Cockpit — Regal 12
Ryan was shifting in his seat, his hand waving slightly for Marty’s attention.
“Yeah?”
“We’re down to two thousand five hundred pounds in the center tank,” Ryan said.
“Understood. But she’ll automatically start feeding both engines from the left tank when we run dry, correct?”
“Yes, the way I have it set up.”
‘Okay. Let’s keep the landing lights off until the last second. I’ll call for them if I need them. Here we go,” Marty said. “I’m going to hold the gear until one mile out. You concur?”
“I do.”
Marty had pulled into position the clear slab of blue-green glass called a combiner, adjusting it in front of his eyes. The so-called heads-up display allowed a pilot to focus outside and essentially have the airspeed and altitude and instrument landing system information all projected on the glass as if it were parading across the distant horizon. The HUD had become the essential piece of equipment for landing in near zero-zero conditions.
“The combiner is working perfectly, Ryan, but I’m changing the normal procedure.”
“Okay.”
“Below two hundred feet I want your eyes out, too. Call a go around if we’re dangerously misaligned, otherwise just… help make sure we can see the concrete.”
“Wilco.”
“Lowering the gear shouldn’t change the pitch in any way. I’m holding two hundred thirty knots and I’m planning to just barely flare to keep the sink rate from being excessive. I’m also going to duck under the glide slope by one dot to get us on the runway as close to the approach end as possible.”
“Marty, we’re seven miles out, two miles from glide slope intercept.”
“Roger. I’ll start down… one dot low.”
“Did we tell the other captain we’re landing?” Ryan asked.
“She knows. She can feel it.”
The approach controller’s voice cut the silence.
“Regal, we show you one mile from intercept,”
“Roger,” Ryan replied. “And you said cleared approach?”
“Yes, sir,” the approach controller replied, “…and the tower has cleared you to land.”
Marty took a deep breath and tried his best to concentrate. Something that had been bothering him was now raising the hairs on the back of his neck. Whatever it was, it was something overlooked, or something they hadn’t considered — but definitely the sort of thing he would be called to account for. He tried again to push the rising feeling out of his mind, but it kept circling his consciousness, like a defiant horsefly.
“Glide slope intercept, one dot low,” Ryan intoned. Marty had pulled the thrust levers back slightly, watching the airspeed with laser-like intensity as they started exchanging altitude for reduced power to keep the same speed.
“Should we ask for the current RVR?” Ryan asked.
“It’s immaterial. We’re landing regardless,” Marty answered, pulling the thrust levers a bit more as the airspeed tried to increase.”
“Four miles out, Marty.”
“Got it.”
What the hell am I forgetting? Marty’s brain again demanded, and once more there were no answers, just the clucking of some distant part of his mind that he would deeply regret ignoring.
“Three miles, holding one dot low, on speed,” Ryan intoned.
“Stand by for the gear at one mile.”
“Standing by. Five hundred feet to go, Marty. No decision height.”
“Roger.”
“Coming up on two miles to the runway, on speed, on glide slope minus one.”
“Roger.”
“Four hundred above and one mile,” Ryan was saying.
“Gear down,” Marty commanded, as Ryan’s hand moved the lever downward, starting the hydraulic sequence that lowered the huge main gear trucks and the nose gear into place.
Whatever had been eating at him loomed suddenly as one of the most profound warnings he had ever ignored, and this time it refused to go away. A very insistent part of his mind screamed “Go Around!” and finally, at a radar altimeter reading of 190 feet above the terrain, the last tumbler between nuance and reality fell into place.
“GEAR UP!” Marty commanded.
“What?”
“Going around. Gear Up! Tell the tower.”
Marty nursed the throttles forward while pulling gently to arrest the descent of the big jet at 120 feet, starting a shallow climb.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING?” Ryan demanded, eyes wide.
“Tell them we’re on the go!”
Ryan froze for a few microseconds before realizing that a protest over how little fuel they had was now too late. The runway was zipping by unseen beneath them, and with it, it felt like their last chance was slipping away.
“Denver, Regal Twelve is… ah… on the go,” Ryan said as ordered.
“Roger, Twelve. Climb straight ahead to seven thousand. What are your intentions?”
Unaware that his finger had once again pressed the transmit button, Ryan’s thoughts found voice: “I wish the hell I knew!”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Present Day — September 3
The neatly dressed man in a crisp white shirt and well-cut blue suit was a far cry from the disheveled and disillusioned pilot who had plopped down in the firm’s main conference room months before with radioactive toxicity. That version of Marty Mitchell had been a study in smoldering anger and determined, martyred defeat. This version was ready for battle and, if not full of confidence, at least focused on what must be done. His fist-shaking rage atop the mountain had been a primal scream at the loss of his integrity, but without really wanting to admit it to himself, it had been Judith’s caring and determination that had restored the possibility of vindication… however remote. “When everything is black and you see a flicker of light, you follow it — no matter how far and faint it is,” he had explained.
And that, Judith Winston thought, looking at her client, was a significant victory, and something she could be proud of, however this mess turned out.
She hesitated for a second, watching him from across the office through the glassed walls of the conference room as she organized her thoughts. Since the Long’s Peak incident and the visits to his hospital room, the contentious barriers between them had slowly dissolved. Even last week’s meeting at the same conference table — a grueling all-day affair to go over every minute detail of the case, the crash, and the critical aspects of the upcoming trial — had been devoid of the fulminating anger at the system that had marked their early meetings. He was still unable to laugh easily — to shed the appearance of a man quietly spooked and ready to run. But at times she had managed to elicit a few genuine smiles.
Judith moved easily into the room, quietly pleased that Marty’s gentlemanly upbringing brought him to his feet as she motioned him back down.
“I… dusted off an old suit,” he said, a bit self-consciously.
“Doesn’t look old to me!” she replied, taking a more detailed look. “Perfect. Quite professional and right for the courtroom.”
“I thought about wearing my airline uniform,” he added.
“So did I,” she said, tilting her head. “I’m still mulling over whether that could be interpreted as somehow arrogant or inflammatory. Or it might just focus the jury on the gravity of the situation. You know, you’re not just someone they call a pilot. Here sits a uniformed airline captain with all his experience and gravitas. And, after all, Regal has yet to fire you, therefore it’s not misrepresentation.”
“Regal would be apoplectic.”
“Fuck ‘em.”