THE UNIVERSE ACCORDING TO CHRIS, PART II Starring: Chris/Mako Chris Meadows Temper Katie Tanner Eve Tokimatsuri Eve/ Enhanced Video Emulation Gryphon Ben Hutchins MegaZone Brian Bikowicz Kei Kei Morgan Yuri Yuri Daniels Mughi Mughi Reality Vaughn Gross pfloyd Adam Johnson Doppleganger Buma J. Random Highly-Advanced GENOM Buma; Katie Tanner Buma attack force J. Random GENOM Corporation Bumas *Special Guest Appearance By Edison Bell, Esq.* With Brief Appearances By: ReRob Robert Mandeville Deedlit Deedlit Satori PCHammer Martin F. Rose Danilia Danilia Doychan and Gaulan J. Random Grunts Soldiers Doychan and Gaulan J. Random Ambassadors Diplomats Captain Farrago James Farrago Hrethrraao Hrethrraao the Wookiee Lord Fahrvergnugen Baron Lord Wolfgang Amadeus Fahrvergnugen Decker GENOM Corporation Type 33/S Replicant DKR-1 Mal Sarrin J. Random Utopia Planitia worker Salusian Scientist Brian Keith Womanizing Pilot Cannon Fodder Jenna Jennifer Steen Planetfall Carl Ellin Based on characters and situations created by MegaZone, Gryphon, ReRob, Reality, PCHammer, et al An Overworked, Underslept Student Production Special Effects by Academic Gloom and Mundanity, Inc. Music by Box of Tapes, Inc. Catering by Sack Lunches R Us Anything Else by Whoever Thought of it at the Time Original Mecha Designs by Chris Meadows, Dave Deitrich, and Friends Carry On Wayward Son sequence choreographed by Chris Meadows DEDICATIONS: For my parents, who love me anyway For Steve and Penny Hutchison (won't they be THRILLED?) For all my other coauthors out there, be they Undocumented Features, Misfold, Superguy, alt.pub.dragons-inn, or alt.pub.havens-rest For all the characters I have an obligation to write: Andrea, Katie Tanner's soulsister, and her sister Sheryl Mako (the OTHER Mako), and the crew of the starship CONSTELLATION Mike, Summer, and the rest of Team M.E.C.H.A. Joe Walker, Ivory Tanaka, and the crew of the ROOSEVELT Ikazuchi carrier For the Ventures, the most excellent instrumental band in the whole of known space And also... For Katie Tanner CHAPTER 11 "Home, home again. I like to be here, when I can." --Pink Floyd, "The Great Gig in the Sky" Almost as soon as the LOVELY ANGEL had touched down in the WAYWARD SON's docking bay, Chris was running down the boarding ramp. As soon as his feet touched the metal decking, he let out a whoop that made the tech crew wince. "It is GREAT to be back!!!" he yelled, jumping up in the air as if he'd just bought a Toyota. "Tell us about it, why don't you?" Katie remarked drily, walking down the ramp behind him. Did the man have no restraint? "Hey, I haven't been here in over four years! I have a right to be a little excited." Chris walked down the safe path delineated by bright yellow paint and arrows, toward the bulkhead door on the far side of the bay. "This place is like my second home. My ONLY home, now that..." He didn't finish the sentence. Chris was again wearing the WDF flight uniform he'd worn before going off to Engineering school on Utopia Planitia, but with a new patch on it that indicated he was a qualified design engineer as well as a pilot. Under his arm, he carried a CVR helmet that also served as a flight helmet. As soon as Chris was in the corridor, Katie just behind him (Kei and Yuri were still back with the ANGEL, seeing to its maintenance and refueling, or something like that), he turned to the nearest wall-screen (currently displaying a cheerful view of outer space, as seen from a camera on the hull) and keyed the touch-sensitive corner of the screen that would bring up the comm menu. There were several options, but Chris chose the top one: initiate contact with Tokimatsuri Eve, the artificial intelligence that ran the WAYWARD SON's systems. Eve blinked onto the screen, a beautiful woman with long, silver hair and golden eyes. She gasped in surprise. "Chris!" she said. "When did you get back!" "Just now," Chris remarked. "Surprised?" "Of course! I had thought that you were away at Engineering school." "They graduated me," Chris said. "Or, rather, HE graduated me." There was no need to elaborate about who "HE" was. "Excellent! Wait 'til I tell Zoner!" "Uh, no, Eve, that won't be necessary." She looked puzzled. "I want to surprise him, you see," Chris elaborated. Eve's eyes widened with understanding. "Oh! I see." "Say, Eve, could you have my stuff moved out of storage, into my old room? No, wait, scratch that. I'd like you to find me some space that could be used as a workshop, preferably isolated from the rest of the ship. And have part of that set up as my living quarters." Eve nodded. "I'll do that immediately, Chris." "Thanks, Eve." "You're welcome, Chris. It never hurts to help." Chris walked into the Wedge, looking around him as if he'd expected everything to be entirely different and was amazed at how much it had stayed the same. "You've only been gone four years, Chris," Katie reminded him drily. "It's all the same." "Yes, but I'm not," Chris said. Katie had to admit he had a point there. Chris spent some time in the Wedge ("Hey, they have capuccino now! They must have finally figured out how to replicate it!"), then proceeded on to the bridge (His Major's clearance allowed him up there). When Chris stepped out of the elevator, MegaZone and ReRob were having a lively discussion on the relative merits of warp vs. transwarp drives as ReRob was sitting at Engineering and Zoner had the comm chair turned to face that station. Yuri and Deedlit were there, too. All four of them looked up as he stepped onto the bridge. "Mako?" Zoner said. "I didn't know you'd graduated." Chris grinned. "Well, I have. I'm now a fully-qualified design engineer, with a degree from Fahrvergnugen Tech to prove it." "What exactly does that qualify you to do?" ReRob asked, wondering whether Chris could take a position in the Engineering department. "Basically, design things. I did learn some about starship engineering, but it's really not my field. I prefer to work with the small stuff--Cyc-bikes, destroids, Veritechs, etc." "So, what are you going to do now that you're back?" Zoner asked. "Now that you're an engineer, that is." Chris shook his head. "You know, I don't know?" he said. "I thought that I would be happy as an engineer. But during those four years I was at school, all I could really think about was flying. I don't think I want to be in Engineering...I basically just want to fly and mess around." MegaZone grinned maliciously. "You want to fly, eh? I think I could find you a spot somewhere...maybe in Kilroy..." "I don't think so," Yuri, Deedlit, Chris, and ReRob said in unison. Zoner grinned. "Just kidding." They all had a good laugh about it, and a short conversation, then Chris left the bridge once more, deciding that he wanted to go and check on his new home, in the aft section of the WAYWARD SON. The turbolift was just as fast as he remembered. Without much delay at all, he was whisked down the length of the starship, and deposited in a maze of empty metallic corridors. "Whoa...this place is BIG..." Chris muttered. "I never realized how big and empty this place was...wonder why we don't have crew back here?" One of the wall screens lit up. It was Eve. "Your quarters are this way, Mako." She blinked out, appeared on another screen farther down the hall. "What are you waiting for? Come on..." Chris grinned. "All right, I'm coming..." He walked down the hall, footsteps echoing metallically, and Eve accompanied him, "walking" past each screen at the same time he did, so it appeared that they were on opposite sides of a wall and the screens were actually windows (NO, not Microsoft Windows...). At last, they came to a bulkhead door. Eve gestured to it. "You may enter when ready," she said with a slight giggle. Chris keyed the same code-sequence on the door that he'd used for his old quarters, and it hissed open hydraulically. Beyond was a wide-open area, with workbenches and tables along the sides, heavy equipment for handling mecha construction, and various gadgets like that. One of the walls apparently had an access to outer space. Eve appeared on a large screen mounted on one wall. "It's mostly antiquated, actually. We were going to scrap it, but I thought that you might be able to make use of it." By the look on Chris's face, Eve could see that she had guessed correctly. "I think he'll probably be able to do that," Katie Tanner said, stepping around a corner. "Hey, Katie!" Chris said. "Is this great, or what?!" "I think I have something you're going to like even more," Katie said. "Come with me..." He's gonna LOVE this... Katie led Chris to the turbolift, down to another docking bay in the aft section of the ship. This was one of the auxiliary bays, Chris noticed--it wasn't often used during normal operations. However, this docking bay had a plane in it. A Veritech, sitting in a pool of light in the middle of the darkened bay. Katie stood back, let Chris approach it by himself. As he got closer and closer, he recognized it... "Hey, that's Zebra 1!" Chris yelled. "The CONSTELLATION!" "Yep," Katie said. "Zoner thought you might want it. All the other Zebra Valks were replaced, but he didn't want the time you spent personalizing it to go to waste." "Oh, wow. I didn't think I'd ever see her again." As soon as he'd said it, Chris realized how much he sounded like Rick Hunter, but he let it slide. "You should know Zoner better than that," Katie said. "It's completely fueled and loaded--your Cyclone and CVR are in there too." She grinned. Chris matched her, grin for grin. "Let me at her!" Katie nodded, still grinning. "She's all yours." Chris quickly got into the CVR and climbed into the cockpit. During his preflight, he reached under the dash to make sure the floptical drive he'd hardwired into the audio system was still there. Good, it was. He hadn't had time to remove it before leaving, and he figured he could always get another if he needed to. The special disk-reading program PCHammer had written for him was still on the computer, good...Chris reached down to a shirt pocket and pulled out the 3.5" floptical disk he kept his music and text library on. He slotted the disk into the drive under the dash and punched up the program on his port comm screen. "CONSTELLATION to WAYWARD SON Control. Request permission to take off from Aux Bay 19D for a short, uh, refamiliarization flight." "Roger, CONSTELLATION." It was Kei, who was apparently now on-station on the WAYWARD SON's bridge. "Please stand by." "Thank you, WAYWARD SON. Engines are idling. You may fire when ready." Laughter. "Opening bay doors. You are go for launch. Repeat, you are go for launch." Chris cued the player as he kicked in the throttle. The music blasted through the cockpit in full quadrophonic stereo as the Valkyrie blasted free of the LOVELY ANGEL. <<>> It had been four years since he had last sat behind the controls of this Valkyrie (or any Valkyrie at all, for that matter). He goosed the throttles and shoved 'er into full burn. He was glad to see that he hadn't lost his touch. He did Immelmans, split-Ses, barrel rolls, inward AND outward (yipe!) loops, Fokker feints, and every other maneuver he could think of. An hour or so later, he turned the ship toward the WAYWARD SON and headed in. He sighed. Even though he was lightyears away from Earth, he felt like he was home at last. CHAPTER 12 "And if they ask, tell 'em that we're just good friends." --Michael Jackson and Stevie Wonder, "Just Good Friends" Not long after, Chris found himself exchanging glances with Katie Tanner over two steaming mugs of capuccino at a booth in the Wedge. She wore her uniform slacks, but had exchanged her jacket for a black sweatshirt with a grey WDF symbol sihouette covering the entire front. In the middle of the logo was a three-quarter head-on view of the WAYWARD SON firing its reflex cannon diagonally down and to the right. Below the ship, partially obscured by the orange beam of energy, were the words, "SDF-17 WAYWARD SON." Chris, being off-duty (well, actually he was perpetually off-duty now), wore a pair of jeans and the black-and-day-glo-yellow "Class of '91" sweatshirt he'd made himself, with some help, back in High School Home Ec. Longtime friends aboard the WAYWARD SON, Chris and Katie had been seeing more and more of each other lately, both socially and professionally. And despite Chris's earlier happiness and excitement at seeing her again after four years, he was beginning to get just a little scared. When they'd parted four years before, Katie, amid a few tears, had mentioned wanting to be "more than just friends." Chris wasn't sure exactly what that meant, but if it meant what he thought it meant, he might have trouble on his hands. Just looking at her... Katie was tall, slim, and incredibly attractive. Her blonde, slightly curly hair fell a little past her shoulders, waving freely in the breeze whenever there was one. Her build...well, let's just say that when she wore the form-hugging full-body flightsuit that was sometimes used in lieu of CVR-3, nearby personnel had been known to experience spontaneous nasal blood loss. She was the kind of girl that Chris would turn and gaze after if she passed on the street, just for the view. And she was interested in HIM! Him, the slob, the perpetual bachelor. He'd thought he had absolutely no redeeming qualities where the fairer sex was concerned. Why HIM? Chris had never before experienced that kind of a relationship, and he found the idea somewhat scary. Katie could tell Chris was nervous about something. "What's wrong?" she asked across the table. "You've seemed kind of distracted all night." Chris shook his head. "I just don't know if I'm ready for this." Katie looked at him, concern evident in her face. "I don't understand..." Didn't he want her? Better to come out and say it. "Katie--you're talking to The Guy Who's Never Even Had A Date In His Entire Life." He stared down at his cappucino. "I'm an extreme introvert. I just don't make friends very easily, and I think that I basically annoyed away most of the ones who I DID make, back on Earth. I never got the nerve up to ask a girl out." He shook his head. "Until the McDonald's brought me here, all I could see ahead of me was the life of a bachelor. I had resigned myself to that." He sighed. "Now here I am, the most beautiful girl I've ever seen is interested in me, and I have no idea just what the hell I'm supposed to do." Katie was shocked for just a moment, then understood completely. He was lonely. I should have expected this from the way he was carrying on about his parents, she thought. Her own life hadn't been all that easy--growing up an orphan, only finding friends when she'd found her way to Utopia Planitia a short time before meeting Chris...in fact, it all seemed now like a bad dream that had faded away in the bright starlight from the SDF-17's observation ports. But she still knew what loneliness was like, and she imagined that Chris had probably had more than his share of it in his lifetime. "I can understand," she said. "We can go on as friends for now...you must have had SOME good friends on earth who were female, though." Chris nodded. "Yeah, I did. Once or twice I wanted it to be something more, but I never got up the courage to ask." He blushed, feeling a little uncomfortable about being so open, and tried to hide his discomfort behind sarcasm. "Something you don't seem to have a problem with." Katie laughed nervously. "Hey, once you dogfight a Kilrathi face to face, the rest is easy." This provided something for them both to laugh at, and the conversation moved on to more neutral topics. "So, how 'bout them Raiders?" Chris landed the CONSTELLATION in his workshop after another test flight and climbed out to notice someone standing in the doorway. "Hey, PCHammer! What are you doing here?" "Oh, I heard someone was moving in, so I just came up to check it out." He pointed over his shoulder. "I live down that way a couple of blocks." "Oh, yeah, you do, don't you?" Chris realized. "What do you think?" He waved his arm at all the stuff. "Wow. Nice." Martin peered at the screen. "Big TV set." "Yeah, isn't it? Can't wait to watch Macross Do You Remember Love on that thing." He grinned, stepping over to a comfortable-looking chair nearby and sitting down. PCHammer pulled up another chair and did the same. "So what are you going to do now?" Martin asked. "Now that you're officially a design engineer?" "Oh, I don't know...build stuff, I guess. And fly." He pointed to the CONSTELLATION. "Definitely fly." He looked back at PCHammer. "Oh, by the way...some of the stuff I'm gonna build, I could probably use your help to program. What do you say?" PCHammer shrugged. "Sure, if I can find the time...What did you have in mind?" "Well, I've got these advanced Cyclone prototypes. Sort of a VR-hundred series. I don't think I'll build very many of them...just a few for personal use, or for friends, at first. And I have some ideas for some personal mecha, too, and improvements on the CONSTELLATION. Between that and flying, I think I'll be keeping pretty busy." True to his predictions, Chris DID keep pretty busy. Since he didn't technically have a squadron (and he SURE didn't want to be assigned one), he pretty much flew with whoever he liked. He flew for a while with the Clay Pigeons, and sometimes Katie, when she was off Eight-Ball duty, flew with them. What took up the most time in Chris's schedule was modifying and reworking the CONSTELLATION into a better--no, make that a BETTER, all caps--fighter. Just about any time you liked (and some times you didn't like), you could find Chris in that shop, tinkering with that mecha (not having any other assigned duties sort of helped out in the time area). Whenever she was off-duty, Katie Tanner came in to help. She wasn't much of an engineer, but at least she could hand Chris the right tools. PCHammer and the Clay Pigeons dropped in from time to time, as well, and the squadron's Santovaskan, Danilia, helped along with Katie. Danilia, though not actually trained, did seem to have a knack for mecha mechanics, and Chris was able to teach her some of his skills, so that she became a competent assistant. Who knows, maybe in a few more decades, she might actually become a full-fledged engineer. If, that is, she ever became serious enough about it. Given her bubbly, overexuberantly cheerful personality, however, it was hard to imagine her becoming serious about anything. On the fighter, the first thing to be refit or replaced was the avionics, which wasn't hard. Along with the upgrade, they installed just about every external connect hardpoint that the Valk could fit, including some that were more common to small starships like the Predator-class Kei and Yuri flew. Chris also improved the floptical drive patch-in, so it was part of the dash instead of hooked under it. After this, Chris ripped out and rearranged the innards of the Valkyrie's flight computer, to improve the efficiency, and also...something else. He left room to install a Machine Intelligence CPU, like Eve, just in case he ever got one. Maybe PCHammer could write it? But somehow, he never got around to asking. Which was just as well, actually--Chris didn't know if he cared to have his piloting second-guessed by a machine, and he wasn't sure that an AI was called for in a ship the size of a Valkyrie anyway. The next stage of the operation was a little tricky, but Chris managed to hack it with help from Katie, Danilia, and Eve (who personally ran the remote waldoes; she'd had ample enough experience with trusting PAIs to perform delicate tasks). They yanked the standard reactors out of the CONSTELLATION, replacing them with an advanced version of the powerful reactors that ran Gryphon's Hyper Valkyrie. After this came the most boring part. The myomers of a standard Valkyrie were not capable of handling the strain placed on them by having that much power on line. So, they had to be replaced completely with a stronger variant (that would actually provide a strength boost on the order of 65%). The reweaving process took about three months, during which time Chris put together a DVR-152 Battler II Cyclone for the heck of it. (It should have been VR-152, but Chris felt that he should add the "D" designation to the front to honor the original designer, Dave Deitrich, and also to differentiate this model from any future VR-152 Cyclone that the WDF powers-that-be might design.) The DVR-152 Battler II was perhaps 15% larger than the original VR-052 Battler, and suitably rugged to match. It was similar to its predecessor in general shape and design, but its electronic systems were much more advanced, with extended radar, radio, and targeting capabilities. The targeting sensor was now built into the helmet visor. Firepower was also increased. In addition to twelve chest mini-missiles, the DVR-152 mounted eight forward-facing mini-missiles in the hip armor of the Cyclone, four on each leg. And the arm units still had two plasma launch tubes each, but now mounted energy cannons as well. Plus the overall armor protection was substantially higher, and the auxiliary power system ran off of a tank of water (or other hydrogen-rich fluid) instead of gasoline. As for armor compatibility, the Battler II was designed to lock in with any CVR-type armor in the WDF's arsenal, but Chris went ahead and made a suit of the CVR-4 that Dave had designed to work with the Cyclones anyway. CVR-4 armor's design included space in the legs for a first-aid pack, survival kit, and tool kit, and also some advanced comm systems that CVR-3 didn't have. All in all, it was an excellent little creation. "Have to thank Dave for making it for me," Chris remarked. "Though he's probably old and grey by now, probably doesn't even remember the Robotech supplement we were writing..." Katie thought it was a neat design. Danilia, being shorter, was more impressed with its size. "Any bigger and you'd be a Destroid!" she giggled. Chris promised to put together advanced Cyclones for each of them as soon as he'd finished testing on that one. Chris had just been planning the next and final stage thus