chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): ROBOTECH: THE MISFOLD By (Hopefully) Many PART 1 EDITOR'S NOTE: This is part one of the second "revised" version of Robotech: The Misfold. The revisions mostly consist of updating the author's notes, correcting typos, and fixing continuity errors. For example, at one point in the story I had a Battler Cyclone firing chest minimissiles; however, Battlers do not actually have such missiles, as Palladium messed up. How many months ago did we begin this thing? I don't know. Oh, wait a minute, I DO know, because the day on which I started it is the day on which the story begins. So I'll just PageDown a few times, and...Ah, yes, September 21, 1992. Almost two years. And how much of it is written? Well, not a hell of a lot. Funny how once you start a project, other projects gang up on you to keep you from finishing it. I've been working on alt.pub.dragons-inn, Superguy, and various other stuff for the last year or so. However, in the last couple of weeks, it's beginning to seem like Misfold has just been sitting there, leering at me from its floppy, daring me to finish it before the slated arrival of the SDF-1/Macross to begin the Robotech saga. So I've decided to get off my duff and write/edit some more on the thing. Because we author/editors are generally expected to say interesting stuff in these notes, I guess I might as well put some interesting stuff in here. Like where I got the inspiration to start this story. I was inspired, believe it or not, by something in UNDOCUMENTED FEATURES 3: OUT IN THE COLD (by Megazone and Gryphon, available for anon FTP on wpi.wpi.edu). Specifically, the part where Gryphon flies the Shadow Legios and has an encounter with USAF F-15s. I thought, say, what if we took that a little further...? So I started this thing, as a vehicle to bring that into being. Of course, the few encounters that Veritechs and regular planes have had have been nothing like what I originally envisioned. But then, that's the way ideas go. It's been a bit surprising, the variety of authors I've picked up. For example, there's MegaZone, co-author of Undocumented Features, the best ever anime/Star Trek/SF fanfic ever written. Jim Pieri, whose name I have seen all over on Usenet and the Robotech list server. Jason Juta, who resides in Africa and is the illustrator for the Robotech Post-Invid RPG supplement that Dave Deitrich and I are putting together. And many others--you know who you are. This story couldn't exist without you. Thank you all, for being a part of this, for sending in your submissions, and for being there ready to continue the story. Oh, and if any of you guyz have any "author's notes" you'd like me to append to Misfold Part 7, send 'em in! ---Chris Meadows Author/Editor Springfield, Missouri Mon., Aug. 22, 1994 DISCLAIMER: The addresses given for the authors herein are not necessarily still correct. ROBOTECH: THE MISFOLD PART 1 The mighty engines of the starship began to come on-line. On the bridge, the astrotechs bent over their consoles, typing in the necessary equations to bring the ship safely through the non-space referred to loosely as "hyperspace" (though it was actually neither "hyper" nor "space") to its destination. The Captain of the ship paced nervously in his cabin. Captain Kranz didn't like spacefolding. It just wasn't _natural_, to bend and twist the fabric of spacetime the way the Ikazuchi's engines did. He'd heard all the scientific explanations--the layman's description of how the engines worked. "The principle is simple," Dr. Emil Lang, Robotechnology's premier scientist, had said in the briefing so many years before. "Envision the fabric of the space-time continuum as a rug." Lang had chuckled at the idea. "And envision the ship as a needle. Make the rug four feet wide. "Now they say that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. That would make the shortest distance between two points on the opposite edges of the rug four feet, right? WRONG." Lang shook his head. "No, the shortest distance between those two points is actually only a couple of inches. If you FOLD THE RUG." Knowing how the engines worked did not mean Kranz had to LIKE it. He shuddered every time they went through a fold jump, and usually spent the entire duration in his quarters. Let his second-in-command watch over the fold process. Kranz shifted his mind to another topic. ANYTHING was better than thinking of the upcoming fold jump. Kranz's starship, the S.S. ROOSEVELT, was one of the Ikazuchi-class star carriers. It carried a large compliment of the Veritech fighters which were the Robotech Expeditionary Force (REF)'s primary assault vehicle. These jet fighters were the most versatile vehicles ever created, for at the touch of a lever, they could reconfigure into fully humanoid robot configurations, all of thirty feet tall. For the last three years, the ROOSEVELT had been assigned menial patrol duties out near the galactic rim. There were some fears that the Invid, a war-like race of protoplasmic aliens, had been occupying some planets out that way, and the ROOSEVELT's Veritech mecha had been needed to free the worlds. The ROOSEVELT had done admirably in this task, and six worlds owed their new-found freedom to the valiant men and machines of this Robotech ship. But now it was time to go home. They had received emergency orders directing them to fold their ship directly to Earth, to join up with the so-called Mars Division that was returning to Earthspace. The Invid had taken over the mother planet, and the REF was not going to let them keep it! On the command decks of the ROOSEVELT, things went as usual. But there was a small error in one of the calculations one of the techs entered into the astro-navigation computer. Instead of typing "3C/G790.000002-AGxX," he entered "3C/G80-.000002-AGxX." It was a small error, but a costly one. It was several hours later. The fold coordinates had been checked and rechecked for inaccuracy, but by some incredible mischance, the error in the calculations had gone undetected, even by the computer cross-check program. Now it was time to go. "Full power to the fold engines," Commander Frederick Carter, the ship's first officer, ordered. "Engineering reports full power, sir," a helmsman said. "All gauges show green." "Lock in fold coordinates for Earthspace," Carter ordered. The helmsman entered a command on his alphanumeric keyboard and read the resulting message on his CRT. "Coordinates locked, sir. All preliminary signals are 'go.'" "Start the countdown." "Yessir. Fold minus fifteen seconds. Fold minus ten. Fold minus five, four, three, two, one. Initiating fold sequence." As the engines' vibrations changed, Carter instructed, "Check status. Stand by to go to manual override in case of a misfold." -Not that it would help any-, Carter thought. "Roger, sir. All systems are go!" the helmsman replied over the rising engine vibrations. The noise got louder and louder until it was all but impossible to hear, and then there was no noise, just the dancing chromatic afterimages always associated with a spacefold. Seconds or an infinity later, the ship emerged from spacefold, preceded by the fluctuating gravity wave disturbance common to spacefolding. And it was noticed. "NORAD command, this is Sparrow Leader. We have a visual confirmation on that bogey you sighted. And you are NOT going to believe this." "Sparrow Leader, this is NORAD command. Please switch on your on-board cameras and give us a visual description." "Roger, NORAD. Cameras on." The F-15 pilot reached over to his left and snapped a toggle switch. The gun cameras on his plane came on, and a small CRT monitor on his HDD (Heads-Down Display, or instrument panel) flickered to life. "Well, NORAD," the pilot continued, "it's about 3,000 feet long, as close as I can make it, and shaped pretty much like a brick. Color scheme of black and red, and there's lettering on the side. I...K...A...Z...U...C...H...I. 