The Balkoran War Prologue

This is the prologue to Dark Skies of the Balkoran War: This four part series is the story of three countries and the war which has consumed the world. I first came up with it in 2008 after being inspired by the Ace Combat series, 4, 5 and Zero after many drafts I have come up with this plot. I expect the entire series to be done in a little over four years so there is a ton of work to be done. At this time I am simultaneously writing the prologue and CH1 so I have low expectations for this right now. Currently  i am thinking of getting a Co-Author but I haven't decided yet. In the meantime enjoy the first draft of the prologue. I will continue editing this for the next few weeks.


                                                                                        Prologue:



The man got out of his car and stared into the murky grey skies, he could see nothing, not the sun, nor the planes he could hear overhead. The area around him was buzzing with activity. He motioned for his driver to come out and join him. The driver was puzzled as to the nature of this drive. Normally he would be driving this man to meetings and places of importance, but never to an open field so close to the coast; so close to the coast that would be invaded, or at least, attempted. The man looked at the driver and smiled, "we're here".
The driver was dumbfounded with this whole situation and the man could easily tell by the sickly look he was giving. "Why are we here?" he inquired. The man simply started to walk away, "we're here because we have to be.” he motioned to the driver, bring her up here and remove her chains." The driver was absolutely shocked by that order but he was obligated to obey it. He opened the left rear door revealing a badly bruised woman about 31 with blond hair and was wearing a tattered flight suit. The driver did not converse with her as it would be against orders. He simply undid her cuffs and leg chains and motioned her to follow the man.
The woman is a prisoner of the man and has been for over four years. She was once regarded as a fierce ace but now she has been reduced to a mere insignificance, a write-off of the war, forgotten by all accept one. But it didn't matter to her now, for all she knew she was going to be executed, after all, she never told them anything. She walked for about ten meters before she collapsed on the ground, exhausted from the torture she received just hours ago. The man was at the edge of the ridge and looked back at her, "I'm sorry for the mistreatment Security Division Eight has given you but I promise you that it won't happen again."
The woman brought her head up and clutched the grass around her, "you can't promise that, even if you could you wouldn't." she could barely get the words out due to her shortness of breath.
The man simply stared out to sea, and the sounds of jet engines got louder, but were soon replaced by a deafening explosion, not from a bomb but rather from an 18inch cannon. The woman got up when she heard that sound, as she knew the cannons that she heard. The man looked back and replied, "I can make you that promise, but even if I couldn't, they can". He pointed at the ocean. The woman immediately rushed up the hill as fast as her legs would allow, when she reached the ridge she collapsed at the sight and managed a tear. The entire horizon was filled with landing craft, each heading within two miles of their location. She looked further towards the horizon, a massive naval battle was underway, she couldn't tell which side was winning, all she could make out were a few destroyers close to the furthest landing craft, begin to engage a heavy cruiser. She was an air force pilot, not familiar with many naval tactics but even she knew that modern ships do not engage each other within half a mile anymore, why didn't each side fire off their missiles first? Then she heard it, the loudest sound she had ever heard, and immediately the destroyers were completely obliterated by a massive shockwave. The man turned towards her.
"That's the Balkara; as long as it stays afloat I fear your navy will not last one more hour."
The driver rushes up behind them, pistol in hand, he then points it at the man's back. "First you bring a dangerous prisoner to the coast, over two thousand miles from the prison, you have me practically release her and now why is it that you fear a glorious victory for our nation?"
The man turns around, not surprised to see that his own driver is against this plan, especially since he never told him what it was. "If we win, then this entire continent is conquered soil by our nation, the allied navy would not be able to stage a counter attack against an invasion of Asea, we both know this, if they win here, they will win the war and the world. For what? Revenge? The attacks on our country were faked, we did it, and we went to war because our leader would not accept what his predecessors wanted."
The driver lowered his pistol, "you make a serious claim against our government, is there any way you can back it up?"
The man walks towards the driver and extends his hand, "I can if you give me a chance." he actually thought that statement was enough to convince the driver.
The driver gave the Man a look of disgust, he clentched his pistol and hit The Man on the left cheek with the barrel of his gun. , "I shall keep my sidearm" he started turning back to the car, "I am leaving, and when I get to the Lackner headquarters I shall report you to Security Division. seeing as the war has finaly reached us I have every confidence you won't be going to the bunkers for help and you certainly won't be shooting me in the back for fear someone will notice."
The Man stood still as he called out to the Driver, "Do as you wish, you cannot stop what I've started." He knew the driver was right about him but he was certain that the Allies would land before he got to Lackner. The only problem was getting to the Allies without them shooting him, after all, he was the enemy.
The driver then started the engine and then drove the car east along the road to the town of Lackner.
The woman simply looked up at the Man "so you are defecting?"
He stared at the ocean. "yes"
"and I'm your ticket to freedom?"
