Disclaimer: I do not own Vandread in any way. This story will also reference StarCraft, Freelancer, Lost Planet, Transformers, and EVE Online none of which I own either but I wish I did. I only own the OCs.

Author's Notes: Hey folks I'm back! I know its way past April fifteenth but I had to take a moment to read over the material that I last left off and get my train of thought back after almost five months of college which I'm happy to report that I have finally graduated! Plus I had to update my other story. But like I said I'm back and this chapter will definitely be worth the wait.

"Talking"

"Thoughts"

...

Chapter 7

Desert Front and Fear

Currently occupying a room located in an abandoned section of the Nirvana that was once a part of the old colony ship Ikazuchi David sat cross legged with his eyes closed as he focused on the task of practicing his abilities. Ever since the repelling of the Harvester Rippers that tried to board the Nirvana David had given a great deal of thought on how he could have possibly heard, much less understood, the machines' binary processors and their communication chatter. Eventually he came to the only possible answer that already had suspected for a while: technopathy. From what he knew those who possessed technopathy had the ability to telepathically "connect" with certain types of machines and by some extension the organic minds that operated them. Of course that kind of ability was extremely rare almost to the point of being unheard of. Mainly because of the obvious differences between an organic mind and a machine one and the fact this particular ability manifested in those who had a working knowledge of machinery as well as a strong grasp in computer programming and AI communications.

Now David knew he was good with machines and computers but not that good and he certainly never had or displayed any technopathic abilities before coming to the Nirvana. This pointed to the disturbing possibility that his Starhawk wasn't the only thing that was changed by the Paksis. Which begged the question, how much had the Paksis changed him? And what other abilities might he have gained as a result? Those were some of the questions that were running through his mind that he needed answered soon. To that end he searched the less traversed sections of the Nirvana for somewhere that would have plenty of space and would be secluded enough not to attract attention but not enough to make anyone suspicious either.

This was how he found the room that he currently occupied and as luck would have it was near an old manufacturing workshop. Of course the tools and machine had long since been decayed to be of any real use but the old parts, scraps of metal, and other items where fairly useful for practicing his abilities. Setting up targets in a rudimentary firing range, practice dummies, obstacle courses, or just staking pieces to "move" them, these were a few of the things he had in mind to test his abilities. Though that was limited as David had to curtail his abilities by not using too powerful that would be detected by the Nirvana's sensors, as primitive as they are, not mention anything that might breach the hull.

Because of this he hadn't progressed as much as he would have liked. Aside from his recent technopathy and a noticeable increase in the power and duration of the abilities he already possessed he wasn't able to find out, much to his slight frustration, if he had any other abilities. Afterward he decided to take a break so now he sat going through mental exercises as the various parts and pieces floated in the air as if they were in zero gravity. After finishing his exercise David slowly breathed out and as he did the floating objects gradually lowered until they touched the ground. David opened his eyes then stood up and stretched for a moment before walking toward the viewport window to stare out into space.

As he did he noticed that the ship was approaching a desert planet at which David raised an eyebrow.

"Not quite sure what Magno hopes to find on that spinning dust ball besides a lot of sand and maybe some deposits of water but something tells me that we're about to find out. Better get the Starhawk ready." he decided as he turned left the room heading toward the Vanguard hangar.

While he didn't know if he would be included in the ground team David had learned from experience that it never hurt to be prepared.

As the Nirvana continues on its journey back to the crew's homeworlds of Mejere and Taraak in the distant Gemini system, the Paksis fused ship makes a stop as it maneuvers and holds position in orbit over a barren desert planet that scans revealed was devoid of life. Yet that may not have always been the case as surface scans found clusters of ruins across the planet that seems to have been large cities that at one point once held thousands of inhabitants. One in particular was emanating a faint energy signature hence the reason for investigating it. That and to see if there were any supplies or information to be found. In the conference room, BC and Magno studied the image being displayed on the room's holographic wall monitor.

"This planet..." BC observed as she stared at the image.

"...It appears to be dead." Magno concluded sharing her second-in-command's line of thought.

"This seems very strange. I think we should check it out more thoroughly. There could be some useful information to be gained from a surface investigation." BC suggested turning away from the screen to face Magno.

"Hmm…" Magno considered this as she carefully weighed her options.

"BC, I'm not too worried about you going down there but as for the others..." Magno said thoughtfully with a frown leaving her the rest of her concerns unsaid but knew it wasn't necessary as BC fully understood what her captains concern was.

"Hmm…" BC returned her gaze to the holographic monitor looking thoughtfully at the image for a moment before an idea came to her and turned back to Magno.

"Perhaps David could accompany the search team?" BC suggested, "Aside from me, he seems to have the most experience in this kind of operation out of everyone on the ship."

"That's probably a good idea," Magno nodded in approval, "In the meantime let's get ready to make an announcement of what we're about to do. Oh, and make sure to tell Parfet to get some of those men's machines ready."

In the Vanguard hangar…

The hanger bay was mostly quiet as there was no one in the hangar except for David and Hibiki who were both performing maintenance on their respective machines on opposite sides of the bay. David was currently sitting in the Starhawk's cockpit finishing up a routine diagnostics on his machine checking the information on their status on the holographic display in front of him. Once the diagnostic was finished and David was satisfied with the results he powered down the Starhawk and decided to see how Hibiki was coming along with his own repairs. What saw and heard next amused him to no end.

On the other side of the bay Hibiki's Vanguard was squatting on top of a thin support lift that held the machine in place by the unit's rear, which David thought made the whole thing seem absolutely ridiculous, with Hibiki himself standing on the railing of the catwalk that stretched before the unit's torso to reach over one of the Vanguard's shoulders that was just above with his head and arms near an open access panel. He was fixing up some of his Vanguard's internal hardware and after a moment Hibiki closed the panel he was working on with Hibiki looking completely exhausted.

The young pilot sighed tiredly as he continued to lie draped over the Vanguard's shoulder.

"They really work people hard around here, don't they partner? How does David manage put up with them?" he asked his Vanguard tiredly unware that David was watching and hearing very word or of a certain red-head girl slowly creeping up the stair of the catwalk and getting closer to him.

"Man, women don't know how hard this is at all!" he grumbled miserably still unware that a giggling Dita was sneaking up on him. When she reached the top she turned to where he was and while striking a slight pose she made a pistol gesture with her right hand bringing the tip of her index finger to her lips while closing her eyes. Quietly chuckling David saw what was coming next for the unsuspecting Hibiki.

"Just who do these women think is responsible for—!" Hibiki started to complain but at that exact moment Dita loudly kissed her finger then pointed it at Hibiki obviously pretending to shoot a heart at him. The sudden noise startled Hibiki and with a cry surprise he lost his grip and his footing as he fell off the railing landing on the catwalk sprawling on his back with David cringing at the scene.

Looking up absently at the ceiling with exhausted eyes Hibiki sighed heavily and mumbled, "Maybe I'm just not eating right..."

A shadow loomed over him and Hibiki looked further up to see Dita standing over him staring at him with curiosity. "Are you okay?" she asked in genuine concern upon seeing how exhausted the young Taraakan was.

Hibiki didn't answer as he stared at Dita's skirt and gulped loudly.

After making sure the diagnostics were complete David reactivated the fighter's security measures and put the system on standby before leaving the cockpit and closing the canopy. When he finally ascended the stair of the catwalk a sudden chuckle from David caught their attention and looked to see him standing behind Dita with an amused expression.

"Alright kid show's over." David grinned as he stared at the scene before him with undisguised humor. "Come on, I'll help you get to sickbay and the doc will fix you up."

Later in Nirvana's Sickbay…

Once David helped Hibiki inside Duelo wasted no time in examining him and a few minutes later Hibiki was sitting on one of the examination tables wearing only a loincloth. Duelo began by first powering on the pulse monitor then placed small wireless medical sensors on key points of Hibiki's face and chest that fed information on the condition of the young teen's cardiopulmonary system to the monitor. After placing the last sensor Duelo began a thorough physical exam of Hibiki with well-trained professionalism.

As for the patient in question Hibiki looked even more exhausted than when David helped him to the infirmary. But when Duelo started gently squeezing Hibiki's thigh and moved his hand in closer to the teen's crotch Hibiki suddenly became much livelier. Jerking up in shocked fright he quickly scooted back before curling up defensively and wildly flailing his arms at the doctor to fend him off.

"Hey what the heck are you doing?!" demanded a franticly alarmed Hibiki.

"Examining you." Duelo replied simply as if it was the most natural thing in the world and it showed from the surprise he had at Hibiki's reaction.

"Keep your hands to yourself!" snapped Hibiki in a wary tone as his face turned red with embarrassment.

Duelo moved closer to him which made Hibiki more nervous, "You seem to be completely exhausted." the doctor noted with concern.

At that Hibiki calmed down and wearily exhaled. "Well going out there and fighting side by side with David and the women is no picnic, Doc! Of course I'm tired, someone's gotta protect them." he said quietly.

"So you're fighting to protect them, is that it?" Duelo questioned with a knowing smile.

"Well...what I mean is...I'm stronger than they are...and since...the women are weak…I…" mumbled sheepishly as tried to find the right words. Suddenly pulse monitor emits a high pitched beep grabbing Duelo's attention and saw the monitor was reading a high increase of Hibiki's heart rate.

"Let's stop talking about the women, you should rest here until you feel better." Duelo suggested.

That's when Paiway appeared next Duelo with a raised eyebrow. "What's this thing? A video game?" she asked curiously pointing at the pulse monitor much to Hibiki's annoyance as he glared suspiciously at her.

"You've never seen a pulse meter?" Duelo asked in genuine curiosity surprised that the young nurse wasn't familiar with even one of the most basic medical technology.

"What's it to you if I haven't?" she retorted with narrowed eyes then she finished with a pout, "Anyway all health problems can be fixed in the Jacuzzi!"

"Ja...cuzzi?" Duelo pronounced uncertainly as he was unfamiliar to what a Jacuzzi was.

"A Jacuzzi is pretty much a kind of high-class sauna and spa. It's basically something to help people relax and relieve them of stress." David clarified as he walked in from an adjacent room making the others, except Duelo, jump in surprise.

"How did he sneak up on us without us hearing him?" Paiway thought in surprise.

"Ah." Duelo nodded in gratitude even though he still wasn't entirely sure what David was talking about.

"Wait, what do you know about Jacuzzis anyway?" Paiway questioned arrogantly putting her hands on her hip.

"My people visited your world before remember?" David answered as he was pretty sure that word had spread about what he told the captain.

"Oh…" Paiway deflated at that looking embarrassed.

When David first heard of the Jacuzzi on board the ship he had utilize every shred of willpower to keep himself from slapping his forehead in exasperation and yell "What kind of hair brained moron would put a beauty salon on a warship?!". Despite this he held his peace as that wouldn't have likely earned him any points with the crew.

"Anyway thanks for your time doc. I'm going to the mess hall to grab some grub." David told Duelo who simply nodded and with that David left.

Curious, both Hibiki and Paiway looked at Duelo in confusion.

"What did he mean by that?" Paiway asked wanting to know what David was doing.

Duelo gave her a reprimanding look. "Paiway, do you remember about the talk we had about patient confidentiality."

"Umm…yes?" Paiway answered hesitantly.

"This is another one of those times." he told her seriously.

Paiway merely huffed and turned her head away. "Sounds like a future Pai-check to me!" she thought mischievously.

At said Jacuzzi…

Within the steaming room several of the dread pilots were being attended to by the staff of the Jacuzzi department which many of the female pirate crew agreed to be one of the most important ones on the Nirvana.

Jura sat lounging and stretched out on a salon chair wearing only a large white towel around her body with another towel wrapped around her scalp to keep blonde hair from flowing down. She relaxed while four attendants surrounded her tending to her pampering. One was massaging her legs while two others were giving her nails a manicure and a pedicure and the last attended to her hair.

"Ahhh, space battles always damages my hair." Jura sighed as she lay blissfully on the chair.

"Don't worry! We're here to revitalize your beauty, Jura!" assured the attendant that was working on her hair.

"I appreciate it. I don't feel much like battling unless my hair is set just right." Jura said as the attendant continued to work. All the while Pyoro floated beside Jura staring at the woman in curiosity at what she and the other women were doing. Due to Pyoro's nature of being a machine, despite its masculine programming, the small Navi-bot was allowed into the room without much of a fuss from the women as they didn't mind Pyoro since it was a machine and more to the point it was a friend of Parfet's.

Jura sighed as she felt her body tension melt away from all the pampering she was getting then she moved her head to the side and noticed Meia soaking in one of the hot tubs. "Meia, are you trying to lose more weight?" she asked with Pyoro following her gaze to stare at the blue haired Dread leader.

"Excess body fat gets in the way of combat." The bluenette replied without turning around.

"But you won't have any breasts left if keep this up." Jura pointed out to her leader.

"Heh. Don't worry too much about me Jura, I can handle myself." Meia replied brushing off her friend's concern with a confident smirk.

While Meia wasn't as interested in maintaining her outward appearance as Jura was even she needed to relax every once in a while, more so nowadays than she did before. She shifted a little to settle herself in the tub more comfortably. Lately though she had felt an increasing need to come here. Spending time in the Jacuzzi usually helped her to relax and clear her head of stress. But lately even that didn't seem to help put her at ease as her thoughts always drifted back to the mysterious male from another world beyond Taraak and Mejere.

"That man." she thought in frustration. "Why can't I stop thinking about him?"

"Hmm…Sometimes humans don't make any sense at all, they seem impossible to understand." Pyoro commented as the robot tilted its head with a confused expression.

Meanwhile at the Cafeteria…

"Hmm…" Dita crouched in front of the conveyer belt that was displaying the meals prepared from the galley while eyeing the various kinds of dishes and paying close attention to the calorie markers stuck into them as she quietly hummed to herself as she searched for the perfect meal for her "Mr. Alien".

Then Barnette walked up next to her and looked at the conveyer belt and hummed to herself while deciding on which meal to eat. One meal caught her eye and reached out eagerly for a dish that a large steak and vegetables with a light but tasty sauce that was labeled 780 calories. Before Barnette could take it though, it was quickly snatched away from her.

"I think I'll have this one!" Dita declared with a cheerful smile on her face.

Barnette's mouth gapped open and a sound of outrage escaped her lips at the sight of Dita holding what would have been her meal.

"Dita! That's loaded with calories!" Barnette said angrily with narrowed eyes in an attempt to dissuade the red head Dread pilot from taking her meal.

"That's alright, Barnette. He told me that he wasn't eating right." assured Dita was she walked away, leaving with the plate in hand.

"Huh?" Barnette's eyes widened in confusion as she tried to understand what or who Dita was talking about.

She shrugged, chalking it up as another one of Dita's many odd quirks. After grabbing another plate, which had baked chicken strips with a side of mashed potatoes and gravy, she went to sit at one of the tables when she noticed one of four people that she hoped she would never see in the cafeteria.

