snow.
It was too much to hope they were unguarded.
Guns fired at them. Ice spat up from the impacts, stinging them.
Bratt and Washburn dropped to their bellies, sheltering behind a shallow ridge of ice. Matt did the same. The snipers were hidden in a valley between two ice peaks. Well protected. Matt spotted orange tents sheltered up there.
“That’s where the corpses from the station are kept,” Washburn hissed. “I know a back way in, and I have one more grenade. Cover me.” She began to crawl away, retreating toward the station’s entrance.
Bratt aimed his gun and fired toward the tents. Matt rolled and hauled his AK-47 around. He aimed, searching for snowy shadows. He fired whenever he saw movement.
Off to the side, Washburn reached a narrow crevasse between two peaks, ready to circle behind the snipers.
Then, as was usual for this day, everything went dreadfully wrong.
By the shaft opening, Jenny readied herself along with the others. She held Bane’s scruff. The storm winds still blew fiercely, but the snowfall had waned to flurries and gusts.
“On my mark!” Kowalski yelled a few steps away. He and Tom stood in front, bearing flaming Molotovs over their heads.
Five grendels massed ahead of them. The beasts’ approach had stopped as explosion after muffled explosion erupted, sounding as if they were coming from just beyond the next peak. The creatures, tuned to vibrations, were disturbed by the concussions.
“It’s the station,” Tom had said. “Someone’s attacking.”
Kowalski had agreed, “Sounds like grenades.”
The momentary confusion of the beasts had bought them time to light a pair of Molotovs and devise a quick plan.
It wasn’t artful. Simply down and dirty.
Kowalski took the lead, stepping toward the nearest grendel and waving his flaming torch at it.
Lips pulled back in response, baring teeth like a dog. The other grendels retreated a step, edgy now, wary. The lead bull kept his spot, not intimidated by the show.
“This one’s well fed,” Ogden whispered at Jenny’s side, crowding her. “It’s surely one of the pod’s sentinels. Its territoriality will be the most fierce.”
That was their hope. Take out the leader and maybe the pack will scatter.
Kowalski took another step. Tom dogged behind him.
In a blur, the grendel suddenly leaped at them, roaring.
“Fuck!” Kowalski screamed, and tossed the Molotov toward the monster’s open jaws. He flew backward, bouncing into Tom. They both fell.
The seaman’s aim, though, proved true. The flaming bottle sailed end over end into the creature’s maw. The result was spectacular.
An explosion of burning oil burst from the creature’s jaws, like some fire-breathing dragon. It howled, spitting and hacking out flaming oil. It spun in agony and blind fury. The others fled from the display, bounding away in all directions.
The smell of burning flesh filled the small ice vale.
“Now!” Kowalski screamed, springing to his feet with Tom.
The young ensign had managed to keep his Molotov out of the snow. He whipped it now with the strength of a major-league ballplayer. It arced past the flailing monster and burst farther down the path, flaming more of the trail ahead, warding away any other grendels.
“Let’s go!” Kowalski yelled, taking the lead.
The wounded beast collapsed to the ice, its lungs burned away. Flames still danced from its lips and the two nostrils high on its head. It didn’t move.
Kowalski gave it a wide berth just in case. Tom waved for the others to follow. Jenny ran alongside Craig and Dr. Reynolds. Free now, Bane raced ahead, joining Kowalski at the front. Behind them, the biology group kept pace with Tom.
The party fled through fire and ice, running full tilt.
Kowalski had their last Molotovs. He kept a fiery path blazing ahead of them. The grendels scattered out of their way.
Then a scream…
Jenny turned and saw Antony down, one leg plunged through a hole in the ice. Tom and Zane helped draw the panicked boy out.
Kowalski had stopped, waiting for them a few yards down. “Sucks, doesn’t it!” They would all have to be careful of such sinkholes. A leg could be easily broken…or a neck.
Zane helped his friend to his feet.
“Shit, that’s cold,” Antony said.
Ice cracked behind him. Up from the hole, a grendel burst forth, battering from below. It lunged and snatched the boy’s leg, biting deep. Zane and Tom were thrown backward as the ice shattered outward. The half- ton beast dropped back into the hole, dragging Antony with it.
He didn’t even have time to scream before he was gone.
Amid cries and shouts, everyone raced forward haltingly. With the snow covering the ice, it was impossible to discern the thinner patches.
“They’re pacing us,” Ogden said, panting. “Tracking us under the ice by our footsteps.”
“We can’t stop,” Kowalski said.
No one wanted to. They continued onward, but more slowly. Kowalski bravely took the point. Everyone kept to his footsteps, not wanting to take any unnecessary chances.
Jenny had seen polar bears hunting seals in such a manner, pouncing up from below to nab their unsuspecting prey. The area must be riddled with iced-over breathing holes, permanent cracks in the ice protected by the pressure ridges around here.
They would have to be careful.
Jenny spotted a mound of snow rise as something heavy pushed up from below. She heard the crinkle of breaking ice from beneath it. The grendels were still following them.
“Around the next ridge!” Tom called from the back. “The station’s parking lot is just ahead!”
They cautiously increased their pace.
Jenny rounded the bend and saw he was right. The jumble of peaks opened into flat ice. They were almost out of the treacherous pressure ridges.
As they made for the opening, gunfire cracked through the whine of winds. Kowalski reached the edge and raised his arm, halting them all while he scanned ahead. More gunfire sounded close by, a real firefight.
Tom pulled up next to them. “Someone’s fighting the Russians.”
“Could it be the Delta team?” Amanda asked Craig.
He shook his head.
Kowalski hissed to them. They all moved forward, gathering together. He pointed an arm. Just ten yards from their hiding place rested a Sno-Cat, with snowmobiles and other vehicles lined up just past it.
Beyond the parking lot, Jenny spotted two figures out on the ice, firing toward the peaks to the left. Gunfire answered them, spattering into the short ridge that sheltered the pair.
It was impossible to tell who was who. Though the snowfall from overhead had died away, the winds continued to blow surface snow in scurfs and eddies, obliterating detail.
Bane suddenly lunged forward, breaking away from the group. He raced between the parked vehicles, heading out toward the open plain.
Jenny made to leap after him, but Kowalski grabbed her elbow and hissed. He pointed an arm.
Beyond the firefight, the glowing entrance to the base shone in the stormy gloom. Figures appeared, limned against the light, pouring out from inside. A major battle was about to begin.
She turned her attention, but Bane was gone, lost among the parked snow craft.
