"Yes, your name, please?"
"Thomas."
Richthofen nodded, placing his hands on the large table in front of him as he faced a room full of students. Every seat in the lecture hall was occupied, some students even standing in the doorway and along the stairs.
He looked at Thomas for a brief moment before stepping away from the table.
"Thomas. It seems like you are quite knowledgeable. Why don't you ask that question again? It's an important one."
The young Thomas, a scrawny boy of perhaps sixteen or seventeen, nodded and raised his voice.
"Why are ships so heavily protected against air attacks when they fight other ships? Shouldn't those capacities be used for stronger naval weaponry instead?"
"An understandable question," he said calmly. "And one that many admirals would have answered differently just a few years ago."
He clasped his hands behind his back.
"War at sea has always been defined by guns, armor, and range. Bigger cannons, thicker steel, longer reach. That is how fleets measured strength." He paused, glancing across the hall. "But that way of thinking is… outdated."
A faint murmur spread through the students.
"Aircraft change everything."
He stopped, turning back to Thomas.
"A ship can only fire as far as it can see. An aircraft does not share that limitation. It extends the eyes of the fleet far beyond the horizon. It chooses when to engage, from where, and often before the enemy even knows it is there."
He let that sink in.
"And more importantly… it strikes where armor is weakest. Decks. Superstructures. Areas never designed to withstand direct attack from above."
Richthofen resumed his slow pacing.
"A well-coordinated air strike can overwhelm even the most heavily armed battleship. Dive bombers, torpedo bombers, reconnaissance aircraft working together, each fulfilling a precise role. First, the enemy is located. Then harassed, forced to maneuver. Anti-air defenses are stretched, distracted. And finally, the decisive strike arrives."
He gestured slightly with one hand.
"Torpedoes from low altitude, forcing ships to turn. Bombs from above, punishing that very maneuver. It is not merely power. It is coordination."
A slight, almost knowing smile crossed his face.
"Some nations understand this… better than others."
A brief pause.
"The British, for example, still place great faith in their surface fleets. Magnificent ships, yes. But many of them are not yet fully adapted to this new reality. Their anti-air defenses are improving, but their doctrine…" He shook his head lightly.
"And that is why the Battle for the Channel unfolded the way it did."
Many students nodded, the idea settling into place. A low murmur spread through the hall as some began to whisper among themselves.
Richthofen noticed it. With a small nod toward the teacher, he allowed the noise for a moment before his gaze shifted to the stack of papers lying on the table.
"Although you are still young, you may already fill out the forms. Join the Luftwaffe. We need capable pilots like you."
His hand tightened briefly into a fist before he gestured toward the papers, his voice carrying a quiet intensity.
"Warfare is not decided solely on land or sea anymore… but in the sky."
Richthfoen watched as the student flocked towards the table from the side. He shook the teachers hands, who was very gratefull for this lecture, before leaving the hall, walking over the wooden floor. The weather outside already sunny.
"The battle for the channel...that sure was something."He muttured, seeign a flciker of hsi own reflection in the glass."
That was when he sank deep into his memory.
"The wave is already in the air. Inform Raeder and the fleet!" Richthofen shouted, raising his hand as he looked toward Kesselring, who should have been the one to give the order.
The two men stood around a large table inside a bunker somewhere in France. They were surrounded by Luftwaffe officers, all discussing fiercely, voices overlapping in urgency.
"Is something wrong, sir?" Richthofen asked, stepping closer to Kesselring, whose gaze remained fixed on the map.
Kesselring sighed, pulling his head back slightly.
"Many capable pilots will die today, Richthofen. It just makes me… a bit sad."
Richthofen nodded slowly.
"I heard the Führer is already working on something. Perhaps this war can be ended earlier than anticipated."
"Hopefully before the Americans arrive," Kesselring added, giving a faint nod.
Richthofen stroked his beard.
"Well, they will have to pass through the wolves' territories first. Dönitz's tactics are quite fearsome, from what I have heard."
