Born to Lose
Born to Lose
Arc: To Beat the Devil
Summary: Pilots from the Majestic scramble to defend the carrier from a Kilrathi bomber attack.
Date: 2659.047
Related Logs: None
Participants: Cole Kanani James Draygo Walsh

Evening on the Majestic this evening comes with a blaring scramble alarm, and a flurry of activity along the carrier's flight deck. The carrier begins to move away from the jump, accelerating as quickly as its engines will sustain as fighters begin to pour out from the launch tubes. « Majestic control to all craft, we are tracking inbound targets on multiple vectors. Patrols have been dispatched to link up with our escorts to turn back the worst of it, but keep a sharp eye out for leakers or this is going to be the shortest offensive in Confederation history. »

Banking his Sabre clear of the launch tubes as soon as he's out into space, Cole clicks his comms to respond. « Voodoo copies, Majestic control. Show me a target and I'll smash it » Cole replies, pausing for a moment before he thinks to ask. « Who else do I have out here? »

James opens his commline as soon as he's clear of the carrier and banks to port while speaking «This is Cutlass sir. All systems show green and I'm ready to go.»

« Copy that, Majestic. » Kanani responds as her Stiletto rockets out of the launch tubes and turns towards the incoming Kilrathi. « Voodo, Tsunami. You got me at least out here. Not sure who else woke up to play, yet, though. »

« Voodoo, Majestic Control. Tracking eight inbound craft at two two six mark seven four. Time to earn your pay. » comes the next report from the carrier's bridge. Lights dim along nonessential areas of the Majestic as the carrier prepares for battle, the turrets traversing the sky warily in search of targets.

« Majestic Control, Voodoo. Roger two two six mark seven four. Cutlass, Tsunami, we're not waiting for an invitation. Best speed, and at 'em. Try and knock out the bombers before they can get in on the carrier. » Cole orders simply, his fighter-bomber already turning onto the indicated heading, the engines flaring blue-white as he activates his afterburners.

James turns towards the indicated heading and kicks in his own afterburners with his eyes locked to the scanners until he can ID targets while his hand brushes the book in his flightsuit pocket once «This is Cutlass I'm on my way.» he says doing his best to mask the nervousness in his tone.

Kanani hits the afterburners on her Stiletto, racing off towards the bombers, as ordered. « Roger that, Voodoo. I wasn't on planning on waiting for the cats to invite us anyways. » Inside her cockpit she takes a deep breath as she gets ready for all the shooting to start up. "Well this wasn't quite how I was planning on spending my day." She mutters to herself wryly.

Razor was in the shower when the scramble warning hit so he does what he can at haste to dry up and get his flight gear on. He certainly isn't one of the first to launch as when he reaches the flight deck, other fighters have already scrambled. His Sabre is waiting for him ready to go though, courtesy of the deck crew and he hops into the cockpit while slamming his helmet on. Taxing to the launch tube, Razor finally comes out of the carrier and hits the afterburners, trying to catch up to the others, «Razor here, was in the damn shower. Can't the kitties call ahead of time.» He certainly sounds annoyed.

And now the fun begins. The eight contacts mentioned by Majestic quickly materialize into eight Kilrathi fighters… four bombers and as many escorts keeping close formation. All eight craft accelerate as the Confederation fighters appear, the escorts moving to engage and the bombers moving for a quick shot before breaking through to the carrier beyond.

« Voodoo to flight. I've got the lead bomber. Pick one and make it go away. Best of luck. » Cole orders simply before he's rocketing in towards his opposite number as fast as his engines will carry him.

James roars towards the third Bomber in the Formation and switches his weapons to Heat seekers as he pulls a half loop. He settles his guns over the craft's engines then squeezes the trigger once he has lock «Cutlass Fox 2!>. He calls as he breaks away.

Kanani moves in on the second of the bombers, trying to line up a shot with her heat seekers. « Copy that, I've got the second one. » She replies quickly, as she tries to avoid incoming fire, and get the shot in. « Tsunami, Fox 2. » She calls out once she has a lock, and launches the missile at the hopefully unfortunate cat.

