Promotion

June 13th, 1943, Benevolent City province.

"First fighter wing is still without wing-leader. Do you want to take a role?", Wheeler addressed Lily, who stood across the table from him.

"If you wish so, sir".

"I know you would rather not have such responsibility, but I do not see who else can take the lead after Alexis is gone'.

"I understand, commander, so I will do my best".

"I'm counting on you. You can now decide who to take on missions and plan the hunts".

June 15th, 1943, Benevolent City province.

"Two enemy light bombers on the horizon, escorted by nine fighters. Should we try to attack them, wing leader?", Kate was concerned.

"Yes, let us hide in the clouds and get them by surprise", Lily was eager to take the chance. "Half of the escorts are older models and they have not spotted us yet, we can pull it off".

"Roger that!", Kate and Hunch replied in unison and ascended into the clouds.

Enemy group approached their position slowly. Just before reaching the cloud our trio hid in, they noticed something and tried to get into formation, but it was to late. Lily activated Acceleration and launched into the gap in the middle of the enemy planes. One of the bombers went down, shot with a bunch of magical ice balls. Six fighters turned and tried to pursue her aircraft, but she already slipped away and increased the distance. Magical barrages went in her direction, but barely scrapped the fighter.

The other three escorts pursued Kate and Hunch, who appeared from the cloud next and scattered in different directions.

Lily, meanwhile, continued dodging the enemy fire, the distance was sufficient to try and turn back, but she was waiting for the good opportunity. The enemy pilots were not that experienced it seems and soon their fire stopped for a few seconds. It was just enough for Lily to make a loop and turn into their direction. She used a sprayed barrage of ice shards to scare the enemies and went straight on in their direction. They tried to attack her, but were to scared and disorganised to aim properly. She got a few minor scraps on her left wing. Also, one enemy shot broke the cockpit glass and the shard scratched her left shoulder, but she ignored the injury. Once Lily got close enough to one of the fighters, she switch the fire to him and broke his right wing.

The enemy started losing height, but she had no time to check if it crushed, as other five pursuers turned and followed her. She needed to concentrate.

Meanwhile, Hunch was able to damage his pursuer enough for him to turn and run. He joined Kate when and they shot one of her pursuers together. The last enemy fighter also decided to flee. Now free from the pursuit they helped Lily. Despite still outnumbering our group, the remaining enemies decided to flee. Unfortunately, the second bomber was able to use the commotion to return to the base, but the hunt was still successful.

"Good job everyone", Lily praised her partners. "Lets get back to rest and re-supply".

"You are way to reckless, junior lieutenant", Kate was concerned about Lily’s behaviour. "What if they were more skilled?"

"Don’t worry, I can evaluate the situation".

"I hope so".

After they returned to the base, Lily was sent to the hospital to tend to her injury. She was really eager to go on another hunt that day, but medics stopped her and asked her to rest at least till tomorrow. Lily was pretty disappointed, but reluctantly agreed.

She went back to her room, threw the coat on a chair and lied down on bed. «What would Lex do in my place? Am I really to reckless? I don’t know. Maybe just dying in a fight is not a bad deal for me. But I still have responsibility for my comrades. It is not the time to be selfish».

The offensive was slowly but surely gaining ground, but the enemy was persistent. Initially high command planned two take the city by the end of July, but the attack slowed down and the plan moved to at least mid-August.

Also, the enemy three-star ace was still causing trouble for allied pilots. There were no new victims so far, as they were ordered to be cautious and just avoid him if possible, but the risk of him appearing made hunts less effective.

A week passed pretty routinely, Lily flew in pair with Kate, sometimes she took one to three other aces with her. They could not score any kills since, but kept the enemy at bay.

By the time June ended high command finalised the new attack plan and their regiment was moved even closer to the front. Today they had a free evening, so Lily was sitting with Kate in the base cantina. Kate had a mug of beer while she was just drinking some tea.

"Fights will get especially bloody from now on. It is the second biggest city in the country and it has high industrial value for the enemy even if all of the tank industry equipment was moved south beforehand. They will fight tooth and nail", Slacker sipped from her mug.

"I know, this is why they rely on us for bomber escorts and securing the airspace".

"Yeah, yeah. I just hope this bastard enemy ace won’t become even more annoying. Last week I barely avoided him. To bad commander Gruel did not leave any notes regarding his investigation. The guy from research division gave us the info, he sent to wing-leader, but it is not enough".

"Yeah, but we have to do with what we have".

They talked for some time and then Lily went to sleep, while Kate joined the third fighter wing pilots to drink a bit more, as she had no missions till the afternoon. After returning to her room Lily took out the sky-blue box again and looked at the piece of scarf inside. «What should I do now, Lex?»