“It’ll be dark soon — surely the drone won’t be able to see us then?”
“It will.”
Bashir looked to the sky. “How high do drones fly?”
“I do not know, but our people in Afghanistan say that night and day they bear witness to the danger above. Sometimes they hear them but do not always see them.”
“So they’re looking for us on the ground, right? What say we leave the ground? They wouldn’t be looking for us up there.” Bashir watched the other man for a sign of endorsement. Finally a broad smile from Bomani gave him his answer. “And how do you suggest we do it, my friend?”
The words my friend were more than just words to Bashir, they meant he had been accepted by the Takfir. He felt overwhelmed with pride, basking in the moment. “The GPS can show us where to find an airport… it won’t take me long.” Bashir skillfully worked the technology. “There… just let me drill out a bit. OK. We’re in luck, my brother… an airfield. I don’t know how big, but an airfield nevertheless.”
Bonani smiled. The young Takfir had done well. Very well.
The air-sock lay limp on the tall white pole. The airfield was little more than pasture. One lonely hangar midway along the strip helped identify it; the other identifier was a sign next to a grassed road. Welcome to Air Ag and Scenic Air.
“Can you fly?”
Bashir shook his head. “No. Do you have cash to pay for a plane and pilot?”
“I have a rifle and bullets, will that do?”
Bashir laughed.
The van bumped along over the grass and stopped near the hangar. Two vehicles were parked up nearby. Bashir headed into the hangar via two large open doors at the front. “Anybody home?”
“Agh shit! Damn, that hurt.” A man dressed in well-used blue overalls stood up straight from working under the bonnet of an old car. He flicked his fingers then looked to see the damage. Bruised knuckles. “Be right with you.” Taking an oily rag from his back pocket he rubbed it over his hands, careful of the sore knuckles. “Howdy, sorry about that, just rapped my knuckles on the block.” The man in his fifties strode over to the doors. As he walked he removed his cap and scratched the remaining hair on the sides and back of his head, before giving the cap a couple of bangs on his leg and replacing it on his head.
“Ain’t seen you before,” he extended his hand. “Nathan Nathans at your service, people round here just call me Nathan, Nat, some even call me Nathans. You can call me anything you like, ’cept late for breakfast. Get it? Late for breakfast… anyways, Nat’s the name. So who’m I talkin’ to?” he thrust out his hand.
There was an awkward silence. The agricultural pilot realized he wasn’t going to get a reciprocal handshake so he pulled his hand back. “Sorry, greasy hand. So, um, guess you don’t want your land sprayed, huh? No? Yeah, well, I guessed as much. So, a scenic flight? You’ve come to the right place. I can show you anything and everything. You like fishing? I got some poles here, and I know the dandiest fishing holes…”
Bashir couldn’t believe this man, he hadn’t managed to get a word in. He held his hands up in the air in a ‘hold your horses’ gesture.
“Aw, sorry, sorry. Not a scenic flight then?” There was no stopping the man. “You just here for directions maybe? Lost, huh? No problem, you come to the right man. I know these parts like…”
“Stop!”
The pilot obliged, then took off his cap, held it in both hands in front of him and gave a huge smile that stuck to his face.
“You are a pilot, right?”
“You betcha, I’m…”
“Whoa, whoa, whoa.” Bashir looked around the hangar. “I don’t see any planes.”
“Yeah, it’s here. Under that tarp over there. Now, you’ll be askin’ yourself: ‘What in heck is that plane doing under that tarp?’ Good question…”
“Mister, I don’t care. All I want to know is does it go?
“Yep, it goes…”
“Stay here, I’ll just go and speak to my friend. One thing… we’d want to put our van in here out of the weather, that OK with you?”
“Yeah, no problem, but it’s getting a little late in the day for sightseeing. I was thinking more like tomorrow.” If Bashir had heard, he paid no attention and continued walking. The pilot looked over at the tarpaulin and rubbed his chin. He spoke out aloud to himself: “And the other thing I was going to say was… it kinda goes, most of the time… but I guess you don’t want to hear that. Nope, guess you don’t.”
Bomani was waiting by the van. “How did it go?”
“We have a pilot, a plane and a place to hide the van.”
“You did well. Let’s move quickly.”
“Just park her up over there, boys… yeah, just like that. I don’t have to tell you boys much, eh? ‘Galloping Caterers’, well, I’ll be. You don’t happen to have some free samples in the back, do you? Oh hi, I didn’t see you before. Name’s Nathan, Nat, some even call me Nathans, you…”
Bomani had turned off the ignition and was getting out the door when the pilot started introducing himself. Bomani stared at the stranger and summed him up in less than a second. “Shut up.” He then slid open the side doors of the van.
“Say what? I couldn’t have heard you right. Anyways, my name is Nathan, Nat…”
“I won’t say it again. Shut up.”
“Hey, you can’t talk to me like that…”
Bomani took out his rifle from the carry bag and pointed it at the pilot. The man’s jaw dropped. Bashir directed the pilot to prepare the airplane for take-off then watched as he pulled off the cover.
“What the hell is that?” said Bashir as the cover fell to the ground.
“An airplane.” The pilot had lost some of his talkative nature once the rifle was pointed at him. But not all. “A three-seater 1940s Waco bi-plane.”
Bomani moved closer to the pilot. “The two cars outside, who do they belong to?”
“The red one is mine and the blue one belongs to my business partner.”
“Where is your partner?”
“Taking a client back home.”
“In what?”
“Our helicopter. Look, we don’t want no trouble.”
“When will he be back?”
“Soon. We don’t fly at night.”
“Where do you live and where does your partner live?”
“Hey, come on now, you can’t just come in here and wave a gun around, we got rights, we…”
Bomani adopted a standing stance for a rifle shot and raised the weapon to his shoulder. The pilot looked squarely down the barrel.
“Not a problem, not a problem.” He cleared his throat. “Kate lives with me, we live here in this hangar. At the back there is where we sleep and eat.”
“This Kate, she is your partner? A woman?”
The pilot nodded.
“Good. We wait.” Bomani walked across to Bashir. “We stay here the night, the drone won’t find us here. Tomorrow we take a helicopter ride.”
It was dusk as the helicopter landed on its wheeled dolly outside the hangar. Kate started her routine to shut down the chopper. Looking towards the large open doors she noticed Nat and a couple of strangers. Happy for more work to be coming their way, she gave a polite wave in their direction; there was no reciprocal wave. What’s up with Nat? Odd. Kate started to unbuckle her seat belt. One of the men started to approach. She held up a hand to stop him coming forward; the rotor blades were still winding down. The man crouched and broke into a run towards the chopper.
It was then she saw the rifle pointed at Nat’s back. The last passengers had talked about the heavy police presence on the ground and the official notice over the radio to be on the lookout for three suspicious men. Even though she saw every movement of the man coming towards her, she was still shocked when her door was pulled open and she was told to get out. The man, in his twenties, followed up his demands by grabbing her by the arm and wrenching her from her seat. Kate fell heavily to the concrete below, then was roughly manhandled towards Nat and the other man with the gun.