” Sammy called out as she beat a hasty retreat.

After five minutes, Riley was in a position where he could brace his feet on the hatch itself. It took him a few more minutes to realize that he could dimly see. There was light from above, penetrating the ice.

The Kitty Hawk was one of the oldest aircraft carriers still on active duty with the U.S. Navy. Built in the early sixties, it had been extensively refitted in 1991 and then assigned to the Third Fleet operating out of Pearl Harbor. It was at present steaming east in the center of Battle Group 72, a collection consisting of the Kitty Hawk, two Aegis cruisers, two destroyers, four frigates, two resupply ships, and two submarines hidden underneath the waves.

They’d just completed a joint training exercise with the Australian navy. Admiral Klieg, the battle group commander, was taking this opportunity to correct several of the deficiencies he’d detected in some of his ships during the exercise. Early this morning he was on the bridge of the Kitty Hawk, watching as his ships reacted to a practice alert, when his staff operations officer brought him a classified message for his eyes only.

Klieg examined the flimsy message under the red glow of the battle station lights. He took a minute to think, then he addressed the waiting operations officer. “Call off the present training exercise. All ships, battle cruising formation. Flank speed.”

“Heading, sir?”

“Due south.”

The SUSV was two and a half hours out from Eternity Base and had traversed twelve miles in that time. Since the explosion the cab had been silent, each man lost in his own thoughts and worries. It was Kim who broke the silence.

“Sir, you said I would know the plan when I needed to. Could you tell me when that will be? We have already lost half our party. If we lose you, I will not know what course of action to take. Nor will I know what to do with that.” Kim nodded over his shoulder at the sled bobbing along in their icy wake.

Pak’s real reason for not including Kim in the entire plan was that he hadn’t believed it would work, and he knew his XO would have thought the same thing. In fact, Pak still didn’t believe they would be able to accomplish the entire mission despite the fact that they had been successful so far, albeit with the loss of five men, seven if he counted Captain Lim and his copilot.

But now, Pak realized, he had to brief Kim. They were committed, and there was definitely no turning back. And, for the first time, he felt they had a chance to succeed.

“We are on our way to a rendezvous with a ship — the Am Nok Gang — that will pick us up off the coast. We will determine the exact location of pickup when we reach the shore and can establish radio contact with the vessel. The frequency to make contact is 62.32. Our call sign is Tiger; theirs is Wolf.

“We will load aboard the ship and immediately head for our target. It will take us an estimated four more days of sailing to reach the target.”

“Which is?” Kim pressed. He knew of the Am Nok Gang. It was one of two dozen merchant ships the North Koreans used for infiltration purposes while maintaining a facade of legitimate maritime operations.

“Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.”

Kim blinked. “The Seventh Fleet!”

Pak gave a weary smile. “We are not to destroy the target, at least not at first. The plan is that the mere threat will allow our government to blackmail the U. S. government to do, or perhaps I should say not do, two things. One is not to deploy their reinforcing units to South Korea in the face of higher levels of readiness. The second is not to use nuclear weapons once the border has been breached.”

Kim thought about it. “Do you believe that the United States would accede to such blackmail?”

Pak shrugged. “The United States stood still when a handful of their citizens were taken hostage. The threat of tens of thousands of people killed in a nuclear explosion might make them change their mind and question the worth of their allegiance to the South. They blinked when they suspected we had nuclear weapons. Even if it doesn’t cause them to do as we wish, destroying their facilities at Pearl Harbor — now that Subic Bay is closed — will greatly reduce their ability to project forces into the Pacific.”

“But how are we supposed to smuggle this bomb into Hawaii? How are we supposed to hide, especially once the threat is made?”

“According to the operations plan, that is up to our initiative. As you know, the Am Nok Gang has high-speed infiltration craft in its hold. If we can get close enough to the Hawaiian Islands, we can make it.

“We do have an advantage: the Americans do not know we have the bomb. They will think the explosion at the base was an accident and that both the bombs were destroyed and the news people killed. They will not be looking for us until we are already in position.”

“Then how will they believe we have the one bomb?”

“Once we are in position, our government will give them the PAL code that arms the bomb, along with its serial number. They will believe that.”

Kim leaned back on the rocking bench and regarded his commander. “We are going to invade the South?”

Pak nodded. “I would assume they are already mobilizing to do so.

“Do they really think we can succeed?”

“We have so far,” Pak answered evenly.

Kim shook his head. “But it is a long way from here to Hawaii. And then—”

“I know,” Pak cut off his XO. “I know all that. But it is too late to question anything. We must do as ordered.”

“What about radiation?” Conner asked. The crater that had been Eternity Base lay two hundred feet away. The edges of the crater were jagged, and Conner had no desire to get any closer.

Riley was tightening the straps on his rucksack. “We escaped the initial radiation because of the shielding of the reactor room. Residual is already up in the atmosphere and will follow the winds. We’re all right.” Finished with his pack, Riley checked the others, making sure they were ready to go.

