Far Below

          Pulling the inflatable respiration control device onto his shoulders was no small task. Bryan always hated wearing all of the mandatary equipment. Once he had the small tubing set properly down his back, he connected the black nylon straps around his waistline and pulled it tightly for a snug fit. He stopped for a moment to look at his reflection in the mirror that was attached to the inside door of his tiny aluminum locker.
          “Reeve, come on before they cancel us out,” Bryan said sarcastically. His best friend, and fellow pilot, Sean was having a fit of anger while strapping the parachute over his shoulders. Bryan stood in front of his locker and smiled as he watched his friend struggle and curse under his breath.
          “Hey Holland, you can guarantee my safety without this damned thing right?” Sean asked, referring to his parachute. There may have been more sarcasm then real fact in his voice, but Bryan couldn’t tell the difference sometimes.
          “Here.” Bryan walked over to Sean and held his pack in place while reaching over to tighten the equipment Sean was having trouble with. Sean smiled and nodded in appreciation. There was a time when they were too afraid to help each other in the locker room. They used to be worried that they would be seen by someone who would turn their close friendship into a sick joke similar to the way a middle school bully would pick on a schoolmate. It didn’t matter to them anymore.
         The anxiety of eyes watching over them had long passed. Sean returned the favor by running his hands underneath Bryan’s gear to make sure that everything was fastened securely to his flight suit. With a pat on the shoulder, he let Bryan know that everything was secure.
          “Keep the parachute on. I’ve never been in an emergency. I don’t know what I can guarantee.” Bryan shrugged his shoulders, stepped to the locker door and slammed it shut. Bryan and Sean grabbed the identical style flight bags and strode towards the double doors at the other end of the locker room. Pushing both doors open to their fullest extent, they stepped out into the corridors of the vast complex. The repeated echos of their combat boots tapped repeatedly as they walked towards the automatic doors at the end of the hallway.
          “I hope you went to the bathroom,” Bryan said.
          “Think it will be that long?” Sean asked while he saluted the uniformed guards at the door. The automatic doors slid open and the two flight officers stepped outside into the dim gold light that cast their long shadows upon the miles of oil stained cement. Bryan and Sean stopped at the chain link fence and put their bags on the ground. Both of them kneeled down and pulled dark black helmets out of their bags.
          The shrieking sounds of various jet engines were soon muffled as they pulled the helmets onto their heads. They picked up their bags and continued through the chain link fence. A man wearing camouflage fatigues ran over to them as they stepped into the windy prop blast of a large rotary engine that swung so fast that no one could see the blades. The pungent scent of burning jet fuel was like a weekly welcome home. Bryan smiled and nodded at the man who handed him a palm pilot computer. Sean looked over Bryan’s shoulder so he could read the message.
          “Report to flight line 11R. The plane is topped off. Current active runway is Eleven Right. Last ATIS reports a broken ceiling of 6,000 feet. Wind is 20 at 14. Contact ground on 112.700. Report you have information Lima. Further ATIS reports reference: 134.2.”
          After a few minutes of walking they found their ride. Sean looked down at his notepad and made sure that they were parked at the correct gate before giving the plane another look. Bryan’s brow furrowed after they walked over to the plane. They both checked to make sure there were no loud aircraft rolling around them before pulling their helmets off.
          “Sean.. Remember when you asked me if I could guarantee your safety on this flight?” Bryan raised an eyebrow at him while displaying a half grin.
          “Yeah.. I know,” Sean replied.
          “They have to go through their bi-annuals before they can even role it out here. So lets get to it,” Bryan said.
          Bryan and Sean opened up a back panel in the fuselage of the aircraft. They both pulled the items that they needed out of the bag and discarded the rest of their equipment into the small storage space.
          “You think we should add a few more things to the checklist on this one?” Sean asked.
          “Oh yeah..,” Bryan said with wide eyes and a continuous nod.
          “Maybe its just the paint job, they probably did everything but that.” Sean pulled his glove off and ran his hand across the leading edge of the swept back wing.
          “Alright Reeve.. Lets pull out the checklist. Follow it by the numbers. I want to get this over with before it gets too dark,” Bryan said.
          “Alright.. Cockpit check,” Sean said.
