I don't own Ranma or the UNSF, if I did Admiral Hayes and company would have been shot for high treason and Ranma would be with either of Akane's sister's rather than her.
I have used several songs in this chapter, but I will just list the ones that I quote here: 1. Warrior, by Disturbed 2. Donten, another Gintama ending song 3. Boom by P.O.D. 4. Warriors of the World, and 5. Die by Honor, by the band Manowar.
I have started a poll on my profile for the next story after Warrior's Way is finished sometime in September. As before please vote or better yet pm me and tell me what you think of the choices. Every pm I get, so long as you actually try to convince me to write the story in question rather than simply say 'do that story' will earn that choice ten points toward the total.
Chapter 18 Going home is hard to do
Ranma was running on fumes by the time he made it back to the fortress. Needless to say he was also really hurting by then too. Motoko and her wingman Rachel flew beside him, the rest of the half-strength Wildfire squadron having already landed. Max's Veritech had taken a pummeling, and Rachel had run out of ammo, even with the extended magazines, an amazing feat for both her regular rifle and the 'sniper bazooka' as she called the re-tasked Defender cannon. Not that she was profligate or wild with her shots, she just shot that often. It took over a dozen on-target hits from the rifle to take down a Gargoyle, whereas it took two or at most three to kill a Reguld.
In terms of damage she taken a few shots to the wings. On the other hand Jeffrey Arborn had been shot down and killed. Much like Ranma and Max he had moved out from under the range of Ben's Armored Valkyrie and been overwhelmed almost instantly. Ben too had taken damage, losing one of his Valkyries legs and most of his armor along his back. Despite this Wildfire had gotten off lightly in comparison to the other elite squadrons. Roy had already been thinking about making changes the normal Veritech tactical doctrine to make more use of the GPB-1S variant and the new weapons, but this battle and how well Wildfire performed had shown him he needed to make that a priority.
"Wild flight you are cleared to land in starboard hanger three. The fighting has died down only on the portside aft, and the other squadrons are rotating through hanger 3 portside." Lisa's voice was crisp and clear, not letting her worry for Ranma show.
Ranma's voice was breathy as he spoke, and he knew he had something wrong with his lungs. "Roger command."
About ten minutes later Ranma landed in the hanger, and as soon as the bay doors closed and air began to circulate workers and emergency personnel were charging forward. The damage to his fighter seemed pretty bad, but the damage to Ranma, as he got slowly out of his cockpit, was enough to halt them all in their tracks.
Ranma really looked a sight, his hair was caked with blood from a long cut to his head, his hands were covered with blood and all his fingers looked to be broken. He was also holding his ribs with one hand and it was obvious as he climbed out, all grace gone from his movements, that he was badly injured somewhere inside.
Even as workmen moved to help him he held up a hand, waving them off and moving to a jeep at the entrance of the bay. As Motoko and the rest of his flight looked on in awe and worry he made his way walking slowly over to the jeep and then sitting down in the passenger's side. He turned to the driver, a young PFC who was looking at him in awe and said "Hospital if ya please."
The private jumped at the command and within moments the jeep was barreling away from the hanger. Chief Morgan turned away from the spectacle to glance at Ranma's Valkyrie and he shook his head at the amount of damage. Not nearly as much as the last time at first glance but he'd have to see what they found when they went over it. "Alright you lot enough lollygagging around, let's get to work and get these birds tucked down and gone over. Move it!" Once they actually began to inspect the Valkyrie however they would find the damage was mostly superficial. The armor nearly everywhere would have to be replaced, and the Fast Pack variant as well as some of the modules in the head and movement actuators in the hands. But the interior structure and electronics of the Veritech was still intact save around the soldier mode's torso. With the new repair facilities, the damage would only take a few hours to make right. The damage to Ranma was much worse.
It took the dogfight on the port side another hour to die down completely, but that was only because all the Reguld pods that came after them had to be killed to a pod. However, Lisa had rotated the defender companies and Valkyrie squadrons in and out of the fight keeping them fresh and with a full weapons load. With the new trans-space reloading magazine the regular battlepods, had been no match for the Valkyrie's working under the Defender autocannon envelope. Even the light autocannons of the Defenders had been upgraded with the new fold-space magazine, and so could pump out more fire at a far faster rate than before.
From the point of view of the mission, the battle had been a complete success. Not only had the space fortress gotten away from the only portion of the cordon around Jupiter that could catch it after operation Feint and the subsequent use of the siege cannon before they left the gravity well of the planet, they had successfully blunted the Gargoyles attack before they could come into effective range of the fortress. This had kept Defender and regular Veritech losses to a minimum.
On the other side of the scale that was only outside of the elite forces that had been sent to take them out with the aid of the missile pods. Those forces had been mauled yet again. Green was down to four effectives, and Skull had lost three pilots dead, including its first lieutenant putting Rick, who had been the squads second lt. into the second in command slot for now. Vermillion had been nearly wiped out, losing everyone but their commander and his wingman. Wildfire, having already had only six pilots and only losing one, had come out of the battle in the best shape of them all. All the survivors were battered, spent and in desperate need of some TLC.
Thus in the long term it seemed as if the Gargoyles were going to be a much larger problem than the older ones. Lisa and the captain were going over the data from the battle and it seemed as if the missile launchers were more deterrent against the new enemy fighters closing with the ship than an actual threat. Every time a missile wave went out the attacking Gargoyles would slow down and destroy the missiles before continuing their chase of the battleship. This had allowed the star fortress and its forces to move away from them, but it was an ominous sign of things to come. These new enemy mechs had excellent unit cohesion and organization as well as a sense of self-preservation, something that the Zentraedi they had previously been fighting had. "They don't act like a normal Zentraedi force," Lisa muttered.
"What was that commander?" Gloval looked up head cocked in inquiry from where he was looking at the casualty list.
"Oh nothing sir, just something someone said to me a little while before this fight began. These new fighters seem to have an entirely different order of battle and rules of engagement than the alien forces we've previously fought. There's just something strange about it sir. For another thing the two groups didn't actually help one another, the Gargoyles only attacked on our starboard side and the others, the Regulds, they seemed to almost shy away from them, like they were scared of them."
"Interesting thoughts commander, I would like to see a write up about that. Look at the data we have collected from this battle, get with commander Drake and see what you can come up with. Be certain to look at commander Sugita's duel with their ace. Also note that all of those new types of fighters retreated rather than face our reinforced missile launchers." Gloval ordered.
"Yes, sir." Lisa did not let any of her concern for her boyfriend show in her voice, but as soon as her work was done here she was going to make certain that he was all right. Not that she thought he was in danger of dying or anything, but the camera from hangar three had shown him limping as he made his way to the waiting jeep, and that alone worried her knowing how durable he was.
Even though it took them four hours to get back to their carriers Miriya was rather upbeat. Sure she didn't have a single part of her body that wasn't in pain, she knew her ribs were broken, and she probably had more than one new scar to add to her collection, but that fight had been one of the best she had ever had. And she knew that her opponent had only won by the skin of his teeth, and had given her several areas she could improve on. So what if she had to stay in traction for a few days, her healing ability would see her right again. I need to work on my speed and my reaction time even more she thought amusingly, even as emergency crews cut into her power armor to get her out. The power armor was so badly battered that the normal hatch couldn't open. Not that she had any power to run the hatch anyway. Or perhaps look to see if I can somehow add more power to my weapons. Hmm….
