An7: Yeah, a classic example of 'Boy that escalated quickly'. But you've seen the fuss America are making over the Korean nuclear tests right now, right? Can you imagine how pissed England would be if they thought someone was going to give a dragon with fire breath and psychic powers to them?
Latias watched as Mac disappeared out of the doorway.
By the time Mac had come to terms with what he'd done, the wind had pushed him beyond the collapsed rear section of the plane.
He'd jumped backwards so as not to see what he was jumping into - namely nothing - and wimp out at the last minute, and so had seen everything in the brief seconds before the thrust from the still-on engines took hold and spun him every which way.
The back section of the plane wasn't so much damaged as non-existent. In the darkness of the sky, with only the moon lighting it, it was difficult to see, but Mac was pretty sure that the missile that had hit the plane had destroyed the back of it, up to the last four or five rows of passenger seats. The worst bit was, he could see specks of white that he could swear were people, or more accurately, people remains. Still tied into seats, which were straining against the floor of the airplane, the back row tipping into the abyss.
Mac saw this in the second that it took him to flash by. Pushed by 500mph winds, he covered the distance of the super jet in under a second. In four, the jet was the size of his thumb in his vision. There was no point in trying to find words for the noise. The wind, sound of the fighter jet and the engines of the plane he'd just jumped out of was loud enough to defy description.
Mac estimated he'd jumped out at 20,000 feet. The terminal velocity of a human being Mac knew to be 62 miles an hour, arms and legs out and causing as much drag as possible. Twenty thousand feet was about 4 miles. At about 60 miles an hour, Mac knew he had about 4 minutes of free fall left. Then he'd hit the sea at a lethal rate: at the speed he was at, water would have the same consistency of drying concrete.
How would Latias even find him in this darkness? He couldn't see her at all...
In the plane, Latias was trying in vain to fit through the door. The seats either side of the door stopped her from lowering her wings, and also stopped her going low enough to the ground to fit through the door with them up. She was all out of patience though. Mac was falling and - like it or not - he was her only way back home. And she had to admit, Mac was an okay person when he wasn't throwing pilots at her. Or pointing guns at people. Or trampling her kills, not listening, loosing his temper, not explaining his full plan to her, falling over, being knocked unconscious, lying a lot, generally being being hopel... Okay so there were a lot of things that he could improve on, but he wouldn't get the chance to if she didn't hurry up and get out of the plane and catch him.
The cabin was too cramped for a headbutt attack, she was too tired for a hyper beam and anyway, she didn't want to put the leg down to fire it, which she would have to. She didn't know if electrical attacks would actually make a hole in the metal plane, there wasn't any room for fighting type moves, flying moves - too cramped to fly.
Latias regretted her situation, and did the only thing she could think of, shifting into Bianca's form. Halfway through the transformation, she lost grip of the severed pilots leg. Luckily, her hands were in the way and caught it.
As soon as the transformation was complete, she walked to and out of the door, making a lot less drama about the action then Mac did.
Latias had free-fallen plenty of times, and quite a few times as Bianca, just to see what it was like.
But falling and jumping out of an plane were two separate things. Latias had never jumped out of a plane. The moment she did, it whipped away from her, barely giving her a glimpse of the wing before she was in the path of the jet engine thrust, which pushed her further away.
Just in time.
Off to her right, she heard an bang. A fifth of a second later, the door she had just jumped out of was hit by a second missile. This one was bigger, and made more of a flame than the last one.
If the heat from the engine exhaust was hot, the heat from the explosion was immense. As Latias got blown further back, she saw the fireball bloom on the inside of the cabin, before bursting out of the hole in the rear.
The sound from the engines turned into a jarring noise as the fan blades expanded by a hair's width and jammed against the fan casing, not that Latias could hear it. Her ears were still ringing from the explosion.
In the cockpit of the jet fighter, the pilot turned in his seat. His helmet was fitted with augmented reality lenses, and overlayed radar, thermal, meteorological and altimeter data in to his field of vision. He'd turned around because the computer had tagged two objects on radar that had heat signatures behind him, and that meant two targets had survived.
While it was true there were lots of things on radar - namely, parts of shattered tail rudder and airliner - the two things were odd. They both had appeared inbetween the two missiles hitting the plane, and the heat signature was fluctuating. Not decreasing, Going up and down. Like a heartbeat. So the computer had flagged it as a living target.
Radar had a range of 60 miles, but the thermal camera was limited to 2. So the pilot had to turn around and pursue them before they got far away.
Mac, meanwhile, was still falling. He'd noted that he and the airplane were both falling at the same rate, and so it was still level with him, just quite a lot further away. Therefore it too would hit the ground in three and three-quarter minutes as well.
