We begin our usual witty repartee until she discovers that Matt is my captain du jour, and she quickly finds other things she needs to be doing. He and I do our paperwork, which he hands to me to turn in. Hands being the reason why. Taylor informs me that he has applied for jobs at a couple other airlines, and that my dad is helping him look. Easier than firing him, but not so good for the staff wherever he ends up.
She also gives me a quick run down of all the new security features being installed, including a 24/7 guard service, a more reliable camera system, electronic locks, and a silent alarm. Nothing like costing your company a lot of money without their knowledge or consent. I am such a winner.
The LAPD office is empty when we pass by, and Perez is no where to be seen on the concourse. We board, push back and head out on time. I feel worried, and then realize it's the simple fact that if something happens right now, I won't know about it until they are telling me when her funeral is. Hulk smash. What the fuck is wrong with me?
Matt starts filling me in on his job prospects while we are in the taxi line, and doesn't stop even when we're airborne. All I can think about is what might happen back home while we're in the air. It's a good thing the passengers don't get to see a camera of the pilots during flight.
I turn my phone back on the second I step onto the air stair in Kona, and it beeps almost instantly with a text from Perez to call. Desperate, I can barely make my fingers work the touch screen. She answers on the second ring.
"Hey, Air Force." I relax, she's almost laughing. "Did you see the front page of the
Times
this morning?"
"No. Is there a salami on it?" She's really laughing now.
"Not exactly, but you need to check it out."
"You're OK otherwise?"
"Yes, and stop worrying. Thanks for last night."
"You're welcome. Any time you want to do it again, let me know."
"Air Force, you know I'm not the one who gets to go next time. Get your shit together."
"Yes, sir."
"Talk to you later," and she is gone.
The airport doesn't have the
LA Times
, but the front page of
West Hawaii Today
has multiple pictures of a streak of light across the night sky. Frak me. I get a hard copy to complement the e-version in my suitcase.
I go golfing with a couple of the flight attendants, Matt gets to go to his room alone. When we come back to the hotel, I read about the light trails, two seen over much of Europe and two over the western USA. More conspiracy theories to join all the other conspiracy theories I have spawned. I need to design a logo for myself with a giant S and a giant D. You know what they stand for.
We all go for shrimp dinner down in Kona town on the ocean, and then walk back to the hotel. A text from Perez appears on the way back, asking me to call ASAP. I send everyone else on their way to the hotel, telling them it's LAPD business. They throw jokes back at me for 100 feet, and then leave me in peace. Perez answers immediately.
"Air Force, someone searched my apartment today while I was at work. Jen and I went over to yours, and it was gone over too. I'm sleeping at her place tonight, and so is Halloween."
"I can come back and sit with you until morning, if you want."
"No, Mr. Smith and Mr. Wesson are keeping me company tonight."
"I thought you carried a SIG Sauer."
"I do, I do, that was a joke. And on a more important note, why didn't you tell me that this Sunday was your birthday? How come I have to find out about this stuff from your mom? Did you want me to show up for dinner without a present?"
"Ask Jen, she'll tell you I don't like presents."
"I did, Air Force, and she told me different. She told me exactly what you like for your birthday, but you're not getting one from me. I didn't say it to her, but she needs to be doing it to a salami this year, if you get me. You've put that girl through a lot, Mr. Packer."
"I know. I'll make it right."
"You better.," she pauses, "So spill now, where is it?"
"In my hotel room, I brought it with me."
"Good boy. I'll see you Sunday," and with that, she hangs up.
I ignore her. As soon as it's dark, I rip the guts out of a few molecules, and fly home, just supersonic, no flash of light across the night sky, and spend the overnight hours sitting on top of Jen's apartment building, hoping someone shows up. No one does. I want to peek into Jen's place, but I know I shouldn't, so I don't. I leave just before sunrise, which means I am back in Kona about 3 a.m. Hawai'i time.
The morning news is good. China and North Korea are friends again, and saying the explosion was just an accident. The troops are headed away from the border. No more deaths. Still don't know what I have to do to make the world any better than it was yesterday, and my calendar is down to 905.
We take off from Kona on time, and I spend the next six hours wishing we would fly faster. It's after nine when we land, but no beeps on the phone as we exit the gate. I call Jen, and she and Perez are hanging out together again at a club. They suggest I come join them, but I tell Jen I'm tired, and Perez that I don't want to leave ‘it' unguarded, even though ‘it' is really back in Hawai'i. I go home, grab a hold of the light, say a word, and let the magic feeling flow through me for as long as I can. Then I turn off the lights, go stand on the balcony, and pray someone comes to visit. Unfortunately, those prayers go unanswered.
Sunday I drive over to mom's house, where Jen and Perez help me celebrate turning 27. Mom and Dad give me a brand new SIG Sauer P229 dark grey nine millimeter of my very own, Kiana and Jen provide the leather to hold it, and one shell for luck. The advanced class starts in January, and they want me to be ready. Best birthday I think I've ever had.
Jen and I head back to my place. She's nervous that some dirtbag is going to break in, and it makes her even more wild, and my second birthday present better than ever. It's late, that is to say early in the morning, when we finally get to sleep. Fog Dude thankfully stays away. I, of course, whimp out on telling her what I know she deserves to know.
I cook breakfast, and Jen leaves me, letting me know she has to work late. I run, lunch, and gym, then get Perez to take me to the shooting range and give me a lesson after shift. She is a good teacher, but I am a bad student, though she promises to get me at least to acceptable by the time my class starts.
Tuesday, I make my usual trip to the islands. Perez calls after I land to say that forensics has finished analyzing everything from the Mountain Pacific crime scene, and not a single fingerprint from either of us came up. We both know that is not possible, unless someone, human or fog, intervened. Wednesday is an uneventful trip home.
