by Bob Mayer
But he was exhausted, and his own body was close to being hypothermic. His hands were already flirting with frostbite. Aw, fuck it, Riley decided—even as another part of his mind screamed no—an hour or two of rest would be worth it if they could move faster. He hugged Sammy tighter and closed his eyes, feeling her head nestle against his shoulder.
SOUTH PACIFIC OCEAN
The flight deck of the Kitty Hawk was packed with rows of aircraft. F-14 Tomcats, E-2 Hawkeyes, S-3A Vikings, F-18 Hornets, and A-7 Corsairs competed for valuable parking space. On the port side of that crowded deck, the elevator from the first-level hangar lifted into place smoothly, bringing up another aircraft. It was the only one of its kind on the carrier.
The most unusual thing immediately noticeable about the aircraft was that the two engines at the end of each wing were pointing straight up, with massive propellers horizontal to the gray steel deck. The aircraft remained on the elevator as it came to a halt. Slowly, the two blades began turning in opposite directions.
After a minute of run-up, the aircraft shuddered and the wheels separated from the deck. Sliding slightly left, the aircraft gained altitude as the swiftly moving ship passed beneath it. At sufficient height, the propellers slowly changed orientation, moving from horizontal to vertical as the entire engine rotated and the airframe switched from helicopter mode to airplane. When the engine nacelles on the wing tips locked into place facing forward, the CV-22 Osprey caught up with the Kitty Hawk and passed it, racing toward Antarctica, 1,900 miles away.
The tilt rotor operation of the Osprey made it the most valuable and unique transport aircraft ever built. Congressional budget cuts and interservice squabbling had killed the program back in 1990, but this particular aircraft was one of eight produced by Bell-Boeing during the original prototype construction. The eight, flown by Marine Corps pilots, had been deployed to the various carrier groups to allow maximum flexibility of use. That innovative deployment idea was now paying dividends.
PENTAGON, ARLINGTON, VIRGINIA
Secretary of Defense Torreta did not seem pleased to be sitting in the situation room at ten o’clock at night after a flight back from the West Coast. General Morris ran a hand along the stubble of his beard as the secretary gestured for him to continue with his situation update.
“The Combat Talon is three hours out from McMurdo Base. The Osprey has just taken off from the Kitty Hawk; it will arrive at McMurdo in five hours. The Special Forces soldiers will cross load to the Osprey and fly out to the target site.”
“We still have no imagery of what happened there?” Torreta inquired.
“No, sir. The weather is clearing, but the site itself is still cloud covered. We have a viewing opportunity by satellite only every three hours as it passes over.”
Torreta glanced at the notes his aide had prepared for him. “What’s the problem in Korea?”
Morris frowned at the change in subject. “Intelligence has picked up enough North Korean activity to justify a level three alert.”
“Yes, yes, I know that,” Torreta replied testily. “But what’s this message regarding the Kitty Hawk Carrier Group from the Eighth Army commander?”
Morris hated airing service conflicts in front of civilians. “General Patterson wants the group to move north to be in better position to support him if something occurs on the peninsula.”
“Does the man understand we have a nuclear problem?” Torreta demanded.
“No, sir. That information is under a need-to-know basis.”
“Well, I don’t want to see any more messages like this. One problem at a time. The president is not happy. He’s already had to talk to the Russian president about this incident, and that proved to be somewhat embarrassing since he doesn’t have all the answers himself. I want this mess secured and cleaned up. Do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, sir.” Morris had long ago learned not to argue with his civilian superiors, but he strongly disagreed with the present prioritizing of events. This Korean thing was much more significant than Torreta thought. Since the breakup of the Warsaw Pact and the quick victory in the Gulf, many people were getting complacent about the potential for war. Korea had been hot for more than forty years, and sooner or later the smoldering below the surface would break out into flames.
Morris looked over his shoulder at the electronic wall map displaying significant military—U.S. and foreign—deployments throughout the world. He had a feeling he was missing something very important.
Chapter 28
ICE PACK, TWENTY MILES OFF THE RUPPERT COAST, ANTARCTICA
The Am Nok Gang picked its way through the ice, barely crawling at three knots. Every so often the ship had to back out of a dead end and try to slip left or right. The captain was in constant communication with his shivering lookout eighty feet above the bridge in the crow’s nest, trying to find a route through the piles of ice. Occasionally, the captain would use the reinforced bow of the ship to smash through thin ice, but large chunks, some hundreds of yards in width, were more than a match for his steel ship. Those had to be bypassed.
The horizon far ahead was a mass of clouds, but the captain knew that if the clouds lifted, he would be able to see the shore. So far his radio operator had not heard a single transmission on the designated frequency. The captain hoped that the people he was to pick up were ready for him because he did not want to wait, sitting in the ice pack. Ships had been crushed as the ice froze around them. The captain wanted to move in and out quickly and get this mission over with as soon as possible.
FORD MOUNTAIN RANGE, ANTARCTICA
Riley opened his eyes and tried to orient himself. He felt strangely warm, which was a very nice feeling. He twitched his fingers and was surprised to find them wrapped around a body. Then it all came back to him—the stopping, the climbing in the sleeping bag with Sammy to warm her up, the talking. He must have dozed off. The thought of giving up the warmth of the bag was extremely discouraging.
