AUTHOR'S NOTES: Blake's chapter is up this time. No GRIMM fighting in this chapter either, but lots of flying.

Aboard the USS Ronald Reagan (CVN-76)

South Atlantic Ocean

16 April 2002

Blake Belladonna's cat ears were flattened back against her head and her yellow eyes were bigger than usual. She swallowed audibly. "Holy crap," she whispered. "Patty Berdolier, this is…this is art." Then Blake took her eyes off Ninjas of Love VII: A Tale of Two Kunoichis and looked at the ceiling of her stateroom. It wasn't much to look at—various pipes and fittings that took water and steam from one part of the aircraft carrier to another part. "Or maybe I just really need to get laid," Blake snorted to herself. Then she went back to reading the book. It was a particularly steamy sex scene where the main character found herself in a threesome with her archrival and a handsome samurai. What made the scene even better was that the buildup had been so satisfying: the three were caught in a triangle of duty and love and war, and finally they had given in to their desires. It would undoubtedly end in heartbreak and tears—feudal Japan wasn't exactly the best place for happy endings—but Berdolier, Blake's favorite author, had done it again.

The problem is, Blake thought to herself, this is seriously turning me on. She lay in her Navy-issue underwear in her stateroom, but she shared that stateroom with another aviator, and the door didn't have a lock. Moreover, her roommate would be returning at any time. Still, Blake looked down at herself and was very tempted to, as Yang would crudely put it, double-click the mouse.

Then she heard the doorknob turn and she quickly went back to her book. Lieutenant (junior grade) Terri Suul walked into the room. "Afternoon, Blake." Terri had a Mid-Atlantic accent that made her sound slightly nasal and arrogant, like someone who demanded to see the manager.

"Hi, Terri." Blake stifled a sigh.

Terri wore her khakis, but she started taking them off, opening up the tiny closet on the opposite side of the room from the equally tiny desk they shared. "We're on the schedule for tonight."

Blake's head fell back on her pillow. "Shit. I thought the weather was crap."

"It is." Terri grinned. Both women could feel the movement of the carrier on the ocean. On a calm day, it was barely noticeable. It was noticeable enough now that Blake could hear the coat hangars in the closet hit the doors. "Ceiling's lower than a snake's ass and the weather is delta sierra." That was pilot shorthand for dog shit. "But the Man says we have to fly a BARCAP, so fly a BARCAP we shall." She was in her underwear now. Terri was lithe and muscular, though not so much that she lost her femininity. She was also a Faunus, one of only two Faunus in Carrier Air Wing 5 aboard the Reagan; the other was Blake. Two horns curved up from her forehead and then down over her ears—Terri had to wear a specially designed helmet to accommodate the horns. Blake had never met a bighorn Faunus before, and wondered what had spurred that particular bit of genetic engineering. Then again, Adam was a bull...

"Damn." Blake put her bookmark in Ninjas of Love—she had nearly stuffed Ruby down an intake when the other girl had dogeared her books at Beacon—got out of bed, and padded over to her own closet. Terri grinned at her. "Was I interrupting something?"

"Almost." Blake thunked her head against her closet door. "It's been a long cruise, Terri."

"Roger that." Terri pulled on her flight suit. They had been at sea for six months, with only one port call at Cape Town, South Africa. "Do something heroic tonight so the skipper lets you take a Hollywood shower." Like all Navy ships, the Reagan had to ration its fresh water. Anyone taking a shower was required to wet down for about a minute, switch off the shower and lather up with soap and shampoo, then rinse off. A Hollywood shower was a reward: then the shower could be left on for the whole time.

"Oh, is that where you go?" Blake teased, putting on her own flight suit.

"Sure do. I've jilled off so much in the shower that I get wet when it rains."

Blake laughed. "Most people do." She zipped up the flight suit. "I really need to introduce you to my friend Yang when we get back home."

"I'd like to meet her." Terri glanced at the picture on Blake's desk; unknown to both women, it was the same one Weiss had, with them in kimonos at Hakone. It was one of Blake's former flight—the famous, or infamous, Ruby Flight. "She's the blonde with the huge tits, right?"

"That's the one." She followed Terri out of the stateroom. Six months before, Blake would've been hopelessly lost after the second corner, but now she knew most of the Reagan like her parents' lodge. She stepped over the coamings without thought, where before she might have tripped over them—especially with the motion of the ship in the waves, which seemed to be more pronounced in the passageway. They were at VF-84's ready room in a few minutes.

