Clear to Lift (36 page)

“He's clear!” I shout, and Boomer is already flaring, making his approach to hover over him. Beanie is also ahead of me, calling that Hap is on the hoist and being lowered.

Will uses his wrists, his elbows, struggling, clawing his way up, using the eaves of a second-story window to move himself away from the water.

“We're losing Cabin Ten!” Walt shouts. “We're losing Cabin Ten!”

“What?” I say.

“The siding's going! We can see it from here!”

Will looks up, our eyes meet, and we know. He only has to shake his head to confirm.

In the blink of an eye, the priorities have flipped, Cabin Ten now the higher risk.

“Boomer, go!” I say, willing the words out.

Boomer grits his teeth. He knows we have to do it.

“Bringin' Hap in,” Beanie says. “Sir, you're clear to go. I'll hoist him in on the fly.”

Boomer starts forward, and seconds later Beanie calls that Hap is in the bird.

“Copy,” I say, reeling from the shock of having to leave Will. I left him.…

Stay focused, Ali. Stay focused!

I look ahead, the father waving his hands wildly on the roof, the woman with a tiny bulge in her jacket. The baby …

Two trees remain near Cabin Ten, which is good because it protects the cabin by breaking up the flow of water, but bad because they're so close that we can't one-skid. We're going to have to hoist. But with a baby …

“How are we gonna bring up the baby?” Boomer says. “A harness won't work.”

“Stand by,” Beanie says.

I look over my shoulder, watching Beanie and Hap as they confer. Just behind them, an old equipment bag …

“The equipment bag!” Beanie and I say at the same time.

Hap pounces on the olive-green canvas bag, unzips it, and dumps the contents—ropes, harnesses, and slings. He and Beanie rush back to the main cabin door, the one that has remained open since we lowered the hoist the very first time at the garage.

“Easy forward ten,” Beanie calls. “Easy forward five, easy forward three, two, one, steady. Steady right there. Sending Hap down … he's halfway down … he's on the roof.”

It runs through my mind for about a nanosecond, the stringent engineering and testing that goes into the design and deployment of rescue harnesses, strops, ropes, and litters. All of them stress-tested, checked, and rechecked. And we're about to throw an infant into an old equipment bag.…

“Baby's in the bag,” Beanie continues. “He's hooked on the mom, they're on the hoist, bringing 'em up.”

Why it hits me now, I don't know, but it's honest-to-goodness dark. Maybe it's that I'm craning my head to look back at Cabin One—to see if it's still there—and I realize that I couldn't see it anyway.

“… they're in the bird … sending the hoist back down…”

Please be there. Please be there. Please be there.
I harbor the same thoughts I had as I sped to the airport to find Will, before he boarded a plane.
Please still be there.

“… dad's on, Hap's on, bringing 'em up … halfway up … they're in the bird … clear to go!”

Boomer wastes no time, spinning and moving back to Cabin One, which now, thanks to the searchlight, I see still stands.

We've got this. We've got this.

I pivot in my seat briefly to look back into the aircraft cabin. The mother unzips the equipment bag, and a tiny head, topped with fine blond curls, peeks out, offering a curious smile.

No way. A smile? That baby's got to be destined to join a SAR team when he grows up.

Quickly, I return to the task at hand, watching Boomer flare into position over Will. Simultaneously, Beanie is sending Hap down on the hoist, no time to lose.

The searchlight illuminates the side of Cabin One, and Will remains almost exactly where we left him.

Thank god …

His body still shakes, which is a good sign. After all he's been through, his body could easily have shut down by now due to hypothermia, so the shivering is good.

Hap continues his descent on the hoist cable, and he's just above roof level when Will's eyes suddenly widen. It's the only warning I have before the
crack!
and the
whump!
as the cabin disintegrates, crashing over Will, and pulling him into the river.

 

41

I choke on my scream, unable to breathe.
Oh, dear god. Will!

“Mother fuck!” Boomer shouts.

He shines the searchlight on the biggest pieces of the cabin, trying to follow.

“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” he yells.

