|
Some two hundred miles outside the outer perimeter of Odessa, the Autonomous Federal Expeditionary Force rumbled on. The land had gotten progressively more steep and mountainous, and the members of AFEF were starting to realize how good of a defensive position the area was. Scant trees were destroyed by the massive hoverjets of the Big Tray, small hamlets and towns were passed over. The might of AFEFs ground force was readily apparent, with ground type Gundams and GM Snipers sitting atop the Halcyon and Silver Platter, as if they were having tea. Readily apparent it was to the people in one of the small farmsteads that was being passed by the fleet. One farmer, an Earthnoid who had realized earlier in the year the economic reality of war, picked up his binoculars, and started counting mobile suits. After a few minutes he ran for his motorcycle and drove off, moving towards the fortress on the cusp of the Black Sea as fast as he could. "Really... Two of them. And support units?" Ionesco asked, taking out his own pair of binoculars and looking at the growing dust cloud on the horizon. While they waited for the final group of reinforcements to arrive, the 86th Independant Fleet was to provide the final line of defense against the Federation, before they reached the fortress walls. The Gambit and Lillith circled above Ionescos three land battleships, which were trying to fit a fresh contingent of Zakus into their holds. While the pilots were inexperienced, Eugene now had close to thirty mobile suits of all varieties under his command. Unfortunately, several of their best units, including his own Zaku, Boraguards Xamel and Cervantes Dom Funf, were in the repair bays and would not be serviceable until tomorrow. "You never can tell with Federal mobile suits... We can outnumber them and still lose, some of those white devils are monstrous... But if there's only two Big Trays..." Eugene looked to Steve Myer, the man standing next to him on the bridge of the Resolution. The black coated man nodded his agreement, both men were thinking the same thing. "There's no way they have as many fighters as us." Myer calmly stated. Eugene brought down his binoculars, snapping the lids back on the two lenses. "Right, we'll beat them in the air. When is Lucas due to arrive?" Eugene asked, looking at his bridge crew. "Fifteen minutes sir." Came the response, quickly and dutifully. "Redirect him, and give him our full air support. Lets see how Ghinius' machine can handle a Big Tray..." Eugene mused. With a few more orders, the Zakus were packed up, and the Dobdays started to move in reverse, while fighter pilots began to launch towards the Federal fleet. "Sir, this is mission control. We're picking up nearly three score hostiles on radar, coming in fast. Looks to be almost entirely Dopps." Daren nodded, strapping himself into the chair of his GM Command. "Right, launch our fighters. Have the mobile suits deploy, and try to get the Dishes to give me a firing solution. Have Ions team watch for enemy Gaws, they're the targets today." "Roger that sir." Within minutes, the men and women of AFEF moved into their battle formations. At the head of the line was Hector Lagrama, Vina Sealander, and a half a dozen GM Grounds and Gundam Massed Production Ground Types, with Type 61 tanks filling the gaps between the two Big Trays. With the Big Trays were four Guntank MPTs and Cameron Sunes GM Cannon, and atop the Big Trays themselves sat Ion and the two other GM Ground Snipers. Their attack plan was simple. Draw out the enemy fleet, and then hit their ships with Sniper fire. Daren knew that once the snipers fired, the enemy would retreat, so it was imperitive that they struck the killing blow all at once. The only mobile suit left out of the combat was Allen Gentles Blue Destiny, held back in the Medeas which were in the back lines. The suits reputation was well known to the Federation now, and they were saving its madness for the attack on Odessa itself. "Ion, I don't want you to fire at all until you have a clear shot of the target. Is that understood?" "Yes sir. You don't have to worry about me." Ion laughed, her hands tight on her Snipers controls. This wouldn't be the first Gaw she had shot down, and by her reckoning it wouldn't be the last either. There would be plenty of targets at Odessa. Fighter by fighter, AFEFS aircraft launched, a wing of over twenty Jet Core Boosters filling the noonday sky. They moved into formation, equipping air to air missiles in their