Earth and Fire (11 page)

“Can I answer
this?” I asked.

“Of course,”
said Gradin, in full sarcasm mode. “Chat all you like. It’s not as if we’re
doing anything important here.”

I sighed. “My
friend, Issette, is calling me from my Next Step. I’d like to check what’s
happening about me missing curfew.”

“Oh, all right
then. Check how the prison guards are reacting to one of their inmates going
missing.”

I giggled and
answered my lookup. An image of Issette’s head appeared, with Keon looking over
her shoulder.

“Jarra, Jarra,
Jarra,” she gasped. “Is that you in the suit? Are you really fighting a forest fire
at Athens?”

“It’s me,” I
said, “and yes. New York Fringe called the Principal with my message then. How
did she take it?”

“They called her
during dinner,” said Issette. “She did that thing of hers that’s like yelling,
only in a quiet voice, and told them it was far too dangerous for someone still
underage and you had to come back immediately.”

“But I can’t,” I
said.

“Don’t worry,”
said Issette. “The Principal got another call a bit later, went off somewhere
private to answer it, then came back looking chaos furious and said you wouldn’t
be back for curfew. We couldn’t work out what had happened.”

There was a
laugh from beside me. “What happened,” said Gradin, “was New York Fringe Dig
Site called the Dig Site Federation, the Dig Site Federation called Hospital
Earth’s Planetary Administration Division, and they called your Principal and
told her to keep her nose out of things.”

“They did?” I
shook my head in disbelief. “Why would they do that?”

“Because Planetary
Administration’s emergency response teams sometimes call on Dig Site Federation
pilots for help,” said Gradin. “The last time we fought a forest fire as
massive as this one, it was to stop it destroying Australia Off-world and its
staggeringly expensive interstellar portals. That means Hospital Earth have a
vested interest in encouraging a new pilot to learn about fire fighting, and
are happy to ignore minor technicalities like her being a few months underage.”

He paused. “By
the way, Issette, I’m Gradin, the unfortunate person teaching Jarra to fly. I
hate to interrupt this conversation with trivia, but our target just appeared.”

I glanced at the
main display, where the white dot of our position was rapidly approaching the
blue cross of our target. “Oh chaos! Hold on, Issette, I’ll talk to you again
in a minute.”

I wedged my
lookup at the side of the control panel, and concentrated on the countdown. I
heard a loud squeak of panic from Issette as we swooped low across the fire,
and realized she must be able to see the view out of the window, but I couldn’t
do anything about it now. The countdown hit zero and I opened the scoops, the
plane lurched upwards as always when we dumped water, and there was another
squeak from Issette. I grabbed the lookup again.

“I’m back.”

“You scared me
to death!” Issette shrieked at me. “I thought you were crashing!”

“Sorry.
Everything’s fine. We were just diving to dump water on the fire.”

“You scared me to
death too,” said Keon. “An extremely terrifying possible future life just
flashed before me. It was a very edifying moment. I can see you’re totally
addicted to doing dangerous things, and there’s no hope of you ever giving them
up to lead a normal existence.”

I sighed. “I may
be forced to give them up. If the Principal is really angry about me coming
here, she’ll stop me spending the summer break at New York Fringe.”

“No she won’t,”
said Gradin. “You just have to tell your Principal you’re going to New York
Fringe to get your pilot’s licence, and she won’t dare to lift a finger to stop
you in case she gets another lecture from some high up official. I think your
Principal will be cheering and waving flags next Year Day when she gets rid of
you permanently. Now if you’ve quite finished chatting …?”

“Yes. Issette,
Keon, I have to go now. I’ll see you soon.” I ended the call and put my lookup
back in the storage pocket.

“Your boyfriend seems
to strongly disapprove of you flying over forest fires,” said Gradin.

“My boyfriend?
Oh, you mean Keon. He’s not my boyfriend.”

“Perhaps he was
considering becoming your boyfriend.” Gradin laughed. “If he was, then I think
he’s changed his mind now. Well, that’s his problem. Let’s concentrate on what
we’re doing.”

