Free Fall. Rick Mofina

third of them, flagging four to consider later.

      “Why didn’t you use my work in the story, Kate?” Sloane F. Parkman stood over her desk, arms folded, tie knotted, every hair in place. He was not wearing the grin today.

      “Because it was wrong, Sloane.”

      “I wrote that according to litigation and FAA records. There was nothing of consequence regarding the actual plane for Flight Forty-nine Ninety, or the RT-86 in general.”

      “You editorialized. I checked those very records and listed what the history was, what the facts are. Then I contacted an industry expert who put that history in context, saying all of the incidents and civil actions were in keeping with what was to be expected given the new model and EastCloud’s size as an airline. I put the facts on the record, Sloane. You chose not to report them. Why is that?”

      “There was nothing of significance to report!”

      “You’re not the expert to make that call! Why’re you downplaying the facts, Sloane?”

      “We’re supposed to be working together on this story. Why did you remove my byline, Kate?”

      “I didn’t. I put it on the story—”

      “I took it off.” Chuck stared at them. “Let’s take this into my office. Now.”

      They entered and Chuck closed the door.

      “Nobody sits down. This will be quick,” Chuck said.

      “Where’s Reeka?” Sloane asked.

      “Got called to a meeting. Sloane, your effort was half-assed. Your contribution added nothing to the piece, so I removed your byline.”

      “But I did what you requested, Chuck. I consulted the records.”

      “What you submitted was akin to a street cop at a crime scene telling people there’s nothing to see here. You kept facts from the light. End of discussion.”

      “But there was nothing—”

      “End of discussion.” Chuck put his hands on his hips. “Senior management liked the story, liked that we challenged the New York Times, got it on the record and got serious pickup. It shows subscribers are paying attention. Now I’ve asked our business reporters to dig into EastCloud and Richlon, to look into their histories. And I’ve asked our Washington bureau to start pumping members of the House Transportation Committee and the House Aviation Subcommittee. Maybe they’re hearing something on the big players here. They’ll feed whatever they get to us. We need to keep digging on this.”

      “Sounds good,” Kate said.

      “Want me to keep checking with my aviation sources, too, Chuck?”

      “Yes. But Sloane, we need to be sure we can put names on the record, like Kate did with the pilot. Kate, I want you to keep pushing all the angles. Work with everybody and keep us out front. You know the drill.”

      Chuck let a few beats pass. His cell phone rang, but before answering it, he said, “Okay, that’s it. Get to work.”

      * * *

      Kate spent the next hour at her desk, putting out calls and messages to sources. Then she tried to reach Raymond Matson to see how he was doing in the wake of the story.

      I hope he’s okay.

      But she got no response. In fact, not much was coming back from anybody. Kate remembered that she hadn’t finished checking reader emails. The in-box showed there were now eighty. As expected, most were nothing.

      That’s the way it goes, she thought, coming to the end, pausing at the last one.

      The subject line read:

      I know what happened to 4990.

      She opened it.

      Your story’s good, but it’s wrong. What happened to that jet will happen again. I know because I made it happen and unless you announce my triumph, we’ll make it happen again. This time it’ll be worse. Watch the skies. We are Zarathustra, Lord of the Heavens.

      Fourteen

      Manhattan, New York

      This can’t be real.

      Kate read the email again and a chill coiled slowly up her spine.

      It’s got to be a prankster or some nut.

      Kate had encountered all kinds of people trying to insert themselves into stories: conspiracy types, people with agendas, people who were unbalanced, hoaxers, you name it. Yet she couldn’t ignore the concern tightening around her. The phrase “I made it happen” gave Captain Matson’s words new meaning: I don’t know what happened, but I know something went wrong.

      Kate bit her bottom lip as she continued rereading the message.

      And they were threatening to do it again. Only God knows when.

      “Hey, Mark, come over here and look at this.”

      Mark Reston, a rumpled hard-news reporter who sat near her, moaned, pulled himself to his feet and stood next to Kate, who tapped her monitor with her pen.

      “What do you think of this? It’s in response to my story.”

      Reston scratched his stubbled chin and drew his face closer.

      “What’s this Lord of the Heavens crap?”

      “Mark, come on. What do you think?”

      “Likely a lunatic is what I think.”

      “What if it isn’t? We don’t know what really happened on that flight.”

      “Likely someone with a tinfoil hat.”

      “But what if it’s not a nutcase?”

      “Did you respond, try to engage them in conversation?”

      “Yes. I got the error message ‘Permanent failure, unknown user’ message.”

      “If this is real, you got a helluva story. Whatever it is, you should alert Chuck.”

      “That’s the plan.”

      Kate printed the email and headed for Chuck Laneer’s office. He wasn’t there. She found him coming down the hall and handed him the email.

      “Just got this.”

      Chuck pushed his glasses to the top of his forehead and read. He removed them when he’d finished and tapped one finger to his teeth, something he always did.

      “Do you have any idea who sent this, Kate?”

      “None. It’s anonymous.”

      “Did you respond?”

      “Yes and I got nothing, a failed-delivery message.”

      “Did you share it?”

      “No.”

      “Make several paper copies and stand by. I’m calling a meeting on how we’re going to handle this.”

      * * *

      Fifteen minutes later, Kate, Chuck and several senior editors sat at the big polished table in the newsroom’s main boardroom.

      They’d reviewed the email and Kate briefed them on all she knew. “So it boils down to this,” she said. “If we don’t write a story crediting this person for EastCloud Forty-nine Ninety, they’ll harm another flight.”

      “Have we had our IT security people try to track the source, verify it?” Marisa McDougal, head of world features, asked.

      “Yes, I’ve got them on it,” Chuck said, “but they’re indicating that it’ll likely be impossible, given our limited resources.”

      “So do we publish this or not?” Kate asked.