He now had the M–4’s stock unfolded and the stub barrel above the lip of the runner shoe. Without the protective overmitts, his gloved hands were turning to ice. He stared along the rudimentary sights.
Zuiden. Could he cream the sod?
Then — another break.
Bunny boots.
Yellow bunny boots padding past the runner — right in front of his face.
They stopped. The man was stooping to check under the sledge.
Cain waited till his pelvis was in sight and hit him with a burst.
A bellow. The surgeon crumpled, thudded on the snow, his gun bouncing on his chest, writhed, kicked. Cain riddled him and stopped it.
It didn’t look like Zuiden and he had no energy to check.
A whistle.
He returned the signal, crawled to the back of the sledge, saw nothing, got out from under, retreated back to the bunk van and climbed up.
Nothing all the way.
A cocoon of nothing.
How many more were hidden in this soup?
He edged to the front of the container. Hunt was still just visible in position behind the quad. She’d heard him coming, briefly turned. He pointed to the van, then the four-wheel bike, flung his arm wide.
She acknowledged.
He went in, gave the pair their marching orders. ‘You two on the bike. The two of us on the sled. Head straight along the sledges, then veer right and look for the blizz line. Go.’
The two crewmen got in position on seat and rear rack of the bike. Cain and Hunt kneeled in the sled, covering opposite sides, ready to fire.
The single cylinder four-stroke started.
No attack.
They churned to the end of the last line of sledges and headed into limbo. Duckworth, steering — hands and face freezing — put the 250-kilogram vehicle into a slide that almost capsized them.
Cain cursed, ‘Slow up,’ and clung to the lip of the sled. Where was the bleeding blizz line? If they….
It was wrapped around Duckworth’s waist.
He freed himself, swung them left, headed through the void. Except for the slender line on their right, vision was nil. The bike’s high-flotation tyres sprayed the sled with snow. As they approached the tower, they heard, above the racket of the quad, the welcome sound of engines from the ship.
Duckworth stopped them at the foot of the tower, which vanished up into nothing. Reilly, still crouched by his radio, pointed toward the noise. Duckworth turned the bike and went forward in low gear until the darker smear of the ship curved down to hang above them.
They reached the hatch, a shuddering lighter square in its belly with a crewman peering down. The winch-line hung from it, a metal triangle attached to the hook. Duckworth killed the bike, got his foot on the metal stirrup, grasped the wire and was hauled up.
Cain stood back to back with Hunt, gauntlets still off. His body was sluggish with cold and his hands felt like dead meat. Swirling snow and droning engines.
Last act, he thought.
The wire came down again and Snodgrass stepped into the stirrup.
Hunt pointed to the pouch on his leg. ‘Got more nails?’
‘Wrong mags.’ He gave her the half-used mag from his Spectre, tossed the gun and got ready with the Ingram.
They stood back to back, ready to engage.
Flynn’s face staring down, a handset held near his mouth. ‘What’s happening?’
Cain called, ‘They’re not after your men. They’re after us and the pope.’
‘Merciful heavens.’ Although Snodgrass was on board, he was letting the cable down again. ‘You’d better come up.’
Cain sent Hunt first.
Sporadic amplified crew-calls from above.
‘Switching to manual.’
‘Buoyancy?’
‘Equilibrium.’
‘Flippers?’
‘Elevators neutral and stern ballast control standing by.’
Hunt was up there and the cable coming down.
‘Clear away aft.’
‘Reporting clear.’
‘And reverse thrust.’
‘Slow astern.’
‘Release clamps.’
‘Ten. Twenty. Forty.’
‘Bow thruster and half left rudder.’
As he got his own foot in the stirrup, the shuddering above him ceased and the solid ice beneath him fell away. The huge envelope, no longer moored, was drifting astern and rising.
Flickers below. The surgeons had reached the tower, were firing up at the ship. Then he was too high to see anything but whiteness and the welcoming square of light above.
‘Clear.’
‘Forward thrust. Up ship.’
‘Twelve degrees.’
He was winched from the freezing slipstream into the bay. The hatch beneath him shut.
Calm — and the low-revving engines’ now muffled drone.
He stepped onto the vibrating floor of a cargo hold with surprisingly vertical walls and central carbon fibre web-struts travelling through floor and ceiling. Pallets secured at the rear. Doors fore and aft. Warm air wafting through floor vents. His ears popped. He felt light-headed.
Hunt stood in snow slush, holding onto a strut, her hood, mask, goggles off. She looked bushed and he wasn’t much better, couldn’t coordinate his movements.
Flynn said, ‘Welcome to Baby.’
‘You can say that again.’ He felt a sense of expansion, freedom. Oxygen deficiency? The symptoms were lack of self-criticism, euphoria. ‘They were firing up at us. You could have holes.’
A wave of frozen air as Snodgrass and two other men came through the rear door. They wore portable oxygen sets with small nose-masks.
Flynn said, ‘Keel officer and sparks — on damage control. You’re checking cells for bullet-holes.’ Snodgrass and one man went back out through the aft door. Flynn said to the remaining crewman, ‘Chief, sort these stowaways, will you. I’ll be on the flight deck.’ He hurried forward.
Cain presumed the remaining man was the airship’s engineer, asked him, ‘Will we lose much gas?’
‘No. It’s not under any pressure. We’re not bothered by small arms fire. And we carry instant patches. The hard part’s crawling around the catwalks and the frame in freezer suits.’ He hung his parka on a hook. ‘You’re going to need breathing gear. Get your kit off and come into the saloon.’
Hunt tried to shed her outer gear, too exhausted to work the zips and tabs. She said, ‘I’ve died and gone to heaven.’
The chief said, ‘Yes, Baby’s very comfortable — until she hits a storm.’
Cain dragged his gloves off to check his hands. Anything was better than the ice.
52
STORM WARNING
They struggled up the sloping deck toward the door ahead, grabbing for the wall-rails as the ship began to roll.
Hunt’s exquisite face, fine-drawn now and sallow, looked more than saintly enough for what she’d done. Cain decided she was quite a woman. She said, ‘Does our moving around affect things?’
‘Not when we cruise under power,’ the engineer told her. ‘The computer compensates for weight-shifts.’
‘I think I’m going to chuck.’
‘Means you’re seasick. This isn’t a plane. It’s a high-performance ship — same roll and pitch.’
The expansive saloon, probably designed for tourist travel, was stripped, utilitarian. Rime-rimmed windows flanking it revealed slowly drifting cloud. Although it wasn’t cold, Cain panted, starving for air. He lurched between alloy work benches used for mechanical and electronic repairs then got to a broad area, bare except for six canvas chairs. They were on braked swivel-mounts and positioned either side of a low table. A mural on the forward bulkhead showed a duck, rooster and a sheep. Its significance escaped him. Stairs rose to a second deck.