Starbound Ascension: The Next Generation

Chapter Seventeen: United We Stand

They all gathered under the darkness of a grey, cloudy day. The ponies of the NGJTF were here to say one last goodbye to their two dead friends murdered in cold blood by the ruthless enemy. They were all silent with the only sounds coming from the loved ones who were closest to Ship. Tough Heart, while normally the most resistant and strong at heart pony, sunk into the ground next to Ship's coffin. Ship's mother and father were there as well, her mother atop the coffin screaming for her little girl. Fragarach's father didn't bother to come as he was stricken by grief having now lost his only son and his mother years ago. Both of their coffins had the flag of United Equus draped over them as they were slowly lowered into their graves right next to Flip and Jet's Father. Rio couldn't let go of her daughter, desperately trying to hold on as she held the coffin close.

“¡NO! No quiero dejarte! No quiero dejarte! ¡Mi hija!” Rio was pulled from the hole by her husband and the others around her.

Jet looked away, “Dammit. I can't watch this...”

His eyes caught the tombstone of Flip and his father's. He as well started to break down.

“This is so much shit...” Avia glared with anger and tears, “First my love, then Tough's... The Pulsar are going to fucking die!”

Tough Heart slowly rose up after his wife was buried. He turned to Jet and Iron Cross, “I'm quitting the force.”

“WHAT?!” Cross was shocked, “But Tough Heart! You are one of the most valuable members of this special forces team! You cannot quit now!”

“Tough, this isn't-” Jet almost finished but he saw the broken shell of a stallion Tough Heart became. He saw his mother's emotions in Tough's eyes, “That look,” Jet sighed trying to compose himself. A wash of zeal and righteous anger filled him as his eyes glanced to his father's tombstone, “LISTEN TOUGH! THIS ISN'T LIKE YOU! You know as much as we do that we can't do this without you! We need everypony fighting or we're gonna end up buried here with them! Do you get it?!”

“NO!” Tough Heart threw a punch at Jet's face, “It's over Jet! Ship is dead and it's all my Celestia-damned fault!”

“Hold your tongue Captain Tough Heart,” Celestia herself graced all of them at the funeral. All the ponies bowed.

“P-Princess!”

“No, now is not the time. You are to continue fighting! That is an order soldier,” Celestia seemed tense, “Jump Jet, Iron Cross, and Cirrus of Nimbus Squadron! Report!”

“Yes ma'am!” all three of them stood front and center, “What are your wishes?”

“Time is of the essence. The Pulsar have a fleet ready to strike Equus! NOW!”

The situation became even more grave. Cirrus was the first to speak, “Permission to speak freely Princess!”

“Granted.”

“Princess Celestia. Allow me to lead the fleet! As Luna's personal Fleet Commander and senior member of the-”

“No,” Celestia spoke with determined tone, “Colonel Jump Jet will lead the NGJTF!”

Jet looked back and forth shocked, “Colonel?! Lead?! Princess Celestia, I-I don't think I can do it! Cirrus should lead due to her experience!”

Celestia sighed and looked to the cloudy skies, “War does not wait for you to be ready. Do you know why I chose you out of all the others Colonel Jump Jet?”

“No,” Jet felt some strange feeling wash over him, “I'm not quite sure what you mean.”

“I chose you like I chose your father to go out into the stars. You showed strength, decisiveness, and a zealous fury only a hero like him showed in this most trying hour. I need you to lead! And to all of you in the NGJTF! I chose, hoof picked all of you to defend Equus in it's hour of need. Right now our enemies are planning our extinction as we speak and the fate of Equus and all her colonies rests on your shoulders. Each one of you showed something special. Each one of you have skills and combat talents no other ponies showed in my selection program. All of you, picked by me. The best of the best. I need you... All of you... To fight.”

A distant sound of thunder rolled through the sky. With Jet's face sunken to the ground and his eyes hidden by his mane a twitch of his face could be seen. Tears dropped from his cheek before his gaze slowly lifted with a furious smile of victory. He couldn't be more honored at the Princess's words.

