Earth II v.5.0 [Short Story Index]

by **Earth_ Two** » Sun Mar 04, 2018 8:53 am

Earth II
The Earth II Short Story Index

Welcome to The Earth II Short Story Index, which is to be a collection of short stories written in, about, around, and/or focusing on the nations of the Earth II Community. If you are not a member of Earth II please do not post in this thread. However, please take the time to read our works. If you are interested in what you see, we invite you to learn about our community and submit an application.

The main requirements for our thread is that each story be strictly in-character (IC), it should be limited to short stories only (as defined as one post), it should not include news posts (as we have a thread for this), and it should contain the appropriate tags as defined below.

Do not let length be a hindrance to you and write to your heart's content. Write the themes important and central to your nation. Creativity is highly encouraged and feel free to spruce up the presentation of your posts.

If you're writing a mature story (carrying sex, strong or gratuitous violence, gore, or extremely questionable moral themes [abortion, rape, etc.]), please add a mature tag to the header of your post:

Tags
Please use this tag to indicate whether the post you are writing has taken place in the Past, the Present, or the Future:

Code: Select all: [align=center][size=150][b][[color=#BF0000] INSERT_TIME_HERE [/color]][/b][/size][/align]

If you're writing a mature story (carrying sex, strong or gratuitous violence, gore, and/or extremely questionable moral themes), please add a mature tag to the header of your post:

Code: Select all: [align=center][size=150][b][[color=#BF0000] Mature [/color]][/b][/size][/align]

Please also put this at the bottom of each of your posts to assist with navigation:

Code: Select all: [align=right][url=https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?p=33582550#p33582550]Return to Introduction[/url] [url=https://forum.nationstates.net/viewtopic.php?p=33582552#p33582552]Return to Contents[/url][/align]

Helpful Links

by **Earth_ Two** » Sun Mar 04, 2018 8:54 am

The Earth II Short Story Index
Table of Contents

Itailian Maifias
- Pakistan Part I: The Worn Battlefield
- Pakistan Part II: Bloody Trails

by **Itailian Maifias** » Mon Mar 05, 2018 6:35 am

[ Past ]

[ Mature ]

The Worn Battlefield
Lance Corporal Lynn Francis
A Company, 2nd Battalion, South Essex Regiment/Prince of Wales Own
Hilltop southwest of Besham City, Northern Frontierlands
Territory of Pakistan, British Empire (34°55'26.60"N, 72°51'17.44"E)
April 7, 2016; 0745 Hrs, Local Time

The sun was just finishing its ascent into the early morning sky, rising high so to let its uncountable rays spread across the earth and enlighten all, especially sending glares across the tops of the vehicles of 3rd Platoon, A Company, the detachment of British soldiers from the outpost some kilometers to the west that had been sent here to aid the local police.

Much as the rest of the lands, this new day heralded yet another one spent in a time of great change and some unrest in Pakistan, all of it kicked off by the invasion and later conquest by the British in 2014; the war was far more brutal to the country's people and infastructure then either side had initially realized and also the integration efforts as Pakistan was incorporated as yet another piece of the Empire found many new changes wrought across the land; new local governments at every level, new administrative divisions, courts, police, and of course rebuilding. The populace wasn't also thrilled with the idea of no longer being a sovereign country and while this wasn't the over-riding emotion, it was still a very present sentiment in the Pakistani society and was something that caused much of what British military authorities initially labelled "insurrectionist troubles" following the official annexation of the country in the concluding months of 2014. Unrest had been expected as a new form of government was implemented, the fiat military control was slowly being ceded to a entirely local government. The southern parts of the country were perhaps the smoothest to accept the new government, new laws and new police, perhaps because of the heavy military presence in the south or the heavy concentration of the urban centers who were filled with businessmen eager at the prospects of the newly widened, and much more substantial, economy available to them however the north had always proved troublesome to control.The military resisted yielding control of the districts as the civilian government took over throughout the other parts of the country, with commanders insisting that the Central National Police (CNP) finish getting itself established as a properly trained, equipped, manned, and reputable organization before attempting to police the harsher terrain, and people of the north. Despite local political blowback over the Army's demands, the CNP slowly gained ground and expertise as it established itself thoroughly throughout the country. The way it was organized was in a simple, bureaucratic inspired fashion; they were the official national police of the Territory of Pakistan, which was the legal nomenclature for the former country as a singular unit, and they would establish divisions across the country. Typically, for cities it would be one division per city and then that division would have however many stations, or precincts, as needed but sometimes in more rural areas the divisions would be much more encompassing. The CNP was also equipped and manned as a first world police force; focused on enforcing the law and patrolling its territories as a police unit, not a second army. This was intentional, as British authorities wanted the Pakistani people at large to feel like normality was being restored, which is hard to achieve when armored vehicles are daily roving around the streets of Karachi, and it was also important to get a local police force manned by their own people out and in the public's eye of perception; no foreign invaders scaring you inside your homes but rather your friendly, neighborhood police there to stop speeders and crack down on criminals.

By the summer of 2015, thanks to some high profile cases involving smugglers from Asian markets being apprehended and their rings dismantled by the CNP, the police gained enough political clout to make the Army slowly begin handing over formal control of the northern territories to the civilian government. Peshewar, Abbotabad, and Mardan were all handed over in an elaborate, public ceremony a day after the summer solstice and surrounding regions soon joined them by the passing weeks and days, mostly once the Army was fully satisfied that CNP was in a position to assume control; unique to this part of the country, there was ever-mounting concern that tribals from the Tribal and Northern Areas, such as Kashmir and such, would begin an insurrectionist force that would attempt to terrorize the population, or take control of property out right. Army control itself even mostly ended just north of the city of Mingora at the feet of the Hindu Kush slopes, with the Army lacking the manpower and political will to be dragged into a close quarters or prolonged conflict across the mountainous terrain. Combat operations had been waged in the northern territories during the war and units were sent to every known city and settlement to clear or capture any remaining Pakistani Army units, but once the war ended, only sparse land patrols mostly on a "presence establishment" mission ever wandered north, though the RAF did frequently conduct patrols, either manned or unmanned.

By the end of 2015, as the new year dawned, the entirety of Pakistan had been formally handed over to the Territorial Government, though the military would remain in what was being termed "prolonged stabilization mission" mode until 2017, per an agreement signed between the Ministry of Defence, the Territorial Government, and the CNP. Per the agreement, Army units would remain on their base and would only rove "outside the wire" to help in roles akin to specialist ones in cooperation with the CNP or other agencies of the civilian government. Typically, they would be employed in more rural areas for wide sweeping patrols, compensating for where CNP lacked the manpower, and also sometimes being granted "deputy status" and conducting patrols in the northern areas, but for the most part, peace time fell upon the land by and large again.

It was on one of these cooperation missions that Lynn Francis and his twenty four fellow soldiers in 3rd platoon found themselves stationed in and around Besham City, which was a slightly average sized settlement in northern Pakistan, approximately two hundred kilometers north east of Peshewar. The reason for excitement today was that the CNP was officially opening its station in the city, and was concerned about encountering some local resistance had there had been some protests-nearing-riot recently in response to the lack of infrastructure upgrades, something that the government had been advertising heavily but had only really been implemented in the southern, heavily populated regions. So, Lynn and his rifle platoon had been sent out from Outpost Frisia, which sat some seventy kilometers to the northwest, to aid the CNP detachment with the opening of the station. Officially, there would be a public ceremony held in the center of the city by the Station Commander as well as the local elder or equivalent, announcing the formal opening of the station, and cover some public information. Technically, CNP had men in the settlement for the last few months who ran security on the construction site of the station, but today the full detachment of a dozen or so officers would be moving in.

The ceremony was set to begin at 9 AM in local time, and Sergeant McMahon had deployed most of his men inside the settlement, taking position atop of rooftops or establishing checkpoints on the road; however, Lynn and his fireteam of five had been deployed atop of a hilltop to the south west to provide over watch on the settlement, and also on the two highways feeding into the southern and eastern limits of the city. Typically, Lynn would command a fire team of himself, a grenadier, a marksmen and two riflemen however for today, McMahon had ordered him to ensure his riflemen, Vinson and Allen, kitted out with MG4s to allow for the team to be more effective at suppression fire missions if needed, though Lynn doubted it; he was a veteran of the initial invasion, serving throughout the entirety of the fighting and and this was his, and his regiments, second deployment to the country. He was thinking through which MRE to eat from his stash back at his bunk on the outpost as he was finished drinking out of a water bottle inside their patrol car which was parked on the hilltop with them, and he finished his drink before returning it to his pack which was sitting on the floor in the back, and then picked up his SIG rifle and began walking over to the ridge line where the other members of his team were scanning the horizon, all of them in the prone position which Lynn also took up, laying flat on the terrain and carefully looking through the optical sights on his rifle as he scanned the central part of the village. "Anyone see anything?"

"Small crowd starting to form along the stage they got set up for the speech, and a lot of our boys and the redhats. "

Vinson spoke back, putting sarcastic emphasis on the slang word for the new national police force, deriving from the distinctive deep red ballcaps they wore, and their penchant to use the color as their defining one, instead of the traditional police blue.

Lynn smiled "Well, looks like this morning is shaping up to be yet another boring day watching the redhats backs. Allen, you wanna trade me something for my tacos MRE when we get back, I'm tired of eating them."

"You're tired of eating them, and we're tired of smelling you afterwards. Just don't eat it and I'll pay you with one of my dried beef ones just so I don't have to hear Corporal Sutton whine about how the latrine smells again for hours."

Lynn chuckled "If only McMahon used those like a normal human, that would be sweet revenge for all the shit we have to put up with from him, pun intended. "

A sardonic reply came from Moore, their lone marksmen who was keeping a diligent eye on the eastern road leading into the settlement "Now Corporal Francis, you wouldn't be daring to mock our ever noble and illustrious sergeant would you?"

"Never, he's our Savior and Sergeant out here in the wild north."

