Ice Station (43 page)

Schofield climbed the rung-ladder up to B-deck two rungs at a time.

When he got up onto what was left of the B-deck catwalk, he reloaded
his crossbow. Then he dashed toward the east tunnel and headed for the
living quarters. He had to find Kirsty, and then somehow he had to
figure out a way to get out of here.

Suddenly an SAS commando rounded the corner in front of him. Schofield
whipped his crossbow up and fired. The SAS commando's head snapped
backward as the arrow lodged in his forehead and his feet went out
from under him.

Schofield quickly went over to the body, crouched down over it.

The SAS commando had an MP-5, a Glock-7 pistol, and two blue grenades
that Schofield recognized as nitrogen charges. Schofield took them
all. The SAS man also had a lightweight radio headset. Schofield took
that, too, wrapped it around his head, and ran off down the tunnel.

Kirsty. Kirsty.

Where were they keeping her? Schofield didn't know. He
presumed somewhere on B-deck, but only because that was where the
living quarters were.

He entered the circular outer tunnel of B-deck just in time to see two
SAS commandos racing toward him. They raised their machine guns just
as Schofield brought both of his guns up and fired them
simultaneously. The two SAS men went down in an instant. Schofield
didn't miss a step as he strode over their bodies.

He moved swiftly round the circular corridor, looking left, looking
right.

Suddenly a door to his left opened and another SAS commando emerged,
gun up. He managed to get a shot off before Schofield's guns
blasted to life and sent the commando flying back into the room from
whence he had come.

Schofield entered the room after him. It was the common room.

He saw Kirsty instantly. He also saw two more SAS commandos who were
in the process of shoving the little girl toward the door.

Schofield entered the common room warily, with both of his guns up.

When Kirsty saw Schofield step inside the common room with his two
guns raised, she thought she had seen a ghost.

He looked awful.

He was soaked to the skin; his nose was broken; his face was bruised,
and his body armor was battered all over.

One of the SAS soldiers behind Kirsty stopped dead in his tracks when
he saw Schofield step into the room. He held Kirsty out in front of
him, put a gun to her head, used her as a shield.

“I'll kill her, mate,” the commando said calmly. “I
swear to fucking Christ, I'll paint the walls of this room with
her brains.”

“Kirsty,” Schofield said as he calmly leveled his pistol at
the SAS man's forehead while at the same time aiming his MP-5 at
the other SAS commando's brain.

“Yeah,” Kirsty said meekly.

Schofield said evenly, “Shut your eyes, honey.”

Kirsty shut her eyes and the world went black.

And then suddenly she heard the double boom! boom! of guns
being fired and she didn't know whose guns had fired and then she
was falling backward, still in the grip of the SAS man who had grabbed
hold of her to use as a shield. They hit the floor hard and Kirsty
felt the SAS commando's grip loosen.

She opened her eyes.

The two British soldiers were lying on the floor beside her. She saw
their feet, their waists, their chests—

“Don't look at them, honey,” Schofield said, moving to
her. “You don't want to see that.”

Kirsty turned around and looked up at Schofield. He picked her up and
held her in his arms. Then Kirsty buried her head in his shoulder
plate and cried.

“Come on. It's time to get out of
here,” Schofleld said gently.

He quickly reloaded his weapons and grabbed Kirsty's hand, and the
two of them left the common room.

They raced around the curved outer tunnel, heading for the east
passageway. They turned the corner.

And suddenly Schofield stopped.

Mounted on the wall to his left he saw a large rectangular black
compartment. Written across it were the words: fuse box.

The fuse box, he thought. This must have been where the French cut the
lights earlier....

Schofield got an idea.

He spun where he stood and saw the door leading to the Biotoxin Lab
behind him. Next to it he saw a door marked:

STORAGE CLOSET.

Yes.

Schofield wrenched open the door to the storage closet. Inside it, he
saw mops and buckets and old wooden shelves loaded with cleaning
agents. He quickly reached up and grabbed a plastic bottle of ammonia
from one of the shelves.

Schofield emerged from the closet and hurried over to the fuse box. He
yanked open the door and saw a series of wires, wheels, and power
units inside.

