Sarah’s mouth fell open, then she grinned. “You couldn’t just let me have the first flight could you, Chase?”
He smiled back. “Actually I was fine being your co-pilot but, when they told me that they had worked on two of them and that both were ready, well, I thought it would be more fun if we did a little dogfighting instead of just going out for a flyby.”
“I like the way you think.”
While getting outside of Earth’s gravity and atmosphere wouldn’t have just been a flyby by any means, the idea that they could actually test these babies in combat was even more appealing to Sarah. That being said, she found it more than a little intimidating to dogfight with the person who was almost single-handedly responsible for saving her planet.
To hide her uneasiness she added, “I’ll go easy on you.”
Chase answered with a broad smile. The more he got to know her, the better he liked her. They went into the hangar and put on flights suits.
A few minutes later, they emerged from the barracks, fully geared and ready to take the F-140s out for a little one-on-one. How romantic, Sarah smirked.
“I’ve taken the liberty to prepare a little shooting practice near Jupiter, then we’ll head out to Neptune to have a go at each other,” Chase told her. “We’ll be back in time for dinner.”
“Is that a date?” she challenged.
He paused. “…Only if you’d like it to be.”
She looked him directly in the eyes and smiled. He returned the smile, but was clearly not as at ease with flirting as she was. She found it endearing. This boyish charm.
“Shall we?” Chase gestured towards the planes.
They were magnificent. The Tomcat was already a vision on its own, but the modified F-140 was leaner and sleeker. With matte, dark-gray paint and light-blue hues, it looked like something from the future. The wings where inverted and pointing forward, which gave the craft a much meaner look. Sarah took a deep breath as she examined it. She couldn’t believe that in a matter of minutes, it would be taking her into space. But then she frowned. The plane had no wheels, only some sort of retractable foot that was holding it to the ground.
“What happened to the gears?”
“There’s no need for them anymore; the F-140 can take off vertically.”
“Niiiiice!” She grinned. “Tell me more about it…”
“We reinforced its armor with some of our more durable alloys, and we completely removed the fossil fuel engine and retrofitted it with a quadrinium one. Now, it can go Mach twelve within atmosphere. In fact, it’s so big that we even managed to cram a little jump engine on board.”
“You mean it can jump? Like how you jumped here with your fleet?”
Chase smiled a little before catching himself. He found himself completely charmed by how new and wonderful all of this was for her.
“Yes, but it’s much more limited in terms of range. You can barely do three light years before the engine needs to recharge; that won’t get you very far.”
“Let’s agree to disagree on that one. Three light years almost instantaneously? That’s amazing! How long does it need to recharge?”
“About thirty minutes. But if the craft is damaged or if too much power is being used for other things, like combat, it could take longer or it could become disabled altogether. This is really just a prototype; it needs refinement. We didn’t have time to make every system with top-of-the-line components. It’s actually quite crude by our standards.”
Sarah ran her hand along the hull. “I bet. But still, this can be used tactically. We could have a few of these in reserve, not far, that could jump at a moment’s notice.”
Chase nodded. “That’s good thinking... I’ve been so occupied with supervising the craft and deciding what technology we could cram into it that I didn’t see the obvious advantage of having a jump engine aboard a star fighter. Our fighters are smaller. Usually, there would be very few tactics that would require them to jump. It was actually one of the problems we had to face to send me here in advance of the fleet.”
“Alright, I’m dying here,” she grinned. “Let’s test these bad boys.”
“Okay. When you sit down, put the two small round devices on your temples.”
Sarah nodded and climbed the steps, sliding into her cockpit as Chase did the same. When she sat down, she noticed there wasn’t much left over from the F-14. There was just a stick, a pad to enter numbers, and the two little round devices Chase had mentioned. She put them as instructed against her temples.
What happened next was nothing short of extraordinary.
As soon as they touched her skin they stuck there, and an entire holographic HUD appeared. Controls, gauges, monitors, radar…the whole shebang projected inside her brain.
“Wow! How is this possible?”
Chase’s voice answered from inside her mind, like a radio, but it didn’t come from the interior of the craft. And while it was definitely handy, it would take some getting used to.
Chase “mind-spoke” as if he was sitting right next to her. “These little devices access the visual and audio cortex of your brain and project the information relayed by pretty much every sensor and piece of equipment aboard these craft. Also, the computer AI responds to vocal commands. You’ll be able to pre-program some commands and use them later on. That’s what I used to remote control the squadron.”
“That’s…so cool!”
“That’s just part of it. I’ve asked for a neuronal interface to be installed on these as well, so if you want, you can touch the purple button at the far right of your HUD, and you’ll switch into neuronal control mode.”
“What’s that?”
“In simple terms: what you think, the ship does. It’s still in the experimental phase. We’ve used it in other applications but never in combat as it requires a very disciplined mind. That’s why I’ve installed it as a toggle, so it can be toggled on and off at will. We may try it later on when we reach target practice, or you can use it now to try to get off this base.”
“Hell yeah!” she cried. “But this is a little overwhelming. I’m used to flying with stick, thrusters, and rudder. I feel like a kid who turned on a PlayStation for the first time.”
