Loyal, Brave, Strong (Bradley Bradshaw)

Chapter Five

After a brief moment of silence where all but 5 pilots were looking between us curiously Admiral Bates cleared his throat and continued on, "While Captain Mitchell will strictly be teaching, Captain Theseus will be flying this mission with the pilots chosen".

Admiral Bates then walked off to the side and stood with Admiral Simpson and after looking at me with curiosity Mav went and stood at the podium and I stood just behind him to the right.

"The F-18 NATOPS, I'm sure you all know it front to back", Mav started and after a few words of agreement from the pilots he threw his in the bin and said, "So does the enemy".

This made everyone sit up straighter, I could sill feel Brads eyes on me but I was just looking straight ahead of me not knowing what I would do if I looked at him for too long.

"What they dont know is what you can do, so we're going to be testing you, see what you can do, find your limits and push beyond them", Mav continued.

After that Admiral Simpson called for the pilots to gear up and told them of the hard deck of 5,000 feet.

Once all the pilots left to get suited up ready to fly, I could see Mav looking at me hoping I would explain what just happened but instead I walked up to both the Admirals and asked, "Could I speak to you both privately".

They nodded and lead me to Admiral Simpsons office where they both walked behind the desk and I stood in front of it, Admiral Simpson then said, "I assume this is about Lieutenant Bradshaw".

"Yes, I thought you should both know that I have been in a", I paused for a moment not knowing how to explain what we are before I settled on, "relationship for coming up to 3 years".

"Will this effect the mission in any way, should we remove Lieutenant Bradshaw from this mission training?", Admiral Simpson asked.

"No sir, this won't change my judgement on the mission or the pilots chosen for the mission, I just believe it is something you should be aware of", I said truthfully.

"Very well, thankyou for telling us, we will keep an eye on the situation and if we believe you become biased, we will remove him from the mission", Admiral Simpson said before dismissing me.

When I walked onto the tarmac, I saw Mav and Brad in what appeared to be a heated conversation so I walked over to them, when I got to them I gave Mav a look which he saw and then walked over to his jet after one last glance at Brad.

Once I was sure he was out of hearing range I looked up at Brad to see he was already looking at me.

"Well, that was a bit of a shock, are you upset?", I asked him.

"No, I'm just shocked as well, I didn't expect you to be here, be a pilot", He said truthfully.

"Does it change how you see me, how you feel about me?", I asked curiously.

Even though we have never defined our relationship we both had strong feelings for each other.

"Defiantly not, if anything it's made those feelings stronger, you now understand me better, has it changed how you see and feel about me?", He asked.

"No", I said with a small smile of my face and a slight shake of my head.

"Are you still coming to stay with me tonight or would you like to stay on base now, I completely understand if you want to stay here instead now", I ask.

"I'd still like to stay with you, if that's ok", He said.

"That's defiantly ok", I say with a smile before I close the distance between us and wrap my arms around his neck, he quickly responds by wrapping his arms around my waist and pulling me closer, we just bask in each others presence for a moment before we let go of each other with a smile and walk to our jets.

After a quick conversation with Mac on what we were going to do for drill, Mav, Payback, Fanboy, Rooster and I were in the air about to start a cat and mouse drill.

"Good morning aviators, all you have to do in this drill is shoot one of us down or survive for 5 minutes", Mav explained the drill we had set up.

"What if we don't?", Fanboy questioned.

"Then we shoot back", Mav responds.

"How about we put some skin in the game, whoever gets shot down first has to do 200 push ups?", Payback challenged.

"That's a lot of push ups", Mav replied, looking over at me with a smirk, knowing they were getting themselves info doing 200 push ups.

"They dont call it an exercise for nothing sir", Fanboy said.

"Alright", Mav paused for a brief second before making eye contact with me to see if I was ready to which I replied with a nod, "Lets turn and burn, flights on".

The second he said that he took off between the two jets, me following shortly after before breaking off from him to get a higher view of what was happening, Mav was in pursuit of Payback and Fanboy so I kept an eye out for Brad, when I saw him getting ready to move in to protect them I quickly started flying to where I knew he was going, pushing my jet as fast as I could go, when I cut him of I heard him through the radio exclaim, "Holy Shit", before he quickly pulled up so he wouldn't hit me, after that I quickly moved my jet to follow him, I heard over the radio that Mav got Payback and Fanboy just as I got tone on Brad.

"Sorry Brad, that's a kill", I said to him before moving to be next to Mav where we all went down to the runway to land and get the next team.