fanfic_name = What If

chapter = Chapter 18

author = Knights Templar

dedicate = Cicero-Phelps who helped me with grammar an all the other fun things i probably didn't fix, an thanks to Cicero for all the kickin quotes.

Rating = O18

Type = Alternative Universe

fanfic = What If

A/N: Chapter 18, and the second part of the long in coming Force of Arms mini-series of sorts. This chapter will concentrate on the defense of the Mars base and industrial facility. Rick, Max, Roy, and Jacob will all be prominent characters in this chapter with a few others ;).

Jacob’s head rested in his arms as he got some all important sleep. What everyone else didn’t see was that his face was laying a plate of food that had been served to him. Rick sat down next to him and prodded him in the side and saw him move and was satisfied to know that he was alive.

He looked across the table at Max and Roy who both wore smiles, and knew that Jacob was going to be a mess when he lifted his face off the plate. Roy picked up a spoon and threw it at Jacob an it bounced off his head, and Jacob shot up with an assortment of food stuck to his face.

When he saw the smiling faces he knew something funny had happened and he had missed it. He looked around at the other pilots in the mess hall and saw them all wearing humored expressions. Jacob looked at the glass windows and saw his expression. He made a shocked face and grabbed a napkin and wiped the food off of his face.

Jacob sat back down and looked at the food that he had been sleeping on and pushed the plate away from him. He grabbed the fresh coffee that the laughing waiter set in front of him and Jacob noticed that he was a Damage Control Specialist. Jacob smiled.

He heard a slight ruckus behind him and turned to see two destroid pilots walking into the mess. He knew both of them; he rolled his eyes and should have known that he would see them here. Ethan Ramsey, and Ryan Darmouth, both two of the best destroid he had ever met, then again they were the only ones he had met.

They walked past him and Jacob called out to them, “Where ya going, ground pounder?” The two stopped and turned around to see a standing Jacob, they both broke out into a smile.

“Hey, cannon fodder, how ya doing?” Ethan asked him patting him on the back excessively hard. Jacob stumbled forward a little bit and didn’t get much better a response from the other man, Ryan Darmouth.

Ryan clapped him on his back and chest with his hands knocking the wind out of Jacob and sent him sprawling back into his seat. He felt slightly dizzy, but he was happy to see two of friends back from Earth still alive. They sat down and Roy acknowledged them with a nod, Rick looked up and smiled an nodded as well.

Max seemed like the only one who wanted to talk to anyone. He looked at Ethan and held out his right hand, and Ethan took it shaking it strongly. “Hello, I am Max Sterling,” he said with that cool voice and determined, youthful look that was responsible for so many enemy kills.

Ethan looked at him and let go of his hand, “Well, we’d have to be crazy to not know who you are,” he said and looked at Ryan who nodded in concurrence.

“You’re only the most famous ace in the RDF; everyone knows that you have the skills that could take out easily hundreds of battlepods in a huge battle like this.” Roy by this time had grown angry and stood up slamming his hands on the table. He had a visibly peeved look on his face and he was turning a slight shade of red as he stared at the two pilots.

Roy jumped up and looked at the Destriod pilots with an angry look on his face as he started into why he was the best and why he would always be the best, an the two Mecha Ground Pounders just looked at Max and Max just closed his eyes and with his Zen like patience waved off their compliments merely stating, "Roy's the best, that's why he makes the big bucks and flies the coolest planes," Max finished.

Roy nodded and sat down an Rick and Jacob just looked on, Rick looked down at his coffee as if studying its color an then looked back up at Jacob, "So, do you know if Minmei made it out?" Rick asked Jacob, an for some reason Jacob didn’t seem suspicious about it, he knew that he was just concerned for a friend.

“Honestly Rick,” Jacob said as he sipped some more coffee, “I don’t really know, we got hammered by this huge Zentraedi frontal attack, out forces were split, we fought hard, but there was really no way to stop them an I got shoved to the furthest lines of Second Sector…” Jacob’s words trailed off as he continued to look out into space.

Jacob stopped talking as he looked at Rick and he could tell that Rick was sad that Minmei was un-accounted for, but Jacob knew that he wouldn’t do anything rash, he loved Lisa too much, an had to much riding on the men and women ha had to command here. Jacob looked up, his side vibrated; Rick too seemed to pay more attention.

