It was 2PM when a junior officer onboard a radical-owned E-7A Wedgetail AWACS heard beeping from his headset indicating a new unidentified contact. He looked at his screen. To the south, multiple contacts were appearing in two major groups to the east and to the west. These groups were massive. Both of them peaked out at just under 300 aircraft each as the AWACS officer watched in horror. When it became clear both groups were approaching the Space Elevator, the officer reached out to a button to make sure his microphone was reading properly.
'All elements, this is AWACS Interdictor, prepare for battle. Two hostile groups approaching from 1-4-0 and 2-7-0. Maybe 600 aircraft in total.' Interdictor warned the pilots.
Interdictor was correct to warn the radicals. The two groups were the attacker strike forces. Leading at the front of the south-eastern group, Blaze looked on at his group's aircraft. Eagles, Falcons, Hornets, Lightnings, Tomcats, Raptors, Typhoons, Flankers, Fulcrums and any other aircraft that could be imagined that was operated by the Oseans or the Eruseans.
'Strike Group Ace, this is Osean Southern Command Headquarters. All leaders, report.' Over the radio an Air Force general signed in. Blaze recognised the voice as Lieutenant-General Theodus Howard, an OADF flag officer and commander of all Osean Air Force assets deployed on the Usean continent.
'Razgriz 1, reporting.' Blaze was one of the strike force leaders and was obliged to respond.
'Golem 1, reporting.' Knocker was another, leader of the guys from Fort Greys.
'Panther 1, reporting.' Talon, an old friend and leader of the carrier-deployed OMDF pilots.
'Sol 1, reporting.' Mihaly, Shilage group leader.
'Skoll 1, signing in.' Henri, Skoll Squadron's leader and the overall commander of conservative Eruseans in the air today.
'Good copy, aces. To all gathered here today, we're the HQ of the Osean Air Force- wait, no, forget that. We're a coalition dedicated to taking down the Arsenal Bird. The first step is to secure air superiority around the Space Elevator. Wait until we're ready to strike the Arsenal Bird in unison.' The general briefed the task force. Blaze switched on his aircraft's AESA radar and immediately started getting pings in the distance from enemy fighters and interceptors.
'Razgriz, forward. Let's get this done.' Blaze ordered his squad to press forward. Swordsman, Archer, Mythic and himself pressed their engines to give all the thrust they had to get to the area faster. As Blaze crossed a certain unmarked line on the earth his radar warning receiver blared. A Patriot SAM site on the ground was targeting him. A bare few seconds later the radar warnings stopped. Either the site had been jammed or it had been destroyed.
'Enchanter 1, rifle.' Phantom called out as he fired a single AGM-88 HARM at the offending radar. The first shot of the battle. In the middle of Strike Force Joker, the south-west detachment, AWACS Sky Eye in his E-3 Sentry was calling out targets.
'Radical presence maxes out at 550 fighters and strike aircraft. They're waiting for us to come to them.' Sky Eye reported. The strike force started to close the distance. Over the horizon, the cables of the massive Space Elevator came into view. Talon looked up. She could see the top half of the white ferroconcrete used in the megastructure's construction. A few black dots would occasionally obstruct the few; radical fighters.
'All hands, coalition command. Begin operation.'
And so it began.
As was the case with anything, Blaze was the first into the fight and the first to take a shot at another fighter. He targeted the closest aircraft to him with an AMRAAM and fired. The target, an Su-33, saw the missile and attempted to evade, but failed and took the hit. Crippled, the pilot turned away from the shooter and attempted to get within friendly lines, but Blaze chased the older Flanker down and took him out with his own 23mm cannon. The rest of the Razgriz were right behind him even as a couple of hundred air to air missiles shot over their heads. The majority of the strike force were volley-firing AMRAAMs and other long-ranged missiles into the massed formation of the radicals. Blaze was more focused on the four Su-27s ahead of them. Himself, Marcus, Grimm and Mythic all fired a single missile, one for each aircraft. The aircraft all attempted to evade but found no luck. Razgriz, five. Radicals, zero. In the skies ahead of them many black puffs of smoke filled the air shortly followed by burning aircraft. The missile salvo fired by the strike force had slammed into the enemy lines, taking out a great number of aircraft. Before the missiles had hit the radicals did the same thing. Blaze checked his RWR to see that he was being targeted.
'Break!' Blaze called out as he turned out of the formation and dived to avoid it. The rest of the squad split up to reduce the risk of all of them being caught by one missile. The AAM-4 fired at Blaze closed in. Blaze dived in close to the sea floor and waited for the missile to get close before rapidly climbing upwards. The missile lost its track and slammed harmlessly into the water. Now freed from being engaged, Blaze looked for another fight among the radicals and found it in a Rafale M. The pilot didn't see Blaze come in from below like a reverse hawk with his cannon roaring. The shells went through the floor of the cockpit and shredded the pilot into mincemeat. Above and behind the Rafale followed an F-22 who saw Blaze and dived down to fire a missile. Blaze was faster and got off a Sidewinder before turning away from the Raptor and climbed while burning at max speed. His missile connected with and destroyed the Raptor, the missile fired by the Raptor didn't come close. Blaze looked at his tactical display for a brief second to check on the allied forces. Many of the fighters had broken out of formation and were now tangling with the enemy, but at the same time some had bit the dust, caught by the radical volley fire.
Mythic took her first bite out of the enemy by engaging in a brief dogfight with an F-16C. The Falcon had been intending to fight an allied Erusean Su-30MKI, but gave up that chance to narrowly dodge one of Mythic's ASRAAMs. The F-16 didn't evade the second missile, taking it up the belly and disintegrating in mid-air. Rapidly re-engaging another target, Mythic took out an Su-27 with a third ASRAAM up the tailpipe. Below and ahead of that was another F-16 which bit the dust via an AMRAAM. She almost gained a lock on a fourth Su-35 but was forced to break to avoid an incoming missile fired at her. Mythic evaded but the missile zoomed past and took out a friendly Super Hornet. She dived towards the sea floor at barrelling speeds and took out a pair of Flankers that were chasing a Tomcat with her cannon. Not far behind her, Grimm smashed through enemies that Mythic didn't catch. An Su-35 went down, its core structural strength shattered by a missile to the spine. Another Su-35 that had dived after Mythic, Grimm chased down and shot down by using a cannon burst of embarrassing length for a pilot of his cadre.
'Grimm, two Eagles high right!' Blaze called out to him. Grimm looked up to his right to see a pair of F-15Js diving on him. He banked sharply to the right and pulled up just as one of them loosed a missile off at him. At the speeds the Eagles were approaching Grimm pulled out of the weapon's sensor cone and would have gone to chase them had a certain old man not beaten him to the punch. Mihaly came in out of nowhere and blew them both out of the air. Grimm ran straight into another target regardless, a formation consisting of an F-22 and three F/A-18Fs. The Super Hornets seemed to be following the Raptor. Grimm got up from below them, somehow without alerting any of the pilots, and once he was on the tails of the four aircraft he opened fire, sweeping right to left. The Hornets all went down as their engines were compromised by 30mm HEI shells and the Raptor took a glancing hit before its pilot dodged out of the line of fire. Grimm followed and fired a Sidewinder. The Raptor popped flares and did some tight turns to try and get out of Grimm's gunsight, but none of these manuevers worked and when Grimm took off the right wing and ruptured a fuel tank, the pilot fell into a flat spin and was forced to eject.
While the other three were having fun with their prey, Snow had cut a beeline through the swarms of enemy fighters looking for their AWACS. He knew its rough bearing but had kept getting set back by interceptors looking to take a bite out of him. The first setback had been a pair of Su-27s. They had been swatted out of the skies by head-on collisions with two AMRAAM missiles. Not even 10 seconds after that a Rafale M attacked him. Snow avoided a missile fired at him, but his own Sidewinder shot also missed and the two passed by each other. Snow pressed onwards but the Rafale wasn't done with him. Blaze, coming in from behind to clear his wingman's rear, saw the radical fighter and dealt with it via means of 23mm autocannon. The Rafale disintegrated, leaving Snow to press on. He got a minute's worth of uninterrupted time during which he rapidly climbed from barely a thousand metres to just over twelve thousand. A pair of Super Hornets had followed him, and the leader of the pair fired a long-range missile at him. Snow got a track through his aircraft's radar on the enemy AWACS, locked and fired a D-model AMRAAM before rolling over so that his canopy was facing the ocean below and dived. With the weight of the aircraft and two powerful engines propelling him down, Snow gained enough speed and distance to get away from the missile, but he dropped chaff and flares just to guarantee a miss. Sure enough the missile overshot him by a couple of hundred metres.
