“I have no idea.” Lacey whispered back, her voice shook, “I have absolutely no idea.”
22
“Just gonna leave your little boyfriend behind, were ya?” Henry teased Lacey as she cried. He was busy tying Trent, Lacey, Ben, and Megan together with a ragged piece of rope.
“He’s not my boyfriend, besides it’s clear he’s working for you anyways,” Lacey snarled at Henry.
“Working for me? Huh well that would have been a good idea, but no, I don’t know your boyfriend here.” Henry explained as he finished and stepped away from his masterpiece. “Now, I would like to thank Ben here for putting such a lovely tracking device on this here cell phone.” Henry showed Lacey how he’d been following their every move using the United Cellular Latitude app on Ben’s phone. When he’d had his fun he returned to Eddy who was carrying the group’s ice axes back to the opening in the crevasse so he and Henry could climb out.
“You weren’t working for him?” Lacey asked Trent over her shoulder.
“No, of course not, I don’t know these jerks!”
“Why did you lie to me then? First you said you owned the tour company and the plane was yours, then later you said you had to ask your boss about taking us to Iditarod.” Lacey waited patiently for a response.
“I…I said I owned the company ‘cause I was trying to impress you. The truth is I do have a boss, it’s a small company, so I run things at that location, but no, I don’t own the company. I…I just thought that you would think I was some back country hick or something, giving tours, I mean you’re in college and you have a future.” Trent dropped his head in embarrassment.
“Uh, I don’t mean to interrupt this little confessional, but Trent do you still have your gun?” Ben interrupted.
“I do, I can’t get to it though, it’s in the back of my pants, in the waist band.” Ben shifted his weight and leaned in toward Trent, their hands were all tied together, it was a stupid move really to tie them all together but Henry only had one piece of rope, and frankly didn’t appear to be that smart, Ben rationalized. Ben felt the handle of the gun by Trent’s back, he tried to grip it with his fingers, but had no luck, his gloves were too thick, there was no way he could get a good enough hold to pull the gun out safely.
“I can’t get it with my gloves on,” Ben announced.
“Get what?” Henry barked at the group. Ben’s back was to Henry he had no clue he’d returned to the cave. Henry marched over to the group and kicked Trent in the leg. “You hiding something?” He growled. Then in a fit of rage, he pushed Trent down so his face was almost touching the ice, revealing the hand gun in the back of Trent’s pants. He grabbed the gun quickly and pointed it at Trent. “Well looky here, didn’t think a kid like you’d be packin’ heat.”
Megan couldn’t contain herself, she was beyond terrified, and also just really sick of Henry. She was sick and tired of being bullied and well—just over it, suddenly she burst out laughing, “‘Packin’ heat’ REALLY Henry,” she laughed harder and looked at Ben. Then in a mocking gangster style voice said, “Hey bro, this gangstas gonna put a cap in us.” She laughed even harder, “I mean seriously OMG Ben we are going to be killed by complete morons!” Suddenly she was angry, she glared at Henry then said, “If you’re gonna do it, just do it, it’s cold down here and I’d rather die from a bullet than freeze to death!” Her voice echoed through the ice cave. Lacey and Ben both looked over their shoulders, amazed at the words coming out of her mouth.
Henry had had enough of this little girl’s tantrum, he raised the gun above his head, clearly not thinking about where he was and pulled the trigger. The explosion of noise made the group freeze, then suddenly it wasn’t the noise that was the problem, the ceiling of the cave began cracking and falling down in large chunks of ice, the huge icicles released and slammed into the floor exploding into millions of glass like shards that sprayed the entire room, the group lowered their heads in an effort to protect themselves, then suddenly the entire roof collapsed, crushing Henry and a bewildered Eddy, who had come running toward the cave as soon as the shot sounded.
