RP: Setareh Wing [Mission Three] A View To A Kill

Zoren had been serving food, minding his own business, serving food... and as soon as he had made his own plate and had moved to sit down, Naak had shook up everything. Mentally Zoren was screaming. "Son of a bitch!!!" He screamed in his head. However, he looked calm, cool, and collected as he drop his plate, shucked his apron and looked to everyone. "Alright! You heard the boss! MOVE OUT!" He boomed in his drill sergeant's voice. With that he took off following quickly behind Naak.

Karuah heard their commander's words and stood up, she was already dry and there was no need to get changed, so she made her way with the others towards the hangar, wearing only her bikini. She did not seem to mind the exposure while walking, either too focused to notice or simply just didn't care. Once she arrived at the pilot lockers she began to get dressed in her link suit, with so little on she could slip the suit right on without any problems.

Dahbi Class Colony
VANDR Bay B-5

With the team assembled, save Rasia Bousaid who was out due to a minor injury, Naak paced the area just in front of them, mulling over the information she had just received.

Finally, she stopped pacing and spoke while looking at her own Erla, "The intel from General Daurjana has led us here. The New Veyrin Republic never expected him to have survived the quayside battle and, if they did, never expected him to leak the information on their next plan of attack to the Commonwealth."

Naak looked to her wing now as he spoke out, "But he did! He did both, to our benefit! We have waited and the time is now that they have chosen to attack. Our sensors indicate they are close. We don't have any time to waste. We will exit the bayon the linear launching system through the electrostatic field after the agridinn bay doors open for us. Then, we will form up with the other VANDR here to protect their colony, about twenty Erla II and twenty Raevr. Our wing will be on this side of the colony, while another ten vandr will be on the opposite side, another ten on the side in between us, and another ten parallel to them. Ten more will be patrolling in between the different groups and will assist where necessary."

She continued on, "Our wing will form a line going to either side of this shutter door we are about to exit, so I want some of you to go left when exiting and stay about twenty meters from the colony and to be about ten meters from the member of the wing closest to you. Keep communication professional, as always." She looked to Akjit as she said this. "Ishtar and I will take up position just in front of the line the rest of the wing will form around the colony."

"Let's head out!" she said after clenching her fist and smiling bravely. She looked each of the members of her wings in the eyes, a twinkle in her own, as she said, "We can do this, as always. We are the Setareh Wing!"

Altair was glad to be by his wings side. And it was good to have a mission he could get behind. Instead of being the aggressors this time, he and his wingmates were fighting to protect the colony. To some people, it might have seemed like a small difference, but to Altair, someone who tried to avoid killing, it eased the burden on his conscience slightly.

Climbing into the Soaring Hawk, Altair was also happy to be back in the air. Shore leave was great, but it was nothing compared to flying. "Hey!" Hawk's ANIOS piped up. "Glad to see you haven't forgotten about me. While you got to stretch your legs out there, I've been cooped up in here.!"

Altair ran through the pre-flight checklists as he casually responded to Hawk. "Nice to see you too. Ready to head out?" After receiving an affirmative from the ANIOS, he walked the VANDR over to the shutter door and spoke over the radio. "Altair here. Soaring Hawk is ready to launch."

How could Akjit make him understand? Or, did Altair understand and was just not conveying it right? This was a matter of life and death! Pacifism, even passively fighting only to defend oneself, or - everyone started to scramble.

Yes. Now he was recalling what Naak had said; it was that time again. Hearing this, the young man awkwardly looked around before simply reaching out to grabbed several more of the skewers of food. Eating them along the way, the scarred Ivuori silently trailed after the group. Waste not, want not. It was simply the most pragmatic thing to do after all. In the end though, this meant that even though he was suited up at the rushed briefing, he was awkwardly holding a few more food skewers than were suitable. More than he could eat before he had to climb into Nightmare and sortie. This meant that when Naak addressed him, he was passing out free food to some of the deck crew.

"Y-yes ma'am!" he saluted, a passing engineer snatching up the kebab from his other hand.

After listening to the instructions Karuah nodded to herself, this would be somewhat complicated due to the nature of having to minimize damage to the colony above all else, but with such large numbers, even if they were met with equal numbers, the defense would be at the advantage in most situations. To add to it Karuah was in good condition this had the potential to be one of the best operations yet.

She climbed into Seid and attached the neural ports, relaxing and letting the cockpit close. "Seid, this time I'm going to need you to add indicators for distance and direction of other members of the wing. This operation calls for a well placed defensive formation." In response to her words the main HUD changed slightly and the indicators were displayed. "Good, also arrange the priorities for incoming projectiles, I want attacks that will hit the colony to be second only to those directed at you." As this information was being processed and algorithms configured, Karuah began her preflight check.