I look frantically downward, seeing only a jumble of wood and brick tumbling in the mud-thickened, now-black water.

This can't be happening. It can't be—
Think, Alison! Think!

The nose of the aircraft snaps to the left as the number-one engine revs up, whining—taking the load for the number-two engine.
Shit!
“We lost number two!” I say, watching the needle on the gauge for engine number two wind down to zero, flaming out, out of gas. Shit, shit,
shit!

Boomer reacts, dropping collective and nosing over to gain airspeed. He turns and lines up for the square-shaped field, where we've been off-loading our pax.

It's cold and we're low, but I don't know if we're light enough to be single-engine-capable, not with the family on board. Which means Boomer will have to make a perfect no-hover landing.

Which he does.

Hap rushes the family out of the rotor arc, but it's not until Boomer rolls off the throttle for the number-one engine, and the aircraft rocks as the rotors slow, and all motorized sounds die away, that the enormity of what has happened hits me. We only have one engine. We can't take off now.

The nauseated feeling overwhelms.

No. No, no, no. Don't give in to this. Don't give up!

I key the radio before Boomer switches off the battery. “Mono County Sheriff, Rescue Seven, request status of fuel truck, over.”

“Rescue Seven,” Walt says. “The roads are all closed. The fuel trucks can't move. They tried to cross the pass near Topaz Lake, but couldn't get through.”

Okay, so what else? What else?

A long shot.

I switch the frequency on the second radio.

“Rescue Six, Rescue Seven, over.”

“Rescue Seven, Rescue Six, go ahead,” Clark says.

“Clark, what's your status? We need help. We need fuel.”

“We're shutting down at the hospital heliport in Carson City. The weather's crap.”

“Can you fly here?” I ask, just shy of panic. “We need you!”

“Negative, the weather's—”

“We're out of fuel! We have a man in the river! We need your help!”

“Alison, I don't—”

“Please! Clark, please! It's Will. Will's in the river!”

The radio goes silent, the pause so long that I wonder if Clark has just switched off his radio.

“I, um, I'll try. But I can't promise anything,” he says.

Boomer turns to me, and we share a long, torturous look.

I put my hand to my chest, something to try to fill an unfillable hole.
Holy god …

My gaze drifts to Jack and my mother, standing arm in arm, and Boomer follows my line of sight.

Jack has removed his dry suit and stands in the bright green jacket I remember from Palisade Glacier an eternity ago. His chest harness with his radios and gear hangs loosely over his shoulder. Celia, Kelly, and Tawny are there. Kevin and Thomas, too.

We've touched down less than a quarter mile from the cluster of police cars and ambulances, so rescue personnel have moved to our landing spot to receive the family of three that Hap escorts now.

After handing them over, Hap turns to Jack, relaying the news.

Jack looks to me to confirm. Slowly, and while gritting my teeth to choke down the emotion, I shake my head.

Jack's body appears to buckle. My mom grabs him, and so does Celia, to hold him upright.

Boomer looks away from Jack, then slams the instrument console. “God damn son of a bitch!” he yells.

I have no words, my mind blank. All of my ideas, the planning, everything leaves me, and my body grows heavy, turning in on itself with ache.

I register movement as Jack regains himself and stumbles under the stationary rotor blades, climbing into the cabin. There is no sound save the sleet that continues its relentless pounding.

“Alison,” Jack says, moving from the cabin into the little space between the cockpit seats. He puts a hand on my arm, but when I meet Jack's eyes—my father's eyes—I can't hold the tears back anymore.

“I couldn't—” I say, gagging on the words. “I tried. I tried. I did.” The tears stream out the corners of my eyes.

“I know you did,” Jack says. “I know—” He stops, removing his hand from my arm to wipe at his face.

I drop my head in my hands, sobbing, barely noticing when my door is opened. I hear a familiar voice, feel the comforting pull of arms around my shoulders. My mom draws me to her, squeezing and rubbing my back, just as she did when I was little. Only this time, she can't fix it.

