DEAD BEEF (Our Cyber World Book 1) (20 page)

“Very sure.” Martin looked at Cynthia and said, “It’s the only play.”

She smiled at him.”A well calculated one or a gambit. I can't quite tell.”

Cynthia looked back at the screens. It was looking cloudy out there. Thunderstorms rolling in, she guessed. A windsock on the platform flew to the left, fully inflated. 

Chapter 28

Ochoa made the call on the satellite phone, feed number 3, and within a few minutes got back confirmation that the drop would happen within the hour. A call would come in when the helicopter was 10 minutes out, the time Martin estimated it would take him to walk up the trail and climb up the rock wall.

To double-check, Martin walked around the cabin and up to the trailhead leading up to the fire lookout to see if a clearing or a wide enough opening in the trees existed to make a safer drop possible. He found no alternatives. It was plan A all the way, even if it fell like plan F.

Martin recalled how he’d frozen halfway up the rope ladder earlier in the day, just because of a little gust of wind. Now, the weather had turned from sunny to overcast. In the far distance he could hear thunder rumbling through the Sierras, echoing off hills and rock faces. Around him, the pine trees were hissing as the wind drove through their foliage.

He went back to the cabin with 15 minutes to go before he would start up the trail. At the sink, he poured himself a glass of water and drank slowly. He realized he hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast this morning. Searching through the small pantry, he found the granola bars he and Sasha had brought up the day before. He took one for himself, and offered them up to the others.

They all ate in silence. Only Sasha’s occasional moan drew Martin out of his thoughts.

“Two minutes,” Stan said 12 minutes before the scheduled drop.

Martin went over to Sasha and whispered in her ear, “I’m going to get some stuff for you. And I’m getting it from our favorite spot in the world.” He kissed her on the forehead, recalling how she had embraced it up there earlier that morning, how she had whispered in his ear.

Martin stood up and said, “I’ll just go now. Just in case I need to go slow.”

Cynthia nodded.

Ochoa said, “Vaya con Dios.”

Martin arrived at the top of the trail eight minutes later. As he passed each rope ladder he counted them off, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. When he arrived at ladder number 6, he could see the last ladder up ahead, just before the trail abruptly ended, with nothing but sky and dark, cloudy space beyond it. He set that thought aside and noticed the last ladder was made out of red metal. Rusted metal, he realized as he approached it. It made sense that the ladder leading up to where the shack had stood would be made out of metal. He took comfort in the thought of climbing up a solid, unmoving ladder, until he saw it up close.

The rusted metal was very thin for the first few rungs, and he could see several of them up above broken and bent. How would anyone be able to climb up there and service camera number 7? He looked down-trail and found the answer: the ladder for camera number 6. He walked back, feeling his shirt billowing in the wind. He told himself that this ladder was shorter than number 4, and the climb would therefore be easier.

A stiff gust readjusted his thinking. Martin waited for it to pass, clinging to the rope ladder and standing flat against the wall. Then he started climbing up, as quickly as he could. While his initial plan would have him wait until the helicopter appeared, knowing now that he’d have to somehow make it from camera number six to the platform, he needed to make up the time that effort would take.

He was almost at the top, when another, stiffer gust lashed across the rock face. Martin wrapped his arms through the rope on either side of the ladder and gritted his teeth. This time, instead of fear, he felt his heart race with anger — anger that Sasha lay dying because some goon had shot her, anger that he had come to her and brought this fate on her, anger that the code had malfunctioned, anger that he’d been fired, anger that if he kept unraveling it all, the fault came back on him. If he had just lived a simple life and not hungered for all that money, success and accomplishment, if he hadn't clawed to create something that would change the world, maybe he’d be living in some mediocre middle class neighborhood, but he sure wouldn’t be here, on this rock, swinging from this ladder, wishing to die and live at the same time.

“You are not knocking me down,” he said to the wind. “You will not knock me down,” he shouted. “I am going to do this, and you’re going to have to kill me if you want to stop me.”

“Why didn’t he use the other ladder?” Stan asked again.

“It’s probably rust and dust,” Ochoa said.

“Jesus, look at him,” Stan said. “He’s just stuck there.”

Ochoa looked at Cynthia. “He needs help.”

Cynthia nodded.

“I’ll go,” Ochoa offered.

“You need to stay here and keep her stable,” Cynthia said.

As if she could sense Martin’s peril, Sasha had grown restless over the past few minutes. She kept calling out for Martin. Ochoa was doing his level best to soothe her.

“Then you need to go,” Ochoa said to Cynthia. “I got this,” Ochoa added. “I got this, and I’ll be right here when you get back.”

“He’s made it to the top,” Stan said.

Cynthia looked up and saw Martin lying face down on the rock. She grabbed her Uzi sub-machine gun and ran out. 

