Two weeks. Just over two weeks had passed since Eva's last sortie, and she was itching to fly again. The only issue was that they weren't able to do any missions even if they wanted to. Fort Grays had been running low on supplies even before Eva and the others arrived. And after their last-ditch attempt to get friendly forces out of Expo City, the remaining fuel and ammo they had left were reserved strictly for emergencies. Now, as the situation on Usea got more and more hostile, it became a high-stakes game of 'hurry up and wait.'
At the moment, however, that wasn't Eva's concern. Currently, she was busy hiding her bright red face by burying it under her arms and pressing it up against the mess hall table she was sitting at. Lucky's face was a similar shade of red, but he wasn't doing anything to hide it. Instead, he just smiled sheepishly as Charger, Magic, and Poet teased both of them. They only just put together what was going on between Eva and Lucky, and they were having the time of their lives.
"Seriously, I can't believe it took you two so long to figure it out," Magic remarked. "I mean, you did see the way you were looking at each other, right?" She arched an eyebrow at them with a smirk.
Lucky babbled for a few seconds as he tried to defend himself, but eventually, he sighed in defeat before turning to Eva. "Diamond, you wanna help me out here?"
Eva shook her head, still keeping it pressed against the table. "There's no Diamond here. Try again later," she said- her voice muffled by her arms. Eventually, she lifted one of her hands and placed it on Lucky's, which calmed her enough to poke her head out.
Charger chuckled at the interaction. "All joking aside, though, I'm glad you two managed to figure this out. Better to voice these kinds of feelings now when there's still time, especially in our line of work."
Lucky shook his head. "Well, it won't matter anyway because we're not letting anyone else die," he said, looking down at Eva with a gentle smile. "Not after everyone else we've lost."
Poet opened his mouth to respond, but he was cut off by a loud shriek that filled the entire room. Eva hadn't heard this sound since her first few days back with the 262nd, but as soon as it slipped into her ears, she recognized it instantly, and judging by the reactions coming from the other four, they did too. It was the sound of an air raid siren, and seconds later, the base exploded to life.
As if she had completely forgotten about the conversation they were having, Eva lept to her feet and looked down at the others. "C'mon. Let's go see what's happening," she said before turning around and running out of the mess hall and over to the briefing room with the others right behind her.
As the five pilots twisted and turned through the corridors of the base, they got to see the chaos unfolding around them. With the siren blaring through the speakers, cutting through everyones' eardrums, people had to yell just to be heard, which only made things worse. And with people running in every possible direction, trying to get wherever they needed to go, it was difficult for Eva and the others to get where they were going.
Despite the chaos, however, they did finally reach the briefing room, which looked only slightly less tumultuous. Commander Knight was hunched over his computer, getting the briefing software loaded up, and Clown was standing at the front of the room with his arms outstretched, trying to calm down the numerous panicked voices bouncing around the small room.
Eva sat down a few seats away from Boggard, and the others followed suit. "We know what's going on?" she asked the pilot from Mage Squadron.
Boggard shook his head. "Not a clue," he answered bluntly, crossing his arms over his chest. "Wish we'd just get it over with, though."
A few moments later, Footpad came jogging into the room and sat down next to Boggard. "What's going on?" he said between panting breaths.
Just before Boggard got a chance to relay the same information, or lack thereof, to his wingman, Commander Knight stood up straight with an exasperated grunt. "Screw it," he muttered before turning to the group that was desperately awaiting his information. "We picked up unknown air contacts coming in from the west. Based on the speed and altitude they were moving at, we believe they're bombers, but we still don't have a visual."
"Have we been able to determine if they're hostile or not?" Eva asked. She was hesitant to speak up at first, but Vortex would usually ask questions like that during a briefing, so she figured she might as well to sound like she knew what she was doing.