The back and forth between the units would continue for a few moments as the men would casually discuss the NCOs they hated, the ones they didn't like and the few they did, as well as how they were all eagerly looking forward to three weeks from now when they would be rotated to JFB Kirkwood, which sat squarely in between Peshewar and Islamabad and was the largest base in northern Pakistan, however most importantly to Lynn and his fellow troopers; it would have a proper mess hall and hot showers.

The idle chatter would be broken up by a radio transmission from a gruff voice everyone in the platoon automatically knew, and groaned at, Sergeant McMahon's. "Eagle 3 Actual to Eagle 3-4, how do the roads look and sitrep, over."

Lynn rolled his eyes and replied quickly "Eagle Actual, Eagle 3-4, only visitors on the roads this fine morning are just your typical high grade tribal dust and critters. Eastern and southern approaches are empty, nothing visible in town except the for civvies starting to gather at the stage, over."

"Eagle 3-4, Eagle Actual, roger that, be sure to keep one LSW per road approach, just in case things go FUBAR, out."

"Eagle Actual, wilco, out."

Lynn rolled his left wrist over and checked the time on his watch, noting that it read eight fifteen and that would mean they had just under an hour until the ceremony got under way and he then resumed his watch through his optics, knowing that if any attack were to happen or some form of surprise protest or riot, they would commit it just before the start time when the most amount of people had gathered; which, considering the settlement had a total population of several hundred citizens, could be a very egregious assault. As he scanned the western flank of the town once more, his sights passing over a lone British soldier patrolling the river bank where the town met the small river, and then crossing a flock of civilians that had left their residences and were walking towards the crowd that had gathered when he heard Moore speak out "Hey Corporal, eyes forward, bearing 47, I got a white truck followed by a beige cargo van driving slow and heading towards the town."

Lynn shifted his rifle to the left and rolled onto his side slightly, looking through his optics but having a hard time making out a definitive look at what Moore was calling out, obscured by the range, so he pulled his rangefinder out of his patrol bag on his back and scanned the bearing that Moore had called out, finding the two vehicles as he had described them and moving slow, no more then twenty miles per hour. "I see them Moore, Allen you got them on your scope?"

"I do, got a range for me?"

Lynn paused and then used his device to get a range "Little over a click out, you could possibly clip them if need be, but Moore make sure you get your eyes trained on. I'm gonna zoom in and see if I can make out anyone."

Before he could, Moore updated the situation "I got eyes on the driver, middle aged man with a dark beard with a wrap on his head. Can't make out anything in the passenger seat but I'm getting some kind of flash."

Lynn zoomed in as much as he could "Looks like a receiver of a weapon possibly, but I can't see anyone besides the driver of either vehicle. I'm going to alert McMahon."

"Eagle 3-4 to Eagle Actual, priority alert, over."

"Eagle 3-4, send traffic, over."

"Eagle Actual, be advised we have two vehicles entering the AO coming southbound on N35, approximately a click plus out. We have visuals on the drivers of both vehicles, but can not determine anyone else at this range. Possible ID on a weapon receiver in the passenger seat of the truck, can not make PID until closer, over."

"Eagle 3-4, acknowledged, we got two rifles at the northern entrance who I'll alert to stop and search, keep us updated as they get closer, out."

"Alright, Moore, the minute you see something new let me know. Allen, keep your sights trained on them just in case we need to open up."

Yates, the grenadier, called out from his position "Who the heck drives so slow into town and isn't a tango? Do you drive up to the local grocer going ten? No, only toweldicks with VBIEDs do that, especially these shitty cars. Frames can't handle the weight."

Lynn replied "True, or it could just be one strange mofo. We certainly see plenty of those, and besides, we can't engage until we get PID on a hostile element, or a explosive. So just stay peeled and be ready to go active."

The next few moments dragged themselves out at an agonizingly slow rate, when after just two minutes of silence, the radio squawked to life "Eagle 3-4, Eagle Actual, come in, over."

"Eagle Actual, go ahead, over."

"Eagle 3-4, change in plans regarding our northern tourists. I briefed the CPN boots and they don't want the vehicles entering the town, just to be on the safe side, so they're sending some of their grunts up to wave the vehicles to park on the side of the road outside of the town's limits. Have your DMR keep his fingers ready in case he needs to provide fire support, over."

"Eagle Actual, interrogative, is there an update to briefing ROEs at this time, over."

"Eagle 3-4, same as before, you do not engage without PID on a confirmed hostile or weapon, however if CPN forces are engaged you are cleared to provide supportive measures, over."

"Eagle Actual, copy your last, wilco, out."

"Alright, Moore and Allen stay ready, you'll be the best options to initiate contact if we have to, rest of you get ready to repostion if need be as well, redhats could need us here."

"When don't they." Came the sarcastic remark from Vinson as the group shuffled in their prone positions, and audible clicks could be heard as the safeties were switched off on the weapons as everyone readied themselves. Lynn re-positioned himself to lay more northernly and then trained his optic back on the northern road, searching for the CPN boots and found them, a trio of officers that had departed from the stage and walking north. He then looked upwards towards the limits of the town and saw two British soldiers who had been set up and were aimed at the oncoming vehicles, one in position behind a wall facing the north and the other inside of a house positioned in a northern facing window that was now opened. He watched carefully as the officers slowly made their way up the road, walking yet moving in a tight formation and at a steady pace. By the time they reached the end of the town limits, the vehicles were less then five hundred meters from them having just come around a curve in the road and were now on a straight approach to the town. He saw one of the officers pull out a bullhorn and presumably began using it as it was now raised to the man's face, and Lynn shifted slightly as the vehicles continued to move onward with no change in route despite instructions from the officers. "Moore, you make anything else out?"

"The van has its side windows blocked with something, a curtain perhaps. Otherwise, no."

"Alright, just stay alert."

After twenty seconds, the vehicles were now inside of 400 meters of the town limits and Lynn could make out that the CPN officer had now readied their weapons, despite the third officer continuing what Lynn could only assume was more strict instructions through the bullhorn. Just as he was about to radio down to McMahon, he noticed the lead truck slightly swerve and then watched as the two vehicles moved to the left of the road, moving to park on the shoulder of it. "Alright, here we go. Moore, if they demand he opens the side door on that van, be ready to hit it if hostiles are in it."

"You mean I we can't shoot IEDs?"

The joke went unanswered as everyone was too focused on the situation at hand, though Lynn suddenly became mindful of the other areas of overwatch responsibility "Vinson, Yates, how do the east and south look? "

"Looking clear as they were before, only action right now is with these two trucks."

"Alright, keep your weapons focused on the other paths though, this could be a diversion and I don't want to be caught unaware."

"Eagle Actual, be advised that CPN forces appear to have gotten the vehicles to stop and they are now parked on the shoulder of the road, approximately 330 meters out from town limits, over."

"Eagle 3-4, remain vigilant on overwatch, out."

"Francis, I got movement on the truck, the driver has exited!"

Lynn retrained his rifle and noticed indeed that the bearded man had now exited his vehicle and was slowly moving to come around the front of it towards the officers, who were now gingerly approaching the two vehicles with weapons readied. "Moore, get ready to neutralize him if he pulls out a weapon, Allen stay focused on the van."

The next forty seconds of what would happen would seem on recollection like it all happened in just one, but right after Lynn refocused his soldiers, the back doors of the van would swing open and two men would come out of them quickly, one of them with a rifle of some type and the other with portable rocket launcher. Before either him or his men could say a word or do an action, the first man with a rifle fired off a number of rounds at the officers, and one of them went down to the ground seemingly injured or dead.

"Shit, shit, PID on hostiles, engage!"

Lynn screamed it out and even before he finished his sentence, gunfire had broken out as Moore fired off rounds from his marksman's rifle at the RPG wielder and Allen unleashed burst fire towards the driver of the truck who had appeared with a pistol as he came from behind the truck and aimed it towards the officers. The RPG-armed hostile crumpled to the ground dead before he could complete a shot, but the driver of the truck got off a few rounds before gunfire from the two British troops on the ground and the CPN officer eliminated him. As he crumpled to the ground, the incredibly brief silence was shattered as a eye blinding flash filled the optics of Lynn and all of his men as what was once the van erupted in one fiery explosion, sending fire, dirt, smoke and charred metal flying into the sky.

"Eagle Actual, we just had a VBIED in the van detonate due north of the town. Hostiles did emerge from both vehicles and engaged CPN elements, at this time, all three hostiles have been eliminated, unknown status on CPN units at this time over."

"Eagle 3-4, I'm sending our boys up to recover the redhats, have your grenadier get on your vehicles turret and be ready to blast anything that tries to enter this town, over."

"Yates, get your ass on the fifty double time!"

The grenadier sprung up from his prone position and ran towards the armored vehicle, opening the rear left door and climbing inside and then into the turret well, yanking back on the charging handle of the heavy machine gun and then rotating it towards the eastern road into the valley. "Francis, I got more vehicles coming in on the eastern road, moving much faster then the first two!"

As Lynn and his men repositioned to get visuals on three quick moving civilian trucks that were roaring towards the town, he tried to get a radio call off but was cut off as the sound of automatic gun fire came from the town and then a radio call came towards him "Eagle 3-4 this is Actual, be advised the eastern checkpoint has been engaged by hostile ground elements. Have your vehicle provide fire support but keep a sharp eye on the other approaches, I do not wish to be flanked."

"Eagle Actual, read you 5 by 5 on your last, wilco, out."

"Alright, Yates, focus your fire on the hostiles on the eastern road, Allen and Moore you as well. Vinson keep an eye on the south in case of a flanking attempt."

Lynn got up from his prone position and moved to be in front of their vehicle, the MG on it manned by Yates loudly belching out bursts of fire on the enemy down below and Lynn took up a position, stationary on a lone knee, as he trained his optics on the battle below and saw a number of men he did not recognize running around with rifles, attempting to take cover from the fire coming from the checkpoint. As soon as he trained his sights on one of the men, he began pulling the trigger, and he could hear in the back of his head that he recognized the sound of Moore's rifle and Allen's automatic machine gun going off with trained precision. The hostiles below were caught in a trap, unable to effectively counter the fire coming at them from two directions and the strength of the eastern checkpoint, initially just a single fireteam stationed behind sandbags, was bolstered as CPN forces arrived to reinforce them.

