Six Passengers, Five Parachutes

by Ian Bull

  “What’s it say?” Taylor asks.

  “I have no clue, but my mom does,” Anthony says. He pulls out his cellphone and takes a photo of the top left corner. “I’ll text this to my dad. He’ll show it to Peg, and she can read it.”

  “Let me do it,” Glenn insists, snapping away. “I have a better camera and reception.”

  Peg is Steven’s red-haired, hot-tempered, and sentimental Irish-American mom.

  “You think that’s smart?” I ask. “She may freak out.”

  “She’ll throw a fit for sure, but we don’t have a choice,” Anthony says.

  “What’s her number?” Glenn asks, his voice echoing off the tile.

  “Can we step outside for this? It stinks in here,” I say, and the nine of us escape into the fresh air by our Dodge van. Anthony feeds Glenn the digits.

  “Mom?” Anthony asks into the phone, and a torrent of words pour out, so loud he must hold the phone away. Even I can hear the shouts coming from both his mother and his father.

  “Mom!” Anthony shouts into the phone. “He wrote that message for you! Do your job and tell us what it says!” Quiet Anthony explodes to life, which shocks us all into taking a step back. He motions that his mom is crazy. “Can someone write this down?”

  Gorney holds a pen over the clipboard he’s been carrying since we were at the Gila River Reservation. He scribbles as Anthony speaks.

  “He’s been rigging cameras on a plane…a DC-9…transmission will be in the KU band…the fight will be in midair on Saturday morning, he thinks.”

  “It’s almost seven a.m. right now,” I say. Carl and I trade glances. Not much time left.

  Chapter 49

  * * *

  Robert Snow

  Day 15: Saturday Morning

  Outside Cananae, Mexico

  Tina will change her mind about me. I’m making her rich. She’s getting seven million dollars, plus some of my salary. My cut doesn’t matter; the crew can have all of it. All I need is a minute so I can convince her how much I still love her. Then she’ll forgive me and tell Boss Man to let me go. But she’s being stubborn. No one will ever catch her and take her son away—Boss Man will make sure of that. She’s going to walk through that trailer door any second, and I’ll tell her.

  Who am I kidding? They zip-tied me to an office chair! I push hard against the headrest, but the chair is locked in place somehow. I yank my wrists, but that makes the zip ties cut deeper into my skin, and pain shoots through my shark bite scar.

  “Tina!” I scream. The door opens and the goon with the brown hair and dark glasses walks inside the production trailer and tosses a gym bag at my feet.

  “It’s showtime, Robert. The fighters start arriving in ten minutes. You board first.”

  “I want to talk to Tina.”

  “Your fight gear and uniform is in that bag.” He opens a switchblade and cuts my ties, then stands by the door and crosses his arms.

  “You’re not afraid I might escape?”

  He laughs and points at the gym bag. “Hurry up.”

  I open the gym bag. Inside are bright blue boxing trunks with white stars, and a red and white short-sleeved jersey with American flags on the back and front. My hands shake, and I start to cry again.

  “This was my moment,” I say. “I planned years for this.”

  He pushes me against the wall and pokes my shark scar with his still-open switchblade, and my whole body levitates off the ground a foot. He holds up a bottle of pills.

  “If you hurry, you get more happy pills. If you don’t, you get more pain.”

  I rush to change clothes. My skinny white arms look stupid in the jersey. It’s like I’m in a horror movie set in a high school gym class, and I’m the clown who dies in the first five minutes, just to get the splatter started.

  “Give me the pills,” I say, and he tosses me the plastic bottle. Inside is a colorful mix of Adderall, Ritalin, Zoloft, Xanax, Klonopin, Vicodin, and OxyContin. I shake six into my hand. He hands me water and I down them all.

  Everything slows as the drugs start to kick in, and the sharp edge of my sick reality dulls to a sweet throb. Thank you, Mommy, for introducing me to their loveliness when I was still in middle school, as we waited for my dentist daddy, who never came home. I’ll miss you, Mommy. I should have called more often. The albino-looking guy with the brown hair grabs the pill bottle back and yanks me out the door.

