What the hell was that? Collin thought as a terrible lurching feeling started welling up in his gut. One moment everything was plain and usual, the next he felt like he'd just gotten hit by one hell of a haymaker to the face. A moment after things un-fuzzed all the electronics were out, the plane engine sounded like it was being butchered by a gremlin, and every passenger in a state of mind to realize just how concerning this current state of things was erupted into a chaotic cacophony of panic.
This better not be terrorists, he thought as he breathed in and out deeply, focusing on just himself as best as he could. Heartbeat, pulse, breath, movement, his internal symphony was a good distraction, though, whatever was going on was too much for his normal calming methods to be much use. Everything began to feel more intense, his senses heightened to a fever pitch as, like the first dip on a roller coaster, the plane started turning down towards Earth, sending Collin's stomach into his throat.
He gripped the arm rests of his seat deathly tight as he ducked his head and prepared himself for the worst, narrowly missing tumbling luggage sent flying by the drop. The cries of the people around him had grown yet more terrified, and many times louder, drowning out his thoughts as the weight of the moment filled him.
What do I do? What do I do? What do I do? His instincts cried out to take action despite his helplessness in the face of the ongoing plummet to a watery grave. He felt ill, he felt overwhelmed, and he felt motivated to try something, anything.
What can I do though? What could I possibly do to fight against it? How to solve it? There has to be something!
He unbuckled his seatbelt, threw off his coat, and took a deep breath. This was stupid, insane even. Yet, he had to do something, anything, to curb this disaster before time ran out for everyone.
***
"Blake, whatever you do, do not let up on the yoke! We need to get this plane under control!" Clarice yelled over the deafening cacophony that now filled the air. She didn't think she'd ever see a more terrifying sight than the sea quickly growing closer through the cockpit window. She was just thankful that the steering still seemed to be working, with any luck they could glide to a gentle landing. As long as neither of them stopped fighting against the steering for a second, that was.
"Not like this. Not like this. Not like this." Blake muttered under his breath, holding his steering controls in a death grip. "What the hell, Clarice! Just what the hell is going on!!?"
Wouldn't that be great to know? She thought as her hands began to ache, her arms growing weary in the fight to regain control of the plane. "This doesn't make any sense. Blake, did we get struck by lightning or something?"
"No way, clouds are too wispy for a bolt from the blue" her partner said, and she had to agree. "Maybe we stumbled into something? I don't know, like a secret military base, or the splash zone of some black ops weapon test? Maybe the electronics are being jammed and they're trying to take the plane down?"
"Oh, yeah, sure. 'They' are out to get us all right! This is definitely happening because 'they' decided a well-travelled flight route was the place to put a top secret whatever-the-fuck!"
There really wasn't any plausible situation either could conjure up that made the sudden inexplicable life-or-death clusterfuck make sense. Which just left the implausible stuff. Which was all implausible for a reason. Clarice liked to think of herself as open minded, Blake doubly so, but neither of them were chopping at the bit to wonder if the Deep State Reptillian Overlords chilling in the Hollow Earth might be to blame.
"Whatever it is, we aren't going to figure it out with guesstimation. Let's just focus on getting things under control." Blake concluded as the nose of the plane finally stopped tilting and started to right itself.
"Alright, here we go. Just a little more…." Clarice was feeling anxious now, her adrenaline was spiking, not a conscious thought dared flow through her mind as her absolute focus narrowed down on one simple goal; keeping every last living being on this plane from getting a live crash course on what happens when a hunk of metal flying at incredible speeds hits a large body of water thousands of miles below.
Inch by gravity defying inch the nose continued to tip back upright, the thunder of storm-clouds and patter of rain against the plane in the darkening sky lending a certain thematic ambiance to the situation.
Wait, storm-clouds??
Clarice had to do a double take. Sure enough, there they were, striking and thundering in a way that she'd find impressive and awe inspiring if they weren't liable to get her killed under present conditions.
"Blake, I know we lost a lot of altitude, so I just need to confirm: were there any hints of storm clouds in this region before the power cut?"
