Original story based on and including characters and material created by Project Aces for Namco Bandai. The author claims no ownership over them.
On Wings of Nightingales (Mercenary)
Chapter 4
Neu Eisendorf AFB, Belka
28 May 1995
1803 hrs.
Sensory deprivation was supposed to be a method of torture. Right now, I engaged in it for catharsis.
I was alone in the shower stalls of the barracks, the events of the day far behind me but the consequences bearing on me dead ahead. I started to lose track of time after I stepped in here, removed my towel and just let the water drench me from the nozzle.
The icy water finally seemed to tame the emotional roller-coaster I had gone through in the past 10 hours. The psychologists often wrote entire journals about the cycles of denial, anger, bargaining and depression, but it wasn't my own mortality I had to accept. No, I accepted that when I knew that I would join a profession where I had to deliberately risk my life.
The only thing left to do was to accept the consequences of my own actions and deal with the turbulence that lay ahead.
Several Hours Earlier
My helmet felt like a cannonball as I carried it with me onto the tarmac. It was supposed to be a relatively cool morning, but I felt like my g-suit cooked me alive as I made my way across the parking ramps to the Grabacr hangar. They hadn't removed my Weiss Squadron patch, probably because they had never gotten around to it on such short notice, or figured I wasn't going to need it where I feared I was going this morning.
Although the BVK officer didn't send his thugs to escort me, it felt as he may have simply held a service pistol to the back of my head. Huckebein was already in the air, and I could not waste any time if I wanted to catch him before he fled over the border to Ustio.
I took a deep breath as I stepped into the hangar, its air conditioned air gracing my shoulders like I passed through a curtain. Four Su-47 Berkuts were parked in this hangar, two to either side of me. With the alarm, the hangar was abuzz (no pun intended) with the Luftwaffe staff's activity.
Yet it didn't seem odd in any way that the crew in this particular hangar performed their duties calmly, as if we weren't scrambling to intercept something. That was probably due to the fact that all the activity in here seemed to revolve around one person, specifically the pilot performing a quick walk-around of the one numbered '000' to my left.
Captain Ashley Bernitz was the paramilitary's poster boy for the Luftwaffe by most measures. Blond and blue-eyed, with a stature at the upper limit allowed for pilots, his commanding presence was felt by everyone in the hangar from his wingmen down to the mechanics and fuel truck drivers. An ace graduate of the academy, he opted to go into a 'special training squadron' to further enhance his technique, and as a result even defeated his teacher in mock combat. A man of calm ritual, rumors abounded that he kept a monthly planner organized down to the minute.
As such, he was also a fanatic by most measures, probably more of Colonel Buchner's evil twin than the Demon Lord's. As one of the recruits pulled directly from the armed forces instead of the streets or universities, he brought with him more experience - and eagerness to do battle against the 'enemies of the holy land' - than the average grunt. This was easily reflected in his kill record, which already surpassed those his older contemporaries racked up during this conflict. More reliable than the propaganda was the fact that he especially tended to delve into almost genocidal tirades against these 'enemies.'
So it actually surprised me when he greeted me with a friendly smile as if he wasn't even bothered by the alarm.
"Ah, they finally sent me a wingman," he said, extending his hand to shake mine, "Or wingwoman, whatever the term is these days."
"Oberleutnant Annette Zweig," I replied, saluting before shaking his hand, "8th Air Division, 7th Fighter Wing."
"The Nightingale of Weiss Squadron," Bernitz interjected, "Good to meet you. Captain Ashley Bernitz."
In spite of his outward friendliness, his voice still sounded cold as was somehow expected of him. I tried not to let that disturb me any more than I already was.
"What's the matter, Oberleutnant? You look like you've seen a ghost," he added with a smirk as he let go of my hand.
I flinched at how close his guess was to the Demon Lord.
"Nonstop sorties, not enough sleep." Unlike my previous excuse to my interrogating officer, I was only half-lying. "Alarm went off just as I finally got some sleep."
"Well, if they're sending a regular to help me out then they must see something very special in you." he quipped, "Especially since none of my other wingmen are here, so you're gonna have to sleep later."
