Twenty Percent Deader
“All wings, be advised, bogeys far at 11 o’clock. Check in, all callsigns.”
One by one, the flyers in my squadron signed off.
“Dancer Two Eight, standing by.”
“Prancer Three Eight, awaiting orders.”
“This is Vixen Half Eight. I’ve got the six.”
“Comet Five Eight on call.”
“Cupid Six Eight standing by.”
“Donner Seven Eight standing by.”
“Blitzen Full Eight, locked and loaded.”
The enemy appeared as black dots on the midnight-blue sky, a scout flight of fighter jets that belonged to the People’s Liberation Army of Tajikistan. I never really understood what the beef between these guys was; they seemed alright to me. And yet they killed and killed and didn’t care who or what got in their way.
The Tajikistanis didn’t seem to like ponies, either.
I knew they would kill me if I didn’t kill them. I hated killing. Death was not something we ponies were familiar with. Sure, elder folks who had gotten long in the tooth would have passed, but we had no real concept of murder.
But on Earth, people killed each other all the time.
“All signs, this is Dasher One Eight. Bogeys closing in, 11 o’clock high. Clear to engage.”
I had learned all this jargon from Forrest Starr, Vixen Half Eight, one of my best wingmen. He had taught me everything; how to fly a human fighter jet, how to fire the weapons, how to…
“Dasher! Incoming, nine o’clock high!”
I saw the missile tracks as they screamed through the sky, tracing fire across the stars. I jammed the throttle, just barely avoiding the rockets as they sped past. We were only about 20,000 feet in the air, and already I could feel sweat running down my brow. My mane was compacted in a heavy helmet, and my face was almost completely covered by an oxygen mask. I couldn’t feel my wings, not with the USAF-issue jumpsuit that made me feel like I was wearing a straitjacket…
“DASHER!”
Lost in thought again, I hadn’t realized how close the enemies had gotten. The Tajikistanis flew like the Blackbolts back home, during the Great Raid of Canterlot. Dawdle out in the open for a bit, then come crashing down (sometimes literally) onto your head. The Blackbolts were a pain in the wing, especially when they attacked Ponyville, but they were nothing compared to the ten-plus enemy planes whose guns trained on our own jets.
“Stag Squadron, double E!” Double E. Evade and engage.
“Fuck! Here they come!”
Sure enough, the enemy jets swooped down on us like falcons, and even the deadening mufflers in my helmet couldn’t keep out the sound of roaring engines. One got too close, and when I looked around I saw the first casualty: Prancer Three Eight, Donavan Aidus, the remnants of his plane spiraling to earth.
“Motherfucker! Three took a MiG! Fucking rammed him! He’s down! Prancer’s down!”
“Does anyp…anyone see a chute?!” I yelled over the radio.
“Negative, Dasher One. No chute. No fuckin’ chute.”
“Break formation! Engage all hostiles!”
With an angry fervor fueled by the loss of their wingmate, Stag Squadron broke from their standard V-flight and engaged the enemy. I pulled back on the throttle and felt gravity pull my body, but then my canopy brightened, and the sky filled with explosions as my ears filled with comms chatter.
“Vixen Half! Fox Two!”
“Hostile on your six, Dancer!”
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!”
“Fox Two!”
“Deploying countermeasures!”
“This is turning into a real GoFu!”
“What the buck is a GoFu?”
“A goat fuck, ma’am.”
“I’M HIT!”
I turned my head around to see an eruption of fire to my right. Donner Seven Eight, Jackson Mayhew. Father of three. He looked a lot like Big Macintosh, except his skin was white, not red.
His plane had taken a direct hit from an enemy missile. But then I saw the battered canopy snap away from the flaming hulk of metal, and seconds later, a dark form burst from the plane and rocketed away. I knew Mayhew’s parachute would deploy. We’d deal with him later.
A plane was on my tail. Then it wasn’t. A burst of machine gun fire from one of my wingmen dispatched the enemy, who careened to the ground.
“Thanks, whoever that was,” I breathed, distracted. “I really…”
“DASHER! HOSTILE HAS LOCK ON YOUR SIX!”
“WHAT?!”
“EVADE, DASH! EVADE, FOR FUCK’S SAKE!”
Forrest Starr’s voice was enough to make me flip into a barrel roll, but it was not enough to save me from the enemy jet. A light flashed on my dashboard. I was done for.
“It’s gonna hit, squad. I’ve got no flares. It’s been good serving with you guys.”
“NO!”
Connection.
I didn’t even feel the pain. There was no pain. Only bright light. And sound. So much sound.
I came to my senses a few seconds later, realizing that I wasn’t dead, realizing that I was on a collision course with the ground, encased in a fiery tomb. The glass canopy was shattered. Alarms were going off. Flames licked at the back of my suit.
I had no choice. I bailed.
Nighttime at 20,000 feet is peaceful, except for the roaring wind ripping at your body. Such was it that I found myself strapped to my rocket chair, spiraling away from the flaming plane, anticipating the chute release.
A low thunk and a sudden pain in my back told me that the chute had been deployed. I felt like my wings had been torn from my body, but that was the least of my problems.
The explosion had rendered me near-deaf, but not blind. I could see the flaming carcass of one of my squadmates barreling towards me. I didn’t know who it was, but whoever it was, I don’t think he survived.
But his plane was heading right for me.
For the first time in my life, I was actually scared. Nothing had prepared me for this.
Being stuck in a gulch with nothing but a tortoise for company…that wasn’t scary.
Having to fly in front of hundreds of ponies at Cloudsdale…not scary.
Fighting a dragon…pssh, I could do that in my sleep.
But there I was, thousands of feet above the world, strapped to a chair that was slowly gliding down to the earth, and a fiery mass of metal that was once a fighter jet was falling in my direction, ready to crush me dead, to knock me out of the sky.
I closed my eyes and braced for impact.
I felt fear for the first…and last…time.