Chapter 25

Murdock and Harlow were about to get out to help when they heard the gunshot. Immediately, the alarms went off at the cockpit, and the autopilot disengaged automatically. The plane gave a sudden, hard jerk to the left that toppled the pilots off their feet, and Harlow banged his head badly on the side, falling to the floor by the unconscious soldier, stunned. With no time to help him, Murdock crawled back to the pilot's seat, got the oxygen mask on, fastened the harness, and got the plane down to a safe level with a vertiginous nose-dive, hoping he wouldn't encounter any other aircraft at a lower level on that Pacific air track, as he didn't have time to use the radio and wait for instructions on descending safely from an ATC.

He didn't know what was happening at the cabin, who shot the gun or if anybody got hurt, but this was their best chance to overcome the soldiers, and he couldn't hang around waiting for instructions while the oxygen levels were so low, endangering everybody.

AAA

Lockhart vomited blood-stained fluid several times, redecorating the toilet basin and the surroundings with red specks. When the nausea subsided a bit, he sat on the toilet seat feeling miserable, panting and shaking, catching his breath while leaning on the back and side panels, wondering if that woman had seen the blood.

Yeah, sure she has. Damn it.

He was sick as a dog, and in his cloud of nausea and pain, for a long while his brain didn't wonder or register why Mrs Everson wasn't knocking at the door, asking him what was going on. When he recovered his will to live and wondered why she hadn't bothered, it was too late.

"Freeze!" he heard her crying.

He got up, drew his gun, and opened the door quickly, totally unprepared for the scene he would encounter. He hit her arm with the door, and the blast of the gunshot got him immediately on full alert, like a lightning bolt, releasing a surge of adrenaline into his bloodstream.

A small part of the fuselage got ripped around the broken window, as if it had exploded outward, making the initial defect bigger. All the air in the cabin rushed to that hole at once, creating a mini-hurricane of debris heading in that direction. The plane jerked to the left, and oxygen masks deployed automatically, but all the people on board not wearing seatbelts ignored them as they screamed in fear, with their hands too busy holding onto something to avoid getting dragged towards that suction hole.

Mrs Everson, the lightest person on board and the closest one to the window, would have got sucked out of the plane if Major Lockhart hadn't acted with a reflex when they got thrown to the side. Without thinking, he let go of his gun to grab one of her arms while he held onto the toilet's door frame with his other hand. For a short while she was flying horizontally, close to that defect on the wall, suspended in the air with her feet flapping about, losing her shoes, crying out with a horrified expression while holding onto Lockhart's arm as her life-line.

Lockhart held onto her as best he could while the plane plummeted down, ripped by the intense, searing pain he felt in his arm and deep inside his abdomen, while lots of small objects flew around him, on their way to the window, hitting him and Mrs Everson mercilessly. He yelled when the toilet door shut closed, cruelly crushing his fingers, but he still didn't let go of her.

After only a few seconds that felt like an eternity, when the pressure inside and outside got balanced, the violent vortex died as fast as it had started, and Mrs Everson fell on top of him as the plane carried on diving. Lockhart let go of the door frame and they both crashed against the cockpit door. Soon after that, the plane got levelled, just when he was feeling lightheaded with the lack of oxygen, and dizzy by the plane's crazy manoeuvre. He pushed Mrs Everson off him, away from the cockpit door, and got up as quickly as he could to evaluate the situation, a bit unsteady on his feet, shaking his aching right hand as if that would help with the pain he felt on his smashed fingers, that could be broken, very likely. Two of his soldiers lied on the floor, unconscious, and the third removed his oxygen mask, holding a gun on his other hand. He looked in control.

Lockhart took one of the hanging masks and inhaled deeply the precious oxygen a couple of times, clearing his head a bit.

"Are you all right?" he asked Mrs Everson then, helping her up, sharing the mask with her. She was so frightened and shaken she could hardly stand up on her trembling, naked feet, so he held her in his arms for a moment while she took a few deep breaths from the mask.

"Yes, I think so," she said with a tiny voice when she let go of the mask, steading herself on him. Then, she lifted her hazel-grey eyes to his. "Major, you saved my life! Thank you. How could I repay you?"

