Earth and Fire (10 page)

The plane
steepened its descent and we landed on a large flat area. Over to our right
side, several transport sleds were parked in a group next to a small mountain
of flexiplas crates, and ahead of us were two freight portals. I frowned at the
sight of them. Freight portals looked huge compared to a normal passenger
portal, and a transport sled could easily drive through them, but our plane
wings were much too wide.

“How do we get
the plane through the portal?”

Gradin laughed.
“We fold the wings. The private pilot theory test only covers the very basics,
so you won’t know about folding wings, or fire plane scoops, or a host of other
things.”

A few weeks ago,
I’d believed I knew everything there was about being a pilot. It was a shock to
discover the amount I had to learn for my private pilot theory test, but again
I thought that was everything. Now I realized I’d been a complete nardle both
times. I still knew next to nothing about all the things a professional pilot
like Gradin did, or how they did them.

“Pay close
attention,” he said. “You may need to do this yourself one day, and it’s not
the sort of thing you want to get wrong. First, you set the aircraft control
systems to show advanced options, and select wing unlocking. The control
systems will ask you for authorization, so you enter your pilot code. After
that …”

He opened the
cockpit, and climbed out. I tore my eyes away from the control displays, which
were all flashing an alarming red, and hurried to jump down after him. The
fabric of my impact suit triggered as I landed on the concraz, freezing my legs
in position with my knees bent. I managed to keep my balance for a couple of
seconds before toppling over sideways. I cringed, expecting Gradin to laugh at
me, but instead he just sighed.

“I told you to
pay attention. You should have noticed I used the handhold on the side of the
plane to help me climb down instead of jumping. The cockpit of a fire plane is
higher off the ground than a survey plane because of the scoops. They’re
retracted at the moment, locked to the base of the plane.”

He pointed at
the plane. I saw that what I’d thought was just a deeper, bulkier cockpit than
usual, actually had a line where it could separate into two.

“You always, and
I mean always, keep scoops retracted and locked except in midair,” he said.

He turned away,
dropped to sit on the ground next to the wing of the plane, and reached up. The
fabric of my impact suit had relaxed now, so I could pick myself up, kneel next
to Gradin, and watch as he slid open a hatch under the wing.

“You turn the
lever from green to red to unlock the wing. Go round and do the other side for
me.”

I scrambled to
my feet, ran round to the other wing, found the hatch, and tried to turn the
lever inside. After a second spent struggling to move it, I worked out that you
had to pull the lever out a fraction to turn it. I looked round for Gradin, saw
he was back in the plane, and climbed in to join him. The control displays were
now flashing a faintly less worrying amber.

“The aircraft control
systems report the wings are unlocked,” said Gradin, “and are offering the
option to fold wings. I confirm and …”

I glanced out of
the window and saw the wings slowly folding back to the angle of a Military
dart spaceship. “Zan!”

“You obviously
never try flying with the wings folded, but you don’t need wings to move on
hovers.” Gradin lined the plane up in front of a freight portal and spoke on
broadcast channel. “This is New York fire plane. Ready to portal.”

“This is Dig
Site Command. Athens has a lot of incoming freight traffic at the moment. We’ll
activate your portal as soon as one of their current portal windows closes.”

Gradin whistled
tunelessly for fifteen seconds before the freight portal flared to life. The
plane moved forward and the bright sunshine of America vanished. We were in the
dusk of Europe now, looking at the dark bulk of the Acropolis set against a
skyline that glowed orange and red, not with the sunset but with flames.

I stared numbly at that glowing sky,
while my suit comms made the crackling noise that meant they were adjusting to
new dig site channels. I heard a woman urgently talking on the new broadcast
channel.

“This is Asgard
1. We’re losing control here. Have to pull back soon.”

That had to be
the voice of someone fighting the fire, and it sounded like they were in
trouble. I caught my breath, imagining what conditions must be like close to
that giant fire. Even wearing an impact suit, the heat would be …

“This is Ground
Command,” said a reassuringly calm, male voice. “Hold your ground, Asgard 1.
We’ve got a fire plane on approach run to dump water for you.”

Another male
voice spoke, pausing to gasp for breath between staccato sentences. “This is Cassandra
2. Can’t find Earth 8. Nothing but smoke and burning trees here.”

I added blinding
clouds of smoke to my mental image, and pictured a team of fire fighters lost
among blazing trees.

“This is Ground
Command. Cassandra 2, your suit location signals show you’re nearly with them.
Keep moving straight ahead.”

I became aware
of a voice that wasn’t coming from my comms. I turned my head and saw an impact
suit clad figure had run up to Gradin’s side of the plane and was urgently
yelling and pointing.

“We’re keeping a
launch area clear over to the right. Athens Air Control is running on channel 1.”

Gradin nodded
and moved the plane on past transport sleds and groups of people, turning to
the right to reach an open area of grass, before stopping and cutting hovers.

“Jarra, set your
suit comms to override broadcast channel with channel 1. We don’t want to hear
all the babble from Ground Command. They’ll be feeding information to Air
Control about who needs help, and Air Control will tell us what to do.”

