Ice Hunt Read online

  The sub dropped, diving at a steep angle.

  Perry stared out of Cyclops, unblinking, unsure if they would avoid a collision as the wall of ice dropped from the cliff like a blue ax. It was now a race between the buoyancy of the falling ice and the weight of their own emergency ballast. The submarine canted nose first. Hand-holds were grabbed. A notebook slid down the slanted floor.

  Small cries echoed, but Perry ignored them. He watched, powerless. A collision here would be disastrous. There was nowhere to surface for miles around. Though the Polar Sentinel had been built to handle the rigors of the Arctic, there were limits.

  The toppling wall of ice filled the world ahead of them. The sub continued to dive. Seams popped and groaned from the sudden increase in pressure as the sub plunged into the frigid depths.

  Then open water appeared ahead, just under the slowly falling slab of ice. The submarine dove toward it.

  The section of cliff face slid past overhead—no more than inches. Perry craned his neck, following it past the arch of Lexan above his head. He could read the pictographic lines of algae across the ice’s surface. He held his breath, ready for the screech of metal, ready to hear the emergency klaxons blare. But the continual low hiss of the oxygen generators persisted.

  After a long half minute, Perry let out a deep breath and turned to the intercom. “Captain to the bridge,” he said. “Good job up there, men.”

  Commander Bratt answered, relief and pride in his voice, “Shutting the flood. Venting negative.” The sub began to level. After a moment, Bratt added, “Let’s not do that again.”

  “Aye to that,” Perry agreed. “But let’s do a slow circle back around and inspect the area—from a safe distance. I wager that breakaway may have been triggered by the DeepEye sonar.” He glanced to Amanda, remembering her concern about the new sonar’s vibration signature and heating effect. “We should get some pictures since we’re testing the darned thing.”

  Commander Bratt acknowledged and ordered his bridge crew, “Helmsman, left full rudder. Ahead slow. Take us around.”

  The submarine eased away from the ice mountain in a slow circle. Perry crossed to the bank of video monitors. “Can we get a close-up of the fracture zone?”

  One of the technicians nodded. “Yes, sir.”

  Amanda spoke, her words slightly slurred, her enunciation slipping with her anxiety. “We should’ve anticipated such a fracturing.”

  He patted her hand. “That’s why we call this a shakedown cruise. If you’re not shook up a time or two, then you’re not doing your job.”

  Despite his poor attempt at humor, her face remained tight.

  Then again, his own heart still pounded from the close call. He bent closer to the screen as the technician manipulated a toggle to bring the exterior cameras into focus on the fractured area. The shattered chunk of cliff shimmered into clarity.

  “What’s that?” Amanda asked. She pointed to a dark blemish on the screen. It was in the center of the fracture zone. “Can you zoom in?”

  The technician nodded and twisted a dial. The section of cliff swelled. The blemish grew in detail and depth. It was not ice or rock, but something unusual. As the sub turned, the Polar Sentinel’s spotlights illuminated it. It was black, angular. Man-made.

  As they swung closer, Perry knew what he was seeing: the stern end of another sub, frozen like a stick in a Popsicle. He crossed over to the canopy of Lexan glass and stared out. He could just make out the sub poking from the ice. It was old, ancient.

  The Polar Sentinel glided past at a safe distance.

  “Is that what I think it is?” Dr. Willig asked, his voice weak.

  “A sub,” Perry answered with a nod. He could recognize any submarine from just a casual glance. “I’d say a World War Two–era sub. Russian I series.”

  Amanda, her face less pale now, spoke from where she now stood with two researchers. “This supports our earlier discovery. The reason I called you down here.”

  Perry turned to her. “What are you talking about?”

  She pointed to a different monitor. “We mapped and taped this earlier from the DeepEye.” The screen displayed a three-dimensional image of the ice island. The resolution was amazing, but Perry didn’t see anything significant.

  “Show him,” Amanda continued, placing a hand on one of the technician’s shoulders.

  He tapped a few keys, and the image of the ice island dissolved from solid to ghostly. Within the interior of the island, passages and distinct tiers sectioned the iceberg, rising up layer by layer toward the top.

  “What is it?” Perry asked.

