“You’re right,” Tucker confirmed.
“I thought I saw a brief flash of fire from that direction a moment ago,” Elle said. “It caught my eye. But it’s gone.”
“There’s smoke, too,” Monk said. “Just a thin trail.”
Tucker squinted and saw he was right. “Could that be coming from Gray and the others?”
“Let’s hope so.” Monk swung the aircraft in that direction. “We’re running low on fuel... and they’re running out of time.”
Tucker nodded.
Two hours ago, from the air, they had spotted a shattered dark trail through the white ice, heading north. The route had led straight into the fogbank and vanished. They had turned and followed it, recognizing the path of an icebreaker. They prayed it was the ship that Gray and the others had boarded.
But Tucker’s group wasn’t the only one following that well-marked trail.
Just before reaching the fogbank, they spotted another ship. Theyswept low, then quickly angled away once they saw it was a Russian vessel, an icebreaking patrol boat. Tucker had used binoculars to study the gray-blue ship. He made out the massive AK-176MA naval gun mounted at its bow. A Kamov Ka-27 anti-submarine helicopter sat on the boat’s stern pad.
They all knew what that Russian vessel, alone in these waters, must have been dispatched to do.
The same as us—to find the others.
Like Tucker’s group, the patrol boat must have come across the broken path through the ice and now steamed hard along it, making good time with the route already shattered for them.
It was what made Tucker’s current search so desperate.
Gray and the others needed to be warned, to know what was coming.
Still, Tucker knew such foreknowledge would do little good, especially out here, locked in ice. He scanned across the unbroken landscape.
Where could any of us go? Where could we hide?
41
May 14, 2:08P.M. ANAT
East Siberian Sea
Seichan sheltered with the others behind one of the Snowcats as shards of ice rained around them. Larger boulders crashed in front. Even with her face turned and her eyes closed, the flash of fire still dazzled her vision. Smoke had briefly blasted over their position, then the easterly winds had battered it back, blowing it past the tall black peak.
“All clear!” Kelly shouted.
The team rose from behind their parked vehicles. They staggered out, rubbing at ears and shaking heads. The group had retreated three hundred yards from the detonation site. They all stared toward the ice wall—or what was left of it.
A stubborn haze of smoke persisted.
Gray crossed and mounted his snowmobile. “Let’s check it out.”
Seichan rushed and hopped onto her Polaris.
The others prepared to follow in the Snowcats.
Gray didn’t wait, clearly anxious to discover if Ryan’s mastery of reading ice was as accomplished as Kelly had claimed. Earlier, they had all watched the former Coast Guard officer drill holes into the frozen wall, shape a set of charges, and place blasting caps. After making some final adjustments, Ryan had given a thumbs-up, and they had retreated.
But did it do any good?
Seichan followed Gray, racing across the ice, skirting larger bluesledges that had slammed to the ground. It took them less than a minute to reach the site. A quarter of the shoulder of ice had been blasted off the peak’s side. They were forced to slow, to pick their way through the debris field.
Once close enough, Gray edged his Polaris to where the misty crack had been. He flicked on his headlamp and pointed its beam toward the center of the blast zone. Seichan drew alongside him, adding her light.