hardpoints, knowing that they would be fighting enemy air superiority fighters. Daren launched his GM Command and met up with the front line, marching between Hector and Vina. Vina, a beam rifle in one hadn and beam spray gun in the other, took a pot shot at a Dopp from long range, satisfied by the small orange explosion she saw off in the distance. "Sure are a lot of them... You sure our boys up there will be okay?" She asked, looking towards Darens unit. Vina was relatively new to live combat, she was very renowned as a test pilot, as well as for having one of the more... Odd... Teams out there. However, she'd spent most of the war in Jaburo, and hadn't quite gotten the hang of killing people just yet. "We're about to see..." Responded Hector. A veteran of the fronts in Africa, Lagrama had fought enemy Dopps and Gaws many times, and he wasn't too sure of AFEFs ability to deal with so many Dopps. The two air forces collided, and within the first thirty seconds it became apparent that Hectors worries were valid. For once the Zeonic Dopps both outmanned and outpiloted the Federation battlegroup, which was mostly made up of Fighter Bombers and not dedicated air superiority fighters. A number of Dopps went down in the initial pass, the Jet Core Boosters packing quite a bit of forward firepower, but after that it turned into a rout quickly. The faster and more maneuverable Dopps whipped around behind the Federation, dropping missiles into fuselages and gunning down damaged and more lightly armored models. The JCBs fell out of the sky and quickly retreated for the mobile suit line, the Tin Cods only lasting slightly longer. The Federal Dishes, some of the best pilots in AFEFs airforce, had to spend so much time dodging shots that they couldn't get accurate firing solutions on th enemy Dobdays. After around a minute, the surviving Federal aircraft quickly retreated back to the Trays. "Hold it!" Said Daren, holding the left arm of his mobile suit up and halting the line. "We need to help our boys up there." The pilots nodded and knelt down, beam rifles and machineguns facing towards the sky. The enemy Dopps made a quick pursuit, but as they went past the line of Federation aces and Gundams, everyone opened fire. Hector, Daren, even Vina struck kills, 100m rounds and mega particles going straight through the Dopps with equal ability. The surviving Zeonic fighters pulled back and moved to regroup, the damaged Federal air group moving back to the Halcyon and Silver Platter. It was then that Hector saw, high in the sky, a single Luggun, floating above the entire battlefield and shielded by the sun. "Everybody! SCATTER!" He yelled, ramming on the jets of his GMPGT and pulling forward. Several of the mobile suit pilots, veterans who had worked with Lagrama before, needed no other explanation, and leapt in all directions. Several of the less experienced mobile suits were caught however, heavy shells from Xamels, Zaku Cannons and Dobdays smashing down on the Federal position. The Big Trays and Guntanks aboard AFEF responded in kind, but without guidance from their aircraft their shots were much less accurate. Camerons shoulder mounted cannon scored a good strike on the Resolution, but it was not enough to stop the heavy battlewagons treads from motion. "Command! Why haven't we reached the enemy yet? Are they not engaging us?" Daren yelled, trying to make his voice heard amongst minovski particle interference. Dust kicked up all around him as small and heavy shells slammed into the Central Asian earth all around him, a good shot from the Thorhammer striking one of the Silver Platters main guns. "Negative sir, they're retreating. They don't want a direct engagement." Came the response from the Halcyons bridge. Daren groaned. Did they know he was coming? Had they been informed on his plan? What was going on? Sanders looked around, pulling his GM Command in a near complete circle, trying to see what the Spacenoids had planned for him. As he did a round from a Zaku II K struck his GM in the leg and he went on his knees, just as he saw the Apsalus II coming from behind the Federal fleet. "And blessed are the meek, for we shall inherit the Earth..." Lucas kissed his rosary, flipping on the capacitors that started the mega particle reaction in the Apsalus II's massive base destroying cannon. He adjusted his altitude, looked for his escape trajectory, and prepared to pull the trigger as he watched the condensor array gauges rise in power output slowly