Oh no! I've gone nearly a week without crapping on the Nazis! Better fix that!
07/10/20: Spread Your Wings
The Corsair soars through the sky, twisting and weaving with the Axis jets on its tail. A bright blue sea, shimmering, sparkling, is laid out below, a beautiful sight contrasted by the burning forms of crippled warships.
The blue fighter plane dives, trading altitude for energy, and for a moment Daniel Fenton is dancing above waves, ducking and weaving around the masts of stricken cruisers – he feels the airframe rock as the Cleveland goes up, black oil spilling into the sea like blood from a wound, but he has no time to think about it. One of the jets overshoots him, and he squeezes his trigger – three short bursts of machine gun fire, and it goes up like a firecracker. One down, far too many to go.
He glances at the photo attached to the cockpit window, just for the briefest second – a woman in a dress, the one he'd promised himself to before he shipped out.
It's enough of a distraction for one of the Fritz to clip him, just slightly, but enough to rock the plane. He shakes his head; focus, focus!
He pulls up and turns, and for the briefest moment he can see the Allied battle line. It's not a pretty sight. Iowa is turning out of the line, her superstructure on fire, and behind her Missouri is listing, her guns still firing even as it's clear she'll go down. Three more battleships are sinking or on fire; only HMS Warspite, at the back, is mostly intact, though battered and scorched. He glances at the sky; the torpedo bombers his wing was meant to be escorting are being swatted like flies.
It is preordained now – the Nazis will soon be landing stateside. And for all his hard work, he will not have been able to protect his loved ones from them.
He turns back, towards the enemy fleet, soaring towards the horizon. For just a moment, he turns into one of the Nazi fighters, and squeezes his trigger – he gets one burst out, just one, and then his guns are empty. Jerry spins out into the sea, but he can hear his friends coming in behind.
He guns it, pushing the straining engine for all it's worth. He knows he'll never make it back to the Enterprise – hell, it might not even still be there. But there's a deck he can make it to, and he fully intends to get there.
His radio is quiet; Tucker, Dash, Kwan and the rest are all silent, and most likely at the bottom of the sea. A pair of Zeroes swing overhead, but they're more interested in a lone Seafire than pursuing him. The enemy fleet is coming up over the horizon – the Kriegsmarine and the Regia Marina, and the Japanese task force assisting them. The screen of destroyers have their anti-air guns pointed up high at the doomed flights of bombers – they don't expect someone this low.
He swings past, close enough to see the flying swastika on the bow of a destroyer, and he sees their capital ships. Bismarck. Tirpitz. Yamato. In the distance, he can see Graf Zeppelin, Goring's pride, the German carrier. He shoots over the Bismarck's bow and points his nose down.
A jet fires – cannon rounds burst through the airframe of the beleaguered Corsair, and he feels the sting of pain. He pats his abdomen, and it feels wet. He takes a long, sharp breath, prays that his control surfaces still work, and steers the plane.
He won't be going home. He won't be getting married. He won't even be able to help protect his family. But there is one thing he can do.
He can take a whole lot of the Nazi bastards with him.
Boom.