I forgot about
Issette, Keon, and the Principal, as Gradin and I fought the fire through the
night, flying more circuits, far more circuits, what seemed like endless numbers
of circuits. The fire had divided into two now, and one part was heading off
along the coast. I wondered if there was a settlement in that direction,
pictured them getting a fire alert and evacuating, and felt vaguely guilty that
we weren’t doing anything to help. We couldn’t fight both halves of the fire
though, and you didn’t risk lives to save a settlement that could be rebuilt in
days. The only reason everyone was here fighting this fire was because we were
historians, Athens was irreplaceable, and we loved it.

Well, everyone here
loved Athens except Gradin. He claimed he didn’t care about the ruins, or even
about the people fighting the fire. He said he was only here because his ego
enjoyed playing the heroic pilot coming to the rescue. I wasn’t sure if I
believed that or not. By now, we’d helped get half a dozen ground teams out of
trouble by dumping water on them, and every time I’d heard Gradin give a brief,
tuneless whistle. Did those whistles indicate worry or just excitement?

Whatever his motives,
whether it was pure vanity or he secretly cared and wouldn’t admit it, Gradin had
been doing this sort of thing for forty years. I could see he was good at it,
brilliant even, and must have saved a lot of lives, so …

“Why are you
retiring?” I asked. “Surely portal delivery pilots don’t fight forest fires, or
at least not as often as pilots on dig sites.”

He sighed. “How
are you feeling right now, Jarra?”

“A bit scared
still.”

“I meant
physically.”

I shrugged. “I’m
starting to ache a bit from wearing a heavy impact suit for hours.”

“I’m aching a
lot,” said Gradin. “My ego still enjoys doing this, but I’ve reached the age
where my body objects to spending too many hours in an impact suit. Rejuvenation
treatments help, but it’s still time for me to start taking things a little
easier. You’ve got forty years before you hit this problem, so don’t worry
about it.”

I wasn’t going
to worry about it. Forty years was an impossibly long time, more than twice my
whole life. We did two more circuits in total silence, before I heard a new female
voice speak on my comms.

“This is Air
Control. We’re going to do a rolling handover to the next shift, replacing one
plane each circuit, and give you all an eight-hour break. London, you’re first.
Complete this circuit and head into land. New Tokyo will then launch and take
your spot.”

“We’re the tenth
plane in circuit,” said Gradin, “so we’ve got to do ten more circuits, and then
we’ll only get eight hours’ rest. That’s the worst thing about such a big fire.
They need so many of us in the air at once that they can only run two shifts,
not the three they need to give us a decent break.”

I thought eight
hours of freedom from my heavy, restrictive impact suit sounded like blizz,
pure utter ecstatic blizz. I’d be able to do wonderful things like shower,
drink, eat, and sleep. Since Gradin was grumbling about it, I toned down the
enthusiasm of my reply.

“Eight hours
isn’t bad.”

“Tell me that
after you’ve been alternating eight hours of flying with eight hours of rest
for a week.”

“A week! You
really think we’ll be here that long?”

“I’ve known it
take that long with a big fire,” said Gradin, “and this one isn’t just big but
has a strong wind behind it. It came in too fast for Ground Command to burn a
firebreak barrier, but even if they had the fire would have jumped it. They’ve
got a lot of people tied up putting out small secondary fires started by
burning debris carried on the wind.”

He sighed. “We
need rain on our side to win this one. I hope the wind is a sign the hot spell
is going to break up into storms.”

“Before Exodus
century, they used to have weather forecasting that …”

I remembered my
promise not to talk about history and shut up, but too late. Gradin was already
groaning.

“Is this ancient
weather forecasting the remotest use to us now? Is it going to tell us when
we’ll get rain, or help us put the fire out?”

I kept carefully
quiet until Air Control finally announced that Sydney would be replacing us. We
left the circuit, went into land, and I climbed down from the plane feeling
stiff and shaky with exhaustion. I unsealed my hood, eager to escape the musty
filtered air of the suit system, but the wind stank of smoke and was full of
floating fragments of ash.

