A good night of rest did Marius the world of good, and with frequent checks through the night from Shimazu, Kai and Tads to ensure his vitals were steady and he had a steady dose of painkillers, anti-inflammatories and other drugs, he slept like a baby. At breakfast time he looked much more chipper than he had the day before, and the team gathered over fresh pastries and cold cuts to discuss what to do.
"How do you feel, Marius?"
"Good, Kai – the rest was nice, and I feel ready to continue."
"I agree – both Shimazu and I are happy with your progress, and the surgical wounds are healing nicely – Tads tells me that the magical healing you received was first rate. I'm wondering, though, if we shouldn't stay here one more day – it's a good environment, and you'll probably speed up your overall healing process a great deal by having good access to a decent bed, showers, space and good food…"
"What's wrong with my food?" Tads looked a little miffed at Kai, folding her arms over her chest.
"Nothing – I didn't mean it like that. But the difference between being able to sit at a table, eating from a plate, with room to stretch out and be comfortable and to digest your food properly, compared to eating with one hand and flying with the other while you're strapped into a flight couch shouldn't be underestimated."
"Oh, right. I see. As long as you're not complaining about the food provided." She relaxed slightly, letting her arms drop to the table. Kai toyed with the idea of baiting her for a moment, a sly grin tugging at the corner of his mouth, but he let it slide.
"So, perhaps we should stay for one more day. It's nice enough here, we can afford one more, and I'm sure we can extend our stay – and we're not on that much of a time schedule for the critter hunt or anything else. And I think I'd rather our pilot be more thoroughly healed than not." There were general nods of agreement from the rest of the team, and Kai headed off to find the owner of the villa, arranging to stay one more night. As predicted, there wasn't anyone else booked in to stay in this part of the season, and she was glad for the extra income.
Back in the dining room, Aswon read the brief file that had accompanied Marius' surgery notes.
"So, it says here that after a period of twenty-four hours, you should engage in strenuous physical activity, ensuring that your heart rate gets well up into the cardio-zone and you break into a 'moderate' sweat. I will assist you with this," a slightly smug look of glee crept onto his face, "by monitoring your workout routine and providing positive encouragement. We will rest until midday, and then start a series of exercises designed to help your body adapt to the new implants." Marius stared at him looking less than thrilled. "It is the proper thing to do, and listed here quite clearly in the procedure notes." He waved the tablet at the team, showing them that he wasn't even slightly exaggerating, enjoying the look on the German's face. Marius was always the first to demand doing things by the book and following the correct protocols and procedures, and now it had put him in a somewhat difficult position…
"I'll help Aswon. For when you need a loo break, or to get some fresh water or something. You know, when your mouth is dry from shouting encouragement so much." Hunter added with an evil smile.
"Have you not got better things to do, Hunter? Like planning a route?"
"Oh sure, I'll get that done while Aswon's on shift – but I'll need a break from computer work anyway. And besides, it depends what we're going to do next. I presume we're off to hunt these critters in Poland first, and then head back down towards the Black Sea."
"Don't forget we still have an amusement park to deal with, along with the Horror. Both of which are over to the east." The rest of the team stifled a groan as Tads bought up the amusement park again – she seemed determined to make sure they didn't forget about it.
"Is this part of your plan, Tads?" She looked at Hunter, confused. "You haunt us for long enough that it's easier and less painful to go deal with the problem than listen to your nagging…"
"I do not nag." She said, having to repeat her words louder over the chuckle of the others. "I'm just reminding you, and making sure you don't forget. It's important."
"In all seriousness," Aswon added, "what do we have on now – and where?"
"Well, the critters are somewhere in Poland, from what I understand. Cosmic is down in Romania, and the Admiral is a bit further south in the Crimea – but we need to go via Cosmic for the job, if he has fake guns to plant. Then of course there's the amusement park over towards Tashkent, and the Horror tomb – assuming it's still there. Could be just an empty place now – I don't see why it would go back there if we got attacked by it in the Sioux… beyond that, we've got this other team to hunt down for Germaine, and that was in Oman, so even further south."
"Should we go and do that first? If it's for Germaine – we normally try to treat her well…" Shimazu asked.
"I don't think so. I think we have to do the bears next, as they're so close – it really doesn't make much sense to do anything else, and they should be reasonably quick to locate and deal with. But from there if we went all the way south towards Oman, or around that area – assuming they're still in the general area, we're going to burn a lot of fuel coming back up towards Romania and then back south again. Not sure if it will be worth doing the job, if we have to spend that much of our pay on the fuel." Aswon gestured to the map, highlighting the back and forth route they'd have to take if they did look for the missing team next.
