“What?” the senior FBI man asked. “What?”
The FAA inspector took a deep breath and shook his head. “I’m not sure you’re going to believe this.”
“Try me.”
“The one aircraft in the United States we most suspect of carrying material that could be used to construct a nuclear bomb?”
“Yes?”
“At this moment, it’s in a holding pattern over Washington, D.C.”
ABOARD SCOTAIR 50—4:00 P.M. EDT
Doc Hazzard excused himself for a quick walk to the back of the aircraft.
“I can only watch us bore circular holes in the sky for so long without a break!” he explained as he slid his barrel-chested frame from the seat with surprising ease.
Within a minute, however, he was back, a quizzical expression crinkling his weather-beaten forehead.
“Uh, Dr. McCoy, you said several hours ago that you’ve got batteries and things ticking away in your equipment, right?”
Linda McCoy studied Doc’s face before replying. “Yes. Why?”
“Well, I hate to tell you, but there’s an electronic alarm going off back there.”
Scott looked around at Doc, who shrugged his shoulders.
Linda followed Doc out of the cockpit and down the narrow passageway on the left side of the compartment, aware of a high-pitched sound that seemed to be rising in intensity as she moved aft. The Boeing 727 was cruising through bumpy air at low speed with very little engine noise, which let the warning horn echo from everywhere in the cargo compartment at once. She scanned her memory of the things her team had packaged back in McMurdo Sound in Antarctica, but nothing, as far as she could remember, could make a noise like that.
“It’s coming from your second pallet, I think,” Doc offered as they moved back slowly alongside the cargo.
“I can’t imagine what that could be,” she said, her head cocked to try to locate the source of the high-pitched sound, which had become almost deafening.
Doc Hazzard tried putting his head against the side of the pallet, while Linda squeezed past him, realizing that it was getting louder as she moved aft.
“Doc, that’s not coming from my stuff! It’s coming from the last cargo position.” Linda pointed toward the rear of the cargo cabin.
Together they moved carefully alongside Vivian Henry’s shipment and stepped behind it, and as Linda reached out to steady herself with one of the cargo straps, the noise changed at the same moment to an urgent electronic warble, causing both of them to jump.
“What on earth?” Linda asked.
Doc backed up and stared at the pallet briefly. “Wait here,” he said. He motioned toward the front of the aircraft and Linda watched him disappear up the narrow passageway, returning in less than a minute with a startled Vivian Henry, who moved around her pallet slowly, her eyes wide and fixated on the large crate beneath the heavy-duty cargo straps and plastic sheeting.
“What’s in there, Mrs. Henry?” Doc asked.
Vivian stared at Doc in uncomprehending silence for a few seconds, then suddenly shook herself awake.
“I … I don’t know. I don’t know what could be making that noise.” Her voice seemed distant against the loud electronic warble.
“What’s in the crate, I mean?” Doc tried again.
“My husband instructed me,” she began, “to bring this to Washington personally. It’s something I’m not supposed to discuss, but it’s very important to our military … to the United States.”
Doc Hazzard moved slightly in front of her, trying to look her in the eye.
“Mrs. Henry? Was there supposed to be anything running, or turned on, in there?”
Vivian took a deep breath. “No. It’s a mockup. A dummy.”
“If we got your husband on the phone, could he tell us?”
“He’s deceased.”
“What … was his business, Mrs. Henry?”
“He was a government scientist, before he retired.”
“What kind of scientist, Mrs. Henry? What area?”
“Physicist,” she replied in a small voice.
Doc felt off-balance all of a sudden. A jolt of apprehension had come with the title of “physicist,” as if the word invested the pallet’s unknown contents with more sinister possibilities. He shook off the feeling and tried again. “Is there anyone your husband worked with who would know about this?”
Vivian’s eyes remained on the pallet as she shook her head, slowly at first, then with rapid back-and-forth jerks.
