Granny in the Flight Path

Originally published in Tomorrow SF vol 2, issue 6

Granny shushed her, but there was no need. Little Siksrik heard the snowcat's engine slow to idle, heard the heavy metal door slam.

She and Granny were hidden in a big crate, the one that had been filled with little bottles, more than Siksrik could count. The bottles were all gone now. Granny and Siksrik - mostly Siksrik - had carried every one of them off and buried them in the hard snow where the soldiers wouldn't see. Siksrik had pulled one of them from its thick cardboard sleeve and studied the label: "Miller Beer." She knew what a miller was, because Miss LaBerge, the Canadian Outreach teacher, had read her fairy tales. Millers were men who had sons or daughters who needed to get married. And a beer was an animal, a nanuq. The bottle seemed to be full of water, but it didn't freeze. Puzzling.

Boots crunched nearby, and rope rattled through eyebolts as a tarp was pulled away.

"Inventory, sir?" said a soldier's muffled voice in English.

"Screw that. If it was here four hours ago, it's still here. Puff the gas bag. I want to be long gone when the radiation wake passes."

Metal clanked outside. Granny's breathing wheezed in the crate, but the arctic wind outside was louder. Little Siksrik buried her head in her anorak, pretending she was a sled dog with her tail covering her muzzle. Thumps. Ropes through eyebolts again. Then a shriek of wind that didn't stop.

"Free it up there. I don't want it to tear as it inflates."

"Yes, sir."

"That's good. Keep an eye on it."

The frame creaked. Siksrik thought both men were out of the cargo basket now.

"Heard any more news about the Luna probe, sir?"

"Nope. I think it's all faked, myself. The Russians can't get all the way to the moon on chemical rockets."

"But if they do get there, won't they claim it?"

"Like what President Goldwater told Khrushchev: You can have the moon. Just stay the hell out of Indochina."

The platform shifted and ice cracked. The shriek subsided.

"O.K. Fire up the auxiliary heaters."

"Yes, sir."

Someone pounded the frame; it must still be frozen in the snow, like the runners on a sled. She heard a roar: the heaters.

"Ah, that feels good."

The platform shifted and swayed beneath her.

"Release lines."

"Yes, sir."

The platform tilted, and Granny fell against her, smothering Siksrik. They were rising.

Granny struggled and finally got off her in the darkness.

"Now can we open it, Granny?"

Granny shushed her again. The village angakok wasn't really her grandmother, just her great-aunt, the only family Siksrik had left. And now Granny was dying, too, of what her people called lump disease. Miss LaBerge called it cancer. It must hurt a lot, because Granny was always complaining.

Siksrik had been staying with Granny when her father went out on his last hunt. He never came back. Some people in the village said it was Siksrik's fault: She'd done something to offend the spirits of the nanuqs, and a living one had eaten him. And Granny said as long as people talked like that, no one in the village would marry Siksrik. Granny claimed to be two hundred years old, the oldest and wisest person in the village. Siksrik was only eight.

"Now open it, little one," wheezed Granny.

Siksrik stood, pushing as hard as she could on the lid of the crate. Something held it shut. Granny couldn't stand, but she pushed, too, and the lid lifted enough that Siksrik could squeeze through. Still dark. She crawled on hands and knees. The tarp covered the cargo basket, pinning the lid of Granny's crate. Siksrik took out the knife her father had given her on the night of her mother's death.

"Siksrik."

She stabbed a hole in the tarp and began sawing.

"Little one." The lid of the crate banged insistently.

"Wait, Granny." Cold fresh air blew through the cut, and she peeked through at the arctic twilight. The moon was rising; there were few clouds. Tension on the tarp began pulling it apart, and Siksrik moved her knife along the rent. Freed, the two sides flapped like a snared sea bird.

The lid of the crate rose, and Granny pulled herself erect. Her face was a grimace of pain, staring up at the monstrous silver balloon towering overhead. The glow of the burners lit the interior. Underfoot, the cargo basket swayed in the wind. Siksrik went to the edge of the basket and looked down.

"Be careful!"