It took me a
moment to work out how to override broadcast channel. By then, Gradin was
already speaking on channel 1.

“This is New
York fire plane reporting arrival. We have pilot and trainee co-pilot under
instruction.”

“This is Air
Control. Welcome New York. Circuit is running clockwise, repeat clockwise, picking
up water from the sea off Piraeus. You’ll be the tenth plane joining circuit.
Confirm please.”

“This is New
York. Confirming circuit is running clockwise and joining as plane ten.”

Ten planes! I’d
only ever seen one plane in the sky at a time. I’d thought all the stuff in the
theory test about maintaining a safe air distance from other aircraft was
pointless.

Gradin spoke to
me on the private circuit. “Opening the wings now. You can get out and lock
them for me.”

I watched the
wings move back to their normal position, then climbed down and carefully
adjusted the levers on both sides. When I climbed back in, the control displays
were flashing green.

“The system
confirms both wings out and locked,” said Gradin. “I acknowledge that, the
controls stop flashing, and we’re back to normal. Now look at the main display.”

I dutifully
looked, and saw a lot of red dots moving clockwise in a distorted circle. A
white dot near the centre of the circle was stationary.

“We’re the white
dot, and the red dots are the other planes?”

“Correct,” said
Gradin. “You can see a gap opening up between two of the red dots. That’s where
we’ll be joining circuit. Time for us to turn our lights on and launch.”

The plane lifted
on hovers, lights started flashing on both wing tips, and we headed up into the
evening sky that seemed pitch black in contrast to the bright orange light
below. I saw the white line of our course appear on the main display, directing
us to the position marked by a flashing white dot in the circle of red ones. Gradin
banked right to follow it, until the steady white dot that was where we were
merged with the flashing white dot of where we should be.

“We’re now in
circuit,” said Gradin. “If we keep in our designated position, we don’t need to
worry about colliding with anyone else.”

He paused before
speaking again in a pointed voice. “I hope you’re paying attention to all this,
because the Dig Site Federation doesn’t encourage us to teach people to fly out
of pure generosity. They’re always short of professional pilots, so they sometimes
call on the amateur pilots for help in emergencies. Next year, you could be
doing something like this solo.”

I imagined
myself alone in this plane, flying through the blackness and the smoke with
leaping flames below, and gulped. Gradin must have heard me, because he
laughed.

“I brought you
here to show you what being a pilot is really about. Not flying survey flights
over a dig site on a sunny day, but times like this.”

His voice lost
its usual edge of sarcasm. “I didn’t have to come and help with this. I
volunteered, and I didn’t do that to save a heap of historic, crumbling stones.
I came because there are hundreds of romantic idiots down there, fire fighting on
foot. When the fire moves too fast and traps them, impact suits will only
protect them for a few minutes before they start being slowly cooked alive, so
they need fire planes to help them. I came because that’s what pilots do when
people are in trouble.”

He laughed again
and now the sarcasm was back in his voice. “When stupid kids get themselves
treed by wolves, pilots come and help them. I’m not a nice person. I don’t care
about the people I save. I only help them because my ego loves it when they
thank the heroic pilot who came to their rescue, but my reasons aren’t
important so long as I do it. I brought you with me to see if you’ll be the
sort of pilot who helps people too. If you are, then every time you do
something heroic, my ego can smugly share the credit because I’m the one who
taught you to fly. If you aren’t, there’s no benefit to my ego so I’m wasting
my time on you. Now, scoops!”

I’d been
listening to him in startled disbelief, wondering if he could really be serious
about what he was saying, and the sudden change of subject confused me. Scoops?
Oh yes, I was here to help with the unknown scoops.

“The scoop
controls are in the centre so a solo pilot can work them with his left hand,”
said Gradin. “That isn’t ideal when you’ve got to fly as well, particularly if
you’re left-handed like me, so you’ll be working the scoops. They’re quite
simple. The red switch unlocks scoops. The control beneath it lowers and raises
scoops, and the one below that opens and shuts them. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Now we’re
approaching the sea. Unlock the scoops, but don’t lower them into the water
until I say, because doing it when we’re moving at high speed will rip the
plane apart.”

I nervously hit
the red switch, keeping my hand well clear of the others.

Gradin dipped
the nose of the plane and cut thrusters back. I saw the darkness of the sea
below us, steadily getting closer.

“This is rather
like coming in to land,” said Gradin. “You need to be low and moving at minimal
speed, so you partially transition to hovers to help out thrusters. Get ready
to lower the scoops, and … Now!”

I used the
control to lower the scoops, there was a faint jerk, and the aircraft slowed
even further.

“The increased
drag tells you the scoops are in the water,” said Gradin, “so you hardly need
the flashing light on the controls. Open scoops for a few seconds to take in
water, close them, and raise them all the way up again but don’t lock them. We
won’t be locking scoops again until we come into land.”

When I’d raised the
scoops, we headed back towards the shore, increasing speed so the white dot of
our actual position caught up with the flashing white of our planned position
on the main display.

“How do we know
where to dump the water?” I asked.

