“A hundred and fifty kilometers,” Vierho said. “You wouldn’t even be halfway to civilization.”
“No argument,” Joao said. “I was just thinking out loud.”
“Well, is everything ready to go?” Chen-Lhu’s voice boomed up at them full of false heartiness. Joao looked down to see the man standing near the tip of the left wing, his body bent over with the appearance of weakness. Joao had just about decided Chen-Lhu’s weakness was appearance only.
He was the first to recover, Joao thought. He’s had more time to regain his strength. But… he was closer to death. Maybe I’m just imagining things.
“Is it ready or isn’t it?” Chen-Lhu asked.
“I hope so,” Joao said.
“There’s danger?”
“It’ll be like a Sunday ride in the park,” Joao said.
“Is it time to come aboard?”
Joao looked at the shadows stretching out from the tents, the orange cast of the sunlight. He found he was having difficulty breathing, knew this for tension. Joao took a deep breath, found a level of hesitant calm within himself; not relaxed, certainly, but with fear held at bay.
Vierho answered for Joao: “Twenty minutes, more or less, Senhor Doctor.” He patted Joao’s shoulder. “Jefe, my prayers go with you.”
“You sure you wouldn’t rather take my place, Padre?”
“We will not discuss it, Jefe.” Vierho stepped down off the float skid.
Rhin Kelly emerged from her lab tent with a small bag in her left hand, crossed to stand beside Chen-Lhu.
“About twenty minutes, my dear,” Chen-Lhu said.
“I’m not at all sure I should have a place in that thing,” she said. “One of the others might give you a…”
“It has been decided,” Chen-Lhu said, and he put angry sharpness in his voice. The fool woman! Why can’t she let well enough alone? “No one will permit you to stay,” he said. Besides, my dear Rhin, I may need you to sway that Brazilian. This Joao Martinho will have to be played very carefully. A woman sometimes can do that better than a man.
“I’m still not sure,” she said.
Chen-Lhu looked up at Joao. “Perhaps you should speak to her, Johnny. Surely you don’t want to leave her here.”
Here or there—not much difference, Joao thought. But he said, “As you say: the decision already has been made. You’d better get aboard and fasten your safety harness.”
“Where do you want us?” Chen-Lhu asked.
“You in back; you’re heavier,” Joao said. “I don’t think we’ll get off the ground before we hit the river, but we might. I want us nose high.”
“Do you want us both in back?” Rhin asked. And she realized then that she had agreed with their decision. Why not? she asked herself, not realizing she shared Joao’s pessimism.
“Jefe?”
Joao looked down at Vierho, who’d just completed a final examination of the undercarriage.
Rhin and Chen-Lhu went around to the right side, began climbing in.
“How does it look?” Joao asked.
“Try to hold it up on that left skid a little, Jefe,” Vierho said. “That might help.”
“Right.”
Rhin began strapping herself into the bucket seat beside him.
“We’ll send help as soon as we can,” Joao said, sensing how empty and useless the words were as soon as he spoke them.
“Of course, Jefe.”
Vierho stepped back, readied a bomb thrower.
Thome and the others came out of the tents, loaded with weapons, began setting them up on the side facing the river.
No goodbyes, Joao thought. Yes, that’s best. Treat this as routine, just another flight.
“Rhin, what’s in that little overnight bag you brought?” Chen-Lhu asked.
“Personal things… and…” She swallowed. “Some of the men gave me some letters to take.”
“Ahhh,” Chen-Lhu said, “an appropriate and touching bit of sentimentality.”
“What’s wrong with it?” Joao growled.
“Nothing,” Chen-Lhu said. “That’s just it: nothing is wrong with it.”
Vierho returned to the wingtip, said, “Just as we planned, Jefe—when you give the signal that you’re ready, we’ll lay down a foamal barrage along your path. That should stall them long enough for you to make it onto the river, and it’ll make the grass out there more slippery.”
Joao nodded, began rehearsing the flight routine in his mind. None of the switches were exactly where they should be. Igniter to the left now; throttle knob jutting from the dash instead of on the floor between the seats.
He set the trim tabs, adjusted the feather-slots in the ailerons.
A pre-dark hush had fallen over the savannah. The grass stretched out ahead of them like a green sea. The river out there was only about fifty meters across: a narrow path for him to hit if the pod got up too much speed. There’d be no dusk at this latitude and altitude, Joao knew. He’d have to gauge his moment carefully, using the last of the light for the dash across the savannah—and darkness to shield them once they hit the river.
A fifteen-meter range for those acid-shooting insects, Joao thought. That only leaves us a narrow strip down the middle if they attack from shore. And God alone knows what other forms they may be able to hit us with—flying creatures, water skaters…
“Stand by with sprayrifles as soon as we’re safely on the river,” he said. “They may mount an all-out attack once they see us trying to escape.”
“We’ll be ready,” Chen-Lhu said. “The rifles are in this gig-box under me, not so?”
“Right.”
Joao lowered the canopy, sealed it. “This model has self-sealing rifle ports on both sides where the windows dip just behind the wings,” he said. “See them?”
“Clever design,” Chen-Lhu said.
“Vierho’s idea,” Joao said. “It’s in all our pods.” He waved to Vierho, who returned to the bomb thrower.
Joao turned on the pod’s landing lights.
All the men saw the signal; a shower of rifle spray arched out toward the river. Foamal bombs began landing along the track they’d take.
Joao punched the igniter, saw the safety light go on. He waited, counting three seconds before the light dimmed and went out. Not too bad, he thought, and he eased the throttle knob ahead.
The rocket motors came on with a jarring blast that had them over the perimeter ditch and roaring toward the river before Joao could ease off the feed. With a sense of breathless shock, he realized they were airborne. The pod felt sluggish, though, and with a tendency to fishtail—too much drag from the floats. They weren’t meant to be left out there in flight.
There was no time for flying niceties, though. Joao wrenched the nose around, aimed for a stretch of river where the savannah blended into jungle on both sides. The river was a long pool there, wider, pointing toward blue hills in the background. There came a moment of gliding suspense. Floats touched the river in a cushioned bounce… up, down… spray on both sides… slower, slower.
The nose came down.
It was only then that Joao remembered he had to favor the right side float.
The pod was still making forward speed, but coasting slower and slower.
Joao held his breath, wondering if the patch had been torn off, waiting for the right side to start its tipping plunge into the river.
The pod remained level.
“Have we made it?” Rhin asked. “Are we really out of there?”
“I think so,” Joao said, and he cursed the surge of hope that had accompanied that brief flight.
Chen-Lhu passed sprayrifles forward, said, “We seem to’ve caught them by surprise. Ah, ah! Look back!”