AN/: I'm back baby! That's right, Karaya 1 has returned to bring you not one, but two chapters of my long-promised story, The Man and the Eagle. This is the story of Mobius 1, which I've taken my own little twist on. AC:04 was the very first Ace Combat game I ever played and I'm excited with all the potential it has for stuff like this. Without further ado, here is the first chapter! IF YOU HAVEN'T READ HOUNDS OF WAR, CLICK ON MY NAME AND GO READ IT. I HIGHLY RECOMMEND YOU DO SO.

DISCLAIMER: I am deviating from the set dialogue, since Mobius 1 actually can SPEAK.

"But to fly is just like swimming. You do not forget easily. I have been on the ground ten years. If I close my eyes, however, I can again feel the stick in my right hand, the throttle in my left, the rudder bar beneath my feet. I can sense the freedom and the cleanliness and all the things which a pilot knows." Saburo Sakai-WWII Japanese Ace, member of the famous Tainan Air Group and 'Cleanup Trio'.

Ch.1 The Wild Frontier

A lot of people think they know war. The way you fight it, the way you win it….thousands of books have been written on the subject, and unfortunately, it still is a valuable skill. I remember a teacher at my secondary school once telling me, 'If a man can not stand a long war, undoubtedly, he can not stand a long peace.'

It is an utterly true maxim.

The place I come from has been chained to the making of war for almost the past decade now. We've grown so hardened to it, it is not even a surprise to anyone anymore. 'Oh yeah, the Erusian bastards bombed Ugellas. But, did you hear about the football yesterday? Bloody hell it was good!' At least to me, it is a rather sad development. Through it all I've tried to remain as positive as I possibly can, but it is rather difficult to. I admit that without any reservations. The world is a twisted place, and I honestly do not know how men have survived the perils of warfare. I watched some of the greatest people I've ever seen shredded by it in a matter of seconds.

And that's all it takes. You make one mistake, one slight half-second of frivolity, and you are finished. In the crapper with a flag draped over you, a little ceremony so your mother can cry her soul away, and an early eternal rest with the worms. Not the most appealing conclusion to a man's life, but it's the way it is.

On the other side of the coin of war, you'll find me, Thomas 'The Butcher' Linke-Byrne. A black haired, brown eyed, 6'1", smooth faced, stone cold fighter pilot, and the epitome of success on the battlefield.

I'm a rather interesting case, d'you know what I mean? I find it rather hard to describe everything I did without going, 'Shit, I did that?!' Today, many consider me to be a hero…and I never felt like it. I just was another one of the boys off fighting another battle against impossible odds. There were moments of triumph and moments of despair, just as any other veteran of the war will tell you. The only difference between them and myself is that somehow, I turned the entire bloody war around with just a handful of pilots. There's a very select few aces who can claim that achievement.

But, being a soldier and all that, I'm not really sure whether to proud about it all or not. I have met quite a few of the guys I fought against and they're just normal people, average lads like me thrown into a war they have absolutely no clue about and are ordered to 'Go kill those bastards over there!'. So, I don't share that whole 'they're all Satan' sentiment that everyone's been throwing around lately, you know? Hell, I could have been one of them if fate had dictated differently, and how would this whole thing have ended up then? A damn lot different, I'll tell ya!

Joking aside though, I wouldn't have traded any of it for the world, besides the killing, obviously. Flying has become my life. There is no other way of putting it. It just is me. I knew that….even from the very beginning.

This is the forgotten story of the 5th Carrier Air Wing, the 'Seahawks', and…the story of the 118th Tactical Fighter Wing and myself, Mobius 1. This…is the true telling of the Second Usean Continental War.

- 0730 hrs. September 19, 2004, Somewhere near Newfield Island-

"We are all green on the readings," my Radar Intercept Officer, or RIO in the second seat of the massive black and blue F-4S Phantom fighter, called out from behind me, "The old girl's ready to rumble."

