Root and Branch Page 2

  “Right there is just fine,” the pilot answered, gesturing toward the vacant seat. “Our navigator won’t be with us on this flight, so you might as well take his spot.”

  Since there were only four seats in the cockpit, Zorn wondered where Pat Craven would have sat if he had not decided to cancel at the last moment. Zorn remained silent while the aircrew completed their checklist review and, despite noise from takeoffs and landings outside, he couldn’t help overhearing their light-hearted banter, which centered on Caribbean sunshine, beaches, casinos, daiquiris, and bikini-clad women.

  “Man, is this job great or what?” the co-pilot gloated. “If they knew how much fun it was, they’d find a way not to pay us.”

  Clayton, the co-pilot, was an athletic type sporting a crew cut. Zorn guessed his age at about thirty-five.

  “Yeah, but this trip won’t be like that,” Travis replied to his younger crew member. “This time we’re headed to a closed base. And we’re flying straight back here tomorrow.”

  “So let’s get there on time, for once,” the flight engineer, added. “Meanwhile, I’ll go see what’s holding up Randy in the stern.”

  The engineer, whom the pilot had introduced as Marcus, seemed the most serious-minded of the three. He was tall and gaunt and his hands seemed to turn and twitch every few seconds.

  “What’s our estimated flight time?” Zorn asked out of idle curiosity.

  “Oh, usually about three hours, if all goes according to plan. Sometimes it takes longer. It all depends,” Travis answered. Zorn found the response oddly imprecise, given that the flight plan would have shown a specific number of hours and minutes. But he let it go. He was in no hurry today and looked forward to catching up on sleep.

  “So, is this your first trip to Transit Base Corvus?” Travis asked.

  “It is,” Zorn replied, hearing the name of his destination for the first time.

  “Well, I hope you enjoy the experience. It’s not what most people expect.”

  “Oh, I realize it’s a closed base, and that we’re not allowed into any of the resorts on the island…”

  “Excuse me, sir,” the pilot interrupted him, “but don’t say the island’s name out loud. Even though we all know which island Corvus is on, its location is classified. You never know who might be listening.”

  He tapped a finger to his communications headset, as if to indicate that military air traffic controllers, and possibly others, might be able to overhear them.

  Before Zorn could reply, the flight engineer handed Zorn the headset from the navigator’s seat.

  “Here, let me show you how your comms work,” Marcus offered, gesturing for Zorn to don the headset. Zorn accepted the headphones but didn’t put them on just yet. He turned instead to Travis, the pilot.

  “Would you mind if I caught a quick peek into the cargo bay before we take off? I’d like to see how our passengers are doing. Unfortunately, I missed watching them board because of a delay at the terminal.”

  “That’s no longer possible, sir,“ Travis responded. “We’re about to get going. You’d need a loadmaster’s rating to be back there right now.”

  “My company has chartered hundreds of flights on C-130s and I’ve ridden on plenty of them. Not once have I needed a loadmaster’s rating to ride in the back.”

  “The rules at Tetra are different.”

  As Travis spoke, Zorn noticed a fourth crewman enter the cockpit from the rear of the aircraft. Judging from the web harness the man wore over his flight suit, Zorn pegged him to be the loadmaster. But while the other three crew members fit squarely into Zorn’s image of U.S. Air Force veterans, earnest professionals who at times resembled bloodless appendages of the equipment they operated, this one was half a head taller than any of them and looked very red-blooded indeed. He strode into the cockpit as if the plane belonged to him and stood before the others with arms folded across his chest. Piercing blue eyes on full alert blazed out of his weather-beaten face.

  “Did I hear our visitor would like a look-see in the hold?” the man asked without making eye contact with anyone.

  “That’s right. Randy, I’d like you to meet Cliff. He’s flying with us to Corvus. Cliff, meet Randy, our loadmaster.”

  The loadmaster nodded in greeting and Zorn nodded back.

  “It’s your ship, colonel,” the loadmaster replied, turning back to Travis.

  A gracious smile broke out on the pilot’s face and once again he projected an airborne version of Southern hospitality.

