USS Firestorm


Takeshi watched on the viewscreen as the wormhole effect collapsed, depositing them in another universe. "Well, another day, another universe. Here's hoping we aren't dealing with alien invasions threatening all of humanity this time."

"Ra Cailum actual is scanning… nothing to report. We're clear."

"Thank you, God."

While Takeshi had fun flying the ship, it was a part-time job. For one, single reason.

Paperwork. While the Pinkertons were good at dealing with the bureaucratic bullshit fast, Takeshi, despite being married to Luna, Ron's stepsister, was not. He pawned 70% of his paperwork off to Ron on the Ra Cailum; bastard dealt with it in a matter of minutes.

Here? He had to do ALL of it. Rubberstamping could be done by any idiot, but there were forms needing ID: fingerprints, retinal scan, even samples of blood for extreme situations.

And that was 80% of all of the paperwork.

Takeshi wasn't normally one to take too much stock in the supernatural (aside from the perennial pain-in-the-ass that was Q), but he seriously believed that paperwork was a demon from the deepest, fiery pits of hell. He'd much rather be training, flying, or spending time with his family.

And so, he stayed on the Ra Cailum most of the time, only coming to the Firestorm when needed.

When they got back to their universe, or even just made contact, perhaps he could make a deal to have the arrangement made permanent.

Wasn't going to be easy. Still, things change.

Speaking of which… "So, when is someone going to tell Ron that he has a problem?"

"What problem?"

"You know damn well, Takeshi. He's in command of six ships, one of which is a superdreadnought."

Oh, that.

Ron had been passed over for promotion, as he wanted nothing to do with the admiralty. His grandfather was a rear admiral, but he died at Wolf 359. Explained why he refused the orders, plus he liked to piss off Jellico.

But he was in command of a small fleet now, likely to be growing. There was no way he was going to be able to stay just a simple Captain.


Raven Branwen could not help but flinch every time she saw Summer and Yang.

Guilt was a powerful emotion, as she couldn't shake it, even with two decades of trying with Larcei.

She was a horrible mother. Pinkerton was right to hate her.

And she was reminded of it every time she saw Summer with their daughter. It took all her willpower not to turn and run whenever she saw them together, or even just Yang on her own, and sometimes even that wasn't enough to stop her.

What DID stop her was a greater fear.

If she feared motherhood, then she feared Ronald Pinkerton more. If she tried to flee from this, he would hunt her down and no amount of respect for Taiyang or her family would stop him from taking her head and sticking it on a pike.

He had so many ways to make sure of that.

Still, there were times when she just had to be by herself, when the guilt just overwhelmed her and all she could do was find a quiet corner and cry, always making sure no one could see her in such a vulnerable state.

She was sure Pinkerton always had eyes on her, enjoying those moments of weakness.

Raven left their quarters, heading for the unused holodecks. No one used them for some reason. Upon entry, she activated a program that mimicked their home back on Patch.

"Hi, Mommy!"

And tried to escape her failure.

"Hey, Yang."

From another person's view, it would be stupid to try and live the thing she had run from. For Raven, it was a form of release, a way to escape, but whenever she slipped into it, she would be reminded again that it wasn't real, and she ran away.

This would be her hell, and she deserved it.


"So, you're trying to make us… Gundams?"

Jaden nodded.

Ron had come up with a classification system for Mobile Suits: General Purpose, Transforming and Assault.

But the class above those was the Gundam-class. He used it as a general term for high-performance machines: the 0 Gundam, for example, was high-spec compared machines of its' era. It applied mostly to high-spec, kick-the-fuck-out-of-shitty-pilots machines.

Like when people referred to the Ra Cailum as a superdreadnought-class ship. It was generalized, non-specific and easy.

"The R&D people have been working overtime and I know all of your have been going through the simulators: you're too good for Hoplites." Jaden told Mark, Noble, RWBY, JNPR, and CVFY.

"So, you want us to not only kick ass on the ground, but space too?" Yang summarized.

"Yup."

