Hostage by Clare Mackintosh
FORTY-SIX
90 MINUTES FROM SYDNEY | MINA
“She’s dead.” Derek takes his fingers from Missouri’s neck.
“Are you sure?”
He nods.
I killed her.
I feel a crushing sense of despair at the bloodshed, at the lengths to which we’ve been driven. Beneath it, keeping its distance, as though it knows it shouldn’t be there, is an eerie calmness. For eleven years, I have carried my guilt rather than shouldered it, and now culpability slips over my shoulders like a second skin. I killed her. There is no disputing it.
This time.
Rowan and Derek drag Missouri from the first officer’s seat with a thud and out of the flight deck. For a moment, I’m alone, the space simultaneously cavernous and claustrophobic. Sunlight paints the sky a thousand shades of gold, and it should be beautiful, it should be incredible.
Here, let me show you…
My body begins to shake, tremors juddering my joints and rattling my teeth. The vast array of instrument panels shrinks before my eyes, until all I can see is the artificial horizon and I’m remembering how I kept my eyes on that line till I couldn’t bear it anymore, till I had to close them—
“Mina!”
I spin around, my mouth open in a cry that dies away when I realize it’s Derek and Rowan. On the floor in the galley, I see Missouri’s body, and I feel a wave of resentment that she won’t face trial, won’t spend the rest of her life in jail. Anger concentrates my mind. Panic is still rising, threatening to engulf me, but I can’t let it win. I have to focus on what matters: on getting home.
“Someone needs to check on the relief crew.” I think of the pilots’ bunks above us—Ben’s and Louis’s lifeless bodies—and fear grips me as I imagine what lies in the crew’s bunks at the other end of the plane.
“What are we going to do?” Derek’s looking at me as though I have all the answers, when I don’t have a single one.
“What’s happening back there?”
“The economy crew is keeping the hijackers the other side of the bar, but I don’t know how long they can hold them. Without Missouri, the rest don’t know what to do. They’re turning on one another.”
“And Cesca?”
“Hanging on. Your colleague’s with her. Erik, is it?” Rowan looks at the instruments in front of the pilots’ seats. “Have you told anyone what’s happened?”
I shake my head numbly. I haven’t moved from this spot, my feet rooted to the floor.
“Erik’s spoken to the rest of the crew,” Derek says. “There’s no one with any flying experience.”
“They’ll attempt a talk-down,” I say. My voice is cracked, as though it hasn’t been used. “Ground control will try to take us through each step, with the aim of getting us safely down.”
“The aim?” Derek looks at me. I don’t say anything. I don’t know how many talk-downs have been attempted and how many have succeeded. I do know that staying in the air is the easy part; landing requires a skilled pilot.
Rowan squeezes past me, sliding into the right-hand seat. “Is this the radio?”
“You’re not seriously going to try and fly this plane?” Derek says.
“Someone has to.”
“Someone who knows what they’re doing! Mina, you must know—”
Rowan turns to look at him. “Don’t you think she’s been through enough? It’s not fair to put this on her as well.”
“You can fly a plane, though, can’t you?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. “I heard you talking to Cesca. You trained to be a pilot.”
“I started training! I was in the classroom for weeks and then… I’ve flown light aircraft, that’s all, Cessnas, Pipers…”
“It can’t be that different—”
“It’s completely different!” I gesture at the switches that cover every surface of the flight deck, light-years away from the two dozen controls that sit on the small instrument panel in the cockpit of a light aircraft. Derek’s frowning, his anxiety heaping pressure on me, because I know he’s right. I know I need to get in that seat but…
Here, let me show you.
“She’s having some kind of panic attack.” I hear Rowan’s voice, calm and reassuring. “Get her back into the cabin and sitting down. Make her eat something—she might have low blood sugar. I’ll try and make sense of the radio.”
She had a panic attack…
I remember walking away from the Cessna, my legs unsteady and my head numb, Vic Myerbridge’s arm around me, strong and confident. Don’t beat yourself up, Mina. The trick is to get back on the horse as soon as possible. Don’t let it get the better of you.
I shake off Derek’s arm. “I’ll do it.”
Rowan starts to speak. “I really don’t think—”
“Let her. Out of all of us, she’s the best placed to do it.”
There’s a loaded silence as the two men glare at each other before Rowan holds up his hands and gives in. He sends a warm smile my way, and as I clamber into the captain’s seat, I hold on to the tiny ray of confidence it gives me, pushing my memories aside. Behind me, I can feel Derek’s presence. He’s not a big man, but the flight deck is small, and a band tightens across my chest.
“Can you stay in the galley?” I turn to him. “And close the door?”
He shoots a stony look toward Rowan but does as I ask, and immediately, I feel better without a presence over my shoulder. I think about Derek’s suicidal confession, and I’m uneasy about his insistence that I take the helm. Does he want me to do it because he thinks I’m bound to fail? Because he wants me to fail?
My hands trembling, I put on a headset, grateful for the times I’ve brought coffee into the flight deck, catching the pilots’ movements as they speak to control. This, at least, I can do.
“Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is World Airlines 79.”
There’s a brief pause after I’m connected, as though the operator is too stunned to speak. And then: “World Airlines 79, what’s your situation?”
I let out a breath. The last time I piloted a plane, it set in motion a chain of events I’d do anything to have changed.
“The aircraft was hijacked. We have control of the flight deck again, but three of our pilots are dead, and the fourth is critically injured. We have no other technical staff on board. Repeat: we have no technical staff on board.” My voice rises as I finish transmitting, and I swallow hard.
“You’re doing great,” Rowan whispers, but I’m breathless with fear, the band around my chest squeezing all rational thought from me.
“What’s your name, World Airlines 79?”
“Mina. I’m cabin crew.”
“Understood,” she says. “Wait one, World Airlines 79.”
The wait is an eternity. In the distance, I can just make out where land and sea meet, although the line is blurred with a golden haze. I can’t see beneath or behind us. I think of the Air Force jets, scrambled to intercept, and sweat prickles the back of my neck. They don’t know that I’m not one of the hijackers or sitting here under duress. For all they know, there’s a hijacker right next to me, telling me what to say. One wrong move, and they’ll take us down…
“World Airlines 79, this is Brisbane Center.” The new voice is male, the headset pouring it into my ears as though he were right next to me. I start to tremble, and I slide my hands under my thighs to keep them still. “Mina, my name’s Charlie. I’m a triple seven pilot, and I’m going to help you get safely down.”
I blink back the tears. “Okay.”
“First things first. I want you to tell me how much fuel we have. See the two glass screens in front of you—right in the middle?”
I scan the vast instrument panel, a sea of levers and knobs and screens.
Here, let me show you…
“Mina?”
“Y-yes.”
“On the top to the right, you’ll see a bunch of around eight buttons. Right in the middle, you’ll see one marked FUEL.”
Rowan reaches toward the button just as I see it and looks at me inquiringly.
“Push it,” Charlie says. I nod to Rowan. “Now read out the figure on the bottom of the two screens.” I do what he says, the figures meaningless to me, and there’s a silence long enough for me to think I’ve lost him.
“Okay,” he says at last. “We’re good for a couple of hours.”
“Is that enough?” I exchange panicked glances with Rowan, who’s looking at his watch.
“Next up is really important, Mina. Around your right knee, you’ll find a dial marked autobrake. Once we’re on the ground, that’s going to stop the plane. Can you see it?”
I remember calling Adam at work once, when I needed to cut the grass and couldn’t for the life of me work out how the new mower worked. I can’t see it, I kept saying, and he’d patiently go back to the beginning and talk me through it again. Charlie’s using the same voice: slow and clear, patient but not patronizing.
“I see it.” I realize that Charlie didn’t answer my question about the fuel level.
“Push it in, then turn it to three. Tell me when it’s done.”
“Done.”
“Great job. Now, we’ve got some time before we start our descent, so I’ll give you a tour of the instruments you’re going to be needing. Things are going to get a little busy later.” He tells me how to extend the flaps and change the speed and where the lever is for the landing gear. Each time, I reach out and touch the relevant control, trying to commit it to memory. It’s so different from a light aircraft, like learning to ride a motorbike, then getting in a car. I look at Rowan, who nods, silently noting the location of the switches.
I look through the window, but my head starts to spin, and I shut my eyes to quell the feelings of nausea it prompts.
“Are you okay?” Rowan asks.
I nod, although it couldn’t be further from the truth.
“Shall I take over?”
“It’s okay.”
He touches my arm. “Your daughter will be okay. I’m sure of it.”
“You don’t know that!” A painful sob erupts through the words, everything I’ve been trying to keep at bay forcing its way to the surface. I’ve been trying hard to keep Sophia and Adam out of my head, to concentrate on getting us down safely. I can’t think about how much I love them—how much I need them—until I know for certain we’re coming out of this alive.
“I’m sorry, I—”
“Please! Just—” I squeeze my eyes shut, pressing my fingertips to my head as though they have the power to change what’s inside. Rowan falls silent. I let out a slow, juddering breath, then press the button to speak to air traffic control. “World 79.”
“Go ahead, Mina.”
“We’re going to need an ambulance the second we land. One of our pilots is in a bad way.”
“Ambulance, fire, police, military—you’re getting the full cavalry, Mina.”
“We have a number of fatalities on board as well. Two hijackers, one passenger, and four staff.”
Only the briefest of pauses indicates the implications of my transmission have hit home. “Copy that.”
“Charlie?”
“Go ahead, Mina.”
I swallow. “The hijackers made threats against my family.”
I leave the sentence hanging, waiting for Charlie to jump in, to tell me that he knows all about it, that Adam and Sophia are safe, have been safe since the moment I did as I was told. Waiting to hear I did the right thing.
“If I didn’t comply with their demands,” I say, when it’s clear Charlie needs me to finish, “they said my daughter would be hurt. I need—I need—”
I let go of the radio button, pressing my head into the back of my seat and squeezing shut my eyes, my chest burning with the tears I’m holding back.