  The technician answered, “We think it’s an abandoned ice base built inside the berg.” He tapped a few keys and the image swelled to concentrate on one tier. There appeared to be rooms and corridors. It was definitely not a natural formation.

  “A Russian ice base if you’re right about that sub,” Amanda added, lifting an eyebrow toward Perry. “The vessel is docked at the lowest level.”

  He pointed to several darker objects scattered here and there on the display. “Are those what I think they are?”

  The technician overlaid a cursor atop one of them and tapped a key, zooming in on it. The shape of the form was unquestionable.

  “Bodies, Captain,” he answered. “Dead bodies.”

  A flicker of movement drew Perry’s attention to the edge of the screen—then it vanished. He frowned and glanced to the others. “Did anyone else see that?”

  Amanda’s eyes widened. “Rewind the tape.”

  The technician shuttled the recording backward and zoomed slightly outward. He forwarded to the blurred movement on the screen. He slowed it down. On the lowest tier of the station something stirred, then disappeared into the deeper depths of the ice mountain, retreating beyond the reach of the sonar. Though visible only for a moment, there was no doubt.

  Amanda whispered, “Something’s alive in there…”

  Act One

  Snow Flight

  1

  Blood Lure

  APRIL 6, 2:56 P.M.

  BROOKS RANGE, ALASKA

  Always respect Mother Nature…especially when she weighs four hundred pounds and is guarding her baby.

  Matthew Pike faced the grizzly from fifty yards away. The massive she-bear eyed him back, chuffing into the breeze. Her yearling cub nosed a blackberry briar, but it was too early in the season for berries. The cub was just playing in the brambles, oblivious to the six-foot-two Fish and Game officer standing, sweating, in the afternoon sun. But the youngster had little to fear when watched over by his mother. Her muscled bulk, yellowed teeth, and four-inch claws were protection enough.

  Matt’s moist palm rested on his holstered canister of pepper spray. His other hand slowly shifted to the rifle slung on his shoulder. Don’t charge, sweetheart…don’t make this day any worse than it already is. He’d had enough trouble with his own dogs earlier and had left them tethered back at his campsite.

  As he watched, her ears slowly flattened to her skull. Her back legs bunched as she bounced a bit on her front legs. It was clear posturing, a stance meant to chase off any threat.

  Matt held back a groan. How he wanted to run, but he knew to do so would only provoke the she-bear to chase him down. He risked taking a single slow step backward, careful to avoid the snap of a twig. He wore an old pair of moosehide boots, hand-sewn by his ex-wife, a skill learned from her Inuit father. Though they were three years divorced, Matt appreciated her skill now. The soft soles allowed him to tread quietly.

  He continued his slow retreat.

  Normally, when one encountered a bear in the wild, the best defense was loud noises: shouts, catcalls, whistles, anything to warn the normally reclusive predators away. But to stumble upon this sow and cub when topping a rise, running face-to-face into Ursus arctos horribilis, any sudden movement or noise could trigger the maternal beast to charge. Bear attacks numbered in the thousands each year in Alaska, including hundreds of fatalities. Just t
wo months ago, he and a fellow warden had run a tributary of the Yukon River in kayaks, searching for two rafters reported late in returning home, only to discover their half-eaten remains.

  So Matt knew bears. He knew to watch for fresh bear signs whenever hiking: unsettled dung, torn-up sod, clawed trunks of trees. He carried a bear whistle around his neck and pepper spray at his belt. And no one with any wits entered the Alaskan backcountry without a rifle. But as Matt had learned during his ten-year stint among the parks and lands of Alaska, out here the unexpected was commonplace. In a state bigger than Texas, with most of its lands accessible only by floatplane, the wildernesses of Alaska made the wild places of the lower states seem like nothing more than Disney theme parks: domesticated, crowded, commercialized. But here nature ruled in all its stark and brutal majesty.

  Of course, right now, Matt was hoping for a break on the brutal part. He continued his cautious retreat. The she-bear kept her post. Then the small male cub—if you could call a a hundred-and-fifty-pound ball of fur and muscle small—finally noticed the stranger nearby. It rose on its hind legs, looking at him. It shimmied and tossed its head about, male aggression made almost comical. Then it did the one thing Matt prayed it wouldn’t do. It dropped on all fours and loped toward him, more in play and curiosity than with any aggressive intent. But it was a deadly move nonetheless.