After approximately five minutes, the amount of gunfire grew measurably lower as the hostiles were downed with increasing rate and soon Lynn stopped firing, and after a few moments began shouting over for his team to halt fire. "Moore, got any eyes on anything hostile?"

A few moments of brief silence as everyone in the team, not just Moore, scanned the road, the three bullet-ridden and disabled trucks, the terrain and asphalt strewn with bodies, some of them so badly riddled with bullets that the riddled flesh was even visible to Lynn at his significant distance and height from the battlefield. "Eagle 3-4 to Eagle Actual, all hostiles appear to be neutralized at this time, over."

"Eagle 3-4, similar reports from the checkpoint confirm this. I want you and your men to get back down to the town, we're going pull security while CPN secures the scenes before we head RTB, over."

"Eagle Actual, wilco. Interrogative, any clue who these guys were, that was a lot of ordinance for some disgruntled tribals."

"Eagle 3-4, I have the same knowledge you do. Hopefully, our friendly CPN officers will be sharing, or MI6 will be better. Now double time it down here."

by **Itailian Maifias** » Sat Mar 10, 2018 4:47 am

[ Past ]

[ Mature ]

Bloody Trails
Lance Corporal Lynn Francis
A Company, 2nd Battalion, South Essex Regiment/Prince of Wales Own
Approaching Pattan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
Territory of Pakistan, British Empire (35° 6'36.10"N 73° 0'29.74"E)
April 14, 2016; 1035 Hrs, Local Time

The rumble of the diesel engines was mostly what filled Lynn's ears as the convoy of the Wombat armored personnel carrier rumbled down the narrow road, the third in the single column line that was transporting the entirety of third and fourth platoon; the tactical plan, as far as Lynn had been briefed by Sergeant McMahon, was going to be mostly simple. They along with fourth platoon would depart from Outpost Frisia and then head towards Betham, the site of that attempted attack a few days ago and then they were to travel north, heading for the district capital of Pattan, which they would secure, or assault and secure if necessary.

Following the attempted attacks on the settlement at Betham, Army intelligence once briefed on the situation had become increasingly interested in the attack. While the southern portions of the territory were considered very stable and peaceful as CNP got its operations established, the northern regions of Kashmir and Gilgit were virtually in no communication with the Empire, or the local governments. Army patrols were sent north on the uncommon occurrence, mostly to ensure the peace was kept and to fly the flag as it were. However, no permanent presence was ever established by the Army, nor the CNP or any of the Territorial Government's other agencies. The harshness of the terrain, and the strain it would have put on the already stretched thin Royal Logistical Corps to construct bases and supply them, however that was now going to change as the entirety of the Regiment was going to be deployed north, with a few objectives. Firstly, they were to construct a FOB out of which two companies, A and B, could operate within, the location of which was the city of Pattan. Secondly, they were to support RLC units in the effort of constructing a number of OPs, outposts and patrol bases throughout the province from which they could secure all urban centers and thereby ensure the stability and peace of the province. However, intelligence had been unable to determine whether Pattan would be held by friendly or hostile forces, so the entirety of A Company which had been deployed on this mission was treating it as an assault and seizure operation, or a 'grab and hold'.

The current plan as far as Lynn was aware was that the convoy would proceed to approximately one kilometer south of Pattan, and hold at a pre-determined location. At this point, the Company's recon detachment would be able to deploy their portable Watchtower UAV and would be able to establish IRST analysis of the entire city and neighboring regions, as well as provide intelligence as to whether there were hostiles present and roughly how many. Meanwhile, Lynn could do nothing much but sit back in the dark and clear his mind and blankly stare at the opposing wall, in between the heads of two of his fellow squadron members. Thirteen of them were crammed into the back of APC, with three more in the front crew compartment. Two of them would be drivers, or rather one would be and the other was their assistant as well as navigator while the third sat behind them with her eyes glued to the screen of the RWS display of her station that controlled and operated the fifty caliber machine gun on the top of the hull. The display feed was set to a white hot thermal mode, and she would scan the horizons looking for any potential hostiles, but so far it had been quiet. In a few moments, the convoy would reach its initial holding position and all the vehicles would halt on the road as the recon soldiers got to work. Typically, the vehicles would park along the road and the troops dismount but there was no known hostile air presence and the arrangement of local geography, the fact that the position was parked behind a substanial hill made the chance of a rocket attack very small so they waited.

After a few seconds, Lynn's radio would come alive with a transmission from Sergeant McMahon "Eagle 3-4, Eagle Actual, status update, acknowledge over."

"Eagle Actual, Eagle 3-4, send traffic."

"Eagle 3-4, be advised that IRST overwatch displays armored and mortar presence within the settlement. Command is optioning for coordinated airstrikes on the positions, at which point we will assault the settlement. Company mortars are dismounting and setting up here now, as will the rest of the two platoons. 1st and 2nd will join you in an assault from the west, while the rest of you come in from the south. Wait for my command to begin assault."

"Acknowledged Eagle Actual, over."

As the message had concluded, other messages had been relayed to the drivers and the convoy broke column formation as the vehicles began to park herring bone style on the sides of the road, all except the two Ajax IFV's they had accompanying them as escort. As the APC's finished parking, the driver would drop the rear ramp and all of the soldiers would disembark, forming up in a 180 degree security circle at the end of their vehicle, taking a knee and then waiting for the signal. Lynn spotted McMahon two vehicles down where he was with the remainder of their platoon, seemingly speaking with a radioman who was the middle man in a conversation between the Sergeant and someone else on the other side of the line. Lynn noticed that the Sergeant appeared to be angry, but shrugged it off and went to joining his fireteam in the security circle as they awaited further commands.

After a few moments, he could hear a loud sound in the air could barely make out flying above them colored blurbs. "Whatcha think they are Vinson?"

"Probably Vipers Kirkwood about to blast god knows what back to the stone age."

"You sure they ever left?"

A quick chuckle came out of the soldiers, but their humor was interrupted by the air splintering sound of a number of large explosions, and then Lynn's radio coming alive "Eagle 3-4, prepare to form up double column formation with the rest of the platoon, birds just hit the city and once the mortars land their initial wave we're going in."

Lynn waved his fire team over and they like then other soldiers of their platoon slowly formed up a double column formation in the center of the narrow road. though Lynn hoped once they moved out of cover of this hill that they would then be allowed to break off into fireteam formations, specifically wedges which would be much more preferable for him, maximizing available firepower. He also hoped that the Ajax's,
which were currently just idling on the road behind them, would join in on the assault because he would bet a paycheck that the enemy had MG emplacements defending the only southern entrance to the village. Granted that the western assault should take them by surprise and possibly dislodge them, he was also hoping he wasn't walking into a trap.

A few more moments of waiting and the familiar crashing noise of mortar rounds impacting, specifically the 88mm mortars that were apartment of the company's mortar detachment, and soon the go command was heard across all of the individual radios of the dozens of troopers of 3rd and 4th platoon. "All Eagle elements, once cover is lost from the hill, split from platoon formation and form on your fireteams. Initial objective is the small airfield some two hundred meters inside of town, we will RV at the control building there., over."

The pace of their march increased to a quick jog and then double time, and within half a minute they broke out from the cover of the large hill, the Ajax's moving from the rear to spread out to their western and eastern flanks as well as higher elevation, and Lynn and his men sharply broke from the column and formed a strong wedge with Lynn taking point, all of their rifles raised as they quickly began jogging. After a few moments, MG and small arms fire broke out from the buildings on the city's border and Lynn could hear returning fire coming from his fellow soldiers, but he himself did not see the incoming contact. "Vinson, anyone got eyes on?"

"Bearing 87, looks like a cluster of small arms!"

Lynn turned to look to his right and saw the house that his fellow soldier had mentioned, and dropped to a prone position, the other members of his fireteam taking a few leaps ahead of him before they realized what he had done and dropped as well and Lynn immediately began firing rounds at the window which he saw the rifle fire coming out of. Naturally, they began returning it towards them and Lynn spoke towards Yates "Yates, get a 40 mike mike inside that window!"

"Got a range for me?"

"Try 200 hundred meters!"

Within a few seconds, the sandy haired grenadier fired off a fragmentary grenade from the underslung launcher on his rifle, and the grenade traveled the short distance before exploding just inside the the window frame, which silenced the gunfire coming from the house. Lynn checked his peripherals and noticed that other soldiers in the assault were in a similar position, either being stuck in engaging perimeter forces or having eliminated them and slowly advancing. "Let's go, up, up, we're clearing that house!"

His fellow soldiers quickly got onto their feet and rushed towards the house, automatically going into breach formation and beginning to stack up on opposing sides of the door with Lynn taking the left side. The minute Moore got on the rear of the right side, Lynn nodded at Yates on the breecher right position and Lynn surged forward, kicking the door open with his right foot and the teams piled into the room with trained rhythm. Once they were in, they realized the house had a hallway that broke to the direct left and they filed up on either side of the wall, weapons trained precisely and they could make out the feet of corpses. They proceeded down the hallway, into the next room which made itself out to be a living room of some kind, the dead soldiers faces and upper bodies were mangled beyond any form of recognition, large pieces of flesh were missing and either on the walls, or floor of the immediate area of the window, with pieces of fragmentary metal embedded in the corpses; a sharp reminder to the soldiers of the effects of their frag weapons. They moved past the corpses and proceeded to clear the remainder of the small house before exiting the building, Sutton taking a white spray can out of his pack and tagging the front wall of the house with a large white 'X', denoting to any British forces that the building had been cleared. He put a red dot above the crux and that would signal to soldiers conducting BDA after the battle that hostile bodies were inside for recovery and disposal. They continued to move forward, advancing towards the remainder of the cluster of houses that guarded the northern outskirts of the settlement. They were all cleared without incident, aside from a few frightened civilians, and soon Lynn found himself heading to the top of a house that's southern wall faced a large, wide open field that led directly to the air field objective. Lynn pulled out his Vector 2 and could see the other half of his squad advancing up towards a large walled compound, looked like possibly a business or industrial complex, maybe even some form of 'police'. "Eagle 3-4 to Eagle Actual, interrogative, do you want us to assist with the breach and clear of the compound at gridref 35767219, over."

