YUKIKAZE (16 page)

Munch was suddenly aware of how cold it was. His radio beacon was operating and he had his survival kit, but he still prayed that the search and rescue team would find them soon.

The black bulk of Banshee-IV disappeared from sight. All he could hear now was the sound of wind. He wondered if they had just been attacked by a ghost.

HIS TACTICAL RECONNAISSANCE mission complete, Lieutenant Rei Fukai returned to Faery Base. Not long after, he was summoned to appear before the SAF deputy commander, General Cooley.

When he entered Cooley’s office, she didn’t acknowledge his salute, but he didn’t take offense. Her attention was fixed on a display linked to the main strategic computer in the SAF’s mission control room. He stood silently at attention until she spoke at last.

“Banshee-IV’s entire fighter squadron was destroyed,” she said slowly. “Is that what you observed, Lieutenant?”

“I recall observing the reverse. I saw them destroy the JAM squadron,” Rei replied. “But if Yukikaze’s data file says that wasn’t the case, then it wasn’t the case.”

“You are correct. So is Yukikaze’s data file. The incident occurred after the air battle.”

“Incident? There was an ambush or something?”

“I wish I could say otherwise.”

The general relayed to him what they knew so far about the situation, indicating the elements on the display as she spoke. It showed analysis results of the aircraft positions, comm records, armaments used by Banshee, radar frequencies, top secret ECM and ECCM, IFF operational conditions, and so on at the time of the incident.

“You’ve got a lot of electronic warfare data there,” Rei said. “Yukikaze could have collected the same intel easily, though.”

“This is all data obtained from crew members of Banshee-IV who managed to escape. Banshee was attacked by a single JAM aircraft just after it launched all of its onboard fighters. The incident began right after that aircraft was shot down. Banshee’s crew lost control of all electronic equipment. Since the nuclear reactor was unstable, the captain ordered all hands to abandon ship. Banshee continued flying unmanned and then attacked its returning fighters. Miraculously, nobody was killed.”

“So what does this have to do with me?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I said, what does this have to do with me?”

The general sighed. “We need to find out what happened to Banshee-IV. The FAF Intelligence forces suspect that one of the crew may have sabotaged the onboard electronics systems,” she explained.

“The JAM aren’t the only enemy the FAF has. An agent from Earth may have infiltrated us in order to prolong the war here,” Rei said.

“That’s ridiculous. Our enemy is the JAM.”

“Then the JAM have taken over Banshee-IV. And if that’s the case, we have to bring it down.”

“Taken over by the JAM? Seriously?” she asked.

“First you don’t believe it’s an agent from Earth and now you don’t believe it’s the JAM. Don’t jerk me around, General. This isn’t my problem, and I couldn’t care less what’s happening aboard Banshee. And besides, Banshee’s air team were idiots. If it was shooting at them, they should have shot back. If it was me, I wouldn’t care if it was a carrier, or a plane that looked like a Sylph, or someone wearing a general’s rank insignia. Anyone who fires on Yukikaze is an enemy, and if she says it’s an enemy, I’ll pull the trigger without a second thought. That’s war. You think too long and you die. But you wouldn’t understand that.”

“Watch how you speak to me, Lieutenant.”

“All right then, General Cooley,
ma’am
, may I please be dismissed?”

Rei coldly watched as she visibly struggled to bring her anger under control. Although she was irritated by his insubordinate attitude, he had no intention of changing his behavior and had little sympathy for her in having someone like himself under her command. He knew she had never tasted the bitterness of wondering during a takeoff whether you were ever going to land again. She’d never experienced combat with the JAM, who had no morals and no sense of honor. Rank meant nothing out there. Neither did emotions.

If I died,
Rei thought,
I wonder if the general would regret the loss of a good soldier. Maybe she’d give me a medal, but no way she’d ever shed a tear for me. She’d probably be relieved to be free of someone who spread pessimism like an infectious disease.
Rei knew it, but…what did it matter?

Whatever anyone might feel after he died was none of his concern. His sole concern was fighting the JAM and getting back alive. As far as the general’s feelings went, he couldn’t care less.

“Lieutenant, I’m ordering you to investigate the Banshee-IV incident. You’ll be assigned an analysis expert to assist you. Major Booker will give you the details. Dismissed.”

