by Matthew Rief
Alejandra wasn’t sold as she piloted them up a narrow gap, losing control momentarily and striking an encroaching rock, nearly sending Jason into the drink.
“You want me to take over?” Jason said with a chuckle after stabilizing himself.
“More snark, and you’re going in, Wake. And don’t tell Finn about that one.”
After suffering a broken bone in his left leg during a rough encounter back in the Caribbean, Finn—their team’s resident expert on all things boating—had been forced to sit the operation out.
Though it wasn’t her specialty, Alejandra was far from an incompetent mariner and insisted on manning the helm. “Hold on!” she shouted as she throttled up, rocketing the craft through a stretch of white caps.
Pushing through the shallows, the RHIB jostled out of the stream and into a lake riddled with jagged pieces of floating ice. Once clear of the flowing water, Alejandra eased back on the throttle, the ride going from jarring to perfectly calm nearly in an instant. She navigated them around the massive icebergs floating lifelessly in the pool of glacial melt.
Up ahead, the lake narrowed, and the steep slopes on both sides closed in, meeting the base of the glacier. Beyond, the ice-covered valley narrowed even more before cutting a sharp left.
“Any sign of our contacts?” Alejandra said, peering through sunglasses as she scanned the shoreline up ahead.
“No sign of life, period.”
The place was a world frozen in time. Jason imagined that, aside from natural effects like volcanic eruptions, storms, shifting tectonic plates, varying temperatures, and water runoff, the place looked exactly how it had for tens of thousands of years, long before any adventurous Vikings or man of any kind set foot on the unique island.
As they neared the base of the glacier up ahead, Jason spotted movement on the ridge to their right. Shielding the sun, he homed in on an off-road SUV rumbling slowly down the steep grade. “That’s gotta be our welcome party.” He pointed toward an opening in the ice along the shore up ahead. “Let’s beach there.”
“Way ahead of you.” Alejandra had already adjusted their course, swerving around a serrated block of ice the size of a school bus before putting the bow on a direct course for the opening. The fiberglass hull slid up the rocky shore, and they both hopped out and dragged it up into a cove surrounded by mounds of ice.
A metallic gray Land Cruiser 150 Arctic Truck, modified with massive off-road tires, continued to the base of the valley and came to a stop less than fifty yards from them. Four men hopped out. Three wore matching black jackets and remained beside the vehicle while the fourth, a man sporting dark blue, moved toward Jason and Alejandra as they climbed up to greet him.
The man was a member of Xplore Iceland, a renowned tour guide company that offered trips into remote parts of the country few dared tread. The lead guide and part owner of the company, a man named Ragnar Gunnarsson, stepped forward and introduced himself with a firm handshake. Nearly as tall as Jason’s six three, Ragnar had long red hair in a ponytail and a thick beard covering a hard, weathered face.
“I believe it best that I go by myself,” Ragnar said flatly. “If a back entrance into the cave exists, I’ll find it and report back.” The Icelander didn’t wait for a response before adjusting his bag and turning to face the base of the glacier.
“We’re coming with,” Jason said. “As instructed by the United Nations Security Council.”
Ragnar paused, then sized Jason up. “The trek is tough.”
“So am I.”
The Icelander smiled. “Even experienced guides who know these harsh lands would be hesitant to venture where we’re going.”
Jason held the man’s gaze, not backing down.
Experiencing what happens when a force meets an immovable object, Ragnar just shrugged. “We shall see.” He turned to Alejandra. “Just the two of us. These men are soldiers with the National Security Unit. They will stay here, standing watch, and they will keep you safe until we return.”
Alejandra and Jason exchanged knowing glances. She brushed off the slight with a grin as she thought about which moves she’d like to use on Ragnar to show him who among them needed keeping safe.
“It’s going to be below freezing down in the cave,” Ragnar added, eyeing Jason’s attire.
“I’ll be fine.”
