The Spindle Station: Book 2 of the Alliance Conflict (14 page)

Carank replied, “Yes. The defensive missiles performed much worse in reality.”

Lorano reviewed all of the data obtained from the recent battles with the Hiriculans and updated the simulation’s main parameters. In addition to the defensive missiles, he added the extra defensive missile ports on Hiriculan destroyers and added the 300+ new simulations that had been created by Jim’s squadron.

Finally, he created an add-on package that included Netos as opposing fighter pilots. He set their profile as accurately as possible. Now, for a nominal fee of $9.99, players could fight against two types of aliens.

“All done.” Lorano announced. “Jim, return to your squadron and enter the simulation. I will connect you to the Victory Games servers and pull the selected fighters into it.”

Carank said, “Good luck.”

After Jim left, Carank looked at Lorano and said, “Someone at Victory Games will notice that we overrode all safeguards and reprogrammed the simulation.”

Lorano shook his head and responded, “I secretly marked that the changes were made by Victor Tyrano. If the humans search in detail, they will find his name.”

“Still, “Carank responded.

Lorano continued, “We will tell Victor what we did. Since he is going to be there physically tomorrow, no one will question the modifications.”

“True. I guess you are right.” Carank responded.

Lorano answered, “Besides, the changes are so minor, I doubt anyone will notice.”

………………………….

Christopher (Kip) Armstrong loved flying. He flew every chance he could get – prop planes, cargo planes, jet fighters, it really didn’t matter. His day job was training new recruits to become fighter pilots for the U.S. Air Force. At the moment though, he was seated in a Victory Games full-sized simulator located at Laughlin Air Force base in Del Rio, Texas.

Kip was leading Alpha Squadron through an attack on a Hiriculan battle fleet. This was a newly released add-on package that allowed massive numbers of players to play in the same battle. Unlike most of the other Victory Games simulations that only involved only one fighter or one squadron, this was a multi, multi-player game.

The objective was simple; win or die. The Alliance had two destroyers and three wings of fighters. They were facing a horde of Hiriculans; one battleship screened by three cruisers and a mind numbing 200 enemy fighters
*
.

Another Victory Games innovation had been the creation of fixed squadrons. Before, your squadron mates were randomly selected. Now, one could join a squadron (or create a new one) and participate in battles with friends. However, the higher ranked players generally banded together to form phenomenal squadrons.

This was the case with Alpha squadron. Kip was awarded the name Alpha because his squadron was currently ranked number one. The squadron featured Kip as the top player in the world. He used his rank to successfully recruit 7 of the other top 10 players. All 20 members of Alpha squadron were ranked in the top 50.

His nearest competitors were Ghostrider and Chaos squadrons. Ghostrider squadron boasted 12 players in the top 20 and all in the top 50. Chaos squadron contained every remaining member in the top 60. Alpha squadron had defeated both of the other squadrons, but the margin of victory had been razor thin. Kip hated to admit that the difference between the #1 and #10 ranking was almost inconsequential.

Today was going to be a historic battle. For the first time ever, the top three squadrons were going to compete together in the same simulation. Well, Kip thought, three of the top four anyway. Kip briefly thought of the weird event several months ago when 20 of the top pilots suddenly quit playing.

There had been questions galore about their sudden disappearance. Most attributed it to burn-out or some sort of protest. Victory Games even made a statement that the players’ accounts were still active, they just weren’t playing publically anymore.

That hadn’t stopped the rumor mongers from declaring that they had been kidnapped by a rival government or abducted by aliens. After a month or two though, people stopped talking about them and they were largely forgotten. Someone had ceremoniously named them the Lost squadron and the name had stuck.

The three squadrons burned through the leading elements of the enemy’s fighter wing. Kip shouted on a general broadcast, “All units, the enemy is going to attempt to loop us. Chaos roll left; Alpha roll down on me; Ghostrider, you have the lead.

The standard enemy attack when it possessed overwhelming numbers was to loop one wing up and then down and loop a second wing down and then back up. This catches the Alliance pilots in a tremendous disadvantage as they are effectively being attacked by three fighters at once. By breaking his flight back into three separate wings and rolling them, he would catch the enemy at the midpoint of their roll and completely unprotected.

