by JC Ryan
Rebecca stirred, too, and then sat up with a gasp. “JR, tell me it isn’t…” She spotted Carmen at that moment and bit back what she intended to say, clapping her hand over her mouth. Robert had run to Carmen’s lifeless body and noted the rope tying her to the tree. He turned on JR.
“If you did this…” he growled, tears beginning to form in his eyes. He was interrupted by Angela and Cyndi’s arrival, accompanied by their own cries of distress. JR spread his hands, but Rebecca interjected her defense.
“He didn’t kill her, the OS did.” She pointed back along the trail where Pyotr’s lifeless body lay. “JR saved me by shooting that guy.” She looked over at JR with gratitude and a question in her eyes.
“I guess it all got to us,” he said, frowning slightly as he tried to think how long they’d been out. Rebecca watched his face as he visibly gained control of his emotions.
“We should get to Summers. He’s only slightly injured, unless they did something else to him while we were getting back here. I think the OS are all dead. Just before she died, Carmen said the entrance they found leads to the same cave. And I think she said it’s open now.”
“We should go for it,” Robert said. “I don’t know how long we’ve been in here, but it’s got to be getting close to our deadline.”
“What if our Sno-Cat’s gone? Or Bart and Roosky are dead?” Angela asked. “How would we get back to the base?”
JR saw no point in repeating his suspicions. “Those guys got here somehow. Let’s just get out and see what’s what. Worst case scenario, we come back in here and make the best of it for six months.”
JR’s suggestion startled the others, but Becca immediately saw that it was the practical way to think. They would have clean water to drink and wash in, plenty of fruit to live on. Better to be trapped in paradise than risk a winter crossing near the Pole without equipment. But, maybe the Sno-Cat was there. They wouldn’t know until they went to see.
JR and Robert sent the three women to see to Summers, while they took care of the bodies as best they could. With nothing to dig with, they couldn’t bury them. After giving Robert a moment to collect himself after he lost his cookies, they settled for dragging them into the jungle and stacking them all together near the new exit from the canyon. They’d deal with them when they came back, if the jungle hadn’t already done so. After all, it was quite warm in here.
After their grisly task, they rejoined the girls. Rebecca had treated Summers’ cuts and released him from the zip tie with a snip of the surgical scissors in her kit. They were all eating fruit with the last of their trail food when the men got there. It was only then that Rebecca noticed JR’s injuries under his camouflage and insisted on cleaning him up.
A lively discussion of their next move ensued, with Summers reluctant to enter the cave again, especially not knowing whether Carmen had lied about it being open, or this one being connected to the cave where they came in. Rebecca argued that they should all stay together, and the other girls were undecided, though Cyndi said she’d go along with whatever Robert wanted, while Angela was vociferously loyal to Summers as the leader, taking sides with the underdog because that was her nature.
Robert and JR made it a majority by saying they had to try for an exit. Faced with the other four squarely against them, Summers and Angela reluctantly rose to follow them into the cave, Angela’s arm firmly around Summers’ waist for moral support. At first, the cave they were walking through was tall and wide, easily traversed upright, even for JR. After walking about a quarter of a mile, though, they reached what at first looked like a dead end. Angela kept a tight hold on Summers, afraid he would bolt for the inner canyon, while the others aimed their headlamps around the walls at the end of the passage. They were about to give up and retrace their steps when Robert called out.
“Here.” His headlamp disappeared as he ducked and crawled through a smaller hole. Cyndi followed. JR hung back, waving Charles, Angela and then Rebecca through. Then he went in on hands and knees, glad not to have to crawl on his belly. He could hear Summers singing as badly as ever up ahead. The height of the passage, at least here where it started, was barely enough to accommodate JR in this position. He hoped he wouldn’t have to back out.
His headlamp was dimming, JR thought, as he crawled behind Rebecca. For the past ten minutes or so, he’d watched her shapely backside lead him further into the passage, which seemed almost like a man-made tunnel, it was so uniform. He was so tired that he thought he could close his eyes and just crawl in his sleep until they were out, if that were ever going to happen. The thought of being entombed here after all they’d been through snapped his eyes wide open again. Rebecca was gone.
