Prey

by Jon F. Merz

"Just concerned about our timings is all," said Havel. "Personally, I'm not all that keen on spending the night in a Snowcat. It seems like an awfully vulnerable position to be in to me."

  Darren nodded. "Good point."

  Mick held up his hand. "Guys, relax. We've got plenty of time to get the weapons, do some initial exploration and then get back to the station by nightfall. We'll batten down the hatches again, post guards, but this time, we'll be ready for the creature if it comes back."

  Julia looked at Mick. Was he really that confident about things or was he simply trying to bolster Havel and Darren? She certainly appreciated his effort. She felt a little better for his effort.

  "It's going to work out fine," she said finally.

  "I hope so," said Darren. "'Cause right now, I'm scared plenty about whatever the hell that thing is out there."

  "Me, too." Said Havel.

  "The only way we'll get over that fear is to find out what we're dealing with,' said Julia. "And that means we go to the mountains and do whatever is necessary to ensure our own survival." She leaned back in the seat, aware of the words she'd just spoken. It felt good hearing that come out of her mouth. Sometimes she marveled at her own ability to sound convincing. She just hoped everyone else thought so.

  "Well said." Mick clapped her on the shoulder. "And you're right."

  "Let's hope everyone else thinks so."

  Darren pointed ahead of them. "Looks like we're arriving at the weapons cache. Nung just slowed his cat down."

  Mick zipped up his hood. "Okay. Let's do this and be quick. You guys follow my lead if you don't mind." He looked at them all. "And when I activate the storage locker, I'd appreciate it if you all hung back."

  Julia frowned. "What for?"

  "The combination is classified."

  "Are you joking?"

  "No."

  "Who are you afraid of getting wind about it? We're all alone down here. The closest settlement is almost two thousand miles away. And there are no Soviets lurking in the nearby area."

  Havel smiled. "I'm an American now."

  Mick shook his head. "Humor me, okay? Some of my old habits die pretty hard. Technically, no one is supposed to know about this. I'd appreciate it if we could keep it that way."

  He opened up the side door and jumped down into the snow. Julia watched him go and sighed.

  Darren tapped her on the shoulder. She turned. "Yeah?"

  "Who is this guy?"

  She glanced back out the window as Mick made his way to the other Snowcat. Presumably to tell them what he just told them. She looked back at Darren.

  "I wish I knew."

  Chapter Ten

  Julia watched Mick from the cab of the Snowcat. He walked across the white ground and stopped every few paces. She thought she saw him reach into his pocket and pull something out, but his back obscured her view.

  The other Snowcat sat just out of range as well. Apparently, Mick had been able to convince them to stay inside. She frowned. Part of her resented the ease with which Mick seemed to be able to assume command over the situation.

  The team was still hers, after all. And while Mick might be a solider with the experience necessary to survive this bizarre situation, Julia was still in charge.

  The problem was twofold. First, she had a thing for Mick. Her heart started hammering every time he even glanced at her. She chided herself for the schoolgirl crush, but dammit, she couldn't help it. And that made sticking up for herself a bit of a problem.

  The second part of the problem was that Mick showed absolutely no real interest in taking control of the expedition. He simply stated the obvious and people reacted to it as common sense. Any attempt on Julia's part to paint him as some sort of quiet usurper of authority would make her look like the bad one.

  And she could definitely trust Kendall to exploit that for everything it was worth.

  She sighed.

  Darren glanced at her. "You okay, boss?"

  She smiled. She liked the sound of that word. "Yes. I'm fine, thanks. Just concerned about what's going on. And how it will affect the original nature of our mission."

  "I think we all are," said Havel from the backseat. "I've been dreaming of coming here for decades. But when I was dreaming, there was no mention of some type of creature hunting us."

  Julia grinned. "I didn't have that in my dreams, either."

  She turned back to look out of the windshield. Mick had stopped walking around. He'd bent down on the ground, studying it intently. At once, he dug a gloved hand into the snow and ice. Satisfied, he used a small ice axe to start chopping away an outline in the snow.

