Good Luck, Yukikaze

“You should be grateful for all the trouble we’re taking over you, Rei. Still, even if I wasn’t around, they’d probably be doing it for you anyway. You’re a very important man, after all. What really happened to you? Did you meet the JAM? The actual, physical JAM? What were they like? Please, answer me. You’re my best friend and I’m tired of talking to you like this. There’s nothing wrong with your head. Those quacks in medical told me so, and just this once, I’m willing to believe them. Rei, say something to me —”

A knock at the door interrupted him. “Come in,” answered Major Booker, who proceeded to gulp down the last of his cocoa. He never would have guessed who was about to step through the door.

“General Cooley...” It was Brigadier General Lydia Cooley, boss of the SAF. Major Booker stood up from his perch on the desk and saluted, then offered her the chair behind his desk. His office lacked a decent sofa for visitors to use.

The general pushed her glasses up higher on her nose, then looked at Rei.

“Is Rei in the way, ma’am?” the major asked. “I was about to call the nurse for him, so...”

“No, it’s fine,” the general answered. “Leave Fukai where he is.”

“Did you come to see him about something?”

“Yeah, you could say that. The Intelligence Forces were asking me how long you intend to keep Fukai like this.”

“Hm,” the major replied. “They’re at it again, are they?” This is one superior who always brings tough problems for us, huh, Rei, he thought. “I’m not handing Rei over to them, General. He’s a vital member of the SAF.”

“As a pilot.”

“A pilot who will fly again.”

“When?”

“We’re working on that.”

Her demeanor softened. “I know, Major,” she replied and then sat down in his chair. “You’ve been putting a great deal of work into this. I don’t want to lose a good pilot either.”

So why don’t you handle the FAF Intelligence Forces’ demands that we hand over Rei to them on your end, General? Major Booker wanted to say, but just barely managed to hold his tongue.

“So what’s the problem then?” he said instead. “If we hand Rei over to Intelligence, he’ll end up a human vegetable. They won’t exercise him, just concentrate on treatments to extract the knowledge in his brain, if you can call that sort of stuff ‘treatment.’ ”

“I think your method is the correct one,” she replied. “However, Intelligence doesn’t agree. It’s very irritating. How long has the lieutenant been like this?”

The major paused. “About three months,” he answered. “Today is day ninety-two, General.”

“Fukai’s term is nearly up, then.”

“What do you mean? Oh, of course. You mean his term of service. But Rei was going to reenlist.”

“Unless he makes that intention known himself, he’ll be discharged and become a regular civilian again. If that happened, then there’d be nothing the SAF could do to stop Intelligence.”

“Can they do that?”

“There are big shots in the FAF who are on board with the idea. They’ll make it happen, Major. If there’s something those people want to do, they’ll do it. And we don’t have any big shots of our own among them who can stop it from happening. I certainly don’t have that power. I am essentially the commander of the SAF, but officially the SAF falls under the direct command of the commander of Faery base’s Tactical Combat Air Corps. At the moment, that’s Lieutenant General Laitume. I’m just the deputy commander.”

“Even though we have our own autonomous headquarters.”

“Despite my rank, I have the responsibilities of a lieutenant general, and the work you do certainly wouldn’t normally be a major’s responsibility. That’s not saying they look down on the SAF. As the war’s tactical situation has changed, our duties have grown in importance, but the internal organization of the FAF just hasn’t kept pace. Still, there’s no use complaining about it. That fact is that, in one month, we’re going to have to give up Fukai.”

The general kept her eyes locked in a sidelong glance on Rei as she said this. “Therefore —” she continued.

“Therefore, you’re ordering me to get Rei to sign his reenlistment papers, is that it?” the major replied, cutting her off.

“Yes,” she answered. “Is that possible?”

“A month, huh... I can’t say for sure, but if Intelligence takes him as he is now, Rei’s probably going to end up an invalid.”

“So long as my SAF has the power of a corps-level organization, that won’t matter.”

As if we, with our thirteen tactical recon fighters, were on the same level as a corps that controls hundreds of planes, the major thought. Still, that was what they said. The data that the SAF gathered affected the entire Faery Air Force, and that was especially true of the data in Rei’s head — if he had seen the JAM’s true form. That could affect the fate of the FAF, if not the whole of Earth. General Cooley was determined to hand over that information herself, to present it as having come from the SAF. In short, she wanted a feather in her professional cap. And it was with an irritated tone that he told her this.

“That may be,” the general answered, nodding coolly. “Still, Lieutenant Fukai is a member of the SAF, and if he wasn’t in our unit, there would have been a lot of valuable information we never would have gotten. By that argument, I already have a feather in my cap, Major. And he may have information that’s just as important. I don’t want all your hard work to be in vain. You’re using the tactical computer in SAF headquarters for Fukai’s treatment. I was the one who authorized that. If I let Intelligence take him at this point, I’ll have no authority left.”

“I understand perfectly, General.”

“How is the lieutenant doing?”

“Physically, he’s fine. That’s because TAB-15 was so close to where he ejected. Those front-line surgeons are rough, but their work is top notch. I swear, they could probably cure a dead man, which is pretty close to what Rei was when they got to him.”

“I understand that he didn’t sustain any severe brain damage.”

“Probably because those front-line docs gave him the right initial treatment. The surgeons we have here at Faery base are good with the theory, but they don’t have the real-world experience. Our chief flight surgeon Dr. Balume is pretty good, as long as you get to him in the first five minutes before the booze messes him up.”

“I expect you’ll do fine with him,” the general said. “Fukai was shot with a pistol, wasn’t he? Was he shot by his flight officer, Lieutenant Burgadish? And where did he disappear to? If Fukai doesn’t recover, we’ll never know that either. I want to know what happened out there. Within the month. Our SAF can do anything, can’t it? That is all. Any questions?”

“None, General.”

“Very well, then,” she replied, nodding. She didn’t seem to want to leave the office.

“How about some coffee?” the major offered. “You look tired.”

“So do you, Major,” she replied. “I’ll pass on the coffee, thanks. How’s the battle analysis going? We’re definitely seeing the action intensify around TAB-15. Do you think all the Sylphid losses are due to the old Yukikaze being shot down?”

“We’re about to have a tactical mission briefing. You can hear it then —”

“I want to hear your personal opinion, Major.”

“Off the record?”

“Yes.”

Strategy sessions, tactical development sessions, mission planning sessions, mission conduct briefings, and on and on and on. There were lots of meetings to attend, the faces varying with each group. At the strategy sessions where the requirements of the next generation of planes were discussed, people from Systems Corps would be in attendance. The tactical development sessions featured lots of soldiers, as you’d expect. And aside from all of those, there were the preflight briefings held before each sortie, with General Cooley invariably in attendance. At those meetings and in her office, the major had asked her for her personal opinions before. However, this was the first time she’d ever come into his own office to ask for his opinion on anything.

“This is just between you and me, Major.”