I lost track of time.

Sleepiness found me, even with the air turning us into a tennis ball and hitting us with its battering blows. Conner’s voice mingled with his father’s as they tried to play ‘I Spy’ out the rain-drenched windows.

Pippa snuggled with Puffin, nuzzling into her mother’s neck, and Galloway turned to check on us, his eyes shadowed by his glasses but still intense enough to conjure goosebumps.

I sat frozen beneath his inspection. His throat worked as he swallowed, never tearing his gaze from mine. I waited for him to turn around so I could breathe again.

But he didn’t.

Slowly, his eyes dropped to my lips, warming and cooling at the same time.

What do you want from me?

Who are you?

Questions glowed on his face, mimicking mine. I’d never met someone I’d had such an instantaneous reaction (both good and bad) with. Half of me wanted to argue with him while the other half wanted to silently stare.

His hand moved to the microphone by his lips. His mouth parted to speak.

I didn’t move or blink, waiting to see what he would do.

But then, it happened.

The bottom of the sky vanished.

We fell.

My stomach was left a few metres above, making me horribly hollow.

A microsecond later, we slammed into a wall of air, curtailing our fall and crunching our spines into the leathered bench.

“Oh, my God!” Amelia screamed.

Pippa’s eyes welled up with tears.

What the hell was that?

“Hold on!” Akin bellowed in the headphones. “The storm was bigger than I thought and left behind disrupted air pockets. I’m going to have to go around and avoid what I can’t see.”

Galloway spun to face the front. His voice came over the frequency. “What flight range does this thing have?”

Good question.

Fear of running out of fuel and nosediving into the sea swamped me.

Akin never answered, focusing too hard on swooping us to the right and hurtling us higher into the sky.

I hugged my lap of luggage.

Please let us be okay.

Please.

Pippa cried on her mother’s knee while Conner clutched his father. Duncan gave me a worried smile that was anything but encouraging. My racing heart turned into a jackhammer, splitting my ribcage with panic.

There were no more sparkly lights outside. No sign of life or habitation. It was just us and blackness as we bounced and skipped wherever the wind wanted to take us.

This was a stupid, stupid idea.

We were all idiots to fly in such weather.

“Shit!” Akin’s curse sliced through my ears, bringing a rush of prickly adrenaline.

A second later, the world ended.

It was quieter than I’d imagined. Less sharp with imminent death and more befuddled with confusion.

The engine screamed, trying to get us to a safe altitude. But we lost height instead. We didn’t plunge like before but hovered—almost as if the moon cast a fishing line and hooked us, dangling us as bait for something big to snatch.

Our trajectory stalled.

We were weightless

soundless

motionless.

Then the inevitable happened.

I said inevitable because everything (every delay, every occurrence, every unseen message) had been warning me of this and I didn’t listen.

I didn’t listen!

Whatever creature the moon had been fishing for, took hold. We jerked then an explosion ricocheted through the cabin. The rotor blades suddenly flapped down so they were visible through the windows, bending like broken wings. The spectacle disappeared as quickly as it happened, snapping upward and tearing free from the mast.

They came free.

The blades keeping us airborne—the very things determining if we survived or died—snapped off.

They abandoned us.

No!

We turned from flying machine to plummeting grenade.

Falling,

falling,

falling.

Dying...

Through fear and disbelief one thought blared.

One number.

One date.

29th of August.

The day we left the world of the living and became lost.

Chapter Eight

...............................................

G A L L O W A Y

......

I’D THOUGHT ABOUT death.

Who wouldn’t when their mother died right in front of them? How could I not when I’d been the cause of someone else’s?

I’d wondered if there was an existence after death. I’d sat in the dark and begged for no afterlife because if there was a heaven, then there was a hell, and I would rot there forever.

I hated myself for wishing away a heaven where my dead mother might’ve found peace purely because I worried for my immortal soul.

But I was a prick, a bastard, and now, the world had finally agreed to kill me. I wasn’t worth its resources any longer.

I had to be exterminated.

There would be no reincarnation—not after what I’d done. I didn’t want my fate, but I accepted it. I just hated that innocent people had to die beside me.

The helicopter went from saviour to dementor.

The air turned violent, spewing us from its domain.

The spinning blades keeping us afloat vanished.

I couldn’t breathe.

We spun like a top, over and over and over.

My ears popped.

My head pounded.

My life unravelled heartbeat by heartbeat.

There was no way to stop it. Gravity wanted us. It would have us.

All of us. Not just me.

I forced my eyes open. The water-drenched windshield showed no answers but I knew. I felt it. I sensed the earth coming faster and faster to meet us. A killing welcome party of water or land, waves or trees.