Team Try Fighters vs. Legendary Giant God
Chapter One: A Contact
Hey Gundam fans! It's The Draigg here, and I'm bringing you an idea that's been on my mind for a while. It's the dream match-up that statistically some people probably asked for! But who will Team Try Fighters face? A classic mech? Something a bit more modern? Get ready for something exciting! Oh, and one more thing, don't bother asking about continuity. Just file this story wherever in the timeline you see fit. Now go, and let gunpla be free!
XXX
Sekai Kamiki sighed. There was no way around the facts.
He was really, really bored.
Today was the day of the school festival, where hundreds of neighborhood residents, parents, and siblings walked through the halls of Seiho Academy. But, as luck would have it, none of them walked over to the Gunpla Battle Club's station. It figured that nobody would bring their gunpla for a quick sparing match, when there were sweets and carnival games to be enjoyed instead.
Sure, there had been a few battles for them here and there, but they were just from people Team Try Fighters already knew. Mr. Ral had battled with one of his signature Goufs, but he had left a while ago to sample all the food he could from other clubs. And there was that one battle with the Plamo Club, but that ended pretty quickly too. Battles against straight assembly suits with different paintjobs tended to be that way. It was just the nature of the beast called Gunpla Battle.
"Senpai…" said Sekai. "Do you think anyone else is going to show up?"
Fumina Hoshino tried to put on her best smile. "O-of course they are! I mean, out of all these people, someone had to have brought their Gunpla to battle. That's just basic math."
In all honesty, Fumina was starting to feel a little disappointed that nobody else had come to battle with them. It took a lot of effort to get their projector table set out to somewhere that people could access it easily. But now it seemed like people were just walking right past them, as if they were invisible. If it wasn't depressing, it was almost a little insulting.
"Should we hand out fliers…?" Fumina thought out loud to herself.
"What fliers?" Yuuma Kousaka asked. He didn't bother to look up from the slight tweaks he was making on his Lightning Gundam. "We didn't even print any."
Fumina's thoughts deflated. "Yeah…"
"We probably should have," added Yuuma.
"Well, we need to do something to grab people's attention!" declared Fumina. Upon receiving no reply from her fellow teammates, she asked a little quitter, "…Any ideas?"
"Maybe some kind of demonstration," Yuuma suggested.
"Like what? A battle between ourselves?" Sekai asked, perking up a bit.
"No… not that," Yuuma said. Sekai slumped back down in disappointment. "We already know each other's techniques."
Fumina snapped her fingers as sudden inspiration hit her. "A costume!"
"What?" Yuuma and Sekai asked at the same time, both looking up at her.
"We don't have any costumes," Yuuma pointed out.
Fumina smiled. "Well, we'll just improvise!"
"How?" Sekai asked.
Fumina's smile grew wider.
XXX
"C'mon, come battle us! Gunpla Battle Club!" Fumina cried out. She adjusted the cardboard box around her shoulders. In hindsight, maybe these improvised costumes weren't such a good idea.
People were streaming past the Try Fighters, except now they were getting some odd looks. Fumina had found some cardboard boxes, and written down the names of mobile suits on them. She had gotten the idea off of something she had seen on the internet. So now, Fumina was wearing a box that said "GUNDAM", Sekai was wearing a "UNIONFLAG" box, and Yuuma's "cosplay" was a "TALLGEESE" box. In other words, they now looked like a bunch of loons.
Yuuma tried to make himself as small as possible against his friends. As it turned out, embarrassment wasn't a good replacement for boredom. He'd much rather have nothing to do than be dressed like this.
On the other hand, Sekai was taking this all in stride. He wasn't uncomfortable wearing the box in the slightest. Although he couldn't help but wonder just what a "UNIONFLAG" was. Probably some type of Gunpla. He made a small reminder in his mind to ask Fumina what it was as soon as the day was over.
"Battle with us! You won't regret it! It'll be great!" Sekai yelled out to the streaming crowd.
Yuuma leaned over to Fumina. "Can I please take this off now?" he hissed/whispered in her ear.
Fumina kept on waving at the people that passed by. "Not until we get someone here," she replied.
Groaning, Yuuma went back to standing around awkwardly. Next to him, Sekai was trying to perform some martial arts moves. Unfortunately, it turned out that it was hard to do that while wearing a cardboard box as a costume. Sekai winced a little as he got a rough scratch around his forearm. But that didn't stop him from finishing his katas, as he ended with a straight punch to the air.
A few minutes passed as Team Try Fighters tried to lure people over to their battle station. Sekai kept on shouting kiais and doing his katas, Fumina did her enthusiastic advertising/slight begging, and Yuuma internally debated whether or not to just dump the costume and get something tasty to eat. Those sweet buns that he saw people walking by with smelled absolutely heavenly.
