April 18th, 2006
0714 Hours
North Pacific
After the first battles of the war crippled American naval air power in the Pacific, a scramble commenced to offer some form of challenge to the Bloc navies. The RES Magic, Equestria’s first aircraft carrier, was not due to be commissioned until later in the year. Most of her time was spent training in the seas around her home port of Baltimare. The news of the attack on the nearby fleets brought that training to an immediate halt, with the ship shifting to wartime stance and sailing west to try and cover the retreating American ships. In the space of a few hours, the Magic had changed from a greenhorn warship in training to one of the few operational Allied carriers in the theater.
The initial reaction to the news of war was a sort of rushed frenzy, with the ponies clumsily readying to apply what little they knew on the deathly subject of modern naval conflict. Even the orders themselves seemed to be in a reactionary delirium. Their direct task, as the Equestrian Naval Command worded it, was to ‘move west with all speed, cover retreating Allied ships, and defend the northern coastline from any attack’. After the battlegroup had steamed a good distance, and the Equestrian admirals had time to collect their thoughts, it came to them that dispatching their sole carrier, not fully trained and virtually alone in the face of the Bloc navies, was a suicidal waste.
With most of the American ships retreating to safety, the orders were changed to the extreme opposite. The Magic and her group turned east at full speed, making for the east coast of Equestria to Bostrot until she was determined to be ready for war. To her luck, the Bloc navies had pulled back to rest and reorganize after their attacks the previous night, thus sparing the Equestrian carrier from an uneven slaughter.
This was an exciting turn of events for Sunspot, the commander of one of the carrier’s two F-14 squadrons. The outbreak of the war itself was hardly surprising as she had been predicting it for months. She had been looking forward to putting the powerful fighters to use, and the time had now come for that.
Trotting across the flight deck, she reached her F-14 resting on the edge of the carrier, hovering up along with her R.I.O. to the cockpit. The Tomcat was directed slowly to the left catapult by the flight crews, moving about the deck in their colorful uniforms. The jet was set up to launch while her wingpony’s was taxied to the other catapult next to hers. She called to him over the radio as the final preparations were made.
“Alright Windjammer, give me a basic repeat of the mission so I know you were paying attention.”
“Follow the set patrol route, cover the carrier, rendezvous with the mercenary squadron coming from the coast, engage any contacts,” her wingpony replied as the final checks in his Tomcat were completed.
“Good to see you were able to stay awake,” she congratulated sarcastically.
“Well I need to now that the war’s on,” he countered. “Somepony’s got to be. You heard about how hard the air bases got hit last night.”
“All that means is the Navy gets to save the day now,” Sunspot boasted. “Don’t worry, Windjammer. With me, we’ll send the baddies running! They’ll learn not to mess with Royal Equestrian Navy pilots!”
“I’ve been in the navy longer than you have.”
“Hey, Key, everything looking good back there?” queried Sunspot to her R.I.O., ignoring Windjammer’s point.
“Yea, I think so. Everything looks like it’s working from back here,” Light Key answered from the back seat of the Tomcat.
“Windjammer, are you set?”
“Ready to go.”
“Magic, this is Corona. Ready to launch, over,” Sunspot called to the carrier’s control.
“Copy, Corona, you’re clear to launch. Good luck, out.”
The metal barriers rose behind the F-14s and Sunspot pushed the throttle forward. The Tomcat’s powerful engines began to blast out fire in shock diamonds while the plane itself was held in place. In an instant, the catapult activated, slinging the heavy fighter forward and throwing it off the ship. The already burning engines propelled the jet as Sunspot pulled back on the stick as the Tomcat carried her into the sky. Windjammer followed only seconds behind, forming up on his leader’s wing as the two flew out in search of the enemy.
“Corona, this is Goodfellow. Do you copy, over?”
“Goodfellow copies Corona, we have you on radar. Be advised, we’re tracking a large aircraft formation at bearing three-three-two, heading south.”
“I see them on mine, too,” Sunspot confirmed. “Where’s that PMC squadron of yours?”
“Affirmative, we’ll patch you through to Arrow now.”
“Corona, you copy?” a gruff voice called on her radio. “This is Viper, lead plane of Arrow. Can you hear this?”
“We hear you, Viper.”
“Good, you should see us soon. Flight of five, moving up from your six. Try not to get spooked.”
The mercenary flight came into visual two minutes later, paying little heed to the Equestrian Tomcats they passed. It hardly resembled a serious military force besides the aircraft, though each of these was a different model, perhaps due to the restrictions or price of operating such a business. Two of them were Falcons of vastly different blocks, the third was a Typhoon, the fourth a Strike Eagle, and the final a regular F-15C.
