Free Falling

Chapter 3: Fight's On

After the little tiff at the bar with Hangman, Annabelle awoke for the first day of training more determined than ever. She was going on this mission, even if it was the last thing she'd ever do. 

One of the plane hangars on base had been turned into a makeshift classroom for briefings over the next four weeks. Desks for two were spread evenly across the room in front of a single podium and monitor. Annabelle found assigned name tags to the various seats, forcing the two man teams to sit together while the rest of the pilots were dispersed seemingly at random. Annabelle let out a sigh of relief when she saw that she'd been seated next to Rooster. Honestly, she would have been fine with anyone aside from Hangman. The other pilots slowly started to file in shortly after, each taking their assigned seats. So when a shadow came across her vision to the side, Annabelle assumed it was Rooster. 

"Hey Roost, decide to hit your snooze a couple of--" Uh oh. Not Rooster. The sight of Bob staring down at her with a small smile on his face left Annabelle completely speechless. She had to stop making a fool of herself in front of him. When she still made no move to speak, Bob decided to take over. 

"Sorry. I didn't mean to startle you."

"No! No, you didn't! Sorry I just assumed it was Rooster cause we got seated together. But you are a far more pleasant sight than him and that moustache he refuses to shave." They both let out a chuckle, helping to ease the awkwardness that previously transpired.  

"I just wanted to see how you're doing. I hope you're feeling better after last night, after the whole Hangman incident." Annabelle knew that she shouldn't be astounded by the natural decency of this man, but that just went to show how bad her luck with men had been her whole life. 

"Wow that's really sweet of you Bob. Yes, I'm feeling much better. Just ready to beat his ass in front of an audience today." The smile that grew on his face was perhaps the most genuine Annabelle had seen thus far. 

"I have no doubt you will. I'll see you in the air, FreeFall." Annabelle nearly swooned at the fact that he actually addressed her by her call sign. No one ever seemed to do that despite it being the norm for naval aviators. She was almost embarrassed by how hard she was falling for a guy she'd only spoken to three times now. She didn't realize that she'd stared at him the whole way as he moved to his seat in the front row next to... Natasha! He was Natasha's back seater! Whether or not this was a good or bad thing was yet to be decided, and it didn't help that her thought process was yet again interrupted by Rooster as he smacked her upside the head while taking his seat to her right. 

"You're staring again."

"Rooster."

"I didn't say that was a bad thing. Been a while since I've seen you have a crush. It makes for nice entertainment." 

"Haha. I'm not in the mood for this today Roost." Noticing his best friend's serious and somewhat somber demeanor, Rooster decided to switch gears.

"Hey, Annie, you know I'm just teasing, yeah? Is something wrong? Is it something with Bob?" Before Annie could respond, a booming voice of authority entered the room. 

"Admiral on deck!"

All aviators stood at attention, the hangar going deathly silent. Admiral Bates. Call sign Warlock. Annabelle greatly admired him and Admiral Simpson, who now ran Top Gun. Simpson had a bit of an attitude, but Warlock always gave off a very assertive, yet calming energy. They certainly had called in the best of the best to handle the logistics of this assignment.  

Introductions were made, a moving speech about how we are the best of the best here for a mission only we can handle, so on and so on. Annie thought she might faze out entirely until the final introduction was made.