“I’m smaller,” she said, her voice tight.
Dr. Nez already had his head through the hole in the crystoplast, but his voice came back clearly as he pulled himself into the van. “Shorter, maybe. We can argue later on who weighs more. Anyhow, you and Virgil have people waiting for you…”
“That doesn’t matter,” Kesia said, her voice rising, then breaking. “We don’t need tents or anything. Its not worth the risk!”
“Really,” Dr. Nez was handing out packages as fast as he could. “How long before rescue comes? We’re going to need water purification at least, a med kit. Dacey’s medications…”
Anders joined the line relaying materials back. Dacey had come out to join them. Now her voice, suddenly quavery and old as it had never been before, said, “I think the van’s sinking faster! Langston, you’ve got to get out of there!”
Virgil Iwamoto clearly agreed with her assessment, because the next time Langston Nez’s hands emerged through the hole with a package, he grabbed him by the wrists.
“Somebody,” Virgil shouted, “help me get a hold on him!”
“It’s sinking!” came Dacey’s shrill scream. “Oh, bright stars! It’s sinking!”
Dr. Whittaker shoved forward, almost knocking Kesia Guyen onto her round rump, and joined Virgil. There wasn’t much room, but both men managed to get a hold on Langston Nez and hauled with all their might. However, even as they did so, the bog gasped and gulped, taking into itself the huge bulk of the van as if it was nothing more than a bug.
Anders stood transfixed in horror as Dad and Virgil were pulled forward by the suction, falling to their knees as they strove to keep their hold on the man who had just been buried alive.
Behind him, someone was sobbing-Kesia, from the sound. Anders flung himself forward and began scrabbling like a dog in the mud, throwing out great gobs of the wet, sticky stuff in an effort to break the sucking hold. On the other side of where Dad and Virgil maintained their life-and-death grip, he saw Calida Emberly also digging, her silver hair streaked with mud. Then Kesia Guyen-still sobbing-joined them in their efforts.
Water that reeked of rotting vegetation seeped down Anders’ sleeves. Gritty mud sanded his fingers raw, but Anders kept digging. Was it his imagination or was the sucking pull weakening?
Slowly, horribly slowly, first Dad, then Virgil began to rock back on their heels. For an agonizing moment, Anders thought that meant they had lost their hold on Dr. Nez. He began to dig more frantically, slime and filth splashing into his face. If they’d given up, he wasn’t going to. He’d dig to the planet’s core if he had to, if that was the only way to bring Dr. Nez up from this sudden grave.
Feeling himself tiring, Anders fueled his frantic digging with memories of Dr. Nez-no, Langston, at this moment only the human being called Langston-and his many kindnesses, not just on this trip but over the years when he’d been Dad’s assistant. They weren’t going to leave him here, a body in the mud of an alien world. They weren’t! They weren’t!
Then Virgil gasped. “He’s coming up. We’ve got him!”
Dr. Whittaker said nothing, only grunted with effort, straining to get his feet under him so he could use his full strength and height to pull the buried man free of the grasping muck. He flung himself upwards, bringing Langston Nez, sleek with mud, hanging like a dead man, into the air and light.
“Is he breathing?” Dacey asked.
Exhausted by their efforts, Dad and Virgil had fallen to their knees. Anders half-rolled, half-crawled to look at Langston Nez. Wiping his hands on the seat of his trousers, he cleared mud from the drowned man’s nose and mouth, then held his ear low against lips and chest. He’d taken life-saving only the term before. Now he went through the check routine.
“He’s breathing,” he said. The ground beneath him shuddered. “But we’ve got to get out of here or we’re down going after the van!”
“You and I will carry Langston,” Dr. Emberly said. “Mother, help Kesia get the supplies that haven’t already been relayed to solid ground. It may be enough for Virgil and Bradford to move themselves.”
Anders obeyed. Dr. Emberly was about his own height. When she took Langston’s feet, Anders raised the mud-covered man’s head and shoulders. The unconscious man might not be overly tall, but covered with mud and soaking wet, he was astonishingly heavy.
Dr. Emberly reached and checked the controls on Dr. Nez’s counter-grav unit.
“Ruined,” she said. “These are basic units, not meant to be sunk in the mud.
She stripped off her own unit and wrapped it around Dr. Nez, then adjusted the dial. “Go! He’s light enough for one person to move now. I’ll get myself back to shore.”
Anders obeyed, but remembering how he had felt the couple of times he’d tried to move around Sphinx’s 1.35 gravity without his unit, he could only admire the older woman for her tenacity.
Eventually, they got themselves and their gear to what they now all thought of as “shore.” Kesia located a freshwater spring near the lace willows, and brought back water. With this, Anders carefully cleared Langston’s mouth and nose, periodically turning him and thumping him gently on the back in the hope that he would cough up any mud that had lodged in his lungs. However, although Dr. Nez’s heart beat and he was breathing, that breath came shallow and rasping.
In the background, Anders heard someone say something about “oxygen starvation” and “brain damage,” but he wasn’t giving up. Dr. Emberly reclaimed her counter-grav belt and went to assist in setting up camp. Dacey Emberly came over to join Anders.
“I’m going to give Langston my belt,” she said softly, “but don’t tell Calida. She’ll worry. My heart isn’t what it used to be, but I’m sure I’ll be fine if I sit quietly. That poor man doesn’t need to fight the gravity along with everything else.”
Anders forced a smile. He didn’t know when he’d last felt so tired, but for some reason the image of Stephanie Harrington kept coming to him. She’d saved Lionheart from the hexapuma after, not before, she’d broken her arm, seriously banged up her knee, and cracked a bunch of ribs when her hang glider had crashed in that storm. If Stephanie could do that, surely he could keep going when all he’d done was move some mud.
Inspired by this, he got Dr. Nez comfortable, then, leaving him under Dacey Emberly’s watch, he went to see what he could do to help with setting up camp. He found Dad-more or less clean now-arguing with Dr. Emberly.
“I think you’re overdoing it. Yes, we’re out of communication with base. Yes, we won’t be expected back until tomorrow-we were set to camp tonight, but eventually someone will come looking.”
“And where will they search?” came Dr. Emberly’s icy reply. “At various picketwood groves to the north-not here. I seem to recall you ‘overlooked’ telling them about your intention to stop here.”
Dad was temporarily silenced, then he said, “When they can’t find us, they’ll search for the air van. The crash beacon will bring them right to us.”
Anders-tired, fed-up, angry that Dad had taken time to change and get clean while others tried to help Langston, while poor old Dacey was sitting carefully over there so her counter-grav unit could be used to ease the injured man’s suffering-lost control. Forgetting everything he’d ever been taught about not embarrassing his parents in public, he exploded.
“Crash beacon! Crash beacon? There isn’t going to be any crash beacon. We didn’t crash. You landed us very neatly, right on the edge of a bog. The van sank very slowly. There was no crash to set the beacon off. No one is going to be able to find us because no one knows where to look-and it’s all your fault!”
Chapter Nine
“What do you mean, ‘they’re missing’?” Stephanie exclaimed.
Karl frowned. “I mean exactly what I said, Steph. You know Frank and Ainsley are both close friends of Uncle Scott. Well, they stopped by yesterday to update him on someone he’d treated for them-a hiker who slipped and broke a leg.”
I don’t care about any stupid hiker, Stephanie thought. Is Anders missing?
“Then Frank went on to say, ‘I wish there was some way we could ask everyone who leaves town to wear a
