[[This might be the wrong place for this, but I figured I'd actually make good on an idea and start writing a story about getting literally sucked into the game, albeit this "shard" is of Squadron 43. Critiques welcome.]]
The buzzing started off in the distance, like a train miles away, slowly growing louder.
“Yeah, yeah, time to wake up, I get it.” The buzzing grew louder.
With a groan he turned over in his bed, right hand dangling off the side, “This… is the last time I go out partying on a Wednesday.” He muttered to himself, letting out a sigh as he pushed himself up, only to be stopped short, hitting his head against something hard, cold and metallic. The buzzing grew louder.
Falling back to bed, he turned over, opening his eyes and squinting as lights flashed, people rushed by, and the buzzing now resounding in his ear. From what he could tell, he was on a ship, probably navy, though he never recalled having this dream, or even being eligible for service when he was awake.
“What the-”
“FUNK! What are you still doing in your rack!?” A woman’s voice called to him, making him crane his neck to see who called, though for a moment, he wondered why he reacted like that, as if instinct.
“I.. uh… what’s going on?” He replied, slowly bringing himself to sit on the edge of the obviously too small bunk.
Grabbing the collar of his jumpsuit as she passed, she pulled him to his feet, although he stood a good head taller than her, she was definitely stronger than she looked.
“Lizards are attacking. Just two scythes and a couple of glaives. Nothing we can’t handle.” Chipper. Her name is “Chipper”, or at least that was her callsign. How or why he remembered this, he didn’t know.
Things barely started to come back as the two made their way down a few corridors, up a flight of what might pass as stairs, and into a massive hangar bay, filled with rows upon rows of fighters and a few light bombers near the tail end. What really caught his sight, however, was the two sets of massive doors on either end. This wasn’t a navy ship, at least not the navy he knew.
“Why did you call me ‘Funk’?” He asked, stopping short, “My name isn’t ‘Funk’, so, why did you use that?”
Bellerophon. The UNS Bellerophon. The hum of the ship’s massive ion engines and fusion core reverberated through his boots into his legs. A klaxon sounded as he began to smell ozone, a few bright flashes near the door catching his attention. A moment later, yellow warning lights flashed at its edges before they slowly pulled away from each other revealing a dark, black void, specked with small twinkling dots.
“I’m… in space…” His eyes fixed on the vastness outside what he only surmised was a force field of some kind, allowing ships to pass through while keeping the atmosphere contained inside the bay.
Chipper spun on her heel and walked right up to him, her deep green eyes examining his face, “Did you hit your head on your bunk, again?” the woman said after a brief pause, tapping his name plate on his left breast, “Uh, last I checked, it’s what everyone called you.”
She resumed her course toward one of the massive Hornets sitting idle on the deck, specifically the one with two bright pink stripes on each wing. She had to get special permission for the color, since their squad was a deep red. “Pink is just light red…” she reasoned, though Funk had to close his eyes and try to shake off these new, strange memories that seemed to start flooding into the back of his mind.
He looked down at his jumpsuit, pulling the nameplate into view. His first and last name seemed jumbled, as if constructed by a 2 year old with no grasp of the alphabet, but there it was, “LORD_FUNK”, spelled out perfectly in between the gibberish. The ship shuddered, more alarms sounded, and a stout, grizzled man in a greasy jump suit ran up to him. “She’s all ready to fly, though we only had enough time to give you a half magazine of the 20mm.”
With that, what Funk assumed was his crew chief handed him a helmet containing a pair of flight gloves. “Just make sure to keep an eye on your APU. We were able to kludge together a fix, so it should hold for short bursts from your repeaters, just don’t hold down the trigger for more than a few seconds at a time, otherwise it might blow.”
That’s right, this was the first challenge mission in the game. Limited ammo and the possibility of losing laser weapons. Sure, missiles usually did the trick, and having 8 of them helped, but there was something else on this mission that he was trying to remember. Something that made it really, REALLY hard.
Taking the gloves from the helmet, he strode to the gray/red fighter that somehow blinked with an arrow right above the cockpit. No one else seemed to notice this, though by this point, he knew he was going crazy. The flight gloves fit, well, like they were meant to and the helmet was nice and snug. Climbing up the ladder, the blinking arrow disappeared, and the machine seemed to come to life as soon as he sat down.