“You guys are flying a pretty loose formation there,” Windjammer noted.
“Worry about yourself, not us. We’ve got a big haul ahead of us.”
“What do you mean?”
“Those bogies ahead of us? Looks like a crow transport formation, a big one,” the human clarified. “You’re lucky, most rookies don’t strike gold like this in their first fight.”
“What’s a Griffon transport formation doing all the way out here?” Sunspot wondered. “Is it an airborne operation?”
“Must be, that’s the only reason for there being so many of them,” Viper agreed. “Looks like they were trying to swing around over the ocean and drop through the back door.”
“They weren’t expecting us to be here.”
“Bad luck for them, good luck for us,” he continued as they approached the Griffon aircraft. “Now look alive and get ready for a fight! Viper to Goodfellow, do we have permission to engage?”
“Affirmative, you’re cleared on all hostile aircraft. Shoot down as many as you can before they reach land.”
“Alright, let’s get this party started!”
The planes dived at the lumbering formation of transports like lions charging into a pack of antelope. The few escorts they had were woefully ill-equipped to deal with the oncoming threat. Hoping to achieve surprise, and with their air forces already stretched thin and occupied elsewhere, only a few Griffon fighters protected each group, armed partly with bombs or anti-radiation missiles to counter ground threats.
Two of them fell almost immediately to radar-guided missiles, along with one of the Il-76s they were protecting. The cargo plane fell from the sky, it’s wing torn off and all it was carrying spilling out the back to leave a long trail of debris. The Tomcats of the Magic followed close on the heels of the Arrows, with Sunspot locking onto on of the other transports. It was not difficult to gain a hard radar lock on the large jet and, with one press of a button later, she had gained her first victory. The missile hit the forward half of the Ilyushin, causing it to stagger and fall. The brief feeling of celebration she felt was immediately curbed when the mercenary pilot cut in again.
“Hey you, Corona lead, the horse with that stupid emblem,” Viper called out. “You’re with me, I want to see what you’ve got.”
“What are talking about?”
“Considering you all aren’t exactly used to a good old fashioned fight like this, it might be nice to teach you something,” he continued as the slaughter developed around them. “I figured you had a few preconceptions about us pirates, so I’d say a lesson in humility is an order.”
“You think a battle’s the best place to do that!?”
“There’s no better place. You think you’re good enough? Let’s see you get more kills than our rookie in the number four spot.”
The Griffon formation had by now broke and the aircraft scattered in individual attempts to escape. Sunspot picked out the next closest to her and launched her missile. In the rush to destroy it, flustered by the human pilot’s challenge, she fired too early, shooting before a lock was achieved.
The missile flew harmlessly past, and she was forced to drastically break her aircraft to ensure she did not overshoot as well. After leveling out, a quick switch to one of the plane’s heat-seeking missiles rectified the previous mistake. The Sidewinder flew off, striking the aircraft in one of it's engines and sending it into a death spiral.
“Hmph, stupid emblem? Who’s he to talk with that one on his tail?” Sunspot asked her RIO. “That ridiculous snake crossed over itself like that. These mercenaries are so full of themselves.”
“I don’t know, did you see the reaper emblem on the number four craft?” Key responded. “It really freaks me out, feels like I’m getting haunted.”
“Well then quit staring at it and find me another target!”
“There’s a couple of Flankers at our three o’clock, above us at thirty-two thousand feet.”
“Then they’re next! Let’s hurry and get there first!”
The Tomcat nosed down into a light dive to gain momentum before pulling up and charging at the Griffon fighters. Sunspot locked the radar onto the leader from its maximum range and let her third long-range missile fly. The two fighters, already alerted by the battle, had plenty of time to react and split in two before diving down, with the leader dropping a line of chaff and flares. The tiny pieces of metal glistened in the Pacific sun in a bright trail as the missile guidance locked on to them rather than the Flanker.
Watching her first shot fly off in the wrong direction, the Equestrian immediately followed up her attack and launched another at the now turning Flanker. As she banked hard to track him, she selected her second Sidewinder and, after hearing the continuous tone of the lock drone in her ear, she shot her last missile, not bothering to wait. It turned out to be a gratuitous assault, as seconds after the launch the radar-guided missile found its target on the rear of the Griffon fighter. The Flanker lurched, falling seawards in a ball of fire with whatever remaining frame being torn apart when the Sidewinder struck moment later.
“Got him! We got him!” Sunspot jumped, causing the plane to jolt lightly by accident. “Did you see that Key?”
“Yeah, but-”
“That’s the third one!”
