We woke up on day 8 and the sun was finally shining brightly in the bedroom window. “It looks so beautiful out there,” said Sky. “Hmm, snow, snow and more snow,” I said. Everyone chuckled and they told me that I never did like snow and cold weather. “Seems I have not forgotten that anyway,” I said smiling. It was still not very warm but at least the snow was melting a bit by afternoon. However, it froze again that night. The next day it was quite a bit warmer and the snow was melting much better.

“Once we can find those sticks, we need to get our SOS sign back up on the roof,” said Sky. “To signal the eagles flying around?” asked Kristina. She was getting very discouraged since she fell and hurt herself. She is walking a bit better, though not much. Sigurbjorn said she had pulled, or perhaps torn, a muscle in her leg, so it will take a while for it to heal. And being cooped up in this small cabin for the past 8 days has not helped any of us.

We really need to be rescued soon or that discouragement will spread and will lead to arguing, something that we have not done since being here. “Six weeks is a long time,” said Sky, while her and I were outside getting fresh air, “it is really showing on Kristina. It will affect all of us soon I think. I am even starting to feel that way myself.” “I guess that is where I have an advantage over all of you,” I said, “each day is like a new day, so time does not affect me in the same way.

But once this snow is gone and we can all be outside more, it will help.” “Yes, I hope so,” she said. Just then I heard something. “I hear a noise,” I said. “It is a helicopter!” shouted Sky and ran inside, coming out with our new guns and Sigurbjorn. “I do not know how to use this,” I said, as Sky handed one gun to me. “It is easy, just hold tight, aim and pull this trigger,” she said smiling at me. “We better wait to see if it is looking for us, or another chopper from Carnival,” said Sigurbjorn.

It was soon close and took a fairly wide circle around us. The side door opened and a man with a machine gun opened fire. We all fell to the ground. They then circled closer and the man dropped something from the door. I spotted it and stood up, catching the device and instantly throwing in as hard as I could away from the cabin. It exploded in quite a large fireball! The chopper came by again and both Sigurbjorn and I opened fire.

The chopper quickly turned the opposite direction and the man at the door fell inside. Just a few seconds later the chopper exploded sending it blazing to the ground in an open area near the stream. “Obviously he was going to drop another bomb,” I said, “and it backfired on them.” I turned to see Sigurbjorn bent over Sky. She had been shot.

Meanwhile, back with the team. While Baldwin, Mandar and Major were in their chess tournament, there was a knock at the door. Tony opened and the 3 girls came in with their visitor. Tracy pushed the woman down on an empty chair. “She is Carnival’s girl,” said Aasta, “she was spying at our door.” “And what do you have to say for yourself young lady,” said Mandar. “Shut up old man!” she exclaimed.

Tracy slapped her hard and was about to do it again, but the woman said to stop. “Then talk,” she said. “Fine, Carnival sent another bird to kill your friends at the cabin,” she said, “and I hope they get them this time! You have caused nothing but trouble for Carnival and he is going to kill all of you! He can do it too, he is bigger than you. You will never get those planes in the air, they will burn.

And no, I do not know where that cabin is and I would not tell you anyway. I want your friends dead, do you hear me, dead!!” “Take a look at the contacts on her phone,” said Aasta, “maybe you know someone.” “Tony, take a look,” said Major. Aasta gave him the phone. “Yeah, 4 of them, big names too,” he said, “Carnival must have money to get them. Wheeler, Bud, Sylvester and Kristopher.”

Major then called Victor and told him. He also told him that Carnival was now in Calgary. The woman had mentioned that to the girls. “Where is he?” asked Major. “Find him yourself, I am not telling you guys nothing more, forget it,” she said. “Are you sure about that?” asked Major again. She just looked away. “Tony, take her out and lose her somewhere,” said Major.

“Right,” he said. The girls went along to the car to make sure she did not scream along the way. Baldwin called Rock and told him to search those planes carefully for bombs. Good thing he did, they found 2 bombs on each plane and one on each chopper. All on the outside but so nice looking that they were hard to notice. A whole day lost when they could have been searching.

To Be Continued.

©2023 Steve McLeod.