"All right, just hold on, then," Vaughn said.
Tai wasn't about to go anywhere. She could hear Vaughn working with his entrenching tool below her. The minutes passed, and she felt her feet shift on the ice, her heart going to her throat. How far would she fall if she slipped? she wondered. Would the fall kill her or would she lie down there broken but alive, the cold taking the final toll on the way to an icy grave, preserved forever here?
"Hang tough." She heard Vaughn's labored breathing, and out of the corner of her eye she could finally see him moving. He would reach up and dig out a hold in the ice with the shovel and haul himself up. It was a slow process, and she wasn't sure how long she could hold here, her numb hands wrapped around the rifle, all feeling in her feet already gone. She assumed her feet were still at the end of her legs. She knew they weren't moving only because she could feel her knees shivering inside her heavy pants.
Vaughn reached Tai's level, and she carefully turned her head to look at him. He gave her a forced smile. "Some ride, eh?"
He was now wedged like she was-his back and feet against the ice. She watched as he squirmed his way up until he could get over the lip. He disappeared over the forward side, then his head reappeared. "I'm anchored up here with Burke. Ready?"
Tai shook her head. "I can't feel my feet."
Vaughn puffed out a deep breath. "All right. We'll pull you up. When I yell, you pull your feet out. Okay?"
"Can you do it?"
"We'll do it." He was gone.
Tai anxiously waited.
"Ready?"
Tai briefly closed her eyes. "Yes."
"Let go."
Tai tucked her knees in and fell for an interminable split second, and then the rope tightened down on her waist, causing her to exhale sharply and stopping her. She scrabbled at the ice with her dead hands and feet, trying to help Vaughn and Burke as much as she could. Inch by inch she went up until she could slap an arm down on the surface. The pressure on the rope was maintained, and she continued up until she could get her waist over and roll onto the surface.
She lay there, savoring the sight of the open sky. Vaughn crawled up next to her and collapsed, throwing an arm over her and pulling her in tight. "You all right?" he asked.
"Yes," she whispered.
Vaughn leaned over her. "Do you want to go on?"
She got to her feet with great effort. "Yes."
Geneva
"We have the other eleven names," the Senior Assessor informed the High Counsel.
The names were projected on one of the large screens and on the High Counsel's own office screen. All eleven were either very high in the United States government or very rich men.
"They went international," the High Counsel noted as he read one of the names.
"Pablo Escovan," the Senior Assessor noted. "The head of the Mexican drug cartel. The richest man in Mexico."
"This is a mess," the High Counsel said. "Only three of those names are ours. Have you projected courses of action?"
"Yes, sir. With a sixty-four percent recommendation: wipe out Majestic-12."
The High Counsel sighed. "CARVE?" he asked, using an acronym they had developed.
"Criticality," the Senior Assessor began, reciting from the first letter of the acronym. "These men are the members of the group that established the Citadel and kept it secret from us all these years. They have been pursuing their own course of action for over fifty years. If they are gone, Majestic-12 is gone.
"Accessibility. It will be difficult to attack the remaining eleven at the same time under normal circumstances. Some of them are the most heavily guarded people on the planet. However, these are not normal circumstances. Our sources report that at least four that we know of are either en route or already at Area 51. The other seven we don't know about, but we should assume they also will be there shortly. An emergency meeting.
"Recuperability. These are not men who share with underlings. And since they have managed to keep the existence of Majestic-12 from us for this long, we have to assume they have extensive cutouts in place. Thus, if we cut off the head, it is a very high probability there will be no one to take their places.
"Vulnerability. Area 51 is a hard site. Their meeting place is deep underground. However, it is a United States military base. We have access to resources. We can do it.
"Effect. Extensive. Economic turmoil. Political fallout in Washington. We have already alerted our public relations people to prepare for it. The presence of Escovan certainly helps. It will be costly but manageable."
The Senior Assessor fell silent.
"Action is authorized," the High Counsel finally said.
Ruppert Coast, Antarctica
"Come on!" Min exhorted his three exhausted partners. "There is the ship."
The four leaned into the rope, and the sled creaked along the ice, making its way toward the ship, now less than two miles away.
"How close-do you-have to-get?" Tai asked in between puffs of breath as they crossed a high point where two sheets of ice had buckled together.
"A quarter mile at maximum. I'd like to get closer than that," Vaughn replied. They were at least three-quarters of a mile behind the Koreans, and his best estimate was that it was going to be close, very close.
There was also the additional problem of whether the ship, which lay ahead, had weapons on board. If it did, Vaughn had to assume that once he fired on the party pulling the sled, the ship would return fire. He didn't fancy the idea of being caught out on this ice in a running gun battle. That had only one foreseeable conclusion, which wasn't favorable for them.
As they went along, he noticed black spots on the ice, about three hundred meters to the left. He dropped and pulled Tai and Burke down with him, out of sight. An ambush? He peered at the figures until he realized what he was looking at: seals, lying on the ice, near a water hole they'd broken in the ice. It was the first sign of animal life they'd seen.
"There they are!" Fatima exclaimed, pointing off the starboard bow.
The captain trained his telescope in that direction. "There are four men, and they are pulling a sled with something on it."
"I want you to get together a party of men to go out there and help them."
The captain wasn't thrilled with that idea. His men were civilians, and he didn't want to risk them on the ice. As he turned to his executive officer to reluctantly relay the order, his eyes widened.
Seven hundred meters off the port side the ice was erupting, three long black shafts pushing through. The shafts abruptly widened, and a massive black conning tower appeared, tossing the ice aside like child's blocks. It continued to emerge, and the ice behind the tower split to reveal a long black deck that sloped down 150 feet behind the tower. The exposed portion of the vessel was almost as long as the freighter.
"What is that?" Fatima demanded.
"A submarine," the captain replied.
"I know that, you fool," she snapped. "Whose submarine? American?"
"I don't know."
"What should we do?"
The captain turned to look at her. "There is nothing we can do. We wait to see what they"-he nodded at the black hull-"do."
Min and his men halted, staring past the ship at the submarine. He knew in his heart it was all over. Even if they made it to the ship, the Americans would never let them sail away. He wondered how the plan had failed.
"Sir?" Kim turned to look at him for instructions.
Min turned to look back at his executive officer. "We go to the ship. Quickly."
Four men strained for the ship in a direct line as quickly as they could go.
Vaughn had started sprinting as soon as the submarine began to surface, leaving Tai and Burke behind, yelling at them to stay put. He passed four seals around a small circle of open water, and the distance was now down to five hundred meters. Another two hundred and he could fire.