Riley waited a few more seconds, then unzipped the bag and crawled out. His movements woke Sammy, who blearily opened her eyes.
“What’s up?”
“Get your boots on before they freeze up,” Riley told her. “They’re in the waterproof bag near your stomach. We need to get moving.”
He peered up—the sky was clearing. The sun hadn’t broken through yet, but the clouds were much higher, and he could see farther along the ice than at any period since the storm started. The wind had also died down. Riley checked his watch—he’d been asleep for almost two hours. He wasn’t happy about losing that time, but he’d had no choice.
He glanced over at the other sleeping bag lying on the ice. There was no movement from Devlin or Conner.
“Wake up!” he called out as he started packing his gear.
Conner heard the voice as if from a far distance. She cracked her eyelids. She could feel Devlin’s weight along her side, and she turned to look at him. His eyes were wide open and staring at her. It took a few seconds before she realized that they were unfocused and glassy. The pupils in the center were black orbs looking into the depths of wherever Devlin had allowed himself to be dragged.
“Oh, my God!” Conner cried as she scrambled out of the bag.
Riley hurried over and quickly examined Devlin. He looked up with a grim face. “He’s dead.”
Conner was shaking but not from the cold. “You mean he died there, right next to me?”
Riley zipped up the sleeping bag, closing it over Devlin’s face. “Yes.”
Sammy looked at the inert bulge in the sleeping bag. Things had gone to crap from the moment she faxed those pictures, and it certainly wasn’t getting any better. There’s only one way to atone for what has happened, she thought. “Let’s go.”
Conner looked at her sister with wide eyes. “We’re just going to leave him here?”
Riley finished stuffing his sleeping bag into his backpack. “There’s nothing else we can do. We can’t haul the body.”
“But
you just can’t leave a man like this,” Conner protested.
“There’s nothing we can do,” Riley repeated. “We know the location, and when this is over we can send people here to recover the body.”
Sammy watched the internal debate played out on Conner’s face. Her eyes turned in the direction of Devlin’s body, then back to the north where the sled holding the nuclear bomb had left its trail. Then back to Riley. Then to her. “All right.”
*****
The increasing visibility had an inverse effect on Pak’s optimism about making it to the coast; it revealed a massive ridge lying directly across their path. There was no way around it. The ice rose more than a thousand feet in moderately steep waves for the next three miles.
Pak had given his men a one-hour break earlier, but it had done little to restore the energy they were burning pulling the sled and fighting the cold. He could sense his men looking at him and at the ridge, their eyes shifting from one to the other. Not a word was said.
Pak leaned forward, the rope around his waist pulling tight. The other men joined in, and they began to traverse to the right, angling their way uphill.
AIRSPACE, VICINITY MCMURDO STATION
ROSS ICE SHELF, ANTARCTICA
The MC-130 Combat Talon leveled out, boring straight in for Mount Erebus, twenty miles away. In the rear, Major Bellamy checked the rigging of the static lines for the two bundles, one hooked to each cable. The bundles were tied down on the back ramp. Bellamy’s men were standing now, parachutes on their backs, close to the edge of the ramp.
They all felt the plane slow down, and the loadmaster looked at Bellamy. “Three minutes out.”
A gap appeared in the top rear of the aircraft, and freezing air swirled in. The back ramp leveled off while the top part ascended into the tail, leaving a large open space. Bellamy stared: the view was spectacular, with the entire Ross Ice Shelf laid out below to the east.
“One minute,” the loadmaster yelled through the scarf wrapped about his face, trying to be heard above the roar of the engines and the air.
“One minute,” Bellamy relayed to his men, all hooked up to the left cable. He edged out, right behind the bundle. The red light glowed in the darkness of the upper tail structure.
“Stand by,” the loadmaster yelled. He leaned over one of the bundles with a knife in his hand, while another air force man did the same on the other side.
The light flashed green, and the loadmaster severed the nylon band holding down the bundle. It immediately was sucked out the rear of the plane. The other bundle went out at almost the same time.
Bellamy waddled out after it, hands over his reserve, chin tucked into his chest. He felt as though he was passing straight through the static line and deployment bag of the bundle as he stepped off the edge of the ramp. Three seconds of free fall were followed by the snap of the deploying chute.
Bellamy guided on the two bright red parachutes of the bundles as he descended. The ice rushed up; he stared straight at the horizon and bent his knees. With a grunt he hit the ice.
Gathering in his chute, Bellamy watched as the rest of his men hit in a long line of white parachutes along the track of the aircraft. He could also see a large snow tractor rumbling toward him, pulling a sled. The tractor stopped and two men hopped off, one wearing an air force parka and the other in civilian garb and sporting a large beard.
The military man introduced himself first. “I’m Lieutenant Colonel Larkin. This is Doctor O’Shaugnesy, McMurdo Station leader. We—”
“What is your purpose here?” O’Shaugnesy interrupted.
Bellamy blinked and looked at the civilian, then at Colonel Larkin. “Didn’t you brief him?”
