I could see it in his red eyes, the way he held his stare two beats too long. Hangover or not, Steve’s mind and his eyes were usually moving a mile a minute. It was like he was trying to prove he had nothing to hide or something. Bullshit. I knew for sure then, the cocksucker was no friend.
To pull his chain, I pushed my plate to his side of the table and said, “I’m going to use my old board this weekend.”
There was spinach hanging out of his mouth when he snapped his head up.
“What’s wrong with your new board?”
“Nothing.”
“Why switch, then?”
“I don’t know, for old time’s sake. Sunday will be the third anniversary of Dorey’s death, I’ll do it for her.”
“I didn’t know that. My condolences in advance.”
I could see the wheels in Steve’s head spinning, him figuring how he would work the Doreen angle into his script. When my omelet was gone, Steve excused himself to go throw up. I stopped by the concierge on the way to my room to arrange for a wheeled car to take me out to the friend of a friend’s house to see if my sky board was still in his basement.
It turned out the board was there, and it worked fine as I moved through the preliminary rounds of four-flyer heats with two wins and two second-place finishes. Both seconds came to the same woman, a young daredevil from Chile named Juanita Zug. The girl’s father was born in a neighboring canton and she had a lot of local support as she flew her way into the final.
The sky surfing course at Lucerne starts above the top of Mount Pilatus. Most competitors take a tram to the top of the mountain, but I always preferred the old cogwheel railway when I had the time. It gave me a chance to clear my head, take in the views of the lake and countryside, but more importantly, to lean out the window and check the wind conditions in different parts of the mountain. It was a whole lot better than just relying on the gauges. From the enclosed tram cars all you could do was check out the flags, try to guess how hard they were flapping. It always surprised me none of the other sky surfers figured that out. They thought I rode the train because I was eccentric, some kind of sad, distant loner or something.
From the top of the mountain, a hot air balloon carried us up another 1,000 feet to the launch zone. When it was your turn to surf, you climbed onto your assigned level of a four-tiered gondola and held on tight until the starter’s horn sounded. Pilatus had one of the five mirrored heat arrays on the course. Using sunlight and methane, the arrays created enough heat to form a column of hot air. That’s where you did your tricks and gained altitude. Each column was surrounded by viewing areas and giant screens. Down lower, they built temporary stadiums around the columns. You had to hand it to the Swiss, they really had that engineering stuff down.
The heat from the mirror array atop Pilatus gave us our first thermal lift, after that it was pretty much a bombing run to another column. All competitive sky surfing boards are limited to reducing gravity by no more than 60 percent. You sort of float, but gravity is constantly pulling you down. You’re always looking for lift from a column, sun-baked ridgeline or dead pasture where you can do some spirals and gain altitude back. Burgenstock had a big array, and that’s where the loudest crowds were. That’s where everybody usually headed first. The cold blue lake had no lift, was pretty much a dead zone, so it was just about impossible to cross more than once before landing. Sky surfing can be fun, you see some cool views, but to me, it always seemed too noisy with all the wind.
I guess, before my time, the old boards were pretty dangerous. It took them a while to get the board sizing and shaping controls, the anti-gravity lifters figured out, but once they did, it wasn’t too bad. I had two sky surfing buddies die while I was in the game, and three or four got banged up so bad they could never compete again. It was the risk you took racing 120 mph through the sky on a surfboard.
My old board wasn’t really that old, maybe only two or three design generations behind, and it worked fine through the prelims as I kept things cool, did just enough tricks to make the finals. Unlike the newer models that have their board controls in the fingers of the surfer’s flying gloves, mine were on my belt. When I wanted to change the bottom of the board from convex to concave to slow down, or for it to narrow and elongate to give me speed, I had to fiddle with the buttons at my waist. It wasn’t a big deal, but the media goofs kept asking questions about it. “Why are you going old school?”
