Exit Alpha (36 page)

W
hen he had Hunt fed, thawed and patched up, he called the driver on the interphone and suggested he stop for food. But the man, frightened by the shooting, refused and hauled them on.

He left the pope with the swaddled, sleeping Hunt and dragged the dead onto the catwalks . . . Raul, Eve, Nina — naked except for her socks — Mullins, the three from the traverse crew and Zia with the knife still a feature of his face. He would have jettisoned them except there was enough garbage on the continent already. Cold, tired, mind shutting down, he retreated inside.

He swabbed the blood stains back to smears, stuffed things back on shelves like some crazed housewife, then collapsed on a bunk and slept.

A jerk in the cable woke him. They’d stopped.

Shouting outside.

For the first time it struck him that the bodies would startle civilians. He peered through the small half-iced window, saw the other traverse, now uncoupled, and six gesticulating men.

He said, ‘I’ll try and sort this. You two lie low for now.’ He placed the burp guns and the sniper’s rifle out of sight on a top bunk, dragged on his parka and limped out.

Hooded masked faces stared up at him. He adopted the right body language, submissive, nonthreatening. ‘Your crew are dead as you can see. Not my fault. I shot the man who shot them. He’s back on the plateau.’

A big-framed man who seemed to be in charge stepped forward. ‘So don’t tell me. You’re from the EXIT base?’ The furious voice was Irish/American.

‘Escaping the place. Been a lot going down.’

‘That the best you can do?’ He waved an arm at the carnage.

‘To fill you in . . .’ He ticked the bodies off, told them the general history. How he’d been their prisoner, counterattacked.

The man’s expression was invisible but his indignant voice said it all. ‘This is a
private expedition
.’

‘Life’s a bitch.’

The other men stood warily as if expecting an ambush. None of them was armed.

‘Just three left alive,’ he told them. ‘Me, a woman and an old man.’

A chorus of angry comments. But no off-colour words, which was odd. What were they? Christian Outreach? They kept turning around to gaze at the girl’s provocative body, the skin now grey, the pubic hair a triangle of frost, the small nipples pointing to the sky.

He shrugged again, starting to shiver. ‘Could we discuss this inside?’

Three men warily followed him up the steps. Two stayed outside the van while the leader cautiously entered. The sight of an old man and a stunning woman reassured him. He pushed out again and gave his backup the all-clear. ‘Check the other vans, then get back to it. We’ve got to finish tonight. And line up the sledges. Met says we’re due for a blow.’

The big man returned, took off his headgear, revealing himself as around fifty with a strong face and reddish hair. Cain introduced himself as Ray, the pope and Hunt as John and Karen.

‘Peter Reilly, ground crew controller. Dear God, this is a terrible business.’

Cain gave the story again, while Hunt and the pope confirmed it. They regretted the loss of his men, insisted they were friendly, while the flabbergasted Reilly listened. During it, they heard sledges uncoupled and later were shunted backwards. It took time for Reilly to vent his protests and be persuaded by truth, lies and blandishments that they were other than rogues and marauders. ‘So what do we do with the dead?’ The man, his psychology massaged, finally aired the question nagging him.

‘I’m happy to drop our lot down a slot. But keep your lot if you want them.’

‘It’s incumbent upon us to bring them back to their families for Christian burial. Terrible business. Terrible. And that poor, poor girl.’

‘We were all very fond of her.’ Cain faked sincerity while Hunt rolled her eyes.

‘Why didn’t you cover her? It’s indecent.’

‘True,’ Cain said. ‘Not enough oxygen and the brain’s been drifting a bit. I’ll do it. And what are you people up to? Or is it better we don’t know?’

He looked affronted. ‘It’s perfectly legitimate. We’re part of the Patrick Flynn expedition.’

It told him nothing. ‘Uh-huh.’

‘We’re erecting the tower for resupply. Enormous project.’

‘What project?’

‘Pole to Pole!’ He pointed to the inscription on a chair. ‘A magnificent demonstration to the world. I have to go now.’

‘Can I help?’

‘Not unless you’re a mechanic or qualified rigger?’

He shook his head.

