Red Squadron

"Red Leader this is Red Two, you have a trail coming out of your drop-tank." Ron's voice crackles over the radio, causing Jerry to lean forward in his cockpit and attempt to get a visible angle on the tank. While not able to see the tank directly, Jerry does spot the trail that's visible a couple of feet behind the tank itself.

"Ah fuck me." Jerry groans to himself, the thought of having to turn back from patrol early snaking its way into his mind.

"Red Leader this is Red Four, just let us know if you're turning back and we'll follow." Henry, an older gentleman, says through the comms.

"Red Leader to Red Squadron, I reckon another twenty minutes before I need to head back." Jerry says and in return the entire squad replies 'Roger'.

Jerry's hand reaches to his headset and he taps the speakers of his comms repeatedly.

>What the hell is that noise?

The thought involuntarily appears as a higher-pitched whining seems to pierce through the roar of the P-47s' radial engines. It was an annoying and yet distinctly familiar noise that Jerry couldn't place his finger on, a noise that held great significance and that Jerry should be able to know by heart.

The mental gymnastics are cut short by a sudden repeated, "BRAT-BRAT-BRAT-BRAT!" followed by a burst of screams over the comms from all the squad members, one of the screams not being of commands and questions but instead of horror and dread.

Jerry's head swivels to his right side five-o'-clock and he spots a silver dot over five-thousand feet lower than him trailing smoke and flat-spinning uncontrollably.

>Red Three...

The thought comes after Jerry's instinct kicks in and he immediately pulls a Split-Ess, catching a green blur go by his plane as he comes out of the dive and pulls into the climb.

Jerry looks to his left side seven-o'-clock as he pulls into a left-hand bank and he quickly spots the green blur- now taking the shape of a FW-190 L/A model that's shooting back up.

As the 190 shoots up another two-thousand feet, Jerry realizes he has been completely ignoring his squad-members' questions and demands for a situation report.

"This is Red Leader, Fockewulf zooming up, I'm pulling in behind him!" Jerry exclaims, going balls-to-the-walls and entering into the climb on the 190's six.

As Jerry climbs after the 190, he slowly comes to terms with the 190's already existing speed and altitude advantage and how far behind the German he really is. Suddenly, the 190 rolls over and dives back towards Jerry's squadron members, causing Jerry to push the nose down, forcing negative G's to push blood back towards his head, but only momentarily as the young pilot quickly eases on the controls.

The 190 seems to zoom down for half a second before another squadron-member is even visible, Jerry activates his comms immediately.

"Break right! You have Hans breathing down your ass!" Jerry yells over the comms, a second later the P-47 the 190 is sighting in on rolls and sharply pulls to the right, causing the 190 to pull back up and not commit to the turn.

Jerry is now leaning forward in his seat, knowing that this next climb is his chance. The  radial engine screams and claws at the thin air of 20-thousand feet as it pulls the plane higher and higher to get behind the 190 for a shot.

Finally the 190 seems to notice Jerry, for it seems to waggle its wings, the pilot unsure of which way to pull to avoid what's coming to him. The 190's rudder jerks left, causing the plane to begin to rotate in a sorry attempt of a Hammerhead.

>Too late.

Are the words that run through Jerry's mind as the gunsight comes ot rest directly over the body of the 190. The German pilot clearly leans forward and turns to Jerry to get one final look of the P-47 before Jerry lets loose with the guns. The rumble and noise barely reach Jerry, for adrenaline has taken complete control of him, his teeth clenched tightly, breathing stopped, and eyes wide open.

Flashes tear across the 190, shredding the cowling, fuselage, and completely destroying the empennage. As the 190 begins to plummet, dark smoke and light coolants begin to barrel out of the plane as if trying to escape what the pilot was destined to. Jerry immediately levels out and tilts his plane as to watch the German's plane. The plane probably reached fifteen-thousand feet before the canopy was jettisoned, and a small dot slowly separated itself from the doomed machine.

Jerry's eyes widen as he watches the pilot plummet, not pulling his parachute and instead leaving this world the way everyone is destined to, in the ground.

On the flight back to the base, Jerry reflects over the pilot and how he looked at Jerry when he was sure of his fate. The way the German's eyes were so casual, as if this were a normal event for him. But Jerry knew that it was pure fear and adrenaline that made the German look like that, the fact that the German was so unsure of how to avoid Jerry made that clear.