The captain greeted her as soon as she was pulled out of the cockpit of her power armor. The captain winced internally at the amount of injuries she could see on the other Meltraedi. Miriya was an ace pilot, in fact the best pilot in all the Meltraedi and Zentraedi forces, her name was spoken with fear by the Invid and every other race she had ever fought, and she had taken this much damage against a Micronian?! "Lady Miriya, the space fortress is now out of our power suit's effective flight range, the backstabber's forces are trying to catch up, but have little hope of doing so unless they can successfully micro jump in front of it, which is doubtful."
What she did not say was it would also be a little suicidal, the humans had shown them the power of the siege gun, and it could wipe out Kyron's entire fleet given the right angle and time to do it in. "His ships also continue to use their capital ship weapons against the fortress, in direct contravention of orders to take it intact, though the Micronians' use of that odd mobile barrier is allowing them to absorb most of the beams without taking much damage. What are your orders?"
Miriya gritted her teeth briefly before speaking. "Get us out of the gas giant's gravity well, after that keep us parallel with them, close enough to see what they're doing but far enough away they can't hit us with any of their weapons." The captain nodded and left as Miriya, disdaining all aid, turned and made for her quarters.
Kyron growled angrily as he watched the space fortress pull further and further away from his ships. "Damnit, order the 10th through 16th flotillas to micro-jump ahead of them, we need to slow them down!"
His flagship captain Grell looked at him in shock. "But sir, all our ships are still inside the gas giant's gravity well, they won't be able to micro-jump that accurately."
Kyron turned and glared at him and Grell flinched. "Do I care? Do it!" Grell nodded, and Kyron watched as fully two-thirds of his remaining fleet disappeared into fold space.
Aboard the Macross, there was a massive sigh of relief throughout the ship as they at last left the last of their pursuers behind, the enemy battleships falling out of capital beam range. Captain Gloval sighed with relief and was about to order everyone to stand down from their battle positions, when Vanessa manning her position at the radar console shouted an alarm. "Captain, we just lost at least three hundred plus of the enemy! Fold space energy detected at their previous coordinates!"
Gloval frowned in surprise but Lisa didn't. "Remember this fleet is led by that madman Kyron sir, he has shown that he doesn't have any care for the lives of his men. Recommend we remain at high alert until we…" She was interrupted as the alarm began to blare, sounding a collision warning of all things.
The Meltraedi captain gasped in shock, anger and rising fear. "That idiot Kyron, he knows our ships can't jump accurately while within a gravity well! If one of his ships hits the space fortress they'll both be destroyed and our mission will fail!" And if we fail, will we be blamed as well? Will Dolza order us destroyed along with the backstabber? The thought terrified her, but she didn't know what she could do about it, and was forced to watch as the battle around the space fortress commenced again.
The Macross was very lucky that none of the in-folding Zentraedi ships interpolated its position, but several of them had come out of fold practically on top of it. Thankfully, the secondary weapons of the space fortress were up to the job, and blew ten of the ships out of the sky before they could launch any fighters. Over forty Zentraedi ships did interpolate coming out of fold, and their explosions lit up the space around them momentarily. Fifty more however folded out in one piece around and behind the space fortress where the secondary weapons couldn't reach them and they all launched fighters and began to fire on the space fortress. Gloval frowned angrily as they began to take damage. "It appears that they no longer want to take the ship in one piece, or maybe this Kyron fellow simply no longer cares. Keep us moving out of the gravity well, but fire at any battleship you can hit along our route. Lt. Laird, keep looking for the rest of the ships that you spotted folding out."
That said he began to direct Lt. Porter in controlling the course of the ship and choosing priority targets. Unlike operation Blitzkrieg, his priorities were the Thurvel-Salan battleships among the enemy, the ones they used as their main battleship class rather than their carriers, the Quiltra Queleual. In so doing he hoped to take them out before they could do enough damage to the space fortress with their capital ship lasers to slow it down.
Lisa took command of the defense around the space fortress, barking out orders to Kim and through the com to Mannstein and to Fokker. "Colonel, I want half your destroids, Tomahawks for preference, to split into firing teams and take positions around the tertiary weapons. Keep the rest in their mounts." The destroid mounts had been one of captain Gloval's ideas, and they were simply indents in the outer hull of the space fortress, much like a foxhole for an infantryman. They had helped keep their losses down against every Reguld assault they had faced, though they had quickly turned into death traps against the more maneuverable and more heavily armed Gargoyles.
"Lt. Young, get every barrier we have out on the hull." Seeing the younger girl about to protest she elaborated quickly. "If we can't get past this battle we won't need a reserve for the next one, and if we do we'll have some time in fold space to rebuild." The space fortress was so large and so heavy that it needed multiple fold generators to give it any kind of speed in fold space, though it could enter fold with only one. Thus the trip from Jupiter to earth would take a day and a half, while the messed up trip from Earth out to near Pluto had taken only ten minutes or so.
Kim nodded and issued the orders, and over forty fresh barrier shields rolled out of their specially made apertures. "Put one each on every secondary and tertiary weapons then assign half to rove around just the engines, the rest to spread out across the rest of the ship. Priorities are to protect the main gun, and if we start losing barriers around the engines to replace them."
Kim paused. "Ma'am what about the command spire and the main section of the space fortress?"
"Secondary priorities, assign one barrier to each but the others are to ignore us." Lisa barked grimly. "We can't slow down, we can't lose the main cannon if the rest of those ships have folded out somewhere ahead of us, anything else is expendable."
Gloval nodded behind her. "Concur commander." Kim gulped but issued the orders to the barrier operators.
Lisa went on barking orders to Fokker now. "Commander, I want you to ignore the Reguld flights already in our defensive envelope, arm all your fighters as much as possible, and start destroying the groups of Regulds farther out. I'll direct you to each in turn, don't get into dogfights with them, launch full missile load at long range return reload and repeat. Remember we will be continuing forward, we don't want anyone left behind."
Fokker nodded grimly. "Be aware that Skull is the only effective Elite squad left, all the others are down to half strength or worse and I've already stood them down."
Lisa nodded back. "Understood CAG, do it!" Fokker nodded and cut the connection.
The Defenders and tertiary weapon systems began to blast away at the surrounding Regulds, destroying hundreds a minute. The killing became even worse as the Regulds landed on the massive battleship's hull, only to come under fire from the Tomahawks spread around the tertiary and secondary weapon emplacements.
The Veritechs flooded out of various hangars then formed up, taking fire from the groups of Regulds already in range of the space fortress, but they ignored them, losing a few Veritechs to their fire but forming into a massive wedge that launched out at the largest approaching concentration of battlepods. With their superior missile and lock on range they annihilated over two thousand battlepods before pulling back to the space fortress to rearm, go out and do it again. Unfortunately that was but a tithe of the forces surrounding the space fortress, and the Defenders, spread out around the hull and with only a few roaming barrier shields to go to their aid, began to take casualties. Thankfully the weapons of the space fortress and its engines hadn't taken any damage, and they had been able to destroy fifteen more ships in the time it took the Valkyries to go through their missiles loads.
Vanessa suddenly gasped. "Captain I've got a heading on about two-hundred twenty ships directly in front of us, they're really bunched up at the moment but out of range of our secondary weapons."
Gloval growled, quickly calculating the time it would take their pursuers to try and catch up to the danger so many enemy ships directly in front of them posed, and the rearming time it would take them to clear Jupiter's gravity well. Then he nodded decisively. "Initiate siege transformation! Get me an angle so we can take these bastards out!"
