Expedition Beyond Page 2

  Mitch was physically the strongest member of the team; at thirty-two, he still looked like an overgrown adolescent. He could pump iron at the gym for hours, or practice Judo with Des in martial arts class, then go down to the pub and chug beers. But he was a wimp when it came to flying, the only team member who was not an accomplished parachutist, even though he’d trained at ground school. The outside of his chute pack had a hook that would be attached inside the plane so his chute would open automatically when he jumped.

  When Mitch heaved into his bag again, Dr. Summers patted his leg.

  Des had joined Boster Denton after graduation as a technical assistant metallurgist to foster advanced weapons construction. After he’d steered the company into the lucrative business of recreational equipment, he was awarded with a promotion to Vice-President of Metallurgy. Now he was commanding his own expedition.

  Meanwhile, Mitch had served a brief stint as an instructor at Mines, but the college’s Board of Regents hadn’t approved of him teaching his students how to use “fuck” as a noun, pronoun, adjective, verb and adverb. The first time the Regents admonished him, Mitch had promised to omit the word from his lectures, but the fifth time, he unleashed an ill-advised tirade of “fucks” on the Regents, who were totally unappreciative of his verbal artistry and fired him on the spot.

  Mitch had immediately called Des. “Those fucking bastards! Fuck them. Who the fuck do they think they are? Fuckers, all of them!”

  “Calm down, Mitch. How would you like to work with me? Come over and we’ll talk about it.”

  Boster Denton didn’t have the same qualms as academia, so Des had promptly hired Mitch.

  Des unzipped a pocket on his chest-pack and removed his pocket watch—one hour until the drop.

  Jack Squires was the team’s computer expert and a worrywort. Seated just ahead of Des, he pulled on his coat sleeve to get his attention, then yelled to be heard over the whine of the engines.

  “Shouldn’t we have put the snow Gliders in crates? What if one of the jets gets damaged when it lands? What if one ends up on a slope and tips over? Would the jet fuel leak? I think wooden crates would have made the drop safer.” Des nodded toward Bearters, the Inuit guide, seated in front of Jack. “It’s his country, and he said no trash, nothing left behind—and that includes wooden crates.”

  Des had handpicked all of the team members except for Jack and Bearters. Bearters had been assigned to the group by the Inuit government. He’d barely spoken since he’d joined them. His large frame was relaxed, his attitude sullen or perhaps merely bored. Des had met him only when the plane had departed from Pelly Bay, and he’d wondered how much English the Inuit actually understood. While Des had explained the mission to him in detail, Bearters had only nodded occasionally.

  When he’d finished, Bearters had said, “You will leave my country as you found it.”

  “We could have burned them,” Jack said about the crates.

  “They’ll be just fine.”

  Jack appeared about nineteen years old and fidgeted constantly. His face was pockmarked with the scars of teenage acne; combined with his short stature, it belied his true age, which Des knew to be twenty-six. Des never would have picked Jack to be on the team; Boster Denton’s president had chosen him for reasons never explained to Des.

  In addition to the seven team members, the plane’s hold had six snow Gliders and six sleds packed with enough supplies for almost two months, as a precautionary measure. Their mission was simple: Find the crevasse, explore it, collect samples or specimens, then leave.

  The snow Glider was a Boster Denton success story. Each of their lightweight bodies covered four jet engines that lifted the Glider from two to eight inches above the snow. Speed was adjusted by ground clearance; the lower the level, the faster the speed. A Glider was designed to propel a sled connected to its front. With a snow sled and the Glider set to hover at eight inches, they’d manage barely fifteen miles per hour. On a flat surface, like a frozen lake, a snow Glider set at two inches and, utilizing winged stabilizers, could clock out at 160 miles per hour. On each side of the Glider, below the Boster Denton insignia, large red letters read: “Stay Back Ten Feet,” because the porous ceramic exhaust plates that dissipated engine heat sideways and upwards could singe anyone nearby.

  The pilot announced thirty minutes till drop.