“You need to know she’s okay.” He can’t see my nod, and a second later, he speaks again. “We’ll get on it.” I let out a breath. “Right now, I need you to change frequencies. I’m going to send you over to Approach—”
“Please don’t leave!”
Hysteria laces my words, but Charlie doesn’t waver. “You don’t get rid of me that easily. I’m walking from one desk to another, that’s all, and when you hear my voice again, I’ll be able to see you on close radar.”
The promise is reassuring, and I follow his instructions to change the channel, but nevertheless, it’s the longest thirty seconds of my life—as though I’ve been cut loose from my moorings and am drifting out to sea.
“Ready to start our descent?”
Relief makes me smile. “Ready.”
He talks me through each step, and we drop first to twenty-five thousand feet, then to fifteen thousand. Charlie guides me to a button marked IAS MACH, and I drop our speed to two hundred and fifty knots. I manage to keep my breathing steady, but I can’t look outside, and each time Rowan moves or Charlie breaks the silence, my pulse gallops.
The flight deck smells of coffee and cleaning products, of sweat and plastic-coated seats. My vision blurs, black spots around the edges, and my head spins.
Eleven years since it happened.
“What do you mean, you’re dropping out?” My father was angry, my mother confused. “You’ve got top marks in all your ground training. You scored top of the class in your last set of tests.”
“I just don’t want to do it anymore.”
I said I’d pay them back, but even if I were to manage it, the house they sold to pay for my training was long gone.
I hated myself for giving up. Giving in. I tell myself being cabin crew is the next best thing, but it’s more penance than consolation prize. A constant reminder of the choice I made.
“Mina?” Charlie’s voice in my ear, Rowan tugging at my sleeve. They’re talking at me, these two men, but I can’t hear the words. The instruments blur into a mass of brown and gray, and the voices belong to another time, another man.
Vic Myerbridge.
I met him in the White Hart. Nice enough, but not my type. Old enough to be my father, for a start, and possessed of a confidence that tipped too often into arrogance. But we talked about flying, and he made me laugh, and it was a pleasant way to spend the evening after a friend had bailed on me.
“I’ll walk you back to your block,” he said. The bar was close to the training school—technically public, but pretty much entirely populated by student pilots or qualified ones who paid to keep their own aircraft on site, and I guessed he fitted into the latter category, although he hadn’t said.
“Not going to invite me in?” he said when we got to my room.
I laughed. Why did I laugh? I felt awkward, I suppose. “It’s a bit late. Thanks for a nice evening.”
He tried to kiss me, and I stopped laughing. Brought my knee up, hard, and then he wasn’t laughing either. I shut my door and locked it, poured myself a stiff drink, and vowed to avoid the pub for a few days until he’d moved on.
Two weeks later, we were assigned the instructors for our first dual flights.
He didn’t say anything. Not when we were introduced, not when we shook hands. Not when we walked out to where the Cessnas were lined up waiting. Not during the checks or when we were taxiing out. He had forgotten, perhaps, or not recognized me—or perhaps he was mortified by his behavior and thought it best to move on.
At nine thousand feet, he told me to concentrate more on how the plane reacted to my controls, to feel its response.
“Every action has a reaction. Here, let me show you.” He reached across and put his hand on my breast.
I froze.
He circled my nipple, then pinched it hard between thumb and finger. “Feel the response?” His voice came through my headset, so close to my ear, I thought I could feel the dampness of his breath.
“No.”
“I think you can.” He tweaked my nipple again, as if its hardened state were evidence of my lie. My hands shook on the yoke and, at that moment, crashing seemed the better of my options. When he moved his hand to between my legs, I told myself it was happening to someone else. The cockpit of a Cessna 150 is a little under three feet wide, the two seats pressed close against each other. From your seat, you can reach out and touch both sides of the cabin, the front, the back, the ceiling. There is nowhere to go. I kept my eyes fixed on the artificial horizon until I couldn’t see through my tears, then I closed my eyes and let him take control.
“Mina?” Rowan shakes my shoulder.
I find my voice, eleven years too late. “Get off!”
He jerks back, confused, and even though I know it’s not him, I know, too, that I can’t be in the flight deck with Rowan—with anyone—if I’m going to bring this plane down safely.
“You have to get out,” I tell him.
“Mina, calm down.”
“Don’t tell me to calm down!” I rip off my headset. Rowan reaches for me, but I throw off his hands because it isn’t helping. Blood roars in my ears, and the flight deck isn’t the triple seven anymore but the tight confines of a Cessna, and Rowan isn’t Rowan, but—“Get out! Get out! Get out!” I swipe at him wildly, not stopping until he pushes his seat back, his arms raised against my fists, all the time telling me to stay calm, it’s okay, everything’s okay.
It is not okay.
Everything is not okay.
It isn’t okay until Rowan is gone, and the flight-deck door closes, and I’m finally alone. But no sooner does the roaring in my head subside than something else takes its place. An alarm—the whomp whomp whomp of a warning siren and lights flashing from the instrument panel.
Panic grips me once again as I read the message on the screen.
We’re no longer on autopilot.