If sound could propagate in space Gloval would have been able to hear Kyron's howl of rage ten minutes later, as the siege cannon fired, then traversed slowly, destroying all two hundred and twenty ships before any of them could join the battle around the beleaguered Macross.
The rest of Kyron's forces, now greatly diminished tried the best to catch up, but the space fortress forged on, smashing the enemies it could and simply taking the shots from the rest. Mannstein took up position on the hull with Apocalypse and with its weapons it was able to kill the battleships the weapons of the Macross couldn't range on, decreasing the number of enemies they were facing slowly but surely. This went on for ten hours, until the ship left the gravity well of the massive gas giant behind.
This was the most dangerous moment for the ship, as the destroids and Veritechs had to be brought back into the fortress. Thankfully because of Mannstein destroying their mother ship and Fokker continuing to whittle the Reguld groups down at range, it was accomplished without further loss of life. As the last hanger door closed Gloval nodded wearily. "Initiate fold space jump!"
Sammy nodded, and the ship, having been gathering energy and preparing for the last twenty minutes, folded out, leaving the tattered remnants of the 11th skirmish fleet behind them.
No one on the bridge looked up from their screens as Kyron stared at the tactical display, where the designator for Zor's battleship had just disappeared. Kyron's face was twisted with rage, and it was clear an explosion was imminent when the communications display lit up. "You are very lucky Kyron."
Kyron turned to face Miriya, who had forced herself up to the bridge despite her wounds, the sight of which made Kyron sneer. "It seems you were the one who needed luck the most. Did the Micronian Ace smack you around, or did you walk into your hatch?" It should be obvious but Kyron still had a lot to learn about the art of insulting people.
Miriya merely laughed at his weak attempt to rile her up. "Oh please, at least I gave as good as I got, and I know how to train myself to do better next time. As for you, if your attack had succeeded Dolza would have ordered the death of you and your entire clan-fleet. Are you a fool to forget his orders? We're supposed to take Zor's fortress in one piece you idiot!"
Kyron scowled, hiding his flinch expertly. "Dolza would not have cared about how we had captured it as long as we did so in the first place! This need to fight the Micronians with only our Regulds is ridiculous!"
Miriya glared, her eyes colder than space, her face a mask of contempt. "Have a care Kyron. You are treading a fine line here. Those orders come from Dolza himself, and if you disobey them again, I will gleefully lead my Queadluun Rau to destroy your entire fleet, then I will gladly drag you before our supreme leader so he can pass judgment on you personally. Do you understand?"
Kyron scowled, but nodded and cut the connection.
Miriya leaned back tiredly. "Send a copy of that transmission as well as our readings from everything that has occurred since we took up orbit around the gas giant to Azonia. Keep an eye on him and his remaining forces, captain. We can ill afford to let that madman drag us down with him." The captain nodded grimly as Miriya went on. "If they try to fold out, rejoin the main fleet." Again the captain nodded, and Miriya wearily got to her feet walking off the bridge heading to her quarters, not once letting the pain she was in show on her face.
Ranma woke up about a day after he was injured to find Kasumi and Lisa sitting by his bed with his mother talking quietly. He blinked and forced himself up, moving his head from side to side. "How long was I out?"
The three women looked up and smiled as they saw him awake. "About a day, maybe a little less. How are you feeling my son?" Nodoka asked.
Ranma twitched a little, taking stock of his body. "All healed, got to love ki healing, though I'm really freaking hungry."
Kasumi smiled and brought out a bag, earning an enthusiastic kiss of gratitude from Ranma which she eagerly returned despite Nodoka's presence while Lisa shook her head, still not used to the things ki could do for those who could use it. "I really need to get some time off so you can teach me more about this ki stuff love."
Ranma pulled away from Kasumi to grin at the other girl. "Yeah right, you know you love your job too much to take that much time off. Heck, you use most of your free time thinking up plans. Heh, pretty soon I'll have to call ya admiral Lisa-chan instead of commander."
Lisa blushed at the praise. Most men would be leery or threatened by a woman who was ambitious and higher ranked than they were, but not Ranma, he was merely happy for her. "You're skipping quite a few steps there Ranma, but thanks for the sentiment."
Ranma pulled the food from the bag and put it on the table next to the bed. "Heh, you'll make it eventually. What's been happening while I've been out of action."
Lisa filled him in on the pitched battle he had missed, eliciting a groan from Ranma for missing the action then told him they were in fold space right now. "But because we only have one of the fold space engines, the trip back to earth will take a day and a half, so you have about six hours or so yet before we break back out into real-space. I'm afraid we'll probably need you and everyone else to be at the top of their game when we do. It's just a feeling but…"
Ranma nodded soberly. "I getcha commander. I'll be ready." Lisa nodded and Ranma and the three ladies talked for an hour before Kasumi and Lisa left with Nodoka to spend a few hours together walking around the city.
Nodoka had been so busy lately she hadn't had time to be with her family for nearly two months now. As chief of the hydroponics section she had been busy designing and helping to build new areas to house animals like cows chickens, fruit bearing trees and a fish farm. This was all in hopes of them getting new food stuff when the returned to earth. If they got as much as they had prepared places for, Macross would be completely self-sufficient set food wise. This would be her first free day, and she wanted to grill Lisa about her progress with Ranma. Not that Lisa realized that just yet, she thought that the woman who had become her mother figure just wanted to hang out with her and Kasumi.
About ten minutes after the girls left, Dr. Lang showed up. Ranma waved at him but kept eating and Dr Lang looked at him severely. "I warned you that using the Valkyries helmet without the feedback blocker that you would regret it. Have you seen this medical sheet about the injuries you sustained? You shouldn't even be sitting up, you have five broken ribs for god's sake!"
Ranma shook his head. "Doc, I'm fine, seriously. A day's worth of sleep and letting my ki heal me and I'm good to go. And I would've never held up against that Gargoyle ace without it." He got out of bed, moving easily despite the injuries he had taken so short a time ago.
Dr. Lang watched him for a minute then sighed. He should have known he couldn't convince Ranma to stop using the helmet interface without the feedback blocker. "Ranma, you have done far more for this ship and our fighting ability with your brain, your knowledge of energy use and your suggestions, than you have fighting for us. Please be more careful all right I think you still have a lot to teach us about energy and controlling it that we need to learn."
"Can't promise that doc, still remind me ta get in touch with some of my friends when we get back to Earth. I bet granny and maybe Mousse could help you a lot with that." Dr Lang nodded, shook hands with the martial artist and bid him farewell.
Ranma had barely finished dressing when Roy Fokker came in. "Hey Ranma, I want to talk to you for a sec." Ranma paused and looked at the CAG, wondering what he wanted.
Azonia and her forces had had an easy time of it, militarily speaking. The five missile based capital ships the Micronians had in orbit died along with their orbital docks easily, taking only two of her own ships with them. After that the remaining human forces, mostly starfighters with two small carriers, far smaller than the missile ships, had refused to engage them. Instead they had dived down into the planet's atmosphere, keeping the planet between them and her forces until they could hide somewhere on the surface. This of course wouldn't have mattered if she it was here to destroy the planet or attack it, as she would have spread her forces out, encompassing it entirely before ordering a saturation bombardment. Instead, she was merely here to invade the planetary data net.
