Whispers in the Forest
Copyright© 2025 by Jody Daniel
Chapter 10
Flight Level 480, Northbound over Zimbabwe.
At forty-eight thousand feet, the air was thin, cold, and smooth as black glass. The vibration and noise of the King Air were gone, replaced by the hushed, electric whisper of three Garrett TFE731 turbofans pushing us north at Mach 0.80
I wasn’t going balls to the walls on cruise speed. Neither pushing the limit of 51000 feet MSL. We would anyway be spending twelve hours airborne plus the ground time for fuel stops. First fuel stop was Entebbe in Uganda. Anyway, it was much faster than commercial air travel.
Below us, the African continent was a sleeping giant wrapped in the glow of the mid-afternoon sun. Above, the sky burned with a cold, steady light that made the problems on the ground feel very small.
From forty-eight thousand feet, Zimbabwe unfolded beneath the aircraft like a vast, living map—ancient, patient, and immense. The land was no longer broken into towns or roads, but into sweeping textures of colour and geometry: deep rust-red earth braided with pale riverbeds, wide savannahs stippled with dark green mopane and acacia, and long, ruler-straight scars where old colonial roads cut across the plateau. The Zambezi lay far off to the west, a silver thread glinting in the sun, while scattered reservoirs flashed briefly like shards of glass before slipping behind the wing.
The sun stood high and hard at thirteen hundred hours, bleaching shadows flat and turning the land into a study of contrast rather than depth. Heat shimmer rose in slow, lazy curtains from the plains, softening the edges of hills and erasing fine detail. At this altitude, weather was reduced to suggestion—thin veils of high cloud drifting like brush strokes, their shadows crawling silently across the ground far below. There was no drama here, no storms or towering build-ups—just the immense calm of a continent breathing under a relentless sky.
Far ahead, toward Uganda, the air took on a faint milky haze, barely perceptible but unmistakable to a pilot’s eye. It lay over the distant highlands and the basin around Lake Victoria, softening the horizon and dulling the blue of the sky into something warmer, heavier. Entebbe sat somewhere beyond that veil, invisible but felt—a humid green threshold where equatorial air replaced the dry southern plateau. From this height, Africa did not feel divided by borders or nations. It felt whole, vast, and enduring, sliding slowly beneath the aircraft as we pressed north into brighter light.
The long-range cruise mode on the FMS was engaged, and the autopilot followed the instructions to the letter.
My tummy grumbled and I thought of the hastily packed provisions in the galley that my trusty branch office manager, the Zulu girl, Thandeka Mkhize, had instructed the competent staff to load for us. She was a pilot herself and thus knew how the aircraft needed to be stocked for a long flight.
I unbuckled and turned to Lena. “Coffee and a sandwich?” I asked. “Real coffee this time. The galley machine actually works. No more thermos flask sludge.”
“Are you making it like you did at the château?” She looked over at me and smiled. “As dark as the devil, as strong as hell, and as sweet as a kiss?”
“Sorry, I don’t have a Cezve available here, but I can make it dark, strong, and Dulce for you.” I replied using the local Volynian words for the coffee pot – a “Cezve” – and the word for very sweet – “Dulce”.
“At home, I will treat you to Cezve made coffee.” Lena replied. “The real Ottoman, Balkan, and rural Eastern European influences, with habits that lean more toward ritual and patience than convenience. You will love it!”
“I know it. I spent time in your country and learned it’s ways, before ... The Thorn chucked me out and did not pay for our services...”
“So,” She said, narrowing her eyes. “You also have an axe to grind with him?”
“Yes ... but your quest takes preference...”
“The autopilot can fly ... Let’s go get coffee and a sandwich.”
As we stepped into the cabin, Volkov got up. He looked refreshed. He had changed into a clean shirt from his emergency kit and was studying a set of digital approach charts on his tablet.
“We have a tailwind,” Volkov noted, pointing at the display. “We will reach Entebbe ahead of schedule.”
“Then we refuel and lift off for Cairo,” I replied. “Just a splash-and-dash. Then ... we cross the Mediterranean and hit the Volynian border.”
Volkov frowned. “We cannot just waltz into Volynian airspace. Zoryanovich controls the grid. If we squawk a civilian code, General Karkarov will scramble the MiGs.”
“That’s why we aren’t going to the International Airport.” I replied.
“The airspace is locked down,” Volkov said. “Since the Princess disappeared, the Regent has placed the military on high alert. If we cross the border squawking a civilian code, General Karkarov will scramble the MiGs. They will force us down at Velyngrad International, and the Regent’s guard will be waiting on the tarmac.”
“We can’t outrun a MiG-29,” I said flatly. “Not even in this bird.”
“No,” Lena said, her voice hard. “We cannot go in the front door.”