  Des looked at Kathy Summers, the doctor’s wife. She was still pretty at 47; her willowy figure contrasted with her husband’s rotundity. Her shoulder-length brunette hair was carefully styled. Originally, Des had been opposed to her coming along, but Stephen, the Cox family practitioner, had insisted he would not go without her, and Des couldn’t come up with any valid reasons why she should not go. He needed Stephen, who was always calm and reassuring, to help anchor Mitch, as well as for any medical emergencies or problems which might arise.

  Des had told Kathy, “You can come, but you’ll have to do all the cooking for us, and the cleanup, and you’re to stay in camp at all times.” He’d half-expected her to call him a chauvinist, but she’d merely said that would be fine with her.

  Hans Brinker rounded out his team. An excellent climber, the tall, thin Norwegian practiced on ropes whenever possible. Even standing in the cargo bay, he pulled himself up to the ceiling with one of the ropes, then rappelled back down. He had been an instructor at the climbing academy Mitch and Des had attended.

  “Fifteen minutes to drop,” the loudspeaker announced with a crackle.

  Des stood and motioned to everyone to put on their helmets. They all complied, except for Mitch, who reluctantly allowed Stephen to help him.

  Des adjusted the small microphone closer to his mouth. “This is an intercom test. Please answer ‘check’ when your name is called.”

  Mitch coughed into his microphone.

  “Stephen.”

  “Check.”

  “Kathy.”

  “Check.”

  “Hans.”

  “Check.”

  “Jack.”

  “Check.”

  “Bearters.”

  “Check.”

  “Mitch.”

  There was silence.

  “Mitch, come on! Can you hear me? Mitch, check in!”

  Stephen broke in. “Des, he’ll be all right. I’ll get him hooked on the line when it’s his turn to jump.”

  “Roger,” Des answered. “Okay, I think everyone knows this, but listen up one more time: First out will be Glider One. Hans will push that out, then he’ll push out Sled One, and then Hans will jump.”

  The pilot’s voice came over the loudspeaker: “Five minutes to drop zone. ETA, five minutes.”

  Des continued: “Okay, then Glider Two and Sled Two—Bearters pushes them both out, then follows. Glider Three, Sled Three, and Jack. Glider Four, Sled Four, and Kathy. The Doc will shove out Glider Five, Sled Five. Then he and I will hook up Mitch on the cable and send him down.”

  Mitch closed his pale eyes.

  “I will push out Glider Six and Sled Six. After they’re away, Stephen will jump, then me. Any questions?” Silence. “All right, then let’s have a good jump. Nobody gets hurt.”

  Minutes later, the pilot said over the loudspeaker, “Approaching drop zone. Opening hatch. I will count you down. ETA, two minutes.”

  Des reminded his team, “Locate and collect your Glider and sled. Leave your beacon on and stay put. I will find you. Please don’t drive around.”

  The hatch door whined open slowly and sky filled the belly of the plane.

  The pilot announced, “Beginning countdown to drop zone: On my mark, begin drop. Countdown commencing: Ten—”

  “Visors down,” Des said.

  Stephen pulled down Mitch’s visor, then his own.

  Des said a silent prayer.

  Mitch stood up swiftly, grabbed the metal link on the front of snow
Glider One and shoved it backwards out of the hatch. Still hanging on to it, he disappeared into the gray sky.

  Des saw the hook on the back of Mitch’s parachute flapping wildly in the wind and felt a moment of panic; he knew Mitch couldn’t open his chute by himself.

  “—seven, six—” counted the loudspeaker voice.

  “Jesus Fucking Chrr...ist!” a disembodied voice said over his headset.

  “—three, two—”

  “It’s a go! It’s a go!” Des shouted into his mike.

  “—one. Mark.”

  Hans pushed out Sled One, then jumped. The rest followed in turn.

  Chapter 3

  ELLESMERE ISLAND, CANADA

  LATITUDE: 81° 45’ NORTH

  LONGITUDE: 76° 5’ WEST

  Day 1; 1820 UTC, 12:20 PM LTD

  As Des descended into the grayness, he checked his altimeter: 500 feet. At 200 feet, he would touch ground he could not see. He looked toward his chute, but saw only gray fog. He prepared for impact, then hit the ground hard, bending his knees. Due to the rough terrain, they had been instructed not to roll, and to immediately pull in their chutes.

