by Rob Jones
“Sure is.”
“How long until we’re at Flower Mountain?”
He glanced at the instrument panel again, checking the airspeed and then his watch. “Not long. If this tailwind keeps up, maybe less than an hour.”
A few minutes of silence stretched out between them. Selena yawned and peered through the window. “It just goes on forever. You can see why we’re still finding ruins and lost cities.”
Decker said, “I wonder how many more surprises there are out there, still, just waiting for us to discover them.”
“A lot, I would think. At least, I hope so! Without anything to discover I wouldn’t have a very interesting job.”
He laughed. “I guess not. I don’t have to worry about that. Being a pilot always means a new challenge, a new place to fly. I’m not the type to settle down. I like a life on the road, but in my case, it’s a life in the air.”
Selena closed her eyes and pushed back in the seat. “I wanted to talk with you about the future, Mitch.”
He sat up. “Oh yeah?”
“About the future of the Avalon crew.”
And slid back down again. “Oh, right.”
“Actually, I have a bit of an announcement about the Avalon team’s future.”
“An announcement?”
“Yes, but when we’re all together.”
“Sounds ominous.”
She paused, and closed her eyes. “I do wish your aeroplane were quieter, Mitch. I can’t sleep.”
“I’m so sorry. Would you like me to switch the engines off for an hour so you can get some shuteye and then wake you when we’re there.”
“Stop being facetious.”
“C’mon! What else can I do? The damn plane needs power to get lift, Lena. Even you know that.”
“What do you mean, even I know it?” She opened her eyes and glared at him.
Decker reached over to the instrument panel where he had set his hat and now picked it up and wore it, pulling the brim down over the right side of his face to block her view of him. Next thing he knew, she had pulled it right off again and tossed it behind their seats.
“Hey!”
“Oh, sorry! Was that rude?”
“Yes.”
“Then looks like we’re even.”
He hid his smile. “The lady has spirit.”
“You bet I do! And I would be much happier if the pilot was actually looking at all these gauges and doing things with them instead of playing around with big hats.”
“And what is wrong with my hat?”
“Well, nothing…”
From behind in the cabin, Charlie leaned his head against the seat and said, “I’m getting some sleep.”
“Good idea,” Selena called back. “We should all do that.”
“Looks like we’re late to the party,” Charlie said. “Take a look.”
When she turned and looked through the cockpit door down the cabin, she saw the rest of the crew were already fast asleep in their seats. Glancing back at the silhouette of Decker in the cockpit, she smiled and closed her eyes. “Get some sleep, Charlie,” she said. “I’m going to keep Mitch company.”
15
Lacandon Jungle, Chiapas State, Mexico
The chopper swooped over the Lacandon Jungle, so low its skids almost brushed the tops of the tropical canopies. When the Spanish conquistadors first arrived, the Lacandon tribe took one look at them and vanished inside this immense jungle. Most of them stayed hidden within it until the twentieth century arrived, but today their lands have been slashed away by logging and mining operations right across Chiapas state.
The Chiapanecan bush pilot Tarántula had hired expertly located the clearing, invisible to everyone else, and lowered the collective, bringing the helicopter down below the tree-line and gently touching down on the uneven ground. “Bienvenido a Laguna Miramar.”
Tarántula unbuckled his seatbelt and stepped out of the chopper. The Snake King had already exited and was standing at the edge of the clearing, staring up at the moon. On his face, the terrifying jade mask glinted in the moonlight as he mumbled an ancient mantra to the gods.
Tarántula watched him raise his hands into the air and release a desperate, hoarse scream into the night. It echoed across the jungle and triggered a cacophony of cries from the legion of monkeys and birds within it.
“Is he all right?” Carlos said.
Tarántula turned his eyes to his old friend. “He knows what he is doing.”
The heat and humidity worked together to make it feel like someone had thrown a hot, wet blanket over him. As most of the rest of his team exited the chopper, he took a breath of the hot, sticky air and wiped his forehead. “Where is the seal?”
“Here,” Diablo said, hefting it from the top of his pack.
Carlos swatted a mosquito on his arm and pointed south of their position. “Which way do we go?”
Tarántula looked at the seal and mumbled. “This way, it’s pointing to the north of the lake.”
Novarro slung his bags over his shoulder and brushed past them. “What are we waiting for?”
Miguel took one look outside and sunk back into his seat. “I think I want to stay in the helicopter. It’s so comfortable in here, and there’s air-conditioning.”
Tarántula adjusted his hat and blew out a deep breath. “Get out. Now.”
“Do as he says, Mico,” Carlos said.
“You said they have an old sea plane, right?” asked Carlos.
Diablo nodded. “This is what I am told. Why?”
“Because without a helicopter, there is nowhere to land around here for hundreds of kilometers. If they are going to land here, then they must use the lake.”
Tarántula started to grin and turned to Carlos. “You hear that, old friend? Our archaeologist friends have no choice but to bring their plane down on this lake. I want you to make sure they have a welcoming committee when they arrive.”
“Leave it to me, boss.”
Tarántula’s grin broke into a greasy smile, the diamond on his front tooth reflecting the bright moonlight. Then, the Snake King wandered back over to them, his face still concealed by the grotesque jade mask.
