by Jon F. Merz
Petrov nodded. "I was surprised. Although not at it being you, just that you’d managed to get that far. Realizing you were hunting me changed things dramatically. I couldn’t take the chance that you’d eventually discover the connection to the Council."
"That’s when you paid me the visit."
"I thought we’d be able to wrap things up then, too. We’d torture you and get you to reveal the whereabouts of the boy. I knew he couldn’t be far away. But then you pulled that stunt and escaped." He sighed. "And I had to listen to yet another night of her caterwauling."
Part of me actually felt sorry he’d gone through that. It must have been pretty horrendous.
"Fortunately," he continued, "every cloud has a silver lining – isn’t that the expression they use over here?"
"One of ‘em."
"Arvella was able to track the boy using her own Invocation powers. We tracked him down to that shabby apartment, stormed it and finally grabbed him."
"How come you just didn’t do that from the start?"
"Arvella had been trying to do that, but it wasn’t until the boy began practicing his skills that she could fixate on his position. I don’t quite understand it myself, but she was successful."
"But you didn’t kill us," I said. "Whose dumb idea was that?"
"That was me giving you a bit of respect. And a second chance. I thought you might back off if you knew how close to death you’d come. I thought you’d leave us alone."
I smiled. "Petrov, I’ve been closer to death more times that you know about. That’s a bullshit explanation. Tell me the truth."
"All right." He smiled. "I hoped you’d do exactly what you did."
"What – go to Nepal?"
"Exactly. That you’d track us down and kill Arvella. The I’d be free to pursue my real agenda."
"Which is?"
"I take the boy when we land."
"Where?"
"I’ve got a buyer lined up for him. Arvella wasn’t the only Invoker of any degree of skill in our world you know. A simple selling pitch by me and this particular Invoker saw the possibilities immediately."
"What’s so special about Jack, though? Why not just grab any one out of the school?"
"According to Arvella, he’s one of the few whose got more raw power than others. He’s rare."
"You know I can’t let him go without a fight."
Petrov nodded. "Unfortunately, it won’t be much of a fight." He thumbed the hammer back on the gun.
"Good-bye, Lawson."
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Thank god for turbulence.
Literally as Petrov’s finger tightened around the trigger, the small plane we traveled in jumped. We hit a pocket of disturbance. Petrov stumbled forward a step and that’s when I lashed out with my left leg straight into his groin.
He buckled instantly, grunting as the full impact from my heel jarred his scrotum.
I moved into him from the seat, trying to gain control as quickly as possible.
I needed to keep Petrov away from Jack, knowing that in the closed confines of the plane, his gun could go off. Even if he didn’t want to kill Jack, accidents happened.
I rushed him back.
We tumbled over a row of seats. His gun slid across the thin carpeting on the floor and under a chair a few feet away.
"Dammit, Lawson-" His words came in spurts.
Petrov sank his elbow into my sternum. That hurt – a lot. I gasped for breath. Petrov continued his assault, slapping both my ears and following up with hook to my jaw.
I braced up and tucked in at the last second – the punch only connected slightly.
It still hurt like a bitch.
"I’ve had enough of you messing up my plans."
He backed off and lashed out with a straight kick to my stomach, catching me full on while I tried to recover from the ringing in my ears. I doubled over as the kick impacted, folding and catching Petrov’s foot.
I pivoted inside his leg and got my elbow on his kneecap. I straightened his leg and sank down so he fell back on his butt. But he’d grabbed my sleeve in the midst of my counter and pulled me down on top of him.
I landed with my knees hitting the inside of his thigh. He shouted in pain – tried to squirrel out from under me.
I wasn’t having it.
I moved up his body with my elbows and knees, trying to pin him and then go for a choke or neck break. As I came up, I nailed him in his lower ribs and then his throat.
He gagged. I thought he might puke on me, but he head-butted me over the eye instead. My vision blurred – tears shot out of my eyes.
He scrambled away and lashed out with another kick to my temple. I wondered if he knew Savate.
I brought my hands up too late, catching the top of his foot across my wrist. I heard a snap and knew I’d just lost a bone.
Pain surged up my arm, but I ignored it long enough to duck and roll forward, closing the distance again. If I could get him on the floor, I might have a chance.
He grunted as I came out of the roll and shot both my heels into his stomach and sternum. He twisted and tried to go for a leg lock on me. I moved in and bent my knees as he did so, nullifying the attack.
Instantly, he abandoned the leg lock and scrambled away again. I had to remind myself that as long as he was able to keep the distance, he could use those devastating kicks to his advantage.
I tried another roll, but he was expecting that and brought his elbows crashing down on my back. I grunted and tried to twist and absorb the impact. I reversed myself and brought another knee up into his groin.
As he doubled over again, I reached up and caught his shirt, continued my backward rolling action and tossed him over me and onto his back.
I came out of the roll astride his chest and went immediately into a double lapel choke. I rammed my right forearm across his windpipe and used my left to add pressure.
His eyes widened.
He sputtered, realizing what I was after.