  Finished with that, he cleared the white covering away and Julia saw some type of dark hole in the ground.

  "Whoever designed that hide, they knew how to camouflage something," said Darren. "I never would have seen that."

  "I don't think any of us would have," said Julia.

  "We are lucky Mick is with us," said Havel. "And that he apparently has knowledge of these things."

  Was there a note of suspicion in Havel's voice? Did he suspect Mick might not be all that he claimed he was? Or that he might be even more?

  Mick had withdrawn a long cylindrical gray metal box from the hole. He reached in and pulled out another one. They both measured roughly five feet in length by three in width.

  The hole in the ground disappeared.

  Julia frowned. "Why did he close it up again?"

  Darren pointed. "He's waving us out. May as well go see what he dug up."

  Julia let herself down on top of the treads first and then onto the snow. Even as she approached Mick, she could already hear Kendall giving him lip.

  "-ridiculous why we weren't allowed to help you remove the weapons from the cache. Why should it be such a secret?"

  Mick looked at him. "Are you finished?"

  Kendall's mouth moved as if about to say something, but he chose not to. Mick nodded to himself and then turned to Julia. "Let's get these open."

  She knelt on the snow and undid the clasps on the first box. A whiff of air that smelled like her uncle's old auto body shop tickled her nostrils. Inside the box she could make out the almost two dozen rifles and pistols. Each had been packed in grease and then slid into its own bag. From where she knelt, they almost looked like inflatable guns and not the real things at all.

  Mick grabbed one of the bags out and tore open the bag. The rifle slid out, still encased in the greasy afterbirth. Mick paid as much attention to it as an obstetrician. He carefully wiped the ooze from the barrel, pawed it off on the snow and then continued wiping it with a cloth he'd found in the case until the rifle shone like new in the bright overhead sun.

  Mick grinned and held it up, examining it from all angles. He slid a small button out from behind the trigger guard and quickly disassembled it piece by piece. Satisfied that everything seemed in working order, he reassembled the piece. Then he dropped the magazine and nodded at Nung to open the second case.

  Nung looked up from doing so. "Ammo?"

  Mick nodded. "Let me have the box marked 5.56."

  Nung handed it to him and Mick felt for some rounds, slipped them into the magazine one at a time, and then popped the mag back into the rifle.

  He glanced at Julia. "You ever shoot before?"

  "In the Girl Scouts."

  He smiled. "No shit?"

  Julia nodded. "Summer camp."

  "Cool." Mick ratcheted the charging handle back on the M16 and let it kick forward a round into the chamber. He stood and looked around.

  "Kendall."

  "What?"

  Mick fished in his pocket and came up with a soda can. Go pace out fifty steps and then place the can on the ground between the two Snowcats.

  "Why me?"

  Mick frowned. "Because you need something to do besides working your mouth."

  Kendall sighed, took the can, and started walking. Mick looked around.

  "We have to clean and zero each of these weapons if they
're going to be any use to us at all. I'll show you how in just a second. For now, let's make sure this baby still works."

  Kendall finished placing the can and hurried back. Mick waited until he stood behind him and then brought the rifle up into his shoulder, leaned forward just a bit and squeezed off a single round.

  The explosion sounded like an atom bomb. Julia groaned inside. So much for the peace and solitude of this place. Man and his guns had forever scarred it now.

  The round burst into the snow two inches from the soda can. Mick nodded. "Off a bit." He looked at Nung. "There should be a small tool in that case. Looks almost like a bit toothpick."

  "Got it." Nung handed it to Mick who then used it to ratchet the rear sights on the M16.

  He stood again and aimed. This time the bullet tore into the soda can and made it jump into the air. It came down with a clank.

  Mick let the rifle down. "Okay. Let's get to work." He glanced at Julia. "How do you want to divide up the jobs?"

  "We'll all clean and zero the weapons."

  Mick nodded. "Okay."