Jacob stood up and Rick stood up with him and they both walked away from the rest of the people gathering in the Mess Hall, Rick saw Max, and Roy, an the Destriod pilots moving with them as they made there way to the Mars Base Commander’s office was. They all stopped at his door and looked at one another before they opened the door and walked in single file.

They finished entering the room and formed a line and went to parade rest and waited for the Commanding Officer to give them their instructions. She looked up at them and stood up, “Gentlemen, we have had something recently come to our attention,” she stopped and looked at everyone of them, “the Zentraedi have broken completely through our defense on The Line, and all remaining forces are heading for their respective rally points, Mars is no exception. We now have hundred of shuttles heading this way full of survivors with hardly what you could call an escort, an worst of all is they have a Zentraedi fighter force pursuing them.”

The soldiers and pilots took in the information without saying anything, and the officer in command looked at all of them, “So this is what I want you to do, I want the Mars First, Second, and Third Veritech Wings to flank the pursuing fighters on the left, and I want the remaining fighters from The Line to form up into wings and to flank on the right. I know this will mean about eighteen hundred fighters, but I want more, I want Frigate Squadrons complimenting this assault, I want total obliteration of this force. Destriod’s, I want you to provide long range fire if any smaller Zentraedi fleet vessels come into the fray, is that understood?” Everyone nodded and the commanding officer nodded her head and the men in the room walked out and started to head for their positions.

Jacob walked towards the mess and started to look for his other squadron commanders; they needed to know what was going on he moved from table to table quietly explaining the situation and telling his men to gather together all the survivors in the next forty minutes that they could. Each told them they would try, and if they couldn’t meet the numbers they needed, they’d “salvage from the Mars forces,” Jacob nodded in ascension.

Jacob walked by the flight crews and the pilots and just about everyone in the cavernous Mess Hall, and he couldn’t help but admire how many different types of people had turned out to defend the planet. Of course there were always those who refused to serve under any circumstances, and Jacob couldn’t help but have his mind drift off to the violently peaceful Lynn Kyle.

A short laugh escaped his lips, the first in a long time, since before this huge battle had started, one which he had heard many call the, “Force of Arms,” battle, because this would ultimately be decided by one sides Force of Arms. He couldn’t help feel that the Zentraedi had a very definite edge, despite what everyone was being told.

Severe losses had been inflicted on the Zentraedi, but they manage to sustain these losses and continue to push on, to no ones real surprise. It was accepted that the Zentraedi wouldn’t stop until they had all been killed, or until all humans had been killed. But his mind trailed back to Lynn Kyle and Jacob felt an anger rising in him as he thought back to his last encounter with him.

[Flashback]

Jacob and a few of his buddies walked around on Earth on the few days leave they had been given before they were to be sent to The Line. It was an uneventful day as they group wandered an aimless Japanese city. They had been to restaurants and shops and just about everything they could in the city.

They were about to give up on finding anything at all and go to a bar to watch whatever sports could be found and drink away the rest of the day when something caught Jacob’s attention. It was a woman running, an Asian woman with a man running after her.

The scene transfixed Jacob an he was about to dismiss it when he saw her turn a corner into an alley and saw the man go after her, “Nothing unusual,” Jacob had muttered to himself, but then he heard a scream, “not usual,” Jacob said an started to make his way over there, as did a few of the others who had watched the scene with growing concern or interest.

They heard another higher, more desperate scream, which sealed it for Jacob; he took off for the alley and got there before anyone else to see a startling scene. There before his eyes was Minmei, the most popular singing star after reclaiming her glory after being humiliated by Lisa, was in a very wrong position with an Asian man hunched over her.

“Shut the fuck up bitch, or I’ll kill you,” the man said as he tried to keep her still. He had failed to notice the group of pilots behind him, Minmei let out another scream, and the man raised a hand to strike her but as he was about to come down his hand was caught. He turned back rather violently and saw a very angry Jacob with four other very angry pilots. Lynn Kyle had been caught trying to rape Minmei.

The man’s expression changed, it went from hate, to shock, then to a hateful glee. “What the hell are you military fuckers doing here?” The man snarled. Jacob didn’t answer him as his friends approached him to show that they had his back. The man didn’t seem to know what to do as the five closed in on him, but he soon remembered, much to the dismay of all in the group.