The three wings lost 12 fighters in the pass, but the enemy suffered massive casualties. Only 40 of the initial wave of 180 fighters in the attack were left. The Alliance fighters had broken through the enemy’s fighter defense and could now proceed to the final 20 fighters guarding the battleship.

Kip momentarily looked up at the overall battle. The capital ships were now exchanging missiles. Kip broadcast, “Standard missile fire. The destroyers’ defenses can easily handle it.”

Kip led the remaining fighters in a dodge and roll maneuver that left the Hiriculan fighters in the wrong position. They lost an additional two but killed all 60 enemy fighters. It was almost a perfect pass! Kip whooped for joy. They could now attack the battleship and cruisers with unheard of numbers.

Kip’s war cry was cut short when a member of Ghostrider squadron interrupted him by shouting, “Commander, the destroyers.”

Kip quickly scanned the monitor showing the overall battle. He couldn’t believe it. Both destroyers were taking heavy damage from the enemy’s missiles. Kip checked the logs and saw that the destroyers had fired the required number of defensive missiles to stop the attack. However, they hadn’t worked.

Gus Swanson (Gus), Kip’s main rival and commander of the Ghostrider squadron, dropped the commander title and yelled, “Kip, the programmers changed the defensive missile profile in the middle of the simulation.”

Kip continued watching the screen as first one, then the second destroyer blew up under intense enemy missile bombardment. The battle was effectively over. They could continue and destroy the enemy capital ships, but they could no longer win the simulation. To win, they needed at least one destroyer to still be alive.

Gus continued, “Someone at Victory Games was watching and decided we weren’t going to win today.”

Kip laughed and said, “Well, if they want to up the odds, we will have to find another way to win. Let’s see if we can get everyone back together again next week.”

Kip was about to release control and end the game when suddenly an Alliance cruiser appeared from thin air and he received a docking summons. Kip looked again. That was strange he thought. Normally, the squadron commander decides the simulation and orders the capital ship to pick them up; not the other way around. In fact, he had never recalled anyone actually getting summoned like this.

Kip did what anyone in his situation would have done. He completely ignored it. That lasted for about 2 seconds. His second in command said, “Kip, turn around. We have a summons to dock with that cruiser.” Apparently the fact that he shouldn’t be receiving a summons didn’t seem bother number 2.

Kip continued ignoring the summons for another 2 seconds. At that point his controls went dead and his fighter went into autopilot. Odd again, or possibly more odd. Autopilot was only able to be engaged if the pilot was injured. Kip certainly wasn’t incapacitated, but the game must have disagreed.

His fighter made a wide, slow bank back toward the cruiser that drew the attention of others. One of the other players said, “Having a little problem flying today are we?”

Kip ignored the barb. Instead of responding, he grabbed the controls. They responded and let him back in command. Just for fun he tried to steer away from the cruiser. He felt the controls go heavy and start to disengage. He quickly corrected his vector back to the cruiser. Okay, he thought, I guess I am going to the cruiser.

He landed on the cruiser. The next moment the game told him that a new simulation had been downloaded and accepted and would start momentarily. The game was correct. Exactly one moment later the next simulation started. Kip received orders to launch.

Kip launched and looked at the parameters of the new simulation. He sighed. It was one of the original simulations – just one wing of 20 Alliance fighters against another wing. Kip ordered, “Okay men, form up on me and sound off.”

Alpha 1 through 12 went as planned. After that came Ghostrider 1 through 4, Chaos 2 through 4 and finally Ghostrider 7. Kip looked closely at his screen and verified that almost half of his squadron had been replaced. He verified it, but still really didn’t believe it.

Gus asked, “Kip, what is this? How did you combine squadrons?”

Ralph Dellman (Rubie) added, “Why did you combine squadrons? What are we doing?”

Kip responded, “I didn’t do this. Someone else did.”

Gus asked, “Who has the ability to rearrange squadrons and arbitrarily assign missions?”