JR’s heart slammed against his chest as he fought panic. It wouldn’t do to break down now, and there had to be a logical reason for her disappearance. No one had cried out, they hadn’t fallen into a hole. He kept crawling. Suddenly his head and shoulders were out into a larger opening. He followed with the rest of his body and found the others all standing and waiting for him. Cyndi was babbling, tears streaming down her face. It took a minute for JR to understand what was happening. Then he saw it.
They were in the room where he and Cyndi had found the script; the strange material of the cave that didn’t match the rest.
“I know where we are,” he announced. The others turned from Cyndi, who was still not making much sense. “Cyn and I found this room when we were all looking for a way out,” he said. “But we didn’t see this little tunnel. Robert, this room’s different from the rest. What is this stuff?”
“Its igneous rock, something the volcano threw out, I reckon.”
“What volcano?” the others chorused in unison. Robert looked around in surprise. “Why? Didn’t I say? I think that valley we were in was formed in the mouth of a volcano.”
“An extinct one?” Angela asked.
“Oh, no. The reason it’s so hot in there is that heat is rising from the active volcano underneath. It’s a curious thing. I’m not sure how the surface cooled enough to support all that vegetation, in fact. All I know is there’s a geothermal source under it, and from the look of this room, it’s definitely volcanic. This is the inside of a giant lava bubble that cooled inside the sedimentary stuff around it.”
Summers, having momentarily forgotten his fear upon seeing the script again, walked closer to it to get a better look.
“Is it 10th Cycle?” JR asked quietly.
Summers shook his head. “Not exactly, but close. I think it may be directions into that valley, but it looks slightly different. Maybe it’s 9th Cycle. I need Sinclair, JR. He might be able to read it.”
JR took a moment to consider the practicality of cutting some of it from the stone and taking it with them, but decided his grandpa would be very upset with him if he defaced an archaeological artifact like that.
“Anyone got a cell phone with battery left?” he asked. “Let’s get more pictures.”
Cyndi stepped forward and handed him hers. “What is this? I need to get one like it,” he quipped, as he took several pictures of the script. JR handed the phone back, noting that it was showing the day and time as August 25th, at eight p.m. The electronics still weren’t working properly, but most hadn’t noticed because their batteries were all dead.
“Come on, let’s get out of here,” he said, taking the lead now that he knew which way to go. How many hours had it been since he and Cyndi had found this room and retraced their steps? He looked for the grease pencil marks on the opening to the room and followed the narrower passage to the next opening confidently.
When they reached the main room, mouths dropped in confusion when they saw the opening. It was twice as large as it had been before, and they were rapidly cooling. They scrambled to get their snow gear back on, before venturing closer to the opening. The wind was howling, and the cold was pervasive, even in their gear. After Robert and JR attempted to step outside to get their bearings and were blown back into the cave, they all sa
t glumly as they tried to decide what to do.
“It’s plain we can’t stay in this room for long,” Becca said, taking the lead on the discussion. “That cold will kill us, even in our suits. We’ve got to either find the Sno-Cat quickly, or retreat to a warmer spot and wait out the wind.”
“Doesn’t it blow more or less continuously for six months?” Angela asked.
“Yes,” Summers answered. “But there are sometimes a few hours’ respite. Up to seventy-two. The trouble is, we don’t have any way of predicting them without the instruments on the Sno-Cat. I think we should go back to the valley.”
“Wait a minute,” objected JR. “We don’t know how long we’ve been gone from the base. People are probably getting worried if they aren’t already. I think we should try for the base.”
Summers looked at him as if he were mad. “You’re suggesting we trek over two hundred miles in a wind that could easily sweep us away like it did Walker,” he argued. “And in temperatures that would freeze you instantly without your suit. I’m sorry, but I don’t think we can take the risk.”
