GRM Reaper Productions, Uninc. in association with British-AnimeTech Limited presents A PsychoMental Production A Virtual Non-Film Benjamin D. Hutchins Brian D. Bikowicz Rob Mandeville Out In The Cold Undocumented Features Volume Three THE CAST Benjamin D. Hutchins Gryphon/Ben Brian D. Bikowicz MegaZone Rob Mandeville ReRob Kei Morgan Kei Yuri Daniels Yuri Deedlit Satori Deedlit John Todd Macquivr/q Adam Johnson Pfloyd/Adam Andrew Petrarca Android Kevin Tefft Kevin Largo Largo Jennifer Steen Jenna John Trussell John/Truss David Ritchie Daver Vaughn Gross Vaughn/Paladin/Reality Paul Heaton Paul Erik Swimm Erik/easwimm/Saurian Fritz Koopman Fritz Mark Luchini Mark/Haywire Patricia Currier Tricia/Trish Mike Callaghan Mike/Archon Chris Sprague Chris/Phantom Derek Bacon Lightnin Rich Parker Rich Gary Mayer Gary Cheryl Zukowsky Cheryl/Cheryl.Z Mike Wheeler Wheels/MWheeler Charles Schletzbaum Schletz Edison Bell Edison Teleute Teleute/Death Lord Fahrvergnugen Wolfgang Decker Decker Shasti Shasti/Vixen Enhanced Video Emulation Eve The Wedge Rats The Wedge Defense Force Special Visual Effects by Your Brain On Drugs, Inc. Destruction by Joe Martin Destruction Systems International Sub-Zero Neo-TechTronic Things by British-AnimeTech, Limited In Cooperation With Virtual Labs, Inc. with the exception of The Mann Systems Series 1001E BioSculptTM Tank by Larry Mann Detians Created by Joe Martin. Background Music Performed by Jim Tyrell From an Original Story by Benjamin D. Hutchins, Brian D. Bikowicz, and Rob Mandeville Kei and Yuri Created by Haruka Takachiho Additional Editing by Vaughn Gross, Tricia, and Cheryl.Z Counselors for Zoner, Jenna and Cheryl.Z Counselors for Gryphon, Vaughn and Kei EVE Shamelessly Stolen from MegaZone23 Catering by the Kenmore Diner Inspiration by D-Term, Nirvana, Weird Al, and Tesla Extra Special Letter Bomb for the Creators of the NFS "No Files Served" "Nightmare File Server." Mr. Bikowicz's Wardrobe by Blackbird Intl. Mr. Hutchins' Wardrobe by "Optical Illusions 'R' Us" GmbH. Mr. Mandeville's Wardrobe by K-Mart Entertainment by Mystery Science Theater 3000. Role Models Provided by Joel, Crow, Gypsy, and Tom Servo. Publishing by Eyrie Publishing Co., NotEvenCloseToInc. Copyright (c) 1992 Benjamin D. Hutchins, Brian D. Bikowicz, and Rob Mandeville Once again this is for all the people out there who love SF, anime, and the marvelous concept known as "write yer own". But more than that: For Kei and Yuri Ben: For Zoner and the returning ReRob, who came up with some of the more creatively impossible solutions to this distance problem. Some actually worked. For General Motors, the only reason I'm able to type this at all. For my father...too bad the RealMen(tm) got him. For my mom...midlife paranoia sucks, doesn't it? For the guys back home, who haven't the faintest clue what's going on, but are there to help me deal naetheless. For Randy, who is yet still comfortably numb--even more so now that he finally has a dog bed. In commemoration of the return of the ice cream truck, this line is for Helene... *snicker* For They MIGHT BE Giants. Too weird to be depressed to. And last but never least, for what was and wasn't and could've been and did and didn't; for Cheryl. Zoner: For Ben, I wish things had worked out differently. I hope the future is brighter. For ReRob, I'm glad to have you back writing with us. For Jenna, who will always remain close to my heart, no matter the physical distance. Merry meet, merry part. For the Internet, thanks for keeping me in touch and making the world a little smaller. For Joe, thanks for understanding, listening, and taking the damn knife away from me. For Cheryl.Z, thank you for supporting me when I needed it. For loves lost and gained, loves that never were or never will be. It's all a part of living, though not always very enjoyable. Life goes on. (a-fucking-men. --G.) ReRob: For Julia, who taught me never to give up on love. For Daver, who flattened only one testicle. For Jesses, who let me blow off a metric buttload of steam. For John Cowles, a Pratt & Whitney engineer with a sense of humor. (I never dreamed that mentioning UF would help me land a co-op job!) For Trish, for being the Cookie Goddess. For Ajay, who let me reconfigure my wetware without interfering. For Michael 'fmeyer' O'Malley, who showed us what a beautiful and precious thing life is. (You shall be remembered fondly Mike. Rest well. -Zoner) For Def Leppard, who showed us how to pickup the pieces. For Sto and Denny's, for being open. ----------------------------------------------------------ONE "It ain't over 'til it's over." --The Alarm The sky above Worcester was a gentle golden panorama. Below, in the crater, the city was rebuilding itself around the vast GENOM complex. Vehicles and people shuttled back and forth and here and there on their business, slowly bringing a warm, thriving vitality to Neo-Worcester. In his newly redecorated office at the top of the tower, Largo seethed. Before his desk, Professor Ian Astbury stood, trembling so hard he made the plastic sheeting under his feet rustle. Nearby, on the large leather sofa, Iczer-2 lounged. "So...you allowed Iczer-1 to escape," Largo hissed. "You cost me my victory over the Wedge Rats. You cost me an eighteen-trillion-dollar space cruiser and very nearly a six- billion-dollar I.C.Z.E.R. prototype. Give me a good reason why I should not kill you right now." "I...I cannot," Astbury replied. "I couldn't let my work be destroyed so casually. She had a good, kind soul, and she was to die for just that reason...I could not conscience it. If I'm to die for that...then so be it." He lowered his head and awaited the end. "Then so be it," Largo repeated. "Iczer-2: kill him." "No." "No?!" "No." "Am I to understand that you are refusing to obey my order?" "I am." "For what reason?" "I do not wish to destroy my creator. Call it a character flaw." "You will not obey me?!" "No. And there is nothing you can do about it." She smiled, seeing Largo's rising rage. "It frustrates you, doesn't it? The great and mighty Largo, powerless in the face of a mere woman." "Do not push me--" "Or what? You will destroy me? Bah. I am so frightened I simply can't control my terror." "My patience is at its end, Iczer-2. Cease this foolishness now or face my wrath. There are failsafes installed in your makeup to ensure against such disobedience. Do not force me to use them!" "Do you mean these?" Iczer-2 asked coolly, holding up a handful of what appeared to be computer chips. Largo's eyes widened. "Your technicians should not have implanted them so close to the skin," she continued, dropping them to the floor and crushing them under a boot. When broken, they sizzled and melted into the floor. "I could destroy you, Largo. You and all your empire, here, now, and finish the job the Wedge Rats began on New Year's Day. I choose not to. Consider it payment of whatever debts I still owe you for my inception." "You cannot do this," Largo hissed. "I created you--and this is how you repay me." "Then you wish me to end your life?" Iczer-2 asked. Largo had no answer. He simply sat and seethed. "Then be happy with what you have," Iczer-2 said. "Come, Professor...I will not leave you to the tender mercies of Largo, after all." Before Largo could protest or do anything, they were gone. Snarling, he reached for his desk intercom, about to order a full mobilization of all GENOM resources to seek and destroy Iczer-2, but before he could reach it, alarms went off. He grabbed his phone and punched 911. "This is Largo. What in hell's going on?" "Security station D reporting, sir," a random security guard's voice replied. "It's kind of hard to describe-- you'll just have to see it for yourself!" "What the--" Largo turned his chair so he was facing out across the city of Neo-Worcester. Above the city, surrounded by the crackling distortion of a recently- completed and very well-done spacefold operation, was the huge blue and white ship which had so recently humiliated him, its every battlescar repaired. The ship looked mean and ready for action. Across its hull just below the huge bridge window, the words SDF-17 WAYWARD SON blazed in deep black. The Wedge Defense Force had arrived. ----------------------------------------------------------TWO "These people are completely ignorant of space war tactics." --Commander Breetai Tul FIVE MINUTES EARLIER Commander Benjamin D. Hutchins, Wedge Defense Force, Acting Captain of the SDF-17 (WDF Wayward Son) in the comatose absence of Captain Brian D. Bikowicz, sat uneasily in the seat of power on that ship's bridge, planning the assault on the GENOM complex in what had once been Worcester. "Okay. Let's do it. Yuri, are the calculations for our last fold complete?" "Affirmative," Yuri replied from the Operations station, her cool professionalism hiding her worry for Zoner. "Coordinates are set and locked. Fold drive is fully charged and awaiting your order for execution. We will defold five kilometers northeast of the GENOM tower at an altitude of two thousand feet." "Perfect. Stand by. Tactical, your summary?" "All weapons systems fully primed and ready," Kei replied from her position next to Yuri at the Tactical station. "Automated point-defense system is engaged and standing by on all antiaircraft weapons. All missile launchers and autocannons report ready on automatic; railguns and micro-Reflex cannons ready and reporting positive fire control from this station. Main gun at standby status and also responding to this station's fire control command protocol. Full-ship deflector field ready." "Excellent. q, fighter status?" "Jolly Roger is like ready and waiting on Armor Two," q answered. "Eight-Ball is reporting ready on Armor One, with Daver in command. There are like four unassigned pilots, though." "Great. We'll need all the support we can get. Fighter type and pilot?" "A Legios, Rich and Gary, but they don't like seem too happy about the assignment." "So they can change it after this battle. Stick them with Fritz. The others?" "Two Valkyrie-A's," q reported. "Tricia and Paul." "Ard?" "No. Like Paulheat T. Bonehead." "Shit. Okay, tag them as Eight-Ball Five and Six." "You mean Four and Five." "No, I don't." Gryphon got up from his seat. "ReRob, take the conn. I have no intention of leaving my squadron to fight without me." "You can't go out there," ReRob protested. "The captain can't enter combat!" "I'm not the captain!" Gryphon replied, his expression darkening. "How many times to I have to tell you people this? Zoner's the captain, and he's not going anywhere. Now take the conn, dammit! I am not leaving the Eight-Ball!" Yuri tightly gripped the edges of her console at the mention of Zoner's name. She was still very concerned about him, he was still in a deep coma. ReRob looked taken aback by this outburst, but said simply, "Okay, okay," and took the command station. Gryphon started for the elevator, already opening the flap of his uniform jacket. "Ben?" Kei called after him. He turned. "Yeah?" "Be careful." "Watch yourself, Kei--people might think you're going soft or something," Gryph replied with a grin. "I'll be fine." He winked and vanished into the turbolift. "You are going soft," Yuri whispered. "Shut up, Yuri," Kei growled. "So are you." Yuri snapped her head around so that Kei wouldn't see her fight back her tears. "Hmm. Well. I'm more or less a figurehead, I guess... I'd probably do more good with the engines. Oh well...q, are the fighters ready yet?" "Eight-Ball has just finished reorganizing--they're like almost ready now, just waiting for Gryph to get suited up. And like Jolly Roger's been ready for five minutes now." "Okay. Begin countdown for fold operation on my mark... mark. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. Execute." "Executing fold operation," Yuri replied in a wavering voice, and engaged the SDF-17's mighty fold engines. The ship's surface flared white light, the crew experienced the now-familiar twisting sensation of hyperspace transposition, and they were off. --------------------------------------------------------THREE "Alia jacta est." --Julius Caesar BACK TO THE PRESENT "So they've come back to torment me yet again," Largo said to himself. "Fools. I'm ready for them this time." He picked up his desk phone. "Orbital control, this is Largo. Mobilize the fleet for home base. We are under attack." "Sir?! I mean, confirm attack on home base and go for fleet atmospheric operations." "Confirmed. Code six. Now move it!" Largo barked, slamming down the phone. Regaining his composure, he picked it up and dialed again. "Section twelve. This is Largo. All defense systems have already been activated, I assume?" "Yes, sir," the chief of defense, one Markus-05 (a Super Buma), replied. "All systems are on standby awaiting positive identification of the vessel." "You idiot! That's the Wedge Defense Force--those accursed Wedge Rats all over again! Destroy them!" "Yes, my lord. All fighters are away. Ground defenses opening fire." The complex began to shake with the discharge of massive weapons. Beams of energy reached for the sky, searching for the SDF-17. In the fighter bay of A.R.M.D.-01, Gryphon checked the controls of his VF-1FS Hyper Valkyrie for the eighteenth time, making sure all ordnance was secure and ready, his fusion turbines were running right, etc., etc., ad infinitum. Behind him were the three grey, black, and blue fighters of his squadron, and two generic beige VF-1A Supers with temporary markings stuck on with contact plastic. The Eight-Ball Squadron. The left hand comm screen on his panel blipped into the view of a pretty silver-haired woman with deep gold eyes. "Follow Kei's advice," she cautioned him, a note of concern in her voice. "Be careful." "Don't worry about me, Eve," Gryphon replied. "I'll be fine. You watch yourself--they'll all be gunning for the ship, not me." "I can take care of myself," Eve (or, more properly, Enhanced Video Emulation) replied. "You should know my capabilities--you wrote me." Gryphon grinned. Eve was the replacement he had written in CLULESS to replace the idiotic AI that ran the SDF-17 (the one who talked like a combination of an '88 Buick Regal and KITT). Not counting Kei and Yuri, and he didn't, because he preferred to think of them as completely autonomous people now--which indeed they were--Eve was the crowning achievement of his gweeping career. He took considerable pride in her. The light above the bay doors turned green. "Back to the salt mines," Gryphon said with a smile. "All Eight-Ball fighters, report status," he ordered. "Eight-Ball One, okay." "Eight-Ball Two, okay," Daver reported from the cockpit of his VF-1J Super. "Eight-Ball Three, okay," Erik Swimm echoed from his -1A. "Eight-Ball Four, okay," Mark "Haywire" Luchini reported, for once not shouting something like "KILL! KILL!" "Eight-Ball Five, okay," Tricia Currier called from her generically beige fighter. She had only recently finished Veritech training, having been held up by some foolish snag in her vision-correction program, but was already fitting into the squadron as if she belonged. "Eight-Ball Six, respond," Gryphon ordered after a second or so. "Huh?" Paul Heaton replied from his fighter. Paul had been held up in training deliberately, as the WDF and the personnel of Utopia Planitia tried excuse after excuse before running out of reasons not to make him a Veritech pilot. They had at least kept him from becoming a Beta driver... "Respond, asshole, this is a preflight check!" "Okay, okay, jeez, calm down," Paul replied in his arrogant way. "Christ, you act like you own the squadron." "I do," Gryphon replied. "That's what my commander's bar means. Got it? You follow my orders or so help me I'll blow you out of the sky myself." "You're welcome to try," Paul replied with a sneer. "You guys--cut it out!" Trish shouted. "You sound like our old calc class." "Right. I'm watching you, Heaton. Fuck up and you're mine. I don't want you in my squadron, I didn't have a choice. So just shut up and do your job." Paul had nothing to say to that. "Eight-Ball Squadron ready for launch," Gryphon reported. "You are like cleared," q replied from the bridge. "Like intercept enemy fighters in sector seven, they're the most immediate concern." "Will do. Eight-Ball Squadron--launch on my mark. Three. Two. One. Mark." He slammed his throttles all the way to afterburner, at the same time thumbing the catapult switch. With a surge of acceleration he was thrown out of the bay, across the deck of Armor-One, and out into the golden sky above Worcester. Around him and behind him his squadron did the same, with nearly perfect precision. Nearly perfect, except that Paul was a second late. The fighters were in a relatively clean configuration, since inside an atmosphere, their snap-on supplemental armor and missile pods degraded performance too much to be worth the trouble of carrying them. They were running in pure, original Valkyrie mode. The six Valkyries screamed into the sky above Neo-Worcester. Ahead of them, to the Wayward Son's port, was their immediate target: a large group of GENOM fightercraft. Gryphon muttered a curse as he saw and recognized them. Unlike the starfighters encountered in the last battle, similar to the Lancer I space fighter, these craft were quite deadly-looking and very effective at their jobs. They were small, red, and crablike, mounting twin plasma projectors on the top of their shells and sporting articulated and almost insectoid limbs. "Invid Armored Scouts. GENOM builds Invid Armored Scouts," Gryphon muttered to himself. "Why am I somehow not very surprised at this?" He keyed his radio for a squadron broadcast. "Eight-Ball Squadron, this is Eight-Ball One. Engage and destroy. Break formation, they're thick up here, but keep it as tight as you can, we don't want anyone getting lost." He pulled away from the formation, reaching up to key the cool shades in his helmet down, Rick Hunter-style. Rick was a schmuck, but he had his cool moments. "Hey, Gryph," Tricia called, "aren't those--" "Aw, no way!" Mark shouted. "Armored Scouts! GENOM's ripping off the Invid! DIE!!" He threw himself furiously into the fight, ripping into a pack of the scouts with a missile spread and a furious GU-11 strafing run. Gryphon ducked to the left and down as one of the Scouts ripped a burst of annihilation discs over his cockpit bubble. Kicking his fighter over and down, he pulled the nose up and performed a quick spiral. The hexagonal targeting reticules on his HUD quickly locked on three of the GENOM craft and pulsed as a lock tone sang in his ears; he flipped the cover off his thumb trigger, selected the appropriate missiles from among the switches to his right with the fingertips of his throttle hand, and let fly. From the pylons under his wings, three medium range fighter-to-fighter missiles (designated in "official" Wedge Defense Force documentation as the AIM-6-XL Reaper) roared free on thick white vapor trails, Roboteching picturesquely before ripping into their targets and blowing them to little red flinders. "Eight-Ball One, check six," a calm voice rang in his earphones. Gryphon tossed a look over his shoulder while pulling up and boosting, in time to see Erik's Valkyrie chop a quintet of Scouts off his tail with an impressive spread of missiles. "Thanks, Erik," Gryphon replied. "No problem, Gryph," Erik replied, streaking off toward another corner of the battle. "These things are maneuverable as all hell," Daver observed. "They're actually outmaneuvering us up here." "It's because they're so damn small," Gryphon replied. "Take this battle down into the streets--we can get the edge on them down there." "Roger, Eight-Ball One," Daver acknowledged. "Gerwalk?" "Yup." "I like." "I thought you would. All Eight-Balls, this is Eight-Ball One. Descend to street level and engage configuration G. Try to keep the collateral damage somewhere below the standard Lovely Angel level, okay?" Back on the bridge of the Wayward Son, Kei glanced at Yuri, who glanced at Kei. They both shrugged and resolved to kill him later. "Take us lower too," ReRob ordered. "Hovering up here is making us a hell of a target for whatever they have. Make for the tower at the lowest altitude possible." "Right," Yuri replied, and guided the massive ship down almost to the tops of the buildings. "Gravity control drive is functioning at optimum." "Good. I was wondering if the structural members would hold the grav pods in or not..." Gryphon dove his VF-1FS into the streets of Neo-Worcester, pulling down the lever on his control panel which was labeled with the big "G". Immediately, the aerodynamics of the fighter changed. Its V-tail folded down into the storage position, then flipped up onto the fuselage to expose three small jet thrusters. The vector-thrust nozzles on the twin engines split into two sections, widening out and forming a V. The engines hinged down, articulated and looking suspiciously like legs, as sections of the underbelly unfolded and extended, ending with retractable, fully articulated hands, the left one of which was now holding the GU-11 gunpod. A fighter jet with humanoid limbs sped down Main Street, getting a ground effect from the thrust of the main jets being directed downward and speeding at nearly Mach 1 a scant few meters above the ground, dodging traffic with relative ease. Behind Gryphon, the other five members of the squadron dropped their craft into gerwalk configuration as well and descended into the street. "Sir, their fighters have entered the city. They appear to have variable geometry technology. Our aeroforces are unable to pursue them effectively without great risk of collateral damage," Markus-05 reported on the main screen of Largo's desk. Largo's office had transformed into an armored command bunker. The windows had been covered by huge armor plates upon which were projected the image of what would've been visible through the windows had the shields been open; the desk had rotated on its dais to face said windows. The chair and desk themselves had changed, the sides of the desk folding around to meet the sides of the chair and locking together into a single armored unit, as the desk folded in the center and various screens and other apparati rose from the top. With the high back of the chair bending down over and out around him, Largo looked almost as though he were at the controls of some small space cruiser. "Deploy the shock troopers, then, and call general curfew again. Most of the civilians should be in their shelters by now anyway--forget the collateral damage! We rebuilt Worcester from a radioactive crater fifty miles across--we can rebuild it again if we have to!" "Yes, sir!" Markus replied, saluting and vanishing. Largo went about his other business, reaching down to press a key on the top of his desk marked "AIR DEFENSE". It glowed and the master screen in the center of the console reported AIR DEFENSE SYSTEMS ENGAGED--DEFAULTING TO MASTER CONTROL. T-joysticks arose from his chair's arms, and before them, perfectly banked for his long, thin fingers, were banks of fingertip selector switches. A HUD-like projection appeared on the window view, bracketing the SDF-17 in a big triangular reticule. "Now, Wedge Rats," Largo growled. "Feel the wrath of GENOM." He smiled and began selecting and firing weapons. ---------------------------------------------------------FOUR "A.D.A.M. stands for Absolute Disintegration of Available Mass." --Eve All over the GENOM complex, and indeed all over the city of Neo-Worcester, small shacks and what looked like minor maintenance buildings and abandoned apartment houses collapsed, huge weapon turrets rising from them. Multi-tube missile launchers, double and quad-barrelled laser turrets, unidentifiable energy weapon emplacements, and other large instruments of destruction rose from the city's unassuming profile, aiming at the Wayward Son. "Oop," said ReRob as blip after hostile blip appeared on the tactical display on Screen 3. "I think we have a problem." "Like understatement?" q offered. "Kei?" "Yeah?" "Shoot whatever you think should die first." "Heh." Kei grinned and began targeting and firing. SDF-17 began firing first, the heavy repeating laser and autocannon emplacements raining destruction on the city. Gryphon skated his Valkyrie around a corner just as a micro- Reflex bolt obliterated the missile launcher that had once been the Wesleyan Church, two blocks back. And then GENOM opened up as Largo finished refining his targeting. Lasers, heavy plasma cannons, particle projector guns, railguns, autocannons, and every conceivable form of missile launcher began firing back up at the Wayward Son. Gryphon and company were too busy to admire the pretty view, though; dozens of grey Invid Shock Troopers had appeared in the streets, and the Eight-Ball Squadron was running dangerously low on ammunition. Gryphon, Daver, Mark, and Paul had exhausted their missiles, and Tricia and Erik had three between the two of them. GU-11 ammo wasn't being a problem yet, but it was only a matter of time. With five Scouts on his six and none of his wingmates in sight, Gryphon figured he had a problem. He was screaming down Main Street at nearly Mach 1 when a sudden inspiration hit him. He had been in a situation like this once before, and since Neo-Worcester was a city reconstituted from the plans of the original Worcester-- Yes! There it was, dead ahead--the Main Street tunnel! And it was still, he noted with a grin, illegal to go through it in his direction. Well, too bad. He tucked the arms as far back as they could go, put the legs almost back to fighter-mode position, and racked the wings back to oversweep, blasting into the tunnel and very narrowly fitting. Behind him, three Scouts impacted various parts of the tunnel mouth and exploded as the other two veered hard and followed him in. It was a short tunnel; Gryphon came exploding out of the other end of it in mere seconds, popping his wings back to full open and dropping the legs to boost himself back into the air. His belly lasers had almost been scraping toward the end there--a Valkyrie in gerwalk mode couldn't quite do ballistic, just a good impression for a few seconds. Just as he dropped the legs he got a quick glimpse of a Saab 900 Turbo which had been entering the tunnel, before the downswinging leg inadvertently punted it back across Salisbury Street. "Oop," Gryphon muttered as he pulled the Valkyrie back into fighter configuration and screamed into the skies. With all the troopers about, the streets were becoming decidedly dangerous places. Better to chance it in the sky. "Eight-Ball Squadron from Eight-Ball One. Pull out and return to fighter mode--there're too many Shock Troopers to fuck around down there anymore." "We're getting ripped apart!" ReRob cried as another impact almost knocked him out of his seat. "Damage isn't that bad yet," Yuri replied. "A lot of dented and burned armor, and we're getting knocked around, but they haven't breached the hull in anyplace important yet." "How reassuring," Rob muttered. "Still, we can't take this too much longer." On the other side of the battle, out Westboro way, the ten fighters of Lieutenant Commander Fritz Koopman's Jolly Roger Squadron were having their own fight for their lives. The five Alpha and five Beta fighters, all separated for better mobility, were scattered throughout the city, alternately dodging and vaping Troopers and Scouts and destroying the odd anti-aircraft emplacement, to help out the Wayward Son. Being second-generation Veritechnology fighters, they had a lot more missile ammunition, but the Legios series weren't quite as fast as the Valkyrie, nor quite as tough. Still, Fritz and his people loved them, and would no more think of flying anything else than Gryphon and his Valkyrie pilots. Fritz leaped his battroid-mode Alpha over Spags, landing on the roof of the Sport Shop and raking a two-fisted GU-XX attack on a couple of hapless troopers; then, as his alarms howled missile lock, he pivoted left, ducked, dove, rolled, came up to one knee, and let off a spread of missiles from his arm pods to bring down a flight of Scouts. Two things drove him as he battled on: loyalty to his ship, of course, and the great desire to redeem himself for the fool he made of himself by attacking Iczer-2 with a Legios. Well...those and the fact that he simply loved what he was doing. "This is not a healthy neighborhood to be in," Gryphon observed to q on one of his comm screens. The Scouts had vacated the skies, and for good reason; there was so much energy and explosives flying around up there as to make any attempt at flying very dangerous. The Eight-Balls were struggling valiantly just to make it back to the ship for resupply. "Like, tell me about it," q replied as the Wayward Son took another heavy hit. "And it's about to get worse," Kei called. "I have incoming hostiles. From orbit, no less. I count one, two, three, four, five, six...shit! Seven hostiles. Big ones." "Oh, shit," ReRob said, looking with horror as the seven big blips blossomed on the tac screen. "Ikazuchis." GENOM's newly-completed starfleet descended from their orbital construction bays, primed and ready to defend the mother corporation to the death. Their pods opened up and each single one of them spewed out its entire complement of Armored Scouts and Shock Troopers. Then they began to add their firepower to the carnage below. "This is very bad!" Rob observed. "Kei! Forget the ground shit for now--go for the Ikazuchis. Try and kill as many as you can." "Aye aye, sir," Kei replied with a grin. "Yuri--turn this pig around so I can get the main gun on them." "Eight-Ball Squadron, like permission to dock is denied," q was calling. "Sorry. Like hope you understand." "Oh believe me, q, I understand," Gryphon said, the lump in his throat growing as he saw the seven Ikazuchis rumble over the city on their own grav drives, weapons opening up. "Eight-Ball Squadron, this is One. Nothing for it, I guess-- kill anything that moves!" "All right!" Mark hollered. "Fire main laser!" the Super Buma captain of GENOM's lead ship, the Quincy, shouted. "And order the others to do the same!" The main laser cannon of the Quincy spoke, followed by all the others. The seven ships' Buma crews, coordinated by the master computer in the GENOM center, seemed to strike as one, with uncanny accuracy and precision--far superior to the disorganized and inexperienced human crew of the original Ikazuchi. The seven mega-laser beams converged just behind the port railguns and blew A.R.M.D.-01 completely off the ship. "Fuck!" said Erik as he watched the entire battle platform crash into and destroy a large section of Neo-Worcester. "Fuck!" said Fritz as he watched the entire battle platform crash into and destroy a large section of Neo-Worcester. "Fuck!" said Kei as she watched the entire battle platform crash into and destroy a large section of Neo-Worcester. "Yeah? Eat this!" SDF-17's foredeck split and cammed open again, the tips remaining at a constant orientation as the rear sections rotated up and apart. The main gun charged with its standard orange lightning show, and then-- FOOOOOOOOOOM! The huge energy bolt whiplashed out, boiling away and utterly annihilating the Quincy and three of the closest Ikazuchis to it (the Mason, Stingray, and Asagiri). The remaining three ships scattered, one gaining altitude to make an attack from above as the others broke right and left around the battle fortress. "Sir! They have annihilated over half our fleet!" Markus-05 reported. "I am well aware of that," Largo replied. "I expected as much. Who ordered those idiots to make a frontal assault in such close formation? Activate Sol." "As you command." It only took fourteen seconds for SOL ACTIVE-- COORDINATING ORBITAL FIRE CONTROL to appear on Largo's main screen. He immediately shifted the main viewer to God's-eye view and attempted to target the bridge. They were beaten, dead already--they just didn't know it yet. He smiled and pulled the trigger. The fifth Ikazuchi (the Gibson), which had broken to the Wayward Son's starboard side, took advantage of Kei's decision to go after the Romanov on her port side first by firing her main laser again. The energy bolt was aimed low, missing the bridge module and blasting a hole clean through the foredecks of A.R.M.D.-02, almost severing it as well. The impact and explosion actually moved the vast battle fortress in the air, shifting it several yards to port. Not much--but enough. And then...several things happened at once. Kei targeted the Romanov and issued the main gun firing order again. A huge bolt of azure energy howled out of the sky without any warning at all, smashing into the SDF-17 on the starboard side, just missing the starboard bridge module to strike just forward of it and to the starboard--ripping right through the back of the starboard main gun boom. The main gun went off--it was already charged and ready--and the resulting blast vaporized the Romanov before ripping into Neo-Worcester and exterminating another large tract of it. The starboard main gun breech exploded where the bolt from the sky had struck, blowing the entire starboard boom off. A.R.M.D.-02 was blown clear as well. Pouring smoke from her hideous injury, the Wayward Son heeled to starboard and dipped like a wounded bird. "My God," Gryphon whispered to himself. He wasn't religious--far from it--but the phrase was part of his language anyway, just because he had grown up an American. "My fucking God." There was a moment of dead silence, as if the entire battle had gone on hold. "Christ on a crutch!" Kei shouted as the entire ship heaved. The damage report on Screen 4 strobed red in an alarmingly large area. "What the fuck was that?!" "Sol!" ReRob cried. "Shit! Kei--activate the full-ship shield. NOW!" "Full-ship shield on--I hope we have enough of a ship left to power it..." A green globe of energy hummed into existence around the grievously wounded ship as it struggled to remain airborne. Fritz looked, shocked, into the sky as the three great energy beams went off; his eyes widened with dread as most of the SDF-17's starboard forequarter was blown off. In his moment of distraction, he didn't see the Scout that charged at his right side until it was too late. He felt the impact as a stream of annihilation discs plowed into his Alpha, felt a ripping pain in his right side as freefall overtook him, and felt the shock as the battroid slammed into the pavement, crumpled on its left side and smoking. Thinking him destroyed, the Scout moved on. Fritz got his damaged machine to its feet, then looked down to assess his wound. There was a hole torn in the side of the cockpit--freak shot, shouldn't have happened--and his CVR-3 was shattered. Blood was soaking the side of the cockpit. With a growing sense of horror, Fritz Koopman realized he was dying. He saw the shield appear around the Wayward Son; he saw the two remaining Ikazuchis and ground forces open fire with everything they had on it. And--in his peripheral vision, almost unnoticed--he saw the dish antenna at the top of the GENOM tower shift slightly. Another of those incredible bolts of energy from space ripped through the cloud to slam against the shield. Fritz could see the SDF-17 shudder with the impact, even insulated inside the sphere of the shield. "Shit! That beam almost punctured the energy shield," Kei reported. "We can't take very many more of those hits." The dish shifted. The beam slammed against the shield. This happened twice more in the space of a couple of seconds. Fritz knew what he had to do. He faced his impending oblivion, stared it down, and accepted it. If he was to die, he would die saving his friends. He transformed his battered Alpha to fighter mode and started for the tower. GENOM defense forces saw him, of course, and converged on him; he could've cared less. He destroyed some, ignored most. Let them hit him, they couldn't stop him. What were they going to do--kill him? He smiled sardonically under his helmet and aimed the black-and-white fighter right at the dish, kicking the throttles all the way open. "Fritz, what the hell are you doing?" Gryphon's voice rang in his ears. "Pull out, you're gonna hit the tower! Fritz! FRIIIIIIIIIITZ!" Fritz fired all his remaining missiles, slammed in the afterburners, and said a silent goodbye to everyone. The Alpha plowed into the Sol command dish antenna moving at 1,700 miles per hour. There was a blossom of orange fire at the top of the GENOM tower as most of the top four stories of the building was annihilated. Largo screamed despite himself as his office exploded around him. "Fritz!" Mark screamed. "Fritz!" The psychotic gleam appeared in his eyes. "The bastards! They killed Fritz! They killed Fritz! Those stinking little yellow-bellied fairies--they killed Fritz! AAAAAAAUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHH!!!!!" Shifting his Valkyrie to gerwalk mode, Mark dove into the streets again, popping into battroid mode as soon as his feet touched ground and sprinting the machine through the streets, destroying everything in his path. "YOU KILLED FRITZ, YOU FUCKING BASTARDS! DIIIIEEEEE!!" he screamed, side-kicking a Shock Trooper, punching aside a Scout, and emptying his GU-11 into a heavy missile launcher. "DIIIIIEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!" "Mark!" Gryphon shouted, swooping into the streets after him. "Mark, come on, come out of it! It won't do Fritz any good for you to get yourself killed too!" Erik and Tricia's fighters got there first; converting to battroid mode, they tackled Mark as Gryphon and Daver covered them. "Where the fuck is Paul?" Gryphon wondered as he hosed down a street corner with suppressive fire. "Eight-Ball Six, this is Eight-Ball One. Where the fuck are you?" "Over by Becker," Paul replied lackadaisically. "Couple of Troopers to take care of. Why, do you need me for something?" "Oh, I dunno--I get the distinct feeling we'll be evacuating soon," Gryphon replied acidly. "I ordered you to stay with the squadron." "Well it's not like I flew to Washington or something. Gotta go--there's a Scout. I just need two more and I'll be an ace." The channel went dead. "What a fuckhead," Daver observed. "Tell me about it. If we get out of this, he's never flying in my squadron again. If I have anything to say about it he'll never fly anything again." "I'm ok, I'm ok--I just lost it," Haywire declared, struggling to get up as Tricia and Erik held him down. "I'm ok, I said, lemme up!" Slowly, carefully, they did. He dropped his empty GU-11; mirroring its pilot, the VF-1A looked dejectedly at the ground. "They killed Fritz." "I know," Trish replied. "They'll pay for it." "Talk later, people, we're being overrun!" Gryphon cried. "Gerwalk, and let's get out of here!" The squadron did so, falling into formation around their leader perfectly (as always). "SDF-17, this is Eight-Ball One. Any chance we'll be able to dock sometime soon?" "Like negative, Eight-Ball One...or at least like not any time soonish," q replied. "You probably oughtta try and get like as far away as possible." "No way, q--we're sticking close. You may need us." "Like thanks, Eight-Ball One. Like, stand by, ok?" "Shield status?" ReRob inquired. "Failing, and failing fast," Kei replied. "I think we're screwed, Rob." "There has to be a way. Yuri--can we fold out of here?" "Not with the ship in the shape it's in...if we tried to fold out of a gravity well in this shape, we'd break up. Besides, with our fold radius, we'd just take those two assholes with us anyway, and what would that help us?" Yuri replied, gesturing to the two remaining Ikazuchis. "There has to be a way," Rob repeated. "Shield integrity at seventeen percent," Kei said softly. "We're fucked." "Their shield is weakening," cried the captain of the Romanov. "Double the attack! DESTROY THEM! For Largo!" "For Largo!" the bridge crew chorused. "The shield's falling," Gryphon said, his voice hollow. "Kei..." "Shield integrity at two percent." "Overload warning!" Yuri called as lights sprang up all over her engineering subpanel. "The shield generators are overheating--Christ! They've been storing all the energy the shield's been absorbing." "Rob!" Android's voice rang out of the intercom. "We've got a problem down here--the shield generators are overloading. I think the whole thing's gonna blow!" "Shit!" ReRob said. "q! Call the fighters! Order them to evacuate." "All fighters, this is like control," q announced calmly. "The shield's like overloading. 