Ace's P.O.V
"Time... is your greatest enemy." Maverick says to us. The main screen, pulling back from a rapidly ticking timer, counting backwards toward zero...Looming larger on the screen are schematics. "Phase one of the mission will be a low-level ingress, attacking in two plane teams. You'll fly along this narrow canyon to your target. Radar guided surface-to-air missiles defend the area." On screen, a schematic of a radar-guided missile array. He continued. "These S.A.M's are lethal, but they were designed to protect the skies above. Not the ground... Not the canyon below." "That's because the enemy knows no one is insane enough to navigate that low at high speed." I said. "And that's exactly what I'm gonna train you to do." Hangman smiles Overhead animation of two planes zig-zagging through a narrow valley. "Your altitude on the day will be one hundred feet... Maximum." All the pilots in the room seem shocked. "Exceed this altitude... Radar will spot you - And you're dead." As the planes on the screen bank, one goes too high... A missile fires and destroys the high plane. "Speed on the day...860 knots.Minimum. Time to target, two and a half minutes." More shocked faces. he points "That's because these Fifth generation fighters are waiting at an airbase nearby..." One screen, schematics of the lethal looking next-gen aircraft. Beside this, animation shows a Tomahawk Missile launch from a destroyer in a carrier group at sea as. "Simultaneous to your ingress, a carrier-based strike will take out this airfield, but if any of these planes are airborne before that,they'll anticipate your target and immediately move to defend it. In ahead-to-head with these planes in your F18s... you're dead. You want to get in, hit your target and be gone before these planes even have a chance of catching you.This makes time your greatest adversary." The canyon, the missiles and the fifth gen planes share the screen now. "The faster you navigate this canyon, the harder it will be to stay under the radar of these enemy S.A.M's. The deeper you are in the canyon, the less margin for error there will be. The tighter the turns, the more intensely the force of gravity on your body multiplies." Maverick points to various turns on the canyon map. "You've all faced sustained G's before. But this... This will take you and your aircraft to the breaking point." 'Holy shit'. I thought. maverick continued. "For today's exercise, we'll start easy. You'll be flying a route on your nav-system which simulates the valley. Maximum ceiling: three hundred feet. Time to target: three minutes. Good luck."
3rd Person P.O.V
Phoenix/Bob fly behind Coyote, blasting above the rocky desert terrain.Phoenix has one eye on a GPS. A green dot represents their F18. A blue line represents the route she has to take. Red lines on either side represent canyon walls.To stay on the line, she has to bank hard, pullings witch backs with tremendous Gs.In back, Bob has his own GPS, monitoring the clock, making calculations. They are both sweating. "Time to target is one minute thirty. We're twenty seconds behind. Increase to 900 knots." Bob says. "We gotta move, Coyote." Coyote guns it, banking harder to follow the proposed route. The Gs intensify and the team strains. It's grueling. But he can't make the turn... Coyote yanks back the throttle and hits the brakes. The line on Coyote's GPS. He strays too far and over the red line. An alarm blares. "God dammit." Phoenix comes around the corner to see Coyote's jet with its air brakes extended. She yanks on the stick sending her jet into a near vertical climb, breaking the 200 foot ceiling. Maverick's with all the trainees, replaying the training run like a coach breaking down post-game film... Maverick says to Coyote "Why are they dead?" "We broke the 300 foot ceiling. A surface-to-air missile took us out." Phoenix replies "No. Why are they dead?" Maverick asks Coyote. "I slowed down and gave her no warning. It's my fault." Coyote feels the eyes of the class on him. "Was there a reason you didn't communicate with your team?" Coyote goes to speak. "One that their family will accept at the funeral." Coyote feels the heat. "None... sir." Then he turns on Phoenix. "And why didn't you anticipate the turn? You were briefed on the terrain." Now Phoenix is the in the hot seat.
