Burning Skies Saloon

[Thraxius Meridius]

---Aboard the Commodore Beckett--

-Cargo Hold-

Thrax sleeps on the cheese-grater like metallic floor on the small cargo hold of the Commodore Beckett. As he snored, the Boom from one of the Lockheart Pyramidions falling in flames awoke him from his slumber. Thrax wakes up from a sleep induced by ale and liquor. His head pounding like an anvil being struck by a large metal hammer. He slowly opens his eyes and tried to sit up despite the pain.

Thrax
"How the hellfire did I end up here?"

He slowly gets up on his feet, and then stumbles from the turbulence. He slowly walks out of the cargo hold and stands in awe of what is happening around him.

Thrax
"...This isn't where I parked my airship!"

[Captain Lockheart]

Lockheart sees this figure stumble out of his cargo hold

Lockheart
"WHO THE HELL ARE YOU, AND THIS ISNT EXACTLY A GOOD TIME!"

*He scratches his head in confusion, and then replaces his Bi-Corn hat on his head*

Lockheart
"Just get a rifle and start shooting those abominations down there, we'll discuss this later"

[Yiski]

--M'Naghten Returns--

Yiski and the other on board watched Zill's ram into the galleon lines.

_Lauren
"And I thought I was reckless."

_Yiski
"You are, but he's better at gettin' away with it. Enough chatter. Keep your voice for targets and commands."

_Lauren
"Front arc on eastern pyramidions."

Yiski looked down the lumberjack's sights.

_Yiski
"Two kilos. Moderate north-south winds. Ship steady. Target steady."

Yiski unleashes the full five shot volley at the nearest pyramidion sniping the eastern flank. All five shots landed and watched as the pyramidion's balloon became non-existent. It dropped so quickly, it's pilot didn't have enough time to deploy drogue chute. Once the pyramidion hit the ground, it ignited and exploded.

The other pyramidion, noticing the lumberjack shots, spotted M'Naghten Returns and opened mercury fire on them.

_Lauren
"Yiski! Right merc!"

Yiski hopped off the lumberjack and got positioned on the mercury rifle already loaded with the tungsten rounds.

_Yiski
"Wanna play 'Who can snipe?' Sure."

While Yiski got the proper shot lined up, the ship's broadside was hit a few times by the pyramidion's mercury fire. When the engineers rushed below deck for damage control, they hardly noticed any damage. Lauren chuckled.

Two shots rang out from Yiski's mercury rifle and both shots landed at the pyramidion's helm. The subsequent explosions made the pyramidion's helm (and it's pilot) disappear. With the loss of control, the pyramidion turned giving it's right side to the eastern flank which dispatched it once the opening was made.

Yiski turns and calls up to Lauren.

_Yiski
"Get us near those transport ships! Not goin' let a single on of those land inside the city!"

Lauren pulled hard to starboard and headed further south on an intercept course.

_Yiski
"I need the gatling up and ready with heatsink!"

Meanwhile the defenders were having some success using heatsink rounds against the abominations. While heatsink rounds have the highest concentration of brass, the increased spread and reduced piercing power meant a lot of accurate hits were needed to take down a single abomination. At one kilometer, the first wave of abominations were closing in on the base of the mountain and had caused heavy casualties to the defenders.

_Frank
"Status on those monsters!"

_Defender
"We have heavy casualties, but there are only eight left."

_Frank
"I want all gatlings in arc to equip heatsink and take out those pains in our asses. Mercury riflemen should re-equip tungsten rounds and start aiming for those galleons. Light flaks. Take down those transports!"

[Skyraider]

--High above the skies close to Anvala--

Sky and the Flying Panthers had been up in the sky for some time now, nothing had happened yet. Then the drone of engines were heard, getting louder and louder. When sky looked to see what it was, it was a group of Junkers being escorted by multiple bi-planes, and they were headed straight to Anvala. Sky spoke over the radio to the rest of the planes assisting him.

