Hard Asset

by Pamela Clare

  With any luck, it was still intact.

  He made his way back to Shanti, grabbed his pack. “Come on. I want to show you something.”

  “What is it?”

  “It’s our miracle.”

  “That’s not a miracle. That’s crazy.” Shanti stared through the binoculars at the rope bridge below, almost dizzy. “Whole planks are missing.”

  She was done with this running-through-the-jungle thing.

  “Do you have a better idea?” Connor took back his binoculars, tucked them in his pack. “I’ll test it first.”

  He walked to the edge where the stairs ended, grabbed the rope guides, and gave them each a good, hard yank. “Here goes.”

  Shanti could barely breathe as Connor turned to face her—and stepped over the edge and onto the ladder.

  He put his full weight on the first rung, gave a little hop, and then stepped down to the next. The wood creaked, but it held. If it could support his weight, it would support Shanti’s. Or so she told herself.

  He climbed back up. “It’s good. There are some missing rungs, and it rocks a little when you move. But I think it will hold.”

  “What if it doesn’t?”

  “That’s why it’s good to have a backup plan.” He reached for his pack, drew out a coil of orange and yellow rope. “We’ll wait until dusk when thermal crossover makes it harder for spotters on the suspension bridge to see us with their infrared scopes. Then I’ll make you a harness and set up an anchor. If you fall, I’ll stop you.”

  Shanti didn’t know what thermal crossover was, but she was more afraid of falling than she was of guns. “Won’t I just pull you over the edge?”

  “Not a chance. You’ll see.”

  They ate their dinner—chicken and noodles with vegetables—and watched as the sun sank behind a horizon of clouds, turning them pink. If she’d been a tourist and not running from an army, she would have loved this.

  “When it’s not trying to kill us, this is a beautiful place.”

  Connor looked into the sunset, pink-gold rays making his face seem impossibly handsome. “I suppose it is. It’s been years since I’ve been able to look at a jungle and see anything other than a job site.”

  After they’d eaten supper, Connor got out a pair of leather gloves and set about building the anchor, securing one end of the rope around the trunk of a sturdy teak tree. Then he wrapped the rope around his waist, knelt before her, and began to tie the free end around her hips and between her legs.

  “Let me adjust this. It won’t be comfortable, but it will hold you.”

  She stood still, her pulse already racing.

  He got to his feet, cupped her face between his palms. “You can do this, Shanti. If you slip, trust that I’ll catch you—and don’t scream.”

  “Right.”

  They got into position—Connor on the stairs, Shanti on the edge facing inward.

  “Don’t look down if it scares you. Remember to give me three tugs on the rope when you’re down. If I fall, you keep going.

  “Don’t you dare.”

  He gave her a lopsided grin. “Good copy.”

  Shanti hesitated, her heart thudding.

  This is the way home, the way to safety.

  Her gaze on Connor’s, she took hold of the guide ropes and stepped over the edge and onto the first rung. The ladder swung a little, but the step held.

  Connor fed her a little rope at a time as she climbed carefully down. “You’re doing great. One step at a—”

  A rotten plank broke beneath her feet, the pieces falling to the water below.

  She gasped, a scream trapped in her chest, her hands clinging tightly to the swaying ladder, her pulse pounding in her ears. Then she realized that she hadn’t fallen at all, not an inch. Connor had caught her, just like he’d said he would.

  “You’re okay,” she said to herself. “You’re okay. Keep going.”

  She moved faster now, confident that Connor would keep her safe. Another rung broke, but she kept going.

  The river was so loud at this point that she wouldn’t have been able to hear Connor if he were to call for her.

  Just a little farther.

  Another step and another and another.

  Relieved to be almost down, she looked up—and saw a man falling headlong toward the ground.

  Connor? God, no!

  He flew past her, landing on stone with a sickening thud.

  Not Connor, but a soldier, his throat slit.

  Panic hit her veins with a rush of adrenaline.

