The sky was vast and clear, wisps of white cloud drifting gently by. It was a blue world, with occasional white clouds floating across the sky.
Emergency (Insufficient fuel to complete the mission or return safely) Emergency
The alert kept sounding beside his ears. Flying an F/A-18, the pilot codenamed Jazz stared intently at the sea below. Yet all he could see was the boundless ocean, nothing else. His brow was tightly furrowed.
Jazz always had the illusion that he was flying upside down, that the ocean below was actually the sky. He knew he had fallen into the extremely dangerous inverted-flight illusion.
"Inverted-flight illusion" referred to a pilot mistakenly believing the aircraft was flying upside down when there was no suitable visual reference. It was one of the most dangerous of all flight illusions!
It was like flying at night and mistaking scattered lights on the ground for starlight, or flying over the sea when it was "equally dark above and below," confusing the ocean with the sky and ultimately plunging headfirst into the sea. Such incidents had happened more than once.
After forcefully suppressing the sensation of flying upside down through sheer willpower, Jazz adjusted his radio frequency.
"Mayday! Mayday! Mayday!"
Jazz kept transmitting distress calls, but all that answered him was the static hiss of a malfunctioning radio. At that moment, a twenty-centimeter breach was clearly visible on the back of the F/A-18. Its avionics had been damaged, and the radio had failed. Another gaping hole near the nose had completely destroyed the radar system, turning the carrier-based aircraft into a deaf, mute, and blind machine.
After drinking the last drop of purified water from his pilot emergency rations, Jazz glanced at the empty water pouch. His gaze returned to the vast ocean below as the low-fuel warning sounded again beside his ears.
He recalled the earlier battle against those unknown enemies. The communications channels had been jammed by interference; he could hear no orders from command and no messages from friendly forces. Infrared missiles and radar-guided missiles had failed. Even when he guided AIM-120Cs in semi-active homing mode, he still could not hit those bizarre aircraft. Meanwhile, his comrades had been shot down one after another like turkeys, burning Hornet wreckage falling into the sea like a meteor shower.
No, this wasn't how it went in the movies! The USA in the movies could pin aliens to the ground and beat the hell out of them!
It was precisely because he had watched Independence Day that Jazz had joined the Navy. But reality had taught him a lesson. There was no need to think about it—the Carl Vinson Carrier Strike Group had definitely retreated, abandoning carrier-based aircraft like them as it fled.
He did not even know his own coordinates! The moment he thought about how, once his aircraft ran out of fuel, he could only eject and struggle to survive in the endless ocean—dying of thirst before starvation, or drowning from exhaustion—Jazz nearly suffered a breakdown. But his desire to live kept him from collapsing under the pressure. The aircraft still had fuel. As long as he had altitude, there was hope.
But ideals were full, while reality was cruel. Under Murphy's Law, after flying onward for some time, Jazz still saw nothing. It was as if his fighter had entered a blue world, surrounded by nothing but unchanging blue.
He looked at the altimeter and confirmed that he was not "flying upside down." Then Jazz slammed the instrument panel hard, sweeping his eyes across the surrounding airspace and sea, praying to see either an aircraft or a ship. Either one would give him a chance to survive!
God! For God's sake, for God's—
"Shit!"
Fuel Starvation (Insufficient fuel) Fuel Starvation
Suddenly, the fuel-starvation warning sounded beside his ears. As the fuel dwindled, despair began to take root in his heart and grow without end, finally crushing his mental defenses.
Looking down at the blue ocean once more, Jazz's expression became calm. He pulled the pistol secured in his pilot self-defense holster, checked the remaining ammunition, racked the slide, and slowly raised it beneath his chin.
Rather than wait helplessly to die in despair, Jazz would rather kill himself now. He knew very well that with those aircraft appearing, every ship in the surrounding waters, civilian or military, would avoid this area.
As a USA carrier-based aircraft pilot, he understood the USA best. Given the habits and efficiency of USA congressmen, along with the sailing speed of warships, a round trip would definitely take months. By then, he would have long since bloated in the seawater and become fish food.
No one would come to save him!
At this moment, the Carl Vinson did not care whether he lived or died. The government did not care either. Until they saw proof of his death, he would only be listed as MIA. The news media would not even report his existence. Other than his family, no one truly cared about him!
A carbon-based organism's fear of death made his body tremble uncontrollably. His mother appeared before his eyes. His index finger slowly tightened on the trigger, and the hammer rose slightly.
"Mom... I want to go home!"
But just as the hammer was about to reach its limit, like the slanted blade of a guillotine crashing down, two tiny black dots suddenly appeared in his field of vision.
Jazz shuddered violently. He stopped pressing the trigger, lowered the pistol, widened his eyes, and kept looking ahead, trying to determine whether it was merely another illusion.
Twenty-five seconds was enough for a Mach 1 fighter to travel nine kilometers, while forty seconds was enough for an aircraft to cover eighteen kilometers. The closing speed of aircraft flying toward each other was extremely high. In less than ten seconds, the black dots in his vision became aircraft visible to the naked eye, and Jazz recognized them—the J-15 Flying Sharks that his superiors had always designated as "hypothetical enemies"!
The instant they approached, Jazz saw one J-15 make a "lead turn" in midair, cutting into his flight path. After checking the Hornet's damage, it deployed its speed brakes and flew parallel to the F/A-18 at a matching speed, steadily moving closer. Jazz turned his head toward the J-15's cockpit.
They were nearly face-to-face. The Great East pilot in the cockpit raised a hand and gestured for Jazz to follow. Jazz immediately took control of his fighter and followed. He knew these J-15s were not here to attack him. With his onboard avionics damaged, if they had wanted to attack, he would have been shot down by a PL12 before he ever saw them.
Led by the Flying Sharks, he flew for who knew how long before finally spotting a black dot on the sea. The steel beast that was the Charles de Gaulle had cleared its deck and was waiting for Jazz's arrival.
Bathed in the familiar orange glow of the landing aid mirror, Jazz descended toward the deck with tears in his eyes.
When the F/A-18 slammed heavily onto the deck and its arresting hook caught the second Arresting Gear Cable, Jazz could not describe how he felt.
What had he just experienced? Under the guidance of J-15s, he had landed on a French aircraft carrier! Were they—Great East—really his enemies?
Before you continue