Observance

by Roy Fokker 99th

The Battle of Katina, and other battles, as observed by Bill Grey, Captain of the 104th ASTF Wing, during the War. Chapter 5 is UP! RnR if you can! After a MASSIVE delay, a new chapter is up.

2. Debts

"Beltino Heavy Industries SSF-15 Kukri

Wing Span: 13.5 meters

Length:18 meters

Height: 5 meters

Weight: 7000kg unladen, 8500kg full load out ver. A, later models 12,500kg (expanded Nova capacity)

Engine: One Moles-Troi 23 Energy Conversion Engine

Power Source: Reactor, Classified Level Phi

Performance:

Maximum Atmospheric Speed: Classified

Maximum Relative Speed in Vacuum: Classified

Service Range: Classified

Armaments: Two Agrias Heavy Laser Cannons, Version A Nova Bomb Capacity One, Version B Four, optional Two BHI-20 Micro Missile Pack (post war period)

Background: The standard issue fighter in service during the One Month War in 2216, the Kukri represents the link between traditional Cornerian fighter design and the later mass produced Arwing design put into service the year of this database's production. Following the concept of an untraditional airframe strengthened through the then commonplace gravity blade design, the Kukri was a far more dangerous craft than most of what the Venomian military could muster against it in ship to ship combat. Sadly, the Kukri never saw what could be considered fair odds during the One Month War, often outnumbered nearly 7:1. Despite only a pair of laser cannons for dog fighting, and the complete lack of either homing plasma cannons or tradition ship to ship missiles early on, the Kukri was maneuverable enough to stay in the flight longer than faster, less agile Venomian designs. The Kukri saw heavy use throughout the War, and after the War to this day, serving home defense units on planets throughout the Lylat System next to it's successor, the Arwing. Possibly the defining moment of this craft's history is the Battle of Katina, where four outnumbered squadrons of Kukri pilots, notably the 104th Wardogs, 87th Lions, 242nd Suicide Kings (squadron colors retired permanently), and the 25th Ravens, held off the combined forces of the First Venomian Naval Vangaurd for six days without outside military assistance before the arrival of Star Fox ended the fighting around Katina. Despite the heavy losses the Kukri squadrons suffered in the fighting, the kill ratio was a then unheard of 15:1. Only the SFX-Arwing can claim a better performance. The craft was later revamped to include the new Micro Missile systems to directly counter the Venomian penchant for using such weapons, with an addition capacity for four BUL-13's versus the original one bomb capacity, but even it its original configuration, the Kukri was an effective multipurpose craft. Of note regarding the design was the modular configuration of its components, often resulting in varying shapes of craft based off of the original Kukri aerospace frame, made to meet the needs and preferences of operating squadrons throughout the Cornerian military."

-An excerpt from Grey's Aerospace Combat Craft, 6th Edition

KATINA
GST 03112216, 1500 HOURS

New Prospect was no longer a civilian installation. Heavy armor plating, originally meant for use on starships coming in for hull refits, now reinforced the central command pyramid. All around perimeter walls, turrets of various kinds lined them, on track systems where civilian trams used to ferry people about the base. The surface storage hangars lay empty, every last piece of material once stored in them, every spare fighter craft now lay below the reinforced surface. Not one foot soldier stood guard on the surface, only the passing wind, the low hum of the base power source beneath the ground, and the tracks of MBT-130 Landmasters rolling along the decks could keep Bill company here, atop the command center's roof, taking in the sight. No running lights were on during the day, and in the mid afternoon, the sun reflected oddly off of the surfaces.

Four days ago, he'd lead for the first time in what The Book called a Mid-Range Tactical Engagement. He'd seen combat before, against pirates, jackers, former military gone nutbar as mercenaries for the highest bidders, and they all had varying levels of organization and technology. He'd rarely, if ever had sustained any losses in his flights, and every flight leader at New Prospect could say the same. Eleven pilots dead in a single engagement. He couldn't even remember that many deaths over the course of an entire year at this duty station. When he first came on as a second in command, he'd always been told by the man he replaced that if he got waxed by some stinking pirate in the vac, he was certain to have been made fun of at his funeral to his parents. No pilot of that old cat's command was gonna take a bullet from a nobody know-nothing jacker with nothing to lose or gain.

It finally hit home that this was no longer the simple fight against simple and lesser-armed opponents, and that he didn't have as much say in who lived and who died, like his first CO had said.

