by Mark Donovan
Feeling severely weak, she made a feeble attempt to clean herself. As she did, she thought of what could have caused the two of them to become so suddenly ill. Either they had contracted the illness from someone, or they most likely ate or drank something that was contaminated. Aleena was unaware of anyone in the village complaining of similar symptoms. So it had to be something they ate or drank.
She thought about what they had eaten in the past day. Everything had been cooked, so it was unlikely that their sickness was brought on by any food that they had consumed. She gazed over at the plastic water container. It couldn’t be from the water she told herself. She drew it fresh from the well today. The well had always provided clean water. It had to be safe she told herself unconvincingly, just as another wave of contractions hit her and caused her to bend over in agonizing pain.
Nasreen suddenly burst through the front door, her face a pasty greyish white, her hands clutching her stomach.
“Help me Aleena,” she said faintly through dried and parched lips, as she closed the door and collapsed onto the floor.
Aleena ran to Nasreen’s side, temporarily blocking out her own excruciating pain and weakness from her mind. Aleena immediately saw that the lower half of Nasreen’s abaya was soiled in waste. As she bent down over Nasreen, her insides suddenly knotted up into a tight ball, racking her in a blinding pain that caused her to gasp for breath and fall over onto Nasreen.
Lying next to Nasreen in agony, with her arms tightly clutched around her stomach and gasping for air, Aleena was aware enough to observe that her sister-in-law’s breathing was very shallow and that her skin looked shriveled from dehydration. Nasreen’s eyes were also closed. She had fainted.
With herculean effort, Aleena placed her head on Nasreen’s chest. As she rested her head and listened to Nasreen’s rapid, but weak heartbeat, her eyes gazed over once more at the plastic water container. She was quickly becoming too weak to think anymore, and she could hear her own rapid heartbeat pounding in her chest as she struggled to breathe. She licked her lips as they felt dry and parched. She would rest a little longer right here she told herself as she closed her eyes, the water container slowly fading from her consciousness once more.
The crescent moon peeked above the eastern horizon. To the west, the last vestiges of the sun were fading as twilight swiftly approached. Hamza had just walked the three kilometers from Mocha as he returned to the village. It had been a very successful day. He had caught three skipjack tuna and his pocket was full with rials from a buyer in the Mocha fish market. He had thanked Allah repeatedly for his good fortune during his walk back to the village.
Hamza was thinking about how happy Aleena would be with his news when suddenly he became aware of wailing cries coming from several of the houses he passed by. As he walked by one of them, a man stumbled out of it carrying a small child. The child’s body lolled like a limp rag in his arms.
“My son is dead,” howled the man, as he saw Hamza.
Hamza stopped and looked at the man, a motionless boy held in his arms. Though dusk, Hamza could see that the child’s clothing was damp and fetid.
“My wife and daughter are dead too,” whimpered the man to Hamza. “My entire family is gone. What has Allah done?” he cried out.
Hamza stared back at the man, frozen, not knowing what to say. As he stood staring silently, he heard more wailing cries coming from behind the doors of other houses in the small village. Fear suddenly struck his heart. The piteous voices were all from men. Men like him who had just returned to the village. He broke from his trance and started running towards his own home, to his precious wife and daughter.
Hamza was in full panic when he neared his house. He had heard voices of agony emanating from every home he had passed since leaving the man holding his dead son.
Gasping for breath, he rushed to the front door of his home and threw his full weight against it, pushing it inwards. Something blocked it from opening fully, causing his body to bounce backwards off the door. In terror, he approached the door again and pushed on it slowly. Partially opened, he slipped his head in behind the door and looked into the dark house. He instantly smelled a strong and recent familiar odor. The familiar smell sent a shockwave of fear trembling through his body.