Nora Jumped into the air, whooping. RWBY was more reserved: they had zero issues with going into space, but beyond the simulators, the only space experience was the time the MACOs were out for their zero-g combat training exercise.

Yang was sick to her stomach while Blake refused to speak anything but some guttural language that only Brok'tan understood. Ruby had fallen in love with the Mobile suit at first sight, so much so that Weiss had had to kiss her to break her out of chibi mode.

Jaune also wasn't all for it, either, living up to his nickname of Vomit Boy, CVFY, Pyrrha and Ren were fine with it, and Mark was all for it.

Unfortunately, they were all MACOs.

And while the MACOs were the Starfleet version of the Marines, they were also specops like the SEALs, Spetsnaz and SAS of Earth.

And that meant they operated EVERYWHERE: on the ground, on a ship and in space. There was no exception.

And on the Ra Cailum, you were the best or you weren't on the ship. So those who didn't like it would have to deal with it.

"So, I present to you…" Jaden led the group into a darkened hangar aboard the Morningstar. "The GN Hunter and Spartan lines!"

Suddenly the lights flashed on, and everyone gasped upon the sight of 19 mobile suits with the hangar. Each one seeming to be uniquely designed, and each one colored each Hunter and Spartan's respective colors, and armed with MS-sized versions of their own weapons.

…and looking utterly, impossibly badass.

"Holy shit." Was the unanimous reaction.

"The first Starfleet-designed Gundam-class Mobile Suits. We're probably not going to use them here, but it's the thought that counts. While we're here, you'll be performing test flights and testing the weapons in the asteroid belt."

Weiss scowled. "So, while everyone else gets shore leave, we're stuck on weapons-testing duty?"

"Don't complain; it took us weeks to design these things and we're still working on them."

"Oh, I'm not complaining." Mark muttered, glancing a hand across the leg of his obvious machine. "You and I are going to get very well acquainted."

"The Spartan gundams are more Spec Ops oriented, being able to bring the heavy firepower when you need it. And you will need it."

"Why us?" Carter asked.

"Six is a pilot and everyone on this ship knows how to fly a shuttle. Meaning you're all getting classes."

"Great."


Cloaked and hidden, the Ra Cailum's master looked at the surface of the planet. "Well, people… I never thought I'd say this."

"Oh, great."

"It's shore leave time! As long as we can stay hidden, everyone's allowed on the ground!"

"Everyone that looks human, at least."

"Oh, come on, Corpie, a little makeup and a hat and no one will notice!"

"Suuuuuure."

"Alright, rules of engagement." Ron declared. "No energy weapons, no transformables, no uniforms, and you must beat up any bullies you see!"

Ron then grinned before going into his ready room. A minute and a half later, he came out.

Holding a weapon so recognizable that EVERYONE knew what it was, even if they weren't from Earth.


Takeshi was wearing a dark blue shirt and black pants, his sword hanging from the scabbard on his hip. Luna wore similar clothing while Ron...

"Tell me that's not an AK-47."

Ron, indeed, held an AK-47 in his hands: to be specific, an AK-47 with a Type-2A receiver. Most people mistook the less aged AKM for the actual AK-47, as well as the Chinese-made Type 56. But this was an original-version AK. "It is the gun that WON'T DIE."

"You could drag it through twenty kilometers of mud, leave it in the forest for ten years, and stuff Twinkies in it, and it would still work after a simple cleaning." Luna defended her brother and his weapons choice.

"Kinda of an odd choice if ya ask me," Jaden said, as he, Nena and Sonja arrived - wearing more… early 20th century attire, with Jaden holding what looked like a M3 submachine gun. "Plus it's not very easy to hide… "

"If I wanted concealable, I'd go for a cricket. I'm going for man-portable firepower. And I don't want to lug around an MG3 around all the time: awesome as it is, it's got problems."

"And the M60?"

"The M60 is a near-clone of the MG42/MG3. I'll stick with the shit that doesn't jam as often, thank you. Besides, I'm going on a picnic."

Jaden smirked. "Still getting used to having two girls?"

"If you had your way, it'd be three."

Jaden scowled. "Touche."