"What did I miss?" Kai asked as he came back in, pocketing his cred-stick after paying for another night, so they quickly recapped what they'd just discussed. "So yeah, the bears make sense. What do we know about them?
"I seem to recall that they're vicious beasts – someone went hunting for them in light armour – vehicles that is, but didn't come back."
"We were told that Georgi is most interested in claws, teeth, bones and the heart," Marius recalled, thinking back to the conversation with his friend. "The beasts are to be slain cleanly, and ideally without the use of complex technology to preserve as much of the potential as possible. I believe that this makes sense to you, Tads?"
"Yes, ideally it they should be slain with entirely natural weapons, using nothing that can't be harvested directly from nature," she raised a hand seeing Hunter taking a deep breath, "I know, I know – that's not always possible, and these things are very dangerous, and withholding the use of automatic rifles and grenades and things makes it doubly so – but that's why telesma are so expensive. The more natural the kill, and the cleaner it is – the more money we stand to make. If we gun them down from the air with those machine cannons, we'll kill them, but we'll not get paid much at all. On the other hand, if we can get to the point where we distract them or get them into a perfect position for Shimazu to slay one with a single devastating strike from his sword – that will preserve as much of the magical potential as possible. We'll just have to try and make it as clean as possible, without taking on too much risk."
They finished their breakfast and then split up, taking advantage of the space in the house and the excellent recreational facilities to enjoy themselves for a few hours – though Marius had a lot less fun than the others, as true to his word Aswon had developed an extensive set of exercises and was extremely eager and dedicated in ensuring that Marius was pushed hard. During one of his two-minute rest periods between bouts of exercise, Tads wandered past and checked in on them.
"It's good that you're exercising like this, Marius. I think it will really help you know."
"Glad…you… think….so…" he panted, standing bent at the waist, his hands resting on his knees as he laboured for breath.
"Yes, very definitely. I don't understand what the stuff is on your skin exactly, but Hunter explained to me that it's like a new top skin, that's a little more resilient to damage. Marius nodded, saving his breath. "Then making sure that it's flexible and well-seated will be a good thing. The more you exercise now, the less it will hurt in the future, and the easier your life will be." She smiled at him, then passed over a towel, letting him wick away some of the sweat that matted his hair.
Marius pushed himself upright and was about to respond when a thought entered his mind – the image of Tads back in the scanning room back in Constantinople. It was the first time any of them had seen her body, and none of them had been expecting to see the masses of scar tissue that covered her torso. The slightly-discoloured skin had been a riot of patterns, lines and whorls of disfigured flesh that was stretched tautly over her frame, forming puckers, craters, protrusions and odd shapes. He suddenly wondered how that felt, day to day – whether reaching for things overhead suddenly pulled on flesh slightly too small for the movement, sending pain around her body. Or perhaps it was a low-level of nagging ongoing discomfort to everything she did. What kind of pressure would that impart onto the psyche, dealing with a source of pain that was omnipresent, with no sign of relief or respite? His memory flashed over to a dozen incidents over the last year they'd spent together, where Tads had suddenly seemed to become intransigent to some aspect of their plan, or stubbornly defiant, insisting that something was either done or not done – and he wondered how much of that might have been a sudden overflow of pain, driven by the bitterness of an unrelenting enemy that couldn't be defeated.
Much as he might distrust magic for it's seeming disregard of the laws of physics and breaking so much of what he 'knew' of the world, he also knew that she was a powerful shaman, and had seen her healing touch cure wounds that would have otherwise slain people. He remembered her work back in the ward on the Russian base at Samara, tending to a room full of strangers as she worked to fix the damage to their bodies, relieve their pain and make them whole again. What must it be like to have that kind of power at her fingertips – yet be unable to deal with the damage wrought over her own form all those years ago? His gaze met hers for a moment, and he nodded at her, accepting her words. She smiled at him, then turned and wandered off, oblivious to the sudden rush of thoughts that had tumbled through his brain.
"Right, time. Down into press up position, Marius. Hands flat, angled out at thirty degrees, thumbs facing directly forward. Arms locked out, back straight, bum clenched. And lower, all the way, tip of the nose on the floor, good, now extend, all the way back up, lock out the arms – that's one. And down, down, doesn't count until the nose touches, and back, up, up, come on, don't look at me like that, two…"
By the following morning, the entire team was looking relaxed and ready to go – apart from Marius, who looked physically much better with his scars already nothing more than pinkish lines against his tanned flesh, but ready to murder Aswon if he so much as thought about saying anything involving the phrases "you can do it" or "just five more" or even "push through the pain", let alone "I'm not angry, just disappointed". Despite the owner of the villa pointing out to them that they seemed to be really enjoying their time there, and perhaps one more night would help them fully relax, Kai was firm and told her they would be checking out shortly.
