Skyhook (32 page)

“And tonight?”

“Tonight, General, the atmospheric pressure out there was no

longer lower, it was higher than two-nine-nine-two, and if we hadn’t reset the altimeter it was watching to fool it, our little automation circuit would have tried to fly us sixty feet under sea level.”

“So, Boomerang’s program was not the problem?”

Ben shook his head as he glanced at the two Gulfstream pilots, who were both nodding. “No, sir. On Monday night, Gene—Captain Hammond here—happened to hit the autopilot disconnect button instinctively just as I hit the reset button on my computer. We assumed at first that my computer had ordered the dive and the hair raising level-off at fifty feet, because Gene didn’t recall hitting the autopilot disconnect. But after we got back a while ago and were waiting for you, we rechecked the flight data tape printouts from Monday, and there it is, big as life. It was the autopilot disconnect that restored control, not my computer reset.”

“Yes, but the dive began while we were still remotely controlling the aircraft,” Mac added.

“True, but remember that our Boomerang system required a major upgrade in the way the autopilot system holds onto the flight controls, making it all but impossible to disconnect it once you connect it. We did that so a hostile force, such as a hijacker in the cockpit, couldn’t override the remote inputs from the AWACS.

But the EDM circuit used the same equipment, and we couldn’t knock it loose with the computers.”

“All you needed was the autopilot disconnect?” Mac asked.

“That’s right. As simple as that,” Ben remarked. “We just didn’t realize the autopilot was even involved.”

“Okay, but what initiated it? What made the autopilot think there was a rapid depressurization?”

“The speed brakes. Whenever the speed brakes were deployed, a mis-wired circuit sent a completely false message to the flight data recorder and the autopilot telling them a rapid depressurization had occurred. Each time we were in full test mode and Captain Hammond pulled the speed brake lever, he was inadvertently telling the

autopilot that we’d had a rapid depressurization, and off it went.” Ben got to his feet before glancing over at Joe Davis.

“So, bottom line? Boomerang is ready. I have no reason to conclude that there’s anything in that program code that needs changing. In fact, I think we’ve gone substantially beyond the minimums.”

tfen held back as the rest of the assembled team headed for the doors, and Mac MacAdams noticed. A very nervous Joe Davis was pumping Mac’s hand in an obsequious display of appreciation, but the general finally sent him on his way. Once the room was empty of everyone else, Mac moved to where Ben was sitting and straddled a chair backward, his arms folded along the back as he studied the chief software engineer.

“Anything wrong, General?” Ben asked, squirming under the unspoken scrutiny.

“No.” Mac smiled. “But I have an important question for you.”

“Yes, sir. Go ahead.”

Mac glanced around to verify the room was empty of other ears.

“Ben, you know we’ll have a lot of lives at stake, both in Air Force aircraft and on the ground, when this system gets installed and turned on.”

“Yes, sir. I’m well aware of that.”

“You’re also aware, are you not, that once Boomerang is deployed, any mistakes in the basic program will be much more difficult to fix without compromising safety.”

“Of course.”

“I know you’ve been working your tail off in the last few days to fix the program, even though we now know it didn’t need fixing. I want you to know that I’m very appreciative of your efforts and your dedication.”

“Thank you, General, I …”

Mac waved him down. “This isn’t an awards presentation, Ben.”

He sighed, his eyes darting around the room once more, well aware he should wait until Dan Jerrod could be located and brought in with his anti-bugging equipment.

Never enough time, he thought.

“Ben, I know all about your visit to Dan Jerrod’s office. I know precisely what you told him and what he told you. You probably didn’t realize that he only pretends to work for Uniwave. In fact, he reports directly to me and no one else.”

“I … didn’t know that, sir.”

“And you still don’t. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And we will not speak of details discussed in that meeting. But here’s what I need to know, and bear with me because I’m shooting from the hip right now and thinking out loud. I know the system tested okay, and I accept that. But I know what you were worried about. Did any portion of that problem—that extra stuff that you found that worried you—show itself tonight?”

“No, sir.”

“But you’re still worried?”

