Ice Station - Matthew Reilly [173]
The whistles around them became more intense, and then suddenly Schofield heard a hoarse bark cut across the underwater spectrum. Schofield spun in the water, looked about himself, then he snapped up to look at the lens-like surface again.
And at that moment, the lens shattered.
Elephant seals plunged into the water from every side. Others roared out of the submerged holes in the walls and charged at Schofield and the others. Their shrieks and barks and whistles filled the water.
Wendy raced for the surface, with Kirsty clutching onto her harness. It was like a rollercoaster ride as Wendy ducked and weaved and banked and turned to avoid the biting teeth of the elephant seals charging at her and Kirsty from every side.
And then suddenly Wendy spotted a gap and caught a glimpse of the surface. With Kirsty clutching onto her harness, she went for it.
Elephant seals lunged and snapped at them from every side but Wendy was too quick. She hit the surface and exploded out of the water.
Kirsty hit the solid ice floor of the cavern with a hard thump. She looked up and saw Wendy moving quickly away from the edge of the pool. Kirsty leapt to her feet just as the earth shook behind her.
Kirsty turned. One of the elephant seals had launched itself out of the water behind her, and now it was loping across the flat floor of the cavern, chasing after her!
Kirsty ran, then stumbled, then fell.
The elephant seal continued its charge. Kirsty was on the floor of the cavern, totally exposed –
– and then suddenly boom! the elephant seal’s face exploded with blood and the big seal went sprawling head-first to the ground.
The elephant seal dropped to the floor, revealing behind it: Schofield, hovering in the pool thirty feet away, with his pistol extended. He had just shot the seal through the back of the head. Kirsty almost fainted.
Renshaw broke the surface on the other side of the pool and found himself right next to the edge when all of a sudden he felt a sharp pain around his right ankle and whump! he was yanked under.
Underwater, Renshaw looked down and saw that one of the elephant seals had its mouth around his right foot. This seal looked smaller than the others and it had those distinctive lower fangs that he had seen on the larger male before.
Renshaw used his spare foot to kick the small seal in the snout. The seal squealed with pain as it released him and Renshaw swam again for the surface.
Renshaw burst up out of the water, and saw the edge of the pool right in front of him. Then he grabbed the nearest rock and hauled himself out of the water just as another, larger seal swept through the water behind him and narrowly missed biting his feet clean off.
Schofield was swimming madly for the edge of the pool.
As he swam, he caught fleeting glimpses of the cave around him – Kirsty over on one side of the pool, Renshaw over on the other. Then he saw the ship, the big black ship, standing like an enormous, silent bird of prey in the middle of the massive subterranean cavern.
And then suddenly the open jaws of the big bull seal rose up out of the water in front of him, obliterating his view of the big black ship.
The big seal was already moving fast and it ploughed into Schofield at phenomenal speed and Schofield gasped as he felt the wind get knocked out of him and he went under.
The bull seal had rammed into his chest with its long lower fangs. Ordinarily, Schofield guessed, this would have been enough to kill any would-be victim, since the big seal’s fangs would pierce the victim’s chest.
But not with Schofield. He was still wearing his body armour over his wetsuit, and the bull seal’s fangs had lodged in his kevlar breastplate.
The elephant seal drove him downward through the water, pushing against his chest. Schofield struggled, but it was no use. By virtue of his breastplate, he was practically impaled on the big animal’s fangs.
Down and down Schofield went, on the end of the giant seal’s nose. Bubbles shot out from the big animal’s heaving mouth as it expelled vast quantities