          Bryan nodded and climbed the ladder to the cockpit. Sean stood below him with his thumb on the clipboard while he waited for Bryan.
          “Check the Tach’s,” Sean started.
          “Six Two Six Four Three Eight,” Bryan said as he looked at the old style gauge in the cockpit.
          “Flight control lock.”
          Bryan pulled a small metal safety pin from under the flight stick.
          “Its out,” Bryan said.
          “Alright.. Come down,” Sean said . . .

          Bryan laughed while he watched Sean dig out a piece of dirt from an instrument that was installed on the inside of the wings leading edge.
          “I think the instructor. wants us to crash and burn,” Bryan remarked jokingly.
          “I know right!” Sean shouted over the sound of a low flying jet that passed overhead.
          “Think our airspeed indicator will work alright now?” Bryan asked.
          “We checked the static tube, the fuel grade and quality, we’ve checked flaps, the ailerons, the engine manifold, the oil seals.. Everything internally seems alright, but the external condition of this plane, and the cosmetic components are shot to hell,” Sean said.
          “You ready?”
          “Yeah.. I guess so,” Sean’s replied with hesitance in his voice.
          Bryan smiled and nodded at his friend. They climbed up the ladder once more. Bryan sidestepped into the pilots seat. Bryan snapped the shoulder harness latch in place after he sat down. With a nervous gasp, he plugged his headset into the radio stack and turned the internal radio on. The noise cancellation feature in his headphones blocked all outside noise and he could hear Sean’s nervous breathing in the headset.
          “You alright?” Bryan asked.
          “Yeah.. Its getting dark, come on,” Sean muttered under his breath.
          “Alright..” Bryan pulled his checklist out of the knee pocket of his flight suit.
          “Last set of checks. Lets show off for the brass by actually flying this poor excuse for a –.”
          “Shh... You never know when they’re going to review the flight recorders,” Sean cut in.
          “Screw them!” Bryan snickered. They both found that undermining authority figures worked to calm their nerves. Nevertheless, it was clearly a sarcastic remark that most people would recognize as a harmless joke. Sean couldn’t help not to laugh when he responded.
          “Okay, lets do it.”
          “Alright.. Call it and I’ll answer your questions,” Bryan said.
          “Beacon light?”
          “On!”
          “Fuel pump?”
          “Flowing!”
          “CPU?”
          “On!”
          “Ejection Pyros?”
          “On!”
          “Light it up!” Sean said in a most exuberant tone.
          Bryan placed his hands on the ignition switch and checked the tarmac around them before he flipped a red safety tab away from the console.
          “Clear!” Bryan yelled.
          Sean felt the rumbling of the engine vibrate through his body as the jet began to wind up. Sean waited until the needle inside the fuel flow gauge passed into a green arch. The engines raw winding soon settled into a comfortable hiss, and he felt the constant buzz of the turbine send a massaging vibration up his legs and back. Sean looked down at his checklist after the surprising discovery that the plane actually worked.
          “Flight controls?” Sean asked.
          “Free and correct,” Bryan responded.
          “Transponder?”
          “Transponder set to standby.”
          “Radios?”
          “Setting to 112.7,” Bryan said.
          “We’re good,” Sean responded.
          Bryan ran his gloved hand around the grainy plastic flight stick and pressed a green button next to his thumb.
          “Shaw tower, Lockheed alpha foxtrot one six with information lima, requesting taxi for takeoff, straight out departure.”
          A deep voice boomed in their headsets,
          “Alpha Foxtrot, taxi to runway eleven right and hold short, contact tower on 127.1 when ready.”
          “Eleven Right, Alpha Foxtrot,” Bryan said before he took his finger off the transmit button.
          The sound of the engine changed from a low idle pitch, to a slightly higher pitch. Sean looked out the clear glass canopy and watched as the ground began to move by slowly. Bryan aligned a green mark on his heads up display with a solid yellow line painted on the ground to aid him in steering the aircraft.. After a minute of taxiing, Bryan brought the airplane onto the runway.
          “Alpha Foxtrot One Six holding short on eleven right for straight out departure,” Bryan said.
          “Alpha Foxtrot, you’re cleared for takeoff,” another voice responded over the radio.
