by Chris Ryan
But there was no rain. There was only the plane, climbing now into the dark sky, disappearing into the clouds of smoke.
Bel understood. The pilot’s reckless flight pattern made sense now. The plane had dropped the water — the equivalent of the contents of a small plunge pool. Now the plane was climbing again, soaring away into the smoky black sky. Moments later she heard another gigantic splash followed by a hiss as it dropped another load.
She waited to see if the water would help clear the black pall of smoke, but it didn’t. It was going to take a lot more water than that to stop the city burning. But rain seemed like a dream on a swelteringly dry day like this. Bel didn’t believe in God, but she had never been more tempted to try a prayer just for luck.
She had reached the edge of the green and could see an outdoor activities shop. Its front window was broken but it seemed to have escaped the flames. She got up and strode purposefully towards it. It was time she got some boots. Her sandal-wearing days were behind her, she decided.
As she walked, she took her phone out and tried to call Ben. She couldn’t get through. After a few tries she had to give up. It was hardly surprising. There were probably a half million other people all trying to place calls at the exact same moment.
Bel put the phone back in her pocket. Where was
Ben? Had he managed to land somewhere safely?
How would she ever find him again in all this chaos?
Chapter Fourteen
In the desert below, the railway line snaked up to a small cluster of buildings. ‘I can see a station,’ said Ben. ‘And a couple of huts.’
Kelly consulted the map on her knee. ‘It’s Coober Pedy.’
‘I think we should land,’ Ben said. ‘We can ask if the police have found my mum or your dad.’
Kelly mulled over the idea, biting her lip. She seemed reluctant.
‘If we don’t land here,’ said Ben, ‘how far are we going to go? All the way to Darwin?’
Kelly straightened up in her seat. ‘OK, give me control. I might be able to land.’
Ben was surprised she was going to try it. He was a bit disappointed too. He felt he had got the hang of flying and was looking forward to trying a landing. With a sigh he took his hands away. Kelly reached for the controls.
As soon as her left hand touched the stick her mouth twisted with pain. She folded her arms into her body, hunching over them protectively.
‘No good. My hands are too painful,’ she gasped.
‘That’s another reason for landing. There ought to be a doctor around here.’
‘One station building and two huts? You’re being optimistic.’
Ben shrugged. ‘At least they’d have a proper firstaid kit. Look, can you talk me through landing?’
Kelly thought about it. Instead of answering, she said, ‘You’ve got control.’
‘I’ve got control.’ Ben took back the stick and the throttle. He felt a bit guilty, but all the same he was pleased to get the chance.
Kelly straightened up. ‘Landing is the most dangerous part of flying and it’s difficult. You’ve got to do exactly as I say.’
Ben gave her a withering look. She certainly knew how to wipe out any ounce of sympathy he might feel. ‘Do I ever not do as I’m told?’
Kelly looked out of the window. ‘Let your altitude drop to five hundred feet. We’ll aim for that flat stretch of road there, so bring her around in a big circle while I check it out.’
Ben tilted the stick left and balanced with a little rudder. He executed a perfect turn to the left, then glanced at the altimeter. It said eight hundred feet. He now felt completely at home manoeuvring the little craft in the air. Landing would be a cinch. He put the nose down.
‘That’s too steep!’ shrieked Kelly. ‘We’re going too fast. Ease off the throttle and that’ll take you lower. You don’t need to point the nose down.’
A bit shocked at being shouted at, Ben pushed the throttle down to decrease the revs.
‘Not too slow! You might stall. Don’t let the speed get below fifty knots.’
‘All right,’ Ben retorted through gritted teeth. ‘No need to screech about it.’
‘Throttle!’ she said.
In a moment, thought Ben, I might throttle you.
Kelly looked out of the window again.
‘What are you looking for?’ said Ben. ‘I thought you’d decided where to land.’
‘I’m checking to see how bumpy it is. And that there are no obstacles like trees or telegraph poles.’
