Arctic Wargame jh-1

by Ethan Jones

  Nuqatlak answered her question with a slight involuntary hand twitch.

  Carrie dashed toward him. She slowly lifted up his head. Blood trailed down from his lips, his nose, and the left side of his head. His helmet was nowhere in sight.

  “Don’t worry.” Carrie steadied his head in her hands. Nuqatlak coughed blood, and his entire body shook.

  Anna checked his pulse. She shook her head at Carrie and mouthed, “Weak.” She looked back down at the man. “You’re going to be OK,” she said with a whimper.

  “No, I’m going to die.” His lips hardly parted as his voice rasped. He struggled for strength to breathe and speak at the same time.

  “We’ll take you to a hospital. We have a chopper,” Carrie whispered. For a second, she wondered if the end would have been different had she decided to use the helicopter for the manhunt.

  “Too late,” Nuqatlak groaned. “I won’t make it.”

  Anna fought back her tears. Carrie knew a mountain of guilt must have been crushing her soul.

  “Why… why did you run away?” Carrie asked, realizing they were running out of time.

  Nuqatlak coughed blood again. “The guns. I know you came for the guns.”

  Carrie hesitated, pondering the next question. Nuqatlak’s pulse was growing weaker by the second. “The guns… where did they come from?”

  Nuqatlak’s head fell forward, but he muttered no words.

  “Where did you get them?” Carrie asked.

  Nuqatlak’s eyes moved toward the right. “North… northeast,” he mumbled.

  “What?” Carrie and Anna asked at the same time.

  “Did you say north?” Anna asked.

  “And northeast?” Carrie said. “That’s Greenland. Did you get them from Greenland?”

  Nuqatlak shook his head and closed his eyes. Even these simple gestures took a lot of effort.

  “No…” his voice was weak and trailing.

  “Then, where? Tell me where?” Carrie said.

  Silence. His eyes remained closed.

  “Nuqatlak, where did you get those guns?” Carrie placed her lips over his ear.

  “Danish… Danish depot.” He breathed the words between gasps, slightly opening his left eye.

  “Where? Where’s the depot?”

  “Pig, pig…” Nuqatlak’s breathing stopped.

  “What? What was that? ‘Pig’ what?”

  No answer.

  “Where did you find the weapons? Where?” Carrie repeated.

  His blank left eye kept staring at the gray sky.

  “Nuqatlak, don’t… don’t you die,” Anna muttered through her tears.

  Chapter Six

  Grise Fiord, Canada

  April 12, 9:25 a.m.

  “There’s at least a dozen Let Støttevåbens.” Justin held one of the brand new light machine guns. It was equipped with a bipod and a night vision optical sight.

  “Enough for a small army.” Carrie examined her sample, her fingers running over the trigger and the sight on the barrel. “There’s probably two thousand rounds in the den.”

  Nuqatlak’s small kitchen had been turned into their command center. Kiawak made coffee and they were assessing their situation while sitting around a white dining table.

  “Holy cow,” Anna said. She almost dropped the gun Carrie gave her, not expecting it to be so heavy. “What were they planning to do with this? Shoot Moby Dick?”

  “What troubles me is where these guns came from, and how many others are out there,” Kiawak said. “Slædepatruljen Sirius uses this exact kind of weapon.”

  “Who’s the Sla… Sirius?” Anna asked.

  “The Sirius Patrol,” Kiawak replied. “They’re one of the best units of Danish Special Forces in Greenland. They use sleds, helicopters, and boats. They have bases at Daneborg, Nord, Mestrersvig, and all over Greenland.”

  “Why do I have a feeling the Sirius Patrol did not just lose all these weapons?” Anna said.

  “It’s too early to jump to conclusions,” Alisha said. “We still don’t know where these guns came from.”

  “Nuqatlak said he took them from a Danish depot,” Anna replied.

  “Did he really tell you the truth? Or you just want to believe it?” Alisha shrugged.

  “Those were his last words,” Anna said, “and I’m just repeating them. The man is dead, so that’s all we have.”

  “Yeah, I know. You killed him.”