"Forget this…" Yuuma muttered, shrugging off his "TALLGEESE" box. Dumping the box on the ground, he quickly said to Fumina, "I'm getting something to eat. I'll bring something for the both of you."
Fumina didn't get a chance to reply as Yuuma disappeared into the crowd. She bit her cheek in annoyance. It was just plain rude for Yuuma to leave his post like that. Yet again, given how he was acting while wearing the "cosplay", she probably should have seen this coming. So Fumina couldn't exactly blame him.
Undaunted, Fumina kept up her act, trying to draw in people. At least she still had Sekai by her side. She felt that he would do anything in his power to make this work. And together, they should probably be able to draw somebody in.
Probably.
XXX
Some time later…
Yuuma was inwardly kicking himself for just ditching his friends. It just made him feel terrible that he had left Fumina behind like that, even if it was for only a brief moment. He hoped that the bag of shortbread cookies he was bringing back would be enough of an apology. Well, he knew that Sekai would certainly enjoy it, even if it wasn't entirely for him. Sekai had an appetite of an entire team of American football players.
However, before Yuuma could consider the specifics on how Sekai's metabolism could work like that, his train of thought was disrupted by a man in a tan windbreaker and jeans bumping into him. The both of them grunted as they reeled away from each other.
Regaining his senses, Yuuma asked, "Are you alright?"
"Yeah…" the man replied, feeling around in his jacket pocket. A brief flash of concern appeared on his face as he pulled out a gunpla figurine. Its arm had fallen off. "Can't say the same about my friend here, though."
Taking the arm, the man popped it back into place. After testing it by moving it around, he then noted, "All better now."
Yumma couldn't help but be intrigued by the gunpla the man had. Not only because he was the first person he'd seen who had actually brought one outside of the usual people, but also because Yuuma had never seen this model before. It looked absolutely unique!
"Hey, what model do you have there?" Yuuma couldn't help but ask. He could've sworn that it resembled a GM, but that description was loose at best. The only thing it shared with a GM was the color red, and a white visor head. Other than that, it was larger than a normal gunpla, and it had bits jutting out from the head, like antenna. It had to have been something else entirely then…
The man held up the model for Yuuma to see it clearer. "An old hand-me-down. Y'know, classic anime."
Gears clicked and whirred in his mind. This was the battle the club wanted! Against an unknown model, from an older anime. It was intriguing to the point where Yuuma couldn't exist.
"Hey," Yuuma said. "If you want to battle with that gunpla, the Gunpla Battle Club stand is not that far away. And, as an active member of it, we'd really like for you to spar with us!"
"Heh, just my luck!" the man replied. "I've been looking for it, actually. I heard you guys are damn good battlers."
Yuuma's face slipped into a slightly sly smirk. "Why not see for yourself?"
"I'd be glad to," the man said. "Lead the way, if you don't mind."
Nodding at him, Yuuma led the man through the crowd and towards the Gunpla Battle Club's stand. Finally, some real action was going to happen after all!
XXX
Fumina and Sekai were still going at the whole advertisement campaign. However, in addition to the previous issues, a new one had come up. As it turned out, wearing cardboard boxes over normal clothing can get really, really hot.
"Come fight the… Gunpla Battle Club…" Fumina panted. Now she had a good idea of how Shiro Amada felt when he wore his pilot suit in Southeast Asia.
Looking over to her side, Fumina then noticed that Sekai was still doing his katas. His face was about as red as his hair from the heat. But, in true fashion, it wasn't like that was going to stop him… although he did give a brief pause to wipe the sweat from his brow.
"Don't push… yourself too much," warned Fumina.
"I'm fine, really!" Sekai said, throwing out another jab of his fist. Breathing through his nose deeply, Sekai found his centering and got ready to do another batch of katas.
Just as Fumina was about to start calling out to people again, she heard Yuuma call out to her.
"Hey guys! I found someone who wants to spar!" Yuuma said, leading a rather unassuming man over to the stand.
Fumina was more than thankful that not only that Yuuma was back, but also that he had brought someone back with him. He sure was gone a while, after all. But, at least now he had made his leaving worth it.
On the other hand, Fumina was also a little confused. She didn't mean to offend, but the man that was following Yuuma didn't exactly look like a battler. Slightly worn casual clothes, slumped shoulders, and messy brown hair. He was more like a guy who you'd see working at a convenience store than see out looking for a gunpla battle. Regardless of the matter, Yuuma had brought him over for a battle. And damn it, she was going to have one with him.
Yuuma, shoving a delicious smelling paper bag into Sekai's hands, brought the man over to Fumina.
"He brought his gunpla and GP Base with him. Isn't that right…" Yuuma began to explain, before it hit him. He never asked for the man's name. "…Sorry, would you mind introducing yourself?"