“You have the finest Princess!” he saluted and threw his hat to the side. He glanced back to his team and yelled, “Come on JTF! You wanna live forever?!” A whole round of cheers erupted from their members. All united, all crying, not of sadness, but of a renewed fire in their hearts. Jet looked to Tough as he stood in place, “What you say big guy? Ready to kick some ass?”

“I...” Tough sunk his head before a fire took spark in his heart. The orange blaze of fur on his chest puffed up and his face filled with righteous fury. The spark took hold as he grit his teeth, “I'm in...”

“Good...” Jet smiled with pride as the whole task force, a few hundred or so ponies, all saluted under his command. Avia walked forward.

“What are your orders brother?”

“All Next Generation Joint Task Force! Launch into the stars!”

With Jet's order all of them blinked away and back to their ships with teleporters on their wrists. Before Jet did the same Princess Celestia held him back for just a second.

“Go, make your father proud...”

“With all due respect Princess. He already is,” Jet teleported to the bridge of the Sky Buster and assumed his new role. He looked to Mac Book and Sagittarius already at their stations, “What's the situation?”

“Colonel! Enemy fleet has jumped out of hyperspace and are preparing to launch an assault on the planet! They're closing in fast!” Sagittarius reported in.

“Mac, intel on these ships. Now!”

“Copy! The enemy fleet has three battleships, two carriers, and a dozen cruisers coupled with scores of support ships! It's a whole armada sir!”

“Damn, we're outnumbered,” Jet paused, “What is our fleet size?”

“Three carriers, one fast battleship, a heavy aegis cruiser, and three missile cruisers with only half the number of supporting ships!”

“What did that former UPF President once say? 'Fair odds?' Something like that,” Jet tried to recall an old UPF saying, “Hmph. I'm launching out!”

“What?! You can't be serious!” Sagittarius exclaimed. His sister, Nelly, jumped in protest as well.

“Jet, sweetheart, you can't go out there! What if-” Nelly was pulled his closer for a full kiss on the lips from her boyfriend. Jet smiled as he broke away.

“I won't,” he stroked a hoof through her cream mane and held her close, “I trust you. So trust me. You stay here, fire the big guns. Trust in the sun, moon, and all the stars that fate will smile upon us.”

“Alright,” Nelly felt at ease. She knew something deep down told her everything would be okay, “But who's gonna?”

“Cross! You lead the fleet for now! The flyboys need me,” Jet stripped off his officer's uniform and donned his flight suit, “Don't disappoint me!”

“Ich werde mein Bestes geben Kommandant!” Cross saluted his commanding officer as he departed to the hangar. Jet strapped into his fighter.

“I'm in the hotseat! Rush you launch me out!”

Rush took his paddles and signaled Jet to taxi onto the catapult, “Vertical on standby on catapult one! Valkyrie on standby on catapult two!”

Brainstorm guided two more planes onto their catapults, “Dawnlight on standby on catapult three! Shadow on standby on catapult four! First squadron ready to launch!”

“Copy that! Launch them out!” Cross ordered as the flight of Jet, Avia, Morning, and Petal all flew out into space. Rush and Brainy were already guiding the next four onto the catapults.

“Squadron one away and airborne!” Jet formed up with his team.

“Look who decided to join in,” Cirrus flew in with her F/A-18X, “Can't stay out of the cockpit for long can you?”

“What are you? My second mom?” Jet rolled his eyes as the Hokums joined in the fun.

“Feels like the Round Table all over again,” Raptor commented.

“Don't worry. No one is dying on my watch,” Jet radioed out as the rest of the Sky Buster's squadrons scambled, “You all here? Let's get started!”

“Crap!” Babs Seed took the first blow from an enemy fighter squadron, “They've got us! Only light external damage managed to punch through our shields!”

“Roger! Sky Buster First Squadron engaging hostile fighters! AMRAAMS away! Fox Three! Fox Three!” Jet fired his long range missiles with his team. Morning, Petal, and Avia all scored direct hits on the first enemy squadron.