Jason was wearing specialty tactical clothing designed to keep him warm in extreme cold but also allowed for maximum mobility. Having inherited billions from his corrupt businessman of a father, Jason had vowed to use the money to right his father’s wrongs. The money, combined with the connections of members of his team, allowed them to create and utilize the most advanced gadgetry in the world.
“Sorry to get your hopes up,” Jason said to Alejandra as the two moved back toward the RHIB. “I know you were just dying to spelunk into a giant ice cube today.”
She chuckled. “I’ll just have to scratch that off my bucket list another time.” She handed Jason a radio. “Call me if you hit trouble so I can rescue you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Jason said with a laugh of his own.
Grabbing his bag, Jason met Ragnar at the base of the glacier.
“Here,” the Icelander said, handing Jason a pair of ice axes. “These tools are your new best friends.”
The two quickly donned crampons and climbed up onto the ice, the spikes biting down and giving them traction with every step. They trekked two miles up the valley, making good time as they traversed each hill and crevice.
Jason could see that the guy was testing him. From the background Jason read for the brief on the flight over, he’d learned that the Icelander had spent twenty-five years leading tours into the hardest-to-reach places in the unique country. He was rugged, strong, and mentally prepared for anything, but Jason was a force of nature himself.
An Ivy League graduate and heir to a billion-dollar fortune, the former collegiate swimmer’s life had changed in an instant nearly two years earlier when his fiancée was killed in a train bombing in Paris. When the emotional dust from the tragic loss settled, Jason vowed revenge upon the terrorist organization responsible. A year-long stint at America’s most secretive and effective covert training facility, a place known as Tenth Circle, or Dante’s Tenth Circle of Hell, transformed Jason into one of the deadliest men on Earth, and he kept his body in as close to perfect condition as he could.
Staying on Ragnar’s heels, the two pressed on and soon rounded the sharp bend, displaying a massive black cliff covered in patches of snow and ice at the end of the valley. A stream of cloudy water cascaded down from the glacier above, rumbling into the base of the valley and echoing for miles.
“That’s Morsárfoss,” Ragnar said. “The tallest waterfall in Iceland.”
Jason stared in awe at the mesmerizing sight but kept his mind and attention in check. He wasn’t there to savor the views. He was there because a team of scientists had been murdered. And when the office of the President of the United States calls, you don’t say no, and you don’t give anything less than your best.
“That’s where we’re heading,” Ragnar said casually, pointing a finger toward a cut near the top of the imposing wall of rock.
Jason could tell that the experienced Icelander was looking for him to freeze or back down as they approached the base of the precipice. Jason did neither, smoothly removing his two climbing axes and stabbing his way up and along the rock and ice beside Ragnar. One slip, one wrong move, and they’d plummet hundreds of feet into the rocks below.
They continued along the steep slope of Vatnajökull, then up the opposite side, mist from the falls blowing across them before they ventured into a narrow-slot canyon. Soon the sheer basalt at their flanks connected to form a cave, the roof closing in with ice as they pushed deeper into the bowels of the glacier.
Jason’s radio crackled to life, and Alejandra’s voice came t
hrough. “You still alive, Jase?”
“For now. We’re heading into the cave.”
“Copy that. Try not to think about that time on Cayman Brac.”
Jason chuckled as he clipped the radio back to his hip.
“That time on Cayman Brac?” Ragnar said.
“Just a little hiccup we had with a cave’s integrity.”
“Well, let’s hope there are no hiccups here. Watch your step. The ice has a mind of its own. It can be temperamental and shift without warning. And the caves this deep into the middle of nowhere aren’t used to being disturbed.”
They clicked on their headlamps. A quarter mile into the compact cave, thundering sloshing of water echoed down the tunnel. They arrived at a waterfall splashing down a column of ice and into a deep, crystalline pool before vanishing under their feet.
“That is why we watch our step,” Ragnar said. “There are underground water tubes everywhere.”
Jason looked around when they stopped at the base of the sub-glacial waterfall. “A dead end?”
