Read Apocalypsis 1.05 Island of the Light for Free Online

again: God. Was it ever possible to do without Him? Just for a change?
    Hastily and without waiting for a reply, Maria slipped back into the cab and closed the door. Peter struggled against the impulse to call her name. He would have loved nothing better than to abort the entire operation. But the cab was already turning around, quickly disappearing in the direction of the city. His last opportunity to abort the whole thing and he had missed it.
    »How many jumps have you made?« Noah wanted to know.
    »A little over two hundred.«
    Noah nodded, impressed. »Private jumps or for the military?«
    »We should get going and not stand around and yak,« Peter said brusquely, and then he walked through the gate into the airport grounds.
    He could not find any sign of the battered Mercedes. But he was no longer interested in the car, anyway. Noah led him to a blue hangar and handed him a freshly packed parachute. A flat backpack with a solid harness.
    »A parafoil,« Noah explained, »easy to steer.«
    Peter checked the text on the sew-on badge and saw that the parachute was properly registered.
    »Who packed this?«
    »I did,« Noah said. »This afternoon. I’ve packed hundreds of parachutes in my life. For private jumps and for the military.«
    Peter ignored the allusion, put the parachute on his back, and followed Noah to a small helicopter that was parked in front of the hangar. A three-seat model with an open cockpit.
    Noah did not ask any further questions. And Peter avoided asking what secretive network connected someone like Noah to someone like Don Luigi. He had full trust in Don Luigi’s judgment, and so he put on his safety belt and focused on the jump ahead of him.
    » Generator on. Rotor brake off …« Noah went through the checklist. The rotor blades were singing their song. After receiving clearance to take off for a »scenic flight«, Noah air-taxied the helicopter to the take-off point and pulled it gently up into the night sky.
    After a few minutes, they had left the city lights of Montpellier behind them and flown into the black darkness over the Mediterranean Sea. Only on a few occasions did they see the glowing navigation lights of a fishing cutter or some floating buoys.
    Noah flew higher and higher on an apparently random route. Slowly but surely it got cool up there. Peter stopped himself from asking whether Noah actually knew the exact position of the rock with the fortress. Approximately 10 minutes later, they had reached an altitude of over 5,000 feet. Noah looked down at the water, flew another circle, and then held the helicopter still in the air over the spot.
    »That’s it!« he blared into the earphones of Peter’s headset. Noah pointed downwards where a light was blinking, which was so tiny that it was almost invisible. Other than that, Peter couldn’t see anything.
    »That’s it?« he screamed into his headset.
    »You will see it as you get lower. Good luck.«
    Peter could feel the familiar surge of adrenaline rush through his body, a brief and hot sensation assuring him that he would be fully alert during his jump and capable of doing the job. He readjusted the straps of his harness, unbuckled his seat belt, and stepped onto the skid of the helicopter. As he looked down into the darkness, he could make out the shadowy silhouette of the fortress.
    And then he jumped.
    Right away, he extended his arms and legs to control his fall. He was plummeting towards the earth at a speed of 150 feet per second. A brief glance at the altimeter.
    Wait.
    He was free-falling. Nine hundred feet within the first ten seconds.
    Wait.
    He continued to fall and reached for the handle of the ripcord.
    Wait.
    Two thousand one hundred feet. Eighteen hundred. Fifteen hundred.
    Now!
    Peter pulled the yellow handle. He jerked to a halt, as his reserve chute shot upwards and spread out above him, filling with air and releasing his main chute. Peter felt another jerk and then he began to float towards the earth, now at a