Free Survivalist - 15 - Overlord by Jerry Ahern Page A

them, some still behind them, the defenders of Hekla counter-attacking now, Natalia and Paul pinned down. Natalia closed her eyes. “Where’s John,” she asked.
    In her self-imposed darkness, she heard Paul Rubenstein saying, “Where the hell is he?” Annie …
    Annie Rourke focused her concentration. If her father were in danger Natalia and Paul might be near by. Natalia … She whispered the word, “Natalia … Natalia … please, Natalia …”

Chapter Ten
    He was sealed in the crevasse. The ice could have been feet thick or only inches thick. He didn’t know which. Rourke stood, balanced on the handle of the Crain knife, his legs cramping because he couldn’t move them, his feet falling asleep, losing all sensation. He tried wiggling his toes inside his boots but with the added numbing effect of the cold, they could barely respond. With the A.G. Russell Sting IA he chiselled at the ice over his head, hammering at the butt of the knife with the Pachmayr gripped butt of the Metalifed and Mag-na-Ported Colt Python from the holster at his right hip. The ice was chipping away, but piteously slowly.
    The walls of ice groaned again. The last time they had made it such that he could not keep both shoulders level and still be able to move freely; this time it confined him still more.
    He stopped hammering, his strength, his very ability to raise his hands all but ebbed away. The next time the walls closed, he would be crushed or forced to drop downward, abandoning any hope of survival. But his will had not ebbed away.
    John Rourke could barely see, the darkness all but absolute now.
    He had never cared to gamble at cards or dice —life was
    too much of a gamble as it was, no matter how one planned ahead. And it was time again to gamble, the stakes all or nothing. If the ice were too thick —
    He blotted thoughts of defeat from his mind. Again, his thoughts focused on Sarah, Michael, Annie, Paul —and Natalia. He loved two women. He might never see either of them again.
    John Rourke wrapped the sling carefully around the blade of the Sting IA and pocketed it. Clinically, his years of firearms expertise summoned up, as though he were punching up a file in a computer. The .357 Magnum over the .45 ACP had the greatest hydrostatic shock value. It would be the Python then. He wasn’t looking to knock down the ice, but rather burst through it.
    He drew himself downward; ironically, it was easier now with the walls having closed in around him, the ice making him shiver with the cold.
    Rourke took his dark-lensed aviator style sunglasses from an interior pocket, placed them over his eyes. He was totally blinded. He removed the glasses, could barely see the section of ice he had chipped away at, memorized the range of motion needed and then replaced the glasses. As he clung to the ice wall, wedged there over the Crain knife which still supported his feet, John Rourke thrust the Python upward, the muzzle pointed by feel, the six-inch rocking gently in his fist as he fired, his ears ringing with it. He fired a double tap, chunks of ice toppling down around him. He fired another single round, then the last double tap, the cylinder empty.
    Rourke could no longer hear even his own breathing. His ears were filled with hollow roars.
    He removed the sunglasses, looking up. He could barely detect that some larger chunks of ice were shot away. Still no opening into the arctic night above him.
    Rourke worked the cylinder release catch, thumbing it rearward, with his trigger finger pushing out the cylinder,
    shaking the revolver over the abyss, the empty brass falling away. He felt in one of the musette bags, finding one of the Safariland speedloaders, ramming it by feel into the cylinder, against the ejector star, the cartridges dumping as he awkwardly held the revolver between his knees. He pocketed the speedloader. If he survived, it would be needed. He told himself he would survive.
    He closed the cylinder, taking the revolver again in