AUTHOR'S NOTES: Welcome to the longest chapter I think I've ever written for On RWBY Wings-a whopping 9800 words and 14 pages. There was no good place to stop, so you get the works today. Whew!

USS Lawrence

Off the Coast of Florida

20 April 2002

Captain Justin Morris stared at the printed sheet in front of him, his stomach turning to ice. It was a notification from Naval Base Mayport: AIR RAID MAYPORT AIR RAID CANAVERAL THIS IS NOT DRILL RAID COUNT 200 GRIMM UNKNOWN STEALTH TYPE POSSIBLE BEARING 310 APPROX 100 MILES SPEED UNKNOWN. He dismissed the yeoman that had brought the message, then picked up the intercom. "CIC, Bridge."

The CIC director picked it up on the other end, in the Combat Information Center deep in the Lawrence's hull. "CIC."

"Bob, what do you have at bearing 310?"

"Captain, nothing. There's not a thing out there. We've been looking since that came in. Assuming this isn't some kind of bad joke, whatever GRIMM is out there is invisible."

"Okay, Bob. Keep looking." Morris hung up the intercom and tapped the message against his hands. Invisible GRIMM sounded like something out of bad science fiction, but it stood to reason that whoever this Salem was, she would figure out stealth technology just like the United States had. The Lawrence's Aegis phased-array radar system was a good system, but it was not designed for this: the Aegis was designed to fend off a mass aerial GRIMM or cruise missile attack against a carrier battlegroup. On the Lawrence's bow and after deck were two vertical launchers with 96 missiles in them—RIM-156 antiaircraft missiles, which were perfect for this situation…if the Aegis system could see the incoming GRIMM, which they could not. He gazed out of the bridge windows, down on the foredeck. One level down, immediately in front of the bridge, was a Phalanx Close-In-Weapons System, a 20 millimeter gatling cannon; there was another on the aft superstructure, just behind the aft vertical launcher. Forward of the CIWS was the forward missile launcher cells, and then the Lawrence's other gun armament—a single 5-inch gun, the last nod to the days of gun-to-gun naval surface warfare. If the GRIMM were invisible, then these three guns would be all the Lawrence would have to defend itself, assuming the CIWS could even detect the incoming drones.

Morris then went over to the plotting board. It showed the Lawrence ten miles from the entrance to Mayport. He had been going there, the destroyer at the end of a three day familiarization cruise prepatory for sailing with the Eisenhower battlegroup, when it left the base in the next three weeks to replace the Reagan. Both carriers were now sitting in Mayport, tied up to the docks along with the amphibious assault ship Iwo Jima and a number of other destroyers like the Lawrence. If the GRIMM got through the fighters that were frantically scrambling from Mayport, they would devastate the base, kill thousands, and possibly sink both carriers. It would be the worst defeat for the US Navy since Pearl Harbor.

Which meant, Morris thought, that there was really no choice after all.

"Helm, come around hard a'port to course three one zero. Go to flank," he ordered. The helmsman instantly spun the wheel and advanced the throttles forward. At full speed, the Lawrence could do 30 knots—only 35 miles an hour, slow by shore standards but fast for a 8400-ton destroyer. Morris grabbed the intercom. "CIC, Bridge. I want you to switch on every electronic thing we've got. Radar, satellite communications, ECM, everything."

"Captain, are you sure?" Bob replied worriedly. "It's going to be like turning on fifty flashlights in a dark room. The GRIMM are going to see us for sure."

"That's my intention, Bob."

There was silence on the other end for a moment. "Understood, Captain. Been good serving under you."

"Yeah, same here." Morris reached up and switched the intercom to the 1MC, so he could address the entire crew. He took a deep breath, said a prayer, and spoke. "Men and women of the Lawrence. A large GRIMM force has been sighted heading towards Mayport. They're of a new stealth design, so our missiles won't work. We'll have to do this the old fashioned way. The GRIMM are less than a hundred miles away and headed in our direction, with a raid count of over a hundred. We're going to try and decoy them away from home. This will be a fight against overwhelming odds from which survival cannot be expected. We will do what damage we can. Good luck, and God be with us. Man your battle stations." He hung up the intercom and held on as the Lawrence made the hard turn, and as the gong went off for battle stations.

Morris went to the bridge windows. "Sir?" the helmsman said. "My course is 310."

"Rudder amidships. Steady as she goes." He looked back at the helmsman, who looked like he was about sixteen, face still pockmarked with the pimples of a teenager. "Sorry about this."

The helmsman shrugged, though Morris noticed his hands shaking. "Not too worried, sir. Maybe they'll make movies about us."

Morris chuckled. "There is that."

Naval Base Mayport

The jeep screeched to a halt on the transient tarmac, leaving several feet of black skid marks. Yang and Weiss leapt out, still dressed in swimsuits. "You drop Blake off?"

"Yeah!" Yang ran forward and caught the flight suit Ruby threw her. The sight of a yellow bikini-clad voluptuous blonde distracted the ground crew for a moment as they wrestled another AIM-9 Sidewinder under the wing of Crescent Rose III. The drop tanks were rolled out of the way, which broke every rule of fire safety, but there was no time for anything else. "What's up?"

"There's like a hundred GRIMM headed right for us," Ruby told them. "There were 200, but apparently the formation split—another hundred are headed for the Kennedy Space Center."

Weiss struggled into her flight suit; like Yang, she was just putting it on over her swimsuit. "Oh God," she exclaimed. "The Columbia's down there. It's supposed to launch in a few days. Saw it on CNN before I left."

"Probably Salem wants to take it out," Ruby said. "And she wants to reenact Pearl Harbor down here."

Yang sucked in her breath and got the flight suit over her breasts. "That movie sucked."

"It was inaccurate as hell anyway," Ruby replied, which made Yang feel better; if Ruby was criticizing war movies for being inaccurate, she was probably all right. "It gets worse." She handed them dry erase markers and whiteboards. "The GRIMM are stealthy. If some passing ship hadn't sighted the formation north of the Bahamas, we wouldn't even know they were coming. Radar won't detect them."

"Dammit!" Weiss shrilled. "My Meteors are useless."

