Volume 16 Tower of Babel Chapter 808 Black Fleet
Yeager's combat uniform was still in the cockpit of the fighter. He did not ask anyone for help. Instead, he took off his shirt and trousers, kicked off his shoes, and got into this one-piece anti-G combat uniform wearing only a pair of shorts. He skillfully hooked the zipper head on the back of the clothes on a protrusion on the edge of the seat, sat down, and the zipper behind him was pulled to the top.
"Tsk... If I had known, I should have asked the logistics department to wash my combat uniform immediately after the flight this morning..." An indescribable smell of sweat was squeezed out from the collar... Although the sweat smell came from himself, Yeager's face still revealed a hint of disgust.
After tightening several airtight valves on his limbs and neck and giving it a quick check, Yeager pressed the switch at his waist. The air in the combat suit was instantly sucked out, and the fabric woven from special materials stuck to his skin. He could even feel the thin layer of semi-fluid material filling the interlayer.
"When Hans comes, tell him that I set off first and ask him to catch up quickly!" After saying this, Yeger put the helmet on his head .
"The preparations for the other two aircraft have not been completed yet." The ground crew member turned around and looked at the fighter jets parked in front of the other two catapults. "It will take at least ten minutes. If you go out now, you won't get support from your wingman."
"It's just a reconnaissance mission. There's no need for combat. Not having a wingman won't be a big problem." With a crackling sound, Yeager turned on a bunch of switches on the fighter's control panel. The field of view of the external monitor was projected directly onto the inside of the helmet. The middle cover of the left and right pedals slid up, revealing a hatch. A folding joystick rose from the hatch and was fixed at a height and angle that was most convenient for Yeager.
Although Yeager said that they would not encounter a battle, he still asked the ground crew: "Have all the weapons bays been replaced with live ammunition?"
In the morning, he was only flying this fighter jet on a routine cruise mission, and he was also leading several new recruits in the team. The fighter jet was loaded with training bullets… Although strictly speaking, this thing can kill people, it is only limited to unarmored targets who are not wearing any protective equipment. When facing indigenous creatures or military vehicles, the training bullets are of no use other than to help the opponent scrape.
"They have all been replaced with live ammunition." The ground crew looked a little unhappy. "It was the captain's order."
"Tsk, it seems that the old guy also knows that this time he's going to be in big trouble... All right, pass the catapult activation timing to me, and we'll take off in ten seconds."
Yeager stared at the indicator light in his mask turning from red to yellow, then he pressed the eject button without hesitation.
The ten-second countdown ended quickly, and the yellow indicator light turned green. At the same time, a huge thrust came from the tail of the fighter plane.
"Yeger Novikov, RV-003S 'Raven-class' high-speed fighter, attack!"
The "Raven-class" ship, which was painted almost black in dark green, accelerated from a standstill to a speed of nearly Mach 2.5 in just one second, and flew out from the bottom hatch of the "Betelgeuse" heavy cruiser like an arrow shot from a bow.
The number printed on Yeager's "Raven Class" is "003S" - the S at the end of the number represents the captain's machine, and the numbers 001 and 002 belong to the first two commanders of this air combat force.
While flying, Yeager quickly checked the fighter's various parameters - since it had just flown once in the morning, many data and settings still retained the same status as the last flight and did not need to be readjusted.
After leaving "Betelgeuse", the communication between the fighter and the mothership was cut off. The headphones were filled with noisy electric currents, and the screen used to display the radar image was occupied by a black and white snowflake.
"The interference is really strong..." Yeager muttered, pushing the joystick to slowly lower the altitude of the plane.
According to the intelligence analyzed by the "Betelgeuse" CIC, the source of the interference should be located in the southeast of Fleet Zero, and the estimated distance should be between 80 and 220 kilometers... But the weather is very good today, and the visibility in this airspace is extremely high, so the officers of the CIC believe that the source of the interference should be on the ground or underground.
As if to show off his skills, Yeager lowered the fighter to an altitude of fifty meters and flew at an ultra-low altitude close to the ground. Although the speed of the fighter had been reduced to Mach 0.75, it was still 255 meters per second. As long as the nose of the plane was slightly lowered, or the terrain in front rose slightly, the entire fighter would likely crash into the ground.
Only an experienced ace pilot like Yeager would dare to conduct such a long-distance and ultra-low-altitude flight.
Yeager stared at the ground below through several monitors at the bottom of the fighter. At the same time, the intelligent program in the computer was scanning and analyzing the image over and over again. Compared with human eyes, the computer can even find enemies hidden in camouflage in a few frames of the picture.
Lock boxes appeared one after another in the screen, and then disappeared one after another. Most of these suspicious targets were stones, vegetation and the like , and were quickly eliminated by the computer.
Yeager had already flown back and forth in the designated area, but found nothing. On the way back, he also encountered several friendly fighters from the Zero Fleet that were sent out to perform reconnaissance missions, but it was obvious that these friendly fighters also found nothing.
Yeager pressed the trigger of the machine gun in annoyance and fired at the ground. However, apart from stirring up a cloud of dust, the only result was to blow up a beetle-like indigenous creature that was resting under a rock.
"Could it be that the CIC's intelligence is wrong? Is the direction wrong or the distance wrong? Or is the source of interference located deep underground?" Yeager thought to himself. Suddenly, a sudden palpitation came over him.
He subconsciously looked up. For some reason, he always felt that the sky above his head seemed a little "unnatural".