He was greatly surprised by her fair praise and gratitude, because everything that had come out of that mouth before, was kind of irksome.

"Well, you owe me a gun, for starters," he said with a hint of a smile.

He looked around searching for one, but he couldn't see any, other than the pistol his soldier brandished in his hand. Both their weapons, his and hers, probably flew out of the window.

At that point, it looked like that soldier had the situation under control, but then, suddenly, Conley and Tia got up and attacked him at once from different directions.

"Look out!" Lockhart cried, but it was too late: they had already reached the soldier, trying to disarm him.

Then, while the three of them struggled to get hold of the gun, it went off.

As before, the loud bang startled everybody. Mrs Everson gasped and fell forward, onto Lockhart's arms again, who just felt a weak jolt on his chest. The realization was shocking for him: that woman had got shot in the back, and that way, she had repaid her debt in full, because otherwise that bullet would have hit him over his heart. In fact, it had, but with so little force and momentum left after going through her body first, it didn't get to pierce his skin, only poking his chest. She had acted as a very effective, bulletproof vest.

"Shit! I'm so sorry, Mrs Everson. I'll come back to you! Hold on!"

He let her on the floor gently, on her back, and lurched forward to help his soldier, his last chance to regain control of the plane. Ignoring the pain in his fingers, he grabbed Conley, pulling from his upper arms, away from the soldier and the gun, and then punched his face with the left hand, hitting his only eye. Conley fell between the seats on the right side of the plane, in an awkward position, dazed, and didn't get up.

In the meantime, Tia hit the soldier's hand, sending the gun flying to the back of the plane, where it landed close to Hannibal, but out of reach from his seat.

Lockhart and Hannibal looked at the gun and then at each other for a split second. Then, Hannibal got up on his good leg, hopping on it. The major avoided Tia by jumping over a couple of seats while she fought with the soldier. B.A sat there, on the floor, between two rows of seats, catatonic after the terrifying experience of the vortex and the nose-dive, and Lockhart used his broad shoulder as a stepping stone to reach the aisle behind Tia.

As Hannibal reached for the gun, in precarious balance over his good leg, Lockhart ran across the aisle to stop him. He could have just tackled him down with his shoulder, but his tactical, military-trained brain made an unconscious decision to target his weakest spot, and he jumped with his right leg extended forward, viciously kicking Hannibal's broken femur like the bully bastard in the Karate competition did on the film. Hannibal truly felt like the Karate Kid then, howling and writhing in pain on the floor, cursing his attacker, fearing the bone had snapped again at the site of the repair.

"Sonofabitch! Aaargh!"

The gun flew from his hand and landed in the middle of the aisle, out of reach from him and the major, who had fallen to the floor between the gurneys at the back of the plane after hitting Hannibal, close to Lawan. Face stood up to get the gun then, as fast as he could move, which wasn't fast enough.

Lockhart got up quickly, still charged with the adrenaline rush, surprised of feeling sorry for the fallen man that was crying in agony, and mildly guilty for what he had done. He saw Face reaching for the gun and lunged forward, but Lawan shot out her foot to trip him. He stumbled then, stamping his foot hard on Hannibal's chest, who yelled in pain again when he smashed his broken ribs. The major carried on stumbling forward with his impulse, and again, when he reached Face, just as he stood up with the gun in his right hand, his cruel but practical, tactical instincts, targeted his enemy's weak spot: the abdomen. Lockhart sank his fist on Face's solar plexus and his fractured sternum.

Face gasped in pain, dropping the gun. He fell on his knees to the floor, and then slid on his side and back in slow motion. As it happened before, after that blow he could no longer breathe, panicking as he gasped for air, looking at Lockhart with a mix of hatred and a desperate need of help.

In a similar way as he had done with Hannibal, Lockhart felt bad about the way Face struggled to breathe then, with all that pain, fear and panic filling up his eyes.

What's wrong with me? Why do I feel sorry for these irritating bastards? he thought when he retrieved the gun, surprised by his conflicting feelings. After all, these men had brought it on themselves. But targeting his injuries to overcome them easily felt like foul play somehow, and he wasn't proud of himself.

