Wings of Honor

by Craig Andrews

  Wings of Honor

  Book one of The Forgotten Fleet

  Craig Andrews

  Copyright © 2021 by My Story Productions

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Also by Craig Andrews

  The Machinists:

  Fracture

  Splinter

  Martyr

  Capture

  Exposure (Forthcoming)

  The Forgotten Fleet:

  Wings of Honor

  Wings of Mourning (Summer 2021)

  Wings of Redemption (Fall 2021)

  For Callan,

  who shines brighter than any star

  and lights the world for everyone around him.

  Now you have a book too.

  Contents

  Foreword

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Afterword

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  Get exclusive fan discounts and bonus content when Wings of Mourning and Wings of Redemption, Books #2 and #3 of The Forgotten Fleet go live by signing up for the Craig Andrews mailing list.

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  1

  Coliseum, Terran Fleet Academy

  Sol System, Earth, High Orbit

  Callan “Coda” O’Neil slipped on his virtual-reality helmet, muffling the surrounding voices and sounds of excited anticipation. The VR’s imaging display flickered to life, and the real-life image of his squadron donning their own simulation helmets on the floor of the Coliseum was replaced by a simulated first-person view of the inside of his fighter drone. Resistant to radar, lidar, and other forms of detection, the matte-black Z-18 Hornet flew silently through the digital representation of space.

  This calm before the battle, the silence before the rest of his squadron plugged into the simulation and the radio chatter began, was usually one of Coda’s favorite moments. But the upcoming battle was with Andrei Krylov’s Shadow Squadron, and Coda’s nerves and overwhelming desire to win spoiled whatever personal heaven the prebattle isolation normally provided.

  Andrei Krylov, call sign “Moscow,” was one of the finest drone pilots in the Terran Fleet Academy and, in Coda’s opinion, its biggest prick. More importantly, Shadow Squadron was tied with Coda’s own Viking Squadron for first place in the academy’s standings. In addition to determining the Ace Squadron of their class, the battle would be one of the deciding factors in determining the pilots’ post-graduation assignments.

  Coda already knew where he would be stationed. The image of the sleek black hull of the SAS Americas filled his mind’s eye. The battle cruiser was the flagship vessel in the Sol Fleet and home to the Nonpareil, the finest drone squadron the Sol Fleet had ever assembled. Coda would soon be one of them, fighting battles that weren’t simulated, battles that actually meant something. He couldn’t wait to rub Moscow’s smug face in it.

  One thing at a time, Coda told himself, dismissing the daydream. Don’t get ahead of yourself.

  “Heads-up,” he said softly, and his heads-up display overlaid his view of space, providing him with important flight data and a small three-dimensional map displaying a full view of the battle. The battle map, which was relegated to the bottom right-hand corner of his vision, would soon be teeming with green and red dots indicating friendly ships and enemy fighters. For the moment, however, a white dot of the friendly capital ship cruised behind the friendly green symbol that marked his fighter.

  Above the floor of the Coliseum, where Shadow and Viking Squadrons were plugged in, was a much larger version of the battle map. Nearly four stories tall and almost as deep, the battle map gave the spectators front-row seats to the upcoming incursion. Instead of the green and red dots on Coda’s HUD, though, the spectators enjoyed three-dimensional, photo-real images of the fighter crafts.

  There, the extensive view would shift to where the battle was thickest, like the vids of a space race moving to where the race was most interesting. A normal battle would draw most of the student body—it was a perfect opportunity to study a fellow squadron’s tactics, after all—but there wouldn’t be an empty seat in the house tonight. Even the faculty would attend. Not to mention representatives from Fleet Command.

  Coda turned, the view in his VR helmet shifting seamlessly with him, and saw the rest of his squadron formed up beside him. Every battle simulation began this way, with the sixteen drones of the squadron stretched out in a simple line that gave each squadron leader a block of clay that they could shape into a formation of their choosing.

  “All right, report in.” Coda listened as all of his pilots announced they were plugged in and ready for action. When the last radioed that he was ready, Coda ordered the squadron to move into standard formation, and in practiced unison, the drones shifted into a V with Coda at its point.

  He didn’t intend to remain in the standard formation for long, but it gave the spectators something to see and provided his pilots with an opportunity to put their drones in action. Not that they needed the practice, of course; they’d logged thousands of hours in their drone operation bays, but Coda had long since learned that even the best pilot could hesitate during the early moments of battle. Having them shift formations before it began allowed them to get control of their nerves and avoid any serious mistakes.

