Old records opened quickly after that. A shell company on the false manifest had booked cargo space at the last minute. It dissolved months after the disappearance. Its listed office turned out to be an empty storefront. Insurance on the lost freight had been paid surprisingly fast. Even worse, one Northline dispatcher had approved the route change that night without filing a proper operations note.
Nora sat with Erik inside the mobile command unit while names and invoices spread across the table. The rough shape of it became clear. The plane had likely been diverted closer to a remote pickup point. The crew understood too late that something was wrong. The weather closed in. Fuel became a concern. They brought the aircraft down on the glacier instead of losing it entirely.
“But if they survived,” Nora said, “why did no one ever hear from them?” Erik turned Adam’s note over again. Tucked behind it, almost hidden in the fold, lay a second scrap of paper. On it was an address in a town three hours south, followed by two words: If alive. They drove there the next morning. The address led to a small repair workshop behind a row of narrow houses. An elderly man in a blue work jacket looked up when they entered. Erik placed the old crew photo on the counter without a word. The man stared at it, then sat down slowly. It was Adam Leen.