Chapter1: Start of the journey

A short *DING* came from the panel above Wilford's head, the seatbelt sign had gone off, and passengers immediately sprung up with the clang of their seatbelts falling to the sides.

The plane had finally reached the cruising altitude of 37.000 feet, giving a chance to the passengers to free themselves of the cramped seats "generously" offered by the ultra-low-cost company. The fresh air emitted by the a/c systems contrasted nicely against the warmness of the Fuerte Ventura airport they had just left.

Wilford rested against the head support, slightly uncomfortable but tolerable. He had been flying with the same company for three years now, the first two as cabin crew or more commonly called Steward, a youthful experience he made to travel the world for cheap.

The last year, after he had quit his job, he had often flew to visit girls met through social media apps, short steamy nights were the bread and butter of his love life.

Being 25 didn't yet sound the "get a family" alarm bell in his mind. Instead, he prefered the flirting adventures that would take him away from home, allowing him to live new exciting experiences, like trekking up a mountain and making love in a yurt.

His family, especially his father,( a "traveller" just like him) had been very supportive of this lifestyle, at least as long as he would work either on his education in psychology or on his career as a part-time computer technician.

The headphones in his ears blasted his mixtape of hundreds of songs all from different genres and bands; they would go from Queen to Ac/dc to musicals such as Les Miserables. Anything that would please his ear, even a short commercial, would get a spot in his mixtape.

While the overture from "Il Barbiere di Siviglia" played softly, and his eyelids grew heavy, a pleasant voice softly whispered enticing promises in his ears.

The ethereal voice knew everything of him, from the dreams he had to even the most hidden fears. He knew him more than a long time confidant or a parent would know, and used that knowledge to sound convincing and slowly infiltrate his mind.

However, the voice suddenly came up with a price for all those promises, so steep it forced his eyes open and banished all the tiredness away. The price for the eternal life he desired more than food and women had to be paid in blood.

The blood of all the passengers on his flight to be precise, the voice told him that if he were to crash the plane, then eternal life, never-ending youthfulness and unlimited power would all be his.

Naturally, his first instinct pointed to a simple conclusion. He had gone crazy, probably schizophrenic. Like in the movie about a mathematician that would imagine people and events so lifelike that he couldn't distinguish them from reality.

He tried ignoring the voice, no one in his right mind would listen to a voice telling him to go full 9/11, except maybe some religious extremist or a mad man. However, the voice grew in strength, he tried countering by maxing the volume in the headphones.

The move seemed to work for a while, then the song ended, and the next item on the playlist, "gotta get up" from harry Nilsson played usually. As relaxed thinking he had won, the song distorted and Harry Nilsson's voice changed becoming more and more like the voice inside his head.

In a moment even the words changed to "gotta blow up". Wilford immediately took off his earphones and decided to face the voice in his ears directly.

"Leave me alone. I will never do something like that!" He stated in his mind hoping the voice could hear him and stop. The other option to communicate was to speak out loud, which didn't seem very bright while surrounded by people.

"Why not?" calmly replied the voice. It had kind of a warm, magnetic tone that made hard not to appreciate it.

"I'm not gonna kill a plane full of people for a voice that is probably just my imagination!" Answered Wilfred incensed.

"So if I wasn't part of your imagination, would you do it?" Asked the voice in a gloating tone. It had found a gap in Wilford wording, and he wasn't going to let it slide.

Wilford didn't answer, his mind thrown into a chaotic state. "I can prove I'm not imaginary." offered the voice in that damnable smooth way it had.

"How?" Wilford hesitantly asked while looking around.

"You see that man walking down the aisle with a coffee?" Wilford turned and indeed saw an overweight sunburned man walking towards him. "I'll make him fall in 3...2...1...!"

The man's leg suddenly jerked back, and he lost his balance falling down, the hand with the coffee tried to grab the seat on his left however missed the hold and ended up spilling the hot coffee on an old lady.

People turned around, and one Hostess ran to help the burned lady screaming in pain.

Wilford gulped down, as the possibility of the voice being more than just his imagination grew more concrete, so did the threat of his possible mental illness.

The two scenarios were either: 1) the voice was real, possibly god, and could offer him everything it said.

2) The voice was real, but more like one of those demons that would trick a human into doing their dirty job without giving them anything in return.

3) the voice was a mental illness; it could control what he heard and saw.

The third option was the scariest, we build our reality based on our senses, but what if our senses were lying, was it possible to live a life while questioning everything?

He gave up thinking about the third one, even if right there was nothing he could do about it, one day he could be thinking he was opening an orange while actually, he was cutting open a person.

