Earth had been at war for over twenty years, ever since the moment extraterrestrial life made first contact and bombed every major city across the globe, throwing the world into chaos. It wasn’t long after that the Terran Alliance was founded, uniting the countries of the world against a common enemy.

The first act of the Alliance was the construction of the Mind and Matter Academy, built to train the next generation of soldiers to protect earth and its inhabitants against what became known as the Nova Forces. Those chosen for the Academy were children blessed with gifts not many possessed.

Gifts that made them more powerful in mind and body.

Of these children, the Academy had two types of Cadets: Mentalists and Defenders.

Maximus T. O’Brian was a Defender.

Chapter 1: Pilot

Out of everything Max had seen since coming to the Academy three days before, the hangar bay was, without a doubt, the coolest. The Fighters inside were just… there was no better word to describe them than awesome!

The Fighters were slick, black beasts. Some sat on the ground floor of the bay, while others hung several stories above his head.

Max had never seen a TF-45 in person before today. But it was plainly obvious why it was unofficially nicknamed the ‘Wishbone’. The forward part of the Fighter was in the shape of a U, which swept up and joined together in the back, where it met the dome compartment of the cockpit.

Without really thinking about it, Max reached out and carefully ran his hand over the soft metal. Even though the Fighter wasn’t powered on, he could almost feel the engine pulsing with life under the cold shell of the Fighter’s outer wall.

What he wouldn’t give to fly one of these! Sure, he’d flown one before, hundreds of times in simulation. But he knew without a doubt the simulations would be nothing compared to the real thing.

Max pulled his hand off the Fighter and let it drop to his side. He sighed and was about to turn to leave the hangar bay when another Cadet appeared around the corner of the Fighter and nearly ran right into him.

“Oh, sorry!” the Cadet said as he took a step back from Max and looked up from his tablet. “I didn’t see you there.”

Max laughed, shoving his hands into his pockets as he rocked back on his heels. “I kind of caught onto that. So, what’s so interesting on that thing that you almost ran me over?” he asked, nodding toward the tablet.

The Cadet snapped his fingers, a grin spreading across his face. “This is perfect!” he said. “I was just going to go looking for a Defender.”

“Oh?” Max said. “Mind if I ask why?”

“What do you think about taking one of these Wishbones up for a spin?” the Cadet asked, rubbing his hands together. “I need another hour to be able to pass my next class, but I can’t go without a Defender. The one I normally go with has a cold, and now here you are to take his place.”

“Are we allowed to?” Max asked, raising an eyebrow as he turned back toward the Fighter.

He knew he’d be training in them soon and had already started in the simulations before even coming to the Academy. But to really fly one? That was both exciting and terrifying at the same time.

“Yeah, as long as we don’t crash it,” the Cadet said, grinning. “It’s actually required to get at least a hundred hours in before graduation. Oh, I’m Harris Novak, by the way. I guess I forgot to mention that.”

“Max,” he said, giving Harris a nod in greeting. “Max O’Brian.” Max glanced toward the Fighter. He supposed he needed to train with it at some point. He might as well start now. “Alright, I’ll go with you.”

“Great!” Harris said, clapping his hands together. “Now all we have to do is get someone to give us access to one.” He dropped his tablet and let it fall to his side where it was tethered to his arm, then he glanced around, and a grin spread across his face. “Hey, Eric,” Harris called to someone behind Max.

Max turned to see another Cadet standing next to the wall working on something. The boy/young man stopped what he was doing and looked up at them. “What is it, Harris? Can’t you see I’m busy?”

“Yeah, yeah, I just have a quick question. Is this one good to go?” Harris asked, patting the Fighter next to them.

Eric sighed and shrugged. “I don’t see why not,” he said, moving toward them. “But you need me to give you access to it, don’t you?”

“Are you sure you’re not a Mentalist?” Harris asked, grinning as he stepped out of the boy’s way.

“Ha, ha,” Eric said, shaking his head as he moved over to the control in front of the Wishbone that monitored the Fighter’s systems. “Thank goodness for small miracles, like not being a Mentalist.”

