“Stop it!” Lieutenant Mayle screamed. “That thing’s gone nuts!”
5
DEEP BELOW FAERY base, under the protection of SAF headquarters, the command center had gone silent.
The center’s huge main display screen had suddenly lit up with icons showing the positions of the returning fighters of the 505th. B-3, Yukikaze, was now transmitting strange data during the mission.
While SAF planes did track the positions of every plane in their assigned reconnaissance area during a mission, they normally wouldn’t transmit that data in real time, and were they to do so, it would only be to track enemy planes; for example, if the JAM did something unexpected that clearly put the FAF at a disadvantage. Normally, the only readout that would appear on the main screen would be the signs marking each phase of the mission as it progressed.
If all went well, it would end with a display from the operation command plane reporting Mission complete, returning to base.
All data, such as enemy and allied plane movements, electronic warfare intel, data on enemy and allied gains, and the like would be stored in the data file of the operation command plane and carried back to base. Watching the battle from on high without joining in was the SAF’s duty, and without the data they gathered, no one would even know how many JAM fighters had been shot down. This was because the pilots locked in combat didn’t even have enough time to verify if one of their companions had been shot down or not.
So usually all Major Booker had to do during a mission was look at the main screen display as it displayed the phrase GATHERING DATA and tick off each point on the attack schedule, while praying that no major abnormalities were reported and that the operation command plane made it back to base in one piece. As much as he’d like to know how the battle was progressing in real time, all he could do was wait. If he didn’t, the JAM could very well steal the information the SAF were gathering.
If they were seeing concrete data on the movements of an operation command plane, then something had gone wrong. A problem had cropped up in the plane, for example, or the JAM were directly targeting it. But neither of those were happening now. What they were seeing now had never happened before, ever. Yukikaze was transmitting data showing the exact position, speed, and acceleration of the 505th TFS as it was returning to base. As though it were absolutely vital data. Furthermore, it was identifying the planes of the 505th as FRIEND/FOE UNKNOWN.
Unknown planes were colored yellow on the main screen. Bogeys that couldn’t be identified as friend or foe had to be treated as enemies, since they were most likely threats. However, the planes Yukikaze was treating as such were very clearly those of the 505th. The five JAM fighters pursuing them to the rear were colored red, marking them as hostiles, with Yukikaze identifying them as short-range high-speed interceptors, possibly of an improved type.
The SAF battle-monitoring personnel couldn’t decide what was going on. The JAM themselves flying into the room wouldn’t have caused a bigger shock than what was happening now, and as everyone there sat in stupefied silence, the three planes bringing up the rear of the 505th were shot down simultaneously. Several Sylphids, which should have been light and nimble after completing their ground attack, had picked up pursuers they couldn’t shake off and been blown apart.
Sylphids were designed for hit-and-away combat, built for speed. There was no way that they could have been caught by JAM interceptors.
On a raised platform at the far end of the center, looking out over the backs of the personnel working there, sat General Cooley at the main command desk with Major Booker at an identical desk next to her. Rei sat next to him in his wheelchair, but the incomprehensible situation had the major’s eyes glued to the main screen and his breath caught in his throat.
“Why aren’t they accelerating?” he asked. “A Sylph should be able to shake off those JAM easily. Why are they just poking along like that?”
“Confirm the position of the 515th TFS,” General Cooley said, her voice calm. “Have them cover the 505th. Display courses for Yukikaze and the 515th. Show Yukikaze’s position as well.”
Major Booker relayed General Cooley’s commands via his headset mic to the tactical computer in headquarters. The text ORDERS EXECUTED was displayed. Yukikaze broke away from her preplanned reconnaissance air space and began closing on the 505th at high speed.
“What’s Yukikaze doing?” General Cooley asked.
As she was saying this, three more of the 505th’s fighters were shot down. While the Fand IIs of the 515th TFS managed to shoot down one JAM, the other four enemies pursuing the 505th shook them off.
“Yukikaze’s trying to find the cause of what’s destroying our Sylphs,” replied Major Booker. “I think she anticipated this.”
Having targeted the 505th TFS, the JAM fighters avoided engaging the Fand IIs in the 515th, dodging them at high speed. The truth was that their tactics suggested that they didn’t care if one or two of their fighters were lost. All that seemed to matter to the JAM was shaking the Fand IIs loose so that they could target the Sylphids ahead and eliminate them. Looking at the 515th, they were keeping a bit of distance from the 505th TFS in order to intercept the JAM fighters. If the JAM were, by some chance, able to break through, the 505th were expected to adopt the tactic of shaking them off. Nobody expected the JAM to chase them so far, since approaching TAB-15 would take the fight inside the base’s air defense perimeter.
However, the JAM had caught up with the 505th before they’d gotten close to the defense line—there was something wrong. And not just one or two planes, but all of the planes of the 505th had slowed down rather than accelerated, as though waiting to be shot down. It was being charitable to call the situation abnormal.
Yukikaze relayed the situation to headquarters via real-time data link.
The four pursuing JAM fighters had easily closed in on the 505th and began picking them off, attacking with air-to-air missiles and cannon fire. Unable to escape, by the time the 505th engaged the JAM, there were only three planes left: the formation led by Lieutenant Mayle’s plane. The other two planes had no chance in the dogfight that followed. Both were destroyed.
Yukikaze had dived from high altitude at supersonic speed, taking out a JAM fighter with a medium-range missile. She took out two more with short-range missiles as she passed them, then slammed into a steep banking turn to pursue the remaining JAM fighter as it attempted to flee. She blasted it from the sky with her cannon.
Not even three minutes had passed since the 515th detected the approaching JAM fighters. In that short time, the 505th Tactical Fighter Squadron had been wiped out. Only Lieutenant Mayle’s plane survived.
Yukikaze reported her battle with the JAM. Even though all JAM in the vicinity had been wiped out and the threat extinguished, she continued to display that she was actively engaging them and did not secure from attack mode. She continued to display Lieutenant Mayle’s plane as “unknown.”
Yukikaze, seemingly about to turn her anger on the Sylphid for having been so easily destroyed by the JAM, wheeled around to pursue Mayle’s plane. Then, as though suddenly headed back to base, she assumed a course for TAB-15, closing fast and flying low. Upon reaching it, she opened fire with her cannon in ground attack mode.
On screen, the indicator continued to show that she was engaging the enemy.
“Abort the attack,” General Cooley said. “Order Yukikaze to return to base. Cancel its mission.”