'Ikazuchi.' Sounds Japanese. Wouldn't put it past the Japs to build a spaceship like this and not tell us about it..." "Sparrow Leader, give us descriptions, not value judgements," the NORAD radio operator said caustically. "Roger, NORAD. There's more lettering...seems to spell out S.S. ROOSEVELT." "Sparrow Leader, give us a reading on its position." "Laser rangefinder indicates it's approximately 240,000 feet away from my present position, and the flight computer indicates that would put it at approximately 250,000 feet of altitude. It appears to be maintaining its position." "All right, Sparrow Leader, return to base." "Roger, NORAD." The F-15 fighter banked left, followed by the three other fighters in the flight, and headed for home. "Sir, we're reading radar contacts," one of the astrotechs said. "And they're not Invid. In fact, I'm reading no Invid anywhere. And I'm picking up civilian radio and video transmissions." "Get me a visual fix on those radar contacts," Commander Carter ordered. "Put it on the main viewscreen." "Yessir," the tech said, manipulating his controls. The picture on the main viewscreen zoomed in to focus on four aircraft. The view was a little shaky because of the extreme magnification, but the planes were easily identifiable. "Those are F-15s!" Carter gasped. "Those haven't been used for over 40 years, since the beginning of the Global Civil War!" Then the tech piped the civilian broadcasts through the speakers. "It's Monday, September 21, 1992. This is ABC News..." "Shut that off," Carter ordered. "What's going on here?" Another astrotech spoke up. "Sir, according to my instruments, we've jumped back in time to the year 1992 A.D." Carter's first thought was, -It's a good thing Captain Kranz isn't on the bridge. He'd _freak_.- His next thought was concerning an old vid he'd seen when he was just a boy--"Star Trek: Tomorrow is Yesterday," or something like that. "Warm up the engines," he commanded. "Prepare to execute a refold to take us out of here. We can't risk messing up history." The fold technician said, "Sir, we can't. It was obviously an error in our fold calculations which sent us here, and to fold again before we can track it down could be disastrous. In addition, it would completely obliterate any chance of our finding the original error, and thus any chance of our getting home." "Sir?" It was one of the younger, enlisted-rating techs who operated the pinpoint barrier system as part of her duties, and monitoring radio transmissions as another part. Her name was Janie Reeds, and she was a Corporal. "If this is 1992, how come the world isn't involved in the Global Civil War? I've been getting nothing but civilian transmissions for the last ten minutes, and there's no talk of any major wars going on at all." She paused, listened to her earpiece for a second. "Though there is some fighting in someplace named Bosnia-Hertzogovena, and also somewhere called Angola, it doesn't seem to be on the scale of what the fighting should have been at this time period." "That's a good question, Janie," Frederick Carter said. He turned to his left. "Major Eddings, do you have an answer for us?" Major Jonathan Eddings was the ROOSEVELT's senior science officer. He currently had the outputs of half a dozen sensor and receiver banks up on his screens and was examining them all. "From what I have been able to ascertain," he replied, never looking up from his screens, "we appear to have misfolded not only chronologically, but into another space-time continuum as well." He reached out, keyed some commands into his keyboard. "I'll have more data for you in a couple of hours." He hit the Enter key a few times, then keyed in a change on one of the touch-sensitive monitors at his station. Carter made up his mind. "Very well, hold our current position. We'll monitor broadcasts for a few hours, then send a scouting party to find out what's going on. Have a VF-1S prepped for the mission--we'll use our oldest fighters until we can be sure of what's going on down there. They should be more than a match for anything the current technology can throw at them, while keeping our most advanced fighters in reserve. I'll be in my quarters." He got up from the command chair, stretched, turned to go. "Oh, and you might as well notify Captain Kranz of what's happened." He left the bridge, leaving the crew wondering what they were going to do next. megazone@wpi.WPI.EDU (B Bikowicz): Commander Carter wasn't the only one interested in knowing more about his potential foes. NORAD was abuzz. The senior officer grabbed the hotline. "Get me Ninth Recon, Beale, NOW!" His aide looked at him in shock. "Ninth Recon?" "Yes, we need to get a closer..." He turned his attention to the phone. "This is General Mitchell. Yes, are you aware of the situation? Good. I want all the info you can give me. On my authorization I want you to prep a U-2R for a recon run. That's the open op. You know what we need, right? Yes, I'll have his authorization for the actual mission. Just get the Aurora ready." Hanging up the phone he turned to his aide, "We need some topside data too. I want you to arrange for Keyhole and Lacrosse passes. Understood? Do whatever is necessary. And have those Eagle pilots isolated until we can debrief them, we don't need this going public. That's just what those Hangar 18 nuts would want." With that he returned to studying the available data. After a moment he picked up the phone again. "Get me a plane to DC. No, not a VIP flight. Prep an Eagle and get me a good pilot, I need to be there yesterday." -The President is going to be shitting bricks,- he thought. -So what am I going to tell him?- Two hours later Captain Kranz was on the bridge to view the launching of the VF-1S. The Valkyrie was minimally armed, carrying only its booster packs for weapons. The underbelly was taken up by a conformal Tactical Recon unit. The TAC-CON unit bristled with sensors: Side-Looking Airborne Radar (SLAR), Imaging Synthetic Aperture Radar (ISAR), photographic equipment, Thermal Imaging (TI) gear, and all manner of Electronic Intelligence (Elint) gear. Carrying the TAC-CON unit did restrict the Valkyrie to fighter mode due to its size, but nothing should be able to touch the fighter anyway--the pod's drag was lower than the normal weaponry, making for an even higher speed. "Looking Glass ready," Lt. Joe Walker called from the hanger deck. The duty officer looked to Capt. Kranz who replied with a slight nod. "Looking Glass, you are clear for launch and flight along programmed route." "Roger." Lt. Walker advanced the throttles to the stop, kicking the Valkyrie out of the hanger deck and racing into the upper atmosphere. Once level at 120,000 feet he settled into an efficient Mach 6 cruise and began a coast to coast run from east to west. As he crossed the coast the TAC-CON pod went active. "Telemetry links are green, we're getting good data," Eddings said, entering commands into the computer keyboard at his station. "I'm washing it through image enhancement, it's coming up on screen now." As the Valkyrie swept over the northeastern sector, images, each covering thousands of acres, scrolled across the bridge monitors. "No signs of war at all. Everything appears intact. There are quite a number of radar tracking systems in operation, however most appear dedicated to civilian use. Few seem capable of tracking the Valkyrie at its present altitude. No sign of any weapons systems which pose a threat. There are several fighters airborne which seem to be limited to 60,000 feet. That's it," Major Eddings finished his report. "Very good Major. Let me know if anything else turns up," Captain Kranz said. "Aye aye sir." -What the hell is going on? I always *KNEW* something would happen with that damn fold system. It just isn't right twisting reality like that. It isn't natural,- Kranz thought as he watched the images scroll across the screen. General Mitchell watched as a new radar track separated from the UFO and raced for the coast. There was a moment of panic as the thought of a preemptive strike on DC flashed through his mind. However, the track soon clearly indicated a path well to the north. Kennebunkport?! No, the chief was in DC today. Damn, why did he have to be so stubborn? He should be up on Air Force One right now. A moving target is harder to kill. No, that's no good. The press would notice that immediately. What they needed least at the moment was a panic. He watched as the data on the track firmed up. Damn! Mach 6 and 25 miles up! He switched his screen to a realtime sat shot. Shit! It looked like a Tomcat on steroids! What he wouldn't give to fly that baby. -Wait a minute.