Skyborn The Divine

16: Rescue

Alice struggled to understand why on Earth she should be so uncomfortable flying in a plane.

The Black Swan was a marvel of modern engineering. It was as subtle, elegant, and comfortable as it was durable. The stealth cargo plane was propelled by six cutting-edge jet engines. Yet, the matte black metallic skin of the craft muffled the high-pitched SCREEEE of the machinery so much that the people on board were hardly aware of it.

But even with the sound insulation, the advanced technology, and even the alloy airframe that made the Black Swan capable of surviving crashes and airspeeds that would rip any military-grade plane to ribbons, Alice couldn't help but feel as though she were plummeting out of the sky in an iron cage.

It was made all the more embarrassing that Alice was fully aware that she, more than any other passenger on the Black Swan, was supposed to be at home in the sky.

"Just breathe," said Ethan with a smirk as he watched her lean against one of the portholes. "They say you're more likely to die in a car accident then in a plane crash."

Alice tried to settle the fluttering in her stomach. She tried to glare at him as soon as she heard his laughter but seemed unable to tear her eyes away from the view outside. She would have been willing to do about anything to be out of this clumsy metal bird and out into the open sky.

"Shut up, Ethan!" she growled. "This isn't funny!"

"It is a little funny," he chuckled.

"No, it's not," someone interrupted. "It's sad."

Alice turned her head and saw Priscilla. She walked past the two of them without sparing either of them a glance. She was dressed in her combat rig, a hissing, whirring mechanical frame that attached to the outside of her body glove, making her roughly as strong as a bear.

"You're a flying metahuman who doesn't like to fly," she said with more than a little disdain. "You don't have the training or the discipline necessary for a mission like this. And worse, I have to rely on the both of you. So, yeah. Not funny. Just really sad."

"Give her a break, Priscilla," said Ethan in Alice's defense. "It's her first time out. I've seen her train. I think she's going to be fine."

Priscilla looked at him with a venomous smile.

"Beaker, you're no better. Your assessment of her ability is worth less than nothing to me."

She walked away towards the weapons locker. Alice and Ethan let her go without protest.

"Don't listen to her," said Ethan as soon as Priscilla was out of ear shot, "or any of them. They think they can tell us how to do this job because they have military training and tech and stuff. But they'll never be as naturally gifted as us, will they?"

Is that what this team is made of? Alice thought to herself, Us and them?

Alice had begun to win some modicum of respect from Athena, but Joshua and Levi still seemed indifferent towards her, and Priscilla treated her with outright contempt. She wondered what it would take to earn the trust of the rest of Meta Team, as well as just what kinds of problems she'd run into until that happened.

Ethan stood, no longer in his pajamas, but dressed for the field. It was a simple black shirt, the sort worn by the rest of the RaTS, but with the long sleeves rolled back so that she could see the thick, corded muscles of his arms. His pants were a dark gray, as were his boots. His hands were fitted with custom-made black gloves laced with high-tech fibers and circuitry.

Alice, too, was dressed and ready for the mission, Priscilla's criticisms notwithstanding. She was once again in her high-tech body glove. She also wore a black and gray jacket worn by many of the security specialists. Her uniform, like Ethan's gloves, was also made of circuitry and fibers designed to work in tandem with the team's computers and equipment.