Not far from where she stood David was sitting alone at one of the tables eating his meal while ignoring the obvious harsh whispers and heated looks pointed his way. Ever since he discovered honest to God real food on the Nirvana he came almost every single day to eat determined to never eat or so much as look at another Taraakan pellet for the rest of the voyage. Nothing would keep him away from enjoying a decent meal, not even the hostile glares from the crew. Barnette noticed that he mostly given a wide berth except seated not too far from him were some of the members of the repair and register crews he had worked with before and while they didn't speak to him often, aside from a few pleasantries, they weren't exactly avoiding him either. She also noticed another girl from the register was oddly enough occasionally glancing at the man nervously.

Barnette, who was already annoyed from Dita's earlier theft of her intended meal, was becoming agitated at how casually this man sat in their cafeteria eating their food and acting like he had the right to be here. It didn't help that the captain made him a guest of all things rather than a prisoner like the other men as he should be. Plus she was still seething at the fact that she had needed his help from the elevator incident and her pride had taken a serious blow. Worse, in her mind at least, was the fact that no one knew how the man had stopped the enemy from boarding the ship and what aggravated her the most was despite that he somehow smooth-talked his way out of Reg duty and back to piloting his machine while she got stuck with scrubbing the engineering deck for three days after she "accidently" locked David in water processing plant.

Hardening her resolve she decided to confront this upstart man and put him in his place. Walking briskly toward him she failed to notice that many of her fellow female crewmates stopped talking and watched with surprise at the sight of Barnette of all people was going to talk to a man. A couple of them wanted to ask her about what could have come over her to even want to talk to David but then they saw her angry scowl and wisely decided to keep quiet and see what would happen next.

When she reached the end of David's table she saw much to her irritation that David didn't even look up either because was too engrossed into his meal to notice her presence or more the likely possibility was that he was ignoring her. That was about change.

But before she had a chance to lay in to him he beat her to the punch.

"She meant Hibiki." David said casually which caught Barnette off guard.

"What?" she asked in surprise but she hid it well.

"The person Dita mentioned, the one who wasn't eating right, she meant Hibiki." David elaborated smoothly still not looking at her.

"Well who asked you man?!" she snapped harshly with a glare.

"I only mentioned it because you seemed confused and my name is David…woman." he replied calmly.

Barnette let out an annoyed growl through gritted teeth.

"Yeah? What makes you think that you can just come here or anywhere on our ship as you please?" she shouted gaining the full attention of her crewmates as they watched to see what David would do.

At that point David finished his then put his utensils down and finally looked up and stared unflinchingly at an angry Barnette.

"First of all because I feel like it and secondly because your captain said so, along with the fact that I'm a guest." David said calmly then raised an eyebrow. "You're not saying that your captain is wrong and that you know better than her, are you?"

The other women in the room gasped at that and Barnette was startled at the implication.

"That's not it! You're just trying to change the subject!" she accused in an attempt to brush off David's question.

"The only one who's trying to change the subject is you, as you plainly avoided the question." he countered coolly. "And obviously you came here just to try to embarrass me and instead you ended up being the one embarrassed."

With that he got up to leave but before he did David stopped next to Barnette. "Enjoy your meal, I'm sure it will almost be as good as the meal you almost had."

Saying all that he wanted to say he left a flabbergasted Barnette and a silent crowd of women.

On the Bridge…

Later on the bridge the operators were working at their respective stations in order to provide a detailed scan of the planet's surface they had found. The main view screen magnified on a sector of the planet that may have been a city. Ezra bent over the console to interpret the readings.

"Multiple heat signatures have been confirmed." Belvedere reported.

"There's a sandstorm interfering so I can't be too sure but I see something that appears to be a group of artificial structures." Ezra supplied while staring down at the console, reading the results from the scans taken of the planet below.

"We should investigate, we might be able to find something useful." BC suggested as she turned the captain.

Magno gave a reluctant sigh, "Our kitchen is running low on supplies…" she mused then she smiled and her tone quickly became more jovial, "Oh well, we'll just have to do things like old fashioned pirates!"

"Thank you, captain." BC smiled before turning to the bridge operators with a commanding look. "Begin monitoring the weather conditions. Let's determine the best time to send out a recon party!"

"Roger!" Belvedere replied turning back to her station to begin her task.

Meanwhile Dita who was holding various foods and ingredients was quietly crouched behind a cabinet while watching one of the cooks washing her hands to make sure the cook didn't notice her. When Dita saw that she was still washing her hands Dita quietly started to crawl to the exit when a sudden chime sounded startling her but then she looked up at the intercom in curiosity.

"Attention all pilots and crew members. We're going to investigate a planet shortly; all pilots are to immediately begin simulation runs on the Vanguards." BC announced before the intercom went silent.

At the same time in the infirmary, Hibiki was lying fully dressed on the examination bed waiting for Duelo to finish examining him when he saw and heard BC's announcement on a holographic monitor.

"What?!" Hibiki yelled as shot up from where he laid, "Women are going to be using the Van-Types?!"

The young pilot then bolted out of the infirmary leaving a curious Duelo behind.

After stopping in the middle of the corridor that led to Vanguard bay to listen to BC's announcement David continued on his way to the Vanguard bay.

"Well that's certainly a surprise." David thought, "Although given that the Dreads weren't designed for atmospheric entry they didn't have a lot of other options. I bet the Dread pilots are less than thrilled about that. Not that it would matter since as far as I can tell most of them has no experience in ground combat. I doubt the y have any EVA zero-gravity combat training either. As it stands less than half of the selected pilots will probably be able to do it."

With that in mind David decided to go to the Vanguard bay to both prep his machine and see how the female pilots perform and adapt to the Vanguards.

"Umm…excuse me?" called a nervous female voice from behind him.

David stopped short and turned to see a apprehensive young girl crewmember holding a pad in her hands.

"Yes? Can I help you?" David asked pleasantly.

"Well BC wanted me to give this to you so here." she held out the pad for him to take.

Once he did the girl did a short bow before running off. David simply shrugged and looked down at the pad to see what BC wanted from him. After reading the contents he casually raised an eyebrow, unsurprised at its contents. He pocketed the datapad and resumed walking toward the Vanguard bay.

"Now I have an even better reason to prep my Starhawk." he mused. "Though I bet the Dread will like it even less than piloting the Vanguards."

True to David's predictions, two pilots in particular who weren't really thrilled at the prospect of piloting the Vanguards.

In the Vanguard hanger Meia, Jura, and Barnette are watching engineers working on the Vanguards to prepare them for the upcoming mission. After weeks of neglect the machines were now being repaired and serviced by Parfet's crew of engineers. Most of the Vanguards were colored in outlandishly feminine styles and patterns such as hearts, stars, stripes, and polka dots.

"Geez, I know that it's impossible to use the Dreads to get to the surface. But even so, that doesn't mean that I have to like using the men's Vanguard." Barnette scoffed with distaste while gazing at the Taraak machines warily with Meia silently agreeing.

"Well I really don't care if it's a Vanguard or not." Jura said with a smile then turned her gaze upward at her scarlet and pink colored Vanguard with eagerness. "Just as so long I can combine into something beautiful!"

Not far away, the young Taraakan cadet Bart took the time to boast knowledge on the Vanguards that he didn't really have so he could further convince the women how indispensable he was to them.

"Hey there! If anyone has any questions, don't hesitate to ask me!" Bart proclaimed confidently, "During my years in the military academy, I underwent thousands of training sessions. You could even say that…"

He didn't have the time to finish his boasting when he was knocked to the floor by an anti-gravity lift that came down right on top of him but stopped short to prevent him from being crushed. The technician who was on the lift gave a look down at the pitiful cadet. scolded the young boastful cadet.

"What do you think you're doing standing under the lift like that?! We're busy over here so try to stay out of the way!" she scolded Bart.

"Okay." Bart groaned as he lied dazed on the hanger deck.

Sitting on the edge of the nose of his Starhawk David could see everything that was happening and he looked on with a deadpan expression that showed very well what he thought. He shook his head and sighed exasperatedly at the scene in front of him. When he first entered the hanger he immediately cringed at the sight of the brightly feminine colored and stylized Vanguards. It became immediately obvious, in Bart's case pathetically so, to the veteran centurion that the women weren't taking the upcoming mission as seriously as they should, as he knew that training for the Vanguards or any Mechanoid wasn't anything like piloting fighters like the Dreads.

At that moment David saw Hibiki running through the doorway with an alarmed look but when he grinded to a halt and looked to his mechanized partner he wore a look of absolute horror and cried out in panic. And for a very good reason, as Hibiki spotted Dita standing on the catwalk in front of his Vanguard holding a paint gun in both her hands.

"I'll make it all clean and pretty. I'm sure Mr. Alien will love it!" said the redhead as she cocked the paint gun took careful aim at the Vanguard.

"Wait!" Hibiki frantically yelled as he dashed up the catwalk stairs to put himself in the path of the spray.

He leaps right in front of his Vanguard just in time to receive a full blast from the paint gun.

"Oh no…" he groaned as he slid off with half his body soaked in bright pink paint and leaving a large Hibiki shaped imprint in the center of the splatter of pink that now mostly covered of the Vanguard's chest plate.

"What the heck do you think you're doing here?!" he yelled furiously at Dita with an angry glare.

"Wow! A pink alien! How cute!" Dita cooed clasping her hands and pressing them against one side of her cheeks with an adoring look oblivious to his rage.

"This woman is nuts!" Hibiki signed in irritation.

A loud cackling sound made him run to the railing and look down.

David had jumped off his Starhawk and walked until he stood a few feet away from the Vanguard while wearing a board grin.

"Hey kid! I hope that's not a new look you're trying out. Because pink is definitely not your color." David chuckled loudly at Hibiki's expense.

Hibiki only stood and growled under his breath.

"Anyway, just be sure you have your Vanguard cleaned and ready. We'll be heading out with the Dread pilots once they finish the simulator." he told Hibiki.

"What do you mean you'll be heading out with us?" shouted an angry Barnette.

David turned to see Meia, Jura, and Barnette walking toward him.

"Hello Meia, Barnette, Jura. Didn't the captain or BC tell you?" he asked acknowledging them with a nod.

"Tell us what?!" demanded Barnette still miffed about her earlier conversation with David.

"I've been assigned to the recon team that's going to the planet's surface." he answered neutrally.

"You're what?!" Barnette yelled in outrage.

Meia concealed her emotions better as she said nothing.

"If you don't believe me here are the orders." said David as he pulled out the datapad and handed to Meia.

Meia looked over it for moment to see if he was telling the truth then looked back up to him.

"Why did the captain assign you to the recon team?" Meia asked coldly.

"Because both the captain and BC knows that out of most everyone on this ship I have the most combat experience when comes to ground operations." he replied candidly. "Which reminds me, doesn't your simulator training start in a few minutes?"

Meia' face twitched slightly and for a moment David believed that she was going to retort. But instead without a word she turned away and left for the lifts with Jura, Barnette, and Dita following closely behind.

A moment later a still half pink Hibiki joined David.

"Man what's their problem?" he asked.

"It was nothing, I just reminded them that they needed to be in the simulator room in a few minutes." David replied with a shrug.

"So are the women really going to use the Vanguards?" Hibiki asked uncertainly.

"That seems to be the case. Why do you ask?" David questioned when he noticed Hibiki's disgruntled look.

"It's just that this whole thing is stupid!" Hibiki grumbled, "I mean there's just no way that the women can understand how to pilot machines like the Van-Types!"

"I don't entirely disagree with you but I wouldn't count them out yet either kid, you might be surprised." David suggested, "Anyway let's get you cleaned up and we'll catch up with them and see how they do for ourselves."

With that he set his hand on Hibiki's paint free shoulder and guided him out of the hangar.

Back on the bridge the operators was scanning the landing site when the results came back positive.

"There are plenty of heat signatures but next to no life signs down there." reported a perplexed Belvedere.

"Hey, do you think that this might be…part of the aliens' plan." Amarone asked Belvedere.

"Keep your eyes on the monitors," BC commanded sternly, "Once the storm dissipates the recon team will be going down there."

"Roger!" both Belvedere and Amarone replied turning back to their respective stations.

Later in the observation room David, Hibiki, Pyoro, and Duelo were watching the female Dread pilots' training inside the simulation pods. It soon became apparent to David that they were totally unaccustomed to fighting with the Vanguards and that they had little to no experience in hand-to-hand combat. David watched as Jura's Vanguard moved forward to attack three others. She thrusted forward with her elbow short blade but was blocked by the other Vanguard. Then her Vanguard then started tumbling forwards off balance due to lunging too far with that last strike. Out sheer dumb luck this made her clumsy attack more successful. But only because the wildly flailing legs of Jura's Vanguard managed to connect with her opponent, knocking the other woman's Vanguard away.

Inside her simulator cockpit Jura's patience had finally ran out.

"I've had enough! What's wrong with this?! Why can't this machine move around with more elegance? I'm out of here!" cried out in frustration then pressed a button that opened the simulation pod's canopy.

"Don't you need permission first?" Pyoro asked curiously from the observation room.

"Oh be quiet!" Jura snapped tiredly before getting out and marched out of the room with a huff.

If David was totally honest with himself he wasn't surprised by Jura's reaction as it was shared by a large number of the Dread pilots and his earlier estimation of the number of women being able to do this may have been optimistic at best. The women had been trained extensively with Dreads and were more experienced with doing long-range strikes and surprise attacks. The Vanguards on the other hand were specifically designed for slugging it out against enemies in close combat, something the Dreads weren't designed to do. Surprisingly despite being against the notion of piloting the Vanguards, Barnette was proving to be an exception as she quickly got the feel of piloting the mech and was even expertly manipulating her Vanguard's weapon systems. Though the other women had mastered the basics of moving the units around and manipulating objects on simulated land somewhat alright, but once they started space combat their performance went downhill from there.

"It looks like I'll have to report to the bridge." Duelo observed as he monitored the Dread pilots' performance and pulse readings from the monitor.

"Didn't I tell you guys," remarked Hibiki, "There's no way a women could ever pilot a Van-Type."

"That's not entirely true kid. They have proven that they can pilot them on the ground just not so well in space." David corrected as he glanced at Hibiki from the corner of his eye.

Hibiki turned to David in surprise.

"Why the heck not? They fly in those Dreads and fight out in space all the time." Hibiki questioned with disbelief.

"They pilot fighters yes, but most of them don't any experience with piloting Vanguards in general or hand to hand combat in an zero gravity environment. Trust me kid, there's a huge difference between them." David explained which Hibiki slightly nodded uncertainly.

