As Eva and Lucky sat alone at one of the tables in the mess hall, Eva decided to let her mind wander a bit. Just when she was about to finally be at peace, something would always happen to mess things up. More than anything, it was stressful. Eva rarely had a chance to unwind and process everything, so she ended up utilizing every moment she could take. Having Lucky and the others to rely on certainly helped, though. She was still amazed by the fact that, despite everything that had happened over the course of the past month, Lucky was able to be as funny and optimistic as he always was.
"Hey, Lucky. How do you think the op's gonna go today?" Eva asked, breaking the rather uncomfortable silence that had been surrounding them for several minutes.
Lucky shrugged. "I'm not really sure, to be honest," he admitted. "We're probably gonna be neutralizing the airfield that we found the other day, but aside from that, I can't really say."
"Well, at least after today we won't have to worry about being bombed as much," Eva pointed out.
Lucky smiled. "Yeah! And that'll give us more of an ability to move around. Plus, it's definitely gonna make rescuing that officer a lot easier."
Eva nodded and rested her arms on the table. "I just hope this officer is going to be worth all of the trouble it's gonna take to get him out."
"I'm sure it will," Lucky said in his classic optimistic voice. "Having a major from the Erusean military is bound to come in handy," he reminded her.
Eva replied with a shrug. "I guess you're right. We'll just have to wait and see, I guess."
Suddenly, the reporter on the TV, who the two of them had been ignoring for the most part, said something that caught Eva's attention. "In other news, we have just learned the identity of the Osean pilot accused of killing former president Harling."
Eva turned around to face the TV and felt her heart sink. The face on the screen belonged to a young man with messy black hair and blue eyes, and it was one that Eva recognized instantly. Time seemed to slow down as her world seemed to collapse even further around her. "Trigger…" She just barely managed to get the word out.
Lucky tilted his head, clearly confused. "What did you say?"
"I- that's- how…" Eva tripped over her words as she tried to something anything, but nothing came out. She sat there in stunned silence for a moment, trying to collect her thoughts. Finally, she took a deep breath in and out and looked over to Lucky. "Trigger was- is one of my best friends," she began. "He and I had the same flight instructor. The three of us had quite a few memories together." If she hadn't been on the verge of tears, she might actually have smiled as the memories came flooding in. Her mind drifted to their flight instructor, and she couldn't help but think of what he would do if he saw them now. Knowing him, he'd probably tell some story about his time as a pilot in the Continental War and use it as a metaphor about not giving up or something. "Trigger was kind of like my big brother most of the time. He-." Suddenly, a realization hit her like a gale-force wind. "Oh my god, they're gonna kill him, aren't they?"
Lucky, who was visibly concerned by now, tried his best to calm Eva down. "I'm sure they won't kill him," he said reasonably, but it didn't seem to calm her down.
"They're accusing him of killing one of, if not the, most famous presidents in Osean history!" she insisted. "There's no way he won't get the death penalty. He doesn't deserve that." Eva exhaled sharply, trying to calm herself, but it didn't work. Suddenly, she looked up to see Lucky flashing an assuring smile at her.
"Hey, don't worry," he told her gently. "It'll be ok. Besides, you've got me and the others here with you." Somehow, Lucky always knew exactly what to say to make Eva feel better.
Eva was about to reply, but Vortex suddenly walked up to them. "Hey, we gotta go. Gates wants to get the briefing started," he explained.
"As I'm sure you're all aware," Gates began. "Erusea has been trying to bomb us since the war began. Now, we've been able to repel their attacks up to this point, but we have to put a stop to them once and for all." He pulled up the briefing software and displayed a map of the region. "Fortunately, your efforts during our last sortie have paid off."
"Psh, about time we do something useful instead of being your damn shields," Magnum remarked from the back of the room.
Crosswind shot her a glare, followed by a quick "Shh!"
"We've determined that Erusea is staging their attacks against our base from an airfield to the west, about halfway between here and San Salvacion," Gates continued. "Eliminating the enemy presence at this base accomplishes two tasks: it gets the enemy off our backs for a while, and it serves as a stepping stone to San Salvacion for our operation to retrieve Major Tillmin in a few days."
Eva could hear Axe groan from behind her. "Oh, come on, air to ground missions? What a bunch of crap," he muttered.
"However, this is not just a simple air raid," Gates warned. "This airfield is within range of the Arsenal Birds' defense network. Meaning it's within the realm of possibility that it could show up."
"There's also whatever that explosion from before was," Vortex reminded them.
Gates nodded at Vortex's addition. "Exactly. Plus, there's always the chance that drones will show up as well. If either the drones or the Arsenal Bird show up, you'll have to deal with them."
"Excuse me, what?" Dodger asked. "You can't just say 'deal with it' when you're talking about the damn Arsenal Birds!"
"Yeah, I've gotta agree," Magic chimed in. "Those things are monstrous. We saw their capabilities firsthand in Farbanti."
"I don't know about you guys, but personally, I'd love to get back at those things for what they did to Meteor Squadron in Farbanti," Charger said.
"Yeah, I think some payback is due," Poet agreed.