Knight shook his head. "Not officially, but they've been unresponsive to any communication. Last time we checked, they were getting dangerously close and making no attempts to land, that's-"
Suddenly, several deafening booms made everyone jump in their seats, and a shockwave followed soon after. Eva and several others jumped to their feet, trying to reach the window to see what had just happened, but before any of them could relay the news, another soldier burst through the door.
"Commander, we've just been bombed!" he cried out. "The landing ship Lune is listing!"
"Dammit!" Knight cursed. "All fighters, scramble immediately and eliminate all hostile aircraft," he ordered. "This isn't a drill. Shoot down every last one of them."
Eva didn't even bother responding as she turned around and sprinted out the door. She could hear the others shuffling behind her as they followed her, but she didn't even acknowledge it. All she could do was push through the hallways toward the hangars. Luckily, things inside had begun to calm down, even if it was only slightly. Once Eva and the others got outside, though, it was a different story entirely. The familiar shriek of fighter jets filled the air, and the bombers' low-pitched rumbling accompanied it. People and vehicles were speeding around as they tried to get where they needed to go, but none of the pilots stopped their relentless sprint to the hangars.
The main hangar doors slowly slid open as Eva and the others climbed up into their planes. Luckily, the ground crew already had them loaded up, but it still took them a minute to go through all of their pre-flight checks.
Finally, Control gave them the green light. "Kestrel Squadron, taxi to the runway ASAP."
For a slip second, Eva almost didn't respond. "Er, roger that. Kestrel 1 is taxying now," she replied as soon as her new callsign registered in her head.
A moment later, her plane started rolling out of the dimly lit hangar and out into the chaos around them. Eva slid the visor on her helmet down as sunlight poured into her eyes and blinked a few times so her eyes could adjust. After glancing over her shoulder, she confirmed that Lucky was moving behind her and focused on the runway in front of her.
"Hurry up and get those damn fighters airborne!" A panicked voice called out over the radio. "We won't last much longer without them."
"Those bombers are coming back for another run!" Another added.
"Do we have personnel helping anyone on the landing ship? We need to evacuate them."
"Mage Squadron, taxi to the runway," Control ordered. "Kestrel Squadron, you're cleared for takeoff."
Eva took a deep breath as she aligned her plane with the runway. "Kestrel 1 copies, taking off now."
She pushed the throttle all the way forward and was subsequently pulled back into her seat as the F-16 gradually picked up momentum. A few seconds later, she had enough speed to lift off the ground, and as Eva retracted the landing gear, she made a sharp turn to the right to go after the escort fighters covering the bombers. All of the targets on her HUD had been marked hostile by default, but out of sheer habit set by the last mission, she got in close and centered the nose of her plane on the Su-33 she was tailing.
"What the hell?" Sky Keeper piped up. "Diamond, I'm looking at the footage from your camera, and these planes aren't from the Erusean Air Force."
Eva was seconds away from pulling the trigger, but as soon as she heard that, she stopped and pulled away. "Are you telling me Oseans are bombing us?" She couldn't help but think that Rogue Squadron was involved, but as she looked around, she didn't see the three half-orange aircraft anywhere.
"Negative," Sky Keeper replied. "Based on the markings I'm seeing. It looks like Free Erusea."
"Free Erusea?" Eva echoed. "I heard about them on the news, but I didn't think they were capable of pulling off a strike like this."
"We can worry about the who, why, and how later," Commander Knight chimed in. "Right now, we need to survive this attack. You're free to engage at will. Eliminate all bandits in the airspace."
"Roger that," Clown replied. "All we gotta do is get up there."
"This is Kestrel 2. I'm taking off now," Lucky reported.
Eva circled around the runway and saw Lucky's Rafale picking up speed before he, too, was airborne. Charger followed after him a few seconds later, followed by Poet and then Magic. Eva changed her heading to go after the enemy aircraft heading away from the base to loop around, and before long, the other four pilots were right behind her. It was strange being at the front of the formation, especially a formation of such mismatched aircraft: an F-16, a Rafale, a Gripen, a MiG-29, and an F-2, but despite all the nervousness she felt, there was a certain feeling of hopefulness in Eva's gut that kept her going as she thought that maybe, just maybe, she'd be able to lead those four out of this war.
