May 9, 2064
13:35

The two pilots stumbled into the command center after taking a minute to vent out their irritation at going back into the field (or the air rather) so soon after having just landed not even half an hour ago. But this is what they signed up for so no use complaining about it.

Gentiane was sympathetic enough to give the two a look of pity, they guessed she's been on the receiving end of this sort of situation before.

"Apologies for sending you two out so soon after having just landed but…" The commander gestured over to K who was standing over a desk with a map of the country, a couple of locations were marked. Overall though, he looked indifferent to whatever was going on.

Or maybe he was really good a poker.

"Here's the quick rundown." K started before clearing his throat and turning the map he had on the desk around so that the two pilots could view it properly. "I just received reports of a coup d'état breaking out among the local military stationed by the purification wall. I do not believe this is a coincidence as the timing just so happens to match with an oncoming collapse fluid storm."

Maven and Expulse already had a confused look etched onto their faces. K started talking again before either of them could formulate a question.

"Your job first and foremost is to clean up the ELIDs around the purification wall, they should be far enough away that your armaments won't damage the wall. However the garrison units may request for support, in which case you should stick to your guns." K further clarified. "If there aren't any urgent questions, you are to deploy immediately. The dolls should be finished with refueling your aircraft. Keep your comms open so that the garrison units can radio you."

On one hand, that clears up the confusion of whether or not they were allowed to use bombs and air-to-ground missiles. On the other hand, Maven wasn't exactly keen on having to do strafe runs with allies that close.

Also what was up with no one using encrypted communications?

"Uhhh what is an ELID?" Expulse asked.

"For all intents and purposes, they're zombies." Gentiane spoke up. "Not too dissimilar from ones in games or movies."

Both pilots could tell that there was most likely a lot more to that than what they were currently being told. But that could wait for later when they weren't being hurried into another mission by a grumpy federal agent.

"If that's all then you're dismissed—"

"Wait one last thing." Maven interjected, earning some ire from K. "We don't have functioning GPS in our jet. Is there anything or anyone here that would know to fix that?"

"I'll see if any of the EW specialist dolls can do something about that, but that'll come later." Gentiane answered. "You've operated fine without one so far."

"Right, just wanted to see if it was possible. We'll get to work immediately." Maven snatched the map K had used during the briefing and quickly made his way out the briefing room, literally dragging Expulse with him.

Silence fell upon the two still left in the room as the doors closed behind the pilot duo. Gentiane glanced at the Statesec Agent who hadn't moved an inch since finishing the briefing. K blinked a couple times before smacking his lips.

"Those two are going to give me headaches aren't they."

Gentiane shrugged her shoulders. "In comparison to most of the T-Dolls, they're tame and mostly well behaved…"

K slightly raised an eyebrow. "I sense a but coming."

"…Let's just say that I'm going to have to ask for a higher budget at the rate their burning through their weapons." Gentiane deadpanned.

"And I really wish they would stop throwing away fuel tanks as if they grew on trees."


The aviators were more than happy to hurry off to the airfield as they noticed K increasingly looking more likely to strangle the two for not immediately getting to work. Granted, neither were particularly fond of running a close air support mission that just so happened to be near an important structure that they also had to protect, but orders were orders and they weren't a position to complain.

The skies above were all gray from the cloud cover—some patches darker than others—which wasn't exactly boding well for the two. As they approached the area that they parked their F-15 on, the two could make out two dolls near the jet along with… a lot of ordnance, mostly of the air to ground variety. The pair of dolls stopped whatever they were doing once they noticed the pilots walking up to them.

"Ah, Maven and Expulse? We finished refueling your jet." One of the dolls dressed in a rather fancy jacket along with a very long scarf walked up to the duo and stretched out a hand for a handshake. She had long blonde hair that was done up in a ponytail along with a green headband to keep her bangs out of her piercing red eyes.

"SV-98, at your service." She said with a warm and confident smile.

Maven shook her hand while Expulse gave a nod down.

The other girl who bore an uncanny resemblance to GSh-18 was dressed as what the pilots could only describe as some sort of school uniform taken straight from their imported manga with her black hair done up in twin tails skated next to SV-98, greeting them with a cheerful smile.

"Hello boss. I'm Nova and this is my partner margarita!" She greeted, gesturing to her shotgun.

The pilots couldn't decide whether the outfit with roller skates or naming a shotgun after a type of pizza was more outlandish. They decided on not questioning the oddities of the T-Dolls for now.

"Introductions aside, uhh…" Maven glanced at his jet, noting that it was completely disarmed. "What about armaments?"

"We were waiting on you two to show up before deciding what ordnance to choose." SV-98 replied without missing a beat. "I figured you would know better than us."

Maven let out an extended exhale, pinching the bridge of his nose before adopting the thinking position of stroking his stubble with his arm resting in his other hand. SV-98 wasn't wrong, they probably have no idea what their mission was or knew what weapons would be appropriate. He held back a snort at the mental image of the two dolls squeezing as many AMRAAMs they could on only for him to drop the news that it was an air-to-ground mission.

"Yeah uh, just put on some cluster bombs and some mavericks." Expulse said after thinking for about half a second.

"Do not—do not do that. No." Maven groaned.

Expulse squawked in what Maven hoped was ironic offensive. "I don't see the issue with my suggestion. Cluster bombs for AoE and the AGMs for when we need accuracy."

"This is why you're the backseater."

Maven closed his eyes and quickly thought over what would be an optimal loadout.

Precision was a must have when operating this close to a structure they need to defend, but having to constantly move the targeting pod around would be a nuisance and also hinder their efficiency. Despite his earlier disagreement, AGM-65s wouldn't be a bad option to have in case they needed to strike down something big, the payload was smaller than the GBU-12s or Mk 82s so it would be easier to use if ground forces happened to be nearby.

"Alright got it." Maven snapped his fingers, bringing the attention on him. "Fit as many Mark 82s along the fuselage as you can, AGM-65 Echos on the inner wing pylons, GBU-12s on the outer wing pylons. Also, maybe a fuel tank at the bottom."

SV-98 turned to Nova, who gave a thumbs up in response.

