Davis glanced back at her and took in the green sweater and the travel-creased clothes and the woman who did not match the word he had been praying for.

“You have military flight time?” Yes, Maya said.

“What airframes?” F-16s, she said.

He hesitated, and she did not blame him for the hesitation; she would have had it too.

“When were you last at the controls?” Eighteen months ago, she said, and watched the disappointment cross his face.

“I need current proficiency,” he said, “not memories.”

She might have argued, but the airplane argued for her.

A vibration came up through the floor of the deck, not the random buffet of weather but something rhythmic and wrong, a shudder with a pulse to it, and she saw his hands tighten on the yoke to fight it.