TEN
Twenty minutes later, Captain Garmadia roared up to the waiting team in a camouflaged Humvee. The cigar between his lips pointed forwards like a small brown diving board as he seemed not to want to make eye contact with any of the HAWCs.
Sam walked around to the front of the enormous vehicle and had a quick look underneath. ‘Thought so. Armour’s been stripped out to make it lighter, and the suspension’s been raised for better ground clearance. Jungle Hummer — this’ll do nicely.’
He looked over his shoulder at Alex, who was staring in the direction they would be going. His face was slightly raised, as if he was trying to catch a scent on the breeze. Sam guessed what he was thinking.
‘Aimee’ll be fine,’ he said, walking up beside him. ‘She’s tougher and more resourceful than most of us put together.’
Alex half-smiled. ‘We need to get there, Sam. Something’s not right; I can feel it.’ He stood there a moment longer then drew in a deep breath through his nose and slapped his second-in-command’s shoulder. ‘Let’s load it up, Sam. You and Dr Vargis in the front with Garmadia; everyone else in the back — double time. And, Uncle, I’m not sure our Paraguayan captain is fully on board with our little vacation. Keep him honest, will you?’
Sam chuckled. ‘No problem. I’ll tell him my best jokes…and use satellite positioning to check his route. We’ll stay on track, I guarantee it.’
He started to turn away then stopped. ‘Gauntlets?’
Alex shook his head. ‘Not till we’re in deep jungle. Carry on.’
‘You got it.’ Sam walked off towards the team, leaving Alex still staring at the horizon.
Alex dozed in the cooled rear cabin of the Humvee, trying to unwind the coils of impatience that threatened to overwhelm him. However, rest was not coming easily to him; strange images formed in his head, and phantoms whirled and screamed through his subconscious. Some he might have recognised from previous missions, but others made him shift uneasily in his seat. Anyone watching him would have wondered at the way his brow creased, and his eyes moved rapidly behind their lids.
He saw a landscape, its plains dominated by dark and greasy looking protuberances that lifted and swelled like trunks of limbless trees. They were alive, but were not familiar.
There was a sound — a calling that grew louder. The lumpy mass opened hundreds of eyes, and saw him. The calling became screams.
He opened his eyes with a start, and shook his head to clear it. He noticed Franks looking at him and she raised her eyebrows. He nodded to her once, then turned away to check his watch and scan the jungle.
The vehicle, packed with the HAWCs, the scientists and their equipment, sped along the partially sealed road, only slowing when it had to leap across loosely packed gravel and swerve around water-filled craters. Alex noticed Garmadia never let the speed drop below seventy miles per hour.
The sparse bush and patchy grassland from the higher altitude gradually grew and thickened to become a wall of green either side of the road, sometimes up to a hundred feet high. In a few areas it was hard to determine individual trees as thick vines sewed them together in a mosaic of different hues.
Garmadia changed gears and accelerated across yet another wooden bridge in need of repair. Some of the short spans crossed shallow gorges that made Alex think of surface wounds slashed into the body of the jungle; others dropped hundreds of feet to streams of milky green water. Alex watched rotting fragments of timber fall away as they roared over the bridge and wondered how many more crossings it could take before a vehicle ended up tumbling into the green abyss.
Ramshackle shelters began to appear in clearings along the road. Small bands of stocky, brown people gathered inside and around them, talking and smoking long-stemmed pipes. With their coloured shawls and small round hats woven with bright feathers, they reminded Alex of flocks of exotic birds settled to feed.
Garmadia slowed the Humvee as they passed the shelters and most of the locals waved. Few smiled, however, and Alex wondered briefly what their relationship with the local military was like.
Several miles back, he had ordered Garmadia to turn off the air conditioning so there would be less of a temperature differential when it came time to leave the truck. The open windows let in the sounds and smells of the jungle, and, as they shot past another campsite, the delicious fragrance of roasting chicken.
‘I’m hungry,’ said Franks, leaning a little further out the window.
Michael Vargis rolled his eyes at her. He turned to wave to some small children who’d backed up when the vehicle approached. As he put his elbow on the window edge, the Humvee hit a large hole and his teeth came down on his bottom lip, cutting it slightly. ‘Ow.’ He placed his fingers against his lip and brought them away with a smudge of red.
Franks took his hand. ‘I know; it’s tough out in the field, honey. But don’t worry, Mommy can put a bunny plaster and a kiss on that for you later.’
She smacked her lips together in a mock kiss and Michael pulled his hand away from her. Even Alex had to turn away to stifle a laugh.
After another hour, the breeze coming into the truck cabin was thick with the smell of damp vegetation and decay. Garmadia pulled off the road and onto a small hump of dry ground, killing the engine and leaping from the driver’s door almost in one smooth motion. He stretched his back.
‘This is as far as we can go by road. Now we enter the deep jungle. But first we find a guide — or, rather, they find us.’
The HAWCs stepped from the vehicle. Alex looked across to Sam, who gave him a small nod.
‘Let’s unload and take a few minutes to orientate ourselves,’ Alex told his team.
He looked at the emerald barrier in front of them. He could sense the crowded life force emanating from the dense, crazy tangle. The noise was amazingly loud: it seemed that everything that could buzz, thrum, croak or screech was trying hard to outdo its neighbour. His senses were almost overwhelmed by the crushing waves of movement and sound. He took a deep breath, exhaled, and ran his hand up through his damp hair. It was only about a hundred degrees, but it was impossible to cool down in the high humidity. The heat stayed with you, on you, all over you. It blanketed, suffocated and drained you.
He turned back to the team. ‘Any more questions about lack of heat and humidity, Franks?’
‘This’ll do just fine, boss. I’ll cool down in the hotel pool later,’ Franks said as she pulled her webbing pack onto her back and threw her XM29 over her shoulder. She methodically patted each of her pockets and belt pouches, and opened and closed holsters, checking on the clasps and the smoothness of the draw.
Alex smiled as he watched her professional movements. He liked Casey Franks. She made him laugh with her evil sense of humour, but also instilled confidence in her teammates with her I’ve-always-got-your-back attitude. Her only problem was she liked to fight way too much. The scar on her face was the result of a brawl in a bikers’ bar when she ended up on the receiving end of a broken bottle. Alex had heard that she’d left plenty of broken bodies behind before her face was finally opened up. Franks needed to learn when to stand and fight and when to walk away — and Alex wasn’t at all sure he was the right person to give that lecture.
She had cut the toughened suit sleeves from her jungle camouflage and he could see the muscles bulging in her arms as she worked smoothly through her tasks. Her five foot eight inch body carried a lot of coiled muscle power — Casey Franks was no lady and she’d be the first to tell you that. She finally pulled her plated gloves back on and punched one hand into the other to test the fit and knuckle impact. Satisfied, she headed over to Sam and Mak, laughing as she greeted them with a joke.
‘Ahhh, here we go…’
Alex turned at the sound of Garmadia’s voice and saw a small Indian boy standing just behind the first wall of trees. The kid looked about six or seven years old, and had skinny brown legs that poked out from oversized shorts. His feet were bare and muddy, and his small chest was covered by a huge T-shirt that just retained a faded image of Superman’s ‘S’ shield.
The Paraguayan soldier crouched down, took a small silver coin from his pocket, flipped it in the air, and then