but steadily. "Ion! Behind you!" Daren yelled, his cry turning more or less to static as the particle density increased. But if there was one thing you learned in a war in the Universal Century, it was how to understand a voice masked by static. Ion swung his GM Sniper around, and holding his LRBR almost at the hip, he quickly took a bead on the Apsalus and fired. The beam struck straight through the mobile armor, severing the M Craft system from its power source. A full half of the machine exploded in midair, the other half screaming off towards the Black Sea as Lucas tried to adjust his systems to make a successful landing. The other GM Snipers moved into position, preparing for the killshot, but before they could make it missiles from the 86ths' Xamel slammed into the Silver Platter, shaking the Snipers and sending their shots wide. "Send the Dodais to retrieve Lucas, Ghinius will kill us if he hears we let that MA into enemy hands." Myer said, attempting to take control of the Resolution right in front of Ionesco. Eugene let him have his way, looking at his gunnery officer. "Keep up a heavy bombardment, they'll have to stop soon. I think command will like to hear about how we destroyed so many Federal units without the loss of any mobile suits... Eugene Rice-Ionesco - 6/2 VP gained, no damage Cervantes Zuhr - 7/2 VP gained, no damage Steve Myer - 7/2 VP gained, no damage Boraguard Heindshaft - 7/2 VP gained, no damage Lucas Marcolini - 7/2 VP gained, 5 additional days damage. Transferred to a Zaku II J for the Odessa event Daren Sanders - 5 VP gained, 2 days damage Ion Bossa-Nova - 4 VP gained, 1 days damage Allen Gentle - 6 VP gained, no damage Hector Lagrama - 4 VP gained, 1 days damage Cameron Sune - 5 VP gained, no damage Vina Sealander - 5 VP gained, 1 days damage "Hello sir, this is the Anaheim Electronics salvage craft Shodan. How may I direct your call? And may I interest you in our online newsletter?" Simmons was about to add more when Reiger grabbed the headset off his ears, placing the microphone close to his mouth. "This is Leon. What can I do for you, commander Church?" "Start getting your men ready. We're going to radio silence and broadcasting particles in ten minutes." John said sharply. "Already were on radio silence till you broke it sir. But, understood. We'll have everything ready for the assault momentarily. Blackguard out." Reiger slammed the headset back onto Simmons, and went about ordering his crew. They didn't look it, and they often didn't sound it either, the Blackguard was privy to one of the better crews in the Zeon fleet. Crews went about their business, marines readied their weaponry, and everyone prepared for the eventual assault. John Church was nervous. His Zaku was in need of repair, but he felt himself needed aboard the bridge of the Zeus anyway. It wasn't as though Fuhst was a bad commander, but they were coordinating a reasonably large number of ships now, including experimental weapons, newtypes, ace pilots, mobile armors, the works. He felt a dedicated flight controller would be necessary, even given the thick M particle cloud they would be emitting. As much as Church tried to focus on the battle however, his mind kept going back to the actions of the days before. The civilians were still on the Blackguard. He hadn't told anyone. Had Reiger told anyone? "Ahh... Major Church..." Came a familiar voice behind the man. Berthold Stulinger, armed with his traditional black trenchcoat, gloves, and half plastic face, stepped up behind Fuhst and John. "It is good to be under your service. My last two.... Commanders.... Seem to not have been of the finest sort. Dear Vereschagin has left us for unknown reasons, and Sergeant, ahh, excuse me, Lieutenant Vinsko is at the bottom of the sea. I hear they were both traitors in the end." Berthold mused, stroking one of his gloved hands. Johns right hand twitched a little, a slight imperfection that Stulinger instantly caught on to. Mm... Is this man hiding something? Command said Church was perfectly clean, although a bit of a pacifist. Interesting... "No need to worry commander." Stulinger stepped up behind John, slapping a gloved hand on the mans back. "I must be off to the mobile suit deck. But after our victory you and I should have dinner, ja? I'd love to hear about your family back on Side 3." John nodded, and began to sweat as Berthold left the room. Not all SS members lived up to their reputations as he had found out, but some certainly did. Inside