“Is there a back door?” I asked.
Volkov tapped the map on his tablet, zooming in on a mountainous region near the border. “Here,” he said. “The Zoryanovich Estate. The Regent’s private hunting lodge. It has a two-thousand-meter paved strip for his personal jet. It is off the main radar grid, tucked in a valley.”
“You want to land at the villain’s house?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. “That sounds like a short trip to a firing squad.”
“He is not there,” Lena said, her voice sharp. “He is in the city at the palace, using all his resources looking for me. The estate will be guarded by a skeleton crew.”
“And,” Volkov added with a wolfish grin, “it is where he keeps his reserves. His private server. If we take the Estate, we take his secrets. And we broadcast the truth from his own living room.”
I looked at the map. It was a tight approach—mountains on three sides, a steep descent. “It’s a one-way ticket,” I said. “If we miss the approach, or if the runway is blocked, we don’t have the fuel to go around and find another airport before the MiGs find us.”
I looked at Lena. “Are you sure about this? Once we cross that border, there is no turning back.”
She touched the ring on her finger—the Falcon and the Key. “I am done hiding, Ruan. Take us in. But now we eat!” Lena said, assertive but kind, like a true leader of people. “I am starving and I believe you all are too.”
The sandwiches Thandeka had packed were simple but substantial—roast beef, mustard, and fresh rye bread. We ate standing around the mahogany fold out table, the map of the Zoryanovich Estate displayed on Volkov’s tablet.
I stood so that I could keep an eye on the flight deck and the navigation and engine parameters.
Lena finished her coffee—black, sweet, and strong, just the way she’d described—and wiped her lips.
“Okay,” she said, her voice businesslike. “We land at the Estate. Then what? We cannot just knock on the door.”
Volkov swallowed a bite of sandwich and tapped the screen. “The airstrip is here,” he pointed to a long grey line in the valley floor. “The main house is two kilometres up this winding road. It is a fortress. Walls, cameras, and a private guard detail.”
“How many guards?” I asked, eyeing the terrain.
“Usually twelve,” Volkov said. “But with the Regent in the city at the palace, the detail will be relaxed. Four or five. They are expecting the house to be empty. They will be watching the perimeter, not the airstrip. Or drinking Vodka and playing cards.”
“So we have the element of surprise,” Lena said.
“We have more than that,” Volkov corrected. “We have the codes.” He pulled a small, encrypted drive from his pocket. “This keycard accesses the service gate at the hangar. We land, we taxi into the Regent’s private hangar—if it’s empty—and we close the doors. To the outside world, the airstrip remains empty. We take the internal tunnel from the hangar to the main house.”
“A tunnel?” I asked. “Does everyone in this story have a secret tunnel?”
“Paranoia is a prerequisite for power in Volynia,” Volkov replied dryly. “The Regent built it so he could flee if the people ever rose up against him. We will use it to rise up against him.”
“And once we are inside?” Lena asked.
“We secure the server room,” Volkov said. “It is in the basement. We upload the deeds and the letter to the national broadcast network. We override the state media feed.” He looked at Lena. “You will address the nation. Live. From the Regent’s own desk.”
I looked at the map, then at Lena. It was a bold, crazy plan.
“And if the guards hear us?” I asked. Volkov looked at his men—Dmitri, who was looking paler but determined, Alexandru, Juri, and Boris.
“Then we do what we were paid to do,” Volkov said simply. “We clear the path for the Queen. Besides, after the broadcast the military will turn and support the future Queen.”
I finished my coffee—wishing I had a splash of milk to cut the strength, but keeping that to myself.
“Right,” I said. “So we sneak in, hijack a TV station, and overthrow a government before dinner. Sounds like a standard Tuesday.”
Lena smiled, a fierce, dangerous expression, eyes narrowed. “Ideally, we do it before teatime.”
I turned to Volkov. “You don’t by any chance have a spare Kalashnikov?”
“AK-12, in the back and seven magazines...” He replied grinning.
Entebbe, Uganda, Africa.
The descent into Entebbe felt less like flying and more like being lowered into a steam bath. As we came down over Lake Victoria, the world beneath us flattened into muted greys and greens, the vast inland sea stretched out like a sheet of burnished metal under the equatorial haze.
There were no sharp horizons here—just layers of moisture and heat stacked on top of each other. The Falcon sliced through it all with her usual grace, stable and obedient, but the moment we broke through the lower cloud deck, I felt it. The cockpit temperature jumped as if someone had opened an oven door.
“Entebbe Tower, Zulu-Sierra-Foxtrot-Alpha-Lima, on the ground at four-five,” I radioed, easing us off the active runway and onto the taxiway. “Request taxi to the remote apron for a technical stop. Fuel only.”
