Chapter 10
Daniel
Ten minutes later, with a very pleased pilot in the cockpit, we reached our destination.
To our front and left, the research vessel sat low in the water, its red hull bright against the dark sea.
A handful of figures in orange parkas lined the deck rail, faces turned up toward us.
One of them stood slightly apart from the others, binoculars raised, a tall figure who waved at us. Nate. I waved back.
We flew closer still, and it was then that I heard them. A low, continuous sound, rolling across the water from ahead of us. Above even the engine noise.
“You hear that?” Reed said.
“Yes.”
The iceberg ahead of us was a vast, flat-topped wall of blue-white ice, sheer on all sides, rising straight out of the water. Around its base, loose brash ice shifted in slow clusters. And on top, against the white expanse, a single small figure. Black back, white front, standing alone.
Reed reduced speed while I reached for the radio. “Nate, this is Dr. Park. We have a visual on the iceberg. Single Adélie confirmed on the surface. We are beginning our assessment.”
Nate’s voice came back immediately, clear and strong. “Copy that, Doctor. That bird has been acting agitated. I don’t understand why it won’t jump off.”
“Let me talk to our penguinologist,” I replied.
I keyed the second line. “Viktor.”
His voice came back immediately. He had been waiting. “Yes. Yes, I’m here.”
“Single Adélie. Top of the iceberg. No idea why it won’t leave.”
A beat of silence.
“Can you tell me if the bird’s right flipper has a deep gouge about one third of the way up?”
I leaned forward in my seat and studied the bird through the cockpit glass. She had turned slightly, tracking the sound of the rotors, her head up.
“Reed, can you bring us around the left side? I need a closer look at the right flipper.”
I picked up the binoculars from the side pocket by the instrument panel. The bird filled the lenses. Small. Alert.
“Copy.” He banked us in a wide, slow arc, keeping distance, the iceberg rotating in the windscreen until we were coming in from the north side. The bird tracked us the whole way around.
There. A pale, irregular line on the right flipper, a third of the way up. I keyed the line. “Viktor. There is a mark on the right flipper. Deep. Healed over.”
The silence on the line stretched on and on.
“Viktor?”
“Hey,” Sam’s deep voice came through my headset. “Give him a second. He is, uh… he is crying, man.” His voice came out unsteady. “He says that is Blue 48. Daniel. That is Blue 47’s mate. She is alive.”
Reed’s head turned toward me sharply. I had brought him upto date on Blue 47 and 48’s story.
“Confirmed, Sam. Tell Viktor that she is in good condition visually.”
“Copy that.”
My head was spinning with the highs and lows of this day. But this one tiny bird certainly had us in her choke hold.
“Okay, he is ready to talk. Over and out.” Sam transferred to Viktor.
“Hey.” He sniffled and laughed.
“Hey.” My heart softened for my roommate. “Your mama lives.”
“I’m fucking gutted, man. I’m so fucking happy right now.”
“I know.”
“Okay, so what’s the situation?”
“We are going to fly above the iceberg. We hear a roar. Several animals calling together.”
“Damn. Okay, keep the line open.”
Reed flew us in, holding us high above the iceberg’s surface. As soon as we had the full iceberg in view, we saw the problem.
“Do you see that?” Reed asked.
“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 get out, 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 calved away. 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.”