Tracer, page 27
They reached the turboprop, the rear half of which was still under the shade of the trees. Korso quickly looked it over, mentally ticking off boxes as he went along. The plane was the right size, about twenty-six metres long. It was in a poor state. The port side wing was completely missing, along with the nose and tail fin. The starboard wing was still attached to the main body, although it looked badly damaged, with the end broken off. It was also missing its propeller. As with the other aircraft they’d seen, there was no undercarriage. The cockpit windshield was gone, and the main fuselage was covered with mud, leaves and indentations, but little of it looked random to Korso’s eyes. It all seemed artificial, as though done on purpose. Which fitted perfectly with their current theory.
Yannick finally joined him, still carrying his equipment bag and machete. He must have jogged, yet seemed barely out of breath. But then he was used to the climate.
‘So this is the plane you want?’ he asked, dropping the bag on what was left of the starboard wing. It landed with a clunk.
‘We’re about to find out,’ Korso said.
Natasha was waiting for them by the crew door on the port side, just behind the cockpit. Like the rest of the plane, the door was covered in dried mud.
‘Locked, I suppose?’ Korso asked.
‘Naturally,’ she said. ‘The same with the cargo door behind us.’
He stepped back for a better look at the rear of the plane, and saw the larger cargo door back there. Also shut.
‘But I can confirm this aircraft is a British Aerospace ATP,’ she said. ‘Without any doubt. This model matches the photos on my phone almost exactly.’
‘So what’s the bad news?’
‘Knock on the door and find out.’
Korso and Yannick exchanged a glance. Then Korso stepped forward and rapped his knuckles against the thick steel door.
An eruption of rattling noises greeted them from within the plane, and he took an instinctive step back.
‘Sounds like a nest in there,’ Yannick said. ‘This is bad, people. Very bad. Still, it could be worse.’
Korso snorted. ‘How?’
‘There could have been labarias in there instead. Quiet, nervy, lethal, and very common here. They also move like lightning. One can strike you five times before you even know what’s happening. A school friend was once bitten by one when we were playing football. It took less than an hour for him to die. Rattlers are better. They always announce their presence first, to warn off predators.’
Korso turned to Natasha, and smiled. ‘Like us.’
‘What is so amusing?’
‘This is exactly what I would have done in Cain’s shoes. I can’t think of a better deterrent for potential scavengers than a cockpit full of lethal snakes.’
Korso stepped forward for a closer look at the crew door, and tried the handle. No give at all. It was sealed tight, obviously locked from the inside. The cargo door would be the same. The might even be welded shut for all he knew. He remembered the tools they’d brought along from Yannick’s workshop. Specifically the oxyacetylene tank and cutting torch in the back of the pick-up.
‘Yannick, how long would it take to cut through this door?’
The other man slapped the door with his palm, receiving more rattles in response. ‘Thick, hardened steel. A car is child’s play with the torch, but something like this? I don’t know. If I had to guess, maybe two hours? Maybe a lot more.’
‘And the time now?’
Yannick checked his watch. ‘Quarter past three.’
Korso pursed his lips. Less than three hours to play with. And even if they got through in that time frame, they still had to clear that cockpit before they could enter. They could always cut through the cargo door at the other end instead, but the time factor still applied.
‘Of course, there is a faster way,’ Yannick said, and pointed at the open windshield above the nose.
‘A faster way to die, maybe,’ Korso said. ‘The thought of blindly dropping down into a nest of rattlers from above doesn’t exactly fill me with optimism.’
‘I can do it,’ Yannick said, with a shrug.
Korso and Natasha both turned to him at the same time.
‘I believe you,’ Korso said. ‘But why would you?’
‘For money.’ He grinned. ‘Why else?’
‘How much?’ Natasha said.
‘Two thousand dollars US. In cash. For that, I will clear the cockpit for you.’
‘Deal.’
‘Excellent. And that will be half upfront, as before?’
‘Of course.’