Without skipping a beat, Ragnar grabbed the ice-climbing tools dangling from his waistband, then aimed one of the shiny steel points at the top of the falls. “Race you to the top.” The athletic Icelander wasted no time digging into the wall with a powerful strike and pulling himself up with reckless abandon. With no rope dropping down from the top to back them up, one slip and everything would be over.
Jason gripped an axe in each hand and approached the precipice, just under and to the right from where Ragnar had started. Zigzagging their way up the cliffs near the falls had been one thing, but scaling a towering block of frozen water that extended outward at times was another thing altogether.
Jason smiled at the challenge that would make most quiver. Gripping the axes tight, he slammed the right tip into the ice and followed Ragnar’s lead. With water pouring down beside them, the two climbed up into the darkness, slamming the picks and jamming their feet into the sleek vertical surface.
Halfway up the seventy-foot wall, Ragnar shifted his trajectory to avoid a cracked portion of the crag. The act brought him closer to the flowing water and the slick ice beneath it.
With the glacial melt spraying into him, Jason took a break to catch his breath on a narrow ledge, then strengthened his resolve. He eyed a spot three feet overhead and drilled the tip of the tool into the smooth, brittle exterior. The sharpened steel drove deep, and Jason pulled and dug his right crampon into a higher position. The moment Jason pried the left axe free and reared it back for a strike, the ice above him shuddered, fractured, then gave way, sending him into a freefall.
THREE
Alejandra watched from beside the boat as Jason and Ragnar vanished from view, trekking up along the bend in the valley. She took in a deep breath and briefly admired the scenery. Though she’d been cold ever since they jumped out of the private jet nearly an hour earlier, she couldn’t help but be enchanted by the magical aura of the place.
Grabbing her bag from the bow, she once more pulled out the briefs they received from various government organizations. There wasn’t much to them. Little was known about what was going on in that ice-riddled corner of the world. Intelligence agencies had tried for the past twelve hours to pinpoint the culprits responsible for the decisive, well-organized attack, and to figure out a motive. For them, and for Alejandra, the answer lay in a secured underground facility in Reykjavík.
A virus that deadly would be invaluable to a vile leader looking to wreak havoc on their enemies, she thought as she examined the images of the victims’ bodies.
She glanced up from the reports at the three Icelandic soldiers standing beside their SUV. When thirty minutes passed since her last visual of Jason, she slid out her radio and hailed him for an update. Jason informed her that he and Ragnar were just entering the cave. When another fifteen minutes passed, Alejandra called on him once more. This time, she got nothing but static through the speaker.
“Signal’s spotty this far out,” one of the Icelanders said. He pointed toward the top of the ridge. “Higher the better, though.”
Alejandra tightened the straps of her pack. “You boys be all right here on your own?”
She immediately regretted the friendly jab as she began to summit the grade that was even steeper than it looked. The piles of loose stones made even minor progress difficult, but she soon found her rhythm by switchbacking along the gradient.
With a layer of sweat on her brow, she reached the top and gazed at the endless stretches of open, mountainous terrain spanning in all directions. To the south, she could see the black-sand beaches and the calm Atlantic. To the north was nothing but jagged peaks and long carpets of white.
She grabbed her radio and tried hailing Jason. The signal was stronger, but she received no reply on the first attempt. While trying again, she froze and spun around as she heard the distant sounds of engines. Along the ridge was a row of three off-road SUVs groaning up the valley. After slipping out her binoculars, she zoomed in on the convoy.
I thought no one drives this deep into the Skaftafell region.
While keeping a sharp eye on the newly arrived vehicles, she grabbed her sat phone and called the leader of their covert organization.
“What’s Jason’s status?” Scott Cooper said in his familiar, low, authoritative voice.
“He’s in the cave. Can’t get ahold of him. How’s the main entrance?”
“Still blocked off from the cave-in, but we’ve got a large team working on clearing the way.”
