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“Thanks for everything,” Sam said to the reporting crew.

“You sure we can’t do more?” Clive said. “Go with you?”

“You’ve done more than enough,” Sam replied. “You were quite literally my safe harbour in a storm! I’ll never forget that. Thank you.”

She ain’t pretty
, Sam thought, as he settled into the old oil-drum craft with rope tethering him to it.

“You call that sailing?” Nora called out over the wind. “You sure you know what you’re doing?”

“Ice sailing!” Sam called back. But this was far removed from any kind of sailing Sam had done before. “It’ll work, you’ll see.” He wished he felt as confident as he sounded. This had seemed like a good idea from the warmth of the hut.

Wind filled the three-metre sail, spreading out a dark green sheet above him. In its previous life, it had been a tarp covering crates, but it was up to this task too.

As for the craft, well … could be better
.
But it could have been worse
.

The steel drum’s bottom was smooth and sleek and it skidded on the ice, bucking and ready to go. Sam held on tight, his padded snowsuit jamming him in like a sardine.

“Actually, not that uncomfortable!” Sam yelled. “Bye, guys!”

He pulled out his survival knife and cut the rope holding his makeshift boat to the hut. The ice sailer flew away across the frozen ground, the “sail” billowing out, catching the immense wind. In just a few seconds, he was travelling at breathtaking speed.

Sam gripped the knife in his hand. He might need to cut his sail loose if there was a serious obstacle ahead.

What if I just need to slow down? Hmm
.

He wiped ice and snow from his goggles.

I ditch the sail
.

And what if the wind changes—and I have to alter course?

I ditch the sail
.

Sam relaxed as much as he could, watching the endless snow flash past him. Every now and then he’d hit a bump where the snow had formed a ridge or the ice had shifted, and the craft took flight. Sometimes it stayed airborne like that for a few seconds, flying forward, before coming back down to the ground, the jarring return to earth unkind to Sam’s body.

Ow. Where’s the cushioning in this thing?

He checked his compass, pulling more on the left-hand rope. He glanced across at the blue mountains that rose up to the east.

There is surely no place more empty and barren … a desert, maybe
.

But this is a frozen desert, just as harsh, and probably even more dangerous
.

Even without a superstorm, if the cold here didn’t get you with frostbite or hypothermia, the terrain would. Sam’s greatest fear was that by the time he might spot a huge crevasse and cut the lines to stop—it would be too late.

The momentum would carry me on
.
Newton’s law, right? I’d be swallowed up and never seen or heard from again
.

He was really travelling with the wind now, the drum barely touching the ground. Then the wind shifted ever so slightly. Ice kicked up from the front of the craft and covered Sam’s goggles. He wiped them clear. The dance of blowing snow started to overtake him as the wind grew in strength.

Is Alex out there? Has he found the Gear yet?

He hit a jagged peak of a ridge—and shot into the air. But this was no ordinary ridge like those he’d hit before. This was a shift in the ice shelf and the plateau ahead was lower.

A lot lower
.

Oh boy …

Sam could see ahead as the nose of the drum started to drop. Then the wind in the sail picked up and pulled—and he shot upward, a few metres clear of the ground.

And now I’m flying
.

Then Sam saw the land ahead. It wasn’t another flat, smooth ice run.

It’s a field of crevasses!

Sam ditched the sail.

EVA

“Hold on!” Pete yelled as the snow plough in front of them smashed through the wooden wall of the shed, debris catapulting in all directions as the plough roared out into the snow.

Peeking above the rim of the window, Eva spotted Briony flat on her back, blown over by the force of Bob’s “bomb.”

But no sooner were they racing out of the smashed wall at full throttle than Eva heard gunshots and the sound of bullets hitting the side of the vehicle.

“Everyone down!” yelled Pete, his foot to the floor as he crouched behind the wheel.

Eva clung to Arianna and Gabriella as they flattened themselves on the floor of the snowcat, bouncing madly as they made their escape.

A few moments later, Eva dared to lift her head—they were clear of the base, away from Stella’s Agents, only whiteness ahead of them. She spun around to look out the back door. The other snowcat was not far behind them.

Thank goodness we got everyone out of there
.

Now we have to find Sam and Alex before those guys find us again
.

She went up to sit next to Pete. “You OK?” she asked. “Are you hurt?” She panicked at the sight of blood on his face.

“Just a scratch,” he said. “Banged my head as we were hotfooting it out of there. I’ll get us there soon, don’t worry.”

“Lora?” Eva said. She couldn’t believe her eyes. They had driven into the Chinese base and seen a group of figures arriving on foot. It was Lora, with a Guardian and an Agent.

