WAR: Opposition: (WAR Book 3) (28 page)

“Seth,” Kirra warned, pointing out the window.

“Yeah, I see them.” Truck headlights shone through the jungle on every side, approaching fast. The search party had arrived.

Kirra peered out the windows. “I see two Jeeps and one lorry with RPG launchers. Two o’clock, six o’clock, and ten o’clock.”

“Don’t worry. We’ll be out of range soon.” Bullets pinged against the sides of the plane, mocking him.

“
Eish
!” Kirra squeaked as the plane rose off the tarmac. She braced her hand against the console and pushed back in her seat.

Seth laughed out loud and put the plane into as steep a climb as it could handle.

An RPG missed them by feet. Seth felt the disturbance in the air beneath them and grinned at the close call.

The helicopter appeared over the trees and raced toward them. Yep. A Mil-17. Thankfully, without external armament. Men fired at them from the open bay doors, but it was too dark for Seth to tell what uniform they wore.

Seth banked away from the helicopter. Some of its shots hit the Cessna’s fuselage. A second RPG flew below the plane on a collision course with the helicopter. The pilot evaded in time, but a third RPG hit the helicopter’s nose and exploded.

“Mayday. Mayday. Mayday. We’re hit, Chief. We’re going—” The explosion tore through Michael’s helicopter, turning it into a ball of flame. Seth screamed in denial even as he instinctively took evasive action to avoid the same fate.

“Seth?”

He blinked and glanced down. Kirra’s hand rested on his forearm. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“Yes.” No. He felt disoriented—his brain insisting the burning helicopter was Michael’s. His grief and rage threatened to break free in a furious vortex. But he didn’t have time for that. He had to keep his attention on his flying.

He felt Kirra’s eyes on him.

“I’m sorry,” she murmured, and he realized she knew where his thoughts had gone.

He mustered up a confident smile. She needed him to be strong. Not lost in anger and guilt.

She frowned, clearly not believing his act. Thankfully, she didn’t call him on his bullshit.

Seth held the plane in its steep climb, evening out just before the engine stalled. He checked behind them. “I don’t see any other aircraft. Looks like we made it.”

The engine sputtered. Seth swore, then tapped a couple of dials. He’d hoped to at least reach the airspace at the border with the UAR, but that wasn’t going to happen.

“Seth?”

“Some of those bullets must have hit our fuel line. I need to take us down.” He scanned the earth beneath them.

The plane dropped.

“Come on, baby,” Seth muttered. “Don’t give out on me now. Just a little farther.”

The engine caught again.

“That’s it. I knew you could do it.” He patted the console, and Kirra snorted in amusement.

He threw her a grin, then resumed checking the ground for a landing site. They’d left the jungle behind and now flew over a broad river delta. The terrain was mostly grass, with the occasional stand of trees. A few villages lined the bank of the river. He needed to put down far enough away from a village that they wouldn’t exit the plane to an armed welcome party.

The engine died. This time, it didn’t restart.

O
h
, God. The plane plummeted. The propeller stopped rotating. Kirra’s stomach twisted. She clutched at the door frame. “Seth?”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got this. We’re going to glide down.” Seth nodded at the flat river delta beneath them.

Kirra nodded and took a deep breath. Seth didn’t appear worried. She tried to let that cheer her, but he was as big a bullshitter as she was. They might be minutes away from dying and he’d never tell her.

Warmth spread through her chest. Normally she hated being lied to. But in this case, she was glad for the small comfort offered by the lie.

Because she really didn’t want to die.

She stared out the windscreen, but it was dark, she couldn’t tell exactly what lay beneath them. She glimpsed an occasional reflection of the plane’s lights in the river, plus one flicker she thought might be lantern light in a village.

Without the engine noise, and if she didn’t think about the fact that the plane was meant to run on engine power, not ride the air currents, their gliding was actually sort of peaceful.

It’s really not that different from surfing.

Uh-huh.

The plane bounced, buffeted by the wind. Kirra gasped and glanced at Seth. He wore an intense look of concentration as he fought for control.

Please don’t let us die. Please don’t let us die. I have so many things yet to do.

She trusted Seth. She just didn’t trust this plane or the wind or the ground or—

The plane dipped sharply. Kirra bit her tongue to hold back her cry of alarm and tightened her hold on the door frame.

They dropped lower, then lower again, each drop sending her pulse spiking. Yet that voice inside her head whooped in glee at the thrill of it all.

“Brace yourself for a crash!” Seth shouted as the ground raced toward them at an alarming pace.

“I don’t know how!”

Seth reached over and shoved her head down to the instrument panel. “Cushion your head with your crossed arms, but stay braced against the panel.”

Every jerk and drop of the plane felt amplified in this position. Not being able to see how far they were from landing was worse than—

The wheels of the plane hit ground with a jolt. The plane taxied roughly for a bit, then jerked to a halt. Kirra’s side of the plane tilted slightly toward the ground.

For a long moment she heard nothing but the sound of her own panicked breathing while her mind scrambled to figure out if she was safe or not.

“Kirra? You okay?” Seth’s voice came over their headsets.

