by Ava D. Dohn
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This explanation of the fighters used during the King’s war was taken from Copeland and Garlock’s, The King’s War: A History:
“When exercising routine fighting maneuvers, the TKR-14, the standard attack fighter needed to be manually operated, thus requiring the pilot’s complete concentration to manipulate the craft. The pilot’s hands rested on right and left spherical control pads. Each pad contained identical command inputs, except being mirror image in design, thus the same fingers on the different hands executed identical functions. The hands did not have to move, because the impulse of the neurological charges racing from the brain initiated the response of the plane. The pilot needed to remain focused on handling the ship to avoid sending mixed signals to the controls. For this reason, a safety feature had been included in the 14. If a pilot did lose control when in manual mode and flying became erratic, the quickest way to stabilize the ship was to lift his or her hands off the pads. This done, the plane would automatically correct itself. In doing so,it would slow down until the pilot again assumed commandof the helm. In a dogfight, though, when the enemy was constantly seeking to get a lock on their opponent, such a maneuver could get a person killed.
The TKR-17 was designed directly off the TKR-14. The two planes looked similar, starting with a long, sleek, pointed nose, tapering back into a rakish, cigar-shaped body, with small tail side-fins and one vertical stabilizer. Below the bubbled pilot’s cockpit, midway down the ship’s sides, were two small, lateral wings. The wings enabled the craft to utilize the atmosphere of a planet when flying in sub-space. They also served as cooling radiators for the engines which were located in the lower midsection of the fuselage. The primary thrust of the rockets was rearward, but the fighter could move in every other possible direction, even backwards. That is where similarities of the 14 and 17 ended.
Fighter craft evolved slowly. The first true fighters were seen about thirty-five centuries earlier. By current standards, they were slow and awkward. It had been difficult to convince the pilots who flew them to upgrade to better equipment. Most people do not like change, and the fighter pilots were no exception. Many of them had flown the earliest of the ships and had been reluctant to modify what they were used to. The TKR series had been first designed well over a millennia ago, and the model 14A was already a little over a century old when the Great War started. Yet it was still the primary attack weapon of the navy.
When Mihai started setting up combat commands prior to the Great War, she felt the need to have a better plane than the 14. Changing the physical structure of the current fighter would be expensive and time-consuming, because most of the navy’s carriers were designed for optimum space, using the TKR-14 as their primary attack support machine. Time was something Mihai did not have.
The prerequisite physical shape of the new plane was already set. Mihai and her design team, which Terey was part of, chose to confine the changes within the framework of the 14. Two prototypes followed that were eventually produced, but were only special adaptations of the 14 called the ‘TKR-15’ and ‘16’, and only a few were built. After a disappointing start, the team chose to scrap everything about the 14 except the exterior structure, which was outstandingly well designed. The control system, armaments, engines, computer system, even the cockpit were brand-new in concept.
Two of the most noticeable changes were visible. The pilot’s cabin was moved three feet forward, primarily to make room for the additional size of the engines, but also for better visuals. Second, to meet the desired acceleration increase, the twin engines had been made proportionately larger than the 14’s. To properly install them, the belly of the new plane was expanded, creating two slightly bulbous extrusions on the lower right and left sides. The remainder of the changes were unseen, yet were the most evident in combat.
The TKR-17 not only mounted laser cannons and energy burst rapid-fire guns, along with racks for exterior ordnance, it also had two solid projectile, forward-fixed cannons. High-speed attack ships rarely mounted solid projectile guns, for it was all too easy for the pilot to fly into his or her own fire. Mihai’s team accepted that risk because of the armor-busting effect solid projectiles had over energy blasts. There was another reason the solid projectiles were desirable. Counter energy beams and fields had been developed that could often neutralize laser and other energy weapons. This was one reason the sword was still a standard weapon of the infantry; energy side arms might be disabled. Solid projectile guns still used mechanical mechanisms for operation, and dry chemical reactions to create the energy to propel the bullets, all of which were unaffected by the counter-energy fields.
The other outstanding feature of the 17 was the way it was flown. Hand controls were of similar design to the 14, but had a more sensitive reaction to the neurological impulses contacting them. Located in the pilot’s helmet were probes connected directly to the main computer. These probes would do continual brain scans of the pilot, and then it would respond to the scanned signals. The artificial intelligence level of the computer was almost equal to the pilot’s intelligence in certain respects. It would even react to the different emotional signals the brain would transmit. An almost symbiotic relationship often developed between a pilot and plane, causing the ship to take on the personality characteristics of the pilot. This was one of the reasons that, during the Great War, the enemy knew when Mihai had joined the fight. For those able to master the needed thought processes to properly operate the 17, the plane became a beautiful and deadly tool. But for those unable to do so, it could become their coffin.
Land based fighter units were later provided with a modified version of the 17, but with similar controls of the 14. These ships were designated ‘TKR-14G’. The greater weight and increased fuel needs limited their use with the navy. Later, more compact engines were designed with similar power and acceleration of the 17. These and other improvements were incorporated into the 14, the new model being designated ‘ TKR-14H’. By the time of the latest council, it had become the standard navy fighter.
