Freshman year, Chase had been duped into thinking that Ritz cared. She’d opened up about Janice and her solitary childhood—until the psychiatrist started to report that Chase was “emotionally unstable.” There were talks about putting Nyx on the Down List, and Chase vowed not to give the woman another ounce of truth. Which pretty much meant she’d been dodging Crackers ever since.
“Well, Chase…” Ritz looked pained in having to use half her name. “You’re ignoring my summons, so I’ll have to tell you right here. I’ve been asked to speak to you by Brigadier General Kale. He believes you are seeing imaginary jets in the sky.”
Chase, who had been trying to sneak away, stopped. It was a full-bodied brake that she felt in her chest like her harness had been pulled too tight. “Kale did not say that.”
He wouldn’t. She had flown side by side with Phoenix. Kale could command her not to talk about what she saw, but he could not expect her to pretend it didn’t exist.
To say that she had imagined it…
Chase was frozen from her eyes to her knees, and she was sure the shock showed on her face. She trusted Kale. He trusted her. Would he really sell her out like that? Was Chase about to get kicked off the Streaker project? The blood rushed to her face in a way that brought way too much breathing and a sudden headache.
Before Ritz could pipe back in, the bell rang and the hallway swarmed with cadets. “If the pressures of this arrangement are getting to you, Chase Harcourt,” Ritz yelled over the crowd, “there are options that—”
“Option this.” Chase turned her back. She blended into the uniformed crowd, a sudden firestorm in her veins. There was a jet up there. A friendly that was as fast as Dragon. Maybe faster. “And when I catch it,” she muttered to herself, “I’ll drop it off in Crackers’s office.”
7
MAYDAY
Dear God, Help Me
Chase sat in Dragon’s cockpit. She shoved her leather gloves between each finger and spun with thoughts. It should have gotten better. It all should have been cleared up by now, but it wasn’t. She’d skipped her classes and gone after Kale, and what had he done?
Walked off into a cadet-restricted section of the base, calling out “Things happen the way they need to happen.”
Well, Chase couldn’t let things happen in a way that would drag her down. Pippin had brought up Crowley’s story as a warning to keep her mouth shut. Crowley had “imagined” spotting red drones over Florida, so they took his wings. He washed out. But Chase had made out with that boy a few times—enough encounters to know he wasn’t creative enough to fabricate such a sighting. He’d seen something, and the Air Force had sold him out. That would not happen to her. She wouldn’t say a word—she would show them. Somehow.
Pippin dropped into his seat behind Chase and fastened in. “Where’ve you been?”
“Thinking.” Chase closed Dragon’s canopy.
“Sounds ominous.”
Pegasus left the hangar slowly, and Dragon was stuck behind her, rolling toward the runway a foot at a time.
Chase muttered a few choice curses. “God, Sylph makes flying look like a job.”
“Hey there, Bad Mood,” Pippin said with slight care. “Want to vent a little before you launch us into the death grip of the sky?”
The shortwave radio popped, and Chase opened the channel. “Get in the air, Sylph!”
Sylph’s voice jabbed through. “Better stay with me, Nyx. I hear you’ve been seeing things.”
Chase snapped. “Yeah, well, how are we ever going to get up there if you take five years to get to the runway?” She punched the radio link off. “How does she know?”
“Small community. Big gossip. And to think the boys’ locker room isn’t such a discreet place…” Pippin sighed. “We could park Dragon in Riot’s mouth if he held it still long enough.”
“It’s not just Sylph,” Chase admitted, with what felt like gravity swelling all around her. “Kale told Crackers that I imagined sighting a Streaker. Crackers hinted that I’m cracking up.”
“Christ on a bike, Chase.” He swore. A heavy, four-letter, rhymes with duck kind of swear. “I thought Kale was smarter than that.”
“Smarter than what?”
He ignored her. “I told you to let it go. Now it’s probably already on your record. They could give Dragon to one of the runner-up pilots for the trials.”
Was that true? Did Chase already ruin her chances to keep her spot with Dragon? If Sylph knew, the whole Star knew—maybe it was too late. Her face burned as her thoughts zoomed to the red helmet. Phoenix was the answer. She had to find a way to fly with him again. Tail him back to his base. Unmask him.
Prove he was real. That she belonged at the Star. She did…didn’t she?
She hadn’t realized she’d stopped Dragon. Ground crew looked up from where they held the huge hangar doors open, no doubt wondering what had made her stall out in the middle of the entryway.
“Nyx.” Pippin strapped his mask on. His voice came loud and clear through her helmet. “Push past it for now. We have to fly. You all in?” He said it like he was worried that she was cracking up too.
“I’m going after Phoenix.”
Pippin’s voice was urgent. Desperate. “No, Chase. Revealing the third Streaker to the Star will open up intel about it to the world. Kale doesn’t want that. They’re not ready. We’ll know more after the trials.”
“Wait.” A red-hot spark lit in her chest. “You know about this, don’t you? You knew about the third Streaker even before we saw him. Didn’t you?”
“I put some pieces together. Parts logs always showed three sets. It seemed off, so I asked Kale about it last year.”
“Last year? And you never said anything?”
“He ordered me not to say anything. Besides, he didn’t give me any real answers.” Pippin’s tone hung with panic. He knew Chase too well not to know that this wasn’t going well. He knew her too well to say what he said next. “Let it go. This is much bigger than the Nyx Show.”