Mayday (28 page)

“Navy, three-four-seven, do you read?”

Sloan’s sudden transmission startled Matos. “Roger,” he answered, gripping tightly to the F-18’s control stick, “go ahead.”
He could tell from the Commander’s voice that he had grown impatient with their unspoken plan. A sense of dread flooded Matos.
He had, he now realized, put off the inevitable as long as he could.

“What’s the situation?” Sloan asked tersely.

“No change so far.”

“Nothing?” Sloan sounded honestly astonished.

“What about the fatigue cracks? What about the wing spar?”

“A little more deterioration. Maybe. Not much.” Matos wished he hadn’t begun this lie. It had only made things worse. He allowed
his eyes to wander over to the missile-firing controls on his side console. He was sorry he had waited. He should have shot
the Straton down immediately, before he had time to think about it.

“Matos, your damage reports have been pure bull-shit. You’ve only made this goddamn job longer and harder for everyone. Don’t
think I’ll forget that.”

“No. The Straton was getting worse,” Matos lied. “Its airspeed is still steady at 340, but its altitude has drifted slightly
. . .” Something caught Matos’s eye. It was a small, dark object below the Straton. It was falling rapidly toward the sea.
Was it part of the fuselage? Was the airliner finally coming apart? Matos peered over the side of his canopy, and as he did
his finger slipped off the transmit button.

“Matos,” shouted Sloan as he latched on to the radio’s clear channel, “I don’t give a shit about airspeeds and altitudes.
Will that goddamn airplane go down? That’s what I want to know. Answer the fucking question.”

“Homeplate—people are falling out of the Straton!” Matos had not heard one word of Sloan’s last message.

“What? Say again.”

“Yes. They’re falling. Jumping.” Matos edged his fighter downward, closer to the airliner. He could see clearly now, as he
watched another body tumble out of the port-side hold.
Oh, my God.
“There’s another one! There must be a fire inside.” It was the only reason Matos could think of for a person to jump to a
certain death. He watched the second body turn end over end until it was too far away to see its flailing arms and legs. It
receded farther and farther away, until it was no more than a black pinpoint silhouetted against the sea. Then he saw it hit
the waves and disappear instantly beneath them.

“Do you see any smoke?”

Smoke?
Matos jerked his head up and stared at the Straton. But everything appeared as it had before. Too calm. Too steady. Matos
ran his tongue across his parched lips, then pushed the transmit button. “No visible smoke. Not yet.” His new bubble of hope
hadn’t yet burst, but it was quickly losing air. No smoke, no fire, nothing. What could be happening in there? For a brief
instant he realized the kind of person he had turned into. He pushed that thought aside. He could live with the memory of
this accident—even if it was his fault—as long as he didn’t do anything else to the Straton.
Please, God, let it go down. By itself.

“Matos, don’t give me more bullshit,” Sloan said angrily, but then quickly changed his tone. “Is there any turbulence? Do
you see any reason for them to jump?”

“No,but . . . wait . . . wait . . . ” Matos kept his finger pressed firmly to the microphone button. “More people are jumping.
Two of them. Together. Yes. There must be something going on. Definitely. A fire, or fumes. Something. No doubt. We should
wait. Wait. It will go down. I know it will.”

Sloan did not answer for a long time. When he finally did, his voice had again assumed a flat and official tone. “Roger, three-four-seven.
Understand. We will wait.”

As he fell with his wife in his arms, Harold Stein raised his head up and stared at the Straton above him. In that split second
he saw and identified a jet fighter hovering above and behind the huge aircraft. The silver image of a long rocket hanging
from its belly stuck in his mind. In a clear flash of understanding, he knew what had happened to Flight 52.

Wayne Metz disengaged the BMW cruise control and took the airport entrance at sixty miles an hour. He drove directly to the
Trans-United hangar and slipped the BMW into a VIP space. He sat staring up at the blue and yellow hangar for a full minute.

He had come up with a plan that could greatly reduce Beneficial’s enormous liability. A plan that would lessen his own liability
as well.

The plan had not been difficult to formulate. It was an obvious one. The problem now was to convince Edward Johnson that their
interests coincided, and that these mutual interests could best be served by Wayne Metz’s plan. He thought he knew Johnson
well enough to risk approaching him.

Metz rummaged around his glove compartment and found his Trans-United ID card. He got out of his car and crossed the hot tarmac
toward the hangar. He spotted the personnel entrance and quickened his pace. A group of airline employees stood near the door
talking, and Metz brushed by them. He flashed his Trans-United “Official Visitor/Contractor” identification card at the guard,
then pushed open the small inner door and mounted a flight of steps two at a time. He moved quickly down a long corridor and
opened a blue door marked
DISPATCH OFFICE
.

Metz approached a clerk. “I’m here to see Edward Johnson.”

The clerk pointed to the glass-enclosed communications room. “Over there. But I don’t think he’s seeing anyone.”

“He’s seeing
me
.” Metz crossed the office and stood in front of one of the thick glass panels. In the small room he could see Edward Johnson
looking down at a big machine. Another man stood next to him. In an instant, Metz could see that they were both highly tense,
and guessed that the tension was not completely a result of the situation but was partly generated by a friction between the
two men. Metz knew that his plan could work only if he were alone with Johnson. He watched for another few seconds. The other
man appeared to be a subordinate. Johnson could get rid of him. Metz rapped sharply on the glass.