  The soldiers had found him. They’d found Connor.

  He was fighting for his life, and there was nothing she could do to help him.

  16

  Blade in hand, Connor jumped back, the bayonet missing him by inches. He grabbed the second soldier’s rifle, used it to yank him down the stairs. The soldier fell with a grunt, landing at Connor’s feet. Connor wrested the firearm from his grasp, bayoneted the soldier through the chest, then knelt, waiting.

  Three tugs.

  Shanti was safely down.

  Whoever they were, these two hadn’t expected to find him. They’d come up behind, looking surprised to see him. Maybe they were off duty and just taking a stroll. Damned bad luck for them.

  When he didn’t hear anyone else, he looked over the edge.

  Shanti stood near the base of the ladder, looking up. He didn’t need to see her face to know she was probably scared to death.

  He motioned for her to step back, pushed the second soldier’s body over the edge, and then hurled the men’s rifles out over the water, where they landed one at a time with an inaudible splash. He ran up the stairs, untied the rope from the tree, and let it fall. Then he put on his pack, slipped his rifle strap over his shoulder, grabbed onto the ladder—and did his best rendition of a fast-rope down to the river.

  Shanti stared at him, eyes wide, clearly stunned. “Are … are you okay?”

  “I’m fine.” He knew this was hard for her, but he couldn’t do anything about that. He would have asked her to help him search the dead bodies but figured she wasn’t up for that. “Gather the rope. Get it coiled up again.”

  That seemed to draw her out of her shock, and she went to work.

  Connor dropped to his knees, searched each man’s knapsack and pockets, and retrieved 9 mm ammo, two full canteens, and two pouches of snacks. He packed the goods away, rolled one body into the river and then the next, letting the water take them.

  He found Shanti watching him. “If soldiers discover their bodies, Naing will know exactly where we crossed. It will narrow his search and make getting home a hell of a lot tougher.”

  “I understand.” She handed him a tight coil of rope.

  He shoved it into his pack. “These two probably have friends who will notice when they don’t come back. They have infrared scopes like I do. We need to cross this river and climb up the other side before they come looking. The rocks retain heat, and sunset will confuse their scopes for a few minutes. But if they find us while we’re climbing, we’ll make easy targets. Speed is survival. I’ll cross the bridge first. Stay a few feet behind me, and hold on tight to the side ropes. If I fall through, you keep going. When we reach the other side, I’ll climb up first, and belay you like I did before.”

  He glanced up at the rim to see whether any soldiers were up there, then made straight for the bridge. It swayed more than the ladder, but it held. Several planks were missing, and some were broken or barely hanging on, but he made good time, Shanti keeping up behind him.

  He heard her gasp, looked back to see that her left leg had slipped between two rotted planks, and reached out to help her up. “Easy, Shanti. You’ve got this.”

  He kept going, glancing back at the rim every few minutes, knowing that he and Shanti would be easy to hit.

  So far, so good.

  The first shot came just as they reached the other side, the bullet whining past his ear before he heard the crack of the rifle.


  “Take cover! Get down!” He dove behind a jumble of boulders and aimed his rifle, searching through the scope for his target.

  There on the rim above stood four uniformed soldiers, one of them aiming a rifle directly at him. If he tried to take them out one at a time, the others could hide or run. They had a better view of him than he had of them.

  Shanti crouched behind him now, breathing hard. “What do we do?”

  A round hit nearby, a fragment of bullet or rock creasing his shoulder.

  Fuck.

  “Stay down!” Connor switched his rifle into three-round burst mode, raised it, and opened fire, gunfire echoing through the gorge. Two men dropped, then the third.

  The fourth ran.

  Connor fired again, and he fell. “We need to get the hell out of here. This area will be crawling with hostiles soon.”

  He stood, rifle in hand. “On your feet, Shanti.”