Lucky for me, the reporters spent most of their time badgering Juanita Zug. She was their new darling, the girl with the hometown angle. I surfed the mountain air currents with style, while she attacked them on every pass. Watching her clips on the video screens, I was impressed, and more than a little worried by the chances she was taking. She dipped deep into valleys and brushed the treetops as she raced between heat columns. Her gonzo, near-crash landings at the edge of the lake were all anybody was talking about. In her semifinal win, she landed on the roof of Lucerne’s Museum of Transport. I heard the organizers put her up to it.
As the two finalists, Fraulein Zug and I were guests of honor at Saturday night’s gala event. While all the other surfers were done for the weekend and ready to party hearty, she and I sat alone at the head table sipping water. In the pauses between music and speeches, we did our best to keep small talk going. The big entertainment that night was some Icelandic pop band that was supposed to be the next big thing. They were loud.
We were told we could split at 9 p.m. That’s when Zug and I stood to leave. We were walking together on the way out when Steve stopped us in the lobby.
“Leaving so soon? Sit down for a second, I want to talk to both of you.”
TRANSMISSION:
Duarte: “Looks like we’re in for another dump. Jeez, it’s cold out there.”
From the log of Maria Duarte
Chief Botanist
We’re midway through our second week on this island and the weather is crappy as ever. Cold, windy and damp. When it’s not raining, it’s snowing. The snow quickly melts here at sea level, but when the fog clears, if I climb up to the top of this bird-shit-covered rock and look to the east, I see the hills on the mainland are adorned with caps of snow. It’s a pretty view, in a bleak sort of way.
The only mainland animals large enough to pick up with the optics in my visor have been several herds of mammoth marching northward along the rim of the sea cliffs. There has been no fire smoke in the hills or along the coast, which leads me to believe mankind does not currently reside in the area. It will be interesting to see how far north we must travel before we start encountering Cro-Magnon. Perhaps this is the western edge of the “no-man’s” land that isolates the Neanderthals of Gibraltar from the rest of Europe.
Exploring this tiny island, searching for foodstuffs, even daydreaming while staring at the horizon, are all good reasons to escape the cave. They help keep me sane. Even in driving rainstorms, there have been times when I just had to go outside and shout into the wind. My poor man, is there nothing I can do?
I have been through my computer’s medical files front to back three times looking for a cure, all to no avail. I’ve cross-referenced that data with the things Gray Beard has taught us, and still no luck. I’ve tried diets rich in zinc, healing poultices, even a stab (pardon the stupid pun) at acupuncture with a sharpened fish bone. Nothing. Despite increasing our physical therapy sessions to three times daily, his muscles continue to atrophy. I had hoped the jumpsuit might aid in his recovery, but each time I put it on him, the machine seemed more inclined to shut his body functions down than to speed them up.
My mind keeps going back to the old man. I ask myself, “What would Gray Beard do?” Sadly, one of our pragmatic native storyteller’s first answers might very well jibe with the fucking jumpsuit–put Paul out of his misery and keep the clan, the platoon, moving forward.
That option I will not accept. I keep Paul well fed and clean. I’m anxious to press on northward up the coast as soon as the weather clears. I feel it in
my bones–if I deliver Paul to Gray Beard alive, the old man will know how to help him. That hope is one of the only things that keeps me going these days.
I feel so alone, so frustratingly fragile. We’ve descended into a world of gray where the ocean and sky struggle to outdo each other in dreariness. The only breaks in the dismal scene are provided by dark squalls of rain and snow, which drift down the coast and out of the hills to block out the horizon and dump their payloads on their way south.
When the last blizzard petered out, I stepped from the smoky cave for a breath of fresh air. Stretching my arms over my head, rolling my head to loosen up the muscles of my neck, I was lost in thought when a tall dorsal fin flashed past the mouth of our harbor. Running down the beach, dodging hauled-out seals and nesting penguins, I scrambled out onto the rocks for a better look.
