FSE

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The search was inconclusive. Nothing in Diane's house could be linked directly to Eric. They had found two different sets of fingerprints in the bathroom and in the kitchen, both recent; however, they could not tell whether it was indeed their suspect.

Now officially in charge of his case, Alan Parker was sitting in his office, awaiting a lead of some sort to surprise him. The clock on his wall read 8:15. He had been up all night looking for him, and, similar to Benson, had not slept very much in the preceding few days. Along with tracking and monitoring Eric's possible whereabouts, he was required to issue a press conference at 10 o'clock, make the daily brief for the government at two, and maybe, just maybe, he could sleep a few hours.

His office was a mess to the third perspective. His laptop was filled with junk, while his black, wooden desk was piled with envelopes, papers, folders, and files. He quickly dozed off, seeing nothing else was to be done, but a few minutes later, he was startled by a call coming from his investigation team. Grunting, he picked up the phone from the receiver, and answered in a tone which would even have startled Andre the Giant.

"Yeah, what is it?"

"Sir?", the man said in a urgent tone. "You should probably come and see this..."

The call was abruptly ended as Alan dropped the phone onto the receiver, believing it was yet another useless piece of information his team dug up, leading them nowhere. He got up, dragged himself out of the room, and started to walk towards the national surveillance room. One of the main reasons he had decided - or blindly decided - to take the case once more, was because he had major access to almost everything the United States had. Privacy, unlike what Americans thought, was an extremely low-priority consideration in their line of work, with hidden cameras and wiretapping easily utilized all over the country.

When he reached the room, the crew immediately looked up, and stared at the man who bravely faced Parker. The screen on the left-side wall of the room displayed a still frame of a video clip, which Alan could not foretell the location of. The man quickly began his brief with an intriguing line - or at least, to Alan it was.

"Sir, you won't believe what we found", he said with an edgy voice. "We've come across a call from a flight 945-K to an air traffic control tower in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. They requested an emergency landing and were cleared around five minutes ago. They said that they were being hijacked by a dragon."

Alan froze for a few moments, looking at his team to verify his claim before he glanced back at the man, chuckling. "He hijacked a plane? Are you serious? This kid has some issues..." He took a small moment to ponder. "Are you able to confirm this?"

"Of course." He grabbed out a remote from his back pocket and pressed a button, which played the clip he had paused on the screen. "This is surveillance footage from around 8:05am at the Fargo International Airport today. We got this shortly after learning of the hijacking." The footage showed their wanted man with a strange looking hairstyle walking casually toward the check-in counter in the airport. Another clip was shown, this time with Eric walking through a series of security tests, without being watched by the officials. The next clip was of him taking a seat in the waiting room, and the final one was of him boarding the flight shortly after the gate opened. "And that's not all we found..."

The first clip rolled in once more, but the analyst stopped it where Eric walked toward the check-in booth. He scuttled over to the screen and pointed at a blond-haired female walking towards the bathroom. "Recognize her?", he quizzed, anticipating the correct answer.

"Diane. The bastard has yet another accomplice..."

"Yeah, and as seen in these clips here, she boarded the plane right after him." He showed a series of clips largely resembling Eric's set of clips, only they depicted Diane. Alan was impressed - it was as if he had thrown his old crew out the door, and replaced them with a newer and better crew, which is exactly what he needed.

"Impressive work", he applauded with a smile, which was something no one had seen in a long time. "Where is the plane at this moment?"

"It's about to land at an airport in Avoca, Pennsylvania. We're going to continue monitoring the plane while they escort the passengers out, and hopefully our suspect will be forced to show himself. He won't make it out, sir."

Alan glanced toward the crew once more, pleased with their effort. "Keep me posted on this. I want to see this dragon fall. Keep it up." He walked out of the room in the direction of his office, to prepare for his press conference scheduled in a little under an hour and a half. He thought to himself that maybe, just maybe, he had a chance after all.

...

Eric wanted to stay high in the air in order to reduce visibility from both the plane and the ground, but still be able to follow it in order to locate Diane. He was saddened he was not able to go back and help her, particularly since he had promised her he would have, and was determined to go the extra mile in order to do so as soon as possible. He remained a hundred feet above the plane as it descended, but did not go further down in order to stay hidden. The clouds gave him a small amount of stealth, but Eric knew risking anything would have been far too dangerous. He noticed the plane increase its steep decent, meaning it was near the airport. Eric hovered in place while it did so, and waited for it to go completely out of his sight, before gradually moving forward to keep track of it.

The town was not very populated, and luckily, was surrounded by a large series of forest. Eric knew if he would have dropped down as fast as possible, he probably would not have been seen. In succession, he would have been able to fly through the dense woods, reaching the airport to see if Diane was safe and sound. To him, it was the only option available, because he was very well known by the public, thanks to the media. Even the airport would be a tricky location to navigate through unobserved.

