Work Text:
Silence. I stare at the wreckage. Unbidden, tears form, carve their jagged paths, glistening silver scars crisscrossing my face.
The silence breaks. The world fades back in. Beeps and shouts and cries and smoldering flickering ashesdustflamesruin. A gentle bump; my leg stiffens. I look down, a single worried eye peers back. A face coated in grease and blood and fire, mirroring my own. I pull myself to my feet, turn away from it all. But the heat still presses against my back, reminding me.
I am a leader, a commander, a pilot. And what is a pilot without his ship?