“General assembly again. The Indians found a helicopter carrying a Russian engineer from Roscosmos and a doctor from the observatory in Kathmandu. They were the ones who detected the signal…” the assistant wanted to continue.
“I know. Car!” Monsieur Bajolet interrupted her.
“Already downstairs.”
Bernard Bajolet hung up and quickly got ready. In five minutes he was in the car. Twenty minutes later, he entered the hall he was already familiar with and sat down at his seat. There were several people in the hall besides him. Everyone looked sleep-deprived. Igor Komarov entered the hall and looked at his watch. Mr. Bajolet nodded at him in greeting. The screen began to set up a video conference call with the Indian military base.
More and more people began to enter the hall. Soon an Indian general entered the room, speaking on the phone, and informed his colleagues that the video conference should begin.
“Will we be able to start soon?” Jean-Jacques Dordain asked via microphone.
“Yes,” replied the general, “helicopter pilots are already there.”
A small conference room appeared on the screen. The camera was fixed on top and showed a simply furnished room. A great number of military men were sitting at the table.
“So, gentlemen,” the Indian general hung up his phone and began speaking into the microphone. “Our team just returned from a rescue expedition. We found the pilot, Captain Shah, the co-pilot and the military communicator. They were sent by the Nepalese military as an escort…” the general didn’t have time to finish.
“Excuse me,” Igor Komarov interrupted him, “have you found Yulia Danilina?”
“Um… No,” replied the general.
“What?! But what happened?” the head of Roscosmos began to get nervous.
“That’s why we asked Captain Shah to tell us his version of what happened. It is more about the missing plane.”
There was a pause. It was obvious that the signal had already reached the military base, but Captain Shah didn’t start any explanation.
“He doesn’t speak English, so he will be translated,” the general added. “Please, Captain Shah, tell us what happened.”
A few more seconds of silence and everyone heard the tired voice of the Nepali pilot. The Indian military interpreter began to speak:
“We left our base yesterday morning. We had two civilians with us. One was a Russian girl from Roscosmos, the other was Dr Capri from Kathmandu Observatory,” the interpreter swallowed, clearly worried. “We were moving to the specified quadrant near Kanchenjunga. Near the supposed place of the emission, all the helicopter systems shut down. We contacted the base…”