Dense Air

Chapter 2

It had been a week. Haya groaned as she watched the others taking off for a patrol. "Stupid military funding... My old plane was shit and outdated anyways." Sighing, she walked inside and wandered the base aimlessly. "Were actively at war and they still can't fund anything. Fucking ridiculous." She sat and watched mechanics working on aircraft maintenance in hangars. She watched one particular mechanic looking at an older jet who seemed confused. She walked over curiously. "Something wrong with it?" The mechanic, a man who seemed to be in his 30s, looked over at her. "Never worked on this kind of jet before, just transferred here from naval aviation... Where's the fuel supposed to get injected for the afterburner?" Haya responded. "I don't know this exact jet, but it probably doesn't have an afterburner. We don't get the kind of funding that the navy gets." She sighed, and quickly walked away before the mechanic could respond, starting to feel a little agitated and not in the mood to talk.

She looked up into the sky as the patrol returned. Kazashi's plane landed vertically beside her, and Kazashi climbed out. "Haya? What are you doing out on the asphalt?" Kazashi said. Haya replied somewhat angrily. "What, am I not allowed to be out here?" Kazashi was a little surprised. "Hey, calm down!" She said nicely, not wanting to anger Haya any more. She could see how irritable Haya was after having no aircraft for so long, and frowned. "You should go get some fresh air, go for a walk or something." Kazashi suggested. "I want to go for a flight, but I guess I'll do a walk. Nothing better to do at this stupid fucking base." Haya frustratedly jogged away.

She sat out on a dock at the coast just outside the base as the sun started to set. Looking up to the sky, she thought about when she'd be able to fly again. "I can't stay on the ground forever... What else would I do but fly? What am I supposed to do... There's no meaning to anything if I don't get back in the air..." She thought back to what made her join the air force. She loved flying, and didn't have many other hobbies or interests. She was one of the very few amount of people who actually wanted to fight, and chose to stay in the military when given the choice to finish their service. "All because of some stupid engine fire..." She wanted to cry. "They've got to have enough funding to just get me another damn plane!"

In the orange sky sunset, there was a glint of silver in the sky. Haya looked up, and could hear roaring afterburners. She couldn't believe her eyes. Thirty years ahead of any of the aircraft they had, a seventy million dollar steel beast with over 100,000 horsepower, advanced Raytheon avionics and radar, and a top speed of 1,915 Km/h rocketed towards her. "Is that..." A masterpiece of technology created by some of the greatest aviation manufacturers in the world, including McDonnell Douglas/Boeing and Northrop Grumman. A true icon of military aviation, so well known that if you ask anyone what the first fighter they can think of is, you'll hear its name. "... the Boeing F/A-18C?" Her eyes widened. "It is! That's an F-18!!" With deafening General-Electric engines pushing it forward with almost 50,000 pounds of force, the F-18 flew over where she was sitting on its approach to land at Misawa.

She ran back to Misawa as fast as she could. The new plane was parked, its engines still spooling down. As the transport pilot climbed out, she marvelled at the fighter. "Why's this here? Aren't these only used for the really good squadrons where they can afford it?" Kazashi walked up behind her. "I talked to some higher ups. Considering that you're one of the best pilots in this Air Force, maybe even one of the best in the world, they agreed to upgrade your aircraft. Pretty significantly." Kazashi was excited to show Haya her little surprise, and Haya was shocked. "Really?! I'm not that great of a pilot..." She looked at Kazashi, then the plane, then Kazashi, back and forth. "Haya, you've shot down almost 150 aircraft. The average number of victories to be considered an 'ace' is 5." Kazashi said. Haya tilted her head slightly. "Really? But Erich Hartmann had 352 kills." She said. Kazashi sighed. "Haya, Hartmann is the world's top ace. Has been since the end of world war 2. Most victories of any pilot in history. You don't have to be that. Now go take a look at the new plane!" Kazashi said. Haya quickly gave Kazashi a thank you hug, and ran over to the new fighter. She climbed up into it, and started to power on the avionics and got ready to start the engine. "Alright, let's see what this thing can do!" She wasn't totally familiar with all the fancy electronics, but had flown one of these in a simulator before. "Here goes!" She hit the starter, and the two 50,000 horsepower each, afterburner boosted jet engines spooled up and roared to life.