the Zeus's hangar, pilots quickly scurried to and fro, trying to prepare for battle. The Olympus Battlegroup had recently taken on a new group of Rick Doms, and carried nearly twenty of the advanced Zimmad units. Carver and Howe stood their units side by side, carrying nearly identical loadouts. They were being pushed to ship defense, and would be prepared for anything that came their way. Church and Fuhst had been fully expecting a pincer attack. "You think we'll get to see any action, or will the fleet just blow them away?" Carver asked, half serious and half joking. He had been working with the rest of them an awfully long time, although Howe was a recent addition. Ross laughed a bit, closing his eyes and attempting to get a feel for his cockpit, as well as the men around him. Slowly his mind fixated on a heavy pressure coming from the rear line of the fleet, and the black mobile armor that was situated behind them. Four coiled tentacles laced around the monstrous Braw Bro like snakes, Mendalshon closing his eyes tight as he tried hard to move the weaponry back and forth. He had a big job to play in this mission, but he wasn't quite as used to his powers as Howe was, despite being formally trained by the Flanagan institute. Regardless of his deficiencies, he felt the pressure coming from the Zeus just as well as Howe did, the two meeting in an informal way that most humans couldn't even comprehend. A minute later, the ships started to move, the Federal fleet being sighted ahead. I SEE NO CHANGES WAKE UP IN THE MORNING AND I ASK MYSELF, IS LIFE WORTH LIVING SHOULD I BLAST MYSELF? "Ah... Lucy, you shouldn't be behaving like that before your big engagement." Schirmjager was a little tired, but was rapping on Lucy's viewscreen with a wrench nonetheless. They'd set up a little bit of a 'room' for Lucy in the hangar bay, with a webcamera and everything. She could see herself, and found this very amusing. T(O_O)| ARMED AND READY "Dah dah... Just calm down a little... You make me take too much aspirin." Schirmjager sighed, going back to the living pilots and making sure they were prepared. She had recently been transferred to the Thoroughbred to help accomodate a new group of GM pilots, and had taken Lucy with her. The two were inseperable. Chan was more than a little worried, having to make the battle strategy for, of all people, a rear Admiral. There were only three Magellan II's in the entire Federation, and why he had the priveledge of commanding one of them was beyond him. He'd set up the plan of attack as best he could, and he'd even gotten assistance from Wyatt. A long range bombardment was scheduled to hit the Zeus's position very soon. "Are we ready to engage?" Chan asked, looking at his altogether too busty crew. They nodded, and he went straight into his commands. "Alright, launch the dummy ships like we planned. We don't want them knowing where they're coming from. Save the MS launch until they pick targets. Broadcast particles, full speed ahead, load anti beam rounds, lets do this." Putting the helmet on her normal suit, Cherish sat aboard the G Armor, still altogether unfamiliar with the controls. But that was alright. It was a fighter. It had guns. Big guns. Lots of guns. And enough armor to stop a bazooka round. What else did she need to know? She flipped through the owners manual more or less just for something to do, and then put it away, waiting for the okay from Melendez to launch. If she gauged it right, she'd be able to get out a good 10 seconds early and still say she saw the green light in the hangar. She flipped the comm unit on, heard something about vigilance, and instantly turned it off. She didn't need backup anymore. She didn't need anybodies help. She didn't need any goddamned vigilance. This was the G Armor. It had a G in the name. It was practically the goddamn Gundam, and she was practically Amuro fucking Ray. She'd show everybody what she was made of now. No technological boundaries would shut her down again. The Swordfish launched a similar group of dummies, and well away from each other, Task Forces 35.1 and 35.2 engaged their target, the Olympus Battlegroup. The objectives were pretty simple. Catch them offguard, hit them in a pincer movement, destroy the Jormungand and the Jotunheim. Cherish slowly counted the number of missiles she had, and then started to laugh. "Sir, I'm getting visual readings now from both fleets. They're larger than we expected. One Pegasus class, two Salamis, one Magellan, two