Annette walked in, wearing a dress, though she didn't seem comfortable in it, while Cassie wore an aviator's jacket over a shirt and jeans with a pair of boots, holding an RPK. "Ready."

"Guns, guns and more guns. Armed to the teeth for a picnic."

"Oh, screw you both."

"Alright, alright," Takeshi said, stopping the argument before it could get further. "So, just to confirm, Luna, Larcei, Lily, and I are beaming down to that big city with the spire. In addition to standard vacation activities, we'll try and find the history of this world."

"And if I run into assholes, assholes die."

"So standard procedure for you."

"Damn right. Now, if you'll excuse us…" All three walked onto the pad and disappeared in showers of light.

"I get the feeling he's going to troll people down there in ways that aren't going to be fun."

"As long as it doesn't involve us, I don't care," Takeshi remarked as Larcei and Lily came in. "You two all set?"

"Yeah, though it's probably going to involve us eventually."


Less than an hour later, everything went to hell.

The girls were having a WONDERFUL time before a bunch of idiots arrived.

As such, after a few insults were thrown, they were all dead, via bullets or psionics.

"Plate armor? Really? That was useless against flintlocks. Against Russian firearms, you were fucked." War. He wanted a peaceful, simple day of relaxing normally.

Sadly, he knew the authors had OTHER plans. They always do.

"Ra Cailum, this is Pinkerton: I want a set of anti-armor weapons beamed down here. Now."

"Sir?"

"Do it."

A shower of light deposited a set of the most famous anti-armor weapons on Earth on the ground.

The Ruchnoy Protivotankoviy Granatomyot 7. Otherwise known as the RPG-7. While useless against any real tanks after 1975, against anything from the 40s would die in one shot.

"One of these days… we need to find a nice, quiet planet." Annette muttered, picking up the launchers. "No natives no nothing… just a quiet beach planet… "

"Fuck beaches. Give me Deinonychus VII any day."

"You only say that because those moons are basically Jurassic Park times a million."

"What can I say?" Ron picked up another launcher. "I love Jurassic Park."


The Imperial light tank was bulletproof to anything below 20mm in caliber, but the militia forces kept firing their useless rifles as much as they could, hoping that they could damage the running gear or jam the gun mantlet or something.

"WHY! WON'T! YOU! JUST! DIE!" The Gallian militiamen shouted, firing off a rifle-mounted grenade at the light tank, doing little to nothing to stop it though. "This is some cheap bullshit right here!"

The tank paused to fire its low-velocity 37mm main gun, but a screech was soon followed by an explosion, the tank falling apart as the ammo in it exploded.

"Whoops." A man holding a long tube with handles and a scope jumped down from a building. "Did I do that?" A brunette with a red scarf on her head pointed her rifle at him, but he simply pulled out a strange rifle/machine gun hybrid. "Drop it; I killed that tank in one shot at range and I've got two VERY lovely ladies with fully-automatic weapons on the rooftops."

The brunette paused for a moment, then lowered the gun. "Who the hell are you?" she asked.

"The man who saved you from a VERY pathetic tank." He pulled out a large object, fitting it into the breach of the tube before they heard more rumbling. "Another tank? Good, I need something to kill." The next target rolled up before he took aim, firing it and less than a second later, the Imperial tank was a smoking wreck.

The redhead, and several other soldiers, just stared. That tube functioned just like their lances did! What kind of weapon was that?

"What, never seen an RPG before?" He loaded another round.

"N-no," the brunette replied. "The closest thing we have is anti-tank lances - they may be modeled after medieval lances, but the tip can fire off much like what that tube thing was doing."

"…Who the hell designed your anti-tank weapons? The further you are from the tank, the safer you are! Does no one get the idea of a tank weighing at LEAST 3 tons and no one can survive getting run over by one?!"

"Well, we usually try to aim for the sides, but… sometimes we're not that lucky."

"Again, lacking common sense in the weapons department. Melee range sucks."

Another tank came into view, but before Ron could reload or anyone else could react, a bigger tank in a blue and white paint scheme came barreling through a wooden barricade.

