53 Flying a Plane is a Piece of Cake

"I see. What did you find Ace?"

"Reporting to Master, I found a small plane that seems to fit our needs, but it is not at all luxurious. Are you sure we want to fly there?" Ace said with halting words. He had a great fear of heights and was extremely reluctant to get on a plane. It turns out he probably wasn't directionally challenged at all, but was just extremely reluctant to get on a plane.

"Yes," Aida responded mercilessly, "Take me to the plane."

"Then… ok."

On the way to the airport, Rin curiously asked, "If you're so afraid of heights, how do you manage to get on a plane?"

"...I sedate myself."

"..." No one knew how to respond.

Ace quickly drove everyone to a separate hangar on the outskirts of the airport. "Here it is."

He showed them a small sized plane that seemed to only fit 4 passengers and the pilot. It was not a luxury plane nor was it a training or commercial plane.

Walking around the plane and inspecting it, Light spoke, "This appears to be a Cessna 182, it's a plane commonly used for skydiving. The company must have brought it to this hangar for maintenance."

Climbing into the cockpit, Light inspected the plane from the inside. Calling out, he said, "We're in luck. Looks like the plane has just enough fuel for us to reach the outskirts of City M. It should help us fly over the mountain and the forest that we were concerned about."

Nodding in confirmation, Aida responded decisively, "Then we'll take this plane. Let's go."

Seeing that they would probably not return, each of them wore a backpack full of necessities, food, water and relevant electronics. Ace was packing as slowly as he could in order to stretch the time it took to get onto the plane as long as possible.

Eventually, Aida couldn't take it anymore. She smacked him on the head and threw both him and his backpack onto the plane saying, "Relax, flying a plane is a piece of cake. I got this."

Climbing onto the plane with her backpack, she sat in the pilot's seat with Light being her copilot. After ensuring the twins were properly strapped in, it was time for takeoff.

Aida carefully navigated the plane to the runway and prepared to take off. She was extremely excited as flying a plane had long been on her bucket list.

Taking in a deep breath, she slowly pulled on the throttle as the plane charged forward. It was making a creaky noise that caused Ace scream, "AHHHHHHH!!"

The twins sat on the side looking at Ace as though he were crazy. Rolling her eyes, she slowly lifted the plane up and soon they were up in the air.

Once they were up in the air, the hard part was over. Light helped Aida with determining which direction to fly in. Meanwhile, Ace was still screaming his head off, not realizing that they were already safely in the air.

Aida turned around and told him, "Relax, nothing's going to happen up here. We're basically on cruise control. Besides, did you know 14% of all fatal plane accidents happen during takeoff and 49% happen during landing. If I were you, I'd be more worried about the landing."

She giggled evilly as she said this. Meanwhile, Ace had stopped screaming and just turned extremely pale as he clutched his seat in fear.

Turning her attention back to the front, she looked down and enjoyed the scenery. The sight was beautiful from 10,000 ft up in the air. It was so nice and peaceful up in the sky, the only sound was coming from the plane. The city had turned into a ghost town but the unique architecture and the beautiful coastline was still intact. It looked as if the whole world decided to hit the pause button for a second, allowing her to enjoy this wonderful moment. If only Xiao Ai were awake, then things would've been perfect.

On the side, Light and the twins were also looking out at the scenery. They had long grown used to flying in planes and were very comfortable with the situation. Yukio took out a notebook from his backpack and began sketching the scene. Rin turned his face to the sun and just enjoyed the heat that it radiated.

They all enjoyed this moment for a while longer, when Ace suddenly called out incoherently, "AHHHH look look… there's something…. LOOK!"

Turning around, Aida responded exasperated, "What are you…"

Mid-sentence, Light interrupted her question by tapping her shoulder. Turning around to look, she saw a dark shadow quickly approaching their plane. It seemed to almost cover the sun itself.

"Oh sh*t, birdstrike. Hold on tight to something!" Aida quickly tried to maneuver out of the way [1]. It was okay for birds to hit the plane as long as it did not fly into the engine.

According to Murphy's Law, "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."

Murphy's Law held true for Aida's group yet again. A large bird directly flew into the engine of the plane, causing it to stall. This sent the plane into a spiral as only one engine was hit.

And then, another bird flew into the other engine causing a second engine failure, but also leveled the plane so it was no longer spiraling. There was no way for Aida to safely land the plane now and they were rapidly losing altitude.

[1] On average, planes hit roughly 40 birds per day, causing damage to both the plane and other objects on the ground like cell towers.