Psychotwist: Lust, Sex, Depravity

CHAPTER ONE

A dark, gray mood had descended on Kirby Lotto. Many things had gone awry during the last few weeks. Missed connections, poor assignments, maybe a low-grade infection somewhere in her body that faded her outlook on life. And now this. Her news director had asked her to fly to a medical convention in St. Louis and interview a Swiss doctor who was said to have discovered a cure for the common cold. As her plane was landing at the airport, his was taking off.

She had spent a restless night in a St. Louis motel overlooking the Mississippi River, then just about dawn had fallen into a zombie-like sleep which made her late for her return flight to New York. She had no time for a shower, or even a quick brushing of teeth. She pulled on khaki slacks, a turtleneck and windbreaker, jammed her feet into jogging shoes and stepped into a cab for the airport.

Lotto rushed through security and made it to the gate just as the last passenger was boarding. She pushed her boarding pass into the ticket agent's hand and forced a smile. I made it.

He glanced at it, began to tear off the stub, then did a double take. Sorry, Miss. This isn't your flight. You're on 1155. It departs in two hours. Of course you have plenty of time.

Her face dropped. Could her hard luck be permanent? Doesn't this flight go to New York?

Why, yes it does.

Aren't there seats on board? she asked impatiently.

There are a few. This early flight is rarely filled, the agent replied, mildly amused by her low boiling point.

I've got a ticket. Let me on board.

You're not properly ticketed.

I don't give a damn! I want on that airplane! She pointed angrily toward the boarding gate.

It's against airline policy. There's no time to change your ticket.

Please. She switched her manner to pleading. I've got to get to New York. I don't have time to spend two more hours in St. Louis. It seems like I've been here a year as it is.

The agent hesitated, well aware that he shouldn't break ironclad policy, but finally could see no compelling reason to keep her off the airplane. And there was just enough time for her to scramble on board. He ripped off her boarding pass stub, handed it to her and said, Go ahead, Ms. Lotto. Have a good flight. Kirby rushed on board and found an empty seat about midway in the huge passenger plane.

As the plane taxied to the runway, the ticket agent realized that Kirby Lotto had left her carry-on bag by his station. He shrugged with an air of disgust and decided to put it on the next flight, the one she was ticketed for. Why did he let her board Flight 777 anyway? If she complained about her luggage, and if it was learned he bent the rules, well, maybe she wouldn't cause a fuss.

Kirby settled into her seat and hoped the flight attendants would bring coffee pronto. She nodded and smiled to her seatmate, an older, matronly woman wearing too much fire engine red lipstick, in the window seat, an empty seat between them. The woman wore an electric blue suit of a plastic derivative, bright red and white plastic earrings and a three-strand necklace to match. A whiff of heavy perfume drifted across the empty seat. Across the aisle was a man, judging by his lower body. He had draped a flight blanket over his head and appeared to be already asleep, strapped upright in his narrow seat.

Kirby contemplated the joys of flying coach class and regretted that she had not had time to buy a morning paper. She fiddled with the in-flight magazine. She skimmed a Japanese folk tale about a man named Nagao who was to wed a woman named O-Tei. It seemed that O-Tei had taken ill, but told Nagao she would return from the dead, be reborn, and marry him. As it happened, Nagao eventually married after O-tei's death, but suffered a series of misfortunes including the death of his wife. Years passed and he met a young serving girl who was O-Tei's double.

When she heard the food trolley in the aisle just behind her seat, Kirby put the magazine back in the seat pocket. She had coffee and a croissant, debated with herself whether to butter the croissant and decided in the negative, then tried to catnap.

She awoke to odd sounds and a tingle of excitement in the air. Something was wrong. She had logged enough air hours to know the usual noises, landing gear going down, or up, flaps down, the change of pitch when they reached altitude, the myriad of routine adjustments that kept the huge metal box with its complex human cargo aloft and on the right course. Something was surely wrong.

There seemed to be an increasing vibration that rattled through the aircraft, like the beginning of an earthquake. As seconds passed it became more intense. Someone in the back of the plane shouted and someone else told them to hush. Kirby glanced at her seatmate and the woman tried to smile. Very likely she was not a frequent flyer and thought this vibration, now becoming bone jarring, was routine. Kirby smiled back.