‘Good. Let me go grab my bag from the wing.’ He left them.
‘I would have paid him twice that amount,’ Natasha whispered once he was out of earshot. Despite the heat, she gave a brief shiver.
Korso could guess why. ‘A bad encounter in your past?’
‘A small garter snake bit me when I was five.’ She reached into her side pack and began counting off notes. ‘They are not especially poisonous, but it was enough to put me off snakes for a lifetime. How about you?’
‘I’m not a big fan, particularly, but I don’t have anything against them either.’ He shrugged. ‘That might change very soon.’
Yannick returned with his bag. He dropped it on the ground, unzipped it and rummaged around inside. He pulled out a pair of long, thick, leather gloves and placed them on the ground. They were the kind that reached almost to the elbow, and looked old and well-used. He also pulled out two telescopic snake tongs and a heavy-duty flashlight.
‘I assume you’ve done this before?’ Natasha asked, passing him the cash.
‘Many times,’ Yannick said, pocketing the bills without counting. He picked up the left glove and patted the leather. ‘I double layered these myself. Nothing gets through.’
He passed the glove to Korso. ‘Here, try it on for size.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you will be helping me.’
Forty-Six
2 hours, 23 minutes and counting…
They counted a total of five rattlesnakes currently using the cockpit as living quarters. Five that they could see, anyway. All adults, all in plain sight. Two big ones on the co-pilot seat, the other three in various spots on the floor. It was only a small space, so there was plenty of light to see by. Korso and Yannick were lying on their stomachs above the nose of the plane, the upper parts of their bodies almost protruding through the open windshield as they attempted to extract the first one.
It wasn’t a straightforward job. With enough ammo it would have been all over in seconds, but they could only work with what they had. It had taken Yannick almost twenty minutes until he was able to get a solid grip on the first snake. They were slippery and hard to pin down. Yannick carefully pulled the current prospect up with his tongs, the spring-loaded jaw tightly gripping the rattler’s neck just behind the head. In support, Korso used the second set of tongs to grip the lower part of the serpent’s body. The large snake kept thrashing around violently, its tail rattling constantly, which made the job doubly difficult.
‘Shh, shh, relax, my slithery friend,’ Yannick said soothingly. Both men carefully rose to a crouch as, in unison, they pulled the snake out of the plane’s interior and into the open air. ‘You must find a new home now, that’s all.’
Korso was sweating, and not just because of the day’s heat. Making sure to keep the rattler well away from both of them, Yannick rotated his body and extended the tongs until the snake was hanging over the starboard side, Korso mirroring his every move with the support tongs. He looked to the port side and saw Natasha watching them from the shade of the trees, well out of range, with the other machete at her side.
‘Safe?’ Yannick asked.
‘Safe,’ Korso said, loosening his jaw’s grip until the snake was able to writhe its lower body free. ‘Drop it.’
Yannick released the lock on his own tongs, the jaw opened, and the snake dropped the seven feet or so to the ground. It quickly slithered under the damaged wing and away.
Korso breathed out, wiped the sweat from his forehead, and took a long swig from the water bottle beside them. The water was hot, but he didn’t care.
‘And that’s all there is to it,’ Yannick said, grinning. He took a quick swig from the bottle before passing it back. ‘Not so hard.’
‘Sure.’ He checked Yannick’s watch and saw that the whole operation had taken them twenty minutes. Better than expected. He hoped it would remain so.
‘Plenty of time left,’ Yannick said as he lay down on his stomach again. ‘Come, my friend. One down, only four to go.’
* * *
Once the last of the rattlers dropped to the ground below and slithered off to parts unknown, Korso checked Yannick’s watch and saw it was 16:27. It had felt longer. He returned to the open windshield and moved the flashlight around the cockpit for what seemed like the hundredth time. Looking for any they may have missed. But as before, he heard no more telltale rattles, saw no movement of any kind.
