Beyond the Clouds_Retaliation

by Daniel Chappell

  “Good work out there,” she says. “Any problems during the mission?”

  “None whatsoever, thanks to your awesome maintenance.”

  She checks off a few things on her screen. “Alright, I won’t hold you then.”

  “Thanks as always, Chief Rodriguez.”

  She disappears to the ceiling again and zips off to her next order of business. Damn, that looks like fun. Hitomi comes up beside me as I walk toward the prep room. She takes off her helmet and shakes out her hair. It’s gotten a little longer in the last few months, but it looks like she recently touched up the highlights.

  “Great job as usual, Mr. Commander,” she says.

  “Same to you, Ms. Commander,” I tease her back.

  Her hand comes up to brush her hair out of her face as she giggles. We reach the prep room together and walk inside, causing the dim lights to brighten upon sensing our motion. It seems like the others are still tied up with the mechanics, so we just change out of our combat gear. She makes a big show of stripping out of her flight suit right in front of me.

  “Hmm. If we were a few million miles closer to home and you weren’t still fully clothed, this might be pretty exciting,” I tell her.

  “Oh, you know you’re enjoying it anyway.”

  “Maybe. Officially, I can neither confirm nor deny these allegations.”

  She bursts into full on laughter just as the door to the hangar opens. Kat walks in and just shakes her head upon witnessing her two commanding officers up to their usual antics. Akane enters behind her followed by the two rookies that first approached us back at the academy. Sam is the first to recover from his surprise.

  “Good fighting today, colonel.”

  “Same to you. You guys performed well out there. How do you feel after your first taste of real combat?”

  “Tense.”

  I laugh a little as I reply. “Welcome to our wonderful world, then. I just came down from the battle tension a few minutes ago, myself.”

  My admission seems to calm both of the two’s nerves a little. Sam takes a deep breath and I can see Naomi’s shoulders relax a bit. She goes over a row to her locker to change out of her flight suit and, after thanking Hitomi and me, Sam follows behind her to his own locker. Since we put on our flight suits fully clothed, there’s no need for separate prep rooms. It saves space and time; if need be I can have a mini briefing right in here as we get ready for a mission.

  “You know,” Hitomi says, walking up closer behind me, “we never got the chance to feel like rookies.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. We kind of got thrown straight into things. I came straight in with responsibility for a whole squadron and you were right there beside me the whole time. Hard to believe we’ve only been at this for two years and some change.”

  “It’s been a long two years.”

  “It has. I’m ready to retire already,” I admit.

  Her eyes soften a bit after my statement. She briefly gives my back a comforting rub and nudges my shoulder with her head. While I told her all of this in a manner of speaking once, I think it’s the first time I’ve just come out and said it.

  “Let’s hurry up and finish things then,” she says.

  “Yes, let’s.”

  We finish changing out of our flight suits and securing everything in our lockers before exiting the room, moving off to occupy ourselves during the downtime.

  Chapter 26

  Major Hitomi Saruyama

  October 28, 2113, 02:20

  A rhythmic thudding reaches my ears over the sound of music playing in my ears as my heart thumps with an increased tempo. My hair, tied up at the moment, bounces against my back and sweat rolls off my body as I continue running on the treadmill.

  Two months in space has really done a number on my sleep patterns. Without any real day or night to speak of, time’s just kind of become a jumbled mess. Really, the only reason we have clocks around the ship is to keep up with mission times.

  I take a look at my watch and slow my pace down to walking speed for a short cooldown before stopping the machine. After grabbing my water bottle from its slot, I step off the treadmill and turn around. To my surprise, I run face first into someone, bouncing off their chest. Upon looking up, I see that it’s Rion standing there with a towel. He offers it to me and I use it to dry my sweat.

  “Good work,” he tells me. “But did you have to find the tiniest pair of shorts you own to work out in?”

  With no one else in the room, he takes his time unashamedly observing my figure. I can’t help but feel my cheeks warm with a mix of excitement and mild shyness.

