Beneath the Ice (38 page)

Perry felt sick.

“Here is the man who tried to kill you, Mr.
Sachs,” Enkian said. “Have any words for him?”

Larimore spoke first. His voice was hoarse
and weak. “I’m sorry, Perry. I . . . I . . . didn’t mean to cut off
your generator, just those to the Chamber and Dome. I hit the wrong
one. I thought . . .” he broke in a spasm of coughing. “I thought I
could force them to leave. I was going to stow away and get
help.”

“After you made your escape,” Griffin
complained. “Save yourself first, is that it?”

“Let it go, Griffin,” Perry said.

“But—”

“Let it go.”

“He could have killed you.”

“He didn’t.”

“It was an accident,” Larimore complained.
“I had to act when I did. Everyone was focused on you under the
ice. It was then or never.”

“It still looks like never,” Griffin
snapped.

“I understand,” Perry said. He turned to
Enkian. “Let Gwen help him. He needs medical help.”

“He killed one of my men.”

“So did Tia,” Perry said.

“That’s different,” Enkian
said. “She was acting on my
behalf.
Commander Larimore was working against me. I can’t over-

look that.”

“There should be a sacrifice,” Tia said.

Enkian nodded. “As usual, you are
right.”

“What kind of sacrifice?” Perry asked.

No answer came. Tia stepped to Larimore and
delivered a crushing blow to his jaw. The man dropped to his
knees.

“That’s enough!” Perry shouted and started
forward. He was immediately jerked back. Several men from the
circle had grabbed him, pinning his arms to his side. He looked to
Jack. Four men had wrestled him to the ground before he could move
a step. It took all four of them to hold him down. Gleason was held
in place by a gun barrel at his temple.

Tia stepped to Larimore’s side and planted a
vicious kick to his kidneys. He cried out in pain and fell forward.
Then, with a strength that belied her size and gender, she grabbed
Larimore’s hood and dragged the half-conscious man across the ice,
dropping him next to the ice hole.

Perry watched in horror as she pulled the
commander’s feet to the opening and positioned them over the hole.
She motioned for the two men who had brought Larimore in. They each
took a bound arm and lifted the man from the floor. Larimore’s head
moved limply from side to side, and Perry could tell he was barely
conscious.

“Don’t do this!” Perry pleaded. “There’s no
need. I’ll take responsibility for him.”

“Very gracious of you, Mr. Sachs,
considering he almost killed you.”

“You’re no better,” Perry said.

“No, but I am in control.” He turned to Tia.
“Do it.”

In an act of cruelty Perry never could have
imagined, Tia stepped to the semiconscious Larimore and gently
patted his cheek until he came to. She stepped back and waited. It
took a moment for the groggy navy commander to take in his
situation. At first his eyes widened and he started to kick, but he
stopped abruptly. He looked to Perry. “It really was an
accident.”

“I know.”

“Maybe I’ll meet your God—”

“Now!” Tia ordered.

Commander Trent Larimore disappeared into
the ice. Perry tried to drive the image of a man falling through
nearly two miles of ice from his mind. He prayed the death would be
quick. He turned angry eyes to Tia, who seemed disturbed.

She looked at Enkian. “He didn’t
scream.”

Enkian shrugged then faced
Griffin. “Tell me, Dr. James. How’s
that
for contamination?”

Griffin bent over and vomited on the
ice.

Chapter
33

“
What’s wrong with her?”
Enkian asked.

Perry followed Enkian’s gaze and saw Sarah
on the ice. She was having another attack.

“People faint,” Gwen said. She crouched next
to the heap that was Sarah.

“Somehow, I think it’s more than fainting,”
Enkian said. He looked at Perry and raised an eyebrow.

“Narcolepsy,” Perry said. “The stress of
watching . . . The stress triggers it.”

“You brought a crewperson with a
neurological disorder to this environment?” Enkian said with
surprise. “I thought you a better leader than that.”

Perry started to explain then dismissed the
idea. He owed this monster no explanations. He watched as Gwen
moved from crouching to kneeling. She moved Sarah’s head to the
side to make breathing easier and stroked the woman’s dark
hair.