“Aww…” Harris pouted. “We’re not all that bad, are we?”

Eric ignored him as he scanned his hand and then entered a code into the console. “There you go,” he said, stepping back. “One Wishbone ready for flight.” Almost as soon as he was finished speaking, the Fighter began to come to life.

It started with a low hum that slowly grew.

“I’ve got to get back to work,” Eric said, stepping back as he pointed toward the Wishbone. “Don’t crash it,” he warned, his eyes narrowing at Harris. “Alright?”

“Yeah, yeah, alright,” Harris said, waving him off as he turned toward the console.

Max felt slightly queasy as he turned toward him. “Why does everyone keep talking about crashing?” he asked. “Does that happen a lot?”

Harris laughed and shook his head. “No. these things are worth millions of dollars; no one wants to be the person to crash one,” he said, clicking away on the computer. “Or be a part of causing one to crash for that matter. Anyway, it’s not like this is your first time up in one… is it?”

Max dropped his gaze and mumbled something incoherent under his breath. When he was finished, he wasn’t sure himself what he’d said.

“Oh my gosh! It is! But… you’re like sixteen or seventeen,” Harris said, looking at him as if he’d grown a second head. “I just assumed…”

“That I had been a part of the Academy for a while now?” Max said, shaking his head. “No. I just got here three days ago. Before that I was living a normal life in a small town in the States, just waiting for the Nova Forces to attack and wipe us out.”

“Man!” Harris shook his head and turned his gaze back to the task at hand. “How high on your testing did you score that they let you join at such a late age?” he asked. “And why didn’t you take the testing when you were younger? I’m sure they would have had stations near whatever small town you were living in.”

“There was,” Max mumbled, really wishing this whole conversation had never been started in the first place. “One of my neighbors was even accepted a few years ago, but I never went to the testings myself.”

Harris frowned. “Why not?”

He could lie and tell him it was because he hadn’t wanted to become a Defender or a Mentalist for that matter, but obviously that wasn’t true, since he wouldn’t be standing there in the first place if it were. But the real answer to that question was complicated and not something he cared to share with someone he’d just met.

“I just didn’t,” Max said. “Can we please just leave it at that?”

Harris shuffled his feet and shrugged. “Sure.”

“I’ll still go up with you if you want, since I need to clock in a lot more time than the rest of you guys,” Max added with a grin. He needed to get in a hundred hours of flight time before the end of the year; that was going to be fun.

“Yeah, sure,” Harris said, glancing toward him. “And I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry. Sometimes I just start talking too much.”

Max smiled. “It’s fine. You’re not the first person to ask me, and I highly doubt that you’re going to be the last.”

“Um… yeah, probably not,” Harris said, then a grin spread across his face. “There! We’re almost ready to go.” A second later, the top of the dome of the Fighter slid back and the cockpit began to lift itself out of the Fighter, making it easier for them to climb aboard.

The cockpit consisted of two black seats, placed back-to-back to each other, with hand controllers on the armrests. Max knew from his time in the simulation that the rest of the Fighter’s flying mechanisms were still inside the Wishbone itself and couldn’t be seen from the outside.

“That one’s your seat,” Harris said, motioning to the seat on the right as he moved toward the seat on the left. “But you need to enter your code first.” He motioned to the monitoring board he’d been working on, and Max took a step toward it.

Max entered his Cadet code and scanned his hand. A second later a green light flashed across the screen, and the last of the barriers between them and the Fighter lowered themselves.

The Fighter was designed so it could only fly when a Mentalist and a Defender were inside, so if only one person had entered a code, it wouldn’t work.

Grinning at Harris, Max grabbed onto the edge of the Fighter and swung himself into the seat. The second he sat down, the safety straps instantly snapped into place over him, holding him firmly to the flight seat.

Once they were both seated, they entered their Cadet codes one last time, and the cockpit shifted before it started lowering them into the belly of the Fighter. The lights flickered for a second, then Max found himself sitting inside the cockpit of a real TF-45. The control console slowly came to life in front of him.