  “It was the most comfortable pair I could find that was clean,” I defend. “Besides, it’s not like anyone here would try anything.”

  “True,” he admits, moving closer so that his face is just a few inches from mine. “But, even though we’re on hold right now, I don’t think I’d like the other guys staring at my girlfriend’s amazing body so hard.”

  He whispers the second bit in my ear, sending chills down my spine. On hold, huh? He’s sure walking a thin line. An involuntary sigh escapes my lips, and I push past him to where the clothes I wore over my exercise gear sit atop a chair, lest I give in to any urges. I don’t know if his teasing has gotten more intense lately, or if my body is just more responsive to it than ever.

  “Duly noted, colonel,” I reply sarcastically as I put on the loose sweatpants and pull the shirt over my head.

  He laughs, and we exit the room together. It seems he really did come here solely to tease me. Where does this guy find the free time while being probably the second or third most important person on this massive ship? Granted, I guess there’s really nothing for us to do unless there’s a fight. With the Ikaruga moving full speed through space, we’re limited to exercises in the simulators as well.

  “Colonel! Major!”

  A voice urgently calling for us interrupts us. I look up for the source of the summons and see Naomi running toward us. She stops directly in front of us, catching her breath before explaining the reason for her urgency.

  “It’s Lt. Watanabe. She fell down a flight of stairs and now she’s been rushed to the medical ward.”

  Before she’s fully finished her last sentence, Rion and I have already sprinted off in the direction she came from, headed for the medical ward. Neither of us is in so much of a hurry just because one of our subordinates is injured. Saika’s one of our best friends. The only thing that matters is making sure she’s okay.

  Luckily, there aren’t too many people walking around the hallways we pass through. Only one person jumps out of our way, startled, as we rush past. We burst through the doors of the hospital bay and up to the person manning the desk.

  “Lt. Saika Watanabe?” Rion asks hurriedly.

  “Room two,” she says after a glance at the screen before her.

  We thank her and hurry past into the main part of the hospital, looking left and right for a moment before finding a door with the number two above it. Forgetting to even knock for the sake of politeness, we swing the door open and barge inside. Within, we find Saika…

  Sitting up in bed, looking almost as if nothing happened. There are some cuts and bruises visible and a bandage is wrapped around her head, but she looks otherwise unperturbed. Hearing us burst in, she turns her head and smiles at us shyly.

  “Saika!” I blurt out. “Are you okay? We heard you fell down the stairs and were hurt.”

  “Yeah, I’m okay. Just a little sore and bruised. Sorry to have worried you.”

  “What happened?” Rion asks, comparatively calm.

  “I was on my way up the stairs and a guy carrying some boxes lost his footing as he got to the first step on his descent. He caught his balance but bumped into me as he stumbled, knocking me backwards. He actually just left after coming to apologize profusely.”

  Rion sighs. “Don’t scare me like that. I can’t be losing you now, you know?”

  She smiles sadly. “You�
�re pretty cruel, you know? Not that I dislike that selfish side of you.” She blinks quickly, apparently confused by her own words. “Sorry, sorry. I know.”

  “It’s perfectly alright,” Rion and I both say in perfect unison.

  The three of us burst out laughing. Having caught up while we were talking, Naomi stands behind us utterly confused. I can’t blame her. There’s no way she could know why the preceding exchange was such a riot to the three of us.

  An alarm suddenly blares out all around the ship. All three of us are habitually on guard and ready to go. Saika goes to get up out of the hospital bed, but Rion pushes her right back down by the shoulder.

  “No. You’re not going out today,” he tells her.

  “I’m fine. It’s just minor cuts and bruises.”

  “Saika, you know exactly how this conversation goes with me. And, if you forgot, there’s someone standing right next to me who can tell you from firsthand experience. Now sit down and wait for us to come back.”

