Maddock wanted off the ice as quickly as possible, knowing better than anyone what lay beneath.
EIGHTEEN
The ice flattened out.
It was young, not yet pushed, cracked and splintered under the pressure of the next sheet forming behind it.
It also meant that the surface was thinner in patches and less secure.
Closer now, there was no mistaking the submarine’s conning tower. The sub had been pushed up in the ice, the prow protruding from the ice at an angle, the sail still clear of the surface. It was obvious that nothing the crew attempted would have liberated it from the ice, but equally there was nothing to stop them from climbing out and striking out across the frozen landscape in search of what passed for civilization on Wrangel Island. The Spetsnaz team couldn’t be far away, but there was no sign of them. He didn’t think they were too late, because the snow around the sub appeared undisturbed by anything apart from the wind.
“You know this thing could be the death of us, don’t you?” Bones asked as they quickened their pace. Neither one of them had to say they needed to push on.
“The ice? The radiation or whatever it is that has been released inside that sub?” Maddock asked. “Or do you just mean the Russians?”
“All three.” Bones replied. “But you knew that, didn’t you? That’s why you made the others stay behind. It’s never been about speed for you, has it? This was only ever going to take two of us if we actually made it this far. We both know that there’s a sickness on board and that the crew won’t be fighting back.”
“If there’s anyone still alive.” Maddock still harbored grim hopes there might be some survivors to help without compromising the mission, but the last shreds of that hope were slipping away. He didn’t expect to find anyone alive. Yes, the Russian had come from somewhere, but not the sub. He was either a native, or an escapee from the Gulag.
They covered the last klick in silence. Each step took them further out onto the frozen sea. The ice held the submarine in a vice like grip. The paused for a moment before they stepped into the shadow of the great vessel, dwarfed by the conning tower and the bulwark spearing out of the ice like a torpedo trapped mid-launch, frozen in time and ice. Maddock was lost in thought. It took a moment for the strangely familiar click, click click to fight its way through his subconscious to the front of his mind. He turned to face Bones.
The big man had a Geiger counter in his hand.
“Radiation,” he said matter-of-factly. “We don’t want to be hanging around here longer than we absolutely need to. And even that’s going to be too long inside there. The level’s not dangerous out here, but it’s bad enough. If we’re going to do this, we’d better get it over with.”
Maddock nodded. No choice. The objective was clear. Retrieve Pandora’s Egg. Whatever the hell Pandora’s Egg was.
A sheen of ice coated the metal. There were enough ridges and rivets to provide hand and foot holds, but it wouldn’t make an easy climb. They had to move with care, knowing that every footfall would sound like a hammer within the sub, announcing their arrival to anyone not too dead to hear it. They climbed until they stood beside the periscope atop the conning tower, and looked back down at the ice below.
It was a long dizzying drop.
“Well at least one of them came out this way.” Bones pointed at the hatch. A metal bar had been wedged into the mechanism ensuring that no one on the inside would be able to get out.
He gave the bulges on either side of the submarine a cursory glance. He knew that was where the ICBMs were housed, already loaded into their launchers. The launchers were hidden behind hatches. There was no way in or out of the vessel that way.
Anyone still alive inside knew that visitors would have to come in through the front door.
NINETEEN
The interior of the sub lay in near darkness.
The only light came from the faint glow of instrument panels and emergency lighting. Maddock had been inside spaces like this both above and below the waterline. It was suffocating, but livable if you ignored the thought of just how little realistically separated you from the water. He knew his way around, basically, because the layout was going to be similar from submarine to submarine. He broke a glo-stick and dropped it down to the bottom of the ladder. It clattered down the rungs to the steel floor.
Nothing could have prepared him for what the light revealed.
At first he thought that the Russians were waiting for them, gathered together at the bottom, ready to take them as soon as they descended, but none of them moved or reacted to the light. They had died waiting to be rescued. Trapped inside by the metal bar jammed into the lock. Someone had passed judgment on them.
Did that mean they’d been beaten here?
“Looks like they froze to death,” Bones said, first down the ladder.
It was hard not to step on a body as he reached the bottom. The crew had huddled up around the ladder, dressed for the outside in full winter gear, with mittens and ski masks beneath their hoods. It was as cold in here as it was out on the ice. Colder if anything.
“What about the illness? Radiation sickness?”
“Who knows? But this can’t be all of the crew.”
“How’s the counter looking?” The moment Bones turned the device, he was greeted by clicks coming thick and fast. It was worse than outside. Not unexpected, but not good either. The reactor was obviously the source of the radioactivity, and given the readings weren’t off the scale that meant it had to be shielded to some extent. But for how much longer? The submarine was not designed to take the stresses and strains of being trapped like this. Surely the integrity of the hull was at risk?
Maddock managed to find enough floor space to place a foot down, then carefully looked for another, using handholds overhead to pull himself through the mass of corpses. The deck inclined fairly steeply. He took the climb slowly, not wanting to stumble and fall into the pack of bodies.
The glow from an instrument panel lit up the frozen faces of crew still sitting in their seats.
There was no one here to save.
He tried not to think about the horror of it; dying trapped in a place like this, locked in a sardine can that slowly froze them.
“That sucks,” Bones grunted, ever succinct. He wasn’t wrong. That’s exactly what they were.”
“Let’s get this over with, man,” Maddock said. “The sooner we can get out of here the better.” Bones didn’t argue with him. It was all about finding Pandora’s Egg.
Maddock moved slowly to the front of the submarine, climbing higher with each step. Metal groaned against metal with every movement, echoing with the relentless press of the ice on the hull. The Echo II had been built to sustain immense pressure at great depths, but this was different. How much more could it take before the stresses and strains were too much for it to bear and the great boat started to come apart at the seams? Would it be torn apart with them still inside it? What would happen to the shields around the reactor? How much damage would they be looking at if the core was breached? Would they even be safe if they made it back to the ship? Or was the entire island and every one on it already damned?