Kyle jumped into action delivering a punch to one pilot and he went down, the man next to him was unfortunate enough to be too slow to realize what was going on and was struck with a roundhouse kick that sent him flying. The other three pilots fanned out, using the limited space to put distance between them and the martial arts guru.

Kyle jumped at a man to Jacob’s right and started to spar with him, which began to look like playing since Kyle seemed to not try his hardest. Jacob had seen enough, he moved quickly over to Kyle and in a very unconventional style grabbed the mans long flowing hair and wound it around his fingers and then used his face as a glove of sorts and started to pound away at the wall. Jacob repeated this a few more times till he felt that his point had been made.

Releasing Kyle’s hair Jacob walked over to Minmei and picked her up, she was sobbing and clung to Jacob like a lost child. The other two pilots began to help their friends who had been knocked out in the first seconds and they made there way to a hospital.

Jacob walked Minmei to a hospital and checked her in; he told them she was not, under any circumstances, to be disturbed until she was better. They nodded and told him that she would be taken care of. As Jacob walked away from the hospital, Minmei stirred and the one thing she remembered about her savior was his name tag: Evers, J.

[End Flashback]

Jacob hadn’t known this when she had enlisted, he thought she was just trying to get closer to Rick by trying to use her fame. Well he had decided that he wasn’t going to let her do that to him and put in a request for an enlisted grade aide, an his choice was Minmei.

He was thoroughly shocked when she came into his office and smiled at him with a big, sincere smile. He was taken aback and his loud and somewhat patronizing and mean. She walked up to him and related her story and Jacob just sat with his jaw agape and a shocked look upon his face.

She was almost in tears when she finished her story and he couldn’t rebuke her, an it seemed to Jacob that she really wanted to pay back the people who had saved her. Jacob remembered what he had told Rick and Lisa an they were on there way to talk to Minmei as well, an Jacob couldn’t let them rip her a new one that she didn’t deserve.

When they had arrived Jacob told them the story and advised that Rick should go in first and talk with Minmei, Jacob knew Lisa was not approving because of her look but she said that it was the best decision and allowed Rick to go in first. Rick wasn’t in the room long till he came out shaking his head with a smiling expression on his face, “Lisa, she wants to talk to you,” Rick said as he passed.

Lisa was slightly shocked by this and went in to talk with Minmei, the two talked for hours, and it seemed that they were on the fast track to getting along. The two had emerged all smiles and Lisa announced that Rick and she had to get back to Mars for final prepping for the defense of the Earth, and Minmei smiled and waved.

Jacob smiled as he reflected something he didn’t get the liberty of doing much any longer and sat in his pilot seat just now becoming aware of the screaming in his head, “Captain Evers, move your fucking ass, you’re causing a cluster fuck down there!” It was the Air Traffic Controller who was yelling at Jacob who had now jammed his throttle forward and took off towards the retreating shuttles and there escorts.

Jacob found Rick’s signal and homed in on it and pulled up beside him trying to get his attention. Rick looked over his visor down as Jacob made hand signals and Rick adjusted his frequency. Rick spoke first.

“Yeah, what is it Jacob?” Rick asked him over the net especially for them, that only a few knew of.

“Well, it’s this whole static defense, then run away thing, I don’t think it is going to work, I mean I saw the hammer fall at The Line, an they crushed us in minutes.” Which was very true, the forces in The Line had, collectively, been wholly defeated in about forty five minutes. But the forces hadn’t needed to fight a huge open space battle as much as they had to fight a static defense and hold off as many as possible.

“Well,” Rick said thinking which was dangerous for him to do even under the best circumstances, “I don’t think it’ll be as easy at Mars as it was on The Line. We have more forces here then we did on The Line, I mean more concentrated forces. An they have to attack, it is too powerful a defensive barrier to just skip seeing as how the Combined Zentraedi-Human Fleet is waiting in ambush for any attack.”

Jacob nodded and fell silent, they needn’t talk about it anymore, they had a job to do, and that was killing the enemy. They neared the rendezvous and say the shuttles moving at full clip towards Mars, they could faintly make out the signs of battle not far behind the shuttles.

