Core Punch by Pauline Baird Jones

trees in the Gulf.
    The wind had tested her to her toenails. And her fingernails. Had made her glad for the stale water and truly awful rations she’d eaten before they tried this long shot. Joe had not been happy they’d had to share with Fido. She’d got a look and he beat her to, “Regs?”
    She’d shrugged apologetically. There were regs of regs for care and feeding of witnesses. Fido had eaten the offering, but he hadn’t been any happier about it than they’d been.
    At first she’d felt lost without the tech, missed the stream of data informing them how truly screwed they were. Then she decided absolute knowledge was not needed. Not knowing allowed delusions of hope to creep in. Helped her keep going when she thought she couldn’t keep her almost numb hands on the controls one second more. She’d gotten almost used to stuff slamming into them, though the big stuff still made her jump. Gotten sort of used to tipping to one side or the other when the wind gusted. Still didn’t like the yank when the cross-wind compensators righted them—more than once by spinning them 180 degrees. When she realized half an hour had passed without crashing and burning, she began to believe they might just make it to the airport.
    Assuming they could find it. It had seemed a large, findable target, until one factored in all kinds of science or math or physics stuff. She wasn’t sure which. Maybe all of them boiled down to a needle in a haystack. What, she wondered to take her mind off the burn in her shoulders and everywhere else, was a haystack?
    The rain slackened off with a suddenness that took her by surprise. It was all the warning she got for the wind speed change. The modification sent them off course, which was the ultimate in optimistic, believing they had a course. She fought her way back to this fictional place. Light tried to push through the cloud cover, low and off to her left. The sun was setting. Oh goodie. Though…if that was due west, or undue west, then Joe’s compass skills had worked. And if they had been heading north—
    She took a deep, shaky breath as an outline of gray appeared at the base of the clouds ahead of them.
    That had to be the big, freaking landmark they’d hoped to find. The one that might help them find that not-so-freaking-big-enough airport.
    â€œLake Pontchartrain,” Joe said with satisfaction, exhaustion cutting deep grooves into a face that managed to be both hammered and pretty. “Now we make our westward turn.”
    Her lifted spirits took a nose dive. West. The turn that would put the full force of the hurricane’s winds on their tail. It had been bad having it hit them from the side, even with the aid of the cross-wind compensators. The cost in fuel consumption had been more painful than the jolts. Joe had hoped it would push them far enough west that when they made this turn they would have covered much of the distance to the airport and wouldn’t have to ride the tail wind for too long.
    The wind had modified in this feeder band. Or not-feeder band. But had it modified enough to make the turn possible?
    â€œWe do not want to be over water,” he added, possibly sensing her sudden reluctance.
    Being over water while flying through buckets of it would make bad worse. She knew this, but—
    She cast him a quick fake confident look. “I haven’t tried a big turn in this yet. Any tips?”
    â€œTake it slow.” He paused. “And pray?”
    Pray she could do, had been doing pretty much non-stop. Her Grand Paw Paw used to say there were no atheists in fox holes. He could add big ass storms to that list. But actually making the turn? Would WTF let her “take it slow?”
    â€œWe can attempt to transfer control back to me,” he added.
    She shook her head. “It almost didn’t work last time.” If the skimmer was damaged, which it was, it was a real possibility