Wonder Material

Capt'n steps off to the side. Allowing a tall man wearing a black lab coat passage. The coat sways at his thighs revealing the inner red coloring Sliding his fingerless gloved hands into his coat pockets, he trades views between the two of us. Pack Leeway, or as I call him Doc. is the main engineer behind Phantom Spirit. he's also Capt'n's old friend, founding base Yurei alongside him. Doc stands around 6" 3', slightly shorter than Chloe's 6" 4'. He has curly side-parted black hair, bangs partially pushed backward as to not block his view. On his nose lies his thin-framed hexagonal glasses. He usually wears Hawaiin shirts of several colors and designs. Today, a red and white flutter of colors scatter on his shirt. He wears brown jeans with black boots sulking into them. Taking one hand out of his pocket, he reveals a coin, sat between his fingers. He rolls the coin over his fingers, priming it between his index and thumb. He flings it into the tensioned air above, catching it before repeating the steps.

Doc: "Every time I catch you two together, your always bickering. Veak, there aren't any issues with Jax calling Spirit a pronoun. If his mission results were affected, then by all means give the command. Otherwise save the commands for when they're needed in battles, not for pointless grudges. And Jax, although the command was unnecessary and pointless. He IS our commander, try to follow his orders. At very least to defuse the issue instead of escalating it more."

He flicks the coin one last time. Launching it high into the air, nearly touching the ceiling. its metallic hum ringing louder than any of the flicks prior. He extends his arm as the coin begins to fall. Swiping it into his palm before trading views between us once more. silencing the hum in an instant.

Doc: "Can you do me a favor Veak? Can you please go join your sister in the tower? I need to talk with Jax about Spirit."

Capt'n: "Fine, only because you're my old-time friend Pack."

He shoots me one last glare before walking off. Leaving his aggravated temper at the door, a modest smile reappears on his face. His unwavering spite, as usual, is concentrated at me, and only me. Directing it to no one else. His one-sided attack is infuriating. I've done nothing to anger him besides accomplish his own missions. I return my eyes to my tainted fingertips. Letting my anger evaporate into tranquility.

Jax: "Thanks for the save Doc. I don't get what his deal is. You said something about him holding a grudge?"

Doc: "It's a long complicated story I sadly cannot tell you yet Jax. Maybe in the future, I can tell you the twisting story... I see you've given her a well-needed wash down."

He walks over to Spirit, running his fingers over her fuselage.

Jax: "Yea, due to her static electric properties, she needs one a little bit too often. I hope I did a good job. It's my first time doing it myself"

Doc: "Yes, yes you did. Who taught you how to clean Spirit? There are special steps you need to take to wash her effectively."

Jax: "I just liked watching the base staff do it. So I just followed the steps they usually did. By the way Doc, I've been wondering this for a while now. You say only I can fly Spirit, do you mean that literally or metaphorically?"

Doc: "I mean it quite literally Jax. Spirit is capable of pulling hundred of G forces before the wings are overload. And is capable of hitting supersonic speeds at sea level thought to be completely impossible, all due to her wonder material Astrapi. Spirit is our first ever fully built Astrapi fighter jet. Previously it was used exclusively on explosives and small components on other Aerocords that require high heat or stress tolerance."

Jax: "I've been meaning to ask. Exactly what are Spirit's limitations? I can't exactly "fuck around and find out", ya know?

Doc: "Of course, and it's a good thing you don't. Spirit is one of a kind. A nearly unreplicable project. Just remember that when you're out on your missions. There won't be a redo or a second Spirit."

Jax: "Right, right, now tell me what her true capabilities are!"

Doc: "I was getting there. Spirit is capable of hitting just over 200 G's making modern-day fighters look like children. She's also capable of hitting just over 2000 meters a second at sea level. All due to Astrapi's strange and arbitrary nature."

Jax: "You've been talking about how great this Astrapi stuff is, but what exactly is it?"

Doc: "To be frank, not even I know. All I know is where we found it and what it's capable of."

Jax: "Do you mind if you tell me?"

Doc: "Ill tell you it's found deep in the seas, very, very deep in the seas. Exactly where in the seas is restricted information. But, I can tell you what it's capable of. Astrapi is an extremely strong and rigid material. It's nearly impossible to shift or bend, and it's capable of extreme heat loads. Withstanding higher temperatures than that of even hafnium carbide with ease. which when your cloak is disabled, renders IR seekers nearly useless against it. Due to extremely low heat being expelled from the airframe itself. but be warned, it may stop IR seekers from seeing you from the front and sides. from directly behind there's no way to shield Spirits exhausts. and a low heat signature doesn't mean anything to a radar-guided munition.

another use of Astrapi, it also works as an abstract sort of fuel when mixed with burning material. It excretes fuel at an extremely slow pace. Despite this, it erupts with more power than what would ever be expected. Which is how your engine's stages function. It works by, quite literally, shoving bars of Astrapi directly into your jet stream's path. But as a warning, stages 4 and 5 begin burning extremely hot. Resulting in shock diamonds that appear behind your exhaust. Rendering your cloak and heat resistance, pointless."

Jax: "Noted, speaking of my cloak, how does it do that?"

Doc: "Another wonder of Astrapi. When extremely high voltage runs through Astrapi. The material becomes invisible to the electromagnetic spectrum. Rendering light and other waves such as radar pulses invisible to it. Thus giving birth to your own and last of your kind, the Stealth class."

Jax: "So, you just ran high voltages through some random deep-sea material? And somehow found out it had the magical ability to render the electromagnetic spectrum pointless?"

Doc: "In terms of how we found it can cloak, yes.."

Jax: "Literally?"

Doc: "Yes..."

Jax: "... You said something about it being used in explosives as well?"

