Recon by Fire by J.N. Chaney & Chris Kennedy

Author:J.N. Chaney & Chris Kennedy [Chaney, J.N. & Kennedy, Chris]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Variant Publications
Published: 2024-06-23T00:00:00+00:00

Cockpit, Ranger One, Shirgan System

“Okay, Holly, we’re en route to the landing zone,” James said. “Estimating thirty minutes to ramp drop.”

“Still?”

“You do want the Cowlee fighters to clear the area, right? And us to be sneaky so the moon’s defenses—and more importantly the battle station’s, too—don’t see us, right? Because it sure would suck to eat a nuke from one of them. We might survive one⁠—”

“Maybe,” Johnson said. “They’re bigger than shipborne missiles. It might only take one. Two would definitely do it.”

“Fine,” Holly said with a sigh. “Take your time and get us there safely. I have Talgattans to kill and pilots to save.”

James smiled at Johnson. “Told you she’d find a way to still be annoyed with the fact that we’re inbound.”

“Yeah, you did.” He nodded once. “Now, it’s time to get serious. We’ve spent all this time looping around so we could approach nose on to the moon; let’s not fuck it up. Keep an eye on the ESM and let me know if you see any changes. Suzie, please do the same.”

“Wilco.”

*Yes, sir.*

<Your heart rate is really high,> Frank said.

<I’m trying to look at everything all at once,> James replied. <I really don’t want to fuck this up.>

<You want to boost now? That would let you keep up with it better.>

<Not yet. I may need it later or when we leave. Johnson says he learned in flight school that a wasted boost is one of the four most useless things.>

<What are the other three?>

<Runway behind you, airspace above you, and fuel you just dumped out the back.>

<Those are stupid. We don’t use a runway, and we can fly all the way up into space. As far as fuel goes, if you call it reaction mass, I’ll give him that one.>

<I think those were for air-breathing aircraft, but it doesn’t really matter. A wasted boost doesn’t help, and I’d rather wait until I need it.>

James took a breath, held it a moment, then let it out quickly through puckered lips. The talk with Frank had at least distracted him a little, and he settled down to focus on the important things: getting to the target and doing it without getting blasted from the sky. At least he was confident in the ship—the maintenance crew had found a spot where something had hit the upper wing surface, messing up the ship’s stealth characteristics, and they had repaired it prior to the flight, so he wasn’t worried about the radars seeing him.

Well, not as much as he might have been, anyway.

Suzie was doing the actual flying of the ship, so he didn’t have a lot to do but watch the dials and gauges, and obsess about how slowly things were changing on the plot. They continued to receive a variety of emissions from radars on the planet, moon, and battle station, but they were the routine early warning radars that James had seen on many trips through the system. As focused as he was on performing his copilot duties, he was surprised when the early warning radars from the moon cut out.

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