Chapter 6: Operation Desert Shrike Part 2

“I’m telling you, Chief. He shouldn’t be flying!” yelled one of the female pilots.

“Based off of what?” Chief Buziba commented. “The UHN choose to have him a part of this mission.”

The hangar of the UHN Gladiator was busy with activity. Every F-170 Falcon was placed onto the catapult launchers. Maintenance crews and ordinance officers were giving final inspections to ensure that every fighter craft was ready to fly. The hangar’s location was near the starboard top deck. It was, more or less, one sizeable closed runaway where the main elevator would lower down into. It was connected to the outside top landing platform. There was just enough room for aircraft to hover or be moved through the central runaway inside. There, they could be placed back onto the launch tube for repairs, refueling, and reloading. The sounds were littered, with people making announcements for anything important. Moving and operating machinery could also be heard as the chief discussed to another pilot. She didn’t seem to be happy as her eyes were set on Dean. He was not that far as he was fully dressed in his combat flight suit. He appeared to be checking to ensure that the size proportions of the uniform were correct. The red and blue uniform looked similar to the red and blue jumpsuits but had extra padding and pockets for various parts and survival gear.

“You didn’t answer me, Petty Officer Chao,” Buziba scolded her. “What’s your issue with Petty Officer Dean?”

She pointed at him. “He’s fucking stoned. You want to have that in the air?”

“He was already checked by the corpsman. He’s fine.”

“The corpsman barely looked at him! He just gave a brief check on his eyes and gave the go-ahead for him to go.”

“I don’t have time for this shit!” Buziba told her. “The ship is going to make the jump to Cipra in half an hour.”

“He’s a danger to all of us,” Chao pressed on with her onslaught towards Dean. “He was the same person that almost collided with...”

“I’m getting sick and tired of hearing about that damned incident report that all of you are bringing up,” the chief interrupted her. “I just checked his profile and record. Anything dealing with that event has been expunged. He served his time and has a good record as a fighter pilot. Hell, whatever makes him have the record that he has, then I’ll fucking have what he’s having.”

Chao was unimpressed. Her face showed her displeasure as they were nearing their fighters. Dean had the furthest set of walking to make. His face was that of content as he looked at the aircraft. It was unknown if he could overhear the conversation with the Chief and Chao.

“Your protest is noted,” Buziba told her. “But my decision is final. Not having him out there grounds one of my fighters in my squadron. We need every single pilot right now, just the same as every able-bodied marine that can pick up a gun or drive a damn vehicle. Next time, place your protest towards the UHN for putting him in. Is that clear?”

Chao stopped as she reached her fighter. “Clear, Chief ... perfectly.”

Buziba gave the nod to her. “Good luck out there. Let’s get Cipra back.”

His tone was severe but understanding towards the other pilot. She understood as she walked up to her aircraft. She got onto the stairs as she was heading towards the platform that would take her to the open canopy of the plane. The chief almost shook his head and yelled out Dean’s name. It echoed inside as they were near the end of the two left most aircraft.

“Petty Officer Dean!” Buziba yelled out. His voice was enough to grab Dean’s attention. He paused in his walk and approached him.

“Hey ... what is it that you need, Chief?” Dean replied in his laid-back and doped attitude.

“Listen,” Buziba called out to him. “I’ve received...” He stopped and bit his tongue before changing his wording. “I’ve been doing research on your flight record. It shows that you were under the influence at times of your past flights.”

“I usually am, Chief. I always take a hit of my best stuff before a flight. It’s like ... the magic stuff that keeps on giving. You know?”

“According to military regulations, there isn’t much that prevents me from stopping you from flying on the mission. However, bear in mind that I still have the authority to ground you if you are too doped to do it.”

“Don’t you worry about it, Chief,” Dean lightly waved his hand. “I always like ... make sure to smoke responsibly. I know the rules well enough on how much...,” he tapped his uniform. “How much hlen’weed one person can smoke in one hour. I can’t get too wasted. Like ... it wouldn’t be good for the others, man. It would be a total bummer for the mission.”

