The air force of the united center kingdom had patrolled their northern boarder with unquestioned success for 3 years. Not a single pilot had ever had to eject from their cockpit. No bird had ever flown home on the strength of his own feathered wings in defeat. Because the cold armies did not have a single gun big enough to take the planes down. They were divided by geography and to this point, and their resources were also horribly divided. Leaving no central factories to arm the front faces of their war.
Lieutenant Sully Corban, a falcon, flew wingman to Captain Torrance Durseen. Durseen had found a way of earning decoration after decoration even with so many prior years of peace. His beak barked orders through the radio with a tone of predicted success.
"We're 10 clicks from the target. It's in the valley up ahead. We are aiming for a northern warlord's personal supply train. It's fast, but it's on tracks. When you get a beat on it, aim at least 100 meters ahead of what you expect to hit. So even if you buzzards miss, you have a chance of derailing it. We do that... then we can come back with a second run on a stationary target."
There were just 6 sets of wings in the squadron. That is all the middle kingdom has ever needed in a rade. As long as you stayed above the bears and the claws of their armies, then the only thing that could reach your plane was the echo'd growl of a frustrated poorly-armed enemy.
In a staggered formation, the propellers of the attacking planes pushed through the lightly falling snow of this far northern sky. The clouds hovered politely at a high altitude and provided a muted grey horizon. Sully pulled slightly on his control column and the nose of his 15-foot dark blue craft aimed over the crest of the approaching rock-topped mountains.
With clearance over the mountain guaranteed, sully sunk into his seat to ease his mind. He was hunting today, and even though he had never learned this from another bird or any other predator, he took the time to try and become aware. He partially closed his eyes, not all the way but just enough to make the view hazed and dreamlike. He took a deep inhale, and slowly re-gripped the controls of his plane, one diget of his wing at a time. The slowly gripping of the control stick and the zen-like near meditation was something that made him feel like what he was doing was different. Even though he had been in his plane for going on 3 hours, by doing this he felt that he was just now stepping into the edge of something dangerous. Something to be taken seriously.
"Straight winged formation, Weapons hot"- Torrance.
The propellers of the fighter in front of sully melted and pushed the white snow into a pelting horizontal rain as he banked into positon.
Like a ground soldier aiming a rifle, Sully filled his lungs with the stale air of his cockpit. When his full chest pressed firmly on his restraints, He let hot air steam through his beak while simultaneously compressing the small red switch held by both wings. He didn't flinch as gun powder explosions erupted in stereo from his wings behind him.
All six planes opened fire with their fully automatic 50 caliber cannons. The narrow train shot its dark-rusted steal hull across the prairie. Explosions of fire and white snow clapped around the tracks. Sully followed the line of his automatic cannon fire and saw the 50 cal magnesium tipped slugs pelt the side of the armored train. The distant sparks of metal cutting metal flew under him as he made his pass. The smoke and steam escaping from the bullet holes were too far down the snaking body of the train to be a danger to the engine pulling it.
The auditory concussion of weapons-fire crashed into the faces of the surrounding cliffs and cracked the branches of the quick-approaching forrest. The trees continued to shake as the last of the planes flown by Sully's friend Ben eased off his trigger to let his cannons cool in the fast moving frigid air. Ben's heavy condor voice came over the radio, "We made contact, train is already slowing. Might be disabled. Suggest second approach to confirm."
It was the captain's call so he responded, "All right, I was hoping your aim was better. Bank left and move in with a two wing pattern. Front to back. I want two waves, so we don't have a third run at this." His annoyance was playful, but easily recognized.
The captain led the first three planes in a left-slanted diagonal pattern. Sully flew in the rear of the second group of three. The smoke of the injured train was visible from anywhere in the valley. It was injured prey. These birds were all hunters, they weren't scavengers so diving head first on a struggling victim seemed out of place. But even a falcon can be a vulture if the setting calls for it.
The train limped along, from the sky it looked only inches from the darkened forest. The scar of tree-less ground marked the path of railway. On either side of it was a dense forest of dagger-shaped pine trees. Even in a winter-induced leaflessness, the trees left little ground visible from the sky. A far cry from Sully's green hilled home on the western coast. He was wearing a thick flight jacket and padded head cover, be still his body shivered from the frost on the cockpit windows. He was ready to finish this job and get back to warmer settings.
They were just a couple kilometers from the target again. Sully could see even from just backside of their planes that his wingmen flew with a bored confidence that was far from inspiring. All he could think was, "I look forward to rolling my eyes when Ben embellishes this mission at a bar tonight."
Sully calmed himself again and re-gripped his flight stick digit by diget. With the last feather resting on the edge of the trigger.
"Weapons hot." - The Captain
Steam fogged his goggles as Sully emptied his lungs and readied his trigger. Being the last in line, he took a second to use his scarf to wipe the steam from his glass eyewear. "ha, this is why i sit at the back of this group." His gasses cleared, then his heart skipped a beat.
The tail end of ben's p-441 rushed up towards the window of his cockpit. Sully reacted and banked left.
