CBS-74 Ptolemaios II

2312 AD


Setsuna stared at the shuttle.

"Why do we need Pinkerton here?"

"We want Veda back." Sumeragi said. "Sadly, he's got the best chance to get it back fast."

"And how does he plan to do that?" Lockon asked as the Ra Horakhty finished docking with the Ptolemy II.

"Cassie said something about interfacing with the old Veda terminal onboard," Allelujah said, "Normally I'd say it's impossible since only Tieria could… but when it comes to Starfleet, seems like they can do whatever the hell they want."

Ron exited the shuttle, cackling madly as he spun in zero-G.

"Uh…"

"Let him be crazy." Sumeragi dismissed, long past caring. "As long as we get our supercomputer back."


"The trace from this terminal should be stronger than the one on the Morningstar: they practically abused it." While they probably replaced all of the connectors, some of the particles in the computer had to be entangled. More from the rebuilt frigate then anyone else.

"You're sure this will work?"

"I've never done a backtrace like this before," Ron admitted. "But I know what I'm doing. Just have Cassie standing by when I begin Operation Fuck You Asshole."

Ian sighed "She'll be ready, just be ready for anything." He said, "We have no idea what's gonna happen if we try to interface with Veda after going dark for so long…"

"That's why I'm here." He extended his tubules into an access port, the terminal activating after a moment. "Connection open. Handshake. Handshake."

'Well, this is interesting.' Ron groaned as something tried invading his brain. 'Well, you are interesting.'

'And who the fuck are you? Are you the fucktard that hijacked control over Veda?'

"I have a counterquestion. Are you the captain of the Ra Cailum?'

'Ronald Pinkerton, supreme asshole, at your service. And you?'

'You may call me Ribbons,' the voice replied, 'You and your people do know how to make a… mess of things…'

Ron grinned viciously, much to Ian's discomfort. And Ribbons'. 'It's what I do best! And now… You FUCKED UP!'

'I have not. Your mind is mine. I will strip it clean of every bit of information I can.'

Ron's grin deepened. 'And I'll make you bleed for every neuron you touch!'

Ian saw that as the signal. "Commander, NOW!"

"Have fun Cassie!" Cassie grinned as she accessed Veda through Ron, and downloaded herself directly inside.

Somewhere within VEDA, Ribbon's eyes widened as he felt a searing pain within his head, which only grew and grew, before he screamed… and his current body's head exploded. Literally.

Ron's left eye turned red as it became bloodshot. But the pain he could ignore.

He just did what he did best. He fucked someone's day up.


Ribbons exited the pod within his new body, coughing up fluid, cleaning his throat to scream.

And use coarse language for the second time.

"MotherFUCKER! I will tear your mind apart for this!"

Deep within Veda's systems however, Cassie materialized within as she giggled madly "Oh, this is gonna be fuuun," she mused to herself, "Now… what do you have to play with, Veda?" She began poking around in several systems - it was mostly childsplay for an AI like herself, maneuvering around security systems and watchdog subroutines, as she recorded all that she found. She wasn't able to access the more higher functions - at least not yet… but one thing caught her eye: the Innovade incubation lab.

She peeked within the files, and inside detail the process of creating Innovades, everything down to their quantum processing capabilities, to other functions… this got Cassie… thinking

"This will be… interesting."


Krung Thep


After moving (all the credit belonged to the Ra Cailum on that one) the people got to work on the first Starfleet MS.

The GNS-01 Tempest. Named for Takeshi's first (and temporary) command. Having heard he was a CQC Specialist, he looked for inspiration with the GN-001 Exia as the basic frame, along with inspiration from the GN-0000/7S 00 Gundam Seven Sword. Though this unit lacked the Twin Drive System that the 00 possessed, Jaden claimed he had 'plans on the backburner' to make something just like that for Takeshi. In the meantime though, the Tempest was just what Takeshi needed. With multiple close-combat swords, a GN Field projector to defend against ranged attacks, and of course the GN Sword Kai to handle the occasional mid-range fight.