Columbus in each battlegroup. They look... They look identical sir." Fuhst looked at Church, who met his gaze, the two saying the word at the same time. "Balloons." "How do we know which is the real fleet..." Fuhst mused, closing his eyes. While he was thinking, John had already come up with the answer. He moved to the flight controller aboard the Zeus. "Give me Ross Howe." The flight controller pressed a few buttons and up came a small visual of Ross, sitting in his Rick Dom. "Howe, which Magellan is real." "What?" Howe answered back, totally confused. He didn't even know the Federation had multiple Magellans. "Don't think, just tell me. Which Magellan is real." Church wasn't usually so adamant. He had more at stake than he usually did. Ross calmed down a little, thought about it, and then slowly closed his eyes. "....Portside." John nodded, hoping Ross's intuition would be as good as that Gundam pilots he'd met right around this area more than a month before. "Tell the Niddhog to fire on the portside Magellans position. I want all six shots to go off before we engage. All ships, full speed ahead, have the Rick Doms stay behind to watch the Starboard fleet, Zakus lead the assault. Tell Stulinger he's in charge of the front wave." John said, adding the last bit with a knot in his stomach. Was he really doing this? Maybe Berthold wouldn't come back, and then he wouldn't have to worry. The two fleets came within range of each other, and before they got quite in effective range, a heavy barrage of missiles came from between the two Federation Task Forces. Zaku pilots started to dodge as the heavy AA compliment aboard the Zeus kept it and the two Musais by it safe. "That came from the direction of the Federation blockade." Reiger stated, watching as one of the Zakus exploded to one of the final missiles. "Wyatt is trying to help huh... A little pre-emptive." He snickered. The Zeus could hold its own against any sort of missile assault. Meanwhile, aboard the Missouri, rear admiral Lokkin was scanning the images of the Zeon ships. Everyone would be in weapons range in just a few moments. "I don't see it..." She said to herself. Her first officer turned to her. "What was that?" "I don't see the enemy weapons platform. It's not there. Did we do a proper sweep of the area?" Lokkin asked, looking at her sensor crew. "Ma'am, particle density is so thick here, I couldn't see it even if I'd seen the blueprints for the damn thing before." Lokkin turned back to the enemy fleet, which at the same moment started to launch mobile suits and fire missiles. Behind it, far behind it, a bright white light popped into existance like a star. "It's a trap!" The rear admiral yelled. Before she had finished her sentence, the plasma charge had already flown past the Missouri, just off target. "Fire missiles now, give me a hard to starboard." Lokkin yelled, her crew responding quickly. Eight missiles belched out of the front of the Magellan II, the heavily armed ship twisting and veering off course as the second round from the Jormungand flew through the cosmos, slightly off target in the other direction. The third round came a few seconds later, barely clipping the back of the Magellans secondary engines, but that was all it took. The entire back third of the warship ruptured and exploded, the Missouri suddenly dead in the water. "I want a damage report now!" Narusa yelled. One of her crewmembers hands went to a computer terminal, and was instantly shocked to death by static electricity. A secondary filled in, the rest of them refusing to even touch the ship for the next few seconds. After the charge had made its way to the ships grounding sections, the crewmember gave her report, a fourth plasma charge flying above the ship as she did. "Ma'am, we've lost all engines. No loss to hull integrity. That round seems to have welded our entire rear deck shut. All weapons are still operational, computer system needs to reboot..." "Get it done. Lets do what we can to protect captain Melendez. Even if we can't move we're packing a lot of firepower." The rear admiral said, sitting back down in her chair. The rest of the ships flew towards each other, Jiccos and Salamis exchanging a heavy barrage of missiles. AA gunners prepared to shoot down incoming targets when it was soon realized that both sides were using anti beam rounds. A heavy cloud of sparkling chaff went up between the Olympus battlegroup and Task Force 35, giving Stulinger and his twenty Zaku squadron an