"Now really isn't the time Clarice!"
Blake's knuckles were stark white as he choked up on the throttle with all he had. He took in ragged breaths through gritted teeth, the veins on his neck and head bulging as he pulled up on the yoke with all his strength. His words cut right to the chase, and she was almost about to refocus on the controls, when an eerie light from out the corner of her eye caught her full attention.
She was already in motion as it raced towards the plane. Everything felt like it was in slow motion as she threw her hands around Blade and tried to force him to duck down with her. It was a ridiculous, suicidal act considering they were at the wheel of the aircraft, but this situation was weird, and that light was weirder. After all, lightning doesn't normally come in shades of red.
Then she heard the scream, loud enough to make her ears bleed, shrill enough to make her blood run cold, and close enough to make her more terrified than she'd ever been in her life.
A second more of hellish fright passed, and her world turned red as freshly drawn blood...
***
Taylor was already feeling strange. They had been since the airport. When the power cut and the plane started tipping, they thought things couldn't get any worse. Their hairs were standing on end, sweat streaking from every available pore, cold chills running down their spine, the whole works. Taylor was shaking like crazy before it hit, and once it did, it felt like they would never stop shaking again.
There was a loud crack at the front end of the plane at first, sounded like the bastard acoustic offspring of a lightning strike and a fork in the microwave. When it hit Taylor's vision went blurry, only thin trails of a red tinged electrical energy streaking through the plane's superstructure. The plane dipped again, not helping matters, as Taylor heard a noise, growing from faint to loud, like the roar of a predator rushing ever closer. It grew deafening, all encompassing, positively cacophonous. Taylor closed and shut their eyes as hard as they possibly could, covered their ears with their hands, and started praying to any sort of higher power that might be out there to help them all. If ever a prayer was to be answered, now felt like the time.
"Something, anything, please. This can't be the end." Taylor murmured as even their words were drowned out by the chaos closing all around them. They couldn't breathe, touch became numbed, everything was spinning, and not just because the plane was currently crashing down to earth.
Then they saw it, a faint red glow in the distance amidst a sea of white and blue. Taylor opened their eyes up in surprise, and yet, that vision remained cemented in their sight.
You see me, a voice in their head said. Did you bring them here?
Taylor didn't know how to respond, Taylor didn't know if they should respond! They were hearing voices, seeing things! Considering the circumstances, the high stress, the adrenaline, and their earlier episode at the airport, this had to be some manic episode.
"This isn't real. This can't be real." Taylor whispered to themselves. "I must be dreaming, right? This is a dream, all of this, I'll wake up, and it'll be gone"
Useless, the voice said again, mere humans are not welcome here. Die, or leave, or reveal how you reached this place. I shan't give you fools another warning!
"Go away. Just leave me alone. Just be quiet!" Taylor spoke in mind just as much in body. They heard, they felt, they say it react. The red flickered quizzically, the noise softened from a scream to a lower rumbling, while an overwhelming feeling of indignation imposed itself upon Taylor.
…We see… It's a shame you were born so unlucky.... Farewell...
And then the red started swelling again, the noise returned more cacophonous than ever before as the sky itself screamed like it were bled. Taylor could feel a pressure that felt smothering, like their meat would evaporate off their bones and their bones scattered to the wind like so much sand.
"Someone, anyone, help us…" Taylor asked one more time.
They were answered in a golden flash, the sky flooded with a brilliant light, and a sound like an atomic bomb put through an audio synthesizer, grand and overwhelming, reverberated mightily throughout the screaming sky.
Taylor themselves grew silent then, and drifted off into a sleepless embrace.
***
"Blake, Blake get up. Blake!" Clarice shook her partner like he was a rattle, not that it did any good. He remained slump over like a sack of potatoes, either unconscious, or worse.
