Chapter 28

[Day of Mars Base Battle: 1210] 

Once I recovered a bit, I started a maintenance examination on Raven. There didn't seem to be much point to it. The techs had already checked him better than I could after my last patrol mission, but I still felt safer if I checked everything myself. Finding nothing wrong with any of the external systems, I climbed into the cockpit and ran a thorough systems diagnostics program. 

While it was running, I sat back in my seat and looked out over the hangar deck. The nighthawks' technicians were all moving about on one errand or another, making minor adjustments and repairs to most of the Valkyries in the squadron. I saw David run back onto the deck and join the rest of his flight. Sergeant Nielsen was speaking to an officer from the Ops department, and, with a brief glance around, he pointed in my direction. The officer came jogging in my direction. 

As he reached Raven, he cautiously looked over its black feathered and beaked paint job. "Commander Landers? I've got a message from Ops." 

"Just a second," I called. The diagnostics had just finished, but they were clear. When I finished cycling through the list, I jumped down from the cockpit and took the paper he handed me. He saluted and left quickly, acting as if he were afraid of me. 

I looked at the note. It was a set of orders, changing my squadron's flight schedule for the day. We were all being assigned to close perimeter patrol and support for the duration of the resupply procedure. "Great. Wonderful. I wonder how in the world we were chosen for this job. How come they didn't assign the great and wonderful Skull squadron to it?" 

I asked Sergeant Nielsen the same questions, and he answered, "Because our pilots are all already here or in the ready room. The message you sent each of us this morning did that. And Skull squadron isn't running the close perimeter because they're already on the outer one." 

"Oh. I understand. I suppose it'd be even more boring than our job." I nodded and turned to head for the ready room. 

"Or more dangerous," Nielsen added as I walked away. 


[1235] 

My pilots took it well. They'd been half expecting to be called out onto the field today, anyway. They were just going out sooner than expected. 

I discussed the flight arrangements with Nielsen and O'Connell as we pulled our flight gear from our lockers, and we decided that Delta Flight would cover the flight deck while Theta and Alpha flights would run the upper and lower portions of the close perimeter, and that we'd alternate positions at 1500 and 1700. Then we separated to tell each of our flights the plan. 

I found them out at our planes and called them over. Once we were all together, I explained, "Alright, guys. We're covering ground level for the close perimeter until 1500. Then we'll change to air cover and then deck. Izi, I want your wing to cover the starboard side, forward and stern. We'll take port. Everyone understand? Good. Lets go." 

From there on, it was all standard military procedure: Hurry up and wait. I spent the next couple of hours standing in battloid mode with nothing to do but watch the destroids deploy and listen to the wings chatter on their radios. 


[1410] 

I was watching one of our radar planes flying slowly around the outer perimeter when a beam of light lanced from a ridge it was flying over and destroyed it. 

Nielsen's voice came over the commo, "Mother of God! Did you see that?" 

"Yes I did, Nielsen. This bodes not well." I opened my send frequency a bit and announced, "Black squadron, prepare for an enemy attack. I repeat, prepare for an enemy attack." 

Nielsen spoke up again, "Black Leader, I see enemy units approaching from Twelve to six o'clock." 

Marshall called in too, "They're all over the other side too, Kay." 

I cursed under my breath, "We're surrounded, then." Then, louder, "All units, extend the perimeter. We can't let them get to the fortress. Move!" Then, changing to gerwalk, I launched up and away from the SDF-1. It didn't take me long to spot the approaching pods, and it didn't take long for them to start taking pot shots at us. 

"Alright, guys. Break and attack. Fight 'em back." <Rah Rah Rah> I found and targeted the battle pods that carried missiles and the officer's pods. Then I launched a missile at as many as I could, while directing Perry, Walker, and McArthur to cover the rest. We smeared most of the missile pods from extreme range, but the most of the officers survived with minimal or no damage. 

