The Flight

Frank wasn’t a firefighter, but even his uneducated eyes could see the fire was spreading.

It had started maybe five minutes before in the overhead luggage bin near the front of the JAL 777’s economy class section he was stuck in.

Figures. I was worried I’d land at Haneda and step off into a repeat of the Great Kanto Earthquake, complete with Tokyo sinking under me…and instead I get this.

The cabin was filling fast with dense acrid smoke, but he could see the cabin crew backing away from the blaze they’d already emptied two fire extinguishers onto. For all the more good it had done, they might as well have saved the effort.

Why the pilot hadn’t depressurized the cabin to starve the fire of the oxygen it needed was something Frank couldn’t figure out. He hadn’t even felt the plane start to descend. It was like the flight crew was oblivious to what was happening……

Or were they already dead?

It was that sudden thought, that he might be trapped in an out-of-control airliner, that there was nothing he could do but wait for either smoke inhalation killed him, or the heat cooked him, that made him think of what was one seat over from him. Frank shouldn’t be in this seat, or on this plane, but a mechanical problem with the airliner that was supposed to deliver him to LAX for his original flight had put him here. Middle seat, halfway back in the Economy section, on the next flight JAL staff could get him on.

On his right side was a fat Japanese businessman who gave him a dirty look every time he had to get up and go to the bathroom. On his left was a slender Japanese woman who’d had her head down reading a graphic novel on her tablet since before Frank had taken his seat. Beyond her, though, was the thing that drew Franks attention:

one of the emergency exits.

If he could get to it, Frank was going to pull the release handle and let the pressure sweep him out of the burning aircraft. He knew he’d rather die like that than any of the other ways he was likely to die if he didn’t. He glanced at the woman, and found her staring back at over the top of a red scarf she’d wrapped around her face. Noise was filling the cabin. People beginning to scream, the increasing roar of the fire, so he leaned toward her.

“Can you understand me?”

Frank had done his best not to scream in the woman’s ear, but he was worried she might not have heard him until she gave a single nod of her head.

“I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to burn to death. If you’ll change seats with me, I plan to open the emergency exit behind you and let myself be pulled out of the plane. If I’m going to die, I want it to be on my terms. If you don’t want to die like that, you can strap into my seat and face whatever happens next. Do you understand what I’m planning?”

Another nod, this one quicker, then the scarf came down.

“Don’t leave me here, take me with you. I don’t want to burn either.”

Now it was Frank’s turn to nod. “Okay, then get up and you can sit on my lap. I’ll wrap my free arm around you so when I open the door, you should come out with me.”

No nod this time, the woman simply stood and allowed Frank into her seat before sitting down on him. But rather than wait for him to wrap an arm around her, she put both of her arms around Frank’s neck and buried her face in his chest. Frank pulled the guard off of the emergency hatch handle, wrapped his fingers around it, and hesitated.

“What’s your name?”

“Himari, Sato Himari”

Frank wrapped his arm around the last person he’d meet in life and pulled her close. “I’m Frank Cullim. Goodbye, Sato Himari.”

The handle moved far easier than Frank imagined it would. So he still had a firm grip on it when it flew away from the now flaming airliner. For a moment, he thought his arm would go with it, leaving him stuck in the plane. Then he and Himari were out of the opening, falling though a sky as dark as death itself. Above him, he could see a trail of flames jetting out of the opening he’d just made in the airliner, but it was just the tail of an orange glow that now came from nearly every window on the plane. The door handle was still in Frank’s hand, so he let it go and did his best to wrap his protesting arm around the woman he’d share his last moments with.

It was cold, and Frank found himself gasping, trying to draw air in that didn’t exist this high up. But as the blackness closed around him, there was one warm spot, pressed close to his chest, two arms still clinging desperately to his neck.

I guess if I have to die, this isn’t the worst way to go.

#

With that thought, Frank jerked awake. He’d been waiting 13 hours in the LAX concourse for a flight to replace the one he’d missed. A young man in the uniform of the gate staff was standing in front of him.

“Sorry to wake you, Mr. Cullim, but we have a last-minute cancellation on the flight that will be boarding in a few moments at Gate 15. It’s an Economy-class seat, but you’ll get to Tokyo sooner than you would if you wait for the flight we’d rebooked you on.”

This is how it all started. This is how I ended up on that burning plane!

Frank didn’t know what was going on, but he knew he didn’t want to take that flight. Then he remembered the arms around his neck, the final trust a stranger had given to him.

“Which way is it to Gate 15?”

Frank had never been one to run, but this time, he did his best. Most people heard his pounding footsteps and dodged out of his way, and the few that didn’t he shoved aside without a second thought. He had someone to catch up with. Gate 15 was ahead, and his breath was coming in gasps when he saw the red scarf. Himari was just standing, looking around like she didn’t know where she was.

He made his way to her through the people starting to crowd towards the gate. Whether she hadn’t had the same nightmare Frank had, or if she’d convinced herself it wasn’t real, Himari picked up her carry-on luggage and moved to join the boarding line. Frank stretched his hand out and tapped her on the shoulder. Her head came around, her eyes rose to meet his, then opened wide. He did his best to give her a smile as he spoke.

“Himari, I think that’s a flight neither of us want to get on. Don’t you agree?”