Chapter 29

Much to his relief, a thick nylon rope traveling through eyehooks set into the rock lined the path along the narrow rock top from camera 6 to the platform. With equal relief, Martin saw that camera 6 had a pair of the tether plus carabineer rigs Sasha had shown him in the morning. He knew how he was going to do this.

The wind was whipping around him erratically. Without standing up or raising his profile any more than he had to, Martin managed to wrap the belt from one of the tethers around his waist and clipped himself to the first eyehook. He next detached the second tether from its belt. Before he could secure the belt, a gust of wind sent it flying east.

That was OK, he told himself. He wouldn’t need it.

He clipped the second tether’s carabineer to his belt on one end and to the rope just ahead of the first eyehook, and then unhooked the first tether’s carabineer from the eyehook and clipped it on the rope. Now he belly-crawled low to the ground, imagining barbwire lining a tunnel just inches above his body, and sliding the carabineers as he went.

When he arrived at the second eyehook, he unhooked carabineer number 1, hooked it back on the rope beyond the eyehook, and repeated the operation with the second carabineer.  He looked ahead and counted. Ten more eyehooks.

At that moment a strong gust coming straight at him from the platform shot him full of dust and tiny rocks. He held on to the rope on his right and clung to the rock with his left hand and splayed legs.

The gust changed in angle and direction, now coming from above. The sound of a helicopter’s engine and propellers came next. He cursed. He had told them not to do this and they did it anyway. And here he lay, not even a quarter of the way, flat on the rock and useless, holding on for his life, his machine gun slung on his back. If they dropped one hundred commandos on that platform right now, he couldn’t shoot a single one of them.

Martin looked up and saw the helicopter float to his right and up, away from the platform.

He had to get to the platform and now.

The wind kicked up again, partly nature’s fury, partly from the helicopter’s blades. He pressed on in spite of it.

Eyehook number 3, then 4, then 5 came on and by him. Halfway there, he told himself, and he crawled on.

The last eyehook dug into the rock about two inches from the platform. Now he had to unhook the other tether and find a place on the platform to secure it. The closest solid object was the welded tripod where camera number 7 stood sentinel over the Sierras.

The metal rods were too thick for the carabineer. The other tethers were there, but blown by the wind away from him, far out of reach at the moment. Martin quickly realized he had to wrap, then hook the second tether to the tripod’s nearest leg before he could re-clip it to his belt. Once he did that, he unhooked the first tether and did with it as he’d done with the first, but on the next leg of the tripod.

This was good enough, he thought. He didn’t need to go further or invent anything else. He was secure against the tripod and could also hold onto it for stability when he stood up. If he could stand up without becoming a sail, he said to himself.

To the west the sky was darkening with angry clouds. The east seemed a more even gray. The wind gusts came from anywhere and everywhere, as if its direction were set with a three dimensional roulette.

Keeping it real and random, bro, he heard Julian say.

Martin saw the helicopter circling above him. The aircraft looked steady from his vantage point, but he guessed they were also swaying to their own flavor of random up there. He had to do this quick, before the pilot abandoned the drop as too difficult.

He tried to stand, and the wind let him know with a strong gust that was a bad idea. He knelt instead and looked up to see a red box coming down slowly, swaying in the wind more and more as its tether grew longer.

He reached for camera 7’s tethers and managed to grab one. He loosened its belt and got it ready by wrapping it around the first tripod leg and re-tightening the belt. Once he captured the first package, he would clip it. The box came lower now, almost at eye level, and he noticed it had a handle. A cooler, he thought. A red cooler.

The cooler swung now in front of him, daring him to catch it as the long pendulum went back and forth like a cruel clock in front of him. Up above he heard the helicopter’s engine rev up, and felt the wind shift. Whatever they’d done up there, the pendulum shortened its swing.

This was it. He reached out and missed on his first try. On the second, the tether brushed his hand, and on the third he missed completely again. Martin took a deep breath and on the fourth swing he leapt as far as the tethers would allow. They caught him, and he made a hugging catch, then dropped to his knees.

He had it. Now he had to detach it, quickly before the helicopter pulled up. He felt the line loosen and figured they had released more line to give him a better chance. He fumbled with the fixture, and somehow he pressed the right thing. It released with a soft clank, and he tossed it away so up there they could see they could now pull it up.

Inscribed on one side of the cooler Martin saw the word “BLOOD.” The wind kicked up and he hunched down, hugging the cooler like a protective canopy.

“Blood,” he whispered. Sasha’s blood.

He realized he was shaking.

The wind let up. Martin secured the cooler, looping the strap through its handle and clipping it tight.

He looked up. A blue object had begun its descent.

He looked to his right, located the second camera 7 tether and reached for it. It was just barely out of reach, and he needed it now. He strained, but couldn’t get there.

Up above, he saw the blue box getting larger.

Martin unhooked his left tether, and slid to his right, reaching again for the second camera 7 tether. He got it this time. He re-tethered himself just as the wind whipped against him, from the left, from the right, from above.

