The trip to the airfield was boring, uneventful. Edge, along with a handful of other JOE's, were released on the same day. The hour-long trip seemed redundant, when they could've arranged a chopper to take them back in 45 minutes straight from the hospital. When they arrived at the airfield, there was a 20-seater rotor wing plane on the poorly maintained tarmac. At least it was going to be quick from here. She climbed the little flight of stairs precariously, and sat at the back. She closed her eyes, involuntarily, from the relaxing drone of the jet engine. She wondered why she had never thought of being a pilot; it seemed to make her happy and calm. She felt tired, relaxed. She had barely said she was going to take it easy, and she was already winding down. She knew it was something in the drip that they'd given her at the hospital. When she'd finally made peace with the fact she was really going to take it easy, she got a shake on her shoulder.
"Hey, wake up sleepy."
She looked up and yawned. She saw Ace, the pilot, above her head, smiling.
"Hey Ace, I fell asleep?" She rubbed her eyes.
"Yeah, sure did. And we weren't even up that long."
"It's the meds, damn doctors." She yawned again.
"Need some help? Walking down those stairs with a crutch is harder than going up." Ace offered, holding her crutch at the ready for her.
She looked at her crutch disbelievingly. She forgot for those few minutes while flying that she was hurt at all.
"No thanks. It's not that many steps." She insisted, slipping her arm into the crutch and making her way to the door.
She looked down at the little flight of stairs again. She realised that going down the steep little stairs might be harder than going up. At some or other stage, she would have to shift her weight on her crutch and she would stumble.
"Should I offer you that help again?" Ace stood in the back of the plane, watching Edge hesitating at the door.
"Maybe." She shrugged.
Ace laughed as he went to the steps, each step he took made him laugh a little louder. He put her arm around his shoulders, and walked down the steps in time with Edge. He then left her on the last step, lifted her off of it by the waist and put her on the ground. He walked with her all the way to the shuttle elevator.
"You know, you really don't have to be so stubborn all the time." Ace said, but Edge didn't answer.
Ace left her at the door of the shuttle elevator and Edge hobbled into the shuttle by herself.
"Thanks Ace."
"No problem." Ace smiled, and the shuttle doors closed.
She was shuttled down all the way to the training floor, where she had to swap shuttles to get to her room. As she stepped out on the training floor, there were people everywhere. People packing crates, labelling piles of document and strapping rovers to trucks. She guessed they were packing up, moving the Pit, but she didn't know where. Her communicator buzzed, and she scrambled to answer. She saw Breaker on the screen before she answered.
"Hey Breaker. What's news?"
"Edge. I suggest if you wanna catch the action, then you better hurry to your room. They just left the truck."
She quickly snapped the communicator shut and hobbled to the next shuttle to go to the lower floor. She stopped on her floor, and to her surprise, no one was on this floor packing. The gym, cafeteria, and their rooms were exactly the way they left them. She breathed a sigh of relief; she would at least have peace here. She hurried to her room, switched on her computer and logged into the system. Breaker sent a streaming request through as soon as she was in. Three little screens popped up, two were streaming from Duke and Ripcord's accelerator suits and one was from Breaker's computer.
"Hope you don't mind Edge, we switched off your communication to the accelerator suits. Sure you understand why." Breaker said and Edge nodded.
"You already found them?" She stated the obvious.
"Yeah, and they're trying to launch a warhead. We don't know where." Heavy Duty's voice announced, but she couldn't see him.
She didn't speak for the next few minutes; she was watching what was happening with Ripcord and Duke. They were so close to getting them. Edge heard Scarlett's voice all of a sudden; she must've been chasing them too.
"Hey Edge, you're missing the action." Scarlett said, also out of view of Breaker's webcam.
"Yeah, rub it in." Edge whispered angrily.
Edge watched the screen more carefully, and saw the route they were running was headed somewhere important.
"Hey guys, I think I know where they're headed." Edge said slowly, hit by a little shock.
"Where?" Scarlett asked quickly.
"The Eiffel Tower."
Silence was all the response she got. She watched in horror, like Breaker and Scarlett and Heavy Duty, what Ripcord and Duke were seeing. The warhead was launched, and hit the Eiffel tower. It started devouring the tower, stopping abruptly. It was too late. The Eiffel Tower had fallen. Duke's video stream was cut. The silence was almost deafening.
"They have Duke." Scarlett said slowly, but was cut off by sirens.
"We have to go Edge." Breaker said quickly, and the stream cut.
Edge sat in the chair behind her desk, her mouth open from disbelief. The team had probably been arrested, and the Eiffel Tower was destroyed. Another video request cam through, this time from General Hawk. She accepted promptly.
"General." She greeted.
"Edge, you're at the Pit. I'm leaving you in charge while Sgt. Stone and I go get our JOE's out of jail."
"General, I'm sure that I'm not nearly as qualified or as capable as the others…"
"You're more than capable and qualified enough. You have my authority to do whatever you see fit. Good afternoon." General Hawk hung up.
She sat back in her chair; hardly enough time went by for shock to set in when the first signature was needed.
"So much for taking it easy. Sorry bro." She sighed, thinking to herself.