"Alright Thumper," I replied, flipping the last of the necessary switches, "I'm good here, taking the stick."

"Roger Butcher," he called back, "Let's get this over with."

The world turned from the pale darkness to the warm, refreshing light as the elevator lifted the Phantom onto the flight deck of the aircraft carrier. This was CV-04, Fort Grace, an FCU carrier that had been my home for the past few weeks. I had only just finished training with my WSO, Johnny 'Thumper' Walsh, when we were called for active duty two weeks ahead of schedule at the age of 25.

The war with Erusea was going poorly for the ISAF, or as we liked to call 'I Shit and Flee'. In their arrogant overconfidence, the coalition failed to realize just how prepared Erusea was for war. And guess what? They were actually rather well-prepared, shock-horror. For almost a year now the ISAF had been 'tactically withdrawing', reducing their troops' morale to pretty much an all time low, setting a record in the process. Or, at least I thought they had.

And now, they were up against the wall. Our tiny contingent of planes was all the alliance had left to stand between Erusea and the ultimate goal of conquering North Point. It was a rather dire situation.

So, when they call up every craft they have left to fend off the inevitable bomber force coming to end it all, and THAT is your first sortie…

You'd have every right to be scared shitless.

And I was. Johnny and I both were. We had no combat hours to speak of whatsoever, and yet, we were the ones being trusted with the fate of entire nations on our very first mission! They definitely should've put that on the job application.

To those it may concern, you will have to bail our asses out, by yourselves. What a bunch of nobs.

"Good morning Mobius 1-1 and 1-2," the Air Boss called from the bridge of the Fort Grace, screeching into our tired ears like a banshee, "Line up for approach on catapult 2, over."

"Mobius 1 copies, moving into position," I replied with a sigh, putting the Phantom into motion with ease. The deck wasn't really a flurry of activity. With only three planes to launch, there wasn't really a sense of urgency. Along with the super low morale, let's just say that it wasn't all sunshine and rainbows onboard.

The flight deck director, one of the 'yellow shirts' approached the front of the Phantom and motioned us to taxi into position onto the right catapult, crossing his arms as we were locked into takeoff position. I raised the throttle into the highest non-afterburner power and lowered the flaps into the full position, doing a quick control check with the launch officer or the 'shooter' and flight deck director. Satisfied with how everything looked, I gave a quick salute to the yellow shirts and they gave a thumbs up to the catapult officer, who was under a protective dome barely protruding from the deck at my 11 o'clock.

"All right, this is Mobius 1 ready to go here, over," I called up to the Air Boss.

"Roger, Mobius 1, you are cleared for launch."

The deck was cleared as the shooter moved off to the side as I engaged the afterburners, lowering himself and pointing off to the bow.

WHOOSH.

I was hurled back into my seat as the Phantom accelerated all the way from zero to 170 miles per hour in 2 seconds. In reality, it felt a hell of a lot quicker than that. I grunted hard as I gunned it for the heavens in a clearing turn, forming into a Combat Air Patrol circle at about 25,000 feet above the sea. After about 5 minutes the two other Phantoms in our group, Rapier 8 and Viper 9, joined up in our circle and immediately changed course for Allenfort AFB, the designated intercept point at Newfield Island.

"Yo, Butcher!" I heard the unmistakable voice of Rapier 8, Henry 'Dice' Daniels, calling out with a snark, "Finally getting to the shit now, eh?"

"Oh, you really want to be in the shit Dice?" Thumper yelled back in annoyance, flipping the bird in Henry's general direction, "No wonder you're an ass."

I only heard Dice laugh as I watched my other wingman Viper 9, Cris 'Hammer' Shaw, form up at my 4 o'clock, while Dice locked in at my 8 o'clock.

"How's your bird looking after clipping the island yesterday, Hammer?" I asked as I disengaged my weapons' safeties.