“Oh. My. God!” Kirra sat up. The world spun a moment. “Whoa. Dizzy.” She reached out and grabbed Seth’s hand, squeezing it both for reassurance and for a steady point in the shimmering world. When the land and the sky stabilized, she took a few deep breaths and felt some of the tension leave her.

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Seth said. “If the fuel is leaking onto the engine or another hot component, it might ignite.” He hopped out and raced around to her door.

Kirra tore off her headset and let Seth lift her out and set her on the ground. He glanced into her eyes. “You okay to move?”

She felt weak with relief, but the dizziness was gone. She nodded.

“Good. Run to that darker shadow that looks like an alligator. I’ll be right behind you.”

Kirra grabbed her backpack and dashed down the hard sand. When she reached the designated spot, she dropped her pack and turned. Flames snaked out from the engine compartment to lick at the front of the plane.

Passengers screamed and ran toward the back of the bus as the fire burst through the broken windscreen.

Kirra squeezed her eyes shut and hugged her arms across her chest. As soon as Seth joined her, she threw herself into his arms.

He pulled her close enough that she could hear the strong, steady beat of his heart and feel the comforting warmth of him.

“Shh, Kirra, it’s okay. We’re alive. We survived.” He patted her back.

She tightened her hold on him. “It’s not the landing. It’s—” She buried her face against his chest. “Flames…attack…bus…rebels…”

“The bus caught fire while you were still inside?”

She nodded.

He pressed his cheek to the side of her head.

Kirra silently repeated her mantra until her panic receded. Then she sighed. “Can we please do boring for a while?” She murmured.

Seth chuckled and kissed the top of her hair. “Admit it, sweetheart, you’d be itching for adventure in a few days.”

“There’s excitement, and there’s we’re-going-to-die terror. At least grant me the right to say no more life-and-death moments, okay?”

“Yeah, I agree with you on that.” He set her away from him. “You ready to move out? Someone is likely to notice the fire and notify the rebels.”

She nodded.

“That’s my girl.”

The warmth in his voice chased away the lingering fear and gave rise to a small burst of satisfaction. He’d once again called her my girl. Only this time the term hadn’t been accompanied by a look of alarm.

She’d take that as a good sign.

“Which way?” she asked. Seth had put them down on a finger of land between two wide branches of the river. As clouds shifted across the sky, moonlight played peekaboo with the water. The air was redolent with the scent of marsh grasses and mud. She imagined the scene would be quite peaceful under other circumstance. Maybe one of these days she’d actually be able to savor the beauty of this region instead of always running for her life.

Seth checked his watch. After pushing a couple of buttons, he held his wrist out in front of him. Changing position, he pointed to a spot slightly ahead and to the right of the direction the plane had been heading. “That’s north. We’ll head that way, then recalibrate when we’ve put distance between us and the wreck.”

The only things visible were several meandering branches of the river, mud flats, and grass. A darker smudge marred the horizon, but Kirra couldn’t tell if it was jungle, hills, or civilization.

She eyed Seth’s thigh, where her scarf had turned black with blood. “Will your leg be able to handle the walking?”

“Yeah. I hardly feel it. I think it just tore a furrow in the outer layer. Nothing serious.” He shrugged it off, then nodded toward the river. “We’ll need to wade through the water in order to hide our tracks.”

“Umm…”

“Is there a problem?” Seth asked.

“Uh. No, I suppose not. The risk of parasites is better than being shot by the rebels or Sankoh’s men, right?” Still, she couldn’t quite erase the graphic images from the video warning travelers to stay out of the water.

“If it helps,” Seth offered, “I’ve lived in the region for almost three years and never had health problems from wading in rivers.”

“Yeah, well, the parasites were probably too afraid to get near you, Mr. Badass. But this time you have open wounds.”

“This water is only knee-high.”

“Fine. Whatever.” She didn’t know why she was grumbling. Staying here with the burning plane, waiting for the rebels or Sankoh’s men to show up was not an attractive alternative. It was just…“I hate the idea of little critters taking up residence in my body,” she muttered. “How can I fight something I can’t see?”

“Doctors can treat both waterborne diseases and parasites,” Seth reassured her. “Plus, one of the creepiest culprits, Guinea Worm, was eradicated several years ago. I bet you saw an older video with the worm being pulled out of someone’s leg by winding it around a stick, right?”

She shuddered. “Yeah. So I don’t have to worry about that?”

“Nope.”

“Good.” But that didn’t eliminate the waterborne diseases or other parasites.
Oh, suck it up. At least you’re both alive.

Shaking her head at her unexpected reluctance, she shouldered her pack. “All right. Lead on.”

Seth had slipped on his own pack and slung the guard’s AK-47 over one shoulder. He stepped forward. “You’re holding up remarkably well, Kirra.”

As the warmth from his words spread through her, Kirra leaned toward him. She needed a kiss.

He turned away. “We need to move out.”

Right. How could she have forgotten? He didn’t want that from her.

For the first hour, the water was wide enough for the two of them to walk side-by-side. Kirra had to admit that the silty river bed was surprisingly easy to navigate and the lukewarm water actually felt refreshing against her lower legs.

