Ice Station (44 page)

.. .while you're doing something with the other....

“Are you ready?” Schofield said to Kirsty.

“Uh-huh.”

In the alcove, Nero hit the large rectangular button marked

BRIDGE.

There came a loud mechanical clanking sound from somewhere within the
walls of the alcove and then suddenly the bridge underneath
Schofield's feet jolted as it came apart at the center and began
to retract.

As soon as the bridge began to retract, two of the SAS soldiers fired
at Schofield and Kirsty, but they had already dropped out of sight and
the bullets whizzed over their heads.

Schofield and Kirsty let themselves fall down into the shaft.

They fell fast.

Down and down, until they splashed into the pool at the bottom of the
station.

It had happened so fast that the SAS men up on C-deck didn't know
what was going on.

It didn't matter.

For it was then that the two nitrogen charges that Schofield had tied
to the ends of the retractable portions of the bridge suddenly and
explosively went off.

It was the way that Schofield had tied
the nitrogen charges to the bridge with his shoelaces that did it.

He had tied them down in such a way that each nitrogen charge lay on
either side of the join between the two platforms
that extended out to form the bridge.

What he had also done, however, was tie the pins of each
nitrogen charge to the opposite platform, so that when the
bridge parted, the retraction of the two platforms would pull
both pins from their grenades. What he had needed, however,
was for the SAS to retract the bridge.

And right up until they exploded, the SAS soldiers never saw the
nitrogen charges. They had been too busy looking at Schofield, first,
as he held the (unarmed) Tritonal charge above his head and, second,
as he and Kirsty fell down into the pool.

Make your enemy look at one hand while you're doing something
with the other.

As he hit the freezing water, Schofield almost smiled. Trevor Barnaby
had taught him that.

The two nitrogen charges on the bridge went off.

Supercooled liquid nitrogen blasted out in every direction on C-deck,
splattering every SAS commando on the surrounding catwalk.

The results were horrifying.

Nitrogen charges are like no other grenade—for the simple fact
that they do not have to penetrate the skin of their victims
in order to kill them.

The theory behind their effectiveness is based on the special
qualities of water—water is the only naturally
occurring substance on earth that expands when it is cooled.
When a human body is hit by a burst of supercooled liquid nitrogen,
that body becomes very cold, very fast. Blood cells freeze
instantly, and being made up of approximately 70% water, they
begin to expand rapidly. The result: total body hemorrhage.

And when every single blood cell in a human body explodes it makes for
a horrifying sight.

The SAS men on C-deck had their faces exposed—and that was where
the liquid nitrogen hit them. So it was in their faces that the
supercooled liquid nitrogen took its most devastating effect. The
blood vessels under their facial skin— veins, arteries,
capillaries—instantly began to rupture and then suddenly,
spontaneously, they began to explode.

Black lesions instantly appeared all over their faces as the blood
vessels under their skin exploded. Their eyes filled with blood, and
the soldiers could no longer see. Blood exploded out from the pores of
their skin.

The SAS commandos fell to their knees, screaming.

But they wouldn't scream for long. Brain death would occur within
the next thirty seconds as the blood vessels in their brains froze
over and themselves began to hemorrhage.

They would all be dead soon, and it would be agony every second of the
way.

From down on E-deck, Trevor Barnaby just stared up at the scene above
him.

His whole unit had just been cut down by the blast of the two nitrogen
charges. In fact, nearly the whole of the interior of the station was
covered in blue liquid goo. Hand railings began to crack as the
nitrogen froze them. Even the cable that held up the diving bell was
covered with a layer of ice—it, too, began to crack as the
supercooled liquid nitrogen made it contract in on itself at an
alarming rate. Even the portholes of the diving bell down in the pool
were covered over with the blue poxy.

Barnaby couldn't believe it.

Schofield had just killed twenty of his men with one stone...

And now he was the only one left.

Barnaby's mind raced.

All right. Think. What is the objective? The spacecraft is the
objective. Must control the spacecraft. How do I control the
spacecraft? Wait—

I have men down there with it.