"Got it~!"

The doll started skating around, rapidly moving the requested weapons from their skids and onto the jet with efficiency that put even the best of ground crews to shame. It was honestly a sight to see.

"I thought you were against using the AGMs?" Expulse asked Maven, not taking his eyes off of Nova who had already attached all twelve Mark 82s onto the fuselage.

"I was, but on second thought they'll be useful if we have to get rid of a big enemy or something." Maven replied, also enthralled at watching the shotgun wielding doll skate around.

"Uh." Maven turned to the source of the voice, seeing SV-98 looking puzzled. "I see that you have nothing in the way of air weaponry."

The pilot in question shrugged. "We're doing a close air support mission. Do the local forces here have helicopters or something?"

SV-98 went rigid for a couple of seconds, her eyes glowing a brighter shade of red before returning back to normal. "None of the databases that I could access mention anything about Belgrade having an active air presence."

"Then we don't need to mess up our thrust to weight ratio anymore than it already is with unnecessary weapons."

"Ah." SV-98 went quiet for a moment. "I see, with that information the percentage chance of you needing air-to-air weaponry is practically zero. I stand corrected."

...That was an overly complex way of getting that point across.

"Nerd emoji." Expulse muttered underneath his breath.

Maven bit down on his tongue to keep a straight face. Rude but not out of place he had to admit.

"All done!"

In the span of around three or so minutes (the pilots weren't keeping track), their F-15 was armed and ready to go drop bombs on radiation zombies or whatever they were.

Maven was definitely going to see about having Nova act as their ground crew for rest of their tenure at Griffin & Kryuger.

"God damn you work fast, can I hire you to in place of an actual ground crew?" Maven praised the T-Doll.

Nova laughed nervously, not expecting that response. "Geez boss, at least take me out for some food first."

"With how fast you worked, I actually might." Maven said, walking to the side of the F-15 and opened the side panel, flipping the switch to open the canopy from the outside before extending the built-in ladder out.

"Well if you do… it better be Italian pizza!"

Neither Maven or Expulse were surprised by the response, though they did wonder what 'Italian' meant.

"We'll see after this mission." Maven replied, letting Expulse climb up first before he went up into the cockpit. "Don't think I've forgotten about you SV, you're invited too."

The doll in question who had moved over to where the ladder was to fold it up for the pilots once they were in froze for a second before smiling warmly.

"Come back with a victory first, you two." SV-98 replied.

Maven laughed and gave her a salute before closing the canopy and running through the usual start up procedures. SV-98 folded up the ladder and backed off to a safe distance as she watched the two aviators turn their jet on.

From here it the pilots more or less went on autopilot as they ran through the start up process. Maven turned on the battery and auxiliary power, then cranked the engines—a loud whirl following soon after. Expulse began the INS alignment and started warming up the targeting pod, letting those two run as he brought up the weapon stores page and started setting up the delivery programs for the Mk 82s and GBU-12s.

Once they had finished the necessary startup procedures, the two aviators did some last minute preparation. Expulse guesstimated the bearing they would need to head towards and set up a course correction line on the HSI page. Maven tuned the radio to the same frequency as the air traffic control tower, he also noted that it looked slightly windier outside than it did a couple minutes ago.

"Uhh Checkmate one to control tower, requesting permission to taxi to runway, over."

"Yep runway is clear, permission granted!" Kalina's cheery voice responded back, a welcome change compared to hearing the federal agent.

The two pilots gave a goodbye wave to SV-98 and Nova before Maven throttled up to around 70% power and began taxing towards the runway.

"Just a heads up, I set a course line to the AO." Expulse informed his pilot. "Follow it for about uhh… ten or so minutes."

"Alright, gotcha." Maven acknowledged before letting out a sigh. "Can't wait to get GPS navigation working properly again."

"You and me, buddy."

Once he was properly lined up on the runway, Maven disengaged the wheel brakes and throttled up to maximum. It took a bit longer than normal to fully take off due to the heavier armament load of several guided and unguided bombs along with the mavericks. But nonetheless he folded up the landing gear and turned towards the objective area.

"Checkmate one, airborne." Maven reported over.

"Roger, good luck you two." Kalina gave one last goodbye.

Maven only quietly sighed in response. His gut was telling him they were going to need it.


The distance to the target area this time was significantly shorter, much to the ease of the two pilots. Unfortunately what little relief that came from the short commute time was outweighed by the general apprehension that was present in the cockpit.

"We're approaching the AO pretty soon." Expulse informed Maven who up until this point had been silent since they took off. "Looks like it's getting stormier as well."

The weather had only worsened since they took off. The clouds were visibly darker and it looked like it was going to rain at any moment, which by itself wouldn't be an issue. It was the chance for lightning that neither pilots wanted to deal with. And maybe it was just him, but Maven swore there was a sickly green tint to the clouds.

"Shit." A piece of information suddenly clicked into Maven's head. "Didn't K say something about a radiation storm or something?"

"Huh? The fed dude? Uh… he said something about collapse fluid or something along those lines." Expulse recounted before it finally clicked in his head. "Ah fuck we're on a time limit aren't we?"

"Yep."

"God dammit." Expulse groaned. He would have pinched the bridge of his nose if it wasn't for the oxygen mask. "You uh… you think we got this?"

Maven clicked his tongue. "Can't say that I'm exactly comfortable with doing CAS this close while having to worry about collateral and friendly fire."

"Glad I'm not the only one." Expulse let out a deprecating chuckle. "Not too enthusiastic to follow in the footsteps of those Osean A-10s in… what was it again? Desert Arrow or Desert Blitz?"

"I don't know, I was asleep for like half of the history lessons."

"Of course you were." Expulse shook his head in mock disappointment.

"Shut up, I don't want to hear shit from you of all people." Maven groaned.

The WSO audibly chuckled from the back at their exchange. The banter the two shared during the down times when on missions brought some much needed levity where otherwise unease and excessive stress would take place and cloud their judgment.

Silence returned to the cockpit once again, though this time it wasn't uncomfortable. However, both Maven and Expulse were starting to raise eyebrows regarding their mission directives. They weren't quite in visual range of their objective area just yet, but they expected to get some kind of transmission by now.

