Burning Angels

91

Moments before the point of impact, Jaeger raised the outboard engine to the point where the prop was hardly in the water, and then cut the power. The giant airship loomed above them, there was a sharp jolt as the RIB hit the ramp, leapt upwards and slammed down with a sickening thud, slewing its way into the hold.

The boat careered forward on to the flight deck, skidded sideways and came to a juddering halt.

They were in.

Jaeger flashed a thumbs up to the loadmaster. The propulsors screamed above them as they went to full power, the massive airship preparing to lift her impossible bulk from the sea, along with her extra cargo.

The airship rose a fraction, the swell sucking greedily at her skids.

Jaeger turned and ruffled Simon Chucks Bello’s hair.

They might have saved him, but had they saved humanity?

Or Ruth and Luke?

Kammler must have anticipated that they’d go for the kid, for why else would he have risked sending out his hunter force; his dogs of war? He must have got wise to the fact that Simon Bello was the answer; the cure.

And in his heart of hearts Jaeger was convinced that the boy would prove to be their collective saviour. But right now, he felt little sense of joy or achievement. That final, horrific image of Narov being blasted off the RIB was seared into his mind.

Abandoning her to her fate – it was torturing him.

He peered out of the cargo ramp. The surface of the ocean was being whipped into a frenzied spray. The propulsors screamed at maximum revs, but the airship seemed momentarily stuck fast. He glanced to one side, darkly, and his eyes came to rest upon the distinctive form of one of the Airlander’s life rafts.

In a flash, a plan crystallised in his mind.

Jaeger hesitated for barely an instant. Then, with a yell at Dale to safeguard the kid, he leapt from the RIB, ripped down the life raft and sprinted along the Airlander’s ramp, until he was perched on the very edge of the abyss.

He grabbed the radio headset that the loadmaster would use, and called up Miles. ‘Get this thing airborne, but stay under fifty feet. Take us due west, and slow.’

Miles confirmed the message, and Jaeger felt the four massive propulsors rev to an even greater pitch. For long seconds the Airlander seemed to hang there, the propulsors cutting through the air to either side of the craft, the swell crashing powerfully against her hull.

Then the giant airship seemed to tremble once along the whole of her bulk, and with a final effort she shook herself free of the sea’s embrace. Suddenly they were airborne.

The giant beast of an aircraft turned and began to ease a path west across the waves. Jaeger scanned the ocean surface, using his GPS and the burning hulk of the Sunseeker as his reference points.

Finally he saw it – a tiny figure amongst the waves.

The airship was about a hundred metres away from her.

Jaeger didn’t hesitate for an instant. He figured the drop was over fifty feet. It was high but survivable, if he entered the water properly. The crucial thing was to let go of the life raft. Otherwise, its buoyancy would bring him up short, as if he’d driven into a brick wall.

Jaeger let the raft fall, and seconds later he jumped, plunging towards the ocean. Just prior to impact, he assumed the classic position – legs tight together, toes pointed, arms linked over his chest and chin tucked well in.

The collision knocked the wind out of him, but as he sank beneath the waves, he thanked God that nothing was broken. Seconds later he surfaced, hearing the distinctive hiss of the life raft self-inflating. It had an inbuilt system that automatically triggered on impact with water.

He glanced upwards. The Airlander was powering skywards and away from danger with its precious cargo.

The term ‘life raft’ did Jaeger’s inflatable something of an injustice. As it pumped full of air, it resolved itself to be a miniature version of the RIB, complete with a tough zip-over cover, plus a pair of oars.

Jaeger clambered aboard and orientated himself. A former bootneck – a Royal Marine commando – he felt almost as at home on water as he did on land. He fixed the position where he’d last seen Narov and began to row.

It was several minutes before he spotted something. It was a human figure all right, but Narov wasn’t alone. Jaeger’s eye was drawn to the distinctive V shape of a dorsal fin slicing through the surface of the water, circling her bloodied form. They were well beyond the protective barrier of the reefs here, which kept the beaches shielded from such predators.

This was a shark for sure, and Narov was in trouble.

Jaeger scanned the waters, spotting another and yet another razor-tipped fin. He redoubled his efforts, his aching shoulders screaming out in pain as he forced himself to row ever faster, in a desperate effort to reach her.

At last he pulled in close and stowed his oars, then reached into the sea and dragged her over the side and to safety. They collapsed as one, a heaving, sodden mess in the bottom of the life raft. Narov had been treading water for an age now, and bleeding profusely, and Jaeger didn’t have a clue how she could still be conscious.

As she lay there, gasping for air and her eyes tight shut, Jaeger busied himself tending to her wounds. Like all good life rafts, this one came complete with the basic survival essentials, including medical kit. She’d taken a bullet in the shoulder, but as far as Jaeger could tell it had passed right through the flesh, missing any bone.

Luck of the devil, he thought. He stemmed the bleeding, then bound up the wound. The key thing now was to get water into her, to rehydrate and make up for the blood loss. He thrust a bottle at her.

‘Drink. No matter how bad you feel, you got to drink.’

She took it and gulped some down. Her eyes found his and she mouthed a few inaudible words. Jaeger leaned close. She repeated them, her voice barely above a croaking whisper.

‘You took your time… What kept you?’

Jaeger shook his head, then smiled. Narov – she was unbelievable.

She tried to stifle a laugh. It petered out into a watery cough. Her face twisted in agony. Jaeger had to get her to some proper medical help, and quickly, that was for sure.

He was about to take up the oars and start rowing again when he heard it. Voices, coming from the west, their position obscured by the thick pall of smoke drifting across from the burning wreckage of the Sunseeker.

Jaeger had little doubt who it might be – or what he had to do.