Obligatory Disclaimer - I own nothing and all characters mentioned are fictitious and not meant to represent any one person in the modern world, nor their viewpoints. This story does not reflect the morals and opinions of the Department of Defense, and all branches therein.
Chapter 6 – Consoling, Shopping, Bombing
September 25th, 2004 – 0240 hrs – Allenfort AB, Usea
Johann was asleep inside his room. It was a few days since the battle over the island, and he was enjoying what little sleep he could finally get. Allenfort had been put on high alert since the attack on the 19th, and Reale was made to be up in the sky pretty much from 0600 to 2100, after 4 days of this he was beyond exhausted. He was finally supposed to get a full night's sleep, the alert had been brought down and he was making the best of the small bed. His dreams were thankfully peaceful, despite the tumult one gets after killing another. A sound woke him up and he opened his eyes, he looked around his room, trying to determine what had caused the noise. He had begun to consider his room more quaint than cramped, his ceiling fan keeping the room nice and cool, a small restroom and shower where he kept some essentials he was given, toothpaste and a razor and such. Above his pillow was a small map of Usea, which Johann would study most nights, trying to understand the new world he was in. He was fascinated with the different names on the continent, from Farbanti to Comberth, his favorite was the curious state of San Salvacion.
In his closet, along the wall of his shower, was his old flight suit and helmet, along with a new ISAF uniform, and flight suit. There was a desk next to the bed where Reale could write reports, letters, or whatever else he wanted to write. As he looked around, he heard the noise again, it was coming from next door, Kai's room. It sounded like he was having a troublesome sleep, tossing and turning, Johann could hear murmuring. He got dressed to go and see if Kai was all right, making a note to request a stipend to purchase civilian, or at the very least, workout clothes, so he could wear something else aside from the uniform when off duty.
As he finished tying his shoes, he heard a scream from next door, "AAAAAHHH!" Johann quickly moved outside his room and knocked on Kai's door, before entering. What he saw inside made his heart pain, Kai's room was completely trashed, he could see literally dozens of bottles of alcohol spewed across the floor. He saw clothes thrown everywhere, and he could swear that that desk had 4 legs, not 2. As for Kai, he was less than decent. He was looking at Johann, his eyes bloodshot, tears clearly seen streaming from them.
"Are you alright Kai?" He asked quietly, the response was immediate, more tears streaming from Kai. Johann wrapped an arm around him attempting to console him. They sat like that for a few minutes, the sobs slowly ebbing away, when Kai could finally speak, his words were short, and his breathing kept catching. "Thanks, sorry for waking you." He took a moment to breathe, "I had a nightmare, I'm ok now."
Johann wasn't stupid enough to believe that, "It's alright, I have found that talking helps, so what's got you so worked up?" Kai shuddered before speaking. "Every time I try to sleep now all I can see is that fight over the island. All I see is my bullets slamming into that last opponent, into his cockpit." He continued, "All I see is the blood, oh God the blood." His tears threatened to fall again, this time against his new-found friend's shoulder, who continued to console him in whatever way he could.
After a time, Johann was able to calm his friend down enough to speak again, "You're okay Kai, if it's any consolation, he didn't feel a thing it was instant." Kai asked him then, "How do you deal with killing another man?" Johann wasn't surprised by the question, he'd gotten it before. "I've found that time heals most wounds, but it will never go away. What you can do is continue to push through it, don't fall into despair, or addiction, and rely on your friends to keep you." He kicked a bottle, "Certainly, this is not the way to go about it. You need to rest Kai; we'll get this shit cleaned up later." Kai only responded with an 'Ok' before Johann got up and left the room. He returned to his room and went back to bed, thoughts of his friend preventing him from a deep sleep.
