Ghost of the past
"And that's what I encountered." Aidan says as he stands in North Carolina's office, his flight gear still soaked with sweat.
Sitting on the desk is New Jersey with her knees crossed while North Carolina stands beside Aidan looking at the camera footage from the Hellcat Three, her blond head tilting to the side as she asks, "So, the air defense didn't activate till you started landing?"
"Yeah, and the missile wasn't affected by countermeasures. I'm sure I could get on the ground, maybe come in a little low and hot, but take off would be tricky." Aidan says as he folds his arms across his chest.
"Any idea if there are any more hidden defensive measures?" New Jersey asks from behind the two of them.
"No idea, but I know something is going on there or at the very least went on there." Aidan says watching a replay of the footage.
"Well, I know me and Carol are pretty good at shore bombardment, so, if there are and we have accurate information we could smash things from blue water." New Jersey says, getting the two of them to look back and see her propping herself up with both arms.
"That could work, but it's still getting down." North Carolina says before pressing her lips together and adding, "Could you get your stern off my desk, though?"
Rolling her blue eyes New Jersey slips off the desk as she says, "What about if we just overwhelm the air defense system with planes? How many carriers do we have here? I know I brought Tico, Intrepid, and Ranger with me."
North Carolina taps her chin for a moment before saying, "I've got Hornet, Yorktown, Essex, and I could put a call into Enterprise."
"Hold up, the actual Enterprise?" New Jersey asks, her eyes lighting up with a twinkle.
"Yeah, me and Enty have been good friends for a long, long time, I'm sure she'd answer the call." North Carolina says as she turns her attention back to the replaying footage
"But what if there are standoff weapons for anti-ship work?" Aidan asks.
"We've got some good anti-air cruisers here, Cleveland and San Diego being chief among them. I'm sure we could put up enough flak to take out anything, failing that, with our rigging, we are much, much smaller targets and we're much more agile too." North Carolina says as she starts tapping her chin.
"Okay, guess I should go and find some smoke grenades or maybe radios that you could triangulate their positions for accurate bombardment, and maybe run some simulations on a high-speed landing too." Aidan asks.
"Good idea." Both New Jersey and North Carolina say in unison.
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Catastrophic aircraft and ground interaction detected.
"Damn it!" Aidan shouts in the simulator as the readout on the simulator indicates another failure to land safely. Running a hand through his hair he asks, "Did I at least live this time?"
Yes, but I will never fly again. My self-repair systems cannot do anything about landing gear being shoved through my airframe.
Leaning back in the chair Aidan grips the controls again before asking, "What if we try to make use of the whole airstrip? I mean the paved area is one and five eights of a mile long, how fast couple we approach that and stop in that distance?"
With or without you staying conscious?
"Both." Aidan says while rubbing the controls in the simulator.
It is possible for both.
"Then let's run it, as fast as possible." He says, restarting the simulator, again.
Dropping low over the water, they photorealistic images of the blue ocean, the green of the island on the horizon. Taking his left hand off the throttle, he activates the landing guidance system, showing him the box to be in, looking up; he can see the recommended decent boxes. Backing the throttle off a little before opening the landing gear doors, taking slow breaths, and making minor adjustments with the rudders, he checks his airspeed, a little over two hundred and fifty knots.
Pulling up slightly to clear the ground just a little more, he can see the paved runway, shifting his vision down, using the bottom screens to show him the ground, as soon as he's sure he's cleared the runway, he pops the air brakes, and drops his rear wheels down, the nose slamming down hard, the master alarm sounding, with quick hand motions, he throws the engines into reverse thrust and engages the wheel breaks.
The end of the runway comes up fast, but the speed drops off faster, he comes to a stop barely a plane length from the end of the entire runway.
That was close. Minor damage was detected in the landing gear, well within self-repair system capabilities.
Breathing a sigh of relief Aidan says, "And how likely am I to stay awake for that one?"
Likely, but I do not recommend going any faster; we almost didn't stay on the runway this time.
"Agreed, so our maximum approach for this one is two-fifty knots, let's run it a few more times to make sure this wasn't a fluke." Aidan says as he resets the simulator again.
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Opening the door from the locker room inside, Aidan sniffed the air and picked up the scent of fried chicken, rubbing his belly and feeling his mouth starting to water, he let his nose guide him. Soon finding himself standing in the entryway to the break room, a sandwich of crispy fried chicken sitting in the center of the table. Wiping his mouth with a sleeve, Aidan looks from left to right, trying to see if anyone is around, not seeing anyone he slowly starts to walk into the room.
Aidan is almost to the table when he feels hands slide up under his then up to grip his shoulders before a woman purrs in his ear, "Got you."
Aidan jumps in time with the pressing of soft globes into his back, running the sound of the voice through his mind, he asks, "Ticonderoga?"
"Good guess and it looks like we're all alone, Admiral, and there is no sign telling me not to touch this time." She purrs before letting go of his shoulders to rub his chest with her hands, one hand sliding south to his belt.
Putting his arms up and kicking his feet out, Aidan slips out of Ticonderoga's grip and lands on his rear, looking up. Ticonderoga blinked her blue eyes a couple of times before looking down and seeing Aidan sitting there, a playful smirk going across her face as she moved her legs to be wide apart as she teased, "I guess just a peek wouldn't hurt, Admiral."
