Hostage by Clare Mackintosh

THIRTY-FIVE

PASSENGER 1G

I found it interesting to see the passengers turn on one another. How quickly the layers of human decency strip away, how swiftly raw instinct and prejudice take over…

Their leap in thought to Islamic terrorism was a natural one, and in fact, I have studied such acts in depth, learning much about their devotion, their patience, their methodology. The 2008 Mumbai bombings were the result of almost a year of training and planning. There are, however, distinct differences between a jihadist’s actions and ours. They are motivated by belief; we are motivated by science. The facts are unarguable, whether or not you choose to listen to them.

The business-class passengers quieted down once they saw the lengths to which they had forced me to go. I had not planned to kill Carmel, but her death reinforced our position of power, and I felt that things would be easier from then on. As the remaining crew was occupied fetching water, I took advantage of the opportunity to pay a visit to the economy cabin. Just as I was entering the lounge, I witnessed a movement behind the bar. I pulled up short.

“Who’s there?”

Slowly, a man stood up, his raised hands shaking so violently, he looked like he was dancing.

“What’s your name?”

“H-Hassan.”

“Move!”

The man responded instantly, ducking under the hatch, and half running, half falling the few feet toward the economy cabin, where Niger was holding the left-hand aisle.

“Get him back with the rest of the crew.”

Niger acknowledged this with a curt nod, stepping aside as Hassan lunged past, then giving him a shove in the small of his back, which sent him running down the aisle. At the back, by the entrance to the galley, a cluster of uniforms pulled the hapless barman to the floor. Niger had made the crew sit in the aisle, where he could more easily see any movement, and I was impressed by his initiative. Living on the streets had given him an edge over the others, a hardness that meant he wasn’t easily intimidated. When I met him, at a global warming demonstration, he was smearing Vaseline over the windscreen of the police riot van, parked down a side street while its occupants tried to prevent a perfectly lawful protest. Our eyes had met just as he was sliding off the bonnet. He wore a balaclava; I had a beanie hat and a scarf across my mouth, making it hard for him to read my mood.

“Fucking pigs,” I said, for quite possibly the only time in my life.

He nodded approvingly. “There’s another one in Bridge Street.”

“Lead the way.”

He’d grinned then and chucked me the Vaseline. Fearless and clever. I had yet to find a weakness. I caught the tub neatly, and we ran together, united against a common enemy. By the end of the day, I had a new recruit (not that he knew it at that point), and he had somewhere to live, after I’d called in a few favors. He never associated his part in our organization with that chance meeting—never knew when we chatted online that we’d already met in person—and that was just how I liked it. I knew everyone; nobody knew me.

In stark contrast to Niger, I was already nervous about Ganges. He was young—still in his twenties—and although he was a psychology graduate, working at the time as an NHS clinician, I frequently found his judgment to be skewed. I watched him finally take up his own position—guarding the entrance between economy and the bar—and saw he was shaking with nerves. It was clear he had contemplated abandoning us altogether, and I knew I would have to watch him.

I looked around the plane, counting off team members, cross-checking positions with names, names with faces. There appeared to be more compliance in the economy cabin than in business class, and I wondered if passengers in the latter carried a sense of entitlement that resulted in more challenges. Perhaps I was overthinking it; maybe the tightly packed seats simply lent themselves more easily to a hostage situation.

A number of the passengers were fiddling in vain with mobile phones, presumably still imagining that the Wi-Fi was indeed “temporarily down,” as they had been informed early in our flight. I could see them stabbing buttons in desperation, even holding their handsets high above their seats, as though the additional height might provide them with a signal.

Communications were a key part of the operation, of course. I decided we would not attempt to hack the flight-deck radio. Yangtze was quite sure it was possible and indeed was champing at the bit to try, but it seemed an unnecessary gamble. Once the hijack was in progress, air traffic control would be largely powerless, and there was always the risk that Yangtze’s interception could be noticed too early and the authorities alerted.

It was far more important to bring down the Wi-Fi in the cabin. Mina’s role was crucial to the success of our mission, and it relied entirely on her being unable to communicate with Adam. It left her frantic, of course, but that was precisely the point.

And as it turned out, she was better off not knowing.