Thursday morning starts like any other day in Terminal 7. Perez and I helping old ladies cross the terminal, she harassing me about being on the cover of the
Times
so often, and both of us trying to figure out how to deal with whoever was stalking us.
About 10, we get a hint that something is up. The radio traffic increases dramatically, and units that are not normally on line in the morning suddenly are. At 10:30, both our radios go off almost simultaneously. "Red 7" and "Air Force 1" have immediate recall orders to Main, and Red 17 is on his way to cover for us while we were gone.
We cross the tunnel into main, fight through a hideously crowded hallway. Someone calls our names, and adds "conference room one" after them. That's our favorite spot, the small conference room at the front of the building.
I don't know about Perez, but I notice the back of the room first. Captain Spears and somebody with even more silver on his shirt are sitting in the corner. Five men in suits and Sergeant Johnson fill out a row of chairs, and they have conveniently placed two of the little red plastic butt busters facing the rest. Perez and I get the hint and sit.
Johnson introduces us as Officer Perez and Reserve Officer Packer. Sounds good, except not in this environment. The five suits turn into two homicide detectives, two internal affairs detectives, and an airport terrorism expert from Homeland Security. I'm thinking that Perez and I are soon to be inmate Perez and inmate Packer. We don't get introduced to the man in the back. Johnson coughs, then puts on his serious face.
"Lieutenant Crane was murdered last night. Shot once in the back of the head at his house. Seven of his fingers were broken, and there were fresh burns on his body. He was tortured. I noticed that there was some tension between the two of you and the Lieutenant when we met the other day. That is the only work related item we wanted to discuss before we head out to the crime scene. I think you know something we need to know."
Kiana leans forward and starts to speak, I put my hand on her knee. She stops. Six men stop their pens.
"Let me. I have less to lose if I say something unkind." She says nothing, but her body language defers. She sits back, the pens start again.
"Five weeks ago, my first day, Officer Perez and I were patrolling Terminal 2, when she noticed four men in the concourse who had a military bearing, and who all had identical metal briefcases. She and I collected information on the men, who, despite being of African-American and Middle Eastern appearance, had Russian passports with Russian names. The men boarded aircraft for Canada. The day after filing the report, Captain Spears and Lieutenant Crane ordered Officer Perez to not investigate these men."
"Ignoring that order, we tracked these four men and four other men who were using last names such as Arm and Hammer, in a pattern of entering the US from Europe on Thursday morning, and departing a week later on Thursday night, alternating between them so that four were in LA at any moment, except for Thursday afternoon when all eight were present. When presented with this evidence by Sergeant Johnson, Captain Spears and Lieutenant Crane barred us from working Terminal 2."
There was some new obvious tension in the back of the room. The five suits had all shifted their positions to leaning forward. I had their attention.
"We left the dates and times of the inbound flights out of the report at my suggestion. I assumed if we told our superiors that they were arriving at the Bradley Terminal, we would be prevented from working there as well. Officer Perez went along, I assume, just to humor the rookie."
"Three weeks ago, we were stationed at Bradley when two gentlemen we had identified landed on a flight from Moscow. I observed one of them slipping something under one of the chairs at the arrival gate. When he left, I went over and retrieved a package from under the seat, a fact which I even hid from Officer Perez at the time. Captain Spears and Lieutenant Crane appeared and barred us from working anywhere except for Terminal 7. Lieutenant Crane remained behind after the captain, Officer Perez, and I left the terminal."
"After that day, Officer Perez discovered that her emails were being hacked. We sent a false email saying that the package would be at the Mountain Pacific office, as would we, at midnight on the 13th. We intended to retrieve the video from that night, given my connection to the airline, and see who was in it. You know what happened instead. We tried following them once, and lost them at the Marquis."
"Both my apartment and Officer Perez's apartment have been broken into and searched in the past week. The video of the Bradley terminal is gone for that day, as is the video of the Mountain Pacific office. It seems to me we have an obvious conclusion. Lieutenant Crane was supposed to retrieve the package and take it out without going through Customs. He failed, tried to get it back, failed again, and someone killed him for it."
To say they were stunned would be an understatement. If Perez didn't like my little white lies, she didn't show it. The Homeland Security guy jumps in.
"Where's the package?"
"We x-rayed it, and then I took it to Hawai'i and put it where no one will ever find it."
He turns to Johnson, "We need the digital record of the scan."
Johnson nods to Perez, who walks to the computer terminal in the corner of the room, the HSA man walking with her. The Internal Affairs detectives walk out, both talking on their phones. The homicide detectives ask for the information on names and flight numbers, which I get by walking over and producing Perez's notebook for them.
The HSA and Perez return, neither of them particularly happy looking. Everyone looks at him. "It's the headend," he says, "for a Soviet-era nerve gas system."
Ninety minutes later, the room is full, standing room only, when he starts talking again. I don't recognize any of the extra people who come in, and I'm still shocked they let Kiana and me stay, but I don't ask any questions. All Kiana has done since the announcement is whisper in my ear, "Nice story, Air Force."
The HSA man starts talking. I have never seen anyone talk with such rapt attention from their audience. He's drawn a diagram of our nozzle on the white board.
"This system was developed in the 1970s in the old Soviet Union. It is ingenious in its simplicity. Most nerve gases are made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and phosphorous, it's a matter of arranging the atoms in a lethal way. Methane gas is carbon and hydrogen, and about 80% of what makes up natural gas. Pure oxygen is available from many industrial sources. You can buy large quantities without attracting much attention."