The first round of the Great Lakes tournament was finally over and with a total of thirty competitors remaining, everyone returned to their hotel rooms to relax while Vlad and his staff prepared the next round. Inside his mansion, the Fenton, Foley, and Manson families were treated to a very classy dinner provided by Vlad's cooks. Vlad had made sure that his cooks had all the necessary supplies to satisfy his guests while he was away.

After dinner, everyone retired to their rooms to get ready for the next day. However, Danny did not go to sleep as he was sitting at a desk with the damaged GM Phantom Striker standing on the desk and a box right beside it. Danny looked at the Gunpla and noticed that most of its body was filled with cracks and the right arm lying next to the body was badly split open. The backpack was in worst shape as the boost pods were basically destroyed and the backpack itself was badly sliced open.

"Man, this would take me at least a week or two to repair if I had the parts needed to fix him," Danny complained.

Danny turned his attention to the box that was also on the desk.

"I wasn't expecting myself to be using this, but I guess I have no choice," said Danny as he opened the box. "But it was supposed to only be for display and it's more or less a scratch built," he added as he took the contents out of the box. "Plus I would have to spend a good amount of the night encrypting the functions onto the GP base," he continued to mention. "Man, I am so going to be losing sleep tonight," he finished as he started to assemble this new Gunpla.

Danny took a moment to look at his GM Striker and gave it a sad smile.

"Sorry partner, but I won't be able to fix you up in time," Danny told his Gunpla. "But I'll make it up to you by making you even better than before once I get the parts I need," he added.

Of course the GM Phantom Striker did not react to Danny's words but it may have been more for Danny's benefit than anything else.

"I just talked to my favorite toy," Danny realized. "I must be going crazy," he added as he continued to work on the new Gunpla.

Or he might have had a lapse of insanity, it was a possibility.

The next day, everyone was had gathered in Vlad's dining hall for breakfast. Danny was sitting at the table, half asleep with a spoon in hand as he nodded off for a moment. Maddie noticed her son's behavior and was concerned that he was up all night.

"Danny, are you okay sweetie?" Maddie asked the half asleep boy.

Danny mumbled something that barely sounded like any known language as he tried to scoop up a strip of bacon with his spoon.

"Danny, were you staying up late last night?" Maddie questioned her son.

Danny mumbled something before his face landed on his plate.

"I'd say that's a yes," commented Dani. "How come he can stay up late but I can't," she whined.

"One, you're only twelve and aren't allowed to stay up," started Jazz. "And two, even Danny isn't allowed to stay up late," she added.

"Oh man," groaned Sam as she realized something. "The next round starts at eleven and the last time Danny stayed up all night, he wouldn't wake up until two in the afternoon," she told everyone at the table.

"Well then, that is a problem," said Vlad.

"Hey Vladdie, can you delay the next round until the afternoon?" Jack asked his best friend.

"I'm sorry Jack, but the tournament's schedule is already set," Vlad told Jack. "But Danny's team won't compete until around possibly one thirty, depending on how long the other matches will last," he added.

Sam and Tucker sighed in relief when they heard what Vlad told everyone, but Sam noticed that Vlad said Danny's team instead of just Danny.

"What do you mean by Danny's team Mr. Masters?" Sam asked.

Vlad's eyes widened when he realized that he did say team.

"Oh, I was hoping that I could keep that as a surprise but for this tournament I decided that the matches from here on out would team based," Vlad told everyone. "I thought it would be interesting to see competitors working in groups of three," he explained.

"So what team are we in?" Tucker asked as he smiled at the idea of being on a team instead of competing alone. "I wouldn't mind being on a team with those two girls I saw at the party," he added.

"*Cough*Not gonna happen*Cough*" said Dani as she pretended to cough.

"Are you feeling alright Dani?" Jack asked, worrying that his youngest was feeling sick.

Everyone minus the two Dannys looked at Jack in stunned amazement.

'I can't believe he fell for that,' thought a good portion of everyone in the dining room.

