Chapter 19
Defection
"W-what?" Alamo said, shock in his voice. "N-no." There was a typing noise as Alamo tried to pinpoint the exact location of their exact target. "No. Iacon 1, disengage immediately."
"Vanguard, following me," Katrina ordered, pulling her F/S-15 away from the formation.
"R-roger," Twister said, shock evident in his voice.
"Right behind you," Peppermint said. They joined up behind the formation of bombers, and Katrina opened up a comm frequency to the bombers.
"Attention Troy and Iacon, you are targeting a civilian outpost. Change course and leave the airspace immediately. Repeat, you are targeting a civilian outpost!"
"The civilians are spreading dissent," Troy 1 said. "They are traitors to the Federation in every way."
"That isn't what the Federation is supposed to do," Katrina said. "The right thing to do is to enforce censorship of communications and ground all flights out. Not this."
Troy 1 chuckled darkly. "Either way, they are traitors. No civilian flights will be allowed to leave Federation airspace and cross into Cascadia without the Federation's explicit permission. And they don't have that right now. All units, prepare to drop!"
Katrina's finger tensed on the trigger. She was close to destroying the entire bomber formation, but which of the aircraft first? The I/U-95 could carry more and was the more obvious target, but the F/C-16s were much more nimble. Damn it.
Suddenly, several things happened in quick succession: A marker box appeared around the bomber and its escorts, Katrina's finger was on the trigger and the bomber was quickly chewed up by her gunpods.
"W-what?" Troy 1 cried, as the wreckage of the I/U-95 fell to Earth in a crumbled heap. "Who was that?"
"It was Vanguard!" Troy 3 said. "These conservatives are the death of the Federation! Eliminate them!"
"Troy 3, Troy 4, go after their AWACS," Troy 1 ordered. "Troy 5 and 6, go after Vanguard. Me and 2 are gonna level the place." Four Vipers split off from the squadron, and two of them blew past Vanguard and made a beeline for Alamo, while two of them faced Vanguard head on in a joust.
"Troy Squadron, this is your last chance to stand down!" Katrina ordered, narrowly avoiding an SAA shot from one of the Vipers. "Damn it!"
"They're not gonna listen!" Peppermint said, blowing apart one of the Vipers with a cannon burst.
"Well, they made up their minds," Katrina said. "Vanguard Squadron, engage!"
"I got the ones attacking the airport," Twister said, igniting his burners. "You go get the ones going after Alamo."
"Roger, Twister," Katrina said, peeling off with Peppermint and shooting for the other two Vipers.
"Comet, watch it!" Peppermint cried as the Viper that fired the SAA at her shot another one off. The RWR warning threatened to break her concentration as she toggled the AOA Limiter. She pulled over the missile and the Viper with a well-performed cobra. Leveling her fighter, she obtained a solid lock and fired a standard missile. It detonated in the tailpipe of the Viper and sent it spiraling down to Earth. The pilot ejected shortly after.
But the temporary delay caused by that pilot allowed the other 2 Vipers to gain the advantage in speed and outpaced the Eagles of Vanguard.
"Alamo, this is Comet!" Katrina barked into the comms. "You have two Vipers heading your way!"
"Copy all," Alamo said. "Readying countermeasures!"
"You better hope that those work," Peppermint said, just as the Vipers unloaded a pair of standard missiles each at the FC-8.
"What the-Deploy flares!" Alamo shouted at the pilots. The FC-8 slowly banked to the right away from the missiles, releasing flares all the way. Three of the missiles missed the FC-8, but one missile grazed the tip of the right engine and exploded.
"Alamo!" Katrina cried. The FC-8 appeared out of the smoke, its underside riddled with scorch marks. The right engine, however, was a belching, smoking mess. Dark smoke poured out of the wound that had been inflicted by the missile blast.
"Don't cough up any tears, Vanguard," Alamo said. "I'm fine, but we have a problem." There were some beeping noises in the background as the fire protection equipment activated. "That blast has knocked out our engine, so thrust is an issue right now. Our auxiliary power is kicking in right now, however, that will take a few moments, so for the time being, we're a sitting duck." there was a typing noise in the background as Alamo sent the IFF data and location of the last two F/C-16s. "Speaking of a sitting duck, that blast knocked out our countermeasure deployment system. Can you take care of those Vipers for us?"
"Sure," Katrina said, still recovering from the near sudden demise of their AWACS. "C'mon, Peppermint. Let's go."
"Righto," Peppermint said, breaking off with her and squaring off against the 2 remaining Falcons in a joust. Just as the pipper was lined up with the cockpit, a missile came streaking out of nowhere and blew it to shreds. Katrina snapped out of her daze and pulled a roll to avoid the debris. Peppermint, meanwhile, pulled around sharply using his AOA Limiter and blew the final Viper to shreds.
"Did you really forget about me, Comet?" Twister's voice said. He sounded irritated.
"Don't worry, Twister, for God's sake!" Peppermint said. "We weren't hoping for your ass to get blow out of the sky!"
"These little shits were easy to deal with," Twister said, as they formed up around Alamo. "Jeez, guess they really did a number on Alamo."
"Our systems are operable for the moment, Twister," Alamo said. "However, I don't know if the civvies down there still don't trust us."
"Then where should we go?" Katrina said, glanced down at the airport. Other than a few bruises here and there, it was relatively intact. "The entire Federation MP force is gonna be right up our ass the second we touch down at any Federation-flagged airport!"
"We could go private," Twister suggested. "Start our very own PMC."
"No fucking thank you," Alamo spat. "I believe the safest option right now is to turn ourselves into the Cascadians."
"Really?" Twister cried. "These bastards aren't gonna trust us one bit, after we demolished one of their bases, shot down an unarmed transport, and mauled their fleet!"
"If we don't do anything rash to them when we surrender, maybe they'll trust us," Katrina barked, shutting Twister up.
"I've got the distress beacon ready," Alamo said. "We just have to activate this once we are in Cascadian airspace." He sighed. "I hope to hell that you are right, Comet."
Katrina checked her fuel status. The needle was around the middle of the gauge. "Vanguard, what's your fuel status?"
"Fuel is looking good," Twister said.
"It's looking good for me as well," Peppermint said.
Katrina nodded to herself. "Alamo, lay us a course."
"Roger," the AWACS operator said.
Katrina sighed as they put some distance between the airport and her past, her simple view of this blasted war shattered.
X
They flew for a couple of hours in silence while listening to Federation radio chatter. A siege had been lifted for some Cascadian forces in the Salvemini Vineyards, and from what Katrina could gather, an aircraft with a crown insignia had broken the Federation offensive.
The Crown.
It was only yesterday that she saw that mysterious F/D-14 on the TV. Could this be the reason why the Federation was so afraid to let anyone in? She dismissed this thought and continued to fly in silence.
X
After a while, they crossed into Cascadia and Alamo let his distress beacon play. It wasn't after a pair of Cascadian F/C-16s and F/D-14s intercepted them that Katrina realized her time in the Federation was over.
