I stepped out of the shower just in time to hear a knock on the door of my trailer. I peeked out the window to see Jackal walking away, toward the hangar. After quickly getting dressed and zipping up my flight suit, I opened the door to see a paper bag sitting on the ground at the bottom of the steps. A sticky note was attached to it: “Breakfast. Hangar at 0800.”
I took the bag inside, dropped it on the table, and opened it. At the bottom laid a can of orange juice and a foil-wrapped sandwich, with an index card on top of it. I took the card and turned it over.
“Good luck on your first day! I’m rooting for you! -MB.”
I reached in and took the sandwich, unwrapping it. Bacon, egg, and cheese. It looked homemade. I looked off in the direction of the airport terminal. “Mama Bear, huh?” With a chuckle, I clapped my hands together in thanks before sitting down to eat.
As I neared the hangar, I heard the roar of a C-130’s engines growing louder as it descended toward the runway. The sound subsided as I closed the door behind me. The two MiGs rested in the hangar where they were left last night.
As I stepped toward them, I heard Jackal call out to me. “Lynx! Glad you’re on-time! Come over here, let’s get started. We’ve got a lot to cover before your first hop.” I looked left to see Jackal, sitting at a folding card table, waving to me.
I walked over and sat in the folding chair opposite him. He immediately slid a tablet over to me and tapped it, starting a video. It was a mock dogfight, filmed from a camera mounted in the cockpit of an F-5 Tiger, looking forward. The fighter was chasing a Mirage F1. The pilot broke left with his target, pulling hard to get an angle on the Mirage. Radio chatter came through, “Almost on his tail. He’s all mine.”
“Wheels, I lost his buddy, and you’re getting too far out. Rejoin.”
“I’ve almost got him!”
“The other one could be anywhere. Can’t catch up to you. Rejoin now, Wheels.”
“Just a little more!” Just as the pilot finished his sentence, another Mirage crossed in front of him. He turned hard to address the new target. The second Mirage pulled up into a steep ascent. Wheels, the pilot, followed. An intermittent low, muffled buzzing sound resounded through the cockpit before a long, low-pitched tone interrupted it. An “X” flashed over the radar screen.
The pilot sighed. “Wheels, dead.” He rolled his plane and pulled the stick to bring it level before rolling upright. He stared off to his left as he guided his plane back to base. Soon, his wingman’s voice sounded over the radio, “Scooter, dead.” The pilot shook his head, bringing his hand up to give his helmet a frustrated knock as the video ended.
Jackal slid the tablet back over his way and picked it up. “Tell me about what you saw. Why are Wheels and Scooter dead?”
I thought for a moment. “Well, I guess Scooter had lost the other fighter while Wheels was chasing the first one, and then both of them went after Wheels, and after that, Scooter didn’t have anyone to support him when they both went after him.”
“Good eye, good ear,” Jackal praised. “It’s a pretty straightforward tactic, but when it works, it works. That’s why we fly in groups. The first thing to know about MAC is that it’s a team sport.” He jabbed his finger into the table for emphasis. “If I get a kill up there, that means both of us got a kill up there, because I had you supporting me. If you leave your wingman, he can’t be held responsible for what happens to you. It helps to be aggressive, but don’t get greedy.”
Jackal set the tablet down on the table and slid it over to me again. “Now let’s talk about rules.” The tablet displayed a webpage with a list of rules and regulations. “Your plane will let you know when you’re dead with a loud beep and an ‘X’ over your displays. You might’ve seen that in the video. When you’re dead, level your plane, rock your wings, and report that you’re dead, then return to base
“Some hops will let you respawn. In that case, it’s a touch-and-go at the airfield, and then re-engage. Most of the time you’ll have what’s called a ‘hard deck.’ That’s a specific altitude where engagement is forbidden at that altitude or lower. It’s a safety buffer between you and the actual ground.
“Every plane is inspected before each match to make sure nobody’s running real weapons. You already know about the laser replacing the cannon and the dummy missiles. They’ll also inspect the airframe to make sure all the hit sensors work. That all happens before we jump in the cockpit.
