by S. M. Nolan
On the ground, a storm could be both beautiful and frightening, but here it had seemed terrifying. With the revelation of this hidden beauty, she extended the peculiar insight to everything going on.
While her battle with Omega was terrifying, she was grateful in a way. Presently, she sat in a single-engine plane flying over Tibet after leaving Nepal, Nevada, and LAX where she'd met a woman she idolized. During her short time with She-La, her fascination had faded to companionship and she'd learned intimately of her life.
Even in Oakton she'd seen a literal underbelly she'd never considered. Her daily walks from the train to the shop, through a condemned ghetto, had never manifested things as they were. So many questions and answers had and still eluded her, but most from simply never fathoming to be conjured, let alone asked.
The mixed blessing roved through her mind for the next two hours while the storm grew to full-force. Beautiful or not, it became a plague just in time for their landing. Russell was awoken by more violent turbulence that refused to relent.
The pilot maneuvered them nearer the ground. Rain pelted the windscreen in sheets of nails, blurred the airstrip ahead and beneath them. Maggie's peripheral vision locked on the pilot as he fought wind to keep the plane straight, level.
Silent determination had overtaken his face. Sweat beaded on his brow. Challenged by unseen Gods, his eyes fixed stubbornly on a single strip of lights that winked through the blur. Intermittent flashes of blue and violet burned a large forest's images in their retinas. It surrounded the strip with little room for error.
Cracks of thunder overpowered the engine's oscillations as Maggie's heart raced. The turbulence was overwhelming. Russell watched the strip close with breath bated. The pilot's arms were locked, senses attuned to the stick.
The plane sank. Its front wheels hit; metal groaned, rubber barked. The plane bounced. Its nose pitched. It set down on three wheels and the tail immediately began to slide.
Their speed was too high. Russell felt it. He held his breath, clutched the side of Maggie's seat.
The tree-line approached at a sprint. The pilot threw back the throttle, reversed the props' direction. The plane jerked with a growl, began to slow. It slid forward unhindered. He attempted to maneuver. Another groan. The engine sputtered, died. The pilot lost what little control he'd had.
“Shit!” Maggie yelled. The tree-line came within reach. “Shit! Shit! Shit!”
“Hold on!” The pilot yelled.
The plane ramped off the strip's edge. It caught air, arced down, landed in grass, slid faster. Maggie braced against the forward panel. The pilot cringed sideways. Russell threw himself backward, grabbed hold of a cargo strap.
There was an almost sudden silence. The plane bit the tree-line. The left wing snapped like a twig underfoot. The fuselage ricocheted sideways, slammed a heavy trunk. Its rear panel bulged inward.
Russell tumbled through the plane's rear. A second trunk depressed the cockpit toward Maggie. She squeaked a cry. Glass shattered over her. Shards sliced her face and arms as she cringed.
All at once, the plane was still.
Rain beat a steady rhythm on the aluminum air-frame, poured in from the broken windows to soak Maggie's side. Her arms and face stung from blood that oozed and mixed with freezing water. She pushed sideways with a grunt, fell awkwardly between the seats for Russell, motionless at the rear of the plane.
“Are you alright?” He rubbed his side and groaned as he angled up. She slowed him with her hand, “Careful. Anything broken?” He thought for a minute, then shook his head. She turned for the pilot, shook him, “We're alright. What about—”
He slumped sideways and his mouth fell open. Blood poured along his chin and neck. Maggie recoiled; a large shard of glass was impaled near his jugular. She fought her reflexes to close his eyes, then retrieved her money from his pocket.
“Sorry. We'll need it more.” She turned away, crawled back to Russell. “The pilot's dead. There's glass in his throat.”
Russell pushed to his knees, “We need to get out.” Maggie looked to the deformed door, then back at the intact windscreen.
Russell watched her eyes, “It's the only way.”
