AN: Oh, there's a lot of cursing in here, not that it should come as a surprise. I've gotten the idea from toying around with an M-rated fanfiction I was working on (rated M, because I actually attempt to have all the original warriors killed by a mass murderer, with all the nice, gory details put in).
Thanks guys, for making this my fourth highest fanfiction, in terms of views (ASOUA leads the pack with 888 views, with ARMA and Code: Apocalypse following with a difference of less than 20 views! I might not retire from writing after all…
I'm going to write more scenes for the actual CL characters instead of the OCs here, since I kind of diverted attention from them in my past chapters. …Why do I feel like I'm doing the wrong thing by saying the American military alphabet instead of the French one (ex: Delta, Alfa, Foxtrot, Sierra, etc.)?
Code: Ascension Chapter 9- Clip the Wings
December 23, 2020
17:32
"Fuck!" David screamed as he watched his missile fire streak by the Dragon that was tailing him for the past five minutes. "Piece of shit won't give me five fucking minutes to relax!"
"No shit, Sherlock!" Melissa Erickson snapped back as she slammed her palm down onto the panel to activate the missile targeting system. "What the hell did you expect when the military dragged your pretty ass here?"
A blue panel appeared in front of Melissa with a red panning indicator that brightly flashed and sent rapid beeping sounds throughout the cabin, indicating that it finally locked on an enemy target.
"Fuck off" she muttered to the monster as she flipped open the lid on a panel, revealing a small green button. "Bitches go boom, baby!" she exclaimed as she pressed the button; the panel flashed red as the missile armed itself and detached from the fighter jet.
A missile streaked through the air, pursuing its target relentlessly as the latter attempted to escape its impending doom. The Flying Manta screeched in agony as the missile collided with the black Eye-of-XANA on its back before shattering into a thousand pieces in a fiery explosion of light and sound. Melissa smirked in triumph before returning to battle, noticing a familiar face as a fellow pilot navigated his plane into a series of barrel rolls to avoid laser fire.
Nodding in acknowledgement, Melissa sped away from him in the opposite direction, unleashing machine-gun fire at random enemy targets.
"Alright, you're dead; who's next?" she taunted, nosing her plane upward to assist a fellow soldier.
Smirking as she took down a string of exploding hornets without suffering critical damage, Melissa fearlessly glared at an oncoming monster.
[Page Break]
18:03
Corporal Winters looked through the Plexiglas windshield, smirking as he saw that he was directly flying above one of the mentioned targets from approximately two weeks ago that the squadrons had failed to bomb. Nodding to his copilot, the latter relayed a short message to following aircraft in an attempt to bomb XANA's fuel lines.
In truth, Joseph could care less if the bombs hit the target, as long as they hit something that would at least impede XANA's progress. Since hitting the exact target was too much of a hassle, Joseph prided himself on bombing targets that were essential to the original targets, much like fuel lines leading to XANA's power source instead of striking the power source itself.
"We're gonna have fun with this thing!" Joseph declared, watching the green dots on his radar grow close to his location, but frowning slightly when he saw red triangles following his allies. "Are you fucking insane!" he shouted, nosing his plane towards the ground. "Who… the fuck… invited these bastards… to the freaking party?"
"Airman, identify yourself now. This is Delta Foxtrot Alfa niner-niner."
"This is Corporal Joseph Winters," he replied, fiddling with the controls. "Bomb bay doors open!" he shouted to his copilot, who worked furiously on calling up defense mechanisms to divert the monsters' attention and release the bombs.
Joseph snarled as laser fire forced him to divert from his intended path and concentrate only on staying in the air as long as he can. Joseph's copilot silently released the bombs; the mechanisms holding in place allowing gravity to take its course. The fighter jets following behind Joseph released their bombs as they swerved to avoid contact with unwanted damage.
"Did we hit it?" one of the younger airmen inquired as she activated the rear defense mechanisms. "Did the bombs destroy it?"
"I don't know. I was getting bounced up and down due to enemy fire." The senior airman responded through the radio patch. "I didn't see a damn thing"
"What bombs?" Corporal Winters asked, whose sole focus was staying alive.
"What target?" added his copilot, too busy dealing with the damage indicators that were flashing wildly with red lights.
