Wild Card

* * *

Jarvis Lenard crouched in the shadows of the mangroves and wondered what was going on.

Drawn to the sound of the marine engine, he had picked his way through the undergrowth to investigate, gotten as close as he dared to peer at the approaching vessel from the gloom at the forest’s edge. It was, he saw from his concealed position, a pontoon boat. A pleasure boat. To his knowledge, the Sunglasses would not come out looking for him in such a craft. Not unless they were trying some deception, no… but what would be its logic? The wilderness area was large, and he reasoned that it was unlikely they would stop the boat expecting he would be close enough to hear it, never mind be moved to risk being exposed to those aboard.

Which, Jarvis thought, was of course the very thing he had done. And perhaps that proved the Sunglasses were a step ahead of him, counting on his desperation to do him in, knowing the boat could tempt him to reveal himself this time when caution would have prevailed at another. Perhaps there were ten such boats, a dozen, set out into the marshes as lures.

Perhaps, yes…

And then again, perhaps not.

Jarvis flattened himself almost onto his belly and crawled further toward the shore, slipping among the low foliage and riblike air roots, his already soiled and tattered clothes muddying to stick clammily to his body. Then, a few yards from the boat, he paused again. A man in swim trunks and a jacket was moving from its pilot’s station toward the middle part of the deck and Jarvis realized now that there was a woman with him, kneeling down over something—

His eyes widened.

No, he thought.

Not something.

Someone.

Jarvis inched still closer until he was chin-deep in the mire, hoping the insects and leeches in his company would not make a total feast of him. But on he went anyway — he had to get a better look at the person on that deck. It was a man, he saw now. A large man lying on his back, his head on what might have been a towel or jacket…

Suddenly Jarvis pulled in a breath.

There was blood all around that makeshift pillow. All around it, and all through it, and even smeared on the woman’s swimsuit.

If these were Sunglasses and not people in trouble… maybe even people with trouble akin to his own, for why else would they have sought the forest in a working boat rather than turn southward toward Los Rayos, where the injured passenger could receive medical attention… if these were Sunglasses, then he was a brainless fool for wanting to help them, ah yeh.

An’ help yah’self, ya want’a be honest, he thought. For here might be a way off the island… a way to reach someone of authority on the mainland before he and his knowledge of Udonis’s hidden shipping files were made to disappear off the face of the earth, like the oil shipped to far and unknown places on those barges.

Dripping wet, spattered with muck, Jarvis put aside his fear and weariness, got to his feet, and started toward the boat — but had not taken more than two steps forward when he heard a new sound that momentarily froze him in his tracks.

Standing barely in the shadows of the trees, he craned his head back, looked through the trees into a broken sky, and saw three helicopters out over the water, one on his left, the other two on his right, still the size of wasps to his vision, but belting in with trajectories that would lead them to converge directly over the shore ahead of him.

* * *

Annie heard the chop of rotors and looked up, her heart pounding in her chest.

“Pete,” she said, and grabbed hold of his arm. “Pete, those copters—”

Nimec pointed up to their right.

“That one’s theirs, Annie, I can tell from its shape,” he said, and then swept his hand across to the left. “And those two… those two’re ours.”

* * *

The Stingray’s pilot spotted the choppers coming on at breakneck speed from the south and turned toward the man beside him, his eyes surprised and dismayed behind his helmet visor.

“Warn those bloody bastards off, whoever they are,” he said.

* * *

Still staring skyward at the choppers, Jarvis filled his lungs with what he thought must have been the deepest breath he’d taken in his entire life… and then prepared to make what he thought might be its greatest decision.

As fate would have it, the people he’d hoped would prove his salvation needed immediate rescuing themselves, needed to get immediately out of sight as well, for it was now beyond question that they too had fallen on the wrong side of the Sunglasses. Fallen in a way comparable to his own in terms of its threat to life and limb, if Jarvis could tell anything from the number of birds in the air.

And having reached these conclusions, how was he to act on them? What new demands of his conscience must he prepare to accept or reject? He exhaled. These were good enough questions in theory, no doubt. But however intimidating it might be, he must deal only with reality, as he had since his cousin was murdered, and then since his own aborted escape attempt on a boat, and all throughout his ordeal afterward. And however many questions he might choose to ask himself, Jarvis knew the choice before him was no different than it had been seconds earlier. He could retreat into the forest and whatever safety it provided, or do what he could for the passengers aboard that boat.

“Lord Almighty, do whatcha can to protect me,” he muttered to himself, and plunged on ahead toward the water.

* * *

“You have entered restricted airspace,” the Stingray’s copilot said into his headset’s mouthpiece, his radio tuned to a common frequency. “I repeat, this is a nofly zone. Identify yourself and redirect—”

* * *

“We’re UpLink International aircraft out of San Fernando,” the lead Skyhawk’s copilot responded in a calm voice. “And you can redirect your head up your ass, because we’ve got permission to approach from your government and are coming in whether you like it or not.”

* * *

Jarvis Lenard emerged from the mangroves in an almost maniacal dash, splashing his bare feet into the open surf.

“Both of ya, come wit’ me ’n’ be quick,” he yelled to the man and woman on the boat, cupping his hands over his mouth. “Getya injured fella int’a raft and come on where I can bring ya into hidin’!”

* * *

The Stingray’s copilot looked over at the man flying the aircraft. “You think they’ve really gotten airspace clearance?” he said.

“They haven’t had much time,” the pilot said, his hand on the collective. “But we can’t know for sure.”

“What’s our next move, then?”

The copilot thought, frowned.

“We aren’t going to just let them through,” he said.

“There are two of them—”

“I can count,” said the pilot. “When can we expect some assistance up here?”

The copilot checked his graphic displays.

“It shouldn’t be long,” he said. “Beta-three-zero’s closest, bearing in from the harbor. The others are also on course.”

“Then hail Beauchart and give him the situation as it stands,” the pilot said. “We stay with the intercept unless or until he call us off.”