Quote:
Originally Posted by unkated
Or he's a drunk who had a buddy who flew on AF 1 as a crewman, and told the drunk enough to make a story good enough, hopefully, to dine and drink out on.
So, he tells an intriguing and almost implausible tale...
And if the PCs begin to investigate, he disappears. If the PCs are hooked on the tale, this may concern them all the more. 
Uncle Ted |
... only to turn up months later at another makeshift tavern, telling the same story, maybe with a few embellishments. Once he realizes who the PCs are, he again does a runner to prevent them questioning him.
He could have the sort of description that has the PCs thinking they see him in a crowd at any new place they go to. This presents him as a recurring theme but something they just can't get enough information for to allow them to actually find him because he wasn't actually there, someone just happened to look like him. This way he stays in the minds of the PCs without actually being present.
Who knows what the PCs will do once they actually catch up with him, anything is possible. Maybe he was on the aircraft, maybe he's just a bystander who witnessed it, maybe he's just the friend of someone who knows what happened but no matter which one applies, perhaps he fears the PCs are after him to bring retribution (for getting all those drinks for free, for not telling what happened to the aircraft, for being a witness to enemy action or whatever - in his drunken state his paranoia runs rampant)