Ben glanced out of the other side. All he could see was a few scrubby buildings: a shed and a petrol station with a dust-encrusted flag hanging limply on a flagpole, then the railway station a little way away. ‘Don’t be daft, there’s nothing for miles.’
‘Yes, well, I’m telling you how to do it properly. Making assumptions can get you killed. Right, there’s no wind and we’re at five hundred feet. Keep that height and fly over the path you will take, just to check everything is safe.’
Ben turned and took the microlight over the makeshift runway at exactly five hundred feet. He remembered to check the plane was level.
‘That’s good,’ said Kelly. ‘Go round to the start again, and as you go, point the nose down — just a touch — so we descend.’
Ben could tell by her voice that this was it. Butterflies were building up in his stomach.
By the time they reached the start of the runway, they were at two hundred feet.
After spending so long seeing only sky on each side of him, it was rather disconcerting to see the ground so close.
‘Turn here,’ said Kelly. ‘We’re going to land.’
One hundred feet. The runway was ahead of them, taking up nearly half the windscreen. Their speed was 60 knots. The butterflies in Ben’s stomach clumped together in an uncomfortable lump. 60 knots felt rather fast. The ground shot past underneath them. Would that spindly undercarriage take it?
‘Put the nose down just a touch more,’ said Kelly. ‘Close the throttle down gently. We want to be slow — fifty knots — but we don’t want to stall. You’re going to continue coming down like this then put the heels down and she’ll land.’
Ben eased closer to the ground. He saw small rocks whizzing past and felt all his confidence draining away fast.
‘Put the nose down more,’ said Kelly. ‘And don’t look at the ground, look ahead or it will all come up too quickly.’
Ben looked ahead. As he did so, a kangaroo hopped into the road, stopped and sat on its haunches.
Ben looked at Kelly in alarm. ‘Where’s the horn?’
‘Pull up!’ yelled Kelly. ‘If we hit it, we’re toast!’
Ben opened the throttle again. The engine roared. The kangaroo blinked at them, then the view changed to deep blue sky again.
Kelly leaned out of the window as the microlight soared upwards. ‘Stupid thing’s still sitting there. Come round again and we’ll land to one side of it.’
Ben’s heart was pounding. The aborted landing had really shaken him. His mind went blank. ‘What do I do?’
‘Ease off the throttle and bring her down.’ Ben did as he was told.
They came round again. ‘Get straight and level,’ said Kelly. ‘Then point the nose down until I tell you to bring it up.’
The kangaroo was still sitting on their runway, blinking at them gormlessly. At this altitude it looked like a man in an oversize rabbit suit.
‘Don’t you dare move, Skippy,’ said Ben. Sweat trickled down inside his suit.
‘Don’t look at the stupid kangaroo,’ said Kelly. ‘Look where you’re going! Right, you’re at thirty feet — ease the nose up — slowly. Keep her level, you’re wobbling. We don’t want to touch down with one wheel. Just relax.’
Relax? When he was sitting here being bombarded by instructions? When the ground was whizzing past only metres away? His hands were so slippery with sweat that he could barely keep his grip on the stick.
‘Bring the nose
back a bit more.’
Ben tweaked the stick back.
‘Not that much! We’ll stall! Nose forward—’
Too late. There was a bang which Ben felt all the way up to his teeth. They were on the ground.
‘Throttle off!’ yelled Kelly. ‘Brakes on!’ She leaned forward with her arms folded, her hands tucked protectively by her elbows. Wasn’t that what airlines told you to do for an emergency landing?
Ben squeezed the brake handle. The craft slowed. Slowly he let out his breath. He seemed to have it under control. A huge grin spread across his face. ‘Wow, I got us down!’
Slowly Kelly straightened up. ‘Yeah, and you nearly took our undercarriage off doing it. Taxi over to the station there. Let’s find out what’s going on.’
‘How do I do that?’
