by James Gunn
The terrorist waved her dagger at the mass of them. “If you attack and not die, my comrade crash bus. This bus not go fast but fast enough, and if raised crash do injury to many.” As if in response to her words, the body of the vehicle began to elevate itself from the ground. The balance seemed to shift from side to side as if it were about to overturn, and people shrank back into their seats to keep it stable. The flight attendant retreated to a seat at the far end and seemed willing to have someone else assume responsibility.
Johnson stepped forward. “No one is going to do anything rash—"
“Appeaser!” said the woman who had been seated beside him in the airplane. “Terrorist-lover!"
The terrorist waved her knife at the woman. “You! Come!” She motioned the woman forward.
“No,” the young woman said faintly, trying to fade into her seat.
“You!” The terrorist rapped once on the glass door behind her. The vehicle turned and leaned, turned back and leaned in the other direction. The passengers tensed and tried to keep the mobile lounge from tipping over by shifting their weight to the opposite side. “You!” the terrorist repeated. “Come!"
The young woman shrank back, but the passengers around her pushed her forward until she stood, trying to retreat, beside Johnson. “Don't be afraid,” Johnson said, taking her arm reassuringly. “You won't be hurt."
“You not be hurt,” the terrorist said in her husky voice, “if you do as told—if all do as told. You—hostage. You and you,” she said, indicating Johnson and the young woman. “If any move wrong, these die first.” She reached up with her left hand and removed her uniform cap. Black hair fell around her shoulders. Now there was no mistaking her sex. She was a beautiful woman, even though her face was set in an expression of savage determination.
“Fatima!” a foreign voice said from among the passengers. The Palestinian who had talked so long to Johnson stood up and started forward, hands half raised as if beholding an apparition.
“Fatima?” the Palestinian said again.
The woman had raised her dagger in quick alarm. “You know my name? How—?” And then, “Mohammed? It be you?"
They both spoke rapidly in a foreign language as they approached. A sequence of emotions crossed their faces. The Palestinian called Mohammed was about to embrace the woman he had called Fatima when she stepped back and motioned with her dagger at the passengers. “I always ready,” she said. “Not do anything.” She stepped forward and put her arms around Mohammed.
“That man is under arrest,” the flight attendant said. “He tried to hijack the plane to Teheran."
Fatima's face brightened. “Ah, Mohammed! You try!"
Mohammed looked despondent. “I fail."
“He's still under arrest,” the flight attendant said.
“No more,” Fatima said proudly. “My brother go with me. He freedom fighter like me."
The mobile lounge slowed, and she stepped back from her brother. The compartment lurched as the lounge turned. Through the forward windows Johnson could see the white bulk of the space shuttle. When, as the mobile lounge passed the shuttle's tail, it came into the view of the seated passengers on the right, some of them gasped and others began to talk excitedly.
“You and you!” Fatima said to Johnson and the young woman. “Out!” She motioned toward the front of the vehicle. After they had passed, she reached down and took another plastic dagger from her boot. She handed it to Mohammed. “You follow! Guard!” She turned to the other passengers. “Far to ground. Anybody move, these die. You be killer.” The lounge had stopped with its front pressed to the left side of the shuttle.
The shuttle, still warm from its passage through the resisting air, stood at the end of a white runway marked by the black skid marks of innumerable airplane wheels that had touched down there in the years since the airport had been in use. They stood with their faces close to the radiating white tiles. The shuttle looked much bigger than it had looked from the air.
A dark-faced young man in uniform emerged from the control booth beside them and knocked sharply on the shuttle's side. A crack appeared in the tile and widened into a squared oval of darkness. A middle-aged man in astronaut's uniform appeared in the entranceway blinking in the sunlight. As he moved onto the lounge's platform, the young man who had knocked moved back into the control booth and pushed something. The lounge began lowering.
“What's happening?” the astronaut asked.
“But that's Henry Chrisman,” the young woman beside Johnson said almost simultaneously.