His eyes slowly adjusted to the dim light as he frantically scanned the interior of the house. At the same time he pushed harder on the door in an attempt to squeeze his way into the home. His eyes detected something or someone lying on his bed, but he could not tell what it was in the shadowy light. Hamza dropped his gaze to the floor below him to see what was blocking the door. In shock he saw Aleena’s eyes staring vacuously back at him, her unmoving body lying on top of another motionless woman. “No, no, no,” he whispered in a crescendoing voice. “Not my Aleena.”
In panicked anguish, and with a sudden overwhelming feeling of nauseousness and dizziness, he forced the door inward with all of his waning strength.
As the door slowly opened the two lifeless bodies remained pressed tightly against it while sliding along the floor. And with each centimeter gained, the smell of death grew more pungent to Hamza’s nostrils.
He finally slid through the opening in the doorway and dropped to his knees. Immediately he reached for Aleena. He put his hand to her nose and mouth. He felt no breath. He touched her face. It felt cool and dry. He put his ear to her heart. There was no beat.
He cradled Aleena’s head tightly in his arms and began to sob while rocking her dead body. As he did, he glanced down at the face of the other body lying next to him. It was his sister Nasreen.
As Hamza continued to hold his wife’s body, he slowly turned his eyes over to their bed, a strange understanding coming over him. Lying on the bed was his daughter Manha, her doll resting next to her. Gently placing his wife’s head on his sister’s torso, he rose from the floor and walked across the room to his daughter. Even in the dim light he could tell that she too had passed. “No,” he screamed. “Not my little angel too.”
Hamza picked up Manha in his arms and carried her over to the bodies of his wife and sister. He collapsed on the floor next to them while still holding Manha in his arms. He sat still and quiet for a moment, as both anguish and loneliness began to consume his soul. Then, slowly, he started to rock back and forth as he held his deceased daughter tightly in his arms. A moment later, he pressed his face into his daughter’s body and muffled sobs began to fill the dark empty house.
Two kilometers southeast of the small village, on a trail that skirted the main road between the village and the city of Mocha, a green knapsack laid open on the ground. Lying next to it, in the dusk of the early evening, was a man’s corpse clothed in a black thobe and keffiyeh. The body was sprawled on its back, the face almost unidentifiable. Its eyes had been plucked from their sockets by vultures, and chunks of skin and flesh were missing from the face and hands. And beside the body, lying near one of the hands, was a small shiny metal cylinder reflecting the evening’s crescent moon.
Chapter 3 (April 2, Sunday 1:00pm, Alaska)
White knuckled, the pilot held the yoke in a death grip, as he struggled to keep the aircraft’s wings level and maintain altitude while flying his small plane through blizzard like conditions over the Canadian Yukon territory. He was headed west, enroute to Fairbanks, Alaska. The weather had deteriorated faster than he had anticipated. Before departing Dawson City, he had checked the aviation weather reports. Though a low pressure storm system had been forecast to work its way into central Alaska later in the day, he had been confident they would make it to Fairbanks before it hit. He was wrong.
Strong gusty winds were buffeting the small Cessna 206 aircraft like a toy kite. The aircraft’s altitude was violently yo-yoing up and down as it experienced gut-wrenching downdrafts, followed by severe updrafts. The pilot continuously yanked on the aircraft’s flight control yoke to maintain attitude and altitude as they continued to push further on into the heart of the spring blizzard.
As he f
ought with the flight controls, the pilot’s eyes were laser locked on the flight instruments in front of him. Looking out the aircraft’s windshield was pointless. There was no horizon to see, and the blinding snow falling outside of their little cocoon obliterated any sign of terra-firma below. The snow was falling so heavy that he could not even see the aircraft’s wingtips. He was, however, able to see ice building up on the leading edges of the aircraft’s wing roots which were closest to the fuselage. He thought to himself that if he didn’t land the plane soon, it would fall from the sky on its own.
His eyes rhythmically scanned the aircraft’s attitude indicator, directional gyro, air speed indicator, and altitude indicator. Simultaneously he pushed, pulled, and twisted the control yoke in a futile attempt to adjust for changes in the instruments, and to keep the plane level and on course to Fairbanks.
