Dead Ice

NINE

The fog had lifted before they cleared the outskirts of the village. Maddock had considered leaving a man behind to maintain the fallback position and assure the team had an exfiltration route if worst came to worst without stretching their resources too thinly. The reality of the situation though, was that they needed to stick together. As a unit the chances of success increased. It wasn’t some dumb hero quest; it was a mission that would demand all of their individual skill sets if they were going to beat the Russians. Besides, breaking up the team would mean trying to coordinate some kind of rendezvous out on the ice, likely with the Russians chasing at least one party, if they were going to get back to the ship. Not ideal.

The clear night sky spread out above them — jewels sparkling on a blanket of black. Moonlight reflected from the ice, setting the world in an ethereal glow. Boots crunched through the virgin surface. A sense of loneliness unlike anything he’d ever experienced pervaded this frozen landscape. It was so cold he barely felt it. He recognized the danger — a sign that his threshold had been broken. It wasn’t about tolerance. It should feel cold. At minus twenty it should feel like hell well and truly had frozen over.

Professor led the way with his GPS device in hand, the map folded and tucked into his pocket of his goose down four-season jacket. There were twenty four satellites up there feeding back info to the Department of Defense HQ and triangulating their global position through the wonders of Star Wars level tech Maddock wasn’t interested in as long as it worked. He was, however, well aware that Korean Airlines Flight 007 had been shot down by the Russians a few years back for mistakenly venturing into their sovereign air space, killing two hundred sixty nine civilians. What they would do confronted with a military incursion didn’t bear thinking about. They couldn’t risk being caught.

The first flew klicks passed relatively painlessly, save for the numbing cold and the burn of the pack straps on their shoulders. That changed when the mountains came into sight. The team lapsed into silence. Only the slow steady crunch of snow and ice underfoot sounded above the howling wind.

Maddock could see that Leopov was starting to tire. Her steps were labored and her expression grim, but she was stubborn. She matched their pace without complaint. Good for her. He dropped back to walk beside her. He didn’t want the team stringing out. Bones would set the pace, he’d bring up the rear and make sure no one was left behind.

“You hanging in there?” he asked, holding out an arm for her to hang onto as the ice shifted beneath her feet. She didn’t take it.

“I’m fine,” she said, as she regained her footing.

“Okay, Lieutenant, I’m going to ask you something. It’s just us here, so be straight with me.”

“Shoot.”

“Have you told me everything?” He had no problem about the team listening in, but figured it’d be easier for her to talk openly if it was just the two of them, and he knew full well this might be the only chance he got to talk to her alone before they crossed the mountains.

“I’ve told you, Maddock, I’m just here to observe and do what I can should the opportunity arise.”

“Of course you are. No doubt you’re also under orders not to tell me what your actual orders are, yes? Don’t worry. You don’t need to answer that. I understand orders. If you can’t tell me, I get it, but I was told that you were with us because you could speak Russian.”

“That’s right.” She met his gaze, her eyes daring him to challenge her.

“Okay, so about that message. Have you told me everything?”

The expression on her face changed to something akin to relief. It was enough to convince Maddock that whatever she was hiding had nothing to do with the message. That was something, at least.

“I’ve told you everything, word for word, except…” She paused and glanced up at the night sky.

“Except?”

“All right, there was something weird about the intonation. My guess, they knew what it was that was making them ill.”

“Right. Maybe not so surprising?”

“I don’t know. Honestly. There was panic in his voice. I think he knew that whatever it is that they are suffering from was going to kill them all. It was fatalistic, you know? Like the cavalry couldn’t save them no matter how fast it got there.”

Maddock nodded. He tried to put himself in their place. How would he feel leading men in that situation? Trapped underwater, the air scrubbers failing and every likelihood that carbon dioxide poisoning would kill them before anything else. It would explain the panic and the fatalism.

“And it was definitely on a loop?”

She nodded. “You could even hear a click every time in started again.”

He hadn’t noticed. “Sounds like this is the kind of stuff you are used to listening into.”

“It’s more than just listening to the words,” she said. “Even if you learn to speak a second language it doesn’t mean that you can catch every inflection, language is nuanced, every sound carries additional meaning. You need to be able to speak it like a native. You have to live with it to understand it.”

He nodded. “And you have?”

“My mother. She couldn’t speak a word of English when she got to America. Neither could I. At home we spoke Russian even after I started school.”

“Was it just you and your mother?”

It was good to get her talking. Put her at ease. Take her mind off the punishing journey ahead of them. It didn’t hurt him either. Maddock listened as she told him about her father being killed while he was trying to get them out of the country. It seemed that America had welcomed them with open arms, but there was an undercurrent to it all, like she thought they’d have been better looked after if her father had made it out alive. He’d been a valuable asset.

“Did you have to leave anyone else behind?”

“Everyone. We left everyone behind.” Was that bitterness or the wind stealing away the last sounds of the words? Every nuance and inflection was important. She’d said as much.