She had no earthly idea just what the actual hell had happened. One moment it felt like the incarnate wrath of some ancient God was bearing down upon the plane, the next moment a comet or something was over the horizon, lighting the sky up in a golden glow. A second later, and a second before she could turn away from her hurt partner to get a good look at what was unfolding outside, something buffeted the plane. Some pressure wave was her best guess, not that there was a single sure sign of what had caused it. All she knew was the clouds immediately around them had been cleared, and the plane itself was steadily spiraling out of control from the force of the recent shocks to its superstructure.
If I survive this, I'm never going to complain about things being boring ever again, she thought, grabbing the controls anew and working to get the plane back under control. Any more excitement and I think I'll just drop dead, one way or another.
It was then, fighting against the controls, partner out cold next to her, not a clue in the world where the plane was nor what on earth was going on, when she heard a knock on the cockpit door behind her.
"Hello?" Spoke a dour, deep voice. "Need any help in there?"
Clarice thought for a moment about what type of crazy bastard would be willing to unbuckle their seat and climb all the way to the front of the plane during a time like this, but then she remembered the old adage of not looking the gift horse in the mouth.
"Yeah, I do." She shouted back to him. "Door's locked though, electronics being busted means I can't get it open from my seat, and I don't think I need to tell you why leaving the controls is a bad idea right now?"
"Got it." The man shot back at her, matter of fact. She heard him try the handle and, when he became satisfied that the power shutting down had not, in fact, opened up the electronic locks like in the movies, she heard several loud cracks against the door.
"Don't bother, airliner doors these days can take a grenade blast," she said, the cracks against the door growing louder.
"Is that all? One moment then…"
With one final, deafening thwack into the door, she heard it bust right open behind her.
"Wha… but… I don't… you… how the fuck did you get it open!?!"
Clarice was left gobsmacked as she watched the man rush over to Blake, a sullen serious expression plastered over the tough guy's face.
"Maybe whatever's been walloping the plane loosened it up? Maybe the airliners cheeped out on the doors? Maybe I really do hit like a megaton bomb? Who knows? Who cares?"
I do. She thought bitterly, already running the lawsuit over in her head for when they land. I should have known those bastards would've been the death of me at some point.
She glanced over at him while continuing her battle for control of the plane, and saw the man put his thick skinned fingers up to Blake's neck.
"Pulse is still good." He said, unbuckling him from the seat and laying him out a corner of the cockpit. "In my professional opinion, I think he has a concussion, probably banged his head during… whatever it is that's been going on, I guess".
"Professional opinion? What, are you a doctor?" She inquired as he took up Blake's seat, strapping himself in.
"Combat Sports practitioner," he explained. "Mostly boxing, some MMA. You don't need to worry, I've punched people in the head harder than your friend hit his. He'll be fine."
"Great, now if you could take the stick and yank it hard, that'd be lovely right about now!"
Clarice only just finished getting the words out of her mouth before the plane was buffeted by a brand new wave of turbulence, while lightning from newly approaching storm clouds stabbed the sky around them, threatened to strike the plane at any moment.
He did as he was told, nearly tearing the yoke from the cockpit from the sounds it was making at first, though he got the hint pretty quick that he should let up on it a tiny bit.
"Alright. So, you have good eyesight, boxer?" She asked, and he replied with a gruff 'mmhhhmm'.
"Great, can you see any places we could land? No idea how much longer this plane can glide for."
A few seconds passed as his eyes scanned ahead and below.
"Keep going straight forwards"
"Really, there's land up ahead?"
"Maybe. It doesn't really matter. It's the only opening we have."
"What do you mean by that?"
Clarice didn't like his tone. She didn't like the situation. And she absolutely hated that he was more than likely right.
"Thunderstorm. Like a wall. I can see flashes alongside dark clouds from one end of the horizon to the other."
"Oh. Great. Some new fucked up implausible nonsense is going to kill us. Just when I thought the madness had let up!" She barked at him, which he took without a grunt or shrug to be found.
Well, shit. Now I just feel like a jerk....
"It's in front of us. It's happening. And we need to deal with it. So just keep flying straight ahead." He spoke to her matter of fact, pointing to a small gap in the storm clouds. "Looks like a small hole, patch of sky is brighter there than anywhere else. Bodes well, don't you think?"