He covered his eyes until it let up just enough for him to resume his task. When he re-opened his eyes, he had to wipe tears away. Was he crying, or were the wind and the dust causing his tears? He had no time to figure that out.

Above him, the blue box swung closer and closer. This time, knowing what he needed, he got the tether ready faster. Just in time, too, because now the blue box, another cooler reading “SUPPLIES” swung at eye level.

Without hesitation this time, Martin lunged. This time the cooler crashed into his chest with a thump, knocking the wind out of him. He came crashing down cradling the cooler. He struggled to breathe at first, and then he settled down.

Again, fumbling with the fixture, he tried to find the release. It didn’t work. He fumbled some more, and a gust came by, and the line tightened, pulling the cooler higher. Still out of breath he hugged it tight until it pulled him straight up, the tethers pulling hard on the tripod.

Martin heard the bolts and the wood give, just enough to imagine himself flying up, hanging from the cooler, a metal tripod hanging from his back.

He hugged the cooler tighter, ready for reality to match his imagination, and heard a click. Instinctively he turned his face to the left, just in time to feel the bracket fixture fly away, brushing his hair.

Martin came crashing down again. This time he held the hunched over position for a minute longer, trembling and struggling to regain his breath. For those watching from the cabin, Martin imagined he might look as if he was praying.

The wind died down, almost completely, and he heard it, to his left. Someone screaming his name.

He looked back to his left in the direction of camera 6. There she was, Cynthia, her head poking just above the rock, screaming his name.

“Are you OK!” she was shouting now. “Martin, are you OK!”

He swallowed and fought the urge to cry. He raised his left hand and gave her a thumbs-up. For a moment, he imagined Ochoa and Beloski back in the cabin, cheering at his gesture.

Martin looked up and saw a slender black-clad figure waving at him from the helicopter, its arm tracing a wide semicircle. “All done,” he whispered. Nothing else to drop, he figured the signal meant.

Now came the hard part, crawling back not only with his tether but with the coolers. He thought about Cynthia waiting for him at camera number 6, and instead of being angry that she’d disregarded his direction he felt relief. Though he’d already planned how to take the cooler down the ladder, it would be tough work, and she could help him save a lot of time.

He would need that. Around him the weather turned grimmer. The thunder grew louder. The flashes of lightning loomed closer.

It was here that Martin made a key decision. To save time on the way back, he would single-tether himself. Otherwise he had three tethers to worry about, his two and the cooler’s, and that would add 50% more time to each eyehook point.

Slowly and carefully he unhooked one of his tethers from the farthest tripod head, then shifted to the edge of the platform and stepped down to the rock where he tethered himself to the first eyehook along his return path. Next he unclipped the red cooler’s tether from the belt that held it against the tripod leg and transferred its carabineer to the nylon rope. The final step had him untether from the nearest tripod leg, and he tucked its carabineer into his pants at the small of his back just in case he needed it down the line.

Martin was now ready to head back. Holding tightly to the rope, he untethered from the eyehook and onto the rope. A second later he was sliding the red cooler ahead of him on the rock and moving toward Cynthia.

For a few minutes, the wind gave him respite, giving him the chance to operate faster and move without frequent stops.

He got to the last eyehook, and slid forward, until his and Cynthia’s faces were only inches apart. She was crying.

“Jesus, Martin,” she said, and for a moment he reflected that this woman crying before him, just a few hours ago had coolly and matter-of-factly popped three 22 caliber rounds into the back of a man’s head.

“I think you mean Jesus Christ,” he said in a poor attempt at humor. “Halfway done, Cynthia. Halfway done. Listen,” he added, showing her the cooler. “This is blood. Blood for Sasha.”

Cynthia nodded. She swallowed, and as a gust of wind hit across his back, Martin could see her eyes drying up.

“OK, you’re going to help me by taking this one down,” Martin said. He unclipped the red cooler’s tether from the guide rope and clipped it onto the right side of ladder’s top rung. “As you go down,” he told her, “you brace yourself. Wrap your right arm through the ladder, hold the strap up with your left, and unclip the carabineer and move it to the rung below. You got that?”

“Yes,” she said. “Easy.”

“Cynthia, promise me something.”

“What?”

“When you get to the bottom, go back to the cabin and take the cooler to Ochoa. Sasha needs the transfusion now. Don’t wait for me. There’s nothing you can do to help me here.”

Cynthia did not reply. Martin was about to insist when he felt a couple of droplets. Thunder clapped behind him. Rain was coming.

He looked back at the platform and he considered for a moment whether he too should go down and head to the cabin. The blue cooler was secured to the tripod for camera 7. He could come back to it later that day, or the next morning.

Martin looked down the ladder. Cynthia was halfway down, making good progress. He pulled the carabineer out of the small of his back, and latched it to the rope. He was going back.