His to fly

by Richard Howells Watkins

Hastily, even frantically, he straightened out and put her into another glide. He found that drops of water were rolling down into his eyes from under his helmet. The windstream made them cold. He pulled off his goggles. With or without them he could see nothing.

“If I can just keep her in a glide!” he muttered. He put out a hand and found the jackknife. Though it was swinging gently, its position indicated that the ship was in normal flight—or making a normal banked turn.

He kept his head well up above the windshield, alert for any vagrant breeze on either cheek that would tell him the ship was not flying straight ahead. By the feel of the wind and the sound of the wires he kept the ship in a glide —as slow a glide as he dared. He checked every impulse to move the stick. When he did move it, he did so very slightly, much less than he felt was necessary. He kept one hand near the jackknife.

Through the dark whiteness the murmuring ship glided on. There was nothing to see, but Jerry’s vigilance grew more and more painfully intense. His eyes ached. His chest felt hollow.

“Damn it! How long is this going to last?”

He groped for his flash light and trained it on the fog ahead. The mist became a white, opaque wall, more impenetrable than the darkness had been. He switched the light off, tucked it in his pocket and put his hand out to the jackknife again. It was not where he expected it to be, but to the right. He edged the stick over to the left.

The landing wheels under him suddenly struck something; the ship jarred harshly. In another instant the nose went down. Jerry was slung violently against the instrument board. His safety belt cut into his body. He cut the motor. Something was happening to the ship. Noises were all about him—rasping, squeaking, swishing, creaking sounds.

He struggled upward again and dimly felt that the ship was bounding along, seemingly with increasing speed. Yet the motor was cut, the propeller was idle. It was like a delirium, a nightmare in the dark.

Abruptly he realized that the ship was on a hill or a mountain, rolling downward precipitously despite the drag of the tail skid. There was nothing he could do. He braced himself and waited.

He did not wait long. She struck something too high for the wheels to rise over. There was a crash. Jerry felt the cockpit rising under him—up and up—and then down. Some object in the darkness thrust at him, and his consciousness left his body with his hissing breath.