January 5th 2013, London
The crowded terminal at Heathrow Airport was buzzing with the voices of waiting passengers, mostly holidaymakers returning home, following the end of the Christmas holidays. Among them walked a burly, square-jawed man in his mid-forties, wearing an Oceanic Airlines pilot's uniform, making his way towards the pilots' lounge.
Captain Paul Conandale had been in aviation for nearly twenty years. A distinguished flight veteran and former fighter pilot in the Royal Air Forces, Paul was a flyboy at heart. Unmarried, yet occasionally dating the stewardesses he flew with, his home were the airports of all the different countries he flew to: Paris, Rome, Athens, Cairo, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Sydney, Tokyo, Beijing, Johannesburg, and every other major city around the globe were regularly visited by Paul. Following each long flight, when a flight crew would get a 48-hour liberty pass to cure jetlag, he and his date would go sightseeing, literally turning his career into a life-long vacation of sorts. The perfect life for an airline pilot.
Tonight was an evening like any other; a transatlantic flight from Heathrow London to LaGuardia New York, departing at midnight; a plane full of Christmas holidaymakers, mostly collage students, returning to their overseas universities in the States for the new term. As he walked along the balcony overlooking the concourse, he glanced over the rail at his passengers downstairs; some one hundred people of different sex, age and nationality, laden down with Christmas presents and shopping, sat in the plastic chairs below, chatting and enjoying hot snacks from the cafeteria, awaiting the boarding announcement.
Looks like they've been warned of Oceanic's special pepper steak dinner, Paul thought in amusement. Picking up a copy of the Evening Chronicle from a nearby newspaper stand, he glanced at the front page and frowned. It was again the same ridiculous story that had made the headlines of all major newspapers throughout the country for the past week:
PSYCHOTIC SCIENTIST DIES IN SUICIDE PLANE CRASH
Regularly updated every day for the past few days, as more hazy information leaked out to the Press, the story recited the details of Dr Alan Johnson's tragedy a couple of years back, when his wife and daughter had been brutally slain in a shoot-out, causing the professor to withdraw into solitude, and eventually succumbing to mental breakdown. Then, just last week, whilst on a flying trip over the forbidden New Forest National Park with a friend, their plane had vanished without a trace, followed shortly thereafter by a rescue chopper that had gone combing the area for them.
In tonight's release however, there was an interesting addition to the story: Dr Johnson's housekeeper had been found brutally murdered in her home, with evidence indicating Johnson as the prime suspect. Latest rumours speculated that the disappearance had been a suicide crash orchestrated by the mentally disturbed Dr Johnson himself, to escape justice, taking the pilot and his colleague, Dr Shaw, to the grave with him. The missing Royal Air Force chopper had been ruled out as a coincidental accident, unrelated to Johnson's case.
Bureaucrats and politicians…thought Paul, Boobies the lot of them… Although he could buy this Dr Johnson snapping and murdering his housekeeper out of grief, and then killing himself, being an experienced pilot, Paul knew something more about aircraft than the Press did: an aircraft going down over land couldn't just vanish without a trace. And then, there was also the mystery of the missing chopper; if Johnson had committed suicide by crashing his plane in the heart of New Forest, then how could the chopper, piloted by an experienced Royal Air Force squadron, vanish under exactly the same circumstances, with no apparent cause? It just didn't add up in the pilot's mind.
As far as Paul was concerned, this Johnson fellow was dead; and mostly likely he had been a deranged psychopath and a killer, given his charming backstory. Whatever it was, it was none of his concern. But there was still this missing piece to the puzzle that he couldn't quite figure out… But what could it be?
Glancing at his watch, he frowned at the time. Drat, time to get cracking. Tucking away his paper, he grabbed his suitcase and hurried towards the pilots' lounge, to meet the rest of his flight crew and maybe have a large, caffeine-rich cappuccino before boarding. This was going to be a long night - unbeknownst to him, the longest of his life.
