Triple Threat - James Patterson Page 0,59

hand, the other clutching Freitas’s windpipe, blood gushing like a sprinkler. His sudden strength is incredible.

“Dr. Freitas!” I yell, dashing back up the aisle to help.

Tanaka turns around and sees me charging. He drops Freitas’s limp body and rushes into the open cockpit—where our two pilots are just as stunned and even more helpless.

Tanaka grabs one of them from behind. In an instant he places her in a brutal chokehold and violently snaps her neck.

I’m just stepping over Freitas’s writhing body, racing toward Tanaka, as he attacks the second pilot. While they tussle, Tanaka intentionally presses down the yoke with his knee—and the plane tilts into a steep nosedive.

I’m hurled forward and tumble around wildly. Everyone does—along with an avalanche of loose papers and cellphones and laptops, each of the latter two now a deadly projectile.

Somehow I manage to get onto my hands and knees. Hanging on with all my might, I painstakingly crawl the rest of the way toward the cockpit, where Tanaka and the pilot are still fighting—and of course the feral human is winning.

Dizzy from the rapid altitude drop and throbbing with pain, I spot a fire extinguisher hanging by the cockpit door. A weapon.

I stagger to my feet, grab the heavy metal canister, and with every ounce of strength I can muster, swing it directly at Tanaka’s skull.

Thunk. I can feel his cranium splinter. Tanaka cries out in pain, stumbles, but remains standing. “You bastard!” he shouts—as he turns to attack me.

I swing again. This time…I miss.

Tanaka springs toward me, but I crouch low and slip out of his grasp. Just as he spins back around, I take one more shot and nail him right in the middle of his face. His nose shatters, and three of his front teeth fall out of his mouth to the ground. Then he drops.

But my relief is brief. We’re still plummeting toward the Pacific.

I yank on the yoke with trembling hands and desperately try to pull up. The plane levels off a bit, but I can feel we’re still dropping fast. The instrument panel is blinking like a Christmas tree. Warning alarms are beeping wildly.

And both pilots are dead.

I have absolutely no idea what to do, except buckle in and pray.

I unbelt one of the pilots, shove him aside, take his bloody seat, and strap in.

I use all the strength I have left to keep tugging up on the yoke—especially when I see the dark, choppy water getting closer and closer. In my mind, I get glimpses of Chloe and Eli.

I can’t die, I tell myself. Not like this. Not without saying good-bye.

And then, impact.

The noise is thunderous as the airplane smashes into the water. The cabin shudders and groans.

The plane finally comes to a stop. Almost immediately, I feel it start sinking.

Shaking off the stunned euphoria I’m feeling at having survived, I unbuckle my seat belt and stagger back into the cabin, which has been severed nearly in half and is quickly filling up with both water and smoke.

“Can anyone hear me?” I shout, coughing, wading through a flood of human carnage. “Is anyone okay?”

Silence. I can see that most of our team is dead, their bodies mangled and bloody.

But then, incredibly, I hear quiet mumbling. Someone’s still alive.

Freitas!

“Hang in there, doc!” I say, splashing over to him. I sling the barely conscious man onto my shoulder. “We gotta get off this plane!”

I unlatch an emergency exit and a giant yellow slide-raft automatically inflates and extends into the water. Thank God. I put Freitas onto it, then give the sinking cabin a final look.

I see Tanaka floating facedown. Reiji, too, is long gone. His gurney is on its side, the plastic covering is shattered, and a giant shard has decapitated him.

Damnit—after all that. So much for bringing either of them back to the lab.

But there’s no time for wallowing. I climb into the raft myself, disconnect it from the plane, and we immediately start to drift away in the choppy current.

I’ve barely gotten Freitas rolled onto his back so I can examine his wounds when, with a final, awful groan, our burning aircraft splits in two and disappears underwater.

Chapter 29

Quick: how long can the average person last without water? A week? Five days? Three?

It’s one of those scary stats you’ve heard a hundred times but never thought you’d need—until you find yourself floating on a raft in the middle of the Pacific.

I couldn’t tell you how many hours it’s been since the crash. If I had to guess,