- The reality of the design hit him. -It's conventional! It has wings! That thing is meant for transatmospheric operation.- The damn Aurora would have trouble keeping up with that aircraft, and he had no doubts that the UFO wasn't pushing it. He grabbed a phone again, this time a direct line to a secret base in Nevada. "Jones residence." "General Mitchell" "Yessir. Voice print confirmed. You've got the Skunk Works General. What can we do for you?" "I assume you know the situation?" "You should never assume...but yes." He hated the arrogant attitude of the techs, but they made up for it with their magic. "What have you got for competition?" "Project Blackeye. Palletized missile system for the Aurora. The missile uses a Pulsed Detonation Wave Engine, PDWE, much like the Aurora, and switches to a solid rocket for exoatmospheric flight and terminal homing. It was originally intended for ASAT use. Project Hotflash. This is a larger missile two of which can be carried conformally by the Aurora. Uses the PDWE and compression lift followed by a liquid fuel rocket. Intended for orbital insertion of small intel sats on short notice. We can fit them with warheads if you need 'em. Nukes if necessary. Interface and launch equipment is palletized for the sensor bays. And...well..." "What?" "We're not quite done with testing but...Project Nova. Have you heard of it?" "Only whispers." "Well, we have ten test aircraft. They're semi-operational. Two-man craft, using turbo-ramjets, extendable scramjets, and a final liquid fuel kick into LEO. We used the ramjet afterbody for the rocket, nice trick...Anyway, they can carry the Black Eye. Plus they're equipped with integral Brilliant Pebble launchers. We can launch them from the base, but their automated first stage boost systems have been recalcitrant. We've been using a B-52H to parent for them. Like the old D-21 drones. Only 4 are close to full up, maybe 2 more on short notice. The other 4 will have to go as is." "I understand. Mobilize all your forces. You're are only real hope if this thing is hostile. I've also had the old ASATs taken out of storage and dusted off, and a couple of Eagles are being readied as we speak. The Lear from the tests is being tracked down. Those missiles are the only nonblack forces we have in this situation. How long until Black Eye and Hotflash are ready?" "I'd say we can be ready to move in 6 to 8 hours." "I'll have a Galaxy there in 5." "Understood." "Good luck." chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): In the modified VF-1S code-named "Looking Glass," Lt. Joe Walker kept a steady hand on the controls as he watched his three computer/communication screens. In the port screen, the navicomputer was displaying his projected course, with a green line tracing across the world map that he was to follow. The starboard screen was displaying fighter systems status. Walker glanced at it again, responding to a query from the ROOSEVELT. "This is Looking Glass. All systems read well within the green. I'm getting some great pictures, too." "Roger, Looking Glass. Continue along preset course. RTC out." Walker snorted, pressing the square on the starboard touch-sensitive screen that reset radio communications to standby. "Continue along preset course," he muttered. "What'n hell do they THINK I'm doing?" He resorted to one of his favorite expressions. "Brass. Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em. Or so THEY say." Then Walker's attention turned back to the center comm screen. Here was where some of the data from the TAC-CON unit was being piped to. He couldn't understand most of it, but he knew enough about sensory instruments to make use of the advanced cameras and radar receiving system. "Hmm, reading some fast-moving blips, about 70,000 feet down and 600 miles ahead. Better see what the TAC-CON has to say about them." He reset the starboard screen to give him an image. There were some blips as the gunsight system locked in, giving him a picture. "Well, what do you know...F-15 Eagles." He thumbed the radio back on. "Looking Glass to ROOSEVELT Tactical Command. Looking Glass to RTC. Do you read, over." He activated split-screen on the port screen, and the image of the ROOSEVELT's CAG overlaid part of the navigation display. "RTC to Looking Glass," the image said. "Go ahead, Looking Glass." Walker slid the faceplate of his CVR-3 up. "I've spotted four bogeys ahead, visual ident as Foxtrot-One Fiver interceptors. Request permission to deviate from preset course for close-up reconnoiter." "Negative, Looking Glass. Stay on course. Repeat, stay on course." "I believe that close-up examination could prove beneficial, sir." -Beneficial to ME,- he thought but didn't say. Walker was a nostalgia buff, of the late 20th century in particular. His great-grandparents had been fighter pilots in the Navy and the Air Force, and he had always wanted to see, close-up and in action, the kind of planes they had flown. The CAG, who knew Lt. Walker all too well, said, "You just want to get in there and do some turns and burns with them, show them you're better than they are." "But sir, it's important that they know we can outfly them, so they won't try anything against us." "Oh, hell," the CAG said. "If I didn't say yes, you'd do it anyway." The CAG had always had a soft spot for the brash young pilot--he reminded him of himself at that age--and also, deep down, he was anxious to see the fighters close up, too. "Thankyou, RTC. Beginning course deviation...now." Lt. Walker switched off communications, slid down the faceplate on his CVR helmet, and disengaged the autopilot. He shoved the stick forward, and the throttle up. The plane began to descend. ETA to the F-15s: 40 seconds. By some uncanny cosmic coincidence, the fighter flight Lt. Walker was planning to "buzz" was General Mitchell's transport and escort to Washington. It was officially under the guise of a "training flight"--if word got out that one of America's top-ranking generals was being rushed to Washington via F-15, it could start a panic! Mitchell was keeping track of the situation on his satellite-connected laptop computer, which was currently displaying a miniature version of the gridmap on NORAD's main screen. It took several seconds before he realized that the plane had changed its course, and half a minute more for him to realize where the plane had changed its course TO. By the time he looked up, the Valkyrie was almost upon them. As Walker approached closer and closer to the F-15s, he began throttling back, then applying reverse thrust to slow Looking Glass down enough not to overshoot the mark. First Walker passed about a thousand feet overhead, then he