While some of her captains amused themselves by smashing every single piece of infrastructure the humans had in space the rest of her captains and her special units engaged in a massive electronic warfare effort. In point of fact, they needn't have bothered, it was almost ridiculously easy to invade the data net. Their problems however, began after they accessed it.
There was so much data! So many confusing images of weird, strange things that they didn't have any word for. What was the point of so many odd exercises between different groups wearing different uniforms? Some kind of competition obviously, but then where were the weapons, what was the pointing of throwing around some strange thing, or kicking another thing? What did the odd created images mean, especially the ones with the odd long eared creature that was seemingly immortal?
Where was the organization, the military structure, why did it seem as if every human and his dog (and where did that phrase come from, it had spread throughout the fleet but no one knew where it came from), had access to the data net, and what was with all those weird pictures with odd naked humans doing odd things?! She had swiftly ordered that those images be blocked out entirely, and the four hundred computer operators that had seen the images reassigned, as many had tried to save some of it to their own personal computers.
Some of the rest of it was understandable, the different modes of dress for example. Among the Meltraedi style and type of cut of the uniform was a point of distinction and individuality, but the sheer amount of difference styles of uniform shown among these Micronians was mind-boggling. How could you tell who was higher ranked if everyone dressed so chaotically? And why did there seem to be to groups of leaders in the first place? The idea of nation she put down a simply different clans, and her analysts agreed. Still, for all their effort, they didn't have much to show for nearly two months of work.
Azonia was leaning back in her admiral's chair, reading from her screen an ancient Micronian treatise on war by someone with the excellent name of Sun Tzu. Ancient it might be, but she was finding interesting parallels between war as this Sun Tzu had practiced it and how she thought it should go, even if she had to stop every few minutes to look up the meaning of some words and phrases. How he spoke of using fire, speed and the chaos of war against your enemy was brilliant, and she wished Sonya was here to share it with.
Sonya wasn't just the head of her intelligence department, Sonya was her oldest and most trusted friend and confidant. The two of them had come from the same crèche, and were the only ones from it still alive. She hadn't realized how much she would miss her friends company until she was gone.
Her reading was interrupted by her sensor specialist voice breaking the efficient hum of the well run bridge. "Lady Admiral, we have a reading of an incoming fold space phenomenon. Size and wavelength match that of Zor's battleship."
With the speed of long combat experience Azonia went from calm peaceful contemplation to alert status and began to bark out orders. "All ship's take evasive action and spread out, no ship to be within 2000 ghorna of any other ship! Launch fighters from the 15th, 34th and 22nd, as soon as the space fortress enters effective engagement range. All ships of the line frigates and battleships retreat once you have flushed fighters. Fighters orders are not to engage the ship directly but peel away their own starfighter force."
She turned to her communication specialist. "Our spies have had enough time in there, get me our best Queadluun Rau operator on the line, she'll need to go and get them for us. Send the signal, tell them we're coming."
The woman acknowledged and then turned back to her screen. A second later, a small undetectable signal shot out from the Night Dagger and eventually impacted the Macross. It was undetectable, except for a small box that no one had noticed stuck to its outer hull. The spies were supposed to check back with their infiltration unit every three hours after a set amount of time, a time that had passed a while ago, but as Azonia hadn't heard from Miriya about getting them back, she knew they would still be there.
Azonia stood and watched as her fleet spread open like a blossoming rafentei, a plant with a colorful top that shot poisonous needles at anything that approached it, though this one had its thorns shooting inside towards the fortress. The flights would be in weapons range in a little under a local hour.
The moment the space fortress came out of fold it knew it wasn't alone and that the neighbors were unfriendly. Worse they were so close that they would barely have time to scramble their destroids and Valkyries, let alone make a plan. Luckily Lisa had already gone over the information gleaned from fighting the Gargoyles. As such, she had ordered the Fast Packs loaded once again on every Valkyrie, and as many missile pods created as possible by the ships factories. This had allowed them to make a minimum of two missile pods containing 240 missiles for every Defender, Tomahawk and Veritech the had.
Morale among the pilots and operators however was dangerously low despite being so close to getting home. Every one of them knew that the elite squadrons had been mauled. Vermillion wasn't flying today, both of the survivors had been stood down by Fokker's orders while Green had been momentarily disbanded, its pilots moved into Skull. Wildfire was flying at a little under half strength. None of the other pilots thought they would do better against the Gargoyles than the elites, and the thought worried, even scared some of them, regardless of the need to win to get back to Earth.
That was what Roy had wanted to talk to Ranma about, and the result of that conversation was that Ranma entered the hanger bay where most of the Veritechs were housed in his female form. This caused the worried mutterings of the pilots to die out and very man and woman there turned and stared at the short redhead.
Motoko took one look and immediately leaned back banging her head against her repaired Valkyries wing. Why the hell is she a man? Oh my god she is so hot! Rachel, standing with the others near her saw Motoko's look of desire as she looked at the approaching redhead and recoiled a little, moving to put Ben and Max between them.
Ranma didn't wear the standard pilot suit, she wore a specially designed one that Roy and Eric Prescott had commissioned months before the latter's death just for her, jokingly as a prototype uniform for the female Veritech pilots. It was skin tight along the legs, covered by a barely there skirt and had an pressure resisting suits over an equally skintight top. Worse was the fact that the pressure resistant jacket accented and pushed up her already pert breasts through use of its packs placed underneath them. Then there was the color, bright red to match her hair, with the Wildfire blue in the jacket and the skirt. More Ranma had even gone with the look, letting her hair out of her normal braid to cascade down to her shoulders. All in all she looked like walking wet dream, and more than one man looked at her in shock. Most of the green pilots hadn't made the connection between the rumors flying around Ranma to the reality, and Max wasn't the only one who felt a rush of desire created adrenaline.
Motoko kept banging her head back against her Veritech's wing as Ranma made his way through the crowd of pilots, which parted like the red sea before Moses. It wasn't just the fact that this was Ranma, famous singer and all around dream girl, but the way she moved. Ranma always flowed more than walked, one step moving seamlessly to another, every muscle controlled and working together seamlessly. It was the stalk of wildcat, a lion or other large cat (though Ranma wouldn't call it that) and it was even more obvious when he was in his female form. As she/he reached their position, Motoko shook her head. "You know I hate you so much right now? Why the hell weren't you born a girl? And why the hell are you dressed like that?"
Ranma smirked at her. "Sorry to burst your fantasies there Motoko-imo. And I'm dressed like this because Roy asked me to do this, something that he owes me a great deal for. Now I got a job to do so if you'll excuse me…" With that Ranma reached up with one hand and flipped herself up onto the top of his Valkyrie's fuselage.
She looked around at the faces of the pilots, and beyond their shock at seeing her here and dressed as she was, there was a lot of fear. Roy had been right about that, but above and beyond showing them something they could fight for Ranma decided to once again put some steel up their spines. Roy suggested songs to remind them of home, or some sexy songs, heh, as if I'd sing shit like that, but that ain't the way to do this anyway. She looked around scowling at them all. "Y'know, Roy asked me ta remind you all of what you're fighting for, but I can tell you all don't need that. You can see what we're fighting for, that little marble of blue in the distance, to get home, get back to Earth, to feel the sky and the wind on our faces."