“That’s what I’m worried about,” Buziba commented. “The records show that you are an incredible pilot. Apparently, that Cebravin shit of yours works pretty well if you’ve made it this far, but understand ... discretion is advised.”

“Oh yeah, no problem, Chief. Hey ... I don’t know about you, but ... I think some of those other pilots kind of have a problem with me flying or something. I like ... don’t know why.”

The chief’s eyes almost squinted a little bit in frustration. Then, finally, he put his hand to his forehead. “Just make sure to handle yourself well out there. Know who you’re shooting. Is that clear?”

“Oh perfectly, Chief,” Dean replied. “Don’t you worry. I’m like ... all decked out ... ready to fight ... of course, we can always just say hello to them instead. I don’t have a problem with that. I’m pretty cool-headed that way, Chief. Ready to catch some rays.” He gave two thumbs up in appreciation.

The chief sighed and gave a slight wave to him. “Good luck out there.”

“You too, man. Yeah...,” he turned around as he went to his aircraft.

Dean approached the F-170. The sleek, stealthy multi-role aircraft had its wings folded up for the cramped condition of being inside the assault carrier. It had a shiny silver and gray color that perforated most of the frame. Its shape was almost like an isosceles due to the folded wings. In the rear was a pair of two turbo thrust engines. The center of the aircraft was a singular VTOL engine that linked up with the two other engines. Besides the VTOL emitter was a pair of closed-up weapon bays for the various ordinance. In the front was the open canopy. The front nose was an enclosed 30mm Gatling gun.

He climbed up the stairs to see that the last of the maintenance crews had given Dean the thumbs up. He responded in kind by giving them two thumbs up in return. He stood on the metal platform that led on top towards the canopy of his assigned aircraft. With a simple little hop, he jumped into the plane’s cockpit and landed on the cushioned seat.

Dean tapped a few buttons on the right side of the aircraft. This caused the canopy to close up and create a perfect seal for him.

“Mmm ... yeah,” Dean commented. “Girl, you going to do good for me, my Falcon buddy.”

He then took an overhead helmet and put it over his head. The helmet visor began to light up. He then tapped a couple of other buttons as the entire aircraft was powered up. The status display was shown through his visor while he was making sure that everything was functioning correctly.

“Like, got to make sure that you are going to pound it...,” he said to the aircraft. “Looks like your twin pipes are swinging good.” He tapped a couple of additional buttons and looked at the display. “Four PA-6s missiles, two PS-5s missiles, thirty micro bombs, four Countermeasure Bros, and up to 2,000 rounds of 30 mil. Yeah ... like, that’s good.”

Dean looked down the front section of the aircraft. He was pretty comfortable and could see the closed-up launch tube doors that led out into space. The plane was already sitting on the magnetic launch rail. He then turned on the communications link with the other aircraft.

“Petty Officer Dean, reporting in on channel two,” he calmly said.

“Dean, this is the wrong channel,” another male voice called out.

“Oh, bummer, sorry about that.”

“Channel five,” the other voice corrected him.

“You got it, man. Thanks.”

With that, Dean tapped a couple of buttons as he could hear the overhead chatter of the other pilots that had climbed into their respected aircraft.

“Petty Officer Dean, reporting,” he stated. “Aircraft unit number thirteen. Status A-Ok. Ready to flake off the carrier.”

“Roger,” Buziba stated on his commlink.

“I like understood half of that,” Petty Officer Chao replied.

“He means that his aircraft is ready to take off from the carrier.”

“Geez, Chao. Did they teach you anything at flight school?” another male pilot asked her. It was said in a derogatory and mocking way.

“Alright enough,” Buziba stated. “Dean was doing his part. I haven’t heard half of your status reports yet. The sooner this is done, the sooner we can relax and wait for the ride to Cipra. I want preflight checks.”

“Chief ... ehm ... squadron leader,” a raspy male voice came through the comms. “B-110 Stingray number 1, pilot Diedrich. Status is a go. I’m having trouble with my mic. Switching over to secondary. Can you read me?”