Some distance away, AWACS Interdictor was taking evasive maneuvers. The AWACS's massive weight and size worked against it, meaning she couldn't do the same dives and climbs that a fighter could, and she was nowhere near as fast. Snow's AIM-120 closed in on the AWACS. Inside the aircraft's cabin, all of its crew were braced for shock.
'Incoming!' The senior officer called out. 'Brace, brace, brace!'
The AMRAAM hit the aircraft in the rear. Both of the rear control surfaces were blown off instantly. The majority of the tail came off and the dome that contained the AWACS's radar system was peppered through with shrapnel. The Wedgetail had taken a crippling blow, but she managed to survive. Barely.
Talon grunted as she pulled a few high-g circles around the Space Elevator. Four Su-35s were chasing her around trying to shoot her out of the skies. Talon looked around to the open skies to her side. An Su-37 was coming in looking for an easy kill. The pilot wouldn't find one; Talon did a full circle around the Space Elevator before looking at the Terminator, selecting a Sidewinder to fire and hitting the trigger. The short-range IR seeker missile was flung out of its weapon bay into the slipstream and locked onto the oncoming fighter. The Sidewinder slammed into the Terminator directly through the nose and exploded, destroying the aircraft, which left Talon with the four Super Flankers still chasing her.
'Need a little help.' Talon said, strained by g-force.
'Talon, break left!' Blaze called out. Talon complied and moved away from the Space Elevator. As she did, a black Su-33 zoomed past going in an opposite circle down and released a flurry of missiles and cannon fire at her interceptors. The four Su-35s went up in flames and Blaze shot through the debris. Talon managed to get a few shells down on a passing Su-57 which damaged it considerably. Behind her, two of the other pilots in her squad formed up on her. Talon noted this and lit up two nearby groups of F/A-18Fs and Su-35s. The three aircraft fired a total of twelve missiles. Those missiles streaked through the air past a few other potential targets and into the fighters who had attempted to break away. Two F-22s and a single F-18 survived the missile barrage, but even they didn't survive long, getting hit by some OADF F-22s a moment later.
Despite not having been in the cockpit of an F-15 for a long time, Talisman still remembered how to navigate through an air battle. She cut a neat slice through the radicals, utterly annihilating an entire six-man group of MiG-29s all on her own using AMRAAMs mounted on Amber racks. A straggler F-16, probably from another squadron that had been wiped out, attempted to take her out. It didn't work for him, for the Black Raven appeared from seemingly out of nowhere and took out the interceptor. He shot past Talisman in his own custom Su-57 and returned to the battlefield. Scoffing, Talisman gained some altitude and observed the battle for a minute, popping a shot off at a wandering F-15J in the meantime. The allied coalition was winning, there were more friendly aircraft in the skies than there were hostile aircraft, but the allies had certainly taken some losses, especially through the Erusean and ISAF squadrons. Talisman once again got jumped by a straggler fighter, but this time she was able to get the initiative against the attacking F/A-18 and tore apart its pilot with a short but brutal cannon spray. She went on the attack now, hunting for the few stragglers that were on their own. Other allies got to most of them before Talisman could; most notably, Cipher shot one down with a missile just as she had been lining up a gun run. Not too far away however was a MiG-31 which Talisman managed to catch with a Sidewinder and send it into the ocean. She beelined towards the Space Elevator and also destroyed an Su-27 that appeared to be evading an ISAF fighter. All the stragglers were now gone, which left the large groups of fighters.
One of these groups of fighters was precisely who the two LRSSG squads were fighting. Trigger tackled the fighters in that group head on, many of whom were veterans. They didn't last long for all of their experience. The group's leader came at him with missiles and guns blazing. Trigger merely rolled under the attacks and fired a scant few cannon shells into the enemy fighter, killing its pilot. Two Sidewinders heading towards two Su-57s followed this initial kill and both fifth-generation fighters were blown out of the skies. Two more tried to get missiles off at Trigger but the latter shot out the pilots of the next pair of aircraft before either could get anything off. He had downed five aircraft in five seconds, and he wasn't the only ace about to blow through the formation. Jaeger, Lanza and Tailor were following him and although their F-15s weren't as fluid to fly as the F-22, they still managed to kick ass. Jaeger and Lanza took branching paths away from their squadron leader to take out three flanking aircraft each, while Tailor followed Trigger through and knocked off a couple of opposing F-15s that Trigger had missed. Trigger pulled a post-stall maneuver and virtually reversed his momentum in mid air to come back around and give chase to the aircraft he missed. Two consecutive AMRAAM shots claimed an F/A-18E and a Sidewinder fired at a Flanker missed but Trigger caught that same Flanker out with cannon shells through that Su-27's engines.
At the same time, Count and Cyclops had also hit the same formation. He, Skald, Fencer and Huxian all volley fired missiles at point-blank range into that group. At least one of their fighters got a couple of missiles off at Cyclops, but Count and Fencer dodged while half of the enemies didn't. Count found that the F-15E he was using, the one that Trigger had personally modified and flown prior to getting his hands on a Raptor, was much more fluid and easier to fly than the examples he had flown in the past. Excellent acceleration and turn rate with a high top speed meant he could kick more ass. Count used his cannon to rain hell on a Rafale that flew up and above him, ripping open the aircraft's belly and causing it to explode. Flying on Count's right wing, Huxian took a bloody chunk out of a Terminator and tore a similar Super Flanker in half. In two passes Strider and Cyclops had destroyed an entire enemy group. Count saw an Su-35 trying to escape and had turned to go intercept it, but Trigger beat him to the punch and rammed an AMRAAM up its tailpipe.
Razgriz had regrouped by this stage and its pilots were sweeping up what remained of enemy resistance. Blaze rushed past a few ISAF fighters to get to a peculiar F-22 sporting a blue paint scheme; a veteran, he suspected. The enemy had been zooming through friendly formations taking out fighters left and right. Behind Blaze, Grimm fired a missile to catch the guy's attention. Predictably, his missile missed but as a result the enemy turned in their direction looking for the shooter. Blaze pulled off to the side, waiting for the F-22 to get closer before turning in and chasing him down. As Grimm went defensive and dived down, the F-22 pilot never noticed Blaze rapidly closing in from his rear. Twenty rounds of high explosive incendiary tracer shells sent the Raptor burning up and flying off course. One ace down. Blaze's warning system alerted him to a lock on his aircraft. He turned towards the direction of the person locking him as the RWR started blaring. Missile incoming. In the distance Blaze saw the shooter; an Su-57. He quickly took a snapshot with one of his few remaining long-range missiles before going to evasive maneuvers. The enemy Su-57 evaded the missile that Blaze had shot, as did Blaze the one fired at him, even if only by a bare dozen metres. Blaze levelled out and continued to approach his new target. The Su-57 climbed up into a cloud formation. Of course Blaze followed. He entered the clouds and he entered a smoking debris field and when he came out there was no Su-57 to be seen. Blaze looked around both physically and on his various sensor arrays to make sure he hadn't just lost it. Mythic bust through the opposite side of the same clouds that Blaze had been in doing lightning speeds and quickly he realised what had happened. While Blaze had chased him into the clouds, Mythic had taken a shot and blown the Su-57 to pieces. He chuckled to himself. The kid was learning.
'Resistance is getting lighter by the minute. We'll be done here soon.' Count piped up on the radio. He was right, the coalition were currently sitting at three hundred active aircraft, while the radicals were down to barely 30, all of which were retreating north. Blaze looked at his tactical display. The Navy was closing in, and so were the Marines.
OFS Kuramangi, Wasp-class LHD
Joint Task Force Four
Rosa was sweating up a storm through body armour, a kevlar helmet and combat fatigues despite the relatively cool interior of the MV-22B Osprey that she, Avril and a full team of Marine Corps Raiders were sitting in. Everyone except for the princess was armed, even Avril who was sitting there as a civilian with an M4.
