Chapter twenty-seven: Rescue Phase One
"Ryder calling Everest, do you read me; over?!" The small compact device fuzzed the voice they'd recognize anyway, and they just happened to be near enough for Jake to pick it up right away.
"Hey Ryder, not used to talking with you on this channel, how's it going down there?" Jake asked, as laid back as he could be.
"Not great right now, Jake." Ryder replied unfortunately. "A plane crashed on the far side of the low ridges below your mountain. It knocked out a cell tower up there so traditional communication isn't working. And it's stuck up there.. The pups and I are on route and Snowflake is headed up to get Everest to help us navigate the area better. She should be there soon."
"Good to know,.. we'll be ready." Jake replied.
"We sure will!" Everest agreed determinedly. Then howling loudly, she dove out the doggy door to fetch her gear.
xxxx
Snowflake drove towards Jake's cabin, carefully staying away from the crash sight. Trying her best to stay on the trail that led to the cabin, Snowflake was able to get to the cabin within a minute.
"Everest? Jake? It's Snowflake! We have an emergency!" Snowflake called out as she stopped her vehicle.
'Would have gotten here faster if I didn't have to slow down on the rough drive here,' she thought to herself.
"All ready to go!.. Off the Trail, Everest won't fail!" The mountain husky exclaimed, hopping into Snowflake's vehicle.
"Let's check in with Skye." she suggested, when turning to her fellow husky.
"'Guess you're gonna need this." Jake mentioned, setting the radio in her lap.
"Thanks Jake." Everest took it between her paws and pressed the button on the side firmly. "Skye, have you found the crash site yet?"
"Sure did.." the cockapoo replied, appearing in the sky above them with her spotlight shining down near them. "And I can tell you how to get there.."
XXXX
The police copter shined its spotlight all the way up to the crash site and they could then follow it all the way down till they found smoother ground, which was actually paved.
"Ok, looks like this used to be a personal storage unit, walled up for security." Chase observed standing up in the passenger seat of his cruiser to assess the scene better. "The plane must have slowed its crash after it hit the cell tower."
"And just in time too." Skye mentioned coming around toward the nose of the plan and focusing her goggles closer on it. "The other side of the wall that stopped it is a really steep cliff."
"Then we should probably pull it back away from the edge so it doesn't compromise our rescue efforts." Chase figured, dropping his gaze downward thoughtfully. "But first.. Skye? Use your megaphone to see if everybody's ok."
"Roger that!" The cockapoo replied. "Ruff! Megaphone!"
When the voice enhancing device retracted out, she hovered a bit closer to the damaged craft.
"Attention pilot! Is everyone alright?" Silence returned at first, but then something made a noise and a piece of debris moved aside as it was pushed over by the pilot.
"This is the pilot of the Marsden carrier." The pilot replied. "We're alive, and myself and my copilot are the only ones on this craft. However, my copilot looks to be in severe need of rescuing. He has not moved since the crash, nor has he responded to my calls. I fear he may be in critical condition."
"Copy that, hang tight!" Skye told him. "Help is on the way!"
Then steering away, she hovered back over to the waiting rescue vehicles, settling over the police cruiser near the center.
"Chase, the pilot and his copilot are the only ones, but the copilot may be in big medical trouble. We gotta get 'em out fast! And he appears to be more difficult to reach than the pilot. I could barely see him next to the pilot."
"10-4, get me up there for a closer look." Chase decided, opening the sunroof.
"Uh, try again, dude." Chester rebuked suggestively.
"Right. Skye, take Chess." Chase corrected himself. Skye eased down and hooked the ring on Chester's pup pack, and lifted him out to float him over to the wreckage. Taking a look around with a scan from his night vision goggles, he waved a paw further to the right so Skye could move them over. Taking another careful scan, he waved again and she took him back over to set him back into the driver seat next to Chase.
"Access will be easier from above." Chester told him. "If we carve back the busted top of the plane we can easily lift the pilot out and hopefully have the space to extract the copilot once we clear a sheet of debris off of him. I suggest sending Marshall in for a medical scan before we move him though.
"My thoughts exactly." Chase nodded in agreement, then turned to peer out the opposite window past his brother. "Marshall, stand by." The Dalmatian nodded in response to the flash of his lights.
"But Chase, how are we gonna cut the plane and get rid of the top? We don't have that kind of tools or vehicles." Rayla pointed out, when peering down at him through the sunroof. "Not with us, I mean."
"Then it sounds like we gotta call for backup." Chase decided.
XXXX
The Lookout was quiet, the remaining pups sitting around the Lookout's lower level waiting to hear back from their friends.
"Well.. this is awkward.." Skyler sighed, not sure what else to say.
Suddenly a noise started beeping at them, making all of them perk up.
"What's that beeping?" Ned asked as he looked around.
"Sounds like it's coming from up there?" Skyler mentioned slowly lifting her gaze up to the ceiling.