  “We told you what happened, Alisha. And I’ve had enough of your attitude that nothing anyone does is good enough for you.” She got up and headed for the door.

  “Wait for me.” Carrie followed Anna to the door. “For your information,” Carrie said as she turned around at pointed at Alisha, “she did well shooting him in self-defense. Otherwise we would be dead.”

  Justin decided to stay out of the squabble. Kiawak, however, apparently found no reason to be impartial.

  “You need to watch your mouth,” he growled at Alisha. “Those women risked their lives, but I haven’t seen you do anything useful.”

  Alisha waited until Carrie slammed the door behind her. “We’re on a cold trail right now because they killed the man who could explain the mystery of these guns. Now we’re back to square one, and we have to explain the deaths of two innocent people.”

  “Nuqatlak was anything but innocent,” Kiawak replied. “He was in possession of illegal weapons and was trying to fence them. We have two people who were shot at by Nuqatlak and had to respond in order to defend themselves. It’s a simple thing.”

  “And now we know more,” Justin said, bring their focus back to the team’s objective. “We had no idea about a number of things until a few hours ago. Now, we have evidence: many guns, just like this one. We know they’re Danish and Nuqatlak, the gun smuggler, confirmed their origin. We need to find where this depot is located, and how this ties to the Sirius Patrol and to those icebreakers, which most likely are Danish too.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure,” Alisha objected. “These machine guns are made by Diemaco, the Canadian subsidiary of America’s Colt. These guns may have been produced for Denmark and their armed forces, but that doesn’t mean the Sirius Patrol or Danish icebreakers dropped them in Grise Fiord. They could have come from anywhere within Canada or the US.”

  “I don’t think so,” Kiawak replied. “There are way too many coincidences. Two unknown icebreakers cruising our waters and machine guns used by Danish forces pop up on our Arctic shores. Plus, the man himself said he found the weapons in a Danish hut.”

  “My other point exactly,” Alisha said. “I know their huts are spread all over Greenland. Maybe Nuqatlak and his woman or other people snowmobiled to Greenland. They broke into one of these stations, which happened to be stashed with guns, instead of food or supplies.”

  “You’re right about one thing,” Kiawak said, “They have depots in East and North Greenland, but these weapons are on the wrong side of the pond. Besides, Nuqatlak said he found the weapons north.”

  “North Greenland?” Alisha said. “He took his last breath, so maybe he left out some words?”

  “I don’t know, Alisha, but I don’t think so,” Justin replied. “If this was really a Sirius Patrol depot, I think they would be guarding them pretty well, not leave them for Nuqatlak and his friends to take their pick. Plus, at this time of year, it’s very dangerous to travel all the way to Greenland. According to Nuqatlak’s file, last year he barely left Grise Fiord, but there was one time he flew to the Pond to buy pork.”

  “Pork? Pig meat? Pig?” Kiawak said. His eyes widened, and he scratched his head. “Why does the word ‘pig’ sound familiar to me?”

  “Because women call you a pig all the time,” Justin replied with a smirk.

  Kiawak leaned back on his chair, holding both hands over his chest. “Oh, my heart. That hurt, Justin. I can’t believe you would say such hurtful words…”

  “It’s because Nuqatlak called Carrie a pig after they shot him to death,” Alis
ha said with a deep frown and a stern headshake. “Which was very polite of him given the circumstances, if I may add.”

  “Yes, yes, we know.” Kiawak dismissed Alisha’s comments by waving his hand in her direction. He tapped his forehead with his palm, as if wanting to push his brain into action and spark up the missing idea.

  “Yes,” he shouted a few seconds later, slamming his fist hard on the table. “Pig Fiord. Sverdrup, the Norwegian guy, the explorer who discovered this area more than a hundred years ago and later sold it to Canada.” Kiawak was reeling off his words like a verbal Let Støttevåben machine gun. “Sverdrup named this place Grise Fiord, which translates as ‘pig fiord’ in his native language. Walruses used to live here at the time and their grunts reminded Sverdrup of pigs. So if Nuqatlak said ‘pig’ and ‘northeast’ when Carrie asked him where he found the weapons, he meant northeast of Grise Fiord. That’s where Nuqatlak found the weapons cache. Some of the locals still call Grise Fiord by its old name, Pig Fiord.”