While attempting to hold the plane level with his left hand the pilot reached out with his right and quickly began to punch a few buttons on the GPS unit mounted in the center of the instrument panel. As he did, a strong wave of air turbulence violently jerked the plane down and toward the left. He instantly returned his right hand to the yoke and fought with both hands to level out the aircraft and recover altitude. When it came to flying an airplane, your two closest friends were altitude and airspeed. He wasn’t ready to abandon any of his flying friends yet thought the pilot, as he manhandled the aircraft back to reasonably stable flight and altitude.
Once more he reached out with his right hand and again started punching buttons on the GPS unit. He needed to find the closest airport to them. After a few taps on the GPS screen with his index finger he identified a small private airfield ten miles west of them in Alaska. As he hit the activate icon button on the GPS screen to set up a flight path from their present location to the airfield, he hoped to himself that the runway was maintained. Landing on a runway covered with a foot of snow would produce the same results as landing in any backcountry snow covered field. The plane would instantly flip as soon as its wheels sank into the snow.
The pilot adjusted the aircraft’s flight path heading to coincide with the GPS screen. A direct route to the small private airfield. Gently, he pushed forward on the control yoke to nose the plane over and speed their descent to it.
Though they were only ten miles away from the airfield there was rugged mountainous terrain only a few thousand feet below them for the entire route. As the pilot flew the aircraft towards the airport the GPS unit frequently broke in over his headset with audio warning messages about terrain ahead, and commands to pull up.
He was acutely aware of the aircraft’s low level flight over the mountains below him, and the GPS warning messages only proceeded to aggravate him as it broke his concentration on flying the aircraft. While he continued to fight to keep the plane in the sky, he kept reciting to himself over and over again what his first flight instructor had repeatedly drilled into him, “Fly the plane.” No matter what else is going on around you, no matter how dire the situation looks, continue to, “First fly the plane.” Secondly, with time and opportunity permitting, “Navigate.” And third, again with time and opportunity permitting, “Communicate.” Those were the three fundamental rules, and the order to execute them in, for a Pilot-in-Command of an aircraft in distress. He was doing his best with the first two, flying and navigating. However, the last rule was not an option today. He was flying across the Canadian / U.S. international border and he didn’t want anyone to know.
As he continued to fly towards the airfield in the whiteout conditions, the pilot kept thinking about the well-dressed Middle Eastern man sitting next to him, his sole passenger. The pilot silently cursed the man. If it hadn’t been for him, he wouldn’t be in this predicament, risking his life and airplane.
The man had not spoken a single word since they departed Dawson City airport. Other than asking for the charter flight service to Fairbanks, he had virtually said nothing else since they met earlier that day. During the entire flight he had just sat silently, staring nervously out the aircraft’s windows while holding on tightly with both hands to a silver metal briefcase that sat in his lap.
The pilot had sized the guy up as a strange type from the moment he had set eyes on him. But Dawson City was filled with strange types and he wasn’t about to pass up on a lucrative charter flight job. The well-heeled man had mostly kept his eyes pointed downward, looking at his feet, when he inquired about the charter service to Fairbanks. As if he was hiding something thought the pilot. Also, similarly to what he was doing now, the man seemed to pay constant attention to the silver metal briefcase. At least one hand was always holding on to it tightly. Nevertheless, so far the guy had not been a pain in the neck customer, and he had no interest in knowing the man’s business or becoming friends with him. He simply wanted to make a good day’s wage. And this guy had offered him three times his standard charter rate to fly him to Fairbanks on short notice. He couldn’t pass it up he swore to himself as he fought with the flight controls.
As they continued to fly towards the airfield, the pilot noticed the man was fidgeting more nervously with his metal briefcase. Incredulously, he seemed to be distracted and un-phased by their current plight, thought the pilot. As if there was something more important to be concerned about other than his own life. Which at the moment was hanging in the balance.