"Eagle 3-4, Eagle Actual, be advised that the remainder of Eagle 3 is converging on mentioned compound and should not need assistance. We're going to use Boar 2 for fire support, if you need any support advise raising Boar 1, out."

"Acknowledged Eagle Actual, wilco, out."

Lynn turned his men and then looked north towards the air field "Alright, we're gonna link up with Eagle 2 elements, and try to push towards this air field while McMahon and the others have fun with the compound. Moore, set up on this roof, you should have plenty of LOS to provide overwatch as we advance. Before we move, let me raise Eagle 2."

"Eagle 3-4 to Eagle 2 Actual, be advised we are moving north towards airfield objective time now, what elements of yours are nearby for co-op over."

A short pause for a reply was heard back through his headset "Eagle 3-4, Eagle 2 Actual, at this time we have 2-2 and 2-3 moving towards the airfield, channel 14.5 freak 908, over."

"Eagle 2 Actual, acknowledged, over."

Lynn informed the rest of his fireteam of the radio codes for 4th platoon's squads and they soon added them to their PRC's as the secondary channel and then moved to exit the house, climbing down the stairs off of the roof and then out of the building itself, leaving Moore behind with his HK417 trained north prepared to provide overwatch on the advancing assault as it crawled forward.

The minute that Lynn and the others broke into the open, he could hear the overwhelming sound of close contact and soon could hear rounds flying past them and they all dropped to the ground into a prone position and began scanning the horizon for the contact. "Anyone got eyes?"

"Negative, let's crawl north I think they're over the hump to our due north."

They began a slow army crawl before they could hear a radio call "Eagle 3-4, Eagle 2-2-1, is that you advancing on our due east in the open field south of the objective, over."

"Affirmative Eagle 2-2-1, blue forces to your due east, pushing contact at this time, over."

"Eagle 3-4, be advised I recommend you push a few degrees east and then keep your optics trained at 245, we're currently taking contact from a weapons squad sized unit that are in the field just one hundred meters north of us, over."

"Acknowledged Eagle 2-2-1, Eagle 3-4 is oscar mike time now, over."

Lynn and his team quickly got up in a crouched position and began moving up as quickly as they could and the moment they cleared the little hill, Lynn could see the hostile forces that Eagle 2-2-1 had been talking about; a group of about five tribals wearing khaki robes were engaging them from prone or crouched positions with what looked like semi-automatic rifles and a light machine gun of some time. He waved his hand to direct fire towards the hostiles and then quickly took aim with his red-dot optics and popped off a succession of rounds at the hostile who was attempting to reload what appeared to be a PKM, the 556 rounds from Lynn catching the man in his throat and upper torso and sent him flying into the ground. The overwhelming fire from a grenade fired from Yates just to the group's south, as well as fire from Vinson's MG4 and the fire from Eagle 2 elements quickly reduced the enemy weapons squad that had been opposing the oncoming assault to a mere bloody paste and fleshy remnants on the still dew-wet meadow grass. Lynn and his troops saw Eagle 2 get up from their prior firing positions and beginning to advance forward slowly and Lynn urged his team forward "Let's get to the end of this small hill line, try to get some LOS into the airfield. Moore, do you copy, can you see into the airfield?"

"Eagle 3-4 Actual, Eagle 3-4-2, be advised I have limited FOV into the outskirts of the airfield, moving to rejoin with your POS time now, over."

"Eagle 3-4-2, acknowledged, quick pace it here, out."

It did not take Lynn to get his men to reach the position he desired and once they were there, they returned to laying on their bellies aiming through their optics into the airfield, Lynn looking through his own to gather as much info as he could. While he was scanning he heard the sound of a rocket ignition and tearing his view away from his rifle sights, saw the plume of an RPG as it was fired from some far corner of the field and flung a missile towards the Ajax IFV, impacting on the outer upper hull of the machine with a shower of sparks and smoke "Eagle 2,
Eagle 3-4 Actual I just saw Boar 1 get popped with a RPG from the NW corner of the airfield, see if your units can engage there!"

"Boar 1 to all Eagle elements, be advised enemy round did minor damage, still operational in the AO."

Lynn quickly took out his range finder and scanned where he had seen the rocket launch from and then activated his radio "Boar 1, Eagle 3-4 Actual, request fire mission at gridref 35067302, saturate area with 30 sec burst of main cannon, over."

"Acknowledged Eagle 3-4, Boar 1 executing fire mission time now."

Within a few seconds the quick fire pop of the 40mm autocannon on the Ajax could be heard and then the succession of explosions going off as the entire corner of the airfield was saturated with the fire, catching a few rigged technical trucks that exploded into a holy fireball, and after approximately half a minute the ground was cleared revealing nothing but damaged structures, mangled corpses and impact craters. "Alright guys, Eagle 2 looks like its advancing now on the perimeter lets move up and breach with them and push towards C&C building."

They began moving and during their calculated move towards the air fields perimeter a radio call went out towards them "All Eagle 3 elements,
be advised that Eagle 3-1 and Actual have cleared armed compound and are now moving to RV at objective Alpha, over."

"Eagle Actual, Eagle 3-4, be advised that 3-4 and Eagle 2 are assaulting airfield from west and south at this time, over."

"Eagle 3-4, acknowledged, we will come in on your rear bearing 194 and assist or RV at Alpha, out."

Once they had breached the perimeter fence, a simple construct of three feet and non-sharpened wire, they took immediate contact from a group of advancing fire, but Lynn and his comrades had already hopped the fence and had their weapons trained in the direction of the main buildings cluster and quickly downed the enemy contacts. They jogged themselves up to the southern wall of the first tent hangar they could find "Alright Yates, I can see a number of hostiles moving in the building right around the corner. We're going to take this corner hard, hug the wall, Vinson you're going to put down suppression fire and Yates you're going to put three forties right on the front of that building. Vinson, anything else moves, you mop it up. We're going to go in and clear the hangar, then recover and take out that building."

After a few moments to recover their breaths, the fireteam executed the plan on Lynn's go command and they began firing off the minute they took the corner, though it was met with a brief spurt of gunfire from the defender's, some of the rounds caught Moore in his torso and sent him to the ground but the fire team kept pressing on, the gunfire ceasing after the three grenades ceased any fire. Vinson had dropped to the ground a few meters to the right of the hangar corner and had peppered the front wall face, staying behind as Lynn and the two others kept moving "Vinson, check Moore out, rest of you on me."

They quickly snapped into the left wall of the interior of the hangar, and caught a hostile scrambling to crawl into the large helicopter parked on the inside, and Lynn quickly adjusted his weapon and squeezed off three rounds that sent the man dropping from the ladder and onto the floor in a bloody mess. With no further delay, they quickly cleared the rest of the hangar, seeing Vinson and Moore come around the corner as they did so. "All fine Corporal, rounds caught my vest thankfully."

"Good to hear. Eagle 2 breaching the C&C?"

"Yeah they went in a few moments after ya'll went in here. Nice chopper Lynn. "

Lynn chuckled "Well thanks I was just about to take it out for a spin before this fool tried to chopper-jack me."

Lynn pointed at the dead combatant with his rifle and the members of his team chuckled for a moment, Lynn then calling in to update his sergeant."Eagle 3 Actual, be advised, BLUEFOR with Eagle 2 are securing C&C objective, we are currently holding in a secured hangar with a captured helo, over."

"Eagle 3-4, Eagle 3 Actual, roger on your last, hold at your current position, we'll RV with you shortly, over."

"Acknowledged Eagle 3 Actual, holding time now, over."

"Alright, let's clean up before the Sarge gets here, looks like the fun is only getting started."

William Banner
Landing at JFB Kirkwood, 12 km north of Attock
Territory of Pakistan, British Empire (33°52'12.22"N 72°24'25.66"E)
April 14, 2016; 2243 Hrs, Local Time

"Hang on Banner, we're touching down here soon."

William looked with uneasy grimace towards his accompanying fellow, Kevin, and spoke into the NH90's internal radio net "Whatever Leigh,
I just can't wait to get my boots back on solid ground."

Sure as his companion had mentioned, the NH90 was hovering just a few feet off of the ground as its pilot expertly guided down to a precision landing on the tarmac shoulder off of the main runway at JFB Kirkwood, the strip currently quiet as a number of other aircraft sat parked and silent off on the nearby shoulder and the opposing ones, frames of all sizes and shapes, all needed to support the RAF operations in Pakistan,
including the most recent one that necessitated Banner enduring a seventeen hour flight from Frankfurt to Karachi, to here finally.

A crewman slid the side door of the helicopter open and William and Kevin promptly stepped out, each firmly grasping a duffel bag or backpack in William's case as the winds of the late evening climate whipped against William's dark blue polo shirt and tan utility pants. He looked around at the base as they continued walking towards a large multi-storied building that abutted the Air Traffic tower, remarking to Kevin "It's impressive what the RAF has been able to do so quickly in two years here, taking it from a bombed out PAF base to the largest RAF base this part of Pakistan. They got Army here too don't they?"

Kevin flatly replied "Aye, it was Army HQ for Northern regions until ONP kicked off this morning; they moved to Hindmoor this morning but this will remain a gateway port for the troops as the op wears on. Ready for the brief?"

William nodded "Yeah, my stomach will recover by the time we get to Kiefer's office, we're meeting with his G-2 right?"

"Yes, a butterbar by the name of Randell. "

The rest of the brief walk was taken in silence; they were stopped by a desk guard once they entered the Joint Command building, but they each presented their DMI credentials and were promptly given an escort up to the seventh floor briefing room, which once they entered after walking a deserted hallway, found a single officer and a projector readied, already displaying an image onto the white board. The officer walked over once they both entered "Agents Banner and Stone, Lieutenant Randell; shall we get to it?"

Leaving the personality business to Kevin, he watched the burly man pump Randell's arm "Always Lieutenant, what did your boys find?"

