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"OKAY, LISTEN. JUST BE COOL." MAVERICK ADVISES.

"If they knew who we were, we'd be dead already." He continues, bringing his hand to his mask, watching the bogey level out beside him. Another bogey swerves up to Archer's left. "Well, here they come."

"What's your plan, guys?" Rooster questions further. Archer brings a hand to her own mask, clicking it into place as she tells the two, "Just put on your masks." She watches as Rooster does so, latching his mask into the locks, looking in her direction for a bit with panic in his eyes. She simply nods, eyes closing for a brief second, before opening them back, turning to the sky.

"Remember, we're on the same team." Maverick points out, and Archer nods, calling out for them, "Just smile and wave, boys, smile and wave." She does so for the bogey on her left from beside Maverick, hand waving back and forth as she nods with her cheeks pushed upwards into a smile, which was more of a grimace.

The enemy pilot waves his hand back and forth horizontally twice, when Rooster asks in shared confusion with the other two Captains who kept on with simplistic waves of their hands, brows furrowed as they tried figuring out exactly what the bogeys wanted them to do, "What's that signal? What's he saying?"

Maverick places his left hand on his helmet, Archer continues to wave at the bogey, and the older man gives a simplistic reply that clears it out, "Yeah, no idea, I have no idea what he's saying."

Archer shakes her head at the bogey who keeps on with the same gestures. Then, he points the numbers three, three and nil. "What about that, any idea?" Rooster continues questioning. Her brows furrow, was the bogey asking them to follow them to some coordinates?

3, 3, 0.

"Do you think he's asking us to go somewhere? Some coordinates, maybe?" Archer mentions, and Maverick seems to agree, "Yeah, maybe, Arch. But we can't follow 'em. What do we do?" Just then, both bogeys swerve to the side before levelling out, and Maverick warns, "Oh, shit. His wingman's moving into weapons envelope."

Archer turns her head to see the bogey by her side fall back beside his own wingman. She curses under her breath, and Maverick cuts in, turning his head to Rooster behind him, "Alright, listen up. When I tell you, you grab those rings above your head. That's the ejection handle."

Rooster looks in Archer's direction, who shares a quick glance with him before she looks at Maverick when the young pilot asks, "Can we outrun these guys?"

The older man's quick to answer, finding Archer's panicking eyes, "Not their missiles and guns." It was a long shot. Probably extremely heavy dog fighting for the slightest chance of survival.

Rooster speaks the thought on everyone's mind out, "Then it's a dogfight." Archer shakes her head, replying as she feels his gaze on her, "An F-14 and F-22 against fifth-gen fighters?"

A simple response, enough to move both front-seaters from Rooster, "It's not the plane, it's the pilot."

Archer takes a deep breath of consideration. If her and Mav would Maverick and Archer these two, then they had a definite chance. But there could be a price to pay. Bradley.

"You'd both go after 'em if I wasn't here." It was true. They'd go after them. But it was different this time. Faith tells him in a voice that seemed like the depiction of fear, "But you are here."

"C'mon, guys. Don't think. Just do." Archer closes her eyes, taking in a deep breath.

A call for her angel goes out in her mind, and she whispers it out, "Talk to me, Ice." A sudden chill runs down her spine, and an invitation to adrenaline and determination is accepted as she opens her eyes.

She turns her head the second her eyes snap open, inverting over the bogey as Maverick turns around to fall behind another. She falls back, right behind the aircraft that had been by her side two minutes ago, turning on guns and blazing out rounds with a press of the red button.

Maverick is calling out for his back-seater loudly as they continue twisting to their sides consecutively, "Tell us when you see smoke in the air!"

Archer swerves up behind her bogey, trying to catch missile lock on him. The circle and square are millimeters away from perfect alignment. In frustration, she utters, "Come on, come on, come on..."

There's tone, there's tone, there's tone....

"Smoke in the air! Smoke in the air!" Rooster's yells are heard in her ears, and a panic settles in when Maverick tells him, "Hang on!"

Archer's missile hits, and the bogey goes down hurling with the wind.

"Yeah, guys! Splash one, Splash one!" Rooster encourages, and Archer smiles, but the happiness drops when she turns back around on tone on her radar. Another bogey was making it's way right behind them, and they needed to act fast.