  Kiawak jumped to his feet as soon as he finished his rattling, a big smile glowing on his face.

  “You sure about this?” Alisha raised an eyebrow and pointed at Justin. “You don’t believe this nonsense, do you?”

  “Well, there’s only one way to know for sure. We’ll fly northeast of Grise Fiord until we find the depot,” Justin replied.

  * * *

  “The Sirius Patrol stocks over fifty depots, small huts they build during the summers,” Justin said, taking brief pauses between his words. He was skimming through a few documents on his laptop. “Matthew from the office e-mailed me these documents a few minutes ago. These depots are all over the place, but they’re supposed to be only on the Danish, I mean the Greenland, part of the Arctic. The troopers usually rest in tents, but they use these huts during extreme conditions when they need to repair their dogsleds or replenish their food supplies. According to Matthew’s reports, some of these huts have hot showers, warm beds, and somewhat decent toilets.”

  “The Sirius Patrol still uses dogsleds?” Anna asked.

  “Yeah, don’t be surprised,” Kiawak replied. “Dogs are more reliable than snowmobiles, you never run out of fuel and, if you’re stranded without food—”

  “Yuck,” Anna interrupted Kiawak, her face squirming in disgust. “Yuck. Don’t finish that thought.”

  “Well, you can’t eat a snowmobile…” Kiawak mumbled. “Hey, check out the view at three o’clock.” He pointed to his right. “Blue ice.”

  They looked out the large windows of the Eurocopter. Details of the layers of ice and snow were very crisp from their current altitude of three hundred feet. The area Kiawak brought to their attention shined with a baby blue color. It looked as if a careful mother had wrapped the ice slopes, cliffs, and crevasses in a warm blanket to shelter them from the cold.

  “Cool, very cool.” Anna dug into her backpack and pulled out a digital camera.

  After a quick, curious glance, Alisha returned her gaze to the pilot. Carrie maintained a straight line, almost parallel to the Grise Fiord coast, which hacked deep into the southern region of Ellesmere Island. Two snowmobile or dogsled trails indicated someone had recently been travelling in this area, going north. Carrie flipped a few switches on the helicopter’s control panel, and the aircraft swerved to the right.

  “What are you doing?” Alisha asked.

  “The fiord turns right about ten miles ahead. I’m going to take us over the ridges, so we can explore both sides at the same time,” Carrie replied. “I don’t think the Danes would dare to venture this far inland and come this close to Grise Fiord.”

  “Oh, now you’re having doubts too?” Alisha said with self-satisfaction obvious in her tone.

  “No,” Carrie replied, “I’m just being realistic. If it’s true that they built their depots in our land, they would set them along our coastline. That way, they have easy access to them and keep them far away from our communities.”

  “Yes, but don’t you think they know the coastline is the first place we would check? It’s the easiest place to reach,” Anna said.

  “That’s true,” Carrie said. “And that’s why we’re searching these inland regions as well. But I still think if we’re to find something, it’ll be along the shores, probably in a secluded bay.”

  “That’s where I would hide my boats if we were out hunting, which, in a sense, we are,” Kiawak said, a thoughtful expression on his face.

  “The CSE report indicated these icebreakers came very close to Cape Combermere, which is exactly northeast of Grise Fiord.” Justin pointed to a map on his laptop’s screen. “If we put together the findings of the report and Nuqatlak’s confession, something’s definitely going on around that cape.”

  Alisha shrugged in a defiant silence.

  They continued their flight over the next fiord and the one after it, maintaining their eastbound direction. At times, Carrie would study the blue map on the navigating screen to the left of the flight controls. The screen projected a detailed topographical map of the area underneath, the southeast part of Ellesmere Island, which resembled the flattened nose of a hammerhead shark. A red dot on the screen, just above the mouths of the fiords, indicated their helicopter’s position.

