Hell Is Above Us: The Epic Race to the Top of Fumu, the World's Tallest Mountain, Jonathan Bloom [best ebook reader TXT] 📗

on (completely fabricated) radio transmissions they had picked up from the United States, the Japanese found out the killing machines were “out of control and on a rampage.” According to calculations from headquarters, some said, the “now master-less machines would reach China and begin wreaking havoc within six hours.”

After an hour of radio silence from Chinese forces, the following transcribed transmission was picked up by Japanese radio men in Kyoto [translated from Chinese]:

To the Japanese curs who are listening in on our transmissions. Do you hear us? Over. [silence] Do you hear us? We know you are listening. We have a question for you. Please respond. What did you do with the money? Over. [silence] We repeat: What did you do with the money? Over. [silence] The money your mother gave you for acting lessons. Over and out.

Operation Barrymore and its Japanese “counter-play” were both disasters. Serving no more purpose, the American actors, writers, and directors were released. Of course, given that the crew of the Auxesis was being held captive (they would not be released until 1945), the entertainers would need to sail the ship back to America themselves. Ultimately, they did get back to America, pulling off possibly the greatest “performance” of their lives: Negotiating the storms and swells of the tumultuous Pacific and returning home to tell the tale.

Fifteen years have now passed since the botching of Operation Barrymore. The American government’s gag order on the operation and its subsequent fallout has finally been lifted. Of the twenty-five actors aboard the Auxesis on that fateful journey, twenty-five are preparing to publish their own accounts. Reviewing the manuscripts, one does not see a single mention of the mountain climbers who passed through their lives, shared life-altering trauma, and then moved on.

The climbers were taken by jeeps to an airfield outside of the village of their imprisonment. Yuudai sat next to Hoyt in the first jeep. Nothing is known about that short ride, but one can only imagine they said nothing to each other and likely avoided eye contact entirely.

The team boarded a cargo plane that carried them over the Sea of Japan, over the hostile enemy territory of inland China and India, and now was crossing over into Nepal. Fumu was getting closer. It was practically on the horizon now. Months of preparation, perils, and death were behind them. Now the Goal was approaching. It was so close but still slightly distorted, just as the oxygen-rich sky awaits beyond the rippling water’s surface after a dive into deep water. Ferguson wrote: “I could not stand the suspense any longer. Enough already! This has gone on too long. Get us to the damned mountain!” He would have his wish soon enough.

Inside the plane, Yuudai approached Hoyt. He sat next to him. Over the hoarse roar of the engines, he apologized to Hoyt. He apologized for the actions of his father. His father was a hard man who did not suffer any challenge to himself or his country. The choice between killing or imprisoning the captain of an enemy ship was no choice at all. Death was mandatory. Yuudai leaned closer until he was apparently an inch from Hoyt’s ear. “I am not my father” he said.

Hoyt’s fog dissipated instantaneously at this utterance. He turned and looked directly at Yuudai without blinking. “Rubbish. What exception are you? I am my father. Chatham over there is his father. We are all but vessels of our parents’ will, and we can no more change that than we can tear off our own skin. Now go and have a seat, yellow scoundrel!” Yuudai returned to his seat, saying no more for the rest of the journey. Ferguson wrote that everyone who could hear the conversation had put their heads down in order to avoid the awkwardness. How could the expedition go well when such animosity existed between team members?

Before Hoyt’s first official entry in his journal on September 1 - the one in which he addressed the journal itself and told of the long hard journey to arrive at Fumu – Hoyt had entered a more “unofficial” entry, one having no date or context. However, it was clearly written somewhere between meeting Yuudai and reaching the base of Qila. Hoyt wrote: “My brother is dead. This Yuudai character seems to think I am mad at him. I am not. I am not even mad at his father. What these Japs do not realize is that this is all the fault of another man. He shoulders responsibility for the series of disasters that have befallen me. His name is Aaron Junk, My Stepfather. My Nemesis. For his undoing, I have forsaken my family. The battle will commence soon.”

At approximately four in the morning on August 20th, Hoyt and his men jumped into the unbroken darkness of low cloud cover. Ferguson wrote later from Base Camp that he had been terrified during the airdrop. No one on the expedition, including Yuudai, had ever skydived. They had all been reluctant before the plane door opened and the deafening wind and engine throb had greeted them. Now they were dropping. Ferguson said that despite his experience with death-defying adventures, the feeling in his stomach from freefall and the stinging cold on his face had made him cry for a moment.

While still in the clouds, the monstrous mountain to their north could not be sensed. When they descended below the ceiling and pulled their ripcords, things changed. Their descent had now slowed and they could take in the world around them. The sounds of the plane and the rushing sound of freefall had dissipated. Now another sound took their place. It seemed to be coming from several miles away, but had the structure of thunder claps occurring right outside one’s window during a summer storm. Explosive. Gun fire perhaps? Had they dropped into a war zone? Visually, the world was still dark except for one patch of sky. The scene looked like a fireworks display