far, refitting and upgrading the booster pack for warp propulsion, when the emergency came up. CHAPTER 13 "Sometimes, you just have to--Hey, stop quoting me!" --Anonymous Chris had been re-reading Valkyrie technical manuals, wanting to be sure of what he was doing. He was sitting in his workshop, feet propped up on the metal desk that he did much of his non-mechanical work at, leafing through the manual. He was trying to figure out what the best way to go about hooking up the warp engines would be (after all, he'd never actually DONE this before), when the intercom beeped. Chris looked up at the big screen on the opposite wall (which he'd decided he liked to use for intercom communication when he didn't need it for anything else), and said, "Yo!" It was Zoner, on the bridge. He looked serious. "Mako, can you have your plane prepped and launched within ten minutes?" Chris checked his watch, did a little figuring in his head. "Yeah, sure, what's the problem?" "Terrorist spacejacking of a luxury liner from Atlantia," Zoner said. "About fifteen minutes ago it diverted from its course, and a list of demands has just come through by computer. The Atlantian government has asked us to intervene." "Whoa, whoa, waitaminnit. Isn't this a job for the Hammers?" Zoner nodded. "It is. They're going in. But you and the Eight-Balls are going to be on the scene making sure the bad guys don't get away. Your plane will be designated Eight-Ball Six for this mission." "But why me? I'm not any great shakes behind the joystick..." "We might need a combat engineer. You never know." It was a good enough explanation for Chris. He tossed the manual aside and got up. "Give me ten minutes and I'll be ready to launch. Out." The CONSTELLATION rode across the sky, vectoring onto the course provided by the nav computer. As Chris approached, he kept a sharp eye out for any bogeys. It was possible that the hijackers had accomplices, and those accomplices might be lying in wait even now... "Eight-Ball Four to Eight-Ball Six, Eight-Ball Four to Eight-Ball Six, this is Temper." Chris thumbed the touch-sensitive square on his starboard nav/comm screen, and it blipped up her image. "Well, hello there, gorgeous!" Chris called over the tacnet. Katie responded, "Hello yourself. Correct your course seven degrees starboard and join up with us. ETA to the LUSITANIA is approximately two hundred seconds." Katie wished he'd be more SERIOUS, GRYPHON was here for Eris's sake! "That's a roger." Inwardly, Chris sighed. There was just no dealing with Katie when she was in "professional" mode, as she invariably was whenever Gryphon was around...or she tried, at least. Chris's radar was painting the LUSITANIA as she hung there in space, not moving. She was the standard Utopia Planitia Carnival-class passenger liner, with standard atomic drive and limited warp capabilities. No weapons of any kind, just a whole lot of luxury accomodations. A few touches on the CONSTELLATION's nav/comm screen brought up the statistics on the Carnival-class. Speeds, turning ratios, dimensions (about 250 meters long, 50 wide), crew of 60, about 200 passengers, escape pods at various locations, air locks, etc. As Chris glanced over the plans, something didn't ring true to him about this situation, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what it was. He opened a commline back to Eve. "Hey, Eve, this is Mako. Listen, something doesn't feel right, here. Talk to me about the passengers and crew on this run of the LUSITANIA, and also tell me about where this run is going, what it's doing, et cetera." "As you wish, Mako. What would you like to know?" "Oh, uh, give me a general overview." "Very well. The LUSITANIA, or the LUCY as she's known to her crew, has been travelling the same route for about seven terrestrial years--that is, from Atlantia to Gaula and back again. The passengers are about 60% idle rich, 30% upper-middle class, and 10% other." "Sounds like a rich prize for hijackers..." Chris thought out loud. Then it clicked. "Wait a minute! Why the demands?!" "What?" Eve asked, looking prettily confused. "Zoner said that the hijackers had issued a list of demands. But why bother? If they want money, all they have to do is smash the commsystems, shake down the passengers and crew, and then take an escape capsule or something to rendezvous with a waiting ship. With all the passengers on board, they could make millions from the jewelry alone..." "I see," Eve said. "But their list of demands seems political in nature. What would you make of that?" "Hogwash. They would have chosen a less wealthy target group--a middle-class spaceliner. They want people to meet their demands, and the public tends to care more about common people. Except for other rich men, most of them don't give a rip whether some rich duffer buys it. It's the sympathy value that political hijackers go for." They were now coming into position alongside the LUCY. It just sort of hung there, still, in space, lights on in some cabins, off in others--nothing to suggest that there was any form of trouble aboard, except for the fact that it was not moving. The advanced sensor suite on board the CONSTELLATION picked up the emanations that indicated a shadow-cloaked shuttle was on its way in--that would be the Hammers. "Hold on a minute, Eve...let me tell Gryphon what I'm thinking here..." "All right, Mako." "Eight-Ball Six to Eight-Ball One. Gryph, Mako here. Listen, something smells about this situation." Chris explained his suspicions to Gryphon. Meanwhile, the stealth-cloaked shuttle containing pfloyd's men passed close to the LUSITANIA, and several shadowy forms detached from it and drifted toward the liner on microspurts of thruster flame. "Hmm...I THOUGHT something felt funny about this. All right, Mako, if what you say is true, then why ARE they hijacking the ship?" Gryphon asked. Chris considered this. "I'll get back to you on that." He closed the commline and resumed his conversation with Eve. "Eve, what are their demands?" Outside the Veritech, one of the auxiliary airlock hatches on the side of the LUCY briefly opened, and the shadowy forms slipped inside. Eve blinked. "The demands are the standard spacejacking list...release of political prisoners, twenty million credits in unmarked bills, a hyperspace starship..." The list scrolled up on the port comm screen. Chris glanced at it. "Have the hijackers claimed any affiliation with known terrorist groups?" Chris prodded. "And what about the 'political prisoners,' what groups are they from?" "The hijackers do not appear to have made any such claims," Eve said, "even though three different groups are claiming responsibility. The prisoners appear to belong to several different groups, some of which are in direct opposition to each other." "That's damn weird," Chris said. "It just doesn't make sense...something HAS to be going on here...Eve, what's the political situation around this star system?" "There are three habitable planets within the system, and some asteroid belts," Eve began. "Atlantia is the farthest out. Closer in is Gaula, and then an asteroid belt with a number of inhabited planetoids in it, and closest in is Doycha. Doycha and Gaula are at war, apparently due to diplomatic entanglements within the asteroid belt. Atlantia is supposedly neutral, but has been accused of secretly supplying weapons to Gaula." Chris was thinking intently, wondering why all this sounded familiar. And then he had it. His jaw dropped as he realized what it might mean, and activated the advanced sensors built into the CONSTELLATION. He only hoped he was wrong. But he wasn't. The sensors hadn't been active for ten seconds before they painted a large area in what the schematics indicated was the cargo section as containing some very high-energy compounds. "Eve, what do you think those are?" Eve, in the starboard screen, glanced over toward the scan results in Chris's port screen. "There is a very real possibility that they could be reflex weapons, or other powerful devices such as nuclear explosives or photon torpedoes." "It's just like I was afraid of...this LUSITANIA is carrying arms to France, just like the original one..." "France?" Eve asked, confused. "Eve, do you believe that history repeats itself?" Eve still looked confused. "I have heard that those who do not heed the lessons of history are doomed to repeat it." "No, Eve, that's not the same. Check your World War I history...I'm going to check the skies." He thumbed the sensors over to outward sweep, looking for something. "I think Gryphon had better know about this. Eight-Ball Six to Eight-Ball One! Emergency!" Gryphon popped up on the starboard comm screen, displacing Eve temporarily. "Gryphon. Clear channel for emergency traffic. Ok, Mako...what's the emergency?" "Check this, Gryphon." He sent the picture of the high-energy compounds that showed up in scanning. "Frack!" Gryphon spat. "There's enough firepower there to atomize a small city..." "How are you at World War I history, Gryph?" Chris asked. "Do you remember what happened to the original LUSITANIA in that war?" "It was torpedoed by a German U-boat." Gryphon said. "But what does that--D'OH!" Gryphon slapped a gloved hand to the facebowl of his CVR-3. "History is repeating itself," Chris said. "Somehow, the three planets in this system are analogues of Britain, France, and Germany during World War I. The LUSITANIA was sunk because it was supposedly carrying American weapons to help against the Germans. And it really WAS, dives on the ship revealed that." "And you think...oh, garh." Chris's sensors pinged. "There! I'm painting a cloaked ship...it's decloaking..." And, it turned out, it was firing! The photon torpedo ripped through space, right toward the LUSITANIA. By some cosmic coincidence, Chris's CONSTELLATION was right in the way. "Oh, SHIT!" Chris yelled, pulling levers and punching buttons like crazy. There was a huge explosion where his fighter had been. CHAPTER 14 "The rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated." --Samuel Clemens Katie Tanner's fighter was there first. "Chris? Chris!! Oh my GOD!!!" Tears filled her eyes as she replayed the explosion over and over again in her mind, trying to convince herself that there was some way he could have lived through it. Gryphon's response was about as articulate as usual under the circumstances. "Bite!" He thumbed his own sensors, trying to find that ship. No one was just going to trash one of his pilots (albeit, only temporarily one of his) and get away with it. Then Katie's commscreen fuzzed, blanked, and Chris's face appeared, behind a lot of static which gradually cleared up. "It's okay, Temper, they didn't get me." Chris's fighter, sans booster pack, emerged from behind the LUSITANIA. "What the hell?!" Katie asked, wiping her eyes. Her exterior was controlled, but that was just a facade. Inside, she wanted to yell, "He's alive!!!" at the top of her lungs. She contented herself with, "Damn you, Mako, don't you EVER do that to me again! How did you--" "Sorry, Temper...wasn't exactly by choice. I jettisoned my booster pack into the path of the torp and bugged. The torp hit the pack and blew up, but neither I nor the LUCY was harmed." "The LUCY?" "The LUSITANIA. But that cloakship is still out there...damn, it recloaked." "We'll find it!" Gryphon grated. "Everyone, sensor linkup. We'll find that ship..." The Veritech fighters interlinked their scanning systems, so that their computers could work together to coordinate the search. However, it was Chris's advanced sensor suite that ended up pinpointing the particle emission traces of the cloaked ship. "Geez, would you look at that?" Chris remarked. "They must be losing several megawatts of power in particle leaks alone. We could lock onto that with our MISSILES. Sorta defeats the purpose of cloaking itself, doesn't it? Primitive, primitive..." "All the easier to take out. Eight-Ball Four, Eight-Ball Six, you're with me. We'll head out to its twelve, three, and seven o'clock, then come around and catch it in a pincer. The rest of you will maintain your perimeter around the ship." "Ah, you mean we're going to Robotech right into it!" Chris said. "I can live with that, let's do it!" "That's a roger," Katie affirmed, still wishing Chris would be more serious, but relieved to have him alive. "On my mark...HIT IT!" The three fighters blasted away in seemingly random directions. Whoever crewed that cloaked ship must have been somewhat puzzled to see three of the fighters going off in opposite directions. But then the surprise would have faded as all three fighters came around, as one, and launched short-range missiles at it. Explosions blossomed all over the nothingness, and the ship became visible as several areas on it exploded outward. The ship was small, dark, with some weapons turrets jutting out of it. Apparently a corvette of some type. "Got it!" Chris yelled trumphantly. "Ya-HOO!!!" But the cloakship wasn't out of the running yet. Green beams of light lanced forth, probing for the attacking fighters. "Shit--disruptors!" Gryphon banked, narrowly avoiding a disruptor beam that would have sliced off his Valk's left wing, and fired medium-range missiles back. The missiles hit, detonating near the engine section. "He's lost all power," Chris remarked. "He's down." "Great. I'll call back to the WAYWARD SON and have them send out a boarding--" Then the whole thing went up in a huge fireball. Debris flew everywhere, one piece cracking the CONSTELLATION's canopy. "Yah!" Chris gasped as the cockpit depressurized. Fortunately, his CVR-4 had engaged its environmental seal instantly upon the loss of air pressure. "Shit! Vacuum sucks!" (Well, duh, of course it does...) He turned off the CONSTELLATION's environmental control, as it was currently pumping oxygen into the cockpit trying to equalize the pressure. "I don't read any survivors...they killed themselves rather than talk to us." "Wonderful," Gryphon muttered drily. "We'll just have to hope that pfloyd gets a prisoner." They were all well aware of the Hammers' methods, and knew this to be unlikely in the extreme. And, true to form, pfloyd took no prisoners. Those terrorists who were not casualties managed to make their escape. Which left the WDF with a mystery on its hands. They met in one of the conference rooms on the bridge deck--Zoner, Gryphon, pfloyd, Chris, and Vaughn (who just happened to be around). Eve was also "in attendance," via the conference screen. "Just what the hell is going on here?" Gryphon wondered. "The original LUSITANIA didn't have terrorists on it!" Chris nodded. "That's why I think something smells. Gryph, what do you think?" "All right. As I see it, the big issue is who those terrorists were, and whose that ship was," Gryphon announced. "Eve, did you recognize the ship design?" Eve nodded. "Definitely Doychan designs--the ship, and the cloaking field it used." "What about the terrorists?" Chris asked. "Other than the demands, did they ever say anything?" "They did broadcast some transmissions toward Doycha. But there were no answers." "pfloyd, what do you think?" Gryphon asked. Adam shrugged. "I really couldn't tell. They carried no identification of any kind, not even jewelry." Gryphon thought for a moment, then asked, "Eve, what about a genetic analysis? Could that pinpoint their home planet?" "It is a possibility," Eve conceded. "However, the three planets in this system all share similar gene pools." "Still, it's a chance. Do it," MegaZone said. Eve nodded. "Processing now." "I wonder who REALLY is behind this. I mean, it seems obvious that we're meant to think it's Doycha," Chris remarked. "It was Germany originally, too. But it's just TOO similar. I believe in coincidence, but this is just TOO plain." Vaughn spoke up. "You mean, it's like someone wants us to join the fight." "Not necessarily us, Vaughn," Eve said. "Remember, this attack was aimed at the LUSITANIA. It is only coincidence that we were here to observe it." "There's that word again..." Chris muttered. "So they want Atlantia to attack Doycha," Zoner mused. "That is, assuming that Doycha really ISN'T behind it..." Vaughn shook his head. "I can't figure it. Why aren't they happy with what they've got? Humans are so stupid sometimes." "The local political situation is quite complex," Eve stated. "The war was started by the assassination of a duke in one of the small asteroidal countries named--" "That's enough, Eve," Chris said. "The politics aren't the issue here. What matters is who attacked the LUCY. And whose those terrorists were, since I suspect they may be one and the same." Eve blinked out to do the analysis, replaced by a view of outer space with the EVE logo blinking in one corner. "What about the Gaulans?" Gryphon asked. "Wouldn't they be the most likely to want someone to jump in against the Doychans?" "Probably so, but I've been looking over the Intelligence Office's most recent reports on this system." MegaZone held up a large sheaf of paper. "Like, have a printout," Vaughn muttered. "I haven't read all of it, I've just glanced over some stuff, but I don't think that Gaula would have the resources to pull this thing off. They're fighting really hard, they're against the wall. It's an all-out effort." "All the more reason why they should want Atlantia in, on their side," pfloyd suggested. "But all reports indicate that they've never captured a Doychan cloakship," Zoner responded. "At least, not intact." "Couldn't they have salvaged one? Or built one to the approximate specifications?" Chris asked, though he didn't really think the Gaulans had done it either. He was just playing Devil's Advocate. "They can't even figure the cloaking device out, much less reconstruct one, especially during wartime," Zoner pointed out. The conference screen blipped the EVE logo briefly, and then Eve was back. "The analysis is complete." "Great!" Chris said. "What can you tell us?" "I cannot say this with 100% certainty," Eve said, "but I believe these men are from outsystem." There was a collective silence as everyone took this information in. "Outsystem? But why?" Chris wondered. "Simple," pfloyd said before anyone else could speak up. "Get everyone fighting, and then move in and take over while everyone's still weak. Basic strategy." "But who?" Gryphon wondered. "No, scratch that. We have any number of ready suspects. Space pirates, nearby systems, megaconglomerate corporations, and so on." "We can't let this go on," Vaughn said. "It's all so pointless." The others present nodded, and Vaughn continued. "So we stop it..." he announced. "Ever read 'All Quiet on the Western Front?' Nab the leaders...give em clubs, let them fight it out...makes more sense than the random drafting and killing..." "Never read it, but saw the movie starring Ernest Borgnine." "You should read it," Vaughn said. Chris nodded. "I will someday. But not only that...you know your early-20th-century history. If this war plays itself out the way WWI did, Doycha will be bankrupted, and then a Hitler will appear in thirty years or so." "I'd prefer not letting that happen," Gryphon remarked. "Especially when you consider what's in store for the common Doychan people, as well as everyone else." MegaZone nodded. "Maintaining peace is what we're here for. The Prime Directive needs to die, hard." He stood up. "All right, everybody, instead of FIGHTING wars, let's go END one." CHAPTER 15 "Speak softly, but carry a big stick." --President Theodore Roosevelt When MegaZone went on the air with the announcement that the WDF would be intervening to stop the war, the first responses to be received were the predictable solicitous messages from both Gaula and Doycha, each asking the WDF to intercede on its behalf. And one from Atlantia, asking it to remain neutral. Zoner exchanged glances with Gryphon. "They just don't get it, do they?" Gryphon just shook his head. Zoner sighed. "Damn, this diplomacy shit gets tiring. Where's Picard when you really need him?" Vaughn Gross spoke up. "I'm not Picard--" "That's not what Haywire says," Gryphon interjected. Vaughn glared at him. "--but I'd be willing to give it a shot," he finished. "Great. I may regret this later, but as of now, you're officially chief diplomat in charge of making peace between Gaula and Doycha." "Nifty! Where do I sign?" The first step was moving the SDF-17 into position in the middle of the battlefield, directly between Gaula and Doycha. At first this might seem a little crazy, but even without the omnidirectional barrier activated, the WAYWARD SON was pretty much invunerable to anything the Gaulans or Doychans could throw at it. And the SON would at least interfere with the aim of both sides. (Vaughn approved of the idea, and decided he'd have to try that sometime.) Next, fighters were launched. Their task: patrol the battlefield and stop any fighting they found. By their presence alone, it was hoped, they would effectively halt the outbreak of any further activities. At the end of the first day, Gryphon was gratified to find that both sides had ceased firing. "This is working out better than I'd expected," he ventured. Zoner shook his head gloomily. "They're probably both going to attack at once, try to beat the shit out of us from both sides." "You know, I'm really glad I'm not quite as cynical as you are. You're probably right, though. Hey, where did Vaughn go?" macquivr spoke up. "Uh, like I think he took a like walk. Said something about like looking at some rocks or something." Zoner sighed. "All right, the middle of a confrontation and our chief diplomat goes for a walk. Okay, I can deal..." "He like said he'd be back before we needed him," q ventured. "Yeah, right, like he KNOWS that," MegaZone muttered. "Like I don't think he's like been wrong before," q replied. Vaughn strolled unconcernedly toward the asteroid belt to one side of the battlefield. He looked around, bemused, and waved to a Valkyrie that passed nearby. The Valk pilot waved back (after 15 years, most of the crew had almost gotten used to Vaughn's strangeness) and banked away. As Vaughn entered the belt, he noticed some beams of light going