(Story Title: The Power Of Section 4)

UN Squadron. One of those games of the old Super Nintendo that I bled a good chunk of my life on, trying hard, hard to kill off the final boss as best as possible. And they definitely did not make that an easy feat. Just getting past the battleship Minks was a gold-plated bitch, if you remember. Oi, the amount of times my poor Thunderbolt II was turned into a flaming wreck by those 16-inch guns.

I was always intrigued by the concept of this game, and much to my shock the only person that had tried writing a story on it has summarily disappeared. The way the game was set up lent itself to one helluva interpretable storyline, and the action was definitely fast and frenetic. This was one of the first arcade shooters I played long ago, and it will always hold a special place in my heart.

FYI, I normally play as Greg Gates. Survivability is better than easy advancement or using multiple weapons, makes it easier to actually complete the game by my playing style.

I know that there is a Manga called Area 88 out there, but I have not read it and I am going on pure interpretation with this one, straight from the game. And yes, I will include the aircraft and weapons from the game, though the effects will be a little modified to be more realistic than else. Remember, in this stori I have to turn a 2-D side-scrolling game into a 3-D cohesive work. Don't expect it to be any easier for the pilots, though, who will work as a team at all times. Also, expect that not all the action will take place in the air, as modern warfare is not always decided (or not always even conducted) in the air all the time.

GENERAL DISCLAIMERS: (These apply to all sections and chapters).

I do not own UN Squadron, though if Capcom sells I may have to pinch pennies and nickels to do so. My writing of this story is intended in no fashion to offend nor challenge the copyright that Capcom will hold on this game for a helluva long time. This is free fan art, and I intend no profit off it whatsoever, nor shall I accept any profit from it.

VIOLENCE WARNING: Yes, Virginia, this will be violent. Quite violent. You have been warned.

BAAAAAD LANGUAGE WARNING: Much as in real life, there will be foul language in some sections. Even the best of us let fly a four-letter word when really pissed off, startled, or else

ANTI-POLITICAL-CORRECTNESS WARNING: To strive to be politically correct serves no purpose, for real life makes no such distinction. I will not do so. Death before dishonor. End of story. Please don't ask me to explain this one

And expect a lot of interpretiveness here, as I try to make this a dynamic story that incorporates more than just the fighting. Also expect to see a healthy dose of operations on the side of the enemy, as they attempt to flatten the UN Squadron for fair.

Writing note: I use footnotes for things that I feel need a little modification or explanation. If you see (0) in the story, that means check footnote (0) for some extra intel at the end of the chapter.

And now, on with the show!

(Prelude: The Middle of Nowhere)

CRACK CRACK.

"High, slightly left of center. Pair of eights."

CRACK CRACK.

"Slightly left still, but a little better on elevation. Bring it down another ring and you're on."

CRACK CRACK.

"That's the ticket, Shin."

CRACK CRACK.

"Do it again!"

CRACK CRACK

"Looks like you're just a hair behind Azeras. You'll need to keep practicing to beat him, though. He's been improving ever since he got here."

"And against Greg?" Shin asks in response.

"He's an American. He might as well have been born with that Patriot he uses."

"Oh." It was no secret: Americans loved their guns. It followed in series that since they loved their guns, they were usually very good at using them. Shin was Japanese Military; he had trained long and hard on mastering the pistol and rifle, and he was 23. It was often said that what he had taken those five years to learn was the province of 12-year-old boys and girls from the west. Disgusting, really, why would they let little kids train on an adult's combat skills? Was their grossly high murder rate not enough proof of the error of their ways?

"Hey, plane incoming!" Someone shouts from the direction of the hangar; Shin looks to the guy first, then to where he was pointing into the sky. His 20/10 vision immediately picked it out as it came down on the 1-North runway, and he immediately recognized it as a Corsair, an aging but still quite capable fighter. And with the latest weapons additions the Corsair would be an incredible striking platform for basic assaults.

Though, in the long run all three of them would need the latest machines that the governments weren't really willing to part with, if they expected to actually be able to stop the menace that Section 4 was really becoming.

The Corsair landed smoothly and taxied off to the hangars, where the pilot would step out and turn the plane over to the mechanics for maintenance and armament. Shin had ventured in on the hangar in question; he was a bit too young to have flown the Corsair back when it was a common NATO fighter, but even today this one was a well-maintained machine from its general condition and appearance. The tail markings showed it was indeed a Scotland machine, and the pilot looked like northern Europe to Shin.

