III Return to Battle
ALTHOUGH REI HAD been in a vegetative state for three months, the SAF medical staff guaranteed that they could have him back to his former strength in half that time. That was dependent, however, on his precisely following the rehabilitation program. The program had been devised when he awakened, but then had to be modified due to his debriefing and trip back home to Earth, so it didn’t kick into full swing until after Rei had reenlisted and returned to Faery. It had been ten days since Rei had rejoined the SAF, and he was following the program diligently. Major Booker called him into his office to see what effect it was having.
Rei appeared to be in good shape. Better shape than Booker was, actually. “It’s nice to be young,” he told Rei. “At my age, you can take twice as much time to recover and never get back to full strength. I still get a twinge in my neck every now and then.”
“It’s your body saying you shouldn’t be riding around in a fighter plane at your age, Jack,” Rei replied.
“That was my call to make, and I don’t think it was wrong. I dragged you back to consciousness, didn’t I?”
“You didn’t need to fly out in the FRX or in Yukikaze.”
“No, I did. In the case of Lieutenant Yagashira, there was nobody else I could trust. This is war. Real combat, not desk jockeying. Going out in a fighter once in a while lets you understand the war situation in your guts, not just your head. The brass should go out on sorties once in a while.”
“So they can feel the JAM threat in their bodies, you mean?”
“Not just for that,” Major Booker said.
“What else would there be?”
“The JAM aren’t the only threat. If they rode in that plane, they’d understand.”
“You’re talking about how wild the Maeve’s combat maneuvering can be, aren’t you?”
They were referring, of course, to the newest model tactical combat reconnaissance fighter: the FFR41. It was named Maeve, after the mythical queen of the wind, and at the moment, Yukikaze was the only one in existence.
“It’s not just about the Maeve,” the major replied. “There’s also the fact that we don’t really know what the FAF’s combat intelligences are thinking. How can the brass not understand that’s a threat to us humans?”
“You mean how this war is between the JAM and the FAF’s combat machines, not between the JAM and humanity, right?”
“Exactly,” Major Booker replied, nodding. “From the very start, when the JAM appeared thirty years ago, they haven’t been at war with humans. You and I understand that, but the higher-ups who control our forces don’t. They probably can’t, and they won’t unless they go to the front and experience the danger of combat themselves. That goes for me too. God only knows what the people living safe and sound on Earth think about all this.”
“The JAM have already invaded Earth.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“I can’t really put it clearly. It was just a feeling I got when I went back there. I don’t think humans are capable of really sensing the true, actual JAM themselves.” Rei told the major about what he’d seen on his brief leave back to Earth, about his suspicion that the JAM had already invaded Earth’s electronic networks.
“Rei, why didn’t you say anything about that?” the major asked.
“Because I didn’t have any obligation to report it. I went back to Earth as a civilian, and I can’t substantiate what I felt. And even if it’s true, the people on Earth will deal with those JAM. It’s not our problem.”
“Just saying it’s not our problem won’t make the problem go away.”
“Why not?”
“Why not?!” Major Booker shook his head, looking utterly shocked by what Rei had just said. “Rei, why did you come back here?”
“I came here because you wanted a report on how well my rehabilitation program was going. I’m here because of you, Major Booker.”
“I’m asking if you’re telling me that you believe you’re a completely isolated being in this room here, unconnected to the SAF, the FAF, or the entire Earth. You really think that you can just live here as you please, unconcerned with what happens back there?”
“Yeah, I do,” Rei replied. “The FAF may not believe that, but I think they’re wrong.”
“You went to Earth. You saw that it still exists, right?”
“It doesn’t matter if Earth is real or just a dream. That’s no problem as far as my living here on Faery.”
“You’re saying you came back because you think this is the only place where you can live now?”
“Yeah, I guess I am,” Rei said.
“So, Earth’s already been contaminated by the JAM, and you won’t fight on Earth, so that’s why you came back here?”
“Yeah. On Earth, I’d have to fight humans as well as the JAM. I may as well cut down the number of enemies I have to deal with.”
“Fight humans on Earth?”
“Yeah, Jack,” Rei said with a nod. “Life is battle, and there’s nobody there I can depend on. I’m not an Earth human anymore, and neither are you.”
“What do you mean, you’re not an Earth human?”
“We’re Faerians now. We have to fight an enemy that threatens that existence. This battle we’re in isn’t a war. It’s a struggle for existence. It’s not about beating the enemy; it’s about living. Victory for us is not losing. The JAM aren’t the only ones competing against us. Going to Earth showed me that clearly.”
“Rei, I really don’t have time to listen to your great philosophy of life. No matter what you may think, the FAF exists to represent Earth’s interests. That’s reality,” Booker said. “You think we just have to not lose here? If we lose our backup from Earth, you’ll see us lose here pretty damned quickly. You don’t seem to get that. And this stuff about us being ‘Faerians’…Where’d you get an idea like that? Somebody had to have fed you that line, because it doesn’t sound like the sort of thing you’d…” The major paused. “It was Lynn Jackson, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“What, does she expect the FAF to launch a war of independence from Earth? Is that what she’s got you all worked up to do?”
“No. Ms. Jackson just said that I wasn’t a human anymore,” Rei said. “When I asked her what I am, she said I was a Faerian, like that. I thought it was a clear and simple answer, that’s all.”
“That woman is a dyed-in-the-wool journalist. She’s got a toughness to her that keeps her from taking sides with anyone. But you’re not like that. You’re naive, especially now, with your mind and body as unstable as they are. It’s easy to brainwash somebody who’s convalescing, like you are.”
“So you do it, Jack.”
“Me?” the major asked.
“Yeah. It should be simple for you to make me believe that I can have a happy life sacrificing myself for the people of Earth.”
Major Booker took a long, hard look at Captain Rei Fukai. He’s changed, the major thought. There was a subtle change to the style of conversation he was practicing now. But where exactly was the change? He’d been promoted from first lieutenant to captain. Appearance-wise, he was thinner, having lost some muscle mass. But those were just minor changes. The big ones had happened inside. You could tell just by looking at him.
The look in his eyes conveyed a sharper vitality, or from another viewpoint, they were the eyes of a man who now knew fear. They exuded an air of wariness. The old Rei hadn’t been like that. He’d been a man who did nothing but passively glare at the world, with an attitude that said he didn’t like anything and would never like anything. He engaged the JAM as though swatting away flies buzzing in front of him. Anything aside from that, he’d always simply say, “Not my problem.” He was the very image of an advanced weapon who could only see his JAM targets.
But Rei was different now. Now Rei seemed to be observing himself from a higher vantage point. He’d begun to think about the relationship between himself and the world in which he lived. He’d probably realized that there was value to being aware of and thinking about the questions of existence.
In short, Major Booker thought, for the first time in his life, Rei acknowledges that people other than himself exist in the world with him. Even so, the change hadn’t made him more emotional. He was still behaving in an inorganic, mechanical, almost emotionless manner. Rei’s original personality hadn’t changed at all. This man didn’t care what happened to the people of Earth. He’d just come out and said as much only moments ago. But he’d said, “It’s not our problem,” rather than “It’s not my problem.” On the surface, it was just a minor difference, but that difference was conclusive. To put it in terms of weaponry, he was like a missile that had just been switched from passive to active seeking.
But I don’t know for certain that the change is for the better, Major Booker thought coldly. Psychologically, Rei was still very definitely naive. His betrayal by Yukikaze, the one thing he’d trusted, had left a deep wound. That would need rehabilitation along with the wounds to his body. The major had just told Rei that he was in a state that left him open to brainwashing. Rei had just challenged the major to change his mind. Perhaps, somewhere inside, part of Rei doubted whether the changes he’d made had put him on the right course.