“Alright boys and girls,” Roy said loudly over the com net, “it’s go time, let’s fuck these guys up!” Hoots and hollers followed the little impromptu, though short, speech. Roy had a flair for making anyone follow him. The forces started to form up into their attack groups, with Jacob rallying to his side of the battlefield. His force was composed mainly of the veterans of The Line with a goodly number of Mars Defense Force troops mixed in.

The Frigates started to form up with the attack wings and formed a powerful flanking force that would strike the enemy and hopefully bag them up and destroy them all with as few casualties as possible. As the forces closed in on what would have been the flanks, the Zentraedi had just begun to notice that they were in a precarious position. They were engaged with one force of Humans and two groups sped at them from the flanks.

The first salvo if guided missiles from the RDF smashed into the Zentraedi forces throwing the rear echelon forces into disarray as they closed in to hammer then with guns and short range missiles. Jacob drew a bead on one Zentraedi fighter and squeezed off a burst and felt his fighter recoil. The ammo found it’s mark and penetrated the smaller, sleeker ship.

The difference between the Zentraedi Pod and Zentraedi Fighter was a big one. Most pilots associated Pods as being the Zentraedi fighter when it wasn’t, it was the. It was the main battle unit for sure, but the smaller, dartish looking ships where the Zentraedi fighters, an they could be just as deadly as the Pods.

Jacob paired off with his wingman, which lasted only seconds as Zentraedi fire found him and sent his VT into a flaming ball of floating wreckage. Jacob fired a missile in the direction of the offending Zentraedi and saw an explosion light the space in which he had fired the missile and he was satisfied that had killed the son of a bitch.

Jacob found a floundering Frigate and flew over to try and save the poor ship only to reach it in time to see the ship go up in a million pieces. Jacob saw the shower of debris wash over his fighter as he banked to avoid all the bits of flying metal. He pulled out the top of the explosion to see that he had four fighter screaming towards him, he gladly accepted the advance and flew straight at them and fired off a flock of missiles before pulling the B lever for Battloid mode.

Jacob stepped on the foot thrusters and pushed his way through the explosions the missiles had left and fired on any ship in his way. The firing quickly turned into a frenzied spraying motion to keep the huge number of fighter off him. This was quickly turning out to be a pain in the ass as Jacob’s group seemed to do all the work while Roy’s forces dicked around with the enemy.

Jacob heard a call go out from Roy, “Hey little boy, how hoes it over on your side?” Roy boastfully said over the net. Jacob rolled his eyes and thought his Battloid to fighter mode and made a quick movement away from a squad of Zentraedi Fighters.

“Yeah well, TARFU over here I am afraid. We are getting more then we can seem to handle on this side. What say you get your ass over here and help us out a little bit?” Jacob said with a snide, uppity tone that he knew would make Roy’s spine quake with a sense of fatherly anger.

Rick watched as Max and Ben polished off another group of Zentraedi. Rick had noticed the conversation that had transpired between Jacob and Roy, and it did seem to him that the Zentraedi where pressing hard on Jacob’s force and the shielding force.

Rick decided to take leadership into his hands and he started to fly for Jacob’s side of the attack and started to pick up fighters and the occasional frigate as he went. As he neared Jacob he could see, as well could the others, that there were indeed many, many more Zentraedi on this side of the battle then there were on Roy’s side. Rick and his forces punched it into afterburner and head straight for the large force of Zentraedi and let loose a torrent of missiles that devastated the Zentraedi, an before they could turn to return fire, another tremendous barrage of missiles crashed into the faces of the Zentraedi.

“No worries boys and girls, the cavalry has arrived,” Rick yelled flamboyantly over the net and his forces clashed with the rear guard units that had been itching to get into the fight. Rick found a target, found many to be exact and let loose a unguided barrage that crashed into Zentraedi fighters, an those that didn’t committed fracticide and damaged or destroyed more.

Rick could clearly see Jacob rallying his pilots into a semblance of a counter attack and led it on the right flank of his attackers devastating the enemy and exposing a weakened flank that could easily be rolled, and roll they did.

Max took whoever followed and made a run on the left flank of the Zentraedi fighters and cause damage to the ever increasingly panicked Zentraedi who seemed ready to fall into a tight formation and sit and just hope that their phalanx-type formation would hold. But try as he could, Max had not the numbers to roll the left flank, until he saw a huge string of explosions and watched as a dozen frigates hammered away with long range weapons and Max took his moment to sweep in and devastate what was left of the Zentraedi left flank. The flank faltered and pulled back to the center of their forces and began to circle to keep the enemy out.