"Oh, well. What the hell" the senior airman grumbled, giving a short glance towards Colonel Sheppard's fighter jet as the latter easily nailed the target with a Phoenix missile, sending a plume of fire and black smoke into the sky. "Pretty damn impressive"
[Page Break]
18:29
Aelita could hardly contain her frustration as one particularly troublesome Hunter tailed her, continually unleashing weapon fire in her direction to keep her distracted. Although it was a relatively small monster, only coming up to slightly less than two feet in height, it made up for the lack of defense by using its agility to coyly dodge the projectiles launched at it. The dark blue metal made it almost impossible to detect if pilots had to rely on their sight only, but thankfully, navigational and detection systems had improved enough to have a backup installed as a backup to the backup for the primary detection systems. This triple navi-detect system served as a tool that was treasured by pilots seeking precision to the nearest hundred thousandths of a degree.
Quietly analyzing the situation, she determined that the only weakness the Hunter had was that since it was small, it could not follow a faster aerial object or coordinate with it efficiently, thereby making it an easy target if she managed to confound it for a few seconds. A sly smile played upon her lips as she relayed to Jeremie a set of instructions, all in a secret code only known between them. Jeremie, upon hearing the coded algorithm, flew directly below the Hunter. Aelita rocketed upwards and proceeded to perform a series of complex aerial maneuvers to distract the Hunter from Jeremie's oncoming attack.
A bright beam of purple light emanated from Jeremie's plane and slammed into the Hunter, causing it to loudly shriek and write in pain. The force was too great- the aura fired from Jeremie's plane knocked the monster back a few feet and held the Hunter in place as Aelita climbed several hundred feet in preparation for a dive. The Hunter screeched angrily and slashed with its wings in Jeremie's direction, howling in frustration that the purple aura was crippling it and weakening its defenses by slowly dismantling it piece by piece.
A glint of metal flashed from above, and suddenly Aelita was streaking towards Jeremie's direction in what appeared to be a suicidal move. A flick of her wrists was all it took to change what the apparent fate would turn out to be- her plane rammed into the Hunter dead on, causing metal parts to fly in every direction. Aelita smirked at the Hunter's last echoing cries of pain crackling through the monster's speaker system before varnishing a toothy smile towards Jeremie.
"Do you see why I chose the option to have extra fortification on the front of my plane?" Aelita teasingly asked Jeremie as she pulled up and flew beside him.
"So you can scare me half to death?" Jeremie replied, his heart still pounding from the near miss from what would have resulted in a fatal collision.
"Now why would I do that?" Aelita innocently asked before giving a nervous laugh and destroying an Assassin with a short burst of fire.
Jeremie allowed himself a small smile at Aelita's antics before turning his attention to his assigned target. Looking up through the windshield, he could see a colossal group of buildings coming into view. The dark, sinister shapes contrasted against the near-blinding lights provided by the explosions made by missiles striking against XANA's minions, seemingly giving off an ominous aura to those who looked upon it.
"Damn it all to hell!" he distantly heard a fellow pilot shout, though he wasn't paying too much attention on what was happening around him.
He was drawn to the centermost building, a small speck of metal attracted to a gigantic magnet that was unarguably the center of Jeremie's attention. His breathing hitched as he saw a long, tube like structure extending from one of the buildings. Grooves ran across the polished silver metal, pulsing bright red with energy. On the structure were hundreds, maybe thousands of worker drones, single-mindedly performing the only task they were appointed with doing- maintain and continue the construction of the energy cannon and defend it against any potential attackers.
One of the beings looked up, its lens immediately focusing on Jeremie's plane. A series of clicks and whirs were all it took to convey a warning message to its fellow robots. Like the game of telephone, the message ran through the group of monsters until it reached a group of tarantulas positioned there for Anti-Aerial attacks.
Roaring loudly in preparation for battle, the Tarantulas opened fire on Jeremie's ship, forcing Jeremie to execute a series of evasive maneuvers to avoid getting shot out of the air at point-blank range.
"Oh, crap!" Jeremie shouted, swerving to the left as he saw a group of approaching dark-colored Flying Mantas. "I need Winged Avenger here, right now!"
"Ready" was the response from the aforementioned pilot.
"I need an airstrike now!" Jeremie shouted, performing a hairpin swerve to attempt to shake the Flying Manta from his tail.
"Give me your damn coordinates!" Avenger yelled back.
"Then give me a fucking minute!" Jeremie uncharacteristically replied, frustrated at the lack of progress made.
Jeremie swiped his hand on the electronic panel on his dashboard, before slamming his palm onto its surface. The panel beeped in recognition and sent an encrypted stream of data into the air, which could only be recognized and decoded by the Regiment's aerial force.