Around her all the pilots faces had shifted from stunned surprise and gawking arousal to introspection, hope and more than a little fear. Ranma saw that fear and addressed it Quickly. "Ya've also seen that the enemy ships around us have launched their fighters, and instead of the old Regulds, it's more Gargoyles, a lot of them. And ya know how badly those things have mauled us every time we fight 'em. Now, I ain't gonna tell ya they're easier ta fight than ya think, but I will say they can be fought, and we got the missiles ta do it."
She swept her arms out to encompass them all. "I know one thing though about us that you don't know: we are the spear of humanity. Where we go, how well we fight, makes a difference not just for everyone on board the Macross, but everyone back home whether they know it or not. I've met the alien's leader, and let me tell ya he is an all or nothing bastard. Eventually he will move against Earth, and he won't be coming to conquer but to kill us all." There were some mutters at that point, some surprise and a lot of worry but Ranma ignored it and went on, now pacing on her Veritech's wings. "But we have a chance right here and now to figure out how best to fight these bastards, you've seen the improvements in our weapons and durability already. The more we learn now, the better for everyone on Earth and in the future. More, we need to make a stand!" She stopped pacing slamming her foot down, making a loud gong that echoed everywhere in the hanger. "Right here and now we stand and fight, not just for us, not just for the guy next to you, but for everyone aboard the space fortress and all of humanity. We need to show these Zentraedi that we will not go quietly into the night! We will not vanish, we will survive and fight back!"
All around her she saw faces stiffen with resolve, some of the pilots even began to cheer. "We're going to go out there, and show these bastards that humanity can match them kick for kick, blow for blow. We are warriors and they are in for the fight of their lives!"
She reached down with a toe and licked on her radio, and a refrain began. With a deep breath she launched into song, let what ki she had regained fill her eyes with blue/ gold fire. "I am now an instrument of violence, I am a vessel of invincibility! I cannot leave this undecided, stepping down to battle another day! Remember me for all time, this determination is a vital part of me. Surrender now or be counted with the endless masses that I will defeat. Come on bring it, don't sing it better believe it! Broken down till your hope has died, beat down till victory's mine! Stand up and show me some pride! And now, are you ready?"
She moved over to stand poised on the edge of her wing then jumped to the wing of Motoko's plane, still signing. "I'm one with the warrior inside my dominance can't be denied, your entire world will turn into a battlefield tonight! As I look upon you, through the warrior's eyes now, I can see the fear that will ensure my victory this time."
She landed, still stalking around staring at the other pilots who had begun to cheer and bang their heads along with the song. "I can't be told to compromise this! They'll never doubt the body lying at my feet, a most formidable reminder. They will speak my name for eternity! I have no need of any guidance I am a weapon, powerful beyond belief! Seen through the warrior's eyes, I never need to question how to defeat you! Come on, bring it, don't sing it better believe it. Broken down till your hope has died, beat down till victory's mine! Stand up and show me some pride, and now, are you ready?"
She leaped back to her own, jet, her eyes and posture challenging everyone there to stand with her and fight. "You can't hide now I am the warrior so decide now how they'll remember you. Do not hide now act like a warrior, show your pride now solidify your place in time! I'm the one with the warrior inside, the evidence can't be denied, the entire world will stare into this battlefield tonight! As I stand before you with a warrior's heart now, I can feel the strength that will ensure my victory this time!"
After she finished singing, Roy, who had been sitting silently in his cockpit, nodded happily at the cheering and shouting going on. Morale is to physical as ten is to one, and it looked like his pilots were ready for the fight now. He sounded a whistle through his Veritech's speakers and stood up looking around at the pilots. "Alright boys and girls, time to go, get in your Valkyries and let's go out there and kick some ass!" This caused another cheer and the pilots scattered to their assigned machines.
Ranma raised her hand and a gather here motion, and his/her squad gathered round her. She ignored the questioning look in Max's eyes, nearly overshadowed by his obvious interest in her. "Alright here's the game plan, we're going to make ourselves a two tiered defense ok? Motoko and I will be team one, get in close and hammer them point blank range but we'll keep in your range Ben." Ben nodded, and Ranma gathered herself then turned to Max. "Max, you're in charge of the second tier, you Ben and Rachel. Keep your distance, hammer them at long range. Once they come into rifle range, Motoko and I will switch our assigned missile pods over to the three of you. Keep hammering them, but fall back if they get too close or you start running low on ammunition, even if you have to do it fast and leave us behind." Max nodded grimly, realizing this wasn't the time for flirting. Rachel and Ben both answered in the affirmative, despite Rachel having a dozen questions about this odd redhead who had assumed command. Max she could tell was wondering about her authority as well, but Motoko seemed to know her and so did Ben, and they both were following her lead so…
Ranma nodded. "Alright, let's go, and remember don't die okay?" Motoko snorted and the others all ran off to their planes. Motoko stood there for a moment then pulled the shorter redhead into a hug, making a point to grope her ass. As Ranma yelped and squirmed to get loose, Motoko moved back smirking at him/her. "For luck huh? Might as well go out on a high note if I do."
Ranma pouted at her then became more serious, gripping the other girl's shoulders. "Don't die okay, I don't have near enough friends I want another ta die on me. that's an order." Motoko nodded and they both moved to their own Valkyries.
The space fortress came on, not even bothering to dodge the incoming fighters, merely aiming straight for the third planet, daring her fleet to do its worst. "I wonder why they are so eager to get back, it's not as if the rest of their race has much to offer them in the way of aid." Azonia snickered as she talked to herself, "Especially now that we've smashed the planets orbital infrastructure. Only whatever forces they have on the planet itself, which is nowhere near enough to matter to their survival against my fleet if we were ordered to destroy them all."
The communications officer spoke up. "Lady Admiral, we have a communication via FTL transmission from commander Miriya, it appears to be a battle report."
"Send it to me." Azonia ordered crisply, then once it was on her screen she spent a few moments reading. It was indeed a report about the aliens, their jet fighters new, heavier weapons loads, and odd small missile pods, and how they had hindered the Queadluun Rau's pursuit of the fortress, forcing them to slow down to engage the missile waves rather than continue to pursue the space fortress. Azonia nodded proudly at the tactics Miriya showed to combat them. Let the Zentraedi simply throw numbers at a problem until they overwhelmed it, such was not the way of the Meltraedi.
Azonia frowned for a moment then thought of a way to match this new tactic, and gave the orders just in case they tried the same tactics again. If they didn't but used those missile pods in some other way then her Queadluun Rau were going to be battered but she had done what she could to limit that battering. She then turned back to main screen, watching the unfolding battle avidly.
Lisa and captain Gloval looked over the tactical screen worriedly. The fleet arrayed near Earth, which was still spreading out so as to not allow the space fortress a target for its siege cannon, was many times the size of the 11th skirmish fleet. Not quite as numerous as they assumed the original fleet they had faced under the alien called Breetai, but still nearly thirty thousand ships of various classes. If they wanted to they could have simply thrown all of their fighters at them at once and overwhelmed the space fortress, easily but it appeared as if this fleet was under the command of someone who remembered the space fortress was supposed to be taken in one piece. In such a massive cluster-fuck that such an assault would be under even the best and tightest unit cohesion and control, that would have been impossible.
However what was coming at them was almost as bad, for approaching from three different directions were three groups of starfighters, with over 400 Gargoyles in each. Any one of those groups would hammer the Veritech and destroid teams, but combined… Lisa frowned wondering about ways to cut those numbers down, but couldn't find any. They were coming in clustered up, but at angles where it would be impossible to engage them with the space fortress's secondary weapons without turning the ship, and that would be something they would easily see an respond to.
