Gundam Fire Still

"Zaft's land ships are planning on kicking the Atlantic Federation guy's ass up ahead, that's a big one."

"They're really bringing their ships to land?" A voice on the intercom asked

"Yeah, about the same size as that big Atlantic Federation thing, but it shouldn't fly, and the bridge looks just like the pre-war intel said it would."

"Hell, they'd need multiple tracks then." Tariq shook his head in disbelief

"No, not a track, it moves quieter than a track, even a Baku's track would bring up a lot of smoke and dust and make noise when it's moving across the desert, but it's quiet and doesn't raise any dust at all."

"Those guys working on intelligence must be interested in how they're propelled."

"Right, wait, pay attention, turn left ahead, stop on that gentle slope and hide the hull, you'll see it soon enough; and, Wolverine, get behind that sand beam up ahead, your hull is low enough to show the missile launcher, but keep an eye on the perimeter."

Jettfrid didn't really have a clue, he knew how to use an electromagnetic main gun was to destroy a vehicle, an MS, or some other conventional equipment, but no one had ever told him how to destroy a battleship, even if the battleship was on land, knowing that a battleship had more guns on it than all the vehicles under his command combined, but he didn't want to give up this sneak attack at all; this ship was The Zaft ship was about to circle behind that Atlantic Federation ship, a good opportunity that an opponent was unlikely to pass up, and one who was focusing on one objective would always more or less ignore threats in other directions, something that was common to both sides.

"Chief, where should we fight?" Over the inter-vehicle communication channel he heard one man take a breath, the massive battleship was slowly coming into their view, in this group were veterans who had survived all the battles, but even they had never fired at such a target before. Even counting since the invention of the tank, the number of tankers who had been able to fire at a battleship was very rare, and few of them had survived rather than being blown to pieces by the return fire of a battleship, but he felt that this time he could probably set a record.

"Careful, estimate the distance yourself, don't alert them with the range laser beam, but I'm sure you won't miss.03, you aim for that main turret, maybe face down a little?" The Lieutenant had to go with his instincts on where to aim, it was always good to dumb down a main gun anyway, it would be a bonus to detonate its ammunition, "Tariq, you have the bridge, aim better and try to take off their bridge along with those radar antennas."

"Watch me." The gunner had put his eyes on the scope head, this simple static to motion shot could be extremely hit and miss, and it was rare for a tank to be able to target a target this large and at the same time this valuable.

"As for the 02...."

"I'd like to target that Zavut standing on the rear deck, it's heading our way and poses the greatest threat" Cook offered voluntarily "You know, those gunnery MS are covered in ammo racks, if it blows up on the deck of a battleship .... "

"Very well, I'll leave you to it." The Lieutenant wasn't sure what the Zaft were thinking, having the MS stand on the deck of the ship and fire didn't seem like it would be any more consistent or hit farther than on the ground, but their gunning MS were all positioned on the unobstructed deck.

"What about us?" The two infantry fighting vehicles that came forward indicated that the target could also be in range of their missiles, and it was clear that they wanted to salvage a chance to fire on the ship as well.

"You guys, aim for the MS on the deck, but don't rush to fire. It's up to you guys if those MS come at us." Those infantry fighting vehicles were equipped with missiles that flew at a slower speed, but that was rather an advantage as they could decisively switch the target they were tracking

"Enemy ships are firing!" Someone shouted over the channel as he watched the targets spew fire, he knew those Atlantic Federals were going to be in trouble and he could only hope that the first round of fire wouldn't do too much damage to them.

Each vehicle's aim point was already displayed on his tactical screen

"Attention, everyone, in three, two, one.

Fire!"

15. Sheltering the Sky (above)

Mu in the air. La. Frada could see at a glance that the land destroyer was hopeless, that the ship that had posed a mortal threat to the battleship had burst into flames in seconds, that it wasn't even worth having him drop two more bombs on it. The first lightning shot from the side had deactivated the main gun that had fired only once, and now that gun had been lifted from its base, the barrel tilted to one side, and fire and smoke were rising from the large hole below; on the electronic threat display, the radar scan from the ship had also disappeared, and what had once been the bridge was now nothing more than a twisted, disfigured pile of metal, with a large hole sticking out On the rear deck, a black mark turned upward indicated that there had been a violent explosion, and in fact there were still sporadic explosions on the deck of the battleship, probably because they had hit a loaded Zavut, the ammunition racks of the MS carrying four low-pressure cannon were not protected and could easily explode. Two missiles, their engines ignited by the explosions and flames, shot out of the ship's side where missile launchers had originally been, and flew straight into the empty sky.