'Droid thinks we're gonna blow soon. You are ordered to evacuate." "What?!" Gryphon shouted. "Like get the fuck away from the ship," q replied. "We're gonna explode." "No!" Gryphon shouted. "I won't leave you to die--I can't--" "You can't do anything, Ben," Kei cut him off, switching her station to his comm frequency. "Get away. Save yourself. That's an order." "But--" "Get away!" Kei shouted at him. "Someone needs to survive this battle. Just because you love me doesn't mean you have to die with me, now get the fuck away! I love you." "I love you too, Kei..." Gryphon choked, coughed it down. Now was not the time, and here was definitely not the place. "Eight-Ball Squadron, this is Eight-Ball One. Evacuate. Fighter mode, burner on. Get away from the ship." Without a word the entire squadron turned and began to streak away. The shield generator display redlined and began to flash "DETONATION IMMINENT". Yuri and Kei looked at each other. "Been nice working with you, partner," said Kei quietly. "And you," Yuri replied. She looked wistfully out the bridge window at the burning top of the GENOM tower, and whispered, "Zoner..." The shield exploded outward, a brilliant green globe of ever-expanding energy, rushing after the fleeing fighters and engulfing Neo-Worcester in a boiling firestorm. The wave of energy slammed into, engulfed, and ravenously devoured both remaining Ikazuchis, the GENOM tower, and everything else in its path. "Eight-Ball Six! Paul! Transform, you idiot, full burner, get outta there!" Gryphon screamed into his helmet mike as Paulheat dawdled behind in gerwalk mode, right in the face of the explosion. "No, hang on a sec--I can make it, I just gotta kill one more and I can be an ace--I'll make it, I--AAAAAAAA--*" He was too late; the explosion engulfed him. The fighter was destroyed layer by layer, disintegrated and ripped apart at the same time. It broke up and vaporized around Paul, and then his frail flesh form, CVR-3 or not, was annihilated just as easily. "YOU STUPID FUCKHEAD!" Gryphon screamed to the dead man as the last molecules wafted free into the atmosphere. The other five planes of the Eight-Ball Squadron streaked away, free and clear ahead of the wave, as on the other side, the remaining three Legios and one lone Beta of Jolly Roger booted it out at max speed. The explosion receded, faded away, and, just as suddenly as it had roared over the landscape, it was gone, leaving behind a blasted and desolate wasteland, a crater within a crater, reaching almost to the outer edge of the original twenty-five-mile blast radius. In the center was a huge depression where the explosion's epicenter had burrowed half a mile into the ground. The Wayward Son was nowhere to be seen. Then, battered, nearly destroyed, but wearily triumphant, the shattered battle cruiser lifted itself out of the crater. The SDF-17 had survived the explosion by being on the inside of it. The shield's spherical radius was unaffected by the explosion. "We're alive," ReRob remarked, looking around. "Now there's a pleasant surprise." "The Reflex furnace is failing," Yuri warned as a light strobed on her panel. "Gravity control at 40% and falling." "Shit--looks like we've got some work to do if we're ever going to take off again. Yuri...engage landing cycle. Put us down on the outside of the crater." "Landing cycle engaged," Yuri replied. From the underbelly of the huge fortress, three great hatches opened, and from within, huge double-tired landing gear extended. The wheels were the size of largish houses, arranged in a tricycle pattern; as the battered vessel eased itself down onto the fused stone and glass that had once been Neo-Worcester, they impressed twelve-foot marks into it. Within a minute the SDF-17 was down. "Great. Shut down all systems, recall the Veritechs, and I'll go down and get repair work started on the engines." ---------------------------------------------------------FIVE "Trust is the province of fools." --Anonymous Gryphon entered the bridge, buttoning down the flap of his uniform jacket. He had paused to wash his face and the like, but didn't feel particularly comfortable, even so. He wouldn't again, until he had the chance to take a shower and get some sleep. If he ever had time to do that again in his life. "Casualties?" he asked as he took his seat from a gratefully fleeing ReRob. "None reported on board," Yuri replied. "Lucky for us the crew is too small to have crews on all the substations, and the deck crews were off the Armor platforms because of our airspace lockout." "That's good news, anyway. How's the ship, besides FUBAR?" "Drive and propulsion systems are still working, kind of--I think we can make it back to Planitia for repairs if we sit here for a while and do some on-site kludging," ReRob replied. "Of course, our shield generators are fucked, and the main gun is gone, and the fighters are running out of cargo holds for the time being, but if we aren't attacked again, I think we should be okay. We won't be moving for a couple of days, though." "Okay...get everyone together in the Lower Wedge, those who don't want to go back to space with us. We'll find some place quiet to set down and let them off, or ferry them down with Betas, or something." "Like yo, there's a message for us," q called, snapping his fingers. "From the Air Force. Says we have to leave. Now. Or they start like dropping nuclear bombs on us." "What?" Kei cried. "That's not right--they can't stop us from coming home!" "They can and they are," Gryphon said wearily. "Life imitates art. Shit. I was hoping this wouldn't happen." "Why don't we fight? It's not right!" "Fight? We can't fight our own homeworld. It isn't what we were given this kind of power to do. The Wedge Defense Force exists to protect places like Earth, not blow them up. We've already done a lot more damage than we should have." He sighed. "q, ask them if we can at least deboard civilian personnel before leaving." "Like will do." q began encoding the request on his keyboard immediately. Moments later, his screen lit up with the response. "Like they won't do it," he replied. "They're like expressly forbidding us to deboard anyone. We're to leave the solar system immediately and like never come back." "Never come back, eh? We'll see about that. Tell them we have uninvolved civilian personnel on board who wish to deboard. All they want to do is go home. The military personnel and the starship itself will depart the system as ordered. And see if you can get us a little more time." "Right." Again the brief span of typing time and the pause. "They're not going for it. They say we have to leave now, and take everyone with us, or they're gonna hose down the entire blast zone." "Fine. I was hoping we wouldn't have to do this...tell them we can't leave until we fix our engines. Probably be about a week." "A week?" ReRob said. "I can get us off the ground in a couple of--" "A week," Gryphon replied. "We need more time than your repairs will actually take us. Trust me." "Like coding..." Once more, the typing and the wait. "They say they'll give us four days. No more. And no one is to leave the ship." "Great. Just like getting money from Dad...if you need fifty dollars, ask him for a hundred. You'll get fifty and he'll think he shorted you." Gryphon grinned. "Now we have some time. Rob, I'm reeeeally hoping here--did any Shadow Fighters happen to not be on the A.R.M.D. platforms?" "I dunno," ReRob replied. "I can find out easy enough, though. Probably be a few minutes." "No big rush--if you can round up a Shadow Legios within a day or so it would be most helpful. I have a few errands to run." Well, why don't you take the Daytona and its beta unit? It does have Minovski particle shielding. No one would detect you." "I can't find the keys." "Well, I'm sure we could hotwire it." "ReRob, the Daytona isn't moving until Zoner recovers. It's his baby, no one is to touch it." "Ok, I understand." "Right, now see about the Shadow Legios." "Ok, I'll get right on it." Gryphon left the bridge and went directly to sickbay. Yuri was there by Zoner's bedside as usual, and as usual, he was worried about her. She spent all of her off-duty time keeping watch over him. What would happen to her if Zoner never recovered, or if he died? Yuri seemed to be denying those possibilities; she insisted that he would fully recover. For his part, Ben was prepared for all eventualities. He had said his goodbyes and done his share of screaming at the moon. If the worst came to pass, he was ready. Or so he told himself. Gryphon walked up behind Yuri and crossed his arms around in front of her, resting his head on her shoulder. She gently placed her hands on his arms. "No change in his condition, huh?" Gryphon asked softly. "None. He's still the same," Yuri answered in a small voice. "You've got to stop worrying so much. Zoner's in a coma. Only time will tell if he'll ever recover. In the meantime, you're still up and about, and you've got your own life to live. You spend all of your time here. People are starting to worry about you. Come on, let's go up to the Wedge for a while." "No. You go, I'm going to be here when he wakes up." "You know, Yuri, that's what I love about you," said Gryphon wearily. "You're just as fucking stubborn as I am." A voice called out from the vidscreen on the bulkhead. "Yuri, you needn't worry so much. I will call you if his condition changes in the slightest." "Thanks, Eve, but I know he knows I'm here. I can feel it. I want him to know that I'm out here waiting for his return." "That's not very logical. You need to take care of yourself." "It's an emotional thing, Eve, it's hard to understand sometimes," Gryphon interjected. "I'm still trying to fully understand human emotions. Just when I think I understand them all, something new pops up. Humans are so unpredictable." "That's usually how it works. Don't worry, I took that into account when I designed your response parameters. Give yourself time to evolve." Then, to Yuri, "But Eve's right, sure he may know you're out here. But he's probably pissed that you're not taking care of yourself." "It's not that he may know I'm here, he does know. With my ESP and his empathy we're linked. I can feel that he wants to come back, but he's lost in his own mind. Once he let his walls down we made contact and we've never really separated. I felt his pain when he was injured, and I can feel his fear and loneliness now. But he has a strong will, he's stubborn enough that he'll recover." Then, quietly, so that Ben could barely hear her, "He has to." Ben hugged her tighter. "Hmmmm. I really don't...know what to say." "That's ok, I understand. It hasn't been easy on you either. What are you going to do about getting people off of the ship?" "Not sure yet, I've got a plan. I'm just waiting to see if it works. Now...I'm going to head up to the Wedge. You're coming with me." "Sorry, but no. I'm staying right here. Until he wakes up or I go back on duty." "You've been sleeping down here, for God's sake! You are incorrigible, aren't you?" He smiled tiredly. "Do try and get some rest. I don't want to relieve you of duty, but if you keep running yourself into the ground like this, I will." "I will. Say hi to Kei for me." "Ok. I'd say have fun, but it doesn't seem to apply." With that, and a tender kiss to Yuri's cheek, Gryphon left sickbay and headed for the Wedge. Yuri leaned over and kissed Zoner gently. "You will recover, I can feel it." "So can I. He's got a strong will." Yuri spun and faced the door to the medical office. "Jenna! I didn't hear you back there." "I've been working on some paperwork. I just thought I'd check on him." "He hasn't changed." Yuri said, looking back at Zoner. "Want to talk about it?" "I don't know..." "Sometimes it helps to dump your problems on someone else. I'm offering my services as a dumping ground." "I'm just so worried. Part of me knows he'll recover, but a part of me is worried that he won't. Maybe I'm just fooling myself." "No, I feel it too. Zoner's talked to me a lot about his past, and his present too. We have a lot in common, I can tell what he's feeling sometimes. Not as close of a link as you have, but it's there. He's fighting to come back, but it's going to be hard. Any help we can give him would be appreciated, I'm sure." "Help? How can we help him?" "Are you willing to learn a few things about energies?" "Well, Zoner's been trying to teach me some stuff as he worked on it himself. I guess it wouldn't hurt." "Well, we can start now if you want." "Ok." Gryphon was, as he was accustomed to being when off-duty these days, slumped into the corner of a Wedge booth, letting the wall on either side of him hold him up so he could concentrate on that incredibly complex task called breathing. It had been a day. A great many things were annoying him. The stress of command he had almost dealt with; it was the kind of thing that had to be done, and he was best qualified to do it. Better to do it himself than worry about how well person x was doing it. Besides, it was easier to tell himself how bad he had fucked up than someone else. There was the fact that he wasn't sure if he could get up out of the Wedgebooth to go to bed. There was the fact that he had lost a pilot. Sure, it was Paul, but still, it would be a mark on the record of his squadron, and whatever his faults, Paul had still been a human being. There was the fact that Fritz had died. Fritz could be annoying sometimes, but Gryphon had genuinely liked the man, and was quite sad that he was gone. There was the imminent threat of nuclear bombardment by the United States Air Force. Enough said. There was the ever-so-polite-and-well-meaning blow off Yuri had given him. Ah well, she was stressed. No news. There was the fact that no one seemed to know where Kei was, and he wanted to talk to her, like a lot. There was the fact that, although he wanted to go to sleep, he had been foolish enough to pour himself into this Wedgebooth and now feared himself incapable of standing. There was the fact that this mental list of his had become redundantly recursive. He gave a small whimper and got to his feet. "Hey, Gryph--good flying out there today," Pfloyd called from the nosh machinery. "Guess we don't have to listen to Fritz anymore, huh?" Gryphon walked right up to Floyd, looked up into the taller man's face, and said in a tone of soft menace, "Pfloyd? I liked Fritz. A lot, in fact. I have two daver-sharp Moraknives, a Buck Lancer 003, and an ElectroMagnum .451 on me right now. I'm in a very, very bad mood. The only reason I don't kill you right now is because I like you, too. And I'm very tired." He shouldered past Pfloyd, opened the big double door to his room, stepped through, and slammed it closed without saying a word, nor looking back. Pfloyd stood by the candy machine for quite some time, staring after Gryphon, before wandering toward the Wedgeterms, shaking his head. "Stress," he said. Gryphon didn't bother with the lights in his room. He evaded the desk chair by reflex, stepped on some randomly unimportant kipple, and allowed himself to drop onto his bed, still in uniform. Sleep quickly attacked and subdued him. ----------------------------------------------------------SIX "Very few things are as they seem." --Anonymous "Ben? Are you asleep?" Gryphon opened his eyes. Kei was leaning over him in the dark of the room, her face marked with sharp shadows in the pink light of the lava lamp. Night, then. "Not any more," he replied, smacking the scattered bits of his consciousness back together. "Why?" "Good." She kissed him. Hard. "Hm," said Ben when she was done. "What was that for?" "Just because," she replied, getting into bed beside him. "It's been a rough day. It seemed like a good thing to do. Besides, you looked like you needed one, and I know I did." Gryphon chuckled. "Tell me about it...what a shitty day. Which reminds me, Yuri says hi." "Oh she does, does she?" "Oop--I detect a note of annoyance." "Just a little. She's really upset over MegaZone--she blew me off when I went down and tried to get her to eat something. Me! Her own partner, her best friend. She's too busy with Jenna, talking about all of that mysticism shit." "Hmm...yeah. I dunno about that sometimes. I mean, I know there's something to it. You know full well that you and Yuri are psionically active. I've experienced enough of empathy and the like to give it some credence...and Jen seems more reasonable on the subject than some...but I always thought of Yuri as being more concrete than that. Empathy and your powers are tangible, they can be easily identified and shown for what they are. What Jenna talks about...I dunno." "She's desperate to save Zoner." "Well...so am I...but I think the answer can be found in slightly more mundane circles. Lord Fahrvergnugen has connections in almost every branch of science--I'm sure his people can come up with something. They'll probably have something ready for us when we get back to Planitia. I thought Wolfgang was going to have a cow when Yuri insisted we bring Zoner along with us instead of leaving him in the base hospital." "I wish I had your confidence," Kei replied, toying idly with a bit of his long hair. "I worry about what'll happen to Yuri if Zoner dies." "I don't know," Gryphon said softly. "I hope we don't have to find out. I'm running out of friends as it is...I don't want to lose Zoner and Yuri." "We may lose Yuri anyway, before this is over," Kei told him. "She won't eat, she won't sleep...she's going to slowly kill herself before he even wakes up. I can't look her in the face anymore, I want to scream at her and shake her. I used to know her." "Hmm...maybe we should go down together and kidnap her." "And do what with her?" "Drag her to Denny's and make her eat something. Just the color of Key Lime pie should cheer her up." "And if Zoner were to wake up while we were at Denny's? She'd never forgive us." Are you going to be able to forgive yourself if she drives herself to an early grave? Gryphon asked himself, the thought directed toward Kei as well. He decided to let the question go unspoken; Kei was upset enough as it was. They lay for some time in silence, holding each other and taking strength from the embrace. Neither could think of anything more to say; both lay silent, turning over plan after plan in their minds, and rejecting them all. There was a soft ping and the monitor on Gryphon's PC showed the EVE logo. "Am I intruding?" Eve's voice asked, the symbol still on the screen. "No, Eve," Gryphon said, getting up and going to the terminal. "Go ahead." The screen changed to Eve's standard head-and-shoulders projection. "I hate to be the messenger of bad news, especially at a time like this, but MegaZone's condition is worsening." "Oh, no." Gryphon put his face in his hand. "What happened?" "Unknown," Eve replied. "His core temperature has dropped by three degrees, with a corresponding drop in heart rate, respiration, and blood pressure." Eve looked downcast and said softly, "He seems to be dying." "Fuck," Gryphon said softly; then, loudly, "Fuck!" He turned, seized by a sudden rage, and backhanded a Pepsi can off his desk, sending it crashing against the far wall and bouncing into the corner. "Ben, stop it!" Kei cried, jumping up and seizing his arm before he could punch something solid and hurt himself. "I'm sorry," Eve said. "Is there anything I can do?" "Yes," Gryphon replied, struggling to maintain control. "Yes, there is." "Name it." "Sing `Tell Me the Secret'. Please." "If you wish." Eve paused, loading something into memory, and then as background music appeared behind her, sang a hauntingly beautiful and slightly mournful song, dancing to it as the viewpoint of the monitor pulled back to a full-body simulation. The song was in Japanese, and Gryphon wasn't sure entirely what it meant, but he loved it, and hearing it sung soothed him. In a moment he no longer wished to put his fist through a cinderblock wall. "Thank you," he said quietly when the song was over. "You're welcome," Eve replied. "Can you do me one more favor?" he asked. "Of course." "Contact ReRob and find out if he found that Shadow Legios for me yet." "What are you going to do?" Kei asked. "Run the Air Force blockade and take people home now? What about Zoner? And Yuri--God, she must be beside herself." "I can't deal with that right now. Trust me on this--I need to get rid of some of this stress and angst and sheer black anger that's building up inside me before I can deal with Zoner or Yuri. You go down and see to Yuri--she's your partner, your best friend, you can help her more than I can anyway. That's been shown already." "ReRob reports success," Eve announced. "A Shadow Legios is ready and waiting in cargo hold six." "Great. Kei," Gryphon said, turning to face her and taking her hands, "take care of Yuri. She'll need you. I love you." He gave her a kiss. "And remind Yuri I love her too." And, throwing open the doors, he was gone, off at a dead run for cargo hold six. Kei stood looking after him for a minute or two, then ran to sick bay. --------------------------------------------------------SEVEN "A fighting man needs all of his courage." --Lt. Cmdr. Roy Fokker When Gryphon arrived in the makeshift flight deck that was hold six, locking down the last piece of his white and black CVR-3, he found a fully fitted Shadow Legios, a small group of suited people, and ReRob, also suited up in full armor, waiting for him. "ReRob! What're you doing suited up?" Gryphon asked as he ran to the boarding ladder. "Figured you might need a Beta driver," ReRob replied. "D'you mind?" "No, by all means," Gryphon replied. "Aren't you going, Matt?" "Nah...I'm staying with Jen. She won't leave until Zoner recovers. Besides, I don't want to leave before I find out what's going to happen to Zoner either, you know?" "Yeah, I understand. I should be back in a few hours... watch the shop for us, 'Droid." Gryphon closed the Alpha's cockpit and signaled everyone clear. They cleared the bay, getting back behind doors; the launch officer opened the doors, and, lacking catapult or even any real launch equipment at all, Gryphon simply punched the Beta's boosters wide open and blew out through the hatch. His radar immediately showed a half-dozen targets, all of them moving barely subsonically and in a patrol pattern around the SDF-17's position--the Air Force blockade, no doubt. Off to the north was a large aircraft emitting a large amount of radar waves, undoubtedly a Sentry. No big deal; in the night, they would never be able to see the black, grey, and dark blue Shadow Fighter, and they couldn't pick it up on any radar thanks to its cloaking device, and since only the Navy's Tomcats had an IR sensor he was safe. Hopefully he wouldn't have to fight--he wasn't too keen on fighting his own homeland's air force--but if he had to, in order to get his friends back home, then he would. Back on board the SDF-17 Jenna, Kei, and Yuri watched over Zoner as he lay listlessly in sickbay. His vital signs were still dropping, not as quickly as they had, but still dropping. In his mind Zoner was tiring, part of him wanted to keep up the fight, to return to the land of the living, but more and more of his mind just wanted to rest, to enter the lands of Morpheus to stay. What was worth returning for? Yuri, Yuri was there, but she was so far away, such a distant goal. And there were his friends, Jenna, Gryph, Matt, Daver, Helene, et al, but they were further away than Yuri. Tired, so damn weary, he'd been journeying through the labyrinths of his mind for so long. Rest, I want to rest, just for a while, forever. To enter the comforting arms of Death, to hear the flapping of her mighty wings, that would be so easy. No! No, I must try to make it back, I owe it to the others. I'll keep trying, for now. On the monitors Zoner's vitals jumped momentarily, then returned to their decline. Jenna noticed it first, "He's fighting, but he's losing the battle. I don't think he'll be able to do it alone. If we're going to help we'd better do it now." "Honestly, what do you think his chances are?" Yuri asked, choking back tears as she gazed at Zoner's comatose form. "He's a fighter, but even all of this hi-tech gadgetry doesn't seem to make a difference. This sick bay is better equipped than the best hospitals on Earth, and we can't help him. Maybe, just maybe, with our help he'll be able to win the fight, but if not we'd better hope that Wolfgang has something else to try," Jenna answered quietly. "Tell me what to do," Yuri said calmly. "Well, I think I'd better be going now," Kei said as she turned to leave. "Please stay, Kei," Yuri asked her. "Together we're more powerful, maybe it will make the difference." "I don't really believe in this stuff...but I won't stop you from doing it if you think it will help." "Please, Kei. Please," Yuri pleaded with her partner. "If it means that much to you I'll stay. I won't take an active role in this, but I'll stay out of the way." "Thank you, Kei, thank you. Please, just hold my hand." "Ok." "Alright, Yuri, remember what I showed you. Just follow your feelings," Jenna counseled. "I'll try," Yuri said, sounding unsure. "Just relax, let it flow, let your feelings guide you. Don't try to force it," Jenna said in a soothing voice. "Ok, I'll do my best." "That's all anyone can ask." Jenna and Yuri closed their eyes in concentration and began trying to help Zoner win his private war. Meanwhile, Kei looked on in a rather bemused fashion. She thought it was all a bunch of rubbish, but if it helped Yuri deal with the situation she wasn't going to start a fight over in now. Besides, she'd have plenty of time later to straighten Yuri out. For now, she could just sit and stew over how amazingly helpless she felt. For someone like Kei, that was a fate worse than death itself. Oh, Yuri, she thought. You used to be my best friend... what's happened? Ben raced towards Boston, the eight passengers in the Beta's bombbay clinging to the handholds as the Legios flew NOE to avoid detection. As he approached the outskirts of the city his sensors picked up something odd. His radiation indicators picked up a hot spot just to the left of his flight path. Ben shifted to VTOL mode and hovered while his sensors zoomed in on it. The image came in clearly, but been couldn't believe his eyes. It was an '84 Colt Turbo, plastered against the wall of an abandoned warehouse. Gryphon hovered closer to check it out. On closer examination Ben noticed a white Festiva crushed into the wall by the Colt. A Colt and a Festiva? No, it couldn't be. But they were slightly radioactive, maybe they could be. Ben zoomed in on the Colt's windows. Judging by the kipple factor, it quite possibly was. It appeared to be Tess, Daver's Colt. How'd she get all the way out here? Nah, it couldn't be. Was she blown all the way here by the blast from the reactor? He'd have to come back and check it closer later. For now he had to drop off his passengers. Gryphon decided to put it down in a parking lot next to Northeastern University. What better a place to let a bunch of college students loose than right across the street from Taco Bell and a campus? ReRob popped the bombbay door and the eight passengers deplaned. "See you later guys, best of luck!" ReRob called out over the external speakers. "Yeah, take it easy...have fun," Gryphon added. The assorted deplanees waved and scattered to avoid being quick fried as Gryphon boosted the Legios into the sky, tucked the legs back in, and shot away. "Well, one more run and we should have all of them off," said ReRob from the back." "Yeah, not too many people wanted off. Just a few who really needed to get back to their lives. I guess flying around in space with a good possibility of dying horribly appeals to the Wedge mentality. What a surprise." "Everyone else is going to need to tell their families what's going on, though." "I guess so...we'll figure that one out later." Ben raced across the barren terrain, hugging the earth in an attempt to use the hills as a shield from visual detection. He couldn't have known about the observation post the Army had established on one of the ridges. And if he had, would he have much cared, really? "God's-eye, this is Recon-one." "God's-eye here, go ahead Recon-one." "We just had a fast-mover blow by in the valley just south of our position. Travelling west sub-mach. Never seen anything quite like it. It must be from that ship." "Recon-one, we have nothing on radar. Confirm you're reporting one fast-mover west bound." "God's-eye, we know what we saw. One fucking large fixed-wing jet. Black and blue coloration." "Roger Recon-one, we'll send a couple of fifteens your way to check it out." "Thanks, Recon-one out." "Viper flight, this is God's eye. New course bearing 193 degrees." "Viper flight, roger." The two F-15C Eagles of Viper flight left the racetrack orbit they had been flying and headed for Recon-one's position. Gryphon flared the Legios and did a perfect VTOL landing; he might be a Valkyrie pilot by choice, but he had passed all the VT training courses quite handily. Call it a natural aptitude. Handling crews ran up to ready the Legios for a quick turn-around. While they were working Gryphon and ReRob deplaned. Gryphon walked to the nearest comm screen. "Eve, can you get Daver to come down here ASAP?" "Of course Ben, right away." Eve's image answered from the screen. Ben and ReRob watched the crews work as they waited for them to finish. Just as the crews finished their checks Daver jogged into the hanger bay. "What's up?" "I wanted you to ride along in the Beta's cockpit with ReRob. There's something I want you to see." "Such as?" "It's a surprise." The next eight passengers boarded the Beta while ReRob, Daver, and Gryphon strapped into the cockpits. Once they were all aboard Gryphon lifted off and blasted clear of the bay. "God's-eye, this is Viper flight. We're in position. Any contacts?" "Negative, Viper-flight. God's-eye shows zero contacts." "Roger tha--holy shit! Viper-two, did you see that?" "Roger, Viper-lead." "What was that? All I saw was a blur and three blue glowing dots. God's-eye do you show any contacts bearing 093 degrees from our present position?" "Negative, Viper-lead. We show no contacts other than yourselves." "Well we just saw something race by about ten miles south, flying low and heading east." "God's-eye still shows nothing, Viper-lead." "God's-eye, this is Recon-one. That fast-mover just blew by again, heading east this time." "Recon-one, are you sure? We don't have anything!" "Yes, we're fucking sure!" "Ok! Ok! Viper-flight, did you copy that?" "Roger." "Recon-one, keep an eye open. Report in the instant that aircraft appears again." "Roger." "Viper-flight, fly an oval along the craft's last known flight path." "Roger." The mission controller onboard the Sentry looked up from his screen. "We'll get that bastard next time!" Ben flew directly to the parking lot at Northeastern and ReRob let out their passengers. "Well Ben, that's all of 'em." "Ok, let's get back to the ship." "Where's this thing you wanted me to see?" Daver asked. "I'll show you on the way back." Ben lifted off and sped back in the direction they had come. As he approached the warehouse he flared and spun the Legios around to face the west facing wall. Gryph zoomed the optical sensors in on the Colt. "ReRob, slave the Beta's monitor to my sensors and switch it on." "Will do." The main monitor of the Beta came to life and displayed a close zoom of the Colt stuck in the wall. Tess was missing her paint, license plate, and the plastic bits on the ends of her bumpers, but otherwise apparently undamaged. "Oh why look, it's Tess," Daver quipped. "Apparently so. I spotted her on the way in the first time. Thought you might be interested," Gryphon answered. "Shit yeah! Can we get her out of there? It's rather undignified." "Sure. ReRob, prepare to disengage." "I'm ready when you are." Gryphon disengaged his Alpha from the Beta and transformed to battroid mode. He gently pried Tess from the crater she'd created when she impacted and put her down in a parking space nearby, pausing briefly to wipe off bits of Festiva. "Mr. Ritchie, your car," Gryphon said in his best valet voice while gesturing with the Alpha. "Now...what to do with her? Shall we stuff her into the bomb bay? Shall we lug her back to the ship in hand? Shall we buy a new guitar? Shall we drive a more powerful car?" "Tess with fusion power! I like this plan," Dave began. "I'm excited to be a part of it," Gryphon echoed. "Let's do it," they stereoed. "You guys have spent far too much time watching that movie," said ReRob. "But for now...what do we do with her?" "Well...ReRob, let me out, I'll drive her back." "You sure that's a good idea?" Rob asked. "Of course not. It's a terrible idea! But Tess looks restless." "Oh, I see." Dave climbed down from the cockpit of the Beta, climbed into Tess, inserted the key, and turned. The faithful little car started right up. Daver grinned and zoomed off down the street. "He's nuts," said ReRob as Gryphon reattached the Alpha. "So?" "..." "Let's book," Gryphon said, converting back to fighter mode and lifting the Legios off the ground. Again tucking the legs back under, they streaked back for the SDF-17. "There it is again," PFC Gen Ericson muttered. "God's-eye, this is recon-one. Guess whaaaaaat?" "It's back?" "Roger, heading west again, going like a bat out of hell." "Viper-lead, did you copy that?" "Roger...I don't see anything--wait! There he is. Bastard's almost invisible. Pursuing." "Hey, Gryph?" "Yeah?" "I hate to break this to you, but we've got company." "Huh?" Gryphon looked back, out over the rear deck and the Beta's tail. "Oh, jet fighters. How quaint." "What're we gonna do?" "Ignore them, maybe they'll go away." "I've got something weird here, God's-eye." "Go ahead, Viper-lead." "Hostile is invisible to radar." "As in stealth, Viper-lead?" "No, as in my acquisition radar doesn't paint him. At all." "Confirm this is not a technical problem, Viper-lead." "It's not a technical problem, God's-eye; Viper-two shows up just fine. This thing is invisible, whatever it is." "It is behaving in a hostile manner?" "Negative...it seems to be...well...ignoring us." "Hmm...Rob, the F-15 is the fastest fighter the Air Force has, right?" "Ahh...I believe so...why?" "Just wondering." Gryphon grinned evilly, shut off the shadow cloak, and began opening his throttles. "Shit!" Viper-lead shouted as the target suddenly surged forward. "God's-eye, the target is visible to radar--and accelerating." "We noticed, Viper-lead. Pursue him." "Hey look, they're following us," said Gryphon. "Heh." "Gryph? Are you feeling okay?" "Juuust fine, Rob, don't worry about me." Gryphon smiled an evil and not altogether sane smile and pulled back on the joystick. The Legios' nose came up and he began to climb. "God's-eye, bandit is climbing, do you read?" "Roger, Viper-lead. From his course, it looks like he's heading back toward the hot zone--probably to rendezvous with his ship. Watch yourselves--I'd bet that monster has some serious AA." "Roger, God's-eye." "Hey, cool, they're still following us," Gryphon said. He started pushing the throttles open a bit more. He and his pursuers were both approaching Mach 2 in a rather steep climb. "God's-eye, do we have permission to fire, over?" "Negative, Viper-flight. Permission to fire is denied." "Roger, permission to fire denied--what the fuck?! Viper-two, stand down! Permission to fire is denied!" "Hey! They _shot_ at us!" ReRob announced as an incoming-fire warning wailed. On his rear-view scope, Gryphon saw the second F-15 launch a missile. "Hmm, how 'bout that," Gryphon replied. The AIM-9L Sidewinder missile homed on the heat of the Legios' huge thrusters, diving for the engine cores. Gryphon gritted his teeth angrily and slammed the throttles open, pulling back on the stick. The Legios stood on its tail and clawed for the stars. Even directly vertical, it only took the Beta's mighty engines a few seconds to push the whole craft to Mach 8. "FUCK! God's-eye--" "We see it, we see it." "God's-eye, this is insane! Estimate bandit's speed to be at least Mach 6 and still accelerating. Straight up!" Gryphon tabbed the control that turned the shadow cloak back on. "God's-eye, target is gone. Last estimate puts him at Mach 8 and straight up. Could be transatmospheric." "Yeah, we saw it. Return to base, Viper flight... there's nothing you can do." "Shit," Viper-lead muttered, and ordered his flight to peel off. "Viper-two, when we get back, your ass is mine." Gryphon climbed down from the Alpha's cockpit, shook ReRob's hand, and said with a grin, "Well, there's another triumph for clean hands, a pure heart, a good soul...and vastly superior technology." "I wish I could've seen those guys' faces," Rob replied. "You guys, that was priceless!" Daver shouted from across the hold as he climbed out of Tess. "Daver?! How the hell did you beat us back?" "It's a secret," Daver replied with a cryptic grin. Gryphon shrugged and went to the nearest phone. "Eve, anything new on Zoner's condition?" "No," Eve replied. "Everything's still dropping. I fear he hasn't got much time left." "What? Well, what in hell is our medical staff doing about it?" "Um..." Eve hesitated. "I don't know a lot about medical procedures, but...it doesn't appear to me that she's doing much of anything." The screen switched from a view of Eve to a securicam perspective of sick bay, showing Zoner comatose, Yuri and Jenna appearing decidedly inactive, and Kei looking very uneasy. "What the fuck...?" Gryphon muttered. "Gryph, good news!" ReRob called from his consultation with Android across the bay. "Truss got the engines working--we can get outta here!" "I'll deal with this later," Gryphon told Eve as she took the screen back. "Right now, try and get everything you can locked down for an emergency fold." "I will," Eve replied. "Don't worry, I'm sure there's a point to whatever they're doing." "Oh yeah," Gryphon muttered to himself as he ran toward the bridge. "Yeah, there's a point all right." --------------------------------------------------------EIGHT "Don't think of it as retreating...think of it as a strategic advance to the rear." --Rich Parker "All hands prepare for emergency launch," Gryphon ordered as he once again took the captain's station. "ReRob, take the Ops station. Engage Reflex furnace. Activate gravity control and lift off immediately." "Right, hang on a second--okay, there it is." The SDF-17 shivered, as if shaking itself out of sleep, as the Reflex furnace rumbled back to operation. Down in Engineering, John Trussell and Andrew Petrarca shook hands. "Gravity control on line," ReRob reported. "Lifting off now." The Wayward Son, tattered and wrecked though she was, lifted from the ground, rising majestically into the air, as her landing gear retracted upward. "Yo, like the Air Force doesn't want us to leave now," q called out. "Something about some big black fighter." "Tell them we don't know what they mean and we're complying with their order to depart a bit early, repairs are completed. And tell them to do have a nice day..." Every Air Force unit in the area began to converge on the SDF-17 as it rose toward the stars. "They say no dice," q reported. "They want us to land immediately so they can carry on an investigation into the plane they say we sent out." "Plane? I saw no plane," Gryphon said with a twisted grin. "Shut them off, then--they can't stop us." "All units, this is God's-eye. You have permission to fire. All units, repeat, you have permission to fire." Every Air Force unit in the area began firing on the SDF-17, with entirely no effect. "Idiots," Gryphon remarked. "Don't shoot back, there's no point in killing anyone we don't have to. Time to suitable fold position?" "Three minutes...mark," ReRob replied. "Begin calculations for fold." "Beginning calculations now." "This is hopeless," Viper-lead commented as he released his last missile into the vast armored side of the battle fortress. "They expect us to be able to bring this thing down?" "All units, this is God's-eye. Break off pursuit." "Shit," Viper-lead muttered for the second time today, and peeled off. The bastard got away again. Damn aliens. "Air Force units have retreated," ReRob said. "We must've reached their ceiling." "Good. Eve, alert all decks to prepare for fold operation. Rob, time to fold position?" "Thirty seconds...mark." "Fold calculations?" "Almost complete." "All decks, all decks, prepare for fold operation, repeat, prepare for immediate fold operation. This is not a drill," Eve announced from every working monitor on board. "We're in position," Rob announced. "Fold calculations complete." "Execute fold on my mark. Three. Two. One. Mark." Once again, the Wayward Son launched herself into a fold. Back on Earth, the collective defense organizations of the world heaved a sigh of relief and stood down their nuclear arsenals. They just hoped it would never be back. And in Tokyo, a man with pale skin and a burning in the back of his eyes rented an office downtown and began to scheme... ---------------------------------------------------------NINE "I seem to have the talent for fucking up every personal relationship I'm involved in." --Zoner The SDF-17 defolded in the midst of the Cygnus Beta system. The once proud fortress was battered and bruised, but it was still functional. The broken prow turned towards Planitia and the vessel began limping home, like a wounded beast. Gryphon sat on the bridge, his mind racing. "q, how long 'til we reach the shipyards?" Gryphon asked. "Like, two hours or so I think. The ship's beat up pretty badly," q answered. "ReRob, are we going to make it there in one piece?" "Well, as long as you don't plan on any more violent encounters, I think we can make it ok." "I try not to plan anything anymore. Plans never seem to work out," Gryphon replied bitterly. "Eve, what's the latest on Zoner?" "His vitals are still dropping. I fear that the disruption of the fold maneuver didn't help his condition any," Eve replied sadly. "Great! So I made it worse by folding, just great!" "Don't get down on yourself, Ben. The fold was necessary, he needs attention he can only get on Planitia. His condition is serious, but not yet grave." "Will he make it back to the shipyards?" "As long as his condition continues to decline at its current rate we will make it with time to spare." "Ok...thank you, Eve. Keep an eye on him and let me know if there are any changes." "Ok, Ben. Please, take care of yourself too. Don't worry, he'll recover," Eve tried to comfort Ben, and then was gone. "q, connect me to the Utopia Planitia shipyards. I need to talk to Lord Fahrvergnugen." "Like, will do Gryph." q worked the controls on the comm panel in front of him. In a few moments he had made contact with the communications officer at the shipyards. The connection was transferred to Lord Fahrvergnugen's office. "Like, I've got Wolfgang on line one." "Put him up on the main screen." "Like done." Lord Fahrvergnugen's image appeared on the large viewscreen on the front wall of the bridge. He sat in a chair behind a large crescent shaped desk. His bright orange hair contrasted with his deep black armor and cloak. "Ah, Gryphon. The fact that I am speaking to you tells me that Zoner has not yet recovered," Wolfgang noted sadly. Then he expectantly asked, "How did operations on Earth go?" "The mission's goals were accomplished. Whether or not it was a success, I'm not sure yet," Gryphon replied. "Something troubles you my son, what is it?" "Well, the ship was nearly destroyed. We lost half of the main gun, a large chunk of midships, both A.R.M.D. platforms, and our engines were damaged. Worse than that, we lost several of the crew in the line of duty. There were numerous injuries amongst the crew on the Wayward Son. If we had had a full complement there probably would have been a lot of deaths. But most of the ship was empty. On the other hand, with a full crew we may have been able to fight rather more effectively." "Damages can be repaired! What is important is that you took the battle to the enemy and emerged victorious. I am saddened to hear of your losses. We will prepare to hold proper military services upon your return. We must also prepare a victory celebration, of course." "A party, yeah, right...there is one more thing..." "That is?" "We're losing Zoner." "What do you mean?" "His vital signs are dropping and the medical equipment onboard ship can't maintain him. We were sorta hoping you might have some tricks left up your sleeve." "This is most distressing. I do have one option left. I'll have to call in some old favors. Just get him back here as soon as you can. I'll do what I can." "We'd all appreciate that. We should be back in a couple of hours." "We'll be expecting you. Wolfgang out." "Well, ReRob, get us there as fast as you can without blowing out the engines again." "Will do Gryph. Don't worry, he'll pull through. He's too stubborn to die." "That's too stupid to die. And will people please stop saying that?" Gryphon snapped. ReRob and q slouched in their chairs. Ben was really stressed out. It was probably better to just leave him alone for now. Zoner had better recover or Gryph might just go over the edge. .. Down in sickbay Yuri and Jenna directed all the energy they could into Zoner to help him in his fight to stay alive. But it was failing, he was still fading fast. Kei couldn't understand what the other two were doing, but she understood what the biomonitors told her. Zoner was slipping away and it didn't seem like what they were doing was helping him any. She had always thought she understood Yuri, but why she was doing this was beyond her. Everything had changed so much since they had met the Wedge Rats. But nothing that happened before that was real anyway was it. Aurgh! This was no time to start that mental argument again. She was real, and that was all that mattered now. Kei looked at Yuri, her eyes focused intently on Zoner. What would happen to her if Zoner didn't pull through? She wasn't sure; Yuri had never gotten so close to anyone else. Even herself...was that a hint of jealousy? No, they were different relationships. She and Yuri were best friends, Yuri and Zoner were lovers. But Yuri was so attached to Zoner--would his death break her? She just couldn't tell. What would happen to her if Ben were to die? She didn't want to think about that. It was too painful to consider, and Yuri was facing it. She wished she could shield Yuri from the pain, but she knew that there was nothing she could do. She could only be there when Yuri needed her for comfort and support. Yuri would have to face events as they happened. The Wayward Son cruised silently through space, carrying its precious cargo, the hopes and dreams of its crew. Many of the crew were suffering from various forms of shell shock. The stress of combat had given way to the excitement of victory, and now to the realization of the extent of what had transpired. They were happy to have survived, yet they felt a guilt that comes from losing one's friends in battle. Why them, why not me? And the condition of their friend and captain, Zoner, was known to all. It didn't help. And the ship travelled silently on. ----------------------------------------------------------TEN "Don't fear the reaper." --Blue Oyster Cult "Ben! I'm afraid that Zoner's condition has taken a turn for the worse," Eve called from the bridge comm system. "What? What now?" "His vital signs are dropping rapidly. At the present rate he won't make it back to the shipyards." "How long does he have?" Eve glanced away. "I estimate fifteen minutes," she said quietly. "Maybe twenty, but..." "Rob?" Rob shook his head slowly. "At least an hour. If I push her any harder she'll blow." Gryphon had no reply. He just sat there, looking at nothing. A minute dragged by. "Gryph?" asked Rob. "You have the conn," Gryphon whispered, his voice barely audible. He got up and ran from the bridge. In sickbay Jenna and Yuri redoubled their efforts. In his mind Zoner could feel their pull. He wanted badly to return to them, to Yuri, but they seemed to be so far away, too far. He had been fighting forever, running through the labyrinth of his mind. Opening the doors to his memories, hoping that one would lead him back to the land of the waking. How long had he been unconscious, it seemed like years. He had no way to keep track of time. Tired, he was so tired. Maybe if he rested for a little while he would be able to start fresh. Yeah, rest. Just a little, stop fighting for a while. I'm sure it wouldn't hurt. In his mind he stopped running, lay down and closed his eyes. The monitors in sickbay flatlined. "ZONER!" Yuri screamed. "NO! YOU CAN'T DIE!" Oh no, thought Kei. Oh fucking no. She hadn't been very close to Zoner, not nearly as close as Yuri was to Gryphon, but that had a lot to do with the fact that she and Zoner were in many