She turned to her com to address colonel Mannstein. "I'll want your destroids to take the same positions as last time we'll be assigning more barrier shields to help you though." What she didn't say but what Mannstein knew was that the number of working barrier systems they had was barely at a fifth of their strength before the last battle. Surviving nearly a capital ship assault had hammered the numbers of barrier shields they could call on badly and they hadn't been able to make up the numbers yet. "I'll also be keeping the Valkyries under the tertiary and Defender envelope. Hopefully the missile pods will offset the Gargoyles' numerical and technical superiority. Good luck colonel.
Mannstein nodded grimly. "Good luck commander, captain."
As Lisa organized the defense of the ship, Gloval turned to Claudia. "Have we heard anything from the SDF high command?" he asked worriedly. He had already noticed that the lunar orbital base had been destroyed and while they were still a little too far away from the planet to see it through the viewport, they were on the outer edge of their radar, and well within their communications range.
Claudia looked a little worried as she answered. "No sir, we should be on their radar, but we haven't received anything. The communication satellites may have been destroyed though."
As could everything else, damn I never thought the aliens would have put a cordon around Earth as well, not with how concentrated they've been on taking Macross. I wonder what they've been up to here. He looked on as this portion of the orbit of Earth came into view and he shook his head. Other than utterly destroying our orbital infrastructure anyway. Damn it, I thought I understood their goals then this happens. As more and more of Earth came into visual range his glare turned from worried to surprised happiness and then confusion as more and more of the planet showed no sign of attack or assault. What in the world were they doing here then?
"Captain, I'm still not getting anything but the most intermittent signals." Claudia said worriedly, her eyes flitting from the view of their home world to her console and back.
Vanessa looked up from her console. "I can't detect anything on this side of the hemisphere. The Agrus and Archer shipyards are just gone, as is Olympia space station. I'm detecting enough wreckage for at least three more Hercules class missile ships than the ones that had been destroyed before we folded. I'm also detecting enough wreckage to account for most of the military and civilian satellites on this side of the planet. There may be something on the other side but I can't tell."
`Gloval nodded. "Inform me as soon as we are in contact with high command. For now Lt. Porter, aim for landing in the Pacific Ocean, about halfway between Hawaii and Japan." Sammy acknowledged the order, and Gloval went back to watching the incoming Gargoyles worriedly.
Azonia had chosen the power suit units led by the most experienced and skilled Queadluun Rau operators. None of them could hold a candle to Miriya, despite one of them seeing herself as a rival to the green haired ace. The 34th flight was led Karina, Chlore led the 22nd and Athena led the 15th. A flight consisted of eight hundred Queadluun Rau, though common tactical doctrine would never allow more than half a flight sent into a battle outside the most dire of circumstances. For this fight each had sent half their numbers, which would be enough to wipe out the Micronian forces and maybe win through to Zor's battleship, though that was only if they didn't take too many casualties wiping out the Micronian space fighters.
As they closed on the space fortress Athena, the most senior of the three, analyzed the makeup of the Micronian defense, a close in defense rather than a multilayered one that would force the Queadluun Rau to run the gauntlet of the space fortress's tertiary fire before hitting their space fighters. In other words the best the Micronians could put up against their attacks. She turned on her radio, giving orders to the other leaders and their flights. "Karina, break off and collect the spies as soon as were close enough for you to split off and we occupy their defense. We'll keep their attention on the starboard and topside to give you a clean run."
Karina was the best of them when it came to user her power suits hands, so she was a natural choice to pick up the small spy pod. "Affirmative."
"Keep our flights separate, my 15th will skim the top of the space fortress, the 22nd hit the starboard side, and the 34th will stay back to reinforce either if we run into any trouble. Oh, and look out for that enemy ace that we've been hearing rumors about, if he can really survive a fight with Lady Miriya, we don't want anything to do with it."
Her simple orders were answered with twin affirmatives from the others, one professional the other grumpy at the idea of not trying to one up Miriya, and they zoomed in on their target inexorably, breaking up into their different flights and aiming for their targets. About ten minutes later though the Micronian Ace did what he did best, and added a little chaos to their well laid plans.
Ranma glanced down at his radar screen, which showed three distinct groups of Gargoyles coming from straight astern, starboard astern and down from above them astern. His computer couldn't separate the marks into individual units yet, but the Macross could when he asked for a force update, and he cursed aloud in his cockpit when the numbers came back. Three groups of four-hundred Gargoyles were going to slaughter them, even with the missile pods. In anything like an even match, the Gargoyles extra armor, agility and firepower would overwhelm any destroid or Valkyrie. Thanks to the missile pods continued hammering, the elite squadrons had only had to face fifty or so at a time as the others fell behind to deal with them missile swarms. Even then the four elite squadrons had been mauled, and the other squads weren't nearly as experienced. The Gargoyles are going to have us for lunch unless…
Ranma paused in his thinking then checked his ki reservoir. It was at barely a third of his max, but hopefully it would be enough to do what he was thinking. "Command, do we have any heavy weapons that can range on one of the approaching fighter groups?"
It was colonel Mannstein who answered. He had positioned Apocalypse at the defensive position farthest back on the top of the massive engine of the space fortress, looking back at the group there. "Affirmative wild 1, I can hit them at this range but they would have time to see my grazer shots coming and scatter."
"Which is the easiest for you to hit ground lead?" Even in space that was the way Mannstein was addressed.
"The one coming down from behind and above." Mannstein answered, his voice even more gravelly than usual as he realized what the young reprobate had in mind.
Lisa's voice cut in, voice professional but still with a sliver of worry Ranma could detect easily enough. "Wild 1, what are you planning?"
"To give them something else to think about rather than attacking." Ranma said grimly.
Lisa paused for a moment, then realized what Ranma might be up to. If it was anyone else, she would have forbidden it, as their odds of surviving and lasting long enough to succeed would be slim to none, but since it was Ranma she swallowed her very personal worry and merely said, "Good luck Wild 1, and come back safe."
Ranma nodded. Wildfire force was near the 'top' of the defensive sphere around the ship so they were in a decent position for this anyway. "Lt Aoyama, you have command here, I'm going to do something to even up the odds a little."
Motoko however spoke up angrily. "No way am I going to let you do this alone onii-chan."
The rest of the squad, even Rachel joined in as well and Ranma growled. "Fine, you lot can come with me, but wait until I break their lines first, that's an order. Pin the lot of them in place, confuse the hell out of their communications and command, then get the hell out of the way when Apocalypse opens up, wakarimas?"
Everyone answered in the affirmative and Ranma flipped his communications to full, pumping a song out into the airwaves as he concentrated, feeding power into his thrusters and his armor. His whole Valkyrie lit up in blue/gold fire, a beacon in space, then he shot forward.
"What in the name of Dolza is tha…" Athena had only a moment to gape in wonder at the strange sight before the strangely glowing enemy mech slammed into Chlore's command like a rail gun slamming into a wall of ice, shattering it and pulling the whole formation in behind it.