Suddenly, Sarah’s eyes sprang open. She
mumbled something then sat up. A second later she was fully awake
and on her feet. She looked embarrassed.

Enkian waved at the men who held Jack to the
ice and those who restrained Perry. “Let them go. If they do
anything foolish, kill them. I’ve grown weary of their antics.”

“So who’s next down the hole?” Perry
asked.

“Amusing as that would be, Mr. Sachs, I
still feel I owe you something for bringing back the brick.” Enkian
stepped to the dark object that rested on the stone altar. “You
have brought my ancestors to me. It goes against my better judgment
and the advice of Tia, but you are all free to go.”

Perry wasn’t sure he heard right. “Free to
go?”

“Yes, you may leave as soon as you like.”
Enkian looked up, and Perry could see the man was serious.

“You’re giving us a plane to fly out of
here?”

Enkian bellowed with laughter. “Of course
not.” He looked at Tia. “Give them a plane, did you hear that?” She
nodded and re-turned the smile.

“Then how do we leave?” Perry wondered.

“You walk, Mr. Sachs. You walk.”

“We’re hundreds of miles from any
installation. We can’t survive out there like that.”

“That’s not my problem,” Enkian said.

“People will be looking for us soon,” Perry
said. “We’ve been out of radio contact too long.”

“They think you’re dead, lying at the bottom
of the ocean.”

“Why would they think that?”

“I’ve seen to it, Mr. Sachs. I have people
everywhere and in high places. Your plane was reported crashing
into the sea. No one is coming. The world thinks this is an empty
place. There is no need for anyone to visit. The only aircraft
flying in here will be mine.”

“Let us at least take the snowmobile.”

“No, no snowmobile. I’m being overly
gracious as it is.”

“You call a slow death overly gracious?”
Jack asked.

Enkian shrugged again.
“Everything is a matter of perspective. To be honest, I don’t want
your corpses around. I could drop you down the rabbit hole, but
like I said, I feel a small degree of grati
tude toward you for bringing me the brick.”

“How can I lead my people onto the ice
knowing they’ll all be dead in a few hours? The wind is kicking up.
Our cold weather gear won’t protect us for long if those wind
speeds climb much higher.”

“You are probably right, but if you stay
here I will have all of you killed and dropped down the shaft. The
choice is yours: death here or death out there.”

“Doesn’t sound like much of a choice.”

Enkian shivered. The cold was finally
getting to him. How he had remained so long without his parka and
undergarments was beyond Perry. Their captor frowned as if
inconvenienced by the chill. He turned to the altar, set down the
glass container, and motioned for his clothing. Tia walked to the
man who held the garments.

Perry’s mind churned like
a blender. He looked toward the open loading door and saw the dim
white ice lit by a sun that hovered just above the horizon. Wind
whipped up ice crystals and swirled them through the air. Death
waited outside that door, death by cold, a cold that would freeze
the lungs and seep into the internal organs until they no longer
functioned. He knew what would happen. Those less
fit, those who carried less body weight, would be
the first to go—Sarah first, then Gwen, then Griffin, then . . . He
clamped his eyes shut and drove the image away, but it returned. As
if perched on some hill, Perry could see the lifeless bodies of his
friends laid out in a line as if held together by string. Images of
the katabatic wind assaulting the still corpses with airborne
razors of ice swirled past his mind’s eye.

Perry’s heart began to
ache as if the deaths had already occurred. Turning, Perry glanced
around the Chamber. Fifty-plus armed men stared back. There would
be no fighting their way out of the situation. He looked at Jack,
who returned the gaze. He could tell Jack had no ideas either. His
eyes drifted to Tia, and he was convinced that she was a trained
and merciless killer. He
doubted if even
Jack with his lineman’s size could handle her.

He thought about what Enkian had said, that
no one was looking for them. Perry felt alone, more alone than he
had ever felt and more hopeless than he could imagine.

Enkian slipped on his thick undershirt, then
his thermal shirt. In a moment he would don the thick white parka.
To Perry the man was the personification of evil. What bothered him
most was the thought that evil would win, that this madman would
get away with it all.

