Freezing Point

by Karen Dionne

  He took a drink from a thermos of water he had found in the pumphouse and smacked his lips. The water tasted good; pure, and cold as the frozen lake from which it came. Sweat beaded his brow. He took another drink and wiped it away. He knew what he needed to do. The problem was that for perhaps the first time in his life, he wasn’t 100 percent certain he could carry it out. Could he really kill another human being? A drowning man, you could turn your back on; someone bleeding on the sidewalk, you could walk away. But initiate the act and commit cold-blooded murder? Not just once, but multiple times? Hard to say.

  An accident would be better. People fell into crevasses, they got lost in snowstorms, froze to death, crashed their snowmachines. The possibilities were endless, especially when you helped things along.

  He disconnected the laptop from the server and shut the lid. Sabotaging the satellite program wasn’t the easiest task he had set for himself. The programming course he’d taken while flying halfway around the globe had given him the basics, but a thorough understanding of such an intricate level of information took years. Whether he had successfully corrupted the program beyond saving remained to be seen, but disabling the satellite interface was only extra insurance. Redundant systems.

  As he slid the laptop into his backpack and stood up to leave, he heard a rustling sound, followed by a series of clicks. The wind, most likely. That, or his nerves and the darkness were getting to him again.

  He turned out the lights and opened the door. Stepped outside into the sunlight, and blinked as he ran into Ben.

  Chapter 54

  “What did you do?” Ben would have shaken Gillette by the shoulders if he could have reached them.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Gillette started to brush past.

  Ben grabbed his arm. “The hell you don’t! You’re not going anywhere until you tell us what you’ve done.”

  Gillette glared. “I haven’t ‘done’ anything,” he said, his voice as cold as the ground beneath their feet. “I’m going back to the op center. I strongly suggest you do the same.” He looked down. “And get your hand off me.”

  “Are you really that stupid? You turned the microwave beam on!”

  Gillette paled and looked toward the melt zone. Steam was rising from the surface, forming a giant white cloud. He turned around. “Turn it off.”

  “We can’t,” Ben said. “You corrupted the program. It’s not responding. Not only that, the lake is steaming because you set the beam to maximum power. We’ve got to get off now. I’ve already sent the others to the ship. Where are Zo and Ross?”

  Was it Ben’s imagination, or had Gillette’s eyes glittered?

  “We’ll do no such thing,” he said, his voice oddly calm. “Get on your machine and go back to the op center. Sit down at your desk, and stay there until this is fixed.”

  “You’re crazy,” Ben said. “Do what you want, but I’m leaving.” What he wouldn’t have given for another foot of height. It was hard to deliver an ultimatum when you were looking at your opponent’s chin.

  Gillette drew back his hand. Ben’s eyes narrowed. Was Gillette really going to hit him?

  When the blow came, Ben ducked. Gillette’s momentum carried him around. He spun in a circle, staggered, and fell.

  Ben bent over him. Gillette’s eyes were closed. Sweat beaded his brow.

  Ben was still trying to puzzle out what had happened when from behind him, came the sound of snowmobiles and Ross and Zo pulled up.

  Zo looked at Gillette sprawled on the ground. “What happened?”

  “I don’t know. One minute he was screaming, and the next he passed out.”

  “You don’t suppose . . .”

  Ben shook his head. “I don’t know. If he is suffering from insulin shock, it doesn’t matter,” he said. “We have to get off the iceberg now. Gillette corrupted the satellite program. He turned on the microwave beam to full power, and we can’t shut it down.”

  “That’s insane!” Zo said. “This whole area is riddled with cracks! The berg could split apart! We’ve got to get out of here!”

  “Exactly.”

  Ben and Ross lifted Gillette onto Ross’s machine. Ross climbed on behind and reached around him for the controls. Gillette’s eyes fluttered.

  “He’ll never make it,” Zo said.

  “We don’t know that,” Ross said. “Come on. We’ve got to get him to the ship.”

  Ben looked back at the pumphouse. The door was open. Whatever Gillette had done, there was evidence inside.

  “You go on ahead,” he said. “I’m right behind you. First, there’s something I have to do.”

  Chapter 55

  “We shouldn’t have left him!” Ross heard Zo’s voice in his helmet say as they raced along. “We should stay together!”

  “He’ll be all right.” Ross peered over Gillette’s shoulder to check his speed. Sixty miles an hour; a mile a minute; ten miles to the staircase. Hopefully, Gillette could hang on until then.