A flight attendant hurried down the aisle. Her cheerless face seemed pale. Where was the confidence? Where was the welcome aboard comradeship? The huge metal tube they all shared was miles in the air, hurtling through space, and there was no place to run, no place to hide. Now they were clearly losing altitude. More than two hundred mice in a gigantic cage somewhere between St. Louis and New York City, rats in a trap that might be slammed to earth. Kirby was certain this was big time trouble.

Why in the hell had she insisted in getting aboard this flight? Why couldn't she have overslept just a little bit longer? And, why, anyway, had her boss sent her to St. Louis on such a wild goose chase. It seemed like everything had gone wrong during the past six weeks. Kirby was beginning to lose confidence in herself and she suspected her boss's confidence was wavering. He often said: Any reporter can go sour.

She was damned mad. The plane was being shaken to pieces. Someone, not far behind her was praying. Others talked in hushed tones. The flight attendants had gone beyond their initial panic and were now patrolling the aisles attempting to calm the passengers. They were doing their job.

And that's what infuriated Kirby. She was a newswoman. And if she was to die, she should be doing her job. She shouldn't die on a nondescript, routine flight between St. Louis and New York, sitting next to a midwestern matron who wore too much makeup and had doused herself in perfume. She should die gloriously in a firefight in the Mideast, during a volcanic eruption in Bali. Maybe an earthquake in Peru or Greece. Trapped in a submarine being attacked by giant squids! Her mind scrambled to compute what was going on. To die strapped in a narrow coach class seat after a breakfast of coffee and stale croissant and no butter.

The very least would be a first-class seat after a glass of cognac, maybe shared with the current quarterback of the Miami Dolphins. There was such a thing as style.

Her indignation kept her mind off the escalating deterioration of the aircraft. A male voice that identified itself as belonging to the first officer came over the public address system.

It appears we may have to land in an, uh, unfamiliar place. A cornfield, or on a highway. We are not far from New York, but there is some malfunction, something. He hesitated awkwardly. Severe engine problems. But please, no panic. The flight attendants will assist you. We have a plan and we will execute that plan. But I urge everyone to remain calm and follow instructions. His voice was deadly serious. Buckle your seat belts securely. Remove your glasses. Place your pillows, blankets, other soft items in your lap, lean forward protecting your head with your arms.

Of course there was panic above the noisy vibrations of the descending aircraft, a definite earthward tilt. At least two women screamed hysterically. A man bolted down the aisle as if there was some place to go. Kirby looked at her companion and tried a smile. The woman smiled back, her eyes as calm as a contented cat, her face at peace. She had a rosary in her hands. Kirby nodded in approval and snugged up her belt. She caught a glimpse out the window, a patchwork of farm fields, wood lots, a distant highway, a pond, there a barn. Now the plane, roaring and vibrating crazily, clipped the top of the first tree, beginning a jarring danse macabre.

Kirby could taste fear as she laced her fingers together on top of her head and leaned forward, a wave of terror nearly sickened her, but she drew strength from her seatmate, the woman by the window. How calm and courageous she was during these hellacious seconds as the plane rattled and wrenched itself between sky and earth.

Then the noise and the quaking and the bone-crunching jolts took over. The plane slammed down, then slammed again and again, until a final destructive crash that blotted the memory and triggered a short-lived blackout.

CHAPTER TWO

When Kirby roused and stirred, dust was rising from every crack and crevice. There was the smell of smoke, and the great plane had broken open like an eggshell.

Kirby found herself in one piece, looking over the edge of the break toward the dull ground just six or seven feet below. She glanced at the woman by the window. She looked almost alive, but a copper tube from the torn bulkhead had pierced the center of her forehead. She must have died instantly; the rosary remained in her still hands.

There were cries from throughout the plane. Agony, some badly injured. Two flight attendants further aft struggled to open an emergency door. Pleas for help from passengers wedged in their seats. A baby squalled.

A primal scream from the first-class section up ahead. My hand is gone. For the love of Christ someone help me. I'm bleeding to death. My legs. My legs. I'm trapped like a dog. Anyone, please help. Then the voice faded among the chorus of pain and torment.

Kirby could only imagine the woman had bled out. Bleeding out, that's what it was called. She had covered wars and disasters in her career. Wounded, shot, torn with jagged edges of glass or metal, no help. Bleeding out. How many on this plane had bled out, or were in the process.