There was an inner door at the rear of the cockpit, so he couldn’t see anything beyond. He was about to ask for Yannick’s machete, when the man pushed by him and quickly lowered himself down, feet first, to the instrument panel directly beneath them.
‘What are you doing?’ Korso said.
Yannick grinned back at him. ‘Earning my two thousand dollars US. Hand me my machete and the flashlight.’
Korso handed him the flashlight, then looked behind him and saw the weapon lying next to the now empty water bottle. He grabbed the machete and passed it down.
‘What’s happening?’ Natasha called out from below.
‘He’s checking for stragglers,’ Korso said, watching as Yannick crouched down with the flashlight, poking with the machete to check every nook and cranny of the cockpit floor.
‘Nothing here,’ he said, finally. ‘I’ll see if I can open the outer door from my side.’
He opened the cockpit door and stepped through, quickly disappearing into the darkness beyond. Korso saw a light beam moving around back there, but not much more. A few seconds later, Yannick called out. ‘There are shipping crates back here.’
‘How many?’ Korso yelled back.
No answer.
Then, ‘The door is not welded shut or anything.’
Grabbing both tongs, Korso slid down to the ground and joined Natasha, standing in front of the crew door and looking as anxious as he’d ever seen her. Then the door slowly opened outward, to reveal a grinning Yannick.
‘Man, it’s an oven in here,’ he said. ‘Any water left? I’m dying of thirst.’
‘Sorry, I just finished the last of mine,’ Natasha said.
Yannick stepped out and handed her the flashlight. ‘I’ll get some more from my vehicle.’ He crouched down next to his bag, reached in and pulled out an old iron crowbar and handed it to Korso. ‘Here, you may need this.’
‘Thanks,’ Korso said. Yannick got up and left.
Korso turned back to see Natasha flicking on the flashlight. She looked up at him.
‘The moment of truth,’ she said, taking a deep breath.
‘Let’s see what we’ve got.’
Forty-Seven
1 hour, 29 minutes and counting…
Even with the waning sunlight coming through the doorway and cockpit, the cargo area remained mostly in darkness, especially toward the tail. It was a very tight fit inside. The fuselage was only six feet in diameter and because of the floor, less than five feet at its highest point. They each had to stoop. The cargo took up the majority of the available space. Each timber crate was six-feet long, three-feet high and three-feet wide, leaving just enough room for them to shuffle in single file down the right-hand side.
Standing beside Korso, Natasha played the flashlight over the cabin, all the way to the end. ‘Six crates,’ she said.
‘That’s a promising start,’ Korso said. ‘Keep the light on this one, will you?’
She cast the light over the surface of the crate directly in front of them. He saw about a dozen nails embedded in the wooden lid. He handed her the .22, which she stuck in the back of her waistband. Then he wedged the chisel end of the crowbar into the seam between lid and crate, near the corner. He pushed down with all his weight, and the sounds of creaking wood filled the interior as the top corner slowly lifted away from the main body. He repeated the process all the way down that side, then the same on the other side. Once he was done, Natasha placed the flashlight on top of the next crate down. Then they each got a hold of one end and opened the crate lid all the way back.
The interior was filled with wood shavings and straw. Korso reached into the packing materials and felt what could only be a circular steel tin, with more alongside, and more underneath. He grabbed the tin and pulled it out.
The silver aluminium container he held was exactly the same as the one they’d seen in the refrigerator unit back in Bilchner. Six inches in diameter and two inches deep. Amicus Beluga was printed in tasteful gold script on the top. The tin was sealed all along the sides, and weighed about a kilo.
‘I believe I owe you an apology,’ Natasha said as she looked over her own tin.
‘What for?’
‘For ever doubting you. The shipment was exactly where you said it would be.’
‘Before we start celebrating, maybe you can bring out that Geiger counter and see if the tin we really want is in here. Otherwise we’re no better off than we were three days ago.’
‘Yes.’ Natasha lost the smile and reached into her side pack. She pulled out a narrow, light-grey instrument, about five inches long and one inch wide. There were five buttons on the front and a small display screen at one end. She switched it on, then studied the figures on the display.
