Rogue Squadron – Chapter 1
Freedom overide, sephiroth12285, The Baka Brigade, Chi no Enjeru, Dust-in: Thanks for reviewing the non-chapter. Here's the first chapter. Hope you enjoy it
Koronis: Sorry you feel that way...yeah technology will have to be adapted and such, but if you read this I hope you come to enjoy it.
Author's Note: Since Revenge of the Sith has come out, I decided to release this, even though I haven't finished writing my other GSD fanfic yet (unfortunately I'm having a case of writer's block with the next chapter of "The Subject"). Anyways, I hope you enjoy this fic and please review. Any help would be appreciated.
You're good Shinn, but you're no Kira Yamato. Shinn Asuka's cheeks still burned at the memory of Commander Waltfeld's evaluation of his last simulation exercise. The line had been a simple comment, not meant to be cruel nor delivered that way, but it cut deep into Shinn. I've never tried to suggest that I'm that good of a pilot.
He shook his head, trying to concentrate. No, you just wanted everyone to realise that you were as good as he was. Reaching out he inserted the card containing his suit's statistics into the simulator. "Red One is ready to go," he commed, as the activation screen came up on the simulator screen. All around him, the simulated controls came alive and flashed to life, "Power is at full, ready to launch."
His wingman, Rey Za Burrel, reported start-up success, "Red Two is operational."
Red Three and Red Four cheacked in, then the external screens came alive projecting an empty starfield. Nav data from the central computer came through onto Shinn's main computer. He punched a button sending the same coordinates out to the other pilots in Red Flight. "Go to light speed and rendezvous on the freighter."
As Shinn's Destiny Gundam engaged its hyperdrive, the stars elongated themselves into white cylinders, then snapped back into pinpoints and began to revolve slowly, transforming themselves into a tunnel of white light. Shinn fought the urge to compensate for the roll, In space, and especially in hyperspace, up and down were relative. How his ship moved through hyperspace didn't really matter – as long as it remained on the course the computer had calculated and had attained sufficient velocity before entering hyperspace, he'd arrive intact.
Flying into a black hole would actually make this run easier. Every pilot dreaded this scenario, based off an Imperial attack on evacuation ships at Orb. While the freighter went around rescuing the evacuees, an Imperial frigate danced around the system, dumping out Zakus or the like, and the heavier Babi units to do as much damage as they could. The Babi units, with full loads of missiles, could do a lot of damage. All the pilots called this scenario the Requiem scenario. The Imperials would normally only deploy four Zakus and a half-dozen Babis but it would do so in a pattern that made it all but impossible for the pilots to save the medical freighter. The freighter was just one big target, and the Babi pilots had no trouble unloading all their missiles into it. What made it even harder was that depending on the random program or the identity of the pilots flying the other side in the simulators, the enemy could dump Zakus, Windams, Daggers or Goufs and sometimes even the Rick-Doms.
The stellar pinpoints elongated again as the mobile suits came out of hyperspace. Off to the port side, Shinn saw the medical freighter. Moments later his sensors reported that the other mobile suits had arrived and the freighter had started to pick up the evacuees. The other pilots checked in and the first shuttle off the medical freighter began to dock the first evacuees.
"Red One, this is Red Four."
"Go ahead, Four."
"By the book, or are we doing something fancy?"
Shinn hesitated before answering. By Book, Stellar had referred to the general wisdom about the scenario. It stated that one pilot should play fleethund and race out to engage the first flight while the other three mobile suits stayed in close to provide backup. As long as the other three mobile suits stayed home, it appeared, the enemy frigate would only drop mobile suits off at a considerable distance from the evacuees. When they didn't, it got bolder and the scenario became very bloody.
The problem with going by the book was that it wasn't a very good strategy. It meant that one pilot had to deal with five enemy mobile suits – two combat mobile suits and three Babis all by him or herself and then turn around an engage five more enemies. Even with them coming in waves, the chances of being able to succeed against those odds were slim.
Doing it any other way was disastrous.
"By the book. Keep the home fires burning and pick up after me."
"Done. Good luck," Stellar's voice came over the flight's tactical channel.
"Thanks." Shinn reached up with his hand and pressed it against the cellphone tat was in his flight suit pocket. Though he could barely feel it through his gloves and the thick material of his flight suit, the familiar sensation of the metal resting against his heart made him concentrate even harder. It was the only thing I have left of you, Mayu, I hope that you can give me strength to make sure a tragedy like Orb never happens again.
