“Flying can be scary sometimes,” the pilot tells me as he turns to look at me. That is when I notice that the plane we’re sitting in, is glowing neon-red. The air masks come down, and the turbulence rocks the metal body of the aircraft, the only barrier between us and death from plunging 30,000 feet mid-air. “Don’t worry, I have cheated death many times,” he says as his face melts in front of my eyes. My screams merge with the ricocheting thuds and soon we drop nearly ten thousand feet.
I hear thumping noises against the cockpit door a few seconds later. “Why is this door locked?!” shouts a voice from the other side. Accompanying the voice were the loud screams of the passengers.
The combination of noises take me out of my trance long enough to remember where I am.
“Open the door!” yells the voice from the other side.
I pull at the controls in front of me in an attempt to level the plane. It’ll slow our descent towards death by precious few seconds.
The radio next to me hisses loudly with its cold metallic voice.
“Let us in!”
I ignore the voice.
“Let us in!” I can feel my ears burn with their plea.
“Let us in!” I try to silence the voice.
“LET US IN!!” I scream loudly to drown out the voice with my hands tightly clamped against my ears.
Just then, the cockpit door bursts open. Two flight attendants dressed in a deep blue pour into the cockpit. Along with passenger screams.
“We know what you’re doing,” said one of the flight attendants with a snarl.
I struggle to unbuckle myself from my seat but get out just in time as they advance towards me. They try to corner me against the controls.
“Did you think we wouldn’t find out?” asks the first one, contemptuously.
“We always find out,” said the other, calmly.
“What are you talking about?” I ask them, puzzled.
They look at each other and their faces bear grins. The first one turns around, walks towards the entrance of the cockpit, and opens the door of one of the storage spaces. A body tumbles out of the cavity. A body dressed resplendently in white. Dressed like a pilot.
“Recognise him?” she asks. She turns his face to face me.
“He’s pretty familiar, isn’t he?” says the other, smiling serenely.
Sure enough, I find myself looking at the face of the pilot seated next to me before the plane started to plummet. I falter backwards and stumble over the controls.
“What- what’s goi- going on?” I croak, the words barely forming in my throat.
“Look at what you’ve done!” hisses the one close to the corpse of the pilot, her foot on his cheek.
“Look closely!” says the other, in her saccharine voice.
I look at the face again and it melts away… again! But this time into a- cushion?
The screams from the aircraft start to melt away, too.
As does the aircraft itself.
I look at the attendants and see they’re now dressed in white. With white caps on their foreheads bearing a red cross.
The kind one approaches me in the bed I’m lying in. The bed I’m tied to.
“Time for a little nap, Ash,” she says.
I scream slightly as she plunges the syringe into my hand and pumps in some ghastly substance.
I feel the waves of drowsiness envelope me.
“Let us in!” hisses a voice in the darkness.
“Patience,” I respond softly.
Maybe tomorrow.