Fade Out (10 page)

The President looked at Connors. ‘What do you say, Bob?'

Connors eyed Wedderkind and Fraser. Scientific curiosity apart, it didn't seem such a bad idea. As the old adage went, “What the eye doesn't see, the heart doesn't grieve for”. Connors sensed Wedderkind's silent scream of anguish and felt like Cassius. Not Muhammad ex-Clay – the other one, in the play by Shakespeare.

Marion Wilson came in with a typewritten message for the President. It was only a half sheet of blue paper, but it was big enough to get Connors off the hook.

The President scanned the message with a frown, then passed the paper to Connors. Some of it was good news and some of it was bad. The good news was they didn't have to fire off any missiles. The bad news was they couldn't – even if they wanted to.

‘Do you want me to read it out?' asked Connors.

The President nodded.

Connors exchanged a glance with Wedderkind. ‘This
information is issued jointly by the Air Force Communications Service, the Federal Aviation Authority and the Federal Communications Commission –' Connors saw Clayson lean forward expectantly. ‘For the last twelve minutes there has been a steadily increasing disruption of all radar surveillance, navigation and air traffic control systems, and high-frequency radio transmissions.'

Fraser and General Clayson shot up in their chairs as if they had a bullet in their backsides.

‘Not just us,' said the President. ‘The Russians too – everyone.'

Connors read on. ‘The breakdown is now complete, worldwide and continuing. Air Traffic Control Centers are diverting flights to the nearest airports. All civil airliners and private planes have been temporarily grounded. Military flights are continuing in areas of clear visibility.'

‘Give them the capper, Bob.' The President's voice was flat and unemotional, but Connors, who could read the signs, knew just how worried he really was.

Connors tried to sound casual too. ‘The same source of interference is already affecting TV transmissions and appears to be spreading through the commercial shortwave channels. Medium- and long-wave channels are at present unaffected.'

Fraser shot a loaded glance at Connors, then looked at Wedderkind. ‘What in hell is going on up there, Arnold?'

Everyone else was looking at Wedderkind too.

Wedderkind gave a shrug like a sick owl and retreated behind his heavy-framed spectacles.

At least we still have the telephone, thought Connors. He made up his mind to call Charly. To tell her not to worry. To say that everything was going to be all right, but that he wouldn't be going with her to the Schumans'
for dinner. Connors pushed the piece of paper towards the middle of the table. Nobody picked it up.

Highway 22 runs northwest from Miles City, in Custer County on the Yellowstone River, up through Cohagen to Jordan, in Garfield County. Between Miles City and Cohagen, the highway slices through the northeastern tip of Rosebud County. On the map, the land is coloured brown and the contour lines start at over two thousand feet and go up over three. On the ground, the overall colour is brown too.

North of Miles City, the land is known as ‘The Big Open'. Bare, rolling, high plains country with as few trees as there are people. For mile after mile on either side of the two-lane hog-backed highway, there is nothing but endless stretches of buffalo grass and sage. Cattle country, scarred here and there by poisonous salt pans, and the intertwined, weathered clusters of gumbo and sandstone buttes that make up the eastern Montana badlands. Every so often, the buffalo grass gives way to alternating strips of spring or winter wheat and ploughed earth that ripple outward from the highway towards the horizon like the waves on some vast inland sea. What trees there are – cottonwoods, dwarf cedar, and pine – shelter in the creeks and draws, or hug the slopes of the rising buttes that break the smooth line between land and sky.

Hard up against the northern edge of the Rosebud County line, some four miles after a winding dirt road leaves the highway, is a place called Broken Mill – a handful of houses and trailers huddled around a post office, gas station, and general store. Of the twenty-two people listed as living there in the 1960 census, only twelve now remained. Most of these were under fifteen
or over forty. Close to the gas station two graded roads, topped for part of the way with flakes of red scoria, run right and left off the highway in a straight line for as far as the eye can see. The only indication that there are people living beyond the emptiness are two hand-painted boards attached to the fences at the crossroad, bearing the names of the isolated ranchers and their distance in miles from the highway.