Just as the last of the large ice chunks shattered to the ground the floor of the cave began cracking. The noise was terrifying, it sounded as though a huge earthquake and volcanic explosions were happening all at once, the ground shook, and a large crack started over by where Henry and Eddy’s lifeless bodies were laying covered in ice. The crack spread quickly, over to where the group was sitting on the floor. It then circled the group, Lacey screamed as she watched, almost in slow motion. Suddenly the ground opened up, and all four were falling, still sitting on a large chunk of ice. It felt like ages, as they free-fell through layers and layers of ice, which shattered under their weight. Finally there was one last explosion, Lacey looked up and saw the entire cave collapse, above them, then as the chunk of ice they were sitting on hit water, all four bounced off and slid into its freezing depths.
They were all fighting to get air, the cold water stung and stabbed at every inch of their exposed flesh. The current of the river was strong, as they fought each other and the motion of the water, the rope untied and their hands were free. One after the other, their heads popped up and they all gasped for air. Surrounding them were other large chunks of ice. The river was flowing under the glacier, the water was crystal clear, and freezing cold. Trent grabbed onto the side of a large chunk of ice and pulled himself on it. Then he reached out for Lacey, and hauled her up over the edge of his makeshift raft. Once he had her out of the water, he grabbed the hood of Megan’s coat and yanked her up over the side. Ben was floating further away, as he saw what Trent was doing he swam to the nearest piece of ice that was large enough to hold him and lifted himself onto it.
“What the heck is this?” Ben called out to the others.
“It’s called a ‘mulan’ it’s a river that flows under a glacier!” Trent answered.
“Okay, where does it go?” Lacey shivered as she asked.
“Sometimes they go underground, but they always lead to another body of water.” Trent assured her. He put his arm around her and pulled her close, “It’s gonna be okay, at least we don’t have to worry about those guys anymore,” he said reassuringly.
Megan relaxed a little then said, “I’m so sorry you guys.”
“What? Why are you apologizing, you just saved us.” Lacey put her hand on Megan’s shoulder.
“If I wouldn’t have gone off on him though, he wouldn’t have shot and we’d just be figuring out how to climb out of the cave right now, not floating down a mulan or whatever this is.”
“True,” Trent said, “But he could have just shot us.”
“I guess,” Megan mumbled. “We don’t even have the key anymore though, this whole thing was pointless.”
“First of all,” Ben answered back as he used his hand as paddles and brought his ice raft closer to the side of the ice raft Megan was sitting on. “This wasn’t pointless, second of all, good call Megz on forcing us to buy this water-proof ‘under armor,’” he said as he pulled on the collar of his undershirt, “and third,” he put the fingertips of his glove in his mouth and pulled it off, as the glove came off a small bronze key dropped onto the ice he was floating on, “We still got the key.”
He smiled at his sister, who’s eyes were wide, “How did you? When did you?” She questioned eagerly.
“When were standing against the wall waiting for them to come into the cave, I knew they were gonna steal the black box, so I took the key out and relocked the box.” Ben smirked, “Just like you said Megz, they were morons.”
“Yeah,” Megan smiled, “I guess you can’t fix stupid.” She relaxed a bit and leaned up against Lacey’s leg.
As they continued to float down the river, the passageway the water had carved would grow small and then large again, the ice that towered above them was incredible, in some places they could touch the ceiling, in others all they could see was darkness above them, as the vast caverns seemed to go on forever
. The layers of the ice were incredible, they passed huge boulders that were encased and frozen enormous trees. They could only guess as to how old each was.
The water moved slowly enough that Ben could paddle around and pull himself to the icy walls of the glacier. He was bored with the slow movement of the water and so began pushing himself toward one side of the river, only to spin on his ice raft, and then push off against the opposite wall, causing him to zigzag across and down the water. He was floating in front of Lacey, Megan, and Trent, who were relaxing and resting their eyes, as if they were floating on some sort of inflatable float at a resort somewhere, completely safe.