back and forth between two of them. It looked pretty, so Vaughn decided to make a closer investigation. As he got closer, he could see that the beams were shots being fired from two small groups of spacesuited soldiers occupying trenches on nearby asteroids. Vaughn shook his head in disgust. "Trench warfare. Can't people find better things to do with their time?" Vaughn stepped out between the two sides. "Good morning!" he called out. For just a moment, both sides ceased firing, but then they started up again. Strangely (or well, around Vaughn, maybe not so strangely), none of the shots that passed near Vaughn hit him. Vaughn shrugged. He guessed he'd just have to take the guns away from them. But then he hit upon a problem. If he took all the guns away from one side, the other side would come charging over and kill them before he could take their guns too. And that would be Not a Good Thing. But then, as Vaughn stood there in outer space thinking, something strange happened. Another Vaughn appeared. "'Morning!" he waved to the first Vaughn. "Let's disarm these guys." It took a great deal to astonish Vaughn. Even this only ALMOST astonished him. He blinked, once, then said, "All right." He took one side, and the second Vaughn (whom we shall henceforth refer to as Reality) took the other, leaving quite a few bewildered soldiers in their wake. They met between the two lines, and Reality handed all the rifles he'd gathered to Vaughn (it made quite an armful for him, but he managed it). "First time I ever met a doppleganger", Vaughn mused, "Usually they are at least a quarter mile away. You are me, aren't you?" "No, I'm me. You won't be me for about 400 years, or I was you the same amount of time in reverse." Reality grinned, checking a complicated-looking watch on his wrist. Vaughn looked over at it "Neat toy. Where did we get it?" "Zoner gave it...um will give it...arg...we got it from Zoner." He looked around, still grinning. "Can't stay. She's waiting for me on the other side of the wormhole, and it won't stay open for much longer." "Shall I tell everyone you said hi?" Vaughn asked. Reality shook his head. "No, better not." "Right. Mess up the timestream and all that. Guess I'll see you. Or be you." Reality nodded. "Laters." He turned and started walking, then accelerated to warp speed, leaving a blue after-image behind him. "Huh. Wish I could do that," Vaughn said, looking after him. "Guess I will." He told the soldiers politely but firmly that the war was over, go home, and then headed back to the WAYWARD SON himself. It didn't occur to him to wonder who "she" was until much, much later. "'Morning." "Hi, Vaughn. Where you been?" Chris asked, as that worthy came walking out of space into the docking bay where he and Katie were tinkering with the CONSTELLATION, carrying an armload of nasty-looking laser weapons. "Out for a walk. Found some guys with these and had to take them away so they didn't hurt anybody." He let all the guns clatter to the deck. "Could you take care of these for me? Wouldn't want them to hurt anyone by accident. Or on purpose, for that matter." "Sure, Vaughn. No problem," Katie said. "Thanks. Laters." Vaughn waved, and walked on out of the docking bay. Chris shook his head, grinning. "That Vaughn. Hope he never changes." "He probably never will," Katie said, returning his grin. "Now, let's get back to work on this engine." "It's a maneuvering vernier, but you're learning." Chris jumped down from the cockpit and called for the number four hydrospanner. CHAPTER 16 "Let us never negotiate out of fear, but let us never fear to negotiate." --John F. Kennedy As it turned out, it wasn't long before Gaula and Doycha contacted the SON again, demanding that they move out of the way immediately. Zoner, of course, refused. Well, actually it was Vaughn who had done the refusing, but it was Zoner who'd told him to. "I'm really sorry," Vaughn had said both times. "But if we do that, you might hurt each other, and we just can't let that happen." The Doychan leader got mad and screamed some things at Vaughn that made everyone else's ears turn pink, but Vaughn just shrugged. "I just hope we can come to some sort of an agreement to stop the fighting. Oh, almost forgot. You need to choose an ambassador. We'll send someone down to pick him up for the peace conference. Laters." He signalled to q to end the transmission. "You certainly showed great restraint," Chris remarked. "Especially when he yelled THAT at you." "Yelled what?" Vaughn asked. "That remark about your ancestry, and what you like to do in your spare time," Katie said. "You didn't even react at all." "Oh, is that what it was?" Vaughn looked vaguely embarrassed. "I forgot to turn my universal translator on, you see, and..." Zoner rolled his eyes, stared at the ceiling and mouthed, "Why me?" Soon afterward came the attack. Space fighters from both sides swooped in on the WAYWARD SON, and sometimes on each other. Gryphon flatly refused to launch any fighters to combat the massed attacks. "We don't need to, and I'm not going to put any pilot on this ship at risk unnecessarily. They can't hurt us anyway, especially with the omnidirectional barrier up." True to Gryphon's predictions, neither side was able to inflict any harm on the SDF-17, other than reducing shield power by about 8% (which was only a temporary reduction; the shield built back up almost immediately). After that, the shuttles departed for the three planets in the system--Gaula, Doycha, and Atlantia--to pick up the delegates for the conference. Even though they came under protest, and with detachments of soldiers as "honor guards," they still came. Vaughn met them in the docking bay. "Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Vaughn Gross, your mediator for this flight on WDF airlines...nonono. I'm here to help you work out your problems. So, if you'll all come along to the conference room, we can start talking about it." So everyone walked to the ornately-furnished WDF conference room, where the peace conference was to be held. Chris and Katie followed, curious to see what happened. The first problems came when they tried to seat the delegates. It seemed that none of them was satisfied with his seating. However, they soon got that out of the way, and got into the discussion. More disagreement. The next crisis came when the chief Gaulan diplomat demanded to speak with the WDF representative. "Would that be you, sir?" he asked of Vaughn in caustic tones. "Huh? Oh, no, I'm just the mediator." "Then who IS the WDF ambassador to this conference?" the Doychan diplomat demanded drily. Vaughn looked around. "Um..." His eyes settled on Chris and Katie, and he hit upon an inspiration. "They are." Chris looked at Katie. Katie looked at Chris. "He's kidding, right?" Katie asked. Chris got up. "Afraid not, Temper. Come on...let's go take our seats..." It sort of went downhill from there. CHAPTER 17 "There are few ironclad rules of diplomacy but to one there is no exception. When an official reports that talks were useful, it can safely be concluded that nothing was accomplished." --John Kenneth Galbraith The diplomatic meeting was anything but diplomatic. First the diplomats argued over who started the war. After Vaughn told them that who STARTED it wasn't important, since no one would be blamed for it. "Wars aren't anybody's fault anyway," Vaughn said. "They just happen." This suited the diplomats just fine. They next went on to argue about who would get what territory gained or lost in the war. To Katie Tanner, all this arguing was grating in the worst possible way. Her temper, which hadn't been helped any by being dragged into this thing, was flaring up and about to explode. Chris recognized the danger signs. "Um, Vaughn, WDF requests a ten-minute recess," Chris said. "All right," Vaughn said, wincing. "I think I need one too. All my synapses are firing. At me. Owie." He blinked, in that manner common to all those individuals suddenly subjected to intense cerebral agony. Chris and Katie walked out of the room, ahead of all the muttering diplomats. Chris took Katie by the arm and led her around a corner, down two levels to a turbolift, and into a nearby empty docking bay before he took his hand off her mouth. "Those blasted so-called DIPLOMATS!!! Of all the idiotic, malfeasant, moronic, imbecilic..." Chris let Katie run through her list of adjectives, correcting her when she mentioned the same one twice a couple of times. "You finished?" Chris asked after she'd finally gotten out some of her anger. "Uh, I think so." "Good." Chris checked his watch. "Okay, the ten minutes are almost up. We'd better get going." Katie shook her head. "I am NOT going back to that meeting!" "Since when did you become Worf?" Chris muttered, then "Nevermind. No, I was by no means suggesting we go back to that meeting...I was suggesting we make ourselves as unfindable as possible, like now. That way Vaughn will have to find some other delegates." "Now you're speaking my language!" Katie said, grinning wickedly. "Let's go find something to do!" In one of the launch bays, Gryphon and Zoner were looking at the weapons cache that had been confiscated from the LUCY. It was spread out all across the hangar, and various nondescript uniformed people were going over the crates and things with handcomps and styluses, tallying the serial numbers and identifiers on the crates. It was something that Gryph found highly disturbing that of the contents of those crates counted thus far, over 90% of them had been manufactured at Utopia Planitia. "I don't get it," Zoner was saying. "Eve, what about UP's computer records? Get a sub-ethernet uplink to Bombsight and see what you can find out." Eve nodded from a nearby wall screen. "I will do that, Zoner, but in order to obtain quantifiable data, it may be necessary to send someone to Utopia Planitia to investigate the matter personally." Gryphon nodded, staring at the ceiling. "I see. I wonder who I could send...?" "Look at this." Zoner kicked at one of the rough wooden crates sitting on the deck. It splintered, and several spherical objects clattered across the floor. Plasma grenades. Zoner jumped back out of reflex, noticing the ExoSalusia Arms logo on some of them. "Where in the hell did they get shit like THIS? >From Utopia Planitia, from US? No fuckin' way." "Yeah, I hear you." Gryphon opened a metal crate, lifted out an RL-2 man-portable disposable plasma minimissile launcher. "Hey, I ought to get one of these for Kei, for Christmas. Think they come gift-wrapped?" "What do you get for the girl who has everything," Zoner muttered drily. Then, "Plasma missiles...photon torpedoes...antimatter demo ordnance...smart bombs..." Zoner called up the list on the handcomp he was carrying. "Even--get this, Gryph--an ExoSalusia Arms Model 44 Wave Motion Rifle. I didn't even think they MADE these anymore. And it SURE doesn't belong in the hands of anyone in this system except MAYBE us." Gryphon nodded. "Eve, how's that record search coming?" Eve, a slightly distracted look on her face, replied, "As well as can be expected. I have so far queried Bombsight on 29% of the lot numbers." "And?" Zoner asked. "So far, it seems that these lot numbers do not officially exist." "I think you're right, Eve," Zoner said. "We're not going to get anywhere like this." Eve glanced to her right, then back at the screen. "Lord Fahrvergnugen requests to speak with you. He would like to know the reason for these database searches." "Uh, just tell him that we're running some routine inventory checks," Zoner said. "I'll contact him later...um...I'm in a conference. Gryphon is too." Gryphon raised an eyebrow. "We can't tell ANYONE at UP what's going on. Not even Lord Fahrvergnugen," MegaZone explained. "Whoever's in charge of this could be someone very close to him. He'd have to be, to make entire weapons shipments just fuckin' vanish." Gryphon nodded. "Great. We'll apologize later. But now, we'd better dispatch someone back to UP as soon as possible. Eve, any recommendations?" At that moment, Chris and Katie entered the bay, looking as if they were running from something. Before Eve could even speak, Zoner and Gryphon exchanged glances and nodded. It was fate, it had to be. Eve confirmed this by saying, "What about them?" Gryphon waved Chris and Katie over. "Mako, Temper!" Secretly, he was glad it had been those two. Mako was one of the more intelligent, dependable men on the ship (fnord!), even though he currently wasn't actually assigned any tasks to perform other than modifying his plane, the CONSTELLATION. Temper...well, she was kind of cute (Lucky Kei wasn't around...). And the way she tried to act completely "professional" when he was leading the wing often put a grin on his face--even if the way she was prone to fly off the handle/against orders often did quite the opposite. "Yeah, Gryph?" Chris asked. "Hey, what's all this stuff?" "These are the weapons you noticed on board the LUSITANIA." "Wow." Chris looked around, at the dozens of crates all over the floor, at the twenty or so workers with their handcomps taking count. "I didn't think there'd be THIS many..." Zoner handed Chris his handcomp. "There's the complete list, if you want it. We have a job for you." "I'm game, what is it?" Chris asked. "We want you to go to Utopia Planitia and check around for us," Gryphon said. "As you can see, most of these weapons can be traced back to UP, directly or indirectly. We need to find out who it was there who was authorizing these shipments." "Wow, you mean you think someone at UP is behind this?" Chris asked. Gryphon nodded. "It's possible..." Chris nodded. "How do we get there? Are you arranging transport for us with the 3WA?" Zoner shook his head. "Nothing official...We can't let anyone know that you're coming--not even Wolfgang himself. We don't want to tell whoever's behind this that you're coming." "Then what WILL we be doing?" Katie asked from a crate several rows down. "Take your Valkyries to Atlantia," Zoner instructed. "I understand there is a starport there. Try some seedy spacer bars. Or used spaceship lots." Mako nodded. "All right, and thanks! We'll get right on it. C'mon, Katie...let's get to our fighters." About half a minute after they left the room, Vaughn called, asking MegaZone to send down some new WDF representatives. CHAPTER 18 "I think it's getting better, but I can't wait another day. I'm on my way. I'm on my way." --INXS, "On My Way" "Atlantia approach, this is CONSTELLATION. Request landing approach for me and my wingmate." "Roger, CONSTELLATION. You are cleared on pad B-97-A3, and your wingmate on B-97-A4. See ya planetside." "I read you, Atlantia approach. CONSTELLATION out." "What now?" Katie asked, putting the last piece of her CVR armor in the cockpit locker. Underneath it she was wearing the pressure-tight flight suit that was standard-issue to WDF pilots, with a holster on it that contained her sidearm, a Gallant H-90 pistol. Under Chris's armor, he was wearing blue jeans and a grey-and-white sweatshirt that said "SMSU" on the front of it. His sidearm was one-of-a-kind, so far--a bigger, uprated version of the Gallant H-90, the Gallant 1000. "Shoulda worn civvies, Katie," Chris remarked. "You'll really stick out around here..." Katie shrugged. "Big deal. Let's go. Do the pubs and bars?" "I dunno...it is rather cliched..." To make a long story short, they were able to find suitable transportation almost immediately. A Wookiee at a bar led them to a hangar with an old Corellian freighter, the MAGNUM CARTEL, in it. Her human captain was a bit reluctant at first. "Oh, no. Not this ship, no way. Their defenses are infallible. No way we could get through without clearance." "We HAVE clearance," Chris said. "We're WDF, don't you see the lady's flight suit?" "Oh, no. I'm not buying into this one, no way." Of course, he was properly mollified when he saw the two Hyper Valkyries sitting on the landing pads. He and the Wookiee helped load them aboard into the cargo bay (they barely fit) before taking off. However, all the time he was muttering something about KNOWING that this was gonna be trouble. For the liftoff, Chris and Katie strapped into the communications and navigation stations behind the pilot and copilot seats. Chris glanced at the thrust gauges as the captain pushed the throttle levers forward and flipped switches. The gauges looked like they had been rather hastily spot-welded to the rest of the control panel, and one of them was upside down. Chris did not find this reassuring. After they were in space, the pilot leaned back, sighed. "Okay, I'll just let Hrethrraao plot the hyperspace jump, and we'll be outta here before you know it." "That reminds me, we haven't been properly introduced," Chris said. "I'm Major Chris Meadows, this is Major Katie Tanner. Wedge Defense Force, Valkyrie section." The spacer nodded. "I'm Captain James Farrago, my Wookiee friend here is Hrethrraao." Hreth waved a hairy paw and growled a greeting. "Nice to meet you...even nicer to meet your cred chit." He glanced back at Chris again. "You'd BETTER be who you say you are..." He left the sentence unfinished. "Oh, don't worry, Captain," Katie said coolly. "We are." Shortly thereafter, the MAGNUM CARTEL jumped to hyperspace. It was Chris's first time in hyperspace, and he had to admit that it was somewhat more impressive than warpdrive--from the inside, anyway. "Well, that's it, folks," Farrago said. "Nothing can touch us now...we're home free." Decker put down the phone handset and stared pensively off into nothing. So, his agent's arms smuggling had finally been figured out, eh? And the WedgeRats were sending someone back to investigate. Their ship had just jumped to hyperspace, and would be here within the week. How annoying. Fortunately, the situation could be salvaged. Not by killing the investigators...no, that wouldn't work, they'd only send more, and be suspicious this time. What was vitally important was that the whole thing not be traceable to him, personally. If that were to happen, it would ruin everything. Decker picked up the vidiphone handset once more, dialed a number. "Decker here. I need to speak to Sarrin." CHAPTER 19 "When action grows unprofitable, gather information; when information grows unprofitable, sleep." --Ursula K. LeGuin, THE LEFT HAND OF DARKNESS Chris spent the time in transit tinkering, and planning. On the CONSTELLATION, there was still one more thing that had to be modified, and that was the warp engines. True, he didn't have the parts to do the job he wanted to on them, but he was still free to tinker around. For the mission, he had borrowed a set of standard Hyper Valkyrie warp boosters, but he certainly didn't plan on keeping them. It is a little-known fact that heat shields aren't really necessary for an atmospheric reentry as long as you have enough fuel to slow down to atmospheric speeds. And for the Valkyries flown by the WDF, that was not a problem. Forget the Palladium Robotech RPG's warning that the boosters must be jettisoned before an atmospheric reentry--WDF jocks didn't fly that way. They just decelerated rather than barging blindly in...the difference between the finesse of a needle and the brute force of a bullet. But still, the boosters were large, bulky, and just a little clumsy. If they could be shrunk just a bit, and streamlined, the aerodynamic profile of the Valk would improve immensely. He'd tested this in a holodeck wind tunnel simulation. Chris had already been drawing up plans on the CAD system PCHammer had hacked up for him, and was looking forward to using Bombsight's more advanced CAD/CAM systems to make his plans a reality. Katie Tanner, on the other hand, spent the time playing holographic games against Captain Farrago. She tended to win at the fast-action games, due to the talent for quick thinking that all Valkyrie pilots had to have, especially those who flew for Eight-Ball. And her strategic knowledge stood her in good stead as well, though Farrago did manage to win more against her at 3D Chess than at Superdimensional Archon. By the end of the week, Katie was sitting around bored. Chris, however, had made some adjustments to the Valkyrie's new subspace transciever system, and was now tapped into a MUCK via Sub-ethernet. Then a new window opened on his Valkyrie's comm screen. It was Farrago. "We're entering the Planitia system," he said sarcastically. "They'll be hailing us any minute now. Think you'd better get up here?" "All right, I'm on my way." Chris took the time to kill the last Buma on WedgeMUD, then saved his character and logged out. Chris slid into the comm-tech's station behind Hreth and punched it up. "--ia control calling unidentified starship. Please respond, over." "Roger, Planitia control, this is the MAGNUM CARTEL, on approach Sigma Niner Niner," Chris said, pulling his WDF ID card out of his wallet and slotting it into a reader on the communication control board. "Transmitting clearance code now." Each WDF ID card had an optical data storage strip--like a magstrip, only better--which included a standard recognition code that allowed Bombsight (or any of a few other computers with the data in storage) to recognize its owner. "Uh, roger, CARTEL...receiving now..." The sound of keyboard clicks came over the subspace linkup. "CARTEL, you are cleared for landing in bay G7432D. Just follow the beacon in." Farrago clicked on his microphone. "Roger, Planitia control. On approach. Out." Lord Fahrvergnugen met Chris and Katie as they stepped down the ramp. "This is quite a surprise!" he boomed. "I did not expect to see you until the WAYWARD SON returned for another refitting." "We have some serious business to discuss with you, Lord F," Chris said. "And we need to talk to you alone." Lord Fahrvergnugen raised an eyebrow, but saw from Chris's expression that he was deadly serious. "Very well..." "Hey, what about us?" Farrago said from the ramp. "Have you ever seen our shipbuilding facility?" Lord Fahrvergnugen called back. "No? One of my men will show you around." "Now...what is the problem, my children?" Lord F asked. He called