First edits. Short supper, long drive.

35: Long Odds

Antarctica-

Three people huddled seventy feet below the lip of a deep crevasse. Trapped on a narrow ledge of blue-white ice, they clung to one another and to the flexing wall, hardly daring to move. From far beneath them came the cold, dank breath of rushing water, the noise of tumbling stone and crashing ice; from above, the surge and whine of freezing winds.

They'd been hurled there from a disintegrating shelter, which had torn itself open before plunging into the void. Two men and a woman… all that remained of tent 3. Randy Clark, Jake Morrow and Maria Duchesne had no comm and little hope of rescue, but it was human nature to keep fighting, odds of survival be damned.

Knowing that water ice transmits radio waves over a very long distance, they all three bared enough each of their left hands to press faltering ID chips to the crevasse wall, but there were a great many variables to figure in. Maybe someone was listening, and able to help. Maybe the crack would remain open and their two-foot ledge stable. And maybe they'd be found before they froze to death.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Tracy Island, the office-

The telemetry from Rescue-2 had spiked suddenly from bad to critical, indicating major damage. Jeff gulped at a mouthful of strong black coffee, scalding himself and staining the fresh shirt Kyrano had supplied him. Ignoring the pain, International Rescue's commander jabbed a console button, a back-lit rectangle bearing the silhouette of a green cargolifter.

Instantly, a schematic, rotating image of Rescue-2 flashed onto Jeff's comm screen, blinking red from a dozen serious wounds. There were problems cropping up all over the battered aircraft. Hull breaches… severed hydraulic lines… unexplained cargo door malfunctions… steering-fuel shortage… and a sudden, brute-force program override.

Feeling his insides congeal to a cold, solid lump, Jeff Tracy mashed the desk comm's send button.

"Virgil! What the hell's going on out there? Are you all right? Who authorized reprogramming? Virgil, answer me!"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The Ice, shelter 2-

Karen Simenski got to her feet despite the numbed stiffness that had turned her arms and legs into lifeless, cold meat. She could literally not feel them, though they responded sluggishly to commands. But Leanna wasn't moving at all.

"C'mon, Pace," she urged, tapping at her friend's parka hood with a hand that might as well have been carved of stone. "Rise-n'-sh… shine, Lady."

Please?

She could not help her friend, had barely strength to lift herself. As the inner door seal hissed open, too cold and dehydrated for tears, Karen dropped back down. She pressed as closely as she could to her motionless friend, thinking to infuse what little warmth remained in her own body to Leanna.

"Almost there, Pace. Don't… don't drop the b- ball now."

Someone came through the shelter's inner door; a tall figure anonymously wrapped in safety-orange polar survival gear. A young man, by the depth and timbre of his voice.

"All right, folks… there's a safety line connecting the tent wall to our… our vehicle. Those of you still able to walk… please step forward."

No. Not alone. Leanna might be chilled down to the very core, but she was in there, somewhere, and surely able to hear a friend's voice. She'd know if Karen left her, and maybe give up.

"They're here, Pace," the astronomer whispered, adding their old 'going home' joke, "Time to… blow th- this Popsicle stand f- for the great, warm… north."

Their rescuer was still speaking, sounding not much better off than his half-frozen charges.

"My partner's back at… at the tractor hold. He'll… get you settled in."

Very slowly, those who could, began to move. But Karen would have stayed where she was had Elton Caruthers not helped her to get Leanna out of that fetal crouch and off the ground. Spotting the numbed and tottering trio, the young stranger stopped gasping directions to head over. Like them, he shuffled along on booted feet that could no longer sense ground nor impact with obstacles, and he panted at thin, dry, paper-cut air.

"Need… a hand, folks?"

The half of her face that could still smile, did so. Karen even managed a small joke, saying,

"M- my knight in… shining armor!"

"Aww…" Elton groused, as the younger man supplanted him at Leanna's left side, "M- meteorologists… never get th- the girl."

Karen didn't want to lose him, either; Elton-with-the-card-tricks-and-movie-trivia.

"Quick. Loop an… arm through, El. Hang… hang on to me. Off to see… th' wizard."

"…'Cause of his wunnerful… heaters," Elton blurrily agreed.

And so, out the door in a straggling human chain, taking the longest fifteen-foot walk of Karen's life. The ice and the wind and the brittle white air tried to force a halt, but Karen held tight to the others and plowed onward, trusting that someone had the guideline. She clung especially hard to Leanna Pace; pushing, pulling, dragging, too focused now to joke or speak.

Then, after an uncounted number of short, wobbling steps, something dark materialized before them, blocking just a fraction of the wind. Shelter…!

A new hand took hold of her parka suddenly, jerking Karen Simenski's group through two separate thresholds. The first was open to wind and cold alike, but the next door, containing a sort of sparking soap-bubble film, somehow blocked the knife-like outer air. Stumbling through, Karen made out a second rescuer and a long, low-ceilinged chamber packed with gradually thawing others. They'd made it.

"Thank you…!" Karen gasped, as their young man from the tent and line handed her over to he of the warming vehicle and impatient tug. These two had raced to the bottom of the world after 115 lost causes, at least one of whom was deeply grateful.

The first man nodded once before trudging through that sparking force wall and out into screaming chaos. The second coughed a bit, eventually responding with,

"Not a problem… but recommend that you sit before, um… sensation returns. S' going to hurt like hell when… blood flow comes back."

His goggles were off, revealing a pair of startling blue eyes in a ski-masked face. His cloth-muffled words were somewhat slurred and filled with abrupt, gasping pauses. Not good.

"Emergency core warming… equipment against aft bulk… bulkhead. Know how to use?"

Karen and Elton both nodded, already feeling the sharp sting and thorn-prickle of returning warmth.

"Okay… head on back, then. More, um… coming through."

She smiled bracingly, because he seemed quite young, and because all of the ways that he wasn't moving indicated some sort of injury. Might have to watch the situation, Karen decided, as she and Elton guided a shambling Leanna Pace toward the promised warming gear; Knight-in-shining-armor-two appeared close to collapse, himself. Very much, not good.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Tractor 1, blundering toward Thunderbird 2-

The shield was failing, if his vehicle's radiation sensors were correct. Taking a hand off the steering wheel, muttering under his breath, Brains switched half the forward view screen to internal cameras 5 and 7 (6 had ceased functioning). What he got in return was bad news, of the 'make out a will' variety. In the few snowy, skipping images that he was able to call up, Hackenbacker glimpsed spears of harsh blue radiation piercing a bubbling, phase-changing shield. His supersolid was breaking down, leaving only a few centimeters of lead and aircraft aluminum between Brains and the glowing-hot nuclear fuel rods. The question was, did he have time to get the seething reactor core to Thunderbird 2, or should he abandon his tractor, and attempt to walk?