When told that Takeshi had some… accuracy problems, Jaden's answer was simple: built within the Tempest was a semi-sentient A.I designed from what he knew about Veda. The system made automatic adjustments when Takeshi aims and fires, which would help him slowly adjust to mid range combat. While it would by no means make him into the Sniper as the same caliber as his wife, it would ensure he would be more reliable in a more ranged battle.

Speaking of his wife though, Jaden had decided that while he was making the Tempest, he went ahead and built her a Mobile Suit as well as a pet project. Once again, Jaden had turned to the four Gen 3 MS for inspiration, and was more than happy to recreate what he claimed to be his favorite of the four: Dynames, as well as some of the more modern GN-006 Cherudim. Advanced targeting scopes, superpowered GN Sniper rifle, some GN Missiles, GN Pistols, and of course. for the occasional melee, some GN Beam Daggers. He had trouble thinking of a name at first… but after tuning on the Radio for a minute, one song played which answered his question for him: GNS-002 Gundam Häyhä.

Within Krung Thep, Jaden was smirking as he looked at the two mobile suits he had invented. They both were still in their rollout grey color… but that was about to change, as he turned off the lights to the part of the hangar they were within, as the door chimed. "Come in!" He called out, as Takeshi and Luna both walked inside.

"Captain Takeo," Takeshi said. "I suppose congratulations are in order for breaking the warp barrier… and impressing Ron and Sonja with how."

"It's what I do," Jaden chuckled, "When I have a problem, I look to… alternative solutions. But of course, that's not why I asked you here… "

"Then what is it?" Luna asked.

"Well…" Jaden sighed, "I've… come to a problem while designing your units and… I think you're the only two I think can answer it."

The married couple blinked, glancing at one another. "And… that being?"

Jaden then smirked, holding up a remote. "How ya want them painted?" he asked, before hitting the switch, revealing the two mobile suits behind him, before the two.

Takeshi's eyes immediately zeroed in on the one with the swords. "That's mine, I take it?" he asked, and at Jaden's nod, he said, "Dark blue with black trim."

Luna, meanwhile, looked over the one with the guns and said, "Dark red with black trim, please."

"Done," He said, pressing a few buttons as several Haro Karals emerged with paint guns as they began to bring color to the factory grey mobile suits. "I went ahead and named them for you… yours, Takeshi is the GNS-001 Gundam Tempest - Sonja told me your first command was a starship of the same name, so I thought you'd like that. And for you, Luna… couldn't figure it out at first, but… I think you'll agree that GNS-002 Gundam Häyhä is a fitting name."

"The White Death." Luna translated, impressed. 700 kills in less than a year, the highest for any sniper. Ever.

Simo "Simuna" Häyhä was the sniper's sniper. EVERYONE looked up to him.

"I LIKE it."

"…you sure you're not related to Ron? You've got that grin…"

Luna smiled. "He's my brother."

Jaden's face fell flat. "Brother."

"Well, STEP-brother. He helped raise me. Then he taught at the Academy. And nearly killed Takeshi when he figured out we were dating."

"Only because you didn't tell him about me when we first started dating," Takeshi snapped semi-irritably. "You didn't tell me about him, either, until just before he showed up to try and kill me."

"It slipped my mind!"

"If you're all done?"

They all turned to face Ron, who recently returned from the Ptolemaeus, left eye still bloodshot. "It's done. Cassie's inside Veda. Ribby's going to have a few billion headaches a day. If he survived our first encounter, at least."

"…Ribby?"

"Ribbons Almark. He's running the group that's controlling the A-Laws behind the scenes, from what Cassie sent me," Ron explained.

"Ah! Well, anyways Ron, glad you're here as well!" Jaden said, grinning. "I actually have a little something for you too…" He aimed the controller at another side of the hangar, and the lights flashed on… revealing a third mobile suit.

Ron blinked. "Is that…"

"Your own Mobile Suit," Jaden answered, "Still a very much work in progress… but I felt if Takeshi and Luna were getting their own machines, I thought you would like your own… she's largely inspired by the MP mobile suits I'm designing as well - I'll show those off when I'm finished - but basically she is a transformer like Kyrios - and is well balanced between CQC and Long-Range armaments. I've also begun experimenting with GN Bit's since if you can access the Veda Terminal, you should be able to utilize the Bits control system as well, allowing you to attack and defend from multiple directions. Feel free to change her name, but I decided to call her… GNS-003 Gundam… Morgan."