Lost in his thoughts over the Johnson mystery, he wasn't looking where he was going, as he walked straight into a scrawny boy of about twenty who had just come through the security check. With a loud clutter, the boy's unpacked books and laptop, which he had been trying to stuff back into his rucksack, fell to the floor. Cursing himself for not looking where he was going, Paul hastily knelt down to help the boy retrieve his belongings, muttering his apologies.
"Oh, terribly sorry, lad. My fault. Are you lost?"
"Yes, I was wondering if you tell me where Gate A13 is, please?" asked the boy in a clear American accent, showing him his boarding pass. Paul chuckled under his breath; he was accustomed to meeting foreign passengers unable to navigate London's largest airport, a place he knew like the palm of his hand.
"It looks like you're on my flight tonight young man," he said, reading the flight number on the ticket, "Just follow the concourse down that way, then turn left and down the escalators; your gate is the forth on your right."
"Gee, thanks…Captain, isn't?" asked the boy, recognising the gold stripes on Paul's uniform. The man smiled, proud of having his title recognised, "Yes, Captain Paul Conandale, of Oceanic Airlines," he said, shaking hands with the boy. Although dressed in baggy clothes, with a long mouse-like nose and a ridiculous spiky haircut, Paul could tell the boy had some serious intelligence to make up for his off-putting appearance, "I take it you're a student here… – sorry, didn't catch your name, son…?"
"Ratty Marcus," said the boy, "I am a biology student at the Royal University of London…or was…" His face fell at his own words, remembering that he had only just been suspended, following an incident of plagiarism in his dissertation. In contrast to his former fellow students currently preparing for the start of the new term, Ratty was returning home a failure, his future ruined. But that was none of Paul's business.
"Well, good for you, young man. By the way, did you know a certain Professor Johnson there?" Paul asked, remembering the article mentioning that Dr Johnson had been an associate professor at Ratty's old university. Ratty nodded, his face brightening.
"Of course, he was my tutor; a bit of an oddball, that guy, but he taught us real well. His successor certainly pales in comparison…" Indeed, Dr Johnson had been one of only a few of his former professors to appreciate his academic skills, the rest of the staff having often regarded him as an average student, not worth their time. The resignation, followed by the 'suicide', of his favourite former professor now only added to his misery, and he decided to cut the chitchat short, "Anyway, I better get going. Nice to meet you, Captain."
"Enjoy your flight, young Mr Marcus."
Paul picked up his own luggage and hurried downstairs to the pilot's lounge. His co-pilot, Bob Chambers, a bespectacled balding man of around thirty, due to be promoted to Captain after this flight, was expecting him. Although a fine co-pilot, the younger man looked rather uneasy in the veteran's presence, not unlike the shy, recently hired stewardesses he sat with, nervous about the upcoming evaluation of his flying skills, which would determine whether or not he would be wearing his forth strip on the return flight next week. Waiting with him were their three-person cabin crew, as well as Officer John Harris, a stern-faced air marshal, who'd be accompanying the flight.
Walking up to the minibar for a quick coffee, Paul caught sight of one particular face he had been eager to see since leaving his hotel that evening, sitting at a nearby table: Constance Campbell, the chief stewardess, who also worked for the same airline. Like Paul, the young brunette, ten years Paul's junior, was a lady of her field, patient and kind to everyone around her, whether passenger or crew, embodying the very soul of the flight crew. In contrast to other stewardesses he usually dated during his overseas leaves, which often turned out to be a-one-time-date only, Constance had quickly become the apple of Paul's eye, and, although they were technically just friends, he was secretly hoping for a chance to propose to her someday.
Walking up behind her, he gently tapped her on the shoulder. The young stewardess, startled, spun round in surprise but then smiled when she saw who it was, "Oh, hallo, Paul. Goodness, you gave me quite a turn! So how was your weekend?"
