RP: 21st Fighter Sq [Mission 4.0] - Breaking the Dam

Elisto broke off and began to chase after one NMX fighter that dove in close, while at the same time his anti-missile defense systems were ablaze with hot fire at the now incoming projectiles.

He was constantly realigning the jamming field and fine tuning it while at the same time going after anything that possed a threat to his fellow squadmates. Glancing partway over his shoulder to see Emiyu, he turned his attention backward and released a spray of fire on an NMX Battlepod, his fighter lacked the firepower of a typical Kawarime but he would make up for that short coming by becoming a mosquito that would be hard to swat.

Spotting a group of missiles, he released several flares to spoof their systems then his defensive systems would open fire if they got to close for comfort. While his eyes were on the fighters, he also had his systems keeping a close eye on the bombers in the area.

With the new orders coming in Yaeko shouted into the come. "Hai Shoi!" With that she spun into a barrel roll as she began evading the missiles and letting lose her cannons at the enemy fighters in the distance. "Take THAT! And THAT! Come get a piece of me you blasted squids!"

She continued to unload, firing at whatever got in the path of her guns. Doing another barrel roll she dived out of the way of an incoming missile. "How you holding up back there Tin Man?"

“Don't ask.” Came the reply from behind Yaeko, Silic's voice sounding slightly strained. The countermeasure pod zeroed in on a missile and blew it to pieces with aether flares, it seemed Silic was saving the Knock-down for the heavy stuff.

Elisto spun his fighter around, avoiding two missiles that had managed to avoid the hail of defensive fire, only to miss his fire and get back into the sights of the turret which opened up on them.

He was keeping an eye on everything around him, monitoring his fellow squadmates while also keeping track of the battlepods and bombers. His eyes were focused more on the bombers than the fighters, since the bombers possed a much bigger threat.

"Breaking formation, initiating evasive maneuvers." Kenshin announced over the comms, taking his ship into a rapid dive beneath the the Hayai gunboat squadrons angle of approach to the enemy. Three of Mishhuvurthyar missiles had managed to close the distance and seemed to be following him in pursuit. Kenshin rolled his fighter during the dive to reorient his Starfire turret towards the incoming missiles -- the bluish bolts of hot aether shot towards the deadly projectiles as they came into closer proximity. One missile exploded, the blast-wave crashing into another missile and slightly knocking it off-angle -- it began to turn and reorient itself towards Kenshin's Kawarime in its unceasing mission of hitting the Star Army fighter.

The other remaining missile meanwhile was too distant to be affected by the blast, and doggedly continued pursuing Kenshin as he descended further beneath the ongoing fur ball taking place above him. As the missile approached, Kenshin executed a 180 degree turn that faced his fighter back towards the ships engaged in battle above him, then he cut off his inertia and brought to the fighter to a sudden and complete stop through use of the Combined Field Systems controls. The missile that had been closing on him overshot due to the sudden maneuver and went right past him. The Starfire turret started making the attempt to shoot the missile down as it went past, but none of the shots were managing to connect. The young pilot dialed the fighters acceleration back to maximum, shooting the ship back up towards the nearby fight.

However, the other missile that had previously been knocked off course by the death of its sibling had now managed to turn around, heading directly for Kenshin. Whilst the pilot tried to jink his fighter out of the projectiles path, he maneuvered too late and the Mishhuvurthyar anti-armor missile impacted his ships shields -- the explosion spread out around his ship in blinding sphere of fire that for a brief moment blocked his view.

Still seeing spots, the boys eyes darted towards the fighters status display. Shield integrity had been reduced to 85% -- luckily the missiles firepower had not proved sufficient to overwhelm the shields dispersion capability and damage the ships physical structure as well.

Kenshin and his fighter darted back towards the rest of the squadron with the enemy missile hugging his tail. His Starfire turret blazing in the continuing attempt to shoot it down.

"Damn it... this missiles invading my personal space! Tamahagane, if you're not busy... I'd really appreciate a hand here... I can't seem to get this little Mishhu welcoming gift off my bloody tail." said Kenshin over the squadron communications channel.

Breaking formation.... what the hell does he think he is doing? Akemi thought as her wingman split from the squadron, grumbling to herself, she kept her position with him. Her Starfire spewing a steady stream of aether bolts in an attempt to destroy or divert any enemy missile.

Even near misses were taking their toll on her her shielding, down to 64%, no time to recharge them... Letting inertial carry her craft, she deftly used the attitude controls to pick off targets to the left and right of their path.

She spun her craft along its vertical axis and fired a blast from her Aether cannons vaporizing a missile and striking the side of one of the battlepods.