"If you were my ticket to freedom I could have simply transferred you to the nearest coastal station and wait for the landing forces to capture it, providing they survive this battle." he pointed to the sky "I need him to see you, from the reports I’ve read, your wingman is out for vengeance," he pulls out a flare gun, " this should end that", he then fires a red flare into the fog filled sky.
"Why do you care?" she asked.
"Because, since you were shot down, he has been quite reckless he is soo focused on shooting down our ace that he will not engage any other target, for example," he points to what looks like a huge blob in the distance, she estimated that it was at least three fourths of a mile long." Thats the mighty Balkara, so powerfull that it just destroyed three of your cruisers just a moment ago. My sources say your squadron was tasked with sinking her. Yet I see no one attacking it." he hears a noise above them, "ahhh, here he is, about ten miles from his target. I do hope he recongnizes you. If not." He gives her a radio. "You know the frequency."
The plane starts to break through the clouds and heads for them.
The Woman's heart pounded as she saw the aircraft fly overhead, as he predicted, it was the duel painted F-16D, both paint schemes were split down the middle of the aircraft, the right being Crimson red with a jet black stripe starting at the nose and continuing along the side to the engine, the left was a mirror of the right being, jet black with a red stripe. The Plane was that of her wingman, he was the only remaining pilot in their squadron and they both used those colors on their jets, and she knew that only he would show her she was not forgotten by having her plane's scheme painted on his aircraft. The truth was that she was forgotten by her country, she was written off as dead when the war began and only now, four years later, he now knows she was not killed by their ace. The F-16 circled back and flew overhead again, this time waving its wings and then went full afterburner back into the fight above the clouds.
"Now we wait." announced the Man.
"For what?" she now walked to the edge of the ridge and looked towards the fortifications along the coast.
"For them to land, in the meantime we can only be spectators of this event."
"What about your driver?"
The man sighed "he will be too late to stop me, it's two hours to Lackner, that’s the only place where he can contact the capitol security division, personally I'd like Division Eight step in."
"Why?"
"Major Strauss is the lead officer on counter intelligence, though he is the personal hatchet man of the President, he has never killed anyone we believe he is secretly against the war. if I can get to him, we can end this war by getting to the president." he turned to her " the only way though to truly end the war is to reveal to the people what Division Eight did to Balkora, they and the president started this war."
They both turned towards the ocean as a huge explosion came from the battlefield, so intense that though it was ten miles away, some of the rocks from the ridge fell off as result of the shockwave.


The Man, Woman, Pilot, and Driver, are all part of a war which has been going on for four years, this war was known as the Seventh Balkoran/Ialy War. This region of the world has seen countless battles all dating back to one battle in 1845. On May 18th 1845 the Ialian prime minister was assassinated in the Nordinian Imperial capital of Amerceir, in retaliation Ialy declared war on the assassin’s country of origin, that country was the Balkoran Empire, They invaded through the western valleys and into the Balkoran Legacy desert. The war lasted for two years, and in 1847 an armistice was declared. Ialy won the war and gained control over the desert valley. In December of 1902. an Ialian made a discovery that would seal the fates of the two countries. He had discovered oil in the Legacy Desert. This discovery angered politicians who fought in the War of 1845, though there were few remaining from that war, they convinced the new Balkoran government that the oil was the rightful property of Balkora and on May 18th 1905 the sixtieth anniversary of the war of 1845, Balkora launched the "Desert Initiative" the objective, retake the oil fields. Balkora took the Ialians by surprise and in two days they retook the oil fields. Ialy launched a counter attack but was unsuccessful. There were subsequent wars between the two for the years after that, all were over these fields. Finally the longest and most devastating war to both sides happened on April 25 1985, this was known as the Fifteen Year War. On April 23, Ialy signed a trade agreement with the Nordinian Empire, a great ally of Balkora. Ialy believed that this would bring the two countries closer, what they did not know is that Balkora arranged for the agreement to take place. They were secretly building up their forces in the twenty year gap between the last of the four Oil Wars. The Nordinian Empire was unaware that government officials were paid off to convince their king to sign the trade agreement. This had no military value, its only purpose was to further lull the Ialian government into a false sense of security, on the 25th Balkora launched a land invasion into the desert followed by an invasion via an amphibious landing two hundred miles to the west of the desert. The Land forces would secure the fields while the sea forces would drive to the capitol. The Balkoran president was no longer accepting an armistice resulting in a future war in which they would lose their oil. This time the goal was to secure the oil fields and force the Ialian government to be dissolved an all territory would be assimilated into Balkora. When Balkora invaded the oil fields, the Ialian military responded by sending their army to counter attack. Their goal was to finally drive Balkora back and destroy their military to the point at which no side would be fighting again, but not invade Balkora. The Balkoran Tank corps crushed all the resistance, by the time the amphibious