"Where is everyone else, anyway?" I asked, looking around. Bernitz and I were the only ones in the hangar wearing flight suits.
"They aren't. The Oseans hit the hangars after my previous wingman and I scrambled," he snarled, casting a glare at the other aircraft on the hangar. "The paint still isn't dry on the replacements. You'll be flying his old craft," he added, pointing to the one pointed opposite the hangar to his.
The planes were the newest additions to the Luftwaffe's inventory, their prototypes developed by Grunder jointly with the Yuktobanians before the Nationalists decided to seize its production for themselves. All of the Berkuts were painted with a three-color camouflage reminiscent of snake scales, with the Grabacr insignia painted onto the rear stabilizers along with the Luftwaffe triangle fin flash. Bernitz flew the number '000' he was inspecting when I came in. Directly under the canopy were several miniature decals of the Ustian, Osean and even a pair of Sapino roundels, indicating his growing kill score.
The one I would be flying had a similar paint scheme. However, the kill decals as well as the pilot's name had been hastily painted over. The light glinting on the fuselage seemed to indicate that the paint wasn't even dry.
What caught my attention the most, however, was the giant '004' marked near the nose.
"Oh, right. Unlucky Number 4," he said as if suddenly remembering it, "A shame, I've never had a steady pilot in that plane since we were formed."
"Really? Why?" I asked, already knowing the answer.
"Loyalty, Zweig," he replied before he turned to climb into Triple-Zero's cockpit, "Everyone I've had in Double-Oh-Four displayed, how do you call it, reservations about their duty. My last pilot expressed quite a few doubts about our nation's ability to win on the way here. And we have to accept sacrifices."
I didn't want to draw that conversation out any more than it should. It was disturbing enough that he didn't seem at all affected by the loss of his wingmen, through bombings or otherwise.
"That's not good," I replied.
"Anyway, Nachtigall, we've got a traitor to shoot down," Bernitz announced as he put his helmet on, "There's no time to waste."
With that, I strapped my helmet on and climbed into the cockpit of 004, buckling the safety belts and attaching my respirator. Bernitz had already started his craft and began taxiing it out of the hangar to the runway. I followed once he was clear of the front door, steeling myself for the mission ahead. I was shivering in my flight suit as I watched his plane take off to my side before mine reached the runway.
"Nachtigall, you are cleared for takeoff," the control tower squawked.
Almost two miles of runway spread out before me. Beyond that was the horizon, and my mission.
I took a slow, deep breath, and pushed forward on the throttle.
I had always felt a sort of adrenalin rush as the G-forces pushed me back into my seat during takeoff. I didn't feel any of that today, replaced by a quivering need to make sure this job went down the way the Korps wanted it to. Although we flew the most up-to-date planes in the Luftwaffe's stock, even Huckebein would know that he had as much chance of being shot down by the Allies then he did with us.
Neu Eisendorf hadn't even disappeared over the horizon beyond our flight before their control tower relayed a message.
"This is Northeast Air Command," came a voice over the radio as my landing gear left the ground, "We have an AWACS in B7R, callsign Orion. He'll try to keep you updated on Colonel Buchner's position, it's a real furball over there."
"Copy Northeast," Bernitz replied, "Hopefully he'll be tied up until we get there."
We had kept our planes' thrust just above minimum, in any event Air Command notified us that it would be more than enough to start catching up with him.
In the meantime, our radio kept going off non-stop with frantic updates about a battle involving more than one hundred planes...but as we got closer and climbed over the northern side of the Round Table, it got quieter and quieter.
The scenery's gradual change was a refreshing distraction once I got into formation beside Captain Bernitz, which seemed all right with him since he didn't seem in the mood for conversation. The forests that lined the northeast gave way to large, snowy mountains, which then flattened out to redder canyon rock.
After that, there was only the giant ridge that marked the very edge of the round table.
Federation Strategic Airspace B7R
1259 hrs.
The sky over B7R was almost completely overcast, but the cloud cover wasn't thick enough for much more than a drizzle. Eerily enough, my cockpit was almost completely silent save for the sound of our engines in formation.