"Its not like I am sitting here doing nothing wingman, but I have your back Murasaki-Hei," she call out over the comm. She could not get a clear shot at the missile without endangering Kenshin, so she maneuvered her fighter between his and and the missile, once it locked on her Kawarime she veered to port accelerated briefly and then killed thrust while she flipped it end to end and blasted the missile. Once the plasma ball of the missile's destruction cleared she engaged thrust and took up her wingman position. "See no problem."

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Elisto had the satisfaction of watching two groups of NMX battlepods take out each other as his EWS gear caused their respective missiles to lock on the other group with deadly results.

Errowyn got a few moments of respite when the #4 Gunbot caught two fighters closing on her from behind in its guns and obliterated them. Any battlepod that happened to pass through her field of fire did so with extreme peril as she lanced them with deadly energy.

Munkata's rampage gave the remaining battlepods reason to fall back and regroup.

However, the second way, the bombers were not as expected heading towards the Heitan, but rather closing on their position. The first eight of them fired torpedoes which locked not on the fighters but the gunboats.

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Meanwhile the group of battlepods that had FTL'd emerged back into the region of space around the Heitan and its escorts. Once in normal small the pods launched their torpedoes at the carrier and any of the other larger ships. The escorts for the task force immediately began engaging not only the battlepods but doing their best to destroy the torpedoes before they could strike a friendly vessel.

Oh drat. Missiles! Was Anne's first thought as enemy fired wave of missiles at the squadron. She listened to orders set by Hunter and armed her Starfire. This is it, she thought then as she set Starfire to try and shoot down enemy missiles.

It was time to fiddle with her wavefront why there is time. Her fingers danced upon the screens as she was setting what she could as fast as she could. She stopped jamming enemy comms, that can wait for later and quickly programmed wavefront to send out strong scalar pulses every two second to faze enemy missiles and their targeting system. She set the pulses to be sent into conical shape so she could protect not only her but her whole wing. At least it should have worked like that in her calculations.

When the bombers started firing upon the gunboats Yaeko banked towards the bombers and began taking them out. Yaeko then flipped her comm to closed channel between Silic and her. "They don't need everyone for the missiles. Besides, the Tessies will take most of them out anyways. Increase power to weapons, let's show these people not to mess with the best damn pair in the diamonds."

Elisto's thought processes were firing non-stop, when he saw the torpedos he right away increased the power to the jamming module to increase the range and potency of the jamming.

He came up behind a battlepod and unleashed deadly aether fire on it's rear before spinning out to target a nearby bomber and unleashing fire onto him. "Emiyu, how you holding up?" he didn't look at his wingmen, instead keeping his eyes purely on the threats ahead of him.

While he was keeping the bomber in his sights he was also calculating impact points, torpedo trejectories, distances to targets and even possible interception routes.

Errowyn took an advantage as the NMX refled to regroup and the Gunboats took care of the two that was following her. She powered down her shield generators to a lower setting, maintaining a light shielding. It would take care of cannon fire, barely for a limited time but not a missile impact.

She mentally thanked the Gunship for being there for her. Working the contols and thrusters of her Kawarine, slipped under a gunboat and came up right in middle of a swarm of missiles heading for the gunboat on the edge of the Gunboat formation. Hitting her left thruster hard, sending her ship spinning fast to the right as she headed right into the path of the torpedoes and anti-ship missles.

Once in position, increasing shield output to the max and putting the cannons on autofire and squeezed the trigger, sending out a swath of aether cannon fire, spraying 270 degree arch of deadly energy and hoping that 90 degree arch of no fire was the rest of Gunboats and the rest of the squadron of the 21st Fighting Diamonds.

The missile and torpedoes that she missed with the spray of cannon fire, She let loose her whole compliment of Decoy flares, lighting up the sector with a big "Here I am, Easy Target!", keeping up the cannon fire.

Eyes tightly closed as not to get blinded from all the pyrotechnics going off. Using her SPINE interface to "see" what was happening.

" Slightly discombobulated, sir."

Emiyu's voice would come through a bit stressed, but nothing out of the ordinary given the situation. She had been silent in the background, but she had been sticking to him like glue for the duration of the engagement.

" Oops, hold on." she said as one of the hundreds of little red dots started moving in a bit too close for comfort. Brilliant teal flares erupted from the sides of the ships as the torpedo dialed in from a distance. The flares burst, showering the front of the torpedo with light. The Knockdown's cannon rotated rapidly to face the incoming missile. One brief flash of light sent a explosive canister careening towards the torpedo. The canister hit dead center, pausing for a second before exploding inside the missile, sending it up in a brief flash of fire.