just about everyone from the original WDF "his children," even those who, like Chris, had arrived independantly of the Wedge. "Here, Lord Fahrvergnugen." Mako pulled out a WDF handcomp and handed it to him. "This is a list of weapons retrieved from an Atlantian freighter." Lord Fahrvergnugen took it, glanced at it. "Ah, the war you are in the process of stopping. Admirable job, I must say. It looks like--" Then he stopped in mid-sentence. "What is this?" He looked up. "These are Planitian weapons." Chris nodded. "Exactly. Somehow they got from here to Atlantia, to aid in the war effort against Doycha." "But--but this cannot be. We do not provide arms to those nations, or indeed to anyone outside of the WDF, Salusia, and a very few allies." "Yeah," Katie Tanner remarked. "But it looks like someone got them anyway." "I will have Bombsight trace these numbers forthwith," Lord Fahrvergnugen announced. "We already tried that, with Eve," Chris said. "Bombsight doesn't even have these numbers on record. It sounds like an inside job to me." "But who could DO such a thing?" Lord Fahrvergnugen wondered. "I have complete trust in all my employees." "Even the most loyal can turn...or be turned," Chris remarked. Fahrvergnugen nodded. "True. But who can it be? If I cannot trust one of my crew, I cannot trust any of them until that one is found." "That's why we were sent here: to find him for you," Chris said. "Or her," Katie added. "Or her, yes." Lord F nodded, fingering his beard. "And where do you propose to start looking?" "I think that we will first look for the people who could have handled the transportation and smuggling of the weapons," Chris decided. "Once we have him, he can tell us who covered for him." "An admirable objective," Wolfgang decided. "Here." He produced from somewhere within his voluminous cloak two gleaming silver badges with his personal seal on them. "These will give you authority as investigators anywhere within Utopia Planitia. Good luck." CHAPTER 20 "Greed is finally being recognized as a virtue...the best engine of betterment known to man." --William Safire Decker fidgeted at his desk. He hadn't WANTED to do it, to help send those weapons to Atlantia. Didn't Largo CARE if he blew his cover or not? But no, Largo had this plan to take over the star system if all went well, and in order for it to do that, they had to fuel the fighting between the planets within the system. So Sarrin handled making the shipments go "astray," and Decker erased all records of their existance from the computer. Decker couldn't get caught, he just COULDN'T. If that happened all of GENOM's plans would go down the tubes...and so would Decker, come to think of it. But how could he...? Then he had it. Surreptitiously, so that not even Bombsight would be aware of it, he rotated shift schedules at the munitions manufacturing sections of Utopia Planitia, to put at least one of his operatives on each watch. That man would be certain to steer the WDF investigators just the way he wanted them... The coverall-clad technician shook his head. "No...the only one I can think of off-hand is Sarrin!" He yelled this over the constant loud noise the assembly lines behind him made. "Sarrin?" Katie asked, punching the name into the handcomp. "Yeah, he's the 3rd-shift line overseer! He's the only one with the proper authority to move that kind of shipment, and the late hours would make it easier for him to do it unnoticed!" "Uh, thanks!" Katie said, making a note on the handcomp. "This IS all just theoretical, of course!" "Oh, of COURSE!" Katie nodded. Chris and Katie met over dinner at the Planitia McDonald's. "So. What'dya find out?" Chris asked, peering at Katie from behind a Big Mac. "This is the only name I came up with." Katie held up the handcomp, using a napkin to hold it since she didn't want to smear it with ketchup and mustard. "Some guy named Mal Sarrin. 3rd shift supervisor." Chris nodded, dipping a fry. "All right. We'll have to visit this guy as soon as we finish eating." There was a knock on the door. The middle-aged, balding man got off of his bunk bed in the small room. "Justaminnit, justaminnit, I'm coming..." He opened the door. "Oh, hi, Decker, what can I do for you?" "I have something I need to discuss with you, Sarrin. May I come in?" "Uh, sure, boss." "Good." The man strode into the room. Sarrin scratched his head. "What did you need to tell me sir?" "Goodbye, Hanover." "What?" "Reference from an old Terran movie. Never mind." "Huh, I--aaaaaah!" ZARK! Decker placed the smoking gun neatly in Sarrin's right hand, and then placed a piece of paper in his left. He then straightened his jacket and stepped back out of the room. When Chris and Katie got to Sarrin's room, they found that they were too late. Sarrin was dead, shot in the head by a laser pistol in his own hand. By his side was a suicide note, hand-written, that explained how he had arranged the shipment of the weapons to Atlantia, and the access codes which he had used to hack into Bombsight and erase all the records. He said that he "couldn't live with the shame of it," and so had decided to end it. Chris didn't really think this WAS the end of it, and neither did Katie, but what could they do? It was wrapped up nice and neat for them--the only thing it lacked was a bow. "What can we do?" Katie asked. "Probably the only thing we can do is go back to the SDF-17. We don't have any proof; we'll have to wait for the next time something odd happens. Maybe THEN we can find out who's really behind it." But they weren't going back just yet. Wolfgang insisted that they stay a few days before departing, and that went for their pilot, too. In fact, Captain Farrago was rather impressed with the shipyards, especially when Lord Fahrvergnugen, in a typical gesture of largesse, declared that he would allow Captain Farrago free access to tools, equipment, and personnel during their stay. Farrago and Hrethrraao immediately commenced tearing down and rebuilding one of the hyperspace drives, happy as could be. Chris also put some work in, building a set of improved booster pods for the CONSTELLATION. He reduced their aerodynamic profile, and even their overall size. The boosters would function as before, but they were slimmer, more rounded--a kind of "Invid Shock Trooper Meets WDF Valkyrie" look. Fortunately, he had been able to cut the size of the warpdrives and the booster engines somewhat. And to his delight, there was enough room left over to tack on four phaser emitters: two at the tips of the boosters, and two at the rear, just above the booster exhausts. They could draw their power from the warp engines. While not quite as powerful as a starship's phaser banks, they were still a good step up from the kind of weapon you would expect to find on a small fighter. Something else Chris did was put together a Cyclone for Danilia, like he'd said he would. Something in her size, of course...she was smaller than most of the other pilots. Scaling it down was a bit of a challenge, though. Meanwhile, Decker made a few calls, a few unrecorded hyperspace transmissions to some...friends. He'd changed his mind about destroying the investigators. All it would take was a little "accident" in hyperspace, and then... A few days later, Chris and Katie took their seats in the cockpit of the MAGNUM CARTEL once more, and Captain Farrago was hitting the switches, in a much more jovial mood now. 50,000 credits plus a chance to do an engine overhaul had certainly been worth a little trip to Utopia Planitia. He'd have to come back here again sometime. Fahrvergnugen had hinted that they might be able to use a pilot like himself in the WDF. And while he didn't exactly relish taking orders, well, having access to that kind of equipment just might be worth it. As they hit hyperspace, Farrago said, "Okay, that wasn't bad. If you guys ever need more transport, just look for me." And then, about eight hours into the trip, the CARTEL fell out of lightspeed drive with an audible KA-CHUNK! Katie fell to the deck, Chris bumped his head on the Valk's dashboard, and loud swearing and Wookiee growls emanated from the CARTEL's cockpit. Chris vaulted from the CONSTELLATION and ran over to the aft engineering console. He pressed the comm switch. "What is it?" "The damn Kilrathi! We dropped out of hyperspace right in front of a Kilrathi attack fleet! Of all the damn..." Chris switched off. "Right." He hit his communicator. "Katie, get down here on the double. Captain Farrago, stand by to depressurize the cargo bay and open the bay hatches." "What?!" Farrago sounded less than pleased. "It's the only way to get our fighters into play. Katie, come on!" The CARTEL began to shake with laser hits as Chris sealed his helmet and the cockpit. Katie jumped into her own Valkyrie, and they were ready. "Okay, Farrago, do it!" Pressure doors sealed over the cargo bay entry hatches. Air whooshed out with a hiss. Then the aft hatches opened, and Chris fired his thrusters. The CONSTELLATION scraped out of the CARTEL, followed by Katie's Valk. "Kilrathi, eh? We'll show 'em what's what! "Roger, Mako. Let's go get 'em." Chris spun his bird, dived, and came around the side of the CARTEL, targeting systems searching for a phaser lock. And he found one. There, that Salthi...Locked! Orange beams of light lanced out from the tops of the booster nacelles, centering on a hapless Kilrathi fighter and making it explode. From there, the phasers tracked over onto another fighter. Then the others scattered. Katie Tanner brought her own weapons into play, firing short-range missiles from under her Valkyrie's wings. They fragged a Dralthi. Then multiple cannon shots from a Jalthi nearly punctured her wing, and she rolled away. Kicking in the boosters, she muttered, "No way." She looped, and ended up on the Jalthi's tail. "Eat THIS!!!" A short burst from the GU-11 later, the Jalthi was a cloud of fragments and O-rings. "YEAH!!!" "Don't get too carried away, Temper," Chris advised, letting a Friend-or-Foe missile swerve by and then disposing of it with the nose lasers. "Carried away? I'm just getting STARTED!" Katie switched to Gerwalk and fired again. Another Kilrathi became One With The Cosmos. "Oh, yeah! Oh, YEAH!" "Just be careful...the CARTEL's started up with its turbolasers and I don't want you to get in the way." "That's a roger, Mako. Don't worry 'bout it." Obviously Katie wasn't...she pulled an amazingly sophisticated Immelman and blew both wings off a Dralthi. "This is GREAT!" "You should be where I'm sitting." Chris's Valkyrie now had a lower mass, but the same amount of thrust, for an improved maneuverability value. Uh-oh...Jalthi on his tail...Chris dodged, while lining up the crosshairs. LOCKED TARGET -- JALTHI. Firing rear phasers. KER-BLAM!!! There were some more explosions as the MAGNUM CARTEL's guns picked off a few more, and some whoops over the comm-net. "Hey, Hreth! That's two hundred more you owe me!" The Wookiee's growl contested this, but Farrago went on, "The hell they were! Those two were right in the center of the Money Lane, you saw 'em same as me!" "Mako! Look--it's two Dorkir cargo carriers, and a Ralari destroyer!" "So THAT'S what these guys are protecting...let's knock 'em out." "Chris...I'm getting something strange off of one of those Dorkirs...some kind of electromagnetic emanations, similar to the ones from a hyperspace engine." "Oh? Let me confirm..." Chris keyed his own advanced sensors. "Yeah, you're right! I bet that's what kicked us back into normspace!" "Let's kick it OUT of normspace!" Katie fired her boosters and moved in. "Whatever...hey, watch your back!" Chris took out a Dralthi that was getting too nosy. "Thanks, Mako...That destroyer is MINE!" Katie switched to Battroid and opened up on it. Chris, still in fighter mode, locked his phasers onto the transport and began firing. Its shields went down, and one of Chris's missiles finished it. Then Chris went in on the other transport and blew it away as well. The fighters turned and ran. Chris let them, they wouldn't be bothering anyone for a while. Chris and Katie decided to fly back to the WAYWARD SON under their own power, rather than bother with reloading the Valks into the MAGNUM CARTEL. After saying their friendly goodbyes, they engaged warpdrive, and soon made it back to the SDF-17 with no further incident. Upon reaching the ship, they found that (wonder of wonders) Vaughn had managed to work out a peace treaty that all sides could agree on. They had signed it, retired their warships, and got back to peacefully coexisting. "Hey, congratulations, Vaughn!" Chris said, meeting him in a corridor a couple of days afterward. "Um, thanks. It was pretty hard at first, but I managed to get them to see that all their fighting wasn't solving anything. I just hope they remember that for a couple hundred years." Chris shook his head. Vaughn was the type of person who did seven impossible things before breakfast. "Only you, Vaughn, only you." Not much later, Chris was showing off his new warp engines to PCHammer and the other members of the Clay Pigeons. "Hmm," PCHammer said. "Very...sleek." Danilia looked them over. "I like it!" she decided. "I wanna fly it sometime!" "I think you'll like this even more." Chris pulled himself up onto the Valk's fuselage and reached back to pop open the Cyclone compartment. Instead of his DVR-152 Battler II, which he'd left behind, here was a different Cyclone, smaller than the average model. "What is it?" Chris brought it down to the ground. "A DVR-120 Ferret light-model Cyclone. I built it especially for you. Scaled it down to your size and everything." "Wow!" Danilia looked like a kid who'd gotten a really neat Christmas present. "I always had trouble using the Battlers, but this looks just right!" "Oh, it is." Chris grinned. "It's even better-armed than most Battlers. 14 mini-missiles, two pulse guns, two light lasers. Better standardized targeting, more powerful engine. But don't tell 'em that or they'll all want one." PCHammer rolled his eyes. "Oh, yeah, we ALL know how Gryphon feels about everyone having his own specialized equipment." Chris nodded. "I think I'll wait a while before I begin full-scale production of these things. I don't think the WDF really needs 'em anyway. Maybe in a couple of centuries..." CHAPTER 21 "Oh yeah, life goes on...long after the thrill of living is gone." --John Cougar Mellencamp, "Jack and Dianne" And then the years passed. The relationship between Chris and Katie stayed about the same, just friends, but the very best of friends. They had arguments, fights from time to time, but they always made up and went on. Though many things stayed the same, the passing years brought technological advancements. Chris, Katie, and quite a few other pilots were soon fitted for cyberjacks, as the technology became readily available, and took to rigging their Valkyries, as well as a little decking. The increased response time over the 'trodes in the CVR helmets was phenomenal. Chris also built cyberdeck facilities into his Valkyrie, and a smaller one in his CVR armor. Of course, Chris didn't want to become dependant on the jacks--he made sure to stay in practice without them, and programmed his computer to disengage the jack at random intervals while in non-combat flight. Katie was of the opinion that he was slightly crazy, but she didn't say anything. PCHammer aged at the normal human rate, having refused to take Omega-2, and people started calling him "Grey." Chris was of the opinion that HE was slightly crazy for this, and once accused him of having refused the vaccine just so that he could earn another nickname. Hammer just grinned foolishly and said, "That's it! You've found me out!" Chris made additional improvements and upgrades to the CONSTELLATION. He replaced the snap-on forearm missile pods with short-range pulse lasers (a darnsight more useful in close combat than missiles), and installed an uprated subspace transciever and power boosters, giving the CONSTELLATION the equivalent power and range of a small starship. Some more work went into the cockpit minireplicator, and the liquid/solid waste recycling systems built into the acceleration couch. After that, he continued to tinker. But even so, things began to get boring for Chris. Building things was fine, and flying combat was okay, too, but it just wasn't all that fun after a few decades. The Clay Pigeons had been great fun, but Grey was getting too old for aerobatics. But then things changed. When PCHammer became a Transformer, Chris was utterly fascinated. Hammer explained it to him as best he could, but Chris wasn't satisfied. Even the tricorder scans he took didn't satisfy him, as even with all the technical training he'd taken, he still couldn't understand half of what the displays told him. (Actually, the device wasn't really called a tricorder; it was listed in inventories as a British-AnimeTech Personal Sensory Computer, model TR-580. But many of the crew called it a tricorder because it so resembled the compact scanner from Star Trek: The Next Generation. And also because it annoyed the hell out of Gryphon.) For a time, Chris considered taking a transfer to Cybertron, studying this mysterious overtechnology under Autobot med/mechanics. But every time he considered it, he thought of Katie Tanner. She was having a hell of a time flying with the Eight-Balls, and naturally if he went to Cybertron, she would want to come with him. Besides, with PCHammer young and vital again (as opposed to old and vital), the fun level aboard the SDF-17 had increased exponentially. So Chris put his Cybertron dreams aside for the time being, and got back into the swing of things. Chris started flying his Valkyrie more often, usually with the Clay Pigeons, who were more than happy to have him. Though he never officially joined the squadron, he flew so much with them that he earned the nickname of "the Pigeon Who Wasn't There." Which was fine with him. In the years to come, Chris didn't fly too many combat missions, but he didn't mind. Like PCHammer, he wasn't all that sanguine about the life of a fighter pilot. He'd been there for a few years, after all, and the memory of X-man's death was still with him. 2288. A lot of things had happened over the last couple of centuries. Katie had quit the Eight-Balls, for one, saying that she should probably let someone else have a chance at the top spot. Now, Chris and Katie Tanner flew off and on with the Clay Pigeons, or whenever a special mission was called for. They were now Lieutenant Colonels, which was just about the limit of Chris's ambition. He kept getting offered squadron commands, and kept turning them down, until Zoner hinted that he'd better take SOMETHING pretty soon or "something bad might happen." So he took a position in Engineering, overseeing part of the R&D department under ReRob. Since ReRob actually took a rather active role in R&D, there wasn't all that much Chris had to do, so he was free to do his own research, or fly missions, or do whatever he wanted. Then, only days before the ill-fated engagement on Musashi, Chris and Katie were called to the main conference room. "We have a problem," MegaZone said as Chris and Katie walked in. Chris noticed Kei and Yuri were also present, as was Gryphon. "A Salusian research facility has come under attack by armed terrorists. They currently occupy the outer grounds, and are advancing toward the main research center." "Have the scientists been evacuated?" Chris asked. "For the most part," Eve announced from the screen behind Zoner. "But some of the research being conducted is rather sensitive, and the Salusians would rather it not fall into terrorist hands." "They've asked that the WWWA send in a small team. So we're going in personally," Kei said. "But we need some air cover. We figured the CONSTELLATION would do, especially since her pilot is an engineer, whose technical expertise might come in handy." "And we thought that Katie could come along, too," Yuri said brightly. "After all, we've worked together before, and the more the merrier." "Sounds like fun," Katie said. "What's the plan?" "This is how it will go..." CHAPTER 22 " " --The Ventures, "Walk--Don't Run" -- NOTE: You may be wondering why the above quote has no words in it. This is because the Ventures are an instrumental group. -- I still say the Z-95 Headhunter is a worthless piece of crap. > Oh, yeah? You're talking to a guy who used to fly one for a living. Mako: You have my sympathy. > There is NOTHING wrong with the Z-95. I once downed six Kilrathi six-guns with a squadron of eight Zs, with only one personnel and three aircraft losses. I say it's not the PLANE that's deficient. May be the PILOT, though... Mako: And I say you're full of it. > Xeno: I would love to continue this discussion, but the buzzer just sounded. I'm outta here. See ya on the other end of the wire. > /signoff Back to the war... "Gah, what a LOSER." Chris slid the keyboard back under the dash and locked it in place, then logged off. The drop alarm had just sounded...three minutes to go until release. He was sitting in the cockpit of the CONSTELLATION, which was itself inside a small Valkyrie fighter bay on board the WWWA ship LOVELY ANGEL. Normally the Angels' own Hyper Valkyrie occupied this spot, but for this mission, they would be deploying his fighter to fly advanced recon while they moved in to secure the base. Chris punched up the intercom. "Mako to Temper. Hey up there! I'm reading two minutes to launch. You all ready?" "Roger, CONSTELLATION. We've got green all across the board." Katie was sitting at the Tactical station on the bridge. It wasn't used much, as the ANGEL generally supported a crew of two (three, counting Mughi) and the control boards at Helm and Navigation had been configured to control everything. "Great. I'm warming up the engines down here...ready when you are. Anything showing up on the ANGEL's sensors?" Yuri answered this time. "Negative, Mako. Just the base. If those terrorists are there, they must be using some heavy sensor reduction." "And that's what I'm here for," Chris said. "The sensor suite on