by the parked jet with only six feet to spare. Its windows flashed past like a row of blind eyes.
Then they were rolling toward the United terminal, where at least a dozen planes were parked at extended jetways like nursing infants. The 767's speed was down to just over thirty now.
"Brace yourselves!" Brian shouted into the intercom, momentarily forgetting that his own plane was now as dead as the rest of them and the intercom was useless. "Brace yourselves for a collision! Bra - "
American Pride 29 crashed into Gate 29 of the United Airlines terminal at roughly twenty-nine miles an hour. There was a loud, hollow bang followed by the sound of crumpling metal and breaking glass. Brian was thrown into his harness again, then snapped back into his seat. He sat there for a moment, stiff, waiting for the explosion... and then remembered there was nothing left in the tanks to explode.
He flicked all the switches on the control panel off - the panel was dead, but the habit ran deep - and then turned to check on Laurel. She looked at him with dull, apathetic eyes.
"That was about as close as I'd ever want to cut it," Brian said unsteadily.
"You should have let us crash. Everything we tried... Dinah... Nick... all for nothing. It's just the same here. Just the same."
Brian unbuckled his harness and got shakily to his feet. He took his handkerchief out of his back pocket and handed it to her. "Wipe your nose. It's bleeding."
She took the handkerchief and then only looked at it, as if she had never seen one before in her life.
Brian passed her and plodded slowly into the main cabin. He stood in the doorway, counting noses. His passengers - those few still remaining, that was - seemed all right. Bethany's head was pressed against Albert's chest and she was sobbing hard. Rudy Warwick unbuckled his seatbelt, got up, rapped his head on the overhead bin, and sat down again. He looked at Brian with dazed, uncomprehending eyes. Brian found himself wondering if Rudy was still hungry. He guessed not.
"Let's get off the plane," Brian said.
Bethany raised her head. "When do they come?" she asked him hysterically. "How long will it be before they come this time? Can anyone hear them yet?"
Fresh pain stroked Brian's head and he rocked on his feet, suddenly quite sure he was going to faint.
A steadying arm slipped around his waist and he looked around, surprised. It was Laurel.
"Captain Engle's right," she said quietly. "Let's get off the plane. Maybe it's not as bad as it looks."
Bethany uttered a hysterical bark of laughter. "How bad can it look?" she demanded. "Just how bad can it - "
"Something's different," Albert said suddenly. He was looking out the window. "Something's changed. I can't tell what it is... but it's not the same." He looked first at Bethany, then at Brian and Laurel. "It's just not the same."
Brian bent down next to Bob Jenkins and looked out the window. He could see nothing very different from BIA - there were more planes, of course, but they were just as deserted, just as dead - yet he felt that Albert might be onto something, just the same. It was feeling more than seeing. Some essential difference which he could not quite grasp. It danced just beyond his reach, as the name of his ex-wife's perfume had done.
It's L'Envoi, darling. It's what I've always worn, don't you remember?
Don't you remember?
"Come on," he said. "This time we use the cockpit exit."
32
Brian opened the trapdoor which lay below the jut of the instrument panel and tried to remember why he hadn't used it to offload his passengers at Bangor International; it was a hell of a lot easier to use than the slide. There didn't seem to be a why. He just hadn't thought of it, probably because he was trained to think of the escape slide before anything else in an emergency.
He dropped down into the forward-hold area, ducked below a cluster of electrical cables, and undogged the hatch in the floor of the 767's nose. Albert joined him and helped Bethany down. Brian helped Laurel, and then he and Albert helped Rudy, who moved as if his bones had turned to glass. Rudy was still clutching his rosary tight in one hand. The space below the cockpit was now very cramped, and Bob Jenkins waited for them