His hands trembled slightly as he reached out and wrapped his hands around the controllers. The metal was still cold to the touch, but he could already feel the heat coming from the engines and warming the interior of the Fighter.

The control console itself was a strange mixture of touchscreens, buttons, and physical controllers.

Max could feel the adrenaline pumping through his veins as he made himself comfortable in the soft leather seat and began the preflight check of everything, starting with life-support and going from there.

“You ready?” Harris asked, his voice coming out of the speakers built into the back of Max’s seat.

“I don’t know,” Max answered back, a feeling of unease settling in his stomach. “I’ve never done this outside of the simulation before, remember?”

“Don’t worry, it’s exactly the same,” Harris said, then he fell silent for a second. “You do know how to fly one in the simulation, right?”

Max laughed and let himself relax. “Isn’t that something you should have asked before climbing into a Wishbone with me?” he asked, grinning. “Don’t worry, Harris. I passed all of my Defender testings with flying colors, including flying. If this is just like the simulation, then I’ll know what to do.”

With that thought in mind, Max took a deep breath and readied himself for take-off. He tightened his hands around the controllers and a second later, he felt his connection to the Fighter in a way he never had in the simulation.

This was the real thing.

Max bit his bottom lip and waited. He knew since Harris was a Mentalist, his connection to the Fighter’s navigational system would be stronger than his, so he would be the one to fly the Fighter; Max would just be the copilot.

That was how these Fighters were designed.

Max’s main control was on the weapon, shielding, and counteroffensive systems. Harris’ main controls were navigation, communication, and other ones he didn’t know the names of. And since they weren’t going to be in the middle of a dog fight, Max wasn’t sure how much more help he’d be throughout the flight.

Oh well, it was still fun to be there, and he needed to log the time anyway.

Of course, their controls overlapped each other’s abilities to a certain extent; in case one wasn’t able to perform their tasks, the other could take over, and they wouldn’t die. But something like that rarely happened.

A cold, blue light flowed down from the open roof above them as someone, Max guessed Eric, opened it to let them out. The Wishbone vibrated with life as they slowly rose off the ground.

Max kept his hands on the console and helped copilot the Fighter the best he could as they lifted up and through the open roof.

After hours in the simulation, he found his part of flying the Fighter almost effortless. A small image of Harris appeared on the screen to the left of Max. He glanced toward the video and flashed his new friend a smile.

The next second the dark metal of the hanger bay was replaced by the swirling white of the world outside the Academy.

For a moment they just hovered the Fighter a couple of hundred feet above the base, taking in the sights around them.

It might be snowing, but the view was still breathtaking from up there.

“The simulations have nothing on the real thing,” Max mumbled, shaking his head as he adjusted the brightness of the viewing window. Glancing up, he bit his lip. “Are we going to break the atmosphere?” he asked. “I… I’ve been to space before, but never in a Fighter like this.”

Harris’ face lit up. “I thought you’d never ask,” he said, swiping his hand across his console and clicking away on the controllers. Max could tell from the changes on his own screens that he was readying them to climb higher in the air.

Quickly, they rose in altitude.

Within a couple of minutes, they were high enough to break through the atmosphere and enter into space. The Fighter shuddered, and Max felt his body tense, but only for a second before everything became still again and the humming of the engine became almost calming to him.

Max let out a sigh. Breaking through atmosphere was always a little unnerving. He couldn’t even imagine what it was like entering space back before inertial dampers were invented. For as long as he could remember, the concept of g-forces was only to train future pilots in case of emergencies when the dampeners weren’t working properly.

Through the window, he could see lightyears of space stretched out before him. He would never get sick of that view. Unless of course, it was the only view he ever saw. Now that would be a different story.

Luckily for him, Max had never been one of those people afraid of open spaces. The thought of drifting through space for all eternity didn’t even bother him. He just sat back and started randomly counting stars.

“That’s weird,” Harris said, and Max caught sight of him frowning out of the corner of his eye before Harris started clicking away on his console again.