  Des gathered in his chute, stumbling twice and falling once.

  He was reminded of when he and Mitch had gone skiing at Vail. Des had skied only once before; to him, Mitch had looked like a madman on the slopes. Later, Des had made progress and actually begun schussing.

  “Be careful, with this fucking cloud cover, the light will be flat,” Mitch had warned as they’d gotten off the ski lift.

  What was flat light? Des carefully maneuvered past other skiers while Mitch took off fast—and with a yodel. As Des picked up speed, he began to understand. He couldn’t see the bumps on the slope; it all looked gray. There would be no snow beneath his skis and he would descend suddenly, only to find an invisible mound forcing his skis upward. He was picking up speed, but couldn’t tell sky from snow. Two quick bumps laid him out, his body spinning wildly. The ski bindings gave way; he rolled over twice and stopped. When he’d regained his equilibrium, he strapped on his skis and finished the run.

  If that light in Vail had been flat, the light here was super flat. As was poor Mitch now, undoubtedly. Des couldn’t fathom why Mitch had bailed out as he had. He finished packing his chute, then stood, surrounded by silence. No wind. And no sign of Mitch. If Bearters didn’t even want burned crates here, what would he think about dead Americans littering the ground? Des removed his helmet to stare into the gray gloom and immediately felt his eyebrows and mustache freeze. He studied the gray sky, the gray snow, the gray ice and the gray fog as he thought about Mitch free-falling to the ground.

  He would locate Mitch’s body, then find the emergency radio and call in a helicopter. The mission was over before it had begun. The snow Gliders and sleds would have to be left behind, if he could convince Bearters that they would return to retrieve them. The Inuit wouldn’t like that, but it was better than leaving Mitch’s body.

  Des decided he would be the best person to inform Mitch’s mother of her son’s death. That he shared her grief would console her. He’d not only lost his best friend, but he had failed miserably in his most important responsibility: the safety of the members of his expeditionary team. Because of that, Mitch was dead.

  He put his helmet on and removed his front-pack, which like Mitch’s had no spare chute. Mitch couldn’t have opened his chute on his own because there was no ripcord. Thirty feet of wire had been coiled inside, attached to the hook on Mitch’s back and to the automatic opening device with its air canisters to ensure full deployment; it was a fail-safe system—unless you had to open it in midair. There was no way to reach the hook.

  In the quiet, gray stillness that surrounded him, Des felt somehow detached, but he said a prayer for Mitch.

  Des’ Tevlar gloves were warm and thin enough for his fingers to work efficiently. He pulled out his trusty GPS, a gift from his parents, traced a finger along the crack on its face, then turned it on. Within three seconds, it displayed the latitude and longitude. While it looked right to Des, he made a mental note to check his GPS against Jack’s before he radioed for help. That crack had been there for three years without a problem, but it’d be wise to make sure before he endangered his team further.

  He stowed his GPS in its pocket, then took out his faceplate. He took off his helmet again, snapped it to his belt and put on the faceplate, pulling the hood of his coat tightly around it. He unzipped another pocket, pulled out his Finder, and turned it on.

  The Finder looked like an oval handheld mirror. At the top was a 15 cm LCD screen with four touch buttons—one on the right, three on the left—and at the bottom was a stem handle. A black dot in the center of the screen blinked four times, turned solid red, then the Finder buzzed. The number “7” was displayed at the bottom left of the screen, “zero meters” at the bottom right—the Finder had automatically defaulted to finding itself. Des pushed the third button on the left until “5” was displayed. Holding the Finder out in front of him, he slowly turned around in a full circle. No blinking black dot appeared; the screen remained blank, indicating that Mitch hadn’t turned on his transmitter.

