Ice War Read online

  “Can we use the ladders?” The Tsar asked.

  “Is too wide for ladder,” Monster said. “Would not be stable enough. Not in such winds.”

  “So what then?” Price asked.

  “If we had snowmobiles, we could try to jump it,” Emile said.

  “And if we had a magic wand, we could make it disappear,” Barnard said. “But we don’t have that either.”

  “And if the Bzadians hadn’t invaded, I’d be hitting on girls in the school cafeteria right now,” Wall said. “Instead of freezing my nuts off here with you Rambo wannabes.”

  “Shoulda, woulda, coulda,” Price said. “We’ll split up. Monster, Barnard and Wall go half a klick north. The rest of us will go half a klick south. Constant radio contact. If we lose contact, return to this point. There’ll be a way around or across.”

  She was right. Price and her team had gone barely twenty metres when Monster’s voice spoke over the com.

  “Angel One, this is Angel Two. How copy?”

  “Solid copy, Angel Two,” Price said. “What have you got?”

  “Is bridge,” Monster said.

  It was a bridge of ice. Part of the wall on their side had sheared off, creating a sloping ramp across to the other side.

  Monster went first, easing himself over the side of the crevasse. He stood on the base of the bridge and jumped up and down a couple of times, testing it.

  “Is good,” he said, with a thumbs up at Price.

  “If it can take his weight, it’ll hold anybody’s,” Barnard said.

  Monster dropped to his hands and knees and crawled out onto the shaft of ice. Still it seemed solid, the broken ice welded at either end by the cold.

  “Oscar Kilo,” he said, then moved away from the edge, using his axe to anchor himself in case any of the others slipped.

  They got the sled across by lowering it on ropes to the bridge, where Monster hauled it up to the other side.

  Price, now last in the team, eased over the edge of the crevasse and found her footing at the base of the bridge. Her new leg began to twinge and spasm. It did that sometimes, for no good reason. As if she didn’t have enough other problems to deal with. She stretched it out, which seemed to help, and began to crawl across.

  The next spasm made her body shake, but she realised with horror that this was not her new leg playing games. A massive vibration in the ice had made the whole ice bridge tremble.

  “Here we go again,” Barnard said.

  “Hurry,” Monster shouted.

  Price was halfway across when the ice began to shake uncontrollably. She buried her axe in the bridge to stop herself slipping sideways, then wrenched it out again as she felt the rope around her waist tighten.

  She slid forwards as the rest of the Angels hauled on the rope. Ice was splintering and cracking all around her as the great icefloes moved, then the bridge dropped away, the shaft of ice shattered by the unimaginable pressure from either side.

  She fell into the crevasse, landing on the rubble of the ice bridge. For a moment she was floating on the surface of the water, then the crushed pieces of ice gave way. But before she could fall through, the rope snapped tight, slamming her into the wall of the crevasse. She grabbed the rope with both hands and jammed her knees up against her chest, to keep her feet out of the water. The impact swung her around, away from the wall, and she realised with horror that the far wall, which had been four or more metres away, was now less than half that distance and closing rapidly.

  “Get me out of here,” she screamed, but already she was rising, sliding up the smooth ice and over the edge.

  “Get your feet up! Get your feet up!” Wall yelled.

  Price spun her hips around, lifting her feet up out of the crevasse just as there was a massive rumble and a crunch of ice from behind her.

  She rolled over and saw that the crevasse had gone. The ice sheets had rammed together, leaving only a long crack in the ice.

  “We should have waited,” The Tsar said. “We would have been able to step across.”

  “That wouldn’t have been nearly as much fun,” Emile said.

  The others all laughed, and Price laughed with them. But he was right.

  She bit her lip to stop herself from whooping with exhilaration.

  “There it is,” The Tsar said.

