not enough

4 - not fast enough

And just like that, Goose was dead.
Ice was shot suddenly into shock. Slider could barely make himself stand up.
Maverick... Ice didn't know.
Maverick was just a few metres away and as many doors as needed from where he and Slider sat, most likely in complete shock, being treated for whatever injuries he may have sustained through the flat spin and ejection. That much, Ice knew of. Anything else, like how it had affected him mentally already, he didn't have a clue.

"How..." Slider whispers.
Ice stares at the tiled floor under his feet. He didn't have an answer for his RIO.
The both of them were still dressed in their flightsuits, helmets sat together on the spare chair between the two of them.
Neither of them know how long they sit there in the simple, brownish-beige waiting room of the base hospital in silence for, but a nurse soon suggests they get home, rest up there.
Ice can't make himself move.
"Ice, hey," Slider says, putting his hand on his shoulder. "Hey,"
He traces the dark brown grout between the tiles with his eyes. It was the simplest pattern he'd seen, especially compared with his childhood home where everything was ornate and had as many different colours as whatever it was could get.
"Kaz," Slider says again, trying to get his attention. "Let's go home,"
"I wanna go see Mav," he whispers.
"We're not allowed, he's in shock,"
"He's lost his RIO. I want to,"
Slider swallows. His throat clicks. "I know, but, at least come get changed first, please?" He holds out his hand.
Ice takes it wordlessly and Slider pulls him to his feet.
"You can come back if you want,"

He does exactly that.
Now dressed in one of his most comfortable hoodies, comfortable because it was just a little too big for him so he could hold on to the ends of the sleeves, and jeans. The nurse was the same one who had told him and Slider to go home, and he doesn't have to say all that much to her for sympathy to ripple across her face and guide him to where they'd put Maverick for the night.
The door to Maverick's room four was shut, as expected.
Tom looks down at the handle. Inhales. Holds it. The metal was cold. Turns it.
He sniffs as he opens it and looks around the silent, air-conditioned to freezing point, room.
Maverick was there on the other side of the room, facing away from him, his head bowed. He looked so... small. It was unusual, seeing him in such a subdued state, even from this much of a distance away.

Ice registers the door clicking shut behind him as he enters the room. The nurse hadn't followed him in, so he thought that she could probably tell it was best to leave the two rival pilots alone on a night such as this. He steps closer to Maverick's hunched form, carefully, he didn't want to startle him.
"Mav," he whispers, sitting slowly down on the bed near to him.
Maverick turns his head towards him like like he had a crick in his neck. His eyes were bloodshot, equally empty and grief-stricken, his face strangely pale beneath the mess of his salt-ridden black hair.
"Come he-"

Ice doesn't get a chance to finish his sentence before Maverick has buried his head into his shoulders, beginning to cry like Ice only had to sit there to break down the feeble wall that acted as his floodgates.
His throat seizes up, he was suddenly full of awful, unbottled emotion, and hearing Maverick, the confident and reckless pilot sobbing so openly against him, it switched something either off or on deep inside of him. So deep, it feels like he'd never received what he was about to give him. Iceman gives him one of the few things he knows how to give.
A hug; wrapping his arms so tightly around him.
"I'm so sorry," Ice murmurs, shutting his eyes to hide his own hot tears spiking the corners of his eyes, holding onto him as he broke into pieces in his arms.
Maverick was shaking, shivering like he'd been standing outside during a blizzard that so frequently blew over the mountains in winter.
The neckline of his hoodie was damp but hot from the tears leaking from Maverick's eyes, pressing into his skin alongside his hair. He didn't mind.
It wasn't as if he was going to tell Maverick to pull himself together and get off him. He didn't think he could.