| Whirlwinds of Tempestuous Fire |
| Arc: | Paradise Regained |
| Summary: | TCS Majestic's pilots strike a Ralari headed to attack the carrier. |
| Date: | 2658.282 |
| Related Logs: | None |
| Participants: | Cole Victoria Kanani Susan |
Evening comes for the Majestic's pilots with the sound of blaring scramble alarms shaking pilots from dinner, working out, loitering in the rec room, and all of those other fun and exciting things that pilots spend their time doing when they're not flying. A perfect interruption to an otherwise dull evening for the pilots who weren't deployed for planetside support.
Cole's broadsword swings clear of the Majestic's launch tubes, circling the carrier lazily as he waits for the rest of the fighters to make their way out from the carrier. « Voodoo to flight, looks like we're to be provided some entertainment after all tonight. » he relays as the information comes in to him from tactical. « We're tracking a large bogey that just entered the system and is presently heading directly for us. CIC isn't sure if it's a capital ship or a grouping of fighters, but either way I'm not inclined to let them get here »
«Well, at least this means I can put off eating tonights dinner special, for a bit.» Quips Kanani as her Stiletto shoots out of the launch tubes. «Voodoo, Tsunami. Leaving them as burning wreckage seems like a good idea, to me, too.»
Tori has to grin at the comments about dinner, shaking her head slightly as she pulls her rapier out of the launch tube, relaxing a little bit today. Hey, she's not on the hot seat to lead, it's all good. « Queen here. All systems reporting green, and we are good to go. Let's go spoil a kitty party, since they already spoiled ours. »
Susan's Broadsword rolls and angles to fall into formation with Cole's as it leaves the hangar. One of the older ships in the hangar, the huge fighter's nose bears the painted legend /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/. Music lover that she is, Susan left it unchanged. «Chatterbox here. Green board. All guns hot and ready, shields up full. Sorry for the delay. Little trouble with the stabilizers. Make that 'scattering shed fur across the sector' vote unanimous.»
In the back of the ship, Chief Petty Officer Devon Knight grins over the back of his gunnery chair. "'Stabilizer trouble', El-Tee?"
Susan blushes. "What? Did you really want me to say they got me out of the shower?"
« Right. Now that we're all here… » Cole comments with a little amused chuckle. « Form up and come about to two-two-seven mark three-zero » the bomber commander orders simply, his own ungainly craft slowly coming around to the heading he'd ordered. « And Chatterbox, let me know if your bird looks like it's giving you any more trouble. I'd rather send you back to the deck than have you get shot to pieces to no good end. »
Kanani rolls and twists her nimble little fighter onto the ordered course, and then lines up in formation as the slow (thanks to the Broadswords) trip towards the cats gets started. «Copy that Voodoo. Heading towards those coordinates now.» She states quickly, then starts to make a more thorough check of her ship's status readings. Might as well make use of the trip time after all.
Tori wrinkles her nose, though that's more a sign she's thinking than anything else. Her rapier comes around, falling into her position easily enough. She has to keep her throttle down a little (Not so much as the stilettos, but still) so as not to outpace the bombers. « Roger that, Lead. Settling into position on your mark. » She goes quiet now, simply settling in and checking over her systems quickly. Her attention is on her sensors though, keeping watch for any sneaky little red blips.
«She feels okay, Voodoo. It was just a bad hydraulic seal, and the patch the deck crew put on it seems to be holding,» Chatterbox reassures her section leader, following his course from her position off his wingtip. She dials her sensors up to long range. «Picking up something from long range, dead ahead… no, no good. Just some debris.»
And so the four fighters waddle their way off into the blackness of space, leaving the safety of planet and carrier behind… It's a long bit of charging through nothingness (thanks in no small part to the low speed of the Broadswords), before threat receivers chirp to life as a pair of contacts appear on radar screens.
