I jammed the stick left,
rolled the wings level, and kept the nose up at an angle that should have been impossible. The thrust‑vectoring nozzles at the back angled down, forcing the tail up, pushing the jet into the sky by brute force.
I punched into the cloud deck at 400 feet. The world vanished. No up, no down, no left, no right. Only violent gray static. The turbulence was catastrophic. The jet was thrown up, slammed down, battered by downdrafts that threatened to snap the wings off. My helmet slammed against the canopy glass. My teeth clicked together hard enough to taste blood. I stared at the HUD — the head‑up display — because my inner ear was screaming that I was upside down and plunging toward the ocean. It was a lie. The green digital lines said pitch 20 degrees, speed 400 knots, altitude passing 10,000 feet.The rain turned to hail. Millions of
