Tally
 
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SCAP, WADJ/1LT Corran "Arturus" Hargraves/STCR Doashim/VE/VEN/(=A=)(=SA=)(=*MA*=)(=JCPA=)(=SCPA=)[MC:1](x2)[SV][BRC][VC:B][CBV][LSM][LoC][BWC][SWC][GWC][LoC-DD][CM-PL]

Words: 1043

He chuckled at the woman's frustration and accelerated his craft as the two enemy fighters approached them.
Aeos gulped, following his example, staying at his rear.
"So...any idea of what to do?"
He sounds nervous as well, It cheered her up slightly that they were both feeling that way. Feeling green, figuratively.

"I guess a pummel from above?"
"Yo-yo?"
"Immelman?"
"Could we just decide, because they are blasting us!"
Both Vasili and Aeos brought their fighter into high acceleration and sped upwards, above the two enemy vessels. Green bolts of flickers came their way and the two Sentinels bolted away from each other allowing the lasers to pass in between them.
"Um...go with the flow right girl?" Vasili crackled over the Comm-link. The two vessels were nearing them at an alarming speed.
"Lets just split them up," suggested Aeos as she studied the two blips on her radar.
"Barrel right through them?"
"Exactly, ladies first Vasili,"

"Ooh, thats low, but sure, gotta give a gal like you some manly protection,"
"Please," she muttered in reply rolling her eyes as she waited for Vasili to drop in front of her.
"Ready?" he asked.
"Good to go, "

Vasili accelerated his craft again and pushed the fighter towards the enemy dropping into a intimidating pummel. Aeos followed him soon and as soon as she could near his rear he initiated the barrel roll.
Thinking about this, it seemed more of an spiral dive, then anything else to Aeos as she swerved to left and dropped her craft in altitude. Vasili kept his fighter straight drop, confusing her slightly as to why he would do that. He was presenting himself as easy target. He started blasting at the two fighters, and Aeos followed soon, as she kept her craft spinning around his overlapping him slightly.

The combination of of their assaults seemed to work, whatever it is that they tried to intend worked. Aeos suspected that splattering rays of laser that she and Vasili shot together created an confusion of where Vasily was, and shooting past the lasers was shooting with a lucky chance.
"You know how easily you could've died?"
"Aww, you shouldn't have cared that much baby," Vasili chuckled.
"So you just make up some flight maneuver, hoping I fall in it with?" asked Aeos dumbfounded, ignoring his ever changing nickname for her.
"Yep, I like to call that one the eye of the storm,"
"The eye of the storm?...lame,"

"Vasili, want to be bait?"
"Why not?"
"Cool, distract them, I'll cover you,"

The allowed the two fighters to group up again, and Aeos flew away, hoping they would aim for Vasili's craft.
Idiots
They went for Vasili, obviously under the impression that they could gang up on him.
Aeos sped after them who was not hot on Vasili's trial.

She swerved hard to the left and dropped sharply in altitude, momentarily disappearing from their view ports before she  assumed her previous position and activated her cannons. The first bolts that emitted from her canons missed as they caught up with her plan. Cursing, she pushed the control and picked up in altitude, soaring above them from a distance.

But too late. The two enemy crafts tailing Vasili changed their target, and grinned at her.
"Oh shit," she muttered as she pulled at the controls to execute a hasty escape. She brought her craft up vertically sharply and kept it going before she before bring it back horizontal again, ending upside down above her previous flight path.
"Vasili cover!" she muttered through the small microphone as blasts made their towards her.
"On the job ma'am," he replied.

The two fighters seems to have forgotten about their previous target and chased her in zig-zag formation through the stars.
Aeos swerved hard to starboard as they tried to gun her down again. She racked though her head for the basic flight maneuvers she was taught.
Of course
But it was risky. She has only performed it with one enemy vessel tailing her. In this case two.
Vasili was taking his sweet time, and she couldn't avoid the bolts from behind for ever.

She swerved to right, and pitched the nose of her craft gently yet hastily, thus initiating a successful barrel roll in which she hoped  would cause her perusers to overshoot. She kept spinning her vessel around the same axis while pushing it forwards, swerving it through the air, varying her altitude with drops and rises.

One overlap and she smirked.
"Idiot"
She let her canons go at it, and a shower of laser bolts raining down on sphere-like object with it the razor sharp wing that extended from it. Dumb-firing at the vessel however was not a good idea, and she resorted her self to finding a missile lock on the fighter.

