Prologue: Prototype YF-44 'Raven'
Author's Note
Yo sup people!!! I'm new here and it's my first fic!!! I've been reading some guys' fighter jet fics and I finally decided to make my own! By the way this fic contains some movie or game references from ones like Maverick, Red tails, Ace Combat, R2B, etc.
If anyone sees something to criticize, please do! I'll need lots of improvement! By the way feel free to share any ideas down the comments below, I enjoy accepting new ideas as well as some story plots!
If you're reading this then thank you very much!
(By the way some parts of this 'Raven' are made up; actually the entire 'Raven was made up so... Don't judge too much on 'Raven' please...)
Here's the YF-44 Raven
Lego version of her. (PS. Built her outta random bricks, took me a while on her extendable wings.)
(Anthro version of Raven; found this relatable on the internet; it doesn't belong to me! But it sure fit Raven well!)
Prologue: Prototype YF-44 'Raven'
EVENT: FINAL TEST FLIGHT
SUBJECT: YF-44 PROTOTYPE 'RAVEN'
OBJECTIVE: AIRSPEED MACH 8, ATTITUDE 60,000 FT
SECONDARY: BVR COMBAT SYSTEM FINAL EXAMINATION
TEST PILOT: LT. MARK 'BUZZIN' WILLOCK
PILOT CALLSIGN: SKYWOLF
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Edward AFB, California
10-27-2029
16:25 PM
Mark was never a obedience pilot, and this the reason why he became the test pilot. After graduating from university, 24 year-old Mark Willock immediately enlisted for service in the USAF; Mark, to be honest never had a single thought about becoming a fighter pilot, nor flying a plane; which too his father, Nathan Willock's dismay. Mark's great-grandfather was a pilot in the first world war flying for the RAF, his grandfather flew with the Flying Tigers against the Japanese in China during the second world war, as for his father, flew during Operation Desert Storm in 91, before his retire, Nathan's wish is to see his son in the air as well. However, as an average 18 year-old, Mark has other ideas, Nathan was pissed when he found out that his son wasted his career on nothing.
The father and son got into a huge fight about this, and it ended badly, with Nathan being in cold war with Mark...
Until the young man hit his 20; Later that day, after his graduation, Mark was at the bar with his fellow buddies when he got an emergency call from his mother... Two weeks ago, Nathan was suddenly recalled by his unit, the mission is classified. Mark, who's still in the cold war with Nathan, obviously ignored this. However, from that day on, Mark lost his father forever...
Nathan's death was never declassified, during the funeral, Mark was both pissed in Nathan... And himself.
His grandfather passed away when he was 10, his last desire was hoping Mark would one day be in the air...
Mark, after about 3 months of cooling down his mind, finally made a decision that would forever alter his life,
The thing is, genetic memory is not a joke. Mark was among the elite list with his fellow classmates in the Air Force academy, after that he was invited to the USAF, however Mark nearly got himself kicked out by pulling a nine G break. The daredevil's fine, but then the Talon suffered a right engine failure, although Mark succeed in gliding the Talon down to the runway, his almost lost his balls when he got beat the shit out of by a really pissed instructor.
Mark got his nickname 'Buzzin' when he went buzzin pass the tower in his Super Hornet. The instructors weren't pissed, wait till some day Mark's gonna down a Raptor by pulling a 10 G cobra. Mark got his first kill during his last active patrol mission over the South Pacific, when he and his wingman Pete 'Turner' McConner detected an unidentified aircraft at the edge of their airspace.
Turned out it was a whole squadron of Russian Sea Flankers.
The fight was intense, Mark and Pete all together downed three Sea Flankers, one of the escaped though. Unfortunately, Pete was shot down; killed instantly with an Alamo straight to his face. Mark would never forget the face of that Russian dog. After a merge with the Sea Flanker, Super Hornet went nose high towards the Sea Flanker, the first Sidewinder did not track well, pre-flaring filled the skies; And even worst for Mark, the Sea Flanker is now at his 3 o'clock. The Archer zoomed passed him, exploding on one of the flares, which truly made Mark jumped outta his skin.
However, during his vertical dive, Mark's Super Hornet gained enough speed to ditch the Sea Flanker's nose, as the Sea Flanker struggled to keep up. Mark saw it coming, and as soon as his got the tone, he set another Sidewinder off, Sea Flanker lacked reaction time and was splashed. Although he gained his first two kills, but Mark knew what'd costed him...
