Annabeth Chase
"Dagger two-three, Brize Norton Tower. Cleared to land on Runway two five, exit runway left," the annoyingly British voice blared from her headset snapped at her squadron mate, drowning out even the drumroll of heavy raindrops striking her cockpit canopy. The moment the confirmation came the air traffic controller continued. "Dagger three-one, descend and maintain to angels three, continue downwind leg for two miles before base leg," the controller snapped.
"Descending to angels three, Dagger three-one," Annabeth replied and sighed, shifting her weight around a bit and flexed her fingers before reclaiming her sidestick and throttle. Heavy drops splattered of the F16's cockpit. An ocean of gray was visible outside her glass canopy so Annabeth kept a close eye on her radar altimeter and the artificial horizon on her HUD. The clouds would break at around five hundred feet, but mistakes in the past and in she knew she couldn't trust in her senses in a soup like the one she was flying through. With the three bags hanging from her plane and only two thousand pounds of fuels left in her main tanks, she was certainly light, though she would have appreciated the additional weight, considering the way she was being tossed around in the clouds.
Still, Annabeth continued her descent, approaching the designated altitude.
Twenty miles ahead something blipped up on her radar for a moment, probably some small plane. No sane person would be flying in this weather, and Annabeth knew if she didn't get down quickly, her runway too would be closed and she might find herself in trouble. Her nightmare was having to land at Heathrow and suffering through the horrors of landing at an international airport or loitering indefinitely after refueling in the air.
This was her third trip to the United Kingdom and for the third time, she had to approach in bad weather.
Suddenly her RWR lit up as another radar had locked her from somewhere behind her, the small diamond with a sixteen written in the middle, appearing on the small screen.
"Caution, body spike," Annabeth warned on the radio.
"Apologies three-one," one of her squadron mates announced. "Just trying to maintain separation.
"No prob," Annabeth replied and leveled out at three thousand feet.
"Dagger three-one, Tower. Turn left for base leg. Cleared for finals, runway two five. Tacan is 15x, ILS is 13, depart runway right at the first opportunity," the tower announced with a distinctive Scottish accent.
Annabeth almost sighed in relief, confirmed the transmission, and banked left towards the north and then further west until she caught the Localizer and a green cross appeared on her HUD, giving her a heading and decent vector to follow.
"Dagger three-one, cleared to land," the tower announced and she quickly confirmed.
There were about ten knots crosswind from the right and she knew it would likely stay that way until she was on the floor.
Slowly she eased off the throttle and deployed the airbrakes to slow down below two hundred knots and quickly finished the landing checklist, dropping the landing gear and switching on the landing lights in the process.
Moments later she broke through the cloud cover and found herself perfectly lined up to the runway a few miles ahead, the bright lights as welcoming as her own husband's embrace at that moment. As she closed the distance she spotted that famous road, separating a field at the airfield, where that small crowd of loyal aviation enthusiasts stood set up at the end of the runway, their optics brought to bear on Annabeth.
Being a few knots Overspeed Annabeth finally idled the throttle and raised the nose to positive five degrees and monitored as her vertical speed, as well as her airspeed, decreased through the flair. Finally, she shot past the aviation fans staging on Station Road, and moments later her rear wheels touched the runway. Keeping the nose raised Annabeth deployed the air breaks and felt herself being pulled forward into her harness, slowly pulling the stick back further as she slowed down and the nose tried to decent until she finally turned right of the runway and followed one of her wingmen over to the ramp where they finally parked next to a row of C130s.
Only when she shut the engines down did she actually see the tall blond man approaching her viper's from the nose. A grin spread across her lips as she put her jet through the shut down checklist and opened the canopy and RAF ground crew pulled out her planes ladder and climbed up to release her from her chair.
Once she stood on terra firma she hurried over to the Tornado pilot. "Jason fucking Grace, how the fuck have you been?"
"Welcome back to the UK, Mrs Jackson. How are Penelope and Percy?"