September 27th, 2004 – 1100 hrs – Newfield Island, Usea
It was Johann's first-time off base since he showed up in this world, and he was making full use of this liberty. After that early morning with Kai, he had spent most of the following day clearing out Kai's room, cleaning it, and making sure Kai had his friends to rely on, himself included. He also spoke with Major Rand, who was for all intents and purposes, his liaison, and asked for a stipend and liberty to purchase some clothes. He was granted it, however, Corporal Getty was made to go with him. They were out in the city now, Getty walking alongside Johann, both men armed with their respective sidearms. They weren't speaking of anything important, just the usual rumor and conjecture from scuttlebutt when they reached the iconic point of Newfield City. It was a massive crater named Anderson Crater, caused by the Ulysses event. It was almost the size of Newfield City and had apparently taken out a large part of the city when the meteorite impacted. The two stood looking at it now, its size much more impressive on the ground than when Johann saw it in the air. He looked over at Getty, getting a good look finally at the other of his escorts, he was shorter than Ramirez, with slightly brown skin and hair, brown eyes, and a smooth face, without blemish. "What's your first name Corporal?" He asked the man, "Robert sir, why do you ask?" Johann chuckled, "No reason, just curious that's all, so, where's all the stores?"
The two made their way to the market district, which Johann compared to what he had seen in Chinatown when he had visited New York. Peddlers were everywhere, most shops were open stalls, the smell of food permeated the air, and it was generally busy, despite it being a Monday afternoon. The two made their way to one of the clothing stores, a small child following them, which Johann kept an eye on. The woman running the stall/store was kind enough to help him pick some clothes, he was never really good at it. He soon had his hands full with some workout clothes, a nice pair of clothes, and some casual wear. After paying and bagging the clothing, Reale deciding not to change out of his uniform, they made their way around the district, not really purchasing anything of note. After a disappointing walk, he checked what he had left from his stipend and found about half of it still there in his wallet, he asked Getty if there was anything he wanted to do or purchase, but neither of them could think of anything.
They headed back out of the city before passing by a bar. They were called over by a few people, whom Getty recognized as some fellow marines on liberty. Johann wasn't due back for another few hours, so he and Getty joined them in their revelry. For the next hour Getty and his fellow marines got quite drunk, Johann was of the mind to remain sober and did not partake. After Getty's 7th shot of...something, Johann was unsure what, some female soldiers entered the bar. They were the same size as the group Johann was in, but he could tell immediately that they were not looking to join the merry marines. Getty got up, swaying, and called over, quite loudly, the girls to join them. Johann grabbed Getty and tried to get him to sit down, but was awarded with an elbow to his chest for his efforts, "Robert," he warned, "sit back down man, they quite clearly don't want to deal with you."
He was unsuccessful, the group walked, or marched over in Johann's eyes, and berated his group, who all drunkenly attempted to protest. The leader of the female group turned and stared at him, "Well?" She asked, "What about you huh? Gonna be like these fools and fawn over us, or are you just gonna sit there and ignore us?" Reale chuckled and responded to the prodding with a dismissive wave before saying, "Unlike these people here, I know better than to even attempt to fraternize with my fellows, especially if they act like stuck up bitches." He flashed a smile and stood up, his rank standing out, and made to leave with Getty, who was barely comprehending his surroundings, let alone the insults being traded.
The women were astonished by the insult, but most of them saw the mark depicting Reale as an officer and backed off. Their leader though, whose rank denoted her as a Staff Sergeant, evidently did not see the rank mark and prevented Reale from leaving yelling out, "How dare you! I am a sergeant of the army, who are you to insult me in such fashion!?" Johann was not amused, it took a while to get him angry, but something about this woman in front of him made his blood boil, "I am a pilot who just fought to save this city from Erusean bombs, how about to make like David Blaine and fuck off out of my way before I make you move." Astonished by his remark, the leader could only move out of the way of the rude man in front of her, and watched the two leave the bar. As for Johann, he regretted his words immediately, but he made certain not to show it on his face, and quickly left the bar with Getty, walking back to where the bus from Allenfort to the city stops.
