Chapter 9: The Aftershock

I listened closely for a while, but heard nothing.

"Nope, nothing at all. Stop trying to spook me—just get your camera ready."

I didn’t take his words seriously. I grabbed the drill handle, turned on the power, and started working.

The drill’s buzzing echoed in the crevice.

Amit came over and shouted, “Careful! If you trigger an avalanche, we’re done for!”

I shook my head: “This is thousand-year-old ice. How could there be an avalanche? As long as there’s no aftershock, nothing will—”

Before I could finish, I sensed something was wrong.

The ground was shaking.

At first, I thought it was the drill, but there’s no way a portable drill could cause this.

Amit touched the ice wall, his face turning pale.

He slapped the emergency stop on the drill and yelled:

"Run! You jinx! It’s really an aftershock!"

I didn’t react at first, but then Amit kicked over the drill, grabbed my sleeve, and bolted for the rope.

The shaking intensified—the whole ice sheet was trembling.

Crack, crack, crack...

Horizontal fissures suddenly appeared on the opposite ice wall.

If that wall collapsed, we’d be crushed and buried in Antarctica forever.

The thought of dying that way made me panic. As I climbed, my mind flashed to the photograph of my mother smiling from my desk at home. Ma, I silently promised, I will come back. I grabbed the rope and scrambled up with all my strength.

Amit was quick, climbing up first and urging me:

“Climb faster! If you’re any slower, you’ll be stuck!”

He was so anxious he stamped his feet, wishing he could pull me up himself.

Boom!

Suddenly, the opposite ice wall collapsed, thousands of tons of ice filling the crevice.

Luckily, at the last second, Amit grabbed my arm and yanked me up.

I sat on the snow, still in shock, as the ground continued to shake violently.

The wind howled, snow flew, and a massive chasm opened, completely cutting off our route back.

The strong seismic waves seriously interfered with communications; our headsets were nothing but static.

We couldn’t reach the Samudra Shakti 2, nor did we know where the rest of the expert team was.

Amit pointed at the snowmobile nearby and waved:

"Get on! Let’s go!"

"What are you staring at? Hurry up and drive!"

The wind whipped our voices away, but we exchanged a glance and understood each other.

The snowmobile sped across the ice, its tracks quickly erased by wind and swallowed by new crevices.

We didn’t even have time to check for bruises. There was only the urgency to keep moving, every instinct screaming ‘Bhaag, Rohan, bhaag!’