Larkin wearily nodded. “I briefed him.”
“If you expect me to believe that you and your men are conducting rescue practice, then you must take me for a fool,” O’Shaugnesy snorted. “Do you have any weapons with you?”
Bellamy spread his empty hands wide. “Of course not.” Asshole, he thought to himself. O’Shaugnesy and the entire scientific community at McMurdo were almost totally dependent on the U.S. military for support, yet they acted as if they owned the place. Bellamy had not been thrilled about putting all his weapons in the bundles, but he had followed orders. One of these days public relations was going to destroy a mission.
Larkin interposed himself between the two. “Your other aircraft is en route, major. It should arrive in about four hours. In the meantime, we’ll put you up in the airstrip control tower.” He turned to O’Shaugnesy. “Doctor, I did you a courtesy by obliging your request and bringing you out here. I ask that you not harass Major Bellamy and his men. They will be out of your station as soon as possible.”
Under the distrusting eye of O’Shaugnesy, Bellamy’s team gathered together and loaded the two bundles on the sled. The men jumped on board, and they all moved out for the main base, three miles away.
ICE PACK, EIGHT MILES OFF THE RUPPERT COAST, ANTARCTICA
“This is as far as we can go,” the captain informed the political officer. The bow of the Am Nok Gang was securely wedged in ice, and less than a hundred yards to the front, a large iceberg blocked the way.
The captain knew he could probably do some more maneuvering—trying to find the thin ice—but he also had to get back out, and he felt this was as far in as he could go and still be able to turn around.
The political officer stood next to him, peering out the glass of the bridge at the mountains looming in the near distance. They looked less than a mile away, but the captain knew they were farther—he just didn’t tell the political officer that. A large glacier, probably the same one that had spawned the iceberg in front of them, split the mountains to the right front.
“All right. We wait.” The political officer turned and went back to his cabin.
FAR SOUTH PACIFIC OCEAN
With the assist of the hydraulic catapult, the E-2 Hawkeye roared off the deck of the Kitty Hawk, dipped down below deck level, and then rapidly gained altitude as it headed southeast. Upon reaching 10,000 feet altitude, the twenty-four-foot-diameter radome on top of the fuselage began turning at a rate of six revolutions per minute. Inside the fuselage, the three controllers watched their screens as an area three hundred miles in all directions from the aircraft was displayed before them. In three hours, Eternity Base would be in range.
VICINITY RUPPERT COAST, ANTARCTICA
They were three-quarters of the way up the ridge when Pak finally called a halt. It was less than a mile straight line distance to the top, but the wide traverses would more than triple that distance.
“Rest,” Pak ordered. “I will be back shortly.” Pak had to know whether or not the coast was just beyond this ridge. He was aware that dedication to duty went only so far; his men were at the limits of their capabilities. They needed some positive news.
Leaving his three men huddled together next to the sled, Pak untied the rope from his waist and headed straight up the ridge, ignoring the screaming pain of exhaustion in his thighs. His breath crackled in the brittle air as he made his way to the top.
As he climbed, Pak’s thoughts turned to home, a place he had a feeling he would never see again. Even if they made it to the Am Nok Gang—if the ship was there—and the ship made it to Hawaii—and they managed to infiltrate with the bomb—and . . . Pak stopped that train of thought. He reminisced about his mother and regretted never having married so his mother would have a daughter-in-law to take care of her in her old age. He was an only son, and his dedication to country had taken him away from his family, leaving his parents alone.
The top was not much farther. Pak slipped and fell, almost tumbling back down, but he dug the metal folding stock of his AK-47 into the ice and stopped himself. Getting to his feet, he made the remaining distance.
Cresting the ridge, Pak stopped and stared, his heart lifting. The ocean—at least he assumed it was the ocean under all that ice—was less than three miles away. Sweeping in from his left and d
escending to the ocean was a large glacier.
Pak scanned the area for a long time. Then his eyes focused on a black speck just to the side of a large iceberg—the ship! It was far out on the ice sheet but within sight. Pak turned and headed back down the slope.
*****
“Look!” Riley exclaimed.
Sammy squinted through red-rimmed eyes. She had no idea what he was pointing at. In fact, she had a feeling she was in a dream—a very bad one at that. She wished she could dream of warmth and comfort and lying in front of a fireplace with—
“There,” Riley grabbed her and pointed again. “Near the top of the ridge of ice.”
Sammy seemed to remember lying safe and warm in a pair of strong arms. Was that a dream too? Or had that been reality and this a dream? Which was which? Then she saw it—tiny black figures against the white background, just below the top. An oblong shape on the ice to their left rear. Reality came flooding back.
“Is it them?”
“Yes.” Riley’s voice held an edge she had never heard before.
“How far away do you think they are?”
“It’s hard to tell. Maybe four, five miles.”
It looked closer than that to Sammy. Four or five miles sounded like forever. “Can we catch them?”
“It depends on how far away the coast is,” Riley replied. “They’ve got the high ground on us.”
Instead of immediately running off toward the Koreans as she expected him to, Riley turned and looked at her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m tired, I’m sad, and I’m cold. But I can make it.” Sammy was surprised as soon as she said it, but it was true.