Get to the cavern.

Bamaby's eyes fell on the diving bell.

Yes....

At that moment, on the far side of the diving bell, Barnaby saw
Schofield and the little girl break through the thin layer of ice that
had formed on the surface of the pool when it had been hit by the
spray of liquid nitrogen, saw them start swimming for the far deck.

Barnaby ignored them. He just grabbed a scuba tank from the ground
next to him and dived into the pool, heading for the diving bell.

Schofield lifted Kirsty out of the water and up onto the deck.

“Are you OK?” he said.

“I got wet again,” Kirsty replied sourly.

“So did I,” Schofield said as he spun around and saw Trevor
Barnaby swimming frantically for the diving bell.

Schofield looked up at the ice station above him. It was silent. There
were no more SAS commandos left. It was only Barnaby now. And
whoever Barnaby had already sent down to the cavern.

“Get a blanket and stay warm,” Schofield said to Kirsty.
“And don't go upstairs until I come back.”

“Where are you going?”

“After him” Schofield said, pointing at Barnaby.

Trevor Barnaby surfaced inside the diving bell, where he was greeted
by the barrel of Schofield's .45-caliber Desert Eagle automatic
pistol.

James Renshaw gripped the pistol with both hands, pointed it at
Barnaby's head. He was holding the gun so tightly, his knuckles
were turning white.

“Don't fucking move, mister,” Renshaw said.

Barnaby just looked up at the little man standing inside the diving
bell. The little man was wearing some really old kind of scuba gear,
and he was clearly nervous. Barnaby looked at the gun in Renshaw's
hand and he laughed.

Then he brought his own gun up from under the water.

Renshaw pulled the trigger on his Desert Eagle.

Click!

“Huh?” Renshaw said.

“You have to chamber a round first,” Barnaby said as he
raised his own pistol at Renshaw.

Renshaw saw what was coming, and with a short squeal he jumped down
into the water next to Barnaby—scuba gear and all—and
disappeared underwater.

Barnaby climbed up into the diving bell and made straight for the dive
controls. He didn't waste any time. He blew the ballast tanks
immediately. The diving bell began to descend.

Up on E-deck, Schofield saw the ballast tanks blow.

Shit, he's going down already, he thought as he came to a
halt next to one of the rung-ladders. He had planned to go up to the
winch controls on C-deck and stop the diving bell from there—

And then at that moment, there came a monstrous noise from somewhere
up above him.

Snap-twangggg!

Schofield looked up just in time to see the cable that held up the
diving bell—frozen solid by the liquid nitrogen—contract
and crack for the final time.

The frozen cable snapped.

The diving bell submerged.

Schofield's mouth fell open. Then he ran.

Ran as fast as he could. Toward the pool. Because now this would be
the last trip the diving bell would be making to the
underwater tunnel and it was the only way to get to the cavern and if
Barnaby were to get there and the Marines down there were already
dead, then the British would have the spaceship and the battle would
be lost, and Schofield bad come too fucking far to lose everything
now—

Schofield hit the edge of the deck running and dived high into the
air, just as the diving bell disappeared under the surface.

After penetrating the water, Schofield shot downward.

And then he swam. Hard. With strong, powerful strokes, chasing the
descending diving bell.

Now free of its winch cable, the diving bell began to sink fast and
Schofield had to use all of his strength to catch it He came close,
reached out, and... grabbed the piping that ran around the exterior of
the diving bell.

Inside the diving bell, Barnaby holstered his gun and pulled out his
detonation unit.

He checked the time. 8:37 p.m.

Then he set the timer on the detonation unit. He gave himself two
hours, enough time to get to the underground cavern. It was crucial
that he be down there when the ring of Tritonal charges surrounding
Wilkes Ice Station went off.

Barnaby then pulled his Navistar Global Positioning System transponder
from his pocket and hit the transmit button.

Barnaby smiled as he put the GPS transponder back into his pocket.
Despite the loss of his men up in the station, his plan—his
original plan—was still on track.

