Work Text:
Right after takeoff, as the wheels retracted, the plane suddenly arced up. It accelerated so quickly. I had never seen a plane move like that before. [He] hit the high Gs multiple times, before disappearing into the blue. The support team couldn't even keep up. And then I knew... I understood why he didn't seem to care about anything that happened here on the ground. Of course. [His] kingdom... was the sky.
-Dr. Schroeder, Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown
"He's the fastest man alive," Hondo had breathed, awed, as they all watched the test progress. As they watched Maverick reach high hypersonic.
The map is unreal to watch, seeing that little icon speed straight over colorado, curving over half the state before he turns back northwest. It feels like it can't be real, except they have twelve different camera angles all corroborating the data on the other screen.
And then Maverick hit Mach 10, and despite the celebrating happening around him, he had a feeling-
The beep as the counter ticks up to 10.1 is damning.
"Holy shit," he whispers.
He should have known that there was only one way that this would end. Maverick wasn't stupid - he knew it was very likely this might be the last flight he ever got with the Darkstar. So of course he would push it, take it as far as he possibly could, break all the limits and set an untouchable record, sprint past 10.2, then 10.3.
The last thing they hear from the Darkstar is Maverick's quiet, "Oh, shit-"
And then they lose everything.
"Maverick!" he calls, on his feet in a heartbeat, uselessly hoping they'll get an answer.
He knows better than to expect them to regain signal, but finds himself watching the screen just in case they do.
He gives it one more moment before he rallies himself, and gets to work. "We lost him somewhere over Idaho?" he asks, looking to telemetry to confirm.
She nods, already typing up a report on a tablet.
"Get SAR up there," he says. "The debris may have spread out far, but we're looking for the ejection pod as a priority." They have to operate on the assumption that Maverick hit the eject like he was supposed to, that he wasn't still in the plane when it came apart.
He has a phonecall to make.
He'd almost let himself think that they might get through this whole project without that call being necessitated. He should've known better than to hope for that kind of luck.
Hondo walks until he's out of the building, and then he hits the contact marked *EMERGENCY ONLY (MAVERICK). He only glances at the time after he hits the dial button, wincing when he realizes it's not even 5am yet.
The call connects before the first ring finishes. "Kazansky."
"Good morning, Sir, it's Hondo," he says, steadying himself.
"What did he do?" Admiral Kazansky knows he isn't calling for fun, or to tell him about a successful test.
"We lost the Darkstar. SAR is already moving to our last point of contact to look for the ejection pod," he says.
"Where was he when you lost him?" The Admiral's voice is remarkably even for someone being told that his husband is MIA before dawn.
"Somewhere over Idaho, just by the southern border," Hondo answers dutifully.
"What happened?"
"The plane lost integrity at just over Mach 10.2," Hondo says carefully.
"The test point was Mach 9."
Hondo winces sympathetically. If Maverick's okay- well. If Maverick survived that unscathed, he definitely will not stay unscathed for long once Iceman gets his hands on him. "There was a….threat to the program," Hondo explains carefully. "There were complaints that we hadn't hit the contract threshhold yet and were going to be shut down. Maverick was confident he could fulfill the contract."
"The contract was Mach 10."
"Yes, Sir."
"Which, last I checked, is less than Mach 10.2."
"Yes, Sir," Hondo confirms.
"Did someone edit the contract while I wasn't looking?" The edge of danger in Admiral Kazansky's voice would be enough to make anyone blanch, but Hondo knows it isn't aimed at him, and it isn't the first time he's heard it.
"No, Sir."
"Why did he go past Mach 10?"
And that was the several-billion dollar question, wasn't it. "I-well. It's Maverick," Hondo offers helplessly. It's the best answer he's got.
Admiral Kazansky sighs loud enough for the sound to pick up over the call, and Hondo feels a stab of sympathy for him. "It is Maverick. Thank you for the heads up," he says. "Keep me updated."
"Yes, Sir, of course." Hondo knows most wouldn't want to reach out to next-of-kin before they even knew what had fully happened, but he knows better. There's a reason he has a direct line to Admiral Kazansky, and it's for situations like this. He wants to know first, when a shitstorm is coming his way, and Hondo hasn't let him down yet on that front.
The call disconnects, and Hondo finds himself looking up at the sky as the sun starts to rise, the pre-dawn light burning away the edges of night.
It hadn't been pure recklessness that drove Maverick on this flight. Hondo knew him better than that. His wings were everything to him, he belonged to the sky. The sky belonged to him. Of course when he was threatened with the knowledge that it might all be taken from him, he'd push as far as he could in one last blaze of glory.
He can't help but wonder if part of this is his fault, for warning him about the consequences if he didn't stop when Admiral Cain had arrived.
Still, Maverick had made the choice himself, knowing the playing field before him.
And Hondo knows -though it's a part of him he refuses to acknowledge just yet, not while they're searching for the pod still - that if this is how Maverick burned in, he'd consider it a good death. That he'd have felt it was worthwhile, even if it cost him his life.
His phone pings, and he pulls it out to see that James, the engineer on Engines who'd gotten brave with Cain, has texted him a link to some social media post. He almost wonders if this wasn't meant to be sent to him, especially with the #UFO SPOTTED hashtags all over it, before he realizes that it's location tagged in Idaho. The rain of lights with a single bloom at their origin point-
It has to be the Darkstar. Or…it was the Darkstar.
It's confirmation that the plane is in pieces, anyway.
There's no time for him to stare at the sky and ponder about Maverick's place in the heavens. They have work to do.
They will find him.