Zoren quickly boarded Enigma and began the startup sequence, leaving the cockpit open to hear Naak's speech. "Alright Enigma, we need to defend this station. Are you ready?" He asked as he nodded to Naak and the others and sealed his cockpit.

"Roger that Doc. All systems are primed and ready to go. What's the big rush?" Enigma replied.

"Enemy combatants are threatening the colony. We need to protect it... We need to protect all the noncombatants on this station with our lives." He said as he continued pre flight checks. "Prep the sniper cannons, we are fight defensively this time." He added

Enigma quickly checked the status of the sniper cannons. "Cannons are ready. Let's go get'em Doc!"

"Pft..."

Getting ignored had left Irfan momentarily mopey, but not incapable. While Ki had gone to prepare to coordinate some of the efforts, she'd followed along and boarded her familiar VANDR. Upward and inward, fastened and started, and finally ready and laughing. Lucidity moved forward and followed the group efforts to spread out defensively. The clawed machine moved a bit slow, her mood returning as she flew her craft.

"Lucy, keep an eye on the boss lady. Same with the other bosses. And track the others. And uh... let's see if we can't spot a time in the defense to show off for Ki~?"

"Oooo~... yes ma'am~! Irfan Song moving to position to get some more kills for my glorious record! And keep the colony safe... totally!"

Space Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

The wing was prepared, now, and lay in wait. Like the last mission, the only thing for them to do was whittle away time in the interim. It didn't take much, though, as soon Naak's VANDR, as well as the rest of the VANDR deployed, picked up movement in front of the grouping to the left of Setareh Wing.

"They're here!" Victory called out to Naak and she, in turn, she spoke out to the wing.

"Keep your formations! The Vanguard is strong and will retain this colony's safety!"

In a moment, though, Setareh Wing picked up mass in front of them, coming out of MASC drive.

Naak said to the bubblegum pink-haired FIOMNI of the wing, "Ishtar, when you get a read on these ships, relay the information to the wing. Drive locations, substructures, vector capabilities, and, most importantly, weapons as you see them."

As the squadron of six ships directly in front of the wing approached them fully, a volley of missiles erupted out of each one. Naak employed a salvo of three anti-missile countermeasures, pausing for two seconds, before emitting another salvo. The impacts from each were explosive and the missiles hit were fully deterred, but there were still twelve missiles shooting towards the colony, if they could get past the wing, first.

"Anti-missile countermeasures, Setareh!" Naak yelled tersely.

Her VANDR held station, floating in the black vastness. Chatter from the Wing filtered in from all sides, and Ishtar monitored it all. The FIOMNI kept to passive scans for the moment as Naak ordered her to relay any pertinent information on the incoming vessels. Yet her immediate concern was the incoming ordinance. It did not really tax her to target and track the remaining missiles, a small tasking of her processing power at worse. At that, her Sensor Pod went into an active sweep.

"Beginning Vector Wave and Subspace Mass scans now. Running the results through my database of New Veyrin Republic materiel."

Karuah had to spend a little time to get used to all the information that Saeid was feeding her, she normally did not like to have her display so cluttered but it was necessary this time, even if it made her feel fenced in. Thankfully it was not till after she had gotten comfortable that the New Veyrin Republic decided to show themselves. THe missiles were an unwelcome addition, but judging by the number of information blips popping up on screen, Saeid was doing the filtering she asked him to properly.

"Saeid, target the missiles in front and fire the Storm Ray array, try to cause a chain reaction of detonations." Karuah spoke with a hint of confidence in her voice, letting her excitement show.

Of course Saeid followed directions perfectly and the VANDR frame fired it's array at the incoming missiles.

Altair deployed the countermeasures as ordered. The missiles were cluttered in with all of the ECM pods fired by Naak, but his ANIOS was able to filter them out and pick out the missiles from the miasma of interference.

He tracked them and opened fire with his shock sting cannons at any missiles that made it through despite the combined efforts of the wing.

Weariness weighed down on Akjit now that the deliciousness was snatched away from him, only for adrenaline to spike the Ivuori's veins as Nightmare's lust for blood grew. This was its break time as much as his own, and interruptions were not appreciated.

Knowing full well that lake shores, swimwear and grilled meat was all waiting for him, the young man launched his VANDR into action at Naak's order. Several salvos of beacon flares went after the enemy missiles, but he didn't stop there - the laser arrays on his Haidan came to life as the point defense system made to pick them off. What the enemy was doing was reprehensible, attacking the colony, but so long as they were here, there would be none of that.

Simply too much was at stake.

Zoren sat in the cockpit of Enigma with his arms crossed, and his eyes as he waited... He was quickly awoken by an emergency warning. "Doc, the enemy is here! Multiple missiles are inbound..." Enigma added.

"This is Enigma... Engaging." Zoren said over the channel, before he launched his own countermeasures. "Target the missiles and fire our own." He ordered.