Emiyu banked sharply, swaying out of line with Ellisto's craft for a moment. The cannons on her ship blazed to life, sending a stream of searing blue bolts towards a few distant battlepods heading in the general direction of the gunboats, leading the pod by a considerable distance. The battlepods tried to avoid the withering fire, but found that they had flown themselves right into the hail of fire. The pods were shredded into pieces before bursting into brief flashes of fire. Emiyu returned to her position behind Ellisto , the ends of her cannons glowing " I'm learning to like this machine, sir." she said, a small purr in her voice.

"Thanks for the save, Tamahagane -- I owe you one." Kenshin sent over the comms to his wingman. His fighter, along with Akemi's were now back in the midst of the Diamond squadron and Mishhuvurthyar battlepods. The rookie fighter pilot targeted one of a small batch of nearby pods and oriented himself towards it, intending to take it out -- then his sensors indicated that the ship and its companions had let loose a salvo of torpedoes. He quickly checked the vectors the projectiles were on and confirmed that they were headed for the gunboats. Yaeko's Kawarime appeared to already have engaged the bombers, so Kenshin turned his attention towards a regular battlepod instead.

Hopefully the gunboats point defenses and the Teisatsu's will intercept or disable the first volley, Kenshin thought to himself as he opened fire upon a new target, blue streaks of aether arcing through space towards the enemy. Sensing its peril, the turrets of the pod were already reorienting to return fire in self-defense and Kenshin prepared himself to jink out of the way.

Elisto rolled his fighter to avoid several incoming shots from a group of Battlepods, he then rolled in behind them and reduced them to molten metal.

His anti-missile defense turret was still firing, taking out several more missiles. Then suddenly Elisto heard a muffled 'clang' followed by the tearing of metal from somewhere on his fighter. His systems flashed and he found himself spinning. "Stabilizers down," he called but then realized that his communications system was offline.

His Teisatsu fighter was spining around, he felt his fighter constantly being shoved 'upward' in relation to where he was sitting and it took all of his concentration and the rerouting of power to his engines and stabalizers to finally kick his fighter out of the spin. He leveled out and allowed himself a brief sigh of relief before he began to figure out what had hit him.

He pondered curiously to himself as he looked around his cockpit and peered over the sides, but saw nothing that caught his eye. "Stabalizers are damaged, but functional. Communications is online, targettings systems functional and wave-front generator along with countermeasures are still functioning, main generator is reading green across the board, weapons systems online, sensor suite is online," he brought up the diagnostic screen and saw that according to his hull report he had damage on his left wing, just beyond his field of view.

Thinking to himself; he got on his comm and looked over at Emiyu. "Emiyu? As you saw, something hit me but I don't know what. Perhaps it was a piece of debris from one of these damned battlepods, but can you please move off to my left and take a look at my left wing? Try and see if you can find anything just below the left tail wing," he reported.

What Elisto couldn't see, was an unexploded missile sticking out just under his left tail, lodged rather well in his wing with the warhead sticking straight out. It's motor was sticking out below his wing, inactive.

"No problem Murasaki-Hei. I am sure you will get the chance to return the favor. After all I was just doing what we're trained to do. I watch your six, you watch mine." Akemi replied. "What the hell, Hey Murasaki I'm getting some weird sensor readings... Tamanahage-Hei to Loverboy, sir I am getting strong energy surges, possibly folds coming from multiple vectors sir." she said trying to keep her voice level.

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Around the 21st a series of six teal spheres formed and a group of unidentified craft materialized. By coloration it was apparent they were NMX. The craft immediately opened fire on the Diamonds with their own Aether cannons.

The battlepod that Kenshin had been firing upon cracked like an egg, fire spilling out from its depths as its engines and reactor went critical. The Star Army pilot pulled out of the way of the enemies ships last few shots, but didn't escape completely unscathed -- his status displayed now showed his ships shields had 65% integrity remaining.

Then came Akemi's warning and the new Mishhuvurthyar craft jumped in. Kenshin targeted one of the new ships and glanced at the sensor read-outs before speaking. "I don't recognize the hull configuration... I'm guessing by all those hard-points its somekind of --" Kenshin's words were interrupted when the enemy opened fire upon the squadron. One of the craft had targeted Kenshin and Tamahagane with several of its eight turrets tracking their movement, unleashing a firestorm of blue aether bolts in their direction.