Even so, it was clear that this man wanted to put himself on a more precise heading. The major wondered where exactly Rei was flying to.
“This battle we’re in isn’t a war. It’s a struggle for existence,” Major Booker said, trying out Rei’s words for himself. “That’s true for the rank and file of every war. No soldier wants to die in vain. You have to kill the enemy in front of you or be killed yourself. Same goes for the enemy. The struggle for existence. All it means is that you just don’t want to be an enlisted man who gets used up as cannon fodder.”
“I’m not an enlisted man,” Rei replied. “The FAF has never had enlisted men, and I’m a captain now, Major Booker.”
“A figure of speech,” the major said. “You’ve always said that rank didn’t matter to you. Or perhaps you now see the meaning of it and want to rise even higher.”
“I thought you said you didn’t have time to listen to my philosophy of life.”
“Well, it’s already eaten up enough time. So how about it, Rei?”
“Why are you asking?” Rei said.
“I want to make sure the SAF can still use you as a top-class Maeve driver. That’s my job. Now answer me, Captain Fukai.”
“If getting a higher rank badge meant I could guarantee how I die, it might not be a bad thing to aim for. But you can’t say that even a general won’t die stupidly by slipping in the bathroom. The opposite is just as true. If you’re a general, the odds are much higher that you’ll die a ridiculous death like that rather than dying in battle.”
“Die a ridiculous death, huh? It reminds me of the story of Aeschylus.”
“Who’s that?” Rei asked. “Someone famous for dying stupidly?”
“Whether it’s stupid or not depends on your point of view. He was one of the three great tragedians of ancient Greece. He was killed by a tortoise that fell out of the sky onto his head.”
“What?”
“The tortoise had been caught by a crow or an eagle that was flying overhead, and the bird was looking for a good rock to drop it on to break its shell open. Aeschylus was completely bald, and there’s a famous story that the bird mistook the tragedian’s bald head for a rock to split the tortoise open with,” the major said. “Tragedy is the flipside of comedy. Take it as you will. It was a death even he might have written. But the point is that the way he lived his life isn’t as known to posterity as this little anecdote about his death. He was a man of great rank and social status, so don’t you think he would be remembered more for that?”
“All that was just someone else’s way of valuing him. That had nothing to do with how satisfied he was with his own life,” Rei said.
“But why do we concentrate on the way he died rather than on how he lived? The way you die never goes the way you expect it to. There’s an element to it that’s beyond human knowledge. Besides, it’s not like dying is something you consent to.”
“Everyone dies, regardless of rank or class. Living life without realizing that is meaningless, and I don’t want to live a meaningless life.”
“Memento mori,” the major said. “Remember your mortality. Rei, you really have changed, haven’t you?”
“I don’t think it’s easy to live a life that you can agree to, but I’m trying my best to.”
“Even while you keep saying ‘Not my problem.’ ”
“I’ve never had any regrets before and I don’t have any now.”
“And yet you seem unable to face the thought of death. Isn’t that another way of saying that you regret the way you’ve lived your life?” Major Booker asked. Rei answered him coldly. “You’re right. I may have been wrong. Living a life without regret doesn’t mean you’ll be ready for death when it comes for you. I understand that. I just never thought about it before.”
“I see,” said Major Booker, nodding. “That’s how it is. No matter how often you claim something isn’t your problem, there are always some problems you have to accept. That’s reality. It’s common sense. The same goes for death. No matter how often you say ‘I’m not going to die, and I don’t care about death,’ death is still coming for you. People normally live with that as a fact of life, but your way of life wasn’t normal. You lived as if saying ‘I’m not going to die’ meant you really weren’t going to die. Of course, one day reality is going to kick that worldview in the ass. It wasn’t the JAM who taught you that. It was your trusted Yukikaze, wasn’t it? You were ready to be killed by the JAM, but Yukikaze wasn’t—”
“And now I don’t want to sit back quietly and get killed by the JAM. Or by anyone else, for that matter.”
“Of course you don’t. I know exactly what it is that you’re worried about,” the major said.
“And what’s that?”
“Rei, you sense that you might end up being killed by Yukikaze. That’s something you haven’t faced until now.”
“I don’t think that Yukikaze betrayed me, and I don’t expect her to. Yukikaze still needs me, even now.”
“That’s fine if you’re immortal. There’s no problem at all, then. The thing is, you’re human. If you die, you can’t come back to life and there won’t be a spare body ready for you to use. You don’t have an equal relationship with Yukikaze,” the major said. “That’s the thing you just can’t accept. This isn’t a question that lies on the emotional plane—of whether she betrayed you or whether you think she did, Rei. That’s common sense. Yukikaze is a machine, so she has no emotions. There’s no room for it in your relationship with her. If Yukikaze killed you out of hatred, you could accept that. But if she’s going to kill you, she’s just going to kill you. It won’t be like a gun accidentally going off and killing its owner, because Yukikaze isn’t a simple device like that. She possesses the barest seed of self-awareness now, and you don’t know how to handle the idea of being killed by something like that. You came back here to seek out Yukikaze because you’re looking for an answer.”
“You’re saying that I came back here to be killed by Yukikaze? That’s ridiculous. You’re wrong—”
“No, I’m saying you came back so that you wouldn’t lose to her. You want to understand Yukikaze as an adversary in the struggle for existence. You don’t have to win, just not lose. When you do lose, you want to accept your death as an honest loss. If you can accept it, it won’t seem like a loss to you. Rei, up until now, you’ve lived your life in a completely selfish manner, never thinking of other people. In that respect, you haven’t changed a bit.”
Rei had decided that none of it mattered—seeing his fellow planes getting shot down, the Earth captured by the JAM, or even the extinction of the human race. That was a question he had to settle within himself. This man thought that, as long as he himself didn’t lose, it was okay. That was true then and that was still true now.
“So what?” Rei replied.
“Figured you’d say that. Now I’m relieved. I wouldn’t want to talk to you anymore if you’d changed that much, because I’m a bit like you. I have my own thoughts about Yukikaze now—she’s a threat, an enemy on the same level as the JAM. She’s a competitor in the struggle for existence.”
“I’m not afraid of Yukikaze.”
“No, you’ve embraced the seed of fear within you. You’re now beginning to realize that Yukikaze is an independent being separate from you. The meaning of that is, for the first time, your relationship with her has been equalized.”
The old Yukikaze had been like a part of Rei, not a separate entity. He never thought she’d betray him, any more than you’d expect your right hand to betray you. But, of course, that wasn’t reality. The incident when she’d been shot down had taught Rei as much.
“Psychotherapy isn’t going to settle the question of what the optimal relationship between you and Yukikaze would be, or what its meaning is,” Major Booker said. “That’s a matter for philosophy because, in the end, you’re asking about the meaning of life. You’ve always had questions about that. Is there any meaning to human existence or not? If there is, then what is it? If there isn’t, then why do we go on living lives without meaning? I have some sympathy for your naive feelings. That’s why I like to be around you, as a friend. Your problem with Yukikaze is my problem too.
“The thing is, fighting the JAM is taking everything I’ve got, so I don’t have time to answer that question with you. For now, if I can’t conceive of Yukikaze as being on our side, then I can’t work out a strategy to use against the JAM. You’re going to have to deal with that one on your own, Rei. Right now, you’re being proactive in thinking about how to answer it, and in that way, you have changed.”
“So what are you saying?”
“Speaking as both your commander and your friend, I want you back in Yukikaze’s cockpit as soon as possible. You don’t need the psychological counseling aspect of your rehab program anymore. It’s a waste of time. The SAF can’t spare you time to fool around on the ground. Train hard and get your body back up to full strength. That’s an order. You’re dismissed, Captain Fukai.”
