WCGW Chpt 58

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==Chapter 58 - What Could Go Wrong==
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18 November 3041
Joshua (Former Outworld System)
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Commodore Franklin Noble arced his SL-26 Samurai into gentle turn to the right as he observed the small town, or what looked like a town, but the obvious signs of Dropship landings and takeoffs outside the town had caught his attention. It had taken a few days to convince Captain Gweneth Rolando to let him and his wingman extend their patrols more. He figured he was just over 300 miles from the depot and their grounded Dropships. Two black specs moved on the ground and rapidly increased speed before rising from the ground, clearly heading their way. He keyed the mic "Heads up Pete, we got company heading our way."
<<"Roger that, boss. Do we engage them?">> Captain Pete Travella asked, keeping his eyes on the rapidly closing airborne targets.
"Let's extend our spread a little more and see what they do. Weapons tight unless we are fired upon, then we mix it up." Commodore Noble said
<<"Roger, weapons tight unless fired on.">> Captain Travella replied as he throttled back slightly to extend the distance between himself and his lead.
"Positive ID, Meteor. Let's pull them further away from where the Dropships are, we got fuel to burn and they don't." Commodore Noble said as he advanced the throttles to force the bogies to burn precious fuel trying to catch them. He saw that Captain Travella had closed and was in a loose formation with him.
After fifteen minutes Commodore Noble said "Now, let's turn into them and see what they do." He banked into a left turn and started heading back towards the still oncoming fighters. "A quick check of his radar announced a rapid closure rate. "Boy, they must have their throttles on the firewall. That is mistake number one, burning too much fuel."
As they range rapidly decreased, the lead fighter fired on Commodore Noble, the PPC bolt missing his Samurai by about 120 feet. "Whoa, check Meteor, these are Inseki II variants. But they made their last mistake. Weapons free, Pete, time to earn our paycheck." Commodore Noble said as he hit the throttle to full, his Samurai leaping into a rocketing climb. As he blew by the conventional fighters, which could not match his speed, he kept his eyes on the lead Inseki II and began a hard left turn onto the Inseki IIs six o'clock position.
The Inseki IIs pilot was no dummy and reefed into a hard left turn and descent, forcing Commodore Noble to match his target. He pulled back on the throttle some to slow his closure. When his left wing ER Large Laser locked onto his target he fired, and the shot just barely missed the Inseki II, which was jinking back and forth. Bad thing for him was he jinked to where Commodore Noble's right wing ER Large Laser could lock and he fired, this shot was true and struck the Inseki II on the right wing. The pilot yanked to the left and Commodore Noble let him have the left ER Large Laser which sliced the right wing from the Inseki II. He made sure the Inseki II was dead and reefed into a hard right turn and hit the throttles.
"Where you at, Pete?" Commodore Noble asked
<<"At your 4 o'clock low, damn near in the weeds. This guy is good, he is weaving like a mad man. I got one good hit on him though. He is doing the max speed he can.">> Captain Travella replied
"On my way, we burned almost 2 tons of fuel, so even money he is going to flame out before getting back to base anyway. Inseki II only carries 3 tons of fuel." Commodore Noble said as he finally caught sight of his wingman and moved to join with him.
A few minutes late a large blotch of smoke announced the death of the second Inseki II.
"Could have been some local militia, but let's do a low level fly over of that town. High speed, but low." Commodore Noble said
Twenty minutes later, Commodore Noble and Captain Travella had ripped over the small town and headed back for their small landing zone that the engineers had scraped out. It was time to tell Captain Gweneth Rolando what they found.
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