  For the next hour they worked until they had twelve M16s and twelve Beretta pistols cleaned and in working order. They checked the ammo and then loaded up the Snowcats.

  "There's a lot of gear here," said Wilkins. "We'll have to watch the gas tanks and make sure we're not pulling too heavy. If we are, it'll cut down on our mileage and we'll be screwed."

  "Good point," said Julia. "When we get to the mountains, I want us together as much as possible. If that thing is living there, we'll want to be together so it can't get one of us alone and..."

  Wilkins nodded. "Yeah. I got it, boss."

  Nung came over with his laptop. "Bad news, chief."

  Julia frowned. "I'm not in the mood for more bad news, Nung."

  "Wish I didn't have to deliver it, but here it is: we got another storm coming down on us."

  "How big?"

  "Big enough to make our lives pretty hellish."

  Julia looked out toward the horizon. She could just see the gray fringe of clouds. They looked dark. Ominous.

  Scary.

  "How long until it hits?"

  "An hour. Maybe less."

  "It didn't show up on the weather report earlier?"

  "Nope."

  She shook her head. "I don't like this."

  Wilkins sighed. "There's worse news."

  Julia looked at him. "Are you kidding me?"

  "Nope. Right now, that storm is coming straight at us from the direction we just came from - the station. We try to go back and we'll be driving right into the middle of it. Best we could hope for then is to get stuck and spend one helluva uncomfortable night in the Cats."

  "And the worst," said Julia, "is that we go off course, get lost, possibly crash, and die."

  "Yeah."

  "What are our options?"

  Mick cleared his throat. "The mountains."

  She looked at him. "Go to the mountains?"

  "It's the only place we might find any type of shelter in the area. We get moving right now, it'll take us about forty minutes to reach the base of them."

  "That only leaves twenty minutes to find something we can batten down under before we get walloped." Julia sighed. "Not a lot of time."

  "Well, we're dead if we go back," said Wilkins. "The mountains might be the only place we can stand a chance of surviving."

  Mick hefted his rifle. "At the very least, we're armed now. If that thing is in the mountains, we can at least hold our own against it."

  "Unless it's impervious to bullets," said Kendall.

  Everyone turned. Kendall shrugged. "Well, you never know."

  "I'll take my chances with it," said Mick.

  "All right," said Julia. "It doesn't seem like we have much of a choice. Let's get going."

  They climbed back aboard the Snowcats and trundled off. Julia kept peering in the rearview mirror. The gray clouds had advanced some. How fast were they traveling? It seemed like they could easily overtake the two Cats.

  What was it about the weather that seemed to be permanently against them?

  She shook her head. That was her imagination. After all, they were down near the South Pole. Down here, the weather wasn't against anyone.

  It simply was.

  And the equally simple fact was that if you forgot that for one second, you would die.

  She glanced down at the rifle between her legs. The barrel stared up at her, ready to disgorge an ungodly amount of firepower at whomever she aimed the thing at.

  Could she kill?

  If she needed to?

  The creature presumably had. And Julia wondered how she would feel if she suddenly came face-to-face with it in the darkened recesses of some rocky cave.

  Could she bring the weapon to bear in time?

  What if other lives depended on her doing that?

  They did.

  The team was counting on her as much as she was counting on them.

  She'd have to kill in order to preserve the team. If it came to that.

  Next to her, Mick's face had resumed its hard look. He, too, kept studying the rearview mirror. Does he find the weather strange, too? Julia smirked. Maybe he was upset he couldn't control it as easily as he seemed able to control everything else.

  His hands seemed relaxed around the barrel of his own rifle. Of course, he's relaxed, she thought, Mick's been around guns a lot. He was in the military, after all. He's probably been in situations like this a hundred times. He probably thinks I'm ill-suited to be leading this venture now.

  Maybe he's right.

  No.

  This was her mission. Not Mick's. She'd use what talent he possessed to get them through whatever perils lay ahead.