Maggie sighed, crawled for it. Her body ached with trembling adrenaline to raise her rifle-butt and slam the windscreen. It cracked in a splintering orb. She mustered her strength again, smashed the window out. Russell positioned their bags on the edge of the cockpit. Maggie shattered the final pieces of glass and crawled into the downpour.
Russell passed their things through. She cast them to the ground below the decimated nose, slipped off from the force. She caught herself on all fours in mud, gave a pained moan. Russell slid down to a crouch beside her.
Thunder cracked. Lightning struck nearby. She managed to stand and shoulder her bag. Her limbs wobbled as something rustled nearby. A light blinded them through the darkness. It sank to reveal an old, hunched, Chinese man. His speech confounded Russell, but Maggie seemed to understand.
“Nǐ hái hǎo ma?”
Maggie fought to stand and uttered a phrase in Mandarin. The man squinted with wily eyes. Lightning cracked. He nodded, hobbled away. Maggie followed in a limp. Russell shook off his puzzled look to shuffle along. The old man sloshed across the muddy airstrip toward a shack, reached it to gesture them in. The central room was lit by a roaring fire-pit that emitted welcomed warmth.
The old man offered them a seat on pillows atop a creaky, wooden floor, then disappeared through a small doorway. He returned with a stack of towels.
Maggie took them with a trembling word, “Xièxiè.” The old man bowed, disappeared to clanging metal.
Russell looked to Maggie as she wrapped the towel around herself, “Guess that Mandarin class was worth it after all.”
“I t-took it for four years,” Maggie shivered. “I never thought I'd use it. Mom… said I should t-take Spanish. Seemed too easy.”
“Good thing to know.”
A brow rose in agreement, “All th-things c-considered.”
Russell put another towel over her. She thanked, felt her face with a ginger finger and winced. She grit her teeth to yank out glass. The old man shuffled in to hang a metal pot over the fire.
He spoke to Maggie, “Nǐ shì shìbīng?”
Maggie eyes glazed with confusion. He nodded to the weapons beside Russell. She replied with bouncing syllables. The old man's eyes narrowed.
“What's going on?”
“He's worried we're soldiers sent to give him a hard time over the airstrip.”
He said something as he tended to the fire, his back to them. Maggie responded astutely.
“Uh, Maggie?”
“He's asking if we want to destroy the temple. I told him we're running from soldiers.”
“Oh. You're not worried about telling him this?”
Maggie shrugged, “If he were in league with Omega, I doubt he'd be helping us.”
The old man seemed to perk up and spoke at an alarming rate. His face was drawn into a deathly seriousness that made Russell tense up. Maggie listened carefully. His face grew more intense. She replied hurriedly, hoping to calm him.
She caught Russell before he could speak, “He's worried we're in league with Omega. I told him we're running from them—that we're looking for the Protectorate.”
The old man examined them with a skeptical lean before speaking. Maggie replied with a bowed head. Russell watched at a total loss. The old man considered her words with a stare, then softened and responded.
“Xièxiè,” Maggie said finally, relieved.
The old man turned back to the fire. Russell sighed, “Guess I'll never know.”
Maggie pulled the towels tighter around her, “He'll help us, and he's warned us if we're lying.”
Russell watched the man shuffle back and forth to produce cups and teabags. He ladled water into the cups, steeped the bags, then passed them over. He rambled while Russell's mind wandered elsewhere.
Maggie drew him b
ack, “The map.”
Reality returned and Russell produced the map. Maggie pointed to the circle, uttered a polite phrase. The man looked it over with a few sentences.
“What's he saying?”
“It's not far but would take days to reach on foot—the path's rough. After the storm passes he'll show us the way to a village to find transportation.”
She looked to the old man, voiced a line of Chinese. He nodded with a few words. Maggie bowed her head in return. He bowed back, disappeared a final time.
“What was that all about?”
Maggie sipped her tea, “He's doesn't want us stealing anything.”
“But he's going to help us,” Russell surmised with a cringe from the bitter tea.
“Only through the night,” Maggie replied. She pulled another shard from her face and sucked air through her teeth. “Assuming the storm's over by morning.”
