Part IV

A Doctor In The House

"What. The. FUCK. Was that?!" blurted Dario, once they were level again and the cockpit had stopped shaking so violently. "I didn't see much from here! What was it? Another airliner? A secret military plane? A frikkin' UFO?"

It may as well have been. But right now, Jonah and Dany simply stared bug-eyed at one another, shaken by what they had just seen. "You... saw that, right?" said Jonah, quietly, making sure he hadn't just imagined the whole thing.

Dany nodded. Even without saying a word, he could tell from how wide those deep purple eyes were that she was just as frightened as he.

"I... I dunno what to... fuck!" muttered Jonah, exasperated. He settled back down into his seat. Sometimes in life, there are situations for which you just can't find the right words. This was one of them.

"Are you... alright?" asked Dany, timidly.

"I'm fine," grunted Jonah, "but... shit. Fuck! That was close."

They had plummeted over a vertical mile in just under a minute, before they had leveled out again at 35k feet. The autopilot had conked out when Dany had overridden the controls, but Jonah had now reset it at 36k, and they were slowly climbing again.

The telephone rang.

Neither he nor the Captain answered it, so Dario took it instead. "Yes?" he answered, "yes, we had a... near collision with, uh, something... yes, uh-huh... yes... yes... well, obviously we're still alive. Yes, Cap'n and Jonah here saved us, I... what? That bad? Oh... that's not good. Right... I'll tell them right away." Dario turned to face the two of them: "It's bad; we've got at least a couple dozen passengers injured from that maneuver."

"What... what kind of injuries?" asked Dany.

"Bruises, cuts, concussions," began Dario, "we've got a boy with two broken legs, and Jackie's got burned somehow. The rest of the cabin crew's trying to administer first-aid right now to those in need of it most, but my guess is that we're gonna have to land ASAP. They're also reporting visible damage to the ceiling; there could be damage to some of the systems we have running above the cabin - to say nothing of the systems we have running below the floor."

"Sorry, uh, remind me, what exactly do we have running in the ceiling and under the floor?" asked Dany.

Dario raised an eyebrow, puzzled by the Captain's statement (as was Jonah as well). "Uh, you know, just about everything! Wiring, hydraulic lines..."

"Then check everything out," commanded Jonah, "last thing we want is to lose control."

"Is that all?" asked Dany, "is that all they said is wrong?"

Dario paused, awkwardly, which could mean one thing. Oh you just had to ask, didn't you?, thought Jonah to himself. Dario continued: "smoke in the cabin's getting thicker. People are starting to notice it now."

Jonah looked at Dany. "Captain," he said, sternly, "we need to declare an emergency."

"Uh... yes. Yes, if you say so," she said, sounding equal parts baffled and hesitant. Seriously, what was wrong with her? Damn it, this was so not the day he needed her to be acting so aloof, like she didn't know what she was doing. Jonah saw her glance back towards the windshield, out at the storm. The strange lights had started up again. "Can we also... get out of this storm? Can we... go back the way we came in?"

"Captain, this is the most direct route to the nearest land," chided Jonah.

"Something about this storm is... it's scaring me," blurted the Captain, "Please, let's get out of here! We'll just go around it!"

Something about the way Captain was behaving was definitely off, and Jonah decided that it was better he confront it sooner than later. "Captain, I dunno what the bloody 'ell is wrong with you, but get a grip on yourself, damn it!" He noticed he was raising his voice, and he honestly didn't know what he was more angry about, the unprofessional way she was carrying herself right now, or her weird behavior earlier that had nearly put them in a tailspin, or maybe just this whole freaky situation, the strange lights and that plane that just came out of nowhere (what the hell was that thing anyway?). Maybe he was just losing his cool.

"Hey, easy hombre!" cut in Dario, "look, man, this whole things got me on edge too!" For a moment, nobody said anything. Jonah, Dany, and Dario looked back and forth at each other. And then Dario continued: "hey, look, I'm just gonna sit here and declare emergency, okay? Comprende?" He calmly reached down for the transponder under his seat, and changed the dials to 7700 - the internationally accepted code for an onboard emergency. He looked back up. "Okay, we better now?"

