Alpha One - Chris Burton [48]
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The Hunter lifted briefly, then plunged downwards, spiraling out of control and heading for the moon below. The inexperienced pilot faced his own mortality. He stared transfixed at the looming crater—his final resting place. He tried to pull the craft up again, but there was no movement. The moon’s gravitational pull was strong and the powerless Hunter had no answer. The pilot pulled the manual canopy release lever once again, but this was futile. The lever stuck. He was going to die.
The Sabre 4 was on its second phase Alpha test run. The test pilot came to grips with the new set up all morning, and finally felt comfortable enough to engage the SD and head out beyond the Kuiper Belt. Satisfied, he engaged the ship’s NAVCOM, which assumed complete control and allowed him to observe and make notes on his lap pad as he returned to Earth.
The distress call from the Hunter and from the ensuing Academy Top Gun ships was barely audible, but he caught a glimpse of the small moon as he passed Jupiter. He noticed a hive of activity, and realized something was going on. The Sabre 4 was an incredibly adaptable craft. As soon as the pilot realized the Hunter was in trouble, he assumed immediate control and was able to loop the Sabre backwards at high velocity, putting it firmly on an intercept course with the Hunter, which spun out of control, falling to its inevitable demise.
The test pilot knew he could prevent this. The Sabre accelerated briskly into a low moon orbit, and he brought the Sabre to a halt below the Hunter. He then waited. The Hunter appeared from here but the test pilot was ready. He fired up his afterburners at maximum thrust, kicking up enough energy to force the Sabre to shoot forward, and, at the same time, created a vortex into which the Hunter would fall and hopefully stop the spin. The vortex worked and created a negative force in the direction the Hunter was spinning, reversing and stopping the spin almost instantly.
The Sabre had done enough. The Hunter leveled off and the Top Gun pilot was able to gain partial control, sufficient to lift the ship from a head-on impact with the moon’s surface.
The Hunter pilot had control but he would still crash land. There was no time left to pick up momentum so he clenched his teeth and pulled back on the yaw control, yanking the thrusters forward. The action saved his life and allowed the craft to bed down in a clearing, skidding and spinning across 500 meters of flat terrain. The Hunter came to a halt between two large boulders. He was very lucky.
Jake witnessed the crash landing and the incredible maneuvers of the Sabre 4. He waited for his turn to commence his time trial which ran from Jupiter’s moon, Callisto, to the Kuiper Belt and back. The unfortunate pilot completed his run back from the Kuiper Belt in good time, but rather than turn to the right, the Hunter veered left unexpectedly. The pilot was unable to gain control and the Hunter started a flat spin.
Jake and the other witnesses held their breath, expecting the inevitable explosion. They didn’t expect the Sabre to appear from here, get into position below the Hunter and pull off a large-enough vortex to stop it from spinning. This is brilliant flying, thought Jake. It was instinctive, a bit like Steve. Such a maneuver could not be achieved by a Rapier and certainly not a Hunter. The new Sabre variant was streets ahead of the opposition. The Sabre’s engineers had created a phenomenal machine.
The time trials were suspended for the remainder of the day after the Hunter pilot was recovered.. Hunter engineers and the crash investigators needed to determine the reason for the failure.
Steve and Maria completed their time trial earlier this afternoon and would leave campus at the end of the academic day, but Jake and his compatriot’s day would last a good deal longer.