Linda had been watching her carefully, especially her eyes. It was obvious that Mrs. Vivian Henry had absolutely no idea what was in her own pallet. Or could it be that Vivian was just a good actress? If so, what was she hiding? A small, cold chill began to ripple down Linda’s back.
“Okay,” Doc said, “I think we better open it up.”
“No!” Vivian Henry’s reply was instantaneous, but her eyes remained glued to the pallet. “He left strict instructions … that …”
Doc put his large hands on her shoulders and slowly turned her around to face him until their eyes met.
“Mrs. Henry, something inside your pallet is sounding a warning. It’s trying to tell us something, and we’re a commercial cargo aircraft in flight. Unless your husband left specific instructions about what to do if you heard such a warning, we’ve got to figure out what this alarm means. Okay?”
She looked at him blankly.
“Okay?”
Her eyes dropped to the floor. “Okay.”
Doc motioned to Linda, and together they began removing the cargo straps, using a penknife to cut through the side of the heavy vinyl covering, exposing a crate within.
“Hold on a second.” Doc disappeared up the passageway again, returning quickly with a crowbar. He tried to control the creepy feeling that the alarm, which kept changing in pitch, was very much beyond his control. The nails screamed as he hauled them out of the wooden crate. The back panel finally gave way and fell, causing all three of them to step back as it clattered to the metal floor of the 727, revealing the crate’s contents.
Facing them was a large stainless steel container. It was rectangular, but with rounded edges at each of the corners. The rear panel was over six feet wide, but only the surface of the metal was visible within the opened crate. There were no stickers or decals—no markings of any kind—only the outline of what appeared to be a removable panel approximately twenty-four inches square located about three feet up from the bottom along the left-hand edge.
Linda McCoy reached out to the panel, but the pattern of the electronic alarm changed before she actually touched it.
When she pulled her hand back, the alarm reverted to its previous warble.
“This thing’s got a magnetic field sensor responding to us!” Linda said. “Why, I wonder?” She looked briefly at Vivian, who seemed frozen in place, her eyes riveted on the container. Doc stepped forward, braving the change in sound to run his hand along the panel.
There were four Phillips-head screws holding the panel in place, and Doc produced a small screwdriver, finding them easy to remove. When the last one was free, he pulled the panel loose and handed it to Linda.
The glow of a TV screen within spilled from the cavity as soon as the panel was open. Doc leaned close and noticed a foldout computer-style keyboard and number pad mounted below the screen. There was a message on the screen directing him to press the “Enter” key on the keyboard.
He did so.
Instantly the alarm stopped as a line of text appeared on the screen.
THE CURRENT LOCATION OF THIS DEVICE IS 38 DEGREES, 52.5 MINUTES NORTH LATITUDE, 77 DEGREES, 03.5 MINUTES WEST LONGITUDE.
The numbers were changing slightly as the 727 moved over the ground, and Doc realized there had to be some form of inertial navigation system inside, tracking their precise position.
Without prompting, a second block of text suddenly appeared.
WARNING! THE FACT THAT THIS DEVICE IS NOW LOCATED W
ITHIN THE PHYSICAL CONFINES OF THE PENTAGON HAS BEEN DETECTED AND LOCKED IN MEMORY. ANY ATTEMPT TO MOVE THIS DEVICE FROM ITS PRESENT LOCATION—OR ANY ATTEMPT TO DEACTIVATE—WILL RESULT IN INSTANT DETONATION!
SEVEN
ABOARD SCOTAIR 50—4:05 P.M. EDT
The voice of the Washington Approach controller was terse.
“ScotAir Fifty, I’ve been handed a telephone number in Miami you’re to call immediately. Do you have a phone aboard?”
Scott felt off-balance. He’d never heard an air traffic controller order a pilot to make an airborne call. He wished Doc was back in the cockpit.
Scott punched the transmit button. “Ah, roger, ScotAir Fifty does have a telephone. Who’s requesting the call?”
“I don’t know, ScotAir,” the controller began, “but you need to call this number immediately. I’m told it’s an emergency.”
