Deception Point (27 page)

Tolland and Rachel were now one.

Joined at the hip.

From between them, the loose tether trailed off across the snow to the struggling Corky . . . and ten yards farther to the empty clip beside Norah Mangor.

Norah is already gone,
Tolland told himself.
Nothing you can do.

The attackers were crouched over Corky’s writhing body now, packing a handful of snow, and preparing to stuff it down Corky’s throat. Tolland knew they were almost out of time.

Tolland grabbed the folded balloon from Rachel. The fabric was as light as tissue paper—and virtually indestructible.
Here goes nothing.
“Hold on!”

“Mike?” Rachel said. “What—”

Tolland hurled the pad of wadded Mylar into the air over their heads. The howling wind snatched it up and spread it out like a parachute in a hurricane. The sheath filled instantly, billowing open with a loud snap.

Tolland felt a wrenching yank on his harness, and he knew in an instant he had grossly underestimated the power of the katabatic wind. Within a fraction of a second, he and Rachel were half airborne, being dragged down the glacier. A moment later, Tolland felt a jerk as his tether drew taut on Corky Marlinson. Twenty yards back, his terrified friend was yanked out from under his stunned attackers, sending one of them tumbling backward. Corky let out a blood-curdling scream as he too accelerated across the ice, barely missing the overturned sled, then fishtailing inward. A second rope trailed limp beside Corky . . . the rope that had been connected to Norah Mangor.

Nothing you can do,
Tolland told himself.

Like a tangled mass of human marionettes, the three bodies
skimmed down the glacier. Ice pellets went sailing by, but Tolland knew the attackers had missed their chance. Behind him, the white-clad soldiers faded away, shrinking to illuminated specks in the glow of the flares.

Tolland now felt the ice ripping beneath his padded suit with relentless acceleration, and the relief at having escaped faded fast. Less than two miles directly ahead of them, the Milne Ice Shelf came to an abrupt end at a precipitous cliff—and beyond it . . . a hundred-foot drop to the lethal pounding surf of the Arctic Ocean.

M
arjorie Tench was smiling as she made her way downstairs toward the White House Communications Office, the computerized broadcast facility that disseminated press releases formulated upstairs in the Communications Bullpen. The meeting with Gabrielle Ashe had gone well. Whether or not Gabrielle was scared enough to turn over an affidavit admitting the affair was uncertain, but it sure as hell was worth a try.

Gabrielle would be smart to bail out on him,
Tench thought. The poor girl had no idea just how hard Sexton was about to fall.

In a few hours, the President’s meteoric press conference was going to cut Sexton down at the knees. That was in the bank. Gabrielle Ashe, if she cooperated, would be the death blow that sent Sexton crawling off in shame. In the morning, Tench could release Gabrielle’s affidavit to the press along with footage of Sexton denying it.

One-two punch.

After all, politics was not just about winning the election, it was about winning decisively—having the momentum to carry out one’s vision. Historically, any president who squeaked into
office on a narrow margin accomplished much less; he was weakened right out of the gate, and Congress never seemed to let him forget it.

Ideally, the destruction of Senator Sexton’s campaign would be comprehensive—a two-pronged attack sacking
both
his politics and his ethics. This strategy, known in Washington as the “high-low,” was stolen from the art of military warfare.
Force the enemy to battle on two fronts.
When a candidate possessed a piece of negative information about his opponent, he often waited until he had a second piece and went public with both simultaneously. A double-edged attack was always more effective than a single shot, particularly when the dual attack incorporated separate aspects of his campaign—the first against his politics, the second against his character. Rebuttal of a
political
attack took logic, while rebuttal of a
character
attack took passion; disputing both simultaneously was an almost impossible balancing act.

Tonight, Senator Sexton would find himself scrambling to extract himself from the political nightmare of an astounding NASA triumph, and yet his plight would deepen considerably if he were forced to defend his NASA position while being called a liar by a prominent female member of his staff.

Arriving now at the doorway of the Communications Office, Tench felt alive with the thrill of the fight. Politics was war. She took a deep breath and checked her watch. 6:15
P.M.
The first shot was about to be fired.