Max tore his gaze away from the window and glanced down at his own console. “What’s weird?” he asked, but he got no response from the Mentalist. “Harris, what’s going on? What’s wrong?”

He didn’t have to be a Mentalist to be able to tell that something wasn’t right.

“I’m not sure,” Harris said as he squinted down at the controllers and tilted his head. “But something is definitely wrong with the Fighter.”

“That’s not exactly something you want to hear sixty-two miles above ground, Harris,” Max said, forcing himself to stay calm.

That’s when the Fighter lurched, and Max realized he could feel the movement as they broke out of their orbit above the earth and were now headed back toward the surface of the planet.

“Not to state the obvious, but I’m pretty sure we’re not supposed to be doing this,” Max said, gripping the sides of his seat as they started to descend, their speed picking up with every passing second. He tried to figure out a way to use the deceleration, but it wouldn’t work. “What’s happening?”

Harris shook his head. “I’m not quite sure,” he said. “But I do know this, I’ve lost control of the navigational system, and I can’t stop us.”

Max let his eyes close for a second, and he forced himself to keep calm. “What does that mean?” he asked, even though he was pretty sure he had a good idea already.

“It means, we’re probably going to crash,” Harris said, and even though Max didn’t know him at all, he could tell from his voice that nothing like this had ever happened to him before.

Fighting to keep control of his part of the Fighter, Max moved his hands over the console, but it wasn’t responding properly. The whole Fighter was freaking out and wouldn’t obey the simplest of commands.

Great. Max had been at the Academy for less than three days, and he was already going to die.

He’d known the moment he’d joined the Academy that his choice would probably be the death of him. But he hadn’t expected death to come so soon, and it wasn’t even going to be a heroic death.

“Huh… We’ve got an incoming transmission,” Harris said, cutting through Max’s less than cheery thoughts about death. Max glanced toward the video screen, and Harris looked at him. “It’s the Academy!”

Max frowned. “Do you think they know we’re in trouble?” he asked, not sure what he wanted him to answer.  If they knew, they might send help, or maybe they’d just leave them out there. Max really didn’t know much about the Academy.

Harris sighed and nodded as he rubbed his temples. “That would be my guess,” he said.

“How?” Max said, just as the Fighter shuddered again.

“Does it matter?” Harris asked, glancing toward the camera again. Max watched as he seemed to hesitate a second longer before pressing one of the buttons on his console, and a transmission began to play.

“This is Control to TF-45-14,” came the crisp voice of someone Max couldn’t identify over the Fighter’s speakers. “Come in, TF-45-14. Do you copy?”

“Control, this is Wishbone-14,” Harris answered, slipping up and using the Fighter’s nickname before he caught himself. “I mean, TF-45-14.” He cleared his throat. “Your message is being received.”

“No kidding?” the person on the other end scoffed. “Mind telling me what the heck you two are doing out there, Novak?”

Well, they obviously know each other, Max thought. Or maybe it was just because of the Cadet codes. Max supposed it didn’t much matter.

“We were just going to do a quick flyover, Aidan,” Harris answered. “I didn’t think anything would happen, and it wasn’t that big of a deal. As I’m sure you’re aware, I needed to log some extra time.”

Aidan growled. “I am aware of that, but I haven’t cleared that Fighter for flight yet,” he said, and you could almost hear the sound of him gritting his teeth over the transmission. “What were you thinking going out in it? There are two dozen perfectly fine ones you could have taken.”

Harris turned red. “Eric said it was fine.”

“Oh, well! Why didn’t you say so in the first place?!” Aidan scoffed before huffing. “What problems are you having with the Fighter?” he asked. “And don’t even think about telling me nothing, because you and I both know that would be a lie. I can see that you’re falling back through the atmosphere.”

“Alright,” Harris grumbled, ducking his head. “Yeah, we’re having some… trouble with the Fighter.”

“I got that much, genius,” Aidan said. “What kind of ‘trouble’? That’s what I want to know since I haven’t tested it yet.”