« Voodoo to flight, I'm showing what looks like a forward escort element for whatever's out here » Cole explains, turning his fighter slightly to head straight for the two pesky red dots on his radar. « Computer IDs 'em as a pair of Sartha-class. Let's go ahead and punch 'em out »
«I see 'em too, Voodoo.» Kanani remarks as the warning chirps start up. Her fighter speeds up some as she angles off slightly to head in the direction of the Sarthas. «Punching them out before they can warn their pals seems like a good plan to me. Looks like the surfs up!» She adds as she gets ready to attack.
Tori adjusts her direction as well, sitting up a little for a moment before relaxing a bit. She turns her guns to full and gets whatever weapons systems need to charge finishing up and ready to shoot. « Queen here. Ready to start attack runs. Let's hope the waves don't tip us over, Tsunami! »
«I see 'em, too. Light fighters almost don't seem worth the ammunition,» Susan says, her voice gaining a faint tremor. Two Kilrathi fighters bearing down on them, backed up by the fabled elephant. Her hand clenches on the HOTAS. «Ready to burn, lead!» Hopefully not literally…
Apparenly, the Kilrathi have seen the Confederation fighters two. The two Sartha begin to close more rapidly, the telltale blue of afterburners showing behind the two craft as they race in towards the Confederation escorts.
« Voodoo to all craft, break and attack » Cole orders, even as he brings his bomber around to line up a shot on the lead Kilrathi craft. After all, it's the least he can do to ruin his opposite number's day. « And Chatterbox? Rule number one. If it has fur, it's worth the ammunition »
Kanani hits the burners for a quick burst to leap out at her chosen Sartha. «Copy that, Voodoo. Going after them now.» She switches her weapons over to her missiles after an instants thought, and then twists and turns her fighter in an attempt to get on the Sartha's tail and launch one of her heat seekers. Once she manages that, she pulls the trigger, and calls out. «Fox 2.» Before she then starts to avoid any incoming fire from the cat.
Tori wrinkles her nose as her tell tales let her know that one of the sartha is targetting her. She jukes her rapier, hitting her own afterburners to get up to speed at Voodoo's command. « Queen. Going in. » She still has to play a little cautious, not wanting to get shot up … again … but she does aim her craft generally straight at the nose of the sartha that's trying to get a shot off on her, waiting until she gets a green target and squeezing off a shot before she hits hard to port, twisting and turning her craft to get out of the way and to prepare for another attack run.
«Got your six, Kanani!» The /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ lunbers into a covering position just off the Stiletto's wing, though it's rapidly left behind by the faster fighter. Of course, if the fleabag doesn't turn in time after making his pass on Kanani, he's going to fly straight into the Broadsword's sights, a physics issue Susan is prepared to take full advantage of. She spares a glance back into the gunnery bay. "Heat 'em up, guys. I may not have time to call targets, so watch your screens!"
Petty Officer Alexandra Hope flips a couple switches, bringing her turret's systems online and ready to fire. "Hope we get to use these guns this time. Last time we were all warmed up with nothing to blow."
Opposite her, Petty Officer Charles "Chuck' Brown smiles. "No comment. Ready to fire, boss."
And sure enough, the Sartha can't turn in time. «Firing!» comes Chatterbox's call, as a triad of heavy mass driver slugs leaves the barrels, hopefully on a collision course with the speeding Sartha.
Struck by gunfire and a missile almost simultaneously, one of the Kilrathi fighters is reduced to a quickly-expanding cloud of debris. The second one is battered but survives, abandoning the escorts in favor of engaging the bomber flight.
« Nice shooting everyone » Cole comments, even as he swings his bomber around after the sole surviving light fighter. « Look sharp, Chatterbox, looks like you might have made yourself a furry friend. I'm doing my best to clean him off you » the australian major adds a moment later.
Given the success of that little manoeuver, Tori flips her rapier around, coming in fast at the same Sartha. Well, his buddy just became space dust, so there's not too much choice at the moment. « That kitty has a lot of friends, at the moment. If you can call us friends. » She waits for her targetting system to show green and lets off another round with her guns.
