by Chuck Dixon
“Who’s the Hendrix fan?” He shouted to be heard over the din pounding from the airship.
Lee shouted back to be heard over Purple Haze. “It’s that bugfuck-crazy SEAL.”
The driving beat of the music died away. The airship settled to the ground into a broad lake of light projected from the halogen bundles mounted on stanchions around the gondola slung beneath it. It dropped gently, the whirring rotors of the engines mounted either side creating twin cyclones brushing back the tops of the grass all around. Four landing legs touched down on a level spot on the veldt.
The ship was approximately a hundred meters bow to stern and a third of that at its widest center point. The lights reflected off the silvery outer skin of the inflatable portion, which was lined with the black squares of solar panels. Beneath this was a gondola that formed the belly of the craft. The gondola was six feet above the turf once it settled down onto the hydraulics of the landing gear at the end of spindly legs like a spider coming to rest.
A hatch opened followed by a set of ladder steps swinging out to squash the grass flat.
“Roenbach, you son of a bitch! You took my idea!” Chaz shouted as he raced into the nimbus of harsh artificial light to embrace his brother Ranger.
“Trust me, we were all out of good ideas,” Dwayne said, pounding Chaz’s back.
“Everybody here?” Boats said, climbing down out of the cabin.
“Everybody plus one,” Lee said, stepping into the glare with Bat by his side and the rest of the company behind. Rick limped forward with some help from N’itha.
“Who the fuck?” the SEAL said.
“The new Mrs. Renzi.” Chaz grinned.
“A lot has changed back in The Now. We made a few upgrades. And we have a situation that needs to be rectified,” Dwayne said.
“I don’t care if it’s World War Three as long we’re going back to where the beer’s cold and the showers are hot,” Chaz said.
“This thing going to carry us all?” Lee said, nodding up at the curve of the airship looming over them.
“It’ll be tight,” Boats said. “It’s rated to lift a ton of weight. But the helium gauges have been dropping in this goddamn heat.”
“We’re going to have to leave any non-essential gear behind,” Dwayne said.
“Won’t Morris have a shit fit about that?” Jimbo said.
“Then, when you see him, don’t tell him,” Dwayne said. Jimbo didn’t ask what he meant by that.
All remaining gear, weapons, CamelBaks, rations, and the scant little else that was left from their trek were dumped in a pile away from the airship by Lee and Chaz. Boats tossed a thermite grenade on the heap, and it went up in a flash of heat hotter than the sun. What wasn’t vaporized was turned into an unrecognizable liquid mess of molten steel.
“Suck on that, Indiana Jones,” the SEAL grunted as the three made their way back to the airship.
“Did you guys super-size the Tube while we were gone?” Jimbo said, seated in a comfortable chair.
Chairs were bolted down in two rows lining the port and starboard walls of the fuselage of the main cabin. The cabin was spartan. Bare metal walls and deck. Four seats down either side of a center aisle and an open pilot’s deck two steps down at the bow. A console of dials and screens glowed. There were viewports down either side. At the rear of the cabin was a storage cage, where several rifles and shotguns stood upright in racks.
Dwayne handed out bottled water and wrapped sandwiches, cheese and turkey, from a mini-fridge. There was a container of sliced fruit as well.
“Brought this beast through in crates,” Boats said. “Five trips. Then we assembled it down on the beach where we first landed. Geteye and two of the Raj’s crew came through with us and helped us assemble it. Took a week.”
“You’ve been here a week?” Bat said.
Dwayne said, “Last time we saw you, for us, was three weeks ago. As soon as we lost contact, Boats and I started planning how to come get you. We remembered what Chaz was saying about a blimp. Ordered one from a place in Van Nuys that manufactures them. Paid triple price for rush delivery and no questions. This whole thing came in one cargo container.”
“Cost us a goddamn fortune to have to ferried out to the Raj,” Boats bitched, still smarting over the cost.
