“Yes.”
I narrated for the rest of the team’s benefit over the open line. “There’s a gigantic chasm that has opened below us. We are flying above it right now and—okay, I see them.” My eyes couldn’t believe what I was witnessing. “Team, there are several… I think hundreds of black-and-white bodies pressed together. I can tell they are emperor penguins. Okay, we are flying over one more time. It seems they are attempting to getout, but this chasm has near-vertical walls. They keep sliding back.”
“Oh no.” Viktor’s anguish was shared by everyone.
“I think we need to move off. The rotor wash is disturbing them,” Reed spoke into the open line.
“Yeah. Move back,” Viktor immediately instructed us.
Reed pulled us back, clearing the chasm rim and banking away. The roar faded fractionally as we put distance between us and the ice.
“Viktor. We are pulling back. Rotor wash is a problem. We cannot hover above the colony.”
“Understood.” He had steadied. “Can you describe what you’re seeing? Describe the iceberg.”
“What we are looking at is a flat-topped wall of ice that rises out of the water to a height I would compare to a huge skyscraper. It is not the typical berg we usually see penguins on. It is just way too high. The walls are completely vertical.”
I paused and glanced at Reed with a questioning eyebrow.
Reed picked up where I left off. “Guys, here’s the strangest part. There is no slope, no gradual incline, no accessible edge anywhere along the perimeter that I can see from this altitude. The chasm runs through the interior. From above, it looks like something took an axe to the surface. The walls of the chasm are the same. Sheer. Vertical. The birds are at the bottom.”
There were murmurs of voices on the open line. Reed kept circling the berg. Mama penguin watched us the entire time.
“Okay, the obvious question is: how did they get in there?” Nate’s voice came through. “I mean, I am a whale guy, but if the walls are that high, that is bizarre, right? And the dolphins knew something was up.”
Nobody answered immediately. I looked at Reed. He shook his head slightly.
August’s voice came on. “Give us a minute. Our glaciologist, Marcus, is working on it. Reed and Daniel, start working on a plan. If you can’t land due to rotor wash, how will you install the ramp?”
I muted the mic and stared at Reed. “I didn’t even think of that. This is impossible. We can’t land. We can’t climb up. It’s a fortress.”
Reed didn’t answer. He had that look he got when he was locked onto a target. Like the whole world ceased existing. It was so hot. I watched him as his gaze raked over the iceberg, the ocean, the research vessel, over and over.
Marcus came on the line. “All right. Here’s what I think happened. What you are describing sounds like the aftermath of a calving event. A large section of this iceberg, I would say seventy percent of its mass, broke away some days ago and drifted off. When that happened, the remaining section lost a significant portion of its weight. Less mass below the waterline means the remaining piece rose. During events like this, bergs can rise substantially, far beyond where they sat before the break. What was once a low, accessible surface for the penguins became something else entirely.”
“So the birds were already on it when it broke,” I said.
“That would be my reading, yes. Before the calving, this would have been an unremarkable, low-lying iceberg. Penguins use them routinely. They were simply standing on a flat surface, doing what they do. Nothing unusual about that at all.”
“And then it broke beneath them,” Nate said.
“Yep. And then it broke beneath them,” Marcus said. “But there is a second element here. Icebergs fracture along internal fault lines when they are under that kind of sudden stress. The calving event cracked it along a second line running through the interior. That crack is your chasm. It did not exist before the break. It opened in the same moment the larger piece calvedaway. Those birds were not standing at the edge of something and falling in. The ground opened beneath them without warning.”
The line held nothing but static for several seconds.
“They never had a chance,” Nate said quietly.
“No,” Marcus said. “They did not have any warning at all.”
11
Daniel
“Thanks, Marcus. We are going to focus on the rescue now.”
I keyed off the line and opened the one to Nate. Reed pulled us back from the rim and held us in a wide, slow circle. “So we can’t land on top.”
“No,” I agreed.