"Who me?"
"Not you Vasili,"
Where was the remaining fighter? She allowed her eyes to flick to the view port for a split second. Vasili seems ti have drawn him away from her rear, and engaging him in a small one-one-one.
"Stand still you bugger," she muttered frustrated at the fighter as it kept  bouncing in and out of target lock.
A series of green flickers flashed through the small cockpit as she locked on.
She squeezed the trigger for a missile.

Were the in an atmosphere, Aeos would have relished herself in the whoosh! sound the missile would emit as it would speed towards the enemy. A small silence would occur upon impact lasting literally a nanosecond before big boom would follow, and debris would fall through the sky as the pilot would to his demise.

But, right now they were in a vacuum, so there was no whoosh! to be heard, and neither could a big boom follow. Instead it was a small super nova as the enemy craft blew up. The debris spat away from each other, but lost it's momentum as the no-gravity-policy took hold of it. It continued to maunder around. These small details however, went lost as she pulled a vertical flip, facing Vasili's little show.
"Right....one down, one to go, need any help?

Words: 1043
 
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PO1/FM_Aeos/Sentinel 2/Flight 1/STCR Doashim/Defensive Fleet/VEN/VE[(=*A*=)]
TRN/AC_Aeos/Training 1-1/Lopen/VEDJ/VE
/SSGT_Aeos/[LoR][ES2C][CoR]

"Aw, you don't give me enough credit!" Vasili uttered as he inverted and pulled into a dive. He expected the enemy to just overshoot him. "You just sit tight, I'll join you in a sec'." A scoff resonated through his ear piece. Time froze as a thought went through Decembrist's head. The first lesson he'd learn in the Navy: don't stop to talk to the girls when somebody's shooting you. There was a loud crash from outside, some high pitched beeps from the inside, and red lights all around. "Uh oh..." He frantically looked around. "Did you see that?! Did my shields just go down?!" He did his best to pull away from Aeos' direction, trying to pull the enemy in between the two.

"Vasili!" his wingmate cried out at the scene. There *is * feeling!

"I believe those were the shields. I've changed my mind," a grunt on Vasili's end as he pulled off again, hard, "save me!"

Vasili wanted to make sure Aeos was actually coming for him, but the novice pilot had a large task for his skill: trying not to get shot with no shields. He lost all thought of tactics and calm. His flight pattern became a random series of jerks and flips, just trying to avoid staying in the cross hairs of the enemy interceptor at all costs. The truly wild part about the fleeing was that he wasn't getting shot...

Bum. Bumbubumbum. Bumbubumbumda dabum(da)dum(da)dum. That same ol' funky groove was playin' at this point. It dictated Vasili. Controlled him. He was at one with the funk. For he was one funkadelic, groovin', righteous big cat. And he was getting shot at.

"HOLY MOTHER!" his vocal chords ejaculated as the green bolts came closer and closer. "He's ridin' on my ass, Aeos! Get yours in gear!"

The music picked up pace, and so did Vasili. He bumped his speed up a little more to prepare for a last ditch effort to shake the fighter that was attacking him. He sacrificed maneuverability for speed, practically placing a missile lock on himself as he sped ahead straight. The radar showed that Aeos was still a little too far away for Vasili to give up.

Vasili's thoughts were jarred with his TIE. More warning sounds echoed through his fighter. Through the window in front of him, the orange glow of fire could be seen reflecting off the Interceptor's metallic surface. Still, he pushed forward, taking whatever beating the simulation had in store for him. "That's it!" he yelled as the ship integrity reached critical, "Get in here!" He was yelling to Aeo, who he hoped was close enough to jump on the enemy's tail. Vasili went straight back to the Academy books. He initiated a wide turn, baiting his opponent to over shoot. Next, he cut the speed drastically and inverted, getting ready to pull away. Just as he went completely invert, Vasili initiated the half loop that was to complete the "Split S" maneuver.

Just as he had hoped, the enemy fighter continued on the turn past him, giving him moments of relief from the chase. If, however, Aeos did not rush in and get on the enemy, he would have to resume the fleeing action; it wouldn't take long for the enemy to change course and get on Vasili's tail again.

"You still alive, V?" she called out. "I'm comin' in fast!"

Vasili checked his radar. The enemy interceptor was already coming after him.

"You see me?" Aeos followed up.

Out the visible portion of the cockpit Aeos could be seen. She was coming right for Vasili, which meant the enemy interceptor was as well.

"We're gonna have to do something a little risky, V," his wingmate informed him. "You with me?"

"For now!" Vasili was annoyed he was getting hit so many times. For a simulation, this was pretty dangerous.