She entered.

The Communications Office was small not for lack of room, but for lack of necessity. It was one of the most efficient mass communications stations in the world and employed a staff of only five people. At the moment, all five employees stood over their banks of electronic gear looking like swimmers poised for the starting gun.

They are ready,
Tench saw in their eager gazes.

It always amazed her that this tiny office, given only two hours head start, could contact more than
one third
of the world’s civilized population. With electronic connections to literally tens of thousands of global news sources—from the largest television conglomerates to the smallest hometown newspapers—the
White House Communications Office could, at the touch of a few buttons, reach out and touch the world.

Fax-broadcast computers churned press releases into the in-boxes of radio, television, print, and Internet media outlets from Maine to Moscow. Bulk e-mail programs blanketed online news wires. Telephone auto-dialers phoned thousands of media content managers and played recorded voice announcements. A breaking news Web page provided constant updates and preformatted content. The “live-feed-capable” news sources—CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, foreign syndicates—would be assaulted from all angles and promised free, live television feeds. Whatever else these networks were airing would come to a screeching halt for an emergency presidential address.

Full penetration
.

Like a general inspecting her troops, Tench strode in silence over to the copy desk and picked up the printout of the “flash release” that now sat loaded in all the transmission machines like cartridges in a shotgun.

When Tench read it, she had to laugh quietly to herself. By usual standards, the release loaded for broadcast was heavy-handed—more of an advertisement than an announcement—but the President had ordered the Communications Office to pull out all the stops. And that they had. This text was perfect—keyword-rich and content light. A deadly combination. Even the news wires that used automated “keyword-sniffer” programs to sort their incoming mail would see multiple flags on this one:

From: White House Communications Office

Subject: Urgent Presidential Address

The
President of the United States
will be holding an
urgent
press conference tonight at 8:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time from the White House briefing room. The topic of his announcement is currently
classified
. Live A/V feeds will be available via customary outlets.

Laying the paper back down on the desk, Marjorie Tench looked around the Communications Office and gave the staff an impressed nod. They looked eager.

Lighting a cigarette, she puffed a moment, letting the anticipation build. Finally, she grinned. “Ladies and gentlemen. Start your engines.”

A
ll logical reasoning had evaporated from Rachel Sexton’s mind. She held no thoughts for the meteorite, the mysterious GPR printout in her pocket, Ming, the horrific attack on the ice sheet. There was one matter at hand.

Survival.

The ice skimmed by in a blur beneath her like an endless, sleek highway. Whether her body was numb with fear or simply cocooned by her protective suit, Rachel did not know, but she felt no pain. She felt nothing.

Yet.

Lying on her side, attached to Tolland at the waist, Rachel lay face-to-face with him in an awkward embrace. Somewhere ahead of them, the balloon billowed, fat with wind, like a parachute on the back of a dragster. Corky trailed behind, swerving wildly like a tractor trailer out of control. The flare marking the spot where they had been attacked had all but disappeared in the distance.

The hissing of their nylon Mark IX suits on the ice grew higher and higher in pitch as they continued to accelerate. She had no idea how fast they were going now, but the wind was at least sixty miles an hour, and the frictionless runway beneath them seemed to be racing by faster and faster with every passing second. The impervious Mylar balloon apparently had no intentions of tearing or relinquishing its hold.

We need to release,
she thought. They were racing away from one deadly force—directly toward another.
The ocean is probably less than a mile ahead now!
The thought of icy water brought back terrifying memories.

The wind gusted harder, and their speed increased. Somewhere behind them Corky let out a scream of terror. At this speed, Rachel knew they had only a few minutes before they were dragged out over the cliff into the frigid ocean.

Tolland was apparently having similar thoughts because he was now fighting with the payload clasp attached to their bodies.

“I can’t unhook us!” he yelled. “There’s too much tension!”

Rachel hoped a momentary lull in the wind might give Tolland some slack, but the katabatic pulled on with relentless uniformity. Trying to help, Rachel twisted her body and rammed the toe cleat of one of her crampons into the ice, sending a rooster tail of ice shards into the air. Their velocity slowed ever so slightly.