"My AMRAAMs are too," Yang said. "Shit. We're going to have to do this with 'Winders and guns."

"Yep." She raised her voice as the Super Hornets of VFA-41 began taxiing out. She knew Oscar was among them, and wished she could wave at him, or something. They were being sent south, to intercept the Kennedy flight. It was not a way she wanted to part from her lover. Assuming we still are, she thought sadly. "Anyway, VF-84's Tomcats are going to try and catch the GRIMM out to sea. We're to stay over the base and engage any leakers." She quickly read off radio frequencies and where the safe bailout zones were, which Weiss and Yang scrawled onto the whiteboards and stuffed into the clear thigh pockets of their flight suit. There was no need for weather information—it was a clear blue sky, a pleasant late afternoon. They would have daylight for another four hours, and Ruby doubted this would last that long.

"Sounds good," Yang said. "I was getting bored anyway."

"Callsigns?" Weiss asked.

Ruby smiled wanly. "Ruby Flight rides again?"

Weiss returned the smile. "That sounds lovely." She made a face. "Now I sound like Pyrrha."

"Wish we had her with us," Yang commented.

"Wish we had Blake with us, but oh well." Weiss pulled her helmet from its bag. "See you up there. Good luck."

"You too, Weiss." Ruby touched her friend's shoulder. Weiss nodded. Nothing more needed to be said. She jogged over to the Typhoon.

Yang put on her helmet as well. "You and Oscar even have a chance to…well, you know."

Ruby sighed. "Yeah, at least we got that. You get a chance to talk to Blake?"

"Nope. She was too busy stuffing her face with crab. 'Course, so was I." Yang bent over and kissed Ruby's forehead. "Let's go kick ass, sis. Whatever happened with Oscar, it'll work itself out."

"What makes you think something happened with Oscar?" Ruby asked.

"A big sis always knows. Don't let it distract you, Ruby." Yang made the last part an order. Ruby nodded, and the sisters parted.

Yang dashed to her F-15, where one of the ground crew held the latter for her. "Hey, thanks, uh…"

"Petty Officer Ghee, ma'am."

"Thanks." Yang put a foot on the latter, and then stopped. "Hey, Ghee. Hold up a sec." She took another step up the ladder, thought for a second, then pulled the dry erase marker from a flight suit pocket. Hurriedly, she scrawled SUMMER'S REVENGE beneath her name on the canopy. "Now I'm ready to go." Yang clambered into the cockpit and strapped in, as Ghee came up after her and helped. Once Yang was ready to go, the petty officer slid back down the ladder and removed it. Yang spooled up the engines and gave the signal to pull chocks. She grinned as she put the oxygen mask on. It was time to fight.

Blake was calibrating the inertial navigation system when Terri Suul dropped into the back seat behind her. "Hi, Blake!" Terri shouted with false cheer. "Go ahead and close the canopy—I'll strap myself in!"

"Hey, Terri." She glanced into the mirrors set into the F-14's forward canopy bow. "Hands clear?"

"Yeah!"

"Closing the canopy." Blake lowered the canopy, which thunked against the rim and slid forward slightly. "You sure you can get all that?"

"Yeah. Already told the plane captains to go help Chani…she'll probably strap herself in backwards. That's the dumbest damn woman in the Navy, I tell you. Whoops…" Blake looked up and saw Terri pull the safety pin out of the ejection seat. "Might want to make sure that works."

"Now I feel bad I talked you out of turning in your wings," Blake said, pulling her straps tight and putting on her mask.

"Fuck it. You were right." Terri pulled on her mask. "Speaking of fucking, me and the hubs had just dropped the kids off with their grandmother in Jax when the call came in. I'm gonna kill those fucking GRIMM with my bare hands. It was a long damn cruise."

"So people keep saying." Blake keyed the radio. "Skull Two Two One, checking in." She listened as Commander Jaeger told her she would be the last to take off.

"Ass end Charlie again," Terri commented. She noticed Blake was staring off towards the transient ramp. "Those your friends over there? I wanted to meet them, but I wanted to see my hubby more."

"Understandable. Yeah, that's them. Ruby's in the F-16, Yang's got the F-15, and Weiss in the Typhoon," Blake pointed. "They'll take off after us—they're backstopping us to stop any GRIMM that get through."

"That's one weird formation. How long did you fly with them?"

"About eight months, but that was a very long eight months." Blake couldn't keep the wistfulness out of her voice.

"Yeah. Damn shame you can't fly with them this time." Terri reached behind her, and suddenly the instrument panel went blank. Blake looked down in alarm, tried flipping a few switches, but nothing worked. The F-14 was still running, the engines a pleasant rumble behind them, but none of her multifunction displays were working, nor was the HUD. "What the hell?"

"Skull One Zero Zero, Skull Two Two One. We've got an instrument failure," Terri radioed. "Give us a few minutes to work it out."

"Skull Two Two One, roger," Jaeger replied. "We can't wait on you. Catch up as you can." The other F-14s began taxiing out.

"Roger that."

Blake got ready to open the canopy. "Let's get a plane captain up here, Terri. Though honestly, we could just fly with the analog instruments—these damn GRIMM are too stealthy for radar anyway—"

"Blake, leave the canopy alone." The instrument panel came on as Blake heard Terri grunt. "There we go…got the breaker back in."

Blake twisted around in her seat. "You took out the circuit breaker? What the hell for?"

"Because all I've heard for the last six months is you talking about how awesome Ruby Flight was, so I'm giving you the chance to fly with them again." Blake could swear she could see Terri's grin in her eyes. "Give it a minute or two, and then we'll miraculously figure out what the problem was."

"You're crazy!" Blake exclaimed.

"I fly with you, don't I?" Terri leaned back in the seat and felt the wedding ring in the breast pocket of her flight suit.

"Mayport Tower, Ruby Lead," Ruby checked in. The base shook with the F-14s of VF-84 taking off. She wondered which one was Blake. "We're up and ready."

"Ruby Lead, Mayport. You are cleared to taxi. I have new orders for you," the controller told her.