Ace's P.O.V
I stare daggers at Maverick. Maverick points to Bob. "Tell it to his family." Off Phoenix's look, Hangman smiles. TWIST along the imaginary route, dangerously close. High G turns. Sweat. "Hangman ease up. Canyon's getting tighter." "Negative. Increase your speed." Payback does so. But Hangman is still pulling away. Now it was me and Rookie, backed by Harvard and Yale. They're flying with extreme skill and confidence, a polished machine. But: "We're ten seconds behind and dropping. Increase to 920 knots." Harvard say. "Negative, Harvard. Hold your speed." "Jaguar, we're late." Yale says "We're alive. We'll make up time in the straightaway.." I replied "We're too far behind. We have to go now." Yale says. "Maintain current speed. We can make it, WE CAN MAKE IT!"
At the debriefing: "What did you do wrong?" Maverick asks. I just stares at him. "Why are you dead?" "Sir." Phoenix says standing up for me. Maverick looks at her. "He's the only one who made it to the target." "He gave the Enemy aircraft time to shoot him down.He's still dead. "You don't know that." I retorted. "You're not. Flying. Fast enough.You were the team leader up there." Hangman says. "Man, on the day, the canyon will be tighter." Coyote says. "We'll be pulling even higher G's,and the missiles will be real." Fanboy says. "The ceiling will be one hundred feet, time to target, two and half minutes." Payback says. "You don't have a second to waste." Hangman says. But Maverick never took his eyes off of me. "We made it to the target." I said. "And superior enemy planes intercepted you on your way out." "Then it's a dog fight." I said. "Against fifth generation fighters." "We'd still have a chance." "In an F18-" I interrupted him. "It's not the plane, it's the pilot-" Maverick cuts me off. "Exactly." Maverick regrets saying it in the same instant. There's an ugly pause. I simmer down. "There's more than one way to fly this mission, sir." "You don't get it." Hangman says. All eyes turn to him. He continues "On this mission, a man flies like Maverick here or a man doesn't comeback.(to Phoenix)No offense." "Yet somehow you always manage." Bob says back. "I don't mean to criticize. You're conservative is all." "Lieutenant."Maverick warned. "We're going into combat, son. On a level no living pilot has ever seen.(pointing to Maverick)Not even him. It's no time to be letting the past hold you back--" "Lieutenant." Maverick said sternly. "What's that supposed to mean?" I glare at him. Hangman looks around the room, waiting. And finally says "I can't be the only one who knows that Maverick flew with his old man? Or that Maverick wasn't there when your're old man-" "That's enough Lieutenant!" Maverick yelled. Then he turned to me. "Jaguar." But it's too late. I lunge, grabbing Hangman's collar.The class jumps in. In an instant its chaos. Hangman is not fighting back. I am. Maverick, Phoenix and several others are holding me back. Hangman pouts his hands up. "I'm cool, I'm cool. It's all good." "You son of a bitch!" I yelled at him "You're all dismissed!" Maverick yells. I tear myself free of those still grasping him. Then Hangman says to Maverick. "You know I'm right." "I said you're dismissed." Maverick yells. Hangman pulls himself free and walks out.
I storm out of the room. I walk to the locker where I take out my helmet. It has a few scratches and dents. One of the scratches wiped the paint away to reveal the old purple paint from before. I bite my lip, trying to hold it in. Rookie knocks on a locker. "Can i come in?" he asks. I turn and try to smile. "I know you've told me before but would it help to tell me what happened to your Dad?" I looked at the floor. I pulled a file out of my locker. "Sure." I replied sitting down on a nearby bench. He put his arm around me. "Hey it's okay." I sighed and began.