While listening, Alejandra stepped to the edge of the ridge and stared intently at the three vehicles. They cruised single file toward the Icelanders near the base of the glacier.
“Scott, do you know if the Icelandic government sent more soldiers to guard the south approach?”
“Other than the three with the guide? No, not that I’m aware of.”
Alejandra fell silent as the vehicles stopped. Four men dressed in black pushed out of the lead, followed by eight more in the other two. Zooming in with her binos, Alejandra could tell from their body language that the Icelanders hadn’t been expecting company. One of the local soldiers stabbed a finger toward the visitors, while another appeared to be reaching for something on his hip.
“Why do you ask, Alejandra?”
She leaned farther forward, craning her neck for a better view. Her mouth fell open as one of the newly arrived men raised a pistol and opened fire. Gunshots echoed up the gorge. Losing her balance, Alejandra slipped on the edge of rock and tumbled over the side. Her shoulder slammed against the gravel, and she rolled into an uncontrollable spin down the mountainside. Battering against the loose stones, she caused a small rockslide before eventually forcing herself to a stop near the bottom.
She winced from the pain and caught her breath. Her knees were bruised, her hands were scratched up, and her mind was in disarray from the chaotic fall. But she was still in one piece and had somehow managed to take the shortcut down without breaking a bone.
Peeking up from behind a crag, she focused in on the commotion for the first time since hearing the initial gunshot. A chaotic shootout had taken place while she’d fallen, and by the time she took in the scene, two of the Icelanders lay motionless on the ground near their vehicle.
It appeared they hadn’t noticed her fall, the natural contours of the slope shielding her from view as she’d whirled down the indent in the mountainside. She observed the attackers carefully, but from her vantage point, and with all of them wearing hats and sunglasses, she couldn’t get a good look at their faces. One of the attackers walked up to and greeted the only remaining Icelandic soldier. The local appeared to be working with whoever the men were.
Withdrawing her pistol from her backpack, Alejandra crept along a row of boulders and ice for a better view. As she neared the boat, which was still resting on the shore, she was able to listen in on t
heir conversation.
“They are already in the cave,” the Icelander informed the strangers. “I put the tracker in Ragnar’s bag.”
A tall, lean man removed his face covering. He looked middle-aged, had East Asian features, and a hard, scar-ridden face. The man held a phone up to his ear and spoke in Korean. Alejandra recognized the language, but she couldn’t make out any of the words.
When the man re-pocketed his phone, he said, “The others are moving in from above with the snowmobiles. Get up in that cave, and block their escape.”
Four of the men did as instructed, donning crampons, strapping ice-climbing tools to their waists, and tightening their backpacks before trekking up the valley and onto the bottom of the glacier.
As the group left, the Korean man turned to the local soldier. “I thought you said there were three for us to deal with here by the vehicle?”
“There was another,” the Icelander said. “Some woman. I don’t know who she is, but she was up on the ridge when you drove up. Probably got spooked and ran away.”
The leader of the group looked to his men. “Search for her. We’re leaving no stones unturned. Not this time.”
Two men took off for the slope, climbing uneasily toward the ridge Alejandra had summited minutes earlier. Three others spread out and moved along the shore, heading straight toward her. There was no time to ponder who these guys were. They’d just killed two men in cold blood, and now they were looking to take her down, as well.
As the leader redonned his headgear, two men holding collapsible rifles rushed in Alejandra’s direction, both scanning for any sign of movement.
“She’s here somewhere,” the leader reiterated. He turned to look at the men reaching the ridge and raised his voice. “You see anything?”
The two replied that they didn’t see her, but Alejandra knew it was only a matter of time before they spotted her. Observing the closest gunman carefully, she timed his movements and crawled behind a jutting section of ice just as he turned away. Less than ten yards from the boat, she came to a halt with her back against the frost. Footsteps reverberated from overhead, and she caught a glimpse of the man’s shadow projecting over the beach.