  It had taken them an hour to travel less than a hundred metres over rugged and broken ice, but it had brought them to a wide flat area. Spirits were good. Their progress was slow but steady. As the lights of Little Diomede came into view again, Price felt a surge of confidence. It did not even look that far and, with the flatter ice ahead of them, they should make good time. The ice here was strange, like nothing they had seen before. Some odd quirk of the weather and the geology of the ice had created a series of rounded hillocks, giant ice pimples stretching in every direction as far as they could see.

  “Do people actually live on that rock?” Emile asked, staring at the vague light in the distance.

  “Somebody’s gotta do it,” The Tsar said.

  “It’s, like, in the middle of nowhere,” Emile said. “What do they do for fun?”

  “Scan for Pukes and play Scrabble,” Barnard said. “And I was joking about the Scrabble.”

  “I’d be bored out of my mind in three minutes,” Emile said.

  “No surprises there,” The Tsar said.

  “Has it occurred to anyone that we look like Pukes?” Wall asked. “I mean, am I the only one thinking this through? Little Diomede is full of sensitive scanners. Their whole mission is to watch out for enemy forces in the vicinity and yet we’re expecting to march right up to it?”

  “As I said, our mission is to observe and report,” Price said. “Their equipment can pick up vehicles and equipment from klicks away, but it won’t pick up foot mobiles in these conditions unless they are really close. We’ll keep well out of range.”

  “And if we don’t see anything suspicious?” Wall asked.

  “In that case I may go in myself and check it out from the inside,” Price said.

  “Using your invisibility cloak,” Wall said.

  “Something like that,” Price said.

  “They don’t call her the Phantom for nothing,” The Tsar said.

  “I’ll believe that when I see it,” Wall said.

  “Monster has seen it, and Monster still doesn’t believe it,” Monster said. “She like ghost.”

  “For the record, Wall, you need to watch your attitude,” Barnard said.

  “My attitude is doing just fine, bro,” Wall said. “Thanks for asking.”

  “I’ll remember that if I ever have to pull you out of a crevasse,” Barnard said.

  “What if they do see her?” Wall asked. “What are they going to think about a Puke creeping around?”

  “If I get caught, my orders are to ask them to contact ACOG, who will verify my identity,” Price said.

  “And if they shoot first and ask questions later?” Wall asked.

  “I didn’t say it wouldn’t be risky,” Price said.

  “If you want a safe job, try Burger King,” Barnard said.

  Wall snorted and turned away, muttering under his breath. Price couldn’t hear what he said and couldn’t be bothered finding out.

  “What happens if the station really is attacked by Pukes?” Emile asked. “Do they just sit there and wait to get blown to pieces? Seriously, if they want to invade, first thing the Pukes gonna do is pound the guacamole out of that place, right?”

  “Any sign of trouble and the operators bug out,” Barnard said.

  “How?” Emile asked.

  “Hovercraft,” Barnard said. “They also have an airstrip, but you couldn’t rely on that this time of year, in case of a blizzard. Like this one.”

  “Enough idle chitchat, Angels,” Price said. “It’s time to check in with HQ.”

  “We’ll have to get out of the wind,” The Tsar said. “The satellite dish needs to be steady.”

  “There’s
no shelter here,” Barnard said. “These hills are too rounded.”

  “Then we’ll make our own shelter,” Price said. “Monster?”

  Monster took a snow shovel from the sled and dug into the leeside of the nearest hillock. He scooped out a shallow cave, dumping snow on either side as additional protection from the wind.

  “Strange,” Barnard said.

  “What?” Price asked.

  “This hill is made of snow,” Barnard said. “Not ice.”

  “What does that mean?” Price asked.

  “It doesn’t snow much here,” Barnard said.

  “So where’d all this snow come from?”

  “I don’t know,” Barnard said. “And how did it get dumped in this big pile?”

  “Anything on the scope?” Price asked, suddenly concerned and unsure why.

  “Nothing,” The Tsar said. “But the feed is so poor that we could be standing next to a Bzadian battle tank and not even see it on the scope.”

  The handheld scopes depended on a feed from all-seeing satellite eyes high above them. But in these conditions those eyes were almost blind.