“Loud and clear,” the chief replied.

“Make sure to give us some good cover out there,” Diedrich stated. “The B-110s are sitting ducks against those Itrean aircraft.”

“Don’t worry,” Buziba replied. “we got you covered.”

Dean could hear the activity that was going on outside of the aircraft. He had tuned out each of the pilots as they spoke and reported their status. He had been more than used to it. The UHN Gladiator was detaching from the rotating centripetal ring module in space. It was already in the process of deploying a ring of gate probes far ahead of the vessel’s bow. Within a few seconds, the rear engines activated, pushing the assault carrier away from it till its forward vectoring thrusters caused it to come to a halt. The other carriers and marine vessels were following suit as well.

“Flight Squadron Beta,” one of the bridge crew called out the chief. The rest of the pilots overheard it. “Marine Taskforce is en route to Cipra. Operation Desert Shrike is a-go. Allied forces are currently engaged with Aksren defenses. ETA to Cipra, twenty-five minutes. Atmospheric entry ETA is thirty-four minutes.”

“Copy that,” Buziba replied.

Dean had little choice but to wait. He began to focus on thoughts of home. The very idea of trying to retake a world that had been colonized almost twenty years ago had some enthralled. Others were in mixed feelings about the operation. Cipra never was a heavily populated world before the Itreans took it. While tragic, the loss of life was much less than other colonized planets in the UWA. Dean could hear the different inflections in the voices of the other pilots. Each person had something to say or some opinion. All of it became more of background noise unless they deliberately tried to address him. All he knew was that he could feel a few pre-launch jitters. It wasn’t uncommon.

“Wha!” one of the pilots reacted. It distracted Dean’s thoughts as the chief inquired as to what happened.

“What is it, Feliciana?” the chief asked her.

“Switch to ship camera seven,” she said.

Dean and some of the pilots had done as she stated. The camera feed from the UHN Gladiator showed one of the T’rintar dreadnoughts that were still a part of the marine task force through his visor. These were the three siege dreadnoughts that were using their frontal gate array to fling hypervelocity rounds towards Cipra. Feliciana had been apparently watching the scene as it provided something entertaining for her. No doubt, the fact that these three remaining ships were still there shelling a planet from another solar system had been interesting to observe. However, one of these ships had damage to it. There was a small fire that erupted from its port side.

The glowing cannon would then erupt and deploy a projectile that would fly into the distant solar system. However, it was clear that gate arrays always work in two different directions. Where one object can fly in one-way, other objects can fly back towards the attacker.

Suddenly a railgun round slammed into the damaged siege dreadnought. This hypervelocity round had been shot by the Aksren clan defenses. The returned fire had struck the T’rintar warship hard. The shell pierced the portside again, flinging space debris everywhere into space. Then, a second shot hit the dorsal section before hitting the centripetal rotating ring.

Everyone felt a hint of fear or apprehension of what was to come. All that Dean knew was that he would need to take a hit sometime before the flight. It was the only thing that really calmed his mind down with the advent of battle. He would need to have one soon.

Ramírez watched as one of the three gate wormholes that linked to Sol had closed down. The Aksren concentrated weapons fire had apparently struck one of the T’rintar siege dreadnoughts.

“Those siege dreadnoughts are not effective enough,” Ramírez commented. “They aren’t hitting any vital targets on the planet.” He was looking at the converted time clock. It was approaching 1142.

“Fleet Adjunct is redirecting the siege dreadnoughts to fire at new quadrants,” Tara’Talar stated.

“I guess the siege dreadnoughts can’t open up the wormholes behind the fleet. It would only tip off the Aksren of what we’re doing. It’s working, though.”

By now, the fleet engagement had gotten closer and closer. The Aksren clan fleet had left the area completely open to their rear towards the planet. It had become a slugging match as the allied fleets had the numerical advantage. It was still a missile exchange only, but it was close enough that some vessels were trying to use their railguns to shoot at each other. There were no coordinated salvos as it was every warship for itself.

