Chapter Sixteen
Drake smiled charmingly at the pretty stewardess that checked his ticket and moved slowly to his plane seat. He settled into his seat and stared blankly out of his window. He looked down at his hands which were knotted together in his lap, and smiled. If the GCPD could be bought by money, why not a stewardess? Why not a pilot? Why ever not an immigrations officer? Drake loved Gotham. He opened his passport and stared at the picture of himself. Name; Brian Adamas. He smirked, he had to admit, Gotham's people had some skills. The passport looked almost real, even to him! There was a slight commotion in the aisle and a couple sat on the seats next to him. He closed his passport and put it away.
He tried to ignore his new companions, he was often told it was rude to stare. But the flight would be a few hours and they hadn't even gotten off the ground yet! He snuck a glance at them. The woman who was sitting next to him and separating him from her companion was beautiful. She had straight, black hair and a serious face that commanded no nonsense. She held a shoulder bag and a notepad was laid across her knees. Drake had no complaints about her legs. He stole a glance at her notepad and recognized the logo for the Daily Planet, a newspaper centered in Metropolis. That explained the business-like air the woman had. Drake immediately turned to resume staring out of the window. The last thing he needed was to run into a reporter!
Lois Lane peered past a teen's head and looked out of the window, she noticed the boy doing the same. "Looks like rain, huh?" she smiled. The boy turned and looked at her quietly, then nodded.
"Weather reports suspect a storm is brewing." Clark chimed in, no sooner had the words left his mouth when a flash of lightning lit up the sky followed closely by rolling thunder.
Lois glared at him accusingly. "You just had to jinx us, didn't you?" Drake tuned the two out, he didn't want to get involved in their fight. Surprisingly, the large, bespectacled reporter just took the comment in stride. He seemed to be used to it. 'Whipped' Drake thought with a wry grin.
Fifteen minutes into the flight, Drake knew he wouldn't be able to catch a break. He smelled gunpowder, from where, he had no idea. He abruptly got up and excused himself to go to the bathroom. He passed over the two reporters and hurried to the back of the plane and past the bathrooms. He stopped at the rear exit and began small-talking with the stewardess there. Then, three men stood up simultaneously, they wore black ski masks and were holding guns. One of them began shouting something that Drake couldn't make out. They were on opposite ends of the plane. Seeing their problem, the shouting man forced his way into the cockpit and began waving his gun around. A second later, a crackle was heard over the loudspeakers. "Attention all passengers, this is the pilot speaking!" Drake frowned at the quiver in the man's voice. "This plane has been hijacked. All passengers please remain calm and give them your full cooperation."
Silence reigned in the airtight prison, everybody just stared at the speakers in shock. Then one girl screamed. The nightmare began. Drake winced as the noise in the airplane escalated, everybody was screaming and shouting. The stewardess who he was speaking with excused herself to help calm down the masses. Drake shook his head sadly. With all the commotion everybody was making, it wouldn't be long before the hijackers made a public example, what would happen if the passengers didn't cooperate. No sooner had the thought crossed his mind when three shots rang out, echoing from the front of the plane to the back. Again, silence overcame the people. The shooter dragged his unfortunate victim out of his seat and dragged him the full length of the plane so everybody could get a good look at the body. "Listen up!" the violent one shouted as he walked. "This is what's going to happen to anybody who doesn't give us full cooperation. You get a bullet in your chest!" he waved his gun toward his victim. "So everybody shut up!"
The man dropped his victim's body once he reached the back of the plane and saw Drake. "You! Sit down, now!" he ordered, Drake decided to play the part of helpless little boy and immediately complied. He sat down in the nearest open seat and settled himself in. The hijacker leaned over him and buckled his seatbelt, pulling it tight. "Everybody fasten your seatbelts!" he shouted once he was done. "And tighten it! Don't put anything on your laps! I want to see your seatbelts! If I don't...!" he let the threat hang over everybody's head. The compartment was soon filled with clicking noises as everybody rushed to follow their orders.