"Like nothing ever happened, honestly," he replied nonchalantly, "Just glad it's fine for today."

Hammer and I thought it would be fun to buzz the island yesterday, mainly to piss off some of the hard-asses we didn't necessarily agree with. The Captain, rather unexpectedly, agreed to it, albeit secretly and would deny any involvement. So, all three of us got as bloody close as we bloody dared to the tower. Hammer got unlucky. There was a big gale that essentially tossed his plane towards the island, his reflexes got him out of there with only a small piece of wingtip gone. He was lucky.

And would we do that again?

Most likely.

"No kidding. Alright guys, let's get going to the intercept point. Those chair force pricks are going to have a damn field day if we're late," I ordered as we all went to cruise speed.

"Yeah, we'll finally get to show them up!" Dice said rather…optimistically.

"You better hope we do, otherwise we're all dead," I snapped back, settling into my seat as we proceeded towards the battlefield.

-0745 hrs. Newfield Island-

"This is AWACS Sky Eye checking in, all craft participating in the operation, report in sequence."

"This is Mobius 1, callsign Butcher, checking in."

"This is Viper 9, checking in, callsign Hammer."

"Rapier 8 here, callsign Dice, ready to kick some Erusian ass."

Thumper and I both groaned at Dice's apparent enthusiasm for combat. We were both desperately hoping his first engagement would finally shut him up for good.

"All navy aircraft are accounted for, air force is now coming onto station," the AWACS called as I watched a three-bird element of F-5E Tigers form up directly to our three o'clock. They looked brand spanking new compared to our bucket of bolts Phantoms, and in that respect I envied them. In other respects…well.

"This is Omega squadron coming on station, Omega 1 reporting in, callsign Roach," the leader called in, he had a pretty deep voice.

Thumper and myself could barely control our laughter at that callsign, I had to disconnect the comms for a second to compose myself.

"Omega 2 reporting in, callsign Meteor," a female voice radioed next rather confidently.

"Omega 11, callsign Fang, checking in," the last one whispered out, the fear grasping onto every syllable he fought to get out.

"You need to speak up Fang, quit mumbling all the time!" Roach shouted angrily towards his wingman.

Already we have this….

"Hey, knock it off Roach. I'm sure he's just got the jitters like everyone else."

"You stay out of my damn business, navy boy."

"Oh really? Well, if you get him killed then it is my business, asshole."

"We'll see who's talking when this is over,"Roach cackled back, his voice just pissing me off more and more, "You'll probably be floating in the sea, a bullet in your brain."

"I'm going to personally see you're the one who ends up with that bullet," I calmly spoke back at him, my voice laced with poison, "You say one more thing pig-shit, and you're going to have someone on you who doesn't care about the rules of warfare."

"Go screw with someone else!"

"Get lost!"

"Leave the damn kid out of this!"

"Focus on the Erusians! You're such an idiot!"

This barrage went on for almost a full minute. After the fire died down, Roach admitted defeat and just murmured some expletives angrily to himself as Sky Eye regained control of the comms.

"Get it together people! We have a flight of Erusian six bombers inbound from Rigley AFB, along with two flights of fighter escorts. The bombers are top priority, we can not let them reach North Point. If they do, the war is over. So, a victory today for my birthday sure would be a good change in fortune."

"Happy birthday Sky Eye, sorry we don't have a cake for ya mate," Hammer spoke warmly in contrast to the heated argument as we approached Newfield.

"I think a victory would be just as good, Viper 9," the AWACS controller responded with a chuckle. But there was no betraying the worry in his voice.

I picked up the bombers, old Yuke prop Tu-95 Bears, at our 2 o'clock high in standard formation. The escorts were all in swarm around the big boys, they seemed to be mostly made up of Mig-21s with a few F-5s also interspersed between them.