"Speak for yourself," Slipstream butted in. "I'm not gonna get myself killed fighting a damn robot."
"You don't exactly have a say in the matter," Crosswind snapped. "You're just convicts."
Gates let out a heavy sigh that was laced with annoyance. "That's enough, Crosswind! They may be convicts, but they're still the ones who are going out there risking their lives, so I'm taking their opinions into consideration." He turned his attention back to the pilots. "If the Arsenal Bird shows up, then you can take care of it however you see fit. Just know that one way or another, that airfield has to be clear of Erusean forces. Am I clear?"
Vortex nodded. "Crystal, sir."
"Good, then get moving."
As Eva circled around her plane, checking to see if everything was in order, she couldn't help but feel a bit more determined than usual. She already had plenty of people she was fighting for: Her mother, Meteor Squadron, Captain Waller, and everyone else on the Kestrel II, and of course, her friends that she was still flying with. But now, she had one more person she was fighting for: Trigger. If she made it through the war, she'd have to make it her goal to clear his name. Until then, however, she had a war to fight. She climbed up the ladder into her plane and shut the canopy. After slipping on her oxygen mask, she switched the engines on and made one last check to make sure she was ready.
"Rogue Squadron, sortie ASAP."
About half an hour passed as they took off from the base. By now, Rogue Squadron was around where they were when they got ambushed by drones a few days prior. While the pilots formerly in Nexus Squadron held a rigid formation, the others were all over the place.
"Hey, Vortex," Eva said suddenly. "Can you teach me that move you were doing the other day?"
After a few seconds, Vortex finally responded. "All right, sure. The best way I can describe it is to make like you're going to do a cobra, only you keep going and do a full loop," he explained. "Once you get the hang of it, you can pull it off pretty easily."
Eva took a deep breath as she lowered her speed. Tightening her grip on the control stick, she pitched up, but it wasn't enough to go into a stall, so she just ended up raising her altitude a bit before correcting it. She lowered her speed to try again, and she almost got it. However, she stalled a little too early this time, causing her to drop in altitude. "Man, this is harder than you make it look," Eva said with a slight chuckle. Making one final attempt, she dropped her speed and pulled up. Finally, she succeeded and went around in a tight loop.
"There ya go, Diamond. Now you've got the hang of it!" Vortex praised her. "Now, let's stay focused. We've still got a little bit longer before we're at the airfield."
"All aircraft, caution!" Crosswind's voice cut through Eva's thoughts, forcing her back into the moment. "Enemy fighters inbound from the airfield. It looks like they scrambled interceptors."
Almost immediately as Crosswind finished his warning, two formations of enemy fighters appeared on her HUD. One was a five-plane squadron of Su-37s, and the other was a four-plane squadron of MiG-21s.
"Roger, I see them," Vortex replied. "Any sign of the Arsenal Bird?"
"Negative, not yet at least," Crosswind replied. "No sign of any drones either."
"Guess that means we need to take out as many enemies as we can before they show up," Eva chimed in.
"Alright, Magic, Lucky, Axe, Dodger, and Trench, you guys get to work on their ground defenses," Vortex ordered. "The rest of us will deal with the fighters."
The squadron's already loose formation broke apart as everyone split up to engage their targets. Eva set her sights on one of the MiG-21s and aimed right for it. The two planes got closer and closer as they flew right at each other. As soon as she was in range, Eva fired two missiles and made a hard left. The MiG-21 tried to fire its machine guns at her, but none of the shots connected as it exploded and tumbled down to the desert below. "Bandit down," she announced.
"Rogue 3, Fox 2," Charger called out, firing a missile at one of the Su-37s.
"Magnum, what the hell are you doing? I told you to engage the fighters." The tone in Vortex's voice sounded annoyed. Eva looked around and saw Magnum's F-15C diving down toward the airfield.
"If the objective is to take out the defenses at the airfield, then don't you think having more people attacking the airfield would make it go faster?" Magnum asked, clearly feeling just as annoyed as Vortex was.
"That's not your call to make," Poet chimed in. "As long as you stick with Vortex and do what he says, you'll make it. I know from experience."
"Psh, whatever," Magnum scoffed. "I've been doing just fine at staying alive, and I don't intend to stop now."
Eva deployed flares to shake off a missile and dropped her speed, allowing the Su-37 on her tail to soar past her. She quickly switched to her 6AAMs and fired a single missile, taking out the enemy fighter within seconds. However, she didn't have much time to process her kill, as the missile alert in her cockpit sounded off right after she shot it down. Eva slammed the throttle forward as hard as she could and broke right. She could hear the missile glide right past her, but she didn't let it distract her. Taking a quick glance behind herself, Eva saw her pursuer and turned straight up into the sky. The MiG-21 followed her, albeit with some difficulty. Suddenly, Eva got an idea. She went into one high-G turn, and then another, and another. She craned her neck to look behind herself, and just as she predicted, the MiG-21 was following, but it was losing speed rapidly, eventually stalling and heading nose-first toward the ground. Eva wasn't far from stalling herself, but with a bit more speed, she turned around to face the stalling plane and fired two standard missiles at it.