"Alright, Diamond. We're waiting on your orders, so just say the word," Lucky said. "You've got this," he added.
Eva nodded. "Right, uh… let's just stay close and keep each other covered for now. Once we're in range, we'll attack the escorts first to leave the bombers vulnerable." It sounded like a decent strategy in her head, but in reality, she had very little clue as to what she was doing.
"Roger that, boss. We'll stick with you," Charger replied.
Eva snickered a bit. "Boss?" she echoed. "Honestly, I think I liked it better when it was kid."
"Well, in my defense, it'd be a bit awkward to call the one I'm taking orders from 'kid,'" Charger pointed out.
Eva smiled, regardless of whether or not the others could see it or not. She realized what he was trying to do, and she appreciated it more than she cared to put into words. Having the others with her to ease her into the role was already making a difference even if they had only just taken off.
"Alright, we're nearly in range," Poet reported. "Should we engage, Diamond?"
"Yeah. Let's all disperse and take out these escorts. Then we can go for the bombers," Eva replied, already switching to her 4AAMs. "Kestrel Squadron, engage."
Just as the words left her lips, Eva hit the afterburners and fired a salvo of four missiles. The flight of Su-33s in front of Kestrel Squadron split away in various directions to evade the missiles coming up behind them, but only two were able to get away in time. By the time Eva's HUD had informed her that she missed two of her targets, one of them was already coming back around. Even though the beeping in her cockpit told her over and over again that she had a missile coming at her, she maintained her heading. All she could do was watch as the distance to her target dropped until she was in range to fire a pair of standard missiles at it. As Eva jerked her control stick to the right, her thumb found the button to launch countermeasures and pushed it down. Luckily, her maneuver to evade the incoming missile put her in the perfect position to shoot down the last Su-33 with guns, which she quickly took before circling back to regroup with the others, who were engaging their own targets.
"I see you still haven't lost your touch, Diamond," Magic remarked with a smirk as she shot down an F-16.
Eva shrugged. "It's like riding a bicycle, I guess," she said before turning her attention to the bombers. "Now, Kestrel Squadron, form up on me. Let's smack these guys down."
"Hold that thought, Kestrel 1," Sky Keeper cut in. "I've got new bandits on radar: MiG-31s coming in from the southwest. You may want to deal with those before you go for the bombers."
"We can take 'em," Boggard said as Mage Squadron finally joined up with Kestrel Squadron.
"He's right," Clown agreed. "You go for the bombers, Kestrel Squadron. We'll keep you covered." Without waiting for any response, he split off with Boggard and Footpad to engage the MiG-31s.
"Right," Eva said with a nod. "Let's go."
Eva and the others turned in the direction the bombers went, but in the time they spent engaging the escorts, the bombers had put a fair amount of distance between them and the Osean fighters. Even with their afterburners, it took Kestrel Squadron some time to catch up to them. Luckily, the bombers started wrapping around to make another pass over Fort Grays, which gave them the opportunity they needed to close the gap. With no escorts to cover them, the Tu-95s went down with ease, and the MiG-31's Mage Squadron went after didn't last much longer.
As the last of the hostile radar contacts disappeared from Eva's radar, she and the others let out a collective sigh of relief. "Well, thank god that's over."
"It's not over quite yet. I've got new contacts on the radar, further south than the others," Sky Keeper informed everyone. "Not sure what they are, though."
"Well, let's find out," Clown said before switching to an open channel. "Attention unidentified contacts. You're approaching the Fort Grays Island Air Base. Identify yourselves, or you'll be presumed as hostile."
The voice on the other end paused before responded, but eventually, they finally spoke up. "This is Captain Rourke of the aircraft carrier OFS Falcon. We're approaching Fort Grays with frigate Heron to dock, but we need support. Enemy aircraft are inbound, but we aren't able to do anything about them. All of our pilots were shot down in an earlier attack. We need support."