Ruby nodded, though the controller couldn't see her. "Ready to copy." She returned the ground crew's salute as she rolled past them. For Navy personnel unfamiliar with Air Force equipment, they had done very well.

"Ruby, we have a destroyer thirty miles offshore, the Lawrence. She is requesting fighter cover. You're all we have left at the moment." The controller gave her vectors, and Ruby plugged them into the INS.

"Roger, understood," Ruby replied. "What about the base?"

"The Lawrence is acting as a decoy. We have F-16s from Moody on the way down here, but if you cover the Lawrence, you'll pull the GRIMM towards you."

"Roger. ETA on Moody?"

"Ten minutes."

Ruby realized the controller—or probably Mayport's base commander—was taking a chance. It would leave the base uncovered for a few precious, deadly minutes. There was a wing of F-15s of the Florida Air National Guard at Jacksonville International Airport, but she guessed they were headed south towards Kennedy, with Oscar's squadron. "Understood, Mayport. We will CAP the Lawrence." She turned onto the taxiway.

"Mayport, Skull Two Two One." Ruby recognized Blake's voice. "We've figured out our instrument issue. Request permission to join Ruby Flight, as they're only a three-ship."

There was a pause. "Uh, roger that, Skull. Permission granted. Ruby, you are number one for takeoff, at your discretion. Contact Screwtop Three Zero One on departure."

Ruby acknowledged and turned onto the runway. Behind her was Weiss, Yang, and now Blake's F-14 swung in neatly behind the F-15. She wondered if Blake had faked the instrument failure, just like Marrow had for her in Moravia. Ruby smiled under the mask, and felt her eyes get misty. The last ride of Ruby Rose and her immortals.

Then it was time to go. The F-16's nose was lined up on the single runway, and she pushed the throttle forward until Crescent Rose shook with power. With only four Sidewinders aboard, the fighter would be very light and responsive. "Ruby rolling," she called out, and let off the brakes. The F-16 surged forward, and she shoved the throttle into afterburner. Takeoff speed came quick, and a little pull back on the stick sent the aircraft off the runway into the air, into the cerulean blue sky. She cycled up the landing gear and checked the sky around her, then watched as Weiss followed her into the air. She was over the Atlantic in seconds, the water below a gorgeous blue and green, the beach a stretch of white sand that white waves rolled against. There was no one on them now, as air raid sirens were starting to go off. It had been so long since Florida had suffered a GRIMM attack that everyone probably thought it was a tornado, she mused. It occurred to Ruby that she had been frolicking with Oscar in those waves only an hour before.

Then she had to put him out of her mind, just as she knew he was doing the same with her. Distracted fighter pilots died. Whatever their future was, if there was one, had to wait. "Screwtop Three Zero One, Ruby Lead," she radioed. "Ruby Flight is one Fox Sixteen, one Fox Fifteen, one Fox Fourteen, and one Typhoon."

Screwtop's controller laughed at that. "Where did they find you at, Ruby? Okay, vector three zero zero for Lawrence. Bandits have broken up into three groups. The rear group of seventy-five is being engaged by Skull at seventy miles. You have the lead group of twenty-five. They're heading for Lawrence—one group is at thirty miles at angels fifteen; the second group is at angels twenty at forty miles. Speed is about 400 for the first group; looks like the second one is about 100 slower."

Ruby switched on her radar, but there were no contacts except the Tomcats of VF-84, beginning to break up to fight the second group. She saw the blip off to the left of the radar screen that was probably Screwtop, the E-2C Hawkeye AWACS. "Screwtop, Ruby, how are you getting this? Scope is clean."

"Because we're watching them through binocs at fifteen miles, Ruby." Ruby's eyes widened. The E-2 was trailing the GRIMM alone, which was suicidal. Still, it gave the interceptors vectors, distance and speed, which was vital.

"Screwtop, I'm buying you a round," Ruby radioed back. "Ruby Two, we'll take the second high group. Ruby Three, you're the fastest. Buster for the Lawrence and hold them off. Ruby Four, hang back for a bit and see if they bypass Lawrence and head for Mayport. Engage at discretion." In the adrenaline of the moment, Ruby had completely forgotten Blake's new callsign.

"Ruby Three, on my way!" Yang sang out. Her F-15 was virtually clean: it still carried two AMRAAMs beneath the fuselage—the ground crew hadn't had time to offload them—but four Sidewinders were nestled under the wings. With no drop tanks and only half fuel tanks, the Eagle was light as well. Yang pushed the throttle forward and the F-15 shot past Ruby and Weiss, a shock cone of moisture forming around the fighter as it approached the sound barrier, and then surpassed it.

"Ruby Lead, contact Lawrence on 151.6—oh shit." Ruby immediately looked towards where the E-2 would be, but at sixty miles, even her silver eyes couldn't see them. But there was only one reason why a pilot would use those last two words with that tone of voice. "Ruby, they've seen us."

"Get out of there, Screwtop!" Yang yelled. "Ruby Three's supersonic; I'll be there in thirty seconds!"

"Can't…" Ruby heard the E-2's pilot grunting with exertion, trying to get his aircraft away from the GRIMM. It was no use, she knew: the Hawkeye was a slow turboprop; the GRIMM were fast jets. "Get the GRIMM, Ruby-" There was something that sounded like a curse or a scream, then there was nothing more from Screwtop Three Zero One.

There was also no time to mourn. "Ruby Three, tally-ho. Four GRIMM, ten miles."

"Bridge, CIC. Bandits, range fifteen, bearing zero one zero, speed 400."

Captain Morris grabbed the intercom. "CIC, Bridge—you picked them up?"

"CIC, roger. Too close for missiles."

"Okay, Bob. Hold on." Morris slammed the phone back into its cradle. He had slowed down some, but now was the time for speed. "All head full. Stand by to engage main battery."

"GRIMM, port bow!"

"GRIMM, starboard aft!"

Luckily, the Navy had never gotten rid of the human lookout: two sailors not long out of high school with nothing more than high-powered binoculars had done what radar could not. "Main battery, local control! Set Phalanx to automatic!" Morris figured that if the Lawrence's radars could see the GRIMM, the CIWS could too. He had to rely on his gunners in the 5-inch mount forward to find their target; Morris had to fight his ship.