One of the things that Hunter had busied himself with was scanning through the para-critter veterinary chip they'd purchased, looking for hits on the type of creatures they might be seeking. He'd gathered the data together into a small file, and as they prepped for take-off, he started to read out the details.
"ok, so I found some details on something called 'Carpathian Bears' – and looking at where the Carpathian mountains are, that seems like it could be a good start. The bad news is that we're looking at something about one and three quarter metres high at the shoulders, rising up to four metres when stood on hind legs – so these things will look down on trolls, no bother at all. They're also chonky fat fraggers, weighing six hundred and fifty to six hundred and seventy-five kilos or so – or at least the one that was found and studied for this entry was. They have a thick and wiry pelt, with bark-coloured mottled fur that's ideal for concealment in the forests of the area. Each paw has a full set of claws that are over a centimetre wide at the tip and nearly fifteen centimetres long, and that means we're looking for something as well armed as a piasma, but slightly taller and heavier."
"What about any notes on defences or toughness?"
"The specimen here was noted for having a very dense and large endo-skeleton, with some large plates that ran over the head, neck and spine – not quite up to the latest armour specifications, but probably highly resistant to damage. Not sure if it will stop Shimazu, but you might have some issues with your pig-sticker in some places, Aswon."
"Hmm. So heavily armoured – maybe magically enhanced. That could be an issue, though at least we have weapons that should defeat that – in melee. But it's possible that the door guns might not be able to penetrate easily. If it is some kind of magically enhanced armour, then they'll do as badly against the critters as they would against spirits. So we need things with exceptionally high penetration. You may want to leave your assault rifle behind and take my rifle – the big one."
"Won't you want it?"
"Probably not – I'm expecting to be moving up with Shimazu and providing assistance and flanking cover."
"Can't believe we're not gonna be able to use the door guns." Hunter shook his head, wondering about the pay for the job again.
"Hey – it's not that we can't. It just might not be the best. If the creatures just have huge bodies that soak up damage, then the guns will definitely help – but they will make a mess of the creature and lower the value. If they're very heavily armoured, then the bullets may not penetrate well, and just end up causing a whole load of superficial flesh damage that just makes it mad. And if it's magically enhanced, then we're not even going to do that. We need to get some eyes on, and be ready to adapt on the fly. Like – if it's the second case, then putting some armour-piercing in the guns will help a great deal – though they'll also really ruin the carcass. But if it's magically enhanced, then it won't help at all, and we should save the rounds, based on how hard they are to get hold of. Your Panther cannon on the other hand, should do the job nicely."
"There's some stuff in here as well that I couldn't get a handle on – there's a bunch of Latin terms and some behavioural stuff I'm not sure about." Hunter squirted the data over to Aswon, to let him read it.
"No signs of major urinary proteins or carrier proteins found, and a lack of anogenital scent glands, with no corresponding strop marks found in elevated positions… oh, oh frag."
"That makes sense to you?"
"Yeah – they don't scent mark their territory like a wolf or rhino or other critters might. A lot of territorial creatures have specialised glands for making a pungent smell that helps them carve out a territory and warn others away. Did you know that some stuff even have special anal glands and muscles that mean when they drop a load off, it comes out square? So it doesn't roll away."
"Frak off!"
"No, I'm serious. Look it up. Some breed of wombat, I seem to recall. But anyway, these don't. And if they don't even have the proteins, then they don't use scent glands on their legs, hooves or head either to mark stuff. And the thing about no strop marks, means they don't claw the trees to make a visual marker of territory. Now, it's possible they howl or bark or make some other kind of noise, 'cos there's nothing in here about that. But we have to be prepared to think about them not being territorial at all, which means they'll just wander around all over the place, and be absolute buggers to track. Or even worse…" Aswon swallowed as a horrible thought entered his mind. "Even worse, they could be social. So we're not gonna find just one – we might find half a dozen males and a female matriarch. Or an alpha bull and a number of bonded females. Crud. That's not something we want to take on!"
"It mentioned some physiology and drugs that were tested, and seemed to work. Maybe we should start looking at something that could lace their food with to slow 'em down."
"Good thought, Hunter. Now then, Shimazu – it sounds like you're going to be taking point on this one, so how do you want to organise things?"
