ABS FIESTA REDUX

[Qwepir]

Jaakko frowns, peeved again.

"Granted. I'd make sure they can receive you, they might not be able to land you depending on how bad the list is. Any way you can leave us with the drones?"

There's no response from Ellie, as she loses more and more control over her own plane. Her radio is cut off, there's no response from her control surfaces, and it's impossible to apply or reduce thrust. Behind everyone else, the Wyvern extends flaps and decelerates even harsher with the drones remaining in formation, while up at the front of the formation all Mjolnir pilots' HUDs flicker and a faint but shrill whine fills their ears.

[Ad Bot]

[Badger]

"Anyone else getting interference? I'd say a skysub is jamming us but I'm not so sure or feeling good after Skytracer falling off."

Walter checks his radar and then does a visual look around from his canopy and preemptively hovers his hand near the communications mute in the event the whine gets louder.  

[ZombiLoin]

Gaffe nervously shifts around in his roosterpit, fitzing with the communications controls in an attempt to stop the flickering and silence the shrill whine in his headset. He sends out a quick message, with an uneasy tone as he speaks, "Anybody else getting this interference? This is forgeted!"

[Gojira]

Markus notices Ellie falling behind.
“Sk- Skytracer? What are you doing?”
The buzzing in his ears only causes him more and more concern.
“...what the hell is that buzzing? Anyone else hearing this, or got issues with your HUD?”
He grows increasingly nervous.

[Mr. Hurricane]

Jaakko calls into the radio.

"CIC, think we're being jammed, one of our aircraft is loosing speed. Any ECCM support available?"

He looks to his RWR, if it would provide any clues, and then to Ellie's aircraft. Her aircraft and drones are invaluable, and he's not going to lose another pilot if he could at the least try to help it. Not so close to the end of the war.

"Hold formation, I'm dropping back to Ellie,"

Jaakko pulls up and away, bringing his Tukreb in next to Ellie and waving. He points to his ears.

[Operator¹]

Ellie waves back 'no' at Jaakko and makes a motion that indicates that she'll attempt to eject soon.


Bell turns off her comms for now and pivots her plane slightly from the formation. "I don't like this.." She mutters.

[Qwepir]

"Anyone else getting interference? I'd say a skysub is jamming us but I'm not so sure or feeling good after Skytracer falling off."

Walter checks his radar and then does a visual look around from his canopy and preemptively hovers his hand near the communications mute in the event the whine gets louder.  

Gaffe nervously shifts around in his roosterpit, fitzing with the communications controls in an attempt to stop the flickering and silence the shrill whine in his headset. He sends out a quick message, with an uneasy tone as he speaks, "Anybody else getting this interference? This is forgeted!"

: Looks like everything's fine on our end, I'm not seeing or hearing anything out of the ordinary.

Jaakko calls into the radio.

"CIC, think we're being jammed, one of our aircraft is loosing speed. Any ECCM support available?"

: Say...ain Mjolnir, did- ... -peat, did not copy.

He looks to his RWR, if it would provide any clues, and then to Ellie's aircraft. Her aircraft and drones are invaluable, and he's not going to lose another pilot if he could at the least try to help it. Not so close to the end of the war.

"Hold formation, I'm dropping back to Ellie,"

Jaakko pulls up and away, bringing his Tukreb in next to Ellie and waving. He points to his ears.

Ellie waves back 'no' at Jaakko and makes a motion that indicates that she'll attempt to eject soon.

Looking at the RWR just reveals that there's nothing ahead of you but your own allies. As you two exchange hand signals, a crackling white bolt of energy shoots between your roosterpits, raising the hairs on your neck and temporarily scrambling your heads-up displays.

"forget," she whispers, making the quick connection that that was the engine that suffered the failure. "Come on." Cualli sprints out of the hangar, heading towards the port engine.

