Counter Punch

A/N: I'd like to thank everyone who's been following my little work of fiction. It makes me feel that my efforts are worth continued pursuit.

Though I seem to have plenty of readers I haven't had that many reviews. I really want to hear your feedback on my progress. So, if you get the chance please leave a review.

"What's our status?" Captain Tenkawa yelled at her chief engineer, one of Uribatake's robed ubergoobers, through a comm. screen as the ship shook violently. His image was covered in static as another large wave of anti-ship missiles detonated against the distortion field.

"The shields are taking quite a pounding, Ma'am. But our battleship engines that power them were designed to take a lot more than this. It's the-" His image faded out again as a barrage of energy weapons deflected off the shields.

"Mr. Aker!" She activated another holographic comm. screen to the crewmen at the tactical station, "Get the gravity cannon ready to fire now!" As the forward section of the ship began expanding into its traditional 'legged' position to expose its primary weapon, Chief Aker's connection was restored. "What was it you were about to say?"

"I said, 'It's the smaller ships that are in trouble,' Ma'am. Even with the new hardware," he added grimly, "this much concentrated firepower could overwhelm single engine vessels." Yurika began analyzing their situation again. It had been more than ten minutes since they had come through the gates. The squadron was still in the formation they had arrived in with the carrier at the center, closely flanked by her battleship consorts, and the smaller vessels shielding above and below. If the enemy was competent, they would soon realize engaging the larger vessels with nothing bigger than a cruiser was an exercise in futility.

"Ma'am," a tactical officer shouted, "we can't fire the graviton cannon from this position! There are still friendly ships that would get caught in the line of fire!"

'If we don't do something fast, the enemy will discover our tactical disadvantage.' Yurika thought grimly, 'We can't even give effective mutual support fire as things are.' She opened a screen to the tactical station, "Then set the arrays for pin-point-combat," her order made everyone cringe, "We'll take them down one by one if that's what it takes to break through!"

Pin-point engagements were a relatively new concept to the space fleet. Modern naval doctrines from before and after the Jovian/Earth War relied on the premise of destroying the enemy as fast as possible using weapons that could destroy multiple ships in a single attack and battle computers that could make complex maneuvers too risky to take. Battles simply involved lining up the ships of both sides and slugging it out until one side or the other withdrew.

Pin-point engagements, on the other hand, meant foregoing the use of heavy armaments to engage the enemy ship by ship. The principle of doing this was to cleanly cut a path through a weak point in an enemy force to open a more tactically suitable position or an escape route should a ship's heavier weapons become unusable. Unfortunately, no one who has attempted to use this doctrine has ever succeeded.

Jun, who had been standing quietly beside the captain's chair, made his own grim decision. "Yurika," he spoke urgently. The captain turned to him a little surprised; she had almost forgotten he was there. "This was supposed to wait until much later in the mission but it looks like we're going to need the new missiles now. I'll send the authorization to Ruri immediately." Yurika nodded in understanding and gave the order to begin cycling 'Secret Weapon #1' into the launch tube magazines.

Yurika opened a tactical layout as the first target for the 'pin-point' system was selected by the ship's computer, one of Omoikane's subunits. Other target indicators from the squadron's other ships were fed to Yurika's screen as Ruri and Omoikane coordinated the counterattack. The forward tips of the ship's 'legs' retracted to reveal the business end of the fully charged energy arrays that ran down the entire length of the ship. In a brilliant spectacle of cascading light, the intense beams of energy lashed out across space as every ship launched a salvo of standard missiles into the enemy's 'right' flank.

The crew on the bridge watched in fascination as their ship's powerful new energy 'lances' impacted an enemy heavy cruiser's distortion field. In the previous war, energy weapons like lasers had simply been deflected harmlessly off any vessel with a distortion field to protect it. The energy lances, however, were not mere lasers. In the first second, they 'splashed' around the shield like a tidal wave crashing against the rocks as they met resistance, but then the shield burst as the engines powering it destabilized under the strain. The cruiser's hull shattered as it was penetrated from bow to stern then exploded brilliantly with five of its sisters a brief moment later.