Winning this scenario would take some deft flying and a considerable amount of luck.
The first of the evacuees were moving onto the medical freighter now, prompting Shinn to begin his final check. He'd analysed the scenario over in his mind many times. He had spent a lot of time analysing the attack vectors and flight styles of the program. While different pilots flew the enemy half of the simulators sometimes, the performance of the enemy mobile suits dictated their performance to an extent. The sensors beeped as the Imperial frigate's arrival. "Great, eleven ks' aft." Pulling the stick around to the right, Shinn brought the Destiny into a wide turn. At the end of it he punched the throttle up to full power, the Destiny racing off towards the enemy. "Red One engaging."
Auel's voice came over excited and strong through the radio, "Send them back to their makers."
"I'll do my best, Red Three." Shinn smiled and waved with the Destiny as he flew back through the Alliance formation and out towards the Imperial frigate. The sensor screen announced the appearance of three Babis and then the he saw that a Zaku and a Windam had also appeared.
Shinn activated his phase shift armour as he raised his beam rifle and his aiming lens popped down as he brought the Zaku into his sight. Good, looks like three ks between the Babis and the other suits. Shinn took a deep breath, and felt the cellphone near his heart and then his right hand on the piloting stick and prepared to fire. At two ks the sensor display painted a yellow box around the Zaku. The box went green as the fighter's image locked into the HUD's targeting cross and the computer indicated it was time to fire. Shinn hit the firing button firing three shots from the beam rifle towards the Zaku.
The first beam missed but the second and third blasted through the head and the cockpit of the Zaku. The Zaku lurched and then blew up into an expanding ball of incandescent pink gas.
Shinn kicked the Destiny up into a ninety-degree snap-roll and sliced through the centre of the explosion. Beam rifle fire from the Windam forced him to bring up his shield to block, making it impossible for him to get a good visual line on the Windam. The sensor screen showed no lock, but Shinn hurried a shot anyway, seeing it glance off the Windams side as it flashed past and continued on in at the medical freighter and the evacuees.
Time to write a new chapter for the book in the Requiem scenario. Shinn switched to his beam boomerangs. The HUD changed to a larger box and the sensor screen display changed to adjust to the new weapon settings.
"Red One, your velocity is down to one percent. Do you need help?" Rey's voice, concerned, came over the comm.
"Negative, Red One."
"Shinn, what are you doing?"
"Making the book a short story." I hope.
The HUD went red and Shinn fired one of the beam boomerangs. His eyes acquired target two. The HUD went flashed green, then yellow and then red and Shinn launched his second beam boomerang.
Numbers scrolled away to zero as the beam boomerangs streaked in on their targets. Two ks away the first beam boomerang hit, shredding the first Babi. Seconds later the second beam boomerang hit its target. A pink novalike explosion lit the simulator's cockpit, then melted into the blackness of space.
His eyes focused on the firing lens as he acquired the third target as the first beam boomerang returned to him. Even as it came back he knew that the rate of closure between the Babi and his Destiny would make the last beam boomerang shot all but impossible. Shinn knew he had to use his beam rifle, as he throttled up again, the third Babi sailed past. He brought his mobile suit around and switched back to beam rifle targeting and climbed up on the Babi's stern.
The Babi's pilot tried to evade him. He juked the suit to the left, then started a long turn to the right, but Shinn was of no mind to let this pilot go, even though it was just a simulation. He cut his speed, which kept the Babi in front of him, then followed it in its turn As he levelled out again on its tail, he triggered two beam rifle bursts and the sensor screen reported some hull damage.
The Babi came up in a roll to the right and Shinn followed this manoeuvre. Had he continued to fly level, the Destiny's beam rifle would have passed on either side of the Babi, giving the Babi a few more seconds of life. Keeping the Babi centred in his firing kens, Shinn fired twice more and the Babi disintegrated before him.
Pushing his throttle back to full, Shinn scanned for the Windam he'd missed. He found it two ks out and going in towards the evacuees. He also found five more enemy suits coming in from the other side of the medical freighter, eighteen ks away. Damn, the Babi took more time than I had to give it.