In the meantime, Tia had managed to knock the soldier out with her Kung Fu kicks and punches, and then she attacked Lockhart when he stood up with the gun, side-kicking his upper abdomen so hard he flew back a short distance, landing on his side close to Hannibal, in the small space between him and Face.

Lockhart felt a sudden, unbearable pain deep inside, and turning pale as a sheet, he vomited a pool of fresh blood. Then, he collapsed on it, in shock. It looked like that woman had also targeted his weakest spot.

"That's Karma for you, motherfucker," Hannibal said while panting in pain, looking directly at his eyes from a short distance. "How does it feel?"

Fuck. Karma is a bitch, was Lockhart's last thought before he fell unconscious.

AAA

After levelling the plane at 8000ft, Murdock re-engaged the autopilot and helped Harlow to his seat, where he dropped as a dead weight, still stunned and confused. He put the oxygen mask on his co-pilot's face, and then he got out of the cockpit, alarmed by the gunshots and all the screams. He wasn't prepared for the macabre scene he found out there: Mrs Everson lied at the front of the plane, close to the cockpit door, with a gunshot wound through her chest; Hannibal, Face, Conley, B.A and all the soldiers were down; and then he saw Tia delivering a mighty kick on Lockhart's middle section, and how he puked all that blood, collapsing on that red puddle. Then, Tia got hold of the gun and stood in the middle of the aisle, the lone standing victor of that awkward mid-air battle.

"Mrs Everson, are you alright?" Murdock said, crouching by her.

"That's a silly question… even for you," she said slowly, with great effort.

He took her hand, trying to soothe her, and applied pressure to the wound, which looked extremely serious, with an ascending trajectory from her back to the exit wound close to her neck.

"Doctor, over here!" he cried, but the doctor was overwhelmed with the amount of badly injured victims lying all over the plane. It would take him a while to get there, tending first for the fallen bodies closer to the back of the plane, where he was.

"Tia, get my cuffs off," Quang said, willing to help the disaster zone.

"I lost the key! We need another one," she said.

"Look in the major's pockets! He should have a set!" Murdock said, frantic to get help with that injured woman, any help. "Hold on, Mrs Everson, hold on, please. You're gonna be all right."

"No, I'm not… but don't worry, dear… I'm dying… anyway," she said, gasping for air. "This would only make… the transit faster."

"What? I don't understand."

"To the other side. I'm ready."

Murdock still didn't understand her, so she carried on, a little bit more specific, while her voice trailed off with the effort.

"I have terminal cancer. Pancreas. They gave me… three months to live. I don't mind dying… I'm ready for it… but I'm happy I could help… the A-team to escape. A little satisfaction… for all the times you had helped somebody… like my friend."

"No, you are not dying. I'm taking you all to a hospital," he said, with tears in his eyes.

"It doesn't matter… really…Let me go…" she said, passing out.

Murdock cursed to himself. If she had terminal cancer, that would explain how reckless and bold she had been, how thin she looked, and why she had a large supply of codeine capsules to drug the pilots with.

He left that floppy hand resting on her abdomen, and as the doctor and Lawan were tending for the injured men and on their way, he returned to the cockpit, because he still had to call the Oakland centre ATC to inform of their new altitude and position, with their little jet still in danger of a collision with other aircraft in the area.

Harlow had recovered fast with the help of the oxygen, but he still had left the plane on autopilot.

"Are you alright?" Murdock said.

"Yes, I was coming to help you. What's going on? Did we win? What's all that blood?"

Murdock's left hand was dripping with Mrs Everson's, from his useless attempt to stop the haemorrhage.

"Yes, we won, but it's like a battlefield out there. The plane is full of casualties. Please, go out there while I call the ATC, and help Tia find another key for the handcuffs. And please, make sure you use them on the soldiers before they wake up. Take this one out with the others, but be careful with Mrs Everson. She's badly injured, lying on the floor, by the door. This blood is hers. She's dying."

"Shit. I'm so sorry to hear that."

