by Rob Buckman
"Are you comfortable?” A disembodied voice asked. He recognized Kat's voice.
"You could say that."
"Tight fit?” She asked.
"Funny, very funny.” He muttered, but she heard.
"It's going to get tighter in a while, but after that you will feel fine, just like you were in your mother's loving arms.” She cooed.
"My mother wasn't an effing gorilla!"
"Am I holding you too tight General Drake?” Another voice with a soft English accent asked.
"I thought this was a two seater, who are you?” He asked, confused for a moment.
"I am called Lady Jane Gray by my Captain. How would you like to address me, General Drake?” The voice asked.
"Lady Jane will do just fine. But who are you?"
"The aircraft General, she is the aircraft.” Kat's voice answered instead.
"Oh... Right. I see." That answer was as clear as mud. "So what's with the coffin."
"It's not a coffin General, the whole cockpit is a pressure suit and a monitoring system all in one. That’s what you flight suit is for. It’s an interface between you and the ship.” At that moment, the lights came on, or to be more exact Scott suddenly had a three hundred and eighty-degree field of vision around him in all directions.
“Wow! That’s some effect.” His instinct was to grab something, but he couldn’t, the cockpit had contracted around him to the point where he and the aircraft were one. Within a few seconds, the material surrounding him warmed to skin temperature and he could hardly feel it.
"All right Kat, you’ve had your fun, tell me what's going on?"
"Nothing really General, I just wanted you to get the full impact of the technology we put into this bird."
"All right, explain.” He muttered. Talk about a captive audience. The aircraft started moving then, out of the hanger and onto the runway.
"One of the major problems with any aircraft is vision, and that is especially important in a fighter aircraft, so we eliminated it." With few preliminaries, the aircraft surged a few feet down the runway and into the air, gaining altitude rapidly. Due to the inertia-dampening field surrounding the aircraft, there were none of the associated g forces on the body except for a slight sideways tugging sensation as the aircraft banked.
"The second problem with high speed fighter aircraft is what is euphemistically called cockpit information management. In other words, there is so much to do just flying a technologically advanced aircraft in a combat situation there is little time to take care of the other little things.”
“Things such as?” He asked.
“Oh, nothing really important, things like air to air missiles locked on your tail, or another fighter aircraft trying to write their names on your tail feather with bullets."
"So, your point is?"
"Years ago, even before your time, General, during WW II the Brits, Germans and the US had great fighter aircraft. The Spitfire, ME 109 and the P51 Mustang, all true fighters. You strapped them on and went out to kill the other guy before he killed you. They only had a few things in the cockpit to worry about, fuel, ammo, oil pressure, RPM and flaps. Mostly, once in the air in combat, 100 percent of their attention was on out flying the other guy.”
“Being a knuckle dragging ground pounder, I’ll take your word for it. So?”
“As aircraft became more complex, so did the instrumentation and what is euphemistically called ‘cockpit management’. It became so bad that they needed two people in one fighter aircraft to fight another fighter aircraft. Simply put, they asked one machine to do too many things, or take on too many roles. The aircraft became so sophisticated that some brainless idiot told the manufactures to take the guns off the aircraft. No longer needed in this day and age of missiles and standoff weapons. Sadly, a few good pilots paid for that mistake with their lives, as the enemy didn’t buy that philosophy.”
“That sucks.” Scott commented as they climbed to cruising attitude.
“In civilian aircraft it was even worse. The poor pilots were so wrapped up in managing the cockpit that more than one crashed due to inattention to actually flying the aircraft.”
“Yeah, I heard that as well. So your point is?”
“We eliminated all that. Simply put, we let the aircraft take care of all those mundane details for itself, like rear firing missiles, chaff, flares, pulse laser cannons, rear fired Gatling gun, whatever you can pack in, all under the control of the aircraft itself.” Kat pulled a sharp turn to port and level out. “You set up for a landing, the aircraft automatically positions the flaps, engine RPM, check three different altimeters and a host of other details, thereby letting the pilot concentrate on what he, or she has been trained to do.”
“Fly the damn aircraft and shoot the other guy down.”
“Give the man a cigar… Oh, sorry General. No disrespect.”
“None taken, and I get your point. I would assume that great care has been taken in programming the um.. AI or CI to cover the different parameters of landings and takeoffs?”
“That was what all the flight testing was about. We put the aircraft through as many bad situations as we could dream up. Now all I do is fly and not have to worry about such things as fuel transfer for balance, flaps, thrust, and a hundred and one other details.” She continued. "All I have to concentrate on is stitching my name on the other guy’s airframe."
"I see your point, so how intelligent, or semi-intelligent is the aircraft?"