“Understood.” He snapped a salute.

He left Cooley’s office and went to Major Booker. Upon seeing Rei, the major shrugged his shoulders and said he sympathized.

“You probably said something to piss off General Wrinkles again, Rei.”

“Apparently I piss her off just by standing there in front of her. It’s not my fault.”

Booker sighed. “Just please don’t make her any madder than usual. Please. Any shit you dish out ends up being served back to me.”

“Come on, it’s not like you’re getting shot at.”

“The JAM you can dodge. The general, there’s no escape from.”

Booker gathered up some papers, shuffled through them, then slapped them down on the desk again.

“Strange incident, though. She told you about it, right?”

“If it’s such a big deal, why am I getting tagged with the investigation?”

“There’re reasons, which she would’ve explained to you—if she felt like it. Rei, don’t misunderstand: the FAF isn’t a business and we aren’t employees. It’s an air force, and it’s run on orders, not complaints. Orders that run from the top to the bottom. It doesn’t work in the other direction. An army can’t be run from the bottom.”

“Yeah, I know. But Jack, why is she always so mad at me? What should I do?”

“A beaten dog will still obey you…as long as it doesn’t get too big to control.”

“Right. So is Earth beating the JAM? Or is it the other way around?”

“I fail to see the humor, Lieutenant.”

They left Booker’s office and went into the SAF briefing room. The major switched on the wall display and pulled up some radar imagery.

“This is Banshee-IV. It’s maintaining its usual course even though no one’s aboard. Actually, we don’t know that for sure. Someone may be aboard.”

“Where’s this imagery from? An ADC recon plane?”

“No,” replied the major as he filled his coffee cup. “This is real-time data from Boomerang Unit 6, Minx. They’re using our proprietary SSL encryption to transmit. The reason why is that the FAF brass have begun a confidential investigation. They’re grilling Banshee’s crew for information and keeping the guys from the fighter squadron canned up like Spam. They hope that it’s the JAM that caused this. The second-best scenario would be a mechanical failure, which would be more serious but still relatively simple to deal with. But if it’s neither, if this incident was caused by someone from Earth, then it’s not just the FAF’s problem anymore.”

“And it would be a pretty damn good justification for a fight between the FAF and Earth. How pissed off would the general be if I said that?”

“Rei, please. You go around staying stuff like that and FAF Intelligence’ll have your arse in the stockade in a heartbeat. The FAF’s duty is to protect Earth from the JAM, but it has to protect itself as well. There are a lot of people on Earth lately who’re saying the FAF isn’t necessary, and Intelligence has to counter that.”

“Counter it without anyone noticing they’re countering it.”

“Exactly. They can’t be obvious about it. People on Earth are so far removed from the battlefield that they don’t understand how bad the JAM really are. Some are even wondering if the FAF
are
the JAM. There may even be people within our own forces who are working to dismantle the organization.”

Rei turned the coffee cup the major gave him around in his hand. “They think the FAF have created the JAM, you mean? What do you think about that, Jack?”

The major shut off the display and sat down. “I’ve definitely noticed a change in the JAM’s behavior between now and the time when I was a fighter pilot.”

“As in, they’re not as openly aggressive as they used to be?” Rei asked. “The JAM are altering their strategy, Jack. I think the threat now is higher than it used to be. The fact that there are now people saying the FAF isn’t necessary is proof that their invasion has advanced. If the JAM were a mirage created by the FAF, they wouldn’t be using that strategy.” Rei sipped his coffee. “But it doesn’t really matter to me. I’m a grunt. I just gotta follow orders. Right, Major?”

“You say ‘It doesn’t matter’ an awful lot lately for someone so talkative, you know.”

“The JAM are a powerful enemy. I’ve finally come to understand that, but that’s all I understand. If Lynn Jackson had spent time here, she probably wouldn’t have written such an optimistic book.”

“That’s possible,” said Major Booker, nodding. “She needs to write a follow-up. But I doubt she ever will. Back on Earth they just don’t understand how much of a threat the JAM is. It’s frightening.”

“I’ll leave that to the Intelligence forces to handle. We aren’t intelligence operators. We’re soldiers.”

“You got that right.”