The ships went to maximum thrust behind their missiles into breach they created. Dozens of missiles went straight into the enemy's shattered formation and suddenly scattered in all directions at the preprogrammed moment Ruri had set for the missile's sensors to kick in. The missiles went after the emission signatures of Aestivalis, those strange scorpion attack drones, a few frigates that hadn't been targeted earlier, and some even wasted themselves on debris. Guess nothing was perfect.

Then a new order came from the ever composed silver haired squadron commander, "All Aestivalis, launch immediately."

"Hell yeah," Commander Ryoko Subaru, ready for combat in her skin-tight, red pilot's suit, yelled out across her command net. "Alright Dirt-bags, remember the Plan!" All the pilots under her command listened intently as the 'drop bays' beneath the carrier retracted. "We go full speed into gap the Commodore was so generous to make for us, maintaining formations, and DESTROY EVERYTHING THAT GETS IN OUR WAY!"

The furious battle cry of green and veteran pilots alike as they simultaneously dropped free of the carrier that answered her orders brought a vicious grin to her face. She could already tell the enemy didn't stand a chance against her pilots. She quickly rallied her squadrons into formations and they stormed towards the enemy.

On a private comm. channel, Hikaru, in her orange pilot suit, and Izumi, in a green suit, were performing their own combat ritual. "It looks like certain someone can feel her blood flowing," Hikaru began in a cheerful tone.

"Her blood flowing? Then does she have a hardon for combat?"

Hikaru felt her cheeks heat, "Izumi, you are such a perv!" She laughed in spite of herself. "You should know better than to give me that kind of ammunition for my manga!"

A very displeased Ryoko suddenly appeared on holo-screens inside their mechs, "I don't know what the two of you are saying about me but…," she paused for a moment as if searching for the right words, "SHUT THE HELL UP!" Her message delivered, the image abruptly blinked closed. Both of the mischievous pilots just laughed at getting the predictable reaction from their friend and commander.

Ryoko tore her mind from the annoying distraction as her Aestivalis approached the enemy line. She didn't have time to assess the entire situation but she could tell the enemy was reacting slowly to the Nadesico squadron's change in tactics. It seemed they were just staying in place and trying to dump as much fire as possible even as they got flanked. Ryoko snorted in distaste; whoever the traitor in command was, she was obviously not skilled or experienced enough to command so many ships.

Her sensors suddenly alerted her to the presence of a large number of incoming enemy drones and a handful of older interceptor Aestivalis, maybe half a squadron. 'The enemy isn't completely incompetent if they know how to scramble an intercept.'

As usual, the enemy had vast numerical superiority on their side. The attack drones alone outnumbered her Aestivalis eight to one; and the opposing Aestivalis inflated that number even further. But her new heavy assault Aestivalis were the most powerful mechs ever built by Nergal Heavy Industries.

Its design was directly descended from Uribatake's failed Aestivalis-X project fourteen years ago. It was 50 percent larger than the average combat mech and powered by its own mini-phase transition engine. It was an improvement over previous suits she had piloted in every respect; it was harder, faster, better, stronger. Every unit came with its own shoulder mounted particle cannon with limited tracking capabilities and could easily handle every weapon in the UEAF arsenal.

Though it was different from the eccentric engineer's design in some ways, he had initially thrown a fit that the military had stolen his design. But after a little time tinkering with the new units, and a very generous after-the-fact payment for the patent, he let the issue slide. Now he was more enthusiastic than everyone else to see how the new toys actually performed.

'He gets so worked up over machines.' Ryoko grinned wryly to herself, 'I'll show him a performance that'll give him wet dreams every night for a month.'

She watched as the swarms of scorpion-like drones speed in for a frontal assault while the enemy Aestivalis maneuvered to position themselves 'above' her incoming formation. 'The cowards want to fire from a safe distance while we engage the drones.' The commander licked her lips hungrily, 'I'll just have to show them there is no safe place to shoot at me.'

She ordered the half of her squadron that was armed with close combat disruptor staves that were as long as their Aestivalis to charge straight into attacking drones. If they broke that line, they would be able to engage the enemy ships where they were most vulnerable.

Fourty-five mechs plunged into the enemy mass with Ryoko at maximum combat speed. Even before they had come within reach of their energy staves, the particle cannons mounted on their shoulders were exchanging fire with the energy blasts from the arched tails of the enemy drones. In those brief seconds, energy rounds bounced of the mechs' powerful shields while the particle cannons blew through the drones that were not in the formation's direct path. A brilliant ring of destruction heralded their approach.