He wanted to push further, but he couldn’t imagine her telling him more than she was willing to offer. It wasn’t an interrogation. The question he couldn’t shake was: was what she brought to the team worth the risk she was adding to the mission? The team could only move at the pace of the slowest member. She was it.

“You didn’t have to hold back on my account,” she said, reading his mind.

“Actually I do. That’s exactly what I do need to do,” Maddock replied. “I can’t afford for you to fall behind. It’s not too late to arrange for the ship to pick you up if you can’t handle it. Don’t let pride wind up getting someone killed, Lieutenant. We’re a long way from home.”

She didn’t answer. Instead she strode out, planting one foot in front of another and driving on. Maddock had seen this kind of thing before; she was being driven on by a mixture of anger and determination. He’d just hit the right button. It might not last for long; right now there was no way she was going to be the last man through the gate. He could hear the effort in every step she took. He matched her pace for pace.

The others had bunched together and were looking back toward them. They’d gained a couple of hundred yards on them, closing the gap with each step. The mountains were closer. He had no idea if it was psychological, but it already felt much colder here as he trudged into the shadow of their slope.

“Take five,” he said when they reached the others.

Leopov almost collapsed onto the packs the others had laid down while they’d been waiting. Someone poured her a beaker of coffee and handed it to her. It was going to be hard for her to get going again if they rested for too long. The others were already itching to get moving again before the weather worsened. They wanted to make the most of the shifting light, too. But standing still in the extreme cold meant the heat was getting away from them. Movement meant warmth. It was a very simple equation.

Bones and Willis began to pace, and soon wandered away.

“Not too far,” Maddock barked.

“Yes, Dad.” Bones called back.

Maddock shook his head and turned to Professor.

“How far have we covered?”

Professor fussed over the map. He checked it against the coordinates on his GPS.

“Just shy of seven klicks.” He stole a glance at the girl. She was oblivious to the fact that they were thinking about her. It was those words, shy of, that betrayed his frustration. Maddock knew that Bones would keep it to himself, but no doubt felt the same. He had to make a decision before it became a problem.

Distance was hard to gauge in a landscape of unrelenting white. The ice glistened in the moonlight as if it reflected the stars, and closer to the horizon the higher ground looked like a vague darkness that merged with the sky.

“Not even halfway then,” he said to himself. That was the reality of it. It had been hard going and they weren’t even close to their goal. Professor said nothing. They both knew that they weren’t moving anywhere near fast enough.

“Yo! Check this out!” Bones called.

The SEALs all whirled about in alarm, but Maddock could tell by the tone of Bones’ voice that nothing was amiss.

“It’s cool,” he assured them. “Shaw and Lewis, you two stay with Leopov. Professor and I will see what’s up.”

They trudged the short distance to where Bones and Willis stood gazing at a snow and encrusted embankment.

“What is it?” Maddock asked.

“See for yourself.” Bones pointed to an oddly-shaped crystal curving down out of a dark patch of exposed rock.

Curved crystal? That made no sense. Maddock moved in for a closer look and, with a start, realized what he was seeing.

“It’s a wooly mammoth! A baby,” he marveled.

“Seriously?” Professor reached out and brushed at what Maddock had taken to be the rock but was, in fact, the mammoth’s head. “It’s remarkably well-preserved. It must be thousands of years old, but it looks like it could have died here last week.”

“Wrangel Island is supposed to be the last sanctuary for the mammoth,” Bones said. “They were here as recently as two thousand B.C.”

“How do you know that?” Maddock asked, surprised at the unexpected source of this fact.

“I’m into mysteries, legendary creatures, all that stuff. Some Native American tribes claim that the mammoth survived in North America until just before the white man arrived. I picked up the detail about Wrangel Island in my reading.” He frowned at Maddock. “I wish you wouldn’t look at me like that every time I mention that I read.”

“You can’t deny you’ve earned my skepticism,” Maddock said.

“Whatever.” Bones shook his head. “Anyway, I thought you’d want to see this. It’s pretty cool, huh?”

They examined the exposed bit of the prehistoric creature for a few minutes longer before heading to rejoin the rest of their team.

Bones fell back beside Maddock, letting Willis and Professor take the lead. “How are you doing?”

“I’ll survive. Don’t worry about me.” It felt like a lifetime ago since Maddock had taken his dip in the icy water. “You don’t think I was holding her back do you?”

Bones held his hands up with his palms toward Maddock. “Hey, I didn’t say a thing.”

“Riiight.” Maddock dragged the word out. He wished that he could put the same big smile on his face, but right then all he could think about was how they were going to get across the mountains. He hadn’t even got to the part where he worried about beating the Russians to the stranded sub. “We should get moving again, though we probably shouldn’t go much longer before we get some rest. Why don’t we give you a ten minute head start so you can find a place to set up camp? You should have everything unpacked by the time we get to you.”

Bones nodded and set about rounding up the others. He made sure that the packs were distributed evenly amongst them once more and led them out.