"Rogue Squadron, update: 50% of the airfield's ground defenses have been neutralized," Crosswind informed the pilots. "Still no sign of reinforcements. Keep it up."
"Roger that," Vortex replied. "We've almost got air superiority as well. Let's keep it up, everyone. Just keep pushing, and we'll be done before you know it."
"Shit, Poet, can you get these guys off my back?" Trench asked, grunting as he tried to outmaneuver the two Su-37s trailing after him.
Poet sighed, clearly putting in some effort of his own. "I can't. I've just about got this guy."
"Hang on, Trench. I'll help you out," Eva told him as she looked around to find him. She quickly picked out his half-orange MiG-29 from the skies and sped up to close the distance between herself and the Su-37s behind him. She switched to her 6AAMs just as she got behind them and fired a single salvo. One plane went down, but the other managed to deploy flares quick enough to break the lock. Although, they still remained focused on trailing behind Trench. Eva briefly hit the afterburners to shorten the gap and get within machine gun range. She squeezed down on the trigger and lit them up, taking only a few seconds to bring the Su-37 down.
"Thanks, Diamond," Trench said graciously.
Eva shrugged. "Just doing my job."
"Looks like that was the last of the fighters. How's everyone holding up?" Vortex asked. Everyone replied with some variation of "Good." or "Fine" before he spoke again. "Crosswind, this is Rogue 1. The airfield has been cleared of enemy forces."
The extended silence after Vortex spoke made Eva nervous. When the AWACS was silent, it was almost never a good thing. "Heads up, Rogue Squadron. You've got MQ-99s inbound straight from the west, but it looks like there's something else too. It's way faster than the drones, so stay on your guard."
Eva tightened her grip on the control stick and looked for the fastest blip on her radar. This time, it had to be Zero, and she was ready for him. Crosswind definitely wasn't exaggerating when he said it was fast, but that didn't stop Eva from flying at it head-on. At first, she thought the small, light gray shape she saw was just a smudge on her canopy, but that theory was dead in the water as soon as a small, slim shape soared right past her. Eva could barely see it, it was basically a blur, but after turning around to face it again, she realized it wasn't Zero. It was definitely a drone, but like none, she had ever seen before. It turned straight up into the sky before dropping into a cobra and heading straight down while rolling all the way.
"What the hell is that thing?" Charger asked.
"Doesn't matter. Take it down," Crosswind said in a very matter-of-fact tone.
"Diamond, form up on me. We'll deal with that thing. The rest of you, take out the other drones," Vortex ordered.
Eva increased her speed and chased after the drone. "Already on it." She quickly got a lock and fired a missile at it, but the drone made a sharp turn at the last second, shaking off the missile. Once again, the drone went straight up into the sky, and Eva followed it. She fired another missile since it was moving in a straight line, but almost immediately after she did, the drone pulled the same maneuver as before and went from going straight up to straight down within seconds. It unleashed a hail of machine-gun fire, shooting Eva's missile out of the sky and rattling her plane as it shot past her.
"Diamond, you ok?" Vortex asked as he tried to land a hit on the drone, which it effortlessly dodged.
Eva scanned her instruments as she leveled her plane out. "Yeah, everything seems to be functioning ok," she told him. She looked around and spotted Vortex doing his best to chase after the drone. Eva tried to guess where they were going and went to cut it off. Just as the drone was about to be in range, it made a sharp turn away from her. "Damn it," she grunted. "This thing sure is nimble."
"Do you guys need help?" Lucky offered.
"No," Vortex stepped in. "Stay on those other drones. We'll deal with it. Diamond, I'm gonna let this thing get on my tail. You shoot it down while it's chasing me."
"Vortex, that's crazy!" Eva protested. "It'll shoot you down for sure."
"It only has machine guns. It'll be harder for it to take me out," Vortex reasoned. "Besides, I have faith in you." Eva could tell he had a smirk on his face as he said that.
Eva made a sharp turn toward Vortex's position and made her way over to him. "Fine, let's just do this quickly."
"I couldn't agree more," Vortex said as he pulled up and looped around, and just as he predicted, the drone slipped behind him and started firing its machine guns. "Now, Diamond!"
Eva made the tightest loop she possibly could without stalling and found herself right behind the drone. She fired her machine guns and shot two missiles, destroying it. "Got it!" she announced proudly.
"Looks like it's clear skies all around," Crosswind told them. "Mission is complete, Rogue Squadron RTB."
"Well, it's about time a mission went off without a hitch," Axe commented.
"I'm surprised Dodger didn't run away once the drones showed up," Slipstream teased.
Dodger chose not to reply, and instead, the squadron headed back to the base in silence.
"The mission was a resounding success," Gates said, clearly pleased by the work of Rogue Squadron. "You cleared out the airfield and repelled the reinforcements, and most importantly, we didn't have any casualties. The mission to extract Tillmin will be taking place in a few days. Until then, get some rest. You've earned it. Dismissed."
Author's Note: Maybe I should stop setting writing goals for myself in author's notes because they almost never happen. I don't really have an excuse this time, I'm just kinda lazy and easily distracted. Anyway, hope you enjoy this chapter.