Randell gestured for them to sit and then proceeded to explain the initial image on the screen, which was a two page document in Arabic from appearance "These are the first of several documents pulled by soldiers of the South Essex Regiment when they assaulted the city of Pattan in northern Pakistan today as part of the first stages of Northern Pines, which I believe you two are well read in on."

Kevin nodded "Yes, we have both been in country for a bit working on BLUE WHALE, Banner here was briefed back in Old World."

Randell nodded "Good, well, then you know the goal of this is to establish an permanent presence in the north, with the goal of readying it for transition to the civilian authorities. The city of Pattan was selected for its small airfield to have a FOB for South Essex to operate out of as they conducted their mission, however they found it occupied with hostile forces and enacted a quick assault. Only 6 casualties were sustained,
no fatalities at this time and a substantial amount recovered. A pair of old Russian cargo helos were found there, as well as a small arms cache and a good sized data dump, which these documents are apart of."

"What do they say?"

"Our translators were a bit stumped by these at first, mostly because it isn't Pashtu, Urdu, or Dari. It's Arabic, looks like most of them were written by a gentle being called Mushin Abbas, who was what he identifies as the "Local Holy Commander" for Pattan. This first document is an inventory for their equipment in Pattan and a description of forces, which will be helpful in IDing remains and such, however this second document is as transcript of communication between Abbas and someone calling themselves "Winter". Whomever Winter is, he never reveals his name but in both this document and several others makes a number of references to the organization him and Abbas work for."

Randell took a moment to pause, transitioning to the next slide which was more pictures; something Banner personally didn't care in, as he knew MI6 would have copies if not the originals translated and re-written into English within hours for his viewing, his focus was purely on Randell's presentation; he had been out of country for a few weeks and needed to be caught up "We believe their name is Al-Judhr, or New Horizon; one of the documents recovered seemed to be some recruiting pitch for tribal elders, or rather a script for their lackeys to follow.
It seems like your standard fundamentalist Islamic terrorist, calls for the overthrow of the British oppressor state, threatens to kill any and all who oppose their holy crusade and then mentions a few of their ops. What caught our interest is one of these was the attack on Bethem, as well as a few previously-believed isolated incidents. It appears now those incidents were not isolated, but in fact all interconnected as a series of tests or growing pains that Al-Judhr conducted to flex its muscle."

"So now that they've tried to punch, where's the kick?"

Randell shrugged "We don't know. We're going to be re-tasking prior BLUE WHALE flights to establish IRST over the AO of NORTHERN PINES and try to recover some data but until we get more to go on, its going to be rough. At this stage, General Pope is ordering all units to assume territories north of Bethem to be hostile in occupation and holding, and we will be proceeding as if we are operating in an occupied country. We were hoping DMI might have some light to shed on us before we ramp up this operation."

William and Kevin both looked at each other before replying "Well, we've been sent to evaluate what you find and then coordinate efforts around a reaction. As you know, BLUE WHALE focused solely on more eastern matters so we're going to have to begin from scratch in the north;
the Kashmir terrain will prove a substantial challenge but I'm confident we can overcome. Once we get out of this meeting, we'll be in touch with some of our connections and work about properly establishing networks to liaise with you and the General's staff, best for us to nip this new threat immediately."

Randell nodded "Indeed, I agree. If you follow me, I can show you to the offices General Pope had prepared for you since you'll both be coordinating DMI Liaison efforts on this operation."

With a word and some nods, the trio of men exited the room and moved to be shown the offices, signalling the end of just one briefing, and the start of something greater then any party, at least with the Empire, possibly realized.

by **Layarteb** » Sun May 19, 2019 7:57 pm

[ PAST ]
The Battle of Sable Island
Part I: Bandits...

• • • † • • •

Sunday, May 9^th, 1986 | 20:30 hrs [UTC-5]
Calverton, New York | Calverton Air Force Base
40° 55' 12" N, 72° 47' 51" W

Activity at Calverton Air Force Base was particularly high for a Sunday evening and that was because the technicians, mechanics, and other support personnel of the 57th Tactical Fighter Wing were working feverishly to prepare sixteen fighters from the 5701st Tactical Fighter Squadron for flight. The premier fighter squadron in the entirety of the Imperial Layartebian Air Force, they flew the F-15C/D Eagle and the squadron had twenty-four such aircraft, tasked solely with the air defense mission. Being the premier fighter squadron, they were also tasked with escorting the Emperor's VIP transport, an aging VC-137C Stratoliner that was, in and of itself, a highly customized Boeing 707-320B that had been in service over twenty years now. There was talk of replacing the two VC-137Cs with a pair of Boeing 747-200s but cost was a factor. The customization of the aircraft was pushing over the §300 million mark.

Tonight, the fighter jets of the 57th TFS would be escorting the Emperor's plane to London, where the Emperor was expected to attend a major conference with the British government concerning trade and military relations between the two empires. Normally such a flight would be only four aircraft but with the extreme tensions with the neighboring Dominion of Tnemrot, not to mention the previous day's military coup, command decided that four aircraft simply wasn't enough. The air force wanted to send a message that it would fly where it wanted and it would not be stopped and so sixteen aircraft would be flying in escort, supported by an EF-111A Raven out of Griffiss Air Force Base in upstate New York and an E-3C Sentry flying out of Massachusetts, the former to protect against surface-to-air batteries on Tnemrot's southern coastlines and the latter to ensure nothing snuck up on the aircraft as they flew.

The importance of the mission, combined with the tensions between Tnemrot and Layarteb meant quite simply that this was be treated as a high risk mission. Though they would keep to international airspace throughout the trip, they were going to be drawing close to Tnemratian airspace above Sable Island though intelligence reported no developments on what was essentially a sandbar and a protected, national park. Their flight path would bring them no closer than fifty miles to the Tnemratian coastline and where the Tnemratians had installed long-range surface-to-air missiles, the flight path would stay much, much further away, though the Raven support was still crucial.

Piling into one of several ready rooms at the air force base were the sixteen pilots flying today's mission, along with the other pilots of the squadron who would be assisting either as ground controllers or in their squadron HQ roles. A quick roll call was made and from there, Colonel John Briggs took the podium. In most squadrons, a lieutenant colonel was the commanding officer but the 57th TFS was different. No one under the rank of captain with less than five years of time in the service could join and aside from these requirements, pilots needed exemplary records, a minimum amount of flight hours, and they had to place in the top three in the triannual Air Force Advanced Fighter Tactic Program. That meant, no more than nine pilots a year could be eligible to join the 57th TFS and when other factors were considered, that number usually dwindled to one or two. The two newest members of the squadron were James J. Blackledge and Charlie P. Goode, both of whom were captains with fewer than six months in the squadron yet each had demonstrated that he belonged with the elite fighter unit.

"All right so we all know who is and who isn't flying today. Falcon 5-7 lifts off in approximately ninety minutes for a trip to London. It's supposed to be smooth skies from here to London tonight and it's going to be a long flight so I want to make sure everyone is well rested before they are wheels up today. If you're not, sit aside and let someone else go. There's no shame in it and it won't count against you," Briggs began but of course, no fighter pilot worth his weight would admit to being "too tired to fly," least of all not on a mission of this level of importance. "Well I figured that would be the case. Well let's get down to brass tax then.

"As you may be aware, the Dominion of Tnemrot has experienced a major, military coup led by General Robert Aldridge. This man is a hardliner who has led the Tnemratian military for the better part of the past four years. Aldridge has, insofar as intelligence has conveyed, set up a junta and called for retaliatory strikes against Layartebian assets over the past two years of tension and incidents. He's called our latest Blue Rhino exercise, and I quote, 'Tantamount to an invasion of Tnemrot's borders.' He's not the kind of guy we want in power.

"Because of this, command doesn't think we should be flying with the standard four-plane flight so we're going up with sixteen. That ought to give the Tnemratians something to think about. Ops want to hit the lights?" With that the lights went dim and a projector was turned on showing a map of Tnemrot with the flight path drawn by a dotted line. Circles with squares at their center point illustrated SAM ranges. "We'll be well out of range from their medium-range SA-2 and SA-6 sites. We will come within range of two SA-5 sites but we do not expect them to be an issue even if they fire at us. Based on our flight path and our distance from the sites, the missiles will run out of energy long before they get near us. Should that happen, we'll adjust our course and utilize our Raven escort.

"In the event we need some extra protection for ourselves, we're flying with an extremely heavy chaff and flare load today. Our ALE-45s will be loaded strictly with flares so that gives us one hundred and twenty flares and we're fitting the outer wing pylons to carry a pair of ALE-37s. That'll give us just shy of five hundred chaff packets, four-eighty to be precise. The pods are light enough we shouldn't have any issues with high-G maneuvers and we've flown with them before. We'll have a standard air-to-air loadout but we're going to be very heavy on fuel. We're taking along all three drop tanks and a pair of FAST packs each. I know you're doing the math in your head but that's giving us over thirty-seven thousand pounds of fuel. Ideally, we can fly to and from London without dropping our tanks. We'll have tanker support along the way so run out the drop tanks first. That means sluggish takeoff but we have enough runway to do it and we're at sea level so there's no air density issues.

"All right let's look at fighter coverage. These are all of the airbases," the slide switched to show the many airbases covering the Tnemratian landscape. Each one had another circle around it showing the radius of the fighters based there. "We can avoid SAMs but we can't avoid these guys. Our threats, should we face any, would be MiG-21s, MiG-25s, MiG-29s, and the new Su-27s. They're all operational and we know that each airbase has a minimum of thirty-six fighter aircraft. They fly in twelve-aircraft squadrons so it's likely that they'll have at least two to four down per squadron but we cannot count on it. Our mission, should we become engaged, will be to give Falcon 5-7 enough time to clear out to the south. She's got a lot more fuel than any of us and anything Tnemrot has. Her divert is Bermuda. We just have to make sure she can get there.

"Based on where we will be flying, we're on our own. Loring and Fredericton are the closest bases but they won't get to us in time if we run into trouble. Again, we don't expect anything to happen but preparedness is crucial. All right, that's what we got for now. Once we clear Tnemratian airspace relax and let's head to London for a few days. We'll alternate some sleeping on the way over and that'll be that, so who's got questions?"

