by Andrew Mayne
Using the razor, I shear myself over the toilet and flush my curls. The bathroom is empty for the moment, so I sneak out of the stall and have a peek in the mirror and fix a few patches.
Satisfied that I am indeed bald, I go back into my little office and use the spray tan in very light touches, checking in the mirror as I go along, making sure that I don't give myself some kind of skin disease.
The instructions say to wait for the tan to set, so I have a seat on the toilet and check my phone – I've decided the stolen one is mine now.
Somehow I manage to fumble through the settings and change the language to English.
I open up Twitter and check @CapricornZero again for any updates.
Nothing.
Fantastic.
Meanwhile, the Brazilian news is covering my landing on the front page. There's no mention of the stadium fiasco, but that was just fifteen minutes ago.
There were too many people there who weren't part of the hit squad. Sooner or later somebody is going to make a connection.
Meanwhile, THERE'S A FUCKING RUSSIAN KILL SQUAD AFTER ME.
This is the first moment I have to take a breath and let everything sink in.
Jesus. Christ.
The smart thing would be to find my way to an American embassy.
Yes...but if I were the Russians, I'd be staking that out, waiting for me to do that.
I could call them...
But @CapricornZero said that a highly-placed mole would rendition me.
What if he's lying? Maybe he's some Chinese spy trying to play the two sides against each other?
This is all very confusing.
I create a Twitter account of my own so I can follow him and send a direct message without using my own Twitter – which I'm sure newsrooms around the world are watching to see if something happens.
There's a thought...
I could post something and explain it's all a big misunderstanding.
Right, David, you'll clear this up in 140 characters. Meanwhile, you'll let the whole world know that you're alive and in Brazil.
But if I just give up the square then the problem is no longer mine.
It's tempting.
It's so god damn tempting.
Right now I'm running on the advice of an anonymous voice and Bennet's last words to me.
The choice is simple, David.
If you trust Bennet, then you keep moving.
If you don't, then you call iCosmos or the embassy and tell them you don't want to play this game anymore.
I think about it real hard.
Bennet saved my life once in a training exercise.
Would he have risked his life, Peterson's or my own if it wasn't worth it?
I have to act on faith right now. There's also the nagging suspicion that turning myself in won't be as easy as I think.
It's decided, my primary goal is to secretly get the hell out of this country before it kills me.
No passport.
No money.
Finally, this is one problem I might actually be able to solve.
28
THE FRAT
I SPOT my prey from across the street as they get out of a van laughing at some inside joke. Dressed in navy blue suits with their jackets over their arms or tucked into their small suitcases, they enter the Hotel Solara as a pack.
It's a nice place, not too touristy. It's more of an executive hotel close enough to all the good bars and restaurants. It's exactly the kind of location where I knew I would find them: An international airline flight crew.
I know their ways. I know their language.
Sometimes the pilots mingle with the flight attendants, sometimes they don't. This looks like a mixed group, which is good for me.
Infiltrating them is tricky. If you just go straight at them, they'll assume you're trying to screw the hot redhead the co-pilot has a thing for. You'll run into the alpha male, almost always the pilot, and get shut down right away.
Worst is when the most senior flight attendant, a woman who stopped getting passes before this century, decides to cock block you out of jealousy. She'll make you a pariah and signal to the group that you're some desperate loner that shouldn't be approached. Even if the redhead liked you, she doesn't want to risk fifteen hours trapped with a woman implying every way possible that she's a slut.
This takes a delicate approach. I learned this when I was an eager college student desperate to fly in the jump seat or get free travel to other parts of the world.
I learned the master approach to these tribes and how to become one of them.
It doesn't work every time, because they don't always have what you need, but when they do, it's golden. You're in.
While the alpha male and the alpha female of the pack protect them from outsiders, there's one person whose job is to bring novelty and excitement to the group: Their social secretary. The gay male flight attendant. If he's black, it's even better.
Yes, it's a cliche, but if you grow up black and gay in white circles you have to learn real quickly how to defuse prejudices and read the room.
He's the tallest one of the group. Early thirties. As he walks through the doors with the others, he exchanges a big laugh with the silver-haired captain.
This is good. Real good. It's a team that likes to fly together. One happy family. If one of them is cool with you, they will all be.
Their plan is going to be to go up to their rooms, get changed, then meet back in the hotel bar in a half hour where they're going to decide where to go to dinner. If it was earlier in the day, there would have been a high chance that they would splinter off into different groups – the flight attendants going shopping and the pilots to the beach to read.
This late, they all just want to get a drink, get something to eat, and for a couple of them, possibly get laid.
I just want a ride back to America.
I make my way to the hotel bar, check my appearance in the mirror and make sure that my tan hasn't sweated onto my collar.
I order a Diet Coke because it looks like it might be a hard drink and rehearse my story in my head. The bartender seems pretty disinterested in me as he goes about doing a bottle count.