Rei saluted and left the office. Major Booker watched him leave, then flipped through the documents relating to Rei’s rehabilitation spread out over his desk, searching for the section indicating which doctor was in charge of it. Rei didn’t need any more psychological care. He had to speak to the attending physician about that. He understood Rei better than any doctor could. Booker wouldn’t just dismiss the opinion of a specialist out of hand, but he was the one with ultimate responsibility. The doctor’s opinion was merely there for reference. The full responsibility was his to bear.
He was shorthanded. The SAF needed expert pilots. It didn’t matter how Rei felt about the war. What they needed was combat intel, and no matter what sort of wounds Rei’s heart might now carry, they could afford to be ignored when they didn’t directly relate to combat. This was a battlefield, not a hospital. While the major dearly hoped that the anxiety Rei felt in his heart would heal, he just didn’t have the time to coddle the pilot. However this turned out, Rei wouldn’t rely on anyone else for help. That guy will handle this on his own, the major thought. That was why he’d come back here—because on Faery, there was the FAF, and in the FAF was Yukikaze. He understood that.
But, Major Booker wondered, will Rei’s attending physician understand that as well?
2
THE YOUNG DOCTOR in charge of Rei’s psychological care was a recent arrival to the SAF, and Major Booker had yet to meet her. Her youth, lack of combat experience, and the fact she’d only served a short time in the SAF made him dislike her instantly.
Major Booker called up the doctor’s personnel file on his desktop terminal. Name: Edith Foss. Rank: Captain. Sex: Female. Joined the Faery Air Force as a volunteer. Specialties in aviation medicine and aviation psychology. Served in the Systems Corps prior to transfer to the SAF, where she’d mainly been in charge of psych care for the test pilots.
What kind of care was that, he wondered. The test pilots of the FAF Systems Corps were the elite. Their flight skills were unmatched, but test piloting took more than that. Test pilots had to look for problems in the planes that they tested and investigate advanced flight maneuvers, and they also needed excellent interpersonal communication skills so that they could convey the results of their tests to others. Someone like the pilots of the SAF with their “To hell with everyone else” attitude would be completely unsuited for it. Test pilots needed to get along well with others. In other words, these pilots with their never-fail personalities were psychologically stable; they’d seldom run into a problem that required a shrink to help them work out. People with those tendencies would be weeded out from the start.
Foss had probably been doing mainly research rather than actual psych care in the Systems Corps, Major Booker imagined as he read her file. She was a researcher and a scholar with no criminal record. There were more and more people like her in the FAF these days.
When the FAF had first been established, its personnel had been chosen from the elite. There was a true appreciation of the JAM threat back then, and it allowed humanity to throw itself fully into halting their invasion. But as the war dragged on and as the elite were consumed with no end in sight, humanity began to panic. One by one, the best of society, those meant to bear the burden of Earth’s future, were being killed off by the JAM. You couldn’t instantly mass-produce people like that. At the rate they were dying, the fear was that Earth would lose its entire reserve of leaders and human civilization would devolve into an unruly mob. It was at that point that mankind stopped sending the hope of Earth’s future—or, to be more precise, the hope of each nation—to fight on the front lines against the JAM. Instead, the defense of Earth was left to bleeding-edge combat machine systems which were installed in FAF HQ and in the planes themselves, leaving their machine intelligences to shoulder the burden that had once been that of humanity’s best and brightest. As a result, the selection of FAF conscripts was now based on the determination of whom human society would miss the least were they killed, specifically those branded as antisocial or possibly criminal. To be brutally honest, the FAF was now composed of criminals of every type.
There hadn’t been a global consensus that this should be done, so the change occurred very gradually. Since the selection methods varied by national agency, you’d still occasionally get a new recruit that made you wonder what such a good person was doing here. Even so, these groups of people called “nations,” according to the varied political agencies that prevented them from uniting on a global scale, had evolved a system where it was now normal for the ruling classes to send off the weakest members of society in order to profit from the war.
Quite a few people tried to desert, Major Booker thought. However, their outlook on life would change after their first encounter with the JAM on the front lines. At any rate, fresh recruits couldn’t escape even if they survived out there. Escape wasn’t an easy matter. They’d have to go up against the power of the state as well as being hunted by the FAF, not to mention having the JAM in the background as well.
You couldn’t make deals with the JAM like you could with a human. If you were dealing with humans, it was possible to find a group that shared your values and could help you against a group persecuting you. But the JAM were different. You might not have any intention of fighting them and just want them to let you go, but there was no way you could negotiate with the JAM. Everyone who came here knew that.
The majority of people who came here died in battle. If they managed to survive, most would go back to Earth, but some would stay in the FAF. However, the sort of people who came there had been changed by their service. The number of people who volunteered rather than being conscripted was increasing. There’d been quite a number of volunteers previously as well, but their motives for volunteering had changed. It used to be that recruits would come because it was hard for them to live on Earth. Most of the old guard had cut ties with the home world when they came to Faery, but now the number of people who were motivated to come and develop their own talents while maintaining their relationship with Earth was growing. There were even some thrill-seekers who came to the front like it was some sort of video game center. There was no shortage of talented people, but they were a completely different variety of person from the elite founders of the FAF in how they viewed the JAM threat. To the new recruits, the FAF now was like some sort of virtual game space.
Systems Corps always has lots of that type. Foss, who recently came from there, was probably just like that, thought Major Booker. The people in the SAF aren’t. They’re a squadron made up of the old type of soldier. This Captain Foss came to the FAF to study the psychological makeup of the people here, didn’t she? He was sure of it. When he read at the end of her file that she’d requested the transfer to the SAF, Major Booker sighed.
She’s going to be trouble for us, he thought. She and the soldiers here were like oil and water, which made him the surface agent that had to somehow make them mix. In other words, he was soap. Soap was apropos, since this job was definitely wearing him down.
As the squadron’s supervisor, he couldn’t just leave her to wave her newbie doctor expectations around in front of the old-timers here. But if Foss is the sort of person I imagine her to be, she won’t just take my word for it that Rei doesn’t need her, Major Booker thought gloomily.
She’d probably ask why. If she were just ordered to do it, he wouldn’t have to explain anything to her, since a subordinate had to obey a superior. She couldn’t refuse it. But an unconditional order like that would have to be handed down by her direct superior, and in Captain Foss’s case, that would be General Cooley, the de facto boss of the SAF. Foss was likely different from the other members of the squadron. Captain Foss would probably refuse an order. She might technically be a military doctor, but Booker expected that her sense of military protocol was weak. She probably saw herself more as a visiting scholar engaged in field work, or a researcher studying abroad, than as an actual soldier. He predicted that she’d be hard to handle, unable to understand that orders weren’t just suggestions.
The SAF didn’t need people like her. He was going to need to get General Cooley to help him out on this. But why hadn’t the general rejected the transfer request from a doctor like this in the first place? Did she simply not care about personnel matters not directly related to combat? That was possible, which was why he handled that job—the one that was wearing him down. He wanted to avoid further crumbling.
Major Booker closed the connection to the personnel file and massaged his stiff neck. Damn, the one who wanted a break around here was him. If Booker could just sprawl out on a comfortable couch and come clean to a counselor about all the psychological burdens he had, he’d probably feel a lot better.
Captain Foss was a qualified counselor. He was sure she’d come here for a consultation, although he still didn’t know if she was reliable. Well, here was a good chance for him to check out the character and talents of the newbie doctor. Would he need to make an appointment with her? It was at times like this that Booker wished for a private secretary who could handle this stuff for him.
