30. Scottie
30
SCOTTIE
“You’ve got this, Scottie. It’s just a walk in the park,” I murmured, gearing up for another flight. “There’s nothing to this. You get on that plane, take off, and once you’re in the skies, you’re home-free.”
My stomach churned as I thought of my boots leaving the ground again. Fuck, I really hated flying. I could do it. I knew I could. I just didn’t fucking want to. Ever since that fucking job with the power station…
I couldn’t think about that now. I had to get us home in one piece, and that meant no fucking deviations from the flight plan. I blew out a deep breath and popped a Tums. I was nearly through the whole fucking bottle. Putting on a brave face, I walked out of the bathroom and grabbed my gear, heading for the plane.
“Yo, Scottie Dog! Are you flying us out today or are we catching another flight?” IRIS shouted.
I flipped him off and climbed the stairs to the plane. FNG was already on board, tossing around a baseball.
“Are you fucking crazy?” I asked, snatching the ball as he tossed it in the air. “Are you trying to get everyone killed?”
“Not yet,” he grinned. “But the day’s still young.”
“Relax,” Max said from the cockpit. “He’s not gonna kill us with a baseball.”
“Says you,” I grumbled. “How much have you had to drink today?” I asked, walking up front. I grabbed his jaw and forced him to look at me. His eyes looked mostly normal, but then again, Max’s normal state was drunk.
“Only two drinks. Relax. I fly better when I have a few in me.” He shoved my hand away and got to work checking everything. Where I used the flight checklist, he did everything by memory. Not that I couldn’t, but I liked to know that I hadn’t missed a single thing and could prove it.
I stowed my barf bags and made sure everything was in order, then marched to the back and checked that everything was stowed properly. Something about this flight just wasn’t sitting right with me. Whether it was the unlucky words spoken on the last flight with IRIS or the day we were flying, I wasn’t sure. But if I said anything to Lock, I was bound to be grounded until tomorrow, and that just couldn’t happen. I had to get home to Quinn. She was leaving tomorrow for another USGS site, and I’d be damned if I would miss her.
The guys ambled onto the plane one by one, joking with each other and acting like this was all some game. The only one who was taking things seriously was IKE, and that was because he was a hardass and he had Isla with him.
“Everybody, get your ass in a seat and strap in. I’m not waiting for you!” I shouted over the chaos.
“Ooh, lover boy needs to get home,” Thumper teased.
Slider smacked him. “Hey, he has a fire to build.”
I rolled my eyes at their teasing. “The fire has been built and it’s roaring. Forest fires can’t burn hotter than what we have.”
“Sure,” IRIS snorted. “Keep telling yourself that.” He kicked back in his seat, putting his boots up on the chair in front of him.
I shoved his feet down and glared at him. “Get strapped in.”
“Get strapped in,” he mocked me.
He’d be laughing when the plane went down. Not that it would. Shit, I shouldn’t have thought that. I just jinxed myself without meaning to. I slammed my fist into the seat and sat down with a sigh.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Max asked, puffing away on his cigar.
I rolled my eyes at him. “Seriously? We’re on a fucking plane. Could you try to obey the rules?”
“Rules are for pussies,” he said, blowing a circle of smoke right in my face.
I waved it away, coughing before putting up the plastic shield. “I have a bad feeling about this flight.”
“That’s because you’re a Nervous Nellie.”
“A what?” I asked, spinning around.
“You heard me.”
“Where the hell did you even hear that?”
He shrugged. “When you hang around a preacher long enough, you pick up a few things.”
“I thought you were staying away from the church for fear that you’d combust into flames.”
“Unfortunately, if I want to stay on my wife’s good side, I have to spend time with her parents or risk burning in hell for all eternity, as she tells me.”
“And you’re worried about that?”
“Not one damn bit, but it makes her feel better. And I can’t stand to see her cry.”
That was actually kind of sweet. “Alright, let’s do this. I have a woman waiting at home for me. Whatever happens, don’t fucking shoot me.”
“Why the hell would I shoot you?”
“Because it’s you, alright? It stands to reason that it needs to be said.”
“I had no idea I was such a fucking disaster waiting to happen.”
“Oh please, everyone in the company knows that if anyone’s gonna get us killed, it’s gonna be you.”
He huffed out a laugh. “Coming from the man with more downed planes than the entire U.S. Army.”
“Hey, they mostly fly drones now!”
“Whatever, candyass. Sit down and let’s get moving.”
Candyass. He was such a prick. If I didn’t like his wife so much, I might consider tossing his ass out of the plane like I did to Edu, but without the parachute.
I really fucking hated flying with this prick, but at least there was someone else here to take over while I was puking. Now, I just had to hope he didn’t start up, too. It wasn’t news to anyone that he’d lost it once before. It could happen again.
“This is Scottie Dog, your captain speaking. We are go for takeoff, so make sure your tray tables are in their upright position and your asses are strapped in because this is gonna be a hard takeoff.”
“Why is this gonna be a hard takeoff?” Max asked.