There's a television in the corner that's playing some talk show with the volume muted all the way down. Thankfully it's not the news.
I take a sip of my drink and watch as the co-pilot – the one with less silver hair – comes into the lounge and takes a seat and checks his phone. Two flight attendants come down a few minutes later, managing to change into suitable evening wear in less time than it takes me to get a tie on straight. These ladies are world travelers.
After the pilot takes his seat, the social secretary enters the room with a bombastic laugh, wondering aloud why he's always the last one down.
The pilot comments that it takes him so long to get his hair just right – which everyone laughs at because he's bald.
I'm hoping the social secretary will take everyone's drink orders and come to the bar where he'll make a sidelong glance at me and strike a conversation.
Instead, it's the pilot. He walks up, gives me a quick nod, places his order then returns to the group.
Damn it.
Now I'm going to have to try a different approach. I can still make this work.
I just need to think of a...
"Hey look!" says the social secretary, "It's that crazy asshole that hijacked the space station!"
Shoot me now.
29
SELFIE
MY HEART STOPS and I feel all my blood drain from my body. One moment I'm in a bar figuring out how I'm going to use my douchey pick-up artist techniques to infiltrate a group of people – taking me back to my college days – the next, I'm punched in the face by reality as I realize I'm not playing some kind of game.
I gain control of my limbs and step away from the bar, pretending I didn't just get called out. After all, that's what a guy that was Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon would
do.
If I run, I look suspicious. If I act casual, it's no big deal.
Out of the corner of my vision I realize they're not looking at me; they're watching the television. The talk show cut over to a news report showing aerial footage of the Unicorn in a clearing in a jungle. The orange parachute is dangling over some trees and the open hatch is facing outwards, towards the camera.
One of the flight attendants, a petite dark-haired woman, is translating the news to her friends.
"They think he may be in the jungle or could have drowned when it first landed. The police got reports that he jumped out over Guanabara Bay."
Well, thanks for unreliable witnesses.
She continues, "But there have been reports that there was a shooting at a football stadium and that he was sighted there."
"He's like the white chupacabra," says the social secretary. Then he looks up and sees me watching them watching the television. "There he is!"
FUUUUUCK.
All eyes turn on me. I'm about to drain other bodily fluids since my blood has already departed.
I manage a weak smile and hold my hands up like chupacabra claws, because that's what Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon would do.
Haha! We're all having fun because that would be absurd!
The group bursts into laughter. I laugh with them like a carefree guy who wasn't almost murdered by a Russian kill team an hour ago.
I let out a sigh then head for the exit, making plans to run for it as soon as nobody is watching.
"You're not going anywhere!" says the social secretary as he bounces up from his chair to intercept me.
I want to run, but that would be bad. I could say that I have an important meeting to get to, but then the conversation I leave behind me will be all about how weird it was that I left as soon as the crazy astronaut was on TV – and didn't that guy look a lot like him?
I have to do the opposite of what people would expect a fugitive to do. I turn around and smile.
The social secretary grabs me by the arm and leads me back to the group. "What's your name?" he asks.
"George," I reply. It's part of my prepared alibi. I had a friend in college, now a pilot doing charters, named George Williams. My assumed identity would be his real one. I know enough about him to pass myself off as George. Also, he's from Toronto, so I can say that I'm Canadian, making me Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon.
"I'm Shawn," he replies, then puts a hand on my shoulder and presents me to the group. "Doesn't that astronaut look like George's whiter, less bald brother?"
This gets a few nods of agreement.
"I think you're better looking," says the older flight attendant.
I make a sheepish grin, trying to be Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon.
The co-pilot shakes his head. "I don't see it."
Thank you, sir. I hope I never have to rely on your acute vision in the cockpit.
"What do you do?" asks the captain.
A minute ago I was going to tell the group that I was a pilot, just like him. Now that David Dixon, fugitive astronaut, is the topic de jour, that seems like the dumbest idea in the world.
"I'm a pilot," says my mouth, deciding to wing it on its own without conversing with my brain on the matter.
"You wouldn't happen to have parked your ride in a jungle, by chance?" asks the co-pilot.
Play it cool, Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon. I jerk a thumb towards the television. "Isn't that crazy?"
"We were diverted for an hour because the bay was the landing zone," says the captain. "Almost had to land in São Paulo."
I'm too terrified to reply. All I can do is grin, which is apparently all Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon can do to keep up his end of a conversation.
Thankfully, Shawn interrupts us, saving me for the moment. Unfortunately, the next words out of his mouth make me feel nauseous.
"Let's all take a selfie with our celebrity friend!"
Oh, lord. I'm seconds away from having a half-dozen people tag and upload my photo to the Internet with a location stamped right on it.
Shawn is directing people before I can even protest.
"Captain Beransky, you over there. Whitcomb, you there. Adele, I'm not even letting you get close to him, you dirty cougar. Serena, I saw you watching him; you stand next to him. Connie, over here, next to me."
