Breathe in

Three... Two... One.

Keith tapped his foot impatiently as Mr. Harris called names for the simulator. Apparently, there was a new simulation. Some of the next-year cadets had been talking about it, and Mr. Harris had finally given into Lance's demands that they be allowed to fly it. Mr. Harris was calling them up in groups of three- next year, your flight group wasn't like the flight groups that they'd had for so long. Keith was assigned with two girls—he should really learn their names, they'd been in the same flight group for a while now—and the wait seemed to be taking forever.

Finally, "Kogane, Keith."

"You're the pilot," the girls immediately told him, and delegated the roles of engineer and communications officer between them.

Keith sat down in the pilot's seat, his hands finding the controls as they always did. Words flashed on the console in front of him.

A shuttle crashed. Find and rescue the survivors.

Keith nodded to himself. Simple search and rescue. They'd done these before. The surface of a moon appeared in front of them, and Keith's hands tightened on the controls. That was the surface of Kerberos. He'd seen it in enough pictures.

"Whoa, steady," his mechanic warned, and Keith realized that he was diving towards the surface of the planet.

"Sorry. I thought I saw something."

A voice crackled over their intercom. "Hello? Is someone there?"

Keith's veins turned to ice. That was Shiro's voice coming out of the coms, Shiro's voice that they were using for a stupid training drill and—

Simulation failed.

"Oh, great going, Kogane," his communications officer snapped, "You nosedived right into the surface! What were you doing?!"

Keith wasn't listening to her. He unbuckled himself, storming out of the simulator. Mr. Harris was writing notes on a little pad.

"What was that?" Keith snarled.

"Our new simulation," Mr. Harris replied calmly, "I don't design them, Keith."

Keith stormed towards the door.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"Away from you, and your stupid simulator," Keith snapped. He raged down the hallways, briefly stopping by his room to get changed out of his Garrison uniform before opening the door to the outside and sneaking into the Garrison garage. Shiro had given written permission for Keith to use his hoverbike, and Keith had no trouble getting it out. Keith drove it out of the garage and towards the lowest point of the Garrison wall. He revved the engine and drove straight at the wall at top speed.

Three... two... one.

Keith slammed on the brakes, and the bike flipped, tumbling over the wall. Keith killed the engine.

Three... two... one.he turned the engine back on mid-flip, and the bike righted itself. It's all about timing. He roared across the open desert.

Finally free.

Xxx

Iverson rubbed his temples. "You've checked his room?"

Mr. Harris nodded. "And the library. And he didn't show up for meals."

Iverson sighed. "Right. We'll check the security feeds."

Mr. Harris followed him into the camera station, where all of the security feeds were coming through. "How are you going to comb through it all?"

"We're not. We're going to make a patch. Or, more accurately, one of them is." Iverson pulled a computer engineer to the side. "Hey. We're looking for Kogane. We need a patch."