Once back at base, the remaining Red Squadron give Jerry a pat on the back and report the squad member that was shot down. However, as Jerry lies in bed that night, his mind continues to replay that scene over and over again, the German's body tumbling aimlessly towards the very ground Jerry's on right now. His mind continues to ask a question that will plague him for the rest of his life...

>When will it be me?


The fifty-calibers rattle on even as the Bf-109 pulls up out of it's pass, trying desperately to damage any bit of the German aircraft, but falling too short as the distance between the B-17 and the 109 increases.

"Did we get hit in the last run?" The pilot, a stout man by the name of Tim, says with a hint of anxiety in his voice.

"We were, there's a hole the size of my dick in above the waist-gunners' position!" Exclaims Kaleb, the Flight Engineer, over the radio.

"Fuck, waist-gunners check in!" The pilot's voice rattles sternly over the comms. Thankfully it is met with the two gunners telling the pilot to calm down and assuring him they're OK.

The pilot lets out a sigh of relief, almost impressed that they has survived three passes from those damned G-models, ones that bear the new 30 MM gunpods.

As the pilot's eyes scan the sky for more Krauts, his eyes drift to the B-17 on his left, dubbed 'Smooth Betty' by her crew members. Tim's eyes widen as he suddenly spots the ball turret, facing partly in his direction and presenting a large hole towards Tim's plane.

"Patch me through to Smooth Betty right now!" Tim shouts through his headset, cuing the radio operator to begin getting on the right channel.

"-amn this machine I fly in!" Is the voice the crew is met with as they're finally put in through to Smooth Betty.

The crew of Tim's '17 watches Smooth Betty in shock, the pilot's voice giving them all a sudden jolt.

"Damn it all! Damn this war! Damn this life!" The pilot screams beckon Tim's mouth to slowly open in an attempt to reach out to the raging man.

"This is Three-Oh-Five to Smooth Betty, check in with your ball turret to confirm if he's alright." Tim says, Smooth Betty's pilot stopping for a good ten seconds before he finally speaks.

"He's dead. My entire crew is dead apart from me and my bombardier." The pilot says, voice sounding dazed.

"Pilot, how badly are you and the bombardier hurt?" Tim says, eyeing the cockpit with utmost intensity.

"I got a good bit of shrapnel in my back, bombardier is probably faring just as well as me." The pilot's voice causes Tim to grip the yaw even tighter with dread.

"Smooth Betty how is your craft? Can you make it to target?" Tim tries desperately to get some hope from this entire situation, but the slivers of hope are quickly fading.

The pilot doesn't respond for another twenty seconds, the pilot appears to look around, probably checking for any visible damage on the B-17. Tim's eyes begin to scan the B-17 again, this time he notices the motionless co-pilot, the large tears in the fuselage where the waist-gunners were supposed to be, and the now-noticeable arm hanging and bouncing from the blown-open ball turret.

"Damn this all." The pilot starts back up, visibly swaying back and forth in the seat as he loses more and more blood.

All the sudden, a high-pitched wail comes from above as a 109 comes zooming in from Smooth Betty's six-o'-clock. Green and white tracers, some the size of tennis balls, slam into the bomber with supreme force.

Smooth Betty shudders and begins to roll over as 30 MM HE shells slice through the wing and fuselage, cuing a bright flash to erupt from the left wing, opposite side from Tim's plane.

"Damn these Germans! Damn my death! Damn it all! Damn the heavens! Damn the he-" The pilot's voice cuts out as the B-17 visibly tears apart due to the high speed, sending smoking engines and large chunks of aluminum soaring over the German countryside.

Tim leans back in his seat, trying his best to forget everything he just saw and heard. His meditation is cut short, however, by Kaleb's voice coming over the comms.

"109 five-o'-clock!" The Flight Engineer calls out before the Boeing is suddenly lit up by the same tracers that took down Smooth Betty. Tim sits up quickly after bracing for the run on the bomber and immediately taps into his comms.

"Hello! Who's alright?" The only voice that responds back is the tail gunner's voice, however it was labored and presented little more than a few uncomfortable groans and grunts, clearly showing that he's probably not going to last the next fifty minutes there and back to the base.

Tim grips the yoke tighter than ever now as he begins to notices that he's lost all rudder control, no matter how hard he presses the rudder he still can't seem to force the bomber to turn.

Tim looks down, trying to find a reason as to why the rudders are jammed, but only finding his right leg blasted open, from a 30-MM no doubt.

Tim looks up, beginning to feel like passing out any second, and leans his head against the window on his left. And as his eyes begin to shut on their own and it gets harder and harder to breathe, he speaks one last time.

"Damn my legs."