Miyu hadn't said another word about Kibbles since they had packed away his belongings, no one really did. It was acknowledged that he was gone. On Patrol, the Navy would say. Non-Responsive to Comms, the Aerospace Force would say. Dead, dead, and ten others with him. They'd had plenty of time to reflect on the losses they'd inflicted and received. Plenty of time to clean out the quarters of the departed, leaving behind small boxes of personal items on the stripped mattresses of their beds. Six of them had been Miyu's. Bad luck, just their time. They had spoken to one another as they cleaned out the quarters, feigning ambivalence to the facts. Bill made a comment that shipping the personal effects back to the families would be difficult as things stood. Miyu agreed. She bought up how they could go out with the next civilian convoy. Bill reminded her that there were no more convoys to send. Those that had remained behind had almost entirely conscripted themselves to the defense force. She'd even joked about how that was inconsiderate of them, as she was sure Kibbles would have wanted his stuff sent back ASAP. They'd both laughed, empty sounding, their masks of leadership and indifference in place, Miyu's seemingly held together by the duct tape of Duty and Leadership.

The First Vangaurd now floated in orbit overhead, the bombardment they all expected to come did not. They wanted the base, the information they could garner. Prisoners. Katina was cutoff, with all her forms of communicating to the outside universe monitored and jammed since a day before now. They stayed up there, taunting the pilots, testing their resolve, trying to lure them up to an engagement out of the base's weaponry, out of range of the extensive defense net that extended for hundreds of kilometers around the fortress.

The last anyone had heard was that the situation on Corneria was improving, but the extent of which was not known. The previous night, small bursts of light could be seen in the stars above in the direction of Sector Y, following a series of confirmed BUL-13 detonations from the asteroid field hours beforehand. The war was continuing elsewhere. Here, it was on pause as Katina's defenders kept their eyes to the skies, watching as the First Vangaurd reinforced. Thousands of them, eleven of his own, efforts by all made worthless as inaction set in.

His watch buzzed, a small message scrolling across the display: IMMEDIATE: ALL PILOTS REPORT TO HANGAR. FULL LAUNCH ALL AVAILABLE CRAFT. CONFIRM LANDING OPERATION GRID POINT 234-2 BY 322-4. GROUND UNITS ENGAGED BY SPACEBORNE ARTILLERY OVER OUTPOST JERICHO. VOICE CONFIRMATION FOLLOWS.

Simultaneously, deck plates slid aside to reveal racks of anti-ship missiles, long range Nova Bomb racks, Landmasters roving to higher ground with fewer obstructions, their main guns pointed at the skies.

"Commander Styles, Bravo one one six three six five two seven nine nine." The feline paused, taking a deep breath. "The ground forces at Jericho confirm a Saucerer formation is moving in, we count nine. They're going to try for the defense nodes before moving in for the kill on New P. Estimate ten mikes to contact with them. We need to soften them up some before they get through to the bases. I am authorizing atmospheric use of BUL-13s. This is not a drill. Sector assignments: The 104th will have air defense priority over the southern and western quadrants. The 25th is assigned to the northern quadrant. Eastern quadrant is to be covered by the 87th."

Bill was already halfway to the hangar by the time the sector assignments were being given out.

The din was almost overwhelming, the usual sounds of pre-flight prep surrounding him. One bird was being pulled off of the line, Miyu shouting over the sound, asking for new canopy ejector pins. He passed the empty spot where Kibbles' fighter should have been. His gaze swept across the entire hangar, seeing where the 242nd should have been, seeing one of their pilots, now one of his, wearing his new and old squadron patches, staring at a picture of a small pup from back home for a moment before giving the thumbs up to the crew chief, the canopy sealing him in the coffin.

He got to his fighter, the first on the line for the 104th, and ran a hand along its hull, akin to a promise to a friend, a lover.

Then he was inside, a tech double-checking his bindings, doing a test on the ejector pins. It occurred to Bill how worthless those pins would be. The Venomians weren't about to take prisoners among these squadrons, not after the embarrassment suffered days before. Blood was in the proverbial water.

"Sir, you are good to go!" the amphibian tech announced, flashing him a thumbs up. Bill nodded, they exchanged a sharp salute, and the tech hopped back down the ladder, pulling it free. The canopy came down, and suddenly it was quiet save for the gentle hum of his engines.

