Viewing the footage also revealed Barnard, Maria, Isabelle and Hannah’s faces to Nina and the police captain, should they encounter them on the Amazon trail to Macchu Picchu.
“I can’t wait to meet Raul and Madalina in person,” Capt. Sanchez mentioned while they waited for confirmation to depart. Nina mumbled, “Aye, I can’t wait to meet the triple bitches.”
Sam and Purdue exchanged looks. Sam leaned back and teased, “Well, if you do run into them, make sure you get even in a jungle mud pit.”
Purdue chuckled, “And don’t forget to alert us first. On that note, Sam, will you be able to use the collar cam again?”
“No,” Sam shrugged, “I had trouble downloading the data onto my hard drive and almost lost the footage once when I tried an alternative override. So I decided to just use a normal handheld instead. The footage on the collar cam is just too important.”
“I agree,” Purdue replied. “Well, it looks like we’ll be flying overnight, thank God. An approximate ETA of twelve hours would be tedious otherwise. At least now we can get some sleep after that hellish experience.”
Nina looked at Purdue and Sam. Their spirits were high, but to her mind they were simply setting aside the true emotional trauma they had suffered until the coming rescue mission was complete. Their injuries aside, the two men were obviously drained in every way. Only she could see it, because she knew them so well. “So, where are we going, exactly?” Nina asked. “To Lima, I assume?”
“Actually, Capt. Sanchez said that the transmission conversation indicated that they were in a place called Pucallpa. Right, Pedro?” Purdue asked.
“Sí, Pucallpa. Although I’ve never heard of it,” Sanchez affirmed.
“The charter company informed me that the nearest airstrip of international standard is,” Purdue scanned over the itinerary to find the name of the airport, “FAP Captain David Abenzur Rengifo International Airport.”
“Geez, that’s a mouthful,” Nina muttered with a raised eyebrow. “And how far is that from Machu Picchu?”
“A stone’s throw,” the pilot explained. He was standing under the ‘Exit’ sign in uniform, ready to depart. “And a bit of an ascent, maybe. Macchu Picchu is south from Pucallpa, but we will take a helicopter from there towards Machu Picchu so that you don’t have to hike through the treacherous Amazon jungle.” The nerdy pilot cackled at his own silliness, but his attempt at humor found his audience mute. He just motioned for them to follow him.
“Seriously? A helicopter?” Sam complained as they followed the pilot to board their flight to Peru. On the tail of the small jet there was the usual registration mark, but on the body itself was written ‘Eagle,’ something Purdue found interesting.
“Come on, Sam,” Purdue said, patting his friend on the back, “hair of the dog, old boy. Also, we have to get there as fast as we can, and you know our friends at the organization have the same resources we do.”
“Oh shit, yes,” Sam realized. “I forgot about those friends meeting us there.”
They spoke in riddles so that the pilot would not decipher their intentions, just in case he was — connected. Nina shook her head in amusement, and was Sanchez striding next to her in deep thought. Purdue mentioned the Inca prophecy of the Eagle and the Condor flying together, as mentioned by Vincent Nazquez. It was just an amusing coincidence, he thought, but secretly he wondered if there was something more behind it.
On the flight they had a light meal and decided to share a drink from the first class bar on offer. Capt. Sanchez declined gracefully, as he wished to stay alert, even going without his jeropiga until further notice. But what he would accept was a bit of insight.
“Excuse me, Dr. Gould, for sounding like a complete layman, but what exactly is Machu Picchu? Is it a town or an historical site, or…?” he asked delicately, hands held in an open gesture.
“Oh,” Nina replied happily, her cheek still holding a grape she’d just popped in her mouth, “of course I can tell you a bit. The Inca Empire was born from the Cuzco Valley… there is a town called Cuzco too… and was most prominent in the fifteenth century and it lasted until, well, the fall of the kingdom, the very page in history we’ve been dealing with the past week.”
“How so?” he asked, sitting on the edge of his seat and folding his hands.
“This golden woman was reputed to be one of the last relics claimed by the Spanish conquistadors under a cruel and treacherous asshole called Francisco Pizarro, who’d ransacked countless villages for gold. You see, Pizarro had captured a powerful emperor, Atahualpa, and held him ransom. But even after Atahualpa’s people paid the ransom and then some, the conquistadors killed him anyway and went on a rampage, destroying the temples of gold devoted to Inti and other gods, among others.”
“Inti the sun god, right?” Capt. Sanchez guessed, and got a nod from Nina.
“So Machu Picchu was built high up in the mountains to protect the nobles from the Spanish raiders. It was like a stronghold, so high up that any would-be intruders would be detected while still ascending the mountains.”
“And that’s where they plan to kill Raul,” Sam asked.
“Sí,” Sanchez said, nodding.
“I have a suspicion they might hold the sacrificial ceremony in the Temple of the Sun. It is one of the main structures of Machu Picchu,” Nina speculated. “If the prophecy coincides with the solar eclipse, it would be the logical place to go.”
“But don’t you have a bug on them, Pedro?” Sam asked Sanchez.
“I did, but lost the signal. The bug’s battery was only good for a period of 48 hours, but I believe Dr. Gould is accurate in her assumption about the location of the sacrifice,” Sanchez explained.
“I think so too,” Purdue agreed. “I just hope we’re right. We have mere hours, if even a single day, to get there and find them before this happens. If we’re wrong, that poor child will die for nothing.”
“Are you going to arrest Madalina?” Nina asked Sanchez, bowling him over with something he’d been silently wrestling with. All eyes were on him in the mild hum of the plane.
“I honestly do not know,” he replied quietly. “She did commit a terrible crime, even if it was under the influence of someone else. I mean, that is what insanity pleas are for, but that won’t make her any more free, you know.”
“Maybe you can just ‘not find her’,” Nina suggested with a wink. “She sounds genuinely good to me, and trust me, I’ve dealt with the most unsavory people you will ever come across.”
“As for Sabian, he shouldn’t be arrested. He should be executed,” Sanchez lamented, “but my job is not to assassinate. In a court of law he will just use his tactics to get off and he should pay for what he did to these people’s lives!”
“As should Barnard and his bitches,” Sam joined in.
“What worries me is how we will get the golden woman melted down for the second relic,” Purdue sighed.
“Hopefully we’ll not need her,” Sam said. With a mischievous smirk he grasped his Beretta’s butt in the holster of his belt. “After all, there is little that a few pelts of lead cannot fix when it comes to murdering fuckwits like those.”
31
Red Messiah