The circular ridge that formed B7R's natural border was the point of no return. Once I crossed it, the only things that mattered were my mission, my team, and my own survival.
"This is AWACS Orion," came a voice over our radio, "Grabacr flight, do you read? Welcome to the Round Table."
Had I not been part of the lead flight into the Round Table at the time, I would have still been distracted, waiting for them to call on Weiss Squadron. The voice perked me to attention, and I took a deep breath as I scanned the skies ahead. I could just see the faint flashes and black lines that indicated the dogfight wasn't getting any less fierce as we got closer.
"This is Grabacr 1," Bernitz replied, "We read you loud and clear. What's the situation?"
"The Allies currently have the upper hand on our fighters," Orion explained, clearly worried. "Colonel Buchner arrived in B7R about 10 minutes ago but he's tied up trying to convince the Allies not to shoot at him. He's at vector 1-6-3 at about 15 miles. I can get him on your frequency."
"Not necessary," Bernitz added procedurally. "What about Schwarze Squadron?"
"The bad news is that they're already here."
"What's the good news?" Bernitz pronounced each word as if he were glaring Orion's radio operator down in person.
"The good news, if you could call it that, is that they're all focused on the Demon Lord of Ustio. The Ustian mercenaries turned the battle in their favor. Grau Wespe is also here out of Weilstadt but they're staying out of Schwarze's way with the Allied reinforcements."
My entire body seemed to jolt itself out of its fear and into an alert state as if I were already in the middle of the dogfight.
Schwarze had no idea what they were up against. They knew the tactics of the deserters, after all they were practically trained in the same classrooms save for the Yuktobanian-born Zubov. But the Demon Lord was different. A mercenary did not attain legendary status without coming up with a style all his own.
"Good. Looks like we have the traitor all to ourselves."
"You'd better hurry though. The Demon Lord is chewing up Schwarze, and it looks like this battle might be over soon."
"We're here, aren't we?" Bernitz snarled, "This battle won't be over until the traitor is dead or we die trying."
I almost flinched at how accurate he was given that he really didn't know why I had been assigned to his squadron.
"Right. I'm updating your IFF now, Colonel Buchner is hostile. Hopefully you can pick Huckebein out from the Allied reinforcements."
My viewfinder lit up with a cluster of more than a dozen planes. I switched to a shorter-range view to pick them out individually.
"There's the traitor," Bernitz replied, as my IFF lit up a plane fleeing as fast as it could across our line of sight. The Berkut was new enough that its HUD could even identify the model we were chasing.
Of all the planes that Huckebein could have made off with in Neu Eisendorf, he stole a MiG-21. The Luftwaffe had captured airfields full of these Yuktobanian relics from the eastern air forces during the Expansion War. Those that we hadn't sold off to the armies fighting off the Yuktobanians after the war were kept for use by aggressor squadrons.
But we weren't taking any chances. Sure, the MiG-21 was not as heavily-armed as our Berkuts, and they certainly couldn't even outrun the almost equally-aged MiG-31s of Schwarze. Huckebein, however, had more flight hours than both Bernitz and I combined. And he was practically weaned in fighters from his era, which meant he not only knew how to start one up out of memory alone, he also knew how to push them to their very limits.
"I'll go after the traitor," Bernitz replied. "Nachtigall, shoot down anyone that tries to stop us."
"Roger."
"And I mean shoot down. Aim for the cockpit if you have to. Don't let any disabled planes get back to their base. Copy?"
I took a deep breath. I had only one choice. "...copy."
"Good. Grabacr Squadron, engage."
"Roger. Grabacr 2, engaging," I said, finally betraying out my lack of enthusiasm.
"No need to call yourself that on my flight, Nachtigall," Bernitz added reassuringly, "Not unless they officially make you my wingman."
A pair of F/A-18s slid into my field of vision, appearing to make their 'rounds' between Huckebein and us.
"Right. I got these two," I replied, swiftly breaking formation to take on the two Hornets. Their formation split into two as I approached.