Kanani gives a quick nod of satisfaction, as her missile pulverizes the Sartha's engines. She then calls out to the bomber pilot who was sorta close behind. « Nice shooting there, Chatterbox. » Then switching over to her guns, she lines up a shot on the remaining Kilrathi light fighter. « Lets bag and tag this guy, before more of them show up, shall we? »
«Good shot, Tsunami!» Susan calls, just before her threat indicator lights up. Uh-oh. Well, there might be a good side to this. «Just get ready to tail him, boss! I'm going to make sure his attention stays on me.»
With a flick of the controls, Susan switches to the Kilrathi ship-to-ship channel, angling for an oblique course to make herself a little harder to hit. She fires off another volley and hisses and snarls into her mike in Kilrathi, adding an aggressive hiss at the end to back up the deadly insult.
Concentrating a little too hard on trying to hit the wildly-evading Susan, the Kilrathi fighter is struck by fire from the other three Confederation craft. The missile it fires is caught in the blast of the Sartha's own explosion, never even coming close to the Broadsword it had been aimed at.
« Right, now that we've had our fun… on to the real work » Cole comments, bringing his bomber back around to something resembling 'level' flight. « Come back around on course and let's resume our intercept. Hopefully we punched out those two before they got a transmission off »
Kanani quickly manuvers her fighter into formation once Cole gives the order. « Sounds like a good idea, Voodoo. Hopefully we can get this finished and get back home before the cats get their act together. » She responds quickly, as she starts to watch her scanners for any more enemy activity in the area.
«Whew… There's no better feeling than having that beeping stop,» Chatterbox says, meaning the threat indicator. With the Kilrathi's demise, it went silent. «Thanks, guys! Coming to intercept course.» And the lumbering fighter falls into formation again. «Ow… that always gives me a sore throat.»
Tori grins as the trio of fighters send munitions of all types into the body of that Sartha, and it goes kablooey. « Nice shooting,» she says, and then, « Chatterbox, whatever you said to them just then, remember that phrase. It seemed to work, sore throat or not. » She levels out her own flight, pulling back over to the broadswords and some semblance of formation. Her gaze finds her own scanners as well, looking for whatever these two babies were protecting.
« What /was/ that, anyway? » Cole asks Susan with a little laugh. « Sounded disturbingly like two housecats going at it » he jokes. After all, he can afford to joke about that sort of thing now that they've won, right? Even if the bigger fight is likely still ahead.
Kanani snickers a bit at the banter, and shakes her head as much as possible in the tight confines of the Stiletto's cockpit. « Whatever it was, I wonder if they really got much of a chance to hear it, seeing as just a second later his ship was getting blown apart. » Still keeping her attention on the scanners, she continues to fly onwards with the rest of the group, waiting to see what else the cats have in the area.
«Trust me, Queen, I will. It's not something I'd care to have said about /my/ family!» Chatterbox replies with a laugh. Cole's question gets a more subdued response. «Kilrathi language. Long story.» /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ course-corrects to track back to the Sarthas' point of origin. «Scanners are still clean.»
Tori grins at Susan's answer, though she chuckles at Cole's comment. « Probably not, Tsunami, but if he was seeing red for that last second, maybe it's not a bad thing, » she says. Her rapier continues along, sensors dialed out to their max as she tries to get advance intel on whatever they're coming up on. « So, a story for sometime in First and Last, Chatterbox? or is this more a story for a quieter evening? » Making conversation, as the flight slows down to tortoise - broadsword - speed.
And if you think that the broadswords are slow, you should see what they're running into… the witty banter might continue for a while longer, but it can't last for /too/ long, before something pops up on the radar once more to take care of any pesky illusion that the Sartha were all that was incoming. No, what's waiting at the intercept point is a Ralari-class destroyer with escorts out and waiting for the Confederation to arrive. Blowing up Sartha is a pretty good way of announcing you're coming, after all.
« Well, well, well… look what we've got here » Cole comments with a not-too-nice little smile as the Kilrathi destroyer shows up on sensors. « Chatterbox, looks like we're going to get to delete a destroyer. Stick close to me, and try not to worry about the fighters. Leave them for our escorts until that Destroyer is toast »
Oh boy. More targets, and a big old destroyer. Not exactly a barrel of laughs so far as Kanani is concerned, but she figures that hopefully the two fighters can keep the Dralthi off of the bombers while they make their runs. « Ever wish they'd send us out with maybe just one or two more fighters to help out? » She asks, as she starts to manuver her fighter into position to intercept the Kilrathi fighters.
