The Sea of Cortez

Sunset on the Sea of Cortez

My ass hurts, and it is becoming clear to me that there is no position in this seat that is going to make things any better. I take a hit off Lou's Walker before it is completely consumed and hope that it relieves the discomfort. He seems a little rougher than usual. We're both pretty tired. Worn out is more like it after this seemingly endless adventure.

We have been flying now over five hours. She is running strong according to indications, and short of some catastrophe we should be able to make our fuel stop in Esquinapa, just short of Mazatlan. Jerry knows the Gringo that runs the place, a local airfield or something. This is the farthest north he has been willing to fly, and the last spot that is marked on the chart. We didn't follow the coast on our way up, not yet anyway. We decided to make a little time so we headed over land after Salina Cruz and headed northwest over Oaxaca, Morelia, and Guadalajara. Uneventful at best without the worries we had with Abigail and no markings on our trip to Mexico City. So far Naomi is a safe bet and we can land her at any strip without worries.

"This is so fucking boring... and I am stoned enough to see those guages smiling at me."
Lou reaches out and taps a couple of them in quick succession... "stop that." He says to them.
"For Christ's sake, are you that fucking stoned that you are seeing things."
"Relax, Nancy, I'm just fucking with you." Lou punches me in the arm, a little harder that I would like, but I do nothing. To play a game trading punches with Lou would certainly see me auger this plane into the ground before it was over.

"Uh... um, excuse me, do either of you have a tissue?" Our hostage calls from the back of the plane, not willing to dare make that statement from between the seats and coax a hard smack in the arm from the stoned killer.
Lou cranes his neck around and then turns half-way in his seat. "What the fuck, are you crying?"
I have to see this and turn my self. Justin's eyes are watering and he is wiping his nose as gentlemanly as possible without having any Kleenex to do it with.
"I seem to be allergic to all this smoke." He says this as though it had just showed up. The reality of it is that the cabin has been full of smoke since Lou lit the first of three Walkers. I honestly think he is related to Bob Marley or something.
"Bullshit, boy... " Lou smiles and inhales deeply, "You aren't doing it right. Just breathe in and hold it."
Justin coughs and then starts digging in his bag for something to blow his nose into.
"Hey, I think there's some TP in the storage cabinet in the back." I turn to Lou, "I could have sworn I saw some when we gave her the once over after Bear gave her to us."

The hostage turns and scoots to the back of the plane, rifling through the small storage locker until he came up with have a roll.
"FOUND IT", he calls to us as he gives it a wave.
I turn to Lou, "Go back there and pop a vent for the little guy. No sense in making him suffer if he is allergic or something."
"Awe for crying out loud, all I was trying to do was to get him to loosen up."
"So you did that on purpose?"
"You think I can smoke three of those fatties and still talk straight? I was blowing most of the smoke back there trying to get him stoned. You know the type, top shirt button fastened... that kind of guy."

We make the fuel stop in Esquinapa. While Naomi's tanks are topped off we walk to a small building emitting an enticing aroma that signals lunch... or dinner, or whatever meal this might be.
"I hope they have cold beer." Lou strides ahead of me and the hostage. "A six pack of tacos and maybe three cold ones and I'll be right."
"Wrong, champ... you are flying the next leg."
"Don't wrong me, pussy. I'll have a six pack of beer and three taco's and fly you where you want to go."
"Yeah, if where I want to go is down."
The little building is what they have for an FBO. There is a two stool lunch counter that probably looked new when the `55 Chevy was still on the drawing board. There is an old woman behind the counter who looks surprised to see us. I am hoping what we are smelling isn't just lunch for the guy fueling our plane and her. No one else in sight.
"Está usted abierto para almorzar?" Lou asks her.
She pulls out a worn pad of paper, then licks the tip of the pencil in her leathered hand.
"Cerveza fría?" One of the many important things to know.
She nods and points to an old freezer.
I pull it open and find several cases of Mexican beer and one of Budweiser. I pull out three and hand them out.
Justin holds his with two hands, like he is holding a fire hose. Then tries to hand it back to me.
"Do they have any bottled water?"
Lou gives him a back-handed knock to the arm, "Where the fuck do you think you are, the Ritz?"
"I would take that as a no then?"
I look around the place, then at Justin, "I wouldn't chance it." I hand him the beer, "You are better off drinking something that has been bottled in a sanitary environment."
"Yeah, you wish." Lou holds his bottle up and looks at it through the light. "I found one of these with a mouse inside once. It was a good thing I didn't chug it."
With that he up ends his beer and pours it down his throat until the chilled foam washes down the inside of the bottle.
Justin just looks at him.