October 5th, 2004 – 1200 hrs – Allenfort AB, Usea
Thankfully for Johann, the sergeant he berated never made an incident report, that, or Rand squashed it. He was heading into the briefing room, an alert was sounded across the base. He had on his flight suit and had his helmet with him as he walked inside. It was only the second time he had been in there, and he noticed how empty it was. Indeed, there were only a few other people in there, the base commander, Col Brey, Major Rand, Thomas, Kai, Toaster, and all of Rapier Squadron. He sat down next to Kai, and Sergeant Ramirez took his leave from escorting him. Rand spoke up once Johann sat down and began his briefing.
The projector spun up and the map of Usea was shown, Rigley AB was highlighted with a circle around it, presumably showing the range of its forces located there. "The enemy held Rigley Air Base is located in close proximity to our front lines, making it the proverbial knife at our throat." The map showed a large contingent of bombers heading to the air base. "A large Erusean bomber contingent was deployed to Rigley; their intentions are clear: a full-scale strike on our forces at North Point is imminent." The map switched to the combat zone, 'Operation Harvest' being pronounced on the left side of the map, a substation and the air base itself was highlighted. 'Oh that looks like a tough fight, that's a lot of AA and SAMs' Johann thought to himself. Rand continued the briefing, "Your mission is to catch these bombers on the ground and destroy them. Rapier Squadron is flying Top Cover for this mission so don't hesitate to use them. We intend to turn the parking ramp at Rigley into a junkyard of Erusean bombers. Dismissed!"
The pilots and Thomas all left the room to head to their respective planes, Sky Eye took off first, followed by a full launch of Rapier Squadron, which began to circle the air base. On the ground Kai was delaying his launch, his face full of mixed emotions. Toaster was already in the air, his Mig having been painstakingly repaired from spare parts, Johann went over to check on his friend questioning Kai's condition as he neared him. Kai wasn't forthcoming, rather, he steeled his face and simply said he was fine, before hopping into his plane and taxiing to the runway. Johann was concerned, but he had to get in the air or miss the mission.
He taxied to the runway and took off slowly, the bombs weighing his plane down significantly. The flight of 15 turned towards the mainland and sped off. Rapier Squadron was a squadron of 12 Tomcats loaded in the air-to-air loadout of 4 Sidewinders and 4 Sparrows. On the flight over, Johann got into a conversation with them. "Rapier, eh? Do y'all fight like Rapiers or is that just the name?" One of the pilots responded quickly, "We spear our enemies before they can spear us, that count?" Johann heard a chuckle from high up in the air, and he responded "No, not really, where's the parrying, the coupe?" Sky Eye broke over the conversation, "Rapier 7, Mobius 1, maintain radio silence. We've just breached Rigley's radar network, commence attack. Rapier Squadron, provide escort and ensure air superiority."
They were coming in from the South, Rapier Squadron flying at Angels 10, Reale, Kai, who had kept quiet during the flight, and Toaster at Angels 6 Kai's Tomcat was in the air-to-ground loadout with 4 Sidewinders, 6 bombs, and 2 AGM-65 Maverick missiles. Toaster's Mig also had 4 Sidewinders, 2 bombs, and 2 Mavericks. The three pilots split off from one another, maintaining altitude but remaining a mile apart. Rapier Squadron sped ahead, the Tomcats gaining excellent speed quickly. Johann saw the substation denoting the 5-mile marker to Rigley and dove for it, firing a quick quarter second burst of HEAP into it. The High Explosive Armor Piercing cannon shells quickly detonated in the substation, and it exploded. Before he could rise back up to his comrades, he received a panicked message from one of the Rapiers, "Mobius 1 deflect! Bandits closing in rapidly!"
Indeed, at that moment, two Fullbacks, Su-34s, were banking and diving hard for the now exposed Reale. They came in fast and fired off a missile apiece. Johann rolled over and dove for the ground, accelerating quickly and escaping the incoming missiles. He righted his plane and checked his surroundings, Rigley was only a few miles away and were already opening up on him with AA fire and locking SAMs, the two interceptors were closing fast behind him, Kai and Toaster were speeding towards Rigley, and Rapier Squadron was well above and behind him, absolutely useless.
