It was no longer about trying to get there, she had to. It was just that simple.

The rocket had been launched seconds ago from a carrier out in the Atlantic and was headed at top speed towards the capital. Impact was on an intercept course, having dropped from the high altitude plane used by T.R.A.C.E.R she was pulling ten G's as she made the turn from vertical to horizontal. Impact knew she was fast. In the air she was unbeatable but those training simulations and y by runs with the R.A.F test pilots were nothing but a game. This was real. In front of her just above the horizon she could see the thrusters ame. She needed to pick up speed and do it fast otherwise she would never catch up to her target. Someone had once asked her, in a P.R interview what it felt like to y. What was the physical sensation you felt when taking off from the ground. Impact had responded with a typically humble answer. It felt like butteries. It did feel like butteries when you had just saved the kitty from the tree and we oating upwards away from the sweet little girl with the big bright eyes so she had not lied to the reporter. At this moment however it felt very different. Right now her stomach was a tight ball of despair. She had always imagined that point of her body as her propulsion centre. The core of her being was the logical place for it to be. From there she could travel in any number of directions and control herself in ight with slight adjustments of her limbs. As she roared above the waves the tighter she clenched the faster she moved. The more she pushed herself the more she gained on the rocket. It was fear that kept her going. The fear that had kept her airborne so many times before when she had been knocked out of the skies. The fear of failure was a pretty powerful motivator in scenarios like this. She had to reach that rocket before it reached its target.

Impact was gaining on the rocket. She wasn't there yet but edging closer with every second. Soon land would be in sight and she knew that was when it was close, if she wasn't in control by the time they both crossed the coast it would be all over. She cried out in both rage and pain, the sound lost in the slipstream of the ight but sounded like a hundred explosions inside her head. Get to that rocket. Get to it now. Move! We cried about again and shot forward with another burst of speed. The air expanding around her with waves of pressure as the speed built. Come on! Another burst of speed, another build up of pressure. Dammit just a little more. Boom. The sound barrier broke. She was catching up but knew it wasn't over. She was running out of time to come up with a plan to deal with the rocket, in her desperation to catch it she had forgotten to plan her next move. Typical Impact rushing in head rst, literally. It's worked so far it'll work this time. And it would have to, she was right on top of the rocket. Impact cut a quick glance to the horizon and saw the dark rising silhouette of land and made the call. She cut thrust and landed on top of the rocket driving it down towards the waves. The contact stuttered the thrusters, cutting them out just before hitting the waves. The air suddenly became thick, forceful water as Impact and the rocket slowed down underneath the surface. Her ears were ringing from the sudden transition of pressures, she needed a moment to collect herself, to untighten the knots in her stomach and let then butteries loose again.

Impact took in a mouthful of air as she emerged from the foam, holding the now dead rocket by the thruster grill. Steam still billowing from the cooling metal that had just been surrounded by a tiny high powered sun. Little by little the world returned, the rst sound she heard was the creaking of cooling metal. Then the rolling shush waves pushing past the metal casing. Then the sound of screaming in her ear. "Are you out of your mind? Is the casing still intact? If so much as a molecule of that lth has leaked into the the water I will personally make you lter the goddamn ocean is that understood?"

"Relax General, the only thing that's loose is the butteries."