Steven moved quietly - well, as quietly as a giant mech can move - through the trees. They'd completed every raid so far without a hitch, but he was starting to have a gut feeling that this last one wasn't going to be fun. Their last target was a large mech depot, with perhaps two trinaries of mechs kept in it. The Falcons had the advantage of numbers, which was only slightly mitigated by their possible element of surprise. And this mission was going to be hard. They not only had to do some damage to their opponents, but they also had to provide a distraction for their techs to plant the charges and refrain from doing too much damage before breaking off the battle and making a successful escape without allowing their enemies to track them down. It was a tall order, and Steven was wondering if he'd bit off more than he could chew. But there was no going back now. "Alright, people, it's do or die. Let's get cracking."
"Did you have to mention dying?" Franz complained.

Steven marked the beginning of the attack with a shot from his gauss, striking a Marauder in the head and toppling it in front of one the hangars. Watching from his hilltop position, Steven was pleased to see his team advancing in perfect coordination towards their objectives. Vidia's weaponry was better at close-in fighting, so Steven had put her in the group moving into the fortification, while he and Ethan would provide fire support for her and the others. So far, things were looking good, but in an operation this complex, it couldn't last. Already a star of Shadowcats was moving on them, and Steven replied by firing into one of them, crumpling the leg and causing it to stumble. Ethan chimed in with his PPC, blasting one of the hostiles in the back. Turning to face its assailant, the mech gave Steven a perfect shot, the slug ripping through the armor and shattering the gyro, dropping the mech like a wilting flower. Steven fired his rifle again, damaging the rifle on one of the cats before it went up in flames from a barrage of PPC fire from James' Rifleman and a smack from Franz's hatchet. Steven fired into his first target's leg again, this time breaking the joint and snapping the leg in half. The other mech was short work when coming under fire from the entire team, but the other bays were starting to open. Steven started sweating. How are we supposed to fight an enemy force almost ten times our size? He only hoped that the techs could plant those charges before it was too late.

A star of Cougars tried to get in behind their opponents, but Steven mowed the unsuspecting pilots into the dirt before they could do any real damage, though they did manage to get in seven or eight hits before going down. They'd been fighting for fifteen minutes now, and things were starting to get hot. The other pilots had been pushed back towards the edge of the compound, and Ethan had relocated to keep a bead on their targets, but there were just too many. Most of them were heavy or assault mechs, and the team had had to use every trick in the book to avoid being turned into scrap metal by them. Franz's Hatchetman had already been lost when it got blasted by a pair of Marauders, but he had been picked up by Kat before being captured. But Kat's Griffin was starting to look like a piece of swiss cheese, and James Rifleman had lost its left arm and looked about the same as the Griffin. Kiva was the only one without a scratch, but that was because she was staying behind Steven, since she would be little use anyway in such a heated fight. The only good thing was that they could move fast enough to outpace the enemy mechs and avoid being tracked. But that was only once the charges were placed. Damn! What's taking so long? Suddenly, Steven's comm crackled to life. "We've set the eggs and we're in the green, cap. Break off any time you like." Finally. "Alright, folks, the eggs have been laid! Let's scramble our tails outta this hot zone!" Steven continued to fire his weapons while the other team members started to get themselves out of the compound, but it was going to be close. Suddenly, a fireball near the edge of the base caught Steven's eye. "Cap! Fairy's down, we can't get to her. Enemy's closing on her fast!" Steven simply kicked the Osprey into a run and started moving towards Vidia's mangled Thunder Fox. A Marauder trying to close in got a taste of nickel in the face, toppling on its back and blocking its comrades line of fire for a few precious moments. Steven immediately stopped the Osprey and got it as low to the ground as he could. Vidia had managed to climb from the cockpit of her mech, now a burning hulk of twisted metal, and started clambering up towards Steven. He could see that even though she was alive, she was injured badly. As she got closer, he could see her body had burned from the explosion and that she was in pain simply from moving. She dropped into the rumble seat as Steven sealed the hatch, As she strapped herself into the harness, Steven bounded up and away from the wreck, leaving a trail of energy bolts to slice into the ground he had just barely vacated. Dashing out into the open, he checked his sensor display and was relieved to see the rest of the team already moving for home. "Kiva, get moving fast as you can and let the medics know that we've got a casualty requiring immediate attention. Let's move people, we've got an appointment in space to keep and we don't want to miss it." Steven glanced at Vidia, who smiled wanly at him, then started pushing the Osprey as fast as he dared.