"As usual, looking forward to sprout my wings again, lassie," he said, taking a seat beside her, "How about you?"
"Went to see my Uncle Herbert at the nursing home. He is quite distraught from the news about Alan…" Paul raised his eyebrows, Bloody hell, is this Johnson fellow a posthumous celebrity or something? he thought, "Did you know him?"
"He and his brother lived at my uncle's orphanage many years ago," said Constance, wiping away a tear, "I used to play with him and his gang whenever he brought them over to our home on weekends or during the holidays. After he left, we lost touch. The last time I ever saw him was at his brother's funeral a couple of years ago, where I met his wife and daughter… Such a tragedy…"
"You believe all those stories then?" asked Paul without thinking, "I mean, that stuff about him being barmy and all?" He regretted asking that question before the words had even passed his lips, as he saw Constance's face curl into a reproachful frown.
"Paul, I don't know what you think of Alan, but my uncle and I absolutely refuse to believe such dirty lies about him. We knew him much better than those insufferable journalists after a story that sells!" Paul wished he had swallowed his tongue.
"I am sorry, Constance. I didn't know it was such a touchy subject for you…" To his utmost relief, Constance smiled a bit.
"Never mind. It was a long time ago. I am sure my uncle will get over it soon or later… I'll see you onboard, Paul, I've got to brief the rest of the cabin crew." She picked up her luggage and hurried out with the rest of the stewardesses and the air marshal without another word. Staring at the clock, Paul realised it was already eleven-thirty, only half an hour before take-off! Gulping down the last of his coffee, he hurried back to Chambers who was shaking his head in amusement from seeing Constance seemingly rejecting his captain's offer for a romantic date in New York.
"Women…" the young co-pilot chuckled, "No understanding them…" But Paul clearing his throat in a stern manner, made him swallow his tongue.
"Another word on that subject and I'll vote you out of promotion! Pre-flight check, lieutenant! What's the weather forecast for tonight?" Startled by Paul's sudden change of mood, Chambers hastily went over the report the control tower had faxed him before coming down to the airport.
"Low visibility and thick snowfall all the way to Dorset - but it clears out over the Atlantic. There is also a sighting of that strange Aurora over New Forest again; we might be flying through it tonight to avoid that incoming storm on the southern seaboard..." Although the New Forest area had been declared a restricted zone for the past few years due to nuclear fallout left over from the recent war, commercial airliners were still allowed to fly over the area at high altitude without fear of exposure to radiation. Only tonight, a new phenomenon, mistaken for radioactive interference in the atmosphere, was materialising over New Forest - a lurking danger for anything that flew into its path, which had already claimed Dr Johnson's plane and Major McEwen's chopper.
"If we take off at all, with all that muck outside," said Paul, watching the thick blizzard outside the glass windows of the terminal, which was obstructing his view of the runways. If the weather continued on like this, soon all flights would be grounded for the rest of the night. And there was something strangely aerie about that winter sky, which troubled him... But, currently, he had other responsibilities to tend to, including getting ready for departure. He turned to his colleague, "Let's go."
Twenty minutes later, Paul and Chambers sat on the flight deck of Oceanic Airlines Flight 571, a twin-engine Boeing 767 that flew regular transatlantic flights between the United States and Europe. With Paul seated in his usual left-hand side captain's seat and Chambers on the co-pilot's right, where he would be sitting for the last time tonight, the two pilots went through their routine pre-flight check.
As Chamber had predicted, because of the heavy weather front on the southern seaboard, they would be making a detour overland, to Dorset, flying straight through the New Forest area, before making their way out over the Atlantic, towards America. With the fuelling truck outside topping off their tanks and the de-icing team sprinkling the plane's wings with anti-freeze, they could hear their passengers in the back starting to get restless, impatient for take-off. A routine flight like any other...or so Paul hoped.