Sky
"Hostiles below us, get ready to dive on the airships first and destroy their balloons with the bombs we have! On the count of three we dive! 1...2....3!

In unison, all the planes dived down upon the Junkers. They certainly lost the element of surprise since the dive sirens kicked in, telling the pilots they were in a steep enough dive. However, the guns on the Junkers didn't have the arc and the enemy pilots were frantic trying to figure out where they were. Sky drops his bombs on the lead Junker, the bombs go straight through the balloon and into the hull, which explode on impact. His fellow pilots did the same, and when they were done, the 4 Junkers were reduced to ash and falling debris. Sky's wing-man responds.

Ivan
"We did it, now all we have to do is...."

Ivan's plane is suddenly shredded and he pulls away as a fighter dives on him. Sky's tail gunner opens up on the one of many planes on his tail.


Sky
"Hostiles on our six! Iris bring them down!"


Iris
"Sure thing, I don't feel like dying today!

Sky
"Ivan, how are you holding up?"

Ivan
"I've got a fuselage fire! A hundred bullets in my left wing and my elevators are barely working!"

Sky
"Hold on! Everyone! We'll bring them into friendly flak, form up on me!"

As Sky says that, bullets shred his plane as well, but the plane behind him isn't so lucky. Iris (Being the tail gunner) shoots the pursuer's wing off and the plane barrels into the ground. Ivan and the rest of the Flying Panthers go into formation, while still dodging as many bullets and giving their gunners a clear shot at the enemies behind them. One of the pilots in formation is rammed by a diving plane and explodes. No one was to survive that, and it was clear either they would die or everyone would.

[BdrLineAzn]

--M'Naghten--

As the battle ensues and Yiski firing away on the mercery. BdrLine and the rest of the crew onboard are running around handling repairs.

BdrLine hears the order from one of the turning engines, he turns to a crewman.

"You heard the man, quick go and load the heatsinks."

"Roger, on it."

The man leaves the port engine and goes past BdrLine to the side gatiling gun. As he moves towards the engine the man left, a shot from one of the Guild pyramidions hit the starboard engine knocking BdrLine on his back. He slowly gets up as a pounding and ringing goes around his head as blood goes down from a minor cut when he hit his head.

BdrLine slowly gets up as he turns to see the damage.

"Flak, Lauren compensate a little in your steering. The starboard engine is out. Fixing it right now."

He goes over to the damage engine only to full unconscious from a second blast.

[Captain Lockheart]

--Commodore Beckett--

Karl
"Captain!, lumberjacks out of ammo!."

Lockheart
"Blast, why didst we pack more?, our side guns wont do too much against those things..."

*Lockheart paces for a moment*

Lockheart
" right, were going to go low, line up out side. were gonna shoot with our rifles from the deck and i want one person on the mercury"

Karl
"I'll get on the mercury cap'n"

*the ship turns and gets its left side facing the remaining monsters. the ship lowers down and the crew start shooting with rifles at the enemy below*

[Thraxius Meridius]

---Aboard the Commodore Beckett--

As the ship lowers Thrax nods, and immediately grabs a rifle from the armory.  He finds a target and takes aim but his rifle fails to fire.

Thrax
"(grunts) Damn it! Work damn you work!"

Lockheart sees this middle-aged drunken idiot fumble around.

Lockheart
"Damn it man! The safety is on!"

Thrax
"... I knew that!"

Karl
"(mumbles to himself) Idiot."

Thrax takes aim port-side and goes guns blazing on the abominations.

Thrax
"I haven't had a battle this good since I last talked to my wife! haha!"

Lockheart
"Just shut up and shoot! and shoot true with aim! We're running low on munitions"

Thrax
"Aye Aye!"

Just as it seemed that things couldn't get worse. Trax spots something amid the chaos. He lowers his rifle for a moment in awe.
He gulps with a grain of fear.

Thrax
"By the gods! What the hell is that thing?"

