Cyborg 03 - High Crystal

by Martin Caidin

  They looked forward with the terrain unfolding before them as it did on the chart. “Dr. Jennings, you’ve got the volcano clearly?” Jennings studied the chart for a moment, nodded, pointing at the high peak far ahead of them.

  “Fine,” Steve said. “Now, directly before El Misti—you’ll have to look sharp because of those lights and shadows through the clouds—can you make out two other features? The one closest to the volcano is Temple Mountain. You can barely see it.”

  “I—I think so,” Jennings said. “Binoculars would help, Steve. I’ve got some in my pack and—”

  “No, doctor, the way this thing is bouncing around, all you’d see would be a blur. Well, look, check the position on the chart. You can hardly miss the Chalhuanca Plateau. It’s directly between us and Temple.”

  Jennings stared ahead, referring back to the chart, then nodded. “Got it. It’s . . . like a butte in our southwest but much larger.”

  “About ten times larger than anything we’ve got.”

  The clouds had split the afternoon sunlight into huge beams poking down from the mists, magnificent pillars that seemed to glow from within. One huge shaft of light reflected brilliantly off water far to their left.

  “Got that?” Steve pointed to the reflection. “Okay, check it out on the chart, doctor. That’s Puma Lake. A lot like our own Crater Lake in the northwest. Exploded and blew away most of the mountain.”

  Steadily the gross details spread along the surface of the earth enlarged before their eyes as they closed the distance to their objective. There was another way to look at the area that held their interest. Closest to them, nestled within a bend of the Sicuani River, was the town of Ayabaca and, directly across the river from the town, the grass airstrip. The river ran in a general east-west direction to the east of Ayabaca, in lush jungle foliage. Small mountains, many of them better described as large rolling hills, upthrusting from the verdant country, were everywhere. But as you progressed northward from the river, the ground sloped rapidly. Perhaps it was once a major range with the abrupt rise one found from Death Valley in California, straight up the rugged slopes of the Sierra Nevada. A sharp peak, a sort of miniature Matterhorn, lay directly before them, east of Ayabaca and north of the river. Beyond this peak, unnamed on the chart but which Steve decided to call Matterhorn because of its obvious name-reference value for his group, rose a larger, blunt-shaped peak. Although it was too far to make out any details at this distance, Steve knew—and pointed out on the chart to Jennings—where the small town of Azul was located. Where Major Ryland had stumbled down from the hills, feverish, swollen from insect bites, in agony from a broken arm.

  He pointed out Cerro Pumasillo with its peak 9,124 feet above ground. “But”—Jennings protested—“that plateau, the Chalhuanca . . . it appears to be thousands of feet higher than Pumasillo. That’s, well, hard to believe.”

  “Start believing, doctor,” Steve told him. For several moments he withheld conversation as the transport crashed into an invisible turbulence. The left wing dipped sharply and for a long, sickening interval they hung nearly vertical, the airplane rattling through the sudden fall. Steve let the Gooney have her head; no use fighting that kind of whooping downdraft. He felt the controls begin to grab again. “Hang on,” he called to the others, and brought in full right aileron, ready with the rudder, bringing back to almost its full stop the yoke in his left hand. The Gooney shuddered and banged metal together and then they were out of it. Only occasional beams of light now pierced the clouds, and the air was making it impossible for a novice to do more than hang on for dear life.

  “Guess that’s it,” Steve told the others. “Dr. Jennings, it’s too rough for you to try to get back to your seat. I think you’d better stay up here with us.”

  Jennings gasped. “Will our—what did you call it?—old bucket survive all . . . this?”

  “All this and a lot more, doctor,” Steve told him. “Remember, they used to use these old coal haulers for crossing the Hump in World War Two.”

  “Hump?”

  “The Himalayas. And it was a lot rougher than this.” Steve glanced at Wayne. “Phil, crank in the radio to one twenty two point eight.”

  “Unicom?”

  “That’s what they’ve got at Ayabaca. Tell them we’re twenty south and coming down from nineteen thousand.”

