That’s it, baby. Light my fire.
Earth-shaking explosions blew the pipeline apart. Mammoth hunks of steel and concrete were thrown up into the air, before they came hurtling back down like a meteor shower. Deafening blasts assaulted her ear-drums until all sound was muffled. Shock waves almost knocked her from the sled. Beneath her gloves, white knuckles clung to the handlebar, while Geir squeezed her so tightly she could hardly breathe. One of the swing dogs lost its footing, stumbled, and was dragged along by its frantic teammates.
Thick black smoke blocked out the feeble sunlight. It looked as if a volcano had erupted.
But was it enough to stop the Terminators?
“Did that do it?” she shouted back at Geir. “Did you get them?”
“Huh?” Geir hollered. “What’s that?”
Molly responded at the top of her lungs.
“Did you get those fucking machines?”
“I don’t know!” He squinted back into the smoke and heat. “Maybe?”
Maybe’s not good enough, Molly thought. They couldn’t head back to camp until they knew that they had shaken the T-600s and their homicidal pursuit. No way was she leading them back to Sitka and the others. We’ve already lost too many good people today.
Hatred, hotter even than the inferno behind her, surged through her veins.
“Hang on!” Geir shouted. His face was blackened with soot, and his beard was singed. “I think I see something... oh, shit!”
She didn’t like the sound of that.
The plow, still loaded with Terminators, barged out of the smoke. Dancing flames licked its blackened exterior, and its mounted machinegun turret had been mangled beyond recognition, but the tank was coming on strong. Fiendish red eyes glowed in the skull-like visages of the four T-600s who clung to the sides of the speeding vehicle. Their phony flesh and clothing had completely burned away, exposing their scorched endoskeletons in all their naked horror. They looked like metallic grim reapers riding a snow plow from hell.
“Fuck,” Molly muttered, angry but not too surprised by the enemy’s persistence. Skynet built its cybernetic storm troopers to last. Terminators weren’t alive—not really—but they were damn hard to kill.
What would John Connor do at a time like this?
“Now what?” Geir shouted into her aching ear.
She scanned the rugged geography ahead of them. Whitman Pass was almost upon them. The rocky ravine was the only way through the mountains for miles. The corners of her lips tilted upwards. There was a trick she had always been meaning to try....
“Hike!” she urged the dogs. “Straight ahead!” She raised her voice to make sure Geir could hear her. “You ever see Seven Brides for Seven Brothers?”
“Not much into musicals,” he admitted. She could hear the confusion in his voice, and readily imagine his perplexed expression. “Why?”
There was no time to explain.
“Wait for it!”
Whitman Pass climbed at a steady gradient from the plain below. Centuries of erosion and geological activity had carved out a V-shaped canyon about a half-mile long and approximately the width of two old-fashioned covered wagons. Wide enough for the Terminator snow plow to get through, damn it all. A narrower pass would have made life much easier—and probably longer. Granite cliffs piled high with tons of packed snow and ice rose on either side of the pass, hemming it in. The pipeline itself was buried beneath the roadway at this point, the better to protect it from falling debris.
A pitted steel sign, left over from the bygone days of human supremacy, offered a dire warning to winter travelers:
DANGER! AVALANCHE ZONE!
Molly was relieved to see that the explosions behind them had not brought a cascade of piled snow and ice down into the pass, blocking their way. That would have put a serious crimp in her plans. She swallowed hard, her mouth dry, while the sled raced uphill into the pass.
The dogs ran sure-footedly over the cracked and icy pavement, dragging their human cargo behind them. The huskies were panting hard; the extra weight was starting to slow them down. The overturned swing dog had managed to get back on his feet, although he limped noticeably compared to his partner. Their headlong passage triggered minor snowfalls from the cliffs above them. Slurries of crumbling snow and ice tumbled down the craggy slopes.
Her upturned eyes darted from left to right, keeping a close eye on a winter’s worth of accumulated whiteness. Fractured slabs of ice the size of roofs were barely held in place, edged with a frigid glaze of rime, blocking out any view of the sky. Pebble-sized chunks of ice rained down on her head. Hang on, she silently commanded the huge sheets of snow, ice, and rock that were suspended above them.
She wished she could slow down, but the Terminators took that option off the table. Speed was their only hope now, plus a whole lot of luck. Unable to tear her gaze away from the cliffs, she couldn’t glance back. Her heart pounded, much too loudly for her own peace of mind.
The ringing in her ears began to fade. She kept her voice low.
“Are they still after us?”
“They’re Terminators,” Geir answered tensely. “What d’you think?”
At least the killer robots weren’t firing at them anymore. Had their ammo gone up in the fire, or did they just know better than to raise a ruckus in an avalanche zone?
Probably waiting to plow us under, she mused darkly, dogs, sled, and all.
Well, we’ll see about that....
They reached the crest of the pass, where the road dipped back down toward the plains. Now it was downhill all the way, and the dogs picked up speed. Unfortunately, so did the Terminators. Molly could hear the tank’s heavy tread crunching over the frozen road behind them. As it drew closer, more ice and rock dislodged. Its chains scraped against the asphalt. The powerful diesel engine could outlast any dog, even a champion. Molly remembered Geir’s earlier challenge. This wasn’t the race she’d had in mind.
The pass opened up ahead. Molly spied a wedge of grey sky through the towering granite V. She held her breath and glanced up at the cliffs.
Only a few more yards....
Finally! The sled careened out of the pass. She prodded Geir with her elbow.
“Let go of me—and grab onto the handlebar!”
“Huh? What are you thinking?”
“Just do it, flyboy!”
His arm came away from her waist. He balanced precariously on the runners for an instant before snatching the handle. Molly threw herself forward, somersaulting over the bar onto the cargo bed at the front of the sled. A canvas bag, stuffed with supplies, cushioned her landing. The wheel dogs at the rear of the train looked back at her, their eyes wide with confusion. Frozen slobber caked their snouts. She could hear them wheezing; their overworked lungs on the verge of giving out.
Not much longer, guys, she promised.
“Hike!”
She yanked open the zipper on the sled bag. Cold hands, numb even beneath her gloves, rummaged frantically through first aid supplies, emergency rations, and extra clips of ammo.
“C’mon,” she growled impatiently. “Where the fuck are you?”
Yes!
Her questing fingers came into contact with something long and metallic. Squatting on her knees atop the cargo bed, she wrested her prize from the bag. It gleamed like blue steel in the fading light.