Then both he and Duelo looked at the monitor screen that displayed Meia's vital signs and noticed a significant rise. They also saw that her breathing was heavy, she was also sweating profusely, and showed signs of extreme agitation even fear. David had seen these kinds of symptoms often enough among recruits and even some experienced veterans in his career in the Terra Novusian Military.

"It looks like she has a serious case of claustrophobia." David remarked with concern.

"Yes I know," Duelo replied holding his chin with equal concern. "But we need to let the simulation continue for now in order to have a better evaluation of her condition."

David nodded in agreement and continued to watch.

Inside the simulation pod, Meia was breathing heavily, her eyes had widened and cold sweat was pouring from her forehead. The simulation showed a missile headed straight for her but Meia sat frozen, unable as the missile made a direct hit destroying her Vanguard. The pod's screen displayed "Killed in combat. Simulation ended". Meia slams her fist into the wall in frustration and fear breathing very hard in an attempt to calm herself down.

Full aware of this development in her behavior Duelo contacted Meia from the observation room's console. A view screen then appeared on her cockpit display showing Duelo's face.

"Are there medical overrides on Mejere?" he asked over the com-link.

Meia continued to breathe raggedly and just stared questioningly at his image on the small screen.

"On Taraak," Duelo elaborated upon seeing her confusion. "Doctors are given the authority to ground pilots when they're in situations similar to yours. Do you want that?"

"Of course not!" Meia shot back weakly but full of determination.

"In that case I suggest that you switch your monitor for full vision in all directions. I believe that should help in lessening the strain on your body." Duelo suggested seriously.

"Keep your advice to yourself! I don't need anyone's help, least of all you! I'll be just fine thank you very much!" she snapped stubbornly.

Standing next to Duelo, David overheard the Taraakan doctor and Meia's little verbal match and he shook his head with a sigh. Though he knew Meia's pride was commendable at times but when someone places their pride over their common sense it usual ends up with that someone being killed.

Then he noticed Duelo leaving the observation room likely to go confront Meia directly about her problem. David pressed the intercom button so he could listen in on what they say in case he needed to step and lend Duelo some assistance. At the same time near the back of the room Bart was sitting on the floor reading a Vanguard instruction book and occasionally muttering the instructions out loud to himself.

"Let's see…how to use the ten-in-one knife shield… following the will of the pilot…" he mumbled as he read. "Ah, simultaneously with the electron pulse beam! I can do this!" Bart proclaimed with a smile as he closed the book.

"Whatever! Just keep doing whatever it is you're doing." yawned Hibiki who had gotten bored of watching the Dread pilots turned to leave only to walk straight into Jura's chest, with his face in the middle of her large cleavage.

"Well hello there!" Jura said seductively with a smile as she stared down at him apparently not minding the fact that Hibiki's face was between her breasts. "Next time we go out, you'll combine with me. I hope you'll keep that in mind."

The blonde pilot walked away, freeing Hibiki from her chest allowing him to inhale a breath while also leaving a thoroughly confused Hibiki clueless to what just happened.

"What the heck was that all about?" he whispered to himself blinking a couple of times in bewilderment.

David who saw the whole thing smirked to himself.

"If only he knew how much other guys would kill to be in his position." David smirked then a thought occurred to him and his smirk disappeared. "Then again it's probably better if he doesn't know for now, it would probably just freak him out more."

Turning his head back to the observation room's window David saw Duelo stand next to Meia's simulation pod as it opened, revealing an exhausted Meia inside as she lay sprawling over the console panting heavily.

"I'm really concerned!" Pyoro stated looking down at Meia with worry.

"The sudden change your pulse seems to be psychosomatic in nature," Duelo informed as stared neutrally at her. "Do you have any what caused this to happen?"

Meia merely raised her head and gave him a smug smile. "Your diagnosis couldn't be more wrong, its clearly just fatigue Doctor." she countered smoothly.

"An adamant denial I see." Duelo observed dryly.

"It's just fatigue!" she snapped back as she stood up then tried to leave only for her to stumble and she almost fell, leaving Duelo to catch her by the waist to keep her from falling. But the Dread pilot felt no gratitude for the gesture and roughly shoved his hands away from her before she kept walking.

She then stopped and turned her head to look at him with a glare.

"There's nothing I hate more than noisy people!" she said menacingly before leaving.

"Why do humans overexert themselves? I don't get." Pyoro sighed.

"I would say that's why their interesting," Duelo replied before looking toward the little machine. "Wouldn't you agree?"

"Not really."

"Fighting primal instincts, keeping their desires restrained, humans are the only things that behave that way." he explained before his face adopted a faraway look. "They truly are fascinating creatures."

"What's so fascinating about that?" Pyoro asked in confusion.

"There are plenty of things that are interesting about humans and life in general Pyoro."

Pyoro jumped up in fright and both Navi-bot and Duelo turned to see David standing at the door way to the simulation room.

"Also, humans aren't the only ones who behave that way Duelo. It's a big galaxy and there are races that came before us and are with us now that go through a lot of the same things we do. And just like us not all of them can resist their instincts or desires." David continued as his face adopted a faraway look remembering all his experiences with the many different alien races.

"Fascinating!" Duelo said with sudden interest as a look of curiosity dominated his features. "I don't suppose you could tell us more?"

"Maybe I will later but right now Meia's situation is a little more urgent right now, don't you think?" David pointed out.

"Yes, it seems she means to go through with the mission despite the strain on her body. Her resistance is…interesting." Duelo consented with a nod though he was slightly disappointed he agreed with David that his patients' health was more important than any fleeting curiosity of his.

"In this case it's just gonna get herself and possibly other people killed," David said grimly. "Perhaps I'll try a slightly more heavy-handed approach."

With that he left to catch up with Meia leaving a curious Duelo and Pyoro.

Meia briskly walked down the corridor still silently fuming at what the Taraakan doctor said. Suddenly she stopped dead in her tracks as she thought she heard something behind her. She quickly turned around to see if the doctor was following her but didn't see anyone. She frowned and turned around to continue but only to see the last person she ever wanted to talk to David standing right in front of her.

"How did he get there without me noticing?" she thought taken aback by his sudden appearance but hid it well.

"What do you want?" she demanded sharply in the usual hostile that she reserved for him.

David wore a look of disapproval on his face. "Apparently someone isn't being honest about their problem with claustrophobia." he said bluntly with seriousness.

Meia's eyes widened briefly but quickly narrowed them at the centurion before walking around him.

"What do you know?" she snapped arrogantly as David watched her walk away from him.

"I know that if you go down there the way you are now you'll not only get yourself killed but you'll also endanger the lives of the rest of team if we get into trouble down there!" he countered sternly not rising to her insult. At this she stopped dead in her tracks.

"Look I'm aware that you're not a fan of having to work with men but you need to realize that you can't do everything on your own especially in your current state of mind." David told her. "You can only rely on yourself for so long before you find yourself in a situation you can't overcome without help. Any good commander, any good leader should know that. Here's a piece of advice, sometimes a good leader is a leader that knows when it's time to follow."

"Keep your advice! I don't need it! None of that will slow me down!" she snapped not turning around.

"Then what is it that you're afraid of?" David asked coldly.

That seemed to have struck a nerve as Meia spun to face him. "I'm not afraid of anything!" she yelled with a hateful glare.

David was unmoved by her hostility.

"Really? It sounds to me like you're trying very hard to be convincing," David remarked with a raised eyebrow. "But the question is who are you trying to convince? Me? The other men? Your fellow Dread pilots and crewmates? BC? Captain Magno? Or yourself?"

For a moment Meia stood frozen uncertain as to how to answer then she shook herself and snarled, spinning on her heels and started leaving.

"Just what is it that you're running away from?" he wondered to himself as he watched the blue haired pilot leave stormed out of sight.

On the bridge Magno and BC were discussing about the recon party being assembled when a call came to the bridge. The main holographic communications screen appeared overhead showing Hibiki to be the caller.

"Hey, old lady! You there?" he asked rudely standing arrogantly straight with his fists to his hip.

BC turned around and stared at Hibiki sternly for his rudeness and lack of respect while the elderly pirate captain seemed untroubled by him.

"There's an old lady right here, what is it little one?" Magno asked curiously.

"Tell all your people to stop messing with Van-Types! This is really starting to piss me off!" The young Taraakan demanded, "Anyway...Oh crap! She's here!"

"Oh Mr. Alien, there you are!" called a female obviously belonging to Dita.

The transmission abruptly ends as Hibiki saw Dita running him.

"Huh?" BC looks at the sudden cut of the transmission with confusion while Magno laughed.

"Heh, heh, heh. Ironic isn't it? It's gotten a lot livelier, ever since we captured those four men!" Magno said with amusement.

"Yeah." agreed a still slightly bewildered BC.

Just then the monitor sounded signaling another call.

"Well speak of the devil!" Magno remarked as she pressed a button to answer the call.

Appearing on the main communications screen the caller was identified to be David who was using a terminal in the Dread simulation observation room.

"Captain, may I have a moment of your time?" David requested respectfully.

Magno smiled at that as she had to admit that the young man in question was very respectful and friendly despite the level of hostility leveled against him by many of the ship's crew. There was also something about David that made her trust the young man.

"Yes young man, what's on your mind?" she asked pleasantly.

"I apologize for the interruption but there's something serious that I need to discuss with you." he said with some urgency.

"And that is?" Magno asked curiously.

"It concerns the Dread squad leader Meia." David answered.

"Oh? What about her?"

"I'm not sure if you're aware," Mobius began looking behind him to make sure he was alone before continuing. "But during the Vanguard simulation she displayed a severe case of claustrophobia. Duelo's own report should corroborate this. I strongly suggest that you not include her in the recon team. She would only serve as a danger to herself and the rest of the squad if something goes wrong down there and she has a panic attack."

The pirate captain closed her eyes pondering on David's suggestion before opening them and making her decision.

"I understand your concern. Of course I was aware of her condition, but I didn't think it was this bad." Mango told him seriously. "If you really think that it's for the best I'll see to it that she is excluded from the mission."

David nodded in understanding. "Understood Captain. This maybe a recon mission but we have no idea what we'll find down there and I don't we should take any unnecessary risks."

David's transmission ended and Magno stared thoughtfully before turning to BC.

"It seems as though it was a good idea to include him in the mission after all." she said with smile.

BC returned her smile. "Yes Captain."

At the same time in one of the Nirvana's corridors a panicking Hibiki had his back to the wall as Dita had finally managed to corner him.

"What do you want?! Huh?!" demanded a wide eyed Hibiki. Then calmed down slightly when Dita held out a meal bento wrapped in cloth.

"Here," she said cheerfully as Hibiki looked at it. "This is for you! You like it right? It's some food for ya!"

Hibiki looked at her for a moment before looking back down at the wrapped bento and swallowed hard.

A few minutes later in the Bio-Park Hibiki was ravenously eating the bento that Dita had given him as they both sat on a blanket. The young Dread pilot continued to smile happily as she gazed at the young Taraakan Vanguard pilot.

Hibiki noticing her staring stopped eating and narrowed his eyes at her before turning around on the spot in order to eat with some privacy. A still smiling Dita just scooted further back to continue watching him eat.

"W-what do you think you're looking at?" Hibiki snapped nervously as he saw Dita's cheerful staring.

"Oh, nothing! I just wanna watch!" Dita replied happily as she continued to blissfully stare at him.

Hibiki just stared suspiciously at her for a moment then elected to ignore her and preceded to continue chomping down on his food.

"Being able to watch you makes me so happy!" Dita said as he kept eating his meal.

At some distance away, a certain someone was hanging upside down by her legs on a branch of a tree hidden behind some foliage taking pictures with her little camera of the unsuspecting Dita and Hibiki.

"Gotcha! Pai-check!" Paiway declared with a triumphant look.

Later on Paiway went to the women's shower room and relayed to Jura what she saw as the blonde Dread pilot was taking a shower.

"…And there they were, all alone having a nice picnic! The funny thing was that he seemed completely under Dita's control. And all because of one little boxed lunch." Paiway said slyly.

Jura smiled as she heard Paiway's info.

"Hmm, I see…" Jura purred as she began to plan a way to convince Hibiki to combine with her Dread.

Sometime later in the kitchen…

Barnette was in an apron standing over a stove cooking a bunch of food.

"That's it?!That's the reason why I'm doing all this cooking?!" Barnette asked angrily as she slammed a bottle of seasoning on the countertop. She was currently wearing a pink apron standing over a stove while cooking a few dishes. When she learned why her partner Jura had requested her to cook one of her special meals, she quickly became quite irritated to say the least.

"It's so I can combine to create something beautiful." Jura explained as she busied herself admiring her polished nails. "You do love me when I'm beautiful, don't you Barnette?"

Barnette said nothing but resigned to keep cooking as she knew that once her friend was like this it was pointless to argue. Then something caught her eye and curiosity took over.

"Hmm?" she saw that the item in question was a bottle of extra hot sauce.

"Hmm…" she smirked sinisterly as a delightfully vindictive idea came to her. Even though she would have preferred this would happen to another certain male pilot Hibiki would do just as well to vent her frustrations on. Without making a sound so Jura wouldn't notice, she quickly took the bottle and poured almost all of the bottle's contents and added some hot spices and seasonings to the fillet she was making.

"Here we go, all done!" she informed Jura merrily unaware that Bart was hiding outside the door while peeking at the inside of the kitchen.

"That's why I love you Barnette!" Jura praised as Bart snuck under the table behind them. "Let's go call him in. I can't wait!"

"You and me both!" Barnette thought darkly.

Once he made sure the two women left the room he chuckled and crawled to where Barnette had made the food. Once there he raised his over the table and looked down curiously at the bits of food left in the assortment of recently used pots, pans, and skillets.

"So this is the food women eat." he muttered to himself before pinching a piece of meat from a skillet and crouching back under the table. He then ate the meat and after a few seconds of chewing he swallowed.

After a moment of silence he popped up from underneath the table and screamed in agony with now swollen red lips.

At the Bio-Park...

"What is this?!What do you guys want from me already?!" Hibiki demanded with a yell of anger as he was dragged toward a draped table with sliver platters that were covered by lids in the middle of the park by Barnette and Jura.

He then found himself being forcefully seated by the two and as soon as he was in the seat, Jura lifted the lid on one of the platters and an aroma of the cooked food instantly caught the attention of the Vanguard pilot.

"Whoa…" Hibiki breathed as a slight drool escaped his lips as he stared down at the dish in wonder.

Jura leaned down next to him at ear level. "If you agree to combine with me you can eat it." Jura said sweetly to him.

Hibiki at the morsel in front of him then turned his head away.

"Fine then I don't want it!" dismissed Hibiki.

"Too bad, it's to die for." Jura said while shrugging her shoulders as she waited for the aroma of the food do the convincing for her. Hibiki glanced at the fillet and swallowed very hard at the smell and look of the food.