But this flawed tactic only provided Frigate gunners with ample long range moving gunnery practice and resulted in numerous pointless deaths and allowed the VT units and Frigate Assault unit’s time to get reorganized. The last attack on Jacob’s flank was about to take place an Jacob, Rick, and Max led the way into the jaws of withering fire.

Rick fired his missiles and Jacob and Max hammered away with guns that chipped away at the Zentraedi. The two opposing bodies neared and volleys of fire began to be traded with ever increasing intensity now as Jacob, still out front with Rick and Max watched ad deadly fire whipped all around them and hit some, missed others.

Jacob saw an explosion and looked to his left to see a VT go up in flames and another crash into the hulk, killing both pilots. The following pilots managed to swerve out of the way and returned fire of their own. The sides collided and a maelstrom of hellish fire and death illuminated the very darkness of space as pilots on both sides killed or be killed.

Jacob and Rick flew into it banking and weaving, trying like mad to avoid the intense fire that was all around them, that killed their friends and their enemies alike. Rick banked hard and released a missile in hopes that he’d hit his target and did a nose dive in what would have been down. A blast knocked Jacob around and sent him into his console hitting instruments.

As Jacob regained his composure he looked at all his instruments and noticed that the music he kept in his VT for patrols was blaring on the main frequency for both Human and Zentraedi. Jacob moved to turn it off but he was forced to get back into combat as he was being pursued by a sloppy Zentraedi. All around he began to notice sloppier and sloppier fighting performance from the Zentraedi. Jacob found a clump of Zentraedi almost sitting idly as if waiting to be destroyed.

The RDF Fliers needed no more encouragement to attack, the jumped on the opportunity to attack while the enemy was immobilized. In seconds hundreds and hundreds of Zentraedi were destroyed in what could be called the greatest slaughter of fighters in one place as of yet in this war. The Zentraedi didn’t stay still to much longer as they made a head long retreat from the battlefield, the VT’s pursued but broke off contact near The Line, which had been compromised.

The fighters began to fly back to Mars and began to land, and other circled and patrolled to look for a Zentraedi sneak attack. Jacob landed after half an hour of circling and walked over to watch all those being taken off the shuttles. He found Rick and they both watched as more and more personal filed into the Mars base which could easily accommodate them.

It was after half a dozen shuttles when Jacob and Rick began to give up hope for Jacob’s aide, he had guess that she had died. Jacob turned and Rick did too, but a cry went up as Minmei walked off the shuttle and everyone began to cheer and whoop and yell. Minmei the Star of the RDF was alive. She looked around wearily and saw Rick and Jacob and ran for them. They both caught her, but Rick knew he had to tone it down. Rick pulled out and Minmei hugged Jacob fully. She released him and they walked away with the crowd parting like the Red Sea.

They sat down with Max and Ben around them the two other pilots who had seen so much of Minmei that to have her there was nothing new for them. She smiled at them and they smiled back at her with Max giving her a polite hello. Ben looked at her, smiled again and continued to eat. She giggled an then a heavy silence fell over the group with the only noises was Ben eating.

“So…” Rick started out, “how’d you get out? You were an Anti-Ship Gunner, and last I knew they were in deep positions inside the asteroids.” He gazed at her an she seemed to go quiet and pensive. She lowered her head and uttered a sigh. She raised her head with a determined look on her face.

“The admiral in command pulled me away and told me to run to the shuttles, to save myself.” Her eyes watered and she looked at all of them before lowering her gaze. In less than then a day she had grown up by years and had become a grown up, far removed from her childish, whiny self.

What followed in the next few days was an endless number of conferences and repositioning of new personal. Rick, Jacob, Max, and Roy found themselves exhausted from long meetings with fighter pilots from The Line. They also had received news from the other fronts, an it was none to good.

The Zentraedi were in clear and complete control of The Line, they had finally annihilated all Human resistance and had even grown so bold as to make a probing attack from Sector Eight, completely opposite from Jacobs, but they had been savaged by a Zentraedi counter-attack led by Breetai himself.

