"Time is your greatest enemy," Maverick says seriously.  The aviators were spending the first part of the day being briefed on the first part of the mission and then trying to fly it for the second half.  As Mav explains how dangerous this mission is, Razor takes a deep breath, while taking notes.  None of them had ever faced anything like this before.  It was nerve-racking.  Even Hangman, who sat beside her, had nothing to say about the mission perimeters, which seemed impossible to fly.

Sophie looked back at Rebound with wide eyes when Mav said that their altitude would be no higher than one hundred feet and airspeed would be six hundred and sixty knots minimum.  His knee was shaking uncontrollably, his tell that he was just as nervous as his pilot.  The speed was one thing, but staying under one-hundred feet too; it was a lot to take in for Sophie.

The anxiety was running rampant through the room as the briefing finally finishes up and the first group got ready to try out the course through their nav system.  Sophie stays quiet, staring at the clock in front of her.  Three minutes.  Two minutes and thirty seconds on the day of the mission.  That was all the time they had to fly through the canyon and precisely drop the bomb on their target.  There was no room for error.  If someone slipped up and made even the tiniest of mistakes, a SAM could take them out or a bandit could intercept them.  One wrong move and the mission would fail.  One wrong move and someone wouldn't make it home.

Sophie feels a nudge on her arm, bringing her out of her thoughts.  "Hey, don't stress too much.  You're a great pilot.  You'll be fine," Hangman reassures.

She nods her head, giving him a small smile.  He's right.  Don't stress.  You haven't even tried to fly the course yet.

Once Hangman leaves to get ready to fly his course, Razor and Rebound go over some strategies for their upcoming run.  Rooster would be their team leader for this exercise, so communication shouldn't be an issue.  They came to the conclusion that as long as Rebound kept his eyes sharp and let Razor focus on the pilot shit, then they should be good.  This course was tough, but it had to be achievable. 

When they were finally up in the air to run their simulation, Rooster started off slower than she expected.  This is a time-sensitive mission, after all.  He was the team leader though, so she followed his lead.

It was when they hit the two-minute mark and they were way behind schedule that she and Rebound started getting frustrated.  "Rooster, we're twenty seconds behind.  We need to increase our speed."

"We're fine.  Speed is good," he replies to Razor's backseater.

Razor kept looking at the timer quickly ticking down.  They needed to move now or else they would fail.  "Rooster, we're not going to make it on time if we stay at this speed.  Increase to five hundred knots."

Rooster could hear the slight irritation in Sophie's voice but had no time to think about it.  He was flying the mission the way he believed to be the safest for everyone on his team.  "Negative, Razor.  Hold your speed."

Razor bit her lip as she made another sharp turn.  The pressure on her body was making her anger amplify.  "Rooster, we're late," Rebound speaks up for her, sensing her frustration.

"We're alive," he says, a matter of factly.  That's all he cared about.  Keeping him and his team alive.  Keeping Sophie alive.  "We'll make up time in the straight away."

"We're not going to fucking make it, Rooster," Razor yells out.  "Bandits will intercept us if we don't increase our speed."

"Just trust me.  Maintain your speed.  We can make it," he ignores them once again.

***

They didn't make it in time.  Sophie was pissed off.  She aggressively takes her helmet off and walks with Rebound back to the classroom they were in.  "What the fuck was that," he asks.  They walked right past Rooster without even batting an eye in his direction.

"That was us dying up there," she says through gritted teeth.  Razor hated to fail and she hated it even more when it wasn't her fault.  She didn't understand why Rooster wouldn't listen to them up there.  She and Rebound practically begged him to increase the speed and he refused to listen.

Rooster looks at the retreating figures confused.  They had finished the course.  They were alive and yet, they were still angry.  He knew that they made it later than what was required, but it was better than running head-first into a canyon.

Razor slumps into her chair, ignoring all the stares she receives from her fellow recruits.  Most of them knew it was better not to mess with her when she was angry and if they didn't know, they figured it out quickly.  Hurricane Razor was just tipping the edge and begging to come out.