Back at the kitchen Bart was standing the kitchen sink as he filled the glass he held with water. Once filled he gulped the whole thing down in an attempt relieve his burning mouth. Then Dita walks in carrying two ice cream cones that each had three scopes of different flavors on them.

"Mr. Alien! Where are you?" she called out looking around the room only to find Bart with his back turned to her.

Bart quickly turned to her with a startled look.

"Oh, hi it's you!" he laughed nervously his lips still red from hot sauced meat.

"Oh hello it's you Mr. Pilot! Your face looks kind of funny." Dita observed curiously.

At that Bart drops the glass and quickly covers his swollen lips.

"I-It's nothing!" he assured her though his voice was muffled behind his hands.

"Uh-oh!" Dita saw that the ice cream on one of the cones was melting and then she held it out to Bart. "Do you want some?"

Remembering his recent experience with "women's food", Bart let out a womanly scream at the thought of eating Dita's ice cream.

"N-No thanks! Maybe some other time! Later!" he yelled with fear and promptly fled out of the room as fast as he could while screaming his head off leaving a confused Dita behind.

"Men certainly seem to do strange things." remarked Ezra as she walked into the kitchen from the storage room carrying an arm full of lemons. "I saw him sneaking in here and stealing some food out of the pots."

"Huh? Ezra, what are you doing with those?" Dita asked curiously as she eyed the lemons.

"I've had a craving for something sour lately!" admitted a blushing Ezra.

Dita simply smiled cutely at that even as the ice cream continued to melt in her hands.

Back on the bridge the Nirvana's sensors revealed that the area around the landing site was finally clear dust storm that covered the planet's surface.

"The planet's weather has stabilized Commander." reported Amarone.

"This is what we have been waiting for! All assigned pilots should standby to disembark!" BC announced over the intercom.

At the Bio-Park…

Shortly after BC's orders was broadcasted on the intercom an alarm that signaled the pilots to board their machines sounded and David ran to where Hibiki, Barnette, and Jura were.

"Hey kid, lunch times over! It's time to get moving!" David shouted to Hibiki.

Both the alarm and David's shouting snapped Hibiki out of eating the fillet as gasped in surprise while looking at David then looked back to the piece of fillet on his fork and tossed it side. He then springed off the chair he was sitting on and started to run out of the room.

"He's right! This no time to for food!" he declared as sprung out of the room. The tumbling chair knocked a startled Barnette off balance and she frantically juggled the plate of food she had in her hands until she balanced herself and let out a sigh of relief.

"Hang on! Don't forget you promised to combine with me!" she yelled after Hibiki with an infuriated look while Barnette looked down at the hot sauce laced food in her hands and sighed in disappointment.

Amused by what he heard David couldn't help but roll his eyes and smile but then spotted the food Barnette was holding. Curious despite himself and the alarm David quickly walked up to the two women and stared at the food.

"Since the kid isn't going to be able to enjoy this meal can I try a bite before I go?" David asked.

Jura turned and stared at him in surprise for a moment before giving him a saucy smile.

"Why of course!" she purred with her usual sensual tone. Her efforts to entice Hibiki may have been foiled but that didn't mean she couldn't have the other men wrapped her fingers Jura reasoned.

Next to them, Barnette kept herself from laughing and managed to pass it off as triumphant grin.

"This is perfect! Now all that cooking will be worth it!" she thought gleefully as she saw her chance for payback.

"Here have some of this!" Barnette suggested as she held out the fillet.

"Thanks, don't mind if I do." David thanked her as he took a fork before stabbing a piece of the fillet with it and popping the meat into in his mouth.

"Oh no, it's my pleasure!" Barnette assured sweetly giving him a false smile. She was confident that after one bite of her tailored food the man's taste buds would be annihilated.

"Well how is it?" Jura asked after a moment of watching David chewing on the morsel of food.

David chewed thoroughly, admiring the texture and the flavor of the meat and then swallowed.

"I gotta say, this tastes pretty good! And the meat is cooked just right!" he said with appreciation. "Though the seasoning a little too bland for my taste. Say, did either of you bring a bottle of hot sauce with you or something like that? Nothing too fancy just something to help bring out the flavor a bit."

Barnette's jaw dropped as her eyes widened in shock.

"What?!" she cried in disbelief.

What Barnette didn't know was that David was already aware that she had tampered with the food with hot sauce just from the smell and look of it plus he knew by...other means. In any case he wasn't worried because of his training and the fact that he had eaten much spicier alien cuisines. So when he ate the hot sauce laced food it hardly burned his tongue at all.

David shrugged and smiled at Barnette. "What can I say? I just like spicy food."

"Give me that!" Barnette snapped angrily as she snatched the plate out of David's hands and used another fork and took herself a piece of the fillet.

"There is no way! He should be writhing in pain by now!" she thought as she shoved the piece of meat into her mouth. The moment she did her tongue felt like it was dropped in a lava pit as she felt a burning sensation on her taste buds.

"Ahhhhh! Water!" she screamed in agony as she ran out the park to find the nearest source of water.

David grinned in amusement as he and a surprised Jura watched Barnette run out of the park. Jura then turned to David with a confused look all over her face.

"I guess something in the food didn't agree with her." he told her innocently before his face turned serious. "In any case she better not take too long, we have to leave for a mission after all. Speaking of which let's get moving."

"R-Right!" Jura agreed hesitantly as she followed David to the Vanguard hangar.

A few minutes later at the Vanguard hangar bay…

David, Hibiki, Dita, and Jura were already in their machines, the latter two in their blue and red Vanguards, and were waiting for Barnette. Then running into the hangar said women quickly made her way to her purple Vanguard. Once inside she, Dita, and Jura guided their Vanguards on the olive green Taraakan dropship and loaded them on the small ship's large harnesses. Hibiki on the other hand moved his Vanguard alongside the dropship as his machine had its own boosters that allowed it to enter the planet's atmosphere on its own, though like the others it was equipped with, much to David's chagrin, a handheld umbrella shaped metal chute-like devices so the units could land safely without sustaining damage from a high altitude landing. Likewise David's Starhawk was capable atmospheric reentry in either its fighter or Mechanoid mode on its own and unlike the Vanguard's required no ridiculous landing apparatuses to perform a simple landing. Starhawk was currently floating above the deck in its fighter mode prepared to launch into the vast void.

Sitting in her Vanguard's cockpit Barnette who now had puffy lips suddenly received incoming message from David. Grumbling to herself she activated her Vanguard's comm system and David's face appeared on the monitor in front of her.

"Hey there Barnette! What took you so long? This isn't exactly the best time to try on new lipstick ya know. Not that it doesn't look great on you!" David remarked cheekily with a broad grin.

If looks could kill Barnette's dark glare would have torn David to shreds and incinerated what was left. However it didn't quite have the desired effect she hoped for. With her puffy lips her glare made Barnette's face all the more comical and David busted out laughing and cut the transmission before she could snap a retort leaving her to snarl heatedly at the blank screen.

Minutes later Hibiki's Vanguard was the first to zoom out of the Nirvana's hangar followed closely by the dropship and David's Starhawk and all three units headed towards the planet's atmosphere.

"I won't let these stupid women mess with my partner!" Hibiki proclaimed as he continued to accelerate ahead of the group.

"Slow down kid this isn't a race!" David told him sternly as kept his Starhawk in escort distance of the dropship and Hibiki's Vanguard.

Apparently though Hibiki elected not to listen as he turned and saw the Starhawk and the dropship approaching him and decided to the opposite of what David told him to do.

"Dammit! They're all here!" he muttered in irritation as he sped his Vanguard faster toward the planet.

Following his example, the dropship increased speed and pursue the lead Vanguard. David just shook his head and sigh exasperatingly for what it seemed like the hundredth time in a row and punched his Starhawk forward to keep up which it did so quite easily.

"I won't let you get away so easily!" Jura declared with a smirk as she directed the dropship's trajectory to follow Hibiki's Vanguard.

"Stop it! The only one Mr. Alien is going to combine with is me!" Dita yelled as she heard Jura's little vow as Jura forgot to shut off her com channel.

"You be quiet and stay out of the way!" Jura retorted angrily.

Both then just narrowed their eyes and growled at one another through gritted teeth.

Barnette just dropped her head. "Hopeless." she sighed tiredly then she touched her still swollen lips and wondered how in the world the man could have even stand eating her hot sauce soaked food.

The Starhawk, Hibiki's Vanguard, and the dropship then began their descent into the planet's atmosphere. As they made atmospheric entry into the planet's ionosphere Hibiki utilized the chute-like device by opening it like an umbrella and placed it in front of his machine like a shield to protect his Vanguard from the intense heat. At the same time the dropship adjusted its trajectory and angle of descent with the Starhawk doing the same while relying on its advanced shields to protect it from the heat. As soon as they passed through the ionosphere, the dropship automatically broke apart letting its cargo experience freefall for a few seconds. Something that made David snort in contempt. What kind of moron designs a dropship that only makes a one-way trip?

The other Vanguards then deployed their own umbrella-like devices opening and pointing them skyward, with Hibiki doing the same, which made them act as parachutes allowing the units to float all the way down to the surface. David on the other hand merely slowed his fighter's descent and leveled it out, deciding to do a bit of aerial recon to see if he could spot anything unusual by air before joining the others on the ground when they landed.

Briefly David couldn't help but idly think of how much a potential hostile force would probably laugh their heads off at the sight of the Vanguards drifting down by way of mech sized metal umbrellas before shooting them down and then laugh again of how idiotic the whole thing had been. Regardless, the chute-like devices were serving their purpose as they brought the Vanguards closer to the ground at relatively safe speeds and if they continued to do so then David couldn't care less how stupid they looked as long as they helped get the job done. Bringing himself out his train of thought he set the Starhawk's sensors to scan the landing site and the surrounding area he was circling for anything unusual while he looked out the cockpit window in case he spotted something that the scans might miss. As he did David could make out the area below him as it came closer into view.

As he surmised earlier on the Nirvana the landing zone like the rest of the planet was a barren wasteland with sand and dunes stretching out as far as the eye could see. The only sign that the planet had ever been inhabited was the ruins of what was once a vast city beneath him and others that dotted the rest of this world's surface. As for the ruined city that the recon team was about to land near, many of the former multi-story buildings showed signs of damage and decay, the most obvious being the erosion from the sandstorms, of course but it was the extent and the consistency of the damage that he found odd. His console gave a high-pitched beep signaling him that the scans were complete. He quickly brought up the results on display and took a moment to read it. Aside from the heat signatures that were detected by the Nirvana the scans came back negative and he didn't spot anything out of the ordinary with his own eyes or sense anything, as far as he could tell the drop site was all clear.

But that did nothing to reassure him, in fact it made him all the more wary of what the recon team might find.

Speaking of which from his cockpit he looked down to see the other pilots' Vanguards coming in for their final approach. To his surprise and despite being her first time Barnette made a flawless landing almost expertly even. Disengaging her chute while still several feet in the air and then she used the Vanguards rear thrusters to bring her Vanguard down easily to the earth. Jura and Dita had similar results except they chose poor drop sites as the sand beneath them gave way, causing their Vanguards to slip and fall to the ground. Then of course lastly came Hibiki who, not so surprisingly, was the least impressive of the lot as David saw Hibiki's Vanguard's arms and legs wrapped around the pole of the chute and clinging on for dear life as he seemed to have forgotten, or more likely didn't know, that he had to disengage his chute or that he needed to use his thrusters to safely land.

"Whooooaaaa!" Hibiki cried out in panic as his Vanguard hurled straight into the ground and crashed in a spray of sand.

From the air David merely shook his head at the sight. "Geez, if he keeps going like this the kid isn't going to be around for very long, regardless of how much the Paksis Pragma enhanced his machine."

He was about to proceed to land where the others were when a sudden thought occurred to him and then smirked at the idea.

"Eh, why not?" he thought with his smirk turning into a sly smile. "It's been awhile since I've shown off in front of newbies."

Back in the Nirvana's Vanguard bay…

The deserted Vanguard bay was silent and one gray Vanguard was still sitting on its maintenance platform in standby mode. Suddenly it became less deserted when a breathless Meia ran inside the hanger.

"I got here too late!" Meia breathed as she came to a stop and stared at the empty bay with its hangar bay doors closed. Pyoro, who had chased after her, floated toward the Dread leader pilot.

"Don't push yourself so hard!" said Pyoro with concern as the little robot tilted its head. "Won't they be alright without you Meia?"

"This wasn't supposed to happen!" Meia denied stubbornly. "I'm the leader; I'm responsible for all of them!"

"Responsible even for those two." she thought silently to herself as David and Hibiki reluctantly came to mind.

"But the dropships were only meant to be one-way. There aren't any others left." the Navi-bot informed Meia.

"What do you mean?" she demanded with an alarmed look.

Not waiting for an answer she turned away with a frustrated scowl then noticed the sole grey Vanguard and after staring at it for a moment she smiled as she found the solution to her dilemma.

Meanwhile back on the desert planet's surface the Vanguard pilots were surveying the desolate landscape that they find themselves in as they looked curiously around the immediate area. Now placed on their Vanguards' backs were the umbrella -like chute devices which seemed to be designed to also double as a sort of booster to help the Vanguards get back into space after the current mission was done as the Vanguards couldn't escape the planet's gravity on their own power or their thrusters. As if the dropship couldn't to do that in the first place.

When David learned about this secondary feature he had to use every ounce of will to resist the urge to slap his forehead. Even after all the months he had spent on Taraak their idiot engineers always seems to find a way to annoy him. It was like the technology they created was intentional made to be redundant and pointless. Though his own Starhawk didn't need any such ridiculous gizmos since the Starhawk's engines were designed to break through a planet's atmosphere on its own even before the Paksis enhancements. The engines were also supplemented by an advanced transphasic core that allowed the Starhawk to reach FTL speeds. And more to the point David's machine was created by engineers who actually knew what they were doing.

As Hibiki's Vanguard finally stood up and joined the other pilots the three women wasted no time in commenting on the scenery around them.

"Well this place is deserted isn't it? Not anything interesting here at all." Jura sighed with disappointment as she looked on in boredom.

Barnette shared her friend's sentiments. "There wasn't any real need for Meia to come down here with us." she added to herself as she stared at the ruins.

"Wow! Look at all the sand!" Dita chirped excitedly as Jura and Barnette's Vanguards walked forward heading further ahead to split up and search the area more thoroughly.

At the same time Hibiki in his own Vanguard was trying to keep up with them but due to both his inexperience on the ground and the difficulty of walking on the loose shifty sand his machine was all but stumbling as he struggled to move it forward while trying not to fall over.

"Hold on! Don't go off on your own-whooaa!" Hibiki yelled as his Vanguard teetered before slipping on the sand and fell on its back sliding down the side of the small dune that he stood on top of a moment ago.

"Mr. Alien!" Dita cried out in concern as she watched Hibiki's Vanguard slide down for a few seconds before he came to a stop at the base of the dune.