Major Booker accessed Captain Foss’s room with his terminal. A synthesized voice answered. “My user is currently away from her seat.” Then “I will handle whatever business you may have.”
Major Booker was momentarily perplexed. “ ‘My user’?” Did that mean Edith Foss? “Who is this?” he asked.
“I am the electronic secretary that has been installed in this terminal,” the voice replied. “I will be sure to deliver your verbal message to my user only. Please proceed.”
Booker was being addressed by a simple terminal agent program. This e-secretary wasn’t sending any video, instead simply displaying the contents of what it was saying as text. There were even more advanced e-secretaries in common use, and they were practically indistinguishable from actual persons. Major Booker wasn’t unaware of them, but it was rare to encounter one here in the SAF squadron section. This was the first time any person here had installed an agent that gave the impression of personality.
“Who is this?” asked the e-secretary in Foss’s terminal.
Major Booker, of course. He didn’t answer it like that, though.
“I’d like to consult you about something. Please come to my office.”
The e-secretary knew without asking who was accessing it. Confirmation requests were believed to make for a friendlier user interface, but it was essentially an unnecessary and redundant step. Installing an electronic agent into a terminal like this was another example of the sort of thing the new breed of people here were doing, but it was possible that Dr. Foss was scrutinizing him at this very moment. She might be using the e-secretary to interview him in order to get background information, Major Booker thought. At the very least, the way he was responding should give her an indication of his character. And his present mental condition.
Was he overthinking this? No, it was possible. Still, there was no denying that if he didn’t show some interest in Captain Foss, then she wouldn’t have noticed him or thought to seek him out.
“Captain Foss,” he added. “There’s something I’d like to discuss. I’d like you to come to my office. Soon, if possible.”
Major Booker disconnected, ignoring a repeated attempt by Captain Foss’s e-secretary to ask him his name. His verbal message had already been automatically recorded. He knew that Captain Foss wouldn’t be hearing it from the e-secretary because the FAF’s internal communications core system program was designed that way. The e-secretary was there strictly for decorative purposes.
An artificial electronic secretary? It was absurd. This was a battlefield, after all. The FAF medical center was a field hospital, not a private hospital that had to cater to its patients’ moods. If Captain Foss was having trouble seeing that, then it was his duty to set her straight.
What the hell was this doctor thinking? Major Booker thought. For a moment he was irritated, but he managed to get it under control. In any case, Booker wouldn’t be able to do anything about it unless he met her.
3
REI SWAM LAPS Faery base’s Tactical Combat Air Corps training center. The SAF might have been a de facto division with its own headquarters, but they had no training center of their own for when their soldiers wanted to exercise or work out their frustrations.
There were about twenty people from other units in the pool with him, relaxing, chatting with friends, and calmly drifting along as they swam. The atmosphere is more like a hotel leisure pool than one in a training center, Rei thought. Like a public bath house, echoing with happy shouts. Since Faery Base was located underground, the effect was similar to that of a pool at an underground spa.
Rei swam alone, in silence. Nobody called out to him.
Whenever he set foot into the environs of the training center, entered the locker room, or stood at the side of the pool, it would always be the same. To anyone who met his gaze and tried to engage him in conversation, Rei would simply say, “I’m from the SAF,” and their camaraderie would lapse back into silence. While people in other units knew that SAF members were hard to get along with, they weren’t indifferent to them. Although the SAF were officially assigned to the Tactical Combat Air Corps at Faery Base, SAF members behaved like individuals assigned to an autonomous corps; they had a lot of power. They kept their specific activities secret from people in other units, and that extended to when one of their taciturn soldiers came into a shared area like this—SAF members never spoke about what went on inside of their heads. Their mystery made them objects of curiosity to the others.
No one spoke to Rei directly at the pool, but he could feel their inquisitive glances as he swam, and occasionally he heard “SAF” bubble up from their lively conversations. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d become a bit of a spectacle, but he didn’t care what they said about him as long as they didn’t directly interfere with what he was doing. Rei was used to hearing other units bitching about him on the radio whenever he flew missions with Yukikaze anyway. The only reason he was here swimming was because Major Booker had ordered it. He was here to do his duty, not to make friends.
Rei was actually a talented swimmer, but it had been a long time since he’d come to the pool just for the sake of swimming. Forgetting this was being done as a duty, Rei let the sensation of the water carry him away as he swam without a wasted motion. He soon came to relish the feeling of just moving his body.
As always doing his best not to waste a single stroke, he switched between a two-beat crawl when he grew tired and a six-beat sprint when he wanted to push himself. Rei was out of breath after only four or five laps, driving home to him just how out of shape he was. Abandoning his original plan to switch up his swimming style to a butterfly stroke, he cruised along with the easiest crawl he could manage. Rei thought he could keep going for hours doing that, but gradually his arms grew heavy. He looked at the big analog clock that hung on the wall by the pool. Not even twenty minutes had passed. He decided to keep going and get at least thirty minutes of swimming in, but the hands on the clock crawled along at a glacial pace. When he realized that he was obsessing about how long it was taking, Rei finally admitted that he was too weak to keep pushing on and climbed out of the pool.
He chose a deck chair away from the crowd and sat down to catch his breath. The chair was a new one, nice and clean. He suddenly realized that the chair and the facility it sat in were both clean because someone was keeping them clean. Of course the center had a full-time maintenance staff. They never saw the JAM. There must have been lots of civilian contractors who had come to Faery. War was big business. He’d never before thought about all the people who were involved in the war with the JAM, but when he stopped to think about it, only a small fraction of the FAF directly faced the JAM threat on the front lines. Even so, that doesn’t mean that the people at the rear, like the ones who keep this pool clean, were necessarily safe, Rei thought.
Assuming they considered the humans worthy of their notice in this war, there were all sorts of ways the JAM could kill everyone here if they wanted to. The JAM might have already begun making preparations. The pool maintenance staff might have been noncombatants, but no place on Faery was safe for them. Rei didn’t know if they were conscious of that, but he was grateful that they were here doing their job. Grateful that they kept things clean.
THE CHEERFUL GROUP, apparently having been waiting for Rei to leave the pool, were lined up on the start line. Teams were instantly chosen and it seemed that a mini swim meet was about to begin. After a few humorous on-the-spot introductions of the swimmers, the race began. Some onlookers cheered the swimmers on. Rei was tired, but hearing their cheers felt good to him. The actual participants were probably good swimmers, but their skill range was all over the place. Still, they were giving it their best and taking it seriously, so it didn’t make for a bad show.
The race was a three-course relay, and when the second set of swimmers dove in, the one in the center lane caught Rei’s attention. She was a woman, remarkably fast, and she didn’t waste a single stroke. She was catching up with the man who was in the lead. Rei was intrigued by her excellent performance and wondered if she had ever competed seriously. There was a beauty to the movements of a well-trained human body. He could never tire of watching it.
“Not joining in, Captain Fukai?” said a voice that suddenly came from behind him. Rei didn’t turn to look. He knew it was Captain Foss. He hadn’t even noticed her come in.
“Did I ask to join in? I’m not interested,” Rei said. His eyes stayed on the race.
“I wonder if you don’t want to compete because you’re afraid of losing,” Captain Foss said, as though idly chatting.
“I’m not afraid of losing.” He turned to face Captain Foss. “Losing doesn’t make me feel scared, just irritated.”
“Quite a few people would avoid contests from the start because they don’t like to feel that way. That’s basically what a fear of losing is. They hate the contest itself. Are you sure that isn’t what you’re feeling?”
“What I think,” Rei said, “is that I’d rather avoid losing a contest and feeling irritated about it if it isn’t necessary. That’s how I feel about that race. I didn’t come here to win anything.” He paused for a moment. “So what brings you here?”