  A minute passed. Two. Ross struggled to hold Gillette upright and control the machine. He was a big man, almost as tall as Ross, and as dead weight, twice as heavy.

  They drove on. Then from behind came a craack that was so loud, Ross thought his heart had stopped.

  Zo screamed.

  The iceberg shuddered and rumbled as explosion followed explosion, coming faster and faster like the ending to a fireworks display. Ross cranked open the throttle. The machine leaped forward, slewed, found traction, and jumped forward again. Gillette flopped to one side. Ross leaned to compensate as the machine bucked and tipped. He glanced over his shoulder. Zo was hunkered low a dozen yards behind, focused and centered, driving fast and well.

  A crevasse opened on their left, and they veered right in tandem. Another yawned on the right, and they veered left. The cracks seemed to be spreading outward like a fan, beginning at the melt zone and running toward the staircase. If they could stay the course and avoid falling in, they just might make it . . .

  Suddenly his machine spun in a circle. He glanced down as he fought for control. Water was spraying out from both sides of the track like a fountain.

  There was only one source for water on the berg. Soldyne’s lake.

  Chapter 56

  Ben grabbed Gillette’s backpack from where it had fallen and looked inside. A laptop. He added a thermos from inside the pumphouse and stored the bag in the snowmobile’s rear compartment just as all the thunder in the world crashed down on him. He covered his ears and dropped, expecting a supersized lightning bolt to come blasting out of the sky. The ice beneath him trembled as one terrible crack followed another.

  He scrambled to his feet, and as he looked toward the melt zone, his jaw dropped. The ice between the pumphouse and the melt zone was completely gone—replaced by an ever-growing half-mile-wide crater. Chunks the size of the Empire State Building tumbled into the hole; crevasses shot out in every direction like fingers. On the far side of the chasm, the rectenna grid wavered, trembled, and collapsed into the void as if it had been stepped on by an invisible foot. The iceberg was imploding, a black hole sucking in everything in its path.

  A crevasse raced off toward the op center. Seconds later, the op center disappeared. Fire shot up from the crevasse as the fuel tank blew.

  He leaped onto his machine and gunned the engine. Glanced behind, and saw the pumphouse tip and roll into the hole. He aimed for the staircase, praying he could make it in time; praying the others were already there.

  Then from behind came a new sound, a soft, sibilant sshhhssstt that grew gradually louder.

  Water.

  A flood.

  He wrenched the machine cross-wise to the current and sped toward an ice hummock that formed an elevated rise.

  Below him, a river was spreading out as broad as the Mississippi. Ice chunks the size of houses twirled as the floodwaters rushed toward the sea. He pictured the water pouring over the cliff—a man-made waterfall smashing into the ocean, throwing up salt
spray and waves.

  Man-made, contaminated water. Rushing toward the sea. Toward the staircase. Toward Zo and Ross.

  Chapter 57

  Zo slowed to a crawl as the water grew higher, her machine slipping like a ball of mercury. Her feet were already underwater, her legs drenched. Ahead of her, Ross was similarly struggling. They were still moving, but barely.

  Suddenly his machine spun in a tight circle. Gillette flopped to the side. Zo gasped as Gillette’s head disappeared beneath the water. Ross grabbed him by the hair and pulled him upright again. She wondered if he was still alive.

  Then her snowmobile coughed, spit, coughed again. Please, God, she whispered. She’d used up a lifetime’s worth of supplications over the past twenty-four hours, but surely He wouldn’t mind one more.

  The machine slowed even further. Stopped. Stalled.

  She turned the key. Tried again.

  “Ross!” she called. “I’m stuck!”

  “So am I,” came the voice in her helmet. “The water’s too deep. My machine quit.”

  “Should we get off and walk?” They had to keep moving. Behind them, the iceberg was snapping and popping like an ice cube dropped in warm water. The stairs couldn’t be that far away.

  “No! Stay with the machine! The current’s too strong. It’ll sweep you away. As soon as the lake empties, the water will go down.”

  She hunkered down to wait, shivering as the water rushed past. She felt the ground shudder. Lifting her visor, she turned around.

  In the middle of the river, a split was forming like the part in a head of hair. The split raced toward them, swallowing up the river as it ran.

  She barely had time to loop her elbows around the handlebars and grip the seat with her knees before the ice opened beneath her, and she was gone.