made a wide looping curve to come up behind the four planes and match speed. "Let's see what they look like," he said. "Cameras, focus on the lead plane." "Son of a BITCH!" the pilot of General Mitchell's F-15 said, and repeated several times, to the point where Mitchell had to tell him, "Lieutenant, SHUT UP." But he was left pretty speechless himself. The plane was about a hundred feet to the starboard of the flight, matching their speed of Mach 1.7 easily. Now that he had a better view of it, Mitchell could see that it did indeed resemble an F-14 Tomcat, though it was a bit shorter and had some sort of additional thruster pack on the top. As the plane veered closer, Mitchell could even read the markings. "U.N. SPACY," it said, and "REF." There was no flag on the plane, though there was a strange sort of symbol--a red truncated diamond in the middle of a circle. And there was what seemed to be a plane designation, on the tailfin: VF-499. The fighter was obviously carrying a great deal of reconnaissance equipment, to General Mitchell's trained eye--some of it he couldn't identify, but it certainly resembled data-gathering gear more than it did weapons. There were wing-mounted pods bristling with antennae and other sensors, and a ventrally-mounted camera pod that was pointing right at him. "Of course!" Mitchell said aloud, as the realization hit him. "That's the reason for the high-speed aerial sweep--they're gathering intelligence." -And I see no reason why we can't gather a little intelligence of our own...- he added mentally. "Hedgehog leader to Hedgehog 4. Decrease speed and get behind the bogey. Activate your gun cameras and go for missile lock. I want to see what he does." "Uh, sir, I don't know if I want to try that--that thing looks DANGEROUS..." "Obey your orders, Lieutenant!" "Yessir." One of the planes decreased its throttle, and moved over behind the Valkyrie. "Gun cameras on...going for missile lock..." "What?" At the tone, Lt. Walker glanced at the control board. "I'm reading a radar lock." He swiveled the camera around to the rear. "Oh, one of the F-15s is on my six, eh? Activating ECM." He flipped a toggle, and one of the wing-mounted pods started sending out irregular radio pulses. "Hedgehog 4 to Hedgehog leader--I've lost missile lock. The computer will not lock on." "I copy, Hedgehog 4. Return to formation." -The lab boys should be able to analyze that camera footage to see what kind of propulsion they've got,- Mitchell thought. He looked at the plane again, as it came closer. Then he saw through the Veritech's canopy. -He sees me,- Walker realized. "The least I can do is be friendly." He pulled off the CVR helmet and waved. Then he had an idea. "Computer, find the frequency those planes are broadcasting on, and give me audio transmission." The computer chirped to let him know the line was open. "This is VF-499, call sign Looking Glass, calling F-15 fighter flight leader. Do you copy, F-15." General Mitchell's jaw gaped as he heard the transmission come over his headset. It was a young voice, with an American accent, and it could have been the voice of one of the pilots in his squadron. It took him a minute before he could get himself together enough to respond. "This is Hedgehog Leader to Looking Glass. I, uh, read you, go ahead Looking Glass." -Contact!- he thought, gasping. -I can't believe this--it's first contact! And they're HUMAN!- "This is Lieutenant Joe Walker, 112th Tactical Space Corps, Robotech Expeditionary Force. I would like to say, from one fighter pilot to another, greetings!" The pilot paused a moment, then said, "I've seen enough 20th century movies to know how hackneyed this is going to sound, but we come in peace!" Markmeister <4MCKENZIE_M@SPCVXA.BITNET>: The inside of General Mitchell's mouth became as dry as sandpaper. "I say again, this is Lt. Joe Walker of the 112th Tactical Space Corps, Robotech Expeditionary Force. We come in peace. Do you copy, Hedgehog Leader? Inside the Veritech's cockpit, Walker waited for a response, hoping that a shooting match wasn't about to start. He wasn't afraid of the F-15s--the Veritech could handle ten of them. He just didn't want to start out on the wrong foot. A hoarse but authoritative voice came over the net: "This is General Mitchell of the United States Air Force. Uh, VF-499--er, Looking Glass, what are you doing in American airspace?" chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): Commander Carter walked onto the bridge of the Roosevelt after taking a brief nap. The first thing he heard was, "What the HELL is he doing DOWN THERE!?" The person doing the shouting, Carter realized at once, was Captain Kranz. He was staring at the main bridge viewscreen, which was displaying data from the Veritech's onboard sensors. In seconds, Carter picked up on what was going on--this talent of his for rapid assessments was one of the things that accounted for his rapid advancement up the ranks. It seemed that Looking Glass had "inexplicably deviated from its set course" and was currently matching speeds with a formation of F-15 fighters. In addition, the pilot, a Lieutenant Joe Walker, had made contact with the fighter section leader, a General Mitchell of the U.S. Air Force. Mitchell had asked what they were doing in American airspace. "And NOW he wants to know what he should tell them!" Captain Kranz fumed. "Who the hell is responsible for this, anyway?" "I am," the Ikazuchi's CAG (Commander: Air Group), Commander Richard Anders spoke up, stepping onto the bridge. "He requested permission to go in for a closer look, and I granted it, believing that it might be tactically adviseable to see what they could throw against us." He thumped a nearby data display console. "As you can see, the data we're getting on the structure of their fighters is well worth it." Kranz muttered something incomprehensible. In the REF's Ikazuchi carriers, as in the aircraft carriers of the late 20th century, the Commander of the Air Group was greatly the Captain's equal, and there wasn't much Kranz could do about it. While Kranz was fuming, Carter was acting. He grabbed a telephone handset off of one of the telecommunication terminals on the wall and hit the button. "Commander Carter here. Patch me through to Looking Glass." The telecom's screen lit up with a view of a pilot dressed in CVR-3 ceramic body armor. "This is Commander Carter. Listen up, Looking Glass." "I read you, Commander," Walker said. "You can tell Mitchell the truth, and even give him a thumbnail sketch of our history if he asks, but leave out all references to the transformation aspect of our Robotechnology, and to the nature of its power source. Do you copy?" "Roger, Commander," Walker responded, relieved to know exactly what he was allowed to say. "Looking Glass over and out." The screen blanked as the pilot switched it off. "Hedgehog Leader, this is Looking Glass. I have received authorization to tell you who we are and why we're here. Do you read, Hedgehog Leader?" "Five by five," General Mitchell responded in aviators' slang for maximum loudness by maximum clarity, "go ahead, Looking Glass." He began to listen, in rapt anticipation. "Well, it all started about 1999..." Markmeister <4MCKENZIE_M@SPCVXA.BITNET>: Joe Walker's Veritech, still in Fighter mode, paced the F-15 flight. "And that's all I can tell you, General Mitchell. We're here, but not because we want to be." General Mitchell silently mulled over the rest of Walker's message. The lad had said a lot more--things about alien invasions, space fortresses, Robotech Masters, Invid...and the creepy thing was that Mitchell believed him. The pilot in the plane--or mecha, as he had called it, sure as hell didn't belong in this universe. Captain Kranz rubbed his jaw, feeling a stubble of