An airplane vanished over the Amazon rainforest, never to be seen again. The authorities did a perfunctory search, but came up empty, declaring everyone dead. But one child of a businessman lost on the flight isn’t so sure. And so the child sets out alone to find the truth of the disappearance and, perhaps, a parent alive… -- Deathshead419
[AN: I misread this and instantly thought of this thing {Offensensitivity warning for flashing imagery} and now I have to divorce myself from that idea]
George Thanatopalos IV had tried to understand the words of his father, "The fastest way to find a needle in a haystack is to burn the haystack." He'd asked, of course, "What if the needle is made of ivory, bone, or wood?" His father always grumbled, "For this exercise, the needle is always iron."
Now there was something elusive in the middle of something theoretically flammable. Something elusive that was also vulnerable to fire.
George doubted his father would appreciate being set aflame. The quick and dirty version of getting what he wanted was not going to achieve the actual goal. Besides, it would be horrendously bad PR for the firm. He had to think slow and clean. Or, at least, slower and cleaner than burning an entire forest just to find his father.
They knew the location of the wreckage. The fifty-mile-long smear of bits and pieces of private plane that had cartwheeled into the slope of the terrain. If anyone had survived that, they were likely injured. Lost in the middle of the trackless wilderness, out of contact range, and probably facing a number of creatures that might want to eat them. Facing diseases they had little to no foreknowledge of, nor defence against.
Malaria. Dysentery. Scurvy. Maybe even tuberculosis and tetanus. Things that hadn't even been considered in the lap of luxury. Things all too real in the middle of nowhere, but easily dismissed in the centres of civilisation.
He had to make certain that his father hadn't succumbed to the situation. Time was running out. George had billions to spend on the search, and the PR to spin it as seeking to rescue any survivors and repatriate the bodies. Hiring experts. Following the GPS location of the wreckage, and searching via the most sensible path to get there.
George let his media department spin it positively. He didn't really care if corners of the internet turned it into a joke. He was about getting his dad back. Nothing else.
It was a hell of a trip. They knew the location of the crash. They had passports and enough money to grease the palms of every human roadblock in George's way. Mercenaries? He hired them to protect himself and his teams. Hostile natives? He did his part to forge a peace or respected their borders. Weather? They had gear for that.
It took longer than a forest fire, but George got there. They found - after a lot of effort - three of the seven on the plane. Remains to be identified later. That implied that four had managed to get up and move away from the site. From there, there were two ways the survivors could go. Up, to try and get their bearings, or downhill and downstream in the hopes of finding civilisation.
They had drones to look for any trace, sending them out as scouts along the animal trails to seek out any sign of previous passage. One drone, sent uphill, found a clear signal of life.
Smoke.
A single column, not the clusters of a village. George took a bearing and, together with his teams, made their way in the direction of the column. It took a further three weeks, but they found George Thanotopalos III in a camp with just one other survivor. Not three. He was banged up and bandaged, but comparably whole. The other survivor had a leg in a splint and a haunted look in her eyes.
She whispered, "Oh thank God," when she saw the team.
"Welcome to my new Eden," said George III. "How was the end of the world?"
Obviously, he had taken more than a knock to the head. Maybe some suspicious mushrooms. George IV got the teams to extract them back to civilisation and worked - very carefully - on gently divorcing his father from the mistaken idea that he was the only one to survive the apocalypse. And therefore singlehandedly responsible for rebuilding the world, civilisation, and the human race.
Seeing more members of the human race was some help. Seeing more Americans helped a great deal more. Getting high-class medical help definitely put him back on an even keel.
Only once in private did George IV ask his father, "We found evidence that four made it out of the crash. What happened to the other two?"
"They were superfluous. And injured. And male." His father didn't even look ashamed when he added, "And delicious when roasted."
This would do so many bad things to their share price if it got out. Best to "not remember" where the other two bodies were. Let the jungle swallow those secrets.
All the better for the families to accept their payout and NDA's.
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