Area 88. A scratch-up old MiG base in the country formerly known as Turkey. Whoever these Section 4 maggots were had put paid to Turkey, which had involved NATO in heavy ground fighting, which had the rather unseemly side effect of forcing NATO into ground combat with forces that were the better of any of their own; the Abrams, the MLRS units, the Paladin artillery tracks, not to mention everything fielded by Germany and Britain, all a bit outclassed by the foe that had primary use of energy and missile weapons. Some of their units used ballistic weapons, but most of their force used particle-based energy weapons, which worried Shin to no end. There was no real telling how well the aircraft would stand up to the abuse of energy weapons, even with the planned extensive modifications to the airframe and outer skin to make it resistant to energy weapons.

There was no real clue as to who the enemy really was, though; nobody except them knew that, and so far nobody was talking. There had been little chance to take prisoners, and even then the information had not been relayed to Area 88 in a timely fashion, if it existed at all. Azeras was rather skeptical of whether or not the CIA, MI-6, or the KGB were forwarding what they needed to know to take these tangos down, and had made that quite clear to the base commander in the days after Shin and Greg had arrived. Though details were sketchy as to the past exploits of Azeras, Shin had little doubt he had been an intelligence officer as well as professional military; Shin's present leaning was toward Afghanistan, Pakistan, or Iran in duty area that Azeras had served, and being trained by either the Russian KGB or Israeli Mossad. In either case, he was very confident and very ruthless in operations, just the sort of person the UN Squadron needed to get the job done here.

And doing this right would take supreme amounts of balls. Because the UN Squadron would be the rapier that knifes out the heart of the enemy before the ground forces come in and sledgehammer the remnant.

Operationally, they did not have to kill them all. What the fighters missed, the ground forces would mop up. The catch was, the minimum to be taken down had to be at least forty percent, or the ground forces would be unable to unseat the foes, and that forty percent had to include the enemy experimental units, which intelligence believed was the whole purpose of Section 4. A research and development group for someone else.

Well, the UN Squadron, despite being mercenaries themselves, had their own research groups and advanced arsenals to drop on the enemy. As well as some mainstay weapons like bombs, Air-to-ground cruise missiles, napalm, and vulcan guns.

In Shin's estimate, this would get real bloody before it even began to get better.

-x-x-x-

(Location Ref: Section 4 Primary Base, Grid ref 15 by 5)

"The last of the enemy advanced fighters has arrived at base, grid ref 5 by 2. Confirmed F8E Corsair, modified to carry a heavy and experimental weapons load."

"So, that puts a Corsair, a Tomcat, and a F-20 at that base, with experimental weapons from each of the countries in question." They only knew the model number of the Japanese fighter, they did not have a proper name for it...yet.

"Correct, General Barkas," the Colonel in charge of intelligence affairs notes.

"Very well. Operations, I want a status report on our forces assigned to smash this base," the General orders. "While you're at it, a report on our other forces would be good as well."

"First off, Firebase Alpha is at sixty percent, and the Regulator is in place. We have scouting forces equal to four regiments standard ground forces, pushing hard forward to break through the enemy ground forces and get solid coordinates on the enemy base. Once we have that, all we need to do is feed Regulator missiles and watch the fireworks. Spirit is presently flying over the Med with the air group, working on sinking the John F. Kennedy, America's heaviest naval asset in the area. Blackbird is out over the Poland area, firing cruise missiles into Germany to stymie their attempts to reinforce the battle front, you'll need to ask Intel about success for that operation. The three Nighthawks and the rest of Wolfpack merc group are back at base for routine maintenance and can be launched at any time. Our land-carrier Sorvetz is still coming in from the north, ETA 4 days. Minks is still trying to break through Suez, moderate resistance from United States naval assets, though they don't foresee any major challenges getting up here unless John F. Kennedy or Nimitz decides to try and stop it. And Gungnir, here at base, is still undergoing final modifications and construction. It will not be combat ready for another month, at the least."

"The enemy does not intend on giving us a month, Colonel. We need Gungnir ready to go right the hell now."

"Sir, we have everyone available right now working on Gungnir. If we added any more personnel, it would have to come from the base defenders or the base construction teams, unless you can call for another few regiments of personnel from the homeland?"

"Pah," The General retorts acidly; "those pansies in the home office think we are overstaffed and underachieving, as if any one of us could wave our dick around and use it to smash the enemy divisions coming down from Germany. I keep shouting for more conventional ground forces to shore up our flanks, but they are refusing on grounds. They have not explained what grounds they are withholding forces on, of course." That was an old tale to Section 4, of course. Like their counterparts here (in Turkey) and elsewhere, they were a research unit that was understaffed, underpaid, under-sexed, and way the hell overworked. "We need to find a way to get Gungnir working without compromising our other projects. Ideas?"

