Chapter 56

56

May 14, 7:45 P . M . ANAT

East Siberian Sea

From the bridge of the Polar King , Gray watched as Captain Kelly transformed his massive nuclear-powered icebreaker into a thirty-thousand-ton bulldozer—only one running in reverse.

"Ten minutes!" Byron Murphy shouted from his nav-station, counting down the time left to them. "We're crossing the five-mile mark."

Halfway to safety.

Gray stared past the bow, toward the spires of rock that marked Hyperborea. As the icebreaker reversed down the channel, the legend receded into the mists. He pictured the massive Poseidon torpedo and its warhead speeding toward there.

He was not the only one.

Tension was evident across the bridge. Sweat pebbled brows, small crucifixes were kissed, lips whispered in silent prayers. Only one of them seemed unperturbed, as if he had done this countless times.

"Hold steady," Kelly called out calmly, guiding his ship via exterior cameras.

Gray kept vigil on the starboard bridge wing. Its windows, front and back, allowed him to view the ship's bow and stern. He shared this spot with Kowalski and Seichan. Across the bridge, Tucker and Monk manned the portside wing, along with Marco and Kane, who had earned their place.

Everyone else was below deck, at the orders of the captain. Though, many of them were in the small med ward, where Harper was playing triage with the wounded.

Maybe I should be there, too .

He gripped a hanging strap to keep himself upright, his ankle throbbing and swollen in his boot. But he did not want to miss this.

"Maybe we shouldn't have scuttled that vessel after all," Kowalski said, staring past the stern to the Ivan Lyakhov , the Russian patrol boat.

Kowalski had warned them of this problem. Sabotaging the Lyakhov had served them earlier, but now it was an obstacle in their path.

The Russian boat sat in the channel carved by the Polar King . Its bow thrusters churned to either side, holding the craft in the center of the waterway. The massive icebreaker bore down on it, still running in reverse. There had been no time to try to turn the massive ship in the thick ice. Even now, every minute counted, which meant this union was going to be a rough one.

While the King had slowed as it neared the Russian ship, the icebreaker dared not lose too much speed. The huge ship swept through a thick crush of broken ice and small bergs. It was the debris left behind by the massive floe that had been blasted into the channel.

"Brace for impact!" Kelly yelled, broadcasting his message ship-wide. But this announcement was less for the King and more for the Lyakhov , which also heard his warning through the radio.

The bow of the Lyakhov swelled behind the icebreaker—then the King' s stern slammed into the front of the boat. Due to the icebreaker's momentum and its massive weight, the crash felt no worse than a speedbump. The King jolted, then shrugged off the impact.

The same was not true for the smaller patrol boat. Its bow crumpled and lifted, riding for a moment atop the breaker's stern. The two continued down the channel this way for a hundred yards, before the Lyakhov finally slid into the water.

"Engage second engine!" Kelly ordered. "There's no slowing from here, mates."

The Polar King picked up speed as the engine crew added the horsepower of the breaker's second nuclear powerplant. Past the King 's stern, the Lyakhov struggled to hold the center of the channel, having to rely solely on its bow thrusters on either side. The boat shimmied and swayed like a salsa dancer in the frigid water. The Russian boat dared not lose its line. If it slipped sideways, it would jam across the channel, trapping everyone.

To pull off this Russian ballet between the two huge ships, it required timing and trust across the two bridges. All their lives depended on mutual cooperation.

As a sign of good faith—a truce formed by necessity—Captain Turov had already been shuttled via helicopter to the Lyakhov , taking along his lieutenant and the archpriest. At this point, recriminations and punishments could wait.

Especially considering what they all faced.

Byron bellowed out the time and distance. "Five minutes to go. Seven miles out."

Gray searched Kelly's features to see if there was any information to be found there. But the captain remained stoic. Still, a single bead of sweat shone on his forehead. It was easy to read.

It'll be tight .

Making matters more nerve-racking was that no one knew for sure when the torpedo would hit. Their timetable was all guesswork. It could hit at any moment.

The Polar King sped along, no longer gaining speed.

This was all the engines had.

"Three minutes," Byron called out. "Eight miles."

No one acknowledged this, as the bridge crew grew breathless, smothered by the tension.

After another minute, Kelly waved an arm high. "That's it. Lock us down. No more sightseeing."

Storm shutters lowered over the windows. Then its louvres closed tight, cutting off the view. Before that happened, Gray noted the same was true over at the Lyakhov . When that warhead struck, its flash could blind instantly, even at this distance.

Kelly was taking no chances, considering the unknown variables.

"One minute," Byon announced, though his words were barely above a whisper. "Nine miles out."

Kelly nodded to the navigator. "That'll—"

The world brightened beyond the shutters. Every louvre stood out starkly, limned against a brilliance that shocked. It was still blinding, as if a sun had crashed before their bow.

It was also eerily quiet—then the world fell dark again.

In the silence, no one breathed. Then a sharp bang shook the ship, but it was no louder than a thunderclap. It was not the concussive world-shattering explosion shown in movies. A loud rumbling followed, rapidly growing in volume, sounding like a freight train running across the top of the icebreaker.

Winds buffeted and rattled the ship.

With the flash over, Kelly found his voice. "Open us up."

A button was hit.

The shutters remained down, but the louvres ratcheted wider.

Through the panoramic spread of the bow windows, a shocking sight revealed itself, dreadful in its power, stunning in its scope. Off in the distance, a fiery plume rolled into the sky. The fog banks fled to all sides, opening an ever-widening view, exposing that hellish heart.

Around that mushrooming cloud, ice shoved up into a huge wave, sweeping toward them and outward in all directions. At the top, its frozen crest shattered into massive, jagged pieces, becoming an icy gristmill, grinding across the top of the world.

"Maintain speed," Kelly said, gulping out his words as that monster pursued them.

The King and Lyakhov raced down the waterway.

But no one was fooled.

They would not escape the inevitable.

"Look!" Tucker called out, pointing directly across the bow.

The churning wave slowly lost some of its power, weakened by distance and the deepening water. Yet, not enough to keep it from reaching them.

Still, the channel that the Polar King had forged through the ice was full of open water. Past the bow, the dark blue trough cut like a knife through the ever-expanding circumference of the blast-driven wave. As the swell approached, it ripped the channel wider ahead of them, piling and pulling ice away.

"Hang tight!" Kelly warned.

The wave struck. The water lifted the bow high, tilting the boat, then dropping it down the far slope. Walls of ice swept to either side, spinning and grinding past them. The noise of its passage was worse than the nuclear blast. It ate at Gray's ears, accompanied by a mournful, deep-toned dissonance, like the death rattle of the world.

Then the surge was gone, rolling off into the distance, before eventually subsiding and sinking into the sea.

In its wake, the waters continued to rock. Ice bumped and scraped the hull.

Kelly radioed the other ship, checking on the state of the Lyakhov , but it wasn't necessary. A muffled cheering rose and echoed from the Russian ship. They had made it, too.

As the celebrations spread, Gray crossed to the bow windows with Seichan. She hooked an arm around his waist. They stared at the dark column that glowed at the heart of the fog-cleared skies. He pulled her closer, needing her warmth.

Together, they gazed at the fiery death of Hyperborea.

It was a reminder of a hard lesson.

Nothing lasts forever.

Not even legends.