After seeing the airplane beginning to land, Eric figured such a distraction would be his best chance to avoid being seen. He ceased flapping his wings, diving straight down at a 90° angle. He found this risky, recalling his former injury a few days prior in Ontario; however, this time, he had an idea. As he approached the ground, he tilted himself horizontally, without the help of his wings, partially slowing his fall. With his wings folded, he gradually deployed them, inducing strain, but definitely not as much as the last time. His speed descended gradually - 50m/h, 40m/h, 30m/h, and finally 20m/h, which was slow enough to be able to flap his wings as usual, without any danger of injury. He aimed toward a small open area between the trees and flapped harder, bringing his flight to a complete and perfect stop. He was then able to continue his journey toward the airport.

...

The moment the plane landed, everyone jumped out of their hiding spots. As soon as the plane's front hatch opened, everyone got out while the SWAT teams took their places. They were relieved their ordeal had finally reached its end. The dragon they saw was much worse than what they had heard on television; he was vicious, did not consider anyone's feelings, and had shown no mercy whatsoever towards anyone. The SWAT teams opened every door, searching every corner of the large vehicle. There was no sign of a dragon, however there was definite proof he had been there - the whole "C" compartment was burned to a crisp, dents covered every wall, a few dead bodies rested on the soaked carpet, and blood lay everywhere; lots of blood.

Two people were immediately pronounced dead. The first of which was a 35 year-old TFR, - a hyena - and had a massive wound through his upper chest. While they had absolutely no idea how it was done, chances were they did not want to know. The second corpse, a tiger, was killed a few meters from the first, with a large wound to the back of his head. He was presumably knocked unconscious after colliding with the ground, sustaining internal bleeding to the back of his head, and killing him in his own slumber.

Witnesses in the "E" compartment had reported the dragon had entered the storage room at the back of the plane. The SWAT team inside checked thoroughly through the crates and boxes there, but no sign of him was found. However, one of them noticed that the hatch on the door leading to the emergency exit was released, and upon further investigation, found that the Airstair was ajar. The dragon had escaped. They immediately contacted their leader, reporting a piece of news no one wanted to hear.

Diane walked out of the airplane in the middle of the frantic crowd. She acted as if she had not seen anything first-hand, and continued the act once inside the airport. She had decided not to follow Eric's original advice. As a rather independent individual, Diane remained in the bathroom shortly after Eric began to fight, but snuck into the "A" compartment while everyone else ran for compartment "E". There, she messed up her hair, took out a hair pin and modeled her hair differently than when she came in. This way, if she was seen coming into the plane, there would be a far less chance of them seeing her come out. She knew Eric was right - she should not have followed him at all. While she did love him, events would most likely repeat themselves, and she was not very fit for them. She quickly left the group of frantic passengers, who began to speak to various media outlets, and headed into the Wilkes-Barre International Airport, in order to book a flight back home.

...

Once out of the forest, Eric peeked around the area. There was a turnpike a hundred feet east of him, with an avenue crossing below it. A residential area sat about the same distance to the left of him, which held a few hundred residents. The airport was directly in front of him, with the plane he had been on parked in the middle of a runway. A few SWAT vans were parked alongside it, as news crews occupied the area bordering the off-limit zones. Fortunately, there were a few doors around the whole establishment; however, the majority of them were blocked off by officers he did not want to mess with.

There was also a small public road circling the left-hand side of the whole property, and Eric reckoned it would have been his best shot to access the airport. He followed it in full view, which was not a very good idea in his opinion, but on the other hand, coming in from the right side would have increased his chances of being caught, for it was a much more crowded area. Ultimately, he reached the end of the road, noticing there were three military-style shacks lined up against the airport terminal, all ranging around 30 meters in length and 10 meters in height. They all seemed to have held vehicles and methods of transportation to navigate around the airport, thus creating much needed concealment for Eric, who could not see any other way to get into the terminal.

He crossed over to another road which led him to his destination, and looked for anyone inside the buildings. There were three members of the airport personnel; the first two were in the building at the left, either inspecting the vehicles or planning to use them. The third member did the same thing in the center building, which left the east building empty. Eric studied the two first employees' movements with the intention of finding an ideal time to rush over to the second shack. Once there, he did the same, but he was not very certain when to move - the mechanic inside was fixing the hood of a truck, and seemed to have been turning in his direction quite often. He knew he would have to pick a time shortly, because the men inside the first building could have come out and spotted him at any moment. Finally, the man dropped a tool and went over to pick it up. Eric quickly took this chance and ran quietly over to the third building. The room was quite dark and held a large truck, capable of holding its 20 foot-high stairway to load passengers into planes.

Unlike what he originally assumed, there was a man in the building, and he was not a member of the personnel; it was one of the officers, and he was obstructing a door leading into the terminal. Unfortunately for Eric, he did not seem to want to move. He knew he needed to find a distraction in order to get inside the building, and luckily, ten seconds after he had arrived to his position, Eric heard knocking. It came from the door the officer was guarding, and in reply, he turned around and opened the door to answer the question the person behind it was asking. It was Eric's lucky break. "Now!", he decided.