Jonah said nothing, but instead looked forward again, fuming. While they had been arguing, the lights outside seemed to intensify, as if this whole light show was being fueled by their bickering. He clicked on his radio. "Mayday, mayday, mayday. Dragon One Niner, at flight level three-six-zero. Near collision with unidentified aircraft has left several passengers and crew in need of urgent medical care. I repeat: injured passengers and crew, requesting immediate landing. Over."

As before, there was only hissing static in response. Oh, this was not good at all.

"Uh... mayday! Mayday! Mayday!" came Dany's voice, trying to repeat after him, "Dragon One Nine... err... flight level three hundred and sixty. We nearly collided with an... unidentified aircraft; we're... alive, but we have wounded passengers... over."

"Captain? You didn't press 'Push To Talk'," muttered Jonah, closing his eyes and shaking his head.

"Oh? Oh, right!" replied Dany, "sorry, again, it's the... yes, it's the fish. Just like Dario said."

That must be some really bad case of food poisoning, thought Jonah, bitterly. Dario, you'd damn well better not conk out on me too. He sighed, and closed his eyes for a moment, exasperated. Oh God... so, our radar's clearly not working, since it didn't pick up that... whatever it was. We can't contact the tower. This freak weather, whatever it is, is actively trying to KILL US. We've got injured passengers in need of urgent medical care. We've got possible damage to the electrical and hydraulic systems. Oh, and we've got a possible fire burning somewhere onboard. And the captain's acting strange, like she's never flown before. Yes, we've flown this route dozens of times and the one time you burn out is the one time all this weird shit happens - it's almost like they were related. Just fantastic... could things possibly get any worse?

Plenty, as he was about to find out.


Irina didn't know how or why the captain had put the plane into such a sudden dive as she had just done. But she was known to be a good pilot, so there must have been a good reason to. But whatever it may be, the fact remained that in just several seconds, the entire cabin had gone from calm and quiet to a raging madhouse. Several passengers and crew-members, Andrea among them, had been launched straight into the air and struck the ceiling. Meanwhile, Jackie had gotten her arms scalded when the galley's coffee machine had splashed all over her. Irina herself had escaped harm for the most part, though she had broken a nail and bruised herself a little.

But she couldn't let that stop her now. Now was the time to do what her training had demanded of her, to show that stewardesses were more than just pretty faces to serve drinks and plaster across on the ads; now, she and her fellow cabin crew had to help out anyone and everyone until they were back on the ground. She looked ahead.

One young man, a teenager with long black hair, was strapped down into his seat, sobbing in pain, his legs visibly broken from the impact. At that moment, he was surrounded by three passengers attending to him. Irina took a moment to look at the one closest to him: he was an elderly man, clean-shaven with short, tidy grey hair, and dressed in a grey tweed suit. He also had a stethoscope out, checking the lad's vitals. The boy whimpered.

"Excuse me sir," asked Irina, "sorry, are you a doctor?"

"That's right," said the man, looking up. "Just give me a minute here." He finished up checking up the boy, and then gave directions to the other two on how to place him. Irina wondered if she should help, but then decided that here, in the narrow confines of the aisle, she would only be crowding up the place more. She quickly walked back to the galley to check on all the other passengers in this section of the cabin, before returning. By then, the elderly gentleman had finished his work for the time being.

"Dr. Harrison Semley, at your service," he said, offering his hand.

"Doctor, we have other passengers in need of your services," said Irina.

"Absolutely," replied Dr. Semley. He took a quick look back at the boy, making sure the two other passengers were following his instructions. "But please, if I may, I'd first like to have a word with the pilot."

"Our captain is busy," said Irina.

"I don't doubt it, and don't worry, I'm not going up there to berate her for her actions," said the doctor, calmly and patiently. "But listen: we have people here who have been severely injured. We need to land as soon as possible, we need to get them to a hospital."

"A hospital? Oh, what is it?"

"This young man here had both legs broken," explained Dr. Semley, "he wasn't wearing his seatbelt; when the plane suddenly plunged, momentum carried him up and over and flew across four rows of seats."

