Ch. 4
Blaze, Tyrant, and Aurora finally ejected from the Konig Wolf bringing back its original form, minus the tail. Mystic ejected from the core of the Geno Breaker, Shadow was in the cockpit resting.
*We need to get these men to the base NOW!* Blaze growled as he refused and controlled the Konig Wolf as they all ran towards Red River Base with the other Organoids running slightly in front of them.
When they arrived Wolf and Raven were taken from the cockpits of the two Zoids straight to the medical center.
Two weeks went by of nothing but waiting. Melody, Nichalo and the others had been ordered to be silent about the current situation until the true identities of the two men currently held in the brig could be confirmed. Captain Herman wouldn't listen to them when they told her the four Organoids would only listen to the real Wolf Novis, and they could tell if it wasn't him, and the same went for Shadow and Raven.
"I don't care what you say about those Organoids, they could have been brain washed, or manipulated into this, and I cannot afford to risk the security of this base," Natalia said as she slammed her hands down on the desk.
"Okay, so we test them, ask them things only they would know, things about what I did here when I was a kid," Daniel shouted back slamming his hands down as well. Melody and Michael stood behind him nodding their agreement with him.
"Captain Herman, perhaps if President Herman and myself asked these men those questions it would be more believable for you," Emperor Rudolph said as he and Rob Herman entered the room.
"Gentlemen, I cannot risk your safety to find out who these men are," the blonde captain said through a glare aimed at Daniel.
"Natalia, you don't have a choice, I'm going to ask those men the questions I want answered," Rob said turning on his heels and leaving the room.
Natalia followed him closely spouting off about his safety as the president, while Rudolph, Melody, Michael and Daniel followed in silence simply because they didn't want to risk losing what they wanted and were getting. They arrived at the brig a short time later and noticed the two men were awake and rather happy to see all of them.
"Colonel Herman, good to see you in good health," Wolf said extending a hand through the bars, it went unshaken so he just laid it on the cross piece.
"I take it you people want to confirm who we are before asking how we survived the last ten years and unnoticed at that," Raven said before sitting on the bed behind him.
"That's the basic idea Raven, and you get to go first," Rudolph said as he approached the bars, "What did I do when you first tried to hand me over to Medlonik and his men for Prozen?"
"You charged me, bound with your mouth covered," the lavender eyed man responded quickly.
"That's right, now what did I call Rosso and Viola when you first met up with Van in the Genosaurer and they stopped you from getting at me?" the brown haired man asked quietly.
"You called them your parents, Van nearly fell out of his seat in the Shield Liger," Raven said with a slight chuckle.
"That's good enough for me, President Herman it's your turn," Rudolph said as he stepped back from the bars.
"Wolf, what did Fiona and Moonbay do when Major O'Connell died?" Herman asked seeing everyone's expression change.
"They cried, you broke your ring finger hitting the ground repeatedly, Irvine stood there, and I did something I've only done twice in my life, I howled in anger and pain," the blue eyed man answered with his head looking down.
"Right, though I really don't want think about the finger. Now what did I ask of you when I saw your quarters for the first time while you were on injury leave?" Herman asked with a grin on his face and clinching his fist a few times.
"You asked me to do yours, though I never did get around to it," Wolf said laughing.
"Uncle Wolf, where was it you put the medallion Melody has on right now?" Michael asked being the only other person who knew.
"I taped a note to the nightstand, right side of the bed the key and a letter were in it, and I'm going to guess she cried when she found it," the blue eyed man responded again noticing the tears in Melody's eyes.
"Wolf, which one of you did I listen to more often, you or my dad and mom?" Daniel asked knowing exactly what he'd say.
"You listened to your father more often than you think, you listened to me when I used that tone that gets me what everyone else wants, your mother was too soft on you though," Wolf responded shocking all of them except Daniel who just grinned.
"It's him, I've never been surer," The red eyed man said with a chuckle.
Melody had one question to ask but she couldn't bring herself to ask it, she pulled Michael's sleeve and gestured to him to lean in. When Michael pulled his head away he had a bewildered look on his face but he nodded to her and walked over to the door gesturing to Wolf to come closer.
"Melody knows where her name came from, she wants to hear you say it out loud to prove who you are," the brown haired man whispered through the bars.
"Melody, you got your name from the first girl I ever loved when I was younger, a bandit that was part of Razor's crew from when I ran with them," Wolf answered quietly before Melody wrapped him in a hug through the bars.
