Lloyd wished the sun wasn't trying to attack his eyeballs, but everyone at HIROSHI woke up at a ridiculously early time he still wasn't used to.

Yawning, Lloyd turned over in his bed, trying to tune out Jay's attempts at being quiet as he kept smashing into his bed frame with small yelps of pain. Zane, at least, was dead quiet as he got ready. Cole and Kai were both snoring as loud as possible, which wasn't helping with his goal of squeezing every last second of sleep out of his day.

Yesterday's conversation troubled him to the point where the sun was beginning to rise by the time he went to sleep. The Iluna planes haunted his sleep, diving in and out of mundane scenarios, his father making breakfast and the frying pan turning into a jet, playing football on the beach and the ball turning into a mini I-35 of his nightmares.

"Lloyd, you gotta wake up. Admiral Mystake says the brief is at 0700, and we only have half an hour until then." Jay shook Lloyd's shoulders again, nearly throwing him out of bed.

"Noooo," Lloyd groaned, shoving his face into his pillow. "M' sleep."

"Do you really want Cole to wake you up when's already grumpy?" Jay pulled the curtains above his bed open, shining sunlight directly into his eyes.

Lloyd screeched, tumbling off the bed with a loud thump. Jay's pitying pat on the back was enough signal for him to drag himself to the bathroom and get ready, gingerly pressing the spot on his hip where he knew a bruise would be forming.

The mess hall was the exact same as they'd left it, though maybe they'd gotten new chairs and tables, the simple breakfast that greeted the half–asleep pilots was oddly comforting. Clustered around one of the long tables, everyone's speculations from the night before arose again, mostly Kai, Astra, and Jay arguing about Iluna. On the other end, Harumi and Morro talked in low voices, completely absorbed in their own conversation. Lloyd was tempted to try and talk to them, but the last time he'd had a conversation with Harumi, he'd broken up with her, and Morro had yelled at Lloyd for 'fucking up my chances at ever flying again'.

So yeah, he wasn't about to intrude there.

The briefing room was headed by Admiral Mystake and a black screen, a pathway split down the middle to reach the lectern. The Admiral stood in front of the screen, impeccable as always in her uniform as she surveyed the twelve seated pilots with a frown. If Lloyd hadn't endured two years of rigorous HIROSHI training under her eagle-eye, he'd be terrified of her. Not that he wasn't, he was just less likely to piss his pants when she criticised him.

"Lieutenants, it's good to see you're all as childish as ever," Clearly, the admiral referring to the squabbling in the back rows. "I'm afraid I've called you back here under rather solemn circumstances. I'm going to cut to the chase, no bullshit. As you may be aware, Reaper and Bica recently encountered hostile I-35s in neutral territory. The Iluna pilots engaged in armed combat, resulting in the appropriate defense counters. Iluna Military activity has been sighted in increasing amounts over the past four weeks, leading us to believe Admiral Vaim was planning something big. We were right."

Admiral Mystake clicked the button on her remote, awakening the black screen. "Roiya's latest surveillance mission, risky as it was, revealed critical information. Admiral Vaim's proposal to create a dark matter, ankosa, enrichment plant has succeeded. Construction finished the second activity heightened, which means the Iluna Military are as cocky as ever. The plant is located in a canyon defended by ​​IB-3 Jin surface-to-air missiles, GPS jammers, and to be fifth-generation Bonai 57 fighters. Expect dogfights, expect danger, and expect to fly in N-18s."

"Are you trying to kill us?" Astra scoffed indignantly. Lloyd resisted the urge to face palm at his sister's outburst, trying to telepathically say shut the hull up to no avail.

"Look at it this way, Reaper. If we don't destroy the ankosa plant before it's too late, we will kill billions. We're taking the chance, no questions asked." Mystake's words were stern with no invitation to argue. The screen kept playing a looped visual of the canyon, tight as hell, defended to an inch of its life, and screaming mission impossible.

"We've never been trained in actual dogfights. If we do survive this, how are we going to beat the Bonai fighters?" Jay asked.

The admiral sighed, fully pained, as if she regretted what she about to say next. "Your solution is unique to say the least. Lieutenants, welcome your trainer Captain Montgomery Garmadon, AKA, the Lord."

You're kidding me.

Lloyd's thoughts exploded in his mind, one question leading to another, his eyes seeing his father walk down the aisle, brain registering nothing. He was supposed to be testing Darkstar. He was supposed to be keeping low and keeping out of trouble. He was not supposed to look so okay with this, he was not supposed to be explaining how they'd start this stupid suicide mission in fucking N-18, and he sure as hell was not supposed to be at HIROSHI.

"—dogfighting will be one of our top priorities when training, to answer your concern Fritz. It's a valid one, so I understand why you're worried." the reassuring smile on his father's face had the complete opposite effect. Only three people in this room were fuming appropriately. Lloyd, Astra, and Morro.

Astra and Lloyd's father had lied to them. He lived life on the edge, risking a deranking everytime he opened his mouth. It was an unfortunate skill they'd gained from him.

But for Morro?

Captain Montgomery had killed Morro's father, Wu Garmadon. His own brother. And Morro would never let go of it.

o o o

"Good morning aviators, this is your captain speaking. Welcome to basic fighter manoeuvres. As briefed, today's exercise is dogfighting, guns only, no missiles." Lord's voice came in loud and clear over the headset, confident as ever. Lloyd only half-listened to his father's instructions, clipping his oxygen mask into place. "We do not go below the hard deck of five thousand feet. Working as a team, you have to shoot me down, or else."