"Anyway…" Jack decided to speak again. "Tell me Vladdie, what you thought about that Gundam 0083 series?" he asked. "I still had a hard time understanding what the Zeon forces were trying to accomplish," he added.

Before Vlad could say anything, Danny's head shot straight up.

"Gato and the Delaz Fleet were a bunch of morons that made things worse for the Spacenoids of the Universal Century!" Danny yelled before going back to sleep.

Everyone looked at Danny for a moment with wide eyes trying to understand what Danny just said.

"What was that all about?" Pamela asked.

Suddenly Tucker's PDA started to go off, Tucker took a look at it and noticed something.

"I have a phone call?" Tucker told everyone in a questioning manner. "I didn't even know my PDA could make phone calls," he added as he answered the PDA.

"Danny's rant about Anavel Gato and the Delaz Fleet from Gundam 0083 was due to the actions that the Delaz Fleet did that led up to the Zeta Gundam series," said a familiar voice from the PDA.

"Hey it's Mr. Exposition," said Dani, referring to Xavier Position, the owner of the hobby shop in Amity Park.

Ignoring Dani, Mr. Position continued providing exposition to the people sitting in Vlad's dining hall.

"The events of Gundam 0083 revolved around an operation known as Operation Stardust which was a three phased plan. The first phase was that Anavel Gato would infiltrate an Earth Federation testing base to capture a new prototype Gundam, the RX-78GP02A codenamed Physalis. This Gundam was designed for tactical nuclear assault and was armed with a nuclear warhead. The Delaz Fleet were going to use the Gundam's design as a propaganda tool citing that the Gundam's existence was a violation of the Antarctic Treaty, which banned the use of nuclear weapons and was signed by the Earth Federation and the Principality of Zeon. However, this treaty was render a moot point as the Principality of Zeon was dissolved after the end of the One Year War and was replaced by the Republic of Zeon," Mr. Position explained before pausing so that the information would settle.

"Wow, that's a lot to take in," commented Maurice.

"The second phase of Operation Stardust was that the Delaz Fleet would use the Physalis on the assault on the Earth Federation's Navel Review at the former Zeon military base, an asteroid known as Solomon which was also the base that Anavel Gato was stationed in during the One Year War. Gato would use the Physalis to fire the nuclear warhead at the Earth Federation's space fleet, wiping out over two-thirds of the Earth Federation's space fleet before moving on to the third phase," Mr. Position explained.

"With how things are going, I hate to know what the third phase was," commented Jazz.

"The third phase was a colony drop on North America as that was where a majority of Earth's food supplies were located," Mr. Position said.

The eyes of the adults who were unfamiliar with the Gundam meta-series widened when they heard that.

"Well, sucks to be those guys," said Dani as she continued to eat breakfast.

"Dani, we live in North America," Jazz told her baby sister.

"Oh…" replied Dani as she comprehended what Jazz told her.

"Unfortunately, the Delaz Fleet succeeded in Operation Stardust, but the main goal of the operation did not go as the Delaz Fleet had hoped. The goal of Operation of Stardust was to expose the corruption of the Earth Federation while also give rise to a new Zeon. Instead, Operation Stardust gave the corrupt members of the Earth Federation justification to create the elite counter-insurgency group known as the Titans as the actions of the Delaz Fleet were comparable to terrorism which was why the Titans were formed, to prevent any future actions done by remnants of Zeon," Mr. Position explained before hanging up.

Everyone was silent after hearing Mr. Position's exposition as to why Danny referred to Anavel Gato and the Delaz Fleet as morons. Well the adults and Jazz were silent because of that, Sam returned to eating breakfast, Danny was still asleep, Dani had just finished eating, and Tucker was looking at his PDA.

"How did he get my number?" Tucker wondered as he tried to solve the mystery of his PDA's unexpected feature.

A couple of hours later, everyone was back in the stadium for the next round of the tournament. The adults, Jazz, and Dani were in the VIP box as they waited for the second round of the Gunpla tournament to begin. Danny was sitting next to Sam, still asleep, while Tucker was standing in front of Char and Revy trying to flirt his way into their hearts, and failing as usual.