Inside his Vanguard's cockpit an extremely embarrassed Hibiki looked up sheepishly in contemplation at his predicament.

"Hmmm…Come to think of it this is actually my first time using a Van-Type on land. Man I must look stupid right now!" Hibiki mumbled to himself miserably as he felt utterly humiliated. Then the sensors on his monitor sounded as it detected something coming in from the air and Hibiki looked up to see David's Starhawk coming toward him and the women fast.

"Huh?" Dita, Jura, and Barnette simultaneously looked skyward as they also noticed David's rapid approach.

When the Starhawk came within a few meters of where the rest of the recon team were David pitched his fighter sharply upward into a loop. Then at mid-loop switched Starhawk from fighter mode to mechanoid which ended with the now bipedal machine landing smoothly on its feet cradling one of its plasma rifles in both hands.

"Oh wow! Mr. David that was so cool!" Dita cheered with a smile.

"Hmph! Show off!" Hibiki grumbled under his breath as he stared the Starhawk with jealousy unaware that his sentiments were shared by a vexed Barnette who merely scowled at David's display of piloting skills.

Jura sighed dreamily with a smile before noticing Hibiki's Vanguard lying on the ground then her smile turned into a sensual smirk as she saw her chance. Hibiki was still sulking when he suddenly heavy metallic footsteps and looked up to see Jura's red and pink Vanguard kneeling over him.

"Hey, can't we hurry up a little and get on with it already?" Jura asked seductively while smiling saucily in her Vanguard.

Taken aback Hibiki stammered. "You-Ya gotta be kidding me?!" Then he paused as he heard another set of heavy footfalls and looked over to see Dita's blue Vanguard stomping toward them before stopping a few feet away from them.

"The only one Mr. Alien is going to do it with is me!" Dita declared fiercely with a glare.

"Now just a minute here, who do you think you're talking to?" Jura demanded indignantly with a glare of her own.

"Well it doesn't matter because you can't do it!" Dita shouted back definitely before the two women once again started growling at one another.

David meanwhile was ignoring the three's antics as he was focused on searching the area with a serious expression. As far he could make out the damage to the city was so substantial he doubted there were any survivors on this planet or if there were they would already have left. But for some reason he felt that wasn't the case as something about the amount of damage the ruined buildings showed had been nagging him in the back of his mind. He expected wear and erosion of course but the way they were angled along with the consistency of how many of them shared the same damage. It was as if a tremendous force impacted in a concentrated point obliterating everything in the immediate area while the resulting shockwave inflicted secondary damage. As far as David knew only two things could have possibly cause this kind of damage on a planet-wide scale like this. The first would've probably been some kind of planetary natural disaster. While the second and most likely, which he sincerely hoped that he was wrong, was a massive wave of orbital bombardment of the entire planet from an attacking fleet. If the latter was true then where were the attackers now?

As he searched his eyes spotted a small flash of reflective light off in the distance. Quickly David had his onboard monitor zoom in to the location he saw the flash and when saw what the light had been reflecting off of, he instantly realized that worst fears were confirmed.

"Ah crap, sometimes I hate it when I'm right!" David thought grimly for on the monitor he recognized the object in question all too well. It was a Harvester emitter.

Although David couldn't guess what it and the other emitters that were likely nearby was designed to do he knew it wouldn't be anything good. They also seemed to be equipped with some sort of energy projector which definitely raised some red flags. There was one thing working in David and his allies' favor, as long as they didn't do anything to set them off the emitters would remain inactive.

At that very same moment Hibiki wasn't the least bit amused of being Dita and Jura's prize to fight over and his frustration had reached the boiling point.

"Would the two of you just shut up and cut it out!" Hibiki yelled before activating his Vanguard's thrusters and taking off.

"No kid, stop!" David yelled urgently a moment too late.

As Hibiki ascended he was detected by the sensors of one of the hidden emitters in the ruins and as it came online its projector shot a red beam outward. A second later from various shielded locations several more emitters then shot out more red beams that converged into a latticework that formed an energy cage-like dome above the city where the recon team were standing in the midst of cutting off any means of escape.

"What's that?" Barnette asked herself in wary alarm at the sudden appearance of the laser grid.

To her surprise another emitter activated not too far in front of her and like the others unleashed a red beam to join the other beams that formed the grid-like barrier. Unfortunately for Hibiki his Vanguard had been right in the path of one of those beams when it activated.

"Aaaahhh!" Hibiki screamed with pain as his body was being struck by arcs of electricity that resulted in some of the beam's energy being conducted through his Vanguard's metal hull. The beam also disabled the Vanguard's thrusters causing them to stall leaving his machine in freefall and sending it crashing back down to the ground in a shower of sand.

"Mr. Alien!" Dita cried out in alarm at seeing Hibiki's Vanguard collision with the ground.

David quickly had his Starhawk's left hand let go of the plasma rifle allowing to be held by the right and used the unit's left hand to draw out the second plasma rifle. Now ready for a fight David berated himself for not seeing such an obvious trap sooner but he knew that there was no point agonizing over it now. And it would seem that the Harvesters had expanded their operations in this sector of space much further than he originally anticipated. David was about to move his Starhawk to help out Hibiki but stopped when a sudden intense buzzing sensation filled his mind. He breathed deeply and concentrated on the source of the disturbance in his mind to suppress it. After a moment the buzzing in his head was somewhat muffled but he could still hear the faint incoherent whispering that sounded like a swarm of insects.

Suddenly a violent sandstorm appeared out of nowhere behind Jura and Barnette causing the two women to look back in surprise.

"Huh?!" Barnette merely gawked in alarm while Jura had a more severe reaction.

"What's going on now?!" demanded an agitated Jura who was on the verge of panic.

"I think it's fairly obvious that we have company so stay sharp and don't panic!" David warned as he immediately aimed his plasma rifles at the incoming sandstorm.

Back the Nirvana's bridge Duelo was looking at the console in front of him which displayed the recon team's vital signs and quickly became concerned. The pulse monitor on his console showed that each member of the team's vital signs were now showing elevated heart rates and increasing respiration, though he noted that David's vitals were slightly elevated it was still cause for concern.

"Their pulse rates are rising rapidly!" he reported turning to BC with urgency. "Something must be happening to them down there!"

"Status report now!" BC ordered the bridge crew.

"A defense system appears to have been activated around the landing sight." Amarone reported.

"The landing party seems to have become trapped by some sort of energy barrier." supplied Belvedere.

BC looked up at the main holographic monitor worriedly.

"Landing party do you copy? Respond!" she called out with concern crossing her features.

Immediately three images of the three female Dread pilots appeared, though they slightly distorted due to the interference the Harvester emitters were causing.

"What is this?!" screamed Jura apparently unheeding of David's earlier advise and she was not the only one.

"It's no use the barrier has us completely trapped!" yelled Barnette with near panic in her voice.

"Mr. Alien is going to die without some help!" Dita cried out urgently.

"All of you calm down!" ordered BC with stern professionalism. "What kind of trap is it?"

Jura merely screamed in fright.

"I don't know!" Barnette replied with raw panic.

"Now the sand is attacking!" Dita yelled out in fear.

"What? The sand is…?" BC repeated in disbelief as Dita's answer left her bewildered.

Meanwhile on the ground the team's problems were becoming more compounded as they were slowing being overwhelmed by the seemingly living sandstorm.

"What's up with this sand?" Hibiki cried out as the sand was clinging on to his Vanguard's armored hull and started to spread further out in an attempt to engulf him completely.

The other Vanguard pilots faced the same problem as the sand attached to them and was slowly covering them as well. The only one who didn't seem to have as much trouble was David as he blasted the sand away with his Starhawk's duel plasma rifles and when the clumps of sand got too close or formed near him he'd scattered them with concentrated bursts of fire from his twin proton CWIS's. While the Starhawk's shields would keep the sand from making contact with his machine it wouldn't last indefinitely against a constant attack, especially if it's from what David had a sneaking suspicion of what was actually attacking him and the others.

In her cockpit Dita glanced around nervously as the sand began to envelope her Vanguard.

"This sand is too freaky!" she said looking disturbed at the sight of the sand that was forming in one of her mech's hands.

On the bridge BC continued to watch as the three women's panic continued to rise.

"What is this stuff?!" Jura demanded with terror in her tone.

"It's almost like it's alive!" Barnette shouted in dismay.

BC was about to issue an order when a fourth screen showing David appeared.

"BC, do you copy?" David called out calmly as he continued to fight.

"I'm here David! What's going on down there?!" BC quickly asked.

"While we were investigating Hibiki triggered a trap that created a laser grid that's preventing us from escaping and the sand around here suddenly became animate and started attacking us." David reported.

"But how?" questioned a perplexed BC.

"I have an idea about that but I need confirmation. Run a scan on the composition of the sand around us for anything unusual, specifically for anything that's artificial." David suggested. "In the meantime I'll try to keep everyone down here alive."

"We'll get right on it! Good luck!" BC acknowledged before David cut the transmission and then she turned to the bridge crew.

"Do it! Run an analysis on the sand!" BC ordered.

"Roger!" Belvedere replied.

High over the ruined city a bright point of light could be seen descending toward an area just outside of the recon team's original landing zone. It turned out to be Meia's Vanguard that was on final approach and as she got closer to the ground Meia activated her comms to reach the ground team.

"This is Meia! Where is everyone? Does anyone copy?" she called out.

On the bridge Duelo noticed that an icon displaying Meia's image and vital signs suddenly appeared on the vitals readout on his console.

"She's pushing herself." Duelo said quietly to himself with a concerned frown.

Back on the ground things weren't going well for the recon team. While David fought to keep more of the sand from infecting the Vanguards more than they already were Hibiki's own unit was almost completely encased by the sand with the others in similar states or worse. The concentrated sand particles worked their way between the Vanguards' joints and grooves impairing their motor functions which restricted their movement.

"Damn it! I can't move at all! What is this?!" Hibiki yelled in frustration as he yanked at his controls and tried in vain to move his Vanguard only to cause his machine to fall backward on the ground for the fourth time.

"Mr. Alien! Try to hold on!" Dita called out as she struggled with her ridged controls. "I'm going to see what I can do to help you!"

"Don't move around too much! It only makes the sand harder!" Hibiki warned her as he found that fact out the hard way.

"Leave this to me!" declared Jura as she approached the downed Hibiki in her own Vanguard. Her Vanguard then jumped toward Hibiki and after landing next to him she leaned down then activated the exhaust vent in the middle of her mech's torso and used the airflow to blow the sand off Hibiki's mech which freed it from the sand.

"Nice work!" Hibiki complemented as he saw that his partner could move again.

Jura smiled as she looked down at Hibiki's Vanguard.

"And for my reward you know what I want you to do." she replied suavely as she eagerly anticipated combining her machine with his.

"Are you still stuck on all of that stupid combining stuff?" Hibiki snapped as he stared at the blonde with irritated disbelief. "Haven't you figured out yet that I can only combine with your Dreads?! How the heck do you expect me to combine a Van-Type with another Van-Type?!"

Hibiki's answer shocked Jura as she sat in her cockpit with wide eyes and mouth gaping.

"You're kidding?! If I had known that I would have never wasted my time training so hard for this mission!" she whined with disappointment.

"Now is not the time for this!" David cut in as he blasted another wave of sand. "We need to regroup and work together if we're going to make it out of here!"

"Who do you think you are giving us orders?! We don't need your help!" Barnette shouted scathingly suppressing her fear for a moment.

"If you want to get yourself killed over pride then knock yourself out! But you better decide what you want to do quick because I've got a feeling that things are about to get a lot more intense for us!" he replied not bothering to turn to her as he couldn't well afford to be distracted by a petty argument in the of battle.

"What do you mean?" demanded a confused Barnette.

Meanwhile because of the sudden sandstorm and her own inexperience in piloting a Vanguard Meia did not have the smoothest of landings as her machine barreled fast and hard onto the sandy terrain several hundred meters from the team's position. The force of the impact not only disoriented her but temporarily knocked out the Vanguard's systems leaving both her monitor and cockpit without power save the red emergency lights. As she reoriented herself she quickly noticed her current environment and suddenly felt dizzy as the walls of the small cockpit seemed to press down on her. Then her pulse started to race as her breathing became rapid which forced her to breathe in short gasps. As her claustrophobia takes its toll her heart rate began to rise, feeling it thundering against her ribcage and sweat poured down her face as her eyes began to widen in fear.

At his station Duelo immediately noticed the severe change in Meia's vital signs and jerked forward in alarm.

"No good!" he shouted before reaching for the console's comms button. "Meia do you read me? You need to turn on your monitor look as far away as you can!

Meia continued to struggle with her claustrophobia taking deep breaths to calm herself down she had heard Duelo's transmission through the Vanguard's comm system.

"Meia, can you hear me!" Duelo called out again through the com channel.

"He needs to mind his own business!" Meia said weakly to herself with rasping breath. Nevertheless she followed Duelo's suggestion and reached out with a trembling hand to press a button on the small monitor control panel to turn on the monitor. When the monitor screen came back online she started to slowly calm down at the sight of the vast sandy terrain. Her heart rate became relaxed as she took slow, even breaths but her moment of respite was short-lived as she saw movement in the sand just ahead of her.

"What is that?" she wondered nervously aloud as the sand shifted and condensed into a lump.

The lump of sand then grew and started rising out of the ground. Slowly as it rose it molded into a vague shape of a Vanguard with its arms held out toward her as if trying to reach for her. Suddenly the mock Vanguard burst apart and surged toward her Vanguard like a tide. Meia barely had enough time to gasp in terror before the sand engulfed her entirely.

On the bridge Belvedere had been monitoring the situation of the landing team on the map display on her console when suddenly one of the red dot icons that showed her the positions of each member of the team winked out. She immediately knew whom the icon represented.

"Meia's mecha has disappeared from the radar!" Belvedere reported turning to face BC looking very worried.

"What's that?" the sub commander exclaimed in surprise.

"It's no good," Duelo shouted to BC at which she turned to him. "Aside from David, the pilots are hopelessly confused! They're in grave danger!"

At that very moment Meia was facing a crisis of her own as her Vanguard lay on its back as the living sand now coated her machine. Her body seized up and froze with fear as the sand began to engulf her Vanguard and this time thrusted her in total darkness.

"W-What should I do? I'm so scared…" she whispered to herself as she clutched her terror streaked face with both hands.

"Barnette! Jura! David! Do you read me?" BC called out as she got in touch with the three. "We've lost contact with Meia! I want you to find her!"

"Roger that!" replied Jura and Barnette, but they had barely finished speaking when their images, save David's, suddenly became static. Over the com-line BC could hear Jura, Barnette, and Dita screaming.

"Jura! David, what happened?!" she asked urgently looking toward David.

"It looks like we're about to have more company." said David calmly as he narrowed his eyes at the upcoming threat. "Is the analysis of the sand finished?"