easy bee line to the Federal ships. Their disguise of little use now, Melendez ordered his ships to launch, the Swordfish and Charon spitting GMs and Saberfish at the incoming Zakus. Cherish launched as well, gunning her engines and coming up well in front of the enemy battlegroup. GMs aimed their beam spray guns and fired, but were a little surprised to see fully half their shots bouncing off the heavy cloud of chaff that still littered the area. Berthold and his Zakus, which outnumbered the Federal group more than two to one, opened fire with bazookas and machineguns, downing several units quickly. "Missile tubes four through eight, load scatter missiles and fire at will. Have our mobile suits pull back and protect the fleet." Melendez ordered, the MPCs of the Swordfish and Missouri opening up as the Zakus broke the field of Chaff. Three MS-06's evaporated in the mega particle fire, but the rest managed to dodge the slow warship cannons. However, they weren't quite looking for the missiles slowly coming towards them, and as the remaining four GMs pulled back for point defense of the battlegroup, a number of Zakus were destroyed by the Swordfishes missiles. Meanwhile, behind the Olympus battlegroup, Lucy and thirteen GMs launched from the Tin Cans Axis and the Thoroughbred. Lucy was well ahead of the rest of them, inside her huge armored subflight, almost the size of a transport shuttlecraft. "Leon, can you cover our rear?" Church asked, looking at the two incoming battlegroups. He was more than sure that the Rick Doms could handle those in rear, but was still worried about the Magellan. It was bad tactical advice, but he was still concerned for those civilians. "Understood." was all Leon said, the Blackguard slowly starting to turn around. The GMs, making a solid line behind Lucy, thought they were catching the enemy by surprise when they noticed the black and purple units all around the enemy ships. "That's a lot of Rick Doms..." One pilot said, his GM taking a bazooka shell moments later. Howe and Darius swerved ahead of the group, the two expert pilots dancing right and left, taking out four GMs with an equal number of shells. Carver wasn't even paying attention to the Federation shuttle as he sped past, the outer hull of the subflight breaking open and a heavily armored Gundam firing its jets and steadying himself. Out of the corner of his eye Carver saw a gun point at him and he shot his Rick Dom upwards, a hail of beam machinegun fire following him upwards in a line. "The hell is that?!" He said aloud, aiming his bazooka and firing a pair of rounds. The Phantom stopped moving for a moment, the two shields on its shoulders swivveling to harmlessly block the shots. Carver was reloading his bazooka and barely strafed left in time, the Gundam firing another heavy barrage with its beam machinegun. The Rick Doms and GMs engaged each other, Ross breaking through the main fleet and heading for the Federal vessels. He did his best to stay away from the Thoroughbred, Pegasus class ships being famous for their antiaircraft compliments. A bazooka in one hand and a panzer faust in the other, he went for the two Columbus transports. "Have the balls try to intercept him. Don't open with AA yet, he doesn't know which ships are real." Chan said, his gunners holding back for a moment. Howe juked past a pair of balls, destroyed a third by kicking it, and shot up above the Tin Cans Axis, aiming his bazooka at the balloon of the Charon. However, he did not fire at the balloon, his downward pointing Panzer Faust jettisonning and moving in its awkward way straight through the Columbus II's reactor. "One down." Ross said, turning his Rick Dom Quickly. He destroyed another Ball with his bazooka and simply ignored the rest, heading straight for the Valley Forge. Cherish ignored the ensuing melee behind her. The only thing she saw was a beam free window to move towards the enemy ships. Pushing her fighters throttle hard, trying to see if she could move it past 100%, she shot through the anti beam cloud and instantly poured on the MPC fire, one of the Jiccos exploding like a bad headache. Cherish laughed. "So much firepower... I love this thing." She said to herself, ignoring the smaller Oka Nieba and going for juicier prey. The Zeus opened up its AA barrage, Cherish moving her fighter left and right, dodging a few shots. She pressed the trigger on her MPCs, but in the same moment several AA guns tagged her fighter, the shells doing little damage to