JR thought about Daniel, and how they’d argued the last time they saw each other. He thought about his mother, so worried about her baby boy in his post-war mental struggles, and even his grandparents, who weren’t getting any younger. He weighed the risk of death in trying to get back to the South Pole to at least let them know he was alive, against letting them think for six months that he was dead. Conceding that Summers was probably right, he nevertheless decided to return to this opening every few hours to see if the wind had died down enough for him to find the Sno-Cat, assuming it was still there.
Reflexively, he looked at his watch as he turned away from the opening. It said February 26th, eight a.m. could that be the true date and time? Was it possible they could still make the pole before the last plane left for the winter?
JR grabbed for Becca’s hand as she stepped away. She turned back to him, surprised. Mutely, he pointed at his watch and then hers. She looked at his and noted the time, her eyes widening. Then she looked at hers and suppressed a cry. February 26th, eight-oh-one. They matched! It had felt like weeks in the valley, though she now couldn’t recall sleeping except for a few minutes after Carmen’s death. Was it possible they’d been inside the cave for only a day or so? It felt like weeks, everyone was so weary. She nodded at JR, and they hurried to catch up with the others.
~~~
Summers was torn. He didn’t like this cave, but at least it was a large space and he could hold his claustrophobia at bay. Here, he could re-exert his leadership of the expedition. When JR and Rebecca caught up with the rest of the group, he cleared his throat and asked for everyone’s attention.
“We have a decision to make, and it can’t wait any longer. We’ve seen from the conditions outside that trying to make it back to the base is foolhardy, even if we could find the Sno-Cat. Once again, the whiteout makes even that task virtually impossible. I say we retreat back to the valley, where it’s warm and we have food and water. Yes, we’ll be cut off for six months, but at least we’ll be alive. Robert, I’d like you to lead the way.”
“Just hold your horses, mate, let’s hear what JR has to say,” said Robert. Summers opened his mouth in outrage, but Rebecca added her opinion.
“Charles, you didn’t see what JR did for us in there. We all owe our lives to him. I think we should hear him out, and then vote.”
JR looked at Rebecca in wonder. Had she just expressed admiration for him? He’d been acting purely on instinct and training, but his self-esteem ratcheted up a notch as he caught Rebecca’s eye. She nodded encouragingly. He took a deep breath, emboldened by the thought that she was looking up to him, taking notice of him, and in a good way. He quelled the butterflies that had suddenly swarmed in his stomach and spoke.
“Okay, here’s the sit-rep. Right now it’s true there’s a whiteout. Becca and I noticed at the mouth of the cave that our watches might be working right again, because they were synchronized. You’ll remember that we all had different times inside the valley, and that even though we tried to synchronize them, they just went wonky again. So, it may or may not be accurate, but we think its February twenty-sixth.
“That means that we’ve got a short window of opportunity to get back to the base if we can find the Sno-Cat, or some other transport out there. Without transportation, it’s a death march, I agree. But, there’s a good chance that some form of transportation is out there. Those OS guys got here somehow. We need to wait for the winds to die down. It’s cold here, but the trip back to the valley and here again takes too long. We have to be ready if the wind dies down so we can see the Cat. We need to stay together.
I’ll stay out by the mouth of the cave as much as I can, and if there’s a break, we can make a run for it. If not, then I agree with Charles that we should winter over inside the valley where we can survive. We can use the time to thoroughly explore and map the interior, yes, Angela?”
Angela nodded, though she stood close to Summers.
“And what if the winds kick up while we’re out on the ice?” Summers objected.
“Charles, do you have family at home? Is someone wondering whether you’re alive or dead? Don’t you think it’s worth the risk to try to make it back to the Pole? Even if we can’t get home, they can at least send word that we’re safe.”
“It’s a four-day trek in the Sno-Cat. So risky!”
“I know it could be dicey, but we’ve made that trip several times, and we’ve done it in two days in a pinch. We know where the crevasses are, and I think we can push to make it in two days. If the wind comes up, we stop. It might be uncomfortable until the next break, but we can stay safely inside the Cat.”