Mark never expected another invitation would came; this time it was a classified file. As Mark guessed, he became a test pilot, and his testing subject, is the USAF's newest stealth bird, hears that lady here took traits from both the SR-71 and the F-22, combing speed and stealth. Her name is YF-44, nickname 'Raven'.
What's truly attractive about this sexy lady here is that she's got some good lookin....
Engines.
Those twin XA-8000A5 Scramjet engine which can also perform some awesome maneuvers with some thrust vectors, this lady here is built to engage the Chinese J-20s, J-31s, Russian Su-57s and their Super Flankers. The internal weapon bay underneath the belly is capable of arming herself with eight AMRAAMs and four Sidewinders, as well as some Mavericks, Laster-guided bombs, Hydras, and all other beautiful motherfakas. However, the guns aren't as great as the ranged arrangements; a 25mm Gatling gun, although 'Raven' has the potential of putting on a 35mm gun on her.
Today's Raven's final test flight, if this goes well then Raven would begin her production.
Oh, and keep in mind that Mark's a daredevil; although the test standard is Mach 8, but Raven's got more potential than that, Mark's guessing this lady here could go up to Mach 10 and can hold up to 10G+ maneuvers. And the consequence of trying these out would be the end of his career.
Mark looked towards the windows of the room, the direction of the hanger, towards the Raven; the G0suit he's wearing has done some improvements just in case of some extreme over G, although that's actually thought up by the engineers of Raven to prevent Mark wrecking her on her last test flight. An engineer got in front of Mark, looked him dead in the eyes, "Alright Mark, our standard speed requirement is Mach 8, not 8.1, not 8.2... MACH. EIGHT."
Mark patted his shoulder, "Chill man, I ain't gonna wreck this sexy lady on her graduation day."
The engineer sighed, "I don't like the sound of that tone."
"Welp, that's the only one I've got." Mark shrugged as they headed out towards the hanger.
Mark could swear in the name of god again, the Raven is larger than he thought; with the wingspan 60ft when swept and 37ft when unswept, about 4 meters off ground, and about 20 feet in length.
"What a big bird we got here," Mark murmured, as he climbed the steps into the cockpit. Upon into the seat, Mark took a deep breath of amusement as he examined the control panels displayed in front of him, "my god she's beautiful." Raven was then towed by a medium sized tractor, towards the runway. Mark watched as the aircraft stopped at the start of the runway, as the tractor drove away, he had completed the last checks as well.
"Tower this is Raven, do you read?" Mark turned on the radio.
"Raven, Tower reads," the preflight instructor responded, "confirming status; Raven, start your preflight report."
"APU system on," Mark said as he flicked a switch, the three screens in front of were lightened up, "HUD set on, now turning on right engine." Another flick and one side of the engine began to whirr before exploding into a growl, "Right engine go, turning on left engine," the left side responded the same as the right, "left engine go. Completing preflight status check; engines, go; fuel, go; electric, go; radar, go; control surfaces, go. Raven requesting premission for taxi."
"Raven, tower cleared for taxi."
"Raven copy." Mark smiled as he slowly pushed the thrustor lever forward, the twin engines' growl turned into roars as two bright jet of gases shot out of the nozzles, Raven was slowly gliding forward, within seconds the glide turned into a run. Upon seeing the speed meters above 120 knots, Mark pulled the centre stick backward, he felt some G forces against him as Raven began her climb.
"Raven, your objective attitude is 60,000 feet, switch to scramjet at 30,000 feet." Came in the tower's instructions.
"Copy." Mark could feel the air currents smashing onto Raven, and getting bounced away, Raven shook a little as she broke the sound barrier, "Alright so there's Mach 2, six more to go." He murmured to himself as the speed began to flood in.
About a 40 seconds later, Raven reached her first checkpoint, "Transitioning to scramjet." Mark smirked, "And the fun part begins." He lowered the thrustor lever before breaking it to the right, then he flicks the scramjet switch on. Inside the air intake, a seperators blocks the turbofan as the scramjet were exposed to the violent air current, the organge jet immediately exploded into bright blue. Mark on the other hand, was pushed backward as if a metal ball smashed onto his chest, his breathing started to strain a little from the 7 G forces.
"Mach 7.5, approaching to maxinum speed." Mark reported as he pushed the centre stick forward after reaching 60,000 feet. He felt quiet for a moment, then looked at the control panels, "Temperature rising, communication system still stable, I'm feelin good." Outside, above the clouds, were the sky; Dark, blue sky.
He's at the edge of the outer space itself.
He then looked at the right windshield, the sunset is amazing.