“Things went south pretty fast.”
Maggie grimaced in agreement. A visible shiver coursed over her, but Russell slid an arm around her. She soaked in his warmth, comforted by his touch, “Thank you.”
They finished their tea in silence, Maggie occasionally gritting her teeth to dig out glass from her face and arms. She bled droplets onto a towel while Russell blotted away mud and blood from them.
He pulled her close, “We need to rest. We can't spend more time here than necessary.”
Maggie laid sideways with him on the hard floor, stripped away the wet towels and pushed against him for warmth. He wrapped an arm over her, positioned his duffel bag as a pillow. The fire-pit bathed them in heat, lulled them into trances with its hypnotic dance.
17.
Transport
October 4th
7:30 AM
Tibetan Airstrip
Maggie rose a few hours later. The old man stood before her. He spoke a few, disdained words and she nudged Russell awake.
“It's time to go.”
They grabbed their gear and followed the old man out. The night's rain had died into a gray morning plastered with stratocumulus clouds obscuring the sun. Cold wind whistled over crackling, dead foliage beneath coniferous trees.
The old man hobbled along the strip's edge for a break in the woods, shuffled onto a small footpath in the trees. They followed in-step, stopped at a dirt road a few hundred yards outside the strip. The old man rambled out directions, pointing them right.
“Maggie?”
“It's the way to the village, we'll find help there.”
She placed her hands together, bowed her head with a sentence. Then with another, she produced several bills and presented them to him. He took the money with a wily squint, placed his hands together, bowed to her, then watched as they started along the dirt road.
An hour's walk raised mounting doubts as the mountain road led them through dense forestry and rough, rocky terrain. Then, from nowhere, empty farmland appeared and a small group of huts popped up along either side of the road.
Maggie removed the map from her bag, made her way deeper between the dwellings. The inhabitants' day was in full swing. Traders haggled for everything from beaded jewelry to furs and food, while men and women worked on large, primitive-looking machines. They paid no mind to the foreigners, focused too intently against the din that apexed at the village-center.
Exotic foods cooked over spits with their bittersweet aromas infecting the chill air. Maggie stopped at a post. The man there tempted her with a set of prayer beads, but she held up the map, asked something in Mandarin. He perked up, surprised, and pointed them down the street with a few words.
“Xièxiè nǐ.”
Maggie weaved her way between villagers, their faces weathered by a life foreign to even her wildest dreams. Russell did his best to keep up, “I'm amazed they'll take our money.”
“They find value in what others will value. I'd have expected you'd know that,” she replied smartly. She stopped short of colliding with a woman holding a child, excused herself in Chinese, then diverted around her.
Russell followed her to a stand on the right side of the road, “What makes you say that?”
“You're the boy-scout. I'm just the talent.”
He laughed. Maggie caught the attention of the man behind the stand. A ratty, 40's era pickup sat beside him. He spoke with a thick accent but well-groomed English, “Ah, American?”
Maggie nodded, “English, but yes.”
“You need lift?” He asked cheerfully.
Maggie pointed to her map, “Yes, to here.”
“Okay, twenty American.” He eyed her rifle, “Army?”
“It's a long story.”
“Ho'h kay,” He said, climbing into the truck. “Only one inside—two seats.”
“I'll take the back,” Russell said. He countered Maggie's protest, “I'm just the boy-scout.”
She relented with a chuckle and stepped around the truck. Russell climbed into the bed. The truck back-fired, then executed a wide U-turn to head from the village.
“Take few hours. Still. Faster than walking,” he said, shifting through ancient gears.
Maggie glanced back at Russell, his back against a wheel-well. He gave a thumbs up. “That's alright.”
She turned to lean on the door with an elbow, her head on a hand. The man spoke with casual interest, “Why you here?”
“Like I said, it's a long story. I'd really rather not go into it,” she admitted politely.
He eyed the rifle between her legs, “Not working for Chinese, right?”