Ryoko could see one of the drones clearly for the first time as neared for a kill. She could make out the insectoid appearance, the crimson armor plating on its back, the energy coils charging in its tail, and those ugly, yellow, glowing eyes she had learned to both hate and fear during the Jovian/Earth War.

The drone adjusted the arch in its tail as it prepared its next shot. Ryoko felt time slow as adrenaline filled her veins. She felt her body move in slow motion as she fed neural instructions through her IFS into her machine; moving with the perfection that she had trained into herself after years of combat.

As the energy blast was fired her way, she instinctively rolled left to evade. In the unnatural slowness, she thought she could actually feel it pass mere centimeters away from her cockpit. As she turned, her weapon was already in position to strike. Her neural feedback registered the disruptor head of the stave slice effortlessly through the drones shield and then through the drone itself. As she blew past, the halved drone exploded behind her.

Her most experienced pilots followed their commander's lead and cut into the drones with fierce tenacity. They weaved through the enemy without fear or thought, relying entirely on their instinct and experience in the deadly dance of battle.

In a matter of seconds they had broken through the enemy and into the hole in the enemy line of battle. The drones immediately changed direction, their simple battle computers tasked only with protecting the capital ships from small craft. The most immediate threat registered as the Aesties that had just broken through, so they turned to engage them again. But that proved to be their destruction as the remaining forty-five mecha came in from behind with ranged weaponry and blew the surviving drones into scrap metal.

The two Aestivalis groups reorganized as they came under fire from the fifteen enemy mecha. They had a motley assortment of old ballistic weapons, laser rifles, and a single particle cannon. The heavy shielding on Ryoko's squadrons easily shrugged off the incoming fire.

The three squadrons divided up to do as much damage as possible to the enemy before Ruri's ships moved into position. Izumi volunteered her squadron to hunt the harassing enemy mechs and keep new enemy squadrons at bay. In her usual mock seriousness, Izumi shouted, "Resistance is futile!" Her men couldn't help smirking at their squadron commander's fragrent abuse of cliche as they cut down the stragglers.

The enemy was finally beginning to move new ships to fill the gap that had been created from both the left and right of the Nadesico squadron's approach. Hikaru's squadron took the right group and Ryoko's took the left where the bulk of the enemy fleet was located. They not only had to prevent the gap from being refilled but they had to secure as much breathing room for their ships as possible. A gravity blast at close range was uncomfortably close to being lethal for any ship.

With less than two minutes to accomplish what they could, they threw themselves against the enemy ships. Dividing themselves up further, they attacked the enemy two or three ships at a time. Like wasps attacking a small animal, Aestivalis jabbed distruptor staves into the distortion fields of ships until they collapsed and backed off as the ship killers finished off the prey.

Ruri almost had the ships in position when another wave of drones came sweeping in from the left enemy formation, even more than there had been in the last wave. That was what Ryoko hated the most about fighting drones; it didn't matter how many you destroyed, the enemy always seemed to have ten times that many ready to replace them.

"Everyone regroup at my position above our ships!" Her sensors showed the enemies fire begin to cover the space they just cleared as Ruri's ships entered the gap, "I don't want to accidently lose anyone to capital ship fire!"

A fire support indicator suddenly flashed to life over the enemy drones. Ruri's gentle face appeared in a screen beside Ryoko, "I hope you don't mind if I lend you a little aid."

Ryoko offered her long time commander and friend a grin in return, "Please be my guest and help yourself." Missiles from every ship that had been focused on enemy ships now launched into the approaching drone swarm. The potent anti-ship missiles knocked out three or four drones with each impact. When the salvo was finished, the enemy's numbers had been dramatically reduced.

But Ryoko was still badly outnumbered by at least five to one and she couldn't rely on taking advantage of their relatively stupid battle computers this time.

She ordered her units armed with small gravity cannons to take the opening shot. There were only twelve units that had the small but expensive arrays that replaced most of the machines lower arm assembly with the cumbersome unit. The array fed directly from the suit's PT engine via lightly armored conduits. It made them vulnerable and risky to place up front. She would just have to keep them covered.