However, the UHN fleet was still holding. Besides the UHN Posseulo that took damage from the beginning, there was only one other confirmed hit on another battleship. The UHN Mikkelson’s centripetal rotating ring took a direct impact from one of the Aksren missiles. A sizeable hole could be seen from Ramírez’s viewpoint. Occasionally, one of the warships would fire a salvo of missiles from the bow tubes, but they were conserving their ammunition for the long haul.

A nuclear explosion registered near the boundary of the UHN task force. The blast wave hit none of the ships as it quickly defused in the vacuum of space. Ramírez was quick as he looked at the net sphere of orbiting drones that sat on the boundary of the UHN warships. He knew exactly what was happening as he frantically called up the admiral.

“Admiral,” Ramírez said. “That’s the second time the Aksren have detonated a nuke on your drone defense net. You’ve lost 87 drones in total. Pull your forces back.”

“Our network is holding,” Rex stated. “The Aksren are just giving us a big knock at our door.”

He continued to observe the scene. The Ark Royal was holding the position as the other battleships continued to protect the command ship. A wall of flak and precision anti-missiles munitions were being expelled to the occasional incoming Itrean warheads. The sphere of drones was quick. Many of these enemy missiles were shot down by these tiny devices that hovered away from the Ark Royal and supporting battleships. The Ark Royal’s vast network of tactical drones made much of the effort to protect the UHN task force. However, a new problem was starting to occur. It was precisely as Ramírez remembered in his studies with Aksren tactics. The fleet drone carrier’s primary objective was to utilize its drones.

“Sir,” Ramírez explained. “The Aksren are doing the same thing that they did to the Shinano over a year ago. They know that the drone net is stopping most of their missiles from getting through, but that doesn’t stop them from nuking the boundary of their locations. They are using the EMP blasts to render them inoperable. If they can’t destroy you, then they will take out the drones first.”

“Then it’s imperative that the marines carry out with their objective,” the admiral replied. There wasn’t any apprehension, and he remained calm and composed. “The Aksren have taken the bait. Their fleet is outnumbered, and we have the upper hand. Besides ... why are they being so slow in trying to take down the Ark Royal? It’s because they know that they can’t stop her. The UHN will prevail this day!”

Ramírez felt gravely uncomfortable with that statement. Again, the funny feeling that he had was kicking in. If the Aksren knew that they could destroy the Ark Royal, why didn’t they concentrate their effort on it? Instead, it was done in a slow, methodical way. It was almost as if the Aksren fleet was committed to a particular specific action. If anything, it seemed that the Aksren defense fleet was taking losses. One-third of their fleet had been destroyed. Over 9% of the allied fleet had been disabled or destroyed in turn. There was nothing more as the admiral looked away from him. Rex was concentrating on the coordination of the UHN effort.

“Incoming,” Tara’Talar warned Ramírez. He braced the console as a missile was closing in on the Atra. At the last second, the autoguns shot it down. The Atra countered as its two forward torpedo tubes launched a pair of heavy anti-ship munitions at one of the Aksren battleships. The battle was fierce. The Aksren fleet couldn’t win this fight.

Finally, he picked up a set of several wormholes on the sensors that were appearing from the rear of the Aksren fleet. It was not far from Cipra. Perfectly positioned at the correct location, the Aksren orbital defenses and warships wouldn’t be able to target it appropriately. If anything, most of the planetary batteries that had been shooting at the allied fleets had been either knocked out or possibly depleted of ammunition. The Aksren fleet would have to reverse course to try to shoot down the incoming marine assault carriers. This would press them to fight on two fronts, and they were already losing the overall fight in the long run.

“There they are...,” Ramírez stated. “Picking up 17 developing wormholes in total ... it’s got to be Marine Taskforce Shrike.”

“It’s working...,” Rex declared as he spotted it too. “We must press the attack.”

“Agreed,” Ramírez looked at Tara’Talar. “Our forces will be arriving in a few minutes. Rex is currently remaining with the fleet.”

“Ramírez, pass the word to the fleet adjunct that they are welcome to provide assistance in shelling the surface of anything that may pose a danger to the marine taskforce. Send a final confirmation signal to their cloaked ship. Let Taskforce Shrike at Sol know that they are clear to jump.”

