The Guardians and Defenders had now got passed most of the fighter screen made by the Coalition as the Raiders joined the battle, and were battling their way to the shield generator and engines of the mothership. Inch by inch, ship by ship, they managed to get nearer to their targets, and eventually they did. “Element give me a hand with this shield generator!” Chemo had taken 2 wingmen with him but both had been shot down, he needed some help to get it down otherwise every fighter around him would aim for his ship. “I’m coming Chemo, hang on. You keep attacking it with your missiles I’ll kill of the fighters.” “Got it mate. Going in.” The 2 acting Wing Commanders fought with massive skills in harmony with each other, every move Element made on each fighter was calculated and precise. He worked his way through the horde and managed to get to Chemo who was being tailed by 3 fighters. Element hammered his thruster, and headed straight towards them. He aim carefully at one, targeting the missile pod on the fighter, next he loaded up a wasp missile, then waited for the unawares fighter to shoot a missile at Chemo. He waited…and it paid off. The missile fired out at Chemo with a green flash, and Element let rip with a wasp. The wasp hit the missile and exploded causing both the Coalition fighter and the missile to go up with a bright orange flame. He without a split seconds thought targeted the next and flayed a volley of hot lasers into its engines which caused a reaction inside the engine core, the pilot wouldn’t have known what hit him. The third realising Element was there, turned and fired at him, but it wasn’t much use, Chemo had turned as well and launched 2 missiles into his tail.

“All right Element launch 4 missiles into it that should do the trick, then we’ll sort out the engine.” “Got it.” They both headed straight for the shield generator and launched for missiles into the side of it, causing it to fly off the mothership and explode. Next they span round and headed to the engines, again in perfect harmony with each other and their ships. A similar routine was carried out for the engines and the mothership came to a hault. “all right! Ok let get these fighters down.” The Wing Commanders rejoined the fight unnoticed and once again the dog fights were the main objective.

Devil and Hellfire smiled as they heard Element and Chemo. “All right, I think its time we took out those launch bays. It’s time to bring the Europa into the battle. Lieutenant, lock onto the motherships launch bays, and fire when in range.” “Yes sir! Locking on…ok we’re locked sir, we’ll be in range in 5 minutes.” That caught Devil’s attention, he did a quick calculation in his head. He studied the dog fight and how many fighters where being launched, how many he thought they would lose and how much time they would have until that horde of fighters turned into a big problem. “5 minutes…5 minutes is too long Lieutenant, have the Chief to get these 3 fighters ready: XT-339-SI98, XT-407-HM76, XT-219-RT83.” Hellfire and Teni both turned to Dev half in shock and half with excitement, they stood and walked towards him, looking questioningly, the admiral nodded at them, and smiled. The Lieutenant froze for a second. “Um you sure you have those numbers right sir?” “Yes I’m sure Lieutenant Now do it.” The stunned bridge staff man turned to the ship communicator. Chief prepare ships XT-339-SI98, XT-407HM76, XT-219-RT83 for launch and battle.” There was a pause on the other end, then a reply came. “Um Comms Officer you sure you got those numbers right? Confirm please.” “Confirmed Chief, do it.” “…yes sir. If that’s what you say.” Devil followed by Teni and Hellfire stood now at the turbo lift doors, Commodore, your now in charge here. “Yes sir!” The admirals walked into the lift and the doors close in front of their faces. Not one word was said on the way to the launch bays.