‘Just drive it like a car. Steer it with the stick and the pedals. But keep the stick forwards so the nose is down.’ Ben hadn’t driven a car before of course, but he reckoned he could guess what to do. The station was a single-storey shack like a couple of Portakabins and a big water butt, and it was about two hundred metres away, so he pulled the throttle up to work up some speed. But he did it too much. The microlight shot forward at 70 knots, the engine howled and the rpm needle swung into the red.
‘Not that fast!’
‘Oops,’ said Ben, and slowed to 40 knots. It was an uncomfortable ride: they felt every bump in the ground. Steering felt different on the ground too and it took Ben a few goes to get it right. The kangaroo blinked at them as they bumped towards the station in a series of S shapes.
Finally Ben braked and unclipped his seat belt.
‘Set the parking brake and cut the engine,’ said Kelly.
Ben did as he was told and slipped open the catch on his door. ‘I’ll let you out from the other side.’
Kelly shook her head. ‘I’ll stay here. You go and ask.’
Her face was trickling with sweat. Ben’s was too, but he didn’t think it was just the heat in Kelly’s case. She was hunched over her hands again, protecting them.
He put his phone into the pocket of his flying suit, disconnected his headset and slipped it round his neck, and jumped out.
Away from the shade of the plane, the sun was mercilessly hot. Ben unzipped his flying suit. Underneath, his T-shirt was soaked with sweat. The dust stuck to his arms and face.
He walked into the station building. Two big fans rotated in the ceiling but they barely stirred the air. A pair of double doors led to the railway track. There was just one platform. It looked like only half a station. Obviously the northbound and southbound trains never arrived at the same time.
‘G’day.’ The stationmaster pushed open the door of the ticket office. He was a robust-looking man in his sixties with a peaked cap and a shirt in the red livery of the Ghan.
‘Hi,’ said Ben.
The man looked out of the window at the parked microlight. ‘That’s a stylish way to travel. I’d stick to that if I were you; faster than the train. Especially today — it’s been delayed.’
‘Why was it delayed?’ said Ben.
‘Kidnapping in Adelaide. That makes a change. We’ve been delayed by floods, lightning strikes and roos on the line, but never an attempted kidnapping. The police stopped it for half an hour.’
‘Did they catch them?’
‘No. Turned out to be a hoax or a false alarm.’ The stationmaster shrugged. ‘Still, makes a change.’
‘Are you absolutely sure the police didn’t find anyone on the train?’ said Ben.
‘Oh yes. They gave us the all-clear. They don’t take any chances these days, what with terrorists and suchlike.’
Ben was stunned. Bel and the major hadn’t been on the train after all. So where were they?
Through the open door to the ticket office Ben could see a drinks fridge. Condensation had collected on the window; the row of cans and bottles inside looked cool and inviting. He reached in his pocket for some coins. ‘Can I buy a couple of bottles of water?’
‘Sure.’ The stationmaster went to the fridge. ‘If you need to refuel, my sister runs the roadhouse next door.’
‘Actually,’ said Ben, ‘can you tell me where the town is?’
The stationmaster brought two bottles over to Ben and made a sweeping gesture with his hand. ‘This is the town. That’s a dollar fifty.’
Ben paid him. Out of the window he could see the dusty petrol station, a few hills shaped like pyramids and a number of small sheds. The road was just a smoothing out of the desert texture. In the microlight, Kelly was waving her gold and black paws to shoo away a pair of emus who were strutting over to peck at the plane, but nothing else in the landscape moved.
‘Sorry,’ said Ben, ‘I mean a big town. My friend needs a doctor.’ He handed over some coins.
The stationmaster beckoned him over to a map on the wall. He pointed to the railway station with a stubby finger. ‘You’re right here.’
On the map, the station was in the centre of a complex array of streets: a church, a motel, a school, a theatre. It didn’t correspond with the isolated shacks that Ben saw out of the window.
The stationmaster chuckled. ‘Son, we not only have a doctor, we have a hospital. In fact, you’re parked on top of it. Welcome to Coober Pedy.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Ben, beginning to think that the poor old guy must have gone doolally in the heat.