"AKEMI DIVE!" The pilot shouted over the comms to his wingman, as he sent his ship plummeting down in order to avoid the path of the enemies weapon fire. One of the enemies first bolts of aether still managed to clip his shields, washing over his ships shields and overwhelming their threshold for absorbing damage. His control's unleashed a spark and the cockpit displays flashed and distorted due to a momentary power overload as the hull of his craft took some minor damage. Whilst he drove his fighter down, Kenshin scanned the status display once again -- shields were down to 45%, hull integrity compromised by approximately 6.25% -- his port engine was damaged and no longer operating at full power.

"Damn these guys hit hard!" Kenshin muttered and then swore under his breath, pissed. "I'm going to drag you S.O.B.'s across the river Styx kicking and screaming!'" He pulled his fighter back up out of the dive, bringing it around to make a pass at the enemy ship's rear. His guns were blazing and he readied his ships single torpedo for launch right down its tailpipe.

Yaeko banked hard when she saw the teal spheres. There aren't any reinforcements coming... Before they had time to finish unfold she was already pointing right at one of the spheres. A stream of cannon fire left her Kawarime as she fired upon the craft. She banked left when she felt she was too close to the craft and looped back around for a second run.

"The craft are unidentified. I want the Tessies to used enhanced sensors, see what you can get on those things. I want to know what kind of firepower they have, how much it will take, and what kind of surprises those things have waiting. There are 6 of them and 5 pairs of us. Each pair take a target, the last one we'll obliterate as a unit."

Yaeko flipped to a closed comm channel with her wing and chimmed in. "Errowyn, I've already hit one of them, go for the same one. Save your aether missile if you can, but use it if you have to."

Emiyu gasped as Ellisto's V-8 suddenly started to spiral out of control. She climbed after him, firing flares from the back of her craft to cover their crafts from encroaching missiles "Ellisto-san ?!" she called through the comm, but there was no reply from him, which caused her to worry even more. Had he been injured by the collision ? She stuck as close as she could encase he had to eject into space. Hopefully, his suit would provide him with a few moments for her to come in and pick him up and carry him back to the carrier...if things went very badly.

Luckily, he was able to get his craft stabilized and level. His voice came in over the comm, asking her to inspect his left side to see if she could figure out what had caused his violent spinning " Hai, I'll take a look." she said, rolling her craft over his and leveling out on his left side. She fell slightly behind, out of his range of vision as she spied something amiss at the rear of his craft

" Uh oh.""

Emiyu sounded a bit concerned as she reported in over the comm " It appears that you have a missile lodged in your left wing. It must have been the engine which pushed up upwards like that ." she said " It hasn't exploded yet. I'll attempt a scan to see if the warhead is active..perhaps I should escort you back towards the Heitan, sir. If I may, I wouldn't consider it wise to fly around a battlefield with a bomb strapped to my craft." she said, punching a few keys on her craft to see if she could get some kind of scan on this missile.

Her flare and Knockdown system was fully active as she tried to scan the Missile. At the same time, she sent a direct communication to Taii Atsui on the Bridge

" Command, this is Zero Zero Five Nine reporting in. Ellisto's craft has suffered damage from a enemy missile. The projectile has lodged itself in his craft's left wing, but has not exploded yet. I am attempting to determine whether the warhead is still active or ineffective. Zero Zero Three Nine is still capable of independent flight, but the warhead presents a considerable hazard. How should we proceed, Taii ?"

She wondered if she was trying to go over Ellisto's head to quickly. But, in her mind, this was something that the commander should decide in the end. She'd like to escort him back, then return to add additional support to her squadron.

Without even having to think about it, Lynn upped the shields on Ira's fighter the moment the enemy appeared. "The squadron is under assault by unidentified sphere-like craft that have phased into existence, Shoi."

Lynn did some more work, trying to put together more information on the bogeys.

Elisto gave a shaking of his head. That explains the thrust I was feelin for awhile there, but how the hell did that happen? Could the defensive systems been overwhelmed or was it a missile that was part of one of these pods we blew up? he shook his head at this pondering.

"Scanning new hostiles," he said to the XO. He was ignoring the damage to his fighter, preferring instead to leave the decision on whether he had to return or not up to the Taii. His scanners were providing a wealth of information at his disposal, but there were things that scanners just wouldn't give. "XO? Anyway we can disable one of these unknowns?" he asked Yaeko.

"I can try," came the response in Elisto's comm. Yaeko glanced over at Elisto's fighter, hoping he was okay to fly. She then dialed in to the closed comm with her wing. "Errowyn, Elisto has asked if we can try to disable one of the unknowns. If you can, aim for the engines and let's see if we can keep it intact enough for us to haul it back to the Heitan."