There were gross changes as well, such as a species of lamprey, those ancient fish-like creatures with circular mouths filled and rasp-like teeth. When it rained, the new species left their waterways and slithered up onto the land, making a meal of livestock. And if they managed to get into your house and found you sleeping, they’d latch onto a limb or torso and leave a painful, weeping sore when they were done.
Nearly every day now, the tingling in their gut followed by the blacking out of all light was occurring. They all knew that whatever was happening was accelerating. No one doubted that there were big changes coming. And they just prayed nothing happened before they had a chance to change it all back.
Drake and Ben walked along a row of their tactical hardware laid out on the warehouse floor. Emma was at the far end also checking off some of her own new equipment arrivals.
“Cheer up,” Drake said.
“I feel like shit,” Ben said.
“What, about bringing in those merc knuckleheads? Forget about it; they know how to deal with deadly risk. They’re hard-asses, and bastards all of them, but damn good at what they do. Plus, they’ve got jungle experience and are totally fearless. They’ll do their job.”
“They didn’t believe me,” Ben said. “I’m, we, are walking them into a freaking prehistoric meat grinder.”
“They’ve risked themselves before, and if they make it, they get a million bucks. Believe me, for that amount of money, they’d go even if I told them they’d have to duke it out with Satan himself.” Drake half smiled.
“If we didn’t need ‘em, I wouldn’t bring ‘em,” Ben replied.
Drake cocked his head. “Hey, you ever heard of the old diving axiom about always swimming with a buddy?”
Ben shook his head and Drake grinned wider. “It’s so it improves your chance of not being the guy who gets eaten by a shark.”
Ben scoffed. “So I should bring them, just so they might be the ones killed instead of me?”
“That’s right,” Emma said, wandering over. “That’s damn right.” She lugged a few big boxes with her.
Drake shrugged. “What can I say? Two against one.”
“You, Ben Cartwright, are going to save your family, and maybe even the entire human race. Those mercenaries are going to make some fast money.” Emma dropped the boxes she carried with a thump, and then folded her arms. “That’s why they call them mercenaries.”
“Brutal,” Ben said.
“But accurate,” Drake added.
“Damn straight.” Emma squared her shoulders.
Ben could see she meant every word and was prepared to fight him on it. “Okay.” He knew that either the mercs went with him, or maybe she’d decide to go as well. And that was something he couldn’t bear. He changed the subject. “What have you got there?”
She crouched by one of the boxes. “We learned a lot last time we went in. Getting there, and I mean up there, proved to be the first and one of the biggest hurdles.”
“You can say that again.” Ben waited.
She laid a hand on one of the boxes. “Flying up to the plateau top is out, as the magnetic pulses knock out electronics, and even using gliders would be impossible due to the wind turbulence. And we found out the hard way that ballooning is subject to attack.”
“And external cliff face climbing is dangerous for non-climbers — sheer walls at over 1,500 feet,” Ben said.
“Deadly,” Drake added.
“Yeah, I was there, I remember.” She half smiled up at him. “Climbing is slow, arduous, and like you pointed out, high risk for novice climbers.” She held up a finger. “But what if we could make climbing safer, and faster?” She pried open the lid on one of the crates and lifted out what looked like a black steel box, 6 x 12 inches, that had a round opening at each end.
She held it up. “Gentlemen, I give you the power winch. The lazy rock climber’s speed lift.” She turned it on its side, holding it flat on her hand. “Can lift 400 pounds of equipment or two people at once. Dual rope feed, and two speeds—3 miles per hour for slow ascent, or rapid lift at 10 miles per hour — you’ll basically fly up.” She pointed. “Rope feeds in one end, and the grip teeth suck it in and spit it out back.” She looked up at the men. “Simple, won’t jam, and so easy, even ex-Special Forces guys can operate it.”
Drake whistled. “I like it. Especially that bit about it being good for lazy climbers and dumb Spec Forces guys.”
“That’ll work,” Ben said. “But one question. The cliff faces of the tepui are between 1,500 and 3,000 feet. And the winch works on pulling us up a rope — so how exactly do we get the rope up the wall for it to feed in and out?”
“Good question.” She flipped open the second box and pulled out what looked like a cross between a rifle and spear gun. “Cliff dart with titanium tip. Just aim and shoot. It’ll penetrate even granite at 300 feet, and the expansion collar will immediately lock it in place.” She stood, holding the gun. “I’ve used these before; once they penetrate the rock’s surface, that’s where they stay. They’re good tech.”
Emma held it up with one hand, sighting along the barrel. “You aim it at where you want it to go in, fire, and then it takes the rope up with it. Then all you need to do is feed it into your winch, and up and away you go.”
She held up a hand when she saw Drake frowning. “Yeah, I know, the cliff face where you’re going to be climbing is around 1,500 feet, so once you’re at the top of your rope, you’ll need to reload and fire again. Then you’ll need to move from rope to rope — I’ve done it before, and you can too.”
“Show us,” Ben said.
Emma quickly mimed the aiming, firing, and then showed them the winch pulling in the rope, and when it came to the end, how to change from one rope to the next without any slippage. It looked simple, but Emma was an expert.
“We’ll need to practice that,” Ben said.
“We all will,” Drake added.
“Okay, your turn.” Emma pointed. “What toys did you bring?”
“Glad you asked.” Drake grinned, and as he walked, he waved a hand over the edge of a sheet where all their weapons were laid out. He stopped. “Okay, for close contact, we got our standard knife kit — hunting and Ka-Bar with Tanto edge. Also, I managed to get a good deal on some new Glocks — short recoil-operated, locked-breech semi-automatics with a box magazine, and all in a non-reflective polymer-frame with a nitride finish.”
“Light and low-jamming, nice ones,” Ben said, crouching to pick one up and hold it in a two-handed grip as he sighted at the far wall.
“My thought was to pack a punch, but be mindful of our weight-to-defense ratio. Last time, we found some of our hardware came up a bit short against the bigger plateau residents. So with that in mind, and also not wanting to load us up with hundreds of pounds of steel, I stuck with the Mossberg 12 gauge, but kicked it up to tactical level with the Venom rotary kit for rapid cycle times, greater shell capacity, and lightning fast reloads.”
Drake picked one up. The shotgun now had a circular magazine on its side. He ran his hand up and along the weapon. “Forend with action bars and grip, 10-round rotary magazine, and barrel clamp.” He held it out front, aimed it from his waist and then from his shoulder, before lowering it and grunting his satisfaction before laying it back down.
“Now we move up to the real kick-ass tech.” He picked up a powerful-looking rifle that was matte-black with a skeletal framework. He looked down at it almost lovingly for a moment before holding it out to Ben.