The Saga of Dan Smith ‘The Good’

An excited voice on the other end of the line was one I had heard many times before. No matter the vagueness of the threat, the process begins the same way.

Someone did something that allowed a cyber threat to penetrate their system. My job is to neutralize the threat, repair or replace the data, and harden their network against future attacks.

Monday morning started as so many others that came before it. After the panicked call from a large company in Hackensack, New Jersey, I called my assistant to make the travel arrangements.

With my laptop in the overhead, I pulled out my latest novel. I had time to get lost in a story while the ground crew repaired some last-minute issue.

A stuffy cabin full of warm bodies transformed into a cave close to the precipice of a frozen mountaintop. The plot thickened when someone in the rescue mission knew the lost person had hidden stolen diamonds. The mission suddenly went awry when the flight attendant stopped by.

“Dan?”

I glanced up to see a friend. “Hey, girl, what’s cooking?”

She smiled as she led a young lady to the seat beside me.

“Tammy is a first-time flyer. She is a little anxious about everything. Since you are a frequent guest, I hoped you could ease her fears.”

This was the second time Gloria had me take charge of a child traveling alone. Gloria and I dated in the past; she knew she could count on me.

She didn’t have to say anything else. Gloria would never impose on me without cause. She knew I flew first class to escape the seat kickers and the chattering of others.

Tammy glanced at me to understand who I was and why Gloria had brought her here.

The bright-eyed, freckled face girl with golden curly hair would be a distraction of biblical proportions. I would not be able to read on this flight.

Gloria knew something. There was more to this story than met the eye. As a forensic investigator, any sort of puzzle catches my attention. Forensic detective work requires that I can focus. Once the aircraft is in the air, I bury myself in metadata. Much like DNA, metadata often leads to an arrest. Somewhere in those bits and bytes is the evidence I need to discover who let that virus or ransomware loose on the world.

There is a dark side to my profession. While ne’er do wells and other criminal elements provide my bread and butter, I loathe them. The world would be much better off if their DNA ceased to propagate.

When they attempt to extort millions of dollars, the attention of other influential people focuses on who they are. Many of my clients were powerful people with no interest in putting them behind bars. They had their own ideas.

I knew one young man who went missing after winning a trip to the Middle East. He was stupid and easy to locate. Cryptocurrency does leave a trace. I didn’t need my unique tools to crack that case. His social network page was full of expensive cars. He lived with his parents and didn’t have a job.

Tammy was not yet a teenager, but complicated. She was more than just some kid traveling by herself on a plane. Her white blouse and checkered skirt reminded me of the school uniforms where I grew up. This was more than a custody battle; much more.

Someone has money to send her to a private school. Why is she traveling alone? Her pale complexion and unusual mannerisms for a child of that age were all part of the enigma.

“If you want to read, I won’t bother you.”

I grinned, “Gloria and I are friends. She probably worked hard to put you in first class. This book can wait.”

She glanced at the novel and then back at me. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. Was she scared or grateful? Was she ignored as a child?

“If she knows you, you are not a stranger, right?” She asked.

My eyes widened as I pointed to her seat belt.

“Put that on. If She did not introduce us, I would be a stranger. She put you here because she wants you to be safe. In my job, I help put bad people away.”

“Oh, you’re a cop?”

I chuckled. “No, I work with law enforcement. I assist clients who have computer issues. When a client gets hacked, and the perpetrators attempt to extort… umm, take money from them, I work to fix the damage and keep it from happening again.”

Latching the seat belt, I tugged on the end until it was tight. Clearly, she didn’t know what to think.

It was stuffy as the mechanics made last-minute repairs. The nozzle above us hissed a warm stream of air. A bell chimed, and the plane went dark. We sat in eerie silence for a moment. The sounds of equipment outside the airplane groaned. The noise sounded like some large angry animal was shoved into a cage.

She grabbed my arm with a death grip. “Mr., I am scared.”

The lights flickered back to life, the hissing above resumed, and I glanced into her eyes.

“I have flown over a million miles; this is normal.”

She relaxed her grasp on my arm.

Tammy was curious about how planes fly. That seemed like a natural question for a first-time flyer to ask. I pulled out a notebook and explained the basic principles of aerodynamics. Tammy was a bright girl and caught on quickly.

Warning bells rang again as the captain announced we were third in line to take off. We lurched away from the gate before the engines sprang to life. Hissing air from above us turned cooler as we taxied for what seemed an eternity.

We taxied on a bridge with cars traveling under us, which caught her attention. She attempted to see the ground over me before I decided to change the calculus of this situation.

I caught her blue eyes and smiled.