We dodged and weaved our way through the incoming barrage of fire, the enemy's accuracy was, fortunately suffering from the extreme range. Unfortunately, their fire started getting too close before we came into range ourselves. "Okay boys. Let's stop making targets of ourselves. Hit the ground running and find some cover. We'll wait for them here." I dropped my altitude and changed to battloid mode. The moment I touched down, I moved as fast as I could to cover. 

The radio was crackling with launch instructions as other squadrons were taking off to join us. <Thank god for that. There's no way we'd be able to fight these guys off ourselves.> I raised Raven's head up from the rock I was hiding behind. There were too many pods headed in our direction, and they were still out of range. I brought Raven's head lasers about and lased long bursts at as many pods as I could. I knew I couldn't possibly hope to hit anything and do damage at this range, but they might slow their advance and keep their heads down. 

A mayday signal crackled over my radio, "Mayday, Mayday. This is VT-205 to any Veritech. We are under attack. I repeat, we are-" The rest of his message was static. 

The origin point wasn't too far from my position, and I figured my wing was probably the closest. I answered it. "This is Black leader, we copy VT-205." An beam nearly took Raven's head off, and I ducked behind the rock again. "Hang tough, we're coming." 

The voice came back, "Kay? Better hurry, I'm losing here." The voice was suddenly familiar. 

"What the...?" That was Thallin! "What are you doing out here?" 

He answered, sounding harried, "No time to explain. I need help, NOW!" He grunted and I heard another voice moaning softly in the background. 

Then Izabelle's voice crackled onto the radio, "Thallin?" She sounded as surprised as I was. "Thallin!" 

Thallin didn't respond. 

<Great. Just great.> "Alright, Alpha wing. We've got to go save that ass hole. Perry, you cover us as we break. GO!" 

Once Perry popped up and sprayed the approaching pods with his GU-11, I made a run across the landscape, dodging madly, and hoped I would make it to the nearest cover before my Valkyrie was shot out from under me. I sprayed any battle pods I could see, but the range was still extreme. Once I made it to cover, I provided cover fire for the others. When Perry saw that I was providing cover, he made his own run across the landscape. He didn't make it. One of the remaining missile pods launched a volley at his Veritech and hit with every one. When the smoke cleared, it was obvious that he couldn't have survived. 

I closed my eyes against the sight and McArthur swore into his microphone. There was nothing we could do. 

Thallin's signal had come from our left off in the direction of the enemy. If he was still alive, he wouldn't be for long. We advanced a couple of times, with more success, until I saw Thallin's unarmed trainer. It was diving straight at the ground in gerwalk. Straight at a cluster of battle pods. 

Just as the pods were about to fire on his mecha, a black Valkyrie battloid tackled his and shielded him from the blasts. It was Izabelle's Veritech, the only other black fighter in my squadron. Her Veritech shielded his with its own armour and gave us just enough time to charge into range. A few quick bursts from our weapons dispatched the battle pods, but it was almost too late for Izi's Veritech. Much of its armour had burned away, and the machinery underneath was slagged. 

"You guys make sure nobody surprises us. I'll check on these two." We ran up to the disabled pair of Valkyries and, while the others kept watch, I pulled Izi's black battloid away from Thallin's gerwalk. "Izi? You okay in there?" 

"Yes, Commander Landers. There is some heavy systems damage, but my Veritech will still function. As for my personal condition, I am fine. Is Thallin still alive? My visual pickups are dead." 

"He should be alright. I'll find out in a moment. But you get your ass back to the SDF." As she changed to gerwalk mode, I signaled to Walker, "Walker, you go back with her, and if there are any planes to spare, get her in one and back out here. If not, come out on your own." 

"Yes, Commander." 

I turned back to Thallin's trainer. It had been badly holed, and apparently his radio was no longer functioning. I really wanted to know why the hell he was out here, so I knelt down and put one of my external audio relays to his canopy. "I OUGHT TO KILL YOU MYSELF!" I screamed. I managed to restrain myself quite well, in fact. 

He replied calmly, "Hello Kay. Nice to see you." What audacity! 