"So…" Expulse began, "are we supposed to wait for these garrison people to contact us first before we start tossing bombs everywhere or—"

Midway through Expulse's question the radio finally came to life, with the first thing they heard being a constant flurry of gunshots.

"BROADCASTING TO ALL CHANNELS. THIS IS ACTING COMMANDER LIEUTENANT DRAGOVIC OF THE EASTERN GARRISON. THERE'S A REBELLION HAPPENING RIGHT NOW AND THE QUARANTINE WALL MAY BE DESTROYED, REQUESTING FOR ANY BACKUP! REPEAT!"

"Guess that answers our question." Maven said before transmitting back. "Garrison commander Dragovic, this is Checkmate One responding to your distress call. Acknowledge, over."

"…Checkmate one?" Lieutenant Dragovic questioned. "Wait hold on, which unit are you from?"

Maven took no less than a couple of seconds to hash together a reason. "We're external support sent by Statesec. We're armed with several bombs and are on standby for close air support tasking."

Technically not a lie.

"Statesec being timely for once..?" Dragovic went quiet for a second.

Government being too slow to respond to emergencies? That was the only conclusion Maven could draw.

"No, no matter. Any support will be appreciated."

Maven hummed in affirmation. "What's the sit-rep right now?"

"Bad." Dragovic summed up concisely before elaborating. "Our forces are being overwhelmed by the rebels, there are hordes of ELIDs outside the bottom wall. Most of us, myself included, don't have much combat experience and with our teams being separated we can't mount an organized defense. Lastly, there's been no responses to our communications from HQ so I doubt there will be any reinforcements."

Despite never being in the ground forces of the military, Maven and Expulse could tell that this was a worse case scenario. Three way battle, limited resources, minimal training, they didn't know how long the defenders had been holding out for but it's miracle they held on for as long as they have.

"I see." Maven responded after a moment of silence. "We're armed with both precision guided and dumb bombs as well as two air-to-ground missiles. We can handle the ELID hordes and lessen your work load."

"…And what about rebel soldiers?" Dragovic asked with a sliver of hope present in his tone.

Maven exhaled quietly, this was going to be rough mission.

"Do you have a laser designator on hand?" Maven asked.

"Laser designator? Uhh… hold on." Dragovic replied. "LASER DESIGNATOR! HEY DO WE HAVE A LASER DESIGNATOR!?"

Around a minute passed before Dragovic came back on the radio.

"We have a designator, is there anything else you need?"

"Set the laser code to one-six-eight-eight." Maven replied.

Dragovic took a couple of seconds to carry out the request. "…Done, laser code is one-six-eight-eight."

"Alright, good. If you need fire support you radio us, paint the target with the laser and we'll drop ordnance. Otherwise we'll be cleaning up the ELIDs. Be aware we are only carrying four guided bombs and two precision guided missiles, so you only have six requests. Make them count." Maven informed the garrison commander.

"Understood Checkmate one, once again thank you for the support." Dragovic thanked before opening the channel to rest of the defenders. "Attention all units, we have support in the air and they will handle the ELIDs, they will also be able to strike high value targets up to six times, coordinate and choose the targets wisely!"

Maven checked out of the channel and readjusted his posture.

"Nice save there Mav," Expulse chuckled. "guess we're now the fed's personal air force."

"I vaguely remember Gentiane mentioning answering to this Statesec like once or twice I think." Maven shrugged before flipping the master arm switch up. "Well we're in it now, Master arm on."

"Good light, targeting pod online." Expulse reported as he switched the pod from idle to on and brought up the screen on his display.

"So we just drop bombs on these… zombie, ELID things unless the guys on the ground need us to blow something up in specific?" Expulse asked.

"That's the plan." Maven affirmed and brought up the weapon stores on a sub-display.

Since anti-air was a non-issue, he saw no need to bother with delivering the bombs via a computed release point and opted for the more traditional dive bomb approach with a computed impact point.

"Roger, let's clean house. Quick n' clean." Expulse acknowledged.

Expulse made sure the targeting pod was fully zoomed out before slewing it downwards and began scanning the ground for movement. It didn't take long for the backseater to spot multiple hordes of slow moving humanoids heading towards the quarantine wall. Good news was that they were far away enough for them to not be an immediate threat to the garrison soldiers and for the pilots to be able to drop bombs without worrying about splash damage.

"Alright I'm seeing movement to our ten o' clock, heading towards the wall, fair bit out." Expulse informed Maven.

Maven acted accordingly and started descending while banking slightly to the left. It was fairly easy for him to visually spot the ELIDs even from a high altitude due to the sheer amount that were grouped together. Thankfully they didn't seem to be particularly fast so Maven didn't need to think too hard about leading the bombs on and begun diving towards one of the groups.

With the impact cross slightly in front of where the group of ELIDs were heading, Maven pressed the weapon release button. "Pickle."

A single MK-82 was released and made it's way towards its target who were none the wiser. A few seconds later the bomb hit its mark, detonating a sizable explosion which wiped out enough ELIDs for that group to not acquire attention for the time being.

"Shack on target. Good hit, good hit." Expulse called out.

Maven looked in the direction from whence the group of ELIDs came from and spotted more movement, another three groups specifically. Expulse saw where his pilot was looking and slewed the targeting pod over with his helmet mounted display to get a better visual.

"Wow alright, they even got big boy zombies. Would hate to deal with that on the ground." Expulse said slightly bewildered with the current lineup of enemies they're facing right now.

"Means it's more important that we take them out before they're actually an issue." Maven responded.

He flew up and then around, giving him adequate time to line up the jet so that it could hit all three clumps of ELIDs in one flyover. Once close enough to the first group, Maven started diving towards the first set of targets and released a MK-82 and wasted no time moving onto the next set of targets, repeating the same process for the other two groups.

With as much precision as an unguided bomb could have, the dropped bombs made their way to their intended destination, eventually exploding once making impact with the ground that the hordes of ELIDs happened to be on.

"Good hit on all targets Mav, nice work." Expulse praised his pilot.

