by L. T. Ryan
He finished his cigarette and flicked it into the grass. He ran up the two flights of stairs and went back into the apartment.
“Is everything OK?” she asked.
He smiled. Walked to her. Took her in his arms and kissed her.
“I have to go to the United States tonight.”
She pulled away from him and took two steps back.
“What for?”
He walked to the counter and took a seat on one of the bar stools there. He thought for a second and then responded.
“It’s for a job. I can’t go into details. I actually don’t know all the details yet. But it is going to pay enough that we can leave Paris. We can really set ourselves up nice down south. That’d be nice, yeah?”
She shook her head. Wiped her eyes. Smiled. “Sure, Pierre. It’ll be nice.”
“Wait for me, OK. I’ll be back in just a few days.” He hopped off the bar stool and walked over to her. Hugged and kissed her. “Start packing the things you want to bring.”
She said nothing. Turned away from him and went back to her bedroom. She closed the door behind her, leaving it open just a crack.
Pierre walked to the door and leaned against the frame. He spoke through the crack.
“I have to leave. I have to go to my place and the bank to get a few things. I’ll call you when I get to the States.”
Kat didn’t say anything.
“Kat?”
“OK, Pierre.”
17
Clarissa boarded the 747. Her ticket was for a first class seat. She found her seat and settled in for the two-and-a-half hour flight. She waited for the cabin to fill before retrieving her laptop from her bag. The seat next to her remained empty and she felt she had enough privacy to review the information on the USB thumb drive Sinclair had given her. He had told her that all the information she needed was on the portable drive, including which gate at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport her next flight would depart from. She had pressed him for more information, but true to his secretive nature, Sinclair would say no more.
Clarissa had a strong feeling that she was traveling to a big city. She would have been OK with Chicago, but that was not to be. She doubted it would be New York City. Not with her history there. Possibly Washington, D.C. She decided not to wait any longer. She pulled down the tray attached to the back of the seat in front of her and placed her laptop on the tray. She got no further than flipping the lid of her laptop open when a flight attendant informed her she would have to wait until they were in the air.
It was approximately ten minutes later when the plane taxied to the runway. Another fifteen before she was able to set up her laptop. This time no one stopped her when she powered her computer on. She pulled the thumb drive from her purse and inserted it into a slot along the side of the notebook. A folder opened up on the LCD display. Inside the folder was a number of documents.
The first document was labeled “Anastasiya Tvardovsky.” Clarissa clicked on the file and opened it. The document contained a picture of a woman who bore a strong resemblance to Clarissa, except for Anastasiya’s dark eyes and hair. The woman was a Russian citizen. She was supposed to arrive in the U.S. in two days. Apparently, these plans had been set in motion months ago. The NSA had initially intercepted the information, and it made its way through the intelligence community. They had a plan to capture the woman and Clarissa was to take her place.
Clarissa next opened a file labeled “Itinerary.” On the first line was her gate assignment, C16. She had a connecting flight to Des Moines, Iowa. Clarissa grimaced at the thought of having to go to Iowa. She had a car reservation in her name at the airport. She also had a hotel reservation for five nights at the Embassy Suites Hotel in downtown Des Moines. The document contained further instructions. While checking in she would have to ask the desk clerk to look for a package in her name. The contents of the package would make it clear to her what do with them.
Clarissa closed the file and moved her mouse pointer over a third file. This one was labeled “Boris Melikov.” She lifted her finger above the touchpad and began to strike it when there was a loud explosion.
The plane dropped for what felt like a thousand feet in just a few short seconds. Alarms sounded and lights flickered on and off. The plane leveled off for a second and then began to bank hard to the left. It started to shudder and shake. Oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling. During the drop, Clarissa’s computer had flown up and smashed into the ceiling above her. She searched the seat next to her to find it. One hand felt along the seat as the other grabbed for the oxygen mask. She found the computer and placed it on her lap and then used both hands to secure the oxygen mask.
The muffled sounds of screams and cries could be heard. But drowning them out was the incredible sound of the rushing wind. Clarissa secured her computer in her bag. She leaned toward the aisle. At the front of the plane a flight attendant clung to a seat. She was in a fight for her life. Her body was being pulled toward the back of the plane. Her hair and skirt whipped about in front of her.
Clarissa noticed the pressure had built up to painful levels in her ears. She clutched her arm rest tight and turned in her seat so she could see behind her.
The blue cloth drapes that normally separated first class from coach were pulled so tight they clung to the ceiling. Through the opening, she saw a sight that horrified her. Nothing she had ever seen had left her feeling so helpless. A ten foot wide section of the side of the plane was missing, along with the rows of passengers who had been seated in the general area, including the seats at the back of first class.
She felt the plane lurch downward and she found herself looking at the floor. She had to angle her head to see what had once been eye level. She forced herself to face forward again. Grabbed a hold of her bag and searched through zippered pockets. She pulled out two photos and then leaned forward in the crash position she had seen in the plane’s pre-take-off literature.
She held the photos just beyond her knees.