CONSTELLATION should break through their jamming, especially when I'm close in. And with the firepower I can provide..." "Thirty seconds to launch..." Katie announced. "Twenty-nine...twenty-eight..." Chris flipped some switches, and the power systems of his Valkyrie engaged. The engines ignited, and the Multi-Function Displays on the instrument board came to life. He flipped down the visor on his CVR, and reached under his right arm to pull a small fiber-optic cable out of a slot on the armor. He plugged it into a jack on the instrument panel, hit the "go" button on the cybermodem control panel on his right arm, and felt the tickling sensation in his head of the Valk's flight control computer awaiting instructions. "Three...two...one...bay doors open; releasing launch bay interlocks, NOW. CONSTELLATION, you are go for separation." An onlooker from a chase plane, had there been one, might have observed the bright red Predator-class starship, resembling a Klingon Bird of Prey, swooping in over a yellow-tan desert planet. On the underside of this ship, a hatch opened, and a sleek white form fell through it, extending its wings. "Roger, Temper...dropping through now." The Valkyrie Veritech fighter dropped free of the Predator-class cloakscout, and ten seconds later its engines flared bright blue. "And I'm away! Will engage telemetry when I have something to report. Mako out." <<<"Rick Hunter Theme" (Robotech Soundtrack)>>> As the CONSTELLATION blasted away from the LOVELY ANGEL, Chris looked around his cockpit with satisfaction. It was pretty cluttered now, for many of the "improvements" Chris had made over the years had not been very neat. To Chris's left, attached to the cockpit wall, was a small touch-sensitive WDF handcomp, standard-issue, a multi-configurable terminal that Chris could detach for remote operations. To his right were three tricorders, arranged in a kind of a rack. The tricorders were hooked up to serve as subprocessors for the Valk's flight computer, specifically in regard to sensory functions. They maintained a subspace link to that computer, and were not actually essential to its operation, so one, two, or all three could be detached and used as remote sensors if the need arose. There was also storage space underneath for various sensory peripherals, including medical, subspace booster, and engineering devices. Gathering information was something that Chris considered very important. The computer they were connected to was located behind the fuselage, within the body of the CONSTELLATION. It was something of a patchwork, too. Its primary component was an optical computer that had once been one of the targeting system subprocessors for the LOVELY ANGEL (Kei and Yuri had presented it to him upon upgrading to a more powerful model). However, it shared out tasks among several lesser computers, connected together in a kind of strange-looking network that actually worked very well. The optical processor tied it all together, but was designed to support and be subordinate to a neural-net processor, like Eve, if Chris ever got around to installing one. The primary purpose of the small touch-sensitive display was to control the cockpit aud/vid playback system, so as to leave the forward MFDs free for flight operations. Chris reached over to it and thumbed up a song selection. As the music started playing, he flipped on his sensors, looking for whatever he could see. <<>> "Yeah...that sounds REAL good..." CHAPTER 23 "She's actual size, but she seems much bigger to me..." --They Might Be Giants, "She's Actual Size" The LOVELY ANGEL settled onto the desert, clouds of dust and sand kicked up by the thrusters billowing all around it. In the background was the tall mesa on which the research base was located, set against a pinkish-green sky with two moons in it. Looked something like a matte painting from STAR TREK or BATTLESTAR GALACTICA. As the engines on the Predator-class starship died, a ramp lowered and three motorcycles, with armored figures astride them, rolled down it. Then the lead figure detached a small control box from her belt and pointed it at the ship. The ramp swung slowly upward and sealed with the hull. The rider returned the box to her belt, gestured, and then raced her bike toward a narrow trail winding around the mesa, leading toward the top. In the lead was Kei, on her WOW-that's-black VR-052 Battler Cyclone. Her eyes swept the terrain in front of her as the bike roared along the narrow dirt path. Just behind her was Yuri, on a similar bike, and then behind them came Katie Tanner. Katie was riding the VR-152 Battler Chris had made for her, painted in the black, grey, and blue color scheme of the Eight-Balls (as was her CVR-4 body armor). On her right hip was a Gallant 1000, and under her left shoulder was an ElectroMag similar to Kei's, only with a customized handgrip. About halfway up the mesa, Kei transformed her Cyc-bike to Power Armor mode and rocketed straight up the side. Yuri followed, and then Katie as well. She'd been on a mission or ten in the past with the Lovely Angels, so she knew that the best thing to do in these matters was to follow their lead. They touched down on the clifftop, and there were the buildings, spread out before them. They knelt, facing each other, and Kei projected a holographic map onto the ground from an aperture in the Cyclone's arm. "The first step is to secure the perimeter. I'll take sectors one through twelve, Yuri, yours are twenty-five through zero, and Katie, you take sectors thirteen to twenty-three." "Thirteen...unlucky number," Katie remarked, checking the action on her Gallant. "Ready." Kei and Yuri drew their own guns. "Let's go," Kei said, and they split up, running across the mesa to cover their individual areas. Inside the LOVELY ANGEL, Mughi padded onto the bridge and bounded up onto the captain's command seat, which had been specially padded and the seatpost carpeted just for him (or so Mughi liked to believe) so that it served as a combination scratching post/kitty bed. Mughi snuggled up, made himself comfortable, and reached out a claw to flip the armrest switch that dimmed the bridge lights so he could sleep. He then dozed off, a small snot bubble on the tip of his nose expanding and shrinking in time with his slow, regular breathing. Chris made several sweeps of the terrain surrounding the mesa. Nothing unusual showing up...wait! What was that? Something large and metallic reading on his scanners...coming up from behind him. Fast. Chris brought the plane around, and noticed several Kilrathi fighters approaching. Dralthi, whee, easy. But these Dralthi were not flying in a Kilrathi formation. This was something that Chris probably wouldn't have noticed a couple of hundred years before. But over the decades he'd developed a keen sense of when something was Not Right. Time to see if they would die like Kilrathi even if they didn't fly like Kilrathi. Chris targeted the forward phaser banks in the booster pods on the lead ship and fired. The Dralthi was hit head-on, glowed, and exploded as the phasers blew it into flinders. "That's a good start..." But now the others were onto him, and they broke, scattering across the sky. "Great. Gotta take 'em one by one." Chris pulled the transformation switch and imaged the change; he actually FELT the changes taking place through his cyberlink, and he could even HEAR them--the fighter was making the peculiar buzzing humming sound common to Cybertronian Transformers. Even though the CONSTELLATION was not itself a Transformer, it did utilize some Cybertronian technology. For example, the gravitic-induction servomotors that increased the speed of the change by over 60% while at the same time producing that trademark transformational harmonic common to all Autobots and Decepticons. Those were Cybertronian, and a few of the microprocessors that helped hold its computer network together were as well. Chris had spent a few years on Cybertron recovering from a personal tragedy, and had picked up some of the basic technology while he was there. Needless to say, he had applied it. As the CONSTELLATION hit Gerwalk mode, the rifle slid down into its hand and it was ready. No GU-11 was this, but an EU-97 particle beam rifle. It was more compact, more powerful, and didn't run out of ammunition like the GU-11 did. The first Kilrathi broke left, trying to come around behind the CONSTELLATION. Bad move. Chris simply spun the Gerwalk-configured Valk around and opened up with the energy rifle/cannon. The Kilrathi ship jinked and dodged with extraordinary grace for a Dralthi. "What the--?" The Dralthi gave him a momentary view of its pipes, then spun on its axis. "But Dralthi can't do that!" Chris protested, even as he evaded the Dral's laser fire. "Sensors, full active sweep. Get me a scan of that ship!" As the sensor suites on the CONSTELLATION came to full on-line status, the faceplate on the ventral-mounted sensor head began to glow softly. A series of beeps and clicks issued from the three tricorders in the cockpit as they began to process the data. "They must have some kind of gravitic propulsion system," Chris muttered. He'd been working on such a system for the CONSTELLATION, but it wasn't off the drawing board yet. "What I wouldn't give for a good look at those engines..." Right now, though, he would settle for a good look UP those engines. Even the maneuverability of the Gerwalk wasn't proof against the mechanical precision of the enemy pilot. Chris growled as several laser shots slammed into the Valkyrie's side, shaking him around. "Damn, damn, damn..." Chris muttered, bringing the forearm-mounted pulse lasers into play. Rapid-fire beams of ruby-red light strobed across the Dralthi, and his sensors began registering hits. Then the Dralthi did something that startled Chris. Even though he was hitting it hard, and continuing to hit it, the Dralthi swerved and broke left, in the exact same maneuver it had tried earlier. This time, Chris followed it precisely with the pulse laser cannons, and nailed it as it went by. Ker-BOOM!!! "Odd...why did it do that? Repeat the exact same maneuver?" Chris wondered. "A drone pilot?" Then the other two remaining Dralthi came in, attacking from both sides, trying to catch him in a pincer. "Not gonna work. Just ain't a-gonna do it. Wouldn't be prudent," Chris muttered in his best "George Bush" impersonation (which wasn't really very good. In fact, it was downright lousy). He cut the Gerwalk's foot thrusters, and it dropped right out from between them. "Slag off, furball!" Chris yelled over the commline as he fired the Gerwalk's rifle at one, and the phasers at the other. The one that took the phaser hit spun out and crashed, and the other one's port engine blew out. It tried to limp away, but ended up making a forced landing. "Yes, WHOO!" Chris whooped. "Let's see what those sensor scans indicate..." He brought the Gerwalk in for a landing beside the Dralthi whose engine had blown out and checked his Gallant as the computer finished processing the results of its in-depth scans of the Kilrathi ships. "Let's see what we've got." Chris opened the canopy and grabbed the touch-sensitive handcomp from the left side of the cockpit. It came free with a rrrrip of Velcro unsealing. As Chris climbed out, he configured it to display the sensor scan results, and glanced over it as he approached the wrecked starfighter. "Hmm, standard drive with gravitic propulsion assist...reinforced titanium-molybdenum frame...Hmm, this is interesting, an enhanced nuclear generator and sublight drive. Geez, there's hardly any Kilrathi systems at all in here. The thing only LOOKS like a Dralthi, but its actual components...Hey, what's this?" Chris tapped some touchpads on the display to zoom in. "The logo on these parts...GENOM!" At that moment, as Chris was coming around to the front of the pseudo-Dralthi, a gleaming metallic fist punched through the shattered canopy. "Oh, SHIT!" Chris slapped the display board onto his belt and grasped his Gallant with both hands. Thumbing the power selector to the highest setting, he took aim and fired off the entire clip into the cockpit, aiming for the Buma that was slowly levering itself out. The gunfire ate away at the Buma's arms, legs, chest, head--chunks of metal went flying, but still the Buma rose. "C'mon, dammit, DIE!!!" Chris kept firing. The shots counter on the Gallant was counting down. 5...4...3...2... Then, the last shot hit the biomechanical monstrosity square in the face, and its head exploded. Ker-THWAM!!! Click...click...click... It took Chris a couple of moments to realize he was firing on an empty chamber. "Shit! Bumas! From GENOM! Shit!" Chris dropped the spent clip from the Gallant 1000, jacked another in, and holstered the gun. He reached down to the handcomp at his belt and tapped out the command sequence to power up the CONSTELLATION'S engines even as he ran for and vaulted into the cockpit. The canopy closed over him and he lifted off! In Cyclone armor mode, Kei crept around some odd, twisted rock formations, of varying sizes, from four to about twelve feet or so. The wind had eroded strange shapes into the cliff over the countless millenia it had been there, and it was still blowing even now. Like Monument Valley on those old westerns Gryph had shown her, she thought. That same orangeish color. Not too far away was the edge of the cliff. Kei paused for just a moment to stand, leaning with a hand braced against a rock formation to her right, and look out toward the horizon. (Imagine one of those Ninja Gaiden-style pans across the horizon from behind, right to left, with Kei remaining centered.) The desert was smooth, the air was clear, she could see for miles. Nothing broke the plain face of the sand thousands of feet below, at least, nothing that she could see. Off in the distance were a couple of the thin white clouds, cirrostratus or something, that were the only moisture condensation that this world would ever see. "Now, where are those terrorists...?" Kei wondered. Her Cyclone's sensors weren't showing anything yet... She continued picking her way between rock spires, through gullies and trenches... There! Something on the infra-red! Kei drew her E-Mag (no sense in making a lot of noise with minimissiles) and started working her way closer. "Scope up." The targeting scope in the Battler's shoulder rose up, slid in front of Kei's right eye. There was a soft "ping" as the smart targeting system integral to the gun interfaced with the shoulder sensor. Just around this one last rock spire...she would have a perfect shot...slowly...slowly...IR was reading it clearly now; four humanoid forms...almost everyone had been evacuated so it couldn't be friendlies...almost there...almost...NOW! ZARK! The head on one of the four olive-drab clothed, rifle-carrying soldiers jerked. Kei moved her gun along to the second soldier, when a rather curious thing happened...The soldier she'd shot raised his rifle and fired. The blast took Kei by surprise, blasting one of the chest sensor panels off and knocking her back against the rock formation behind her. "What the fuck--?" And then all four of the troopers stood, their skin sloughing off of them in a rather disgusting manner to reveal the metal underneath. Kei's blood ran cold. Bumas! They rushed her... Yuri, in her CVR, heaved herself up on top of one of the spires of rock. Now she had a great vantage point from which to make her recon sweep. She looked around. The edge of the cliff was maybe two hundred yards away, and unobstructed from her view for about a hundred and twenty degrees--precisely her assigned area. As Yuri scanned the area with her macrobinocs from left to right, something flickered. Movement! Yes--an arm had just come over the cliff, and the rest of a body was following. Yuri put down the binocs and unsling a laser rifle from her back. This was a specially-designed sniper's rifle, and it had been made especially for her. While Kei was the better shot with a sidearm, Yuri was unparallelled with a rifle. She raised the rifle to her eye, looking through it but keeping the other eye open as well, and lined up the crosshairs. Just as the man's head rose up over the edge, she put a laser blast into it. The man lost his grip, and dropped silently off the edge. Then two more heads started coming over the cliff. ZARK! ZARK! And more. "Shit, this is like the pan-and-zoom from the NES Platoon game." ZARK! Some of them actually got all the way up, and they spun and dropped most picturesquely. But after several minutes of sniping, they quit coming. Yuri waited for about ten minutes, but they didn't show up. "What now?" She looked around. She know that Katie and Kei probably wouldn't appreciate any help..."I know! I'll secure the base!" She put her legs over the edge and slid to the ground, slinging the rifle and hopping on her Cyclone. She pressed the starter switch, and drove off toward the nearest airlock entrance... Katie walked across the terrain, making her patrol sweep. By some chance, she'd been assigned the flattest section of the mesa--almost no rock spirals of any kind, just a gradual dropoff toward the edge of the mesa and the thousands of feet to the ground below. As she walked, in full Cyclone armor, she fingered the handle of her ElectroMag nervously. Something had been bothering her all day...she wasn't sure what it was. A premonition perhaps? Ever since her wakeup call that day, she'd been jumpy, on-edge. "Bad Moon Rising," by CCR. "Don't go 'round tonight, or it's bound to take your life...there's a bad moon on the rise." The refrain played itself out in her head, over and over, and there was nothing she could do to make it quit. She knew that Kei and Yuri were supposedly psychic...could it be "rubbing off" on her? Could just being around them be causing her to get a psychic flash? She shivered. Maybe she shouldn't have taken this mission...No, don't be ridiculous. You hardly get any chances to work with Chris as it is, and work has been spotty since quitting the Eight-Balls...you couldn't have stayed behind. She tried to stop thinking like that. In covert missions, you often made your own luck, and dwelling on the chance that something could happen to you was not the way to survive. What was that over there? The sensors were reading something... Deep inside the base, one of the few remaining scientists sat at a monitoring station watching the cameras. So the 3WA team had come, and were fighting the enemy even now. But there was no way they could win, this man knew that. The 3WA had not been fully informed. They'd just been told that this was a research base, and that it was under attack by terrorists. They had not been told that it was a bio-weapons lab, and GENOM wanted what it was making. The risk was deemed too great--bio-weapons were not exactly in favor with most governments at the time. The old Salusian shook his head. Why had he done it? Why had he gone to work for the megacorp that, though supposedly Salusian, was actually not government-sanctioned at all? For the money, he guessed. Damn sure couldn't be for anything else. It was all over now. He had to act fast, before GENOM broke through. They damn sure wouldn't get anything they could use, and it was going to cost them dearly to get in at all. He moved to another console, one with red lights, switches, and levers, and started pulling them down. The reflex furnaces began to go from neutral to active status. CHAPTER 24 "I am descending From heaven above So catch me, I'm falling Hold on to my love..." --Pretty Poison, "Catch Me I'm Falling" Chris streaked for the plateau at full burn. Katie and the Angels could be in danger! Chris cursed himself for a fool for not going in with them, though he knew that there was no way he could have done that. "Mako to team! Mako to team! Urgent! Be n your guard! These aren't terrorists, they're--" Katie nearly jumped when his voice came over the headset. But then it faded out as a lot of interference came over the air. She tapped the comm switch on her armrest. "Mako! Mako, say again! I lost your signal. Mako, come in!" Yuri also winced as the signal broke up. She fingered her earring, the CVR helmet being off now. "Mako? I'm not receiving you...what did you say?" Kei heard but was too busy to reply. Besides, she was pretty sure she could guess what Chris had been about to tell her. "Gyah!" ZARK! ZARK! "Kei! Yuri! Temper! Do you read me!" A whole lot of static interference had come over the commline. On the port MFD, data appeared indicating that energy was beginning to build at several points beneath the mesa. Chris barely glanced at it. He was now directly over the plateau, and descending toward it. He barely bothered with retrothrust, and was jerked forward when the Gerwalk touched down. "Oof!" Grabbing the handcomp and a tricorder, he jumped out and hit the ground running. <<>> Katie was still trying to contact Chris, when suddenly she realized she wasn't alone. A dozen...no, two dozen...no, MORE gleaming metal forms had just shot up from the edge of the cliff, trailing thruster fire. Katie recognized them instantly from file photos, though she'd never personally fought any. Bumas! She fired her plasma minimissiles and took about six of them out, then they closed to hand-to-hand combat range and things got hazy. One of the Bumas fired its thrusters and leapt right toward Kei. She fired a plasma mini right into it, but then the other followed and bodyslammed her into the rock. She brought her knee up in what would have been an excruciating blow for humans, but it just sent this Buma flying back a few feet. It extended cyberblades, slashed downward at her. She crossed her arms for a parry and bind, then brought up her foot and kicked the boomer in the chest, throwing it back into two of the others. Before they could do anything else, she fired her remaining plasma minis into them, wasting them. The Bumas were too close for weapons, pressing in all around her. She couldn't move without hitting a Buma, so she took full advantage of this, firing the VR-152 Battler II's arm cannons and kicking and