Damn, this incessant sleet! Rain! Whatever! Will! Oh, dear god, Will …

My mom hugs me closer, and I shake in her arms. Visions of the rescue mission from beginning to end flicker and flash through my brain. The unchecked efforts of so many people to help save lives despite the danger. And I think of Rich, who never would have put himself in this position. Will would and did. Heroic, brave, selfless. And I lost him because of it.

No! Will!

The visions shimmer and morph. Will stands on Donner Summit. He unfolds his arms, standing taller.
“You missed something.”
And I see myself running. Blinded by rain, darkness, out of breath—

A wet, golden blur streaks under the rotors, Mojo's wolfy bark rising. He leaps into the main cabin behind me, issuing a series of yelps, before bounding out once more, sprinting a complete circle around the bird, and returning to the cabin.

He leaps in again.

“Mojo!” Jack says, falling backward this time as Mojo launches straight into his chest. “Calm down, boy. Calm down.”

Jack's attempts at subduing the Lab prove futile, as Mojo yips and woofs, scrabbling to keep his footing on the metal flooring of the aircraft. Then, quick as flash, he darts from the aircraft once more, turning circles, jumping, barking, in front of the cockpit window. A sprint ten yards toward the right, toward the river, a manic dash back.

But it's Mojo's sudden stillness that causes me to sit up straight. Stable on all fours, he looks up, meeting my eyes, and stares, waiting, alert.

Beep … beep … beep … beep … beep.

Like Mojo, we still. Boomer and Jack breathe in, hold it. My mom straightens. And we listen.

Beep … beep … beep … beep … beep.

Jack bolts up, and his hands fly to his chest harness, which now lies on the cabin floor. He had been carrying it on his shoulder, having removed it from over his dry suit. He picks it up, fumbling with it.

BEEP … BEEP … BEEP … BEEP … BEEP.

The beeps grow louder as he pulls the fluorescent orange avalanche transceiver from its holder.

“It's Will,” Jack whispers in disbelief.

“What?” I say, not daring to hope, but damn it, the spark flares. “Wait, Jack. What are you saying?”

“I'm saying, this receiver is beeping because Will turned on his transmitter.”

“He's alive, then,” I say, my breaths coming fast. “Jack, where is he? How far?”

“Less than four hundred yards.”

“Maybe he washed up on shore,” I say, unstrapping. “Maybe—”

“Alison, don't get your—” Jack starts.

“Which way?” I say, leaping out of the aircraft. But then I realize I don't need to ask. I just need to follow Mojo.

The dog sprints away, toward the broad plain that fans out away from the canyon, and I follow. Freezing rainwater soaks my flight suit, and I labor to run as mud from the soggy field sucks and pulls on my boots.

One hundred yards? Two hundred? Up and over a bridge that's somehow still standing, the water rushing just beneath.

But the longer I run, the greater the dread. What if the avalanche transceiver was ripped from Will's vest and floats on its own. Or what if it's still attached to Will, but he's been pulled underwater or remains trapped under debris. It could be all of these things.

Another fifty yards. Mojo skitters to a stop in a marshy quagmire of a field that borders the widened river, barking nonstop.

“Where is he, Mojo? Where is he?”

I pull the flashlight from my survival vest, but it doesn't have near the intensity that I need. Then, from behind, a high-powered beam shines on the water. Kevin and Thomas run up behind me with Beanie, Boomer, and Jack on their heels. Kevin carries a portable spotlight, which he sweeps across the river.

Jack holds the avalanche transceiver in front of him. BEEP … BEEP … BEEP … BEEP … BEEP.

“He should be right there!” Jack says, pointing.

Please, please, please …

“I think I've got something!” Kevin says. “I have an orange glove!”

We snap our heads in the direction of the light, to the top of an unmoving mess of debris, piled high, like a beaver dam. The only thing between the glove and us … fifty yards of uncrossable river.

“It's gotta be…” But then Kevin's voice trails away.

“It's just a glove,” Thomas says.

Mojo continues to bark toward the pile.

“Remember—and I've seen this several times—the gear you see on the snow could still be connected to the victim, like a hand in a glove.”

“What if he's buried? He could be beneath all that!” I say.