SG Vol. 1 pt. 23 (Patreon)

“I’ll go over how every single one of you is a colossal fuck-up later. We only have limited time to make use of these simulators, so we’re going onto what we originally came here for,” I tell the cadets over the comms system.

Valkyrie may have calmed down from hitting the sides of her simulator, but now she’s the only one left looking disappointed. The rest have relaxed and look ready to move on.

Except for Filly. She’s still crying.

“You’re going to be going up against each other in one-on-one duels. Your objective is to disable the other’s VSU. Whether you want to do so by killing the pilot or rendering the unit inoperable is up to you. Whatever you choose, you have one minute per round and there will be three rounds of combat each,” I explain to them.

Now… I think I’ll have Filly against Worm, Breeder with Samurai, Shitger with Valkyrie, and Muscles with…

Well, I’m just a fucking dumbass, aren’t I?

“Muscles, you get the absolute pleasure of going up against me. Aren’t you excited?” I ask.

Everybody looks on their displays at Muscles.

“Yes, sir,” Muscles answers, looking up into the camera right at me.

Out of all of them, Muscles is probably my favorite now.

Time to put him in his place. Again.

After telling one of the useless instructors standing by and watching to handle the simulations for me, I climb into an empty simulator and strap myself in.

“So much as touch my unit and you win,” I tell Muscles over the comms now that I’m situated. “Shoot me, hit me, fucking poke me and victory will be yours. Understand?”

“Copy,” Muscles replies.

This is going to be fun, but only because of how frustrated he’s going to look when we’re done.

A yellow light is glowing inside of my cockpit, and it turns green as soon as the simulation loads on the screen in front of me.

It’s not photorealistic, but it’s good enough. The simulation for depth of field is almost flawless which is the most important.

The faces of the others disappear from my display, leaving only my unit’s vitals and targeting reticles on it.

Well, there’s one other thing that I can see.

Muscles’ VSU in the distance in front of me.

Let’s see…

Air-to-air missiles, flares, knife, and an FN P90-L in each of my unit’s hands. A pretty light loadout, but the F-16 VSU is meant to be a quick and mobile fighter. Just a little wobble of the controls results in a stronger reaction than when I’m piloting an A-10C VSU.

“Three… two… one… begin,” the robotic voice says, prompting both me and Muscles to immediately shoot up into the air and lock onto each other.

The alarm is already beeping, telling me that he’s got his missiles locked on.

Let’s see what he does if I stay perfectly still.

Predictably, he gets the height advantage on me and shoots four of his Sidewinder missiles at me.

The FN P90-L may not be intended to be used as an anti-missile weapon, but that’s how I’m going to use it.

Shooting the missiles down would be next to impossible without the VSU’s aim-assist.

But, I really hate using aim assist.

I aim my guns and shoot at the incoming missiles, causing one of them to explode while the other three get peppered full of holes and lose all thrust.

Muscles, taking advantage of the “distraction,” tries to fly straight into me from above.

Looks like he’s going to try and take touching me seriously – he fucking wants to ram his unit straight into mine.

I might prefer my A-10C VSU, but the maneuverability of these F-16 VSUs is pretty damn nice and allows me to boost forward out of his path at an instant’s notice.

Muscles immediately changes directions and aims his guns at me, shooting while trying to close the distance.

He looks ready to chase me upward, so I reverse my thrusters to shoot myself straight down instead.

He overshoots, positions himself with his torso pointed down at me, and I shoot my guns up.

Hundreds of bullets tear through his cockpit and leave only a few large holes of shredded metal.

“Objective accomplished. Restarting simulation,” the robotic voice says before returning us to our original positions at the start of the duel. “Three… two… one… begin.”

I wait for Muscles to make the first move this time, but it turns out that he’s doing the same.

Our thrusters keep us hovering in the air without moving, neither of us tries to shoot the other nor launch missiles, and we just stare at each other.

Maybe he’s given up?

I doubt it. He’s not the type to give up or he wouldn’t have tried taking me down on the first day.

Finally, he locks on and launches all of his missiles this time.

There’s no way I could shoot them all down, so I shoot my flares and fly backward.

Muscles comes flying through the flares immediately as the missiles go off-course, his guns aimed at me and firing as he flies.

Much like with his real body, he’s too telegraphed. Too obvious.

He breaks left and uses his thrusters to try and get below and behind me, his guns never stopping their barrage of bullets for even a second. Some of them even get close hitting me as I fly out of the way, shooting upward once more, but this isn’t enough.

It’s painfully obvious that he has no idea how to fight against another pilot in a VSU. There is no intelligent strategy in any of his movements. They may as well be random.

I let him chase me for a few more seconds. He either thinks that he has me on the run, leaving me unable to rest for even a second, or he knows that I’m just playing with him.

Either way, I deploy my air brakes, reverse thrust, and spin around to shoot my missiles the instant they lock onto him.

Scraps of scorched metal fall to the ground.

“Objective accomplished. Restarting simulation,” the voice says yet again. I’ll give him a taste of what it means to go against an ace pilot this time. “Three… two… one… begin.”

The simulated g-forces aren’t enough to stop me from flying toward him at full speed.

Almost fast enough to break the speed of sound, he panics and starts shooting his guns and all of his missiles at me.

A two-second burst of my right gun is enough to tear through his cockpit and win the third round, and his missiles easily overshoot me.

Eight seconds was all the final round took.

“Sir, how did… how did you handle those gees?” Muscles asks now that our comms are reconnected.

“You get used to it,” I answer.

Damn. He doesn’t look frustrated. Just disappointed again.

“You can let us out now,” I tell the instructor I left in charge of the simulators.

Our simulators return to the ground and let us out.

“How is fighting an ace without any experience going to teach him anything?” the instructor asks once Muscles and I get back to the observation deck. “That’s not fair, don’t you think?”

“You need more time on the front lines if you’re going to say stupid shit like that,” I respond. He’s a higher rank than me, but that soft look in his eyes tells me that he’s maybe seen one battle and then got transferred to instructing.

He tries to stare me down and fails, giving up to walk away instead.

Bastard.

“Tell me, Muscles. Did you learn anything?” I ask.

“Sir, yes, I learned that you are too good, sir,” Muscles answers.

“Stop kissing my ass and give me a serious answer.”

“Yeah. I learned that I have no idea how to react or fight against another VSU.”

“No fucking shit. You sure could have fooled me. Anything else?”

“I,” he pauses, looking like he’s thinking about it. He looks up at me and says, “I learned that brute force doesn’t work. I tried it in the first simulation, and I tried it in our matches, and it never worked. I failed to think of a sufficient plan and trusted myself to figure it out as I went.”

“Well fuck, that’s the kind of self-analyzing that takes you from being a worthless maggot to a worthless shit.”

“Is… is that a good thing, sir?”

“Figure it out yourself. Now, let’s watch how these other brats do with the last of their matches. By the way, how was fitting into the cockpit?”

“Uncomfortable, sir.”

“That’s because you’re trying to be a bodybuilder instead of a pilot. Stop eating so much.”

“Sir… Samurai will make me eat whether I want to or not.”

“She what? Scratch that, I don’t actually care.” I don’t want to miss the others’ matches, even if I plan on rewatching them back in the class with them later.