Saturn Run (The Planetary Trilogy Book 1)

by Stanley Salmons

  “Listen, doc. She’s a nice kid. She didn’t deserve this. Whatever needs to be done… you know…?”

  “Sure. Don’t worry. We’ll look after her.”

  “Can I see her?”

  “Okay, but not for long. I want to keep her sedated.” He caught the eye of a nurse and they had a quick, conversation in lowered voices. The nurse indicated that Dan should follow her and they went down a corridor flanked by a series of identical doors. She stopped at one, asked him to wait for a moment while she went inside, then opened the door and beckoned him in.

  Dan caught his breath when he saw her. More than half her face was covered in bandages, and what was left on show was a mass of purple bruises. He pulled a chair up to the bed.

  “Kelly?” he said gently.

  The unbandaged eye opened and seemed to register. She spoke in such a small voice that he had to crane forward to hear her.

  “They hurt me, Danny,” she said, unnecessarily.

  “You’re going to be all right, Kelly. You’re in good hands here. They’ll look after you. Just take it easy now.”

  The blue eye looked at him and a big fat tear rolled out and tapped onto the pillow. Again that small voice:

  “I won’t be pretty any more, Danny.”

  “Sure you will, Kelly. They’re going to… all this can be fixed. You’ll be bruised for a bit but in a few months no one will know anything happened.”

  He wanted her to believe it, even if he wasn’t sure of it himself.

  She blinked and another tear rolled free. He wiped it away with his thumb and even though he was very gentle she flinched at the contact. He felt sick to be in a line of work where this sort of thing could happen.

  “You mustn’t go back, Kelly. When all this is over you have to get a different job. A girl like you… there are plenty of other things you could do. Things’ll work out. You’ll see.”

  She did her best to nod. The nurse started to make signs at him.

  “I’ve got to go now, Kelly. I’ll see you again. Take care, beautiful.”

  She murmured something but it was so faint he had to put his ear near to where he supposed her mouth to be.

  “Take care yourself, flyboy,” she whispered.

  24

  Dan had been angry when Karl Stott made the “farmer’s boy” remark, but it was like nothing compared to what was boiling inside him when he came away from the hospital. He knew there wouldn’t be any justice for Kelly. She’d be far too scared to talk to the police – and with good reason. For their part Virgilius and his organization wouldn’t do a thing for her. They might demand compensation from Braggazzi for her lost earnings but even if he did cough up she wouldn’t see any of it. Braggazzi and his cronies would go unpunished because doing anything to them would be bad for business and might even provoke a gang war that nobody wanted.

  Back at the hotel Dan managed to get a grip on himself. Ted and Ferris were right about one thing: he’d be crazy to go up against Braggazzi on his own. Whatever agreement Raoul Hernandez had reached with Virgilius, Mikhael Rostov might still have people on the outside looking for him, and he didn’t need Braggazzi’s mob after him as well. Virgilius wouldn’t protect him; he’d throw him to the wolves rather than risk a retaliatory strike. Besides, it was pure fantasy, there was no way he could actually do it. Braggazzi didn’t keep those two hoods around because they had a sparkling line in conversation – they’d take him out before he got anywhere near their boss.

  Being sensible didn’t stop him seething with rage and frustration. He was itching to do something and the feelings of helplessness made it worse. It was still dominating his thoughts the following morning when a call came in from Virgilius’s office.

  “Mr Virgilius would like to see you right away. He wants you to fly some guests out.”

  Dan didn’t need to be told who those guests might be. On the way up in the elevator he was rapidly turning over ideas in his head.

  He knocked and went in. Virgilius was standing behind his desk.

  “Mr Braggazzi and his two colleagues will be leaving today,” he said stiffly. “I’d like you to make sure they get away safely. They want to go to Nassau, in the Bahamas. Okay?”

  “Yeah, fine. Straightforward stratospheric hop. The Steelpoint should be available.” The Steelpoint was a small supersonic liner they used for private parties. “When do they want to leave?”

  “In three hours.”

