Keith Thomson - Twice a Spy

The cold air screaming into the cabin helped Charlie regain control of his muscles. His panic abated, or at least moved aside, allowing him to wonder how his father was doing and hope that, if he was okay, he would know what the hell to do now.

Drummond was crumpled on the copilot’s seat, breathing, but not much more.

Charlie jumped up from his seat in the cabin, but the rush of air swept him off his feet, sucking him like a dust ball toward the aperture where the cabin door used to be.

He grabbed for the bulkhead. Gritting his teeth, he pulled himself around it and into the cockpit. As he noticed the Caribbean leaping toward him, his stomach jumped into his throat.

He glanced at the instrument panels. There were a hundred times as many dials, knobs, buttons, gauges, and other glass bubbles as there were controls in the PlayStation aerial dogfight game that constituted his aviation experience. Save the pair of yokes, one in front of each seat. A yoke acted like a steering wheel. It also moved the nose of the plane up and down. At least on PlayStation.

He grasped the yoke in front of the vacated pilot’s seat and pulled it toward him.

The nose of the plane turned up. Too much-the sensation was just like that on a roller coaster when the car transitions from plummet to climb. Gravity thrust Charlie backward. He grabbed the seat in time to avoid being thrown back into the cabin.

PlayStation didn’t do this.

He reached forward and ever so gently nudged the yoke forward.

The plane fell into a nosedive.

Stomach imploding, Charlie gripped the seat so tightly that he tore the leather at a seam. He tried the yoke again.

The nose turned up, and-incredible-the plane settled. But for how long?

Out of tricks, he knelt by Drummond, shaking him. Drummond rolled the other way.

“Dad, please?”

Drummond struggled to open his eyes. “Where are we?”

“Airplane. Sky. Caribbean somewhere. You with me by any chance?”

“Check.” Sitting up, Drummond glanced out the cockpit windows. He exhibited no alarm. Possibly a good sign. “Are you okay?”

“I am if you know how to fly,” Charlie said.

“You mean a plane?”

Charlie battled terror to think of a way to communicate the exigency in a way that might spark his father’s memory. “Bream’s trying to make it look like we died in a plane crash.”

“What kind of plane?” Drummond asked.

“This kind.”

Struggling to sit up, Drummond took inventory of the cockpit. “Use the autopilot,” he said. His speech was sluggish. He tried to reach forward, toward the instrument panel. His arm seemed leaden. He teetered.

Charlie propped him up. “Hang in there, Dad,” he said.

As Drummond tried to recompose himself, Charlie searched for the autopilot. The search could take half an hour. If there even was an autopilot.

He looked back at Drummond, who appeared transfixed by the passing clouds.

“Where is the autopilot?”

“Oh, that, yes, right.” Drummond seemed grateful for the reminder. “Sorry, we need to find someone to help.”

“Say you were the only person on the plane?”

“I’d radio for help.”

Charlie dropped into the pilot’s seat, snatched up the headset, and brought the microphone to his lips. “Mayday! Mayday!”

No response.

Drummond pointed at the talk switch located on the top of the yoke. Charlie hit it. Then tried more distress calls. Still nothing. Not even a crackle.

He wiggled the headset jack at the base of the instrument and tapped the radio. The channel selector read 118.0 MHz.

He looked to his father. “Is there an airplane equivalent of nine-one-one?”

“I believe so.”

Charlie waited.

“Any idea what it is, Dad?”

“Maybe one-two-one-point-five?”

Charlie clicked the knob to 121.5. “Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!”

Only static back.

“Mayday!”

Drummond said, “It’s often out in places like-” He fell backward, out cold before the back of his skull struck the headrest.

“Dad?”

Something beneath Drummond began buzzing. An egg timer, it sounded like.

Wedging his hand between his father’s left leg and the seat cushion, Charlie plucked out Bream’s satphone. Forgotten in haste. Or had the twisted fuck left it behind so he could call and deliver a parting shot?

Charlie thrust the phone to his ear. “Cockpit.”

“Listen, J. T. Bream,” came a voice through the earpiece, “I know where you are, and I’m going to come and kill you if-”

Charlie couldn’t believe his ears. “Alice?”

“Chuckles?” She remained the pro, avoiding using a real name, and, at the same time, employing her safety code.

“Yeah,” he said, adding a safety code of his own: “It’s a laugh a minute here.”

“Did you get away from Bream?”

“We’re away from him, put it that way.”

“Your dad?”

“He got knocked out when Bream bailed, but I think he’ll be okay, if, to make a long story short, you can help me land a plane.”

“Maybe,” she said. Charlie assumed she hadn’t blinked. “Do you know what kind of plane it is?”

“Propeller …”

“Start reading off the labels on the instruments.”

“There are labels on most of them-”

“Read whatever you see.” She was as cool as a call center operator, which had the effect of dissipating enough of Charlie’s panic so that he could focus. “Maybe a model name?”

He found one on the yoke. “Beechcraft.”

“Good. How many propellers are there?”

He checked the side windows. “One on each wing.”

“Okay. How about this? When you got going, did the engines make a noise like a car starting, or did they whine?”

“A whine, I think.”

“Turboprop, then. What seat are you in?”

“The one on the left.”

“Pilot’s seat, excellent. Directly in front of you there should be a glass-covered dial that indicates what’s known as ‘attitude.’ ”

Finally, something PlayStation had. “Yeah. Tells you which way’s up, right?”

“Exactly. Blue’s the sky, brown’s the dirt, and the little white bars in the middle are our wings.”

“Well, if it’s working, we’re flying level now.”

“Good. Now, just to the right you should see an instrument that looks like an old-fashioned clock.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Our altimeter. I know you know what that is. Should be a window across the top half with numbers. Can you read them?”

Charlie’s stomach settled, somewhat. Alice knew what she was doing; she wasn’t just trying to calm him down. “About fifty-two hundred feet.”

“Stable?”

“I think so.”

“Great. To the left is a speed indicator. Read it to me.”

“One-ninety.” According to the gauge, it was 190 KIAS. Knots? Knots Incorporating Air Speed? No time for Q amp; A.

“We have to find out how much flying time we have. On the wall to your left, there should be two gauges on a separate panel.”

“Okay.”

“Those are the fuel gauges.”

“There’s one-twenty-five on both gauges.” Not a bad total, he thought, if this was anything like a car.

Alice was silent.

A sticky foreboding spread over Charlie.

He glanced at Drummond. Still out.

Finally, Alice spoke. “What do you see outside?”

“Not much,” Charlie said. “Just tranquil Caribbean, a couple of clouds.”

“No land?”

“No.”

“I was hoping-sometimes there are islets there that don’t make the GPS maps.”

“We’ve run into a couple. Just not lately.”

“Listen, Charlie, I’m afraid there’s no way you’re going to make land.”