I went for the one on the left, as it broke away faster. Getting rid of the faster one would at least make the other one easier...but as I increased thrust to match, my Berkut almost overshot him. He broke into a side loop to evade me, and as I went in to pursue him my plane almost overcorrected itself. The controls felt much lighter than the F-16s I flew for Weiss Squadron, which meant I could maneuver in a dogfight with less effort.
I wondered if they assigned me to such a squadron with such high-tech aircraft out of coincidence. The BVK often tried but failed to get the newest and best equipment to their own people first. Either way, I had to be thankful that I had the opportunity to use these, if only because it would make it quicker to get my mission over with and out of my mind. It certainly made locking onto that Hornet easier, and destroying it with one of the Berkut's short-range Adder missiles even more so.
"Splash one, Nachtigall," Orion recorded as the Hornet spun out of control and slammed right into the Round Table, "Good to see you're keeping your skills up."
I didn't have time to respond, as my missile warning indicators started to blink on my HUD. The downed Hornet's partner was obviously out to get me.
"Is that you, Ashley?" came a voice over the radio. "The Korps sure are fast."
"Huckebein, you traitor," was Bernitz' only response. I smirked to myself as I deployed the air brake into a tight loop. My organs seemed to shift inside my torso as the Berkut enthusiastically did so. My sudden actions also seemed to have surprised the Hornet's pilot, as he had to pull into an even wider turning radius to compensate. I squinted at my HUD as the sun passed over the cockpit from the maneuver. A green arrow pointed me in the Hornet's general direction, and soon the tables were turned.
"You didn't bring your whole team with you today," Huckebein replied, almost taunting. He didn't even seem disturbed with the fact that he had all eight Schwarze fighters sent after him, let alone two Grabacr. Then again, he knew he faced long odds when he decided to break out of detention.
"I don't need four fighters to take down one traitor," Bernitz scowled, "And certainly not a goddamn Slav and his thugs."
"Did they tell you why I was a traitor?" Huckebein replied.
The only reply he got was silence, enabling me to pull up onto the tail of the other Hornet.
"Figures. The Gray Men don't tell their goons why they're sniffing out their targets," Huckebein replied, with an almost fatherly exasperation. "They just give you a name and you don't get any second thoughts about flying after them."
Although the Korps' enlisted soldiers and low-ranking officers in the military followed the general chain of command, many of the elites allegedly reported to a group of individuals you might be familiar with as the Grey Men.
Officially that referred to the paramilitary unit's central command along with their founder, Chancellor Drexler.
But to many of us, they also included the group of old nobility, business tycoons and die-hard politicians instrumental in getting the Nationalists into power. With their influence, they practically ran every possible outlet for propaganda. Unlike other dictatorships, we didn't need a state-owned propaganda press when all of the biggest private outlets agreed that Belka itself was collapsing from its follies into "Federation." None of the other parties from the neo-Monarchist Ralds to the Federal Democrats stood a chance.
Of course, they weren't some kind of strange, secret conspiracy...at least not then. Sure, nobody really knew if Drexler was their leader or their mouthpiece. But apart from their little meetings, their public lives matched their personalities to a T. Openly and boastfully loyal to the state, and all with membership in the National Workers' Party.
In fact, their name originally came from the fact that all of them were at least 50 years old.
But through their influence they recruited thousands of my contemporaries to serve as the "guardians of the nation" under the party's authority, supervised by bitter veterans of the Expansion War. Their hormones and desire to do something to help their country get back on their feet were all they needed to possess, and the industries they owned would supply them and the army with the tools they needed to enforce their ideology upon the populace and Belka's neighbors.
"I don't need 'second thoughts' to know you're a traitor," Bernitz snarled back. Their bitter argument was almost entertaining were it not for the stakes we were playing against. "Doubt leads to treason."
At least it helped me somehow concentrate my aim, and my HUD lit up a bright red square to indicate a missile lock.
"Second thoughts and doubt are what makes us human, Ashley," Huckebein continued. "Sounds to me like your obsession with becoming some kind of superman is mkaing you you quite the opposite."
"You...you-" The sound of the other F/A-18 exploding from the impact of another of my Berkut's Adder missiles fortunately cut out whatever Bernitz said next.