"Sorry to butt in, but one thing I wanted to say was – don't expect Elk to help in the hunt." Aswon glanced over to Tads. "Stop me if I'm speaking out of turn here – but I think Elk might have some dim views on going out to deliberately hunt and kill these creatures, out in the middle of nature. Tads may be able to use her powers to help defend us against attacks or hardship, but she might not be able to assist us offensively. We've seen what happens when she does something that her Totem doesn't feel appropriate."
"I agree. I was trying to work out a way of saying that, though."
"Though another thought crosses my mind – I wonder if claw clippings would be good enough? If we can drug them and knock them out, what about if we managed to clip their claws – would they work as telesma? Then we don't have to kill them at all!"
"For some uses, probably. But there's almost certainly a bunch of enchantments or things that need the heart or pelt or other parts of the body. So we'd get some money, but not a lot, I feel."
"Ok, well it's worth a thought. Hunter – maybe when you have a minute, get hold of the contact details of Georgi and send a message, or get Marius to do it?"
"Sure, Kai, I can start work on….what's that?"
The conversation was derailed by the sounds of Kai struggling not to vomit, as he rocked back and forth in his seat, shaking his head violently. A few moments later he pulled off the headset, blinking furiously as he glanced around the inside of the tilt-wing, making retching noises.
"Major pollution ahead. Astral space is all twisted. Belugh." He grabbed a container of water and gulped some down, trying to overwhelm the memory-scent in his mouth with another sensation. "I take it you can see something ahead, Hunter?"
"Yeah, could say that. There's a frakking huge wall, spreading out both east and west, and beyond it looks like a wasteland. It's not proper ground either – looks like marsh. Oh… oh right, I get it now. Just changing maps. Ahh, it's the land lost to the black tide."
Tads reached for the viewing prism, but Kai grabbed her hand and shook his head at her, warning her not to look.
"I don't think you'll like it, Tads. There was some massive storm, oh, like thirty years ago or something. Topped the scales – actually made them extend the scale to higher numbers to account for it. Stuff like hurricanes and tropical storms are generally found much further south, but this one kicked off right over the North Sea, sent a storm surge tens of metres high outwards covering thousands of kilometres. Overwhelmed sea-defences and took out a huge swathe of coastal industries and resulted in millions of tons of pollution that devastated the coastline of the UK, France, Netherlands, Denmark, Norway, Sweden… stirred up all kinds of stuff off the seabed as well, and wrecked masses of shipping. Seem to remember that it caused a bunch of insurance companies to go broke as well, when they had to pay out on stuff. You know the ship we used to get over from the UCAS to Egypt?" He looked around and saw a few nods. "Yeah, imagine if thirty of those got swamped and broke in half, spilling all of their fuel and cargo all over the ocean, adding to the pollution – and then the shipping companies put in claims for all of them going down all at the same time."
The craft fell quiet for a moment as they contemplated the scale of the disaster that Kai was relaying.
"Since then, there's a chunk of the eastern side of the UK that's a toxic hellhole – almost uninhabitable, with all kinds of mutated creatures in the fens and bogs of Anglia, the Danish lost most of the island of Jutland, and I remember reading that it was only the fact that the Dutch were so drek-hot on sea defences that they didn't lose most of the country, too. But some engineers had been predicting something like this for years, and they'd built up a massive series of dams and dykes to protect themselves – and they only lost a section right to the north of the country. Never thought I'd see it personally, and on reflection, I think I'd be happier if I hadn't. It's twisted like a rope out there, there's just pollution everywhere and all the life has been affected – I tell you for nothing, nobody's eating fish out of that soup."
"Can confirm. According to the sensors, the land we can see if just piled up sediment, and has about 95% moisture content – we can't set down on anything out here, and I can see the sheen of pollutants even over the wave action. Wrecked bits of boat, half submerged cars, destroyed factories and buildings, stretching on for kilometres either way. Air pollution is about seven times higher than normal – though the filters are holding it, so don't worry. Even Marius doesn't look happy about it."
"Well, I'd rather not think about that anymore, thanks, and I'm not looking out there again – not until we clear the danger area. At least the wards should keep it at bay. Eugggh." He shivered, as the sense of death and decay he'd seen rippled through him once more. "So, we could get some clippings and stuff – and there might be a good market in some places. Chinese herbal medicine kinda thing. There's bound to be some societies where it'll fetch a high price – but we'd have to investigate and find out which."
"If we are going to drug their food, I could make meat. But I'm actually thinking of making fruit – something really sweet, that they wouldn't get in their diet normally. Maybe huge chunks of pineapple or something like that."
