Dreamtail on station
The Normandy siege is underway, but with a twist the allies aren't expecting and aren't prepared for
By the time that the gryphons started to decend on their destination the fighting below them was already underway, the main landings had taken place and Raela was relieved to see that American forces were starting to make advances on the small city they were supposed to take. The city of Carentan, where all the beaches came together. This would likely prove to be some of the toughest urban warfare they had seen to date. The navigator took a breath and closed her eyes for a moment, then looked around under her. Herself and the entire squadron of gryphons were around her, 24 of them in total, the broader wing gryphons gliding on the wind, Fidik and some of the other faster higher-aspect winged gryphons were having to. Over their heads the two B-25s permanently attached to their squadron passed by, with their menagerie of volunteer aviators as their top cover, you saw Christopher is his Lightning, besides that there were Mustangs, Warhawks, a whole litany of different fighters all with strengths and weaknesses. The Mitchell's were special to their unit though, they carried no bombs but extra reserves of ammunition, to allow them to act as gunships. Raela would guide them in in order to prevent friendly fire.
The gryphoness heard the yelling of orders and status updates on her radio pack from down below, she wouldn't do much fighting, her giant wings and heavy pack made her slow and unsuited for slinking building to building, tree to tree, trench to trench. She'd remain at vantage points that she could see and coordinate the battle, which had its own set of challenges, as once the troops figured out where the coordination was taking place, they concentrated on trying to track and destroy that information source.
"Whiskey Seven on station" she said over the radio to the commander of the ground troops currently making their push on the city. "SEVEN WEST BANK OF THIS RIVER, START HERE, WEST AND EAST" the voice yelled back at her, the sound of gunfire in the background of his radio traffic. "She then pushed another mic button with her talon "2 west bank, gun runs 2, we're falling in south with the actual... ONE West bank, north of two" The planes answered with just a couple clicks of their mics as she, made a series of avian croaks and calls which caught the attention of the gryphons in the formation, they all scattered immediately and descended to various positions. The larger gryphons were equipped with a cross between a rifle and pistol that was contoured to their talon hands and front legs, the smaller gryphs relied more on tactful deployment of ordinance, and their speed to give them the edge.
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Fidik looked over at Raela when he heard her call, he was to go far east and try to push in with ground forces there. The falcon gryphon tucked his wings in. Until they were just two bumps on either side of his body, the air rushing past him.
By the time he flared his wings open to quickly land behind cover the human fighters were set up being. The Mitchell's had made their first strafes, the sound of the 50cal fire hitting all around them as the radial engines of the planes chugged them away for another lap around, to the sound of various profanity laced cheers from the allied forces. The human squad leader looked over and he slapped the gryphons back hard enough to make the large bird wince, as he leaned in to hear his words as the gunfire made his sensitive ears ring "Holy fucking hell am I glad to see you guys here!" the man yelled to him a big smile coming onto his mud and bloodstained face. His troops peered from cover and started firing at the German forces that tried to relocate and find new cover that the Mitchell's were now aware of. "See if you can find where we can advance to, if you have some incidiaries, let em rip once they do another pass, we need to take out their tanks, their anti-aircraft is still all working the higher--" They all ducked as a shell burst near them, sending sand and debris flying over their heads. Fidik's ears positively rang as this point, but he nodded at the commander's words "your girl knows her shit, she's watchin it all I know... but still if they swing this way your mitchell's will be toast! They need to stay as low as they can. We're gonna make this push soon!" he said with another smack to Fidik's back as the gryphon saw a nearby building he could use as cover "Lay down cover fire I'm gonna push to that building there!" the gryphon said as the commanded nodded and with a few yells the sound of M1 gunfire rang out as the falcon shoved off the ground and within a few wingbeats he clambered into a window and looked around, at times moving on three legs as he pulled the oversized talon handgun from the holster on his harness. He eventually made his way to a window and looked down to see civilians running away from the sound of gunfire followed by German troops running up the street, away from the American forces. He ripped one of the incendiary grenades off his harness, ripping the pin out with his beak he tossed it out of the window and ran down the hallway of the ruined building. Looking outside quickly he heard the grenade explode and lept out a window, wings tucked in as he quickly traded altitude for speed, firing a couple shots with his pistol at the German troops, before they could get any shots out the falcon groaned at the g-forces of a turn he made behind a building.
