RP: 21st Fighter Sq [Mission 7.2] Operation Payback - Fighter Launch

Meanwhile the 2XF Task Force continued streaking towards their objective. A might juggernaut of the Empire prepared to make the enemy pay dearly.

Atsui walked the bridge of the Heitan, pacing if she was honest with herself. This plan was ambitious, and she had every confidence in the Taisho's strategy. What was truly bothering her was that she would be fighting from the bridge and not a cockpit. She looked at the flight board, there were 168 names on the board. She made a point to memorize each of the names, and their face from their records. Many of them would not be returning from this mission, at least until they could be resurrected.

At that moment a diminutive figure approached her, a brown haired NH-33M wearing a perfect fitting type 30 duty uniform. It bowed when it approached her.

"Message from the Taisho, Numa-Taii, Heitan and the rest of 2X-TF-O01 have the honor of first blood. She will bring TF-02, and 03 in shortly after you have engaged the enemy. By her orders, you are in command of 2X-TF-O01." Mirriam one of Sorano's personal assistants said floating in mid air.

Atsui took a moment to consider what she had been told. "Kindly inform the Taisho, we will engage in fifteen minutes and we thank her for the honor." she said returning the bow slightly.

She watched Mirriam flit out and head to the communications room.

Fighter launchbay

Errowyn had changed quickly into her flight uniform and scampered down to the launchdeck where her Kawarime sat, surrounded by techs, ammo handlers loading the requisite load out she requested.

She stood there watching for a long moment, with her helmet in the crook of her arms.

Taking a deep breath, Errowyn stepped forward into the fray towards her fighter as the crews finished last touches and dispersed. Doing a quick walk around, seeing the payload she requested gleaming in the light of the now quieting launchbay.

Gave a feral grin as she entered her cockpit of her fighter with assistance from the chief of her deck crew. Once settled and giving him the thumbs up to let him know she was situated and comfortable with the safety harness slightly digging into her to hold her firmly in place.

"Get a few crabheads for me and the boys," Crewchief spoke, patting her helmet. "Bring back my bird."

"You got it." Errowyn replied as she bgan her com's checks and pre-flights. She smiled as the hiss of the hydraulics announced the closing of the canapony.

One with the machine... She was ready. "Hellcat ready for launch!" waiting for the signal to launch as she alerted her squadron commander.

Hangar Deck

Akemi made her way to the flight deck prior to the designated time. She took a few minutes to walk around her Kawarime. She ran her hand along the wings, and the body. It was her way, it helped her to get into the right frame of mind, just as checking her sword before a fight helped to focus her thoughts.

Once she completed the circuit she climbed in and started the power up. She looked over at Kayo sitting in her cockpit and have her a smile and a brief nod.

Yaeko walked into the hangar deck, helmet under her arm. She walked up to her fighter with a smile, patting its landing gear as she passed by.

"Hey there old girl, I missed you on our last run. But I promise we'll get some action this time."

Climbing into her Kawarime, she started her start-up sequence and pulled up some of the mission information on one of the displays. Once everything was properly prepped for launch, she put her helmet on and synced the comms systems. Satisfied, she waited for everyone to get situated into their Kawarime before speaking, and while she did she glanced around the cockpit, making note that she needed to get around to decorating it with some pink now that she didn't have to share it with Silic.

"Hey there 21st. Now, you all know that I'm not very good with words so I'm going to make this simple on all of us. Fly carefully, don't try to be a hero, keep an eye on your wingman, keep your squad mates alive. I don't want any of you getting harmed on this one. Good luck, drinks on me when we get back."

Yaeko paused as she got a communication from the bridge, at which point she chimed back into the squad comm. "Slight change in setup. Tin Man, you've been ordered back to my back seat. Scrapyard, that means we're back down to a duo."

"Roger that ma'am, I'll keep your six nice and clear," said Elisto as he looked over his fighters controls, he had jumped in just after the group had gotten to the bay and was now running a preflight check and diagnostics while waiting for his chosen modules to be loaded onto it.