The images came back, haunting him like some
ghoul that possessed his mind. Despair was knocking on the door,
and defeat was climbing in the window.

The struggle to conceive of a way they could
survive on the ice continued. Maybe they could make it to the
crashed C-5. A few of them had made it through a rugged night there
once before, but damp reality extinguished the thought. They had
barely made it back on snowmobiles. Seven of them walking the
distance was impossible.

The only way out was by air, and Enkian was
certainly not going to allow that to happen. Not if he had . . .
any . . . choice.

There was a tickle at the back of Perry’s
brain, an urgent nudging. For some reason he was thinking of an
event he had read about in the Bible, an event familiar to all
Sunday school children. In the midst of a great storm the wayward
prophet Jonah had said, “Pick me up and throw me into the sea. Then
the sea will become calm for you, for I know that on account of me
this great storm has come upon you.”

That was how Perry felt. None of his crew
would have been here had he not asked them to be. None of the dead
strewn around the fallen C-5 would be such if he had not accepted
the challenge of the mission. He didn’t mind dying, but he could
not stand to see anyone else meet their end. “Toss me into the
sea,” Perry mumbled. He looked at his feet.

“What?” Jack asked.

“Toss me into the sea,” Perry said.

“I don’t follow, pal.”

Perry watched as Tia lifted the white parka
jacket and Enkian begin to slip his arms in—

Perry sprang forward and dove for the altar,
his eyes fixed on the one object that Enkian held as dear as
life.

A warning was shouted.

A shot was fired.

Out of the corner of his eye, Perry saw Tia
shove Enkian to the ground and cover him with her body.

Perfect.

Perry hit the ice hard, landing on his side,
the cylinder in his hand. As Perry slid he pumped his feet, trying
to find purchase on the ice. He didn’t want to rise to his feet; he
wanted to slide three feet further.

He heard voices, another shot, a man’s
panicked voice, but he ignored it all. He rolled on his belly,
pushing with his legs and clawing with his one empty hand.

The hole was two feet away . . . one foot .
. . In what seemed an eternity of seconds Perry reached his goal,
stretched out his arm, and held the cylinder over the open mouth of
the ice shaft. His hand was shaking, and he could barely breathe.
He waited for the gunfire, but no more came.

“Stand down! Stand down!”
Enkian was screaming. “No one
moves.”

The advancing footsteps stopped.

“Back off!” Perry shouted. “I’ll drop it. I
promise you that. I’ll drop it.” His eyes drifted from the cylinder
to the hole, not wanting to look but unable to stop himself. Two
thirds of the way down the two-mile shaft, Larimore’s dead body
floated. Perry was glad the shaft was too dark for him to see that
far down.

The Chamber’s activity had come to a halt.
No one spoke. No one moved. Keeping the cylinder hovering over the
shaft, Perry wiggled and twisted until he was on his knees. He
looked around. Enkian was still on the ice, Tia by his side on her
knees, her eyes drilling Perry. Jack and Gleason were several steps
closer. Three of Enkian’s army lay doubled over on the ice.
Apparently, Jack was going to take on the whole bunch.

“It seems you have me at a disadvantage, Mr.
Sachs,” Enkian said calmly, but there were rough edges to his
voice. “May I rise?”

“You may sit,” Perry said. Enkian did. “Tell
your mascot to sit.”

Enkian did so, and Tia
lowered herself to the ice. All around Perry were men with guns
pointed at him. His mind was racing.
What
part of this seemed like a good idea?
he
asked himself. He took a few deep breaths.

“Tell me why I should not have you shot,”
Enkian said.

Perry pretended to drop the cylinder.

“No!”

“That’s why,” Perry said.

“You have my attention.”

“Here’s how this is going to work,” Perry
said. “My friends get the twin-engine plane. They get in and fly
off safely. If that happens, I give you the cylinder, and you get
to keep me as a bonus.”

Enkian smiled. “You don’t have a pilot.”

“Griffin can fly the plane.”

Looking at Griffin, Enkian smiled. “Right
now I don’t think he could walk to the plane by himself.”