"Alright Seahawks, let's get the party started," I stated with a nervous and very long sigh. I pitched the Phantom's nose up into a steep climb with Dice and Hammer in tow up to about 35,000 feet. The 'chair' Force guys were going to attack from a different vector, but weren't too enthusiastic about getting into a climb. "Thumper go ahead and get us ready to rock."

"Roger, we are all green on my end, ready to go," Thumper called out, giving me a thumbs up from the back seat.

"Affirmative, let's go ahead and get those bombers taken care of. Hammer, I want you in trail position behind so the escorts don't buzz my ass straight off."

"I got ya, Butcher. Lead the way."

"Good. Dice, I want you up high as secondary back-up. You see anything go for Hammer, smash 'em."

"Roger that Butcher. Let's play for some blood."

I took another deep breath out of what seemed like thousands, desperately trying to calm my mind for the inevitable chaos I was above to punch face-first into.

And waiting wasn't going to make it better.

"This is Mobius 1. Moving to engage the targets. Let's give our boys some breathing room."

I rolled hard into a half Split-S, lining me up into a vertical dive with plenty of options for attack. My eyes latched onto the front two bombers of the formation, and I adjusted my Phantom's position with just a touch of input. I switched my weapons to my longer range AIM-120 'Slammers', locking up the bears within a few seconds.

"Burn 'em Thumper!"

"Firing, Fox 3, Fox 3!"

I engaged the afterburners as the missiles detached themselves from the craft, smashing into the two Bears just seconds before I snaked through the formation in my dive. The shockwave from the blasts pushed the Phantom quite a bit, having detonated most of the bombers' ordinance with the missiles.

"Holy shit, Splash two!" Thumper exclaimed, "What the hell were those guys carrying?!"

"No clue mate, we got other things to worry about!" I shouted back as I glanced up to my rear-view mirror to see a nest of escort fighters bearing down on Hammer and myself. I pulled hard back on the stick, pulling into a Immelmann turn. I glanced back over my shoulder through the maneuver watching the swarm of about six fighters screaming up towards me with several tracer rounds just barely passing by. I gunned it back into the formation, locking up two more of the bombers with my Slammers.

"Fire 'em now!"

"Fox 3, Fox 3!"

The two missiles made quick work of the Bears, blowing the nose off of one and ripping the tail off the other.

"Splash another 2!" Thumper called out.

"Dice! You and Hammer take the rest of the bombers. I'm going to have a little chat with these escorts."

"I copy Butcher," Dice radioed back with the sound of cannon fire in the background, "Just finished bagging my first kill."

"There's plenty more out there, keep hunting!" I ordered as I pulled a High-G turn to get behind one of the escorts, a Mig-21. I decided mid-way through the turn to go ahead and take the deflection shot with my cannon. I squeezed off a few quick bursts with the Vulcan, peppering the Fishbed into taking a slow dive into the sea.

"Splash one," Sky Eye called out, "Keep up the pressure Mobius 1."

"High copy, re-engaging," I calmly retorted as I reversed back into the chasing ball of fighters, I locked up two for my sidewinders. This time I didn't even need to call out to Thumper, who fired off the missiles straight into the intakes of the Fishbeds, sending them burning into the drink. "How many do I have now Thumper?" I yelled over the roar of the Phantom's engines, with my latest kills scaring off the rest of the pursuers.

"Like I would be keeping count!" he shouted back at me with feigned annoyance, "Just keeping dropping them like this and the war will be over tomorrow!"

"I wish," I grumbled back as scanned the formation again, picking up two more bombers to my 8 o'clock low, "How are my Seahawks doing?"

"Well, it looks like we're up two to nil, just starting the second half," I heard Hammer grunt back, "Still got a few bombers over here, but the escorts seem pretty happy screwing with the Chair Force. It seems like the Erusians prefer to pick on guys who don't really fight back. We'll try to free 'em up Butcher."

I laughed as I rolled into another attack dive, locking up my last two Slammers from long range.

"This is Allenfort AFB, we are under attack! Get the rest of the personnel to the bomb shelters, now!"