'Goblin, Siren Actual, clear to lift.' The man sitting next to Rosa, an officer and presumably the man in charge of the marines, indicated to the pilot of the Osprey. The twin turboprops that powered the VTOL gained power and eventually the aircraft left the deck of the ship they were on. Behind them a second Osprey was doing the same. The officer put away his radio and inserted a fresh magazine into his HK416. He racked the charging handle, chambering a round, and noticed that Rosa was looking at his kit.
'Tool of the trade, wouldn't be helpful if it wasn't ready.' The officer remarked. Rosa weakly chuckled.
'Yeah. I've never actually used a gun before.' She thought it prudent to mention. The officer raised his eyebrows, and then withdrew his service sidearm from a holster on the top of his plate carrier. He handed it to Rosa, but didn't take his hands off the weapon when she took hold of it.
'15 rounds. When it's empty, the slide-' The officer pulled the slide back on the M9A3 to illustrate. 'will lock back like this. When that happens, press the magazine release and let the mag fall out. Replace with another mag.' The officer then pulled out a couple of spare mags for the M9 and handed them to Rosa. She pocketed one and tried to load it into the handgun.
'Which way do they go in?' Rosa asked.
'Metal plate should be facing forward, and the bullet - the bronze looking bit of the rounds in the mag - should also be facing forward.' The officer explained. 'Once you've got that in, rack the slide back to chamber it, and then you're set.'
'Thank you.' Rosa thanked the officer. The latter released his hands from the M9, and Rosa tightened her grip around the weapon.
'Once we're down, stick with me and try not to shoot me in the back.' The officer said. Rosa nodded dumbly. 'If you need help, call out for Thomas or Jester.'
'Who's Thomas and Jester?' Rosa asked, not sure who either of those people were.
'I'm Thomas, the really tan guy at the back of the plane with the black helmet is Jester, he's my platoon sergeant.' Captain Thomas Hewlett explained.
'Will do, Thomas.'
The two ship formation of Ospreys approached the base of the Space Elevator, escorted by four F-35Bs. The megastructure appeared big even from a distance, but when one was looking at it when right next to it, the Space Elevator was truly gigantic. Looking through a viewport, Avril noticed their escorts firing air-to-ground missiles at something. Tanks, probably? She didn't know. What she did know was that they were close to their intended landing zone. The Marines were getting ready to disembark.
'One minute!' Hewlett and Jester called out across the aircraft. Avril quickly ran over what they needed to do; breach the gates to the maintenance access routes for the Space Elevator, ascend the megastructure killing any hostiles along the way and then holding the elevator against enemy ground troops. It was going to be one hell of a day.
'30 seconds! Ready up!'
All enemy resistance in the air had been swept up. It was now just a waiting game for the Arsenal Bird to come down south and get in range of the coalition's weapons. However, the Arsenal Bird's weapon range far exceeded anything that they had.
'All forces, incoming projectile!' Long Caster called out. 'Spread out!'
Blaze didn't have to be told twice. Immediately he pulled away from the majority of friendly fighters in the area and made a rapid climb. Mythic followed him up but Snow and Grimm both separated from the squad in their own directions. Not entirely sure what he was meant to be evading, Blaze kept a constant eye on both his radar and on the horizon for any incoming projectiles. Something popped up, a signature the size of a small aircraft.
'Impact in 5 seconds… now!' Long Caster reported as a large missile splintered apart and threw out a bunch of odd spheres across a wide area. Those spheres then exploded spectacularly in bright flashes of blue. Those blue explosions were deadly. Anything caught inside the fireball was vaporized instantly. The shockwave from the explosions disintegrated aircraft that were too close. For many hundreds of metres around aircraft were buffeted by the sudden displacement of air. Blaze gained some altitude as a result of that buffering.
'Jesus fuck! Half my squad's just disappeared!' The F-35s of the OMDF's Hawk Squadron were the first to report.
'Numerous squadrons are gone. Trident, Grogi, Harrenhal, Warwolf, Longsword…' AWACS Sky Eye was reading off the list of squadrons that had just been wiped out by the sudden missile attack. Many others had taken casualties.
'Where the hell did that come from?!' Count had to ask.
'Transmission coming in from Coalition Command. The Arsenal Bird is carrying a number of Helios missiles. They're an airburst-type weapon! All forces, spread out!' Bandog chimed in.
'Oh that's just brilliant.' Huxian was both annoyed and amused.
'Second projectile incoming! We'll mark the predicted impact zone.' Long Caster took over again. Blaze checked his TAC display. Several red markers were shown all around the Space Elevator. He was about to run into one. Blaze did a 180-degree turn to get away, passing underneath Cipher who was also turning away from the impact area. Razgriz Squadron formed up on their squad leader and they dropped altitude. In the far distance the Helios projectile could be seen approaching the task force. The weapon must have been a dumbfire weapon for it wasn't tracking any of the aircraft that were now moving away from where it was predicted to explode. A few moments later the Helios made it to the impact zone and exploded. This time however, no-one was in the blast zone. Blaze winced from the sheer blinding light, even through his helmet's tinted visor. He checked the weapons he had left. A single AMRAAM, two Sidewinders and roughly seventy percent of his cannon's total ammo storage. In other words, not a lot left in the tank.
Most of the guys still up in the air weren't fairing much better. There might have been a hundred fighters still in the air plus a couple of dozen arriving as reinforcements with the bombers, but the massive fight with the radicals had put them down quite a few missiles. On the upside however, the Air Force wouldn't be fighting the Arsenal Bird alone; the Navy wanted a piece of its own. In the clean blue waters surrounding the Space Elevator, numerous frigates, destroyers, cruisers and even a couple of battlecruisers were entering the AO.
'Arsenal Bird is entering visual range.' Talon, Panther 1, was the first to see the giant flying wing close in the far distance. 'Big son of a bitch, damn.'
'She's just out of range. Wait for her to get closer.' Mihaly pointed out. The coalition formed up into one gigantic line south of the Space Elevator and waited anxiously. Eagles, Lightnings, Hornets, Flankers and Falcons were ready. Blaze had his thumb over the missile release button, waiting for the order to come.
'Formation leaders, confirm readiness.' Coalition Command checked to double check that everyone was ready.
'Razgriz, weapons green.' Blaze confirmed the readiness of his own squad.
'Strider and Cyclops, check.' Trigger spoke for the other two LRSSG squads.
'Skoll, ready. Rigel, ready.' Two Erusean squads were good.
'ISAF forces, green.' Cipher spoke on the behalf of the remaining ISAF aircraft.
'Sol Squadron, check.' Mihaly had Sol under control.
'Panther and a few others, weapons green.' Talon had Panther set, alongside a few straggler aircraft whose squads were gone.
'This is Spare, ready for action.' Huntsman, the charismatic captain that he was, checked in with the penal pilots.
'Fort Greys squadrons, set.' Golem for all of the remaining Fort Greys pilots. There weren't many checks after them, perhaps because of a lack of squad leaders still up and in the air. The Arsenal Bird drew closer and Blaze had to blink to make sure that it wasn't deploying any drones.
'Zero hour… mark.' There was a pause before the general on the other side spoke again. 'All forces, execute, execute, execute!'
The hammer had dropped. VLS silos for the many dozens of ships opened up to reveal their high explosive contents before belching them out in a display of fire and smoke. Up in the skies, bombers and reinforcement fighters fired everything they had at the Arsenal Bird. AGM-154 JSOW-ERs from B-1B and B-2A Spirit stealth bombers dropped and kicked over. F-35Bs and Cs loaded for beast mode unleashed entire racks worth of AMRAAM missiles. Erusean Tu-160s launched all of their variants of long range cruise missiles loaded with cluster munitions. Blaze thought about firing his Sidewinders, but decided against it even as Grimm and Mythic fired off one each of their own AIM-9Xs as they came within range. All of these missiles; AMRAAMs, SM-2 Standards, Sidewinders, R-77 Adders, IRCAs amongst a few other more obscure types; moved on from their launching platforms and homed in on the Arsenal Bird. There were so many missiles in the air that they would have appeared as a massive wave on any kind of radar and a radar warning receiver would be blaring. The Arsenal Bird's central control system registered that it was being threatened and took appropriate defensive measures. Weapon mounts appeared from armoured compartments. Energy banks within the gigantic aircraft's core received power and started to charge rapidly. Fire control radars locked onto the first series of missiles and ordered its own weapon batteries to intercept. The first dozen coalition air-to-air weapons were blown out of the air, but a lot more were still coming for it. Those power banks finished charging and released their stored energy into the centrepiece of the Arsenal Birds; its shield-based active protection system. As the majority of the missiles approached, the shield deployed. A few impacted against the forward hull but did little damage. The rest slammed against the shield, exploding in bright flashes of orange, but did literally nothing. Blaze had been watching the various missiles lock on target and not hit shit.