As Ben bounced back and forth across the river, he saw a strange movement in the water along the right wall of the river ahead of him. He paddled closer to it, indulging his curiosity. As he approached he saw that the water was swirling, it was a slow movement, so he didn’t really think anything of it, he pulled his raft closer. With his final pull towards the swirling water the ice he was sitting on began spinning in the whirlpool. Ben realized something wasn’t right, so he straightened up and began trying to pull the raft out of the whirlpool, it spun faster and faster, he felt as if he were in a tornado, he was becoming dizzy and frightened, but fully expected the raft to get out of the current of the whirlpool and continue on downstream. When he realized that he was sinking into the whirlpool, he stood up and yelled to the others. All three quickly sat up. They saw Ben standing on his piece of ice, spinning in circles, extremely fast. Lacey panicked, “JUMP!” she yelled.
Ben jumped from his twirling, sinking piece of ice and grabbed onto Lacey’s outstretched arm. Relief washed over his face, but then as he looked at Trent, Megan, and Lacey’s faces he realized something was wrong. He clung to Lacey’s arm, but looked over his shoulder, the lower half of his body was being pulled under the water into the whirlpool. Trent and Megan began paddling, trying to pull him out of the whirlpool, but weren’t strong enough. Ben felt his waist then his stomach go under the water. Soon it was his chest, and shoulders, one second later his head was under the water, which swirled ferociously around him. He held tight to Lacey’s arm, thinking for sure she could pull him up and out of this nightmare. He held his breath and opened his eyes, just in time to see a blurry vision of Lacey floating in front of him, still clutched to his arm, Trent seemed to fly by them and quickly sank faster under the water in the spinning whirlpool, followed by Megan. Her strawberry blonde hair floated weightlessly around her face, her expression was one of an underwater scream, she clutched her chest with one hand and grasped the empty water with the other. Ben kicked and pulled Lacey trying to get down and closer to Megan as she sank deeper and deeper below them. With every pull toward Megan she seemed to be being pulled even faster away from him. The force of the water was too strong and he wasn’t fast enough. He tried harder, pulled Lacey faster, his fingers touched Megan’s as she struggled to grab his hand, right as their fingers touched an invisible force in the water yanked her away and she disappeared into the abyss below.
23
Megan’s eyes and body ached, she was frozen, she pulled off her gloves and looked at her hands, they were dry at least, but blue and grey in color. She knew this couldn’t be good, although she hurt she forced herself to stand up in the water. The tunnel she had gotten pulled down into spit her up into a small cave, the water was only a few feet deep and appeared to flow into another underwater tunnel about five feet from her.
The ceiling of the cave was rounded ice. She was in what she thought must be an air pocket that somehow hadn’t collapsed. She waded around in the frigid water, looking for any escape. She certainly couldn’t fight the current and go back the way she came in, the water was far too powerful. This left her only one other choice. She slowly and carefully walked to the other side of the cave, where the water appeared to be flowing. There was a tunnel on this side, she knelt down and looked at the space. At the top of the rounded tunnel, there was almost six inches of air space above the water flow.
“Well, I guess I have no other choice,” she mumbled to herself and almost jumped as her voice echoed in the small cave. “Echo!” She shouted and listened to her voice ricochet off the blue icy walls. She smiled and took a deep breath, knowing she would need it to tolerate submerging herself into the cold water again. She sat carefully at the entrance to the tunnel. The cold water filled her coat and pants once again, she squealed from the pain, but then quickly decided it wouldn’t do any good, so she bit her tongue and got ready for what could be her last breath.
She reached up to the top of the tunnel and casually pushed herself in, as if she were simply entering a water slide at an amusement park. It quickly became dark inside the tunnel, she kept her face above the water and tried to convince her body to just float, it became harder and harder though, she was so nervous, her legs kept instinctively going down trying to get footing on the icy floor. The water had carved a smooth surface, and so finally as she grew tired, she let her legs relax, her boots scratched along the bottom, working to slow her down at least, until finally there was no bottom and she was falling once again.
Ben’s head throbbed, he found his temple with his gloved hand and began massaging it before he opened his eyes. As he gained more and more consciousness, he slowly managed to open his eyes, what he saw didn’t make much sense. He focused in on the circular object more, trying to make sense of what appeared to be an enormous eyeball encased in ice.