"Husky team, Bulldog team, confirm green." His twenty-five men and women went down the line, green light, green light, green light, until finally it came to him once more. "Wardog Zero One, green light. All craft green. Control, Wardog Zero One confirms preflight complete, request permission to launch."

"New Prospect Command to Wardog Zero One, you are under our control. Hanger doors open in thirty seconds, you are first out the gate. Upon launch, form up and assume vector two seven zero, and stand by."

"Confirming. Lead to Pack, set to auto hover, prepare for ascent." Above everyone, the massive doors that sheltered this place from bombardment began to part the way, the sunset sky beckoning for them all. Once the doors were open entirely, the 104th began to lift away from the deck in pairs, Bill solo and last, watching them go. Clear of the hanger, their engines would ignite, and like a cannon shot they would be off. When he at last was in the air, the 87th below him and coming up for their sector assignment, he punched his throttle forward, following the rest. "Husky, we're taking the southern quad. Bulldog has the western."

"Leaves us a bit thin, Lead." Bulldog One said. Bill smiled thinly, having tuned his comms to transmit this to the rest of the pilots coming into the air.

"Wardog Zero One to Pack, we can do what aviators cannot. Confirm, 104th."

"You implying something, Grey?" Saru shot back.

"Lion Zero One to 104th, your Lead is an asshat, confirm."

"Protocol, Lynxara." Bill smiled.

"You hide behind protocol all the time, Wardog Zero One. See you on the ground." The 87th peeled off to their respective sector, the rapid fire sonic booms rippling across the skies, followed by the 25th behind him heading north.

"Lead to Packs." Bill checked his displays, intel dump coming from the tower. Frost up. Contacts are confirmed, we are open for business."

"Bit late in the afternoon for school to start." Bulldog Lead said with a chuckle.

KATINA ORBIT, VSS INDIGNATION
GST 03112216, 1510 HOURS

The Venomian admiral who'd replaced the previous one after the incident four days prior sat in his own Combat Information Center, brooding over a set of displays, wondering what his opposite number on the Cornerian side of things was up to at this very moment. He was taking a much more cautious approach with this assault than was arguably necessary, but if anything, his climb to this position had been possible because of his cautiousness, forced as it may have been at times. He'd waited for the reinforcements from Macbeth, where other lizards like himself may have charged on ahead without a second thought, and had made sure to stay well out of range of New Prospect's anti-ship weaponry if at all possible. Having spread his forces out in such a way that blockaded any civilian shipping out or onto the planet, it was only a matter of time before they crumbled. The stable geosynchronus orbit enabled free control of the skies, and he could hit any ground target he pleased with crushing firepower. A scorched earth campaign was not his objective, however.

The Plan called for repeated use of AISaucerers, targeting the defense towers that surrounded the extreme outskirts of the fortification, purposely putting high priority targets within easy reach of the defenders, sending craft in waves, taking potshots with the dorsal beam grid on the defense nodes for psychological effect. The AI fighters that would swarm from the air carriers wouldn't win the battle alone, but a constant deluge of them would eventually fray the lifeline that the Cornerian pilots represented. It was physically impossible for them to stop the destruction of the defense nodes. The real assault would come later, with a heavier Saucerer variant leading that charge, her bays holding actual manned fighter craft, and twenty thousand shock troops to land and take control of the base-city once the air cover was neutralized.

There was no real place to run. They could abandon the base and head for the mountains to play guerilla warfare, but that would still guarantee a Venomian ground base. From here, they could begin staging fleets, and try to salvage the situation on Corneria and the asteroid field. Sector Y had started to see heavier fighting, coinciding with the arrival of new reinforcements from the enemy homeworld. Intel tagged it as elements from the Sixth Home Defense Fleet, lead by a new fast attack ship that had not been seen by intelligence before hostilities opened.

The same ship had been over Corneria City when the siege there had been broken, and had been spotted in the field when a small wing of craft took out a series of asteroid crushers, eluding pursuit and breaking through to Fichina, where they were lost after engaging a retreating sapper unit and their mercenary guards, coming out victorious, subsequently reacquired ten minutes ago in Sector Y.

