The Freezer Page 22

  It would all be over.

  Regardless of his abilities, if he couldn’t breathe, he’d die quickly outside.

  I rose to my feet and moved to help. The ice was a problem, however, and it seemed to take an eternity to get up. By the time I had begun moving toward the pair, the director had twisted his body just so and it was enough to hurl the lieutenant away.

  I watched in horrified silence as Cray soared above the surface, arms and legs trailing as he collided with the shattered travel tube. He fell to the ice, clearly injured.

  The director turned to me.

  This was not going to be easy. Snow had been absolutely right. The work they had done was remarkable, and the result was clear. I couldn’t imagine an army of these guys; they’d be unbeatable.

  What would happen with these abilities in the Council’s hands? What would they do?

  And what if dissident groups got them?

  Perhaps the best thing was the complete destruction of the facility, as Lefave intended. Only I wouldn’t let Lefave leave.

  He had to die with his research. Taking him in—making a capture—in this case might just be unrealistic.

  As he stepped forward, intent on finishing me off, I wondered about Dinova. She had mentioned that she had dissident friends. Had they known her plan?

  I leveled my weapon and pulled the trigger. The energy lashed out and he darted sideways to avoid it. But as he did so, I adjusted my aim and fired again. And again.

  And again.

  Three quick blasts after the first, near Lefave but not directly at him.

  I had hoped that he would evade the first and stumble into one that followed.

  And it worked.

  My third pulse grazed the outside of his arm. The sleeve of his vacsuit instantly melted and with a gush, his air vented.

  The oxygen bottle would have immediately cranked wide open to forestall the effects of the sudden decrease in air pressure; the computer was attempting to minimize the danger and prevent the occupant from losing consciousness before he or she could make a repair.

  But this rip was enormous. It was at least a foot across and the outside edges were charred and ragged.

  Lefave roared in rage but the surge in oxygen and the sound of the venting pressure somewhat obscured it.

  With a final shriek that disappeared into nothingness as his air disappeared, he bent his legs and powered toward the landing pad and the air lock there, Module F.

  As we watched, his long strides carried him to the lock in only seconds. I fired several more times, and each shot came close, but not close enough to kill. I grazed his thigh and damaged the suit there as well. By the time he arrived at the dome, he was stumbling over his feet and struggling for the hatch controls. My hope that he would keel over and lie on the ice to die quietly didn’t happen.

  The hatch opened and he disappeared within.

  “Damn,” I snarled. Right now he would be gasping for air and repairing his suit. We needed to leave the area immediately.

  The broken travel tube continued on to the living module about ten meters away. But once there, it would be difficult to access the module. With the tube vented, the hatch had been programmed not to open.

  I possessed some Security Division codes that worked on most CCF hatches. I had been able to lock the personnel into their cabins, for instance, because my code overrode the ones at The Freezer. This hatch, however, would not open with my simple security code. I needed one that only senior officers at the facility would have possessed.

  Meaning Director Lefave.

  “I don’t suppose you have the codes to that hatch?” I said.

  No one answered. We’d have to go the other way then. I gestured to them and began to lope toward the emergency air lock in Module B. We needed those weapons desperately, otherwise I would have retreated to regroup and plan a defense.

  But right now, a good offense was the best thing I could come up with.

  Cray was shaken up and clutching his shoulder, but he followed without asking questions.

  Dyson, gasping for breath from fear and the sprint across twenty meters of ice, said, “It will only let one of us in at a time, don’t forget.”

  I said, “Cray and Snow will go in and get their pistols. The rest of us stay outside.” I fixed my gaze on them. “Do it fast. We don’t have much time.”

  * * *

  Sato, myself and Dyson crouched outside the dome as the emergency air lock—which was simply a one-person circular hatch that opened manually with a hand crank from either side—shut and the lock cycled. I could hear Snow and Cray breathing heavily over the comm.

  They were terrified.

  Working with Lefave over the past few years must have been torturous. Watching his personality disappear as a rage-filled monster superimposed itself over it, experiencing his wrath as he forced them to continue experimenting on the prisoners in that ice cave...

  Forced to work for a commanding officer who was irrational and temperamental. Listening to the shrieks of agony in the night...

  No wonder Dinova, Marius and Bojdl had fled this place.

  No wonder Bojdl’s guilt had left him a shell of a man.

  No wonder Dinova’s rage had led her to kill in vengeance. It didn’t excuse her, but I understood her motives a bit more with each second that passed.

  The worst part was that our lives in the military meant that one never questioned authority. If a lower rank objected to an order, it could mean demotion, time in the brig, or even corporal punishment of some sort. That kind of consequence was rare, but it did happen. I had heard of some cases of extreme punishment by warship captains, and not once had the highest ranks in the CCF countermanded or even questioned such orders.

  And then the hatch turned and I spun to it, terrified. I shook my head at my nerves, however: Lefave could not be in the module. He hadn’t gone in through the locked travel tube hatch—

  Unless he had ripped his way through the bulkheads, which was possible. After watching him tear through the tube like a battering ram...