“No one company really runs Fox One, at least not yet, but all the PMCs participating agree on the rules. This isn’t war. We’re here to put on a good show. With me so far?”
I nodded.
“Good.” He slid the tablet back over to him and picked it up. “Now, let’s talk about these MiGs. You already learned about the instruments, so now we’ll talk about their flight characteristics.”
The two of us looked up from Jackal’s tablet as we heard the hangar doors start to open. We’d been discussing the specifications of the MiGs for hours. I’d almost forgotten we were in the hangar with them. Jackal turned his chair to observe as a small platoon of men and women in flight suits streamed into the hangar and surrounded both MiGs. He pointed to them. “Pay close attention.”
They worked in teams. A pair lifted a ladder onto the side of the MiG I sat in last night. Another immediately climbed up and into the cockpit. A fourth climbed up the ladder and onto the fuselage. He began waving a device on the end of a stick over the plane’s body. A pair standing beneath each wing brought a similar device up to each wingtip, then each wing root. “That guy on top and the ones beneath the wings are making sure the sensors work properly,” Jackal commented.
The team that had lifted the ladder turned to inspect the gunport as the man atop the plane’s fuselage climbed down to the ground. As a pair of tugs approached the hangar, the ground crews pulled the chocks from both planes’ wheels. They stood clear as the tugs began pulling the fighters out onto the ramp, one after the other.
As the hangar door closed, Jackal stood. “They’re gonna finish the preflight out there and start both of them up for us. In the meantime, let’s get ready.” He turned to a rack attached to a nearby wall and took a vest down from it, turning and handing it to me. “Survival vest. This is in case something happens and you need to eject. Hopefully you won’t have to use it.” He pointed to a holster on the vest’s lower left side. “This is the only real gun allowed in MAC. This is if you drop in the middle of nowhere and a bear attacks you or something. It stays in its holster at all times unless you need to use it. Got it?”
I nodded and took the vest.
“Good.” He turned to the rack once more and took a plain black helmet down from it. Attached was a facemask and a hose. He handed the helmet to me. “This is your helmet and your mask. Put everything on and head on out. Climb into the cockpit, hook in, and the crew will make sure you’re all set.”
When the crewwoman unhooked the ladder, I felt my hands start shaking. I took a deep breath through my oxygen mask. I looked to my left just in time to see Jackal climb up into the cockpit. As a crew member helmed him settle in, I looked to my right. Shizuka was out on the tarmac, along with a woman I hadn’t seen before. Shizuka wore a plain t-shirt and a pair of shorts and running shoes. She must have taken a break from Miss Takahashi’s training to see us take off.
The woman standing beside Shizuka wore a short pleated skirt and a crop top with a plunging neckline. A pair of white, cross-laced boots reached all the way up to her thighs. Her hair, a light silver, cascaded down her shoulders and her back, as well as covering her left eye, and a pair of pointed fox ears of the same color sat atop her head. As she turned to say something to Shizuka, I noticed she also had fox’s tail to match her ears.
The fox woman noticed me staring and waved at me. I nervously waved back, wondering if she was someone I should know. She smiled and curled her right arm, placing her left hand on her bicep and giving me a resolute nod.
As I racked my brain trying to figure out the fox woman out, I heard Jackal’s voice in my helmet. “Lynx, you up?”
Startled, I faced forward and scanned my surroundings. “Yeah. Yeah, I’m ready.”
“Good. You’re now Unicorn Two. I’m Unicorn One. We’ll take off to the north and familiarize you with your airplane.”
I nodded. “Sounds good.”
“One thing before we get rolling,” Jackal explained, “You probably don’t taxi your Cherokee with the door open, but when we’re flying for an audience, we taxi with the canopy open so we can greet them. We’ll be doing that every time so you can get used to it. We’ll taxi now, just fall in behind me and take it slow. Don’t worry about keeping up.”
