Resurrect: A Jason Quinn Thriller Page 2

  There had been a palpable feeling of energy as the three archeologists, the only passengers, had boarded the pitiful looking plane on the tarmac of Xinning’s one-horse airport. David had commented on how lucky they were to be flying in the DC-3 instead of the only other plane on the blacktop, a war-scarred Russian Antonov AN-2 complete with its top-mounted gunner’s turret. Malcolm had been quick to note that their plane was in fact an Ilyushin Il-14, which was a Russian knockoff of the infamous American-made Douglas DC-3. David had looked like a child who had just dropped his ice cream cone, when he was shown up on his miniscule knowledge of aviation. Later they had all laughed and joked while Malcolm discussed in his thick Australian accent the things he would show them in Hongers, as he liked to refer to the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, since it had reverted to Chinese ownership in 1997.

  After the plane had left the ground however, each person turned their thoughts inward, and Eva spent about an hour mulling over the finer details of the buried city they had discovered in the Taklamakan Desert. Five months at the site wasn’t nearly enough, considering all the delicate scraping of toothbrushes involved, but it was all the Chinese Government had been prepared to allow them on their visas and digging permits. Now they would have to return to the U.S. (and Malcolm to Australia), where they would send a barrage of letters to the Chinese embassies and the recently formed People’s Ministry of Archeology in Beijing, requesting permission to return to the desert. This was an old game the archeologists were used to playing with the Chinese. The Chinese gave a limited length of time on the visas and the scientists returned to their own countries to resume the barrage of paperwork. While that was going on, the Chinese government sent teams to the site to loot whatever needed to be looted (a process which was inevitably blamed on “Capitalistic Barbarian Pirates”). Then the communist government would finally relent, and allow the scientists back in, and another few months of work could be accomplished, provided the bribe money that kept the on-site officials happily drunk every night, didn’t run out.

  The trio, working with a team of Chinese laborers, a few students from Chongqing University, and the omnipresent and ever-vigilant team of bureaucrats and military personnel, had managed to uncover quite a few artifacts that would go to the museums in Beijing. They had found a number of items that gave them the impression that the city had been constructed sometime in the fifth century, but it had also been used as recently as the 1800s. What had frustrated Eva, more so than David or Malcolm, was that there was no historical evidence of the city’s existence. As far as Eva could tell, there had never been a city there, at that place in the desert. There was no hint of a town there in any records she could find, and yet it had existed for over a thousand years before becoming partially covered by the shifting sands in the last hundred years or so, perhaps even in the last twenty.

  She had slept in the uncomfortable aircraft chair until the sun on her face woke her and some elusive thought nagged at her subconscious. When she awoke, she looked to the other two, who were also asleep in their chairs. Her mind took some time to focus on her surroundings and remember the flight to southeast China. That was when it had occurred to her. She was sitting on the left side of the airplane. And the sun is on my face. A quick look out her window confirmed her fear when she saw the snow covered mountains below them. They were flying west. Hong Kong was to the southeast. That was when she called to David and Malcolm, telling them what was wrong.

  Dr. Malcolm Brewer was a big man. He had banged on the door to the cockpit of the aircraft only twice. When he received no answer from the pilot, he threw his bulk foot-first into the flimsy door that separated the cockpit from the cabin of the plane. Dr. David Arlon was right behind him, looking like the frightened, wiry professor that he was. The door burst inward and Malcolm took in the sight in a fraction of a second.

  There was only a pilot, no co-pilot. The pilot had no shirt on but was wearing a leather World War II flying helmet. The man had stabbed a large knife into his own stomach, and dragged it upward through his chest, spilling his intestines into his lap. There was a large tattoo of two Chinese characters on the man’s carved open chest. He was obviously dead, and had probably been dead for at least part of the flight because his body was cold to Malcolm’s touch. Malcolm’s eyes swept slowly upward from the gaping wound to the instrument panel, where he saw several gauges and the liquid compass above the windshield had been smashed, and the fuel gauges read well below empty. Somewhere in the back of Malcolm Brewer’s consciousness, he heard the starboard engine quit. Finally his eyes continued their sweep to the view out of the stumbling aircraft’s canopy windows. What he saw was a lot of snow and a lot of rock. All of it was big, and all of it was close.