He brought up the partial scans and visuals of the ship in action, the scans of her fighters. Nothing matched. New equipment? Not fully in production, possibly experimental. It was Cornerian, and yet not. He'd seen what they had over Macbeth, seen the holos of his forces fighting the enemy on their homeworld. Nothing he'd seen matched these new anomalies that were working from zone to zone, in and out faster than his people were ready for. Intel confirmed four fighters, a possible fifth, but it had to be at the least a thirty craft wing for that sort of carnage, and it was still not within the realm of absurdity of it was a mere fifteen craft squad. The BUL-13 was something the Venomians had nothing like in their arsenal due to the lack of the rare materials required to produce them, and they were the most dangerous tactical warheads on either side short of nukes. He gazed at a star map, in thought.

Katina was a single gate jump from Sector Y. A datapad was in his hands a moment later, and he put out a hypersignal message to his fellow admiral in command of the Vangaurd there:

Admiral Kalnin, greetings from the First Vangaurd. I assume you are aware of the new type fast attack ship that's been raiding our frontline positions. I have been made aware they are in your region. If they break through, transmit a known vector my way. Best Regards, Admiral Rokel'shta.

He stared at the message a moment before hitting send. He was probably just being too paranoid, but this couldn't hurt. He called to his flight ops personnel and doubled the patrols around his fleet, and his gaze relaxed upon returning to the battle planet side.

NEW PROSPECT, KATINA, SOUTHERN DEFENSE QUADRANT
GST 03112216, 1542 HOURS

Turkey shoot was something that could be used to describe the fighting, but seeing as how there were Avian pilots in his unit, Bill decided against calling this out. The enemy was coming in dumb and fast, staying in formation even with the Cornerian fighters ripping through them. He double checked his squadron status window, and found no serious hits.

Too easy.

"Lion Zero One, Wardog Zero One. How's your end?"

"Not liking this at all, Bill. There's too many of them, but they're not overwhelming us just yet. We're breaking through to their Saucererwaitone-" She faded into static for a brief moment, an orange flash that matched her fur flaring up just before. Bill's mouth ran dry. She came back online. "Sorry, took a few hits portside. Command hasn't spotted any ground troops. Not liking this at all. Starting another run on a carrier." Her face winked away from his displays. There was a bright flash, followed by six more from the western quadrant, the thunderclap of multiple Nova's in the atmosphere rolling across the landscape. "Confirm! Lions have the first kill on a Saucerer! Hoo-ah!"

"We see it, good work Captain." Commander Styles broke into the general frequency.

"New contacts, heads up Ravens." Saru came in over the command net. "Got a situation developing in Northern Quadrant, new type of Saucerer, this one is much larger. Bays are opening…confirming ground units exiting! New Prospect North is being invaded!"

Bill strained to hear over the thunder of his own Nova joining three others from his team, a pair of Saucerer's coming apart at the seams, crumpling against the dry ground short of their targeted defense node. Things began to happen very fast. Two green lights representing teammates blinked red. Styles called for a collapse of all ground forces back to the Central Hub, the air wings were to provide air cover as needed. His threat receiver went off. He went ballistic, full booster climb, roll right, neck craned back, looking for the missle. Looking. Looking.

Five!

Chaff! Flares!

Hard left, cheeks and fur sagging heavily against him, his vision turning gray.

Roll over right, inverted immelman, the ground filling his vision for a moment, the sun in his eyes a brief moment, the craft rattling with the near misses.

He took the breath he strained for.

Two left.

Bulldog Lead called out a shot. There was a faint rumble, then a second, louder one as the sound caught up to him. The threat receiver winked out.

"Lead, tail is clear. Got your wing. Contacts, at our three sirbreakbreakincoming-"

Nose over, the edges of the world red, then gray again as he jinked under the laser fire, back up into an ascending roll, getting visuals on the targets. Bulldog Lead had mirrored him, coming in on the three craft formation from below. Bill fired the moment his lead reticle rested on a fighter. Miss. They split up. Grey followed the lead craft. The other two stuck close together, and he could picture the lizard or the ape in the fighter he chased out, wrenching his small airborne dart around while howling for his two subordinates to get on the guy who was on him. Bill's cannons barked a short request, the enemy replied by punching burners and knifing for the deck, Bill had anticipated, and the Venomian seemed to walk into the proverbial saw blade. One azure bolt punched through the cockpit. "Kill confirmed." he said, cringing slightly as the fighter tumbled away. Nasty way to go.

"Lesson learned, SIR." Bulldog Lead exulted, blasting his pair to shrapnel seconds later. He formed up next to Bill, and the pair made their way back to the center of the furball.