"So any idea what the matches will be like?" Johan asked Amon.

"Well if this is anything like the World Tournament, then we'll most likely be having one on one point matches where the ten with the highest points will compete in the final ten," Amon guessed.

"Ladies and gentlemen, for the next round of the Great Lakes Gunpla Tournament please turn your attention to the monitors for the team listings," said the female announcer.

Once the announcement was finished, the competitors were talking amongst themselves as they were not expecting the next round to be a team match. Regardless the thirty competitors looked up the monitors to see their names listed in teams of three. One team was composed of Victor Soulman, the Black Knight, and Evan Cole. Another team had Char and Revy teamed up with Valerie, Maddie Horton was teamed up with Amon and Zeke, Axel was paired up with Genki and Johan, and Gemini was teamed up with a man named Gavane Borjarnon and a young woman named Brittney Lee. Among the remaining five teams listed, Sam and Tucker were surprised and pleased to see that they and Danny were on the same team as well.

"Sweet, we're on the same team!" cheered Tucker as he looked at the listing again.

"Yeah," agreed Sam before looking at their sleeping friend. "Now if only we can wake Danny up before our match comes up," she pointed out.

"Well, we're the last match so we should have plenty of time to wake him up," Tucker told Sam.

While the competitors got themselves acquainted with their teams, the announcer explained to everyone how the tournament will determine which teams gets to advance by a points system rather than simple elimination rounds. The final four teams with the highest points would be the ones competing in the semi-finals. The matches would also be set up to test the teams' abilities to work together and to adapt to different kinds of events. For this set of matches the teams would be competing in simple three on three matches.

After the rules were explained, the first match was underway as the first two teams entered the area. One of the two teams was the team of Victor, Black Knight, and Evan while their opponents were a trio of girls who used different colored AMX-004 Qubeley Gunplas from the Zeta Gundam and ZZ Gundam series. One Qubeley was colored white, another was colored purple, and the last one was colored red. The match was a fairly short one despite the three Qubeley units launching all of their funnels at their opponents, as the Nightmare Gundam took out a beam saber and detached one funnel to combine the two into one weapon. The fin funnel increased the power of the beam saber to create a massive beam fan like weapon. The Nightmare swung the beam fan to destroy several of the funnels that were within range of the two Gundams and one Tallgeese.

The Black Tallgeese was equipped with a mega particle cannon and flew above the two Gundams to fire the cannon at the Qubeley units. The mega cannon fired a large powerful beam that hit the red Qubeley while the other two scattered to avoid the attack. However, the white Qubeley's left leg was caught by the Raider Thunderbolt's beam hook, which ripped the leg off before the Raider fired its mouth mounted beam cannon, the Zorn cannon, into the Qubeley's chest.

The purple Qubeley tried to direct its funnels at all three of its opponents but the Nightmare Gundam got right in front of it with its left hand glowing purple. Before the purple Qubeley could react, the Nightmare Gundam grabbed the Qubeley's head and crushed it with the purple glowing hand. The attack was the Darkness Finger which made sense as the Nightmare Gundam had the arms of the Master Gundam.

Battle Ended

While the crowd was cheering, the other competitors were shocked at how fast the match went and how one-sided it was. The trio of Qubeley Gunplas were barely able to do anything to match those three Gunplas. This was no doubt the most powerful team in the tournament thus far.

The next round of matches were relatively longer as the Gunpla Fighters showed their skills against one another. There were a few teams that seemed to have gotten the whole teamwork thing down easily while there others that needed to work on it. However, since the matches are determined by a grand total of points, the teams had more than enough time to work out a system for themselves.

As the matches continued, Sam and Tucker were focusing on waking up Danny as he continued to sleep through all the matches while their match got closer. Sam had tried to the common tactic of shaking the boy relentlessly but he had continued to sleep. When Tucker tried, he went the idea of using the most annoying sound from his PDA but Danny, while still asleep, simply grabbed the PDA and threw it to a wall causing it to shatter to pieces much to Tucker's horror.