“We’re diverting to an airfield about ten miles from here to allow time for this storm to blow over,” said the pilot to his customer, as he continued to keep the plane’s wings level and descend toward the mountains and in the direction of the airfield.
The passenger abruptly looked over at him and snapped in a direct and commanding tone, “No, you will continue on to Fairbanks. I need to be there today.”
The pilot looked over at his passenger in surprise. “Buddy, I’m doing all I can to keep this aircraft in the air and if I do not land it soon we will never make it to Fairbanks, or anywhere else for that matter, except for the mountains below.”
As the pilot spoke the man slid his hand inside his suit and pulled out a Beretta M9 handgun and pointed it directly at the pilot’s face. “Sir, you will continue to fly this plane to Fairbanks, Alaska.”
The pilot stared back at the Middle Eastern man in shock, but kept his composure as he continued fighting the aircraft controls. “Buddy, if you look out your side window you will see that there is ice building up on the leading edge of the wing.”
The passenger glanced quickly out the window, while he continued to point the Beretta at the pilot.
“Do you see the thick glaze of ice on the wing?” asked the pilot. “Do you see the actual one inch long icicles hanging down from it?”
The passenger looked back at the pilot and pointed his gun closer to the pilot’s face. “We will make it,” rasped the man. “You will continue to fly this plane to Fairbanks.”
The pilot looked incredulously at the man. Not so much for the fact that he was pointing a gun in his face, but more for how this quiet and unassuming man that he had met just hours earlier was now commandeering his plane.
“Sir, if I do not land this plane very soon we will stall and fall out of the sky as sure as you are holding that gun to my face.”
Suddenly, the aircraft’s left wing dropped causing the plane to rotate counterclockwise ninety degrees along its longitudinal axis. The passenger violently slammed into the pilot. As he did, the pointed gun barrel stabbed into the pilot’s cheek, ripping the soft flesh. Fighting through the shock and pain, the pilot reacted instantly to the stalled aircraft. He applied hard right rudder, pushed the aircraft’s nose forward and twisted the yoke in an attempt to level the aircraft’s wings. However, blood spurting from the deep gash in his cheek impeded his ability to level the aircraft. The plane continued to fall from the sky.
Though he was pushing the right rudder pedal with all his strength to stop the spin and level the wings, the ice buildup on the aircraft was so thick that he was having no success. At the same time,
blood gushing from his cheek wound was hampering his ability to see out of his right eye. He glanced at the vertical speed indicator and saw that they were losing altitude at over a thousand feet per minute. He then looked at his altimeter and quickly calculated they would come in contact with the mountainous terrain below in less than a minute at their current rate of descent. He nosed the plane over even further to build up air speed and to hopefully gain flight control of the aircraft. At this point he knew there was no chance of making the small airfield. The best he was now hoping for was a controlled crash that he could survive.
After pushing on the rudder pedal and control yoke for what seemed like minutes, but was instead just seconds, the directional gyro indicator began to slow its rotation. He was stopping the spin, but he knew his altitude was critically low. He glanced over at his airspeed indicator and saw that it had crept up nearly thirty knots, but the altimeter dial foretold their fate. He pulled slightly back on the yoke to decrease their rate of descent and to put them on a controlled glide path into the whiteout abyss that surrounded them.
In a near state of panic, the pilot rapidly attempted to wipe the blood from his eyes and face with his coat sleeve while he fought to control the plane’s descent. Suddenly he yelled out in possessed frustration, “We’re going down.” He made the statement more to himself than his passenger next to him. He glanced over at the man who was still pointing the gun at his face, though it was shaking wildly in his hand. The pilot could see his own blood dripping from the end of the gun and the man was mumbling loudly in Arabic, “Allahu-Akbar.”
The passenger paused from his chanting when he heard the pilot cry out. “No we are not. You will continue to fly this plane to Fairbanks.” As he finished his sentence he violently pistol whipped the pilot in the side of the head with his left hand while still holding the steel briefcase tightly in the other.