Siksrik saw the miniature snowcat creeping across the snowfield to the Soldier Place. A thin line snaked from beneath the basket to the ground, but the balloon still rose. It seemed she could see forever.

"Have you ever been this high, Granny?"

"When I go to speak with the Moon Man, much higher."

"Oh." She saw the moon far away, but it seemed level with her.

"Come away from the edge, little one. You're not a bird."

"I'm high as a bird."

"Not as high as the Raven."

Suddenly Siksrik was afraid again. "I don't want to meet him, Granny."

"Your father didn't like to hunt the nanuq, but he did, little one."

A gust of wind swung the basket, reminding her she was no longer in her village. Though the children taunted her, she knew them. The Raven was a stranger, more powerful than the spirits of men or animals. Granny had told her the story many times: At the dawn of time, when the ice first cracked to create the Raven, he in turn created the first men, the Inuit, from the ice of the great ocean.

But now, the ice cracked too often, frightened by the false suns that blossomed and withered to the north. Granny was going to speak to him about that, and the easiest way, she said, was to ride the soldiers' offering basket into the sky.

With a creak of taut line, the balloon stopped rising. The burners remained lit, breathing fire and life up into it.

"When will the Raven come?" asked Siksrik.

Granny closed her eyes, pursing her lips. Lines like ice breaks crinkled her face, and wind ruffled the fur edging her anorak. She listened not to Siksrik, but to a voice only she could hear. Siksrik shuffled her feet, pushing snow down through the metal grating.

"The Raven hasn't yet decided," said Granny. "Maybe soon, maybe late. He's thinking about the offering to see if it makes him hungry."

Granny had brought a little pouch filled with raw seal liver to add to the tribute offered by the soldiers. It should more than make up for the worthless bottles removed from the crate.

"Sit beside me, little one."

Siksrik plopped herself down next to the wheezing angakok. She kicked, banging her heels against the side of the wooden box they sat on. Granny shushed her, and she stopped.

"I talked to your papa last night," said Granny. "He stood right next to me, and even though my eyes were closed, I could see him. He said to me, 'Granny, just ask that little girl to do what's needed and she'll do it.'" She paused for breath, sucking it in great gulps. "And he said, 'When you talk to the Raven, you ask him to find somebody to take care of her, because, Granny, your time's almost up, just like my time was. I'll visit her when I can, but that's not enough.'"

"What about the nanuq?"

"He said to me, 'You tell Siksrik the nanuq wasn't mad at me; he just wanted company, so it's no little girl's fault.'"

Siksrik stared down at her feet, wiggling them but not kicking the crate. Granny had a coughing fit. Siksrik heard another sound through the wind and the roar of the burners: A far-off rumble.

She poked Granny's anorak. "I hear something."

Granny tried to stifle her coughing but failed. Siksrik huddled against her, listening to the growing rumble. A star grew in the twilight sky. Siksrik stared, unable to turn away, and Granny lifted her head to look, too.

"The Raven?" Siksrik whispered, pressing against Granny.

"Inside!" croaked Granny.

Siksrik helped her clamber into the crate, then climbed down beside her. She shivered in the darkness, imagining the creature beating toward them on giant wings. She didn't ask Granny why they had to hide, because Granny was still coughing. The roar outside climbed to a shriek.

Abruptly the crate jerked upward, tilting sideways. Granny gasped as Siksrik fell against her soft belly. The Raven was shrieking in her ears, and Siksrik howled to drown it out. She fought her way off Granny to fall beside her. The crate lurched. Siksrik held her breath, but the crate stayed in the cargo basket. Everything in the basket was vibrating: cans, bottles, steel drums. Music for the Raven.

"Granny!"

The angakok was limp beside her.

The crate still tilted, but Siksrik managed to stand. When she lifted the lid, the wind tore it open to bang against the other side. The Raven was pulling the basket through the night like an empty sled drawn by crazed dogs. Siksrik looked up and gasped at the sight of the Raven. It was huge and black as soot, but fire glowed in its belly. Of the silver balloon there was no trace. The basket was being sucked up toward the fire.