"The witch of Le Morte d'Arthur, Morgan le Fay. I'm a fan of witchy."

"Yeah, you and Cassie certainly—" Takeshi took a boot to the face.

"Shut the fuck up."

Jaden was confused. "Uh…"

"Cassie's his girlfriend."

Jaden looked at Luna. "How the fuck does that work?"

She shrugged. "They make it work."

He decided to leave it. Starfleet was weird.

"Either way, I should tell you that these new MS have a different cockpit from that of the GN-XIII's the A-Laws and ESF use." He informed, drawing their attention. "It's an experimental design I was going to give to CB… but I thought I'd give it to you guys first." He gestured to a large ball-like object in the hangar.

"What's the difference?" Ron asked, as the four walked up towards it. "Seems basic…"

"At first glance? Yes…" Jaden said, stepping inside before turning it on. "But when it's on…" suddenly the interior of the cockpit lit up with a hexagonal pattern, before the interior of the MS revealed the outside in a full 360 Degrees. "…things are a lot more interesting."

The unholy grin on his face made Jaden back off slightly.

"Groovy."

"Did… you just pull an Ash Williams?"

"Damn right I did! Now, I want this thing prepped for launch. It's time for the witch to meet her warlock."

Jaden grinned. Ron was eager.

He LIKED that. "My pleasure."


Kati Mannequin knew that finding the Ra Cailum was going to be hard, so she shifted focus to the other CB carrier.

And lo and behold, she found them. No sign of the Ra Cailum, but she could draw them out.

Her plan seemed solid at first: attack Celestial Being's asteroid base, lure them out, and have her GN-XIII's under cloaks to engage them while they deployed.

However, plans themselves do not survive first contact with the enemy… which proved true as their E-Sensors picked up not one, but two ships emerging from the base. The first being the CB Mothership they had encountered before… but a second ship also emerged, this one looking identical to the old CB mothership that was destroyed during Fallen Angel. A minor snag, but nothing that shouldn't-

"WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!" Someone shouted. Kati blinked as one of her cruisers exploded. Violently.

"Report!" A new Gundam appeared, spinning through the wreckage.

"Surprise, motherfuckers!"

Kati paled. That was the voice of the Ra Cailum's captain.

HE was piloting that Gundam?!

"Who wants to die?!"

One of the Baikals Crazy Ivaned, fleeing fast as her engines could carry her, her captain screaming. "NOT ME! NOT ME!"

It would've been entertaining if it weren't accurate.

Unfortunately the other Captain's were not as smart, as they launched Mobile Suits to engage the attacker - though before they could even attempt to approach, suddenly a beam of energy from further in the asteroid belt lanced out and cored two of the GN-XIII's in one shot. "Wha?! Where did that-" Another GN-X was suddenly sliced in half, as a blur of motion flew by the formation.

And once AGAIN, first contact with the enemy resulted in the plan going to shit.

The Ra Cailum and CB had teamed up and made three more Gundams, enhanced versions of the LAST four.

And she wasn't sticking around to see if the fatass was remade.

"In the famous words of King Arthur, RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY!"


"Monty Python strikes again!"

On a submonitor, Takeshi facepalmed. "Seriously, Ron?"

Ron, unlike his brother in law, was not wearing a normal suit.

Ex-drone: he didn't need one. "At least I'm enjoying myself," he admitted, "Too bad we have to beam back to the Ra Cailum: these things won't fit in any of the shuttlebays."

"Hopefully once that carrier me and Sonja are collaborating on is finished, that won't be a problem!" Jaden said over the comms.

"If we need to, we can always strap them to the hull," Takeshi remarked. "And hey, maybe Sonja could build a miniature transporter unit to install directly into the cockpits, in case we need rapid entrance or exits."

"Either way, ships like the Ra Cailum can't handle MS teams. We can barely hold our shuttles and Mobius Squadron. Hope Cassie's doing ok."