  But once that was done, they'd be back on schedule.

  And back to Julia being in command.

  She gripped the rifle a little tighter.

  I could kill, she decided. If I had to.

  Chapter Eleven

  By the time they reached the base of the mountains, the gray bloated clouds had overtaken them. Howling winds drew a fist of cold across the plain and slammed into each of them as they got out of the Snowcats and dragged out the survival kits with them. Julia glanced at Mick and the others and shuddered thinking about what would have happened if they'd tried to go back to the station.

  Mick's shouts could barely be heard over the gales. "We've got to hurry!"

  He aimed them at the base of the nearest slope. Mick slung his rifle over his right shoulder and started clambering up.

  Wilkins appeared at Julia's ear. "Does he know where he's going?"

  Julia shook her head. "I don't know. No one is supposed to have explored these mountains before, but he seems comfortable enough."

  And he was.

  After climbing up twenty feet, Mick suddenly turned and waved the rest of them up. "There's a cave up here."

  Julia glanced at Wilkins and thought she saw a frown come over her number two's face. She couldn't blame him. Mick suddenly seemed a lot more comfortable with things than made sense.

  Still, they couldn't very well sit out the encroaching storm front outside. And if Mick had found them a cave, that would be a lot better for their survival. Julia made her way to the wall of the mountain.

  Havel had already started up. Nung was positioned to follow him. Julia got in line.

  She glanced around and up at the sheer magnitude of the mountain range. She'd never been in so much awe as she was just then. The craggy peaks jutted toward the dark sky, scratching the very heavens.

  And it's all unexplored, she thought. Briefly, she experienced a sense of excitement. This might be a blessing in disguise, she thought. A chance to explore the mountains anyway.

  But then she realized that the fact they were armed would presumably discourage any real exploration attempts beyond hunting the creature down.

  And Julia wasn't so sure she wanted to do that.

  Nung's feet disappeared in front of her
and Julia slung her own rifle over her shoulder. She grabbed a slippery handhold and found purchase, making her way up in the same way the others had.

  When she finally made the first ledge, she risked a look back down. Wilkins was on his way up, followed by Darren and then finally Kendall. Julia saw him looking back at the Snowcats.

  Was he thinking about making a run back for the station in one of them? He'd never make it! And worse, if he took one of the Snowcats, half the team would be trapped here.

  But Kendall apparently thought better of his idea, if he'd even had one, and started up the mountain as well.

  Julia breathed a small sigh of relief and waited for Wilkins to climb up. Twenty feet suddenly seemed a lot higher, looking back down at the ground.

  Wilkins drew abreast of her and exhaled a long icy breath. "Whew!"

  She clapped him on the back. Climbing in heavy parkas and with a rifle was difficult.

  Mick suddenly materialized. "C'mon. Another five minutes and this thing is going to be all over us." He turned and they followed him toward the opening.

  In and of itself, it wasn't all that big. Maybe three feet wide by four feet. Just enough to squeeze through. But as she ducked into the darkness, compacting her already petite frame, Julia could see that the cave opened up dramatically on the other side of the opening.

  Already, the air felt still, compared to the howling maelstrom outside. Mick walked further on and caught up with Nung and Havel who were crouched by a large boulder, rifles at the ready. The cave opened into a tunnel that appeared to go on for some distance.

  Where did it end?

  Wilkins and Kendall finally got into the cave and all of them huddled a moment to take a breath and relax. Masks came off, and hoods came down. Inside the cave, the air was still cold, but not nearly as bad as it was outside.

  Mick checked the opening again and came back shaking his head. "It's bad out there."

  Nung pointed. "Good thing that opening isn't any larger. Otherwise we'd still be catching hell from that wind."

  Kendall leaned against the cave wall. "Well, now that we're here, what do you propose we do?" He aimed a gloved finger at Julia.

  "What we'll do first," said Julia, "is establish a base camp. We need warmth. Food. Water. Until we get out of here and back to the station, we're going to have to rough it for a while."