Accompanied by the song Donten Ranma slammed into the Gargoyles formation like the wrath of god, unloading his/her missiles as she zoomed in, faster than any of them could lock on and swooping into knife range. She transformed into his soldier mode right before actually impacting one of them, and his new knife whipped out, slamming into its chest as around her ten more exploded from his missiles. She flipped up and over that one, firing at another, unloading twenty rounds into it and blowing it out of space. Then she took a moment to turn and smack her robotic ass at the rest, which seemed to work just as well on this group as it had on the ones he/she used the same insult on way back during Operation Blitzkrieg. The song changed to Boom, an American heavy metal song, and the Gargoyles either scattered in an attempt to get away from this strange audio attack or closed in, which was what Ranma wanted. As the song went "Boom, here comes the boom, ready or not, how you like me now" she destroyed three more, her knife lancing under his arm as another tried to grapple him from behind, though this one had one of its shoulders painted gold, not that it mattered.
He changed into guardian mode, and rocketed away, pushing the now dead suit into another, then used two more missiles to blow that one up. She kept moving dodging fire and killing as he went. Fighting these guys is tough, but nowhere near as tough as fighting the ace, and they can't deal with the music assault, just like the Regulds couldn't. The song changed to Warriors of the World and she continued to kill, drawing more and more Gargoyles into her dance of death.
Behind her, just as the front ranks were reforming and turning to help engage this mad Micronian, the rest of blue flight, which had worked together to pull Ben's GPB-1S, got within range. Ben, Max and Rachel stayed there while Motoko switched to soldier mode and charged forward, her battle cry of "BANZAI!" a scream of fury. She slew two Gargoyles in close, and charged a few more, hammering away with her rifle in one hand as the song sang "will die by steel!" Her sword lashed out again, chopping the arm off another Gargoyle then swung back to take its head off. She joined up with Ranma and together they became a hurricane of destruction. Motoko wasn't nearly as quick or deadly as Ranma, or as durable as she didn't quite have enough ki to use the armoring technique on her Valkyrie. What she was was one of the finest swordswomen alive, especially after her lessons with Nodoka, and she was quick, economical and controlled, using her sword to maximum effect along with her rifle and other weapons. While Ranma took the lead, she watched his back, and this was, like in the boarding actions not the soft option.
Max, Ben and Rachel were reaping a horrible toll as the majority of the Gargoyles concentrated on the whirring dervish of destruction in their midst, their longer ranged missiles and Ben's immense firepower making the difference between victory and defeat. They all took glancing hits and Rachel lost her non rifle holding arm, but they kept at it grimly.
This continued for ten to fifteen minutes, then Mannstein's voice cracked like a whip over the com systems. "Blue flight, incoming grazers in ten seconds, get the hell out of there!"
Ranma and the others saw the ravening beams of the four heavy grazers coming toward the dogfight around them and switched immediate to fighter mode, boosting down and out of the way. Ben, having anticipated this, hit the emergency release, and his normal VF-1A popped out of the GBP chassis, and he immediately joined the others in rocketing down and away from the dogfight. The sudden change between fighting and remaining in one relative position in space to suddenly running away surprised most of the Gargoyles who floundered behind them. A few managed to follow, but the rest were still in a large clump when the grazers hit that portion of space. When they passed, there were only sixty remaining Gargoyles from a force that had numbered four hundred. The remainder, disorganized and demoralized by the sudden reversal of fortune retreated swiftly as Blue flight came together, almost negligently killing the few that were still willing to fight.
Ranma checked their readiness reports and nodded grimly. While their missiles were all gone, because of the energy-enlarged magazines for their rifles they were all still reading at half or a little under in terms of rounds, with Ben still having all his rifle magazines left. Energy and fuel wise they were good to go too. Damage was a mixed bag. Motoko had lost half her wing, Max had taken a shot that took out on of his thrusters, and he was banged up from head to foot. Ben again had no damage, the armor mode having taken all of it he had, and having been left behind to die with the Gargoyles. All in all, they were still a going concern. "Blue flight reporting in, this groups done, pulling back now, where do you want us?"
While Blue flight had made its insane charge, which had only really worked because of the music attack and Ranma's odd insults, which completely scrambled the aliens ability to think, the other two groups had closed with the space fortress and its protectors. There the fight hadn't gone nearly as well. Forewarned about the music attack these two groups kept unit cohesion far better, much like the Gargoyle groups they had faced previously. The missile pods were a nasty surprise though. Every Veritech and destroid had at least two missile pods hooked into their onboard targeting systems, and the tertiary weapons had ten at a minimum each. This allowed them to throw out a massive amount of missiles, but the aliens swiftly developed a response to this.
Too close to form a solid wall and act as a full unit as they had in the fight to break out from Jupiter, each group of ten worked together to destroy any missile salvo that targeting the ten in front of them. They still took loses, far more than their leaders had thought they would but they kept coming, destroying the pods and the Valkyries and destroids who used them as they did. By the time Mannstein had taken his shot, his position had actually been under fire for several minutes. Losses were climbing as the missile pods died or ran out of ammunition, and the Gargoyles closed, some landing on the topside and sides of the fortress. Lisa had already been forced to reroute Defenders from the keel section of the ship to the top, and two of their precious barrier systems had been overcome by pointblank coordinated fire.
"Wild 1, I want you back on top of the ship soon as possible, we're taking a pounding there. Her voice showed what little relief she could let herself feel at Ranma's survival in a pitched battle, but otherwise it was her normal clipped professional tone. "Sending you a flight plan, I want you to take the bastards on top from behind if you can. Then when you rejoin the defense, relieve Silver and Bronze both of them are reporting heavy losses and low ammo."
Lisa wasn't the only one who knew they were taking a pounding. Roy knew it too, and he and the rest of Skull were taking insanely reckless chances to try and relieve the less experienced squads, but it just wasn't enough. Roy killed one Gargoyle with a well place shot at near point blank range that blew up the engines along its back, then turned and swiftly transformed into guardian mode, ducking underneath two cannon shots that would have killed him if he had stayed still. The other Gargoyle, marked by a golden shoulder guard, flew forward, killing an Orange squad member as it closed with Roy. Roy growled and zoomed in to engage rifle and lasers blazing, stitching up on of its arms before it dodge to the side returning fire.
Athena grimaced as she lost some of the movement actuators in her arm. "It would appear as if the Micronians have more than one ace to be respected." If she was honest with herself, the word that most described her emotion for the first enemy ace was closer to awe and fear than respect. Before its fellows had joined it, it had killed over fifty Queadluun Rau, including Chlore. The self-proclaimed rival of Miriya hadn't faired very well against the ace Miriya was so interested in, and Athena wondered absently what had happened to the green haired ace. It and its squad-mates had pulled her entire reserve force into a tight enough area of space that the massive weapons of the one huge enemy mech had been able to devastate it, and they had all survived! It was surprising, and Athena felt respect for these Micronians growing within her as this fight continued.
Now she closed in on this one, who bore a strange symbol resembling a skull on its chest, dodging laser fire from its head and returning in kind from her pulse lasers. They both scored a few glancing hits, but the Micronian made good use of all three of its fighters forms, dodging her main cannon fire and she frowned as return fire took out one of her feet and two ventral thrusters. Thinking quickly, she routed more energy to her main thrusters and shot down, dodging the rest of its fire. Before the skull bearing Micronian could reorient itself, two cannon blasts caught it directly on the chest. To her surprise it didn't explode, but she could see cracks and dents galore.
The tide of the battle separated her from her prey then, and she cursed, "Another time Micronian." Her computer beeped at her and she sighed in relief. "Karina, it would appear as if we have all their attention on us up here, break off and collect the spies." Karina acknowledged her orders just as a golden beam of power brought her attention to the back of her formation, the section she had ordered to stay back and act as a new reserve. She looked over and saw five battered Micronian mechs smashing into her formation from behind and she shook her head resignedly. "It would appear as if the Micronian ace is here."
