Chapter 9
The closing ceremony over, Buffy went back to her room to pick up her stuff.
Bags and luggage were stowed away on the coaches and they made their way to the airport.
Once they’d arrived, and had checked in, they had an hour and a half to kill before take-off, so Buffy went and phoned her mother.
“……………Yes, honey, I saw the closing ceremony – who was that nice guy carrying the flag?”
“That was Brad Douglas – his skating partner is Tanya Glenn – they did really well, got the bronze”
“Not as good as my baby though! – So, when will you be home?”
“From this flight, or do you mean with you?”
“Well, both!”
“It’ll be the middle of the night by the time we land in LA, I’ll try and sleep on the plane, but you know what it’s like, I might need a few hours sleep once I’m back at the academy, I’ve got to sort out my pass, see Fred, wash my clothes, repack to come to home - but all being well I’ll see you Friday evening, early – around 6-ish”
“I’ll check the flight time and come and pick you up”
“Great – we could go out…get a Chinese dinner or something”
Joyce beamed at this suggestion, and readily agreed.
Buffy said goodbye to her mother and went to find her ‘team’ who were in the coffee shop.
On her way back, she saw Faith being pushed in a wheelchair, and stopped to talk
“I’m so sorry about your injury – tough call”
Faith smiled and shrugged and said
“Like I said, there WILL be a next time…congrats on the silver by the way”
“Thanks – uh oh, smile”
“What?”
“Paparazzi”
The two girls smiled and several shots were taken, then Buffy spied Illyria looking down at her from the coffee shop upstairs.
“Gotta go, you take care- bye”
“Yeah, bye”
Buffy made her way up to her team, after signing an Olympic programme for an autograph hunter.
She ran up the rest of the steps
“There’s a party of school girls due in, Angel said he thinks it’ll be better if we go and sit in the VIP lounge and wait else we’ll be inundated for autograph requests” Illyria said, holding out Buffy’s flight bag to her.
“I’ve got about a dozen signed photographs of you, I’m going to give them to the air hostess so you shouldn’t be bothered too much during the flight, and as we’re in first class, we shouldn’t be disturbed anyway”
Buffy nodded and followed Angel through the double doors of the VIP lounge.
***************
Having got comfy, she settled down to watch the in-flight movie, and had a delicious dinner of salmon teriyaki with wild rice and mixed mushrooms, followed by a sinful chocolate mousse – and she enjoyed every mouthful.
Stretching and yawning Buffy lowered her recliner seat to nearly horizontal, got a mask, sleep pillow and cover from the hostess and settled down for a nice sleep.
She woke, refreshed after a nice long sleep, went and freshened up, there was about a hour to go before they landed she took a magazine from her flight bag and began to read.
**********************
Riley Finn steered the old hog-hauling wagon through the torrential rain storm on the highway, the rain falling almost faster than the windshield wipers could shift it, he risked a glance at his father, who had been drinking Budweiser, and about twenty miles back had scratched his three-day growth of beard, belched and closed his eyes and was now snoring like a band-saw through a log.
“Geez daddy, I’m awful tired myself…but then I guess you are too – and jeepers, it’s colder than polar bears ass in here…” (He began to fiddle with the controls till he felt some heat blasting out into the cab.
“That’s better!” Tuning in the radio too, Riley began to sing along quietly to the country music he could hear playing………
***************************
Fifteen miles out from the airport, Captain Jonathan Andrew called the control tower………
“Control tower, this is delta India flight niner-niner-zero coming into land on runway…4, over” the landing gear dropped with a satisfying clunk and the confirmation co-ordinates came up on the flight path for landing on runway 4.
“Control tower to delta India flight niner-niner-zero, you have confirmation on your runway, sorry about the weather you guys, we wish you a safe landing, over”
************************
Riley felt his head droop, and he jerked it back up, a slight swerve in the steering gave him a jolt, his father gave a grunt in his snoring, and his head lolled against the window, till he settled back to sleep again. Riley blinked and shifted slightly in his driving seat – boy was he tired…the hypnotic swish back and forth of the wipers coupled with the warmth of the heater lulled him again……………
Suddenly there was a loud bang, and Riley was jerked awake, he tried to make sense of what was happening, slammed on the brakes, the wagon was all over the wet road, he couldn’t control it, as it aqua-planed and was heading straight in front of the path of a tour bus, he caught smack in the middle, which sent the bus straight through the crash barrier and down a steep embankment, rolling over and over, throwing the occupants around inside like rag dolls.
Riley had no sooner heaved the steering to the left, when he was hit by a huge juggernaut, sending the hog wagon in the same path as the tour bus, which was now lying on it’s side on some tarmac, hissing and steaming…
The last thing Riley remembered was seeing his father go flying out of the passenger door before the wagon rolled over again and again, something hit his head and everything went black.
The juggernaut driver tried desperately in vain not to follow the hog-wagon, but the road was so slippery with all the rain that it was nigh on impossible, and he felt the impact as vehicles slammed into him, sending him down the embankment too.