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Clarice thought back to the red and gold lights, shuddering at the sheer helplessness she'd felt in those moments. There isn't a single safe place in this sky, she thought, reluctantly steering the plane towards that one promisingly hospitable patch.
"If it's a way out, it's a way out. Don't dress it up. Odds are, Murphy's Law is about to blindside us."
"This is how I speak normally." He insisted. "Also, I'm more than proficient at avoiding blindsides. So long as I'm here, you shouldn't have much to worry about."
How reassuring.
His sentiment reeked of ego and unwarranted self-assuredness. The type of attitude that rubbed Clarice the wrong way worse than anything else.
"Just keep your hands steady on that stick, keep your eyes peeled for any more madness, and let me get us out of this alive."
"Okay"
He agreed without a word spoken back, giving Clarice a much needed respite from idle banter. With the sky somehow growing thicker by the moment with heavy dark storm clouds, lightning filling their front view more than seemed possible, Clarice felt her shoulders growing strained by the minute from the weight of the situation. She felt sweat pour down her brow as she deftly steered clear of the worst of the storm brewing around them, her hands growing clammy as she clenched the flight controls in a death grip. Her hair stood on end as stray bolts hammered down against the outer hull of the plane, she was only glad that there wasn't much more in the way of damage that could be done to the thoroughly crippled flying machine.
If nothing else though, at least the wings remained functional.
"Almost there…" she spoke with baited breath as the opening grew alluringly closer, a bright light amidst darkness, growing steadily smaller with every passing minute.
She could scarcely believe it was almost over. The peril almost passed. She felt her grip loosen, her focus dull, only a hand on her shoulder reeled her back into clarity, a stern voice against her ear kicking her every last instinct into overdrive.
"Dive… NOW!!! The boxer yelled as he worked Blake's controls to send them into a death drop. She should've argued, would've normally, but the tone in his voice, her prior experiences, well, things were hardly normal. A second's response could mean the difference between life and death, and in this case, it certainly felt to her like it did.
She pulled down, and as she did, as their plane nearly approached the opening, she realized why he'd screamed his head off so abruptly. She could hear it, a thunderous symphony of destruction, just barely audible over the sound of the storm, hidden just out of view from the midnight dark boundary of clouds to their front.
As they dived, by what felt like a hair's length, they missed what would have been their deaths. The cockpit was turned down, she couldn't see just what in blazes it was, but the red and golden glows, the sheer sound of it, and the turbulence by which it buffeted the plane into an even sharper decline told Clarice all she needed to know.
"Well, okay, looks like you're a bit more sharp than I gave you credit for-"
She was complimenting him, she would've thanked him whole heartedly, however, there was no time for that. A harsh pressure against her every atom informed her that now was the time to focus on driving, for the tip of the plane had struck the thick stygian clouds, blue light sparking up at the lightest touch, intensifying evermore as the rest of the aircraft passed through into the unknown skies beyond.
They were only stuck within the cloud coverage for a few moments. Yet, those moments made Clarice feel like she knew how it felt to die…
***
Collin had never particularly wanted to know what it felt like to take a seat on an electric chair. By all accounts the martial artist found it quite annoying that he'd just been put through a decent enough approximation.
The sensation that filled his body as they passed through the sparking shadowy skies was worse than the most brutal beatings he'd ever been handed in the ring. It was beyond being stabbed, beyond any sickness he'd ever been burdened by. It made him feel worse than the most devastating hangover he'd ever had, a particularly hellish day of regret soaked agony brought on by a night of reckless experimentation with drink and drugs that one of his fellow fighters had coaxed him into indulging in.
He pulled through of course. He always did, whether he wanted to or not. It was just his natural stubbornness and unreasonably high pain threshold at work, or at least, he figured that must have been what it was. The problem now though was that the plane was now falling to the ground in the dead of night, with only moonlight and some far off murky glow to light the way.
I never thought the day would come that I'd be wishing I was back to doing street fights, he thought, before shaking his head. At least if he snuffed it here it would be under his own terms, doing the best he could, trying to help people rather than trying to get enough money to afford his next meal.