‘The town,’ said the stationmaster. ‘It’s all built under the ground.’
Chapter Fifteen
In Adelaide, the streets were full of boiling smoke. The police and ambulances were busy dealing with casualties; the fire brigade had their hands full trying to deal with the fires. The army had organized mass evacuations, but so many people slipped through the net — the ones who hadn’t got out fast enough, or were stuck somewhere that was inaccessible.
Those people were now trying to get to safety by themselves.
Some made good decisions, others didn’t. It was impossible to tell which option would be more dangerous until you tried it. Whether you survived was more down to luck than judgement. Choices had to be made in a split second. Do you open this door or that door? Do you run down this road or that road? Every choice was a toss of the coin. Heads you win, tails you lose.
Victoria and Troy had so far made the right decisions. They fled from the golf course, not knowing where they were going. They came out onto a road they’d never seen before, lined with burning houses. The sky was dark and full of strange smells. Halfway down the road Victoria noticed some white gates on fire and realized she knew the street very well: she’d cycled up it every day for the past five months and fantasized about living in the big house behind those gates.
They reached the end of the road and chose to turn right. They didn’t know it, but they’d won another coin toss. If they’d gone the other way, they would have been under the burning telegraph pole as it collapsed across the street.
When they reached the corner shop, they had to stop running — there was too much smoke and they couldn’t breathe.
Ahead of them, a car exploded, vaporizing into a ball of mangled steel and burning petrol.
That was another coin toss won. If they had continued running, they would have been caught in the blast.
They darted down an alleyway and came out in a small precinct on the edge of the shopping area. For the first time, they saw some other people: a vet in green overalls and latex gloves; a decorator with smears of yellow and white paint on his clothes; a postman in his navy-blue uniform; a jockey from the racetrack, still in crash helmet and goggles, his candy-striped silks and breeches streaked with soot. Victoria and Troy felt reassured to see people who had come from the same part of town. The vet and the jockey felt the same when they saw Victoria and Troy in their golf shoes, eye shields and single gloves. To have got this far from the golf course and racetrack, they must have made good choices. Everybody hoped that luck was contagious — there was bound to be safety in numbe
rs.
The group pressed on together towards the centre of town. Surely the fire wouldn’t follow them there. Surely concrete and brick buildings would give them more shelter than the woods and grass on the outskirts.
As they hurried on, burned-out restaurants and bars emerged from the smoke — then the casino, the building newer than the others and perhaps built from more fire-retardant materials. Certainly the windows still looked intact.
They approached the building and Victoria reached for the door handle. It was hot. She let go and herded the others away. Instinct told her it was burning inside.
Suddenly a green neon sign appeared through the smoke, flashing fitfully: SWIMMING POOL.
The jockey went ahead and pushed open the double doors. Inside, the turnstiles were open and the shimmering blue waters of the pool were visible at the end of a short corridor.
Water. That had to be safe. Another winning toss, it seemed.
They all ran in and headed for the corridor that led to the water.
All at once the vet began to cough. ‘Stop!’ she called. ‘I can smell something.’
‘It’s just the chlorine from the pool,’ said the jockey.
Victoria also started coughing and her eyes were watering. She never liked the smell of swimming pools but this seemed much worse than that.
Then the jockey was choking, and the decorator too. He put his hand on a door handle to steady himself and pulled it back sharply. ‘It’s hot—’ His words ended in another spasm of coughing.
It was Troy who recognized the smell. He pushed the decorator away from the door, back towards the turnstiles, and put his hand over his mouth to stop the fumes long enough to speak. ‘Get out! That’s the chemical store. I used to work at a spa. You have to keep the chemicals cool. If they get hot, they explode.’
The group spluttered their way back to the turnstiles and out into the street.
Another coin toss won.
Bel’s lungs were raw and her eyes were watering. At least she had managed to get some Brasher walking boots from the outdoor shop on the green. She didn’t like the idea of looting so she’d scribbled a note with her name and address and details of what she owed them.