  Dan thought quickly, his plan already taking shape. “I don’t think I can get a co-pilot and flight attendants at that notice. Look, it’s only a short flight – two hours at most. If you want to give them a good lunch here I can tuck them in myself and fly single-handed. I’ll make sure the in-flight bar’s fully equipped, so they can help themselves to coffee and drinks.”

  “Sure. That’ll be fine. Tell Ted to stand by, would you? He can bring them out when they’re ready.”

  Dan had a word with Ted and then went straight to the flight pad and started running the system checks. When he’d finished he made sure the cabin was in perfect order and the in-flight bar was fully furnished with drinks and snacks. He put several more bottles of drink in for good measure. He was really going to look after these guys.

  By the time they arrived Dan was in uniform, saluting and treating them with the greatest deference. He stowed their baggage and asked if they’d like him to take their jackets. Braggazzi’s minders seemed curiously reluctant to part with theirs but Braggazzi handed his over. As he did so Dan noticed the four big rings on the fingers of his right hand and a mental picture flashed up of the lacerations and bruises on Kelly’s face. He didn’t miss a beat. He made sure they had reading material for the flight and that their seat belts were fastened. He served them drinks from the in-flight bar and invited them to make full use of that and the coffee dispenser once they’d reached cruising altitude. He collected the glasses and closed the in-flight bar for take-off. That was a standard safety procedure – the action of closing the lid inflated cushions that secured all the bottles and glasses in place. Then he wished them a pleasant flight, returned to the cockpit, and sealed the armoured door that, for security reasons, separates the cockpit from the cabin in all passenger liners, big or small.

  The Steelpoint was a nice aircraft to fly. He took off and climbed at fifteen hundred feet per minute to five thousand feet, at which point he opened up the engines to double the rate of climb. They joined the airway at ten thousand feet. At twenty-nine thousand feet he lit the boosters to push through Mach 1 and they continued the climb at supersonic speed. Thirty-three minutes after take-off he levelled the craft out at sixty thousand feet and let the autopilot take over. They were travelling at Mach 2, somewhat less than the normal cruising speed.

  He could observe his passengers on a monitor that gave him a wide-angle view of the cabin. He hadn’t said anything about reaching cruising altitude and speed and the seat belt lights were still illuminated, but they were already milling about in the cabin helping themselves to the free drinks. They seemed to be in high spirits. Smiling, he switched off the “Fasten seat belts” sign and left them to it.

  They partied for about half an hour while Dan kept everything nice and stable. He couldn’t do anything silly here anyway, in full sight of ground radar. But when they were flying along the Texas-Mexico border and about to cross the coast a cloud system came into view. It was four hundred miles away, towering up to forty thousand feet over the Gulf of Mexico – and it was just what he was looking for. A low pressure system like that could well be associated with high-altitude windshear, so it would be a perfectly normal reaction if he initiated a precautionary descent and that’s exactly what he planned to do. He took control over from the autopilot.

  He throttled back to Mach 1.65 and set the craft on a gradual descent, reducing speed all the time. He was heading directly for the cloud formation, looking for holes in the front with the precipitation radar. It would take about half an hour to get there.

 
His three passengers were still pouring drinks and enjoying themselves generally. They’d had a good flight up to now. Back on the ground Dan had considered several possibilities for making them much less comfortable but all of them had to be discarded. Unfortunately anything he did to the craft would be in the Flight Data Recorder, and some things would lead to a major investigation that could cost him his licence. He couldn’t afford to break the rules. On the other hand he could bend them a little. There was still time.

  The land slid by below him and ahead a sheet of shimmering blue expanded steadily on all sides: the Gulf of Mexico. They crossed the coast south-west of Houston. At thirty-four thousand feet there was a bump as they made the transition to subsonic speed. It was sensible to travel subsonically under these conditions but that was also intentional: it would extend the total flight time to Nassau by about forty minutes. Only they weren’t going to Nassau.

