[ WP ] Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 lands in Beijing Airport , 3 Months late - passengers claim to have flown as normal .

The aircraft sat in the hangar like nothing had happened and nothing at all was wrong. It sat there as if it had a perfect right to be there. 
 
 It was surrounded by barriers and tape, by spotlights and equipment, and most of all by people. 
 
 Charlie Keyes was one of three crash investigators from the UK, and was only allowed near the aircraft because of his expertise as an investigator and because he'd worked for a company that made components used in the plane's construction. There were two dozen similar experts from all over the world, but the investigators who were closest, who had the most access, were Chinese. Charlie left the politics of the situation to the Malaysian Government, since China had insisted they were incompetent to handle the investigation and the resulting row had made its way to the UN. 
 
 His interest lay entirely with the Boeing 777-200ER sitting bathed in lights and attention. Or at least, it would when he was allowed near it. 
 
 For now, Charlie sat in his hotel room at the Sama Sama, watching and rewatching the rolling news footage. The news channels seemed to be obsessed with showing the same sequence, the plane landing at Kuala Lumpar airport. He watched the aircraft descend at a steady three degrees, watched the gear, the flaps, watched for any sign that there was something unusual about the airframe or the behaviour of the pilot. 
 
 He watched the press attempt to mob the passengers, who looked tired and baffled at the sudden attention. He watched the paramedics dealing with sudden collapses and shock as the truth was revealed to them. There were endless shots of the hotel where the passengers were being detained and debriefed. 
 
 None of it told him any more than it had the previous day. He left his room, made his way to the hotel Grill where he ate a steak and drank a beer in peace and quiet, then went back to his room. 
 
 There was a woman sitting on his bed. 
 
 `` Hello, Charlie,'' said the woman. She was tall, with long red hair pulled back into a servere ponytail. She was wearing a navy blue trouser suit, the brass jacket buttons catching the light. Beside her on the bed was an aluminium flight case, the sort you might keep camera equipment in. 
 
 `` Hello?'' said Charlie `` are you with the hotel?'' 
 
 The woman smiled, shook her head. Charlie decided she was handsome rather than pretty, she had a strong jaw and an equally strong nose, which she seemed to be sighting along to fix him with a stare. 
 
 `` When you've finished gawping - and before we go further I should make it clear that this is as undressed as I get - we have something to talk about.'' 
 
 `` Flight MH370,'' said Charlie, taking a seat at the room's armchair. She nodded. `` Of course it is,'' said Charlie `` there's practically nothing else interesting about me. So, which newspaper do you work for?'' 
 
 `` I do n't'' she said, looking a little offended. `` I'm here because I need your help.'' 
 
 Charlie shrugged and stood up. He raided the minibar, pouring himself a ruinously expensive gin and adding a hint of tonic. 
 
 `` Anyone with any interesting in that aircraft wants my help, or someone's help if they can get close to the airframe.'' He sipped the gin, added some more tonic and sat back down. `` So, what are you after and what are you offering?'' 
 
 `` You'll help, then?'' 
 
 `` No,'' said Charlie `` I just want to know what I'm missing out on before I throw you out of my room and call hotel security.'' 
 
 She laughed, and it was a laugh of genuine amusement. Warm and honest. 
 
 `` Fair enough'' she said `` I'll make my pitch quickly before I take up too much of your evening.'' 
 
 `` Please,'' said Charlie `` my evening is entirely free so take all the time you want. What do I call you?'' 
 
 She frowned and chewed her lower lip for a moment. 
 
 `` Call me Melissa,'' she said `` let's pretend it was my Grandmother's name and I've always liked it.'' 
 
 `` Anything you like, Melissa. Pitch away.'' 
 
 `` Well,'' said Melissa, leaning forward and locking eyes with him `` since we're pretending, let's have a choice of what I do. Would you rather deal with a discredited academic on the fringes of experimental physics or a rogue Intelligence Officer with a loose canon theory?'' 
 
 `` The academic,'' said Charlie `` better chance of interesting theories, much smaller chance of gun ownership.'' She grinned. 
 