"Roger that Doc." Enigma replied. His HUD quickly filled with targeting information for the missiles and Zoren smiled. He pulled the trigger and launched a massive salvo of Star Locust missiles.

He primed his sniper cannon, preparing for the counter attack.

Space Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

Eruptions could be seen in front of the wing as the missiles were downed by their counter offenses. The explosions alighted the darkness of space and there was a gleam in Naak's eyes as she watched.

Zoren's Star Locusts destroyed two missiles while Saied's Storm Ray Array hit three. Altair's Shock String Cannons ended the trajectory of two and Akjit's combined Beacon Flares and Laser Array got four missiles down. The remaining missile was aimed to hit the colony and pounded into it, pummeling a small segment of the edge.

"We can't let them get through!" Naak said. Noticing all but some members had come to the colony's aid, she said, "Sanjaya, Ekia, Irfan! I need you awake for this!"

Then came a second wave of attack from the ships as their laser arrays that were focused on the colony. Ekia let herself be the first struck, Rebirth taking the hit for her.

"There has to be a better way," Naak said, gritting her teeth. "Let the station take the hits from the lasers and hold formation, firing at the enemy ships while they're in our sights!"

Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

The pops and deadly sparkles of counter-measures being used had Irfan's eyes sparkling a bit as it fed the display information to her. The woman's Haidan lurched a bit forward, however, as she was called for a moment later. It zoomed just a hair ahead of its old position, at least in scale to the void, before she re-adjusted and reaffirmed her position in their defensive line. More specifically, she knew that staying back would put them at a disadvantage against these ships. Lucidity raised its arms forward toward one of the closest ships, knowing she'd need to employ the tactic at a closer range to ensure they had little reaction time. The ignition of missiles fluttered around the forearms as the missile tubes half of her payload, taking all but a second to release a dual salvo from either hand, and putting her Star Adders to work.

"On it, boss lady! Just lemme at 'em!"

Scrappy as she was, the missiles were far from alone... angling her shoulders and silently thumping out thirty-six of the small mortars as she turned her craft into a walking death machine. The mortars would likely deal minimal damage unless they all connected, but her hope was to draw the ships into a panic with the sudden cloud of ordinance now filling the void between her section of the defensive line.

Space Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

Due to the tracking priorities that Karuah had set, she was able to notice the incoming barrage of beams and attempted to make a move to get between them and the colony to defend it. Saeid however was thinking much further ahead and offered a change of action before she could make her move thanks to the neural connection. A smile formed across the pilot's lips as she realized what her frame was planning.

"Oh you're so cheeky Saeid." Karuah chuckled and then went through with the plan.

The first few beams connected, but thankfully the captain ordered them to prioritize removal of the ships, so she hoped that she would not get scolded for her hesitation. She made her moves to make up for it however and fired off a salvo of star locust missile, not at the ships but at the course of their wave of shots, using a timed detonation to place a cloud if charged particles in their path and dissipate the beams.

Space Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

Zoren continued his barrage of star locust missiles, keeping the enemy missiles at bay." "Doc, we have to do something!" Enigma said to Zoren as he fired away at the missiles.

"Couldn't have said it better myself." He replied. As he heard Naak's orders, he shifted his sniper fire towards the ships, while his missiles and chaff took out the missiles. He shook his head. As good as they were doing, he needed to do more. He opened a private line to Naak. "Boss, let me go in.They won't be able to touch me in ARMS mode. I can get us better scans of the ships." He added.

The Database turned up a hit. It was the very same flat, rectangular designed craft which had come close to saturating Mazern's atmosphere with cobalt-salted fusion weapons before her prior ship, the Astarte had even left the homesystem years ago. Essentially it was one huge missile platform.

"You have a choice to make, Lanranr. I have encountered this type of vessel before. It is a huge, mobile missile platform. The last time it was encountered was AR 937, where one came close to ruining Mazerin's atmosphere with fusion warheads salted with cobalt. We narrowly defeated it by utilizing my ship, the Astarte's PWAC launchers to create an effective area of denial attack. The range of its weapons during that time necessitated a Geo-synchronous orbit."

Space Outside of the Dahbi Class Colony

One. One missile had made it through.

What felt like a leaden ball sunk in Akjit's stomach as he heard Ishtar's assessment - they needed to stop a missile bombardment ship?! The sheer number of projectiles it could unleash might be too much to stop, even if they focused entirely on intercepting. But not only that, their own countermeasures were limited; it'd come down to who ran out first if they played that game, and that ship was bound to win. Following Naak's orders, Akjit shifted his fire towards the enemy vessels and let loose with his heavy weapons; this was something that was best nipped in the bud.

"Lanranr Behea, should we close in with the enemy vessels?" he asked her, holding formation as she had ordered.