PROLOGUE

At 8 miles altitude, nothing was perceived from the dark black clouds, which drew over the country that night. Up here, there were only stars, a weak glowing crescent moon, and liberty.

The formation of jets was now finally on the flight home after their training. They had throttled the speed to not disturb the population unnecessarily with the noise of their engines.

They were still about 15 minutes away from their base and Kevin, pilot-in-training, became nervous slowly. He hated the landing manoeuvre in the dark.

"Break a leg!" laughed his co-pilot, Ryan, behind him, who had a lot more experience.
"You gotta come down somehow!" he laughingly added.

"Shut up, Ryan!" Kevin snapped, annoyed.

They began to descend. In the clouds, they were totally dependent on their instruments.

Blind flight.

"Hey Cap! The guy's chicken!" Ryan said to the Captain over the radio.

"Shut up Ryan!" the Captain repeated.

"Highest concentration now, folks! The clouds hang low, and chances are, it's raining. Once we get out from the clouds, we're not too far away from the runway. So you gotta respond quickly."

Great... landing in the dark and with a wet tarmac...

Kevin forced himself to stay calm. He would be home with Angelica and her young daughter in less than an hour.

They immersed into the cloud cover. A dark gray mass surrounded the jet. Optical range was zero.

Kevin focused on his instruments. The plane sank slowly but steadily, and the rate was constant. On the radar, he saw the other two jets, which flew in an unchanged distance further to his right.

"Three Fox call Tower, seek landing permission" he heard the captain.

Suddenly, the plane made a heavy leap, like a shying horse. The speed went down and suddenly they fell off way too fast!

As he had learned, Kevin moved the machine automatically upwards and increased the speed.
Then he heard a laugh coming from his headset.

"Good reaction, buddy!"

"You stupid dumbass! I almost had a heart attack!"

"Kevin, Ryan, what's going on?" exclaimed the captain.

"I only wanted to scare lil' guy!"

"Goddammit, we're landing! I just need to wait for the confirmation of Tower! Pull yourself together!"

"Roger ..."

"Roger, Cap."

Kevin would certainly never fly an aircraft with this idiot again.

"Three Fox, call base. Seek landing permission ... Tower?"

Silence ...

"They must be on coffee break!" Ryan laughed.

"Shut up Ryan!" cried the captain and Kevin simultaneously.

"Here Three Fox, call Tower ... Seeking landing permission," the captain tried it again. But no answer came back.

After several more vain attempts the captain said,

"We still have enough fuel ... We soar again and circle ... If nothing changes we change cour- "

"... Captain ...?"

Kevin heard only hissing.

"Have you understood what he said? ... Ryan ...? "

Suddenly the jet was dark. The lighting and all the instruments turned out.

"Ryan! That's not funny! You've heard the cap! "

Kevin could not see the instruments, but felt that they drastically lost speed!

"Ryan!"

The engines and electronics were all off.
Kevin clung to the control stick and stared into the gray mass in front of him.
In the simulations, they had worked out engine failure and failure of the electronics, but never both at the same time!

Suddenly, the clouds disappeared and allowed the view of brightly lit streets: the ground ... way too close!

Kevin tore at control stick around, but the jet fell like a stone from the sky.
He knew that he had to get out. They had often done this in their basic training. He had to blast the hatch away and to push the ejection seat button.

But there was not enough time.

Kevin's final thoughts in the few seconds before the crash were of his wife Angelica, his small daughter Melissa, and even his copilot Ryan, who would die with him.