Out of caution, he tried to launch a small unguided missile upwards, and the missile's trail drew a straight white line in the air.
Just when the missile reached a height of about four thousand meters, it was blocked by a light curtain that suddenly appeared and exploded with a loud bang!
Then, accompanied by a distortion of light, a pitch-black warship with no markings or emblems on its hull, not even a hull number, appeared in the sky...
"Is it... the optical camouflage technology of the Alpha civilization?!" Yeger was stunned. The Ark has not yet mastered this technology. The biggest difficulty lies in how to distort light so that the obstruction can produce an "invisible" effect. If an optical camouflage armor like that used on vehicles is equipped on a warship, then even if the surface of the warship can present the color of the sky, the light blocked by the hull will still leave a large shadow on the ground.
The optical camouflage technology of the Alpha civilization allows light to "bypass" the battleship - except for some abnormalities found when observing at close range, there are almost no flaws.
Even though Yeger had been mentally prepared, what happened next still made him freeze in the driver's seat - if he hadn't suddenly heard the warning "Danger, about to hit the ground" and brought his soul back to life, he would probably have died in the plane crash while in a trance.
What emerged in the sky... was not just a warship, but a complete fleet, a fleet that was fully up to the "Class A standard"!
All the warships of this fleet were like the first one Yeager saw, painted completely black without any markings or numbers - even the flagship, an aircraft carrier battleship over a kilometer long.
Yeager only knew that it was an aircraft carrier battleship, but he had no idea of the class and model of the battleship - as far as he could remember, the Ark Air Force Fleet had never had such an aircraft carrier battleship.
Building an aircraft carrier and battleship is a huge project that requires the coordination of multiple official and private forces, a large amount of manpower and resources, and a long construction time. Not to mention, the people involved in the project alone, from the chief designer to the welders and even the odd jobs like cleaning the factory or cooking for other staff, add up to tens of thousands of people... Unlike the old era, in this era, it is impossible to keep the construction of aircraft carriers and battleships completely confidential.
Even civilians, as long as they have a little knowledge, can generally tell you which fleets the Ark Air Force has and the names of their flagships... As for those fanatical military fans, they can even name the basic parameters of these aircraft carriers and battleships like they are familiar with them - aircraft carriers and battleships are like the sea aircraft carriers of the old era, their strategic significance is far greater than their tactical significance.
Yeager is not a civilian. He is a senior soldier who has served for more than ten years and is also a member of the Air Force Fleet. But even he doesn't know when such a black aircraft carrier battleship appeared on the Ark...
But Yeger firmly believed that this aircraft carrier battleship was definitely built by Ark - the design of the hull was completely in the style of human civilization, and its appearance was similar to the aircraft carrier battleships currently serving in the major fleets. Those exiles wandering in the wilderness could not even solve the problem of food and clothing, so it was absolutely impossible for them to build such a huge ship.
Let alone aircraft carriers and battleships, the Exiles could not build any airship at all - even when the heretical sects were still around, they had never owned even a single airship.
Where on earth did this aircraft carrier battleship come from? No... I should say, where on earth did this entire fleet come from?
Yeager couldn't help but think of the warships that had been transferred away some time ago, but in this fleet, he did not find any familiar warships - even if those warships had been modified or changed their paint, he could tell at a glance, but in this "Black Fleet", they were all new models of warships that had never appeared in the archives.
Yeager took a deep breath and calmed himself as much as possible. He gripped the joystick tightly with both hands and brought the fighter as close to the ground as possible.
He had no intention of launching an attack on this fleet - his mission was only reconnaissance, and now that the goal had been achieved, the top priority was to return to the mother ship immediately and report the matter to the captain... But then again, as long as the officers and soldiers on Fleet Zero were not blind, they should have seen this black fleet that had removed its optical camouflage.
The weapons of the Raven class could not penetrate the shields of these warships at all, but the anti-aircraft weapons of these warships could restore the Raven class and its pilot Yeager to their original state of matter within half a second... Even if Yeager launched a surprise attack on this black fleet with the determination to die, it would be meaningless.
He couldn't even delay the other party for a second.
"Damn it... Although I guessed that it was the rebels, I could never have guessed that the rebels would have a Class A fleet that had never appeared before... I must be dreaming..." Yeager wanted to pinch himself, but at the current flying altitude, he didn't dare to move his hands off the joystick.
"Although this fleet has not launched an attack, they first interfered with the radio, and then came so close under disguise. It is obvious that they are definitely not friendly forces... And with the combat effectiveness of the Zero Fleet, I am afraid it is no match for this black fleet that suddenly appeared." Yeager quickly analyzed the current situation in his mind, "No, although the combat power of the Zero Fleet is a little short, we still have that ancient battleship, the 'Aguna Tor'... As long as that thing joins the battle, we can't lose!"
While flying towards the mothership, Yeager observed the situation in the sky - although Fleet Zero and the mysterious black fleet had discovered each other and both sides were within each other's attack range, neither side opened fire first, and the situation maintained a delicate balance.
Yeager knew that the commander of Fleet Zero and the captains of each ship must be in the same mood and thinking as himself... No one knew what to do with this fleet of unknown origin.
Under such strong interference, even communicating with the other party is impossible.
But the Black Fleet is still slowly approaching Fleet Zero and "Aguna Tor" - this delicate balance cannot be maintained forever, and will soon be broken!
Yeger clenched his teeth, sweat constantly seeping out of his forehead and neck, dripping into his helmet.