"Belay that last!" another lookout yelled. "Target aft is friendly!"

Morris turned around to face forward. There was a glint of sun on metal, two of them, and he knew those were the robots bent on killing him and his crew. Then the Lawrence shook as the 5-inch gun fired twice. The radar-guided shells burst a second later, and the GRIMM flew into the flak. It disintegrated and fell in pieces into the water. The second round of firing was just a fraction too slow and burst behind the second GRIMM, but with a whine of servomotors, the forward Phalanx whirled left and fired as its gunlaying radar acquired the target. A sound like tearing paper resounded through the ship as the whirring barrels—the same gun carried by two-thirds of Ruby Flight—sent hundreds of 20 millimeter rounds downrange in a second. The next GRIMM was torn apart as well and fell harmlessly into the water ahead of the Lawrence. Morris made a slight course change to avoid any debris. A cheer went up from the bridge and the forward lookouts: first blood to the Lawrence.

"Aircraft, portside!" Morris looked in that direction. More flashes of sunlight off metal, perhaps a thousand feet above the Atlantic, curving around. But ours or theirs?

"Bridge, CIC!" Morris snatched up the intercom. "We've got air cover! Ruby Flight!"

"Patch them in. I want to hear it." He hung up the phone and switched on the speaker.

"Lawrence, Ruby Three." It was a female voice, which surprised Morris—though he wasn't sure why; a quarter of his ship's complement was female. "I've got two GRIMM coming from your rear and another from the left." Some of the bridge crew laughed at that; the pilot had to be Air Force. "I've got them. Just don't shoot my ass!"

"Secure aft Phalanx," Morris ordered. The CIWS was programmed to attack anything that got too close, but it couldn't differentiate from friend or foe. Morris tried to pick out the attacking GRIMM along with whoever Ruby Three was. "Fire SBROC." The Lawrence's chaff dispensers fired rockets that exploded behind the ship, creating false echoes for the GRIMM's radar, if they had any. That, and Ruby Three, would now decide the fate of the destroyer.

Yang pulled back on the power, afraid to overshoot the GRIMM, but not so slow they would have time to react. She raced over the waves at over five hundred miles an hour, and her Sidewinders began growling in her ear, sensing a heat source in front of them. Then Yang saw them, and fired twice. The two AIM-9s flew off the rails and closed the distance in less than two seconds. The first GRIMM exploded and tumbled end over end into the water; the second was blown apart a second later, the remains falling into the wake of the Lawrence.

Yang pushed the stick to the left, clearing the destroyer, and flew past the ship. She barely noticed, her eyes set on the third GRIMM. The last two had been a pursuit, but this was nearly head-on, and she passed minimum Sidewinder range in a second. A quick touch of a button with a metal finger—Yang no longer even felt pain from her artificial hand—and she pulled the trigger a half-second later, leading the third GRIMM. This one was riddled and disintegrated. "Ruby Three, splash three!" Yang exulted, and climbed away, throwing in a victory roll.

Morris grinned at Yang's radio call. We might just survive this after all. As if to mock his thoughts, one of the lookouts yelled, "GRIMM, port bow!" at the same time CIC made the same call.

"Hard to starboard!" Morris barked. "Come right to three-four-three!" The helmsman once more spun the wheel, as Morris tried to make the Lawrence a smaller target by presenting its forward superstructure. The Arleigh Burke-class that the destroyer belonged to had some stealth, though Morris was under no illusions it would fool the GRIMM entirely, but anything helped. Once more, the 5-inch traversed right and opened fire, and once more the drone exploded well short of the Lawrence.

"Bridge, CIC! Two bandits, port bow, range ten and closing fast!"

"Reverse your turn, hard to port!" Morris ordered. He raised the binoculars and cursed. While they had been watching the first GRIMM, two more were now coming straight at them.

Yang rolled out at ten thousand feet, upside down, looking for the GRIMM. There were more coming in, the GRIMM doing what they did best: swarming a target until they were destroyed or the target did. There were more than she had things to kill them with. Yang dived on two of them. "Blake, get your ass in here! They're concentrating on the Lawrence!"

"Yang, Blake, on my way!"

Yang dropped in behind the two GRIMM, which suddenly split: one remained on course, boring in straight at the Lawrence, while the other went to the right, to circle around to get behind her. She ignored that one—it wouldn't be in position for awhile yet—and concentrated on the one in front of her. The remaining two Sidewinders were growling again, but Yang wasn't sure if they were guiding on the GRIMM, the destroyer, or the sun's reflection of the sea below. Gonna have to gun this guy. She put the pipper in front of the drone, did a quick check of her position against the sea and the destroyer—a little too low and rapidly closing; Yang idly remembered that Navy ships had Phalanx gatling guns and hoped it wasn't tracking her—and fired. The F-15's own gatling gun ripped through the GRIMM and it tumbled forward. Yang was already stomping the right rudder pedal and putting the stick into her right knee, pulling Summer's Revenge into a hard right break, both to clear her tail and avoid crashing into the Lawrence. Putting on an airshow for the Navy—where's that other fucking GRIMM? Yang leveled out and looked frantically for the other one, then saw to her horror that it hadn't circled around for her at all.

It had reversed its turn and was headed straight for the Lawrence.

Morris ducked involuntarily as the entire ship shook in the wake of the F-15's engines, nearly rattling the windows out of their mounts. One of the lookouts was nearly blown off his feet and let loose with some very choice curse words. Morris then heard the metallic sound of something hitting his ship, and saw spray hit the bridge's port side, drenching the Aegis array there. He rushed to that side and saw that the fighter pilot had cut that one a little close: the GRIMM had hit the water, but shrapnel had peppered the Lawrence. We've got Kevlar armor behind the hull, Morris thought, shouldn't be anything too bad—

Then he saw the other GRIMM. It was so fast it was a blur, headed straight for his ship. The F-15 was pulling away, out of position to stop this next attacker. "Get down and brace!" he shouted, and ducked below the coaming on the windows.