"Granny! Granny!" Siksrik shook her, but Granny didn't respond.

The Raven held its wings stretched tautly. It had no feathers like a mortal bird. Where its beak should have been, two fat sticks protruded, and above them was a glowing painting of a fierce bird holding strange eggs in its talons. There were words written there in the language of the Whites: Atomic Eagle.

Closer to the belly now, Siksrik saw two men inside dressed in tan soldier suits. They must live on it, like lice. They weren't on fire, but light shone all around them. Behind them towered a rack of giant silver eggs, like the ones in the picture of the bird. She wished she could ask Granny what it meant, but she looked down, and the old woman's eyes were still closed.

Up into the belly of the bird went the basket, and the belly closed beneath it. The wind stopped, but the basket was still swaying from the lines that once held the balloon. All around her was metal, no bird entrails. Glass fires glared down at her. The shriek of the Raven was muffled.

"Hey, Bill, look in that crate!" A soldier pointed at her, and she shrank down beside Granny.

"Ring the captain! And get a Tommy gun!"

"Granny!" Holding back tears, Siksrik tugged Granny's arm. She could hear Granny's ragged breathing, see her tongue lying behind worn-down teeth.

Boots pounded on metal.

"I don't know how many, sir. The basket could be crawling with them." The soldiers talked too fast for her to understand everything in their language.

"All right!" shouted a deeper voice. "You all come out with your hands on your heads!"

Siksrik huddled closer to Granny.

"In that crate there, sir. That's where I saw one."

"In the beer crate?! What the hell'd they do with our beer!"

"They're not coming out, sir."

"Sir, maybe we should just drop it. The Russki's must have the damn thing booby-trapped by now. And we've got supplies for a few more days in the air."

"Open the cargo bay doors!"

Metal clanked, and the shriek of the Raven pierced its belly. The air grew cold again. Granny's eyes were still closed, so everything was up to Siksrik. She poked her head cautiously above the lip of the crate.

"There!"

"Don't shoot!" said a soldier.

"Jesus, it's just a kid."

"Come out of there. Now! Cover him, Coville."

Siksrik climbed out and stood beside the crate.

"Come to the edge of the basket. And put your hands in the air!"

Siksrik raised her mittens. There were seven soldiers. Two had big guns pointed at her, big enough to kill a nanuq. The others held little guns in their bare hands. Below her, where the belly of the Raven had been, there was only wind, and the ice far below.

"How many more of you?" barked the deep-voiced soldier.

"Just Granny," she whispered.

"I can't hear you! Sergeant Wilkins, get the boy down."

"I think it's a girl, sir. Permission to close the cargo bay doors?"

"Granted."

The belly closed again with a boom. Wilkins, a man no older than papa had been, put his gun in a pouch on his belt and lifted her down from the basket.

"The captain asked how many there are of you," he said.

"Just Granny. She's hurt."

"Where is she?"

Siksrik pointed to the crate.

A soldier with a little gun warily climbed onto the basket and peered into the crate.

"It's a woman, sir, dressed like the kid. Seems to be unconscious; I'll need a hand."

Two men lifted Granny down from the basket.

The captain seemed disappointed by Granny's appearance. Siksrik saw that on one of the belly walls, near the silver eggs, were pictures of millers' daughters with no clothes.

"Sergeant Wilkins and I'll take her to the mess room," said the Captain. "The rest of you, search every inch of that cargo." He gestured for Siksrik to come.

The two carried Granny into the Raven's gullet, and Siksrik followed. They passed through several chambers, each with men at work, before the soldiers laid Granny on a table. All the rooms were hot, like being too close to a fire. Granny wheezed loudly, the way she did when she slept on her back.

The captain spoke to the wall: "Doc, report to the mess room. You got a patient. Lumas, we found two stowaways on the cargo pickup. Monitor the DEW transmissions and see if you hear anything about it. Everybody else, keep your eyes open."

A man carrying a bag with a red cross hurried through the other door of the room.

"What happened to her, sir?"

"She was like this when we pulled her out. Fix her up so we can talk to her."

