Bird At Sea

Chap 8

It was astronomical twilight, waning into total darkness, wisps of clouds covering a few stars above. Ahead of us, there was a storm, presumably where the enemy fleet was located. Having to brief the others beforehand, we enact the first part of the plan. First we change up our fleet formation, being slightly more clustered rather than a singular line, we then continue with our direction westward. With the storm now nearly being cleared in what will be the battlefield, we commence the attack. With the assistance of Helena's SG radar, she directed torpedo and cannon fire to the needed direction, which was north of us. Many of the shots missed, with the few ones that hit releasing short bursts of fire, ever so slightly illuminating the area and just barely able to see the silhouettes of enemy ships.

Search lights turned on, so I began my interception. One of the targets was a Kongō-Class battlecruiser, likely Hiei. Returning fire from the enemy narrowly passed me, hearing the whistles of the shells going by. A small volley of rockets is shot out, while damaging the ship slightly, the search light is missed completely. Turning around for a strafe, it was by then that AA fire was being directed towards me, though, due to the darkness of the time and the speed of my bird, they fell far short. Once lined up, the ADEN 30mm cannons roared to life, the High explosive and incendiary shells lit some fires on the deck of the battlecruiser, but more importantly scored a hit on the searchlight, making them almost blind. A few of the allied aircraft also assisted me in hindering the abilities of the enemy ships, the aircraft came from Ark Royal, the only aircraftcarrier present here.

For the moment all was going well, though the number of enemy ships were much larger than anticipated, mainly because of the mass produced Siren ships, who are not personified by anyone. But out of the blue, said Siren ships did a maneuver we weren't expecting; they were charging straight at us. "Incoming! We have Siren ships approaching us from the south, to our left!" Shells landed around our fleet, a couple hitting our ships. Not only was our fleet formation being broken up, but we have been flanked.

Siren ships gave us full broadsides, now being able to hit more accurately with close range, allied ships fell into disarray with the sudden confusion. The oncoming fire from the flanking fleet began to overwhelm us. Allied ships now face critical damage. I tried my best to give support, jumping from one side to another as fast as possible, but it was too much. How was this happening? This is nothing like what happened in my world's past. The comms filled with yelling for help, and screams of anguish.

I finally made the call, "Retreat! Fall back, we can't stay any longer!" Ark Royal and a few others, already having a clear path to escape, tried their best to give out support to those unable to leave, as did it. Swooping in, I popped off smoke, fired rockets aimlessly, dropping bombs at random. The night went by in almost a blur, before I knew it, we were back at port, my jet parked at Ark's carrier, sitting in it with cold sweat. Not getting a wink of sleep that night, let alone time for it as daylight broke.

I sat in the Harrier for who knows how long, thinking, regretting, sorrow, disbelief, other feelings as well. Regardless what has been done is done, but still, why did it play out so differently? where the extra fleet had come from. Reevaluating, all IJN ships were present, and of course the added Siren ships that were there beforehand... Was that it? With the addition of the variable of Sirens, perhaps that was what threw so many things off, I can't rely on my past events here, we're going to have to play it the old fashion way.

A knocking startled me, looking to the side it was Ark, having a worried look over her face. Lazily, I drew back the canopy of the cockpit. "¿Que Pasa?" I ask her. "You've missed breakfast." "So what?" "'So what!?' You haven't eaten as of yesterday in the afternoon! You have to get going, moping around won't win any wars or battles." I drew in a long sigh, I could not deny what she said. "You will get something to eat and then we'll meet up with Wales, she has something to show us." Finally I got up and followed Ark.