There was a single light in the sky, moving too dynamically to tell what direction it was going in or how far away it was, but Mac was pretty sure it was the fighter jet, apparently still tracking the airplane he'd jumped out of.
Mac had fallen for 20 seconds, and Latias had been notably absent. He didn't really mind, she could take her time for all he cared, and he still had another three minutes and forty seconds to go before hitting the ground. Latias could easily get to him, as long as she left the plane before it was hit by another missile.
Twenty-one seconds into free-falling, Mac saw the speck that he'd assigned the status of 'passenger plane' to, flash bright orange. Then nothing. Then an even brighter flash.
Mac started counting in his head.
One...two..- The boom from the explosion reached Mac, nowhere near as loud for him as it was for Latias.
The plane was two and a half seconds away by the speed of sound, or roughly 800 meters away. Mac also realised that his tenancy to do maths at life-or-death times was probably a habit he would have to break out of.
Mac stopped calculating distance, and started fearing for his life.
The plane had exploded. Granted, it was still probably intact, but judging by the size of that fireball, if Latias was inside at the time, she would be toast. Literally. Carbonated granules.
Mac was amazed at the missile in a way that would probably get him locked up in a lunatic asylum. But he could see how it would work. Missile filled with napalm and an explosive gas. Fire it into the side of the plane and let it penetrate the skin of the aircraft, then make it spray flammable gas and napalm everywhere. Then ignite it and the room would reach flash over point - the moment at which the very oxygen in the air combusts. Bang, everything in the plane dead in under a second. And no trace of explosives, as the case and napalm would be completely burned up by the flash over. The perfect weapon.
Mac worried a bit more, the panic amounting exponentially with every second. He'd been falling for thirty seconds, but the explosion had made him doubt Latias making it out. And how was she going to find him in the dark?
Latias transformed the moment she stopped staring at the explosion. This time when she dropped the leg, her arms where tucked into her sides and stayed there as the snack fell to earth.
"Oh no you don't!" Latias quipped, glad to use her own voice, as she dived after it.
In the fighter jet, the pilot was confused. The second dot that the computer had identified as a target had just disappeared from radar. The thermal camera said it was there, but the radar said it had split in two. And it wouldn't track the target in that situation, so he'd had to do it manually with his eyes.
The target started catching up to the other part of it, before joining back up again, flying against the turbulence for a while, then turning back the other way and chasing after the other target.
Latias had caught up with the leg, conveniently forgetting about the hi-tech jet fighter that was bouncing radar off her and reading her heartbeat. Her feathers absorbed the radar bounces, but did nothing to disguise her heartbeat.
She started racing back towards the plane, finally focused on Mac. Then she turned around and realised he'd be in the other direction unless he'd decided to chill on the wing for a bit.
She scanned the sky for him as she flew closer and closer to where he jumped out. After 400 meters, she saw a speck of heat, falling quickly towards the ocean. There were too many smells up here to see if his scent was around, but who else would jump out of a plane?
Mac's hopes lifted as he heard a squealing sound above the noise of the wind. He couldn't see where from though, Latias was too small to see in this darkness until she was about fifty meters away.
Latias covered that distance quickly, and in no time ended up diving down next to Mac, who shouted over to her as she arrived.
"YOU TOOK YOUR SWEET TIME!"
Ordinarily, a conversation wouldn't be possible in these situations, the wind noise would be too great. But Mac wasn't free-falling with another human, he was falling with a dragon, specially adapted for these circumstances. She psychiced him back.
"Just be glad I'm here. Did you see that explosion?"
"Well, yes, but now you're here, would you mind stopping me from falling? In case you don't realise, I can't fly. I'd be nice to have some solid ground under me."
"How's solid dragon?"
"Just let me sit on your back."
Latias was already on the case, flying underneath him and slowing down slightly. She didn't stop immediately, because he would hit her quickly and that would be painful.
Gently, Mac landed on her back, hugging the soft feathers the moment he could reach. It wasn't particularly for comfort, more to stop him falling off her, but she took it as a sign that Mac wanted a hug.
"Awwww! Is the little human cold?"
The answer, Mac was well aware of, was yes. But he put off that particular inconvenience to check his phone. If it had been damaged, they wouldn't have GPS and he would have no idea which way to go then.
Mac glanced up at the direction he thought the fighter jet was in whilst his phone unlocked, but the sky was dark. The other plane had probably all burnt out, and the jet must have assumed the fugitives had gone with it, and returned to base.
And if the authorities thought they were dead, then they wouldn't be looking for them any more! They'd escaped! And for real this time!
Unfortunately, reality issued a slap to the face for Mac. The fighter jet hadn't returned to base, it was just facing towards him so the tell-tale glow from the engines was facing away.