punching. The missiles on arms, hips, and chest took care of more Bumas, but they JUST KEPT COMING! And Katie's armor was taking hits, too, with blades and weapons. A vibroblade penetrated her left thigh, and she screamed, slamming the Buma's head with a backhand that nearly decapitated it. Then a hot poker lanced through her right side, from behind, and she turned to fire her cannons at a Buma with a laser rifle. She coughed up blood. "Shit!" She didn't notice that the Bumas had been herding her toward the edge of the cliff until she was almost on it. She tried to regather her strength, push her way forward...but suddenly she found herself falling. Katie's thrusters cushioned her fall somewhat, but only one of them worked. So she fell somewhat erratically, banging against the side of the cliff and turning over and over...her hands scraped furrows in the rock wall as she tried desperately to slow down. Finally, she hit the bottom with a loud WHUMP! and an agonizing pain in her left leg. Broken, she was sure. And she hurt all over, and her ribs were on fire...She coughed, and blood covered what was left of her faceplate, which was cracked and shattered in several places. "Fuck..." Katie said, looking up as a shadow fell over her. It was a big ol' Buma, standing over her, with what she could swear was a sadistic look on its plate-metal face. Then its chest exploded, and dozens of living-metal tentacles reached out hungrily for her. Katie's last thought was this is going to hurt. A lot. And it did. Chris ran over to meet Kei. Her Cyclone was nicked in several spots, and it had taken a couple of serious hits, but she appeared unhurt. "Kei! They aren't terrorists, they're Bumas!" "I noticed," Kei remarked drily. "Quickly. Where are Katie and Yuri, they could be in terrible danger!" Chris realized how melodramatic that sounded, but there was nothing to be done about it now. "Yuri went that way, Katie that way." Kei pointed. "On perimeter patrol--" "Okay. I'll go find Katie, you get Yuri. We've got to get off this rock!" "Right. We'll meet at the LOVELY ANGEL in ten minutes." "Gotcha." CHAPTER 25 "Can't get no satisfaction, runnin' around with a chain reaction..." --Drivin'N'Cryin, "Chain Reaction" The Salusian scientist pressed the switches down, one by one, each switch another nail in the coffin of this laboratory facility's doom. All the failsafes were being overridden, one by one. Now all that remained was to set the reflex furnaces to maximum overload. The reactors would chain-react, and the base would destroy itself in a glorious ball of fire. He reached over to the lever, rested both hands on it as if trying to build up the strength to pull it down. Then his muscles tensed, he exerted force, and the lever slid into place with a loud ker-CHUNK. All around him, the scientist heard the low-pitched tone that was rising, increasing, would soon be a high-pitched thunderous roar. He relaxed in the chair. Nothing could stop it now. Soon both he and the base would be destroyed. With a glance toward the large NO SMOKING sign over the door, the scientist pulled out a large, antiquated-looking pipe and a bag of tobacco. He filled the pipe slowly and with relish, then lit up and puffed away, the trace of a smile on his otherwise impassive face. Chris vaulted back into the cockpit of the CONSTELLATION and took off again, heading in the direction that Katie had gone. As he approached the edge of the cliff, he knew that something was definitely wrong. There were Buma parts scattered everywhere, and his sensors were revealing metal components from a Cyclone, and human blood as well. "Shit. Katie!" Chris called over the external speakers. "Katie?!" Sensors revealed no functioning biomechanicals within range. No Katie either. Chris began to shake despite the warmth of the cockpit. There was only one direction she could have gone and not shown up on his sensors. Straight down. He tapped the comm again, using subspace frequencies this time. "Mako to Temper. Katie? Are you out there?" He held his breath, waiting for an answer. Static. And then... "--is Temper, calling Mako. Chris, I read you and I'm all right! It'll take more than a few Bumas to keep me down." Chris let his held breath whoosh out in a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness. Katie, where are you?" "The bottom of the cliff. I'll meet you at the ANGEL, okay?" "That's affirmative, Katie...I'm going to--What in the hell?" "What is it, Chris? Say again?" "Sensor readings have gone off the scale. There's some sort of massive power buildup in the heart of the mesa...I think it's a reflex furnace, or several of them. Shit, it's gonna blow any minute!" Chris punched some more keys. "Mako to Kei and Yuri! Do you read me? Emergency! Emergency!" Kei pulled out the old Starfleet-style communicator that Ben insisted she carry and flipped it open. "Kei here. What is it?" "Kei, this is Mako. Listen. My Valk's sensors are picking up a BIG disturbance under the base. I think it's reflex furnaces, and they are very shortly going to blow in a very big way. I estimate like eight minutes or so. I'm en route to the ANGEL now, and will be bringing it up to pick you up before it blows. Get to Yuri and tell her this also." "This is Yuri, and I hear you." In the background, footsteps could be heard. "But I'm almost to the master control, and I may be able to shut it down..." "Don't take chances. Just get out of there. Kei, will I be able to lift the ANGEL without you there?" "Mughi will know the codes," Kei responded. "See ya." She flipped the antenna grid shut and returned the communicator to her utility belt. Chris jumped out of the CONSTELLATION even as it touched down, and ran for the LOVELY ANGEL while at the same time tapping a series of commands on the WDF handcomp at his waist. Behind him, the canopy of the Valkyrie closed, the Gerwalk-mode fighter launched itself into the air, then converted to full jet mode and boosted off into space. "Chris!" It was Katie Tanner. She was running hard, and her Cyclone was falling apart around her. There went the left missile cover...and the right wheel...and the entire right arm of the CVR...She reached up, took off the helmet. There was blood on the faceplate, Chris noticed. "Katie! Are you all right?" Katie nodded. "Just fine. Nothing that Omega-2 couldn't handle. Right now we have to get Kei and Yuri and get out of...ooh." She collapsed against Chris. "Guess I'm a little tireder than I thought I was." "You get to sickbay and get some rest. I'll go get Kei and Yuri." The tricorder in Chris's right hand was counting down from six minutes as Chris entered the LOVELY ANGEL through one of the boarding hatches and made his way toward the bridge. Five minutes, as the door slid open onto a darkened bridge. Chris stepped in, fumbled for the lighting keys beside the door, brought the bridge into full illumination. There was a screeching yowl as Mughi leaped about three feet off the command seat, flailed around in the air, and landed on his face in front of the seat. CLONK! "Mughi! We have to raise ship in a hurry, and rescue Kei and Yuri!" Mughi got up, shaking his head to clear it. What did this human want? Chris shoved the tricorder in front of Mughi's face. "That's how long Kei and Yuri have left to live if we don't go get them forthwith. Now get off your butt and help me!" Mughi stiffened. No human talked to him like that, except Kei and Yuri! But noticing that the Lovely Angels had only about four minutes left by the clock on Chris's tricorder, he decided to forgive it just this once. Mughi ran forward to Navigation as Chris sat down at Helm. Mughi entered the access codes, and Chris powered up the ship. He'd flown Predator-class vessels before, so the control layout was nothing new to him. However, the added power in this vessel WAS, and the ship listed to one side as he overcorrected. Mughi rolled out of his seat, and once again landed on the floor, on his head. THUMP! "Uh, sorry about that. Maybe you should have fastened your seatbelt." Mughi glared at him, promising to get even later. But Chris had it under control now. Punching buttons and flipping switches, he maneuvered the ship toward the crest of the mesa. There wasn't quite room to land it, but he could hover next to the base. "Three minutes. Where's Kei?" Chris punched the comm switch. "LOVELY ANGEL to Kei. Three minutes left, where are you?" Kei emerged from a hatch on the base exterior. "Here! Pop the bridge hatch!" she called into her communicator. A small hatch on the underside of the nose of the Bird of Prey-like craft fell open, a rope ladder dropping out of it. Approximately ten seconds later Kei was up it and on the bridge. "Two and a half minutes..." Chris announced. Kei shoved Mughi out of Navigation and sat down. Mughi walked stiffly back toward the command chair, a pained look on his face. Kei ignored him in the urgency of the moment. "Where the hell is Yuri?!" Yuri was currently standing with a smoking gun in the open bulkhead door to the master control room (having shot out the lock). She was looking at an old man in a lab coat smoking a pipe in blatant defiance of the "no smoking" signs. "Hello, young lady," he said. "In just under..." He glanced over at the panel. "...three minutes this place will be a smoking hole in the ground. And there's nothing you can do to stop it." He blew a smoke ring her way. Yuri pinched her earring. "Mako, this is Yuri. I've found one of the scientists down here." "Bring him with you and get to a higher level of the base," Kei responded. "We'll blast a hole open and get you out!" "Come on," Yuri said. "I'm not leaving. I--" "There's no time to argue. Either you come now, or I'll shoot you and carry you. Which would you prefer?" Shaking his head in resignation, the man got up. "Very well. But I'm only doing this for your sake." "That's very reassuring. C'mon, MOVE!" Kei jacked into the controls and targeted phasers. "They're in the elevator..." she muttered. "Moving upward." She keyed the commline again. "Okay, stop there and get down. I'm going to burn through." "A minute and a half remaining..." Chris remarked. "I'm going to move in closer so we can get them out." "Do it." Kei looked at the monitor ahead, as crosshairs only she could see zeroed in and locked on. "Firing." The orange beams lanced out, making a smoking hole in the metal. "There! There they are!" "I'm putting the port wing next to the hole..." Chris pressed some keys and then held down on the maneuver buttons very, very carefully. "There." Kei switched the main screen to a view to port. It showed Yuri and the scientist clambering across the wing into one of the hatches. "45 seconds..." Chris announced. "Get us out of here!" Kei said. "You got it." Chris punched the proper controls to seal all hatches and fire thrusters. The LOVELY ANGEL blasted skyward at top speed. Even the inertial dampers were slow to compensate for the degree of thrust Chris poured on. Chris and Kei were pushed back in their seats. Mughi, unprepared, fell out of the comm seat and went bouncing across the bridge floor, ending up upside down under a console at the back of the bridge. He grumbled, muttered, and otherwise did a passable impersonation of an irritated Gryphon. Chris put the rear view up on the screen, the mesa behind them with the base atop it, looking calm and clear. A few seconds later, the mesa shattered with a rumbling roar. A fireball blossomed up into the sky, and the LOVELY ANGEL, in the upper atmosphere though it was, was still buffetted by shock waves (this pleased the already irritated Mughi to no end). "Gah! The EM pulse knocked out half our sensors!" Chris yelled. "Compensating." Kei twigged some switches, punched some keys. "Okay, we're all right." "Whew." Chris wiped his brow as the shocks finally settled down. The bridge door slid open behind them, and Yuri walked in. "Oh, hi Yuri." Chris stood from the Helm, and Kei took his position. Yuri sat at Navigation, her customary demesne. "How's the scientist?" "Oh, he's okay. He keeps muttering something about retiring." Chris stepped back to Tactical. "And did you see Katie?" "Yeah, she's in sickbay, resting. Looks a little pale, but insisted she's all right." "You think she is?" Chris slid his WDF handcomp into an interface bracket on the panel, tapped some commands on it and on the control board. "I'm going to bring the CONSTELLATION into the docking bay, if that's okay with you?" Kei said, "Go ahead." "Yeah, I think so. She's like us, it'll take a LOT to keep her down." Yuri punched some keys at Navigation. "Okay, CONSTELLATION, you are clear to land." "Thanks...opening bay doors...matching speeds..." Chris entered commands on the handcomp at the same time he flipped switches and pressed buttons on the Tactical control panel. He glanced at a small monitor which was currently showing a view from above the open bay doors as the CONSTELLATION matched speeds with the LOVELY ANGEL, then rose, slowly...slowly...The docking attachments clicked, the Valk was secured, and the bay doors closed. As Chris powered the Valk down, he said, "Okay, we're clear." And another mission ends as usual for the Lovely Angels, Chris thought. Yuri glared at him briefly, then turned back to the controls. Had she read his mind? Well, they WERE psychic... "Setting course for SDF-17 rendezvous..." Kei announced. "Course set, and here we go!" The LOVELY ANGEL leaped into warp. Destination: the WAYWARD SON. Katie Tanner stepped out of sickbay, in a fresh uniform. She looked in perfect condition, except for her paleness and the trail of dried blood leading out the corner of her mouth that she'd forgotten to wipe away. She reached down, checked the load on her ElectroMag pistol, then reholstered it and began to walk forward. As she passed under a shadow, her eyes gleamed bright red. CHAPTER 26 "I see your red eyes shining down on me..." --Danielle Dax, "Dead Man Chill" Chris was replacing the shorted shield transducer when Katie Tanner stepped into his workshop/launch bay. Chris tossed his wrench aside, wiped his hands on a rag, and walked over to greet her. "Are you sure you're all right?" It was the day after the mission, but Katie still seemed a bit pale. "I'm FINE, Chris," Katie said. "I just haven't been getting enough UV, that's all." "I think you should have Jenna scan you just to be sure," Chris said. "No, I don't need it." Katie grinned. "Listen, we can talk about this later. Right now I need to go do something. I'll see you in a little bit. Bye!" She turned to go. Chris reached behind him and whipped out a medical tricorder. With a few quick keystrokes, he got what data he could before she was out the door. If something was seriously wrong with her, he could have Jenna confine her to quarters or something... "Now to collate it..." Even though Chris was no doctor, he was a qualified paramedic thanks to a few training courses he'd taken over the years. He more than knew his way around a medical tricorder. "What is WITH her?" Chris wondered. "She's been so distant lately. Ever since..." The data started coming up. "Shit!" He looked closer, punched for a detailed analysis. "Double-shit!" He closed the tricorder, grabbed his Gallant. "Eve, where's Katie Tanner?" The large wall screen lit up with Eve's face. "Lieutenant Colonel Tanner is in Elevator 17, heading for deck--" "Stop her! Keep her where she is!" Chris hastily slapped on his CVR-3 armor. "Call security!" "Why?" "Just do it!" Chris checked his gun and ran out of the room. What he'd seen in the scan had him panicking. <<>> Katie Tanner stepped into the elevator, a characteristic devil-may-care grin on her face. What was not characteristic was the red glow in her eyes, and the way she was stroking the handle of her custom E-mag. The elevator doors opened, and one of the pilots from Zebra flight got on. This pilot considered himself something of a ladies' man, and was currently after Katie Tanner, despite (or perhaps because of) her friendship with Chris. "Hi, how's it going?" the pilot asked, trying to start a conversation. Katie didn't say anything; she just stood there looking at the doors. He tried again. "I hear you just got back from a mission. Guess that must be some pretty important stuff you're doing, eh?" Still no response. Not even a chewing out for talking to one's superior officer that way. Maybe the direct approach would work better. "So, you free Friday night?" Katie Tanner absently drew her gun and shot him through the heart. ZARK! The pilot looked down at the hole in his chest, shock and horror plainly writ across his face. As he fell back against the wall, he gasped, "I guess that means...no..." He slid down to a sitting position on the floor, leaving a bloody streak against the metal wall behind him. His eyes closed, and he slumped forward. Katie spun the gun on her finger and reholstered it. She stepped out the elevator and ran down the corridor. About ten seconds later, Chris ran up from another corridor, put his arm in the door to stop it from closing. "Katie, you--Oh, SHIT!" He propped the door open with his Gallant, then knelt beside the slumped body, pulled his glove off and checked for a pulse. The man's eyes fluttered open. "'sallright. Detian," he rasped. "'llbe...okay." "Shit," Chris said. "I've got to stop her before she kills someone!" He punched the "EMERGENCY" button on the elevator panel, retrieved his gun, and ran down the corridor after Katie. The wounded pilot leaned back against the corner as his body slowly began to heal itself, and reflected that this was the LAST time he went after another pilot's girlfriend. It just wasn't WORTH it. "Katie, hold it!" Katie Tanner turned around. Target: One, humanoid. Identity: Meadows, Christopher Edward. Handle: Mako. SSN: 429--... Holding weapon Gallant 1000. Threat assessment: Level 4 (moderate). Recommended course of action: Query. "Mako, what is it?" "I know what you are, Katie. Just put your weapon down, and I can help you." Assessment: Target has acquired unit's operational status. Cover blown. Recommended course of action: Attack. Katie lunged at Chris, faster than he would have thought she could. "Damn!" Chris yelled. Even as he brought the gun up, three shots from Katie's electromag penetrated his right leg and arm. His gun went flying. "Damn!" With his left hand, Chris pulled his backup gun, a Glock 2000, from its position at the back of his belt and started snapping off shots at Katie. Though he was left-handed, he fired his gun right-handed and wasn't as good at left-handed shooting, especially with only one hand. Assessment: Firing. Threat assessment: Level 6 (moderate). Recommended course of action: Continued attack. As Chris continued snapping off shots, shells tinkling on the metallic floor, he was treated to a sight that he would remember for a long, long time, and that would haunt his nightmares for years to come. Katie's eyes glowed bright red, and then her skin exploded outward from her body in a tan and red haze. Underneath was gleaming, silvery metal. She sprang forward... "Shit!" Chris yelled, still firing. Then he ran out of ammo. "Dammit, Katie, don't DO this!" Assessment: Target wounded, out of ammunition. Threat assessment: Level 2 (minimal). Recommended course of action: Break off attack. Katie stopped. Chris didn't know why. Her eyes flashed at him again, then she turned, fired thrusters at shoulders and hips, and raced off down the hall. "Shit! I've got to stop her before she hurts anyone else!" He reholstered the Glock, grabbed his handcomp (with his left hand, the right was still hanging limp). "Lucky I'm left-handed," he muttered, magna-locking the handcomp to the front of his left leg and tapping out a key sequence on it. In Chris's launch bay/workshop at the rear of the ship, the CONSTELLATION sat in the middle of a landing pad, lit harshly by the spotlights hanging from the ceiling. It was a perfect still-life, or would have been had anyone been there to see it. Then the still-life took on motion, as a panel on the old Valk flipped open, just behind the cockpit, and something stood up, a humanoid silhouette against a lit section of the wall behind it. Thrusters fired from two protruberances at the shoulders, and the thing leaped to the deck. As it ran out, metal-shod feet striking sparks and ringing echos off the metallic deckplates, it was visible in the light. Its shape was instantly recognizeable. It was a motoroid, BGC-type, sort of, colored red. Only it was a little bigger and chunkier than the average. As soon as it was out the door, it kicked in full thrust and rocketed down the corridor. Major Adam Johnson, aka pfloyd, CO of the 22nd Special Operations Service (The Hammers), was walking through the corridors of the ship, on his way to see ReRob about some ideas for new weapons for his unit. He walked along, singing an old Damn Yankees song to himself. "Hey brother, ready for another dose of my Yankee pride?" He crossed a junction when something glinted in the corner of his right eye. He turned to look down that corridor, and was astonished at what he saw. "Aw shit..." he cried as his jaw dropped and his eyes bulged. The Buma that was Katie Tanner stood over a terrified crewman, about to plunge its cyberblades into his neck. The mech's head turned and saw pfloyd standing there. She bellowed in a way that only Bumas could and turned to face pfloyd. As soon as his wits returned, he reached into the black satchel that hung by his left hip and drew a heavy pistol... Chris heard the whining sound of the engines down the hall before he saw it coming. He staggered out into the hall, favoring his right arm and leg. Even though the Omega-2 had kicked in, it would be a little while before arm and leg had healed completely. The red motoroid came to a halt in front of Chris, and the front opened up. Grunting with the pain, Chris pulled himself up into it, lifting his right arm into place with his left and latching it, pulling his right leg up and locking it in, and then attaching left arm and leg normally. The motoroid locked shut around him, and blasted off down the hall. The corridors around