“Splash six bandits!” Avia reported in, “Zoey give these guys a data link!”

“Copy Miss Avia!” her AI assistant engaged her data link protocol, “Link established! Missiles, Radar, and all systems buffed!”

Inside the EMS Manehatten Babs directed her battleship to engage the remaining fighters that hit her, “Gunnas! Load Trinity warheads on main guns! Proxy Airburst will ya?”

“Roger Miss Battleship Babs!” her crewpony vectored in communications to the main battery gunners, “All forward guns! Load Trinity! Proxy Airburst!”

“Forward guns loaded!” the gunners of the ship reported back as the mechanical lifts and conveyer belts delivered the giant shells to the batteries of cannons, “Fire salvo!”

Eighteen naval guns discharged heavy ballistic warheads into space in a massive plume of fire and smoke. The magically enchanted thermobaric warheads exploded in a swarm of enemy fighters with the magic acting as a medium for the shockwave of the blast to ride on in the vacuum of space. The enemy squadron was decimated from the Trinity warheads.

“Enemy fighter squadron silenced!” Babs reported to the fleet.

“Hmph,” Cirrus of Nimbus Team smirked, “Hey Fairview, let's show these Pulsar that our battleship isn't the only heavy hitter! Deploy the weapon!”

“Roger Miss Cirrus! Enemy cruiser in range! Blast them apart!” the Admiral on the Fairview 2 commanded his crew to unleash a secret weapon mounted in the front of their hull. The armored panels at the front of the ship retracted in a second to reveal two massive 31 inch guns, “Load SABOT!”

“SABOT loaded!” the gunners locked in the shells in their breach, “Fire salvo!”

Two shells exploded out of the forward guns with enough velocity to punch right through the enemy's shields. The armor piercing round shattered the shimmer of the Pulsar cruiser.

“Shields are down! Nimbus! Attack!” Cirrus inverted her plane and dove into the fight. Her twin anti-ship missiles armed, “Bruiser! Bruiser!”

“ASMs away!” Mac Book tracked the missiles. Many of them were shot down by the cruiser's CIWS guns but the few that managed to make it through did so with deadly effect, knocking out the internal missile batteries of the Pulsar ship, “Times three splash on target! Direct hits! Enemy magazine compartment ignited!”

“One down! Nimbus retrograde to safe airspace and rearm!” Jet gave his order as the swarm of enemy fighters made contact, “Sky Buster First Squadron has made contact with the leading edge of the Pulsar! Engaging!”

“Copy Colonel!” Cirrus broke off her flight to rearm their missiles with magic, “Hokums! If you can help them out!”

“Aye!” Raptor flew in at full speed with Lightning and Tomcat, “Hokum flight! Fox one! Fox one!”

“Twelve Missiles away! ESM linked! Tracking buffed!” Mac Book continued his electronic support measures, “Good hits! Enemy fighters thinned! ARGH!”

The Sky Buster was torpedoed by a flight of stealth fighters that decloaked to launch their anti-ship missiles.

“Damage report!” Cross glanced to Sagittarius.

“No hull breach! Superficial damage to engine one sir! Shields are holding!”

“Cross, this is Button Mash! Leave them to me!” Button came forward with his Aegis Cruiser. All alone on his bridge and linked to his spaceship with a total immersive cockpit he manipulated holograms to give orders to his crew, “Anti-air teams to your stations! We'll put up a no fly zone around the Sky Buster! Protect our carrier!”

“Yes sir!” The scores of vulcan cannons mounted all over the ship spun to life. As more missiles came in to attack the carrier an impressive wall of lead blanketed the spacefront and shot down all missiles launched toward the Sky Buster.

“Radar team! ID stealth fighters! Switch to low frequency radar! Engage when you see fit!”

“Copy that Commander Button!” his radar operators scanned for the enemy cloakers, “ID on eight bandits! Data linked to missile teams!”

“Locked on! Birds affirm!” the surface to air missile turrets of Button's ship tracked the invisible craft, “Birds away! Birds away!”