However, when the speed hit Mach 7.8, things Raven started to complain.
Mark noticed his left windshield is melting a little, he frowned, "Windshield heat caution, aircraft surface temperature's reaching maximum intake." Right after he said that Raven began to shake, "Not a great time to complain girl." Mark whispered, still frowning.
Then it hits Mach 7.9.
Raven is not happy about her current condition, waves of molten glass started to cover up the windshield, as the nose of the aircraft began to turn orange, "Com' on babe! Jus a little more!" Mark gritted his teeth, as he grabbed onto the centre stick; he's not planning for an ejection, plus upon ejection, the air current and the extreme G forces would kill him right away.
Now the entire nose is engulfed in flames, Raven's scramjet engines roared in fury, "Raven, this is what you're born for." Mark said under his breath, "Now let's hit it girl! Com' on!" The aircraft shook harder as Mach 7.9 is slowly tiltring towards Mach 8.
Finally, with a beep, Mach 8.
Tower erupted in cheers, as Mark released a huge breath he'd been holding back.
"Tow... sion... Cle... T..." Mark frowned again as the signal studdered, "Raven cannot read, please repeat over."
Suddenly, alarm began to rang as the HUD flashed red, "Caution! Right engine failure! Caution! Fire Warning! Caution! Airframe Overheat!" Raven finally give up, her right scramjet sceeched into a stop as the fuel poured out after one of the scraps blown off by the wind slashed the fuel tank, then it was in flame. "Shit! Raven don't you dare!" Mark's eyes widened in fear as the warning got more rapid, then the right engine was engulfed in a fireball, sending the entire aircraft into an destructive spin, air current found its target as it tore the airframe apart.
The last thing Mark saw was the flash of flames in the cockpit before darkness took his senses away.
However, unnoticed by him, a fiant spark of blue aura lightened on the damaged Raven before it was burned out...
Chapter 1: Bogey and Bandit
"I SWEAR TO FUCKING GOD I'M IN HELL NOW!!!" A familiar shriek bellowed in the cockpit of Raven, Mark hated his life from this point. A hour ago, Mark's consciousness ended at the scene of the forceful destruction of Yf-44 Raven and himself, then it was an unknown time of total darkness, all five of his senses decided to quit their jobs, Mark could only imagine himself floating through some sort of tunnel... In a sitting position. For some reason Raven survived the re-entry, and did not went down to pieces. Finally, a blinding light appeared in Mark's vision, causing him to blink, and after reopening his eyes, there he is.
Boom.
Himself sitting in the cockpit of a... somewhat undamaged Raven.
"The fuck? Is this god's hands? Where the fuck is Gabriel?" Mark hammered his helmet, the slight pain from his palm proved him otherwise, "Alright, I actually hate the thought of going back home, for damn sure these mad scientists' gonna slice' n dice me up in their labs..." The pilot checked the aircraft system, to his surprise, the navigation system failed to operate.
"Kay, unless the Russians or the Chinese wrecked the Starlinks, Raven should be able to know where her nose is pointed...", Mark murmured, "Let's try uploading the date links... Nothing... Great." The data links are in confusion, Mark figured that repeatedly refreshing the data links would a waste of electronic system, plus the radio is dead for sure.
"Let's hope the targeting pod is still alive," Mark flicked on the targeting screen, the screen fuzzled a few seconds before showing the image below, "Kay, let's see wha----THE FUCK?!?!" On the screen appeared to be a clean sky, however, several dots appeared to be moving from the upper right corner of the screen, as Mark zoomed in more, he was shocked to recognize the moving do--- aircrafts.
"Why the fuck is a Flogger roaming around? Am I in Russia or wha?" It displayed five Mig-23 Floggers, flying in an aggressive formation, under their wingpoints are the radar-active missiles and what seems like R-60s, Russia's out of his mind instantly, no way are they gonna bring up those old junks from their junkyard to replace the Felons or the Flankers. Suddenly, the leading Flogger fired, followed by the rest of the squadron.
"Whoa now I'm in a active warzone?!" Mark scrolled the targeting pod towards the direction the Floggers are firing at, "BVRs, let's test the radar and the HUD." Mark restarted the electronic system, the radar monitor and the HUD popped back to live.
"What we have here... hmm, five bandits, 10 o'clock, angles two-five; oh and they fired back." Worrying about one of these radar-active missiles would lock on to him is pointless, Raven would never forgive those engineers if this happens, stealth six generation here man.
The Floggers immediately broke formation, popping chaffs along the way, however only about 3 seconds later, two of the Floggers were splashed.