  Chapter 58

  She didn’t scream. Her mouth was too full of water.

  There was a brief sensation of falling, and then the machine stopped. She coughed, gasped, fought for air as the water poured down on her like Niagara—freezing ice water pounding her head and back, pulling at her, trying to tear her off and wash her away. The noise roared in her ears. Chunks of ice smashed onto her helmet like rocks. An ice boulder rolled past. Another lodged over her head. The torrent eased, momentarily diverted. Then the boulder rolled off and the flood resumed.

  Stay with the machine.

  She tried to calculate the number of gallons. Whatever the amount, it was finite. The deluge couldn’t last forever. All she had to do was hold on.

  Something hit her helmet and dropped onto the seat between her knees. A rat. It darted up and sheltered in her crotch. Another dropped into the crevasse, and then another.

  They scrambled up her arms, her neck, down her back, digging in, desperately trying to hang on, just as she was.

  The flood continued, pounding, relentless. One by one the rats washed away. She looked down into the abyss and watched them land in the water with a splash.

  The water was rising.

  Despair washed over her. This was it. The end. The only option left was to wait for the water to swallow her—or let go.

  She loosened her grip. The roaring faded. She thought of her husband, and of her unborn child, and suddenly, miraculously, Elliot was beside her. He took her face in his hands. His hands were warm, and she smiled, grateful not to have to face death alone. He kissed her cheek, smiled back. Then as abruptly as he had come, he was gone.

  The water stopped. Suddenly and completely, it turned off like a faucet. She blinked, drew a breath. Lifted her head.

  Water dripped off the walls, her helmet, her clothes. Below her, a dozen rats were treading water. The water was receding.

  “Zo! Are you there?” came a voice in her ear. “Can you hear me?”

  “I’m okay!” she called. “The water’s stopped.”

  He laughed, a warm, human sound that pushed the wet and cold away.

  She looked around. Her machine was wedged front-to-back in a narrow crevasse. The walls glowed from the sunlight pouring in above her head. The lip of the crevasse was within reach.

  “I’m going to try to climb out.”

  “Be careful.”

  “It’s okay. It’s not far.”

  She drew one foot up onto the seat, keeping a grip on the handles. The machine didn’t shift. She brought up her other foot, tested her balance, and let go. The edge of the crevasse was only slightly higher than her waist. Washed smooth. Slippery.

  She ran the sequence through her head, visualizing the maneuver, then jumped and threw herself forward. Belly flopped onto the ice, scrambled away, and lay still.

  A shadow fell over her moments later. “Well, what do you know,” Ross said. “The Amazon Woman does it again.”

  She smiled past her chattering teeth as he pulled her to her feet.

  “You sure you’re all right?” he asked.

  “I’m fine. A little cold and wet, but nothing a hot bath and a cup of tea won’t fix. Where’s Gillette?”

  His eyes went dark, as he shook his head. Zo understood. It had taken all her strength to hang on. If Gillette had been on her machine . . .

  The ice sparkled benignly in the sun, the cracks and explosions replaced by a musical tinkling as the skiff of water refroze.

  “What now?” she asked, and shivered.

  He took her hand. “Now we walk.”

  Chapter 59

  Ben drove as fast as he dared, paralleling the path the torrent had taken. The explosions had stopped, but that didn’t mean a crevasse wasn’t about to open in front of him at any minute. He didn’t know how long he had been riding, how close he was to the stairs—if the stairs were still there.

  He veered to avoid a crack, jumped another, and tried not to think of the torrent waterfalling over the cliff, polishing and smoothing the ledges, engulfing the ship.

  In the distance, he saw two figures, and angled toward them. Zo and Ross.

  “What happened?” he asked as he pulled up alongside. “Where are your machines?”

  Zo pointed toward a narrow crevasse.

  “Jesus,” Ben breathed. “Just when you think things can’t get worse.”

  “You have no idea.” She looked at Ross.

  “Go ahead. Tell him. He’s in it as deep as we are, now.”

  “We’ve got a new problem,” she said. “Remember you told me your tanker wouldn’t make L.A. harbor for another week? Turns out that’s not true. It’s going to arrive tomorrow.”

  “How can you possibly know that?”

  “Before we left the ship this morning, Ross talked to his sister by satellite phone. POP’s been tracking your tanker.”

  “What? Why, so she can move her protest down to the docks?”

  “No,” Ross said, “so she can blow a hole in the side of your ship.”

  “What?”