Again.
Her wing caught the top of an emerald-green pine and spun out, clearing the woods with fire blazing as orange as a construction zone. Chase didn’t have her visor on. Or her helmet. She wiped the sweat out of her eyes, shocked to find herself drenched, her hands shaking. “Get it together,” she muttered. The U.S. was on the cusp of war with the New Eastern Bloc, and where was she? Stuck in the goddamn centrifuge simulator.
She shielded her vision from the neon blaze and threw the door open.
Riot got in her face. “How many times are you going to drop too low? I warned you. I even gave you a countdown to the hard deck, which Sylph never needs by the way. HOW CAN I HELP YOU IF YOU WON’T LISTEN?”
Chase’s head hung low but not in defeat. Or sadness. It was fury.
Poor Riot.
She reached back and slammed his face so hard that he crumbled to his knees, howling. Adrien tried to step in, but Chase flung the woman’s kind arm away. “I can’t fly in that stupid machine.” Chase motioned to the Star City Centrifuge. “I have to get in a jet.”
I need Dragon…and Pippin.
The words didn’t come out, but they didn’t stay deep either. They spotted her surface, tears coming on fast. Hands useless. Legs weak. She sat hard and covered her face, feeling the raw skin beneath her eyes and the weariness that now wrapped around her like a nightmare. It was exhausting to feel this much. If she could have unplugged every single emotion, she would have.
She was trying to do just that.
Riot got back on his feet, his nose bleeding. “I don’t think you broke it.”
“What is happening here?” Dr. Ritz stormed in, immediately inspecting Riot’s face. “Did you do this?”
“He tripped into my fist,” Chase said.
“Well, you’ve just set yourself back a week, Chase Harcourt.”
Chase stood fast. “A week?! This is going to be over in a matter of days!”
Ritz spoke to Riot, ignoring Chase. “To the infirmary and then get some rest. How long until you’re back in the air?”
Riot checked his watch. “Five hours.”
“Go.” Ritz turned to speak with Adrien, and Chase watched Riot leave.
He stumbled into two chairs on his way out, and it had nothing to do with his nose. He was leveled with exhaustion too. They all were, especially Sylph and Tristan. Tourn had ordered a permanent Streaker watch along the d-line. One jet wouldn’t do much against an invading fleet, but with the radio humming nonsense and the satellite on the fritz, the Streaker’s responsibility was to get back to the Star with a warning—a warning to send everyone to the bunkers…
Pegasus and Phoenix had been trading twelve-hour shifts over the last five days—since Pippin’s death had turned the Second Cold War into an out and out conflict. And this time, there were no confidential statements. Everyone knew. About Ri Xiong Di, the drone, the crash.
About Pippin.
Chase glanced at Adrien’s desk. The elderly engineer kept her handheld screen on mute, but Chase could still see the psychotic news coverage. The public’s panic. Raids and hysteria, not to mention President Grainor’s grim speeches and knuckle-white grip on the podium.
But this time, the screen showed a new terror.
Pippin’s three brothers and mother had been squeezed onto a ratty couch. His mother kept her hand over her face.
“What is that?” Chase blurted, interrupting Ritz and Adrien’s dispute. They followed Chase’s glare, and Adrien touched the corner of the screen to turn on the sound.
The reporter leaned in like a predator. “Can you tell us about your son? What were his passions? His hobbies?”
“Nerd stuff,” Pippin’s oldest brother said.
Andrew, the youngest, squirrelliest, and inarguably dirtiest of the boys, sent an elbow into his eldest brother’s side. “Henry loved flying. He was the best RIO in the Air Force. And the smartest. He had the best pilot too: Nyx.”
Chase’s heart bottomed out. She stopped breathing.
The reporter slid even closer, proving he wasn’t a predator after all. He was a damn scavenger, and he was about to pick the family clean. “Mrs. Donnet, how do you feel about Henry’s pilot? Are you angry that your son died while she lived? Do you blame her?”
Pippin’s mom stared down.
Adrien made a move to shut off the screen.
“Leave it on,” Ritz and Chase said in sync.
Chase needed to know. She certainly blamed herself. She should never have dropped so low with that drone on her tail. She should have let that missile take out their wing and ejected…
After a few long moments, Pippin’s mother said, “They were attacked by Ri Xiong Di. We’re lucky one of them survived.”
The reporter didn’t seem to hear her, launching into questions the family couldn’t possibly know, including: “What can you tell me about the jet your son was flying in? Sources have led us to believe they’re a new type of jet that has yet to be disclosed to the public.”
Adrien put the screen on mute just as the image showed Chase’s and Pippin’s junior year cadet pictures side by side. Chase wavered and sat down. All the blood had left her brain.
“Hope they made a fortune from that interview,” she murmured. “Enough to buy a real house.” But that’s not what she really hoped. She hoped it hadn’t happened at all. No interview, because Pippin hadn’t died, because there had been no accident. Her mind kept doing this sort of…rewind. She went backward, pulled the move differently, didn’t head too low, bested the drone. Won the trials.