FicWad

A/N: I would once again like to thank all those who have taken the time to review my story, and to thank all who deem this story good enough to read and put on their favorites, alerts, C2s etc.

The first strains of Twilight

Clark AFB, Luzon, the Philippines
1035 GMT (6:35 PM Local), 2 December 2001

The first C-17 Globemaster III transport aircraft from the 60th Air Mobility Wing based out of Travis AFB, California had just arrived with a consignment of heavy weapons, which slated for use in the defense of both Taiwan and Japan. Along with the cargo aircraft came the B-1R 37th Bomb Squadron out of Ellsworth AFB and 15 KC-10 Extender tanker aircraft out of Travis AFB, which would perform refueling operations for all aircraft assigned to operate in the South China Sea sector. Along with the heavy weapons came the Green Berets, F Company from Ft. Bragg, their mission would be to parachute into Taipei and hold back the Chinese forces until greater manpower could be mobilized. At that moment, only 12% of United States military forces were at battle-ready status, and the logistical situation was an absolute nightmare. As the General looked out over the flight line, his hazel eyes distant as he though about what he would face in the war to come. He held no illusions that he could stay in anonymity forever; he only hoped that when he was revealed to the world, that he and his wife would be ready to take the storm.

GIGN Headquarters, Paris, France
1055 GMT (11:55 AM Local), 2 December 2001

Gabrielle Delacour had been working for the international sector of the French counter-terrorist unit for several years, before the attacks on the UK and USA, and these only strengthened her resolve to see the end of the would-be tyrant Lord Voldemort. Having worked in the international sector for several years, she had lost most of her accent, but when angry she lapsed into the French language especially when cursing someone. As one of her foreign contacts had so eloquently put it: The French language is excellent to curse with, it is like wiping your ass with silk; and she quite agreed with the sentiment, if not the actual wording. She had joined the GIGN in '98, when she had turned sixteen, and due to her special skills in stealth and endurance (thanks to her veela heritage); she quickly advanced through the ranks. She had been on missions throughout the world: in Afghanistan, Argentina, Egypt, China, Russia, and even Iceland, where she met a very charming MI-6 agent while preventing a war between the divided Koreas. However, she had always returned home to her native France, where she most felt at home, excepting, of course, being with her fiancé in England.

She had first met her fiancé, Harry Potter, during the Triwizard Tournament where he had rescued her from the bottom of a lake even though he did not have to. From that, point on she was entranced by the handsome young man, and he conquered her fantasies from that day forward. She had dated other men and even gone to bed with some, but she knew in her very soul that her veela heritage had already selected her one true love, and she could not be happier. Just thinking about him now made her feel a certain kind of dampness in her knickers. She and Harry had met again at the wedding of her sister Fleur to one of the Weasley brood, specifically William. It turns out that she had dominated Harry's sexual fantasies as well, even though he was 'officially' dating Ginny, another of the Weasley brood, his thoughts always returned to her, imagining what his life would be with her, and often in NC-17 rated fantasies. Only eight months after he first started dating her, he proposed and when she accepted the ring, he had bought for her; the smiles on both their faces could be seen from the most distant stars. The air around them was almost humming with the strength of the love that these tow people had for each other.

Now as she walked towards the operations section to pick up her next assignment, she could not help but wonder what had become of her love. She knew he was not dead, because she would have felt her heart ripping in two, had he died. However, she decided to leave the worry for another day, for she needed to have her head on straight for any type of mission she could be assigned. When she got her assignment, she was secretly thrilled because she was going in with the first wave of parachutists in the liberation of Newcastle in only a few days. She knew that her love was still alive and after the battle, she would find him and lock them in the first available room for the next week and hopefully even longer than that. However, until that time she would need to focus all of her mental facilities on her job, and wheedling out from her superiors the information as to where she would most likely find her Harry.

Osan AB, South Korea
1124 GMT (8:24 PM Local), 2 December 2001

Although the amphibious operations planned by both sides postponed, due to Typhoon Kazami, land based operations over the Korean peninsula would still be viable for at least two more days. After that wind speeds would be in excess of 100 km/h, far too fast to fly with any degree of safety, and certainly too fast to fight with any amount of accuracy. However, for now at any rate, the contingent of American-made F-16H Block 60s and F-15C/Ds was keeping the battle for aerial supremacy in stasis, and it would soon become a war of grinding down the enemy and not stopping once they were down. In addition to the regular stationed fighter squadrons, there were the 12 state-of-the-art EB-1R Lancers of the 502nd Squadron that had flown in from DreamWorks via Eielson AFB in Alaska. They could be triple hatted as bombers, fighters, and as Electronics/Reconnaissance (ER) aircraft; and they could carry many weapons for multiple mission roles. Unfortunately, most of the high tech weaponry had to be left back at DreamWorks due to the atmospheric conditions caused by the typhoon, so the only weapons were unguided munitions. The cargo aircraft just could not fly through the vicious crosswinds, and going over the continent was right out due to the uncertain political situations in the shattered former provinces of China.