*******************
Captain Andrew yawned, slipped his headphones from his ears to round his neck, and began to flick switches off at the controls and said,
“Well Larry, that’s me done for the weekend – got my daughter and her husband coming up from-“
“Jon – they DID say runway four, didn’t they?” the captain’s co-pilot Larry asked worriedly putting on his headphones again
“Yes, why – “
“Look – what’s that faint orange glow on the runway?”
The captain immediately got onto the control-tower, they were coming into land, their altitude dropping below 100ft…
“Control tower – this is delta India flight niner-niner-zero please advise – runway four has a fire, repeat runway four has a fire,”
Clem Foster, the air-traffic controller’s eyes nearly popped when he saw on radar the size of the objects that were on the end of runway four -
“Christ, it MUST be a crash - a crash – it’s a crash – abort the landing – it’s a crash!”
Larry began to disengage the autopilot landing, flicking on switches and tried to pull up the nose of the plane – alarm bells went off, the engines screaming, inside the cabin the oxygen masks dropped and the lights went out, even with seatbelts on people were jolted and thrown around, even though they were pinned in their seats, some began to scream, others prayed.
“JESUS! This is the control tower, delta- India, ABORT LANDING, I REPEAT ABORT LANDING! Holy mother of – “
Clem Foster hit ever alarm button he could in the control tower, bringing in his fellow flight-path attendants, and sending out the fire engines
“What is it Clem– Jesus Christ – oh my god, this is going to be SO bad…”
Inside the plane was chaos, overhead lockers flew open, bottles, hand luggage was being thrown about, Buffy thought it was all over – she could hear through the screaming a voice telling them to assume the crash position…terrified, she leaned forward and covered her head with her hands, praying, seconds later she felt a hard thump on the back of her head as a seat from further up the plane flew backwards, hitting her………her screams, and those of others ceased………
“Ambulances will be required…this is the control tower of airport, we have a major situation down here – seems there has been some accident on the highway, they have broken through the crash barrier and are on the runway…initiate Code Red Alert Emergency Procedure – Code Red, repeat………”
Captain Jon Andrew desperately tried to bring the nose of the plane up, but realised it was hopeless, they were going to crash…
“LARRY!”
“I know, I KNOW!”
“ENGINE’S STALLED – SHE WON’T GO UP!”
“I’LL TRY AND STEER HER AWAY FROM………OH GOD PLEASE…!”
The plane literally wobbled in the air, tipping dangerously to the left, biting his lip and pulling back on the steering column for all he was worth Captain Andrew could see the runway coming up to them faster and faster, the left wing clipped the juggernaut, tipping the plane onto the other wing, and by some miracle the plane hadn’t touched any other debris on the runway, captain Andrew dong a superb job of steering, but it was not enough, and the stricken plane ‘belly-flopped’ and practically broke in half, although the two halves were still joined - the right wing was now scraping along the runway, causing sparks, aviation fuel gushing out from the wing-tanks covering everything and suddenly the engine burst into flames, flames that crept everywhere where the fuel had sprayed.
With superhuman effort, Larry and Jon managed to bring the plane to a halt, the fire engines were already there, spraying the plane with foam, the emergency services well practiced in rescues.
There was a rush of cold air as doors were opened, and emergency chutes were set up.
Rescue workers were quickly swarming the plane, looking for injured passengers – there were a few obviously dead.
“Here, there’s someone here” The medic looked at the small blonde girl still in her seatbelt.
“Is she breathing?”
“Just, help me – undo the belt, okay after three lift…what’s the, why can’t – oh god, her foot’s trapped………here, buddy here, she needs to be cut out, her foots trapped”
The fireman nodded and came over to the paramedics with his hand held circular saw, he located where the young girl’s foot was trapped and proceeded to cut the metal foot-rest bar from the seat in front that was trapping her foot.
“Okay, you can lift now”
The two paramedics put a neck brace on her and then onto a stretcher, she was lowered to a waiting ambulance
**************************
“ Are you Mrs Joyce Summers, mother of Buffy Summers, the ice-skating star?”
“What – good grief, it’s 3.40 in the morning, can’t you wait until-“
“Mrs Summers”………
“A decent hour – she’s not here anyway, she’s been taking part in the Olympics and –“
“MRS SUMMERS!”
“What? - How DARE YOU raise your voice to me and -”
“Mrs Summers, there has been a terrible accident, I’m afraid Buffy is in hospital”
“SHE’S WHAT? - Oh my god, oh my what happened – she was coming back from – I saw the closing ceremony this morning…”
“Look, Mrs Summers, stay put, I will get the local cops to come out to you to tell you of any up-date news and to bring you to the hospital”
Joyce got out of bed on shaky legs, and began to dress, she wondered whether to phone Hank or not, and decided to wait until she knew more herself.
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Author's Chapter Notes:
NOT for those of a nervous disposition!