  “Oh, bloody hell,” he said, loud enough for Eva to hear him.

  CHAPTER 2

  A large snowflake was gently swaying as it clung to Eva’s eyelash like a man scrambling at a cliff’s edge in a bad 1970’s made-for-TV movie. When her eyes finally fluttered open, the delicate structure of the flake was disrupted, and the remains quickly turned to water on her cheekbone. There was blood in her right eye, and she groggily pawed at it. A few more blinks and her eyes were able to focus.

  Eva’s first thought was that she was outside. But that wasn’t right. She was still in the passenger chair with her seat-belt fastened, and she was still in the plane, but she was also outside. The front half of the aircraft simply wasn’t there. In fact, the seat that had been in front of hers wasn’t there. She looked down to see the jagged tear across the floor of the plane’s fuselage. Ahead of her was only a long sloping valley of snow between two hills on either side. She tried to stand, forgetting the seat-belt, and found that she couldn’t. After unleashing herself, she stood and turned to look to the rear of the plane. Some snow was inside, but otherwise it looked normal. Then, she turned back to face the front of the plane and saw that it still was not there. No plane. No propellers. No cockpit. No David and Malcolm. Just outside and snow.

  “Mal?” she called.

  She took a step forward, and she was out of the aircraft. The wind was so strong it nearly knocked her down. She had been somewhat aware of the cold, but she had been completely sheltered from the wind in the plane’s rear half. Struggling against the wind, she walked to the side of the broken plane and around the edge of the shredded metal skin. She could see what had happened immediately. The plane broke apart when it hit and her segment, the tail, had slid down the icy slope before spinning to a stop with its opening facing away from the rest of the wreckage. There was a wide trough in the snow where the tail had turned, and Eva thought of children making snow angels. Then, she looked up the long vista of snow-covered mountains and saw the blackened trail from where the plane had come, skidding and leaping as it must have. There was a trail of debris stretching off into the distance, but no single chunk of it was recognizable. She desperately scanned the distant hills for a sign of the other half of the fuselage, or a wing, or David.

  “DAVID!!!” she wailed, but her voice was lost in the wind immediately. Regardless, she tried again. “MALCOLM!!!” Nothing but the fierce shriek of biting wind in her ears.

  I’m not panicky yet, she told herself, but she knew that she would be. It was only the shock that was keeping her calm, if a little loopy. That and maybe the concussion, she thought as she raised a hand to touch the clotted blood on her forehead above her right eye. The area was tender and already swollen so much that it felt as if her forehead had grown a bony knee.

  She looked wildly at the trail of wreckage and realized that it probably stretched for several hundred yards. Maybe more. But you have the biggest part of the plane. Yes. First things first, she thought. She headed back into the shelter of the fuselage fragment, and immediately felt warmer. Bastard wind, she thought and realized that her mind was starting to clear. Hopefully that wouldn’t also mean she would start to panic and scream like a lunatic. She looked behind her seat and saw that her carry-on was still there. Amazing, she thought. Then she saw why, when she tried to lift it. The strap had caught on the bottom of her chair. Thank God for the small things.

  Inside the bag, Eva found her Gore-Tex jacket and pants, as well as a fleece pullover. She quickly threw these things on, and then she pulled the purple fleece ear-band out of one of the jacket’s pockets and slipped it over her head. Great, she thought, keeps the ears warm and staunches the flow of blood on one’s forehead too! Sarcasm was better than panic any day, but she still felt it uncomfortably close to her like a leering uncle with bad breath. She also found her fleece gloves and an energy bar. Those were pretty much all the useful items she had. Eva then searched the rest of her half of the plane, looking for anything else that might be of use. There really wasn’t that much. A small first-aid kit had some matches, which she hoped would be able to start a fire for warmth. Some of the chairs were still intact, and she thought she could burn the seat covers and the foam cores. Granted, it would stink to high heaven, but better the carcinogenic fumes than hypothermia.