As both sets of words still seemed to hang in the air the woman called Fatima had moved beside the astronaut and placed the tip of her dagger under his chin and her left hand on the man's shoulder so that he could not draw back. “Not resist! No move quick. No one get hurt."
The lounge had reached the ground. “Come!” Fatima commanded, leading Chrisman forward. Johnson and the others followed as Fatima motioned to Mohammed to bring them off the lounge. The lounge retreated from the shuttle's side about ten feet and then began to raise itself once more into the air. The dark-faced young man in uniform slipped from the booth and dropped to the ground. Fatima led them around the nose of the shuttle as voices came from the shuttle's hatchway above calling to Chrisman and demanding to know what had happened. On the other side of the shuttle a tow truck was pulling to a stop and an electric car was approaching.
Mohammed spoke rapidly to Fatima in the foreign language they shared, and she responded curtly. A man in coveralls got out of the passenger side of the tow truck. “What's that lounge doing here? Has it got people in—?” The man saw Chrisman and stopped.
At the same time the electric car came to a stop behind the truck and the driver got out. “What's going on—?” He stopped.
“All you—truck driver, too,” Fatima said, pressing her dagger into the soft flesh under Chrisman's chin as if to emphasize her command of the situation. “Go other side of shuttle. Stay! Do right, Chrisman not be hurt. Hostages not be hurt. Do not—be much bloodshed."
The driver of the truck got out of the far side. Chrisman said, “Do as they say. Let's get as many people out of this as we can."
Slowly the three men strung themselves out and rounded the nose of the shuttle.
“Get into car—back seat,” Fatima told Johnson and the young woman. “Get in also,” she told Mohammed. “Keep knife ready. Kill if move.” Mohammed swallowed hard and followed them.
The young man in uniform led Chrisman to the automobile and pushed him into the passenger side of the front seat while Fatima was getting into the driver's side. “This electric car,” she said. “Only steer and push to go. Right hand for knife. Mohammed has knife. You move—you die."
“Don't worry,” Chrisman said calmly. “I'm not going to do anything rash, and I'm sure these others are not going to do anything either."
The young woman murmured something weakly that sounded like assent, and Johnson said, “We'll all be sensible."
Ahead of them the tow truck began to move, and the car in which the rest were riding followed as it left the runway and, picking up speed, headed toward a section of fence around the perimeter of the airport. A moment later it plunged through the fence, and the car followed through the gap, crossing the flattened chain links. In a few moments, rolling across grass, the truck and the car behind it had reached the highway. The truck stopped. The driver got out and opened the car door beside Chrisman, motioned him to move over, and got in beside him, his knife in his hand. The car rolled onto the highway, got off at the first exit, and pulled up behind a traditional automobile parked along a side street. They got into the other car and it sped off into the hills of Virginia.
* * * *
The building was an old farmhouse. They reached it by a dirt road after they had been traveling in hills for half an hour. It was isolated: they had not seen another dwelling for at least fifteen minutes. The house was set in a valley and was surrounded by large trees. It would have been a
pleasant place under other circumstances. The hostages did not see the inside of the house, but it looked as if it had not been occupied regularly for some time. The roof was mossy and places on it seemed damp or discolored, and the wood siding had not been painted for many years.
The hostages were led to a barn that seemed even older and in poorer repair than the house. It had been converted into a prison by first nailing shut all the doors except a small one set into the main barn door, and then nailing new planks, startling in their contrast to the weathered wood they covered, across all the openings, including the hayloft door. The hostages were led and pushed from the car to the barn and through the small door. When they were close, they could see that it had been equipped with a large new bolt.
The young woman was tense and seemed close to hysteria. Chrisman was calm and thoughtful. Johnson was quiet, as if he knew something that the others did not. Mohammed was nervous, particularly when his sister told him that he would stay with the hostages inside the makeshift prison.