the G Armor but the momentum actually physically pushing the fighter off course. The beam shots went wide and Cherish tried to move into a dodge, but found the controls of the Armor decidedly less responsive than those of her old Saberfish. Round after round slammed into the luna titanium, the bulkheads slowly starting to buckle and crack. Cherish groaned, launching off a barrage of missiles and turning back around, using the warheads near instant explosions as cover as AA rounds tagged them. She turned, moving for the Oka Nieba, and was about to pull the trigger when a trio of Rick Doms came at her from above. "Where is everybody else? Stupid pilots..." She groaned, dodging a pair of 360mm shells, the third slamming into her upper armor. Remembering she had rear firing missile snow, Cherish boosted away, launching four rockets at the incoming Rick Doms. Two exploded, the third dodging out of the way. Berthold took out another GM and moved on the Swordfish, but its AA gunners were experts, and it still had two elite GM E's and a number of Balls defending it. The black Zaku Kai tried to make headway but there were no openings, and as another Zaku exploded behind him, he decided he would go for a different target. Stulinger turned and sped back towards the main line, flashing his mono eye in morse code for the two Zaku II HMTs to follow. Both pilots understood the SS's command and whipped around, Stulinger and his two wingmen heading for the two Columbus transports. The lot of them fired at one ship, the rounds piercing the balloon and popping it easily. Stulinger would have been angry, but at least they had more targets. The Federation fleet defense was too tied up with the enemy Zakus, and the three pilots zipped around the Charon, filling it full of bazooka rounds until it began to explode. They started to move back towards the Missouri, which had been aiming its rear MPCs the entire time. The heavy beams shot out, Berthold and one Zaku II R dodging but the third evaporating as the mega particles passed through it. Meanwhile, the cloud of anti beam chaff had finally subsided, and the Magellan II and Zeus opened fire on each other instantly. Fuhst had given careful coordinates to his men, but so had captain Melendez, and just as the beams were about to strike through the body of the Missouri, a second line of sparkling chaff went up, covering the aft of the Missouri to the fore of the Swordfish. The Magellan II fired its salvo, several MPCs hitting the Zeus dead on. That ship is going to be tough... Stulinger thought to himself, but as he did he noticed a number of tiny imperfections in the space around the Missouri, the near imperceptible sight of black moving on black. All at once five MPC beams fired out at the Magellan from point blank range, destroying a number of key systems immediately. "What the hell?! What's firing on us? Somebody report!" Lokkin yelled, but it was already too late. The second barrage melted through the bridge and reactor, the snaking black mega particle guns nearly invisible as the Braw Bro floated along, a good distance away from the enemy. Felix was more or less content with the single ship kill, watching the Magellan II go up in an impressive display of fireworks. Besides, he had a splitting headache now, and didn't know that he could properly pilot the Braw Bro much longer. If he activated his engines the Federation would know where he was, but as long as he just coasted through an M particle cloud... Lucy and Darius danced around in impressive circles, the Rick Dom able to keep up with the Zephyr Phantom in speed, but Darius completely unable to damage the most expensive Gundam ever made. He dodged beam shot after beam shot, going through his third magazine as his bazooka failed time and time again to pierce those two shoulder shields. "I'm better than this... Who the hell is this guy." Carver growled, tossing his bazooka away and grabbing his heat saber. Even a Gundam couldn't stand a blow from that. He shot towards the Zephyr Phantom in an erratic zigzag, Lucy firing her beam pistol but barely missing each shot, unable to correct her firing arc computations fast enough. Carvers Rick Dom ducked in below the Phantom, doing a wide upswing with the heat saber as Lucy pulled backwards. The blade cut through her beam machinegun and tore apart her left arm, and Darius moved in for the kill, coming down hard on the enemy Gundam. The two shields swivveled into place, both of them blocking the incoming heat