"Or else what?" Astra scoffed from base, an extra aggressive edge to her words. Obviously she still wasn't over the whole betrayal bit, and neither was Lloyd. Dogfighitng would be a good way to cool off so he didn't strangle Morro after his cavalier comment earlier that day. He's training us to die, don't you see?

"Or else I shoot back. If I shoot even one of you down, you both lose."

"This guy needs an ego check." Morro drawled over the base comm channel. Lloyd turned it off immediately, eager to rid himself of Morro's attitude. Vortex's problems with Lloyd's old man were between the two of them.

"All right, let's put some skin in the game." Kai proposed, ever ready for a bet.

The captain entertained his suggestion with a dry chuckle. "What exactly do you have in mind?"

"Whoever gets shot down first has to do two hundred push-ups."

"That's a lot of push-ups." commented the Lord.

"They don't call it an exercise for nothing, sir." Kai quipped.

"I don't plan on getting myself involved with that, Lato. Do you?" Lloyd directed the question to the aviator behind him, receiving a single nod and flash of a smile before Zane attached his mask to his helmet.

"You got yourself a deal gentlemen. Lights on, let's turn and burn."

Lloyd rocketed the jet up to six thousand feet, waiting on Kai to give any sign of the captain. "You see anything?"

"Nope," Kai's voice was crackly over the comms line, "Must be behind us."

Lloyd was too busy keeping their ships in line to notice the grey blob streaking behind them. The Lord's plane cut between the finite space, sending both jets spinning in opposite directions.

"Holy shit." came Kai's swear, echoed by Lloyd's own frantic thoughts.

They barely had time to right themselves when Zane, unusually panicked for his calm demeanour, began yelling indecipherably. "Lord's coming in, break left!"

Lloyd responded instantaneously, jerking the joystick to a hard left, and while simultaneously keeping an eye on system readings and Zane's comms, his father's teasing words barely broke through his concentration.

"Junior, where's your wingman?"

He cursed, taking the jet on a forty-five degree turn to evade the Lord's lock-on. "Shit, Forge, where are you?"

"I got your back, I'm coming, just hang in there." Kai grunted.

Zane rattled off a series of numbers that Lloyd barely comprehended. He hadn't flown with Zane in a while, and the first five minutes of their exercise had been a total failure. Yet slowly but surely, they began working in rhythm as they waited for Forge to intervene. Lloyd could practically feel the tiny circle locking onto their ship just as another N-18 sped through the gap between the two planes.

"Break right!" Kai yelled. Lloyd reacted instantly, shouting back the same command.

"Forge just saved your life, fellas, but it's going to cost him."

ooo

"I hate push ups," Jay groaned, his arms shaking as he rose for his hundredth push up. Zane was too busy mechanically repeating the exercise to reply, and Lloyd was trying not to let his arms snap in half like twigs. The Lord had been rotating them each day to try and find a combination that would be able to take him down. So far, no one had come close to it but Morro and Astra.

His twin had ranted to him madly about Morro's antics that day, forcing them into extra sets of push ups.

"This idiot, in the first place, I don't want to be stuck behind him helpless, and he knows not to get personal with dad. But no, we're stuck in a corkscrew and I'm wondering if I'm going to be a pancake in two minutes because this little shit decides banking for the hard deck is the best idea he's got. Some nerve, that asshole."

Astra's glower as she pushed up from her planked stance was funny enough that Kai and Lloyd decided to get a selfie with her, but Morro's sullen frown didn't help the gloomy mood. Over the past week they'd all been subject to increasingly loud arguments between the nephew and uncle, from behind closed doors, open ones, literally anywhere possible you'd be guaranteed to hear them bickering. And it wasn't familiar banter, it was Morro dealing out the most bitter insults you could dredge up from a drain.

No one else knew what had happened between Wu and Monty Garmadon, and how Morro was even connected to that. Maybe Harumi, but Lloyd didn't plan on asking. Maybe he should. As an excuse.

Between their rigorous training and constant reminders of failure, the gang had been hanging out at Steep playing pool and darts to distract themselves from the impending doom. Lloyd wasn't even sure how many times he'd lost a bet to Zane and Cole's superior pool duo despite rotating through a range of partners. Until later that night, when out of the corner of his eye, he spotted a quiet, white-haired figure slink up to his side.

"You've lost for a week straight," she said, pulling a cue towards herself. "How are you not embarrassed?"

"I'm just good at hiding it." he shrugged, trying not to throw up from pure shock. Harumi was talking to him. Harumi was talking to him after he'd drunkenly told her that he wasn't ready for anything. He just hadn't told her he wasn't ready to be Lieutenant, not be with her. She'd taken it the other way, of course. How could anyone assume you weren't ready to move up the ranks? That was the whole point, wasn't it?

"It's a bit painful watching you try."

"Didn't know you were watching me." Lloyd flashed the slightest of smiles. Harumi ignored it, calling over Zane and Cole.

"Wanna play, boys?"

"Lloyd's got a new partner, huh?" Cole's eyes darted back and forth from Lloyd to Harumi. Cole was quite possibly the worst person to witness matters like these - Lloyd playing pool with his ex-not-quite-girlfriend, said girlfriend standing dangerously close.

He cleared his throat. "We're gonna whoop your asses."

Zane said nothing, simply picked up a cue and reset the table. Lato's silence was a weapon often used, indicating the pilot's serious commitment to whatever he was doing. Meanwhile, Cole was busy rounding up everyone to watch what he seemed to be calling 'the match of the century.' Harumi barely took a step away when Lloyd caught her elbow, drawing her in close.

"We've got this, yeah?"

She looked up through long lashes, almost teasingly. "We're a good team, Lloyd. I didn't forget everything about us."