She hears tone on her, as she warns to her boys, "Here comes another one!" Archer pulls the yoke to herself with a tight grasp and the force of both her hands, ascending higher and higher by the second. From behind her, Maverick follows on her trail, ordering his WSO, "Rooster, flares! Now, now, now!"

The flares are successful, capturing the bogey in their trap and blowing it up in flames. Maverick warns Rooster, noticing Archer do the same before he does it, "Splitting the throttles," The pedals are pushed to an equal, throttles half at either sides, Archer continues his saying, turning her head behind to meet her uncle's eyes. "Coming around!"

Maverick is first after the bogey, calling out encouragement to the aircraft, as Archer wings out by his side, trying to capture tone herself. The older Captain gets tone, and Rooster encourages, "You got him, Mav!"

When he shoots the shot, the bogey seems to invert vertically, missing the missile barely, but perfectly. Rooster voices out the thought on everyone's minds, turning to look at the bogey as they fly right beside it and ahead, "Holy shit! What the fuck was that?"

Distracting herself from the bogey, Archer calls out for the other two, "We gotta get low, Mav!" The other Captain is quick to agree, and both of them fall down towards the terrain, in hopes of letting the nav system of the fifth-gen confuse itself and the person flying it. They invert, pushing the yokes forward as they fall low towards the green terrain.

Mav is right beside her when they fly between two mountains, heart beating even faster when Rooster announces, "Here he comes!"

For a few seconds, there was nothing. No smoke.

Then, guns.

Back to back, consecutive rounds of ammunition are fired at the two aircrafts flying ahead and beside each other. Unable to see clearly behind her, Archer asks, "Talk to me, Rooster! Where is he?"

"He's still on us!" Rooster replies, before they barely miss hitting a waterfall, droplets forming a cloud for brief seconds as they pass by.

Archer feels a jerk hit the jet, turning her head behind as she swerves the curve between the mountains, eyes widening when she sees yellow lines on fire right there. "We took a hit! We took a hit!" Rooster voices out and Maverick curses, "Damn it!"

The young man suggests, "Come on, guys, do some of that pilot shit!" Maverick warns in a rough tone, "Brace yourself!"

Both Captains share a glance that lasted two seconds, Maverick bringing up his hand in a fist, opening it. She understands what he means, pulling the cover open beside the throttle and pushing the wings out.

The bogey flies right below the two, as they continue ascending higher and higher, grunting at the sudden forces on their chests and heads. Archer pushes the yoke away from her, and the jet beeps at the sudden notion, falling into a free fall for a few seconds. She feels her stomach ascend, just as Rooster curses rather loudly once again, "Holy shit!"

They fall straight low, back into the terrain, right behind the bogey. Maverick tells Archer from ahead of her, "I've got tone, I'm taking the shot."

The missile leaves, but the bogey opts to deploy flares, the shot lost. They fly horizontal to the terrain, and at the sight Archer curses, "Damn it!" Maverick gives another warning as they level out beside each other, "Out of missiles, switching to guns." He takes the shot, throwing out multiple rounds after one.

Archer throws out another missile on tone, but misses when flares catch onto it. She looks down at the radar, seeing just one other missile available. A feeling settles in her chest.

On the yoke, she flicks a switch, shifting to guns herself and adding to the blaze that Maverick kept throwing in the way of the bogey ahead of them. They finally hit a few shots, and Rooster calls out, "You got him, guys!"

"It's not over yet." Maverick replies, both Captains letting out more rounds consecutively at the aircraft ahead. She looks down at the count, seeing just sixty-six rounds left. Archer takes a heavy breath.

Sixty-six rounds and one missile.

"One last chance." She calls out, head jerking to the side and meeting Rooster's eyes for a brief moment, smiling slightly when she sees him nod and say, "You can do this!"

Looking back at the bogey, they continue shooting at him, finally hitting him with multiple rounds.

Archer smiles when she sees the enemy eject out of their seat and into the sky not a few seconds later, jet hitting the side of the mountain low.

"Yes, Splash two! Splash two!" Archer takes a deep breath of relief at Rooster's words, head falling down, before she looks to the side at Maverick, speaking out, "Not too bad, old man." Her uncle gives her a sly smirk, flying over and out of the green terrain and over the clear blue water.