respect quite similar people, and thus didn't get along sometimes. Neither opened up easily, and both were given to mistrust. Seeing so much of herself in him had given him some special significance, and they had been friends. Pain welled up inside her, but she slammed it back down and closed a heavy steel hatch over it. Now was not the time; she was needed. She could cry later. If she could even cry at all. She hadn't tried lately. Jenna jumped into action, adjusting the life support system. All of this technology, and she still felt helpless. Yuri began sobbing and calling out to Zoner repeatedly. Kei gathered her up and carried her sobbing form to a chair in the corner. All of the worry and pain which had built up in Yuri for the preceding weeks poured out as sobs wracked her body. Kei hugged Yuri to her and tried to ease her pain as she watch Jenna desperately trying to save Zoner. Zoner stood up, he felt refreshed and energetic. That nap had really helped. But something seemed different, the pain that had been in the background for so long was gone. He realized then that he wasn't alone. He turned to face his companion; he knew who she was. She was stunningly beautiful, dressed in a halter and slacks - all black, with a silver ankh hanging around her neck. "How do you do Teleute? I've been waiting for a chance to meet you," Zoner said in greeting. "I'm doing ok, Zoner, my job sort of keeps me busy." "I can imagine, it must get tiring. Do you have time to talk for a bit? I've been interested in you for a while. You're very intriguing." Death thought it over for a moment. "I suppose so, let's go for a walk." With a gesture of her hand they were in a park in the spring. They strolled along the path and chatted with each other. "It's no use. I can't bring him back," Jenna called out from her position at Zoner's side. "NO!" Yuri cried out in anguish. "Shhhh!! Yuri, I'm so sorry..." Kei whispered. She didn't know what to say. She had never seen Yuri this torn up, not even when Billy died. "Jenna, may I make a suggestion?" Eve inquired from the comm screen. "Anything if it will help save him." "Put him in a chill down unit, the ones used for severe trauma cases." "Why?" "It will give him more time before brain damage sets in. Maybe Lord Fahrvergnugen can do something in that time." "I understand. Thank you, Eve." Jenna entered the commands to transfer Zoner's body to a chill down unit. The cold would slow the onset of organ damage, stretching the normal five minutes to an hour or more. It took but a few moments for sickbay to complete the transfer. "Bridge, this is Jenna. How long until we reach Planitia?" "Umm, like just under an hour," q replied. "How's Zoner doing?" "I... I couldn't save him I'm afraid. But there is still a chance. I've chilled the body down. If we can get him to the shipyards soon maybe they can do something. But an hour is cutting it close." "Where's Ben?" Kei asked, noticing his absence. "Like, I don't know. When we got the news about Zoner he gave the conn to ReRob and ran off. Sorry." "It's ok, I can understand how he feels." Kei wanted so much to be with Ben, but she couldn't leave Yuri. She hoped that Ben would understand. "Right now our main concern is getting Zoner to Utopia Planitia ASAP. What do we have that's fast and can carry the chill down unit?" Jenna asked. "Not much, I'm not sure if it will fit in a Beta. I think our best bet is the Daytona from Hell and its beta. It should fit in there no problem, and that thing can do warp. I say we try it," ReRob answered. "Ben said not to touch it..." Kei interjected. "I think he'll understand us using it in this case, he didn't want it used until Zoner woke up. But if we don't use it that may not ha---," Jenna caught herself as Yuri's sobs increased in intensity. "I'm sorry Yuri, I didn't mean to hurt you. I'm sure Wolfgang will be able to do something," she added, but even she remained unconvinced. "Ok, ReRob. Have the Daytona prepped and ready ASAP. And get some people down here to help move the chill down unit." "Will do. Who's going to fly it?" "I will," Kei called out from the corner. "And Yuri is going too." "Fine, you know what you're doing. Jenna's going along too, right? Anyone else?" "I'm going to try and find Ben. How long until the Daytona is ready?" Kei asked. "Give me about ten minutes." "Ok, I'll be in the bay in ten minutes, with or without him." Then, to Yuri, "Are you going to be ok?" After receiving a nod in reply Kei ran from sickbay to find Ben. Find him she did; he was standing in the upper observation deck, leaning slackly against the thick armor glass, his face pressed to the cool surface, looking out of the corner of his eye at the stars. "Ben?" she asked. "Are you all right?" "He died, didn't he?" Ben replied, his voice empty. "The bastard went and died. Didn't he?!" The last was an intense, ringing, almost accusatory shout. "Yes," Kei replied. "He died." For a long moment Gryphon was silent. Then, as the muscles in his arms and back knotted, he began to quiver silently. His lips peeled back from clenched teeth; with a scream of primal rage, he whirled around and slammed his fist with all his strength into the glass. "BASTARD!" Nothing happened, of course, because the glass was molecularly aligned crystalline armor. Apart from a dull thud and the echo of his scream, there was no real effect. Snarling with rage, he drew back his arm and hit it again. And again. "Son of a bitch," he snarled, smashing his hand into the glass. "Son of a bitch." He began chanting it, like a mantra, his voice rising. There was nothing in the room for him to break but himself; it would have to do. He drew back his arm to deliver another punch. "Ben, stop it!" Kei shouted, at him, grabbing his arm and wrenching him around to face her. "You're going to smash your hand. Stop it!" "Leave me alone!" he cried, trying to push her away. "Just leave me alone." "No," she replied, throwing her arms around her and pulling him close. "Listen to me. I need you. Yuri needs you. Do you understand?" "I..." He slumped in her arms, the sudden rage draining away as fast as it had filled him. "I'm sorry...I just can't believe it. After all the son of a bitch put us through...he goes and dies." He laughed bitterly through the tears that ran down his face. "You know, he went into that coma on Yuri's birthday. How pleasant." He shook his head weakly. "Son of a bitch." "Stop it," Kei said firmly. "There may still be a chance. Jenna has him in a chill unit; there may be time to get him to the shipyards if we use his Daytona. Maybe there's something Wolfgang can do. I volunteered to fly it myself...but I can't think of anyone he'd rather have flying it than you." There was a long pause. Gryphon drew in a deep, shuddering breath and let it out as a long, exhausted sigh. He raised his arms, putting them around Kei, and hugged her tight. Then: "Okay. Let's go." The Daytona from Hell, Beta unit attached, blasted out of Cargo Hold Eighteen with Gryphon at its controls and Kei riding shotgun as copilot. In back, Yuri and Jenna watched over the chill unit and each other as the pilots of the Eight-Ball Squadron stood as a combination honor guard and moving crew. Gryphon thumbed the side of the throttle and pushed it forward; the Beta's warp drive flared, and they were superluminal. His eyes were narrow and clear as they watched the starfield warp and flicked over the instruments; his hands on steering wheel and throttle were white-knuckled. The muscles in the corners of his mouth and eyes twitched. Kei put a soothing hand on his, feeling it quiver. In four minutes, they dropped back out of warp and docked with the shipyard control unit; not a single word had been said onboard the entire time. As they disembarked and a medical crew from the shipyard unloaded the chill chamber, Lord Fahrvergnugen and his entourage entered the docking bay. The medical crew quickly moved Zoner down the hallway, apparently towards the infirmary. With them was a tall, thin man no one recognized; late twenties, clear blue eyes behind round spectacles, disorganized and pale brown hair, and somewhat archaic dress. "Welcome back, my children," said Lord Wolfgang Amadeus Fahrvergnugen. "Allow me to introduce you to a friend of mine. Commander Benjamin D. Hutchins and company, I present you Mr. Edison Bell, Esquire." -------------------------------------------------------ELEVEN "Just think what we could accomplish without all the idiots of the world to slow us down!" --Ralken Abegius "Greetings. Lord Fahrvergnugen told me that I may be of some assistance. I understand that you have an injured companion. Please allow me to examine him," Edison greeted the incoming personnel. "If there is anything you can do to help, we would greatly appreciate it," Jenna replied. "Just revive the asshole so I can kill him," Gryph snarled. Kei rested her hand on Ben's arm. "Please forgive him, he's been a little stressed by all of this." "I understand. No offense taken," Edison replied. "Can you save him?" Yuri asked timidly. "I can only try, milady," Edison replied, bowing. "However, the odds are rather good. Do not fret." Yuri tried to smile but she was obviously unsure about trusting this stranger. She replied quietly, "Thank you." "Well, I must began my work immediately. No sense in delaying any longer. Lord Fahrvergnugen, if I may have my leave?" "Certainly. I know you will do your best. Good luck." Edison nodded to Wolfgang and strode off down the hallway in the direction Zoner had been taken. "Come. Let us relax in the lounge. There is no need to worry. Edison is an old friend of mine. He has technology and skills that even I fail to understand. If anyone can save Zoner, it is he." Wolfgang swept his arm in an arc in a gesture for those assembled to lead the way. Edison began examining Zoner with various and sundry devices. His instruments registered some low level brain activity, not much more than some electrochemical residue, but it was there. Good. He wouldn't have to attempt to totally reconstruct the neural network. That was always a pain in the ass. Anyway, he was definitely dead. Hmmm. There was a small amount of damaged cerebral tissue. Could mean some memory loss. Well, I'll do what I can later. The organs were pretty much okay, the brain just stopped running them. Hmmm. But the life support system should have been able to support them. Aha, the nervous system had been sending out scrambled signals. Well, that could be solved. Edison fitted Zoner with a collar. Dozens of small needle-like electrodes extended from the collar into Zoner's neck. Some of them electronically jammed any signals the spinal column might generate as he continued his work. The others began emitting the correct signals to control the organs. He then strapped a metallic belt across Zoner's chest and entered a few numbers on the touch pad on the front of the belt. It began emitting electrical pulses into Zoner's body. Edison watched as the display began to show an irregular heartbeat. He entered a few more figures and the heartbeat began to stabilize. Once that was accomplished he turned on the rest of the circuits and restarted Zoner's lungs. Once he was satisfied that the body could maintain steady life support, albeit with electronic assistance, he turned the chill down unit to the defrost setting. Now, for the interesting part. He fitted yet another band on Zoner. This one was around his head. The headband began emitting low level signals to the brain to stimulate activity. Edison watch the display with some consternation; Zoner wasn't responding as he expected. Zoner walked through the garden with Death discussing the life and times of the universe. She had a great sense of humor and Zoner was enjoying himself immensely. She told him about her "family" and how they all played their roles. Zoner discussed philosophies, beliefs, and religions with her. She had some very interesting views, well, she had been around forever so she certainly had time to form them. Zoner admired her, she was so carefree for someone in her position. The garden was so beautiful, he wished he could stay there forever, but he knew that was impossible. Suddenly Zoner doubled over in pain, holding his head. "ARGH!! What is that?! Fuck this hurts!" Death wrapped her arms around him in a comforting manner. "Do not worry. It's your body, they're not giving up on you yet." "But... I thought I was dead?" "You are, but there are those who try and avoid me. This may not be your time. Not just yet. Only Destiny knows for sure." "But then why are you here?" "I know all about you, all about your fascination with me. And you are dead at the moment." "So what's going on? What was that pain all about?" "Well, they're dragging you away from me. You might say it's the pain of birth." "The pain of birth? I don't remember anything like this." "Of course not, you were far too young. The pain was great enough for your mind to erase its memory. Not many people get to remember it." "So, will I remember any of this?" "Well, in your subconscious, your emotions, and in your dreams I will always be there. However, your conscious mind will try to forget what you have seen." "Too bad, I really enjoyed meeting you. It must not be too often that a mort takes the time to talk with you. Unless of course they're pleading for another chance. How much longer do I have here?" "Life is dynamic, only change is constant, you may yet stay here. But it appears that you will most likely return to your friends soon." "But I will see you again, right?" "Of course, every living thing meets me eventually." "Soon?" "No, not for a very long time." "The pain seems to have dissipated." "Yes...for now. Let's continue our walk. You're pretty interesting yourself." Edison decided that there was only one alternative left. But Omega-2 was a major step; maybe he should talk to the others first. No, just go ahead and do it. Well, maybe he might anger Lord Fahrvergnugen. Yes, better to talk to the others. Edison strode into the lounge. Before he could address the others Yuri leapt up. "Did you save him?!" "I have revived the body, but the brain is a bit more complicated. He's not responding to treatment as I would expect." "Damn bastard's even stubborn dead!" Gryphon snapped, punching the wall. Kei drew him closer. "But, there is one alternative left to me. It will almost definitely work. However, there are some major side effects," Edison continued. "What kind of side effects?" Yuri asked concernedly. "Well, it gets a bit tangled. Let me explain. We have time." "First off, what is this option anyway?" Kei asked. "Omega-2." "Omega-2? What is that?" "A retro-virus." "I think you'd better start from the beginning," Jenna suggested. "Well, duh. That's what I've been trying to do. If everyone would be so kind as to quiet down. Thank you." Edison paused for a minute, seemingly to organize his thoughts. Then he began to speak. "I am a Detian. Simple fact. We're a race of dimensional travelers from Earth, in an alternate time--I assume you're familiar with alternate time--where the Earth was engulfed by nuclear war in the late 1980s. "The population was basically destroyed. By a happy coincidence, one of the largest groups of survivors happened to be a group of college students. Among them was a brilliant biotech engineering major by the name of Abegius-- Ralken Winthrop Abegius. Abegius built a society from the ashes, using the intellectual power of the surviving community to create greatness within a few decades. "One of his first achievements was Omega-2. Simply put, because being a dimensional engineer I'm not too sharp on the particulars myself, Omega-2 is a retroviral treatment that re-encodes the subject's DNA. Ralken liked to call it `immunization against death'. Everyone in the community of survivors was effectively rendered immortal, under the agreement that they would sign the Detian Constitution and agree to abide by the laws." "'Scuse me...just how immortal are we talking here?" Gryphon asked, his curiosity piqued. "Let me put it this way. I'm one of the original Detians. The war happened in 1987. I came here from the year AD 14,375,512." "Gaaah?!" "That's what I said. But that's another story entirely. I'm almost certain Omega-2 can save your captain...but it's not something I want to do to someone against his will. One tends to think that immortality blurs one's distinction between life and death; not true. There is a great deal of pain involved in being deathless; I would not hand that to someone unwilling. So, unable to ask him, I'm asking you: would he object?" Gryphon merely uttered a well-executed Drummeybird call. "Is...oh shit, how do I ask this...is there any way he could die later, if he wanted to?" asked Kei. "Well..." Edison considered. "That's a tough one. It is doable, I suppose...atomization tends to work...cortex bombs are fairly effective...nothing that isn't messy." "But it can be done." "You seem awfully...I dunno, keen on this subject..." "It has to be asked...it gives him an option out, if he doesn't want immortality." "I see your point..." "fnord," said Gryphon, and left the room. He had something to do. "Where's he going?" Yuri asked, looking after him. "Probably to go somewhere and have an attack of the willies in private." "Then...I take it it's agreed? I'm to try whatever I must?" "Yes," Yuri replied. "At least to give me a chance to say goodbye...if that's what he really wants." "I understand...I think..." Edison turned and left the room, slightly confused. Ephemerals always tended to confuse him; it had been so long since he had been one. Edison returned to Zoner. He checked the indicators one last time for any signs of change; there was none. The body was still running fine, but the higher functions of the brain weren't responding to the stimulus. He could never quite understand the mind; by all rights the brain should have been responding to his technology. But it wasn't. Odd. Oh well, not that it mattered much. Edison reached into his waistcoat and pulled out a small black box. He placed the box on the medical tray, released the latch, and slowly opened it. Inside were some of the most highly illegal objects one could possess, according to the Detian constitution: three bottles of Omega-2 and an injector gun. Edison carefully lifted the gun and one of the bottles out of the case. As he fitted the bottle into the butt of the gun he pondered the meaning of what he was about to do. This little bottle held the power over life and death. It continued to amaze him. He snapped back to reality and dialed in a small dosage. It didn't really matter, a couple units would do it. The only thing dosage affected was time of action. He leaned over Zoner and pressed the gun to his arm. He muttered, "I hope I don't regret this, friend," and pulled the trigger. It was done. It would most likely take a couple of days for the virus to propagate and begin repairing the damage. All that was needed now was time. Zoner suddenly stopped in mid-sentence. "What's wrong?" Death asked. "I'm not sure. I think something just happened to my body. I'm not sure exactly what. It feels like something alien entered me or something. It's a strange feeling." Death looked almost saddened. "I think I may know what it is, but it's nothing to worry about. Go on with what you were saying." Zoner had the feeling that it was definitely something to worry about, judging from her reaction. But he decided not to press the point and he continued where he had left off. Edison rejoined the others in the lounge. They all turned to him expectantly, but no one spoke. Edison broke the strained silence himself. "I did it. Give the virus a couple of days to work through his system. After that we should start seeing results." "Is it ok if we check in on him?" Jenna asked. "Certainly, but do not disturb any of the equipment I have placed on him." "Of course. And thank you." With that Jenna left to look in on Zoner. She was also curious about the type of equipment Edison used. She felt a little jealous that he had succeeded where she had failed. As Edison watched her depart he mumbled, "Don't thank me yet." "What was that?" Yuri asked. "Oh, nothing." "So he'll be okay now?" "He should be. But be prepared, not everyone adjusts to immortality well." Edison thought back to his own experience. "Who wants to live forever?" Gryphon asked from the doorway. "Ben! How are you dealing?" Kei asked, concerned. "I'm alive." Kei seemed a little upset at Ben's terse reply, but she understood. It wasn't everyday a close friend became an immortal. "So, Zoner's immortal now..." Yuri said, her voice trailing off. It sounded like a mixture of joy and sadness. She stood and turned to leave the room. "Thank you for bringing him back, Mr. Bell." "Please, call me Edison. Everything does." "Ok...thank you, Edison." And she left the room. "Well, there's not much else for me to do at the moment. I believe I'll get some rest. Good day." Edison turned to leave. "See you, and thanks," Kei called after him. "Yeah, thanks a lot," Gryphon added. Edison detected the slight bitterness in his voice and understood. He just hoped he wouldn't have reason to regret his actions in the future. -------------------------------------------------------TWELVE "We can rebuild him. We have the technology." --The Six Million Dollar Man Over the next two days the remaining crew of the Wayward Son watched as the skilled workers at the shipyards began the task of reconstruction. They first removed the charred stubs where the A.R.M.D. platforms had been. Next to go was the wrecked root of the starboard bow main gun boom. As these tasks were performed hundreds of workers swarmed over the hull, patching the smaller wounds. Of course, removing the damaged sections was the easy part. Installing the new components was much more delicate work and would take much longer. While the work was being done, the crew of the Wayward Son had the time to mentally review the battles on Earth. The severity of what had transpired began to sink in. They were fugitives from their home world. What the hell was their purpose? They had defeated GENOM, what was there to do now? It had seemed like a good idea when it started. Travel around the cosmos and be heroes, great. But reality was a stark contrast to their dreams. They had lost friends and seen death first hand. For many the first sentient creatures they had killed were the agents of GENOM. Many tried to rationalize that they were all Buma, but they knew the truth. Many of those they had killed were humans, same as they. That was the hardest thing to accept. They had the chance to leave the ship before returning to the shipyards, and some of their friends had, but they had stayed. Why? Was it loyalty to the others who stayed, the chance for adventure, the chance to make a name for themselves, or were they trying to leave Earth, and their deeds, behind? Their reasons varied, but one thing was constant: they were here now and planned to stay for the duration. No matter what. In addition to all their own problems, the crew was waiting to hear about the Captain. When the SDF-17 had docked Gryphon had returned and made a speech to the crew. He told them that Zoner was indeed still alive and that the chances for his recovery were pretty good. But he seemed upset by something, and the crew picked up on it. Rumors began circulating almost immediately. Zoner was dead, he had been dead, he was a cyborg, he had a new body, he was an AI now, he needed constant life support. The rumors were many and varied. It didn't help matters that after the initial speech Ben, Kei, Yuri, and Jenna seemed to be avoiding the rest of the crew. The Rats were convinced that they were hiding something. Since his initial speech to the crew Ben had been avoiding contact with nearly everyone. He spent most of his time in his room at the shipyards. Occasionally he would venture out to check on Zoner or the reconstruction work. Zoner, immortal, how the hell did all this happen? And what the hell was Zoner going to do when he woke up? Maybe they all went through this so Zoner could wake up and kill himself. And Yuri seemed pretty distant lately. She was happy that Zoner was still alive, but something else was bothering her. Gee, wonder what that could be hmmmm? Her goddamn lover was immortal! Kei was stressed out too, since both her best friend and her lover were so upset. This whole situation was lousy--why couldn't Zoner just wake up and get it over with? Ben hated being stressed. Jenna spent most of her time with Matt. They had a lot of talking to do. With the stress of combat behind them they wanted to make up for lost time. They spent a lot of their time walking around the shipyards and watching the stars as they traveled through the endless night. Occasionally Jenna dropped in to check on Zoner; she felt a little irrational guilt for not being able to save him. She tried to get Edison to discuss his technology with her, but he continuously put her off. He said that it wasn't time for the technology he used to be spread across the universe. Jenna thought that he seemed to have a god complex. He had all the knowledge and technology, and he would decide who got what. In spite of this, she still was grateful to him for saving Zoner. (In fact, it was no such thing; Edison had seen the effects of spreading Detian technology among races not yet prepared to deal with it. Such intervention had led to the annihilation of at least four sentient races, dozens of worlds, and eventually the backbone of the entire Detian civilization in the Patron Wars. He felt uneasy enough as it was just sharing the secret of Detian immortality with these people, and had he not felt such a deep kinship with them he wouldn't've considered it, but...) Yuri spent a good deal of her time staring longingly at Zoner. Ever since Edison had presented them with the chance to bring him back she had been second guessing their decision. What if Zoner was supposed to die? What if being immortal somehow changed him? She couldn't answer these questions and the unknown future troubled her. She went for long solitary strolls around the shipyards to think. At the end of the second day she sought Edison out. She found him in his room. Knock knock knock "Edison? Can I speak with you?" "Yes, of course, Yuri. Please come in." Yuri opened the door and entered. Edison gestured towards a chair and Yuri sat down. "What did you wish to speak about?" Edison asked. "Well, I wanted to talk to you about Zoner." Yuri paused. "And Omega-2." "What do you wish to know?" "Will Omega-2 change Zoner?" "Yes, it will restructure his genetic makeup. His body will change a bit. He'll actually end up healthier than before, of course. I thought I had made all that clear before." "Yes, yes you did. But that's not what I mean. I mean, will it change Zoner as a person? He'll still be the person he used to be right?" "For the most part, yes. As long as the damage to his brain wasn't too severe he will have all of the same memories as he used to--and it is your memories, both conscious and subconscious, that make you who you are. The real wildcard is how he will deal with being immortal. A lot of people have trouble dealing with it at first." "How serious is it?" Yuri asked, leaning forward. "I won't lie to you. Some people simply can't deal with it at all. I have seen people go mad, I have seen suicides, I have seen people develop psychosis, but many people pull through just fine. Let me share something with you--back in the beginning, after the Third World War on our Earth, the original Detians were nonconformist college students." He grinned. "And we came through just fine." "Since he's infected with the virus he won't age, right?" "That is correct. He will remain 21 forever, unless he wishes to age. He can wish to...if he so desires he can age at a normal rate. Of course, he can always age backwards at the same rate until he's 21 again. He can die of old age if he so desires." "So he can remain young forever," Yuri said, staring at nothing, a sadness in her voice. "What troubles you, my dear?" "I've just been thinking. You saved him from death, and now I'll be the one to die first. Ironic." "You are troubled by this?" "Well, yes, I guess so. I mean what happens when I get old and he is still young? Or even if he ages with me, he can always go back. Will he still want me? I can't ask him to die for me and I don't want him to have to go through life waiting for the day that I'll die." "Highlander syndrome," Edison mumbled. "What was that?" "Oh, nothing. I was just thinking. If he really does love you he will stand by you. Of course there is another alternative." "Really? What do you have in mind?" "You can accept the Omega-2 virus yourself." "I... I don't know. Would I have to die first?" "No, of course not. I can inject you at any time." "What's it like? I mean being infected by the virus." "It's not too bad. At first you may feel a little ill, slight fever, et cetera. But you will begin to feel better than you ever had before. All of the changes take place on the genetic level, so you won't notice much of anything, until the genetic changes begin reworking your metabolic processes--and your body seems to be in good enough condition that it won't have to do much in that department." "I'm not sure. Can I think it over?" "Sure. Take your time. Big decisions shouldn't be rushed." "Ok. I guess I'll talk to you later." "It's always a pleasure." With that Yuri left Edison and returned to her room. She had a lot of thinking to do. -----------------------------------------------------THIRTEEN "Who wants to live forever?" --Queen Edison was awakened by a loud knocking sound. He thought for a moment to figure out what it was. He finally decided it was the sound of someone knocking loudly on his door. He squinted at his chronometer. 4:38AM. Gaaah. Who would be knocking on his door at 4:38, well, 4:39, in the morning? Well, only one way to find out. Edison rolled out of bed and wrapped himself in his robe. Knock knock knock. Sheesh. Whoever it was, they were sure impatient. Edison shuffled to the door and opened it. Standing there was an apparently distressed Yuri. "What is it, Yuri? Is something wrong? Did Zoner wake up? What do you need at.." glance "...4:40 in the morning?" "I couldn't wait any longer. I've made my decision and I want to do it before I have time to change my mind again." "What? I'm afraid I'm not following you here." "Omega-2. I want you to inject me right away." "What?! You wake me up at four something in the morning so that I can give you a shot?! Couldn't this wait until morning?" "Well, actually yes," Yuri replied, shrinking back. "But it's sort of important to me. I've been thinking since I talked to you and I finally made my decision. I want to do it. I love Zoner and I want to be able to share eternity with him." "Ok, ok. You know the facts, you're a big girl, you can do what you want with your life. Come in. But don't expect eternity; one of you is bound to get killed eventually." "That's a pretty pessimistic attitude." "It's the voice of experience. After the Patron Wars I've very few friends left. Are you sure you want to do this?" "Yes, positive." "Very well." Edison opened his cabinet and fished about for a moment. He withdrew the same black box he had used earlier on Zoner. Placing it on his night table, he released the latch and opened it. "One last time. Are...you...sure?" Yuri's reply was a solemn nod. Edison withdrew the injection gun and the serum bottle from the case. As he approached Yuri he loaded the bottle into the gun and prepped it. He placed the gun to her arm and looked directly into her eyes, searching for any uncertainty. Finding none, he pulled the trigger. "That's it?" Yuri asked. "That's all. It's done now. There's no turning back. You have the rest of your life to think about your decision, and that's a long time. Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to get some more sleep." "Oh, sorry. Thank you." "I'm here to help." Yuri left the room and Edison closed the door and returned to bed. 4:47. Hmmm. In less than ten minutes he had totally changed the course of Yuri's life. The universe was really quite interesting sometimes. After leaving Edison's room Yuri went to sickbay to see Zoner again. She looked down at his unconscious form and prayed that he was at peace. Before turning to leave she leaned down and kissed him and whispered, "Now we have all the time in the world, my love." Zoner was lying in a field next to Death. They weren't talking at all, just lying there enjoying the peaceful scene. The sky was incredibly blue, the clouds incredibly white, and the grass was incredibly green. He had never seen anything quite like it while he was still living. Living. He had a bad feeling that his time here was growing short. As of late he was beginning to lose the feeling of freedom he had felt at first. Something was pulling on him, weighting him down. He was being pulled back to the land of the living. The worst part was that he wasn't sure if he wanted to go or not. The living world had his friends, and Yuri, but it also had all of the evils he had tried to fight or avoid for so long. This place was at peace, everything was in balance. Death had so much to say and teach him. He turned and looked at her, laying there in the grass, her black outfit in stark contrast to the green of the grass. She was beautiful. But more than that she exuded a confidence he had seen so rarely amongst the living. Was he in love with her? Perhaps. But it was different from what he felt for Yuri. Damn! He was so confused, being dead wasn't really like anything he had pictured. He actually was enjoying it. He knew, though, that he had to return if it wasn't his time. But he would return here eventually. Everyone did. Death turned to face him--looked him right in the eye. "I'm sorry. It wasn't your time yet. There are those with the ability to alter the paths of Destiny, and your paths must have crossed. It won't be long now before you have to return." Her sudden speech surprised him, as did the apparent sadness in her eyes. "I just wanted you to know that I really enjoyed my time here. I think you're terrific. You're beautiful, charming, funny, intelligent, everything anyone could desire. Yet so many people fear you. I hope I remember at least some of my time here so I can tell others what you're like. Then maybe they wouldn't fear you quite so much." "That's sweet of you, but I don't think it will happen. The fear of death is something that runs very deep through most people. Mortals such as yourself come along only once in a great while. You're special. Which is why it is sad to see you go. Let's just try to enjoy the little time we have left together." "Sure. Why don't you tell another tale? It must not be very often that you get an interested audience." Death smiled. "Ok, I will." And with that she began to tell a tale which spanned the years as if they were minutes. Around eleven in the morning Yuri awoke. She sat in bed for a long moment trying to notice any difference in her body. She discovered nothing. Slightly disappointed, she decided to get up, get dressed, and go for a walk. She also wanted to find Edison and apologize for waking him in the middle of the night. On her way to Edison's cabin she ran into Kei. Kei immediately noticed the change in Yuri's attitude. "Yuri, what's up? You seem happier or something." "Well... I am, I guess. The future is looking a bit brighter today." "What? Did Zoner wake up?!" "No. He's still out cold." "Then what's going on?" "Once he wakes up Zoner and I will be together forever." "What? I don't understa... YURI! You didn't! You had Edison inject you with Omega-2 too?!" "Yes. Now Zoner and I can share the rest of time." "How could you do that? I mean, Zoner I can understand, he needed saving. But you--you're perfectly healthy. Why?!" "It has nothing to do with health. I know what I went through when Zoner died, and I don't want him to go through the same thing when I die. This way he won't have to watch me grow old and die while he lives on. Alternatively he won't have to make the decision to grow old and die with me. Now we can stay together forever young." For some time, Kei had no reply to that. She stood silent in the hallway, thinking a thousand thoughts at the same time and not getting a clear fix on any particular one of them. Certainly nothing coherent enough to put into words. At length she looked sadly at Yuri, her lips trembling, and said quietly, "I hope you miss me." "What? Kei--" She could say no more; Kei had turned and run away. -----------------------------------------------------FOURTEEN "Our little group has always been and always will until the end." --Nirvana Kei ran straight back to the room she was sharing with Ben. She burst into the room, utterly shocking Ben. She jumped onto the bed, wrapped her arms around Ben, and began sobbing. Ben had no idea what was going on, but he knew that Kei was hurting, and that was all that mattered. He gathered her in his arms and hugged her back. "Kei, what's wrong?" "Yu.. Yu.. Yuri... Sh.. She...." More sobs. "Shhh. It's ok. Just calm down. Slowly now. What happened to Yuri?" "She had... She had Edison, well, she's immortal!" "WHAT?!" "She had Edison inject her with the Omega-2 virus." "What? Why? I don't understand? Why?" "She said she wanted to be able to stay with Zoner forever. She didn't want to die first." "Of all the stupid... Shit! The bastard hasn't woken up yet and he's already causing trouble." "Don't blame Zoner. This was Yuri's decision. She did it herself," Kei said, a bitter tinge in her voice. "Why does it upset you so much?" "Why the hell do you think I'm upset?! My best friend, my partner, is immortal! I'm upset for the same reasons that Yuri was. She's going to live forever, and I'm going to grow old and die. How can I stay with her now? In a few years I'll be old and she'll still be young and able to stay in the field." "I don't know what to say... What did Yuri say when you told her how you felt?" "Well... I never really told her... I sort of ran away after she told me about being injected." "Why?" "I... I didn't want her to see me upset. I'm supposed to be the strong one, remember? So I ran away. Real bright, huh?" "Don't worry about it. You can talk to her later. She'll be around for a while. Right?" Gryphon said with more than just a little sarcasm in his voice. "You seem pretty upset yourself." "Upset? UPSET?! Of course I'm fucking upset! First Zoner goes and gets himself killed through his own stupidity, then he gets revived. So now he's immortal! Then Yuri, who's also a good friend, goes and does the same damn thing! I don't know... It just seems like things have gotten too weird around here. Everything seems out of control. I guess I'm just scared of the future." "It sure is going to be tough. I mean watching them stay young while we grow old together." "Well, there is one other choice." "What?" "We can always do it too." "Ben! I mean... I don't know... It just seems so strange. Being able to live forever and all." "Well, I want to. I can't make you do it--and I won't if you don't--but I'll be damned if I'll let Captain Poetic Suicide outlive me." "I still don't know. Can I think about it for a while?" "Sure. I don't think we're going anywhere soon. But I would mention your interest to Edison. Just so he doesn't take off or something." "Ok. You're right...as usual...Ben. I'll talk to him later. Just hold me for now, ok?" "Ok. No objections here." Ben and Kei snuggled close and reclined on their bed. Just being held by Ben calmed Kei. Soon she was resting peacefully. Ben followed her into slumber soon thereafter. Zoner and Death were sitting together in a shady glade on the edge of a forest. They talked to each other in hushed tones; it seemed a sacrilege to break the peace with a louder tone. Zoner suddenly turned and looked up at the sky. "Teleute... I think it's time..." "Yes. It is time for you to return. Come. I'll take you back. It's not often I get to return someone to the living." Somewhat sadly Zoner replied, "Ok. I guess we may as well get it over with." They set off along the footpath into the trees. As they walked the scenery became less and less clearly defined. Soon they were walking across a dimensionless, endless plane. They continued on for some time until features began to define themselves again. They were in the shipyards now. They walked through the corridors, and although they went unseen, they were given a wide berth. When they reached sickbay Death gestured for Zoner to enter first. He entered the room and saw himself lying unconscious on one of the beds. Death approached him from behind and gently laid her hand on his shoulder. "So, this is it huh?" "Yes Zoner. It's time for you to awaken." "I'm going to miss you. You know that." "Yes, I know that in some way you will. But you won't truly remember your times with me. But I will be there when you dream. Now, it's time to go." "How do I get back?" "I'll take care of that." Death gathered Zoner into her arms and embraced him. He returned her embrace in full. He felt as if she were embracing his entire being. He felt filled with love and comfort, pain and suffering, life and death. And then the feeling was gone. Zoner slowly opened his eyes and moaned. His head was killing him. He surveyed his surroundings through heavily lidded eyes. Where was he? He didn't recognize his surroundings at all. This sure wasn't sickbay on the Wayward Son. He remembered the battle and stumbling into sickbay with his head wound. He had been dizzy. That was it. He must have passed out. But that still didn't explain where he was. Ah. They probably returned to the shipyards to get the ship patched up. Man, he must have been out for hours. He tried to sit up and immediately regretted it. His head spun and he collapsed back onto the bed. He could hear the monitors above his head beeping incessantly. He must have gotten a concussion. He vaguely remembered some odd dreams about a woman in black. But they were choppy and they didn't make much sense. Like most dreams, they were slipping quickly from his waking mind. Well, at least he was awake. It was sort of surprising that there was nobody working in the sickbay though. He wondered where Yuri was. No sooner had he thought it than Yuri burst through the door into sickbay at a run. She ran to his bedside and gathered Zoner into her arms. "Zoner! You're awake! You're actually awake! How do you feel? Are you ok? Is everything alright? Does anything hurt? Do you want anything? Can I..." Zoner cut her off. "Yuri, calm down. I'm fine. It was just a little bump on the head. No big deal. I've gotten them before. There's no need to get so excited. I've just got a bad headache. In a couple of days I should be fine." Yuri stared at him with a half amused, half surprised expression on her face. "You don't know what happened at all, do you?" "I'm not sure I follow you. What do you mean?" "Do you know how long you've been out?" "No. A couple of hours I guess. Why?" "A couple of hours?! You've been out for over a month!" "WHAT?! What's going on? What happened?" "You collapsed in sickbay and went into a coma." "You mean I've been in a coma for over a month." "Well, not really." "What do you mean not really?" "Well... You see... You sort of... Well... Died." "WHAT?!" "You died. You were dead." "WERE?! I am completely lost now." "Well, we brought you back." "Brought me back? How? What's been going on? ARGH! I hate being totally out of touch." "Well, I think Edison can explain better than I can." "Edison? Who's that?" "He's a nice guy. I think you'll like him. He's the one who saved your life. I'll call him." Yuri turned and walked over to the intercom. "Edison? Yes, he woke up. Well, I was wondering if you could come down here. Ok. See you in a bit." Then, to Zoner, "He's on his way." Just about then Kei, Ben, and Jenna all rushed into sickbay together. "We came as soon as we heard the news," Jenna gasped. "Wow...have a reception," Zoner said, surprised. "Hey-- what's wrong?" He was beginning to notice things, things that didn't fit right; like the fact that they were all looking at him strangely, with the exception of Gryphon, who was pointedly refusing to look at him at all. Kei in particular looked unsettled--no, frightened--by something. Kei, frightened? Shit, must be something major, he said to himself. "Look, everyone--what the hell is going on?" he demanded. About that moment, the strangely dressed guy with the little round glasses strode into the room, his hands spread wide and a great grin on his face. "Ah, you're awake. Now you have to face the most difficult decision of your