"Mhm," Kesselring muttered, straightening his posture as plane after plane left the runways of German airfields.
Somewhere above Northern France
"Are you ready, boys?" Erich Hartmann asked into his radio, slightly shaking the wing of his brand new Focke-Wulf Fw 190, a masterpiece of technology.
"Yes, Oberleutnant."
"Yes, Oberleutnant."
The replies echoed through the crackling radio. Erich glanced left and right. The men of his own squadron were ready.
Their mission was simple. This time, they wouldn't be the main force. They had to escort the heavy naval bombers and intercept any enemy aircraft.
After a short moment, Erich pressed a button, his voice once again filling the earpieces of his team.
"We will meet Staffel IX at Point Bravo in a few moments," he announced.
A few seconds later, a massive formation of planes rose beneath them, one after another joining into position, forming a growing wall of steel in the sky.
"Good morning, sir," Erich said over the radio, scanning the formation, trying to pick out his commander's aircraft.
"Good morning, Oberleutnant Hartmann. I am delighted to fly with you today," came the reply, a calm, mature voice cutting through the static.
"Thank you, Hauptmann Lieber," Erich answered, giving a slight nod toward the aircraft he believed to be his commander's.
Then time seemed to move on itself.
The rhythm of flight took over. Every movement became instinctive, every decision a seamless continuation of the last. His hands adjusted the controls without thought, his eyes reading the sky as if it were second nature.
The Channel stretched endlessly beneath them.
Erich blinked.
His consciousness finnaly returning.
Noise hit first.
A deafening chaos. Not one engine, but dozens, hundreds, layered into a violent storm of sound. His headset crackled alive, voices overlapping, shouting, breaking apart into static.
"Contact! Above us!"
"Break right!"
"They're diving—!"
The sky was no longer blue.
It was filled.
Fighters and other planes thundered through the air in every direction, dark shapes crossing, twisting, colliding into chaotic patterns that made no sense at first glance. Tracer fire stitched glowing lines across the clouds, red and green cutting through white like wounds in the sky.
Erich pulled the control stick to the right, his plane responding instantly, tilting as his gaze swept across the sea below.
The Channel stretched beneath him, no longer calm water but a battlefield in itself. Columns of smoke rose from multiple points where ships had already been hit. Flames flickered on the decks of smaller vessels, and dark trails of oil and fire marked their path through the water.
Farther out, a cruiser was already burning heavily, its forward section engulfed in smoke. Another ship answered with steady anti-air fire, black flak bursts rising into the air in constant rhythm.
He breathed heavily as he watched Lieber's plane sink downward, the torpedo still attached beneath it, never released. Lieber's aircraft had been hit, spiraling down into the raging sea.
Erich exhaled sharply, finally forcing his focus back into the present.
Whether they would win or lose did not matter to him. That was no longer something he could influence alone. What remained was what he could still control.
The air above the Channel.
Erich rolled into another dive.
A Spitfire broke across his field of view, climbing sharply out of the chaos above the Channel.
He adjusted instantly.
Closed the distance.
Fire.
The enemy aircraft jolted, smoke pouring from its engine before it dropped toward the water.
Erich didn't watch it fall.
Another shape was already moving into view.
He turned toward it immediately.
He banked toward it at once. And so he hunted. Each kill sent a cold, satisfying shiver down his spine.
Below, more and more British ships were struck by torpedoes and bombs. The terrifying presence of the Luftwaffe threatened to bring the entire fleet to its knees.
Erich didn't count them anymore. Not consciously.
By the time the sun began to sink toward the western horizon, the sky over the Channel had become a graveyard of smoke trails and falling wreckage. He had become something cold, precise, and relentless, a machine wearing the skin of a man.
Thirteen.
Thirteen British aircraft had fallen before his guns that day.
A new record for a single Luftwaffe pilot in one air battle over the English Channel. Even the usually reserved radio operator in the command post below could no longer hide the disbelief in his voice when he confirmed the claims.
-------------------------------------
Thank you all for the support! I appreciate every Power Stone, comment, and review.