landing force landed, the Ialian military was at fifty percent, they only had a remnant Army, their Navy was useless, all that really remained was their Air Force. President Anatoli Minetti Issued an order, All Forces were to retreat to the Northern Mountains, their capitol was taken the next day. for twelve years they fought, mainly guerrilla warfare, only rarely engaging in full scale battles, frustrated, the Balkoran President gave an ultimatum, either they surrender in three days, or be destroyed, military and civilian, he did not specify the means of destruction but Minetti secretly flew to the Asean Capitol across the ocean where the Union of Allied Nations was convened. He presented the ultimatum to their head insisting that military aid be given to combat the Balkoran threat. However the U.A.N. would not hear of it, their head argued that because the two countries have been fighting for over a century, they were not worth giving aid to, they did not want to be the next target of either of the two. Minetti insisted on aid and refused to leave until it was given. During this time the Asean Intelligence Agency uncovered an unbelievable plot. Their informant in the Balkoran Air Force revealed that ten bombers were being fitted with nuclear weapons to use against the dug in Ialians. President Harris of Asea immediately brought this to the U.A.N. and stood by Minetti, the head still refused aid to Ialy. Harris promised Minetti that they would not stand by while his country was wiped from the earth. He ordered the entire Asean Military excluding National Defense Forces to be en route to Ialy in one hour. The Asean Air Defense Force was the last hope to Ialy, they would arrive only five hours before the deadline would expire, they would join the remaining Ialian Air Forces in what was known simply as the Great Air Battle. The chief of Staff for the Ialian Air Force activated a squadron that would defend their new capital from the nuclear threat, this squadron was named Roller. It was comprised of the twenty five best aces in the Air Force. It is this legendary squadron that the Woman and Pilot belong to. Roller squadron would join the newly formed Allied Forces in this battle. At noon on December 31st 1992 Balkora launched operation New World, the complete destruction of Ialy and all its inhabitants. Five minutes prior, the Allies launched Operation Freedom Wing; the operation was setup in a full barrier cap over the entire Ialy wartime border. Over two thousand aircraft were airborne from both sides. For two hours there was dogfighting on all along the border. Nine of the Balkoran bombers were shot down. The tenth did not make it to its target. That plane was piloted by a Joseph Cambell Balkora's most experienced bomber pilot despite it being his first year after exiting flight school. After sneaking through the blockade, he had his co-pilot takeover while he checked the bombs he claimed it was his aircraft and he should be sure the bombs will drop not his engineer. His target was a University in the middle of the wartime capitol. He did not want to commit to this mission, but his entire crew was. He was able to subdue his engineer and remove the fuses from the nukes. When he took over control of his aircraft he immediately dropped the nukes over a lake ten miles from the city, after doing so he ejected while a bomb placed in the plane's cockpit would take out the rest of the crew. He survived, he was captured and threatened with death until two weeks later when the flight data and recordings from the cockpit of his plane were recovered. a He was then regarded as an Ialian hero, he officially defected to Asea and remained there as the veteran squadron leader of Blizzard squadron until 2011 when he retired from the Air Force.
It was all downhill for Balkora, with this attack defeated, it was without doubt that Balkora would not give up in its efforts to rid of Ialy, the next day, after hearing of the nuclear attack, Decari, and the Ularia joined the Allies to help drive Balkora back. Ularia and Decari staged a two pronged assault behind the Balkoran lines and cut off their retreat. With nowhere to run the Balkorans, in their complete hatred of Ialy, fought to the last man, this was only due to military propaganda; as a result only ten Balkorans survived the final battle of the war. Balkora lost the war and went into economic chaos. Their military budget skyrocketed the debt and drove the country to bankruptcy, as a result most of their land was given to Ialy to clear the debts, and the president was executed by the World Court on crimes against humanity charges that same day. Balkora was falling apart. In 2002, two years after the Great War ended, the government began to stabilze, the next three leaders of the nation, taking lessons from the war, wanted nothing but peace between the two countries. Ialy accepted their peace agreements and hoped that this would be the start of a new beginning for both nations. It was. For twenty more years they would be at peace. However a secret group of radicals made a new discovery in their own country. This organization was the White Movement; they were comprised of generals and politicians from the last war their goal was to rid of Ialy and those responsible for their defeat resulting in the great economic collapse. Through geological research they discovered vast gold reserves in the southern region of Balkora. This would remain a secret until one of them would become the next president of Balkora. Since the war's end, Ialy and Asea have been allies and part of their agreement was the construction of a joint Ialy Asean airbase, In 2010 Victoria Air Force Base was constructed in what was former East Balkora. The first Asean squadron to be assigned to it was demon flight. Former President Harris would become the new head of the U.A.N. and Minetti the ambassador to the Nordinian Empire.
The importance of this air base would not be known until the reports of the Final Balkoran Ialy war were released.
It is at Victoria where the war began.