Thought the Zentraedi had taken The Line, they had lost over one million vessels, not as many as hoped, but was a millions plus vessels they didn’t have to deal with. An everyday that resistance continued, more human ships were created. Close to two thousand additional ships had been created and manned, and were being held in mobile reserves.

Jacob looked at Rick as they finalized reports over the squadrons. Rick looked exhausted and Jacob knew he was, they all were, an from the intelligence reports they had a few days from when the projected Zentraedi attack would start. They all knew what was next: sleep, they all needed to get some sleep.

They all trudged off to their quarters and started to get ready to go to bed; they all knew that if they didn’t get any sleep they wouldn’t be very effective pilots. Jacob simply got on his flight suit and crawled into bed. He didn’t bother pulling to covers onto his body; he just slept in his flight suit with the AC on. It had become second nature to sleep ready, because if you were caught unprepared would soon find themselves in a bad way with everyone scrambling about.

Jacob’s head hit the pillow and he felt himself slip into sleep and felt the wonderful carelessness of sleep take over. He felt as if he was being lofted away. He squinted as he heard a banging on his door and gave an angry growl as he lifted himself from bed. He went to the door and opened to see a Rick with a panicked look on his face that said it all: it was time. Jacob looked at his watch an was surprised to see that he had gotten a wonderful seven hours of sleep, “Guess I am getting used to no sleep,” he muttered to himself.

It was a flurry of movement as all crews and pilots and personnel made quickly for their positions in preparation for the un-merciless and relentless Zentraedi attack that would fall on the last strongest set fortification before they met the mobile forces that were arrayed around the Earth. Jacob grabbed his helmet and started to pull on his “Thinking” equipment as he ran down the halls bumping into people as he ran.

Being a Wing Commander allowed certain privileges, an one of those was a ace mechanic team that you were allowed to pick, an Jacob had very through in his picks and had come up with a team that could have his fighter ready in a minute or less, and in a hot scramble that was an amazing time for loading missiles and getting a fighter as sophisticated as Veritech.

Jacob ran to his fighter and flashed his fighter crew a thumbs up, they returned the gesture an he started climbed the ladder to his Veritech and jumped into the cockpit and saw everything was go for take off an he set the engines for maximum throttle as the lift took his plane up and set him on one of the hundreds of runways on Mars, he gunned the engines and took off for space, and the fearsome Zentraedi.

As Jacob flew over, he could see the huge guns on Mars already start to pound away, wanting to take as many Zentraedi as they could with them before the enemy fell upon them like locust. In the distance Jacob could faintly make out the handiwork of the accurate and precise gunners as far off explosions started to fill space.

Jacob flew to his holding pattern and watched as thousands and thousands of pilots rose up from the base, an they all knew that more were coming. Jacob started to look for anyone he knew an saw an old friend he hadn’t talked to in a long time, Steven Cymry. He flew up to his wing an saw his register him an he was the first to speak.

“Hey you old bastard,” Steven said as they flew the holding pattern that kept the space full of Veritech flying around Mars. Jacob rolled his eyes an looked around for Steven’s wife Niriya. He never ceased to be amazed that all it took was a visit to a salon and the changing of one letter in her name that she had become so apparently different from her twin or clone, whichever was preferred.

Niriya looked almost exactly like her clone, except for the fact that her hair was a platinum blonde an she had become more humanized faster than Miriya. They still talked, an they were still started at by the men wherever that went. Jacob had to admit, they were very hot, way outta his league, but it never hurt to hope.

It wasn’t long before Roy, who was in command of all the fighters was told to break off of Mars an get his fighters set up in a defensive position because the Zentraedi were coming in fast and furious. Jacob smiled; he knew that the only defensive posture Roy would take was a head on run at the enemy and an all out melee. Roy started to count off the pilots he wanted at his wing, Jacob heard his name an tried to home in on the signal an after what seemed like forever fruitlessly looking he found Roy, Max, Miriya, Steven, Niriya, Rick all at the “edge of the sword,” as it was called. He couldn’t help but smile with a note of pride as he edged his way up there.

Jacob took a position off of Roy’s left with Rick and Max on his left side with Jacob making up the farthest edge of the command wing on the left side. Jacob saw a glint and recognized it as a Battlepod, and then he saw many, many more glints. There had to be more then twice the number of Pods out there then the fighters that were streaking towards the Zentraedi. Jacob gulped; this would be an ugly fight.