'Oh fuck me.' He muttered under his breath.
'Attack ineffective!' Sheep, pilot of Silex 1, was the first to openly put it out there.
'Captain, this looks like a problem.' Grimm said over their individual squad net.
'State the fuckin' obvious, Grimm!' Blaze was well aware of that fact. While the radio net exploded with people panicking about the fact that their synchronized attack had failed, Mythic had seen many objects falling from underneath the Arsenal Bird. They vaguely looked like triangles with extra wing extensions on either side of them. She recognised them quickly. MQ-101 drones.
'Commander, incoming. MQ-101s.' She pointed out to her squad. Blaze looked. The young lieutenant was right. The task force had incoming.
'Strike force, incoming, bearing 0-3-0.' Blaze called it. The strike force was now trapped against a rock and a hard place. The Arsenal Bird's APS went down as it got closer. With the MQ-101s now approaching and looking for targets, Blaze assumed that the Arsenal Bird could only run its APS for so long before it had to go down to recharge. Everyone on the radio was still in a blind panic. Blaze looked across at his squad. Grimm was to his left and was already looking at Blaze. To his right, Snow and Mythic seemed determined to tackle the drones. Blaze bit his lip. There wasn't any other choice.
'Oh there's no way in hell we can win against that!' An Erusean F-35C pilot was complaining.
'They've got way more firepower than we do.' Similarly, an ISAF squad leader was also complaining.
'Break break break,' Blaze interrupted the flow of radio chatter to get a message out. 'Fighter squadrons, hold formation and break their line. They've got the ordnance but we've got the numbers. Bombers, withdraw. You're of no use here.'
Surprisingly all mentions of panic faded with Blaze's call. Each individual group loosened up their formations to match the enemy. The LRSSG squadrons took the lead and boosted onwards. Their twelve aircraft were the first to engage. Blaze let off his second-last missile while the others released a combination of AMRAAMs and Sidewinders. Shortly after, missiles flew out from the rest of the coalition aircraft even as they were targeted in kind by the MQ-101s. Blaze pulled up steeply to get above the incoming missile wave. Allied weapons slammed into the MQ-101s, taking out a lot of them.
A lot more evaded with expert precision, something that couldn't be said for many of the remaining coalition aircraft.
Talisman pulled to the right to evade a missile. Her wingmate, Shadow, turned with her but Xeno was directly behind his squad leader and pulled away far too late. His Super Hornet caught a missile to the belly and went spinning wildly out of control. Shadow saw her former wingman take it.
'Xeno!' She screamed in horror.
'I got thi-' Xeno said in confidence but was cut short by his aircraft exploding. There was no surviving that.
'Fuck.' Shadow muttered bitterly. She turned back towards the oncoming drones and bagged one with a Sidewinder that shot past them, turning it into a burning wreck.
Razor Squadron wasn't doing much better. All of their fighters had survived the initial blast, but as the two sides clashed things quickly got messy. Razor 4, Titan, the only member of the squadron that hadn't been in from the beginning of the war, took down one MQ-101 with an off-bore shot Sidewinder but took cannon shells through the right wing stab which ruptured a fuel tank and set the aircraft on fire. He then took a second MQ-101 down, this time with his own cannon, before finally getting both of his engines shot out by a missile to the rear. Titan then ejected safely. Lance saw him go down and cursed silently. He moved to assist Luna, who had been tracked down and was in a defensive dogfight with no less than three MQ-101s. There were explosions in the skies all around them.
'Luna, jink up.' Lance indicated for him to climb. Luna complied, bringing the MQ-101s with him, and Lance tore one in half with a concentrated cannon burst as it crossed his gunsights. Threatened, one of the remaining MQ-101s did a backflip and fell onto Lance. Lance was quick and sent a few shells through the drone's central processor before it could fire anything. This kind of worked against him. A large chunk of debris from the dead drone found its way into one of Lance's aircraft's engine air intake. He felt turbine blades shatter on impact. Warning lights and alarms blared as internal sensors figured out there was something wrong. The Super Hornet tilted off to one side, but Lance held it in one spot while he fired a short range missile at the final MQ-101 chasing Luna. He got it and Luna's six was cleared. Lance yanked the stick back and started falling towards the ground. Quickly shutting down the damaged engine so that no further damage would be caused, Lance realised he was effectively out of the fight. He turned towards the Arsenal Bird, adamant to get some missiles off, but the Arsenal had fired something and his other engine exploded. The front end of the Hornet was torn open and Lance felt his leg get shredded open by spall and molten metal. The cockpit was exposed to open air. Lance grunted in pain, grit his teeth and pulled on the ejection handle.
'Razor 1, bailing out!' Lance yelled despite the deep throbbing pain in his leg as the canopy was blown open and his ejection seat was thrown out of the aircraft. Lance was thrown into the slipstream and he caught a glimpse of what had shot him down. Laser weaponry, originating from the Arsenal Bird.
Trigger got to see the effectiveness of the laser weaponry deployed on the Arsenal Bird first-hand. Two pulsed laser pods on the underside of its body had popped out and focused fire on the coalition aircraft. The laser blasts were devastatingly effective, utterly destroying anything that got hit by them. In retaliation, Trigger approached from underneath with Lanza covering his six. Jaeger and Tailor were preparing for a similar strike on the other side. Above and behind Strider, Cyclops Squadron were intercepting MQ-101s and making sure that they didn't chase down any of the Strider pilots. Trigger looked up to see the massive hull of the thing they were fighting. He slaved the Raptor's fire control to his HMD and released two Sidewinders at the glowing hot pulse laser pods. Those missiles shot upwards and impacted exactly where Trigger wanted them to go. The first laser pod was destroyed. On the opposite side a kilometre away, Jaeger pitched up and used his twenty-millimetre cannon to shred open the pod's casing and then the wiring that powered it internally. The weapon was disabled by the time Jaeger had to pull away to avoid hitting one of the Arsenal Bird's propeller blades. Its APS started to charge again. Trigger saw a light start to emit from the centre of the gigantic aircraft.
'Strider, get away from that thing!' Trigger called it and flew away from the Arsenal Bird. His squad heeded his words and wisely withdrew. Before the APS system deployed, dozens of AA missiles were released from tubes hidden in the Arsenal Bird's hull that flew up and then curved down looking for targets. Spare Squadron composed some of those targets. They were already occupied in dogfights with some of the MQ-101s. Champ, flying his MiG-35 Fulcrum-E, was lost in bloodlust tearing through drones despite the fact that he was out of air to air missiles. He ignored the radar warning receiver even as a missile boosted towards the spine of his aircraft. Champ took down one final MQ-101 before he realised he was being targeted, and by that point there was no time to evade. The missile severed the entire rear segment of his aircraft from the front and the rest disintegrated and exploded, killing Champ near-instantly before he had a chance to scream. Huntsman pulled a sharp left and dived, narrowly avoiding an explosion right over his head. He, Taipan, Full Band and Keystone had just gotten lucky by getting away.
The Arsenal Bird's APS deployed properly in a fashionable display of energy. A missile aimed at the Arsenal Bird exploded on the field and dissipated, doing absolutely nothing. Blaze groaned. Without any superweapons and no way to penetrate the Arsenal Bird's energy shield, any hope of destroying it was going with each passing minute.
'Warpig, Siren Actual, target the enemy T-80 blocking the main entrance, bearing 0-7-5!' Captain Hewlett almost screamed into his radio with one hand while taking potshots at enemy soldiers with the other. His platoon, Rosa and Avril included, had attempted diplomacy with the radical ground troops but that had failed miserably and now they were all pinned down at the end of the bridge that linked the Space Elevator with the mainland. Luckily, the Sea Goblin rescue unit wasn't the only Marine unit that had been deployed. At their backs was also a friendly Abrams. The main battle tank's 120-millimetre gun fired with a thunderous bang and a long depleted uranium dart shot across the bay and into the turret ring of the Erusean T-80. One of the tank's hatches flew open and flames shot out of it. A couple of seconds later the whole tank detonated. A critical hit.