Just then, the cabin shook violently, and the lights flickered. Irina and Dr. Semley grabbed onto the nearest seats and held on for dear life, just in case the plane bucked suddenly again. It didn't this time, but the cabin continued to shake, and there was a loud grating noise.

"Good God!" moaned one of the passengers, accompanied by a sudden surge in the sound of the engines.


With a long, loud heave, Tyrone gagged up the rest of the bile in his throat. The barf bag was bulging and dangerously near-capacity. There was more vomit, on his expensive designer pants and jacket, on his polished leather shoes, some even on his glasses - all of it the remains of tonight's copious drinking mixed with whatever crazy stunt the captain had just pulled. Crazy bitch, what the hell was that all about?

Someone a couple rows behind him had gotten flung up, hit the ceiling, and landed back down hard; the person seated next to that bugger was now tending to him, and there were probably many others throughout the plane. Tyrone wondered if he should be a noble soul and go and help him and... oh god, here comes another one. Tyrone gripped the edges of the bag and heaved.

Blaarrgh!

Okay, surely he must be empty now. He tried to fold down the top of the bag and tape it shut, but his head was splitting from the dehydration, making it hard to focus. The bag slipped out of his grubby fingers and landed at his feet with a squelch, releasing its contents. The smell was horrible.

Tyrone opened the window next to him and peered out, hoping that looking outside would ease his motion sickness, calm him down and... yeah, no, not happening. Yes, he had forgotten about the shimmering white sheet of light he had seen earlier, clinging to the wing, only now, it had intensified. But that wasn't the worst of it. No, now it was joined by strange... swirling forms around each of the two engines he could see, like wisps of glowing powder or smoke or something, dancing around each pod and over the wings, tendrils extending over the metal skin.

Out of curiosity, he shifted forward in his seat a little, trying to see more of the wing out of that tiny window. Yes, now he could see a little bit of the rear of the wing and the furthermost engine and OH MY GOD, THE ENGINES ARE ON FIRE.

Bright orange jets of flame, each maybe 30, maybe 40 feet long, came shooting out of the rear of the furthest engine pod, like it was suddenly transformed into a rocket booster or something. And though he could not see the rear of the nearer engine from this angle, from his business-class seat towards the front of the plane, it was only logical to assume that the closer engine too was also spouting gouts of fiery death.

From his seat, Tyrone stared on, in a mix of horror and lurid fascination. He blinked. It was a terrifyingly beautiful scene to behold: the scarlet flames, the swirling lights, and beyond it, the vivid arcs of green lightning and glowing aura against the night sky like the Aurora Borealis.

At some point, though, he decided he'd had enough, and squeezed his eyes shut and did not open them again for the longest time he could remember. And all he could think about, apart from the dizziness in his head and the nausea in his gut, was what exactly was going to happen next? Were the fuel tanks going to ignite, the whole plane explode into a fireball? Were the flames going to melt the cabin, burn everyone inside to a crisp? Were they going to crash and die in the impact, or survive only to be left bobbing up and down in the ocean, to drown or get eaten by sharks or die from exposure to the elements? Or marooned on an island in the middle of the ocean, probably inhabited by cannibals or monsters from some distant age long forgotten? Were they going to choke on the smoke he could now smell in the cabin? Was he just going to sit here and slowly die from dehydration, because the stewardesses were too busy right now to bring him a glass of water, with ice and a little slice of lemon on the side?

Probably the latter.


Even from up front in the cockpit, they could hear the engines making straining noises. When she had first arrived on this strange place, Dany could remember just how frightening and bizarre the constant rumbling of those great engines had been to her, like the sound of a dragon's heavy, constant breathing. Oddly enough, in just a few short minutes, she had kind of gotten used to it, though she supposed that was thanks to the mind of Lady Amelia Of The House Of Daniels, with whom she had now become one in body, mind, and possibly soul too.

But what she was hearing now was unlike anything even Lady Amelia heard before, and the panic she could see in the eyes of Jonah and Dario reinforced the realization that this truly was an exceptional situation, even for someone brought up in this strange world. It was a rumbling, grating sound, rising and falling rapidly; if the "normal" sound of the engines were like a dragon breathing, the wretched din they made now was like that dragon was now choking and gagging for breath.

