Death Plateau – Chapter 1
It had been nearly an hour since all contact had been lost with the dive team.
A routine check on the ice caps following a small earthquake recently had opened up a cavern in the ice, according to sonar scans, therefore a dive team consisting of ten of the bases best divers had been sent down, just to check if any damage had been done to the ice supporting the abandoned military base. Nobody knew why anyone would think to construct a small military base here, as it is deep in the remote arctic, over 100 nautical miles from the nearest area inhabited by humans, but the government said this base was 'important'. Naturally, this raised many superstitions as to what goes on in this remote military base, many people believed it was where the government once tested top secret weapons, and similar things to that.
All was fine when the dive squad hit 300 metres down; they were talking to one another over the microphones to each other and remaining in contact with the command centre over 100 miles away from them. Then one of the divers said to another: "do you have a visual on the cavern, Dive Leader?"
"Affirmative, Wilkes. Depth 319 metres below sea level, on a ledge in the ice shelf." Dive Leader replied. "To all divers, cavern looks dangerous, enter with caution, repeat, cavern looks dangerous, enter with caution." All the divers acknowledged and swam into the cavern cautiously.
Carefully, they climbed onto the raised ice inside the cavern, not wanting to slip and fall into the water and risk damaging the equipment. So far, there was nothing unusual about the descent and entry to the cavern. That's when it all started to go wrong. Horribly wrong.
As all the divers exited the water, they seemed to hear a noise further inside the cave.
"What the hell was that?" shouted one of the divers called Renshaw.
"Dunno" said Dive Leader.
The divers took off their dive gear and left it in the corner of the cave.
"Smith, Evans, you stay here and guard the cave entrance and dive gear. If anything happens, let us know immediately." ordered Dive Leader.
"Affirmative" They replied in unison.
"Right then team. Split into two parties. Clarke, French and Gant, team Alpha, come with me, we head northwest into the cave system. Rest of you, team Bravo, head northeast."
Thinking it was just a noise made by a chunk of ice falling; the squads proceeded into the cave in opposite directions, oblivious to the danger they had just gotten themselves into.
After about ten minutes of exploring the cavern, a voice came in over the radio. It was the voice of Smith, who was clearly in panic.
"Dive Leader, we have a code red situation back here! They came out of nowhere, Evans is dead, repeat, Evans is dead! It... It just dived out of some hole in the wall and bit his legs off!" he yelled.
"Remain calm, Smith. Just remain calm; we are coming to get you." Dive Leader ordered.
"It's back! Please! Someone help me, I don't ! Please... aaaarggh!"
Smith never finished off his sentence, but over the mic, the rest of the team heard a load roar and a blood curdling scream. Then the team heard a loud grunting noise, similar to what they heard earlier, and saw a huge shape silhouetted in the faint light of the cavern.
"Run!" yelled Clarke, one of the members of Alpha squad. The squad didn't need that much persuasion whatsoever. They turned around and ran through the cave system like Olympic sprinters. "Keep going! I don't want to get eaten!" screamed Dive Leader. On they ran through the tunnel for about ten minutes, until they were unable to hear the grunts of the beast. It was then they saw it.
"Oh my god..." breathed Dive Leader.
"Is that what I think it is?" asked Gant.
"Too damn right." replied Dive Leader.
Suddenly, a frenzy of panicked voices burst over the radio.
"Run! It's going to eat you... aggghhhhh!
"Henderson? What the fu... oh no... Help! Aaaarggh... Please..."
"I ain't gonna make it... no! Ugghhh..."
"What the hell!" yelled Dive Leader. "Renshaw, Henderson, Foster come in over, come in, ASAP!"
"I think that was the sound of Bravo squad being killed." French stammered.
Then another voice came in over the radio, the voice of Thomson, the remaining member of Bravo squad, who still seemed to be alive.
"Dive Leader report... Dive Leader, come in over... Henderson, Renshaw and Foster are K.I.A, repeat, Henderson, Renshaw and Foster are K.I.A. this beast just came outta goddamn nowhere! It was bloody murder! The thing ripped their damn bodies apart! Whatever you do, if you encounter that thing, for god's sake, run! Dive Leader, anyone! Can you hear me? This is Thomson, can you hear me? There's something in the ice, it looks like a missile..."
Thing is, nobody could hear Alpha squad. Alpha squad were dead. Johnson was alone. With a giant, lethal creature on the loose and a top secret British government ICBM silo, with a missile containing an active nuclear warhead embedded in the ice, which was capable of destroying half of the world. A lethal missile which had simply been abandoned when all the scientists were found dead, mauled to death by some creature.
Neither did Thomson know that some of the world superpower countries would do anything, pay any price, accept any losses, to get their hands on this missile.
This abandoned military research base Arctica, codenamed 'Death Plateau' was about to become a four way battlefield between four world superpowers. The small squad of British SAS troops that had just arrived to defend the abandoned base were in for the fight of their lives. Lieutenant Riley and his fellow troops of Her Majesty's SAS, the county's elite troops were a tough unit, all set to follow their leader to hell.
They soon discover they just did...