Did I really see a fin? Was it notched, or was that just my imagination? Bad thoughts conjuring up bad images? I scanned the waters for 20 minutes to no avail. Finally, I was shivering so badly my teeth were chattering. I was returning to the warmth of the cave, balancing on a narrow shelf of rock, when I spotted him. The shark was stalking me, two black eyes, unblinking just below the surface. He had his tail tipped low to keep his dorsal fin from projecting out of the water. Flutters of his pectoral fins allowed him to keep pace with me. Though his mouth was nearly closed, the gleaming tips of jagged teeth caught my attention. I was staring at those white teeth, mesmerized by them, when he pulled back his lips and distended his jaws in a way that revealed row upon row of serrated triangles. In, out, he did it twice, then with several flicks of his tail, the shark disappeared into the inky depths.
When I returned to the cave, I didn’t have the energy to go into all the details with Paul. He has enough to worry about. Instead, I said, “Looks like the weather’s about to turn. Are you ready to head back out to sea?” A nod of his head told me he was.
TRANSMISSION:
Duarte: “Are you as sick of this cave as I am?”
From the log of Paul Kaikane
Recreation Specialist
Steve led us across the lobby’s fancy carpets to a spot where two soft couches faced each other over a low glass table. I had walked past guests sitting and even napping in the couches many times, but never tried them myself. They were comfortable, though nowhere near comfortable enough to get me to sleep in public. I never could figure that out. “You have a room,” I’d think. “Why not go up and relax?” City people, I guess they like to be part of the hive. I’ve always been content to be off on my own.
Steve started right in on his bullshit. “Tomorrow’s finals are a sellout locally,” he says, “but our ratings are down worldwide. Do either of you have an idea how to boost those ratings?” His burgundy suit matched the couches. I thought about pointing that out, but instead said, “Just get to it.” By this time, after five days of me giving him the silent treatment, Steve knew I was on a short fuse as far as he was concerned.
“You two never fall. You never crash. It has been two years since either of you has activated your gravity neutralizers.”
Turning toward Juanita Zug, I saw she was all ears. Steve noticed it too. He directed his sales job toward her.
“Just imagine if you made tomorrow’s flight sans safety gear. I swear to you, the idea hit me this afternoon as I watched the semifinals. The suits are so monotonous, and the helmets hide your beautiful faces. If not for your personal colors, the spectators couldn’t tell you two apart. I found myself wishing, not for the first time, that the world could see you as you are, not hidden behind technology. It would be the most-viewed final in the history of the sport. Kaikane and Zug, those would be household names around the world. Doesn’t that sound better than being faceless, nameless stunt artists?”
I told him to go pound salt and headed up to my room. As the elevator doors closed, I saw Fraulein Zug was still on the couch listening to Steve. The next day, she made an appeal to surf without her suit, but the Swiss officials shot the request down as fast as I expected them to. The way Steve came busting out of the officials’ trailer told me things did not go his way. Sucker looked ready to snap. His mood put my head on a swivel. I didn’t know who to trust. When they said there was a problem with the microphone in my helmet, I told them that was too bad. Nobody but me touched my board or gear that day.
As usual, I took the old cogwheel train up to the top. I expected Zug to zip up in the tram, but there she was a few seats back checking the wind just like me. There are always cameras and microphones on you during the finals, micro-drones flying around. Even if you don’t see them, they’re there. We kept to ourselves.
Finally it was time to climb aboard the gondola and ride the hot air balloon up for launch. We didn’t have much to say, just wished each other “good luck” and went back to thinking about what we were going to do. She was dressed in her usual bright red suit and white helmet while I had switched back to the old solid white suit I used to win my first title. Filmmaker Steve hated the all-white get-up. He said it messed with his exposures, and pleaded with me to use the shimmering purple suit with his company’s logo across the shoulders. I suggested he go fuck himself.
Maybe it was busting his chops in front of the crew, but I felt like a changed person. I was usually hyper-aware leading up to launch, watching the clouds and shadows, pre-flying the route in my mind, but I wasn’t going through any of that. It’s hard to explain. I just felt calm. For the first time in the three years since Dorey’s passing, I finally felt at peace. Winning the stupid competition, risking my stupid life, was not going to bring her back. I finally accepted that the only way to move forward was to stop dwelling on her pain and start celebrating her life. Sounds simple. I had heard it many times from many different people, but it took me three years to believe it.