“What’s a PlayStation?”
“So there are things you don’t know,” she laughed teasingly. “No worries. I’ll show you one when we get back from the test flight.”
“Alright, let’s get these started. Touch the—”
But before Chase could finish his sentence, Sarah activated the neuro-link, got off the ground, retracted the stands, and was flying towards the sky.
“Wooooohooooo!” she cried as she lifted through the clouds.
Chase blinked then hurried to comply. “Alright then!” He touched the neuro-link toggle and joined her in the sky, positioning beside her in formation like a normal wingman.
“Chase,” she sounded breathless, “this is the weirdest and most exceptional thing I’ve ever experienced in my life. I’m literally piloting this thing just by thinking it. It’s amazing!”
Chase grinned but cautioned her. “Just keep in mind that the neuronal link is tiring after a while and, if you lose concentration or get lost in emotional turmoil, the results can be unpredictable. If that happens, toggle it off immediately; don’t wait until you feel like you’re losing control. As an additional measure, I’ve programmed the onboard AI to turn the neuro-link off as soon as it detects something is wrong in our vital signs. But that’s never been tested so I don’t know how sensitive it will be.”
“Roger that. For now, it handles like a dream. It’s not more tiring than watching an IMAX movie in 3-D.”
“A what?”
“Yeah sorry,” she apologized. “I keep referencing day-to-day Earth technologies; I’ll catch you up on that later.”
“And I thought I had learned all there was to learn about Earth technology.”
“Oh I don’t doubt you did for the military stuff, but we love recreation he
re, maybe too much. Sometimes I wonder if that’s what prevented us from evolving as fast as we should have as a species. Anyway, that’s a good conversation topic to save for the date.”
“Alright, I look forward to it. What do you say we punch these babies through the atmosphere?”
“You sure do know how to talk to me, Lieutenant Commander.”
And with the blink of an eye, both F-140s accelerated to max speed, became fireballs in the sky and, a few moments later, were orbiting the Earth.
“Oh…my…god!” Sarah exclaimed.
“Are you alright?”
“I’m fine. I’m better than fine. In fact, I don’t know if I can find adequate words to describe how fine I feel right now. I’ve dreamed of this day my entire life, but since I didn’t choose a career as an astronaut I never thought it would come. I’ve seen movies and pictures, but to experience this first hand…? It’s simply magical. Thank you, Chase.”
“You’re perfectly welcome. Enjoy the view; we’re not in a hurry.”
“Thanks. How much fuel do we have, in terms of time?”
“Fuel? Oh, quadrinium doesn’t deplete nearly as fast as fossil fuels do. It all depends on how we tax the systems. So for our test flight, unless we encounter heavy resistance, we could use the ships for the entire day or even more before we’d need to reload. The ship also has secondary power, which is a system similar to what you call batteries. But it has a lighter design and a much higher energy storage capacity. It’s linked to the shields and recharges when they aren’t being taxed.”
“Amazing! Is there anything this ship can’t do?”
“It doesn’t make breakfast.”
There was a pause.
“…Um…that was a joke, Commander. A really dumb joke,” he muttered to himself.
“Roger that” said Sarah playfully.
“Alright, back on topic and your original question. The Thunderbolt actually misses a few things. The life support isn’t redundant, neither are the engines or shields. We also only managed to install first-generation particle cannons. Our own ships are more advanced in terms of firepower and redundancy in the critical systems; they’re also smaller, faster, and more maneuverable than these. But because of its size, the F-140 has a stronger armor and a much bigger quadrinium chamber. Therefore, it can do longer missions, and probably take a bigger beating, armor- and shield-wise. It’s just that if we lose a primary system like shields, it will need repairs on Earth. There isn’t any self-repairing circuitry. Not yet anyway. We were in a hurry and had to sacrifice on installing some systems.”
“Alright so…no. These craft are amazing, notwithstanding all the techno-babble you just threw at a girl in awe of seeing her planet for the first time. It’s amazing to think this was once an F-14 Tomcat.”
“Yep, there’s not much left. But we kept the seats and the stick.”
“I like it; gives it a retro feeling.”
Chase didn’t know what “retro” meant, but inferred from the context it probably meant something old. He would have to get used to the subtleties of the language. Both English and Universum were very similar, frighteningly so when one stopped to think about it, but just like dialects could make things sound different, that’s how Chase felt about English. It was a dialect. Sometimes familiar, sometimes rather distant.
“I’m glad you like it, Sarah.”
“So what do we do next?”
“Now the fun begins. On the left of your HUD, I’ve marked a point on your radar with a blinking blue dot, do you see it?”
“Yes, what do I do?”
“You either touch it or think about going there.”
Before she could confirm, her ship jumped. Chase thought about the destination and the AI engaged his jump engine as well. Stars became lines in the frontal view of the canopy for just for an instant, before they returned to stars. Then Chase’s ship jumped out of hyperspace beside Sarah’s.
“Did we just make a jump?!” Sarah was unable to contain her excitement.