We end up with a platter of tacos and some beans and rice. Kind of a communal thing. There are four tacos each, and more of the sides than we can eat. In the end Lou drinks his three beers with his meal and takes a fourth along for the ride. Justin drinks his beer, and leaves with half of it still in the bottle. I take one with me for good measure and we return to Naomi. An hour has passed.

Lou climbs in and heads for the co-pilot's seat.
"Hey, you're driving."
"You were serious about that?"
"Hell yes I was serious. She's your plane. Besides, you need the hours."
He looks at Justin, who is busy buckling in and making sure his tissue was close at hand.
"Listen to this guy... I need the hours. Just because someone gives you an airplane doesn't mean you need to go out and start getting legal about it. Not in fucking Nogales, anyway."
He piles into the pilot seat, sloshing a little beer on the instruments on his way in. There is a coffee cup holder on the left bulkhead that he tosses his bottle into and there is another splash.
He laughs, kind of giggles, then turns to me. "Hell, if we get pulled over this car is going to smell like beer."
"Is he all right to fly this thing?" The hostage calls up from his seat.
I look at Lou, who I know is pretty much just fucking around, "Are you sure you're okay to... "
"Don't say it. DON'T say another word or Poindexter back there will fly this thing."

We get off the ground and head for the coast. Our run will be straight up the coastline once we pass over Mazatlan. Within fifteen minutes Lou banks us over the beach so we can see the honeys baking in the afternoon sun. He keeps us at about a thousand feet and out over the water so we can see the resorts and beachfront communities off to our right. There are a lot of these retirement communities that have cropped up in the fifteen years that I have been gone. Last time I flew over this strip of land there was nothing but huts and dirt road.

The drone of Naomi's twin radials, in combination with the big lunch and beer, put me to sleep. I break my own rule about sleeping in the right seat. Lou, on the other hand, breaks an even bigger rule by falling asleep while is at the wheel.

"LOU!"
He is sound asleep, head hanging back over the seat, mouth wide open while a slight snore get's cut short when I yell.
We are low, I mean really fucking low. There are fishing boats ahead of us that we will have to pull up to avoid. I can't believe we didn't hit the water during all of this, but that time was about to come.
"PULL UP... PULL UP!" I reach for the wheel when he does and just as we do, the left float hits something and all of a sudden the plane is yawing left.
"SHIT shit shit" Lou tries to correct in the split second after the collision but it's too late. We drop into the Sea of Cortez with enough force to tear the left wing off. But she holds together.

The hostage screams. At first I think we might have a taken on a teenage girl stowaway, but no... it is just him, now wearing one of the old float vests. For all I know he might have put it on when we left our fuel stop.

Naomi dives in hard, dowsing the port engine, throwing a good ten gallons of sea water into the cockpit through the open side window. When she bobs to a stop, I have the imprint of a gauge bezel in my forhead. Lou has a bloody nose and his lip is split. Good thing she did it. I kill the number two and the constant sound of her engines is gone.

"Are we sinking? HEY... are we SINKING?" Justin screams from the back. He is out of his seat, pulling straps on his life vest. I am half expecting to see him hold his nose and walk toward the door.

"No, we aren't sinking."

I look at Lou, who has his shirt bunched up around his nose to stem the flow of blood.

"You okay?"

"Yeah... sorry about that."

"Good thing she held together."

"Good thing."

Within twenty or thirty seconds it occurs to me that we did hit something. There could be a boat sinking in our wake and we would be responsible. I can hear an engine idling toward our position.

"HEY OUT THERE."

Now we can hear every sound.

"YOU OKAY IN THERE?"

Then... "Hey Andy, I think they're gonners in there. I don't think they're among the living."

Another voice... "Grab the boat hook, Theo. Let's board her and see if they need our help."