Dirt Bikes, Drones, and Other Ways to Fly

by Conrad Wesselhoeft

  The fly buzzes into the web.

  The fawn wanders under the branch.

  You start to see the unseen.

  That’s what happens during my next two chopper trips to White Sands. I map “human movement” in and around Compounds 52 and 117, tracking every insurgent soldier and even following the couriers as they beat a path by dirt bike along the steep mountain trails between the compounds.

  I zoom close enough to see the brand on one courier’s bike—Yamaha. Small world.

  I map and track until my pores, if not my eyes, tell me he’s there.

  At least, somebody’s there.

  I can see his presence in little ways. How it quickens the soldiers’ steps. Straightens their backs.

  Some days this happens in Compound 52, some days in Compound 117.

  On my second trip, flying over Compound 52, someone darts out of a bunker. I turn my belly-mount camera.

  See a man in baggy pants, vest, and porkpie hat rush toward a sandbag wall.

  Zoom in and see . . . not a man, a boy. Maybe eight or nine years old.

  He peers over the wall—at that deep drop into the valley. I’m there with him—zoomed right up behind him. See him bend down and pick up a rock, pitch it over. He leans out to watch the rock plunge into the valley. For a moment, I feel that fall with him.

  He’s just about to turn and show me his face when a soldier grabs him and hustles him back into the bunker.

  This all takes about fifteen seconds. Major Anderson opens the mike.

  “Arlo?”

  “Got it,” I say.

  “How much?”

  “All of it.”

  When I log off after nearly five hours in the air, Major Anderson comes out from behind the glass wall. He’s beaming.

  “You sure earned this tonight,” he says, handing me an envelope. “Go home. Rest up. See you next time.”

  I want to ask if that was Caracal’s son, but I never caught his face. Never got that angle. So I’ll never know.

  Mullins joins me for the helicopter ride back to Orphan County. All that rotor-chop should make sleep impossible, but it lulls me like a baby. I sleep most of the way back, waking as the sun rises on the mesa breaks and torn shadows of northeast New Mexico, my home. A land so empty and aching that all I can do is stare in awe.

  We skim low over Burro Mesa, right over the herd. A few cows cut and run. Then the grassy tableland slices off, and I’m staring down at that sheer drop to the dusty floor of Colorado.

  That’s when it hits me.

  An idea so stupid it’s brilliant.

  A stunt so impossible it might even be easy.

  Must be because I’ve just woken up in a helicopter at sunrise and opened my eyes on this patchwork of dazzling light and dusky shadow. Or maybe because my mother’s ashes lie scattered below on the mesa. Or maybe because I’m still half dreaming.

  But I can see it all.

  And feel it.

  My gut soars.

  I shudder and shove the thought out of my mind.

  We land five minutes later behind the Shell station. I fist-bump Mullins and the pilot and slide out of the chopper. Then they’re off again. Quick as that. No snacks from the store. No piss break. Just up and gone.

  Dad’s waiting in the pickup. I get in, and he pours me a cup of coffee from his thermos. I hand him my paycheck. We watch the chopper get small.

  “Arlo, you look like the cat spit you up. I better take you home to bed.”

  “Nah,” I say as the caffeine kicks in. “Already slept. Just take me to school.”

  Chapter 40

  “CLASS, WHO CAN DEFINE OVERSOUL?”

  Mr. Martinez flips his necktie over his shoulder and scans the room. His glasses glint. “Arlo, please tell us what Ralph Waldo Emerson meant by oversoul?”

  Damn! Dad was right—I should have gone home to bed. All that chopper adrenaline and caffeine has drained out of me. I can barely keep my eyes open.

  Oversoul . . . oversoul . . .

  From some smoky place, I cough up:

  “Uh . . . it means . . . don’t conform. ’Cuz when you don’t conform and stay an individual, society as a whole benefits.”

  “Wrong essay,” Mr. Martinez says. “That’s Emerson’s thinking on self-reliance, which we discussed last week.” His eyes worry over me. Then he raises his voice. “Anybody?”

  Everybody slouches and sucks in.

  “You blocks, you stones,” Mr. Martinez says, and thrusts his pointer at Lee. “Please enlighten your classmates, Miss Fields.”