"You could always go to the top, request the regiments from the Archon himself," the Brigadier of the Forest Fortress notes.

"Prostrate myself before that bohemian dumbass? Like hell that would work," General Barkas replies stiffly.

The room became eerily quiet for a minute.

"Nothing? No ideas?" The General asked fairly.

"No, sir, not one. All our projects are running understaffed, just as is Gungnir."

"Damn, looks like I'm going to have to ask a few of the other generals for personnel, see if someone can spare a few battalions," he muses. "All right, anything else to report?"

"No sir," more than a few of them reply.

"Chad, please remain." It was a clear dismissal to the remainder of them, who to a man filed out and were gone. Only Colonel Chazz 'Chad' Mary was left with the General. Some also called him 'Hail' Mary for his apparent ability to hand the other foes of the Home Office a defeat on a shoestring force composition, which was not a simple task given the other foes they had accumulated elsewhere. Barkas had pulled Chazz from a posting in a real quagmire—a battle of attrition against foes far worse than NATO—to help him get these projects finalized so they could be used to take this world and reinforce the forces elsewhere.

"What'll it be, boss?"

"This annoyance...this Area 88, what do they look like to you?"

"The last desperate harangue of a dying people, boss," Chazz replies almost immediately.

"If you would, explain that."

"The UN is in the shitter on this planet. After America told them to go suck wind, and kept to their NATO buddies instead of the blowup in Africa in years past, they went downhill. The great backwards-attempt at socialism has failed for this planet; more's the pity, I think our job would be easier if the UN had swept away all that NATO bullshit instead of vice-versa. You'll note that they are using the UN Squadron as the initial thrust, but their battle plan calls for NATO to do all the real heavy lifting?"

"I noticed. You're saying that the UN has little actual strength here?"

"Correct. They must be desperate, like grade-A, balls-to-the-walls desperate for anything resembling a victory here. Unchecked, though, NATO would be able to crush us in place unless we get our prototypes up and running."

"Gungnir should be able to erase their divisions off the map, all we have to do is get it mobile and active."

"Once we get the Phase Pulse Cannon running on Gungnir, you can kiss any amount of land on this planet goodbye, but we have to get it running first," most effort of which had failed to one degree or another, though.Nobody said making superweapons would be easy, of course, Chazz thought wryly behind a passive mien. The policy of Home that required such means, however distasteful it may have been to him as a person, was still the policy of his governing entity and he would do it as ordered, when ordered. Calling him a super-patriot would not have been unfair or inaccurate. He considered his duty to Home to be the greater of any other consideration he may have had, including his life. Few any more believed that old premise, and even less were willing to enact it since death was becoming the all-too-frequent outcome of the battles they fought. For sure their foes elsewhere were not relenting; if anything, the enemies of the Home Office were becoming more and more fanatical about taking them down.

-x-x-x-

Shilke, a scout for the Section 4 team, had been assigned forward of the Firebase for the purpose of finding the exact location of this Area 88. The base itself occupied three grids in theory, though those three grid references were a hundred kilometers square each, and trying to take that much land off the map using the Regulator would take way the hell too many missiles. Thus, his team was supposed to get hard coordinated and oh, by the way, don't get caught by their base security forces.

"Rigo, Consuela, move up to that dune on the left and check out the area. But be damn careful about it, kids," Sergeant Coras says. Their squad sergeant was the grizzled one of the team, having seen combat in six theaters in his lifetime against the enemies of the Home Office, and somehow he had managed to survive the onslaught of the 'righteous'. Of late, surviving was not the expected outcome; the enemy they faced elsewhere had such overwhelming technological advantages that any numerical superiority the Home Office may have had in a combat theater was simply target practice to the arrogant assholes they fought. Thus the whole existence of Section 4, that the weapons built here could be used elsewhere to help win through against the hated foes, and oh, by the way, having this lovely world under their control would be nice as well.

"Roger that, boss," Consuela replies and begins a cautious, hunched-over dash for that dune. Shilke had to admit that the Hated Enemy had one thing right intrinsically: women could fight just as well, often better than a male counterpart. They had managed to force that much upon the Home Office, as in some theaters the national population had been literally depopulated of all males above the age of twelve in combat against the Hated Enemy, and they still lost that theater even with combat-capable women available that could not fight because they were not allowed. A necessary change, and one that Shilke did not object to; Consuela and he got along very well.

Shilke carefully watched them move through the shadows of the dunes to where they were at the requested location, then signal back visually for the rest of the team to move up. After a few moments, they all had assembled and moved to the next dune. They could hear activity to the southwest, but they could not see anything yet. Hearing the base, though, meant they were real close.