  “Contact!” Buster boomed suddenly.

  “Copy that, Buster,” Coda said. “What do we have?”

  “Looks like your standard smash-and-go scenario,” Buster said.

  Coda glanced at his battle map, noting the newly appeared red dots marking the enemy fighters. They were two minutes out and zipping toward Coda’s fighters, away from a capital ship of their own.

  “Let’s get some space between us and our ship.” Coda keyed an intercept course and sent it to his squadron. “Seventy percent burn for sixty seconds on my mark… Mark.”

  Viking Squadron moved as one, angling below their previous flight path, and creating some space between them and their capital ship. The scenario’s objective was simple: destroy the opposing side’s capital ship and the easiest way to accomplish that was to destroy the opposing squadron then go for the capital ship itself.

  The way this particular scenario had been
constructed seemed to push them toward that inevitability. There was no cover, no territory to hold, nothing that would make their sensors go haywire. Not even a planet and an associated gravity well to contend with. Just empty space. The academy leadership wanted an old-fashioned duel. But Coda wasn’t interested in giving them what they wanted. He was interested in winning. Thoroughly.

  He wasn’t planning on taking on the second-best pilot in the academy straight on, either.

  “Vikings, form up in the Revised Coleman Diamond and wait for my mark.”

  The Coleman Diamond was a formation named after the famed pilot Commander Chadwick Coleman, a hero from the early days of the Baranyk War before drone warfare had replaced real pilots in real starfighters. Commander Coleman had used the formation in a suicidal attack on the Baranyk Fleet, the battle that had turned the tide of the war—or at least staved off imminent defeat, depending on who was telling the story.

  The tactic was simple enough to understand though rarely leveraged. Unlike the starfighters of old, drones could be fielded in much greater numbers, replenished faster, and more importantly, since their pilots were tens of thousands of kilometers away, not limited by the same physical constraints the former star pilots had been.

  As a result, the newer formations employed on the front were more fluid, capable of shifting strategies at a moment’s notice. They more closely resembled a school of fish, changing directions on a dime, yet still coordinated, moving as one, never colliding. With that in mind, Coda hoped the formation would distract Moscow enough that he wouldn’t notice the new wrinkle Coda had put on it.

  Coda remained in position while thirteen drones formed a diamond behind him, its top and bottom points equal distances above and below the plane of the impending battle. Coda’s wrinkle was to have the remaining two fighters throttle down to fall behind the formation then match speed before going completely dark. Their dark hulls would make them all but invisible to visual identification, and their lack of heat signatures would help hide them from computer detection.

  The plan wasn’t foolproof since radar or lidar could still detect the drones, and their residual heat signatures might intermittently pop up on enemy HUDs. Of course, anyone paying attention might also notice that the incoming squad was suddenly two fighters short, but that would be easy enough to miss since the fighters would go dark while the formation was coming together.

  As soon as Viking Squadron completed its formation, Moscow countered it with one of his own.

  “Coda, this is Buster. Are you seeing this?”

  “I am,” Coda said. Shadow Squadron had slipped into a spear with Moscow at its tip. “He means to punch through our diamond.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “We’re going to let him.”

  “We’re going to do what?”

  “Three seconds before collision, break formation and form up into seven battle pairs twelve degrees positive-Z,” Coda said. “That will give us a better attack angle as they break though. If they don’t engage, burn hard in pursuit. If we do this right, we’ll have time to break their formation before they’re able to get to our capital ship.”

  “That’s not going to give us a lot of time,” Buster said. As Coda’s best friend and flight leader, he was the only one who could get away with directly question Coda’s orders.

  “Then don’t miss,” Coda said. “Every shot counts. Vikings Fifteen and Sixteen, remain dark and maintain your trajectory. We’re going to end this before they know what hit them.”

  They were committed now. Even if Coda wanted to alter strategies, they didn’t have time.

  “Contact in fifteen seconds.” Coda shifted excitedly in his seat. All his time spent at the prestigious military academy, everything he’d worked for, every test he’d aced, and each battle he’d won culminated in this moment. Anything short of a decisive victory would be a supreme disappointment. “Ten seconds. Prepare to break formation.”

  At seven seconds, Coda fired a volley of digital projectiles at the incoming drone spear. He hadn’t given the order, but the other ships in the formation followed his lead, firing as well. The odds of them hitting one of the incoming vessels was slim, the distances were too great, but like before, the action allowed his fighters to get the first shots out of the way.

