We're quickly cleared to our cruising altitude, and onto our flight plan, which means we set the "LNAV" button on to navigate (L is for lateral), and set 17000 into the altitude selector window. (Yes, we make everything sound way cooler than it really is.) The flight management computer can fly smoother and cleaner than any human, but you don't want the FMS flying you in bad weather or in a real emergency.
Before long we're at 35,000 feet, seat belt sign off, cruising comfortably toward paradise. And to think I could have taken the Cleveland route and be fighting thunderstorms for four hours across America.
We play a game for the passengers of "guess the mid point" where they get to write the time down when they think we will be exactly half way between LAX and KOA. The winner gets a free something, I've never bothered to find out what. That takes us a few minutes to set up, then it's just the usual checks on the hour and half-hour. If we're leaking fuel, it would be nice to know when we can still do something about it.
We go through security procedure to get some beverages, and hit the head. I've got a clipboard in my lap, my coffee cup on the console, a pen in my right hand entering data on fuel consumption when I know I have to stop. I've given up trying to find out how I know anything anymore, but my head just pops straight up.
Ken, my captain, looks over at me, and being a veteran captain, he is both puzzled and alert at the same time. If we have to act, it is often with only a few seconds notice.
"There's something wrong." Now he's probably thinking that "act" means locking me in one of the overhead bins.
"What?"
"I don't know, but we need to find out."
He's already been scanning his instruments, not sure what to make of his first officer.
"FSuhcikt" That's him saying "Shit" and me saying "Fuck" at exactly the same instant. Big planes have cockpit voice recorders. When they crash, 99 out of 100 times the last word on the recorder is "Shit" so Ken is more correct than I am, but I am a big fan of the "F" word. I'm pretty sure the last word the Air France guys said before they hit the Atlantic was "merde."
The clipboard is thrown aside, I grab my yoke, and push the button to turn off the auto pilot. The plane asks me if I really want to do that. I push the button again to say yes. Then I speak to Ken.
"Descend?" It's my controls, but his plane.
"Fast, please."
I push forward hard, not worried about all the coffee I'm about to spill in the cabin, but wishing we had time to warn the flight attendants to sit. Not a second later the cockpit is crazy with horns and a mechanical voice screaming "Descend! Descend! Descend!" Ken switches that shit off (ok, shit works better in that sentence, I'll give you that), and recommends an even stronger angle of descent. I'm way ahead of him.
Every big plane, and lots of small ones, have a device on board called a TCAS, which is a collision avoidance system. What we had seen on the HSI screen was a little red diamond of another aircraft at our altitude and heading right toward us from the north on a collision course.
Ken's got visual, he points at it. "Fucking Gulfstream." Proper use of "fuck" by him this time. A Gulfstream is a large private jet.
I turn the computer back on, and let Mr. Boeing's creation return us to the correct course, speed, and altitude.
Ken has the mic in his hand, and his finger's on the button to talk to the passengers, but he waits a second. Just because we practice this stuff all the time, doesn't mean our hearts don't get to racing. I am watching the instruments, and trying to get back to calm as well.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, this is Captain Montara. You may have noticed we took a slight deviation in our routing. Once we are this far over water there are no radar stations tracking us and keeping other planes away. Instead, we work with a control center in Oakland who is talking to every aircraft out here, and in theory, plotting their courses, altitudes, and speeds to make sure they stay away from each other."
"As you are now aware, that system is imperfect. Fortunately, we saw other aircraft far enough away. I've been flying this route for eight years, and today is the first time this has ever happened to me, and I sincerely hope it's the last. I apologize for any inconvenience, and suggest you sit back, relax, and enjoy the rest of our flight."
Not long after he finished, we hear a bell, which means that the chief flight attendant wants to chat. I only hear one side of that conversation, but from Ken's description after he hangs up, all hell had broken loose. No one was seriously hurt, though a couple passengers, and all the flight attendants, had bruises. They were starting free alcohol service, so soon no one would be feeling any pain.
Now we have work to do. First we send Oakland a really nasty email. We have both electronic and voice communication, but the voice is full of static, and we never use it if we can avoid it. Then we send our company an email, letting them know what had happened.
Finally, all our work done, Ken looks over at me.
"How the hell did you know?"
"I have no fucking idea. Maybe I caught the diamond in my peripheral vision and my subconscious wigged out on it."
Our high frequency radio starts chirping, meaning that Oakland is trying for voice communication. We can barely make it out, but it's an apology, and notice that the Gulfstream was both off course and at the wrong altitude. Nice of them to make the effort to say it, not just email it, even though it wasn't their fault.
I still can't quite get back to normal. It's like I have to burp, but it won't come out.
We're about 300 miles out when our email dings us, and the company tells us our maintenance people have flown from Honolulu and are in Kona, and they want to inspect the aircraft. They also will have paramedics ready on landing, though we are sure now that no one needs them.
At the usual spot, we contact Hawaii approach.
"Hawaii, Mountain 4-6-1 with you flight level 3-9-0."
"Mountain 4-6-1, Hawaii approach, radar contact, descend pilot's discretion 8-thousand, direct Kona, cleared visual approach runway 1-7."
Apparently, they've cleared everyone out of our way, and we are number one with a bullet. Radar contact has a nice sound to it. Between LA and Cleveland, you are in radar contact all the way. Maybe that's not such a bad route after all.
Twenty minutes later we're stopped at gate 9 running the after landing checklist, when our flight deck (cockpit to you old school folks) is unexpectedly full. The two pilots flying our bird back to LA, a maintenance person, and the Honolulu operations manager are all trying to crowd their way in.