life," said Edison Bell without preamble. ------------------------------------------------------FIFTEEN "To be, or not to be? That is the question." --Hamlet, Prince of Denmark "Excuse me?" asked Zoner, blinking a couple of times at this odd gentleman. "Let me get right to it, MegaZone, and save us all the pain in the ass of kicking around the subject. In order to save your life--or rather, reclaim it--I injected into your system the very essence of my race, the Detians--Omega-2. A retro-virus so powerful few in the universe have even heard of it. It did the job quite nicely; drew you back across the line and anchored you firmly in the here and now. Perhaps too firmly." Noting Zoner's still-puzzled expression, he went on, "You still don't understand, do you? Simply put, you are now immortal." "Immortal?!" Zoner sat bolt upright in his hospital bed, flinging off the sheet. "What the fuck do you mean, immortal?!" "I was afraid of this," Edison muttered to himself. "You cannot die, Bikowicz--accept it." "Never? What the hell is going on? Did I wake up to a bad Highlander remake or something?" "Oh, calm down--if you really feel it necessary to end your life, yes, there are ways. Make this entire exercise a waste of my time and resources, go ahead. Let yourself age and die like some ephemeral fool. Or stay, live, enjoy life to its fullest extent forever, the woman you love at your side and the entire universe for your playground. You decide," said Edison, and left the room. "What the fuck is going on? Who is this guy and why is he trying to guilt trip me. And... Wait a second, rewind that--what was that about the woman I love at my side?" Zoner called after him. "I wasn't going to leave you behind, all alone in the world," Yuri told him, putting an arm around his shoulders. "You too? You mean you're immortal too? Yuri, you shouldn't've--" "What? You don't want to share the rest of time with me?" "No, no, that's not what I meant. I want to be with you forever, but--" "Look at him," Gryphon muttered to Kei under his breath, but he was angry enough that everyone in the room could hear it. "Fuckin' ingrate." He turned on his heel and stormed out of the room. "Ben, come back," Kei called after him. With a quick and perfunctory--and rather cool--"Welcome back, Zoner," she went after him. "Ben, what's gotten into you? You've never been this mean to Zoner, not even at the worst times. What's wrong?" "He's being his usual sensitive self, that's all," Ben replied through his teeth. "He's put Yuri through hell, and now all he can think of is his own pathetic deathwish." "That isn't true! He's concerned that Yuri had this done to her--" "--'cause he's just gonna leave her behind," Gryphon finished. "You watch--he's gonna go find some active volcano or blast furnace or something and, with a huge amount of pomp and circumstance, and probably Pink Floyd blasting in the background, do himself in." "You don't know that." "Oh yes I do. He's gonna make good and damn sure he's wrecked everything, smashed it all up, then leave it all behind and you and me to pick up the pieces." "Well if it helps you any I've made my decision." "What decision?" "I'm going to do the same as Yuri." "Why? A while ago you didn't want to." "I'm afraid for the future, okay? That isn't a crime. I want to be able to spend longer with you than our little human lives can give us--and I want to be able to stay with Yuri. Besides--maybe if there are more of us around him like that, Zoner won't be quite so keen on bailing out of life again." "That's a possibility...I hadn't thought of that." Gryphon gave a sigh, squared his shoulders, and said, "Fine. Let's go get this over with, before I change my mind. And if I haven't told you lately--I love you." Kei just smiled and gently squeezed his hand as they walked. "What do you mean, you want it too? Good Lord, I have better things to do than go around making young lovers immortal for a lark! Do you know the severity of this crime in the Detian culture? It's worse than a capital crime." "What do you care, Bell?" Gryphon asked. "You're an anarchist. I can tell just by looking at you. Unconventional, masterless and irrepressible. That's the whole reason you're with Wolfgang and company at all--they're just like you. We're just like you. The Detian government is too restrictive--so you ditched and you'll do whatever you damn well please. Besides, even if you did care about it, you've already done it twice here, and who knows how many times elsewhere--the hole you've dug yourself can't get any deeper. Now fork over." Edison was silent for a moment; then a smile spread across his face. "I like you," he said, slapping Gryphon's shoulder. "Just a second while I ready the equipment." Within moments, everything was ready. Edison slotted a vial, dialed an appropriate dosage, and, without pausing or hesitating, shot Gryphon's arm. Then he turned to Kei and, noting the set of her jaw and the determined narrowing of her deep brown eyes, did the same to her. These two weren't waffling about it, that was for sure. "It's done," he said calmly, replacing his equipment once more, "and I want you to know something." "What?" "I wish you luck. Few relationships can stand the test of immortality. I didn't want to warn Yuri about this, simply because she was so overwrought as it was--but I feel you should know, and eventually you must warn her. I can only think of two or three, among the entire Detian civilization, that survived into 413...and mine was not among them. I wish I didn't have to tell you this, but facts are facts and you have a right to know." "Thank you for expressing your concern," said Kei, "but somehow, I think we'll manage." She squeezed Gryphon's shoulders. "Somehow, I think you just may," said Edison with a smile. "In any event, I wish you the best of luck. All of you." "You realize it won't end with us," Gryphon warned. "As soon as the word spreads--and it will, soon enough--more people will be coming to you. Possibly the entire Wedge Defense Force." "I know," Edison replied. "And as long as they can convince me they have a good reason, I have no problems with administering to them either. I've been around long enough to know how people think pretty well...and unless I miss my guess, Jenna and Matt will be next, followed quickly by your chief engineer and the pilots of your Veritech squadron...and so on, and so on..." Edison sighed. "No rest for the weary." He smiled. "Go on, go to your captain and tell him he's no longer quite so alone...it'll cheer him up." "Ben! Kei! There you are," Yuri called as she met them in the hallways. "I've been looking for you. Zoner wants to know why you're so upset." "He would," said Gryphon with a sardonic grin. "Mr. Perception, that's Zoner. We were just on our way to see him...got some news that may cheer him up." "What might that be?" "Well," said Kei with a smile, "we've just been to see Edison, you see..." "Oh, Kei, you haven't!" Kei nodded. "That's wonderful! I never wanted to lose you either, you know," said Yuri as she embraced her partner. She smiled sarcastically. "Where would I find a partner with your shot-to-kill ratio again?" "Don't get all mushy on me," Kei said with matching sarcasm. "I'm glad we'll be together too." "Hey, what about me, don't I get a hug?" Gryphon said with mock woundedness. "It was my idea." "Your idea? Ha! I had to practically drag you down there." "Don't argue, you two--oh, Ben, don't be that way, I'm happy I won't have to lose you, too," Yuri cut them off, hugging Ben as well. "We weren't arguing...were we?" "I don't think so..." "Come in," said Zoner when the door to his private recovery room chimed. The door hissed open and in walked Trouble Investigation Consultant Team #261 and the commander of Veritech Fighter Squadron VVF-261 (Eight-Ball). And they were all--lo and behold--smiling. "So hey," said Gryphon, "feel any different? I don't." "No not really. But... Wait a minute. What the hell do you mean `I don't'? You too? And I suppose Kei too?" "Something like that," Ben replied. "Basically, Yuri did it so she wouldn't have to leave you, and Kei did it so she wouldn't have to leave Yuri, and I did it so I wouldn't have to leave Kei, or Yuri, or--horror of horrors--let you outlive me. And now we figure Jenna will do it, so she can stay with us longer, and Matt will do it so he can stay with Jenna, and ReRob will do it so he can stay with us, and the other pilots from my squadron, and so on, and so on..." "You mean--" "By the end of the week, I figure the whole WDF will be immortal." Of course, rumors spread like wildfire through the Wedge Defense Force about this strange man from out of time and his immortality formula. No official word had been released, of course--that would wait until Zoner was recovered enough to resume his duties, and formally took command back from Gryphon. That didn't stop people from talking, though. Nor seeking out Edison to be treated on their own. Gryphon's prediction was right; by the end of the week, almost the entire Wedge Defense Force was Detian. No one really knew who was and who wasn't; most had vague ideas, or assumed, but no one really knew, nor really figured it was any of their business. (Most of those who would've opted to remain mortal had gotten off back on Earth; if the whole space defense force routine had been a bit much for them, immortality? Not.) On Friday, MegaZone formally took command of the Wedge Defense Force back from Gryphon, and immediately, the two of them went into conference with Lord Fahrvergnugen. ------------------------------------------------------SIXTEEN "It's been a long time coming and it's good to be back." --The Alarm "From all understandings, you have done well," Wolfgang observed from the head of the conference table. "Both your battles have ended in victory, and only a few of your personnel have died. Why then are both of you having serious doubts about your command abilities?" "Both battles have ended in victory, sure," Zoner said, "but both times we've gotten the shit beaten out of us. I've watched the tapes of the battle on Earth, and while I'll admit the victory was impressive considering the odds, look at the damage the ship took! Both A.R.M.D. platforms destroyed, almost a quarter of the ship blown off, main gun disabled, system after system overloaded and burned out, Reflex furnace barely functional." "I fucked up, okay?" Gryphon said with a trace of defensive anger. "I had the responsibility of command and I went out to play pilot instead. What happened on Earth was my fault, and I'll accept full responsibility for it." "Nothing was anyone's fault," Wolfgang interrupted. "For your first battle, you were inexperienced and unready for combat--and you performed admirably. For your second you were understaffed, without your most capable leader, and highly demoralized. Both times you have come out on top. This shows to me that you are indeed the force I've been trying so hard to create. You are worthy of your positions and I will not see you giving them up. Consider this an official reprimand for having such a dim view of what I consider to be great achievements." There was a moment of silence as the two young officers pondered. "As to the future," Wolfgang continued, "repairs are almost complete to your ship, and I have addressed several of your other problems as well." "Such as?" Gryphon asked curiously. "The Wedge Defense Force is highly skilled and motivated, but undermanned," Lord Fahrvergnugen observed. "There are not enough of you to provide a truly flexible force. You can field only two squadrons of Veritech fighters, and no Destroids, nor other types of starfighters. You have no commando troops to speak of, nor conventional infantry, nor space marines, and so on. I had decided not long ago that I needed to find another force to attach to the WDF, one that matches it in motivation, skill, aggression, one that could be easily trained to use WDF equipment, one that would be loyal and brave. It was truly a dilemma, but with the help of a good friend, I found the solution." "Well, don't keep us in suspense..." Zoner trailed off. "I don't plan on it. Gentlemen, may I present to you my good friend, and possibly the savior of the Wedge Defense Force, Princess Asrial of Salusia." Gryphon and Zoner looked at each other with looks of, well, not amazement--more like "Why did I somehow expect something like this?" After the weirdness they had absorbed in the last several months, this seemed just par for the course. "You don't think he means...." Zoner began. "It wouldn't surprise me," Gryphon replied. "At all." "Those are Uncle Martin's antennas..." Gryphon's reply was a suppressed chuckle and, "No they're not. They look particularly cat-like to me." While this exchange was taking place Princess Asrial entered the room and observed the pair amusedly. "Gentlemen," said the Princess regally. "Lord Fahrvergnugen has related to me your mission and your plans, and I must agree that your mission is a noble one. I'm more than happy to offer my support. For that reason, I have attached one of my own crack units to your forces--the 101st FTL Cavalry. They have already completed training in all WDF equipment and received their postings; it only remains for you, Captain Bikowicz, to formally accept their attachment." MegaZone stood and offered his best approximation of a courtly bow. "Princess, I would be honored. But just one thing. Please don't call me Captain Bikowicz. Call me Zoner, or MegaZone, tack on the Captain if you want." "Very well, Zoner," Asrial replied, smiling. "This," she said, indicating the tallish, red-haired Salusian to her side, "is Major Perry Aldzinjal, commander of the 101st Cavalry." "Captain," said the Major with a tip of his uniform cap. He wore the distinctive orange and black uniform of a Salusian space marine. "Pleasure to be working with you." "If that's all, gentlemen, I really should be getting back to Earth--I've been here far too long as it is." "By all means," said Zoner. "It's a pleasure to have met you, your highness." "I agree," Gryphon seconded. "And an honor." "Flatterers," said Asrial, and with a wink, she left the room. "My men are ready to move into their assigned quarters, Captain, if you'll just give the word," said Major Aldzinjal. "Like I told the Princess, call me Zoner, Major, we're pretty informal around here. Move your guys in whenever--I don't think we're going anywhere for a while." "All right--you guys call me Perry, if we're running an informal shop, and I'll catch you later. I have to supervise the move." "You seemed to hit it off fairly well," Lord Fahrvergnugen observed as Perry left the room. "I am pleased; I think this merger will work nicely." "What of the repairs to the ship?" Gryphon asked. "Ah, the ship. All the damaged systems have been repaired or replaced, and major structural components replaced or reinforced. The main gun has been repaired--in fact, you're almost ready to take her into space again. All that remains is the replacement of the A.R.M.D. platforms, and that won't take long." "We're getting new platforms, then?" asked Zoner. "Not exactly," Wolfgang replied. "I had intended to build a fleet for your forces, as they grew--I had two smaller ships ready to go, in fact. However, since your vessel is in need of side platforms for Veritech and Destroid operations, and I have no A.R.M.D. platforms completed, I opted for a new modular system the technicians came up with." "Why do I think I know what's coming?" Zoner mumbled. He touched a key on the conference table and a screen glowed behind him with a schematic. Where the mounting hardpoints for A.R.M.D.-1 and -2 had been there were large extended armatures, locking cogs, it appeared. An image of a small ship appeared next to the SDF-17; in its stern was an aperture the same size and shape as the cog. In choppy tech- animation, the smaller ship turned around and backed onto the cog, locking in place. With a groan, Zoner realized what it was; the aircraft carrier Prometheus. The schematic rotated, and sure enough, Daedalus slipped into place on the other side. "This way, the two smaller vessels can be detached at will to become fully capable starships--for support, or small-scale missions where the Wayward Son's size and power would be more of a liability." Zoner turned to Gryphon as Wolfgang went on about the technical details of the linkage system and mouthed silently, "Daedalus? Prometheus? Why me?" And so, several days later, with much pomp and circumstance, the SDF-17, WDF Wayward Son, once again unmarred and proud, left the Utopia Planitia Naval Shipyards, this time bearing a crew eight hundred strong and morale running higher than ever before. They didn't know where they were going, but they knew they'd find out when they got there--and they knew for a fact that it wouldn't be boring. ----------------------------------------------------SEVENTEEN "Against boredom even the gods themselves struggle in vain." --Friedrich Nietzche A YEAR AND A HALF LATER The Wayward Son cruised through space at a leisurely .8C, ticking over the powerplant on an aimless trip to nowhere. Their mission to Earth over, the crew had very little to do, for though they were supposed to be a defense force, defending the universe from great evil, there didn't seem to be a hell of a lot of great evil around. In the year and a half since leaving their homebase shipyard again, the Wedge Defense Force hadn't seen much action. Oh, there were rumors of this great evil or that great evil, but nothing had ever really materialized. A couple of interventions by the SDF-17 in naval battles of the Salusia-Zardon War, to pay the Princess back for the 101st Cav, maybe a police action or two. Of all the Wedge Defense Force's personnel, Kei and Yuri were the only people to really get any interesting action, with the formation of the Worlds Welfare Work Association as a department of the WDF in June of '92. The 3WA provided smaller-scale service than the WDF proper, befitting its model organization--so they tended to get more business. The crew of the SDF-17 was well-trained and everyone knew their jobs, so it wasn't a question of competence; it was just that, contrary to popular belief, space fortresses have very little to do with their time when not part of an active military force. For that reason, boredom had built among the crew until they demanded a vacation. Captain's Log, Terran Synchronized Date 25 August 1993. Captain MegaZone recording. The crew has demanded a vacation. I don't know where the hell we are, so I've ordered an immediate advance at .8C in some random direction. Eventually, we'll reach some place fun. Fifteen levels below the bridge, down in the body of the vessel proper, the door to M-Level Cabin Suite 401 hissed open and the SDF-17's XO emerged. Commander Benjamin D. Hutchins left his room. It had been almost a month since Kei and Yuri had left the area in Lovely Angel on assignment; unable to go with them because of the pressures of command, he and Zoner were stuck on The Most Boring Super Dimensional Fortress In The Universe for no short period of time. During that time, Zoner had become increasingly manic and Ben increasingly morose. Today he had finally sublimated all that nervous energy that usually built up to make him lethargic (go figure) into a calm, restrained feeling of energy. He walked with an easy, measured stride to the elevator, entered, and keyed it for the bridge. (He refused to talk to the elevators.) Moments later, the door opened with an annoying SCHNUK noise onto the bridge. The bridge was a purpose-designed room, professionally engineered so that only three or four things were wrong with it and it was a tolerable place to work. Ben walked out onto the bridge and settled into his seat on the captain's right. "Yo Gryph," said MegaZone with a sidelong glance at his XO. "What's up?" "Less than nothing," Ben replied shortly. He reached into the fridge under his seat and got himself out a ginger beer, then opened up a book and started reading. Over in the right-hand corner, Communications Officer Macquivr snapped his fingers for attention. "Like yo, Captain, you've got a message coming in." "On screen," Zoner ordered. He really enjoyed being captain, although the crew had forced him to promise not to point at the viewscreen and say "Engage" any more. The forward windows' view of space dissolved into a comm screen image. The cockpit of a smallish spacecraft, two-seat with lots and lots of switches, knobs, buttons, dials, and levers. Lovely Angel, SDF-17's Wasp class corvette. At the controls was Yuri. Kei was nowhere to be found. "Hi, Yuri--" Zoner began. "Wayward Son, this is Lovely Angel," Yuri cut him off in a most uncharacteristic way. "We are coming in hot, repeat, hot to Prometheus, bay four. We are damaged and carrying wounded--be advised, Lovely Angel is declaring an emergency." "What is the nature of your emergency?" Ben asked, his brain snicking into business mode. "We have moderate thruster damage and severe powerplant damage; velocity control is negative. We're at one-quarter c and that's where we're staying until we cut engines. Have the emergency nets ready. We are carrying one wounded personnel in stable but poor condition. Have medical assistance standing by. I am beginning final approach. Lovely Angel out." "Shit--Yuri, wait--" Too late; she had already cut the connection. She needed all of her concentration to land the ship. "I have visual contact with the Angel," Q reported. The windows zoomed in to show the sleek red needle heading for the Wayward Son, the entire rear left quarter of the ship smashed and mangled. The engine core was in one place exposed and trailing a strange glow. Zoner slammed a hand down on the intercom controls on his chair arm. "Attention Prometheus! Prepare to attend emergency crash situation." Meanwhile, Ben was fulfilling his XO position by advising sick bay. "Q, you have the conn," Zoner declared, getting up and heading for the elevator. "Come on, Ben." They ran, as fast as they could, to the portside docking bay. By the time they arrived, it was all over; Lovely Angel was a tattered heap against the rear wall, wrapped in shredded nets, and Yuri and Mughi were standing to the side, behind the fire control 'bots putting out the fire and shutting down the fusion core. Medical personnel were attending Kei, who was laid out on a gravstretcher. "Kei!" Ben shouted, taking off across the docking bay at a full panic run. Yuri caught him halfway there, blocking his charge with a strong arm across his chest. "Stay away," she told him forcefully. "There's nothing you can do." "Let me go!" Frantic as he was, he might have gotten past Yuri, but when MegaZone grabbed him, well... The fight drained away from him; his shoulders under Zoner's hands stopped trembling. He let himself slump. "Right. Nothing I can do. I'd just get in the way." He laughed mirthlessly. "I hate feeling useless." "What happened?" Zoner asked Yuri. "We were attacked on our return route here. We had just come out of warp when a squadron of them attacked us--I have no idea what they were flying. They were good--too good. The Angel was damaged anyway, from the course of the mission- -we were out of missiles and half the laser banks were down. Maneuver power was at 78% and shields iffy at best. They knew. Somehow they knew. They kept hitting us on the left, where the shields were weakest." "What happened to Kei?" asked Ben. "We took a missile hit to the port nose," Yuri told him. "Her panel blew in her face." "Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck!" Gryphon spun around and punched the wall. "Take it easy, she'll be all right," Zoner said. "Do you know that? Do you? No. And neither do I." "In fact I do. Her Detian physiology will have her up and about in no time." Gryphon scowled and turned away from Zoner. He hated it when he was right. Fortunately, it didn't happen often. He tabbed the intercom on the wall on and dialed it for fighter command. "This is Hutchins. Get my fighter ready. Full booster pods, the works. I'm going hunting." "Are you crazy? They tore us apart!" Yuri shouted. "They were fighting a ship four times their size, weakened, undergunned, and half crippled. They were briefed on your damage status and probably your fighting style too. I'll be flying a fully-prepped, perfect-condition Veritech VF-1FS Hyper Valkyrie, the most flexible, powerful starfighter ever produced. I'm rested and I'm pissed off. I'll never be sharper. I just hope they haven't left the sector yet." He took one last look at the crowd of medtechs around Kei, then turned and started running full-tilt toward the fighter bay, stripping off and discarding bits of his shipboard uniform as he went. Thirty seconds later, he jumped into the cockpit of his VF-1S, buckling his left boot and sealing the last clasp on his CVR-3 chestplate; he pulled on his gloves and clamped down his helmet as he began running prelaunch checks. The cockpit canopy came down and sealed as all the missile lights lighted once and went out. GU-11 loaded and locked, firing relays in place. Transformation systems were reading green. All modular systems were on line. He got final clearance from q and hit full burner. The Valkyrie was catapulted out of its launch tube in three seconds, accelerating across Prometheus' foredeck and streaking into space, gear going up. Something smallish and red appeared in his peripheral vision. He glanced at it; it was MegaZone's ridiculously red Daytona, minus its Beta unit and fitted for space combat. He opened a frequency. "Zoner, what are you doing?" "Flying your wing, why?" "I could ask you the same question." "Making sure you don't get yourself killed." "Just make sure the same applies to you." Gryphon started searching his scope for other targets, which were indeed forthcoming; on the other side of a nearby asteroid field, in fact. Five blips, high energy--very likely starfighters. And five makes a squadron. Of course they would be hiding; anyone knew that attacking the Wayward Son was pure suicide with only a squadron of fighters. Her armor was proof against most fighter-size weapons, except possibly Mauler anti-ship missiles; her sheer size rendered her incredibly hard to kill; and her own defensive weapons were formidable, not even counting the Reflex cannon. Also, she was known to carry a full wing of Valkyries; several modified wings of Legios units; a Salusian Special Forces Shadow Legios/Vindicator "commando squad"; a company of Garland X-2's; a division of space marines, most of them hand-picked Salusian specialists, equipped with Cyclones; and of course the elite Hammers, all of whom had Cyclones of their own. That wasn't even counting the Destroids and the rest of the 101st Salusian FTL Cavalry, including their wing of Raptors. And, of course, she had a WWWA Wasp-class corvette and its accompanying troubleshooter team assigned to her as a homebase port. Not a ship to be messed with. These guys had signed their death warrant when they attacked the Angel. Gryphon checked their location again and kicked in his boosterpacks, vectoring straight into the asteroid field. "Gryphon, I can't keep up with you at that speed!" Zoner shouted. "So catch up and pick up the pieces," Gryphon replied, opening the Valkyrie's wings a little more to use more of the vector control surfaces. He went diving into the asteroid field at full speed, dodging asteroids as if he were flying a normal jet in an atmosphere. The way Veritech fighters flew wasted a lot of power, but then again, it wasn't as if they were in desperate need of conservation, and besides, it made pilots feel better. Zoner spat out a vile curse before heading in at his own top speed, ducking around flying chunks of rock and having an easier time of it because of his slower speed and smaller size. Gryphon cleared the field; his lock was still firm on his five targets. Grinning, he pulled the wings all the way back and aimed straight at them, pushing the Valkyrie to its absolute maximum speed. And suddenly, there they were. Black, almost invisible against the starfield, and absolutely unmarked, five attack fighters and a warp tender of uncertain origin and vintage. The tender sported a simple construction; spindly power core, bridge, quarters ring, docking bay for the fighters. Gryphon tagged one of the fighters with his targeting system and had a closer look. A medium fighter by WDF standards, with apparently moderate armor and surprisingly good shielding. Their shape was dramatic and strange, a flattened discus with a cut in front for the cockpit windows and two big thrusters in the rear. Gryphon locked one into his target tracking system and watched the small screen; it lit up with the words "LOCKED TARGET --DRALTHI" and a small schematic of the Kilrathi fighter in question. "What the--?" Gryphon wondered, then shrugged and decided some tech with a warped sense of humor had done it. Better to concentrate on the job at hand; it appeared that the fighters had just relaunched after having their weapons stores replenished. Gryphon smiled. Good. Wouldn't do to go beating up an undergunned opponent, would it? The five fighters scattered like startled pigeons as he came barreling out of nowhere into their midst; the targeting reticule inside his visor swung onto the locked one and sang a missile lock. As the fingers of his right hand selected missile racks, his left thumb flipped open the safety cover over a trigger and clamped said trigger down, launching three AIM-6-XL Reaper missiles from their pylon under the left wing. They blossomed the way Reapers tend to do, spreading outward to confused anti-missile systems before diving back in and plunging one after the other into one of the Dralthi, converting it to a rapidly expanding cloud of glowing yellow and orange bits. The Valkyrie's wings extended fully as Gryphon throttled back, cut out the boosters, and performed a wide duck to the left; missiles from the four remaining Dralthi passed around him or blew up behind him. One clipped the left rear engine pod, shattering some of the modular armor but doing nothing of consequence. Nine Reapers left, and just the thing to do with them too. Gryphon dove straight "down" in relation to the tender, doing a neat Immelmann around it, and then emerged on the other side to launch all his remaining wing missiles. The Dralthi broke and fled, scattering again, as missiles corkscrewed toward them. Two escaped. One took four hits and died a horribly messy death. The other lost a wing and went spinning off into the asteroid field out of control, vanishing from the battle zone. "Hmm...that was unproductive," Gryphon muttered. "Oh well." The two remaining Dralthi regrouped and began a concerted attack, unleashing all of their remaining missiles as well. Deceleration almost threw Gryphon's head into the instrument panel as he yanked back the throttle and slammed the Valkyrie into Gerwalk configuration. The GU-11 dropped into his left hand as the arms extended; the wings flared out and a strange sense of balance appeared, even in deep space. ANTI-MISSILE SYSTEM ENGAGED, his HUD informed him. He raised the GU-11 and fired off a rapid burst, letting his arm track with the reticule; most of the missiles got hosed, but a couple got through to blast off armor and vaporize one of the snap-on arm missile pods. Growling, he swung his arm around, cut the AMS, and opened fire with the GU-11 again, raking one of the Dralthi. Its own armor withstood the barrage, but he had screwed its vector grav control surfaces up a bit. Gryphon dove into the open again. The Valkyrie converted fully to battroid mode, rapidly slowing and curling into a ball as the undamaged Dralthi screamed by, its twin lasers chattering a neon burst across the sky. Bolts tracked black scars up the Valkyrie's right leg, side, and arm as it came out of the tuck and opened fire with the remaining snap-on pod, putting its two AIM-105-3X General Hosement missiles right into the glowing throat of the Dralthi's engine. It stuttered, flared, faltered, and then, slowly banking to the right, exploded. The remaining Dralthi came up from beneath the Battloid's orientation, lining up for its own pass; Gryphon dropped the Valkyrie back into fighter mode and opened up all the stops, accelerating out of the Dralthi's line of fire almost instantly. He banked to the right so hard that the lateral acceleration flattened him into his seat, coming around on the Dralthi's right flank before the unfortunate pilot even realized what was going on. The Dralthi hadn't finished firing his burst at nothing before Gryphon's Valkyrie was back and at a near-standstill in battroid mode. "Eat this, asshole!" Gryphon shouted, emptying the GU-11 into the small silver-black square that was the Dralthi's cockpit window. The craft heeled to the left and exploded. The battroid stood there for a short time, not moving, surveying the tender and not knowing quite what to make of it. Then the tender did something rather silly; it fired a laser cannon at him. Gryphon dodged to the left; the laser bolt shredded the remaining snap-on armor on the left leg. Snarling, he put the Valkyrie back in fighter mode again and streaked out in a sweeping arc, then approached from the front and opened up with all his remaining weapons; nose lasers, side lasers, and head lasers, strafing right up the beam. The first thing to go was the bridge dome, holed and then blown out from within by pressure; then lots of nasty but probably inconsequential hull damage on the way down to the other end. Just as he cleared the end of the ship, Gryphon slammed the Valkyrie into Gerwalk mode again and ducked it down and under, putting it "upside down" and facing right into the tender's drive thruster's exhaust. He popped the thumb covers off the other two thumb triggers and then fired away. The booster pods shed their small pop-off plates on the fore-sections and spewed out their entire collection of AIM-105-3X missiles, all twenty of them--right into the throat of the sublight fusion drive. The Valkyrie jetted back a good hundred yards, converted to fighter mode, flipped neatly over, and headed at a good healthy clip back toward the asteroid field, jettisoning the now-useless snap-on stuff and extending the ruddervators. A couple of seconds later, the tender exploded in a rather Death Star-ish manner. Gryphon found MegaZone in the asteroid field, hovering off the bow of the crippled Dralthi, his every weapon to bear on its cockpit. "Problems?" Zoner said. "None. You?" "Yeah...this asshole doesn't seem to want to come back to the SDF-17. On the other hand, he doesn't seem particularly eager to die, either." "I see. Gimme his frequency." "Done." "Thanks. Hey, you! Yeah, you! You hear me? This is Commander Benjamin D. Hutchins of the Wedge Defense Force, executive officer of the WDF Wayward Son and commander of the VVF-261 Valkyrie Squadron. Your buddies are all dead and that last big explosion you saw over there was your tender." "No! You lie!" a human-sounding voice shouted back. "Would I lie to you? If you like I can show you the dust cloud. Now listen carefully. You're coming back to the ship whether you like it or not." He cut the channel closed before the pilot could respond, then shifted to Gerwalk mode. "Keep him covered, Zoner," said Gryphon, and clamped a hand onto the Dralthi's remaining wing, the metal fingers digging into the armor and making grooves. The rear thrusters flared and they were off. After dropping the Dralthi off at Repair Two, Gryphon made a circle around the Wayward Son, as was standard, before carrying out a normal arrester-hook landing on Prometheus. Zoner had, by this time, docked on Daedalus. Climbing out of his cockpit, Gryphon noted that the cleanup crews had already removed the wreckage of what had once been the Lovely Angel. "Enjoy yourself?" asked Yuri from the doorway to the ready room. "As a matter of fact, yes," Ben replied as he took off his helmet. "How's Kei?" "She's awake. She's been asking to see you." "Great." He tossed his helmet into his locker. "I'll head down now, then." About halfway to the turbolift they encountered ReRob, who said simply, "I understand we had some excitement today." "You might say that." Zoner rounded the corner and called out for them to wait. "Zoner--any word on that asshole we captured?" "He's in the brig; we've got Archon and Daver working on him, so it shouldn't take him too long to crack. If that doesn't work, we can always send in Wheels. He's not human, by the way." "No? What then?" "I hate to say it, but he's Kilrathi." "Oh gaaah. I hate it when I'm right." "And Perry has informed me that the Kilrathi are ancestral enemies of the Salusians..." "Which explains why my computer knew what a Dralthi was. Oh marvelous..." They piled into the turbolift and headed for sick bay. Kei was in one of the monitor beds, swathed in bandages, her right forearm in a green plastic Gel-O-Seal cast; instead of her characteristic ribbon she was wearing a head dressing, and small squares of gauze covered most of her face, including an eye. Nonetheless, she smiled when Ben came in. "Hi, Ben--I'm glad to see you. I must look like hell--" "You?" Ben replied with a cockeyed grin. "Look like hell? Impossible!" "Flattery will get you nowhere, but keep trying, love." "The damage was mostly superficial, caused by bits of flying, hot metal and the like--she's lucky she didn't lose an eye," said Jenna. "Of course it probably would've grown back. I still don't understand everything about Detian physiology." "That's me," Kei said wryly. "Always the lucky one." "So, partner, how're you doing?" Yuri asked as she entered the room. "I've been better, but I'll be ok. How are you?" "Other than a bit pissed off, I'm fine, but I'm glad to see that you're ok." "Of course she's ok," Edison observed from the doorway. "What is this? Some kind of convention?" Gryphon snapped. "I heard of her injuries and I thought it would be prudent of me to check in on her," answered Edison. "Besides, I was concerned." "Sorry. Guess I'm just a bit pissy at the moment," Gryphon apologized. "Can't imagine why." "No problem. But as I was saying, her injuries, albeit painful, are nothing to worry about for a Detian." "So she'll fully recover?" Jenna asked. "Of course. It takes quite a bit to keep a Detian down. But as Kei has had the misfortune of discovering, a Detian still feels pain, since the nerves heal fully too." "Oh great, so we get to recover and don't get any benefits from toughening in the process," Gryphon observed. "Yes, but you will develop a tolerance for pain over time. Remember, you have only recently entered the Detian way of life. You still have to reevaluate your concept of time. What you formerly felt was a long time will be nothing eventually. When you don't age time can become irrelevant... It will take a long time by your old way of thinking for you to develop pain resistance, but for a Detian it is a very short time indeed." "So the more we get hurt the more we will be able to take?" Yuri asked. "That makes some sort of sense..." "What are we supposed to do, try and get hit?" Kei inquired. "No, nothing so drastic. As you have shown, you will have plenty of opportunities during your normal duties. Give it time." "Time, that's what it all comes down to, isn't it?" Jenna observed. "Yes...in the end the passage of time provides all the answers," Edison answered. -----------------------------------------------------EIGHTEEN "Bored.. Bored. Bored. Bored. I've only been here two months, and I'm already bored. No unnecessary sedation, no electro-shock therapy, not even any elevator music." --The Tick "Eve, what's the Kei's status?" Zoner asked from his command chair on the bridge. "She is recovering steadily. Currently Ben, Yuri, Jenna, and Edison are visiting with her. It seems that Omega-2 greatly increases the human healing rates," Eve replied from the view screen in the arm of his chair. "Thanks, Eve. Say, how're the rest of the crew doing?" "Everyone is healthy, even the few who didn't opt for Omega-2. But morale is fairly low. After the first few months of steady fighting the lack of action seems to be affecting them." "In other words, they're still bored. Well, hopefully we'll find something to do. Maybe we can find some new worlds to explore. I had Lord Fahrvergnugen load some extra scientific equipment on board just in case. I don't want to end up being the Captain of some sort of space police vessel. I really don't enjoy bopping about blasting things." "You seemed anxious to join Ben on his last mission. You even left the ship when you know you're not supposed to risk yourself." "Well, I didn't want him to get himself hurt. And, well, I was bored too. But I still don't enjoy killing others. I will respond if provoked, but there is no pleasure in killing others. And speaking of others, how's the questioning of the prisoner going?" "Daver and Archon are still working on him." "They're not working him over are they?" "No, they're just questioning him. Quite politely, in fact." "Well, let me know if they get anywhere. Or if they don't remind me to go down there in, oh, say, three hours." "Very well." "Oh, and Eve..." "Yes?" "What do you think we'll find out there?" "I cannot answer that. There is much that I do not know." "Yeah. The unknown. There never seems to be a shortage of that, does there? I don't know. Sometimes the future scares me. And I've got a lot of it." "Yes. I've observed that the unknown tends to make humans uneasy, more so than the Salusians. Would it help if I were to sing?" "Heh. You know I love to hear your voice, Eve. Certainly, if you'd like to sing, please do." "Is there anything in particular you'd like to hear?" "Not really. I'll leave the judgement to you. Maybe something to cheer the crew up a bit." "I believe I know just the song." With that Eve's sweet voice began lilting from the comm system across the ship. "Ah, I love to listen to her sing." "Um, like, Zoner?" q called from the comm station. "Yeah?" "There's a solar system about ten degrees off of our present path. Do you want to check it out?" "Might as well. It's not like we've got any pressing engagements at the moment. Maybe we can find somewhere to get the crew some R&R." "Like ok. Chris, like, change course." "Altering course to port ten degrees," Chris Sprague announced from the nav position. "Fine. Are we going to get near anything any time soon?" "Doesn't look that way, Zoner," Chris replied. "Fine. I think I'll go hang in the wedge for a while. q, you have the conn. If anyone else wants to take a break just get someone else who's qualified to take your place. Call me if anything happens." "Like, will do. Take it easy." Zoner left the bridge, but avoided the elevators. He felt like wandering the corridors for a while listening to Eve's singing. She did have an incredible voice. Ben did an outstanding job in the HDS. He always suspected that Ben had kept it around, but there was no need to let everyone else know about it. Let them suspect. He smiled. Life really was pretty good; odd, but good. He contemplated going to sickbay, but he decided that there were enough people there already, so he just continued to stroll along for a while. Eve finished her song and continued into another. She said she liked to sing, and it showed. Another benefit of the Detian retro-virus: his brain was reorganized too. It made it easier to learn and retain knowledge. So of course, with all of the time the crew had, they spent a great deal of it learning new languages. Zoner's first choice had of course been Japanese; he wanted to enjoy Eve's singing the way it was meant to be. Before long Zoner found himself in the housing sections of the ship. With all the time he had he still hadn't been down here that often. The Wayward Son was a huge ship. Zoner veered off to the Salusian sections, to see how the new crew were adapting to life on board ship. The barracks were actually very nice to live in. Since there was so much room to spare they had been constructed as apartment complexes. After living in college dorms the Wedge Rats understood the need for privacy. At first Zoner had wanted to put the Salusians right in with the old crew. He felt segregation was wrong and that it would be discriminatory to separate them from the rest of the crew. But after a few meetings between the SDF-17's commanders and the Salusian leaders it was decided that it would be best to allow for separate housing, at least at first. There was some nervousness on both sides and the cultural differences might cause some conflict. It was felt that over time the problems would work themselves out and that the humans and Salusians would mix freely