Just need to configure the wavefront to my specs...

Anne put on her helmet and climbed into cockpit of her fighter as others did. She started it and went to do pre-flight checks. All seemed fine as always. She also started both of her Wavefronts modules and checked if they work fine. She could not technically run them on the ship, because it would cause problems, but they have test-routing and she ran that.

The lights in the hangar deck shifted from white to red, and the pallets with the 21st Fighters on them began moving them to the launch bay.

"All hands, Battle stations, Battle stations. We are dropping out of fold. All fighters for first wave to launch positions." came across the speakers and the comm channels.

The Diamonds once launch position watched as the bay doors in front withdrew and the blast barriers rose behind them. The view beyond was a swirling mass of teal from the fold. There was a flash and the teal was replaced with the familiar black of space, star fields created a backdrop to the arena they were to enter.

Tactical data streamed into the V8 systems, showing the wall of warships ahead of them. The tactical showed the NMX were deploying battlepods in massive numbers. The other warships of the Heitan's attack group launched a wave of Ke-Z1 torpedoes which streaked out towards the enemy.

"Good Hunting Diamonds, we're going to kick that wave of Battlepods in the teeth for you." Came Atsui's voice across the comm.

A second later the view ahead was dominated by aetheric explosions as the torpedoes detonated as the battlepods came within their blast range. The explosion created a blazing wall of death for the hapless battlepods that flew into it.

"Flight control to Diamonds. Launch"

Launch Bay

Yaeko readied herself, connecting into SPINE, and got in a comfortable position as she watched the doors in front of her open and she was bathed in the teal light of hyperspace fold.

"Everyone, hurry up into positions!"


As the teal light disappeared Silic was groggily climbing into the back of the Kawarime. "Just don't make me sick this time," he grunted as he harnessed himself in.

"Running a little late there?"

Yaeko's thought was cut short as she saw the mass of battlepods, followed by the torpedoes.

"Well Diamonds, things just got a whole lot easier for ourselves. Prepare to launch on my mark."

She waited as the explosions outside the ship dissipated, meanwhile listening carefully to the comm chatter and waiting for their sign. Then she got it.

"GO, GO, GO!" She called out as she accelerated her fighter forwards. Thanks to Silic's modifications, she did so a little faster than most.

Errowyn and her wingman delayed their launch by a micro-second and then blasted out into space and into fray as she quickly formed up with the rest of the 21st squadron of the fighting diamonds. Letting them lead with their defencive eletronic field at work.

Bringing up her fighter to full battle speed as debri from the destroyed battlepods streaked by. Eyes darting from the hud to gauges and controls as she armed her missiles for launch while she brought up her targeting computers.

"Roger that all light green, ready to launch." Anne reported to flight control and prepared to set her plane off. She was actually a little anxious to get off the ship and move out. After last mission where they had to play infantry it was nice for her to sit in the fighter again. That said she would rather spend her time on the ship, cuddling with Silic or talking with Elisto. She was a little worried about Elisto as she did not get a chance to chat with him.

As their time came and Hunter launched Anne took a deep breatk. "Zero-zero-four-four launching!" She reported and hit her engines, taking off and moving to her place in formation.

Akemi and Kayo both hit their engines when the launch order came, streaking out of the carrier and into their respective positions in the squadron.

Ahead of the group the line of enemy warships could be seen. There two two cruisers screening a Battleship. A number of Pillager Light Cruisers were identified as well. Dozens of battlepods were flying in close proximity to the ships to protect them.

"zero-one-zero-three, launching," Elisto said as he lit up the engines, and held on his fighter rocketed out of the hanger and out into space, he spun it around for a moment to do a quick check of his flight controls before he fell in behind Yaeko. Right away he began to look for any targets that would be juicy enough for the squad and the fleet to tackle, something like a ship that was acting as command, or perhaps even more - like a carrier.

