The wolves of the sea circled the minkes, separating the smaller female from its mate. Two big male orcas remained on the periphery, breaching high in the air to flop hard onto the surface as if to mark the kill zone.

The assaults were carried out by the juvenile killers and a few of the adult females. Over the next forty minutes, we watched from one hundred and seventy feet below the blood-drenched surface as the remaining minke fought to breathe—until one of the big bulls landed on its back in an attempt to drown it.

I turned in my seat and jumped, confronted by a black-and-white monster whose emerging presence occupied the entire starboard side of the acrylic glass. The bull killer whale stared at me as if we were a threat to its pod’s dinner.

The sea became alive with squeals and clicks as the pack’s males echolocated us. A nerve-racking game of cat-and-mouse ensued as the two six-ton predators bumped and prodded the Barracuda with their snouts until we vacated the area.

Dusk came quickly, offering us an opportunity to practice piloting in the dark. Ben engaged the exterior lights while I used the sub’s sonar to guide us west through the shallows of Prydz Bay.

Four hours and twenty minutes after we had tumbled into the sea, the Barracuda leaped out of the water and slid onto the ice. Physically exhausted, Ben and I climbed out of the submersible and into the back of an awaiting snow vehicle while our underwater vessel was loaded onto its trailer.

We continued this training regimen over the next week, alternating our roles until I became a competent pilot. During this time, True occupied his days “recouping” in the company of a Swedish weather technician named Jennie Backman. I was thankful for her distraction.

Then on day eight, we received a radio communiqué from Vostok Dome, and everything changed.

8

Vostok, East Antarctica

Earplugs, bench seating with webbed backs, tiny windows, and a ride that induced hemorrhoids, we were back onboard another C-130 transport, this time bound for our final destination—a minus-forty-degree desert of ice located a thousand miles to the southeast of Prydz Bay.

Vostok. After six months of head games and fears, I was finally on my way. And I was truly excited. Perhaps it was the past week of training with Ben, but my attitude and confidence level had changed. The simple truth was that Vostok really was the holy grail of science, an unexplored frontier that could potentially reveal how life came to be on Earth. For whatever reason, Ben and I had been chosen among thousands of explorers to be its Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, and my ego was running wild.