eventually. The average Salusian life span was many times that of a normal human, so there wasn't any real need for the Salusians to use the Omega-2 retro-virus, even though testing had shown the Salusian genetic structure to be close enough to that of humans that it was possible. Besides, a number of the Salusians were very wary of Edison. Apparently the Salusian empire had some problems with Detians in the past. But no one was talking about it. Of course in their natural state the Salusians were furry bipeds, somewhat resembling a skunk in coloration. But Princess Asrial had insisted that they all undergo a conversion to full human form. So they actually were hard to tell apart from the humans, except of course for their extra set of ears. Most people wouldn't even notice them. (Of course, the Wedge Rats weren't most people.) The humans and Salusians were actually hitting it off fairly well; a few human-Salusian relationships had already developed. That was another benefit of having more crew aboard. A number of the Salusian crack units were female. That helped balance out the male majority amongst the Wedge Rats. Zoner greeted crew members he encountered as he strolled along the streets. A few of the Salusians came to attention as he approached. He made sure to stop and chat for a while to tell them to chill. He didn't want to be Captain of a purely military vessel. He liked the casual atmosphere and as long as the discipline was there when it was needed he didn't think it caused any problems. He was steadily learning the names of most of the new crew members--a task made much easier by the retro-virus' effects on his brain--but he still had several more to learn. As he strolled through the center of what could be called the town he ran into one of the Salusian crew who had been training for bridge duty. Second Lieutenant Deedlit Satori began to salute as he approached, but she caught herself. "You're learning," Zoner called out to her. "Sorry, sir...I mean Zoner. I guess I'm just not used to being so informal around superior officers," Deedlit replied. "I understand. You've spent years in the military learning the routine and then we tell you to forget it. It'll take a bit of getting used to. But it'll help if you don't think of me as a superior officer. Remember, we're all equally important. The only time I'm superior is when I issue an order." "Ok. I'll try. What brings you down here anyway?" "Just sort of wandering around. I'm just as bored as the rest of the crew." "Want a companion?" "Sure," Zoner replied with a chuckle. "Misery loves company." Zoner and Deedlit continued on in Zoner's original direction of travel. As they walked Zoner took the time to really look at her. It was hard to believe she was an alien. Deedlit was a very attractive woman. She was a little shorter than he was, about six feet tall or so. Well proportioned, a beautiful smile, and a sparkle in her eyes. Youth; she was young and had yet to truly experience the trials of combat. She was his senior by a number of years, but a Salusian's childhood, like their lives, was longer than a human's. He wondered if that attractive sparkle would remain there after she had seen the horrors of war. He hoped that it would. He felt that he was aged beyond his years by the responsibility of command. Or maybe it was just coming back from the dead. He wasn't sure. None of these thoughts changed the fact that Deedlit was attractive. As they walked her long black hair trailed behind her in the artificial breeze. There was something about her that he just couldn't quite pin down. Something about her features. Wait! That was it. For the first time Zoner really noticed that there seemed to be different races among the Salusians. Deedlit's features seemed almost Asian, but not quite. It wasn't really surprising. Humans had many different races, why shouldn't aliens? Zoner decided to simply ask her about it. "Deedlit, I want to ask you something. Please don't take this the wrong way, but are there different races of Salusians?" "Hmm? Oh, yes, yes of course. It's not much different that the way different races developed on Earth actually. Salusia has several continents and the living conditions vary widely. The different races evolved for the same reasons as on Earth. Genetic mutation in isolated population and survival of the fittest mostly. Why do you ask?" "Well, I just really noticed how there seemed to be subgroups among the Salusians, appearance wise that is." "Oh. Is that why you were looking at me so intently?" "Um...well, yeah, that's part of the reason. But you are very attractive." "Really? I wasn't sure humans would be attracted to me." "Don't worry about it. You know, Yuri would probably kill me if she heard me saying these things." "Why?" "She can get very jealous. But she really doesn't have anything to worry about. I'm hopelessly in love with her." "I'm not sure how to take that." "Well, you may be very attractive, and I like you a lot. You seem fairly cool--but Yuri is the one I love. Love isn't a logical thing, you know. Don't try to figure it out." "Yes. I know." "Do you have anyone?" "I used to, but we broke up a couple of years ago. Then I got promoted and I've been so busy that I haven't really had the time to devote to a relationship." "Well, it seems that we have almost nothing but time as of late. You should try to find someone. There're plenty of people aboard." "Yeah, I know. I probably will." "Well, I think I'm going to head back to my quarters for a while. See you later." "Ok. See you later." Deedlit turned around and started back towards her apartment as Zoner continued on towards E7. "There's nothing to do but abuse mecha," ReRob muttered to no one in particular. Logan gave him a quizzical look. "Well, word is we're heading for a system. Maybe they'll be a planet to check out," Android replied. "Yeah. Like in every episode of Star Trek. They always find an inhabitable planet," Lightnin joked. "But the odds of actually finding an Earth-like planet are extremely low in the real world," ReRob rejoined. "I know. But let's at least try and be hopeful. Besides, we've got forever to find one," Lightnin replied. "Searching for a planet forever could get real boring," Android observed. "Yeah I guess it could. Maybe we should come up with another goal. I want to live long enough to be a witty as Joel and the 'bots," Lightnin replied. "I guess our bosses on Earth didn't like us then," ReRob ventured. "Umm...you could say that," Android answered. -----------------------------------------------------NINETEEN "The best laid plans of mice and men aft gang agly." --ancient Gaelic saying "Status?" asked Zoner when he got back to the bridge. "We're still closing on that system," Gryphon replied, relinquishing the captain's seat and taking his own station again. "Not close enough for anything but long-range scans yet, but it looks like there's at least one class-M planet. Maybe we'll find something." "What about the captured pilot?" "He isn't talking. No true Son of Kilrah is afraid of a bunch of monkey-boy torture artists, apparently." "Oh, Christ, they're torturing him?" "No, no...he's disappointed that they're not, though. Reinforces his view of humans as wimps. All they got out of him was his name." "Which is?" "Promise not to boot?" "Ok ok." "Bakhtosh Redclaw." "It just figures. He is Kilrathi, then?" "Yep. Won't say what he's doing in this sector, or why the five-ship tender, or what. Just snarls and spits." "Sounds like a Kilrathi to me. I suppose I should go down there sometime." "If you feel like it, I suppose. The mech section is tearing apart his fighter right now--they should have a line geared up to build them in a day or so if you want. Some of the Salusian pilots really like the design." "I'll have to talk with Perry about it, I dunno. We've got enough assembly lines down there to build armies, for chrissake...I still don't know where the hell the raw materials come from." "Probably got huge cargo holds down there or something, don't worry about it. Wolfgang said our production stores should hold out at least a hundred years." "Ok...hey, how's Kei?" "She's fine, or will be in a day or so. The cuts and bruises are just about healed, and the arm should be fine by seventeen hundred. Jenna wants to keep her there for another hour or so to observe. " "Cool. I'll go down and see her sometime later, after I get done with Redclaw. If anything happens, let me know." "Will do." -------------------------------------------------------TWENTY "Some people, ya know, they just will not do." --q TWO HOURS LATER "Zoner--unidentified objects coming in from three-ten by negative oh five," reported Kei, who was back at her position, her arm already out of its cast. "Composition?" asked MegaZone. "Metallic, powered, ten-ton to thirty-ton. Too slow to be missiles, probably manned." "Fighter craft." "Yeah, that's what I thought too." "q, scramble the Eight-Balls to intercept. Don't fire until I give the say-so. We've got bogeys out there, not bandits." "Like, gotcha, Zoner." Macquivr summoned the fighter group as its commander was leaving the bridge at a run; they headed out to meet their new neighbors, who were approaching from the planet. A few minutes later, the Eight-Balls were within tracking range of the craft in question. Gryphon tagged the nearest one with his target tracking system and glanced at the small screen; there was a small schematic of a light fighter and the words "LOCKED TARGET -- SALTHI". "Eight-Ball One to Control," Gryphon called. "I'm looking at two squadrons of Salthi fighters here...we've got cats again." "Yeah, but when they scratch, do they leave marks like Darensbourg?" ReRob asked. "Uh, I don't think Cat has lasers in her fingernails, Rob." "What are they doing?" "Accelerating." Zark! "Make that firing guns. Request permission to return fire!" "Knock yourself out, Gryph. Save me a wing fragment for my wall." "Yeah, right. Eight-Ball One to squadron: EXTERMINATE!" Mark responded with, "Did somebody say the magic word?" while shoving his throttle to burner. Daver announced, "Hey, these guys are easy to nuke." And to prove his point, he clicked into battroid mode and started raking space with his GU-11. Tricia responded with "Stop showing off, fuckhead," and sent her first volley off. Saurian started chasing the back Salthi. His targeting system was, shall we say, tweaked. He didn't lock on the Salthi. He locked on the pilot. He got a lock so good the HUD wrote out, "Hey, is this a lock or what?" "You guys watch this! This lock is sooo sweet! I can't fucking miss!" The rest of the squadron chimed in with "So shoot, already!" Which he did. Rather than Scott Bernarding, he fired one lone Reaper. That should be enough to toast a recon bird. He made sure to select the missile with "Let's get to know each other better" written on the side. It spiraled in beautifully, aiming directly for the cockpit. At the last second, due to what had to be an error in the internal guidance system of the missile, it reversed course. It was flying backwards, and was close enough to the Salthi to break/burn through the klasterglass of the windshield. The remainder of the thrust was spent totally incinerating the poor unfortunate Kilrathi. A split second later, the warhead detonated, sending the Salthi exploding in a fireball, leaving nothing but a couple of O-rings and a piece of hose. Daver was the first to respond, after grabbing one Salthi and throwing it into its wingmate, with "I don't believe it. He fucking Swimmed it!" Mark unloaded his GU-11 into the fourth Salthi, making it look like a piece of Swiss cheese. It returned fire, damaging his wing. "Why won't this thing kerfucking die?!" he screamed. A quick burst from Tricia's Valkyrie sent the Salthi exploding into more O-rings and hose. "You just have to know what you're doing, Mark." Gryphon briefed a pair of Reapers on a quick mission, and scrambled them. They converged on the remaining Salthi from opposite sides, destroying it in much the same manner that the Ewoks killed an AT-ST with a pair of heavy logs. "Scratch five Salthi, Zoner. On the leader board, that's one for me, two for Daver with a style point, one by Tricia with an assist by Haywire, and, well, you'll just have to see Erik's gun camera footage. I won't even try to explain it." "He Swimmed a missile, didn't he?" "It was so fucking perfect, though!" retorted Saurian. Tricia chimed in. "Uh, guys...take a listen on 58.26." STATIC "--peat, we are under siege by elements of the Empire of Kilrah. Under the Salusian Treaty Pact of 17,280, we request assistance from any Salusian ally within range of this transmission." STATIC "I heard that, guys," said Zoner. "What're we gonna do?" asked ReRob. "I think it's pretty goddamn obvious. First off, the majority of our crew are Salusian, and thus we are basically Salusian allies. Second, these are Kilrathi. Third, our morale problem stems from the fact that we are really fucking bored. The order: Prepare all squadrons for combat. We're here to eat sushi and kick ass!" q looked up. "But, Zoner, we like ran out of sushi three months ago." "Bingo. Get me a channel to the Salusians." "Like, you're on the air, Zoner." "Attention, Salusians! This is Captain MegaZone of the WDF Wayward Son, responding to your distress call. We will be in orbit of your world within forty minutes. Please advise us as to the Kilrathi strength and composition." "Thank you for your response, Captain. The aggressors have ten Sivar-class dreadnoughts and seven Snakeir fighter carriers, each holding about thirty craft. Five types of fighters, including the new six-gunned Jalthi heavies. We have no armed spaceworthy vessels--we had a squadron of Scimitars, but they were all destroyed attempting to repulse the first wave." "Thank you. Wayward Son out." He turned on the intercom. "You heard that guys, we've got some heavy opposition. The Veritechs are outnumbered ten to one, so we're going to need to support them as much as possible. Prepare to separate Prometheus and Daedalus as Destroid units. The main ship will worry about the dreadnoughts. It's been over a year, guys, so some of you may have lost a bit of your edge. Here's where we take that edge back. Zoner out." ReRob piped up. "Zoner, permission to leave the bridge and the ship?" "Huh? What for?" "An experiment." "A what?!?" "Zoner, trust me on this, okay?" "Alright, but it had better be good!" ReRob smiled the smile of a child with a new toy. You know, the one that set Dad back a month's salary. "Q, get the following people to bay six, in battle dress: Deedlit Satori, Cheryl Zukowsky, Kevin Tefft. And tell them no hurling!" "Like, will do, Rob." ReRob made an evil chuckle as he took the elevator to the lab/landing bay. ---------------------------------------------------TWENTY-ONE "You are one...ugly...--urk!" "Motherfucker." --Lt. Harrigan and the Predator ReRob, of course, was the first one in the bay. And his experiment was ready. Well, almost ready. The ship was lurking there. In extremely dark ugly. Not flat ugly or gloss ugly or matte ugly; more of a WOW that's ugly kind of ugly. Uglier than Ren and Stimpy. An ugly you could actually hear if you listened closely enough. It might even be describable. Here goes: Start with a Beta Veritech. Take a pair of Avenger cannon: you know, the 30mm guns they put on the A-10 Thunderbolt, the kind that eat tanks for a midnight snack. Put two of them on pivots and turntables on top of the MM-40s. Then, take the MM-40s out. Replace them with PBC-11 particle beam cannon arms from the MBR-04-VI Tomahawk Destroid. Of course, that means the barrels will stick out of the front, but so what? Second, add four strategically placed 30mm chain guns to the underbelly. Third, change the standard "Vivian" locking collar so that it attaches to the back of a standard Salusian R-12 Raptor starfighter. And, finally, because this thing ain't quite done yet, leave some armor plates missing, color the whole thing gun- metal grey, and leave some oil stains and grease droolings all over the place. The other three (Deedlit, Cheryl, and Kevin) came in more or less simultaneously and barely succeeded in not hurling. Kevin was the first to speak. "What the fuck is that, ReRob?" Deedlit said, "Oh...my." Cheryl was optimistic. "Well, it ought to kill things rather nicely." ReRob started up. "Ayup, that it will. Deedlit, take the Raptor. This...thing is slaved in to your controls, so expect some major thrust to weight ratio. And don't take it into an atmosphere. Get going as soon as the rest of us get into the Beta. But give me a minute, we've got to do this right." ReRob ran over to a tray cart. There was a bottle of champagne in the obligatory ice-filled pail. He hucked the bottle to Cheryl, and grabbed a can of white spray paint. He sprayed a quick "Kilroy was here" sign, with the left hand conspicuously missing. "His name is hereby Kilroy, his designation Thundergod One." "It's a he?" queried Kevin. "This sucker's too fuckin' ugly to be a she!" Deedlit, Cheryl, and Kevin responded in unison, "Excuse me?" ReRob remembered that he was unique among the crew in his tastes. "Anyways, christen this sucker and we can be off!" Cheryl wound up and bashed the champagne across the starboard hull. Unfortunately, that particular piece of armor plate wasn't firmly affixed, and it swung downwards, only held on by one bolt. "real sturdy, Rob..." "Fine, let's get moving! Deedlit, keep the bandits on our port side!" Within seconds, the Salusian was turning over the turbines while Cheryl, Rob, and Kevin were strapping into the three-seater cockpit. "Cheryl, you've got those two top rotary cannon. Your responsibility is anything above the ship. Kevin, you've got those four cannon down the bottom. You also have the drum bomb in the bay. That's a two-ton nuclear device, so don't use it unless you really mean it. Any questions? No? Good. Let's rock!" With that, Deedlit punched the throttle. Unfortunately, she had no experience whatsoever with the Legios concept, nor had ever flown something with quite the acceleration of a Beta. Cheryl and Ktefft, who were seated sideways behind ReRob, were slung to the side as the conglomeration rocketed into the void. MegaZone, and the rest of the bridge crew, saw this...thing...as it screamed to follow the Veritechs. "ReRob, is that you?" "Yup. I told you it was an experiment. Meet Kilroy the Thundergod." "Last time I did an experiment like that, I threw it down the toilet." "Well, it's uuuugly, but it should work." "What the fucking hell is it?" "It's a Beta with weapons up several places one should never have weapons. Three gunners, no waiting." "Any special strategies for interacting with our Veritechs?" "Yeah. Tell them to get out of our way. And leave the Jalthi to us. We outgun them." "You WHAT?" "Twelve guns versus their six. Pipe Beta through Gunstar, and you get the picture." "Whatever. Just make sure you bring it back." "We'll try." ---------------------------------------------------TWENTY-TWO "On a countdown to zero/Take a ride on the nightmare machine/There ain't gonna be heroes/There ain't gonna be anything" --Def Leppard Author's note: At this point the authors could try and write out the entire battle. But the reader would probably get VERY bored if we described ALL of the destruction and carnage. After all, there are quite a few ships out here. If you really want to see a hugemongous space battle, similar to the one which takes place here, go watch the end of Return of the Jedi on fast forward, three times. We will, however, satisfy some of your bloodlust by writing what the more main, central, hero- type characters are doing. We now return you to our regularly scheduled carnage already in progress. "You fight like a stillborn kitten." "Bite it, catface!" Gryphon yelled in reply, vaping the offending Kilrathi Jalthi. "Nice one, Gryph! That makes seven kills this mission," Daver called out. "Yeah yeah yeah. I know I'm good. No autographs." "You also have a Krant on your six." WHOMP! "Ouch. I knew that." Daver placed a Reaper where the sun don't shine and pulled along side Gryph. "Nice one, Darkwing. Pat yourself on the back later." "I was just kidding, geez. Umm, excuse me..." Gryph's GU-11 chattered to life. "Damn Salthi." "That's eight for you and five for me." "Well, you're doing better than most wingmen. They usually come up empty." "Yeah. Well, I've got to get back to the battle over here. Can't keep the pigeons waiting." "Ok. Just watch yourself." "Hahaha! DIE! DIE! DIE! Nine lives my ass! DIE!" "Mark, calm down. Don't take too many chances," Tricia warned. "I'm ok. Just--- HA! Fool! Taste my wrath! ---sorry, where were we?" "Nevermind. I give up. Just make sure you get your ass back to the ship in one piece." Mark filled a large area of space with depleted shoggothium, and managed, via sheer luck, to frag a Gratha. "HA! DIE! I love this job! And I was going to work for Mass Electric this summer! Die furball!" "What AM I going to do with you?" Tricia mumbled. Mark was totally absorbed in the glee of utterly hosing the enemy. Therefore he didn't notice the Dralthi closing on him from below. The Dralthi opened fire and nailed Mark's battroid in the backpack thrusters. Seriously screwing them up. Luckily Erik didn't miss the Dralthi. A salvo of AIM-105-3X missiles succeeded in increasing the entropy of the universe in general, and said Dralthi in particular. "Probably scrape him up if he keeps this up," Erik commented dryly. "Mark! Are you ok?!" Trish asked concerned. "'Tis only a flesh wound." "Haywire, stop fucking around and kill Kilrathi sanely. Alright?" Gryphon called over the comm. "Awwww. That takes all the fun out of it." "Haywire." "Oh, alright." "Kill sanely? Are you feeling alright, Gryph?" Daver asked. "I'm fine, Dave." "Yeah, I'm sure that's what HAL said too." "Fuck you, Dave." "Ooh baby. Will you?" "In your dreams, Dave." "You mean nightmares, don't you?" "Oh, just shut up and-- CHECK SIX!" "Huh?! What? Whoa! Nice kitty! Good kitty. Have a missile." The Reaper Roboteched gracefully and impacted the Gratha's engines. The Kilrathi was having a very, very, very, very, very nice day. Assholes! Back on the bridge of the SDF-17 Zoner was shifting nervously in his chair. "Zoner, like, what's wrong?" q asked. "Oh, nothing. I just wish I was out there with the rest of the crew. I haven't had a good opportunity to try out my Daytona in combat yet. My beta has more missiles than most of them. And I've got a GAU-8 too. ARGH! I want to relieve some stress too." "Zoner, calm down. We need you here. Who else is qualified to command the Wayward Son?" Yuri asked. "Everybody. Like you for instance." "Oh no. Not me. I don't want to do it." "Exactly. That's why I'm stuck here." "Anyway, we might as well do something a little more useful than plinking fighters with railguns. Kei, do you have a good setup for targeting the Sivars yet?" "Well, there're a lot of fighters in the way, some of which are ours. So if you can get us clear..." "Done. Yuri, change course 300 mark 18. All ahead flank." "Ok. Course 300 mark 18, all ahead flank." While all of this was going on the kludge from hell was closing on a pair of Snakeirs. A small cluster of fighters buzzed about the Snakeirs, protecting them. Or so they thought. The Kilrathi picked him up a long way off. Well, it wasn't like the kludge was stealthy or anything. A pair of Gratha peeled off and closed with the kludge head on. They're so stupid. "Cheryl, you got these bozos?" "Yeah Rob, easy." The two GAU-8s pivoted and each locked onto a Gratha. Twin fingers of depleted uranium reached out and plinked their targets. Hard. O-rings scattered about the cosmos. "Two down, eleven to go." "Yeah, look sharp everyone." When their brethren bit the big one, the remaining Kilrathi turned to attack the kludge. "Here they come. Stay sharp. We don't need anyone going... catatonic." ReRob's crew collectively moaned and refused to reply to the pun. "Deedlit, you keep us moving and keep them off our ass, ok. The fields of fire are sort of limited." "I'm a fighter pilot. That's generally what I've been trained to do. Fighters pilots aren't generally trained to sit still and say `Hey, I'm a fighter pilot; kill me.' Sir." "Um. Yeah. Anyway, here they come." "We're ready for 'em. Let's go," Kevin said. Three Krant circled in from below. They opened fire at long range, but their attacks just bounced off the kludge's armor. Kevin waited for them to close. "Come on. Come on. Just a little closer to be sure... DIE!" Three of the chain guns spat angry bits of lead and uranium at the Krant. And managed to seriously pit them. "Hey! ReRob these things are weak! I said DIE!" Kevin opened fire again. This time two of the Krant lost sizeable portions of their structure and drifted off into deep space. The third turned to limp back to one of the Snakeirs. "I got 'em!" "Nice one," was all Cheryl said. She was busy hosing a pair of Dralthi which dared enter her arc of fire. "Deedlit, line us up for a Tomahawk shot," ReRob ordered. "Roger." Deedlit arced the kludge gracefully (?!?) through space and brought her sights to bear on a pair of Jalthi. "Set up." "I've got the guns," ReRob called out. He fired all of the kludge's forward firing weaponry; the two Tomahawk cannons and the Raptor's mass drivers and neutron guns. One of the Jalthi bloomed into a fireball, but the other dodged and returned fire. It's six laser cannons chewed into the kludge and ripped off some of the armor. The crew was thrown about violently from the energy of the blasts. "Big money! Big prizes! I like it! Ok, Deedlit stay on him!" "Doing my best!" Deedlit and the Jalthi's pilot each fought to gain a superior position over the other while Kevin and Cheryl held off the remaining Kilrathi. "Argh! This bastard is good. Shoot him as soon as you get a chance," Deedlit yelled into the comm. "I'm planning on it!" ReRob shot back. "Now!" Again six weapons spat out destruction towards the Jalthi. This time they connected, but the craft was only damaged. "Ah! So the monkey boy can fight!" the Jalthi's pilot exclaimed over the radio. "No fuckin' shit, Heathcliff!" Rob replied. The kludge was shaken by the impact of Kilrathi missiles. "What the fuck was that?" Kevin asked. "I dunno. Shit! We've got a Gratha on our six!" "I shall feast upon your offspring," the Gratha's pilot stated to the crew. "Jeez, you mean you haven't even tried depleted uranium? Here, have a taste test! Guys, hold on back there," Deedlit called over the comm. She hauled the kludge through a half- loop and a snap roll, broke hard right and bore down on the Gratha's port side. "Now you die." The Gratha fell apart rather nicely when confronted with the six weapons fired at it. "`Now you die'? How cliche. Every stupid movie has someone saying `Now you die', it's totally unoriginal," ReRob editorialized from the back seat. "Give me a break, I haven't been speaking English for that long. It seemed appropriate." "Appropriate yes. Original no," Cheryl replied. "Umm. Do you think we could get back to swatting these furballs out of existence?" "Check." The rest of the crew shut up and returned to their guns. Deedlit reacquired the Jalthi they had been dueling and reengaged in a dogfight. The Jalthi had lost some of its control thrusters and couldn't keep up with her skill. It died rather quickly. "Ok, what do we have left?" "Three Salthi." "Ok, no problem." The kludge began trying to duel with one of the Salthi. It didn't work. "Uh...I see a problem," Deedlit said. "Like what?" ReRob asked. "This is like killing gnats with a shotgun. They're just too nimble." "And I can't get these damn turrets to track quick enough," Kevin added. "Yeah no shit," Cheryl chimed in. "Ok. So what do we do?" "Let me take them in the Raptor," Deedlit suggested. "Ok. Do it..." "Alright! Got one!" Kevin cried. "That's nice, dear. Go ahead, Deedlit." The Raptor engaged its thrusters and raced away from the Beta. Rob and company sat back to enjoy the fireworks. Deedlit got reaccustomed to the quicker response time and much better handling of the Raptor alone; without all that mass behind it, Beta thrusters or no, it was a hell of a lot more comfortable to fly. She punched up to full cruising speed and slung the ship around, keying the main guns to her manual control again. A Salthi crossed her field of view; she locked it down and began tracking it, fighting with the smaller vessel for position. The pilot of the Salthi tried to dodge as the Raptor swung into his six, but his fighter's inability to turn right foiled him; he had to sit and take a hit or two before his boosters pushed him to safety. It was enough. Deedlit put the trigger down, and the paired neutron guns and mass drivers of her fighter spoke. The first salvo knocked down the Salthi's shields entirely; the second blasted great holes in its armor; the third holed fuel tanks and ion drive. The fighter exploded majestically, but Deedlit took no time to watch; the Salthi's wingman had been battering at her rear shields with its lasers this whole time, and now she turned her deadly attentions on him. "We're in position," Yuri reported. Out over the bow, the glow of the half-distant battle could be seen as missile salvos streaked back and forth and the flaring deaths of starfighters flashed. That was below the line of fire, though; directly ahead were discernible the outlines of Sivar-class Kilrathi dreadnaughts. "Lay in a firing solution and fire when ready," Zoner ordered. q leaned over to Yuri and, tapping her elbow, whispered, "So like, how many do you think she'll get?" "Two...three at the max," Yuri replied. "Two?! I beg my illustrious partner's pardon? Four, at the least!" "Five bucks says you only get three." "You're on!" "Ladies..." "Targeting," Kei replied with a grin. On her small screen, the God's-eye view of the enemy formation shifted a little. The dreadnaughts were jockeying for a better position from which to thump the planet below, ignoring entirely the enemy mothership hanging motionless some distance away. The Wayward Son was entirely too far away to be a threat, they reasoned. On the little screen, the blips that were dreadnaughts moved a little more, coming closer to the red band that was the main gun's killzone. One...two...three...four...four. Damn. The other three weren't moving into the beam zone, and it looked like one would be vacating soon, so... She thumbed off the striped safety cover and punched the trigger. The bow cammed, the sparks flew, and the beam leapt forth, clawing space in its ravenous manner, just as always. The Kilrathi ships scattered like terrified mice before the firestorm, but too late; the four targeted ships were caught and incinerated in the space of a thought. The Salusian tech who maintained the bridge viewer systems apparently had a twisted sense of humor; over the magnified explosions of the four ships, the letters "GAME OVER" blinked for a few seconds. "Yes!" Kei cried, punching the air in triumph. "Four of the bastards. Pay up, sucker!" Yuri sighed and forked over the cash. "Good work, Deedlit," ReRob complimented as the Raptor finished off the second Salthi. "Now we--whoa!" Rob was cut off as the tremendous flash of light cut the cosmos in half. "Wha... oh--they set Kei loose again. God help us all." He grinned. "Four Sivars--not bad at all. I wonder..." He swung the monster around and aimed it at the nearest Snakeir. "Deed, cover us--I'm gonna try something." "Roger," Deedlit replied. ReRob aimed the Beta right at the Snakeir's pipes, opening up with all the weapons at his command; his gunners followed suit. He reached down and flipped the button that armed one of his two AIM-666-XL AntiChrist heavy missiles. The pinging of a missile looking for a lock sounded as the small red reticule swung across the HUD and lined up with the green gunnery crosshair (which looked suspiciously familiar to a Leppardhead like Rob, making him wonder about the HUD's designer). The ping became a tone--the missile found it simplicity itself to lock on a target that huge. Rob dodged some flak, took some more (the Beta's armor laughed as it flaked away-- pathetic laser cannons), and then, verifying his lock, fired. The AntiChrist ripped out of its underslung launch tube, right to the left of the locking mechanism for the Raptor, not even bothering to Robotech before diving into one of the Snakeir's thruster exhausts. Nothing happened. "Okay, so maybe it didn't work," ReRob said ruefully, pulling up and boosting out as the flak got just a bit too heavy. A great gout of flame shot out of the Snakeir's exhaust; the ship heeled to port, began to list in relation to its former orientation, and then, in a rather beautiful manner, exploded. "Holy shit!" Kevin shouted, craning to look back. "Good shooting, Rob," Cheryl added with a grin. "Heh," ReRob said with a grin, opened up his throttles a little more, and dove in to attack another. "Don't get too cocky, sir," Deedlit cautioned. "You might not be so lucky this time." "I know what I'm doing," ReRob replied, and proceeded to plunk his second AntiChrist into a second carrier's engines and blow the second ship sky-high. "This is getting boring," ReRob said with an evil smile, and aimed his experiment in ugliness at a Sivar. "Sir, you can't be serious--" Deedlit began. "Just cover my tail, Lt. Satori, and watch the fireworks. Kevin, remember that drum bomb?" "I like the way you think, ReRob," declared Cheryl. "Heh," was all Kevin said. He pressed the key that armed the bomb; the bombsight unfolded from the ceiling in front of him. It looked kinda like that proton torpedo targeting thing Incom T-65 starfighters have. He had a wireframe nose view of the oncoming rear end of a Sivar-class dreadnaught--specifically, the pipes. "Shit--this AA is heavy," ReRob said as the Beta shook from the pounding. "Hurry up and drop that sumbitch!" "Got it--bomb away!" Kevin cried, hitting the Big Red ButtonTM. The bomb bay swung open and a small rocket charge ejected the bomb; in zero-g, it continued on the Beta's trajectory, plus the lateral motion imparted by the ejection charge. Targeted perfectly, it "fell" right into the Sivar's thruster. "Let's get outta here!" ReRob shouted, yanking the conversion lever. The Beta's legs and arms extended, but somewhere just short of real battroid mode but after gerwalk, something jammed. "Shit--I was afraid of that," said Rob, and hit full boosters. The Betakludge flipped over and streaked away as it returned to fighter mode. Fifteen seconds later, the three Beta crewmembers glanced back at a perfectly unconcerned Sivar. "Damn," ReRob said, "looks like the bomb mis--" BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! [Huge explosion deleted--but it looks just like the Death Star blowing up] Three Sivars were swallowed up in the fireball, besides the one which was actually meeting the fiery death; only one came out, and it looked pretty crispy around the edges. "WOW!" Rob shouted. "Holy fuck!" said Kevin, looking in awe at the Big Red Button. "Cool!" Cheryl agreed. "I think it's time to head back to base," ReRob grinned. "Deedlit, you want to come back with us, or are you up for some more action?" "Think I'll stay--ump--right here, sir," Deedlit replied shortly. Glancing out his port window, Rob saw her engaged in a fierce dogfight with a squadron of Dralthi. "Oh. Have fun," he replied, and headed for the Wayward Son. "What the fuck was that?!" Zoner demanded as the explosion blotted out half the main viewer. "Christ on a crutch!" Gryphon shouted, his face appearing in a corner of the viewer. "What the fuck was that?!" "I don't know!" Zoner replied. "I thought you did it!" "I couldn't do that if I wanted to!" "It was us, guys," ReRob joined in, popping into another corner of the viewer. "What the hell did you use, a kilo of antimatter?!" "Close; a drum bomb." "Shit!" "Actually, most of the explosion probably came from the Sivar's engine core," Daver interjected. "Probably," Gryphon agreed. "Yeah, you know, an ion drive that big has got to have some major capacitance--now take the engine cores on the UN Spacy's new A.R.M.D. Mark II series--" Zoner began, and started to trail away on a long blatter of jargon. "Gryph, I think I activated technospew mode...I'm sorry," Daver said apologetically. "No problem," Gryphon replied. "I can just shut off his channel." The Kilrathi forces surrendered five minutes later, having lost more than 45% of their forces to fightercraft. Most of them committed ritual suicide out of sheer embarrassment. -------------------------------------------------TWENTY-THREE "I thought I could live in your world/As years all went by/With all the voices I've heard/Something has died." --Guns N' Roses Of course, once the battles had ended the planet's survivors extended their invitation to the Wayward Son's crew to have their R&R down on the surface. The crew accepted graciously. And there was much rejoicing. (yaaaaay) ReRob and Deedlit just seemed to hit it off after the launch of Kilroy. She finally learned to fly a Raptor with a sixteen ton Thundergod linked to it, and was the only one who learned to do so. Of course, that was because there was only one Thundergod, since very few people had the exact type of insanity required to fly one of those mecha. Of course, Kilroy wasn't the Kludge from Hell anymore. Customized armor panels were fitted on the superstructure, the avionics were optimized for the new weapons systems, and the "battroid" option on the mode selector was removed. Due to the geometries of the weapons, there was no way in Hell the machine could assume battroid configuration. But that mode was almost useless in the original Beta anyways. A modified Salusian force shield was placed on the mecha, an air shield which gave the Thundergod a spherical aerodynamic profile. Due to the size of the sphere, the thing had even more drag than the ship itself, but at least the supersonic wind resistance didn't rip off the various weapons systems. Since the shield had to be up for any serious atmospheric flight, the now-useless wings were removed. Sure, the thing had the aerodynamics of a thirty- foot bowling ball, but who cares when you have enough thrust to reach Mach 8? But, back to R&D. ReRob wasn't a big believer in relationships with co-workers (it tends to complicate things somewhat), but there was no real way around it. As pilots, they were totally different. She was a precision flyer, working on the "one shot, one hit" philosophy. He, the designer of the VR-065 Obliviator and the VF-1B10 Thundergod, was mister area denial, working on the premise of quantity over quality. His primary mecha was something that could only be described as a pig, but it got the job done. In this way, Deedlit and ReRob complemented each other. She was able to deal with small, fleeting opponents and cover ReRob's six when he went after the big targets with AntiChrists and drum bombs. ReRob returned the favor by hosing the larger targets covering Deedlit when her weapons couldn't penetrate. In short, this duo was an incredible team. In shorter, you didn't fuck with them. The two became inseparable out of the cockpits as well, and Kevin and Cheryl knew enough not to tag along. Their personalities fit their fighting styles. Deedlit, the artiste, was an artist as well, an incredible singer. ReRob took up bass, already knowing a bit of keyboard, to back her up. ReRob was more brute-force than artistic, but had a certain style which could not be denied. His creativity went not into song, but into his design work. Jokes were often made about Deedlit going into "Minmei mode" in her studio while ReRob went into "Frankenstein mode" in his holodeck virtual shop. They were married within ten years of Kilroy's maiden voyage. After all, considering the life-spans of Detians and Salusians, there was absolutely no need to rush anything. As stated before, Kilroy was the only Thundergod ever made. Normally, this fact would serve to prove the model a "failure." Deedlit and ReRob considered it rather successful. And above that, the mecha was still being used for its initial purpose: ship-to-ship assault. The only difference was the name: it had been re-dubbed the Rick Allen, the original Rick Allen designated as Thundergod Prime The Wayward Son continued on in this way for many, many years. Two hundred ninety-seven years to be exact. The WDF's reputation as a force of justice spread to span this universe, and a few others too. Despite all this the Wayward Son had a relatively uneventful existence. There really isn't much for a Super Dimensional Fortress to do most of the time. After a while just the threat of intervention by the SDF-17 stopped most disputes. Besides, during this time the WDF's branch, the 3WA, grew into an intergalactic investigative-police force. The 3WA handled most of the troubles now that they had their own para-military division, and of course, Trouble Consultant Team #216 (Lovely Angel) became the most successful TC team space had ever seen. With their new Predator-class assault scout, Yuri and Kei carved a swath of infamy across known space, solving, true to form, every single case. (Not unlike a Claymore mine...messy...but effective.) Between missions, however, the two remained integral parts of the SDF-17's crew. However, during this time one of the other members of the crew took his leave. Vaughn left to search for Iczer-1 and explore the universe. "So, you really think you'll be able to find her out there? The universe is a pretty big place you know," Zoner observed. "Well, I need to find out exactly what she meant when she left," Vaughn replied. "You seem to really have something for her don't you?" "Just trying to get rid of confusion. After all, I don't like dealing with it." "Why? Rob's a nice enough guy." Vaughn motioned as if to bap Zoner in the head, but stayed his blow. "Ok, sorry. I understand why you're doing this. At least take a fighter or something to get around in." "Why? What purpose would it serve me?" "Carry food perhaps?" "Well, there's planets. I mean, bacteria can live on an asteroid." "I don't know. A change of clothes. It makes it easier on re-entry. It still seems silly to me for you to be walking around in vacuum unprotected." "Look at it this way, a vacuum is nothing. Why do you need to protect yourself from nothing? And air isn't all that dense, you can just kind o' meander on through." "Only you Vaughn, only you. You ever going to come back and visit us? You never did take Omega-2 did you?" "Nope. Never been into the drug scene. And, well, I'll either be back eventually, or I'll have picked the time and place that I wish to die." "You're not going to die until you're good and ready huh?" "Nah. My decision. I'll make it when I want to. And nobody else can force me." "You're not human are you.... Forget I said that, didn't mean to insult you." "I can forgive you this time." Grin. "Yeah, right. Anyway, where do you think you'll head to start with?" "Well, she went thatwayish. So, off I go..." "You got everything you need in that backpack?" "Ah, let's see. Two pair underwear, three pair socks, one pair pants, two T-shirts, and saline stuff for my eyes." "What about toothbrush and such?" "Oh yeah, I need a toothbrush. Gotta keep my breath fresh. I'll be right back." "Ok, I'll be here," Zoner called out, then he mumbled, "This is one of the weirdest conversations I've ever had." "I'm back. And this time I've got everything." "Yes, so you are. Are you absolutely sure this time?" "I think I'm sure, 'cause only fools are positive." "Well then, take care. Somehow I think we'll be seeing you again sometime. Best of luck finding her. Drop us a line sometime. Have fun stormin' the castle." "Think it'll work. It'd take a miracle." "Right. So go out there in the name of true love and find Iczer-buttercup." "I'm leaving now before this gets any worse." "Ok. You already say farewell to the rest of the gang?" "Well, I'm not one for tearful goodbyes. So, I figured I'd just slip out and let people think that I just went out to play with the rocks. You're lucky you caught me or I would have forgotten my toothbrush." "It's just my luck acting up again. Just call me Longshot." Shrug. "Such is..." "Take it easy man. I'm going to miss you." Vaughn entered the airlock, sealed the inner door, and vented it to space. He popped the outer hatch and walked off into the cosmos. "I always knew he was a little odd," Zoner mumbled as he watched him walk away. The Wayward Son became an ambassador of peace, visiting planets throughout the universe supplying new technologies for developing worlds, and occasionally squashing those worlds which sought to overpower their neighbors. This earned the hatred of a number of