Ace Combat : Shadows of War
Chapter 4
Jessica sits up suddenly, she looks around seeing that she was in her room. She reaches up feeling her forehead covered in a cold sweat, she however soon noticed that her entire body was covered in this sweat. She slowly moves her knees up to her chest and hugs her knees, she leans in hiding her face behind her knees. She sits this way for a few moments before her body is shaken by sobs, "Why...? Its all my fault he was shot down...if I had been more careful...then he would still be here..." She says softly between sobs.
Meanwhile in their room Mark had not gotten any sleep, he laid there holding onto Kimiko. He looked at her reaching to her and gently moving some hair from her face, losing Alteric out there had gotten to him. He couldn't stop thinking about how painful it would be if he lost Kimiko, he was also afraid of leaving Kimiko in such a way. Such thoughts were really getting to him, almost to the point he was ready to leave all of this behind and go off somewhere where he and Kimiko could live in peace.
Kimiko slowly opens her eyes and looks at Mark, "Will you please tell me that what happened yesterday was just a dream..." She says softly.
Mark looks at her, he gently wraps his arms around her and holds her tight against him. "I'm sorry my love...but it wasn't.." He says to her softly.
Kimiko closes her eyes as tears form in the corner of her eyes, she holds onto him tightly. "I already miss him so much...he was so much like a father to me..." She says softly as she closes her eyes, as she starts to cry.
Mark nods his head some, "Yeah I know how you feel." He says softly holding onto her.
Andrew had been awake for a few hours, he was in the gym working out. He was punching at the punching bag, the thoughts of everything that just happened going through his mind. After several more minutes of punching at the punching bag he stops and goes over picking up his towel, he wipes away the sweat on his face. He sighs some and tosses the towel onto the bench, 'Damn man...why'd you have to go and get yourself shot down...if I try and go for Jessica now...they'll say I only did it now because of how vulnerable she is.' He thinks to himself, as he reaches up and rubs his head. He sits down on the bench leaning up against the wall of the gym.
It took Jessica almost to noon to get up the willpower to leave her bed, after getting her shower she headed off to the mess hall to get something to eat. Even though she wasn't sure if anything she ate would stay down, when she gets into the mess hall she could see Mark and Kimiko in there. Mark was looking out the window and Kimiko was looking at her food, more moving it around then eating it. She silently moves over to them, she sits down next to Kimiko. Mark and Kimiko look at her, after a few moments Kimiko drops her fork and leans in close to Jessica hugging her. Jessica closes her eyes tightly as she hugs Kimiko back, she could already feel the tears sliding down her cheeks again.
Mark moves around to the other side of Jessica, he reaches to her and gently rubs her back. "It'll be alright.." He says to her softly.
Jessica turns looking at Mark, she reaches up and wipes away her tears. "I've been trying to tell myself that all day today...it hasn't helped any so far...because its all my fault he's gone..." She says softly looking down.
Kimiko looks at her and shakes her head, "No its not, how can you think that?"
Jessica looks at Kimiko, "Yes it is...if I hadn't been so careless...he wouldn't have had to save me...why did he do that..." Jessica says as more tears run down her cheeks.
Kimiko reaches up and wipes away her tears, "He did it because he cared about you...because he loved you..." She says softly to Jessica.
Jessica's eyes go wide as she hears what she says, she then looks down closing her eyes. "Why didn't he ever tell me...I would have loved to hear him tell me those words..." She says softly before falling back into Kimiko's arms.
Kimiko closes her eyes holding onto her, she looks over at Mark some as she holds onto Jessica.
A few days pass, during which there have been a series of attacks on both allied and enemy fighter groups. The one doing this has yet to announce themselves, the scrambled reports that come back from the fighters under attack speak of an invisible fighter.
Jessica was standing outside the hanger that Alteric and her were standing outside less then a week ago, she looks up at the sky some. After a few moments she looks back down, she was holding onto Alteric's ace wings. She looks at it sadly as she brings her arm up holding it close to her chest, 'I wish I had something more personal of his to remember him...' She thinks to herself, she jumps suddenly when someone touches her shoulder. She looks over and sees Andrew.