Ribbons Almark's eye twitched. Repeatedly.

"Whatever he did is SCREWING with us."

(BGM: Hall of the Mountain King - Apocalyptica version)

Regene couldn't help but smirk slightly at Ribbons, ever since the incident earlier he has suddenly been acting more… emotional, and she couldn't really blame him. The audio systems of the station were going on and off playing random music which prevented him from thinking clearly, and whenever he would leave or enter rooms, the doors would always slam shut right in front of his face.

"MotherFUCKER!"

At least whoever was doing this had a sense of humor.

Because this was HILARIOUS!

Ribbons then screamed to the heavens.

"RRRRRRRRRRROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!"


Ron hacked another GNX-III apart. "Someone's screaming my name." He grinned. "Goooooooood."

"Good?" Luna asked. "What did you DO to Veda?"

"I allowed Cassie to upload into the computer. She's driving him INSANE."

Luna began laughing. "NICE!"

Takeshi chuckled as he kept hacking machines apart. "Good to see that you've found yet another way to be a Darwin Award Generator, Ron."

"Tis what I do." He vaguely noted 00 Raiser (GNR-010 0 Raiser attached to the 00, acting as a synchrophaser for the Twin Drive) engaging the custom Ahead.

"The fuck is going on over there?"

The Twin Drives suddenly surged, and the Raiser glowed red with light, going into full Trans-Am, suddenly teleporting out of the way of a beam blast.

"Well, about time they broke the heisenberg principle." Then everything went to hell in the form of voices.

'Where the hell is the Ra Cailum?!'

'I can't feel my legs!'

'Charge complete.'

Ron gripped his head as the swarming voices brought back long-buried nightmares. "Not again. Not…"

"Ron?! Ron!"

"Hey! Captain! You alright?" Jaden spoke on the comms. "Captain? CAPTAIN?! What's going on with him?"

The Morgan suddenly started drifting as Ron curled up and clutched at his head

'Borg, assimilatio-no, stop, why did I do that-Borg,go away- why so many voices,Borgvoices, stop-get out-not again… GET OUT OF MY HEAD!'

THAT was when everything began getting worse.

"Would someone explain to me what the fuck that was about?!" Jaden yelled.

"The Borg were a hive mind; Ron's reliving—Oh, fuck." Takeshi swore, paling. "TELL ME the Button wasn't pushed."

"Sad to say, Takeshi, it was pushed."

"CRAP!" Takeshi yelled, disengaging from his fight. "ALL UNITS, UNLESS YOU WANT TO FIGHT A BERSERK RON, FALL BACK NOW!"

"Wait, what are you talking about?" Jaden asked. "What Butt-" Suddenly there was an enraged roar across all the comm channels. "…never mind, figured it out… ALL CB FORCES, BACK IN THE BASE AND BATTEN DOWN THE HATCHES!"

Ron's right eye flashed red as the Morgan suddenly darted into motion. A Baikal exploded instantly as the Morgan shot around, slicing apart GNXs, vaporizing Aheads, or smashing head-first into cruisers, all the while the A-LAWS tried to run.

Keyword tried.

While Ron was no innovator, he didn't need to be: his reflexes were beyond human when he chose to be.

So when he ran into Hiling Care, he quickly and unceremoniously destroyed her machine. "WHAT THE FUCK!"

Setsuna watched as Ron tore the artillery MS apart, ripping off the GN mega launcher from the wreckage.

"Setsuna, I really think we need to get the fuck out of here!" Saji yelled.

"Get outta here! Get outta here!" Haro repeated.

"You will be destroyed. Resistance is futile!" Ron roared, turning on the spot and locking onto the 00 Raiser like a sentry gun.

Setsuna didn't like the sound of that. "We don't have a choice. Commander Yamato, how long does this state last?"

"We've never timed it!" Takeshi replied. "It's never lasted the same amount of time from instance to instance, anyway - until whatever triggers his anger is taken down or he burns through his rage, he's an insane berserker! And he can't really be hurt! Best you can hope is that the invulnerability doesn't extend to his Mobile Suit!"