I looked over to Jackal’s plane. Its ailerons and tailfins moved up and down for a moment, before Jackal’s voice came in over the radio again. “Unicorn Group, two-ship, taxiing for departure, runway three-zero, departure north.”
Mama Bear’s voice responded, “Runway three-zero, departure north for Unicorn. Good hunting, you two!”
“One rolling.” Jackal’s plane began slowly pulling away from the hangar and turning onto the taxiway.
I took one last look at the fox woman. As I released the brake lever and advanced the throttle, she gave me an enthusiastic thumbs-up and yelled something I couldn’t hear over the MiG’s engines. “Uh, two rolling.”
Jackal and I slowly rolled down the taxiway. I was careful to keep my distance, but I could see his plane slowly pulling away from mine. As we approached the runway, I heard his voice over the radio. “I’ll take the near side of the runway. You roll through behind me and take the far side. Much gentler turn. Easy on the rudder pedals.”
“Roger.”
We closed our canopies and as his MiG pulled onto the runway, it made a tight turn, pulling forward out of the taxiway’s path. “Unicorn, taking the runway.”
As I took the runway to his right, Mama Bear’s voice sounded through my helmet. “Unicorn, clear for takeoff. Good luck.”
“One rolling.” Jackal’s MiG’s engine nozzles opened up wide, spraying flames as his plane sped down the runway.
I hesitated. My left arm froze. Through my right hand was shaking, I brought it over and used it to push my left hand forward. My breathing quickened as the plane accelerated. My right hand found the stick. “T-two rolling.” My chest felt heavy and my back pressed against the seat. I felt the plane start to lift up into me and I pulled back the stick.
The wheels left the ground and I looked back to see the airfield shrinking into the distance behind me. I took a deep breath, trying to calm my left hand down before lifting it from the throttle to pull the gear lever up. Mechanical whirring and clanking resonated up through my butt, confirming that the landing gear was stowed.
“You good, Lynx?”
Jackal’s voice jarred me back out of my own head. “I think I’ll be okay. Just a little bit freaked out. Never really flown anything this powerful.”
“Take it slow. We’re up nice and high now, so ease off the afterburner.” I nodded, coaxing my left hand to cooperate and pull the throttle back. “Good, good. Listen. You’re scared. That’s fine. But the one thing you can’t do up here is forget to fly the airplane. Focus. Learn it. Figure it out. Fly through your fear. That’s what we’re up here for. I can’t fly your plane and mine at the same time. Understand?”
I nodded and took a deep breath. “Yeah. Yeah, I understand.”
“Good. Gentle on the stick, turn heading zero-three-zero and we’ll get started with some basic fighter maneuvers when we reach the training area.”
I tilted the stick right and pulled back gently. The plane rolled into a gentle right bank, and I leveled off as my heading indicator pointed to thirty. I took another deep breath and pushed the hat on the stick forward. The stick gently tilted itself forward until the plane’s nose was level with the horizon.
I took a moment to look outside the canopy. Jackal and I were flying along a river. To our right, fields of farmland, pastures, barns, and silos stretched out across the plain. Trucks carrying supplies and produce traversed dirt roads, past grazing cattle and cornfields. To our left, a town dominated my view. Its water tower stood tall above all its houses and buildings.
I remembered my first time flying. As I pulled back on the yoke and I felt our plane leave the ground, I started panicking. My father could tell something was wrong. He told me to hold the yoke steady in a climb and look out the window to my left. As I turned my head, my anxiety was overtaken by wonder. Everything I had known and grew up around was below me. I was looking down at my own town and my own neighborhood. Places I knew well from ground level, but had never seen from above.
Everything looked so much closer together. The world looked so much smaller. And in the distance, a landscape I didn’t know and had never seen. Mountains I couldn’t name and cities I’d never been to. As we leveled off, my panic and anxiety had disappeared completely. I had ascended up through my mind’s own fog, like flying up through clouds.
Ever since then, looking down always cleared my head.
TE Anubis