He brought the beam boomerang targeting program back up and locked in on the Windam. The HUD seemed to take forever before it went red and acquired a lock. Shinn fired and watched it blast through the Windam and then turned his attention to the new enemy mobile suits.
"Red One, do you want us to engage?"
Shinn shook his head as sweat dripped down his forehead. "Negative Two. The frigate is stioll here and could dump anoterh flight." He sighed. "Move to intercept the Zaku and Windam, but don't go beyond aa k from the evacuees."
"On it," the reply came quickly.
Good, they can tie the Windam and Zaku up while I dust these Babis. Shinn studied the nav data given by the computer. The medical freighter, the Babis and the Destiny formed a shrinking triangle. If he flew directly at the Babis he would end up flying in an arc, which would take more time than he had and let them get close enough to launch their missiles at the evacuees. That would be les than useless as far as he was concerned. He plotted an intercept course six ks out from the Evacuees. Steering towards the intercept point, Shinn saw that he'd have just over a minute to deal with the Babis before they were in firing range on the evacuees. Not enough time.
Flicking a few switches, Shinn directed energy from phase shift armour into the engines. It took the acceleration compensator a second to cycle up, so the Destiny's burst of speed pushed Shinn back into the padding of his command seat. This had better work.
"Red One, the Imperial frigate has hyped. Are we released to engage the enemy?"
"Affirmative, Three. Go get them." Shinn frowned for a second, knowing that his fellow pilots would make short work of the enemy Windam and Zaku. They would deny him a clean sweep, but he'd willingly trade two enemy mobile suits for saving the evacuees. Commander Waltfeld might have gotten all of them himself in his Murasame, but then he was a veteran of Jachin Due and blew up the Genesis battlestation.
He mentally took note of the position of the three Babis as the computer marked them as targets. The range to intercept was 3ks and he had added thirty seconds to his fighting time. He acquired the first Babi and the targeting lens showed him to be coming in at a forty-five degree angle to the flight path of his target which meant he was way off target. Shinn quickly punched the generator back into recharging his phase shift armour, then pulled even more energy from his engines and shunted it into recharging weapons and shields.
The resource redirection brought his speed back down. Shinn pulled back his stick, easing the Destiny into a tun that brought him head-on into the Babis. Tapping the stick to the left, he centered the targeting box on the first of the Babis.
The HUD started yellow, then quickly went red. He fired his beam boomerang. As he acquired the next target the HUD started red and he threw the second beam boomerang. He acquired the last Babi but the sensors screeched and Shinn looked down on his display. He saw that Green Two had been destroyed.
"Green Two, what happened."
"He's gone. One."
"A fighter got him?"
"No time to chat…" The comm. call from Stellar in Red Four ended in a hiss of static.
"Auel?"
"Got one, Shinn, but his last Windam is good."
"Hang on."
"Don't worry, I'll beat him."
Shinn acquired the last Babi and but the sensors indicated that the last Babi had already shot past the intercept point and was bearing in on the evacuees. The pilot had the wide-bodied craft slowing spinning, making it hard to get a lock with the long-ranged beam boomerangs. The medical freighter, being as big as it was, would present large enough a target that even a rolling mobile suit could get a lock on it.
And once he has that lock, the medical freighter is so much space junk. Shinn switched back to his beam rifle as the beam boomerangs returned. He pushed the Destiny forward, and even though two ks separated them, he triggered a couple of shots. He knew that his chances of hitting were not good at that range but the light from the bolts would shoot past the Babi and give the pilot something to think about. And I want him thinking about me, not the evacuees sitting there ready to be obliterated.
Shinn redirected all power back into the engines and shot forward. Two more beam rilfe bursts caused the Babi to shy a bit, but it had pushed into target-acquisition range. The ship's roll began to slow as the pilot fixated on his target, then as Shinn brought his beam rifle to bear, the Babi jinked away and cut away to port.
The Orban's eyes narrowed. Heine has got to be flying that thing. He thinks it's payback time. The other pilot had flown a Jachin Due though in a different squadron and was one of the best, but Shinn knew that he was better. He's going to kill the medical freighter and I'll never hear the end of it. Unless…
Shinn pulled away his phase-shift armour and followed Heine through a barrel roll, he keep the throttle full forward. As they levelled out again Shinn triggered a snap shot at the Babi it caught a piece of the Babi near the engines, but Heine dove beneath the Destiny's line of fire. Here we go!