«Definitely a quieter evening in the FAL, or just a quieter evening,» Chatterbox replies, as the comms drift into silence for the long wait.
Or maybe not so long. Paint on the screens. Red paint. «Looks like a Ralari-class. Thick hide and sharp teeth. Forming on your wing, Voodoo, and preparing for a torpedo run.» The two sensor blips of the Broadswords come into alignment, one parellelling the other's course.
Susan glances back into the gunnery bay. "Looks like we get to dance with a destroyer, guys. You know the drill. Devon, keep our tail clear!"
Devon grins again over the back of his chair, but this time it's a feral, anticipatory grin. "You got it, El-Tee! Bring on the fleabags!"
« All the time, Tsunami,» Tori replies, though her amusement is tempered by knowledge of the impending fight. « Let's see if we can't take out those dralthi before the bombers finish with the ralari, what do you think? » It's not entirely serious but hey, if it helps keep the team focussed, Tori's all for it.
The four Kilrathi escorts break away, racing in towards the Confederation craft, even as the first bursts of flak begin exploding around the Confederation strike. At this long of a range, they don't have a hope of hitting anything… but that's likely to change soon enough!
« Here, kitty kitty kitty… » Cole comments under his breath as he lines himself up on the Kilrathi destroyer, ignoring the inbound fighters for the moment… just waiting out the little warbling tone of his torpedo's warhead attempting to lock on its target, and then gently squeezing the trigger to release his shot.
Kanani switches her weapons over to heat seekers, and then rolls her fighter onto the tail of the Dralthi chasing Susan. Once she gets a lock, she pulls the trigger, and the missile leaps off of the racks towards the fighter, and then she starts trying to avoid all the incoming fire. « Hope you guys take care of that flak quick like.» She commments as her ship twists around with the other fighters.
Flak missing - that's a good thing, but just the fact that it's out there is enough to have Tori fly a little more cautiously. She switches to try a dumbfire, seeing if she can damage one of the dralthi enough to take it somewhat out of the fun. As the kilrathi fighters come barrelling in, she flips over to meet them, finding one that's targetting the bombers and taking a chance to fire at it, at the earliest opportunity. « Fox-1 » she says simply. « Tally ho. »
«Treat, kitty! Treat!» Susan calls, pointing her nose at the Ralari in imitation of Cole and pushing the throttle home. /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ bores straight in at the destroyer, beginning the long, breathless charge down the throat of Doom commonly known as a torpedo run. Agonizing seconds pass as the gunners blaze desperately at pursuing fighters and the lock-on system does its slow work, analyzing and recording every nuance of the destroyer's structure, setting for the most vulnerable point…
And there's the tone! Susan's finger snaps the trigger home. «Torpedo away!» she calls, yanking the Broadsword through a quick Immelmann. Now they just have to get away!
The Kilrathi gunners begin to find their range, knocking chunks out of each of the Broadswords… though the sturdy craft manage to hold together. One of the Dralthi isn't quite as lucky, as a Heat-seeking missile tracks right into the engines of the Kilrathi medium fighter, detonating it in a flash.
« Sunovabitch » Cole grumbles to himself as his broadsword is hit by the Kilrathi gunners and his torpedo sails on clear past its intended target. « Coming around on him again. Keep those fighters entertained » Cole adds, a little more sharply than really intended.
So the dumbfire didn't work too well. Tori switches back to her guns, checking out how they work. She's still trying to tail the dralthi that's aiming at a bomber. Bad enough the ralari is throwing flak at everyone but the dralthi are just in the way. She doesn't say anything until she has a chance, after a little nip and tuck maneouver, to fire. « Queen, guns,» she says simply.
