Yusef, the final member and commander of the team, stood behind the two flight-trained hijackers. He had a mobile phone pressed to one ear on which he received reports from the other teams. With each report the smile in his blood-dripping beard grew wider, more jubilant.
'The Merciful, the Compassionate One smiles upon us in all his glory,' Yusef exulted. 'The other two airships are also in our hands.'
Samadi, at the pilot's controls, pointed and exclaimed, 'Brothers, look! There beats the heart of the beast.'
Looking out the bridge's forward window, Yusef nodded with anticipatory satisfaction at the immense skyscraper that was their ultimate target.
'If you hanker after Paradise, Brother, then fly us into the base.'
Samadi smiled nervously and nodded. He was not nervous over his impending death; that was nothing. But he was only the best pilot among them, not necessarily a good one. Pushing forward on the yoke with one hand, the other pushed the throttle all the way forward. The speed of the ship began to climb up to maximum.
Behind them, in the passenger compartments, the rest of the airship's passengers began to scream at the changing attitude, altitude and speed. The hijackers ignored those screams completely.
Headquarters, Terra Nova Trade Organization,
First Landing,
Hudson, Federated States of Columbia,
0829 hours, 11/7/459 AC
As with all poisons, Linda thought, toxicity is in the dose.
The ground floor of the TNTO was also the floor of the Terra Novan Trade Appeals Board, the planet's sole effective international court. Thus, that floor simply swarmed with lawyers. The density made Linda's skin crawl.
One child in her arms, another held by the hand and the third trailing along, Linda stepped onto an elevator heading up to the office's of Patricio's family firm.
'Your destination, please,' the elevator's speaker asked.
'Chatham, Hennessey, and Schmied,' Linda answered clearly, though with a slight but utterly charming Hispanic accent. The machine running the elevator understood it well enough, in any case.
With a smooth sound the elevator began to shoot upwards until it reached the 104th floor. There it came to an equally smooth stop. The doors opened to either side with a whoosh.
Heart pounding, as it always did whenever she had to meet some of her husband's family-Annie alone excepted-Linda Hennessey and her children stepped off of the elevator. A sign high on a wall announced, 'Chatham, Hennessey, and Schmied,' the name of the family business.
'Why do I put myself through this?' she asked of no one in particular. She asked and she answered, 'Because family is important and I do not want my husband to have lost his… especially if I can help it.'
'Come on, kids,' she ordered, then led two of them forward. Linda carried Milagro, the baby.
Imperious, impervious, unsmiling and unfriendly, Pat's Uncle Robert Hennessey watched without any expression at all as Linda led and carried the children into his office. If my own wife… useless mouth… had managed to have children perhaps I would not resent this woman having taken my only-practical-son. I should not blame her… but I just can't help it.
In her own way equally impervious, Linda smiled with a warmth to rival the sun of her homeland. She glanced about Bob's office, mentally comparing his trophies and mementos-golf, business, and such-with her husband's, much to the favor of the latter. I am proud to be the mother of my husband's children.
Truth to tell she found the entire office to be borderline tacky, unrestrained and unrefined. It wouldn't do to mention that, though.
'Linda,' Bob greeted, without noticeable enthusiasm.
She didn't answer directly. Being old money, she was probably better at playing status games than Uncle Bob when she cared to play them. Instead, she placed Milagro down on the floor and said, 'Go see your grand-uncle, ninos.'
The two little ones scurried around Bob's imposing desk. The eldest, the boy, strode like a young prince, before putting out his hand to shake, formally. By that time Milagro had already climbed aboard.
Still sitting in his chair, his throne, Bob looked down into a lovely little girl's enormous brown eyes, saw the image of the nephew that was more like a son, and felt his heart melting.
He looked up to say something to Linda. She was looking out of his office window, wide eyed, speechless, an expression of shock written on every curve of her unlined face. Bob's eyes followed and saw. Mouth gaping wide, he exclaimed, 'Oh, my God!'
Columbian Airlines Flight 39, 0849 hrs
The airship hit near the base of the skyscraper. Its structure, even while coming apart, was just strong enough to force its nose through the thin walls and into the main lobby with its toxic dose of international lawyers. As the ship lost speed to the collision, its engines in the rear broke loose and drove forward, smearing passengers and crew alike, before tearing out of the remains of the front and smashing into the shocked barristers. With the engines came a great invisible cloud of hydrogen gas, pouring into the open lobby before igniting from a spark created by the one of the engines tearing through a steel support.
The hydrogen began burning in front, incinerating several score shrieking attorneys. Then the flames raced through the rich oxygenhydrogen mix present in the tunnels carved through the ship by the flying engines. Flame then burst out of the rear, tearing open the hydrogen cells there. The contents of these, once mixed with oxygen, effectively exploded, driving the remains of the ship, and much of its hydrogen, farther into the lobby of the TNTO. There it burned hot enough to incinerate several thousand more international jurists, as well as to set aflame anything therein remotely flammable.
Yusef and company, however, didn't get to see any of that. They were dead and on their way to wherever and whatever might prove to be their final reward, moments after the ship's nose touched concrete.
Terra Nova Trade Organization,
0849 hours, 11/7/459 AC
Arms clutched protectively around the now crying Milagro, Bob rushed to the side of the fallen mother. Julio followed.
'What happened?' she asked, groggily.
'I don't know, I don't know,' answered a shocked Bob as he helped her to her feet. 'The LTAs never come that close. Jesus, it hit us!' He thought about that for a moment, then amended, 'No, it crashed into us. On purpose. Christ!'
As Bob spoke, the fire sprinklers came on overhead, sprayed for a few seconds, and then died as pressure from below fell to nothing. The pipes had been cut. Unchecked by the sprinklers, smoke and the hint of flame began rising past the exterior windows.
Milagro began coughing as faint smoke filtered into the office complex. Minutes passed as Linda soothed the child, Julio calming the next oldest beside her. Just as the last tears were wiped and the last sniffles snuffed, Julio looked up and pointed out the window and across the city to where another airship closed on a building only just less grand than the TNTO. That was the headquarters for the Global News Network, based in First Landing.
Julio said, 'Mom, there's another one…'
Cochea, 0903 hours, 11/7/459 AC
Hennessey and his two friends missed the first impact. However, like the rest of the world, they saw it replayed over and over in the next several minutes.
'Dear, God!' Hennessey exclaimed, once he made the visual connection. Stomach sinking and heart pounding he added, 'That's my uncle Bob's building.' He raced for the phone, frantically dialing his cousin Annie's number in First Landing.
1050 5th Avenue, First Landing
'Dammit, dammit, DAMMIT, STOP that ringing!' Bad as the ringing was, the sound of her own shout seemed enough to tear the top off of Annie's head. She shuddered and pulled a pillow over in an attempt to shut out the nagging phone. No such luck. It continued to ring.
'Shit,' she muttered. 'May as well see who it is.'
Slowly, reluctantly, not a little angrily, Annie stumbled to the phone.