One was of her and her father when she was eleven years old. She had just caught a huge largemouth bass during a fishing trip in North Carolina.
The other photo was of her and Jack, taken four years ago during one of their on-again phases. She wished she had fought harder to keep him. Maybe she wouldn’t be in this mess right now and maybe Jack wouldn’t be dead. Dead because he saved her life.
And then, amid the chaos and carnage of a 747 plummeting to the ground because of a ten foot hole in the fuselage, Clarissa felt a wave of calm and serenity wash over her. She clung to a single thought. When the plane hit the ground she would be reunited with Jack and her father.
Episode 7
1
The plane shook and pitched and screamed on a direct path toward the ground. Clarissa clutched the picture of her and her father in one hand. The picture of her and Jack in the other. Even though they were out of sight with her head between her knees, the photos comforted her. She recalled the in-flight literature showing the need to place her hands over the back of her head. She figured that anything that might land on her would be heavy enough that it wouldn’t matter.
She remembered a documentary on plane crashes she watched on TV a few years prior. The show revealed that most passengers don’t die upon impact. Bodies drove downward and seats drove upward upon impact. Femur bone snap like twigs, hobbling those who survived the initial impact. Heads bang and roll and passengers are left unconscious. Most victims found themselves unable to escape their seats, and they died slowly of asphyxiation from the smoke, or painfully as they burned to death in the fire.
Clarissa’s calm faded. Although she had resolved herself to dying, she didn’t want to suffer in the process. How long until they hit the ground? A flicker of hope remained that they would land safely. That hope faded a bit each time the plane pitched or dropped or made a sound like it had ripped open further.
She fought the pressure against her body and lifted her torso a few feet. She turned in
her seat to take a look at the carnage behind her. More seats had been torn from the bolts. Bolts that had secured them to the floor.
First class had not been spared.
Finally, equality.
The jagged opening in the fuselage revealed a glowing orange sky. Daylight? Fire?
She turned her torso and her attention to the front of first class seating. The flight attendant who had so recently hung on for dear life was nowhere to be seen. Lost her battle with the negative pressure. Sucked out of the plane like a cockroach flushed down a toilet.
How long had the woman lived? Perhaps she hit her head on the way out and had been knocked unconscious, or even more mercifully, had her neck broken. Or had she escaped cleanly through the hole, untouched and unscathed, enjoying the ultimate free fall from thirty or twenty or however many thousands of feet they were in the air?
Clarissa spotted a small child sitting alone diagonally and in front of her. She didn’t need to see the child’s face to realize the little girl was terrified. Everyone on board who managed to stay conscious thus far had to be scared beyond their wits.
Clarissa strapped her bag across her chest. Unlatched her seat belt. Stuck one leg into the aisle. The pull and the pressure nearly ripped her from the seat. She realized that she had to get into a position that spread the pull over the width of her body. That is where the flight attendant had been at a disadvantage. She had been standing straight up and facing the front of the plane when the explosion, or whatever it was, occurred. The woman had been instantly knocked off her feet.
Clarissa slid out of her seat. She kept her body low and spread out. Half in the aisle. Half in front of the seat. She reached out, forward and diagonally, and clutched the armrest of the little girl’s seat. Clarissa resisted the urge to pull herself up or try to enter from the row behind the little girl. The wrong move now would leave her high and exposed. Ripe for the hole and the sky to swallow her alive.
Her right hand gripped the girl’s armrest. Her left hand reached around the seat in front of her. Her plan was to explode across, with her body low and flat. In a fluid motion, she pulled herself from the protection of her seat. Forced her body across the aisle, forward and diagonally. She flung her left hand across her body and grabbed the armrest on the other side of the girl. A moment later she crouched in front of the child. Spun and sat down. Buckled herself in. Wrapped an arm around the little girl. She placed her head next to the child’s.
“It’s going to be OK.”
The little girl turned her head. Long brown hair whipped in front of her brown eyes. Her tear stained cheeks were flushed red. She grabbed Clarissa’s hand.
The plane pitched forward and the noise that followed terrified Clarissa to the core. She stifled a yell in her throat.
Don’t scare the girl.
Clarissa felt the urge to look behind her and see if any further damage accompanied the sound she’d just heard. But to do so she’d have to stand and that was not a safe option. Had the gaping hole grown? Had the plane finally torn in half?
A faint voice tried to communicate from above. The pilot or the co-pilot or another member of the flight crew was speaking. They were going to land. They had found a spot and that was why the plane took a nose dive. Of course, Clarissa didn’t know if that was what they were saying at all. In fact, the voices from above might be made up. Or that of her father or Jack. She wasn’t sure, and there was no way to tell.
A moment later the plane leveled out. The pull remained, but the downward pressure and subsequent tearing at her stomach dissipated. She heard the sound of gravel from above again. The words “emergency” and “landing” stood out to her.
She hugged the little girl tighter, pulling her into her chest. She leaned over and across the little girl’s head and neck.