“The main
display will mark it in blue, and give you an extra subtle hint by counting
down in big flashing numbers. I’ll be flying low over the flames at that point,
and you open scoops when the numbers get to zero. There’s sometimes a late
change of target, but Air Control will usually tell us that verbally as well as
change our flight plan. Most of the pilots here will be flying solo, and they could
miss a last minute change on the displays.”

I looked ahead
at the leading edge of the fire, a vast glowing V shape bearing down on Athens.
I hadn’t appreciated the sheer horrific scale of it until now.

“Deity aid us,”
I murmured.

Gradin laughed.
“I wouldn’t depend on it.”

I could see a
small black dot moving above the flames. That must be one of the other
aircraft. Something fell from it, a trailing curtain of water, and a patch of the
fire below faltered and died.

“After the water
hits, ground teams will move in with dusters,” said Gradin. “It looks like
Ground Command have given up hope of stopping the fire, and are concentrating
on the centre, trying to break the fire into two wings that pass Athens on
either side.”

There were
dusters in the stores at Fringe dig sites. Our history teacher had demonstrated
one once. You carried the bulky things with a shoulder harness, fed them with lumps
of rubble, and they sprayed out fine dust to smother a fire. A duster worked
impressively well against a bonfire, but a fire on this scale …

A blue cross
appeared on the main display, and Gradin started to lose height. The flames
seemed even larger now, we were flying through thick drifts of smoke, and the
plane gave a sudden lurch that made me gasp.

“It can get a
bit bumpy,” said Gradin.

I fought back
panic and managed a single word reply. “Yes.”

Numbers were
flashing on the main display. I tried to ignore how close the flames were and
concentrated on the countdown. When it reached zero, I opened the scoops, there
was another lurch and then we were climbing for height again.

“You can feel
the plane react to losing all the dead weight of the water,” said Gradin.

I belatedly
remembered to look back and down, but whatever impact we’d had on the fire was
out of view behind us.

“Now we head
back out to sea, pick up more water, and go round again,” said Gradin.

We did nine more
circuits, picking up water and dumping it on the fire. My nerves seemed linked
to the height of the plane, tensing as we went low to pick up water or to drop
it, relaxing as we gained height again. On the tenth circuit, we were low over
the fire, and I had my hand on the controls ready to open scoops, when the blue
cross and countdown suddenly vanished from the main display.

“This is Air
Control. New York abort drop, you have a new target. London abort drop, you
have a new target. Berlin abort drop, you have a new target.”

A new blue cross
appeared on the display, and Gradin banked the plane to the left, flying further
over the flames. “If they’re diverting three of us, it means a ground team is
trapped by the fire and we’re making them an escape route.”

I watched the
countdown reach zero, opened scoops, and twisted in my seat to look down
through the side window. Was that a transport sled down there among the smoke
and the flames? I couldn’t be sure. I wanted to change channel from Air Control
to Ground Command, find out if the team trapped by the fire were safe now, but
if I started messing around with my comms I might miss instructions meant for
us.

“This is Air
Control. Madrid abort drop, you have a new target.”

Gradin whistled
softly. “Four of us now. They must really be in a mess down there.”

I tried, and
failed, to look directly behind me. “Is there anything we can do?”

“We keep going.
We pick up more water.”

“This is Air
Control. Madrid abort drop, you have a new target.”

I frowned. Air
Control had already said that once.

“They’ve made it
out then,” said Gradin. “Madrid is going back to normal fire fighting.”

I gave a sigh of
relief.

“You can see why
they got in trouble,” added Gradin. “Just look at what’s happening down there.”

I looked down. I
could see it was easy to get in trouble with a fire this size, but … “I’m not
sure what you mean.”

“Look at the way
the flames are moving,” said Gradin. “The wind has changed direction.”

“Is that good or
bad?”

“Good, because the
centre and one wing of the fire is now heading away from Athens. Bad, because
the other wing of the fire is heading straight for it. Ground Command will be going
frantic right now, getting everyone on transport sleds and moving them to new fire
fighting positions.”

As we picked up
the next load of water and headed back inland, I could see Gradin was right.
The whole battle against the fire was shifting position, the circuit on the
main display had changed shape, and the blue cross of our target appeared in a
totally different place than before.

The countdown
had just started when I saw a fountain of flame ahead of us. We’d been losing
height ready to dump water on our target, but Gradin hit the thrusters hard and
we soared upwards again. I was wondering what the chaos had happened, when
Gradin spoke on the Air Control channel.

“This is New
York. We skipped our drop because of an explosion on the ground. Probably an
old home power storage unit.”

Now I understood
what had caused that fountain of flame. All the homes abandoned during Exodus
century had had a power storage unit. Most had failed and lost their power long
ago, but some were highly unstable and would explode in the heat of a fire.

“This is Air
Control. New York, you have a new target.”

We dumped our
water on the new target. We’d flown five uneventful circuits after that, when a
chiming sound came from the storage pocket on my left. That was my lookup
crying for attention. I hesitated, grabbed it, and checked the display. It was
Issette calling me.