"No but it's almost done." BC responded.

"Alright but speed it up if you can, in the meantime I have a plan to rally the team and help Meia." David told her before he cut the transmission.

BC blinked in surprise and turned to her captain questioningly.

"It would seem that young man has something up his sleeve." Magno mused curiously.

After David had disconnected the comm-channel to the Nirvana he couldn't but grimace in exasperation after hearing Meia was here and already missing.

"That girl…just what was it that she was hoping to prove by coming down here?"

He knew that it was bad idea for Meia to be on this mission and how deadly it would be for someone in her state of mind to be in this kind of situation. Quite frankly he should have known that she would pull a stunt like this but David cast that train of thought aside as knew that getting distracted in the middle of a battle would get him killed, especially with what was about to come next.

As if on cue a new threat appeared in the team's midst similar to the Vanguard copy that attacked Meia.

"W-What the heck are they?!" Barnette yelled frantically upon seeing the rising of the sand Vanguard replicas.

The others looked on in shock as mounds of sand formed into sand copies of Vanguards. Wasting no time David immediately opened fired and managed to disperse some of the mounds before they had chance to fully form. The doppelgangers proved to be no slouches either as they began to attack the still shell-shocked Vanguard pilots. One sand doppelganger threw a punch at the head of Jura's Vanguard but Jura, snapping herself out of her trance, managed to block the blow but the sand clone countered and thrusted itself forward to grapple with her. Soon the other Vanguard pilots found themselves in a similar predicament.

"Someone help me!" Jura pleaded.

"They're everywhere!" yelled Barnette.

"No! Stay away!" Dita screamed.

Back on the bridge BC heard the panicked cries of the female pilots and was growing more concerned by the minute.

"Ground team, what's going on?!" she called out trying to make sense of what was happening.

"The results of the analysis are complete." Amarone reported.

"Bring it up on the main monitor!" BC directed.

"That object seems to have a will of its own and is somehow controlling the sand!" Amarone explained as she brought up the image of the object which appeared to be a flea-sized, insect-like robot with four legs and a pair of mandibles on the main holographic screen.

"I thought so." said Magno knowingly from her captain's seat. "This was a trap the enemy left behind for us!"

"Get a hold of the ground team!" ordered BC. "Tell them that machine is cause of the sand."

"We can't!" Ezra said with anxiety in her voice. "For some reason I'm having trouble reaching them! But I think I can contact David."

BC nodded in understand. "Then get me in touch with him."

"David do you read me?" BC asked over David's com channel.

David just finished blasting another sand Vanguard when he received BC's transmission.

"Go ahead BC." David acknowledged as he acquired another target.

"We've finished analyzing the sand and we found out that it's being controlled by small machines belonging to the enemy." BC informed urgently.

"Just like I thought." David nodded to himself. There was only one thing in the Harvester's arsenal that could manipulate the sand like this. Nanobots.

Though not as advanced as the Alliance's own nanites, this piece of nanotechnology was still potentially destructive and was versatile in completing various tasks in a variety of ways depending on the level of technology and programing. As proven with these as they hacked the other Vanguards' systems and created exact sand copies of the machines just by touching and analyzing them. Of course the only reason that David and the others weren't seeing sand doppelgangers of Starhawk was because most of the Nanobots hadn't got close enough. Even if they did they couldn't bypass his shields in small numbers and it would take quite a few to breach his shields. Plus unlike the Dreads or the Vanguards, his Starhawk's computer systems were protected by numerous security lockouts and firewalls.

Turning his attentions back to the immediate situation he responded, "Thanks that's all I needed to hear! Now that I for certain what we're dealing with I think I know way to deal with them, at least temporarily." David informed her as an idea began to take shape and it involved using another of his abilities.

"…If you're sure that whatever you're planning will help the others then I wish you luck." BC said uncertainly.

"Thanks. And don't worry, I'll bring everyone else back safe and sound. David out." David assured her before severing the transmission then looked to see how the others were doing.

As he suspected things weren't going well for the pilots of the Vanguards. Though the sand Vanguards were slower than the real Vanguards, there simply a lot more of sand made copies and the their numbers were starting to overwhelm the four of them and Meia was likely already overtaken by one. Not to mention was the fact that the women weren't used to fighting in hand-to-hand combat situations. Plus their morale was at an all-time low as they we're still panicking and had no one to help coordinate them. Even with David assisting them the situation was looking grim.

Hibiki managed to break away from a sand figure that had been trying to prevent his Vanguard from rising. As he rose to his feet he spun around bringing his Vanguard's fist into a punch that passed right through the body of a sand figure causing it to lose its shape. The young Taraakan pilot barely had enough time to turn around before he was attacked by another sand Vanguard. Hibiki threw another punch but it was blocked by the clone's forearm then it countered by pushing him back.

"Geez," Hibiki growled in frustration. "Is this a total waste of time or what?"

"Kid you need start using your head and to stop fighting like that or just end up being trapped by the sand again!" David admonished as he set aside one of his plasma rifles and drew out a beam saber before slashing a sand Vanguard that tried to attack him from behind.

"Well how in the heck am I supposed fight then?!" Hibiki snapped angrily.

"You have a sword so use it!" David said exasperatingly as if was the most obvious thing in the world.

"Huh? Oh, right!" Hibiki stammered sheepishly as he just realized that he had his Vanguard's sword this whole time. Quickly he drew the large blade from the Vanguard's back and just as the sand Vanguard attempted to throw another punch Hibiki cleaved it in two with his sword leaving the enemy to collapse.

"Hah! How's that?" boasted Hibiki with triumphant grin.

"Not bad kid but don't get cocky! This fight isn't over by a long shot!" David cautioned as he decided to his plan into action.

At the same time Dita was fending off one of the sand Vanguards. When she noticed that her Vanguard's combat readouts were flashing she looked down to see what was wrong she became shocked at what she was seeing. It showed that her Vanguard's systems were being copied and to her further dismay being drained of power.

"The sand is copying all of the Vanguard's systems!" she said to herself in alarm then Dita jerked back with wide eyes as a sudden realization struck her filling her with dread. "Almost as if…it's draining blood out of us!"

Suddenly her Vanguard's armor groaned as the sand Vanguard began to squeeze in an attempt to crush Dita's machine's head.

"Someone help me!" she pleaded distressfully.

Then suddenly the groaning of metal stopped. Surprised, Dita looked and saw David had cut the arms of sand Vanguard with his beam saber then blasted it apart with his plasma rifle. David temporally put away his beam saber and used the mech's free hand to help pull Dita's Vanguard to its feet then drew the beam saber back out.

"You alright Dita?" David asked with genuine concern.

"Mmhmm! Thank you Mr. David!" Dita beamed happily.

David smiled then his expression turned serious as he opened a com channel to the other members of the recon team.

"Everyone listen up," David called out gaining the attention of the other pilots. "You need to form on me and take defensive positions in a circle. When we do don't let the enemy divide you from each other! Watch each other's back and provide support as needed! Got it?"

"I don't take orders from a man!" Barnette growled as she struggled with a sand Vanguard before driving her opponent away.

"Look the only way any of us are going to make it out of here alive is if we work as a team," David explained trying his best not to lose his patience with the emerald haired Dread pilot. "If we keep fighting like we are there's a good chance that most of us won't make it. I'm all asking is that we put our differences aside until after rescue Meia and get out of this mess! Does that sound like a fair deal to you?"

Barnette was about to snap a retort when Hibiki beat her to the punch.

"He's right," Hibiki said as he moved his Vanguard to stand next to David's Starhawk. "We need to pull ourselves together and get outta here before we wind up dead!"

"I'll help too Mr. David!" Dita joined in as her Vanguard moved to stand next to the two men.

Barnette couldn't believe what she was hearing! A woman willingly fighting alongside men?!

"Dita! What in the world are you doing?!"demanded Barnette incredulously wearing a look of shocked disbelief.

"Mr. David and Mr. Alien are only trying to help us!" Dita defended as she defeated another sand Vanguard with a sword of her own.

Barnette scoffed at that and attempted to rebuttal Dita's words when Jura's Vanguard came next to her.

"Dita's right Barnette! We have to do this if we want to get out of this horrible place and David and his machine are our best chance to do that, so let's go!" she said as she managed to use her own sword just in time to slash another sand Vanguard in front of her before she moved to where David, Hibiki, and Dita were to stand with them.

The Dread pilot bit bottom lip down hard as she knew that Jura was right but as a proud woman of Mejere she was still against the idea. Eventually Barnette reluctantly followed Jura as the two of them reached where the others were.

To his surprise Duelo saw the vital signs monitor on his console had once again changed. Instead of rising further as he initially fear the recon team's vital signs, except for Meia's, were steadily falling back to normal levels. While vitals showed they still had tension it wasn't as severe as it was before.

"Commander the recon team's vitals are stabilizing! It seems something has happened to calm them down." he informed as the Taraakan doctor turned to BC.

"They are?" BC looked to the doctor in surprise at what she was being told who confirmed what she heard with a nod. Quickly she turned the bridge crew. "What's going on down there now?"

"Commander! It appears that the recon team is mounting a defensive counter-attack." Belvedere report as she read the sensor information a bit surprised at what she was seeing.

"Who's leading them? Is it Barnette or Jura?" Magno asked as the report given to her by Duelo that Barnette had the highest score on the Vanguard simulator while Jura is co-leader of the Dread teams despite her poor marks on piloting a Vanguard.

"No ma'am!" Belvedere shook her head in a negative. "It looks like the one who is coordinating them is… David in the Starhawk!"

"He is?" BC blinked in surprise wondering how David managed to convince Hibiki and the women, especially Barnette of all people, to go along with him.

Magno gave a loud chuckle at that and BC turned to her captain curiously

"It seems that young man is about to come through for us after all!" Magno smiled broadly with a look of approval with BC mirroring her captain's smile as she knew that Magno was referring to David.

On the surface the tide of battle was starting to turn in favor of David and the rest of the recon team as the Starhawk and the four Vanguards stood in a circle shoulder-to-shoulder and with their backs to each other as they blasted and slashed any sand Vanguards that tried to attack. Yet the sand Vanguards still kept coming as they attempted to swarm the outnumbered defenders. Now that the team was holding their ground David decided that it was the right time to use one of abilities and send someone to find Meia.

"Alright people heads up," David said to the others through com-link. "Looks like their trying to overwhelm us with numbers but I have idea to give us some breathing room."

"What are gonna do?" Hibiki asked with a grunt as he decapitated another sand Vanguard with his sword.

"I'm going to extend the Starhawk's shields around us," David explained as he fired at another target. "Though it will only be temporary since my Starhawk's shields weren't designed to function in that capacity so I don't know how long it will last but it will give one of us a chance to find Meia. Of course this might not work so be ready and give me some cover while I get it ready."

"Roger/Right!" Jura, Dita, and Hibiki replied respectively while Barnette remained silent.

Though what David told them wasn't entirely the truth none of them really had the time to sit and wait for him to explain in depth what he was about to do and he wouldn't for the same reason. As for not knowing how long the shield would last, that was more or less true since he had never used his abilities to project a shield over such a wide area for any lengthy duration before. David knew that the effort alone would be taxing enough, especially while trying to fight at the same time.

"It's not much of a plan but it will have to do. Time's running out and knowing the Harvesters they have something else planned for us." he thought grimly. David closed his eyes as he inhaled deeply and concentrated for a moment before exhaling while opening his eyes revealing that his light amethyst irises were glowing brighter.

The lone Taraakan and the three Mejerian pilots gasped and yelped in surprise as a blue energy suddenly emerged from the Starhawk rapidly expanding and passed through them without harming them even as it encompassed them. In contrast when the blue field came into contact with animate sand and the sand Vanguards it instantly disintegrated them leaving only minute slag and blackened sand. Predictably unmoved by their comrades demise more animated sand and sand Vanguards surged forward which ended with similar results but still they pressed on undaunted even as the shield expanded. Finally the shield stopped seven feet ahead of where the Starhawk and the Vanguards were standing and as soon as it did David immediately started firing at the enemy again leaving Hibiki and the others dumbstruck.

"Barnette, now's your chance! While the enemy is distracted you make a break for it and go find Meia. The rest of us will hold them off!" David instructed Barnette with effort as maintaining the shield while fighting was putting some strain on him.

Barnette shook herself from her stupor and growled, "Stupid man, I already told you that I don't take orders from men!"

This proved to be the last straw for David who was already experiencing stress from keeping the shield up and fighting the nanobot controlled sand. He didn't have the time or the patience to put up with Barnette's attitude anymore.

"Oh for the love of…would you just shut up and listen for once you raving sexist harpy!" David roared angrily at which Hibiki winced while Dita and Jura gasped in shock of David's sudden anger. "If you don't do what I say right now then Meia will die and it'll be your fault because you decided that your pride was more important than her life!"

Barnette sat there flabbergasted as she had never been talked to or insulted like by anyone before, least of all by a man. But as much as she wanted to deny it she knew that David was right, much to her ire.

"Fine, but don't think that this is over or that it changes anything!" Barnette finally said stubbornly.

"Of course not princess, I wouldn't dream of inconveniencing you," he replied sarcastically in mock reverence before he snarled. "Now get your butt in gear and go find Meia!"

He cut com channel before Barnette had a chance to respond leaving her to growl in agitation then she quickly left to go looking for Meia while David and the others stayed inside the shield.

The bridge was quite as most of the bridge crew was stunned into silence after hearing David's conversation with Barnette.

"Well isn't this a surprise! That young man certainly knows how to lead." Magno said in amusement as she also heard how David handled the team and Barnette in particular.

"He certainly handled the situation like a squad leader." BC nodded in agreement who was very much impressed with David.

Duelo on the other hand wasn't paying attention as he was absorbed by the unusual information he was receiving on David's vital signs.

"I've never seen a reading like this. What could be causing this anomaly?" he pondered as the Taraakan doctor stared at the vitals of the most mysterious person on the ship.

Fifteen minutes later David was getting tired and he knew that if he kept the shield up any longer he would end up to tired to fight. But before he dropped the shields he needed to warn the others.

"Heads up the shield enhancement are about to fail so get ready!" he warned then he dropped the shield.

With the barrier no longer between them and their quarry the nanobot driven sand and sand Vanguards surged toward the recon team with a vengeance. Hibiki, Jura, and Dita drew out their weapons and engaged the enemy once again.

"Okay people stay tight and hold your ground! We have to buy enough time for Barnette to find Meia and find a way out of here by the time she gets back!" David told them with determination as he unleashed another barrage of plasma fire.

"Roger!" the other three Vanguard pilots acknowledged.

At that very moment Barnette was still searching for Meia but so far she couldn't find her anywhere.

"Meia where are you?" Barnette called out worriedly through both the com-link and her Vanguard's external speakers.