Avenger soared through the sky a little above Mach 1, using the extra clips on his primary weapon to blast through monsters attempting to interfere with his mission.
"Get out of my damn way!" he roared.
A small beep diverted his attention momentarily to the cockpit controls. Fingers dancing over the controls, he easily decoded the message and read over the coordinates before quickly plugging them into his navigational systems and calculating the distance between them.
"AAAAAAAAAHHHH!" he yelled, partly because of the wild exhilaration he felt from the simple task of blowing enemies up, as if it were a virtual reality game.
Avenger shot through billowing clouds of smoke caused by downed planes and monsters, momentarily causing his engines to stop functioning.* Avenger's plane drifted for a few seconds before rumbles shook through the fuselage. A burst of fire shot out of the exhaust hole before the engines roared into life once more, launching the pilot through the chaos.
Zooming over the battle scene, Avenger could see the darting figure of Jeremie's plane weaving through the battle, desperately trying to evade Anti-aircraft fire from both the Flying Mantas and the Tarantulas assigned as ground support.
"Belpois, I need you and you other rookies to haul ass and get yourself out of my firing range" Avenger instructed, preparing his assault.
"Where isn't your firing range?" Jeremie shouted back, loudly crying out in surprise as a laser slamming into his plane, burning off part of the stabilizers on his plane's tail.
"Just get out of here" Avenger snapped tiredly, rocketing upwards until he reached an altitude of about forty five thousand feet. "You're carrying a ton of explosives, and I would really hate it if you get blown up; it would be too messy"
Jeremie nodded his head and complied with his orders, temporarily leaving the target's area to assist Aelita in fending off the barrage of fire from the supporting Tarantulas strewn across the battlefield.
"Cripes" Jeremie remarked, executing a barrel roll while using his machine guns to return fire at his 'fan club'. "This would be so much easier if we were doing this over water. That way, we could have naval support, and there would be a chance of survival if we were hurtling to the ground"
"I know" Aelita replied through gritted teeth, rapidly going through the various damage indications piling up on her dashboard panel.
Avenger streaked downwards towards the swarm of monsters, rapidly executing barrel rolls to increase his momentum.
"Eat this!" he shouted, slamming his palm down on the light blue panel mere inches from him.
Instantly, the metal coverings on his wings slid back to reveal an impressive display of arsenal. Red crosshairs flashed onto the screen as the computer systems instantly detected enemy combatants, sending a signal to arm the missiles in preparation for launch at the same time. All ten missiles launched simultaneously, slamming into the monsters without fail. Flames and shrapnel shot from all directions as the missiles fragmented to exact maximum damage towards the targeted monsters, as well as any surrounding monsters. Black smoke obscured vision for all pilots in the surrounding area.
"YEAH!" Jeremie shouted, now piloting his plane towards the original target once more.
His celebration was short-lived, however. A Dragon, infuriated with his constant meddling in XANA's affairs, slammed into Jeremie's plane, using its front claws to tear into the metal and cling on. The acid green metal glinted with a malicious glow as the Dragon slammed its head onto the Plexiglas windshield of Jeremie's plane, leveling its yellow and black 'eyes' with Jeremie's.
"Shit" was all Jeremie managed to say before the Dragon uttered another ear splitting roar before beginning to wrap its slender body around Jeremie's plane.
Annoyed, Jeremie began barrel rolling and executing unpredictable moves in an attempt to buck the unruly monster off. Undaunted, the Dragon merely roared once more and wrapped itself around the plane tighter, causing metal parts to break off.
"I hope that you like it hot, because you're going to hell!" Jeremie shouted, roughly pushing the controls downwards towards the energy cannon.
The Dragon opened its mouth in response, and, believing that the monster was going to attempt making him deaf again, Jeremie instinctively covered his ears. Instead of roaring, however, yellow energy began to be sucked in towards the energy cannon built into its mouth, preparing a devastating blast to Jeremie.
Jeremie's face paled upon looking at the impending attack, and mentally ran through his list of what to do in this kind of situation. Finding none, Jeremie's eyes darted around the cockpit, growing nervous as he heard the sounds of crunching metal increase both in frequency and in volume.
"AELITA!" he screamed before he slammed his palm onto the panel; his plane slammed into the energy cannon mere moments later, sending a small plume of fire and smoke into the air.