Through a cloud of smoke and rust, a large ominous shadow emerges from the shadows of the flames. A large beast, ten times bigger than the ones that they've seen so far. It was the Alpha, the seeming leader of the abominations.

Thrax
"...Umm excuse me!"

Lockheart
"WHAT IS IT??! STOP WASTING MY TIME!"

Thrax points to the direction of the large alpha beast.

Thrax
"Umm... I think I'm gonna need a bigger rifle for this one!" 

[Skyraider]

--Above the M'Naghten--

Sky hasn't been lucky today yet. He couldn't see how many planes were behind him but one thing was sure, every time they shot one down two would replace it. Then Sky gets an idea.

Sky
"Everyone pull up into the vertical, NOW!"

Everyone does as he says, including the biplanes behind them. The bi-planes soon began to fall from the skies as their engines weren't as good as the one Sky installed into their planes, Sky calls out to Yiski over the radio.

Sky
"Yiski, if you can spare a moment, we have about 50 planes falling from the sky. Enjoy the free kills!"

Sky and the rest of the Flying Panthers flip over and dive on the falling planes.

[Captain Lockheart]

--Commodore Beckett--

Lockheart
"Oh dear god..."

Thrax
"Yup"

Lockheart
" he's coming straight for us!, raise us now. use hydrogen."

* the ship lurched upward so fast that the men almost fell, Lockheart fell of the bridge of the ship and on the main deck*

Lockheart
" shit, my arm"

* he grabbed the radio and ordered a barrage from the Imperial Might the shots made a deafening sound as they hit, but the alpha surged through the clouds of smoke unscathed*

[RearAdmiralZill]

-Then it was fixed-

Zill was tanking along, disabling the galleons along the southern flank. All the ramming was beginning to stress the hull, and he had to ease off. The engineers worked frantically with Jun leading them. Shink and PapaP took aim with the long Lumbers and greased rounds. The sheer amount of shots took down two galleons and a pyra.
Zill
"That's it!"

Shink
"Gun's overheated. Get me an engie!"

The pyra rammed into one of the galleons and took them both out. The other galleon recovered and fired flak. The explosions sent shrapnel into the decks, injuring two men. Zill cursed under his breath and took hold of his mercury. He quickly loaded a tungsten into the chamber and sniped out the helm of the enemy galleon. It started to spiral out of control with red smoke coming from the helm. 2 Squids came in and finished it off. Zill's radio blared.
Matty
"I'd say that counts as our kill."

Zill
"Flak. Do you see what I see?"

Zill was eying a transport ship ramming the main gates. It crash landed and 40 more soldier bolted out into the city.
Matty
"Looks like our chance to shred some birds."

Zill
"I'll tank this. You get over there now."

Jun'ko
"I don't know if we can take the damage admiral!"

Zill
"Make it!"

The order surprised Jun'ko, but she doubled her efforts along with the extra crew. 2 pyra's had closed in and started pelting the boat with firepower. Zill rammed one, and got one hwacha on the other. PapaP let loose some incendiary rounds to keep them busy.

[Yiski]

--M'Naghten Returns--

The second blast rocks the ship and causes Yiski to grab onto the railings to keep upright. Lauren struggled keeping the ship steady with a dead starboard engine.

_Lauren
"Status!"

_Crewmen
"Starboard's out and BdrLine's hurt!"

_Lauren
"Get him below deck!" Yiski we're going to have to make this a ground battle."

_Yiski
"Sure. Think you can manage dockin' in this condition?"

_Lauren
"Who said anything about docking?"

_Yiski
"Skies... not again."

Lauren swung the ship around using the port engine and made for Anvala. Yiski knew all too well what she was planning: Landing the ship somewhere in the city. She pulled the same stunt almost a decade ago when Lauren crash landed in Lord's Leap during a training accident.

_Lauren
"M'Naghten to Captain. Clear the city center! I'm making an emergency landing! Repeat. Making an emergency landing in city center."