The ready room was mostly empty. The Reagan was sailing with its battlegroup in the South Atlantic, not far from the Equator, headed north between Africa and South America. They would be back home at Naval Base Norfolk in less than two weeks. GRIMM attacks were rare south of the Equator, but there were various human threats that had nothing to do with Salem, and that was why the Reagan sailed there. However, it also meant that there were some nights that there was little to do, and this was one of them. Most of VF-84's F-14D Tomcats were on the hangar deck, except for the two aircraft that would fly Barrier Combat Air Patrol—BARCAP—that night, which were up on the flight deck. Since there was no need for them, most of the crews were either amusing themselves in the wardroom or gym, or racked out in their staterooms.

The squadron's commanding officer was not one of them. Commander Richard Jaeger was standing at the front of the room, looking at assignments. When Blake had reported aboard, Jaeger had been somewhat distant to her; he made it obvious that he did not want her in his squadron. Terri had been assigned as Blake's RIO, but Blake had learned later it was because Terri was the only one who volunteered. The other pilots' and backseaters' reactions to Blake ranged from indifference to outright hostility, and it wasn't because she was the only Marine in the squadron. Blake understood. She then volunteered for every bad weather mission; every crappy little job that the squadron's personnel were often forced by Navy bureaucracy Blake did too. She had stood watches in Cape Town, letting others go on liberty. Gradually, over the months, VF-84 had accepted Blake Belladonna, and so had Jaeger. He had informed her two days before that her fitness report, the Navy's equivalent of a job review, would be a very favorable one. For all the good it does me, Blake thought morosely. With the letter of reprimand in her personnel file, she would never be promoted beyond Captain. In a year or two, perhaps three, Blake would start feeling the pressure to leave the Marine Corps entirely.

"Blake, Terri," Jaeger greeted them. "Hate to do this to you." He caught Blake's ears going back; Jaeger was familiar enough with Faunus nonverbal language to know what that meant. "I am, Captain. You two just happened to be on the rotation tonight. Mickey and Marie from '213 will be going up with you." He referred to the other F-14 squadron aboard the Reagan: VF-213, the Black Lions.

"I didn't think it was personal, sir," Blake said. It was only partially a lie. "How's the weather?"

"Delta sierra." Jaeger called over the squadron weather officer, and the four of them went over the weather conditions, which were indeed terrible. The Reagan was heading into a storm, with low clouds and heavy rain, to say nothing of a wind that heavily tossed the sea. "To be honest with you, I wouldn't be surprised if CAG cancels the BARCAP tonight. There's probably no GRIMM out there, and if there are, they have better sense than to fly in this shit." He shrugged. "Still, better suit up and woman your plane." He chuckled at the joke. "Just in case."

"Yes, sir," both women chorused. He dismissed them. Next, they went to the equipment room, where they donned G-suits, survival vests, lifejackets, oxygen masks, and their helmets, secure in their bags. Then it was up a few more flights of stairs, into the Reagan's island structure, and out on the flight deck. Rain and wind hit them in the face instantly. Blake watched in amazement as the Reagan rose up and down. In the murk off the port side, she saw one of the attending destroyers shove its nose under; waves poured over the ship up to the bridge level, but the tough little destroyer punched through the water, shook itself off, and descended to meet the next wave.

They walked—waddled might be a better word, with the weight of the flight gear and the fact that the carrier was rising and falling—and found their Tomcat. Unlike the rest of the squadron, aircraft 200 was Jaeger's F-14, and it carried full-color markings rather than the subdued ones of the rest of VF-84. Instead of the black outline of the skull and crossbones on the tail, the tail was completely black, with the Jolly Roger in white, just like the pirate flags of old. Slung underneath the Tomcat was the standard BARCAP loadout: two AIM-54 Phoenix beneath the fuselage, two AIM-120 AMRAAMs and two AIM-9 Sidewinders beneath the wing gloves. For stowage on deck, the F-14's wings were raked back. Blake ran her gloved fingers over the wet skin of the Tomcat. Much like her career, the F-14 was also not long for the world. They were getting old, and the Navy planned on replacing them with the Super Hornet. Gambol Shroud, Blake's former, heavily modified F-14, had been the last attempt by both Grumman and the Navy to keep the venerable Tomcat in service, but what was left of Gambol Shroud was scattered across an irradiated Polish countryside.

