PART 2: “Please come with me. Immediately.”
Mara unbuckled her seat belt and stood.
Every eye in that section of the aircraft followed her as she walked toward the front of the plane. The green sweater, the tired face, the deliberately ordinary appearance all seemed to fall away at once.
She was not just Mara anymore.
She was Captain Dalton.
And she was about to find out why a transatlantic flight needed a combat pilot.
The cockpit door opened, and Mara stepped into a world she thought she had left behind.
The captain and first officer were both still in their seats, but their body language told her everything before either of them spoke. The captain’s knuckles were white on the controls. The first officer was pale, sweat beading on his forehead. Across the instrument panel, warning lights flashed red and yellow in a chaotic pattern, blinking and beeping across the dashboard.
The captain glanced back at her.
In his eyes, Mara saw something she recognized immediately: the look of someone who knew he was out of his depth.
“You’re the combat pilot?” he asked.
“Yes, sir. Captain Mara Dalton, US Air Force. Retired.”
She stepped closer to the instruments.
“What’s the situation?”
The captain exhaled sharply.
“We’ve lost partial control of our flight systems. Autopilot failed 20 minutes ago. We’re flying manual now, but that’s not the worst part.”
He pointed to the radar screen.
Mara’s blood ran cold.
There was another aircraft on the display.
Close.
Continued on the next page
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