by J. T. Cross
“What if we haven’t found them by the time we get there?” Chuck asked.
“If we don’t find anything, we’ll widen our search path and fly back to the starting point. We’ll keep doing that as long as we have enough fuel.”
“I think it’s our best bet,” Kate said.
Luc picked up an emergency beacon locator that had been sitting on the table off to one side. “I bought one of these when I first started dating Kate,” he said with a slight grin.
“Very funny,” she said.
“But seriously, if we get anywhere near them, this should be able to pick up their emergency signal.”
“We should also keep our eyes open for any wreckage, smoke signals, or flares,” Chuck added.
Luc picked up two pairs of binoculars. “These should help with that.”
“Are there any men in the village who can help in the search?” Chuck asked.
Luc shook his head. “We can’t count on them. You remember, all the hunters refused to go in with me when I searched for the boys.”
“Why?”
“They’re afraid. They’ve all heard village legends that people who go into that area are usually never seen again. If the animal I ran into is any indication of what lives back in there, there’s a good reason why.”
“I’ve done my share of big game hunting,” Chuck said, “and I’m sure not about to let a few animals scare me off.”
“Are you sure? Because now’s the time to reconsider.”
Chuck changed his expression to that of a man who was ready to go into battle. “I’m up for it.”
Luc looked at Kate. He hated to expose her to danger, but felt he had no other choice. He knew they would need at least three ATVs to get everyone out, and that was cutting it short. He promised himself he would do his best to keep her safe.
“When we go in on the ATVs, we’re going to be on our own,” he said with his eyes locked on hers. “There will be no one to bail us out if we run into trouble. Knowing what you know now, are you sure you want to help me?”
“Of course, I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she said.
He wrapped his arms around her and held her close. He could smell the familiar perfume she always wore. He pulled back and looked into her eyes. “I hope you know how much I appreciate you,” he said. He took her face in his hands, tilted her head up, and gently kissed her.
He looked up and saw Chuck watching them out of the corner of his eye, grinning.
“We should get to work,” Kate said, her face slightly flushed.
“You’re right,” Luc said moving to the table. He began folding the map and putting things into his backpack.
While Luc packed supplies, Kate and Chuck drove to the airport to get her plane fueled and ready for the flight to Manatuk the next morning.
After he had finished packing the last item, Luc called Yudi in Manatuk. The conversation was brief. Yudi agreed to provide Kate and Chuck with ATVs. He also told him that he and Miki would haul their things out to the Manatuk hunter’s campground.
Luc could imagine how relieved Yudi must have been when he hadn’t asked him to come along. He guessed that was probably why he loaned him the two ATVs so easily.
He went out and began loading the supplies into his truck, checking things off a list he had put together earlier. By 9:00 that evening Kate and Chuck had returned. They ate a quick dinner and double-checked that everything was packed. After that, they turned in early.
Luc let Kate use his bed and Chuck got the couch. He lay on the floor in a sleeping bag, tossing and turning, unable to get the sound of Christie’s voice out of his mind.
* * *
Christie had worked hard straightening and organizing the inside of the helicopter cabin. By the time she was finished, everyone had a place to sleep. Earlier they had agreed that she would sleep on the booth at the rear of the cabin, Kelly and Stuart would each get a seat, and Marcus would sleep on the carpet with an extra blanket under him for padding.
She had also itemized the emergency food and divided it among the four of them. She estimated they could go a week before running out of food.
She looked around the cabin and felt satisfied that things were as good as they were going to get. Earlier in the evening Marcus had found an LED lantern that promised 100 hours of light on a fresh set of batteries. She hoped they were fresh. The lantern now sat on the small conference table at the rear of the helicopter in front of Kelly and Stuart.
She walked over to them. They were drawing on a pad of paper she had given them. Bending over the table, she looked at their drawings. It looked like Kelly had been trying to draw a little girl. She rubbed her back as she continued to draw. “That’s very nice, honey. Is that a picture of you?”
“No,” she said looking up. “It’s the doll Kate gave me. I wish she was here now. I miss her. When will they rescue us?” she asked, as she continued drawing.
“Soon baby, real soon.”
She looked at Stuart’s drawing. He was a good artist for his age. He had drawn a picture of an airplane. “That’s a nice plane,” she said.
“Thanks. Kate gave me a model of that plane. She helped me build it.”
Christie raised her eyebrows. It seemed Kate certainly knew how to win them over. Pangs of jealousy laced with guilt rose up in her. She added them to the ever-growing pile of confused emotions that centered around Luc.
“Those are really good drawings. I want each of you to draw me another one. Okay?” Anything to keep them busy so they didn’t worry seemed like a good idea, she thought.
She walked to the front of the cabin and looked out the hatch window. She watched as Marcus threw another piece of wood on a fire he had started earlier in the evening. Next to the fire was a neatly stacked pile of dried branches and split wood.
He had worked hard before the sun went down and had accumulated enough dry firewood to last through the night. He had told her he thought it was important to have a fire going at night in case any planes were searching after dark. It sounded good to her.