Hangman also knew this, but he didn't care.  "What's your problem," he asks from beside her.  His mood was shockingly neutral for someone who had also failed their run.

"Not in the mood," she didn't want to play twenty questions with him, especially when her foul mood had to do with Rooster.  Hangman would never let it go.

When everyone had finished their first run and was back and seated in the classroom, Mav went through each group's simulation to highlight where they went wrong.  "Why are they dead," he asks the first group.

Phoenix and Coyote both explain what happened while they were in the air and why they'd be dead.  They didn't communicate well, causing Phoenix to break the three-hundred-foot ceiling.  Maverick was not impressed with either of them.

"Is there a reason you didn't communicate with your team?"  His question is directed to the team leader.

"I was focusing on-," Coyote tries, but gets cut off.

"One that their family will accept at the funeral," Maverick asks without flinching.

Shit.  The tension is high, but these are conversations that need to be had.  These are thoughts that should be going through everyone's minds as they trained for this mission.

"None, sir."

After asking the same question to Phoenix, he moves on to Hangman, Payback, and Fanboy's attempt at the course.  The double-seater jet ran into the canyon, making the mission a failure.

"What happened up there," he asks the second team.

Hangman had no problem answering.  "Well, I flew as fast as I could.  Kind of like my ass depended on it."  Confidence exonerated the man, even though they failed the mission.

"And you put your team in danger and your wingman is dead," Rooster speaks up.  Sophie rolls her eyes at the man.  They always had to throw digs at one another, trying to assert their dominance.  She hoped after all these years that they'd be able to shove their rivalry up their ass for her sake, but nothing has changed.

"They couldn't keep up," he smugly answers.

"You're acting like even more of an ass than usual today," Razor mumbles to the man beside her.  He ignores her and sticks with his answer.

Maverick moves onto team three's simulation and it makes Razor's blood boil watching the simulation of their jets on the screen.  "Why are you dead," he questions Rooster.  "You're team leader up there.  Why are you, why is your team dead?"

Rooster looks at Maverick, wondering why he's been called out.  They made it to the target alive.

The air is thick when Phoenix picks up her head to speak.  "Sir, he's the only one who made it to the target."  Razor rolls her eyes.  She knows that Phoenix is trying to help to ease the tension, but Mav is right to question Rooster.  They had failed the mission.  They would have died.

"A minute late," Their instructor glances at the ground before looking back at Rooster, "He gave enemy aircraft time to shoot him down.  He is dead."

"You don't know that," Rooster argues back, not ready to back down.  He wasn't going to allow Mav to make him out for a fool. 

"You're not flying fast enough," Hangman stresses, "You don't have a second to waste."

"We made it to the target," he tries to convince Maverick and now Hangman too.

"And superior enemy aircraft intercepted you on your way out."

"Then it's a dog fight."  Rooster's back sits straight up, ready to take on Maverick.  He wasn't planning on backing down.

The conversation starts to feel a lot more personal.  It's as if they've forgotten they're in a room with at least a dozen other people.

"Against fifth-generation fighters," he asks incredulously to the younger pilot.

Rooster looks at Mav, trying to stay sure of himself.  "Yeah, we'd still have a chance."

"In an f-18," Maverick's voice rises.

"It's not the plane, sir.  It's the pilot."

"Exactly," he shouts.

Oh shit.  The room is silent for a minute.  They could hear a pen drop on the ground if they wanted to.  Sophie forgets about her anger for a moment and looks to Rooster.  It was a slap in the face to hear Mav say that out loud.  "There's more than one way to fly this mission."

"You really don't get it," Hangman speaks up again.  Sophie drops her forehead in her hand.  This is never-ending.  "On this mission, a man flies like Maverick here or a man does not come back," he looks over to Phoenix, "No offense intended."

"Yet, somehow, you always manage," Bob pops his head over to say.

Razor would've laughed if it weren't for their current situation.  Nothing about this was funny.

