“Were they really lost or was that a cover?”
“Our data says they were really lost.”
“So how the hell did they end up at this place?” Morris demanded. “Who recovered them?”
“I assume the same person who built the base, sir,” Hodges replied. “Anyone who could support that could also support the undersea recovery of the bombs.”
“Anything from your two guests?”
“Not yet, sir, but we’ll get something. We’re close. From what we’ve received so far, I would say that it appears Eternity Base was a privately funded enterprise using government support.”
Morris closed his eyes. He didn’t doubt that for a moment. Billions of dollars a year were spent by the government on various secret projects. Who was to say that some influential civilian couldn’t do the same thing, especially if that civilian had the proper connections in the military industrial complex. “I want a name.”
“Yes, sir.”
Morris opened his eyes as an imposing figure in a medal-bedecked uniform stomped into the room.
Morris stood. “General Kolstov. Welcome.”
The Russian general wasted no time on a greeting. “I understand there is a problem. A nuclear one.”
Since the president had informed the Kremlin of the source of the nuclear explosion, a liaison officer from the embassy representing all of the countries of the former Soviet Union had been assigned to the Pentagon to follow the situation. It was part of the nuclear disarmament and control treaty that both countries had signed the previous year. Any incident involving nuclear weapons was to be monitored by both countries to ensure there would be no confusion or misunderstanding that might lead to unfortunate consequences.
Morris wasn’t sure which he hated worse — having a civilian superior riding herd on him or the presence of General Kolstov in the Pentagon war room. Still, he had to admit that the provision was a good idea. He knew that if his people had picked up an unknown nuclear explosion in Antarctica and the Russians had reported it as an accident — an accident that had no logical explanation — he’d sure as shit want to have someone sitting in on their investigation. Morris wasn’t sure he’d buy a story of two bombs lost overboard and suddenly reappearing at a mysterious base. He wasn’t sure General Kolstov was going to buy it either.
The merchant ship Am Nok Gang cruised south at a steady twenty knots. The captain stalked the bridge, unable to sleep. He watched as an iceberg, long ago spotted by his lookouts and radar, slipped by a mile from the port bow, the constant sunlight reflecting off its slopes.
This was insanity, the captain knew, but he dared not say it. The political officer’s cabin was next to his, and that man, not the captain, held the ultimate control over the ship. They’d received the order from
Pyongyang less than twenty-four hours ago, and there had never been any question but to obey.
The captain shook his head. The fools! How could he pick up someone off the coast of Antarctica? Obviously no one had bothered to look up the facts. The ice pack surrounded Antarctica the year round, giving up slightly to the sea in the summer but never allowing open water to reach the coast. The captain knew the history of these waters. He’d spent thirty-two years of his life in Antarctic waters on the annual whale hunts. North Korea was one of the few rogue nations that still ignored the international outcry against the ravages of the hunt.
The captain knew that Capt. James Cook, the first to sail around Antarctica, from 1773 to 1775, had never once spotted land, the ice pack keeping him well out of landfall. The first party ever to land on Antarctica and spend the winter had not succeeded until well over a century later, in 1895. And in the century since, men in ships had been able to accomplish little more in these vicious seas.
But now, now, the idiots in Pyongyang wanted him to pick up people off the coast of Antarctica! The captain silently laughed to himself — as if a simple command could make it happen. He would see what the political officer had to say when they hit the ice pack in the morning. Maybe he would order the ship to fly over the ice! Whoever was to be picked up would have to come to them, not the other way around.
The captain twisted his head and peered into the distance as the lookout phoned in another iceberg off the port bow. The false dawn of the time piece was a long way off.
The SUSV stuttered, pivoting to the right and not moving forward. Pak grabbed the dashboard and turned a quizzical look to his driver. “What is wrong?”
“I don’t know, sir. It is not responding.”
“Stop.” Pak zipped up his coat and then opened his door. He climbed down to the snow. The answer stared him in the face. The track on the right side was gone. Pak peered back. It was thirty feet to the rear, laid out in the snow like a long, thick metal snake. One of the linchpins holding it together had snapped in the bitter cold.
Kim joined him. “What now, sir?”
Pak’s reply was terse. “We walk.”
Kim didn’t question. He rapped on the door to the rear cargo compartment and yelled in his instructions. Ho and Lee began unloading the gear. Sun left the driver’s seat and joined them around the sled. They unhooked the tow rope and rigged it to be pulled by men.
Kim used his last satchel charge on the SUSV. The party moved out to the north, all the men straining in the harness. Twenty minutes out a sharp crack from behind told of the destruction of the vehicle.
Riley was channeling his anger into his legs, pumping steadily as the miles flowed beneath them. The anger had started smoldering low in his gut from the minute he’d seen the bullet holes in the soldier’s back at the base of the stairs. Then when Devlin had raced down the shaft and told them that Kerns and Vickers were dead, it had piled more fuel on the fire. The last two shots had really ignited it. He’d been on the other side of this kind of ruthlessness before, but it had been for a better cause. Or at least he’d thought it had been a better cause.
Riley was more than willing to go on without rest, but he knew that wasn’t smart. His plan was to halt the party every fifty minutes for ten minutes of rest. Every other hour, he would break out his small stove and cook up something hot — soup or coffee. They would go slower that way, but in the long run they would cover more miles. Years of experience in Special Forces, marching with the merciless weight of a rucksack on his back, had taught him that it was the long haul that counted.
They continued to follow the tracks in the snow: two treads and a deep impression in the middle. Occasionally the trail would disappear, covered by blown snow, but it was easy to pick up again. The Koreans were heading due north as directly as the terrain would allow. Riley didn’t permit himself to dwell on the fact that they were probably moving two to three times faster than he was.
“Does the sun shine all the time?” Kim asked as the five men huddled together next to the large sled, trying to share some warmth during the short break Pak gave them every so often.
Pak looked up. The storm had lessened two hours previously, and visibility had increased to almost a mile. “We will have no night.” Pak’s best estimate was that they were less than five miles from the coast. The only map he had was one he had torn out of a world atlas stolen from a schoolroom prior to their departure from Angola. It was totally useless for navigating. He was offsetting his compass based on the map’s notation of magnetic south, but he wasn’t confident that he was taking the quickest possible route.
Pak’s main goal was to head north — as best he could tell — and also stay on the lowest possible ground, skirting around mountains. Despite the bomb’s weight, the sled pulled easily behind the five men — as long as they were on level ground. They’d just spent the past forty-five minutes traversing back and forth — getting the sled up and over a large foothill — making only two hundred horizontal meters in the process.