said Bowman. “We won’t be needing rope.”
“Y’all aren’t suggestin’ we BASE-jump the drops, are you? We still have to get back out.”
Arguello grimaced. “I do not know how to do that and have no desire to learn.” Arms folded across his chest, he shook his head slowly back and forth.
“It would take too long to explain now. But we won’t need rope.” Bowman looked at each of them in turn. “Trust me on this one.”
Hallie watched their reactions. The others seemed willing to do that. And so, somewhat to her surprise, was she.
“One last thing,” Lathrop said. “We will have a small special operationsteam staged near Brownsville. Two-hour response time. But they are only for extraction from the surface, not rescue from the cave.”
“Whoa, there.” Haight held up both hands, like a cop stopping traffic. “I got a few more questions about little things like equipment, food, communications. An expedition like this would normally take months to organize.”
Lathrop was ready. “We don’t have time for ‘normal.’ You saw the pictures of ACE victims. We have, at the very most, ten to twelve days.”
“And those things are taken care of.” Bowman again.
“Righto, then. Any idea how long we’ll be underground?”
“We have planned for seven days,” Bowman said. “Two days to reach the bottom of the cave, one day there to collect material and rest, and three to come back out again. Plus one extra.”
Lathrop looked around. “Thank you for your patience. Any more questions?”
“Just one more.” Haight, hand up. “Really. Then I’ll stop. Earlier y’all said, if I remember aright, we were picked ’cause we could get security clearances and we all had serious cavin’ skills and such.”
“Correct.”
“Y’all also said, ‘and a coupla other things.’ ”
He doesn’t miss much
, Hallie thought. She remembered the phrasing now, but only after Haight had brought it up. Haight looked from Lathrop to Barnard and back to Lathrop. “I was just wonderin’ about those ‘coupla other things.’ ”
Lathrop and Barnard exchanged glances. Barnard nodded slightly.
Lathrop said, “Well, as a matter of fact, there were some other criteria.”
They waited. He looked at the floor, then back at them.
“You are all unmarried, live alone, and have no children.”
No one spoke. But Hallie thought:
In other words, expendables
.
THEY SPENT THE NIGHT IN GUEST ROOMS AT ANDREWS AIR Force Base. The next morning, after showers and breakfast, they were jetted to a military airfield at Reynosa, Texas. There they were outfitted with the caving equipment they would need: scuba rebreathers, mil-spec meals ready to eat (MREs), redundant lights, exposure suits—the best of everything that advanced research could create and government money could buy.
At eight P.M. , when it was full dark, a jet-engined, stealth version of the Osprey vertical takeoff and landing aircraft spirited them two hours south. In the moonless night—a gift of pure luck, as Bowman had noted—they off-loaded in a clearing a mile from Cueva de Luz’s mouth.
Bowman herded them back to the tree line and the stealth craft lifted off, its jets making not much more noise than idling bus engines. Without lights of any kind, in ten seconds it disappeared intothe black sky and they were alone in southern Mexico’s high mountain wilderness. The nearest village, a Cuicatec settlement, was twenty miles away.
They were all carrying heavy North Face backpacks. Bowman was the only one with weapons: a SIG Sauer semiautomatic pistol in a thigh holster, a huge dive knife worn in a scabbard strapped to the inside of his left calf, and, slung over one shoulder, a weird, futuristic-looking rifle with a carbine-length barrel, a circular magazine like the ones used on Thompson submachine guns, a lightweight tubular stock, and a pistol grip like an M-16’s. Hallie had asked him if was a rifle or a shotgun during their ride in the
“Y’all aren’t suggestin’ we BASE-jump the drops, are you? We still have to get back out.”
Arguello grimaced. “I do not know how to do that and have no desire to learn.” Arms folded across his chest, he shook his head slowly back and forth.
“It would take too long to explain now. But we won’t need rope.” Bowman looked at each of them in turn. “Trust me on this one.”
Hallie watched their reactions. The others seemed willing to do that. And so, somewhat to her surprise, was she.
“One last thing,” Lathrop said. “We will have a small special operationsteam staged near Brownsville. Two-hour response time. But they are only for extraction from the surface, not rescue from the cave.”
“Whoa, there.” Haight held up both hands, like a cop stopping traffic. “I got a few more questions about little things like equipment, food, communications. An expedition like this would normally take months to organize.”
Lathrop was ready. “We don’t have time for ‘normal.’ You saw the pictures of ACE victims. We have, at the very most, ten to twelve days.”
“And those things are taken care of.” Bowman again.
“Righto, then. Any idea how long we’ll be underground?”
“We have planned for seven days,” Bowman said. “Two days to reach the bottom of the cave, one day there to collect material and rest, and three to come back out again. Plus one extra.”
Lathrop looked around. “Thank you for your patience. Any more questions?”
“Just one more.” Haight, hand up. “Really. Then I’ll stop. Earlier y’all said, if I remember aright, we were picked ’cause we could get security clearances and we all had serious cavin’ skills and such.”
“Correct.”
“Y’all also said, ‘and a coupla other things.’ ”
He doesn’t miss much
, Hallie thought. She remembered the phrasing now, but only after Haight had brought it up. Haight looked from Lathrop to Barnard and back to Lathrop. “I was just wonderin’ about those ‘coupla other things.’ ”
Lathrop and Barnard exchanged glances. Barnard nodded slightly.
Lathrop said, “Well, as a matter of fact, there were some other criteria.”
They waited. He looked at the floor, then back at them.
“You are all unmarried, live alone, and have no children.”
No one spoke. But Hallie thought:
In other words, expendables
.
THEY SPENT THE NIGHT IN GUEST ROOMS AT ANDREWS AIR Force Base. The next morning, after showers and breakfast, they were jetted to a military airfield at Reynosa, Texas. There they were outfitted with the caving equipment they would need: scuba rebreathers, mil-spec meals ready to eat (MREs), redundant lights, exposure suits—the best of everything that advanced research could create and government money could buy.
At eight P.M. , when it was full dark, a jet-engined, stealth version of the Osprey vertical takeoff and landing aircraft spirited them two hours south. In the moonless night—a gift of pure luck, as Bowman had noted—they off-loaded in a clearing a mile from Cueva de Luz’s mouth.
Bowman herded them back to the tree line and the stealth craft lifted off, its jets making not much more noise than idling bus engines. Without lights of any kind, in ten seconds it disappeared intothe black sky and they were alone in southern Mexico’s high mountain wilderness. The nearest village, a Cuicatec settlement, was twenty miles away.
They were all carrying heavy North Face backpacks. Bowman was the only one with weapons: a SIG Sauer semiautomatic pistol in a thigh holster, a huge dive knife worn in a scabbard strapped to the inside of his left calf, and, slung over one shoulder, a weird, futuristic-looking rifle with a carbine-length barrel, a circular magazine like the ones used on Thompson submachine guns, a lightweight tubular stock, and a pistol grip like an M-16’s. Hallie had asked him if was a rifle or a shotgun during their ride in the
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