  A look at her watch revealed it was nearly two in the afternoon. Thing still worked. Damn, Timex does take a licking, she thought. Maybe three or four hours before nightfall. And she would still need time to start her fire. Okay. Two hours. That’s what she could spare for a search. She would hike up the wreckage trail for one hour looking for David and Malcolm, before she’d have to turn back. She knew her chances of finding them were not very good. She also knew that the chance of finding parts of them was better than of finding them safe and well, but she refused to let her mind dwell in the morbid zone. She grabbed the thin fleece Xinjiang Airlines blanket that was still sitting on her chair and wrapped it around her head like a shawl. Please let me find them, she prayed, and then she stepped out into the gale.

  CHAPTER 3

  There hadn’t been that many fires. There hadn’t been much fuel left in the plane. She tried to keep her mind on the task at hand: finding David and Malcolm. But her mind kept wanting to leap ahead in the process.

  What are you going to do when you find their bodies, and know you’re all alone? What then, huh? Oh, a fire. That’s good. How long will seat covers burn? Maybe until morning? And then? What are you gonna eat? How long will it take for a rescue team? This is China! Will there even be a rescue team? How long until—

  Stop it, she told herself. One thing at a time. One. Only one. Find them. They’ll know what we should do. Malcolm will know.

  Eva trekked up the slope through the snow for forty minutes. Along the way, she would stop occasionally to look at a chunk of wreckage. She was looking for anything that might be of use to her in the hours or days ahead. There was no sign of either of the men, and there hadn’t been a sizable chunk of plane in a while, when she came across a nylon bag. It was David’s carry-on bag. There was a gash in the side, but it was otherwise intact. She quickly opened it and riffled through for more layers of warm clothing. She found a sweater that she took, and also his Swiss Army knife. The rest was books and folders. She left them. They didn’t matter now.

  The wind had died down some, but it was still plenty cold. She took off her jacket and threw David’s sweater on over her fleece, and then put the jacket back on. She felt a little bulky with so many layers, but the warmth felt good. She checked the time, and then trudged on toward the next chunk of plane she could see in the distance. It was a portion of wing, she saw as she approached it. It was mostly covered by snow, which was why she hadn’t seen it at first. She passed it and headed up a particularly slippery part of the slope to the crest of the hill. The view was better here than it had been back at her half of the plane. Most of the rest of the plane was here on this small plateau. The daylight was fading already. She had used up her hour just making it up to this plateau where the bulk of the fuselage and wreckage lay. She called out one more time.

  “Malcolm!!! David!!!” She waited for a response for nearly a minute, then she started to cry softly as she walked across the plateau.

  It took her longer to get back to the plane’s tail than it had to walk away from it, and by the time she reached her shelter, the light was leaving the sky quickly. She made quick work of the seat covers with David’s knife, and decided to start her fire in the rear of the fuselage. She would stay between the fire and the open end of the plane, trying to get as much fresh air from the wind, and as much warmth from the fire as possible. Luckily, the seat cover lit quickly and easily, and the foam worked too. She figured if she needed to, she would also light the fleece blanket and the sweater, and anything else that would burn.

  Darkness fell abruptly and soon after the wind died almost completely, but the temperature plunged, and she found herself edging closer to the fire before long—noxious fumes or not. She sat on the aluminum base of one of the passenger seats, and slowly ate half of the energy bar she had. The other half would be for the next day and the really hard work.

  She planned to leave the wrecked plane the next day. On the plateau, she had found Malcolm’s body. She noticed the gray color of his skin, long before she saw that one of his arms was missing. Its arm was torn out at the shoulder (she had a hard time thinking of the mangled corpse as ‘Malcolm’). After awhile, she thought she should bury him, but then realized she had no shovel, and the ground was frozen anyway. She needed to keep moving because there would be no one to bury her. Eva had searched the body, and found another Swiss knife and a packet of peanuts from a bar in Hong Kong. Malcolm had also been a smoker and she found his Zippo lighter. She pocketed the smooth silver lighter, said a brief prayer, and then continued on her way.