  Lee doesn’t talk much these days. Probably because it’s embarrassing to always know the answer. Plus, being the shiniest spoon in the drawer doesn’t sit well with everybody.

  She hooks corn-silk hair behind her ear. “Um . . . Ralph Waldo Emerson believed . . . basically . . . that our individual souls are connected . . . and that . . . basically . . . they form a single soul, which he called the oversoul.”

  “Yes,” Mr. Martinez says. “Now can you parse it down so that the livestock in the barn understand?”

  “Um . . . it’s like rivers,” Lee says. “Each of us is a river. Like maybe I’m the Cimarron and Lobo’s the Rio Loco and Arlo’s the Rio Grande. We start out separately, but then we flow into the Gulf of Mexico and are no longer individuals. We’re part of something bigger. That’s like the oversoul.”

  Mr. Martinez thrusts his pointer at her again.

  “And should we believe in this oversoul?”

  “It’s up to each of us, as individuals,” Lee says. “But most people want some kind of proof.”

  “Ah, proof! There’s the rub,” Mr. Martinez says.

  He taps his pointer against a sun-faded quote on the north wall. Without looking, he recites:

  “‘We see the world piece by piece, as the sun, the moon, the animal, the tree; but the whole, of which these are shining parts, is the soul.’ Ralph Waldo Emerson.”

  He wanders over to my desk, leans down, and whispers, “You okay, son?”

  “Yeah,” I whisper back.

  “You don’t seem your usual upbeat self these days.”

  “Just tired is all.”

  He reaches into his pocket, shows me his phone. “Remember, if you ever need to talk . . .”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  He raises his voice. “Lee, close the circle for us. Can we apply the idea of an ‘oversoul’ to our daily lives? Or is all this just a useless academic rant passed down from one jaded English teacher to the next?”

  “Useless academic rant,” Vonz mumbles.

  But Lee thinks about it. Finally, she says, “This morning on the news, I heard a report about another attack on the North-West Frontier. Something like a dozen Americans got killed. One was from here in Orphan County.”

  Mr. Martinez sets his face. “Carlos Johnson. He was a student of mine. Graduated three years ago. I know his family well.”

  Sharon Blossburg flaps a hand. “My cousin used to date him.”

  “I’ve been thinking about him all morning,” Lee says. “All I can think is, he won’t ever be able to do anything again. Not date anybody. Not dive into a swimming pool. Not smell ponderosa pine. Nothing.”

  Michelle Pappas snorts. “Girl, he’s dead! Get over it. It’s not like you knew him.”

  “Go on, Lee,” Mr. Martinez says.

  “Well, maybe,” Lee says, “we should think of the oversoul as a strategy for living. I mean, we can choose to live connected—in our minds, bodies, and spirits—or not. The point is, we can, and Carlos Johnson can’t. But I’m sure he’d give the world to be able to again. Not just breathe—but live—live to the fullest, in all his senses, connected in every way. Like the rivers are connected to the Gulf. If he were here right now, in this room, he’d say—”

  “‘Wake up, zombies!’” Lobo blurts.

  Most of the class cracks up. But Lee looks serious. “Lobo’s exactly right,” she says. “He’d say, ‘Wake up, zombies!’”

  Mr.
Martinez strolls to the front of the room. “Who here agrees with Lee?”

  My hand shoots up, because everything she’s said ties in with how I see it. The oversoul—that’s just the Drone Zone.

  A few other hands crawl into the air.

  Mr. Martinez whacks his pointer on his desk.

  “Everybody up there,” he says, twirling the pointer to encompass all four walls, “from Harriet Tubman to Albert Einstein to John Lennon to Anonymous—tells us the same thing: Waste not the days, hours, or minutes. Dream big. Dream beautiful. Live—LIVE! For we know not when . . . we know not when. Give all!”

  He beams at Lee.

  “Young lady, that was one helluva speech!”

  Chapter 41

  THE EFFECTS OF MY BIKE stunt at Rio Loco linger worst in my chest, left shoulder, and left arm. But I’m getting better. I’ve gone from being barely able to lift my arm to being able to lift it, creak by creak, all the way up, and around.

  It’s a slow windmill. But a windmill’s a windmill.