His arms flailed but I kept my head tucked in tight to his collarbone, giving him an occasional headbutt to soften him up.
It was working.
I felt his strength begin to ebb as his arm movements became more erratic. A couple of times he tried to punch my ribs, but I ignored the impacts and tightened my choke.
"Lawson! He’s got the gun!"
I looked up in time to see Petrov’s arm coming up. He’d managed to recover the piece while we grappled on the cabin floor.
I missed it somehow.
I had to abandon the choke and go for a disarm. As his arm came up, I smothered it and went for a technique called ura onikudaki which looks something like a chicken wing type of arm lock. I wrenched his arm back, keeping the pistol aimed toward the front of the plane.
Petrov brought his right knee up, trying to dislodge me from being on top of him. I slammed his arm back, trying to torque it beyond its breaking point, but the floor of the plane wouldn’t let me wrench it back too far.
For now, I’d have to keep it there while I finished him another way.
The plane jumped again, bucking us both as we hit more turbulence. We must have dropped a few thousand feet judging by the sudden rush in my throat and stomach. I felt a rise of bile, but pushed it back down and kept the pressure on Petrov.
We leveled out again.
Somewhere ahead of us, I heard the door to the pilots’ cabin click open and a voice say, "Sorry about tha-what the?"
Petrov chose that moment to squeeze off a round.
The explosion made me wince. My ears rang.
The bullet slammed into the center of the copilot’s chest. Blood exploded as the round impacted, sending him ass over teakettle back into the cockpit.
I heard another shout from the pilot, but at that point, Petrov succeeded in freeing his other leg. He upset my balance.
We rolled over with him now getting the upper hand. I still had his arm wrenched back, but he immediate;y slammed his head down over my bruised eye.
Another crack told me, my orbital bone wouldn’t be up for any beauty awards any time soon. My vision blurred again and I could feel the swelling rise.
The pilot stumbled out of the cabin over the dead body of his copilot. "What the fuck is going on here?"
Petrov shot the gun again, this time killing the pilot.
My ears hurt. The smell of gunpowder hung in the air.
But the report of the gun caused Petrov to wince too.
I took advantage to wrench his arm back further. Without the floor impeding it any more, it popped. I heard another grunt from Petrov.
He dropped the gun and his arm hung by his side, the shoulder popped out of its socket. I used my hips to buck him off and then drove my elbows hard into his ribcage again and again until I heard another series of cracks.
He cried out and rolled off of me, grasping to find the pistol.
I got to my feet, a bit unsteady – I only had vision out of one eye.
Petrov flailed across the carpet, scrambling with his good arm to reach the pistol. I dove for it as well, skipping off his back.
I reached the gun first.
I turned around.
Petrov had gotten to his feet – he was rushing at me like a marionette with one good limb and one broken string.
I drew the gun down
lining up the front sight
the rear sight
center mass
and squeezed
once
twice
three times
the bullets popped out of the gun in rapid succession
and thudded into Petrov’s chest as if someone was pounding on it with their closed fist.
He stumbled -
- shocked
- and looked down as his shirt exploded crimson.
Blood soaked through fast. He took another step backward, closer to the cockpit.
He lifted his head, looked at me, still disbelieving. His mouth moved – he started to say something – but then turned around and fell face forward into the cockpit.
Instantly, the plane lurched.
"Lawson!"
Jack’s voice careened off the interior of the plane over the roar of the engines and the sudden whine of an alarm from somewhere in the cockpit.
I got to my feet again, tried to right myself and stumbled forward, tripping over the bodies of the copilot and the pilot.
Petrov lay sprawled across the instrument panel in the cockpit. I yanked his body off the controls and saw immediately that his last effort had been to disengage the autopilot setting.
Jack came running up behind me.
"Are you okay?"
I nodded, trying to clear my head of the thousands of angry mosquitoes that were buzzing around inside of my battered skull. My wrist throbbed and my stomach felt like shit.
"Lawson!"
Jack’s shouts brought me back, but only just. The plane gave another angry lurch and the dials ahead of me began spinning wildly.
"Shit."
Jack pressed his face into the cockpit. "What’s going on?"
I pointed at Petrov’s corpse. "Help me drag him out of here!"
Jack grabbed his feet while I got his shoulders. We pushed and pulled him out of the way, until he was sprawled next to the other two bodies.
The plane tilted forward then, tossing us forward and back into the cockpit. I slammed my bad wrist against the paneling and grunted.
"Goddammit!"
Jack managed to get to his feet. "What’s happening? What’s going on?"
I pointed to the copilot’s seat. "Get yourself strapped in there, good and tight. Do it now!"
He didn’t argue.
I slid into the pilot’s seat and strapped in. The altimeter was spinning wildly out of control. A quick check told me we were only a few miles up and losing altitude fast.
I glanced at Jack. His face looked like white as a winter blizzard.
I looked back at the controls and tried to remember anything I’d ever heard about flying a plane.
And anything didn’t equal very much in this case.