  As soon as the snow cave was big enough to hold the whole team, Monster strapped the shovel back onto the sled. Inside the concave shape he had created, the wind was almost absent, which was a great relief.

  “Emile, you take guard,” Price said.

  The Tsar handed the scope to Emile who studied the screen carefully. The Tsar retrieved the satellite radio unit from the equipment sled. He opened the radio cover and pressed a few buttons. A small dish emerged, unfolded and automatically oriented itself to the right point in the sky. The Tsar checked a few things then activated the set and plugged it into his com unit, switching it so they all could hear.

  “Heaven, this is Angel One. How copy? Over,” Price asked.

  The voice came back almost immediately. “Solid copy, Angel One. This is Heaven. Over.”

  “Heaven, we are in position at designated OP: grid reference, Charlie November, four, three, five, niner, three, one. Over.”

  “Good work, Angel One. What is your visibility rating? Over.”

  “Tango two at best. Over,” Price said.

  There was a short silence, then the voice on the other end said, “How you doing, Price?”

  “Good, Wilton,” Price said with a grin. “How ’bout you?”

  “I’m fine,” Wilton said, his voice thin and crisp through the radio. “How’s the arctic?”

  “Arctic? This is the subarctic,” Price said. “The arctic circle is eighty klicks thataway.”

  “I’m glad they didn’t send us to the arctic,” Wall said. “It’d be cold and miserable there.”

  “I wish I was there with you,” Wilton said.

  “No, you don’t,” Barnard said.

  “Ignore her, it’s much nicer than you’d think,” Price said.

  “Nice?” Wilton asked.

  “Sun’s out, the water is cool, we’re all in our swimsuits, drinking ice-cold beers around the pool,” Price said, wiping frost from her face mask, and stretching her new leg to stop it from cramping up.

  “Now I know you’re lying,” Wilton said. “You ain’t old enough to drink beer.”

  That brought laughter from the team.

  “We have eyes on the island,” Price said.

  “Any sign of enemy activity?” Wilton asked.

  “Negative on that,” Price said.

  “Confirming no sign of enemy activity,” Wilton said, reverting to formal radio procedures. “Next check in at 13:30 mission time. Over.”

  “See you then,” Price said.

  The Tsar unplugged and packed up the transmitter.

  “Okay, Angels, we are Oscar Mike,” Price said.

  “LT!” Emile said.

  “Azoh!” The Tsar said.

  Price spun around and saw what they saw. The mission had barely begun. And already it was over.

  HEAT

  [MISSION DAY 1, FEBRUARY 16, 2033. 1700 HOURS LOCAL TIME]

  [OFFICE FC7001, THIRD LEVEL, WEST QUARTER, THE PENTAGON, VIRGINIA]

  It was too warm in the office.

  Blake Wilton was uncomfortable and sweating lightly, although he had not been earlier and the temperature had not changed. Perhaps it was some kind of reaction to knowing that his friends were camped out in the frozen subarctic wilderness and wild weather of the Bering Strait.

  The air-conditioning for his office was controlled by his computer, and he lowered it a couple of degrees.

  Technically, he shouldn’t even be here.

  He had been forced out of Recon Team Angel when he had grown past the height limitation, against all predictions of the geneticists. They had removed the bumps on his skull, recoloured his skin and stitched up his tongue, which still felt strange when he ate or tried to speak Bzadian.

  He had been training for the last six months as a gunner with the Canadian Land Force Command, Second Spitfire Battalion. Not twenty-four hours ago he had been out on the ice in a two-man hovercraft, conducting live firing exercises against robotic targets.

  He had been called to Virginia without warning or explanation, given a quiet office well away from anyone else, and only told at the last minute what he was doing there. Liaison officer for a vital recon mission.

  No matter how harsh the conditions the Angels were facing, he wished he was there with them, doing something more constructive than simply being the radio contact for his old buddies.

  The operation was top secret. The participation of the Angels was to be denied if he was questioned.

  They didn’t exist, he didn’t exist and none of them were involved in this mission.

