Chapter 32

Kīlauea Rim, Hawai‘i

Saturday, April 26, 2025

Time to eruption: 76 hours

Mac had ended up postponing his dinner with Rebecca Cruz the night before. He'd asked for a raincheck and headed back to the office, where he'd pulled a college-like all-nighter with Jenny and Rick Ozaki and Kenny Wong. They'd finally left HVO around four o'clock in the morning. Somehow Mac had managed to get to sleep around five.

But an hour later, for some reason, he was wide awake. When he came out of the shower, he saw he'd missed a call from the Military Reserve. He was about to return it when Jenny phoned and told him she'd be at his house in fifteen minutes. The army had called her when they couldn't reach Mac.

"Our presence is requested, even though it didn't sound like a request," Jenny said. "The guy even used the word stat."

"Where are we going?" Mac asked.

Jenny said, "The Ice Tube."

"They say why?" Mac said.

"Colonel Briggs's man said it was easier to show us than tell us," Jenny said. Then she added, "You get any sleep?"

"‘Ain't no slumber party,'" Mac said. "‘Got no time for catching z's.'"

"Another one of your old songs?"

"You calling Bon Jovi old?"

"I know he's cute," she said, "but he looks like my dad now."

It was a short ride from Mac's house to the Military Reserve. The guy who'd called Jenny was the same sergeant who'd driven Mac and Briggs to the Ice Tube the day before, Matthew Iona. He met them at the base, dressed in fatigues, and they all changed into what Mac thought of as their spacesuits and got into Iona's jeep.

"You ready to tell me what this is all about?" Mac asked.

"It's like I told Dr. Kimura, sir. It's easier to show than tell."

They made the bumpy ride up the mountain in tense silence after that. When they arrived at the entrance to the cave, Mac said, "How many people at the base know what's inside here?"

"Not many," Iona said.

"But you're one of them."

Iona shrugged. "Just lucky, I guess." He looked at Mac. "You feeling lucky, Dr. MacGregor?"

"Not recently," Mac said.

Then they were back inside the cave, beams from the flashlights they'd brought with them crisscrossing in the semidarkness. They walked slowly, almost as if they were making their way across a minefield, the only sound in the Ice Tube the crunch of the lava rock underneath their feet and the breathing they heard behind their glass masks.

At one point Jenny stumbled and grabbed Iona's arm to keep from falling.

"You okay, ma'am?" he asked.

"Peachy," she said.

"Just a little farther," Iona said.

Mac knew that the dimensions of the cave hadn't changed since the last time he was here; it hadn't shrunk. But it seemed like it had. He didn't know why—he had spent his career in confined spaces like this and had never once suffered from claustrophobia.

But he felt like these walls were closing in on him.

They moved along the foam-covered deck, passing the massive coolers Mac remembered. Finally, they reached the grate door, and Iona unlocked it and opened it. The sudden creak of that in the quiet around them seemed jarring. Mac saw Jenny jump back.

"I feel like I'm in a freaking haunted house," she said. She looked at Iona. "Sorry. I'm usually not like this."

"No need to apologize, ma'am. We're all a little jumpy these days. I didn't know when I joined the army that I was signing up for this."

They went through the door and saw the canisters lined up on both sides of them. Mac was unable to shake the feeling that he was looking at miniature nuclear bombs.

"There," Sergeant Matthew Iona said, pointing to the right.

The walls seemed to press in closer.