  It’s seven a.m. on Game Day, and my plane looks gorgeous. There is a line of six Toyota trucks in the tall grass off the runway. Those are the Zetas—well-paid cartel gangsters that get to see the show drive-in style. Too bad I never got to meet the cartel leader. He seemed like such a nice guy on the phone. We even talked about doing a reality show about him and his crazy, funny family who all work and live at his compound. It’d be an awesome show.

  No one is around. “Where’s my crew? Give me an Ooh Rah!” I yell, but no one answers.

  Hachiro, Katashi, Yoshi and Yuko peek at me through the window from inside the design trailer, but when I wave at them, they don’t wave back. Up in the sky, a private jet is banking to land. That’s Kahlil Omidi, from Iran. The headlights of another are off in the distance. That’s Miko Asenov, the Bulgarian. The production is right on schedule.

  Boss Man’s two goons drag me to the back airstair, which isn’t necessary; after all, I’m the producer. Jim the PA is shooting my walk up, shouldering the news camera like a real pro.

  “Tim,” I say. “You made the jump to camera shooter. Good for you! Where’s Tina?”

  The black-haired goon pushes me up the stairs, which are loose. They’ve disconnected the bolts so Pauline can fly away with the back open and leave the stairs on the runway. Good on you, crew, for remembering the details. I’m glad she’s getting what she wanted.

  “Is Pauline already on the plane? She’s a good pilot. She’ll do awesome today.”

  Metal-faced Michel is at the top of the stairs with the other camera, shooting my entrance. He backs up while keeping me in frame as I walk deeper into the plane.

  “You’re such a pro, dude! I love your work!”

  The interior looks great. It’s like the inside of an MMA cage, with canvas on the floor and black fencing on the curved walls. I run my hands against the fencing and it vibrates in undulating waves, but that’s the drugs talking. There’s red and purple cushioned padding on the other side, which makes the color pop. Nice touch. Rotating lights are recessed into the curved ceiling. Green, blue, yellow, and red beams arc around the interior. I smell melting hair gel!

  “You smell that? I love that smell. Reminds me of theater class,” I say to the goon with the brown hair, but he doesn’t appreciate my memories. He pushes me into a seat. Hachiro put three seats in a row, facing another three seats, with five yards in between. Perfect for the faceoff.

  But my seat is special. I’m at the top, against the wall, like I’m the CEO in charge. That’s because I’m the executive producer and it’s my big day. The brown-haired goon buckles me into my seat, which is nice of him. Then he buckles my wrists to the armrests. They have special timing locks on them. When did Hachiro put arm restraints on my seat? I didn’t approve that.

  Then I remember—I’m the seventh passenger. My brain comes back online, like when you wake up scared shitless in the middle of the night, gasping for air like you’re drowning, even though you’ve taken three sleeping pills. “Where’s Tina? There’s been a mistake!”

  “Just breathe, Robert,” Michel says.

  Metal-faced Michel moves in close with his camera, and I see my reflection in the lens.

  “You got the wide-angle lens on. Good for you. You can get everyone in the shot with the right 20mm lens.”

  “That’s right. We’ve got the wide-angle lens on,” he whispers in a soothing voice. The golden metal bars on his face vibrate like moving straw.

  “You got a star filter on that? That will look good with the lights.”

  “I’ll put the star filter o
n,” Michel whispers back.

  The moving colors are nice. There’s no music, but I’m sure they’re adding it into the show in the control room in La Paz. I hope it’s the Rocky theme. I love that movie.

  There’s a monitor hanging from the ceiling. And my face is on it. Wow! It’s my intro. Man, Tina edits fast. My stats are running along the side. Cool! Betting has begun. The graphics look good, too, with bright colors flashing as the bets come in. I have a red, white, and blue flag waving behind me—my own Olympic moment. I feel myself floating away.

  The image cuts, and now I don’t look very good. They shot my close-up when I was tied to the office chair in front of the plane yesterday, and I’m howling and weeping. If I’d known they were using that for my Up Close and Personal, I’d have put on my NFL game face. I then see video of me walking onto the plane, which just happened. Nice time delay! Weird—I’ve been sucked into my own private Matrix. There’s video of them belting me in….

  Belted in? I look down and see my wrists and remember.