'Fuck it, I'll not go down without a fight' He banked sharply and turned to engage the two fighters. He sprayed a quick second burst into the first plane and rolled to avoid the second's missile. The dogfight then turned to altitude, and the enemy Fullback zoom climbed to dive for Reale, the Phantom's payload weighing down so much that reciprocating the climb was near impossible. At that moment one of the Rapier's fired his missile and it blew right into the enemy cockpit, ending the dogfight.
Reale performed an Immelmann, thereby reversing his heading and sped towards Rigley. Kai and Toaster were already bombing the Eastern portion of the base and had taken out a great deal of enemy AA and SAM sites. Reale turned to the East before banking around and began his bombing run on the now tantalizing row of bombers. He dropped 7 of his bombs, 6 hitting the bombers, 1 in the control tower for good measure, before pulling up away from the Western AA. He made ready to perform another strafe, this time on the runway to prevent more interceptors from taking off when he heard the noise. It was the noise of death for many thousands who never had a chance in heavy armor, and in the sky, it was unlikely you would survive it. 'BRRRRRRRTTTTTT' It sounded out again, and Johann ducked in his cockpit.
The A-10, for indeed, only one plane is capable of such terrible destruction with cannon, was flying in from the North, and was attacking the exposed Phantom. Reale rolled to the left and climbed as quickly as he dared, locked into prey's panic. The A-10 simply followed and the two soon reached almost 13,000 feet in the air. Johann was desperate to avoid that dreadful cannon and had forgotten his training, and so was just flying erratically. Meanwhile, Toaster had just fired off his last Maverick. He saw Johann high above, flying erratically, and began to climb to help out his ensnared ally. He locked onto the A-10 and launched a Sidewinder, which did hit the plane. Unfortunately, the A-10 stayed alive, though now significantly slower to maneuver. Tobias turned back to the fight below, dropping a bomb on a fighter attempting to speed down the runway.
Rapier Squadron at this time was likewise engaged in combat with enemy fighters. The twelve-ship formation had rushed off to the North of Rigley, engaging two 5-ship formations coming in from most likely St. Ark. Rapier 7, a man named Cameron Kell, took his flight consisting of Rapier 8-12 to engage one of the formations, his squadron leader, Rapier 1, taking the remaining pilots to engage the other formation. He commanded his flight to climb high above the enemy formation, who were still flying directly Southwest towards Rigley. He got a look at the enemy planes, 5 Mig-29 Fulcrums. His flight reached sufficient altitude, he ordered it to roll and dive, each pilot targeting a separate enemy thanks to Sky Eye's Battlenet. 6 missiles shot out, two heading for the lead plane, the rest targeting a separate plane. The Fulcrums jinked as soon as the missiles were fired, but they found nowhere to go. The enemy flight leader was hit with both missiles, one exploding his engines, the other slicing him to ribbons with explosive shrapnel.
The other missiles found their mark, and 4 subsequent booms echoed out as the planes exploded, only one managing to eject before his plane was consumed in explosive flame. Sky Eye called out over the radio, "Rapier Beta flight flow to Rigley, our fighter-bombers need your support." Cameron ordered his flight to Rigley, firing a missile towards an A-10 that was targeting an allied Phantom. His flight began to circle Rigley lazily, their loadout insufficient at targeting enemy ground forces.
The missile found its mark, and the A-10 suffered another hit, this time taking off almost all of the right-wing, Johann found his chance, instinctually pulling a High-G turn to the right, getting behind the A-10 and pouring almost a full 3-second burst of his gun into the engines of this terrifying foe, resulting in an immense explosion that consumed the plane. Johann collected himself, quickly reflecting on his failure and cowardice when faced with such a foe. He turned back towards Rigley, dropping his last bombs with a monotone "Mobius 1, Pickle". Rigley was crippled, if not outright destroyed. Rapier Alpha flight was still engaged in combat, so he and the other planes moved to end this fight quickly.
