Breaking Sky(51)

“Yes…but I’m getting a hold on it. It won’t throw me off again. I think.”

“You should chase a ghost. That’s what I do,” she said. “Although, I shouldn’t call him a ghost because he isn’t dead. Not yet.” The ease with which her father came up shocked her into continuing. “Kale says I fly like Tourn.” She shook her head. “Christ, I have no idea why I tell you things. I swear I leak truth around you.”

“I’m a third party. It’s easier to talk to people who are on the outside.”

“Maybe.” She looked down Phoenix’s narrow engine bay. It reminded her of Crackers’s heart circle or trust circle or whatever the woman had called it. Chase still wondered how they could be interchangeable. Love was one thing—a fluffy Easter bunny sort of thing—but trust was real and rare, and she believed in it. Did she trust Tristan? Could she? She barely knew him.

The question reminded her that she had one more confession. “I also wanted to apologize for kissing you in the locker room the other day. I wasn’t making a play.”

He finger-combed his hair back, and the shorter pieces broke free, brushing his cheeks. “I get that you wanted to surprise me. And you did that much.”

“I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. Especially with everyone saying that we’re…that I’m going after you.” God, this was a terrible topic.

“Who is everyone exactly?”

“Riot,” she started. “Sylph and Pippin. Kale…all the cadets who saw us spar.”

“That really is everyone.”

“You’re the one who rolled on top of me for like ten minutes.” Her ears warmed as she remembered what it had been like to be under him, his breath wild on her neck. She held her hands over her cheeks, trying to block his view of her flush. A little late, she got the impression he was reading her body language negatively.

“I’m under no illusions, Chase. I suspect that’s why you don’t like me.”

She stared at his eyes. Flame blue and so steady. “I never said I didn’t like you.”

“Is this what you do to someone you like?” He pulled up his shirt and showed off his stomach. Beyond being ripped, it was covered with purple bruises.

“Whoa. Sorry.”

He dropped his shirt but held her eyes. “Do you know what helped me get my nerves in check in the air the other day?” he asked in a low voice. “Chasing you.”

“I am aptly named.”

He grinned. “How often do you get to use that joke?”

“Not enough.” She took her dog tags off and wrapped the chain around her wrist. “I’m glad I could help you up there.” It was no use; no matter where she looked, the air was growing heavier. She could feel his eyes endlessly pulling at her. She forced a laugh. “With this much tension, we really will put on a good show for the government board. Don’t you think?”

“What I think?” He took her dog tags and ran his fingers over the imprint of her name. “I think about what will happen after the trials if Ri Xiong Di doesn’t back down. It’s all I can think about. What about you?”

“I don’t,” she lied instinctively. She stole her dog tags and jumped down the stairs. It had felt good to open up to him until this moment. If he was going to start talking about the Second Cold War, she was done.

“See you later, Arrow.” She felt herself flee inside even as she jogged out of the hangar. Guns, missiles, dogfights. Bombs.

Death.

That’s what would happen if they couldn’t find a way to make Ri Xiong Di back down. That’s what was on the other side of the trials. The sheer fact that this was not a game.





24


    BOOLA-BOOLA


   The Call for Bringing Down a Drone


The sky was an old friend. Chase spiraled through a thick cloud and into the wisp-blue of high altitude. The week hadn’t been kind. Not after a mild concussion and a fight that lingered in every word she shared with her RIO. “Ready for a little heat, Pippin?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. No snappy words. No joke.

She punched the throttle, imagining Dragon’s fiery wake. Whenever she thought about her midnight smackdown with Pippin, she felt some sort of spiky creature reposition itself in her chest. She was dying to let it out, but Pippin’s stringent lack of eye contact proved that to be impossible.

So she focused on flying. The trials were in less than two months—she had to focus.

“How’s the weight?” Pippin asked through the amped volume of their helmet mics.

“The weight?”

“The missiles, Nyx.”

Chase wobbled left and right, testing out the latest wrench thrown into the Streaker pilots’ training: deactivated missiles snuggled beneath her wings. “The drag is mild, but I still can’t imagine firing them.”

“You’ve got to learn how to aim first.”


As if on cue, Phoenix shot up from behind. Dragon’s warning alarm blared through the cockpit. Chase punched it off and flipped on the shortwave radio. “We got it, Arrow! You know how to get us under missile lock. Give me a chance to work this out!”

“I thought Nyx was supposed to be the fun one,” Romeo responded. “She’s complaining like Sylph these days.”