“Of course, General. I can’t explain what it was… why it was there, you know? It’s eating at me. There’s no way that extraneous code should have been inside the program at any time.

I have to view it as potentially hostile.”

Mac was nodding, his mind racing to choose the right words.

“Very well. Ben, there are many things that you have no need to know, and therefore I cannot discuss with you. I can assure you, though, that thanks to your speaking up and coming to Dan, we’ve solved the riddle and uncovered and neutralized the source. In other words, we’ve terminated the problem. The unfortunate part is, I simply can’t tell you the details.”

“It was… I mean, it’s all taken care of?”

“Yes, Ben.”

“There was a threat, but it’s completely defused? I was afraid that

I’d merely interfered with them, and they’d try something else.

Whoever they’ is.”

“I understand. I wish to hell I could give you the details, but I can’t.”

“That’s okay. I understand, sir. I’m very relieved to hear this.”

“You’re a very diligent fellow, Ben. I knew you wouldn’t stop thinking this problem through and searching for a conclusion unless I told you personally it wasn’t necessary.”

Ben smiled. “Yes sir, you’re right. It’s been eating at me very actively, to the point that I’d begun to suspect everyone.”

“That includes me as well, I assume?”

Ben smiled sheepishly. “Really hadn’t gotten around to you yet, General. But I was becoming suspicious of friends and even my cat. Or his collar, at least.”

“I’m sorry?”

Ben laughed and waved it off. “Not important. Just something Dan Jerrod said.”

“Okay. Well, you can cut out the worry now. The responsible parties are contained.”

“Great.”

Mac got to his feet carefully and pushed the flimsy gray chair out of the way.

“Go on home, Ben. Get some well-deserved rest. Oh, and if no one’s told you, the start of the post-development program for Boomerang to maintain the system will be announced next week, and we very much want you to stay on for at least another year.”

“That’s good to hear, sir.”

Mac shook Ben Cole’s hand and walked him to the door of the hangar office, holding it open. He watched him go, before turning back into the room to get his coat. He would need to call Jerrod immediately to let him know what had been said. The security chief would be nervous, of course. Saying anything to Cole and keeping him on was a calculated risk, but it had apparently worked. Ben Cole was more than likely neutralized.

At least, for his sake, Mac thought, I certainly hope so.

He tried Dan Jerrod’s cell phone and home numbers with no luck.

The office extension rang uselessly as well. Mac sighed and punched in another number, assigning to Jon Anderson the task of tracking Jerrod down.

Mac focused on the door, well aware there was work to do, but the lure of the beautifully designed Gulfstream sitting like a crouching tiger on the hangar floor a few dozen yards away was too powerful for a lifelong pilot to ignore. He turned away from the outside door and entered the hangar, intent on strolling around the Gulf stream for a few minutes, contemplating her sleek shape and how she looked suspended in flight.

There was no one else in sight as Mac shoved his hands in his pockets and forced himself to relax, breathing deeply, his nose catching a hint of kerosene and other aviation solvents, aromas that painted an olfactory picture of the hangar’s interior.

The absence of anyone else in the hangar was comforting. A general officer poking around was, by definition, suspicious, his mere presence threatening to spark an alert among subordinates, who would instantly assume that the big man was searching for something to criticize. It helped to be anonymous every now and then, escaping the inevitable bow wave of recognition that the stars on his shoulders brought.

Mac stopped thirty feet in front of the nose of the Gulfstream, admiring its lithe appearance. Gulfstreams were the gold standard for executive jets, a $43-million luxury liner. He chuckled at having the audacity even to daydream what it would be like to own one on a general’s salary.

Not yet, at least, Mac thought, his mind poking into fantasy images of his post-military life to come.

He began at the nose and walked beneath the fuselage to the tail, reaching up to touch the aircraft every twenty feet or so, letting his fingertips merely brush the cool metal as he passed.

There was something mystical about an aircraft in a quiet hangar at night, Mac

thought. Air museums had always intrigued him as a result.

Walking around a silent, powerful airplane inside a huge building always inspired feelings of awe, which contrasted with his technical knowledge the way that logic and emotion always clash.

