|
Derek Carter floated silently toward the Zeon asteroid mining base in his GM II. He figured that an Artillery cannon would probably be the best way to destroy a large fortified rock and finished making his final preparations for the attack. After all, the mining base didn't have much besides probably a bunch of marines waiting inside. Not even cannons. Piece of cake, right? Unfortunately for him, the soldiers stationed at the base noticed him on his way in. Having nothing else to fight back with, they closed the heavily fortified doors, gathered in the center of the base with their weapons, braced themselves and prayed the door would hold up. Round after round impacted the door from Derek's cannon. Each time the base shuddered, but nothing seemed to budge. Zeon soldiers silently thanked their engineers after each impact. After reloading a couple of times and not seeing even a dent in the door, Derek finally gave up and started making his way back to the Ogre Sighing Derek said quietly to himself, "Perfect... Samantha is going to say something like 'this was just like in that episode of Omegaroids or Busterman Turbo R Kai' or something and then say I should have used my GM's super attack to blow up the door. Ugh..." Derek Carter: 1 VP gained, No Damage It never truly ends. War can be described as a series of punches and counterpunches until one only one side has the strength to strike. For the past week of the One Year War, this was the daily cycle for Zeon and Federal forces in South America. Neither is relenting though and like any heavyweight prize fight, it all comes down to that last knockout punch. Whenever that happens. It placed a strain on their engines, but the Medea B-class Utah manages to catch up with the other Medeas of the 87th Airborne. Together, the air fleet disappeared over the horizon away from the Big Trays of the 87th Integrated Fleet. There is no mistaking the fleet's purpose: The Don Escargot ASW aircraft outnumber their air-to-air brethren. In fact, there are only half a dozen Tin Cods flying in formation with Captain Jim Irwin and Sergeant Scott Archer. As a veteran of far too many aerial dogfights than he can keep track of, Irwin felt some unease about the 87th Airborne. Only by his expert hands is his half-repaired Tin Cod doing anything resembling flying. If the Zeon fleet they are tracking has as few as three Dopps, they would be in trouble. "So let me get this straight" came a familiar voice," we're going to divebomb towards the ocean surface based on someone else's wild estimate of where our target is?" Irwin looked up and towards the north as the more modern and sophisticated Core Booster pulls up beside him. "You ever done precision strikes with a ground team?" "Not really, I prefer to eyeball my own targets." The Tin Cod pilot sighs. The emergence of Minovsky Particle interference as a major part of the battlefield has thrown decades of intimate air support doctrine out of the window. They might as well be fighting with WWI tactics. Hell, they probably are. "Just let the Dish and Don Escargots do their work." It took most of the day, but finally the Schutzstaffel Tactical Fighting Unit is once again a fully submersible fleet under the control of the SS. Despite being injured, Sturmbahnnfuhrer Raven Tarasova sat on the bridge of the Pendragon. Accompanying her is Hans Bond and Sebastian Brennan. While Captain Marina Nimue respect the SS officers, they are taking more unnecessary space on the bridge. Suddenly a series of alarm bells began to ring. "Captain! We have Federal units approaching fast!" "Opportunistic bastards aren't they?" said Hans with a raised eyebrow. "A few more minutes and I would have irradiated Jaburo to the ground," growled Sebastian. The captain of the Pendragon grabs the sonar report and walked over to the trio of SS soldiers. "The signals are coming away from the continent," remarked Marina," these are not Jaburo squadrons. They are the Federal reinforcements we anticipated." Marina took a long stride towards the helm. "Bottom us out! Get us through the thermal layer quickly and get a rearguard out." Like hounds to the hunt, Don Escargots began dropping a hail of sonar buoys. There are so many of the small cansisters that for a moment, the Zeon sonar operators thought the planes were dropping mobile suits. There were actually, a pair of GM Aquas that did fell into the water. But no sooner did their armor get wet did the ace Z'Goks and Acquys of the STFU tore them apart. Jim Irwin saw this and on instinct banked his Tin Cod. Scott Archer saw the plane dive and brought his larger Core Booster after it. "The telemetry data isn't ready yet!" warns Archer as they rocket down through the clouds. "With the explosions in the water, the telemetry data isn't going to be ready until the sun goes supernova! Stay on my flank!" Silence grips the two pilots as they weave around the slower Don Escargots. Surprisingly enough, there is no flak or ground to air fire. Not that they were complaining of course. "The Dish says the Zeon submarines are diving! They're going underneath the ASROC envelope!" "Drop them!" The missiles left the Tin Cod and Core Booster hardpoints as they fan out over the ocean waves. As Irwin and Archer pulled out of their dive, the torpedoes splash into the water and their seekers went active. A ripple of explosions soon follow. They can be heard from the Don Escargots lingering above the waters. Did they strike their mark? Did the combination of depth charges and aerial dropped torpedoes take their finally toll? In the dark depths, three shapes left the air bubbles churned from the high explosive detonations. With their hulls shaking, the Jukon IIs and Mad Angler ships seem to breath a sigh of relief as they continue diving to safer depths. On the bridge of the Pendragon, Marina nodded towards Hans, Sebastian, and Raven. The captain was spared dealing with the loss of a submarine today but there is no telling how long her luck would hold out. Jim Irwin - 3/2 VP Gained, No Additional Scott Archer - 3 VP Gained, No Damage Alec Irusk - 1 VP Gained, Fatigued 2 Gilgamos Uruk - 1 VP Gained, Fatigued 2 Gil Krundel - 1 VP Gained, Fatigued 2 Tony Knight - 1 VP Gained, Fatigued 2 Akira Sasaki - 1 VP Gained, Fatigued 2 Raven Tarasova - 1 CP Gained, Fatigued 2 |