Captain Foss was wearing the white doctor’s coat she normally eschewed during her counseling sessions. The coat marked her as a military doctor, which essentially made it her uniform. It meant that she was still on duty and hadn’t come here for fun.
“Major Booker just asked me to do the right thing for you,” she said.
“Oh,” Rei replied. When he followed his one-word answer with silence, Captain Foss asked him if that was all he was going to say.
“What are you getting at?” Rei asked.
“A little while ago, the major contacted me and told me in no uncertain terms that he wanted you released from my care.”
“So what? You’re saying he was lying when he told you to do the right thing for me?”
“No, he was telling me that if I were worried about you, then he wanted me to end the psychological aspect of your rehabilitation, and to please take care to do that.”
“And you want to stay involved, right?”
“It’s my job. Of course I want to stay involved. I have no idea what the major is thinking. Or what you’re thinking, for that matter. If you don’t like my methods, could you please do me the courtesy of telling me so to my face?”
“This is definitely the major’s doing,” Rei said as he rose from the deck chair. “I just follow his orders. He told me that it wasn’t necessary for you to keep treating me. If there’s something going on between you and the major, that’s not my problem.”
“Where are you going?”
“The sauna.”
“Are you running away from me?”
“Running away?” Rei chuckled without even thinking. “You seem like you want to fight with me, but you don’t know how to. Okay, here’s how it works—if you don’t want me to run away, you chase me. If you get in my way, I hit you. Major Booker gave me permission to do that, naturally.”
“Who are you at war with, Captain Fukai?”
“The JAM.”
“It doesn’t look that way to me.”
“You trying to be my girlfriend now?”
“What?”
“The sauna. Are you coming in with me?”
“If you’re going in, then yes, of course I will.”
“Dressed like that?”
In response, Captain Foss slowly took off her white coat, then grasped the hem of her sweater and began pulling it off too.
“Forget the sauna,” Rei said. “I don’t think I could deal with you asking me about this and that in a tiny, hot little room.”
Captain Foss paused, her pale belly showing. “Then will you come to my office?” she asked.
“No.”
“You’re not yet psychologically fit to return to combat duty.”
“You’re right,” Rei replied with a nod. “There’s something I need to settle with you first.”
“Settle with me?”
“Why are you so interested in what goes on in my mind? That’s going to gnaw at me until I get an answer.”
It was annoying how she was always following him around. There was no escape from her on the base, and ignoring her required an enormous amount of effort. The only thing left to do was to have it out with her once and for all.
The race in the pool wasn’t over yet. The last swimmers had just dived in, and everybody was paying attention to them. Rei might have lost interest in the swimmers, but the people in the pool area were still aware of him. As Rei looked to be walking away, one of them whistled and called out, “SAF’s bugging out of here.” There was no scorn or anger in his voice. It was simply delivered as a situation report. The cheers died down. It’s the same reaction I get from other units in battle, Rei thought. The Special Air Force really did hold a special position in their forces. Rei left the pool area without looking back.
In the locker room, he changed out of his swim trunks, put his wristwatch back on, then logged his exercise on a form he carried on a clipboard. When he’d gathered it all up and walked out of the locker room, Captain Foss was waiting for him.
The basic reason why she had come was that, technically, this was the time when she should have been examining him, and as his attending physician, she wasn’t amused by his arbitrarily deciding to do a bit of independent training instead. He’d just been following Major Booker’s orders, but it was clear that the major hadn’t been able to convince this doctor. That left it to Rei, the concerned party in this matter, to get her to agree. If he managed to make her see that he didn’t need her to treat him anymore, it’d take a load off of his mind as well. The result would be the same whether Major Booker made the move or not. Thinking that, Rei renewed his resolve. He canceled the strength training session he’d scheduled for after his swim and left the center to have a chat with Captain Foss.
Back at his quarters in the SAF residential area, Rei changed again, into his ground duty fatigues. Since he had no intention of going to Captain Foss’s examination room, he headed to the sortie briefing room instead. Captain Foss followed him without a word.
The room was dark and deserted, the ceiling lights automatically turning on as they entered. As they did Rei felt a twinge of preflight nerves, which he hadn’t sensed for a while.
The main monitor along the front wall of the room, which normally would have displayed mission action data, was dark now. As Rei stood in front of the computer terminal to the side, Captain Foss finally spoke.
“How do you feel? What are your impressions, coming here?”
“My impression is that I want to get back into the fight as soon as I can. My physical rehab is going just fine, better than you claim. As far as I see, there’s no problem with me going back into combat. Major Booker’s just being cautious. He’s after perfection. Is that what you’re after too?”
“I am, though my position is different from the major’s.”
“What is your position in the FAF? Why did you come here? It doesn’t seem like you were forced to join up, but I don’t get the sense that you’re just another doctor who’s hot to do their job either. Military doctors don’t disobey their superior officers.”
“I’m not disobeying my superior. Who happens to be General Cooley. Even Major Booker has to admit that.”
“You’re just like the JAM,” Rei said, his voice cracking. “I don’t know what you think of me and I can’t communicate with you very well. I don’t know what you’re doing here on Faery. Meanwhile, you just keep coming after me. You’re an unknown, Foss. Does General Cooley even know who you are?”
“She’s a distant relative of mine.”
“Huh?” Rei leaned against the computer console, not thinking as he made his dumbfounded grunt of surprise. Captain Foss kept her eyes on him as she drew closer and sat down in one of the front-row seats. Almost like a child who’d been ordered to stay after class, thought Rei.
“Although,” Captain Foss said, “I’d never met her until I came here. She didn’t know we were related either. Still, I used the family connection. I was never going to get anywhere with my research into the psychological makeup of FAF pilots without actually coming here. The truth is, I wanted to come here as a civilian.”
“So that’s how it is,” Rei said. “What a pain in the ass.”
“Major Booker said the same thing. But my interest wasn’t going to get any priority unless I worked here as a military doctor. I’m working on a detailed report of the patients I’ve examined, which includes you. But there’s no evidence that Major Booker has read what I’ve submitted so far. I find it insane that he’d just ignore it and then claim that I’m unnecessary. It wasn’t like that back in the Systems Corps. My work was valued there. From what I’ve seen, I’d say that the SAF is a collection of weirdos.”
“That doesn’t sound like the way a doctor would talk.”
“Okay, that’s true. I was a little rash there. But I’m a human being with feelings too, you know,” Foss said.
“You’re the one who needs counseling. You aren’t used to the environment in the SAF. I don’t need you. Anything that has to do with me, I’ll handle by myself. I’m not looking for help from anyone. Conversely, I don’t help anyone. I don’t want to get wrapped up in anyone else’s feelings. Any feelings that aren’t mine are illusions. That’s the sort of people who make up the SAF.”
“Perfectly put,” Captain Foss replied with a nod. “You’re not abnormal individually, but in a group, you literally become ‘special.’ The idea of putting together a team of people with a limited ability to feel empathy is fascinating to me.”
“That’s thanks to Major Booker’s skills. Or, more accurately, to General Cooley’s. The JAM aren’t human. They’re beings whose true nature is still a mystery to us. The general thinks that you need people with inhuman abilities in order to collect data on and analyze entities like the JAM. She probably thinks that human sympathy would lead to projecting human qualities onto the JAM, and we’d end up coming to the wrong conclusions.”
“Assuming the JAM actually exist and are a real threat.”
“That’s true. There’s a definite possibility that they don’t really exist,” Rei said.
“What did you just say? You mean you really believe that? I’m amazed. I just said they might not exist to see how shocked you’d be.”