Meanwhile, in the rear of the aircraft, in economy, Ratty Marcus was trying to make his way along the crowded aisle to his seat, 52-B. Stowing away his rucksack and coat in the overhead locker and stowing his laptop under his seat, his sat down beside Air Marshal Harris and another thin man in a smart French suit.
"Bonjour," said the man, offering his hand to shake, "Dr Loomis Renaud, Curie Medical Institute." Dr Renaud was a French physician, on his way to attend a conference on the development of a new drug in New York. But, despite their polite exchange of words, Ratty was not in the mood for chatting, his mind still dwelling over his certificate of dismissal issued, tucked away in his bag. Trying to banish the miserable thought of having to confront his parents in the morning, which, he knew, were terribly upset with him for goofing up his studies, he fastened his seatbelt, hoping to drift off to sleep and forget his problems for a while.
Meanwhile, on the flight deck, Constance knocked on the cockpit door and entered, carrying the passenger list, which she handed to Paul, "Ticket check is finished, Captain; all 105 passengers onboard are onboard and the tarmac crew reports the baggage loaded and stowed away. We're ready for departure."
Hearing the tower inform them that they had a temporary gap in their air traffic and with the bad weather quickly shifting their way, which would probably cause the airport to shut down any moment now, Paul seized the opportunity. He turned to Chambers, who was still working through the checklist, "Send word to the truck crew to roll up their hoses and clear off. We're leaving now." Although sceptical, Chambers, being a less experienced pilot, thought it wise not to argue and put the checklist away.
"Your call, Captain."
While Chambers announced their departure to the control tower over the radio, Paul addressed the passengers over the intercom, "Good evening ladies and gentlemen and welcome aboard Oceanic Flight 571 to La Guardia, New York. Estimated flight time is eight hours and 50 minutes. Also, approximately half an hour after take-off, we will be flying through the Aurora, which I am sure will be a beautiful sight for everyone to enjoy, before we redirect to the coast. Enjoy your flight and thank you for flying Oceanic Airlines."
Soon, Flight 571 was taxiing along the runway, preparing for take-off. With Chambers manning the throttles and Paul the stick and rudder, ten minutes later, the airliner was airborne and at cruising altitude, on a southwesterly course, leaving the snowed-in London area behind.
Climbing above the blizzard, soon they were flying through clearer weather over the clouds, which shadowed the English countryside. In the back, Constance had the cabin crew on their toes, unloading the galley trolleys, serving up drinks and snacks to the passengers. As they flew over Hampshire, towards Dorset, suddenly, Paul saw it; dead ahead, about five miles to their twelve o'clock, was that mysterious Aurora, its bright ribbons of rainbow colours resembling a giant, luminous curtain floating in the night sky.
As they neared the Aurora, Paul suddenly noticed a blinking light appear out of nowhere on his radar screen, heading straight towards them. Strange… I thought the Tower said there was no other air traffic in the area. Homing in on the signal for an identification number, thinking it might be another plane, he couldn't pick up any transponder signature. He pointed it out to Chambers who shrugged it away.
"Just a swarm of birds most likely. If it were another plane, it would definitely have a transponder. No idiot PP would be flying in such weather anyway…" Paying the mysterious signal no further heed, the co-pilot pressed the call button to summon a stewardess for some tea. But Paul, unnerved by that mysterious signal getting closer and closer, got on the radio to Heathrow Control.
"Heathrow Tower, we have an unidentified signal on our flight path approaching fast from heading 085. Please check and advice."
"Roger Flight 571, maintain your current heading and altitude. Stand by." The seconds ticked by in silence, Paul watching nervously as the distance between them and the unknown signal getting shorter and shorter, yet seeing nothing ahead through the fog. Suddenly, he heard the Heathrow flight controller again, yelling, "Flight 571, you are on a collision course with a non-responsive aircraft! Divert immediately…!" Then, he saw it: a small Cessna 172 suddenly appeared, seemingly out of nowhere, only a few yards away, heading straight towards them on a head-on collision!