“I don’t know,” Harris said, grimacing. “Nothing’s working like it’s supposed to, and I can’t get anything to respond. Maybe it’s a programming malfunction? It seemed to be working perfectly fine when we first left.”

While they were talking, Max wiped his hand across his brow and frowned. Why was he sweating?

“Great.” Aidan sighed. “Alright, you’re heading in too steep,” he said. “At this rate, you’ll crash into the ground in less than seven minutes, if you don’t die from other malfunctions by then. I’m going to have to bring you in manually.”

“What?!” Harris said, his eyes growing frantic as he sat back stiffly in his seat. “Isn’t that dangerous, Aidan?”

Aidan laughed dryly. “Well, it’s not as if we have much of a choice, now do we?” he said. “If we don’t do something, you two are as good as dead.”

“But…” Harris started to protest.

“Just stop talking before you do change my mind,” Aidan said. “I’ll contact you again when I’m ready to connect.” With that, the transmission ended, and the Wishbone fell into an eerie silence filled only by the humming of the engine.

“What is he going to do?” Max asked, breaking the silence. It seemed to take Harris a second to realize he was talking to him.

Harris sighed and rested his head back against the headrest as they continued to descend steeply back toward earth, but there wasn’t much they could do about it. Not until the controls came back online.

Max was about to repeat his question when flames flickered across the window. With a sinking feeling, Max realized why it was getting warm in there. For some unknown reason, the shield was failing.

 “Aidan’s a Mentalist,” Harris said, nibbling on his bottom lip as he stared (literally) out into space. “Since the controllers are what seems to be giving us problems, I think he’s going to try and sync himself up to the interface. He’ll have control of the Fighter and hopefully, he’ll be able to land us safely.”

He didn’t know much about how the Mentalist’s powers worked with the Fighter, but he knew enough to realize what Aidan was going to do wouldn’t be easy. “He’s going to do that from the base?” Max asked. “Is that even possible?”

“Hypothetically, yes,” Harris said, running his hand over his unless controllers. “It won’t be easy. That’s for sure, but if anyone can pull it off, it’s Aidan. He’s the strongest Mentalist I’ve ever met.”

Max nodded and tugged on the collar of his jacket. “Since you’re a Mentalist, I guess that’s saying a lot.”

“Yeah…” Harris moaned and closed his eyes. “I don’t feel so good, Max.”

Max was thinking the same thing, and man! It was starting to get hot in there.

Suddenly, Max felt like his stomach was trying to climb up his throat, and he felt himself being pressed back against his seat. Gritting his teeth, he turned his attention to the console in front of him, using more willpower than he should have had to.

When he finally focused his gaze on the screens in front, Max realized the inertial damper wasn’t working anymore. That’s why his brain felt like it was pressing up against the back of his skull.

Max swallowed and fought back the nausea that hit him. He knew the blood flow to his head was starting to slow, but he fought against the need to pass out. This was one of those emergencies he was thinking about earlier and hadn’t really wanted to experience for himself.

Maybe all those days training with g-force simulations wouldn’t be a waste of time like everyone had thought it would be.

“Are you alright, Harris?” Max asked, forcing himself to keep his eyes open. He waited a moment, but Harris didn’t respond. Slowly, he turned his gaze toward the video feed of the Mentalist and realized his fellow pilot was no longer conscious. Great… Just what he needed. “TF-45-14 to Control,” he said, grimacing. “I could use some help up here; Harris just passed out. And my head doesn’t feel so good.”

“I see. Most likely because the Inertial dampers are on the fritz,” Aidan responded, sounding like he was there, inside the Fighter with Max, which was slightly disconcerting to the Defender. “But it won’t matter what happens to him if you crash. You’re going to have to take the main control of the Fighter and try not to pass out. I can’t do everything, but I’ll be your copilot and help you as much as I can from here.”

“What?!” Max said. “I wasn’t trained to fly the Fighter on my own; I was only trained to be a copilot.”