“Dragonfire there’s one on your six, evade now! I got him… YEAH he’s down!” The fight was heating up for the pilots outside, even with the help of Raiders they were taking loses still, the Coalition fighters were gaining ground on them inch by inch. Chemo and Element were again fighting together with some other wingmen, Maniac had by this time joined in their little group along with Rebelkun and Zwille, they were helping each other out, one would lure some fighters out of the horde and the others would kill them. Their systematic method was working quite well but they couldn’t keep it up forever. “Aesthir can you give me a hand over here? I’m kind of out numbered…a lot…” “I cant I got 2 on my tail and I’m stuck here with Raiders, can you hang on for a minute?” “I don’t think it will wait that long man…my shields are gone and my stabilisers aren’t holding too well.” Damon was fighting as many off as he could, but like most of the others he was eventually taking hit after hit, one too many and he would be gone. Luckily Arctan had come to help but he too had some problems. It looked bad for the Raiders as well, they couldn’t get to the others to help and were taking a lot of hits themselves. Aesthir tried to get to Stealth so they both had some cover on one side. But he wasn’t achieving much at this point. Kozuka was in a frenzy trying to kill off 5 fighters at one time, he wasn’t doing too bad and managed to reach Aesthir and create a path for Aesthir. “Damn it we need to keep in groups otherwise they’ll have us. Kozuka, you stay here with Stealth I’m going to break a path to Dragonfire and Phoenix, they look like they could use some help.” “Yes sir, good luck. Stealth I’ve got you six.” Kozuka raced towards Stealth who was having trouble with 4 fighters his tail, he was picking them off one by one in front but they were lining up behind him to get a shot. “Damn it Kozuka get these guys off me! My hull is only laser proof for so long!” “I’m trying, but these guys are swarming me! Shit! I need help! Someone get these guys, I can’t hold it!” Just as he said this a missile ripped through the fighter right on Kozuka’s tail and sent a shock wave over Kozuka’s ship. He turned to try and see what had done it and then a similar fate met the one in front of him. “What the…” “I got him!” “Still got it then old friend” Kozuka watched as a older model fighter swooped down in front of him, then took out 2 more fighters with missiles flying in almost every direction. With great elegance, harmony and speed the fighter took down the 2 on Stealth’s tail and shot down the 2 trying to lock onto Aesthir. The he noticed the name on the side. “Devil?! Is that you?! But how the… why…” “Don’t forget Hellfire and Teni mate they’re here too.” Devil grinned behind his visor. “Man it’s good to be back in the cockpit, such old memories come back.” “Yes I prefer it to the bridge.” Kozuka didn’t bother to ask why again, he was just glad to see the fighters. “Hell, go help the Defenders Teni you help the Guardians I’ll help the Raiders.” “You got it mate.” “Yes sir.” The three fighters split up into the battle and began helping out those who were in trouble. Untitled was lining up one on Maniac’s tail, he hit the missile button and fired a blaze of laser, the fighter exploded. He had little time to celebrate as a fighter behind him opened fire on him and blew a wing off his ship. “Crap! Someone scrape him!” Hellfire rushed down, aimed a quick missile and fired. It hit perfectly on the nose of the fighter. He then span round and shot his particle lasers at it, sending it into a fireball which barely missed his ship. He flew to help damon dodging missile gun fire and ships as he went. Destroying ships as he went as well. For a split second Untitled observed him, it was as if he was one with his ship, in complete harmony and knowledge of everything it did. “So we finally get to see the legends fight…”

The Commodore on the bridge was watching the fight, he smile as he saw Devil, Hellfire and Teni make the red blips around them disappear and then wait for the rest. Then a warning alarm went off and his smile faded as he saw what was causing the alert. Three incoming jump signals heading straight for them. He grabbed the communicator. “Sir! We got 3 capships coming straight for us! 2 cruisers one carrier. E.T.A about 2 minutes.” A curse passed over Devil’s lips. “All right guys we got company. Prepare for more fighters. Commodore de-cloak and hit those launch bays now!” “Yes sir!” Element finished off the last fighter near him. “More fighters? Oh man, I’m almost out of missiles!” The Europa now sat almost next to the mothership, it de-cloaked and fired its massive forward tachyon cannons at the launch bays of the mothership. Both were destroyed and no more fighters could launch from the mothership. “Good job Commodore. Ok Chemo, take your wing and take out the turrets on one side of the mothership. Defenders, Raiders, we’ll be making sure that no fighters get to them or the Europa, got it?” a resounding “YES SIR!” Rang throughout the comm. Channel. “Sir we got incoming.” The fighters picked off the last of the mothership’s fighters and waited. They didn’t have to wait long. Three capships came out of jump speed. But only 2 were Coalition, the third was Alliance. Devil stared for a moment, time seemed to stop. He looked over the side of the Alliance Carrier. He repeated slowly, “The ANS War Cry.”