The Heart of the Dragon
Chapter 4

Darkness. Pain. Fear.

All of those three words were what Angie would use to describe the event. She could barely feel her body, she would have thought that was the first sign of being dead. But to her astonishment, she began to feel pain again, she wouldn’t have felt pain if she was dead, right? She realized that her body was lying flat on the floor of the jet, and she felt pain all throughout her body.

Her eyes began to slowly open, her blurry vision gave off the expression that she was indeed lying on the floor of the jet. Her memory was a bit groggy, but she remembered being in her seat when the plane crashed. But that’s when she noticed her broken seatbelt hanging off her seat, it must have snapped when they crashed, thus causing her to fall out from her seat.

She wanted to get up to see if everyone was still alive, but at the same time, she was in so much pain that she didn’t want to move. But she had to know, so being careful, she began to slowly push herself from the floor while wincing in agony. She looked down at her body, abrasions and cuts were all over her body, the cuts were most likely from the broken glass that were scattered around her from the windows. She then began to gently feel all over her body for anything that was broken, and to her surprise, she didn’t feel anything that was broken.

She was still amazed that she was alive, but she had a feeling she wouldn’t be so long depending on how bad their crash was. When she looked up, she spotted Tammy out of her seat with one of her legs twisted up in her seatbelt as she spread out on the floor. She too was covered in bruises and cuts along with a big bruise on her forehead. Angie then turned to Eli who was hunched over in his seat with the seatbelt still around him.

It was hard to tell if they were alive or not, but needing to check, Angie gently crawled towards Tammy where she checked for a pulse. To her relief, she felt a pulse.

“Tammy” she called while lightly shaking her shoulder, not wanting to cause more pain “Tammy. Tammy get up.”

“Hm?” she heard her mumble.

“Tammy” Angie breathed, feeling a bit more relieved that she responded.

“What’s going on?” Tammy mumbled some more.

“We just survived a plane crash.”

“Wait, what?” she started to move, only to cry out in pain as she dropped back to her first position.

“Tammy!” Angie screamed in fright.

“I-” Tammy gasped in agony, “My everything hurts.”

Angie began to feel around her friend’s body to see if anything was broken, and just like with her earlier, she didn’t seem to feel anything broken, but she was badly bruised.

“Well you’re not broken,” she told her, “That’s good.”

All of a sudden, she heard a low moan as she turned to see that Eli was starting to regain consciousness.

“Eli” she gasped as she scooted over to him as she helped him sit up.

He didn’t look as bad as Tammy did, but he did have some bruises on his face along with a bloody nose. She looked down at his seatbelt and unbuckled it, she then lifted his shirt to see a long deep bruise that ran across his stomach.

“Oh my God” she gasped at the sight.

Just then, she heard more moans as she turned to see Jackson and his father waking up in their seats.

“Are you guys okay?” Angie asked them with a worried look.

“I think so” Jackson mumbled with his hand on his head “What about you guys?”

“I’m fine, but Tammy’s really bruised up, and I don’t know about Eli.”

Mr. Monroe took off his seatbelt and hoisted himself up while cringing from the pain.

“Holy shit” he breathed at the sight of his jet.

“What-” Eli suddenly mumbled, “What’s happening?”

“Eli,” Angie said calmly “How do you feel?”

“Hurt” he clutched his stomach “How are we not dead?”

“I have no idea. But we might not be alive for long, depending on how badly we crash.”

“Yeah about that” Tammy winched while taking her leg out from her seatbelt “Where exactly did we land? Because I’m pretty sure we didn’t land in the water.”

“We’ll look in a moment” Mr. Monroe replied, “In the meantime, I need to go see if the pilots are okay.”

He went into the pilot’s room as Jackson slowly got out from his seat and began to help everyone. He started with Tammy and he and Angie gently lifted her up while holding her body still as they set her back in her seat.

“Ow,” she flinched while clutching her left arm.

They then turned to Eli as they checked for any other injuries he had.

“I don’t think any bones are broken” Angie observed, “Although I think your nose may be the only thing that’s shattered.”

“Great” he grunted while wiping the blood from his nose with his arm just as Mr. Monroe came out from the pilot’s room.

“Okay-” he began “Both pilots are alive, although the co-pilot is badly injured.”

“Well can they still try to radio for help?” Tammy asked, still wincing in pain.

“They’ll try. First, let’s see where we are.”

After helping everyone on their feet, they walked over the bits of broken glass and pieces of the jet as they went over to the door where Mr. Monroe and Jackson pulled it open, only for the door to break off as it fell onto what appeared to be sand. They peered out from the jet to replace themselves on some island. They then stepped out from the jet, some limping from pain as they turned to the crashed jet.

“Holy crap” Tammy gasped.

The back end of the jet was completely gone, burned off by the lightning. Dents and scratches covered the body, one of the wings was on the verge of breaking off, almost every window was either shattered or cracked and the nose had buried into the sand.

“Well, we’re screwed” Eli huffed.

“Okay let’s not panic just yet” Mr. Monroe suggested, “We’re gonna try to radio for help.”

“Good luck trying to get a signal,” Tammy scoffed, “Where we are, I think we’re on some deserted island with no life.”

“You don’t know that,” Angie said, “Maybe there are some animals here we can hunt down if we run out of food.”

“Unless we’re on an island of cannibals” Eli suddenly put in with his eyes widen “In that case, they’ll hunt us first.”

“Everyone, just stay put” Mr. Monroe ordered, “Nobody leaves the sight unless I say we can. I’m gonna try out the radio, you guys try to take care of any injuries.”

He went back into the jet as everyone began to examine themselves to make sure there were no serious injuries. While doing so, Angie was already thinking of her parents, they had no idea what had happened. But she knew that if they didn’t get a call from her, they would suspect something is wrong, meaning they would send a search crew to look for them. That is, of course, if they do manage to replace them on a deserted island in the middle of nowhere.