As the concussion wave hit, the speeder was tossed around like a child’s toy. Kurt banged his head against the canopy as it tumbled. He spun around and caught sight of Hayley and Wiggins just as the churning waves of silt swallowed them whole.
THIRTEEN
The noise reached Joe through the fog of sleep. At first, it sounded like a sprinkler irrigating a field, repetitive and sharp, only slower: chih-chih-chih-chih-chih…
Joe’s mind wandered to the stretches of farmland he’d grown up around in New Mexico and the high-pressure irrigation that was used to bring the desert to life. Somehow, even half asleep, he knew he wasn’t in New Mexico.
When he opened his eyes, the world was a blur. He tasted something salty and put a hand to his mouth, it came away red with blood. Blood that was trickling from a gash in his forehead, running down his nose and onto his lips.
His vision began to clear, and he realized he was in the driver’s seat of a motor vehicle. The windshield in front of him was smashed in a starburst pattern that lined up with his head. The nose of the vehicle was pointed down at a sharp angle, like he’d driven into a ditch.
Even as his other symptoms cleared, the strange noise continued. It even became more distinct, sounding for all the world like a giant fan turning at moderate speed.
Shouts from outside the Jeep reached his ears.
“Over here,” someone said.
“Get a crowbar.”
The door beside him moved. Fingers appeared around the edge and wrenched it several inches. A face appeared in the gap.
“
Are you okay, mate?” a man in army fatigues asked.
Joe put a hand to the gash on his forehead. “I’ve been better.”
“Sit tight. We’re gonna get you out.”
The soldier went to work on the bent and twisted door, helped by another soldier who’d brought a crowbar. Together, they forced the door wider an inch at a time.
As they worked, Joe’s memory returned. He was in Australia. He’d been chasing after another vehicle. He tried to peer around the starburst in the windshield for any sign of the hovercraft, thinking for a moment that they might have hit head-on. He saw only the dirt wall of the gully he’d gone into.
The door beside him finally broke loose, and the soldiers reached in to help him. With care, they pulled him free of the mangled wreck. As one of them searched the Jeep, the other led Joe out of the ditch and toward a tan-colored NH90 helicopter with Australian military markings.
Now Joe realized where the odd sound had been coming from. The rotors above the big transport were still turning.
A stern-looking man in a black suit met him a few feet from the helicopter’s door.
“Are you the one who called us in?” the man asked. “On Bradshaw’s radio?”
Joe nodded. “What happened?”
“What do you mean?”
“The guys I was chasing,” Joe explained, “did you catch them? They were in a hovercraft.”
The man raised an eyebrow. “Hovercraft?”
“I know it sounds crazy,” Joe said, “but that’s what they were driving. Afraid I can’t give you a make and model.”
The man shook his head glumly. “Whatever they were in, we didn’t find them.” He motioned toward the open door of the helicopter. “We have to debrief you. This bird will take you back to Alice Springs.”
“What about Bradshaw?” Joe asked.
“He was medevaced out thirty minutes ago.”
“Thirty minutes ago?” Confusion swept over Joe. He felt like he’d made the call no less than thirty seconds ago. Even given his few minutes of unconsciousness, they couldn’t have gotten to Bradshaw that quickly.