I rolled my eyes. “It’s not.”
“Then why did you say it is?”
“Because I like saying it!” I snapped. “Jesus, do you have to question every fucking thing I say?”
“When you’re in the pilot’s seat? Yes.”
We started down the runway and that eerie feeling slammed home again. I rechecked every single fucking thing. Something wasn’t right, though all the gauges said we were primed for flight. I pulled back on the yoke and took her to the skies. Everything was fine. We were fine.
But my hands were shaking and my gut was telling me to turn the fucking plane around.
“This isn’t right,” I murmured.
“What?”
“It’s not right.”
“What’s not right?”
“This. The whole fucking thing. Something’s wrong.”
Decision made, I decided to circle back to the airport. I steered us left as Max started yelling at me.
“What the fuck are you doing? We’re supposed to be heading home! We can’t just head back to the airport because of your gut!”
“I’m fucking telling you?—”
The plane suddenly jerked hard and an explosion tore through the right side of the plane.
“Engine two is out!” Max shouted. “We gotta land now!”
“No fucking shit,” I retorted.
“Scottie!” FNG shouted, running up front. “The plane’s on fire!”
“I know the plane’s on fire!”
“Landing sometime soon would be good,” Max continued.
“Not to be a pain in the ass,” Thumper said, shoving FNG aside, “but I’d really like to make it home to see my kid. Oh, and Bree. Shit, don’t tell her I forgot about her.”
“Did anyone think to extinguish the fire?” Fox shouted from the back.
“All of you, sit the fuck down!”
“My Funyuns!” Fox yelled. “Help! They’re on fire! They’re burning up!”
“Someone put out the fucking fire!” I shouted.
FNG snorted. “I say let ‘em burn. No one rushed to my aid when my umbrellas were in danger.”
The plane dipped, then the horizon danced all over the fucking gauge. I did my best to level us out, but we were all over the fucking place.
“Mayday, mayday. This is Cessna Three One Zero Six Foxtrot. We have an engine out and are inbound for landing. Our position is five miles south. Please be advised we’ll need emergency services on site. Over.”
“Shit, he’s calling it in,” FNG sighed. “This must be really fucking serious.”
“No shit, asshole,” Thumper snapped, smacking him upside the head.
“Would you all fucking take your seats?” I growled, ready to lose my shit.
“This is all your fucking fault,” Max grumbled.
“My fault? How the hell is this my fault?”
“Because you had to say it! You had a feeling something was wrong. You jinxed us!”
I pointed to the back of the plane. “They jinxed us. You didn’t hear IRIS on the way here, giving me his shitty, not helpful advice about keeping the plane level!”
“You should be doing that now!”
“It’s kind of hard with one fucking engine and half the plane on fire!” I shouted as the wheels touched down and something metal scraped against the ground. We came to a screeching halt and then I heard the plane door open and the stairs drop.
The fire crew rushed to our aid and were hosing down the plane as we disembarked. It was a fucking disaster, and as I stepped off the plane, I saw for the first time what caused us to nearly plummet to our deaths.
“Is that a fucking wind turbine blade?”
IRIS stood beside me, nodding as he stared at it. The blade sliced clean through the right wing of the plane. “Looks like it.”
“Holy shit,” I murmured. “Just a few feet over and that thing would have taken out the whole fucking plane.”
“Skewered us for dinner,” IRIS nodded.
“We’d be the shawarma,” I joked, finding the whole thing kinda funny now.
IRIS turned to me and frowned.
“What?”
“You didn’t puke.”
“What?”
“In flight. You were in the danger zone and didn’t puke. Didn’t even grab for a bag.”
I thought it over and realized he was right. “Well, shit.”
I heard the distinct sound of vomiting and turned just in time to see Max bent over, hurling his guts next to the plane. I smirked, wondering if my time with tactical vomit was over. Maybe it was time to pass on the torch. I’d had it long enough, after all.
“Are you the pilot?” one of the ground crew asked.
“Yeah, that’s me.”
“Nice flying, man. I saw the whole thing. The blade broke loose from the wind turbine and was flying right at you. It was scary as hell. That thing was really flying.”
“Wait, you saw it?”
“Yep, watched the whole thing. You turned away from it just as it flew toward it. Did you see it?”
“No, I had no idea.”
He grinned. “It’s like you knew it was coming or something. Anyway, glad you all made it down safely.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, shaking his hand. What the fuck were the odds of that happening?
“What is it?” Slider asked.
“Guess I just became your lucky charm.”
He rolled his eyes as Fox came walking over, sniffling as he wiped his eyes.
“What is it?”
“They’re all gone,” he cried. “I lost them all.”
I winced, grasping his shoulder. “Did you get a chance to say goodbye?”
He nodded. “They didn’t deserve a death like that.”
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes at him. Or tell him that I’d get him some new ones. Somehow, I didn’t think he’d appreciate me replacing the ones he lost. “Yeah. That sucks.”
What else was I supposed to say to a guy after he lost his Funyuns?