I dived to avoid the explosion, and quickly scanned my radar for my next target. Picking the nearest dot, I rebounded back up and over the ridges to find an F-15C lit up on my HUD just wrapping up a kill. Without any objection from my flight lead - directed at me, anyway - I decided to pursue. Maybe it was the familiarity of the plane's model, but unlike the two Hornets I felt as if this plane was drawing me closer to it, as if luring me. The pilot definitely noticed me as I got closer, and immediately pulled into a loop that I followed almost reflexively.
The sun lit up the F-15's silhouette as it pulled into the loop, and suddenly I knew why I was drawn into it.
My Berkut had caught up to the all too familiar blue-winged craft of the Demon Lord of Ustio.
After two months and a nuclear conspiracy, I finally gained the opportunity to shoot him down. Suddenly, my mission and everything else became unimportant as I began to chase him down.
This was why they called it the Round Table, after all. The only objective up here was to survive.
I could practically see the Ustio Air Force triangle on his wings. My missile lock went off for split-seconds at a time, not nearly long enough to fire off any of the Berkut's missiles without giving him time to evade. My HUD lit up with the cannon aiming reticule, indicating I was almost too close. All I had to do was align it with his fuselage long enough to fire and hope my reflexes were quick enough to do the rest. It was much easier to hope than aim though.
The G-forces slowly crushing body into a pulp as the Berkut effortlessly matched the Eagle's maneuver didn't even seem to hurt through the adrenalin-charged concentration I put into keeping up with him.
The reticule wobbled and spasmed trying to even touch the Demon Lord's craft as we leveled off after another a sudden J-turn. The Eagle's exhaust ports almost hypnotized me as my Berkut got closer and closer.
My finger slid down to the cannon trigger. There was nothing that could break my concentration now.
Almost nothing, anyway.
I pulled the trigger.
"Goddammit, I've got someone on my six. Nachtigall, finish him off!" Bernitz suddenly shouted over the radio, as Huckebein's MiG screamed below me and past my two o'clock. I turned just a moment to face the fleeing MiG...and when I turned back, the Demon Lord was gone. My hesitation allowed him to escape, but at that moment, it seemed like he just vanished into thin air as if I chased an illusion.
I let out an angry cry as I changed my course and directed my plane toward the fleeing MiG. At that moment I felt my first real hatred toward Buchner, not for any ideology, but from distracting me from the opportunity I had dragged myself into this conspiracy to earn. Not that he didn't make it easy to catch up, but the rush from chasing the Demon Lord lingered just enough for me to keep up with him easier.
"So Ashley managed to recruit the Nightingale," Huckebein began.
"Nachtigall," Bernitz then suddenly said, his voice obscured by the action going on outside, "Don't let him toy with you."
"How about you, Oberleutnant Zweig? Did they tell you why I was a traitor either?" he asked.
I hesitated just that long enough that I had to overcorrect. Surely he wouldn't have known. Surely the moment he looked toward that exit in the auditorium...
"N-no..." I stuttered, "I'm just going to shoot you down."
"Would you shoot me down if it meant one more nuclear bomb dropped on your own country?"
"Stop it..." I said through a clenched jaw, reminded of the consequences of my failure, "Stop it now!"
"He's playing mind games with you," Bernitz replied, "He's crafty like that."
"Did you know I was in the same squadron with Bernitz?" Huckebein asked.
"No...no, you didn't tell me that," I said, suddenly as curious as I was angry. This momentary lapse enabled him to gain some distance between me, and it seemed like the high G-forces were finally starting to have some effect.
"Grabacr weren't always rabid paramilitary dogs," he explained, pulling the MiG upward to create a rolling scissors, "Least not while I was leading it."
"Then how come I'd never heard of you with Grabacr?"
"Because it wasn't even called Grabacr then," he replied, sounding angry, "It was one of the special training squadrons for Academy and Kellerman graduates."
I vaguely remembered hearing of these squadrons before I graduated. Although I managed to score just high enough to qualify, I chose to be directly assigned to a combat squadron straight out of the Academy as I didn't really see what value these specialized squadrons had to offer. But it was Colonel Buchner's connection to these training squadrons that caused me to make a mental connection I didn't notice before.