Booker worked the display controls and brought up data on Banshee-IV. “You’re going to land on this thing with Yukikaze. You don’t need to worry about being attacked. We’ve confirmed that Banshee’s exhausted all her weaponry. I want you to find out what’s happened on board. Yukikaze is being installed with a special-purpose landing system as we speak, so it should be easy for you.” The major gestured toward the glass wall of the briefing room that overlooked the maintenance floor. Yukikaze was being towed out.

“So it’s going to be kind of like a carrier landing? I thought they had to extend a hook from Banshee to recover its fighters.”

“That’s what they did in the old days, back in the age of airships when they’d have the planes hanging beneath the carrier. But times have changed. Any plane can land on Banshee, and it’s been designed to take on aircraft making emergency landings. Special equipment isn’t necessary. You should be able to land there with just a standard arresting hook, but we’re still installing an automatic carrier landing system. It’s nothing fancy, just modifying the avionics software a bit. And to be safe, we’re fitting six wire anchor launchers along her underside as well.”

Major Booker suggested that they test them out, so he and Rei went down to the maintenance floor. After the mechanics gave them the thumbs-up, Rei got into Yukikaze’s cockpit while the major settled into the rear seat. The mechanics removed the external ladder and moved away from the plane.

“Rei, look at your arresting hook control panel. There should be an AUX control switch. That should trigger the launchers for the wire anchors. Give it a try.”

Rei turned the switch. With a loud
wham
, thin wires shot out from under Yukikaze and embedded themselves into a dummy board that had been laid down over the floor of the bay. The sharp, recurved heads of the wires stuck fast.

“Normally, you wouldn’t need this because the plane would be caught by the arresting cables. There’s a self-propelled, robotic spotting dolly on Banshee’s deck. It keeps the plane’s attitude correct and shuttles the launch bar back, but we don’t know if it’s working. If it isn’t, the aircraft stowage elevator may not be working, either.” Booker climbed out of the plane.

“If it isn’t,” Rei said as he followed the major down, “Yukikaze will be stuck on Banshee’s deck. I won’t exactly be able get out and stroll around out there. The thing is flying, after all.”

“It’s moving at less than 120 knots, but yeah, it’d be certain suicide if you tried it.”

“Even if I wasn’t blown off I probably wouldn’t even be able to breathe because of the wind pressure.”

“Don’t worry. I’ve got an idea.”

“It better be a good one, Jack. If I go rolling off of there, ‘Oops, sorry’ isn’t gonna cut it.”

“You’ve had wind tunnel resistance training, right? Relax. Leave it to me.”

Rei followed the major across the maintenance floor and into the personnel elevator.

“We have another place to go?”

“I want to introduce you to your partner. His name’s Tom John, from the Systems Corps. Everyone calls him “Tomahawk.” I think his real first name may be Thomas, but I’m not sure. What I do know for sure is that he’s a genius at avionics.”

“Tomahawk? He’s an Indian?”

“Yeah. They say he’s a genuine Native American. Think he was born in Canada.”

They entered the SAF mission control room. It was a highceilinged chamber, its walls filled with battle progress displays crowded with code letters and data transmitted from the Tactical Air Force’s GHQ.

Tom John was drinking coffee and chatting with a female operator. Seeing Major Booker, he put the cup down onto the console and saluted. He had sunken cheeks, reddish brown skin, and long black hair that was tied back. His physique was slight. Compared to the large woman next to him, he could almost be mistaken for a child. But the impression Rei got from him belied his physical appearance. He was, without a doubt, a soldier. Rei thought that his eyes were like those of a hawk.

“Hi, Tom,” said the major in a friendly tone. “Welcome to the SAF. So, getting to know us?”

The operator coughed and turned back to her console.

“Yep,” answered Tomahawk with a smile. “You’re lucky—the SAF has a lot of pretty girls here.”

“Speaking of, our little tomboy Minx should be back soon. How’s she doing, Hikalatia?”

“Minx is scheduled to return at 2220,” said the operator. “Banshee-IV has no means of attack, and there’s been no unusual activity.”

“Like I said before, Banshee exhausted all of its missiles and gun ammo. But there is the possibility that it could be directed to crash into Faery Base. Anyway, Tom, let me introduce you. This is Lieutenant Rei Fukai, one of our top Sylph drivers.”