President Herman and Rudolph were not at all surprised by his answer, though most of the others were. Michael and Daniel were stunned and seemed unwilling to move, neither of them knew about that, Natalia seemed to be in a total state of confusion. Melody was crying tears of joy into her father's shirt through the cell bars.
"Captain Herman now would be a good time to let these gentlemen out," Rudolph said gesturing to the keys in her hand. The captain did as ordered and let Raven and Wolf out of the cell. Raven finally asked the question that had been on his mind for nearly ten years.
"Where is Nichalo?" the lavender eyed man asked as they left the brig hall of the base.
"Behind you," a voice came from the direction they had just come from. Raven and the others turned to see Nichalo standing there in tears before running to his father's arms.
"Why didn't you come back? Why didn't you tell us you were alive?" Nichalo asked through sobs and tears. Raven just smiled and held his son's embrace, even though everyone in the hall that passed by was looking at them, Raven didn't care, he had his son to take care of again.
They all managed to move to another part of the base that was familiar to all of them, Melody's quarters.
"So they kept this place huh?" Wolf asked as they walked through the door.
"Yeah, under direct standing order from me," Rob responded as he sat on the couch.
"Who's using them now?" Raven asked noticing how clean the place looked.
"I am, just seemed a waste of time to let them go unused," Melody said from the chair across from him, Michael sat on the arm of the chair while Natalia and Daniel took the other chair.
"Okay guys, let's get to business. What on Zi kept you two from coming back all this time? We thought you two were dead, looked that way from the blast mark on the ground," President Rob Herman said leaning his elbows on his legs.
"We were dead, at least we thought so," Wolf said as he leaned back into the couch.
Flashback
"Wolf, we're getting pounded, Van, Zeke and Irvine are down, we need to end this," Raven shouted through the com link.
"I know it Raven, let's tear 'em up," Wolf said as he broke into maniacal laughter swinging the claws of the Konig, pounding cockpit after cockpit.
*Wolf, the Zoid core is exposed, one hit and kaboom,* Mystic said from her position on the core.
"Okay Mystic, can we use that to our advantage somehow?" the black haired man asked as they powered through two more Zoids, his eyes shining red.
*Fake a hit to the core, the armors already repaired there,* Tyrant said.
"Okay so how do we fake a core explosion?" Raven asked through gritted teeth.
Wolf quickly counted the Zoid corpses on the ground around them, he found a Zoid with an opening over the core.
"That's how Raven, there's a Rev Raptor with an open core," Wolf said yanking the controls and heading in that direction. Raven led an enemy to fire on the open core before swinging around and keeping him with in the blast zone.
"Wolf, it's been one hell of a ride, at least we went fighting," Raven said as everything around him turned white.
"You got that right," Wolf laughed as the blast enveloped both Zoids.
End Flashback
"When everything turned white around us, I felt the Geno Breaker getting hotter before having this feeling of being towed away, and then everything went dark," Raven said looking at the floor.
"When we woke up, we thought we were long dead and in heaven, we saw them putting four caskets in the ground at the Wind Colony, I don't really know what we were thinking but we turned around and left," Wolf said as he too lowered his gaze to the floor.
"You could have rode into town, and cleared this whole mess up, we were all there," Rob said calmly leaning back into the seat he was in.
"We really didn't know how we cleared out of that blast, it should have taken us with it, but it didn't, we would have sounded like mad men trying to explain it," Raven said before realizing the Organoids weren't there, "Where are Shadow and the others?"
"Blaze and the three others are repairing the Konig Wolf, and Shadow is doing the same for the Geno Breaker, they won't leave the Zoids till they're fixed," Melody said with a slight chuckle.
"It's been two weeks, how aren't they done yet?" Michael asked looking towards the door.
"Probably are, just don't want to risk something going wrong, I've had trouble keeping the Konig balanced without the tail for ten years," Wolf said before going to the kitchen and getting a bottle of water.
Meanwhile, in the hanger Joyce was watching over the two Zoids when Blaze approached her.
*Do you have a Konig Wolf tail lying around? This thing gets awfully hard to balance without one,* the black eyed Organoid asked looking towards the Konig Wolf.
"Yeah, I think we have the tail that came off this one here in storage, President Herman had them keep it and the armor pieces from the Breaker too," the black haired girl said in a soft tone.
*Zeke went with the Liger, I know you were really hoping since we showed up that he would to, but he really is gone and none of us can explain why we aren't, Joyce, nothing could have been done, you know that,* he growled out wrapping the girl in a hug, before the black haired woman broke down and cried into his armored chest.