  “Five seconds,” Coda said. Then three. “Break!”

  The diamond shattered, breaking into seven shards of two fighters apiece, all darting above the battle plane. There was no up or down in space, but if there were, the new position would have given Coda’s fighters the high ground. They blanketed Shadow Squadron’s flight trajectory with cannon fire.

  Moscow didn’t have time to adjust course and lost four fighters as they sped through the barrage. Unfortunately, the losses weren’t enough to force them into a different strategy.

  Coda keyed in his pursuit and maximized thrust, burning hard. His wingman, Hound, just off his wing in the dash-two position, did the same. Panic flared in Coda’s chest as Shadow Squadron showed no signs of breaking course. He keyed in on the nearest enemy fighter, thumbing the switch on his joystick, activating his missiles. A red square appeared around the target, and a second indicator, larger than the first, tracked behind it.

  The target took evasive actions, trying to slip missile lock. But this is where Coda shined. He countered the target’s moves almost as if he knew what the other pilot was going to do before they did it, and quickly closed the distance. As he did, he toggled the lead fighter and the Viking capital ship. A countdown appeared in the corner of his vision, counting down the time before the tip of the spear was within firing range of Viking Squadron’s capital ship.

  This is going to be close.

  The two indicators came into alignment on the enemy target, then glowed more brightly and was accompanied by a steady tone. Coda had missile lock.

  “Viking One,” Coda announced. “Fox three!”

  Coda launched the first of his eight AIM-220s. He didn’t have visual on the missile, it was too small to register in the black, but a yellow indicator identified it on his HUD. It zipped from his fighter, streaking toward its target.

  “Splash five!” Coda shouted as the enemy drone exploded in a brief flash of light. He shoved the joystick forward, avoiding the debris from the destroyed drone as another flash of light flared, and another red dot disappeared from his battle map.

  Six down. Ten to go.

  Five fighters remained in the haft of the spear, the rest creating a V at its head. Positive-Z, Coda and his wingman had a clear firing angle, but just as they got missile lock again the haft of the spear broke away, streaking toward its pursuers. Half of Coda’s squadron was forced to take evasive action and engage the enemy.

  Coda and Hound held course. Not me. Not today, Moscow.

  He eyed the countdown to their firing range, then searched the battle map hoping to see signs of life from Vikings Fifteen and Sixteen. Viking Squadron’s best chance of winning was if the two fighters could get to Shadow Squadron’s capital ship before Moscow got to theirs. It was a race, and one Coda was beginning to feel less confident about winning.

  Two more fighters broke away from Shadow Squadron, flipping nose to tail and plotting an intercept course with Coda and Hound. It was a maneuver only a drone could perform. At a minimum a real pilot would have blacked out under the immense strain. More likely, the inside of the cockpit would have been coated in human soup.

  “Evasive maneuvers,” Coda ordered, and he and his wingman split, allowing the attacking fighters to slip between them.

  “They’re coming around on our tails,” Hound said.

  “Break off,” Coda said. “Stall them. Keep them off my six. I’m staying on the leader.”

  “Roger.”

  Hound flipped, then spun and shot toward the nearest enemy fighter, opening up his cannons. Coda stayed focused on the tip of the spear, trusting his wingman would keep him safe. Moscow was at the tip of that spear. He knew it.

 
; A glint caught his eye, something closer to a lesser darkness than to light, then was followed by another flash of light just off Moscow’s wing. Coda looked back at his battle map, and all became clear. Buster, on a cleaner attack vector, had fallen into firing range. Coda could almost see Moscow calculating his chances. Could he get into missile range before Buster eliminated him and his wingman?

  Not likely.

  Moscow must have come to the same conclusion. He aborted their attack run, diving negative-Z below the battle plane and racing back toward the dogfight. Grinning, Coda flipped his drone, plotting a new intercept course.

  In his all-or-nothing gambit Moscow had accepted catastrophic casualties and was now significantly outnumbered. Coda’s squadron remained at full strength, while Moscow’s was down nearly two-thirds. If Coda had been in Moscow’s shoes, he would have doubled down on the attack, but the risk of losing that way, losing without firing a single shot, would have been too much for Moscow to bear. At least this way, he could save a little face in front of the room full of superiors and say he’d taken some of Viking Squadron with him.

  The battle’s over, Moscow. The rest is just a formality.