A quarter to seven in the city of Boston, a group of men entered Logan International Airport.
The date was September 11, 2001.
The men had, within them, a mission that had been cultivating for three years, possibly even decades longer than this, a mission that would come to consume the lives of many and their own lives as well. They had prepared for this day since the beginning of their lives, ever since they were witnesses, as young children, to the salvos dropped onto their lands by the soaring sharp-nosed black planes in the sky. They held onto their carry-ons and showed their passports very sternly.
The airport’s agents thought they were very serious travelers. They didn’t even order donuts or coffee, which is a very serious faux pas to Bostonians. They reasoned they would have all the donuts and coffee they could ever want in heaven.
I thought only manna and ambrosia were in heaven?
Another slapped his hand down. You’ll find out when you get to heaven.
Besides, they have cherry soda here, of course God would invent coffee-flavored ambrosia.
This is true. God is supreme.
The men boarded the plane. They viewed everything angrily: the plane interior, their fellow passengers, the orderliness of the aisle, for these were all products of the enemy.
They sat in their assigned seats. They were, admittedly, very comfortable.
One of them sat next to a woman with a camera held to her chest. She was gregarious and asked, Aren’t you excited to see New York City?
One part of his mind fumed: New York City! Home of cash flows that fatten the wealthy and impoverish the needy! Financier of all the weapons that spill the blood of my countrymen! The other part of his mind thought: I’ve always wanted to see Broadway. He shook his head violently, as if dispelling the contradictory thoughts, and sat stoically in silence.
The men felt the wheels under the plane turn. Though they had been students to many airplane flights, they never got used to this rumbling, trembling feeling. The wheels turned faster and faster; through the window, one of them saw the tarmac tuck more and more gently out of view; everything was a blur; then the plane picked up, as their hearts did; they were in the air, they were in the air! oh sweet God, what insanity! and when they saw they would only go up, they would never go down, they sighed breaths of relief, for they were human, terrestrial creatures.
The sight of the clouds was beautiful. They transported one into mythic views, of Prince Husain’s magic carpet, of the malaikah flying with the Lord in heaven.
The flight attendant offered the group refreshments. Inwardly they cried, No! Do not take the crackers and sodas of the enemy! But then they thought, Even God wouldn’t refuse free food!
They then stretched their feet, and turned to the plane’s entertainment, the most popular film of 2001 (again, this is historically accurate). I don’t recall the name, but it’s about a young wizard struggling against a curse from a vile sorcerer. The men understood the analogy and wept, for they too were fighting against forces beyond their control.
One of the men said, I don’t think I can do it.
But it was just a movie!
No, he said, I have fallen in love. He looked meaningfully at the woman with the camera, whose skin was white as snow. This did not do, as their skin was as dark as almond.
Even worse: Sarah was Jewish.
One of them shouted, How can this be! She is of the same tribe as the enemy!
And yet they beheld the way he looked at her, and she, to their surprise, looked at him, the light in their eyes, the sunshine in their smiles.
In fact, they were so radiant the woman’s father jumped up from his seat, tears in his eyes. He explained that, though his daughter’s fiancée was of a different religion, he learned, from his grandfather’s experiences in the pogroms, and his father’s experiences in the Holocaust, and his own happy, fortunate, still alive experience, that life is a miracle, and life is accepted because it must be accepted because it was all we are. He called for a toast, shook hands fervently with all of the men, and invited everyone on the plane to the wedding.
One of the men said, I don’t think I can do it either.
Another man retorted, But we have planned this for years!
He simply replied, I have begun to see the people of this plane as people.
Maybe heaven is just this moment of being empowered with the decision over our fate and choosing mercy over suffering, they surmised.
Let us call Osama, a man sighed.
Now, at this point, I shouldn’t even need to tell you Osama bin Laden was, in fact, Andy. The group of men told Andy their intentions. Andy cried, But what about your mission! What about your revenge! They responded: If God is good, and God is the truth, then we shall find another way to free our people. Andy angrily hung up.
The flight attendant told the pilots the good news. The captain cried, What great news! Nothing can bring us down today!, raised his coffee cup for a symbolic toast, and drank his first sip of the day. He then slumped over, dead.
The plane dipped down. The first officer panicked; in order to concentrate, he drank some of the coffee. He too slumped over and died.
And now the Twin Towers were in view.
This was Andy’s plan. He figured there wasn’t a bad chance the group would have second thoughts, and so he fool-proofed the tragedy.
For the sake of his bride, his father-in-law, and his friends, the groom assumed control of the plane. He learned quite a bit from his training. He pulled the yoke closer and closer to his chest; more and more sweat drip-dropped over his eyes; the passengers felt the nose of the plane tip higher and higher; the front of the towers pushed further and further away from view; cheers were almost in their throats; and then, to their horror, they could see into the windows of the towers.
They could see a man inside the building, clearly irate, sweat pouring around the armpits of his work shirt. He shook the machine, he punched the machine, he yelled at it, but no restorative liquid would come out. This is the worst day of my life! he screamed.
This was true.
And so, ending this and many other adventures, Andy and Gary returned to the present with a great many memories, curing their curiosity concerning the past. However, they had been away for too long, and were a little rusty concerning their regular duties.
It was now time for another war game.
© 2025 Jay Lee