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“Oh, fuck, I don't know. Eighty? Ninety? I didn't want to run out. But I can already see these are only going to last until midway through cruise, if I'm lucky. Why? Tempted to read one?”

“No, definitely not.”

“You know, I think this is one of your problems, Sara Denning. You can't even chill long enough to read a romance novel.”

“How is that a problem?”

“Allowing yourself to escape to a place that connects with your inner femininity is important to your well-being. You're gonna lose yourself otherwise.”

“What? I'm not losing myself. I don't need to read that stuff to remind me I'm feminine.”

“I think you do.”

“Please.”

“They all have happy endings, you know. A guaranteed you're-gonna-feel-good-at-the-end perk.”

“I don't need a Harlequin romance to make me feel good.”

“You need something.”

I glare at her.

“And not just that, you need … well, you need to put away your systems manuals and let go of yourself.”

“I'm not having this conversation,” I say.

“Fine,” Em says, fluffing up her pillows before scooching under the covers. “I'm transporting myself to a happy place now. Good-bye.”

Climbing into my rack, I flip the switch for the tiny light above my bunk. As it flickers and yawns to life, I cross my arms behind my head, fixing my gaze on the miscellaneous ducting and wiring snaking across the overhead. The ship vibrates, hums, churns, and whines, but not loudly enough to block the sustained ringing from Emily's comments.

Allowing yourself to escape to a place that connects with your inner femininity is important to your well-being.

Not
my
well-being. I can't succeed in this world and maintain that connection. It started the day I entered the Naval Academy, when I began a journey I had never intended, stepping onto a career path carved for someone else. To survive, the walls went up. And to get to where I am now, they stayed up.

I shift my focus to my stack of journals. If I did need an escape, I certainly wouldn't find it here. The pages don't contain a lot of pleasant thoughts. But then, that's silly. Why do I need an escape? I don't need that.

Maybe a letter home? It would be easy enough. My
ü
ber-practical mother pre-stamped a box worth of envelopes so I would write to her—physically write, as in nothing electronic—insisting a letter means more if it's handwritten.

My mom … I miss her. I've lived away from home for eight years, but for some reason, when floating on a hunk of steel in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with nobody who “gets” me, the loneliness becomes acute and nostalgia reigns. I miss my dad, my old bedroom, movie nights, my dog, my cat, green leaves—colors in general—home-cooked meals, and walks in our tree-lined Minneapolis neighborhood. I also miss the simple things—things you take for granted until you're isolated on a ship at sea—like taking a drive, ordering out for pizza, and even shopping at the grocery store.

But most of all, I miss my brother, Ian.

I let out a long sigh, too tired to pick up the pen. Instead, I stare at my bunk light until my eyes blur and close.

 

3

A prolonged screeching rakes at my ears and my eyes fly open.
What the…?
I turn in time to see our desk chairs accelerating across the floor.

Gripping the side rails tightly, I lower myself, peeking at Em as I do so. Somehow she's sleeping through this. I find my bottom drawer where I have several bungee cords stowed, pull our chairs to the end of our bunk railing, and tie them to the support posts. There.

I climb back in bed. It's 0130.

I toss and turn and so does the ship.

I look at my watch. 0200.

It's going to be one of those nights.

*   *   *

“God, I feel like crap,” I say, foraging through my metal closet for some workout gear.

“Well, you had a busy night rearranging the furniture,” Em says, reclined in her rack, her nose in another Harlequin.

“I can't believe you didn't wake up. The chairs were sliding all over the place.”

“Didn't hear a thing,” she says, not looking away from the pages.

“Well, I'm going to squeeze in a short run before the Operation Low Level brief. I've gotta do something.”

“Actually, that got pushed back. It's at seventeen hundred instead.”

“Excellent. More time on the treadmill.”

Em rolls her eyes.

“It really does help with stress,” I say.

“So does smoking.”

“Oh god, Em, you haven't started smoking again, have you?”

“Well…”

I open my mouth, but she interrupts before I can say anything. “Go,” she says, obviously not in the mood for another lecture.

