Downtime - Marc Platt [24]
A row of motionless figures was ranged across the crest, staring down at the intruders. They were dressed in orange robes like monks and carried tall staffs.
Cavendish heard a deep sepulchral chanting and felt a tangible wave of anger hit him. He was thought a profanity in their sacred place. He started to walk up towards the ridge, but the stare from the orange line was implacable, so increasingly angry that he found it physically difficult to face. It forced against him like a current of energy. The chanting grew in strength. He began to get the shakes. He turned and ran for the helicopter. Its blades were already scything the air.
‘Let’s get out of here!’
The Valkyrie lifted, then baulked under a surge of turbulence. They veered sharply sideways. The rockface loomed. Loose stones rattled onto the fuselage. Londqvist fought with the juddering controls to stop the machine smashing into the mountain. The force beat against them like a tide of invisible fists. The helicopter, its engine screaming, tilted down towards the mouth of the black pit. Londqvist wrenched the control column back with a yell. The machine pulled up with metres to spare. It cut through the veil of smoke and rose away. The force of the guardians of Det-sen broke.
Behind them, Cavendish saw the line of figures begin to file slowly down into the valley. They were searching out their path with their long staffs, moving like a group of blind men.
‘What was it?’ he kept repeating.
‘Put it in your report,’ snapped the pilot. ‘I am flying on to Lukla.’ He was plainly concentrating on putting as much space between themselves and Det-sen as he could.
Cavendish was still shivering. His hand stung a little where tiny fragments of the web had clung to it. He tried to brush them off.
‘I said, I am flying to Lukla,’ insisted Londqvist. ‘What is the name of the contact there?’
Cavendish pulled the file out of his holdall He flicked clumsily through the pages and eventually found the list of civilian auxiliaries. All the entry for Lukla said was ‘Eric’.
By the time they reached Lukla, Cavendish had settled himself again. Londqvist flew over the settlement and then turned to drop down to the airfield. As they passed over one of the tin-roofed houses, they saw a man with wild grey hair staring up at them. Then he began running frantically about, tearing up a row of plants from a makeshift allotment at the back.
‘Eric?’ suggested the pilot.
‘Right,’ said Cavendish. ‘I’ll deal with him. You get yourself some tea or something.’
Cavendish found the teashop quickly enough and was soon joined by Londqvist, which was not what he had intended.
‘Wait outside, old chap,’ he advised using his inimitable Sandhurst charm. ‘Don’t want to intimidate him, do we? I’ll bring you out a tea.’
There was an old man in the shop, but he ignored Cavendish’s questions, seemingly content to stare ahead and turn his prayer wheel. The officer was just heading through to the back when he came face to face with Lukla’s legacy from the Summer of Love. Eric was waving a half-empty bottle of cheap whisky.
‘What’s the hurry, man,’ he slurred, blocking the way.
Cavendish flashed his UNIT pass. Eric peered at it, mystified. Then an expression of recognition dawned across his face. ‘Hey, UNIT. That’s cool. I thought you guys were checking me out as a drop point.’
‘Sorry about your garden,’ said Cavendish, curtly. ‘I’ll take two teas while I’m here.’ He eyed the old man in the corner.
‘That’s Uncle,’ Eric said. ‘He’s cool too. No talka the Inglesi, eh Uncle? He has a neat line in Tibetan hats though.
Only eight yuan.’
Uncle ignored this and concentrated on his prayer wheel.
‘No thanks. Just the tea,’ said Cavendish. ‘Do you get much news down from Tibet?’
Eric swigged at his bottle. ‘Bad news. This place is getting too busy. Backpackers and trekkers. Like, soon there’ll be a Hilton. That’s all the crap I came to get away from, man.’
‘Have you heard about the monastery at Det-sen?’
Eric nearly