The controller relayed the number and Scott punched it into the Flitephone handset, his mind whirling through a variety of apocalyptic possibilities as a man answered on the other end, listened to the name ScotAir, and identified himself as an FBI agent. Scott felt himself shudder within.
“We’ve been trying to find you, ScotAir. You were in Miami this morning at the same time some undocumented hazardous material was shipped out. We think that material may be on board your aircraft.”
The memory of Linda McCoy’s pushiness in getting her two pallets aboard suddenly flooded Scott’s mind, almost blocking the agent’s words. They hadn’t really verified her identity, had they? They hadn’t even inspected her pallets, once he’d agreed to take them.
“We need you to land immediately,” the agent said.
The visual memory of Mrs. Henry’s single pallet also crossed his mind. He knew even less about her.
Scott realized the agent was still talking, and he wasn’t paying attention.
“I’m sorry. Say again.”
There was a pause in Miami. “I said we’ll have the appropriate people ready to meet you to examine what you’ve got on board. You haven’t unloaded anything since you left Miami, have you?”
Suddenly, for some reason, he felt guilty. All they’d done wrong was load someone else’s pallet, and that was an innocent mistake. Yet the fact that an FBI agent was asking him questions at all was vaguely terrifying.
“No, sir,” Scott answered. “It’s all still aboard. But I need to know, are we in any danger, if what you’re looking for is really here?”
Silence.
“Sir? Did you hear me?”
He could hear the phone being shifted from one hand to another in Miami, and at last the FBI agent’s voice returned. “Ah, Captain, I doubt you’re in any immediate danger, but I can’t say for certain. If the … items … we’re looking for are on board your airplane, it depends on how well they’re, ah, packaged.”
More links and connections raced through his head, none of them comforting: Miami … drug dealers … drug-making equipment … hazardous carcinogenic chemicals … What if we’re carrying illegal drugs?
Scott heard his own voice as if it were disembodied. “Okay. Where do you want us to land? We’re waiting to get into National, but right now it’s closed.”
There was a worrisome hesitation on the other end. Scott could hear voices before the agent spoke into the handset again.
“Okay, stay in your holding pattern. What phone are you on?”
Scott passed the number of the aircraft’s Flitephone.
“Keep the line open, Captain, and I’ll call you back as soon as we’ve decided where to bring you down.”
“You do realize there’s a hurricane moving in here?” Scott asked.
“I … wait a minute,” the agent began. Scott could hear someone talking in the background. “Okay, Captain, what did you say?”
“I said there’s a hurricane moving into the D.C. area. Whatever we do, we’re going to need to do it fast. One of my clients wants her cargo to go to National, but if it doesn’t reopen soon, the winds are going to go out of limits.”
“You’ve got just one shipment on board, right?”
“No, sir. We’ve got two. One’s going to Denver, Colorado. The other was loaded by mistake this morning. We’re delivering it to National.”
More background discussion. Scott realized he’d flown beyond the end of the holding pattern. His right hand found the autopilot controller and began a right turn to reverse course. Even at ten thousand feet and two hundred forty knots of speed, the turbulence was getting worse, and the old 727 was bouncing around with an irritating consistency.
The agent’s voice filled his ear again. Scott thought he detected fatigue. “Okay, Captain, we’re going to need to inspect everything you’ve got aboard. Right now, we’re considering bringing you down at Andrews Air Force Base. Hang tight until I’ve got final word. I’ll call you right back.”
The sound of the cockpit door being flung open was punctuated by the sound of the FBI agent disconnecting.
“Scott!” Doc Hazzard laid a large left hand on the younger pilot’s shoulder, turning him partly around with a startling roughness. “Scott, we’ve got a problem.” Linda McCoy stood in the doorway, he noticed, her face ashen. Mrs. Henry was nowhere to be seen.
“What?”
Doc flung himself in the copilot’s seat and began strapping in. “Dr. McCoy will take you back there. I’ll watch the bird. I don’t know what to make of it.”
“What, Doc? What the hell are you talking about?”
