Seawing/Skywing

**Key Features** | »» *"Aozora"* missile rack (x2)»» Swivel-mounted kinetic-burst autocannon (x1)»» Variable sea/air boosters (x4)»» Gyroscopic cockpit»» *"Seimei no mizu"* tanks (always cleaned)

## Tactical Analysis

 File:WingComparison.jpg
* **Air emerge**: In its base form, the Sea-wing is a relatively quick-moving submarine armed with an anti-air missile system specially designed to track and destroy flying targets. While it has no way of attacking other surface craft, it can burst from the waves into the flight-capable Sky-wing form seemingly anytime.

* **Sea submerge**: While in Sky-wing form, this vehicle's kinetic-burst gun can rapidly overwhelm unarmoured targets, with results arguably superior even to the machine guns of the Soviet Twinblade gunships. Unlike a helicopter, however, the Sky-wing must remain constantly in flight, and unlike any known vehicle, it may simply dive back into the water to avoid harm.

* **Nearly undetectable underwater**: While underwater, the Sea-wing is undetectable to any form of scanning, short of sonar. Being a submarine also prevents it from being fired upon by conventional weaponry and less-sophisticated targeting sensors. It does become vulnerable when surfacing to fire, though having first-attack advantage has proven to be essential to Imperial battle tactics. While the Sea-wing is extremely capable on its own, it seems designed to work even better in concert with other Imperial forces, including naval forces such as the feared Shogun-class battleships. In Sky-wing form, these craft can help Shogun battleship main battery guns track inland targets.

* **Target spotting**: In light of their defeat in WW3. The Seawing has been remodeled to be able to fire its torpedoes while underwater, and the Skywing has its autocannon replaced with a small Wave-Force cannon that's more effective against vehicles and dealing splash damage. Though the retrofits being recent only ace Skywing/Seawing pilots can use the new model.

## WWIII Operational History

Doubtlessly one of the more impressive feats of Japanese engineering to date, the **Sea-wing** is a stealthy submersible whose sealed hull and specially-designed locomotors let it rise up and out of the water in the form of an anti-surface strike craft. This makes it perhaps the most maneuverable craft in the Imperial military, which, considering the extreme mobility of many of Japan's fighting forces, is saying a lot.

What's more, neither the Soviet nor Allied military possesses a counterpart to this type of never-before-seen dual-role craft. With the discovery of the Sea-wing, it seems not even the seas are safe from the Empire of the Rising Sun's ambush forces. A gyroscopic cockpit prevents Sea-wing pilots from tumbling upside-down when switching to **Sky-wing** form.

It is rumoured that pilots prefer the skies to the seas, in general.

 File:SeaWingArt.jpg  While lurking undersea, the Sea Wing is nearly undetectable to scanners, and could almost be mistaken for a large mechanical devil ray. Once it has detected enemy aircraft, it surfaces to unleash a rapid seeking missile barrage against its foe. The missiles are disturbingly accurate even at range, and Sea-wings seem to carry no shortage of them either. An entire top ace squadron of Soviet MiG fighters once was decimated by a Sea-wing patrol in only a matter of minutes.

While the MiG incident left Soviet Air Command in a state of near-panic, only later was the Sea-wing connected to the Sky-wing strike craft, which was previously assumed to be a completely different unit. In Sky-wing form, the vehicle seems to use variable sea/air boosters to help keep it aloft, while using a single swivel-mounted energy weapon to attack surface targets.

The weapon causes intense burns, and has proven deadly against unarmoured targets in particular -- especially ones ill-equipped to take on a fast-moving aircraft like the Sky-wing. Because of its flight capability, the Sea-wing is arguably the most versatile element in the Imperial Navy.

The way in which the Sea-wing transitions to the Sky-wing and back again, is almost bizarre, in that the vehicle simply turns end over end like a coin-flip. How Sea-wing pilots are able to withstand this, in addition to the g-forces of subsonic rises and submerges is anyone's guess, though the cockpit of the vehicle is believed to be suspended in a sort of gyroscopic mounting and the pilot capsule is filled with a Breathable Liquid withstanding the impacts and the sudden pressure changes.

At any rate, piloting such a craft must take incredible skill, especially since the Sea-wing's slender form means it is relatively fragile and dependent on its mobility for protection. The Empire of the Rising Sun, having a considerably smaller population than its rival world powers, must be training only the best of the best to commandeer these unusual vessels.

## Post-War Operational History

After the war many surviving generals had realized that the Seawing, while capable of easily destroying any aircraft with their missiles, had a flaw in needing time to surface, thus leaving a brief but potentially devastating gap, and demanded the engineers to fix this issue, even as the Fukiya was being made since they see a use in a submerged anti-air vessel. And a few months after the war the engineers had found a way for the Seawing to fire its missile while underwater. Mainly through making sure the water couldn't leak in while loading a new missile and by giving the missile a two-stage launch. First, the missile will launch with a propeller, like a torpedo, and quickly move upward, and once the boosters are out of the water it ignite, flying into the air like normal. Though they also had to make the missile an airburst now, as test showed that the missile has a chance to miss due to the switch from sea to air, which had unintentionally improved it further.

It was during this time the engineers also began to upgrade the Skywings weaponry by trying the idea of putting a Wave-Force cannon on it. Through trial and error, all they could manage was a mini-cannon as any larger would have slowed the craft or made it sink in sea mode. And while its power couldn't reach what the engineers wanted it was still a success, since it can now reliably damage lighter vehicles without losing its potency against infantry with rather devastating splash damage, it even fires faster than most wave-force weaponry.

However, the new weaponry were to complex to retrofit, so they had to completely remake a new model, with only veterans being allowed to test pilot the new models.

## Just the Stats

 **Armour Type** | Light Armour

 **Armour Type** | Thin Skinned

 **Kill Reward** | 7200

 **DPS** | 32

 **DPS** | 25/5