In response, I launched my missiles and pulled up hard, sling shotting them at breakneck speed towards the Bears, shooting them down in what seemed like less than a second. I watched the wreckage fall to the ocean, a strangely mesmerizing sight of the metal and everything else falling in a dance of death.

But in this moment, my carelessness was exploited.

MISSILE ALERT!

"Son of a bitch! Hold on back there Thumper!"

I broke hard into a tight, sweeping counter-clockwise turn, revealing the pursuer as a midnight black F-5. He looked and meant business, as he attempted a deflection shot of his own, landing several cannon rounds on my left wing.

"We're hit but still good!" Thumper called out, "Get his ass!"

The Tiger overshot and was pulling into a tight Chandelle. I used this opportunity to gain altitude and come into a barrel roll attack, gaining some energy over the Tiger in the process. I locked him up at my 12 o'clock about 1500 feet out with a sidewinder, but he danced his Tiger out of it and tried to line up another deflection cannon shot with a head-on attack. I broke from my run into a wingover turn, pushing my left rudder pedal hard as I reversed back onto the Tiger's trail.

But this guy was not taking no for an answer. As a last resort, he broke into a defensive spiral, circling ever lower towards the drink. I didn't perform the usual opposing pursuit in the opposite direction. I just closed in as much as I dared, almost to just under 400 feet. I wanted as much of him as I could fit in my canopy.

As we leveled out I unloaded on him with my cannon, sending fragments of aluminum sparking and flying in all different directions. Eventually, the Tiger's engines flamed out from my fire and the pilot bailed, sending the black bird dipping unceremoniously to the sea. I circled around the parachuting pilot and to my surprise he waved to me and gave me a thumbs up. I looked back to Thumper and he grinned, we both gave the Erusian a thumbs up. The enemy pilot nodded back as he glided down into the ocean.

"All targets are confirmed destroyed, good work Mobius 1," Sky Eye cheered with the relief heavy in his words.

"Allenfort is still operational. Our thanks goes out to the fighters up there. Whoever's kills were those bombers, I don't think I'm going to be able to thank you enough!" the tower operator called with tons of cheers in the background.

"All in a day's work tower. Glad to be of service. Let's scurry home Seahawks, I'm sure the Captain doesn't want us out past curfew."

Our procession of Phantoms turned back towards the Fort Grace, now battle-scarred and battle-hardened. The blue birds were darkened by the smoke and blasts, but they were still alive. They would live to fight another battle.

-0815 hrs.-

"Alright Mobius 1," the landing operator called out, "Let's get you home and squared away without any trouble, sound good?"

"Just ready to get out this seat Buzz. I'm calling the ball," I radioed back.

I lined my Phantom up on final approach a ways back from the Fort Grace, centering myself on the landing strip which always seemed a hell of a lot smaller than it was.

"I hear ya mate, roger ball. Alright….give me just a little rudder to the right."

I depressed the right rudder just enough to re-center, lining the bore-sight up with the deck centerline.

"Perfect, hold it there and keep your throttle right where it is. You are on the money."

"Roger."

I dropped the landing gear and the tail hook as we slowly dropped down to the deck. I made some tiny little adjustments to my position as we were a couple hundred feet from the deck and held my hand over the throttle as I waited for the signal. After a few more silent seconds, the rear wheels of the fighter hit the deck with an hard shake.

"Gun the engines!"

I throttled up to make sure that if the cable snapped I could escape back into the air without trouble. But, I had managed the landing without trouble, catching the first wire with no problems and bringing the Phantom to halt in short order.

"Perfect landing Butcher. You gonna put those kill stripes on today?"

"It can wait Buzz. Who knows how long the debrief's gonna be, knowing Chief…"

"Probably ages," Buzz added, finishing my sentence for me.

"Yup. I'll be sure and catch you and the guys for lunch."

"Sounds good, I'll see you around."