"All right, Shilke, Greg, your turn."

"Where to, boss?" Greg asks. His was the heaviest load of the team, but he was also built monster-style for it as well. His armaments consisted of a pistol, 9 millimeter, a sub-machine gun, 9 millimeter, and a recoilless rifle, 150 millimeter, with four extra rockets for use on heavier targets. Everyone else carried the G3A3, except for Rigo, who carried the MG3 Light Machine Gun, a monster that hocked over 1200 rounds a minute of 30-caliber ammunition.

"Head forward and slightly left to that hillock over there."

"Roger that," Shilke replies as he begins cautiously moving up toward the ordered dune. Greg was not far behind, though when they got to the hill in question some nagging part of his soul made Shilke stop before he looked over the rim toward whatever may be beyond. Also, he did not signal for the remainder of the team to approach, which was confusing their sergeant until they heard something.

The sound was low at first, a low rumbling and high-pitch whistle combined, ramping up until such a point that the rumbling was incredibly loud and so was the whistling. "Jet engines," Greg says after a moment. "If I don't miss my guess, sounds like a F-14."

"How do you know that?" Shilke asks.

"I used to live near a factory that produced F-14s for the war back home," Greg replies stoically. Rather than looking over the top of the hill, he looked around the right side, then came back to a hidden position. "Yep, F-14 in United States paint-job. And the hangars are all down the side of the taxiways. We found it."

"Distance from here to the centroid of the base?" Shilke asks. That was what the base commander wanted, where the center of the base was.

"That way about two kilometers," Greg points. "Heavy concentration of buildings, crew quarters and something else that I didn't quite recognize," he says as the Sergeant approaches.

"Excellent work, team, time to hump it out of here—" the F-14 that they had been listening to had been in takeoff cycle, and finally came up off the runway headed almost directly right over them. When he got to a certain airspeed and altitude he turned around as if he was going to land again; this had the Sergeant confused, unless the pilot had some kind of mechanical problem?

"Everyone down and stay down," Coras orders. He could only hope the enemy did not have low-light IR or NV equipment to see his team at night. "Consuela, get on the horn and relay what we found, quick," he finishes.

Consuela had some objections to using a radio this close to a major enemy base, but she bit her lip on that account and did as ordered. The word went out: base center in grid 9-by-1, sub-grid 86-by-47. The order came back to withdraw the team immediately and hunker down to watch the fireworks.

"Sir, we got a problem, that fighter's coming back around," Shilke notes worriedly as he watches the fighter perform a classic hammerhead turn that literally reversed its direction, just before the pilot put some speed on.

"Oh, shit, he's seen us," Coras notes. "Run for it!" he shouts as he suits actions to words. The rest of the team was not far behind him, either.

WRAAM. Whatever hit the ground where Coras had been, had left damn near nothing left of him beside one booth that fell to the ground in front of Consuela, who appeared stunned but still alive. Rigo had been wide and slightly forward, so he was blown away from the impact location though relatively intact. Shilke could not see the rest of their eight-man squad, they had been close to Coras and may have been annihilated by whatever hit the Sergeant.

What was that? He asks blearily in the confines of his mind. It was not a typical weapon, that was for sure. It almost looked pink, except for a malevolent red pattern of some kind in it (1). His reverie of what had hit the team did not last long before he was out cold from impact trauma. He never even had the chance to shoot himself, as he wanted to do instead of being captured by local barbarians...

Author's Chapter Afterword:

Prelude to reckoning, anyone?

This is just the beginning, as is said, the prelude to the first battle. The first mission is next chapter, as the team has to put paid to the Regulator MLRS before it puts paid to the base. Nobody said it would be easy, and this is where the experimental equipment will come in handy for the team, since they have a lot of enemies and static defenses to shoot through before they can even begin in on the Regulator.

Don't fry a brain cell trying to sort out Section 4's angst right now. If I write a sequel to this story, it'll all become a lot clearer as to what that references.

If you have any questions, comments, just want to say this is cool or sucks, drop me a word in a review. I listen to all comments and I am not a flamer when people criticize me. If you have suggestions, I will listen to those as well. I always like suggestions.

As is said elsewhere: Keep the reviews coming, comrades, your dreams are but a drop of fuel for the ongoing nightmares of Area 88.

Footnotes:

(1): this was one of the F-14's in-game special weapons, the Super Shell. It is a high-damage penetrator weapon, but by extrapolation when used against the ground it would have a kinetic component to it as well, which would throw the scout squad's survivors around. Expect to see more of this weapon as the story progresses.