The impact seemed to lift the Lawrence completely out of the water. The GRIMM struck the ship portside aft at almost six hundred miles an hour, narrowly missing the rear stack, obliterating the rear Phalanx mount and the SRBOC launchers, then taking out the starboard side torpedo tube array before the remains fell into the water. Fire enveloped the entire rear of the ship.

Every man on the bridge fell, and the windows shattered. Morris struggled to get his breath, and saw his helmsman down, the man cursing as he looked down at the piece of glass sticking out of his arm. The intercom was screaming something, but he couldn't make out what it was. He tried to get to his feet, but his legs seemed to just not work anymore.

The F-14's wings were raked completely back as Blake and Terri charged in. Blake saw three more GRIMM headed for the burning Lawrence. She gritted her teeth behind the mask: those were fellow sailors and Marines on that ship. "Terri, check six!"

Terri twisted around the backseat and looked between the F-14's twin tails. "Six is clear!"

"Hold on!" Blake, like Yang, realized she was going too fast. She slapped back the throttles and raised the nose a little; the Tomcat shuddered but bled speed off. She pushed the nose back down and the Sidewinders growled. Blake fired twice. Two more GRIMM were turned into burning comets; one went end over end in a fireball, the other climbed and fell to pieces. A quick flick of her thumb, and Blake switched to guns. She fired a split-second later—and a fraction of a second too late. The GRIMM rocked with a hit, but it continued on. "Shit, fuck!" she shouted. "Lawrence, Ruby Four! You're going to be hit!" She climbed and rolled, trying to get in position to do something, but it was too late: the third GRIMM in the formation she had attacked went straight into the stern of the destroyer and exploded.

Ruby and Weiss had climbed above the second group of GRIMM, and once more Ruby thanked Summer Rose for her genetics: she spotted the GRIMM at fifteen miles, even before the infrared sensor in front of the Typhoon's canopy did. "Weiss," she radioed, since they were on a separate channel from Yang and Blake, "nose cold. I want to try something." She had already switched off her radar. Weiss gave her two clicks of the radio in response.

The two groups passed each other, Ruby and Weiss well above the GRIMM. The latter made no move to intercept either fighter, continuing along in a four-abreast formation, clearly heading for the Lawrence. She dipped the F-16's wing and inspected these new invisible GRIMM—invisible to radar, but not the naked eye.

They were actually rather aesthetically attractive, Ruby thought with a practiced eye towards such things in aircraft: rather than the brutalist straight-winged Beowolves or Ursai, or even the swept-wing Beringal, these were teardrop shaped, with slightly drooped delta wings and half-oval canards. The twin tails were likewise rounded, and the intakes for the twin engines above the fuselage, to lower the drone's heat signature from the ground. The engines were not louvered like the F-117's, so there was a heat source there. What surprised her was the clear bulge ahead of the intakes—while all aerial GRIMM had such a bulge, where the sensors probably were, this one was more pronounced, and it was clear, like a cockpit. She did not see anyone inside. Still, Ruby thought, these things should give off some radar signature. Even Uncle Qrow's F-117 eventually reflects back enough energy for a radar to pick him up. So why aren't we detecting these guys? Then they were past, as if it was an airshow put on for Ruby's benefit.

"Weiss, Ruby, let's take them out." They were only ten miles away from the Lawrence. "You have the lead."

"Roger." Weiss had the inside track, so it would easier to let her make the first pass. The two fighters made a gentle turn around to come in from behind and the left of the GRIMM. "Rolling in." Weiss accelerated and picked the two GRIMM on the far side of the four-ship. "IRIS-T. GRIMM." She looked directly at her targets; the IR turret, slaved to her helmet cueing system, instantly swiveled in that direction. The DUST system in Armas Gigas instantly transmitted the targeting data to the slim little IRIS-T missiles slung under her wings. She pulled the trigger, twice. Both missiles flew off the rails and tracked into the third GRIMM, blotting it from the sky. A ripple seemed to go through the formation as the GRIMM suddenly realized they were under attack. Weiss cursed: she had wanted the IRIS to engage two targets, but perversely, they had gone after the same one. She swept past and rolled hard to the right to come back around. "Weiss, splash one."

Ruby wasn't far behind. Out of curiosity, she quickly switched on her radar and found she got a return. Even if she had AMRAAMs, they would be too close, so Ruby simply shot down both GRIMM with two Sidewinders. She overshot the formation and the last GRIMM turned to follow her. "Ruby, splash two!"

"Ruby, check six!" Ruby glanced behind her and saw the other GRIMM coming towards her. Does it even have any— Then she saw two ports iris open and two missiles fired at her. Ruby immediately split-S and headed for the sea, dropping flares behind her. The two missiles, confused by the large heat source suddenly gone and two more in front of them, went after the flares.

The GRIMM dived after Ruby, but Weiss was already on its tail. The drone sensed her behind him, and twisted left, away from Ruby, but Weiss simply flattened her dive a little and watched the GRIMM with her eyes. "IRIS-T, GRIMM." She pressed the trigger just once this time. A single missile ignited, went three feet off the rail, then made a ninety-degree turn and struck the GRIMM. It was a glancing blow, but it was enough: the drone staggered, stalled, and dived into the ocean.

"Weiss, Ruby, eleven o'clock low." Weiss looked in that direction and saw the Lawrence burning—and more GRIMM headed for it.

Justin Morris had gotten to his feet and taken the helm himself. A corpsman came to the bridge, saw the wounded sailor, and went to him immediately. No one else seemed badly injured. Morris thought he saw something out of the corner of one eye and turned the wheel to starboard, only for the ship to stubbornly refuse to turn. Instead, he spun it in the opposite direction, and the Lawrence began to turn, but much slower than before.

"Bridge, XO." The intercom popped and crackled, but Morris heard the voice of his executive officer, Commander James Evans.

He reached up. "Bridge, go."

"Skipper, we've taken two bad hits aft. We've lost the aft Phalanx, and the stern's all torn to shit. Don't know casualties yet, but we've got the hoses working."

"Jim, we've lost steering, too. The rudder's jammed. Starboard turns only." Morris cursed. The Lawrence was now stuck going in circles. He steadied the wheel, and the ship seemed to come out of its curve a little. "Get someone down to the engine room and find Chief Holo. We might have a lot of shock damage to the hull."