pfloyd echoed the sound of a Smith and Wesson model 29 revolver. He snap-fired all six .44 Magnum shells at the Buma's body, only to watch them bounce off. He turned and ran down the corridor, back the way he came, letting the cylinder of the gun drop open to release the empty cases. He reloaded on the run with a speedloader and flicked the gun closed. He then turned and aimed. The Buma was just turning the corner as he lined up the white outline of the rear sight with the red ramp of the front, locking in on the head. Two shots were quickly fired. He saw the sparks from impact, but he could not tell if there was any damage. He turned to run again, and ducked down a narrow hallway just as the Buma fired its jets. The Buma couldn't make the turn to follow him. pfloyd sighed in relief as he took a few more items from his satchel, securing them in various places around his body. He then left his satchel and ran back into the corridor, running in the original direction he wanted to go in the first place. He heard the whine of the Buma's jets not too far behind him. He knew she was coming in for another attack. He turned around just in time to see her barreling down the corridor, her arms outstretched. He hastily fired the last four shots in the Magnum, then dropped it as she was nearly within arm's reach. When the time was right, he slipped to the side and grabbed her wrist. Keeping his hands tightly gripped around hers and maintaining the entire hold in front of his center, he pivoted, taking the Buma for a ride. She switched off her jets just before he let her go. She sailed into the massive doors of a cargo bay, crushing them. His right hand was a blur as he drew a heavier handgun from his left hip. He brought it to aim as his left hand steadied the gun in a proper two-handed Weaver grip. He looked through the scope on the frame, centering the dot on the Buma's chest. He calmly squeezed the trigger. The report was louder than the revolver...the impact was greater... He had acquired this treasure on his first visit back to Earth, through not-so-legal channels. He loved his Desert Eagle in .50 Action Express, not only because it could deliver over 1400 foot-pounds of energy to its target, but because it was actually one of the most powerful handguns in the world back in the late 20th century. He had kept this particular piece under lock and key, bringing it out only for demonstrations. However, he was going to use it as a source for a new heavy tactical pistol for the Hammers. He was glad he had it. There was a very loud *BOOM* as the pistol fired. A ball of muzzle flash larger than a canteloupe hung in the air. Twin "rabbit ears" stood straight up from the muzzle's gas compensator, helping to force the muzzle back on target quickly. pfloyd had always enjoyed using the 325-grain hollowpoints in this gun...in fact, he had cast and relaoded his own round. He had also designed a new one. A round he was now using. The round was still a hollowpoint, but it now contained a white phosphorous charge inside it. He saw the impact sparks, and fired a second shot. He ceased his fire to watch the results. He could smell the Willie Pete doing its job, trying to burn its way through the Buma's armored shell. He kept his gun trained on the mech as he inched his way closer. It lay very still. He was within eight feet of it when it lashed out at his legs. He jumped back, but the hand still nicked his foot, causing him to go off-balance. He lost the gun as he hit the floor. He pushed off a wall to put some distance between him and the Buma, who was now getting up. Pf performed a backwards roll and landed on his feet, waiting for the Buma. She charged him without using the jets. Just as she reached him, he dropped low and spun, swinging his right leg out as he did so. The mech tripped over the leg and slammed into the deck. Pf righted himself and began running down the hall, away from the mech, pulling something from his belt. The Buma started to rise and turn. Just as it roared again, pf turned and tossed something in the hall, then continued running away. Target: One, humanoid; Identity: Johnson, Adam. Handle: pfloyd. Variety of weapons detected. Threat assessment: Level 8 (extremely dangerous). Recommended course of action: Terminate with extreme prejudice. Sensor contact: canister, 10cm x 4cm radius. Identification: unknow--- The canister exploded in midair, three feet from the Buma's head. Eight very bright flashes, equal to 500,000 candela, and eight thunder-like explosions (around 150db each) caught the mech by surprise. Its hands went to its temporarily overloaded optics. The auditory sensors couldn't register anything. The mech roared once again. pf turned the corner, heading back to the Buma. He ran at full tilt, and leaped into the air, right leg extended. His foot slammed into the Buma's head at precisely the point where he wanted to hit: just around the ear. The Buma's head recoiled from the blow, and pf bounced off and away, landing in a crouch. His foot hurt like the blazes now, but he wouldn't stop. He surged forward again, landing a perfect hook kick to the Buma's head again. The mech fell backwards, trying to protect herself; however, she was still blind and deaf, and couldn't tell where the blows were coming from. pf kept kicking and throwing the stunned Buma until it was severely dazed and disoriented. He then stepped back a few paces and found his Eagle. He snatched it up and thrust it into his waistband as he kept backing up. He then reached into his pocket and pulled out a small strip...the strip held a half-dozen mini-grenades, similar to the old Italian MU50Gs. He quickly held down the spoons with one hand and pulled each pin with the other, pressing the backs to the floor. He carefully removed the first egg as the Buma started to get up. He tossed it down the hall, watching the spoon fly off. The then gave a forceful shove to the rest, sending the strip down the hall. He threw himself down an adjacent corridor and lay prone, covering his ears, closing his eyes and opening his mouth. Half a dozen explosions resounded in the hall, followed by a nightmarish mechanical scream. pf scrambled to his feet, drawing the Eagle. He turned the corner and sighted in on the Buma. A massive shock went through his arm, instantly numbing it. He screamed as the Pachmayr grips of his Eagle slipped from his hand. The gun clattered to the floor. He turned to see Chris with a heavy security team charging down the hall toward the Buma. Chris stopped at pfloyd, who was now holding his arm. "What the fuck did you do that for?" pf screamed. "I almost had it!" "I didn't want you to kill her!" "Her?" "That's Katie!" pf looked at the mech, who was now being trussed up with numerous sets of heavy security bonds. The shell was badly scored and burnt, and the mech didn't move. "Can't be." "It was," Chris said. "Whatever you may think, that's not Katie anymore." "Katie's still in there." "If she is, I don't want her around me." Chris looked at the damaged mech as it was being secured. "How the hell did you defeat it?" "Oh...the usual," pf replied. "I started off using my .44. Then it charged me. I used something that obviously can beat a Buma...Aikido. I threw it into the cargo doors." He continued to recount how he used the WP rounds from his Eagle and the mini-grenades. pfloyd still rubbed his arm, trying to get the feeling back. "I wish you didn't paralyze my arm...and if my scope is damaged..." "I told you, it's Katie in there..." "I don't care..." Chris looked back at pfloyd. pf returned the look with one of disgust and anger. pfloyd pushed Chris out of the way, gathered his things, and called Holly for a BodySlide. He disappeared in a muted derezzing flash. Chris just stood there, looking down at the heavily-damaged Buma. "Sickbay, get a maglev stretcher and a team of medics who can keep a Buma alive down to my location stat." "A Buma?" Jenna's voice came back. "Mako, am I receiving you properly?" "Yes, dammit, now MOVE!" Chris cut the connection, but kept the channel open so Jenna could pinpoint his location. The Buma struggled to get up, but it was leaking fluids fast, and the bindings held it tight. Then the stretcher arrived, and they lifted the Buma onto it. "Careful...we've got to keep her alive!" "We'll do our best, sir," the medtech replied, jacking the Buma's body into a special life-support system. "You'd damn well better. This is no ordinary Buma. Katie Tanner's brain is in there." CHAPTER 27 "So forget those rumors, we're gonna stay together until we fuckin' well die, I'm sure of it." --Freddie Mercury, "Queen: Live at Wembley, '86" Ten minutes later, in sickbay, Chris stood over the mostly paralyzed Buma that had once been Katie Tanner, holding a datajack in his left hand. The cord on it led to the cybermodem in Chris's CVR armor's right arm. As the Buma's red eyes glared malevolently up at him, Chris said, "Don't worry, Katie. This will only hurt a little bit." The Buma snarled as he slid the plug into a jack behind its ear. He hit the "go" switch and dropped into unreality. There they were. There was Chris, there was Katie Tanner, there was a gleaming electric-blue Buma icon. Chris's subconscious mind automatically translated the scene into images his conscious mind could comprehend, so what he saw was Katie Tanner, nearly naked, strapped to what looked like an electronic version of some sort of medieval torture rack. The Buma hovered nearby, between her and him, at one moment a gleaming cybernetic monstrosity, at the next a jumble of electronic circuitry and geometric planes, with two red eyes staring out at Chris from within. "Ah, so THAT'S how it's gonna be, eh?" Chris remarked. "Well, come on. Come and take me." He rezzed up a Demon utility he'd written himself--a combination of Armor, Shield, and several types of attack programs. It rezzed into the shape of a DVR-152 Battler II Cyclone all around him. The Buma leaped, swinging a neon blue energy blade at him. Chris parried, and fired a virtual plasma minimissile in response. It knocked bhe Buma several feet back, orange drops of virtual circulatory fluid/data spraying out of the wounds and flashing briefly into 0s and 1s before rezzing out. "Eat errors, program!" The Buma electronically snarled, and tried again. It fired a bombardment of minimissiles from its chest that Chris managed to avoid. In response, he fired his arm cannons to pierce the Buma's arms and legs. Enraged, the Buma tried a different tactic. It moved over to where Katie hung unconscious from the manacles, and superimposed itself over her, vanishing except for a series of blue lines and plates that surrounded her body, and a red haze over Katie's still-closed eyes. The the shackles vanished, and Katie, eyes still closed, moved in to attack him. Even as Chris dodged, he knew he couldn't fight back. The Buma was using Katie's own mind to attack him, and if he counterattacked, he could very well kill her, too. "Aaaah!" Chris screamed as one of Katie/Buma's attacks hit home. "Katie, NO!!!" Was it his imagination, or had Katie's eyelids twitched slightly? "Katie, stop it!" He jumped aside as an energy blast from her palm barely missed him. "Katie, wake up! Stop attacking me, attack the Buma! Fight, dammit, FIGHT!" Katie's eyes snapped open, then widened. She started to throw a punch, missed, stopped. "What the hell...?" Katie drew back, struggled, then fell backward, out of the electric-blue lines and plates. "Die, damn you!" Chris's virtual Cyclone fired all 12 chest minimissiles at the same time that Katie Tanner fired energy blasts from her palms. Caught in the middle, the Buma disentigrated in a dazzling shower of VR special effects. Chris jacked out, retracted the cable back into its sheath in the CVR's right arm. "Katie? Can you hear me?" "Unhhhhhh..." The moan sounded eerie, an electronically- filtered version of Katie's voice. "What happened? Where am I? I--I can't feel anything!" The red eyes glanced anxiously back and forth, taking in the worried faces of Chris and the medtechs. Then down, at her prone metal body. "Katie, I--I'm not sure how to tell you this, but...you're apparently in the body of a Buma. I don't know how it happened--must have been during the mission. You were attacked, do you remember?" "I--I think I do." The memories came--falling off the cliff--the Buma--the metal tentacles--***PAIN***--the curious cold feeling of metal all inside her, cold, icy, pressing against her skin from the inside--a red haze--shooting the pilot--shooting Chris--fighting pfloyd. "My god, that pilot! I killed him!" "No you didn't," Chris reassured her. "That's right." Jenna appeared at the other side of the bed. "He's a Detian, he'll be fine." "That's one thing to be thankful for," Chris sighed. "Dammit, Largo's gonna pay for this, and pay HARD." "Right now, we have to worry about Katie," Jenna said. "What can we do?" Chris asked. "I know Omega-2 can work miracles, but even it has its limits." "Precisely," Edison Bell said, striding into sickbay. "Which is why we have the BioSculpt tanks. It will take a few months, but we will be able to regrow Katie Tanner's body, without a doubt." "Great! Let's get started!" Chris said. "First I'll have to run a few preliminary tests," Jenna said, detaching the cylindrical probe from a medical tricorder and running it along Katie's cranium. She punched some keypads, took another reading. "Hurry," Chris said. "I want her back in her body and back on her feet ASAP." "For that matter, so do I," Katie remarked in a feeble attempt at humor. <<>> And so Jenna ran her tests while Katie lay paralyzed on the table. Edison Bell was in and out, making sure that Katie was all right, checking other patients, and just generally being inscrutable. Chris talked to Katie, trying to keep her spirits up. Katie hovered on the edge of hysteria in her paralysis. Suddenly her own body--everything she felt, everything she sensed from it--was GONE. Taken away and replaced with this cold, metal--thing. She couldn't even move it, it was so damaged. Her vision was strange, grainy, red-tinted--she was seeing through Buma optics. Her hearing was similarly odd, and she couldn't FEEL anything. Chris sensed this and kept up a constant stream of words, giving Katie something to focus on, to hold onto to keep from falling into the abyss. It was his fault this had happened, and he wasn't going to let her slip completely away, for if he did, he was afraid that she wouldn't come back again. They talked about whatever came into Chris's head; the conversation rambled all over. Chris kept casting furtive glances at Jenna, who was working as fast as she could, medicorder in one hand, entering data into the medicomp with her other. Though the conversation rambled, not once did Chris say what was on his mind: the three simple words, "I love you." He felt he SHOULD, but he just couldn't bring himself to say them. And somewhere in the depths of her hysteria-clouded mind, Katie sensed this, and felt that it was all right. She knew the way he felt about her, and she felt the same way. Chris didn't know how long he stayed by her side. He did know that he had more than five cups of coffee throughout the ordeal, and had to use his CVR's waste-disposal facilities twice. Meanwhile, Jenna and her med-techs scurried here and there, setting up equipment, tending to the wounded, and carrying out their other duties. As Chris and Katie talked, wall monitors blinked on and there was some sort of shipwide announcement by MegaZone. Chris was too worried about Katie to pay any attention at all to it, though. But what DID get his attention was when explosions rocked the ship, several minutes later. "What the HELL?!" Chris gasped, holding onto Katie's Buma body to keep it from sliding off the stretcher onto the floor. "We're under attack!" Jenna announced. "Evacuate everyone to the lifepods!" Interns and nurses scrambled, detaching life-support leads, replacing them with portable units, then shoving the stretchers out the doors. A few minutes later, most of the stretchers had been moved out. The explosions were stil going on. Edison Bell, on his way to the elevator, stepped in. "Why are you still here?" Edison asked. "It's Katie--her body," Chris said. "We can't--" "No, you can't, can you? Jenna, you get to the lifepods. Your patients need you; I'll handle this." "Uh, right." There was no need for argument; Jenna knew from past experience that when Edison said he was going to handle something, he WOULD handle it, come hell, high water, or Eris herself. She gave Katie Tanner one last doubtful look, then turned and ran. "What are you going to do?" Chris asked. Edison adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. "I'm going to see if I can't solve your problem." He started pulling equipment out of his coat pockets and, working rapidly, put it together and activated some of it. First, he set up a small box next to Katie's head and turned it on. A glowing blue field shimmered into being around her head. "What's that?" Chris asked, reaching toward it. "Sterilization field," Edison remarked. "Don't touch." Chris jerked his hand back as if stung. Edison continued working, pulling on special gloves and reaching through to start undoing catches on the Buma's skull. "What are you doing?!" Katie asked, a touch of panic in her electronically-filtered voice. "Don't worry, m'dear. I'm saving your life." The ship lurched again. "Damn!" Edison pulled out another device, pressed the side. The ship stopped shaking, at least in their viscinity. "Temporal stasis field," Edison said, forestalling Chris's next unasked question. "It will only hold for...mmm, three and a half minutes, so I had better get to work." "You'll get no argument from me," Chris said. "Good." Edison worked so fast his hands were almost blurs. explaining what he was doing as he did it. "It is obvious that this body cannot be salvaged without a great deal of work, work for which we definitely do not have the time. Therefore, I am putting together a transport unit, within which Katie's brain will be able to survive." Chris noted the absense of such adverbs as "probably" or "hopefully." Edison spoke with absolute certainty. "I--I'm scared," Katie said. "That's only natural," Edison said, connecting some piping. "It is a frightening idea. But rest assured that this procedure does work. The mere fact that I am here now is itself evidence of that. And I have performed this same procedure countless times. There is absolutely nothing for you to be worried about." Bell continued to work, putting together a container about the size of a large gasoline canister. About half of it was taken up by a system of miniature pipes and electromechanical parts. "Nutrient fluid recirculator," Edison said, pointing. "For life support. Oxygenator here, replicator interface port--connect this to a replicator feed for automatic nutrient replenishment..." Edison checked his watch. "Egad, there's no time left. Katie, I'm going to anesthetize you for the transfer. If either of you have anything you'd like to say, best make it quick." Chris gulped. He knew there was only one thing he COULD say. "Katie, I--I love you. And I always will." "I love you too, Chris," Katie replied, putting all the emotion into her voice that her metallic face could not convey. She looked at Edison Bell, gritted her metallic teeth. "Okay, do it." Edison did. "Say g'night, Katie..." Chris whispered to himself. Then Edison performed the transfer, using a special levitation system that moved the brain without damaging it. He finished, and sealed the brainbox (as Chris mentally referred to it). He picked it up by a handle in the top and handed it to Chris. "Now get out of here. The stasis field is almost spent. Get to your fighter and get out as fast as you can." Chris nodded. "Thanks, Edison." Then he was gone. Edison checked his watch again, just as the small stasis generator shorted out and exploded in a shower of sparks. He then ran for the turbolift, hoping that this hadn't made him too late. It had. <<>> Chris dashed down the corridor as explosions shook the ship. Eve was on every wall screen he passed, singing "Tell Me the Secret." It was about then that it finally sank in. This was it. No, not just it. This was IT. The ship was dying. The WDF had lost. Everyone was fleeing. The woman he loved now resided in the small canister under his left arm. It was all so UNREAL. Life had gone from Normality (whatever that meant) to Very Seriously Fucked Up in a very short time. Chris turned the corridor into his workshop/hangar. Pausing only at his desk to snatch the case of flopticals and isolinear chips that contained his entire technical library, he dashed for where the CONSTELLATION sat, unmoved, on the launchpad, its ventral access hatch still hanging open from when he'd replaced some burnt-out components earlier in the day. Everything else was scattered all about, but the Valk was still there and in one piece. Chris ran up to the Valk, set the brainbox carefully down, reached up to close the panel, when a thought struck him. Though he'd never actually installed a computer intelligence in his Valkyrie, he had provided that section of the fighter which it would occupy (and which currently contained all the CONSTELLATION's other flight computer equipment) with superior protection to even the cockpit. Micronized inertial dampers, microgravity generators, additional armor, and the like. He did NOT want his computers taking any hits in the middle of combat. The neural-net machine intelligence had never been installed...the empty space was big enough to hold the box, there was a conduit that connected right to the minireplicator...it was the safest place in the entire fighter... Chris reached up and mag-clamped the brainbox into place, connecting the replicator feed into the conduit, noticing as he did so a neural output jack in the bottom of it. And this jack was the same configuration as the input jack leading to the optical primary processor. Chris never knew what made him do it, but some insane impulse caused him to reach out and jack the lead from the computer directly into the plug on the braincase. Then he closed the panel. As he climbed into the cockpit, Chris wondered, as he was to wonder many times in years to come, just what the hell he'd done that for. "Hey, it's designed for neural-net intelligence," Chris told himself. "And that's what the human brain IS, right? A neural net. It'll be just like jacking in." Or would it? Chris wondered. All the Cybertronian tech in this bird...sometimes it was hard to be sure. Chris pulled on his helmet, powered up the Valk, pulled the jack plug out of his arm compartment automatically...then stopped. What might happen if he jacked into a computer with a human brain wired directly into it? It could have all sorts of undesirable consequences, both for himself and for Katie Tanner. He decided not to chance it; after all, he could fly it unaugmented. Pulling up the flight computer display, all Chris could see was a lot of 0s and 1s. "Katie?" No response. "Looks like I'll be flying on manual for a while," Chris reflected. "No prob, I can deal." He flipped the switch to open the outward egress. Nothing happened. "Okay..." Chris reached under the seat, pulled out a small box with a button in the middle, rather like a garage door opener, and pressed it. KA-THWAM! The panel was blown outward, and a lot of stuff from Chris's workshop was sucked into space. Chris fired the thrusters, and the CONSTELLATION went with it. Chris looked back one last time at the ship that had been his off and on home for around 265 years all told, and held back tears. Then he turned back ahead. It was time to look toward the future. <<>> <<>> <<>> But despite himself, Chris Carry on my wayward son found himself looking back at the ship as it floated above the planet There'll be peace when Musashi, wreathed in silent you are done explosions. There was a huge gap in its hull where the Wedge had Lay your weary head to rest once rested; it had now detached itself to serve as an escape craft. Don't you cry no more Floating nearby was the source of the gunfire, a HUGE Imperial super star destroyer. And then the WAYWARD SON's <> engines came on! It blasted straight toward the star destroyer, pinpoint barriers directed to the front. Chris held his breath as it crashed through the globular shield surrounding the destroyer, then INTO the destroyer itself! Chris realized what was going to happen and kicked in full boosters to get away as rapidly as possible. There was a series of explosions, ending in one huge immolation, and Chris closed his eyes against the brilliance. And then...all was silent. