A set of older fighter jets took off on the runway below. They roared and sent vibrations through the tower and straight into Chase’s chest. Those birds were probably impressive in their day, but now they wouldn’t last half a minute against a red drone. Too many things felt that way. Great, but dated. Chase had been born in a country stuck in survival mode, and when she read about America’s recent history of prosperity, she had to squint. What did that look like?
Chase elbowed toward the busy center of the tower. Pippin was with her, although he hung back. She knew her RIO better than he liked to admit, and something about that phantom Streaker had spooked him. Well, Chase was spooked too.
She cleared her throat twice before a staff sergeant swung around in his chair. The name above the chest pocket on the digital tiger stripe pattern of his Airman Battle Uniform was MASTERS.
“Pippin and Nyx. My lucky day.” Masters was young and hawkish in nature with narrow-close eyes and a nose that skewed beak-like. “Cadets can’t be in the tower. Out.”
“But, sir—”
“Out!”
“Do you mean ‘shouldn’t be in the tower?’” Pippin asked. “Because we are clearly able to be in the tower, thus disproving the use of can, its verb root being ‘to be able to.’”
“Pippin, I suspect that semantics are not the staff sergeant’s strong suit.”
“Truth.” Pippin’s smirk was all in his eyes, mischief in a brainy-gone-cute way.
Masters practiced a cold scowl. Clearly, he imagined himself to be a general. Too bad he looked like he was about to squawk. “You two think you’re so untouchable. You might be Kale’s pet, Harcourt, but your RIO is just a RIO. How would he like some demerits?”
Chase turned to Pippin. “Is it 138?”
“142 last time I tested.”
Chase smiled at Masters. “His IQ is 142, sir. Just how badly do you think the military wants him here and happy?”
Masters leaned back in his chair, making it groan. “I don’t have time to pal around with you two. And I can’t help you do whatever it is you’re up to.”
“Now that use of can I do believe to be accurate,” Pippin said.
“Where’s Kale? We have business that concerns the whole goddamn military.” Chase pointed to the blipping radar screen. “You saw that I had company up there.”
“I saw nothing.” Masters folded his arms. “Are you imagining things? Should I let the academy psychiatrist know that Dragon’s team is cracking up? Is Nyx finally washing out?”
Chase leaned in. Her body tensed like gravity was about to triple. “You—”
Her RIO took her arm and led her out of the tower just as her fist readied to plant itself into the staff sergeant’s face. The door clamped shut behind them, giving way to the dense cool of the stairway and its concrete-encased quiet.
“I’m all for lipping pompous officers, but violence is only going to get you on the Down List.” Pippin took hold of her shoulders and peered in close. She looked away. He knew how to haul her out of her red zone like no one else, and she wasn’t always pleased about it. Anger was like speed—it gave her direction.
She shook out her fists. “I know. This all feels really weird. Don’t you sense it?”
“Yes. Very weird. That staff sergeant was told not to talk to us, Chase.”
“How could you tell?”
“Because he looked way too happy to say he didn’t see anything. Either that or…” Pippin ran out of words. It wasn’t like him. His calm was something Chase piled her recklessness on. That way, no matter how wrong she was—and she was wrong quite a bit—she always had the bedrock of his self-assurance.
“What?” she asked.
“Or…maybe they really didn’t see anything.” Pippin looked older than seventeen when he was this tired, and yet his face had a forever-young quality. Chase called it “boyishly boyish good looks” when she was trying to get him riled. But right now, with his hair sweat-sticky and his eyes red, he looked older than the staff sergeant she’d almost hammered.
Chase buzzed with the last of her energy. “So you didn’t see that jet on your radar, and the tower might not have seen it on the satellite. Is that even possible?”
“I don’t know.” Pippin was stumped as often as he was grave.
And he was suddenly both.
Chase took off toward the administration offices and Kale with a corkscrew feeling deep in her stomach. A secret jet without a signal didn’t smell like a backup Air Force bird. It reeked of Ri Xiong Di. Of sabotage.
4
BRIGADIER GENERAL
One Serious Star
Kale’s office smelled like coffee. A pot always burbled in the corner, and shelves lined every inch of wall space, sagging under the weight of old books, sad-armed plants, and military paraphernalia from centuries past. Chase knocked on the doorjamb, waiting for the brigadier general, the head of the Star, to invite them in.
He didn’t.
His head was bowed over a book on his desk, his gray hair looking soft. His shoulders, on the other hand, were hard and straight—the kind you could balance a country on. Although Chase loved to fly and the academy was home, there were days when she wondered how she’d stay in the military as a career. Then she’d see Kale in his uniform and she’d scrape around in her imagination, wanting to picture herself weathered and proud and in charge.
“General?”
Kale waved her into silence. She waited a few moments while he licked his thumb and flicked through a few pages. “General, I…”
Kale snapped a look that made both cadets stand at attention and clip their hands to their foreheads. “I need a word with Harcourt,” he said. “Donnet, you’re dismissed.”
Pippin backed into the hall and whispered, “Watch yourself. Don’t say too much.”
Chase mocked a sneer at her RIO, but Pippin wasn’t joking. He had that too-serious look on his face again. “What?” Chase mouthed.
“Harcourt,” Kale commanded. Chase stepped into his office, suddenly nervy without Pippin at her back. She couldn’t fly without him, and that feeling often permeated her time on the ground.
Kale shut his book. “Let me tell you about my night, Harcourt. Here I was, peacefully trying to eat my dinner, only to get a call from the tower. Do you know what they said?”
“No, General.”