It was from Broken Mill, from Annie's Mercantile and General Store that Deputy Carl Volkert telephoned to the Rosebud County Sheriffs office in Forsyth details of what he thought was a plane crash. Normally, he would have used his car radio, but since early morning there had been some heavy fade-out on the normal police frequencies. It had been impossible to transmit or receive a coherent message. There was a lot of background noise on the phone line too. Volkert told his office that several of the people at Broken Mill claimed they had seen a bluish-white ball of fire cut through the overcast and curve down towards the southwest, going out of sight behind Crow Ridge. Volkert, who had been making a quick detour to visit his lady friend, had heard a long, distant rumble of thunder but had seen nothing from his car. Three kids were convinced they had seen a UFO. Volkert didn't take them too seriously.

The county sheriffs office told Volkert to take a look around Crow Ridge, then phoned the Air Force at Glasgow AFB, one hundred and thirty miles to the north. The base had been mothballed in the mid-seventies and was now host to a long line of cocooned B-52s but the tower was still operational. Air Traffic Control had no reports of any aircraft missing or in distress in Montana air space but agreed to arrange for a helicopter to check the area.

The county sheriffs office knew, of course, about the
temporary ban on civilian flying. What they didn't know was that ten-tenths cloud and heavy rain had socked in all the Air Force bases in the northern half of the United States. Blinded by the loss of radar navigation aids and the progressive disruption of radio transmissions, no military aircraft had left the ground. Apart from the birds, there was only one thing that could have been in the air over Montana that Friday morning, but nobody at Glasgow AFB, Broken Mill, or in the county sheriffs office in Forsyth had any idea what the people in the White House were expecting.

Volkert drove south on the highway and turned on to the ungraded dirt road that snaked up towards the top of Crow Ridge. The road had been cut by an oil company that had sniffed around the area at the tail end of World War Two and probably hadn't been used since.

Each spring, the rain and melting snow had softened the deep, scarring ruts in the fawn-coloured gumbo, but never enough. When the dry spells came, the ground hardened back into the weaving pattern cut by the last departing truck in those far-off days when Volkert had been glued anxiously to the family radio-set, wishing he was four years older so he could get himself some action and a few
fräuleins
before the shooting was all over.

The earlier, thunderous precipitation had turned the top half inch into mud. Volkert took a couple of the earlier turns too fast and almost slid off into the pines. He dropped his speed to about forty. He'd already taken several rocks against the underside of his car. One jolt had sounded as if his transmission box was coming through the floor. There was no point in piling it up this far from home…

As the edge of the rocky plateau came into sight, his car stalled. Volkert swore quickly to himself. He'd collected it that morning fresh out of Maintenance. He tried to restart the car. Nothing. The motor didn't even
turn over. He got out, opened the hood and checked all the electrical leads. There was nothing loose. The battery was full. He slammed the hood shut and peeked under the car to see if he'd fractured an oil or fuel line on a rock. No leaks, nothing broken. He got in behind the wheel again, checked the wires under the dash for a loose connection, then tried to restart the car. No response. Volkert hit the wheel with his palm and pulled out the radio mike. That at least was independently powered. With the fade-out he might have trouble getting through, but it was worth trying.

‘Car Four Seven to Rosebud One, over.'

The mike hissed a storm of static at him. The noise flared up and faded away several times. Volkert repeated his call sign, then suddenly the mike went dead. His radio batteries had failed too. He reached up and switched on the interior roof light. To Volkert's surprise it came on, then began to flare rhythmically. A few seconds later, the light went out. Volkert dropped the dead mike back on to the seat in disgust.

‘Goddamn crap heap…' He got out of the car and took a long look around him, hands on his hips.

It was a good seven miles back down the dirt road to the highway, and it wasn't all downhill, so he couldn't freewheel back. Overhead, the low clouds looked ready to open up with another heavy squall of rain. Shee-yit… Still, now that he was up here, he might as well take a look around. He remembered that there was a couple living in a shack down over on the northern flank of the Ridge. Man by the name of Bodell. A World War Two Marine vet, and a hard-eyed sonofabitch. Looked mean enough to hunt bear with a razor strap. Volkert had seen him a couple of times down in Broken Mill, and had heard some more about him from Annie. Drove a beat-up old ex-US Army Dodge 4 by 4. Maybe he could talk him into giving him a tow.