She then looked down from the dune she was standing on and finally found Meia's Vanguard almost completely encased in sand.

"Oh no, Meia!" she shouted in alarm and Barnette quickly made her Vanguard slide down the dune's slope.

She rushed to the endangered Meia's side and activated the shovel extension in her Vanguard's left elbow and immediately went to work on freeing Meia's Vanguard from the sand that restrained her machine. Suddenly without warning, the sand covered Vanguard rose and shoved Barnette's mecha away and cried out in alarm as her Vanguard feel on its back sprawling on the sand. Then Meia's sand controlled Vanguard then ignited its thrusters and shot up into the air, reaching out with one arm and touched one of the red bands that formed the defense barrier. As the Vanguard started falling back down to the ground an alarm instantly started to blare around the entire area with all the emitters' lights flashing simultaneously.

"What now?!" Barnette questioned nervously.

Not too far away David heard the alarms sounding off too and swore under his breath.

"I really hate it when I'm right about these things!" David thought as he knew exactly what that alarm signified which meant he and the others needed to find a way out now.

On the bridge a new holographic display appeared on the main monitor as the Nirvana's sensors detected a new threat.

"The self-destruct system sequence for the defense system appears to have been activated, there are only three hundred seconds to detonation!" Belvedere reported.

"Huh, that's not good!" Magno commented with a troubled look.

"Contact the landing party they have to return immediately!" commanded BC.

On the ground the situation the recon team faced became no less dire as the pilots of the Starhawk and the three Vanguards faced down a number of sand Vanguards ahead of them.

"Trust me we'd love nothing more than to leave of this dust bowl of a planet but we're kind of busy down here!" David said as he shot down more doppelganger Vanguards.

"Yeah like it's that easy, we already been out of here we could!" Hibiki snapped as he stood with Jura and Dita's Vanguards flanking his own as they stared down the enemy.

In his cockpit Hibiki looked over his shoulder and saw what appeared to be another sand Vanguard staggering on top of the dune behind them.

"And here they come again!" he growled angrily.

David however narrowed his eyes in suspicion at the appearance of the new enemy.

"Something's not right," David thought as he sensed that something about that particular sand Vanguard seemed off. "It's looks and moves differently than the others and it somehow feels…familiar."

David focused on the sand Vanguard and instantly felt a familiar presence within the machine a mind that was just like…

"Oh hell…!" David's widened as figured out what or rather more accurately who the "enemy" was.

Hibiki let out a battle cry and was about to grab a knife to throw at the sand Vanguard but Barnette's Vanguard rushed forward beside the apparent enemy.

"Wait! That thing's Meia, the sand's taken over her Vanguard and it's controlling her!" Barnette warned them desperately.

"What did you say?!"asked a taken aback Hibiki.

On the bridge everyone was tense as they anxiously waited for the landing party to make their escape.

"Two hundred seconds 'til detonation!" Belvedere warned.

Inside her Vanguard, Meia was in full state of catatonic shock and unaware of what was happening outside of her mech. She snapped back to reality when she heard Hibiki's voice shouting to her through the com channel.

"Hey! Are you taking a nap in there?! Get that stuff off!" Hibiki yelled as he used his Vanguard's thrusters and launched himself at Meia's Vanguard. His Vanguard slammed into Meia's knocking it onto the ground on its back straddling her Vanguard then quickly got to work as he started rubbing off the sand of her machine's chassis with his Vanguard's hands.

"Good luck kid." David watched Hibiki for a moment before turning to his console and started another scan of the area. While Hibiki is saving Meia he would find a way out of here.

David knew that if he tried to destroy even a few of the emitters to create a gap in the barrier the rest would compensate and he'd be right back where he started. And he couldn't destroy all the emitters in time before the self-destruct mechanism went off as they were too many. No, in order to get everyone out alive he would need a way to take out the emitters simultaneously. To that end he set scanners to trace the power flow of the emitters in order to locate their power source.

Meanwhile Hibiki kept scrapping the sand away to get to Meia.

"S-stop it! Just forget about me…" Meia told him weakly.

"Don't so darn selfish!" Hibiki snapped, "Your reason for living maybe just to piss me off, but I'd feel crappy if I let you die in front of my eyes like this! Don't think life is just about you!"

Hibiki tried to scrape the sand off Meia's Vanguard but it only kept regenerating and became twice as thick each time.

"Dammit! Dammit!" cursed Hibiki as he saw that his efforts were futile. "Well this is getting me nowhere fast! There's gotta be some better way to do this!"

He quickly looked around for anything that could help him before looking up and spotting a large tower-like storage tank that was a few feet away from him and an idea came to him.

"One hundred twenty seconds left until detonation!" Belvedere notified with worry.

"Did you all hear that?" BC shouted on the comm-link.

"We know that already!" Hibiki shot back irritably as he drew out and threw a knife at the storage tank. When the knife made contact it exploded causing the tank's metal casing to crack and liquid nitrogen began leaking out flooding the surrounding area in a sub-zero mist.

The female Vanguard pilots cried out in alarm as they began to feel the extremely cold temperature even in their cockpits.

"What are you doing?! It's getting cold in here! I'm freezing!" Jura whined but then immediately realized something. "Wait a minute! Freezing…?" She looked through her monitor and saw that the sand duplicate she was just fighting a minute ago had suddenly stiffened and became brittle.

A second later it fell apart, breaking into shards of sand and shattered as it hit the ground. Likewise the same thing happened to the rest of the sand Vanguards as they became little more than brittle statues before shortly shattering into pieces. The sand over Meia's Vanguard went through a similar process as it cracked and broke away, freeing the Dread leader's Vanguard and allowing her to see daylight.

"That was amazing! You're so smart Mr. Alien!" Dita beamed with praise.

"Now that's using your head kid! Good work." David nodded and smiled with approval. "Now go save Meia while I shut down the defense grid so we can get the heck out of here."

"You got it!" Hibiki said with a hint of respect as he went to help the freed Meia.

David then turned back to his console as it sounded signaling that it located the power source for the laser grid. With that he holstered his mechanoid's plasma rifles then pulled out the ion railgun. After that he put his Starhawk into a running start before using his thrusters to propel himself high into the air. Then David used the thrusters hold the Starhawk steady at a constant altitude as he angled his weapon and zeroed it in at the location of the emitters' power generator and waited to acquire a lock on it.

At the same time Meia, while she was relieved to be free, she was less than thrilled of the reason for her liberation.

"To think that I owe a man my life…" Meia whispered in self-reproach.

"How dumb are you?!" Hibiki shouted grabbing her attention as she stared at him. "We've got enough problems as it is! Male or female it doesn't matter right now! If you don't want to die then take my hand!" he finished reaching out to Meia with one of his Vanguard's arms.

In her cockpit Meia breathed sharply as she stared at Hibiki on the video monitor and his Vanguard in front of her.

At that exact moment David acquired a targeting solution on the power generator and without a moment's hesitation opened fire. The magnetically accelerated blue ion beam cut through the air and tore into its target causing a massive explosion. The defense grid's beams flickered briefly before fading altogether.

"The shield is down! Hibiki! Hurry up and get Meia out of here! Everyone else pull out now! Double time!" David ordered as he had the Starhawk transform in midair into its fighter mode.

Jura, Barnette, and Dita took off first while David remained behind to wait on Hibiki and Meia before he would follow the others.

"Come on kid pick up the pace!" David thought urgently as he knew time was running short.

"Only thirty seconds remaining!" Belvedere warned urgently.

"All units get out of there now!" ordered BC with a aggressive wave of her hand.

"Come on!" urged Hibiki.

At that moment a dozen conflicting thoughts and emotions ran through Meia's mind. But ultimately she made her decision.

"I don't want to die…" she thought desperately.

Reluctantly her Vanguard reached up and grasped Hibiki's mecha's hand. Then Hibiki pulled her up and draped her Vanguard's arm over his machine's shoulder and took off as fast as his thrusters would allow with David following close behind. A few seconds later just as David and Hibiki were about to leave the atmosphere with Meia in toe the thrusters on Hibiki's booster as well as those on his Vanguard started sputtering as they strained to break atmosphere with the weight of two Vanguards. Slowly they started to descend as the planet's gravity was trying to pull them back down.

"Ah crap we're falling!" Hibiki yelled frantically while Meia once again froze in fear as her Vanguard violent shook and her monitor and the outside of her viewport was bathed in fire.

"Don't worry I gotcha kid!" David reassured loudly as he tapped a control button that activated the Starhawk's tractor beam. A wide light blue beam surged toward the two Vanguards bathing them in its light as caught them mid fall and started pulling them behind the faster Starhawk.

"Whew! That was way too close! Thanks David!" Hibiki said as he breathed a sigh of relief.

"Don't mention it kid!" chuckled David as he made a beeline to the Nirvana at top speed.

Inside her Vanguard a far from amused Meia scowled under her breath as this was the second time that her life was saved by a man.

"Time's up!" Belvedere announced solemnly as the countdown meter on her console read zero.

On the bridge of the Nirvana, Magno and the rest of her crew watched as a large portion of the desert planet's surface was engulfed in fiery inferno. Duelo's medical readouts on his console showed nothing but static.

There was a somber silence on the bridge, as the pirates started fearing for the worst. However Duelo was the first to notice that the vital signs readout of the pilots sprang back to life showing all six pilots to be alive and well. Then the bridge crew watched as the Starhawk and five Vanguards speedily emerged out of the massive explosion that burned across the planet's surface.

"All Vanguards and the Starhawk are safe and accounted for!" Ezra said with a smile of relief.

"We were able to retrieve some data from the planet." reported Belvedere.

"Read it." BC ordered.

The young girl seemed startled for a moment before turning to BC in confusion.

"Umm…you want me to read it?" Belvedere asked nervously with a meek voice.

"What? Didn't you hear my order?" BC looked at her sternly with one hand on her hip.

"I'm sorry! I'll read it now." Belvedere apologized before the bridge operator turned to her console and starting relaying the data aloud for the BC and the rest of the bridge crew to hear. "Attention: The crops this season are red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, lymph cells, etc. All components are in good condition. This is where the data ends."

As the operator was speaking the eyes of everyone on the bridge had turned to stare at her in shock as they heard the information.

BC spun to face her captain. "Captain, this means…!" she began but Magno finished for her.

"It appears what are enemy wanted was to harvest for their own purpose, it's safe to assume from this information is that they think of us as nothing more than vegetables!" she said in quite outrage as she looked on with barely concealed anger and disgust in her eyes. "If this incident has taught us one valuable lesson it's that were facing truly formidable opponents."

After she had a moment to calm herself down Magno then turned her head to look to BC who was now standing next to her.

"BC, I would like to see David in the conference room later today. But before that," Mango instructed before BC could execute her previous order. "I would like to Meia first. There are some serious concerns that I want to discuss with her."

"I'll get right on it Captain." BC nodded and walked toward a console to carry out her captain's order.

Magno sighed as she knew the upcoming meeting concerning Meia would be difficult but it needed to be done. As for David…she decided that the outcome of the meeting as well as the future of further ground and Vanguard based operations would be entirely up to him.

In the Vanguard hanger bay, Parfet and her maintenance crew got to work as they began returning the pilots' machines, minus the Starhawk, back to the Vanguard's berths for repairs. Tired and weary from their ordeal on the planet, the female pilots were now sitting against various large supply crates in the storage area to regain their strength. Barnette was resting against one such crate with Jura laying her head on her lap. Dita was sitting on her knees with her legs bent away from her while Meia sat alone, some distance away from the others as he rested her right arm and head on her left knee.

"Being saved by someone is bad enough," she thought to herself bitterly. "But being saved by a man is an absolute disgrace! And out of all men it had be them!" she looked over to Hibiki who was leaning against the safety rail who was groaning after he had sneezed.

"My head is going to split open! I think I got a cold." Hibiki moaned as suddenly feeling sick when he noticed Meia staring up at him before she closed her eyes and turned her head away from him in contempt.

"Now what wrong with-?" he began nasally before sneezing hard again.

Unfortunately for Meia when she opened her eyes she saw the second reason why she was alive. David had just exited his Starhawk and was making his way out the hangar. Meia was still bitter as her pride had taken a serious blow by the fact that she had to be saved by yet another man and her thoughts were filled with loathing as she looked at David. But there was more to what she was feeling than just bitterness and resentment, there was a mix of strange feelings that she never experienced before as she watched the man. She tried to ignore these foreign sensations but couldn't quite seem to banish them from her mind while observing David. The man in question seeming to sense her staring turned and was now looking right back at her. Realizing that she been caught Meia quickly looked away to find something, anything to stare at but David.

David watched her curiously for a moment then he shrugged his shoulders and continued to walk toward the exit. Once she was certain that David was leaving Meia returned her gaze to his retreating back just in time to see him stagger slightly and brace himself against the door briefly before composing himself then opened the door and left the hangar.

Meia stared after David as a torrent of thoughts raced through her mind.

"What's wrong with him?" Meia wondered part in suspicion and part in concern. "Why did he seem so exhausted when he was fine just a second ago?" she blinked as another thought occurred to her. "And why do I even care?"

Peeking from behind the crates Paiway had snapped three photos of Hibiki, Meia, and David while wearing a Cheshire cat grin.

"Gotcha!" she said slyly to herself while still wearing her smile. It was then that Pyoro floated next to her.

"I guess I'll never understand humans." the little Navi-bot sighed exasperatingly.

"Even if you did understand us what's the point?" Paiway asked the little machine in mock curiosity with a raised eyebrow.

"Well what's the point of what you're doing now?" Pyoro countered.

"Bleh! What a mean robot!" the young nurse declared staring at the offending Navi-bot with an unpleasant look.

"Shut up." the robot retorted.

One hour later in the conference room…

"You asked to see me, Captain?" Meia asked as she walked into the conference room noticing to her confusion that BC and Duelo were also waiting in seats next to the captain.

"Yes Meia, please have a seat." Magno instructed without expression.

Meia became a little wary from her captain's neutral tone and expression as she started to suspect the reason why she was called.

"Captain, if this is about what happened on the planet…" she began.

"That's part of the reason why I asked you here Meia." Magno interrupted then took a deep breath as she knew that Meia won't like what was coming next.

"This won't be easy for me to say any more than it will be for you to hear but here it is." Magno stared at Meia. "As your captain, my first and foremost priority is the well-being of this crew. And being a captain means that sometimes I have to make tough choices." She then turned to Duelo. "Doctor, would you care to share your opinion that we discussed earlier concerning this subject?"

Duelo looked to the elderly captain and nodded before he addressed Meia.

"Regretfully as this ship's sole medical physician, based on Vanguard simulation results and my observation of vital signs during the mission I have deemed you psychologically unfit to take part in any future Vanguard operations. Therefore I hereby relieve you indefinitely from piloting the Vanguards effective immediately." Duelo said impassively with strict professionalism.