          “Alright.. It took us long enough,” Sean directed towards Bryan with humor in his voice..
          Bryan pushed the throttle stick forward and aligned the craft between the two numbers on the runway.
          “Oil’s in the green, amps good, mags have a positive charge. We’re good!” Sean shouted over the vibration.
          “Here we go!” Bryan yelled. In one swift movement he let his feet off of the rudder peddles and smoothly pushed the throttle forward until he felt it snap into the afterburner groove. The loud rumble soon transformed into a roar. They watched the runway fly by faster and faster. Bryan turned his attention to his airspeed indicator. He watched the speed rise. 98 knots.. 110 knots... 125 knots.. He pulled the flight stick towards him and the roar went silent as the wheels separated from the ground. Only the hiss of the engine echoed around them now as they flew into the sea of clouds. Sean could hear the sound of the gear pulling into the wings.
          Sean yelled as he was pulled into his seat by an invisible force. He took a deep breath and held it while he pulled the oxygen mask over his mouth. The g-forces pushed in on him unexpectedly.
          “You could have given me warning!” Sean screamed in exasperation.
          “It wouldn’t of been as fun,” Bryan said with a chuckle.
          A sudden jolt ripped through the aircraft and the comforting hum of the engines began to sputter. Bryan was still holding the high performance climb before the engine went silent. He quickly looked at the heads up display that displayed the vitally important numbers to him. He watched as the numbers dwindled along with his nerve.
          “Sean.. Contact tower,” Bryan said an icy tone.
          Without missing a beat, Sean transmitted his distress call.
          “Mayday Mayday Maday..,” Sean
transmitted with a professional calm. “Alpha Foxtrot One Six is declaring an emergency, clear the runway. Two souls aboard. We just had a flame out.”
          As the tower talked to Bryan’s co-pilot, he mentally blocked everything out that didn’t matter and checked the airplane’s readouts once more. The airspeed kept going down while he kept the tip of the airplane pointing towards the sky. The longer he pointed the nose of the airplane into the sky, the faster his airspeed dropped. 100 knots, 50 knots, 0 knots!
          “Hammer Head!” Bryan warned Sean as he slammed his right boot into the rudder peddle causing the plane to spin around. The airplane hung in mid air for a second before the nose quickly swung from sky to ground like a derailed roller coaster. Bryan and Sean both bolted towards one side of the glass canopy. Bryan’s airspeed began to rise the moment the dark blue sky was replaced by the ground. The airport was directly below them now. They could see the tiny white, orange, and blue lights emerging on the tarmac far below them.
          “Flaps extended! Airbrake’s on! Gear down!” Bryan said.
          “I’m dumping the fuel,” Sean stated with a stutter.
          “Good,” Bryan said.
          Bryan’s heart began to slow as he concentrated on his airspeed. Both of the pilots grunted in a brief agony as Bryan pulled back on the stick to align the airplane with the runway after executing the steepest dive they ever performed. Bryan pulled his legs back in and let the rudder straighten the plane above the runway. He reached below the heads up display and flipped the landing light on. The runway illuminated in front of them. Bryan held the plane parallel to the runway and allowed their loss in speed pull the aircraft closer to the Earth. Bryan sighed in relief when he felt the wheels touch ground.
          “Wooohhhh!” Sean boomed with glee.
          “That’s how you do that,” Bryan pressed both breaks hard and brought the plane to an immediate stop on the runway. Not even bothering to shut the aircraft’s electrical systems off, they pulled the canopy away from their heads and yanked their helmets off. They calmly unstrapped themselves from their seats and stepped out onto the wing.
          They brushed some of the nervous sweat away that saturated their hair. They could hear the whaling sound of the rescue vehicles getting louder while they contemplated the past ten minutes of their lives.
          “What happened?” Sean asked.
          “I don’t know.. Its not our fault, we checked everything,” Bryan gasped with laughter and relief..
          Bryan and Sean slid off of the delta wing and let their feet flop to the ground. They paced down the center of the runway and stopped a safe distance away from the untamed machine.
          “I can guarantee your safety after all,” Bryan stated with a boyish smile and an uncanny sense of pride that he never knew he had until that moment.
          “I knew that,” Sean said softly.
          A calm fell over them as they waited for the spectacle of lights to close in.