I open the door and jump back slightly. Lego stands in the passageway, his hand poised to knock.

“Whoa, sorry about that, ma'am,” Lego says.

“We didn't mean to spook ya,” Petty Officer Joe Messina adds, moving into view. Known to all as Messy, he's an Alabama-born crew chief just like Lego.

“No, that's okay,” I say, gathering myself. “What's up?”

“They need us to fly, ma'am,” Messy says. “Gotta pick up the skipper of the
Lake Champlain
.”

“But I thought
their
guys were bringing him.”

“Last-minute change, ma'am,” Messy says. “We have thirteen people to deliver to their ship, so I guess they figure since we're comin' anyway…”

“Yeah,” Lego says. “We're briefin' in five minutes.”

“Damn,” I say, my shoulders slumping. I really needed that run. “Well, if I have to fly, at least it's with you two.”

“Hey, that's just what we said.” Lego grins.

“Okay, guys, I'll be right down.”

“C'est typique,”
Emily quips as I change into my flight suit.

“Yeah. Guess I'll see you in a few.”

*   *   *

“Lace, your heading is two eight zero,” Commander Claggett says. “Champlain is at ten miles.”

I scan the vast, undulating horizon, seeking a gray hull under a gray sky on a gray ocean—the ship further camouflaged by a sea that seems to breathe, rising and falling with fifteen-foot swells. We're flying low, as we always do, about two hundred feet above the water.

En route, we pass the four other ships in our battle group, technically known as a carrier strike group—one cruiser, one destroyer, one frigate, and the aircraft carrier, USS
Nimitz
—pitching and heaving in the heavy seas. The ocean tosses the smaller ships like play toys between its massive swells, and I think once again how fortunate I am to be stationed on the
Kansas City,
a ship second in size only to the
Nimitz
.

Our ship, a replenishment oiler, is so large because it carries the food, fuel, and ammunition necessary to supply the six ships in our group, in addition to the USS
Birmingham,
the submarine that cruises with us. All total, our contingent counts about seven thousand people. But even for a mobile force as large as ours, we're dwarfed by the Pacific, a fact suddenly more relevant in weather like this.

As I search for the
Lake Champlain,
I silently curse Emily, as I often do. The nickname Lace was her brainchild, derived from her staunch and continuing belief that I need to lighten up. Wearing a lace bra and underwear underneath my flight suit would facilitate this, she said. Naturally, I took offense, so
naturally,
she told the pilots in our detachment … who told the aircrewmen … who told the maintenance guys. Now, not only does the name tag on my flight suit say
LACE,
but so does the lettering across the back of my helmet, courtesy of the parachute riggers who maintain our flight equipment.

The fun ran out of it for Emily a long time ago, so I'm Sara again to her. I still hear it occasionally from the other pilots and aircrew, but curiously, Commander Claggett uses it exclusively to address me. If he can find a button of mine to push—and this is a big one—he doesn't hesitate to slam it home.

“Sir, did maintenance have an estimate for repairs on the ramp?” Lego asks.

“They think they can have it done by tomorrow morning,” Commander Claggett says.

“Man, the air framers are gonna be up all night,” Lego says.

“Ever heard of somethin' like that happenin' before?” Messy asks. “Holes in the ramp? I know I haven't.”

“No … no, I haven't,” Commander Claggett says.

“You know, the aircrew said they barely felt it,” Lego says.

“Which is surprising when you see the size of the holes,” Messy says. “They were huge suckers—”

“All right, that's enough about the holes!” Commander Claggett barks.

Same old story. His short fuse strikes again, and this will set the tone for the rest of the flight.

An uneasy silence ensues.

And this has me worried. Normally, Commander Claggett fills transit time with aircraft systems questions, so as the minutes tick by, I wonder what has his mind occupied. Probably holes and maintenance reports and—

I see the orange flash from the master caution panel out of the corner of my eye.
Shit!
“Sir, transmission chip light!”