“I could put you to sleep explaining how a 747 flies,” he’d told a high-school class as a career-day speaker once, many years back, “but I will be forever emotionally mystified at the fact that so much metal can be supported by the wind and actually fly as a thing of beauty.” Airplanes were merely collections of man-made parts capable of using wing shape and power to suck themselves into the air, and yet they could stir the heart of even the most jaded pilot. Every time he’d visited the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio, or the Air and Space Museum in Washington, a planned hour had become an afternoon with the doors closing behind him.

He stopped for a second beneath the Gulfstream’s tail and then walked to the right wingtip, enjoying the changing perspective of the jet as he moved. The wings were turned up at the end in an appendage known as a winglet. He stopped for a second to admire the right one, the bold rake of its shape shifting the horizontal wing to a vertical fin, a design that lessened the aerodynamic drag of the aircraft and made it more fuel efficient. The winglet was painted blue to match part of the body paint, but there was a patch at the very front of the winglet, on its leading edge, that seemed darker.

Why is it that way?

Aircraft as big and expensive as a Gulfstream were painted or repainted all at once in special facilities. Yet, in the orangish light of the hangar’s sodium-vapor lamps, a foot-long expanse of the winglet’s leading edge appeared darker.

Must have been a bird strike or some other repair, Mac thought casually as he began walking away. But he stopped suddenly and walked back under the winglet, studying it intently, though unable to touch it because of the height.

There was a stepladder in one recess of the hangar and Mac retrieved it to climb up for a closer look. The difference in the paint

shade was very subtle. It was no wonder they’d missed it when they’d looked at the aircraft for damage a few days earlier. But whether it was the telltale aftereffects of a repair, or just an inconsistency in the original paint, he couldn’t be sure.

Mac ran his fingertips lightly over the area, feeling for a sharp edge where someone might have masked off a section before repainting. He could feel nothing unusual, but his eyes detected a small irregularity, as if a dent had been repaired imperfectly.

He looked around, relieved that apparently no one had been watching him, and returned the ladder to the spot it had occupied.

Suppose they’d come back Monday evening with damage from hitting that Albatross. Is it possible they could have repaired it secretly and said nothing? Our contract requires a report. Mac climbed inside the Gulfstream and searched the maintenance log, but there were no indications of a wingtip repair.

He thought about the Uniwave manager who ran the test aircraft program. He was, Mac concluded, perfectly capable of trying to cover up something that would have seemed insignificant, in order to avoid the paperwork that even a bird strike would trigger, especially if the discovery had been made after news of the Albatross crash reached his ears.

But we didn’t even suspect the possibility of a collision ourselves until we looked at the radar tapes, Mac reminded himself. Why would he? No, he concluded. If a damaged winglet had been discovered, they might or might not have asked the pilots about it, but afterward the aircraft would have been quietly repaired and the damage marked off to impact with an unseen object.

Mac left the Gulfstream cockpit and stood again on the hangar floor, studying the aircraft. He winced at the memories of his own involvement as a young officer in helping commanders minimize and hide major aircraft damage. It didn’t matter that coverups were a widespread practice carried out in order to avoid hurting the Air Force safety record or embarrassing a particular command; he’d always known it was wrong—if not criminal. Sometimes it was noth

ing more sinister than the maintenance staff working a few nights to repair a small dent in a wingtip rather than formally reporting it, but at other times an entire squadron would labor in secret for months to keep the cost of an accident from exceeding a million dollars and becoming a so-called “Class A,”

which was the most embarrassing level. The possibility that Uniwave might have done the same thing to avoid contract problems chilled him. Even worse was the thought that the beautiful twin jet sitting before him might have caused the loss of a civilian amphibian, and not even he was being told the truth.

-t~wo miles away Ben Cole parked his car in front of his favorite Mexican restaurant on Spenard and got out, locking the door as a black van he’d noticed before pulled into the same lot and parked several stalls down. He felt a small chill as he realized he’d seen the same vehicle in his rearview mirror since leaving the base.