  Snow and Cray had holsters on their thighs now and pistols clutched before them.

  They stumbled out of the hatch one at a time, their eyes darting from side to side to make sure Lefave was not in sight.

  “Where to?” Dyson snapped. He was eager to be off the ice and away from this place. I didn’t blame him.

  I exhaled forcefully. I knew that there was still a chance of rescue, but I needed a backup just in case. “We need to call for help.”

  “I told you, the controls that I fixed are gone. There’s no hope for them.”

  “The dish—”

  “Is trashed! Sure, we could fix it given enough time, then maybe patch into it and send a call for help to a nearby outpost. But Lefave would attack for sure!”

  Cray said, “You saw him, Tanner. He’s mad and powerful. He’s gone off the deep end. I suspected it would happen soon, but this is beyond what I thought. He’s inhuman...” He trailed off.

  I mulled over the situation, but knew I had to be fast about it. In the meantime I led the group toward the south side of the facility. Snow and Cray were on our flanks, pistols raised and ready. I brought up the rear.

  We had to send a distress call. What I needed was something stronger than a simple omnidirectional vacsuit comm with a signal limited to a two-kilometer radius. A communit that was strong, whose signal would be able to burst past Jupiter’s radiation and send a frantic plea for help. I could bring the CCF with a simple message to Lawrence at Fort Iridium, or to the relay satellites around Jupiter, or to the colony on Titan.

  If only that jumpship on the landing pad were still intact.

  If only—

  I swore. I knew what to do.

  Chapter Twenty-Two />
  We entered The Freezer through Module D’s air lock. The line of icetracks stretched along the curving bulkhead; there were only nine machines now, after the one I had used ended up in pieces at the bottom of the crevasse when Lefave made his first attempt on my life.

  Dyson stood to the side watching me apprehensively; he still had no idea what I had planned.

  “We need a portable power unit,” I said. “What do you have available?”

  He frowned. “I have a few of varying outputs. Some are—were—in use elsewhere in the facility. What did you have in mind?”

  “There’s a jumpship out there in a frozen crater. Its systems might still be intact.”

  A sudden silence descended in that dome. The others had been removing their helmets and searching the workbench for weapons of some sort—wrenches, hammers, screwdrivers and so on. But now all eyes turned to me.

  “Go out on the ice?” Janice Snow finally gasped. “Are you serious?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “But Tanner, we shot that jumpship down with a rocket-propelled explosive! It hit the ice hard, on fire and venting air! There’s no way—”

  “Three people survived the crash, meaning the gravity field was functioning on impact. That means the jumpship’s systems could be operational.”

  Dyson looked staggered. “You can’t be serious. That jumpship can’t launch—”

  “I know we can’t leave the moon. But some of the systems might be useful to us right now.”

  Sato grunted. “The communit.”

  “Yes. We can contact the Jupiter relays with that comm. But we need a power source for it. We’ll go out there, together, and call for help.”

  “And meanwhile Lefave remains here and prepares to kill us?” Snow said. “We can’t stay out there forever. When we get back, he’ll be ready for us.”

  “We can’t just stay here and wait for him,” Cray muttered. He was gasping slightly and clutching his right shoulder. The impact with Lefave had knocked the wind out of him, but with the exception of the jarred shoulder, he was going to be okay. He met my eyes. “I agree with the lieutenant. Let’s call for help, and then we can try to take him out.”

  “We don’t have much time here anyway,” I said, passing a hand across my chest. “This facility won’t be here in a day, remember? And the vacsuits here aren’t especially reliable in this environment. If we don’t figure out some way to escape this moon, it won’t matter if Lefave kills us or not, because Europa will just do it for him.”

  A deadly stillness stretched on as they looked at one another. Then Snow said to Dyson, “Is it possible? After eighteen months? Will the comm function?”

  He shook his head. “Everything is frozen there now. The ship was burning on impact. And would its systems even survive outside? I really can’t say.”

  I was slightly uncomfortable as I watched the exchange. I outranked them all and they should have just followed my instructions without hesitation. Still, I understood what kind of stress this situation had forced on them, and I had to let them think that the decision was by mutual consent.

  Sato was studying my features. He understood that the discussion bothered me. “The lieutenant’s right. The artificial gravity field must have remained at or near one gee. There’s a good chance that the communit can reach the relays and our signal will get diverted to a military outpost.”

  Cray said, “You were in that jumpship, right, Sato? What do you think?”

  He winced. “I won’t deny it—it was a wreck. The hull is heavily damaged, accordioned and burned. The viewports were shattered. The control cabin, however, seemed relatively unharmed. That’s where the comm is, after all.”

  “The comm equipment is there, but the transmitter is in the nose!” Dyson yelled. He clearly did not want to go out on the ice, and his fear was palpable.

  Eyes turned to Sato. “What about it?” Cray whispered. “What condition was the nose in?”

  Another tortured moment. “Not good,” he finally responded. “Buried in ice and crushed, as I said.”