beard. -Need a shave soon,- he thought. "Ensign Coello, what's the status of Looking Glass?" Ensign Illeana Coello tapped in a sequence on her keyboard. The main screen displayed a map an a group of blips in tight formation. Commander Carter reported, "Hmm...he's with them and there don't seem to be any problems...wait a minute...what could that be, Ensign Coello?" Illeana read her screen and responded, "It's a civillian transport vehicle...a 747 by the looks of it." "How far is it from the group?" Kranz asked. "Three miles and closing." "All right. Get on the net and inform Walker at once." No one noticed the blip that briefly appeared south of the group. No one could, because it disappeared from sight one half second after it showed up. A sleek dark shape sped at four times the speed of sound toward the F-15 group. It was needle-thin and coal-black, resembling the old F-104 Starfighter, except that this craft had a delta wing and a square exhaust nozzle. Inside, the pilot made minute corrections to his course. Checking his radar and other sensors, he made sure that he had not been detected. There was nothing. He had not been picked up. So much the better, he smiled behind his oxygen mask. He flipped a series of switches, and his weapons board switched to green--they were fully armed. Meanwhile, halfway around the world... Jason Juta : Asuka Suzuki waited motionlessly on the cold, hard airstrip. The wind whipped his jacket around this way and that, giving it the appearance of a slick animal trying to claw him to death. As he waited for the transport, he pondered the facts which had caused such an uproar at Intelligence. The thought of an extraterrestrial craft hovering near North America was enough to make him want to faint with excitement. Not much was known about it, though, because they couldn't use any powerful equipment without alerting the "aliens" or other, more mundane, groups. The Americans were keeping a very low profile about it, that was for sure. Asuka wondered if they had established communications. His thoughts were arrested by the thunderous roar of the transport plane landing nearby. Its huge propellers slowed as it ground to a halt, and he started off to meet its special passenger. When he was twenty paces away, the door opened and a man in a dark suit and glasses climbed out, looking around impassively. "How...cliched." Asuka muttered under his breath. The goon started down the stairs, and was followed by a short, well proportioned woman in a sharply cut and ironed suit. Her dark hair whipped violently across her face, almost concealing her fine features and flashing green eyes, which travelled briefly over him before alighting on his face. "Miss Tanaka," he greeted her. "It's good of you to come on such short notice." She shook his hand. "It's good that you contacted us so soon, Professor Suzuki," she replied cooly. "Let's get out of the wind, shall we?" After driving for a few minutes, Asuka had filled Ivory in on all the details. His attempts at conversation had produced nothing more than her full name, Ivory Tanaka, and a few comments on the weather, so he had proceeded to tell her the details of the discovery. A large, rectangular craft with an unknown power source was suspended in American airspace. A little activity had occurred, including the 'meeting' of a UFO and and an F15. "There appear to be some electromagnetic anomalies around the area. I suppose that they're caused by the engines," he commented finally. Ivory stared ahead at the road. "This is an excellent opportunity for the Company to test our new equipment. And, if things go well, we might even be able to get our hands on that alien technology." She turned to him. "But of course, you know nothing of this, Professor. We do not exist. We have nothing to do with the Japanese Government. You do not know me... understand?" She stroked her neck meaningfully. Instead of feeling threatened, however, Asuka found the gesture quite sexy. She was quite beautiful...if she wasn't working for the Company, he might even have tried to ask her out. Ivory spoke again, interrupting his fantasies. "The hardware and the EA-2000 are being delivered to the airbase right now. I'll be setting up the prototype control system as soon as we've got some readings on the ship." She almost smiled. " I've been wanting to try out the virtuality remote control in an actual mission for a long time now." The thought of her in a skintight virtual reality suit sent Asuka's mind soaring again. Or perhaps plummeting was a better word. A few hours later, Asuka looked up from his console. He had just finished feeding the last in a series of CD-ROMs into a complex computer which had been set up in his laboratory. It wasn't all that large, but had a menacing, technological look that he found unsettling, looking almost like a bug of some sort. A sea of wires vomited out of it, all of them connecting the Parallel Processor to Ivory Tanaka. She wore a blue bodysuit which left little to the imagination, and it was to this that the wires were connected. A large system of cables and harnesses had her suspended from the ceiling, making her look like a spider caught in its own web. Around the lab were scattered other pieces of equipment, and grim-looking Company scientists, bending to their various tasks with cold efficiency. He looked at her again, then handed her a large black helmet, managing to touch her hand in the process. She glanced at him, but said nothing, and slipped the helmet on. A technician stepped up to him. "Could you please take your seat, Professor?" He went with the tech and sat in a corner, out of the way. From further away, the entire setup almost looked absurd. But it was still exciting. If only the poor scientists working on virtual reality around the world knew that the Company had perfected it as a smart control system.... Ivory swung her limbs about, loosening up, as the techs scurried around the lab, doing last checks to their equipment, and connecting the helmet to a large wall screen. Finally, they sat down. "Systems checked and okayed." "Processing checked." "Override checked." "All systems operational and ready." "EA-2000 ready to take off." "Commencing VR control." "10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1..System operational!" And then the wall screen sprang to life. keely@netcom.com (Keely Christa Danine): Old voices, old songs. Waves of radio dancing upon the hull. "Computers," a harsh voice spoke through gritted teeth, "are SUPPOSED to be unimaginative." The speaker's name was Stefan Anderson. One of the ROOSEVELT's senior technicians, he should properly have been off duty. His only real concession to the changing shift was that he worked in his room rather than among the others of his kind. Wearing his uniform still, he bent over the terminal, the blue of worry already about his eyes. His fingers tickled the keys again, and the computer spoke with dulcet voice. "Hmm?" Sigh. Once recovered from the shock of their arrival, he had been quick to deduce the accident's cause. A skein of tangled events was life, with certain that stood out in unfortunate combination; it was ever thus. The Invid had been ready for the S.S. FIRE EYE. The electric song of a well-aimed missile left the bridge without life support for near two minutes before the computer cleared its thoughts. Those who were there reacted in different ways. The Captain and the essential crew, of course, with cool detachment. An ensign trapped with the rest of them panicked briefly, but restrained himself after no more than a dirty look. Lieutenant Hannock, astrotech, had handled himself decently well for someone without true combat experience. Even so, even now he could grow pale at the thought of that time, when the lights