Across the aircraft a man struggled to free his wife, talking, encouraging, words of endearment, all the while. Darling, you'll be Okay. I'll have you out of here in a minute. Please talk to me, please. Darling. If I can just get this damned belt off you. Please, darling. Talk to me. We'll both be fine. You'll see.

The horrifying stink of burning plastic was beginning to fill the large cabin. It stung the eyes and burned the nostrils.

Kirby unbuckled, half crouched forward and jumped. She met soft earth and was thankful for her jogging shoes. A man thudded down beside her on the ground. He glanced around furtively as if about to dart into the nearby woods.

We've got to help them, Kirby gasped.

He gave her a puzzled look, then shot back. The plane's burning. I'm out of here. Without another word he dashed into the woods.

Kirby looked after him in dismay and anger. You son of a bitch, she shouted. You gutless son of a bitch.

Please, lady, came a near hysterical scream from the plane, save my baby!

Kirby looked up into the dark maw of the aircraft. She could see little but dust and now dark smoke was beginning to swirl through the interior. I can't climb back up there, she said helplessly. I can't even see you. The plane was lodged above her among the severed trunks and limbs of trees.

I can see you, the voice shouted back. I can throw you the baby.

Kirby craned her head to see into the turmoil of the broken plane. The screams and cries of the other passengers continued, but no one else dropped down through the shattered fuselage. I can't see you! Kirby shouted. But she could hear the crackling of flames, smell burning plastic and oil.

Cradle your arms, the voice commanded. I'll drop the baby into your arms!

OK, Kirby responded. The baby fell from the plane almost instantly, squirming and crying. She barely got a grip on it. Bright flames and the crackling of the fire became more intense.

The plane's burning, the trapped mother screamed from the plane. Get my baby out of here. Run! Run!

Kirby Lotto hesitated a second, felt the soft baby move in her arms, saw the infant's face contorted into heavy sobs. Then she ran, ran as fast as she could, her heart pounding, bounding into a large area of boulders that had split off from a cliff face, found a safe haven behind a boulder as big as a house where she deposited the baby. Her firm intention was to return to the plane.

Then, varoom, the downed plane exploded like a nuclear bomb, a huge fireball rolled aloft, illuminating the dull day. Even behind the boulder Kirby felt the heat wave, was almost knocked down by the blast, realized instantly that not a soul could survive such an inferno. Flight 777 was dead. She and the baby and the man who had run off like a cowardly wild beast survived. Were there others? As far as she could tell there had been only one crack in the fuselage.

There was no time to wait for the burning wreckage to cool. The baby screamed even louder and she noticed blood trickling from its left ear. She padded the ear with a tissue and tried to sooth the child with soft words and a gentle hug.

Then she began picking her way through the lightly treed area, then down a dry wash, the image of more than two hundred people, who had been alive just minutes ago, flashing like frozen frames in the shadowy passages of her mind. The horror of death and yet, her seatmate, the woman at the window, had seemed at peace, like an anchor, or a safe harbor in a dragon-haunted whirlwind of fear. Kirby regretted making an early quick judgment on the basis of gaudy jewelry and an overdose of perfume.

She hung between reality and nightmare, between earth and hell. The baby, the pleasant day, the joy of dashing through the countryside with the heart pumping the blood at an insane rate. This was reality. But in paralytic flashes her brain was bombarded with the shrieks for help, the wails of the dying, the ghosts of those recently dead. These visions, this terror flooding the dark passages of her brain, would it always be with her?

Her past regimen of jogging and workouts was paying off. She loped down the boulder-strewn dry wash, dodging felled trees and shrubs, her breath coming easily, the baby now quiet in her arms. Fifteen minutes passed, then twenty-five. Off to the right, the noise of a passing truck caught her attention. She scrambled out of the dry wash, over a broken down fence, then jumped a small ditch to reach a two-lane highway. The truck was long gone, but she flagged a late model compact car.

It pulled to a halt and the driver rolled down the passenger side window. I've got an injured baby, she said breathlessly. I've got to get it to a hospital, or a doctor, anyway. She waited while the driver digested the news, his eyes darting from her to the bundle in her arms.

