"Monty!" Stanley protested, but Monty shushed him with a wave of his hand.

"Is it safe to assume that?" Monty repeated.

Bob stopped for a minute to think about that. "Yeah," he replied. "I think that's about right. I don't like you two much."

"Wonderful! I mean, I'm glad I know where we stand, then."

"Good," Bob said and tried to close the door again.

"No, wait!" Monty cried.

Bob stopped. "What?" he asked, impatiently.

"Well, don't you think that a man deserves some dignity? A little self-respect during his last hour?"

"Yeah, I suppose so," Bob said and tilted his huge, brawny head slightly to one side.

"Criminals are always given a last meal before they're executed. Don't you think that my good friend and I deserve to sit out there with our fellow passengers, to enjoy good conversation and good food, one last time?"

"Well, I don't know about that." Bob looked suspiciously at Monty. "How do I know you won't cause more trouble?"

Monty held his right hand up. "I give you my word as a gentleman: Stanley and I will sit quietly in our seats until you drag us out to shoot us."

Bob considered Monty's words for a moment. "Do you swear?" "By all that I hold dear."

"Well... all right."

Monty and Stanley thanked Bob profusely and walked back to their seats, but Monty took the seat next to the filthy-looking man.

"You promise, now, that you won't cause any trouble?" Bob asked. "Because if you do, I'll have to put you back in the bathroom; maybe I'll have to shoot you now instead of later."

"No, no, we'll be good," they both reassured their captor.

"Well, that was some quick thinking, Monty," Stanley said as soon as Bob had walked off, but Monty wasn't listening; he was talking quietly to the filthy-looking man next to him. Stanley leaned over to hear what they were saying.

"... shame that the plane is going to Cuba now, isn't it?"

The man nodded angrily.

"I, for one, sure don't want to go to Cuba," Monty continued. "Who do these guys think they are, dragging us out of our way?" Monty shook his head in disgust. "It's too bad there's no one on the plane with the balls to do anything, no one to take control of the situation and turn this plane around."

The man sat up a little straighter and glanced at a man sitting across the aisle, who looked just as scruffy as he did.

Finally, he leaned over and whispered to Monty, "This was supposed to be my plane!"

"Really?" Monty feigned surprise. "What are the chances?"

"Yes, I know," the oppressed terrorist said. "These weasels stole my opportunity! I was going to bring this plane to Bolivia and use you people to bargain for the lives of my brothers and sisters, who are being held, unfairly and against their will, by an oppressive government."

The man was working himself into a frenzy, and Bob and some of the other Cubans started to take notice.

"You're not going to let these guys force your people to remain in bondage, are you?" Monty urged him on. "You cannot allow injustice to continue! Stand up and fight!"

"Yes!" the man cried. "My people must no longer lay captive in chains!" He stood up and whistled distinctively for his compatriots. "Rise up and fight! This is our plane!"

A roar erupted as several men stood up in each cabin, all pulling sub-machine guns from their coats and holding them above their heads symbolically. The original hijackers, seeing their plan going desperately wrong, rushed on the new hijackers, and the terrorists began to fight one another.

Monty pulled Stanley down to the floor and almost had to yell for Stanley to hear him. "Worked like a charm," he said.

"What? I don't understand what just happened!" Stanley said as a Cuban hurled a Bolivian over their heads.

"Well, while you were in the lavatory and the Cubans took over the plane, I noticed that our friend Bolivian there," Monty indicated the man he'd incited to riot, who was now busy pounding the crap out of a Cuban, "had become extremely agitated and kept glancing at that man ahead of him across the aisle, who looked just as scruffy and out-of-place as he did. And, watching his fidgety, nervous behavior, especially when the Cubans identified themselves as Cubans, I deduced that he, too, wanted to take over the airplane for some reason of his own."

"Wow," Stanley gaped at Monty. A Bolivian ran screaming down the aisle, closely followed by a screaming Cuban. "That's amazing! I never would have figured that he was a terrorist simply because of all that."

"Well, the 'Bolivian People's Front' tattoo on his hand helped, too."

"I see."

All around them, terrorists were kicking the shit out of each other in a mad struggle to take possession of the airplane. Cubans threw Bolivians against the hatchways. Bolivians hurled fine blue China from the larder at the Cubans. And up in First sat Bruce Willis, cowering in his screened-in personal cabin, a luxury afforded to all First Class passengers.

When the fighting finally stopped, Monty and Stanley peeked above the seats. Not a passenger was in sight, for they, too, were cowering on the floor. More importantly, not a terrorist was in sight, either.

Except one.

Bob stood, alone, in the passageway between First and Club, his face beaten, his body bruised. All of his terrorist companions were down, beaten senselessly by the Bolivians; the Bolivians, in turn, were also down, beaten senselessly by the Cubans. Only Bob remained.

He stood, surveying the carnage, swaying slightly and in disbelief.

From behind him, several First Class passengers emerged from their screened-in personal cabins and crept up quietly on him. Suddenly, they moved in, a raging mob of infuriated accountants. They beat him with their briefcases and calculators until he lay on the floor, nearly unconscious.

Stanley and Monty rushed over to him and bent close as he whispered, "You promised," before he passed out.

The passengers and flight crew banded together to tie up all the terrorists and, having no better place to put them, stashed them in the spacious lavatories located at each end of the cabins. That task completed, the liberated group of British Airways flight 217 breathed a collective sigh of relief.

"There's just one problem," Monty said, apprehensively.

Stanley, fearing the worst, like maybe the plane was almost out of fuel and they wouldn't make it to land, asked, "Oh, good Lord, what is it?"

"I have to pee."