"Der Ausländer ist angriff unsere stellung! Wir brauche Luft Unterstützung Jetzt!"
The German transmission from the ground meant nothing to me, I didn't speak the language. My squadron leader however, understood it perfectly.
"Captain Griffon! Take Paladin and Victory flights and engage the enemy aircraft, well take out the ground forces and then assist you." I acknowledged his order and spoke into my headset to talk to the other pilots under my command.
"Victory lead, this is paladin lead, engage using AMRAM's then switch to sidewinders. Use your cannon if you have to, these things fight up close, no one lose their wing man!" The Lieutenant acknowledged and took his Eurofighter flight to attack the enemies orbiting the German tanks from a distance.
I then took my flight up above the enemy's position where we would attack the drones from a higher up position. During the fighting in England, we realized that the soft spot of the drone's armor was on the top of the craft. Sending a diversion group while the rest attacked seemed to confuse and disorient the AI piloting the ship, making the enemy aircraft actually pause. They could not issue commands to the drone itself and it sat there. It was a turkey shoot.
"Paladin lead, this is Vic lead, were engaging the enemies and have drawn their fire away from the tanks. The drones have broken out of their 'colony' and have been attacking us. Hurry up, we can't hold them for long!" As the transmission ended, I could see one of the fighters from Victory flight disappear from my HUD, signaling that he had been shot down. I ordered my men to hit their afterburners until we were at the desired altitude.
We then pitched our noses down and sped down towards the earth below. "Paladin flight, align up your targets, two missiles each." The three other Typhoons locked onto a separate target, each until all sixteen of the enemy aircraft were targeted. I then gave the order to open fire.
"Paladin-Lead, Fox-three!" I yelled, launching my long range missiles at the targets while moving at well over 700 kph. The other pilots followed suite, launching their missiles.
"Paladin-two, Fox-three!"
"Paladin-four, Fox-three!"
"Paladin-three, Fox-three!"
We waited half a second for the missiles to contact with the drones, all but five of them exploding into great balls of fire and smashing back into the ground where the Germans were finally turning the tide of battle.
"Royal-Lead to all elements, engage all enemy aircraft." My squadron leader commanded as the fighter-bomber flights joined our formation and launched their missiles at the remaining aircraft, downing two more. My flight pulled up and came underneath the last three where we opened up with our 27mm Mauser cannons, tearing apart the enemy's fuselage and killing the AI systems inside, destroying the final aircraft that still posed a threat.
"Walsh and Royal flights, return to England. Vic and Paladin flights, continue to engage the enemy ground units until bingo fuel. We'll see you home soon lads." The two flights turned and headed back to England where we were stationed. The rest of us however began a strafing formation on the exposed enemy armor.
"Engage the mechs with your Mavericks, then come around and strafe their lines with your cannons. You should have no AGM munitions when we return." I said into the mic as the rest of the squadron formed up in a strafing formation with three planes leading on point and two on each side of the nose flight. Each pilot locked one of the quadruped mechs and fired their missiles. Knocking the Ravager's, I think that's what the Yanks called them, ground armor out of commission.
On the fly-by however, we began receiving heavy anti-air fire. One of the flak guns hit my wing man to my left, killing him and it sent his plane spiraling towards mine. I yanked my joystick up but his nose nicked my left engine and set my plane on fire. I pulled up and tried to recover as more anti air fire raked my plane and warning and 'eject signs popped up along my HUD.
"Bloody hell, this is Paladin-Lead, I am ejecting!" I radioed in before pulling the eject lever.
As my body was launched out of my burning plane, the tremendous force of gravity I experienced was like nothing I had felt before. I could literally feel my spine being pushed down and condensed. The pain was so great I blacked out.
When I woke up I was covered by my parachute and on my side. Nothing had been broken but I had an intense headache. I started to unstrap myself from the chair and crawled out from under the parachute. Upon standing up, and looking around, I was greeted by several machinegun rounds. One of which struck my left shoulder.
I was knocked down from the force, and I started cringing in pain, the incendiary round burning through my flesh. I yelled out loud and crawled behind the heavy fighter seat. I inspected my wound while still receiving fire from the aliens. There was a ten millimeter hole underneath my collar bone. The blood inside was boiling from the intense heat. I reached around and grabbed the first aid kit from the chair and injected myself with a shot of morphine.
As another volley of fire came from the Ravager infantry, I huddled down into myself, exposing as little of myself as possible. I pulled out my sidearm and blind fired several rounds over the ejected seat. I ejected my empty clip and loaded a new one. I leaned out of cover and saw about twenty of the giant slugs running at my position. I opened fire and dropped one. I was out of ammo and there was nothing I could do.
I turned back around and waited for them to come up and execute me. But, before they reached me, two Eurofighters soared overhead and fired their cannon at the enemy infantry, tearing them apart and igniting their breathing apparatus. German tanks and infantry then rolled up and began firing at the enemy. A German medic came up to me and started speaking to me in German.
"Bist du Gesund? Was brauchst du?" I pointed to my shoulder and he began dressing my wounds. As I looked at my squadron returning to base, and the German forces pushing the enemy back into the landing zone of their CAC. I realized, there might actually be a chance for us win this war.