Shit, he thought. All the advanced fighters in his squadron had some of the ingredients of a fully stealth fighter. Nothing like the F-22, B-2, or the F-35, but if they got on the right vector, they were very hard to find. Clearly his French cousin intended to give him the run around. Very well. In mimicry of the maneuver Lord Mantil had made earlier that morning, Jean-Paul rolled his plane, his acute eyes scanning above and below him as his view rotated. There. A quarter mile behind him, and fifty feet below.

Balbuzard One barely registered the turn as Jean-Paul started his loop, such was his confidence in his own shroud at this angle of approach. He was still programming his missiles with his intended attack vector when Lightning One’s voice came over the radio.

“Balbuzard One, Balbuzard One, above you!”

The other French pilot glanced up in a reflexive jerk to see Jean-Paul’s plane had vanished from his field of view. An instant later, the rogue jet was barreling down on him from above, guns blazing as he ripped the other plane apart. Jean-Paul had pulled a fifteen-G inverted loop to bring him up and over the jet pursuing him, coming down on the other fighter like the sword of god.

Like Pelishar’s commander not two hours earlier, Captain Sarah Hutcheson’s emotions swam as the last of her small squadron was rent asunder by the bullets. The plane did not so much explode as get decapitated, and there was no report from its pilot as it began to fall to Earth, its battered nose a mockery of its slick, graceful, former glory.

But Sarah was no amateur. She had seen what this other pilot could do and she had seen the damage the fragmented F-16 had done to it before she had finally killed it. She could take him, but she would not rely on old tactics. They clearly would not work against a pilot this daring and capable.

Breaking off the pursuit, she started to race for home, hoping that the rogue Rafale would continue on whatever mad mission had caused it to turn rabid in the first place, but knowing she could outrun him even if he chose to pursue. Sure enough, the other plane did not come after her, and she noted with satisfaction its smooth turn as it started to climb again to pursue some other goal. Maybe a defection? Who knew? She only knew it had killed two of her command and she was going to exact her retribution.

Lord Mantil, his parachute just opened, was beginning an almost serene drop to Earth when he saw her breaking off the engagement. “You can take him!” he screamed at the howling air as she flew off toward the horizon. “He’s damaged, and you have a superior plane. Goddamn it he’s trying to kill the very people you are here to protect!”