(It’s time to drop… let’s fucking go!)

---

“Entering atmosphere, on target for DZ Juliet in fifteen mikes,” Blue said over the ops channel so both her aircrew and the legionnaires loaded in the back could hear.

Tension wound up her spine and across her shoulders, tightening her muscles to the point of pain, but she kept her hands light on the controls as she guided the Rhino into the optimum reentry angle. Her gaze flicked from the flightpath projected on her helmet’s HUD to her instruments and back out the cockpit in a practiced rhythm. Sweat trickled down her back and dampened her undersuit, and she dragged in measured breaths of the slightly metallic oxygen mix pumping into her helmet.

It wasn’t that the drop wasn’t going well. Her skills hadn’t rusted all that much from her extended leave, and she was actually happy with how quickly she’d fallen back into flying. No, it was because while her dropship commander Captain Makenna “Twister” Latham sat in the left seat, she’d assumed the copilot duties and placed Blue as pilot in command for the sortie. It changed nothing from their mission planning session but for one key detail—the command-and-control decisions were in Blue’s hands.

Blue wasn’t stupid. She understood the more experienced pilot was prepping her for her upgrade ride, but a little warning would’ve been nice.

Maybe that was the point.

Twister, only a few years older than Blue but with silver already threading through her white-blonde hair, verified their course.

“Entry angle checks good,” Twister said crisply before she switched over to the airspace control channel and made the appropriate comm calls to get clearance.

A tremor ran through the tough assault shuttle as they slipped into the upper atmosphere, and Blue firmed up her grip on the controls. Another, harder tremor hit, and she grinned as the vibrations rattled her bones. She was so damn grateful the Legion had long ago done away with those annoying—and highly ineffective—AI cockpit systems. Nothing more than decision tree matrixes, most AIs couldn’t handle the rapidly changing environment of a combat drop. And the ones that were advanced enough calculated the odds and refused to drop.

Only humans were dumb enough—brave enough—to do the job right.

Blue’s tension fell away, all of her focus given over to flying her ship. No time to worry about any simulated EPs Twister might throw in to trip her up, no time to stress over being in command. The only thing that mattered was the feel of her ship beneath her hands and completing the drop safely.

They were shedding altitude a touch faster than Blue wanted, and she pitched the nose up to bring their airspeed back within the target range. A glance at her scope verified Bravo Five was still in formation several hundred meters off her right wing, and she briefly wondered if Killi was flying the drop or if Captain Wanda “Witch” Sanderson had it.

“Airspace Control cleared us to DZ Juliet,” Twister said as an alert pinged on their weather radar. Bright green outlined an alarming amount of yellows and reds, indicating a rapidly building storm system off the coast. The older woman arched her brow. “And they passed along an advisory on that thunderstorm.”

Blue felt the weight of the other pilot’s gaze as she rapidly assessed the unexpected weather and its projected path. If she did nothing, the edges of the storm would brush up against their route by the time they were over the ocean. While the Rhino could handle a little rain, lightning and atmospheric turbulence were another matter entirely—especially when it was avoidable.

“Adjust our flightpath so we’re approaching the DZ from the northeast and update Bravo Five.”

Twister smiled and bent her head over the console, her fingers dancing over the screen. A few seconds later, a new flight profile flashed in Blue’s HUD.

“Bronze Raven Five, Bronze Raven Four, transmitting updated profile due to anticipated weather,” Twister said.

Blue verified the flightpath would keep them well clear of the vicious storm and turned the Rhino onto the new heading. The second dropship followed.

“Bronze Raven Five, updated profile acknowledged,” a low contralto voice purred over the comms as the second dropship followed their lead.

Blue grinned.

If Witch was on the comms, Killi was flying.

Twister waited until she’d leveled the wings and resumed their steady descent before she traced one finger on the weather radar scope.

“What would you have done if the storm was tracking in this direction instead?”

“RTB,” Blue said immediately.

If the storm was going to hit the DZ, there was no point in continuing the drop. The system was too big, too slow rolling to clear the area quickly, so going into a holding pattern to wait it out wouldn’t work. Returning to base (RTB) was the only proper course of action.

Twister nodded as if she’d expected that answer, flipped on the cargo compartment camera, and pushed the feed to the auxiliary viewscreen. Fifteen legionnaires, including one undersized, underaged newbie, were strapped in. Most were relaxed, a few looked as if they were napping, and only one or two seemed nauseous. Tavi’s expression was stoic, but she noted his white-knuckled grip on his straps and couldn’t tell if he was nervous or excited.

“And if they were on the ground, operating in hostile conditions, and needed an immediate extraction?” Twister asked quietly.

Blue hesitated. Risk the ship, risk her aircrew, risk her life . . . or leave the legionnaires high and dry. Like any other aircraft, the ASL-71 Rhino had published regulations and standards for safe operations.

Those regs went out the cockpit during combat ops.

Her gaze locked onto Tavi’s painfully young face, shocked all over again at the resemblance to her brother. Her hands tightened on the controls, and she had to let out a slow breath before she could soften her grip once more.

“We’d get them out.”

The silence stretched between them, and Blue’s gut clenched. Had she gotten it wrong?

And then the corner of Twister’s mouth curled up.

“Good answer.”

---

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Missed the previous snippets? No worries, I got you covered.

• Snippet 21
• Snippet 20
• Snippet 19
• Snippet 18
• Snippet 17
• Snippet 16
• Snippet 15
• Snippet 14
• Snippet 13
• Snippet 12
• Snippet 11
• Snippet 10
• Snippet 9
• Snippet 8
• Snippet 7
• Snippet 6
• Snippet 5
• Snippet 4
• Snippet 3
• Snippet 2
• Snippet 1