1. skydive

In the two years that they'd been together, Carswell Thorne had grown accustomed to Cress having some pretty outlandish ideas. Though her initial excitement at Earth had toned down a notch, she was still overflowing with thoughts about what sorts of things they should experience together. It didn't matter if they'd both already experienced it on their own, Cress wanted them to do it again. Together.

Okay, it was kind of cute and made him feel useful and needed, but sometimes her ideas were a little tiring for someone who was perfectly fine with just kicking back and relaxing. Almost an entire year of traveling around the world had worn him out.

So when she suggested that they skydive together for their upcoming two-year anniversary, he wasn't exactly thrilled.

"Cress, we fell out of a satellite together. How could you possibly want to plummet towards Earth again?"

She beamed. Typical. "It was so romantic!"

"Falling to our death is romantic now? You were terrified!"

"You were knocked out, so you would hardly know what was going through my mind during the fall."

He just shook his head, part amused, part disbelieving at his girlfriend who was still looking as though it were the best proposal she'd ever made.

"Oh come on!" she said, mock-pouting. He hated that look. It made him cave into whatever she wanted and that kind of power was not okay. "It's our anniversary. How could we not relive the first time we met?"

"Should we invite Cinder? Maybe she can gag and bind you, then glamour herself to look like you and Sybil before we jump. More authentic that way."

"Stop being so silly. This will be beautiful. You didn't get to experience the fall with me the first time."

"The part of it that I did experience was enough for me."

"I dragged you under the bed and held on to you tightly the entire time."

His lips twitched. She had not shared this part of the crash before. He tried to imagine her clutching him in fear, sobbing into the strong, manly chest of the stud she'd fantasized about for so long. He broke into a grin and brushed a finger across her cheek. "Fine. If that's what you want for our anniversary, we'll do it."

-o-

Thorne breezed through the instructional hour, bragging to the one human employee that he was the renowned Captain Carswell Thorne. Yeah, that Captain Carswell Thorne. From the Lunar Resistance. He owned his own spaceship and this poor guy was stuck on Earth on a small hover.

Cress's jumpsuit nearly drowned her, which was so adorable that it made him want to bundle her up in a blanket and cuddle with her. He still had to catch himself whenever he had thoughts about that sort of thing, because it was also not okay for anyone to look that cute. It was good, then, that there wasn't time for such things with the task at hand.

His own jumpsuit was a little too snug in certain places, and he hated the way the harness made everything bunch up. Cress giggled and brushed off his complaining, so he sucked it up and decided to compliment her on how cute she was instead. It was important to be sweet on one's anniversary, after all.

Before they got on the hover, they helped each other strap on the little android packs that regulated their parachute release times and safety backups in case of failure. Though he knew it was reliable, his stomach tightened into a little knot that he hid by giving Cress an enthusiastic thumbs up. She squealed and took his hand and they got on the hover.

Cress babbled the entire way up about their relationship, but Thorne wasn't really listening. Why did he feel like he was suddenly afraid of heights when he took hovers all the time? He captained a spaceship, for stars' sake, and he loved looking down at the great blue planet—as Cress liked to call it.

He tightened the straps on his pack with one hand and his grip on Cress's hand with the other. She took his squeeze as a sign of encouragement and dazzled him with one of her gorgeous smiles.

"I love you so much."

He swallowed and smiled back. "I love you too. Happy anniversary."

Before he was ready, they were lining up at the opening of the hover and they were securing their goggles and earpieces. The android counted down in their ears and he braced himself against the wind.

"Catch me if you can!" squealed Cress. Then she threw herself out of the hover. He could hear her screams of joy through his earpiece.

Eyes widening and face paling slightly, he gave himself a nanosecond pep talk. This was going to be easy. He had survived a satellite plummeting to Earth. Cress would not show him up.

He raised his arms in the freefall position and dropped out of the hover.

The wind hit his face and he was falling, falling, falling.

The first ten seconds made his stomach flip-flop and up became down, Earth became sky. But after the initial swooping sensation subsided, it didn't feel at all like he remembered from the falling satellite. Instead, he was flying. He turned his arms as he had been instructed and tried to dive to catch up with Cress.

He hoped her android's camera was taking flattering pictures of him from underneath. Cress would surely put them on her port later. Anniversaries—and basically any occasion at all involving the two of them—he'd learned, needed to be documented thoroughly.

"Do you like it, Cress?" he shouted.

There was slight static and then he heard her through the earpiece again. "I'm freeeeeeee!"

"Twenty seconds until parachute deployment, Sir," said the crisp android voice.

Thorne positioned himself as the android instructed. He saw Cress's yellow parachute open below him and she shot upward and past him when it caught against the wind. A beat later his own opened and the strings pulled against the harness on his legs. And then he was climbing up too.

He yanked on his strings and guided the parachute over to Cress. She reached out her hand for him, a glorious smile on her face beneath her dorky goggles. He held out his own hand, but the androids quickly alerted them that their parachutes could tangle and they could not get any closer.

They talked the rest of the way down, mostly about the view and how Cress could see the world from a whole new perspective.

He didn't think it looked so bad from up there either.

They both landed at the same time, Cress disappearing in a mess of billowing yellow nylon some fifteen meters away from him. He unhooked himself from his own parachute and sprinted over to her to make sure she was okay.

He unearthed her, but she pulled him down on top of her, laughing hysterically.

"Someone is a little too excited, I think," he said playfully.

Her laughter died down and she considered him. "You know, one of my first thoughts after we had crashed was that two people who had survived such a daring escapade should probably kiss."

"You would," he said, rolling them over. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to entertain that excellent thought at the time, Miss Darnel."

Her hair fell into his face as she leaned closer to pull off his goggles. "Never too late for a second chance, Captain Thorne."