  Oh. Rion’s dominant side came out a little there. That was a little bit sexy. Oh yeah, impending attack, injured friend. Serious moment. Ahem. Right.

  “Okay, fine. You better come right back.”

  “Who do you think we are?” Rion says with a mock-pompous air. “We’re the best damn pilots in the galaxy.”

  The thing is, he’s right. As much stress and anxiety as all of us have about being so far away from home and a million other things, we have absolute faith that we can best any fight as long as we work together as always. That fact, while we take it with a grain of salt—especially since we lost Brian—still remains relatively proven. Also, is it weird that Saika is the only person that I don’t mind flirting with my boyfriend?

  Without wasting any more time talking—or dealing with my oddly wandering thoughts—Rion and I run out of the room and head for the hangar. Naomi already left well ahead of us and, by the time we get to the prep room, she’s on her way out to her plane. We hurriedly put on our own equipment and rush out to our planes.

  Prefight checks are completed in moments and we’re cleared to take off. My plane’s datalink is on fire with information updates and assessments coming from CIC. Before I’ve even passed through the outer hangar doors, chatter from control starts to come through the radio.

  “A large Republic fleet is approaching us from ahead. It appears to be the remnants of the enemies we fought not long ago along with some reinforcements. They have yet to directly engage us, but they are headed to intercept us at high speed.”

  I look down at my radar and zoom out so that I can see the enemies in the distance. By my count, there are six enemy ships. The strange thing, however, is that none of the enemy ships have launched any fighters despite us putting out four squads to intercept them. Rion seems to notice this odd behavior as well.

  “42nd Squadron units stick close to our ship and form a line of defense. 35th Squadron units with me to create a forward perimeter,” he orders.

  All sixteen pilots follow the order without hesitation. The 42nd Squadron, filled with many of the new pilots, forms an evenly spaced line in front of our ships’ formation. The rest of us move farther ahead, fixing our distance so that our fleet is right at the first ring of our radar. Only then do the enemy ships begin releasing fighters of their own.

  “I don’t like this,” I tell Rion on a private channel.

  “Me either.” He switches back to the command and control channel. “Ikaruga, the enemy forces seem to be up to something. I can’t tell what, but their air wing is definitely behaving strangely.”

  “Acknowledged. We have yet to observe any weapons activity from the enemy fleet either. For the time being, we’ve decided to just observe as long as the enemy ships don’t display any hostilities or get too close.”

  “Understood. We’ll continue to monitor the situation from our position as well and I’ll report any insight we manage to gather.”

  The CnC channel falls quiet once more as Rion switches back to the operational wing channel. To maintain clear lines of communication for orders, we only use the command and control channel for orders from HQ and crucial information both ways. CnC transmissions can be heard from any other channel to ensure information receipt.

  As I observe them, the enemy fighters spread out into a wide formation. Units move up, down, left, right; every direction conceivable out in space is used by their forces. By the time they’re done with their movements, they’ve spread out into what looks like a flat wall of planes facing our direction.

  What the hell are they up to? I’m practically shaking with curiosity trying to figure out their intentions. Beside me, I can feel Rion’s brain whirring as well. The enemy fleet continues to close in at an awkward angle, their air forces maintaining roughly the same distance from their fleet as we are from our own.

  In the next moment, the fighters staring us down begin to approach. They maintain their widespread formation as they close in our first line of defense. My radar alerts me with a single beep as they come within the second ring of our radar range. If they get too much closer, any ensuing skirmish will be too close to our carrier for comfort.

  “Ikaruga, I’m going to push some units forward to ensure the hostile fighters keep their distance,” Rion informs the carrier.

  “Copy that. The enemy fleet still shows no weapons activity but watch yourselves out there.”

  “Understood. 42nd units move up to my current location and maintain a perimeter. 35th units come with me to approach the enemy in preparation for an intercept.”