"104th, you are not falling back-" Styles began.

"104th is defensive, will comply as situation allows." Bill said about as evenly as he could while Bulldog Lead's fighter became a complex mass of twisted airframe and fire from a sudden barrage directly above. " Husky Unit! Bulldog Unit! Collapse back to Central ASAP!"

The central net was growing more chaotic, the ground forces chatter up north especially difficult to listen to.

"-line is breached, falling back to second perimeter-"

"-armor and infantry breaking through, requesting immediate air support! Ten-Five-One! Grid square November Charlie-"

"-medevac request, Squad Three, A Company sustaining critical casualties, is anyone on this-"

"-situation at second line unstable, command, requesting Nova drops, grid square November-"

"-down to three effectives, need immediate-"

Above it all, the 25th Ravens were the avenging angels for the faltering ground defenses, the first of the three squadrons to have managed a withdrawal to provide close in air support for both the central command hub and the ground units. In pairs or alone, members of the 25th came in low, often times barely between Landmasters as they raced in from friendly lines to the Venomian armor, introducing them to the same hell the Cornerians faced. For long minutes, the 25th fended off the combined air and ground assault with no other assistance, then were rejoined by the 87th. The 104th managed to rejoin the main defensive line after it had wrapped up its engagements with Venomian fighters, bagging the last AISaucerer before falling back to the line. For one hour the line held, a grinder rapidly developing between the two forces. Recovery of wounded from the first defensive line one kilometer out from the command hub, five hundred meters from the second line, was attempted and failed thrice. With as much confidence as could be mustered knowing there could have been friendly survivors in the area, Commander Styles ordered the first line be sanitized by a Nova bombardment.

It would not be the first time friendly forces, dead or otherwise, could not be recovered due to the circumstances of war.

KATINA ORBIT, VSS INDIGNATION
GST 03112216, 1650 HOURS

There was a phrase on Corneria regarding the sport of hunting. "You either get the game, or the game gets you." Admiral Rokel'shta of the First Vangaurd decided that for the moment, the game had gotten him. The resistance was incredibly fierce, but he'd been correct to lead the assault with AI fighters before putting his men in the direct line of fire. He'd been wrong to not expect the Cornerian use of Nova weaponry so close to their own base, but he did know he'd forced them to expend them early on his small armada of Trojan horses. The ground units had taken quite a pounding, but at the end of this exchange, his losses still did not match the Cornerian losses. All of the defense nodes had been abandoned hastily, leaving the central hub alone with its' defenders.

He did put in his now part-of-the-daily-routine request to Command to be given permission to just glass the little colony and set up more rudimentary encampments on the surface, which would have gone much faster, and he'd known for a fact that the majority of the base civilian population had evacuated in the days prior. This was taking much longer than it should have. Checking his datapad again for what seemed to be the hundredth time since the initial assault started, and found that there was a red flagged message blinking at him from the inbox.

MESSAGE 235-03112216 NOT RECEIVED, INTENDED SHIP NOT PRESENT AT COORDINATES SPECIFIED/NOT FOUND/DATABASE ERROR.

"I need a status update on the battle in sector Y." he barked to his aide. The lizard hurried off. Rokel'shta crossed his fingers together, a million new scenarios playing out in his head, the recordings of that new fast attack ship staring up at him from his desk quite suddenly.

NEW PROSPECT, KATINA
GST 03112216, 1700 HOURS

The bombardment had been fast, precise, lasting a single minute. The ground shook for that entire time, and after it finished, silence reigned over the field. The Venomian blitzkrieg broken, their hover tanks picked up ground troops as they reversed course, fleeing across open terrain under intense fire, contrails of anti-tank rockets, bursts of heavy plasma fire in their wake. The mother ship for the hostiles settled over one hundred fifty klicks away, for the moment her remaining fighters landing in waves and returning to the sky to fly defense in the event the Cornerians were hungry for pay back, which they weren't. For now, the 25th, least damaged of all the squadrons, remained in the sky, while the Lions and the Wardogs landed for rearm, repair, and rest.

Miyu did not leave her cockpit, wanting to be alone; the 87th was down to sixteen effective pilots, including their captain.

