Disastrophe

Chapter Five

Chapter Five

 We were plummeting at a break neck speed. Tears streamed down my face as I clutched the arm rest with one hand and Robbie’s hand with the other. We were still engulfed in flames and, even with the oxygen masks; it was excruciatingly hard to breathe.

“Robbie!” I gulped, trying all I could to keep breathing. “Is this going to end in a Disaster? Or a catastrophe; how is this going to end?” I sobbed. Before he had a chance to reply, the man who went into the toilet with the cigarette was walking up the aisle. Surely it was tremendously difficult and dangerous, but from what I had gathered about him, he didn’t value his like very much. He made me wonder why he was so disgruntled outside the airport, and I had a strong hunch he was responsible for the flames. He came up to me, his face so close to mine I could feel his spit as he spoke.

“No, kid, it’s not going to end in a disaster or a catastrophe. It’s going to be a disastrophe!” He cackled, coughing as he inhaled the smoke-filled air. And with that, he returned to his seat.

“Crystal! He doesn’t sound like he’s from England or America!” Robbie tried to tell me urgently.

“You mean…this is a terrorist attack?”

He nodded. I nearly fainted at the thought. How ironic it was that, on my first ever flight, all of this happens. It made me wonder if the faulty right engine had something to do with sabotage. Or maybe it wasn’t a terrorist attack; he was looking so down that it was likely to be a suicide attack more likely, and he’d decided to take us with him.

 Meanwhile, Thomas was attempting to reach the cockpit all over again. This time he was battling against the strong tilt of the plane and the smoke. He was re-opening the door when the plane came to a very sudden stop, for quite literally a mille-second, and then began spinning upside down and falling dramatically. Thomas fell against the open door and the stewardess, the only person in the cabin with her seatbelt off, was falling all about, and more than once ended up on the ceiling. I could only imagine what was going on in the cockpit, well, actually I saw.

 The first officer was shouting ‘Mayday’ through his headset and the captain was tugging so hard on his controls that I thought they would drop off. By now we could only be a matter of minutes from LA. It was just that small matter of “Are we going to make it alive and still be able to land?”