Johnson looked up, then walked to the door and unlocked it.

Wayne Metz entered the communications room. “Hello, Ed.”

The two men shook hands perfunctorily.

Johnson noticed that several of the employees were looking up from their work. He glared back at them, and heads lowered all
over the office. He slammed the door and bolted it. “Goddamned center stage.” Everything in this damned Straton program was
too visible. He motioned to Miller. “This is Jack Miller. He’s the senior dispatcher. Fifty-two was his flight.”

Metz nodded absently to Miller, then turned to Johnson. “
Was?
Did it . . . ?”

“No. Wrong tense. It’s still up there. But it’s my flight now. Jack is helping out.” Yet Johnson knew that deep down he had
already written the Straton off. The past tense fit the Straton, but he’d have to be more careful when he spoke of the aircraft.
You had to
sound
optimistic. “Actually, we haven’t communicated with them since I spoke to you. But the flight is steady and there’s no reason
to keep calling. If he wants us, he’ll call.”

Metz nodded. “It looks like he might make it, then?”

Johnson shook his head. “I didn’t say that. We’ve got to talk him through an approach and landing.” He decided to be blunt
with Metz. “As far as I’m concerned, that’s almost certain death.” He motioned toward Miller. “Jack’s a bit more optimistic.
He thinks this guy Berry can make a perfect three-point landing and taxi to the assigned gate.”

Miller cleared his throat. “I do think he has a chance, Mr. Metz. He seems competent. The messages reflect that.” He glanced
between Johnson and the printout of the data-link messages lying on the console.

Johnson nodded.

Miller picked up the messages. “All the data-link messages are here if you’d like to see them.”

Johnson pulled them from Miller’s hand and thrust them toward Metz. “Go ahead, Wayne. Read them. They’re good for your ulcer.
That goddamned Straton. I knew that goddamned airplane would get us.”

Metz took the sheets and began reading. He subconsciously shook his head. The impersonal words, spelled out in that odd computer
type, somehow made the news much worse. Made it infinitely more believable in any case.
Lack of air pressure caused brain damage.

Miller glanced at Metz, then at Johnson. He barely knew Metz, but felt an instinctive dislike for the man. Too meticulously
dressed. His hair was styled like a movie star’s. Miller didn’t trust men like that, although he knew it wasn’t a fair way
to judge. The fact that Johnson had asked Metz to come in was indicative of the way this airline was run these days. Ten or
twenty years before, this room would have been filled with men in shirtsleeves, smoking, and drinking coffee— pilots, flight
instructors, executives, dispatchers, the Straton Aircraft people, anyone who cared about Trans-United and who could lend
a hand. Today, when an aircraft got into trouble, they called the insurance man and the corporation lawyers before anyone
else. No one dared to smoke a cigarette, or say anything that wasn’t politically correct. It was time, thought Miller, to
get out of the business.

Metz handed the messages back to Miller and turned to Johnson. “Are you certain these messages are an accurate appraisal?”

Johnson tapped his finger on the stack of printouts. “If he says people are dead, they’re dead. I imagine that he also knows
what two holes look like.”

“I’m talking about the brain damage business. And why do you think it’s irrevocable?”

“My expert,” he nodded toward Miller, “tells me that, more than likely, what Berry is observing is in fact brain damage. Is
it irrevocable? Probably. It’s caused by cells dying. That’s irrevocable. But who’s to say for sure what state those poor
bastards are in? Berry is an amateur pilot, not a neurosurgeon. For all we know, Berry could be the son-of-a-bitch who planted
the bomb in the first place, although that doesn’t seem too likely.”

Metz nodded. “Well, it certainly looks bad.”

“Very perceptive,” said Johnson. “Thank you for sharing. I’m glad I asked you here.”

Metz decided to play it cool. “Why
did
you ask me here?”

Johnson stared at him a long time. He answered, finally, “Evans called you because you’re in the emergency handbook.”

Metz looked pointedly around the empty room.

Johnson smiled to himself. Metz was a sharp customer. He was playing hard to get. “All right, I wanted some assurances from
you, Mr. Insurance Man. First of all, are we completely covered for this type of thing?”

“You would seem to be. Your hull carrier will cover the damage to the aircraft, of course. But everything else is our potential
responsibility.”

Johnson didn’t like “seem” or “potential.” He said, “Including any claims that arise if the Straton smacks into San Francisco?
Everything it hits? Everybody on the ground?”

“That’s basically correct.”

Johnson paced for a few seconds. He hadn’t gotten the bad news that Metz wanted to give him, because he hadn’t yet asked the
right questions. He looked up at Metz. “Can your company afford this?”

Metz gave a barely perceptible shrug.

Johnson stopped pacing. A chill ran up his spine. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that no one can answer that until the damage is done. It also means that it is the responsibility of the insured
to take every reasonable step to minimize the loss. It also means that Trans-United Airlines had better be able to prove that
the accident was not a direct result of negligence on its part. It—”

“Wait a goddamned minute. First of all, you’d
better
have the money. Secondly, we
are
trying to minimize the loss. That’s what we’re here to do. Thirdly, there was
no
negligence on . . .” But even as he said it, Johnson wondered again if any of his recent cutbacks in maintenance could have
contributed to the accident—or could be made to look that way by some lawyer.