'Tank's down, captain!' One of the platoon's enlisted personnel called. Hewlett pushed himself off his stomach and indicated forward with his non-dominant hand.
'FORWARD!' He roared, dashing off their previous position and running towards the Space Elevator. His platoon of forty followed their commanding officer. Avril and Rosa were towards the front of the platoon embedded in between the regular infantry and the platoon's command staff. The two civilians were fairly fit but Avril in particular was struggling with her long-wounded leg and soon she was lagging behind the rest of the infantry. Hewlett looked back and noticed this. He turned around, ran for her, picked her up with one arm and continued to sprint for cover while suppressing a nearby enemy position with his HK416. By the time he had hit cover alongside the rest of his platoon, Hewlett hadn't so much as broken a sweat. By comparison, Rosa was panthing, desperate for oxygen.
'Oh my god,' She inhaled deeply trying to catch her breath. 'How do you run that fast in all this equipment?' Hewlett swapped the magazine in his rifle for a fresh one.
'A lot of training.' He peeked his head around a nearby corner. A bullet slammed into the opposite side of the wall forcing him to get back. Hewlett took a step back, raised his rifle and peaked again. He fired three rounds, nailing some poor bastard in the chest and head. Master Sergeant Jester Goodwill did a little peak of his own. He pointed at something in the far distance; an access shaft.
'Eleven-o-clock, access shaft. That's our place.' Jester mentioned it to his CO. Hewlett looked and spotted it.
'Seen. About four hundred metres, looks pretty narrow. We're not getting a platoon in there.' Hewlett was thinking. Rosa looked at him and Jester, not fully understanding what was happening. She turned to watch Avril lean out from cover and fire a couple of shots off at the enemy with her M4. Avril actually managed to hit somebody, but that was a short-lived victory when a bullet hit Avril in the head. She jolted back. Rosa saw the impact and dropped to her to check. Rosa put two fingers on Avril's carotid artery. There was a pulse. She was alive, but as evidenced by her violent shaking on the ground she was fucked up. Jester was already at the pair's side having heard the sound of a bullet slamming very hard into something solid. 'Oh shit', he muttered.
'Corpsman!' He yelled for a medic. Very quickly one was with them. The name on the medic's platecarrier read J. Stark. Stark pulled off his backpack and opened it to extract the necessary equipment. Jester dropped his HK and gently slid off Avril's ballistic helmet. She was developing a sizable lump on her forehead and she was thoroughly knocked out.
'Round caught the lip of the helmet. She's lucky.' Jester mused, noting the indent that a rifle calibre round had made.
'Very.' Stark agreed, pulling out a neck brace and putting it around Avril's neck to support her head. 'I can stabilise her, sergeant, but she's not going anywhere anytime soon.'
'Do what you can.' Jester told the medic, returning to the core of the platoon. Rosa stayed with Avril for a few moments racking up her options. Avril had been taken because she could help destroy things inside the Space Elevator that would stop it from acting as a power receiver and transmitter. Now they didn't have a dedicated engineer and in the heat of the situation that was exactly what they needed. A few rounds cracked over Rosa's head and she ducked to the ground. Two infantrymen, one with a rifle and the other with a light machine gun, sprint-crouched over in front of Avril and started suppressing the enemy. Rosa proned all the way back to proper cover where Hewlett was nailing hostiles left and right with his rifle.
'Thomas!' Rosa called out over the noise. 'I know how to shut down the Space Elevator!'
Thomas looked at her, then up to the Space Elevator, next to the battle happening in the air as the Arsenal Bird released its APS and unleashed a laser onto an unwitting Navy destroyer and then finally back to Rosa.
'Jester, watch the lads for me.' Hewlett deferred to Jester. 'Maywell, Caspona, Hunter, on me!'
'Headquarters, we're getting shit on by that thing, any analytical data would be appreciated!' Blaze sent a flurry of shells through an MQ-101 while also evading one chasing behind him. Snow shot overhead, releasing an AMRAAM as he did so, destroying Blaze's attacker for him.
'Standby Blaze, we're working on it.' The general down at coalition command said. For the situation he sounded blatantly unaware. Oh for fucks sake, Blaze muttered to himself. The Arsenal Bird was unleashing its beam laser against the surface ships that the coalition had brought. An OMDF cruiser exploded under the effects of the beam, one of its weapon magazines detonating. Ahead of that cruiser a destroyer was targeted and cut in half.
'OFS Garrett, all hands abandon ship!' The captain of the destroyer that had just been destroyed ordered the rest of his crew to get off the ship. Blaze banked to get in front of the Arsenal Bird and then turned to charge at it head-on. That laser module had to go. He locked onto the front of the Arsenal Bird and let off his very last air to air missile. Trigger had managed to find his way behind Blaze and fired two of his three AMRAAMs at the module. The three missiles streaked towards the Arsenal Bird. It made no effort to defend itself and the trio slammed into what was essentially glass. Predictably the material didn't stand up against the Sidewinder and two AMRAAMs and shattered in an explosion. A wild laser beam flew across for a brief moment before the laser's focusing lense shattered, hitting an unfortunate OMDF F/A-18F and disintegrating it. Just to make sure, Blaze gave the laser module a quick cannon burst before flying overhead and passing between the ship's two main propellers. He looked back to see that the Arsenal Bird was charging its APS system again.
'APS coming up!' Blaze announced it to the remaining coalition aircraft. The enemy was now down to around thirty MQ-101s from ninety, but now only sixty coalition aircraft were standing from their original six hundred, and the majority of those still up came from the ace squadrons. To make things worse everyone was running out of ammo. In Razgriz they may have had six missiles between the four of them. Some were winchester on AAMs completely.
'Cyclops 1, winchester air to air!' Count said that he was out of AAMs.
'Shit, I'm out too.' Huxian echoed that.
'Sol 1, any wisdom that you can impart upon us?' Snow ended up asking Mihaly for anything they could use to defeat the Arsenal Bird.
'Not while that shield is up.' Mihaly admitted that they couldn't do much while the APS system was active.
Goddamn it, Blaze thought. Hope was running very short, very quickly. He pressed on. There was no other choice.
'Keep hitting and running, exploit any weakness they have.' Blaze reminded the remainder of their forces. He looked to the base of the Space Elevator and even from a distance he could see ground forces clashing with each other. Come on guys, we need you right about now.
Rosa was running harder than she ever had in her life just to keep up with her military escorts. Ahead of her, Hewlett was firing and sprinting as they moved for the access shaft. He fired a grenade from the underbarrel M320 of his rifle at a fortified position. The grenade exploded on the outside of their sandbags and didn't injure anyone but it provided the distraction he needed for himself and his team to reach their objective. Instead of stopping and conducting a normal breach at the door, Hewlett utilised his forward momentum and kicked down the door with sheer force. The captain came to a rapid stop inside as he mag-dumped a pair of radical soldiers that were about to come out. Their sub-team's medic, Hospital Corpsman First Class Gary Hunter, was the first in after Hewlett, followed by Rosa and then Staff Sergeant Jake Maywell and Specialist Ronald Capona. Rosa stopped and was gasping for breath. Her heart was racing.
'Siren Minor, Siren Actual, we're inside the objective, moving to kick this fucker's teeth in.' Hewlett reported via radio. He looked to Rosa. 'Now's not the time to rest. Show us the way.'
'Yeah.' Rosa took a deep breath and grit her teeth. 'Follow this hallway. There'll be a cargo elevator to the right. That'll take us up the windbreak.'
'You heard the lady, let's move.' The fireteam picked itself up and moved down the long hallway. Rosa was right about the cargo elevator. After a minute of hard walking they encountered four hostiles that had come down from an elevator. Hewlett got the first two with precise headshots, Maywell and Capona got one each. They didn't lose any momentum and stormed the elevator. There was no-one in it. All five members of the fireteam stood inside. Rosa stepped over to the control panel and hit a button that said OBSV.
'Go straight out of the elevator and then go right into the far staff elevator. Head for the weather deck.' Rosa memorised as the cargo elevator they were on started moving up. Despite the side of the aforementioned cargo elevator, it ascended very quickly. Rosa had an odd feeling and withdrew the M9A3 that Hewlett had given her. She pointed it towards the floor.