weapon. Darius pushed hard on his thrusters, expecting the resistance to only last a moment, but was taken back as two seconds of contact with the luna titanium only managed to slice through one of the two shields. A moment later, Lucy's own beam saber slammed through Carvers cockpit. She tossed the saber and the lifeless Rick Dom aside, turning and looking around, assessing the battlefield. The Rick Doms had forced the Federal GMs into a rout, expert pilots and better machines destroying the Federation units on a massive scale. Lucy turned and backed away from the now approaching Blackguard, dodging missiles and MPC fire as she moved back towards the Valley Forge to cover their regroup. But to Lucy's dismay, she watched as explosion after explosion rocked the Salamis Reviseds hull. Even with an impressive host of advanced laser AA guns, they could not catch Howe, who seemed to know where the enemy weaponry would point a second before it fired. Ross pulled back as a stream of lasers went for his position, slamming the last needed bazooka shell into the side of the Salamis Revised. The round was stopped for the most part by the ships heavy armor, but the explosion buckled right around the reactor, shraphnel hitting the superheated core. "Captain. Reactor pressure just went sky high. The ship is going to blow any second." Came voices from all over the bridge. Chan was mortified, watching his soldiers die all around him. In almost a trance he was rushed by his crew to the Salamis capsule, half the bridge crew managing to get in and take off just as the Valley Forge warped and exploded. The shuttle flew wildly, shooting around in circles before being caught by the Zephyr Phantom, Ross moving to take out the final remaining GMs. CAPTAIN, ARE YOU ALRIGHT? |(T_T)| came the image in the shuttles viewscreen, but Lucy was given no response. She hurried back to the Thoroughbred and Schirmjager, which was now quickly turning around and using its impressive engine array to escape the battlefield. Meanwhile, Melendez had also given the retreat order, but Cherish refused to take no for an answer. Now with almost nobody to stop her, she zipped around behind the Oka Nieba, opening fire over and over again with her MPCs. "Stupid Zeon... Stupid ships... Stupid AA guns..." She growled, watching as wave after wave of mega particles tore through the Nieba. After she had buchered the ship enough she sped back to the Swordfish, watching the Musai explode behind her. A line of 120mm shells from Stulinger glanced across her frontal armor, managing to hit and destroy both of her MPC guns just after they had done their damage. "Why hello there little black Zaku. Want to play a game..." Woods grinned, gunning the G Armor towards the black Zaku Kai. She was passing what remained of the Zeon Zakus, Church having given the withdraw order a little bit early. Berthold stopped his Zaku Kai in its tracks, taking careful aim for the G Armors cockpit. He knew how to deal with a fighter that had heavy armor. He adjusted upwards ever so slightly, fully expecting the Federation pilot to veer off any second now. In that second, he would kill them. Cherish kept moving towards the black Zaku, and their mexican standoff ended with the G Armor ramming the Zaku Kai headfirst, tearing both of its legs off and passing by. The fighter was so beat up you couldn't tell what dents had been caused by ramming the mobile suit and what had been caused earlier, but Cherish was very much alive, and laughing, albeit with a bad case of whiplash. What a CRAZY BITCH. Berthold thought to himself, his Zaku spinning around in ridiculous circles as it went back towards the Zeonic battlegroup. The two fleets went back and reorganized, Church making no hesitation in opening a private channel to the blackguard. "Is everyone okay over there?" He asked quietly. A few seconds of silence, and then Leons voice answered back. "They're all fine John. You should be a little more concerned about pursuing the Federation. They'll be back you know." Altecha Chan - 9 VP gained, Valley Forge destroyed Cherish Woods - 8 VP gained, 5 days damage 1 days injury Zephyr Phantom Unit 1 - 0+1 VP gained John Church - 10/2 VP gained, no damage, promoted to Lt. Commander Leon Reiger - 12 VP gained, no damage, Operative specialization gained Darius Carver - 10 VP gained, dead 7 days Felix Mendalshon - 11 VP gained, 3 days injury, +1 NT Ross Howe - 10 VP gained, 3 days damage Berthold Stulinger - 11 VP gained, 4 days damage |