I taxied my bird off to the bow, with the nose facing off to the port side of the ship. To no-one's surprise there wasn't really any sort of celebration for what we had done. We had done what we were asked to do, and this was only the beginning of a long road to winning the war.

I popped my canopy open and climbed out with my helmet under my shoulder. As soon as I was down the ladder I gave Johnny and big hug and pat on the back, and he returned the gesture.

"Good flying Tom, you bastard!" Johnny said with a big grin.

"Couldn't of done it without you Johnny," I answered with a grin of my own as we handed the Phantom over to the plane captain, one of the 'brown shirts', and headed into the island for our debrief. I was praying it was going to be under an hour this time.

-1045 hrs.-

Of course the briefing did take about two and half hours, par the course. Most of this was due to the guy who gave our briefings, Commander Frank 'Chief' Redmore. He had been in the Navy for 25 years and made sure to inform us of the fact every day. He also had a tendency to rabble on tangents for what seemed like forever. He looked the part of a lifer Navy guy too, salt-worn tan skin, razor sharp brown eyes, a body set like a solid boulder, and perfectly in-regulation brown hair.

"The Air Force boys were complaining that you didn't help them when under fire today," Redmore spoke as he sat himself on the old wooden table at the front of the briefing room, his eternal abode, arms crossed. I couldn't really tell if he was annoyed or not, but I figured he was waiting for our input before he made a decision.

We all let out a concerted groan at the Chair Force's claim, with Dice unable to contain himself. It had seemed his first blood had not diminished his enthusiasm. I glanced over to Johnny who was staring at the ceiling in annoyance, mouthing 'Why do I have to be near this guy.'

Dice was the king of the jokers, a bleach blonde-headed, grey-eyed pain in the ass. He was always finding something to laugh at. In fact, if he didn't try to kill himself so much, we would've called him Joker. But, he had a passion for trying to get himself axed off, and none of us ever knew why.

After we all quieted down, the discussion turned back to the topic at hand.

"I'd say they made themselves rather useless, if you ask me," Hammer replied quickly, "They refused to gain altitude advantage at the beginning of the scrum and that endangered their pilots immediately. We did help them once we were sure that we were safe from tailing escorts."

Hammer laid himself back in seat, running his hands through his buzzed red hair and scarred forehead. Out of all the pilots of the Seahawks, Hammer definitely looked like someone made for the military. He was most muscular of all of us, had an extremely bony face, a boxer's broken nose, and the killer blue eyes to go with it. One time after we first got time off after training, people thought he was Special Forces because of how menacing he looked. But funnily enough, he was the most soft spoken of the pilots, but when he talked everyone listened to him.

"I see," Chief retorted placing his hand on his chin, "They filed their report as if they did all the work. I know you lot way better than they do, and I also received the reports from Sky Eye and Allenfort, so I figured it was rubbish all the same. But as you know…"

"We're a team in this conflict," the gathered group of airmen replied half-heartedly.

"That's right," Chief said with a hint of disappointment, the first time I'd ever really noticed him say it like that, "But moving on, it seems like Tom took care of everyone today with some fancy flying."

I just shrugged at Chief's compliment, "I did my job. Dice and Hammer did too, and made sure I could get all the bombers and a couple escorts without having too much of a problem. I'm just glad we're still alive to be honest."

The Chief just nodded back, a knowing, warm smile grew on his face as he looked around to all of us, "Sometimes that's all you need to do gentlemen. I think you lot are going to turn this war right around with the way you fought today. Dismissed."

We all stood at attention and began to file out of the room, but Chief pulled me over. I motioned for the rest of them to go on. We both sat down back at the front row of the briefing room, and I lazily glared back up at the drawing of the whole fight. The initial attack, my second run, the repulsion of the escorts, and the final battle with the Black Tiger were all up there, snaking through the board.