  “All right, then, let’s see about giving Cliff a quick tour of the cargo bay once we’re at cruising altitude. Would that work for the two of you?”

  “Certainly,” Zorn answered.

  “Same here,” the loadmaster replied with similar bonhomie before turning back to Zorn. “But if you don’t mind my asking, do you have a particular concern about what’s back there?”

  “Not exactly a concern, but I do have a question. I noticed some of the passengers lined up for injections before boarding the aircraft. Can you tell me what sort of medication they might be getting right before takeoff?”

  Travis cast a nervous glance at his co-pilot, and then at the loadmaster. An awkward pause followed, until the loadmaster sidled up to Zorn and bent forward to address him in a conspiratorial whisper.

  “If you really must know, sir, it’s a sort of tranquilizer. Keeps the detainees from panicking once they’re up in the air, you see.”

  “Really? Is that standard procedure?” Zorn asked, scarcely able to conceal his disbelief.

  “Trust me, sir, the medical staff knows exactly what they’re doing. It’s all about the safety. And, so far, it’s been working like a charm.”

  Without waiting for a reply, Randy flashed a predatory grin and retreated back to the cargo bay. Zorn let the matter slide. After all, it was his own fault for being too late to observe the boarding.

  “Okay, everybody,” Travis said. “Let’s get this bird in the air!”

  Once the plane had climbed to cruising altitude, Zorn turned off his headset and found himself lulled into sleep by the noise and vibration of the powerful turboprop engines. He awoke after an hour or so, read a book for a while, then dozed off again. He awoke a short time later to flashing lights and piercing alarms.

  “What’s going on?” he asked the flight engineer, who was typing frantically into an onboard computer.

  Marcus interrupted his typing and faced Zorn with a surprisingly nonchalant look on his gaunt face.

  “Fuel leak sensor. It looks like we’re losing fuel pretty fast. We may need to lighten the cargo load.”

  Then Marcus called the pilot through the onboard communications system.

  “Colonel, I think we’d better get Randy up here, fast.”

  In less than a minute, the loadmaster arrived at a brisk walk and took up position just behind the pilot, examining the array of dials, gauges and controls spread out before him.

  “How serious is it this time?” Randy asked.

  “Nasty,” came the pilot’s response, audible through Zorn’s headset. “How much weight can we shed back there?”

  “We’re carrying about ten tons, including thirty-six corpses and assorted cargo. How much do you need to drop?”

  “Pitch it all, if you can. We need to lighten up, and fast.”

  “Roger that, skipper,” the loadmaster answered.

  “Wait a second,” Zorn interrupted, his eyes wide with surprise. “Corpses? You mean we don’t actually have live passengers back there?”

  “Change of plan,” the loadmaster growled. “Passenger is a generic term. We fly ‘em dead or alive. For this flight, it’s corpses being repatriated for burial. The men you saw getting injected must have been waiting to board the other plane on the apron.”

  Zorn found this explanation even more difficult to swallow than the one before.

  “And you intend to dump them overboard like surplus field rations or ammunition?”

  “Look, bu
ddy, it’s those stiffs or us. Think of it as a burial at sea. But there’s no time to gab about it. I’ve got to go back and unhitch the cargo.”

  Zorn opened his mouth to object, but Randy turned aside and spoke to the pilot.

  “I’ll need some help back there. Who can you spare?”

  “Clay and Marcus have their hands full. Take the VIP. I’ll waive all restrictions.”

  “Okay, got it.”

  The loadmaster reached into a cargo bin at the side of the cockpit, rummaged around, and returned to face Zorn with a spare web harness in hand.

  “Put this on. It can be dangerous around the cargo doors if you aren’t strapped in.”

  Randy then demonstrated how to step into the harness and tighten its straps. Zorn didn’t move. Then Randy thrust the harness to within an inch of his passenger’s nose.

  “Now come with me and do exactly what I say. That is, unless you want us all to go to the bottom together.”

  Zorn didn’t like it, but Randy was right. This was no time to argue. So he stepped into the harness, tightened it, and followed the loadmaster into the cargo hold. There he followed instructions to clip the carabiner from the long strap attached to his harness onto the overhead safety wire.

