SFFSat 7/6/2014 - Black Ice part 8

This is my snippet this week for SFFSat. SFFSat is a place where a number of authors post snippets from their written works, and give the opportunity for comments, support and encouragement. Please also explore the other blogs that are part of this set - you can find the information here. 


This is part eight of the Anton deGama story, Black Ice. Anton's crawler is sliding towards a deep trench on Titan. Anton's effort to evade inevitable doom involved detonating a methane explosion against a giant tumbling boulder of ice. He blew the huge rock in front of the crawler - but the boulder has not stopped the ice-slide...

 

Anton stared at the trench ahead – and then flung himself into the crawler again, jumping forward, using every second the low gravity saved him to get to the controls. He had no time to repressurize, let alone get out of the suit: fortunately, the cockpit was designed so that a driver could do simple maneuvers when suited up. 

Not that this was going to be simple. The crawler was only ten metres now from the narrow gash of the trench. The boulder, sliding directly in front of the crawler, was going to tumble into the gap first. Anton aimed the harpoon with careful haste, and fired. 

The harpoon soared over the boulder, falling back to dig deeply into the solid ammonia at the far end. Anton put all the crawler's power into the winch. The front of the boulder lifted slightly, as it went over the lip of the trench. The whine of the winch filled the cockpit, deafening Anton even through his helmet, as the crawler took the entire front weight of the gigantic boulder. 

Anton had not expected Vauxhall-Douglas to win such an uneven contest: the cable snapped viciously after only a couple of seconds. 

 As always, comments appreciated!