CRASH SITE AMAZON P. 2

Before setting off on my latest adventure I stopped by the University to consult with Professor Ashua Kellinsworth. The principle goal of the expedition being to find Captain Quinn Danner's crash site somewhere in the Upper Amazon, Prof. Kellinsworth is the world's premier authority on all things Danner. Captain Danner was attempting to find the mythical Original Spring, the place where the Amazon supposedly originates and, as local legend has it, from whence all water on earth first sprang forth. His plane is known to have crashed but the site is unknown. Danner's aeroplane, The Indefatigable Hummingbird, was never found. Or, to be more precise, the innumerable flaming pieces of The Indefatigable Hummingbird were never found. Danner built the I.H. himself and left no plans or specifications. He claimed it was indestructible and could even survive a direct collision with the side of a solid steel mountain. If we find the crash site the exercise will be a success but if we find even one small piece of the I.H. it will go down as the single greatest endeavour in the history of all mankind.

I arrived at Prof. Kellinsworth's office with a fifth of scotch under my arm. Ashua is a connoisseur of being intoxicated. It was office hours and a young, skinny nerd was sitting before the good professor with a bright red back-pack on. Prof. Kellinsworth's brow was wrinkled more than usual, his stringy white hair spread out in all directions perhaps in exasperation.

“No no no no no,” he was saying. “Wrong. Wrong again. You are wrong.”

The nerd's eyes were wide. His lip trembled. “But –” he began.

“No. Wrong. Wrong.”

“How –”

“Wrong.”

“If I –”

“No.”

“Can I –”

“Stop it. Just stop it. You're wasting my time. You're wasting MY time. Here's my advice, listen carefully because I will not repeat it, go home. Not to your dorm room, to your parents' home. Look around yourself. Soak it in. Because that is where you are going to live your entire life because you are a moron and will never amount to anything.”

The young man shifted his eyes as he passed me. Prof. Kellinsworth does not believe in the Socratic method. Socrates, he often points out, was killed. Obviously he made some mistakes.

“Ditkovski,” Kellinsworth mumbled. Then he saw the liquor. “Have a seat!” He smiled brightly, all his teeth showing. I pushed the bottle onto what little spare space there was on the cluttered desk. The Professor flipped the top off with one thumb and poured a health dose into his mouth.

“I'm going,” I told him. “The Amazon.”

“You're a damn fool,” he said. “You'll never find it and if you do you'll never survive.”

“Survive what?” I asked.

“I can’t say.”

“Why not?”

“I don't want to.”

“Why?”

“Because I don't. What? I don't feel like it. Go away.”

It was an ominous beginning to a trek that was already certain to feature danger as its main entree. I pressed Kellinsworth for more information but he said he was sleepy.

For this trip it is important to keep the size of the expedition party small. We will be traveling in very sensitive areas amongst some peoples that have never seen a civilised man before. My assistant, Penelope Atwood, can not make the expedition as her fiancée, a rugged man's man named Gregory Pince, is insisting that she attend their wedding. I am therefore trusting my very life as well as copious note-taking to my second string assistant, Benvolio Sinclair. Joining us on the expedition are a who’s who of the most rugged, intellectually hungry scientists, adventurers and servants in the world. Our Amazon expert is Paulo Kwampis, a half-Brasilian/half-Australian professor from the University of Bali. His assistant is Maxwell Penchant from College du Quebec. Our Brasilian emissary is Chicago Dan, an Ohio State quarterback from Chicago who was kidnapped on a college summer abroad to Brasil. He killed his captors and set himself free but loved the country so much he never left. Our resident Captain Danner expert is his great grand-niece Mya Danner Dungle. She's brought along her fiancée, Efron Cax, heir to the Cax Uranium fortune. To analyze the remains of the Indefatigable Hummingbird, if we're so lucky, is experimental aviation engineers Joel and Bill Hollister formerly of Lockheed-Martin. Joel designed the first successful stealth aircraft and Bill flew its first test flight. It crashed. And it took four months to find the crash site as there was no way of tracking its flight path. Bill survived by very slowly ingesting the only food source – the poisonous Cackle Berry. Eventually he was able to build up an immunity. For protection we've hired a tight-knit crew of seven mercenaries known only as Les Sept. They are French. We also have a mechanic for our armored caravan known only as Carl. Our meals will be cooked by Rufus Antonio, the man who chef'd my very first expedition. They will be served by Amy, Alexa and Sara, three interns from The Culinary Institute of America. Essential to such a cloistered group as ours is always a troupe of entertainers to stave off cabin fever. We were lucky enough to land zydeco band Brother Buford from the Williamsburg neighborhood of Brooklyn. This is our intrepid group. Just 26 plus our seven various toadies to do any manual labor and heavy lifting. The perfect group to assault the Amazon!