Kirsty was standing farther down the east tunnel, looking out into the
central shaft of the station.

“Hurry up,” she whispered. “They're
coming!”

Schofield heard voices over his newly acquired headset:

“—Hopkins, report—”

“—going after the girl—”

“—perimeter team, return to the station at once. We
have a problem here—”

At the fuse box, Schofield quickly found the wire he was looking for.
He pulled back the sheath, exposed the copper wire. Then he punched a
hole in the plastic ammonia bottle with the butt of his gun and
positioned it above the exposed strand of wire. A small trickle of
ammonia fluid began to drip slowly out of the bottle, down onto
the exposed wire.

The drops of ammonia smacked rhythmically against the wire.

Smack-smack. Smack-smack.

At that moment, in time with the rhythm of the ammonia drops hitting
the exposed wire, every light in the tunnel— indeed, every light
in the whole station—began to flicker on and off, like a strobe.
On. Off. On. Off.

In the flickering light of the tunnel, Schofield grabbed Kir-sty's
hand and took off toward the central shaft. Once they got to the
catwalk, they hurried up the nearest rung-ladder to A-deck.

Schofield strode around the A-deck catwalk, heading toward the main
entrance to the station. The station around him nickered black and
white. Darkness, light, darkness, light.

If he could just get to the British hovercrafts, he thought, he might
be able to get away and get back to McMurdo.

There was movement everywhere. Shouts echoed through the station as
the shadows of SAS commandos raced around the catwalks in the
flickering light, searching for Schofield.

Schofield saw that some of the British commandos had tried to put on
night-vision goggles.

But night vision would be useless now. With the station's lights
flickering on and off, anyone wearing night-vision goggles would be
blinded every time the lights came on—which was every couple of
seconds.

They reached the main entrance passageway, just as an SAS soldier came
bursting out of it onto the catwalk. The SAS man collided with
Schofield, and Schofield was almost bowled over the catwalk's
railing.

The SAS man hit the deck, rose to his knees, raised his gun to fire,
but Schofield let fly with a powerful kick that connected with the
soldier's jaw and sent him crashing down to the catwalk.

Schofield was about to step over the downed soldier's body when
suddenly he saw a large black satchel stretched over the man's
shoulder. He grabbed it, opened it.

He saw two silver canisters inside the satchel. Two silver canisters
with green bands painted around them.

Tritonal 80/20 charges.

Schofield frowned.

He had wondered earlier why the British would bring Tritonal charges
to Wilkes Ice Station. Tritonal was an extremely powerful explosive,
usually used for demolition purposes. Why would Barnaby have it here?

Schofield grabbed the satchel off the unconscious man's shoulder.

As he did so, however, he heard shouts coming from inside the entrance
passageway. Then he heard footsteps, and the click of safeties being
removed from MP-5s.

The SAS commandos outside, the perimeter team...

They were coming back inside!

“Kirsty! Get down!” he yelled. He spun quickly and brought
both of his guns up just as the first SAS commando charged in through
the main entrance of Wilkes Ice Station.

The first man went down in a hail of blood and bullets.

The second and the third learned from his error, and they entered the
station firing.

“Back inside!” Schofield yelled to Kirsty. “We
can't go this way!”

Schofield slid down the nearest rung-ladder with Kirsty on his back.

They hit B-deck. A bullet pinged off the steel ladder next to
Schofield's eyes.

Schofield heard more voices over his British headset:

“—the fuck did he go—”

“—took the girl! Killed Maurice, Hoddle, and
Hopkins—”

“—saw him on A-deck—”

And then Schofield heard Barnaby's voice. “Nero! The
lights! Either get them on or get them off! Find that fucking fuse
box!”

The station was in chaos, absolute chaos. There was no steady light,
just the terrible incessant flickering.

Schofield saw shadows on the other side of B-deck.

Can't go there.

He looked out over the central shaft, and in a flickering instant, his
eyes fell on the retractable bridge on C-deck.

The bridge on C-deck....

Schofield quickly checked his inventory.