“Once we get in the air, you trade seats. That way, you can see out the window.”

She smiled for the first time on that trip. Gloria was not far away and smiled at me.

“I love this part of the flight,” I told Tammy.

She seemed to relax as the engine thrust pushed us back in our seats. The ground fell away, and she stretched to see the buildings below.

“I see what you mean,” She said.

I got up to trade seats. Catching Gloria by the bathroom, she knew from my look I had questions.

“Spill it; who is she?”

Now it was Gloria that became misty-eyed.

“Tammy is my niece. Her parents died in a car crash. Some jackass driving a big truck decided he could smoke pot before his shift. He ran on top of their car and crushed them.”

My heart sank to my feet. I was speechless.

“Your sister?” I muttered.

“Susan, my older sister.”

“I am so sorry.”

Gloria’s eyes turned red before excusing herself. I didn’t know what to say at that point. I was still waiting by the door when she exited the bathroom.

“Dan, I can’t talk about this now. It’s still too upsetting. Just go be a friend to her as you are to me.”

I nodded, making a note to learn who was responsible.

I traveled so often that I felt like an airline employee at times.

“Where is she going?”

“My younger sister is going to keep her for the summer.”

“What then?”

“We don’t know.”

I gritted my teeth and headed back to my seat.

They had passed Tammy around with different family members. Her behavior became erratic. This trip was yet another attempt to pass her off. This was not my first rodeo with children and messed up families.

I befriended a little boy who had been a pawn in a custody battle two years ago. He had a rude awakening with coke and air turbulence. That event fused a bond between us that last to this day.

His mother is the CIO of a company I was assisting. We became friends, and I see them when I am in California. Her son is ten, and he calls me once in a while. The calls always end with, ‘When are you coming back?’ His last call ended with ‘When are you coming home?’

That Freudian slip broke my heart.

His mother still fights with her X. I have heard her from the other room. She is not ready for another man. Until she claims her share of the blame, I would take his place and be assigned his wrongdoings by proxy. No Thanks.

Clouds below obscured her view. Tammy asked me for her backpack.

She began drawing, and I attempted to get some work done. I glanced at her drawing to see she had created a fair likeness of Gloria.

“Are you close to your aunt?”

She shot a glance at me.

“How did you know she’s my aunt?”

I smiled, and her wrinkled brow softened.

“Tammy, she and I are friends. Tell me about you?”

She laid her pencil down while trumpeting her fingers on her sketchpad.

“I am angry with God. Most everything I care about is in that backpack. I lost my home and my parents, and it’s not fair!”

Tears suddenly dotted her blouse. I felt her pain. I knew what she was going through was the source of her difficulties adjusting to living with people who were not her family. The individuals she needed were killed by a selfish idiot.

I let her sob while I searched my mind for the solution. I knew once a person cries, there is a release. Like a pressure cooker, crying is a mechanism like a safety valve.

A warm rush came over me, a helpless feeling. There was no button I could push or line of code I could delete to make things better.

I lived alone, forsaking my desire for love to serve a higher purpose.

Love opens you up to pain, and I was still throbbing in pain from my first love.

The airport was more my home than my house in the burbs of North Dallas.

I was also angry at some nebulous character that drove a truck.

Lives are messy and abstract. Puzzles with computers don’t have emotions. I had developed tools to deal with viruses. Were there tools to deal with emotionally overwrought people?

I thought back to my first and only love. I remembered my heart being shredded by her cancer. I could relate. Maybe what saved me from a life of hell would help her. She continued to sob while hiding her face.

“It’s going to be ok,” I whispered.

“You don’t know that.” She said while still obscuring her face behind her locks of curly hair.

I would have hugged her while she cried if she were not a stranger to me. I am sure her parents would have done that.

“Tammy, I know about your parents. This won’t make sense right now, but remember this one thing.”

She glanced at me as I held up one finger. Her face was wet, and strings of snot hung onto her nose and chin as if they were an elaborate trapeze for a flea circus.

I pulled out my hankie, removing the circus act while erasing her damp cheeks with my fingers.

The warmth from her crying and red cheeks hung in the air like walking into a hot sauna. I touched the end of her nose lightly before handing her my handkerchief.

There was a spark of sunshine that peeked through her cloudy appearance.

“That’s better.”

She grinned as a memory came to the surface.

“My daddy used to touch my nose, hold up his thumb and tell me he had my nose. I miss him so much.”

A smile crept over my face as I envisioned his love for her.

“Listen, God works good from bad things. He is ever faithful, and guess what? It’s ok to be angry with him,” I whispered.

Her eyes widened, “It is?”

