Highfleet: Uncharted Skies

by Stalin with Da Spoon

Chapter 3: Skybound We Roam

A silent little blue-jay rested peacefully in it's nest of twigs and leaves, happily snoring as it was tucked away within it's tree. The quiet whistling wind brought with it serene tranquility and a cool breeze. However, it quickly found it's tranquil rest violently interrupted by an ear splitting sound as it's tree shook, covering it's ears with it's wings as the very sound barrier itself was broken. As it peeked out of it's nest, it saw four long smoke streaks across the sky, as four large metal constructs soared above.

These sleek flying constructs of steel and power, known as the T-7 Interceptor jet-powered aircraft, flew in a diamond formation, with their squad lead at the head. Chuckling on the radio, one of the pilots designated Novor-3 also known as Russel addressed their fellow airmen after the achievement of breaking the sound barrier so easily.

"Novor-2, that was a sick ass barrier break, nice one."

"Roger that, Novor-3, just wanted to try and catch up after you damn bastards left me in the dust." Novor-2, AKA Kurtis said with a light chuckle before Novor-Lead came on the radio.

"Now now, simmer down partner, it ain't a competition, Novor-2."

"I know, Novor-Lead, I know." Soon, Novor-4, AKA Roger spoke up.

"This is Novor-4, just wanna comment that the situational analysis report was right, it certainly does feel like our planes are lighter than on Elaat. Feels nice being able to turn without blacking out for once."

"Affirmative, helps us with flying these things, and means we don't gotta burn as much fuel too, so least we can run longer flight missions." Novor-Lead, or by his real name Belikov, said, as he made a quick glance at his displays, looking at his fuel gauge and confirming that the jet had actually burned through only half of the fuel it would have burned through by now on Elaat, which made him feel a bit better about being stranded on an unknown world.

Taking a quick peek at his radar, he could see the three dots representing his wingmates. On his speedometer he saw he was keeping a modest 150 kilometers per hour, as he and his squad were ordered to stay only marginally ahead of the fleet. His radio began to buzz with a message from the fleet behind them, as he quickly switched to the frequency and answered.

"This is Novor-Lead, go ahead."

"Novor-Lead, this is Novorossiysk Air Command, the Grand Duke has ordered that should you encounter any potential intelligent alien life to immediately divert course and return to the fleet to land for debrief. Even if they engage you, you must pull off and retreat. I repeat, do not retaliate in the case of coming under fire, retreat immediately."

"Roger that Air Command, we'll be careful. Novor-Lead out." The frequency then ceased it's signal as Belikov switched back to his squadrons frequency. "Just got word from Air Command, if we encounter or detect any form of alien life, immediately pull off and return to the fleet."

"Roger that."

"Here's hoping it's just us on this new planet."

"Knowing our luck, we sure as hell won't be."

Belikov couldn't help but feel a slight chill go down his spine. What if they did encounter alien life? What if they were hostile? What if they spoke a language his people did not understand? It would be quite a strange experience. Who knows, they could be talking pastel ponies with wings and horns, but that's impossible right?...

Right?

[Sevastopol Operational Command Bridge.]

Mark Sayadi Salemsky sat in his command chair on the main deck of the bridge, between the chair of his general and admiral while The Prince was out on deck enjoying the nice breeze. Outside the window, the sun could be seen slowly descending over the horizon, while the moon slowly rose over the hills, as the fleet all engaged the large spotlights on their ships to guide them forward. Pyotr could not help but comment on the planet's unique features.

"This planet definitely appears to have a unique time zone... Night has fallen 2 hours earlier than on Elaat. We will need to likely adjust our shift schedules accordingly." Pyotr said as he sipped a bit from a coffee he had recently brewed, as admiral Daud nodded.

"One thing I have noticed is the abundance of wildlife and other forms of life and fauna on this planet. Many trees and small animals scurry around on the ground below, so if were to ever run out of rations, we could always go gathering and hunting for food. We have the equipment to do so, in fact we have an entire specialist task force trained for hunting animals."

"Though we never had to use it on Elaat, mainly due to their being hardly any forms of wildlife within the dunes of Gerat. The other parts of the planet were not much different, with many of our animals going extinct." Pyotr chimed in.

"Right, of course. Plus, there was hardly any life on the dunes of Gerat. It is a good thing we could always stash up on food at the local towns, and at Khiva we stocked up on extra, even though some of them may have gone bad." The Grand Duke was currently busy focusing on the display screen mounted to the ceiling in front of his seat, as it displayed the entirety of the fleet, including each ship, their crew status, and their fuel reserves.

The fleet had in total about fifteen ships, some being small, some being medium, and some massive. The fuel levels were pretty level, thanks to the planet's low gravity being less demanding of fuel. The crew were all doing quite well, though some were slightly worried of being on an unknown world, while some rejoiced at the thought.

The Duke himself however, was more intrigued than anything. If they were too far from home to establish contact with the empire, perhaps they could establish a colony here. They had the manpower, and a good portion of the fleet had female operators, so if worse came to worse, procreation could occur. But it was better to fully scout out this planet and potentially meet with it's inhabitants. He expected by now that Novor Squad would encounter something any second now.

Suddenly, the radio buzzed to life, as the operator answered. "This is Sevastopol-0 Strategic Command, come in."

"This is Novor Squad, we have made contact with unknown biological entities. Repeat, Novor Squad has made contact with unknown biological and airborne entities!"

Those words, even if the duke was expecting them...

Made his blood run cold.

Comments

[Skyblazer9]

I'm looking forward to seeing the first interactions between the Ponies and the displaced humans. Keep up the awesome job!

[HorizonSniper]

Hehe, the ponies shall be horrified by the impact on the ecology created from burning LCH4 in those amounts... Then will come the shock of seeing the almighty B O X

[ARandomLonelyDude]

the manual says that the aircraft are drones(explains why they kinda suck at attacking ships in the game) source: https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1434950/manuals/HighFleetManual.pdf?t=1627748221 page 31 in shipworks section second paragraph

looking forward 2 more