“We assembled the cabin on board the Raj. That was the most involved build. Rigged up a raft to haul it through the tube behind the Titan. It took some work with torches to cut a bigger working area in the Tube chamber. Then we hauled through the frame for the envelope and the engines. Geteye and the guys worked on the upper while Boats and I bolted on the maneuvering engines,” Dwayne said.
“And since when are you guys pilots?” Lee said.
“Hey, I went to chopper school in the Navy,” the SEAL said.
“And, if I remember right, you told us you washed out twice,” Lee said.
“Anyway. Blimps are more forgiving.” Boats shrugged.
“You said you wanted us back in a hurry last time we had contact. By your calendar that’s been more than a month,” Jimbo said to Dwayne.
“You’ve been through the shitter. Let’s get you back to The Now. Plenty of time to update you there,” Dwayne said and made his way to the pilot deck.
“Take a deep breath and pucker your assholes, ladies and gentlemen. Next stop, the future.” Boats grinned and went forward to take his place in the pilot’s chair.
57
Turning to the Now
The motors growled to life, sending a vibration through the aluminum gondola that betrayed the fragile nature of the craft. It was an excursion model, a millionaire’s toy. It had a fraction of the helium capacity or lift properties of larger cargo craft used in construction projects.
Boats pulled a lever on the console to release a ton of sand held in a ballast chamber in the belly of the gondola. As the sand bled out through several open cocks, the airship rose gently at first and then, with a jerk that settled them all back in their seats, lifted one hundred feet in seconds. The motors settled down to a steady beat. It was a noisier ride than any of them expected. Also less graceful than it appeared from outside the craft as it responded to every crosswind and updraft, no matter how slight.
“The skin’s a little damp from a gusher we flew through. We’ll have more lift as she dries out,” Boats called back from the pilot’s chair where he was turning the wheel and working levers to keep them level and on course.
At this remark, the passengers looked from their ports to see that they were cruising along at less than two hundred feet over the plain below. The sun was rising behind them, and the grass looked like burnished copper passing by below in a dizzying blur. Dark shapes darted through the grass and out from under the long gray shadow cast beneath them. Animals, startled by the appearance of this floating monstrosity, were rushing to get out from under its massive shape. They saw bison, caribou, and camels raising thick clouds of dust in their haste to be away.
The sun rose and began to dry the wet surface of the huge shell containing the helium nacelles that kept them aloft. They lifted higher to an altitude of one thousand feet, and the ride smoothed out except for course corrections that yanked them back and forth in their seats without any warning—except for the SEAL’s cries of “bitch!” from the pilot deck. The sun also worked on the aluminum and magnesium shell of the gondola, raising the temperatures inside. No air-conditioning aboard the blimp. But the ports could be unlatched and swung inward to allow cool air to blow across the passengers.
Within hours the airship crossed the open prairie and threaded the needle of a pass through the San Gabriels to the beach. By noon they were setting down on a level patch of sand within sight of the base camp created to construct the blimp. The mini firebase was covered by a pair of .50 machine guns on raised platforms manned by Geteye and two of his crew. A dome tent was set up by two Titan inflatables staked down and secured on the sand.
Dwayne radioed ahead while in transit to the coast to Ca
roline in The Now in order to schedule a field opening. They departed on the pair of power rafts after setting a thermite charge in the cabin of the airship that turned the craft into a swirling tower of flame. The aluminum and magnesium structure was practically vaporized in the blast furnace heat.
“She was a beauty,” Boats said from the tiller of Titan One. He looked back at the collapsing column of white smoke spreading over the beach.
“Chronal integrity, bro,” Chaz said from his bench seat.
“Except for all that shit we left behind at Blue City,” Lee said.
“We’ll keep that our little secret,” Bat said. “Besides, who’s ever going to find that stuff after all the time exposed to the weather and changes?”
Boats kept quiet. He concentrated on the horizon line, looking for the mist that would take them home.