So the choice now was simple, an unknown entity offered him everything he wanted in exchange for a massacre. Should it trust the entity? And even if it could be believed.... could he really kill 200 people for his dreams to become real?

"Of course you can," interrupted the voice, "think about it, all humans have limited lives, not even a century each. Just steal a few years they would have wasted anyway and receive a lifespan higher than all of your ancestor's combined." He paused for a moment.

"A life without sickness, without ever getting old. A life without fear." He continued, his words incredibly seductive to Wilford. All those possible lives he could experience, and all the good he could do to repay the victims...

Finally, his hesitation broke down, "people die all the times, people will eventually forget about them, but they will always remember me if I become an immortal, I will become a master of everything and lead humanity to a new golden age." He said, convincing himself further.

"Well said my boy, now you just need a little sacrifice." The voice sounded thrilled with its success.

A plan quickly formed in Wilford's mind, then he thought of what could go wrong, and formulated a plan B and finally a plan C. His eyes turned cold, and he stood up heading towards the front of the cabin.

Two cabin crews were counting the inventory in the food trolleys while happily chatting. Wilford approached them, and his smile grew bigger when he recognized one of the two.

"Hola Laura, long time no see!" he greeted warmly.

The Spanish girl raised her big brown eyes and smiled when she recognized the person that called her. "Will!" she squealed getting up and hugging him. "haven't seen you in so long, are you still operating in Standsted?"

Wilford returned the hug while agreeing. "yeah, I spent my annual leave in FUE, and I'm now staff travelling around. How has your transfer treated you?" he asked, getting out of the hug and staring her in the eyes.

"it's been alright, nice beaches and food, besides basically nobody works here, it's all good." She replied with a smile.

They kept talking for a little about old colleagues and events while the other cabin crew kept counting by herself with an annoyed expression.

"by the way," he changed the topic, "I got some delicious cookies you can share with the crew." He said, taking out from his jacket a roll of homemade cookies, a little partying gift from his last adventure.

"Those look good!" she exclaimed eating one and offering the other to her colleague that accepted keeping her annoyed tone.

"Oh right, who are the pilots?" he asked, trying to sound cool.

"Today we have Jane Smidth and Francois Delacroix," she replied nibbling on a cookie, not noticing anything out of the ordinary.

"Ohh, Francois and I know from way back, mind if I say hi?" he asked with a glint of desire in his eyes.

"You are with as just as a passenger today. You know you can't use the interphone," Laura replied with a giggle.

"Oh, please, you know I won't report you." He insisted displeased. "I also wanted to give him some cookies." He added hoping to convince her.

"Sorry Will, you know the rules. If you want I can give him the cookies after we land or if he has to go out." She denied apologetically.

Wilford dropped it, knowing the answer wouldn't change and sat down in the first row where he kept chatting with her. Like a patient hunter, he waited his moment. The flight would last 4 hours, so he had time.

Drawing the line at until 40 minutes to landing he bid his time until then he would be able to move around without arousing attention. The chance he was waiting for was when the pilot would need to go to the toilet.

The door to the flight deck was, unfortunately, bulletproof. So the forceful approach was to be excluded. He had to be devious, so he went around making a few preparations.

Finally, at 1 hour to landing the signal he had been waiting for arrived, the seatbelt signal went on, and the interphone rang twice; the flight deck called the cabin to ensure it was safe to get out.

Laura answered the interphone, waited until everyone was seated and then gave the password in a hushed voice that Wilford barely heard.

Adrenaline rushed through Wilford as he saw the door opening, he had to control himself not to rush it like a madman. Instead, he waited until a cabin crew went inside, and the pilot went out.

Once the door was closed, and the pilot entered the toilet, he acted. He pressed the call bell above his head. A crisp rang echoed the cabin, soon followed by an old man throwing himself on the ground.

Wilford had given him all the money he had on himself to pretend to be having a heart attack. "It was just a prank on his friend" like this Wilford had convinced the man to follow his orders.

Laura saw the fainted man and immediately left the front galley to help him. Wilford instead got up and pulled the little curtain to hide what he was going to do in the front galley.

He used a hidden lever in the toilet door to unlock it, little trick all cabin crew know and then opened it fast. The pilot had a dumbfounded expression on his face as the door opened and before he could open his mouth, "Francois, my friend, long time no see!" Wilford's foot smashed in his face.

The strength of the blow slammed his head against the wall behind him. Without waiting a moment, Wilford kept stomping on his face and then slammed the side of his head on the wall. All the hate Wilford had against Francois and the french people, in general, turned in stomping fury.

Only when he saw the body feebly falling forward unconscious or worse did Wilford finally stop. "Long time indeed." he dragged the body out and fixed his clothing.