She picked up her backpack and pulled out the book she had been reading. She walked back to the lantern and leafed through the pages until she found the spot where she had left off.
Sitting in a seat not far from the conference table, she angled the book so she could read in the light given off by the lantern. She tried to get back into the story several times, but couldn’t. She finally gave up. She decided books were much more fun to read when the characters in them were in a worse and more dangerous situation than yourself. That clearly wasn’t the case any longer, at least for that book.
She put the book down and decided to check on Kelly and Stuart again. They were still drawing at the conference table.
She looked down at Kelly’s drawing. The second drawing was definitely better than the first. There was no mistaking it was a cat and a fairly large one, considering its size compared to the tree she had drawn next to it.
She immediately sensed something wasn’t right. What concerned her were the cat’s teeth. Kelly had drawn long curved incisors, something no ordinary cat possessed, and something she was sure Kelly had never seen.
“Is that a picture of a kitty cat?”
“It’s not a kitty. It’s a big tiger.”
“How did you know how to draw that?”
“Because I saw it out the window before it got dark.” Kelly pointed out the window opposite the side of the clearing where Marcus had built the fire.
“You saw a big tiger outside the window?”
Kelly got up on her knees and pointed out the window. “I saw it over there, looking at me.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I don’t know.”
“You’re not pretending, are you?”
She shook her head back and forth. “No. I really saw it. I’m not pretending!”
“Marcus!” Christie yelled and ran to the hatch door.
She looked out the window and saw the fire bur
ning, but Marcus wasn’t there. She looked around the clearing and didn’t see anything, so she slowly opened the door.
“Marcus, are you out there?” she put her hands on either side of her mouth and yelled, “Marcus!” He wasn’t there.
She ran to her backpack and pulled out the pistol and flashlight. She went back up to the hatch door, opened it, and carefully stepped down into the clearing. She held the gun out in front of her and flashed the light around the as she began to walk toward the rear of the helicopter.
“Marcus, are you out there?”
She walked to the edge of the boundary where the trees began to grow. Tall and slender, they were a species that seemed out of place for this far north in Alaska.
Instinctively, she reached down and felt the ground. It was warm, warmer than it had any right to be, but it explained a lot. To the eyes of a paleontologist, the trees were an aberration, only able to survive because of the warmth provided by the ore that was obviously mixed deep into the soil throughout the Valley.
She shined the light in between the branches and the beam penetrated deeper into the forest. “Marcus, are you out there?”
She heard a rustling sound as if something large had moved through the branches. She felt the hair stand up on the back of her neck. What the hell was she doing out there anyway? Was she crazy? She decided to go back in the helicopter and pray that Marcus was okay.
A growl came from not far within the stand of trees. It was low, impossibly low, the vibrations seeming to vibrate the shirt against her skin. She knew a growl like that could only come from the largest of cats. She pictured the Smilodon from her book and felt her heart skip a beat.
Her mind began to race. Should she turn and run? If she did, would it trigger the animal’s instinct and cause it to race between the trees and leap on her back as she ran? She probably couldn’t get halfway back to the helicopter hatch before it would be on her.
She heard movement again, this time to her left. Oh God, not another one, she thought. What had she gotten herself into? Indecision overwhelmed her. She began to shake uncontrollably.
Chapter 5
Christie struggled to keep from trembling as she stared into the darkness between the trees, listening to the low undulating growl. She didn’t want to do anything that would show weakness to whatever was out there, but she knew she needed to retreat. She slowly raised the pistol and pointed it into the trees then began to slowly back up toward the helicopter.
She had taken only two steps backward when something dark burst out of the trees to her left and raced toward her. She swung the flashlight in the direction of the movement, pointing the pistol straight at it.
“Don’t shoot,” screamed Marcus.
She moved the gun away just as Marcus reached her. “Run!” he yelled and shoved her toward the helicopter.
The firm push broke her fear-induced inertia and she began running full-speed back to the hatch door. When she was halfway there, she slowed for a moment and turned to see what was happening behind her. She saw Marcus raise his gun and fire several shots into the stand of trees then turn and run after her.
“Run, dammit!” he yelled.
She turned and continued running, reaching the hatch at the same time he did. She felt him grab her belt and help her up and through the door. He jumped in after her, slammed the door shut, and pulled the latch down, locking it.
She lay on the floor breathing hard, scared to death. At that moment, she heard something land on top of the cabin roof, causing the whole aircraft to shake. “It’s on top of us,” she said.
She saw Marcus put his finger to his lips to quiet her. She nodded, letting him know she understood.
He quietly crawled to her side and whispered into her ear, “If we’re quiet, maybe it will get bored and go away.”
She heard the low rumbling growl again, after that silence. She looked up at the cabin ceiling, praying there was no way it could get in. Then there was a little shock that vibrated through the helicopter. “I think it jumped off,” Marcus said.
They waited in the dark, afraid to talk or make any sound. After a while they heard a roar from some distance away. “I think it got bored with us and left,” Marcus said.
