Lex and Miller heard shouts as they emerged from the frozen mess hall.
“Over here! You’re not going to believe this.”
It was Sebastian calling. Hearing him, Quinn and his partner Connors dropped what they were doing. Weyland hurried forward, too, with Max Stafford at his side.
Lex’s gaze followed the billionaire as he moved across the snow-covered ice. He was moving with some difficulty, she noted. He seemed breathless and was leaning heavily on his ice pole. Yet when he spoke, his voice had lost none of its forcefulness. “What is this, Dr. De Rosa?”
Sebastian led all of them around the corner of a dilapidated processing factory and pointed. There, in the ice, was a gaping hole ten feet across. The pit was perfectly round, and if there was a bottom, it was lost in the shadows far below.
Perplexed, Weyland looked at Quinn, then at the mobile drilling platforms that were still being unpacked and assembled.
“How the hell did this get here?”
Quinn crouched on one knee and examined the pit. “It’s drilled at a perfect fifty-five-degree angle.” He pulled off his bulky glove and ran his hand along the sides of the shaft. The icy walls were perfectly smooth—almost slick to the touch.
Lex peered over Quinn’s shoulder. “How far down does it go?”
Sven ignited a flare and tossed it into the pit. They watched it bounce off the smooth walls and fall for many seconds, until the flare’s phosphorescent brilliance was swallowed by the dark.
“My God,” Weyland said softly.
Max Stafford looked at Dr. De Rosa. “Are we expected?”
Weyland dismissed that notion with a wave of his hand. “It must be another team. I’m not the only one with a satellite over Antarctica. Maybe the Chinese… the Russians…”
“I’m not so sure,” said Lex, staring into the abyss.
“What other explanation could there be?” Weyland insisted.
Lex looked around at the ghost town and the barren glacial ice fields all around it. “Where is their base camp? Their equipment? And where are they?”
Max Stafford shrugged. “Maybe they are already down there.”
Once again Quinn crouched down to examine the mouth of the shaft. “Look at the ice. There are no ridges, no bore marks. The walls are perfectly smooth—this wasn’t drilled.”
“How was it done?” asked Lex.
Quinn looked up at Lex. “Thermal equipment of some kind.”
Weyland nodded. “Like yours.”
“More advanced,” Quinn replied. “Incredibly powerful. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
Quinn activated his flashlight and turned its beam on a building close to the pit. A large circular hole had been cut into the structure, vaporizing the stout wooden walls and melting the metal machinery inside the building. It was clear from the trajectory that whatever had cut through the ice had also sliced through the structure.
“I told you I’m not the only one with a satellite. It must be another team,” said Weyland. He glanced at Quinn. “Whoever it is, they clearly have better equipment than we do.”
“Listen,” Quinn replied, standing up to the billionaire. “Whoever cut this, sliced through pack ice, the building, the beams and the solid metal machinery. We should find out what cut this before we proceed.”
Max Stafford locked eyes with Quinn. “And I thought you were the best.”
Quinn bristled. He rose, squarely challenging Stafford.
“I am the best,” he said.
Weyland stepped past Quinn and stared into the pit. “They must be down there.”
Lex examined the ice at the mouth of the hole. “No. Look at the ice. There’s no ridges… nobody’s been down there.”
Weyland frowned. “When does the Big Bird satellite pass over again?”
Max Stafford checked his watch. “Eleven minutes ago.”
“Get on the horn to New Mexico. Get me that data.”
While Max downloaded the satellite reports, Quinn moved one of the Hagglunds forward, directing its spotlights into the pit.
Miller and some of the roughnecks gathered to peer into the hole, but Connors waved them away.
“Don’t want nobody fallin’ in. Gettin’ them out again would be a goddamn waste of time.”
Weyland was leaning against the vehicle when Max Stafford appeared, computer printouts and satellite images in hand. He spread the papers across the hood of the Hagglunds as Quinn, Sebastian, Lex, Miller, and Verheiden gathered around.
“There it is, clear as day,” said Weyland. His fingers traced the red line all the way across the map, right down to the interconnecting squares.
“And this time yesterday?”
Max unfolded a second printout. Weyland studied it. “Nothing.”
Sebastian squinted at the map. “So whoever cut this shaft did it in the last twenty-four hours.”
“That’s just not possible,” said Quinn.