“Let's talk this over,” Chrisman said, turning just inside the barn, looking out through the still-open doorway at his captors. “Surely we—"
“No talk,” Fatima said. “Talk for leaders. They do what we ask, you go free."
“But what do you want?"
“No talk!” she repeated fiercely.
At her tone, her uniformed companion lifted the revolver he had retrieved from the glove compartment of the car and waved it threateningly. Chrisman opened his mouth again and Johnson touched his arm cautioningly.
Fatima took the plastic knife from Mohammed's shaky hand. She said something in their foreign language. Mohammed protested, and then she spoke in English. “You no need. Guard outside. They attack, you yell. You listen! They plan something, they whisper so you not hear, you tell. We bring food soon.” She pushed him gently inside and closed the door behind him.
They stood in the semidarkness of the barn's interior. The night was not yet upon them, but here in the valley only a few beams of sunshine penetrated, and only a few of those got through chinks in the barn's siding; still, it was enough to reveal them to each other and the interior of the barn. On the dirt floor a few worn blankets had been tossed on mounds of old hay. The place smelled of dirt and mold and decaying vegetation. On the left a ladder led to the hayloft. Chrisman climbed it with catlike grace, moved around in the loft, and then quietly came back down.
“Well,” the young woman said, her voice close to breaking. “Is there a way out?"
Chrisman looked at Mohammed.
“You're the great scientist!” the girl said. “Surely you can find a way out for us?"
“There's a solution to every problem,” Chrisman said evenly. “But we don't want to discuss it in front of our guard here."
“He won't do anything,” the girl said scornfully. “He couldn't even hijack an airplane."
“I try,” Mohammed said. “But if you talk I must tell. If you go apart to talk, I must tell that, too. I not want to see harm come to you. I not want to see bad things happen. But I must do these things that I am told."
“Any solution ought to involve Mohammed,” Johnson said reasonably. “It ought to be good for him, too."
“Sometimes it's impossible for everybody to win,” Chrisman said.
“And sometimes if everybody doesn't win, nobody wins,” Johnson said. “We've all had experience with that lately. But first maybe we should introduce ourselves. I'm Bill Johnson, and this is Mohammed."
“I gather some of you already know me,” Chrisman said. “I'm Henry Chrisman."
“And you invented the bomb neutralizer among other things,” the young woman said. “That almost solved the terrorist problem."
Mohammed's face brightened with understanding. “Ah, yes!"
“But not quite,” Chrisman said ruefully. “And you are... ?"
“Jan Delaney,” she said. “I'm nobody. I was going to visit my sister in Washington when all this happened. My first trip to Washington. My first trip anywhere on an airplane. And all this had to happen! I'm a computer programmer in Los Angeles...."
“I'm just a nobody, too,” Johnson said. “But maybe if we try very hard, we can come up with an answer to this problem."
“It must have been just a great stroke of luck, picking me off like that,” Chrisman mused. “They must have had their people planted at Dulles waiting for a target of opportunity, and I fell into their hands. They might have had to wait for years.” His voice changed. “My wife will be worried."
“My people have learned patience,” Mohammed said proudly.
“I hope they are able to learn something else,” Johnson said.
“We can always kick our way out of here,” Chrisman said, looking at Mohammed. “This old barn is ready to fall apart if you lean against it. But it will make noise. The question is: who will get hurt?"
“We don't want anyone to get hurt,” Johnson said.
“Mr. Johnson here is not only a lover of terrorists,” Delaney said scornfully, “but a coward as well."
“If anyone gets hurt,” Johnson said, “it not only will be a personal tragedy, it will make the situation worse for everybody."
“The question is: What are their demands?” Chrisman said, leaning back against a pillar. The pillar creaked, and Chrisman straightened up.
“No matter what their demands are, we can't do anything about them,” Johnson said. “And no matter what the official response is, it can't make anything better."
“How's that?” Chrisman asked. He spread a couple of blankets on the hay and sat down on one of them. “Sorry,” he said to Delaney. “I've had a hard day."