He calmed himself as best as he could, adrenaline shooting through the roof as his blood pumped through his veins like coked out little drag racers. His eyes felt bloodshot, his nerves felt twitchy, yet his mind remained his strongest and most resilient muscle. He focused on that, bade calmness return to him, focused on it, and then moved out to the rest of his body. He imagined the eye of a storm slowly expanding, blowing out the frantic flames of nervousness that threatened to blaze through his every last cell. He closed his eyes, he couldn't see anything anyways, and breathed in and out as deeply as he could, timing it to pair with the rhythm of his heart.
He didn't know how to fly a plane. He was a sports fighter, a martial artist, an up and coming celebrity, none of which are generally famed for their abilities to operate complex and damaged aerial machinery at staggeringly high altitudes. His hands though, he prided himself on how he could work a fight, the way they gave him control over the worst situations a normal bloke could find themselves in. This was just another fight, and the woman to his side had shown him how to work it, he just needed to go the distance till she was ready to take the reins again.
He grappled with the situation piecemeal. First he twisted and turned just enough to stop the plane from rotating out of control. Then he did as he'd done before, pulling up to try and get rid of the downwards descent. That too panned out well enough, it felt like they were flying horizontal again, at least enough that they weren't in danger of immediately crashing. Of course, a new problem sounded itself off as something his the cockpit windshield, splattering right dead center of it. He perked his ears, distinguishing the sound of hearty thunking all over the hull of the plane.
Must be hitting a flock of birds... he figured, sighing.
Which means we're low enough to hit birds. That doesn't bode well.
He heard the woman to his side groan in pain, her body stirring, her ragged breathing fighting to return to a normal pace. She seemed all the closer to waking up that was good, she'd be able to land the plane, and she had to. He sure as shit wasn't qualified to do something like that, and the other guy was still passed out colder than a thanksgiving turkey bought a week in advance.
Still, as they continued to fly low, the landmass below them grew oddly clearer. He could distinguish shapes, blobs moving in the dark, rolling fog banks, trees that seemed to be growing worryingly closer, like the needles of an iron maiden about to close over them all.…
…
…
…
Wait a second…
He dared let go of the controls and grabbed her by the shoulders, shaking her like a coke with mentos, hoping she'd burst back to wakefulness ASAP. He even dared slap her awake, somewhat more forcefully than he felt he should, likely leaving bruises on her cheeks.
Not that he could tell in the dark.
Not that it mattered.
"Wake up, damn it! There's no way I can land this thing!"
He saw her eyes open at last, and felt relief, followed sharply by a surprisingly decent haymaker to the face that sent him swaying.
"What the fuck was that for!" She yelled at him, her words scalding hot like magma.
"Land." He replied, tasting copper in his mouth.
Huh, I'm bleeding? That much force and she isn't even showing a wince of pain? Why does an airline pilot know how to throw a punch that good?
The second hit, this time a backhand slap, brought him back to the moment. "Are you even listening to me? I asked you a God damn question you jackass! What the fuck possessed you to slap me up you sorry bag of dicks!"
"Just look out the window…" Collin pointed down, and she looked. It took a few moments to really notice, and even then, only because the sound and sensation of a treetop smashing against the underside of the plain was impossible to miss.
"What was that? What's going… on… oh….. oh shit!!!!!!?"
The look of shock on her face only lasted for a second before her everything went into making sure this plane didn't become the world's most inconveniently convenient coffin.
"Keep us flying straight. Whatever you do, do not let up on the controls!" She yelled at him as her hands flew to more buttons and switches and levers than he could name. "God dammit! Right, no power. Well, that makes things more difficult!"
The plane started freely hitting trees now, every crack of splitting wood stealing some momentum, yet threatening the ground's ominous, unstoppable approach. "Alright… this… this… and that! Okay okay okay, steady as she goes…"
She kept muttered to herself as her hands danced over the airliner's cockpit controls, flying from switch to switch, button to button, lever to lever. Collin didn't know if there was a method to her madness or if she was just throwing everything at the kitchen sink, desperate for even one thing to work right.