"TINA!" screamed Tucker as he ran towards the broken remains of Tina, apparently.

"Well, at least I know that even Danny can't stand that thing," Sam lamented before trying to wake Danny up again. "Wake up Danny!" she yelled as she shook Danny once again.

Sadly Danny continued to sleep much to Sam annoyance.

Battle Ended

"Oh come on!" yelled Sam in annoyance as she continued to shake Danny awake, but the Fenton boy was still sleeping. "Seriously?" she started. "This isn't funny anymore Danny!" she yelled as she slapped Danny's face to wake him up.

"OW!" yelled Danny in pain as he finally woke up. "What was that for!?" he yelled at Sam.

"Our match is coming up!" Sam told Danny while still upset with how he kept on sleeping.

"What?" replied Danny as he tried to understand what Sam was talking about.

"Long story short, the next set of matches are team matches where the teams with the highest points get to compete in the semi-finals and the finals," Sam summarized the overall point of the tournament to Danny.

"Oh…" replied Danny as he took in what Sam had told him. "You still didn't have to hit me though," he told her.

"I'm sorry Danny, but we're about to be called up now," Sam apologized to Danny before they got ready for their match.

"My…precious Tina…" sobbed Tucker over at a corner.

Danny and Sam looked at Tucker for a moment before turning towards each other.

"What's wrong with him?" Danny asked Sam.

"You threw his PDA to a wall while you were still asleep," Sam answered.

"Oh…" replied Danny as he looked at his sobbing friend. "Oops," he added.

A couple of minutes later, the trio stood on one side of the battle system while their opponents stood on the other end. Their opponents looked like three teenage boys, one with bleached white hair wearing a white and black outfit and dark sunglasses. The other two were fairly plain looking with generic clothing.

"These are our opponents?" questioned the white haired boy. "They don't look like much," he added. "Well except for the Goth girl, she looks really fine," he commented on Sam's appearance.

Danny and Tucker were annoyed with this boy's comment about them while Sam was actually disgusted by the boy who was trying to hit on her.

"Let's take them out fast guys," Sam told Danny and Tucker.

Tucker nodded his head in agreement while Danny noticed the Gunplas in their opponents' hands.

"I don't think this will take long at all," said Danny.

"What do you mean Danny?" Tucker asked Danny.

"I've faced those guys along with a few others by myself yesterday," Danny told Tucker. "Those guys are the only ones left of that big group," he added as he took out his new Gunpla. "Looks like I get to finish the job with you guys helping me out," he commented.

Beginning Plavsky Particle Dispersal

Field 5: City

The battle system had chosen what looked like a city inside a colony for this battle.

Please set your GP Base

The six competitors did as instructed and set their GP Bases on the battle system.

Please set your Gunpla

The three boys Danny faced before placed down the Strike Freedom Gundam, the Providence Gundam, and the Legend while Sam and Tucker set down Fang Garazzo and Gunner DOM respectively. Danny took out his newest Gunpla and placed it on his GP Base. Sam and Tucker looked at Danny's Gunpla and were surprised at what it looked like.

Battle Start

"Let's go guys," Danny told Sam and Tucker as he grabbed the control orbs. "Go, Phantom Epyon!" he yelled out as his new Gunpla launched out of its gate.

Once out on the field, the monitors displayed Danny's new Gunpla. All of the competitors noticed the new Gunpla and were surprised with the look it had. Among the competitors was Axel, and he looked at the new Gunpla in a critical manner.

"So he is using an Epyon as well," Axel whispered to himself.

Indeed Danny's new Gunpla was an Epyon Gundam, but where the original Epyon and the Chimera Epyon were crimson and black, Danny's Epyon was a mix of black and white. There were also noticeable changes in the body as this Epyon had shoulder machine cannons, wings that open to give the appearance of six pairs of wings, a solid bladed double edge broadsword with a long white cable at the end of the hilt that connected to the right hip armor. Its serrated heat rod whip was white while the small shield was black. On the head, it was missing the trademark V-crest antennae. The talons on its wrists were colored green and there was a small hole between the talons of both arms. Another interesting thing about this Epyon was that it had open slits on the shoulder pauldrons, the sides of its head, the sides of the headpiece, and on the outer sides of the ankles.

