A/N: A retelling of the movie "Wings" for a younger, gentler (or at least less-cynical) audience.

Wing and a Prayer

Loftus Sparrow was washing dishes in his kitchen when he noticed movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned and saw his ten-year old daughter Survey standing several feet away. She didn't say a word, but the pout on her face said plenty. In her hands were a paper airplane with a crumpled nose, and she stared at her father until he finished with the slippery dishes. "What's wrong, Dear?"

"I can't fly it right. It keeps crashing into the floor," she said mournfully.

"Let me take a look at it," her father said as he dried his hands. While he made sure they weren't going to ruin the paper craft, he continued. "Maybe it's not the way you're flying it - maybe the airplane needs to be built a little different. The early airplanes weren't built much stronger than that, and yet men fought in them in the Great War." He took the offered airplane with hands that were now dry and looked it over. "Do you mind if I try it?" Survey shook her head and Loftus aimed the airplane through the doorway and tossed it. It dove down to the floor and skidded after crashing.

"I bet you have a story that goes with this," she said with a grin.

"Why do you say that?"

"Because you're so smart you have a story for almost anything."

"Thank you for the compliment, but anybody can tell a story. But since you bring it up, as it so happens, I DO have a story. I'll tell it to you now while we work on the airplane instead of waiting for bedtime, if that's okay with you."

She agreed, and the two left the kitchen and sat down at the dining table, where Loftus brought some new paper as well. "The story goes this way..."

Before the Great War, there was a young man named Jack Powell who lived in a small town. Jack liked speed and dreamed of one day becoming an airplane pilot. In the meantime, he took his car and removed all the fenders and extra parts after changing some of the other parts to make it go as fast as it could. There was a girl named Mary Preston that really liked him, and she liked the same things he did. They finished the car and Mary named it the "Shooting Star" because of how fast it was, and Jack gave a ride to a girl HE liked named Sylvia Lewis. She liked it okay, but she was from a big city, so cars didn't impress her very much. She liked another young man in the small town and his name was David Armstrong. His family had lots of money, which was a burden Sylvia was willing to live with.

"It must be hard being rich," Survey noted.

"I wouldn't know," her father answered.

"And you won't as long as people keep paying your lawyer fees in chickens and firewood."

Through a complicated process that probably didn't have anything to do with the young lovers, many of the world's countries entered into the Great War. The United States decided to play too, and men across the country signed up to fight in the war. Jack and David both signed up to be pilots, along with a man by the name of Herman Schwimpf who had to fight ethnic stereotypes because of his name. Many people didn't want to let him be a pilot because they thought he might be sympathetic to the Germans, but he showed everyone he was willing to draw all over his body to prove he was a patriotic American. He still got punched a lot, even though the flag correctly had 48 stars on it.

"So, they didn't want any German people flying for the Allied side," Survey said. "Other than that, how inclusive were they? Were there any Asian pilots?"

"Ah, no."

"Black?"

"No."

"Hispanic? Indian? How about women"

"No. It was basically squadrons and squadrons of white men."

"I see."

So, Jack and David had to go to training to get into physical shape since Jack drove around a lot and David was driven by a chauffeur. Part of the training was boxing, and Jack and David decided to fight for Sylvia, who wasn't even anywhere nearby. Jack beat up David, called him gamey which made sense considering both were sweaty and a little bloody, and after that they were best friends instead of mortal enemies - kind of like when you kick Bobby Turnell and then run away afterward, hoping he'll chase you. After that they got to go to pilot training, and instead of being washed out for having a German name the school got to wash Herman out because he was too dumb and everybody breathed a sigh of relief when he became a mechanic. Everyone except the pilots that flew his planes, maybe.

Jack and David reported for training and got a new tentmate by the name of Cadet White, who was already training to be a pilot. He shared some of his chocolate bar with Jack, making sure to break the piece off so that they wouldn't share any of the nasty diseases that like to hang around soldiers during war. Either that or he kept the part that had more almonds in it. They discussed the need for good luck charms, although White didn't think you needed one even though they flew airplanes that were made mostly of wood and fabric. He then left to go practice and got killed, which might have been a very convincing argument for his side of the debate. Unless he died while choking on an almond - in which case you should never trust airline food. They had to pack away his belongings, and it made David sad because it reminded him of his parents and how he kissed the dog, his mother and father (in that order) and saying goodbye to the butler (without kissing him) before leaving for training.

"His family must have been very sad when he left," Survey guessed.

"I'm sure they were. It's like when I send you off to school every day, except war is a lot more dangerous because they have people shooting at you, bullying, horrible food, and you always have to study for what's coming up next."

"Are you talking about war or school? I'm not sure."

"Come to think of it, neither am I. Now..."

But after a time both men became pilots and went to France to join with the Third Army, since I guess the First and Second Armies were already full. They got to join the Dawn Patrol one day, which meant that you had to skip breakfast and hurry into your plane before the sun came up. Jack hoped they would meet some Heinies, which meant German soldiers back then instead of just German beer. While they were flying, they encountered Count Von Kellermann and his Flying Circus, which was not a group of comedians, but instead were a collection of skilled German pilots. The gun in David's airplane jammed, so the Count waved to tell him that he would have to kill him later because it wouldn't be fair to kill him now. Jack got shot down, and he crashed and escaped into the safety of a British trench, where he was immediately offered a drink - purely for medicinal purposes.

