Crashers (2 page)

He glanced at the hippies and the truckers. Let them stare. Sure, he was about to commit a crime. And in Oregon, it was a capital offense. But so what? No one here today would recognize his crime, or realize that anything bad was going on. Hell, Dennis thought, there wasn't even a good word for the crime he was about to commit. They'd have to come up with a name for it. Maybe they'd call it a silverman. Maybe he was about to commit first-degree silverman.

The images on the screen clarified themselves. Dennis tapped madly at the keyboard, making no mistakes, no type-overs or go-backs. He'd done this a thousand times in practice and he knew exactly what he was doing.

Time to change the world.

Fifteen minutes later, Annie Colvin, the chief flight attendant for Flight 818, rapped on the cabin door and poked her head in. “Got 'em corralled,” she said, in the tone a preschool teacher uses to announce that naptime has commenced. “Ready when you are.”

In the left-hand seat, Meghan Danvers nodded and looked back over her shoulder. “Thanks. Tower's giving us the hold sign but we're up next.”

Annie Colvin started to back out, then stopped. “Anybody want anything before I buckle up?”

Meghan said, “No, thanks. I'm good.”

Russ Kazmanski turned as far as he could in the cumbersome copilot's chair. “I'll take some coffee, if you've got it brewed up.”

“Hang on,” she said and backed out.

“Decaf!” Russ called, hoping she heard him. “That's all I need, the jangles.”

“Careful,” Meghan warned playfully, and rolled her eyes, the color of nutmeg, toward the ceiling panel equidistant between their seats. The cockpit voice recorder was housed above that panel. “Big Brother's listening.”

“Then I probably shouldn't mention the ganja, mon.”

He grinned, but Meghan frowned. “Not funny, partner. CascadeAir doesn't even allow joking about that.”

“I know,” he said soothingly. It had been a joke, and they both knew it. In the past six or seven years, a corporate policy of zero tolerance for alcohol and drug use had turned into a siege mentality. Substance-abuse posters were mandatory in all crew lounges, and pamphlets offering help and counseling seemed to arrive in employees' mail almost monthly.

Annie Colvin came back with the coffee; it was not in the plastic that passengers got, but a proper china cup. “Here you go,” she said and handed it over the high-backed chair. “Decaf all right?”

He noticed that she'd put in milk and had provided a spoon and a saucer to put it on. He winked back at her. “Great, thanks. We're— Hold it.”

Annie saw both pilots tilt their heads a fraction of an inch, hearing something over their headsets.

Meghan said, “Roger that, tower.”

“Okay, we're rolling,” Russ said to Annie. “We'll see you topside.”

She said, “Bye,” and headed back to her foldout seat in the galley.

Russ stowed the coffee cup and saucer on the recessed panel at his right knee, where it was out of the way. He knew the skipper was a real stickler for protocol, but the softly curved shroud was made of vinyl laminate over thermoformed plastic, all perfectly waterproof. In fact, the surface was intended for food and drinks during flight.

The moon shone down, illuminating the tarmac runway. A dull glow emanated from the south: downtown Portland. The moonlight made Mount Hood a little pink. The Vermeer 111's harsh white lights turned night into day, bled all the color out of the grass to the left and right of the runway.

Meghan queued her jet up to the line, ready to roll. She toggled her microphone. “ATC, this is CascadeAir Eight One Eight, in the blocks and ready to sprint.”

The air traffic control voice that came back was surprisingly West
Virginian for Oregon. “Ah, roger that, Eight One Eight. Y'all got limitless ceiling tonight and little wind. You are cleared for takeoff on runway two eight lima. Have yourselves a good one.”

“CascadeAir Eight One Eight, roger that.” Meghan nudged the Vermeer 111 out into the wide runway. “Thanks for the hospitality, Portland. We'll see you next week. Eight One Eight out.”

They began to pick up speed. Meghan glanced over just as Russ glanced at her. They winked at each other; kids with big, multimillion-dollar toys. Russ said, “Power's set.”

“All right, then. Read 'em off.”

“Seventy-five knots,” Russ chanted. “One hundred . . . one twenty.”

“Vee one,” the captain said. V-codes represent aircraft speed, and V1 is the decision speed. Hit that speed and you're committed to taking off.