"Just keep flying straight, I'll blow this loser right out of the sky." She sounds confident she'll live.

Vasili put all the energy he could into his engines. Faster and faster he went, with the enemy now straight behind him. Aeos kept getting closer too, angling in from above, ready to intercept their mutual enemy chasing after the broken Vasili. Even more warnings sounded now in Vasili's space.

"Uh, Aeos... I got a missile lock on me!" For the first time in a while, Vasili was legitimately scared. He could hardly outrun an enemy pilot, how could he outrun a missile? He didn't have any inanimate objects to give him advice, either. This was gonna be crazy.

Glancing at his radar, the symbol for the opposing Interceptor was replaced with a missile symbol.

"I got him!" Aeos screamed through the Comm. "Just keep flying straight!" The missile was closing fast on Vasili despite his speed. "Don't move. At all." Closer.

"Er, mind informing me of your plan?" He asked shakily, the prospect of dying not too appealing. Aeos had assumed the role of the now-exploded TIE with a quick roll and loop; she was chasing after the missile that was charging towards Vasili.

"I'm going to shoot the missile," she said with confidence. Vasili new she was just smirking in her TIE at the situation.

"Oh, good."

At this point, there were three options:

-The missile catches up with Vasili who, despite strong urging from his gut, has decided to listen to his female counterpart in this escapade and fly straight in stead of trying to evade the bomb-in-flight.

-Aeos misses her shot and hits Vasili, same end result as the first.

-Aeos makes the shot and saves Vasili's life. Vasili is now the woman in the relationship between the two and forever indebted to Aeos for saving his life.

Please just let me die here.

The missile was dangerously close at this point. The number next to the symbol on the radar kept decreasing. 300... 250... 200... 150... Just a couple of seconds before Vasili was swapping bar stories with his sweet and dear Lord. He kissed his fingers once more and plucked the "Ace" card off the console. 100...75... 50... 25... then, an explosion.

But it wasn't Vasili. Fifteen meters, merely half a second before impact, Aeos took the shot. Whether it was luck or skill, the shot hit the missile. The explosion was incredibly close, and the shock from it damaged Vasili's interceptor enough to severely damage the ship. The back half of both wings were destroyed and the engine was damaged beyond function. Vasili, uninjured but dizzy and just plain worn out, cut the power and let his TIE drift.

Blackness surrounded him. It wasn't the blackness of unconsciousness, just blackness. Darkness. Complete black. As the power went out, so did the lights. What little power was left powered life support systems and communication. He could breathe and he could talk, but Vasili was at the mercy of nothingness. He let his head droop and his chest heave. Close call. If Jaden was watching, he's probably laughing right now.

By now, the lesson had been learned. This behavior wouldn't cut it out in the field. Aeos saved his life. The woman he had been harassing with an hour ago; the woman who had been throwing beer bottles at him; the woman who had shot at him as he left the hangar; that woman had just saved his life.

Sitting around drinking beer all day wasn't helping either. The only reason this woman had to save him was because he was too weak to save himself. His skills weren't honed, his flying was sloppy, he was just plain poor at flying this fighter. He was fresh from training, and he should've known better.

From inside his dark hole, Vasili saw Aeos fly past. "Vasili?" she asked. She sounded nervous, though Vasili doubted it. "Are you there?"

Vasili opened his mouth to speak, but a cough escaped. "Yeah", he struggled through the coughing, "Yea*co*h, I'm he*ough*re."

"Your fighter looks pretty bad, is it even flying any more?" Aeos sounded back to normal now that she knew this man was still alive.

"No, no it isn't. I cut the power." The defeat was in V's voice.

"Think you can hold tight? It's gonna be a while before help can come... if I decide to report you're alive." Vasili could just feel her attitude coming through the line. He wasn't in any mood to play though.

"See you back at the ship, Aeos."

Aeos must've decided to follow the good path and report his interceptor crippled but not destroyed, a rescue boat arrived at Vasili's TIE a while later. The latch from his TIE was pried off and he floated into the rescue boat. He sat down inside and removed his helmet, revealing his tired, defeated face.

Well, that's that.

Ah hell... she's gonna want like... two drinks for this stunt. I just hope she doesn't tell anyone back on board.

(Word Count: 1512)
 
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SCRW/FM Vasili "Decembrist" Rustam/Sentinel 3/Flight 1/STCR Doashim/Defensive Fleet/VEN/VE [SoA] (=*A*=)

Will you not refuse this currency, or is blood money just money to you?