Page 9 of Billionaire Wolf Needs a Pilot
“There!”I shouted, spotting a clearing.It was barely large enough, but it was our only shot.I angled us toward it, fighting against controls that barely responded.
The altimeter spun downward.Five hundred feet.Four hundred.Three hundred.
“Emergency power to flaps!”I ordered.The plane bucked as Bryce complied, the sudden drag helping to slow our descent but threatening to stall us completely.
Two hundred feet.
“When I say cut, kill all power,” I instructed.“Not a second before.”
One hundred feet.The trees were so close I could see individual branches heavy with snow.
“Brace for impact!”I shouted, pulling back on the yoke with every ounce of strength I possessed.My shoulders screamed in protest.“Cut power!”
Everything went silent as the remaining engine died.For one surreal moment, we glided, suspended between sky and earth like a ghost.
The belly of the aircraft scraped treetops with a sound like fingernails on a chalkboard amplified a thousandfold.Violent shudders ripped through the plane as branches snapped against metal.The sound was deafening, like being inside a can being opened by a giant.I kept the nose up, fighting for every second of controlled descent, feeling the control surfaces tear away piece by piece.
Then we hit.
The first impact slammed me forward against my harness with bone-crushing force.My teeth clacked together, nearly biting through my tongue.Blood filled my mouth, hot and coppery.Snow exploded across the windshield, blinding me momentarily as we bounced back into the air like a stone skipping across water.The plane pitched forward when we hit the ground again, the nose digging in with a sickening crunch of compacting metal.
“Hold on!”I screamed, though my words were drowned out by the roar of impact.Metal screamed as we plowed through snow, earth, and whatever lay beneath.The control panel erupted in a shower of sparks that singed my cheek, the smell of burning electronics filling the cockpit.
A thunderous crack split the air as one of the plane’s wings caught something solid beneath the snow.The entire aircraft lurched violently to the side, the world outside spinning in a disorienting blur of white and gray.Bryce’s screams mixed with the shriek of tearing metal as we slammed against our restraints.
“We’re rolling!”I yelled, helpless against the physics now in control of our fate.
The windshield spiderwebbed, then exploded inward in a lethal spray of glass and ice.Freezing air and snow blasted into the cockpit.I threw one arm up to shield my face, feeling glass shards slice into my exposed skin like tiny daggers.
We were upside down now, suspended by our harnesses.My vision flashed between blinding white snow and dark earth.The next impact drove the breath from my lungs.Something massive, a boulder or fallen tree trunk, punched through the fuselage just behind the cockpit with a sound like a bomb detonating.Metal shrieked and tore.The entire aircraft shuddered, then seemed to fold around the intrusion.I heard Tanner cry out in pain, the sound cutting through even the explosion of destruction.
We slid another fifty yards, the motion suddenly smoother as we hit what must have been the frozen lake I’d spotted.The ice groaned beneath us, a deep bass rumble that vibrated through the dying aircraft.Hairline cracks appeared in the surface, spreading outward like lightning bolts from our point of impact.
“The ice is breaking!”Bryce gasped, blood streaming from a gash on his forehead, turning half his face crimson.
I fumbled for my harness release, fingers numb and clumsy.“We need to get out before—”
A final, violent jolt cut me off as the plane’s momentum carried us into a snowbank at the lake’s edge.The impact slammed my head against the control panel with brutal force.Pain exploded behind my eyes like a supernova, white-hot and all-consuming.
Then, silence.Absolute, deafening silence.
The sudden absence of noise was almost as shocking as the crash itself.No more engine roar.No more alarms.Just the soft hiss of snow falling on hot metal, the gentle tick of cooling components, and Bryce’s shallow, ragged breathing beside me
The cockpit lay at an unnatural angle, partially buried in snow.Through my blurring vision, I could see blood dripping from somewhere above me, falling in hypnotic crimson droplets onto the shattered instrument panel.My blood or Bryce’s, I couldn’t tell.
Mom.The thought came unbidden, an image of her sitting in the nursing home, confusion in her eyes as she asked again where I was.Would I ever see her again?Who would explain to her, day after day, why her daughter never returned?
I tried to turn my head, to check on my passenger.My responsibility.Through the twisted wreckage of what had been the cabin doorway, I glimpsed Tanner.The tree that had punctured the fuselage had missed him by inches, but it had torn through the plane’s midsection like a spear.Somehow, impossibly, he was moving, struggling with his harness despite what must have been serious injuries.His face, partially visible through the gloom, showed something I hadn’t seen there before, genuine concern.Blood trickled from a gash on his cheek.
“Foster!Foster, can you hear me?”His voice sounded distant, as if coming through thick cotton wool wrapped around my brain.
I tried to speak, to ask if everyone was alive, but my mouth wouldn’t cooperate.My tongue felt thick, unresponsive, swollen from where I’d bitten it during impact.The edges of my vision darkened, black creeping in from the periphery like spilled ink on paper.
A dull throbbing at the base of my skull intensified with each heartbeat.Something warm and wet matted my hair, trickling down behind my ear.The cold was setting in now, a bone-deep chill that started at my fingertips and spread inward with frightening speed.Shock, the analytical part of my brain informed me.You’re going into shock.
My hand went instinctively to my chest, searching for the familiar comfort of my pendant, but found nothing.Panic flared brighter than the pain.With immense effort, I turned my head slightly, each millimeter of movement sending jagged shards of agony through my skull.I spotted it lying on the floor, or was it the ceiling, of the cockpit, just beyond my reach.The silver glinted dully in the weak light filtering through the broken windshield.
Tanner had freed himself now.I could hear him moving through the wreckage, calling my name with increasing urgency.Bryce wasn’t responding beside me.His breathing had grown shallower, almost imperceptible.