"*gasp* the control room!" They all gasped, scrambling up to pile into the elevator. When they got to the top, they momentarily got stuck in the doorway but were able to free themselves so they could fumble over to the panel. Skyler tripped just short of the flashing button and Kylie hopped up next to her so she could reach over the border collie and just barely hit the button.
"Hello? Lookout tower, go ahead." She said, trying to sound calm.
"Kylie? Yes, it worked! Looks like we'll need your help after all. Head to the Air Patroller and bring it up the mountain. Skye will have her spotlight out to show you where to go. We need RoboDog to lift up part of the plane once we cut it, to free the pilot and his copilot."
"You got it, we'll be on our way shortly. Thanks!" Then shutting down the channel she stepped down and turned to her friends.
"Let's move, pups!" She announced bravely.
XXXX
"Rocky, do you think it's too unstable to cut anything?" Chase asked.
"Probably." The mixed breed replied. "But.. I don't think we wanna find out till we have the Air Patroller here to hold it steady for us.."
"That's what I thought." Chase sighed. "Marshall, fire assessment."
Marshall hopped out of his vehicle and sniffed the air.
"No fire yet.. just a bit smokey from the burnt rubber.." the fire pup deduced. "But did you catch that?" Chase poked his head up out of the sun roof and sniffed. "Jet fuel.. if there isn't a fire now there very well might be soon."
"Right.. Rubble, Rocky the water cannon carts are loaded with foam retardant that should hopefully prevent the sparks from the busted circuitry to light the leaking fuel on fire. It might just buy us time till the Air Patroller gets here." Marshall informed them.
"Perfect! Green means go!" Rocky called, moving in on the wreck.
"Rubble on the double.." Rubble followed up. Taking places on opposite sides of the plane they sprayed a layer of foam over the entire vessel, making a slow approach toward the wall with the drop on the other side.
"Chess, let's drop the winch and secure it before that thing starts to get loose." Chase decided, turning to his brother, who determinedly nodded then leapt out the window. "When we start doing stuff this whole thing could get a little unstable on us.. and we need an anchor point so that it doesn't drop before we get everyone evacted and out of the way."
"Way to be thorough, Chase." Ryder smiled proudly.
"Thanks," Chase smiled appreciatively, losing it moments later as he spoke. "But I wish there was more we could do right now. I get the feeling this thing's a ticking time bomb."
"Because it is.." Marshall mentioned. "But don't worry, we got this."
"Ryder, are the wings still attached? We need to be careful when we lift the plane; if it tilts sideways it would be tricky to secure it. Maybe have Everest help Chase with her gear?" Snowflake suggested through her pup tag.
"Good questions, Snowflake." Ryder replied. "Chase, what'do you think?"
"No wings.. it might compromise the structural integrity of the whole plane. Plus all we need to do is run the Air Patroller's hook through the windows so that when we cut, we'll lift away the roof of the cab and not the whole plane. That'll give us just enough clearance to get the pilot and his copilot out safely."
"Sounds like a plan.. now all we need is.." his sentence was interrupted however by a breeze that whipped up to the whirring sound from above.
"The Air Patroller!" Several pups gasped.
"Are we glad to see you guys!" Chase called, shielding his face to look up at them.
"Almost wish we could've been here sooner." Skyler mentioned from the walkie system they'd brought with them.
"Ok Ryder, how can we help?" Kylie asked.
"We need you to drop the hook so the pups down here can run it through the windows and secure it." The boy replied, placing his thumb and forefinger to his mic, holding it more securely in the wind.
"No problem," the cocker answered back. "Robodog, drop the hook."
The robot canine barked and tapped something next to him.
As soon as the hook dropped, Zuma hopped up to retrieve it and climbed closer to the window through the rubble. Giving it his best shot, he threw it as hard as he could but came up short. Fortunately for him, Rocky appeared on the other side. The pilot saw that it was possibly in reach and began to shift toward it.
"Mr. Pilot, stay still." Rocky advised. "We don't want any debris to come loose and hurt someone. We got this."
"Alright, just trying to help, my friend." The pilot sighed, as he withdrew.
"Don't worry." Rocky smiled.
"We will, dude!" Zuma agreed.
"Ruff! Claw!" Rocky barked, thankfully it reached right over to grab the hook. And he pulled it out so he could hop up onto the roof and secured the hook to its cable to hold it in place.
"We're good! Hook secured," The mixed breed announced.
"Then cut the roof off the cab of the plane." Ryder affirmed.
"Ruff! Welder!" Taking the fire stick to the metal, it began to melt rather quickly. He ran it from the right corner of the windshield down the side. Then hopping up on top again, he cut along the first seam of the plane's metal hide. Up the other side and then carefully maneuvering passed the broken section of wall.. He was able to cut across the bottom edges of the frame on both sides of where the windshield used to be. As the last point released there was a slight drop, but thankfully the cable held up perfectly. Rocky, who had recoiled in fear of the crash, slowly let his guard down to find everything was still fine; much to his relief.