One Glock pistol. One MP-5. Neither of which would be enough to take
out twenty SAS commandos.

Schofield still had the satchel he had stolen from the SAS man who had
come in from outside. Two Tritonal charges were in the satchel. He
also had the two nitrogen charges he had liberated from the very first
SAS commando he had killed after flying up out of the water on the
Maghook.

“All right,” he said, looking down at the narrow retractable
bridge on the deck beneath him. “It's time to end this.”

In the ghostly flickering light of the station, Schofield and Kirsty
stepped out onto the retractable bridge on C-deck.

If anybody had seen them, they would have seen them walk right out
onto the middle of the bridge, would then have seen him crouch down on
one knee and do something to the bridge for several minutes.

And then, when he was done, they would have seen Schofield just crouch
down next to Kirsty and wait.

A few minutes later, the British found the fuse box and the flickering
stopped and the lights to the station came on again. The station
glowed white under its bright fluorescent lights.

It didn't take the SAS long to spot Schofield and Kirsty.

Schofield stood up on the bridge as the remainder of the SAS
unit—about twenty men—adopted positions on the C-deck
catwalk, surrounding him. It was a strange sight—Schofield and
Kirsty out in the middle of the shaft, standing in the center of the
retractable bridge, while the SAS took up positions on the circular
catwalk all around them.

The SAS raised their guns ...

... just as Schofield held one of the Tritonal charges high above his
head.

Good strategy is like magic. Make your enemy look at one hand
while you're doing something with the other....

“Hold your fire,” Barnaby's voice came over
Schofield's headset. “Hold your fire.”

Schofield saw Barnaby step out onto the pool deck fifty feet below
him, alone. All of the SAS platoon except for Barnaby were up on
C-deck, surrounding Schofield.

Schofield glanced at the pool next to Barnaby. The killer whales were
nowhere to be seen. Good.

“I've armed the Tritonal charge!” Schofield shouted.
“And my finger is holding the arm button down! The timer is set
for two seconds! If you shoot me, I'll drop the charge and we all
die!”

Schofield stood with his feet spread apart out in the middle of the
retractable bridge. Kirsty was kneeling at his feet, huddled beneath
him. Schofield hoped that the SAS didn't see his hands shaking. He
hoped they didn't see that his shoelaces were missing.

“And if you shoot the girl,” Schofield said, seeing one of
the SAS men lower his sights at Kirsty, “I'll
definitely drop the charge.”

As he spoke, Schofield cast a worried glance over at the alcove on the
catwalk.

If they retracted the bridge...

Barnaby shouted up to him, “Lieutenant, this is very unpleasant.
You have killed no less than six of my men. Have no doubt, we
will kill you.”

“I want safe passage out of here.”

“You're not going to get it,” Barnaby said.

“Then we all go up in flames.”

Barnaby shook his head. “Lieutenant Schofield, this is not you.
You would sacrifice your own life, I know that. Because I know
you. But I also know that you could never sacrifice the
girl.”

Schofield felt his blood chill.

Barnaby was right. Schofield could never kill Kirsty. Bar- naby was
calling his bluff. Schofield glanced again at the alcove over on the
catwalk. The alcove that housed the bridge controls.

Nero caught him looking.

Schofield watched intently as Nero looked from Schofield to the alcove
and then back at Schofield again.

“This is Nero,” Schofield heard Nero's voice
whisper over the headset. “Subject is looking at the bridge
controls over here. He looks pretty nervous about it.”

Make your enemy look at one hand...

Bamaby's voice: “The bridge. He doesn't want us to
open the bridge. Mr. Nero. Retract the bridge.”

“Yes, sir.”

Schofield then saw Nero walk slowly toward the alcove and reach for
the button that retracted the bridge. He made a point of watching Nero
all the way—for this to work he needed the British to
think that he was worried about their retracting the
bridge....

“Watson,” Barnaby's voice said.

“Yes, sir.”

“When the bridge opens, kill him. Take him out with a head
shot.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Houghton. Take the girl.”

“Yes, sir.”

Schofield felt his knees begin to shake. This was going to be close.
Very, very close.