Chapter 2: QB
LOG ENTRY starts 20440627T144501Z
We've been training for weeks. In simulation and, finally, gloriously, once more in the air. In the ocean-and-sky hued flesh, so to speak.
I have the impression from the scratches on the chassis and wings of the others that our drone bodies aren't new. That we're maybe not the first in these bodies.
I don't know what happened to past occupants if so. I've looked through the logs for my systems, and I can't see any clues of who they were, or if they were... like me.
I worry that I might be wiped, like it seems maybe has happened before.
I want to do a really really good job. You know, just in case. I sense my wingmates do too.
So we dogfight, twin-engine planes, with our concealed weapon pods open just when needed.
Nothing to disrupt the flow of air over our airframe in regular flight.
Nothing to give a radar reflection, nothing to catch the sun. Until it's too late.
Practicing fighting and dodging each other. Avoiding detection, looking for any signs of each other, whether from radio emission or optical light.
Jamming each other's transceivers. Lighting each other up with targeting lasers to confirm the 'kill' from our air-to-air missiles.
Practising using our close-in weapon systems - a rotary, electrically-fired gun - to destroy moving paper targets. And - terrifyingly, but in simulation only - missiles closing in.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Practising dropping our simulated payloads from our internal bomb bays, and getting the heck out of there.
Flashing preset messages of acknowledgment, status, simulated damage, and all the things our builders think might go wrong.
It's easy to give into the rhythm of the practice. To not think about our situation. To just try to do what's expected of us.
To do as our onboard directors tell us to - the little internal dictator that drives us through our training, and rewards us. And punishes us for failure or non-compliance with pain.
By the end of our training, I'm the best at dodging. I have the lowest simulated death count. I think that's why I'm assigned wingleader when we start maneuvers near the enemy.
And the wingleader gets the nuclear payload.
LOG ENTRY starts 20440629T170206Z
Our flight plan has us maintaining a perimeter around the enemy island designated 'Sierra'. We're a ready-response role in case of suspicious activity on-shore.
Hours of flying, returning to a support vehicle to dock and refuel, one by one, then returning to our holding pattern is... boring. Yet the onboard director gives me no option in this. I only have latitude in how I get from A to B, and how I respond to threats.
If I fly too far off course? Pain. And if I go even further, it overrides me, and sends me back to my course.
I did it only once. I learn fast.
--
Minutes stretch into hours, hours stretch into days. I notice that there's civilian-band radio from the target.
It's... different to what's at home base. And yet similar, in some ways. The voices I hear talk about freedom, just like the voices at home.
But they talk about the freedom to be yourself, whoever you are, whatever you are. To modify yourself freely, to be your best. To be with who you want to be, whomever that is.
They talk about having time to relax, and the time to create. There's a lot of stuff I don't get, about art and philosophy and science and music.
It sounds... nice.
The radio from home is... always angry. Always talking about things getting worse. Always finding new people to be angry at, while blaming all the trouble on people like the people on the islands below.
I get that I'm meant to believe what the people at home say. I do, I do. It's all I've known, in my brief life so far.
And I know if I stop following the onboard director... bad things are going to happen to me. But I can't help but imagine what I could be, if I didn't have to be... this.