‘There’s no cell phone coverage in the jungle,’ Korso said. ‘So I assume you’ve got a way to contact Sardoca once we find the damn thing.’
‘I have a sat phone in my side pack.’ She inserted the detector into the wood packaging, and began moving it very slowly around the crate.
‘What kind of radiation did they coat your tin with?’ he said.
‘An extremely diluted form of Beta radiation. Not nearly enough to affect us, but if this counter picks up the slightest trace it will immediately start beeping.’
It didn’t.
They moved on to the next crate, and went through the same procedure. No beeping sounds. When they got to the third crate, Natasha said, ‘This one’s already been partially opened. Look. The lid is loose at one end.’
‘This must be where Cain took his sample from.’
Korso removed the rest of the nails, and flipped the lid open. Natasha passed the Geiger counter over the interior. Nothing. Same with the next one. They moved on to the fifth crate, which was right in front of the main cargo door. That left only one more crate after this, which would probably contain the Geisha coffee, and therefore would be of no use to them.
‘Time check,’ he said.
She pulled her cell from her pocket, looked at the screen. ‘Sixteen fifty-four.’
Which meant they’d been at this for over twenty minutes. He didn’t like it. ‘Yannick should have been back by now.’
‘Maybe he’s taking a bathroom break. Come on, we have more important things to worry about.’
He turned back and spent the next two minutes opening the lid of the last crate of caviar. Natasha inserted the Geiger counter into the container, moved it around slowly at the top left before dragging it diagonally across the bottom right…
Beep, beep, beep, beep…
Natasha raised her head and looked wide-eyed at Korso. She was beaming.
Korso began to smile back, but stopped when he heard a familiar sound coming from the tail of the plane, beyond the last crate. He’d heard the same sound when he’d passed the Skyhawk. The sound of scales being rubbed together.
‘La naiba,’ Natasha whispered, also recognising the sound. She carefully backed off down the narrow passage, toward the front of the plane.
Korso grabbed the flashlight and aimed it at the darkness at the rear. The light caught the head and neck of a snake back there, its tongue flicking in and out of its jaws as it checked for new odours. The rest of it was behind the last crate. He couldn’t see how big it was. He couldn’t tell the species. But it wasn’t rattling, and he recalled Yannick’s earlier warning about the lethal labaria, and how common they were in these parts.
Whatever it was, they had to get rid of it. Which meant he had to get rid of it.
He turned to see Natasha had paused halfway down, and was now watching him, gun in hand. ‘I could shoot it,’ she said.
‘It would take more than one shot, and we might still need them. Get me one of the protective gloves and a set of tongs. And a machete.’
Without a word, Natasha quickly backed up the rest of the way and disappeared through the doorway. She reappeared seconds later, holding all three items. She came within reach of Korso and handed them to him, one by one.
Placing the machete on top of the fourth crate, Korso inserted his left hand into the thick leather glove and pulled it up over his lower arm as far as it would go. Then he set the flashlight down on the floor, the beam still aimed at the tail of the plane. The snake was still in the same position, the tongue still flicking back and forth like a water diviner. Korso gripped the tongs in his gloved hand and carefully inched his way down the passage.
The snake chose that moment to languidly uncoil itself from its darkened corner and emerge into the open. Korso’s heart skipped a beat. It was as big as a rattler. Except if this was a labaria, it was about ten times more deadly. Not that it made much difference. One bite from either and he was a dead man. For real this time.
Standing just behind the flashlight, Korso used both hands to extend the tongs toward the head of the snake, the jaw grip open and ready. Six feet, seven feet, eight feet, until the grabber was just a few inches away from the snake’s head. The snake looked at it curiously, still flicking its tongue. It hissed once, then in a flash, darted its head at the shaft just above the grabber. Korso barely saw it move, but he felt it connect three times. He’d never seen a snake move so fast. A labaria then.