He closed his eyes once again and this time moved his head back a bit to get a better look. As he did, he realized he was looking at an enormous eyeball, he gasped and tried to stand, slipping on the ice he slammed against the icy wall and found himself face to face with a huge Wooly Mammoth. It’s body was perfectly frozen in the glacier’s ice. It’s brown fur and thick hairy trunk looked as though it had happened just days before. The clarity was profound. Ben followed the beast’s legs, and back, he stepped back trying to take in the entire magnificence of the animal when all the sudden he tripped over something, and then landed hard on his back and cracked his head against the icy floor.
“Ouch.” Lacey moaned. She looked around and screamed as the vision of the Wooly Mammoth stared her straight in the face. In terror, she rolled over and met Ben’s knee, which slammed her in the eye.
She grabbed her eye and moaned again, then asked, “You okay Ben?”
“My head is killing me.”
“Yeah, mine too.” She sat next to him and looked around. The sound of splashing water brought her attention to what must have been their entry point into the cavern they sat in. Once again, they were surrounded by ice, the water from the river lapped against the icy beach in which they sat. It was like a frozen lagoon, the blue ice shone brightly, the crystal clear water flowed past them and around a bend leading to what Lacey imagined to be only one thing…more ice.
Suddenly it hit Lacey, “Oh my gosh, where’s Megan? Where’s Trent?” she yelled. She jumped to her feet then slipped and caught herself on something that was protruding from the ice behind her. She looked down and saw her hand wrapped around what appeared to be a long, dark brown horn. She followed the horn, it went back into the ice and met the Wooly Mammoth’s face, it wasn’t a horn at all she realized, it was an enormous tusk. She let it go quickly, almost as if she were in a museum and someone was going to tell her to let go of such an ancient artifact.
Ben gasped as he stood up and headed to the side of the cave where the river disappeared around the corner. Lacey followed not knowing what to make of her nephew’s actions. Ben jumped back into the water and started to swim to whatever he saw, he grabbed onto something, Lacey was too far away to see exactly what it was until Ben pulled the object closer to him. It was Trent, he was floating lifelessly in the freezing water, face down. Lacey screamed when she saw his lifeless body, Ben pushed Trent toward Lacey, she grabbed his arm and began pulling him onto the bank. As they slid him up and rolled him over, his still glassy eyes made Lacey shiver.
Lacey unzipped his jacket and began pounding on his chest, she stopped momentarily and listened for his heart, not hearing anything, she began again. Ben put his hands on each side of Trent’s face and rolled his head to the side, hoping maybe this would help any water come out, “Give him mouth to mouth!” Lacey yelled at Ben.
“What? Mouth to mouth…uh…I…uh,” he stalled looking at Trent’s lifeless face, “Lacey I don’t know how to do that and…and…EWW!” Lacey pushed Ben to the side,
“Fine, you do the heart compressions, I’ll do it!” With that she plugged Trent’s nose then lowered her mouth to Trent’s and began blowing air into his lungs. Ben continued to push in on Trent’s ribs, Lacey continued to blow air into his lungs, they paused only for a second or two at a time to listen and see if there was any sign of life.
Just as Lacey lowered her face back to Trent’s a low gurgling sound escaped his lips, followed by an enormous wave of projectile vomit. Lacey screamed and threw her face back as it covered her, she was dripping with a mixture of water and whatever Trent had eaten for lunch. She wiped her face and her mouth with her hands. It was in her eyes, her hair, even her ears. She opened her eyes and saw Trent shaking and throwing up even more. Ben had rolled him onto his side, and was holding his head as his whole body convulsed with every heave.
Finally the heaving stopped, Trent wiped his mouth and looked up to the vomit covered Lacey,
“Oh no, I’m…I’m so sorry,” he whispered. He was too exhausted to say anything else, he reached over and grabbed Lacey’s hand, “Thank you.”
Lacey just sat there as he caught his breath, Ben couldn’t help but laugh, he was so relieved that Trent was alive and well the fact that his aunt was covered in vomit was just too much. He grabbed Trent below the arms and lifted him to a sitting position.
Waypoint Alaska Page 13