‘Well, there’s one thing you could do. Cook up a mess of chow. Enough for us all. We’ll need it in two hours.’

‘You’ve got it.’

Reilly rose, donned his headgear. ‘This van’s now powered by the genny so the shower should work in an hour. You’re welcome to have one but keep it short. Two minutes and out.’ As he left he called back, ‘And I’d thank you to cover that girl.’

Hunt said, ‘What’s with that guy?’

Cain shrugged. ‘I’d better do a recce.’

The pope, tired of his long confinement, asked if he could go too. Cain made sure he put on all possible clothing including three sets of gloves, two sets of socks, a woollen undersuit over his double set of thermals, windproofs, polar hat, mask, balaclava and goggles. They left Hunt in the warmth of the van and braved the searing air.

The pope looked down at Raul’s body. ‘No one sillier than a clever man.’ Then at Nina and the others. ‘God forgive them. Why did you line them up like a morgue? No wonder the man was upset.’

‘I couldn’t think straight — was out of it.’ Cain helped him off the sledge, offered his arm for support.

‘What an astonishing sense of space.’ The pope stared at the endless white desert, a mournful sight now, in the twilight.

The sledges were parked crosswind in lines of three — a defence against drifts and blizzards. Cables snaked from generator vans to power them. But the sound of generators was drowned by dozers. The sun was diminishing by twelve minutes each day and, by midwinter, would be an hour of apricot blush on the horizon. By now the two huge Cats should have been shut down for the night with battery blankets on, sump and coolant heaters plugged in. So why, he wondered, were they still working?

He steered the wheezing priest around the first line of sledges toward the noise.

The dozers, some distance from them and dwarfed by the plateau, fussed like beetles around a prefabricated cone-shaped structure of heavy metal pipes. From the apex a mast projected high above the snow. The support seemed set into the ice and, from it, low guy-wires stretched to belays. One dozer, headlights blazing, was using a crane-like structure, mounted behind its blade, to lift a girder into a trench. Shackled to the centre of the girder was a guy-wire. Men with wrenches stood near the hole, directing the move.

The pope panted, ‘Is it for drilling?’

It was hard to see in fading light. ‘Don’t think so.’

The top of the structure was fitted with a half-sphere of metal that had some kind of inner mechanism and seemed mounted on a swivel. Cables hung down from it, one attached to a winch at the base. Near the mast was an empty sledge and another packed with equipment — wire crates holding tall pressure bottles, fuel drums, propane cylinders, a compressor, rolls of hosing, a motorised pump and a pile of canvas bags. They watched as the dozer pushed snow into the trench around the girder, piled more into a mound above it then rolled over it to compact it.

A megabucks traverse to put up some tower? What was going on here? He said, ‘Want to look around some more?’

‘Too cold,’ John puffed, turning to go back. ‘Was good . . . to get out . . . but now . . . have to cook.’

They walked back past a man erecting a blizz line between the tower and the encampment. He called, ‘Could be nil tomorrow, folks.’ He was referring to visibility.

‘What’s the tower for?’ Cain asked.

‘For Baby.’ He continued hitting in the post. ‘The belaying and guying’s the hard bit. Down here it’s got to be strong. You should see the specs.’

Cain left the pope in the van, sorting out packets of pasta, and went to check on Hunt. He covered the naked Nina with a sleeping bag then walked back to the bunk sledge. When he’d clumped up to its landing he rested on the rail for a moment and stared at the merciless landscape, trying to fathom what all this meant.

He’d called himself an exile, like the first Muslims. Why did that recur to him now? First an exile. Now a castaway. He’d lost everything — except John. When you lost everything you began to live, they said. The blessing of being near the pope was worth all the rest.

As he entered the warmth and light of the bunk van, Hunt sat up. ‘What’s happening?’

‘They’re building a bloody great tower.’ He examined her face. Her nose and cheeks looked better.

‘For drilling?’

‘No idea. It’s just a heavily guyed stalk. You should see the cables on it. How are your hands and feet?’

‘Feet are okay.’ She pulled off one of her gloves to expose a swollen hand. ‘Stings like hell.’

‘But looking good.’

