This wasn’t an unusual occurrence and the passengers on the military transport plane shifted a bit and then settled back to sleep. The flight would skirt the southern tip of Greenland and the northern tip of Iceland before making European landfall above Sweden. Then, a couple of hours in Russian air space before landing at the flight’s destination. All in all, Philadelphia to Kabul, the flight would last just over 14 hours. It already seemed longer than that to Chelsea Bannister. She was used to flights that included wine service and extra pillows. The Globemaster wasn’t a comfortable airliner. It was built to move soldiers from one place to another, and do it as cheaply as possible. Chelsea shifted uncomfortably and put her long chestnut hair up in the back and fastened it with a rhinestone clip. This was an act that she had done, and then undone, at least 20 times since the flight had left Philly. As she stared out of the tiny window and into the clouds that obscured the ocean from view, she pondered the circumstances that had brought her to this point.