She just had to keep her mind from wondering what little critters might be worming their way into her cuts and scrapes.

Eventually, the vegetation on the banks thickened and the river narrowed. Kirra was forced to walk behind Seth as the river diminished to a trickle.

The wind had picked up as storm clouds massed overhead and blew her hair into her face, but she couldn’t muster up the energy to grab another headscarf from her pack. Each trudging step through the mud sapped her strength. She wanted to demand that they stop, but there was no place to hide. So she kept pushing forward until the water disappeared.

She glared at the embankment blocking their path. The steep slope of dirt and vegetation couldn’t be more than four meters in height, yet to her, it appeared unsurmountable.

Seth grabbed an exposed root and hauled himself up.

Well, if he could do it after having been beaten and shot, then she had no excuse. Still, she was relieved when Seth held his hand down. “Give me your pack.”’

She passed it up to him. Once he’d placed the pack on the ground next to him, she followed his example. Pretending that the root was a rope and the embankment was the side of a target’s house, she ignored the shaking of her arms and legs and forced her body to climb.

Her muscles gave out as soon as she crawled over the edge. With a groan, she collapsed at Seth’s feet.

“You know,” he said, voice laced with humor, “saying thank-you for bringing the plane safely down was enough. I don’t really need you to genuflect.”

She swore at him in Afrikaans.

He raised his brows and laughed down at her. It wasn’t fair that he looked so strong and confident while her entire body felt wobbly as jelly and her heart beat as fast as if she’d run the hundred-meter dash.

“Come on,” Seth said briskly. “Up you go.”

She felt a tug on her arm. “You’re mean,” she muttered.

“Nope. Just trying to save your life.” With him pulling and her pushing, she made it to her feet.

He tugged her over to sit on a rock, then dug in his pack and handed her an energy bar. “With the grasses hiding us, we should be okay for a moment.”

She demolished the bar within seconds and washed it down with a huge swig from her water bottle. Even so, Seth finished his rations before her.

“Better?” he asked.

She nodded.

“Good. Let’s check where we are.”

Kirra opened her map but could barely make anything out in the dark. To keep it from blowing away, she anchored one end of the map with her water bottle and held the other end down with her palm.

After checking the coordinates on his watch, Seth switched on the red light feature of his torch. “Unfortunately, we’re only a third of the way to the UAR,” he said, tapping their location. “If we walk northeast, we’ll eventually hit the north-south road.” He spread his fingers out to show her the distance to the road.

“But everyone will be looking for us that way.”

“Precisely. So we’ll head straight north.” He tapped a line on the map. “This east-west road will take us over here”—he indicated another line—“to this north-south road. It will take us into the UAR via the back route to your concert.”

“That sounds reasonable.”

Kirra pulled the map out from under the water bottle. As she began to fold it, a gust of wind snatched the map out of her hands. Kirra lunged for it at the same time as Seth. His hand hit hers. She reached out with her other hand, but the wind carried the map higher. A moment later, it disappeared over the grasses.

“Sorry,” Seth said. “No worries, though. We still have the compass on my watch and the GPS on my phone, once it’s charged.”

She nodded. She suspected that once the concert was over, she’d want to return home, so she wouldn’t need the map for exploring.

“C’mon. Let’s move” He led her at an angle through the grass and scrub brush until they reached a deserted dirt road. After checking his watch, he turned right.

As they walked, the vegetation changed from reeds and scrub brush to thick grassland to a thinly wooded forest. The horizon had begun to show a line of gray when a cluster of buildings appeared ahead of them.

Seth took her hand and tugged her gently off the road.

“I know,” Kirra murmured. “Wait here until you scope out the town.” She waved her hand tiredly toward the road. “Just hurry, all right? I’m about to fall asleep on my feet.” She sighed and found a tree stump to sit on.

“Yes, ma’am.” He nodded sharply, then strode off. Damn the man, did he have an endless supply of energy? He barely even limped, while her feet and legs felt as if they were made of lead. She didn’t even want to imagine how she’d feel if she hadn’t trained regularly with her self-defense coach. Thabo put her through a vigorous regime of aerobic exercise, strength training, and flexibility exercises. “All the training in the world won’t save your life,” he liked to say, “if your body is too slow.”

But right now she doubted she could do more than shuffle, even if her life depended on it.

“Kirra. Come on sweetheart, wake up.”

“Huh?” She came awake with a start. For a moment she didn’t know where she was. Then she remembered. Plane crash. On the run. Seth.

“Did you find us a place to stay?”

“Yeah. In another ten minutes you’ll be able to sleep in a real bed.”

“Oh, God. That sounds wonderful.”

He led her through the grove of trees to their left. Eventually, he turned onto an overgrown path that led to a cluster of five burned-out bungalows. When Seth guided her to the last bungalow on the right—a blackened building with no windows, debris piled in the yard, and the stench of rotting vegetation and guano floating toward them—Kirra balked.

“I can’t—” Her hand snuck into her pocket as she backed away. “I won’t—”