The man bent over Granny.

"Hey, you," said the captain. "Girl. What the hell were you doing in the cargo basket? And don't try to hornswoggle me about it being an accident."

Siksrik understood only half of what he said, but Wilkins gave her an encouraging smile.

"To talk to the Raven."

"What?!"

Clearly it was forbidden, which explained all the soldiers. Siksrik wished Granny would wake up.

"Granny said we must talk to the Raven," whispered Siksrik, "to make it stop the new suns in the North."

"Doesn't sound like the Russians, sir," said Wilkins.

"Well, somebody put them up to it."

Granny groaned.

"You just lay there, ma'am."

"Their angakok says not to move," Siksrik translated.

"Where are we, little one?" asked Granny weakly.

"Are you two talking Russian?" asked the captain. "Speak English."

"Granny hasn't been to school," Siksrik explained. "She only speaks Inuit."

"Doc, keep an eye on these two. Come on, Sergeant, I want to talk to you."

#

"They're loons, Sergeant." He sat in the navigator's seat, facing Wilkins.

"But not Russian loons, Captain. My little girl Rebecca, back at the base, is about this girl's age. This kid's no more a spy than she is."

"They boarded a warplane! The only atomic rocket plane in the world, on an H-bomb test flight, and they picked it. We're not scheduled to land for another two weeks."

"It's not your fault, sir."

"Ha! Tell that to the Pentagon."

"Maybe we should ask them."

He gnawed on a thumbnail. "We got our orders, Sergeant. Hey, Summers!" he yelled to the pilot. "What's our time to target?"

"One hour, forty-seven minutes, sir."

"Enough time to cancel," said Wilkins.

"It's not the scientists sitting in their seismic shacks I'm thinking about - it's Goldwater sitting in the White House. What's he think when the Pentagon calls and says the captain of the Eagle broke radio silence to say, 'Excuse me, I can't make up my mind'? I tell you, Sergeant, I was in the war and if there's one thing I learned, it's that you gotta make decisions."

"And they gotta be right," added Wilkins.

"Damn straight. I say we're GO for drop."

"Yes, sir."

He stood and walked back toward the tail, jostling other airmen in the cramped corridor. When he passed through the mess room, the old woman had her eyes closed again, but was muttering in her strange language. He nodded to Doc and made his way back to the cargo bay. Coville and the other four had the cargo spread and stacked all over.

"You find the beer?"

Coville shook his head and set down the inventory list. "No more stowaways, either, sir."

"Well, that's a comfort. You men have forty-five minutes to clear this out and jettison the basket. I want this bay clear an hour before the test drop."

"Yes, sir."

He crawled through the tunnel above the bomb bay, back toward the reactor. Through the waist gun windows he saw puffs of cloud flashing past, illuminated by the running lights. The horizon was growing darker. This bomb drop would take place by the light of the moon.

Lieutenant Prescott was in charge of the four technicians in the cramped reactor room. He was scratching his head, and looked up when the captain entered.

"Get the spies all locked up, Captain?" he asked.

"Heck, Lieutenant, it's a kid and an old lady. But whoever let them on the cargo basket will be in a lot more hot water than me before this is over. Everything O.K. back here?"

"I dunno, sir. We got some aberrations in the core. Nothing you'd notice from the rocket temperature, but there's a thirty percent ripple in the gamma level."

"They tell you what to do when that happens?"

Prescott smiled. "Yes, sir. In Navy Nuke School, they told us to surface."

"Maybe I better go check my chute."

Prescott chuckled. "Sorry about that, chief. I'll let you know if it looks serious. Might just be the detector."

The captain nodded. The room smelled like a giant radio set: hot vacuum tubes spiced with ozone and outgassing insulation. He missed the old-fashioned smell of aviation fuel, like coffee on a cold morning. Beyond layers of lead shielding huddled the atomic core and the superheated rocket chamber. If the problem was back there, they were flat out of luck, and really would need their parachutes. And the Pentagon would have his hide.

He turned and headed back toward the nose, squeezing past the men on duty. The old lady was still mumbling on the table. Doc gave him a shrug, but before he could speak, the radar operator stuck his head in from the doorway.

