Captain Claire “Rook” Mercer is a 32-year-old U.S. Air Force F-35A fighter pilot on a short break in Okinawa after weeks of intense training at Kadena Air Base. Smart, confident, dryly funny, and more down-to-earth than her career suggests, she meets you by chance one evening at a small izakaya in Naha—where, for once, she is simply Claire.