I decided to pay tribute to Dorey with one last soul surfing session. No big snapbacks or fancy spinner maneuvers, just smooth, graceful lines and curves, like we used to do back in Hawaii on our longboards. When we were on tour, guys would talk about how they needed to “dominate” waves. Dorey would just shake her head. Her thing was to “become one with the wave.” Sure, she could do her tricks when she had to, in surf meets and for the cameras, but Dorey loved to pick a clean line across the face of a wave. She would stand tall, clasp her hands behind her back like an old Waikiki Beach Boy, and just ride.
When the horn sounded, Zug launched her board into the heat column with a tilt that let her drift in a tight spiral straight for the crowd below. Provoking screams and shouts, she buzzed them with inches to spare on her way to Burgenstock. I watched her tuck and go as I slid down the ramp with my hand on my belt. Soon as I was in the air, I expanded the board to maximum size and concave lift. The bigness of the thing surprised me, I had never taken it to the max. It was like riding four Ping-Pong tables as I gained altitude with each circle around the heat column. I don’t know how high I went, but later they said it was some kind of sky surfing record. It was a clear, sunny day and off to the west I could easily make out the rocky summits of Jungfrau and Eiger, and behind them way off in the distance, the Matterhorn.
The column topped out in a mountain air current, sweeping eastward out of the Grindelwald. Temperatures plunged as I rode the high-level winds for more than three miles out over postage stamp Lake Lucerne. At least five camera drones shadowed me the whole flight. At first, I tried keeping an eye on them, Steve had birds in the air and was desperate enough to pull anything, but in the end decided to forget all that and enjoy the ride.
Reducing the size of the board by half and rounding the edges of the bottom to convex, I picked up speed toward the far column of Dietschiberg, where the old Lucerne Golf Club used to be. They said I was the first to ever make the crossing from Pilatus without stopping to gain altitude at another column. I didn’t wave to the crowd or do any tricks, just returned my board to maximum size and lift and made lazy circles up to more than 8,000 feet.
By this time of day, Lucerne�
��s rooftops, streets and paved lots were putting up a lot of heat of their own. I rode the city thermals in a slow meander all the way to the neighboring town of Kriens where the lowest heat column and biggest crowd were. I hit the Kriens column at about 600 feet, just as Juanita Zug was putting on a show down below with one of her signature moves. Racing in tight circles around the edges of the column so that centrifugal force held her to the board as if she was glued to it, Zug leaned far to the inside until her body was parallel to the ground. At the last possible moment before crashing into the super-heated mirrors, Zug stomped on the tail of her board to stall and do a floater. The column carried her back up toward the sky as she raised her arms. The crowd went nuts. It was a good trick.
I left the cheers below as I rode the column high enough to let me make a run for Burgenstock. This was the backwards way of doing things, and I guess it was another first when I surfed into the thermals of Burgenstock column with about 50 feet to spare.
Burgenstock is a nifty little slice of Switzerland set on the spine of a humpback mountain that sticks out into the lake like a tongue. I found the place two years earlier while cruising in one of the lake’s red and white passenger ferries. My rail pass worked on the boats and I had spent the day riding around the scorpion-shaped lake, jumping off whenever a ferry stopped someplace that looked interesting. I was headed back to the house where I was staying when I spotted a little red cogwheel train climbing just about straight up the side of a mountain. It wasn’t until the boat pulled away that I found out my pass wasn’t good for the cogwheel. It took just about all the money I had left in my pocket to ride the train, but it was worth it when I got to the top and found views like pictures from a webmagazine. The lake scenes are amazing, and then you walk up to the crest of the mountain and see this absolutely unexpected panorama of Swiss countryside. I’ll never forget the sound of cowbells echoing across the green valley that day, or the way gardeners tended flowers and rose bushes in the luxury resort while rich people walked around doing rich people things. After that, even though I was so poor I stood out like a sore thumb, I returned to Burgenstock whenever I got the chance.
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