Birdie slammed the pick into the stone once again. He had almost passed out a few times, but that didn’t matter. The saw was forgotten; he just wanted to smash stuff. Over the three hours he was reflecting, there were no more taps on his suit. It seemed he had broken the stone enough for Lara to pick it up on her own.

Birdie hit the stone a few more times, but his swings were failing. No longer as strong as they were when he was remembering, Birdie decided to take a break. He looked back at the tunnel. He had dug quite a distance in the past three hours, far from the original Tunnel 350. There was rock and ore everywhere. He didn’t remember seeing any blue glowing ore, but he may have missed it, focused on swinging as he was.

It wasn’t like him to be lost in a rage. After Alf died, he had devoted himself to being calm and collected, a rock against the tide of the world. But he had lost control when Lara said someone of his namesake had saved her. Birdie started doing breathing exercises as best he could. The mask was in the way, but the toxic air would kill him were he to remove it. In, Out. In through the nose. Out through the mouth.

Birdie sat down on a large rock Lara had yet to move, crossing his legs and leaning his back against the wall. He hadn’t noticed until now, but the smashing and screaming had been loud enough to hear even through the mask. That was ok, let it go. Lara should be coming back soon. That’s fine, let it go.

Birdie cleared his mind one thought at a time. Meditation was a practice he used daily to clear his mind, stay calm, and stay sane. Most of the time he could breathe and clear his mind within minutes, staying within the trance gave him clarity. It helped him make decisions, and notice things he wouldn’t have otherwise.

This time entering the trance took longer. Five minutes, twenty, half an hour after starting, his mind finally went blank. He continued to stare at the darkness behind his eyelids, breathing deeply, and centering himself. A feeling on his arm broke the trance. He took one last deep breath before opening his eyes.

Lara was pointing to her ears, likely trying to talk to him. Birdie turned on the comms, and nodded letting her know she could speak.

“I don’t know what I said, but I’m sorry for angering you.” Lara bows, showing a sign of regret and submission.

“It’s OK, I just remembered something unpleasant.” Birdie stood up and stretched himself out. “Let me help you clean the rest of this up. I know I went faster than you could keep up with, so I’ll help you out. We can go a bit slower now, no need to rush when we can't go home for another 5 hours anyways.”

Lara and Birdie packed up the truck, and Birdie sent Lara off. They had talked while cleaning up, learning a bit about each other and their lives. Lara had been a pilot before being captured by Turma, and supposedly a great one. She had two sisters, a brother and strict, but loving, parents. They had supported her dream of flying in the sky and for them had become one of the highest rated pilots.

Birdie didn’t talk much. He listened to the story that she seemed much too happy telling. Birdie was supposed to talk about himself, but waited for her to finish. Before long, the truck was filled back up, and Birdie sent Lara on her way.

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They continued talking as Lara drove. Birdie looked around and saw that there was still a lot to pick up. Instead of going back to mining, he silently decided to help Lara load up one more truck full, and sat down to listen.

Lara told a story of a time in an air force, when she had been caught out with her wingman by ten aircrafts.

“They came from the starboard side, too quickly to be caught on radar and out of direct sight. We were startled when the radar pinged an unknown aircraft. But we had our training, and took evasive maneuvers.”

A large piece of rock caught Birdie’s eye.

“At the time, we thought that we were lucky, and it was a single enemy. We thought we would be able to take care of it quickly. That turned out to not be the case. We had been chasing the enemy for three minutes, and holes were strewn throughout its frame.”

Birdie walked over to the human sized boulder, and took out a chisel and hammer.

“The second aircraft pinged on the radar. It was behind and below us but catching up quickly. My wingman shot the engine and we took a u-turn, heading straight for the spotted enemy.”

Birdie turned down his mic and hummed. Creating things was fun, especially when the way you made it was by breaking other things with a hammer.

“That’s when we saw it. A group of aircrafts outside of the radar’s range was just climbing over the nearest hill, approximately thirty miles away. We completed the u-turn and kept going,making a near full circle and heading to the nearest air defense turrets. The first craft we spotted kept hounding us however, slowing us down as we evaded the shots heading our way.”

Birdie began to carve, making an outline on a flattish side as he listened.

“A hundred miles from our destination, they had caught up. My gunner had shot down the second aircraft, but ours were slower than the enemy. We kept dodging and weaving, taking shots to less important parts of the craft if we couldn’t dodge.”

Birdie broke off the parts not within the outline, keeping a five inch distance from the rough line he made.

“Heat seeking rockets were thrown off by flares, and flanks were avoided by flying low. We navigated around canyons, through terrain too thin to fly horizontally on, and pulled up at the last minute over mountains, gaining distance from the enemies and hearing them crash from the tough flying.”

He gently broke off the outline from the rest of the stone, making a silhouette of what he wanted to carve.

“We took down six enemies on our flight. Not including the two at the beginning. We thought to stay and fight, but we were right near the air defense towers. We crested a hill, but the two flyers left were better than the rest of the flyers. They stayed right behind us.

He began to shape it, turning the second artwork into a 3D sculpture. Taking off big chunks at a time this way and that.

“We thought we would get away free, counting the eight enemies taken down as just a bonus of coming home safe.”

Birdie was almost done. He was just finishing up on chiseling the torso. Next would be the legs, face and arms. This was a delicate part, hard to chisel so finely with a hammer four times the size and weight of the chisel.

“But then, Jack, oh Jack. He was such a nice man. We were going to get married, Jack and I. Jack took a missile aimed for me. We had run out of flares, and there was nowhere to hide.” The emotion was palpable. Even from just her voice, Birdie could tell how much she had cared about that man.

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

“Don’t worry, it was years ago…” She sniffed. “Thank you for listening.”

“Of course.” Birdie was happy with his carving. It was a fine depiction of a friend. He would have to show Mint later.