"You know you're going to get the Distinguished Service Cross, don't you?" the old man asked as he looked towards the board, "Getting ten kills on your first sortie, and the way you handled them being fresh out of the academy and thrown in the deep end…that's something that can't be trained."

"The rest deserve it as much as me. Especially Thumper. Once I got in there, all those nerves were gone. I just focused on it all…and it was easy," I spoke, staring down at my clutched hands and twiddling thumbs, "I don't want the medal. I just want to be left alone to do my job."

Chief didn't seem surprised at my response, "Wanting something and earning it are two different things entirely, Leftenant. You earned that medal, and whether you like it or not, you better get used to it. Otherwise things probably won't end up all right. You just keep up your job and you'll get home in one piece, ok?"

"Yes sir," I replied nonchalantly as I got up, offering one more salute. But Chief only held out his hand, and I took hold and shook.

"You saved us, whether they like to admit it or not. So, thank you Tom."

I flashed a smirk back, "You're welcome, sir."

I walked back out to the hall, my mind at ease and focused.

If they come again, I can stop them. There is no doubt anymore. Victory…is possible.

-Ten Hours Later…-

The majority of the flight crew had turned up on the Hangar Deck for the official announcement of the day's kill scores. The whole atmosphere was quite a contrast to what it had been only hours before. Everyone seemed much more upbeat, more smiles and laughs, less gloom and doom. It was contagious, even the normally stoic Hammer had a bloody big grin on his face, and for a good reason. He had bagged six kills, along with Dice.

So, that made all of our jet combat pilots on the Fort Grace aces. Not a bad way to get ourselves up to speed.

I was off smoking a cigarette over at one of the openings looking out to the twilight coated sea, the orange light of the falling sun calling from the far western horizon, illuminating the seas with reds and yellows as it eventually became a victim of time. Johnny came over not long after the final sunset clutching a bottle of water in his right hand, and he looked lazily off towards the horizon, where the lights of Newfield began to shine out over the waves.

Johnny, or Thumper, looked like a kid fresh out of secondary school, with his neatly combed dirty blonde hair, and rather short and frail stature. His face betrayed that innocence, with a big, slightly bent and busted nose from his rugby days, wavy wrinkles on his forehead and well-defined lines under his eyes, one for each. Johnny had that stare too, the thousand yard stare all the kids wanted. But he earned his from his childhood, and even then he hadn't told me what happened. All I knew it was bad, properly, properly screwed up.

"You saved a lot of people today, Tom," Thumper began as he took a sip from his water, "They said the bombers didn't even kill a single person today."

"I hope that doesn't set a precedent," I replied with a grunt as I took one last drag from my now tiny cigarette and threw it over the railing and out into the water. I looked up to the darkening shattered sky and let my smoke climb up towards it.

"At least that's better than going home in a damn bag."

"Anything's better than that, mate."

"A-bloody-men,"Johnny laughed back, holding his water bottle up in an imaginary toast, "I hope we keep it this way."

"We just go out there, fire our shots, and go home. Beyond that there's nothing more to do."

"True. But the day is going to come when we're going to have to do more."

"Oh, you're Mr. Philosopher now," I snarked back, slapping him on the back of his head, "Enlighten me! Tell me the error of my ways!"

He just looked at me, his smile gone and I could almost see his dark past playing out in his eyes. My smile left me as well, and I turned my head back out to the sea.

"I didn't mean to scare you Tom," Thumper sighed as his drooped down, his eyes planted in a gaze towards the deck, "I've just seen too much, brother. As soon as we really get going, they're going to push us all somewhere we don't want to be."

"I got you, Johnny," I replied back giving him a soft pat on the back, but Johnny kept his gaze on the floor, not even stirring, "You got really snake bit, huh?"

"Yeah, unfortunately."