*Blaze, I found the tail, and its back on, we can go now,* Aurora, the metallic orange and green eyed Organoid, said not noticing Joyce crying.
After a few minutes the five Organoids were walking down the halls following Joyce to Melody's quarters.
"Blaze, did my father say anything before he was killed?" Joyce asked stopping in the hall.
*I'm sorry, he didn't have time to, I wish I had better news for all of you, I really do, and sometimes I wish we could have saved them, but we all know we couldn't. I'm very sorry Joyce,* Blaze growled using a more normal volume, before continuing on to Melody's quarters.
"Well it appears that we are the ghosts here, perhaps we should report to our wives Raven," Wolf said with a grin at how Clare might react.
"No can do gentlemen, we can use you two to our advantage in this fight, no way we're going to let it get out that two of the tiger slayers have come back from the dead," Captain Herman said as she stood up to and blocked the path of the men.
"Captain, I'm sure you don't realize it, but you are addressing a pair of Colonels right now," Rudolph said standing next to the men. Raven looked slightly stunned but quickly adjusted his appearance to hide it.
"When did I get promoted above captain?" Raven whispered to Wolf.
"Probably just to make a point Raven, if not it was at the funeral, a hero's death and all," Wolf whispered back.
"Colonels, I apologize but I cannot allow you to leave this base unsupervised," Captain Herman said as she snapped to attention with a salute.
"Okay, so Melody and Nichalo go with us to make sure we stay out of trouble," Wolf said back to his usual self.
"Mr. President, I believe we should go along to escort these men to their families as well," Rudolph said getting a nod of approval from Rob.
"I guess we could all go, Rosso and Viola would be happy to fly cover," Michael said when he heard Blaze's footsteps in the hallway.
"Blaze and the others are ten feet from the door," the brown haired man said shortly before the door opened and Joyce led the Organoids into the quarters.
"Let's go home folks," Wolf said leading the way out of the room. The major portion of the group followed, Michael was about to follow them out when he felt Melody's hand on his arm.
"Michael, I missed him for all these years, and he's acting like he was gone for ten seconds," the black haired girl said quietly with a few tears in her eyes.
"I'm sure he missed you too, but you know how your father was, I mean is, never showing his emotions openly, I'm betting he's waiting till you all get home," Michael said before wrapping her in a protective hug.
"I'm sure he's just as happy to be back as we are to have them back," the grey eyed man said before leaning down and kissing Melody gently on the lips.
*So you two are coming right?* Mystic, the royal blue green eyed Organoid, asked from the door, acting as though she hadn't seen the kiss.
"Mystic, just how much did you see?" Michael asked without letting go of Melody.
*Nothing at all if you didn't want me to,* Mystic said before leaving the room and two red faced people behind.
The two left quietly hand in hand. 'We've been dating almost a month and neither of us wants to bring it to our families, how lame are we,' Michael thought as they walked to the hanger. When they got there the others were all looking after their Zoids.
'Those two are in love and just like her parents they're hiding it,' Wolf thought looking towards his kid and Irvine's. "Hey Raven, check that out," the blue eyed man said pointing towards the Melody and Michael as they climbed into their Zoids.
"Love birds and they think they're hiding it, you know you and Clare didn't hide it as well as they are, you two were all over each other whenever you could be," Raven laughed as Wolf nearly fell out of his Zoid in shock.
Ten minutes later they were all on board the Whale King and on the way to the Wind Colony, Natalia had notified them they were bringing a Whale King and was told it would be better to land near the skirts of the village at the ruins and ride the Zoids into town. Melody and Nichalo had told their mothers to stay at home till they spoke with them, Clare and Reese had reluctantly agreed to this condition. Two days went by on the large Zoid with Wolf and Raven getting to know their kids again.
"We've both been helping to rebuild after storms or bandit attacks or whatever came up, we also spent time as mechanics working on whatever Zoids came our way," Raven said as he sat down on the couch in the Whale King's lounge.
"We spent most of the time in a small village as protectors, No one recognized us for the Tiger slayers and we took advantage of the peace and quiet and time seemed to fly by us, when we came back we got pegged for the slayers and got hit pretty hard, they used nerve gas on us but with the Organoids to fly us out of there we got away from them, and that's when you found us, the radios had been damaged in the fight so they couldn't talk to you," the lavender eyed man said quietly.
When they arrived at the ruins near the Wind Colony Wolf and Raven stayed on the Whale King until the others had a chance to speak with the men's wives.