  “Right.” Wayne busied himself with the radio contact. He pressed the headset close against his ears and had to repeat their call sign several times. Finally he turned to Steve. “We’re cleared in. Surface wind at fifteen knots gusting to thirty-five. Down the runway at two zero zero.”

  “Sounds like it’s on the nose.”

  “Yeah, no local traffic, they say.”

  Steve came back on the power and the C-47 eased into a steep descent at two thousand feet a minute. The others would be blowing like whales to clear their ears, but they’d had enough time at it lately. The transport shuddered and slewed as Steve brought them down through the punch of the winds streaming from the distant peaks. Then they were through the worst of it. Steve had Ayabaca clearly in sight. Grass surface, four thousand feet long, no tower—just someone looking out the window of the operations shack.

  “Check me on the elevation,” he said to Wayne.

  “Thirty-two hundred.”

  Five thousand feet on the altimeter. “Half flaps,” he called to Wayne. His copilot brought the flap handle down, dropped them to 50 percent. They slowed their speed, feeling the deceleration. Steve called it off. Gear down, full flaps. He was on flat pitch on the props, playing the throttles, bringing her around in a steep curving descent so he could roll out on their final approach.

  “Going to use those leading edge flaps?” Wayne asked.

  “We don’t need them here. We’ll turn off before we ever reach the halfway mark.”

  “That,” Wayne said after a pause, “should be something to see.”

  Back some more on the power, the bumps lessening. The runway dropped neatly into sight dead ahead of the nose, and Steve came back even more on the power. He brought her low over the trees, dragging her in, and behind him he could hear Jennings sucking in his breath. He sensed Wayne tight as a steel drum by his side, fists clenched in his lap, determined to sit it out without a sound. When she began to shudder with the first indication of the coming stall, Steve brought in power. The big engines rumbled smoothly, helped by those fat blades on their props. The airspeed indicator trembled around seventy, and their sink rate eased off with a slight nudge of more power. The last trees whispered beneath them. They were all holding their breath, teeth clamped tight, sweating out what was to them the inevitable crash. The runway rushed toward them and at just the right moment, the only moment, Steve moved the yoke forward just so much, and tapped in power. The Gooney Bird lowered her nose, grabbed at the angel’s whisper of lift, and touched the wheels without a sigh.

  “I don’t believe—look out!” Wayne’s shout was still in his ear as Steve saw the truck rush from a clump of trees on the side of the runway directly before them. His hands moved in a blur. Full power, the throttles jammed forward ahead with back-slamming acceleration. Not enough. Without conscious thought, every move one of reaction rather than planned action, Steve hit the lever for the leading-edge flaps.

  Lift. Lift from flaps and power and the speed they had left, even the lift from ground effect—the air-cushioning between the wings and the ground—and it was all together just enough to carry the C-47 forward and up in a crazy bounce and they were over the truck and beyond. Steve chopped the throttles, slammed her down on the grass, standing on the brakes as he swerved to the right. Phil Wayne flinched as the trees rushed to his side of the airplane but he had no more time to think of it because Steve was standing on the left brake, the left only. He brought in full power again to the right engine, the prop screaming as it spun with maximum revolutions, and in that wild, deliberate movement, almost an out-of-control ground loop, the C-47 swung around to the left, reversing its
movement and rushing back along the airstrip toward the truck.

  “Mueller!” Steve called out. “Your rifle! Get it and get ready to bail out of this thing.”

  He brought in power to the left engine and raced toward the truck now stopped near the right side of the runway. A man gaped from the truck cab. They watched the vehicle jerk forward, stop. “He’s flooded it,” Steve said. The man stared at the huge prop rushing at him, then bolted from the truck and rushed for jungle cover off the runway. Steve brought the transport around to the right. He stopped with the cabin door in full view of the truck and the running man.

  “Muedler! Get out there and get him!” Mueller, out of his seat, moving fast, threw the door handle and flung open the stops. He dropped from the airplane to the ground, the rifle in his hand.

  “Stop!” he yelled, his rifle cracked, a sharp report echoing along the runway. Mueller had fired over the man’s head. Steve tore away has straps. “Hold her with the brakes,” he yelled to Wayne, and ran down the cabin, wheeling through the door to Mueller’s side. There was a glimpse of a form just disappearing into concealing brush.