“I hope so,” she said and pulled Kelly and Stuart closer to her.
“I’ll tell you what,” Marcus said. “Why don’t you and the kids get some sleep, and I’ll sit up here and wait a couple hours, in case it comes back.”
“Thanks,” she said.
“What the hell was that thing?” he asked.
“I think we just met up with a Smilodon. Do you know what that is?”
He shook his head. “I have no idea and I don’t think I want to know.”
Since she wasn’t positive, she decided to drop the subject. She took the kids back to their seats and tucked their blankets around them as best she could, then went to the curved seat at the back, snuggled into it, and pulled a blanket around herself. She saw Marcus reach toward the lantern and turn off the light. The cabin went black. “I’ll see you in the morning,” he said.
She lay in the dark wondering if the creature had really left. She began to hear little taps on the roof above them. The sound got louder and she realized it was raining. She listened to the raindrops hitting the top of the helicopter, until exhausted, she finally fell asleep.
* * *
Serena sat across the table from Victor in the small Northern Energies hangar at the Manatuk airport. She pulled up the zipper on her jacket. It was cold even though she had recently turned up the heat. She watched Victor finish a last bite of apple pie and wash it down with a swig of hot coffee.
“That was a good piece of pie,” he said. “I wouldn’t have thought the backward savages around here could bake something that good. Aren’t they all into whale blubber and that kind of shit?”
Serena raised her shoulders, shaking her head. Her hands felt like two chunks of ice so she wrapped them around her warm cup of coffee. “Your guess is as good as mine.” She couldn’t stand him.
“Where’d you get the pie?”
“The airport manager brought it around earlier. He said his wife baked it for the airport workers, and he had some extra.”
The cell phone in his jacket pocket began to ring. She knew the only person who would be calling him on that phone was Roland Valenkamp. He pulled the phone out of his pocket and flipped it open. “Hello.”
A big smile spread across Victor’s face. “Yes, it went down.”
He leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the table. “No, I didn’t actually see it hit the ground. It disappeared in the clouds. But it went down.”
She watched the smile disappear from his face. He took his feet off the table and stood up. “I’m sure they didn’t make it.”
A very sour look appeared on his face, and he began to pace back and forth as Valenkamp did the talking. Victor said nothing for almost a minute.
“Yes, Mr. Valenkamp, I see your point... What would I need?”
She watched Victor look up at the ceiling and rub his forehead with a pained expression.
“To do it right, I’d need two men and three ATVs.”
He looked down at the floor and continued listening.
“Yes, that’s what they use around here when they go out to hunt in the mountains. Yes, sir, like the ones we used in Nigeria. They’re small enough that you could get three on one of the larger helicopters.”
Victor didn’t look happy at all. She rather enjoyed it.
“Yes, Mr. Valenkamp. I’ll personally lead the team in tomorrow and make sure all the loose ends are tied up. Hello, hello. Mr. Valenkamp are you there?”
Valenkamp must have been really pissed to hang up on Victor, she thought. Maybe he would terminate Victor. It would be nice not to have to look at his smug expressions any longer.
She watched him flip the phone closed and put it back in his pocket. Without warning, he picked up the chair he had been sitting on and heaved it acr
oss the room. “Shit!” he screamed at no one in particular then slammed his hand down on the table.
She scooted her chair back to get out of his way. She had no idea what he might do next.
“What’s wrong?” she asked cautiously.
“Roland’s really upset. It seems he was under the impression that we would see the helicopter crash and burn. When I told him that we didn’t actually see it destroyed... Let’s just say he wasn’t happy.”
“So, what does he want us to do about it?
“He’s sending another helicopter in tomorrow afternoon, one of the big ones. It’s going to have some ATVs on it and a couple of men, Ivan and Nicholas. He wants us to go in and make sure that no one lived through the crash.”
“How are you going to find the crash site?” she asked.
“I don’t know. I’ll worry about that tomorrow. I’m going to sleep,” he said, as he walked over to a cot and slipped into a sleeping bag. “Turn off the light,” he said.
Serena walked over to the light switch and turned the main lights off. She made her way over to the other cot by the dim light that came from inside a small bathroom on the other side of the hangar. She climbed into her sleeping bag and zipped it up. She closed her eyes and briefly wondered what Luc and Kate were doing before she fell asleep.
Chapter 6
Luc lay in his sleeping bag, as the early morning sunlight filtered between the blinds, thinking about the flight to Manatuk and the search they would soon conduct. He told himself there was a good chance they would locate the downed helicopter.
He glanced at the alarm clock sitting on the floor next to him. It was set to go off at 5:30 a.m., and in fifteen more minutes it would begin to ring. He decided to take a quick shower before the others got up.
After his shower, he quickly dressed and went into the kitchen to grab a bowl of cereal. He heard the alarm go off, then Chuck yawning loudly. Luc walked into the living room.
“I’ve got several different kinds of cereal if you’re hungry,” he said to Chuck.