Harlow grabbed the soldier still in the cockpit and dragged him out, into the cabin, walking around Mrs Everson, wondering what exactly had happened there. She was still alive, but she didn't look good at all, as Murdock said, with a large puddle of blood forming around her.

AAA

Doctor Wu first checked the pilots, who had hold on nicely, strapped to the gurneys, that were secured to the structure of the plane, with an oxygen mask already on their face. They looked stable, so he quickly moved on to the next fallen man, Hannibal.

"I don't know if my leg got broken again or not, but help them first," he said, pointing at the others. "Don't worry about me, I won't die because of this." Although it hurts like hell, he thought, with a hand covering his eyes, still grimacing with the pain.

Lawan was already giving mouth to mouth to Face, so the doctor had a look at Lockhart, cursing the loss of most of his medical stuff, that flew out of the plane with that decompression vortex. At least, he had managed to grab his stethoscope in mid-air, as it flew off his neck, were he had it hanging.

"Do you think his stomach burst with that kick?" Hannibal said. He loathed the bastard for kicking his leg and stamping on his ribs, but he felt sorry for him at the same time. Maybe he was bonkers, like Face said, because he also understood why the major had targeted his leg: a good soldier always takes advantage of the enemy's weaknesses, and to him, they were the enemy. But, targeting his injuries like that was cruel. And unnecessary. However, the jerk got what he deserved: live by the sword, die by the sword.

"I don't know. It could be. He looks in traumatic shock, and he has vomited all that blood. But, if he really has a gastric perforation, he will need emergency surgery as soon as possible to survive, which he won't have here."

He left the major as he was for a moment, had a quick look at Face, who was breathing again already, and then walked up the aisle to check on Mrs Everson, who didn't look good at all, with a very faint pulse. She was dying, bleeding out so quickly there was nothing he could do for her under the circumstances.

AAA

No! Not there! Shit, Face thought as the major hit him hard in his upper abdomen. He fell to the floor, with the wind knocked out of him again.

One more time, he gaped like a fish out of water, panicking, never getting used to that sensation. He had already panicked when the window burst, but at least he was wearing a seatbelt and he had made use of the oxygen mask, also helping Hannibal with his. But now, it didn't matter if he had a mask on his face or not, because he couldn't suck any air in, as his suction pump didn't work anymore.

Fucking bastard! You deserve what you got! he thought, delighted when he saw Lockhart vomiting blood after Tia kicked him, collapsing in his own puddle. And Hannibal had felt sorry for that motherfucker before!

Christine had been screaming almost non-stop since the moment Margaret had cried "Freeze!", behaving like a frightened teenage girl watching a horror movie. She was by his side nearly as soon as he hit the floor, but she wasn't of much help, only fussing all over him, crying without doing anything useful.

Mouth-to-mouth, come on! he begged mentally as he gaped. Make me breathe again!

But she didn't. Instead, Lawan pushed her to a side when she kneeled by him, and to his dismay, her lips were the ones contacting his mouth, not Christine's.

Well, at least she was a professional, she knew what she was doing, and she didn't blow smoke into his pipes as Hannibal did after the helicopter crash. And, she didn't use her tongue, like some of the younger, cheeky nurses would have, to make the most of such occasion. It could have been worse!

"Thanks, Lawan," he said when his diaphragm re-booted and he started breathing again.

"You're welcome," she said, placing an oxygen mask on his face. "Shut up and breathe!"

That rudeness made him laugh under the mask, despite the pain he was in. Why couldn't she show her tender, human side, ever?

AAAAA

A.N – nearly back at LA now. One more chapter only (unless I have another stupid plot idea to make this longer which I hope it won't happen!)

Now, shameless auto-plug: for anybody interested in smut and comedy combined, I posted an MA rated comedy-porn story. Not many people are reading, and I think this is because most people don't change the settings to see all the stories, and only see the T ones. So, if you are interested in a good laugh while reading a quite raunchy story Amy-centred written in first person, please have a look. "Amy's Four-in-One".

And if you do, review, please. Or send me a PM if you are too embarrassed. But say something so I know what people think of this kind of stuff.

Thanks.