Shinn shoved his stick forward to follow the babi's dive, but because his rate of speed was a good twenty percent faster than that of the Babi, the Destiny moved into a broad loop. By the time Shinn inverted to finish the turn off, Heine's Babi came back up and banked in on the Destiny's tail.
Before the Babi could unload a missile or two into his unshielded back, Shinn broke the Destiny hard to port and carved across the Babi's line of fire. Basic manoeuvre with a basic response. Without even glancing at his instruments and paying no attention to the sensor alarms, Shinn cut engine power back into phase shift armour. One more second.
Heine's response to Shinn's break had been a reverse throttle hop. By bringing his Babi up into a steep climb, then rolling out in the direction of the turn, Heine had managed to stay inside the arc of the Destiny's turn. AS the Babi levelled off it closed very quickly with the Destiny – too close for a missile lock, but not a laser shot. The Babi shrieked in at the Destiny. Collision warning alarms wailed. Shinn could feel Heine's excitement as the Destiny loomed larger. He knew that the Babi would snap off a quick beam burst, angry at having overshot the Destiny, but happy to smoke Shinn before taking down the evacuees.
The Destiny's pilot hit a switch and the beam boomerang came out as Shinn pounced. The Phase Shift armour had no trouble absorbing the Babi's twin beam rifle bursts. Had the Babi used its heavy missiles, the Phase Shift armour could even have handled all the damage that they could do, though that would have been enough to drain phase shift armour to empty. The Babi was caught by the unexpected beam boomerang at close range and exploded in a nova of pink gas. The feedback from the explosion managed to drain a lot of power from the phase shift armour but the Destiny was undamaged.
"Red Three did you copy that?"
Shinn got no response. He looked down at his sensor screen. Bakka. Shinn flipped the phase shift armour to cover both front and back. He looked harder as the computer magnified the image of the evacuees.
The image of the lone Windam making a strafing run on the medical freighter appeared on Shinn's screen. The clumsy little craft skittered along over the medical freighter's surface, easily dodging the return fire. That's seriously gutsy for a Windam. Shinn smiled. Or arrogant, and time to make him pay for that arrogance.
Shinn brought his beam boomerang targeting lens up and locked on to the Windam. It tried to break the lock, but CIWS fire from the freighter boxed it in. Shinn's HUD went red and he fired the beam boomerang. "Scratch one Windam."
The beam boomerang shot straight in at the Windam but the pilot broke hard to port and away, causing the boomerang to overshoot the target. Nice flying! Shinn brought the Destiny over and started down to loop in behind the Windam, but as he did so, the Windam vanished from his forward screen and reappeared in his aft arc. Yanking the stick hard to the right and pulling it back, Shinn wrestled the Destiny up and to starboard, then inverted and rolled out to the left. A beam rifle shot jolted a tremor through the simulator couch. Shinn recharged the phase shift armour with energy from his beam rifle. Jinking the Destiny right and left, he avoided the beam rifle shots coming in from the Windam but they all came far closer than he liked.
He knew that Heine had been in the Babi and Heine was the only pilot in the unit who could have stayed with him, so far. Except for our leader. Shinn smiled broadly. Coming to see how good I really am, Commander Waltfeld? Let me give you a clinic. A snap-roll brought the Destiny up on its left. Pulling back on the stick yanked the Destiny away from the original line of flight. The Windam stayed with him, then tightened up on the arc to close the distance. Shinn then rolled another ninety degrees and continued the turn into a dive. Throttling back, Shinn hung in the dive for three seconds, then hauled back hard on the stick and cruised up into the Windam's aft.
The Destiny's beam bursts missed wide to the right as the Windam cut to the left. Shinn keciekd his speed up to full and broke with the Windam. He let the Destiny rise above the plane of the break, and then put the fighter through a twisting roll that ate up enough time to bring him again into the Windam's rear. The Windam snapped to the right and Shinn looped out left.
He watched the sensors display the shrinking distance as it reached one and a helf ks and then slowed. Fine, you want to go nose to nose? I've got phase-shift and you don't If Commander Waltfeld wanted to commit virtual suicide, Shinn was happy to oblige him. He tugged the stick back to his sternum and rolled out in an inversion loop.