Roy grunted as he held his ribs, trying to staunch the bleeding. It wasn't a gut shot, but whatever it was, he was bleeding badly. Yet he couldn't in good conscience pull himself form this fight, his men needed him here as a visible mark to rally around.
His thoughts were interrupted as suddenly a beam of gold fire slashed across a little portion of the dogfight, and five new friendly blips slide through the gap thus created to take up position with Skull. "Skull 1, Wild 1 here, how's it going old man?"
Roy actually chuckled despite his pain at Ranma's irreverent attitude. "Oh just peachy here Wild 1, glad you could join the party."
Ranma frowned at the tone of Roy's voice. "You ok there Skull 1?" Without waiting for a reply he reached out with his senses and felt Roy's life force flicking worriedly. "No, you ain't alright. Pull back Skull 1, you're no good out here injured."
Roy's grimace was plain in his voice as he replied. "No can do, with Vermillion unable to fly I'm the only one who can act as CAG." The leader of Green, who like the rest of his squad had been folded into Skull, had died earlier in this battle, leaving Roy one of only two pilots from the original group the Macross had started with when they left Earth. He was the only one out flying right now who had the seniority
Ranma shook his head, almost absentmindedly killing a Gargoyle as it headed toward Roy. "Roy, yer not gonna do any good out here if ya die, and I don't want ta face Claudia if ya do. Pull back or so help me I'll drag your ass to the nearest hanger and toss you in myself."
In his cockpit Roy twitched at the bald threat, but he knew Ranma was crazy enough to do just that. "Roger Wild 1. Command actual this is CAG Skull 1, pulling back and turning command over to Wild 1."
Before Gloval or Lisa could respond to this surprise announcement, Ranma broke in. "Advise that medical personnel be on hand in nearest hanger to present position, Skull 1 has been injured, unsure how badly but it seems pretty severe."
Roy growled but Claudia cut in, probably allowed to by both Lisa and Gloval to address this. "Roger that and thanks you blue 1, medical personnel will be waiting for skull 1 in hanger five. Expedite your movements Skull 1." The words were bland, but the tone was sharp with worry. Roy responded in a henpecked tone of voice, and Ranma turned back to the battle.
The dogfight continued for another hour and was costly for both sides, but suddenly, just as the last barrier shield died and more than half of the remaining Valkyries were reporting empty magazines, the Gargoyles began to fall back in an ordered retreat. None of the pilots, operators or officers questioned this odd retreat, and Lisa grabbed the chance to start rotating them all back in to rearm. Ranma ordered his flight back in with the second wave, but stayed out until everyone else returned. But it looked as if the aliens were worried about how much damage the hull had taken which was considerable, and they were done attacking for the day.
Lisa turned from her console, looking over at the captain. "Sir, a suggestion." Gloval cocked his head, tired and weary and saddened beyond belief at the amount of deaths they had taken in this fight, but the fierce eyes of the younger woman seemed to compel him and he nodded for her to continue. "It's obvious, now more than ever, that the aliens are fighting us with kid gloves but we still need to show that we are not scared of them, that we can fight and that they may kill us but cannot break our spirits."
Gloval sat up, emboldened a little by the commanders tone, the pride in their troops that overrode her sadness at their losses. "And you have a suggestion how to achieve this?" Lisa nodded and after explaining it Gloval nodded. The ship, having just entered earth orbit, slowed for a few minutes to deliver its message.
Ranma leaned back in his flight chair sighing with relief, more drained than he had been save after fighting the Gargoyle ace, but not anywhere near as injured. Bruises and black and blue marks were it. His flight had been battered, but he dreaded to see how the destroid companies and other Valkyrie squadrons had been mauled. As Lisa began to recall the survivors in by the numbers he looked ahead of the ship and saw Earth looming under him, and he grinned exhaustedly. "We made it…." A moment later, a song began to blare out on every communication channel from the space fortress and Ranma grinned, making a mental note to kiss the hell out of Lisa as soon as he could. The song was Die with Honor, and its lyrics encompassed the warrior ethos in his mind.
Aboard her flagship Azonia was grimly satisfied by how the fight had gone. The tactics the Micronians had come up with were simple but extremely effective. That audio attack had proven deadly, as had that one ace's mad charge, holding up a full third of her assigned assault group to be decimated by long range fire before her females could come up with a counter. Still it was obvious to her, and all those under her command that the battle would eventually have been won, if she didn't order the Queadluun Rau to pull back. Their losses were severe, but they had devastated the Micronian forces, and she still had literally millions more if she wanted. But the defense had won her respect, far more than the pitiful one the Micronians around the third planet had put up.
She turned from studying the space fortress to the tactical screen as two other ships folded in well behind her own fleet, followed by a bare few hundred more at an even greater distance. "It seems as if Miriya and Kyron have arrived." But by Dolza, what happened to the rest of the 11th skirmish fleet? If that is all the ships they have left, Kyron has lost more than 4/5 of his entire command.
As per her orders a communication line was opened immediately, and a moment later Azonia stared at the wounds visible on Miriya through the transmission. She was about to ask what had happened to her ace pilot when Miriya answered her questions before she asked them. "This time I lost." She shrugged, then went on, voice iron hard with determination. "I'll win the next battle."
Azonia looked at her pilot for a moment and then simply smirked. "I trust you won't lose again," she said dryly. "That Micronian ace made quite the nuisance of itself in the engagement we just had. I'll send you some tactical recordings for you to look at later. So, how was working with the backstabber, and how did the young idiot get so many of his ships destroyed?"
Miriya rolled her eyes and was about to answer when Azonias communication officer spoke up. "Lady Admiral, we're receiving an odd communication from the enemy ship."
Azonia cocked her head. "Another audio attack, no they are far too far away from any of our units to make use of it, we would even have time to react to the siege cannon. Put it on, I want to see what it says."
The communication officer did so, and the song Die with Honor filled the bridge. The odd background noises were incomprehensible, but the message of the words were not. The phrase 'fight with blood, fight with steel, die with honor, never yield, fearless hearts, filled with pride, into glory we shall ride!' struck all who listened to it most profoundly. No, Azonia reflected, these Micronians were nothing like the Invid, those disgusting bugs, nor any of the other races her people had encountered. Despite the chaos and the oddities she had seen they were far more like her people then she had ever thought possible, and it… it actually bothered her to know what their likely fate would be.
She sighed and turned back to look at Miriya's communication on her screen, but even the green haired death dealer looked somber. "We can talk more when you're aboard. We retrieved our spies as well, and I find myself looking forward more than ever to what they will have to tell us." Miriya nodded firmly, and they cut the connection. Azonia turned back to watch as the mighty space fortress turned and broke atmosphere, heading down toward one of the ocean below it.
Lisa turned to Captain Gloval, a huge smile on her face. "Captain I beg to report that we have touched down safely." Gloval returned her salute, but couldn't keep his own wild grin off his face. Despite the losses, despite the crushing casualties, the lack of communication in the last few hours, after a year roaming the solar system, the Macross was finally home again.
End chapter
As always read and review. Oh and I decided to kill off Chlore here. Before anyone asks, yes that means all the Meltraedi are within a single fleet in my story, the portion around earth is only about a fourth of their total numbers, why that is will be made plane in the next chapter. Hope everyone liked how I'm starting to flesh out Azonia's character.