"The Gray Men took it over and renamed it Grabacr because they wanted a more vicious squadron of young pilots in their image," he continued, his flight path made a little more predictable due to the conversation, "and I left because I knew I would never be ruthless enough for them."
As my Berkut reached the apex of the rolling maneuver, I could just see Bernitz' craft turning the tables and chasing down the bandit that had chased him. From its silhouette, the F-14 would soon be mincemeat.
"That's why Bernitz especially hates you?"
"Ashley was my brightest pupil," he said regretfully, "Too bad his hatred for the 'inferior' blinded him."
"Shoot him down now, or I'll shoot the both of you down myself!" Bernitz shouted.
My entire spinal column froze up at that order, my eyes nearly bugging out. I shook my head and, fortunately enough, I could still stay on Huckebein's tail.
"I'm sorry, Colonel," I told him, "I have to do this."
"Don't apologize to him!" Bernitz interjected, "he's a traitor!"
"I understand, Nightingale. I hope you'll do the right thing in the end," Buchner replied, surprising me. "Of course, I won't insult your honor by going down without a fight."
With that, Huckebein suddenly pulled into a upward spiral. I moved to match him, but that meant the two of us were now climbing quite steeply.
The MiG was able to maneuver from side to side, but my Berkut more than kept up for its size. The problem was I had been more used to Weiss Squadron's "slower" F-16s, and the extra G-forces from the Berkut's ultra-responsiveness were starting to overwhelm my adrenalin as the gun reticule appeared on my HUD to indicate my cannons were in range. I couldn't keep up these extreme maneuvers forever.
The instant the reticule's center dot touched the Fishbed, I squeezed the trigger like I was trying to strangle it to death. Muffled thumps echoed into the Berkut's cockpit as the equipped cannon churned out 30mm shells at the much smaller craft. Smoke began to pour where the shells had impacted the fuselage close to the engine.
And then, it seemed as if he had stopped fighting. He leveled the Fishbed out just above the gigantic ridge lining the Round Table. I pulled back on the throttle, and found myself almost flying in formation behind him.
It was as if he didn't want to fight anymore.
"Good flying, Nightingale," he said through the radio, "See you on the other side."
The entire cockpit seemed to lift out of the wounded MiG as Huckebein ejected, leaving a trail of smoke behind. The canopy of a Fishbed was attached directly to the ejection mechanism, creating a sort of pod to protect the pilot from the elements until the parachute deployed. The launch was also my unconscious cue to finish off his aircraft.
A short-range Archer missile dropped from my Berkut's hardpoint and raced toward its target. Its impact was enough to finally finish the MiG off, exploding into a fireball and plummeting into the bedrock of the Round Table. I pulled upward as soon as the missile fired to avoid getting caught in the explosion.
The moment of impact also suddenly broke me from my battle rush, as if awakened from an exhilarating dream.
"Splash Huckebein!" Orion announced, "Grabacr Team, that's mission accomplished."
I circled around the falling wreckage of Huckebein's plane, silently hoping to see a parachute somewhere. Maybe if he survived and somehow made it to Allied Lines they could authorize a bombing raid against Eisendorf or wherever the nuclear bombers were deployed from. He got a better view of the bases outlined on the map than me, he should know which ones they were.
But no, I couldn't see a parachute deploying. And this was B7R. Few people managed to find their way out of this place when the magnetic field that surround it rendered navigation and communication almost completely useless. I wanted to keep circling, just to see if he was all right.
At least until my console started blinking with a missile lock warning.
It suddenly jolted me out of what seemed like an obsessive trance, and the first place I looked was my radar. A hostile blip showed up practically on top of me. My fingers fumbled about the control panel for the counter-measures.
But just as I reached the button, the entire control panel seemed to fall into shadow as the missile lock warnings stopped. I looked to the side only to find the source of this shadow filling me with a dreadful sense of deja vu.
The Demon Lord's F-15 loomed to my nine o'clock, blocking out the sun. I could see right into his cockpit from mine, and it looked as if he was staring right into my eyes from his helmet. It wasn't hard to imagine him smiling at me through the respirator attached to his helmet. Not that he needed me to see it.
