Chapter Text
“Shit, we just flew through his jetwash! Get control Mav, get control! Maverick’s disengaging! Maverick get down here dammit!”
“Talk to me goose…Talk to me goose!”
He hears “Woo! Splash four!” in his radio
But he’s spinning out. He pulls the handles.
Another RIO, floating in the water.
No. Not again.
No.
“NO!” He wakes up with his throat raw, blankets tangled around him.
He breathed out.
He’d made it.
They both had.
But he was having a hard time reconciling that in the darkest hours of the night.
He’d been back at TOPGUN for a week. The new class didn’t start for two more.
During the day, he was getting acclimated to teaching, flying the smaller, lighter planes the instructors used.
At night, his dreams haunted him.
He could hear Ice, over and over. “I’m in deep shit, dammit!”
Merlin, yelling about the jetwash, overlapping with Goose’s voice, full of terror.
He picked up the phone before he even thought about what he was doing.
It rang, and just as he was going to give up, the voice on the other end answered. “Hello?”
“Ice?”
“Maverick? What the hell? It’s…0158.”
Shit. He hadn’t even thought about the time. “I…I know. I’m sorry.”
A sigh. “No, Maverick. Something’s going on. What’s wrong?”
Maverick bit his lip. “Are…are you ok?”
Ice sighed. He was unsurprised. The hellish last few weeks the man had been through? Anyone would’ve been thrown off.
“Yeah, Mav. I’m ok. We all are. We made it.” He keeps his tone level, even. He knows Maverick was metaphorically spinning out, and now wasn’t the time to go head to head with him.
He hears a wet sigh from over the phone.
“Yeah. Yeah, we did.” He still sounds like he doesn’t quite believe his own words.
Ice tries something. “Hey, Mav. You with me?”
A huff. “Yeah.”
“Good. Give me three things you can see.”
Maverick, after taking a second to process the request, lists them off. He can feel his heart rate coming down.
Slowly, Ice walks him through the rest of the exercise, and he can hear how the man’s breathing has calmed and his words are just starting to curl together at the edges.
“Alright, Mav. Try to sleep. And, uh…don’t hesitate to call again. Yeah?”
“Yeah. Ok, Ice. Thanks,” he slurs out, mostly gone already.
“Goodnight, kid.”
Ice hangs up the phone, running a hand down his face. God, he was tired as hell.
But he’d said he’d be the kids’ wingman anytime, and he meant it.
Always.
Maverick wakes himself up as the sun rises the next morning.
He’d never been able to sleep late after being in so many years.
He hears a knock on the door as he finishes pulling his shirt over his head.
He opens it to see Iceman Kazansky at his door, hands full of grocery bags.
“Ice?” he asks dumbly.
“Good morning!” he responds with a smile.
Iceman was in his house. Uninvited.
He was not sure where this development came from.
Iceman, for the matter, had made himself at home in his kitchen.
He was going through the cabinets, in search of things, and exclaiming softly when he found them.
In short order, Maverick found himself shuffled to his own kitchen table, sat down at it, and watched as Ice made a full breakfast.
A plate with eggs, bacon, and toast was placed in front of him, with a glass of water.
“What?” he asks dumbly.
“It’s food. Traditionally, one eats it.”
That shakes him out of his stupor. “I know that. Why are you here, making it?”
Ice sits at the table, his gaze serious. “Because I know what you’re going through. A lot has hit you in a short amount of time. It’s ok not to be ‘just fine’ all the time.”
Maverick wants to deny it. Tell Ice that he’s wrong, he has no idea what he’s on about.
But he can’t.
“I just…I can’t. Left Bradley fatherless. Carole, a widow. Nearly did the same to Merlin. It doesn’t stop.”
“You’re dangerous. It gets results, but it’s not always the answer. But you made it back, Maverick. You’re here. You’re here, for a reason only you can discover.”
Maverick takes his words in. He was right, of course. He usually was.
But dammit, he missed Goose. And the fight had hit just too close to home.
He nods, eyes burning.
“You gonna eat?” He pretends his voice isn’t thick with emotion.
Iceman smiles at him. “Yeah. If you don’t mind the company, of course.”
He shakes his head. On the flipside, it was welcome.