Their craft flew north, crossing over the submerged and lost portion of the Netherlands that had been sundered and abandoned to the vengeance of the North Sea, heading for the virtual point in space that marked their turning point, far enough north to avoid going into German airspace. They heeled over to starboard, and started flying to the east, now out over the 'sea' properly, but still finding the water littered with filth and the remains of humanity's losing battle with nature. It wasn't long before they crossed into more of the fetid swampland, crossing over the remains of the Kingdom of Denmark – or what remained of it after nearly half the country had been lost to the black tide.
Marius twitched, picking up a fair burst of transmission, and his senses quested forwards, listening carefully and adjusting his receivers slightly, a virtual cocking of the head.
"Mayday! …day! Golf… …. … four. …. Strike! ….lost…. … … …. Failed. Mayday!"
He checked the sensor screen and saw a faint blip appear, ahead and slightly to their port side, perhaps twenty kilometres ahead. He turned slightly to head straight for them, and bought his power amplifiers online, then adjusting his sensors again. Focussed intently on his work, something seemed to 'click' in his mind, and he hardly noticed as the newly implanted Genesis cyberware seemed to engage more fully, meshing him even more tightly into the bird. On the screen the flashing icon of the air target strobed, with a '7700' identifier flashing brightly next to it – the number used to indicate an aircraft in serious distress.
"Say again, your transmission is faint and garbled."
"Mayday! Mayday! Golf India Xray Tango Three Four, I have had a bird strike! Lost port engine. Flight instrumentation has failed! I have no instruments at all. Left engine has failed! MAYDAY!" The voice was female and sounded on the verge of outright panic, tears and fear choking her transmission.
"Three Four, copy. Be advised we are closing on your position. Will approach and render assistance. Remain level and on current course. Standby." He checked the position again and his mind raced as he did the mental maths. They were flying on a course of 191 degrees, speed 95 knots – based on their own approach speed of over four hundred knots, on a course of 92 degrees, that would put the intercept point… there. He set a waypoint and then turned towards it, before calling back to the team and advising them of the situation and patching the team circuit into the radio.
Tads grabbed the viewing prism and just grimaced at Kai, before pulling it down over her face and risking a look. At least she had warning, but she still felt her stomach flip and her skin crawl as she looked out over the filth below them. She had no idea how deep the black morass was, but by how twisted the manasphere was, she wasn't sure how successful she'd be trying to pull up earth from below the water to make something even vaguely safe for landing on. Likewise, sending her spirits out into that much would be a horrible thing to do to them, and the idea of trying to cast spells through the miasma didn't terribly excite her either. She looked around a bit, then called out to the others.
"No firm land in sight, nothing at all. I'm not sure I can make anything either. For the moment, don't count on magical support – it's horrible out there. We can be safe from it, inside the wards, but not outside."
"Three four, do you have any remaining instruments. Can you advise on your ground speed or altitude?"
"Hello? I don't. It's all broken! Covered in blood and feathers! All the screens are dark. Ohhh ghosts, I don't want to die!" Marius called again to try and calm her, but he couldn't seem to get through to her that her actions only increased the likelihood of her crashing, and that she needed to calm down.
They were close enough for a visual now, and he pulled up the sensors to grab an image, letting the team see the twin-engine Cessna as it bounced up and down through the air, yawing and pitching in response to the rough commands from the pilot.
"They're gonna slam it into the sea if they're not careful!" Hunter checked their own altitude and then called back to them. "We're at less than a thousand metres, they're probably only at around three hundred!"
"Hello? Three Four, isn't it? What's your name?" Kai called out over the open channel, ignoring protocol and procedure. He knew his voice control powers wouldn't work over the radio – the electronic medium seemed to rob the communication of any of his power – but he figured that what she really needed was a friendly voice now, someone who understood her position.
"Mel… Melanie."
"Hi there, Mel. My name's Kai. It's all looking a bit scary for you at the moment, I imagine, but actually though it might look bad, you're going to be ok. You see, we're nearly there, we can actually see your plane now, and we'll be with you in less than a minute. And I have a whole team of experts with me, and we're going to help you out. So, first of all, there's one thing I'd like you to do. Mel – can you pull back on the controls, just a tiny bit. Not too much, just enough to gain a little altitude? Excellent, ok, hold it there, that's perfect." He continued to chatter away, not really giving her time to talk back, other than to answer his questions briefly. He made sure to phrase them in a close manner, letting her answer with yes or no, or just a single word answer, trying to cut down on the number of things she had to think about.