“Alright boys and girls,” Roy said as they moved ever closer to the impending dance of death that would effect them all, “all I got to say is this: We’re fighting for a few simple things, one of which is out very survival, the second is some damn peace for our race, an the third is to show the fucks that they aren’t the baddest boys on the block. So in final I have but one thing to saw, Ammo’s cheap, so let’s break the bank!” (Thanks to Cicero-Phelps for that quote, it is a good one.)

A general roar of excitement and anger rose up and the first volley of human missiles was launched and suddenly Jacob could see nothing but streaks from the missiles and was a bit scared that fighters behind him were firing missiles. He calmed down an remembered that all missiles avoided Fighters and Ships with a friendly “ping”. More missiles poured out from the rear echelon fighters an Jacob watched in amazement as did Rick an everyone else and hundreds of thousands of missiles made for the Zentraedi.

When all the contours and streaks cleared away the Veritech pilots could see clearly the damage they had inflicted, it had been significant. There seemed to be whole new debris fields were the front ranks of the Zentraedi forces had been. In little less than two minutes an untold number of Zentraedi had been killed. But the fight had yet to begin an no matter how many they killed now, they knew they’d have to kill more later.

The sides collided and the war was on again. Rick and Roy paired off and found themselves strafing a slovenly group of Battlepods and launching missiles at others when they pulled out of a run. Jacob pulled his stick back and over hard and inverted himself to get away from a group of BP’s that had somehow gotten on his six. Jacob pulled the B lever an thought his mecha through its transformation.

He ended up in an awkward position with himself inverted in the human form of the Veritech, but that didn’t stop him as he pulled the trigger and rounds flew at the BP’s and started to create gapping holes in them and seconds later they exploded. Jacob ignited his thrusters and got himself oriented and found himself surrounded yet again. This time Jacob decided to put a little “Max,” on his moves as he imitated perfectly what was coming to be called the Max Maneuver. Once again the BP’s exploded and Jacob moved off to find more worthy pray.

Rick locked onto another BP an launched a missile. The BP had no chance as it went up in a fiery explosion that engulfed the one right next to it. As Rick scanned the area for any pilots in trouble he dispensed a would be attacker an juked out another to transform into Battloid mode and release a full burst into the giants back. The BP exploded reflecting light off Rick’s Veritech. Se spotted Max and Ben going at it like maniacs with Max doing most of the work, and Ben doing most of the talking as usual.

Rick arrived on the spot in time to destroy a BP that had snuck up behind the unsuspecting Ben. Rick heard Max give a sigh of relief, “It’s like babysitting a damn kid Rick,” Max told him over the TAC net an Rick let out a roar of laugher. Rick used his foot thrusters to dodge BP fire and launch a missile from the shoulder rack of his armored Veritech, everyone had a Armored Veritech.

Rick spun his Veritech around firing all the time spraying the area with bullets destroying and damaging many Battle Pods in the process. Rick spied out of the corner of his eye the gold and brown trimmed Veritech an knew that Jacob had gotten himself over to this position to be among friends, it always made a battle easier.

With Jacob was Roy whom Jacob had picked up and was now bringing to there happy little get-together. Jacob smiled as he took his spot and started to unload on passing BP’s all the while yelling about them, “Scratching my mother fuckin paint job!” Rick laughed an wondered why he was laughing in a battle zone. He shook his head an realized he was going crazy.

Jacob looked down at his song list an wondered if the same thing would work twice, “Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me,’ he thought to himself, but he had nothing to lose so he activated the music an grimaced when he saw nothing happen, then he homed in on the Zentraedi signal and something miraculous happened for the second time in the War, the Zentraedi froze in place. The pilots needed no encouraging, they unloaded with everything possible, an the Zentraedi still continued to show no movement. Nothing could stop the slaughter now as waves of carefully husbanded frigates came into the fray and started to pour it on with homing missiles and precise and deadly fire.

An then as soon as it seemed to start the Zentraedi began to break and run in terror as if the devil was chasing them or whatever they feared. Jacob smiled, it had worked yet again, but he knew as all of the pilots did, that they would be back for more and the RDF would have to be ready for it. The fighters made for home with too many friends and loved ones missing from the ranks.