Whatever the case, he felt it working. It felt like their speed was dropping thankfully quickly.
"Alright, brace yourself, this is going to be a hard landing!"
Collin did just that, and for the second time that day, felt himself take the hardest hit of his life to-date.
***
As wakefulness assaulted Taylor, as the youth's mind began to stir, they saw all too much, with far too little clarity. Images, sounds, sensations beyond comprehension, all this and more flooded into them just as surely as feeling returned to their resting flesh.
The world dying, the world living. Rinse and repeat. The end so black and cold, life anew glowing warmly. Change and chaos, stilled decay, and invisible hands wrestling with the forces of all things like modelling clay, fighting out which future to mold.
A thousand thousand years flashed before their eyes, life weak and small growing grand and mighty, before withering away to pale shadows of what they were. Fields of icy crystals shining with colors unlike any found in nature under a midnight blue sky, clouds of burning dust raining molten fire upon vast dunes of metallic sand. They saw a fierce vortex of red swirling all manner of matter around, all of which were wriggling and writhing. A barren rocky void roiling with inky black tides, smoky whisps just out of sight following along with their disembodied gaze.
Countless visages each uniquely attributed, full to the brim with adaptive new scenes to drink in. There was so much, too much, all things now shone before Taylor's mind's eye, past and future mingling as one: tides of howling monsters racing for their flesh and blood, legions of staunch saviors filling a world too young with good and hope. A face, a masque, inhuman and shining, with knifelike teeth and glowing orbs for eyes, judging them. Mimicking each movement as an animal looking at its own reflection in a pond.
Then, at the end of it all, came a voice. Unlike the last one that had visited Taylor. It was exhausted, melancholic, yet still enriched with the ember of nobility long tarnished.
"I'm sorry," it said to them, fighting for each new word, as if its very soul was weighed down by the crushing pressure of fathomless depths of betiding woes.
"You must run now."
And so Taylor did just that.
Few else were up yet, the aftermath of their crash landing all too fresh for these weary travelers. Taylor felt much the same, yet now, some alien compulsion animated their limbs, an unfathomable impulse spurring them forwards.
We should not be here!
Taylor's thoughts were a pessimistic jumble as they rushed to the emergency exit, trying with all their might to get it open. Even so, that forlorn sentiment of wrongness saturated every stray idea that came to mind. A pernicious wrongness to this place, to their being here, to every last thing to do with this waking nightmare!
I never should have come here, we never should have come here. What in the name of Creation have we done?
Their own thoughts now seemed as alien as the vistas which were flooding into Taylor's aching mind. They knew without knowing that something was terribly wrong... something was watching them, even now, observing every littlest move. They had to go, they had no choice but to go, it wasn't safe here, it would never be safe here, nothing would ever be safe again.
With a hiss and great forceful push the door swing wide open, a thick fog rolling in from the outside world into their oversized formerly flying aluminum coffin. In short order after an inflatable ramp popped out, proving just the way down Taylor needed to continue running away.
The ground was cold, thick, murky, and swampy in every aspect. Grimy liquid coated Taylor's legs almost up to the knees, while every step sucked their feet down into the damp soggy muck. It slowed Taylor down, made them stagger, forced fright to chill them over, making them trip over themselves in the mad dash to leave before the inevitable wrapped its grim tendrils around the terrified teen.
Only a few more steps and they'd tripped onto their hands and knees, now crawling desperately, frantically, with the vain inch of moving even one more inch away from the horror closing around them.
"You can run no more..."
No, no, no, no, no…
Rough slick scaly skin slid across their flank, a thick muscly coil that circled around Taylor, colder to the touch than the murky swamp muck that now drenched Taylor.
No, please, no…
They heard a grim hiss against their ear, as something slid under and over their body, closing around like a hangman's noose.
"I should have done more. I should have been better. I had to make things right, and yet, I never did. Forgive me, please, I knew not what I had done!"
Those words were all Taylor knew, before darkness once more came for them...