Kanani grins for just a moment, as her missile strikes true, and blows her target to smithereens. She then dodges the incoming flak and shots from the Dralthi tailing her, and she swoops around, to try and put her final missile into that one as well. She figures that Queen will be able to take care of the fighter chasing Cole for the moment anyways. On getting a lock she calls out, «Fox 2.» And then releases the missile hopefully to as good of an effect as her other two have had this time out.
«Hit! But it's still there…» Nothing to do but go around again. Reversing her shaken Broadsword's direction, Chatterbox pours on the speed. The entire ship vibrates with the strain of this second charge, a dangerous high-pitched whine marking damage to the engines from the last pass. In the back, lasers shriek and burn angrily as the gunners keep the ship's tail clear.
And once again, the tone sounds! «Fox 3, aiming high!»
Struck simultaneously by a pair of torpedoes, the Ralari is torn apart in slow-motion by a series of internal explosions, until it's left as nothing more than a drifting charred hulk of space-debris.
Cole grins under his helmet at the sight of that Ralari slowly tunring into a burned out Ralari-bits collection. « That's more like it. Nice shot, Chatterbox! » Cole adds. Of course, it's only then that his threat receiver goes crazy. « Looks like I've got the whole damn Kilrathi navy's attention after that one » he adds, maneuvering wildly to try and keep the Dralthi behind him from getting a clean shot.
And with the destroyer's flak cannons gone, Kanani finds herself in the clear, and immediately goes on the offensive, trying to put down one of the Dralthi that's now chasing Cole's bomber. Switching over to her guns, she opens fire once the cat gets in her target sights.
Tori is still chasing that one Dralthi, since it has a thick skin. She at least saw that she hit it somewhat last time, so that's a bit of encouragement. As her threat receiver continues to beep, she keeps dodging and trying to lose the fighter targetting her, even as she fires at the one aiming at Voodoo. « Darn, guess we lost that one, » she says, though she doesn't sound at all sorry about it, since she didn't really expect to beat them.
The explosion that lights the entire inside of /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ through the aft gunner's viewport brightens the entire crew's day. Cheers ring throughout the Broadsword's cramped interior. «Good shot, Voodoo… watch out, you've picked one up!» Chatterbox calls, making the understatement of the year. The lead Broadsword has gained a fan club of two! Chatterbox swings wide around, arcing in on the Dralthi's six. «I'm on him… just stay mobile!» she calls over the hard, steady pounding of her mass drivers.
The exchange of fire following the destroyer's demise proves a vicious one, with trouble enough for both sides. Queen's guns tear apart a Dralthi, though in the process a heat-seeking missile slams into the rear of the Rapier. By some miracle, it manages to hold together.
It's tough to miss the explosion of a missile against one of his escorts' shields, and the implications that go along with it. With the destroyer out of the way, Cole at least finds himself free to transition from hunted to hunter, ignoring the fighter behind him for the moment. « Queen's looking pretty beat up, let's peel that Dralthi off her » Cole orders, even as he switches over to his missiles. « Don't worry about the one on me »
Okay, that was … unexpected. You'd think by now Tori would be used to such things, but no such luck. "Crap," she mutters, as she finds herself frantically checking all her systems to make sure that everything is working. Or at least, what isn't working. She doesn't get far into it before she realizes that the odd sounding buzz she's hearing is her threat receiver, and she does her best to move her poor little mangled rapier evasively. She flicks her radio on, holding her breath to see if it's working. « Queen here. I'm uninjured, can't say the same for my poor rapier though. Going to try to duck, dodge and otherwise avoid being hit again. » Course, if the silly kitties focus on her, that leaves the others freedom to fire at will. Whoever he is.
Kanani isn't quite able to get a shot in on the Dralthi chasing Tori, at least not one where she's certain it won't slam into the damaged Rapier if she misses, so she takes another quick shot at the other Dralthi, which has decided to go back to shooting at her again, and just hopes that the two Broadswords are able to help out Tori, for now.
«What? Vickie's in trouble? Tsunami, can you hold this one?» Without waiting for an answer, Susan wrenches /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ into a tight turn, making the superstructure groan in protest. Too far away for guns, she snaps the selector switch over to missiles and impatiently waits for the computer to give her a tone. Wait for the beep… wait for the beep… wait for the…
Beep! An FOF missile streaks from under the Broadsword's hull even as she reaches for the comm controls. Angry Kilrathi invective fills the channel, complete with insults for every fur-bearing galoot out here.
