Flying Frogs and Tu'lips

[Cavalas Wren]

"The Rodian rebels control the skies surrounding Equator City and the surrounding regions. After some reconnaissance, we have pinpointed the origin of their air superiority to a makeshift air base several Kilometers north of the city. Your mission is to lead a flight of starfighters escorting our bombers to take out the airbase. Expect heavy resistance."​

The deeply rooted trees of the Rodian rainforest swayed heavily as the two sections flew over them at a frightening low altitude. The two sections, each consisting of three starfighters and a single bomber were heading north-west to seek out their target but had to be creative in their way of approach. With the rebels holding the skies hostage it was necessary to fly below the radar as long as possible, which wasn't at all easy on a this humid ball of rainforest and frogs. Heading one of the sections was a former lieutenant of the Border Alliance and their Defiant Squadron whose illusions shattered in the Republic's service and now uses his advanced flying skills for the Chosen in return for vast credits and comradery. The last time he flew a mission in this part of the galaxy he was flying a bomber, which was way too slow in its turns for his liking and he was quite enjoying being back in a proper interceptor. "Oi boss" Cavalas said over the comm to Caedryn, "Did I tell you about my previous encounter with a Rodian pilot?" he laughed.

@Arclight

 

[Arcangel]

Caedryn's intercepter roared over the Rodian treetops. While not flying at maximum speed, being held back by the bombers they were escorting, the starfighter/bomber flight made excellent time. While a decent pilot, Caed was nowhere near the level of the jovial Cavalas Wren, a former Border Alliance pilot who had decided he preferred actually profiting from his work. It was just as well, Caedryn usually kept his boots on the ground except for the rare occasion. One of those occasions which happened to be today. Normally he wouldn't be leading a starfighter group, but some sort of illness had swept through half of the flight group pilots, leaving them under strengthed and in need of pilots.

"Dont think i've heard that one Cav, but im sure you're about to tell me so lets hear it." Caedryn joked as he banked the starfighter. Nearing the target zone, they had a short ways to go still, and flying so perilously low the flight had surely evaded radar detection up to this point.

 

[Cavalas Wren]

"Oh Banth-" Cavalas was interupted by the violent blinking of red lights that suddenly decorated his cockpit, "kessing frog-eyes incoming."

Engaging his shields, Cavalas pushed his interceptor to an even higher speed and pressed it dangerously close to the treetops he only narrowly avoided. The radar clearly showed six incoming fighters and if they got off the first shots the Chosen bombers might be hardpressed to even get in sight of their target. "Athos, Porthos, protect the King-" he told the pilots in his section over the comm. Athos and Porthos were the two other starfighters, while the King, obviously, was the bomber. "Climb to five thousand, give them something to look at," he continued with a confidence in his voice that he could never muster outside of the cockpit before reaching out to Caedryn in the same tone. "Boss, the story will have to wait. Follow my lead."

The timing was too sensitive to wait and see whether or not the leader of the Chosen actually complied, as mere moments later the six rodian starfighters appeared from behind a rainforest-covered mountain range and were sure to see the bombers as they climbed to a higher altitude. Fortunately that was exactly what Cavalas had hoped and as they were about to pass him in their attempt to get a lock on one of the bombers, he rose from the treetops almost at a vertical angle and shot one of the frogs down with perfectly timed torpedo before firing his laser cannons rapidly in an attempt to scatter the remaining starfighters. Hopefully, if Caedryn had followed his lead, the chaos and shock would make the remaining rebel pilots easy pickings.

 

[Ral]

It felt good to be back in a cockpit again, flying something. Ral was a little worried initially about claustrophobia setting in, or the tight space bringing back memories of being in his solitary cell on Mandalore. It had taken a moment or two to adjust to the confined area, but after a few deep breaths he was ready to go. Now, back in the saddle again, Ral felt cool and confident as he gripped the ship's controls in his hands, listening silently in on the radio chatter shortly before they were targeted. Moving his ship in position next to his cousin's fighter, Ral's hand flicked a switch and raised his shields before moving over to another button, pressing it once to divert auxiliary power to the weapons. There was that old familiar feeling of adrenaline coursing through his veins as the thought of action crossed his mind. While not the best pilot in the Galaxy, and probably more than a little rusty after his incarceration, Ral was eager to get back out into it and shake off the dust that had built up.