On her way, she tries to figure out why they'd be calling her to the engine. It doesn't take her long to remember the other engineer's mention of a reactor meltdown and the fact that Elu wouldn't be particularly vulnerable to radiation. Well, not the same amount of radiation that would be fatal to a human-- she knows that enough radiation can potentially fry Elu's electronics, but there's no way that there's that much radiation pouring out of the engine.

You make your way through the wing structure towards where you understand the engine block is, but quickly realize that you've never actually been out this way before. You've been following the signage directing towards the engine room, but the journey has been so long it feels like you should have arrived already. Running down what feels like the dozenth claustrophobic hallway so far, you finally spot a door at the end labeled "PORT ENGINE BLOCK". As you approach, you see the latch turn and the door opens inwards, but your own shipmates aren't the ones coming through.
: Oh- uh, hey, Cualli-
: [We don't have time for this.]

The woman with the glasses draws her gun, and the man in the welding mask beside her begins reaching for his.

[carolcat]

Cualli's eyes widen as she registers the guns. She runs her options through her head: run and probably get shot, try to find out what's going on and possibly get shot, or use Elu as a shield and let him take the bullets. She may be strong, but she knows there's no way for her to incapacitate both of these people before catching a bullet through her head.

If she questions them and gets shot, then chances are Elu would act fast and stand a chance of surviving what follows and reporting the information back to whoever he can. She rests her hand on Elu's shoulder and speaks. "Something tells me I wasn't told to report here just so that I could get executed," Cualli says, trying to keep her voice level. "What's going on?"

[Badger]

Walter traces the direction of the shot (given he was able to see it)

[Operator¹]

Bell turns back on her comm and radios Kommandmant.

: Can you contact the carrier and tell them to find the Kintharian technicians? Something is wrong with the Wyvern and they've been the only ones that have touched it.

[Qwepir]

Walter traces the direction of the shot (given he was able to see it)

All you can tell is that it came from directly behind. For all Walt knows, it could have come from Skytracer's plane.

Bell turns back on her comm and radios Kommandmant.

: Can you contact the carrier and tell them to find the Kintharian technicians? Something is wrong with the Wyvern and they've been the only ones that have touched it.

: Tordenskjold, this is Djuriskas Lead, come in. ...Tordenskjold? Huh. That's odd, I can hear you people just fine but the carrier isn't getting through.

[Operator¹]

: I don't like this, I'll see if I can't re-establish radio contact with the Tordenskjold.

Bell quickly turns around and turns up the throttle.

[Qwepir]

Cualli's eyes widen as she registers the guns. She runs her options through her head: run and probably get shot, try to find out what's going on and possibly get shot, or use Elu as a shield and let him take the bullets. She may be strong, but she knows there's no way for her to incapacitate both of these people before catching a bullet through her head.

If she questions them and gets shot, then chances are Elu would act fast and stand a chance of surviving what follows and reporting the information back to whoever he can. She rests her hand on Elu's shoulder and speaks. "Something tells me I wasn't told to report here just so that I could get executed," Cualli says, trying to keep her voice level. "What's going on?"

Elu doesn't even wait for a response before lunging at the woman with the gun, the sight of her pointing it at Cualli was all he needed to make a decision. He crashes into her and knocks her to the ground, causing her suppressed pistol to go off twice. The first bullet, meant for Cualli, catches Elu in the arm and the second ricochets off the ceiling and tumbles down the hall. The man next to her gets his (also suppressed) pistol out of his holster and shoots Elu twice in the back, but to no immediate effect, and the one in the hat steps back and nearly drops their tablet.

: I don't like this, I'll see if I can't re-establish radio contact with the Tordenskjold.

Bell quickly turns around and turns up the throttle.

You start to turn around and a second PPC shot flies across your bow.
: Maintain your current heading. We need to talk.

Ellie's Wyvern briefly banks hard to the left for unknown reasons and shakily levels back out.

Theme

[Operator¹]

: I guess you guys are doing something back on the carrier too, is there a reason for this?

[Badger]

"I'm guessing the Kintharians found out our little battle plan and don't want us to follow through. At least we're not getting pounded by a bunch of imperials instead right now."