“Sunspot, we’ve got one starting to come after us!” Key warned, his neck craned over to watch the rear of the Tomcat. “I-I think it’s the other one! The other Flanker!”
“What!? Hold on!”
The Tomcat was put into another dive, pressing the ponies back into their seats. As her prey had done before, Sunspot released long trails of countermeasures to preempt any missile lock on. Leveling out two-thousand feet above the North Pacific, the Griffon was still tailing the fleeing Equestrians, being even closer now than he was before. Sunspot kept an eye on him in the mirror of the cockpit and tried to think of her next move; consequently, she did not notice the other aircraft diving down in front of her, heading in the opposite direction. As she watched, the Tomcat was shuttered by the fast-moving F-15 from before. Her competitor shot past at close range, firing one of his own missiles as he did so and hitting the enemy fighter on the nose, saving Sunspot the trouble of further evasion.
“Ugh… that felt a lot closer than it should’ve been,” Sunspot groaned audibly.
“You still alive in there, Corona One?” asked Viper as the skies calmed momentarily. “Looks like our guy is three ahead of you, you’re lucky I don’t add to his score for saving your butt from that Crow.”
“Just.. whatever.”
“It ain’t over yet neither. Goodfellow’s tracking a second wave of transports. You ready to engage?”
“I don’t think I can, I don’t have any missiles left.”
“You still have your guns, don’t you?”
“Yeah, but… against all those-”
“Their number doesn’t matter; more of them just means more kills and money for us,” Viper cut her off. “You want to be one of the best? You need to be hungry. Stay aggressive. Long as you got something on your bird to kill the enemy with you go after them.”
The squadron was soon leaving the Corona team behind once again as they tore into the second group of transports. There was hardly any real coordination in the fight, and the herd was already in the process of scattering. Sunspot took a look over the expansive battle and radioed her wingpony, whom she had virtually forgotten about during the fight.
“Corona Two! Windjammer, are you still there? You have any missiles left?”
“Copy lead, I've still got some.”
“Alright, you cover my six. I'm going to close in on one of those running targets and take it down with my guns, out.”
She did not bother waiting to hear the response, wanting to get a final score before the remaining Griffons escaped. Nor did she contend the idea of letting Windjammer go off on his own, being far more likely to gain a kill with his missiles; the fright of being surprised by the escort earlier was enough to warrant a lookout for her. She selected an Ilyushin flying out to the east, alone and hoping it would not be noticed.
Catching up to the transport was an easy task for the fighter, and Sunspot now gathered her patience to get a good shot on the target. The gun sight steadied over the huge plane and she shot a long burst from the Tomcat’s cannon, ripping into the fuselage of the plane. The Ilyushin slowed and dipped down, slowly descending to the sea. The plane’s Griffon passengers filed out the back, having no need for individual parachutes, and spread their wings out to each make their individual escape.
“Hah! Look at those pigeons scatter,” Viper observed. “Well horsey looks like the fun’s over. You got the last kill but our rookie got more than twice your number.”
“Let's hope our Reaper can keep it up!” the Typhoon pilot chirped through an odd English accent.
“He’ll do fine. You Navy pilots on the other hand.”
“We’ll be fine!” Sunspot answered. “It's our first fight, we’re just getting used to it.”
“Well, you better get used to it quick. You're in our world now, and with this kind of war you adapt or you die. There's no good witch to wish all your troubles away,” the Arrow leader continued in his lecture. “In this environment you need to get good quick, cause our Reaper’s not always going to be around to save your tail. Next time the real grim reaper’s going to take off your head, got it?”
“I got it,” she resigned. “Still, we did alright didn't we? Everypony’s alive, and we got a good number of those bandits.”
“Yeah, yeah, you did fine. There might be hope for you guys after all,” commented Viper. “Just remember the lessons you picked up. You want to win you need to get better. Cash, glory, whatever the Hell you’re aiming for; that all depends on your strength and skill. Power drives you to victory, simple as that. Capiche?”
“Capiche,” the pony repeated. “Thanks guys.”
“Just doing our job. I'm not trying to push you into the ground, just trying to cram a bunch of lessons into one quick fight. Remember what you learned and you'll be okay,” he finished. “Alright, let’s get back to base. I’m sure they’ll have some more work for us to do.”
Sunspot watched as the squadron pulled away back towards land, leaving the F-14s to make their return trip to the carrier.
“Ready to head back, Corona One?” Windjammer asked.
“Yeah… let’s get back quick.”
“Not too bad for our first day of war, but I’ve seen enough for right now.”
“The more I score, the better I get, and the better I get the more I'll kill,” she theorized to herself as the two planes began their journey back. “And both of those will help stop… will help win this war. That's what it's all about, isn't it?”