He ran against the wall to scuttle over to the back of the small building, where there was a very large area of darkness able to engulf him with freedom of movement. He hurried along the back side of the large truck, watching the officer who was looking out toward the airfield. "Damn", he thought. "There goes my chance to sneak in..." However, he noticed the officer did not seem to look behind him very much, which gave Eric an idea. He tiptoed toward him gently, while making sure no noise would come from his steps. About twenty feet away from him, he began to shift his hand into his dragon claw. At fifteen feet he was about a bounce away, and at ten feet he could smell his prey dripping sweat from his pores, triggered by the heat of the day. Five feet away from the officer, he ran up to his back, and stabbed him as hard as he could between his two shoulder blades with his left claw, while muffling the painful grunts of his victim with his right. He dragged him as quickly as he could back to the shadows, preventing the corpse from shedding any visible blood traces. At the back of the building, Eric deposited him underneath the truck, hoping no one would be able to find his body until the next day at the least.

With his hands regaining their normal form, Eric gently opened the door the officer was guarding, took a quick peek inside, and figured nobody was there. It led to a corridor which ended with a three-way intersection around 15 meters away from him. He cautiously walked through it, listening for any footsteps, which would have been very dangerous considering there would have been nowhere to hide. Once at the end, he looked around both sides. The left corridor led to a door not very far from his position, but the right corridor was in the direction of the terminal with some other doors; however, it was much farther to reach. He decided to take the risk and walk towards the right corridor, leaving himself out in the open for an unsuspecting employee to see. Still on the lookout for footsteps, Eric hurried across the corridor to the first door. He opened and searched many of the rooms, only to find storage boxes, and at one point, a worker, whom he quickly evaded. In what seemed to have become a terrible maze for Eric, the seventh door revealed to contain yet another corridor, this time with a sole door at the end. He was then unsure whether to continue roaming through doors in the current corridor, or follow the new corridor, which contained a single room at the end.

All of a sudden, he heard a footstep. After a brief moment of analysis, he figured it came from the last door he had recently passed by. The steps got closer and closer to the door, and Eric knew he needed to hide. He decided to go through the door he was looking to go into, and shut it, avoiding a potentially bad encounter with an employee. Eric then moved on to the umpteenth door, listening for any noise coming from the opposite side - nothing. He opened it, and to his surprise, the room quickly became useful in his quest to the airport terminal.

After shutting the door behind him, he saw the rectangular window which occupied the giant wall in front of him. It had an immense view of the airstrips, lighting the room and the table in the center with grace. Two doors held their position on opposite sides of the room, stumping Eric with further options to consider; however, given the fact the terminal was on the left side of the airport, that he was on the right side, and the airstrip was in front of him, he knew that the door to the west would definitely be his best bet. Finally, for the first time since he arrived, he had a clue of where he was going.

Before he managed to get to his destination, however, the door opposite of him opened, revealing a man walking into the room and looking at the frozen-in-place Eric. The man shut the door behind him, not noticing who the guest was, since Eric had not turned around yet. When he did, the face of the man automatically showed recognition of the intruder, whose face had been plastered in the media oh so many times. He shuttered in fear of Eric's capabilities, while backing up toward the door he came through. Eric knew he could not let him continue; he would quickly reveal his location, sending security to run after him, which is not what he had planned to achieve. Eric spoke, hoping intimidation would be his key to successfully manipulating the already distraught man.

"Move one more step, and I'll slice your whole body into a million pieces", Eric yelled, in the form of a threat. "Don't move."

The man obeyed, cowardly. "Pl-please, what could you pos-ssibly want with me...?"

Eric knew he had him in his grasp, and moved closer, shifting his eyes into their reptilian shape in order to further control the situation in hand. "Well first of all, you never saw me. Is that clear?"

"Y-yes, si-sir..."

Jackpot. He knew the man would probably revolt against his wishes either way, but he knew how to take care of that. "Good. Now, you're going to be a good boy and tell me the fastest way to get to the terminal through these corridors. Make it snappy; the more time you waste, the more tempting it'll be to crush that small head of yours."

The man felt a large, cold shiver run down his spine simply at the thought of his assailant's future assault. "Uhh... it-it's quite s-sim-ple really... g-go through th-hat door and walk - uhh, walk p-past six doors un-t-til you get to a door with a wind-dow... then walk to the end of th-the corridor and you'll be near the suitcase redemption roo-room... please l-let me go..."

Eric glared at him with a grin. "I'm sorry, but we're all sold out of that" The frozen man's heart skipped a beat as he saw Eric take a small step backwards, before launching an immense blow to his head, knocking him out cold. He knew it was wrong, but it was necessary. Besides, after checking his pulse, he knew he had not killed him. He grabbed the unconscious man by the arm and placed him onto a chair, leaning over the table, which imitated a sleeping employee. He then made his way through the left door, one step closer to finding Diane.