With the afterburners kicking, Razor is able to catch up with the rest of his flight and also see the multiple red blips displayed on the front sensors, «Target rich environment, eh? Excellent.» Cycling through the various bombers, Kell picks one that is going after his squadron leader, «Got the last one, arming dumbfires.» With that said, he flicks the master switch on to his armaments and begins to dive in on the Grikath, knowing one is gunning for him in return. When close enough, he fires it off, hoping to do significant enough damage to make it harmless against the Majestic.

The lead Kilrathi bomber blows apart as a dumbfire missile slams through the front of the craft… though the Sabre that fired the killing shot certainly pays the price in damage for the kill. A second bomber is struck by a missile, trailing a line of plasma from its crippled engines and slowly falling behind the formation, though it continues its run. Kilrathi gunnery seems accurate today, a well-placed volley of fire nearly shearing the nose from James' Stiletto. At the end of its range, Majestic's laser batteries begin to open fire, hoping to disrupt the Kilrathi bomber pilots for a few precious moments more.

« Voodoo reporting enemy bomber destroyed » Cole reports swinging his bomber around towards a new target, ignoring the flashing red on his damage readout. « My bird's hit, but holding together » he thinks to add, before muttering under his breath. "And hopefully it will keep doing it"

James sees a flash of light as a neutron burst slams into his craft head on and the damage alarms start screaming. he grimaces and opens a commline «This is Cutlass. I'm hit but still here. Coming around for another run." He seeks out the bomber he had targeted earliar and roars towards it's tail «Cutlass Fox 2!»

"Damn, just winged him…" Kanani mutters to herself, as she sees the damage done to her target. Granted with the plasma leaking from the bomber, it was a bit more serious than 'winging' it, but she just isn't happy that it didn't blow up. « Nice shooting, Voodoo. » She comments, before she launches another missile at her target. « Fox 2. »

Pulling his fighter bomber into a half loop, Razor loops around to try to latch onto the Grikath he had targeted. Before he could dive in for a second strike, he spots a couple of hostiles on his tail and goes into evasive, «Razor here, picked up a couple of kitties on my tail, going evasive.» He wants to go after the bomber but for now he will try to get by without being pummeled by both Kilrathi fighters.

Finally, the onboard computer in Walsh's stiletto having been coaxed into operating in something close to normal manner, he's been given the green light to launch. «Ozone to flight, gotta love technical problems. How are we looking?» As he asks, he's looking around madly, trying to assess the situation. Bombers. Bad news. He points his nose in the direction of the nearest Grikath, and hits the 'burner.

The fight goes south for the Kilrathi bombers in a terrible hurry. Pounced on by the Confederation fighters, multiple missiles rake through the Kilrathi formation. The addition of devastatingly accurate gunnery from the Majestic's batteries proves too much for even the sturdy hulls of the Grikath to withstand. A woman's voice from Majestic gunnery triumphantly calls «Va te faire foutre, chat!» even as the Kilrathi escorts begin to pull back away from the carrier.

« Looks like they're trying to get away » Cole comments, grinning with satisfaction at his second destroyed bomber of the night. « Time to show the furballs there's a price for coming to play on our turf » he adds, switching his selector to guns and lining up on a Jalthi.

Kanani grins as her target is blown up, and she quickly pulls onto the tail of one of the retreating Sartha's, trying to put a missile into it's engines. « I hear that, Voodoo. Hey kitties, no one said you could leave the party early. » She adds before pulling the trigger and launching the last of her missiles.

James has no idea what the Majestic crewoman just said but is already angling for a shot at one of the Sartha's when he notices a Jalthi on his tail. He fires off a hasty snapshot then begins weaving and looping as he tries to lose his Kilrathi tail.

With one Kilrathi shrugged off, Razor goes back to the offensive despite still having another on his tail. Only doing a little bit of jinking and juking, he focuses in on one of the Heavy Jalthi fighters and after kicking forward with his afterburners, he launches his second Dumbfire Missile, leading the target a little bit to try to catch an intercept strike.

