5: Chocky's Thunder
by chaos_eternus
<Sol System, Near Lunar>
Masters cursed as Eagle 4 span off, sparks and debris billowing from his damaged craft as the Iron Eagles target dived behind the Lancer, scoring a string of direct hits across the rear shields of the craft, collapsing them before moving onto the engines.
“Eagle 4, Ejecting Ejecting Ejecting!” came the strained cry over the radio as the Lancers reinforced cockpit blew into space, small rockets pushing it clear just before the crafts engines went critical and blew, the bight ball of flame momentarily eclipsing the suns brightness.
“Control this is masters, do you copy?” Masters spoke over the Ground control loop, “Control this is masters, do you copy?”
“This is control; we read you signal strength 3”
“Request Rescue, we have a Dutchman”
“Copy your Dutchman, be advised your nearest reinforcement is Independence, ETA 15 minutes.”
Masters cursed disbelievingly, “Control, we won't be here in 15 minutes, we are bingo missiles, I say again, we have no missiles remaining; we can't take Al-Kesh with just our pulse lasers!”
“Eagle 1, this is Eagle 11, we are re-engaging, and we have foxes in the henhouse”
“Copy control, Masters re-engaging” Doug said, not hiding his digust as he flipped to the fighter-to-fighter channel.
“Eagle 6, Ejecting Ejecting Ejecting”
“Eagle 12, I have good tone, Eagle 12, Fox 2!”
A pair of enhanced sparrows sped through space from Eagles 11 and 12, the first impacting on an Al-kesh' s shields, knocking them down, allowing number to hit the bomber, and another Al-Kesh died. Instantly, the Jaffa pilots turned their attentions to the two Lancers who had missiles remaining, not caring about objects in their path.
“Oh shit! Cut him off, cut him off!”
Eagle 4 frantically hit the thrusters on his cockpit escape pod, desperately trying to manoeuvre out of the way of the approaching Al-kesh. He breathed a sign of relief as he realised the bomber was going to miss, then his eyes widened as it Al-kesh, its weapons still firing at the Lancers, altered course, heading right for him.
“Oh, f@#&” he moaned, just before the bombers shields vaporised his tiny lifeboat.
“That's it!” Masters snarled, “He dies, no-one kills defenceless pilots!”
“Eagles, this is Independence,” the voice cut over the remaining fighter's radios, “Disperse disperse! We'll take it from here; you might want to get out before our main weapons fire”
“Indy, this is Iron Eagle, be advised we have a Dutchman in the engagement area”
“Copy, we have her beacon plotted Eagle one”
While the Jaffa were momentarily surprised by the Tau'ri fighters breaking off, and fleeing the area at maximum speed, they didn't remain stunned for long. Soon after, Independence began the delicate operation to retrieve Eagle Six's escape pod. This battle at least, was over.
< Blastboat >
Xander tensed as he watched the fleet vanish into hyper. He was not happy with his orders, he could understand them certainly, and he knew that under the circumstances they were the only orders that could be given but still…
This kind of spur of the moment this is what has to happen planning reminded him far too much of Sunnydale and Buffy. The fleet had no ammunition, it was as simple as that, and so they had to get more. That meant going back to the sol system, which was the closest source of munitions, as unfortunately a gate transfer was not an option. That left his ship, Blastboat and Valour's Hour, which didn't require ammunition to guard this system until the shattered population could regain control over their drained power grid.
Luckily, between the three surviving Prometheus class and both Dauntless 'es enough ammunition had been scrapped together to give him a full load out but still…
Even worse, he would have to wait for the fleet to reload before his ship, which had only a toilet as far as personal facilities went, no bunks, no rest areas nothing could be relieved, as Enerina's Dal shakka mel and the Independence could not leave their posts. This was due to an attack that had just been launched on Earth which ruled out the standard crossover procedure, i.e. both groups of ships simultaneously leaving their posts and heading for the others, resulting in a ‘crossover' half way through, an operation that left each system unguarded for the least amount of time.
That left one capital ship and his minor warship to hold the system against the reinforcements the locals had insisted were called some time ago by Maktenos and were overdue to arrive. Reinforcements that incidentally would almost certainly include at least one capital ship; Joy. It made Xander wish for simpler times when all he had to worry about was the end of days.
Well, they were in the eye of the storm now, and time would tell who battened down their hatches faster.
< Thundersdawn >
Once again a fleet gathered within sight of Thundersdawn. This time however, the fleet was missing two limbs, Iwo Jima , destroyed in action against the Goa'uld, and USS Persephone, whose damaged navigation system had failed during the jump out of hyper, putting her in Thundersdawn 's only available capital ship sized dry-dock for at least another week.
However, amongst the warships of the fleet, a different bird nestled. Liberty, the prototype Merchant class fleet support ship had left the dry-dock where she was under construction early and all bar one of her holds were loaded with relief supplies, medical, food, water and other essentials. Her final hold was loaded with the components her crew would have to install themselves, en-route. This was to be her first mission.
As one, the fleet turned and accelerated to hyper, slower this time, Liberty not having the acceleration available to her that the warships did.
<Chocky's Home System, Contested Space>
With a flash, the fleet dropped out of hyper, and almost instantly went to battle stations. Maktenos's reinforcements had arrived already, once more they would have to fight for this system, so be it. The four warships accelerated, their engines straining to bring them into the fight as soon as possible, for three Ha'tak's versus one Ha'tak and an MTB were uneven odds, and the defenders were being forced to fall back closer and closer to the besieged planet of Chocky's birth.
With the return of the main fleet, that changed however and the Goa'uld controlled Ha'tak's were forced to re-deploy to meet the stronger threat that had just arrived, giving Blastboat and Valour's Hour time to regroup.
All six Tau'ri warships targeted the same Ha'tak , their Gauss rifles, torpedoes and the Goa'uld designed weapons systems of Valour's Hour flooded space around the vessel, catching the vessel in a murderous crossfire which sent it spinning, uncontrolled and on fire through space.
Their ardour cooled by the quick destruction of their comrade and the obvious remains of a mothership and a major Goa'uld station the two surviving Ha'tak's broke off, fleeing the system. It was finally over.
Okay, once again thanks to JPMwycombe for Beta'ing the original version of this fic for me. Also thanks to tcafanfic.net for the free add-less hosting of the Thundersdawn Archive.
For the record, I do not own characters or concepts from Chocky's Challenge, Buffy The Vampire Slayer or StarGate SG-1, however I do own the original characters, concepts and the storyline.