The Dragon, although having survived the shot, made the fatal mistake of releasing its pent-up energy on the remains of Jeremie's ship. A devastating blast rang through the area as a series of chain reactions occurred- the explosives that were detonated by the Dragon's energy blast exploded at the base of the energy cannon, immediately weakening the structural supports. With a mighty groan, the energy cannon lurched forwards and slammed onto the ground, sending a large plume of dust into the air.
[Page Break]
19:27
"AELITA!" Jeremie screamed, instantly attracting the attention of the aforementioned pink-haired female.
"JEREMIE!" she shouted, instinctively rocketing her plane towards Jeremie's last known location.
She easily spotted the large serpentine monster with Jeremie's ship within its clutches falling towards the energy canon that had been the source of their worries for the past few weeks. Aelita's apprehension grew as she saw her husband eject from the cockpit, but had not activated his parachute. That's when she saw that he had been somehow knocked unconscious during the fray, whether it was due to his inability to breathe the air at 5,000 feet above sea level, or if he had been knocked unconscious due to parts collapsing as his plane was crushed around him.
She hardly noticed anything else as she piloted her plane towards Jeremie's body, wishing that she could do something about the situation rather than attempt to go under Jeremie's body and hope that he would slam onto her plane in the rather clichéd underbody scoop. Laser fire slammed into her plane, which sent warning signals to shrilly beep throughout her cockpit.
"Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!" Aelita screamed, trying and failing to focus on her unconscious husband and the pursuing monsters at the same time.
Flames enveloped her already battle damaged plane as the continuous laser fire scored hits on her combat plane. She panicked as she heard the sound of sizzling metal being vaporized by the laser blasts, causing her to be so stressed that she failed to notice a faint white aura surrounding her body. She hoped that she was doing the right thing as she struggled to stay alive. With one foot, she kicked at the lever that would eject her seat from the slowly dismantling plane.
The rush of cold wind at roughly six hundred miles per hour forced all air from her lungs. Gasping for breath, she clawed at the seatbelts strapping her to her seat. Her successful efforts to free herself, however, sapped her strength, and she could only scream as she free fell down to the earth.
"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Aelita screamed reaching upwards as if the air would suddenly support her. Faced with this predicament, she was completely unaware of the white aura flicking around her before surrounding her body with an intense white glow.
[Page Break]
19:34
"AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!" Aelita screamed in agony, feeling the bulge on her back grow larger.
The pain was almost enough to force Aelita to shed several tears of pain. Before she knew what was going on, her wings ripped through the back of her uniform, the remnants of the two belts formerly used to restrain her wings snapping into fragments and falling uselessly around her.
Feeling her strength renewed as the white flame enveloped her, Aelita flew downwards, completely enveloped in the white light that made it impossible for humans and machines alike to look in her direction. As the blinding light dimmed, Aelita was still surrounded by the white flame-like light, though it was possible to see her in the center of the mystical light. By this time, her hair had changed to a pure white color, and her Sapphire eyes were blazing with anger- her true form had been activated.
A laser nearly clipped a wing; Aelita snarled in anger an shot a beam of pure white energy at the attacker before turning back to her target, not caring if the blast had actually hit or not. A loud explosion two hundred feet above seemed to confirm that, though.
By the time Aelita reached the limp form of her husband, they were less than seven hundred feet from the ground. She quickly snatched Jeremie's body and held it possessively close to her chest. Spreading her wings, she jammed them in an effort to slow their rapid descent to the ground. The strain on both her wings and her back, however, convinced her that the gesture wasn't helping matters at all, and that she had to take different approach to landing safely.
Nervous, Aelita started shaking in fear as she saw the ground rapidly rise towards them. Quickly making up her mind, Aelita allowed her wings to marginally spread outwards at an angle, allowing her to lose thrust and gain drag at a moderate pace. Aelita sighed in relief that they weren't going to be as flat as pancakes anytime soon, but was disappointed to learn that due to her actions, they were glided towards a rocky outcropping.
Flapping her wings several times despite the ache due to the extra weight of Jeremie's body and the almost unbearable strain created due to her fierce will to live, Aelita regained enough altitude to avoid smashing face-first into an extremely solid object. Exhausted despite the health and energy boost of her true form, Aelita started to unintentionally drift into the ground. Before she knew it, one of her feet grazed the ground, and Aelita shrieked as she was catapulted forward.
Both Aelita and Jeremie tumbled onto the ground, sending up a plume of dust and scraping their exposed hands on their face and around their hands. With a groan of pain, Aelita's body landed on one of her wings sometime during the fall, which made her let go of Jeremie. Both Aelita and Jeremie's bodies skidded on the desert ground, causing more damage to be inflicted to both of them.