“Get as much
sleep as you can,” said Gradin. “In eight hours’ time, we’re doing this all
over again.”

I had the luxury of a proper bed
and a whole room to myself during the rest break, while others slept in sleep
sacks on the crowded floors of hastily erected mobile domes. Gradin laughed at
my embarrassment, telling me a single pilot in the air was more important to
the defence of Athens than dozens of people fire fighting on the ground, so it was
vital pilots had the chance to sleep properly.

He was perfectly
right, except for one key fact. I wasn’t a pilot, just a clueless kid operating
the scoop controls. That might make Gradin’s life a bit simpler, but it
certainly wasn’t a crucial contribution because most of the pilots here were
flying solo and operating the scoops themselves. I felt I didn’t deserve special
treatment, and I said so, but Gradin just yawned, told me to shut up, and
walked off to his own room.

So I slept in
undeserved luxury, dreaming I was flying a fire plane above a forest fire that
wasn’t threatening Athens but my Next Step. Everyone had evacuated, but I had
to save the building because Issette had left Whoopiz the Zen in her room. To
add to the weirdness, the rest of the settlement had vanished, and our Next
Step was standing alone in an immense forest. I was trying to find the sea so I
could fill the scoops with water, but there was nothing but endless trees below
me. I was still frantically searching when the alarm on my lookup jerked me
awake with a start.

I showered,
checked the pile of cartons someone had left in my room, drank some frujit and
ate half a helping of Osiris mash, then struggled back into my impact suit.
Once outside, I paused to look at the horizon. Was the fire burning a little
less fiercely, or did it just seem that way because it was daylight?

I found our
plane, but Gradin wasn’t there yet. I put on my hover tunic and climbed into my
seat. Still no sign of Gradin. I hesitated, then entered my pilot code and
started running the diagnostics and power checks.

Gradin arrived a
couple of minutes later, his suit already sealed. He shrugged his way into his
hover tunic, glanced at the flashing lights on the control panel, and gave a grunt
that seemed to indicate approval, before climbing into the plane and settling
down into his seat with a groan.

“Here we go
again. Check your hover tunic. Set your comms. Abandon your sanity.”

I gave a
startled giggle, and he groaned again.

“No giggling.
Definitely no giggling.” He tapped his comms controls and spoke on the Air
Control channel. “This is New York. We need at least three more hours’ sleep
but we are, reluctantly, ready to launch.”

“This is Air
Control,” said a female voice. “I haven’t slept at all in over twenty-four
hours, Gradin, and I’m not grumbling.”

“This is New
York. You’re ten years younger than me, Valeska.”

“This is Air
Control. Sydney, please complete this circuit and head in to land. New York
will then stop complaining, launch, and take over your spot.”

Gradin set his
comms to speak on the private channel with me again. “Thirty years ago, Valeska
and I were together in Shanghai. A solar storm brought down the Earth portal network
and stranded us in a dig site dome for three days. Unfortunately, there were
twenty other people there as well, and she ended up marrying one of them. It
was a lucky escape. For her, if not for me.”

I didn’t reply,
just sat there in cautious silence during the take-off, wondering if it was
really Gradin inside that suit or a stranger. He seemed much less sarcastic
than usual, almost friendly.

He waited until
we’d taken up our position in the circuit and filled the scoops with seawater
before speaking again. “You’re still here then.”

“What?”

“You didn’t run
away in the rest break.”

I was grazzed. “Of
course not. Did you think I would?”

“It seemed possible.
You were scared yesterday, and you’d already run away once after scratching my
plane.”

I winced at the
reminder.

“I brought you to
Athens to see if you’d make a real pilot or not.” Gradin laughed. “A trial by
fire. You did pretty well. You didn’t run away during the rest break. You’re
back for more today. That means I’m taking you seriously now. I’ll fly the next
three circuits, and then we’ll swap over. You can fly for a bit while I take
over scoops.”

I gulped. “Me? Fly?
Here?”

