She snorted. “We’ll be lucky to make it through the night. Sunrise is still another eighteen hours off. And the coming day will be only two hours long.”
Jason considered their options. “If anyone does come looking for us, they’ll have a hard time spotting us in the dark.”
“Maybe we could devise some signal. Siphon some of the petrol from one of the vehicles and ignite it if we hear a plane.”
Jason recognized one clear problem with this plan. “What if it’s not rescuers that come looking for us first?”
Karen hugged her arms around herself. “You’re right,” she mumbled. “Then what do we do?”
“I think I know where we can go.”
Karen lifted both eyebrows, but before she could question him, a squawk rose from her coat. She visibly startled at the sudden noise. She tugged down her parka’s zipper and removed a portable radio, one of the set she had distributed before exiting the station.
“. . . hear us? Does anyone copy?”
“That’s Gray!” Jason said, struggling past the impossibility of it.
Karen passed Jason the radio.
He pressed the button. “Commander Pierce?”
“Jason, where are you? Are you safe?”
He did his best to explain his situation, while getting a brief description from Gray about his escape from that calving berg of ice. But Gray’s team still remained stranded out there, and like Jason, he feared the enemy might return soon.
“I can take a couple of Ski-Doos and go fetch them,” Karen offered.
He nodded.
She faced him, her expression doubtful. “But, Jason, do you truly know somewhere we can find shelter?”
He stared out across the dark, featureless ice.
I hope so.
5:22 P.M.
Gray shivered inside his jacket and hunched farther over the handlebars of his Ski-Doo. He had a thick wool scarf frozen over the lower half of his face. His gloved fingers felt molded onto the grips by the cold.
He squinted against the wind, his aching eyes fixed to the glow of the Ski-Doo’s headlamp as it tunneled weakly through the swirling fog. He kept his gaze locked onto the snow machine in front of him, driven by Karen Von Der Bruegge. The station commander had arrived an hour ago, dragging a second empty Ski-Doo behind hers. She now carried the injured Barstow on her vehicle, while Kowalski huddled behind Gray.
Gray had to trust that Karen knew where she was going. She seemed to be following the treaded tracks of the group led by Jason. The kid had taken the others deeper into the fog-patched expanse of the Brunt Ice Shelf, retreating from the Weddell Sea—hopefully far enough away that the enemy couldn’t find them.
If we’re lucky, maybe they’ll believe we were all killed.
The Ski-Doo in front suddenly slowed. Distracted in thought, Gray came close to rear-ending the other, but he braked in time to avoid a collision. After another ten yards, the reason for that sudden deceleration appeared out of the gloom.
A massive shadowy silhouette filled the world ahead of them. It looked like a flat-topped mountain rising from the icy plain. As they approached closer, details emerged: the towering skis, the bulk of the blue module, and the lone John Deere tractor.
It was a detached section of the destroyed station.
Earlier, Jason had noted this module being towed into the fog just before the assault broke out. He had hoped that the enemy, focused on the bulk of the Halley VI Research Station, might not have spotted its departure.
Looks like the kid was right.
Though dark, the module looked unmolested. He spotted a Sno-Cat and a scatter of snow machines parked nearby. Karen drove her vehicle up and stopped alongside them. Gray trundled his Ski-Doo next to hers.
A hatch in the rear of the high module opened, and Jason stepped onto the small back deck. He waved them forward to the ladder that led up to him. Gray needed no such encouragement. The steamy breath of warm air from that open hatch was invitation enough.
The group hurried toward the shelter and its promise of heat. The temperature had dropped to thirty below zero, and with the katabatics kicking up more fiercely as the night deepened, the wind chill made the freeze all the more bone numbing.
Gray assisted Barstow up the ladder. The pilot had dislocated his arm when they crashed the Ski-Doo, and while they’d managed to pop it back into place, the limb was still painful and weak. After a bit of effort, everyone got inside.
Gray slammed the hatch against the polar freeze and took a moment to bask in the warmth. His face burned painfully as it thawed. Frostbite was certainly a worry, but at least he could still feel the tip of his nose.
He followed the others into the heart of the module, which appeared to be one of those residential pods, broken into bedrooms, a communal bathroom, and a gymnasium. Everything was decorated in primary colors, designed to compensate for the endless monotony of this frozen world. As his nasal passages continued to thaw, he also smelled the cedar scents from the wall planks, another psychological trick to mitigate for the lack of plants and greenery.
They all gathered in a small central common room, which held a table and chairs. Several of the rescued researchers had already retreated to various bunkrooms, likely shell-shocked and exhausted. Others leaned on walls, wearing dour, worried expressions.
They had full right to look that way.
Jason spoke, “We were able to catch up with the John Deere. Think we spooked the tractor driver as we all piled up on his tail. But at least his path was easy to follow. Once we got here, we fired up the module’s generator.” The kid waved to the smatter of lights. “Unfortunately we have no way to radio out.”
Kowalski clapped Jason on the back. “You found this goddamned place. That’s more than enough to win you a cigar.” Proving himself a man of his word, he pulled a cellophane-wrapped stogie from an inside pocket of his parka and handed it to Jason. He then looked around. “It’s okay to smoke in here, right?”
“Not normally,” Karen said. “But considering the circumstances, I’ll make an exception.”
“Then I could get used to this place.” Kowalski stalked off, perhaps looking for a quiet place to light up.
Gray turned to more practical matters. “What’s the status of food and water?”
“No food in the module,” Jason answered. “Only what the tractor driver brought with him. It was meant to last him several days in case he got stranded, but his reserves are not nearly enough to cover our numbers. Water shouldn’t be a problem, though. We can always melt snow or ice.”