'This seems pretty high up. Will we need any pressure gear?' Hunter asked. Rosa shook her head.
'Not until we reach the top of the windbreak. There's a chamber with oxygen tanks and other things you'd want for skydiving.' She explained.
'Charming.' Hewlett commented. He raised his HK at the door. They had almost arrived.
The Arsenal Bird hadn't dropped its APS, but on the upside it wasn't utilising its potent weapon systems against the allies. Twenty MQ-101s remained but the ones that were still up were proving to be very stubborn to shoot down. Blaze was chasing one down through a series of climbs and rolls. The drone was trying to waste Blaze's kinetic energy and attempt a turnaround so that it could tear Blaze straight out of his cockpit. Mythic slapped that plan straight out of the air by diving on the drone from a different direction and destroying it with her cannon. A good thing for Blaze because he had to pull sharply away from his direction of travel to avoid a missile fired from the Arsenal Bird. The missile exploded harmlessly far away from his Su-33.
'Sol 1, what about Justice's base rectenna?' Wit suggested to Mihaly.
'Once again, not while the APS is up.' Mihaly rebuked Wit with what he had stated earlier. Wit swore. Trigger saw a drone doing circles around the Space Elevator for no apparent reason. He decided to go after it, turning away from Strider Squadron, and did a couple of circles around the Space Elevator before sharply turning up and busting the MQ-101 down with a cannon burst that tore it completely in half, nose to tail. As Trigger climbed he heard something bounce off the canopy. He looked up and saw a small crack in the very top. It wasn't anything to be worried, but Trigger asked himself what the hell had hit him.
Back with Rosa and the marines, the door opened and the five found themselves staring at a trio of soldiers. Hewlett and his guys wasted no time, immediately firing their rifles at near point blank range into the enemy. The three dropped, dead. Hewlett and Caspona pushed up from the elevator first. There was a fourth guy just around the corner who Caspona dropped with a short burst from his Mark 48 machinegun. An MQ-101 shot past the open area at which they were standing, drowning out all noise. Rosa, Hunter and Maywell all moved forward which was when a fifth soldier struck out with his G3 battle rifle. Rosa saw the man move and take aim at Hewlett. She whipped around, pistol in hand, and fired two panicked shots. The soldier's head recoiled with the impact of the first round and dropped instantly, dead. The second shot went out over the nearby railing, but hit the next aircraft to fly past; an F-22A Raptor. That Raptor passed by as fast as anyone could blink, but the roar of its twin engines was deafening even through earplugs and active noise cancelling headphones. Rosa walked over to the dead body. There wasn't much point, the guy was definitely dead. Gray matter and blood had been sprayed over the floor from a gaping wound in the side of his skull.
'Nice shot.' Maywell commented on Rosa's gun skills and then pressed on towards the next elevator. There were two in their direction of travel. The one they wanted was out of view and was blocked by a few gates. The marines bypassed said gates and walked into the elevator. This one was much smaller than the previous cargo elevator they had been on, but there was still enough space for the five to all stand in. Hewlett pressed the button for the highest floor they could go to. The door slid shut and the elevator shot up. Despite the speed at which the elevator climbed, the sheer size of the Space Elevator had to be considered. They would have to wait a few minutes. The marines with rifles changed their mags for topped up ones. Rosa leant up against the back wall of the elevator and exhaled. She had just killed a man and that was starting to weigh in on her, even if the guy had been actively trying to kill them.
'These sensors, are they inside or outside?' Hewlett asked to distract her. Rosa shook her head to regain her focus.
'They're inside the windbreak, but that area is unpressurised.' Rosa recalled.
'How many sensors?' Hewlett asked another question.
'Six. All equally spaced out around the same elevation. I've never touched them but they look pretty fragile.' Rosa was surprisingly able to accurately recall the positions of those devices. Hewlett was about to ask another question, but he was cut off by the elevator suddenly stopping. Rosa was lifted off her feet by her own momentum for a split second. She looked at the floor reading at the top of the elevator's door. Maintenance Access 7.
'Oh that can't be good.' Caspona mused.
'Get this door open.' Hewlett ordered. He slung his rifle around his back and shoved his gloved fingers into the little crack in between the sliding doors. Hunter grabbed the other side, as did Caspona, while Maywell helped on Hewlett's side. The four did some grunting and slowly the doors pulled away to reveal the grey walls of the interior maintenance access hallways.
'Rosa, go.' Hewlett grunted under the strain of trying to keep the door open. Rosa noticed that even through his combat uniform Hewlett's shoulder and arm muscles were showing. She dashed through. As she reached uniformly solid ground, the elevator groaned. Maywell looked up at the roof.
'Oh fuck. Captain, GO!' He roared at his superior officer. Understanding what was about to happen, Hewlett released the door to Maywell and moved as quickly as he could through the opening. Maywell yelled in strain but held it long enough for Hewlett to get through before letting go. The timing was perfect, for as soon as the door slammed shut something hit the top of the elevator and it just fell out of existence back down to the base floor from which it had come. The elevator hit a certain speed before there was the loud screech of metal on metal contact. A taut cable fell down the shaft and hit the elevator with a loud bang.
'Maywell?!' Hewlett checked over his radio the status of his guys.
'Aw fuck me that's gonna leave a mark.' Maywell wheezed out after a couple seconds worth of silence. 'We're good, sir. But we're going to be in here for a while.'
'Copy. We're not waiting for you.' Hewlett reported, unslinging his rifle and looking at Rosa. 'It's just us now. Up the stairs?'
'Yes.' Rosa said. The pair moved to the nearest set of stairs that went up and started the long climb.
Outside the situation was escalating. The majority of the coalition aircraft were now completely out of missiles and some were running out of cannon ammo, making them winchester completely. That said, most of the MQ-101s had been destroyed which meant the main problem presented to the coalition was avoiding the potent anti-air possessed by the Arsenal Bird.
'AWACS Long Caster, AWACS Sky Eye, we're transmitting technical data to you now.' Headquarters finally beamed over that data Blaze had been asking for.
'Received. All aircraft, target the Arsenal Bird's propeller assemblies. Can't stay in the air if it has no propulsion.' Long Caster received this information and relayed it to the fighters still in the air.
Oh this is gonna be fun, Blaze thought. 'Use your cannon on the engine modules. Don't waste your missiles on it.' He said to the surviving aircraft while pulling away from Razgriz Squadron and diving on the Arsenal Bird like an angry hawk. He went for the port side main propeller and unleashed pure hell from his cannon. The high explosive incendiary shells ripped into the shield that covered the gigantic engine powering the propeller. A fire started within the engine's cover but the propeller didn't break down and feather itself. Blaze pulled out of the attack before slamming into the Arsenal Bird. Grimm and Mythic picked up the slack for him, the pair conducting their own attacks one after the other in the same fashion that Blaze had. Something broke and a large volume of oil and hydralic fluid spilled out. Grimm passed by, and it was left to Mythic to properly destroy the engine. She let off a three-second cannon burst. The propeller started shaking and then sheared off its mount. The massive prop descended and fell into the ocean.
'Port main prop down.' Mythic reported it as she turned from a dive into a climb before hitting the Arsenal Bird. This annoyed the AI controlling the Arsenal Bird and its APS popped. Everyone was clear of it before it activated.
'Fuck me, how long can that thing run the shield for?' Blaze asked in frustration.
'In theory, forever. Arsenal Birds receive power beamed from the Space Elevator. Can't break it unless you disable said power source.' Wit replied, perhaps forgetting that Blaze did know how it received its power. That said, Blaze may have forgotten it in a moment of frustration.
'And I don't think it's about to let up after that.' Seymour added in reflection of the Arsenal Bird now missing a main prop.
Hewlett and Rosa rushed up the giant column of stairs as fast as they could. Rosa was wheezing and desperate for air but she kept going. Hewlett was feeling the strain too, represented by beads of sweat running down his face. A couple of floors above them a door burst open and a couple of radical soldiers came out. They went up the stairs, not seeing the Erusean princess and an Osean Marine Corps officer a flight or two of stairs below them.
'Where the hell are they going?' Hewlett whispered to Rosa, stopping for a second and tracking them before they went out of his line of sight. Rosa catched what she could of her breath.