“No. I respect Tibet's desire for independence.”
Plains shifted to trees that lumbered past. The man replied with insight, “Good thought, but China not ready for it. Communists preach equality, should instead preach brotherhood.”
She felt a strange resonance with his words, “I agree.”
“Maybe one day we have American friends to help.”
“Maybe,” she said, feigning hope. “Your English is quite good. You've studied it?”
“Worked for small Chinese-American company. P-R manager for long time, but lost job when company shut down.”
“Why?”
He answered with a hint of regret, “Bought by larger company. Sold off.”
“You didn't agree?” She asked, as trees turned to rocky hills.
“No. Thought the company should go public, trade on international markets. Bosses refuse.”
“What kind of company would do that?”
“Medicine, drugs—big money, small minds,” he said critically.
Maggie remembered what little She-La had said about the protectorate; their funding came from large, independent companies—pharmaceutical and weapons manufacturers and the like. Omega was no different. She sensed a connection, the coincidence far too convenient.
“Was it an American company?”
“Yes,” he said, his eyes fixed on the road.
Maggie could tell the subject was sore, but curiosity got the best of her. “How'd you end up back here? Seems like you could be making good money with a resume like that.”
“Ah, money not Life. Life is living—not money,” he corrected. “This my home. Born here. Live here. I leave to make money and help sick family. Sick family die. Company close. Don't need money. Buy truck. Offer lift.”
Maggie relished such simplicity. “Sorry, I was just curious.”
He remained silent, the conversation clearly ended. The road was soon enclosed by high rock-walls that rose to great altitudes, curved steadily, then sharply, before descending in long, steep slopes. She understood now how difficult the road was to walk, and further saw how inconvenient the Protectorate's hiding place was.
It was two hours of inclines, descents, and twisting silence in the old, rickety pick-up before the man spoke again.
“Mountain end close. Destination close.”
Maggie snapped from a trance, “How much further after?”
“Few minutes walk.”
They traveled the last few mil
es in anxious silence. The mountainous rocks sloped into more trees, leveled in thick woods that replaced the cliffs. The truck rolled along until it came to stop between two, nondescript sections of forest. He let it idle while Maggie stepped out.
“C'mon sleeping beauty,” Maggie called over the engine.
Russell wiped his eyes, eased from the truck's bed. The man laughed at Maggie's remark. She smiled, stepped to his window.
“Thank you.” She handed him an extra pair of bills. “I hope the future finds you well.”
He bowed his head, executed a noisy three-point turn, then disappeared up the mountain. Maggie watched him leave then started through the trees.
Russell spoke, “I wonder where we'll—”
Loud Chinese silenced him. Several men in masks charged them with raised rifles. Maggie and Russell readied in defense, backs together.
“Maggie, what the hell's going on?”
“I don't know!”
“Fàngxià nǐ de wǔqì, bìng quèdìng zìjǐ!” A voice yelled, muffled by a mask.
“Maggie?” Russell asked, straining syllables.
“What do you want me to say, Russell? We're here for the Protectorate?”
The barrels thrust toward them. Maggie fingered her trigger.
The tone shifted and two men closed the distance. The pair's rifles were jerked away. One man knocked Maggie to the ground, fought to hold her down. Two more kept Russell's arms restrained. Maggie kicked, screamed.
Russell shouted, “Don't struggle! We'll find a way out, just—”
Maggie wasn't listening. She freed a leg, planted a kick into a man's groin. He roared, reeled back with his rifle, and slammed it against her forehead. She lost consciousness under the flow of blood from a fresh wound. Russell shouted in vain, helpless.
18.
The Protectorate
October 4th
6:30 PM
Somewhere on the Tibetan Plateau
Wetness slid across Maggie's face. Her eyes snapped open. She scuttled back on her hands, up a bed to a stone wall. An old, white-haired woman with gentle eyes apologized in Chinese and bowed. She dunked a cloth in a bowl of water, reached for Maggie.