He took a deep breath to calm himself and took the interphone. "No turning back anymore." he pressed the button to call the flight deck and waited for the response while holding the pilot close to him. If the flight deck were to look out from the spyhole, they would only see the pilot's back.

The sound of the interphone calling rang inside the plane. The old man should be able to buy him some time but not too much. He had to hurry. Soon a voice from the other end of the phone came, "It's a bright day outside, isn't it?" asked the voice.

"And you haven't seen the sunrise. The cabin is secure." the password had to be given in couples. Had Laura had said it any quieter he would have needed to force it out of the pilot, which would have alerted the rest of the plane and ruined his plan.

A moment of silence followed, and then the answer came "Ok, we are coming out." The affirmative response made Wilford smile in anticipation. His plan had succeeded, now he only had to beat the girl that entered the flight deck and the second pilot.

The door slowly opened, and Wilford could already taste victory when suddenly someone entered the front galley from the closed curtain. Laura had heard the sound of calling from the interphone and left the old man with the cabin crews from the back then made her way to the front where she found Wilford holding a bloodied pilot.

"Fuck!" Wilford exclaimed while dropping the pilot and rushing the door. However, the girl inside reacted fast and slammed it shut. Wilford ended up slamming in the door, unable to open it, so he turned his sight on the woman that ruined his plan. "Plan B."

Laura's eyes kept glancing between Wilford and the pilot on the floor when she saw Wilford stepping forward she tried stepping back, however, she hit the wall and paralyzed.

Wilford immediately pinned her to the wall, right next to the heavy curtain, and pressed his elbow to her throat. "Give me the code to the flight deck," he demanded increasing the pressure on her trachea.

In case of pilots not answering or other emergencies, the cabin supervisor would have a code to open the flight deck door, precisely what he needed now.

His resentful voice leaked through his gritted teeth, afraid that if he were to yell now, the passengers would come to stop him. Laura tried saying that he was hurting her. However, his cold eyes terrified her words back down her throat.

The sound of the interphone ringing interrupted them, Wilford knew he didnìt have much time, soon the captain would make an announcement on the interphone to have the passengers restrain him. So he took the interphone and only said one sentence. "Make an announcement, and she is dead." he threatened while looking at the door.

"three seconds to talk or I break your neck." he increased the pressure of his arm turning her face a shade of blue. "One," he said as she wheezed trying to push him away, however, the difference between a 1.55 woman and a 1.92 man was too much for her to prevail.

"Two," he said as she aimed for his eyes, he countered by stomping on her foot, from the sound he could tell at least some of her toes had broken.

"Three, there won't be a four." she tried her all to fight against him; however, the pain and the fear mixed with the lack of oxygen and she fainted.

Wilford held her up for a moment more before dropping her body on the pilot. "Useless trash, time to do this the forceful way. Plan C."

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Maria had been enjoying the flight home with her husband, Javier, the two of them had a nice vacation to find the old spark of love that had dimmed during the wed life.

For the past 20 minutes, they had been staring down at the approaching Iberian peninsula trying to guess the names of the cities and sharing pleasant talk.

Suddenly they heard the interphone system activate. "Attention passengers, a very dangerous individual, is trying to hijack the plane, we request your help to apprehend him!", as the announcement repeated in a different language she saw a man run past the aisle headed to the back.

All the passengers that saw him shared one single thought, "It's him!". A few passengers tried grabbing him with their arms or tripping him with their legs; however, he was too agile and managed to avoid most of them and powered through the rest.

A passenger in the last row managed to take off his seatbelt and stand in his way right before he reached the back galley. Maria saw him slam hard against the smaller men and both fell right between the toilets.

A pained groan came from the man down, hower he had no rest as Wilford headbutted him hard, a long cut opening on both of their foreheads. As blood trickled down his forehead, Wilford got up and opened both toilet doors creating a kind of wall between him and the rest of the passengers.

Some brave people got up too and started kicking and pushing the door wall that resisted their hit without even a crack. More and more people stood up and helped while Wilford did god knows what in the back galley.

Before they managed to break the barricade down an explosion in the front of the plane rocked the plane. Immediately everyone's ears popped some even exploding with a spurt of blood, then drinks and every other liquid became a thick mist covering the cabin.

Deaf and blind the passengers didn't even notice the oxygen mask dropping down as one by one they started fainting. Maria did, however, she managed to put on her oxygen mask just in time to see the front door detaching itself from the support and flying towards the right-wing.

The subsequent explosion of the right engine timed a second explosion in the back galley. The one-winged plane started precipitating while spinning in the air, cracks formed on both holes of the plane and quickly expanded meeting each other in the middle.

The last thing Maria saw was the plane breaking apart and the immense sky filling her eyes.