The buzzing started off in the distance, like a train miles away, slowly growing louder.
“Yeah, yeah, time to wake up, I get it.” The buzzing grew louder.
With a groan he turned over in his bed, right hand dangling off the side, “This… is the last time I go out partying on a Wednesday.” He muttered to himself, letting out a sigh as he pushed himself up, only to be stopped short, hitting his head against something hard, cold and metallic. The buzzing grew louder.
Falling back to bed, he turned over, opening his eyes and squinting as lights flashed, people rushed by, and the buzzing now resounding in his ear. From what he could tell, he was on a ship, probably navy, though he never recalled having this dream, or even being eligible for service when he was awake.
“What the-”
“FUNK! What are you still doing in your rack!?” A woman’s voice called to him, making him crane his neck to see who called, though for a moment, he wondered why he reacted like that, as if instinct.
“I.. uh… what’s going on?” He replied, slowly bringing himself to sit on the edge of the obviously too small bunk.
Grabbing the collar of his jumpsuit as she passed, she pulled him to his feet, although he stood a good head taller than her, she was definitely stronger than she looked.
“Lizards are attacking. Just two scythes and a couple of glaives. Nothing we can’t handle.” Chipper. Her name is “Chipper”, or at least that was her callsign. How or why he remembered this, he didn’t know.
Things barely started to come back as the two made their way down a few corridors, up a flight of what might pass as stairs, and into a massive hangar bay, filled with rows upon rows of fighters and a few light bombers near the tail end. What really caught his sight, however, was the two sets of massive doors on either end. This wasn’t a navy ship, at least not the navy he knew.
“Why did you call me ‘Funk’?” He asked, stopping short, “My name isn’t ‘Funk’, so, why did you use that?”
Bellerophon. The UNS Bellerophon. The hum of the ship’s massive ion engines and fusion core reverberated through his boots into his legs. A klaxon sounded as he began to smell ozone, a few bright flashes near the door catching his attention. A moment later, yellow warning lights flashed at its edges before they slowly pulled away from each other revealing a dark, black void, specked with small twinkling dots.
“I’m… in space…” His eyes fixed on the vastness outside what he only surmised was a force field of some kind, allowing ships to pass through while keeping the atmosphere contained inside the bay.
Chipper spun on her heel and walked right up to him, her deep green eyes examining his face, “Did you hit your head on your bunk, again?” the woman said after a brief pause, tapping his name plate on his left breast, “Uh, last I checked, it’s what everyone called you.”
She resumed her course toward one of the massive Hornets sitting idle on the deck, specifically the one with two bright pink stripes on each wing. She had to get special permission for the color, since their squad was a deep red. “Pink is just light red…” she reasoned, though Funk had to close his eyes and try to shake off these new, strange memories that seemed to start flooding into the back of his mind.
He looked down at his jumpsuit, pulling the nameplate into view. His first and last name seemed jumbled, as if constructed by a 2 year old with no grasp of the alphabet, but there it was, “LORD_FUNK”, spelled out perfectly in between the gibberish. The ship shuddered, more alarms sounded, and a stout, grizzled man in a greasy jump suit ran up to him. “She’s all ready to fly, though we only had enough time to give you a half magazine of the 20mm.”
With that, what Funk assumed was his crew chief handed him a helmet containing a pair of flight gloves. “Just make sure to keep an eye on your APU. We were able to kludge together a fix, so it should hold for short bursts from your repeaters, just don’t hold down the trigger for more than a few seconds at a time, otherwise it might blow.”
That’s right, this was the first challenge mission in the game. Limited ammo and the possibility of losing laser weapons. Sure, missiles usually did the trick, and having 8 of them helped, but there was something else on this mission that he was trying to remember. Something that made it really, REALLY hard.
Taking the gloves from the helmet, he strode to the gray/red fighter that somehow blinked with an arrow right above the cockpit. No one else seemed to notice this, though by this point, he knew he was going crazy. The flight gloves fit, well, like they were meant to and the helmet was nice and snug. Climbing up the ladder, the blinking arrow disappeared, and the machine seemed to come to life as soon as he sat down.