“Shit!” Commander Claggett says. “Lego, got anything back there?”

“Checking,” Lego says. “Mess, get the aft tranny. I'll get the forward.”

“On it!” Messy says.

“Sir, did you jiggle the light?” Lego asks.

Sometimes, this actually helps. Funny to think how many pilots and aircrewmen, despite how highly trained, or how well versed in scores of exacting emergency procedures, throw in this extra “step.”

“Stand by.” Commander Claggett reaches over and messes with the light, but it remains illuminated. “Still solid.”

“I don't have anything in back,” Messy reports.

“Oh, shit, we've got smoke!” Lego says. “Forward tranny!”

“Sir, do you want the controls?” I say. It's not a requirement that the aircraft commander take the controls in an emergency. It depends on the circumstances. But with the bad weather today and the rough seas, experience counts. Of course he'll fly it.

“No, you keep the controls,” he says. “I'll go through the emergency checklist.”

Hmm. That's odd. There's only one item for the transmission chip light emergency procedure—land immediately.

Okay, Sara, enough dallying. Just get on with it.

As I key the mic, the sleek gray hull of the
Lake Champlain
finally, gratefully, comes into view.

“
Lake Champlain
Tower, Sabercat five five, one mile to the south. Declaring an emergency,” I say.

“White smoke, sir!” Lego says, interrupting my radio call. “Fuck! And a lot of it! We need to land! Like right now!”

“Sabercat five five,
Lake Champlain
Tower. State the nature of your emergency.”

“Do you hear anything?” Commander Claggett asks.

“Nothing, yet,” Lego says.

We're listening for the grinding noises that come next—when the transmission gears begin to shear.

“Sabercat five five,
Lake Champlain
Tower. Repeat. State the nature of your emergency.”

“Shit, sir, we can't see much of anything now. This is gettin' bad!” Messy says. “And the pax are gettin' panicky.”

We call our passengers “pax” for short, and right now, we have thirteen of them in our aircraft. A wall separates the cockpit from the cabin, the two areas connected by a narrow passageway, so unless I lean far toward the middle, the passengers remain hidden from my view. They sit on bench-like troop seats that run the length of the cabin, a distance close to thirty feet, allowing them an all-too-clear view of the smoking transmission. No wonder they're panicking.

It's up to Lego and Messy to keep them calm and strapped into their seats, and it sounds like they're having a difficult time of it.

“Tower, five five,” I say between the chatter. “Transmission chip light with visible white smoke. We need to land immediately, half-mile final, over.”

“Roger, five five, your deck is green.”

The
Lake Champlain,
a guided-missile cruiser with a flight deck half the size of the
Kansas City
's, lifts and falls, disappearing and reappearing in an ominously churning sea, the water foaming white along the crests.

I spread my fingers on the control stick, trying to loosen them, to relax, but as white tendrils of smoke begin to weave their way into the cockpit, my grip tightens, my stomach twisting into a hard knot.

“You're a hundred feet above the water,” Commander Claggett says. “Ninety knots on the airspeed.”

Just keep it steady, Sara. Focus on the horizon. Not the water. The horizon.

The smoke is getting bad now. What was initially wafting into the cockpit is now rushing in. I wish I could open my window, but I can't take my hands off the controls. I shift to short, shallow breaths, bringing my tongue to the roof of my mouth to act as a barrier. Next to me, Commander Claggett shakes as he coughs, hand over his mouth.

“Okay, ma'am, lookin' good,” Lego says, keeping a calm voice even though I know he's inundated with smoke. “A hundred yards to the deck.”

The smoke is swirling and I move my head side to side to find an opening. Oh my god. The smoke has just obscured everything. Shit! I move my eyes to the gyro, the one instrument that can tell me if I'm flying level. My hands slip inside my gloves, slick with sweat.

“Kyle…? Kyle, I can't see,” I say. My voice sounds like someone else's. Monotone. Too calm.

“Just keep it smooth like you always do, ma'am,” Lego says. “I'll be your eyes once we're over the deck. We can do this.”