Maven silently acknowledged his WSO's words with a nod of the head and was about to go off to find more ELID clusters to drop bombs on, however a transmission came through the radio before he could continue pretending that he was back over the Moloch Desert in Emmeria.

"This is Dragovic to Checkmate One, requesting air strike on enemy Hydras. Designating target with laser."

"Checkmate One copies, moving in to support." Maven replied, steering the jet towards where the garrison defenders and rebels were fighting.

Expulse switched the targeting pod to laser spot tracker mode, the image feed from the FLIR going blank as it started searching for the laser that was being designated for them. It only took a few moments for the targeting pod to pick up the friendly laser, the image feed came back to life and was centered on where the laser was pointing at.

"I have the target in sight, locked on." Expulse relayed to Maven.

"Weapons hot. Pickle, pickle!" Maven announced as he pressed the weapon release button, releasing one GBU-12 guided bomb.

Maven broke off and started turning back towards the outskirts of the purification wall to continue bombing ELID hordes, not needing to care about keeping the targeting pod on target as the laser designation was handled by the ground forces. Said laser continued to guide the bomb directly onto a hydra, the impact alone being enough to disable it on top of the 500-lb explosion that occurred upon impact taking out any additional quadrupedal armored machines.

"Targets are confirmed down, that was perfect Checkmate One!" Dragovic praised.

"Roger that, returning to sweeping up the ELIDs."

Maven continued back to the outskirts and switched back to using the MK-82 unguided bombs on the ELID hordes which seemed to have repopulated and then some in the short time they were dealing with a precision strike.

"Christ it feels like for each set of them we bomb, two more take their place." Expulse commented.

"Well at least bombing from above is all we have to do." Maven responded before focusing back on the task at hand.

He counted three hordes of ELIDs that needed to be dealt with immediately and another four or five groups that were of lower priority. With how they were positioned, it would require at least two passes to bomb each group. Maven noted that it looked like the large ELID was leading the grunts, or at least that is what he was assuming based off of the grainy black and white image feed of the targeting pod.

Perhaps he should see about requisitioning an upgrade.

Nevertheless Maven once again dived downwards towards the ELID hordes, calling out the brevity code when he released the bombs once he lined it up with the crosshair on the heads up display. The first fly by was enough to take out the immediate threats, leaving the pilots with five MK-82s left on the F-15's fuselage.

Maven began flying around for a second bombing run but a radio transmission halted that plan.

"Checkmate One, requesting immediate fire support on enemy Typhon! We're under heavy fire!" Dragovic yelled into the comms.

A typhon, a hover tank with an electromagnetic beam cannon as it's main armament. Maven remembers nearly being fried with one of those when they got sent to this world.

"Acknowledged, moving into position to provide support." Maven said, banking back towards the quarantine wall.

He decided that the Mavericks would be a better weapon of choice over the GBU-12s and switched to the air-to-ground missiles. Thankfully the process for deploying them were the same, if not easier than the laser guided bombs since the AGM-65Es could be launched without a targeting pod—not that that mattered here.

Though despite setting up the missiles as per training, the Maverick missile wasn't picking up a laser designation. Expulse brought up the display for the AGM-65E on a sub-display just to make sure that seeker head was uncaged.

"Uhh Dragovic, are you going to laser the target or…?" Expulse asked into the radio. "We can't really launch without a designation."

"W-wait hold on for a moment Checkmate." Exchanges of gunshots could audibly be heard over the communications channel. "Lasing target, cleared hot!"

"Weapons hot. Rifle!" Maven called out as he shot off one of the AGM-65 Mavericks.

To the dismay of the pilots however, the laser that was guiding the missile disappeared without warning or indication. Without laser guidance suddenly gone, the Maverick lost the ability to do the minor course correction adjustments it needed to compensate for weather conditions.

The missile ended up missing its target, striked close enough to cause some damage but not enough to disable the hover tank.

"Hey Dragovic, what's going on down there? Laser guidance stopped too early!" Maven asked.

There was no response other than static over the radio.

"Dragovic? Dragovic, how copy—"

Maven's attempts at reestablishing communications was interrupted as the radar warning receiver started blaring that a missile was fired at them.

"Shit! Stinger, two o' clock! Break right!" Expulse yelled out.

"Fuck, fuck fuck."

Maven rolled rightwards before pulling back on the flight stick as much as he could, all the while dumping flares as additional countermeasures. Expulse let out a breath he didn't know he was holding as he saw the stinger missile pass by.

"Okay Jesus, missile dodged." Expulse called out, further confirmed by the RWR going quiet once again only to start acting up again. "Bitch! That the rail gun tank is out for vengeance! Start booking it Maven, full throttle, full throttle!"

The pilot jacked the throttle into maximum power, igniting the afterburners while deploying some chaff in the off chance that it messed up the lock that the typhon had on them. Both Maven and Expulse saw the blue beam shot pass them in the rear view mirrors, thunder accompanying it as it did.

"That was too close for comfort holy shit." Expulse said mostly to himself.

"Fucking—" Maven paused for a moment before exhaling. "Dragovic, there are enemies with stingers! We cannot provide close air support until those guys are dealt with!"

The aviators still didn't receive any reply.

"…I uhh" Expulse hesitated. "…maybe he kicked the bucket?"

"And we'll join him if we try going back for another strike." Maven said between gritted teeth.

The pilot was about to go vent his frustrations by way of dropping the last of the MK-82 dumb bombs onto whatever sorry ELID zombie abominations that happened to cross his line of sight. It was far away enough that if the rebels decided to launch more missiles at them it would be trivial to dodge them.

That plan was quickly interrupted by a groan followed up by some coughing transmitted over the comms.

"Dragovic, you still alive?" Expulse asked.

The garrison officer coughed. "Took a couple of hits. Stable for now… however I won't be on the field for a bit."

"At least you're still alive." Maven said. "Though what about air support now? Got no one to designate for us and even if we did, we'll probably get swatted down by enemy SAMs."

Dragovic took a moment to think before an obvious solution hit him.

"Hold on Checkmate, I might have a solution." He said before switching comm channels.

In under a minute, Dragovic got back to the aviators bearing good news.

