Matthew Reilly - Ice Station

Alison's eyes glowed as they stared at the words:

O. NIEMEYER

Brigadier General Trevor Barnaby walked across the pool deck of Wilkes Ice Station. He'd been in control of Wilkes Ice Station for a little over an hour now, and he was feeling confident.

Only twenty minutes ago he had sent a team of fully armed divers down in the station's diving bell. But it would be at least ninety minutes before they reached the underground cave. Indeed, the diving bell's cable was still plunging into the pool at the base of the station right now.

Barnaby himself was dressed in a black thermal wet suit. He planned to go down to the underground cave with the second team?to see for himself what was really down there.

"Well now," he said as he saw Snake and the two French scientists handcuffed to the pole. "What have we here? Why, if it isn't Sergeant Kaplan." By the look on his face, Snake was obviously surprised that Barnaby knew who he was.

"Gunnery Sergeant Scott Michael Kaplan," Barnaby said. "Born: Dallas, 1953; enlisted in the United States Marine Corps at age eighteen in 1971; small arms expert; hand-to-hand combat expert; sniper. And as of 1992, under suspicion by British Intelligence as a member of the American spy agency known as the Intelligence Convergence Group.

"I'm sorry, what is it that they call you? Snake , isn't it. Tell me, Snake, is this a common occurrence for you? Does your commanding officer often chain you to poles, leaving you at the mercy of the incoming enemy?"

Snake didn't say anything.

Barnaby said, "I would hardly have thought that Shane Schofield would be the kind of master to chain up his loyal squad members. Which means there must be some other reason why he chained you up, n'est-ce pas ?" Barnaby smiled. "Now, whatever could that reason be?"

Snake still said nothing. Every now and then, his eyes would steal a look at the diving bell's cable as it plunged into the pool behind Barnaby.

Barnaby turned his attention to the two French scientists. "And who might you be?" he asked.

Luc Champion blurted out indignantly, "We are French scientists from the research station Dumont d'Urville. We have been detained here against our will by American forces. We demand that we be released in accordance with international?"

"Mr. Nero," Barnaby said flatly.

A mountain of a man stepped out from behind Barnaby and stood next to him. He was at least six-foot-five, with broad shoulders and impassive eyes. He had a scar that ran down from the corner of his mouth to his chin.

Barnaby said, "Mr. Nero, if you please."

The big man named Nero calinly raised his pistol and fired at Champion from point-blank range.

Champion's head exploded. Blood and brains instantly splattered against the side of Snake's face.

Henri Rae, the second French scientist, began to whimper.

Barnaby turned to face him. "Are you French, too?"

Rae began to sob.

Barnaby said, "Mr. Nero."

Rae saw it coming and he screamed, "No!" just as Nero raised his gun again and a moment later the other side of Snake's face was splattered all over with blood.

In the pitch-darkness of the crawl space at the base of the elevator shaft, Mother snapped up at the sound of the gunshots.

Damn it , she thought. She must have blacked out again.

Got to stay awake , she thought.

Got to stay awake....

Mother stared at the clear plastic fluid bag she had brought with her. It was connected by a tube to an intravenous drip that was stuck into her arm.

The fluid bag was now empty.

Had been for the last twenty minutes.

Mother began to shiver. She felt cold, weak. Her eyelids began to close.

She bit her tongue, trying to force her eyes open with the jolt of pain.

It worked for the first few times. And then it didn't.

Alone at the base of the elevator shaft, Mother lapsed into unconsciousness.

Out on E-deck, Trevor Barnaby stepped forward, his eyes narrowing. "Sergeant Kaplan. Snake. You've been a naughty boy, haven't you?"

Snake said nothing.

" Are you ICG, Snake? A turncoat? A traitor to your own unit? I bet the Scarecrow wasn't too pleased when he found out. Is that why he chained you to a pole and left you here for me?"

Snake swallowed.

Barnaby stared at him coldly. "It's what I would have done."

At that moment, a young SAS corporal came up behind Barnaby. "Sir."

"Yes, Corporal."

"Sir, the charges are being set around the perimeter."

"At what range?"

"Five hundred yards, sir. In an arc, like you ordered."

"Good," Barnaby said. Soon after he had arrived at Wilkes, Barnaby had ordered that eighteen Tritonal charges be placed in a semicircular arc on the landward side of the station. They were to have a special purpose. A very special purpose.

Barnaby said, "Corporal, how long do you expect the laying of the charges to take?"

"Allowing for the drilling, sir, I'd say another hour."

"Fine," Barnaby said. "When they're all set, bring me the detonation unit."

"Yes, sir," the corporal said "Oh, and, sir, there's one other thing."

"Yes."

"Sir, the prisoners who fell from the American hovercraft have just arrived. What should we do with them?"

Barnaby had already been told via radio of the soldier and the little girl who had fallen from one of the escaping hovercrafts and been picked up by his men.

"Take the girl to her quarters. Keep her there," Barnaby said. "Bring the Marine to me."

Libby Gant was standing in a dark corner of the underground cavern, alone. The beam of her flashlight illuminated a small horizontal fissure in the ice wall.

The fissure was at ground level, at the point where the ice wall met the floor. It was about two feet high and stretched horizontally for about six feet.

Gant crouched on her hands and knees and peered down into the horizontal fissure. She saw nothing but darkness. There did, however, appear to be empty space in there?

"Hey!"

Gant turned.

She saw Sarah Hensleigh standing underneath the spacecraft at the other end of the cavern, over by the pool, waving her arms.

"Hey!" Hensleigh called excitedly. "Come and have a look at this."

Gant walked over to the big black spaceship. Montana was already there when she arrived. Santa Cruz was standing guard over by the pool.

"What do you think of that?" Hensleigh pointed at something on the underbelly of the ship.

Gant saw it, frowned. It looked like a keypad of some sort.

Twelve buttons, arranged in three columns, four buttons per column, with what looked like a rectangular screen at the top of it.

But there was something very odd about this "keypad."

There were no symbols on any of the keys.

Like the rest of the ship, the keypad was completely and utterly black?black buttons on a black background.

And then Gant saw that there was one button that did have markings on it. The second button in the middle column had a small red circle printed on it.

"What do you think it is?" Montana asked.

"Who knows," Hensleigh said.

"It could be a way to open it up," Gant suggested.

Hensleigh snorted. "Not likely. Do you know any aliens that use keypads?"

"I don't know any aliens." Gant said. "Do you ?"

Hensleigh ignored her. "There's no telling what it is," she said. "It could be an ignition key, or a weapons system..."

"Or a self-destruct mechanism," Gant said dryly.

"I say we just press it and find out," Hensleigh said.

"But which button do we press?" Montana said.

"The one with the circle on it, I suppose."

Montana pursed his lips in thought. He was the senior man down here. It was his call. He looked to Gant.

Gant shook her head. "We're not here to see what it does. We're just here to hold it until the cavalry arrives."