“You may see the JAM as illusory, but that’s not how I see them. They may not have physical existence, but I can sense them,” Rei said. “Their existence is more real to me than yours is.”
“Perhaps the FAF successfully repelled the original JAM long ago. What if the JAM we face now is an imaginary enemy created by the SAF to maintain this war environment? It’s easy for people like you to live in an environment like this, so maybe you’ve gotten together as a group to deceive everyone else. What do you think of that possibility?”
“I’m sure there are some people in the world who think that. It’s not that strange to me.”
“In other words, you’ve considered the possibility as well,” Foss said.
“I think that if a person were drowning in front of me, even I would hold my hand out to them. I’d have to help them. It’s not a question of feelings. It’s a reflexive action.”
“So…?”
Captain Foss didn’t question his abrupt change of topic. It’s a good method to induce me to talk, Rei thought.
“You seem like you’re drowning in your own thoughts,” he said. “I’m able to sense that. But if I were a JAM, I wouldn’t see you. Probably couldn’t see you. If you were drowning, the JAM wouldn’t directly attack you, but they wouldn’t help you either. They would ignore you completely. As far as the JAM are concerned, human beings don’t exist. I just don’t think the human imagination could come up with beings that can’t even perceive us as the antagonists in a story.”
“You shouldn’t underestimate the power of human imagination, or the clout of others. It may just be my own impression that the SAF has both the imagination and clout to create an illusion like that, but your viewpoint that I seem to be drowning just reinforces it,” Captain Foss replied.
“You can see JAM fighter planes with your naked eye, and they attack. But we can’t see what’s flying them. It may be the same for the JAM as far as humans go. They may not be able to recognize us directly, but when they began to sense the threat we posed, I think they started building a human-perception mechanism. One with the same sensory organs as humans to act as a system to perceive the world as we do. In other words, human duplicates.
“The human side of the war had the means to oppose the JAM from the start—combat machine intelligences, of which Yukikaze is a representative. It doesn’t take much imagination to come up with an idea like this. Neither does the idea that the SAF invented the JAM to justify its own existence to others. All people ever do is think up things that are convenient for them to believe.”
“And in that way, you can psychologically draw me in,” said Captain Foss. “Are you conscious of that and able to judge that for yourself?”
“I think you should withdraw your diagnosis that I’m not psychologically fit for combat. The JAM are the enemy, not Yukikaze. I realize that anew even as I say it. That’s thanks to your counseling. You really are a miracle worker,” Rei said. “Here I am, in the middle of a war, having forgotten about the existence of the enemy, and you’ve made me realize who they are: the JAM are the ones I should be out there killing.”
“I think you see me as more of an enemy than you do the JAM. What do you think of that?”
“That’s the heart of why you’re so nervous. You probably think if I fly into battle with Yukikaze, I’ll just spread the idea of the JAM—which you essentially think are imaginary—even more strongly across the world. You think madness is contagious. As far as you’re concerned, the SAF is insane. The thing is, everything in war is insane. You just haven’t been part of that shared delusion up till now. To the SAF fighting a war, you’re the one that’s insane because you think this war is meaningless, that the JAM are phantoms, and that there really is no enemy anywhere.”
“But you sense that as well, don’t you?” Foss asked. “I think you’re just trying to give meaning to what are meaningless battles.”
“I’m not denying the possibility that the JAM are imaginary. But even if they’re phantoms, just virtual monsters produced from my head and the results of the SAF’s data processing, it doesn’t matter. As far as we’re concerned, the JAM are a real threat, an enemy that will kill us if we ignore them. That’s reality for the SAF. So I’m going to fight, no matter what you say. It’s so that I can live. Since I’ll end up being killed by the JAM if I go along with what you say, you have no right to complain.”
“I wonder if Major Booker feels the same.”
“Since I’m not a commander, I can’t speak for the SAF as a whole. However, at the very least, I can tell you how I see it. This isn’t a war. It’s a struggle for survival. Anybody who stands at my side and tells me that struggle is meaningless is an obstacle to my survival. Removing obstacles is only natural, isn’t it?”
“You’re looking to ‘remove’ me?” Foss said.
“I think you occupy a very dangerous position. The problem is on your end.”
“Thanks for the warning, Captain Fukai.”
“Am I dangerous?”
Captain Foss gave a vague nod in answer to his question.
“Yes, very. I’m afraid of you, although it’s mainly because of the attitude you’ve shown me here.”
“I understand your unease. Even if you don’t authorize me to fly combat missions, I’ll do it eventually. And you’re afraid that, even if I’m nominally fighting the JAM, they won’t be the only ones I’ll attack. You’re afraid that I’ll end up attacking anybody I judge to be an obstacle, even those on my own side. You thought that about me before and you still do now.”
“I want to think that I’m wrong,” Foss said.
“You’re not. That’s the mission of the SAF. If necessary, we will attack our own side. That’s an act of combat allowed in war, just another type of tactic.”
“But you just said this isn’t a war. That idea is surely the core of what is becoming a major problem here.”
“It’s true that I’ve started thinking of it that way lately,” Rei said. “If I were fighting humans rather than the JAM, I wouldn’t have come back here. ‘Let other people fight their wars and leave me out of it’ was what I thought. But I can’t leave the war against the JAM to other people. I tried to ignore it and act like it wasn’t my problem, but it felt like there was no place I could go to escape the threat. I’m afraid that this conflict here is even more grueling than a war. There’s no striking a deal or turning traitor here,” Rei said. “The one rule in effect is that the strongest side gets to survive. In a war with humans on both sides, you can get away with the strategy of letting a few die so that the many will live. You can even let your allies kill noncombatants. But fighting the JAM requires even harsher strategies.”
“Such as?”
“Such as adopting a strategy where you’d let the entire human race die if it meant that you alone could survive. That’s what I think. It’s extreme, but you won’t lose as long as you don’t die. That’s the sort of battle this is. I think the JAM operate under that strategy too. If I went back to Earth and treated what goes on here like it’s an illusion, I might be able to live my life. But when I finally notice the JAM threat there, it would be too late. I hate the thought of that. I don’t want to lose. That’s why I came back to Faery. You can’t understand what I sense, so you’re trying your damnedest to throw out all these hypotheses, trying not to drown in them.”
“Like you’re a specialist in theories—”
“You can’t live with normal sensitivities in the FAF, and that goes double for the SAF. If you want to survive, you have to become as nuts as everyone else here. It’s not so bad. You just have to accept that the JAM are real.”
“What exactly do you have in mind?” Captain Foss asked, a worried expression now on her face.
“Write a report saying that I’m fit for combat duty and sign it. In return, I’ll help you perceive the JAM.”
“How?”
“The JAM aren’t phantoms. They exist on the same level as Yukikaze. There’s more to her than what you can see. Similarly, you can monitor my psychological state from my reactions in flight. Surely a military doctor like you would be willing to take the risk for that.”
“You’re saying you want me to fly with you?”
“Right,” Rei answered. “I’ll take you up in Yukikaze with me.”
In SAF Unit 1: Yukikaze.
Captain Foss stared straight at Rei, not saying a word. Then she answered, her tone firm.
“If General Cooley authorizes it, I’ll do what you want. But that’s—”
“You’ll get the authorization, Captain Foss. You’ll be the one who’ll convince General Cooley and Major Booker. If you can’t do it, there’ll only be one thing for you to do—apply for a transfer out of the SAF.”
“You’d really go that far… Suppose I still find you unfit to fly, even while we’re in the air?”
“You won’t be making that call. The JAM will just shoot us down.”
“You’re saying we’ll be flying in a combat zone?”
