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68.
Jack Simon felt useless. And he was determined not to be useless for long. Linsey's cell phone appeared to be dead, so he couldn't reach her for advice. Louise's personal assistant finally answered and said Louise would get back to him—she did daily briefings with the brass.
Idly, Jack called a friend in La Jolla. This woman, Nancy Sullivan, was a suburban stringer for the paper in the North County. "Nancy, it's Jack Simon."
"Hey, Jack. Long time no see. Hey, how are you taking all this mushroom stuff?"
"I'm right in the middle of it, Nancy. Wonder if you can do me a big favor. It might mean saving two kids' lives?"
"Wow. If I can help, yeah, sure, being a good citizen, what do you need." He told her, and she agreed to try.
An hour later, two ultralight planes came sailing down the coast at about 1,000 feet. Just dots in the sky, Jack watched them through binoculars as they banked left and turned inland. They approached his location atop the venerable Mr. A's Restaurant building (Bertrand's at Mr. A's) just north of the downtown area. At one time just about the tallest building in San Diego, it still was a local fixture every Christmas season when its upper edges were strung with thousands of green and red lights to give the illusion of a wreath wrapped around the building.
The ultralights buzzed closer, until Jack didn't need the binocs any longer to make out the two pilots—each wearing an orange jumpsuit and white helmet. Like big bumblebees, the two craft one by one sailed up to the roof, slowed, and dropped to a landing. It didn't take much for one to roll to a stop, and Jack ran alongside to help pull each one to a stop.
Nancy Sullivan climbed out and introduced her dad, John, a trim tall man of 60 or so with the weathered face and devil-may-care blue eyes of a longtime daredevil. Nancy handed Jack the orange flight suit and helmet he had requested. "I hope you find the kids in good health," John said.
"Thank you," Jack said. "If I live to tell the tale, I'll mention you guys in my story." He stepped into the flight suit.
Nancy said: "Everyone in town has a story."
Jack pulled the helmet on. "Give me a quick refresher." He'd flown with them off the Glider Port cliffs above La Jolla a number of times but it was a few years back and he was rusty.
"I'll check you out as best I can," John said. John eyeballed the rooftop. "Looks a bit tight, but I think we can get airborne. Nancy, I'm going to fly ours down to the street and pick you up. We'll take off down the steep slope at B Street."
"Sounds like a deal, dad." She turned to Jack. "Let me show you the controls. This is a new model you may not have seen before. Once you are airborned, it's pretty simple. The tricky part for you is going to be landing."
"I understand that."
"They said on the radio that you can't walk on Pacific Highway or any of the surface streets in the harbor area because the air if full of spores. I couldn't find a breathing kit for you."
"No problem." This is so crazy to begin with that I'll just wing it anyway, oxygen mask or no.
With a deafening racket, the motorcycle size engine in John's two-seater nylon and aluminum craft spun the twin props and the tail rotor into blurs. Rolling briefly, the craft just barely cleared the stone railing dropped out of sight. "Oh my god, dad!" Nancy screamed and ran to the edge. Jack followed, and saw that John had successfully recovered and was even then half a block away and rising above the street. Nancy seemed weak with relief. "Are you sure you want to do this?" Jack nodded. She gave him a walk-through, and then, with a peck on the cheek, sprinted down the stairs with her cell phone glued to her ear.
* * * *
Jack was on his own. He took the plane as far to one end of the roof as he could. Then, tracing John's path, and revving to max power, he felt himself being hurled into the air. This smaller one-seater was easier to maneuver than John's, he figured as he stabilized and turned toward the harbor.
He saw the distant speck of John's craft setting down among the tall buildings around the extremely steep B Street hill. Heading in that direction, he quickly started to gain on the downtown area with its skyscrapers all standing close together.
He spotted John at the top of B Street in the middle of the intersection at Tenth Avenue. They waved to each other. It would take Nancy a while to get there on foot. He wished them a safe journey and continued his steady buzzing journey southward over the rooftops of Banker's Hill and Little Italy. The airport was shut down, but some of its lights were still on—haphazardly left on, perhaps, as staff and passengers fled. There had not been a civilian carrier landing here in several days.
