automatic stop, bradley bradshaw

twenty-five.

THEY WERE SOON DOWN TO ONLY ONE WEEK LEFT AT TOP GUN. SKYE, AS MUCH AS SHE openly admitted to being sick and tired of it, was genuinely terrified for what life would be like when she wasn't at top gun any longer. specifically, she was terrified of leaving rooster. 

she'd only just recently gotten her friend back, and she didn't know if she could handle losing him again. but the days were passing quickly, and she was running out of time with him. as he'd said, they were just friends. and friends had no obligation to see each other, right?

skye was lucky enough to have been close in proximity to katia for her whole life, but she figured that if they'd gone to different colleges or had different careers.. they wouldn't have had to see each other every day. they'd still be best friends no matter how much time had passed since they'd seen each other last. 

but with rooster, things felt different. the last time they'd been separated for a long period of time, they'd lost contact completely. and with him mad at her dad, she didn't think she'd be seeing him over the holidays, either. 

"riot, focus up." katia said, bringing her out of her trance. "we've gotta win this thing." 

they were attempting to work in an air to surface exercise where they would drop ordnance on land targets, testing their speed and precision in comparison to what they'd entered the program with. 

"yeah, sorry. i'm focusing." skye replied as she guided their jet through the preset hurdles in the course. they were speeding in front of payback and fanboy, who were competing with them in the task. 

fanboy groaned on the comms. "we gotta speed up, payback."

"yeah, i know." he replied, growing frustrated.

they gained speed on skye and katia, but they were already doing a spin in the air and dropping their fake bomb onto the target with help from katia's targeting system. "bullseye!" she cheered. 

skye spun around. "woo hoo!" she said, watching as fanboy and payback also landed on the target. "good job you guys!" 

the two women landed their plan on the tarmac, and were about to plan a trip to texas roadhouse to celebrate when hondo, a man that they hadn't really gotten to talk to much in their experience at top gun, jogged over to them. 

"hey, hondo, what's up?" skye asked, stopping mid stride to face him. 

he frowned. "there's a call for you, havoc." hondo said, and both girls looked at each other before turning back to him. "it's your dad." 

skye sat outside of panther's office as katia listened to him give her what appeared to be a run down of the news, and allowed her to use the phone to contact her mother. skye stood immediately when the door opened, her eyes scanning katia's face. 

"the cancer's back." she said solemnly. "it's been going undetected, and he's about to go into radiation."

"oh my gosh." skye didn't know what to do or say, so she silently wrapped an arm around her best friend's shoulders. "we can make it to california in five hours if we leave right now." 

katia shook her head. "no, i can't make you leave."

"if you want to go see him, i'm not going to make you go alone." skye insisted. 

"we have four days until we graduate. we can't be gone for two of them." katia replied.

"this is more important." 

"more important than the plaque?"

"you are more important to me than anything." skye deadpanned.

katia smiled. "if you want to go, it would really mean a lot having you there."