Which they did. Smoothly.

Russ said, “Positive climb.”

“Okay, gear up.”

He hit the landing-gear handle. They could hear the mechanism clamor beneath them. Both waited to hit a layer of turbulent air, as so often happens, and Russ casually put a hand over the coffee cup that Annie had brought him. When it happened that evening, it was as soft as the gentlest breeze. They doubted any of the passengers felt it.

“LNAV on auto?” Meghan said.

“Got it.” The copilot put the lateral navigation controls on autopilot. “You've got good climb thrust.”

Meghan waited for a moment, watching the lights of the city spread out beneath her. “VNAV.”

Russ put the vertical navigation system on autopilot. “Gotcha.”

“Good. Flaps go to one, gear handle off,” she said, and they began chanting the after-takeoff checklist. For every term she used, Russ repeated it back at her, like a call-and-response sermon. Landing gear up and off. Flaps up. Checked up. Altimeter okay. Center autopilot on.

Meghan gently turned the sleek, massive aircraft, bringing it into a southerly direction. Russ reached for his coffee cup.

“Like a baby's butt,” he said.

Meghan allowed herself a proud smile. “Damn straight.”

 

Flight 818 found its course and began picking up speed. It was still climbing to cruise altitude as it passed over a rest area off Interstate 5.

.   .   .

With the press of a knuckle buster—shift, option, apple, and the letter
X
—the handmade computer on the hood of the Outback emitted a silly, cartoonish sound. Dennis Silverman had chosen the noise because he thought it was funny. He smiled at the noise now, almost drowned out by the sound from the airliner passing overhead. He smiled down at the squirrels.

Dennis logged off the computer, closed the cover, disconnected the emitter and tripod. He was careful not to step on the twitching forms of the poisoned squirrels as he hopped down off the hood.

He did so love to play with poisons.

RUSS KAZMANSKI SAID, “HMM. What's that?” He tapped the screen of the Gamelan flight-data-recorder monitor.

Meghan Danvers said, “What's what?”

“I've got a— Whoa!”

The cockpit began shaking madly.

“Shit!” Meghan barked, the avionics monitors dancing so badly in front of her eyes that she couldn't get a read on them. “Trimming rudder to the left! What've we got?”

“I— Dammit!” The bucking grew worse. Above their heads, four electronic caution tones sounded, followed by a siren.

“What've we got!” she barked.

“I dunno! Wait, check the— This doesn't make sense!”

The tones chimed again. The siren was going nonstop.

“Call it in!”

Russ toggled his transceiver. “Uh, PDX flight control, this is CascadeAir Eight One Eight! Mayday! We are declaring an emergency!”

 

In economy class, passengers gripped their seat arms or one another. The air masks deployed, just as they had in the safety video everyone had ignored.

.   .   .

The West Virginian drawl from the tower answered back immediately. “Roger, Eight One Eight. Do you wish to return to Portland?”

“Affirmative,” Meghan cut in. She was holding the controls with both hands, the small clusters of muscles around her knuckles standing taut. A vein pulsed visibly at her throat.

“What is the nature of your emergency?”

“Unknown, Portland! Engine trouble! We're shaking apart!”

“Understood, Eight One Eight. Runway one zero romeo is available. We're clearing airspace for you. Contact one zero five point four for your lineup.”

Russ fought down the urge to puke, switched the secondary communication array to frequency 105.4. He flicked a glance toward the captain, who didn't look frightened. She looked positively pissed off.

“One zero five point four, roger,” he said.

“Ah, good, Eight One Eight. Come about one eight zero, altitude at your discretion. Would you like fire crews on scene?”

“One eight zero confirmed. Affirmative on the fire crews. We don't know what's wrong!” Meghan shouted to be heard over the warning sounds and the rattling of her vessel. She began the 180-degree turn as directed.

“Eight One Eight, you are, ah, seven miles from the first localizer.”

“Meg, we got— Christ!”

The airliner yawed madly. Russ's coffee cup and saucer went flying, a clipboard rattled to the deck. The ship began rolling to the left. Meghan gripped the yoke, hauled with all her might to the right. The ship bucked like a bronco.