  Angrily he jerked the rifle from Mueller’s hand, brought it swiftly to his shoulder and aimed. The rifle came down slowly. Too late. He turned to Mueller. “You had him nailed. Why didn’t you do the job?”

  Mueller looked at him. “Austin, that would have been killing a man, an unarmed man, in cold blood.”

  “And just what do you think he was trying to do to us . . . he nearly did us all in and you—” He tossed the rifle back to Mueller.

  “Austin, did you ever stop to think,” Mueller said, “that what happened could have been an accident?”

  Steve looked at him, turned and went back to the airplane.

  CHAPTER 9

  “I’m going into Ayabaca—the town’s across that river,” Steve told them, “to check in with the local authorities. That’s part of our deal. I also want to talk with whatever passes for the local constabulary to file an official report on what happened out here when we landed. Dr. Jennings will want to have a few words with a local office that deals with guides for this area. And then we’re coming back, before nightfall. When we get back, you people will have your rifles loaded with a shell in the chamber. You’ll have put together a hot meal for all of us—use the galley in the airplane . . . Someone tried to take us out today. They missed, which doesn’t mean they’ll quit trying. This airplane is an easy target on this field by itself. So are we. Tonight we all stand watch.”

  They returned shortly before nightfall. It was either cut their visit to Ayabaca short or stay there the night through, and Steve wasn’t about to leave that airplane with three men who might hesitate and get themselves killed before they could pull a trigger. “That ferry is on a cable,” he explained. “They use a pair of mules walking around a windlass to haul it back and forth. The old man who runs it won’t stay after dark. He says maybe falling into the river at night isn’t worth it. Chances are you don’t come up alive. We’ll find out more in the morning.

  “Tomorrow Jennings and Wells have to be in Ayabaca. Mueller, you’ll go along to ride shotgun, and even if you’re touchy about using that rifle you should be able to discourage any unfriendly types in broad daylight. But be back here by three in the afternoon. No later . . . Rudy, you and Dr. Jennings will want to talk with that local guide office. They know the country better than anyone else, and—”

  Rudy broke in. “You never said anything about using a guide.”

  “And we’re not going to. We can’t trust anyone here. We have no idea who’s been bought by Fossengen. Also, a guide has a mouth. He’ll either sell his information to the highest bidder or maybe talk just to make himself a hero. But I want you to talk with them. Nose around. Anything you pick up could help. Call it window shopping. Mueller, you register with whoever passes for the local chief or government man in Ayabaca. We’ll play this straight up, just like you said from the start.” He turned to Wayne. “Phil, you please read up on that handbook. The more I think about it the more I’m convinced we may need someone else to fly this tin beauty. Didn’t you say you had about fifteen hundred hours?”

  Wayne nodded.

  “How much multi?”

  “About four hundred. You know, Cessna 310, Aztec. But I’ve got about two hundred hours in the Twin-Bonanza.” Wayne grinned. “And three hours in the right seat of the airplane I’m sitting in right now.”

  The Twin-Bonanza, Steve reflected. Husky airplane for its size. Same basic procedures as the Gooney Bird. Stepping from one to the other was a matter of thinking a little bigger. With that much time behind him, plus the fact that Steve had judged Wayne as more than competent, he could check him out to handle the C-47 through the complete take off and landing routine. He’d pick it up with Wayne in the morning. “Phil, go over to the airport office. We’ve got maybe thirty minutes of daylight left. Let’s get this thing tanked up before dark. Have him bring the gas truck here, and make sure he drains the sumps on that truck before he runs a hose to our tanks. And then watch him. Wear your thirty-eight like it’s high-noon time. In full view. Check the fuel yourself. And the oil.”

  Wayne got to his feet, opened his pack, strapped on the revolver, withdrew the weapon and loaded six shells into the chamber. Steve nodded with satisfaction.

  He turned to the others. “Chow time. Everything ready?”

