Wildfire (25 page)

Ben wasn’t surprised that she found it all incredible. He’d had trouble believing it himself. ‘Apparently it’s not so far-fetched. It’s called the High Active Auroral Research Project. They have technology that can make wind and rain and even tornadoes. Do you remember those scientists thought we’d come over in that big plane from Alaska? That’s where the other HAARP research station is based. They’ve been shipping HAARP equipment to Australia.’

Kelly folded her arms tighter. ‘Baloney. I thought your mother was a scientist, not another of these
kooky activists. Give me a break.’ She was starting to get angry.

‘My mum got this from respected scientists, not crackpots.’ Ben leaned forward. ‘Listen, in Alaska, a lot of people living near the HAARP station have been getting weird illnesses … and their dogs and cats were dying. Does that sound familiar? That was happening in Coober Pedy.’

‘According to a bunch of hairy, sandal-wearing, mud-wallowing bums. People get sick all the time. That doesn’t prove anything.’ Kelly ended up coughing again, a long attack that turned her face red.

‘Look, I’m telling you because you might need to get checked out by a doctor. If you don’t believe me, that’s fine. This HAARP thing fires a super-charged, high-frequency radio wave into the sky. It’s like detonating a nuclear bomb in the ionosphere. The fall-out can give people migraines, allergies … I just thought you might want to know—’ Ben stopped. Kelly was waving her hand at the mask.

‘Oxygen.’

Ben stood up, pulled the mask down and put it over her nose. She took some deep, slow breaths, then
nodded that she’d had enough. Ben took the mask away and sat down again.

Kelly leaned forward and pulled her knees up beneath the sheets, hugging them. She looked like she was thinking seriously about what he had said. ‘When we were near the base,’ she said in a small voice, ‘it got very windy and I thought I was covered in crawling insects. And then you got it too.’

Ben nodded. ‘And the plane instruments went haywire. I said it felt like an electric shock. HAARP can also knock out communications systems. Apparently that’s another reason the military are interested in it. We definitely got hit by fallout from this thing.’

Kelly shuddered and hugged her knees tighter. ‘Did you see a doctor? What did they say?’

‘The doctor couldn’t find anything wrong.’

Actually, that wasn’t the whole truth. The doctor who examined Ben hadn’t had experience of that type of radiation. Bel was trying to find some experts who did.

‘I expect your mum’s got everyone running around in a panic. At least the base is in the middle of Australia, so it can’t be harming that many people.’

Ben shook his head. ‘That’s not what Mum says. She thinks they chose Australia for a more sinister reason. Alaska has given them control of weather in the northern hemisphere. Australia gives them the South Pole too. It’s like a world domination thing. She’s gone straight to the Australian prime minister about it.’

‘It sounds like we stumbled on something pretty big,’ said Kelly thoughtfully.

‘Big and sinister. I thought we were chasing red herrings out there in the desert, but we might just have blown the lid on research that could be as dangerous as the hydrogen bomb.’

Kelly looked down at her knees, deep in thought. ‘Remind me, what’s your mom’s organization called? Fragile Planet, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ said Ben.

‘I’m thinking maybe I should join. Can you ask her?’

Ben snorted. ‘If I ever see her. On top of the halfterm break, I only got a few extra days holiday off school so I’ve got to fly back home in a few days. She’s working round the clock again. I might as well have stayed in Britain.’

Kelly smiled weakly. ‘That’s like my dad. I’d just caught up with him here in Melbourne, and he immediately had to go off somewhere on army business.’

‘Does he know we – er – wrecked the microlight?’

Kelly sat bolt upright, her eyes wide. ‘No way. And I’m not going to tell him we broke into a top secret base either.’ She lay back against the pillow. ‘Hey – at least you have some good stories to tell about your holiday. You’re getting to be something of an expert on disaster zones, what with the flood in London and now this.’

Ben suddenly started laughing. He laughed so hard that tears ran down his cheeks. It was almost a minute before he could compose himself enough to talk again.

Kelly was looking at him, mystified. ‘What did I say?’

Ben sighed. ‘My whole family is one big disaster zone.’

Out in the Great Victoria Desert, Grishkevich and Hijkoop had quite a crowd in their lab. Most of the base’s science personnel, and a visitor, had gathered around one of the TV monitors to watch a news broadcast.

The screen showed two firefighters moving slowly through a blackened building, searching the ground with powerful torches. They moved unsteadily, the wet wreckage sliding and shifting under their feet. Where it had moved, smoke rose in wisps from the deeper layers. The surface was cooling, but underneath it was still hot.

A journalist gave a commentary: ‘
The first fires in Adelaide were reported at eleven this morning. By two o’clock most of the city was on fire. It burned until eight this evening – and experts say if it hadn’t been for a freak thunderstorm it might still be burning now. For many it has been a lucky escape, but the search for casualties goes on
…’

Hijkoop stabbed a button and the screen went blank. He turned round. ‘How about that? Saved because the weather changed. That’s the power of nature for you. And that is why we have to be able to control it.’

His remark was addressed mainly to their guest. He was a commanding presence – tall, and wearing charcoal-blue dress uniform with gold buttons.

Major Kurtis spoke: ‘Gentlemen, I am totally in agreement. I am here to tell you that despite anything you may hear to the contrary, the HAARP experiment is very far from over.’

If you enjoyed this book, you’ll also enjoy the
Alpha Force
series by Chris Ryan. Turn over to read the beginning of
Red Centre
, which is also set in Australia!