Doc Hazzard grabbed the yoke with his right hand and turned toward Scott.
“That warning horn? It was coming from Mrs. Henry’s shipment. There’s a metal container in that pallet. It looks like stainless steel. I opened an inspection hatch and found a TV screen inside with a message you’ve got to see. Scott, this thing may contain a bomb! And it’s got an inertial navigation system in it that may be malfunctioning. It thinks it knows where it is, but it doesn’t know precisely.”
“Doc, for God’s sake, slow down! Tell me that again. There’s a huge container back there with some sort of message and you think it’s a bomb?”
Doc shook his head as he scanned the instruments, trying to make sure he knew where they were. “You’ll understand when you look at it.”
“What’s this about an inertial navigation system?”
Doc turned to him. “It thinks we’re in the Pentagon. Rather, it thinks it’s in the Pentagon.”
“Well, we flew over the Pentagon before we started holding, but what does that have to do with …” The word “bomb” was beginning to sink in.
There was true panic in the copilot’s eyes, Scott noticed. For eight months nothing had seemed to rattle Doc Hazzard. He was always steady as a rock. But now he was shaken.
“Doc, does Mrs. Henry know what’s inside that pallet?”
Doc shook his head vigorously. “Not a clue. She says her husband was a government physicist. Whatever that is back there, he built it. I can’t get anything else out of her, except that he’s dead and left instructions for her to take it to the Pentagon. It’s supposed to be a mockup of some sort. That’s all she’ll tell me, and she looks pretty scared.”
Linda McCoy’s hand gripped his shoulder with surprising strength. “Captain, please follow me back. I’m really worried about this.” Her voice carried a tense urgency as well, and Scott scrambled out of the seat to follow her through the cockpit door.
Vivian Henry had steadied herself against the turbulence by holding on to a small handrail above the windows, but she was aware of little more than the container before her. She’d recognized the look of alarm on the face of the young female scientist several minutes before, then had seen it consume the copilot as well. They seemed unable to tell her what they were seeing, so she’d stepped forward and looked for herself at the small screen inside her ex-husband’s creation. All she could see on the screen was text, but in her head she could hear the familiar snarl of her deceased husband’s voice reaching out for her again with the hor
rid clarity of a can’t-get-away nightmare.
What does he mean, “detonation”?
Maybe it was a burglar alarm of sorts, she thought in a frantic search for a benign explanation. She looked at the screen again. He obviously meant those words to be threatening. Once the shipment was within the Pentagon complex, Rogers Henry had devised a plan to keep it there.
Perhaps that’s it! The threat is just a ploy to make sure they really study the mockup.
Nothing would happen. Nothing would explode. Vivian knew Rogers had always been passionate about defending his country. He would never attack it.
Doc Hazzard and Dr. McCoy had disappeared toward the cockpit, leaving her alone with her husband’s handiwork. For the first time a cold, haunting shroud of fear began to cover her mind with an unexpected sense of helplessness and resignation. The old feeling of being cornered by him in some other impossible position, her back against a wall—often with his hands around her throat—came back with chilling familiarity. So many times she had assumed she was about to die at his hands—so many times she was sure he would carry out his threats. Until she’d mustered up enough courage to leave him, she’d grown used to feeling helpless and being resigned to her fate.
But there were other people involved this time, she reminded herself.
Vivian Henry looked out the nearest window, trying to shake the feeling of impending doom. Rogers had stopped appearing in her nightmares some time ago, but the rancid, electric feeling of impending attack had returned. It was a feeling she knew all too well. For years she’d had nightmares about his stalking her, nightmares she relived night after night with the visceral presence of pure hate reflected in his eyes when they fastened on her. His pupils would become tiny little pinpoints, and she would be transfixed, unable to move, until she awoke in total confusion.
She stared, mesmerized, at the partly exposed metal canister, sensing her ex-husband at his most sadistic.
Linda McCoy reappeared with the captain, both of them with averted eyes and strained faces as they looked inside at the glowing TV screen. She heard the young captain inhale sharply.
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