  “Sorry I left my chef’s cap at home,” Rudy said. “Field rations coming up.”

  “Good. Keep Wayne’s hot for him. Mueller, soon as you eat, sack in. Get your rest now. You’re on guard shift like everybody else.”

  “I didn’t ask to get out of it,” Mueller said.

  “Good man. Never volunteer.”

  Steve went into the cockpit by himself, closed the door behind him. He knew his move would raise some uncomfortable questions. No way out of it; besides, he could probably offset curiosity with an edge to his voice, pretend irritation. Cut off from the vision of the others, he took out what appeared to be a set of heavy flight goggles from his flight case. Careful examination showed them to be something more—micro-miniaturized electrical circuits were embedded in the goggles. He closed a twistlock wire lead to the frame, ran the wire within his clothing down to his right leg. He pressed a detent he felt with his fingers, and a section of the bionics limb slid away. He worked in darkness, by feel. The other end of the wire was another twistlock, and he inserted this within the power capsule in the leg, twisted it into position. The panel came back into place. He brought the goggles up over his face, sat erect in his seat and looked through the cockpit windshield.

  A ghostly world of infrared lay before him. He saw by temperature emission from whatever came within his sight to a distance of about a thousand yards. Without the IR goggles the airfield lay shrouded in gloom. He draped the goggles carelessly about his neck and returned to the cabin. Wayne, Jennings and Mueller were there. Phil Wayne waited expectantly for him, Jennings puttered with his equipment, Mueller was asleep in the cargo area, his body pushed against parachute packs. Steve motioned for Wayne to help him remove the wide belly hatch, one of several special modifications for the Gooney Bird. They lifted the hatch, placed it quietly to one side.

  “Got your pack?” Wayne nodded, and Steve motioned for the other man to follow him. They dropped quietly to the grass beneath the transport. “The truck first,” Steve said. “Try not to make any noise.”

  Wayne’s hand held him. “Where the hell is it? I can’t see a damn thing out here.”

  Steve brought the goggles up to his eyes. “Put your left hand here,” he instructed, moving Wayne’s hand to his right shoulder. “Stay close with me.” With no further word Steve started across the field. The grass was cool and dark to his infrared vision, but the truck, still radiating heat from its metal, came to him clearly against the “cold” background of foliage. When they were almost there, Steve slowed, tapped Wayne’s arm. “Can you see it now? About twenty feet away.”

&nb
sp; “How the hell do you see in the dark?” Wayne asked in a whisper. “Those goggles?”

  “You’re the electronics genius. You tell me.” He hoped that would take care of it.

  Wayne nodded. “That I will. When we get back.”

  “Can you work without light?”

  “Sure.” Wayne worked his way forward until he touched the truck. “Okay from here. You play watchdog.” He disappeared beneath the truck. Five minutes later they were on their way back to the airplane.

  “Okay, let’s get the rest of it set up,” Steve said. “I’ll give you a hand.” They busied themselves in a wide circle extending to a hundred feet on all sides of the transport, placing small tripods on the grass at sites selected by Wayne. Finished, the electronics specialist set up a panel in the cabin. “Done,” he said, wrapping it up. “The pattern on this board roughly matches the perimeter. Wait, I’ve got an idea.” He fished in his equipment kit and with a piece of chalk roughed an outline of the C-47 on the plastic-faced board he’d just completed work on.

  “Great,” Steve said. “Now sack in. I’ll get you up at three A.M. for your shift.” Steve outlined the setup to the other three and draped his body in a cabin seat. Seconds later he was fast asleep.

  “Steve, wake up.” Steve broke out of sleep, sat up abruptly.

  “It’s on the alert board,” Rudy added.

  Steve glanced at the panel. Where Wayne had outlined the airplane and the circle beyond he saw three glowing red lights. “Get the rest of them up and stay low,” he said as Rudy moved away. Moments later they were by his side, looking at the panel. “You all understand it? Each red light marks where someone has broken the photocell beams Phil set up around us. About a hundred feet away from the ship. They must be working their way in slowly. I suspect they’ll start after us with the truck they left here on the field. Okay, everybody to positions.”