  25

  He glanced at the cabin and made sure all three were moving about, then he threw up the spoilers. They weren’t ready for the sudden deceleration. He heard one of them shout “What the fuck…?” as they hurtled up to the front of the cabin, and he heard their bodies thud against the bulkhead. Then he retracted the spoilers, throwing in the throttle at the same time, and the craft surged forwards. They back-pedalled and slammed into the rear wall of the cabin. Drinks and glasses had gone everywhere. When he looked at the monitor there was no one left standing. He switched on the “Fasten seat belts” sign, sounding a tone in the cabin, and activated the voice communication channel.

  “Gentlemen, this is your pilot speaking,” he said calmly. “We seem to have encountered some windshear. Please return to your seats and fasten your seat belts. I’m going to descend to a lower altitude to try to make you more comfortable. Unfortunately the radar shows a tropical storm down there so we may still hit a bit of turbulence.”

  They were picking themselves up groggily and groping their way to the seats. Dan made sure they didn’t get there. He rolled the craft sixty degrees to the right and they tottered and slid across the cabin, banging heads into the cabin wall and the overhead lockers. Just as they were straightening up he rolled the other way to send them sprawling helplessly over seats and just as hard into the opposite wall of the cabin.

  The Cockpit Voice Recorder would have picked up his communication to the cabin, so he covered himself by calling in his position relative to the nearest ground station and reporting the mythical windshear to Area Control.

  “Area Control, November-Five-Two-Four-Six-One-Victor. Thirty D East, Lima-Alpha-Charlie VOR. Flight level Three-Zero-Zero, severe chop.”

  When it came, the answer was curt: “Roger. Met report received at two-one.”

  He continued the descent, gradually losing speed and altitude. He glanced at the monitor again. His three passengers were in their seats now. Their general state, and the expressions on their faces, suggested they were no longer in such high spirits. If there had been a flight attendant in the cabin he would have cleaned them up, calmed them down, checked their seat belts, collected up the glasses and bottles that had been thrown everywhere, and secured the drinks cabinet, but there wasn’t.

  What a pity.

  He reached forward and twisted the knob on the climate control to bring the cabin temperature up.

  I haven’t finished with you yet, you bastards.

  The towering cloud was directly ahead of them now. It looked like a solid wall, brilliant white in the sunlight. They entered at twenty-five thousand feet doing two hundred and fifty knots. Immediately the cabin darkened and the view out of the windows abruptly became a featureless, and apparently motionless, slate grey. Dan promptly put the nose down, pulling enough negative g for everything that wasn’t tied down to float up to the ceiling. Then he pulled up again in a steep curve. In the monitor he saw a flailing figure falling to the floor of the cabin.

  Well, well. Someone didn’t fasten his seat belt.

  Under the positive g everything that had gone up was now raining down with twice its normal weight. He could see the two in their seats holding up their arms, trying to fend off a hail of crystal glasses, open bottles, cups and saucers. One yelled as a glass jug of hot coffee came down across his knees.

  He levelled out. He could hear Braggazzi’s gravelly voice shouting “Help me up, you apes!” but the two hoods seemed too petrified to move. Braggazzi struggled to his feet and dropped awkwardly into his seat. Like the others, his clothes were covered with spilt drinks and coffee and he had a cut over one eyebrow.

  There were plenty of genuine updrafts and downdrafts inside this cloud and it was taking quite a bit of skill to hold the Steelpoint straight and level but Dan wanted to stay in the cloud. His next move was going to be that much more effective if they had no horizon to look at. He started to manoeuvre, decelerating, using plenty of rudder to yaw the craft, then accelerating, and banking in the other direction. They would find this very disorientating. Their visual world would become quite unstable, drifting around dizzily as their vestibular senses said one thing and their eyes said another. He kept it up for ten minutes. Then he killed about fifteen hundred feet in one gut-wrenching drop. Just as their stomachs parted company with the backs of their throats he did it again. Dan was unaffected, but then he was an experienced pilot, he knew it was coming, and he hadn’t had a large business lunch and a lot to drink. He lifted back a thousand feet, yawing and rolling at the same time. He’d been through enough flight simulation manoeuvres to know exactly what induced nausea and he was going to use as many of them as he could pass off as turbulence in a passenger liner. The oppressive heat in the cabin wasn’t going to make things any easier either.