"JESUS CHRIST! Hard to port, now!"
With the plane only a second away from flying straight into their laps, Paul and Chambers both grabbed hold of the controls, making an evasive turn. But it was too late; before they knew it, the Cessna was upon them, its exposed wing grazing their starboard engine like the blade of a swinging knife. The violent impact shook the plane, followed by the booming sound of an explosion - a sound that was instantly muffled by the screams of terrified passengers in the back. In another instant, the klaxon alarm was blaring in their ears, multiple caution lights lighting up on the control panel, as the engine burst into flame.
Paul quickly hit the fuel-cut off switch for Engine #2 and activated the in-built fire extinguisher to douse the flames. Hastily readjusting the thrust on the remaining port engine to compensate for the loss of power, and trimming the stabilizers, he bellowed across the line, "Mayday, mayday! This is Flight 571 declaring an emergency! We're hit! Starboard engine is out, further extent of damage unknown. Request heading for nearest airport! Our location is…" He had only a second to register that they had reached the edge of the Aurora, which illuminated the cockpit in rainbow colours, before their real problems started…
Meanwhile, Ratty had gone to the rear of the aircraft, to use the lavatory. Flushing the toilet, he turned to the basin to brush his teeth. Although he was hungry, he had decided to skip dinner and turn in early, hoping to get as many hours of blissful sleep as possible, in preparation for confronting his father in the morning. Perhaps, if he could convince him that the fault was the university's and not his own, he might ask for his help to submit another academic appeal to the Rector, or transfer to another university…
Suddenly, without warning, Ratty was caught off-guard as the plane tilted sideways, followed by a violent vibration that nearly sent him through the roof of the lavatory. The mirror above the basin was instantly shattered by the shock, showering the small room with razor-sharp glass shards. Ratty threw his arms in front of his face to shield himself, wincing as pieces of the broken mirror cut into his skin and clothing. He could feel the plane shaking and swaying dangerously, telling the boy that they were in trouble. He could hear the panicked screams outside the door and the voices of the cabin crew trying to reassure passengers.
Hastily doing up his pants, he forced the jammed lavatory door open, eager to get back to his seat. But no sooner had he stepped out into the aisle, which was strewn with baggage that had fallen out of the overhead lockers, than all the lights suddenly went out, plunging the cabin in total darkness, filled with the terrified screams of his fellow passengers…
Constance had been pushing the trolley up the aisle through economy, serving drinks. She was just passing a gin-and-tonic to Dr Renaud, when she was suddenly thrown to the floor by the violent vibration of the collision, pinned beneath the trolley, which came down on top of her. Instant panic and chaos ensued, as baggage lockers burst open, spilling their contents all around the cabin, hitting passengers on the aisle seats.
Glancing out through the windows, she caught a glimpse of the small plane that had hit them, disappearing into the background, leaving the engine it had grazed in its path, burning behind it. Bright orange flames and smoke licked the cabin windows, intensifying the panic.
"Oh my God, fire! We're going to die!" someone screamed, as bruised and panicked passengers seemed about to jump from their seats in fright. Fighting to control her own fear, Constance pushed the overturned trolley off of her, struggling to keep the passengers calm. She could see her colleagues, as well as several of the passengers, already tending to the wounded, including a beverage-drenched Dr Renaud, who was on his feet, tending to an injured woman in the seat in front of him. At the back, she saw a battered Ratty Marcus forcing his way out of the wrecked lavatory.
As she tried to make her way towards the boy and help him back to his seat, a new crisis followed: the cabin lights suddenly flickered and went out. The emergency circuit, which was supposed to automatically spring to life, failed to respond. Renewed screams of panic followed, as the cabin crew struggled to preserve order, now faced with the additional problem of not being able to see, and with all the emergency flashlights stowed in the fore and aft galleys, out of reach.