"Whoof! That was close!" He sighed. "Ok guys, we're all set, get that thing out of here!"
"You got it! Let's go RoboDog!" CiCi decided.
"Thanks for the assist, you guys!" Chase's voice fuzzed through the radio. "Find a safe place to leave that piece and stand by incase we need another."
"Copy that, Chase.. Sir?" Skyler quoted, though a bit awkwardly at the end when realizing how odd it sounded. "Sorry, I tried.. Probably butchered that, didn't I?"
"I didn't even notice." Chase replied back. "But if you wanna forget it ever happened, we can do that too. I won't tell anybody." And just by him saying this she and the other PUP Pals among her could imagine him winking at the end of this statement.
"But I might.." Chester's voice chimed in.
"Shhh!" Chase hissed and they could tell he'd elbowed him or something.
"No promises!" Chester mentioned.
"What's that, you guys?" they heard in the background, possibly Marshall.
"Nothing!" The shepherd brothers replied quickly. Then there was a brief silence, followed by a snort and another 'shh'.
"You'll get us both in trouble!" Chase hissed again. "So.. ok. Keep up the good work guys." Then the call dropped.
Tiny snorted.
"Anyone else enjoy that as much as I did?" he asked, turning to those among him.
"Enjoying what? Teasing Chase and Chester?" Brian asked
"Wait, get in trouble for what?" Ned said in confusion.
"I think they should probably be focused on the mission?" CiCi figured suggestively, and there were many wavered sounds and responses in regards to her well-made point.
xxxx
Suddenly a whiff of something drew Chase's nose up again.
"Guys?.." he mentioned slowly earning several eyes' attention. "You smell that?" His dread rattled through his shaky tone as his eyes fell on his brother and the fire pup himself. Both sniffed more carefully.
"Yup.. that's not good." Marshall sighed. "We gotta hurry."
"That's what I was afraid of." Chase sighed. "Ok, we don't have much time, a major fire could burst at any moment. Skye, get the Pilot out of there!"
"Ok, Chase,.." the cockapoo replied in a low tone. "But I'll need to pull some debris out of the way first. Too much in there for me to safely lift him out."
"Do it. In the meantime, Rubble, Zuma, keep water and foam on the plane to buy us as much time as possible." Chase replied.
"You got it!" Rubble called, easing his water cannon cart forward.
"Ready, set, get wet!" Zuma howled, spraying the cannon after hopping into the cart.
Snowflake sat in silence, wondering if there was any way to help. Sadly, she couldn't think of any.
"There!" Skye called, freeing up the space around the pilot. "Now to get you outta there.." Hovering back over the plane, she let down her harness and the pilot was able to sit up enough for it to fit around him.
"Got the pilot, Chase," the aviator reported, setting the pilot down and turning back toward the plane once again. "Going back in for the copilot,.. but I might need a spotter."
"Don't worry, Skye," Rocky shouted, still standing on the front of the plane. "I gotcha."
"Ruff! Cab up!" Chase barked.
Squinting to see, as the cab raised them higher, he began to wonder even further.
"I think we need a three pronged spotter set up," he decided. "Snowflake, right side! Marshall, on the left!"
"On it!" The two pups replied, racing over to their designated spots.
"Ok, Skye." Marshall began, hopping into the pilot seat and bent down to view the underside better. "You might be able to get your hook in there like we did with the roof. But it may be a little tricky. We'll need to time this just right."
"Is there enough space for the hook? Right side looks clear!" Snowflake reported to Marshall and Chase.
"Ok,.. slowly.. slowly.. Good! Rocky, we need your claw!" Marshall called.
"Ruff! Claw!" Rocky moved closer when there was a small vibrate under him. However, he resumed his task which was to grab the hook and secure it to the cable.
"Ok! Take it up, Skye." The mixed breed shouted up to her.
"Roger that,.. here goes nothing." The Cockapoo replied. When she pulled up to carefully remove the debris, the copilot was just barely becoming visible when a hiss sounded a fair distance from them. And both Marshall and Rocky peered in to see what it was, as they were the only ones with a clear view of the back of the plane.
"Uh oh.."
What is up you guys!? We are back once again! And hooray it worked! We're all caught up again and my how much more fun we are in for?! Can't wait to get to that point but there is still fun to be had with what we just released!
And can I just say we have the craziest timing when it comes to these two week post breaks? Both times we've done this we've always left you guys on a MAJOR cliffy! And this one was bigger than the LAST one!
We'll try not to leave you hangin' quite as badly, but as we all know,.. There's no guarantees! ;D
But still! What a crazy rescue already, can't wait to hear your thoughts and for you to see what comes next. Enjoy for now! Thx!