  To reward myself, I throw away my sling and flush the Oxy blues down the toilet. For a day or two, pain floods back. Then it ebbs, slowly.

  Over three weeks, I make five chopper trips to White Sands. Then I’m back on the Ducati, making the Monster roar. I’m not exactly a new man, but close enough.

  One night, Major Anderson takes me to the back of the Skunkworks and shows me scale models of Compounds 52 and 117.

  “We built these from your images, Arlo.”

  The desk-sized replicas are painted in the earth tones of the Swat and super detailed, with sandbag walls, gun emplacements, trees, crags, and sharp plummets.

  “Extremely cool!” I say.

  “Predictive analytics,” Major Anderson says, “is the science of anticipating human activity based on routine patterns of behavior over an extended period of time.”

  He explains how he feeds all the data I give him—my video and still images—as well as other factors that he’s constantly collecting—like weather, temperature, day of week—into a software utility that shows how people inside the compounds are likely to move around. Hour by hour. Minute by minute.

  Just ask the utility to show you where anybody in the compound will be at any time of day or night, and it will. At least, it will predict it.

  This is the “human map.”

  Chapter 42

  “ARLO, WE NEED TO TALK.”

  It’s five days later, and I’m back at White Sands again. Thursday night has bled into Friday morning. On the other side of the world, Friday morning has bled into Friday night.

  Major Anderson’s words could mean anything. But I have a good idea. I shudder.

  We go through the glass door into the control room. Colonel Kincaid is here, sitting in the light of a thousand LED diodes, which illuminate the room to the brightness of a dim alley. His eye bags look pouchier than usual. He gestures for me to sit.

  “Arlo, tonight we reached a milestone,” Colonel Kincaid says. “We completed the surveillance phase of Brave Panther. We now have all our pieces in place. We can finish drawing the map.”

  “Hey, congratulations,” I say, though I’m not feeling it.

  “We took a risk bringing you on,” Colonel Kincaid says. “We knew you could fly—you have all the instincts and reflexes of an elite pilot. What we didn’t know was how well we would work together. So far, so good, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah—yes, sir,” I say.

  “We got this far, this fast because of you, Arlo. You caught all the images we needed. And you got one we never expected—the boy. That was fourteen carat. And you did it all with stealth. Not bad for a beginner.”

  “Hey, I’m not exactly a beginner,” I say. “Not if you count the game.”

  “We don’t count the game,” Colonel Kincaid says. “You fly a real drone in real time. Never forget that.”

  “Sorry,” I say.

  Colonel Kincaid pinches some lint off his chinos, flicks it away.

  “Arlo, it’s time to begin the next phase of Brave Panther. If you’ve read my memos, you know what I’m talking about.”

  I look down at my boots.

  “A single sting,” Colonel Kincaid goes on. “Launched from one of our attackers. The kind you love to fly.”

  He waits for me to agree. I say nothing.

  “Let me tell you about this man Caracal,” he says. “He’s not really interested in the day-to-day drudgery of killing GIs in the Swat Valley. That’s just how he butters his toast. Caracal’s a big-bang thinker. I’ll tell you what he dreams about: our cities. Ever been to Chicago?”

  “No, sir.”

  “How about Atlanta?”

  “Uh-uh.”

  “L.A.?”

  “I wish.”

  “Our cities, Arlo. That’s what he’s all about. Look at me.”

  I lift my eyes off the floor and look at him.

  “We will be swift,” he says. “One preemptive strike. Pinpoint and perfect. And you’re going to do it.”

  “Not me,” I say.

  It comes out a whisper, but I’m definitely thinking it. Loudly.

  Colonel Kincaid sighs. “Oh, yes. We had an agreement, didn’t we. Nothing lethal. Wasn’t that it?”

  “It was more than an agreement,” I say. “We shook on it.”

  “Yes, we shook on it. But this is war, Arlo. War changes everything.”

  “Not to me, it doesn’t,” I say.

  He leans toward me, so close I catch a whiff of his aftershave—some kind of lemon-lime combination.

  “Arlo, we have an opportunity here to do extreme and lasting good. The cost is cheap: one life—and hardly a life at that. A vicious killer. A monster. The payoff is monumental, saving countless lives.”