violent races, but none of them possessed the technology to confront the SDF-17. At least not yet. The WDF wasn't the only group traveling about depositing technology. The Wayward Son used the times between skirmishes to explore the unknown and search for new worlds. The WDF became the chief exploratory force for the United Galactica when the latter organization became reality in 2100. They had the capability to explore new areas, and to defend themselves if they proved hostile. The Wayward Son discovered over a hundred inhabitable worlds and countless planets useful for natural resources. The WDF used their authority to establish many of the inhabitable planets as preserves, not to be disturbed by the encroaching races of the universe. Jenna lost all regrets she had about remaining on board when she got the chance to examine her first new world. Even with all of the work the Wayward Son did, it still only barely scratched the surface of the vast strata of the unknown of which the universe was made. The human crew of the Wayward Son remained forever young, while the Salusians aged and their normal slow rate. After more than 200 major trials by fire and countless small skirmishes the crew was a tight-knit, well oiled machine. The crew implicitly trusted one another, drawn together by the loss of so many of their comrades over the years to various enemies. The crew changed slowly over time. Many of the original members left to take positions with other security agencies, or as technical consultants. Most left to form the initial core of the 3WA. The crew became very heterogeneous over the years as other races joined the ranks. Humans, Salusians, Cybermen, Zardons, Garudans, Kilrathi, Zentraedi, Karbarrans, Daleks, Gorig, Cybertronians, Predators, Praxians, Spherians, Dralasites and Vrusk all worked together in a spirit of cooperation. The members all put aside their individual differences to take part in keeping the peace and exploring the vastness of space. Many of the races led extended lives and therefore turned down the offer of Omega-2. However, most of the Praxians and the Garudans did accept in order to remain with the crew longer. Edison was never officially part of the crew, but the Wayward Son became his new home. He came and went as he pleased and many times he returned with new destinations for the ship and many tales of his adventures. It was disconcerting when he returned before he left. However, he only did this twice as he tried to avoid it at all cost. Creating temporal loops was a Bad Thing(TM). One of the rules that Edison and the crew agreed on early was in not supplying Omega-2 to any of the worlds. Not even to save a life. Omega-2 was available only to the crew. It seemed like a harsh rule, but, despite their disdain for the Prime Directive, the crew didn't want to play at being gods. The WDF became a thing of legend on many of the more primitive worlds. After a few initial mishaps Zoner decided to visit only the worlds where the culture was advanced to the point of excepting the possibilities of life on other planets. Their visit to Terra had been a huge blunder. What were archaeologists going to think when they found paintings of the crew in CVR-3, the alien races, and their landing craft? And those huge drawings on the plains made from rocks so that the 'gods' could see them. Sheesh. Sometimes it seemed to be more trouble than it was worth. The fame of the SDF-17 also increased the prosperity of the Utopia Planitia shipyards. It became a symbol of status to own a vessel created at the same shipyards which had created the legendary Wayward Son. The most repeated demand was for another Super Dimensional Fortress. However, Lord Fahrvergnugen simply deferred, saying that the only remaining copy of the plans were on board the SDF-17. After all, the Wayward Son was a custom order. Most of the planet's business came from the main 3WA armory which was located there. A new traffic control system had to be developed to handle all the agents coming and going. Orders from 3WA Central HQ on Meizuri kept the agents constantly busy. It seemed ironic to most of the WDF members that the 3WA, while being much larger than the crew of the SDF-17, and certainly being more visible, had no where near the mystique of the one lone vessel. These were the golden years for the Universe and the WDF. Technology surged forward and civilizations flourished. Intergalactic trade reached an all time high and nearly everyone seemed pleased with the situation. There was, however, one corporation, and one man in particular, who was extremely displeased with the status quo. The corporation was GENOM, and the man was Largo, and he had a plan to ruin the WDF for all time. Sure, he had been set back a couple dozen years by that troublesomeness in MegaTokyo, but that was all behind him now. He had buried that mess like the one in Neo-Worcester, and GENOM was firing on all cylinders now. No time like the present. Those troublesome Wedge Rats would finally pay for all the trouble they had caused. --------------------------------------------------TWENTY-FOUR "Peace? Prosperity? Phaugh. It can't last." --Field Marshal TARAX Arcade 18 JUNE 2289 HALSTEAD STATION Orbiting over the planet Halstead, Halstead Station was something along the lines of an orbital office building. It was owned, nominally, by the government of the planet, constructed ten years earlier in an attempt to raise commerce to the area. The government of Halstead had expected to have a couple of small corporations and many small businesses move into their station, paying it off in a few years and bringing attention to the remote location, perhaps stimulating trade and a few more space stations. Instead, a single corporation had moved their central headquarters from Earth entirely into the station. Halstead Station was the sole preserve and basically the property of GENOM Interstellar GmbH now. In his office at the peak of the station, furthest out along its axis from the planet's surface, Largo sat surveying the starscape. It had taken him many years to recover from his corporation's near-annihilation in Neo-Worcester. The first time he recreated GENOM from ashes, he had an entire industrial complex handed to him; the second, he had to start over, with nothing but an office in a building in Tokyo. Over the next few years he lost control of the growing corporate entity, and won it back, and had to deal with upstart women in battlesuits...it had been a long, hard road. Now, though, he had his giant back, and he had the means and wherewithal to destroy the Wedge Defense Force, once and for all. All it required was some timing and finesse...and a bit of technology. The preliminary work was all done; now he could strike. He had been patient. Now was his time. "You have done well, my servant," he said to the man standing in the shadows near his desk. "Unlike many others, you have not failed me." "I am gratified, my lord," the man replied. "Good," Largo said. "I like my servants content." He picked up his telephone and dialed. "This is Largo. Is the project ready? Excellent. I'll be right down." He hung up and went to the elevator; the other man followed him, keeping to the shadows as though he felt nervous about being seen, even here. Shortly, they had arrived in a techlab and were standing before twin Mann Systems Type 1001E BioSculpt tanks. A tech immediately handed Largo a sheaf of printouts. Scanning them, Largo's face tightened into a grim smile. "Perfect," he said, and threw back his head and laughed aloud. The sound terrified the techs. "Perfect!" He roared. "With this I will finally have my revenge!" he declared, brandishing a fistful of papers. The first BioSculpt tank opened up and a perfect replica of Commander Benjamin D. Hutchins, Wedge Defense Force, stepped out. Looking quite unconcerned, the false Gryphon toweled himself off and picked up the clothes that were waiting for him--a perfect copy of Gryphon's SDF-17 uniform. "Begging your pardon, sir," a tech ventured, "but how will a Type 33/S copy of one of them destroy them?" "Simple. Through my spies aboard the SDF-17 and in the Utopia Planitia organization, I have compiled, over the last century or so, detailed psychological profiles of the Wedge Defense Force's command staff. I know how they think. And this one--this one is their weak link. Destroy his credibility--make the others think he has betrayed them--and they will crumble. "We will use this doppelganger to do just that. And then--then will we strike. Their morale will be low and they will be missing at least one member of their command staff. Our fleet will tear them to shreds." "How will we be able to use the doppelganger, m'lord?" the shadowed figure asked. "You will see, Decker," Largo replied with a smile. "You will see." Then, the second tank opened up. A blandly beautiful Asian woman stepped out of the cylinder. "And, to add insult to injury," Largo said, "We shall beat them at their own game. Two of their best agents, Kei and Yuri, were taken from video series. And the best way to eliminate a cartoon character is, of course, with another cartoon character. To irritate them even more, we're using a character from the Dirty Pair comic book, which the Angels find incredibly insulting. Enter..." he gestured melodramatically "...Shasti." "And my mission, Largo?" "Infiltrate the Wayward Son. Kill the Lovely Angels, and impair the ship's combat capacity to the best of your ability. The warrant officer," he pointed to a man standing at attention, "will see that you get whatever resources you need for this job. You have a blank check, of course. Any expense for such an elite operative...and such an elite operation." "Your information on the crew was helpful. I already have a plan, Largo." She stepped towards the warrant officer, who rapidly produced a bathrobe. Largo turned to a lesser tech. "Give the order to the central computer. Let Operation Gotterdammerung begin!" --------------------------------------------------TWENTY-FIVE "Desperate eyes across a weary room/A glazed look, and I was on the road to ruin." --Pink Floyd Gryphon, Kei, ReRob, Deedlit, MegaZone, and Yuri were sitting at Chez Lucifer enjoying some drinks. In strode a bombshell in a rainbow dress and purple hair. Megazone and ReRob turned to watch, and Yuri slapped MegaZone across the face. Zoner thought the peek was worth the pain, though. ReRob, however, didn't care, so he kept on looking. And what he saw was...surprising. He avoided her gaze directly, but just sat there, trying to determine who she really was. Gryphon was the first to react. "ReRob, are you okay?" "I think I know her, Gryph." "What? We haven't been on R&R for two days and you think that you know somebody in this room?" "If she's who I think she is, Gryphon, than I know her better than I know you." Kei spoke up. "ReRob, she's obviously not an old flame... How can you know her better then Ben?" ReRob was still in Never-Never Land. "If she's who I think she is, she's a legend--and my summon spell's been working overtime. Mother of Pearl! It is her! It's the way she holds the baton!" ReRob, of course, was referring to the carefree way she triple-flipped her credstick before catching it and placing it into the bar register. ReRob immediately fell into a quasi-trance, trying to figure something out. Oddly enough, Deedlit seemed to be dealing quite well with the entire situation. Gryphon spoke. "Will somebody tell me what's going on?" "He said 'baton' didn't he?" Megazone asked, Gryphon replying the affirmative. "Then it's gotta be Vixen," Zoner said matter-o'-factly. Deedlit was nonplussed. "Oh, her. Okay." Meanwhile, ReRob got up, intentionally oblivious of the people at his own table, and made his way to the lady who was making all the commotion. "Excuse me, Ma'am, but you wish to speak with me." "I doubt it." "You want to talk to me about a credstick which pays in the coins of pleasure and pain. You want to talk with me about a file on this--" he pointed to his pocket computer-- "which describes you." "Why should I want to--" ReRob attempted to punch the lady and failed. In fact, the message never passed through his spinal chord and stopped far short of any motor neurons. He never moved at all. He wanted it that way. The lady responded by drawing a second credit baton from her back. She stopped just as the stick got into a position fit to be wielded. "And, you want to talk to me about why you did that while I stood perfectly still." "You're right. You do want to talk to me about those things, sir." With that, they sat down with their respective drinks at a vacant table. "I think some formal introductions are in order. My name's ReRob. I'm a Terran traveler." "My name's Dawn. That'll do for now. I'm a local." "Beauteous. Now what I'm about to show you is a character sheet from a role-playing game. The scale is one to six, with six being the natural human maximum. Take a look at this character, and tell me what you think of it." He punched a few keys on his pocket comp, and gave her the display. Dawn looked the display over. "You're a good player, ReRob. She's a powerful character, but not a rules munchkin." "Now check the psyche profile." "I like this lady. You wrote a good, detailed profile. But what does this prove?" "Okay, you still won't crack. How about this?" Dawn found herself staring at the Vixen's equipment list. Highlighted at the top was the item "Monofilament whip concealed in a credit baton." ReRob spoke. "If you were trying to bribe me, you wouldn't have pulled out a reserve credstick from a back holster. What're the odds that, if I took a look at that baton, I'd find the control buttons to let the tip detach?" "Listen. I don't show my credit batons to strange men." "You do it every day. If you didn't, how would you check out at the supermarket? You can't convince me that you're not the Vixen unless you can actually contradict this sheet." "Well, I wasn't born anywhere near Seattle." "Other than that. I think you're the local version of the Vixen." "Well, if I'm not the actual Vixen, then why would my stats mesh so well with hers?" "It's a long story, a long strange trip, a little of Heinlein, and a truckload of half-level magic." "Half-level what?" "That's another long story. But the facts are, you are a perfect match to these stats. In fact, I'm willing to bet the armored bike I rode up here on that "Vicki" is your middle name." "You've got a battlebike?" "The chromed monster. It's parked right outside. Take a look if you want." Vicki strolled outside the club for a minute or two. She returned, duly impressed. "Are those things around the front wheel...?" She made rotary motions with her hands. "Yeah. Rotary laser arrays. Mondo firepower. They're messy, but they're fun at parties." "You realize that's incredibly illegal." "I kinda thought that. So?" "So, do you realize how much I could get for turning you in?" "If you could turn me in. I'm kinda hard to handle. At least, that's what Deedlit says." "You don't know my capabilities." "Oh, really?" ReRob pointed to the computer screen. "By the way, you haven't answered my question." "Oh, yeah. You win. The full name's Dawn Victoria Scritelli." "Greetings, Vixen. Robert Edward Mandeville. Just call me ReRob." He stood up. "Now, according to your M.O. you're a recon combat goddess. We could use somebody like you. You between runs right now?" "Yup. I was here to meet a contact, but he doesn't seem to be showing up." "Well then, this sounds like the start of a very lucrative relationship." ReRob slapped down a holographic business card. "I'm a military recruiter. I'd like you to join the Wedge Defense Force. Our contracts have zero-zeros installed, so you can cut and run anytime. You won't be a wage slave." "One condition. I want one of those battlebikes." "I'm three steps ahead of you, Vix. We want you piloting one of those. But a little different. More suited to your combat style. That's a pig-man bike out there." "Then show me your facilities." ---------------------------------------------------TWENTY-SIX "You have been recruited by the Star League to defend the Frontier against Xur and the Ko-Dan Armada." --The Last Starfighter "Adam, I'd like you to meet a new prospect for the Hammers." Pfloyd looked up from his Tank War game. "I don't recognize the face. What squadron are you from, Lassie?" "She's not signed with the Wayward Son yet. I was showing her around, trying to entice her into joining." "You didn't get her from twenty-three, did you? You heard Zoner explicitly ordered no visitors from the station." "I checked it with him, he said it's kosher. Besides, she's not a SHARP." "And who, exactly, is this person?" She spoke up. "I'm the Vixen." Adam's jaw left a dent in the floor. "Next stop, the Cyclone bay. That bike I showed you is one of the six varieties of Cyclone variable geometry mecha." "Mecha? That was a motorcycle you showed me, back at Chez Lucy." "That's the beauty of it. It can be configured as a motorcycle or as a suit of augmented body armor." "Body armor? You want me in body armor? That'd slow me down, dull my edge." "You haven't seen the VR-038 yet. Ah, but here we are." The pair walked into a room full of cyclones, stored here as motorcycles. Four of the six varieties were represented here, the Hammers' VR-065 Obliviator being stored in the Thundergod and the VR-027 Predator not operated by any Hammer. These were the VR-052 Battler, VR-041 Sabre, and VR- 038 Light Combat, and a new model called the VR-077 Terminator, a machine resembling a VR-041 on steroids. Each of them had the Wedge-DF logo, which strongly resembled a shamelessly ripped-off RDF logo, as well as the two crossed carpentry hammers on a red-and-white background of the Hammers' unit logo. ReRob went over to a rack and got a suit of CVR-3F armor, and handed it to Vixen. He pointed to the women's locker room. "Put on one of these. It's standard field armor, capable of stopping anything short of anti-tank weaponry. You'll also find that it's very light and maneuverable. It also acts as a linksuit for the mecha." Vixen went into the locker, and returned in five minutes clad in the armor. ReRob led her into the next room. The next room was the Mecha Combat Training Room, or MCTC. A VR-038 was parked there. ReRob walked in with a sledgehammer. "Cute little bike. Doesn't look like it'll stand up to much, though." Vixen was not impressed, obviously. ReRob responded by beating the shit out of it with the sledge, and with progressively larger weapons. She started being impressed when he failed to slash the tires with his Husqvarna. "So what's this mecha bit, ReRob?" "Push this button." Vixen pressed a button on a hard-to-reach location, and the vehicle fell open. ReRob gave her instructions on how to attach the mech in the so-called "Static Transformation to Battloid." She stood up, admiring the response of the suit. "The control system partially reads your mind. That results in literally boosting your own reflexes. Which, by the way, are incredible to begin with." "Can you pipe something through the audio system?" "No problem. Eve, I'm gonna need some music here. Could you shuffle the Use Your Illusion albums? Begin with 'You Could be Mine'." Matt's rhythms rocked the MCTC for a few seconds. One single keyboard note, then Duff's bass snuggled in below the percussion. Vixen started to move, getting a feel for the music. Slash cut in with the "Terminator" riff. Vixen shifted into high gear. ReRob hung back and watched the show. He had never seen a mech move like that before. He had never seen a human move like that before. Odds were, Vixen hadn't seen it either. The Eve had a sense of timing herself. It followed "You Could be Mine" with "Live and Let Die." Vixen had ReRob shut off the audio after that. She removed her helmet. "Where do I sign?" Within an hour, ReRob had fitted her for her combat equipment. These consisted of a suit of CVR-3F, a Gallant laser pistol, and a VR-038. True to form, ReRob spent some time tinkering with and individualizing each. The CVR-3F had a "pocket" for a credit baton on the inside of the left forearm guard. It was a light shade of lavender. The VR-038 was black with lavender trim. On the front fairing, the words "Femme Fatale" appeared in script. The Gallant was altered to use, in addition to its own power supply, energy taken directly from the mech. Since that was normally her only weapon, it had better have some major ammo. Vixen turned down the RL-6 Rocket Launcher, explaining that it was too ugly for her to use effectively. -------------------------------------------------TWENTY-SEVEN "Aah...leftovers." --Casey Jones The Wayward Son cruised its regular patrol route through sector seventeen, on its way to do some exploration outside the frontier, on condition green and with very little going on. It had been a boring week. "Like yo, there's a message coming in," q suddenly announced. "On the emergency channel." "Let's hear it," Zoner ordered. "Ought to liven up the day a little." "Coming in." "This is Musashi Control to any vessel," a panicked voice announced. "Please, respond!" "Go ahead, Control," q replied. "This is the WDF Wayward Son." "Wayward Son?" the voice asked, sounding relieved. "The Wedge Defense Force? Thank God! Our capital city is under attack. Repeat, Musashi City is under attack by unknown invaders. They're slaughtering our people in the streets-- for God's sake, help us!" "Musashi, this is Wayward Son," Zoner announced. "Be advised we are aware of your situation. We are taking action now--keep us informed to new developments. Wayward Son out." He turned. "Gryph, take your squadron down and run a quick recon. If we have to run a full-scale op, then fine, but I want to know what we're up against." "Right," Gryphon replied, heading for the turbolift. Within five minutes, the five fighters of the Eight-Ball Squadron were streaking planetward. "Give me all we have on Musashi, Jenna," said Zoner. "Musashi...class-M. Terraformed about a dozen years ago, and already has three major cities on it, one of them domed. Vesper's the domed one, then Zepan, and the capital, Musashi City. Temperate, a lot of rainforest. Mineral deposits and such make it a decent mining world, but it's far enough from Kilrathi space not to have to worry about them." "Thanks." He turned back to the main viewer and watched the five glowing dots recede toward the planet. Ten minutes later, Gryphon appeared in the corner of the screen. "There's a serious situation down here all right," he said. "Mecha in the streets, hosing down civilians left and right--we were lucky to get in and out without getting blown out of the sky. I don't recognize them, but they're pretty tech. We're gonna need the Destroids for this, I think. They've got crap for air cover, but their ground troops are good." "Okay, thanks. Get your squad back here for rearming and some quick armor slapping, and I want you back down there. q, alert Major Aldzinjal and his people--we need the Destroids ready to hit the dirt in ten. Prepare to disengage Daedalus for landing." In a high-tech command-center kind of place, Largo leaned back in a large and comfortable seat and smiled at the screens of destruction. Black mecha and disguised Buma troops were being hosed down by the WDF's Destroid divisions with consummate ease. This he had expected, and in fact, planned on. GENOM was going to lose this battle, and the WDF would never know who they had beaten. At least not until it was far too late. "Well, that was simple," Gryphon said with a smile, jetting back to make a gerwalk landing near the planetside command center. He dismounted from his fighter and walked over to Perry, who was standing near the Monster he ran ground ops from. "Hey, Commander," said Perry. "Dunno who those guys were, but they weren't up to facing us down, now were they?" "Nope," Gryphon replied. "Suits me just fine. I'm no big fan of the skin-of-the-teeth victories." "Major!" a Salusian trooper called, running from the MAC-II. "We've just received a priority request for aid from city officials. There's a concentration of enemy infantry holed up in a pre-secondary school near downtown. They've got student hostages." "Aw hell," said Perry. "I hate the mop-up most of all." "I'll handle it," Gryphon said. "Tell them assistance is en route, and get me a secure line to the SDF-17." "Okay," Perry replied. "Seems like you have a plan, eh Gryph?" "Something like that." The trooper left, and returned a few minutes later with a field phone. "SDF-17, this is Gryphon. Yeah, q, let me talk to Zoner, willya? I got a situation here, and a plan for dealing with it. Yeah, thanks. Hi, Zoner...you heard about our little situation? Yeah. I've got a plan. We can't use firepower to get those kids out of this, obviously. What I figure is, we send in a couple of small squads, quiet-like. You know, sort of ESWAT stuff. Yeah. Kei and Yuri will want in, of course--this is just their kind of op. Uh huh. I figure all we'll need is the Triple-S and the three of us. Okay. Meet 'em in fifteen then." He hung up. "You're sending the Triple-S?" Perry asked. "They'll be pleased--haven't seen much action lately." "Yeah, I figure it'll please Gordo to no end. He gets so bored between vacations." [The Triple-S was the WDF's elite Shadow Security Squad, the commandoes' commandoes. The only unit to be equipped with top-secret CVR-7 armor and equipment, the Triple-S proudly bore the motto "Invisible--Invincible--Unstoppable". Officially, the crack squad, consisting of eight Salusians, a Praxian, and one of the elusive Predator race, did not exist. "Gordo" was Lieutenant Commander G'rdnak Ripperfang, the squad's Predator commander.] Within fifteen minutes, the ten members of the Triple-S, Gryphon, and the Lovely Angels were meeting at the conference table between Perry's MAC's feet. On the table was a large map of the Seventh Street School. "Gordo, you take your squad in through the back, here," said Gryphon, pointing. "Your relative invisibility should keep you undetected in the gathering dusk. Spread out, pick off hostiles as you see fit, and try to get the kids out alive. And try not to let them see your face, ok? No offense, but these are little kids, they're not ready for a shock like that." "Right," Gordo replied, and sealed his helmet over what was, after all, an amazingly ugly face by human standards. "Kei, Yuri, you'll enter from the top, either here or here. Work your way toward the office, that's probably where they've got their nerve center set up, assuming they've got one. Try and get the bossman, if possible. No frag explosives. I don't want kids getting hurt." "You think I'd go tossing frag grenades around with children in the area? I'm hurt," said Kei. "I know you all too well, m'love," Gryphon replied with a grin. "You tend to get carried away..." "Right, right. No frags." "Okay. I'm going in through the roof, here. Unless I miss my guess, they'll have a lot of their hostages holed up in the gym, where they can hose em quickly if someone on our side fucks up, but not all of them, so they'll still have an ace to play if it comes to that. I'm going to try and take out their guys in the gym. We can work our way to the middle and herd them all into the killzone. Everyone clear on what they have to do?" Everyone nodded. "Okay. Let's do it." The force broke up. The ten members of the Triple-S jumped onto their VR-029 Predator Cyclones and zoomed away (except Gordo, who rode an ExoSalusia Industries J-4500 gravbike); Kei and Yuri piled into a jeep and took off; Gryphon mounted his own '29 and raced after them. -------------------------------------------------TWENTY-EIGHT "You're wondering who I am/Machine or mannequin/With parts made in Japan/I am the Modern Man!" --Styx The Vixen was waiting for ReRob. She caught him totally unprepared, on his own turf. Then again, that's her specialty. He had barely closed the door when she had him pinned up against it by the shoulders. "How's biz? Everything's sub-zero, I hope..." She was looking at him as if she had something extremely interesting on her mind. "Yeah, sub-zero, what's on your mind, Vix?" "You know, I'm not sure why, but you just seem... incredibly cute. Those big blue eyes..." "Brown eyes." "Those big brown eyes just invite me to come inside." She gently but very forcibly laid him out on his bunk. "Vix, if you haven't noticed, I'm already married..." He squirmed in an attempt to extricate himself from the compromising position. His unofficial wrestling training rendered him nigh-unpinnable. The "nigh" came into effect here, and he aborted his escape attempt. He put his hands over her ears in an attempt to physically push her away-- --Until he felt the metal slabs behind her ear. It seemed like interface plugs of some form. He froze. "Are you out of your ever-lovin' mind, Vixen? Have you sold your soul?" Vixen turned her voice and blood to ice in the split- second it takes a computer to reconfigure to pre-set standards. She lifted her right hand from his shoulder just long enough to take her full dress stiletto and firmly plant it into ReRob's throat. Of course, I'll need to step up my time scale a little bit. But I have ReRob's terminal right here, and his hand is still warm... She slid ReRob's thumb across the security plate on the terminal and started gweeping away. --------------------------------------------------TWENTY-NINE "Hello, handsome. If things have gone totally wrong, I'm talking to myself and you've got a wet towel wrapped around your head." --Quaid Gryphon was the first one "on station". He used his thrusters to get to the upper windows, which were opened for ventilation. With the PC-2 Predator Cloak engaged on his VR- 029, it simply would not do for him to enter by the main doors. He got to the track on the upper deck, where he could see the situation. The situation was particularly bad. Out of the two hundred people on the gym floor, twenty of them were terrorists. Oh, shit, thought Ben. He turned on his comm. "Eight-Ball one to Angels and Triple-S. I'm in position...shit. I'm looking at about twenty shoots and a hundred and eighty odd no-shoots. This could be messy. I'll try to ease the burden on you people and start sniping. Tell me when you get to the door." He took aim on one of the terrorists, aiming at the center of his back. Three laser dots centered on the target's body armor. One of the others noticed it. "Hey, Eddie, what're those dots on your armor?" "Have a nice trip, Eddie..." Gryphon muttered. "What dots? I didn't put any dots on..." his sentence remained unfinished due to the fact that he was missing a torso soon thereafter. The effect of an EP-42 on a man wearing an armor vest is decidedly unpretty. The children, being children, began screaming their lungs out. "Whatwuzthat? FUCK!" A terrorist turned around to find the shooter. He saw a shimmer in the air, somewhat like heat waves, but...different. He started firing with his pulse pistol. "Fuck! They saw me!" Gryph booked it for the nearest pile of athletic kipple, hiding behind a Musashiball. "Whutizitwhutizitwhutizit?" "NofuckingclueIdontcareIdontwannaknowkillit! You, you, you! Sweep the balcony!" Three grunts ran up the stairs. Gryphon was ready. He held a Bloody Card and he knew how to use it. After all, he learned from a master and had a couple of centuries to dabble in the art. Sort of like the way he picked up electric guitar. "Sweep the balcony, eh?" he said softly to himself. "All right..." Just a flick of the wrist... The Card's trajectory took it through the necks of the three thugs. It returned quickly. The thugs didn't... "Holy shit!" one of the surviving thugs shouted. "What the fuck was that?" "I dunno, but whatever it is, we gotta kill it, and quick! You guys, split up, take different stairways," ordered the guy Gryph had pegged for the boss. "He can't get you all at once. I'll keep the brats under control myself." "They're right there," Gryphon observed to himself. "I can't get'em all at once." He moved quickly into the shadows near the ball, then hit his thrusters and leaped across the balcony, landing on the other side of the gym. All the men in black saw were two curls of jet exhaust with an undefinable area of not-rightness at the end, streaking across the open space above. Gryphon proceeded to duck behind some traffic cones (why are there always traffic cones in gyms?) and wait. Soon enough, one very nervous-looking thug with a machinegun of some sort walked past. Gryphon waited until he passed to pop his right arm's CADS-3 sabre. The thug heard the hum of the weapon, softer and lower than an electric shaver, and started to turn, to inhale the breath he needed to cry a warning-- --too late. His head landed next to the leader. By that time, Gryphon had targeted one across the gym and blown him in half. Then he jumped straight up, without using the thrusters to give himself away, and hung, suspended and invisible, in the pipes. A sudden burst of violence, then disappear; it was the only way to approach a situation like this when you're one man against twenty. He crawled through the pipes, staying as silent as he could, around the corner and near to a stairway. He had to get down from the balcony somehow, and he had just the idea. He reached down and removed a grenade from his belt, making certain it wasn't a frag; wouldn't do to have shrapnel flying about with all the kiddies. He wound up and threw it across the gym with all the strength his Cyclone could offer. It cleared easily, tagging the thug directly across the balcony from him in the chest and blowing him sky-high. At the instant of the explosion, Gryphon jumped the rail and dropped behind the stairs. It worked; they didn't see him. Now it was a matter of keeping to the shadows under the balcony. Gordo and his team were heading in through the back. They approached the building, cloaked, nine Cyclones and an armored Predator. Not a force to be messed with. Three guards were watching the back door, and one or two on some windows. Sergeant Phelan Satori took his group of four Triple-S troopers around to the east wing; the other team of four, under Sergeant Kristina Satori, took the west. Gordo and his partner, the Praxian Lieutenant Miyu, took the rear entrance itself. It was dark by now; the two cloaked individuals approached the rear steps directly, covered doubly by their virtual invisibility and the night. The three guards watching the door were getting rather bored, watching nothing for hours on end tends to do that. Perhaps if they had felt at risk they may have been alert enough to notice the slightly shimmering bits of night that were moving, but they felt safe. They weren't. Gordo fired his mono-net at the thug on the left, pinning him to the wall and dicing his body. As he fired Gordo shifted quickly, one of the remaining guards turned to fire along the return path of the net, and was speared by Gordo's staff even as he raised his weapon. The third guard went for his radio to warn those inside. The radio fell to the ground along with his hand as Lt. Miyu's saber passed through his arm. Before he could scream she slashed again, and his head separated from his neck. The rear entrance was secure and no warning had been issued. Perfect. Gordo and Lt. Miyu slipped inside with a graceful ease that would put a ninja to shame. Rather amazing for someone Gordo's size. The corridor appeared clear. The pair headed left, they would work their way clockwise through the building. They leapfrogged from room to room, much like the SAS would have hundreds of years previous. In fact, imagine if SAS troopers had a couple of hundred of years of experience and that would be their style. Most of the rooms were clear, but one room at the end of the corridor contained two thugs, a small group of students, and their teacher. Gordo reached the room first and quickly assessed the situation and waved Lt. Miyu forward. She came as close to losing her professionalism as she ever did. One of the thugs was sitting on the floor in the far corner with a number of students in front of him as a shield. The other thug was in the front of the room, raping the teacher as the students watched. "Bastard!" Miyu hissed. "Calm. I'll take the corner. You can have him," Gordo replied emotionless. "Thanks," Miyu replied with genuine gratitude. Gordo crouched in the doorway, the thug in the corner was too busy watching his buddy, and probably waiting for his turn, to notice. Gordo's targetting system painted a neat triangle on the thugs chest. One of the students noticed and seemed about to say something, but he then thought about it and turned to the doorway. He barely noticed the shimmer and gave Gordo the thumbs up. "Smart kid, I like him," Gordo thought, and fired. The thugs chest vanished in a bloody haze as the plasma bolt impacted. The rapist froze for a second as his buddy exploded, then he went for his gun. Unfortunately his gun was on the floor beneath his clothing. Before he could reach it Miyu had closed the distance and pinned him to the wall. All the thug could see was a shimmering humanoid form holding him in the air by his throat. "So, thought you'd have yourself a little fun while you were waiting did you?" Miyu asked, her voice dripping with hatred. "He... Hey, I'm sorry ok. So, you got me now. Might as well lock me up right?" "If you had just been holding the hostages that MIGHT have been an option. But after this..." she gestured to the desk, "I don't think so." "S...So what are you going to do?" "Extract vengence." "Who the hell are you anyway?" Lt. Miyu deactivated her cloak. "Lieutenant Miyu, Wedge Defense Force Shadow Security Squad." "Triple-S?! Shit we're screwed!" "No. You'll never be screwed again." Lt. Miyu used her free hand to grab the thugs balls. Looking him in the eyes she said, "I don't think you're mature enough to have these." She squeezed with all her strength, and crushed them. The thug's eyes bulged out of his head and his mouth opened to scream. But the scream was choked off as Lt. Miyu tightened her grip on his throat. She let him suffer for a minute and then ended his pain with her sabre. "Sloppy Lieutenant, you're losing your professionalism." "Shut up Gordo." Then turning to the teacher, "Will you be ok for a while?" She asked as she gathered her clothing. "Yes... Yes, thank you." "No thanks needed. It's our job," then mumbling, "and the bastard deserved it." Meanwhile, Gordo addressed the class. "Everyone stay calm. Stay in here until someone else comes by to get you. You'll be safe now." Turning to Miyu he added, "Come on Lieutenant, there's more of 'em waiting out there." "Roger." Miyu re-activated her cloak and followed Gordo out of the room. Sergeant Phelan Satori lead his team in through an open window on the lower level of the east wing. They quickly swept through the lower rooms, coming up empty. It appeared that the terrorists had moved everyone to make it easier to cover them. After rechecking everything again they regrouped and moved upstairs. Again most of the rooms were vacant. But they did find four thugs holed up in the corner room, apparently acting as a lookout. Sgt. Satori waved his group back. "Ok. We've got four clustered against the far wall. I want to take them out without making too much noise. No need alerting any of the others, now is there. So I figure we go in fast, use our sabres, and get out. Agreed?" All three of his troops signalled their agreement and they gathered out side of the door. Sgt. Satori gestured to indicate who would take on whom. One they were all ready they struck. Sgt. Satori went in first. Pvt. Shima opened the door and Sgt. Satori fired his thrusters and leapt across the room, landing upon the terrorist with the radio. Before he even finished his leap the other three troopers were through the door and airborne. The radio operator's head disowned his body and sailed across the room. Three other heads followed in quick succession. "Good work. Let's finish the sweep. Stay chilled." "Null perspiration," Shima replied. The squad finished their sweep, finding only a couple of students hiding under one of the teachers' desk. They were awed by actually meeting the legendary, and non-existent, Triple-S. It didn't take much encouragement to get them to stay put until everything was over. Just a few autographs. Gryphon had managed to remove three more of the scum from the gene pool with a grenade. The fools thought they'd be safe huddled together along the far wall. Dumb. Real dumb. Dumb de dumb dumb dumb. Ten down, ten to go. The terrorists were getting jumpy. After all, it was a bit unnerving to have nothing slaughter half your troops. They began arguing amongst themselves, which suited Gryphon just fine. The more disorganized they were, the easier they would be to kill. One of the thugs backed away from the center of the gym towards the wall, where he figured he'd be safer. He would have been right, if Ben hadn't been there waiting. He heard the hum of the sabre's blade a second to late. He had time to feel the cool air on his brain and wonder how that could be before he died. Ben shifted quickly and the gunfire that followed the thug's death missed him entirely. Fed up with the situation four of the thugs bolted for the door. One of the remaining five screamed at them and shot one in the back as he fled. Fine, let them kill themselves. Two of those fleeing stopped when their buddy bought it, but one continued. He got plugged for his trouble too. The shooter was still screaming epithets at the two who remained. Actually, he was being quite annoying, and far to loud, so Ben silenced him with a bolt from his EP-42. Then, since they were being kind enough to stand in a row, he let the Bloody Card have some fun. It sailed through both terrorists and returned to him. Unfortunately a good deal of lead followed it home. Not that it mattered much, but it was annoying. The problem was the guy with the M-790 grenade launcher. The shaped charge wouldn't normally be much trouble for the force field, but it was using part of its energy to deflect the hail of lead the other three terrorists were sending Gryph's way. The explosion overloaded the cloaking shield and slammed Gryph into the wall. "SHIT! That was a perfectly good cloaking device. I'm going to have to kill you all now. I hope you don't mind. Actually, I don't really care if you do. I'm going to do it anyway." Gryphon fired his jets and flew directly into the oncomming fire. His Cyclone was taking damage, but for now it was ok. On his first pass he raked the schmuck with the M-790 with his sabre and neatly parted him. Three left. Sergeant Kristina Satori led her three troopers into the west wing. There had been only a single guard at the door, and he had proven to be little challenge. Her team silently worked its way toward the central building. As her brother had found in the east wing, the terrorists had left only a few members scattered in the outer rooms. "Seems they left all the peons out here to die," Pvt. Eco commented. "They didn't want to leave the wings empty, but they weren't important enough to use their experienced troops." "Or maybe they just don't have enough. Or there could be a few hundred of them waiting in the central building. Never make assumptions about the enemy. Always treat them as a superior force and you'll live longer," Sgt. Satori scolded. "Remember, never assume..." "...for when you assume you make an `ass' out of `u' and `me'. Yeah, I know." "Ok, just keep it in mind. Now, we've got half the wing left. Stay on your toes and remember, kill 'em quietly." Sgt. Satori swept down the corridor like a ghost. As the team leapfrogged from room to room they found more of the same. Nothing. Until they reached the last room before the central building. The terrorists had set up a communications station there. When the team arrived they found the two occupants engaged in the futile action of trying to raise the guard they had killed on the way in. "Outpost Zed. Outpost Zed. Do you read me?" "It's no use man. He's probably sleeping." "Maybe they got to him. Maybe he's dead." "Who got to him? The local cops? They're worthless. Besides, you can't get near the door without crossing the field. If he saw anyone coming he could just press the alarm button on his radio." "Yeah... But what if he was sleeping and they got him? They could be out in the hall right now!" "You are so paranoid. Fine. I'll check the hall." The terrorist got up and walked over to the open door, stuck out his head and scanned the hall. Totally missing the cloaked squad. "See, no one there," he said as he smiled at his buddy. The smile didn't last long as his head exploded from an EP-42 blast. Before his friend's mind could even register what