"Okay—" The garrison officer coughed again. "We just recently got some outside support from two tactical dolls, one of them will spot targets for you and the other will prioritize taking down anti-air."

"Copy that, we'll continue providing air support until we're out of guided munitions." Maven affirmed.

"Understood, I'll let the dolls give the orders to you now. Good luck up there." Dragovic wished, another fit of coughs following right after he finished his sentence."

"You too, stay alive down there." Maven replied before recommitting back to where the garrison defenders and rebels were still exchanging fire, though it looked like the rebel numbers were dwindling more and more since the mission began.

"Hailing Checkmate One." A new voice came over comms. The speaker was female and sounded… cold, blunt, bit hard to describe without knowing her face.

"Roger that, I'm guessing you're the new designator?" Maven asked.

"Affirmative, you may refer to me as AN-94." The doll said. "I am already designating a battered up typhon. Any ground threats relevant to you should be no factor by now."

Expulse slewed the targeting pod back to where it last was, picking up the laser. "Yep, got it, locked on. Do the thing Mav."

"Gotcha. Rifle away." Maven called out, launching the second and last maverick they had.

This time, the missile had no issue delivering its payload on the still active hover tank, finally finishing it off with a relatively small explosion. There were also no warnings on the RWR, the doll responsible for that was working fast.

"Oh yeah, shack on target. It's down now." Expulse said with a satisfied grin.

"Confirmed, typhon is destroyed." AN-94 verified. "Returning to combat now, will radio if another air strike is needed. Out."

With no immediate threat now, Maven took a moment to catch a breath for the first time in this mission. A quick peak downwards told the pilot that garrison defenders managed to push back a significant amount, probably due to the two T-dolls that entered the fray seemingly out of nowhere. Though he felt like something was missing—

"H-hey we got ELIDs heading towards the quarantine wall! There's too many of them, we'll run out of ammo!" A garrison soldier broadcasted.

"Ah fuck, forgot about those!" Maven did a sharp turn towards the quarantine wall.

Turns out that the remaining ELIDs had grouped up into one large clump, about five of the large ones and enough of the grunts to make any ground soldier's heart drop. Through the FLIR it looked like a swarm of ants marching towards a piece of sugar that someone accidentally dropped.

However to pilots, this basically was a wet dream.

"Oh boy, time to see how many of these fuckers I can get at once." Maven said, already diving downwards, flying at an angle towards the horde. "Alright, pickle! Pickle!"

Maven dropped two bombs, one towards the front and the second in the middle of the over sized crowd. The two explosions wiped out a good chuck on the small fry ELIDs and did some damage to the larger ones, killing one apparently as Expulse only counted four of them now.

"Good hits Mav, wanna give them one last present?" Expulse said with a wide smile.

"You know it." Maven responded in kind.

He put some distance between themselves and the ELID horde before turning around and diving downwards. Maven delivered the present onto the horde in the form of the remaining three bombs they had, aiming for the big abominations that he mentally noted to ask about proper names once they got back to base.

While being somewhat off the mark as to be expected with dumb bombs like the MK-82, a significant amount of damage was done regardless, two of the large ELIDs down with the remaining two visibly limping, still mindlessly trying to make their way to the quarantine wall.

"That shouldn't be an issue for the garrison soldiers now." Maven said.

"Yeah it better be, because we literally only have three GBU-12s left." Expulse pointed out.

Well unless AN-94 needed something blown up, they were mostly useless now. Gun runs were always an option but they could only do that maybe two or three times if it was really necessary.

"So we do just orbit around until something needs an order of five hundred pounds worth of explosives?" Maven asked.

"Seems like it—" It was Expulse's turn to be interrupted by the radio, a common occurrence today it seems.

"Attention, the operation to seize the control room has failed, and too many of our people outside have fallen. Regardless we will be enacting the final plan."

Both of the aviators were guessing this was a ringleader of sorts for the rebels.

"Whoever is in the control room, you heard us, right? Same goes for the pawns in the sky." The low male voice said over the open comms channel. "Unfortunately, everything you did was for nothing!"

Maven heard a female voice start to speak but Expulse beat her, having found a perfect opportunity to vent his frustration of having to even do this mission in the first place.

"Hey jackass! One, I hope you know you're speaking on an open channel. A lot of you dumbasses don't seem to know or care about that!" Expulse yelled in an exaggerated manner. "And two, if your grand plan was to reenact a shitty B-tier zombie invasion for shits and giggles then you might want to invest in some glasses because they're all pretty much dead. You've failed and if you remotely give a shit about your lives, I suggest you ditch your weapons and hope the ground forces are in a forgiving mood."

The rebel commander didn't seem phased at all by Expulse's rant.

"Failed? Haha… You only talk big when your untouchable up there! At least someone else had the guts to storm us directly." Expulse was starting to seethe at this man. "Still, I'll tell you this. In order to ensure our plan went off without a hitch, our heroes have already rigged the columns here with explosives while you fools were delayed by our comrades! And now, I hold the detonator."

"With just a press, this stupid quarantine wall will be blown to the depths of hell!" The rebel commander taunted further.

The female voice that wasn't AN-94 that Maven briefly heard made itself known now. "Why are you doing this? Weren't you originally garrison troops? Your duty is to protect your people! Can you proudly wear those badges you carry if you let infected creatures into the city!?"

"Of course we can! What we're doing is for the sake of peace and freedom!"

…What the fuck was this man smoking? Maven was genuinely curious to how anything here could be interpreted as 'peace and freedom.'

"As for the people?" The rebel commander snorted. "They aren't even people! Our people are locked outside the wall! The real people are starving, bleeding, struggling on the edge of life and death!

The commander who clearly had a few screws loose continued on.

"We use our blood to protect those maggots in the city, but what have they done? They simply live within the walls without a care in the world, allowing those thieves who live on high to steal the fruits that we protect with our lives! Let them bear the consequences of their weakness! Let them go to hell with the people up top!"

"Do you want to die!?" The female snapped. "You push that button, both you and the rest of your unit will die!"

