Francesco Mazzotta - Cellular Activity

“Janet, please do ensure that the aircraft can’t communicate with the outside world, apart from us. Then put me in contact with the F-14s after the Boeing.”

After a while, a nasal voice breaks into Thompson headphone. “Captain Clark listening.”

“Captain, this is Richard Thompson. Have you already reached the target?”

“It’s twenty-five miles in front of us, we approach from 7 o’clock.”

“Well, Captain, I want you to escort the Boeing to the base CNT222, repeat charlie nine tango two two two. Keep me aware about any alteration of the route, updates every 5 minutes.”

“Roger that, sir.”

The tanned face of the Commander Green has turned almost unnaturally pale. He updates the co-pilot about the communication just received. The other man listens with a surprised and concerned expression. “Do we have any pictures of the subject?”

“We are receiving them right now. Call Camila, Luis and July. Just them for now.”

The flight takes place quietly i n the passenger deck. Someone is reading a book, two girls about thirteen years old are talking in a low voice with their faces bent over their smartphones, while showing each other the messages they received and keeping an eye on the flight-attendant. Some people takes a nap with night-blue colored mask over their eyes.

Almost no one pays attention to the voice of the co-pilot. His tone is calm and quiet, calling the staff in the cabin, as requested by Green.

The three women gather silently, converging from different directions and rapidly exchanging puzzled looks. They head toward the cockpit.

A light gust of wind slightly stirs the fabric of Ahmed’s targui, recalling him back to the present. He is proud of his headgear, recently received as a token of his entry into the world of adult males. The boy observes the endless expanse of yellowish dunes, wondering whether the desert is really as wide as they say, and whether there are really those restless spirits called djinn. After all, those are the rumors used by the village elders to discourage young people from venturing recklessly in the desert, starting a journey from which it’s highly unlikely to come back.

But he doesn’t feel like just everyone else. He looks at the horizon, dreaming about immense cities, lush oases and places where life isn’t a constant struggle against the extreme heat of the day and the freezing cold that comes with the night. He loves his village and his people, but he’d like to see what else the world has to offer.

Ahmed feels a presence beside him. His field of view is constrained by the cumbersome headgear, that is perhaps a bit too large for his head. Even the whine of the dog tells him that they are no longer alone. There’s no need to turn around to see who’s up there.

Ahmed clears his throat, ensuring to have an authoritarian tone. “I’ve made up my decision: I’ll come with you on your next trip.”

The boy waits, hoping that his tone was enough convincing.

His brother Yidir lays a heavy hand on his shoulder. It’s considerably taller than Ahmed and he has his face covered by a black headdress. His voice is serious, deep, and he is many years older than his younger brother. He could be his father, and in many ways he has fulfilled this task. “The desert won’t forgive anyone, Ahmed. Don’t be in a hurry to deal with it. The heat, the cold, the thirst, the animals… Even the stones can kill you. Not to mention the silence.”

“I can take care of myself”, Ahmed promptly replies, immediately regretting his voice that took on a shrill tone. It’s a remnant of his childhood, still not entirely disappeared with the recent puberty.

Yidir smiles under the fabric that covers his face. “We’ll talk about this when the time has come”, he cuts sharply.

The man turns, walking back on the dusty road leading to the village. After a few steps he seems almost to change his mind and stops, turning back to his younger brother. “Come on, Ahmed, let’s talk about it in the shade. There’s no sense in challenging the sun without a good reason. There’s something I want to show you.”

Hearing these words, the disappointment in the boy vanishes, leaving rapidly its place to curiosity. By toddling, he follows quickly his older brother, tormenting him with questions all along the way, trying to guess what’s up.

The three flight-attendants walk back to the passengers deck, seemingly untouched by the news. Despite being very young, all of them have dozens of flight hours experience, and they have already experienced potentially critical situations. Yet, although the current one is much more worrying, their faces are a mask of calmness.

The three girls split up, moving slowly along the rows of seats, taking care of passengers, as usual. Camila seems to have recently stepped over the threshold of thirty years. Her long dark hair, tied in a braid, sway to the rhythm of her steps. The girl isn’t tall, two thin lips show a smile on her slightly square face. She observes the passengers while moving at a leisurely pace along one of the aisles between the rows of seats.

She pauses next to the two chatting girls, catching a glimpse of one smart-phone, before one of them hastens to hide it inside her jacket. Camila moves on, pretending not to have seen anything. She moves towards a man sitting a few meters in front of her, on the right side. The man keeps his eyes closed, but his head is erect. Camila’s heart skips a beat, as she realizes that the face that she is looking at matches perfectly the photos seen on a screen in the cockpit. The flight-attendant takes instinctively a half step back, a whirlwind of thoughts flows in her head. At that precise moment the man opens his eyes, strangely fixed on hers, as if he was already staring at her through his closed eyelids. The woman regains control of her emotions with a big effort of will, and smiles slightly, exchanging a few words with an elderly woman sitting to her left. Amr replies to the kindness of the woman, pulling out a white smile framed by equally perfect lips, though the cut of his mouth is slightly too wide. Camila is surprised to feel some discomfort at the warmth transmitted by the man’s face.

Suddenly someone grabs her, just below the right elbow, startling her to get her attention. Camila instinctively withdraws the arm, turning to look at the man sitting to her right. She had already noticed this passenger earlier: a black man, much more than overweight, with a too prominent forehead, and he’s dressed in a yellow t-short of awful taste.

Amr also looks at the scene, recognizing the man glimpsed in the bathrooms of the airport of Cape Town.

Camila caters to the passenger in front of her. “May I help you, sir? Do you need anything?”

The other watches her with an almost dazed look and a hint of saliva ready to drip from the left corner of his fleshy lips. He seems to regain control after a couple of seconds, blinks a few times and swallows.

“Are you fine, sir?”

The other mumbles something. He has the look of someone who has just woken up from a too short nap, almost struggling to stay awake. “My arm”, he mutters, while he grabs heavily Camila’s arm with one hand, to put it on one of his huge biceps. “I can’t feel the skin on my arm, and I feel strange cramps in all my body.”

Camila nods, thinking that the man’s limb has simply fallen asleep, maybe because of his obesity and the seating position held for too long. The woman notices that the skin of the man’s arm is extremely hot, as if the passenger is highly feverish.

“It’s just a disorder of blood circulation that may often occur, sir. It’s due to prolonged sitting. May I get you anything?”