Read Online Fault Line by Chris Ryan - Free Book Online Page A

lowered the stretcher carefully to the ground so as not to jar the injured man’s leg. Alex put down the fuel cans.
    Hex was taking his bergen off. ‘Do you want the good news first? No old Maya structures, so it should all be solid ground.’
    Amber was standing next to a mahogany. ‘But the bad news is we’ll have to clear nearly twenty trees.’ She thumped the trunk of the tree behind her. ‘And that includes this monster.’
    The tree was nearly three metres in diameter, with buttresses flaring out like a bell of fabric from the bottom. They looked around at the rest of the area. Many of the other trees were not as big, but they were solid oaks – at least a metre in diameter. It looked like hard work.
    Paulo unloaded the protective chain mail off the stretcher. ‘Alex, what’s so funny?’
    Alex was smiling as he slipped his bergen off. He opened the top and took out the metal box. ‘I’ve almost been hoping we’d have a chance to do this.’
    ‘Yeah,’ said Amber. ‘Somehow we can tell.’
    ‘Don’t tell me,’ said Li. ‘You’ve brought some wood lice.’
    ‘Beavers?’ suggested Hex.
    Almost reverently, Alex opened the box and revealed the contents. It contained forty white sticks about the length of a Cumberland sausage, wrapped in cellophane. ‘This,’ he said, ‘is plastic explosive. I went on a course at half term. Ladies and gentlemen, I am now qualified to blow holes in things.’
    ‘I admit that’s very cool,’ said Li. ‘But what good is it right now?’
    Alex lifted the sticks of plastic explosive out of the box. Underneath were drilling tools and some other, smaller boxes. ‘We put a couple of holes in each tree and stick some explosive in. Then – bang. Job done. We’ll be back in Belize City in time for dinner. I don’t think we’re going to need those chainsaws.’
    His words lifted the group’s mood in an instant. It was though the sun had come out.
    Amber felt her old positive self again. ‘Hex has marked the trees we need to move. There’s a cross on each of them.’
    ‘That wasn’t me,’ said Hex, his voice full of doom. ‘That was the Blair Witch donkey.’
    They all started to giggle. Amber poked him in the ribs. ‘Don’t start us off again.’
    Alex handed Paulo the drilling tool. It was like a giant corkscrew, with a handle and a long twisted shaft. ‘Bore two holes in each tree, opposite each other and one slightly below the other. The one below creates a weak spot; the one above pushes the trunk over.’
    Paulo nodded. ‘Like a topcut and undercut when you’re felling a tree with a saw or an axe?’
    ‘Exactly. And make the undercut so that the tree falls outside, not in towards the landing zone.’
    Hex picked up the machete. ‘I’ll clear some of the smaller bushes.’
    Alex took the wrapper off one of the sticks of plastic explosive, then tossed it to Amber.
    Amber caught it on reflex, then realized with horror what she’d got in her hands. ‘What did you do that for?’
    Alex laughed. ‘PE’s virtually inert. You could put it on a fire and it would barely burn.’
    ‘Very funny,’ snapped Amber. Her heart was still hammering. ‘I bet you weren’t so cool about it when they did the same to you on your course.’
    Alex smiled sheepishly. She was dead right. He’d been shaking like a leaf when the instructor had tossed the stick of PE at him. You couldn’t pull the wool over Amber’s eyes.
    Amber sniffed the PE. It smelled of nothing and felt like plasticine. Strange stuff. ‘How is this harmless substance going to blow down a tree?’
    Alex touched the small box in the kit. ‘These detonators. You don’t want to play catch with those.’
    ‘Do you want this back?’
    ‘Pick up the box. You can help me put it in the trees.’
    Alex went to the first tree. Paulo had made two nice big holes. Now the question was how much PE to use. On the course – with the Territorial Army back at home – he had learned that even a small piece could