• • • • ‡ • • • •

Sunday, May 9^th, 1986 | 22:25 hrs [UTC-5]
Over Shelter Island, New York | Captain James J. "JJ" Blackledge (Wraith 1-2)
41° 4' 19" N, 72° 19' 26" W

Blackledge slid his aircraft ten meters to the left. He and the rest of his squadron had just joined up with Falcon 5-7 as she coasted through the clear, night skies at 32,000 feet and 500 knots. Once in position, Blackledge set his autopilot and relaxed. The four flights had taken up positions in front of and behind Falcon 5-7. Blackledge and Wraith 1 flight was forward, port while Wraith 3 flight was to their opposite. Wraith 2 was behind them and Wraith 4 was on the opposite corner. All four flights had a one mile separation from the jetliner, flying in a Finger-four formation so that they could easily break away if necessary.

Comms chatter was at a minimum, the lines being kept open to ensure that the Sentry's air controllers had priority over the net. The Sentry was flying further south and west than the main formation, putting it further away from Tnemratian airspace than the main formation. The Raven was flying above and to the north of the main formation, putting itself between Tnemratian airspace and the main formation, its electronic warfare systems in passive mode but ready to be flipped into active jamming at a moment's notice. The Raven, when her AN/ALQ-99E was activated, could create a sizeable hole in the sky to confuse incoming radar-guided missiles.

They were still about thirty minutes from approaching Tnemratian airspace and insofar as they could tell, all was quiet. Zulu 7-0 - the Sentry - was reporting only a few commercial contacts traveling on normal air routes to and from Europe. Separation wouldn't be a concern given the flight path that Falcon 5-7 had adopted and so there was little to do but fly the course. The fighter pilots of the 57th TFS were all on autopilot, relaxing in their cockpits for they had a long journey to go. Some were taking a quick nap while others were reading or checking their flight systems. Had it been a daytime mission, they might have brought along a camera or been gazing at the Earth below. On this evening, all they could see were stars for the Moon was in its new phase and thus invisible in the blackness beyond. The Raven's crew, flying under callsign Spark 6-0 was on autopilot as well though neither of those men were sleeping, for the EWO had his eyes on the threat scope. Lastly, aboard Falcon 5-7 herself, most of the crew and passengers had settled in for a peaceful evening. In reality, only the flight crew, the Emperor, and a handful of military personnel aboard knew of the danger they were facing flying near to Tnemratian airspace. For everyone else, it was just going to be a chance to get to sleep so that they were fully rested when they landed in London.

For those thirty minutes that it took for the nineteen-aircraft flight to approach Tnemratian airspace, there were no indications that anything was amiss. The F-15s were flying without their radars on, taking data instead from the Sentry's air controllers. Jamming systems were in passive mode and threat scopes were empty. The only emissions anyone was detecting were the pulses of energy from the Sentry's massive AN/APY-2 radar. Making six revolutions every minute, the massive rotating dome atop the E-3 was looking out as far as the horizon, down to the ground, and up into the heavens. If anything was out there, she could detect it.

When the flight reached a point just eighty nautical miles from the Tnemratian coastline, the tactical director aboard the E-3C Sentry pressed the transmit button on his headset and said to all aircraft, "Zulu 7-0, Falcon 5-7, we've reached Point Bravo." An acknowledgement came and every fighter pilot suddenly sharpened up and put their books away or awoke from their short naps. They took stock of their cockpit, of their systems, and of their position in the sky. Autopilot remained on but they could flick it off with a single swipe of a toggle switch. For the next two hours, the formation would be flying close enough to Tnemratian airspace to be "in danger" though still, no one expected anything to happen, at least for a few minutes past Bravo.

It was roughly five minutes past Bravo when a surveillance operator in Zulu 7-0 watched as a contact appeared on his scope. With an overlay of the terrain below, he could see that the contact was coming out of Hope Brook Air Force Base on Newfoundland. Keying up his own transmitter, he spoke to everyone on the net, "Launch activity detected, Bulls-eye zero-one-eight, two hundred and fifty nautical miles." That got everyone's attention. Tnemrot had scrambled a fighter or several fighters, it was impossible to tell on the radar scope, which in and of itself wasn't a concern. Tnemratian fighters routinely fly out to investigate radar contacts and the Emperor's flight plan was on file with international registers so that the Tnemratians would know that it was the Emperor's flight. More than likely, as they'd done this before with bombers, they would fly out, flash their missiles, take some photographs, and fly home, just to tell the Layartebians that they knew they were there.

Yet Hope Brook wasn't the only source of activity as the same operator watched launch activity at Winterland Air Force Base, also on Nova Scotia. Winterland was a Fishbed base, where thirty-six MiG-21bis Fishbed-L interceptors and their trainer models were based. Hope Brook on the other hand contained MiG-25PD Foxbat-Es and MiG-29A Fulcrum-As. The Foxbats, though old and in many ways outdated, were extremely dangerous because of their speed and long-range missiles. The Fulcrums, considered to be deadly close-in, could carry medium-range missiles as well. Everyone's attention perked up further and further as the formation headed along its flight path.

Surveillance operators aboard the Sentry watched as more and more aircraft took to the skies over the next few minutes. The Tnemratians were known to execute formation takeoffs so each contact could be as many as four. In no short order, there were three to twelve contacts flying inbound from Winterland and five to twenty from Hope Brook. Suddenly everyone began to grow nervous. By the time ten minutes had passed since the first launch warning, the Sentry operators classified several of the contacts as MiG-25s based on their altitude and speed. They got up to altitude much quicker than the other contacts, exhibiting a standard, Foxbat flight profile. Aboard Falcon 5-7, the Emperor was alerted to the proceedings but he ordered them to press on, believing that this was simply a show of force by the Tnemratians and nothing more.

Pressing onward, the fighters took a wider separation from Falcon 5-7 so that they could set up for a more advantageous position. Then, at fifteen minutes from the first call, surveillance operators picked up more launch activity but this time to their north. "Launch activity detected, Bulls-eye two-nine-zero, one-six-zero nautical miles." That was Shearwater Air Force Base, which contained three regiments of fighters, including MiG-21s, MiG-29s, and the newest fighter to grace Tnemrot's inventory, the Sukhoi Su-27P Flanker-B, the Eastern answer to the F-15 Eagle. The Sukhoi had range, it had a sizeable weapons load, it was maneuverable, it was fast, and it had a capable avionics suite. It was everything the Eagle was and, perhaps, more. It had yet to be put to the test, especially against Layartebian pilots. Aboard Falcon 5-7, Lieutenant Colonel Greg Lemons, the tactical director and effective commander of the entire mission stared at the data before him.

Opening a private line to Falcon 5-7, he was put through to the Emperor in less than ten seconds. Though secure, he was still wary of what he would say, "Falcon 5-7, Zulu 7-0-Actual, based on the data before me, I recommend we execute Dolphin-Seven." In the battle section of Falcon 5-7, an air force liaison sitting next to the Emperor pressed mute on the phone relay and explained what that meant.

"Sir, the Tnemratians are executing a tactical ambush. They're pressing forward with their Foxbats, Fulcrums, and Fishbeds to drive us to turn around and head right into what's being launched from Shearwater right now. We should abort, take a southerly course, and recover at Layarteb City."

"No," the Emperor said, "I shall not be scared out of the sky by the Tnemratians. They would be utterly foolish to try to kill the head of this country. The sheer havoc that would rain down upon them would be tremendous if that were so. No military general, not even one as misguided as Aldridge is would commit to battlefield suicide."

"Sir, that is tactically unadvisable," the liaison, a major said.

The Emperor pushed the mute button, "Zulu 7-0-Actual, how long until we need to execute this."

"Sir, no more than eight minutes."

"Then we wait eight minutes more," the Emperor said.

Displeased with what he saw as unnecessary grandstanding, Lemons ordered his fighters to intercept the incoming Tnemratians. Each of the four flights broke off and headed towards their targets. Wraith 1 and Wraith 3 headed towards the fighters coming from Newfoundland while the other two formations headed for those coming from Nova Scotia. Every Tnemratian fighter was on an intercept course with Falcon 5-7, climbing up to high altitude and settling in with their cruise flights. In the cockpit of Wraith 1-0, squadron commander Colonel Briggs issued his own orders to his aircraft, "All Wraith flights, this is Wraith 1-0, Master to Arm, keep your tanks until I order."

With that call, every one of the sixteen pilots reached forward and flipped the toggle switch, arming and activating their weapon systems. Still, they kept their radars off until ordered to activate them by either Briggs or the surveillance operators aboard the Sentry.

The fighter groups, converging at one another at over one thousand knots would make contact within minutes. The Eagles, pressing ahead now to an airspeed of five hundred and fifty knots began to spread themselves out, increasing the spacing to four hundred meters between each fighter. They kept their Finger-four formation though. Pilots watched the skies ahead of them. They were hurdling into the blackness of the night, their radars off, their cockpits silent until, all of a sudden, radars began to activate. Their RWRs lit up with symbols showing that there were MiG-25s, MiG-29s, and Su-27s coming at them. None of the MIG-21s turned on their radars yet but they wouldn't until they got closer for they carried only short-range missiles. As the radars came online, Zulu 7-0's passive receivers went haywire. They, along with Falcon 5-7, were being targeted by the incoming fighters.

In rapid order thereafter, Lemons ordered over the net, "Activate radars, weapons free." In that instant, every one of the AN/APG-63 radars were toggled from standby mode to active mode. It took only a few seconds and a few sweeps before the Eagle pilots saw a host of radar contacts in front of them closing at a high rate of speed, especially now that the Foxbats had gone supersonic and were continuing to accelerate.

"Wraith 1-0 to all Wraith flights, let's attempt to warn them off, Fox One at maximum range, pick a target and engage," Briggs ordered. One-by-one, fighter pilots put their radars into long-range search and then into range while search. Based on their formation position, they locked up a target opposite them and switched to their Sparrow missiles. The Sparrow had a range of just under forty nautical miles but firing at such a range almost guaranteed a miss. This was done more to warn off the approaching Tnemratian fighters who were keen on looking for a fight based on everything so far. Briggs hoped that a few Sparrows into the air would cause them to turn tail for home and thus end the engagement but that was a big gamble. The miles ticked away very quickly but not before Sentry operators called out, "Acrids inbound!"