  He wrote up his contact notes. That took less than ten minutes. He fiddled with the computer for a few minutes, doing nothing really, then stood up, intending to go to McDonald’s for an early dinner. It was only one o’clock on the ice, but it was after five pm here, and his stomach was growling.

  That was one thing he really liked about the Pentagon. There was a big food court with every kind of fast food imaginable, from KFC to Dunkin’ Donuts.

  He particularly liked the shakes at Mickey D’s, although they didn’t taste quite as good when you only had one tongue.

  Even as he thought that, he remembered his friends stuck on the ice, and it seemed wrong.

  In any case, he never got out of the office. The door opened and Daniel Bilal entered.

  Bilal was someone important. He was in military intelligence, but that was all Wilton knew. He didn’t seem to have any rank, at least none that was publicly displayed. But he had the power to get Wilton pulled from his hovercraft crew and flown secretly to Virginia.

  Bilal was small, black and dressed casually, as if he had no time for the uniforms and suits that were the dress standard in the Pentagon. He wore a light grey sports jacket over a T-shirt with a picture of the Cat in the Hat.

  “You had your first contact?” he asked. It was a question, but Wilton was quite sure that Bilal already knew the answer. Bilal seemed to know the answer to everything.

  “Yes, right on schedule,” Wilton said. “They’re on the ground and moving towards the first observation point.”

  “Good,” Bilal said. “What time is the next check-in?”

  “In about half an hour. That’s 13:30, mission time,” Wilton said, trying his best to sound professional and official.

  “I’ll sit in on that one,” Bilal said, checking his watch. “I’ll see you in twenty minutes.”

  “Sir,” Wilton began, unsure how to frame his question.

  “Yes, Blake,” Bilal said.

  “It’s just that I don’t understand,” Wilton said. “I thought the Angel program was shut down.”

  “That’s what we wanted you to think,” Bilal said. “That’s what we want everyone to think.”

  “Why?” Wilton asked.

  “Because that’s what we want the Bzadians to think,” Bilal said.

  “But we, I mean they, are not
really trained for this kind of mission,” Wilton said.

  “We know that,” Bilal said. “But Angels have certain special qualifications that could prove to be more important than cold weather training. The first teams we sent in were arctic specialists and that didn’t seem to help them any.”

  “Teams?” Wilton asked.

  “Two Seal teams,” Bilal said.

  “What happened to them?” Wilton asked.

  “We don’t know,” Bilal said, shrugging. “Bad luck or bad timing. Or …”

  “Or what?” Wilton asked.

  “Or perhaps someone knew they were coming,” Bilal said.

  As Wilton was pondering the implications of that, his personal phone rang. He queried Bilal with a glance. Bilal nodded.

  It was Corporal Courtney Fox, one of the communications operators at Fort Carson, the Team Angel operation base.

  “Hi, Courtney. How’s everyone back at Carson?” Wilton asked, not so much to exchange pleasantries as because Courtney needed a few seconds of his voice to establish vocal ID. It felt good to talk to someone from Fort Carson. Recon Team Angel had been the only place he had felt at home. Like he belonged. Hearing Courtney’s voice reminded him how much he missed it.

  “We’re all good, Blake. Somehow it’s not the same without you around though,” Courtney said.

  “You’re just saying that,” Wilton said. “Do you have a voice match yet? Or do you need me to keep talking.”

  “Just came through,” Courtney said, with a pleasant laugh. “Hey, I have an incoming audio call for you, do you want me to route it through?”

  “Who is it?” Wilton asked.

  “She hasn’t identified herself, but she asked for you by name and gave all the correct security codes,” Courtney said.

  “Put it through,” Wilton said.

  “See you, Blake. Come back and visit,” Courtney said.

  There was a slight click and the sound of her breathing was gone.

  “Hello. Who is this?” Wilton asked.

  It was not Price.

  The woman’s voice was not one he recognised. It had a flat robotic sound.

  “Can you talk freely?” she asked in a monotone.

  “Not really,” Wilton said, with a glance at Bilal.