Realising the boy was likely to trip and hurt himself, Constance, using the still-glowing phosphorous aisle markers on the floor, made her way towards him and pulled him back to his seat. Blindly helping him fasten his seatbelt, she failed to notice the Aurora outside becoming a vortex, engulfing the plane and swallowing them…
Meanwhile, up in the cockpit, Paul and Chambers had their own problems; and it wasn't from further damage caused by the collision. All their flight instruments had suddenly started dancing, displaying erratic readings, as if caught in some sort of magnetic interference. Suddenly, the plane was engulfed in a bright white vortex of rainbow light, as it touched the Aurora, swallowing them into its depths. Then, all the lights blacked out.
With no emergency power and with all instruments now down across the board, the pilots fought hard to regain control. Although they had no functioning indicators to give them any flight readings, they could feel the G-forces of the enormous velocity they were being carried along at, reaching speeds only encountered in steep nosedives. They were going down! Paul pulled back hard on the stick, trying to break free of the vortex's embrace; the elevator wouldn't respond. He tried making a turn; likewise, the rudder wasn't responding either. He couldn't even roll the aircraft.
"Damn, we've lost hydraulics! Switch to backup systems, now!" But even as Chambers turned the emergency levels on the pedestal, switching over to the backup pumps, they didn't get any response from either control stick. The plane was dead as a doornail, flying completely out of control. Even as the pilots resorted to switching over to complete manual control, they got nothing.
"Nothing, sir, no control. Oh, Lord, we're going to break up!" shouted Chambers, furiously shaking the unresponsive control stick in every direction, trying desperately to regain control, as the wild turbulence of the vortex continued beating the aircraft with all its might.
"Calm down, don't force it!" barked Paul, trying to 'feel' what his plane was feeling. Being a flight veteran, he had had his fair share of mid-flight mechanical failures and could easily recognise them. This wasn't hydraulic failure, otherwise the controls would gradually be growing sluggish, not instantly go dead on them; and it wasn't a broken jackscrew either, otherwise the stick would be stiff as a board. And the electrical failure they were experiencing didn't affect the hydraulic system, which functioned manually. It was unlike anything Paul had ever seen before, almost as if this mysterious force outside was carrying the plane along…to where?
Before he knew it, it was over. With another bright flash of light, the vortex spat them out on the far side of the Aurora. The electrics flickered back to life; he could hear the remaining port engine still roaring on full power in the background, as well as the murmuring of the frightened passengers in the back, but no further signs of apparent trouble. Several instruments were down, but he could still retain control of the crippled aircraft…for the moment.
Staring out the windshield, Paul suddenly realised something was very wrong. The weather had suddenly turned crystal clear; the cloud cover, the blizzard and the Aurora had all vanished; now, a bright starry sky stretched out to the horizon. What had happened?
As he turned to Chambers, he saw his colleague clutching his face with both hands, moaning in pain; the blood trickling down the co-pilot's front told Paul that his colleague had been badly hurt. One of the navigation screens had exploded from a surge caused by the turbulence, sending razor-sharp splinters into the man's eyes, blinding him. At that moment, Constance entered the cockpit, walking over the collapsed door, which had been knocked clean off its hinges by the impact and now lay flat on the edge of the aisle.
"Paul, what's happened? Oh my God…!" she gasped, spotting the maimed Chambers bleeding grotesquely in his seat. Without taking his hands off the controls, Paul turned to her for a report.
"What's the situation back there?"
"Two passengers have collapsed into seizures. I have already checked the passenger manifest; we have three doctors aboard and they're already pitching in to help…" she said, her eyes wide with terror. The instant the blackout had passed, she and her colleagues had turned to check on the passengers, discovering two elderly ones with pacemaker implants having heart attacks. Several others had suffered cuts or bruises from falling luggage, including a steward who had broken both his legs from a loose galley trolley. Air marshal Harris had already taken charge, helping the cabin crew tend to the wounded, all the while trying to control the panic. For the moment, the situation seemed to be more or less under control. But they couldn't expect it to stay like that for much longer.