The Germans planned to take a big plane called a Gotha to drop some bombs on a small village called Mervale, where Mary...

"Mary? How did she get to France?" Survey asked.

"She volunteered for something called the Women's Motor Transport Corp, to help drive vehicles to carry supplies, wounded soldiers, and important messages."

"So, women weren't allowed to fly or fight, but they were allowed to drive. I thought you said people make jokes about women drivers?"

"They do make jokes, and Mary DID accidentally bump into a soldier. I guess in war, no one can tell how bad they drive."

Anyway, the big bomber with a dragon on it lumbered away toward the small town, along with two fighter planes as escort. David kept the fighters busy until they both landed abruptly, full of his bullets, while Jack shot down the bomber. The people on the ground cheered when they saw the airplane with the shooting star drawing on the side, because Jack was becoming famous for his good flying; now Mary knew that Jack was a pilot nearby. They were both heroes and got medals, and were now called an 'Ace', which is one better than a King. And because they had to recover from being kissed by the French Commander when he gave them their medals, they got to have a little vacation in Paris.

But the Army was going to have something called a 'Big Push', which meant that everyone had to help yell and scream and kill the enemy at the same time. The Army sent Military Police to bring back all the soldiers that were relaxing in Paris, where Jack and David were now drunk for the first time after drinking a bubbly adult drink called 'champagne'. There were a lot of friendly women there too, who were happy to drink and dance and be happy with the men. Most of the men probably drank to forget the horrors of war, choosing to endure the horrors of hangovers and socially transmitted diseases instead. Jack learned that alcohol made you really silly and sleepy, and Mary found him and tried to get him back to his unit so he wouldn't get into trouble. Instead, she was caught with her pants down while changing clothes and it looked to the police like she was just another friendly girl, except when they found out she was a Motor Corp volunteer they made her resign.

"Wait...if a woman gets caught in something that isn't respectable, she has to lose her job. If a man does it, they just say get back to work?"

"I think you've got it, Survey."

Now the Army was getting ready for the big offensive, and David and Jack were back at their unit. It got really complicated because David liked Sylvia and Sylvia liked David, but Jack liked Sylvia too and David knew that Jack liked Mary really and that Sylvia didn't like Jack as much as he liked her. David knew that Jack would be sad if he found out, so he wouldn't tell Jack the truth and Jack got mad and they both had to fly on a mission to pop some balloons in a German parade without their good luck charms on them. David protected Jack by attacking some fighters while his friend popped the balloons and ruined the parade, but David got hurt when he was shot down and hid in enemy territory.

The Germans told Jack that his friend was dead, and this made Jack so mad that he vowed to beat Germany all by himself, but when the Big Push came he had a little help from millions of others. Lots of people died on land and in the air in the big battle; people probably died at sea too, but the budget wasn't big enough to show that. Jack flew everywhere, shooting at all the Germans he could find to get revenge for his friend David, who wasn't really dead. Instead, David managed to steal a German plane and used it to fly back towards home. But Jack thought it was another German pilot and shot down his best friend. When he went to see the crashed plane, he found out that his friend was in it, and now he was dying. The two said they were sorry for yelling at each other and they were the best friends ever. Then David took a wheelbarrow ride while Jack put his coat over him.

"Why didn't Jack recognize David?"

"Probably the same reason you don't know your friend is in a bus passing by. They didn't have radios in the planes like now, and Jack wasn't expecting a pilot that wasn't German. It was too windy to shout from one plane to another, and Jack was pretty mad so I guess he thought David was just waving to taunt him."

"I guess they both felt bad about it."

"Jack felt bad. David didn't feel anything now.

After that, the war was over, and Jack was a big hero. He came home and got a parade, then went to David's parents and told them and the dog how sorry he was. David's parents and the dog forgave him, and he was looking at his old car afterward when Mary came by. He realized that he really did like her as much as she liked him, and that maybe life after the war wasn't going to be so bad after all. A shooting star, the same thing that inspired the name of Jack's plane and car, flew by in the night sky and they kissed. The End

Loftus finished folding the paper into a new airplane - telling his story, he had been distracted enough that the job wasn't done. "Now let's try this one out," he said as he stood and pointed it towards the other end of the room before throwing it. The new plane did little better than the old one, swooping to the floor and sticking in the rug. "When at first you don't succeed," he said as he picked up the plane and made a few tears in the rear of the wing to create ailerons. He tried again and this time the plane glided much more evenly across the room before hitting the far wall.

"I see," Survey said as she took the airplane and studied it. "You used the same design, so the trust and pull factors were the same. You increased the lift while only slightly increasing drag. Nice work."

"Where did you read about those things?" her father asked, slightly astonished at the sudden terminology.

"On the back of a cereal box. But it didn't make sense until just now."

"You'll have to remind me again that you're ten," he said with a smile.

"Ten and a HALF," she corrected. "So, what was the moral of the story, daddy?"

"I think it should be 'Always treat friends like you may never see them again'. What were you thinking it might be?"

"Never name something that flies through the air after a burning, falling object. It would be like calling a submarine 'Fishing Weight', don't you think?"

"Good point. Very practical."

The End

A/N: The first movie ever to earn a "Best Picture" Oscar® and the only completely silent movie to do so. An epic of its time, it broke ground in a lot of ways. After watching "The Artist", I decided it was time to watch one of the biggest (but not longest) pre-talkies.