“Well, possible or not, it’s here. It’s done,” said Sebastian.
Sebastian and Quinn locked eyes, and a vein appeared on Quinn’s tanned forehead.
“I’m telling you there’s no team and no machine in the world that could cut to this depth in twenty-four hours.”
Charles Weyland stepped between them. “The only way we’re going to know for sure is to get down there and find out.”
Then Weyland turned to face the rest of the party. “Well, gentlemen,” he said loud enough for everyone to hear. “It seems we may be engaged in a race. If it’s a competition, it’s one I don’t intend to lose—”
Weyland coughed. Suddenly he doubled over, spasms wracking his body. Max held his shoulders as Weyland choked back the urge and regained control of his breathing.
“Okay, let’s get to work. I want to know what’s down there and I want to know in the next few hours.” Weyland’s voice was weaker, but his eyes had lost none of their spark.
As Weyland trudged to the door of the Hagglunds, he reached out and squeezed Max Stafford’s arm. “There are no prizes for coming in second,” Weyland rasped. “Do you understand, Max?”
Max nodded once. “My men are ready, sir.”
The area around the pit swarmed with activity. More Hagglunds had been moved up, and their spotlights turned the never-ending dark into day. Teams of roughnecks unloaded coils of rope, and a multiple winch-and-pulley system mounted on a metal tripod had been assembled directly over the mouth of the pit.
Lex was hammering pitons into the ice when Miller arrived, dragging a pallet packed with his chemical analysis gear.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Safety lines,” Lex replied. “It’s a long way down… don’t want to lose any of you.”
As Miller unpacked his gear, he took off his wool cap and scratched his head.
“Put your hat back on.”
“Huh?”
“Your hat,” Lex said. “Put it back on.”
“It itches.”
Lex paused, lowering her hammer. “I saw a man lose both his ears from frostbite,” she said matter-of-factly. “With the ear canal exposed, you can see a full inch inside your head… all the way to the eardrum.”
Lex smiled sweetly, tucked the hammer into her tool belt, and strolled away. Miller pulled his hat over his ears.
Dodging roughnecks, Lex crossed the lighted area to the lead Hagglunds. She opened the door to find Charles Weyland inside. He was alone, gulping oxygen from a portable tank. He lowered the clear plastic mask when Lex entered the vehicle.
“You’ve caught me a little… indisposed,” he croaked, humbled.
Lex closed the door and sat down by his side.
“How bad is it?”
Weyland looked at her through eyes hollowed by chronic pain. “Bad.”
“There’s no room for sick men on this expedition.”
“My doctors tell me the worst is behind me.”
Lex shook her head. “You’re not a very good liar, Mr. Weyland. Stay on the ship. We’ll update you at the top of every hour.”
Crossing the cabin, Weyland concealed the oxygen bottle in a storage bin. When he faced Lex again, some of the fire had returned to his eyes.
“You know,” he began, “when you get sick you think about your life and how you’re going to be remembered. You know what I realized would happen when I go, which will be very soon? A ten-percent fall in Weyland Industries share prices… maybe twelve, though I may be flattering myself…”
Weyland slumped into a seat. Concern furrowed his broad forehead.
“The dip in stock prices should last about a week, long enough for the board and the Street to realize they can get along perfectly well without me. And then that will be that. Forty years on this earth and nothing to show for it.”
Weyland nodded toward the activity outside.
“This is my chance to leave a legacy. To leave my mark—”
“Even if it kills you?”
The billionaire reached out and squeezed her arm. Lex felt the failing grip of a dying man.
“You won’t let that happen,” he said.
“You can’t go,” Lex replied.
“I need this.”
Lex sighed. “I’ve heard this speech before. My dad broke his leg seven hundred feet from the summit of Mount Rainier. He was like you—he wouldn’t go back or let us stop…”
She paused as the memories returned, and with them the sadness.
“We reached the top and he opened a bottle of champagne. I had my first drink with my dad at fourteen thousand four hundred feet…. On the way down he developed a blood clot in his leg that traveled to his lung. He suffered for four hours before dying twenty minutes from the base camp.” Lex swiped the dew from her cheek.
Weyland touched her shoulder. “Do you think that’s the last thing your dad remembered? The pain? Or drinking champagne with his daughter fourteen thousand feet in the air?”