They did a preflight with the F-14's plane captain, all three of them getting soaked in the rain. Blake half-expected someone to come and tell them to head back inside, the weather was too bad to fly, but when that didn't happen, both she and Terri climbed into the cockpit. They closed the canopy, which at least shut out the rain that now pattered on the glass. Both went through their preflight routine inside the cockpit, switching on the engines, aligning the inertial navigation system, everything needed to get ready to fly. Radio leads and oxygen was connected, and they were ready to go. Blake closed her eyes and did a quick hand check of the controls: in the clouds, if they lost power, the cockpit would be plunged into darkness. She needed to be able to fly by feel.

"Blake, there's the cat officer. Bet he's going to tell us to power down," Terri told her.

Blake opened her eyes and looked out of the canopy as the yellow-vested catapult officer ran over to them. He began motioning them forward. "Looks like we're going up, Terri." She looked over and saw the VF-213 Tomcat also being moved, this time towards the waist catapult on the angle deck.

"What…what the fuck…ain't no way." Blake taxied the F-14 forward, following the hand signals to turn the big fighter towards the bow, touching the brakes when the carrier went into the troughs; aircraft did simply roll off ships on occasion. "Oh shit, Blake…why didn't I join the Army like the recruiter told me to?"

"Then you'd be flying helos in this shit. I'm a damn Marine, and look at me." Blake stopped the F-14 and lowered the nose so the catapult shuttle could be hooked to the bar on the nose landing gear; it gave the Tomcat a predatory look, like a cat getting ready to pounce. Blake checked and made sure the wings were raked forward now for maximum lift, and saw the jet blast deflector being raised into place. She tightened her straps, and glanced down the catapult. The bow pointed directly into the ocean, then rose as the Reagan crested a wave. She gave the catapult officer a sharp salute, which was returned as the man dropped to one knee. His fingers went down and touched the deck. Here we go, Blake thought, and her heart began pounding. The throttle was all the way forward; the F-14 sang with power, and rainwater flashed to steam behind them as nearly 54,000 pounds of thrust left purple and orange shock diamonds behind them, only held back by the catapult.

The catapult officer's hand left the deck and pointed forward. A second later, the catapult fired, and the Tomcat was sent down the bow, pressing Blake and Terri back into their seats. They were off the deck in another second, and Blake hauled back on the stick, feeling rather than seeing the ocean reaching up for them. Then they were climbing, the landing gear cycling up, and everything went dark around them as they went into the clouds. The wind buffeted them, but Blake was glad that the storm didn't seem to be as bad as the one she had flown through to photograph Roman Torchwick's hideout at Cleveland. It seemed a lifetime ago, but it had not quite been a year.

Blake watched her instruments: to look outside would give her vertigo in seconds. It showed her in a climb. The altimeter showed 16,000 feet, and it was still dark outside. "Terri, I'm going to find how high this goes."

"Okay," Terri said. "Kind of along for the ride here." There were no flight controls in the backseat of the F-14.

Blake smiled under the oxygen mask and kept climbing. Finally, at 21,000 feet, they broke out of the clouds. She added a few thousand more feet for good measure, and just like that, the air smoothed out. There was a full moon, and it illuminated the clouds as a gray, wispy blanket. Terri thumbed the radio switch to notify the carrier. "Roughneck, Skull Two Zero Zero. Cloud ceiling at 21,000 feet."

"Skull, Roughneck. Roger, ceiling at 21,000. Do a 360 and stand by." Blake's eyebrows came together at that. Normally the controllers in the Reagan's Combat Information Center would be telling them to proceed to their BARCAP point. Blake put the Tomcat in a lazy circle and waited to see the other F-14 come up and join them.

They waited five minutes and then the radio crackled to life. "Skull Two Zero Zero, Roughneck. The other BARCAP is downed on deck. Recover aboard as soon as you are able."

Blake was the one to answer this time. "Roughneck, Skull Two Zero Zero. Negative on BARCAP?"

"Roger, Skull."

"Roughneck, Skull Two Zero Zero, wilco. Will head for marshall in five." Blake reached forward and hit the switch for the fuel dump. The Tomcat was too heavy with fuel for a four hour BARCAP and a full missile load to land safely, so they had to dump fuel. A vapor trail of jet fuel now followed the F-14, glowing in the moonlight. "Isn't that a kick in the head."