Drake glanced over to his original seat and at the couple who had been sitting next to him. "All we had to do was get to Gotham, interview Bruce Wayne, and write an article on the charity event incident. And then we could go back to our homes, where we could just take a shower, get a decent meal, and relax! But no! We have to get stuck in a hijack!" he heard the woman complain. He couldn't resist a grin, he liked her. Then he turned his attention back to the hijackers and frowned. There could still be more terrorist hiding in the passengers or the airline staff. He disliked hijacks when he wasn't the one instigating them. He decided to wait and see what the terrorist's first move would be.
Money, Drake rolled his eyes. That's what it all boiled down to? Typical small time crooks. His only hope for a nice, peaceful return home for recuperation was crushed for a few extra bucks! He could not belive this. He wanted to get out of Gotham before he got killed by some psycho and yet he finds himself in mortal danger of a plane crash on his way out. He hated Gotham, Gotham must hate him as well with all the troubles she was throwing his way. The hijackers explained very carefully what would happen next. The authorities on the ground would transfer a great some of money into an untraceable bank account and once the hijacker's received the money and the plane landed, they would take a few people hostage and leave the plane from the rear. If their demands were not met, they would blow a hole in the plane, causing it to crash. It was a simple, yet effective plan of action. Only... he frowned. Things could get messy. If he was the hijacker and he took these actions, he would blow the plane up as he parachuted to safety. There was no way the police would let the hijackers get away if they got off the plane in the airport. The hijackers wern't planning on letting a single hostage live.
He craned his neck to peer down the aisle where two of the three hijackers stood idling. They both wore identical backpacks. Drake looked around for any other backpacks like them. He found three others, six terrorists in total. One was worn by the third exposed hijacker, another was stuffed under a passenger seat and the third was hidden in a refreshments cart. The three hijackers set an explosive device on one of the airplane doors and waited for the transaction. Drake guessed that would be their escapeway.
The tense wait only lasted about half-an-hour before one of the hijackers announced over the loudspeakers that the money had been received. Hundreds of passengers let out unified sighs of relief but Drake knew the ordeal was far from over. "Hey!" one of the passengers called out bravely. "What's going to happen to us?" Apparently, it wasn't only Drake who was thinking along that line. The hijacker closest to the man pointed his gun at him and fired. Panicked passengers screamed, causing the pilot to lose concentration and the plane dipped dangerously to the side. The stewardess cart that Drake had noticed before, now rolled, unmanned, in his direction. Drake took the opportunity to snag the parachute and exchange the backpack with the one under his own seat.
Then, the hijackers moved slowly down the alley to the rear of the plane and they grabbed their 'hostages' as they went and soon, all the hijackers were in the back of the plane. Drake could see the detonators in one of the terrorist's hand now. He held one that would set off the explosives on the door and let them out and the other was for the bombs set to crash the plane. If he was going to move, now was the moment. He slipped his parachute on and waited as his target set off the first bomb. He unbuckled his seatbelt and dashed toward the group just as the door exploded, sucking all six of them out of the plane. Drake had managed to grab hold of his target the moment before the air pressure whisked them off their feet. He wrestled the second detonator out of the man's hand and shoved him away.
He hated this feeling, the freefalling, tumbling, being shoved about by the air current. He somersaulted in the air before finally regaining control of his movements. He spread his limbs out for balance and glanced up at the blossoming parachutes above him. One of the hijackers screamed when he realized his parachute had been stolen and plummeted to the earth. He peered past the expanse of canvas as the plane wobbled, barely under control. Then he saw a blue and red smudge outside the plane and the machine steadied. Drake pulled his own toggle and felt his stomach drop into his feet as he was jerked upward. He guided his parachute away and drifted lazily off from the group.
He was sinking in the sky for a while now, he looked down and could see empty fields, the terrorists would get away from the police easily from his distance. He drifted over a wooded area when the red and blue smudge came by again. He looked up and watched as whatever it was incapacitated the terrorists and came for him. He gulped and looked down past his feet. He could survive a fall from this height. The trees would stop his fall. He unbuckled the parachute and let his arms slip out of the harness. And he was freefalling again.