"Dang, those explosions looked more like the ones a Phoenix missile would do... Tomcats?" Mark whispered to himself as he flew towards the incoming bandits, "Yup, definitely Tomcats," Raven is now in the radar search range of the Tomcats, however, the stealth characteristics would allow Raven to be blind on their radars.
As the distance began to close in, Mark is able to have visual on them...
As well as the Tomcat pilots...
Then it all went downhills.
Rapid warning alarms filled the cockpit of Raven, Mark was shocked for a second before immediately defending the incoming enemies, "Holy shit! The fuck's wrong with these guys?!"
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Flash Row has seen many crazy things throughout his career, for example; about three months ago, his squadron of F-14s are scrambled to intercept two bogey aircrafts are approaching South Equestrian Coast, where their carrier is. After taking off, Flash Row identified the two bandits are the Changelings MiG fighters, however it's a whole new aircraft they'd never seen before. After confirming the weapons onboard by the MiGs, Flash Row was ordered to splash the two bandits. It was then the two of them blasted their afterburners; no kidding, these two bandits just took off like alerted rabbits. Their Sparrows were useless against them, Flash remembered his jaw on the floor; an aircraft that's capable of out-running two missiles.
Later he was told that the two bandits he encountered were the newest interceptors of the Changeling Air Force; MiG-31, callsign 'Foxhound'. With the terrifying capability of flying up to Mach 3, non of their current fighters could do a thing about them. Luckily, the Tomcats are originally made to be interceptors, and interceptors loves big bad boys.
Flash Row scored his first kill with a Phoenix missile on a Foxhound at about 170 kilometers, then it was hell let loose.
Back from memory into reality, Flash Row knew something's on his way when he spotted a black spot at his 2 o'clock, cannot be the Floggers, most of them were splashed by the first wave of Phoenix missiles, the rest of them were having trouble defending the second wave.
"Another new MiG?" Flash Row has a dark look on his face, MiG-31s are already enough for him, then the black spot became larger per second...
"What the---" Flash Row trembled as the bogey zoomed passed him like a missile, his radar showed no sign until the merge, "Jigsaws, bandit contact! I just merged with it, change of plan, splash the merged bandit's the priority for now!"
Flash Row's hooves shook in shock, that... bandit's maneuvers... they're so smooth, plus the airframe is nothing like he'd seen before, the cover is black as night. Two split tails with their flaps bended in an angle that produces more air current for its climb rate, the extendable wings just like the Tomcat... It's just like their Tomcat but with some enormous updates...
Jigsaw 3 fired a Sidewinder, Flash Row knew it was over, at this close of the range, nothing can escape---
Then his eyes widened in yet another shellshock; with no flares observed, this bandit suddenly lifted its nose up to a 90 degrees angle while side-spinning towards the right, the Sidewinder lost track, and self-destructed a few yards behind the bandit.
"Holy Celestia!" Came Jigsaw 3's voice, "That thing just pulled 9Gs! How'd the airframe not get torn apart?!"
"Jigsaw 3 hang on! I'm getting to his six!" Flash Row felt a bead of sweat leaking from his helmet, a cold sweat, "My Celestia I swear if you evade this..." Hearing the tone, Flash Row gritted his tooth as he fired his Sidewinder at the tail of the bandit.
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"Nice Raven," Mark sighed as he recovered from the extreme over-G, "thank god they're using the earlier version of the Sidewinders, a 9X an' I'm fucking dead." Then came the alarm, "Fucker just snitched to my six!" Mark growled as he rolled and pushed his centre stick, diving down while pumping flares out, he heard an explosion just on top of him, "Fucka mah turn." Mark had a deadly smile, he immediately extended the wings of the Raven as the entire aircraft was lifted backward , with his flaps down for climb, he made the Tomcat overshot, "Sorry Tom, your on da wrong side man." Mark blew a raspberry, "Fox-2."
The Tomcat was hit, its right engine is in flame, the entire tail was blown apart, as the aircraft went down side-spinning, no ejection observed yet, no survivor at this attitude even if the bandit did ejected.
"And score one for Raven!" Mark laughed, but was then cut off by yet another missile lock, "Damn bastards."
Author's Note
Alrighty! Two sides revealed:
Equestrian F-14s and Changelings Migs! Welp, Mark just splashed a Tomcat, no way is he friending the Equestrians (Sorry mane six fans
Anyway the updates won't be appearing in a pattern, I'm only updating if I have time or ideas.