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Raela's quick scanning avian eyes, combined with her unique ability to process multiple streams of information at the same time, made her role an almost irreplaceably valuable one. She was currently flying a broad sweeping pattern behind the front lines but in view of the small town they were trying to take. She had long streamer antennas trailing behind her. Feeling the weight of the radios and their batteries in her harness she listened to 4 different streams of radio traffic, inter-squad for her, the other gryphons, their planes. One for the command of the current unit they were operating with, and other general command frequency used for all the forces currently in play. She could speak on any of them with buttons that were pressed when she closed any of her talons. She watched as the Mitchell's made their first attack run "Same spot 1, Two a little more west. Danger close, stay as low as you can." Her attention returning to the field at the sound of Fidik's grenade going on as she made a sweeping turn to attempt to continuously be a moving target for anyone tracking her from the ground that she couldn't see.
"6, Dreamtail" Fidik's voice called out her callsign on the radio "6 go" "Visual, in the main street there's about 10-foot soldiers and at least one tank that's all I saw. I popped a smoke" "Roger. See if you can either get ahead of them or form up with 17 and make some high-speed passes at them" "Received" Raela traded some altitude for speed to stay even lower to the ground for a bit as she tried to get a westward look at the shelled city. "Two west bank two, look for smoke, make a west bank, keep them from running off on us"
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Christopher clenched his taloned fist on the throttles of his P-38 as he scanned all around for any incoming aircraft, before exhaling a breath as he tried to relax. Right now they were just being top-cover and listening for anything Raela may need. He smiled when he heard Raela's suggestion that Fidik form up on him. The falcon gryphon was fast enough in a dive he could easily keep pace with the Lightning. They would time dive in on a target, Christopher would fire his plane's guns to keep the enemy's head down and Fidik would come right in with a very targeted grenade drop or quick talon slash to a head, and be rising into the skies again before they even knew he was there.
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"WE'RE MOVING WE'RE MOVING" Raela's yelling nervous sounding voice broke Chris's train of though for a moment "Which way?" One of the B-25 pilots quickly answered "WE'RE RR---" the 2 seconds of silence made Chris's neck feathers feel like they were going to fly out of his body. He quickly dipped a wing of his plane just seconds before a green... he didn't know what to describe it was, lightning bolt? Regardless he quickly clenched his beak as negative G-s assaulted his body as he dove off station to evade whatever came up at him. Down on the ground moments before Fidik saw this one German soldier just stop and turn toward and face the incoming forces and his whole upper body started to glow a bright green color and these giant lightning bolts of... something just positively reigned destruction on the buildings, trenches, anything they could find. Raela had just swept behind a building, when the force of one of the impacts made her and her 100 pound pack smash into the ground, the impact knocking the wind out of her, the sharp stab of pain when she got back up confirmed something was broke, the giant eagle gryphon shoving back into the air "WE'RE MOVIN EAST EAST... TWO WEST BANK TWO LOOK FOR...LOOK FOR WHATEVER JUST--" The ground shook like an earthquake as a huge ball of fire erupted as one of the Mitchells crashed into the ground "WITHDRAW WITHDRAW AUTENTICATE ROMEO TANGO SIERRA... DREAMTAIL DITCHING" Raela screamed into the mic, before pulling the ripcord on her pack and letting the heavy unit drop from her as she power winged to try and get distance from this... whatever this man had. She looked back and saw what was proving to be a simple advance now going completely awry, men screamed and yelled, planes crashed, as more and more lances of this green energy shot up from below.
Raela panted as her wings strained and the broken ribs complained, Fidik snapped his wings open and tail open to brake as he came up beside her panting "One Mitchell made it out, Chris and Tyler and both overhead still I just heard him say, they're still covering us.... I though I heard you say you were hit! Are you okay?"
"It's magic?" "What?!" "MAGIC!! Don't you HEAR what they tell us, they said they were.... They were doing some crazy studies, they they must have figured it out" She bellowed as she panted heavily from the exertion of propelling herself along so relentlessly, her broad wings made for soaring not speed "I.... I think you're right Just some more Rae then we can stop..."