"Base, this is Vance! We have a medical emergency at Grid Nine!" Elena yelled into the phone, her breath coming in ragged gasps. "We have an unknown vessel exposed in the glacier wall! There is a survivor inside, calling out in some language I can't make out! We need heavy extraction equipment and a medical team right now!" The radio operator's bewildered response was cut off by static as the storm began to close in.
With the base team at least an hour away, Elena and Sam knew they couldn't wait. The voice crackling through the ice was growing noticeably weaker, the distorted words breaking apart into wet, raspy bursts of static. "They're running out of air, Sam!" Elena yelled, anchoring a heavy winch line into the solid ice above the pocket. "We have to get them out right now!"
Sam swung himself down the ice wall, his crampons biting into the glacier as he reached the dark, embedded mass. Up close, he could finally see it wasn't rock—it was a smooth, rounded surface covered in frost and deep burn marks. He slammed his pickaxe into the surrounding ice, working frantically to chop a trench around the heavy object before the person inside fell completely silent.