"Look, I don't mean to criticize; you're conservative, that's all."

"Lieutenant," Maverick warns.  He clearly doesn't know Jake.  Jake doesn't stop until he's pissed off every bone in someone's body.

"We're going into combat, son, on a level no living pilot's ever seen.  Not even him," he looks towards their instructor.  "It's no time to be thinking about the past."

Razor sharply looks over at Hangman.  He knows.  "Jake, don't say another fucking word," she says so only he can hear.

"What's that supposed to mean," Rooster takes the bait.

"Don't fucking say a thing," Razor grabs onto Hangman's arm, but he pulls himself out of her grip.

"Rooster," Mav tries to detour him.

Hangman looks at the man, "I can't be the only one that knows that Maverick flew with his old man.  Or that Maverick was flying when his old man-,"

"Lieutenant, that's enough."

But it's too late.  In the blink of an eye, Rooster is out of his seat and heading for Hangman.  Everyone else in the room quickly follows in suit in an attempt to break up the two before it led to a physical altercation.  Rooster gets one good shove into Hangman before he's pulled back by Maverick, Bob, and Phoenix.  "You son of a bitch," he yells out to Hangman.

Hangman is held back by Payback and Rebound, but he nudges them off.  "I'm cool, I'm cool.  He's not cut out for this mission."

"That's enough," Maverick tries again, but it's no use.  He has lost control of his trainees.

"You know it," Hangman says to Maverick and then makes slight eye contact with Sophie.  He was trying to prove a point to her and she was not happy about it.  "You know I'm right."  Jake walks past Rooster, making sure to stare him down before exiting the room.

"You're all dismissed."

***

After the shit show of a training day they had, Sophie takes a long hot shower in the locker rooms.  She was irritated with how their simulation run went, but she was even more pissed at Hangman for what he said.  She was also tired of the conflict between Rooster and Hangman.  She dealt with it all through the academy and flight school and she was over it.  They were both very important people in her life, so she didn't understand the constant need to one-up the other.

Once she finishes her shower and gets dressed, Sophie makes her way outside where she sees Jake getting ready to leave.  They were the last two in the parking lot, so she walks up behind him and angrily shoves him against his truck.  "What the hell was that?"

He gently pushes her off him, "I'm not doing this with you."

"Like hell, you aren't.  That was way out of line, Jake.  You know that.  You don't bring up a man's dead father like that.  What the fuck were you thinking," she yells at him.

"You wanna know what I was thinking," he turns around to get in her face.  "I was thinking that if that was the mission today, then you'd be dead.  He would've gotten you killed."  He stares into her eyes, face void of emotion, but venom dripped from his words. 

"Well, it wasn't."  She crossed her arms, still angry with the man in front of her.  He crossed the line when he brought up Rooster's dad.

"Look, Soph, I know I went too far today, and I'm sorry for that.  But you need to see that he's not cut out for this mission.  Not with Maverick as the instructor.  He's too caught up in the past and you needed to see that."

"All I saw was you making an ass out of yourself.  Rooster can handle himself," Sophie assures him.

"He hasn't proven it once yet."  His eyes meet hers and the cocky pilot exterior melts away for a moment.  "Sophie, you're my family.  I can't lose you.  I can't lose anyone else in the sky."  He blinks back the slight mist that was forming in his eyes and covers it up.  Sophie was the only one that knew who Jake really was.  Everyone else knew Hangman and while Jake had many of the same qualities as his pilot alter ego, it wasn't the real him.  He put up walls that he didn't want people to tear down.  There was more to him than anyone knew.

Sophie sighs, "Every mission has its risks," she takes a moment before responding.  "But I know in your own twisted way, you mean well.  And I also know that you know you fucked up today."  She was still very annoyed with him and the situation between Hangman and Rooster.  It was growing old and tiresome.  "You need to make things right with Rooster.  I can't deal with this rivalry much longer.  It takes too much out of me.  And I won't choose between the two of you."