Light emanated from the capacitors in the weapon arrays as they charged. Then everything around them seemed to go white before the light filters could act when they fired. Even together, they had nowhere near the power or range of even a frigate's gravity array. But they disintegrated dozens of the insect-like drones instantly as the graviton energy waves crossed paths with them.

The mecha commander ordered the heavy artillery back as the enemy entered the range of her particle cannons. Everyone viciously unleashed their fire on full auto in the sparse seconds before the fighting went to close combat. More explosions dotted star filled vacuum around Nexus. Ryoko gritted her teeth and her mech gripped its stave tightly as the distance fell.

She lashed down on the first drone that came her way, six more coming in behind it. Her pilots' efforts had reduced the odds down to almost three to one. Almost.

She released her stave and grabbed the tail of another drone with both hands as it attempted an attack run on one of her people from behind. She did a full power clockwise spin and slammed her victim into another passing drone. Both shattered to jagged pieces in all directions.

Her people were fighting with everything they had. Then she watched in shock as a drone actually landed on distortion field of one of her men, labeled Jonas Withal by the IFF. With a violent thrust, it lodged the pointed end of its energized tail through the field and open fire.

Jonas was one her most experienced NCO's and he reacted quickly, but not fast enough. As he tried to spin around to face his attacker, an energy round hit his charging particle cannon and exploded, destroying his left arm and sending his machine's head careening through the blackness.

Seeing one of her men harmed threw Ryoko into a rage. Shields and thrusters at full power, she slammed straight into the drone, the impact shattering its frame and destroying its computer and sent it spinning lifelessly out of sight.

Five more drones decided to engage her. She primed her machine's fists, "Bring it ON!" Suddenly, particle cannon rounds intercepted all five drones from below. Ryoko blinked in surprise to see the defensive Aestivalis wing, lead by Lt. Tori Long, coming to their aid. Moments later, the battle with the drones was over.

'I took too long to realize they needed more aid,' Ruri chastised herself in her mind. The 'screen bubble' prominently displayed Ryoko's Aestivalis squadrons fighting for their lives and the Tori's wing rushing to their aid. Several yellow damage icons dotted Ryoko's formations and Ruri's grip tightened when she looked at them.

"It's not your fault, Ruri," Haley tried consoling her, speaking to her through the electric plane they entered when synced with Omoikane. "Please don't blame yourself." He had grown accustomed to reading her subtle changes in mood. And he knew Ruri always blamed herself when they took casualties. Blamed herself for not being smarter, not being faster, not being more prepared… not being able to predict the future.

"I am their commander, Haley. The responsibility for their lives… responsibility for their deaths… is mine."

"But the responsibility for this war is theirs!" Hari flashed images of the enemy fleet they were almost perfectly lined up to destroy. "The blood of everyone that will die in this war lies on their hands and the sadistic freak the leads them!"

"I know that but…"

"Hari-kun is correct Ruri-chan," Omoikane decided to add. It still addressed others with the Japanese suffixes it had used since its creation despite the military adopting English as the standard language for all branches. And it also still carried its longstanding friendship with Ruri since that time. "We all did what could reasonably be expected in the situation we found ourselves."

"And that includes you, Hon," Hari added sweatly.

Ruri still couldn't sure if her hands were clean of guilt or not but she did feel comforted by their words. She thought about giving some kind of thank you when the tactical station reported that enemy was fully enveloped by their target envelope. She would have to repay Omoikane with a game later and Hari, well, he would be pretty easy to please.

"Attention all ships! Open Fire!"

As the enemy's sustained fire of light gravity cannons, lasers, and missiles continued to be shrugged off by their distortion fields, the energy arrays finished their charging cycle and all eleven ships fired as one.

What the enemy was not able to accomplish in twenty minutes of combat, Ruri's command finished in an instant. That the enemy had not changed positions or formation made things even easier. It was the most incredible display of power any of them had seen since Nergal locked away the Y-Unit and its PT cannon thirteen years ago.

A barely visible hellstorm of graviton energy was unleashed that destroyed everything it touched. It washed over the enemy fleet in a mere fraction of a second, sparing only a lonely few on the fringes of its wake. The warships it swept across ceased existing as tangible matter. What had once been a fleet was now merely a hole in space. Seventy-three ships gone in an instant.

"Communications," Ruri called.