Doc: "Ah, glad you asked. Remember how I mentioned it excretes its fuel slowly? When mixed with another specific material, that's confidential. It releases all its energy in an extremely quick manner. Making samples as small as one cubic millimeter as powerful as a 500 pound explosive."

Jax: "So I'm basically a flying megaton bomb?"

Doc: "Nonono, this material is not something you would find anywhere. It must be specifically made in a lab. And all that being said about the material. You must think it would be extremely heavy. After all, it was found at the very bottom of the deepest seas. But the answer to that question is, no, it's actually extremely light. The whole mass of Spirit comes in at only a few hundred pounds. It's so little that your weight was accounted for during its development. To abuse Spirit's lightweight, we've developed the Multi-Stage Astrapi Booster Turbojet or MSABT-06. The engine works purely off of using the fuel properties of Astrapi. It works as if a normal TurboJet engine but with extremely reduced fuel usage. With the MSABT at full throttle, it would be using as much fuel as... Say an F15 on idle. All while producing the same amount of power, or more than an F15 on full afterburner depending on the selected stage. And due to the same amount of fuel being used through all stages, switching stages is fast and instant. Allowing for quick changes of power when needed."

Jax: "So what your saying is Spirit has virtually no weakness? All while being faster, more agile, and having the overkill ability to cloak. She's also versatile and fuel-efficient to run?"

Doc: "Oh no, she very much has weaknesses. Although she is indeed fuel-efficient and versatile. And the Astrapi on board will be fine. the wiring, electronics, fuel, ammunition, hydraulics, and worst of all, her low weight are all weaknesses. The wiring used to conduct Spirit's sensors and Cloak arent made of Astrapi. As such, when you're pulling high G maneuvers. They can swing around becoming too loose to their connections. Then her motherboards and sensors connected to those wires. For the most part, they aren't made of Astrapi either. The sensor can break or wear from the constant G forces applied to them every mission. Or the motherboard can break free of its hostler and destroy Spirits brains, and as such, herself."

his voice begins to grow slightly louder and louder.

"Then comes the ammunition, which can jam or not even chamber during maneuvers. It's the exact reason why Spirit has her own gun reset button! And to reduce wind oscillations and increase cross-wind resistance, Spirit is unable to carry missiles! Although she can be modified to be able to at the cost of high top speed capabilities and control. There's also the issue with hydraulics. At 2000 meters a second the wind pressure will be the very definition of extreme. The hydraulics struggle in all aspects to force the control surfaces to reflect the wind. Making top speed maneuvering difficult, for the better or worse! Then the two biggest issues, Spirit's fuel, and low weight. You'd think extremely low weight would be good in a jet, and you'd be right! But with lower weight, means air resistance will be more present. Offsets in wind streams cause extreme oscillations to occur. Throwing Spirit into unwanted maneuvers without input! Especially at the extremely high speeds Spirit is capable of achieving! And when you mix the fuel's weight into the equation things get spun for a whole different loop!!! now do you not have to worry about just the air's extreme consequences!!! but the sloshing of your internal fuel helping contributes to those offsets in the wind stream!

to combat the hydraulic, ammunition, and electronic issues, counters were put in place. the gun has a reset. the electronics and wiring were fortified inside their own air-tight Astrapi containers, rejecting movement. The hydraulics were designed from the ground up to counter high forces. And giving the engines high aspect thrust vectoring. to counter the fuel issue, special compression fuel tanks were added to constantly keep the fuel compressed, removing sloshing. and to fix the wind oscillations, Spirits specialized AI was added. Spirit flies the plane alongside you. Allowing you a much lighter controllable flight. In terms of pure control at Mach 2 above. You only have access to about 1% of your true control. To allow higher maneuvering actions on the fly. If you slowly pull the stick back completely, it will slowly gift your control in a small trickle of power. giving you more and more control slowly. while if you yank it back as fast as possible it gives the full control back to you as needed. And after the stick is eased off, the control slowly begins to shift back towards Spirit. It's adaptive so it's controllable but won't hinder your ability when the time is needed. All of which came from smaller test aircraft. Which tested each and every one of these techs individually. Packing them all together into your jet, Full Astrapi Reaper Stealth Class, or FARSC-08, code name Phantom Spirit."

Jax: "08? So Spirit had predecessors."

Doc: "Yes and no. 2-7 were the test aircraft that never actually were in action. 01, code-named Silence, was the very first Stealth Class Aerocord. Housing a weaker version of your current engines in an F22s airframe. It was also not constructed out of Astrapi itself, removing Spirits signature cloaking capabilities."

Jax: "Weaker how? And what happened to Silence? It's not on base anymore."

Doc: "Lost the last 2 stages. And lost in action, never was confirmed shot down or captured. As it is now, it's effectively a ghost plane."

Jax: "I see... I just have a few more questions. If Astrapi is so hard and rigid, how did you get it into shape to form Spirit?"

Doc: "Restricted information, I know you're the pilot. But the less you know, the less you can say if captured.

Jax: "Understandable, last question. I thought Spirit wasn't supposed to have been painted due to its extreme consequences to her stealth capabilities."

Doc: "She doesn't? Spirit does not have any sort of paint job. Her dark tint is Astrapi's natural color."

Jax: "Oh... I wonder what this is. Maybe some oil or something I just noticed."

I show Doc my tainted fingers. His eyes widen for a second before looking away to adjust his glasses.

Doc: "I thought I told the base staff not to put oil or paint on Spirit. Since it can be toxic when mixed... Those damn cleaners are too effective."

Jax: "What do you mean?"

Doc: "It's no issue. Come with me ill do a quick check-up on you to make sure you're not poisoned or anything."

He grabs my wrist dragging me outside the hanger.