The last moments of the flight were filled only with the roar of the wind. No creaks. No groans. No screams. No cries. Just the wind. Louder than she had ever heard it in her life.
The plane hit the ground and the wind stopped and the sound of metal grating against metal began. Things that weren’t meant to twist and bend were twisting and bending. They snapped and tore. The screams and cries returned.
Clarissa felt her body being jarred left and right and up and down. Something smacked her head. Or had she smacked her head into something? It didn’t matter. She fell unconscious.
* * *
The first feeling Clarissa had was dread. The real danger in a crash was smoke and fire and broken limbs. She felt the heat of the fire. She swam in the black smoke. She wiggled her toes, then rolled her ankles, then bent her knees. Nothing felt broken.
A hand ran through her hair. She turned her head and saw the little girl kneeling in her seat.
“Are you OK?” the girl asked.
Clarissa sat up, rising further into the cloud of smoke.
“Yes. We need to get out of here.”
The girl nodded.
“I want you to get out of the seat and crouch down low,” Clarissa said. “Stay close to me.”
The little girl got out of her seat and dropped to her knees in the aisle. She made herself low and kept her eyes on Clarissa’s.
Clarissa slid out of her seat. She knelt down as low as she could while still allowing herself to move. It took a moment to remember which side of the plane she was on. Once she had her bearings straight, she began to move toward the back of the plane. She looked to her right, at the seat she had previously occupied. The seat had been crushed. If she had remained there, she’d be dead.
She continued on. Felt the heat of the fire, but couldn’t see its glow. Where was the fire? Would the smoke block it out completely?
Clarissa’s plan was simple. Find the tear in the side of the plane and get the hell out.
She inched her way to the back of the plane with the little girl close behind. The heavy smoke skewed any view of her surroundings. Clarissa had no idea what lay ahead. The plane could be split at any point. They could fall into a crack and get stuck. She operated on blind faith.
A few feet later Clarissa made out the shape of the hole in the fuselage. It appeared to be huge. At least thirty feet in width.
The smoke started to thin, rushing up to the ceiling and out through the hole. Clarissa abandoned her crouching position and stood with her back hunched over. She motioned for the little girl to rise.
A fire raged inside the plane beyond the hole. The desperate cries of the survivors in the back of the plane carried through the blaze and rode along with the smoke. Clarissa wanted to run to them. Help them. Save them. Impossible, though. She knew it. Her heart ached and tears flooded her eyes. How many survivors would perish?
The real danger in a crash was smoke and fire and broken limbs.
Her skin felt like it was going to melt against the heat of the fire. Her throat ached from the smoke stained air. She walked a fine line between life and death, and that is why, despite the panic and desperation, she fought her way to the hole in the side of the plane.
They reached the opening. Her heart pounded harder in her chest. So close to freedom. Still so close to death. Clarissa grabbed the little girl. Picked her up and held her tight to her chest. The plane was tilted on its side and the drop from the hole to the ground was only a few feet. She carefully positioned herself on the edge and jumped. She navigated through the wreckage, picking up speed the further they got from the plane.
Emergency vehicles approached with their high beams flashing and strobe lights turning. Sirens filled the air. For a moment Clarissa was happy to hear a sound other than the crackling of fire, and the burning of flesh, and the desperate screams of those trapped in the plane.
She kept moving away from the plane, trying to get far enough away to escape injury should there be an explosion. She set the little girl down and waved her arms in the air.
As the vehicles neared, their headlights lit the scene. The plane had crashed in the middle of a field. Mangled and twisted and split into three sections. T
he cockpit was upside down and forty feet or so ahead of the body of the plane. The tail had also split off and sat at the edge of the artificial lighting, barely visible. She saw the outlines of bodies on the ground. Likely ejected through the hole during the crash. The lucky ones, she thought, who didn’t have to suffer in the fire.
One thing struck her as odd, though. She did not see any other survivors walking about. That didn’t mean there weren’t any, of course. But so far she had not seen another living soul aside from her and the child.
A squad car stopped nearby, while the fire trucks and ambulances formed a semi-perimeter around the wreckage.
A young dark-haired officer stepped out of the cruiser. He panned his flashlight across the ground as he made his way toward Clarissa and the girl.
“Ma’am, are you and your daughter alright?”
“Yes.” Clarissa paused for a moment. “She’s not my daughter. She was alone on the plane. I moved to sit next to her after the explosion.”
The officer nodded. He opened the trunk of the police car and pulled out a blanket. He walked over to Clarissa and the little girl and wrapped the blanket around them.
“Can you walk?”
Clarissa nodded. So did the little girl.
The officer said, “Follow me.”
Clarissa reached for the girl’s hand and they followed the officer. They walked for thirty yards or so, away from the wreckage. He turned and pointed toward an ambulance.
“Go there and get checked out. Someone will be along to take a statement.”
They continued walking, and the young officer returned to his car. Clarissa looked down at the little girl and noticed her crying.
“Are you OK?”
The girl shook her head. She lifted her leg and pointed at her foot, which was positioned at an odd angle.