“Yes. I just
said I’m taking you seriously now. It’s obvious most pilots you’ve flown with have
taken the lazy option. They’ve done the take-off and landing themselves to
avoid putting in too much effort teaching you, and then sat back and relaxed
while you did the boring work of flying their dig site survey legs for them. The
end result is you’re still a novice on landings, but you’re a perfectly
competent pilot in midair.”

“Yes, but …”

“But what?”
asked Gradin. “Even if you stay an amateur pilot rather than a professional,
you’ll probably end up helping with something like this eventually. Better to
get some experience of it here with me, rather than come back in a year or two
and try it for the first time solo.”

He was right. If
I was ever going to do this, it made sense to do it now. The only argument
against it was to say I wasn’t the sort of pilot who’d ever do it. To say I was
the sort of pilot who enjoyed flying surveys over a dig site on a sunny day,
but would let Athens burn without lifting a finger to save it.

Gradin wouldn’t
think much of me if I said that. More importantly, I wouldn’t think much of me
either, so I kept quiet and tensely studied every move Gradin made for the next
few circuits. After we’d dumped the third lot of water, he spoke on the Air
Control channel.

“This is New
York pilot handing control to co-pilot.”

I hit the unlock
switch for the co-pilot controls, moistened my lips, and spoke on Air Control myself.
“This is New York co-pilot, Jarra Reeath. I have control.”

“This is Air
Control,” said Valeska’s voice. “Noting that with interest.”

I switched my
comms back to the private channel and concentrated on the flying. This was far
harder than flying a survey plane over a dig site. Things were bumpy with the
heat from the fire, the strength of the wind, and the scoops dragging beneath
the plane. I was also painfully aware I had to keep precisely in position
because I was sharing the sky with nine other planes.

“When we’re over
the sea, I’ll talk you through the speed and height changes,” said Gradin. “Filling
the scoops is a lot easier in daylight than at night.”

I grunted an
acknowledgement, my eyes torn between the view ahead and the main display of
the control panel.

“We’re approaching
the coast,” said Gradin. “Start losing height.”

I dipped the
nose of the plane as I flew on towards the sea, crossed the coastline, and
looked down at the waves below.

“Ease off the
thrusters now. Imagine you’re coming into land.” Gradin paused for a moment. “Lose
a little more height, and … That’s it. Keep this height, slow to stalling speed,
then transition to hovers but keep the thrusters running on minimum as well.
Rather like your crash landing.”

Why did he have
to remind me of that? I held back an angry response, concentrating on balancing
thrusters and hovers.

“Scoops in
three, two, one, now!” said Gradin.

I felt the jerk
as the scoops entered the water, increased hovers, and found I needed to
increase thrusters a fraction as well.

A few seconds
later, Gradin spoke again. “Scoops are full and out of the water. Climb for
height now and then cut hovers. The plane feels sluggish, doesn’t it?”

“Yes.” I gasped
out the single word.

“You did that
well,” said Gradin, “but next time please remember you’re allowed to breathe.”

I gulped in air
and giggled.

“But not allowed
to giggle,” he added. “Now, dumping the water is much simpler. You just slow
and lose a bit of height to make sure you hit the target. The fire beneath you
can be distracting but you have to learn to ignore it.”

Minutes later, I
was trying to ignore the flames beneath me. They somehow seemed much higher and
brighter now I was flying the plane.

Gradin was
giving me directions again. “The display countdown has started, so that’s your
cue to start losing speed and height. Remember to breathe this time. Just a
little lower and … three, two, one, now!”

The plane
responded to losing the dead weight of water by bouncing upwards. Up was good. Up
was away from those flames. I climbed for a bit more height and flew on in the
circuit of planes, gradually curving my way round to fly back towards the sea.
My jangling nerves relaxed. Gradin would take control now.

“That went quite
well,” said Gradin. “You can fly a few more circuits for me.”

Chaos! How many
circuits did he mean when he said a few more? Two or three? I considered
asking, but decided it wouldn’t make things any easier. I flew on for the next
circuit, another, and six circuits later I was blinking sweat out of my eyes
and still flying. Gradin had stopped talking me through every move by now, just
throwing in the occasional comment on speed and height.