Sons of Heaven
Bad Times Book Five
1
Nanking, 1864
The Heavenly King was hungry.
It was a sensation he was not accustomed to experiencing. Not for many years, in any case. A stirring within his belly, a grumbling complaint, his physical needs made themselves known.
With the help of a coterie of his wives, he dressed in layers of rainbow silk and donned a robe trimmed in hems of pearls and silver. He stepped into the dusty path of one of the many courtyards that encircled his palace. He squinted into the sunlight filtering down from a sky hazed with dark smoke. From over the high walls of his palace came the rumble of distant cannon and the patter of musket fire. It was unheeded by all as these sounds were commonplace after months of siege.
The Heavenly King was followed by scribes, who wrote down his every utterance in three different languages. His wives, who doted upon his every whim, followed behind. There were valets who saw to it that his raiment was flawless, and a trio of pretty young boys, who carried carafes of chilled water should he feel thirst.
It was hunger that vexed him now, and he announced that he would eat. His food preparers were sent for. A score of servants arrived, crawling toward him across the courtyard on hands and knees, foreheads on the dirt. Their hands were empty of offerings. “I would have my afternoon meal. Only I sense that the assigned hour of its serving has passed,” the Heavenly King pronounced to the backs of the men prostrated before him. The scribes dutifully wrote down these words as he spoke them.
One of the kitchen servants crawled forward to raise his head but not his eyes.
“Your meal was to consist of curried sparrows in honeyed rice, O Excellent One,” the servant stammered.
“And how does this explain the absence of my meal?” the Heavenly King said in an ethereal voice, free of rancor or suspicion. The passive tone did nothing to quell the servant’s fear. The man was aquiver from ankle to wrist.
“We cannot find any sparrows, Excellent One. They have either flown from the city or been trapped and consumed.” The servant banged his head on the dirt in abject apology.
The Heavenly King pondered this. His entourage stood breathless. The hands of his scribes were poised, quills ready to record his next words.
“The Israelites,” he said in a faraway voice.
The scribes hurriedly wrote down those words. None followed as the Heavenly King stood frozen in mid-gesture, lips pursed to continue. His eyes shifted focus into the infinite, seeking deeper truths hidden from the eyes of mere mortals. After long moments, he spoke again.
“Lost in the desert and starving, the Israelites called out to God, My Father. They asked Him for his aid. They prayed for Him to show them the way to game or grain or fruit. Days and days, and many more days passed, and My Father did not answer them. The Israelites feared that He had abandoned his chosen people, and they might perish there in the wilderness under His uncaring eye.” His entourage, feeling very much like the ancient Israelites, stood in the baking sun and waited while the Heavenly King gathered breath.
“And, one day, God cast manna upon them and told them to partake of it. It fell from Heaven like rain. The Israelites picked it from the ground and ate it. And it was good. It was sweet and satisfying and filled their souls with My Father’s love, even as it filled their bellies. From God’s love came abundance.”
All stood, or knelt, waiting for further remarks from the Heavenly King. Some prayed silently. Most prayed that their lord would reach a conclusion to his lecture sooner rather than later. His proclamations routinely went on for hours and hours. And though he showed no sign of the slightest discomfort, his entourage was broiling in the afternoon sun, sweat soaking their fine silks, and heads growing light in the heat.
“My father offers us manna in our time of need. He strews it upon the ground in all directions. We need only pluck it up and end our hunger.”
The Heavenly King gestured grandly, his manicured and powdered hands taking in the broad courtyard. All turned to follow his gesture, but all they saw was a walled enclosure of hard dirt. Once it had held a magnificent garden with flowers and fruit trees, koi ponds, and all manner of colorful birds. The deprivations suffered by the city had reached even here; the inner sanctum of the most divine Heavenly King. The trees long ago cut down for fire wood. The fruit consumed. The flowering plants ripped up for fodder. The colorful songbirds trapped and eaten. The fountains drained, and the glorious silver and gold koi consumed. What was once a sumptuous refuge was now dust dotted here and there with clumps of weeds.