Bill counted his own losses while drenching his face with a bottle of water, taking a second and chugging it down as quickly as he could before climbing back into his craft. The 104th, with their twenty remaining craft, was to replace the 25th in the air alongside the 87th while Saru put her people down for repair and rearm. With Bulldog Lead KIA, he decided to take up that position, and made the appropriate configurations to his IFF. He tapped the all call button on his wristwatch, letting his people know that his IFF showed him as WDBULLDOG01. They all had five minutes before going back up. He watched as tech pulled free the twin beam cannons from his craft, replacing their barrels and capacitors before locking them back into place. Five people worked on one fighter so one pilot could fly and possibly buy a piece of it in said fighter that was worth more than the cost to train five hundred of those technicians. He smiled humorlessly, frosting up once more. Almost time to go. He looked back towards Miyu's craft from his own, found himself frowning.

"Wardog Zero One to Moping Zero One. Miyu, you alright?"

"Fine." No picture came through on his display.

"You're doing fine. You are."

"Grey…I don't wanna- I'm…honestly terrified going back up." She moved her hand from the camera in her fighter. She'd looked better, fur disheveled, exhausted from the hard flying, from the losses. Her eyes didn't quite look back at his. "…Tried to get in contact with the folks on Zoness…"

"I'm sure they're fine." Bill said. "I'm on the same page as you, Captain, believe me. I've got a father in the Orbital Defense Fleet over Corneria, probably wondering about his son about now. Haven't heard from him, but he's dad after all." He reached out towards a small photo of his father and himself, age six, at a playground, his now deceased mother having taken the picture.

"Grey…I think I'm-"

"Don't say this. Don't say what you want to say right now, not right now, not when we're back up in three minutes. Look at me." She didn't. "Look at me, right now, you wanna cry about this, you wanna punch your fists into the walls and break your wrists again? You can do all that, but right now we gotta be who we are. We're the Captains of fighter squadrons. We don't have time for this, not right now."

"What if they are really-"

"Don't think about them right now! Look at me, look at my face, Captain!" She finally did. "Repeat after me! I, a citizen of the Cornerian Alliance!"

"I, a citizen of the Cornerian Alliance, Bill, damnit, I'm-"

"-swear an oath of honorable service to the eighteen billion souls who cannot protect themselves, from threats foreign and domestic-"

"BILL! SHUT UP! I AM NOT SOME STUPID CONSCRIPT, I KNOW WHO I AM, I KNOW WHAT MY JOB IS, AND I KNOW THAT I AM A WOMAN, AND I KNOW I AM ALLOWED TO BE WORRIED ABOUT MY FAMILY, AND MY FRIENDS WHOM I HAVE WATCHED GET KILLED BECAUSE SOME STUPID APE BASTARD THOUGHT IT WOULD BE A REAL SWELL IDEA TO START SOME WAR BECAUSE HE WAS A LITTLE UPSET FER GETTING EXILED FROM THE HOME PLANET FOR LETTING SOME BIOWEAPONS LOOSE YEARS AGO, ALRIGHT!" If she had been strong enough, Bill was certain she would have torn through her restraints, reached through the private channel, and choked him. She sobbed once, then started to settle back down, one deep breath at a time.

"Feeling better?"

"You go to hell."

"Good."

"I really hate you, you freakin' mutt."

"Dogs and cats working together to solve psychological breakdowns, what ever will come next?"

"You know what? You know what?" She nearly roared, starting to unbuckle herself from the seat. "I'm going to come over there RIGHT NOW."

"Launch in two minutes, Captain Lynxara, better get ready." She looked at him almost incredulous.

"Did you major in Pissing Me Off before joining flight school or what?"

"Miyu. Keep your eyes in front of you. You've got family back home, we all do. But you do have people here right now who need you to be the Captain. You need to cover my wing, understand?" She looked away, and Bill chuckled. "Lion Zero One, copy?"

"Roger. Bill?"

"Yeah yeah, don't die. Did you want dramatic music too or what?" Wardog Zero One began idling the engines on his craft.

"I'm going to hurt you, I haven't decided how."

"Woof." He bared his fangs before cutting the link. "Awright Wardogs, finish your preflights, and get ready. We're up in one minute."

NEW PROSPECT NORTHERN DEFENSE AIRSPACE, RAVEN-ZERO-ONE
GST 03112216, 1701 HOURS

"Raven Zero One, RTB for rearm and repair." The ATC tech sounded young to Captain Saru, but the joke went that most people did. Nearly thirty-five standard years of age, Denise Saru, Captain of the 25th ASTF Ravens, was the eldest pilot on the base. She never got angry over the grandmother jokes, letting her skills in the skies do the talking. Taking another glance at the skies and at her sensor displays, she nodded to herself with some satisfaction; Clear, for the moment.