• • • † • • •

Return to Introduction
Return to Contents

by **Layarteb** » Sat May 25, 2019 8:36 pm

[ PAST ]
The Battle of Sable Island
Part II: Furball

• • • † • • •

Sunday, May 9^th, 1986 | 23:33 hrs [UTC-4]
Near Sable Island, Dominion of Tnemrot | Captain James J. "JJ" Blackledge (Wraith 1-2)
44° 10' 43" N, 59° 45' 54" W

Captain James Blackledge heard the audio call out from AWACS the same time he heard his RWR go crazy. His cockpit was filled with the sound of beeps as the MiG-25 Foxbats, inbound at supersonic speed, had let their R-40RD air-to-air missiles go. The missiles had roughly the same range as the Sparrows but they carried a significantly heavier warhead and they were much bigger missiles. Launched at supersonic velocity, the missiles had a major advantage, especially since they had been targeted not against the Eagles but rather the aircraft the Eagles were protecting. Each Foxbat carried four R-40 missiles and they generally flew with two R-40RD and two R-40TD missiles. The designation was the AA-6 Acrid, hence the call "Acrids inbound." The only difference between the RD and the TD missiles was their guidance method. The former were guided by semi-active radar while the latter by infrared.

With the call, the Eagles let loose their own missiles. Using assistance from AWACS, the sixteen F-15C Eagles designated sixteen separate targets and fired their AIM-7M Sparrow missiles at long range. Blackledge's flight engaged MiG-25s exclusively, which were easy to pick out because of their higher speed and the fact that Zulu 7-0 had provided IFF identification on each radar target thanks to its sophisticated IFF gear. With the call of "Fox one" all over the radio net, sixteen missiles were now inbound and flying towards the Tnemratian fighters. In the air, the Sparrows would naturally pass by the Acrids, perhaps saluting one another, the former moving at Mach 4 and the latter at Mach 4.5.

The Eagles, already at maximum military power, poured on the thrust but as no one had yet to be targeted specifically by the incoming fighters, they kept their tanks, holding onto the precious fuel they contained for just a few seconds more. With the launch of the Sparrows however, that was a major game changer. The MiG-25s, focused on their own target tracks had to make an important decision. They could hold lock on the escaping VIP transport or break lock to dodge the incoming missiles. The Eagles thus had the advantage, none of them were engaged and none of them needed to dodge incoming missiles. It was such that six of the nine Foxbat pilots didn't bother, opting instead to save their own skin. They quickly broke lock, turned their aircraft as best as they could, which at Mach 2.35 meant a very wide turning radius, and activated their ECM. These six Foxbat pilots avoided the incoming Sparrow missiles easily for the missiles had been launched at near maximum range. The three who did not however found themselves unable to dodge the missiles and while their Acrids were jammed from the Raven and the countermeasures of the VC-137C, the Sparrows launched their way did not miss.

Thus, first blood had been drawn and the three Foxbats targeted by Briggs, Blackledge, and McDaniel flying in the Wraith 1-3 position, were felled. AWACS called out the splashes, at which point Briggs ordered everyone, if they had not done so, to drop their tanks and kick up their speed to decrease the range the enemy fighters had between them and the VC-137C, which was now escaping southwards towards Bermuda at maximum speed, which was only 550 knots, not much but where the VC-137C had the advantage was fuel. None of the Tnemratian fighters could chase her all the way to Bermuda and by turning tail to the enemy aircraft, the VC-137C reduced the effective range of the Tnemratian missiles by more than half. With each passing mile, she would further decrease their effectiveness.

The Tnemratians however had banked on their Foxbats being able to score the kills. The rest of the fighters were there to deal with the escorts, though the Tnemratians had expected eight Eagles, not sixteen. Their intelligence had been off and for that, they were now in a situation of changing mission. The nine Foxbats that had scrambled had already lost three of their number by the time the Eagles dropped their tanks. The other six turned for home, complying with their strict orders, which were simply to engage the VC-137C and return home if their path was blocked. The interceptor pilots could have pressed on, using their superior speed to catch up to the jetliner but losing three of their own was not something they were prepared for and so they quit the fight. The Tnemratian Air Force had only two regiments of MiG-25s though that added up to seventy-two aircraft. Losing three in one shot was more than they'd ever lost before.

Blackledge flipped his radar back to Long Range Scan (LRS) mode and saw the contact tracks light up on the MFD. He turned the radar down to the 40 nautical mile range scale to focus on the nearer tracks, a group of MiG-29s coming out of Hope Brook. Briggs called out over the flight net, "Wraith 1, split," which meant that the flight was splitting into its two elements. Having practiced this multiple times, the Eagle pilots knew precisely what to do and Blackledge slid into the protective position on Briggs' starboard side. Captain Thomas McDaniel in Wraith 1-3 did the same for Major Charles Friesen in Wraith 1-1.

Wraith 1 headed towards the MiG-29s while Wraith 3 headed towards the incoming MiG-21s from Winterland. Wraith 2 and Wraith 4 were going after twenty-two MiG-21s, MiG-29s, and Su-27s flying out of Shearwater. "Two, take the target to the right," Briggs called out and Blackledge acknowledged, moving the radar acquisition cursor over the right target on his screen while Briggs took the left. They had many targets for Hope Brook had scrambled six Fulcrums but with this extreme spacing, they would avoid wasting missiles.

Blackledge flipped his radar mode once again to Single Target Track (STT) mode and the full power of the radar was now focused on one target, a MiG-29A Fulcrum-A coming at them at 750 knots. Likewise, they were heading towards the MiG-29 at nearly 800 knots. Both sets of aircraft were supersonic and only going faster. With a good lock on target, Blackledge let another AIM-7M Sparrow go but it failed barely as it got past his aircraft, flipping up and over and going errant. Blackledge selected another Sparrow and fired again, calling "Fox one," into his microphone for the third time. The missile pulled into the steering course and rocketed forward, screaming towards the MiG-29.

It would take twenty seconds for the missile to reach the MiG-29, during which time the Fulcrum's pilot took evasive maneuvers while the other Fulcrums locked up and engaged the Eagles. Blackledge activated his ECM and turned with the evading MiG-29, dropping chaff to confuse incoming R-27R missiles. His Sparrow met its mark, exploding on the MiG-29 and destroying it. The explosion was visible from the canopy and Blackledge called out "Splash," as he turned his aircraft hard to avoid an incoming R-27R. By this point, beyond-visual-range combat was about to be moot. The F-15s and the Tnemratian fighters quickly clashed in a giant furball in the skies over and near Sable Island.

Briggs found that his two Sparrow launches missed and so he and Blackledge, along with Wraith 1-1 and Wraith 1-3, closed for a dogfight. Friesen had managed to score a hit on one of the MiG-29s but he'd only succeeded in damaging it. The pilot, fighting a crippled plane, dropped from the fight and turned for home. Because there were so many bandits in the skies, no one would be chasing after retreating fighters for glory kills, just the same as why no one would shoot at pilots under parachutes. Air combat was the last vestige of warfare where killing the enemy didn't mean physically killing the enemy. Fighter pilots were all too happy to see their prey exploding all over the skies but they took real solace in seeing or hearing that their prey ejected. Retreating fighters weren't a threat, unless they turned back into the fight, and so they would be allowed to live to fight again.

Kills began to rack up as Sparrow missiles met their marks on MiG-21s and MiG-29s all over the skies. So far, Wraith 1 flight had downed four aircraft with Blackledge leading with two victories. Wraith 2 flight had brought down three aircraft; Wraith 3 flight had brought down three aircraft; and Wraith 4 flight had brought down one aircraft. None of the Eagles were, as of yet, damaged or destroyed, though that was about to change.

The first Eagle to be damaged was Wraith 3-1. Flown by Major Frank Parnell, Parnell had just brought down a MiG-29 with a Sparrow missile when another MiG-29 had launched an R-27R missile at him. He'd successfully broken the lock but the missile's proximity fuse had detonated the 86-pound blast-fragmentation warhead. The shrapnel from the warhead peppered the port side of his aircraft and he was receiving all manner of warning lights. Withdrawing from the flight, he quickly took the aircraft down and turned for home, hoping to make it lest he be forced to eject over the cold waters of the North Atlantic, for which doubted he would survive, so far was he from friendly territory. It would be nearly two hours of flying to Otis Air Force Base, the closest friendly airfield but he'd make it, landing the aircraft expertly despite the damage. By then, the battle would be long over and the victories tallied.

In what was about to become a knife fight, Wraith 1 and Wraith 3 acted to protect their stricken comrade. The pilots switched from their LRS and STT modes to Track While Scan (TWS) mode. The Eagle's radar could track several targets simultaneously, though with the Sparrow missile, it could only engage one at a time. With the fire-and-forget Sidewinder missile, things were very different.

Briggs and Blackledge found themselves angled against two MiG-29s while the rest were being engaged by Wraith 3 flight. The closure rate was tremendous and neither force fired against the other until they'd passed one another. It was then that Briggs and Blackledge turned hard to port and came around to engage the Fulcrums. It was simply a matter of who turned tighter and faster. Against the stresses of the turn and the airspeed, it was Briggs and Blackledge who'd won but only against one of the Fulcrums, the other having disappeared. Briggs, out of position, quickly yielded to Blackledge whose AIM-9M Sidewinder growled with a lock. He let the missile go with a shout of "Fox two," and watched the Sidewinder track right into the starboard side engine of the Fulcrum. They'd never known what happened to the other Fulcrum, presuming instead that someone had shot him down. Instead, the Fulcrum's pilot had cut down low and abandoned the fight, running for the deck hard and then turning for home, escaping the melee, having fired three missiles and scoring no hits.