"This target is silent, continue the search," Mu said to his wingman, who could already see someone escaping from the burning ship, and stopped the wingman who was still planning to drop a bomb, his wingman had taken two shells in the last attack on the Tiger flagship, but had now been repaired and was once again carrying the leaping pilot; the other two Air Tyrants were providing support over the main battlefield, having reported a bomb hit on another destroyer a few minutes ago while communications were still open, but now the communications channel belonging to the maneuvering armament was once again overrun with the busy sound of neutron jamming.

"Watch for a search low to the west, intel says Tiger's forces also have some vertical takeoffs and landings of fighters."

"I'm more interested in taking down an MS than a fighter, Captain, those MSs are clumsy in the air, I'd love to catch one of their early warning MSs, I'm told they're rare."

"That was once upon a time, now I wonder what new tricks they'll have up their sleeves, and as far as early warning MS goes, they'll get away before you get too close." Mu was lacking interest in discussing this, he'd found this to be a very aggressive young man during the last battle, but it seemed a little over aggressive.

"See the fire at 10 o'clock? Target spotted." It was only as the eyes caught the target that the heavily suppressed radar began to filter out the flying targets located at low altitude from the ground clutter of the downsight scans. Two Zaft fighters were flying low intending to go after the ground forces that had attacked them, two thin lines of fire were sweeping across the low altitude but nothing was found, it seemed those ground forces didn't have any decent anti-aircraft firepower, "The ground forces are going to be in trouble."

"I'm going to take care of them!"

Before Mu could reply, the wingman had pushed the throttle and the higher positioned Air Tyrant was diving harshly downwards, the 20mm cannon pulling a long line of fire through the air, unfortunately the line of fire swept right between the two targets. The agile sharp turn of the unscathed twin planes below came head on towards the straight incoming Air Tyrant, and Mu noticed that his wingman was alternating between two different calibers of cannon to avoid overheating, a good technique, but cannon hits were always a problem in high speed air combat; on the opposite side, the Zaft fighter fired missiles under the wings in unison, then split to either side in the same agile manner Steering.

"You're pushing the throttle too hard!" Mu couldn't help but point, he watched as the low-flying Airmaster was trying to pull up, the pull up was clumsy and crude because of the excessive speed, but with the help of the vectoring nozzle, the Airmaster pulled up hard enough that the missiles with narrow head-on views missed their targets, but the wingman that had just regained altitude had no more chance to point the nose at the target for now.

Mu gently pulled the lever and made an agile diagonal somersault to keep an eye on the one approaching in his direction. These Zaft vertical take-off and landing fighters were very agile and powerful at the same time, their odd aerodynamic design giving them powerful engines but always difficult to gain speed, but that translated into their amazing hovering ability. So Mu wasn't about to engage in a dogfight, his opponent had apparently spotted the Airmaster at 3 o'clock, and the former was up to his old tricks, entering the head-on situation with a quick turn, which would make it easier for him to gain an advantage with his excellent payload or the adjuster's dynamic vision, but what came up was not just one Airmaster approaching at high speed, but two closer than that, trailing white smoke. Missiles. Dodging missiles coming head-on was a piece of cake for an adjuster pilot, but after such an easy dodge, the Air Tyrant was already whistling past its head as the air currents shook violently.

Mu didn't want to give his opponent the chance to play the Sakano circus, the number of missiles in the flush, inevitably the blind cat met a dead mouse, and these fighters, although hovering nimbly, but definitely not as good as the MS he had dealt with that could turn instantly; he closed the small throttle, and then made a half-roll inversion, in the vertical plane turned 180 degrees has appeared in the opponent's rear lower; the beam cannon on the back of the plane easily locked on the target, his opponent may be agile enough to dodge the missiles, but to dodge the sub-light speed of the particle beam is another matter.

As he watched his opponent, who was trailing black smoke and flames planted below, Mu whistled softly in celebration of this newly acquired hit count he hadn't had in a long time; it was frustrating to stay in this desert while long unopened as a Moon Front Ranger.