  Randy led the way to the rear of the hold, where Zorn noticed some three dozen figures in black vinyl body bags, each zipped up to the throat, leaving faces exposed. The corpses’ eyes were closed and their skin pallid but remarkably lifelike, as if embalmed. All the bodies lay atop metal cargo pallets lined up on roller conveyors, with feet pointed toward the rear loading ramp. Attached to the foot of each bag by a plastic cable tie was a gray cinder block.

  Why were the faces uncovered? And why the cinder blocks? And if Randy had only just learned of the fuel leak, when would he have had time to weight the body bags to sink to the bottom?

  Zorn stepped forward to take a closer look at the corpse nearest him but the loadmaster held out an arm to keep him back. In the same moment, Zorn felt himself thrown forward as the C-130 decelerated to enter a steep descent. Suddenly the engine noise faded to a murmur and Zorn felt light as air. Nausea ensued within seconds. Then the aircraft leveled off again.

  “What’s the matter? Never seen a stiff before?” Randy taunted on seeing Zorn’s face go ashen. Once the plane reached low altitude, he grabbed Zorn’s harness and led him deeper into the hold, where he pointed out the ramp controls, located near the left paratroop jump door.

  “See this? When I give you the thumbs down, push the red button to open the ramp. And keep pushing until the ramp stops. Once all the pallets have rolled off, I’ll give you a thumbs-up. Then push the black button until the ramp closes. Got it?”

  Zorn nodded. “No prayers or anything?” he asked, appalled at what he’d been directed to do.

  But the loadmaster just rolled his eyes and walked away to busy himself among the pallets. A few moments later, he stepped to the opposite side of the aircraft and gave the thumbs down signal.

  “God bless their souls and give them peace,” Zorn muttered before pushing the red button to open the ramp. Suddenly the upper and lower cargo doors separated, allowing sunlight to stream into the airplane’s fuselage. The noise of the four turboprop engines grew to a deafening roar and the interior temperature dropped by tens of degrees. Gusts of wind buffeted Zorn, nearly tossing him off his feet. Then the upper and lower doors ceased opening. The rearmost pallets rolled down the ramp and those next in line followed. Nothing could stop them now. All at once Zorn felt his gorge rise and a strong urge to turn away, but something compelled him to keep watching.

  Only then did it catch his eye that one of the figures was a head taller than the others. And as it rolled past, he recognized the Abraham Lincoln beard on the exposed face of the lanky detainee he had seen queued up before takeoff. To Zorn’s horror, the figure seemed to writhe within its body bag. And he could have sworn that the eyes blinked open and shut several times. But before Zorn could take his thumb off the controls, the body of the tall young detainee rolled off the ramp and vanished into thin air. No parachute. Just a plunge straight down from ten thousand feet.

  Zorn stopped pushing the red button but more pallets kept rolling out. He scanned the faces that passed by but none of them moved a muscle.

  “What the hell!” Zorn shouted over the din. “One of the bodies just opened its eyes!”

  “It’s nothing! Forget it! Keep pushing the button!” the loadmaster shouted, unable to approach Zorn because of the spinning rollers that separated the two men.

  A moment late the pilot’s voice came in over Zorn’s headset: “For God’s sake, man, keep pushing the damned button! Now!”

  And so Zorn pushed and pushed until his thumb ached, until the last pallet rolled out into empty space. And his heart sank with them. Almost immediately the aircraft climbed from the sudden loss of weight, once again throwing Zorn off balance. He righted himself by putting a hand against the airplane’s fuselage and didn’t notice when the loadmaster stepped in behind him.

  “Man, I hate it when they do that,” Randy called out over Zorn’s shoulder, his voice conveying a distinct sense of relief.

  “When they do what?”

  Randy gave a short laugh. Then he stepped in front of Zorn to take over the controls, pushing the black button until the door was fully closed and the last ray of sunlight faded away.

  “When they do what, Randy? What the hell happened with that kid?”