  Two other screens to her right, by the radar monitor, were the object of Carrie’s occasional glance. The first one streamed enhanced real-time images from two powerful cameras mounted at the nose of the cockpit. These images were the most useful during summer flights because of the bright and sharp contrast between ridges and valleys, cliffs and plateaus. At this time of year, the staleness of the glittering snow and ice was blinding and mind numbing.

  The second screen displayed photographs taken by two infrared cameras installed on both sides of the helicopter’s fuselage. The infrared system enabled the detection of thermal energy emitted by all objects with a temperature above freezing. These waves were then converted into colored photographs. The higher the temperature of the target, the brighter the red dots in the pictures. A few miles past, the system displayed a few red dots, probably caribous or muskoxen, given their constant and rapid movement. A building, Danish or not, would emit a low and static amount of thermal energy.

  * * *

  Over the next sixty minutes, insignificant dots blipped occasionally on the infrared screen, but nothing worthy of a second glance appeared. The Arctic Cordillera mountain range gradually rose along the eastern shore of Ellesmere Island. Carrie was careful to keep a reasonable distance from the majestic mountain peaks. A few of their summits stabbed at the skyline with their steep cliffs, some of them over three thousand feet high. The helicopter crew admired glacial lakes, frozen rivers and rocky mountainsides. Everything was buried under snow blankets and ice caps. Baffin Bay was not yet in sight, but it was only a matter of minutes before they would marvel at the spectacular vistas of Ellesmere Island broken coastline.

  “Where are we?” Anna asked, peering through the window. Her forehead pressed against the cold glass, and the vibration of the engines sent a jolt through her body.

  “We’re flying over the Manson Ice Cap, heading east, toward Baffin Bay,” Carrie replied.

  “How can you tell?” Anna continued. “All I see is white powder, with the occasional black mountain top poking from underneath.”

  Carrie smiled. “I’ve got the map in front of me. Plus, the chopper knows his way around these mountains.”

  They all giggled, except Alisha, who kept staring at her laptop.

  “Once we’re over the ocean, I’m gonna take us north, so we can search the coast. If we don’t find anything, we’ll turn around for another swipe of the inland valleys before—”

  A few electronic beeps from the flight control dashboard interrupted Carrie. She glanced at the infrared screen, fumbled with a few switches, and zoomed in the right side camera.

  “What is it?” Justin asked.

  “I… I don’t know. Let me check something.”

  The helicopter lost some alt
itude, and Carrie steadied the aircraft in order to focus the camera for a clear image. From their distance of six hundred feet above the coastal cliffs, she could not pick the details of a large mass of white-yellowish debris at the center of the small screen. At first, she thought it was a colony of seals, but the infrared screen remained relatively calm. Could it just be ridges of exposed cliffs, after a windstorm scrapped the ice off their slopes?

  “We’re dropping in for a closer look, at that point, right there.” Carrie tapped one of the screens so Justin could follow her words. “There seems to be something tucked in at that little bay. Maybe, just maybe that’s what we’ve been looking for.”

  Justin glanced at the helicopter’s navigational screen, then at the topographical map of the island on his laptop, apparently comparing the curves. He took a quick look outside the window at the bay growing larger by the second underneath them.

  “That’s Cape Combermere, right?” he asked Carrie.

  “Yes, that’s right,” she replied.

  Chapter Seven

  Cape Combermere, Canada

  April 12, 11:10 a.m.

  The debris was spread over a stretch of rocky ridges, about one thousand square feet. If it were August, Justin may have thought this was the shipwreck of some careless Arctic adventurers. But in mid-April, when the Arctic’s frigid weather could stiffen a man in a matter of minutes, Justin was positive the rubble was not the result of a human error or a natural disaster.

  The prefabricated, timber panels, although split into smaller fragments and scattered from one end of the site to the other, resembled the basic elements of a large shed. Two log pads created a flat platform over the hard-packed snow that was sheltered about two thousand feet inland and away from the sudden movement of menacing ice floes. High cliffs rose up on both sides of the narrow clearing, providing extra protection from the northern and eastern wind currents.

  “What do you think, Kiawak?” Justin picked up a couple of the framed pieces, then scratched the snow surface with the tip of his boots.