The fighters started to land on Mars an saw that nothing had changed, no significant difference. Jacob landed and didn’t even bother to take off his flight uniform, it would be pointless to take it off an then just put it back on. Jacob saw Rick an Roy an the others congregating around an Jacob walked over. They all nodded and shared a moment of silence. They didn’t say a word as they headed for one of the many lounges all over Mars an just sat, some slept, others talked quietly, an the rest just sat an looked about.

Jacob say Roy sit down with a genuine look of exhaustion an hopelessness on his face. They need not ask what had happened. The Anti-Fold generator had been destroyed; the one thing that had kept the Zentraedi from moving about with impunity, but the RDF had an Ace in the Hole: Mars. Mars absolutely had to be destroyed or neutralized in order for an advance to be successful.

It wouldn’t be long now before the Zentraedi folded onto Mars and the Destroids were being deployed all over Mars to keep the fighters at bay long enough for the Veritechs to take to the sky. Jacob watched as thousands of Destroids, with additional armor and weapons were deployed.

It was hoped that the Destroid would put up enough fire to allow either the Veritech to fly or for them make a run for Point Z were the SDF-1 an the Human and Zentraedi fleet was anchored. Jacob looked out the window some more and heard sounds that told him that they wouldn’t stand and fight but run for Point Z, they had to, necessity dictated that a new stronger position had to be found. Jacob looked up at the boards positioned all over the place an saw that his unit was being evacuated an he moved off towards the huge barge like ships that would jump them to Point Z.

Jacob trudged off and found himself in front of an ugly transport ship, an they were being launched very fast, Jacob saw Rick’s vessel go, an then got on his an made sure the Veritechs was strapped down an secured. He jumped into the human cargo section and jumped away to the SDF-1.

Ethan an Ryan sat in their Destroids watching the evacuation and hoped that they would get a chance to get off the Death Trap that Mars had become. The only consolation that they had was the fact that right under them was their transport ships an their ticket out of there. They hadn’t waited long because the Zentraedi jumped on Mars as soon as the transports were finishing folding.

Ryan and Ethan started to pour fire out in great volumes destroying BP’s in numbers that Veritech pilots could only dream of, an all the while taking hits and shrugging it off and firing at more BP’s. The Zentraedi started to fire on Mars, but the Red Planet had one more trick, slats started to move and huge cannons appeared and started to spew fire at point blank range destroying fighters and capital ships.

The Cannons fired repeatedly covering the sinking Destroids and all the while they hammered away at the BP’s destroying thousands with raking fire that covered space. They disappeared and the transports burst out of the ground and made a run away folding close to the surface most got away, many were caught by enemy fire and destroyed but a majority of the Destriod force managed to fold along with the Veritechs to Point Z. Then as if to rub it in the face of the Zentraedi the Protonuclear reactors overloaded and exploded in an enormous flash that engulfed hundreds of thousands of Zentraedi vessels in an ever expanding flash that wiped out almost as many of the closely huddled together Zentraedi Vessels that had been destroyed in The Line. Mars had been completely destroyed, the Red Planet was no longer there, it had been another casualty of war.

Rick got out of the transport to find his wife and father-in-law waiting for him an Lisa rushed to Rick an he swept her up in his arms and kissed her passionately. Donald watched as Jacob walked over and put his arm on his fathers shoulder, he smiled and Jacob smiled back. Lisa an Rick continued to hold each other. The wonderfulness of the happy couple’s reunion underscored the death and mayhem that had already happened, an that is yet to happen. All over couples and friends were finding each other.

Jacob looked up an saw a figure coming at him full speed an hit him square in the chest, it was Minmei, and she clutched him with all her might. Jacob was surprised as was everyone else. Jacob wrapped his arms around her and she just let go an looked at Jacob, “Jacob, thank you for saving me, thank you for being my hero,” he smiled and she hugged him again.

A/N: WOW! That was long, an it took forever to write, sorry about that. Anyway, thank you to Cicero-Phelps and Nighthunter for helping me an giving me ideas the whole way an lastly I hoe you like this chapter. Chapter 19 will be the longest yet, an will take some time, so I warn you in advance. An I plan a lot more, much, much more.

State = Continuará/To Be Continue

feedback = Sí/Yes