The rebel commander merely laughed in response. "This is a battlefield, girl! We have no intention of going back alive! All our comrades came here prepared to die. How could soft and weak running dogs like you understand our lofty resolve?!"

"You…" The woman began trying to formulate a sentence.

"You're all off your fucking rockers!" Expulse butted in, at a lost from the shit he heard this man spew.

"That's right little bird in the sky, we're mad! We're all mad!" The rebel commander starting breaking down into maniacal laughter. "Everything's gone mad!"

"LET THIS MAD WORLD HEAR OUR CRY—"

A two round burst of gunshots was heard over the comms channel followed by… rather disturbing gargling noises. The pilots suspected at least one of the bullets hit the rebel commander's neck.

Maven and Expulse waited a few more seconds just in case some explosions still managed to go off, not that they would be able to do anything to help with most of the munitions spent. But to everyone's relief, no bombs exploded.

"Enemy commander has expired." The familiar voice of AN-94 came over the radio channel. "The garrison soldiers are finishing off the stragglers."

The coup was stopped, ELIDs at this point were no factor, quarantine wall was still in tact. All mission objectives miraculously completed.

"Well uhh… mission accomplished..?" Expulse hesitantly said.

"I guess so." Maven replied, also feeling uncertain about it.

"Hmm… I must say, the loud mouth bought valuable time. So consider this a thanks." The unknown female voice started talking to us.

"I would like to object to that title." Expulse said, though was quickly shushed by Maven.

"She's not wrong, nice blog post buddy." Maven snicked to the dismay of his WSO. "Anyways, I should thank you as well for taking down the air defense."

"Unnecessary, it was a trivial task for an elite T-doll such as myself, but I'll take it anyways."

Maven could feel wrinkles appearing on his forehead. She was one of those types. Something akin to a haughty arrogant girl in those stories he read which never translates well into real life.

"I uh… I see." Maven coughed out. "Can we get a name?"

"Mmmm…" The doll took a moment to think, though Maven could tell it was an act. "I don't know, can you?~"

The pilot groaned, he was mentally drained and physically tired and just wanted to make love to his bed right now.

"Look alright, does Griffin and Kryuger ring a bell?" Maven asked.

The soft chuckle was his response. "I guess that mean's we'll be meeting very soon. I sure hope you two are as interesting in person, especially the loud mouth~"

The doll closed the comms channel, letting both pilots groan in peace without some teasing remark.

"Great, she's also crazy like the rest of the dolls." Expulse groaned

"Seems like not even the 'elites' are spared." Maven replied. "AN-94 seemed normal at least…"

It only clicked now that he interacted with the T-doll whose namesake was now his favorite assault rifle. And though she sounded cold and impersonal, Maven chalked that up to how she acts when on a mission.

"Please don't tell me you're starting to fantasize about that AK-94 doll now." Expulse deadpanned.

"I'm not jackass."

Expulse wasn't convinced but carried on "Good, because one we're—"

"BINGO FUEL. BINGO FUEL."

"—that. And two," Expulse craned his neck back to where the ELIDs had came from. The sky was visibly tinted in a sickish green and the winds were picking up. "I'm pretty sure that's the radiation storm or whatever we were told about so I think it's time we get the hell out of here."

"Agreed, I'm tired as shit." Maven agreed.

The sounds of stomachs rumbling was heard in the cockpit.

"…Guess we're hitting the café before we go collapse on our beds." Expulse said.

Maven laughed in response and throttled up the to the maximum he could without going into afterburners. The flight control system already had a way point from where it took off, so all Maven had to do was turn on the auto pilot and have it guide them back to base.


The return flight took roughly ten minutes, same time it took them to get to the area of operation. Despite the prior low fuel warning, Maven had set the bingo to a high enough number that fuel wouldn't be a concern.

Once within visual range of the temporary base of operations, Expulse switched back to the comms channel that G&K was using.

"Checkmate One to uhhh… whoever is Air Traffic Control right now, we're inbound and skipping standard landing procedures." Expulse said with the upmost of professionalism. "Not like any one else uses the damn airfield."

"Jeez you sound tired." Kalina replied. "I'll let Gentiane know you two are back. She'll probably want a debrief in a the command center."

The last sentence made the two aviators groan in agony. All they wished to do right now was to inhale some food and pass out somewhere in their room, preferably the bed, but anything would do at this point.

Maven did his best to guide the jet down onto the runway, though he didn't remember having to put this much effort to making sure the jet didn't go lopsided or something. Probably just a side effect of him being tired.

Regardless, Maven managed to successfully land without skidding off the runway and crashing into a tree or something. Definitely not one of his best landings, but they were still alive and the jet was still air worthy.

"Great landing buddy." Expulse said.

"Shut it."

Maven was pleasantly surprised to see Nova on the ground guiding them to the parking area, where SV-98 also happened to be present. The pilots did the usual shut down procedure and opened the canopy, to which SV-98 had already unfolded out the ladder.

"Successful mission?" SV-98 asked as the two aviators were climbing down.

Maven took a whole second to think about it. Quarantine wall was still up last time they checked, rebels were dealt with and they were still alive.

Sounds good enough.

"Yep." Maven answered. "Though I'll consider it complete if we survive the debriefing."

The sniper wielding T-Doll snickered and gave the pilot a pat on the shoulder. The gesture did little to reassure Maven but was still appreciated nonetheless.

With a reluctant sigh, he tapped the shoulder of his WSO and nodded towards the command center. Expulse understandably groaned but started walking beside Maven regardless. The two gave SV-98 and Nova a good bye wave and continued towards the temporary base of operations.


The debriefing was predictably dull for the most part as the two pilots recounted the operation bit by bit. It started to get more 'interesting' when the event of the failed Maverick missile strike came up. Expulse decided to speak up and politely inform Gentiane about the drawbacks of using what was the equivalent of an AIM-7 semi-active missile on targets.

The solution to this would be to switch over to JDAMs or JSOWs like the GBU-38 or AGM-154 respectively. Though that would require having a functioning GPS which they don't have so they wouldn't be of use anyways.