and consoles had dimmed and the flow of air stopped. When he had nothing to do but wait quietly to see if he would die. For most of the support staff, such things were easier. Sheltered by the hull and their distance from command, they could, at least, not see their enemy rising against the sun, not see the cold plans laid for battle. And even when the ship quaked, they could pretend. Stefan had spent the battle playing cards with himself. It was never in him to worry about these things. The natural turn of his mind was towards action and confidence; mania and delusion. Where this did not shelter him from trauma, dianin socrazine did; the doctors had long ago determined him in need of a sedative to restrain his excesses, and few better could be found. The medication was at best a tolerated evil. Within him, he could often feel the rush of energy and impulse that crashed against the drug-made gates. It had all been very innocent. Lieutenant Hannock had been suffering from nightmares and restlessness. And his next shift was slated, until the traditional last-minute changes, for well after the delicate fold. He was a friend. It was all very natural to loan him some. Just enough to help him sleep. Just enough to fuzz his mind ... Knowing of the drug made determination of the error far easier for Lieutenant Anderson than it would be for the others who labored to track it down. The number of errors that a single technician can make are far fewer than those that many can. And quickly enough, hold the calculator whichever way he might, his guess at the error's source had been confirmed. It was clear to Stefan that it was Lieutenant Hannock's fault, if it was not the Invid's ... who had, after all, precipitated the original trauma. It was equally clear that most determinations would place some upon his shoulders. Loaning out the drug was, of course, criminal. And military law is harsh. The next step became to conceal the truth. It wasn't easy. He had been arguing with the machine for almost an hour now. Reason had long since been exhausted, and the privileges of rank had fallen in its track. He was forced to resort to more common methods of hacking. And worse by far, the computer seemed to be catching on. He was good enough that he was used to fudging. But far from perfect. Security. He wrinkled his nose. It was an old man's game. The visions were beginning. It made it hard to work, but he decided not to catch up on a missed dose. They were harmless ... would be harmless ... for days, if the usual patterns held true. Weeks, if he was lucky, before he lost the ability to _believe_ that they were unreal. Before then, he would no doubt be back on the medication, detestable as it was. He had superiors to watch out for. As always. He smiled faintly, as if to show the machine that he would prevail despite all odds. His fingers danced over the controls again. The computer beeped. chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): Major Jonathan Eddings was at his station on the bridge, entering commands into the keyboard. He was setting up a data uplink program that would allow the ROOSEVELT's computers to interface with earthly computers, over a data network that archives said had existed in the late 1980s and that, Eddings conjectured, in all probability still existed today: Internet. Eddings had just finished programming the data interpreter when an alarm went off on his console. "What the--?!" Eddings began, acting before the second syllable was out of his mouth. Within 1.5 seconds of the alarm, his palm had slammed down on the red "System Lockout" button next to his keyboard. The function of this key was to lock all consoles out of the ROOSEVELT's main computer except his own. The bridge's illumination lights began to flash red, but Eddings ignored them. What was going on? Eddings' fingers clattered on the keyboard. He drew a sharp intake of breath. Someone had just tried to delete the spacefold coordinate log file! If the error-checking programs hadn't been running at the time, the log would have been wiped out! Eddings felt faint when he realized that he almost hadn't started the programs when he'd logged on, in his haste to set up the Internet client. Well, there was one way to safeguard the file completely, and that was to make numerous backups. Eddings used his OVERLORD-class clearance to begin downloading the spacefold coordinate log file to fiber-optic chip. Then Captain Kranz was at his console. "What the hell is going on?!" -That seems to be his favorite expression lately,- Eddings thought. "All the computer-run systems have shut down, including communications--we're completely out of touch with Looking Glass!" "It couldn't be helped, sir," Eddings explained. "Someone just tried to delete the spacefold coordinate log file." Kranz gasped as he realized the significance of this. "If that file had been wiped out, we'd never get home again!" Eddings wisely decided not to mention that there was still a high probability that they wouldn't get home and said, "Exactly. Which is why I engaged System Lockout while I'm copying the file to chip. It should be done in, oh...seventeen seconds." "Just hurry up!" Kranz said. "Without our communications with Looking Glass, there's no telling what he could be getting into!" In his quarters, Stefan Anderson laughed at the computer whose flashing red screen said ***LOCKOUT*** in large, unfriendly letters. His attempt had been detected, as he'd thought it would...but not before he'd managed to slip a scrambler virus into the datafile. Anderson knew that if he attempted to change the log, he would be detected and logged. But if he attempted to DELETE it, a system glitch would cause the logging function to be off-line for approximately 1.377 seconds. Thus he had inserted the virus and logged out. The program ran the delete command, then found and changed the proper string of characters in the coordinate file. Now the error was erased--3C/G80-.000002-AGxX was 3C/G790.000002-AGxX once more. "No computer beats me." ajalbert@watson.eece.maine.edu (Anthony J. Albert): Lieutenant Joe Walker's head suddenly swung back to the display. A beep had alerted him to something...but what was it? -Ah, there. Another aircraft nearby.- He focused the cameras on it. It appeared to be a large civilian aircraft, no threat. "Bogie at 50 miles, Hedgehog Leader. Appears to be civilian," Walker reported. The sleek black craft was closing on its target. The alien plane was directly ahead, but the radar guided missiles refused to get a lock on it. The pilot, a product of the best flight school around, switched his selector to infra-red, waited a moment for the growl of the heat-seeking warhead to sound in his headphones, and fired. Missile alert sounded in Lt. Walker's headset. -DAMN- was all the thought he used as reflexes (and Reflex technology) kicked in, to boost the thrust and send the Veritech into a snap-roll. The missile lost its lock on the Veritech fighter, looked for the next hottest spot in the sky, and zeroed in on Hedgehog 4. General Mitchell watched as the Veritech suddenly went into crazy manuevers. Then the missile warning tone sounded in his own headset. Suddenly, Hedgehog 4 exploded. -What the...- thought the General. "Flight break!" he yelled into the headset. Hedgehog flight scattered. Lt. Walker, meanwhile, was looking for the attacker, and informing the S.S. ROOSEVELT what had happened. "You say you're under attack?" replied the CAG. "We have nothing on our scopes here." "Well, a missile just took down one of the F-15's. My scope's clear, and the visual camera's not done with its sky search yet," replied Joe. *BEEP* sounded as the cameras got a glimpse of the enemy and put it on the screen. -Odd looking craft. Flat black, all smooth airframe, and _not_ on my radar scope. Well, it tried to kill me, so I think I'd better return the favor.