The comms, for once, were eerily quiet. As they headed for the skies over the Bering Strait down one AWACS and down one pilot, the five remaining members of Polaris, refueled and rearmed, held a tense silence gently in their hands, none of them wishing to shatter it.

The radio, however, would have none of it. It crackled and jumped, panic and chaos flooding their ears in equal measure. "God damn it!" A CIF pilot's voice came in shrill and frantic. "That's all of Aurora gone!"

Federation radio was similarly distressed. "We're getting our asses handed to us! Call for reinforcements!" Another fighter answered back. "Heard the Crisis Response Team's coming. Yeah, I'd say this is a fucking crisis!"

"Shit, they're coming?" The first Fed replied. "This furball gets any crazier, and they're gonna call out the Peacekeepers!"

IRIS shivered at the mention, and she could feel the eyes of the squadron lock onto her plane. She regained her composure, but the silence in Bluejay's absence was a frightening presence rather than the calm she had always hoped for. As they approached the Strait, the consequences of their actions became painfully clear, and the Major ordered them to break formation and engage.

A massive tangle of contrails hung above the stormclouds, the identities of enemies and friendlies almost impossible to tell apart. The sky over the Strait was a canvas, painted in fire and smoke, and the aces dancing in the carnage held the brush.

IRIS looked down at her palette and considered her options. With all the confusion, she was just as likely to shoot a MLAA at a friendly and not even notice until the missile pitbulled out of control and leapt at the nearest target. She knew that the only way to survive was to get nimble, and she was not going to do that with ten MLAAs strapped to her plane. She watched as the missiles decoupled from their racks, sailing disarmed into the stormclouds below. "Polaris Six, MLAAs ditched. Heading into the merge."

She watched as the furball enveloped her fighter, adding one more wake to the contrail constellation. A Federation fighter spiked her warning receiver, and she turned defensive, the lightened weight of her plane responding immediately. She glanced over her shoulder, watching the nimbler F/C-16 turn with her. "This is gonna be fun," she grumbled to herself. My intestines really are gonna hate me for this, she thought, flipping the caution-taped AoA switch.

Her plane spun on a dime, locking eyes with the Federation pilot as she momentarily flew backwards. "Polaris Six, guns, guns, guns." They weren't looking at each other very long. "Splash one."

She soared off, in search of another target. A friendly F/S-15, one of the mercs from Hawk Team, called out for help sanitizing a bogey from his tail. "Somebody swipe this Viper off my ass!" The pilot was in pursuit, tunnel-visioning on a Federation Sk.27. She sighed, gunning the throttle towards the Agile Eagle, and pointed her HMD at the F/C-16's single engine. One heat-seeker and one "Polaris Six, fox two" later, and the F/S-15's pilot let out a sigh of relief before firing off a heatseeker of his own, the Sk.27 bursting into flames ahead of him. "Holy shit…" The pilot said. "Hawk 1, on my way out to the south-east, bingo Remington. Polaris Six, I owe you one!"

A smile broke across her face. Feels good to be appreciated.

Diving back into the furball at a passing F/C-15, the remaining missile vanished off her wings as she was soon forced to call out "Polaris Six, Remington!". Fighters exploded around her, her allies and enemies alike calling out kills, lamenting lost friends, and otherwise… panicking.

"My IFF's overloaded!" one CIF pilot shouted into the radio. "There's too many bogeys in the sky!"

Another joined in, the panic oozing from his voice. "We're getting torn up out here! Where are the reinforcements?"

A charismatic, suave voice cut across the radio. "Let's get to business!" New IFFs popped up on her radar. Mercs, she thought. Nice of them to finally show up. One of the CIF lead pilots expressed her thoughts for her. "Where the hell have you guys been? Half the Federation Air Force is here!" The mercs bickered amongst themselves, before the distinctively, buttery smooth voice of an AWACS operator broke through the comm static. "This is the Mercenary AWACS Galaxy to all IF callsigns, flashing ident to any IF AWACS. How copy?"

"Should we… tell him?" IRIS radioed into her squadron.

"Nah," Jackal raised an eyebrow. "You really want to admit we let our AWACS get smacked?"

"Good point," she said, quieting down.

BASH shook her head. "We have an obligation." She switched to the open CIF channel. "AWACS Galaxy, Polaris 1. Our AWACS was forced to RTB after taking damage. You are the only IF-affiliated AWACS aircraft left in this AO."

"What?" The AWACS' blank, disbelieving stare was loud enough to hear. "What do you mean I'm the only friendly AWACS left in this AO? Fine, all friendlies, I'm in charge now. Begin Handshake procedures and try to stay alive."

"What state, Polaris?" the Major radioed in. "I'm Remington," IRIS replied, "But I could go for a few more rounds." The rest of the squad replied similarly, though with less enthusiasm.

"Bullshit, Six. We already lost one plane today. RTB." The Major shook her head.

"Aw," IRIS said. "And I was just starting to have some fun. We coulda seen that Crown guy in action."

"Why?" Burn said. "So you can get your ego checked? God, you need it."

"That dude's overrated, anyways." IRIS huffed. "No way the shit they say about him's true."

"No sense arguing about it," Jackal said. "We'll just have to ask the guys who make it out today. There will be more battles, Spook. Let's get outta this one while we still can."

The five planes turned away from the Strait. "AWACS Galaxy, Polaris. Our squadron is bingo Remington, RTB."