Jaguar ~ Top Gun Maverick

Chapter 4

Ace's P.O.V

"Time... is your greatest enemy." Maverick says to us. The main screen, pulling back from a rapidly ticking timer, counting backwards toward zero...Looming larger on the screen are schematics. "Phase one of the mission will be a low-level ingress, attacking in two plane teams. You'll fly along this narrow canyon to your target. Radar guided surface-to-air missiles defend the area." On screen, a schematic of a radar-guided missile array. He continued. "These S.A.M's are lethal, but they were designed to protect the skies above. Not the ground... Not the canyon below." "That's because the enemy knows no one is insane enough to navigate that low at high speed." I said. "And that's exactly what I'm gonna train you to do." Hangman smiles Overhead animation of two planes zig-zagging through a narrow valley. "Your altitude on the day will be one hundred feet... Maximum." All the pilots in the room seem shocked. "Exceed this altitude... Radar will spot you - And you're dead." As the planes on the screen bank, one goes too high... A missile fires and destroys the high plane. "Speed on the day...860 knots.Minimum. Time to target, two and a half minutes." More shocked faces. he points "That's because these Fifth generation fighters are waiting at an airbase nearby..." One screen, schematics of the lethal looking next-gen aircraft. Beside this, animation shows a Tomahawk Missile launch from a destroyer in a carrier group at sea as. "Simultaneous to your ingress, a carrier-based strike will take out this airfield, but if any of these planes are airborne before that,they'll anticipate your target and immediately move to defend it. In ahead-to-head with these planes in your F18s... you're dead. You want to get in, hit your target and be gone before these planes even have a chance of catching you.This makes time your greatest adversary." The canyon, the missiles and the fifth gen planes share the screen now.  "The faster you navigate this canyon, the harder it will be to stay under the radar of these enemy S.A.M's. The deeper you are in the canyon, the less margin for error there will be. The tighter the turns, the more intensely the force of gravity on your body multiplies." Maverick points to various turns on the canyon map. "You've all faced sustained G's before. But this... This will take you and your aircraft to the breaking point." 'Holy shit'. I thought. maverick continued. "For today's exercise, we'll start easy. You'll be flying a route on your nav-system which simulates the valley. Maximum ceiling: three hundred feet. Time to target: three minutes. Good luck." 

3rd Person P.O.V

Phoenix/Bob fly behind Coyote, blasting above the rocky desert terrain.Phoenix has one eye on a GPS. A green dot represents their F18. A blue line represents the route she has to take. Red lines on either side represent canyon walls.To stay on the line, she has to bank hard, pullings witch backs with tremendous Gs.In back, Bob has his own GPS, monitoring the clock, making calculations. They are both sweating. "Time to target is one minute thirty. We're twenty seconds behind. Increase to 900 knots." Bob says. "We gotta move, Coyote." Coyote guns it, banking harder to follow the proposed route. The Gs intensify and the team strains. It's grueling. But he can't make the turn...  Coyote yanks back the throttle and hits the brakes. The line on Coyote's GPS. He strays too far and over the red line. An alarm blares. "God dammit." Phoenix comes around the corner to see Coyote's jet with its air brakes extended. She yanks on the stick sending her jet into a near vertical climb, breaking the 200 foot ceiling. Maverick's with all the trainees, replaying the training run like a coach breaking down post-game film... Maverick says to Coyote "Why are they dead?" "We broke the 300 foot ceiling. A surface-to-air missile took us out." Phoenix replies "No. Why are they dead?" Maverick asks Coyote. "I slowed down and gave her no warning. It's my fault." Coyote feels the eyes of the class on him. "Was there a reason you didn't communicate with your team?" Coyote goes to speak. "One that their family will accept at the funeral." Coyote feels the heat. "None... sir." Then he turns on Phoenix. "And why didn't you anticipate the turn? You were briefed on the terrain." Now Phoenix is the in the hot seat.