PART 2: The Woman in the Cockpit Had Flown Before
The hangar shook violently.
Fire crawled higher across broken steel beams.
Smoke thickened.
Emergency alarms screamed through the chaos.
But inside the cockpit—
everything narrowed.
The woman’s blue eyes scanned the controls.
Fast.
Precise.
Like muscle memory had never left.
Hydraulics—
weak.
Fuel—
barely enough.
Weapons—
half dead.
She exhaled slowly.
“Still breathing,” she muttered to the aircraft.
Outside—
soldiers stared through smoke and flickering red lights.
Nobody moved.
Nobody understood.
The battered A-10 wasn’t supposed to fly.
Not after the missile strike.
Not after the fire.
One mechanic shook his head in disbelief.
“That bird’s dead…”
Then—
the engines roared louder.
Alive.
Hungry.
The woman flipped another switch.
Hands blackened with grease.
Completely steady.
Like she had done this a thousand times.
The frantic soldier stepped closer to the cockpit.
Rain from broken sprinklers dripped across his bruised face.
“Lady!”
He shouted over the engine noise.
“You even know what you’re doing?”
She looked down at him briefly.
Expression unreadable.
Then calmly—
“Better than the people who grounded me.”
The soldier froze.
“What?”
She ignored him.
Eyes forward again.
Then suddenly—
a terrified voice shouted from deeper inside the hangar.
“Incoming!”
Everyone turned.
Outside—
through burning wreckage—
dark shapes moved across the night sky.
Fast.
Too fast.
Enemy aircraft.
Three of them.
Closing in.
One soldier’s face drained of color.
“Oh God…”
Another shouted,
“We don’t have air defense!”
The woman stared through the cockpit glass.
Silent.
Watching.
Then quietly—
almost disappointed—
“They sent kids.”
She grabbed the radio.
Static cracked.
Dead channels.
Then—
one weak signal.
A nervous voice.
Control tower.
Destroyed.
Barely functioning.
“You can’t launch!” the voice yelled.
“Runway’s gone!”
She glanced ahead.
The hangar doors half collapsed.
Debris everywhere.
Flames.
No clear exit.
Impossible.
Outside—
missiles streaked across the sky.
Closer now.
The soldiers began running.
Panic spreading.
The frantic soldier looked back toward her.
“You can’t take off!”
The woman tightened her grip on the controls.
A faint scar near her wrist caught the flashing red light.
Old.
Military.
Forgotten.
Then slowly—
she smiled.
Small.
Dangerously calm.
“Didn’t say I needed a runway.”
The engines screamed louder.
She slammed the throttle forward.
The A-10 lurched violently.
Metal groaning.
The entire hangar shook.
“What the hell is she doing?!” someone screamed.
The aircraft surged ahead—
straight toward the burning debris.
Straight toward the collapsed wall.
Then suddenly—
a soldier near the fuel station froze.
Eyes wide.
Recognition crashing across his face.
“No…”
He stepped closer to the cockpit window.
Heart pounding.
Because he had seen those eyes before.
Seen that shark-mouth jet before.
Years ago.
Before the mission that killed an entire squadron.
Before the military declared her dead.
His voice barely came out.
“Phoenix…”
The woman heard it.
Didn’t look back.
Just whispered quietly—
“They should’ve left me buried.”
Then—
the A-10 blasted through fire and steel—
straight into the storm-dark sky.
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