I nodded. “I was angry with God for a while. I still don’t know what the good will be, but I trust good is coming.”

I never admitted that to anyone. I confessed my deepest secret to a twelve-year-old stranger.

Gloria was not far away and heard what I had said.

The plane banked as the sky ahead darkened. Like the fog from San Francisco Bay, the edge of the night crept west upon the earth below. Another evening would soon be upon us.

Tammy wandered off to the bathroom when Gloria appeared.

“That’s the first time she cried since the accident,” she said.

“You saw all that?”

Gloria nodded. “I heard what you told her.”

I stared at her. “She had a meltdown, and I had to wing it. Why didn’t you help me?”

“You were wonderful. Dan, you were exactly who she needed. Just maybe that God you spoke of has you here for a reason. Did you ever consider that?”

I stood there in silence while pondering what she said.

“Puzzles and computers are my things, children I am not sure about.”

“What about that boy you befriended? You still see him, don’t you?”

I grinned and pulled his Gameboy out of my vest pocket. “He gave me this before I left him the last time. I have to beat his score before I give it back.”

Gloria glanced at the toy and chuckled.

“Tell Tammy. She probably has a few pointers.”

“I never thought about that.”

“You’re a good egg, Dan Smith.”

“Thanks, I think.”

Tammy headed back to her seat while catching our gaze.

“Enjoying your first flight?” Gloria asked.

She glanced at me. “Yea, thanks for sitting me up here.”

Gloria smiled, turned, and left to pick up drinks, empty bottles, and trash.

“What’s your name?” She finally asked.

I peeked at her. “Smith, original, huh?”

She laughed, “Your first name?”

I faced her and put on my business face. “Dan… Dan Smith, forensic investigator at your service,” I said in a somewhat jovial tone.

She giggled at my playful manner.

Her tone turned somber as quickly as it was cheerful a moment earlier.

“Why were you mad at God?”

I pinched my lips tight, my eyebrows narrowing as I contemplated what I would divulge.

“When I was a little younger than you, I was in love with the neighbor girl. We taught each other how to ride bikes, played in piles of leaves, and chased butterflies. We were Bonnie and Clyde one weekend and fishing buddies the next. I was a pirate, and she was a mermaid. You get the idea. We grew up together, and we were inseparable.”

Tammy giggled. I found her laughter delightful. That innocent little girl was still there. Reality had kicked her in the gut, but she was still there. She needed therapy, and I would make sure Gloria did something about it, even if I had to pay for it.

“What happened? Where is she now?”

“We went to school together and eventually to college.”

I stopped talking so my emotions could return to the secret places where grown men foolishly keep such things. I couldn’t respond. I tried, and no words escaped my lips.

“She died?” Tammy asked in a whispery voice.

I glanced at her and nodded. “I was holding her when she breathed her last breath. It was all I could do.”

Tammy cried again for me when I couldn’t.

“When?”

I took another deep breath while dabbing the burgeoning tears from my eyes. “We were just graduating from Wharton. The doctors discovered why she wasn’t feeling well… Yea, I was mad at God.”

She sat back in her chair, gazing at the lights below. Abruptly facing me again, she asked, “And you say God will turn that into something good?”

I heaved a sigh and smiled. “I do. I don’t know how, but I know this; if I look for that miracle, I will see it. When we focus on bad things, that’s all we see. Does that make sense?”

Tammy nodded before turning toward the window. We were both lost in thought as the city's lights sparkled like diamonds. The captain announced we were about to land. We put away our stuff and set the tray tables back where they belonged. We sat in silence as the plane stopped at the gate.

Gloria approached. “Would you take Tammy into the terminal? My sister will meet you. I called her. She is expecting you.”

I nodded. It was an odd feeling when Tammy grabbed my hand as we walked down the jetway. The last child that held my hand was Jimmy. I led him off the plane to his mother, who waited for him.

I was a fixture with that airline.

My heart hurt strangely as I surveyed the room.

A lady that favored Gloria waved from down the hall as she approached.

“Here she comes. Mr. Smith, will you stay in touch?”

I smiled and nodded. “Your aunt knows how to get in touch with me. If you need me, have her call.”

“For real?”

I nodded. Linda, her other aunt, peered at me and then at Tammy. After Linda hugged her, she glanced at Tammy and then back at me. “I see you made a new friend. Gloria speaks highly of you, Mr. Smith.”

Tammy blushed and nodded before setting her backpack on the floor.

“Mr. Smith, I think I found some good.”

I smiled, peering at her.

“Oh?”

“Yea,” she raised her arms, taking me off guard. “I think you need a hug.”

I stood there as the two walked down the hall. This was not over; Gloria was the key.