Alex Van Helsing The Triumph of Death - By Jason Henderson Page 0,66
surface. A rumble of static passed through Alex’s mind and he leaned forward instinctively.
“Follow the reef,” he told the pilot, and the chopper continued the curve around the island.
Alex felt it still, and he looked at Astrid. “They’re here already. Hiding among the coral.”
An abrupt growl in his mind shocked him back an inch.
This was cold water, and cold-water islands don’t have coral.
Water was burbling next to the dark shadow, the not-coral.
“Turn back. Turn back now!” Alex called, and the pilot threw him a look.
“What?”
“Turn back! Head to Mainland! Now!”
But there was a growling in his mind and something bursting from the water, and then the helicopter pitched violently as a chunk of ice the size of a football slammed into the side of the chopper. Alex looked out.
An icy shape like a gun emplacement had risen from the waves and turned toward them, the ice folding in on itself and forming something like a cannon. Alex saw it spasm once, and then another white ball was flying toward them.
The chopper spun for a moment and the pilot fought with it. “Someone’s shooting at us. What the hell is that?” the pilot screamed.
“Move out farther, a quarter mile; we have to bail out.” Alex was up and ripping through panels in the back, searching for gear. He set a flare gun aside and found a life raft. He prayed whoever was shooting from the water would have limited vision if they got farther away. “You can go, but we have to bail. Does this raft have CO2?”
“You’re crazy!” the pilot called, and then cursed as the ice slammed into them again. “We’re going back to Mainland.”
Alex glanced at Astrid as he threw the door open, looking down at the water. They were fifty feet off the ground.
“Take us lower, take us lower,” he said, and the pilot turned, zipping across the water as the ice gun discharged again, in the distance, too far to connect. “If we’re lucky they’ll think we went away. No way they know it’s us; this is just them holding everyone at bay while they get ready.”
“What are we doing?” Astrid asked, joining him at the open door.
“We can make that.” Alex judged the distance, which had dropped to thirty feet.
He held the rubber raft out the door and shook it, letting it roll out and float limply behind the chopper. “On my mark, we’re going to jump. Pilot, then you’re clear. Tell no one. No one!”
Astrid looked back toward the island. “Won’t they see us?”
“If so, we’ll have a lot less rowing to do,” Alex said. “I’m going.”
Alex breathed, then pulled the cord. He couldn’t hear the minor explosion as the raft filled with air, and he put his hands on the top ropes as Astrid did the same. The raft was about six feet wide and perfectly round. “Keep your hands on the ropes and land on the raft. It might turn over, it probably will turn over, so when it does, just swim out from under it, and we’ll turn it back over together. Don’t let go of the ropes.”
She was looking down. “Uh…”
“Listen,” Alex said, channeling Sangster. “We don’t live in a world where nothing goes wrong. We live in a world where we have a plan when it does. Okay? Now go.”
Another lob of ice flew in the distance, and Alex and Astrid leapt with the raft.
There was a half second of air until Alex felt the wind get smashed out of his lungs as the raft hit the waves, and he and Astrid both cried out involuntarily. They slammed against one another, and the waves caught the raft. Alex scrambled to stay on top of it, but they were caught in a wave and it tipped them over.
Freezing water shot through Alex’s clothes as he found himself under the raft, sinking and holding on to the ropes. He held out his hand and felt Astrid, and kicked, moving back until he found the surface outside the side of the raft. After a moment she came up as well.
The chopper was zipping off in the distance, and Alex hoped that there were no eyes looking out on the water to see them ditch. The gun emplacement hurled a few more ice chunks at the retreating chopper, and he judged that they had not seen him.
As they hung there in the water, Alex’s teeth were chattering, and he said, “We have to turn it over. Then we paddle it to shore.”