"No shit," Terri grumped. "They get us all the way up here, and now we gotta go right back down. Shouldn't have launched in the first place. Dammit." She looked around. "Kind of a shame, though. It's pretty up here, anyway."

"Yeah, shame we can't just hang out up here for a bit." It was rather beautiful, Blake thought, but BARCAPs didn't fly alone. Just because the Reagan hadn't run into GRIMM didn't mean that there weren't any around, and GRIMM were programmed to kill things that flew by themselves. "Wonder what happened to Mickey and Marie?"

"Hopefully nothing bad." A carrier flight deck was the most dangerous spot on earth: a pitching, slick deck, jet blast and intakes that could suck a person off their feet and into the deadly fan blades of an engine, propellers that could take off heads and arms on unwary deck crew. Arresting cables could break and cut people in half. Catapults could misfire and "cold cat," not have enough steam in the catapult to get an aircraft in the air, which would invariably end with the aircraft going into the water, often with fatal results. Quit thinking about that, Blake commanded herself. She checked the fuel gauge. "Okay…close enough for government work. Let's head back down."

"Should I start praying?" Terri asked, only halfway joking.

"Oh, I'm not that bad," Blake said, beginning the long turn towards the marshall point. She pulled the throttle back and pushed the stick forward, and the clouds enveloped them again. "That was just that one time. It had been awhile since I did a night trap."

"You know how long it took me to get that oleo strut out of my ass?" Terri joked. It had been their second flight together, a night landing in relatively calm weather—but Blake was out of practice. She had dived for the deck, slamming the F-14 down in a fashion that would make Landing Signal Officers and plane captains cry.

"I thought you liked it in the ass," Blake quipped. Once more, she watched the instruments and not the sky around her. They flew into a squall line, and rain lashed the canopy. Now the wind began hitting the Tomcat, slewing the aircraft; Blake compensated with stick and rudder.

"Well, I don't not like it in the ass," Terri replied. She switched on the radio. "Two Zero Zero at marshall, state four zero." Since they were the only aircraft aloft, they were cleared in to land. Blake descended some more, and checked her altitude. Five hundred feet. They were still in the clouds. The LSO radioed that they were on glide path, so Blake had to trust whoever the LSO was today, and the controllers in the island that could see her on radar. Finally, at three hundred feet, they came out of the gray wall. Below them the sea was whitecapped. Blake peered through the rain, but couldn't see the carrier. "Roughneck, Clara," she called, code for that she couldn't see the lights that would guide them into landing.

"Blake, ten o' clock," Terri called out.

"Oh, there it is." The wind had pushed them out of the approach. Blake turned the F-14 to the left to get back into it, but she knew she was out of position, and climbed back into the clouds before the LSO even told her to waveoff the approach.

They went around again. This time, Blake pulled back on the power a little more, and put in more rudder. They came out of the clouds right on the glide path to the carrier. Blake could see the ball, the Fresnel lens light on the starboard aft corner of the Reagan that gave her the path to follow, the lights on the angle deck, and the vertical drop line, a series of lights from the very rear of the flight deck, the round-down. Those lights told her where the deck was: if she descended below those lights, the Tomcat would hit the water, or equally as bad, the back of the carrier. She dropped her flaps, landing gear and tailhook. "Two Zero Zero," the LSO called, "come left and power." Blake pushed the F-14 left, fighting the wind, and pushed up the throttle. "Call the ball."

"Two Zero Zero, Tomcat ball, three point three," Blake called out.

"Too much power, Two Zero Zero. Right a bit."

"Fuck," Blake whispered. The carrier was moving up and down, and the Tomcat was moving sideways in the wind. She shed some power. Then she was descending too low, so she brought the fighter up. Then she was too high as the Reagan hit a trough.

"Two Zero Zero, wave off."

"Goddammit," Blake snarled, and advanced the throttles forward, flying over the carrier, raising everything—flaps, gear and hook.

They circled around and tried it again. Blake glanced at the fuel gauge; it was getting very low. Terri was silent, not wanting to distract her pilot. The third time was the charm, Blake thought, and it looked like it was. Then the Tomcat's wheels touched the deck, the hook passed over all four arresting wires, and Blake was forced to bolter, go off the angle deck and back into the air. She climbed back around as Terri radioed the Reagan with their fuel state. "Terri," Blake said, "I'm sorry."