"Oh. I'm Hiroki Hashimoto," Hashimoto said, giving a slight bow in introduction.
Returning the favor, Fumina said, "And I'm Fumina Hoshino. Nice to meet you!"
Yuuma added, "I'm Yuuma Kousaka, and that's Sekai Kamiki", nudging his head over in the direction of Sekai. Sekai looked up from digging around in the bag for shortbread cookies to give a smile.
"I heard you guys've been making quite a splash recently," Hiroki said. His lips turned up in a patient smile. However, his eyes looked a little confused. "What's with… uh…" he muttered, pointing to the boxes the team was wearing.
"Oh! Uh… heh…" Fumina sputtered, scratching the back of her head. "Just an idea to reel people in…"
"Well, it's… creative?" Hiroki offered.
"That's one way to put it," Yuuma added in his mind.
An awkward pause surrounded the group, with the only noise coming from Sekai almost literally inhaling shortbread cookies.
"…Anyways!" Fumina exclaimed, trying to salvage the scenario. "What gunpla do you have?"
Hiroki pulled out the odd red gunpla out of his pocket. "This one. It may look a bit old, but it's been modified to battling standards. And, I've been wanting to take it out for a spin, so this is the perfect opportunity to try it out!"
"You haven't battled with it before?" asked Yuuma.
Hiroki shrugged. "Nothing beyond testing it."
Having finished the bag of cookies, Sekai finally turned his full attention to Hiroki. "You're confident about your gunplay! Now I'm looking forward to battling it!"
"Wait, wait," Yuma intervened. "How are we going to battle him? A three-on-one fight doesn't exactly seem fair."
That gave Fumina and Yuuma some visible pause as they thought about the battle rules. It wasn't very fair to just gang up on an amateur's mobile suit, but they had always performed as a team. Well, perhaps some kind of compromise could be made.
Turning to Hiroki, Fumina asked, "Would you want one of us to be your teammate? Make it a fair two-on-two battle?"
"No thanks, I want to see what this gunpla can do on it's own," decline Hiroki. It was plain as day that he was very confident in his build, but not in a cocky way. The clear enthusiastic interest could be seen in his eyes.
"Are you sure?" Yuuma pressed.
"I'm positive. Really, it's okay!" Hiroki replied, smiling.
"That's the spirit!" Sekai chimed in. "Now come on, let's get ready!"
Fumina felt fighting spirit well up in her chest. Now she was pumped to fight this mysterious mecha! But, there was one pressing thing first…
"Yeah! …As soon as we take off these boxes…" Fumina cheered, before trailing off at the end.
"Right," Sekai and Yumma agreed at the same time. Although Yuuma was fortunate to have already taken off his box, he still cringed at his teammates' appearances.
Hiroki only barely held in a snicker at that.
XXX
A few minutes and a pile of unsurprisingly sweaty cardboard boxes later, the holographic table was fully set up. All that was left to be done was to set the GP bases, set the damage level, and select a battle stage. After that, there was nothing left that couldn't be solved with pure, unadulterated combat.
The combatants set their GP bases, and the table began to disperse Plavsky particles. Once the holographic field was set up with Plavsky particles, the stage selector began to cycle, having been set on random.
"Field 01: Space," the display table announced.
The empty hologram area filled with a simulation of a stretch of outer space. The playing field appeared to be near the orbit of a gas giant planet, with rings of asteroids nearby. Plenty of cover, while still having the benefit of three-dimensional movement. An ideal battlefield for gunpla.
"Damage level set to B," announced the table.
Team Try Fighters placed their respective gunpla on their GP Bases, and prepared to launch.
"Any ideas for attack?" Yuuma asked the others as the launch counter ticked down.
"Nothing out of the normal," Sekai breezily said.
"Support, long range, and close range roles. The usual," Fumina added.
Yuuma nodded to himself. "Right."
The counter finally reach zero. It was time to launch.
"Star Winning Gundam, launching!"
"Launch, Lighting Zeta Gundam!"
"Kamiki Burning Gundam, let's do this!"
At that, Team Try Fighters sortied, launching their respective gunpla into the virtual void of space. They were ready for a fight, ready for anything.
And on the other end of the field…
"Hiroki Hashimoto! Launch, Ideon!"
XXX
Can you hear it? I'm sure you can hear it, that far off roar… In the deep darkness, it shakes your soul, forcing it to wake! It towers over the Earth, is this the proof of its immense power? That's right, Team Try Fighters is fighting the Legendary Giant God, Ideon. Or, Gigantis, if you want to go off of that one non-canon manga. Anyways, I'm sure that some people had thought about this match-up before. And even I'm excited to see how this plays out!