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaah! Chris looked around. It was Once I rose above the noise over. SON and destroyer had and confusion separated, and both fell, charred, smoking, and partly melted, toward Just to get a glimpse beyond the planet Musashi. It was the end this illusion of an era, and all Chris could think was to wonder why his eyes I was soaring ever higher were dry. He checked the instruments, But I flew too high determined his position. 47,100 miles from Musashi's surface. He wondered if he should try to land. "At least I can still see." Though my eyes could see I That reminded him. He checked still was a blind man sensors. They seemed to be working, but he still wasn't picking anything up. Must have been fritzed by the explosions. He hoped they'd come back on. Chris felt a cold anger come Though my mind could think into his mind. "Damn you Largo, I I still was a madman don't know how, or even if I'll be the one to do it, but somehow, someday...you'll pay for all this." He checked the flight I hear the voices when I'm computer. No luck. Still 0s and dreaming 1s. "I hope you're okay in there, Katie," he muttered. I can hear them say... Chris closed his eyes for a moment, but the sight of the WAYWARD SON plunging into the star destroyer replayed itself the instant he did. Carry on my wayward son "All right, dammit..." Chris muttered. "What now...what?!" There'll be peace when Green laser blasts streaked over you are done the canopy. Chris checked six. Imperial-type TIE fighters. Oh, Lay your weary head to rest for yay. Life just didn't get any better than this. Don't you cry no more They must have been launched before the destruction of the big ship, Chris thought. They must be looking for survivors. Dammit, flight computer or no flight computer, I'm not going to let them have any of ours. Chris considered. Even though the main flight computer was not functional right now, the subprocessors were. And one of them was the ECM system. "Let's see if I can mask us as one of them." He called up the program on the port commscreen, made some adjustments...there. Special radar Masquerading as a man with a emitters throughout the body of the reason CONSTELLATION started pulsing signals of varying intensities and My charade is the event of the frequencies. The purpose was to season distort the radar image of the CONSTELLATION into resembling the radar image of a TIE fighter. In this way, Chris hoped, he could sneak up on them. Chris brought his fighter around, down, and in. He was coming up on two of the TIEs' sixes. He was just congratulating And if I claim to be a wise man himself upon the tactical effectiveness of his plan...and It surely means that I don't then they broke and turned on him. know "Guess I'm not so smart as I thought," Chris muttered. The CONSTELLATION was On a stormy sea of gloom and buffeted by shots from TIE lasers. emotion Chris ducked and dodged as best he could, but was getting severely Tossed about I'm like a ship shaken up. "I hope those inertial on the ocean dampers are working right..." Status checks showed they were. "Good. Katie's not feeling any of this." Chris looked around, dodged I set a course for winds of more lasers. "They're trying to fortune box me in." He looked around, spied a way out, and went for it. But I hear the voices say The lasers followed him. Then the CONSTELLATION flipped over, went to Gerwalk, and started Carry on my wayward son hosing TIEs with its pulse lasers. "Hah! This is a LOT easier than There'll be peace when the game!" you are done But more TIEs came in from behind Chris, and despite that fact Lay your weary head to rest that they basically sucked, they did have the advantage of numbers. Don't you cry no more Chris went to Battroid and took them down with his rifle, dodging their cannons and even punching <> through the canopies of a few of them for variety. But still they came. Chris dogfought them all over the sky, in all Valkyrie modes. "This'd be a hell of a lot easier if I had a wingman or three..." Then there they were, eight Super Valkyries coming in out of nowhere. "This is Zebra One calling CONSTELLATION. Planetfall to Mako, do you copy?" Chris let out a whoop. "Zebra flight! All RIGHT!!! Join up, and let's do it!" As they flew together, taking Carry on! on all remaining fighters with all their weapons, Chris let himself You will always remember remember for just a moment all the good times they'd had flying Carry on! together, when he had been the leader of Zebra Flight and What can equal the splendor? afterward. But only for a moment. That Now your life's no longer empty time was gone forever, and he had too much to worry about to let Surely heaven waits for you! himself live in the past. At last there were no more bogies on the scopes. Chris con- tacted Planetfall on his commline. "Survivors are rendezvousing with the DAEDALUS and PROMETHEUS on the dark side of Musashi's main moon," Planetfall said over the tightbeam. "You coming?" Chris shook his head. "I've got warpdrive, remember? I'm go- ing to make for somewhere outsys- Carry on my wayward son tem, maybe Meizuri or Utopia Plan- itia. I don't know. Maybe that's There'll be peace when where Gryphon and Zoner are. I you are done have no idea what's going on, or how the WDF is going to recover Lay your weary head to rest from it, but I don't think it's going to be the same for a long, Don't you cry long time." "Roger, Mako." Planetfall Don't you cry no more! saluted. "We'll be seeing you." Chris nodded, a lump coming to his throat. "Goodbye, and may <> switched off and vectored away, engaging the warpdrive. The blue glow flared all around the CON- No more! STELLATION, and then it was gone. EPILOGUE "Don't give me wings and take away my sky." --Nona Hendryx, "Women Who Fly" The CONSTELLATION dropped out of warp a safe distance away from the planet, and Chris removed his CVR helmet and wiped his brow. He then set about checking over the damage to his ship. The CONSTELLATION had taken several direct hits by TIE lasers during the battle. The Salusian shield was out again (pretty damn useful, that shield...stopped an average of 1.3 shots from anything heavy before exploding. Gotta fix that someday...), and there were several chunks of armor missing all over the ship. Nothing crucial, though, and the area where Katie's brain was snugly nestled hadn't even been touched. Chris checked the flight computer again. Still just 0s and 1s, scrolling ever upward in no discernable pattern. "Oh, hell," Chris muttered. "She's probably still unconscious or something. I guess I'll have to go in and wake her up." He jacked in, hit the "go" button, and reality fell away. The nonplace where Chris found himself was inky black, warm, and soundless. He could somehow feel the familiar response-overlays of the Valkyrie, but they were distant. Between him and them was something else, which Chris somehow knew had to be Katie Tanner. Chris assayed a brief mental probe. *Katie?* he sent. *Are you there?* *Unnnngh...* He felt the moan, even sensed the feelings of disorientation at some level. He pulled his perceptions back, not wanting to interfere with her while she was still coming to. Katie slowly woke up. The first thing she noticed was that she was feeling things again. Was she in a new body? Yes...and no, she decided. It felt...different. She opened her eyes, and found herself looking out the gun camera on the bottom of a Valkyrie. THAT was it, THAT was what it felt like...like rigging a Valk. Almost. There wasn't the smooth, artificial feeling of being in control via cyberjack. This felt different...ALIVE, almost. Katie tried to pull her senses out of the Valkyrie, back into her meat body--but she couldn't. *Where...where AM I?* *Katie?* Startled, Katie fired a brief spurt from the boosters. (If she'd been in a human body, she would have jumped.) *Chris?* she managed. *I'm here,* his mental "voice" said, with an emotional undertone of calmness that Katie could somehow sense. *Don't worry.* *Chris?* Katie transmitted. *Where AM I?* Chris floated there in the virtual void, seeing what Katie was seeing from the CONSTELLATION's camera. *Katie...you're inside the CONSTELLATION. Or, more precisely, you ARE the CONSTELLATION. I connected your brain up to the main processor. It was the only way.* *The only way?! The only way for WHAT?!* Her thoughts sounded slightly hysterical. *It was the safest choice. The internal compartment of the CONSTELLATION has the best shielding, inertial damping, and gravitics of the entire ship. You can't be hurt in there. If you'd been in the cockpit, who knows what might have happened to you?* *And it was just COINCIDENCE that the neural jacks matched,* Katie shot back caustically. *You always wanted an AI for your precious CONSTELLATION. Now it seems like I'm it!* *Would you rather I left you unplugged, deaf, dumb, blind?* Chris asked. *You'd slowly be going insane right now, trust me.* Katie had no reply to that. *Anyway, it's only temporary. If we can get somewhere with an advanced medical facility, we can get you a new body.* Chris was glad that he hadn't let the guilt he was actually feeling slip through over the link. He really didn't know whether his decision had been right or wrong. HAD he plugged her in simply because he wanted an AI and she was "available"? Chris didn't like to THINK he was that callous, but it was possible, wasn't it? Katie Tanner mentally sighed. Regardless, there was nothing she could do about it now. And it could be worse, couldn't it? She had sensation again. In fact, she could even feel pain from several areas. The Valk had taken some damage, apparently. And that reminded her. *Where's the WAYWARD SON?* Katie asked. *What happened to it?* *Destroyed,* Chris said bitterly. *It and an Imperial-class super star destroyer destroyed each other, and a large part of the planet Musashi, too.* Katie would have gasped, had she facilities with which to gasp. Destroyed?! How could it be? Who had done it? What would become of the WDF? Chris sensed her worries. *Don't worry about it. The WDF is regrouping behind Musashi's moon. What they're going to do next, I don't know. We're not joining them, because we have warp power. We're going to go find out--* He didn't finish the statement, as the Valk took several direct laser hits, including a couple through Chris's recently-healed right side. "Gaaaah!" he screamed, coughing up some blood. "TIEs!" Katie felt similar pain. *I'm on them,* she sent over the link, turning to face the enemy. She'd rigged her own Valkyrie countless times; actually BEING it was actually quite similar. Even better, in fact. She snap-rolled to avoid more enemy fire, then ran a quick scan on the targets. The tricorders in Chris's cockpit began beeping. The two Twin Ion Engine interceptors had probably been dispatched as an advance recon patrol for the attack. Now they were making a dive at this lone Valkyrie, undoubtedly thinking it an easy kill. Two phaser beams lanced out from the Valk's booster/warp nacelles to tell them they were wrong. The battle over, Katie ran a quick diagnostic. Some more laser damage, that's nice...uh-oh. The cockpit had been penetrated, though the self-sealant had closed the hole already. *Chris? Are you all right?* "No, I'm NOT all right," Chris said, unable to concentrate over the link because of the pain. "I'm pretty seriously--KOFF, KOFF--injured. I think I'm--KOFF--looking at a week or so of downtime while the Omega-2 works on this." Chris's left hand reached up and engaged the emergency medical life-support systems built into the CVR armor. It started pumping painkillers into him, somewhat dulling the agony. "Activating emergency medical systems--KOFF, KOFF--and IVs. I'll stay jacked in so you can monitor my vitals." Chris collapsed back against the accel couch. *Wait--what am I supposed to do?!* Katie asked, worried and confused. "You have--KOFF--control, Katie...take us somewhere...I trust you. Good night...and I love you..." As Chris drifted off, she caught a brief flash of guilt as his mental shields went down. It made her feel just a little bit better, she supposed. Then why did she have this sudden desire to comfort him? So, Chris lay unconscious in the cockpit of the CONSTELLATION. Katie looked at him through the video pickups in the Valkyrie's multi-function panel displays. He was all bloody, and his armor was shattered in places and had holes through it in others. His face was pale, with a trail of bloody spittle hanging from his lips. He looked pretty bad. But from the biomonitors in Chris's armor, Katie could tell that he was getting better. The Omega-2 would need time to work, but it would do the job. Now Katie had to see about what she could do for herself. After running through her options, which were few, Katie convinced herself that she should go to Utopia Planitia. Something told her that anyone who still had warp drive would return there. And there were the best medical facilities and medical minds in the cosmos--she could find help for both Chris and herself! It was only a week away at maximum warp. Katie figured the course, locked it in, and engaged warpdrive. The CONSTELLATION hovered there in space for a moment, then the drive nacelles glowed blue and it slingshotted forward, off toward a distant star. Everything would be all right, in time. Katie knew that. <<>> If you never rode west of Produced and Directed The Arizona border by Chris Meadows You can turn the other way, boy But you never get far Technical Advisors: Gryphon, You'll be livin' a lie MegaZone, PCHammer, pfloyd If you wanna see the wonders of the age Continuity Checking: You must follow MegaZone, Gryphon The evening star Stress Relief: Evening star Animaniacs Shine a little heaven on a Cadillacs and Dinosaurs stranger with no dream Eek the Cat/Thunder Lizards Where you are Outlanders You can see the loneliness I mean Tiny Toon Adventures And if I gotta fight, I can never Transformers Generation 2 play somebody else's game Comic Book I can follow the evening star (Starlight, you never need some- Animation Studios: body else's name) Tokyo Movie Shinsha If you follow the evening star Toei Spectrum Have you ever known a sunset When the sky is on fire Special Effects: How you end another day, boy Academic Gloom and Mundanity, You'll be searching too far Inc. Like the desert I rode on Any memory is lost in the Editor: Qedit v2.15 (available restless wind at better shareware BBSes I just lie beneath everywhere) The evening star Future Editor: Qedit v3.0, Evening star available for shareware by early Shine a little heaven on a next year. Don't miss it--I sure stranger with no dream won't! Where you are You can see the loneliness I mean Special Thanks To: And if I gotta fight, I can never alt.toys.transformers play somebody else's game The Bettman Archive I can follow the evening star British-AnimeTech, Inc. (Starlight, you never need some- Casio Watches body else's name) Cybertron Film Commission If you follow the evening star Dave Deitrich Dave Van Domeln/RoboMACs Have you ever held a woman ExoSalusia Firearms In the California moonlight Musashi Historical Put your money on a good night Preservation Society If you've never been there Palladium Books It's a sight for sore eyes The Robotech ListServer If you wanna see the wonders of Semware the age The Smithsonian Institute Making love beneath The Superguy ListServer The evening star Utopia Planitia Film Commission Evening star Wedge Defense Force Shine a little heaven on a Historical Archive stranger with no dream Where you are And an Extra-Special Hack of the You can see the loneliness I mean Year Award to: And if I gotta fight, I can never Transformers Generation 2, the play somebody else's game cartoon that never should I can follow the evening star have been (or at the very (Starlight, you never need some- least, should have been a body else's name) whole lot better). If you follow the evening star Manny Galan, the Transformers (Starlight, you never need some- Generation 2 artist who never body else's name) should have been. If you follow the evening star Mighty Morphing Power Rangers, the only live-action TV show that uses the tie-in toys as Don't miss the further adventures the actual special-effect of Chris "Mako" Meadows and models. friends, as they are continued in Hammer Time III by Martin Rose Written On-Location on the SDF-17, and Chris Meadows! Stay tuned, the MAGNUM CARTEL, and at various UF fans! locations in deep space. SOUNDTRACK (in order of appearance) They Might Be Giants, "See the Constellation" (Apollo 18) "Rick Hunter Theme" (Robotech Perfect Collection Soundtrack) The Ventures, "Walk--Don't Run" (Play the Hits) INXS, "Suicide Blonde" (X) Talking Heads, "Psycho Killer (Live)" (Stop Making Sense) Kansas, "Hold On" (The Best of Kansas) Eve, "Tell Me the Secret" (Megazone 23 Vocal Collection) Kansas, "Carry On Wayward Son" (The Best of Kansas) Kenny Rogers, "Evening Star" (Eyes That See in the Dark) APPENDIX: EXPLANATION OF OBSCURE REFERENCES Okay. I guess you're confused. Well, I'll try to explain some of the obscure references in here that are mine originally. (I won't explain all of them, 'cuz the humor kind of goes out of a joke when it's explained away...) However, I won't mention those that come from other Undocumented Features stories, nor will I mention the ones from Universe Part 1. I would advise you read Undocumented Features 1, 2, and the first part of 3, as well as One Vision, Hammer Time 1 and 2, and The Universe According to Chris Part 1. They should explain a lot. (Heck, I'd recommend you read ALL of UF, but the above are the only ones with a direct bearing on this part of the story.) So here, in order of their appearance in the story, are most of the obscure references, anime and otherwise, that I've used. Fokker Feint: An aerobatic maneuver for Valkyries described in the Robotech TV series and novels. LUSITANIA: A passenger liner from World War I, sunk by the Germans because it was allegedly carrying contraband weapons. [As dives on the wreck were later to reveal, it actually was.] DOYCHA, GAULA: Germany and France, with somewhat altered names and locations. I was just playing around with World War I, basically. ATLANTIA: Great Britain, the United States, or a mixture of both. Secretly supporting Gaula. Captain Farrago, Hrethrraao, the MAGNUM CARTEL: Standard Smuggler, Wookiee, and Corellian Stock Light Freighter from the Star Wars Role-Playing Game (West End Games). "the Money Lane": From the Han Solo novels by Brian Daley, the Money Lane is the area around the rim of the MILLENIUM FALCON (or any other Corellian Stock Light Freighter) that both guns can be brought to bear on. Han Solo and Chewbacca had a constant contest going, wherein whoever shot fewer targets in that area would pay the difference in hundreds of credits to whoever shot more targets. Salusian Scientist played by Brian Keith: In one of the better episodes of the first season of DEEP SPACE NINE, Brian Keith played a Bajoran settler who was the bane of Major Kira's existance. I enjoyed this portrayal so much that I gave him a guest appearance in the story (though this time he got to annoy Yuri). -----END OF FILE----- -- Chris Meadows | If you are a Transformer, the worst possible CHM173S@SMSVMA | fate you could ever hope for would be to be CHM173S@VMA.SMSU.EDU | drawn by Manny Galan. Or to be eaten CMEADOWS@NYX.CS.DU.EDU | by Unicron. Either way, you're mangled CMEADOWS@NOX.CS.DU.EDU | beyond all recognition.