"No sweat, Blake," Terri replied, but Blake heard the tremor in her voice. It never occurred to Blake, she realized, that her RIO might be scared. She wasn't herself, just frustrated.

"Skull Two Zero Zero, Roughneck," the controller radioed. "We're going to launch a tanker and keep you up there until we clear the storm. Get back up to the tops."

"Roger," Blake acknowledged, and started to climb.

"Yeah, if we make it that far," Terri groaned.

"I can drop you off at the next corner." Blake tried to lighten the mood.

"Can you? That would be great." Terri laughed, but it was a little too high, betraying the other woman's fear.

Blake reached the cloud tops again, which were a bit lower now; she hoped that meant that the storm was starting to blow itself out or move on. "I wonder what poor bastard they sent up in the tanker," she mused aloud. She checked the fuel gauge and wished she hadn't. They had about another five minutes, and then Blake and Terri would be in a F-14 glider.

"Skull Two Zero Zero, Fast Eagle One One One. You want some gas?" Blake saw movement in her right eye, and a F-18E Super Hornet climbed out of the clouds. On the tail was an ace of spades with the number 41 in the center, with red trim. Above the ace of spades was a green gear within a gear. Blake grinned beneath the maks. "Well, hello there, Oscar," she said, though she didn't say it over the radio.

"Fast Eagle, Skull, we'd love some," Terri radioed. Blake throttled back, and Oscar Pine manuevered his F-18 forward of the Tomcat. Beneath the wings of the Super Hornet were two large drop tanks, and beneath the belly a buddy pod, allowing the F-18 to offload fuel as an aerial tanker. As Blake dropped her flaps and slowed down even more, a hose streamed behind the F-18, ending in a basket. Blake deployed the F-14's refueling probe from the right side of the nose. She pushed the throttle slightly forward, dividing her attention between the refueling basket and Oscar's aircraft. She slid the probe home on the first try. "Contact."

There was a pause. "Negative transfer. Fast Eagle is sour," Oscar said. The pod wasn't transferring fuel.

"Oh shit," Terri said. They were almost out of fuel, and there wasn't enough to even try one more approach to the Reagan. This was blue-water operations, too far away from land to divert there. They would have to eject, into a storm-lashed sea where drowning or even dying of exposure before one of the destroyers reached them was a very good possibility.

"Skull, Fast Eagle, disconnect. Going to try something." Blake did as Oscar asked. She watched in increasingly cold sweat as Oscar reeled back in the hose, then streamed it again. "Try again, Skull."

"Here we go," Blake breathed. Once more, she pushed the probe into the basket. Usually Terri could be relied on for joking around, making orgasmic noises when they tanked—something else that reminded Blake of Yang-but she was silent except for breathing into her mask. "Contact."

"We're sweet!" Oscar exclaimed. "You're getting fuel!"

"Hot damn—" Then Blake felt the F-14 shudder. "What was that—"

"Oh, shit!" Terri repeated, louder this time. "Flameout on one!" There simply was not enough fuel left in the tanks.

"Oscar!" Blake shouted, not bothering with callsigns. She shoved the throttles back to idle; engine two was still operating, but this would keep them from getting into asymmetrical thrust, which would almost certainly send them into a spin. "Toboggan!" She prayed he knew what she was talking about, or that Ruby had told Oscar some war stories.

Either he did or she had, because Oscar put the F-18 into a shallow dive. Blake followed, her hands moving by instinct now, her eyes flicking from her HUD to the probe to the other aircraft. "Terri, call out altitude every ten seconds! We'll disconnect at fifteen thousand and punch at five if I can't get a relight!"

"Okay!"

Now Blake not only had to trust herself, but Oscar. They entered the clouds again, and visibility dropped to less than fifty feet. Oscar switched off the rotating beacon atop the fuselage, which could be distracting, and turned on his landing lights. She could barely see the ghostly outline of the F-18 ahead of her, and the wind began to whip the refueling hose around like a child playing crack the whip. "Terri, state!"

"One point one! Seventeen thousand!"

1100 pounds of fuel and 17,000 feet. Okay. "Oscar, break off! Disconnect!"

"Roger!" Oscar tried retracting the hose, but at that moment the turbulence was too much, and it snapped where the basket joined the hose. Fuel instantly splashed across the canopy, barely missing the intake. The basket remained stubbornly attached to the probe. "Brute force disconnect!" Blake shouted.

"Fast Eagle is climbing!" Oscar vanished into the murk. "Blake, are you clear?"