'This goes all the way to the top of the windbreak. They might be going to protect the guard sensors.' Rosa coughed. 'If we go through where they came from we should walk into the pressurised staff room.'
'If you're about to say an elevator, why didn't they take it?' Hewlett tried to predict what Rosa was going to say next.
'Worse. Fun fact, there's a vent system that runs up from here all the way to just above where we need to be.' Rosa corrected the captain. Hewlett shot a glance at her, then at the door they were talking about, then back at Rosa again.
'Why do I get the feeling there's a catch here?' Hewlett suspected something was up.
'I don't think you'll fit. They're quite cramped.' Rosa admitted the fault in her plan.
'Oh, lovely.' Hewlett said sarcastically. 'You sure you'll be good on your own through there?'
'As long as you're waiting for me at the top I'll be fine.' Rosa nodded in response to the question. 'There'll be pressure suits in here. I say lets go.'
The pair climbed a couple of extra flights of stairs and opened the door into the staff area. Compared to the utilitarian grey of the maintenance access stairs they had been going up for the past five minutes, this area was starkly contrasted by hospital white floors, walls and roofs. The area was mostly featureless minus a few screens and switchboards. At the far right corner of the room there was a second door. Hewlett moved towards it with his rifle up. A radical soldier, most likely an officer based on his uniform and headwear, walked through that door.
'Didn't I just tell you-' The officer was saying before his life was swiftly ended by a single 5.56-millimetre round to the forehead, blowing grey matter against the door and wall behind him. Hewlett jogged in with his rifle up and breached. There was a security guard and a second, higher ranking, officer inside. Hewlett shot the security guard before he had a chance to react. The second officer spun around in his chair, alarmed at the sound of gunfire, which gave Hewlett a chance to slam him directly in the face with the buttstock of his rifle. The officer recoiled with the impact out of his chair and onto the floor. Blood flowed from a broken nose. Hewlett kicked him in the ribcage so that he would roll onto his belly and kneeled down on his back. He dropped his HK, withdrew a flipout utility knife and held it against the officer's throat.
'Listen to me. I'm going to ask you some questions. If you don't answer, I'll slit your throat and let you bleed. Do you understand?' Hewlett threatened the officer. He looked to Rosa. 'See if you can find some pressure suits and SCUBA gear. I'll be out when I'm done with this guy.' Rosa wisely took the hint and left the room. Hewlett turned his attention back to the whimpering officer.
'Where did you send those men?'
'T-to guard the distortion sensors at the top.'
'How many men are up there?'
'Six.'
'Does that include the two guys you just sent out?'
'Yes.'
'Tell me, how much do you value your life?'
'V-v-very?'
Hewlett shook his head in pity. He tore the officer's soft cover off, pulled his head up by the hair and then plunged the tip of his knife into the officer's throat. He slashed across, severing both carotid arteries. Bright red blood sprayed onto the floor. Hewlett wiped the blade of his knife off on his sleeve, picked up his rifle and left the officer. He would pass out from lack of oxygen going to the brain in a minute or so. Fatal blood loss would kill him after that. Hewlett found Rosa outside putting on a pressure suit. She had dragged out one for Hewlett.
'Thanks.' Hewlett dropped his rifle and popped off his platecarrier so that he could fit the pressure suit over his uniform. He figured out everything pretty quickly and by the time Rosa had slid her helmet on, so had Hewlett. Rosa went over to the switchboard that they had spotted earlier, and after a few seconds of searching found the switch she wanted. She flipped it and towards the door where the radical officers had been a vent in the wall opened. Rosa moved towards it, climbing up and entering it. She glanced at Hewlett who had the suit on and was now fixing his platecarrier over it.
'Thomas. Don't get killed.' She said as reassurance to the captain. Hewlett smiled and nodded.
'Rosa, don't fall to your death.' He shot back a one liner at the princess. Rosa chuckled and disappeared into the vents to begin her ascent. Once she was gone, Hewlett picked up and slung his HK416. He checked that the magazine was full and busted out through the door. It was time for him to start his ascent as well.
The Arsenal Bird still had its APS system up. An annoyance for the coalition, but it did stop the beast from firing at friendlies. Blaze checked his ammo and fuel reserves. Twenty-ish percent left on the cannon, about a third left in his fuel tanks. He continued the fight by blasting one of the few MQ-101s that was stupid enough to cross his nose.
'That damn shield.' Huxian was bitter about the energy shield, a feeling that all of the pilots were feeling.
Rosa leaped across an open space and grabbed onto a grated vent cover. She looked up and started climbing.
Hewlett was sprinting up the stairs. His face was covered in sweat and his thighs and calves were burning from having to carry the pressure suit in addition to his own kit.
Rosa gripped tightly onto a sticking out light, the purpose of which was foreign to her. She lifted herself up and managed to swing herself so that she was standing on said light. Rosa knelt and then jumped up to grab another grated vent cover. Once she climbed up that and got a foothold, she was set.
Hewlett kicked down a door and was slammed in the face by frigid air. There was a single man looking out at the destruction happening far below. Before that man noticed that an Osean had just arrived, Hewlett charged forward and bodyslammed him, knocking him off the edge to fall to a hard death. After the enemy was gone Hewlett went to a nearby elevator, which would take him to the very top of the windbreak.
Rosa was almost at the top. She had roughly a minute's worth of climbing left to go. An explosion nearby didn't distract her from that.
Count moved around uncomfortably in his cockpit. The Arsenal Bird's APS STILL hadn't gone down, the longest that it had been up over this entire operation.
'Come on you big fucker, go down.' Count whispered to himself.
As Hewlett climbed the final open-air elevator, he withdrew a flashbang from his platecarrier and pulled the pin, clasping the spoon. He threw it up just before the elevator arrived at the top of the Space Elevator and stopped moving. The flashbang exploded in a bright flash of white, blinding three of the people up there waiting for him. All three were killed by precision shots to the torso and head. Around the corner of a pillar a fourth soldier had heard the loud bang and gunshots and was coming to engage the hostile. Hewlett beat said soldier to the punch and hit him with two suppressed shots, both to the right arm. The man screamed in pain, his humerus shattered. Hewlett put him out of his misery with a shot to the nose which passed through and severed the top of his spinal column.
Rosa had arrived at the top of the vent system. She climbed up into an area where she could actually stand on solid ground, walked forward and kicked open a vent. She leant out and instantly realised that she was where she needed to be. Rosa dropped down onto the floor, landing heavily, and pulled out her M9. She moved forward with it and rounded a corner. There was a radical waiting for Hewlett to move out of cover, holding a G3. He didn't hear or otherwise notice the princess behind him. Rosa took aim at the soldier's head and fired a single round. The man dropped like a sack of potatoes, dead. She moved into the open, looking for Thomas. The latter found the princess first and almost mistook her for an enemy.
'Funny seeing you here.' Hewlett remarked, lowering his guard. 'Anyone else up there?'
'Just me.' Rosa said.
'Where are those sensors?' Hewlett asked as he climbed up a ladder to get to Rosa's level. Once he had made it up, Rosa walked him over to the inside of the wind break, right over a twelve-kilometre drop to sea level. The sensors they were looking for were concealed in small glass boxes. Out of curiosity, Hewlett tried shooting the box to see if that would break it. The glass cracked, but it didn't break under the force. Annoyed, Hewlett set his gun to fully automatic and fired a full magazine at the box. It broke on the last few rounds of the magazine and a line of orange lights lit up from the top of the wind break all the way down to sea level. Rosa picked up a nearby sledgehammer and moved over to one of the other boxes. She lifted the hammer up and swung it, grunting with exertion. The metal head slammed into the glass, crashing straight through it and breaking the circuitry inside. Another line of orange lights activated.
'What are we going to do about that shield?' Huxian asked, clearly worried about leaving the Arsenal Bird still up.
'I've got a plan.' Count coughed to clear his throat.
'What are you going to do?' Huxian was skeptical of Count's plan.
'Damned shield. Just go away.' Count started saying something off the top of his head.
Hewlett unloaded another magazine at point blank range into another box. It broke and went orange.
'Be gone!'
Rosa roared as she slammed the hammer into a third box, destroying it completely.
'Disappear!'
'The fuck are you on, Count?' Trigger had to ask about Count's random antics.
Hewlett bashed in another box with the buttstock of his rifle, hitting the main circuitry to make sure it was destroyed.
'Away with you!'