"Just make sure you make it through this little skirmish here, Cav, I hate it when people never get the chance to finish their stories," Ral chuckled slightly as he pulled up on the control stick of his fighter, pointing the nose up towards the sky and climbing with Cavalas. Checking his scanners, Ral mentally marked the location of the Rodian fightercraft. "Now, let's get to killing us some bugs, eh?"

 

[Arcangel]

Hearing Cavalas interrupt his story with a curse, Caedryn’s hands began to move over the fighters controls. Flipping switched, diverting excess power from the engines to his forward shields and laser cannons, Caedryn scanned the sky visually. In the distance he could see six small specks that grew larger with each passing second.

Hearing his cousin’s comment to Cav, Caedryn laughed before adding his own joke. “That’s right Cav, you’d best survive to finish that story, and that’s an order.” His tone light and joking. Despite his joking manner, inside the cockpit Caedryn was all business. Catching onto Cav’s plan, Caedryn nodded in silent approval. As the veteran pilot began his vertical ascent, Caedryn followed suit, pulling up hard on the yoke and diverting some juice to the engines. Nose up with an enemy bogey just a hair out of his sites, Caed juked the fighter slightly to bring his targeting box around the rebel fighter.

Thumbs pressed down on the firing studs, scarlet beams spat out from the nose of his fighter. Upon contact the Rodian Starfighter exploded in a dazzling display. “Looks like we got the jump on them, didn’t even have their shields up yet!” He whooped in excitement as the trio soared past the remaining fighters.

@Ecclessey

 

[Cavalas Wren]

Upon first contact the Rodian fighters pulled off their initial targets as predicted. They hadn't signed up for a suicide mission and with two fighters blowing up before their radar actually caught wind of additional enemy crafts, there was little left for them to do besides falling back into evasive maneuvers. Scattering themselves into all directions, Cavalas' target forced him to pull himself from vertically rising to inverted in order to get on the Rodian's tail. It was a tricky turn, complicated by negative Gs and the risk that he'd plummet to death if he only slighty lost balance of the fighter amidst the exhausts of the six other fighers buzzing around. This maneuver, however, had been invented by and named after his Mandalorian flight instructor, De'vad Imle'man, who had inserted it dominantly into the Top Gun program and Cavalas to this day never deviated from that program in any of his flying encounters.

Ending up inverted on the Rodian's six, Cavalas rolled the barrel with full left rudder to have his cockpit towards the skies again. The Rodian, going east, had managed to get some distance between them as he ran at full speed. "There's no way I'd lose to some frogs," he replied through the comm to his friends as he accellerated to catch up. @Ral

 

[Ral]

With his target in his sights the Mandalorian squeezed the trigger of his control stick, his fighter's laser cannons spatting their deadly payload through the open sky until they struck the Rodian's craft midship. The volley lit the enemy ship up like a capital ship's main engine cluster before it turned into a descending comet, its tail made of smoke and bits of falling metal and debris. Smiling, Ral pushed his control stick to the right before pulling up and cutting the throttle down, his fighter pushed through the trail left from the burning wreck of the Rodian's fighters as it pealed to the right.

Coming back around, Ral quickly switched his targeting computer to the next Rodian fighter. Stepping on the rightyaw pedal with his foot, the Mandalorian caused his fighter to turn right as he pushed the control stick to the left, letting his craft rotate so it would be level with the ground. The Rodian's fighter shot past his viewscreen moving left, so Ral pushed his control stick left and gunned his craft's engines. Moving in behind the Rodian, the Mandalorian lined up his shot, and with a gentle squeeze of the trigger, another burst of laser fire erupted from his cannons, striking the Rodian dead center. Unfortunately, it wasn't quite enough to kill him, and the alien broke off, forcing Ral to pursue.