Kip knew the answer to that one. He responded, “The same person that reprogrammed the destroyers. Someone at Victory Games headquarters is messing with us.”

Rubie must have scanned the added and deleted pilots. He said, “Guys, do you realize this new group is extremely highly ranked. Twenty of the top 26 pilots are here.”

Clearly someone had given great thought as to how this squadron was assembled, though Kip couldn’t immediately determine the significance. For instance, numbers 7 and 8 overall were missing, but 24 and 26 were here.

The mission window bleeped. A cruiser had just appeared and launched a squadron of Alliance fighters. The distance was just a touch longer than normal, but well within the bounds of the simulation. They would make contact in just under 5 minutes.

Kip said, “Okay guys, we’re here. We may as well show these losers how to fight. Chaos 2, 3 and 4, you are now Alpha 13, 14 and 15. Ghostriders, you are now numbers 16 – 20 respectively.”

Kip figured it would be easier to simply assign numbers then figure out who outranked whom and change everyone’s number.

Gus shouted, “Hey, the computer is updating files.”

After a slight pause, Gus continued shouting, “Look at their profiles. These guys have been playing 6 or 7 hours a day every day for the past 8 months. Their mission log is astounding. It appears that they have been playing on a private Victory Games server.”

Rubie added, “They have even defeated the battleship simulation. I thought that was impossible to beat.”

Kip brought up the screen for the player ranking and profile. Sure enough, the rankings were changing. Kip watched himself drop from number 1 to number 21. He looked at the profiles of the players replacing him. He read the top two out loud – Ace, Rush. He didn’t recognize some of the others, but he saw that they were all well decorated.

However, Kip did recognize those first two names. He made a leap of logic and realized who these on-coming pilots were. He said, “Everyone, form up, go ghost. It looks like the notorious Lost squadron just reappeared and wants to dance.

Kip noted that the commander of the Lost squadron was Pinball and was ranked number 20. He was a little surprised the lowest ranked member was their leader. Even more unusual was the fact that rival commander was sending a message to both squadrons. He said, “Play time is over ladies. This just got real.”

Kip turned off the full broadcast and switched to a frequency only his squadron could hear. He said, “Alpha, break into three teams. Units 1-8, barrel roll left, 9-12, pincer left, and the rest of you follow through with mop-up.

Kips switched to manual flying mode, took a deep breath, and forced himself to relax. The information from the simulation flooded his brain and threatened to overwhelm him. However, he stayed relatively calm and quickly found the color yellow. In a few seconds more he mapped the rest of the colors and was in full control of his fighter. He could feel and sense everything around him. He was serenely calm and ready for battle.

He did a hard barrel roll left followed by a bank and flip. The triple maneuver should leave his sub-wing of 8 fighters in a position to drop on the unsuspecting rear flank of the other squadron. He finished the flip and blind fired. Nothing. No hits. In fact, no one was there. The enemy must have anticipated the maneuver.

Gus shouted, “Damn.” There was little else he needed to say.

Kip realized that their opponents could easily match them maneuver for maneuver. He ordered the squadron to split into 10 groups of 2 and seek individual targets of opportunity. Kip located his wingman and dove for the nearest fighter.

He fired two guided missiles and followed those with an additional 2 non-guided or dummy missiles. Four missiles at one target should be overkill. Strike one, he thought and rolled to the next target.

Rubie, Kip’s wingman, radioed Kip on a private channel and said, “No way, did you see that?”

Kip had to admit that he hadn’t seen whatever it was that he should have seen. He simply replied, “No.” He didn’t want to admit that he was having a private celebration for his first kill.

Rubie responded, “All 4 of your missiles missed.”

Kip looked at his board and yelled, “How?”

Rubie: “A different fighter flew past and shot all 4 missiles out of the sky.”

Kip: “No way. Nobody can shoot a missile.”

Rubie: “Well, nobody till now.”

Kip spotted a second enemy fighter and dove toward it. He had learned from the last experience. He wasn’t going to let this one escape. He waited until the last possible second and fired another 4 missiles at the fighter. Rubie, right behind, also fired 4 missiles. He grinned as he verified that this one exploded.