Airborne

Chapter 14 - Strategy

Sure enough, Yuki's plan worked flawlessly. After the plane landed, the bustle of the other passengers getting off the plane lured the infected towards the front of the plane. This allowed Mike, Yuki and Daryl to make their way into the cargo hold, being cautious when stepping over the scattered luggage, and manuals,

and pools of blood.

There was a hatch that Yuki began to unlock while Mike and Darryl began taking watch, making sure no infected returned.

"Got it!" Yuki whispered with a beam as he swung open the hatch, only to find a metal barrier blocking the way.

A metal crate was blocking the way.

"Fuck" Yuki whispered. "The Cargo hold is filled to the brim, we can't go through there." He hissed to himself while Mike and Darryl gawked.

"You didn't know that? I thought you worked here!" Darryl snapped at Yuki, Mike immediately standing up and slapping his hand across Daryl's mouth.

"Shut up!" He hissed, "They can still hear us."

"I'm thinking" Yuki pondered, "The pilot can open the cargo hold door, to let all the luggage out to allow us to pass through. B-but there is no way to contact him." He explained to the other two.

Just then, Mike noticed it was getting dark outside, how long had they been traveling? 8 hours? give or take some timezones?

Just then, they heard passengers entering the plane again, their shrieking causing the infecting to pile against the suitcase fort once more.

"Whats going on?" Mike asked, before jumping in the air with the sound of a gunshot. The infected howled at the earsplitting pop, the chorus of wails and moans that followed pierced Mike's brain. Someone had just killed, no doubt about it. Were they bitten? Gone crazy?

"Oh shit, we're taking off again." Yuki murmured as he felt the ground begin to move under them. "What did we miss?"

"Dubai is overrun." Darryl stated coldly. "Where else is left?"

"Who cares?" Yuki asked with a nervous smile. "Let's just save our own skins first." He said before suddenly the plane sped up.

"Get to the front of the cabin, we need to buckle up." Yuki instructed Mike and Daryl as he led them both to some seats.

"When that plane takes off, infected will be falling down here to the back. We need to make sure we don't go down there with them." He explained as he sat onto a seat.

"Can't we just go into a bathroom?" Daryl asked nervously.

"That's what we do after takeoff." Yuki said with a grin. "While all of them have tangled themselves in the back, we make our way to a bathroom and wait for them to be drawn back to the suitcase fort."

"What next?" Mike blurted out as he sat down in his seat.

"I don't know, I'm making it up as I go along. They don't train you for this scenario you know." Yuki said, beaming as the plane lurched forward, Yuki reached forward and pulled Daryl into a seat. Mike could hear people up front holding onto the luggage fort, making sure it didn't go down with the infected.

"Seatbelts in!" Yuki snapped at the other two, causing Mike and Daryl to immediately respond. It was an obvious rule, but Yuki was a flight attendant, he clearly knew what he was doing and it was his duty as a flight attendant to guarantee his passengers' safety.

Sure enough, the plane tilted back as it lifted itself from the ground, Mike looking back to glance towards Dubai, the skyscrapers towering over the clouds, the final rays of dusk reflecting off the glass towers. Mike noticed the several pillars of smoke emitting from the city, Dubai was also gone, alongside with most of Asia, Bangkok had quarantined itself, but considering the circumstances, it was also doomed.

Mike's train of thought was interrupted by the howls of infected as they tumbled past them. Yuki was right, the swarm of undead fumbling past the three of them, a pile of thrashing limbs, looking for a surface to latch onto like cockroaches. Darryl winced as he felt a icy hand grip onto his ankle.

"Fuck!" He hissed as he began kicking his leg against his seat, trying to crush the fingers to get them to let go. He whimpered as he felt the fingers digging into his skin, clenching his teeth as it drew blood, dripping onto the carpet and running down the walkway.

However, the sound of tearing flesh was heard as black goo abruptly stained Daryl's pants. He glanced back at the horde of squirming infected below. One of them was missing a hand, the former body of Fiona as a matter of fact, or whatever she had become by now, her once well kept hair now going in all directions, matted with blood and several bald patches.

Daryl gawked as he glanced down and noticed Fiona's severed hand, still having an iron grip on his ankle, blood oozing from the fingers and dripping down towards the pile of zombies below.

Crushed by her own comrades.

Just then, the plane stabilized and the lights began dimming down, likely for the other passengers to sleep.

"Now!" Yuki hissed as he undid his seatbelt. Mike and Daryl soon following. Daryl glanced down at the hand gripping his ankle, he winced as he knelt over and pulled the hand from his body, finger by finger, before tossing it back at the horde. Still with a wounded ankle, he stumbled into the closet bathroom, all while the horde of infected still lay tangled behind them.

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Finally, I wrote a new chapter for this book.

It took a while, but I finally got inspired again, although it's short.