"We're clear, Oscar!" Terri called out, knowing that Blake was busy. The other Faunus advanced the throttles forward slowly, keeping the nose down to force air through the engine's fanblades. It was also sucking rain down it as well. The number two engine's thrust increased normally, but the number one engine remained stubbornly off, and Blake brought up the nose. She could not tell if she was right side up or upside down. "Ten thousand!" Terri called out. She prepared to reach up and grab the ejection handles. She could feel the Tomcat begin to shudder at the edge of a stall.

Then the number one engine relit with a bang that nearly sent them into a flat spin. Blake compensated, and got the F-14 back on level flight. "Skull, Roughneck, come in," the controller called out.

Terri took a deep breath of oxygen. "Roughneck, Skull Two Zero Zero. We're still here. Proceeding to marshall." She glanced at the fuel gauge. "State 800 pounds."

"Skull Two Zero Zero, cleared in straight approach."

"Skull Two Zero Zero, roger," Blake called. She reached the marshall point and turned towards the carrier. To her surprise, she wasn't remotely frightened. She was angry. I'm going to land this fucking airplane or I really am going to ram the landing gear struts up our asses.

"Skull Two Zero Zero, call the ball," the LSO radioed.

"Two Zero Zero, Tomcat ball, 600," Blake replied tersely. She could see the carrier; the cloud base had lifted some.

"Two Zero Zero, you are low." Blake climbed slightly. "Power." She advanced the throttles. "Too much." She pulled the throttle back. "You're doing fine, Two Zero Zero. Hold what you have."

"If we bolter, punch out," Blake told Terri.

"Got it."

"Up a bit, Two Zero Zero." Blake pulled back the throttle just a hair. The basket was flopping against the canopy, distracting her. She tried to ignore it and watched the ball. It began to sink. "Cut, cut, cut!" the LSO yelled.

Blake saw the carrier rising to meet her, and slammed the throttles forward—but then she felt the wheels hit the deck, and the hook caught the number two wire. It instantly deaccelerated the Tomcat, and Blake pushed the throttles back. The nose stopped short of the end of the angle deck. They were aboard. Blake pulled off her oxygen mask and laughed in sheer exhiliration. She raised the hook and followed one of the deck crew off the landing area. They were halfway to their parking spot when the engines died.

"Captain Blake Belladonna, reporting as ordered, sir."

"Lieutenant Oscar Pine, reporting as ordered, sir."

Richard Jaeger looked up from his desk at the two pilots. He smiled. "Good to see you both. That was one hell of an airshow you two put on." He looked past them. "Where's Lieutenant Suul?"

"She went to sick bay, Commander," Blake answered. "She thinks she might've wrenched her back. We did come down kind of hard."

"You got aboard, that's what counts." Jaeger grinned. "And then there's this guy, who not only traps on his first try, but caught a three wire." The third arresting wire was what pilots aimed for; it was the sweet spot, the wire set to best stop the aircraft.

"Sorry I had to dump the tanks, sir," Oscar apologized. "I couldn't get the hose to reel back in."

"That's fine, Lieutenant. They put those tanks on so quick, they probably would've come off when you trapped anyway." He leaned back in his chair. They heard the catapults fire from further forward on the carrier—the Reagan had finally cleared the storm, and now a new BARCAP was being launched. Jaeger found that very ironic. "Where did you learn that toboggan trick? I read about that in a book about Vietnam."

"A friend of mine had to do it, sir. She was losing fuel and a KC-135 towed her back home."

Jaeger nodded. "Lieutenant Rose or Captain Xiao Long?"

"Lieutenant Rose, sir."

"Uh-huh." Jaeger looked at them both squarely: the tall Faunus girl, the slightly shorter human boy—Oscar looked much younger than he was, like a farmboy playing fighter pilot. Jaeger had to remind himself that the "boy" had more kills than anyone else in VF-41. "Lieutenant Pine, I had a talk with Commander Simon with your bunch over there at '41. We were thinking about letting two crews hit the beach early, fly off here and land at Jax a few days before we tie up at Mayport. I think you two earned it today. Feel like taking the flight in a few days?"

Oscar smiled. "Yes, sir!"

Jaeger noticed Blake was silent. "Captain?"

"Sir, permission to speak freely," Blake asked.

"Go ahead."

"Is this a reward…or are you just getting rid of us early?"