When the eighteen Tritonal charges went off, Wilkes Ice Station would
float out to sea on a newly formed iceberg. Then, thanks to
Barnaby's GPS receiver, British rescue forces—and British
rescue forces alone—would know exactly where to find
the iceberg, the station, Barnaby himself, and, most important of all,
the spaceship.

The diving bell fell downward through the
water—fast—with Shane Schofield clutching onto
the piping on top of it.

Slowly, hand over hand, Schofield made his way down the side of the
falling diving bell. The big bell rocked and swayed as it careered
downward through the water, but Schofield held on.

And then, at last, he came to the base of the bell and swung himself
under it.

Schofield burst up inside the diving bell.

He saw Barnaby right away, saw the detonation unit in his hand.

Barnaby whirled around and drew his gun, but Schofield was already
launching himself out of the water. Schofield's fist shot up out
of the water and slammed into Barnaby's wrist. Barnaby's gun
hand popped open in a reflex and the gun flew out of it and clattered
to the deck.

Schofield's feet found the deck of the diving bell just as Barnaby
crash-tackled him. The two men slammed into the curved interior wall
of the bell. Schofield tried to kick Barnaby away from him, but the
British commander was too skilled a fighter. Barnaby crunched him
against the wall and let fly with a powerful kick. His steel-capped
boot connected with Schofield's cheek, and Schofield flailed
backward and felt his face slam up against the cold glass of one of
the portholes of the diving bell.

At that moment—and for just a split second—Schofield saw
the glass of the porthole in front of him, saw a thin crack begin to
form in the glass right in front of his eyes.

But he didn't have time to ponder that. Barnaby kicked him again.
And again. And again. Schofield fell to the deck.

“You never give up, do you,” Barnaby said as he lay the boot
into Schofield. “You never give up.”

“This is my station,” Schofield said through clenched teeth.

Another kick. The steel cap of Barnaby's boot slammed into the rib
that Schofield had broken during his fight with the SAS commando in
the hovercraft earlier. Schofield roared in agony.

“It's not your station anymore, Scarecrow.”

Barnaby kicked at Schofield again, but this time Schofield rolled out
of the way and Barnaby's boot hit the steel wall of the diving
bell.

Schofield kept rolling until he came up against the metal rim of the
pool at the base of the diving bell.

And then suddenly he saw it.

The harpoon gun.

The harpoon gun that he had taken from Little America IV. It was just
lying there on the deck, right in front of his eyes.

Off-balance, Schofield reached for the harpoon gun just as Barnaby
leaped down onto the deck in front of him and let fly with a brutal
side-kick.

The kick connected and Schofield fell—harpoon gun and
all—off the deck and into the small pool of water at the base of
the diving bell, and suddenly he found himself outside the
falling diving bell!

The diving bell plummeted past him and Schofield reached out with his
left hand and caught hold of a pipe on the side of it as it rushed
past him and suddenly he was yanked downward.

Schofield kept ahold of the harpoon gun as he wrapped one of his legs
around the exterior piping of the falling diving bell. He could only
guess how deep they had fallen.

A hundred feet? Two hundred feet?

He peered in through one of the small round portholes of the diving
bell. This porthole also had a thin white crack running across it.

Schofield saw the crack and suddenly he realized what it was. The
liquid nitrogen that had splattered against the diving bell up in the
station was contracting the porthole's glass,
weakening it, causing it to crack.

He saw Barnaby inside the diving bell, saw him standing on the small
metal deck, saluting at Schofield, waving his detonation unit at him,
as if it were all over.

But it wasn't over.

Schofield stared at Barnaby through the porthole.

And then, as he looked at Barnaby from outside the diving bell,
Schofield did a strange thing, and in an instant the smile vanished
from Barnaby's face.

Schofield had raised his harpoon gun—

—and pointed it at the cracked porthole.

Barnaby saw it a second too late and Schofield saw the British general
step across the diving bell and scream, “No!” just as
Schofield pulled the trigger on the harpoon gun and the harpoon shot
straight through the cracked glass of the diving bell's
porthole.