Free Beneath the Ice by Patrick Woodhead Page A

calls Jonathan by his surname – Katz. Don’t ask me why, but that’s the way he likes it. And just so you know, they haven’t spoken to each other in nearly a week. Fell out over the washing-up rota.’ Joel raised an eyebrow. ‘It’s the little things, huh?’
    ‘So I hear.’
    ‘Actually they’ll be OK, but that’s no thanks to the Russians. They’re real dicks when they’re drunk, and since breaking through to the lake they’ve been doing a lot of celebrating. They don’t really speak to outsiders much anyway.’ Joel paused, gently setting the book down on a nearby crate. ‘But we only need them to drive us to the mountain range. After that, it’ll be over to you.’
    Luca nodded thoughtfully, then pulled a notebook from his top pocket along with the folded map. ‘You said everything was already set up to extract the samples, right?’
    ‘Yeah. We had everything in place then the mother of all storms hit. You should have seen it. It was this massive front that came in from the coast.’
    As he spoke, Joel’s eyes blurred slightly, remembering the sheer ferocity of the wind.
    ‘Joel,’ Luca prompted, bringing him back to the present, ‘I need to figure out some timings here.’ He offered the other man the map showing the new route that Dedov had plotted. ‘The base commander said it’s about four hours by tractor to the edge of the mountains, then we have to find a way over. After that, I calculate it’s a six-kilometre trek across the lake floor just to get to the drill site.’
    ‘I’m not all that good with maps, but that sounds about right.’
    ‘So how long are you going to need to extract the samples?’
    Joel rubbed the end of his nose, turning his eyes skywards in thought. ‘We need to re-open the borehole then feed down the piping. If everything goes well, then I’d say no more than three hours. Like I said, all the hard work’s been done already.’
    Luca scratched down some timings on his notepad, when Joel’s hand shot out, stopping him mid-calculation.
    ‘I forgot to mention that we left two Ski-Doos at the drill site. They’d be perfect to drive us back across the lake, which should cut a few hours off the return journey.’
    ‘They in good condition?’
    Joel shrugged, suggesting that there was no guaranteeing anything left outside in Antarctica.
    ‘So what do you think?’ he asked, trying to decipher Luca’s notes.
    ‘Crossing the mountain range is the big unknown, but assuming we find a route, then we’re looking at nearly a whole day’s worth of travel.’ Luca looked up into Joel’s eyes, which were magnified by the lens of his glasses. ‘You think the others are capable of that kind of journey? It’ll be tough.’
    ‘Andy and Katz may bicker like children, but deep down they’re both committed to this project. They’ve been working on it since its inception. That’s three years’ worth of work, so as much as they’ll moan about their sore legs, they know how important this is.’
    ‘And you?’
    Joel cast his eyes down to the book lying beside them. ‘Put it this way – if I have to read that bloody book one more time, I’ll be joining Hiroko up in Module Four.’
    Luca simply waited for an explanation, having realised that Joel hadn’t met anyone new for a long time and seemed to refer to every facet of the base as if it were common knowledge.
    ‘Oh, yeah, you don’t know about her, do you? She’s the other scientist from the Japanese programme, but since the accident she’s really flipped. Now she’s refusing even to step outside the base. I mean, we’re talking full-blown agoraphobia and it’s got so bad that she can’t look outside the main windows without her legs starting to shake.’ Joel paused, raising an eyebrow. ‘Frankly, I don’t know how things could have got so messed up so quickly.’
    Breaking away from Luca’s gaze, his eyes passed across the interior of the room as if the answer were to be found somewhere amongst the