"Dad, you and Raven go to the houses you call home now, mom and Reese are out with Rudolph and Rob, I was only following orders, me and Nichalo wanted to surprise Reese and mom," Melody said through the radio.
Raven and Wolf tore out of the hanger towards the village at a high speed, Blaze, Shadow and the other Organoids right on their Zoid's heels. When they got to the village out skirts they ditched the Zoids.
"Shadow, you and the others stay close to the Zoids, I don't want too much of a shock," Raven said as he exited the Geno Breaker and he and Wolf headed for their separate homes as instructed.
"Well since no one's home I'll just get a little something to drink," Wolf said to the empty house as he entered it. A few minutes later Melody and Clare could be heard shouting outside.
"I don't get it, Herman and Rudolph don't seem the kind to make something this big up as a joke," Clare said as she slammed through the door to the house.
"Mom, I'll keep saying it they didn't make it up," Melody shouted.
"THEN WHERE IS HE MELODY?" the blue haired woman screamed pain and sadness more evident than the anger she felt.
"Where is who?" Wolf whispered into Clare's ear just like on the scouting mission. Clare's eyes went wide and she swung a fist at her husband that he quickly stopped and grabbed the other hand before she could swing it.
"Clare, I'm really here, and I am not a ghost or some damn thing or another like that," Wolf said, his eyes and tone softer than normal. Clare relaxed as she realized that her husband was really standing there in front of her.
"Well I'll leave you two alone," Melody said quietly before turning to leave.
"Going to see your boyfriend?" the blue eyed man asked with a chuckle as his black haired daughter tripped over her own feet.
"What boyfriend?" Clare asked seeing her daughter's reaction.
"Well… I… umm… you see," Melody stammered.
"Our little Melody and Michael have been dating, my guess is for a month or more," Wolf said with a grin plastered on his face.
"Well, I guess we weren't hiding it as well as we thought," the blue eyed woman said scratching the back of her head.
"Better than your mother and me, if I hadn't known what to look for you would have slipped it past me and Raven both," Wolf said chuckling slightly at the panicked look on Melody's face.
"Uncle Raven knows? Oh man this is going to get out," Melody said running out of the house towards Michael's place.
"Michael, you and I need to have a word in private," the black haired woman said trying to catch her breath after flying through Michael and Moonbay's front door.
Michael kindly asked Sarah to leave the room so they could talk; she obeyed but only rounded the corner so she could listen in.
"Melody, what's got you in such a hurry?" the brown haired man asked as she sat down after catching her breath.
"Dad knows, and so does Uncle Raven," Melody said with a look in her eye that told him what they knew.
"Okay, we may be able to salvage the situation," Michael said as he sat next to her.
"Situation, you make this relationship seem like a mission," Melody nearly shouted.
"Sorry but my sister is behind that wall over there, I didn't think she should know about us," Michael said pointing to the top of Sarah's head poking out from behind the wall. Melody turned beet red and tried to shrink herself into the couch.
"It's okay you two, I've known for a while now, you guys are good at hiding it, but I'm a teenage girl, I know the signs of romance," Sarah said with a chuckle as she stepped from her hiding place.
The three of them spent the afternoon talking about pretty much everything. Moonbay walked to Clare's house to see what all of the racket was about. When she arrived she saw the large black and red Konig Wolf standing behind the house, so she looked in the direction of Reese's house to see the red Geno Breaker near their home.
"Why do I have a feeling I'm seeing ghosts?" Moonbay asked the empty space around her.
"Because we are ghosts," Wolf said from behind her. Moonbay jumped nearly ten feet in the air hearing a response to her question.
"Well I guess that proves we really are ghosts," Raven said when Moonbay turned around to face Wolf, causing her to jump ten feet up again. Wolf and Raven were both on the ground laughing their heads off when Moonbay finally realized they were actually there.
"Dad, you are so immature sometimes," Nichalo said watching Raven and Wolf, with Reese and Specular next to him.
Michael and Melody decided to take a walk around the village; they were about half way to the ruins in their Zoids when a distress call came over the radio.
"This is the Royal Whale King escorting Emperor Rudolph's wife Marian, we are under attack and need assistance," the officer piloting the Whale King shouted.
"DAD, RAVEN, WE NEED HELP NOW!" Melody screamed into the radio. The two of them ran full out till Wolf and Raven caught up and they found the attacking forces.
"Time to go to work folks," Raven said as he charged the main weapon of his Geno Breaker, the charged particle cannon.