Eva jumped down and ran over to Lora to hug her. “Stella’s Agents took over Crawley Station,” she said. “They were all pretending to be the crew to find out what we knew. How did you get away from the rest of them? Hang on, where’s Sam? And Jabari and the other guys who were with you?”

“I know about Stella,” Lora said. “They turned on us out there, but our guys got the jump on them. Not all of them made it.” She looked gratefully at the Guardian and Agent standing protectively nearby. “I was knocked out for a while and by the time I came to, we were halfway here.”

Eva silently thanked the universe again for the courageous Guardians and loyal Agents who had done so much for them in the race.

“And Jabari and Sam?”

“Jabari had already gotten out to track Alex but we’ve lost communication with him too. And Sam …” She sighed heavily. “Now I’ve lost Jabari, Alex
and
Sam.”

“No,” Eva said, “it’s not your fault. I’m sure we’ll find him.”

They turned when the door of the station opened. A man in an orange snowsuit emerged and rushed to them. Over the wind they could not hear him—but he was pointing at the station, where another crew member stood by the door and waved them inside.

“You’re sure there’s no sign of Sam?” Lora asked Jedi over the communications link. This one was perfectly clear, unlike the radio and satellite phones that they had brought.

“Sorry, no,” Jedi said. “The storm is skirting your location, going out to sea, but it’s still enough to wreak havoc on any kind of search.”

Eva looked to Gabriella and Arianna, who appeared as worried as she felt.

“But I
have
plotted where Alex may be,” Jedi said.

“You have?” Lora asked, hope in her voice.

“Yes,” he said.

“Tell us, we’ll head there,” Eva said.

“It’s OK,” Jedi replied. “Someone else is on the way to help him. You sit tight and wait for news on Sam. Don’t worry—I
will
find him. I’ll contact you again soon.”

“What did Jedi mean, someone else?” Eva asked anxiously.

“He must mean other Guardians or loyal Agents, such as we have left,” Lora said. “I get the impression he didn’t want to say on an open line.”

“Maybe Jabari!” Arianna said. “Maybe he spoke to Jedi?”

“It would be great to get news of Jabari, I’m very worried about him,” Lora replied. “He’s a tough man, but this is not exactly his usual terrain.”

“And where did you last see Sam?” Eva asked.

“Out there, near the mountains. He was in the snowcat with, I now assume, Stella.”

What little colour Eva had in her cheeks drained completely.

“Think he’s OK?” Gabriella asked carefully.

Lora looked like she was going to cry, but then her cheeks flushed and she stood, angry.

“Lora, it’s OK—he’ll be OK,” Eva said. “He
has
to be.”

“He’s tough,” Arianna said. “Right now, he is probably at some other research outpost.”

“Or heading for where Jedi tracked Hans to,” Eva said.

“Where is that?” Arianna asked.

“Forty kilometres northeast of here,” Lora said. “The other side of the mountains, toward the coast.”

“We can’t get there in this weather, can we?” Gabriella said.

“Well, we can’t just stay here,” Eva said.

“Then we have no choice,” Lora said.

SAM

Sam gave up on the GPS. It wasn’t working at all. He followed the compass instead, trusting that it would lead him in the right direction and that he’d come to the Chilean station if he stayed on that heading.

The mountains were visible to his left. Behind them, a wall of grey clouds gathered as the storm started to come back around.

Sam moved as fast as he could on foot. The wind was at his back and helped—a lot.

Sometimes too much
.

The crevasses were so large that they were easy to spot. There was no way he could cross one, so he followed the ridges to where they came close together and jumped over the narrowest gaps, which sounded easier than it was. Twice in the first ten minutes, Sam tripped and fell, stopping just in time to avoid rolling down a bottomless crack in the ice. He paced slowly across the uneven ground until he came to a gap that was small enough to leap over, then he would get his bearings again and keep going.

Three kilometres. Maybe an hour’s trek in this weather and with these obstacles
.

Sam didn’t have time to think more about the journey ahead because at that very moment, the world disappeared.

“Arghh!” Sam leaned back and pulled out his ice axe, spearing it into the ground in one fluid movement. The axe punched through the snow-covered ice and buried itself with a dull sound.

“Arghhhhh!” Sam held on tight as he slipped down the crevasse, slowing, but not fast enough. His gloved grip slipped from the axe.

“
No!
” he yelled, but he didn’t fall far—the thin rope around his wrist that tied him to the ice axe held him as he dangled in the cold air.

Man, that was close
.

He was not looking forward to the climb back out.