Jean (paper_roses) wrote in artofwar_rpg, @ 2011-03-23 20:23:00 |
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Entry tags: | {backstory}, †haylie collins; spitfire, ♦charles xavier; professor x, ♦hank mccoy; beast, ♦scott summers; cyclops |
Who: Scott Summers and Professor X's Rescue Team--Jean Grey, Haylie Collins, Hank McCoy, and Logan. [NPC cameo by Professor Xavier]
What: Scott destroys his bomber and crew, and tries to survive the crash, badly injured and with eyes shut.
When: August 23, 1961, Starts at 8:44am to 11:30am CST - continues from that time
Where: 120 miles east bearing slightly north of Galveston, TX and north to shore to swamps south of Deep Lake in Rockefeller State Wildlife Refuge and Game Preserve near coast of Louisiana
Rating/Warnings: R. Will note violence and death and deep emotional stresses of an highly injured man.
Status: Closed; Complete. Part 1 of 2
Start: Red Eye Flight
(Bomber Team Final Training Flight Over Texas and Shoreline of Louisiana)
Lt. Scott Summers, USAF
"So, what are you planning for graduation, Scott?"
Scott grinned back at his engineer. Jeb Bettany had been the top graduate in Aeronautical Engineering at the Academy, and has been Scott's roommate during junior year. They were friends, and had even dated twins together two years ago. "I'm going to the big party in Houston, the one near the Space Center. Got nowhere else I'd rather be. But I'll be on the phone for a while. My foster parents wanted me to call. I think they're sending me some money, or something. They're pretty proud."
"Good for you, pal. I'll wait and drive you. I'm in no rush. We can figure out where those coeds from Phi Mu live, since they aren't in the house on campus?"
Scott chuckled. "You already checked?"
"You know it! That blond is sweet and the redhead has a thing for you, Red-Eye." Scott was checking instruments and delayed in his response.
"Yeah, I think you're right. About both. If we can find them, let's take them out for dinner before the party. Hey, check engine three. We're jittering."
"Right, Pilot. I'm on it. And we'll have a blast."
Captain Vasquez spoke rather drolly. "You boys have got to land this thing, before I upcheck you, so remember that instead of planning your romantic conquests."
Scott's copilot, Daniel Maxson, kicked in with a comment. "Jittering stopped. What did you do, Jeb?"
Jeb turned to look at both of them, clapped each of them on the shoulder. "We had a clogged fuel line, and I bled it and pumped it to get the air mix right again. I don't think it will happen again. But we'll flag it for maintenance."
Scott turned back around, and gave him a high sign. "You are one cool engineer, Lieutenant Bettany." And then his vision swam red, and he saw his friend blown backwards, smashing through the engineering board, pulped against the instrument panel, ground to pieces, and then his face blown off. Smelled burning, electrical arcs. Heard everybody going off, all at once, at HIM. Alarms, claxons, the fire warnings. It had suddenly become a madhouse in the big bomber flight deck.
He heard their instructor, Captain Vasquez. "Mother Mary! Scott, stop it. Dear God, stop it!!"
He looked at Vasquez, now, and whatever had happened to the engineering board and to Jeb happened to the Captain, too. He tried to shout again, but he was thrown back out of the control area and into the bomb bay, the areaway shattering, cutting him in bursting bits that threw red blood that Scott could barely see through the red haze. "Danny! What the hell is that?"
"That's YOU, Scotty! Close you eyes, close them!"
What did he--? Scott swept around, and saw the instrument panel in front of him, the glass of the cockpit, all blow away. Glass shards came back from the periphery and cut him, cut Danny. Danny screamed. "No, Scott! Close your eyes! Or I'll have to hit you. Close your--"
Hit me? thought Scott. He saw the chaos blowing the nose of their bomber into bits. "I don't--"
And he saw the movement, as his copilot, and friend, rose with the emergency axe, and came at him.
And was blown to pieces, along with the sidewall of the cockpit. Scott just stared at him, and watched, and heard the plane beginning to break up. Only one command station, Danny's, has not been utterly destroyed. His crew, his instructor, all dead. And he had barely been touched.
And then it struck him. Only where he was looking, a path of destruction. He closed his eyes.
And it stopped. Sort of. Too much damage had been done. The air was whistling through the craft, and fires were going, things were creaking and snapping and breaking away. He heard one engine go out, and realized there was nothing he could do to stop a crash. Everything was smashed, and if he opened his eyes to pilot, he would kill himself.Still, he moved to the other seat, and sat there. The stick sort of worked, some of the instruments might still function, but he could not open his eyes to see them.
As the plane dipped, then careened downward, he worked his hardest to level it out. Hit the proximity switch. If he got too low, he'd know it just a second or two before he crashed.
Scott could barely breathe, but the plane was descending. Soon that would be different. For now, he needed compressed air. He fumbled Danny's mask on, strapped it in place and it delivered what he needed. He could breathe again.
He worked by instinct, the way he had learned to do in a crisis in the cockpit, keeping his eyes closed, afraid to take even a brief look. He felt a pressure in his skull, too, like nothing he had ever felt before. He realized it had started a second before he had killed his best friend.
Scott felt numbed, but he still struggled with the plane. By now, they would be over the sea, with heavy seas from the recent storm. But if he turned back they might crash into a civilian area. If he could get her nose up, what nose she had, he might hit the water softly enough that the plane would not break to bis, and tear him up as he had torn up three other Air Force aviators.
He got the nose almost level when he heard the proximity alarm. At that moment, his head cleared. He knew what he was, a danger to everybody he ever knew. A murderer, maybe even a monster.
Scott changed his grip for a high descent angle, Kept it going, his grip firming up. A death grip, he realized. Nobody else was going to die because of him. He never even felt the airplane hit the water.