He raised one hand in a mocking version of our army's salute before he banked away and pushed up to afterburners. I couldn't take my eyes off of his craft as he turned it away and raced off into the distance to join his comrades.
I shook my head as I noticed the thin smoke trails spewing from his wings.
"You're the only two friendlies on my radar," came another AWACS order, " Recommend set course to zero-one-zero and RTB."
"Roger that," Bernitz replied, his chilly, rational voice returning now that the source of his anger had disappeared into B7R, "Our job is done here."
"What about the Demon Lord?" I asked.
"The Demon's as good as his name," Orion added regretfully, "While you two were busy with Huckebein, he and his wingmen shot down every last plane from Schwarze and Grau Wespe."
I gasped. Even after all that, he still managed to find time to pull up next to me and wave.
"We've still got lots of ammo and fuel left," I suddenly pleaded, "Can't we go after them?"
"Skip it, Nachtigall," Bernitz replied, "They'll lead us right into the Allied air defenses. The Demon Lord will be back. Just be patient. People like us don't go down easy."
I wanted to take his Freudian slip as solace.
The airwaves remained silent for the rest of the trip. Neither of us were in the mood to say anything. Not that there wasn't anything to say at all this time.
Rather than watch the scenery pass by, the return trip gave me time to think.
He could have killed me right then and there, while I was unaware. And I could have finished the job as he turned away.
Why, then, did we let each other go?
I wouldn't be able to figure that out before we got back to base.
Neu Eisendorf, Belka
1745 hrs.
I let out a fearful sigh the moment my landing gear hit the tarmac, letting the air brakes finish bringing the Berkut to a standstill. My hands trembled from fatigue as I guided the plane off the runway to park it by the hangar.
An eerie silence filled the cockpit as the Berkut's engines turned off. The base was no longer in a state of alarm, though fighters and transports kept landing or taking off after I used the runway. The Allies were getting close, and they needed every fighter in the air that they could muster.
The first person to greet me once my feet touched solid ground was none other than the Korps officer that had interrogated me earlier that morning. I noticed him stepping out of one of the paramilitary's all-black Gnade SUVs as I climbed out. For some reason, the fact that we completed the mission made his stature seem smaller.
"What happened to the traitor?" the officer asked, his fists clenched as he stared into my eyes. "Is he dead?"
"I...I..." I couldn't find the words to say as I removed my helmet. But I didn't feel afraid of him anymore.
"Yes he is," came a voice from behind. I turned to find Bernitz removing his helmet to expose a cold, calculating face. "Zweig made the kill."
"You're joking. She took out the Raven?" I didn't know whether to be disgusted at the officer's condescension as he gestured at me with an open hand, or further surprised at Bernitz' believing that Huckebein was dead.
"She took a little encouraging," he replied, clearly downplaying his threats, "But she got the job done." The Captain put a hand on my shoulder, giving a confident smile. I flinched the moment his hand landed on my shoulder, it felt like he could crush me or give me a science fiction stun pinch without effort.
The officer's face cringed in frustration. Not that I was in the mood to exact some schadenfreude from it. The officer then waved an accusing finger at me.
"You're a very, very lucky woman, Oberleutnant Zweig," he muttered, taking deep breaths to hold in his anger, "Unfortunately, I'm required to be a man of my word. You're in the clear...for now. Dismissed." Without another word, he stormed back into his vehicle and drove off.
"In the clear? What is this about?" Bernitz suddenly asked suspiciously.
"Told a very bad joke about the Blackshirts within his earshot," I said almost non-chalantly, my fear counter-balanced by his frustration and allowing me to come up with something I could get away with saying. "No offense. But he didn't like it and had me assigned here to help you."
"He probably did that to save his own pride," Bernitz replied with a smirk, brushing off the excuse. "Ironic, because this mission wouldn't have been a success without you."
"Is that an offer to keep me on your wing?" I asked sarcastically, raising an eyebrow. If he was also flirting with me, he was doing a very bad job at it.
"Almost, but not quite," Bernitz said sternly.
"That's a shame..." I added, looking away and trying to be more relieved than disappointed.
