Captain Nagase, Warrant Officer Hubert and Sergeant Stone sat around a table in the officer's room of the Pilgrim I. Kei's arm had noticeably healed. She was no longer wearing a sling for her arm and the cut that had severed her bicep was now just a thin scar.

'Did some rounds around the crew. They're coping well as far as I can tell.' Hubert was saying. Kei was paying attention. Since the incident and the death of over 50 people, Pilgrim had gone from being busy to minimum levels of activity. This of course came with the concern of keeping the remaining 30 people occupied.

'Considering the situation, that's good. Jacob, what's the news in your department?' Kei directed her next questions towards the Emmerian Air Force sergeant and damage control chief. Jacob opened a dossier he brought with him and handed it to the captain.

'Full details in there. We've rewired electronics to direct more power to the operations centre. Also, we hit a problem.' Jacob answered, leaning forward and resting his chin on his hands.

'What's the problem?' Kei asked while flicking through the dossier.

'The port-side flaps and engines are dead. Gears are melted through, cables have been severed, and even if we fixed all of that we're out of the hydraulic fluids and fuel required to run them.' Jacob summarised.

'Charming.' Kei closed the dossier after taking in all the information she needed, handing it back to Jacob. 'Basset Space Centre was damn near flattened at the start of the war, the Eruseans aren't looking to help us. Yuktobanians are out of contact, we're not in an orbit to receive from the Emmerians, and the Estovakians-'

'-don't even have a functioning space agency because of the Emmerian-Estovakian War.' Jacob finished her statement. The sergeant rubbed his eyes and cracked his shoulders.

'Yeah. Is there anything you two want to bring up with me?' Kei asked the final question. The two senior-ranking men shook their heads. Kei simply nodded and dismissed the meeting.

July 14th, 2019

OFS Phobos

Blue Ridge-class command ship

'Swordsman, Talon, check in.' On board the giant command ship, Zoe Talon Davis contacted the airborne mission commander for this operation. Instead of the aviator standard one-piece flight uniform, she was wearing the OMDF's standard working uniform; a desert digital pattern. Her arm was still slung and in a cast.

'This is Swordsman, about to cross Checkpoint 5, continuing to Sledgehammer.' Snow reported in. A very long way away, the F-14D pilot was deep in Erusean territory on a recon mission.

'Roger that. What's the activity level like up there?' Talon asked.

Hatties Desert

'No drones or interceptors. Skies are clear.' Looking out of his canopy, Snow saw the sand below. Behind his plane, Captain Walter Luna Atkins escorted Snow. They were looking for an old cluster of structures, something that had been constructed well back in 1998.

'These guns have been out of service for 20 years. Going to take a miracle to get them going again.' Atkin commented, flying on Snow's right in his F/A-18E.

'The Army's dedicating an entire battalion of engineers to get the place back online. They'll find a way.' Snow replied, himself understanding the technical challenges behind the operation. The Stonehenge railguns were old and rusting away. One of them had been disabled by the Ulysses asteroid impacts in 1999. The remaining seven were destroyed by ISAF in 2005 during the Continental War.

'I think I can see the guns… Holy shit, they're big.' Luna said as the massive guns came into view over the horizon. Even from a long distance they appeared to be tall and intimidating. However, all eight guns were in the low position. None of them were powered. Snow stared at them for a moment before snapping out of the trance.

'Talon, Swordsman, arriving in the area of operations. Are you seeing this?' Snow reported to the command fleet.

'Affirm. The engineers are going to have fun fixing this thing. Stay on location. Trident and Poseidon Squadrons are launching with the tankers, expect arrival in roughly three hours. I'll be in touch.' Talon ordered the group. She was the operation's overall commander, a newly-promoted O5 Commander. Snow was the leader of the Navy's squadrons being dedicated to Stonehenge's security. Under Operation Dragon Awakening, the plan was to reactivate Gun 4. A future operation would see the Oseans baiting an Arsenal Bird to the region so they could destroy it.

444 Squadron Airbase, Zapland

In the primary hangar bay, Alex pried open service panels on his Su-33 to get into the avionics bays of the aircraft. Across from him in the service bay, Trigger and Avril were working on refitting some of the Spare Squadron aircraft. Since the incident where Trigger had brought Avril to a combat zone in his F-15E, the two had been working closely together. Alex noted this a few times, suspected a possible romance and then dismissed the thought without saying anything. He was guilty of the same thing, back in 2010.

In the prisoner's mess, Grimm, Sara, Michael and Taipan were playing a game of poker with the rest of the squadron, led by High Roller.