Bird At Sea

Chap 4

Standing outside for a moment to stretch, I was greeted with HMS Belfast. "Greeting Mr. Aguila, I have brought you some breakfast, I'm sure you must be hungry by now." She brings a tray with a typical English dish, one of eggs, beans and cooked tomatoes. "Ooh... uh, thank you?" "Is it not to your liking?" "No, no, I actually need this should I fly, thank you very much." "Is there anything else I can provide for you?" "No, that would be all, thank you." She bows and leaves. After having to enjoy the much needed meal, I stared out to the open blue sea. It was quite indeed a beautiful sight, the waves calmly splashing against the bay, some seagulls flying about while squawking, the sun warming my face as the cockpit was open. Far into the distance something began to brew, a storm, figures started to appear from the horizon of the sea. Squinting my eyes to see what it was, as the figures became closer, specks appeared in the sky as well, which then turned to dots, and they too were approaching. Upon closer expectation these figures were ships, more or less having a modern shape, Sirens. Jumping out, I yelled out "Sirens, Sirens!" to anyone who might hear, which there were. As the others started to scramble, I myself got back to my bird and started it up. Just as I got in the air, Siren aircraft made their first strikes and missiles were shot to the harbor or to ships, giving the members of Azur Lane a hard time to get to their ships of their own.

Starting to engage these jets, having to now only rely on my guns will make this interesting. Choosing target after target, it was easy to get behind them and splash them, seeing how they did not move as much, but once they caught wind of my presence, the dogfight truly commenced. One got behind me, 'Missile, Missile, Missile' said the avionics. I popped flares and turned, but with the enemies forward swept wings, they could just about keep up with me. Once again doing a maneuver with the vectored thrusting, I performed a loop ending in me being behind the enemy and gunning it down. More bandits were strafing the harbor below. Intercepting, I took out one by surprise and began to give chase to another, yanking on the stick as the bandit performed a High-G maneuver, doing the same to keep up with it, taking a sharp breath, holding it for a couple of seconds then taking another sharp breath, I felt my entire body being pulled down to my seat. Finally I out turned the enemy and splashed it with one burst. Tracer fire nearly misses, doing evasive maneuvers, I was almost thrown around my cockpit. The rearview windows revealed four of the Siren jets were on my tail. 'Missile, Missile' I pop counter measures and bank right, 'Missile, Missile' I pop more and bank left, 'Missile Missile Missile!' "Shut up!" Pulling on the stick towards me, the Harrier shoots straight up, pushing it's engine to its limits. The bandits follow, but as I go higher, they start to lag behind but are still within range. As I dodge I yell to myself and to them "¡Vamos, entran perdida!" After a few seconds, what felt like aeons, the bandits finally stall out. Turning the Harrier in a 180, I splash one and go past the other three as the chase starts all over again. "Bandits on my six, on my six!" Flying low near the harbor, my heart raced as I made half calculated movements. I attempted another loop with the Vectored Thrusting (VT) but the Siren jets do a post stall maneuver of their own, just nearly being toe to toe with me. As I thought it would never end, Javelin called out to me, "Over here!" Spotting Javelin, she had another fellow destroyer beside her, they both stood on water as they had their ship's rigging on. I turned toward them, not knowing fully what they wanted to do. Just barely tapping out on Mach one, I passed by the two and almost startled them, but they focused back and with their AA guns shot down the bandits behind me. "Thank you so damn much!" I said to them over the coms.

Just as things seemed to have started to calm down and start repelling the Siren's attack, the air, for whatever reason, began to be filled with Sakura petals, from where the Sirens came from, was a storming vortex of petals unable to see what was within. A large voice boomed out, "It's true, we are to fight against the Sirens, but unfortunately a difference in our beliefs split the camps apart to separate factions." A second makes itself known, "The first faction is believed in only using powers that were created by humankind, Azur Lane fights on this side." The first one speaks again, "As for the second faction, their group uses Siren technology to defeat the Sirens, they are the Iron Blood and then There's us." The Vortex of petals began to clear, and from it were to Carriers, both having the Imperial Seal of Japan, as well as another emblem of five Sakura petals on the bows of both ships. "We are the Great Sakura Empire," said one of the voices. I know these two ships far too well, they are of the first carrier division, the-" "Akagi." "And Kaga." They both said.