  “You don’t know that,” I say.

  “We know enough,” Colonel Kincaid says. “And this much we know for sure: we need our best drone pilot.”

  “Second best could do it,” I say.

  The colonel glares at me.

  Major Anderson says, “Arlo, we’re running the analytics now. We’ll hit him in the dead of night, when he’s moving between compounds. Everything is predictive. Nothing is guaranteed. So it’s essential that we maneuver all the odds in our favor. That’s why we need you.”

  I look down at my boots again—my Old Gringos, which Mom bought for me at Solano’s in Raton. Unlike the officers’ polished shoes, my Gringos do not reflect the diode light. They are scuffed and beaten. But they fit. Like molds.

  I’m about to tell Colonel Kincaid and Major Anderson what they don’t want to hear. Because once you go against your grain, you can’t live with yourself. I sure can’t.

  Just as I open my mouth, Colonel Kincaid holds up a hand. “One more thing, Arlo.”

  One more thing! Why does there have to be one more thing?

  “It’s the best part,” Colonel Kincaid says. “In return for doing extreme and lasting good for your country, your country will do extreme and lasting good for you.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I say.

  “Arlo, what will happen to your sister?”

  “My sister!” The thought of Siouxsie hits me like a jolt. “What’s she got to do with this?”

  “What’s going to happen to her?”

  Something spikes inside me. I clench my fist.

  “Huntington’s disease is a terrible road,” Colonel Kincaid goes on. “Siouxsie will need lots of help. We can provide that help. We can take care of her.”

  “Shut the hell up!” I blurt out.

  Kincaid doesn’t even wince.

  My mind tells me to get up and walk out, but I stay glued to my chair. Finally, I say, “How do you mean, ‘take care of her’?”

  “As time passes, she’ll need more and more care,” he says. “We’ll be sure she gets it. We will help her. That’s our pledge to you.”

  “Pledge!” I nearly spit the word. “You can’t even keep a simple handshake promise.”

 
“That’s your view,” Colonel Kincaid says. “Our view is different. We’re warriors—as tough and adaptive as we need to be. But in this, we won’t waver. You can count on it.”

  I plant my eyes square in his, matching him second for unblinking second.

  “Exactly what will you do?” I say.

  “Exactly this,” Colonel Kincaid says. “We will make a heap of your father’s debt. You know what I mean—everything that’s delinquent and owed. Didn’t he say he was sitting on a pile the size of Pike’s Peak? Well, as soon as you complete the mission—successfully—we will liquidate.”

  “Liquidate?”

  “Pay off everything he owes, Arlo. Level Pike’s Peak.”

  The air sucks out of me. Everything I felt sure about a minute ago, I don’t feel sure about now.

  “You can do that?” I ask.

  “Yes, we can do that,” Colonel Kincaid says. “And furthermore, we will set in motion a process to ensure that Siouxsie gets the best medical care for the long haul.”

  I shiver. “‘The long haul’?”

  “The rest of her life,” he says. “Many years, we hope. However, it could be merely a few.”

  I want to smash his face. I also want to climb into a hole and pull a boulder over me. Instead, I just sit there, paralyzed.

  Something flickers on Colonel Kincaid’s face—sadness, humanity, who knows.

  “Arlo, I may seem to you like a hard-ass bastard, but I do this work because I believe in it. Wars don’t just go away; they need to be stopped. It’s a complex job—the math, the physics, the engineering. But the baseline is simple: You hit the opposing team to help the home team. You hit first, before they hit you. You hit below the belt, if you have to. And you don’t miss. You hit the mark.”

  His mouth twitches. It’s almost a smile. “You and I have something in common,” he says. “We’re both uniquely fitted to this work. Born for it, you might say. I don’t know if that’s a blessing or a curse. It’s just the way it is.”

  “What if I say no?”

  Colonel Kincaid shrugs. “If you decline, then your job here is done. You get on that big Ducati and roar back to Orphan County. You can keep the Ducati—you’ve earned it. Major Anderson will send you a final paycheck. You’ve got to admit, Arlo, these steady paychecks have been pretty nice compared to your Snack Shack revenue. Your last check should cover gas and groceries for several weeks.”