“Well, I wasn’t trained to help save the lives of idiotic Cadets, yet here I am,” Aidan said. “Besides, you were trained to fly it. I know for a fact that every Cadet, whether Defender or Mentalist, is required to know all the basic controls of the TFs, for this exact reason.” He huffed. “You’re just being a big baby because you don’t want the responsibility of flying the Fighter on your own. You’re just going to have to get over it, or you and Novak are going to die. I guess it’s up to you.”

Max swallowed.

He didn’t like it, but he knew the disembodied voice was right. He did know how to fly it; he just didn’t want to. The thought of flying the multi-million dollar Fighter was more terrifying than anything he’d ever done before.

“Look, don’t worry about messing this up. If you don’t do this, you’re dead anyway,” Aidan continued when Max said nothing. “So what do you have to lose? Hey, look at it this way. If you fail, you’ll probably only know it for about five seconds before you instantly die in a fiery explosion.”

“Great pep talk, thanks for that,” Max scoffed as he reluctantly placed his hands back onto the controllers and tighten his grip around them. “You really know how to cheer someone up, don’t you?”

“My job is to get you, Novak, and that Fighter back here in one piece,” Aidan said. “If you want someone to make you feel better, talk to Dr. Conner. I’m sure he’d love to talk to you, assuming that is, you don’t die in the next five minutes because you were too busy talking instead of flying.”

“Great,” Max growled, ignoring the throbbing in the back of his head. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

“You do that,” Aidan said. “I’m almost finished on my end, so you’d better get yourself ready to fly or die. If you believe in God, now might be a good time for a prayer.”

Max nodded, forgetting that the person he was talking to couldn’t see him. But at the moment he was more preoccupied with the ground they were headed toward at several hundred miles an hour.

Praying might be a good idea.

“Okay,” Aidan said, grabbing Max’s attention again. “I’m almost finished, and I’m putting you in command of the Fighter… now!”

Aidan had barely finished speaking when the cockpit began to shift, and the next thing Max knew he was sitting in the front of the Wishbone, where Harris had been sitting just a second before, looking out over the earth as it came closer and closer with every second.

He knew he was now in the pilot’s seat, and theoretically in control of the Fighter, but that didn’t make it any less unnerving.

Gripping the controllers, he began to give the Fighter commands. “It’s working!” Max cried as he could feel his ability to control parts of the Fighter coming back to him, more than it had before. He could feel that he was no longer the copilot but was, in reality, flying the ship on his own.

“Yeah,” Aidan mumbled. “I know. I’m connected to the Fighter too, remember? No offense, but you don’t have the mental capacity to control the Fighter on your own, whether you’re a Mentalist or a Defender. You always have to have a co… copilot.”

“Yeah, yeah! I get it,” Max said, his grip tightening on the console. They were still coming in too hot. “Any chance we could pull up a little sharper? I don’t think we’ve slowed enough to keep from crashing.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Aidan said, sounding anything but. “I was a little busy trying to keep the inertial damper from failing completely, so you don’t have the full force of the Gs crushing against you and the shields from failing completely. But I’ll stop that now so you don’t feel uncomfortable coming in at such a steep angle,” he said. "Would you like a bag of peanuts with that too?”

If he wasn’t about to die, Max might have snapped something back at him. But since Aidan was the only thing standing between them and imminent death, he decided against it.

At least for now.

The earth was still rapidly coming toward them, almost a blur in front of them. Max squeezed his eyes shut and waited for impact, but it never came. Slowly, he opened his eyes again and looked out the front window.

The Fighter hovered just feet above the ground.

He let out a long breath he hadn’t even realized he was holding.

Max wasn’t quite sure how, but Aidan was able to activate the thrusters and keep them in the air, if just barely.

“So, are you going to come back in? Or just sit there gawking?” Aidan asked, and Max was pretty sure he heard the sound of relief in his voice too. “Hurry up, I for one don’t want to spend all day here.”

Max shook himself and smiled. “Right, I’ll head back now,” he said. “And Aidan? Thanks.”