lacrimula-falsa:

Rhodey’s 50th Birthday Celebration Week – Day 1 – Last Flight

For Rhodey’s 50th Birthday Celebration Week – Day 1 – Favourite Appearance:

My favourite Rhodey appearance is the Marvel Cinematic Universe, since that’s the one I know the best.

I really wanted to make a moodboard for this. But alas my laptop is broken so I can’t realise that idea properly. So I wrote a ficlet instead. This is a canon-divergence fic where Infinity War had a happier ending. It was typed on my phone so please forgive any typos. Unbetad.

~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~

Last Flight

Rhodey retires the War Machine armour.

~~~~~

Rhodey had flown one last flight with Tony. Of course he had. One last time for War Machine and Iron Man to “cleave the heavens” as Thor had rather poetically phrased it.

One last ‘goodbye’ to New York’s sky.

But this, this was for Rhodey alone. Just him, the suit, and no city under him.

Trees and water as far as his eyes could see.

Rhodey banked to the left a little, spiralling down until the armour almost touched the treetops, a few stray branches ‘ping’ing against the dark grey metal.

He was just flying circles. It was nice not to have to go anywhere.

No enemies lighting the HUD up red. No sounds of fighting muffled by the helmet and filters. Just the wind rushing. The steady thrum of the repulsors. Maybe, if he really focused, the sound of the water below.

Rhodey’s cheeks ached from smiling, happiness beating against his ribs like thousands of butterfly wings. This was what freedom felt like.

He’d even flown a few loopings. But he was no spring chicken anymore and piloting the armour was hard work. Eventually the aching in his joints and muscles had convinced him to just cruise for a while.

Rhodey eyed the two tall trees he’d been circling for the last twenty minutes.

Well, maybe one last thing…

He fired up the boot repulsors and zoomed the HUD in, narrowing his eyes at the gap between the trees.

He could make it.

Granted, the park authorities would be pissed if he felled a tree. But what where the chances of that happening?

“Here comes War Machine. You better watch out, trees.”

Rhodey’s pulse picked up as the trees loomed close, the suit’s proximity alerts flaring to life and shading his vision orange. The adrenaline made him feel hot, giddy and shaky, but his flight stayed steady. He’d had some training after all.

He tucked in his arms a little tighter and locked his knees as best he could.

Three… two… one…

In a sharp, precise manoeuvre Rhodey flipped the suit onto its side and flew into the gap between the tree trunks.

There was a short, heart-stopping moment where he thought he’d miscalculated, before the suit zipped through the gap with a loud sound of bark being scraped off by metal, barely audible over the proximity warnings.

War Machine cleared the trees in a shower of wood chips.

Rhodey blew out the breath he’d been holding and immediately soared high for a victory lap.

“WOHOO! WAR MACHINE ROCKS, SUCKERS!”

Realising he was climbing a tad steeply, he adjusted his flight path and fell back into a circle pattern, pulse still thundering in his ears. “

Yeah, still got it.”

Damn but it was good to just fly to fly, without bad guys or pissed of superheroes on your tail. He felt ten years younger already.

~~~

It was a long time still before Rhodey even thought of landing.

He circled, he swooped and dove and climbed and spiralled in random patterns, soaking in the feeling of the armour around him. Free as the proverbial bird.

The stars where just starting to come out when he finally touched down on one of the park’s wooden walkways. A few leaves followed him down from the canopy of trees. He was bone-tired but still smiling.

Opening the faceplate, Rhodey was greeted by the smell of moist leaves and the sound of some of the loudest crickets he’d ever heard competing with the rushing water under his feet. A light breeze cooled the sweat on his face and made him shiver when he finally stepped out of the suit.

The War Machine armour closed behind him with a familiar sound.

He turned around and patted its grey arm, smile dimming somewhat despite his beets intentions. He felt like someone had suddenly made all his bones heavier.

“Well, old buddy. You’ve been one hell of a ride. We had some great times together.”

Resisting the utterly ridiculous urge to hug the armour, Rhodey stepped back and put his right hand on the chestplate, giving the side of the armour one last fond pat with his left.

“This is it, then.”

He cleared his throat against the sudden lump in it.

“War Machine Full System Access. Identify James Rhodes, password ‘honeybearsfireckracker’, code nine-delta-three. Engage Retirement Protocol.”

The suit’s eye-slits lit up green. Instead of a verbal confirmation the suit, charmingly enough, nodded.

Nice gag, Tones.

He stepped away as the boot and palm repulsors lit up.

The helmet’s faceplate turned skyward as if watching the stars rise, the War Machine armour took off, shooting into the sky.

Rhodey watched it go through the hole in the trees, watching the repulsor glow grow fainter.

When it was almost invisible, the War Machine armour detonated in a bright flash with a sound like fireworks.

Rhodey put a hand up to shade his eyes. He stood and watched for a moment as sparks rained down before going out.

Then he turned, took his torch light out of the pocket of the undersuit and started walking towards the park exit.

~~~~~

A/N: The park Rhodey flies over is the Krka National Park in Croatia. It’s stunningly beautiful, you should go there. (Also please don’t detonate anything in or above a national park, it’s a horrible idea and happens solely for the imagery here. Let’s just pretend that in the MCU there’s technology to make this sort of explosion harmless for the environment.) I will add a link to their website later.

Thank you @dailyrhodey for allowing the creative liberties I took with MCU canon and for running a kick-ass event.