Aidan's grey eyes go wide as he gets an eye full of twin keels from below before she moves to straddle his hips, placing her hands on his chest and teases, "Well, you saw me, can I see you now?"
"You already saw me, I was on Bremerton for two days, naked!" Aidan protests.
Ticonderoga winks before taking his hands and putting them on her hips she purrs, "You're right, maybe we should just start to have some fun."
"Ticonderoga," Aidan starts as she leans forward and starts to kiss his neck before whispering, "I know, but there is no reason why we can't all share. I'm lonely too."
Pushing her back by her shoulders Aidan uses a more forceful tone, "Ticonderoga, right now, I am not in the head space for this, I'm trying to get ready for something crazy dangerous, and I need a clear head, okay?"
Ticonderoga frowns before getting up off of Aidan as she flicks her blue hair and turns away from him, "Fine, enjoy your sandwich. But after this operation, I'll be back."
Hanging his head and sighing, "Yeah."
She turns and kisses his cheek before winking, "I mean it, no reason why we can't all share you."
Before he can say anything she turns and leaves the dining area and Aidan takes a seat to dig into some lunch and keeps running the landing process through his mind as he says, "I'm only going to get one chance at this."
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"Me and New Jersey are in position Aidan, sending the signal to the carriers to begin filling the sky with targets." North Carolina says over the radio.
"Copy Showboat, Dealer Four starting approach." Aidan responds as he starts to descend at a safe angle, far from the atoll, and to start his approach from the southwest.
Once he is skimming the waves, barely fifty feet off the deck, Aidan looks up to see explosions in the sky, letting him know the air defenses are being engaged.
I do not like being this low and this fast, it is dangerous.
"I know but we practiced in pretty much everything but a typhoon, we got this, Merlin." Aidan tells the Hellcat as they cross the artificial point to lower the landing gear. In no time, the water gets lighter and lighter in color as reefs and sand start to appear. Edging lower, looking down as the sand turns to grass, a little lower, the wheels all but touching the ground, with a quick movement of his left hand, activating the air brakes, pulling back a little for the wheels to touch down, the nose wheels slamming down right after, putting the engines into reverse thrust and feeling himself being pulled forward by momentum as the wheel brakes engage, slowing the Hellcat down as fast as possible, the end of the runway quickly approaching as the speed drops to zero.
Once the plane has come to a complete stop, he starts undoing his straps as the screen shows:
Opening the weapons bay, please retrieve your cargo.
As soon as the canopy opens, Aidan all but throws himself out over the side and down to the ground, sliding under the wing to open the crate under the Hellcat, to retrieve some smoke grenades.
Running to the closest of the launch points for the surface-to-air defenses, a six-tube launcher painted to look like the jungle is moving to track sky targets, taking one of the grenades, Aidan pulls the pin and drops it in front of the launcher.
Pumping his arms in and out as he sprints away from the launcher, Aidan calls into the suit radio, "Fire for effect on red smoke!"
Not looking back he keeps running, mentally counting down from forty seconds, when he reaches zero, he looks over his shoulder just as the deafening roar of the explosions hit, fire, dirt, smoke, and bits of ruined weapon system flying high into the air.
When he reaches the second one near the runway, he tosses another smoke canister onto it and starts to run away from it, looking over his shoulder to see blue smoke this time and he calls out, "Fire for effect on blue smoke!"
Slowing to a jog to start heading towards where he'd seen buildings he calls out, "Any other launchers?"
"Missiles coming from the tree line north of your landing spot, near the hangers." Spoke one of the carriers.
"Copy!" Aidan calls back as he changes direction to jog toward the launcher and toss another smoke charge.
"Missiles from the east side of the runway, near the water." Spoke another carrier.
"I got it." Hornet chimes in, "Deploying B-Twenty-fives."
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Bending at his hips to catch his breath, Aidan finds himself standing by the doors to another bunker, running a hand down his face he tries his keycard, and gets a red flash. Checking his satchel, he finds one last smoke grenade, pulling the pin and tossing it at the bunker, Aidan looks at the color and runs as hard and fast as he can, panting into the radio, "Fire.. for effect… on orange... smoke… this one… is a bunker."
His legs giving out, Aidan trips and tumbles onto his back as the shells arc overhead coming down on the bunker, blasting it to bits and he speaks into the radio, "Good… shot… need… rest."
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Climbing down a series of ladders, Aidan finds himself in a laboratory, his pistol drawn he moves from room to room, coming up to a door with a light on. Pressing himself against the wall, he opens the door, jumping in right after, pistol leveled off, pointing it at an old woman sitting in a chair behind a desk, covered in papers, her long hair messy and unkempt, she pushes up her cracked red-rimmed glasses and she asks, "Hello?"
Keeping his pistol squared off at the old woman, Aidan carefully moves into the room and he asks, "Hello?"
She blinks brown eyes at him and asks, "Who are you?"
"You first." Aidan says, keeping his weapon trained on her.
The woman moves some papers away and taps the nameplate on her desk, as she says, "Doctor Anzeel."
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