Walsh Seems like Walsh wasn't exactly needed, with the bombers getting chewed up without him. And as seems to be typical, all the Sarthas in the area seem to treat him like some sort of homing beacon. "Always the Sarthas…" he mutters to himself, jinking wildly. He's not so keen on having to eject again in a hurry.

James feels his fighter kick to one side as a burst strikes his tail and looks at his status readouts «This is Cutlass I got hit again but I'm still ok.» He then spins his fighter around so it's nose is pointing towards the Jalthi on his tail and boars in before squeezing the trigger «Cutlass Fox 2!»

The Kilrathi get their hits in, battering another Stiletto with gunfire…. but the numbers weren't too friendly to the Kilrathi to begin with, and are getting worse with each additional fighter that clears Majestic's launch tubes. The last pair of Kilrathi are left in a simple fight for survival, against more than twice their number.

Cole, meanwhile, is rather disappointed inside his cockpit at the less than spectacular results his guns have on the target in front of him. "'Same damage as a Neutron' my ass" Cole grumbles in complaint about the tech evaluation on his particle guns, even as he lines up his next shot on the Jalthi. « Careful, folks. No point in buying your farm here »

Kanani sharply rolls her fighter after the remaining Sartha, after having finished off the other one. With no fighters after her, still, she doesn't bother with any manuvering that might mess up her shot, and then she unloads a burst of mass driver rounds at the cockpit of the enemy fighter, hoping to leave a lasting impression.

The head on pass between the Jalthi and Razor's Sabre results in a clear winner. The cannons from the Jalthi pumps out an impressive array of energy fire but the ones that smatter onto the Sabre is easily shrugged off. However, the delayed Dumbfire that fires off of the Sabre's hardpoint slams into the cockpit of the Jalthi, making a very brilliant mess as the Kilrathi fighter explodes. With his dumbfires out now, Kell decides to switch to full guns instead of going with the Friend or Foe as he gooses his afterburners, diving in on the light nimble Sartha fighter, not use to fighting these light fighters in such a heavy craft.

Somewhere in a mess of twists and turns, Walsh managed to release a missile at one of his playmates. It was shaken off with not too much effort, but it kept the Sartha occupied for a few seconds. The other Fuzzy, though, seems to have pressed double hard. Walsh hears the familiar buzz of his shields, followed by the impact of Neutron fire on his wing. «Goddamn I hate Sarthas!» He maneuvers wildly, trying to shake the fiend from his tail.

It's a bad day for the furballs from Kilrah, once again. The last two Kilrathi fighters are brought down by the swarm of angry hornets (erm, Stilettos) whose nest they kicked… leaving space clear except for Confederation fighters and the dead.

« Voodoo to flight, looks clear. » Cole comments as the last Kilrathi craft disappear off radar. « Keep your eyes open for a second wave, but I suspect that's all they had to throw »

« Roger lead. Hopefully they've learned their lesson for the rest of the day, at least, though. » Kanani comments with a chuckle, as she checks her radar just to be certain all the bad guys are dead.

With his mass driver and particle cannons pumping out lethal firepower, Razor's shots easily punches through the cockpit of the light fighter, pretty much decapitating the kitty. «And scopes are clear, if a second wave comes, then they're late to the party. Unless it's some kitty cap ships, they seem to be afraid to poke at us ever since we smacked their welcoming party around when we jumped into Perry. Might've scared them out of the system.»

James smiles as the last enemy fighter comes apart and quickly begins working with his fighter's repair systems. «This is Cutlass it looks like the nose punch I took will need a little time in the shop but all systems seem functional and the tail is fine.»

«You mean they've stopped shooting at me? Aww, I was -so- enjoying it!» Walsh quips as he settles out into level flight. «So, who's been telling them to concentrate on that Ozone guy, anyway?»

« I admit it, Ozone » Cole replies, giving a little amused chuckle. « It was me. And look on the bright side, your fighter still looks a whole lot better than mine »