Rei flew closer to the enemy base, telling Lieutenant Katsuragi to begin intelligence gathering as he did so. The Rafe had just flown a simple course around the center of the base. A manned fighter, however, could take a more flexible route based on the flight crew’s judgment. Every sort of tactical recon flight pattern was worked out in advance, and a combat-hardened flight officer could judge a situation and call for, say, a bee dance flight pattern, which the pilot would immediately execute. A predetermined flight pattern like that could also be flown on automatic. However, Lieutenant Katsuragi wasn’t used to combat yet, and Rei thought that making and executing flight pattern decisions should be his call alone. But Lieutenant Katsuragi proved to be even more skillful than expected, understanding what Rei wanted to do and answering him with a request for an Endless Eight pattern. They would fly a continuous figure eight centered over the base below them. It would involve an intensive observation of the base itself, beginning at high altitude and gradually moving lower.
Rei complied with the request. It was a dangerous pattern, but there didn’t seem to be any action in the air at this point. It looked like there were hardly any JAM left to intercept them. There was no sign of any FAF ground attack fighters around them, just a formation of small planes meant for dogfighting that were flying on the perimeter.
There was an installation that may have been the entrance to an underground hangar bay next to the one remaining runway. It looked like a small white hill with a gaping entrance that rose to the runway’s side. If it hadn’t been destroyed, it most likely was the sole remaining escape route the JAM had left on the base. Occasionally, several black JAM planes would appear at it and begin to take off, only to be picked off by the FAF’s fighters. Not on the runway, but immediately after they’d cleared it. It was as if they were swatting flies.
Rei had a feeling that it was an ant queen, not a fly, which lurked underground at the bottom of that hole. It really did feel like they were there to exterminate a nest of ants. He wondered what methods FAF authorities were going to use to capture the base. Maybe they’d try pouring insecticide down the hole. He wondered what the men on the surface there would see when they went underground. Probably nothing, Rei thought. The odds were good that they wouldn’t have time to see anything. They’d be too busy being wiped out in some completely unexpected way by the JAM. If the JAM had really abandoned the base, they wouldn’t leave any clues behind. And if they were intending to defend it to the bitter end, they’d probably use that hole as a trap to draw the enemy to them. The humans weren’t going to get to see the inside of a JAM base that easily. The proof of that lay in bitter experience. They’d had many opportunities to penetrate a base over the decades they’d been fighting, but never once had they managed to do it. Did they really think this time would be any different? Rei wondered.
Yukikaze flew her figure-eight course, descending as she did.
Rei approached the runway, flying at low altitude as though he intended to land. That was when it appeared. A JAM plane. Just one. A relatively large high-speed fighter of the type used for hit-and-away combat. It was out on the runway now, accelerating. All the FAF planes in the air banked around, getting into formation to intercept it.
What happened next was about what Rei had expected, although not entirely as he had imagined. JAM defenses launched from the white sand. Two types. One type was anti-aircraft missiles. They popped up from the sand and ignited their rocket engines in midair, then seemed to self-destruct as they accelerated upwards, scattering smaller pieces in every direction. They hadn’t destroyed themselves, however. The missiles had split into countless micro-missiles, which now sped toward the FAF planes that were still getting ready for their attack. The other type were small fighter planes. Short range interceptors. Too many to count, not that there was any time to count them.
In an instant, Yukikaze had passed over the JAM fighter on the runway. There was no time to target it. Instantly, Rei began coming back around to engage. At roughly the same moment, he saw the JAM attack slam into the FAF formation, wiping it out. The JAM planes already in the air took up a protective formation around the one taking off and flew after Yukikaze. Rei snapped her into a turn and then saw the disaster that had struck the ground below. The planes, probably taking off from the center of the base at supersonic speeds, had produced a shock wave that had left a round hole in the desert sand, which began to cave in. The rumble and roar was loud enough to be heard aboard Yukikaze. Cookie base was turning into an enormous crater right before his eyes.
All to let that one plane escape, Rei thought. They must have been preserving the fire power they needed to escape, waiting for the FAF attack to let up. And then they’d abandoned the base. It didn’t look as though they planned to repair it, as they had in the past. But why? Why now?
“Multiple bogeys. JAM, closing in!” Lieutenant Katsuragi called out, his voice tense. Setting his fire control radar range to super search mode, Rei calmly confirmed the countless JAM contacts flying at them.
“Support fighters won’t make it here in time,” Lieutenant Katsuragi said. “The nearest one’s—”
“Don’t expect any support.”
Rei knew that slipping away from the enemy on his own wasn’t going to be easy. The swarm of JAM planes began to surround Yukikaze.
“The one they’re trying to protect is the plane that took off from the runway.” The other, smaller planes couldn’t fly for long. They were like disposable interceptors. “Lieutenant, find that plane. We’re taking it down. Get me a heading. Engaging!” he demanded, declaring his intention to attack to Lieutenant Katsuragi.
“Roger!” He paused a moment. “Two bandits, on our six! Get ready to break to starboard…now!”
Rei changed direction as he’d been told.
“Target sighted, closing fast,” said Lieutenant Katsuragi. “Locked on.”
It had been picked up on Yukikaze’s antiaircraft fire control radar, which was able to track multiple enemies simultaneously. The ant queen. No, not an ant. A wasp. And Rei could tell that Yukikaze had no intention of letting it get away alive.
She turned to evade the smaller JAM flying up from low in front of her.
It was here that Rei realized that the enemy planes were behaving strangely. They weren’t attacking. And not a single missile that had launched from the desert sands below had flown after Yukikaze.
“Any time you’re ready, Captain Fukai. All loaded missiles are reading green.”
“Understood.”
Leveling off—though by all rights he shouldn’t have had time to do this, he realized—Rei looked outside of the cockpit. He searched for the target with his naked eye. It was heading toward them from the skies to their upper right.