"Splash two," Blackledge called out, unaware that he'd downed a MiG-25 early on in the fight. That call meant the last of the MiG-29s had been shot down and now there was only a sea of MiG-21s to engage. Friesen had shot down one and was angling for a shot on another when Briggs and Blackledge downed the MiG-29.

In the melee, two mores Eagle had been damaged, one piloted by Captain Donald Rimmer in the Wraith 3-2 position and one by McDaniel. Rimmer had moved in behind a MiG-29 and engaged it with a Sidewinder missile only to have shrapnel from the Fulcrum damage his starboard flight control surfaces. It was light damage but damage nonetheless. He stayed in the fight but he wouldn't be getting any more kills. McDaniel had been providing cover for Friesen when a MiG-29 maneuvered in and fired an R-60 or AA-8 Aphid missile. The warhead on the R-60 detonated close to the Eagle's starboard-side engine, severely damaging it. Like Parnell, McDaniel quit the fight and headed for Otis. The Fulcrum that had damaged him soon found itself blown out the sky by Wraith 3-3 piloted by Captain Robert Smith, who put a Sparrow into the Fulcrum from a range of just five nautical miles, opting for the radar-guided missile to ensure no chance of fratricide. Sidewinders were heat-seeking and if they found a larger heat signature in an Eagle, they could inadvertently go for it instead of their actual target. It had been a wise move by Smith and it had ensured McDaniel wasn't further engaged.

By this point in the fight, three of the sixteen Eagles had been damaged with two returning to base. The Tnemratians on the other hand, had lost a significant number of aircraft. Wraith 1 had downed seven and damaged an eighth. Wraith 2 had brought down five. Wraith 3 had brought down six. Wraith 4 had brought down three. Barely six minutes had passed since the call for Acrids had been made and already the enemy was down twenty-nine aircraft between those shot down and those returning to base. This was nearly three-fifths of their force against an eighth for the Eagles of the 57th TFS. Falcon 5-7 was safe, having put distance between her and the enemy fights, though she was nearly lost during the escape maneuver.

Colonel Michael Locke, flying as pilot-in-command, had put the Stratoliner into a steep turn when he'd decided to bug out of the situation. In his bank, he brought the Stratoliner to within just 1° of its limit. The turn was so sudden, so steep, and so severe that had everyone not strapped themselves into their chairs - as ordered mere minutes earlier - they'd have been seriously hurt. As it was, anything and everything not strapped down went flying through the plane, injuring people but not seriously. An expert at flying the Stratoliner, Locke brought the aircraft around to a southerly course while the defensive systems operators released packets of chaff and jammed the incoming missiles behind the massive bubble created by the EF-111A Raven, which not only turned with them but maintained their position for optimal jamming effectiveness. It was a tense few seconds while the Acrids screamed towards the Stratoliner. Most of them exploded harmlessly behind the aircraft in the clouds of chaff or simply ran out of speed and fell into the sea but one missile managed, not only to get through the jamming and the chaff clouds, but also to overtake the plane. Fortunately, its Foxbat pilot had broken from the fight and the Acrid simply passed over and beyond the Stratoliner, losing speed and falling into the sea well ahead of the jetliner though it did so with Locke and his first officer, Lieutenant Colonel Dexter McLennan watching. It was sobering to see but they were safe, protected by speed, range, and the Eagles of the 57th TFS.

In the fight, the Tnemratians had thrown in the towel. Twenty-one aircraft were destroyed with only twelve pilots ejecting. One was damaged and seven had returned to base. What was left in the skies now was a multitude of MiG-21s and Su-27s though the former weren't fairing very well against their counterparts. In barely thirty more seconds, four of the eight Flankers were shot down and the other four had bugged out from the fight. For the MiG-21s, five of the twenty were returning to base unharmed while two were damaged and on the way back. Yet despite the retreat call, some of the Fishbed pilots found themselves unable to disengage and thus, they had to remain in the fight, much to the chagrin of their GCI controllers.

Three such aircraft were engaged by Wraith 1 flight. Blackledge, having maneuvered in on one that was attempted to ambush Briggs, downed his fourth aircraft with a Sparrow shot. The Fishbed never stood a chance. Briggs downed his second aircraft seconds later with a Sidewinder, capping his kill-count at two. That left the third and final Fishbed. Blackledge spotted it out of his canopy as the pilot launched a missile towards his flight lead. Briggs dropped flares and successfully evaded the missile but in doing so, he put the Fishbed in an advantageous position for a second shot. Maneuvering to get the Fishbed off his tail, he yanked hard up and to the right, clearing Blackledge to enter the dogfight.

In Blackledge's earphones, he heard the Sidewinder seeking its target for he was out of Sparrow missiles. In this type of high-G turning though, he wanted the Sidewinder, not the Sparrow, of which he had two left, having fired one into and successfully killing the MiG-29 and another against a MiG-21 that had avoided the missile only to be downed by Friesen seconds later, accounting for Friesen's second Fishbed kill. Now Blackledge was hunting for his fifth - though he assumed it was his fourth - kill of the night. Doing so would make him an ace and an "ace in a day" to boot, one of the most prestigious accomplishments in aerial combat.

Maneuvering hard to stay with the Fishbed and wanting to do so quickly, before the Fishbed got off another missile, Blackledge watched the G meter on his HUD top +7.5 and he kept pulling, so light was his aircraft now without missiles, tanks, and a lot of fuel that pulling these hard Gs was easy for the fighter. The growling tone of the Sidewinder echoed in his headphones and until finally the sound changed from the growling to a high-pitched, solid tone. This meant a lock and he needed nothing further from his fighter. Calling out "Fox two," he pushed down on the button and the Sidewinder detached from its pylon and screamed forward towards the Fishbed. Flying outwards to keep track and maintain its intercept course, the missile took barely six seconds to reach its target, catching the Fishbed on the port side wing. Shrapnel from the missile penetrated the hull and thick, black smoke belched from the Fishbed's tail. The pilot, unaware that he'd been chased, rolled the aircraft hard and sent it into a spin. He ejected moments later from his mortally wounded and now spinning aircraft.

"Splash four," Blackledge called and with that, the Battle of Sable Island was concluded. The Tnemratian fighters had all turned away and the Eagles, having burned considerable amounts of fuel from their knife fight, came off their afterburners and turned for home as well. There was no need to fly out and protect the Stratoliner for it was taking a very wide southerly course to return to Layarteb City, protected by both the Raven and the Sentry's radar, which saw no threats except the retreating Tnemratian fighters.

In the final moments of the fight, Wraith 2-1, piloted by Major Christopher Maestas took damage from an R-60 missile fired from a MiG-21. The damage was classified as moderate and he was going to recover back at Calverton.

"Zulu 7-0, Wraith 1-0, what's the final tally?" Briggs called out as they crossed back into friendly airspace and only after a long period of silence.

"Twenty-nine confirmed, two possible," Lemons answered. "We'll have to check the tape but Wraith 1-2 has a leading five." Silence filled the airwaves as Blackledge, aware of his flight position, went through the kills in his head. It was only then that the Foxbat had clicked. He'd been told his missile was a hit by AWACS but in the rush to engage the MiG-29s, the message had gone through one ear and out of the other.

"Five," he said in response, a bit of bewilderment in his voice.

"Roger that Wraith 1-2, unofficial though."

"Unofficial my ass," Briggs said victoriously, "beers on Wraith 1-2!" Cheers went over the net as they continued onward for Calverton.

The tape would confirm that Blackledge scored five kills, making him an ace-in-a-day. Briggs scored two kills, Friesen two, and McDaniel just one. In Wraith 2 flight, the squadron's XO scored three kills, including a Flanker that he'd felled with a Sparrow shot at close range. The rest of his flight only scored one kill each though Maestas had been robbed of a second kill when a MiG-29 he'd damaged successfully recovered at Shearwater. In Wraith 3 flight, Major Arthur Maginnis flying the Wraith 3-0 position had two kills with the rest having one. He'd damaged a MiG-21 but its pilot managed to land the aircraft. Wraith 4 flight had one kill each so that all sixteen pilots had come out victorious in some fashion but none as successfully as Blackledge.

The incident would go down as the Battle of Sable Island, a rout by the 57th Tactical Fighter Squadron and an embarrassment for the Tnemratian Air Force. They'd lost twelve MiG-21s, three MiG-25s, ten MiG-29s, and four Su-27s. Three MiG-21s and one MiG-29 had been damaged but successfully recovered. Five MiG-21s, six MiG-25s, one MiG-29, and four Su-27s successfully evaded damage and returned to base. None of the Eagles were lost and of the four damaged, all recovered safely albeit two at Otis and the rest at Calverton. Everyone who took part in the battle was decorated in a closed but touching ceremony attended by the Emperor himself. Lemons, for his direction of the fight and efficiency in directing the Eagles, was met with a Bronze Star. Briggs, who led the 57th TFS and shot down two fighters, was awarded with a Distinguished Flying Cross as were McDaniel and Parnell who successfully landed their much damaged aircraft. Maestas received a Bronze Star with V device. Friesen and Maginnis were also awarded with Distinguished Flying Crosses for their two aerial victories while the squadron XO, Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Wyatt was awarded with a Silver Star for three aerial victories. Blackledge was awarded the highest honor of the squadron's pilots, the Air Force Cross. In addition, every pilot who participated in the battle was awarded an Air Medal and the unit received a special commendation from the Emperor. The crew of the EF-111A Raven were awarded with an Aerial Achievement Medal each as well.

The Battle of Sable Island didn't just validate the tactics and skills of the pilots who participated in it. It was the start of a war. Four days later, Operation SPIDER SILK was launched, the invasion and annexation of Tnemrot. Within nineteen days, Tnemrot's air force had been routed, its air defenses had been destroyed, and its navy sunk. In the ten weeks that followed, Tnemrot's ground forces were defeated and its government toppled. By the end of 1986, organized resistance had disappeared and the Dominion of Tnemrot began official annexation into the Empire of Layarteb, bringing a final end to the chapter of Tnemratian-Layartebian relations that had been sour for eight hundred years.

• • • † • • •

Return to Introduction
Return to Contents

Earth II v.5.0 [Short Story Index]

Earth II v.5.0 [Short Story Index]

Who is online