Faster than a Russian kill team can draw a bead on me, I'm surrounded by the flight crew and in the dead center of a selfie shot as Shawn sticks his long arm out to capture the moment.
I stare at my face on the phone screen as the camera clicks and half panic, half feel a measure of relief. Yeah, it's me. But I kind of sort of don't look exactly like me.
To be honest, it's a crappy picture and would not go on my dating profile; while the one provided to the news from my iCosmos page was shot by a fashion photographer and makes me out to be much more handsome than I am.
I fake the cheesiest, shit-eating grin I can manage because that's what Totally-Not-Fugitive-Astronaut-David-Dixon would do.
These people aren't idiots. I need to get away from them as conveniently as I can without attracting attention, because sooner or later one of them is going to wise up.
30
PARTY ANIMAL
I'M DRAGGED by the group into a taxi van and taken to a restaurant bar called the "Angry Turtle." I keep waiting for a convenient moment to slip away, but I can't find one or think of something to say that doesn't sound forced.
We take a group of high tops in the corner of the balcony that overlooks the street. The place has a seaside shanty look to it with surfboards on the walls.
I situate myself so I can see who comes in, but staying out of sight as much as I can. I also take note of all the entrances. To my left is a fire exit that leads to a set of stairs and the alley.
I'm ready to bolt through that door the moment the policia arrive. If they cover that exit, I can go up to the next level and get on the roof.
On Google Maps the buildings don't look too spaced apart. Not that I want to have to actually try to run across roof tops. I'm not even sure if that's a thing outside of Jason Bourne movies.
"Drink up!" says Shawn as he slams two handfuls of shot glasses on the table.
FAA rules are 8 hours from bottle to throttle, but I notice Captain Beransky abstains. Everyone else puts a glass to their lips and prepares to drink.
I leave mine on the table. Shawn is having none of this and puts it in my hand. "Are you flying?"
While I haven't had much opportunity to tell them my made up tale of woe since I got pulled into this hurricane, now's my chance.
"I'm hoping to get a jump seat back to the US," I reply. "Maybe cockpit."
"Are you stranded?" asks Whitcomb.
The way he asks that makes me feel extremely nervous. It's exactly what I am.
"I flew down to fly as a relief charter for some crazy Saudi prince. More money than common sense. Turns out he pissed off his uncle or something and had to turn around. That was my ride back to the States."
"Can't your charter company do something about that?"
Great question. And I have an answer. "They're supposed to. They say relax for the next three days. They're some new plane-sharing start up. Really disorganized."
"What are they called?"
Christ, this guy missed his calling and should have been in the Gestapo.
"Blue Air." It's a real thing, a small stealth startup you can look it up.
He nods. "I think I know somebody who flies for them."
For crying out loud.
"You know Carl O'Brien?"
This could be a trap. "I don't think so. I'm new with them. A friend just recommended them to me."
"Who?"
I almost say, "George Williams." Wouldn't that be hilarious. "Jeff Roberts."
If Whitcomb calls me out on that, I'm prepared to say that Roberts doesn't actually work for them, he just recommended them to
me. And if that doesn't fly, I'll throw my drink in his face and run away.
I totally understand how cops work now. They just keep asking you questions, getting you deeper and deeper into your story and watching how long it takes for you to make something up.
That's why you should just ask for a lawyer up front. Unfortunately, that won't work too well in this situation.
Shawn slams his hand on the table. "Will you two bitches shut the hell up? We got some ladies that need to dance and I'm not going to let some gajo locals sweep them away. All the gajos are for this boy."
Adele, the cougar, grabs my hand and pulls me onto the small dance floor. She puts my hands on her hips and starts to sway.
I do my best to play along and keep my back to the door. The only other dancers are Shawn and Serena and a very awkward Whitcomb and Connie.
Captain Beransky sits at the table and watches us like we're his children.
"You're very quiet," says Adele over the sound of the Brazilian pop music.
I try to think of something to say, but she finishes the conversation.
"That's a good quality. Most pilots can't shut up."
Lady, you should see me when I'm not on the run from super powers and not dodging bullets. I'm a veritable motor mouth.
"I prefer to listen," I reply.
She does a twirl. "Oh my. That is a rare quality."
Shawn steps over with Serena and gives us a fierce look. "Time is up, cat lady. Let's let these two play."
Serena, the very attractive Portuguese speaker, is dropped into my hands. She was paying a lot more attention to the news than the others. I'm terrified of what's going through her mind.
Likewise with Whitcomb. I see him pointing to me and whispering to Connie. They peel away from the dance floor, leaving just the four of us.
Thankfully Adele and Shawn are great dancers and are attracting all the attention. I just give Serena a sheepish grin.
She leans in to whisper something to me. I get a whiff of her fragrance and I kind of forget all my problems for a moment.