  Those soldiers had radios, and it was a good bet they had called this in. It was also possible that a company was encamped nearby that had heard the gunfire. Either way, Naing would soon know precisely where Connor and Shanti had crossed the river.

  Shanti hurried over rounded river rocks and boulders to the other ladder, her heart still in her throat. More afraid of bullets than falling now, she started climbing as fast as she could, not waiting for Connor or the rope.

  Don’t look down. Don’t look down.

  Some hideous multi-colored spider had made its web between two of the rungs, but Shanti gritted her teeth and moved past it.

  Up and up and up.

  She came to a place with several missing rungs, the gap too wide for her. “I can’t reach! It’s too far!”

  “I’m going to boost you.” Connor came up beneath her, nudged his head between her thighs from behind, as if to give her a ride on his shoulders. “Hold on tightly to the ropes and climb with me.”

  He rose up the ladder, lifting her with him while she held on for dear life. “Can you reach the next rung now?”

  “I’ll try.” She raised one foot, just managing to catch it with her heel. She slid her leg through and then another, as if she were climbing onto a swing. Then she pulled herself up, making the mistake of looking behind her.

  It was so far to the ground.

  Don’t look down.

  “Beautiful. Keep going.”

  She was almost there. If she fell now, if Connor fell, they would hit the ground like those two soldiers had. They would die.

  Don’t think about it.

  She climbed and climbed.

  Relief flooded her as she pulled herself over the top and onto the carved stone stairs on the other side and crawled to safety, Connor right behind her.

  He checked his rifle. “The only way to evade these bastards now is to put a lot of miles between us and the river. I know you’re hungry and tired—”

  “I can handle it.” She would not be the reason they died out here.

  Connor’s lips curved in an approving smile, sweat beading on his temples. “Listen to you—Princess Shanti of the Jungle.”

  He led the way, sticking to rocky ground, moving at a pace that left her almost running behind him. She welcomed it, knowing that every step led her farther away from Naing and his troops and closer to freedom. Up a steep slope, down a rocky ravine, across a creek, and up again. Through dense undergrowth. Across a grassy field where macaques sat eating…

  “Mangoes!”

  Connor walked over to the tree, sending the macaques into a screeching fit, most of the troop running away or disappearing into the trees. “Take just a few.”

  They picked fruit, Shanti dropping it into her handbag. Then Connor took advantage of the lack of tree cover to check in with his boss, giving him a quick update, while Shanti devoured a mango, the fruit taking the edge off her hunger, sweet juices spilling down her chin.

  “Strong copy, Cobra. We’ll head north and keep to the mountains.” Connor tucked his cell phone away, picked another mango, and ate. “We’ve made thirty-six miles today. They want us to stick to the mountains and head straight north for now. The cover is better, and there are fewer roads.”

  The last of the light began to fade, leaving them in the dark, the birds going silent.

  Connor stopped, took out his flashlight, aimed it low. “I don’t see any way to keep going if we don’t have some light. Stay close.”

  Shanti focused on the circle of yellow light in front of Connor’s feet, doing her best to step where it was safe.

  On and on they went, hour after hour, Shanti hollow with hunger and weighed down by exhaustion. She thought for a moment of asking Connor to let her take a nap, just a few minutes of sleep right here on the ground. But she couldn’t fail him. Then it came to her that this is how so many Rohingya survivors had come to Bangladesh—fleeing on foot through the mountains at night. She couldn’t fail them either.

  Shanti kept going, step after weary step, a light rain falling.

  It must have been close to midnight when Connor stopped, turned the flashlight toward an unusually long and high mound of vines to their right.

  Shanti fought to catch her breath. “Are we there yet?”

  “I think we might be.” He stepped closer to the vines, moved the light over it, and chuckled. “Well, hello.”

  Shanti saw something white poking out of the green leaves, stepped closer—and realized she was looking at the top of a human skull. She clapped a hand to her mouth, choked back a scream.