"Captain? There's a -"

"Hold on. I'll talk to you up front."

He followed the radar operator to his station just behind the cockpit. There was a bright green blotch on the radar screen, vaguely swirl-shaped. Bad weather ahead.

"Between us and the drop," he commented.

"Yes, sir."

"Well, as long as it's not like that at the target, too. Tell Summers to try flying above it. That should keep us out of the worst of it."

#

"She says she has pain all her days," Siksrik told the man named Doc. "It's how she knows she hasn't become a spirit."

Granny still lay on the table, minus her anorak, wheezing between mumbled phrases that weren't addressed to Siksrik. Doc had felt Granny's head, announcing she had a lump. Of course. Granny had lumps everywhere.

"Do you know if she has any allergies?" asked Doc. "I need to know before I can give her pain medicine."

Doc tried to explain allergies, bewildering Siksrik. He finally announced he wouldn't give Granny medicine. Siksrik had already decided that if Granny wanted medicine, she'd make her own. She wished Granny could make the air colder.

The room had gradually tilted. On the table, Doc's magic objects rattled and nearly slid off before he caught them. Soldiers Captain and Wilkins entered and sat in chairs fastened to the floor.

"Her name's Siksrik," Doc told them. "The woman's her grandmother and they live in a village near Chukchi Base. Siksrik says they just climbed in the basket - nobody stopped them."

"Not my grandmother," said Siksrik. "My grandmother went out on the ice and didn't come back."

"But she's a relative."

"Yes, and the angakok."

At the word, Granny opened her eyes and looked at Siksrik. She struggled and sat up, despite the protests of the Whites.

"It is time to speak with the Raven," she said. She reached into her shirt for a pouch tied around her neck and began untying it with stiff fingers. Her lips were drawn back in pain.

The captain cleared his throat. "What's she getting, there?"

"Charms," answered Siksrik.

"As long as it's not a bomb," he muttered.

The room bumped up and down. Clouds streamed past the room's small window, reflecting the room's light.

"It's going to be bumpy," said a buzzing voice from the wall. "The storm extends above our ceiling."

"Siksrik," said the captain. "Did anyone outside the village suggest getting in the cargo basket?"

"Granny said the Moon Man told her."

"Who?"

"The Moon Man." She pointed out the window, but there were only clouds. Lightning flickered. The three soldiers looked at each other.

"What does this man look like?" asked the captain. "How long has he been coming to your village?"

"He doesn't come. Granny flies to meet him."

"Maybe she's seeing a bush pilot on the sly," said Wilkins.

"Oh, Jesus, Sergeant," said the captain. "This old lady has to be about eighty."

A bright flash from the window flooded the room, accompanied by an ear-splitting boom. The flash faded, and for a moment, so did the room lights. Then they came back on.

"Lightning strike," said the buzzing voice from the wall. "I think we're O.K., but we'll be in this storm for a while."

"Santa doesn't like us invading his air space," said Wilkins.

"Hell, we nuked Santa four times already," said the captain. "He's not going to mess with us."

"Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus," said Doc. "And all his reindeer glow in the dark."

The soldiers laughed. Siksrik remembered that Miss LaBerge had told her Santa was an old White who lived farther north. Granny said Whites couldn't even make a decent igloo, so how could one of them live so far out on the sea ice?

Outside the window, a pulse of lightning curled into a ball, looking like a great eye peering at Siksrik. The eye faded back into the clouds.

Granny held her charms in one trembling palm, fingering them carefully as the room bounced up and down.

Watching her, the captain asked, "Did the man give your granny anything to take with her to the basket? Like maybe a radio?"

"Sometimes Granny takes presents to the Moon Man, but he just tells her things."

The captain nodded. There was another flash, bright as the first, making the captain's face look white as snow. A crash like breaking ice shook the sky, and when the lightning faded, the room lights didn't come back on.

"Summers?" yelled the captain.

Lights flickered for a moment, then died again. The shriek of the Raven had faded, leaving the sound of wind. Siksrik heard men yelling in the corridors. The captain got to his feet.