  He watched his passengers with clinical detachment. Within minutes they were reaching for the air sickness bags. They vomited, and as they lay back gasping he did it all over again. He let them recover for a bit and then, just when it seemed to be over he repeated the manoeuvres, more violently this time. Normally a craft like this Steelpoint would be flown well within its design limits; he was pushing that envelope hard now, and even he was surprised at how much difference it made. During all this time he was travelling in a very wide circle through the edge of the low pressure system. His passengers were turning themselves inside out but there was nothing left for them to vomit. Dan knew he was putting a tremendous strain on them. It would be a little embarrassing, of course, if one of them had a heart attack, especially if it were Braggazzi, so he didn’t really want to go as far as that. All the same, between the heat and the sickness he imagined that all three of them must be feeling pretty close to death by now. Finally the liner emerged from the cloud but the passengers were too weak to notice. Dan checked the clock. He’d managed to keep it going for fifty minutes.

  26

  It would have been easy enough to head east for Nassau but Dan had no intention of taking Braggazzi and his companions all the way. If he did they’d certainly be met there, and when the reception committee saw what shape they were in they might decide to take it out on him. Also he didn’t want them back in comfort as quickly as all that. They were far enough south by this time that he couldn’t be expected to divert to Houston. So he descended, picking up a little speed on a south-westerly heading across the Gulf of Mexico, and as soon as he knew they were in range he put in a call to Veracruz.

  “Vera-radar, November-Five-Two-Four-Six-One-Victor. Steelpoint. Position fifty miles north-east, heading Two-Three-Zero, flight level One-Five-Zero. Diverted by rough air. Intend to land. Request arrival information.”

  It was all standard practice. It probably hadn’t changed in a couple of hundred years.

  “November-Six-One-Victor identified fifty miles north-east. Runway Three-Three in use. Do you require further assistance?”

  “Affirmative: suggest airport security presence for passengers. Request descend flight level Eight-Zero. November-Six-One-Victor.”

  “Roger, November-Six-One-Victor, cleared descend flight level Eight-Zero.
Report level.”

  He started the descent, as he was cleared to do, from fifteen thousand feet to eight thousand feet for the approach to Veracruz. The monitor revealed Braggazzi and his bodyguards slumped in their seats, hands gripping the armrests with whitened knuckles, eyes staring wildly out of sweaty faces from which any colour had long fled. He switched the cabin communication on again. This was also for the benefit of the Cockpit Voice Recorder; again, he was covering himself.

  “Gentlemen, we hit some fairly rough conditions in that storm,” he said, as if he was telling them something they didn’t know. “I’m a bit concerned about the safety of the craft. I think it’s possible we sustained some damage. It’d be taking a chance to continue on to Nassau in this condition. I’ve just radioed ahead to Veracruz, in Mexico, and they’re letting us land there. I’d be happy to take you on to your final destination but they only have a small maintenance section here and I need to have the craft checked over. I don’t think it’s fair to delay you that long. It would be best for all concerned if you took one of the scheduled flights.” He had the schedules up on the computer. “There’s one leaving in two and a half hours. I do apologise for any inconvenience caused by these operational difficulties and I hope they’ll make you comfortable at Veracruz Flight Center. Please remain seated until the seat belt sign is extinguished.”

  He clicked off the communication channel and smiled. A nice touch, that last bit. To get out of their seats now they’d have to borrow someone else’s legs.

  He also had serious doubts about how comfortable they were going to be at Veracruz. He had only suggested a security presence for the passengers, and that could be interpreted as his anxiety to look after them properly. But when these guys came off the craft, walking very unsteadily and with their clothes soaked and stinking of drink and vomit, the security people were likely to reach their own conclusions. They had a reputation in Mexico for not being long on patience. Weak as he was, Braggazzi was an aggressive customer who was used to having his own way, and the profile of his companions’ jackets left Dan in no doubt about what they were carrying. One way and another they were more likely to end up in a cell than on the next flight to Nassau. It would be a fitting conclusion to a nightmare journey.