We’d picked up
water and were heading inland towards the fire, when Gradin suddenly leaned
forward in his seat and whistled. There was a jet of flame shooting up from the
fire where a power storage unit had exploded. The plane ahead of us in the
circuit, Paris Coeur, was rocketing skywards on full thrusters to get clear.

Gradin gave a
grunt and relaxed back into his seat again. “Keep an eye on the main display,
Jarra. The explosion should have died down before we reach it, but I expect Air
Control will play safe and divert us round it anyway.”

Gradin was
right. The white line of our course on the main display changed to send us on a
gentle curve round where the power cell had exploded. I was banking to the left
when I heard a woman’s urgent voice on Air Control channel.

“This is Paris
Coeur breaking circuit, breaking circuit! Thrusters are overheating, must have
been hit by some debris from the …”

Paris Coeur was
breaking circuit, changing course for an emergency landing! One of the seemingly
pointless rules I’d learned for my theory test wasn’t pointless at all. Paris
Coeur had total priority now. Other aircraft should take evasive action to
avoid a collision. Other aircraft included me!

I looked ahead, anxiously
watching Paris Coeur, and saw the aircraft altering course to head towards
Athens. If I …

The plane ahead seemed
to falter, tipped sideways, and dived at a sickeningly steep angle towards the
ground, smoke trailing behind it.

“Nuking hell!”
Gradin’s voice shouted in my ear. “She’s on fire! Get out, get out, get out,
get …”

He broke off as
something small fell clear of the plane, tumbling downwards at speed for a few
seconds before slowing. The pilot’s hover tunic had cut in to break her fall.

“She’s jumped,”
said Gradin. “Jarra, pay attention!”

Chaos take it, I
couldn’t be paying more attention than this!

“That pilot’s
going to land in the heart of the fire. Her impact suit won’t take that level of
heat for long. We have to try and pick her up with our scoops.”

We had to what? I
opened my mouth but no words came out.

Gradin was still
talking. “I’ll work scoops. You’re flying. We dump water right on top of the
pilot, turn, and come back positioned as if we’re filling the scoops. I’ll talk
you through exactly what to do.”

He paused for a
second. “Jarra, do you understand? Talk to me! Are you going to help me with
this, or are you freezing up on me?”

I forced myself
to speak. “I’m helping. Shouldn’t you be flying though?”

“No! It needs an
expert on the scoops to have any chance of this working.”

There’d been
dead silence on the Air Control channel, but now Valeska started talking. “This
is Air Control. Paris Coeur is down. Paris Coeur, respond please.”

There was no
answer. The falling figure had just hit the ground. Their impact suit would
have triggered hard to protect them, and they’d probably blacked out for a few
seconds.

Valeska was
calling Paris Coeur again when Gradin interrupted her. “This is New York. We’re
coming in to try a pickup with scoops. Paris Coeur, are you awake yet?”

“This is Paris
Coeur,” said a dazed female voice.

“This is New
York. We’ll dump water on you, then come back. When the scoops touch, you jump in
and yell.”

Another female
voice joined the conversation. “This is London. If you don’t make it first try,
New York, bank away to the right. I’m coming in behind you and I’ll dump water
to keep things under control. You can come round to follow me in for a second
attempt. I’m flying solo so I can’t try this myself.”

“This is Air
Control. New York, your target is set to Paris Coeur suit location. All other planes
ignore targets and stand by to assist New York with water drops.”

I looked at the
blue cross on my screen, and altered course slightly to head straight for it. I
heard Gradin speaking again, back on our private channel now.

“This is just like
a standard water drop, Jarra, but you’re going to bank round immediately
afterwards and come back as if you’re picking up water from the ocean. You’re
doing the flying, because I know you can handle that. I’ve seen you do it.”

I didn’t reply.
The blue countdown had started and I was totally focused on my approach to my
target.

“You have to
come in a fraction lower and slower than usual. We need to drop this water
perfectly on target,” said Gradin.

I lost a bit
more height, slowed, and felt the aircraft jerk upwards as the water fell.

“Turn hard right,”
said Gradin.