  She ate the nuts as she looked for David. She didn’t find him, but did find one of his hiking boots. Thankfully, there was no foot in the boot, but the boot was all she needed. They were both dead. She didn’t need to see David’s body to know that. There was a sports water bottle in her carry on, and she filled it now with snow, and held it close to the fire until the heat melted the snow. No, I won’t die of thirst, she thought.

  Eva wondered, not for the first time, what had happened. Why had they been going west? Why had they crashed? Why had there been no sign of the cockpit on the plateau? Where was that damn pilot? Did he crash the plane on purpose? She had to assume so, because they were going west before they crashed. She looked at the ridiculous fire she had made and saw that it would be time to light another seat cover soon. She knew there wouldn’t be a rescue team. She would have to leave the plane and the wreckage behind if she was going to survive. She knew that. Which way to go, she mused. Where was she? If she was in Tibet, as she suspected, then most directions would be fatal. She would die long before she found civilization.

  South then. Sooner or later, south will mean warmer. If I live long enough, warmth will be all that will matter. Eva laid down on the floor of the aircraft, and fell asleep in minutes.

  CHAPTER 4

  Eva woke early because she was cold and the wind was howling loudly. The fire had long since dwindled out, but the daylight was back now. She checked her Timex, only to find that it had stopped. Figures, she thought. She got up and slowly stretched her neck to the left until there was a loud popping sound from her cervical vertebrae realigning themselves. She stepped to the edge of the plane and looked at the sky. Clouds and gray, but not snowing.

  “That’s something at least.”

  She looked back into the fragmented fuselage and thought of making another fire with some of the remaining covers, then dismissed it. Might as well get going. She stepped back into the tail to collect the fleece blanket, which she hadn’t gotten around to burning yet. She paused and thought about staying. No, Eva, just go. Then she walked out into the wilderness.

  She had trudged through snow and slipped across patches of ice for what she guessed to be about three hours when she needed to rest, and she stopped to finish what was left of the energy bar. She thought she was heading south. She hoped she was heading south. The clouds obscured the sun for most of the day, but there were times when she could tell from the whiteness in the sky, from where it was that the source of light was emanating. She rested until the water in her sports bottle was gone, along with the last bite of chocolate-peanut butter something-or-other.

  “No more food then,” she said aloud. “I wonder if I can catch and kill a yak? Hell, I wonder if I’ll even see a yak.”

  She filled the water bottle with snow and placed it inside her fleece against her t-shirt and under her breasts, hoping that her body warmth would melt the snow. Her head ached and she rubbed at the lump occasionally as she started once more. She told herself that sooner or later she’d likely come across a source of water like a river or creek. She’d then follow it south, hoping that she would eventually end up in a town or come across a road.

  The temperature was dropping. She was cold, but her own heat from the exertion of hiking in the mountains was keeping her warm, if not hot at times. She tried to stay in the valleys between the hills as she went. The snow on the ground was deeper now and once she fell in up to her waist. She cursed herself for not thinking of trying to make some kind of snow-shoes out of plane parts or the seats, but it was too late for her to turn back now.

  It was all still snow and rock. She hadn’t seen a single plant or creature. Not even a bird. Barren was the only word that kept repeating in her head. Barren, but beautiful. Towering rock hills and mountains, with snow sprinkled on top. They looked absurdly like ice cream to her. Every time she had a thought like that, she wanted to turn to David or Malcolm, the men she had worked with for the last half year. The men she had joked with, laughed with, and shared her excitement of archeological finds with. Then, as her mind would start to crumble and she would be on the verge of tears, a different part of her mind would take hold. The drill instructor part of her mind. Steroid Eva. Go! Keep moving, girl. Walk! Survive. That’s all that matters. One foot in front of the other. That would be enough to clear the watery edges of her eyes and sober her up. She would focus again on the task for maybe an hour before thoughts of the dead man with only one arm returned.