Volkert followed the dirt road up to the point where it ended among the trees. From there on up, the route was marked by a series of deep, crisscrossing ruts imprinted with the tread of heavy-duty Goodyears. Probably from Bodell's old Dodge, thought Volkert. If so, it meant they'd be able to get the truck back up over the top to where he'd left the car. He aimed off left towards the rocky crest. From there he would be able to scan both flanks of the ridge.

Volkert clambered up on to the highest part of the ridge and took a good look around. The visibility was down to two or three miles. On a clear day in Montana, you could see more than fifty. Down below him on the plateau, he could see a big crater at the edge of the tree line. Behind it was a semicircle of blasted trees. They looked as if they had been flattened by a giant fist.

There was no sign of any wreckage of a plane.

Maybe it just blew to pieces, thought Volkert. There had been some talk of an explosion. He was just about to climb down when he heard the helicopter. It was about level with him, just below the overcast and coming in at an angle from the north. The black blob resolved itself into an olive drab Air Force Bell Iroquois. Volkert waved his stetson at it.

The helicopter altered course and lifted in a curve around the ridge to the left of him. Volkert could see the midships crewman leaning out of the hatch. Volkert waved again and pointed down towards the crater as the Iroquois flew a tight circle overhead. Volkert started down off the ridge. The helicopter banked sharply and came in low over the top of the ridge, almost running him down.

Crazy bastards
…

The midships crewman gave him a thumbs-up sign. Volkert watched the helicopter float down across the
plateau. With a bit of luck, he could maybe hitch a ride back to Rosebud. It would sure beat the hell out of Bodel's Dodge.

As the thought entered Volkert's head, the helicopter suddenly stood on its tail, then fell out of the sky.

Volkert broke into a run.

Blades windmilling, the helicopter spiralled down and clipped the side of the crater. Just before it thudded down on to the rim, the midships crewman jumped clear and went rolling down the slope of the crater. By a bizarre twist of fate he chose the wrong side. A flailing rotor blade sliced his head off as he was scrambling to his feet, then the helicopter keeled over and steam-rollered his body into the loose earth.

Volkert covered the half mile down to the crater as fast as he could. The pilot was wandering around the helicopter, his face drained of colour. He seemed pretty shaken up. Volkert checked him over, but the only thing broken was his wristwatch.

The pilot waved dazedly towards the broken body of his crewman. ‘I can't find his head.'

‘Keep looking,' said Volkert. He patted him on the shoulder then turned to take a look at the copilot. He was lying with the top half of his body inside the upturned cockpit. Volkert squatted down beside him.

‘You okay?'

‘Yeah, fine. Was just trying to raise somebody over this goddamn thing.' The copilot waved towards the radio. ‘Was that you up on the ridge?'

‘Yeah. They sent me over to check out reports of a crash. Looks like you're it. Volkert. Rosebud County Sheriffs Office.'

‘Great. You got a radio?'

‘No. Mine's out too. The whole car cut out on me a quarter of a mile back. Down towards the highway.
There's a man back over that way with a truck. Reckon he's our best bet.' Volkert cast an anxious eye over the helicopter. ‘You sure you want to stay in there? I seen one of these things come down once. Fractured a gas tank – went up like the Fourth of July.'

‘Yeah, that can happen,' said the copilot. He threw down the useless mike. ‘Does this guy have a telephone?'

‘No. But if he's home, we can maybe hitch a ride down to Broken Mill. We can phone from there. Okay?'

‘Sure. Let's go.' The copilot wriggled out of the upturned cockpit.

The pilot, who still hadn't found the midships crewman's head, had to be dragged by the arms all the way to Bodell's house.

Three hours later, after the pilots had got back to the air base north of Glasgow, they felt a burning, prickling sensation on their hands and faces. The exposed areas of skin turned bright red, began to swell painfully, then started to erupt. The medical section diagnosed it as a massive dose of ultraviolet radiation and ordered immediate hospitalization.