The call to assemble broke up our conversation, as we dropped everything and rushed over to the front of the procession to join Dice, Hammer, and their WSOs. We were all wearing our dress khakis, garrison caps, and I was wearing my G-1 standard issue black leather flight jacket, adorned with my squadron patch on the left shoulder, and the hand-drawn Seahawks insignia on the front. I had paid hand-over-fist to get one over the dumbass green Nomex jackets they'd been issuing for a while, and I was always glad I had spent the extra money since they looked ghastly on the Navy uniform.

The gathered group of Phantom crews separated ourselves into our respective crafts and stood out in front of the crew waiting for the inevitable shout of…

"Attention! Captain on deck!"

And so, out came our invincible Captain, Logan T. Nelson. His attire was his formal dress blacks and pale white peak cap. Nelson had been in the FCU navy for a long time, graduated from the FCU Naval Academy at Port Edwards almost 20 years ago. He had originally been a bridge officer on a cruiser, but changed to aircraft carriers and the Fort Grace had been his girl ever since. He had that weathered sea dog look much like Chief. However, he seemed a bit older with his grey, a bit more reserved and quiet with his bright blue eyes and small stature, but that didn't stop us from admiring him just the same.

"At ease, everyone," he called out, the separating of feet echoing loudly through the deck, "Today, our pilots have won a great victory in the fight to take back our homes."

Our homes…except that mine never was taken…

I'm doing this now of all times? Get a life Tom.

"This is the first day of a long journey. Although we may not know when it will end, we know now that we can fight back, that the Erusians are not the invincible juggernauts the world thinks them to be." The Captain took a step towards us, taking a moment to look us all over with a calm, serious stare. "As of today, September 19, 2004, the ISAF command recognizes and confirms the aerial victories of the Naval pilots of the Fort Grace. Both Viper 9 and Rapier 8 destroyed six craft during the fight over Newfield Island."

The crew let out some hoops and hollers for them, and I slightly turned my head to see both Hammer and Dice nodding and holding their hands up in recognition of their cheering. But this was just the tip of the iceberg.

"Also," the Captain continued once the revelry had died down, "Mobius 1 downed ten aircraft during the mission, including the six Bear bombers intent on destroying Newfield and North Point."

The crew erupted into chanting and yelling, "Butcher! Butcher! Butcher!"

Thumper and I couldn't hold back our laughs as we turned to crew and waved to them.

Are we rockstars or something now? Jesus H. Christ….I don't think I can get used to this…

After about five minutes, the cheering finally quieted and the Captain could continue.

"The ISAF is grateful for their duty, and thanks each and every one of you on the Fort Grace for getting them there and home safely due to your hard work and meticulous attention to detail.

Now everyone knew he added that on the end, because in these kinds of transmissions, the ISAF cared very little for the small guys who kept the heroes running. But Captain Nelson who had started as one of them, knew exactly the people responsible for it.

With his speech concluded, we all applauded for a moment, then came to attention again as he left for the island.

The crew then, 'forced' us to put our kill marks on our Phantoms. I decided that we should do the Erusian roundels in orange on the right intake. Within a few minutes, each of the Phantoms had their respective kills adorned on their bodies, now flexing their muscles as combat hardened jets.

Afterwards, we all buggered off to mess to have a beer and watch the football for a quiet end to the day. It would be the last we would have for a while.

AN/: Well it's a start, and I'm already feeling better just getting it out there to show you guys. It's been a much smoother fall semester in college, since I made a 4.0! So, it's been great to finally have time to really grind this out and get it going for you guys so you have some new stuff from me to enjoy. Even better, I finally give you the story I originally promised at the end of Hounds of War, for you loyal readers out there who remember that. Butcher has been an absolute hoot to write and I've got a lot of stuff planned for him, fun things mind you! And this story is going to play out quite different than to Hounds of War. This is going to be much more of Butcher's personal story along with his flying career, especially later on, with a ton more personal experiences given out compared to Erich. Anyways, I think that's enough babble from me for one chapter. Thank you all for coming again!

Bis später,

Karaya 1