"Yasakuni, cleared for takeoff, runway two eight." The radio said as Haya slowly moved out onto the runway. "Cleared for takeoff, runway two eight, Yasakuni." She replied as she reached for the throttles, took a deep breath, and pushed them to full. She was slammed back into her seat as the 60 foot long supersonic metal bird shot flames out of its roaring afterburners, going 0-60 miles per hour in less than a second. She had a rush of adrenaline as she reduced throttle, realizing she wouldn't need all that power just to take off. She pulled up and brought up the landing gear, soaring into the sky as the sun finished setting and darkness fell. She could see the stars as she looked around. "Alright, let's try this out!" She pulled back on the stick, doing an Immelmann maneuver, where you do half of a loop and then roll right side up to switch direction. She'd done hundreds of them in her Harrier. But in this new, super maneuverable jet, when she pulled back on the stick, it pitched up hard, and 12Gs slammed her down into her seat. She tightened her leg muscles, the standard technique to keep blood flow to the brain in high-g maneuvers. But she eventually eased on the stick, unable to stay conscious with that much g force. 12Gs would have ripped the Harrier's wings clean off, and she'd never felt anything like it. "Hell yeah!" She excitedly grinned as she rocketed through the sky with power like she'd never even imagined. "Alright, let's put those engines to the test!" She levelled off and firewalled the throttle, engaging the afterburners and using the aircraft's maximum power. She was pushed back into her seat as she accelerated. She could feel the amount of thrust from the engines as a few moments later she broke the sound barrier. "Mach 1.2... I like it!!" She giggled and started to head back towards Misawa.

She landed and taxied back in. She shut the engine off and sat inside, not opening the canopy yet. She sat there, looking at the incredible feat of technology in front of her, the avionics systems glowing a sharp and crisp green. Haya then powered off the rest of the aircraft and climbed out. There was nobody around this late, so nobody was able to wheel over the stairs needed to get in and out. She climbed out on top of the aircraft, and laid down on the left wing looking up at the stars. It was quiet once the engine had spooled down. As she looked at the stars, she saw a green light, a red light just beside it, and a flashing red light behind them both forming a triangle. There was also flashing white lights where the red and green lights were. She smiled. Those were the red and green navigation lights, flashing red beacon light, and flashing white strobe lights of a plane. She remembered back to when she learned about each light and when to use them. Her mom taught her: nav lights always on, beacon light on if the engine is on, and strobe lights on if you're in the air or on a runway. She started to think more about when she started learning to fly. She learned on a Cessna 172 Skyhawk, a 150 horsepower single engine aircraft that her mom owned. She remembered her first solo flight. "November 721 Delta Sierra, cleared for takeoff runway 26, make left traffic." Those words changed her world forever. After that, so much happened, and she became one of the best pilots of the JASDF in an aircraft that can go almost double the speed of sound. But then she remembered the harrier incident where she ejected over the water. She never wanted that to happen again, especially because ejecting doesn't always work properly and is far from a guarantee of survival. She sat up and looked back at the rest of the 60 foot long F-18. The two tall horizontal stabilizers towered over her, glimmering in the moonlight. Other people here would see an airplane. But she saw something much more. A steel giant that obeys every command you give it, that has enough power to viciously tackle the atmosphere in tight maneuvers with its sleek, precisely tuned airfoils, and to rocket through the sky with its roaring engines. Haya saw the freedom of the sky itself. For her, it's so much more than a machine.

A mechanic ran out to bring over the stairs, sent by the tower who noticed Haya stuck on the wing. The mechanic did that, and ran off. "Thanks!" Haya yelled as she started to climb down the stairs. She started to walk inside, but stopped to turn around and look back at the fighter one more time. That was her bird. Her key to the sky. Engines with thousands of times more power than any human being. And it obeyed every command she gave. She kept walking inside, with a newfound sense of confidence. She wasn't just back in the sky. The sky was hers, and she was free again.