The Nautilus was trapped. There were thick walls of ice above us and below us. We were prisoners inside the iceberg. I watched Captain Nemo. He looked very calm and quiet.
"Gentlemen," Captain Nemo said. "There are two ways to die here. The first way is to be crushed by the ice. The second way is suffocation (dying because you cannot breathe). I do not worry about hunger. We have plenty of food."
I spoke to Captain Nemo. I told him our air tanks were full. But Captain Nemo had bad news. He said the tanks only had enough air for two days. We were under the water for thirty-six hours already. The air inside the ship was already turning bad.
Captain Nemo had a plan. He wanted to cut through the ice. We had to break the wall under the ship. Captain Nemo moved the Nautilus down. It rested on the ice at 350 meters deep.
I talked to my friends. I told Ned Land and Conseil that the situation was serious. Ned Land said he was ready to help. He was very good with a pickaxe (a heavy tool with a sharp metal head for breaking ice or rocks).
I took Ned Land to a room. The crew were putting on their diving suits. Captain Nemo accepted Ned Land’s help. I went to the large room with Conseil. We watched the men through the glass windows.
Captain Nemo and twelve men went onto the ice. Captain Nemo measured the ice walls. The ice above us was 400 meters thick. But the ice below the ship was only ten meters thick. They decided to dig a large hole there.
The men worked very hard. They used their tools to break the ice. Ice is lighter than water. When the men broke a piece of ice, it floated up. It hit the top of the tunnel. This was not a problem. We only needed the bottom to be thin.
After two hours, Ned Land was very tired. New workers took his place. Conseil and I went out to help too. The water was very cold. But I felt warm because I was working hard.
I went back inside the ship after two hours. I noticed a big difference in the air. The air outside in my suit was fresh. The air inside the Nautilus was bad. It had too much carbon dioxide (the bad air that people breathe out).
We worked for twelve hours. We only cut one meter of ice. At this speed, we needed five days to finish. But we only had air for two days. Also, we were still under the iceberg. We could not reach the surface.
The situation was terrible. But everyone did their duty. During the night, the men dug more. But the next morning, I saw a new danger. The water around the ship was freezing. The side walls were moving closer to the ship.
The ice was growing. It could crush the Nautilus like a piece of glass. I did not tell Ned Land or Conseil. I did not want them to be afraid. But I told Captain Nemo about this new problem.
"I know," Captain Nemo said. He was very calm. "It is another danger. We must work faster than the ice. We must finish the hole before the water freezes."
I worked with my pickaxe for many hours. The work was good because I could breathe the fresh air from my suit. When I returned to the ship, I felt sick. The air inside was very heavy. We had oxygen, but we could not remove the bad air.
On March 26, the walls moved even closer. I felt despair (a feeling of having no hope). I wanted to stop. Why should I dig if I was going to die? Captain Nemo took my hand. He led me back to the ship.
"M. Aronnax," he said. "We must try something dangerous. Or the ice will trap us forever." He had an idea. He wanted to use boiling water.
The ship had machines to make fresh water. Captain Nemo made the water very hot. Then the pumps pushed the boiling water against the ice. This made the ice melt. After three hours, the temperature of the water went up.
"We will succeed," I said. Captain Nemo agreed. He was not afraid of the ice crushing the ship anymore. But we still had the problem of the air.
On March 27, we had only four meters of ice left to cut. We needed forty-eight more hours of work. But the air was almost gone. I felt a great weight on my chest. I could not stop yawning. My lungs were gasping for air.
Conseil stayed near me. He was also suffering. "I wish I did not have to breathe," Conseil said. "Then there would be more air for my master." Tears came to my eyes. He was a very good friend.
We loved going out to work. When we worked on the ice, we had fresh air in our suits. We breathed happily. But we had to take turns. Captain Nemo also took his turn. He was always calm and did not complain.
Finally, only two meters of ice remained. But the air tanks were almost empty. We had to save the last bit of air for the workers. When I went back inside the ship, I was half-dead. My head hurt and I felt dizzy.
It was the sixth day of our imprisonment. Captain Nemo decided to use the weight of the ship. He moved the Nautilus over the hole. All the men came back inside the ship. We closed the doors.
Captain Nemo filled the reservoirs (large tanks that hold water to make the ship heavy). The ship became very heavy. It weighed 1,800 tons. We waited and listened. Then I heard a loud noise. The ice cracked.
"We are moving!" Conseil whispered. The Nautilus fell through the ice like a heavy stone. Then Captain Nemo started the pumps. The ship stopped falling. We began to move north very fast.
I was lying in the library. I could not breathe. My face was purple and my lips were blue. I could not see or hear anything. I thought I was dying. Then, I felt a little bit of air in my lungs.
Ned Land and Conseil were there. They had one small tank of air left. They did not use it for themselves. They gave the air to me. They saved my life. I looked at the clock. It was 11:00 AM on March 28.
The Nautilus was moving at forty miles an hour. We were only six meters from the surface. There was only a thin layer of ice above us. The ship hit the ice from below. It hit the ice again and again.
Finally, the ice broke. The door of the ship opened. Fresh, pure air came inside. We could finally breathe again.