Setsuna HATED Starfleet.

So much so that he made a single utterance.

"Fuck."


The Ra Cailum was busy evacing personnel and materials, leaving CB and their top officers to fight A-Laws.

"Sucks to be Setsuna. Pseudo-telepathic states end badly, don't they?"

A shift was recorded on their sensors, at L2. "Cassie's ruining their lives, alright. Contact the CB people: we've got a lock on Veda's location."

"Um… yeah, about that." Corpsa breathed out.

"Whattttt…" Sonja asked.

"Ron's going crazy."

"Tell me something I don't know."

"No, I mean kill-everything-in-sight crazy."

Sonja tensed up. "Ohhhhh crap."

"There's a major energy field being generated by 00's drives. It closely resembles that of a psionic field generated by a large group of telepaths."

"The LAST time we ran into a mass group of telepaths, Ron killed all of them!" Ron had vowed that he would never return to the Collective or have his mind unwillingly linked to any more than one person.

In fact, his brain developed a countermeasure: rampage, using an organic chemical that would tell the positronic brain to deactivate the aggression inhibitor and counter any attempt to reactivate it until the threat to his sanity (what was left of it) was destroyed.

They had a Button that could shut the thing off manually, but for the automatics to trigger… yeah, that was a bad thing.

"Tell Setsuna to shut 00 down."

"He's engaged Trans-Am: once activated, it can't be shut down until the time limit is reached."

And Ron had installed a synaptic transceiver in the Morgan for the machine's test flight. In essence, Ron WAS the Morgan. "Then he's going to have to deal with the Captain until his blunder resolves itself."


Setsuna F. Seiei was not having a good day.

And it was all thanks to that Starfleet Captain, Ronald Pinkerton.

In hindsight, he'd likely realize it was his own fault - the Captain didn't go berserk until he'd activated Trans-Am, which had triggered that odd state with the voices from all over the place.

What made it WORSE was that it was like fighting Ali Al-Saachez in hand-to-hand combat. "How is he controlling that Gundam?"

"Synaptic interface: basically, he's using his brain to pilot the damn thing!"

"You mean it's literally an extension of his own body?"

"You're screwed, just saying!"

He was pretty much forcing himself to play keep-away from the berserk Captain and his Gundam. However, he seemed to be getting incrementally better at dodging Ron's attacks.

What no one knew at the time was that the massive amount of GN Particles in the area, coupled with the intense stress of having to fight for his life against an unstoppable berserker, was triggering and accelerating a process in Setsuna that, normally, would have taken several months.

Innovation.

Unfortunately, Setsuna couldn't use this to aid him in any way, as while Setsuna was getting better at dodging, he forgot whom he was fighting.

The ultimate adaptive race in any universe: a Borg drone. While no MS experience to speak of aided Setsuna, it was going to stop soon as Ron's Borg mind processed the information and…

Well. Adapted.

'I just need to keep dodging for another 71 seconds. Unfortunately, he's getting closer and closer to killing me in those 71 seconds.'

He needed some way to figure out how to turn this around. And as he kept dodging by the skin of his teeth, a part of his mind took to figuring out how he was still able to dodge.

The answer he came to was something not-quite instinct: it was like he was getting flashes of insight as to where Ron was going to attack bare milliseconds before it happened, which was just enough time to make sure the 00 was not where Ron would be attacking.

Could he use this?

"Precognition will not aid you. You will be destroyed. Resistance is futile."

"Captain, I believe we prefer you being an emotional asshole!" Setsuna slashed, but Ron intercepted with a beam saber before Setsuna broke off.

'He's adapting too fast for me to counter.' Setsuna looked at the gauge. 40 seconds. "Commander, I need assistance."

"We're NOT suicidal, Setsuna: Ron IS the Gundam at this point. We can't react fast enough!"

"I have something of an idea - but it will require him being distracted. Right now he is only focusing on one object - me." Setsuna shivered a bit as he said that. "We need to give him too many things to orient on at once."

"Like THAT'S going to work!"

"Do you have any OTHER ideas?!"

