Poison || Jake Seresin - TGM

04 | in one ear, right out the other

song for the chapter
In One Ear, Cage the Elephant

Rooster went down to the tarmac and got ready for his push-ups while Danielle and Razor went inside to listen to the next groups of people take their turns.

Soon enough the next group of losers were sent down to do their push-ups. Inside, the remaining aviators sat and listened in on the comms when it was Natasha, Bob, and Hangman's turn.

Danielle could hear some bickering between Natasha and Hangman. She walked over next to Rooster, giving him a slight nod. The two listened together as Maverick got Natasha and Bob out, and was now hunting for Hangman.

"Typical." Rooster scoffs. Danielle looks at him then turns around, walking back outside ready to meet them on the tarmac.

Walking outside, Danielle walks up to Natasha and Bob. "You were doing good for a while." she says trying to cheer them up before they had to do their push-ups.

"Until Hangman screwed it all up." Bob said rolling his eyes.
"That's just how it's going to be with him." Natasha said shaking her head.

"How it always is." Danielle sighed, walking away to let them get their punishment over with.

Towards the end of the day, everyone had taken their turns in a dog-fight with maverick. Now, he had decided to mix up the teams.

He sent up Hangman with Danielle and Razor.
As the three walked out onto the tarmac, Hangman did a light jog to catch up to the others.

"I don't trust you." Danielle says before he's able to say anything. He gives an offended look before replying.
"You kind of need to if we're going to be flying together."

Razor shook his head silently and walked ahead of them to get out of the conversation, leaving a space between Danielle and Hangman as they walked.

"What you did to Phoenix and Bob wasn't right." Danielle says, as she stops walking.
"What?" Hangman stops a step ahead of her.

"You left them, you can't do that during the mission." she looks over at Razor climbing up into their aircraft. "I know it's a drill, but you have to take it seriously."

"I tried helping them, it's not my fault they couldn't evade Maverick." Hangman says furrowing his brows.
"They wouldn't have had to if you helped from the start. Flying with me, I won't let that happen."

Hangman smirks "Suit yourself."
The two walk away from each other to opposite sides of the tarmac.

"Don't let him get in your head." Razor says as Danielle climbs into her seat.
"Trust me, I won't."

Up in the air, Danielle looks around in front of her for Maverick while Razor check the rear.
"I don't see him."

"I got eyes on him." Hangman says, seeing Maverick flying towards them. Danielle looks ahead to see him flying towards the middle of her and Hangman.

"Go left, we can circle behind him." she says looking over at Hangman. He doesn't respond.
"Hangman." Danielle says sternly.

As Maverick gets closer she starts to go right, still watching Hangman sit in place. She groans as Maverick flies past them and Hangman doesn't budge. She turns and quickly follows behind Maverick.

"Hangman come on give me backup. I can't do it alone." Danielle says flying after Maverick. "Where is he?"
"I lost him." Razor says looking out the window for Hangman.

"Of course." she increases speed in hopes to catch up to Maverick but with all of the turns he was doing it was hard to stay on him.
"Hangman!" she yells into the comms.

Maverick quickly comes to a stop when Danielle wasn't paying attention, causing her to jerk at her controls and fly above him.
"Shit. Hangman get over here, I can't shake him."

Hangman still north we're to be found, Danielle takes a few deep breaths. She attempts to evade as quickly as possible but Maverick was too fast.

"Razor, any ideas?" she says frantically.
"Nothing without backup."

"Hangman you're gonna lose 'em." Maverick says into the comms.
"Shit!" Danielle says looking back at Maverick as he flies closer.

"That's a kill."

"Damn." Danielle sighs, slowing down.

Once back down on the tarmac, Danielle and Razor had finished their push-ups by the time Hangman had landed. It was getting towards the end of the day, so Natasha, Rooster, Bob,
Payback, and everyone else that was listening to the dogfights has decided to come out onto the tarmac to talk to everyone.

Danielle was wiping her sweat when she saw Hangman walking, starting to unzip his suit so he could do his push-ups.

Seeing his face made her angry. She walked over to him, ignoring everyone else coming from inside.

"You dick." she pushes her hands into his chest. "First day back, I'm giving you another chance and you blow it. Twice."

"Woah slow down." he chuckles trying to ease the situation.

"How am I supposed to trust you on the real mission if I can't trust you in a dogfight?" she asks. "We all need to work together. But you think you're the best. That's the problem."

"I can't be confident?" he scoffs.
"Confident and cocky are very different. You're full of yourself and your skills."

"Low blow coming from you." Hangman says staring down at her.
"What's that supposed to mean?" she furrows her brows.

Natasha starts walking over, ready to break them apart before they start a fight, but Razor grabs her arm stopping her.

"You're not much better. I know you think you're the best here."
"That's not true. We all have an equal shot at this. If we work together. You on the other hand. Your confidence is out of control." she laughs. "You just emit these rays of  cockiness. You're so egotistical."

Hangman chuckles "I actually prefer the term 'self love'. Ever heard of it? You're too hard on yourself."

"Yeah how do you know?"
"I can tell how you beat yourself up about getting out first. Or getting out at all." Hangman says and Danielle takes a deep breath.

"And how can you tell? You can read people?" Danielle rolls her eyes. "I don't care what you think about me. I care that you work with us as a team."

Danielle was done. She had so much more pent up anger in her mind she just wanted to scream at him. But she knew she had to keep calm to be able to finish off the training for this mission.

So instead of yelling, she silently turned around and walked back to Natasha. "Let's go before I scream." She walks past the rest of the group to grab her things.