Get in, he said, unlocking the door. He was a well-scrubbed, well-dressed man in his thirties, maybe an accountant or a real estate salesman, Kirby speculated. He glanced suspiciously at the baby, which was whimpering, and then back to Kirby. But he soon had the car slightly above the speed limit. Was there an accident? he asked. He had seen no sign of one on the highway, which was sparsely traveled.

Plane crash, Kirby said. Back in the fields someplace. It took me forever to get to this road.

Plane crash, he said. A private plane?

Commercial jet. We were approaching New York when something went wrong. Terrible vibration. Engine troubles I suppose.

You were on the plane? His suspicion deepened. For all her ordeal, all the scrambling to the highway, she looked neat and well groomed, not even breathing very heavily.

You were on the plane?

Yes, of course, it was loaded. I mean almost full, I still can't believe it.

Where's everybody else? the man questioned.

A man escaped. Ran off immediately, the rat. Other than that, just me and the baby. As far as I know, anyway. I ran. The baby needs medical attention. It could have internal injuries.

Is it a boy or a girl?

I don't know, Kirby replied. I haven't looked. I'm not going to change it. She looked at the child. It was wrapped in a sort of green wrap around blanket, but not a blanket, a thing that snapped on.

It's not yours?

No, of course not, Kirby said, a little angry. It's mother tossed it off the plane to me.

And she's dead?

I suppose so. In fact, I'm certain she's dead. The plane exploded.

The driver shook his head in disbelief. Could this be a strange put on? Stuff like this simply doesn't happen. But the woman looked decent and she did have a baby. The best thing to do was to get her to a hospital and get her out of his car. Tonight he would be at a meeting of hardware dealers. There would be drinks, music and laughter, plus meaty talk about the hardware world -- nuts and bolts sessions as they were called.

He sought to change the subject. I had some trouble, too. Had to detour for car repairs, find a dealership, not easy to do right here. I'm headed for a Grand Clam Hardware convention in Boston. I'd planned to bring my wife along, but Poagie stayed home with the flu. He suddenly gestured with his hand. There's a hospital sign.

A large white H on a blue background meant hospital. They had entered a small New Jersey community. Thank God, Kirby thought. Two hundred plus people killed in a plane explosion and this bird's worried about his wife missing a hardware convention.

The driver had slowed down, searching for a second sign that would point the way to the hospital. Except for the immense hardware inventory that he kept tucked away in his brain that could be called up at a moment's notice, the wheels in his head turned slowly. But he finally realized that this woman's story was likely legitimate. She was well dressed, intelligent and carried a clean-looking baby from all he could tell by the blanket. You don't know the baby's name? he asked, although he assumed she didn't.

No. I didn't even talk to the mother on the plane. She was a couple of rows behind me.

You've really been through it, he said. You must be half out of your mind. Will you check into the hospital too?

No. I've got to get to New York as soon as possible. My plan is to drop the kid off and grab whatever I can for Manhattan.

The hardware man thought a minute. You aren't far. I mean a cab could take you there if you were willing to spend a few bucks.

If I can find a cab, Kirby said. She rocked the baby who was starting to whimper again. Christ, it probably needs changing, food, God knows what else. Where is that hospital.

I'm sure it's not far, her driver replied, then added, If you like, I'll wait outside the hospital for you and take you as far as a taxi. There should be one downtown.

Downtown where? Kirby asked.

Oakview. That's the name of this town. We just passed a sign. Hey, can I see the baby? Would you hold it up?

Exasperated, Kirby held the baby up so the driver could take a look. It was a handsome child, fair skin, blue eyes, a haze of peach fuzz on its head. Then she cradled it back in her arms.

Finally, a sign told them to make a right turn. Let me off at the emergency room, Kirby said.

She thanked him for the ride and pushed the door open. Do you want me to wait? he asked.

Why not. I'll just be a minute. Inside the hospital, Kirby almost bumped into a nun. At last she was having some luck. Thrusting the blanketed baby into the nun's arms, she said, This baby was in an accident. It's ear's cut and it could have other injuries. She looked into the kindly eyes of a slightly confused nun and said, Thank you, Sister. Then she was out the door, back in the car and headed for downtown Oakview.

The amazed nun stood holding the squirming baby. She had been too surprised to speak, but now took quick action. She went deeper into the hospital, found a nurse and passed the baby off to her. Some woman came through the door and handed me this baby. Says it’s been hurt and could have serious injuries. I don't know what happened to her. She almost ran out the door.