Termination Shock

Well, that escalated quickly!” T.R. said.

Some combination of pure oxygen from the mask and a precipitous drop in altitude had revived Willem to the point where he was able to be annoyed by the joke. It was a callout to an old Internet meme. He decided to let it go. “Yes,” he said, “but it kind of seems like you were expecting it.”

“We were prepared for it.”

Amelia wasn’t having it. “You have multiple fifty-cal emplacements with interlocking fields of fire. The whole mountaintop is diced up into compartments with anti-personnel and anti-vehicle barriers. Choppers keep their engines running so they can get out fast if mortar rounds come in. It is a straight-up combat zone.”

“Well, it is today,” T.R. allowed. “Most days it ain’t. It’s probably over and done with already. These are pinprick raids. They happen once a year, tops.”

“Papuan nationalists?”

“Or Indonesian black ops angling for a budget hike,” T.R. said. “Impossible to tell, since they do exactly the same shit. What they have in common is that they don’t actually want to destroy the cash cow.”

“The mine?”

“The mine.” A thought occurred to T.R. “Hey, you still have that Glock?”

“No.”

Amelia held it out, action locked open, magazine removed. “I took the liberty. You want it?”

“No,” T.R. said, “I just don’t like loose ends.”

Amelia shrugged, then slid the weapon across the floor to Willem. The magazine followed a moment later. Willem decided to keep them separate for now. He normally carried a shoulder bag, which his father derisively called a man-purse and Remi just called a purse. This was now somewhere on top of Sneeuwberg. So he put the pistol into his belt at the small of his back and slipped the magazine into his pocket.

T.R. had been summoned forward by the pilot, who had put the chopper into a banking turn. Then he leveled it out and angled it back a hair until they were basically hovering, perhaps a thousand meters above the jungle. They were about halfway from Sneeuwberg to Tuaba. The land beneath them had shed most of its altitude and flattened out somewhat. From the jungle below they could see a pall of smoke swirling around a clearing near the highway. “Aw, shit, that’s the pump station,” T.R. said. “Those fucking assholes.”

On a closer look the clearing was a puddle of gray liquid, like wet cement, spreading out into the surrounding jungle. “System should shut off automatically before the spill gets too much worse,” T.R. said. He came back into the cabin, checking his phone. “Aaand the fucking cell towers are down.” He called back to the pilot. “Get on the horn back to Sneeuwberg and make sure they are aware the slurry pipeline has been breached.”

“Roger that,” came the answer. T.R. slammed down into his seat as the chopper tilted forward to resume its flight back to Tuaba. “Fucking assholes,” T.R. said. “They do this every few years. Blow up the pipeline. They know it’s how copper leaves the island. But it’s also the only reason money comes in. Very self-destructive. It is an escalation to be sure.”

“So, just to calibrate,” Willem said, “shooting up Sneeuwberg and detonating some ANFO is a common occurrence but blowing a hole in the pipeline is a big deal.”

“Correct. Forces us to shut a whole lot of things down, higher up. The mine is like an engineered avalanche, running on gravity, material in motion on a scale you can’t believe until you see it. Momentum that is inconceivable. To stop it is like diving in front of a freight train.” T.R. checked his phone again but the look on his face said he wasn’t getting any bars. Finally he slapped it down, put his chin in his hand, and looked out the window. They were almost there. Looking out, Willem could see the outskirts of a town passing below them. And there was only one town.

“We’re gonna land on top of the Sam,” T.R. explained, suddenly remembering his duties as gracious host. He meant the Sam Houston, which was one of the Western-style hotels that had been put up in Tuaba as a base of operations for visiting engineers, business executives, and the like. “From the helipad there, we can get you down to a room where you can hang out while we arrange a convoy to take you to Ed’s compound. Or anywhere else you prefer.” Beyond him, through the chopper’s side window, Willem caught sight of the airport’s control tower in the middle distance. The Sam Houston was in the belt of Western-style hotels and amenities near the airport, so they must be close.

But instead of banking toward the Sam, the pilot swung the other way and put the chopper into a climb. The world rotated slowly around them, and in a few moments the Sam Houston Hotel complex came into view out the window on Willem’s side. It looked like any other generic modern hotel, rising a dozen-and-a-half stories above a parking lot ringed by palm and banana trees.