Standing in the bow and wrapped in a thick blanket, Gary Detweiler held a smoking Beretta in his outstretched hand.
“About fuckin’ time.” Clayton’s voice, from inside the Nuge. “Where da hell you been, boy?”
7:29:45 A.M.
Colding tossed the last plastique ball and turned toward the Otto II, chancing a quick glance at his watch.
Twelve seconds.
He had only one chance. He opened the throttle and leaned forward, holding on tight as the Ski-Doo slammed toward the boat.
7:29:49 A.M.
They didn’t have time to tie off. The Bv’s port side ground against the Otto II, breaking away ice that clung stubbornly to the starboard hull. Sara and Tim scrambled aboard as Gary pulled his dad out of the hatch. Clayton screamed in pain, but with his son’s help made it onto the boat.
Sara looked around for Colding but didn’t see him. “Gary! Where’s Colding?”
Gary ran to the short ladder leading to the boat’s flying bridge. As he climbed, he pointed out the port side.
Sara looked. There was Peej, driving toward them, Ski-Doo bouncing off the broken ice like a Jeep driving through a rutted gully.
She checked her watch. Two, one…
7:30:00 A.M.
Twenty-four balls of Demex plastic explosive detonated simultaneously. Ice chunks and shards flew like frozen shrapnel, some to land a good mile away.
A six-pointed ring erupted around the Otto II. The concussive force ripped inward, powerful enough to hit the ancestors closest to the boat and knock them into the frigid waters. Sara and Tim dove to the deck, ice flying all around them.
Colding was halfway between the ring and boat when the plastique detonated. The shock wave hit him from behind, so powerful it tumbled the Ski-Doo like a toy thrown by a petulant child. He flew through the air, the snowmobile spinning out from under him and smashing into a dozen pieces against the ice.
He landed fifteen feet from the boat’s port side, his limp body cartwheeling off the ice. He flew another ten feet to plunge into the newly open water just five feet from the boat.
Sara watched, horrified, as P. J.’s body vanished beneath the surface.
“Rope!” She stripped off her jacket. “Get me some fucking rope!”
The Otto II’s engines roared to life. Gary looked down from the flying bridge and pointed to a footlocker.
She opened it and pulled out a long coil of red-and-white nylon rope. Then Gary was at her side, clumsy bandages across his chest showing huge splotches of red, some of them wet and fresh.
She handed him a loose end of the rope. “Tie it around my waist!” She peeled off her sweater and kicked off her boots as Gary tied the rough rope around her hips.
She turned on Gary. “You do not pull me up until I tug on the rope, understand?”
Gary shook his head. “You’ve only got a few seconds in that water, Sara, you can’t—”
She reached out and held the sides of his face.
“Pull me up before I tug, and I’ll kill you. Do you understand?”
Gary nodded.
Sara turned, put her foot on the side rail, then dove into the water.
The cold splash from the Bv’s brief submersion had been bad, but nothing like this. She tried to stay under as her body rebelled, instinctively pushed for the surface.
Get out get out get out.
Her head popped out of the water, barely in time for her to let loose a scream of primitive, instinctive fear.
She looked up at the boat. Gary stood there, the white-and-red rope in his hands, a look on his face that said Should I pull you in?
Sara didn’t answer the unasked question. She drew a huge, rattling breath, then forced herself under once again. The cold scraped her skin like a grater, driving at her with needles of pain. She kicked and kicked. Hard to see anything in the murky water.
So cold…
Her lungs screamed from lack of oxygen, but she dove farther. She wouldn’t leave him down there. She kept on kicking with all of her quickly fading energy.
Where is he? I can’t lose him…
She couldn’t see. Blood roared inside her head. Her heart banged like a kick drum, faster, faster.
Her hand smashed into a slimy rock at the bottom of the harbor. She couldn’t take any more, had to go up. She put her hands out to push away from the bottom, and her fingers hit something soft.
Soft like fabric.
She grabbed for it. It was a body—Colding’s body.
He’s not moving…
Sara wrapped her legs around his back and yanked on the rope. She immediately threw her arms under his shoulders, clutching him chest to chest in a desperate, loving embrace. The rope snapped taut around her waist, pulling them toward the surface.
Can’t breathe can’t breathe…
Sara’s mouth opened of its own accord. Icy water poured across her tongue, into her throat. She thrashed, panic taking her, yet she refused to let go.
Her head broke the surface. She gasped for air, coughing violently. She barely felt the hands pulling her into the boat. Her body shivered as if from an epileptic fit. Somebody pulled off her pants and wrapped a blanket around her before her thoughts became her own again.
She sat up. Tim was over Colding, performing CPR, blowing air into his mouth, then pumping his chest.
Unable to move, Sara watched while her lungs kicked out deep, chest-rattling coughs. Engines roared. She felt the boat lurch forward.
Colding coughed, sending a splash of water out of his lungs and onto his face. Tim turned him on his side. Colding coughed again, then Sara heard the sweet sound of air rushing into his lungs.
“Help me get his clothes off,” Tim said. Sara reached in. She and Tim pulled the waterlogged snowsuit off Colding’s body. Colding kept coughing, but he obliged, weakly helping them remove his clothes. Sara moved to him and held him, their two naked, wet, frigid bodies wrapped in the same blanket. Gary threw a second blanket around them. It had blood on it—the same blanket he’d been wearing only moments earlier.
“You two will be fine,” Tim said. “I’ve got to look at Clayton.” He limped to the bow, leaving Sara and Colding clinging together, their bodies shivering in unison.
“Guess I owe you one,” Colding said through blue lips.
Sara nodded. “Guess so.”
They kissed, both sets of lips feeling icy and clammy, but it didn’t matter. All the death was forgotten in that moment, because she had life, and she had him.
They had won. Not without a heavy price, but it was over.
They had survived.
Huddling together, shivering together, they looked back to shore as the Otto II pulled away from Black Manitou Island.
COLDING’S LAST EIGHT plastique balls had made an arc behind the ancestor horde. The bombs shattered huge chunks of ice, enough to break off a massive slab that stranded the ancestors in the harbor.
They ran about the slab, looking for a way off, but there was nowhere for them to go. A small piece near the edge broke off under one’s weight—it fell into the water, thick limbs splashing uselessly. It lasted only a few seconds before it slid beneath the surface.
The main slab cracked in two. When it did, the seven ancestors at the edge of the left chunk proved to be too much weight—the slab tilted like a large teeter-totter. The seven tried to turn and run back up the ice, but it was too late: they all splashed into the water, doomed by their useless attempts at swimming.