With the plane badly damaged, and now with injured passengers onboard, Paul realised an immediate landing was imperative. The question was, would they be able to make it to the nearest airport with only one working engine? Was the plane in any condition for a routine landing? And where had that vortex come from?
"What about structural damage? See anything back there?"
"The forward galley is a mess from a loose drinks trolley and several overhead lockers have burst open. The oxygen masks have also deployed, but there doesn't seem to be any decompression…" Paul's eyes darted to the cabin pressure regulators and saw that indeed, thankfully, they hadn't lost pressure, indicating they hadn't suffered any severe structural damage from the turbulence. The oxygen masks deploying was simply the result of the sensitive safety sensor being tripped from the blackout.
Turning back to his radio, he switched over to the emergency band and activated the plane's distress locator beacons, sending out another mayday, "Heathrow Approach, this is Flight 571, level at 12,000ft. We've lost our starboard engine and have casualties. Request heading to the nearest airport. Do you copy, over?" But he wasn't picking up anything anymore, other than crackling static. All communications were down across the board; even the satellite uplinks for the navigation systems had gone off the air. Meanwhile, the port engine was straining to keep up, slowly overheating, and leaving them precious little time to attempt a landing. If it seized before they could make it back to the airport, it would mean a blind, dead-stick crash landing in the middle of the English countryside, possibly resulting in a great many deaths. Realising the emergency at hand, Paul turned to Constance, who was waiting for further instructions.
"Get the doctor up here to help you move Chambers out; the casualties you can lie down flat on the forward galley floor, but keep the aisle clear. Make sure everybody is firmly strapped in, including the cabin crew – you, I'll need up here in the co-pilot's seat. Tell the passengers they can go off oxygen – we're below fifteen thousand and we haven't lost pressure. I am going to turn us round and make a run for Heathrow. Let's hope we can make it… Well, get on with it girl! And don't worry; everything is going to be all right!"
With the plane fully loaded, Paul made a turn, setting a new course back to Heathrow – the only airport in the south not closed yet from the blizzard -, using the stars, the panel's magnetic compass and his watch to navigate without the radio and navigation beacons. But, deep down, he already knew that they couldn't make it. The starboard engine was dead; the readouts for the port one were already in the red, indicating it would quit any moment now. He had tried dumping the fuel, to lighten the plane, but found the purge valves were jammed and inoperable. And without some means of communication, he had no way to confirm if the runway at Heathrow was still clear for them to land, until they had visual contact with the airport. What if it was snowed in solid by now and only realised it when it was too late?
So much for an easy flight…
Soon, Flight 571 was making a run for Heathrow - at least where Heathrow was supposed to be. Constance had returned with Dr Renaud and Harris and moved Chambers out of the cockpit, placing him on the galley floor, where the rest of the injured (or rather the dead) were also being made more comfortable with blankets and pillows the cabin crew had salvaged from the seats. The chief stewardess had then returned and strapped herself into the unoccupied co-pilot's seat, to assist Paul with the upcoming emergency landing.
Struggling to keep the plane level, Paul attempted again and again to regain contact with ground control, but to no avail. He had run a full systems' check, trying to figure out what was wrong, but found the results puzzling. It seemed almost as if the fault wasn't with his instruments at all, but with the ground stations. Sure enough, he hadn't taken long to realise that the entire country below seemed to have gone into a complete blackout; with the exception of the stars, the ground was now an endless sea of darkness, completely deprived of any artificial illumination, as far out as the eye could see. What had happened?
