Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume6 Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 11===

The tiltrotor gunship.

Up until the introduction of Objects, that weapon was close to holding the primary role on the battlefield. Its overwhelming loading capacity gave it tremendous firepower and its ability to take off without a runway made it very convenient. Another factor that moved it closer to holding the primary role was the introduction of a variety that was filled with nothing but cartridge-style laser weapon units in place of the guns.

That allowed it to overcome the previous rule stating that a slow aircraft was powerless on a battlefield without air superiority already achieved. The gunship had become a fortress of the sky that could intercept fighters and even cruise and ballistic missiles. The appearance of such a fortress allowed a combination of the normal model and the laser model to rip through both the air and the land and one-sidedly conquer a battlefield.

But the introduction of laser weapons also strangled the gunship itself. Based on its use in gunships, armies began introducing laser weapons for air-to-air use, surface-to-air use, and for missile defense. Even the quickly moving air superiority fighters could not evade those laser weapons, so there was no hope for the gunships themselves to evade them. And once tons of anti-air lasers were equipped on the Objects that could not be stopped no matter what, the tiltrotor gunships had lost their spot in the primary role.

[[Image:HO_v06_07.jpg|thumb]]

And now one of those weapons that had created an era and greatly affected the flow of history was being used against two flesh-and-blood soldiers.

To be blunt, there was no hope for them.

The pilot used the gunship’s internal communications to speak with his comrades.

“The anti-personnel sensors are working great. I’m gonna make a nice circle around that center point. Let’s show them this old thing still works.”

“Pteranodon really is the perfect nickname for this old fossil. And it’s a pretty cool name, too,” replied one of his comrades.

“Fossil? This is the latest model,” said another one. “Some officer is probably still having them developed for nostalgic purposes. It’s obviously not for any practical reason.”

“Weapons control: standby. Auto-loading: standby. Chemical cooling: standby. All green. We begin in 10 seconds. Everyone make sure you have your noise canceller on!” said a third comrade.

The pilot’s job was to continually fly in a large circle around the center point seen on the anti-personnel sensors. Even a trainee could fly that cruel merry-go-round. Since it was possible the target would use a shoulder-fired missile or something similar, he kept his fingers on the chaff and flare buttons just in case. He doubted he would really need them though.

(This is an easy job.)

But he suddenly noticed something while waiting for the countdown to finish.

“Wait. Do not fire! I repeat, do not fire!!” he shouted.

“Why not!?”

“I still have them in my sights. I can fire at any time.”

“The target is fleeing to the bridge between islands,” explained the pilot over the internal communications while a cold sweat covered his brow. “That bridge doesn’t just allow transportation. It is the cornerstone of the plumbing, electric, and communications infrastructures. It would be easy to blow the target away, but we would be cutting our own lifeline at the same time. All of our weapons are too powerful!!”

Heivia and Genelia were not on the top road part of the bridge. They were down below. A normal bridge would have had a complex steel framework strengthening it, but the bridges on the Cook Addition Islands had pipes, power cables, and communications lines passing through.

“This is just a cheap trick. It won’t be enough to survive.”

“True. Dammit, they’re jamming us so our communications can’t reach the Objects. We have to do something about that gunship either way.”

“You mean shoot it down?” Genelia frowned. “That’s a tiltrotor. A tiltrotor! This isn’t some forcibly altered mid-sized transport plane with no flexibility. It can stop in midair like a helicopter and it can rise and descend however it likes. Hiding under the bridge just means it has to descend to an altitude low enough to peek under and shoot us.”

“But they can’t use the ridiculously huge guns installed on that gunship. Even the smallest Gatling gun would crush their lifeline.”

“They don’t have to use them. The tiltrotor was originally used as a transport plane. They can open up the back cargo door and target us with a sniper rifle. We’re still in trouble!”

“That’s what I’m waiting for, baby.” Heivia removed the grenade launcher from the bottom of his assault rifle. He handed the rifle to Genelia. “You handle this. Fire like crazy at the tiltrotor’s engine. You probably won’t hit much and it probably won’t set fire to the engine even if you do, but it should make the pilot panic. If he flies erratically, it will shake the people aboard and lower their accuracy considerably.”

“What will you do?”

“I’ll use this.”

Heivia lightly waved the 40mm grenade launcher he had removed from the bottom of the assault rifle’s barrel. By extending a few attached parts, he gave it a grip and stock. Its silhouette changed from “tube” to “gun”.

Genelia blinked several times.

“What range does an underbarrel grenade launcher have?”

“Two to three hundred meters.”

“But they can aim from 1000 meters away!”

“While peering through a scope from inside a tiltrotor that’s moving all over the place? They won’t be able to snipe with that kind of theoretical value. No matter how hard they try, 700 meters will be their limit. If they want to be sure, they’ll get as close as 500 meters.”

“Are you so stupid you can’t do simple subtraction?”

“I can make up for that with some addition.”

Heivia spun a ring-shaped part on the side of the grenade launcher and attached an additional part to the bottom of the shell that was about the size of a can of coffee.

“What are you doing?”

“Supercharging it. This increases the gunpowder used to fire it. This is often used to increase the firing range of a mortar. It isn’t popular when used with handheld grenade launchers though. There were reports of the barrel being unable to withstand the increased pressure and gaining small cracks after firing a few times.”

“Why were we issued something that dangerous?”

“There are still a ton in stock ''because'' they’re so dangerous,” said Heivia as if singing while he peered down the grenade launcher’s sight.

The sensors were all on the rifle, so he had to aim with the naked eye for once.

[[Image:HO_v06_08.jpg|thumb]]

“More importantly, you need to get firing, too. Target the gunship’s wings and engine. It’s descended and is about to peer in under the bridge. If you don’t frighten the pilot and get him to shake the gunship, the snipers will fire.”

“I’m doing it. I’m doing it. But isn’t that a smoke grenade? Do you really think we can shoot down a gunship that was made to be fired on from below? The interior is probably filled with thick plates,” asked Genelia while firing the assault rifle on full auto for so long it seemed obvious she was not actually trying to fire accurately.

Heivia waited for the perfect timing with a thin smile on his lips.

“The tiltrotor is only meant to fly 3000 meters up, so unlike a transport plane meant to fly at high altitude, it has no ability to regulate its internal air pressure. In other words, there is no wall dividing the cargo area and the cockpit. That means the smoke will fill the cockpit as long as I can fire it in through the cargo door. Also, the tiltrotor was always less stable than a helicopter. It’ll be done for in a few seconds if the pilot is blinded this close to the ocean surface,” he said while holding a finger against the trigger. “After coming all this way for a tropical vacation, they need to go swimming in the ocean at least once.”

A 300 euro riot suppression round brought a 2 million euro cutting-edge craft crashing into the ocean surface.

With the jamming gone, Heivia and Genelia now had a chance to inform the Objects on the ocean of the truth.