The Citadel

CHAPTER 16

Ruppert Coast, Antarctica

With shaking fingers Min punched in the six-digit code, one by one. He cursed as his numbed fingertip slipped on the fifth digit and struck the wrong number on the numeric pad inside the access panel. The LED screen cleared, and Min took a deep breath. Once more he began.

Vaughn was less than fifty meters away. He threw the M-1 to his shoulder and stared down the iron sights. The head of the Korean wavered in them. Vaughn drew in a frigid breath and held it. The sights steadied and he pulled the trigger. The comforting recoil of the weapon was erased as the round made impact with the ice that had jammed into the barrel when Tai used it to break her fall. He felt the pain in his hands as the breach exploded.

Vaughn realized his error in a heartbeat as the Korean lifted his head at the sound of the small explosion and stared at him, their eyes locking over the bomb.

Where had he come from? Min wondered as he swung up his AK-47, pressing the metal folding stock into his shoulder. His eye never left the other man's as he lined up the front sight post with rear and pulled the trigger back.

The rounds roared out and streamed across the fifty meters, slamming into the man and throwing him out of sight down to the ice. Min put the weapon down and checked the piece of paper again. What number had he been on? His fatigued mind struggled to understand.

Vaughn's breath came in deep, painful gasps. His right side was on fire and he could feel the blood seeping into his layers of clothing. He knew he had to move. He put every ounce of energy into his legs. Nothing. He tried to scream, but a gasp was all he managed. He had to stop the Korean, or else the Russian sub would be destroyed and he would die.

Min tried to concentrate on the LED screen. Yes, he was up to the fourth. He held his finger over the numbered keys. He had no feeling in the hand anymore, so he guided it down by site. When the dead finger rested on the proper number, he pushed.

The fifth now. Min looked at the number on the code sheet. He matched it with the keyboard. His right hand would no longer hold steady. Min took his left hand and placed it over the right forearm, steadying it. He pushed down and glanced up at the LED screen. The ENTER sign was still flashing on the top. Yes, the five were correct.

Min checked the sixth number. He forced his finger over and down. He hesitated as he thought of his family, so far away in Korea. Min sighed and pressed on. An inch away from the keyboard, stars exploded on the right side of Min's head. He rolled away from the bomb onto the ice and looked up, trying to see his attacker.

A figure loomed above. Min put his arms up to block the blow that came down on him. He felt his left forearm shatter as steel hit bone. The pain brought it all into focus. He was desperately reaching for his AK-47 on its sling along his right side as he stared into the greenest eyes he'd ever seen. A woman!

She swung the shovel again and he rolled away from the next blow. But he moved too far, and gravity took control as he began to slide.

Tai collapsed to her knees, dropping the bloody entrenching tool as the Korean fell into the hole in the ice. She started to stand when the man suddenly surged out of the water and grabbed her left forearm with his right hand.

The Korean pulled her down to the edge of the hole. He looked up at her, his dark eyes boring in. Tai felt herself drawn in by them as she bent over, her face lowering toward the almost frozen water.

The entrenching tool whirred by the side of her face and smashed into the Korean's head. His grip loosened on her arm and he slipped beneath the surface. Tai collapsed to the ice then, and Burke slid down beside her, dropping the e-tool.

Tai struggled to her feet. There was no sign of the Korean. The bomb sat alone on the ice near them. Tai walked over to it. The cover on the control panel was off.

"Oh crap," she muttered. "Vaughn!"

Vaughn managed to crawl almost ten feet, leaving a trail of red on the ice before he could go no farther. A coldly logical part of his mind knew he was going into shock from the combination of loss of blood and the cold, but that didn't bother him much. It would only be moments before the Korean finished entering the code and the bomb went off, so oblivion wasn't far off either way.

As he retreated into the numbness, a persistent voice intruded. With great difficulty, he cracked his eyes and peered up. A stinging blow across his cheek barely elicited feeling from his frozen skin.

"Wake up, goddamnit!"

Vaughn found a scrap of energy and focused. "What?" he muttered.

"The Korean was messing with the bomb. We stopped him, but I need to know if he finished arming it." As Tai grabbed his arms, the pain brought Vaughn fully alert. He tried to help her and Burke drag him across the ice with little pushing movements of his feet.

"I can't land on the ice," the pilot said for the third time. "This aircraft needs fifty-six inches of solid ice to support it, and you can't tell that by looking out the window." The Osprey's engines were in the helicopter position, and they were cruising at forty knots above the ice.

Bellamy accepted the inevitable. "All right. Then give me a hover and we'll fast-rope out."

"Okay."

Bellamy turned to Captain Manchester and signaled. Manchester and an NCO began rigging the fast rope to bolts in the ceiling of the Osprey, while Bellamy looked out over the pilot's shoulder. He could see both the submarine and the ship that was slowly making its way out of the ice pack.

"Where's the bomb?" he asked.

The pilot did a gentle bank right. "There," he called out.

The sled was a long black spot on the ice. Bellamy noted the three figures, two dragging one, less than twenty feet away. He ran back to the rear of the plane as his team lined up on the rope.

"There're three people on the ice near the bomb. They make a move for it, take them out."

The first man nodded and slipped the selector switch on his MP-5 sub off safe. The plane came to a halt, and Manchester threw the door open, heaving the fast rope out.

Tai and Burke propped Vaughn up so he could look at the LED screen. He scanned it for ten long seconds and then shook his head. "He entered five of the six numbers on the PAL code. You stopped him before he could enter the last one."

They looked up as the Osprey came to a hover overhead and a thick rope uncoiled out the door. Vaughn watched the first man emerge with the MP-5 over his shoulder, quickly followed by a line of men, slithering down to the ice less than thirty feet away.

"Get me away from the bomb," he said to Tai. "Now!"

She grabbed his jacket and pulled him back onto the ice, the bomb between them and the men, just as bullets cracked by overhead.

"Cease fire!" someone was yelling. "We don't want to hit the bomb. Alpha team, fan right. Bravo, cover."

"I think we'd better surrender," Vaughn suggested. "Just keep your hands far away from your sides and start yelling in English."

"Don't shoot! Don't shoot!" Tai and Burke called out as four men rushed up, weapons at the ready.

"Freeze! You on the ground-hands away from your sides."

"He's wounded," Tai informed them.

"Step away." she was ordered. One of the man carefully rolled Vaughn over as another kept a weapon on him. "Shit," the man muttered as Vaughn's blood-encrusted jacket came into view.

"Berkman, get over here. We've got some work for you."

As the medic went to work on the wounded man, Major Bellamy checked the bomb. His heart gave a jump when he noted that five of the six numbers for the PAL code were entered. They'd made it just in time. He didn't understand what had happened and who these three people were. His job was to secure everything. It would be up to the powers-that-be to determine what to do about the prisoners.

He ordered Manchester to find a spot with sufficient ice depth to land the Osprey. As soon as the aircraft settled down, he loaded the bomb, the prisoners, and his men on board. They lifted, heading back for the Kitty Hawk.

As soon as they took off, the Russian submarine slowly sank under the surface and disappeared. There was nothing left except Vaughn's blood and the rapidly retreating freighter.