"You could say that, but don't let Lady Jane hear you, she’s very intelligent and quiet sensitive."
“I am not sensitive, just more attuned to the nuances of the English Language.” To Scott’s ear, the CI even sounded a little huffy.
“See what I mean, very sensitive.”
"Just like the bloody pilot!” He muttered, hoping she didn't pick that up. As she didn't respond, it must have got by her. It didn’t, but Kat wasn’t about to say so. “But, if you have the anti-gravity field, why the pressure suit?”
“We found that at full strength the inertia dampening field its fine for normal civilian flying, say going from point A to point B, like now. In a combat situation, it hinders high speed combat maneuvering.”
“So, you have to compensate for the G forces just like always.”
“You’ve got that right, General, but with the available technology of this time, we can now pull a lot more G’s with no ill effect, or over straining the air frame, and pilot.”
“It sounds as if you have thought it all out.”
“Yes, sir, and then some. The suit you are wearing is an interface between your body and the aircraft. Lady Jane knows your vital statistics at all times. She can even provide medical assistants if you, or I get injured.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“She can also take over in the event of an emergency and I become incapacitated, or unconscious.”
“What on Earth can she do?”
“For one thing, get the aircraft out of harm’s way, and back to the airfield, or on the ground as the case may be. In the event of major structural damage, she can detach the cockpit section and take the occupant to safety, even a water landing and radio for help.”
“That make a lot of sense,” Scott murmured, “getting the pilot to safety and out of harm’s way means the pilot losses are minimized.”
“That’s the plan, General.”
“There is no way you invented this from scratch, Kat.”
“No, sir, didn’t need to.” At least she didn’t bite his head off this time for using her nickname. “Much of the technology all ready existed. Some we modified, others, like the guns we developed and put the package together.”
“Good thinking.” Scott was still trying to get use to the feeling of flying without really seeing the aircraft, just a ghostly outline. At first, it was disconcerting, partly because he had no control over what was happening.
“How did you manage to get this craft built so fast?”
“That
was the easy part. Like ours, the younger crowd is obsessed with speed, and love to build racing um… not sure what to call them. Space racers, transatmospheric space planes. Anyway, it wasn’t hard to convince the manufacturers to take one of their basic designs and modifying it to fit the our concept of a space fighter. We told them the extra ports on the front were for control jets. Once they delivered all the basic parts, Jango and his crew put them all together and mounted the weapons.”
“How did it work out?”
“The first one, not so good. Unstable in flight. We tested and modified as we went, ending up with this one, the Mark 8.”
“Guess this one tested out okay.”
“More than okay. She’s great, but it still leave the unanswered question of how she will perform against those alien craft we saw.”
“I hate to say it, but I suspect we’ll find out shortly.”
Looking around, he saw a flight of similar aircraft and two cargo transports forming up on his, nodding to himself. His baby sitters had turned up. After an hour, he started to relax and enjoy the feeling of freedom and began to wonder what it would be like to take on another aircraft in this bird. He suspected you didn't really fly this machine in the old sense, but more like a bird. The pilot, and aircraft one unit, each responding to the user's wishes. To prove this, he felt around in the arm sockets for a control stick. There was one.
"Can I get you something General Drake?” The soft English voice asked.
"No, not really, I was just wondering if there was any way I could get a drink.” He lied.
"Yes, sir. If you would pull your arm back, you will find a tube attached to the area behind your right ear. Pull it down, and I can provide you with water, or a stimulating drink. Which would you like?"
"A stimulating drink would be good, thank you." As he drew his arm back, the material relaxed so it was easy for him to slide his hand up along his chest and find the tube.
It fitted along the indentation of his neck and up into his mouth comfortably, and a quick suck brought an ice-cold tangy liquid into his mouth. It was stimulating as Lady Jane said. Someone had put a great deal of thought into this aircraft, thinking and anticipating conditions the pilot might face. On long flights, food and drink were important, and in the old aircraft not very convenient.
"What do you do if you need to eat Kat?” He asked.
"The tube can provide a liquid based food supplement that provide all the basic food elements, vitamins, minerals, calcium, and a few other ingredients the flight surgeon suggested."
"We have a flight surgeon now?” He asked. That one had got by him.
"Yes, we sent one of the astronauts, our resident biologist over to the education facility and he brushed up all the medical text and made himself our flight surgeon."
"Good, smart thinking.” This was one of the things he had been trying to get the other to do. Find a problem and solve it, then come and tell him about it. It looked like the word had got round. He thought of asking what you did in the event you needed to go to the toilet, then changed his mind. Hopefully he wouldn't be in here long enough to need an answer to that question.