“So have I,” she said, and sat down on the other blanket, not far from him, as if casting her lot with the famous scientist. If it came to a vote, it was clear it would be two of them against one of Johnson.
“All they can ask for is something that will improve their ability to terrorize: jailed terrorists, a dismantling of security measures, money, weapons, airplanes....” Johnson said evenly. “They know they can't get Palestine back for us.” He looked at Chrisman and smiled. “For you. We don't count."
“In this kind of thing,” Chrisman said, “nobody counts. We're all pretty small in comparison to the size of the problem."
“It's that we've got to solve,” Johnson said.
Delaney looked scornful. “You think you're going to solve the problem of terrorism here in this barn, in a few hours, when all the world's wisest men haven't been able to do anything about it in the last twenty-five years?"
“Maybe we've got the last good chance,” Johnson said.
“If you have an idea maybe we shouldn't discuss it in front of our friend here,” Chrisman said, nodding at Mohammed.
“I go back there,” Mohammed said proudly, pointing toward a dark corner of the barn. The last of the beams of sunlight had disappeared, and only the darkening twilight kept the gloom from being total.
“Any solution would have to involve you,” Johnson said to Mohammed.
“Some kind of solution!” Delaney said, sniffing.
“Let him talk,” Chrisman said. “I like the way this man thinks.” He settled back on his elbows as if to listen, but just then the door opened.
“Is all right, Mohammed?” Fatima asked from outside.
Mohammed nodded and then realizing she could not see him, said in a shaky voice, “Yes."
Another Middle Easterner, one they had not seen before, came through the door with a pistol in his hand. Behind him came Fatima with a sandwich-filled paper plate in one hand and a thermos jug in the other. “You not hunger,” she said, “as so many of our people.” She put the plate and the jug on the dirt floor of the barn, and motioned her head at Mohammed as she turned and went back through the doorway.
Shamefacedly avoiding the gazes of the hostages, Mohammed followed his sister through the doorway. In a few minutes he returned. The guard looked hard at him and then retreated through the door. The door
closed. They could hear it bolted.
“I tell my sister nothing,” Mohammed said. “I know not if she believe me."
“Hell,” Delaney said, “I don't believe you."
“There was nothing to tell,” Chrisman said. “Now. What's your idea?” he said to Johnson.
As if he were gauging their capacities to understand and to change, Johnson looked at the scientist sprawled back on the blanket and the young woman sitting tensely on hers, hugging her knees to her chest, and the young Palestinian standing nervously apologetic nearby. “First, perhaps we should eat before the food gets any older,” he said and smiled. “And maybe we can think better when we have food in our stomachs."
Delaney didn't want to let Mohammed have any of the sandwiches until Chrisman commented wryly, between bites of the dry bread and cheese, that the food might be poisoned, and then she wouldn't eat until she had seen the effect on Mohammed, even after Chrisman apologized and pointed out that it wouldn't make sense to poison them when they could be disposed of just as easily in other ways, and in any case they wouldn't take the chance of poisoning one of their own. But Delaney's fears were not logical. Finally, however, they had all eaten and drunk the cool, iceless, odd-tasting water, though Delaney had spit out a mouthful when Chrisman said, “Of course the water may be drugged to put us out—I'm sorry. It's just water from an old well."
By now they were all seated on blankets, and the barn was almost completely dark. Their captors had not provided a light, and they were faceless voices in the dark, like children telling ghost stories late at night. “Of course we could break out of here now,” Chrisman said quietly. “It's hard to believe they have enough guards to catch us in the darkness. Of course, we would have to blunder around among the trees and brush. They might have automatic weapons, and one of the terrorists might lose his head and open fire. We wouldn't know what direction to go, either. We couldn't go back down the dirt road or we'd be recaptured for sure. There'll be a full moon later tonight. That would help us, but it would help them, too. And there's our friend, here."