Casual Affair

Fourteen

It had been two days since I saw Bradley and Sienna kissing and I had been beside myself. I refused any calls, texts, and even house guests. In a desperate attempt to make sure I was breathing, Natasha would knock different patterns on the shared wall of our duplex and I finally gave in and replied with a knock.

Luckily that had been enough because after that, I was left alone for the remainder of the weekend. Unfortunately, Sunday decided it wanted to be against me with the rest of the universe because it flew by, forcing me to see Bradley and everybody else at work on Monday morning.

In an effort to hide the swelling on my face from all of my crying I had been doing, I wore my aviators that Mickey had gifted to me the Christmas before but they could only hide so much.

Rather than find my normal seat towards the front of the briefing room, I hid in the back seated beside Brigham.

"What's with you?" He questioned.

"I'm hiding," I replied simply, sinking down into my seat, crossing my arms over my chest.

Though Brigham and a few of the others hadn't been part of our extremely tight knit group, he was a very well liked, respectable guy and I knew that he saw what had happened on Saturday at the Hard Deck. Honestly, I'm sure everyone saw because Sienna had always loved being the center of attention and that made it that much harder for me.

"Good morning, Daggers."

My brows pulled together as I noted that it had been Admiral Simpson standing at the front of the room instead of Mav.

"Do I have quite the job for you all today," he continued and I sat up slightly. "The Air Force has already scrambled jets for this issue but the Pentagon wants all of you up in the air providing support and to keep your heads on a swivel for any suspicious activity you may see up there."

"I'm sorry, for what issue, sir?" I asked as I sat up fully.

"NORAD has noted several unidentified objects in our airspace that they need an eye kept out for," he replied.

"Oh, thank god," I sighed.

I looked up and Admiral Simpson raised a brow in question at my response.

"I am so ready for E.T. to come and take me away," I replied which earned soft laughter from many of my squad mates. "Hopefully they're hospitable."

"You know they aren't those types of UFO's that I'm talking about, lieutenant," Admiral Simpson replied with a chuckle, shocking me.

"Oh, come on admiral. A girl can dream, can't she?" I replied and Brigham playfully elbowed me as we all stood up to get dressed.

"Lieutenant Cain?"

I turned to see where Admiral Simpson had called to me and my brows pulled together.

"Yes sir?"

"This team is yours today," he replied.

"Yes sir," I replied with a small smile. "Thank you, sir."

Though odd, it almost seemed like Admiral Simpson making me team leader was an apology for what had happened with Sienna but I couldn't be too certain.

"Ryder!"

I tightened my jaw hearing my name being called and I knew immediately that it had been Bradley.

"Go away," I groaned as I got to my locker and grabbed some of my extra gear.

"Ryder, c'mon," Bradley said as he leaned against the locker beside mine. "Just talk to me."

"What's there to talk about? Sienna saying she'd like to see me six feet under? Or when you two were kissing in front of everyone?"

"None of that was my fault," Bradley replied. "I didn't ask her to kiss me. She saw you coming back in and grabbed me before I could even do anything."

"Right. Well I can promise you that's far from what it looked like but you don't have to worry too much about it because anything between us is done. I was an idiot to think that we should've given anything a second chance."

I slammed my locker shut and pushed past Bradley to walk out to the runway where our planes were fueled and ready.

"Dagger one up and ready," I called out over comms, only for Payback to answer. 

"Dagger two up and ready."

As the others got into their planes, Reuben, Mickey, and I taxied and got into the air, shortly followed by Brad, Natasha, and Bob. The others got into the sky not long after and we all made our way over the pacific, careful to not stray too far outside of American airspace.

Ever since our mission, NORAD kept finding things within our airspace to include foreign aircraft that we assumed was spy craft of sorts but none of it had been concerning. If anything, it was disappointing that I wasn't about to be beamed up, especially after the weekend from hell that I had but I wasn't that lucky. I was never that lucky.

"Daggers five and seven, you all see anything up north?" I asked as my eyes scanned the horizon.

"All clear up here," Coyote replied. "You all have anything down there?"

"All clear. Looks like the Air Force took care of whatever they pinged," I replied with a yawn. "Never any fun for us these days."

"Well they knew E.T. wanted you so they sent him on his way. You're too needed down here," Mickey encouraged.

"Maybe I'll keep you," I replied with a smile before noticing one of my gauges wavering before a slew of red lights began to flash within the cockpit. "Shit."

I began to climb in altitude so that I could problem solve but all of my gauges were spinning. No fires, no bird strikes, and no reason why I should be in engine failure but somehow I was.

"What's wrong?" Payback questioned as he, Bradley, and Nat all climbed with me.

"I'm in engine failure," I explained, the entire panel of the cockpit glowing an angry red color.

I wiggled my joystick around only to get no response from any of my controls and I knew that I was screwed.

"I have to eject," I called out. "Mayday, mayday, mayday. This is dagger one requesting support. I am in engine failure and am ejecting."

I heard Mickey give my coordinates over comms and I braced myself as I ejected from my jet. Ejecting was the easy part. The scary part was not knowing what was swimming in the ocean below as I was forced to wait for help.

Maybe Sienna would get her wish after all.