"Ok, she's a single pilot, only soul on board. She was flying down from Denmark towards Hamburg to visit family, and some big-ass bird hit her windscreen and broke a lot of stuff, and the body or something went into the engine. And she's not long qualified as a solo pilot – she's got thirty hours of stick time, which I'm guessing isn't very much?" he told them a few minutes later. By now Marius had intercepted them and swung round hard to match course, while dropping power almost to stall speed to keep level with them. They could see the small fuselage, probably designed for seating around ten people at most, the high mounted wings and the pair of turbo-prop engines, one of which was streaming smoke behind, the propellors windmilling violently in the air-flow.
"She needs to shut down that engine. It will be pulling her off course, causing damage to the airframe and runs a significant risk of fire… never mind." They saw the sudden gout of flame as it burst out of the rear of the engine, igniting a spray of fuel that sent a massive fireball out like a teardrop behind her. They heard her scream over the short-ranged backup radio, and Kai dived back on, talking to her and calming her down again. He alternated between talking to her and asking Marius questions, while Hunter frantically tried to punch a signal through on the sat-phone so he could pull up the schematics of the plane and details on the controls.
Over the course of the next few minutes they managed to get her to feather the prop and shut down the fuel flow to the engine, and though there was still wisps of smoke emerging from the craft, the flames and steady stream of dense black smoke were soon gone, seeming to steady her nerves considerably.
"What's our position? Where's the nearest land to here?"
"If we let her carry on, current course, she's about a hundred klicks from the edge of the black tide, and a few more until there's a chance of an airport – though that puts her almost to Hamburg. Or, it's a little further to the north if we turned her around and sent her back to Denmark."
"I do not want to get close to Germany. We should turn her around. Now."
Kai still thought Marius was being overly paranoid, but now wasn't the time for that argument. Instead Marius applied a little extra power and moved to be ahead of the stricken Cessna and took the lead position, and started a very gentle turn to starboard, while Kai talked Melanie through the manoeuvre to follow them. Using their own craft as a reference point they managed to get her turned one hundred and eighty degrees, and maintained a very gradual but steady climb, her single remaining engine probably working at maximum thrust but no more.
"I'm gonna drop the back ramp and get eyes on." Hunter unbuckled himself and climbed out of his seat, moving back into the troop bay. By the time he was there, the others had also unbuckled, donning the sturdy leather belts Tads had commissioned for them all, and clipping onto the safety straps at the rear of the cargo bay. The wind buffeted at them as the ramp dropped, but as a special forces insertion vehicle the designers had anticipated that they might have parachute troops wanting to deploy from the rear, and had done what they could with the design to try and shield them from the worst of the airflow.
"She's got no windscreen left – well not much of one," Tads shouted, subconsciously feeling that she had to raise her voice over the noise of the slipstream, despite the high-tech throat mike that picked up the vibrations of her speech just fine. "I can try to levitate her out of the plane if she'll climb out. But we'd need to slam the brakes on really fast, as I can't make her keep up with us – the spell isn't strong enough to go fast. If I lose sight of her, I can't control the spell!"
"Ok, that's an option. But if we can get her to land, like a proper landing strip, I'm sure we can talk her down. She does follow instructions, as long as we can give them clearly. And if we can get Marius to fly in front like this, we can just get her to follow us on the approach?"
"We need to have a standby plan though, just in case her plane starts to break up or develop more problems. Must have been a hell of an impact. Look – you can see one of the propellors has broken clean off, and it's trashed the air intakes." Hunter examined the engine though a pair of binoculars and surveyed the damage. "Control surfaces have taken a beating too, and I can see the leading edge of the wing has been damaged and is fluttering all over the place. She must feel like she's flying a blender…"
"Kai – talk to her about the controls. Find out if she has a rigger interface or pilot system. Her controls might be smashed, but the system may be ok, and if so there is a chance I could try to remotely fly her vehicle."
Kai switched channels and talked to Mel some more, finding out that while the digital instruments of the plane were fairly modern, unfortunately it didn't have a full pilot or VCR system. The best it had was a couple of datajacks, and while the pilot did have jacks of her own, she wasn't going to plug in – the frequent sparks and surges of power she could see from the instrument panel had her mortally afraid of getting zapped.
"Ok, Mel – now, can you tell me anything about your fuel status?"
"No, the instruments are all dead! I can't see any information!"
"Ok, yes, we know that. But did you start with a full tank, when you took off?"
"Oh, yes. I did."
"Great, so how much do you think you have used to get here, and how much would you expect to have left?"