Pitching the nose of his ship up, Ral pushed the throttle forward and he began to gain on the Rodian. Banking ever so slightly, Ral lined up a perfect shot, his crosshairs led the alien's craft by a slight margin. At that range it would be just enough to strike the already damaged craft. Pulling the trigger again, Ral's ship fired off another burst. The lasers arced through the air and struck the Rodian in the cockpit. Ral could see the alien silhouetted against the fire before he was disintegrated by the lasers and flames. The fireball quickly expanded and the Rodian's craft began twirling down to the ground. Grinning, Ral whooped. "That's two for me! Let's clear these suckers outta here. I almost feel bad for these Rodians; they had no idea who they were getting involved with!"

@Arclight

 

[Arcangel]

Soaring upwards and right on Cavalas wing, Caedryn stuck with his wingmate as he demonstrated a prodigious display of fancy flying. While not performing as admirably as his wingman, he still managed to avoid crashing and remain hard on the two fighters tails with Cavalas. The interceptors engine roared as he gunned the throttle to catch up with the Rodian fighters.

“Aye, no way they are getting out of here alive.” Caedryn responded as he flew, breaking off slightly from Cavalas wing to come in on the enemy fighters from a different angle. “Herding them in for you now, get ready for the shot.”

Coming in on the Rodian fighters, Caedryn pressed the firing stud, aiming to box them in rather than actually damage them. Spraying deadly laser bolts in a box around the fighters, they would be hard pressed to maneuver out of the hailstorm, leaving them vulnerable for Cavalas to swoop in for the kill.

@Ecclessey

 

[Cavalas Wren]

These two, Ral and Caedryn, were probably the reason why Cavalas had finally found his place among the Chosen. They both had the skill to back up their brazen talks, and that wasn't something you saw very often, in fact, these guys were much better than their tales could reveal. Within moments five out of seven rodian fighters had been destroyed and instead of trying to claim a kill, Caedryn was selflessly guiding them into place for Cavalas to end their miserable existence. Truly, just like his previous encounter with a Rodian pilot, they proved not to be the greatest minds in aviation and allowed themselves to be lined up for a kill shot by banking away from Caedryn's distraction.

Cavalas didn't hesitate and due to his boss' excellent herding didn't need to waste the torpedo's. Four seconds was all it took for the Rodians to disappear into clouds of smoke and fire after escaping the hail of bolts, and with seven out of seven, the bombers once again had clear skies ahead.

"So-" Cavalas began as he turned his bucket around to rejoin the defense of the bombers, "I was in a dogfight with this Rodian, right? It was on some Mid Rim world and I was working for a private contractor, just like the Rodian, but we were on opposite sides." he began to continue the story he had wanted to share before they were so rudely interupted. @Ral

 

[Ral]

The dogfight seemed to be over before it even really began. The poor alien bastards had been blasted to oblivion before they even knew what was happening, such was the skill and expertise of the Mandalorian pilots; the trio of them annihilated the half dozen Rodians in such a short span of time they didn't even lose time from their main objective. Checking his scanners, all that Ral saw were friendly fighters, and gazing out his canopy told him the same. "Well done everyone, very well done. Let's get back to our wards and finish this mission!"

Pulling his fighter back into line with the bombers, Ral listened in on the story Cavalas began once again to tell. The grizzled-looking Mandalorian listened intently as he pulled up the holomap. Looking over the edge of his canopy to the ground down below, he checked their surroundings, matched it to what their current position read as, and matched it to how far they were from their target. The makeshift air base was about twenty clicks out, but even for the bombers that was a short distance, and luckily it would be just outside of the visual range. Going at their top speed to cover the area, they would reach the target area in about a minute and twenty seconds. Then the bombers would unleash their hellish payloads and reduce the base to scrap. "Hey, Caed," Ral spoke up after a few seconds. "What's the airbase defenses like? Will we need to move in ahead of the bombers and pull fire? Pull some Wild Weasel stunts?"

