Elías and Jóhann are attacked on the glacier

Elías and Jóhann are attacked by American soldiers on Vatnajökull, captured, and thrown into a crevasse. The assault leaves Jóhann dead and Elías close to death. Its account changes from a suspected accident into evidence of a deliberate attack, and Ratoff’s later taunt to Kristín exposes the cruelty behind her brother’s injuries.

The attack and its immediate aftermath

Jóhann and Elías encounter American soldiers on the glacier and are taken captive. Kristín tells the rescue team leader, Júlíus, that the two men were thrown into a crevasse; she rejects the idea that Elías simply had an accident. Her account places the attack within a larger operation involving American soldiers and an aircraft connected to them, though she does not know the precise location of the men’s capture.

Rescuers find Jóhann’s battered body in the crevasse. Elías has also fallen into it and is still alive, but his condition is so poor that Júlíus sees little chance of his survival. The rescue team is heading back to camp and expects a helicopter from the United States Defense Force at Keflavík, while a storm threatens to overtake them before they get there.

Kristín’s account and the search

When Júlíus reports what the rescuers have found, he tells Steve that Elías has managed to say only one thing: his sister’s name. Kristín takes the telephone and insists that the men’s injuries did not result from an accident. She believes American soldiers on the glacier seized them and threw them into the crevasse, and identifies the south-eastern part of Vatnajökull as the likely area of the assault.

Kristín says that she and Steve have spoken to an old pilot who once carried out surveillance flights in the area, and she intends to go to the glacier. She doubts that she can get help from official channels: she believes U.S. special forces have taken over the base on Midnesheidi and the embassy in Reykjavík, does not know whether the Icelandic Government is involved, and says the police want to question her about a murder. Her determination to pursue the rescue therefore follows directly from the danger to Elías and the collapse of the routes through which she might ordinarily seek assistance.

Ratoff’s confession

The assault’s brutality becomes explicit when Ratoff confronts Kristín. He tells her that Jóhann screamed after Ratoff put out his eyes, and that Elías then cried and called for his sister while Ratoff attacked him. Ratoff turns the brothers’ suffering into a deliberate humiliation of Kristín, claiming that Elías called for her while she was absent. The revelation identifies Ratoff not merely as an officer connected to the operation but as a direct perpetrator of the violence against both men.

Consequences and significance

The attack leaves Jóhann dead and Elías gravely injured, with his survival uncertain as rescuers race against a storm. Elías’s only reported words are his sister’s name, a detail that links his near-silent condition to Kristín’s attempt to reach him. Ratoff’s later account makes that appeal part of his cruelty: he uses Elías’s dependence on his sister to wound her as well. Together, the rescue report and Ratoff’s taunt establish the assault as both a physical attack on the two men and a personal threat to Kristín.