Blue and Red: Stories From Shanxi
The Ballad of Metal Angels: Second Date
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"2159 was a rough year for the Alliance. On the ground, Colonel Atticus kept a death grip on his corner of Taiyuan, and General Arconis was chipping away at General Williams's position, while up in space, General Arterius kept Admiral Drescher from properly securing Shanxi orbit. But June was when things really went to hell."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"Operation Valluvian Twilight. Some would say that was the turning point in the war. Personally, I disagree, but it was a demonstration of the new tactics the galaxy needs now, proof that the Hierarchy can adapt.
"The role of fighters during Valluvian Twilight was different from how I had envisioned it during the Mehrkuri project. Some of us were to function as spotters, providing targeting and navigational data to the fleet.
"I was a little too busy for that part, though. Novus was tasked with escorting the spotter planes, and as for me? I had a priority target of my own, a veritech with familiar yellow markings.
"For the past few months, that veritech had been popping up in after action reports, usually taking down at least three or four fighters at a time. Retiring the Carthaans in favor of the Mehrkuri was cutting down our casualty rate, but he was doing a fine job of keeping it up there. He was burning us down so easily, he'd even picked up a nickname among the nuggets."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"Honestly? I'm flattered. I mean, I like to think I'm good, but I'm no Max Sterling. When the turian fighters FTLed in, we scrambled every veritech in the fleet. It took maybe two minutes before we figured out the Red Death had singled me out.
"Remember what I said about not being Max Sterling? Well, by that point, it seemed like the bonies were trying to prove me wrong. Savage, my CO, told me to fall back, see what their game plan was."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"I'm not an idiot. When he pulled away, I followed, but I kept my wingman with me. Even with two to one odds, it wasn't going to be easy to take down the Yellow Flame."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"Believe it or not, a part of me was actually relieved when her wingman followed us. Mostly, I was worried, mind you. I was neither suicidal nor that confident in my own skills. But it was a change from the script the Sterlings wrote back in the First Robotech War.
"Not that her wingman stayed in the fight for long. I went to guardian and hit my retros. Boney von Richthofen peeled off, but her wingman tried to stay the course. As he overflew me, I just held my P-3 up and ignited it."
Flight Lieutenant Tavor Linneus, Novus Two
"I didn't see him move. That's all I can say. For a pilot, situational awareness is key, and I slipped up. I managed to pull away in time to avoid critical damage, but with my starboard stabilizer melted off, I was no longer combat effective.
"Frankly, I count myself lucky just being here to tell you about it."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"What happened next was a matter of timing. He was already on my six, but the Mehrkuri has better acceleration, allowing me to put some distance between us. I knew the overall plan for Valluvian Twilight, and it was a simple matter to weave my path into it.
"Fortunately, things were running on schedule, so we were in the right place when the PFS Archer dropped out of FTL between us."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"To this day, I still don't know how she pulled a goddamn frigate out of her ass like that. One minute, I'm on her like white on rice, the next, a frigate appears out of (CENSORED) nowhere right in front of me and spoils my shot.
"I nearly rammed into the damn thing. And then I found myself dodging what had to be half that frigate's point defense lasers."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"An exaggeration. A frigate like the Archer can only focus at most a third of its GArDIAN lasers on any one target. Still, it got him off my back and put him on the defensive, while Operation Valluvian Twilight swung into motion."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"With all the turian ships jumping in, most at virtually point blank range with our own ships, the local space get very crowded, very quickly.
"And that's not even counting the lasers, particle beams, missiles, and mass accelerator shells suddenly flying all over the place.
"So, you'd forgive me for losing track of the deadliest turian pilot ever.
"No, not for long. Once I got out from under the frigate's guns, I found her pretty quickly. Then again, she wasn't exactly hiding."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"That's when things got... interesting. With all those ships trading blows at knife fight range, it wasn't long before there were a lot of dead ships floating around. It turned an open space duel into a lethal obstacle course."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"It was like the deadliest game of hide and seek I ever played. I chased her into the derelict remains of one of our carriers that took one too many hits. I never thought I'd ever see anyone with the nerve to try that or the skill to actually pull it off in a goddamn fighter.
"I mean, a battloid or powered armor or veritech, maybe, but a fighter? Never thought it was possible."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"It wasn't easy. While the Mehrkuri was built for maneuverability, flying inside a ship wasn't something it was designed for.
"He was good. He countered my Render missiles with missiles of his own, and while he didn't manage to stay out of my forward arc, I never managed to land more than a few rounds on him at a time."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"That went both ways. That turret of hers still kept my missiles off her, and while I was able to tag her with my lasers or my gun pod every so often, she stayed out of my plasma lance's range and was always able to flit away before I could do any serious damage."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"It played out like that for a while before some (ERROR: TRANSLATION NOT FOUND) dropped a nuke a little too close. It sent my fighter spinning, and by the time I regained my senses, I realized it had knocked my fighter completely offline."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"I'm still not sure whether that was a turian nuke or one of our reflex missiles. Either way, it took me a few minutes to get my bearings.
"I got lucky. The hull of one of the nearby ships must have shielded me from the worst of it, because my VT was still functional. It didn't take me long to find my dance partner."
Lieutenant Commander Tyune Satarn, Novus Leader
"I was dead. He had me dead to rights, and we both knew it. My fighter was completely unresponsive, and he had his gun pod pointed straight at me. All he had to do was pull the trigger.
"Spirits, if he didn't want to spend the ammo, he could have simply grabbed my fighter and ripped it apart. I'd seen veritechs do that very same thing before.
"Instead, he just flew off."
Third Lieutenant Jack "Lantern" Mitchell, Viking 14
"I just couldn't do it. I'm a combat pilot. I fly, I fight, I kill. But I just couldn't bring myself to execute someone in cold blood like that.
"Command wasn't too happy about that. Got an official letter of reprimand in my file and everything, but... well, it's not the first time this sort of thing's happened, and it's usually worked out in humanity's favor, so our regs are a bit more lenient about it than most other species' militaries.
"Call it crazy - and most of you who aren't human probably will - but it's worked out for us so far."
Codex: Relay War: Operation Valluvian Twilight
Operation Valluvian Twilight was an ambitious plan hatched by General Desolas Arterius and launched June 16th, 2159. Its primary component was a massive naval assault with the sole objective of taking control of Shanxi orbit long enough to provide orbital fire support to General Arconis's troops groundside.
Operation Valluvian Twilight was an unqualified success, though not without losses. The naval component of the operation focused on a new role for fighter craft. Turian fighter pilots took the brunt of the casualties, as carriers launched the initial assault without frigate or cruiser support. By itself, such an attack was doomed to failure; however, the fighters committed to the assault transmitted key telemetry data to General Arterius's flagship, allowing precision FTL jumps by the remainder of the fleet directly into knife-fight range, perhaps the earliest truly successful use of FTL strafing and certainly the first on this scale.
Despite the losses, this gave the Turian Navy control of Shanxi orbit, allowing General Arconis to execute phase two of Operation Valluvian Twilight, which consisted of a series of targeted orbital strikes against targets pinpointed by forward observers on the ground in conjunction with a fast-paced rush by armored cavalry and assault infantry.
Faced with mounting losses and an untenable position, General Augustus Williams was forced to withdraw, slowly relinquishing territory to turian forces while the United Earth Spacy marshalled their forces to contest control of Shanxi orbit. By the time turian naval forces withdrew, Williams had been pushed completely off the colonized continent, effectively ceding the world to turian occupation.