The wyvern opened its jaws, and spat out a fine, dense cloud of mist.
Chase slammed the plane into a near-vertical climb. The plane shrieked in protest, threatening to stall, but Chase forced it upward. The cloud of acid missed them by inches.
“What are you doing?” Connie screamed in his ear as the plane hurtled straight up toward the sun.
“Sudden emergency!” Chase desperately craned his neck, trying to see where the wyvern had gone. “No time to explain!”
He caught sight of the wyvern, only a dozen feet off their tail. Its wings cut through the air like knives. Even with the Spitfire's engine roaring at full throttle, it was catching up with them.
Let's see how you handle this…
Chase flipped the Spitfire nose-over-tail, tumbling into an upside-down dive. The wyvern futilely snatched at them as they shot underneath it with inches to spare, its wicked claws snapping shut on e
mpty air.
“Chase!” Connie's furious voice blasted through the headset. “I'm giving you three seconds to straighten out or I swear to God I am taking back control of this plane!”
“If you hit that switch, we'll both be dead!” Chase yelled back.
He pulled the Spitfire out of the dive, praying that they'd gained enough distance from the wyvern to be able to risk a straight dash back toward land. At the moment, they were too far from Brighton for Chase to be able to psychically contact the rest of his fire team. Commander Ash in his Phoenix form could drive away the wyvern, if Chase could just get close enough to the city to reach him…
DANGER!
Chase instinctively jerked the steering column in response to his stallion's shriek, spinning the Spitfire on its axis. He was almost too late. The wyvern's acid cloud of breath clipped one wingtip, eating dozens of small holes into its metal skin.
“Chase!” Connie must have seen the acrid vapor steaming off the acid-etched metal, but of course she had no idea the real source of the damage. “That's it, I'm taking back control. Three!”
“Connie, no!” Chase shouted frantically. “Please! Trust me!”
The wyvern's sleek light, sleek body and disproportionally large wings made it lethally fast, much faster than any dragon he'd ever seen. It took all of Chase's flying skill just to stay ahead of it. It matched him turn for turn, no matter what evasive maneuvers he tried.
“Two!” Connie continued relentlessly, as the sea and sky spun madly around them.
She was going to do it. She was going to take back control. And the instant she leveled out the plane, the wyvern would catch them.
“One!”
There was only one thing Chase could do.
He hit the eject button.
CHAPTER NINE
“I have control,” Connie said, flipping the override switch. “Chase, you are so—”
In front of her, Chase's cockpit abruptly blew open. Chase stood up on his seat, the wind whipping his hair and flight suit. She distinctly saw him drop his unopened parachute back into the cockpit.
Then he launched himself out of the plane.
“What the actual fuck?” Connie breathed in disbelief.
Instinctively, she wheeled the Spitfire over on one wingtip, trying to follow his falling figure. She caught the barest glimpse of him as he plummeted toward the distant waves—and then the Spitfire lurched sickeningly.
To Connie's horror, the strange corrosion she seen earlier was spreading further, Swiss-cheese holes appearing in the surface of the Spitfire's left wing. It was as if invisible acid was eating away at the metal. With a clunk, the left flap pinwheeled away, the control lever going dead in her hand.
The plane yawed, tipping to the left. Connie fought to steady it, desperately trying to keep the plane level with only half the controls operational.
Out of nowhere, rain pattered across the cockpit. Instantly, pits appeared in the glass, obstructing her view. Through the warped cockpit, she saw more holes appearing in the nose of the plane, eating into the engine housing.