  “Tina! Where’s Tina?” I shout. “I’m not supposed to be here!”

  Someone laughs at me. It’s Kahlil Omidi. When did they bring him in? He’s in the far seat, dressed in the same fight gear as I am, but his shirt is green and yellow and covered with Iranian flags. He’s wearing a black Velcro harness that holds a GoPro Hero camera tight against his chest. His pecs, arms, and neck muscles bulge out of his shirt, and his black hair is slicked back. He really does look like an angry Omar Sharif.

  “Hey, Kahlil, how’s it going? Remember me?”

  “I’m going to kill you first,” he says. His eyes are red, like he took steroids for a year and then went swimming in a pool of chlorine.

  “But I’m the guy who cast you.”

  “Even better,” he hisses.

  Up above, his intro is playing with the new graphics package Tina designed. His info comes up over a lower banner fluttering Iranian flag. Kahlil Omidi—devout Muslim, lethal in the Persian martial art of Pahlavani. The video cuts to him swinging his clubs, then kicking and punching people. It looks slick—good pacing, snappy editing. I love good TV.

  When I glance back down, big, bald Miko Asenov the Bulgarian is getting belted in. The goon with black hair tightens his straps and then steps away.

  “Miko! How was your flight from Sofia? You get the award for coming the farthest!” Miko doesn’t even look at me. He’s like a bald block of white human flesh, with three thick skin folds on the back of his neck. He has he Bulgarian flag on the front and back of his shirt—three horizontal bars of white, green, and red.

  “Your country’s flag is boring, Miko,” I say, and he spits at me.

  He’s also got a GoPro harnessed to his chest, which I realize is a design flaw. You can’t see the flags on their uniform properly. That would never have happened if they’d just let me finish producing this show.

  Miko’s intro starts, and he punches a man unconscious. His graphic comes up: Miko Asenov, lethal in the Soviet SAMBO fighting style. There’s no music on the intro, which makes it hard to enjoy, but Miko looks awesome, kicking ass on some Arab guys. Farsi and Arabic lettering comes on the screen. I asked Tina to play up that Miko is anti-Muslim, and those lines must do the trick, because Kahlil reads them and screams at Miko, pulling at his restraints. Miko just glares back. Michel moves in with his camera for this pre-fight drama, and gets close-ups of spittle flying from Kahlil’s mouth, then pans over for Miko’s staredown. The betting in the Arab and Slavic worlds must be going through the roof right now.

  It’s going to be a great show. My crowning achievement. Where am I? This isn’t on a monitor inside the mobile office; this is right in front of me. I can feel my feet again and my adrenalin kicks in. I realize, once again, I’m on the plane.

  “I can’t die! I can’t! I’m not supposed to be here!” I scream.

  Michel turns with his camera and moves close, and I see my own weeping face in the black reflection of the lens. Glancing up, I see myself weeping on the monitor. My tears are being broadcast instantly around the world.

  The goon with the brown hair appears and sticks four pills in my mouth, followed by a squirt from a water bottle. I gag it all down and the drugs kick in fast, thank God. It’s my special time with Mommy, and everything turns sweet and distant. Miko and Kahlil are just people on TV again.

  “You are weak,” Miko says and spits at me. He’s such a nice guy.

  The goons strap in Lucas Souza from Brazil and Rico Perez from Honduras next. Kahlil and Rico are on one side, with an empty middle seat between them. They’re facing Miko and Lucas, who also have an empty middle seat between them.

  “This plane is filling up!” I say. “No one likes the middle seat, right?”

  Lucas looks ready to pose for Playgirl with his coiffed brown ringlets, tanned skin, and V-shaped physique. His shirt is skintight, all of it yellow and green and blue with the Brazilian flag. He flexes, which makes his GoPro nod up and down on his pec muscles.

  “Dude, do the capoeira for show, but the jujitsu for the win! I’m betting on you!” I shout, and he looks at me like I’m crazy.

  Rico Perez wears loose clothes that show off the Honduran flag, which is white and blue horizontal bands with blue stars inside the white. His GoPro harness and camera are tight against his body, while his clothes are so baggy they’re about to fall off him. All he needs is a Dodgers cap and he’d fit right in Los Angeles—except for the gang tattoos running down his arms, up his neck, and now onto his face. He may be good in a gang fight, but in an MMA death match, he won’t last. Tina was right; it was a mistake to cast him. That’s when all my mistakes started.