With everyone looking at him hopefully, Charles conceded that it was indeed unusual for the winds to start so early in March, even though most research stations made that the deadline for leaving if you weren’t wintering over.
“All right, but we don’t wait longer than twelve hours. It’s too cold here. We need to save our strength for the trek back.”
JR agreed, and suggested Robert take the women and go back to the valley to stock up on fruit and water while he went back out to the mouth of the cave for another look at the weather. It was too bad that the opening let in so much of the outside cold. The walk back and forth from the back of the main room, around a winding passage through several very large stalagmites, took at least fifteen minutes. If it weren’t well below zero at the mouth of the cave, he’d just stay there for the twelve hours, get some sleep. But, even at about thirteen degrees Fahrenheit, the main room was noticeably warmer.
His musings took him around the last barrier and to the opening, now significantly larger than when they’d entered so many hours before. Howling wind still drove snow past the opening in stinging gusts. Checking his watch, JR saw it now said February 26th, 9:20. Not quite an hour and a half to return to the main room, discuss the options and get back to the mouth of the cave. Okay, he could check at least six more times before his deadline passed. But, he’d have to stay awake. It was going to be a long twelve hours.
JR was making his way back to the rest of the group when he met Rebecca coming toward him.
“Hi,” she said, smiling.
“Hi? What are you doing, Becca? Thought you were going to help gather fruit and maybe then get some sleep?” he asked.
“I thought I’d meet you, away from the others I mean. I haven’t thanked you yet for saving my life.”
“Oh.” The quirky humor that JR had been known for as a kid had been in full retreat since his first deployment, but to his surprise it surfaced now. “No problem. I was going to kill those guys anyway.” He chuckled at Rebecca’s bewildered face. “Hey, don’t pay any attention to me. Stress relief humor, you know?”
Becca looked relieved, then chuckled herself. “Yeah, I know. It’s been intense. JR?”
He looked down at her walking beside him. “Yeah?”
“I’ve mis
judged, I mean, damn it!”
He stopped, turning to her with puzzlement. She seemed to be struggling with what she wanted to say, so he stayed quiet to give her a chance to collect her thoughts.
“Josh, can we be better friends? I, I think you’re amazing,” she said. “It’s like you’re a different person here. One I admire.” To his utter confusion, Rebecca threw her arms around him and pulled his head down to hers. With the face masks, a kiss would be odd to say the least, but she had to give him a heartfelt hug. After a moment, he returned it, wrapping his long arms around her as well and wondering if he could get a rain check on the kiss. A few minutes later, with both of their hearts beating a bit more rapidly, they resumed their walk back to where the others had made themselves as comfortable as possible.
They found Summers sleeping soundly with his head in Angela’s lap, Cyndi curled up with her head on Robert’s shoulder, and a spot that Rebecca had cleared of rubble for her resting place. She invited JR to join her and snuggled into his arms with a sigh of contentment.
Holding Rebecca felt like nothing else JR had ever experienced. She wasn’t like the many other girls who’d lain next to him. He didn’t know quite how to take it…a girl who wanted his protection rather than sex. He hoped sex wasn’t out of the question, later of course. JR drifted off to sleep with visions of a radiant Becca coming to him in a vine-covered bower, the strange ambient light in the valley limning her soft skin, which was conveniently unfettered with clothing.
JR woke with a start. He took a chance on waking Becca by turning on his headlamp, which was now alarmingly dim. His watch said February 26th, 12 p.m. Damn! He’d missed a weather check. Gently extracting himself from the arm Becca had thrown over his chest and lowering her head to his backpack that he pulled over for a pillow, he unfolded his lanky frame and strode away toward the entrance as fast as he dared. By the time he reached the mouth of the cave, he could see that the wind had died down almost completely. He ventured a step or two outside and looked up, then almost staggered as his perspective flipped. Suddenly, instead of looking up at a million stars, he had the peculiar sensation that he was falling into them. His watch must be twelve hours off, he thought, because it was full dark, and only the stars lit the night. He’d completely forgotten that this would be the normal state of things for most of the day and night, for quite some time.