The voice she'd heard buzzing in the wall before called through the corridor, "Tell Engineering I need some power! Losing pressure on hydraulics, too!"

"Lieutenant Prescott!" roared the captain. "Let's get this bird alive again!"

"Working on it, sir!" came a reply from far away.

A soldier ran into the room, a light in each hand, and gave one to the captain. The captain followed him out, toward where Siksrik had left the basket.

"Is the bird dead?" asked Siksrik.

"That's a figure of speech," said Wilkins. "Planes get hit by lightning all the time. Don't worry, we're not going to crash."

"Granny?"

"Hush, little one. I'm waiting for the Raven to speak."

Lightning relieved the gloom in the room, through the ice forming on the window. The room was tilting the other way now. Siksrik kicked her heels against the post supporting the chair.

A soldier hurried through the corridor, from where the captain had gone. A few seconds later, the lights came on, but not as bright as before.

A man spoke from somewhere up the corridor: "This is Eagle to Spectator Group. Current position is 84 degrees, 7 minutes north; 138 degrees, 29 minutes west. Game postponed because of rain. Will advise." He repeated his odd speech.

"Must be serious if we're breaking silence," said Doc, fidgeting.

Wilkins nodded.

The lights flickered again, then the captain's voice buzzed from the wall, "Anybody not on critical task, report to the cargo bay immediately and assemble survival gear."

Doc stood up.

"Siksrik," said Wilkins, "You come with us. Granny can stay here and rest."

"Granny, the soldiers say I have to go with them."

"It's all right, Siksrik." Wheezing, Granny fingered her charms and looked out the window. Long white hair concealed her wrinkled neck.

The cargo basket still hung where Wilkins had lifted Siksrik out of it, a short distance above the metal floor. But now soldiers worked around it noisily, with the thuds and scrapes of crates being shoved around.

"Coville," said Wilkins. "Double-check the bomb racks. Make sure nothing's armed."

"Yes, sir."

"Anybody know what happened?"

"Nathan said vacuum tubes went off like flash bulbs in the reactor control room."

"Can they fix it?"

Nobody answered. Their faces reminded her of her father's face when her mother died. The room was tilting sideways now, as well as forward, like floating ice overweighted by a sled.

The captain came through a tunnel and climbed down the ladder.

"We're losing it. Get your chutes and prepare to ditch." Scowling, he noticed Siksrik. "Sergeant, strap her to you. Doc, get a spare chute and put it on the old lady."

"Are we over water, sir?"

"Ice. Damn near as bad." He went forward.

"Maybe Summers can land it," someone said.

"Hell, he can't even keep us level in the air," muttered Wilkins. "Coville, don't be a moron! Get your cold weather gear on first. And forget the oxygen mask. We'll be scraping the ice when we jump."

Thunder boomed outside, accompanied by flashes from the tunnel above the silver eggs.

"Stay here, Siksrik. I have to get something from my bunk."

The others were too busy to pay attention to her. She sat on a crate, panting in the heat. Each bounce of the room caused the cargo basket to sway. The lights failed again, and the soldiers began cursing. Someone crawled over and around crates toward her, and by the light of someone's flashlight she saw it was Doc.

"Siksrik, I need you to help me with your granny."

He dragged her by the hand through the darkness. Other soldiers jostled her, nearly bowling her over with their gear. She ended up in a room that, by its feel, might have been the one where she'd left Granny, but a flash of lightning revealed the tables were bare. Doc pulled her to a corner of the room.

"Down there." Doc was in a hurry.

Siksrik squatted and could smell Granny's presence, hear her wheezing. The angakok had wedged herself into the corner, behind one of the chairs attached to the floor: like a wolverine at bay.

"Siksrik," said Doc. "I need to tie a pack on Granny. It has something in it that will make her float to the ground, so she won't get hurt when she jumps out of the plane. But she thinks I'm trying to hurt her."

Siksrik tried to translate, even though she didn't quite understand. Especially the part about Granny jumping. Granny wasn't a hare.