At some point the WSO got sidetracked into professionally complaining about the lack of any allies that could reduce our workload and take the heat off of us. Which to be fair, Maven was going to bring all of this up himself to Gentiane—albeit with a lot more tact—after the debriefing with the hopes of seeing if something could be hashed out.

To his surprise, once Expulse wrapped up his less than professional rant, Gentiane didn't appear bothered by the lack of proper manners. If anything she seemed like she had good news to deliver.

"Disorderly conduct aside…" She casted a small glare to Expulse, but it didn't seem like she was being serious. "I believe I have a solution to your GPS and wingman problem. We got into contact with Svarog and they were willing to lend us a specialist in this field, she should be showing up tomorrow."

Fixing the GPS and getting a buddy in the air? Talk about hitting two birds with one stone.

"Sweet." Expulse stated, sufficiently calm now.

"And new weapons?" Maven asked.

Gentiane grabbed a pen and a random scrap of paper that littered her desk.

"Just tell me what you need and… I'll pass it along."

The two aviators turned to each other.

"Definitely the GBU-38s." Expulse stated immediately. "I don't want to use laser guided shit any longer."

"Agreed." Maven had no complaints with that. "AGM-154 is also a must have."

"The Alpha or Charlie variant?"

Maven took a moment to think. "Do we really have a need for guided cluster bombs?"

Expulse scratched his chin, putting the remaining functioning brain cells to work.

"Probably not to be honest." The WSO answered. "What about the GBU-31?"

"Which one? V1, V3 or both?" Maven asked for clarification.

"Huh?" The confusion on Expulse's face was apparent. "What even is the difference again? And I think you skipped V2."

"V1 is just a normal bomb, V3 is for penatrating bunkers or something. V2 and V4 are just special versions for the navy in case someone was cooking too hard."

"Ah. Get both then?" Expulse suggested.

"Get both it is." Maven tapped his fingers on his leg in thought. "Anything else we're missing?"

"Wait won't we need a different ejector rack for if we want multiple 38s on one station?"

Maven mentally facepalmed. "Shit, which one was it again? The BRU-41?"

"I think so yeah—"

"Wait wait." Maven snapped his fingers as he forgot one last important upgrade. "Targeting pod."

"Oh shit right, really want to swap out the LITENING for the Sniper XR." Expulse added on.

Both aviators turned towards Gentiane, ready to confirm which armaments they wanted. Neither of them caught the emptiness in her eyes as she mentally tried to avoid thinking about how much this would all cost.

She prayed that Helian would be in a good mood later today.

Gentiane wrote down every name that the two mentioned—making sure the 'AGM-154' specifically had 'Charlie' written next to it—and handed the scrap paper over.

"Is this everything?"

Maven and Expulse briefly scanned the list. Everything they requested was on there so they handed it back to Gentiane. "Yep, that's everything."

"Okay, I'll send this through the relevant channels." Gentiane said, exhaustion beginning to seep through her voice as well. "Maybe if we're lucky, Svarog might send it tomorrow as well."

"Alright, you have our gratitude—" Maven was cut off by the growl of his stomach.

There was a slightly awkward silence, but the aviator could see a shine of amusement in Gentiane's eyes.

"You two should go eat and rest up, you've earned it. Dismissed." Gentiane did a shooing motion with her hands, not bothering to hold back the smile anymore.

The two pilots took their leave and were about to exit the command center, however the door opened in their faces and the two were greeted by the familiar visage of a totally not suspicious government agent.

The two parties stared at each other momentarily before K broke the silence.

"…Dragovic wanted to let you two know that you both did a great job today, that's all."

K didn't bother waiting for a response and walked by the two and headed towards Gentiane, presumably to speak in more convoluted riddles about why they're here.

None of that was their concern however and they had much bigger issues to fry, namely their horrendous need for food. Maven took a whole three steps out the command center before stopping.

"…You don't know where the cafeteria is." Expulse guessed.

"I don't know where the cafeteria is." Maven confirmed with a sigh. "I'm getting an odd sense of déjà vu right now."

Expulse merely nodded his head. "Yeah let's not repeat that and just harass the first doll we find."


After politely shaking down the first T-Doll they found for directions, it was only a short walk to the cafeteria. There wasn't anything noteworthy about the place, having a similar an identical appearance to other air force bases they've operated from in Gracemeria. Which meant the place was well furnished compared to the navy and especially the ground forces.

The one detail that was somewhat surprising was that the one and only M1903 Springfield was serving again, alongside G36 as well. Said rifle wielding T-Doll shot Maven a knowing look when the two aviators got to her. Thankfully that was all she did and gave them both some food without much teasing. Nevertheless in Maven's mind it only reinforced Springfield had some type of mind reading abilities.

With the food issue now sorted out, the two aviators decided to set up camp in the corner of the room and snagged a four seater for themselves. Maven and Expulse wasted no time digging into their meals, almost forgoing basic table manners had they not been in public. As expected the quality surpassed five star restaurants, including an Italian bistro they once visited.

The two were so focused on inhaling their food that neither one noticed a silver haired individual approaching them.

Until she decided to make her presence known by blowing into Maven's ear, startling the poor starving pilot.

"H-hey, what the shit!?" He managed to get out once he avoided almost choking on his food.

The white haired doll—who he could now see had her eyes closed for some reason—merely gave the smuggest smile Maven had seen in his life so far and took a seat next to Expulse.

The doll didn't stop there and decided to take up as much space as possible, going well into Expulse's personal space who wasn't very happy about that as he paused eating and gave silver haired doll a glare.

Maven was about to speak up but was once again startled as another doll that he didn't realize was next to him sighed.

"Is this really necessary, AK-12?"

The two aviators recognized by voice alone that this was AN-94 from earlier, which would mean that the obnoxious silver haired T-Doll currently all up in Expulse's space was the other doll who was involved in today's operation.

AK-12 pouted and folded her arms. "I was just curious about their reactions. Though I must say they were quite entertaining."

Expulse slowly turned his head towards her with the most deadpan expression he's made. AK-12's response was to boop Expulse on the nose, to which he swatted her hand away and went back to trying to eat.

"Not going to sit down 94?" AK-12 pointed out that the platinum-blonde haired doll was still standing up right next to Maven.

