The One Who Got Away

Two: The Fall

Too beautiful to be real

The International Airport of Ikamia is massive. Crowds of people from all over the world thrum around me, but I don't have time to take it all in. Ikamia is six hours behind my homeland so it's 1pm instead of 6pm, and I have a full schedule if I want to make it to the welcome party and surprise Lysander tonight.

First step: get out of the airport and find a taxi.

I walk my suitcase across the baggage collection area, towards the exit. All around me, people are milling and pouring over maps.

As I glance at the people passing me, I wonder if any other SIRI students are here, flying in as late as me. I dismiss the idea. Orientation was this morning. I have to be the only one flying in this late.

I reach the escalator down to the exit into Ikamia, but I have to pause at the top to turn my suitcase around so that it fits on the stair block.

The crowd is loud all around me but I'm focused on ensuring my luggage is in the right place and not about to all tumble out. It made the flight, but the zipper is absolutely bursting. I didn't exactly have time to pack everything carefully!

A few voices are louder than everyone else, probably meaning they're closer. But I'm just trying to position my suitcase properly.

"What's taking so long?"

I barely register the words said from somewhere behind me.

Stiff from my eight hour flight, I begin to slowly straighten up, taking the time to stretch out my back.

"Seriously. Some of us have places to be."

Whoever's talking sounds impatient, and it cuts through my all-consuming daydream about seeing Lysander later. I shake my head and try to think about how I'm going to find a taxi instead; whatever's going on behind me has nothing to do with me.

"Give her a moment, Jet," says a different, much calmer voice.

Oh no... are they taking about me?

Embarrassment flushes my cheeks. I've never gotten in anyone's way before. I didn't mean to block the escalator! There are at least two more on this floor (it's a BIG airport), and I didn't realise how badly I needed to stretch until I bent over. I would never purposefully slow someone down, especially at an airport!

I turn around to apologise with my heart racing inside my chest. It's so loud that it's difficult to absorb everything else happening around me.

"Jet! Careful—"

Before I can face the group I've wronged, someone shouts and something jostles into me. I'm already off balance from turning and now—

I'm falling.

Shit!

I shriek and desperately reach out for anything to stop me.

The room is a blur. My head flies past my feet. It's the weirdest out-of-body sensation to have your whole body suspended parallel to the ground—or in this case, a moving escalator.

I make contact with the escalator hand-rail and I wrap my whole hand solidly around it.

But I forgot one important detail.

Escalator rails move.

Instead of steadying me, the rail seizes my momentum and increases my head-over-heels downwards descent.

My scream fills the whole huge airport, echoing off the highest ceiling I've ever been under.

Then someone grabs my other flailing hand. For the longest second I've ever experienced, I'm stuck in the air, still being pulled downwards by the escalator.