William nodded in agreement, “Ok, we’ll take turns sitting in the flight deck and we’ll pull the rear blinds up occasionally too, but believe me, even in this plane, if it comes we WILL hear it!”
William looked across at the passengers’ faces and everyone of them had the same expression: a mixture of fear, disbelief and scepticism.
He turned to Amy and then moved his gaze to Sarah for reassurance. Sarah smiled at him and nodded as if to encourage him to keep going but William didn’t, he couldn’t; the sound of the T Rex still haunted him and he’d had enough of trying to be the leader now that David was gone. He turned to Marcus, “They’re all yours, Marcus.”
Marcus stepped forward and instantly William knew he had done the right thing, the way he moved and stood instantly grabbed the group’s attention, then he spoke and it sounded to William exactly how he imagined a drill SGT to sound.
“Ok, we need to bury Steven before…well, you know.”
Nick stepped forward, “If those things are running around out there will it be safe to do so, can’t we just dump the body?”
Marcus replied to his question, “If we do that it will draw animals over to us and they’ll associate the plane with food. We need to bury him and it needs to be deep and a decent distance from the plane.”
Nick accepted the argument and agreed with Marcus. “Ok, if someone will stand guard I’ll do it.” Marcus looked around at the group of people who now hung on every word he said.
“Look, David and Lynsey are gone, but if we’re going to survive here we need to band together to work as a team with one purpose; there can be no individual goals or motives. If we don’t stick together we won’t make it.”
“What can we do while you deal with Steven?” Sarah asked him.
“Ok, we’ll bury Steven first thing tomorrow. While we do that make sure the cargo door is locked when we leave and the safety catch is pulled tight. As for tonight, close all the blinds and kill all the lights apart from the ones above where we sleep, that’ll save power too. We should also try and stay in the same part of the plane, except Holly, she needs to be comfortable and Sarah, I think you should stay with her.”
Sarah nodded, “I will.”
“Ok, then that’s all I have for now.”
With that the group disbanded and headed back through the galley to the economy cabin.
An hour had passed and they had done all that Marcus had asked them to: the cargo door was checked and double-checked, the blinds had been pulled down on all the windows and the remaining passengers were now huddled together in the centre aisle of the economy class seats.
William headed through the darkened cabin passing through the galley and back into business class. He headed over to Sarah who was sitting with Holly. She saw William coming over, He stood beside her and reached out his hand she took hold of it, looking up at him she smiled, “You ok? You’ve had a funny day.”
William sighed, “You’re good at understatements!”
Sarah let go of his hand. “So, where are you sleeping tonight?”
“Oh, I think I deserve business class, besides, if Marcus over there can sleep in here, so can I.”
They looked over and Marcus was already asleep; laid out on the forwardmost reclining seat.
“Can we trust him with that gun?” Sarah asked quietly.
“Do we have a choice?” William replied.
He turned his attentions to Holly. “How is she doing? She doesn’t seem any better.”
Sarah took a sad look at her. “She’s not, William, she’s running a very high temperature and all we have on board are paracetamol.”
“Well, you can only work with what you have Sarah, just make her as comfortable as you can I guess.”
Sarah smiled and lay back on her bunk. She reached up and switched off the overhead light. William walked over to the other side of the cabin and climbed back into the seat that Amy had put him in earlier. He reclined it down and turned off the light above his head. Reaching across he lifted the blind slightly, outside it was dark, so dark that when he looked backwards he couldn’t even see the wings. Another day had slipped by, another day of being a prisoner stuck in this metal container with the memories of yesterday still very fresh in his mind.
Chapter Six
Sarah woke to a soft moaning. Her eyes flickered open and just for a split second she thought she was in her own bed and the last three days had just been a weird dream, but as she started to regain consciousness she realised with a heavy heart that she was on board the plane.
She yawned and stretched her arms out from under the blanket that had kept her warm and far too comfortable for her to want to get up. She looked around the cabin; it was still quite dark she could barely make out the interior features, but she could see that Marcus and William were still asleep.
The soft moaning came again, she turned to her left to where Holly was. Sarah could see beads of sweat collecting on her forehead. Sarah reached over and placed her hand on it, she felt warm, too warm. She pulled the blanket down from Holly. The white uniform blouse was wet, she must have been sweating most of the night while they had slept. Sarah pulled her own blanket back and got out of the bunk and headed for the galley. She took out one of the disposable cups which had now become a lot less disposable given the fact they couldn’t be easily replaced or replaced at all, and placed it under the cold water tap. Turning it she expected the water to run freely but it didn’t; it made a gurgling sound and spat the water out -almost knocking the cup out of Sarah’s still half-asleep hand.
She recognised this instantly, she had once lived in an old apartment in New York during a previous job and she knew that there must be air in the system and normally that means there’s no water. She took the half-full cup over to Holly. There seemed no point worrying about the water supply right now, she would tell William when he got up though; she knew it would be last thing he would want to hear because it meant a return to the river and after the story he had told them the night before last; that didn’t seem a good idea but then neither did running out of fresh water.