"Yes, Commodore?" Yukina replied.

"Instruct the Rascal and the Wanker to do a mop up here."

"Aye, Ma'am."

"Tactical," Ruri demanded, "Is there a force of surrounded friendlies 1,943 kilometers from our present position?"

The chief tactical officer checked the sensors and replied, "Yes, Ma'am. It looks like at least ten friendly vessels are engaged there."

"Captain, recall the Aestivalis and get their injured treated immediately."

"Aye, Ma'am," Hari answered from his command chair below Ruri. "Attention! All Aestivalis…"

"Communications, instruct all of our remaining ships to proceed to the support of friendly forces. And continue attempts to raise the commanding ship or officer of Nexus."

Ruri continued giving orders as her ships, minus two frigates, rushed to aid the only friendly force they could clearly identify. She easily could have performed all of these tasks herself, but it was important that she let the crew earn their salaries. She needed to keep their skills sharp but also prevent them from relying too much on her. Because if she was ever called away or incapacitated, they needed to be able to depend on each other.

The black fleet remained still and silent as they observed the actions of the Nadesico battle group. After easily dealing with the fleet surrounding the Gate terminals, these interesting people with their remarkable new ships made mince meat out the forces attacking the remnants of the 72nd Cruiser Fleet and 9th Destroyer flotilla.

"They took out four battleships, thirty cruisers, and hell knows how many support ships without breaking a sweat," the armored commander said admiringly.

"Forgive me if I'm not impressed," the sarcastic captain said as he scratched his balding head. At least his brown hair hadn't started going gray yet. "Given the stupidity of their opponents, a tram filled with circus clowns probably could have taken them out. Hell, the first fleet they fought didn't have enough sense to let their comrades know a new enemy force arrived."

The commander snorted, "Give credit where credit is due, Gerard. That second force had cut through the UE line of battle, isolated three entire UE Space Fleet groups, and had already finished off one of them by the time our… friends arrived to save them."

Captain Gerard crossed his arms, "Well, I think the UE are a sorry bunch of losers, too. So I'm still not impressed."

The man in black armor shook his head and laughed, "Your stubbornness will be the end of you, my good friend.

"Besides, I'm not asking you to be impressed with them. I'm wanting you to gauge their combat potential... and think of how they will react when he comes to meet them on the battlefield."

"Thank you! Thank you so much Commodore!" Captain Kakuji Kato had not stopped thanking Ruri over the last three minutes. Out of two small fleets and a flotilla, the Captain Kato was the senior ranking officer to survive.

"Again, we are grateful to have rescued as many of our fellow soldiers as possible." Ruri, for her part, was hiding her impatience well behind her courtesy. She felt the urgency of the situation breathing down her neck. They needed to aid as many UE Spacey forces as possible so an effective counter attack could be organized. "I recommend you retreat to the Nexus terminal to treat your injured and reorganize."

"Oh we will definitely do that, Commodore! Again, I…" The captain was abruptly cut off as one of the communications officers shouted there was a Priority Alpha message for Commodore Ruri Makibi.

A large holo-screen opened at the front of the bridge but the image was shrouded in static and the voice grabbled. "Can you boost the signal?" If this was an Alpha message, then the sender would have to be a high ranking officer trying to reach her.

And if that was true, then what he had to tell her must be vital to victory in the Nexus system.

Slowly, the officer's image became clearer. Hari's eyes widened in shock and dismay when he recognized the man on the screen. "Oh, God," he pleaded up to the ceiling, "Please! Anything but this man I beg you!"

The officer was the spitting image an old military poster boy. He was tall, dark, and handsome. He was still lean and trim, with slick black hair, and looked absolutely immaculate in his well decorated uniform, complete with an admiral's insignia.

"It has been many years since I had the privilege to gaze upon the Jewel of the Stars," he said in a voice made to melt a woman's heart. Even Ruri could help but to blush as she listened to him address her. "It is my honor to serve with you again, the ever dignified and beautiful Commodore Ruri Makibi."

"Aren't you MARRIED, DAMNIT?!" Hari screamed at the honorable Vice Admiral Araragi.

A/N: Honestly, I had a lot of fun writing this chapter. I'm at my best when things are getting blown up!

And does anyone know what Araragi's first or last name is? All I can find is the one name for the guy.