"Don't you 'Hello Kay' me! First I hear your mayday call, next thing I know, Izi's throwing herself in front of three pods doing full barrage." I thought to myself, <Not that I wouldn't have done the same thing. I would have been firing back at the pods, though.>"Is she OK?" 

"I just sent her back to the ship. Her Veritech is shot." 

He groaned audibly and continued, "Well then, we'll be on our way. Wouldn't want to interrupt your party." 

"Thallin, I swear, if you get out of this one alive, I'm going to track you down and punch your lights out. Now git! We're falling back." I stood up and pointed back at the SDF-1, waving the trainer in that direction. Thallin righted his gerwalk and flew back in the direction of the fortress. I turned to McArthur, "You heard me, right? There's no way we can hold out here until the others can catch up." 

"Sir. While you were communicating with the trainer, I received a general order to retreat. Everyone's pulling back to the fortress." 

"Damn. Alright, move back then. We'll cover each other until we find someone else to join with." 

McArthur ran to the nearest cover in the direction of the SDF-1 while I kept an eye out for enemy pods. Then he covered me as I ran past him to the next patch of cover. We destroyed a dozen pods and an enemy fighter as it tried to strafe us. We found a couple of wrecked Valkyries too. None showed any signs of life. We grabbed their gun pods and did our best to survive. 

We saw no one else until we were a kilometre away from the fortress. A couple of battloids from red squadron were dragging their commander's wrecked gerwalk. He was still alive, and, according to their reports, the rest of their squadron was either dead or ahead of them. 

"This isn't good. We're getting creamed out here. How come the SDF hasn't taken off yet?" 

"Apparently neither the gravity engines or the main thrusters are working. They can't get it off the ground." 

"What are we gonna do?" 

"We're gonna hold these buggers off as long as we can, and we're gonna hope Gloval has a few tricks left up his sleeve." 

Right then, the ground quaked violently. Moments later we heard a terrible explosion from the direction of Mars base. The radio was dead quiet for a moment, and then crackled back to life as people started talking again. The primary and most excitable subject was that the SDF-1 was finally lifting off. 

I turned and looked back at the fortress, and I saw it lifting slowly into the air with its gravitic engines. "Yes! That's what we needed guys! Get up to the Prometheus. We don't wanna be left behind!" 

We changed to gerwalk mode and lifted, by concerted effort, Red leader's Valkyrie up into the air. That was a mistake. Our cluster of Veritechs made such a wonderful and tempting target to the enemy that almost none in the area could resist. In the resulting onslaught, McArthur's and Red Two's Valkyries were holed badly, Red Five was destroyed outright, and I lost both my arms. We all lost our grip on Red leader, who fell back to the ground. 

The three of us that remained blasted our afterburners in a race to to the Prometheus and for our lives. McArthur didn't make it. He had his engines blown from beneath him and fell to his death. There was nothing I could do about it. All I could do was fly away and try to survive myself. 

I hit the deck of the Prometheus screaming bloody murder. My instruments were blowing sparks, smoke was filling the cockpit, and several fires were blazing from the holes in my Veritech. I pulled the fire control cord and did my best to walk Raven out of the way of others trying to land. It was still functioning well enough to do that, but not for long. 

I shut down the power when I couldn't move anymore, closed my helmet against the atmosphere, and forced the canopy open. From there, I had to jump fifteen feet to the deck, and I landed badly. I laid where I had landed on the flight deck, breathing heavily and looking up at Raven's black beak. Raven was still burning in a few places, but the noxious and thin atmosphere put them out quickly. 

After a moment, I pulled myself to my feet and looked around. The flight crew was working overtime, trying to get as many Valkyries landed and stowed as they could as quickly as they could, so they ignored me as I limped across the deck to one of the flight elevators and rode it down. No one payed much attention as I staggered across the hangar deck and into the airlock leading to the ready rooms. Only a single pair of eyes turned as I collapsed unconscious onto one of the couches there and didn't move. 


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