He reloaded the RPG, hearing the sound of yet another tank. "Oh, look, more prey."

As the tank came into view, though, the brunette smiled. "That's ours, tough guy," she said to Ron. "Definitely a lot better than those Imperial Tanks we've been fighting."

"Not really. I can still one-shot it."

"Wait, what?"

"I've seen more heavily armored tanks and this thing can STILL kill them." Her jaw dropped.

There were BIGGER tanks? With more armor?

And that tube can still kill them?! "That tube—"

"Ar. Pee. Gee. It stands for Rocket-Propelled Grenade launcher. Use the right name, girly."

"If we're gonna use 'right names' for things, mine's Alicia," the brunette snapped.

"Ronald Pinkerton. Get these people out of here. I'll secure your escape."

"Huh?"

"You've got civilians, get them on the tank and get the fuck out. I'll keep the assholes off your backs."

She didn't argue as she tank rolled by.

Then the man grinned.

'Ra Cailum, I need a hologram of a certain ship on the waters.'

"Sir?"

'I have an idea. Time to be me.'

"An absolute troll?"

'Damn right~!'


Takeshi walked through Randgriz, seeing a very large amount of stupid.

He was thankful Ron wasn't here: there would be a great deal of time, effort and LOTS of bodies, but he would purge the stupid from the city.

A lot of the stupid seemed to center around racism, as it seemed that everyone with bluish-black hair with the shawls got glares or other nasty looks from a lot of other people. He had sent Larcei and Lily to find a library, see if they could find any reason for this - once they knew the why, they could figure out a way to stop it.

If not, they could always sic Ron on them.

The threat of death was always a way. Look at the Iconians: he might've ended the war more or less peacefully, but the Ra Cailum was always a high-priority target for them as he blew up lots of Iconian ships.

Still, he was a last resort.

For now, they just had to look into the area, see what the situation was. And it looked like the situation was war, if what some of the local newspapers had to say was any indication.

And knowing Ron, he was going to be in the middle of it, helping out without really breaking the Prime Directive, as the Ra Cailum's engineering crews were being put on overdrive, putting together early to mid-20th Century weapons of war.

As they arrived at a library, though, that was furthest from their minds.

"Well, time to find out the history of this world," he said to Luna. "Even if we weren't wanting to blend in, it'd be a good idea to do this, so we don't blunder into the same issues this world has for whatever reason."

"Ron's going to be flooding the Science Department with alternate histories by the time we get home." Takeshi glared at his wife. "Come on, Takeshi, he'll give you all the credit, if only to avoid the promotion that the President is going to shove into his face."

Takeshi groaned at the reminder of what happened to Kathryn Janeway, who, the second she finished her report, was given a massive 3-rank promotion to Vice Admiral. There wasn't a person on that crew who wasn't promoted.

Except for the Equinox survivors.

They were STILL in New Zealand.

"That doesn't help much, because it means I'll be the one with the promotions, meaning I'll get stuck with the paperwork!" he growled.

"Well, you COULD do something stupid and get demoted to commander again…"

"Don't give me ideas."


Hours later, they had a few answers.

Hundreds of years ago, something happened in the area where, in their universe, was a massive forested habitat.

Here, it was desert, caused by something called the 'Darcsen Calamity'.

According to what the history books said, the Darcsens (the people with the shawls and blue-black hair) once tried to conquer Europa, and devastated much of the landscape, only to be stopped by the mighty Valkyrur. Warriors from the north, brandishing shields and spears wreathed in blue flames. They stopped the Darcsens, and were hailed as gods. The Darcsens were then stripped of their last names and sentenced to work in the Ragnite mines as penance for their crimes.

"Something doesn't seem right," Takeshi said as they left the library.

"It screams cover-up. Reminds me of the bible in a few ways. And every other religious text."

"Ron is going to be PISSED," Takeshi stated. "At least it explains all the racism. Though that means we'll need to find out the truth of the matter before we can start to fix the problem."

And the truth was not here. It was out there.

In the wastelands. Which explained why Ron wanted to make tanks, planes and warships.

He was insane, but there was method to the madness.


