12:30 September 7, 2019
Heathrow Airport, London
"Excuse me sir?" A small voice asked, drawing Alan out of his thoughts. A little girl's hand was placed over his own.
"Yes, little Miss?"
"My doll's shoe rolled under your seat. May I have it, please?" A plump ragdoll was tucked under her arm and she gestured at the bare limb before pointing at his chair.
"Of course." He smiled, reaching to pluck the black mary-jane and offer it to the child. "And where are you and your dolly off to today?"
"We're going to visit Auntie in Killarney!"
"Are you now? That sounds very exciting." He helped ease the shoe back onto the doll's foot.
"It isn't really," The girl sighed, twirling the yarn hair adorning the doll's head, "but I do love Auntie lots and she has a funny shaggy dog that's fun to play with!"
Her mother called for her, gesturing for her to hurry on so they could board the plane.
"Bye bye, Mister!"
"Goodbye, Miss Susan Geraghty." She gave him a puzzled look, but smiled nonetheless, before bounding off to her mother's side.
"Susan Geraghty, aged six years, eight months and two days." Tiffany read from her book. "Scheduled to die in a plane crash due to engine failure."
"Six years old." Alan watched as she turned and gave him one last wave before disappearing through the doors. "She's barely started her life."
"I don't like this, Senior." Tiffany clenched her hands into fists, shaking her head. "I know it isn't my place, but that plane holds 147 people. That's 147 lives whose last moments will be in maddening fear and hysteria."
"One plane, Agent Carnegie. All those planes will fall. Each plane with 130-150 souls, will fall and crash and take even more souls with them." His book open on his lap, Alan watched as name after name began to appear.
"It isn't right." She shook her hand, teeth gritted. "No one deserves to die this way. Not screaming and begging for their life, drowning in their regrets and missed opportunities."
"And that deep, dark realisation that there is no way out. That this will truly be the end." Alan knew it all too well.
'Now boarding all remaining seats'
Tiffany stood and took a deep breath.
"That's our call, sir." He nodded, before giving her hand a squeeze. When had Little Tiff grown into Agent Tiffany Carnegie? The sole female in the Rascal Pack, and perhaps Alan's fondest favourite; Tiffany with her milk coffee skin and cloudy hair and lightning reflexes.
"I'm going to Reap them all when they fall asleep." She steeled her jaw. "I don't care that it isn't protocol and you can report me to the Board. But I'm going to Reap them before they crash. No one deserves to die like that."
"I've a feeling all the commotion following the flare will render this a minority incident; easily overlooked." Alan replied, taking his seat beside her on the plane.
It was easy to wash a soft wave of tiredness over the mortals, easing them into a deep sleep. A trick even an Academy student knew, for particularly stubborn humans.
Tiffany conjured her scythe. "Ready?"
He nodded, and she swept her scythe over a row of seats. Pulling the souls cleanly from their bodies so no wounds appeared meant that the mortals simply died in their sleep. He cut the records cleanly and coaxed them into their logbooks.
The souls in the cockpit were the last and once the Captain's soul had been taken, the plane lurched into a freefall. Alan grabbed Tiffany's hand and vanished back to the airport. Their next mission would be out on the tarmac, where that very same plane would fall onto a stationary plane.
As Alan ran, something caught the corner of his eye. A black bird flew past him, turning sharply and heading for the private runways.
The clock struck 13:00 and he braced himself as the solar flare pulsed through the atmosphere. Above them, the other planes began to plummet. Tiffany opened her book.
"And so it begins."