Only ten miles shy of the airport, he heard the klaxon start blaring again as more caution lights lit up on the panel. The port engine, overtaxed and overheated beyond its safety limits was going into emergency shutdown. Paul and Constance listened as the roaring jet on the wing slowly ground to a halt, leaving them gliding without power. With no other option left, Paul began an emergency descent. Pretty soon, he would be bringing a dead Booing 767 down in a crash landing, in the middle of nowhere. Although the terrain beneath them, he knew, was thankfully mostly open country, in this darkness, a jetliner this size encountering the slightest obstacle on touchdown, whether a patch of forest or a farmhouse, could mean the difference between life and death for everyone onboard.
Trimming the flaps and lowering the undercarriage, his mind kept flashing back to that 'ghost' Cessna that had hit them. Although it had only been visible for a few brief seconds, Paul was sure he knew that plane from somewhere before…With a gasp of realisation, he realised it had been none other than Dr Johnson's plane, which had supposedly crashed in New Forest, over a week ago! Slowly, everything began clicking together in his mind: what was happening to them was exactly what must have happened to Dr Johnson and that Royal Air Force chopper…
Then, he felt the force of the impact…
Back at Heathrow Control, the flight controllers in the tower were busy redirecting all incoming traffic to other airports up north, after the airport manager had ordered the airport closed until morning due to the heavy weather. Suddenly, one of the controllers monitoring the flight path of Flight 571, waiting for it to clear the coastal airspace, saw another faint signal appear on his screen. It seemed to be another aircraft with its transponder switched off, yet the man was at a loss as to how an aircraft could have materialised out of thin air in flight! Then he heard the pilot of 571, confirming that they were also picking up the same signal.
"Heathrow, we have an unidentified signal on our flight path approaching fast from heading 085. Please check and advice. Over."
"Roger Flight 571, maintain your current heading and altitude. Stand by."Using satellite surveillance, the flight control realised, with horror, that it was another plane, entering the flight path of Flight 571! He turned to his radio, trying to warn that mysterious plane, "Unidentified aircraft, be advised you are entering the flight path of a heavy jet. If you maintain your current heading, you will collide. I repeat, you will collide! Change your heading immediately!"
Getting no answer, he hurryingly turned back to Flight 571 to warn them, "Flight 571, you are on a collision course with a non-responsive aircraft! Divert immediately…!" But it was already too late.
With cold horror, the flight controller saw the dots marking the locations of the two aircraft on the radar screen, touch and then move off in opposite directions; the reading showed the unidentified aircraft go into a nose dive and vanish, as it fell below radar interception; Flight 571 seemed to have been knocked off its course but remained in the air. Then the flight controller heard Captain Conandale's voice again, declaring an emergency.
"Mayday, mayday! This is Flight 571 declaring an emergency! We've struck another aircraft; our starboard engine is out, further extent of damage unknown. Request heading for nearest available airport!"
But before the flight controller could give any instructions however, the radar signal began to weaken and then Flight 571 vanished from the screen as well. The flight controller felt his insides turn to ice; had the jetliner gone down like that Cessna? Panicking, he grabbed the phone from its cradle and alerted security.
In spite of a thorough search, the wreckage of Flight 571 was never found, nor any of its 105 missing passengers and crew. The incident was a devastating blow for Oceanic Airlines, when the families of those lost, the majority of which had been university students in the prime of life, filed lawsuits against the company for criminal negligence. The cause of the accident, as often happens, was ultimately ruled out as pilot error, pinning the blame posthumously on Paul. The airline eventually went bankrupt in the early 2020's and merged with British Airways and other companies that bought her remaining aircraft and stock.
Even after all airlines eventually closed in 2029 when the Apocalypse fell upon the Earth, the mystery surrounding the disappearance of Flight 571 remained unsolved; no one ever realised that the plane had simply vanished into time, thrown deep into an unknown future by a time warp…
Author's note: For those of you that are confused, Flight 571 is the plane that Alan's group hit after escaping from the future in the first book. I intend to introduce further parallel events for the next few chapters before returning to the original characters. Coming up next, the story of Jamie McEwen. Enjoy and please review!