The green neon lights forming hexagonal hoops atop the Emerald Plaza were still on. Their familiar shapes were a signature element of San Diego's night skyline. On his right, the first of the highrise condo towers started appearing. He was flying among the buildings at the 20th floor level. The magnificent 1930s County Building passed on his right.
He saw abandoned vehicles and a great mass of debris—everything from mattresses and bedsheets to windblown books and magazines—on the streets below. He could see the roiling arms of spore clouds, and instinctively took himself a few hundred feet higher. He saw an overturned pleasure-riding carriage, and its dead horse starting to bloat in the hazy sunlight. It was clear up here, but patches of fog remained below, mixing with spores.
Jack followed the line of India Street until he came to the MTS Trolley Exchange Building near the Santa Fe Railroad Station. There he angled west a bit to avoid getting near any more high rise buildings and their unpredictable drafts.
Still, as he flew over the fantasy ramparts of the huge old power station, now a big cube full of condos, he felt warm and cool winds shake him from side to side. Quickly, with his stomach lurching, he banked right and flew out toward the Star of India, the world's last iron-hulled sailing ship that had in the 1800s sailed back and forth with cargo and passengers between the Isle of Man and Australia.
According to his fuel gauge, which he hoped was right, he still had a quarter tank. He leveled off at 400 feet and sailed over the waters past the aircraft carriers tied up at NAS North Island. He flew past the old tourist attraction of Seaport Village on his left, and saw the great hotel towers and the Convention Center beyond that. Flying over a forest of masts—in happier times, the well to do could anchor their yachts and sailboats behind the hotel and go in for a steak, a swim, or a night's sleep.
Hugging the top of the glass tube—must be a quarter mile long, he thought—he sought a place to land. There wasn't one. The top of the tube was round and if he tried to land there, he might well slide off and fall several stories to his death.
He spotted the hole where the chopper had punched through several large, curving panes. He saw the wreckage inside, but no sign of life. Worse yet, he saw several large white shapes—mushrooms the size of automobiles—on the carpeted floor around the wreckage. There was no way he dared stall and then drop at least fifty feet to the concrete floor beside the chopper.
At the end of the building was a large open air plaza several hundred feet square. It was covered by a roof resembling a complex of gigantic sails undulating in a liberal reinterpretation of the Star of India's sails a mile or so north. As he came around the turn, having run out of building, he understood the opportunity: he angled around and approached the building dead-on. There seemed to be just enough clearance as he sailed over the hand railing and under the sail-roof. Ahead beckoned about 4,000 square feet of mostly clear space—empty, shining concrete that functioned as an open-air dance floor capable of holding 1,000 persons or more. Only now it was covered with various types of mushrooms. He landed and came to a rolling stop beside a towering white mushroom with an umbrella-like cap six feet across. A mist of fine black and green spores drifted down from the fleshy gills and frills underneath.
Jack ran for the entrance on the second floor. Luckily a small service door was open. As he had hoped, the infestation on the second floor inside wasn't as bad yet as it was out on the streets. He ran down the carpeted hall inside a surreal tube of glass and metal that looked like the inside of a giant space city. Rings of dark violet neon enhanced the effect of running through a series of giant circles or hoops. Now he saw the wrecked helicopter lying on its side a few hundred feet ahead. He had to dodge between big, puffy shapes and tall slender shapes and things that seemed to be hovering above just waiting to swoop down. Even here, outlined against the brightness coming through the glass, he could see a light rain of spores falling. In one corner, a huge round thing, which looked dark green, opened a hole in its top and emitted a gasp of black spore air. "Jimmy! Maribel!" No answer. He smelled the dead pilot before he saw him. The man's twisted and smashed body lay tangled in steel and broken glass. There was nothing anyone could do for him. No sign of the children—at least not in the wreck, which was probably good.
Jack ran on. "Jimmy! Maribel!"
Silence.
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