A tense silence swept through the radio channel before Sky Keeper finally replied. "Falcon, this is the AWACS Sky Keeper. We're diverting aircraft to assist. Just hold on."
Eva looked down at her radar and turned toward the new friendly contacts. "Guess the fun ain't over yet," she remarked as she looked over her shoulder at her squadron behind her.
Kestrel Squadron and Mage Squadron started flying toward the Falcon as fast as they could. About halfway to the carrier, more aircraft appeared on their radars- marked hostile by default. Eva and the others were slightly closer to the Falcom than they were, but it would still be close. Eventually, though, the enemy fighters, along with the Falcon and Heron, appeared on Eva's HUD, and she wasted no time engaging them along with the others.
Her first target was the lead plane in a squadron of F-2s. She fired a pair of standard missiles at them, but they turned at just an angle that her attacks would miss their target and force her to go after them. As Eva turned to follow her target, she realized that she'd overshoot on her current path, so she rolled over to bleed off some speed and give herself a perfect shot on the F-2. She promptly gunned it down, but before she could look around for her next target, another F-2 snuck up behind her and tried to go guns on her. Eva watched tracers fly by her cockpit and heard a few shots ping uselessly off her airframe, but it didn't last for long as she pulled hard to the right. Unfortunately, her pursuer followed after her.
"Someone wanna lend me a hand?" Eva asked as frustration with the F-2 behind her quickly rose into her tone. "I could use some cover."
"Be right over, Diamond. Hang in there," Magic assured her.
Eva pitched straight up and looped back around, looking for Magic as she went. Finally, she spotted her wingman's F-2 heading straight for her pursuer, who was caught completely off-guard. All it took was a single standard missile and a burst from Magic's machine gun to send the Free Erusean pilot spiraling down to the ocean below.
Eva let out a sharp exhale of relief and gave Magic a thumbs-up as the two made eye contact with each other from their cockpits. "Thanks for the assist, Magic."
"No sweat… boss," she replied in a voice that painted a clear picture of the massive grin on her face.
Eva opened her mouth to give a cheeky response but stopped herself before she could let out any sound. "Nope. Not gonna take the bait," she decided, shaking her head.
"Ahh, you're no fun, Diamond," Poet teased her.
"Nah, I'm just more focused on the guys trying to kill us," she pointed out with a smirk.
"Well, there's only a few left, so let's finish 'em off," Footpad said as he pulled away from the burning wreck of an Su-34.
Eva didn't respond verbally, but she nodded in agreement as she made a wide turn around to face one of the last Su-34s. As the two planes faced flew straight at each other, Eva readied her 4AAMs. She wasn't quite in range, but in a few seconds, she would be. Then she got her chance. She let a single missile fly out from underneath her wing, but as it made contact with its target, Eva realized the Fullback was still flying. They were both rapidly approaching each other, but Eva was quicker on the draw. Just before the Su-34 could fire a missile at her, she made a sudden turn to angle herself closer to its path and bringing her close enough to finish it off with guns.
"Is that all of them?" Eva asked as she glanced down at the radar to see nothing but friendlies.
"Affirmative, all hostiles in the vicinity are confirmed destroyed," Sky Keeper answered.
Captain Rourke let out a sigh of relief. "That was close. Thanks a million for the assist. Especially from the Blue Kestrel I've been hearing so much about."
"So… what exactly are you doing all the way out here?" Boggard asked. "I would've thought the comm-blackout would put a stop to any sort of travel."
"It's… a bit of a long story, truth be told," Rourke admitted. "To sum things up, we were initially scheduled to leave earlier to resupply you guys, but the blackout canned that idea. Then, the situation changed, so we had to act."
"That does sound complicated," Clown agreed. "But you can explain it all to the base commander and us once you're docked and unloaded, so let's go ahead and guide you in."