"Got it, Skipper. Could use some more hands up here, too."

"On the way."

The helmsman got to his feet, his arm bandaged now. "I can take her, sir." Morris stepped back and let the sailor resume his duties. He picked up the phone again. "CIC, Bridge."

"CIC." Bob sounded a bit breathless.

"Everyone okay down there?"

"A few bumps and bruises. One unconscious person; I think she's concussed."

Morris looked at the corpsman. "CIC. Go." He returned to the intercom. "Bob, we still have radar?"

"Lost about half our coverage. Shock damage, Captain," Bob informed him.

"Release half your bunch to fight the fire aft," Morris ordered. It would also get more people from belowdecks, if the Lawrence started going down.

"Aye, aye, sir."

"Any idea where the GRIMM are?" Morris asked. There seemed to be a brief lull.

"Yeah," Bob answered with an almost hysterical laugh. "All around us."

"Jesus," Terri whispered. Blake had taken the F-14 high, to get a look around with the undernose TCS camera. The GRIMM were separating, curving around to take the Lawrence from all sides. The good news was that the destroyer had definitely decoyed half the Mayport group towards her; the bad news was that she and her crew might not survive the experience. "C'mon, Blake, we've got to get down there."

"Not yet." Blake touched the radio button. "Rubies, Blake. We've got GRIMM at seven o'clock, five o'clock, three o'clock, and one o'clock to the Lawrence. I'm holding high to guide you in." She let the radio button go. "Terri, keep watching our ass in case any of them sneak in."

"Oh, I get it." She switched on the radar, and kept her head moving. "No joy still on the radar. I'll keep up the visual scanning."

"Thanks, Terri." Blake shared her backseater's desire to get down there and stop the GRIMM; one had gotten past her, and that enraged her. This was what the Tomcat was designed for, what Blake was trained for, and sailors had died because both woman and machine had failed. Yet there was a time to step back, keep one's cool, and wait. "Rubies…here they come."

"Blake, Weiss. I'm on the two at seven o'clock low." Weiss and Ruby had split up, which normally one never did in a dogfight if one could help it, but there were more GRIMM than there were defenders. She hoped there weren't more than they had ammunition.

Two GRIMM skimmed the waves towards the Lawrence, and Weiss dived behind them, leaving off her radar still; they might not detect her. Then again, it might not matter, she thought, because the GRIMM were less than fifty feet off the water. She pushed the throttle forward to catch up, and was presented with another problem. She was behind and between the GRIMM, but had only one IRIS left—under her right wing. She could use the missile to kill the rightmost drone, but not the one on the left. "Well," she mused, as if confronted with a mildly difficult mathematical problem. "This will take…careful timing…" Weiss took a deep breath, then looked at the rightmost GRIMM. "IRIS-T, GRIMM." She waited a precious half-second longer to make sure the IRIS was tracking the GRIMM and not some other heat source, then fired. The nimble missile crossed the distance and struck the GRIMM from behind: it pitched upwards and spun back into the ocean.

Weiss was already moving, pushing the stick slightly left, but applying right rudder. The Typhoon's nose went to the left while the fighter stayed roughly on a straight course, the aircraft's microprocessors compensating for the odd angle of attack. They wouldn't for long, but Weiss didn't need long. She switched to guns and pressed the trigger. The Mauser 27mm cannon marched shells the length of the teardrop-shaped robot. Fuel cells ignited and exploded. Weiss didn't bother to see if it crashed, because on her present course she would hit the Lawrence herself. She quickly got her nose forward, slammed the throttles forward, and pulled the stick back as far as it would go. Gs pressed her back into her seat as she climbed, rocketing upwards. "Weiss…splash two…" she grunted out.

"Weiss, twelve o'clock low!" Yang shouted. "Break left!" Weiss immediately did so, pulling out of the climb and diving to the left; her G-suit squeezed her so hard with the sudden maneuver that she screamed. One of the GRIMM had actually decided that the Typhoon was a better target than the Lawrence, and come after Weiss instead. She rolled wings level and looked frantically for the drone, even as her RWR screamed that she was locked on. Frantically, Weiss punched the countermeasures button, dropping chaff and flares in her wake. The teardrop shaped machine followed her into her right break and closed in, and Weiss had a bad feeling that these GRIMM had guns too.

Yang roared in. "Weiss, break left now!" The Typhoon did so, and it gave Yang a second as her friend cleared the GRIMM for her. She fired her last remaining Sidewinders, not wanting to give the GRIMM another chance at Weiss or someone else. Both missiles guided just as the drone began another turn, and it exploded. "Splash four—Weiss, you're clear!"

Ruby settled in on the two GRIMM approaching from the four o'clock position of the Lawrence. These GRIMM did know she was there, and executed a defensive break—one going high and the other rolling slightly to the left, forcing Ruby to choose. She let the climbing one go, trusting someone else to get that one, and stayed on the GRIMM that was still headed for the destroyer. It was headed for the Lawrence at top speed, and Ruby accelerated. It would have to be a guns kill, and then she would have to do what Weiss did, otherwise she'd ram the ship too. The Ruby Rose of Beacon would have overconfidently been sure that she could avoid such a fate; the Ruby Rose of today simply didn't care. Either she would pull it off or she would die; so be it.

Ruby closed in, her eyes flicking from the ocean ten feet below her to the GRIMM two hundred feet in front of her, and the Lawrence, a mile away and closing at 600 miles an hour. Ruby fired her gatling cannon into the GRIMM; it shuddered and sparkled, and then it suddenly climbed, either in a computerized last attempt to survive or from damage. Ruby did the same, before GRIMM, F-16 and destroyer all ended up in a massive collision.

The Lawrence was below her when she felt Crescent Rose jerk hard to the right, nearly taking the stick out of her hand. Instantly, Ruby compensated with left rudder and somehow kept the F-16 from going into a flat spin that would end up with her skipping across the Atlantic like a flat stone. She felt an explosion behind her, and once she had the F-16 under control, looked behind. Pieces of the GRIMM were falling into the ocean, followed by most of the Lawrence's latticelike mast and navigation radars. She blew out a breath she didn't know she had been holding, then noticed the right wingtip Sidewinder rail was gone, leaving a ragged tear where it used to be.