Extract from Alpha Force: Red Centre
Copyright © Chris Ryan, 2004
0 099 46424 1

978 0 099 46424 2

Being up the tree wasn’t the scary part. It was OK if you looked straight ahead at what was in front of your nose. All you saw was the trunk, which was solid, gnarled and rough, with warty areas like the hide of a prehistoric animal. In places Hex could see tiny cracks, where a softer, redder substance showed through the bark. It smelled warm and woody and wet. In fact everywhere was warm and wet. Hex’s clothes were drenched with sweat and when he breathed in, the air was damp like steam.

The trouble started if you looked anywhere but straight ahead. Not down – Hex knew better than to
look down – but on either side. Then he saw thin air and foliage fading into a blue haze in the far distance and his senses started turning somersaults.

He felt his teeth baring in a fierce grin that was outside his control. It was partly nervousness, partly a sense of the absurdity of his position. Here he was, suspended ten metres up a red cedar tree in the Australian rainforest with his foot on a branch, waiting for the signal to swing on a rope to the next tree. A week earlier Hex hadn’t even realized Australia had thick jungles like this. Now he knew – thanks to an online virtual tour while waiting to board his plane – that the vast continent harboured a great variety of terrains, and many extremes. Here at the very tip of the Daintree Rainforest in Queensland all was lush, wet and tropical. Hex knew that only ten or so kilometres away, the land became arid and the trees shrivelled to scrub and bush.

Hex focused on the tree he was clinging to, then swivelled his head slowly like an owl, careful not to risk a disorientating glance up or down. His gaze found the next tree, his destination. A bright yellow
star-shaped target glittering there, pinned between two branches.

Together with four friends from far-flung corners of the globe, Hex was part of the group they called Alpha Force. They had tackled many arduous missions together but this had to be one of the strangest – volunteering to try out a series of games for a reality TV show. It’s for charity, Hex reminded himself soberly, forcing the grin off his face before it turned into hysteria. For every star collected, a sponsor would pay money to a chosen charity, and so Alpha Force were here doing a trial run before the real contestants arrived.

Hex wasn’t entirely in his element. The kind of games he excelled at involved codes and were firmly grounded in cyberspace: he was an expert hacker and code-breaker. His natural habitat was indoors, at his computer or in the gym. When he wasn’t on a mission with Alpha Force, the only contact he had with the great outdoors was running and cycling across Hampstead Heath. But here he was, hanging up a tree in a steamy rainforest, waiting for the camera crew to finalize their positions and lighting.

The other members of Alpha Force weren’t having it any easier. As Hex was edging his feet nervously along the branch, his Anglo-Chinese friend Li was hurtling towards the ground twenty metres away at the end of a bungee rope. Unlike Hex, though, Li most definitely
was
in her element. She was grasping the rope with both hands with her knees bent and her feet out ready for the impact. The moment she touched down on the forest floor, she folded at the waist and knees and then sprang up like a cat, propelling herself towards a box high up in another tree. The move was graceful and smooth, and executed with the pinpoint accuracy of one who has trained as an athlete from an early age. The tight plait of Li’s long black silky hair sailed out behind her like a tail and her slim legs caught a branch with the ease of a trapeze artist. She wrapped her legs around it and steadied herself while she reached into the box for one of the yellow stars. Then, like a monkey, she dropped back down to the ground and lifted off again in one slick movement.

Paulo would have been happy right then to have joined his friends in the trees. He was on his hands
and knees in a Perspex tunnel which was like a green-house in the fierce Australian heat. Brushing sweat out of his eyes with his wrist, Paulo came across one of the yellow stars and grabbed it, eager to finish the game trial and get back out into fresh air – or, at any rate, fresher air; the whole rainforest was like a sauna at this time of day. On Paulo’s list of priorities right at that moment, saving the tiger from extinction ran a distant second to gulping down an ice-cold cola float.

Paulo lifted the target. ‘Got it!’ he called to the camera crew.

The first thing that hit him was an angry droning noise. On the earth in front of him, a black shape was spreading like treacle. Was it tar? Oil? Paulo had a split-second when he noted with curiosity that the black stuff glinted with a blue metallic sheen, and then a cloud of huge flies hurtled up into his face like missiles. They buzzed around his ears and pelted his skin, seeking out the sweat that dripped off him in a constant flow. He let out a splutter and they swarmed into his open mouth. He felt a crunching sensation, a bitter taste, and spat violently, shaking his head and then his whole body in an effort to dislodge them.
Crunched flies stuck between his lips and teeth. The walls of the tunnel rocked from side to side. It made no difference. The flies were glued to the sweat on his face like a black lace veil. They began to swarm down under his collar and creep up his sleeves.

Paulo had reckoned he was fairly used to flies: on his ranch in Argentina flies and other insects were a constant torment to the livestock and the people who handled them. But this was something else.

‘Who dreams up TV shows like this anyway?’ he muttered under his breath as he crawled doggedly on into the next chamber. This was hung with spider webs. Maybe webs were just what he needed to deal with the flies, Paulo thought.

The webs stuck to him like sticky muslin, but he barely noticed against all the droning and fizzing in his ears. He lifted the next target and under it was a large spider.

Paulo grimaced at the spider. ‘I’ll swap you that star for all these delicious flies – how about that?’ he said.

‘Hold it there, Paulo,’ called one of the camera technicians. ‘We need to set up the close-up on the spider. Won’t take a second.’