'Gone cuckoo, Count?' Huxian was just confused, nothing else.
Rosa made it to the last box first. She raised the sledgehammer for a final swing. There was little sound, except for the shattering of glass and the impact of metal breaking through circuitry. All six orange light strips were active. A safety monitoring system saw that all six location markers were missing, and activated the corresponding protocol to ensure the safety of all personnel around the ISEV. All power generation coming to and from the Space Elevator was cut. Outgoing communications were disabled, and microwave energy transmitters were shut down.
Blaze had to blink to make sure he wasn't hallucinating. One moment the Arsenal Bird's APS shield had been up, the next it had faded away in the space of a second. He checked his radar which confirmed it for him. The energy shield was no longer present.
'Where in the…' Snow pondered what had just happened.
'There we go!' Count played the shield's disappearance as his own doing.
Huxian laughed. 'What kind of magic did you just work there, you asshole?!'
'It's not magic. It's a scam.' Count joked. 'We've got an opening, let's exploit it. Do it, Trigger!'
'This is Panther Squadron, we'll take down its anti-air.' Talon declared, the surviving members of her squad already on the dive to attack the Arsenal Bird's air-to-air missile launchers while she was saying it. Four F-35Cs swooped in on the starboard side of the Arsenal Bird, tracer shots very much indicating that they were hitting the launchers. The mounts exploded when shells hit their ammo storage dumps. Some of the surviving AA launchers fired back, hitting one of the Panther Lightnings. The pilot's aircraft was crippled but before it exploded he brought it into a collision course with one of the sub propellers. At the speed he was going the sub propeller's blades were sheared off and the entire assembly was destroyed.
Strider and Cyclops Squadrons all bunched up into one group and at the same time dumped their cannon ammo reserves into the starboard side main propeller. Under the weight of so much explosive filler and lead the blades were torn off and the engine itself torn to pieces. However, this maneuver left all of them except for Trigger and Lanza out of ammo.
'Can we even get all of the propellers with this little ammo?' Lanza pointed out. Blaze was doubtful about it, even though things were starting to let up for the coalition.
'Sol 1, Razgriz 1, got anything for us now that the shield is down?' Blaze asked Mihaly for any advice.
'Justice has a supply unit attached to its belly. Shooting the joints to disconnect that will expose its core. Hitting that core with a missile should destroy it.' Mihaly answered.
'In theory. That might be impossible, even for an experienced pilot.' Wit pointed out.
'Well we're certainly not lacking in experienced pilots around here.' Pixy, the enigmatic bastard that he was, counter-pointed out.
'That's the truth.' Blaze flew underneath the Arsenal Bird, avoiding a missile as he did so, to find the supply unit that Mihaly was talking about. It was situated right where he said it would. 'Snow, form up on my right wing and come in from the nose. Grimm, Mythic, attack from the rear. Aim for the connecting joints on that shuttle-looking thing.'
'Roger, captain.' Snow acknowledged.
'Will do, captain.' Grimm acknowledged.
'Yes, sir.' Mythic acknowledged.
Snow quickly appeared with Blaze. The pair flew out a few kilometres before turning back in, charging the Arsenal Bird head-on. Grimm and Mythic did the same from their end. The latter pair got into range first. With their 27mm cannons Razgriz 3 and 4 tore off the joints that held the supply shuttle to the Arsenal Bird. The supply shuttle sagged forwards, only held by the front two connecting joints. This made it easier for Blaze and Snow to land their shots, and with two quick bursts the supply unit fell away from its mothership and into the ocean to sink to the sea floor. The Arsenal Bird's base rectenna was now exposed to attack.
'Big bird's open.' Jaeger saw.
'Just as well. Trigger, hit it!' Blaze ordered Trigger to start his attack, being one of the few with any missiles left. Trigger came in slow from the back of the Arsenal Bird. He pulled his nose up rapidly, going into what could be considered a Cobra manuever, and fired his last AMRAAM straight up. The missile hit the rectenna dead on. The entire baseplate exploded and debris started falling down, luckily after Trigger had pulled out of the cobra and moved away from the Arsenal Bird. Explosions rocked the wings of Justice, seconds before fires spontaneously erupted across the entire mega aircraft. Entire chunks of pure white armour plating were thrown hundreds of metres away. Justice was done for. She split in half down the middle and the two severed halves fell into the ocean.
'Holy shit.' Huxian was surprised at how combustible the Arsenal Bird had become in its final moments.
'That's the last of the Rocs.' Jaeger said.
'Oh thank christ that nightmare is over.' Trigger was just glad the battle was finally over, after severe casualties had been incurred. Several other pilots expressed their relief at the destruction of the enemy's final bastion.
'Headquarters, Razgriz 1. Orders?' Blaze waited for a new directive.
'The mission's been completed, Razgriz. All hands, return to your bases.' The Air Force general popped in at the very end of the mission to report.
'Belay that. Two aircraft are approaching at very high speed!' Sky Eye cut in to interrupt that order. 'Bearing 0-1-0. Cyclops 1, prepare for contact!'
Rosa and Hewlett were strapping into parachutes. It was going to be much faster to get off the elevator via a HALO jump than it would be to directly descend. They had witnessed the Arsenal Bird go up into flames and collapse. Hewlett slung his rifle around his chest and tied his radio backpack to his legs. Rosa was already set. Hewlett noticed.
'What are you waiting for?' Hewlett tightened the straps for his backpack. 'I'll be right behind you.'
Nodding, Rosa went out onto a catwalk. She walked for a few seconds before reaching the edge. Rosa waited for a second, inhaled and then pushed away from the catwalk. Just as two futuristic looking aircraft shot past the Space Elevator. They were looking for a target, and the closest happened to be an F-15E in desert camouflage with a magicians hat painted onto the tail.
Count looked back to see that two aircraft were targeting him. He pulled into a sharp turn left to get away from the enemy flying airframes that he had never seen before. They were of a completely alien design, and they were massive, easily bigger than his Strike Eagle. A missile was launched at him. Count turned the other direction and dived so that the missile hit the top of the Space Elevator.
Hewlett was knocked off the catwalk by the shockwave of that first missile. He yelled in surprise but went into good form. Hewlett noticed that the Strike Eagle and his two pursuers were coming downwards. He shot down like a dart.
The two enemy aircraft chased Count straight down even through a spiral. The leader of the two, a dark grey patterned fighter, launched another missile. This missile exploded right behind him, sending shrapnel throughout the skies that of all things impacted the back of Count's F-15E.
Rosa had been right in the path of the explosion, and would have been killed if it hadn't been for the bodyshield that had arrived at precisely the right moment to absorb the majority of the explosion's force. Hewlett was slammed into Rosa by the explosion which knocked both of them off course. The former's helmet was missing, forced off by the blast. The pair tumbled towards the ground.
'Thomas!' Rosa tried to call out over the wind. Either the captain couldn't hear her or he was out cold. She assumed the worst, Hewlett wasn't moving of his own free will. Rosa clasped her arms around Hewlett's chest, finding his chute release and holding it. She waited until the two were at a much lower altitude, which only took a minute. Rosa looked at her altimeter; a thousand metres above the deck. She pulled Hewlett's ripcord and decided to hold onto him for the remainder of the descent.
Both of Count's engines were damaged and one of the tail control surfaces had been shot through, but luckily he was still able to fly. The only reason why he hadn't been shot down then and there was because Blaze had intervened by flying in between the three, getting a single hit on the light grey aircraft before his cannon ran out of ammo. Blaze quickly realised that these aircraft far outclassed anything the allies were fielding. They had more ammo, were faster, had more fuel and were in an entirely new class of maneuverability.
'All hands, retreat from combat!' Blaze gave the retreat order while still in an evasive dogfight with one of the enemy aircraft. The other one had split off to attack other allied forces. A bunch of Erusean aircraft went down insanely quickly, destroyed by laser weaponry and missiles. Cyclops Squadron were the first to get away from the AO.
'Who are these guys? They're tearing us apart!' Talon was quick to get out of the area.
'Never mind that for now. There's an abandoned carrier to the south just outside of the AO. It's not going to be an easy landing but it's the best shot you've got!' Long Caster had pointed out the closest airfield to the few remaining allied forces. Blaze kept one of the aircraft in a dogfight while everyone else retreated.
'Now's not the time to be picky guys, go!'