Slowly they worked back and forth, with Kai calmly asking her questions while Marius and Hunter crunched the numbers and plotted positions on the map. Even allowing for a significant allowance of lost fuel from the damaged engine and the fire, she fortunately had more than enough fuel for several hundred kilometres of flight – so she wasn't going to crash from lack of gas.
"Now, I have to ask you one more thing – do you have anything onboard that you shouldn't? You're not bringing anything to Germany that was illegal or anything like that are you? Not smuggling alcohol or drugs over the border?"
"No! I don't do things like that!" For the first time in their conversation she sounded more angry than afraid, and Kai gave a grin.
"I just had to ask, I expected that answer. It's just once we get you safely down, there's no doubt going to be some questions asked. Ok, now just keep following us, I'm just going to chat to my team about how best to do this." He cut her out of the team chat, and called for opinions.
"Well, we could try to get a parachute over to her, and get her to bail out? If we have a rope we could just wind it out of the back?" Kai nodded at her, but a quick check of the cargo area revealed that though they had various straps and tie-downs, they didn't have any rope or gear remotely long enough to use in an effort to lower a chute down to her. Neither did they have a winch or cable on the aircraft – though Aswon was making notes on his pad to discuss this with Nadia as soon as he could.
"Just a thought – Marius. She's going pretty slowly – if she puts her landing gear down, will that make her crash, or stop flying?"
"No. It will lower her speed only a small amount, but she will not stall."
"Is that worth doing, to make sure it works then? I mean, if she can't do a proper landing, will that make us look at an alternate idea?"
Kai joined him on the back ramp, wearing a parachute, with an additional one held in front of him.
"I could always parachute over there, and drop this off to her?" Shimazu appeared next to him, holding another.
"And I could jump after you and actually pass it over, when you frak it up?"
"Hey!"
"I don't think anyone should be using up a parachute to try and get another one over there. Let's see if her gear works, and if we can just get her on the ground…"
By this point Hunter had some basic images of the cockpit downloaded, and they started to talk her through the process, making sure she was comfortable. With the digital controls smashed and non-functional, they had to use the backup mechanism – when this was deployed, they saw the nose wheel cover and the starboard gear flaps open, and the tips of the gear emerge from the bays – but the port side flap remained stubbornly closed.
As they flew northwards, they started to see the Danish coast ahead – and a general lightning of the sea and the air around them. Tads happily informed them they were leaving the blight, the pollution gradually fading away as the sea currents shifted and flowed. With the miasma behind them, Tads felt much happier about using her spirits, and soon had a more powerful sylph of the air summoned and dispatched to the Cessna, where it dived into the wing spar and found the twisted control rods and burnt out motor that had jammed the door shut. Moments later the flap popped open, the spirit materialised and pushing on the twisted metal and forcing the gear out into the wind stream.
"Help! Something's happening! The plane's falling apart! Oh ghosts, I'm goooonnnnaaa dieeeeee…."
"No Melanie, don't worry – that's us at work, remotely getting your gear fixed. We can see all three wheels of your landing gear now. It's all fine. We're getting you ready for landing, and just making sure it's all ok. Speaking of landing, what was the name of the airstrip you took off from?"
Kai spent a few minutes calming her down again, and finding out details of her route, then told her to hang on while he made some calls – then switched to the sat-phone and with Hunter's help found a number for her take-off location. They initially answered in Danish, and it took a few minutes to work out in broken English what was going on, but they soon had the nature of the emergency conveyed – and the operator at the small grass strip directed them to divert to Faaborg instead. Kai made another call, following up on this and soon realised why. Not only was Faaborg a paved runway, even if it wasn't that much longer, but it also had a proper tower rather than a man in a hut, with a basic approach radar, and even better was closer to a town with both fire and ambulance service. Kai was soon chatting away discussing the inbound aircraft, passing over the details of Melanie's original flight plan and the nature of the emergency, and the controller at Faaborg advised them that they would have a priority approach to a cleared field, with emergency services standing by.
Approaching the islands, Marius started a very gentle and slow descent, guiding in the Cessna smoothly on a ten kilometre glide slope that would terminate just over the runway threshold – making it easy for the damaged plane to just follow his tail all the way down. Soon enough the tower was able to contact the Cessna directly, her backup radio having enough range to send her responses back. A calm voice started to chat to her in Danish, switching to English a few moments later.
"Lead flight, this is Aksel Sorensen. I am in communication with Melanie now. Are you able to continue guiding her down?"
Marius confirmed that he was, and relayed his current flight information and approach details, getting approval from Aksel, who informed them that he was based in the next town over, her original departure location – and he was in fact her flight instructor and tutor. Between his familiarity with her flying and his calming voice, Melanie seemed finally to have settled down, and was following his instructions carefully, sticking to Marius like glue as he continued to guide them down.