- Walker slaved the ventrally-mounted laser cannons, the only weapons he had, to the camera. The pilot of the black stealth craft cursed to himself, as the missile missed the alien. -Operative One won't be pleased if I screw up,- he thought as he lined up for a head-on missile lock. The tone sounded in his ears, and he squeezed the trigger. Just a moment later, the Veritech's camera found the range, and triggered the lasers. As they swept across the black plane, its fuel tanks exploded, reducing the stealth aircraft to little more than splinters. But the missile was already away. ajalbert@watson.eece.maine.edu (Anthony J. Albert) and chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): -Missile!- was in Walker's head as he turned to evade. But it was too late. The missile slammed into the underside of the VF-1S, destroying the recon pallet and spraying fragments throughout the craft. "RTC, I'm turning back," he notified the S.S. ROOSEVELT. "Request you rig for a crash landing." There was no response. Walker tried again. Still nothing. The ROOSEVELT's comm signal had abruptly cut out. Hedgehog flight had scattered. By coincidence, General Mitchell's F-15 had turned just enough for him to see what had happened. He saw the stealth aircraft just before the Veritech's laser raked it, and he saw the missile strike the Veritech. -Damn, it's tough,- he thought in admiration. -That missile would have killed any one of our planes, but it's still flying. Flying roughly, but still flying, and mostly in one piece.- Mitchell checked his laptop. The Veritech was turning back towards its ship. "Looking Glass, this is Hedgehog Leader. Do you require assistance, over?" Lt. Walker was struggling, but the Veritech was (mostly) staying in the air. "Hedgehog Leader, this is Looking Glass. Negative, I can make it back to the ROOSEVELT. Thanks for the offer, over." Just then warning lights began coming on all across Walker's control board. "What? What's happening?" He punched for a systems status check. Apparently the power surge caused by the destruction of the TAC-CON had caused a power surge that had fried half the circuit boards in the Veritech's computers. With these critical failures and the lack of contact from the ROOSEVELT, Walker was hesitant about trying to make it back to the ship. Joe switched over to full manual controls and called General Mitchell again. "Hedgehog Leader, this is Looking Glass. Things have gotten worse, so I'm going to have to take you up on that offer. Conditions are deteriorating, so I will land where you direct," he said into his helmet mike as he pulled the handle to jettison the remains of the recon systems. "Roger that, Looking Glass. I'll direct you to Langley Air Force Base; its the closest. Hedgehog Flight will stay on your wing until you get there. Hedgehog Leader over." General Mitchell then contacted the controller at Langley. "This is Hedgehog Flight Leader, we have an emergency, and request immediate crash landing clearance." It was granted immediately, and the press of a button on the controller's board sent the crash trucks and rescue vehicles racing to the runway. "Looking Glass, this is Hedgehog Leader. Come about to match my heading, and we'll take you down to the runway." "Roger, Hedgehog Leader," was the quick reply. ajalbert@watson.eece.maine.edu (Anthony J. Albert): Joe Walker followed the F-15s until he could see the airbase. -Here goes.- He lined up the runway, noticing the crash vehicles parked to either side of the strip, and brought the Veritech in for the landing. As the crash crews watched the strange craft coming in, they wondered at its strange appearance and markings, and the damaged underbelly. As the wheels touched the runway, Joe Walker breathed a sigh of relief, but had an increasing feeling of tension for what would happen once he got out of the cockpit. chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): As the F-15s taxied to a halt in front of the hangars, Lt. Walker shoved the canopy open on his fighter, venting the smoke that had begun to gather in the cockpit from the fried circuit boards. Walker looked around, and noticed distant figures already pointing toward the plane, and some people running toward them. Lt. Walker swore, and released some catches on the back of the acceleration couch of the VF plane, lifting the seat back out and tossing it to the ground below. In a little niche behind the ejection seat, a four-foot-wide, box-shaped object was stored. It was the REF's standard survival vehicle, the VR-052 Battler Cyclone motorcycle, currently in its compact storage mode. Walker lifted it out and set it on the top of one of the intakes to the rear of the cockpit, and stepped out beside it. By now ten or twelve people had gathered in front of the plane. Some wore flight suits, others uniforms, and some were dressed in the coveralls of technicians. -Might as well put them to some use,- Walker thought, yelling down, "Hey, could one of you guys chock the wheels for me?" "You bet!" one of the techs called back, running for some of the triangular blocks used to secure the wheels of airplanes to prevent them from moving prematurely. The rest of the men admired the plane. "What the hell kind of a bird is this?" one of the pilots asked, admiring the design. "Looks like someone's shrunk a Tomcat and put extra burners on it." "Must be some kind of a new research project, like that F-117 Stealth Fighter," a tech suggested. "Yeah," another chimed in. "They must have brought it in here because it took some damage." He pointed to the charred areas on the bottom. "Looks like a component blew out or something." Joe let them continue their wild guessing as he moved over to stand next to his Cyclone. He loosened the H-90 Mars-Gallant "hip howitzer" pistol in its holster on his belt. If anybody tried to confiscate this plane, they would get a big surprise. An older man in a uniform with a lot of brass on it came running up. His voice sounded familiar as he said, "All right, clear out," to the assembled crowd. As they reluctantly dispersed, he peered up at Lieutenant Walker, shading his eyes against the sun with his right hand. "I'm General Mitchell, Hedgehog Leader. You must be Lieutenant Walker?" Walker stood to attention and saluted sharply, partly due to the instinctive reaction to seeing a higher-ranking officer, and partly because it seemed the thing to do. "Second Lieutenant Joe Walker, 112th Tactical Space Corps, S.S. ROOSEVELT, SIR!" Mitchell returned the salute just as sharply and said, "Uh, welcome to Earth, Lieutenant," a little unsurely. "Thank you, General." Walker jumped down to the cockpit, and swung down to the tarmac. "Nice to be here, even if it's not the same Earth I was born on." They stood there for a few moments in awkward silence, neither knowing precisely what to say to the other, until an electronic whine from the Veritech's control board broke the silence. "The ROOSEVELT! I'd better see if I can make contact, to get instructions on what to do next." Walker jumped up, grabbed the edge of the cockpit, and chinned himself up to where he could roll over into the pilot seat, or what was left of it. The comm screens were blank--not even static. Walker banged on the control panel with both hands, and the screens fuzzed into life. There were lines across the screens, and that's about all there was. "Come on, dammit!" Walker muttered, pressing buttons and flipping switches. There was a crackling sound and more smoke filled the air. Then the panel went dead. Down below, Mitchell was yelling for a cockpit ladder to be brought over. As the technicians wheeled it up to the plane, Joe pressed some