“Foxtrot-Alpha-Lima, taxi to Apron Two via Alpha. Fuel bowser has been notified.”
I followed the yellow lines away from the terminal, deliberately putting as much concrete and distance as possible between us and the glass-fronted commercial gates. I parked the Falcon on the far side of the apron, out of sight, out of mind. The APU stayed running—non-negotiable. Kill the air conditioning here and the cabin would become uninhabitable in five minutes flat.
We waited.
Five minutes slid by. Then ten. The heat pressed in from all sides, even with the packs running full blast.
“Where is the fuel?” Volkov asked, leaning forward to peer out the side window. His eyes weren’t on the apron; they were on the perimeter fence, on the access roads, on every moving shape. One hand rested casually near his sidearm, a habit he hadn’t dropped yet.
“Welcome to Africa time,” I muttered, drumming my fingers against the glare shield.
“They said the bowser was notified.”
I keyed the mic again. “Entebbe Ground, Foxtrot-Alpha-Lima. What is the ETA on that fuel? We are on a tight schedule here.”
“Standby, Captain,” came the reply after a pause thick enough to cut with a knife. “The driver is ... en route.”
“En route from where?” I grumbled to Lena without taking my eyes off the apron. “Cairo?” But I transmitted: “Thank you, Foxtrot-Alpha-Lima.”
Twenty minutes crawled past. The sun beat down mercilessly on the fuselage, turning the aluminium skin into a radiator. Heat shimmered off the tarmac in slow, drunken waves. Inside the cockpit, the tension grew dense and sour. Every service vehicle that trundled past made my shoulders tighten. Fuel truck? Or airport security wondering why a South African jet was loitering in the shadows with the blinds drawn?
“This is dangerous,” Lena whispered, her voice low. “We are sitting ducks.”
“We can’t leave without Jet A-1,” I said. “We’ve got enough to reach the border, but not enough to clear Egypt and make Cairo on the north side.”
Finally, salvation appeared in the least impressive form imaginable. A battered yellow fuel tanker lumbered into view from behind the terminal, its paint sun-faded, its exhaust coughing black smoke. It moved at the pace of continental drift.
“There he is,” I sighed, relief washing through me despite myself. “Buggy Speed Racer himself. Straight out of Scooby-Doo.”
I opened the door and climbed down onto the tarmac. The heat hit me like a physical blow—thick, wet, and clinging, carrying the mixed scents of kerosene, hot rubber, and stagnant water from the nearby swampy ground. Sweat broke instantly across my back. I stood next to the wing as the operator dragged the hose into place and secured the coupling. I slipped a folded twenty-dollar bill into his hand.
“Fast as you can, chief,” I said. “We’ve got a tailwind waiting.”
He grinned, wide and unbothered, pocketed the cash, and cranked the pump to life. The flow rate picked up noticeably. Thirty minutes late. In the air, thirty minutes is nothing. On the ground—while outrunning a coup—it’s an eternity.
When the tanks were finally full and the caps secured, I settled the bill with my American Express and jogged back up the steps, sealing the door behind me like I was closing a hatch on a sinking ship.
“Let’s get out of here,” I said, dropping back into my seat. “Before someone decides we owe a parking fee.”
I ran the start sequence faster than the book would have liked. The engines spooled, temperatures came up clean, oil pressures steady. We rolled almost immediately. As we lifted off, climbing away from the shimmering runway and back toward the cooler safety of the upper atmosphere, I checked the clock.
“We lost fifty minutes,” I told Volkov. “We’ll have to make it up on the leg to Cairo. I’ll push the cruise to Mach point eight-two.”
“Do it,” Volkov said without hesitation. “Burn the fuel. Just get us there.”
“Don’t worry, Ruan,” Lena said gently. “I contracted you. I will pay for everything. When this is all done, just hand me the account...”
I let that sit as the Falcon climbed, the air cooling with every thousand feet. She said she had the means—and I knew she did. But as I watched Entebbe shrink beneath us and the horizon clear ahead, I realised something quietly, firmly.
There are some things you don’t invoice.
Her trust. Her friendship. The knowledge that I was helping put a country back on its feet.
That would be payment enough.
Entebbe to Cairo.
The climb out of Entebbe was sluggish, the Falcon heavy with fuel and the air thick with equatorial humidity. But once we punched through the inversion layer at flight level two-four-zero, the temperatures dropped, the engines breathed easier, and the aircraft found her stride again.
We turned north, following the invisible line of the Nile River toward Sudan. The next four hours were a study in isolation. Below us, the lush green of Uganda gave way to the scrub of South Sudan, and then the endless, terrifying emptiness of the Sahara. The sun was setting as we started to transverse the desert.