Making Waves
Exhaustion and stress left Mairin with a dreamless sleep. She woke with a sense of mental stillness she wasn't accustomed to. The lapping of waves and the bustle of people moving around on damp rubber reminded her of where she was. She rubbed her eyes, blinking into the brightness of the morning. She wondered if it was because she met Shamhat that her mind was quiet. Did she have wings now or was it something else? She reached to touch back, glancing over shoulder to see if she had wings. She sighed as she found there wasn't anything there save a hole in the back of her shirt over her shoulder blades.
Had the wings just been her imagination? It was hard to say how much of what she had experienced in the crash was real and how much was from oxygen deprivation. There were a number of rational explanations for what happened and why her clothes were torn. They had been in a plane crash. She shielded her eyes with her hand, squinting into the horizon. "Where are we?"
"Nice to see that you're finally awake, Mairin." The closest passenger to her, an older brunette in a stained white tank top and grey leggings sighed with a shrug. Mairin remembered her name from when she got on the plane, the woman was worried about her traveling alone, Greta. "I think we were somewhere near Greenland or Iceland." She clicked her tongue for moment. "Or in-between them, I don't remember."
Mairin sat up, stretching her legs. "It shouldn't take them too long to find us then." She leaned forward, pulling her legs against her chest. "Any word on what caused the crash?"
Greta shook her head. "Nope. Just poof!" She made a poofing sound, throwing her hands out of emphasis.
"Yeah man! It was all rocky and then things started creaking as we went down" Jason, a Latino teenager in a Metallica t-shirt and cargo shorts energetically interjected, "The weirdest thing happened! There were like two explosions!"
"It's just speculation. It could've been..." Greta lowered her voice, looking between the two. "A bomb that blew up the engine. We might know the truth when they get the black box. Must people passed out in the spin. I don't remember much until I was in the water."
Mairin tugged her blanket more closely around her, glancing towards the endless horizon of water. "I think I read somewhere that people hallucinate when they experience something like this." Had the secondary explosion been Shamhat saving her life? If she had died, her parents would have never forgiven themselves for letting Mairin go on this trip alone. After the incident with the stove, they had been vigilant in their care of her. Any sign of trouble, her parents were there to offer support. Shamhat had saved her from dying in the crash but now what?
"Mairin, you okay?" Jason nudged her shoulder.
Mairin touched her forehead with a wane smile. "Just a bit of a migraine. It's bright, isn't it?"
Greta offered her a water bottle. "You might be dehydrated, here, they handed us some water when you were out." She pressed the warm container into Mairin's hands with a reassuring smile. "We don't have much to stave off heat stroke, but you should try to drink or lay in the shade of the blanket."
"Thank you. I'll try." Mairin returned the smile and slowly sipped the warm fluid as it slid down her parched throat. "Did any of the crew say how long they think it'll be before someone finds us?"
"Nah, no telling but, we're between two countries! Someone should find us soon, at least one coastguard might be looking for us." Greta offered.
"Does your phone work? My battery died." Jason asked, holding up the black screen of his cellphone.
"I don't know. I turned it off." Mairin reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out her phone. She pressed the power button, waiting for the screen to power on. "There's no telling if there's even a signal out here. Did anyone else try it yet?"
Jason and Greta shrugged.
"My phone went down with the plane," Greta frowned, watching Mairin's screen with hopeful eyes.
The smartphone vibrated in Mairin's hand. Their eyes widened, Mairin's hand tightened around the case. "Don't get your hopes up yet... there might now be..." A flurry of missed messages flooded the screen. Mairin gulped, speaking quickly as Jason let out an excited gasp. "I... who do I call?"
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A half a day after Mairin's call to the US Embassy in Iceland, three large grey hulled ships with pointed bows marked with diagonal red, white and blue strips cut across the surface of the water towards them. Above they saw the dark shadows of men and women peering down from the upper decks of the Icelandic coast guard offshore patrol vessels. There was too much of a risk of capsizing the life rafts with the ship's wake if they approached, so they announced they were deployed rhibs to retrieve them. Small rigid grey hulled boats approached with crew in bright orange vests.
"Thank god for modern technology," Mairin hugged Jason and Greta as the rescue crews arrived. An excited shout rose from the other life rafts as they were pulled towards the temporarily anchored ship. They weren't sure how many people had died in the crash, it was hard to account for the passengers without a manifest and everyone was scattered across life rafts.
It took several hours for the survivors to be brought about the aft deck and examined by the Icelandic medics. A fair amount of the crew spoke English and they were through. Someone explained that the delay in retrieving them came from the State department coordinating further with the Icelandic authorities to redirect their vessels from where they had been searching before the call. The GPS pin from the phone, and further triangulations had taken a few minutes to conform but coordination with the search and rescue crews had taken longer.
It was dawn before they were safely ashore again. A crowd of journalists and family members waited on the pier in eager expectation. Mairin cried when she saw her parents' worried faces in the crowd. She ran down the gangplank and flew into her parents' expectant arms.
"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" Mairin sobbed into her mother's shoulder. Eun-Jung muttered praises and reassurances in Korean, clinging to her daughter. Trever hugged his family close.
"It's not your fault. If you hadn't gotten the call out... who knows what would've happened," Trever soothed, smoothing his hand over his daughter's hair. He shook his hand. "No, I'm not going to think about it."
"Excuse me, everyone!" A man in a black suit called out over a loud speaker. "I'm sorry to interrupt. We know that everyone is exhausted and relieved from the incident but we'll be redirecting you to hotels to recover. Please move through the gate to one of the buses and we'll take you there."
"So what happens now?" Mairin sniffed. Her mom pulled back and took her hand, giving it a firm squeeze.
"We're going to spend the next couple weeks in Iceland," Eun-jung's voice trembled as she calmed enough to speak English again. She smiled gently, wiping her eyes. "No flying for a bit."
"How are we getting home?" Mairin asked, taking her father's hand into her free one.
"Cruise and then we'll drive cross country to get home," Trever offered as he guided them into the crowd towards the buses.