All you had to do was stay pt2
Second part to this story here.
Warnings: not much. Less angst than part one. Mentions of injuries and probably some incorrect military information.
She dug through the pile of tools, muttering under her breath as she looked for the specific one that she needed. Finding it at the very bottom, she pulled it free and placed her other hand out to stabilize the pile. She really needed to clean her desk.
Right now, she was working on an F/A-18, and she only needed this one tool.
None of the others littering the work station or the floor around the plane. If her CO found the hanger in such a mess, he would blow his top and she would be stuck doing whatever PT she could do for weeks.
So would get it clean. It would just have to be later, after she fixed the plane.
Scuttlebutt said that a bunch of Top Gun graduates were coming back in today and that the extra Super Hornets would need to be operational. She was to get them ready and then send them to be painted. The names were to updated for the incoming pilots, it seemed.
Further scuttlebutt implied that the great Captain Pete Mitchel would be coming back as well. She swallowed hard as his name crossed her mind.
Pete Mitchel was her dad.
But that was something else that she would deal with later, much like her messy workstation.
So she fixed the plane, letting the intricacies of the work silence her mind. Grease coated her OCPs, her hands, her face. Her only focus was the piece of machinery in front of her and above her.
So when someone walked in, hollering her name, she jumped, sending her bad shoulder straight into the wing of the plane. She cursed the semi for a moment, wincing and rubbing at the sore muscle.
“Y/n/n? Is there a y/n/n here?” A male voice called from the other side of the Super Hornet, confusion laced through every word.
She sighed. The only people who didn’t know who she was were the haughty pilots who were here for the Top Gun program and then left, to parts unknown, to pass on their knowledge. She didn’t interact with the pilots much, no matter how nice any of them were rumored to be.
She didn’t trust them, plain and simple.
She had been one of them once.
Now she was a mechanic, living on borrowed time until the Navy found out that her medical records were faked.
So when she walked around the nose of the jet, she was expecting a pilot.
But she wasn’t expecting him.
He started, and then just… stopped.
She expected cursing, anger, for him to turn and walk away, anything.
Anything other than the silence and staring that was going on right now.
She stared right back, crossing her arms. Too late, she realized that grease was stuck under her fingernails in little halfmoons. She curled her fingers in, trying to hide them.
“Can I help you?” She snapped at him. She’s didn’t have time for the one person who had made her cry in public.
Rooster blinked, hard, and then swallowed.
“Y/c/s? Is that you?” His voice was quiet and choked. He cleared his throat and then motioned toward her. “I uh, heard about your accident. With the semi.”
She narrowed her eyes at the pilot and gave him a moment before she spoke.
“Yes. But two surgeries and almost two years of physical therapy and I’m here, alive.” She indicated the plane behind her and said “I’m a mechanic now. And I go by y/n/n.” She didn’t feel like telling him that she didn’t use the call sign anymore since she wouldn’t ever be flying again.
Rooster swallowed again, nodding this time. “Of course. Makes sense. I’m, I’m just glad you’re alive. And that you don’t look too…” he gestured across his body and face and then winced.
She stared. Did he really just say that? Did he really just comment on the fact that she looked mostly normal, after all that she had been through? She clenched her fists and inhaled. A count of ten and then she exhaled.
Her temper had been a lot worse since the accident. The doctors said that some things in her personality would be different - the trauma and PTSD alone would do that to the psche, let alone any actual damage to her brain that might’ve occurred.
And this encounter was going to call upon all of the therapy sessions she had gone to since the accident.
“I, that’s not what I meant.”
“Of course not.” She sighed through her nose. “What did you want again?”
Rooster nodded. “They told me that you were the best mechanic they have.”
“I need you to look at my Hornet. Felt a little off during training today.”
Training today? How long had the pilots been in for?
How long had her dad been here?
Later, she reminded herself. Much, much later.
She shook her head and looked back up at the F/A-18 behind her. “Going to be a while. Still finishing this one.” She jabbed her thumb at it.
Rooster nodded. “That one for Yale?”
She quirked and eyebrow at him and shrugged. “I dunno. All I know is that I was supposed to get it fixed before the lot of you got here and it seems like I’m behind. So if you’ll excuse me, I’ll get back to that. And then you bring me your Hornet and maybe I can take a look at it. Maybe.”
She didn’t even know why she was agreeing to this. Most likely, there was nothing wrong with the plane, and Rooster was just not flying how he needed to.
But she remembered what it was like being up there, feeling all of the pieces of the plane working together in a harmony that it seemed only the pilot could hear.
So when Rooster agreed and then turned to walk out of the hanger, she stopped him.
“When is your next training session?”
He squinted up at the sun and answered, “this afternoon.”
“Make sure you bring your plane over after lunch then. And you’ll need to stick around so you can figure out if I fix whatever is going on.”
He nodded. Rooster still didn’t look at her, glancing down at the ground this time.
“And Rooster? Don’t hate on my work this time, ok?”
The pilot looked up at her now, a smile ghosting his lips. “Of course, y/n/n. I’m sure you’re still the best there is.”
Rooster walked away from the hanger, still unable to believe his luck. He had thought about graduation every night since then. He had nightmares of y/c/s - y/n/n - staring him down and then leaving, tears spilling down her face.
He had showed up to the hospital once, as soon as he could get leave, to talk to her. He knew about the surgeries, knew about the rehab, knew about the broken bones. But he hadn’t been able to make it past the front desk once he found out her room number. Instead he had sent her flowers, a stuffed bear, and a card that merely said “get better soon.” He wasn’t surprised that when he had mustered up enough courage to try visiting again that he saw a little boy carrying that stuffed bear out and the wilted flowers sitting in the nurse’s station.
He hadn’t tried since then.
And honestly? He had pushed the thing so far back in his mind that his subconscious still thought that she was in the hospital. Not back at Miramar, working as a mechanic. And apparently a hell of a mechanic at that.
He’d gone in thinking “y/n/n” was going to be some gangly guy with glasses.
Instead it ended up being the worst mistake of his life.
But here was a second chance, a way to repair his busted heart and their relationship. Maybe it was beyond repair, but it was worth a shot.
A tug in his chest stopped him in his tracks.
Not waiting for his chicken heart to give out again, he turned around and ran back into the hanger.
“Y/n/n?” He called out for her, hoping beyond hope that she would answer with a more pleasant expression than last time.
She poked under the plane, face hard. “Yes?”
“We’re going to the Hard Deck tonight for drinks. You should come.”
She considered for a minute.
Rooster’s heart beat in his ears, drowning out everything else.
She met his eyes and nodded. “Ok. I’ll see you there. Six sound ok?”
Rooster broke out into a grin. “Yeah. Six sounds great.