Go where was the key question, Conner realized. She’d been so happy to make it out of that dark hole that she’d thought of little else. Now, with the wind lashing her face and the cold seeping into her bones, she wondered what the plan was.

Riley handed her a small backpack. “Let’s see if the plane might have escaped the blast.” He pointed at the white fog on the other side of the crater. “We’ll walk around.”

“But none of us can fly,” Devlin protested.

“I’m not thinking of flying,” Riley replied. “I want to see if the radio is still intact. It’s most likely the EMP has destroyed its circuits, but it’s worth taking a look.” He glanced at the three of them. “Are you ready?”

With two nods of agreement and a blank look from Devlin, they set out. It took fifteen minutes to circumnavigate the crater with a good two hundred yards of safety margin. Conner was surprised at how easy it was to walk on the ice. A thin layer of snow covered the ice cap, and she felt as though she was just sliding along, the brittle snow barely covering the toes of her boots. The problem was the wind and the snow that blew with it. She had to keep her head bowed and the hood of the parka pulled in close. She was walking like that when she bumped into Riley’s back.

“Shit,” he was saying. “They blew the goddamn plane. Either that or the bomb blast did this. Either way it doesn’t matter.”

Conner lifted the edge of her hood. There was little to indicate that a plane had been here. Scattered pieces of metal littered the ice.

“Where now?” she asked.

Riley didn’t say a word; it was Devlin who answered. ‘The nearest base is Russkaya, about seventy miles to the northeast.”

“Let’s get going, then,” Conner said.

“No.” At first Conner didn’t believe her ears. But Riley repeated himself, turning to face the three of them. “No. We go after them.”

“After who?” Devlin asked, but Conner already knew the answer.

“The Koreans.”

“But how?” Conner asked. “We don’t know which way they’ve gone.”

Riley considered that for a few seconds. Conner wondered what thoughts were running through his head. His advice and actions so far were the reason they were still alive. Whatever he was going to say, they owed it to him to listen.

“They’re heading for the coast,” Riley finally answered.

“How do you know that?” Conner asked.

“Because it’s their only option. They couldn’t have landed a plane in that storm.” He pointed at the ground. “And that’s the direction their tracks go.”

Conner turned and saw the tread marks leading off to the north.

“But they’re probably very far ahead of us,” Devlin protested. “And they’ve got a vehicle.”

Riley agreed. “They must have taken one or two of the over-snow vehicles from the storage shed. They’re certainly not pulling that bomb with manpower. They have a big head start and are moving much faster than we can on foot. Nevertheless, we need to go after them.”

“What do you mean ‘need’?” Devlin asked.

Conner found it interesting that Riley and Devlin now seemed to have switched camps. She was uncertain about her own feelings. She was so happy simply to have survived that she found it hard to focus on the future.

“They’ve already shown they are willing to use the bomb. We have to assume they have the other one. It’s up to us to stop them.” Riley was resolute.

“You didn’t want to stop them before!” Devlin shouted. “Maybe none of this would have happened if you’d listened to me.”

“We couldn’t do anything before,” Riley said. “I miscalculated — I didn’t think they’d use one of the bombs here, and I didn’t think they could get away. Now that I know they actually have a chance of getting away, I have to do everything I can to try and stop them.”

Devlin turned away. He seemed defeated. Riley looked steadily at Conner. “How do you feel? The three of you could stay here. The weather seems a little better. I’m sure there’ll be someone flying out here in the next twenty-four hours.”

Conner felt like curling up in a little ball and blocking this whole crazy week out of her life, but she knew that wasn’t possible. Reality was here in the form of a chilling wind and a gaping crater in the ice. This was not the time or place to stand around debating things. Besides, it was not in her nature to stay behind and wait.

Sammy had been listening quietly to the conversation and now she stepped to Riley’s side. “I’m with you.”

Devlin waved his arms, gesturing at the terrain around them. “It’s crazy. We could pass a quarter mile away from them and miss them. And what will we do if we find them?”

“We stop them,” Riley answered, slinging the rifle over his shoulder.

Devlin looked into Conner’s eyes. “I say we stay here. If we go wandering around on the ice cap, we might never make it out alive, whether we run into the Koreans or not. The blast had to be picked up. People will come to investigate once the weather clears.”

Riley put on his pack. “Make your decision now.”

“Conner, please stay here,” Devlin pleaded.

Conner picked up her pack. What Riley had said down in the reactor was right. She had helped cause all this. She looked at her sister, then at Devlin. “We need to try, Devlin.”

Devlin reluctantly shouldered his pack.

Riley’s voice was flat. “All right. We go after them. But you three have to listen to me and do what I say without asking questions. This is my area of expertise.”

They all nodded.

Riley pointed. “This way.” With long strides he was off into the blowing snow, Sammy at his side, Conner and Devlin falling in behind.