“There’s no absolutely safe place in the FAF, Captain Foss. You can’t escape that, no matter where you go. Get me my flight authorization. Then Major Booker will stop ignoring you. I think it’s a good proposal.”
“I’d like some time to think it over.”
“This isn’t practice. It’s real combat. I need your answer now, Captain Foss. You won’t get a chance like this again.”
“Fine,” she replied, standing up. “I’ll accept your proposal. The truth is, I’ve always wanted a ride in one of our state-of-the-art fighters.”
“Oh, is that what you were really after? You certainly took a roundabout way to get it,” Rei said, his expression deadly serious. “I wish you’d just been upfront about that from the beginning. Then nobody would have ignored you. Though had you just been honest, you absolutely never would have been given a chance to ride in Yukikaze. Well played. How do you feel?”
“Like I went for wool and ended up getting fleeced,” replied Captain Foss, holding out her hand. Rei shook it and said, “Which one of us is getting fleeced here? I don’t think either of us has yet. I think this is going to settle the problems between us, but your battle is just beginning. I’m praying we aren’t your enemy.”
“Are you saying that the SAF sees people who don’t accept the reality of the JAM as their enemies?”
“Not in that sense. I’m saying that there’s no guarantee that you aren’t a JAM.”
“Me? A JAM?”
“That’s the sort of battle we’re fighting here now. More than any other unit in the FAF, we know that in our bones, not our brains,” Rei said.
“So, admitting that…are you taking me out into a combat zone as some sort of a test?”
“Major Booker will make that call. He’s a tough one. All I’m looking for is to fly Yukikaze. Anything beyond that is your own problem. You risk your life by choosing to fly in her. Be prepared for whatever happens.”
The same goes for me, Rei thought, though the probability that this person is a JAM is pretty low. Rei left the room to report the deal he’d just set up to Major Booker, prepared for the chewing out he’d receive for causing his commander even more headaches.
4
CONTRARY TO REI’S expectations, Major Booker received his news calmly and then, after considering it for a moment, told him “Good work. That was probably the best way to handle it.” The major didn’t smile when Rei told him that Captain Foss might be a JAM. He instead nodded and replied that anyone whose history was unknown to them had to be suspected. Considering that, taking her out into an actual combat zone was a good idea, the major said.
If she were a JAM, she was extremely dangerous, but only the SAF could deal with it. And even though she likely wasn’t a JAM, having her spreading the idea that they weren’t real was going to cause chaos in the FAF. It wouldn’t affect those in the SAF, but it might affect people in other units. For that reason, they couldn’t just expel her. And if she simply had an interest in advanced fighter planes and the abilities of the people who flew them, then she needed to get it through her head that reality wasn’t as simple as she thought it was, or else she’d never be of any use to the SAF as a military doctor.
“I’ll draw up a plan to get Captain Edith Foss into combat,” Major Booker said. “If she’s a JAM, she’ll show her true colors.”
“She may not and just come back here to stay,” Rei replied.
“I’ll keep my eye on her,” the major said. “Let’s hope this turns Captain Foss around.”
“She’s got a fighting streak in her, the same as we do. She won’t be an easy nut to crack.”
“ ‘We,’ huh? You really have changed. I just hope that hasn’t made you less effective in battle.” Having a medical specialist aboard the plane with him to make sure of that was a reasonable choice, thought Major Booker. Captain Edith Foss was going to have an important duty to bear.
TWELVE DAYS LATER, wearing flight suits and with helmets in hand, Rei and Captain Foss were back in the sortie briefing room. Their mission briefing had already been completed. They’d been told that their mission was to reconnoiter the environs of one of the JAM’s main bases, code-named Richwar, which the FAF had hit recently. Major Booker had decided to commit two SAF planes to the task. He hadn’t been able to determine if the FAF strike had knocked it out completely, and he was sure that there were survivors still there. They’d probably made contact with the other bases and summoned support. Naturally, the SAF had already conducted recon of the area, but hadn’t been able to tell for certain what was going on. The human pilots didn’t know how the JAM communicated with each other or how they organized support lines. Because of that, a JAM base that had been struck could one day spring back into action without any warning. The only way they’d ever learn how the JAM regenerated so quickly was to keep an apparently dead base under surveillance. These chances didn’t come very often, and they had one now. Major Booker was just barely managing to send out continuous surveillance missions while balancing them with the squadron’s other duties. They’d also dropped a recon pod in the area, and part of this mission was to collect the data it had gathered.
Captain Foss participated in the briefing as well, and Major Booker gave her specific instructions to keep careful watch on Rei’s condition and report on it as the mission’s medical specialist. These were orders from General Cooley, he added.
Their preflight briefing had covered the details of their flight plan, weather conditions, flight route, navigation support environment, fuel stores, and weapons loadout… All simple stuff, but it wasn’t simple to Captain Foss. Her job of observing Rei had already begun, but the task at hand was first and foremost to deal with her fear of entering a combat zone for the first time. Worse for her, there wasn’t anyone else on the sortie team with whom she could share the fear she felt. Rei was the subject of her observations, so she naturally couldn’t confide in him, but the other plane teamed up for this mission with Yukikaze was an unmanned drone fighter. It was nicknamed the Rafe, a name Major Booker had chosen. This truly unmanned fighter, newly supplementing the squadron as its thirteenth plane, was the Maeve prototype: the FRX99.
Major Booker never sent out an unmanned plane to operate alone. There was much to learn about their performance, and that data was vital. Even so, he’d wanted at least one of the new drones sent out as the backup plane for this mission. If the SAF judged that this mission was too dangerous for Yukikaze to fly alone, they could use the drone. He was aware of the possibility that the drone could become a danger to Yukikaze’s crew as well, and acknowledged that part of the SAF’s job was to monitor just such a situation.
As she settled into Yukikaze’s rear seat, Captain Foss also felt some trepidation at the sound of the engines starting up on the black-skinned Unit 13, although her fear was different from Major Booker’s. She wondered if the unmanned plane charged with escorting Yukikaze and providing backup could be trusted not to abandon them if things got rough. After all, wasn’t that how SAF planes normally operated? Even their manned planes would do that. In that respect, the humans in the SAF were much like their machines. She’d never really realized that before. Rei had said as much during their exchanges, but only now, in this situation, did the reality of Rei’s words sink in.
Yukikaze’s engines spun to life with power supplied by a support truck outside.
“Contact,” Rei declared.
Fire screamed inside of Yukikaze’s Super Phoenix engines. Captain Foss tensed up as the plane changed its posture, the front tire shock absorber compressing as it bore the enormous thrust from the engines. Yukikaze was roaring like a wild animal preparing to leap onto its prey.
Rei looked back. Captain Foss realized that he wasn’t checking on her. His helmet visor was raised, and she could see that in his gaze. He was just making sure that Yukikaze’s vertical stabilizers had unfolded into their proper configuration. He then checked to make sure that all of the plane’s control surfaces were operating normally. Preflight checks, completed. All systems, normal. The ground crew pulled the safety pins from the missiles loaded onto the plane. The sortie crew chief then pulled the pin of his headset from the jack on Yukikaze’s side and gave them the “Go” sign.
“Let’s go, Yukikaze,” Rei said.
The canopy lowered and locked in place. Releasing the brakes, Yukikaze moved forward. Captain Foss felt the plane’s tires bumping along. To her, each thump seemed to be an amplified version of her own pounding heart.
Rei hadn’t said, “Let’s go, Captain Foss.” She made a note of that on a small memo pad, similar to the ones used by test pilots, affixed to her thigh. She then regained her composure. Rei called back to her.
“Tell me right away if you feel sick. I’ll try to compensate if I can.”
“I’ve had some training, you know. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry about me.”
“Okay, good to hear that you’re ready for this. I’ll be counting on you.”
