periphery, nineteen more Viper hulls fall away. Something goes fuzzy in my brain as I watch my control dissolve. My formation flies on, cut by two-thirds, holes torn in its former perfection. This can’t be happening. Why is this happening? Sure, Seely hates me, but how in any system’s hell did he convince nineteen of our classmates to ruin my drill? There’s no way the bitter little rutter has that much clout.
My heart rate doubles, my mind reeling as I try to inventory which fighters have fallen back. At my left, I spot the glint of sunlight off a Viper’s nose—Gal’s Viper. He’s still with me.
“This is Wraith One. Form up on me,” Seely announces.
“Seely, what the hell is going on?” I shout, wrestling with my controls. Another spin of the gyros flips my Viper around, pointing me at the stray flock as I continue to sail backward in what’s left of my formation.
They’re shifting into an arrowhead. An attack pattern. My mouth goes dry. This isn’t disobedience. This isn’t just to stick it to me. This is something more. Something worse.
“Gods,” Gal whispers over the comm. “Not now. Not…Ett—”
Seely’s voice overpowers the line, full of authority I never suspected him of possessing. “Wraith One, authorizing weapons free.”
Every lesson I’ve ever had about leadership under pressure crystalizes in my mind. “Gold One, evasive action immediately,” I scream at what’s left of my fighters. The Vipers split like they’ve been cleaved by a knife.
All except for Gal, who bolts across the black with no regard for pattern, for order, for any sort of direction that might save his ass.
Something in his brain has gone animal. Not the pack-animal mentality you sometimes slip into when you’re flying in formation. No, Gal’s just doing everything in his power to run.
“Heavens and hells,” I swear, twist out of formation, and take off after him. The comms go live with confusion, the other pilots uncertain whether they’re supposed to follow me.
Above the chatter, Seely’s voice comes through loud and clear: “This is Wraith One. Shoot to kill.”
I throw everything I have into the engines as the vacuum around me comes alive with the flash of boltfire. Gal swerves erratically, and my heart leaps into my throat as one of the bolts skims his Viper’s wing. I hazard another glance at my instrumentation. Watch as the twenty defectors point their arrowhead directly at Gal’s retreating tail. Not at the remaining nine Vipers holding formation as they flee across the black.
Just Gal.
“What the rut do you think you’re doing?” I seethe through my teeth. I watch Gal on the instruments, my face heating with fury as another burst to the engines drives me deeper into my seat. This isn’t the Gal I know—the Gal I’ve known for years, the one who pranks the senior staff, who struggles to keep even the most stalwart ships flying steady, who doesn’t fear anything the way he should. Something’s terribly wrong.
My calm evaporates into the vacuum.
I flip a switch on my radio controls, activating every distress beacon on my dashboard. “Base, this is Gold One. Twenty of my squad have…They’re not following orders, and they’ve turned on one of my pilots. They’re shooting to kill. Requesting—”
I hesitate. I shouldn’t hesitate—the whole point of the academy is training me to act when the situation is dire. I twitch my controls to dodge another round of boltfire that streaks across my Viper’s nose.
“Requesting ground support and awaiting further instructions,” I conclude. The Viper rattles around me as my engines max out their burn. I flip the radio back over to the exercise channel, where Seely’s still spinning orders to his mutiny. A note of indignation lances through my panic. It’s bad enough Seely’s trying to kill Gal, but with the single line available between our ships, everyone has to listen to him do it.
“Gold One, the rest of you go to ground,” I shout over Seely’s noise.
“Wraith One, split it. Let’s cut him.”
The drumming starts as a single beat, a single hand slapping a dashboard, the noise big enough to fill a