  Des searched for “6” and a blinking black dot immediately flashed on the right side of the screen. He turned until the dot was in the middle and read the distance: two hundred meters. He picked up his bundled chute and front-pack and walked toward Stephen, carefully following the reading on the Finder.

  The fog seemed to be packed more densely around the doctor—he looked like an apparition in the flat light. He wore his faceplate and hood and his hands were clasped behind his back.

  “I’m sorry about Mitch. I know he was a good friend of yours,” Stephen said as Des neared.

  Des nodded in acknowledgment, but said nothing.

  All Finders were beacons, but not all beacons were Finders. Stephen had already retrieved the sled and Glider, both with a large “6” on each side, by following their non-Finder beacons. Each team member had been assigned a numbered sled and Glider; Des was assigned to Six, Kathy and Stephen shared Four. Mitch had pushed out Glider One, the one assigned to Hans. While Des knew the numbers of the units assigned to the team members, only they had memorized the beacon code for their own Glider and sled, so Des would have to wait until he found Hans to know if the beacon on Glider One was working.

  Des and Stephen stowed their chutes and had hooked the sled to the front of the Glider, before Des realized the difficulty of locating snow Glider Five and Sled Five, because only Mitch had known their Finder codes.

  “Doc, what’s packed on Sled Five?”

  “I don’t know. It’s either food or equipment, but hopefully not the food sled, or we’ll be up a creek if we can’t find it. Jack has the contents of each sled on his computer. Maybe Bearters can find them without the beacons,” he added.

  Des punched in “4” on his Finder and the flashing black dot appeared on the right-hand side of the screen. He set it in a holder on the front of his Glider; they climbed on and Des fired up the engines. When the snow Glider rose a foot off the ground, Des pushed a control lever forward and the small jet engines rotated back. With a lurch, they were off to find Kathy.

  Kathy was seated on the ice, posing with her legs crossed and one hand behind her head. She didn’t move until Des had turned off the Glider and both men had dismounted.

  “What took you guys so long?” she said. “At this rate, it’s going to be dark by the time we make camp.” It was a joke—the sun wouldn’t set for another two months.

  Since Kathy had collected Glider and Sled Four, she and Stephen mounted that one, while Des climbed back on Six.

  They traveled southwest, opposite where they would have headed to make base camp. This had been the subject of a lively discussion on deployment before they left, but Des had final say and he didn’t think they would lose too much time
backtracking.

  When they reached Jack, Des pulled him aside.

  “When you get a chance, look up the contents of Sled Five.”

  Jack replied, “I already know: sustenance, Des. It’s the food wagon.”

  Shit.

  By the time they reached Bearters, Des had three urgent things for him to find: Mitch, Sled Five, and Snow Glider Five.

  Des pulled Jack away from the others again. “I want you to wait here with Kathy while Stephen, Bearters, and I go pick up Hans and look for Mitch.”

  Jack nodded.

  Stephen unhitched his sled from his Glider. Bearters climbed on Glider Two, Stephen and Des shared Four. According to the Finder, Hans was two thousand meters due west.

  When they arrived, Hans was seated on top of the roped-on canvas covering Sled One.

  “We need to find Mitch,” Des told him without preamble.

  “Ja, I know.”

  “Is Glider One’s beacon on?”

  “Ja, it’s on.”

  “How far?”

  “Thirty-four hundred meters. I thought I should wait for you.”

  “You did right. Let’s get going.”

  Hans climbed on behind Bearters.

  After a few minutes Bearters suddenly stopped his Glider, got off and walked back into the gray fog. He reemerged with a brown pack, then turned it towards them to show the hook.

  It was Mitch’s parachute, still fully packed.

  When they reached Glider One, Des inspected it. Though the craft seemed undamaged, something was missing.

  The Glider’s parachute was gone! Des focused on the carabiner where it had been attached. Before he could say anything, he heard grunts from the fog.

  Everyone heard it; they all froze, except for Bearters, who released the leather thong from the trigger of his holstered Colt .45.

  More grunts, louder and closer. Whatever it was sounded menacingly big and threateningly active. Bearters eased out his pistol and cocked it.