Free Hard Ground by Joseph Heywood

With that, the woman slowly lay back, and the conservation officer moved quickly to her but found only the body of the brown dog. She rubbed her eyes, feeling like she wanted to cry, or maybe to laugh, or to applaud. She knew she’d seen and been part of something special and had no idea what or why.
    She guessed she’d never know, and she knew that was often the way among people who dealt firsthand with life and death. Sometimes in the woods in this job you saw things, and there was no explanation. None.
    Foresta Quinn took the dead dog into her arms, cradled it, and made her way back to the highway. EMTs had just pulled a woman’s body from the wreck and had her on a gurney, and Quinn looked, blinked hard, and lost her voice.
    A sobbing man came up to her. “My mom and that damn mutt were inseparable. They were always together, everywhere.”
    Foresta Quinn couldn’t look at the man, mumbled only, “They still are,” gently placed the departed animal in his arms, and walked away in tears.

Airzilla
    Conservation officers around the state called the man Buck Rogers, but his real name was Ralph Haliday, and he had flown three combat tours in Vietnam and since 1970 piloted for the Department of Natural Resources. Haliday had innovated and perfected tactical flight techniques for law enforcement that had been adopted by states all around the country, but his accomplishments and competence aside, rumors were flying around that all CO pilots would soon lose their flight duties and become full-time ground pounders. There were numerous quiet bets, some of them substantial, that Buck Rogers would retire rather than be relegated to mere truck-and-foot patrols.
    Elliot Rose, twenty-seven, with less than three years on the job, had no bets or opinions on Haliday and had never met the man, but this would change today. Rose’s sergeant had pressured him into flying as Haliday’s airborne spotter. “Easiest job ever. Old Buck can see deer turds from five thousand feet and tell you when they got dropped. Just sit back and enjoy the ride and the scenery.”
    Elliot Rose had been disturbed his entire life by the prospect of flight. He’d flown, of course, but only when there were no other options. Now, this was one of those times. He’d avoided spotter duty for three years, but no more. Looking at the small, single-engine plane inside the hangar at the Escanaba airport, Rose felt his stomach roll. Some smartass had painted Airzilla in gold script on the side of the plane.
    â€œYou Rose?” a gravelly voice asked from the shadows.
    â€œYessir,” Rose answered automatically.
    â€œI ain’t no goddamn sir,” a rotund, red-faced, gray-haired man snapped at him. “I’m Haliday, an officer just like you.”
    â€œYessir, I mean . . . I know.”
    â€œAfraid to fly, Rose?”
    â€œNo, I just don’t care much for it.”
    â€œFair enough,” Haliday said. “I like mitigated candor. So why’d they pick you?”
    â€œSergeant Brown thought I should see night ops from topside.”
    Haliday grinned and nodded enthusiastically. “Cool; this will be a memorable night, Rose. First time always is. Ain’t a puker, are ya?”
    â€œNot on boats anyway.”
    â€œBoats ain’t birds. Your sarge go over the tactical plan with you?”
    â€œFive trucks, ten officers. South and east Marquette Counties, east Delta, west Schoolcraft, finishing down in the Garden.”
    Haliday chuckled. “Finishing. I like that. You know those douchebags down to the Garden, the DeRoche brothers?”
    â€œKnow of them. I’ve done some fish patrols down there.”
    â€œOpen water or ice?”
    â€œBoth.”
    Haliday smiled. “I always save my A game for the Garden clowns,” the pilot said and began walking around the plane, looking at it, gently touching it in places, almost like a lover’s gentle caress, like