He didn't recognize the voice through it's shrill panic but heard, "TREE LINE TREELINE TREELINE. PULL UP!"
BOOM! CRACK! The sky exploded around him. His feathers shook with each new eruption.
He knew people were barking orders, but it was impossible to hear over the concussion of each new shockwave.
Then, the sky cleared as if taking a breath and he heard, "EJECT. EJECT!!! I REPEAT WE ARE UNDER ATTACK!"
Sully reacted, he used his right tallon to yank the yellow leaver that was dusty from neglect. The canopy clicked and groaned, but held tight. It's detachment was halted by the excess of frost on the mechanisms.
Sully undid the restraints and perched on his seat. The now pilot-less craft began to let gravity pull it to the ground. He squinted and felt the blood rush to his legs, the seat tore under the grip of his readying tallons. In one focused motion He opened his eyes wide, let out his breath in a frightened squawk and shot himself beak-first at the roof of his windowed cockpit.
The goggles guarded his eyes from the rain of glass around him. The cold air stung his lungs as he quickly tried to orient himself. With his wings still at his side, he fell at the same rate as his doomed plane only meters bellow. They floated together, as if they stood still and it was the ground that fell towards them.
He ripped himself free of his jacket. Leaving only his emergency belt and head covering to slow him down as he flew on his own strength.
CRACK!
His plane exploded bellow him. A flat piece of hull shot up and knocked the air from his already frantic lungs.
He spun. Dizzy, he instinctually spread is wings.
His body righted itself and with a cough his vision returned.
Now looking through cracked glass, he tried to gage the scene around him. The concussion had left a ringing in Sully's head. It was the ringing combined with the muted screams that were coming through the radio in his head covering that made this scene seem unreal. Seem distant. This couldn't be happening.
He shook his head again, splatters of blood from his beak and face freed themselves and landed onto the screen of his broken goggles.
He contorted his body and reached up with his tallons and removed his goggles. He straightened out and absorbed the scene around him.
All planes were down. The ground was peppered with the hulls, the smoke, and fires of what remained of the 6 machines. The trees wear dancing with the cannon fire that launched from the forrest edges. Cannon FIRE!!!???
This made no sense. No warlord had ever had armament like this. The Bears didn't have the resources. THIS MADE NO SENSE! They had never had anything more than a glorified sling shot. They had never had anything like this. Not like this. Not something that could down a plane. Nothing that could kill a bird in the air. The air was theirs, the middle kingdom's, it was HIS! It was a place for SULLY CORBAN!
Even though his ears were still throbbing from the shell fire he saw the explosions in the air had stopped. It made sense. No planes, no need for cannons.
He batted his wings evenly in place and brought himself into a hover so he could look around, he twisted his head to find more birds in the air. He couldn't see any! The eject order had come, some MUST have made it. They should be sitting in the air, small targets for cannons, and too far in the air for accurate rifle fire. Where were the birds?
Finally, he saw Ben's massive wing-span in the distance rushing towards him. He saw ben's beak moving, so he listened as best he could. Over the radio and Through the ringing of his ears, "SULLY MOVE! MOVE SULLY! Turn and Fly you bastard. NETS."
It was as if branches were escaping from the trees. Brown shapes rushed up towards the sky where sully sat. Sully turned and flew like a bullet. A brush of silent wind rushed by him. His wings flexed and pushed the air as fast as his feathers could handle. Another gust pushed the air into the right side of his small frame. His body twisted to reorient himself, but he saw that the last rush of wind had thrown a net right into Ben's right wing.
Ben's huge frame was nearly twice the size of the small weighed net, but it didn't matter. The bollens at each corner of the square bult momentum as they rapped and spun around Ben's hallow bones. With a loud CRACK, Sully saw the wing go limp and bend unnaturally behind Ben's body. Ben screamed. Gravity took hold and with his good wing, ben tried to hold fast to the invisible cliff that he was quickly leaving behind. A trail of feathers and blood followed ben to the trees. This is why there were no other birds in the sky.
Sully hugged his body and dove towards his friend.
His training told him that it made no sense. Twice his size, unconscious, and weighted with four iron-clad bollens, what did he expect to do for the Condor?
But sense or not it all he could think was. My friend is dying. My best friend is dying.
Crack! Sully's descent snapped to a halt. Sully did a flat spin as his right tallon became entangled.
The bollens worked hard to wrap his thin leg. Sully's sole reflex was to get the ropes off. He contorted his body forward. Leaned in with his beak and frantically pecked at the thick cords of the net. Fasted and faster the bollens spun to the skin of his leg. Sully's heart beat nearly out of his chest. SNAP! The rope ended and the momentum crushed his leg in two. He screamed through his whole body.
The pain turned the world white. He felt adrenaline pumping to his wings and torso. Nature was focusing his senses. It was preparing him to survive the unavoidable impact.
The ground rushed up. Sully filled his lungs and let it go slowly. He tasted the dry blood in his mouth, felt frozen tears on his face being pushed free by the rushing wind, and heard the distant growl of what he hoped were only the rustling of the trees bellow.
