Pitt smiled faintly. 'It's a long story.'
Cleary's mind shifted gears. 'I see no bodies.'
'They must have all evacuated the center during the battle and headed for the hangar to board the aircraft and make their escape,' Giordino speculated.
'My map of the facility shows an airstrip, but we didn't see any sign of aircraft during our descent.'
'Their hangar can't be seen from the air. It was carved into the ice.'
Cleary's expression turned to fury. 'Are you telling me the fiends responsible for this shameful debacle have vanished?'
'Relax, Major,' Giordino said with a canny smile. 'They haven't left the facility.'
Cleary saw the pleased look in Pitt's eyes. 'Did you arrange that, too?'
'As a matter of fact, yes,' Pitt answered candidly. 'On our way here, we happened to run into their aircraft. I'm happy to announce that all flights from the facility have been canceled.'
Shouts and cheers erupted unabashedly in the Pentagon and White House war rooms at hearing Cleary's voice announce the termination of the ice shelf detachment systems, followed by Lieutenant Jacobs's report that the survivors of Wolf's security force were laying down their arms and surrendering. Elation washed over the two rooms at learning the worst of the deadly crisis was over. They heard Cleary's voice carrying on a one-sided conversation with the saviors of the mission, who carried no radios and whose words could not be heard intelligibly over Cleary's throat microphone.
Unable to contain his exhilaration, the President snatched up a phone and spoke sharply. 'Major Cleary, this is the President. Do you read me?'
There was a flicker of static, and then Cleary's voice answered. 'Yes, Mr. President, I hear you loud and clear.'
'Until now, I was told not to interfere with your communications, but I believe everybody here would like a coherent report.'
'I understand, sir,' Cleary said, finding it next to impossible to believe he was actually talking to his commander in chief. 'I'll have to make it quick, Mr. President. We still have to round up the Wolfs, their engineers, and the last of their security guards.'
'I understand, but please brief us on this macabre vehicle that came on the scene. Who does it belong to and who was operating it?'
Cleary told him, but failed miserably at attempting to describe the snow monster that had burst forth from the ice at the last minute and snatched victory virtually from the mouth of defeat.
Everyone sat and listened, bewildered, but nobody was more bewildered than Admiral Sandecker when informed that two men from his government agency who were under his direct authority had driven sixty miles across the barren ice in a monstrous 1940 snow vehicle and helped crush a small army of mercenary security guards. He was doubly stunned when he heard the names Dirk Pitt and Al Giordino, who he thought were due to land in Washington within the hour.
'Pitt and Giordino,' he said, shaking his head in wonderment. 'I should have known. If anyone can make a grand entrance where they're not expected, it's them.'
'I'm not surprised,' said Loren, with a smile across her lovely face. 'There was no way Dirk and Al were going to stand by passively and wait for the world to stop.'
'Who are these people?' demanded General South, angrily. 'Where does NUMA get off interfering in a military operation? Who authorized their presence?'
'I would be proud to say I did,' Sandecker said, staring directly at South without giving an inch, 'but it simply would not be true. These men, make that my men, acted on their own initiative, and it looks to me that it was a damned good thing they did.'
The argument died before it had begun. It never left the minds of those present in the war rooms of the Pentagon and White House that without the intervention of Pitt and Giordino, there would have been no estimating the frightful aftermath.
Pitt's and Giordino's ears should have been burning, but without a link to Cleary's headgear radio, they could not hear what was said half a world away. Pitt sat on the step of the Snow Cruiser and pulled the bandages off his face, revealing several cuts that would require stitches.
Cleary looked down at him. 'You're certain the Wolfs are still here?'
Pitt nodded. 'Karl, the head of the family, and one sister, Elsie, must be in tears at seeing the aircraft they'd planned to use to flee the facility has been rendered nonflyable.'
'Can you and Mr. Giordino lead me to the hangar?'
Pitt cracked a smile. 'I'd consider it an honor and a privilege.'
General South's voice cut into the brief conversation. 'Major Cleary, I am directing you to regroup, do what you can for your wounded, and secure the rest of the facility. Then wait for the main Special Forces unit, which should be landing inside half an hour.'
'Yes, sir,' answered Cleary. 'But first there is a little unfinished business to settle.' He pulled out the connector between his mike and receiving unit, turned to Pitt, and fixed him with an 'Where is this hangar?'
'About half a mile,' said Pitt. 'Are you thinking of rounding up a hundred people with the few men you have left?'
Cleary's lips spread in a shifty grin. 'Don't you think it and proper that the men who have gone through hell should the final kill?'
'You'll get no argument from me.'
'Are you two up to acting as guides?'
'Did you get permission from Washington?'
'I neglected to ask.'
Pitt's opaline green eyes took on a wicked look. Then he said, not? Al and I never could pass up a diabolical scheme.'
45
It would be a classic understatement to say that Karl Wolf was horrified and enraged when he laid eyes on the broken wreckage of his aircraft. His grand scheme was in tatters, as he and his scientists and engineers milled around the hangar in fear and confusion. To his knowledge, the mechanism to break away the ice shelf was still set to come online in less than four minutes.
Misguided by Hugo, who told them his guards at the control center were still locked in a life-or-death struggle with the Special Forces teams, Karl had no perception that the Fourth Empire had died before it was born, or that Project Valhalla was aborted.
The Wolfs stood in a solemn group, unable to accept the full impact of the disaster, unable to believe the incredible story of a huge vehicle that had run amok and smashed their aircraft, before heading off toward the battle raging in front of the control center. They stood stunned with disbelief at the sudden reversal of their long- cherished plans. Hugo was the only one missing from his family members. Committed to the end, he had disregarded their predicament and was feverishly organizing the remaining members of his security force for the final resistance against the Americans he knew for certain were short minutes away from assaulting the hangar.
Then Karl said, 'Well, that's it, then.' He turned to Blondi. 'Send a message to our brother Bruno on board the Ulrich Wolf. Explain the situation and tell him to send backup aircraft here immediately with all speed. We haven't another moment to lose.'
Blondi didn't waste time with questions. She took off at a run toward the radio inside the control room at the edge of the airstrip.
'Will it be possible to land on the Ulrich Wolf during the early stages of the cataclysm?' Elsie Wolf asked her brother. Her face was pale with anguish.
Karl looked at his chief engineer, Jurgen Holtz. 'Do you have an answer for my sister, Jurgen?'
A frightened Holtz looked down at the icy floor of the hangar and replied woodenly. 'I have no way of