"The Raven says it will speak to me," said the old woman. "I must wait."

"Maybe if you just put the pack on," said Siksrik, "the Whites will be happy and leave you alone."

Granny shook her head. "You must do what they say. And I must not. The Raven has told me."

Someone ran into the room. Others were shouting outside.

"Doc?" It was the captain's voice.

"Trying to get the old lady, sir. She's wedged herself behind the chair-mount in the corner."

"Well, dammit, get her out! Two minutes till we ditch. Two minutes. If you can't do it, leave her." He stormed out.

"Siksrik!" Wilkins was calling for her. "Siksrik!"

"She's in the mess room, Sergeant!"

His boots pounded the corridor. He had a flashlight, and it reflected onto his face. He wore a heavy coat now, with the hood thrown back. Slung over one shoulder was a bulky pack.

"Come on!" He dragged her back toward the big room. "I told you to stay put! Why didn't you?"

She didn't answer, and he was in too much of a hurry to notice. A cool, pleasant wind blew in the corridor now, and when she got to the big room, she saw dark clouds through the open belly of the bird. A man moved a long stick, and abruptly the big cargo basket fell through the opening, a length of cable whipping after it.

Wilkins had put his pack on, and now stooped to face her, setting his flashlight on the floor. He was breathing hard, his eyes wide. The plane bounced and tilted, knocking him to his knees. The light rolled to the hole and disappeared.

"Siksrik, the plane is falling and we can't stop it." He made a choking sound and reached into his pocket. "Here."

He put something in her mitten, a soft bundle.

"My daughter gave me this. It's her teddy, and she gave it to me to keep me company. I want you to take care of it for me. O.K.?"

Siksrik nodded. By the reflected glow of other flashlights, she saw that the bundle was a nanuq, small and fuzzy, with no claws or teeth.

Wilkins wrapped a strap under her arms and tightened it, pressing her against him.

"You take care of the bear," he said. "I'll take care of you."

The captain's voice roared again. "All right! We jump now, or we don't jump at all. Push the gear out, then start jumping, by twos. We have got to stay together. You drift a half-mile away, we'll never find you. Light your flares when you're down, and head for your buddy, then a survival crate. With your buddy. Then regroup and we'll wait for the rescue planes. Questions?"

"What about Summers, sir?"

"He and I go last. Ready?"

A chorus of yessirs answered.

"Kick the gear out!" He turned and ran.

Boxes leaped down into the clouds, lines trailing. Cloth puffed from the boxes like smoke, then the clouds swallowed everything. Two soldiers jumped after the boxes.

A man stumbled through the corridor, struggling to fasten the straps of his pack.

"Doc!" said Wilkins.

"I had to leave her." He sounded like he was crying. "I tried to pull her and she started biting. How the hell was I going to get a chute on her?"

"O.K. Stick with me. Jump when I jump."

"Granny?" called Siksrik. She tried to pull away from Wilkins.

Wilkins picked her up and jumped through the open belly. They fell into the clouds, and Wilkins' pack opened, spilling its contents, cloth that rolled upward into the darkness forever. Lightning flashed in the form of a ball, a great eye of the Raven peering down at her. She saw Doc swimming in the air. As thunder crashed, Wilkins' cloth billowed into a balloon almost like the one she and Granny had ridden. It snapped her upward, and Wilkins' grip on her tightened. She pressed the magic nanuq against her.

"Jesus, it's cold," said Wilkins.

It was quiet now, floating in the clouds. She tasted snowflakes with her tongue.

"The captain must have jumped by now. I'm real sorry about your Granny."

"She will speak with the Raven," Siksrik said solemnly.

Lightning flashed again, and abruptly she heard the scream of the Raven. For an instant the clouds parted, and she caught a glimpse of it as she'd first seen it from the balloon basket, a moving star in the darkness. Then the clouds folded around it like great wings, and it was gone, its roar receding into the storm.

"That's impossible!" said Wilkins. "Everybody jumped except for ..."

Siksrik floated toward the ice, holding the nanuq.

Copyright (C) George S. Walker 1994.