“Gladslam!” Mac Book reported that the whole stealth fighter squadron was shot down, “Woo! Thanks for the cover Purple Dart!”

Button smiled and nodded, “You got it!”

“This is Rumble! Ready the bulldogs crew!” Rumble vectored his radio to his cruise missile teams.

“Cruise missiles armed and ready! Bulldog! Bulldog!” a volley of missiles launched out from the EMS Rainbow Dash. They streaked toward their targets and impacted with catastrophic results.

“Direct hits!” Sagittarius reported in, “Two enemy cruisers hit! It punched right through their shields!”

“Let's say we finish the job Crusaders!” Scootaloo flew into the battle with her F-8X, “Pounder, Waveform terminate those damaged cruisers!”

“Roger!” Pound Cake enabled the anti-ship missiles in his massive weapons bays, “Bruiser! Bruiser!”

“Waveform! WUB! WUB!” Bass Drop uttered the brevity code for his own mothers experimental weapon: the bass cannon. Using magically enchanted sound waves to direct a massive concussive shockwave the weapon caused the Pulsar cruisers hull to break away before Pound Cake's missiles impacted into the same hole. It caused a massive explosion which rippled as a chain reaction in the enemy ship.

“Enemy cruiser down!” Sagittarius cheered, “Multiple long range missiles inbound! Brace for impacts!”

“I got this!” Button Mash took the head of the fleet formation. His defensive wall of lead made a great no fly zone all around the fleet as missiles were shot down left and right like flies, “Colonel Jet! Do something about the fighters that got through!”

“Roger! Sky Buster Squadrons! Let's get em!”

“Morning here! I've got two bandits making a break for our carrier! Petal and I are engaging!” Morning Shine got caught up in a dogfight with two Pulsar US-74s, “Guns! Guns! Guns!”

The rotary barreled cannon of his fighter tore into the enemy craft as Petal flew in from above to take it down with missiles.

“Ha!” Petal smiled.

“Kill stealer,” Morning chuckled as his two remaining missiles destroyed the other fighter en route to their aircraft carrier.

Jet looked back at the fleet and saw friendly radar signatures launch out from the Sky Buster. It was Red October and Blossom flying in with their bombers along with Piggle's Neophron and Scratch's Wipeout.

“This is Inferno! Chernaya, Warpig, and Kitty are flying off my wing. Fighters! Open up an air corridor so we can punch right through!”

“Roger that Blossom!” Jet radioed back out, “All fighters! I want you to target all anti-air guns of the enemy vessels! Pave the way for our bombers and ground attackers to mop up!”

“Affirmative!” the combined fighter squadrons gave a round of cheers.

“Let us help too!” Babs came over Jet's radio, “Crew! Turn this ship 'round. Give em a full broadside! Target their AA guns!”

“Full broadsides! Give it everything you got!” the gunners on the Manehatten used the covering fire of the Purple Dart to face the enemy with all their guns to bare. Twenty four 18 inch guns lined up to fire in a massive salvo that clouded the whole side of the ship in smoke. The shield piercing SABOT rounds melded with the enemy plasma and punched right into their anti air guns. One AA cruiser was disabled by the volley of Babs and her crew.

“Yo Nelly!” Jet radioed back out to his girlfriend, “Show the fleet they're not the only ones packing! Arm the cruise missiles of the Sky Buster!”

“Wilco love! Man it's been a long time since I fired the big guns!” Nelly typed away at her fire control console, “Missiles up and ready! Launching!”

With a tap of the keyboard the forward facing missiles of the Sky Buster launched out. Dozens of missiles fired from the carrier and flew past the fighter squadrons.

“Fighters! Follow up those missiles! Launch your own to combine in the attack! Vertical! Bruiser! Bruiser!” Jet fired his own anti-ship missiles along with the rest of the combined squadron. With hundreds of ASMs in transit the remaining CIWS turrets of the enemy fleet couldn't knock them out fast enough. The missiles that impacted made their guns inoperable and they were easy picking for the bombers flying in.