  “Some kind of rigor mortis, probably,” the loadmaster replied with a shrug. “Damned creepy, but you see it now and then. Best to forget about it, unless you want nightmares. And, believe me, I’ve had my share.”

  Randy walked Zorn back toward the cockpit, unclipped him from the safety wire and helped him remove his harness. Zorn accepted the help without a word. But as he stepped forward toward the flight deck, he noticed a closed-circuit television camera overhead, its red light blinking. Had the dumping been recorded? Was there some video file now that showed him pushing the red button to tip the bodies overboard? Had he stepped into a trap?

  Back on the flight deck, the aircrew seemed oddly unperturbed by their apparent brush with disaster. No one acknowledged Zorn as he settled into the navigator’s seat and buckled in, even though he and Randy had ostensibly saved them all from a watery grave.

  Zorn was in no mood to be congratulated, anyway. He remained badly shaken, both by the emergency action and by his growing suspicion that the crew had deliberately manipulated him into tipping the corpses overboard — if indeed that’s what they were. When he’d seen the tall kid on the tarmac, he had been very much alive.

  “How much fuel do you reckon we lost up there, Marcus?” Zorn heard the pilot ask the flight engineer. “Was it as grim as it seemed?”

  “Wouldn’t you know,” came the co-pilot’s offhand reply over the headset. “Looks like another faulty sensor. It turns out we hardly lost a drop. But don’t you worry, chief. I’ll have it checked out the minute we land. With any luck, we’ll report the lost cargo, get the sensor replaced overnight, and won’t need to push back tomorrow’s takeoff one bit.”

  Zorn found the explanation unpersuasive as he replayed the sequence of events in his mind. Listening to the crew through his headset while Travis and Clayton plotted the final leg of the flight to Transit Base Corvus, Zorn calculated that the bodies must have been released over the Puerto Rico Trench, the deepest area of the Atlantic Ocean, some five miles below sea level. Considering that most of the flight had taken place over relatively shallow waters, and that their route had crossed the trench only briefly, the choice of drop site seemed remarkably opportune. At that depth, he imagined, no trace of what they’d dropped would ever be found.

  As soon as the plane landed and taxied to a halt near the control tower, Zorn unbuckled his lap belt and shoulder harness and gave Marcus a questioning look before heading out the door. The lean flight engineer, who had seemed so nervous before takeoff, gazed back at Zorn briefly before tur
ning away. He knew. Of course he knew.

  Chapter Two: American Intifada

  “In times of war, the law falls silent.”

  –Marcus Tullius Cicero

  FOUR MONTHS EARLIER, CARCASSONNE, FRANCE

  Roger Zorn drove through the gate of his ancestral French estate and immediately felt as if he were emerging from a trance. He had spent the entire morning in meetings at the Toulouse headquarters of the private security company that bore his family’s name. But he had left early to spend a quiet March afternoon replacing broken trellises at his recently purchased vineyard in Lezignan, about a half hour from where he lived in Carcassonne. The windows of his 2005 Citroën C6, an oddity of a luxury sedan that his late father had bought shortly before his retirement at age eighty-five, were rolled down. Zorn could hear the crunch of gravel as he passed through fragrant orchards of apricots and almonds that had just begun to display pale pink blossoms.

  It was nearly seven P.M. and the sun had already set behind Carcassonne’s medieval walled city. Zorn was hungry and looked forward to relaxing with a glass of wine, though he usually didn’t drink on weeknights. But tonight he didn’t care about rules, or duties, or responsibilities. Lately, he just wished people would leave him alone. Not just his clients and the board of directors, but his wife and children, too. He felt tired. He needed a change.

  Zorn left his briefcase and the garment bag that contained his business suit in the stone entrance hall and walked down a whitewashed corridor to the library, where he could hear the evening news playing on television. The library was one of the central rooms in the eighteenth century chateau and retained its original oak-coffered ceiling and parquet floor, though the walls were painted a pale blue to conform to the blue-and-white upholstery of the sofa and chairs. Afghan tribal rugs lent the space a warm and comfortable feel. On an antique oak sideboard he spotted a silver tray with an uncorked bottle of red wine and two empty balloon glasses.