It was evident that they were facing deadly opposition. Rapier Alpha flight had lost two of its 6 members, including the flight leader, Rapier 1. Cameron quickly took over command and ordered the remaining pilots to egress quickly away from the combat, drawing the planes into easy targets. Reale fired a missile at one of the enemy planes, detonating it, before he pulled away from the flight, now down to a quarter gun and a single missile left, Kai and Tobias following. Rapier Squadron dispatched the last hostiles and Sky Eye called over the air, "Well done, Rigley Air Base destroyed." Cameron responded, "Sky Eye, this is fighter squadron, we're heading home."
On the flight over Johann tried to talk to Kai about their victory but he kept silent. It wasn't until they were flying near the coast that he spoke up. "It was here," he said, "Here was where I earned my name." Johann could tell this was something difficult to talk about and kept his mouth shut. "It was after my escape from Rigley, I had no idea where I could even go, the last thing we had heard was that Comberth had fallen and that GHQ was routed."
Toaster interrupted the story, "I saw Comberth fall, it was...horrible. The ocean was on fire from ISAF ships being destroyed, and I got caught up in the rout with some Airman, we escaped to a nearby town and grabbed transportation from retreating allies." Kai grunted in affirmation, "All we heard was that it fell. Anyway, I was just trying to flee the continent when my radio picked up a transmission from allied forces on the ground."
He was up in the air, concern still prevalent in his mind as he kept checking his fuel gauge. Just past 1/3 full, he had a few hundred miles left in his tank. His radio crackled and a panicked voice screamed out of the comms. "Allied Fighter, do you read?! We need immediate support, respond!" The man responded to the panicked voice, descending down to get a closer look at what was happening. "This is 2ndLT White, I'm here what do you need?" He could see a single allied tank on his IFF, surrounded by multiple Erusean targets.
"We need CAS on my Marker immediately!" Kai checked his plane, he had only really looked at the fuel gauge and when he fled Rigley, he chose the one plane that hadn't exploded. Dismay filled his heart, he had no weapons with which to help his allies. He keyed his mic, the sadness evident in his voice, "I'm sorry, I cannot help you. I have no weapons with which to fight save this plane itself." The voice of panic turned to anger. "Coward! Fire on my Marker immediately." Gurgles filled the mic, evidently, the tank had taken a critical hit. "Marker...Marker...marker...marker...mark...er." It was horrible to listen to. He continued his flight out of mainland Usea, soon coming across an allied ship, who helped him fly to Allenfort.
"I took the name Marker to remember my failure to save an ally, to ensure that I would never again fail to protect my allies." Cameron broke in when Kai finished. "You didn't fail Marker, you had no way of knowing, nor any way to help. Don't let this destroy you." Johann affirmed this and Sky Eye added, "It's a better story than what you told me. Rather than using this as a way to repent for a nonexistent failure, use it as a shield to remind you of your promise." With that the flight stayed quiet save for some banter.
After the flight landed, and a short memorial service was held for the two fallen pilots, a debriefing occurred. Major Rand, as ever, began to debrief the pilots. "Good Job. The attack was a success. Reale, congratulations on making Ace." A resounding cheer was sounded out, and Johann received many a pat on his shoulders. Rand continued, "A significant number of enemy bombers were eliminated, and a full-scale air strike on North Point was averted." Colonel Brey entered the room then, the room coming to attention. "I have good news and bad news," he started, "The good news is that the fighter formations you took out were one of Erusea's top frontline squadrons. The bad news is that they had just gotten back from hard-striking St. Ark. The further bad news, or good, depending how you take it, is that we are pushing up our evacuation, you all have 5 days to prepare for Operation White Out, our campaign to allow a safe evac from the St. Ark area. Dismissed."
Author's Note – Now that we are all caught up, know that it will take some time to write up the next chapter as I have a boatload of refreshing and research to do. I don't have a specific timeframe, sorry.
Jupiter Magnus