For a split second AN-94 looked startled but quickly recovered and took a seat next to maven, respectfully not encroaching on his personal space like AK-12 and folded her hands on her lap.

Maven could feel the social awkwardness radiating off of this doll.

There was a somewhat awkward silence now for Maven at least, Expulse was occupied with AK-12 borderline harassing him for some sort of reaction.

Maven cleared his throat. "So uh… you can see even though your eyes are closed..?"

He couldn't tell if that was a taboo thing to ask but he was genuinely curious since he hadn't seen any other doll walking around with closed eyes.

"Hmm? I can see perfectly fine don't you worry." AK-12 answered with an aura of haughtiness. "I usually keep them 'shut' to avoid excessive processing power."

Interesting piece of information, though he couldn't help but be curious about what AK-12's eyes looked like. He must've been an open book today because AK-12 seemed to immediately catch on to what he was thinking about.

"Curious to what they look like hmm~?" AK-12 teased. "Most are scared by them you know."

Both Maven and Expulse looked concerned at that last bit.

"But I can spare you a quick glimpse right now."

AK-12 proceeded to partially open one of her eyes, and the two pilots could see why most would be put off. Even half lidded like they were now, her eyes shone a bright pink, much brighter than the other dolls even in a low light environment. Even Grizzly's, who shared the same eye color, wasn't nearly as blinding as AK-12's.

"Huh, I think they're cool." Expulse said flatly. He meant what he said but he had troubles being more enthusiastic when the doll in question was intentionally trying to take up as much space as possible, knowing full well she was annoying the WSO.

"Now that you've asked something about me, it's only fair I get to ask something in return, no?" AK-12 asked with a smile that seemed to keep widening.

"Uhh sure?" Maven replied feeling uneasy for some reason.

AK-12 pondered—or pretended to ponder, he couldn't tell—for a moment. "How'd you feel about relationships with a doll?"

Maven nearly choked on the remaining food that was in his mouth. He was expecting something more normal like why are they are working with Griffin & Kryuger despite being combat aviators or how did they get their goofy call signs.

"I uhh, I haven't thought about it..?" Maven answered honestly after swallowing his food correctly.

Apparently even that indecisive answer was something of interest to AK-12.

"So you're not against it? Interesting from someone who's new to working with T-Dolls, assuming that's correct of course." AK-12 said with a smile.

"..Nope, haven't worked with T-Dolls before signing onto here." Technically not a lie, Gracemeria or anywhere else for that matter didn't have robots this human-like. "Is something about that surprising?"

"Most humans tend to be weary of T-Dolls for one reason or another." AK-12 stated, not elaborating further than that but Maven could guess the reasons as to why.

Probably something about the uncanny valley or taking jobs or whatever else came up in science-fiction books he occasionally read.

"Well neither Expulse or I have an issue with you guys." Maven said.

"Nah I rescind that, give me some damn space." Expulse stated unamused while staring at AK-12, who only smiled even more. "Can't you be more like your partner and not be a nuisance?"

AK-12 acted as if she took great offense the WSO's statement. "My poor heart~ You really need to take a lesson on how to talk with girls."

"You need a damn lesson on how to act like a somewhat functioning member of society."

As the two began to have a back and forth, Maven leaned towards AN-94 who was silent this entire time.

"Does… she usually act like this?"

AN-94 snapped towards Maven, momentarily startling him, but she didn't appeared bothered or anything by his question at least.

"Only with our team leader." AN-94 stated without much emotion. "…Though she only does this with people she finds 'interesting' in her words."

Maven raised an eyebrow at that. "Huh, so she's interested in Expulse?"

"Logic would dictate so."

Maven and AN-94 continued to watch the two go at it for a bit longer before they stopped, AK-12 appearing triumphant as if she got the last word in.

"It's getting late and I don't want to tease our two lovely coworkers too much so we'll take out leave." AK-12 stated much to the relief of Expulse.

Of course she just had to get the last laugh and stole the remaining food that was on his tray for herself, causing the WSO to squawk in outrage. AN-94 followed suit but gave a small bow to the two aviators before leaving with AK-12. Once the two dolls were out of sight, Maven and Expulse decided to also retire for the night.

"Fucking smug piece of shit stealing my food…" Expulse complained to himself as they returned the trays before walking back to their rooms.

"At least 94 is nice enough." Maven said.

"Because the white wall of a doll barely said anything the entire time." Expulse replied. "I think a loaf of white bread has more personality."

At this point Maven realized the exhaustion was probably catching up to his WSO didn't bother responding

The two power walked backed to their shared room and practically barged in. Expulse didn't even bother switching out of his flight suit and unceremoniously collapsed onto his bed with half of his body hanging off the mattress. With the remaining functioning brain cells, Maven closed the door behind him and shifted his backseater into a slightly better sleeping position before unzipping his flight suit and shrugging them off of his legs, leaving the pilot in a t-shirt and underwear.

He switched off the lights and followed in the footsteps of Expulse in flopping onto the bed, albeit making sure he was actually on it and not five seconds away from rolling onto the floor. Today must have been particularly exhausting because sleep didn't take long to come to Maven.

One last thought did cross his mind before he dozed off however.

'Wait did I lock the door?'


I once again appear to deliver a mediocre chapter for this quarter lmao.

A decent amount has happened since I last uploaded, very late merry Christmas and happy new years to you dorks. Depending on timezone it'll also be my birthday (which happens to be the same date as Ace Combat 7) when I'm uploaded this so yay for that I guess.

Honestly very iffy with this chapter as a whole, combat is weird for me to describe so apologies if that got boring. But finally got to include my favorite doll in Girls' Frontline so I'm happy about that (guess who lol)

If you happen to know me on other platforms, the 'specialist' from Svarog should also be an obvious guess. I was going to include her in some shape or form since I saw her design but with her game being released on global, got a lot more material to work with now.

Also just in case anyone asks, I know I did mention I had some other stuff I wrote that I might upload, but after going over them again all of it was subpar at best so it'll never see a release, sorry.

All of that aside, thanks for giving this chapter a read.

Take care of yourself buddies.