The Kilrathi pilots seem to ignore Susan's choice words in Kilrathi, keeping to their former targets… though thankfully managing to hit neither of them. Only after the launch of its latest missile and the demise of its wingman does the last surviving Dralthi turn its attention towards Susan's bomber.
« Got a piece of the bastard, let's see if I can finish him off » Cole comments as he brings his broadsword back around on that last Dralthi. Switching the selector back over from his missiles to his guns, he draws a bead dead center on the pancake-shaped Kilrathi fighter and gently squeezes the trigger.
Susan doesn't say anything. Her throat is too sore after screaming in Kilrathi. But she does speak in another way, pointing her nose at that persistent Dralthi after Victoria. He seems equally interested in her! Head-to-head, the two ships charge down each other's noses, medium fighter versus heavy bomber. The two pilots stare across their gunsights down each other's barrels as the cannons roar… who will fly and who will die?
Kanani turns her attention to the remaining fighter, having freed herself of any other trouble. Quickly getting the Dralthi in her targetting sights, she pulls the trigger, unleashing a hail of mass driver rounds at the cat. « Let's hope this finishes him off. »
Tori cringes as she tries wheeling and dodging as much as she can. It's not exactly her favourite place to be. And then the threat receiver stops making noise. She blinks, glancing at it, and thumping it once, to check if it's broken. « Still in one piece, » she reports, though sensors will let folks know that. And as the action continues, that kilrathi who is left wanders into her line of sight, so she throttles up as much as she can, her own ship protesting for all its worth, but she gets a chance and clicks on that trigger to fire. Hey, if nothing else, maybe she'll confuse the kitty.
« Looks like that's all of 'em. Well done, all. Queen, think you're going to be able to land that busted-up bird of yours or should I be getting my gunner ready to pick up your pod? » Cole asks, his broadsword quickly falling back into a pattern of lazily circling the Kilrathi debris.
Tori blinks, as she actually manages to hit something, with her rapier as damaged as it is. « I can land it, » she says simply, confidence obvious in her voice. « Just make sure they clear me some room in the landing bay. » She actually moves her raggedy rapier back into formation, giving the poor thing an unseen pat on the console. "Good job." « Back to base, Lead? I'd like to get into something a little more comfortable. »
Kanani breathes a sigh of relief as the final enemy fighter is blown up. « I think we're in the clear now. How are you doing, Queen?» She adds in addition to Voodoo's own similar comments. She waits to hear from the Captain before lining up in formation with the rest of the group, and commenting. «So, back to the Boat, Voodoo? Dinner's probably getting cold by now.»
«We still have a Vickie,» Susan says in obvious relief, her voice a touch raspy. «And the fleabags are going to need one /big/ broom to take their ships home.» /Doo-Wa-Diddy-Doo/ slips into a holding-pattern turn to wait for orders. «Anyone for drinks at the FAL? I think the old tradition holds that the first round's on the first-time killer.»
« Yep, let's bring 'em on back » Cole agrees with Kanani's suggestion. « Give the Majestic's gunners the good news that they can keep napping a little while longer » he adds with a chuckle, bringing his fighter back around towards the Majestic. « And I'd be up for drinks after landing. Though… I do need to talk to Tsunami first »
« Back to base it is, » Tori says, as she heads thataway. « I may have to take a raincheque on that drink, Chatterbox. I'm pretty sure I'll be getting my ear talked off by the techs about damaging my poor Rapier. » Once at the Majestic, Tori brings her fighter in, keeping it in one piece, though it's far from her most elegant landing. And when she hits the release, it takes a few extra seconds before the lid opens, so she can get out.
«I understand. I'll wait for you.» And back to the barn they go. Kanani starts her fighter off back on the slow, slow trip to the Majestic, rolling her eyes slightly at Cole's last comment. She doesn't respond to it though, and just keeps on piloting her nice undamaged ship back on it's way.