Both Meghan and Russ looked up as the “stick shaker” sounded; they were perilously close to stalling an engine.

Meghan reached down beneath her legs, toggled a switch. They heard a gurgling sound as fuel began dumping from the emergency vents, raining down on the farmland of Marion County, Oregon.

Something deep inside the plane snapped. The stick in Meghan's hands whipsawed to the left. She was holding on so hard, the sudden movement broke two bones in her left wrist.

“Dammit!” she shouted.

“Jesus, God,” Russ muttered.

The Vermeer jetliner shrieked. It howled and jerked like a wounded animal, as the starboard wing began ripping away from the body. The ship rolled, pivoted, began its death dive.

“Nooooooo!”
Meghan roared, demanding the beast do her bidding.

The negative g force hammered them into their restraints. Russ's face went white as his clavicle cracked under the pressure.

CascadeAir Flight 818 screamed toward the ground. Meghan Danvers pressed her feet to the floor, lifted her butt off the chair, and hauled back on the stick with all her might. She screamed as her broken wrist protested, the bones grinding together. She pulled and pulled, back arched, legs vibrating. The jet howled and she howled back, one wild animal challenging another.

Less than a hundred feet from the ground, the overworked elevators began responding to Meghan's herculean effort. The pitch leveled out, at least a little. When the giant aircraft hit the ground, it was belly, not nose, first.

Meghan Danvers wouldn't live long enough to realize how many lives she'd saved.

WEST LOS ANGELES: ANOTHER happy hour, another club.

The scene was a blend of nouveau riche and Eurotrash, corporate risers and high-end call girls. Half the room were players, and the other half had fucked the first half. The music was low and sensuous for now—with a promise of something rougher as the night wore on. The place was a ragout of money and hormones and booze and meth and coke. A high-octane cocktail of adrenaline and endorphins.

Daria Gibron had come there for a couple of reasons: one was to translate for a junior-junior member of the Saudi royal family in the market for a French chateau. The work had been easy enough, the negotiations simple and the vodka martini dry. The job complete, Daria bade both foreigners
adieu
and drifted deeper into the crowd, finding a place at the long teak bar and ordering another.

There wasn't much chance of going home alone, and that suited Daria just fine. She wore Dolce & Gabbana: a little black tank top with a matching jacket and a short skirt, with strappy spikes to show off her muscular calves. She'd spent lots of money to give her hair that poorly cut, haphazard look, very short in back, much longer in front, which looked as good in a boardroom or business luncheon as it did on the dance floor. She accepted the Belvedere martini and spent the next hour turning down invitations
to “get the hell out of here” from men in Armani suits and women in Gucci.

The one who finally caught her eye was out of place. Faded blue jeans, lace-up military boots, and a maroon pullover sweater that was neither stylish nor weathered enough to be chic. Blond with blue eyes, he wore his sleeves pushed up to reveal tattoos on both sculpted forearms.

“How d'you do?” he asked, his accent Irish and rough-hewn.

“Well enough.” Daria went with noncommittal. This man, with a half-day's stubble and lopsided smile, was far from the best-looking man in the room. But there was something about him, she thought, as he ordered a beer. It arrived and he took one sip, all but spitting it back out. Daria let loose a laugh that surprised the Irishman and herself.

“God, and that's rat piss,” he said, and she laughed again.

“American beer? Undrinkable.”

“Aye. Give us some of that, then.” Without waiting for an okay, the Irishman took a sip of her martini, their hands brushing as he took the glass.

“That's passable. Name's Jack.”

“Hallo, Jack. Daria,” she replied, leaning toward him and speaking for his ears only. Her accent was Middle Eastern, but that's all he could tell.

He glanced into the mirror behind the bar and Daria realized what it was about Jack that had attracted her, in a room full of gorgeous men and women. He was scanning the room the way a pro does. He'd chosen his position to give him a view of both doors, and his eyes strayed to Daria's face only in passing, a touch-and-go before scanning the room again.

Much as Daria herself had been doing.

“What brings you to the United States?” she asked.

“Was hoping to get laid,” Jack replied, his blue eyes gliding to hers for a moment, then sliding away to scan the room again.