 `` I've been doing experimental physics for a middle tier university in an English speaking country for the last ten years,'' said Melissa `` and in that time I've been working on a variety of projects, all of which have not been good for my chance at tenure. I consistently fail to get published and some of my work has been called into question by other more reputable physicists. But in the last couple of months, I've discovered something that I ca n't quite believe. Can I show you what I'm talking about?'' 
 
 Charlie, feeling magnanimous, waved his agreement. She opened the flight case and removed something that looked like a complicated microscope. 
 
 `` This is a complicated microscope,'' she said `` and it's actually so complicated that I'm not going to bother describing what it does or how it does it. All you need to know is that I've been using it to study the thing I found. Let me get it set up.'' 
 
 She bustled with the microscope, arranging it on the small desk and plugging it in to the wall power socket. Charlie sat, and drank and watched as Melissa sorted slides and tested the device. She looked to be very familiar with it. There were slides, which she quickly and efficiently arranged in a small rack. She slide one into the microscope, made some adjustments and stepped to one side. 
 
 `` Take a look,'' she said. 
 
 He did. After a moment to get used to the image, he realised he was looking at glass with a wavelike distortion in the middle of the focal area. There was a click and the image changed. Charlie could feel Melissa's presence close by him. He frowned and then recognised what he was now seeing - metal, with the same wavelike pattern. After another click, he was looking at wood. Here the image was different and immediately familiar: a stress fracture pattern, and signs of healing. The sample came from wood that was growing at the time it was damaged. After another click, he was looking at bone with the same stress fracture pattern. 
 
 `` I do n't understand,'' he said `` what are you showing me?'' 
 
 Melissa sat back on the bed. 
 
 `` I found this same pattern repeating itself in over two hundred samples of material. After it turned up in the dozen at my lab I began testing things elsewhere. From home, from random parts of my home town, from any location I travelled through. In organic or living material, microscopic stress fractures with evidence of remoulding. In non-living tissue or inorganic samples, the wave image. I'm interpreting it as evidence of a single moment of massive stress at the microscopic level.'' 
 
 Charlie thought this over for a moment. 
 
 `` Well, that's certainly unusual,'' he agreed `` but I have no idea what this has to do with Flight MH370.'' 
 
 `` At first, I was n't sure either'' said Melissa. `` Then I started to notice something about the pattern of damage. You'll have to take my word for it at the moment, but the fractures and stresses... line up.'' 
 
 `` Pardon?'' 
 
 Melissa looked away, suddenly unwilling to meet his stare. She reached for and fiddled with a slide. 
 
 `` I know. I know how it sounds. But there's a radial pattern. Samples from the same area show the same sort of damage in the same places. Samples from different places have the damage in different areas, but when you put those images together, they... line up. Like they were all caused by the same stress at the same time. 
 
 `` To make things even more bizarre, the pattens point to a common epicentre. A ground zero.'' 
 
 Charlie blinked, drank, and set aside the empty cup. 
 
 `` Let me guess,'' he said `` that ground zero would be more or less the last reported position of flight MH370?'' 
 
 Melissa nodded. 
 
 `` If I can get a look at the aircraft,'' she said in a suddenly breathless rush `` then I can confirm whether it was anywhere near an event that seems to have caused microscopic damage to an awful lot of the planet. Then maybe we can secure resources to find out what that even was.'' 
 
 Charlie smiled. 
 
 `` Your carefully prepared slides are n't exactly evidence'' he said. Melissa nodded. 
 
 `` True, which is why I'm going to need a sample of your hair.'' 
 
 `` My hair?'' 
 
 `` Yep. I ca n't have interfered with it, and if the same damage shows up in a sample of your hair you'll have evidence to support my thesis.'' Charlie shrugged. 
 
 `` Fine'' he said. 
 
 *** 
 
 It took a minute to harvest some hair and prepare a slide. It took a minute more for him to see the same damage in the single strand of his own hair. He sat back from the microscope. 
 
 `` Well I'm damned...'' he said. Melissa smiled. 
 
 `` It looks like you were in... what... the South of England when it happened?'' 
 
 Charlie shrugged, unable to remember or think about it very clearly. 
 
 `` Let's... ah... think of a way to get you to the aircraft'' he said. Melissa slowly packed the microscope and tried to restrain her triumphant grin. 
 
 `` Shall we say bright and early tomorrow?'' she asked. Charlie nodded and watched her leave.