They prepared for the last of the days operations, a saturation bombing of KPA formations. The ATO (Air Tasking Order) had them flying against forces that were on the approaches to Kimpo, only a short distance from Seoul, the capital city, and the nerve center for the South Korean military forces. They knew that the success of their aerial bombardment missions would be crucial to the South Korean defense, for even though the two Koreas had had a cease-fire for almost fifty years, the South had partially relaxed its military and 65% of the regular forces could be called within a week. As such, the only units those were at full strength when the North invaded were Border Guards and they were equivalent to light infantry companies individually, with minor anti-armor capability. The crushing numbers of Northern troops and tanks quickly overwhelmed them, and the few that escaped manage to warn the nearest local garrisons of the impending battles. The KPA at first had seemed to be utterly self-assured that the people of the South would welcome them and glad turn on their capitalist oppressors. However, with every house and town they passed, the KPA gradually got the picture that they were not welcome in the least. Instead of joining the 'liberators' in bringing down the democratic government as the regular foot soldiers had expected, they found themselves at the center of massive riots that quickly turned violent. Once the crowd of enraged civilians took a soldier of the KPA, they would not be found again, at least not alive anyway.

At about 8:30 PM local time, the last of the pre-flight checklists had been completed, and the first of the twelve bombers made its way to runway CL4. As the aircraft obtained takeoff clearance from the tower, the four Pratt & Whitney engines went to full military power, and the mighty plane leapt forward. On two other runways, the same thing was happening, but the sight was no less awe-inspiring. After only about half an hour of flight, the computers indicated that the optimal bomb release pint was coming up in about ten minutes. From that point on it should have been like shooting fish in a barrel, but as the old adage says, a battle plan never survives first contact with the enemy. The first thing that went wrong was flawed intelligence; the skies were supposed to be clear of enemy air traffic, and unfortunately, they were not. The North Koreans had a defensive screen of MiG-29 Fulcrums flying a protective screen for them, and the Mikoyen Gruyevich fighter had been born and bred to hunt down and destroy enemy attackers. The Lancers had not been fitted with LPI (Low Probability of Intercept) radar yet so they were almost flying blind, in respect to other aircraft. Therefore, when the MiGs swept them with their fire control radar, the bomber crew could only tell that they had been painted as a target, but they could not tell if it was from civilian stations or military radars. The bombers were relying almost solely on the civil air defense radar for their defensive operations, so they got the warnings about the MiGs only when the first AA-10 Alamo missiles flew off the rails.

The first missile struck EAV-041, the "Straight Flush", near the right wing connection to the main fuselage, nearly shearing the entire right wing off the side of the aircraft. The command crew sent out a general mayday to the other aircraft and activated the homing beacon, in the hope that SpecOps demolition forces would be able to destroy the remains of the downed bomber before enemy forces could recover it, and reverse engineer it into something that could massacre coalition service members. Seconds after the first missile hit, the other bombers had gone to BUSTER and scattered in all directions, some going high, some going low, but all of them were hauling ass to get away from the MiGs. Another missile missed the left wing of EAV-046, the "Lucky Strike", by a hair's breadth but the proximity fuse detonated and shrapnel damaged engines 1 and 2. The bomber could notwithstanding fly but it could not do any high-G maneuvers so it had to try to make a direct abort back to Osan. Three of the bombers regrouped and pressed on towards their targets. The computers calculated the precise moment when to drop the lethal payloads of 500- and 2000-pound bombs, and when it arrived, the three bombers opened their bomb bay doors and let the entire load just drop.

Unfortunately, when the bomb doors are open the radar cross-section increased by a hundredfold, thus taking away the last of the bombers covertness. The DSO (Defensive Systems Operator) on each of the three aircraft immediately found the radar watchbands lit up like a Christmas tree, with military, civil defense, and civilian sets all looking at them. The North Korean SAM crews had been alerted to the hostile aircraft by the air defense command, and were just waiting for a target to present itself, and now three big juicy bombers had almost handed themselves over on a silver platter. The SA-15 Gauntlet crews began tracking the bombers with their powerful Kilo band Doppler radars, and after only a few seconds, they had an excellent lock on all three of them. The three SAM batteries ripple fired two missiles each, and the death carrying aluminum tubes sped off into the night, with smoke and fire trailing behind them. Two of the missiles scored good hits on the fuselage of the left outside bomber, and the entire airframe erupted in a chain of explosions caused by the jet fuel. The right outside aircraft escaped instantaneous obliteration but shrapnel from the two nearby missiles, which had proximity fuses, damaged the cockpit, killing the pilot and wounding the co-pilot. The last bomber completely escaped the inferno and quickly went to full afterburner and flew over the Yellow Sea, where it circled around towards Osan. The mission had been a complete wash, with three 1.6 billion dollar aircraft shot down and four grounded due to battle damage. For now, the 502nd Lancer squadron's war was over, but they would be back with a vengeance and a grudge to repay.


A/N: To all those interested, BUSTER means full engine throttle w/ afterburner, if available.