Ruined Salvation

An Alternate History of the Robotech Universe

By Cicero Phelps

It all started to go bad before the first notes played.

Rick realized belatedly that he should have monitored his flight leaders better; most of them, although experienced, were also greener than fresh spring grass, and still had a tendency to get jumpy when the enemy engaged at close range.

Captain Gloval had ordered radio silence to prepare for Minmei's broadcast, and, as such, Rick couldn't offer his standard cautions to the group. As they approached their pickets, Rick thought, but couldn't be certain, that Gold Group's lead element opened fire without orders, prompting a massive return salvo from the Zentraedi battlefortress.

On his first experience observing the Zentraedi fleet, Lisa and Rick, along with Ben Dixon, witnessed the destructive firepower of a fully armed and operational death-dealing factory. They tried to convince Earth's leadership to negotiate an end to hostilities with the Zentraedi.

In that, they failed.

That failure led, inexorably and irrevocably, to the present, which snapped him out of his reverie, and back to the present. A huge green wave of energy came at them, the Zentraedi's opening salvo. Rick glanced back; the SDF-1 communications tower was damaged, and Breetai's bridge was destroyed. Rick shook his head in horror, but scanners confirmed his death.

Azonia and Gloval took their ships to the fore of the line, intending to get between the Zentraedi pickets and Dolza's ship. Rick took the fighter wing in ahead of them, trying to be the tip of the spear aimed at the heart of the Zentraedi menace. “Hunter, once you're past the defense line, take your fighters in and destroy the Zentraedi ship to ship at close range. If you get in that close, it will be difficult for their gunners to hit you without damaging their comrades.”

“As ordered, Captain. How's the short range broadcaster?”

“Commander Leeds is still attempting repairs. But you need to buy her some more time. Engage at point blank range and destroy as much as you can.”

“Engaging, Captain. Skull Group, Gold Group, we're the tip. Hammer everything you see that's not a friendly. Aces High, Blue Group, and Gray Group, spread wide, exploit the gap and finish what gets by us.”

He heard agreements, then swapped to Skull Squad's frequency. “Max, Miriya, form your elements up on Attack Pattern Delta. We hit the center of their line and spread like a firework. Concentrate on the communications relays and command cabins. If we hit them there, their ships will fail.”

“Agreed, Rick,” Miriya replied.

“Let's do it, boss,” Max echoed.

The laser fire was thicker than a hornet's nest in full fury, the lights nearly blinding us as we flew into the teeth of the thickest fight we had ever seen. Rick, himself, had grown up watching newsreels of the GCW, and had never seen anything that fierce even then. He jinked and juked all around, dodging missiles and laserfire, and the shrapnel from the damaged craft around me started denting my armor enough that he had to seriously worry about not being able to function in the battle. “Skulls, fireburst, high noon. ATTACK!”

He led his element in a high climb, rolling and side-slipping to discharge his weaponry at the nearest comm tower. It glowed bright orange and white with the heat of expanding energy and distorted into fiery shards. He pulled out of his strafing run and took a pass at the command center at the front of the ship, targeting the bridge window and hoping that the glass would do some damage against them.

Suddenly, he had to make the squadron dance around to avoid the capital ships that flooded the area. Azonia's fleet and the SDF-1 closed the gap and started tearing holes in the Zentraedi main battle fleet. Salvos from large cannonades ripped metal plates into liquid matter and then cooled the melted liquid into perfect droplets. Rick's sensor board beeped, showing that his target's shield system was failing. He looped around and led his element towards the next target.

All of a sudden, the comm channels lit up with a familiar voice. Minmei's song started playing, and they cut the chatter to let that play out. Then, in the aftermath of a missile barrage, a sudden shriek of pain rang out.

“Hunter, Minmei's been killed; the missile barrage took out the transmitter and the stage she was standing on. We're patching a hole in the containment field, but with the pounding we're taking, we may not survive much longer.”

Rick grit his teeth; this was turning into one hell of a nightmare, and very few options presented themselves at that moment. His sensors beeped again. “Captain, my scanners indicate that Dolza's ship is suffering severe damage in its lower left quadrant. Should we focus our attacks there, to maximize our efforts?”

“Exploit the gap, Hunter.”

“As ordered, Bridge.”

Rick glanced at his squadron board. Two thirds of Skull Group and more than three quarters of Gold Group had been erased from the board, and the trailing squadrons didn't fare much better, either. All in all, he had between three quarters and two thirds of his original strength, and they all had less than half the original weapons load as well as damage corresponding to well over half of their fuselage. The gap in Dolza's ship was tiny, by Zentraedi standards, but could be successfully exploited by a squadron or two of VT fighters.

Rick formed up the survivors on his wing. “Okay, guys. This is it. Form up behind me, we'll break through that gap, blast a hole large enough for the SDF-1 to get through, and end this thing.”

Another missile barrage came through, wiping out another half squadron. Rick led his men in, island-hopping from large cruiser to battleship, and avoiding the large cannons of Dolza's fortress. The squads took strafing runs at their huge, ample targets and softened them up for the cruisers that followed them in. Of course, even the destruction and crippling of a mere half dozen ships means nothing against a force of over a million vessels, but Rick and his pilots did what they could to clear the way for the SDF-1 and allied Zentraedi vessels.

Rick took his element in close; fifty klicks remained between his fighter and the hole in Dolza's fortress. He finished his pass at a disabled battlepod, and looked ahead at the target spread before him.

WHAM!

He took a tumble, spinning on all four axes. “Computer, what's my status?”

“Power grid at zero. Weapons grid at zero. Aft stabilizers down. Radiation leak in cockpit. External communications damaged. Life support failing.”

Rick sucked in a deep breath and let it out through clenched teeth, trying in vain to check his anger. “Not like this,” he said, frantically. “Not like this. If I'm going down, then I'm taking you bastards with me!”

He aimed his VT at the heart of the gap. “Max, take command. I'm going to do something that I never thought I'd ever do.”

“What's that, boss,” Max asked, his voice shaking.

“Afterburners set for full velocity ram on my mark. Mark!”

He rode through volley after volley of incoming lasers, cracking his cockpit glass and taking his wings apart bit by bit. He braced against the impending collision as the gap grew larger and larger against his vision. After a few seconds, only bright blue light could be seen.