CHAPTER ONE - JOEY
Just like that I'm falling. Down down down. The plane is going to crash. My mind is racing and if I'm screaming I can't tell, the sound of wind rushing past the jet is too loud. The ground is approaching too fast. I have little to no time to even try to save this. My hands are frantically pressing all the buttons I can reach that could even remotely save me and my plane from this certain demise. My logic suddenly smacks me in the face and I remember I packed a parachute in the back of the plane.
I am up and I'm running to the back storage compartment of the jet. I'm out of time. I can feel the turbulence come to a sudden halt. Then the tip of the plane crashes into the earth. I'm thrown back onto the wall of the captain's pit. My head feels like it's been screwed on the wrong way, and I can't think. All my thoughts are either empty or too frantic to make out. I can make out one thought, You are dying Joey. I don't know why but I don't accept it. I fumble and try to get up but my legs are too weak. Maybe my brain is right. No. I somehow find the strength in me to press my hand against the door of the plane and I push and shove. I keep on doing so until I hear a click and the door swings open. And I fall. Onto the ground. I'm alive! Not for long there is that voice again; it doesn't sound like my inner voice now that I hear it again.
"SHIT!" I swivel my whole body to face the direction of the voice. No one else came on this mission with me but no one is anywhere near me either.
"WHO'S THERE?" The power in my own voice shocks me not because I haven't heard it before but because I was just in a plane crash… a fucking plane crash! Silence. No response but heavy breathing that I can't exactly tell if it's coming from myself or somewhere else. That's when I hear a loud clang come from the back of my jet. Very slowly I begin to approach the door to the storage compartment of the plane. I reach for my gun and pull it out of its holster. "I ASKED WHOS THERE?" Still no reply. I kick at the door. A tiny rustling sound comes from inside. I don't shoot but I want to. Instead I reach my hand toward the branch blocking the handle and pull it back. I then slowly twist the handle and open the door. A man wearing an all red army uniform lunges for me and pins me to a tree with a gun to my head. He laughs.
"Well well well… I didn't think you'd be stupid enough to actually open the door but here we are…" the man isn't smiling exactly but it's close enough to a smirk to unsettle me.
"Who are you?" I demand. My gun is still in my hand so this guy either is the stupidest person ever or he has a plan.
"The name's Manny. But you wont need to remember that." He presses the gun even more firmly into my skull. Now it's my turn to laugh.
"You really think you are capable of killing me? That's a good one." I can't help myself. I had to make his ego deflate at least a little.
"Yes I do in fact think that." His voice is a little more firm yet timid. I clutch my gun and shoot. Hoping that his foot would be the one to bleed and not mine, luckily I'm a good shot. "FUCK!" he stumbles back and lands on the dirty floor clutching his foot with his hands which are now covered in blood.
"You were saying?" I'm proud. But I'm still not satisfied. "Now… before I shoot you in a more convenient spot for me… tell me, what were you doing in my plane?"
"You just shot me and now are threatening to kill me so why… exactly would I tell you anything?" He is really playing with death now.
"Are you serious? If you want to live you will make the right choice." I am just getting angrier by the second.
"I thought you were gonna shoot me anyway so… there's really no point in me telling you a thing." I can't with him. He is toying with me and I won't have that. He is still wincing and blood is still pouring out of his wound.
"You're right actually." I growl, "I might as well just kill you right now." Now it's my turn to press a gun to his head. "How does that sound?"
"Sounds better than me telling you anything." He is quite cocky.
"Well then…" I go to pull the trigger when I realize he is smiling. "Why the fuck are you smiling?"
"Because, you really are stupid aren't you?" I pull the safety back and feel a jolt of pain in my left foot. "Payback" he gets up and begins to limp away.
"YOU ASSHOLE!" My anger is burning my skin so hot I can almost swear my whole face is red. I have no choice but to make a bandage to stop the bleeding. So I strip my shirt off leaving my skin bear on my chest. I tear a strip off of the bottom of the shirt and wrap it around my foot. I suck in a sharp breath and press down to stop the bleeding. I grab what's left of my shirt and put it back on. Manny, as he told me his name is, is almost fully gone into the trees. I push up against the ground and limp towards what is sure to be certain death.