  My brain wakes up and screams at me from deep inside my skull.

  “Tina! Where are you?!” I yell. Rico laughs at me. He sounds funny, until I realize he can’t breathe through his nose. It’s still busted from his casting two weeks ago.

  I look up at the monitor and see his and Lucas’s intro packages. The images are blurry, and I can’t read the words. Either it’s out of focus or I’m overdosing. I close my eyes and feel my heartbeat, slow and deep, echoing in my head like I’m alone in a vast, black empty room.

  When I open my eyes, they’re strapping in Ming Lee. He’s dressed in red, with the yellow stars of the Chinese flag dotting the edges of the collar, the sleeves; they’re outlining everything. His is the only uniform not ruined by the GoPro, because his whole outfit is the flag. He looks awesome.

  “Dude! How’s your ear? How did it heal so fast? That Chen guy did a number on you,” I say, but Ming stares straight ahead, deep in meditation mode. I’m not making many friends here. No one appreciates what the producer does. People get cast and they think they’re stars. Here’s the classic TV cast/producer power break down:

  Season One: The cast works for you.

  Season Two: You and the cast work together.

  Season Three: You work for them.

  “You all still work for me this season!” I yell. “Don’t forget it!”

  Michel moves in for another one of my close-ups. I see myself in the lens again. That’s right, I’m the crazy class clown in the slasher movie who gets killed first! My whole life’s work ends here, dying on my own reality show!

  “Tina! I need to see you!” I scream.

  Ming’s intro comes onscreen and he looks awesome. He’s more lethal than Jet Li and Bruce Lee together. Numbers run like a stopwatch on the side banner. The betting on him is going through the roof right now. Boss Man was right about the Asian betting. Boss Man is making bank, and the plane hasn’t even taken off yet. What a great show. I hope he’s proud of me. It’s so cool that I get to watch it happen so close.

  Steven Quintana gets strapped in last. I hate this guy. He’s wearing the same exact outfit as me—a red and white striped jersey, with an American flag on the front and back, but he’s got on black sweatpants. That’s a lame costume. Couldn’t they find something better? He fills out his jersey better than I do an
d has a lean physique, more like a surfer or a runner than a fighter. He’s got an American flag bandana on his head, so he looks like a Jesse Ventura wannabe. He and I are the only ones not wearing cameras on our chests. Probably because we’re the ones that are going to get punched, not the ones doing the punching.

  All the other fighters look up when Quintana’s intro starts. It shows Army Rangers in action in Iraq and Afghanistan, protests in the Arab world, in Asia, in Russia, in Latin America, and crowds burning the American flag. Photos of dead bodies come on screen, ending with the famous black and white photo of the naked, crying Vietnamese girl running down the road after being drenched in American napalm.

  Nice touch, Tina. No one sells anti-American sentiment better than a craven American TV producer cashing in. The video then shifts and shows Steven with Julia Travers on the red carpet, yelling at people taking their picture. Brilliant transition! The baby-killer becomes spoiled Hollywood trash on TMZ. Then the video cuts to a scared Quintana tied to a chair in the mobile office. He’s missing a tooth and looks like a filthy homeless guy.

  Ha. That’s his hero shot. And he looks like a putz. Hilarious!

  “You got caught, asshole!” I laugh.

  “You like movies, right Robert?” he asks, staring at me.

  “TV and movies are my life,” I say.

  “Come with me if you want to live,” he says.

  He just quoted The Terminator. That’s cool! But I can’t raise my hand to salute him, because I’m strapped in…and I remember again.

  “Tina. Where are you? Tina! You’re making a mistake!” I scream.

  Tina slaps my face. “Does that feel better, darling?” she asks. Where did she come from? The combo of the stinging slap and her smiling face is humiliating, but wonderful. She smells like rosewater, and her curly hair falls perfectly down the front of her loose green t-shirt. She leans over, and I can see her cleavage and the lacy edge of her satin bra.

  “I knew you’d come. Are you going to let me go now?” I ask.