~ "Cougar! We won't make it! You need to eject!" Merlin yelled. "No! Stay put! We can make it." Cougar flicked on his radio transmissions. "This is Cougar. We are low on gas and are in need of assistance." The radio cackled and Stinger began saying "Cougar this is Stinger what wrong?" "Merlin and i are low on gas. We need you to bring the ship closer to our location." "Stay put. Copy that." Merlin talked from the backseat. "Cougar we need to eject! We can't make it!" "Yes we can!" Cougar pushed hard and thrusted forward with jolts of speed. Cougar looked at the picture of his son and wife next to the air pressure meter. "I'm coming home Ace." He whispered before thrusting forward even fast. "We need to go lower!" Merlin yelled. "Decreasing altitude by 400 feet!" Cougar yelled back bore diving through the clouds. They broke through cloud cover and the boat was nowhere to be seen. "It's not here..." Cougar said. "Cougar we need to eject! The ship wont be here in time!" Cougar flicked his radio back on. "This is Cougar we are heading to the ocean. Preparing to eject requesting assistance!" "This is Stinger. We won't make it in time you need to eject." Cougar reached upwards grabbing onto the ropes as the jet plummeted towards the ocean. "Eject!" Merlin yelled. Cougar pulled with all his might. "It wont budge!" Merlin pulled his and ejected. Cougar pulled and pulled but nothing happened. "This is Cougar to mission control. I cannot eject i repeat i cannot eject!" "Pull harder!" Merlin yelled from his parachute. "I'm sorry Ace." He said looking at the picture as the plane smashed into the waves below. The plane sank fast. Cougar pulled, yanked, and tried to get free. But he couldn't. He opened his mouth to breathe but water filled it and he drowned. ~
"I'm sorry." He said. "It's okay. At least your Pop's survived the crash." I said patting him on the back. "Yeah, god thank Merlin." "Ha!" I laughed a bit. "So what's up with you and Phoenix?" He asked. "i dunno. I like her. She hates me." "Why?" "She's still getting used to the fact that I'm not the dickhead i was back in Top Gun," He patted me on the back and stood up to leave. "See you later." i said as he left. I put the helmet away and changed into clean clothes.
The next morning I revived a text saying to go to the beach rather than the hanger. I didn't argue and hopped on my bike riding down.
3rd Person P.O.V
Cyclone looked everywhere for the pilots but they were nowhere. Hands come down into frame, grip it,ready to snap it right to left. The pilots are divided into two teams, squaring off in a game of football with one unusual feature:There are two balls. Both quarterbacks snap at the same time.Both teams scramble. In an instant, it is chaos.Maverick is a quarterback on one team, Jaguar on the other. Jaguar manages to make a pass. Maverick is sacked. In fact,the opposition seems to care more about sacking the teacher than they do about scoring.Yet, in the midst of the hard-hits, we see something we haven't seen before: camaraderie. Hondo makes an epic attempt at a touchdown despite half the class clinging to him. Hangman looks down at a prone Maverick, relishing a kill. Jaguar, walks past, stops,grudgingly helps him up. It is the first remotely friendly moment they have shared.Maverick, a little sore, tenderly heads off field, waving Bob in as his replacement. Maverick sits in one of two low lawn chairs, watching the chaos, mildly amused. He helps himself to a beer from a cooler as he eyes: Hangman helping Rooster off the ground. Another truce of sorts. Both balls snap and the entire class clashes. Anarchy. Maverick smiles. And a shadow falls over Maverick.Maverick looks up at: "Sir." Maverick says. Cyclone is standing just beside Maverick, sunglasses hiding his eyes. He stares at the game, perplexed. "What is this?" He asked "Dog fight football. Offense and defense at the same time." He replied. "And who's winning?" "Oh, they stopped keeping score along time ago." "This detachment has training to do,Captain. Every available minute counts." "Yes, sir." "Then why am I looking at this clown show?" "You asked me to build a team, sir.There's your team." Cyclone looks again. The cadets are split into two huddles,strategizing, working together. They break for the next play. "The mission has been moved up one week. The last phase of training starts tomorrow." And he walks away, taking with him any sense of accomplishment the day has produced. Maverick looks back at the class, Jaguar's team rallying around him.