He looks at her, "Sorry, didn't mean to scare you." He says softly.
She looks forward and shakes her head, "No, its alright..." She says barely above a whisper.
Andrew nods his head some, "Alright...well we need you inside now so we can over some new formation ideas brought to us by the brain bank."
Jessica nods her head some and pushes away from the wall, the two of them walk into the hanger. As they are sitting down a pilot from another wing comes running into the hanger, "Hey guys, command has ordered that you hear this." The young man was carrying a small audio tape, the four of them nod their heads. The young man moves over to the tape player, he slides the tape into it and pushes the play button.
As the tape starts up there is nothing more then normal radio chatter between a group of pilots in a wing by the codename of Falcon. Soon the chatter starts to change, sounding more frantic. "This is Falcon One, I've picked up an unusual signal on the radar." Says a male voice, "Its him, its got to be him...what else could it be...!" A more frantic younger sounding voice says, "Calm down Falcon Four." Falcon One says to the young pilot, there was a few more minutes of radio chatter then suddenly there was silence from Falcon One. "This is Falcon Two, Falcon One has been shot down." Comes a slightly panicked voice, there was suddenly static from Falcon Two. "Where the hell did that missile come from?" Comes the frightened voice of Falcon Four, "Calm down Kevin...command we are bugging out now." Falcon Three says, "Roger that, RTB immediately." There's a few minutes of silence before the frantic voice of Falcon Four can be heard, "Falcon Three has been shot out of the sky, I...I didn't even see the missile on radar...I didn't even see the missile until it hit..." Falcon Four says, "I...d..don't want to die..." He says softly, then suddenly there was nothing but static.
Andrew sits up quickly, knocking his chair back in the process. "What the hell does command to do?"
The young pilot raises his hand, silencing Andrew.
A few minutes later, "This is Falcon Four...I have been given...a message...to deliver..." He says softly, "My codename is Shadow Wolf and I have a message for all warring contries, you will stand down and destroy all your tools of war. If you do not comply I will continue to destroy your tools of war, I will bring about a new age of peace. I have seen enough death in my lifetime, all those who do not comply will be cleansed from this world." The voice then stops, the voice is highly altered and unrecognizable. The young pilot stops the tape.
He looks at them, "Command has been debated on having a meeting with Yuketebonia, they are thinking of a joint operation to try and take down this Shadow Wolf. Until then they have set up an operation with you and other ace wings to try and engage this fighter." The young pilot says to them.
Andrew looks at him and clenches his hand, "So in other words command is using us as bait...they think because we lost Alteric we aren't nearly as good as we were..." Andrew says looking at him.
The pilot shrugs his shoulders some, "I'm not one to question command, I'm only the messenger." The pilot says looking at Andrew, he then ejects the tape and leaves the hanger.
Jessica was looking down, she started to look down when Andrew mentioned Alteric. She looks down at Alteric's ace wings in her hands, she closes her eyes as she closes her hands around it. "Alteric would not want us to hide cowering...he would want us to fight this Shadow Wolf..." She says softly as a tear slides down her cheek, she then slowly looks up. "...and as long as I am able I will continue to fight...in Alteric's memory." She says looking at them.
Kimiko looks at Jessica and nods her head, "Yeah, me too" She says as she looks at Mark and Andrew.
Mark looks at Kimiko and nods his head, "I'll always be right at your side my love." He says to Kimiko.
Andrew looks at Jessica and nods his head some, "Yeah you can count me in too." He says softly.
A few hours later Kaizer squadron along with several other squadrons find themselves in the briefing room waiting for their briefing, they were all silent, mostly for Jessica. Jessica was still holding onto Alteric's ace wings, she looks forward as she does her best to keep back her tears.