"Roger that New Prospect, will RTB once we've been relieved by the 87th and the 104th. Hear that kids? If you need new cannon capacitors, bombs, sharp sticks, RTB as soon as we get our back up. The rest of us will remain on patrol." The usual smattering of 'Yes Mom' filler her helmet speakers, sixteen pilots were going to hit dirt for their necessities, which surprised her. She still had twenty-eight craft up, and this too surprised her. The 242nd had been nearly annihilated, the survivors disseminated into the 104th, and now they were back down to twenty. The 87th had fared no better, down to sixteen of thirty.

When she was younger, she might have attributed this to raw skill on the part of her people, but she knew she'd been fortunate with the way the week had played out for the 25th. Her eyes went back to the sensors. Bill would have said she was as jittery as any hare was usually.

"Raven Zero One, reinforcements inbound in two minutes. How you holding up, Saru?"

"Was just thinking about you, Wardog. I've got a little over half my flight setting down for repairs. Good to have you back up here."

"Headed in yourself?"

"I'll go in last." She looked to the north. From her vantage point, a thousand meters over the base, she could see the Saucerer, no longer on the ground. Like a guillotine pointed at them all. The way the afternoon sun lit up the cloud of fighters surrounding it was pretty in its own way. Another fighter blocked off the view, Bill saluting her from it. She wearily returned the gesture. "It's awful nice up here."

"How long do you think we have, Saru?" Bill asked abruptly.

"If we really intend to hold New Prospect, we're not lasting beyond nightfall." She shrugged. "I suppose though, we've nowhere to run. The planet is blockaded. They know where we can go. If they really want, they could just glass the colony and move on. They want the base. It's about making a statement."

"Get down to the deck for some repairs. You're very reassuring, by the way." Bill coughed.

"I'm a realist." That was when her plane wrenched hard to the right, away from Bill's craft, and she could smell smoke in the cockpit, feeling her gut tighten as her fighter staggered, then dropped towards the ground.

"Captain Saru!" Bill dove after the suddenly stricken craft.

Displays flashed the bad news to her right then and there. She'd taken a few hits during her strafing runs on the Venomian troops, but nothing that had taken her out immediately. Her left wing was gone, part of the fuselage with it. Her engine indicator was blinking red, which was bad. She had no response to any control surfaces or thrusters, meaning her reactor had scrammed and ejected itself free of the craft. The fighter was a loss, and she knew it. She pulled her ejection lever. Nothing. Part of her was angry. Where were the warnings? Everything had been fine, this wasn't fair.

Bill followed the ruined ship for a few moments, relieved that Saru was still alive. From what he could tell, she'd taken a round or two close to the reactor, and it had finally gone critical.

"Eject Captain, I've got you." His voice came in over the speakers.

"Gonna to hafta jump out myself, my pod is busted." She said, working her straps quickly, not even sure if she had much time left, unable to tell if Bill could hear her. With her body free of the straps, she raised her legs up as best she could, and kicked at the canopy. Not a single budge. Again, and again. The third time succeeded, the canopy bursting open, the actual charges designed to pop it in the even of such an emergency finally going off. She felt a sharp pain all around her, and could see flame, honest to goodness flame around her. Her legs seemed to feel nothing, but she knew she could still kick away from the wreck. She did, and could see again, her arms reaching towards Bill's craft.

Everything went dark.

NEW PROSPECT KATINA, COMMAND CENTER
GST 03112216, 1703 HOURS

"Situation in the air, Raven Zero One has dropped from the scopes."

"Reacquire."

"Negative response. Last transmission indicates a reactor failure!"

"Get SAR up."

"Command, Wardog Zero One! Captain Saru is down! Condition unknown! I've got her and am bringing her in now!"

"SAR is en route, Captain Grey, hold position."

"Negative! That is a negative, am bringing her in now! Need surgeons on standby!"

The Command Center suddenly got a lot busier.

Author's Note: I've been working pretty hard at my store recently, so this update and edits done during it were delayed MANY times. I did get a review that essentially got me to continue writing this, and I do thank that individual for it :) I would appreciate more feedback if at all possible. Again, I hope you enjoy it.