Then she saw something else: the GRIMM that had broken away from her had not tried to engage someone else: it was diving on the Lawrence.

Morris didn't see the GRIMM; it was approaching from above. He did feel the ship get hit again, and the navigation displays on the bridge winked out; there was a horribly loud sound of rending steel as half the mast tore itself off and fell into the water, even as burning fuel from the GRIMM set new fires on the uptakes of the forward stack. The tortured metal sound had barely faded when the forward Phalanx suddenly rotated almost straight up and fired.

The GRIMM wasn't coming at a 90 degree angle; Terri had managed to lock on with the Tomcat's radar and it sensed it was about to be hit, so the drone's angle was more shallow, enough that the CIWS was able to engage it. The shells worked as advertised, and the GRIMM exploded—but the burning remains were carried down to hit the Lawrence anyway. Had the Phalanx not fired, the drone would have penetrated through several decks and hit the forward missile magazine, which would have blown the Lawrence apart and killed every person aboard; instead, the GRIMM's remains smashed the Phalanx, destroying it, and sent fragments and burning fuel scything through the bridge.

Morris was saved only by the heavy wheel housing in front of him, and the consoles forward. The helmsman was knocked off his feet as well. The rest of the bridge crew were not so lucky. Morris was hit by a spray of blood as one of the yeomen was decapitated, another was thrown upward into the overhead, and the air was rent by screams as both bow lookouts were set afire. One died almost immediately, his lungs scorched by aviation fuel; the other ran off the bridge and dived into the ocean to die there.

Morris was deafened by the the explosion. He felt the ship heeling over from both the damage and having no one on the wheel. He got up in a daze and grabbed the wheel, wrestling it back to get the Lawrence back on an even keel. Blood dripped into his eyes, turning everything into a red haze.

"Sir?" He turned; it was the sailor who had been manning the navigation console. "Sir," she repeated in a clear voice, and held up her right hand. Every finger but her thumb was gone, and blood spurted in four streams from the stumps. "Sir, request permission to be relieved and go down to sick bay."

"You're relieved," Morris told her, almost as much in shock as she was. The helmsman caught her before she passed out, and yelled for a corpsman.

"Bridge! Bridge!" Morris shook his head clear of the cobwebs and grabbed the intercom phone; it was amazingly still intact. "Anyone left up there?"

"Yeah, Bob, I'm still here. Need a corpsman up here now."

"Did the bridge take a hit?"

"Four dead, one wounded." He felt pain in his scalp, but ignored it. "We're still underway." He wiped the blood away from his eyes. "Forward Phalanx mount is gone. Get the XO and tell him to get a firefighting party forward. I think we lost the mast, too."

"Pretty much lost everything down here, radar wise. With your permission, I'll evacuate CIC," Bob told him. "Do we abandon ship?"

Morris considered it, and realized the thought angered him. "Not yet. We've still got the 5-inch forward. As long as we've got a single gun left, we stay. Get forward and take command of the firefighting party, Bob." He slammed the phone down, not angry at his subordinate, but at the robots that were killing and maiming his people. "As long as we've got a single gun left," he repeated quietly. "And someone left to fire it."

"Those two at twelve to the Lawrence are making a run," Terri warned. "Third one joining in."

"Like hell. Hold onto your horns." Blake pushed the stick forward and dived; the F-14's wings raked back again like a hawk diving on prey. "No more, you sons of bitches," Blake hissed. "No more." Terri held onto both sides of the canopy as the Atlantic filled her field of vision. The Tomcat was diving so steeply that the GRIMM were not likely to detect them in time, but if Blake didn't pull out in time, Terri wouldn't have to worry any longer about much of anything.

Blake counted silently, and then grabbed the stick with both hands, pulling it back into her lap. The F-14 skidded and nearly stalled—an older F-14A would have fallen out of the sky—but she had timed it exactly. The Tomcat was now behind all three GRIMM. Blake fired her last Sidewinders at the one slightly behind, didn't watch to see if they hit, then switched to guns and raked the second. The first GRIMM disintegrated under the impact of both Sidewinders; the second flew apart and tumbled into the ocean. Blake, her teeth bared under the mask, lined up on the third and pressed the trigger. One shell left the barrels and the gun jammed. "Goddammit!" Blake shouted, as the GRIMM accelerated away. She curved back to the left and tried again, but nothing happened at all. "Terri!" she shouted. "Get ready to punch out!"

"Why?" Terri asked with remarkable calm.

"Because I'm going to ram that fucker!"

Morris found a piece of torn uniform and slapped it over his forehead; it was well and truly hurting now, and he knew he had been hit by something. It kept the blood out of his eyes, in any case. With his vision now mostly clear, he looked directly forward. With almost superhuman clarity, the clarity one gets when they are about to die, he saw the GRIMM hurtling straight at him, with a F-14 Tomcat right behind it. The drone would hit the bridge and end his life, and the Lawrence's. "Damn you!" he screamed. "Stay away from my ship! Stay away from my ship!"

The 5-inch gun suddenly whirred to life. The barrel had been pointing uselessly to port, and Morris had assumed the crew was either dead or had evacuated their position beneath the unmanned turret. He had not known that shock damage had knocked out the traverse controls, but one of the gunner's mates had done some very hurried repairs. Now the turret spun forward and fired a single shell. It was a snap shot, unguided by nothing but prayers—but they were answered. Impossibly, the shell exploded just short of the GRIMM, engulfing it in flames. The drone exploded a half-second later.

"Oh shit!" Blake and Terri screamed simutaneously, but there was nothing for Terri to do but duck and Blake to haul back on the stick. Fragments pattered on the nose, shattered the windscreen in front of Blake, but somehow none of the shrapnel went down the intakes; Blake's last-second climb had saved them from damage. They cleared the Lawrence, while the destroyed GRIMM fell harmlessly in front of it.