Mark found himself in a… peculiar situation. Ron had pulled him from the Gundam testing put him in command of a ship.

And not a starship. A naval ship.

The ship he found commanding was one of the more recognizable ships of the twenty-first century.

It was a Nimitz-class supercarrier.

And it wasn't even real! Ron had some specialty holo-generators that he used to construct the vessel, giving them a mobile runway to launch the new weapon he planned on introducing to this world.

Air power. There were no aircraft on this planet.

Not one. They had tanks, but tanks were invented by the British and the French ten years after the first flight of the Wright Flyer and had become so advanced that by World war I, they were flying in combat missions.

This was 20 years after that date. There should have been biplanes in the air, at least.

Still, thing came in handy: the Khepri was tearing asteroids apart and producing aircraft of 30s vintage.

"Well, not what I expected to be commanding. By the way, why choose me?" Mark asked Ron, looking over the flight deck from the bridge. "Why not have Corpsa do this?"

"You're human, she's not and you're bored out of your mind." The captain was right. His Gundam still needed work and he was tired of fighting Qrow.

And getting his ass kicked.

"And what about the rest of your human or human-looking crew?"

"They said 'fuck no' and you didn't."

"Well, I'm in it now. Just tell me where to go and I'll go."

"The closest port. Just get that Vimy ready." The aircraft in question was the Vickers Vimy, an enhanced version of a WW1 bomber. It crossed the Atlantic, the first aircraft to do so.

It had a 2000 pound bomb load, too.

"Copy that. Setting course, heading out at fifteen knots."

It may be a carrier, but carriers gave excellent strike capability to any fleet or operation. He would be content with that.


The lead Imperial commander was unhappy. Some asshole with some long-range anti-tank weapon had knocked out half a company of tanks.

A long range anti-tank weapon? That was insane! How the hell did that work?

And he was strolling through their lines, laughing!

"Send a squad down to deal with that nuisance, and tell them to keep moving, don't let him get a bead on them. We can't lose to one man!"

Droning was heard from above. "What the hell is…" He looked up. Then saw something above.

Which was dropping… something.

It would be the last thing they ever saw.

The area lit up like a fireworks display as the bombs detonated, leveling everything around the point of impact and spreading fire even further, destroying the Imperial command structure, wiping out the reserves, and demolishing what was left of Imperial morale.


"Well, so much for a peaceful vacation… " Nena pouted, looking at the newspapers involving the current 'Second Europan War' between the 'Atlantic Federation' and 'The Empire', with Gallia caught in the middle and now being invaded by the Empire. "Just our luck to pop in the middle of another war…"

"I think Take once said something about the crew being cursed to forever live in interesting times," Jaden said, shaking his head. "The more I'm with you people, the more prevalent that fact becomes."

A loud horn was heard out to sea, where the three soon sighted a ship.

Jaden was disappointed that it wasn't the classic CVN-65 USS Enterprise, but Ron wanted to use a larger, more modern carrier.

And in his words 'Enterprise was wasteful: eight reactors? Even Nimitz had only two and barely needed the other one'.

So a Reagan-subclass Nimitz was chosen as their holo-ship until the Ra Cailum finished the more real ships.

"Well, certainly knows how to make an entrance," Jaden muttered, "A little subtly wouldn't hurt once in awhile though..."

The decks were covered in canvas and wood aircraft from WW1: he saw Sopwith Camels, Fokker Dr1 triplanes, Gotha bombers… And in the air was a freaking Vimy.

The ship pulled into Anthold's port, coming to a brief stop.

"Well, I guess you'll be in charge of being the rep."


Half an hour later, Jaden walked up to the gangplank of the warship, just as a squad of Gallian militiamen arrived, rifles at the ready, if shakily.

"Is… this ship… yours?" One of the Militiamen asked, pointing up as the colossal warship.

"Yup." Jaden informed, sticking with the story he knew Ron would come up with. "Captain Takeo, from the Hosho mercenary guild. Sorry for the startle, but we needed to come in silence - didn't want to risk radios being intercepted by Imperials."

"You know about the war?"