“Now!” she yelled, lifting her foot.

For an instant the payload line on the balloon slackened slightly. Tolland yanked down, trying to take advantage of the loose line to maneuver the payload clip out of their carabiners. Not even close.

“Again!” he yelled.

This time they both twisted against one another and rammed their toe prongs into the ice, sending a double plume of ice into the air. This slowed the contraption more perceptibly.

“Now!”

On Tolland’s cue, they both let up. As the balloon surged forward again, Tolland rammed his thumb into the carabiner latch and twisted the hook, trying to release the clasp. Although closer this time, he still needed more slack. The carabiners, Norah had bragged, were first-rate, Joker safety clips, specifically crafted with an extra loop in the metal so they would never release if there were any tension on them at all.

Killed by safety clips,
Rachel thought, not finding the irony the least bit amusing.

“One more time!” Tolland yelled.

Mustering all her energy and hope, Rachel twisted as far as she could and rammed both of her toes into the ice. Arching her back, she tried to lift all her weight onto her toes. Tolland followed her lead until they were both angled roughly on their stomachs, the connection at their belt straining their harnesses.
Tolland rammed his toes down and Rachel arched farther. The vibrations sent shock waves up her legs. She felt like her ankles were going to break.

“Hold it . . . hold it . . .” Tolland contorted himself to release the Joker clip as their speed decreased. “Almost . . .”

Rachel’s crampons snapped. The metal cleats tore off of her boots and went tumbling backward into the night, bouncing over Corky. The balloon immediately lurched forward, sending Rachel and Tolland fishtailing to one side. Tolland lost his grasp on the clip.

“Shit!”

The Mylar balloon, as if angered at having been momentarily restrained, lurched forward now, pulling even harder, dragging them down the glacier toward the sea. Rachel knew they were closing fast on the cliff, although they faced danger even before the hundred-foot drop into the Arctic Ocean. Three huge snow berms stood in their path. Even protected by the padding in the Mark IX suits, the experience of launching at high speed up and over the snow mounds filled her with terror.

Fighting in desperation with their harnesses, Rachel tried to find a way to release the balloon. It was then that she heard the rhythmic ticking on the ice—the rapid-fire staccato of lightweight metal on the sheet of bare ice.

The ax.

In her fear, she had entirely forgotten the ice ax attached to the rip cord on her belt. The lightweight aluminum tool was bouncing along beside her leg. She looked up at the payload cable on the balloon. Thick, heavy-duty braided nylon. Reaching down, she fumbled for the bouncing ax. She grasped the handle and pulled it toward her, stretching the elastic rip cord. Still on her side, Rachel struggled to raise her arms over her head, placing the ax’s serrated edge against the thick cord. Awkwardly, she began sawing the taut cable.

“Yes!” Tolland yelled, fumbling now for his own ax.

Sliding on her side, Rachel was stretched out, her arms above her, sawing at the taut cable. The line was strong, and the individual nylon strands were fraying slowly. Tolland gripped his own ax, twisted, raised his arms over his head, and tried to saw from underneath in the same spot. Their banana blades
clicked together as they worked in tandem like lumberjacks. The rope began fraying on both sides now.

We’re going to do it,
Rachel thought.
This thing is going to break!

Suddenly, the silver bubble of Mylar before them swooped upward as if it had hit an updraft. Rachel realized to her horror that it was simply following the contour of the land.

They had arrived.

The berms.

The wall of white loomed only an instant before they were on it. The blow to Rachel’s side as they hit the incline drove the wind from her lungs and wrenched the ax from her hand. Like a tangled water-skier being dragged up over a jump, Rachel felt her body dragged up the face of the berm and launched. She and Tolland were suddenly catapulted in a dizzying upward snarl. The trough between the berms spread out far beneath them, but the frayed payload cable held fast, lifting their accelerated bodies upward, carrying them clear out over the first trough. For an instant, she glimpsed what lay ahead. Two more berms—a short plateau—and then the dropoff to the sea.