  While Matt did not fear the yearling cub—a blast of pepper spray would surely stop it in its tracks—its mother’s response was a different matter. The pepper spray would be no more than a tenderizing seasoning when her pile-driver strength pounded down on him. And forget about a head shot, even with his Marlin sport rifle. The bear’s thick skull would only deflect the bullet. Not even a shot square through the heart was a safe bet. It would take ten minutes for such a shot to kill a bear, and the shooter would be bear scat by then. The only real way to kill a grizzly was to aim for the legs, bring her bulk down, then keep on shooting.

  And despite the personal danger, Matt was loath to do this. The grizzlies were his personal totem. They were the symbol of this country. With their numbers dwindling to less than twenty-five thousand, he could not bring himself to kill even one of them. In fact, he had come to Brooks Range on his own personal time to help in the cataloging and DNA mapping of the parkland’s population of awakening grizzlies, fresh out of winter’s blanket. He had been up here collecting samples from hair traps stationed throughout the remote areas of the park and freshening their foul-smelling scent lures when he found himself in this predicament.

  But now Matt was faced with the choice of kill or be killed. The cub bounded merrily in his direction. His mother growled in warning—but Matt was not sure if she was talking to him or her cub. Either way, his retreat sped up, one foot fumbling behind the other. He shrugged his rifle into one hand and unholstered his pepper spray.

  As he struggled with the spray’s flip top, a fierce growl rose behind him. Matt glanced over his shoulder. On the trail behind him, a dark shape raced at him, tail flagging in the air.

  Matt’s eyes grew wide with recognition. “Bane! No!” The black dog pounded up the slope, hackles raised, a continual growl flowing from his throat. The dog’s keen nose must have scented the bears…and maybe his own master’s fear. “Heel!” Matt yelled in a barked command.

  Ever obedient, the dog halted the charge and stopped at his side, front legs braking, hind legs bunched. With one resounding bark, he crouched, teeth bared. A wolf cross, Bane was broad of chest and bulked out just shy of a hundred pounds. A short length of chewed leather tether hung from his collar. Matt had left Bane, along with his three other dogs, back at his temporary campsite while he went to freshen the scent lure of a nearby hair trap. The lure—a mixture of cow’s blood, rotted fish guts, and skunk oil—drove the dogs crazy. He had learned his lesson this morning when Gregor had rolled in a freshly laid lure. It had taken repeated baths to get the scent off the dog. He had not wanted a repeat of the event this afternoon and had left the dogs behind. But always his companion, Bane had clearly chewed through his lead and tracked after him.

  Bane barked again.

  Matt turned to see both bears—mother and cub—frozen in place at the sudden appearance of the large dog. The she-bear snuffled the air. Up here in the Brooks Range, she was surely familiar with wolves. Would the threat be enough to chase the bears off?

  Closer, only fifteen yards away, the cub danced a bit on its feet. Then with a toss of its head, it bounced toward them, heedless of any threat. The mother now had no choice. She opened her mouth and bellowed, dropping down to begin her charge.

  Matt thought quickly. He jammed the can of pepper spray into its holster and snatched a jelly jar full of blood lure from the side of his backpack. He leaned back and tossed it with all the strength in his arm and upper back. The fist-sized bottle flew with the accuracy of a Yankee pitcher’s fastball and shattered against the bole of a cottonwood thirty yards up the trail. Blood and guts splattered out. Usually two thimbles of the contents were enough to freshen a lure, capable of attracting bears from miles around. With the entire bottle emptied, the concentrated scent immediately swelled out, ripening the air.

  The cub stopped its ambling approach, dead in its tracks. It lifted its nose high, sniffing and snuffling. Its head swung like a radar dish toward the source of the delicious smell. Even the she-bear interrupted her charge to glance toward the smeared cottonwood. The cub turned and bounded up the slope. For a hungry cub, fresh from hibernating in its winter den, the reek was a thousand times more interesting than blackberry briars or a pair of woodland strangers. The cub loped happily away. His mother eyed them warily still, but she sidled back on her haunches, guarding her cub as it trundled past her toward the fouled tree.