  The squads each move up a step on the battlefield as Rion calls for another four squads to be on standby and ready to launch at a moment’s notice. Everyone’s tension levels are stretched from all the unknown variables facing us. No one knows what might happen next, so all we can do is keep watching and be ready for anything.

  As the enemies are about to reach the first ring of our radar, they shift their formation again. The edges begin to come farther out ahead of the center, forming a hemisphere that continues to encroach on our defense line. It seems like they’re trying to surround us before the fighting even begins.

  “Ikaruga, if these hostiles get any closer I’m going to be forced to engage,” Rion warns.

  “Copy that, White Fang One. Our attempts to contact the enemy fleet and fighters have been met with no response. You are free to engage at your discretion.”

  Almost the second the operator says it, my weapons sensors start wailing as the enemy fighters’ weapons start training on us. Rion orders us to scatter, then tells the 42nd Squadron units to move up and the reserve fighters to launch all in one motion. In that time, his plane never stops maneuvering.

  We’re outnumbered for sure. Even with the reserve squad launching now, the enemies have a slight numbers advantage over us. The edges of the enemy forces start to converge, threatening to completely encircle our measly eight planes and cut us off from our reinforcements. The units from the 42nd Squadron reach us just before we’re encircled, making it sixteen against a number I lost count on.

  The time for counting the enemy is long past, anyway. I push all unnecessary thoughts from my head and get into the groove of the fight. There’s lights everywhere from the thruster trails and plasma bolts fired by dozens of planes in an intense battle. Each of our planes seems to be trying to deal with two or three of the opposing ones.

  I lose track of time as my mind is taken over by the battle tempo. One enemy falls under a barrage of fire from my plane. Two enemies. Four. As I glance around me, there seem to be many fewer enemies than at the start of the battle. I know I lost count of the enemies at the start, but isn’t this still too few?

  Sure enough, I glance down at my radar to see that a large group of enemies are retreating toward their fleet. A smaller, but still sizeable, group continues fighting us on the front lines, not giving any opportunity to analyze their intentions. I’m still locked in battle with one fighter after another. It seems like everyone else is
in the same situation.

  Warning: Missile launch detected.

  An alert from my onboard computer catches my attention. Did the Republic seriously opt for expensive spacefaring missiles on their fighter craft? Before I have a chance to look, an enemy almost takes my nose off and I break off to evade.

  “All units, retreat now!”

  Rion’s voice sounds nearly panicked as he says it. I finally get a moment free to glance down at my radar and see that the missile alert isn’t coming from one of the fighters. Two missile tracks fly from the enemy ships in the direction of our fight. The last time Rion sounded this way because of a missile crosses my mind. Bad things are coming.

  That said, the enemy fighters aren’t giving us much room to get away from them. Every time I think I’ve gotten a moment to break free of the fight, another enemy catches me and continues to make my life difficult. This back and forth process continues as the missiles get closer and closer.

  After what feels like an eternity, I finally manage to get a break and free myself from the enemies surrounding us. To my sides, I see Rion and Kat, with Smith and Saika a little farther in the distance heading toward our ship. By now, the two approaching threats from the enemy fleet are way too close for comfort. The best we can do is push full throttle and weave around the attacks from our pursuers.

  “Where’s Two-One?” Rion suddenly asks.

  “She was just right next to me,” Kat responds.

  I look at my radar and see her radar signature a good distance behind us, still blockaded by the hostile fighters. Apparently, when the rest of us slipped through, she got caught up by a group of enemies. Rion has already begun turning around to give her some help.

  A massive flash suddenly spawns in the dark expanse of space. It’s so bright that it seems as if a supernova snuck up on us. My eyes happen to land on my radar as I shield myself from the blinding light.

  One of the missile contacts has disappeared right around the origin of the flash. Most of the hostile fighters that formerly occupied the space have disappeared, obliterated by the force of the explosion. What about Akane? I scan the contacts and finally find her dot. It’s moving away from the area at a high speed—much faster than our planes should be capable of. Suddenly, she vanishes from radar completely.