more buttons, trying to get or send any kind of a signal at all. "Looking Glass to RTC. Looking Glass to RTC. Do you read me RTC? Dammit!" He pounded on the control panel again, and all three screens flashed blindingly in his face, then went dead once more, this time with an air of grim finality about them. As Lieutenant Walker blinked to recover his eyesight and swore up and down at the plane, importuning it, the technicians who had built and maintained it, and the ancestry of said technicians all the way back to Adam and Eve, General Mitchell appeared over the edge of the cockpit. Mitchell looked in on the young pilot, and his eyes wandered over the control board. These were some of the most advanced flight controls he had ever seen--complicated, but apparently simple. He recognized the HOTAS (Hands-On Throttle And Stick) design, and saw the three display screens that took up almost the entire forward control board as a logical outgrowth of the CRT displays on the control panels of most of the present fighter planes. If there had ever been any doubt in Mitchell's mind that this plane had been human-designed, these doubts were now gone. "Well, it looks as though communication with the ROOSEVELT is out," Joe Walker sighed. "The avionics are completely shot, and my wrist-comm doesn't have the range." He looked over at Mitchell. "This is the cockpit of a VF-1S Valkyrie Veritech Fighter, General. What do you think?" "I like it," Mitchell said. "And as one pilot to another, I think I can say that this plane must be a dream to fly." Walker chuckled as if at some private joke. "You don't know the third of it, General." He pressed the switch to power down the Veritech (as though it needed it). "I guess that's it," he said. "Even though the on-board computer has flatlined, this mecha still holds some advanced technological secrets. I'd better wait here until the ROOSEVELT sends someone to pick me up." "If you're worried about your plane's safety, I can personally guarantee that it will not be tampered with," Mitchell offered. "The hangars here are among the most secure in the entire United States. We can simply have it towed inside and locked." The offer was especially tempting to Lt. Walker, 20th-century nostalgic that he was, and after ten seconds of thought, he decided to accept. "That would be great!" he said. "All right, I'll have it done," General Mitchell said, motioning a technician over. "And after that, there is someone whom I think will want to meet you. Yes, he'll want to meet you very much..." ajalbert@watson.eece.maine.edu (Anthony J. Albert) and chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): Back at the S.S. ROOSEVELT, Captain Kranz was more than a little upset. He'd just learned that the VF-1S sent out on reconnaissance had been attacked by a stealth plane, and then contact had been lost during the temporary failure of communications caused by Major Eddings' computer system lockout. Kranz was beginning to wonder what sort of a world this alternate Earth REALLY was. "Sir, if I may, I suggest that we send someone to retrieve Looking Glass, and then move the ship into a higher orbit while we try to determine exactly why we are here," Major Eddings said. "You can find the Veritech?" Kranz asked. Eddings nodded. "We can track its transponder signal. After we dispatch someone to pick it up, we should move to a higher orbit." "I agree with that, Captain," Commander Carter added. "We don't know what the people down there might decide to do about us. If their history is similar to ours, it is possible that they could attack us while we are within the atmosphere, but unlikely that they could reach us at geosynchronous orbit." Captain Kranz thought for a long moment. "Very well. Commander Carter, I want you to go for the plane personally. I know I can trust you to handle any complications expediently, and as my second-in-command, you will have authority to make any important decisions. Take a linked Alpha-Beta Legios, and take some technicians with you in case there's any trouble with the plane itself. After you have left, we'll maneuver to a higher orbit. That should give us some breathing room in case events decide to turn nasty." ajalbert@watson.eece.maine.edu (Anthony J. Albert) and chm173s@nic.smsu.edu (Chris Meadows): As soon as the Veritech was safely locked away, a limousine pulled up and General Mitchell and Lieutenant Walker climbed in. Walker had taken off his armor but kept his gunbelt. Mitchell noticed the large pistol, but said nothing about it. The car immediately drove to the White House, where George Herbert Walker Bush, President of the United States of America, was waiting. After undergoing the usual search upon entry, Mitchell was taken to the Cabinet Room, where the President was already meeting with the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Walker, sans gunbelt, waited outside. "General Mitchell, I am told that you are currently the most knowledgable person regarding our friend. Who are they, and what do they want?" "Sir, they are maintaining a stable orbit about 50 miles up. They haven't made any threating moves. They did send out one reconnaissance fighter that made contact with me on my way here. As far as I could tell, the pilot, a Lieutenant Joe Walker, was a male human, spoke American English, and was in no way unfriendly." -Now how do I tell them the rest?- thought Mitchell. -No way but right up front and straight out...- "Upon receiving authorization from the ship, he told me who they were and where they were from." Bush leaned forward, clasping his hands together and looking Mitchell right in the eye. "Well, don't keep us in suspense. Tell us what he said." "He said that they're from the future. I know that sounds far-fetched, but it seems to fit. A ship with both Japanese and American names on it, a fighter with an American pilot, and 'U.N.' stencilled on his plane." Mitchell felt his career going down the toilet in the eyes of the Joint Chiefs and the President as he blurted out his thoughts on the matter. -Might as well go for broke.- "He told me that they are from the year 2035, and that the superior technology they demonstrate was the result of three successive alien invasions. I hope to have a full transcript of our communications within a few minutes, since I ordered it pulled from the flight recorder as we landed. But it really will not be necessary." "Why is that?" President Bush asked. -Now the bombshell.- "Because during our flight to Washington, the plane--he referred to it as a VF-1S Valkyrie--was attacked by some kind of stealth fighter, and damaged. I have requested an investigation of the wreckage of the stealth plane, by the way. The Valkyrie landed at Langley, and I have its pilot waiting right outside this door." He gestured to the exit. Stunned faces were all the response he got for several long seconds. Then President Bush said, to no one in particular, "I wonder how this will affect my chances for re-election..." "Commander Carter is away, sir," Corporal Janie Reeds reported. Kranz nodded. "Move us into orbit, then." The S.S. ROOSEVELT smoothly lifted away from Planet Earth. At NORAD, the controllers' jaws were agape. The big blip had launched another small one, and then immediately headed out for a higher orbit. Its change of velocity was astonishing. Within minutes, it had disappeared from the scopes of less-powerful ballistic radars; only the deep-space ones could track it as it moved out into geosynchronous orbit, approximately 21,000 miles above the planet Earth. -- Chris Meadows | Robotech_Master's First Law of Superguy: CHM173S@NIC.SMSU.EDU | Continuity is Overrated. CMEADOWS@NYX.CS.DU.EDU | Robotech_Master's Corollary: ...but sometimes CMEADOWS@NOX.CS.DU.EDU | necessary all the same.