  Matt sensed now would be a good time to make a hasty retreat. “Heel, Bane,” he whispered. The dog’s nose was in the air, sniffing at the lure. Matt reached down and grabbed the chewed end of the lead. “Don’t even think about it.”

  He backed over the ridge and down the far side, leaving the bears to their prize. He kept walking backward, one eye on the trail behind him, one eye on the ridge above, just in case mama decided to follow. But the bears stayed put, and after a quarter mile, Matt turned and hiked the two miles back to camp.

  Camp had been set by a wide stream, still iced over in patches as full spring was late to come. But there were signs of the warmer weather to follow in the blooming wildflowers all around: blue Jacob’s ladder, yellow fireweed, bloodred wild roses, and purple violets. Even the frozen stream, framed in willows and lined by alders, was edged in blooming water hemlock.

  It was one of Matt’s favorite times of the year, when the Gates of the Arctic National Park climbed out of winter’s hibernation, but too early for the tourists and rafters to begin their annual pilgrimage here. Not that there were that many folks even then within the confines of the eight million acres, a reserve the size of Vermont and Connecticut combined. Over the entire year, fewer than three thousand visitors braved the rugged park.

  But for the moment, Matt had the region all to himself.

  At the camp, the usual cacophony of yips and barks greeted his safe return. His roan mare—half Arabian, half quarter horse—nickered at him, tossing her nose and stamping a single hoof in clear feminine irritation. Bane trotted ahead and bumped and nosed his own mates in canine camaraderie. Matt loosed the three other dogs—Gregor, Simon, and Butthead—from their tethers. They ran in circles, sniffing, lifting legs, tongues lolling, the usual mischief of the canine species.

  Bane simply returned to his side, sitting, eyeing the younger dogs. His coat was almost solid black, with just a hint of a silver undercoat and a white blaze under his chin.

  Matt frowned at the pack leader, ready to scold, but he shook his head instead. What was the damn use? Bane was the lead of his sled team, quick to respond to commands and agile of limb, but the mutt always had a stubborn will of his own.

  “You know that cost us an entire bottle of lu
re,” Matt griped. “Carol is going to drain our blood to make the next one.” Carol Jeffries was the head researcher running the DNA bear program out of Bettles. She would have his hide for losing the jelly jar. With just one bottle left, he could bait only half the sampling traps. He would have to return early, setting her research behind by a full month. He could imagine her ire. Sighing, he wondered if it wouldn’t have been better simply to wrestle the four-hundred-pound grizzly.

  He patted Bane’s side and ruffled the dog’s thick mane, earning a thump of a tail. “Let’s see about getting dinner.” If the day was wasted, he might as well have a hot meal tonight as consolation. Though it was early, the sky was beginning to cloud up, and this far north, the Arctic sun would soon set. They might even get a bit of rain or snow before nightfall.

  So if he wanted a fire tonight, he’d best get to work now.

  He shrugged out of his coat, an old Army parka, patched at the elbows, its green color worn to a dull gray with a soft alpaca liner buttoned inside. Dressed in a thick wool shirt and heavy trousers, he was warm enough, especially after the long hike and the earlier adrenaline surge. He crossed to the river with a bucket and cracked ice from the stream edge. Though it would be easier simply to scoop water from the stream itself, the ice was distinctly purer. Since he was going to make a fire, it would melt quickly enough anyway.

  With practiced ease, he set about the usual routine of preparing his camp, glad to have the woods to himself. He whistled under his breath as he gathered dry wood. Then, after a moment, a strange silence settled around him. It took him half a breath to realize it. The dogs had gone quiet. Even the twittering of golden plovers from the willows had ceased. His own lonely whistle cut out.

  Then he heard it, too.

  The rumble of an airplane.

  It was a soft sound until the single-engine Cessna crossed the ridgeline and swooped over the valley. Matt strained up. Even before he saw the plane, he knew something was wrong. The sound of the engine was not a continual whine, but an asthmatic sputter.