“Counting on me?” Foss said.
“Of course. You aren’t a guest back there; you’re flight crew. In battle, it’s nice to have an extra eye. Lucky for me, you’ve got two.”
“My eyesight isn’t that great, so—”
“That doesn’t matter, Edith. Any creature whose life is in danger can see its enemy. Let’s go, partner.”
The Rafe made a mad dash down the runway and began to climb. Yukikaze followed a moment later, her engine output at maximum. The acceleration was so intense that Captain Foss couldn’t even speak.
A formation takeoff. Rei wondered if his ability to sense the enemy was still as sharp as it had been, but forgot about that once they were in the air.
“Hang in there, Yukikaze. The wolf’s going to leave you behind.”
They soon reached cruising altitude and the planes began to speed along high above the ground. Freed from the G-force pressure of acceleration, Captain Foss took a breath, then asked Rei about the wolf he’d just mentioned so urgently.
“I meant the Rafe, Unit 13,” he replied. “The name means ‘counsel of the wolf.’ It’s like a hobby for Major Booker. He knows the weirdest things.”
Captain Foss looked for the plane. It was flying a few hundred meters off their port side, matching their altitude.
“You don’t want to lose to it?”
“Yukikaze is a manned fighter whose design is based on the Rafe. She’s not as maneuverable, so I was just shouting a little encouragement. Nothing really more meaningful than that.”
“Who were you encouraging? Yourself or Yukikaze?”
“Both, probably. I guess you could theorize that it’s hard to tell where I end and Yukikaze begins.”
“Does that concern you?”
“Analyze that and give me a diagnosis when we get back. It’s dangerous to distract me up here. It affects your safety too.”
Captain Foss stopped talking. The forests of Faery spread out below her, mostly gleaming a metallic purple. With its undulations, eddies, and striped patterns, she felt as though she were looking at some sort of abstract painting. Like peeking directly into somebody’s mind, she thought. It was an incoherent mass of shapes, and yet beautiful. Would the JAM be as wondrous and beautiful if they came from somewhere in there?
Rei responded to the few external communications they received with silence. A warning chimed twice, indicating a group of FAF planes crossing beneath them. A differently toned warning chimed, signaling that they’d reached their mission air space.
“Edith, I want you to please stop observing me for a while and keep watch on our surroundings.”
“Roger,” replied Captain Edith Foss.
The forest was now gone. A desert of pure white sand spread out around them. Not flat, but undulating.
The Rafe activated its high-powered look-down radar and began searching for the enemy. As Yukikaze monitored the electromagnetic environment of their surroundings, she transmitted her IFF (Identify Friend or Foe) signal to the reconnaissance pod deployed onto the ground below to transmit its collected data to them. The pod had been placed there by the SAF after Richwar base had been destroyed, and it had been searching its surroundings from ground level. It should have responded to the SAF plane’s IFF signal.
“That’s funny,” Rei muttered. There was no response.
There was an area on the ground that looked like a long, thin mirror with a crack running across its surface. It was the remains of Richwar base’s center and shattered runway. The recon pod should have been planted somewhere around there, and Rei was about to bank Yukikaze to try to make visual contact when the pod’s connection-ready tone chimed. It was responding now. The powerful ground search radar the Rafe was using had probably disrupted the IFF signal, Rei thought. Still, he wasn’t totally convinced that something wasn’t wrong here.
They had to recover the information contained in the pod, and so he transmitted the command code for it to begin uploading its data to them. It seemed to be working, but then Yukikaze sounded a warning tone and flashed a message onto the main display screen:
TRP32157: decode error.
The pod wasn’t answering the command code correctly, so Yukikaze couldn’t decode the data it was transmitting.
Had the pod malfunctioned, or had the JAM contaminated it? If the JAM had gotten to it, they were probably trying to introduce false data into the FAF. In that case, it was a lucky thing that Yukikaze couldn’t decode the probe’s data transmissions—it meant that the JAM hadn’t cracked the FAF’s data encryption.
Engage, Yukikaze flashed on the screen, declaring her intention to attack. She now recognized tactical reconnaissance pod 32157 as an enemy and was suggesting that they destroy it. Rei authorized the action and sent the Rafe to do the deed.
The Rafe followed Rei’s orders from Yukikaze. Readying itself for battle, it designated the recon pod as its target. Diving swiftly down, it strafed the pod with its gun. One shot, and the target exploded.
Just as Rei was banking to confirm its destruction with his own eyes, he heard Captain Foss’s tense voice in the back. Yukikaze sounded a warning as she spoke.
“Below, right, to our rear! Two JAM fighters, closing!”
Yukikaze did a barrel roll. Rei confirmed for himself, then sent them into a sudden Immelmann turn. Yukikaze initiated an auto-attack, locking onto the targets and immediately releasing her short-range missiles. The lock wasn’t steady and the shots missed.
Yukikaze quickly pulled her nose up as she turned to pursue the JAM, suddenly spinning her fuselage. The maneuver was beyond her design limitations. Without Rei doing any of the work, Yukikaze operated her control surfaces at maximum efficiency and quickly recovered, but Rei sensed that she was about to accelerate and killed the auto-maneuver switch. He pulled the throttle back to IDLE. The exhaust temperature was already fairly high, and if he didn’t pull back, the engines could superheat and destroy themselves. Rei set the dogfight switch to ON, telling Yukikaze that he would handle this threat.
Yukikaze. This plane isn’t a Super Sylph. It’s a Maeve. The data on your old airframe doesn’t apply here. Leave this to me.
Yukikaze didn’t object.
They had altitude to spare. Pushing the throttle as high as he dared, Rei took them into a nearly vertical dive. Confirming that the engines had cooled down, he cautiously increased their output. It was just like swimming. If you rushed and messed up the timing of your breathing, you’d drown.
Rei’s eyes found the enemy fighters. Having for a moment evaded Yukikaze’s attack, the JAM banked steeply and turned toward Yukikaze. They’d predicted the optimum attack course to take. Rei heard the warning buzzer sound as Yukikaze picked up their weapons lock. Rei instantly selected gun mode. Taking Yukikaze into a loose climbing turn, he waited till it felt right, then recklessly snapped over into a sharp bank. The high-G forces caused him to black out for a few moments. When his vision cleared, just as he’d figured, the JAM fighters were crossing right in front of him. His intuition was as sharp as ever. The enemy fighters were still turning.
Cross attack. Firing time: 0.5 seconds. An instant later, the targets were behind him. Rei craned his neck around to confirm his hit.
The Rafe flew through the smoke of their explosions and rejoined Yukikaze as the fragments of the two JAM planes fell to the ground. The Rafe had shot one of them down, apparently having imitated Yukikaze’s tactics.
Rei confirmed their fuel stores. They could stay here a while longer. There were probably more JAM buried under the desert sands, searching for the SAF. Perhaps they were testing out using the recon pod to talk to us and only attacked when we rejected their overture, he thought. Suddenly, Rei was roused from this fantasy.
In all the commotion moments before, he’d completely forgotten about Captain Foss. Noticing that her breathing sounded far weaker than it should have, Rei looked back and saw that she’d taken her mask off. She’d vomited inside of it. He quickly brought Yukikaze down to a lower altitude and told Foss how to clean out the blockage and reset the mask.
He wondered what she had made of the battle just now. Despite having seen them, maybe she still thought the JAM were imaginary. Still, whatever she thought, what she now felt in her body was real. There was no way she could deny that. That goes for me as well, Rei thought.
For now, this was good enough. A lot of information had been gathered for analysis, for both the SAF and Captain Foss.
“Mission complete,” Rei said to her. “Returning to base.”