At that moment, she heard one of them surging loudly, and then a heavy CLUNK, followed by a warning ding from the dashboard. She noticed one of the small devices, labeled "EPR", was rapidly falling, the one marked "1".

"Engine failure, number 1," barked Jonah.

Dany's mind raced as she tried to recall what to do next. Her eyes shot back and forth across the dashboard, desperately looking for something, anything. She also remembered there were more controls overhead, and looked up. The first label to greet her eyes was... fire suppression? It's worth a try.

"Fire action!" she commanded, "number 1!"

For once, Jonah did not react with surprise, so clearly she must have said something correct. He pulled up a small notebook he kept in the pouch next to him, and opened it to a specific page. "Checklist, powering gear."

Fortunately for Dany, the thoughts and memories of the previous occupant of this head were now coming quicker to her mind than ever before. Whoever this Lady Amelia Daniels may have been in life, she was at the very least extremely knowledgeable in the strange ways of this world, and that included the operation of this massive and monstrous contraption. An enormous construct, untold millions of tiny moving parts, each intricately crafted with the highest precision to fit and lock in with each other and move in concert. Hundreds of miles of delicate wiring, strung throughout the beast's body, like nerves. Thousands of gallons of oil sloshing back and forth inside the tanks, inside the beast's belly and inside its wings, fueling four huge and hungry engines, each burning as hot and fierce as any dragon's breath for hours and hours on end. A skin and skeleton crafted from materials completely unheard of anywhere in The Realm. And all of this in the capable of hands of one woman and her two trusted companions.

The more she thought and learned about it, the more she marveled at just how all of the pieces fit together. Lady Amelia had undergone months of rigorous training in flight school, had spent countless hours both in the... flight simulator, and, eventually on actual aircraft. If the great machines of this world held great power, then they could and should only ever be entrusted to those with great responsibility. Indeed, thinking back to her earlier thoughts, perhaps that was why this world still lived on, even when these people possessed the very power to end it in their hands; that such great weapons were only ever entrusted in the hands of those with wisdom and restraint enough to wield them?

Dany felt ashamed. Ashamed to admit that where once she thought she knew better than anyone else (and why not? She had been after all the Stormborn, the Unburnt, the Mother Of Dragons, the Breaker Of Chains, Khaleesi Of The Great Grass Sea, Queen Of Meereen, Lord Of The Bay Of Dragons, and, well, you get it), now she was coming around to realize that in all her hubris, she was still probably only half the woman that Lady Daniels was. And she was also ashamed in the knowledge that it was her arrival here tonight that had deprived this aircraft and everyone upon it of a capable pilot. Lady Amelia Daniels would know what to do in this situation... well, maybe. But if anyone here tonight perished, then that terrible burden all rested on Dany's shoulders.

"Captain?" asked Jonah, "powering gear?"

"Uh... set," she said, snapping out of it. Though once she could recall the first stage of the drill, she found she could quickly recall the next steps after it. Evidently, this whole procedure had been well rehearsed by Lady Amelia many times before.

"Thrust lever," said Jonah.

"C-closed," stuttered Dany as she found what she thought and hoped was the right switch, letting Amelia's instincts guide her.

"Start lever," said Jonah.

"Off," replied Dany, firmly, finally getting into the rhythm of it.

"Number 3 engine's going too," warned Dario. Sure enough, she noticed the gauge labeled with a "3" dropping as well.

"Shutdown number 3," she commanded; she could recall from Amelia's mind that a craft like this could still fly with only one of these engines running.

"No... wait!" blurted Dario, "no! 2 and 4 too! They've... all gone. All four engines have burnt out!"

The main lights in the cockpit flickered, and then went off, leaving only the small lights in some of the instruments glowing. At the same time, a strange silence descended over the place; now, without the constant droning of the engines, the only sounds were the heavy breathing of the three of them, accompanied by the muffled cries and murmurs from the passenger cabin behind them.

As Dany and her two companions looked on in horror and confusion, DAL Flight 19 suddenly became the world's largest and most expensive glider.