"Yes! RUN before he uses Trans-Am on you!"

The Morgan turned red. "He just did."

"We'll pray for you."

"That is not funny!"

Setsuna kept spinning away and parrying, but he was nearly out of time. He needed some way to end this, now!

He dove his mind deep into whatever near-instinctive sense was letting him dodge. If he could dodge and counter at just the right time…

There!

Ron charged in once more, Setsuna parrying the beam saber with his left GN Sword… which he then released, swiveling around and orienting for a shot with his other sword in rifle mode, all in less than a second.

And in a stroke of luck, the shot hit a specific control node on the synaptic interface without damaging the cockpit itself or hitting anything that would cause the machine to explode.

'That should reduce the effectiveness of his piloting—' The Morgan's saber impaled 00 through the leg, Setsuna kicking Ron away before he could cause more damage to the Gundam. The 00 Raiser turned back to white and blue, Trans-Am ending.

"The field is fading. He should be back to normal in a minute."

Setsuna kept his distance, waiting to see just what happened, but not letting his guard down.

"What in the holy FUCK happened?"

"He's back to normal. Setsuna, NEVER do that again. EVER!"

"I make no guarantees, Commander," Setsuna replied.

The 00 Raiser's Trans-Am was powerful enough that he would likely need it in the future. Even if it poured out enough GN Particles to generate a mass pseudo-telepathic field.

He would just have to make sure that Captain Pinkerton wasn't in the area before he used it.

"No, seriously. What the hell did you people DO?!"


"WHY didn't you tell us that thing could create a telepathic field?"

Jaden rose his hands in defense. "Whoa now, I didn't even know the 00 Raiser could do that!" he informed. "A lot of its tech is new even to us! But on that note, why didn't you tell me Ron had a problem with telepaths?"

"We weren't expecting it to be a problem!" Takeshi replied. "Earth hasn't had very many cases of people with telepathic abilities in our universe - only a few races do. We don't have many Vulcans or Betazoids in our crew for that reason, and any we do know to keep their 'mental voice' silent around Ron."

"His experiences with the Borg were that bad?"

"Worse. We ran into a large group of telepaths once that forced their way into our minds. The entire crew was knocked out. All but Ron, who decided to go on a rampage and killed every single one of them. Command wasn't happy until we confirmed that they were all hostile."

Jaden winced. That did not sound good. He decided to focus on the how of the situation. "Well, anyway, as far as we can tell, it's not really a direct result of the 00 - nothing in the drives themselves caused it. All that we can tell happened is that, during Trans-Am, the GN Particle release rate was obscenely high." He hummed thoughtfully. "Best I can gather, it was the Particles themselves - get them into a high enough concentration, and they can connect people's thoughts apparently."

Takeshi sighed. "Geez, talk about unintended side effects," he remarked. "We're probably going to need to test this a few times to see what the limits are - without Ron around."

"Not going to be easy," Jaden said. "Even after all our work with GN Particle physics, there is a lot about the damn things we don't know… odds are, knowing Aeolia, he had this whole sharing thoughts thing planned out before… " he shook his head. "Well… best we can do is try and find out a way to make sure the next time the 00 Raiser does that, we can mute out the psychic noise for Ron somehow… I'll have some of my people work on that."

"I'll have Sonja work on it, too," Takeshi replied. "Maybe two different groups focusing on the problem can come up with a solution."

"I'll take all the help I can get to prevent that button from getting pushed again," Jaden nodded. "We'll coordinate on a program, keep your fingers crossed that we get something to work."

"I damn well hope so. We don't need Ron going on a rampage."

"Again."

"Yeah. Again."


Ron the True Fan: Weaknesses as always.

Redemption's Avenger: Even someone like Ron has weaknesses. He just covers them up with lots of killing!

Takeshi Yamato: Yep. And it seems that having to fight for his life against the insane berserker has jumpstarted Setsuna's Innovation. It's not complete, not yet, but it's definitely happening a lot faster than in canon.

117Jorn: In short? Shit be going down in Anno Domini, and it sure as hell ain't over yet!

Ron the True Fan: time for blood!

Ja Ne!