“Do you see it? All about us? Manna from My Father,” the Heavenly King announced with a beatific smile.
All looked about them and saw nothing that looked anything like it might be a gift from God.
The Heavenly King touched the arm of the kowtowing kitchen servant and lifted the terrified man to his feet.
“See the offering of My Father? It lays awaiting you. There is no need to be hungry. God is great, and God is kind and has not abandoned His children. We are as the Israelites before us, blessed and chosen, anointed by His love and showered with His abundance.”
The entourage looked about, their distress growing. The fear was plain in their eyes, fear of displeasing the Earthly issue of God the Father Himself.
The Heavenly King laughed, a tinkling, feminine titter. He was amused rather than angered. The childlike ignorance of his closest followers charmed him.
“Here. Here on the ground at your feet. Manna from Heaven.” He chuckled as he lowered himself to his knees. To the astonishment of all those about him, he plucked a clump of weeds from the dust and began eating the leaves.
The Heavenly King, the second son of God, brother to Jesus Christ, their savior and unquestioned master on Earth and in Heaven, was on his belly munching pea-weed, as contented as a kid goat.
2
Shanghai
He was determined to walk from the car on his own.
In the end, Dr. Morris Tauber surrendered to his keepers. They grabbed him by either arm and walked/dragged him along the pier. His feet skipped, sneakered toes scraping over the asphalt surface. The drugs they gave him reduced the pain in his joints and limbs to a muted ache. The cold rain drizzling down brought him around from his stupor just a bit. He could see they were walking under the enormous legs of a cargo crane. He saw lights set high above on moored ships and grain towers. The harsh glow twinkled and blossomed against the wet lenses of his glasses seated crookedly on his face. A firmament of shifting red and yellow illuminations.
They marched him to where a cargo container ship loomed high over them. The words across the bow struck a chord in him.
Ocean Raj.
His home away from home for... how long had it been?
A group of men stood in a pool of wavering light at the foot of a gangway. Two of them stepped forward to meet Morris and his escort.
“He looks like shit,” said a familiar voice. Jimmy Smalls? The US Army Ranger and Pima Indian.
“Mo, you hear me? Give us a sign, brother.” Lee Hammond. Another Ranger.
“Caroline,” Morris croaked.
His own voice sounded miles away. “Back off, asshole,” Jimbo said.
Morris felt his axis shift as he was pulled back and forth, then he was finally in the hands of the two men he knew. His friends.
“Caroline’s fine. She’s away from here. Safe with the baby.” Jimbo’s voice was close to his ear as they half-carried him up the gangway.
“Dwayne’s with them. Rick Renzi and N’itha too,” Hammond said.
“Who’s Neeta?” Morris said through lips that felt like balloons.
Then he was washed away on a current of sputtering lights that swept him spinning down a deep dark hole.
He knew before he opened his eyes that it hadn’t been a dream. He was back on the Raj. The smell of chili cooking with an after-scent of motor oil. The bunk under his back swayed gently. The smells and motion brought him upright, his gorge rising.
Someone was touching his arm and putting a plastic bucket under his chin. He spewed into it, shoulders heaving.
“I got you, brother. Get it all up. Get that shit out your system.” The gentle basso voice of Chaz Raleigh.
Morris dropped back on the bunk, bathed in sweat. Daylight came in through the port glass.
“I hurt,” he said.
“Where?” Chaz said.
“Everywhere.”
“They worked you over good. But nothing’s broken. Worst thing they did was load you up with oxy. You’re going to be a few weeks getting over that,” Chaz said and held a plastic cup of water in crushed ice to Morris’ lips.
“Why’d they let me go?”
“That’s a story for another day. You just go back to sleep. Maybe later we’ll get some broth in you.”
“Ice cream,” Morris whispered.
“Yeah. That would work too, brother.” Chaz laughed. “Back to sleep for now.”