  “Don’t worry about him. He’s a friend.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Connor pushed the vines carefully aside, revealed a red circle surrounded by white and blue. “It’s a British Blenheim bomber from the war. Our buddy here was shot down, and he’s been here ever since. Let’s see if the fuselage is intact.”

  Shanti stayed where she was while Connor walked around the plane, stepping through deep undergrowth.

  “It looks like he lost a wing, but the fuselage is mostly unbroken. There’s a hole here big enough for us to enter and shelter for the night.”

  “You want to sleep in there?” Shanti would rather keep walking.

  “Don’t worry.” Connor’s teeth flashed white in the darkness, a note of amusement in his voice. “I’ll make sure no one else is home before we move in.”

  Connor left Shanti to heat their MRE—Beef Tacos with Santa Fe Style Rice and Beans—and went about making their extremely cramped shelter safe, the interior of the plane lit by his flashlight, rain falling hard outside. He had already cleared the plane of anything that might bite, including a young Burmese python. To keep predators out, he taped old webbing from inside the plane over the hole in the fuselage and covered that with one of the squares of space blanket he’d brought from the tree house. It wasn’t a serious obstacle, but it would keep out mosquitoes and snakes—and give him enough warning to respond should anything bigger and meaner come for them.

  That meant he could truly sleep tonight.

  When that was done, he took out the first aid kit, put on a glove, and treated the shrapnel wound on his shoulder. It wasn’t deep and hadn’t bled much.

  “You’re hurt.”

  “It’s just a nick.” He finished with that, then replaced the bandage on his temple with a clean one and put the first aid kit away.

  “I think dinner is ready.”

  He got the towelettes out so they could wash their hands, and then it was time to eat. “Today was hard, but you handled it.”

  “The only easy day was yesterday, right?”

  “You got it.”

  “What happens tomorrow?” There was apprehension in her eyes.

  “I wish I knew.” He took another bite, ravenous for real food. “They’ll send all of their resources to this side of the river. There will be helicopters and soldiers on foot. They might bring dogs. The best way to defeat them is to keep moving. Just do what you did today, and with any luck, you’ll be in The Hague in two days.”

  She didn�
�t look as relieved by this news as he’d imagined she would. “I thought you said it would take seven days.”

  “That was back when I didn’t know what a hard charger you were. It would have taken us seven days if you’d been able to go only twenty miles a day. But I think we gained a good forty-five miles today. That leaves about fifty miles ahead of us.”

  They would be the fifty most dangerous miles of their journey, but she didn’t need to hear that now.

  She nodded and said nothing, probably beyond exhaustion.

  He finished eating, pulled out the food he’d taken off the soldiers he’d killed. “Do you know what this stuff is?”

  Shanti took a packet of what looked like crumbly tamales without the corn husks. “These are peanut rolls.”

  Connor took one, ate it. “They taste like Butterfingers without the chocolate.”

  “These are tamarind flakes—like fruit chews made of tamarind. These little dark nuggets are called jaggery. It’s made with cane sugar and date tree sap.”

  Connor took a piece of jaggery, popped it in his mouth, sugar melting on his tongue. “I like it. This isn’t a lot, but together with the mangoes, it will give us some extra calories.”

  Shanti nodded, but didn’t eat, sitting there, looking at nothing, a distant expression on her face. He’d seen that look on young soldiers’ faces after a day of fighting. He’s seen it on the faces of civilians who’d fled their homes to survive.

  Say something.

  “How are you feeling?”

  Can’t you do better than that?

  She shook her head. “I’m alive. That’s all that matters, right?”

  He reached over, took her hand. “I can see that something’s bothering you.”

  She seemed to hesitate. “Those men you killed today—I was relieved and happy that they died. You saved our lives. They were strangers who weren’t there by choice. They were ordered to come after us. They have families and friends, maybe wives and children. But I was relieved when they died. What kind of hypocrite am I if I talk about nonviolence and then feel good about it when someone else gets killed?”