Clive Cussler - Skeleton Coast

“Understood, Beau.” Already the distance between the main group of men and Juan was taxing their tactical radios’ range. Eddie’s voice sounded tinny and remote.

Juan tried to think of anything else he needed to say before he could no longer speak with the team, but they had gone over everything enough times so all he said was, “Good luck, Beau Geste out.”

“Same to you. Death Valley Scotty, over and out.”

Though he didn’t expect any more communications with his men Juan left on the radio just in case.

To maximize the amount of time in the air and thus distance over the ground Cabrillo had to fly the parafoil so it teetered on the edge of stalling. He had to force the toggles that controlled the chute’s aerodynamic shape to his waist. It took strength and coordination, but mostly it took will to ignore the bitter cold and the pain that began to build in his shoulders and quickly spread across his back and the rippled muscles of his stomach.

Drifting ever downward at the vagaries of the wind, Juan checked the empty desert below him. From this altitude he could see for what seemed like forever but no matter where he looked the barren wasteland remained dark. He could see no lit towns, no campfires, nothing but darkness as vast as the sea.

When he passed through ten thousand feet his left hand slipped off the toggle. The parachute immediately twisted into a sharp turn that accelerated his descent and spun his body out from under the canopy like a pendulum. He eased off the right toggle to negate the turn and grasped the left one once again. In those frantic seconds he thought he caught sight of something far to his left, but when he looked at the spot again he could see nothing.

Knowing it could be a mistake, he eased off the toggles again and reached across his chest for a pouch containing night vision goggles. He ripped off his safety glasses and the oxygen mask, which he no longer needed, and quickly settled the night vision rig over his eyes. Then he yanked down on the toggles to slow himself again.

The desert went from a dull khaki color to iridescent green with the aid of the light-amplifying goggles and the object that caught his eye was revealed as a small convoy of vehicles crossing the desert. They were moving away from Cabrillo and only the lead vehicle was using its headlights. Their weak beams reflected only intermittently off the dunes while the others followed in darkness. They were also too far for him to reach, given his current altitude, but he knew they would eventually stop.

He adjusted his glide path, arcing through the air like a bird of prey, and began following the caravan as it pulled further away. After just a couple of minutes he could no longer see the convoy and the only evidence the vehicles had existed at all were the tire tracks they had cut across the ground.

Cabrillo remained aloft as long as he could, twenty minutes according to his watch, but eventually he had to make his landing. The ground below him was nothing but endless waves of sand, dunes that rose and fell with the regularity of ocean swells. He flared the chute just before touching down, intentionally stalling it so he landed at no more than a walking pace and managed to stay on his feet.

Dumping air from the canopy as quickly as he could, Juan gathered up the nylon in a tight bundle so the wind wouldn’t carry it away. He unhooked the straps and thankfully dropped the parachute pack and what little gear that had remained with him. His upper body smoldered with a deep burn that would take days to ease, though already he had an idea that would add further strain to his aching muscles.

He’d touched down just a couple of feet from the caravan’s tire tracks and taking a sip of water from his only canteen he noted they were widely spaced and that the tires that left them were heavily lugged—trucks specially fitted for the deep desert.

That meant there were three options, two of which were good. Either they belonged to Namibia’s military or a safari company and would gladly help a man stranded in the trackless wastes. Or they were smugglers and would likely kill him as soon as he approached.

Either way, it wasn’t in him to wait for a couple of days until Max could locate him through his subdermal transmitter and send a team to rescue him. Cabrillo would rather get himself out of this mess on his own because he’d never live down his best friend’s ridicule when he got back to theOregon .

Juan laid out all of the equipment that hadn’t been attached to the main chute. The pile was meager. He had his machine pistol, Glock automatic and plenty of nine millimeter ammunition, a knife, a medical kit, the canteen, and a small survival kit containing matches, water purification tables, some fishing line, and a few other odds and ends. He had his chute and its pack, which had a hard plastic plate that was molded in the shape of his back and helped alleviate some of the stress of deployment.

All in all there wasn’t much to help him catch the caravan, but Cabrillo had an ace up his sleeve. He patted his artificial leg, thinking,Ace up my cuff, actually .

FOR fifty minutes Eddie, Linc, Mike, and Ski glided gently across the night sky. Because he’d been a field agent for the CIA, Seng didn’t have the jump training of the former soldiers on his team but like nearly everything he did, Eddie was a natural. It was the decades of martial arts training, learned first from his grandfather in New York’s Chinatown, that allowed him to channel his focus into any new task.

He didn’t have the combat experience of the other Corporation gun dogs, either. He’d spent his career working deep undercover, always without backup, pretending to be someone he wasn’t in order to build a network of informants to gather intelligence. However, only a few months after joining Juan made him head of shore operations because Eddie simply wouldn’t let himself fail in any situation.

Using GPS he guided his team unerringly to the Devil’s Oasis, arriving above the forlorn desert prison with enough altitude so they could loiter for a few minutes to scan the featureless roof and enclosed courtyard. Infrared showed a trio of guards sitting just inside the closed gate and a vehicle with an engine that was still warm. Eddie guessed it had driven a perimeter screen at least an hour earlier. The other vehicles, both inside and outside the courtyard, were as cool as the night air.

He tapped his throat mike in the prearranged signal for Linc to go in first.

Franklin Lincoln eased up on his toggles to begin his approach, turning into the wind just as his feet cleared the crenellated parapets as far from the guards as possible. He touched down with the barest scuff of his boots and collapsed his canopy. He took a few seconds to shed most of his gear and weigh down the nylon so it wouldn’t flap. When he was set he tapped his own throat mike.

Like a wraith, Eddie came out of the darkness, his canopy spread wide like a hawk’s wing. He angled in so the dirt bike hanging from its tether would land right next to Linc. The big SEAL grabbed the handle bars as soon as the balloon tires hit and steadied the bike so it wouldn’t fall over. Eddie’s landing was perfect, and by the time he had his chute off and secured it was Mike Trono’s turn to touch down. Again Linc made sure the bike didn’t clatter against the thick wooden roof and alert the guards.

Jerry Pulaski was the last one in. As his bike settled onto the roof and he flared his chute a gust kicked up and suddenly yanked him backward. Linc had a firm hold on the bike, but the pressure of the wind against Ski’s parachute was like trying to push a billboard into a hurricane.

“Help me,” he whispered, the strain making his voice raw as Ski frantically tried to collapse the chute.