We were going down.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
I’ve often said that a life without adventure is not a life worth living. Funny how many things we say always seem to come back and haunt us at the most inopportune times.
This was one instance when adventure could go on vacation for all I cared.
I slid the headset on and tried radioing a Mayday. The damned radio didn’t seem to be working. And since out altitude was falling quickly, dicking around with the radio could wait as far as I was concerned.
I grabbed the yoke and tried pulling us out of the dive.
The yoke didn’t want to give.
I pushed the throttle forward, increasing our airspeed to try to speed up and gain us some altitude.
That didn’t do much.
But gradually, I was able to pull the plane back somewhat from the deep dive. Now we were only descending at a partially critical angle.
That didn’t make sense.
We should have been climbing given that I’d pulled the yoke back as far as it would go. Our altitude was still decreasing and worse, our airspeed was falling dangerously close to stall speed.
"What’s happening, Lawson?"
I glanced at Jack. The kid was gonna need years of therapy if he had to endure much more bad luck.
"We’ll be okay." I wished I meant it. I did another visual check of all the controls. Everything said we were still going down and I couldn’t figure out why.
Then I saw it.
The fuel gauge was spinning like mad.
We were dumping fuel.
"Goddamn Petrov." He must have punched the button when he hit the instrument panel.
The only good news was that I’d finally determined why we were about to crash. The bad news was…well, hell it was pretty obvious.
"Jack, head toward the back of the plane and see if you can’t find an emergency cabinet with parachutes, all right?"
He didn’t question me, which was good. He simply unstrapped himself and headed back, using the seats like handholds. Kid was a trooper, no doubt.
I had no knowledge of where we were and since the radio was out, there seemed little point in trying to land anywhere. Plus, we were flying over some of the rockiest and inhospitable land known to planes.
Jumping seemed a good option.
Our air speed was closing in on seventy knots and we’d probably stall in a few minutes. I took off my belt and wrapped it around the yoke, then attached it to the seatbelt to keep it pulled all the way back. I needed to keep the plane level for just a few more minutes until we could jump.
If not, well…
"Lawson! I found the chutes!"
I floundered toward the back of the plane and found Jack already heaving two of them out. I checked them over as fast as I could. There was no way to tell if they’d open or not, but our choices were pretty limited.
I helped Jack into his chute and then strapped mine on. It had been a while since I’d jumped. The key for us right now was not to jump until we’d descended below thirteen thousand feet. Any higher and we’d need oxygen to survive the fall.
I herringboned my way back to the cockpit and checked the altimeter. We’d just passed fifteen thousand and were falling about a thousand feet every thirty seconds.
I checked my watch and headed back to jack.
"You okay?"
He nodded but his teeth chattered away his fear. I put a hand on his shoulder.
"We’ll be fine. Just do exactly what I say and you won’t have any problems, okay?"
He nodded again.
"When we leave the plane, you’re going to make a starfish in the air with your arms and legs out. That will stop you from spinning, okay? I want you to count to twenty and then pull this cord-" I showed him. "-here."
"‘Kay."
"Once the cute opens, look for me and use to two steering ropes to direct your fligh
t. It’s just like a video game, okay? It’ll take you a few seconds to get used to the controls and then you’ll be fine."
"I can do it."
"Right before you land, yank down hard on the control ropes and you’ll land as soft as cotton, okay?"
"I’ll be okay."
I smiled. "I know you will, slick." I checked my watch. Time to go. "You ready?"
Jack smiled and gave me a thumbs-up.
I headed to the cabin door and rotated the T-bar, sliding the door open and in. A huge gust a wind smacked me in the face – roar filled my ears – and I had to fight to stay standing. Too much cloud cover prevented me from seeing anything.
I motioned for Jack to come up to the door and just as he started to, the plane went into a dive.
Jack tumbled forward, hitting a row of seats.
"Lawson!"
"Fuck." I went after him and found him tangled between two rows. My belt must have snapped off of the yoke.
There was precious little time. I heaved Jack over my shoulder and got us back to the door way.
"You go first!"
His eyes bloomed white when he looked at the open air. I shook him once. "You can do it! Ready?"
He nodded and I pushed him out, watching him fall.
No time left.
I vaulted out of the plane, too, feeling the slipstream smack me like a poor wet newspaper. I tumbled ass over ass for about three seconds before I straightened myself out into the starfish pattern.
Below me, I could barely see Jack. He’d evened out though, that was a good sign.
In my own mind, I’d begin ticking off the seconds until his chute should have opened. As soon as I reached zero I saw the streamers billow out of his back, rushing back up toward me as the foils filled with air and braked his fall.
Thank god his chute opened.
I was coming in on his position fast and pulled my own ripcord. Instantly my own cells filled with air and the straps bit deep into my groin making my bowels ache.
But we’d done it.
I grabbed my risers and took a deep breath. I glanced back and saw the plane nose-diving toward the earth. The air seemed silent aside from the slight whine of the plane’s engines as they died somewhere below us.
Thirty seconds later I heard a massive explosion.
Impact.