it had just seen, he suffered the same fate. The three remaining terrorists huddled together in the center of the gym. Two of them held their guns leveled on the crowd while the third taunted Gryphon, who was hiding behind a stack of equipment. "Hey! You'd better come out here now, or the kids buy it! Do you want to be responsible for that? Huh? Well?" Arrgghh! A single grenade would take them all out, but they were too close to the kids. Would they actually kill the children? Yes, they would. Actually, it was surprising that they hadn't done so already. What could he do? Gryphon grinned as he hatched an evil plan. Ben strode out from behind the stack of equipment. "Ok, I give up. Don't hurt the kids." "Nice of you to see it our way. Now drop your weapons." Ben complied and dropped his EP-42 and removed his sabre arm shield. He just hoped the thugs would be as stupid as he thought they were. "Great, now walk over here. Slowly." They were. Ben slowly walked towards the terrorist, the two who had been covering the children had turned to watch him. That made it all the easier. They thought that they had won and they were letting their guard down. Fools. "You're going to pay for what you did to our friends man. I know who you are. That weird cloak means you're a member of the Triple-S. Doesn't it?" "You got me. Yeah, I'm in the Triple-S. Now that you've got me, why don't you let the kids go?" Just a little closer. "No way man. You're just added fun. I'm going to enjoy torturing you." The three thugs laughed, and Ben struck. He fired his boosters and charged directly at the trio. In the second it took them to realize what he was doing he was on top of them. They opened fire on him, damaging the Cyclone. It wasn't enough. Ben fired his holdout missile from his forearm guard, directly into the center of the trio. As he fired the missile he flung himself down on them, using himself as a shield for the blast. The missile's high explosive warhead packed enough power to annihilate the three terrorists and to throw Gryphon, Cyclone and all, several feet into the air. Ben dragged himself to his feet. His Cyclone was wrecked to the point of uselessness, so he discarded it. It had served their purpose, none of the children had been seriously hurt by the blast. A few had minor cuts from shrapnel, but no one had any major injuries. He told them all to stay put and that someone would be back to get them in a little while. Then he set off for the main building. -------------------------------------------------------THIRTY "This chick is toast!" --Dr. Peter Venkman I'm in pain. Painpainpainpainpain. Why? Perhaps the knife in my neck might have something to do with it. Yank! "Aaaaaaarrrrrrrggggggghhhhhh!!!!!" ReRob bent over to let the blood drain out of his throat. After a few minutes, scar tissue formed. It still hurt like MegaZone's chili, but he could stand up. He examined the knife. "Eight centimeters of cold steel. That bitch really needs to die." He looked at his hand. One long strand of green hair remained entwined in his fingers. With a little luck, that would be her undoing. He selected Michael Wheeler on the intercom. "Wheels, meet me in the genetics lab--now!" Within five minutes, ReRob and MWheeler were in the lab. "What's the rush, Rob?" "I need a genetic analysis on this," ReRob pointed the strand of hair. "I need to know exactly who or what this lock belongs to." "Green hair? Checking up on Vixen?" He raised his eyebrows to imply the obvious. "If that's Vixen, I'm Coyle. You don't want to know. Just run the analysis." Mike started up the computers and inserted the specimen. Within a few minutes, data started scrolling on several screens. "Well, the DNA is perfect for a killing machine. Either she's one in a millennium, or...shit! This stuff's not natural. Your mistress was made to order. How much'd you pay, ReRob?" "I never thought I'd say this, Wheels, but do you really want to eat this?" He held up the knife, still dripping blood. "What the fuck?" "The wielder was 'Vixen'. The blood is mine. Take the analysis, and pump it into the fictional database." "Right." ReRob sat at the terminal and initiated a search for any fictional character who would need precisely that genetic makeup. He had run into too many fictional beings lately not to believe in Heinlein's "Number of the Beast" hypothesis. Not surprisingly, he got several answers. Only one, however, made any sense. He took a hardcopy and dashed to his machining lab. His Virtual Machinery shop could rez up almost any conceivable tool. The tools could only be used in the lab, being only holograms and force fields, but their effect on metal was permanent. It was also the garage for his motorcycle and body armor. Both had been recently plated with stainless steel. He slapped on his CVR-3 immediately. The motorcycle was a VR-065 "Obliviator" Cyclone. This was definitely not the Robotech standard; the 065 didn't exist in Robotech. However, like the previous Cyclones it was a variable-geometry motorcycle which could reconfigure, link to a suit of CVR-3, and act as a two hundred pound suit of power armor. The only difference between the Obliviator and the "real" cyclones was the choice of armament. Sick of missiles and swords, ReRob created his own forearm weapons system. Dubbed the RLAMF-1 (Rotary Laser Array-Mondo Firepower), it was a pair of six-barrel laser cannons powered by spare batteries kept in the front fairing. It was the "pig-man" version of the Cyclone, and was truly harrowing to watch. ReRob straddled the beast, and kick-started the Mr. Fusion power unit. "Feelin' rowdy tonight?" He cranked the throttle. She responded briskly, but there was something in the hum that just didn't seem right. "Open--end wrench, eight mil." The shop responded by forming the tool in his open left palm, like a nurse handing a scalpel to a surgeon. ReRob tightened a screw on a plate, loosened it, and adjusted it for about ten seconds. Now, all was right with the bike. "Delete tools; end session." All that was left was a door, ReRob, and the Cyclone. He made a static transformation into battloid and walked out. He logged into the computer through his helmet radio. "Eve, can you locate Vixen?" "Vixen is in the MCTC ReRob." "Is anybody else there?" "Negative." And ReRob thanked the Lord and several toy designers for putting thrusters in the powersuit. ---------------------------------------------------THIRTY-ONE "You've been---Thunderstruck!" --AC/DC As the Triple-S squads and Gryphon were going about their business, two familiar figures approached the central building from above. Kei and Yuri paradropped from the Lovely Angel using thrust packs. They gingerly touched down on the roof and scanned the floor below with thermographic equipment. "Kei, looks like we've got a cluster of terrorists in the office, with several more scattered about the halls and outlying rooms. There are two groups of hostages, by the signatures I'd say the one in the office area was mostly officials and the one in the hall is students." "Ok. I say go in through the roof into the office, wipe out the leaders first. Then we can fan out from there. We can get the Triple-S to work in from the outside. And I finally get to use this." Kei pulled an Illudium PEW 36 limpet mine out of her equipment bag. "What'd'ya think?" "And we wonder why people say we're destructive," Yuri mumbled, then louder. "Sounds ok to me. Let me call the other groups. As long as they're on schedule they should have completed the preliminaries by now." Yuri began calling the other strike teams to coordinate the final thrust. When she was finished Kei spoke up. "So, everyone ready to go?" "Well, all of the Triple-S is ready, but I couldn't raise Ben on the radio." A worried look took up residence on Kei's face. "Well, try again." "I've already tried several times, either he can't hear us or he's not answering," or can't answer she finished the thought. "Well, um, his radio probably got fritzed or something, right?" Kei attempted to reassure herself. "Yeah, that's it. Ben can take care of himself. Well, ready to do the deed?" "I'm always ready, where should I plant this little gem?" Kei asked, patting the mine. "Right over here," Yuri pointed out the location directly above the terrorists' command. "The other groups will began their sweeps when they hear the blast. There's a gap since I couldn't get to Ben. We'll have to make it to the other hostages fast. Ready?" "Ready," Kei answered, activating the mine's timer. The pair took shelter behind a rooftop airconditioner, pulling on rebreathers as they did. "So, how long is the timer?" Yuri asked. "Oh, I set it for thirty--" BOOM! "--seconds," Kei answered with a grin. She was already up and running as she finished her reply. "Hey, wait for me!" Yuri called after her. Kei pitched a couple of concussion and flash grenades through the jagged hole the mine had torn in the roof and the two of them simultaneously leapt through, using their thrust packs to break their fall. They descended into utter chaos. Several of the terrorists had been killed by the blast or the falling roofing while the remainder were reeling from the combination of the initial surprise, the swirling smoke and dust, and the effects of Kei's grenades. The pair quickly began dispatching the remaining terrorists with a single professional shot each from their electromags. It was over quickly. "Clear!" Kei called from her side of the room. Zark! "Clear!" came Yuri's reply. They ran to the door to the outer office. "You toss in a flash and I'll follow it into the room, ok?" Kei suggested. "Fine by me, you know they're probably waiting for us out there." "I'm counting on it," Kei replied with a grin. Yuri applied a boot to the door, hard, and tossed a flash grenade through as it swung open. Before the door had even completed its arc Kei had kicked in her thrust pack and was racing through the top of the opening. As the door opened the three terrorists on the other side, alerted by the rather loud mine explosion, poured laser fire through the opening. They were professional and they new any foe would be coming through low, so that's where they concentrated their fire. Which is the reason all of it passed harmlessly below Kei. The trio had just enough time to realize their mistake before the flash grenade blinded them and they lost track of Kei. She immediately took advantage of this, drilling two of them as Yuri shot the third. "See, the pros are easy to take out because they're so predictable. It's the damn amateurs that you have to worry about. They're crazy." "Whatever you say Kei, but we've got to get to those kids, now. Let's move," Yuri prompted as she ran into the hallway, "Follow me." The pair avoided most of the terrorists on the way, the Triple-S could do a room to room sweep later, they just wanted to get to the children as quickly as possible. Of course they were happy to plug anyone who wanted to slow them down. At the sound of the mine blast the three Triple-S squads began sweeping the central building, from the outside in. The plan was simple, they would either wipe all the terrorists out and meet each other in the center. Or they would herd the terrorists ahead of them, and wipe them out in the center. Either way the wiping out of the terrorists was the same. Of course the original plan called for Ben to hold up one side of the net, but since he wasn't around it just meant more work for the Triple-S. When he heard the mine go off Ben had been slowly working his way towards the offices. The sound of the blast startled him at first, but then he realized that it must be the pair making another of their patented dramatic entrances. He smiled, readied his electromag, and charged toward the offices. Kei and Yuri move swiftly through the halls. In just a few minutes they are close enough to the children to prepare their strike. "They should be just around this corner," Yuri says. "Ok. We go in hot. We can't use any grenades because of the children. So we go in and try to plug them all before they can react. Ready?" "Ready." "Let's do it." ---------------------------------------------------THIRTY-TWO "And now we meet again, for the first time, for the last time." --Dark Helmet ReRob entered the Mecha Combat Training Room from the port side. He turned on the wall intercom, selected the bitcher on the other side of the gym, and maxed out the volume. Vixen heard a noise from the east side of the MCTC. Impossibly loud and distorted for a human, and far too low to be Kei or Yuri. All combat systems are already operational: no need to do anything but scan the quadrant, and listen to the message: "You! Yes, you! Stand still, Lassie!" Attack coming from behind: analyze. Too large to be a slug, too fast to be thrown, poorly aimed at her right scapula. Defense: a step to the left; executed. Determine nature and trajectory of attack as it passes, and check along path for assailant. Knife, extremely well-balanced, familiar. Blood on the blade; why isn't that knife in somebody's neck? A flick to the right to face the assailant... She turned, and caught what seemed to be a humaniform mirror way out to the west. It was actually a man in a VR- 065 Cyclone. The faceplate was up. The brown eyes, the French nose...why isn't he dead?!? The pilot spoke: "I know precisely what you are, Shasti. And I don't take no shit--" He flicked his faceplate down, activating the external speakers, "from a machine." His RLAMF units warmed up, singing a monotone dirge. Shasti had no weapons systems to warm up: in her "Vixen" persona, she was only fitted with a VR-038 Light Combat Cyclone. The advantages of this 'mech are the extreme speed capabilities. Combined with her innate combat abilities, she stood a good chance of defeating ReRob's RLAMF-1's just hand to hand. Even so, she wasn't going to play those odds. She wielded a Gallant H-90, an armor piercing handgun. "Then it's time to dance. Computer: audio. Duran Duran, James Bond Soundtrack. 'A View to a Kill.'" I'm severely boned fighting Shasti, ReRob thought, but I stand a chance against Vixen herself. I wrote her, and I should be able to make her hesitate. If I can draw her out, and fight defensively until then,...but then, I always fight defensively. He laid down a ninety-degree arc of laser fire, caught Shasti's foot as she leapt, and failed to do any severe damage. He then remembered that he was in the training room, and the doorway sent the 'mech an automatic safety mode message. The cyclone was intentionally failing to produce any real damage. However, Shasti's Gallant was burning decently sized holes in the supports and obstacles. "Road Hog, Safety Override! Execute!" Now he was doing some real damage. The room should be missing entirely in about two minutes. He took a flying leap for good measure, and narrowly avoided a shot. He re-located Shasti, and spiked the external speaker. "Just one thing, Shasti." "What?" "How the hell did you get Vixen?" Zark! "Why, I hacked into your account, darling," she replied sweetly. Her voice and face hardened and she continued arrogantly, "Your password is annoyingly simple." "People never think of the three-dot password, it's supposedly illegal with our system. But I found a way to circumvent it. Thanks for the tip, I'll have to change it later on today." He fired a double blast to keep Shasti from getting a bead on him. "Getting optimistic, aren't we, ReRob?" "But still, you impersonated the legend for two slottin' weeks, and fooled me! I'm the one who wrote the character. How did you work it so perfectly?!?" ReRob talked for a little too long and took several rounds to the head. There was little faceplate armor left, but it was still intact. "It was easy. You had a hundred kay of data on your "nature girl", and I was built to take slotted personalities." ReRob returned fire and blew a hole into Perrault Hall. The fight quickly moved, since there was more room. Fortunately, they were playing Star Trek V: The Final Frontier. Thus, the only one who was actually watching the show was John Trussell, who hadn't seen it before. He was already getting a bit fed up with the movie. "You mean you've got her entire personality slotted?!?" "As we speak! It's sitting in the background right now, and I intend to erase it from memory as soon as I'm done with this little entanglement." ReRob saw Trussell out of the corner of his eye. "Schmuck! Get out of here!" "Well, I was kind of watching this movie..." Shasti punctuated her words with blasts. "The incredible thing about it was that it was so easy! I didn't think I could find anybody with a set-up like yours. I mean, after all,--" "What does God want with a starship?" Shasti and ReRob spoke in unison: "Keep out of it, Kirk!" Trussell, fed up with the movie, got up and left. ReRob knew that Shasti was set-up for close combat. The Obliviator, on the other hand, was built for the open battlefield. It was time to make some room. "RoadHog: Check for EVA!" "Cleared for EVA. Environmental systems to 85 percent capability. CVR sealed. Life support guaranteed for two point five hours" "Eve: isolate and evacuate Perrault Hall and MCTC. Override code Sierra Hotel India Tango!" ReRob heard blast doors sealing, but he wasn't going to wait for a computer- controlled evacuation. He invoked a manual override, blowing away a large portion of the ceiling. Explosive decompression forced both Cyclones into hard vacuum. People on the bridge saw two unmistakable mecha: ReRob's "signature" Obliviator and the violet Light Cyclone he made for Vixen. The safeties were obviously not on, they had blasted a hole onto the weather deck (and not even in the MCTC!) and were intently attempting to kill each other. A quick chorus of "? the fuck?" followed, and then they found ReRob's frequency. "ReRob, this is Zoner. Knock that the fuck off!" "No can do, Zoner. I just hope that you boys can pick up the pieces when I die." And he switched into the standard frequency of Vixen's suit. "Vixen, are you there? Can you read me?" Shasti closed for the kill, despite the efforts of ReRob's RLAMF units. But, almost to her surprise, she did respond: "Yup, I'm here with the rest of us." "You can stop the rest of those personalities. You just have to try hard enough!" "I,...I can't!" Shasti breached the armor on ReRob's upper right arm, amputating the arm and exposing the stump to vacuum. "I'm just lucky she's letting me use her vocal chords!" ReRob's LSU kicked into overdrive, in a vain attempt to keep the pressure up, despite the hole in the suit which once was its wearer's arm. Rob realized that he had only a half- minute of oxygen left: he might be able to survive longer than that, but even a Detian can't talk without air. And talk was his major weapon. It was, as the cliche goes, now or never. "Well then, before we part, I need to know just one thing." "Sure. Anything, for you..." Another blow knocked ReRob off the deck and sent him spinning out of control. He righted himself, and stopped with relation to the Wayward Son. "Why?" "Why what?" ReRob brought his left RLAMF forward. "Why did you get off with that stupid credstick, when you could have any guy you wanted?" Vixen froze. Back when she was a Shadowrunner, that little fact had been brought up by the Dweller during an astral quest. That hurt her, more than life itself, more than all those years she spent running from Lone Star, corp cops, and wannabe samauri before she got Awakened. Her entire mind froze for an instant, and her body with it. ReRob didn't dare hesitate. He fired an overload burst, turned his fiber-optic barrels to molten spaghetti, and hit her square in the chestplate. There was very little left of her CVR chestpiece, and she floated there, her boots magnetically stuck to the deck. ReRob's suit was just as motionless. -------------------------------------------------THIRTY-THREE Johnny stares a long time at Alt's almost lifeless body. There is a feeble pulse. But Alt-- Alt is gone; lost in the machine; trapped behind crystal. Lost forever. Gone. --Never Fade Away Deedlit was the first one out of the airlock with her Cyclone. After all, she knew that something was going on. She wanted to be there when it hit the fan: she didn't want to be in on the mop-up. She had been on the bridge talking to MegaZone, trying to see if he could figure out what was going on. So when the bridge crew saw the two armor units going at it, she was on her way out. She saw ReRob's limp, lifeless body slowly floating away from the Wayward Son. She also found an RLAMF unit flying away at high velocity: no matter. Shasti was magnetically stuck to the deck: she called in a crew to destroy the monstrosity. She caught up with ReRob's corpse, and looked into the faceplate. His eyes were shut, and his nose, ears and mouth were bleeding. The suit was completely evacuated. Almost on a lark, she opened his facebowl. There was no more damage that could be done, none at all. Something stirred. ReRob spat blood at her, then silently mouthed three words. Deedlit couldn't read them, but she was certain that they weren't "I love you." His left arm jerked, triggering explosive bolts on the remaining, useless RLAMF. He pulled back for an augmented punch. She grabbed his arm. For a hanging moment, they were at stalemate, neither of them able to move. Then, his arm stopped resisting. Deedlit took the arm and went for the airlock at full speed. Jenna was at the other side of the airlock, already setting up an IV unit. She and Deedlit started stripping off pieces of CVR-3 while placing him on the stretcher. "What the hell happened out there?" "I don't know...he..tried to kill me." A half hour later, in sickbay, Rob opened his eyes. Deedlit and Jenna were almost hovering over him. He spoke. "Is...Shasti...dead?" "Who's Shasti? Shasti who?" "Shasti...Vixen. A WWWA Buma...always wanted to kill Kei and Yuri...used Vix to get to me to get to them." "She's dead, Rob." "Save me the body, will you, Deedlit? I want to oversee the disassembly personally...it'll be more of a disassembly than a dissection, knowing her stuff. Gee...my arm's gone. "Don't worry, hon. You're a Detian, it'll grow back in a week or two." "No, deety...I don't ever intend to forget this. Jenna...you still have those bio-emulatory limb mounts? "Yeah...you mean the ones I made up for RoboSwimm?" "Right...those. Slap one on my shoulder. And call up my labs and get a right Chrome arm, my size. "Chrome? You know that won't help your psych profile any." "Fuck my psych profile! The entire reason I'm getting this arm is because I thought somebody had no cyber whatsofuckingever, and she turned out to be Madame Metal. I found out because she had jack plugs in her skull! I'm going to get that arm cybered, and I don't care who knows it." "In her skull? How did you find that out?" Deedlit was confused. "You wouldn't believe...she tried to rape me." "Oh, god." "Yeah...BTW, who pulled me in?" "I did, Rob." "Then a major apology is in order. Deety, I tried to kill you out there." "Accepted. But why?" "I thought you were Shasti. I only corrected myself when you stayed my hand. An 038 couldn't do that. Thanks for pulling me in." "What's a wife for?" "That's supposed to be 'What are friends for?'" "Well, I was your friend first. It was kind of a prerequisite." "How very true." Jenna walked in with the arm and mounting frame. The bioemulation feature was built to "convince" the Omega-2 retrovirus that the arm was real, thus keeping the wearer from growing a new, flesh, arm. "When I mount this, do you want local or general anesthetic?" "No." "No?" "I've been through enough pain today, and still am in enough pain. This won't hurt nearly as much as losing the arm...or losing the dream." --------------------------------------------------THIRTY-FOUR "What I am is what I am are you what you are or what?" --Edie Brickell & New Bohemians As the pair were about to dive around the corner a group of terrorists opened fire on them from the rear. "SHIT!" they cried in unison as they took cover. "Kei, you go around the corner. I'll hold these guys off." "Right. Good luck." With that she dove around the corner, and froze in her tracks. Ben was in the hallway. Strewn about him were bodies of the terrorists and several children. As she watched, a child grabbed Ben's leg and clung to him. He leveled his gun on the child's face, grinned evilly, and fired. He then began putting several shots into the remaining children. Until he was interrupted by Kei. "BEN!" she screamed, it was all she could think to say. Ben spun and fired on her, wounding her shoulder. As Kei dove for cover Ben dove through a doorway. Kei was shocked, and confused, she couldn't believe what she had just seen. Her heart turned to stone and she lost all the love she had every felt for anyone. How could he have done this? How, goddammit?!?! She began to cry, for the betrayal, and for the children. Ben was racing towards the offices, he knew he was behind schedule and he wanted to try to hold up his side of the net. As he rounded the corner on the fly he ran into Ben as he dove through a doorway. This shocked him somewhat, as running into yourself tends to do. "Huh-- What the-- Who the hell--" He false started several times. Before he could untie his tongue Ben had turned the corner and was gone. He gathered himself together and stepped through the door, a confused look on his face. That confused look quickly turned to horror as he took in the field of bodies, most young children, which filled the hallway. The horror quickly turned to shock as Kei grabbed his attention. "You! How could you?! You motherfucking sonofabitch! DIE!" "Kei, what--" He was cut short as Kei put a neat pattern of shots, sort of a 'therefore' symbol, from her electromag into his chest. Even a Detian can only take so much. The shots laid him out cold on the floor of the hall. She had to struggle to restrain herself from blowing his head off and killing him right there. "Kei, I took care of those guys. Is everything ok in here--" Yuri stopped mid-sentence as she rounded the corner and took in the scene. The bodies everywhere, Kei sobbing on the floor with a wounded shoulder, and Ben sprawled with three shots through his chestplate. The shots were definitely from an electromag, and the terrorists were using lasers or projectiles. But that would mean... no, why would she? Was she crying because she shot him? "Kei, Kei, are you ok? Ben will be ok, he's a Detian remember. Hey, friendly fire happens. It's not your fault..." "I did it on purpose," Kei mumbled. "What?" Yuri asked, not sure she had heard her correctly. "I shot the bastard on purpose," Kei stated coldly. "What? Why?" Yuri asked, really confused now. "He did this," Kei said bitterly, indicating the carnage with a wave of her hand. Yuri just stood there for a few moments, dumbstruck by the concept. "Ben? I really doubt he would have done this. It must have been the terrorists. You just got confused in the heat of battle. I mean..." "I'M NOT FUCKING CONFUSED!" Kei screamed. "I SAW THE BASTARD DO IT! HE SHOT THE KIDS RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME, THE SADISTIC MOTHERFUCKER!" The calm which followed her scream was unbearably quiet, and her whispered comment which followed seemed almost a yell. "So I shot him." "You're hit too. Did he..." "Yes, he shot me. I'll be alright. Like you said, Detians can take a lot." "Are you sure? This must be hard for you..." "I said I'm alright!" Kei snapped, obviously not, then she calmed herself, "Let's get him back to the ship and locked up." Before I kill him myself, she failed to add. "And let's get some medics in here. Maybe some of these kids can be saved." Yuri activated her radio and called the Wayward Son for a medical team and a transport shuttle. When she finished that she checked in with the Triple-S. They were nearly done with their clearing sweeps, and would be finished by the time the shuttle got there. Lt. Miyu had an interesting bit of news. "I thought I saw Ben a few minutes ago heading outside." "That can't be, he's in here with us," Yuri replied, she didn't want to try and explain in what condition that was. "Oh well, it was probably just a trooper scouting around. Some of the regulars started securing the perimeter after we started our final strike." "Ok. Well, I'll see you when the shuttle gets here." --------------------------------------------------THIRTY-FIVE "Hurts/Hurts/Hurts/Like a like a motherfucker/Love/It hurts/It kills/Like a sonofabitch." --Faith No More Kei sat silently brooding during the flight back to the Son. Her mind was clouded by a flood of emotions. Contrary to what she had told Yuri, she was not alright. Everything that she had based her world on, all the trust she had placed in those around her, had been destroyed when she saw Ben shoot that child. She finally understood, completely, what had driven Zoner to distrust everyone. It was so clear now. If she couldn't trust Ben, after all the time they had spent together, after she had thought she knew him so well, there really wasn't anyone she could trust. Yuri tried to console her, but Kei coolly brushed her off. Even her bond with Yuri had been shaken. The scene kept replaying in her mind. Ben aiming his gun at the poor child's face, grinning, and then spreading the child's brain across the hallway. She saw it all clear as day. Her entire world had died with that child. Yuri sat next to Kei. After her attempts to brighten Kei's mood had been met with a "Thanks, but no thanks" reply she too began trying to figure out what had happened. She couldn't imagine Ben doing what Kei had said, but then she couldn't think of Kei lying about it either. And Kei was very definitely upset. There had to be a better explanation for the events as they happened. If only she could think of one. Ben had been loaded into the cargo compartment with several of the wounded. A couple of Triple-S troopers rode with him in case he awoke and tried something. Kei had insisted on that. In fact she wanted to do it, but Yuri had talked her out of it. The troopers didn't really understand why they were guarding one of their commanding officers, but Kei's angry attitude had convinced them that it was important. They figured it would all be straightened out once they were back onboard the Son. Once back aboard ship Ben was taken to sickbay, and placed under guard at Kei's request. The Triple-S dispersed to their normal shipboard positions, and of course they told others what had happened on the planet. Soon rumors about Ben were flying fast and furious, most of them having nothing to do with the truth. At least the truth as Kei would have it. After Ben had been taken away Kei pulled Yuri aside. "I want you to fill Zoner in on what happened." "Me? What about you?" "I need some time to calm down. I don't want to talk about it right now. Tell him I'll be by to see him later. I've got some things to do." "Well, ok. He probably won't be happy, but he should understand. Take care, ok?" "Yeah, I'll be alright. I just need some time alone." With that Kei left quickly and Yuri went to find Zoner. She found him in his quarters, trying to start preparing the mission reports. "Hi love. Can you spare me some time?" "I always have time for you. What do you need?" "I need to talk with you about the mission." "Yeah... I understand something odd went down. And now I hear Kei has Gryph under guard. Can you explain all this to me?" "Well, I can try." Yuri filled him in on the mission. Clearing the offices, trying to get to the children, up to the point that she stepped around the corner. "So I found Kei sitting there, bleeding and crying, and Ben had three shots, obviously from her gun, in his chest. There were bodies everywhere. Both children and terrorists. It was a real mess." "Kei shot him?! Why?" "She says he's the one who killed all the children. Said he saw him blow one kid's head off and then shot any other survivors. Then he shot her. So she shot back." "Whoa... Hold on... Waitaminute. You're trying to tell me that Gryphon slaughtered a hall full of kids and then tried to do Kei?? That's crazy! He loves her, he'd never try to hurt her! And he killed a hall full of kids? Yaright! Tell me another one." "I don't know. I find it hard to believe too. But that's what she says. Kei is pretty messed up right now. She says she'll be in to talk to you later." "I'm sure she believes what she says, but there has to be another explanation. Gryph killing a bunch of kids seems about as likely as Kevin sleeping with a woman." "Well, you can talk to her about it later." "I'll do that. In the meantime why don't you see what you can do to help her deal. You're the closest to her, next to Gryph." "Believe me, I've been trying, but she seems to want to be alone." "I just hope that she doesn't do what I did. Remember way back when I told you about Rob betraying my trust?" Yuri nodded. "Well, I stopped trusting everyone, and I wanted him dead. One of the worst moves I've ever made. Try to force her to talk to you, make her communicate. Whatever you do, don't let her build a wall. Go find her. Love you." "I'll do my best. See you later. Love you too." After leaving Yuri to talk with Zoner, Kei headed back to her room. She threw herself on the bed and began sobbing deeply. She couldn't stand the emotions she felt. She loved him. She trusted him. The Ben she knew could never have done what she saw him do. He must have been a damn good actor to fool everyone for so long. He used her, fooled her, twisted her emotions to suit his needs. Never again, never again would she allow someone to get as close to her as he had been. And another brick slid into place. Schnick. She cried for a long time, but eventually her sorrow turned into a cold rage. She was angry at herself for being so gullible. She had trusted him too easily. That would change. Schnick. She jumped off the bed and began tearing all the kipple off the walls. There were pictures of her, of the two of them together, posters he had hung, everything that reminded her of him or their past together she destroyed. She threw all of his little collectables on the floor and crushed them underfoot. She set out to destroy him, starting with everything that he valued. Schnick. After she trashed the room she turned on the comm screen and placed a call planetside. "Musashi City Police. How may we help you?" "This is Kei Morgan with the WDF." "Oh! Yes, what can we do for you." "I have a question for you. Are there any security cameras at the Seventh Street School?" "Um... Lemme check. Yes, yes there are. All of the main hallways have cameras." "Thank you. Is there anyway we can get a copy of todays recordings?" "For you? Of course." "Good. Can you tight-beam them to this comm station?" "We should be able to. Yes, let me set of the link to the school's computer... ok, ready to receive?" Kei pressed a few buttons. "Ready." "Transmitting." The comm screen was filled with the word 'Receiving' and bar graph showing percent complete. The transmission only took a few minutes. "Will there be anything else?" the officer asked. "No, that should be all. Bye," Kei replied. "Bye." Kei began searching the recordings for the film of the events she had witnessed. She was going to need some kind of proof to convince everyone else. ---------------------------------------------------THIRTY-SIX "Everbody's got this broken feeling, like their mama or their dog just died." --Concrete Blonde "Can I talk to you?" Kei asked, knocking on the open door to Zoner's room. "Yeah... Yeah, sure. Actually, I was hoping you'd drop by," he replied. "I've got something for you to see," Kei stated coolly, setting a holodisc on his desk. "What is it?" Zoner asked, holding the disc up to the light. The only label was a computer verification stamp, WDFWWWA40427^[XA, on the outer edge. "Computer verification?" "100% authenticated. It's the real thing." "Fine, but what is it?" "Just watch it." "Ok, ok." Zoner slotted the disc into the wall-mounted comm unit and started the playback. He was treated to a panoramic view of Ben as seen from a ceiling mounted security camera. That part was ok; what Ben was doing wasn't. Ben had charged through a side door and wasted the three terrorists holding the children. Then, as the children began thanking him he walked to the center of the hall, smiling at them the whole time. He seemed to be enjoying their appreciation. Then the smile twisted and he looked like a bully just about to pound on a smaller child for fun. One of the children ran to him and said something--too bad there was no sound--and Ben patted him on the head benevolently. An instant later he had placed his gun to the child's face and fired. Then he began dropping the remaining children. The film continued on as Zoner watched in disbelief. Then Kei entered the frame. She froze, and then yelled to Ben, who spun and shot her. Zoner noticed that Kei had unconsciously touched the wound on her shoulder as she watched the scene. He also noted her lack of emotion. He knew that was not a good sign. After shooting her, Ben leapt through a doorway, apparently for cover. However, a moment later he stepped through again looking a bit puzzled. That's when Kei shot him. The playback ended just after Ben hit the floor. The two of them sat there for several seconds in strained silence. Zoner staring at the now blank screen, and Kei staring at Zoner. Zoner was the first to break the silence. "Fuuuccckkk meeeee," he muttered. "Do I need to explain anything to you?" Kei asked, a hint of sarcasm in her voice. "Well, like who the hell that was in there shooting the children?" "You saw for yourself, it was Ben." "Well, it sure as hell looked like Ben. But I can't believe that was really him." "I can understand that. It was rather hard for me to accept at first too. He had us all fooled," Kei monotoned. The lack of emotion did not escape Zoner's notice. "Kei, are you sure you're dealing alright with this?" "You of all people should understand how I feel. You're the one who used to talk about being betrayed. I understand now, about what you used to say, you can't trust anyone." "Kei, do not, I repeat do not build a wall. Scratch that, it's too late. Start tearing down the bricks you've already put in place. I walled myself off, and look where it got me. Three years without a friend, a suicide attempt, and one of the darkest outlooks I've ever known. It is NOT a healthy thing to do. It seems like the best choice at the time, but looking back I wish I hadn't done it. I missed out on three years of living. I mean, now that we're `immortal' three years doesn't seem like much, but I was young and I should have been living life. Not cutting off the world. I've never fully recovered, you know how hard it is for me to open up to anyone. Remember when we first met, when Ben first created you?" Kei flinched a bit at that reminder. "I used to drive him nuts because I wouldn't talk to him. And what about how I almost lost Yuri. Do you want to go through that?" "You're just looking back on it now, it's too far in the past for you. The Zoner I met at WPI would have understood. I know he is still inside you somewhere, and I know you will understand me eventually. But for now I think I'm going to want to be left alone for a while. Are you going to tell the rest of the crew about this?" "Um... I don't think so. He does have some rights still. And I'm not totally convinced that was him. I'll set up a hearing board." "A hearing board? I thought I could at least trust you." Schnick. "Have it your way. I think he should be killed, just like he killed all those children. So what are you going to do with him for now." "He is still an officer, and a friend, he remains free for now. I don't think he'd be stupid enough to try anything onboard anyway. I will forbid his use of any ships that he could run away with, especially his fighter." "Whatever," Kei said coldly as she picked up the disc and left. "She is not dealing," Zoner mumbled to himself. But what Kei had said was true. That old part of him was still buried inside and he was making a comeback. Zoner wasn't as sure of Ben as he admitted, even to himself. He was totally sure that Ben wouldn't do something like that, but then again way back in seventh grade he had been totally sure that Rob could be trusted too. Still, Zoner called to have the guards pulled off Ben and to see how he was doing. Jenna told him that Ben was healing fast and should be up and around in a little while. When Ben came to he tried to figure out what had happened. He remembered running into himself, and then being shot by Kei, but that was real fuzzy. No, that couldn't be right, Kei wouldn't have shot him. He must have scrambled his memories up because of shock or something. He slipped out of sickbay without disturbing Jenna and walked back to his room to get some new clothes. He punched his entry code on the comlock, but the door didn't open. Instead a message popped up on the display screen. "I changed the code. Your stuff is in room 498. I hope you fry you fucker. -Kei" What the fuck? What the hell did he do to deserve this? Kei had a hot temper, but wanting him dead was something else. Then he thought of his memories--maybe she did shoot him. Still, the question was: why? He had to find someone who could explain the situation to him, and by the looks of things Kei was right out. He decided to find Zoner. Gryphon entered Zoner's office, walking stiffly with the pain of his bandaged chest, and said, "Zoner? What the hell's going on? I don't understand any of this. Kei tried to kill me, no one will talk to me--what the fuck is going on?" "Get out," Zoner deadpanned. "Just get out. I really can't deal with you face to face right now. I feel like I should kill you myself, but I don't feel like washing your blood off my shoes." "What?! Oh, come on, Zoner, not you too! What the fuck did I do that--" "Don't play the innocent with me--Kei saw you with her own eyes. Why would she lie about something like that? And I've seen the film. It's destroying her, tearing her soul apart, to think that the man she loved, the man she trusted so much, would do a thing like that. If it wasn't for Yuri she probably would've killed herself over it. Over you. I hope you're proud of yourself, you son of a bitch--now get out. This is your last chance." "Zoner, I didn't do it, whatever the fuck it is! I don't know what Kei saw, and don't you think it isn't ripping me apart inside just as much to know that the woman I love hates me? I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!" "Shut up, just shut up. I trusted you, Ben. I trusted you a lot. Now it looks like you've betrayed that trust." "Oh, yeah," Gryphon replied, his own anger mounting. His frustration and rage that no one would believe him was reaching a fever pitch. "You trusted me soooo much. You would never let me into your life, not even after I saved the worthless thing. I always knew a little of what was going on, just enough to drive me absolutely mad with curiosity and concern, but I was never cleared to know further. You played the little word games and the little mind games and you amused yourself. I'll always be the freshman to you, won't I? Huh? Well fuck you, man, you and everybody like you. I don't need any of you." Ben turned away and seethed. "If Vaughn were here," he said, turning back, "he'd set you straight. Vaughn wouldn't believe something like this of me, even if Kei did." "Bullshit," Zoner replied. "If Vaughn knew what you did, he'd be the first one coming after your head." "My ass he would. I don't know what it is I've supposedly done, and I don't care, 'cause I didn't do it. Either I was framed or you're all just crazy, and if it takes the rest of my life to prove it, then that's what it takes. I'm not going to let this rest, goddammit--and I'm never going to forget just how much you trusted me. Fuck you!" With that, Gryphon turned around and stormed out. Well, that went just fine. Who the hell else can I try? I guess Yuri is the next one in line. But if she gives me the run around too I think I'll go crazy. He found her relaxing in the Wedge. She tensed up when he approached, something that did not go unnoticed. "Hi, Yuri, can we talk?" "Uh.. Yeah, I guess so. What about?" "Why does Kei want me dead?" "What?! How can you ask that after what you did?!" "Well, for starters, I don't know what it is that I supposedly did." "I'm sorry, Ben, but I just can't believe that." That's it, I'm going crazy. "How do I find out?" "Talk to Kei," Yuri snapped. "Oh yeah, great idea. Here Kei, here's a target for you. So do you believe her?" Yuri looked troubled for a minute, then she made up her mind. "I don't know. I don't think there's any way you could've done that. But I can't