A couple minutes later the base commander comes in, everyone looks at him as he comes in. He moves the center front of the room, he turns looking at all of them. "All of you are our last resort before turning to Yuketebonia for a massive joint operation, now for this operation. You will all be heading up to the location that Shadow Wolf has been last seen, you will be split up all over the area so he doesn't shoot you all down at once. The lead wing will be Kaizer wing." He then looks over at Jessica, Kimiko, Mark and Andrew, "Since a new Kaizer One has not been named yet, Jessica you are now Kaizer One."
Jessica looks at him shocked, she then slowly nods her head. "Y-Yes sir." She says softly.
The commander nods his head, "Alright then, you have your orders. Now god speed to all of you, I hope you all return safely." He says then turns and walks from the room, everyone stands up and start to leave the room.
Jessica, Kimiko, Mark and Andrew are the last to leave the room, they all move silently to their hanger. When they get there they get dressed up into their flight suits, they move to their jets and take off into the sky.
."Flamingo One, all clear over here in sector one." A woman's voice calls out.
"Ibio One, all clear over here in sector two." A young man calls out.
"Absunder One, all clear over here in sector four." A man's voice calls out.
"Pelikan One, all clear over here in sector five." A young woman's voice calls out.
"Kaizer One, all cle..." Jessica starts to call out but stops, "Wait...what's that?" She says seeing something streak out of the clouds towards the Ibio team, her eyes go wide realizing its a missile. "Evade Ibio, its a missile!" She yells out.
Ibio pulls away from each other, the missile continues to fly down towards the middle of where they used to be. Just as it seems they have gotten clear of it, the missile explodes suddenly. Instead of the normal blast radius of a missile, it reaches out like the blast radius of a bomb. All of Ibio's planes are hit by the blast, they all fall towards the ground ejecting before hitting the ground.
Soft laughter can be heard over the radio, "Not bad, you're the first to ever spot that missile. But I should have expected as much from one of the Kaizer squadron." The voice of Shadow Wolf can be heard,, "However this does not matter, nothing will save you from me. All those who don't surrender now will be sweep from the sky." Shadow Wolf says.
Jessica looks around some, "All wings keep your head on a swivel and go into evasive maneuvers." Jessica calls out to everyone, everyone responds with a 'Roger'.
As they are flying around another missile arcs down out of the clouds, when this one explodes it knocks Flamingo one and two out of the sky. They also manage to eject before their planes hit the ground, "He's just toying with us!" Absunder three yells out, "At this rate he'll bounce all of us out of the sky." Flamingo four calls out.
Jessica clutches her flight stick closing her eyes, "Be quiet!" She yells out.
Everyone looks towards her jet, "Jessica..." Kimiko says softly.
Jessica opens her eyes looking forward, "Have you all really grown so weak and dependent on Alteric that you can't fight on your own? Well I'm not going to let him down and look down on me in shame, when we meet again I want his eyes to be full of pride." She says as a few tears slide down her cheeks.
Kimiko, Mark and Andrew look towards her jet and smiles slightly, "Yeah and the same goes for us." The three of them say.
Jessica looks back at them and smiles, "Thank you..." she says softly.
"How touching, now if you are done. Let's finish this." Suddenly a half dozen more cluster bomb missiles drop out of the clouds, the others are caught completely off-guard and are knocked out of the sky. "Now that the fleas are out of the way, I will deal with you four personally." Suddenly two hundred thousand meters away a massive sky fortress.
The three of them look at the fortress in shock, "Impossible...how the hell could something so big stay in the air!" Andrew yells out. "I don't know, but don't lose focus." Jessica says as she keeps her eyes forward.
A large hanger door on the bottom of the sky fortress opens, an upside down jet is lowered from the opening. "Shadow Wolf, prepare for launch." An unknown voice says over the radio, the jet is suddenly released and drops away from the sky fortress. The engines on the jet roar to life as it thrusts forward, doing a barrel roll straightening out. He kicks in his afterburners and flies off towards them at blinding speeds, "We shall end this now." Shadow Wolf says as he flies towards them.
Jessica clutches her flight stick tightly, "Right...Kaizer Wing engaging enemy." She pushes her throttle forward shooting forward.
Kimiko, Mark and Andrew all do the same following along behind her.
End Chapter 4