‘You got me in time.’ Her seamless frown. ‘Ready for a threat assessment?’

‘Shoot.’

‘Before we left the Hagg, we heard them radio their base about finding us. They would have monitored that at Alpha.’

‘Agree.’

‘Then they veered. That could have meant another transmission. Reilly knew we were EXIT. So Vanqua could know we’re here.’

‘. . . And have a fix on the trav. So why hasn’t he attacked?’

‘Don’t know. But if the weather holds, Zuiden could fly in any time.’ She shook her head sadly. ‘LOYALTY TO THE CAUSE IS STRENGTH! What happened to us, Cain?’

‘Slipped a cog?’

‘I’m close to my event horizon.’

He sat on the bunk beside her. ‘No training like a near-death experience.’

‘I’ve been chewing things over for hours.’ She stared at her hand. ‘I thought I could handle anything emotionally.’

‘Unemotionally, you mean. You were raised an emotional cripple, then landed with a sociopath.’

‘Well, it hasn’t worked. I mean, Raul dead, after all I’ve been through with him, all I’ve had to half-believe. Then Ronnie knocked out.’

‘You can’t pretend you cared for her.’

‘There were times I could have throttled her. But she was a marvellous person. Of course I bloody cared for her. Was just too up myself to show it.’

‘Take it easy, soldier. You’ve been through hell and this air makes us pea-brains.’

‘Even you loved Ronnie. What a fool I was. I didn’t know what I had.’

‘Confirmed.’

She stared at the wall. Her eyes brimmed. ‘When you got under her crust she was so warm. Am I right about her being alive?’

‘Nice theory but — no.’

‘Then . . . EXIT. Destroyed. And I’m typecast as the trigger for it. Now they’re going to take us out. So what’s it all been for?’

‘My situation analysis won’t help.’

‘You’re a Grade Four. You’re all I’ve got left. Please, I’m in damage control. What happened to us, Cain?’

‘Simple. Everything becomes its own opposite. All it takes is time.’

‘Oh Jesus.’ She turned her head away.

‘Sorry,
petite soeur
. Sometimes it’s better not to ask. Got to go. I’m on kitchen detail.’ He turned her head back gently. ‘Remember, no combat-ready unit ever passed inspection. Now I suggest a nice hot shower before dinner.’

A brave smile.

TRAINING LEADS TO COURAGE. He’d never seen her smile. On her pre-Raphaelite face it looked odd.

He kissed her hair. ‘I feel I’ve just met you.’

He left to help the pope with the meal.

* * *

The men came in for dinner, exhausted and ravenous. Stripped of outer clothing, they became basic types who seemed remarkably well behaved, although the smell of food and the warmth provoked their banter. But when Hunt joined them, they were gobsmacked to be confronted with such a superb-looking woman in that void. Their talk trailed off and they ate in uncomfortable silence.

‘So,’ Cain said to break it, ‘we still don’t know what you’re doing. What’s the tower for? What’s this “Baby” thing on the chairs? And who’s this?’ He pointed to a framed photo on the cooking alcove wall showing an impressive man wearing a naval commander’s uniform. The caption read: ‘Kapitänleutnant Martin Dietrich, commander of L.22 and L.42.’

‘Dietrich?’ Reilly exploded. ‘One of the
greats
.’

‘So what did he do?’

‘What didn’t he?’ The man’s bombast revealed everything but facts. ‘Martin Dietrich — the World War One Zeppelin commander.’

The pope’s lopsided smile. ‘That construction outside is for . . . an airship?’

‘It’s a docking mast for Baby. She’s circling the world via the poles. Surely you’ve heard?’

Cain scratched his head. ‘Baby’s a blimp?’

Reilly stiffened at the slur and his Greek chorus darkly muttered. Cain had once suffered a like reaction when he’d called an enthusiast’s model railway a ‘train set’. ‘She’s not a rubber cow. She’s a
ship
. Rigid frame, high-tech, high gross gas cell volume. Internal cabin. Bow thruster. Carbon fibre construction. Vectoring ducted propellers. Latest diesel rotary engines. Fibre optic fly-by-wire. Computer-assisted stabilisation . . .’