There was the sound akin to that of a firework being let off, and Latias set off away from it without warning, Mac and the phone barely making it along with her. In seconds, she was at 300 miles an hour, all concerns for Mac's ability to hold on nullified. She needed to go fast, or the jet and whatever it had just fired would catch up with her.
It was so fast and so exposed Mac couldn't open his mouth, only bury his face against Latias neck to try and abate the wind. His hoodie's hood was already up, fortunately, and it dampened the wind somewhat. What the hell had spooked Latias that badly?
Latias answered his question even though he hadn't asked it, psychic voice sounding weak because of the effort needed to fly as fast as she was. And still accelerating.
"That bad plane. It's still following us. I thought you said it was going to turn off?"
Mac had, but clearly there was still some time left. Surely no more than a few seconds. He couldn't take his phone out of his pocket at this speed, but he was sure it wouldn't be that long. Then again, it didn't need to be.
"Hold tight, he's gaining!"
Latias kicked it up a notch, but it was clear that the fighter would easily beat her in a straight line while she had the world's most unaerodynamic human on her back. She'd have to try to out-maneuver it. At speed.
What was the firework noise though?
The question was answered a second later when the sky lit up bright. Very bright. The pilot had fired a flare, but for what purpose, Latias didn't know.
Then the flare began flashing, quickly. It was confusing, the light being there one minute and not the next. She supposed it was meant to be disorientating, but she navigated using earth's magnetic field and it wasn't very effective.
On her back, it was a different story. Mac was utterly confused about what was going on. The strobe light had ruined his night vision and was too bright to see in at the same time, even when he had his head pressed into Latias.
Latias looked behind to see how close the fighter was. It came a shock to see it about fifty meters away, and closing in.
In the cabin, the pilot looked at Latias and Mac through the thermal camera, and blinked twice. A virtual red triangle encapsulated them. Another blink, the box turned yellow. Target selected. He flipped a red cover on the joystick, before pressing down the switch underneath it.
Latias heard the world's loudest pop directly behind her. Was the jet firing at her?
She did a rapid turn upwards, tilting her wings and feeling the force on her back as Mac was pushed at 8 times the force of gravity into her. It was equivalent to the 70 kilo human weighing 430 kilos. But she kept the turn, and rotated 90 degrees in twenty feet. Any less and the g-force would have been lethal to Mac.
As it was, he'd already almost passed out. It was so fast, he wasn't able to be sick like most people were, the contents of his stomach being pushed towards his chest by the g-force and down by the acceleration. It was - Mac would decide later at a less perilous time - like being sat on by the world biggest elephant.
Latias was built for those kind of forces and didn't think twice about it other than for the extra weight on her back. In contrast, the turn almost seemed slow. On the plus side, they were now facing upwards, away from the fighter.
In the fighter, the computer was running through procedures at a rate of 28 million calculations a second, and it still couldn't figure out where the target went. One moment it was in view, the next, it had jumped a seemingly impossible space upwards. The computer assumed it wasn't the same target, and removed it from the list of things to be shot down.
The missile relied upon a laser beam from the fighter to find its target. With the computer deciding that the target had disappeared, the laser was switched off, and the missile went unguided directly forwards, much to the pilot's confusion.
His target had seemingly turned directly up, on the spot. So quickly that by the time he realised this, he was already a few hundred meters forward from where it had done the turn.
Latias heard the missile go past her with a snapping noise, the crack of it breaking the sound barrier after launch. But it continued below her and judging by the noise, was carrying on going away from her. Then the jet went past as well, almost like it was following the missile. Latias chuckled. They had all this fancy technology, but it was no match for her, even when she was hindered by a human lying on her back.
She continued turning backwards, just slower and using her flippers to aid the turn. It was still lightning fast, but it wasn't quite the 8g's Mac had just suffered. In two seconds, she had completed the turn and was now one hundred meters behind the jet, the air warm from its exhaust.
It was the safest place in Latias' opinion. From what she gathered, it could only attack from it's front. And it wouldn't be able to see behind itself, so it should carry on straight until it either shut down, like Mac said, or she did something to stop it.
The pilot looked above and around for the targets, but they'd disappeared. The consequences when he returned to base would not be nice if he'd not taken them out though, so he kept a low speed and looked around in radar and thermal. After a few seconds, he thought of looking behind himself.
The heat map was partly whited out by the engine exhaust fumes, but the radar had a small blip on it, and there was a small dot of heat difference that looked worthy of investigation. He switched back to visible light for confirmation. The flare was still flashing, and in between flashes his target was clearly visible on the camera.
Clearly, the thing he was engaging was too agile for missiles, he'd have to be further away. But there was one more weapon in his arsenal, a prototype.
He flipped up his visor and looked to the place in the cockpit he knew would be marked 'LASER'. And flicked it.
