Soul Thief (Blue Light Series) (25 page)

At
quarter past nine Doug was settling into seat 22A of Delta Flight 942 with a scheduled stop in Boston, continuing on to Portland. Doug leaned back, closed his eyes and tried not to think about Annie. But it wasn’t possible. She was all he could think about. His heart ached with her absence.

He opened his eyes and watched his fellow passengers board: a tall dark man with a briefcase; a big blond woman in Bermuda shorts verbally abusing a short bald man wearing a flowery
Hawaiian shirt; two children escorted by a flight attendant; a young, pretty brunette in a beige skirt and white blouse who smiled at him before settling into the seat directly across the aisle.

Two men in uniform came on board and ducked into the forward cabin. Doug identified them as crew. He checked his watch. It was
nine twenty-eight. Only two minutes to go before the door would be sealed shut. Then takeoff. Then . . . what? Was he doing the right thing?

He suddenly began to perspire. He had never experienced such agonizing indecision. He looked at his watch again. It was twenty-nine after the hour.

A fat businessman smelling strongly of sweat brushed past him and plunked himself—all out of breath—down in the seat nearest the window. Doug looked over at the man with disdain.

The cabin attendants were busy slamming overhead compartments, and the noise suddenly seemed heightened, distorted somehow, threatening to drive him mad. The door to the outside was closed with a dull thud that caused the sensation of pressure in his ears. Doug wondered again what
the hell he was doing, leaving Annie here. Nothing felt right. His whole life seemed suddenly wrong.

Doug’s body convulsed as a brilliant flash of white light exploded behind his eyes, and the
Collector was suddenly there inside his head.

Go away,
Doug said.
I don’t want you in my head.

But you must see what I
need to show you.

I don’t want anything from you. You’re a m
onster. You murder people. You steal children.

You misunderstand me, Doug. I only want what’s best for you. I allow you to see things others cannot.

I don’t want to see your atrocities!

For your own good you must see this.
And you must leave this aircraft at once.

Doug’s head nearly burst with sudden and intense pain. In the vision he was inside the plane’s cockpit. There was a shimmering bubble of terrible energy building inside the cockpit, or inside Doug’s head. He wasn’t sure which, and it didn’t matter. What did matter was what he suddenly knew, what the
Collector wanted him to see. Both crew members were simultaneously struggling to bring an out-of-control aircraft back under their control, to no avail. The captain was barking into his headset microphone as sweat poured down his face, and although the communication was eerily silent, Doug knew what he was saying: Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! Through the windshield the ground was approaching with insane speed. The vision ended in a blur of dazzling white light and a final burst of intense pain.

Doug came awake with a strong jolt, feeling wetness on his upper lip and tasting blood in his mouth.

“Are you all right?” someone asked. It was the young woman across the aisle from him. Doug could not reply. He closed his eyes and groaned, nearly puking. His head thrummed vividly.

You must leave this aircraft at once
.

“Hey, mister, what’s the matter?” A kid had turned around in his seat and was staring down at Doug. “You were talking loud and screaming and you’ve got a bloody nose.”

“Shush,” the child’s mother said, pulling the kid back into his seat. “You leave that man alone.”

“He’s right,” the young woman across the aisle said. “You were talking in your sleep, and you do have a bloody nose. Here.” She handed him a Kleenex. Doug wiped his nose on it.

“It was a dream,” Doug said. “I have bad dreams all the time.”

The woman frowned. “Listen, you sure you’re all right?”

Oh, Christ,
Doug thought, suddenly remembering the dream.
This plane is in trouble. I can’t let it leave the ground.

He left his seat and moved swiftly down the aisle. The flight attendants were immediately on guard. They’d heard the commotion coming from seat 22A and were watchful. When the guy with wild eyes and blood on his chin bolted for the flight deck they were ready for him. A male and a female approached from forward and a muscular-looking ma
n closed in from behind. They intercepted him halfway down the aisle.

“Sir,” one of the men said politely. “You must take your seat.”

Doug’s hands were pressed to the sides of his head. Slowly he removed them. “No,” he said. “Please? You can’t let this plane take off.”

“Sir, the plane is preparing to move out onto the taxiway.”

“Then you’d better stop it.”

“You’re bleeding from the nose, sir,” another attendant, this one a tall, thin young woman, said. “Here.”
She handed him a wad of tissues. “Wipe it off and please take your seat.”

Doug shook his head in utter disbelief. “You can’t let this plane take off,” he said again.

“And why is that?” asked the muscular man who was inching his way closer to Doug from behind. He opened his coat, showing Doug a sidearm. He produced a badge. “I’m an air marshal, sir, and my advice to you is return to your seat.”

Doug hesitated. Was he really going to stand here and tell these people who were eyeing him warily—eyeing him as if he might be a lunatic, or worse, a terrorist—that he’d seen a vision of some terrible catastrophe? The plane was going to crash because he was on it, damn it. If he left the plane perhaps it wouldn’t happen. But that wasn’t necessarily so, he knew from experience. Could he take that chance with all of these innocent lives on board? His mind was spinning with contingencies and he knew that he had only a split second to make his decision before it would be too late. What should he do? Jesus, what should he do? The headache was receding now in cold, radiating waves.

“I’ve changed my mind,” he said, hoping he wasn’t making a terrible error.

“Changed your mind about what?” asked the confused-looking air marshal.

“I’ve changed my mind about this plane leaving the ground. It’s okay. I’ll go back to my seat. Sorry if I caused a disturbance.” A slight jolt and the feeling of motion told him that the plane had started to taxi. His heart rate accelerated. All three attendants were staring confusedly at him now, and some of the passengers were glaring at him in alarm.