“Roger, sir,” he looked at Tara’Talar and repeated the words which were passed on to fleet adjunct in turn. He continued to watch the battle in space. One of the Aksren battleships was trying to shoot down the scores of incoming missiles. However, there were too many as it slammed into it with an overwhelming force. The last missile of the volley was a nuclear warhead. A bright flash erupted in the darkness of space as the vessel was vaporized in the blast.

“Message has been sent,” Ramírez replied. “Received final confirmation confirmed to be sent to the Battleship Vin’kra.”

The cloaked battleship was one of the only means to deliver messages from one solar system to another safely. Utilizing tiny wormholes, the communication could be relayed instantly. While cloaked ships were hard to make, their abilities in surveillance, ambush, operational support, and communication transmitters made them extremely valuable in full-blown battles. No doubt, the T’rintar, and Aksren had their own sets of hidden vessels that were serving as deep space transmitters far outside of the main battle. Ramírez knew of the Vin’kra that was serving such a purpose. However, the tiny wormholes and communication spikes did have a chance to give off the location of the warship or the gate that it established.

“Received a message from the cloaked battleship Vin’kra,” Tara’Talar said. “Aksren fleet has picked up the location of the gate. The Vin’kra needs to move and reestablish a link with Sol. It will need thirty minutes to reset itself.”

“Understood,” he noted. Ramírez tried to home in on the location of the Vin’kra. However, he couldn’t see it in the vast darkness. He thought that he saw a tiny wormhole in space, but it soon collapsed. All communication to the Sol system had been cut off for half an hour.

There was a brief pause as Tara’Talar spotted something. “Odd...,” the lesser adjunct commented. This caused the human officer to look at her with fierce intensity.

“What is it?” he demanded.

“Picked up an Aksren communication...,” she tried to find the English word. “Spike? Yes, a surge of communication came 100,000 kilometers in the starboard bow direction.”

Ramírez looked at his screen and was trying to trace the source. When he zoomed in multiple times, he could see a tiny wormhole in the middle of nowhere. It was a makeshift gate array.

“There’s the Aksren cloaked battleship,” he said.

“It’s sending a communication through its gate array,” she said. “It’s being broadcasted ... no, it’s an activation signal.”

It was here that Ramírez could observe the entire set of events. It all made sense now, but it was almost too late. To his horror, his mind was telling him exactly what he suspected was happening. The Aksren were summoning reinforcements, but they were waiting for a specific time frame or set of events to occur. He was frantic as he contacted Rex.

“Sir!” Ramírez called out to him. His voice was almost frantic. “We’re picking up a cloaked Aksren battleship that’s outside of the battle lines. We suspect that they are trying to summon reinforcements.”

“This was almost expected, commander,” Rex replied. “The Aksren will be bringing reinforcements as we will bring in further reinforcements of our own to counter them. They’re not giving up Cipra without a good thrashing. We’ll give them a bloody good show.” He raised his fist in triumph.

“That’s not the point, sir. The Aksren ... they are waiting for us to launch a marine assault onto Cipra. I ... I think that this is a trap. It’s a goddamn trap! All of it. They purposely left the planet to create the opening in the first place. They’re doing it on purpose!”

The frantic use of words seemed to stick to the admiral’s soul as he began to think about it for a few seconds. All the evidence added up. It was almost as if the commander was looking at a deer caught in headlights.

“Sir, we have to stop this till we can gain a proper foothold in the battle arena!” Ramírez blared out. “Call the marine task force and cancel the op!”

Nothing could be done about it. The swirling vortexes had fully formed near Cipra. In less than a few seconds, the entire marine fleet was to come hurtling through and straight to the planet. At the same time, a set of numerous new vortexes began to appear. They were slow and gathering strength. One group was near Cipra’s orbit. All in all, it was about forty additional developing gate apertures. The rest and the vast majority were situated slightly behind the main battle line. This was an enormous amount. There had to be thousands...