ENCOUNTER by Hep Aldridge (bill gates books recommendations .txt) 📕

“Alive and well, Gus; how are things in Florida?”

“Not bad; I take it you talked to Fitz. Did he tell you to call?”

“Yep, just got off the horn with him; what’s going on?”

“Well, the legal stuff is still moving along slowly; no new developments and no one’s bothering us. So, that’s all good. I wanted to let you know we have finally cleared the debris off the quarter deck of the galleon and have gotten down to the main cabin area. I think we may have found that Vatican emissary’s cabin, and it looks like he hadn’t taken a vow of poverty.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I think you will be very happy with what we’re pulling out of there, on the QT, of course—quite the haul. The rest of the recovery is going smoothly. Weather looks like it may take a turn for the worse, though, so we may have to shut down for a few days, but no big deal.”

“Man, that’s great news; I look forward to the details later.”

“Lawrence is still tied up in Orlando, but he wanted me to give you a message. He said he got a call from the law firm he was working with in California about Reggie’s legal troubles.”

“Okay, what’s the latest?”

“He said the guy who has the lawsuit against her just got busted for trafficking cocaine. He thinks this can really help her case and will stay in touch with the attorney.”

“That sounds like it could be very good news. Let him know we talked and to keep those money-grubbing government yahoos at bay.”

“Don’t worry about that; from all accounts I hear, they are kicking butt, in a legal sense, of course,” he said, laughing.

“Great, anything else I need to know?”

“No, don’t think so; things are moving along smoothly, but I’ll let you know if anything comes up.”

“Good, just so you know, we found the old village where the priest lived, the one that wrote the journal, and we’re putting together our search plan for the lost city, so we’ll keep you updated as well.”

“Fantastic, all right, you all be safe; we’ll be in touch.”

“You got it, Gus; you guys take care too,” and with that, the call ended.

We had cobbled together a makeshift table and some low benches from scraps we found in the village. Joe had set up the laptop and his pad along with the solar charger we had gotten in Fitz’s care package. Batteries were being charged, and he was looking over a topo map of the area we had loaded into the laptop. The others were gathered around, talking. I quickly brought them up to speed on the info I had just received, except for the Reggie legal stuff. I thought I would keep that to myself until I found out how things developed.

I said, “Okay, folks, here’s the plan. Joe, we need to get the drone in the air and do a visual flyover of our immediate area to see if we can spot any trail leading from the village into the mountains. If nothing jumps out, then we’ll have to try a LIDAR search. We have a good head start on the Vatican mercs, but we don’t have time to waste, so we need to get the drone up as soon as we can.” Joe had already started setting up the drone for launch.

“The rest of you spread out and do a quick area recon of the village perimeter and see if you can spot any physical sign of a trail. Don’t go too far and stay on Comms. Give me a holler if you find anything. O’Reilly, I want you to hang back and help Joe and me review the drone video in real-time. Okay, let's hit it.”

An hour and a half passed, and we had come up empty-handed when O’Reilly, who was intently staring at the video feed from the drone, said, “Is that something down there, between those big boulders? That looks like a trail.” Joe stopped the drone’s forward motion and hovered, then dropped down for a closer look.

“It looks like there might be some wear on the rock surfaces, a little smoother going between those boulders,” Joe said as we all stared at the screen.

He was right; there was a slight even discoloration of the rock surface that wound between some huge boulders and then disappeared under the rugged canopy below.

“Okay, Joe, take her in, low and slow. Let’s get a better look.”

Sure enough, when he got the drone lower, we could see a narrow track had been worn smooth between the huge boulders, and it was heading in the right direction… up. I think I let out a whoop as Joe locked in the GPS coordinates of our discovery.

“That could be our trail,” O’Reilly said.

“Could be,” I said, “at the very least, it’s a good starting point. Nothing else has presented itself, so unless the others find another one, then that’s the path we start on. But let’s check it further. Joe, take the drone back up, start at the path down there, and fly straight ahead and see if we can find any more indications that the path continues ahead. Do a visual and continue the LIDAR scan; if we can’t see it, maybe the scan will pick it up.

After ten minutes more, he said, “Sorry, Colt, the canopy gets too thick. I can’t really get a good visual of the ground, but the LIDAR scan is processing, and we should have something in a few minutes.”

“Continue the scan all the way back here; maybe we can find something that will give us a starting point close by.”

While Joe was doing the scan, I had been on our Comms and recalled everyone. I was anxious to move out.

“O’Reilly, let’s start breaking camp. When everyone gets back, I want to be able to move out quickly.” No one else had indicated they had found a path headed in the right direction, so our discovery was it.

An hour later, we