"Copy that, Overwatch." Everett replied as calmly as he could. The past few seconds, or even milliseconds, had felt like hours as he tried in vain to shake the bandit off his tail. He had completely forgotten about his planned attack on the bombers - every time he thought he had a window of opportunity to make a quick run on the bombers, the enemy fighter would immediately get a missile lock. Countermeasures counted for little when the enemy was directly behind you and could kill you with guns as easily as with missiles, and that meant that Everett had no choice but to break off his attack and initiate evasive maneuvers. It was infuriating, but Everett had to hand it to the enemy fighter, they were nothing if not determined.

The missile lock alarm sounded in the cockpit again; by now it was beginning to feel like an annoyance more than anything else. "Countermeasures away," Zola said nonchalantly. 

"Evading," Everett said and pulled the Fencer up into a climb. As successful as they were in frustrating the enemy's efforts to shoot them down, they could not go on like this forever. They had to shoot down the bombers before they even had a chance to bomb the airfield. Thankfully for Everett and Zola, the Ghost of the Strait still had one trick left up its sleeve. "Zola, fire up the plasma stealth system. I'll inform the squadron and Overwatch." Everett said grimly. Plasma stealth, while not a new concept, was still a rather new technology to be used in the field. It relied on hundreds of electrodes placed around the aircraft to heat up and ionize the air around it, effectively encasing the aircraft within a cloud of plasma. In theory, the cloud would deflect, absorb or even simply disrupt any electromagnetic waves entering it, making the aircraft invisible to almost all forms of detection.

Of course, it was all a theory.

"On it," Zola replied with a nod and starting flicking a number of switches, even reaching over to Everett's side of the cockpit at times. "System primed. Go is on you."

"Overwatch and squadron, be advised that Excalibur Four is activating plasma stealth. We will be off communications and off radar for the duration. Out." Everett said quickly over his mic and waited for a second before hitting the switch that would activate the system. The only sign that it came online was the momentary flickering of the electronic flight instruments and the sudden messages flashing across Zola's HUD informing her that the locking system of their missiles were either defective or being jammed. It made sense, the plasma stealth system, being a first-generation system, blocked all outgoing electromagnetic waves as well as incoming ones. Even their radar was displaying signs of being jammed.

However, it worked well enough to give Everett a rough idea as to where the bombers were. "Right, Zola, switch to guns." He said and turned the aircraft around. Their efforts to shake off the enemy fighter - which was still following them, in fact - had brought them ahead of the enemy bomber formation. "We'll be hitting them head on. How's our friend doing behind us?"

Zola smirked. "Not too well. Good for us, eh?" She said just as a burst of cannon fire flashed across her side of the cockpit. The Fencer even shuddered from taking one or two hits. "Fuck! Can't say he's not doing his fucking best to shoot us out of the sky, though." She grumbled.

Everett shrugged. "At least it will be easier evading cannon fire than missiles." He said. They were closing fast on the enemy bomber, and from what little Everett could see, they were quite literally going to be attacking it head on and from slightly above. It was the best angle Everett and Zola could ask for; they were essentially going to rake the entire length of the bomber with cannon fire, guaranteeing a hit on something vital.

"We're in range, I'm firing!" Zola shouted out.

"Don't stop until we're clear of the tail. I want to be sure that we've blown them out of the sky." Everett said, his tone dripping with determination.

"Just like ground attack, got it." Zola said with an almost manic grin as she pressed down on the trigger, firing the Fencer's cannons in several long bursts as Everett carefully piloted the aircraft to ensure they struck as much of the bomber as possible. The first burst punched clean through the cockpit as well as riddling the wingbox with holes. The second struck the bomber in the midsection, but it was the last two bursts that brought it down. The third and fourth burst ravaged the entire empennage of the Tu-95, reducing the elevators and rudder to just shreds of aluminum hanging onto a metal frame. With the loss of such vital flight control surfaces, the bomber lost control and fell into a deadly, unrecoverable spiral towards the earth.

However, Everett still had the enemy fighter to worry about. "Disengaging stealth. He won't try a missile kill here." Everett said and flicked the switch to turn off the plasma stealth system. At the speed they were going, it did not take long for the plasma cloud to dissipate. "Excalibur Four confirms one more bomber kill. Bogey still on my tail." He reported. "I'm flying among the bomber formation, he won't dare attempt a missile kill there."