Ken tells them to get out. Captain Amos is there, chief pilot, so that doesn't work on him, but everybody else leaves. Ken gets "the look," and starts talking. He gives me all the credit for catching it before the electronics, and for flying through it without killing anybody.
I add my two cents, "It handled normally during descent and landing, no sign that I could tell of any damage." Ken agrees.
The three of us go join the maintenance crew (apparently two had stayed outside when the one had tried to crash out party) and the manager doing an extended walk around. It appears that, indeed, no damage had been done. I still need to burp, but I don't consider that important enough damage to report.
Ken and Captain Amos had been talking and walking the plane by themselves. They come back around to where I'm standing, and Captain Amos whispers in my ear, "How did you know?"
I shake my head and make the palms up, arms out, shoulders squishy move that relays my lack of knowledge. The captain pats me on the back, and signals his first officer to get on board. Ken and I turn toward the gate. There are 188 passengers staring at all the activity around the aircraft they are about to board. Should make for a fun trip for the flight attendants.
We get to the Royal Kona as the flight attendants are gathering at the bar. They grab our bags to prevent us from going upstairs, and make us tell them what really went on. Ken plays up the "we would be dead if Simon wasn't a psychic" angle, which is likely not true, we would have just had a quicker descent and more injuries in the back.
Our food arrives, and we eat as, one by one, they all show off their bruises and we debate whose is biggest, baddest, and ugliest. Laughter is the best medicine. The flight attendants have a tough job, they couldn't control the plane, they didn't know exactly what was going on, they were outnumbered 40 to one by the passengers, and yet they kept everything together, under control, and running smoothly, despite the bruises.
Finally, I get to go upstairs. I change into my running clothes, get to the beach, and run for an hour. In the sun and humidity, it's more than enough, especially since I still have not been able to burp. I get the shower going as hot as I can, get naked and get in. Then the burp hits, loudly enough that I think the whole hotel heard it.
I get clean, though I'm feeling bothered again, same as on the flight, but it's not a Gulfstream on attack vector. I go back into my room, still naked, grab my e-reader, finish the morning papers, work on a sleazy novel I've been reading a page at a time for months, and scratch my balls occasionally. The clock says it's eight, after sundown. I need to pee, so I go take care of it.
Then it hits me. I never turned the light on in the front room, or bathroom, which does not have a window, yet I can see as plain as day. It should be dark in here, really dark. It occurs to me, in the way that things have been occurring to me lately, that I burped light. I say that to myself again: I burped light. Could be worse. It could have been a magic fart.
I walk back into the room itself. The curtains are closed, the lights are off, but it's bright in here. I peek back at the bathroom, and it's dark in there. Just call me Brother Love, I am a traveling salvation light show. I sit down on the bed, in what should be a dark room, cross my legs, and close my eyes. I learned meditation techniques in college, but running always did the same thing and gave me a cute ass at the same time. Momentarily I wonder if sitting naked on the bedspread in a hotel room is wise, then decide getting the DNA of 40 men on me isn't my biggest worry right now.
I work to breathe in rhythm, relax and calm myself. The room is dark, except my eyes, even shut, are telling me there's light out there. Makes it harder to focus, but not impossible. I don't know how long I sit quietly, but later I'll figure out that is was a couple hours.
At some point, the light must mistake my meditation for acceptance, because it dims, and then sure as heck I know how to reach inside myself. I hold the light in my hand (virtual, not actually my hand), and feeling extremely stupid, whisper "Shazam," not knowing if I actually have intention.
Nothing happens, except it goes dark. I open my eyes, not sensing any difference other than I am no longer a human flashlight. I stretch my legs out, slide to the end of the bed and stand. I have trouble gauging the distance to the floor, and almost fall. Pausing a second to stabilize, then head back into the bathroom to finish up from my shower, I hit the light switch, though it takes two tries. This light must have really fraked with my balance.
There is a man in the mirror and he is not me. I jump and something unintentional comes out of my mouth. He's taller. Maybe six foot four. Where my hair is brown, his is black, though both of us have short spikey hair. His face is long, mine is rounder. We have the same nose. The iris of each eye is black, inhuman, shiny, mine are blue. His muscles are ripped and huge, mine are tight, but not bulgy. There's a salami between his legs. I have a nice brat, but this is a serious Kosher salami.
Just to make sure, I reach up with both hands and run them over my face and then down over everything, even the salami. It's really me. No way my clothes are going on over this body, and I have no idea how I'm going to leave my room. The light says to squeeze, though it has no voice. I close my eyes and search for that inner hand, find it, and squeeze the light back in. When I open my eyes, I'm me again.
I get dressed and run down stairs. The gift shop is directly across from the elevator and it's about to close for the evening, but I convince the clerk I have an emergency. I don't tell her I just burped light. I grab an XXL sand colored swimsuit and an XXL t shirt emblazoned with a sea turtle swimming under water, throw three twenties at her for a $50 outfit, and run for the elevator.
The room is dark and I leave it that way, returning to the bed in my naked meditation pose. I close my eyes, find the hand, grasp the light. It slips out. I try again, but now I can't find the hand. I'm way too anxious and not being helped by the light laughing at me, the bastard. Can a light have parents? Is it possible that they were married? Bastard. Pretty sure that's the truth.
I spend more time just breathing. The hand is easy to find now, I gently hold the light and speak, "Fuck me," which apparently is full of intention. A rush of something courses through me which I know is the light. Then there is light in the room for a couple seconds, but I really don't care. This is better than sex, or at least better than all but the last 20 seconds of sex, and it's in every inch of me, feet to head. I breathe a couple of times just to enjoy the after glow.