Coughing as the foreign particles invaded her airways and her exertion finally took its toll on her body, Aelita struggled for breath before finally gasping in relief when she was able to do so. Crawling over to Jeremie's body once she had skidded to a stop, Aelita worriedly pressed two fingers to the side of his neck, feeling slightly relieved when she felt a small, barely recognizable pulse. ** Quickly squatting beside him, Aelita began a slightly modified version of CPR, unfailingly delivering thrusts to Jeremie's chest. ***
After about forty seconds however, Aelita began to grow worried even more as Jeremie failed to regain consciousness. Still, she kept the chest thrusts going, refusing to believe that he was truly going to perish. Snatching his head in her hands, she tilted his head back at a slight angle before pressing her lips against his, she blew life giving air into his body before pulling away and administering another breath.
Panting in disbelief at the lack of effects, Aelita quickly set him onto the ground and began chest thrusts again.
"Jeremie… no… please wake up… please…" Aelita moaned, feeling wetness collecting around the sides of her eyes as she continued to perform CPR. "Jeremie… Jeremie… JEREMIE MICHAEL BELPOIS, gosh fucking damn it! WAKE UP!" she screamed, sending a stinging slap across Jeremie's face.
Still, his body refused to move, and Aelita, believing that he was truly gone, let the tears slide down on her cheeks and splash onto his face. Freely sobbing in anguish, she felt her knees give way and collapsed onto Jeremie, burying her head on his shoulder. Too depressed in her anguish, she did not realize that Jeremie had just inhaled deeply, nor see his tired Sapphire-colored eyes fluttering open half way to see a pink-colored mass of hair shoved in front of his face. He winced in pain as his cheek still stung with the force of Aelita's slap, but found that he could not move his arms, as they were throbbing with pain.
They lay that way for a few moments, Aelita too wrapped up in her pain to recognize Jeremie's obvious presence of life and Jeremie was too tired and bruised to move at the moment. Aelita, deciding start to dig a grave to bury her husband in instead of just lying around and becoming a potential target for either falling wreckage or monsters, was surprised when two hands weakly grasped her and pulled her down, cradling her form on his chest.
"Looks like you owe me one this time" Jeremie lightly chuckled before being interrupted by a series of coughs forcing their way through his respiratory system. He wheezed in agony from his sustained injuries, and did not say or do anything more than breathe.
"Yeah…" Aelita lightly smiled as she watched her husband slowly recover and crack his bones as he stretched to remove himself of the discomfort of being stiff from sitting in a plane for a few hours. "I guess that's one off the list of the times that you rescued me… At this rate, I'll never be able to repay for all the times you saved me!"
"Don't worry about it for now, Aelita" Jeremie replied, closing his eyes as the tendrils of sleep wrapped around him. "Just rest… you've done enough for today."
Aelita gingerly curled up into a small ball, careful not to directly be on top of his chest while his body was recovering. Jeremie gave a small smile as he curled up beside her and fell into the darkness of sleep. As both of their breathing became synchronized, fighter jets and fighter-bombers alike distantly roared above them, all singing the song of triumph over the enemy.
Author's Note: * The mentioned incident here actually happened once on a commercial plane about 30 years (I don't remember the exact date) ago- the plane that Captain Moody flew went through volcanic ash that was spewed into the air by a recent eruption. Though the four engines stalled, one of the engines was able to function properly again, and so there were no casualties as a result of that problem.
** It's cartoon physics. I'm pretty sure that in real life, nobody could survive that fall or manage to slow their descent that fast (but then again, Aelita does have ten times the normal healthy human endurance level of her peers when in her true form). It's like Wile E. Coyote falling down a two thousand foot fall from a cliff.
*** I recently read in Reader's Digest that it was more efficient to keep on giving chest thrusts without stopping, because pausing to breathe air into the victim takes away precious time that could decide life or death.
Here's a fun fact- the Concorde, the world's first supersonic jet was retired due to the horrific costs of operation. Everyone knows gas prices are always high, and jet fuel is no exception. When you reach the speed needed to break the sound barrier, or go over it, fuel use increases exponentially for the plane. Because of this, planes today actually travel slower than they did 30 years ago!
One gallon of jet fuel weighs 6.7 pounds. Although it takes roughly 6,000 gallons of fuel for a Boeing 757 to travel from New York to California, it's actually more fuel efficient than a Hummer, if you crunch in the calculations for the gallons-per seat-per mile.