“Yes, the neuro-link will choose the fastest way to achieve a goal. Since you thought about going there, it decided to jump. You should see a countdown on your HUD going down from three hundred. That’s the time it will take for the jump engines to be available again.”
“Incredible. How long would it have taken to come here at full burn?”
“A little under three minutes.”
“Oh…so jumping wasn’t really necessary?”
“No it wasn’t. But it was fun, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, that it was! So next time I should think about flying there slower?”
“Like I said, the neuro-link requires a very disciplined mind. Yours seems to handle it quite well but, because you don’t know the capabilities of your craft, it’s bound to create some quirks like this one. I’m just hoping any other unpredictable quirks won’t put pilots in danger.”
“I think we’ll be fine. That doesn’t answer my question though.”
“Yeah, sorry about that. So you could use your HUD, and when you press the target on it, it will ask what method of travel you want to use – burn or jump.”
“Roger that. So where’s that targeting field? I want to blow stuff up.”
“It’s right ahead of our position, just a few thousand miles. The targets should show as red dots on your radar.”
“They do. Cool. There’s close to a hundred at first sight. May I?”
“By all means, have fun. You can either think and acquire your targets mentally, or line them up and shoot manually.”
“Great! I love the neuro interface; I want to see how it handles in a fight. Are the targets firing back?”
“Only if you want them to. They can fire low energy discharges that will simply light up the shields to inform you when you get hit.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” She nodded. “Let’s set them up that way.”
“Done.”
“Thanks. Time to have some real fun.”
And with that, Sarah’s F-140 went full burn towards the targeting field. They started firing from all over the place and she soon saw a few impacts on her shields. Thinking fast, she entered a whirlwind dance of evasive maneuvers, trying to get hit by as few probes as possible. The more she practiced, the less probes managed to score her shields. It was quite impressive, considering how outnumbered she was by opponents, and Chase watched her appreciatively. She was one hell of a pilot and, coming from him, that meant something.
“Why aren’t you firing back?” he eventually inquired.
“I’m just testing the maneuverability of this thing; it’s amazing. Will my shots destroy the probes?”
“Only if you wish them to.”
“And can I? Isn’t that a waste of training resources?”
“I guess… Tell you what, blow up a few for the fun of it and then switch to training weapons. Then the hits will only disable the probes and turn them off.”
“Deal! Thanks!”
And the laser show began. Sarah blew a good five probes with real lasers, crying out with the sheer joy of it, before she switched her weaponry to practice mode and started turning the probes off one after another with impressive ease and at an even more impressive rate. A few moments later, they were all disabled.
“That was FUN!” she cheered.
“What about a real fight now? Against a human opponent?”
“I thought you’d never ask. But let’s make sure we have those training weapons on. I don’t think it would look good on my rap sheet if I blew you out of the sky on the first day.”
Chase couldn’t help but smile. Her attitude was very similar to his. Aggressive and witty with a naturally playful arrogance. He liked that about her. Very much.
“Let’s not get too cocky; I’m no dumb probe.”
“Oh Lieutenant Commander, I’m counting on that fact very much.”
Without another word of warning, the fight began.
In just a few moments, Chase was already on Sarah’s six. H
e opened fire and scored a few wing hits, although the damage simulator translated that they barely would have impacted ten percent of the shields in a real fight situation. As the chase progressed, Sarah became more and more evasive, and even managed to catch him off guard by decelerating abruptly, a maneuver he both used himself and loved.
Then the roles reversed. Chase was the prey and Sarah was the huntress.
She rained laser fire on his craft like there was no tomorrow and, while he went evasive himself, he got hit quite a few times on the rear shields. In a matter of seconds, they dropped to a virtual seventy percent. He tried executing a few of his pre-programmed evasive macros but they only worked with marginal success. However, the more she attacked, the more he studied her patterns. She had the tendency to try and anticipate his moves based on the repetition of his patterns, and he could use that to his advantage by throwing her a curve ball at a critical moment. But he decided that he wouldn’t try to show off just yet, and hit the afterburner and flew away rapidly instead.
It didn’t take long for Sarah to adjust her speed but that had given him enough time to make a full reverse and be nose to nose with her. They fired at each other at the same time and both took hits on their frontal shields. In a matter of seconds, they were on a collision course. Neither one would be the first to back down, and their ships’ computers beeped frantically the coming impact. But at the very last moment, when they could each almost see the other smiling in the cockpit, they veered and rotated right, avoiding each other by mere feet.
“You’re holding out on me, Chase. Why?” Sarah asked over the comm.
“I thought you’d like time to adapt to the new ship. It’s your first space flight after all.”
“I’m not made of glass, and I have logged thousands of hours flying planes.”
“You’re right, I apologize. I won’t patronize you anymore; get ready for a full on assault.”
“Bring it on!”
Chase had seen enough of her fighting patterns that he let his brain take over and fly the fighter on pure instinct. It felt good to let go of every thought and become one with the fighter; it was a sensation like no other. Sarah came about and started shooting towards him, but he instinctively danced through the rain of lasers. After a few seconds of hitting nothing but void, Sarah laughed.
Earth Last Sanctuary (Universe in Flames Book 1) Page 14