Naturally Meia wasn't about to sit and take this lying down.

"What?!" roared an outraged Meia as she sprung from her seat and slammed both hands on the table while glaring angrily at Duelo.

"You can't do that! I lead all combat operations on this ship! You don't have the right or the authority to make that decision!" the Dread leader yelled heatedly.

"As a matter of fact he does have the right. He has the right as the ship's doctor and because I say he does." Magno replied sternly but she wasn't surprised by Meia's outburst as Magno expected that kind of reaction from her.

"Captain, you can't be serious! He's just a man!" Meia protested.

"I am serious as I happen to agree with his assessment." Magno said with authority. "I shouldn't have to remind you Meia that I did say to everyone that the men would be a part of this crew for the duration of this voyage. His analysis of your behavior during that mission confirms something that I have long suspected about you for some time."

"What are you talking about Captain? I was only suffering from fatigue!" Meia tried to deny.

Duelo shook his head at that.

"You showed increased signs of agitation, nervousness, increased heart rate, and hyperventilation. You became indecisive and distraught. These are all the symptoms that pointed to claustrophobia. It seems that you can't stand being placed in tightly enclosed spaces, and that you panicked while inside the cockpit of a Vanguard." the Taraakan doctor explained.

"That's…!" Meia huffed. "I'm not going to just stand here and listen to this! I pilot a Dread better than anyone else here, so what makes you think that I would have any trouble piloting a Vanguard?"

"Aside from the claustrophobia attack that you suffered on the mission." Duelo pointed out at which Meia scowled. "Unlike the Van-types of my world, a Dread's cockpit is more spacious in design, so it doesn't surprise me that you have excellent performance and feel more at home with a Dread."

"I agree." Magno said simply.

"What?! You're actually siding with this…this… man?!" Meia demanded in shock at Magno.

"It's not a question of whether the doctor is a man or a woman, Meia." Magno stated firmly. "The fact is that Duelo has made a valid point. Your fear of closed spaces had put others in danger. In fact, David noticed your behavior as well and recommended to me that you be left out of the mission. Your actions have not only proved both the doctor and David right but they also endangered that other young man who decided to place himself in extreme danger to save you."

Meia became silent at that as she suddenly realized the reason why the recon team left without her and her resentment for David grew. Then she became even angrier at the fact that she had once again been upstaged the two irritating men. And if that wasn't bad enough now this male doctor was telling her that she was unfit for ground combat!

"Meia, don't think that we're punishing you," assured Magno upon seeing Meia's reaction. "We are only thinking of your well-being and that of the crew. You are an outstanding Dread leader no one here is denying that. However, we can't afford to lose you if we were to send you out on another mission involving the Vanguards. Do you understand?"

Meia silently thought over the captain's words for a moment. Then with a deep sigh, she reluctantly sat back down and nodded.

"Yes Captain," Meia said calmly. "Then we won't use the Vanguards in future operations from now on."

"Actually the Captain and I decided to add the Vanguards to our forces." BC corrected with a shake of her head. "We don't know what other weapons or abilities of the enemy that we might encounter on our way back home, and there may be situations where the Vanguards are needed again."

"More to the point Meia this latest mission has shown us that the aliens will no doubt have other traps on other worlds like that one and they will no doubt attack us not just in space, but from planets or worse." the commander continued. "As it stands, we are going to form a new group of pirates who will be responsible for any operations that will not involve the Dreads directly or need to be done on a planet's surface. In light of that, we have decided to appoint a ground team leader to handle such operations in the future."

"I see." Meia nodded in understanding though it still annoyed her that she couldn't lead the Vanguard operations herself. "So who will be chosen to act as the squad leader? Is it Jura or Barnette?"

Magno and BC exchanged an uneasy look as they knew that Meia would definitely not like their choice for the position.

Magno decided to break the silence and give Meia the news. "Although Barnette did show considerable skill and potential as a Vanguard pilot she has little experience in leading others. And while Jura can handle one she has informed me that she will not pilot another Vanguard again. And even if that were not the case neither of them know how to lead a ground operation and the same is true for Dita as both you, her, and possibly Jura's Dreads have the same ability to fuse with Hibiki's Vanguard. As such aside from the Starhawk, they are our best weapons in space battles with the aliens. But we do have a candidate already in mind. He has already shown an exceptional ability in commanding a team and has demonstrated that he is capable of making calm decisions under pressure. Because of these qualities we believe that he is the ideal choice as Vanguard squad leader."

"Then who…" Meia began but stopped as she realized of precisely what or rather whom her superiors were referring to. "Wait…? Did you say he?! You don't mean that you're actually putting that manin charge?!"

"I am. He has the training, the experience, the knowledge, and the skills to lead a ground operation. All due to the fact that he is part of a vast alliance's military. This last mission proves that he is the best candidate for the position of ground operations leader." Magno replied before narrowing her eyes at Meia. "Is that a problem?"

Meia was about to respond but remembering who she was about to address she stopped herself.

"No ma'am." Meia said crisply.

The pirate captain nodded. "Good. Now that will be all Meia, you can go."

Without another word Meia stood up and left the room. Magno watched her go then sighed and turned to look at Duelo.

"You can leave as well doctor, you don't need to stay for the next meeting." she informed him.

"I understand." Duelo nodded and he was about to leave when he stopped and turned to look at Magno.

"Captain there's also something else I thought I should mention." he said seriously.

"Oh?" Magno raised an eyebrow curiously.

"During the mission I noticed an odd change in David's vital signs when he used the shield to protect the team." he explained with a puzzled look. "Strangely enough the monitor displayed an unusual energy signature that I have only seen once before."

"So you believe that this is somehow related to when he fought off the enemy boarding party?" BC asked seriously with a look of interest.

"Possibly, but I can't be certain. As I said I simply thought it was worth mentioning." Duelo stated.

"Thank you doctor," Magno nodded with a smile.

Duelo returned it with a nod of his own before exiting the room leaving the pirate captain and BC alone as they waited for David to arrive. They didn't have to wait long as soon after Duelo had left David wearing his civilian attire entered then stopped at a respectable distance from the table.

"Captain Magno, BC." David greeted cordially. "You asked to see me?"

"Yes I did," Magno gave him a pleasant smile. "Please have a seat young man."

David moved to one of the seats that was closest to the head of the table and sat down.

"Now young man I would like to ask you something important. You don't have to answer it right away, all I ask is that you keep an open mind." she said.

"I'm listening." David nodded.

"Then I'll get straight to the point. David, how would like to be the squad leader of the Vanguards and all future ground operations?" Magno asked.

David blinked at that and for Magno and BC it was the first time they saw the Starhawk pilot truly surprised.

"I'm sorry but could you repeat that?" asked David who was still a little stunned.

"I asked if you would like to lead the Vanguard team." she repeated wearing an amused smile.

David was silent for a moment before asking, "Why me?"

"You have already shown that you are extremely experienced in many areas of combat. Particularly the kind that the Vanguards were made for. Also the knowledge and expertise that you have in using your Starhawk can help give the pilots of those machines a fighting chance. More to the point any good leader is someone who can make calm decisions in a crisis and lead others to victory while making sure they come back home alive, just as you have demonstrated today. You showed that you have compassion and loyalty to your allies, regardless of their gender. I can't think of anyone better for the job." Magno explained with praise while BC nodded in agreement.

This of course threw an already surprised David for a loop as he never thought the female pirates would trust him enough to give him a command like this. But he quickly recovered and looked skeptically at the two women.

"Don't get me wrong Captain Magno I understand your reason for wanting to create a Vanguard team but there's just a couple of things that you might be forgetting." David said as he felt compelled to point out.

"Oh?"

"While I'm sure you're crew are skilled in what they do, most of them barely have any more experience than the average civilian at least compared to the standards of what I'm used to working with. They also don't have what it takes to be in the ground operations yet. They still need to be trained in basic military discipline." he explained seriously.

"And even if I take the job, what makes you think that the volunteers you assign to me would even listen to me much less any order I give them?" David continued. "Most of your crew hates men in general after all which I'm sure includes me regardless of the fact that I'm not from Taraak."

"They will. A few of them may not like but they're a good crew and they will do what is necessary to get the job done. So what will be your answer young man?" Magno asked curiously.

David thought about it for a few minutes then nodded.

"I accept. But on a few conditions." he finally said.

"Name them." Magno nodded.

"First I would like to ask that the members of the ship's security join the volunteers in some of the training exercises." he stated and upon seeing the confused looks on both women's faces David elaborated. "While they may not participate in any Vanguard missions I feel that some of the exercises that I have in mind will be beneficial to them. Both in defending the ship against intruders and in missions where a few of them might end up escorting you somewhere you might want to go personally like a planet or station."

Both women nodded at that as it made perfect sense to them.

"Alright young man what else?" Magno asked with a gesture that encouraged him to continue."

"Second I would like Hibiki to be assigned to the group too." David said.

"Any particular reason why?" asked BC who was surprised that David would ask for Hibiki to participate.

"Frankly while the kid has talent and is learning he's still more than a little green when comes to having combat skills." David replied with a knowing look. "This way I'll be able help to further develop and hone his skills and the women he'll be training with will see that he won't get any more special treatment than they will."

"Lastly I want your assurance that aside from yourself and BC that when I'm training the squad no one will countermand my orders." David said seriously. "I can't train a squad if a resentful crewmember of a higher rank than the members of the squad decides to barge in and orders them to leave."

"You have a deal young man." Magno agreed as she found all of David's conditions reasonable.

"Alright then Captain…when do I start?" he asked with a smirk.

Both Magno and BC smiled as they were relieved that the Centurion had agreed to train some of their crew to fight ground missions.

"You can start once the recruits have been selected young man. Which should be done by tomorrow." Magno replied.

"Then I'll see the squad first thing in morning at 0800 sharp in the training room." David informed the captain to which she nodded. "Will that be all Captain?"

"You can go young man." Magno said and David nodded before getting up out of seat and left the room.

"It seems that we made the right choice, eh BC?" Magno mused with a small smirk.

BC gave her captain a smile of her own. "It's just like you said captain, things are going to get a lot more interesting."

Later David was standing in front of the observation window at the end of the bio-park staring out at the vast expanse of stars pondering about the day's events. He closed his eyes as he revisited his latest decision to train and lead a Vanguard squad. Sure he had been a part of a team before and had even temporarily lead squads into battle but this was different, he had never trained a squad of raw rookies and lead them himself before. But he knew that came with a heavy responsibility and while he didn't know if he was ready for it he would do his best and learn to handle the job. Also something else had been bothering the veteran Centurion since coming back from the mission on the desert planet. When he created that shield it was the first time he ever projected it even remotely that large of an area and he certainly never thought he could sustain for even five minutes much less fifteen. It got him thinking on how much his abilities could have possible grown and what it could mean for the future.

"Do you need something?" he asked casually without opening his eyes as he knew very well who was walking toward him from behind.

Meia silently gasped; surprised that he was aware of her presence.

"Well?" David questioned without looking at her.

"What are you doing here?" she asked scathingly while barely hiding her irritation at his lack of attention.

"Just to think over a few things. Well, maybe more than a few." David answered in simple honesty.

"You expect me to believe that? You probably expected me to come here so you waited just for a chance to gloat!" Meia accused with a glare.

At that David opened his eyes and finally turned to face Meia with a stoic look.

"I'm not entirely sure what you're getting at but I don't know anything that I could have possible done recently that's worth bragging about." he replied neutrally.

"Don't give me that! You're probably relieved to hear that I was taken out of the Vanguard team since you were the one who was against me being on it in the first place! The captain probably already gave you command of all the Vanguard missions and ground operations, right?" Meia demanded bitterly.

"So that's what this is about then." David thought as he shook his head. "Captain Magno did offer me the job and I accepted it."

"So I was right!" she snapped angrily.

"But you're wrong about why I took the position. I'm not in it to show you up and I'm certainly not doing it for kicks or bragging rights." David pressed ignoring her remark. "I'm doing it because it will help increase our chances of surviving future battles and trust me on this, there will be more. That means I'll work with everyone to make sure that we all make it out alive and back to all our homes, including you."

"I don't need anyone's help, certainly not from any man! Especially yours!" she shouted defiantly.

David was unperturbed by her outburst which only infuriated Meia even more as he stared at her silently for a moment.

"You want to die don't you? You feel like you have nothing to live for and that's why you don't want anyone's help." David said and Meia was about to angrily retort this but he cut her off. "Don't try to deny it I can see it in your eyes Meia. I know because I've seen that same look on more faces than I care to remember. Something happened to you in your past and it still haunts you doesn't it? Do honestly think that you're the only person who's ever lost everything and suffered Meia?"

"What the hell do you know?!" she hissed. "You don't know me!"

"I know pain when I see it, especially when a person who is going through it tries to hide it." he countered without emotion. "Just like I know that you may not like me or the other men but the…enemy doesn't care whether we like each other or not, they'll kill us just the same."

"And like them, I don't care about you or any other of the crew's issues with myself or the other men." he continued. "Even so, I do respect you Meia." David admitted.

"What…?" the Dread pilot started in surprise.

"There is a very good reason I didn't want you on that last mission. You're a great pilot and the Dread teams are lucky to have you." David said sincerely. "And if you had died on that ball of dust it would have been a waste of your life and skills, not to mention the grief and loss that your friends would feel at your death. Trust me, I know what I'm talking about when I say that I have seen enough death to last me a lifetime. I've lost a lot of friends and allies in the many battles I have fought in my service to the Alliance Meia, and I know that every life is important. If you die needlessly…have you ever once thought about how you're shipmates would feel if you went ahead and died? They would be devastated. They rely on you to lead them and you are as much a part of their lives as family would be, even if you don't realize it or want it. Keep that in mind before you go charging off to your death. And regardless of how you feel about me and the other men being on this ship…I want you to know that if you are ever in trouble I will save you. Even if you don't want me to." David finished with conviction.

David then started walking toward the exit, but not before stopping next to a bewildered Meia.

"Let me give you a piece of advice before I go. Life isn't something that you can just toss away Meia, not the lives of others and certainly not your own. You have a reason worth living for. But until you figure out what that reason is, you're not dying. Not on my watch and that's a promise." he said quietly with resolution.

With that he exited the bio-park leaving a stunned and speechless Meia behind to ponder on his words.

Back at the men's quarters David was now lying on his bunk as he stared up at the ceiling in deep thought, reflecting on his recent brush with Meia and wondered what tomorrow would have in store for him and his allies.

"Well that can wait." he thought silently to himself. "Right now I need to get some sleep. I have a feeling tomorrow is going to be a long day."

Slowly he closed his eyes and drifted asleep.

Author's Notes: Phew! This took a while but I'm glad to report that this chapter is done! Remember to review and don't hesitate to voice your thoughts. Next up is Chapter 8: The Learning Curve! Until next time!