Four Past Midnight by Stephen King

cufflinks, ID bracelets. And watches, watches, watches. From Timex to Rolex, there seemed to be at least two hundred of them, lying on seats, lying on the floor between seats, lying in the aisles. They twinkled in the lights.
    There were at least sixty pairs of spectacles. Wire-rimmed, horn-rimmed, gold-rimmed. There were prim glasses, punky glasses, and glasses with rhinestones set in the bows. There were Ray-Bans, Polaroids, and Foster Grants.
    There were belt buckles and service pins and piles of pocket-change. No bills, but easily four hundred dollars in quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies. There were wallets—not as many wallets as purses, but still a good dozen of them, from fine leather to plastic. There were pocket knives. There were at least a dozen hand-held calculators.
    And odder things, as well. He picked up a flesh-colored plastic cylinder and examined it for almost thirty seconds before deciding it really was a dildo and putting it down again in a hurry. There was a small gold spoon on a fine gold chain. There were bright speckles of metal here and there on the seats and the floor, mostly silver but some gold. He picked up a couple of these to verify the judgment of his own wondering mind: some were dental caps, but most were fillings from human teeth. And, in one of the back rows, he picked up two tiny steel rods. He looked at these for several moments before realizing they were surgical pins, and that they belonged not on the floor of a nearly deserted airliner but in some passenger’s knee or shoulder.
    He discovered one more passenger, a young bearded man who was sprawled over two seats in the very last row, snoring loudly and smelling like a brewery.
    Two seats away, he found a gadget that looked like a pacemaker implant.
    Albert stood at the rear of the plane and looked forward along the large, empty tube of the fuselage.
    â€œWhat in the fuck is going on here?” he asked in a soft, trembling voice.

4
    â€œI demand to know just what is going on here!” the man in the crew-neck jersey said in a loud voice. He strode into the service area at the head of first class like a corporate raider mounting a hostile takeover.
    â€œCurrently? We’re just about to break the lock on this door,” Nick Hopewell said, fixing Crew-Neck with a bright gaze. “The flight crew appears to have abdicated along with everyone else, but we’re in luck, just the same. My new acquaintance here is a pilot who just happened to be deadheading, and—”
    â€œ Someone around here is a deadhead, all right,” Crew-Neck said, “and I intend to find out who, believe me.” He pushed past Nick without a glance and stuck his face into Brian’s, as aggressive as a ballplayer disputing an umpire’s call. “Do you work for American Pride, friend?”
    â€œYes,” Brian said, “but why don’t we put that off for now, sir? It’s important that—”
    â€œ I’ll tell you what’s important!” Crew-Neck shouted. A fine mist of spit settled on Brian’s cheeks and he had to sit on a sudden and amazingly strong impulse to clamp his hands around this twerp’s neck and see how far he could twist his head before something inside cracked. “I’ve got a meeting at the Prudential Center with representatives of Bankers International at nine o‘clock this morning! Promptly at nine o’clock! I booked a seat on this conveyance in good faith, and I have no intention of being late for my appointment! I want to know three things: who authorized an unscheduled stop for this airliner while I was asleep, where that stop was made, and why it was done !”
    â€œHave you ever watched Star Trek ?” Nick Hopewell asked suddenly.
    Crew-Neck’s face, suffused with angry blood, swung around. His expression said that he believed the Englishman was clearly mad. “What in the hell are you talking about?”
    â€œMarvellous