Yaeko's eyes scanned the battlefield, trying to gain an understanding of what was going on. She shifted slightly squeamishly as she tried to pick a target. She hated when their mission was vague like this. Figuring that she would try to to be bold, she readjusted her trajectory and started heading towards the battleship.

"Diamonds, fall into a Wedge Formation on me. Stick close to your wingman but keep some distance between pairs, we don't want a single missile taking four of us at once."

As she spoke, she readjusted her IFF to concentrate on the area around the battleship, zooming in her view so she good better comprehend the cluster of dots that her squadron was zooming towards.

Errowyn and her wingman dropped back into the protective cover of the other's defensive measures and gave themselves room to manuever when the engagement finaly happen.

As the course change by the lead pilot towards one of the Enemies' Battleships, tapped into the Heitan's info base and brought up the most current schemitics and stats on the Target, formulating her attack run, letting the others deal with the protective screen of battle pod.

"Wingman," Errowyn called to her wingman, "Just follow my lead and hit where I hit." She smiled feraly as she gave a soft purrrrrr. Knowingly using the others for distraction as she and her wingman punch through and attack the Battlecruiser, scince they carried heavy offensive load with ship busters. "Engage enemy with cannons, save the missiles for the B-ship."

She was in her element...

Akemi looked at the target that Yaeko had chosen for their squadron. Well, looks like our Commander wants to make a statement in a big way. This should prove interesting. She settled in next to Yoshi, and kept a sharp eye out. it would not be long before they were in range of enemy weapons.

Kayo meanwhile was staying close to Anne's Teisatsu. Her wingman had chosen a mostly defensive load so it would be up to Kayo to keep any enemy off her.

-----------------

Yaeko's IFF showed that there were dozens of battlepods staying close to the warships, it was clear to see their mission was to protect the ship from any fighters that tried to get close.

As the Fighting Diamonds continued to close on the Battleship, a squadron of battlepods broke free and moved to intercept. Each of the eight battlepods fired a volley of four missiles towards the Kawarime.

Behind the Diamonds the Emeralds were moving into position to help backup the 21st.

Meanwhile in the region of space, additional fold events were detected as additional ships of the 2XF were dropping into their designated target areas.

Errowyn watched the events unfold on her tactical display as she and her wingman let the others in the squadron to deal with the Battle Pods.

She was itching to get into the fray, but let the others deal with them as the NMX Battle Pods left a gap in the defence of the Battle Cruiser. Glancing at the status of her Kawarime, smiled feraly as she added more speed to her run. "Wingman, Lets go for it!" Maneuvering around the Pods as she armed her anti-ship missiles for launch.

Elisto looked up from his sensors, noting the inbound ordinances. He looked off at his control panel for the wavefront. "Bringing wavefront generator online, jamming enemy missiles," he spoke as he flipped the controls.

Yaeko watched the situation unfold. She was about to order the squadron to engage, but then she noticed Errowyn maneuver to attack the battleship and a friendly squadron fall in behind.

"Thanks for the support Emeralds!" Yaeko called out. "Can you guys handle these guys for us?"

"Affirmative Diamonds, will comply," came the response.

"Thanks Emeralds." Yaeko said before switching comm channels back to the squadron's. "Alright Diamonds, Emeralds have our support. Flank around the battlepods and hit the battleship. Cannons online and ready your missile. Scrapyard, good quick thinking."

The wavefront jamming sent by Elisto caused most of the inbound missiles to malfunction and go wildly off course. Any heading towards NMX objects were destructed. The battlepods started to veer at the group of Diamonds that had broken from the group. When they did the Emeralds cut loose with their cannons. This had the desired effect of destroying multiple battlepods and bringing their attention to the Emeralds.

The Capital ships started exchanging salvos between the NMX and the 2XF ships. The area that the 21st was flying through was a sea of deadly energy, but one that with good piloting they should be able to navigate.