Eva had barely slept. The excitement she was feeling kept her awake for hours until she finally managed to fall asleep. As the early morning sunlight poured into the window, Eva sat up, making sure not to hit her head on the bunk bed above her as she had done numerous other times. She stretched her arms out until she heard a series of satisfying pops and stood up. Magic seemed to be just waking up too as Eva heard her stirring above her. Eva didn't say anything but instead went to go put on her flight suit.
"So, you excited?" Magic drowsily asked as she climbed down from her bed.
Eva scoffed. "As if you even need to ask. I've been waiting for this moment for weeks," she replied.
As she was getting ready, she noticed her laptop sticking out from the bag under her bed. 'Maybe this'll help me get some ideas to write about,' she thought. A bit of inspiration wouldn't hurt, but hopefully, she wouldn't have as much free time on her hands after today. A part of Eva was almost regretful, in a way, that she wouldn't have as much time to work on her novel, but she would choose flying before writing in a heartbeat. Besides, her story wasn't going anywhere.
"Come on, let's go meet the others at the mess hall," Magic said as she zipped her flight suit up.
By the time Eva and Magic arrived at the mess hall, the other four had already found a table, indicating their presence with a wave. Eva wasn't feeling particularly hungry that morning, so all she had was a piece of buttered toast.
"What is that?" Lucky asked, looking at her toast as she sat down next to him. "You lecture me about breakfast, and all you eat is that?"
Eva grinned. "At least I'm eating something," she said, giving him a friendly nudge on the shoulder. "I notice you don't have anything at all." Eva gestured to the bare spot on the table in front of Lucky.
"Yeah, but how do you know that I didn't just eat what I had already? You don't know how long I've been here," Lucky argued.
"I know because I've been with you since we left our room," Poet chimed in, throwing his bunkmate under the bus.
Everyone laughed, including Lucky. He was good at making jokes at his own expense. It was then that Eva realized how long it had been since all six of them were together. They had all been busy doing something, so they didn't have time more often than not. It felt nice to be with all of them. They were fun to be around.
"So uhh… who all is going out today?" Eva asked. She was unable to hold in her excitement.
"Myself, Charger, Lucky, and you," Vortex answered. "We're leaving in just a few minutes, so be ready."
"So, you're finally letting Diamond fly, huh?" Poet asked with a grin.
Vortex exchanged a look with Eva. "Yeah, I figured it was time I let her get out there," he said, sighing.
"Ah, you worry too much, Vortex, she'll do fine," Magic added.
Vortex nodded. "I know she will," he said, glancing over at Eva. "Y'know what, Diamond? After we're back, we'll do something fun at dinner. A celebration for your first sortie, Nexus Squadron style."
Eva swallowed the last bite of her toast. "Sounds fun." She stood up. "So, do you think we should get going?"
Vortex laughed, amused by her excitement. "Settle down there, Diamond. We've still got a few minutes. Besides, I still need to tell you all that we're doing an exercise with Meteor Squadron tomorrow."
Meteor Squadron was the other fighter squadron aboard Kestrel II. Eva didn't know them that well, nor did she see them much, but she heard they were all remarkable pilots.
"What kind of exercise?" Magic asked. Eva was about to ask the same question.
"We're going up against them in a mock dogfight. We'll be going up at 1300 hours, so right after lunch. It's gonna be all six of us against all six of them," Vortex told them.
Eva just about squealed with excitement. Dogfighting was one of her strengths. If anything, she considered herself reasonably good at it. Although she probably wouldn't last long against Meteor Squadron, it'd be nice to get some experience.
Vortex stood up. "Alright, you three, I think it's time we got ready to head out." He looked over to Magic and Poet. "Don't sink the ship while we're gone," he said with a smirk.
"I can't make you any promises," Poet replied.
Vortex laughed as he led Charger, Lucky, and Eva out of the mess hall.
The first stop the four pilots made was to grab their flight gear. As Eva slipped it on over herself, she realized that it was a lot heavier than she remembered. She tucked her helmet under her armpit, and they continued to the hangar. Eva's heartbeat got faster as they stepped in. After how long it had been since she had flown, it felt surreal in a strange way. She scanned over the planes in the hangar and finally found hers, the one with a light blue crystal emblem on it. She slipped her helmet on as she sat down, and the canopy closed over her. Small carts hooked up to their planes and backed them onto the elevator— First Vortex and Charger, and then Lucky and Eva. By the time Eva and Lucky made it up, Vortex and Charger were just taking off. Eva flicked on the engines.
"Diamond, Lucky, this is the Control Tower. Prepare for takeoff."
Eva put her oxygen mask on and took a deep breath. She looked over to her left at Lucky's plane and the four-leaf clover emblem on his tail. Lucky was doing the same thing. He caught her eyes and gave her a thumbs up.