“I don’t think you should let this plane leave the ground,” one of the passengers said; she was an older woman with a curled nimbus of blue hair and she looked terrified. “I heard what he was saying. He was talking about murder.
What if there’s a bomb on board?”

“A bomb
?” another passenger screamed which elicited more shouts from passengers.

“I don’t like the look in that man’s eyes
,” someone else said.

Doug exhaled his pent-up breath in relief.

Several of the passengers had taken off their seatbelts and were now standing, staring at Doug and the attendants. The attendant closest to the flight deck, the young woman who’d handed Doug the tissues, wore a worried frown. She turned and knocked on the cockpit door. It opened and she went inside. The plane abruptly halted and presently the captain appeared in the doorway. He had the manifest in his hand.

“Everyone just sit down and stay calm,” he said. He motioned for the attendants to let Doug pass. In the distance, even above the sound of the idling engines, Doug heard sirens. The authorities had been alerted. Doug felt a strange mix of dread and relief.

Again the pilot glanced at the manifest. “Now,” he said in a mildly condescending voice. “Mr. McArthur, is it? What seems to be the problem?”

“May I talk to you in private?” Doug said. He could see that the plane’s door was in the process of being opened and he pretty much figured there’d be a small army of trigger-happy federal agents on the other side itching to take someone down.

“And what is it that you wish to talk about?” asked the condescending pilot. 

Doug leaned forward and whispered, “Not here. I don’t want to alarm the passengers.”

The pilot frowned. “Mr. McArthur, you have caused a disturbance. I’m quite sure that you will be removed from this aircraft and taken for questioning.”

“Then what?” Doug said.

“Then what?” the captain repeated, obviously stymied.

“The plane,” Doug said. “Will it be grounded?”

The captain raised an eyebrow. “Should it be grounded, Mr. McArthur?”

Doug knew he was digging a hole for himself that he might never be able to crawl out of, but there was no way he could allow this plane to leave the ground after what he’d seen. “Sometimes I sense things,” he said in a voice low enough that he hoped the passengers
couldn’t hear.

The captain smiled tentatively. “Sense things?” he echoed.

The door opened with a whoosh of compressed air and two security types in plain clothes stepped inside. “Yes,” Doug said. “Sometimes I sense things. Bad things. And I sense bad things about this flight.”

The security guys had made their way up the aisle and were now standing behind the captain. The air marshal continued to hold his position behind Doug. “Is this the man?” one of the new guys asked.

“Yes,” the pilot said, stepping aside. “He claims he . . . senses things.” The pilot was totally incapable of concealing the condescension in his voice.

The two plainclothesmen stepped up to Doug and each took hold of one of his arms. “Now we’re going to escort you off the plane, sir. Please don’t resist or make a scene.”

“I don’t intend to make a scene,” Doug said. “I just don’t think it’s wise for this plane to take off.”

“And why is that?” the security guy said. “Because you . . . sense things?” They were moving down the aisle now toward the exit. Doug was hardly walking of his own accord. The security guys were practically dragging him. “We’ve dealt with these kinds of threats before and you know what usually happens?”

“This isn’t a threat.”

“No? Then what is it?”

“A warning.”

“Same difference,” one of the security guys said.

“And you’re going to take the chance that I’m wrong?” Doug said.

“Yes, unless you give us a good and concrete reason why this plane shouldn’t take off. Something a little less vague than . . . you sense things.”

Jesus Christ,
Doug thought.
They’re just going to ignore me and let this plane go.
He tried to put himself in their place and wondered what he’d do. Some nut case claims he senses something bad about the flight, nothing concrete, and they’re just supposed to believe him and stop the plane from taking off?  Obviously if he told the truth they’d strap a white canvas jacket around him and drag him off to the funny farm.  He supposed he’d react in pretty much the same way.

They escorted him down the stairs to a waiting car. He was cuffed and patted down. The security guys removed his wallet along with the scrap of cloth that contained the artifact. “Be careful with that.” Doug wished now that he’d put it around his neck.

“What is it?” the security guy asked. He had unwrapped it and was staring blankly.

“A necklace,” Doug said.

“Stupid looking necklace if you ask me.”

“I didn’t.”

“Like something a kid would wear.”

“It’s personal.”

“Yeah, well, we’ll see what the chief has to say about it.”

They put him in the back seat and drove the car to an area of the airport that said Security above the door. The two
guys took him inside where they were met by an older heavy-set man who breathed asthmatically through his nose. He had bushy gray eyebrows and a florid face. Even though the air conditioning was cranked, the man’s shirt was stuck to his thick trunk with sweat. He was already dead from a heart attack. He just didn’t know it yet.

The
security flunkies—one on each side of him—sat Doug down in a chair facing the heart attack guy and then stationed themselves on either side of him like wooden soldiers. “So this is the clown?” Heart Attack said.

“Yeah.”
The first guy handed his boss Doug’s personal effects, taking his time going through Doug’s wallet.

He laid the wallet aside and opened the folded piece of soft fabric. “What’s this?” he asked, picking the object up by its chain. He was squinting at it.

“A necklace.”

“Looks old.”

“It is. Also personal.”

Heart attack glared at him and laid the object on his desk
, ran his hand over it as if he was trying to decipher something from it. “So, what’s your story?”

“Says he gets these . . . feelings,” answered one of the security guys.

“That so?” Heart Attack said, looking totally unimpressed. “How often do you get these . . . feelings?”