When she returned to Holly she was awake; although only just.
“Here, take small sips, Holly.”
She took the cup out of Sarah’s hand and sipped at the water inside.
“You’re burning up, Holly,” Sarah said, in the most soothing and calming voice she could muster.
Holly handed her the now empty cup. “I need the toilet, Sarah.”
“Ok, honey, I’ll help you over.”
Slowly, Holly climbed out of her bunk. Sarah could see just how wet Holly was with the sweating she’d done during the night. Her blouse stuck to her as did her dark blue skirt and as she walked to the toilets, Sarah could hear her tights rubbing.
“I think we should get you changed, Holly. You go to the toilet and I’ll head down to the cargo bay and try and find you something that’ll be more comfortable.”
“Ok,” replied Holly.
Sarah helped her into the toilet and then headed back to the hatch in the galley. Slowly she pulled it open and climbed down the ladder, she felt for the lights and found them. With a click the fluorescent tubes flickered and then bathed the hold in a harsh bright light. Sarah headed over to the left-hand side where she remembered David telling them that was where the passengers’ luggage was kept. She found her own bags and pulled them down from the rack. She unclipped the latches and flipped the lid open. She sat in front of the case and looked at the present that was laid on top of her clothes. She smiled to herself and brushed her hands over it. The present was for her niece who was turning thirteen. She had taken ages deciding what she would like when she became a teenager and now after all the thinking and pondering it seemed that her niece would never receive it anyway. Sarah pushed the present to one side and dug through her clothes until she found the PJs she had brought for the short stay she had planned at her sisters. She closed the lid and returned the case to its resting place on the rack; she turne
d and headed back up to the galley.
William was starting to stir as the first light of the day started to find its way through the small cracks where the blinds didn’t quite fit snug against the window frames.
He turned in his bunk and opened his eyes. Looking into the cabin he could see that Sarah and Holly were gone from their bunks. Stretching, he got out and made his way to the galley.
As he stepped through the curtain he saw Sarah coming up from the cargo bay holding her clothing. “Morning, Sarah, how are you?”
“Not bad, William, I had to go and get some clean clothes for Holly, she’s burning up and her clothes are soaking from sweating.”
“Do you think she’ll come out of it?” William asked.
Sarah shrugged her shoulders, “To be honest, I don’t know. I had a look at the wound when you and David had gone looking for Lynsey and…” She stopped.
“And what, Sarah?” William prompted her to continue.
“Well, it looks to me as though it’s badly infected, and we don’t have any antibiotics.”
William nodded in acknowledgement, “Ok, Sarah, keep an eye on her.”
As Sarah replaced the hatch, William turned the tap to get a drink of water but nothing happened.
“I was going to tell you about that, William, once you were up.”
“What do you mean?” he replied.
“I got a drink this morning for Holly and only managed to get half a cup, I think we’re out.”
William tossed the cup into the sink and rested both hands on its side, his head sunk in his shoulders. “Shit, you know what that means, Sarah, don’t you?”
Sarah sighed, “I think I do but I know it’s not where you want to return to.”
William took a sideways glance at her. “As I said, a master of understatement!”
Sarah smiled and left the galley to head back to Holly, who she had left in the toilet.
Sarah knocked on the door of the locked toilet. “Holly, you there?”
“Yeah,” came a short and weak reply.
“Unlock the door, honey, I’ve brought you a change of clothes.”
With a click the door unlocked and Sarah passed in her PJs. Holly took them and the door shut tight again.
William made his way into the economy cabin. The other passengers had started to wake up. Amy and Nick were already up and looking out of the windows on each side of the cabin. William headed over to Nick first and sat next to him.
“Anything?”
Nick turned to confirm whose voice he had just heard.
“Nothing, William, it’s all quiet, the weather looks good but I can’t see anything moving.”
He turned and reached past William.
“Amy, you see anything out there?”
“Nothing, Nick, nothing at all.”
Marcus appeared through the curtain and made his way to where Nick and William sat. He sat in the middle row adjacent to them.
“So what’s the plan today?”
William answered his question. “Where do I start? we need to bury Steven today without delay or he could infect the plane and there’s another problem.” William leaned towards Marcus so that he could whisper, “it looks like we’ve run out of water, which means we’re going to have to go and get some!”
William relaxed back but he could tell by the look on both their faces that they didn’t like the idea any more than he did.
Nick turned from his viewing spot. “Could we not search elsewhere for a water supply?”
William thought about it for a few seconds but as much as he wished they could he knew it wouldn’t help them.
“The problem is that I reckon wherever we go around here there’s a good chance there’ll be something out there that wants to eat us, and I thought of something else last night.”
“What’s that?” asked Marcus.
“It seems to me that there is no way that T Rex could have sneaked up on Lynsey and taken her out of the cargo bay as David thought. She would have heard it, everyone on the plane would have heard it, but also there is no way in hell that it could have fitted under the plane.”
