Joel called up now, saying, “Okay, there are some branches and stuff to climb over on the side, but it’s pretty clear here in front of the plane. We could smell burning near the back—it doesn’t mean anything’s on fire, but I think we should all come out front for now.”

It was only then that Tom saw Barney standing right next to Joel, so deep was the darkness and so weak the light from the phone. People started moving, a controlled rush to disembark, as if they’d simply arrived at their planned destination and everyone was eager to be on their way.

Tom undid his seat belt and Chris finally gave up on his phone, turning it off before releasing his own belt. Tom watched him as he shuffled over onto Barney’s seat, then into the aisle on that side.

Tom didn’t move himself, but sat there listening to the sounds of the others making their way out of the plane, down the emergency slide, the gentle ripple of voices moving away from him and then back toward him as the first people appeared below.

There was silence then in the cabin behind him and he readied himself to move, stopping only because something appeared to be happening in the area around the plane. It was getting lighter, not a creeping dawn, but the urgent daybreak of the tropics.

Suddenly he could see the trees rising up on either side, the hill in front, the same hill they’d so recently slid down. Within a minute or so he could see Joel and the others clearly, the daylight flooding across the sky so quickly that it was disorienting.

And now he could see the reality of what had just happened. Stretching uphill from where he sat was the path that had been swathed by the back of the plane, trees torn up and thrust aside, the earth gouged, debris littering the slope, so much debris that it was once again hard to believe that the small group of people gathering below him had managed to walk out of it completely unhurt.

CHAPTER 5

Tom made his way to the back of the plane. The emergency slide had twisted a little, but it was still workable. He slid down and clambered over the few strewn branches to the area at the front, skirting around the group so that he was on the far side of them.

They all seemed to be looking up at the remains of the cabin from which they’d just emerged, all talking again, trying to take in what had happened now that they could actually see it. Barney and Shen were even studying the tear in the fuselage body like professional air accident investigators.