“This is Blossom! Good job fighters! Bombers on final approach! Knock out the rest of their fighters!”

Inside the cockpit of his Blackjack bomber Red October looked to Passion behind him, “Good, just like I showed you. You learn fast my little dushka!”

“Thanks sweetheart,” Passion smiled to her new boyfriend, “Missiles armed! Let get back at these Pulsar for what they did to Frag and Ship!”

“Da! Pobeda dlya Rodiny, i vse Equus! Chernaya! Launching nuclear missiles!” Red October and Passion opened up the bomb bays of their massive stealth bomber. The rotary drum spun out their deadly ordinance and all their missiles launched forward and burrowed into the defenseless enemy ships before each giving a chain reaction of explosions, “You can thank my mother for those missiles you dirty Pulsar bastards!”

“Inferno dropping AGM-129 ACMs! Eat some more nukes you shitheads!” twelve more missiles dropped out of Blossom's bomber and streaked toward the final enemy ships undefeated. Massive nuclear impacts decimated the Pulsar fleet and the surviving ships turned tail to retreat.

“Oh no you don't!” Scratch flew into the debris field with her A-164 Wipeout. Off her wing was Piggle and Apollo with their own ground attack planes, “Pigsy, Appy. It's all fair game! Finish them off!”

“Copy that!” Pigsy ducked in and out of the remaining enemies with fighters hot on his tail, “Hey guys! Can I get a hoof over here?!”

His aggressor was shot down by the shimmer of Umbra's craft. Pigsy's sister pulled up next to him.

“Trust me now brother?”

Piggle sighed in relief as he continued his attack on the enemy fleet, “Yeah... Thanks sis. I thought I was a goner.”

“All this time you saw me as a monster. All the pain my powers have inflicted on others. It took a long time to finally control them. And yet...”

“Umbra there's one behind you!” Jet came into the fray to kill the fighter about to shoot down Umbra and Piggle, “And that's a save! Don't space out! Save the sappiness for later!”

“Guess we'll talk about my Dark Resonance Syndrome later,” Umbra pulled away to be replaced by Hornet as he hovered above Scratch.

“Hola mi amor! Care for an escort?”

“Dude there's one behind you!” Scratch chuckled, “I got him!”

Scratch flipped her Wipeout into a snap Immelmann and got into a head on attack with Hornet's enemy. The massive GAU-8 cannon spat out 4,200 rounds per minute into the cockpit of the enemy fighter.

“Well,” Hornet sheepishly smiled, “that was embarrassing.”

“Don't think I can't handle myself in a dogfight, in a ground attacker no less!” Scratch giggled and winked to her boyfriend.

All enemy ships were routed in the Equus space front. The few that managed to warp out left behind scores of wrecks that littered space.

“We won! Mission complete! Any casualties?” Jet looked on as plane after plane formed up with his squadrons, “twelve thirteen fourteen, twenty! Hoho! Look at that!”

“Nimbus Flight here, no combat losses!” Cirrus smiled to all her pilots, “Excellent work!”

“Hokums here! Aside from a few flaps and elevators missing we're all good! All of our planes are still flying!” Raptor formed up with his own squadron.

“Sky Buster Squadrons... Not a single scratch!” Jet cheered, “Hell yeah!”

“What do you mean Colonel? I'm right here!” Scratch join in.

“You know what I mean!” Jet laughed with her.

“Scootaloo here. No casualties! Chalk another win up for the Crusaders!”

“Hey!” Button Mash vectored in a transmission to Jet, “Reinforcements are here!”

A flight of UPF Black Jacket fighters showed up out of the wrap, “Hey! Frostbite here! We came as soo... Crap we missed the party!”

“We got this!” Jet circled around as a UPF fleet came to the unneeded aid of the Equus fleet.

“And here I thought the New Supremacy gets to fire it's railgun in combat again,” Quincy sighed, “Oh well.”

“RTB everyone! We're heading home!”