Marcus shook his head. “That’s good news isn’t it?”
William gave him a disdainful look. “Think about it, Marcus, if the T Rex didn’t get her, then what the hell did?”
William could tell by the look on Marcus’s face that the penny had dropped.
“Shit,” said Nick, “and I’ve had another thought.”
“What?” asked Marcus directly.
“Whatever took her may now think of the plane as a place to eat.”
“Agreed,” said William.
Marcus sat quietly for a few seconds and joined in. “Look, I think we need to get organised, we may be smaller and we may be easy prey out in the open but there’s a reason mankind ended up at the top of the food chain.”
“And what’s that?” asked Nick.
“Our brains. In nature we’re quite weak you know, we don’t really stack up against anything in terms of strength and speed, but we’re much cleverer and in the end that’s what counts.”
“Yeah, if we had the technology with us maybe a couple of SUVs, hunting rifles, maybe a tank, but we’ve got nothing except that small hand gun you have and you already said that won’t do much to a big animal.”
Marcus shook his head like a teacher who was getting frustrated with a student who just couldn’t get to the answer.
“You’re not hearing me. We have a ready-made castle here, a safe house. I don’t think anything here is big enough to be much of a threat to the plane, agreed?”
Both Nick and William agreed.
“Ok then, what we need is to work out how we can minimise the risk while we are out of the plane looking for food and water.”
“Ok, Rambo,” joked William, “how the hell do we do that?”
Marcus smiled. “I prefer Hannibal from the A-Team.”
William managed a small laugh. “Ok, Hannibal, you’re going to build a tank from the cases in the cargo hold and I suppose Face here will chat the T Rex up.” He pointed to Nick, who laughed with him.
Amy came across from her seat, “What’s going on here? You seem to be having a laugh.”
“We’ve decided we’re the A-Team, Amy, who’d you like to be?”
“You’re mad, the three of you,” she smiled.
William sat back in the chair. “This is the first time I’ve smiled since I left my flat.”
Sarah got Holly back to her bunk. She had changed her blankets and pillows and given her some more paracetamol for the constant pain she felt in her arm. Holly had almost gone straight back to sleep and Sarah knew from her time helping out in the local hospitals and health centres that this was not a good sign but she also knew there was nothing else she could do for her. Either her body would fight it or this place would claim another life. Once she knew that Holly was asleep, Sarah got up and went looking for William.
Pushing her way through the curtains she found him towards the back of the economy class still sitting with Marcus, Nick and Amy.
“Hi, everyone,” Sarah said as she approached the group.
“Hi, Sarah, how are you this morning?” asked Marcus.
“I slept ok but I’m worried about Holly, she’s not getting any better.”
None of them seemed to react to this news which took Sarah back a little but it seemed by the conversation they carried on with that they were discussing plans around going hunting, and upon reflection, Sarah thought that was as important.
“Anything I can do to help?” Sarah asked them.
William turned to her, “I think if you stay here and see to Holly and just reassure the rest of the group.”
Sarah cocked her head as if she was confused about something. “That sounds to me like you’re going back out there, William?” William sighed again. “I am, Sarah, I know the way, besides, this time we’ll be ready and there will be four of us, plus Marcus has his gun.”
Sa
rah just nodded her head. Really, she knew that she had no reason or right to ask him or even expect him to not go and with that she stood up and made her way back to Holly’s seat.
Marcus looked at William. “Anything going on between you two?”
“No! what gives you that idea?”
“Just the way she reacted when you told her you were going back to the river.”
“Ok then,” Nick interrupted much to William’s relief, “I guess we should get organised.”
William agreed, the sooner he could leave Marcus’s line of questioning about Sarah behind him the better.
“We should head to the cargo bay and see what we can use.” The group agreed with William and they set off to the cargo bay, the fluorescent lights still illuminating it in a harsh white light.
The four of them headed over to the right side of the bay and unclasped the tie straps that held the bulky luggage and other storage containers in place. One by one they emptied and went through the boxes and luggage to see what, if anything, could be used from the excess cargo the plane was carrying.
As Marcus had suspected, there wasn’t much that would be of any use as far as they could see. Nick picked up a large bag containing a full set of golf clubs. “Anybody for a game?” he chuckled. “They could be a good weapon if used correctly,” Marcus stated.
“Well, if you’re so good with them I’ll swap you them for the gun,” replied Nick.
“Now, now, boys!” Amy interrupted them, “lets just find things we can all play with.”
William smiled to himself. He moved a box to one side and found two shovels. He sat back, the find had brought back to him the grizzly task they had yet to complete. “Guys, I’ve found some shovels,” he announced to the group. Nick understood the statement and placed the golf clubs back against the side of the fuselage. “I guess we should just get on with it.” he said.
“Nick, you’re right, that would be the right thing to do; all things being equal but they’re not, and I, for one, am not going out there without something to protect myself,” Marcus replied.
“It’s alright for you, Marcus, you have a 9mm stuck in your trousers,” Nick said.
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