"We landed people last month via airdrops. We've got some information as to what's goin' on and we're here to help. My commander is probably in the middle of the action."

A fat man soon entered sight, wearing the same uniform as the regular military, only more… gaudy. "What sort of warship is THIS? There's no guns, no anything, just… those things on the deck!"

Sonja looked at the moron. "This, dumbass, is called an aircraft carrier. It's at the top of the most dangerous warships on the water, only equaled by the modern battleship."

"It has no weapons!" The fat man shouted, "How could it-" Suddenly two aircraft launched from off the deck of the vessel, taking towards the skies - stunning the militiamen and regular army staff.

"Several hundred vehicles capable of dropping bombs right atop your enemies at will?" Jaden asked, grinning. "Sounds pretty fucking dangerous to me."

The two aircraft then dropped paper from the skies onto the city. Leaflets were a basic way of communicating their purpose. "Those Harts are our basic light bombers. We're still working on our more advanced aircraft, but we've gotten some of our heavier stuff on the ground."

"Like what?" Jaden grinned.

"Squeak."


The earth rumbled before the massive form of a vehicle approached.

It had sloped armor, total coverage, and a MASSIVE gun.

It had a misleading name.

It was called… Maus.

Its sheer appearance alone caused the Imperials to pause… wondering what in the hell was slowly crawling across the ground towards them. An Imperial Medium tank turned its main gun, and fired at the Maus…

…the round bounced harmlessly off of its armor.

The Tank stopped. And its turret turned to face the offending tank…

*BBBRRRROOOOOOOMMMMMMMMM*

…and suddenly the Medium tank was flipped over, converted into a smoldering wreck.

"HOLY FUCK!"

"RUN!" More people fired at the supertank, but nothing hurt it.

Lancers got close, but, like Ron said, up close and personal with a tank was stupid, as the tank kept moving.

And crushed them under its' tracks if they weren't machine gunned down by the coaxial MG34.

Watching was the newly-commissioned Squad 7. Including the Edelweiss, the tank commanded by Squad leader Welkin Gunther, and the one that had shown up to help the defense at Bruhl, even if it wasn't truly needed.

"Jeez…" one of the Squad's Lancers, Largo, remarked. "Whoever these guys are, their tanks are powerful - never seen something with armor to just shrug off another tank's shot, let alone flip the offending tank with return fire."

The tank crushed an armored car, making it explode.

"That tank scares me. You think that thing is connected to the people we found in Bruhl, Welkin?"

"Overwhelming firepower and heavy armor? I think so."

"How is that even functioning?" Isara asked, watching as the Maus ran over a truck. "It has no Ragnite radiators on the outside! And what's with those fumes coming out of it?"

"You can ask them all the engineering questions later, sis," Welkin said, before climbing back into the Edelweiss. "They may not need it, but it'd be impolite not to help them out! Squad 7, move out!"

The Edelweiss moved forward, firing her 82mm low-velocity gun at a light tank before it fired back, the 37mm gun bouncing off the armor. The Maus' turret turned towards the light tank. The massive gun did not fire, but a smaller barrel fired, the gun punching through the armor.

They didn't even SEE the shell.

Welkin knew what this was.

A high-velocity shell.

No one had tech like that yet! Not even the engineers back at base!

Just who were these people?!

On the turret was a symbol.

An arrowhead with a notch, and a five-pointed star within it and a circle surrounding it.

As two things flew overhead, Welkin knew things had changed.


117Jorn: *King Tiger Tank rolls up* IT'S TIME TO GO WORLD OF TANKS ALL UP IN HERE!

Ron the True Fan: And more than that… (Whistling is heard before shells impact a massive Ratte) warships beat tanks.

Takeshi Yamato: And so, we arrive in the world of Valkyria Chronicles. This was intended to come two stops after RWBY in the original, but as you can already tell, we've mixed up the schedule a bit for the rewrite.

Ruby: So… why'd you rewrite it?

Redemption's Avenger: Don't look at me.

Ron the True Fan: Not going to talk about it.

117Jorn: Till next time…

Ja Ne!