@Arclight

 

[Eccles]

"so we played a bit Bantha and Tusken, right, and I ended up flying directly above him, while inverted" Cavalas was remembering his favourite flying encounter, whether there was much truth to it seemed to more unlikely with every telling, but he still never grew tired of sharing his unlikely adventure with everyone he encountered.

He was quite in a good mood when suddenly his starfighted lost altitude and flew into some turbulance that didn't seem to effect the other fighters around him. "Bloated Agamarian Stew and all, something's wrong with my bird," he pensively called out over the comm as he frantically pressed some buttons in order to figure out what exactly was happening. "Oh man," he sighed "it seems a bit of fried Rodian touched me and messed up the aerodynamics" he continued as he felt his muscles tighten trying to hold the control stick still. "I'm afraid I have to return to base" disappointment was thick in his voice as he, with quite difficulty, turned his ship around. "I'll have the drinks cold and the stew warm upon your return."

Within seconds he had separated himself from the bombers and their protection, and while it was hard to leave his fellows in the middle of their mission, there was no doubt that with the fighter in its current state it could only damage their attack. The engines had to work harder and a novice pilot wouldn't even be able to keep it in the air, let alone land it back on base, and Cavalas then knew that the boss would agree with his effort to save the costly fighter.

 

[Arcangel]

"Roger that Cav." Responding to the pilot as he pealed out of formation to head back to base. "Looks like we will be doing this run by ourselves Cuz."

The two fighters screamed over the landscape as they headed towards their target. "Hit them low and fast. The bombers will be on radar now, we want to take out their fighters before they can scramble." As the airfield came into view ahead, Caedryn could almost imagine the sound of air raid sirens blaring on the ground. He could see the specks of men running around, rushing to their fighters. But they would be too late. Pushing the fighter's throttle to maximum, his fighter swooped down on the airfield, lasers blasting. Fighters on the ground burst into flames and exploded spectacularly. And then he was past them. Behind him he could hear the sound of proton bombs detonating, the bombers making quick work of the airfield. "Good job boys, lets make one more pass, then its time to head home."

@Ral

 

[Ral]

It was unfortunate that Cavalas had to turn around and leave them right before they got to their objective. It was really quite disappointing for Ral; he had been looking forward to fighting with the man some more. But it was not meant to be, if seemed. Nodding back at his cousin's statement that they would have to do the strafing run themselves, Ral smiled a little as he spoke back to Caedryn. "Ah, yeah, so it would seem. Oh well, more targets for us. Cavalas will be so disappointed that he missed this party! Haha, alright let's go kill some bugs!"

Dropping to nap-of-the-earth, Ral piloted his ship as close to the foliage as he safely could while using any valleys or low points to help keep his ship undetected and hard to see. "Already on it, cuz. We'll hit them so hard they won't even know what's happening until it's too late. Now, let's see how much panic we can cause." Grinning as they approached their target, the Mandalorian pushed the throttle forward to maximum and shot forward, cutting the throttle back once they reached the edge of the airbase. Depressing the firing trigger on his control yoke, Ral opened up on the people and targets below. Laser blasts blew chunks of duracrete out of the tarmac. Explosions threw Rodians everywhere, tech and pilot alike. Ral targeted the fighters and hangers first, blasting as many as he could, using the fighter's repulser lifts to keep his ship from crashing into the ground as he blew apart AAA and SAM sites.

Pulling up as he finished his first pass, he keyed his comlink to reply to Caedryn. "Roger that, I don't think there's going to be much left of them now." Accelerating to attack speed, Ral piloted his ship around in a semicircle until he was facing the airbase again. Huge plumes of black smoke rose into the air as fuel ignited and burned. Death and destruction could be seen everywhere as fightercraft, buildings, and armored vehicles lie in ruins.

"Time for round two!" Ral called out as he dived his fighter into an attack run. He could see the Rodians still moving around on the ground, a few brave pilots trying to use the respite to get to their fighters. They weren't going to make it. With his laser cannons he lit up the tarmac, killing pilots and causing their ships to explode in great balls of fire. The bombers would finish the job, there wasn't anything left to protect them from now.

@Arclight