  “You see?” Dyson shrieked. “There’s no chance!”

  I had had enough. I stepped toward him. “Pay attention, Crewman. I’m your commanding officer right now. That jumpship is our only chance at survival. If we stay here we might just kill Lefave, but listen to me: we can’t survive if we don’t call for help! We’ll need to go out there sooner or later, and it’s better to do it now.” I gestured at the icetracks. “We’ll be taking seven of those out. We’ll sabotage the other two so he can’t follow us.”

  “But—” he started.

  I cut him off before he could say more. “You’re in the military, dammit! Now shut up and follow protocol!”

  It had the desired effect. He glanced at the others to gauge reactions and then deflated and turned his eyes to the deck. “Aye, sir,” came the muted response.

  The crackling of the melting ice was louder now, and the deck was trembling beneath my feet. I shot a glance downward, then at the bulkheads as if to verify my senses.

  Cray noticed my gaze. “It’s speeding now.”

  The deck even seemed slightly slanted downward to the south, but it might have been my imagination.

  “Now what’s the best way to disable these vehicles?” I asked Dyson.

  He exhaled as he gathered his thoughts. Finally, “We could just pull the cables connecting the batteries to the engines. Do you want to permanently damage them? Or just put them out of commission for a bit?”

  We only needed seven, but the other two might come in handy later. “Just disable.”

  “Then the cables are the best way. You can reattach them later. I’ll show you where each lead goes.”

  “Is there someplace we can hide them, so Lefave can’t get one operating and come after us?”

  At that point the module lurched and the slant that I had perceived before became slightly more pronounced. Everyone reached out, attempting to keep their balance, and their eyes widened.

  “In a locker maybe?” he eventually responded.

  “Too predictable. Where else?”

  “On the workbench with some other equipment? In a tool chest? In a—”

  “We can take them with us,” Sato said.

  I considered that. It was a great idea. “Okay, let’s disable two icetracks. The rest of you, get suited up. Bring extra oxygen, crampons and ropes.” To Sato: “Find some stakes to anchor the rope when we get there.”

  “Easier than what we did last time,” he grunted. “I’ll get right on it.”

  “What about the power source, Dyson?”

  He marched to a locker near the bench and withdrew a piece of equipment about thirty centimeters long and fifteen high. Multiple cables stretched from it; it looked almost organic in nature.

  We were ready to move within five minutes. The whole time, Snow and Cray had stood by the travel-tube hatch and watched for Lefave. The tube was dark and it was impossible to see all the way to Module A, but they held their ground and strained their eyes for signs of the director.

  Finally we mounted our icetracks and powered them toward the air lock, which allowed two through at a time. I directed Cray and Dyson to exit first, since Cray had a weapon. Then Snow and Dinova. Then Marius and Sato.

  Then me.

  We left two inoperable vehicles behind us, their cables in the storage bin beneath my seat.

  Once out on the ice, I paused momentarily as I soaked in the sheer desolation to the southeast, the path we had to take. Jupiter loomed over us, as if keeping watch on this freezing desert of a moon. Only a quarter of it was lit, but those flashes of light on the remainder betrayed its immensity.

  Around us, the light levels were dropping quickly.

  Here we go.

  I hit the throttle
and we surged from The Freezer. The tracks from my previous mission to the first set of coordinates were still quite visible, and I cranked the vehicle to maximum speed. Unsafe, perhaps, but at least we knew there were no fissures before us if we followed the path.

  I hoped.

  I glanced to my right as we started on our way.

  The three crevasses in the ice seemed longer and wider than they had before.

  * * *

  The crashed jumpship was some fifteen kilometers away, and it would only take about ten or fifteen minutes for us to arrive. We had to slow our speed at some points during the trip, as Snow, Cray, Dinova and Marius had never been out on an icetrack before, and they were hesitant at first but grew more confident as the clicks churned by.

  I keyed my comm for Dyson only, and I noted his head jerk as the beep sounded in his helmet. He was to my right, and we had settled down to a pace of about sixty kilometers per hour.

  “Do you read me?” I asked.

  “Lieutenant,” came the curt response.

  “What are the chances a fissure has opened since we last came this way?”

  “In only two days?” He considered it for a bit. “Not likely. Our current speed should be safe enough.”

  “What kind of signs would indicate a new fracture?”

  “The tidal forces generate a lot of heat in the sea below us. The ice flexes and cracks. It’s due to Titan’s and Jupiter’s orbits yanking this moon in different directions. But there’s no way to tell if a brand new fissure has opened. Not until you’re right on top of it, anyway.”

  Great. I had thought this would be a relatively easy trip, but nothing was simple about this assignment.

  It was slowly spiraling out of control, like what had happened on my recent mission to SOLEX One. I didn’t like the thought of that.

  I had to keep these people alive.

  While traveling to the crater and the jumpship, I realized that it was a perfect time to get more detail about what had happened on this moon. What Lefave had done, exactly. There was also still a survivor back at the ice cave. The poor man had suffered for months. I knew there was only one course of action there.