"I have an incoming transmission, General Scott Drake, will you accept it?”
"Does she have to do that?"
"Do what General?"
"Not you Lady Jane, the pilot, Kat!"
"You have to specify to whom you are speaking to General Scott Drake."
"Kat!” He yelled.
"You don't have to shout General Scott Drake, she is quite capable of hearing you without raising your voice.” It sounded like his mother talking.
"Lieutenant Katharina Blake! Will you please ask her to stop using my full name each time she talks or addresses me?"
"Who do you mean General?” She asked in a sweet voice.
"Listen women, I'm just liable to come up there and put you across my knee and paddle your ass, now do it!” He yelled again, wanting nothing better than to do just that.
"Wow, testy isn't he.” Kat commented.
"I take it by your words that you meant he had a tendency to lose his temper very quickly, Kat."
"Yes, and Lady Jane, when addressing the General, you only have to use his title and last name, unless he gives you other instructions, is that clear?"
"Yes, it is."
"And General."
"Yes?"
"You might find it difficult to do that up here, or down there."
"Do what?” He said between clenched teeth.
"Paddle my ass."
"Don't take any bets on that. Now tell Bud Abbot to put that call through."
"Bud Abbott... Oh, I see.” She said, catching on. "Lady Jane, will you connect General Drake with the incoming transmission." A few second later the head and shoulder hologram of his communication tech popped up in front of him, appearing about three feet away.
"General!” The man said, startled by his closeness.
"Don't ask Eddy, I couldn't even begin to explain."
"Right, sir,” he said, suppressing a smile, "I have just received the data packet you were expecting, shall I transmit it to you?” He asked.
"Yes. Hold on. Lady Jane?” He asked in a sweet voice.
"Yes General Drake.” She answered.
"Can you receive the data packet and show it to me here?"
"Yes General Drake."
"Good, thank you. Eddy, transmit, when you are ready."
"Incoming data packet received General Drake, displaying for you now.”
As expected, the data pack was from the President and contained information of the whereabouts of the archeologist he was on his way to see. It also contained a condensed extract from the World Encyclopedia on the Island and the people of Japan. He passed on the landing coordinates to Kat and sat back to read, but he had to read it twice before he really took notice. If it weren’t so funny, he’d have to cry.
‘....The Island of Japan is situated off the East Coast of Mainland China in the sea of the same name at 35o North Latitude, and 140o East Longitude. This ancient human culture is noted for the fine craftsmanship of its woodwork products, especially bamboo and chinaware. In 2012 the Island was struck by a deadly plague and quarantined from that date until the present day after an attempt by the World Council to send medical and reconstruction teams to the Island failed. During the one hundred years of isolation, the plague accounted for 98 percent of the Islands population. As of this date, it is estimated that less than five hundred thousand or so people remain of the original estimated population of 120,000,000 people.
For the last 350 hundred years, the Island was famous for the pursuit and dedication of its people to peaceful philosophy, religion, art, and ritual pursuits such as the Tea Ceremony and other tranquil pastimes. The main religions was Shinto, the worship of ancestors until the Island converted to Islam, and the philosophy of Aikidoismum, as in a follower in the teaching of Aikido, a modern Japanese philosopher, 199-? - 2020. The main export was artistic paper, china artifacts, painting, and woodwork in bamboo until all exports stopped due to the plague...
Scott had to stop reading, as this was so much BS that he didn't bother reading the rest. This was so far from the truth that it wasn't even funny, but one oddity that did stand out, was the referring to a philosophy called Aikidoisum. There was no such thing, or at least Scott didn't think so, and he'd spent a year in Japan studying robotics and martial arts. He knew what Aikido was as he held a black belt himself, but Aikidoismum? Had someone slipped something by the World Council and deliberately left a sign? It could be, and something to check on when he arrived. That turned out to be sooner than he thought. Without warning, the world suddenly turned upside down and they plunged towards the ground. Scott groaned, swearing he'd get even with the woman driving this bus in the very near future, holding on the best he could. Kat heard the groan and grinned. She landed the aircraft on the open space at the coordinates, not that there was much to see except a spectacular land, and seascape. The material
surrounding him relaxed and the bottom door popped open. He slid out, breathing a sigh of relief as he stepped off the seat. Kat was already out of the aircraft, standing there smiling at him, and for a moment he had the impulse to go over and do just what he said, paddle her ass. She swayed her body, and in the revealing suit, it was as if she was daring him to go ahead and try.
"Escort present and ready to go General.” Janet Blake snapped rushing up with her team. Scott unclenched his hands, visibly relaxing before he turned.
"Thanks Janet.” He said softly.