The two mobile suits closed swiftly. Shinn centred his foe in the targeting lens and waited for a dead shot. Without phase-shift the Windam would die with one burst and Shinn wanted the kill to be clean. His HUD flicked red as the Windam juked and out of the centre, then locked freen as they closed.
The Windam started firing at maximum range and scored hits. At that distance the beams did no real damage against the phase-shift armour, prompting Shinn to wonder why Andrew would be wasting the energy. Then, realisation dawned. The bright bursts on the phase-shift are nothing but distraction to my targeting! I better kill him now!
Shinn tightened down on the trigger button sending beam bursts at the closing Windam. He couldn't tell if he had hit anything. Lights flahed in the cockpit and the computer started screeching furiously. Shinn's phase-shift was down and the weapons had run out of power and sensors were running on minimum power with all the available power being used by engines.
Shinn was worried, as he was stuck in space without phase shift armour and weapons he was a sitting duck. He didn't know where the Windam had gone it was outside visual range and the short-range scanners. He knew that the Windam pilot would take down the evacuees before coming back to finish Shinn off.
Suddenly, the starfield went black and the simulator pod hissed and it cracked open. Shinn's card popped out as the computer finished processing the results. The canopy lifted up and the sound of laughter filled the cockpit. Shinn almost flicked the blast shield down on his helmet to prevent his three friends from seeing his embarrassed blush. Nope, might as well take my punishment. He stood and doffed his helmet, then shook his head, "At least it's over."
Stellar clapped a hand on his shoulder, "Such modesty Shinn, it's so not you."
"Huh?"
Rey came up next to him and smiled, "You won the scenario." The others came up and congratulated him.
"What?"
"You had nine kills. Heine won't be happy," Auel said, beaming because he thought that Heine was one very arrogant jerk.
"Thanks for the good news, Auel, but I still got killed in there." Shinn hopped out of the simulator. "The pilot who got you three – Commander Waltfeld – he got me, too."
Rey shrugged, "He's piloted much longer than we have, so it's not really a surprise that he got us. But are you certain you got killed?"
Shinn frowned, thinking back to the simulator. "I don't think I got the mission end message."
"Clearly you have too little experience of dying in these simulators because you'd know if you did," Stellar laughed lightly. "He may have hit you, Shinn, but he didn't kill you. You survived and won."
Shinn blinked, then smiled. "And I got Heine before he got the evacuees. I'll take that."
"As well you should." A dirty blonde haired man with two scars crossing under his left eye shouldered his way through Auel and Rey. "You're an exceptionally good pilot.
"Thank you, sir."
The man offered Shinn his hand. "Thought I had you, but when you shot out my engines, your beam boomerang caught up with me. Nice job."
Shinn shook the man's hand hesitantly. The man wore a black uniform with no name or rank insignia on it, though it did have Orb, Mendel and Jachin Due battle tabs sewn onto the left sleeve. "You're very good in a Windam."
"Nice of you to say, Mr. Asuka – I'm a bit rusty but I really enjoyed this run." He released Shinn's hand. "Next time I'll give you more of a fight."
A woman wearing a Lieutenant's uniform touched the Windam pilot on arm. "Admiral Todaka will see you now, sir. If you would please follow me."
The Windam pilot nodded to his fellow pilots. "Good piloting, all of you. Congratulations on winning the scenario."
Shinn stared at the man's retreating back. "I thought Commander Waltfeld was in the Windam. I mean it had to be someone as good as him to get you three."
Auel laughed, "Apparently then, he is that good."
"Sure but who is he? He's not Kira Yamato or Athrun Zala obviously, nor is he Dearka Elthman or Yzak Jule, but he was at Orb, Mendel and survived Jachin Due."
Stellar's eyes lit up. "You noticed that the Jachin Due tab has a black dot in the middle – he was in the run against Genesis."
Auel looped his right arm around Shinn's shoulder and motioned for the other pilots to follow. "So, Shinn, you remember that you have to make good on all those dinner and drinks promises he made to talk us into helping him win. Right guys?"
Rey and Stellar laughed, "Absolutely, let's go. The four pilots went off down the hallway towards the mess hall where Shinn would be paying for dinner and drinks, happy that they were together and piloting. Only Shinn, in the back of his mind was worried. That pilot shot the three of them and disabled me with a Windam. And he said that he was a bit rusty. He is decidedly dangerous. I have to become better, so that there will be no more tragedies like Mayu's.