Morris had turned the destroyer to port just in case, and the Lawrence rode over the disturbance in the water caused by the crashed GRIMM. His heart leapt into his throat as he saw yet another drone approaching from the starboard side, but this one never got close enough: the Typhoon rocketed past the destroyer and shot it down with cannon fire.

Evans came onto the bridge, shirtless. "Hey, skipper—oh, fuck, sir."

"Most of it's not my blood, Jim."

Evans looked around the charnel house that had been the Lawrence's bridge. "I'll get someone up here to relieve you at the helm, sir. Bob's taken command of the firefighting party aft—we're knocking down the fire pretty good there. Chief Holo reports that the engine room has got about two feet of water in it, but they're plugging the leaks. Both shafts are still intact, so we're still underway. The rudder's jammed about 26 degrees to port."

"Take command of the firefighting party forward, Jim. I can hold the fort up here."

"You sure, Skipper? You're—oh fuck." Evans repeated. He pointed. "Sir."

Morris whirled around. There was one last GRIMM, headed for the Lawrence, from her port aft quarter—where there were no guns left. He shoved Evans out of the way and grabbed the wheel, trying to wrestle it to starboard, but the wheel remained where it was. All he could do, again, was to watch helplessly as the drone headed for the Lawrence.

Ruby spotted the GRIMM. "Tally-ho GRIMM, my five o'clock low!" She turned to get behind it, but she was out of position, and the F-16 responded sluggishly. She wondered if Crescent Rose had lost more than a wingtip rail. "I'm out of position!"

Weiss climbed and rolled in that direction. "Weiss here; I'm Winchester." She was out of missiles except for the Meteors; she had used up the last of the cannon ammunition in the final GRIMM.

"Blake, Winchester!" Blake was trying to see around the shattered windscreen. There was a piece of GRIMM sticking through it.

"Yang here. I'm on it." Yang had been orbiting around, trying to find something to shoot down after shooting the GRIMM off Weiss' tail, but she was down to her gun, and someone had always gotten there first. She quickly checked the sky around them: this was the last one. She hoped.

Yang rolled out behind the GRIMM, which actually started jinking around, ruining her gun burst. She mumbled something foul about Salem's parentage and closed in closer, pulled the trigger—and nothing happened. Her eyes darted to the round counter in the HUD, which defiantly read 0000. "Shit." Then she shrugged. "Oh hell, why not. Always wanted to try this."

Yang closed in as the GRIMM suddenly stopped jinking, mainly because it was on its terminal approach to its target, which was only six miles ahead. Yang swallowed what little saliva she had, pushed up the throttle a little more and slid up next to the GRIMM. The drone stayed on course, either unable to sense her this close, or its robotic brain figured there was nothing Yang could do where she was. She checked her altimeter, took a deep breath, and cut just a little altitude—enough to bring her wingtip underneath the GRIMM's downward turned one. Then, before the drone could react, she jerked the stick to the right. There was an audible thump as the wingtips hit each other, then Yang was rolling away, trying to keep Summer's Revenge from rolling right into the water. The GRIMM, however, suddenly had its internal gyros tumbled, and before its computer could right the aircraft, it had hit the water and exploded.

Yang had gotten control back and swept past the burning Lawrence. "Yang, splash, uh, whatever number we're on…and don't ask how I did that last one."

Ruby had watched Yang's manuever, her eyes wide. "And you call me reckless?" she said aloud. She did a lazy circle and scanned the skies. They were finally empty. "Lawrence, Ruby Lead. If you can hear me, you're clear. No more GRIMM."

Morris heard the call and slumped over the wheel, letting out a long breath. "God, how many was that?"

"Counting the ones in the second group," Evans said, "which I guess Ruby Flight shot down too, or maybe the Jolly Rogers…24 or 25. I know we took at least four hits, maybe five. I counted about 20…I think. I don't even know, Skipper."

"Me neither." Morris straightened up. "Get the fires out, Jim, then we'll try to relay a message to Mayport in case we need a tug."

"You got it." Evans hesitated. "Why didn't we abandon, Justin?" he asked quietly. "A lot of other people would have. Hell, I would have. I came up here to see if you were still alive, and if you weren't, I was going to order abandon ship."

Morris smiled tiredly. He felt like he could sleep a week. He pointed at the words that someone had painted above the bridge windows, when the Lawrence had been commissioned. "You know who this ship was named for, Jim."

Evans looked at the words, and nodded. They read Don't Give Up the Ship.

AUTHOR'S EXHAUSTED NOTES: I hope you had as much fun reading that as I did writing it.

For those of you who aren't history majors, the last stand of the Lawrence is based directly on the ordeal of the USS Laffey on April 15, 1945 (ironically just a few days ago; that was coincidence). Ruby Flight actually does more in this story than any fighters did in real life. Though four FM-2 Wildcats and a handful of F4U Corsairs were able to shoot down about a third of the kamikazes and bombers that came after the Laffey-at one point, 50 were detected headed for the destroyer north of Okinawa-the rest were shot down or driven off by the Laffey herself. The ship was hit by four bombs and six kamikazes...and got home. Today you can see her as a museum ship in Charleston, South Carolina. Look it up on the internet if you want to read the real story. Captain Morris quotes Captain Frederick Becton of the Laffey in the story. (Fans of Spice and Wolf will get the pun of having a Chief Holo on the Lawrence.) He also quotes Commander Ernest Evans of the USS Johnston, who charged the entire Japanese battle line at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, trying to pull two battleships and several cruisers away from a small task group of escort carriers. The Johnston succeeded, but was sunk, and Evans paid with his life. (He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor.)

Speaking of the Lawrence, it's named for James Lawrence, who was killed in a gun battle with a British frigate during the War of 1812. His last words were "Fight her until she sinks, but don't give up the ship." Oliver Hazard Perry would later put that on a flag in the Battle of Lake Erie. While there was a USS Lawrence back during the 1960s, there is no Arleigh Burke-class destroyer named that.

Finally, Yang's little manuever is possible-RAF pilots did it in World War II with Spitfires and Meteors against German V-1 cruise missiles.

Well, the band is back together again (I couldn't resist quoting Doc Holliday with "Ruby Rose and her immortals"), but what's next? We'll see next week!