Units at the city center didn't have time to wait for orders from either Yiski or Frank to clear out. They scattered immediately when they saw a goldfish land on top of the city center's fountain, crushing it and causing water to spout from either side of the ship. Yiski immediately grab Blood Bolt and jumped of the ship and headed for the southern wall. Lauren helped some crewmen get BdrLine off.

_Lauren
"They say any landing you walk way from is a good landing."

Meanwhile in the skies, the eastern flank had split into two groups: One to help Zill take out the galleons and another to deal with the transports. Since the last transport wasn't guarded by covering fire anymore and being beaten in by the batteries, the pursuit fleet took it out. It crashed against the mountain and was immediately concentrated fired on by the gatling pillboxes.

Consequently, the defenders (and Yiski) had to now deal with 40 abominations roaming the city.

[RearAdmiralZill]

-Then it was fixed again-

At this point, only half the galleons remained. Zill could barely see through the smoke bellowing from his galleon's damage. He left the boat headed toward the last enemy formation and assessed the damage.

The hull was gone. No one really knew what was keeping it alive. Jun'ko shook her head and looked at him.
Jun'ko
"You can't ram again or it'll split the ship."

Zill
"Understood. Get the injured in the hold. We're almost through."

She hugged him and ran below deck. He tightened his hat on his head and swung the helm around, giving Shink and Papa clear shots. 3 Goldfish flew past to harass the galleons. They let fly with tungsten, shredding two galleons in one volley. The remaining boats turned to face Zill. They unloaded flak into the ship. 3 rounds exploded on the top deck. Shink fired a volley of greased to keep them occupied. Zill could feel the warm draw of blood along his face.
Zill
"Keep us up! I want any fire possible on those galleons!"

The engineers kept only the guns and hull alive. Zill could barely keep steady as the goldfish swooped onto the galleon formation, breaking it up.

[Thraxius Meridius]

--Commodore Beckett--

As Thrax fumbled to the floor like so many times before (with or without the help of ale). He got up as he saw Lockheart crash down onto the main deck. As he heard lockheart's shout in pain, he ran to lockheart.

Thrax
"Don't worry!"

Thrax helps Lockheart up and takes out a flask of liquor from his pocket.

Thrax
"Here take this! Always works for me!"

Lockheart
"Now's not the time!"

Lockheart smacks the flask out of Thrax's hand and it slides off the deck and falls through the skies.

Thrax
"Well for me, NOW is always the time! Suit yourself"

Thrax whips out another back-up flask from his inside jacket. He takes a swig and picks up his rifle and starts shooting.

Karl
"What the hell is that?"

Thrax
"Whiskey!"

Karl
"No, I meant that hulking mass that just came out of nowhere!"

Thrax
"Well if I knew anything about hulking masses charging towards things, I'd probably guess its my wife. But in this case, I don't know.
If it breathes and if it bleeds, shoot it!"   

Lockheart
"Damn it! How in the hell are we going to stop that?!"

 

[BdrLineAzn]

--City Center--

Lauren and the other crew men drag BdrLine into a building.

Lauren
"Anyone of you guys know how to treat him?"

Crewman
"I do hold on."

The man goes over to the unconscious BdrLine and kicks his side. The shock instantly wakes him.

BdrLine
"WHAT THE FLAK"

He sits up straight and puts a hand to his side.

Lauren
"That's one way to wake someone. Come on we need to go and help out with the defense. About 40 of those things are lose in the city."

The group then gets up and out of the building to look for weapons, and hope that they find the monsters before they find them.

[Skyraider]

Sky noticed how the M'Naghten didn't shoot at any of the falling planes. So Sky and the Flying Panthers finished some of them, however most recovered and a huge dogfight began. After awhile they were close enough to Anvala that flak opened up on the remaining planes. One plane missed Sky and overshot.

Sky
"Today ain't your day huh?"

Sky fired a short burst at the plane, and the thing evaporated. Sky hit the engine which ripped everything apart. Eventually no one was left on the retreating pilots, they all took a long time too remember the two crew on the plane who was rammed. Then they made it back to an airport and landed.