United Airlines Flight 175
On the plane, things were clearly spiraling out of control. The cabin was a mess, and the flight attendants were doing their best to keep order.
"Please trust us! Please believe we can handle this! Please trust us!" one shouted, trying to calm everyone down.
Another attendant, a Black woman, grabbed a megaphone and yelled hoarsely, "Everyone, stay quiet, stay calm! We've reached the control tower, and the operations center has responded. Don't worry—we've got this under control!"
It's basic flight safety 101: if something goes wrong, don't panic. Trust the pros. Chaos means certain death for everyone, but handing the problem to experts might just give them a slim chance.
There wasn't a full-blown riot, but the cries of women and kids echoed through the cabin. People were pulling out their phones, trying to call loved ones for what might be their final words. Too bad the lines were jammed—most couldn't get through.
A young guy named Pete was one of the lucky ones. He got his dad on the line.
"Dad, I love you! I love Mom, I love our family!"
"I don't know, I don't know… They're saying the hijackers stabbed both pilots and hurt a crew member. They've taken over the plane!"
"No, it's not chaos! They must've trained to fly this thing, but… the direction's all wrong…"
"The Statue of Liberty… Oh God, that's New York. They're heading for New York…"
This was a flight bound for LA—New York was definitely not the plan.
The signal cut out. Pete tried again and, somehow, got through. This time, his voice was completely different, cracking with tears as the passengers' panic swept him up. "Dad, I'm done for! I'm done!"
"It's bad up here—really bad!"
"God, the plane's shaking—it's unstable…"
"It's going down, and this isn't the airport!"
"God! I love you! Dad, I love you!"
At 9:03 a.m., United Airlines Flight 175 slammed into the South Tower of the World Trade Center.
---
American Airlines Flight 77
The hijackers, armed with knives and tear gas, had taken control. They'd cleared out first class and herded all the passengers to the back of the plane. Unarmed and defenseless, the passengers had no way to fight back.
Their phones were their only lifeline to the outside world. With limited lines, they had to prioritize the most useful calls.
"I'll do it," a woman in her fifties said, stepping up decisively. "I'm Barbara Olson. My husband's Ted Olson, deputy attorney general at the U.S. Justice Department. If there's a chance, I can get help through him."
Even in this dire moment, she stayed calm, spoke clearly, and sounded credible—no one doubted her.
She quickly dialed her husband. "Honey, I'll keep it short. The plane's been hijacked! There are six of them—brown skin, red bandanas, and weapons!"
"No guns, at least none I've seen, but they've got knives and box cutters!"
"The pilot? He's dead. The crew's trying to reach the tower on the emergency line, but it's tough."
"This isn't the way to LA. Maybe… we're heading back to Washington. Yeah, someone here who knows this stuff says we're turning back!"
"What do we do now?"
What could they do? At 10,000 feet, even a deputy AG—or the president himself—couldn't do a thing.
The plane had lost contact with the ground 20 minutes ago.
At 9:29 a.m., autopilot was disengaged, and it switched to manual flight—target: the Pentagon.
At 9:34 a.m., it banked sharply and began to dive.
At 9:37 a.m., with a deafening crash, American Airlines Flight 77 hit the Pentagon.
---
United Airlines Flight 93
Thankfully, this San Francisco-bound flight was delayed by 25 minutes. After takeoff, the pilot got word that two hijacked planes had struck the World Trade Center.
When the hijackers attacked, the pilot and co-pilot fought back with everything they had. The flight attendants, braced for the worst, shared the urgent news with the passengers.
"The pilot's dead! The Trade Center's been hit—we can't just sit here and die!"
They didn't say it outright, but some tech-savvy passengers had already pieced it together from their phones.
The boldest among them sprang into action, rushing to the emergency phone and shouting to everyone, "All of you—charge the front! Fight them! Hesitating now is a death sentence!"
The hijackers caught wind of the commotion and barked threats over the intercom: "We've taken the plane! We have a bomb, and we're heading back to the airport! Sit down, or we all die!"
The cabin erupted—banging, crashing, yelling, the sound of shattering glass and plates. Total chaos.
But in a crisis like this, heroes rise. "Get into the cockpit—fight them! We're dead otherwise!"
"No time to think—I'm going in!"
"Charge!"
A woman jumped up, yelling, "Everyone, together—go!"
Then came the latest update: "The Pentagon's been hit! They're aiming for the White House! Fight—fight those bastards!"
The whole plane surged with battle-ready energy. Nearly every man stood up, grabbing anything they could use as a weapon—trays, belts, backpacks, shoes, metal chopsticks—and stormed toward the cockpit.
Five minutes later, chaos broke out in the flight deck.
The plane lost control.
Thanks to the passengers' brave counterattack, it didn't reach its intended target in Washington. Instead, it veered off, broke apart, and crashed into a rural field.
---
Four planes hijacked in a single day.
The entire United States was thrown into disarray.
Dunn sat quietly in his office, his gaze heavy.
Even here in Hollywood, far from New York, the atmosphere at Dunn Films was thick with fear and dread.
"Dunn, NASDAQ and the NYSE just shut down—emergency closure! Futures, bonds, forex—everything's stopped!"
Scott Swift sounded almost relieved. He'd come back to LA to talk business with Apple. If he'd stayed in New York, he might've been at ground zero.
The World Trade Center was the heart of global finance. This double-tower strike would likely claim hundreds of CEOs and VPs in the financial world.
But Scott Swift, a hardened Wall Street veteran, had a tough skin. Even in a national tragedy, his mind was on money.
Dunn took the call, shaking his head.
Now that it had actually happened, he felt lost, his emotions a tangled mess. But Scott's tone… was that a hint of excitement creeping in?
Oh, right—he'd made a profit!
Of course!
The markets were frozen, and the government was scrambling to respond. But so what?
When trading resumed, who could stop the freefall?
The NYSE had only closed twice in history: once in 1914 when World War I broke out, and again in 1933 during the Great Depression.
In a disaster this big, even government bailouts and the Fed cranking up the money printer wouldn't save the day.
"Yeah, keep it low-key. Grief's the vibe right now," Dunn said, taking a deep breath, his voice steady.
On the other end, Scott Swift—brimming with energy—couldn't hold back a loud laugh.