"I would actually recommend you," he added, much to my amazement, "But I'm afraid my superiors won't even give me the time of day unless you sign up for the Korps first. I'll put in a good word with the Base Commander for wherever the regulars decide to transfer you in the meantime."
"I thought you dismissed your other Number Fours because they were as shaky as I was earlier."
"Not necessarily," he replied, "They volunteered for my squadron full of pride but little substance when it came down to it. I expect regulars such as yourself to be shaky, but in the end you got things done. A true will of iron is only forged in the hottest fire."
I sighed forlornly. "I don't know. I just don't believe I did the right thing."
"I'm not surprised a regular like yourself is full of doubt either," Bernitz said with a condescension like a schoolteacher, "But you've shown that deep down you're not like those dime-a-dozen thugs they hire for the street brigades. You and I, we get things done like our Fuhrer and the other patriots in the government. We can change things."
"Oh...uh...thanks. And...uh...Captain Bernitz?" I asked just as I started to walk away, "Was it...true?"
"Was what true?"
"What Huckebein said...are we going to use nuclear weapons?" I knew we were. But a part of me wanted to know if he knew it too.
Bernitz shrugged, looking quite puzzled. "You know he was just trying to mess with your head."
"But if we had to...would we use them?" I asked.
He came back with a confident, almost scripted answer that sounded more rational than it was.
"Of course! We're Belkans. We do whatever it takes to protect our blood and land," he said with a smile, "If it really came to that, I wouldn't hesitate to drop one on the Allied columns myself."
It was that same, sadistic, devilish smile that the BVK officer that assigned me to this mission gave me earlier. And when he put his hand on my shoulder just then, it felt exactly as cold as the officer's gloves. And I couldn't tell him the truth then, because that would put me back into jeopardy.
"Oh. Well...that's..."
"You shouldn't be so tense," Bernitz called out as I walked away, "Remember, it's not patriotic to waver in the face of the enemy!"
I didn't want to respond to it. At least not with a voice. I held up a hand to wave back - or dismiss it, I couldn't tell - as I made my way back to the locker room.
What started as a walk though turned into a jog as I began once again to dwell on the repercussions of what I had just done. And this time, without the BVK or Bernitz staring me down, it began to show in my emotions as well. By the time I walked through the door of the locker room, I had started breathing heavily. One of the base staff passed me just as I was about to open my locker.
"Oberleutnant Zweig?" she asked, "Is something wrong?"
"No. It's nothing..." I said, trying to hold back tears.
"Are you sure? You weren't at that meeting, were you? A lot of pilots here seemed really shaken up about that."
I nodded weakly. "Yeah..."
"Look, when you're feeling better, they'll be posting the reassignments."
"Okay...sure," I said, nodding as I wrapped my towel around me and finished undressing.
"Don't worry," she said as she turned to leave, "I'm sure it was all just bluff and bluster, whatever they did back there."
By the time I reached the shower, I struggled to hold back tears.
I shot down Huckebein before he could escape. My mission from the Korps was complete as long as I kept silent about what happened.
But I knew inside that I had failed, not just my country but myself. I silenced a man that would have exposed a grand plan for nuclear annihilation for a chance, however fleeting, to settle a vendetta that now seemed so insignificantly petty. A chance that I missed my opportunity to exploit.
More than that, it felt like the Demon Lord didn't mock me when he flew wingtip-to-wingtip with me as much as he congratulated me. By cooperating with his plan and shooting down Huckebein I had sunk to his own level. Both of us were practically war criminals now, our hands practically caked with blood that would never be washed off. Yet with history written only by the winners, only one of us would end up condemned in the end.
I stayed in the shower until I was sure my body had gone completely numb from the cold, only to step out having caught a bit of the sniffles.
I put a new uniform on, and walked out of the barracks ready to face this judgement...
...only to find what I thought then was a chance at redemption.
To Be Continued...
Author's Note: Yeah, my flight terminology sucks. When I started writing this I figured I could use Grabacr 1 as we've always known him. Then the "conversations" started to develop and I realize that someone as coldly hateful in 2010 would probably have been a little less so in 1995 when they thought they were winning.