“I am most pleased with our work here tonight. If we sacrifice the foreigners to Huracan and then locate the source of his divine power, he will greatly reward us!” He turned to the moon and fell to his knees. “Kaloomte! The king of kings!”
Tarántula and the others shared an unsettled glance as the Snake King began mumbling his prayers to Huracan.
*
The Avalon flew low with night still at its back. As the bright Mexican moon rose rapidly above the jungle, the vintage sea plane turned to the left and swooped down toward a large lake to their southwest which had been totally invisible only moments earlier.
In the low ambient light of the cockpit, Decker turned to Selena and gently nudged her awake. “We’re almost there.”
“Go away and leave me alone,” she mumbled. “I need at least another hour’s sleep.”
“Sorry, but we’re about to land. Let the others know and tell them to buckle up.”
Selena begrudgingly climbed out of her seat and was making her way toward the cockpit door when a loud explosion sounded in the night. A second later, the Avalon rocked wildly in the air and then lurched over to one side, sending her tumbling into Decker’s lap.
“Sorry, Mitch!” she said, pulling herself up and grabbing hold of the back of his seat. “But what the hell was that?”
“I don’t know, but we’re going down!”
Riley’s face appeared in the door. “Your flying sucks, mate! You just woke everyone up!”
“We’ve been hit by something,” Decker called out. “Maybe shot at. I don’t know. Tell everyone to buckle up. We’re going down.”
“This is not what a guy wants to hear from a pilot, Mitch.”
“Now, Riley!”
Riley left the cockpit and Decker scanned the instruments once again.
Only three hundred feet in the air and dropping like a stone.
He gripped the yoke with all his might and fought hard to keep the damaged aircraft in the sky. He’d been in a few scrapes in his time, but this was already the worst and it had only just begun. The enormous rotary engines, fixed either side of the cockpit on the vintage plane’s high-wing configuration, roared and whined as the Avalon’s nose pitched down harder.
He glanced momentarily to his right and saw Selena. She looked scared as hell. “Listen, you’d better go back into the main cabin and strap in. Looks like we’re going down hard and fast and there’s nothing I can do about it except try and keep her on a track to the lake.”
“And you’ve tried everything?” she asked, wide-eyed with fear.
“No, I thought I’d try some of the things I can do to stop her going down, and forget about the rest. Yes, I tried everything!”
“No need to be facetious, Mitch. I was just asking.”
“I’m sorry.” He swivelled in his seat and craned his neck to the left to look outside the side window one more time. “Engine seems okay but the wing surface has been badly damaged by what looks like gunfire! Bastards shot my plane to shit! Ailerons look like goddam vegetable strainers. God only knows what they did to the back, but judging from the response I’m getting up here…” he turned and fixed his eyes on her. “It ain’t good.”
A meaty explosion on the right. Selena jumped and swore, and then looked out of her side window. “Mitch, what would it mean if there was a thick cloud of black smoke billowing out of the back of an engine?”
Decker, who had leaned forward in his seat and was tapping the glass screen of the attitude gauge, stopped what he was doing and turned to her. “Huh?”
“Black smoke, Mitch. Pouring out of the thingy at the back of the engine.”
He looked at the starboard engine’s oil pressure gauge and watched the little needle slowly sinking down to zero. “Looks like they took out engine number two… sons of bitches! And it’s the cowling, not a thingy.”
“Perhaps rather than correcting my speech with your somewhat niche airman’s vocabulary, you might be more concerned that the Mexican jungle is about to smash into this cockpit!”
“I think you’ll find the cockpit is about to smash into the Mexican jungle, Lena.”
“I swear to God, sometimes I could slap your—”
Riley Carr’s face appeared in the cockpit door once again. “Engine two’s out, Mitch, and the horizontal stabilizer on the portside looks like Swiss cheese.”
“I worked that much out, but thanks.”
The Australian SAS man gave a bright, toothy grin and leaned on the doorframe as casual as if he were in a beach house with a beer in his hand. “So, are we fucked or what?”
Standing behind him, Charlie didn’t have to think about it. “Is Riley cool? He’s straight from the fridge.”
Decker was also straight from the fridge, but in his case, from the ice box. Flying planes, especially vintage aircraft, was a serious business and demanded a calm head. “I’m shutting engine number two down.”
“That sounds bad,” Selena said. “Is it bad?”
“It’s not great, but we’re okay. She can fly on one engine. I’m feathering the prop to reduce drag.”
“Feathering the prop?” Riley said. “I’m an open minded guy but please tell me that has nothing to do with a rugby player?”
Decker gave him a look. “I’m from New York state, Riley. I don’t know the first thing about what happens on a rugby pitch. I’m talking about the engines.”
“Phew.”
“This is a variable prop aircraft, which means the propeller blades can be rotated so they’re thin-side on to the wind. It reduces drag. That process is called feathering.”
“Gotcha, big guy. That’s a load off.”
Decker rotated the blades on the dead engine and increased power to the portside one, carefully mitigating the effect with the rudder as he tried to line the aircraft up with the moonlit lake ahead of them.