"Lucky, your callsign for this sortie is Nexus 3. Diamond, yours is Nexus 4. Verify and read back, over," the tower told them.
"Lucky confirmed Nexus 3," he replied.
"This is Diamond. Callsign is Nexus 4, roger."
"All systems are normal, take off when ready."
Eva's heart pounded as the thrust on her plane increased. Out of nowhere, the catapult shot her forward, and she was airborne before she knew it. She retracted the landing gear and gripped the control stick firmly.
"Good to see you two in the sky, now form up on me. Let's get this patrol started," Vortex told them.
"Oh man, this is great. I feel like there's nothing that can stop me!" Eva's voice was full of energy. She was ready to burst with excitement, so she did a little barrel roll to let some of it out.
"Save some of that energy, Diamond. We've got a patrol to do," Vortex said lightheartedly.
"Right, sorry, Vortex." She quietly accelerated next to Lucky until they slipped behind Vortex and Charger.
"Hey, you can't deny the kid has spirit at least," Charger said with a laugh.
Eva rolled her eyes underneath her helmet. "Still not a kid, Charger, and it's not like I'm gonna get younger anytime soon."
"Nexus Squadron, this is the Control Tower. You've passed through waypoint one. Continue on the route and keep an eye on those radars," Tower told them.
"Roger that Tower, we'll let you know if we see anything," Vortex replied.
The Control Tower was the closest thing they had to an AWACS, which was a bit redundant because they were patrolling for the carrier in the first place. For the most part, they were mostly there to issue out orders, which was just fine as far as Eva was concerned.
"Well, Diamond, I hope you're ready for flying in a straight line and then turning once every couple of minutes," Lucky said sarcastically.
"Hey, flying is flying, and when you've been out of the sky for as long as I was, you take every second you can get." Eva looked down at her radar, checking to see if anything new had popped up, but frowned as it showed nothing but their four aircraft.
As they carried onward, it turned out that Lucky was right. The patrol was essentially just them flying in a circle around the carrier. Despite that, Eva still didn't mind. If anything, as they made their way to land, Eva was just as giddy as when she went up. Besides, now Eva was able to look forward to dogfighting with Meteor Squadron. By now, everyone else had already landed, and now it was her turn. She took a steadying breath as she lined herself up with the flight deck. She lowered the landing gear and tailhook on her plane and started reducing her speed.
"Your approach is looking good, Diamond. Continue on your current course," Tower told her.
Eva angled her plane upward ever so slightly as she touched down. She felt herself get thrown against the harness on her seat as the plane suddenly stopped. Eva let out a sigh of relief, and she switched the engines off.
"Thatta' girl, Diamond," Vortex said in a way that she could just tell he had a mile-wide grin on his face. "You did well out there. I know it wasn't all that glamorous-"
"No, no, it's fine," Eva quickly said to reassure him. She didn't want him to think she was disappointed. "I enjoyed it." She lowered her oxygen mask and took off her helmet as she got out of the plane and went to go meet up with the others.
Despite how loud and cramped the mess hall was at dinner, the pilots of Nexus Squadron were still able to enjoy each others' company, whether it was laughing at some stupid thing Charger was doing or groaning at a terrible joke that Lucky made. Poet was setting up some long-winded joke that was sure to make water come out of Charger's nose, and Magic was trying to teach some card tricks to Lucky, who couldn't even shuffle the deck right. Eva was giggling as she watched Lucky struggle when she saw Vortex coming back to their table, and he had two others with him. They were wearing flight suits, so they had to be pilots.
"Hey everyone, I brought back some friends," Vortex, nodding to the two he had brought back. "This is Domino and Torch. Domino here is Meteor Squadron's leader, and Torch is his wingman."
Domino, the shorter of the two with messy black hair and blue eyes, nodded and gave everyone at the table a small wave. "Good to meet you all. Vortex has told us a lot about you guys." He smirked and gave Vortex a nudge on the shoulder. "When he's not putting on his 'tough guy squadron leader' act in front of you guys, he's quite the sap y'know."
Vortex rubbed the part of his shoulder that Domino nudged. "Ah, he's just trying to make you feel better since he knows you're all hopeless," he said sarcastically, the grin on his face quite obviously showing that he didn't mean a word of it.
"It's good to meet you guys," Torch chimed in. "It's gonna be interesting to see what happens tomorrow."
"Well, you know, we're all friends here, so no hard feelings when we eventually come out on top," Charger said with a wink.
Domino laughed. "Ten bucks says you do something stupid and get knocked out first." From the way the two interacted with each other, it seemed as though they had some history together. However, Eva wasn't quite sure as to what.
"Well…" Magic said as she stood up and stretched her arms. "I think I'm gonna turn in early, or else I might just faceplant on the table."
Eva yawned. "Yeah, I think I'll join you. Busy day tomorrow, after all." She looked back at the others, waving a quick goodbye before the two headed off to their room.