On the radar screen he could see his wingman still tangling with another Zaft fighter, the Air Overlord was able to rely on his speed to get away from his opponent, but the young man was just as unable to hit his opponent who was as slippery as an eel at low altitude and low speed.

"I suggest you abandon this objective, the front line still needs support."

"Well, what the hell."

The moment the Air Tyrant turned his nose around and climbed back up, they all saw the bright spot at low altitude suddenly disappear, followed by a quickly disappearing pile of diffuse reflections from debris; he squinted and tilted his head to look over to see a flame exploding low in the desert.

"What the hell?" There was a surprised voice over the comms from the young man, who seemed unable to believe that the target that had played him for a fool a few seconds ago had been taken out without a word.

"One from low, cunning missile, watch your perimeter." Mu was equally stunned, though it was the enemy that had been shot down, and this sneak attack tactic was deeply appreciated, he didn't like chaos on the battlefield. Then he saw the blinking symbol in the corner of the main screen, friendly data link access? What friendlies could there be over this vast desert?

The next surprise came from the electronic threat display, a radar from high above was scanning itself, and its radiation was so powerful that it struck him, knowing full well that Zaft had no air units that excelled at high altitudes ---. -Either at low altitude, or cosmically, and would never have scanned itself at the altitude now judged by the computer. But the onboard computer cleared his doubts after a split second of analysis, and the radar scanned what was determined to be a joint Eurasian AWACS radar, and the source of the friendly data link was revealed.

As he pressed a button, the side screens began to rapidly update the battlefield situation, a sight not seen since the April Fool's crisis, the excellent radar system and data chain made the battlefield transparent in one direction, although the radar power of the medium AWACS overhead was far less than the air command post of the last era, but covering this small piece of the air-ground integrated battlefield was enough.

The entire sky was almost completely occupied by symbols marked friendly, and he knew to himself that it had been a long time since he had seen such a sight, whether on the moon's surface or as the ships were being chased all the way to the front, his own side rarely had much of a real advantage; now, for the first time, the ever-pressured Combined Forces were getting the chance to unilaterally dump their firepower, and he could see the combined Eurasian attack squads hurrying in, clearly waiting impatiently to drop their revenge bombs on Zaft.

On the ground, a mixed squad of MS and anti-MS destroyers were being chased by Baku, but relying on the terrain and the hold of the guerrilla half-tracks, they weren't at a loss for the moment, and a batch of Wolverine attackers were about to bring those in hot pursuit of Baku into range; a sneaky fighter squad was flying low, and that crisp sneak attack earlier was clearly their handiwork; the Archangel didn't seem to be able to take much advantage of the battleship's opposition as it had split up some of its weapons and missiles to support the ground units left and right, but now a couple of Eurasian Union bombers were heading for the Tiger's flagship.

Mu cut the comm to a pre-programmed synergistic command channel, where he would be able to communicate with friendly forces as necessary, if all went well.

"Attention friendly forces in the air, beware of misfiring, the enemy is very close." Carl's voice sounded quite normal over the channel, though it was punctuated with gasps.

"We have targeting indications and targeting pods to receive strike guidance, sending a list of available weapons below." Apparently, the Eurasian Union was cooperating well

"Bomb drop locations have been marked, approach at your discretion, no anti-aircraft fire from the enemy."

"Understood, target sighted, start into bombing trajectory."

"Attention, additional instructions, all infantry are friendly, guerrillas have no enemy identification devices, please do not fire on moving infantry."

"Understood. 30 seconds to drop bombs."

"Roger, please drop bombs."

Although he couldn't see the target far above the ground or what the guys below were doing, Mu could still see a flicker of light representing the enemy go off in the climbing Air Tyrant's cabin.

"Attention, a new enemy airframe has been launched." The voice from the Archangel CIC sounded.

"Confirming a new batch target, number, 1.

, type, unknown, approaching Archangel." The joint Eurasian soldier on the pre-warning plane reported in order, "We have no bomb-mounted aircraft on the intercept course."

"Leave it to us, Air Tyrant twin aircraft, loaded with bombs and ground weapons, ready for intercept." Mu cut into the conversation, he knew he didn't need to apply to the guy on the AWACS, the guy might only be a captain or lieutenant, but a report was due to friendly forces.

"Understood, next is the latest report from command, there is a strong flow of air approaching from the north, dust storms could occur in the area at any time, over." The commander on the early warning plane continued his report in order.