Latias decided whatever Mac said he'd done to the plane, it hadn't worked, and decided to take matters into her own hands, and tackle the plane herself instead. Just as she started to accelerate, a beam of light zipped past her, missing by a matter of millimeters and feeling immensely hot. She dodged to the side as the light disappeared a second later. It looked like a powerful, but artificial, hyper beam.
The pilot was struggling with the controls. Not only was the thing apparently getting closer, it was moving side to side very quickly and the lack of a thermal target because of the engine washout meant he had to aim manually. He blinked twice and fired another laser beam the moment the generator had brought it back to full power.
Another beam of light zipped past Latias, but this one was further away, even though she was getting closer. Well enough was enough.
With one final boost, she flew within biting range of the planes wing. A second later, and she was above it. The laser thing that was firing at her was on the underneath and so was unable to hit her, as she was hidden by the wings. Neither could the missiles get her, because they were mounted on the underneath. Knowing she was safe, she matched the airplane's speed, and started biting the wing, trying to find some way to disable it. It was just like a big bird, after all, and Latias had hunted birds before. It took just a few bites to kill them.
The fighter pilot couldn't believe what he was seeing. If it what the camera was showing him was true, the dragon-like thing was attacking his aircraft by biting it. And there was the other target, clinging to it's neck!
Latias flew to the edge of the wing and started trying to bite the edge off. But the material wasn't like skin, or leather. It was a metal, and it took several attempts just to make a dent in it. But she persevered, and after a few tries, a small triangle of wing fell away. But not much else happened.
Mac realised where they were and shouted into her neck.
"LATIAS! THE MOVING THINGS ON THE BACK OF THE WING! SEE IF YOU CAN TEAR THOSE OFF! THEY'RE MORE IMPORTANT TO FLYING, AND WEAKER!"
Latias heard and flew around, just as another noise dropped out.
In Mac's pocket, the timer on his phone ticked over to zero.
In the cockpit of the fighter jet, a warning tone started to buzz. The pilot looked across the physical control panel, to see a single light flashing red. If that was right, it said the engine was spinning down. Switching off. Which was impossible, because he hadn't told it to. Perhaps it was just an error caused by the target being on his wing. He pressed the mute button and carried on.
On the wing of the plane, it was starting to cool down. The engine was indeed switching off, and the afterburner had already closed off. With that and the wind blowing over them, it began to get cooler. Latias carried on though, and started biting at the bits of metal at the back of the wing that were fluttering up and down rapidly, the computer making thousands of decisions to move them and obtain the perfect angle for flight.
Not that it mattered, because in three solid bites, Latias had separated the entire flap from the wing, sending it spinning into the blackness the moment it was free. Instantly, the plane started to rotate clockwise.
Another warning rang out in the cabin, this one telling the pilot one of the ailerons had failed. Most things failed when Latias had chewed on them for a while.
Fed up, the pilot decided to do what he should have done the moment the target had caught up with him, and accelerated away. He moved the throttle leaver forwards ten percent, expecting a huge jolt of power. But if anything, it felt like he was going slower. Decelerating.
A glance at the engine speed indicator confirmed this. The engine wasn't responding to his instructions, instead opting to shut down. Even now the thrust it was providing was insufficient, because they were starting to loose altitude.
Mac shouted to Latias again, noticing the loss of heat and engine noise.
"THE ENGINE'S OFF! WE CAN LEAVE NOW, THERE'S NO WAY HE CAN FIRE ANYTHING WITHOUT ANY POWER!"
Mac was right. The turbine inside the plane needed to be running for enough power to start any missiles. Lights flashed on in the cockpit to report the loss of power, to go out a second later when the jet lost power altogether. To save on weight, the fighter only had batteries that would provide power for millisecond interruptions.
Latias pulled upwards and away from the fighter as it made its almost silent descent towards the water. If the wind hadn't overwritten it, Mac would have been able to hear the whistling noise as it plummeted.
In the cabin, the pilot gave up and pulled the eject handle. He had failed in his mission, and ejecting wasn't going to help him achieve it, but it would send out an emergency beacon so he could be picked up. That was, if they wanted to. Perhaps they'd just leave him bobbing up and down in the ocean until he starved as a punishment. And to stop him telling anyone about the whole 'dragon test subject' thing.
It was a good thing he had packed one of those cyanide pills...
Wow, that last sentence was grim... Could you do me a favor? Hit that review button? Type some words about what you thought about, this chapter?
Also, readers. I'm pleased to announce that, as of March 4th, I will be signed on to a project to create cheap hydroelectric power generators and water filters for developing 3rd world countries such as Cambodia. It's unbelievably exciting, and I can't wait to start, but after that, uploads will slow down for the foreseeable because the workload is MA-HU-SIVE. Just giving some advanced warning and letting out my excitement. Eek!