Jaeger's eyebrows rose. "Captain, most people would have offered to blow me for a chance to get back on solid ground a few days before we tie up. Especially after being at sea for six months with only one liberty call—which you didn't take. Now why would you ask that question?"

"You know why, sir."

Jaeger paused, then looked at Oscar. "You still want the flight, Lieutenant?" Oscar nodded. "Then dismissed. Go tell Commander Simon. We'll get the orders typed up by tomorrow, if CAG approves." Oscar came to attention, then left. He whispered something as he did so, and shut the door behind him. "What did he say, Captain?"

"'Keep the faith', sir."

"Uh-huh," Jaeger said. "I imagine that got said a lot at the court-martial."

"Yes, sir." Blake's ears—both sets—burned with the memory.

"I'll be honest with you, Blake," Jaeger said. "I didn't want you in this squadron. You know that. The only reason you were assigned to VF-84 was because your old CO at Pax River said you were the hottest Tomcat pilot since Snort Snodgrass. The Navy didn't give me any choice anyway. No one wanted to be your RIO, because you had a doubly bad reputation—not only from that court-martial, but also because you were former White Fang. Luckily, Terri Suul volunteered—Faunus kinship, I guess. You two proved you were a good team. God knows you proved you're a damn fine pilot tonight."

"She's a good RIO, sir."

"One of the best in the squadron." Jaeger got up and walked around the desk. He looked her in the eye, his tousled black hair reaching the same height as her ears. "Blake, I don't know what you did in Poland. I do know what you've done since you've come aboard. I judge you by that standard, not by what some Air Force puke decided six months ago. God, you've got, what, 40 kills?"

"50, sir."

"Damn. I've got ten, and I was the highest scorer on this boat until you showed up. And you've got a Navy Cross." Jaeger smiled. "Blake, there's no hidden punishment in that offer. You've proven yourself. No one in this squadron is going to say anything about preferential treatment. Six months ago, yes, but not now. Understood?"

Blake finally smiled back. "Yes, sir. Thank you, sir."

"Yeah, well…don't let it go to your head." Jaeger went back and sat down. "I can't make that letter of reprimand go away, Blake, but even if they force you out of the service—which would be fucking stupid—I can at least make sure you go out with a commendation of some kind. Okay?"

"Yes, sir."

Jaeger stared at her for a few seconds longer. "Good. That's settled. Now get out of here, you bum." Blake's smile widened. She turned to leave the stateroom. "One last thing, Blake," he said as she went to open the door.

"Sir?"

"Terri didn't go to sick bay, did she?"

Blake hesitated. "No…no, sir. I didn't mean—"

"Why isn't she here?"

Another pause. "She's thinking about turning in her wings. I'm going to talk her out of it."

"I see. Well…a mission like tonight. God knows I'd be tempted to turn mine in too." Jaeger nodded. "Tell her she's going ashore with you. That might cheer her up a bit, give her something to think about."

"I apologize for lying—"

"For covering your RIO?" Jaeger shook his head. "Nothing to apologize for, Captain. Just don't make it a habit. I'm not Ironwood. I'll just throw you over the side." Blake opened the door, and he stopped her again. "And one more thing, Captain."

"Yes, sir?" Blake wondered if there was another shoe to drop.

"Take a Hollywood shower. Both of you. I think you've earned that, too."

Blake chuckled. "Sir, I wholeheartedly agree."

AUTHOR'S OTHER NOTES: I am deeply indebted to Stephen Coonts' book "Flight of the Intruder" and Mark Vizcarra's online documentary "Tomcat Tales" for inspiring Blake's chapter. This mission is based loosely on one flown by F-14 crew Tom "Pager" Page and Rick "Rico Suave" Jordan. CDR Jaeger makes reference to "Snort" Snodgrass-which would be Dale Snodgrass, regarded as the best F-14 pilot ever, and the inspiration for Maverick. (Sadly, Snodgrass flew west in 2021, after a plane crash.)

In the real world, VF-84 was long gone by 2001-the Jolly Rogers became VF-103-but this is a different story. VF-41, or more properly, VFA-41, was in the Super Hornet by this time. Readers might catch the subtle (or not so subtle) references to Robotech and Area 88 here.

So now we have Ruby getting some leave, Weiss heading out, Blake and Oscar headed for the beach...which just leaves Yang, flying F-15s at Signal. What's she up to, these days? That's next time, along with a cameo by another character we haven't seen in quite awhile...