Now Diana stuck her head in the cockpit door. “Are we going to be all right?”
“Sure,” Decker said. “Well, everyone except Riley. There’s no hope for him.”
“I understand,” she said. “Thanks. I’ll tell the others… especially about Riley.
With the aircraft lined up, Decker pulled back on the throttles and reduced the power to the one good engine. They lost altitude instantly, and rapidly approached the same height as the tropical canopy either side of the enormous lake.
Decker extended the flaps but there was no need for the landing gear on a water landing. “Let’s hope those bastards don’t have anything else in store for us.”
They all heard the sound of crackling in the distance.
“They’re firing again!” Riley called out.
Selena gasped. “You just had to say it, didn’t you Mitch?”
“Huh?”
“If you hadn’t said what you just did, we’d be all right.”
“That’s insane!”
Suddenly the Avalon lurched heavily to the left and began to nosedive.
Selena screamed. “What’s happening?”
“Rudder’s off! They must have hit the tail!” Decker called out, gripping the yoke as it shook and wobbled violently in his hand. “We have serious issues with some of our control surfaces.”
“And this means?”
Decker stared up at her. “See that lake?”
“Yes, of course I bloody do! It’s right in front of us!”
“We might not be landing on it anymore.”
The plane twisted in the sky and she gasped again. “What does that mean?”
“It means the damage to the aircraft is moving us off course and I’m struggling to steer her back toward the lake!”
“But the rest is just… jungle!”
“I had not noticed that – thanks! Brace for impact, we’re going down!”
16
“Can’t you take her back up?”
“Ha! You just called the Avalon her!”
“I did not. I merely asked if you could take it back up into the air again.”
“No can do,” he said. “Only one engine and thanks to the damage to the control surfaces, I’ll struggle just keep her on a straight course, never mind up.”
“Well fuck me with a bag over my head,” Riley said. “This really is bad.”
“Yeah,” Decker said. “This really is bad. Lena, get back and tell the others to strap in and brace for impact. Riley, you’re up front with me. I could use some help with the yoke and rudders. Strap yourself in and enjoy.”
“Got it, Mitch.”
When Selena had disappeared through the cockpit door, Decker turned to the young Australian. “We’re in deep shit, Riley. I didn’t want to say anything with Lena around, but if this thing hits the trees we’re breaking into a thousand pieces. We might not all walk away.”
“Fuck.”
“And even if we do, we know we have hostile forces armed with guns in the area, almost certainly Tarántula and his goons. If we’re wounded in the crash it’s not going to be hard for them to find the site and hunt us down with their weapons.”
“Double fuck.”
“Grab the yoke and help me pull it across to the left. We’re going to do all we can to counterbalance the yaw with full left rudder, got it?”
“Got it.”
The tall Australian followed Decker’s orders and extended his long leg down until his boot was on the rudder pedal. The effect was instant, but did little to correct their trajectory. “You think we’re going to make it?”
The engine on their left hand-side growled and roared and the hot tropical wind buffeted the plane back and forth as they plummeted ever-closer to the ground.
“We’re not hitting the middle of the lake in a million years, which is what I was going for. We might just be able to make the area to the right near the shore. Our goal right now is to miss those tr
ees.”
“I’m with you, mate.”
Decker reduced power again and struggled hard against the powerful yaw pulling the aircraft away from the lake and toward the jungle. They were already below the canopy level of the surrounding rainforest and impact was imminent. Decker called out to the crew and told them brace and seconds later the vintage aircraft touched down on the edge of the lake with a stomach-turning smash. Diana screamed for her life as the plane twisted to the right and ploughed a deep groove in the water.
Decker fought it. Full corrective rudder and pulling the remaining engine’s power back to idle, he gripped the yoke with his full force and just managed to keep the Avalon heading on a straight course. After a few terrifying seconds, the old plane came to a rest at the end of the lake just inches from the shore in a cloud of smoke and carbon monoxide. Decker and Riley shut the plane down and walked out of the cockpit.
In the main cabin, Diana gasped and grabbed onto Riley’s arm as the aircraft bobbed about on the surface of the lake. As the one working prop slowed down above them and the roar of the engine settled down into a much quieter whine, Charlie looked through the window and took in the jungle surrounding the lake. “So when they said this place was remote, they actually meant unbelievably bloody remote.”
“Yes,” Decker said. “Yes, I think they did mean that.”
They climbed out of the Avalon and waded through the shallow water around the aircraft, passing their packs of gear from one to the next until it was on the shore. They stacked the heavy backpacks, full of camping equipment, ropes, glow sticks, food and water, into a big heap and watched the old seaplane bobbing up and down, smoke from its damaged engine rising above them in the moonlight. It drifted above the lake for a few seconds and then the breeze picked it up it was gone over the tropical canopy. They listened as the sound of the engine quietly faded, to be replaced with the relentless chirping of cicadas and croaking of marsh frogs.
“Well…” Riley said, reaching down for his pack. “Welcome to the —.”
“No,” Selena said. “Do. Not. Say. It.”
He laughed and hoisted the pack up over his shoulders. “You know me too well, Professor Moore.”