The Langoliers

Infobox short story |
name = The Langoliers
author = Stephen King
country = United States
language = English
genre = Horror,
Science fiction novella
published_in = "Four Past Midnight"
publisher = Penguin Books
Publication_type = Anthology
media_type = Print (Paperback)
pub_date = September 1990
preceded_by =
followed_by =

"The Langoliers" is one of four novellas published in the Stephen King book "Four Past Midnight" in 1990.

Plot summary

On a cross-country red-eye flight aboard American Pride Flight 29, a Boeing 767 From LAX, California to Boston, Massachusetts, some passengers awaken to find that the crew and most of their fellow passengers have disappeared; the only passengers remaining are Brian Engle, an off-duty airline pilot; Dinah Bellman, a young blind girl with minor psychic powers; fifth-grade teacher Laurel Stevenson; Nick Hopewell, a mysterious Englishman (it's strongly hinted that he is an assassin and secret agent); Don Gaffney, a retired tool-and-die engineer; Rudy Warwick, a perpetually hungry businessman; Albert Kaussner, a talented Jewish teen violinist from Texas; Bethany Simms, a teen girl with a drug problem; Bob Jenkins, a mystery author; and Craig Toomy, an investment banker on the verge of a psychotic breakdown.

The remaining passengers discover that those who have disappeared have left behind items such as belt buckles, watches, headphones, pacemakers, and surgical pins. The only people left were sleeping when the disappearance took place. They are unable to contact anyone outside the plane, where there are no signs of life. Brian attempts to get through a nearby Air Force base, which doesn't respond his calls. When they fly over Denver they still don't happen to find any life below, since they see nothing but darkness filling the city. The same thing applies with other cities they fly over.

Brian suggests that they make an emergency landing at Bangor International Airport in Bangor, Maine, since there is an extra long runway and little air traffic, due to the pottentially crowded skies of Boston. Craig doesn't want to make an emergency landing since he has to get to his meeting in Boston. They land at Bangor anyway.

The environment is odd in several ways. Day and night only last a few hours each; there is no electricity; sounds do not echo; food has no taste, and stored chemical energy contained in matches and batteries cannot be used. This is worrying since they cannot refuel the plane.

Dinah hears sounds in the distance resembling radio static and informs the survivors that whatever makes the sounds is coming for them. Eventually all the passengers can hear this noise. Craig believes that the noise is caused by the "Langoliers", fantastic, nightmarish creatures his father told him about when he was a boy; their purpose is to punish and eat the lazy. In his desperation to escape the Langoliers and make his appointment in Boston, Craig descends into madness and attacks the others, mortally wounding Dinah and killing Don before Albert is able to temporarily dispatch him by knocking him out with a toaster.

Meanwhile, Bob theorizes that they have flown through a rip in the fabric of time, and that their plane, being from the "correct" timeflow, has a limited ability to bring life to this lifeless world. The group tests the theory by taking food, drinks, and matches from the snack bar back to the plane. The matches light and the food and drink regain their flavor. They reason that this is because although the plane had traveled into the past, it still contains the present inside.

The passengers decide to try taking off and retracing their path to get back home. They refuel with the currently useless fuel from the airport, hoping it will become usable inside the plane. This works.

As the plane is ready to take off, they glimpse the source of the sound. These are strange, round creatures with large spinning mouths filled with razor-sharp teeth -- possibly the Langoliers feared by Craig Toomy. They travel with great speed, and literally everything in their path is devoured, leaving only a void.

As the group is threatened by both the vicious Langoliers and the violently insane Toomy, Dinah uses her telepathic ability to convince Craig that his meeting is actually being held on the tarmac, using him to decoy the creatures away from the plane as it takes off. Like everything else, Toomy is devoured by the Langoliers.

The plane takes off and the world is devoured beneath them, and Dinah succumbs to her injury and dies. They retrace their original course hoping to find the theoretical rift again; they find it, but are faced with one final dilemma when they realize that they surivived their first passage through the rift only because they (unlike their fellow passengers) had been asleep.

Nick sacrifices himself to control the plane so they can traverse the rift, while lowering the air pressure to put the others to sleep. Awakening on the other side, they find another deserted world. At first, it seems identical to the dead world they left behind, but when they land they find that sounds echo, food tastes fresh, and there is a peaceful hum in the air (in place of the ominous noise of the Langoliers). The rift, it turns out, has taken them into the future. Soon the present catches up with them, and people and activity materialise around them as they rejoin the natural flow of time.

Film, TV or theatrical adaptations

The Langoliers was adapted for a two-part TV Movie in 1995. The TV movie starred Kate Maberly, Kimber Riddle, Patricia Wettig, Mark Lindsay Chapman, Frankie Faison, Baxter Harris, Dean Stockwell, David Morse, Christopher Collet and Bronson Pinchot.

The movie version of "The Langoliers", produced for broadcast on ABC-TV, was filmed almost entirely in and around the Bangor International Airport in Bangor, Maine (author King's hometown) during the summer of 1995. King himself made a cameo appearance in the film as Craig Toomy's boss, during Toomy's hallucination.

External links

*isfdb title|id=40706|title=The Langoliers
*imdb title|id=0112040|title=The Langoliers