"Just to let you know, the port side wheel is looking flat. There's not a lot we can do about it, but it's probably not going to last on landing, and may throw her off." Hunter called from the back ramp, where he'd been studying the gear and the rest of the airplane carefully as they gradually lost altitude and started to cross the smaller islands to the south of the mainland.
"And we're cleaning up in the back here and hiding anything illegal, in case we get inspected as part of this whole situation." Aswon added, as he and Shimazu started working through the cargo area and troop bay, tucking away their firearms and other weapons, ensuring nothing too obvious was on display.
"I have some fresh spirits called," added Tads, looking a little stunned, but still with them. "I've got several, as powerful as I could safely manage, and I've explained to them that their plane is damaged and I'd really like their help getting it down in one piece."
"Sounds like we've done everything we can. Marius – are we taking her all the way in? Could we not just peel off and leave her to it now?"
"We could, technically. I think they can get her down safely. But I would feel better if we can guide her all the way in. It is not far, and I see no reason to leave her now."
"Alright then. Let's get ready for landing!"
The last few minutes seemed to shoot by rapidly, a hundred minor corrections to her glide slope, talking her through how her plane was likely to pull sharply to one side due to the possible damage on the wheel, and how she had to correct this, the slight wind on the airstrip, the actions to take as soon as she was down. Marius stayed locked on the glide slope, giving her a visual indication of exactly where to fly, and her flight instructor Aksel keeping up a constant stream of calm, measured commands to tell her exactly what to do and when.
They crossed the threshold, and Marius pulled up, with Aksel advising her to break formation and stay as she was, touching down a few seconds later. Ghostly spirits appeared suddenly on the end of the port wing, materialising one after another until half a dozen of them were clutching to the wing edge, straining to lift the wing slightly. The starboard wheel and nose gear touched down, with the port side wheel held scant centimetres up in the air as the spirits struggled with the weight, the tyre wobbling in the wind. Melanie touched the brakes, and the starboard wheel slowed, shedding speed and making the plane judder and try to veer to one side.
The Cessna snaked across the white line marking the centre of the runway, following a snake-like pattern as the pilot over-corrected and then adjusted again, the spirits doing their best to hold the damaged gear above the surface of the tarmac, while behind her the fire appliances sped down the runway, following along.
One of the spirits lost its grip as she slewed to one side, and the others were unable to hold the wheel up without it, and the damaged port wheel finally made contact with the tarmac, spinning rapidly as friction caught it, before the flat tyre wobbled and caught on the gear, locking up and then jamming for a few seconds. A trail of black rubber was left along the runway in a gentle arc, before the pressure was too much and the tyre shredded, dropping the gear onto the runway where it quickly dug in and spun the plane around on its new axis. The spirits scrabbled back onto the plane, grabbing hold of it and steadying it as best they could – and fortunately it had shed enough speed by now from the starboard wheel braking that they could control it as the port gear collapsed under the abuse.
The plane skidded to a halt, laid at a sharp angle and with a stream of debris scattered on the runway behind it, while the fire truck pulled up alongside, foam cannon pointed at the wounded plane, ready to douse any fire with high-density fire suppressant. Nothing happened though, other than a moment later the pilot's door being forced open and a very shaky student pouring out of the doorway and down to the ground, running away from the plane for half a dozen paces before her legs gave out and betrayed her, landing her in a heap on the runway. A waiting ambulance gunned its engine and headed over towards her, paramedics lifting her bodily and getting her away from the plane, while firefighters and ground staff closed in on the plane, making sure that the starboard engine was shut down and the fuel flow had been cut off.
Tads released the spirits, sending them back to the astral realm with her profound thanks – they'd served their purpose and remaining here would only cause more questions to be asked, and probably unnerve people far more than they already were. The tower controller finally remembered that there was more happening here than the drama of the Cessna.
"Lead flight, you appear to be STOL/VTOL capable – are you able to land on the remaining runway."
"Affirmative."
"Please land at your discretion, then. Thank you, and welcome to Faaborg."
Marius neatly landed the tilt-wing, putting it down right at the end of the runway, far away from the Cessna and emergency equipment that was now pulling up to examine the plane more closely, and watched as a small four wheel drive vehicle pulled away from the hangers and drove slowly over the close-cropped grass towards them.
"Kai – you had better be ready with a story, we have company coming."
Kai nodded, took one last look around the aircraft to make sure everything was in order, then put an entirely false but welcoming smile on his face and turned to face the approaching vehicle.