figure out how Kei saw you do it if you didn't. I don't think Kei would lie about something like that." "Fine, but can you at least help me try to clear myself." "How?" "Help me get off the Son so I can figure out who set me up." "Oh.. I don't know... I mean I shouldn't... You know, it's not right..." "Please, Yuri." She bit her lip and nodded. "I guess I at least owe you that much. After all, you created me. But after you're gone I can't help anymore." "Thank you. You won't regret it. And I understand," he kissed her forehead. "You prep my fighter and I'll go get my stuff." "Ok. I'll meet you by the hanger in ten minutes." "Great. Thanks again." Gryph went to his new room and hastily packed the clothes he planned on taking, along with a few mementos that Kei had managed to miss. He scrawled a note and then left for the hangers. Yuri met him outside the bay door. "Ben, we've got problems." "Great, what now?" "Zoner issued a command barring you from taking any ships off the Son. They've got security on the bay. I can't get to your ship." "Eve or a decker?" "A decker I think." "Can you get past them?" Yuri stared at Ben. "Ok, ok. Sorry I asked you. Will you please get past him?" "I'll do my best." "That should be plenty good enough." "I'll go back to my quarters and work from there. I can prep the ship from the 'trix. I'll contact you via this comm screen as soon as it's clear. Once security is down move quick." "Will do. And Yuri?" "Yes?" "Take care of Kei. Tell her that no matter what I love her. I just hope that someday I can come back to her." "I'll tell her. You just better not have done it. Or I'll come after you." Ben watched Yuri's retreating form and wondered again just what it was that he had done. -------------------------------------------------THIRTY-SEVEN "I--the I that matters, the I that usually inhabits that meat body--was in the Matrix, and that's all there was to it." --Derek 'Dirk' Montgomery Upon reaching her room Yuri pulled her 'deck out of it's case. It wasn't much to look at, having been cobbled together and upgraded over the last few hundred years, but it sure got the job done. It was designed just for Yuri, and with it she could run with the best of them. Being immortal meant having a lot of time to practice. Yuri plugged the 'deck's interface plugs into her 'Frankensteins', tuned in, turned on, and dropped into a new world. The shipboard Matrix was a slightly modified electronic simulation of the old WPI campus. The various building constructs simulated various shipboard departments. `Harrington Auditorium' was where the recreational programs and files were located, `Daniels Hall' held files relating to the ships stores and maintenance areas, `Fuller Labs' was where the very files the system ran on were located and also served as Eve's `home', other buildings held files related to what the real buildings had been used for. So of course Yuri headed for the construct of the `Campus Police Building', where security was based. As she approached the construct she could she her icon's reflection in it's mirrored `windows'. In the 'trix her icon closely resembled Yuri in the `real' world. Except her skin looked like white silk and her hair was the black of a black hole. And her 3WA uniform looked like polished gold. Yuri entered the construct easily, as her shipboard rank gave her nearly total access to the Matrix. Of course size means nothing in the 'trix and the construct was much larger on the inside than the outside, and spatial geometry had no reign at all. She knew the node well and it took her no time at all to find the connection controlling the security on the hanger bay. She was right, a decker was doing it realtime. That would make it a bit harder, but there were few onboard who were a match for her. She doubted that anyone from GweepCo would be doing such a menial task. The decker seemed to be running overwatch from his own cyberdeck. Well, she might as well get started. Yuri reached out and shoved the barrier over the hanger controls. The barrier flared red and a klaxon sounded. Instantly another icon appeared, to investigate the disturbance. Yuri knew exactly who she was facing. The icon, dressed in a Domino's Pizza uniform, could only represent Schletz, the Domino's Dude. This would be interesting. Schletz wasn't much of a programmer, but he did play interactive combat games all the time. He got started with mudding way back at WPI and was now into full fledged virtual reality adventuring. So he did have a lot of, admittedly simulated, Matrix combat experience. "Yuri! Hold it right there. What do you need in Hangar 7? The only thing in there is Ben's fighter." "Actually, I wanted to get to the fighter." "No can do. I'm sorry, but Zoner specifically said no one goes near it." "Well, then, I'm afraid I'm going to have to insist." Yuri thrust her open palm at him and a beam of searing blue light leapt at Schletz. The beams impact knocked him back a bit, but he didn't seem very damaged. "Well, if that's the way you want it." A pizza appeared in his hand. What the hell kind of weapon is that?, Yuri thought. The he threw it at her like a frisbee. It emitted a high pitched keening sound as it flew and it seemed to track her as she tried to dodge. Yuri waved her hands in an arc before her and generated a shield. The killer pizza glanced off and returned to Schletz's hand. He then produced a ladle of pizza sauce which he splattered on her shield. The sauce began eating its way through. I don't believe this! Where the hell did he come up with these silly weapons? Yuri thought as she dropped the now useless shield and produced a mini-grenade which she then lobbed at Schletz. When the grenade struck him it exploded into thousands of stands of light which surrounded him like a cocoon. "That should hold you," Yuri said, turning back towards the hanger. She spun back as she heard the strands shearing. He was cutting through the net. But with what? Of course, a goddamn pizza cutter! His icons may be silly, but they sure as hell work. Yuri snapped off a shot with the Bloody CardTM, but he caught it in a gooey wad of melted mozzarella. Before she could react he threw a handful of something at her. Anchovies! They seemed to multiply as they flew. The covered her and stuck. Wherever they touched her she felt a white hot pain. What the hell?! These anchovies were part piranha and they were eating her icon. Yuri realized that this was a killer program and tried to punch out. No use, she was trapped. The program ate through her persona and began attacking her mind directly. She knew that this was the end, killed by anchovies. Yuri screamed as the world flashed white-- Then she was sitting in her room. The external biomonitors she had installed on her 'deck had dumped her before the killer bio-feedback could do its job. She had a splitting headache, but she was pissed. No more pulling the punches. She loaded a few new programs into memory and dove back into the Matrix. She used her auto-recall program to return her to her last location immediately. Schletz was still there. He seemed a bit surprised to have her fly in again, after her had used his best program on her. Although he was a bit relieved; if she had died Zoner probably would have made him follow soon after. Before he had even gotten over his initial shock of seeing her she struck. Again she flicked the Bloody CardTM towards him, and again he activated his cheesy capture program. But this time while he was occupied she drew her electromag and fired. A blinding beam of white light leapt from the barrel and pierced Schletz's icon. The light infused his icon for a moment, then it faded. "Hahaha. Looks like it was a dud," he gloated. "I don't think so," Yuri replied, a wry smile on her lips. As she spoke his icon began glowing again, this time a deep crimson. "Wha... What's going on? Aurgh!" As the glow increased in intensity his icon began writhing in virtual agony. His screams became incoherent as his icon began burning from the inside out. It only took a few seconds for the icon to flare into a full blaze and collapse on the ground. Yuri knew that at the same time the icon was burning before her, somewhere Schletz's real body was twisting in agony as her killer program created deadly bio-feedback in his 'deck and wiped his mind. She would have to face up to that later. With Schletz out of the way it was easy for her to override the lockdown on Hangar 7. She deactivated the alarms, unlocked the doorways, and instructed the hanger's automated systems to begin equipping the fighter for long- distance warp flight. Then she activated the comm screen where Gryphon was waiting. Gryphon jumped as the comm screen came to life. "The bay is clear," Yuri informed him. "Have many problems?" Ben asked. "Nothing I couldn't handle," she replied. "Who was the decker?" "Schletz." "He put up much of a fight?" "He used killer on me." "Killer? Are you ok?" "I'm fine, but I can't say the same for him." "Yuri... Did you?" "Yes, I retaliated with killer. Only I was a little more successful than he was." "Oh Yuri. Are you going to be ok? I mean trouble wise?" "I don't know. I'll take care of that when it comes time. Now get out of here. Your ship should be ready in a few minutes." "Ok. Please take care of yourself. You're a great friend. I love you." "I love you too Ben. Now go." Ben ran to his fighter and mounted up just as the automated systems began powering up. He activated the computerized pre-flight checklist as he stowed his bag and prepared himself for his flight. He still wasn't sure where he was going, he just needed to get away from the Wayward Son until things had cooled down. He figured he would just head to some inhabited world that he could lay low on until he could find a way to clear his name. The computer informed him that all systems checked out 100% in working order. He issued the command to open the outer bay doors and pushed the throttles to the stops. His Valkyrie leapt from the bay and streaked into the blackness. -------------------------------------------------THIRTY-EIGHT "Turkey Fact #12: Turkeys are filled with enough eltriptophane to knock you on your sorry Thanksgiving ass." --Crow Up on the bridge the Valkyrie's departure did not go unnoticed. "What the fuck?! I thought I ordered his ship off limits. q, open a channel." "Like, doing it now." "Hey Zoner, what's up?" Ben's image filled the main screen. "Where the hell are you going?!" Zoner demanded to know. "Well, since you don't seem to believe me, Kei wants me dead, and no one will tell me what the hell it is I've done, I thought I had better clear my own name." "Gryph, you were confined to the ship--" Zoner began. "--the operative word there being `was'," Gryphon replied. "As you can see, that is no longer true." Ignoring the interruption, Zoner went on, "Get back here now and you'll get a fair trial." "Yaright, I really fuckin' think so. Heh." "Gryphon, get back in here!" "You gonna come out here and make me? You keep saying what a fuckin' awesome pilot you are, loudmouth--c'mon out here and prove it to the world. See if you can take out the galaxy's best Veritech pilot with your little flying car. Look, I'm already accused--and, it seems, preconvicted--of some horrible war crime or atrocity or something. The woman I love hates me, tried to kill me. All my friends are against me. I'm desperate and I've got nothing to lose. So help me, Zoner, if you come after me, I'll fuckin' kill you." Zoner's ire rose within him at those remarks; who was the better pilot had long been a bone of contention between the two of them. "You can goddamn well try!" Zoner shouted, jumping up. "Zoner, no," Logan said, turning in his seat. "He'll do it. Look at his eyes, man, he'll kill you." Logan seemed shocked that anything that deep could have emerged from his mouth. Well, if you don't want me to pull a Skywalker and blow the Wayward Son out of space, you'll leave me alone," Gryphon went on. "Remember, I know all her weak points." "Could he do that?" Zoner asked ReRob, who was watching on a subscreen from Engineering. "It's very likely," Rob replied in a voice that hinted toward him not really caring if it happened. "Well, I really must be going. See you later, asshole." Ben cut off communications. "Sonofabitch! Keep a track on him!" "I've got one... Shit! He just went warp!" Logan reported. "Goddess dammit! I guess it's up to me to tell Kei," Zoner said unhappily. She would NOT be very pleased, no, not at all. The rest of the bridge crew wondered amongst themselves exactly what Ben had done. Not unlike Ben. --------------------------------------------------THIRTY-NINE "We did as we were told." "We just heard you offer the apology for all the monsters of our times." --Anthrax "HE WHAT?!" Kei screamed. "He got away," Zoner repeated. "How?" "He took his VF and warped out." "I thought you said you were making his VF off limits to him?" "I did." "So how'd he get it?" Kei asked tauntingly. "Apparently someone beat the decker on guard duty and opened the bay for him. I'm having someone check on Schletz now." "Schletz was on duty? Why him?" "Let's face it. As much as I don't care for him he is damn good at matrix combat." "So who could have beat him?" "I'm not sure. I'm having Eve check on that." "Don't bother," Yuri's voice came from the doorway. "What?" Zoner asked. "Don't bother checking, I know who did it." "Who?" Zoner asked, hoping he didn't know the answer for once. "I did." Damn! Right again. "Yuri why..." "You! You helped him escape!! You bitch!!" Kei screamed as she leapt for Yuri. Zoner quickly interposed his body between the two to prevent any mass destruction which would result from a fight between them, at severe risk of grievous bodily harm to himself. "HOLD IT! Kei, get a grip. I want to ask her some questions before you kill her." "Sure, defend her! You're probably in on this too!" Kei seethed. "I was there, I saw him do it, and now I'll make him pay!" She turned on her heel and stomped towards the door. "Kei, where are you going?" "To pack! I'm taking the Lovely Angel and hunting that bastard down! I never want to see either of you again!" With that she left the room. "Oh Kei..." "Yuri, I want to talk to you, now!" Zoner stated, fixing her with his cold gaze. Yuri looked him in the eye, and then lowered her gaze after seeing the anger there. "Ok." "Our room. Let's go." Zoner motioned Yuri ahead of him and followed her back to their quarters, turning the situation over in his mind along the way. "Ok. You're the one who helped Ben escape?" Zoner asked. "Yes," Yuri replied in a small voice. Zoner looked at his dataterm briefly. "You wiped Schletz's mind?" "Yes." "Killer?" "Yes." "Why?" "He used killer on me first. Only my 'deck saved me." "So it was self-defense?" "Yes." "Uh-huh. You knew about all of my orders concerning Ben, right?" "Yes." "And, as one of the highest ranking crewmembers, one who is supposed to set the example, you chose to break them?" Yuri looked dejectedly at the floor before answering. "Yes." "Why?" "I don't believe that Ben could do such a thing. I helped him get away so he could prove his innocence." "Do you have any evidence to support his claim?" "No." "So you just followed your feelings, despite Kei's testimony and the video evidence?" "Yes." "Your judgement is better than the rules the WDF supposedly follow then?" "No." "No? But according to our rules Ben should have stood trial. And at that trial he would have had the chance to defend himself. I guess the rules don't apply to him then, do they?" "Um... Yes. I mean... Oh Zoner, why are you doing this?" "Yuri, because of this situation I have lost Ben and Kei. You know what trust means to me, and because of his actions Ben has made himself appear guilty. Whether he is or not. Therefore, I feel my trust in him has been betrayed. On top of that, because of your actions, I have lost Kei, another valued friend. But both of those losses pale in comparison to the third." "Which is?" "I have lost the one person whom I have loved the most. Due to your actions I have lost all trust in you, thereby killing any chance of our relationship continuing. Without trust I cannot share my love." Zoner turned his face away from her, fighting off the urge to cry out at the world. Yuri was shocked. This was too much for her to take in one day. "Zoner... You can't mean that... I love you..." "And I loved you. It hurts me more than you could ever know to do this. But I cannot allow myself to be hurt like this again. Love is something that I cannot afford to feel. Never." "NO! Don't do this! Don't turn me away, not now! I need you, I want to stay with you. We can work it out. We've been together for centuries, don't do this now." "Yuri, you know that I can forgive nearly anything, except betrayal of trust. If you had come to me with your 'feelings' I would have seriously considered them. I too find it hard to believe that Ben committed the crimes of which he is accused. Instead you went behind my back, disobeyed my orders, and helped him escape. Thereby condemning him to an appearance of guilt. I am truly sorry. Part of me died when you said the two simple words, `I did'. Unfortunately, that part was the part of me capable of feeling love and trust. If I cannot trust you, I can trust no one but myself." "Oh Zoner..." "Farewell, Yuri. I'll have my kipple removed later. I'm going to resign my commission as Captain. I cannot lead a crew I cannot trust." Zoner left the room without looking back, leaving Yuri alone sobbing on the bed. He paused at a comm screen in the passageway. "Eve?" "I'm here," she responded as the screen sprang to life, "How can I help you?" "I'm leaving. Please have a droid take everything that's mine out of my room and pack it in the Daytona's beta unit. Prep the Daytona for long duration flight, and make sure the Garland is loaded as well as a full load of Cyclones. Actually, make one of the Cyclones a Battler, one a Sabre, and... hmm... make the third a Shadow. Of course I'll need a set of CVR-7 too." "It sounds like you'll be gone for a while." "You could say that, I'm not coming back." "What? Why not?" "It would take too long to explain, and I really don't want to talk about it right now anyway. Just please see to the Daytona. Oh, and if you could, please transfer the production designs for the Cyclones, Garland, Daytona, and associated systems, including weapons, to the onboard computer. Oops... Almost forgot... Please transfer all of my monetary holdings too. I'll need them, I've got quite a bit saved up. It should be enough to get settled down somewhere and live for quite a while." "I don't understand why you want to leave, but I'll do what you asked. Will Yuri be going with you?" "Definitely not!" Zoner snapped, then added, "Sorry, Eve, I'm just a bit tense. Yuri and I are no longer together. You can have her explain why if you'd like." "I'm sorry to hear that. If that's all I'll begin preparations immediately." "Yes, do so. Please." "Very well. Goodbye. I'll notify you when the preparations are complete." "Thank you. Oh, and Eve..." "Yes?" "Please keep this as quiet as possible. I want to make the announcement of my departure myself." "I'll do my best." "Thanks. I'll miss you, Eve." "I shall miss you too, Zoner." "Farewell." With that he turned and continued on his way. --------------------------------------------------------FORTY "A warning to anyone still in command/Of their possible future to take care." --Pink Floyd Zoner entered the bridge of the Wayward Son for the last time and took his usual place. He still wasn't sure how he was going to break the news to the crew. They had served well, beyond all his expectations, and part of him felt as if he were deserting them. He mechanically attended to his duties as he worked on the problem. He was still mulling it over when the comm screen on the arm of his chair beeped. He keyed up the message and Eve's face filled the screen. "The task you requested of me is complete. When are you planning on...," Eve just short of shrugged her shoulders since she didn't want to say it out loud. "Well, no time like the present. I'll see you in the hangar bay. Zoner out." As Eve vanished from the screen he addressed the bridge crew. "Excuse me, I have something rather important to say." Everyone turned to listen. "As you all know Gryphon has fled the ship while awaiting trial for alleged war crimes. Kei is currently packing as she plans to track him down..." he paused before adding, "and kill him. Before you say anything I would like to say that I am not going to prevent her from leaving. They can settle this on their own. But that isn't the announcement I need to make. I just wanted to make that clear. What I need to tell you is that I am resigning my position..." A beep from the tactical console interrupted him. ReRob read the display. "Hangar 13 reports the Lovely Angel has just departed." Zoner continued, "That would be Kei. As I was saying I am resigning my commission as Captain and leaving the WDF and the Son. I do not feel that I am capable of leading this crew any further due to personal reasons. I would also like to add that Yuri will not be accompanying me when I leave." That drew a number of murmured comments. "The problem at hand is picking a new Captain. That will be my last task before I leave... ReRob?" "Yes?" "In light of Gryphon's hasty departure you are next in line for succession. I want an honest answer. Do you want the position as Captain of the Wayward Son? And if you do, do you honestly feel that you are prepared for that role?" ReRob thought it over for a minute before answering. "I do not desire to become Captain. I feel that I can better serve this ship and the WDF if I remain in engineering and R&D. I'm sorry." "Don't be, you do a good job down there and I'd like to see your work continue. q?" "Like yo." "Due to ReRob's deferment you are now next in line for the position as Captain of the Son. I ask you the same questions as I did him." q thought it over for an even longer time than Rob and finally gave his answer. "I would be, like, honored to serve as Captain of the Wayward Son. Like, I'll do my, like, best to continue the successful career that the WDF has, like, had so far." "Very well. As my last act as Captain of the WDF vessel SDF-17 Wayward Son I appoint John Todd, AKA q, to be my replacement at such time that I resign said position." Zoner took a deep breath and paused for a moment before continuing in a small voice. "I, Brian David Bikowicz, AKA MegaZone, do hereby resign my commission as Captain of the WDF vessel SDF-17 Wayward Son. I turn over command of said vessel to my appointed replacement John Todd, AKA q." Zoner look q in the eyes, "q, she's all yours. Take damn good care of her. She's a good ship, a bitch sometimes, but she'll always give you her all." "Like, I'll do my best." "I know you will. Farewell everyone. Break the news to the rest of the crew after I'm gone. I don't think I could keep it together long enough to do it myself." Zoner headed straight for the door, ignoring their questions. He wanted to leave with some dignity and it wouldn't do for them to see him crying. Zoner ran straight to the Daytona from Hell and checked over the packing job. Good, everything was in place. He strapped in and punched up the coordinates of the nearest inhabitable planet. He figured on stopping there until he could make the decision as to his final destination. That did it, he was all set to go. By all rights he should just leave... But he couldn't just yet. He punched a button on his dash. "Eve?" "Yes, I'm here." "Please prep the Angels' VT-1FD for long duration warp flight and send a couple of droids to Yuri's quarters to help her pack." "Will she be joining you after all?" "No, but I think she'll be leaving on her own." "Very well." "Thanks Eve." He punched another button. "Yuri?" "Z-Zoner..." She was still crying. "Yuri please listen to me. I'm sorry. I had no right to be so cold. But I still can't stay. I want you to go find Kei. Patch things up. I know that inside she still loves you." "She never wants to see me again," Yuri sobbed. "You know that's not true. That was her anger talking. Please, for what we once had, don't let her get away too. I had Eve prep the VT-1FD for you and a couple of droids should be there shortly to help you pack." "What about you?" Yuri asked hopefully. "I'm sorry Yuri, but I'm still leaving. Maybe someday I'll have gotten over this. But until then you need Kei and Kei needs you. I have to go now." "Where?" "I'm not sure yet. I'll find somewhere to settle." "Will I ever see you again?" "Hell, it's a small universe. I'm sure you will." "Take care of yourself," she paused, "I love you." "You take care too. Goodbye." I love you too, he didn't add. Zoner powered up the Daytona from Hell and blasted out through the open hangar doors. He made an orbit around the SDF-17, taking one last look before blasting off into space and parts unknown. ----------------------------------------------------FORTY-ONE "Carry on my wayward son/There'll be peace when you are done/Lay your weary head to rest/Don't you cry no more" --Kansas q took his place in the captain's chair, moderately bemused by the whole situation, and leaned back. As soon as all the craft that were going to leave had left, he gave his first order: "Like get us out of here." All hell broke loose. The ship shuddered, a deep thundering noise echoing through her superstructure; the deck heaved a good two feet under everyone's seats. Screens exploded, instruments went dead, alarms howled, the lights turned red. "What the fuck?!" q shouted, roused to raising his voice at last. "We've been hit by a phased radiant energy pulse, port aft quadrant. Major armor damage, minor damage to the superstructure," reported Logan at Tactical. "Trying to get a fix on the aggressor now." "In English?" "Someone shot us with a big phaser and dented the ass- end," Logan replied. "That's like what I thought. Red alert, prep for combat, all that other shit. Helm, bring us around to...face...them...oh my like God." The SDF-17 had swung to face her tormentor, and as the hostile vessel filled the screen, jaws dropped. There were gasps. Several of the WDF's recovering Catholics lapsed into old habits and crossed themselves. Looming outside the viewscreen, a hundred or so kilometers distant, was a huge slab of battleship-grey metal, bristling with gun emplacements and unidentifiable things, its decks sloping down and narrowing to a point at the prow, the bridge with its twin shield generators jutting above the rear of the ship. An Imperial Star Destroyer. No, check that--Star Destroyers were roughly the same size as the SDF-17, and they could have cruised in and out of this ship's hangar bays. With a blip, Largo's sneering face filled the bridge viewscreen. Down in Engineering, ReRob cursed at one of the subscreens. Why the fuck wasn't this guy dead? "Greetings, Wedge Rats," Largo said with a smile. "I suppose you've been wondering why you haven't heard from me all this time. Well...I decided finally to come and show you. What do you think of my latest project?" The screen flipped back to transparency. The enormous ship loomed before them. "I call it the Executioner." "We are like seriously fucked," q muttered. "Operations. Plot fold. Prepare to like retreat." Phantom at Ops punched a few keys, looked quizzically at his panel, tried it again, then slammed a fist down on the panel. "Dammit!" "Oh, by the way," Largo said, "my agent who was aboard your vessel earlier was kind enough to disable your fold drive." Down in Engineering, ReRob looked at his status panel, noted nothing wrong, and, snarling, began to trace. "Goodbye, Rats," Largo said, and disappeared. The Executioner opened fire. The Wayward Son began to shiver and buck as her armor absorbed firepower that could have devastated star systems. "This is not good," Logan shouted over the din. "We're not handling this pounding at all. Returning fire with conventional weaponry is having no effect." "Like fire the Reflex cannon!" q shouted. "Do something!!" Logan overrode the targeting safeguards--at this range he couldn't miss--dropped the crosshair and fired. The bow split, the lightshow flared, and the beam leapt forth, just as always. And disappeared, three hundred meters from the Executioner's hull. "What the fuck?!" "Ooh," said Largo over the com. "Someone in whatever parallel dimension my ship's phase shields exit to is in a very bad mood now." "Where the hell did he get phase shield technology?" ReRob growled from inside the fold panel. The Executioner had no main gun per se; ten or so very large phaser arrays seemed to take up that function. They and the huge vessel's subweapons hammered at the SDF-17, shattering her armor and ripping huge chunks out of her superstructure. "Daedalus, Prometheus, this is the captain," q said into his intercom, shouting over the noise. "Detach and retreat at maximum warp. Like get out of here, that's an order!" Surprisingly enough, no one argued. Perry Aldzinjal was a good soldier; he knew his first duty was to survive, not to make heroic stands. His men on Prometheus had been trained the same. The two smaller ships detached and began making top speed away from the battle; they were ignored. The Executioner was after only one thing. One of the Executioner's main batteries struck home near the engine room, blasting out an enormous section of torn armor, several important power conduits, and half the master computer core. The Wayward Son screamed silently and began to die. The screens all over the ship blanked; computers shut down and things went momentarily silent. Then, with a soft beep, the EVE symbol appeared on every screen aboard, along with the flashing legend "FINAL PROTECTION MODE". She began to sing, softly, mournfully, as the ship that was her home began to die, and she with it. Explosions wracked the more vulnerable areas, ripping through fighter bays and Destroid decks with fury and violence, blowing energy converters and engine subassemblies to pieces. The few surviving fightercraft scattered. All remaining personnel, heeding their Final Protection Mode training, ran for the Wedge. After the programmed ten-minute delay, the doors slammed down. Explosive bolts banged and armor plating fell aside like dead skin from a sunburn; the Wedge catapulted free from its bay, leaving another gaping wound in the Wayward Son's tortured hide. The Executioner, and GENOM Corporation, had won. The SDF-17 was deserted. All over the ship, red alert lights flashed in empty corridors, where once people had run and worked and, laughed and loved, hated and feared, lived and died. Silence, but for Eve's singing and the muffled din of outside combat, descended like a heavy weight, and already the air of disuse and desertion spread across the ship. Except... Edison Bell emerged from the turbolift four seconds too late; the Wedge departed and he was left behind on a dying ship. He knew there were no more functioning escape pods; all that had not been used were destroyed. The fighter bays were gone. He had no way out, no escape. He was doomed. So be it, then. He turned and ran for the bridge. Largo had won, but that didn't mean he had to get away with it. Running into the bridge, he took his seat behind the helm and began entering commands with swift precision. Master power conduits were damaged or destroyed, but creative rerouting of several minor conduits through the Crusher switchyard gave him operational power again, for as long as the Reflex furnace kept burning. On the Wedge, the remaining crew of the SDF-17 watched their dying ship as it heeled to port and foundered in space, explosion after explosion ripping through its infrastructure and blowing out through its hull. Largo's Executioner cruised imperiously past the dying ship, ignoring it utterly, not even granting a valiant but defeated foe respect in death. Their mistake. The thrusters at the rear of the ship flared. The Pinpoint Barriers glowed into flickering, hesitant life once more, manifesting across the bow. At first those on the Wedge mistook the action for the ship's final death throes, but then the Wayward Son began to move. To move, to turn, and to, haltingly, gather speed. Until there was no doubt in anyone's mind what was about to happen. The bent and battered prow of the Wayward Son touched the dull, transparent, bluish glow of the Executioner's phase shields; they reacted with the pinpoint barriers in a fizzling, sparking light show, melting the ends of the main gun's focusing arms; the phase shielding rippled back like an oil slick from a drop of glycerine, avoiding contact, giving the dying SDF-17 a doorway. Then the prow rams slammed into Executioner's armored hull just aft of the bridge, ripping through the plating and tearing apart huge sections of systems and circuitry. Behind, the SDF-17's still-mighty thrusters drove her forward in her death plunge--but they could not maintain forward velocity through all that. The ship stopped with just the last rear quarter protruding from the Executioner's flank. Edison smiled as he watched the GENOM crew attacking the huge invader futilely. What could they do to a dying ship? He moved to the Tactical position. As Eve's song continued, the electric guitar filling his mind, he overrode the targeting computer, safety systems, power limiters, and design cutout interlocks--and fired the entire failing Reflex furnace through the main gun. The prow cammed apart one final time, and the charging light show sizzled and tore at the surrounding wreckage, casting those peculiarly sharp shadows unique to displays of pure, raw power. Back on the Wedge, q, truss, et al. looked with horror at the SDF-17's stern protruding from the Executioner. "What's he going to--" truss began. "Goodbye," Edison said, and pulled the trigger. The beam emerged from the other side of the Executioner's engine room, poorly focused, to burn through Musashi's upper ionosphere, skip off the denser layers below, and blow a chunk out of the planet's primary satellite. The two ships separated, plunging through Musashi's atmosphere; Executioner with a huge hole blown through her engines, leaking fuel, poisoning the atmosphere, and SDF-17 with most of her front half disintegrated and the rest, battered and dying already, smashed by backblast. The twisted wreckage of the Executioner, her back broken, slammed to ground directly in the center of Musashi City, and then her shattered engines went up. A toxic nuclear-chemical fireball claimed most of Musashi's western hemisphere and poisoned most of the remaining planet. SDF-17, WDF Wayward Son, crashed into the desert two thousand miles distant, landing on her keel and settling, slowly cooling, into the dust. Her back remained unbroken. For Edison Bell, everything went white as he felt the ship shudder in her death throes under him, saw the blue beam lash out once more to strike Executioner a mortal blow. For the barest instant he was aware of the hiss of escaping air and the interesting sensation of his flesh being ripped from his bones; then there was nothing. Shortly, the whiteness resolved itself into a room, about ten feet square, with no entrance or exit. He glanced down; he was still dressed in the clothes he had met his death in. He was quite aware that he was dead; he had been there before. He knew full well what it looked like. And he knew what came next. A door opened in the far wall of the room, and a pale woman in black stepped into the room. "Hallo, Teleute," said Edison mildly, hands in pockets, looking entirely unperturbed. "Bell," said Death. Her mouth quirked in a little grin. "Finally got yourself killed, eh?" "That I did, that I did," Bell replied airily. "Damn shame too...I fear that young fellow Gryphon may never get out of his jam now, without my help. He was framed, you know." "I know," Teleute replied. "I have... an interest in the Wedge Rats. I've been watching them." "Oh, that's right, I forgot. The all-seeing Endless." He sighed, then looked with interest at Death's feet. "Your shoe's untied." "Give it a break, Bell. Better things than you have tried." "Yes, but none have succeeded." Edison grinned. "You can't hold me. Some may rush gallantly--or stupidly--into your open arms, but not Edison Bell! Today is not my day to die." "Too late. Come on, I'm a very busy woman--I don't have time for your shenanigans." "I'm afraid I'm not budging. I've far too much to do to die now. Already I may have been delayed too long." His smile vanished; his steel-grey eyes narrowed. "Don't try to stop me, Teleute." "I have to," Death replied. "'S my job." The door opened again, this time to the left of Bell (and, consequently, Death's right), and a large man in a grey cassock entered, bearing a large leather-bound book. "I'm afraid he's right," the man said. Bell's eyebrow crooked; he knew the voice, although he had never met this particular Endless before. "Oh, Christ, Destiny, what is it?" Bell's eyes widened. Destiny had left the door open. This was his big chance...he started edging toward the door. "Look here," said Destiny, opening his book and pointing. "He isn't supposed to die today." "Are you sure this isn't some kind of typo?" Destiny shoved back his hood to reveal the face of Vaughn Clark "Reality" Gross--and he looked annoyed. "I don't make typos." Bell paused, stunned, at the doorway, at the sight of Destiny's face, but then remembered all that was at stake and stepped through. "Well, look, this is ridiculous. Edison--Edison? Oh hell--where'd he go?!" Edison Bell was mildly annoyed to find everything gone all white again. He looked at his watch. It was half-past infinity. He closed his eyes. -----------------------------------------------------EPILOGUE "We are young/Wandering the face of the Earth/Wondering what our dreams might be worth/Learning that we're only immortal for a limited time." --Rush UTOPIA PLANITIA Lord Wolfgang Amadeus Fahrvergnugen sat slumped in his great black chair, looking blankly at the screen of his deskcomp as it mutely and unsympathetically reported the death of his great dream. It was so hard to believe. His children, not only defeated but utterly routed, slaughtered, the few survivors scattered across the Universe. Gryphon, a madman, killer of children. MegaZone, abandoning his offices and his duty to go off and sulk like a child. Kei and Yuri divided by lines of hate and pain. ReRob, scarred and tormented, his only comfort Deedlit. How had this happened? The door hissed open. This, Fahrvergnugen knew without turning, would be Decker, disregarding his lordship's orders to be left alone with some sage comment or suggestion which would turn the tide, but for which he would later refuse all credit. Fahrvergnugen turned around to greet his trusted assistant-- --and found himself looking squarely down the barrel of an M-5 plasma rifle. His vision planed away up the barrel, parallax twisting the figure at the end, but Fahrvergnugen recognized him nonetheless. Decker. "Decker!" Fahrvergnugen roared. "What in hell is this!" "What does it look like, m'lord?" Decker sneered. "This is an assassination. After all, my masters have defeated your little toy army--it wouldn't do to have you building it again. With your death, we close the circle." "Your masters--GENOM?" "On this level, yes." "`On this level'..." Fahrvergnugen murmured, thinking. Suddenly his eyes flew wide with comprehension. "Of course!" he shouted, leaping to his feet despite Decker's armed and dangerous presence. "How could I have been so blind! Of course!" "Clever, aren't you, Wolfgang? Pity your knowledge came too late. Your tin-plated starship and its crew of miscreants and degenerate weirdos has been destroyed! Your time is past! The future belongs to my masters!" Fahrvergnugen's face twisted in rage, and he charged at Decker, his left hand grasping the haft of his bastard sword and hauling it from its scabbard. Decker stepped back, startled by his lord's roaring charge, and fired. His aim was spoiled by his surprise and the beginnings of a very real fear; the plasma bolt took Fahrvergnugen low in the right side, shattering armor plate and spraying the room with blood. Fahrvergnugen's sword hissed around in a whistling chop, severing Decker's head; it bounced into the corner of the office as the corpse clattered to the deck in the doorway. Fahrvergnugen stood for a few minutes, fighting for control, before sheathing his blade and taking stock of his wound. Deep, painful, but not mortal--not to one of Fahrvergnugen's constitution. He picked up the plasma rifle, slung it over his shoulder, and keyed the door. Lord Fahrvergnugen paused in the doorway to look back at his office and the death of his dream one last time; then he turned, muttering, "Celine must be told," and was gone. In Kent, England, 1865, a child was born, the second of two, to the Holmes family. The elder brother, Mycroft, a somewhat slothful but undoubtably brilliant lad, was delighted with his younger sibling, who was every bit as brilliant as he, and with many times the energy. The boy grew to a man, tall and gaunt, with slick black hair and a hawk nose, and piercing, incisive, steel-grey eyes. He took up lodgings in Baker Street in London and began a successful business as a consulting detective, and soon his name was famed throughout the world, through the efforts of his friend, a doctor, and the doctor's literary agent, A. Conan Doyle. Before all that fame business happened, though, on the tall, gaunt, black-haired detective's twenty-first birthday, Edison Bell opened his eyes, sat up, looked in the shaving mirror, blinked at the hawk-nosed face he saw there, reached into his pocket, pulled out his grid pass, checked the coordinates reading on it, and cursed. "Damn!" he cried. "I'm in the wrong universe!" Ok, so now that you've read this weirdness and you're totally lost you'd like some answers. Well, we're not going to tell you everything, since a lot was explained in the original Undocumented Features, and in The Long Road (aka UF2) which are available on the Internet via FTP. The address is 130.215.24.1 (wpi.wpi.edu) cd /anime/FanFiction. Set binary on and get dp.undocument.1.Z and dp.undocument.2.Z; have fun. (Plug plug plug, huge shameless plug) megazone@wpi.wpi.edu can answer any questions, or at least try to. However, there are a few new things, and the authors wanted to spew randomly about some unimportant stuff. And this glossary is the result. Redundancy: See recursion. The Mann Systems Series 1001E BioSculptTM is the result of many generations in the evolution of the 101-E Bio-SculptTM tank. See the glossary from UF2. Swimming: Has nothing to do with water. It comes from Erik A. Swimm's last name. See, last year, when we started writing this atrocity, we used to throw knives at a cardboard box on our Fold-O-Couch-O-Death MkII (see the UF2 glossary). Well, other than putting LOTS of holes in the mattress, Erik had a good record of getting the knives to stick. Handle first of course. So hitting someone with the wrong end of a thrown/airborne object became Swimming it. Recursion: see redundancy. Roboteching: 1. Taken from the TV kludge Robotech. (I like it ok? -Zoner) The extremely picturesque, and rather silly, way missiles seem to fly away from the target on random paths, only to converge on it at the last second. 2. The practice of taking material created by others and kludging it into your story line. Saab 900 Turbo: Speedbump. This writing is the product of Benjamin D. Hutchins, Brian D. Bikowicz, Rob Mandeville, the Editorial College (peanut gallery), .gif files, text, lack of sleep, STRESS, angst, caffeine, sugar, incredibly green pie, remarkably hot chili, AT&T, the US Postal Service, the Big Duck, lots of music once again, and yes, despite all the darkness, love. Published 3 September 1992 at Eyrie Publishing, NotEvenCloseToInc., 14 Dover Street #2B, Worcester, MA 01609. For everyone: thanks again. Benjamin D. Hutchins Brian D. Bikowicz Rob Mandeville ------------------------------------------------------------- Natural Progressions to be Found in the English Language: cat...................................catapult I-NET: gryphon@world.std.com BELLNET: (508)755-4675 SNAILNET: 14 Dover St. #2B, Worcester, MA 01609 USA ------------------------------------------------------------- ############################################################# #I have one prejudice, and that is against stupidity. Think!# #megazone@wpi.wpi.edu Moderator for FTP 130.215.24.1 /anime# ############################################################# -- REMANDE: Rob Mandeville -- just ask for ReRob remande@wpi.wpi.edu WPI Box 2906 "Worcester Insane Asylum!" I'm an AI trapped in a man's body.