Up in the VIP box, Dani was practically jumping around the place screaming about how cool her brother's new Gunpla was.

"That is such a badass looking Gunpla!" yelled Dani.

"Dani!" yelled Maddie and Jazz after hearing what came out of her mouth.

Back on the battle system the other boys were surprised to see Danny's new Gunpla.

"I thought that guy only had a GM!" yelled the builder of the Legend.

"He did," said the builder of the Providence. "What do we do now Elliot?" he asked.

"Don't worry guys, it's still a close combat Gunpla," said Elliot. "We can take him and his friends," he added as he combined the Strike Freedom's beam rifles into one long sniper rifle and fired at the Phantom Epyon.

"Danny, watch out!" yelled Sam as she moved her Garazzo towards Danny to block the shot with her GN Field.

However, Danny had his Epyon disconnect the sword from the cable so he could holster it onto its back before opening its hand in front of the beam shot. When the beam got within range, it curved away from the Phantom Epyon much to Elliot's shock as well as the shock of the other competitors.

"An I-field?" remarked Axel as he was not expecting someone to install an I-field onto a Gunpla.

"He used the design concept of the Crossbone X-3 as a way to make up for the Epyon's lack of proper defense against long range attacks," commented Victor.

Back in the battle, the Phantom Epyon charged towards the three Gundams much to their surprise.

"Guys, flank me from both sides," Danny told his friends. "I'm going to split them up," he added.

"But that's a stupid plan Danny!" Sam told him.

"I know," replied Danny as he continued his charge.

"What is he thinking?" asked Tucker as he moved his DOM next to Sam's Garazzo.

"No idea but let's see where he goes with it," replied Sam as she took the right flank.

"Oh man," muttered Tucker as he took the left flank.

The Phantom Epyon continued to charge forward at incredible speed. The builders of the Legend and Providence freaked out and flew away from the Strike Freedom as it was right in the Phantom Epyon's way. The Strike Freedom deployed its DRAGOONs and had them surround the Phantom Epyon.

"Fire!" Elliot yelled as he commanded the DRAGOONs to fire at the Gunpla coming towards him.

However Danny was able to make his Epyon dodge all of the beam shots while still charging at the Strike Freedom, which was pulling back away from it. The beam shots had hit various buildings but none of them landed a hit on the Phantom Epyon. Elliot was starting to freak out as the Epyon got closer, so he took to the air to get away from the Phantom Epyon.

"Got ya," said Danny as he had his Epyon pull up to follow and launched its heat rod to grab the Strike Freedom's right leg.

As soon as the serrated whip wrapped itself around the Strike Freedom's leg, ice started to form over it.

"That wasn't a heat rod," said Axel in surprise.

Genki and Johan looked at their teammate in confusion as to why he kept on making comments about this different Epyon.

Back in the battle, the Legend's builder found himself engaged in a battle with Sam's Fang Garazzo. The silver DRAGOON wielding Gunpla tried to keep its distance by using its DRAGOONs but Sam's Garazzo blocked the attacks with her GN Field. Normally when Sam was using her GN Field she would not be able to counter attack but her Garazzo was missing its GN Saber Fangs and the builder of the Legend didn't even notice. That proved to be his fatal mistake as a GN Saber Fang impaled itself into the center of its head while the other four Fangs stabbed the rest of its body. The Legend's DRAGOONs stopped functioning as the Legend Gundam stopped moving.

As for the Providence Gundam, it was fairing much better against Tucker's Gunner DOM as its DRAGOONs kept Tucker from using his long range rifle. Instead Tucker had to deploy both of his DOM's beam shields to protect itself from the attack.

"Man, I should have used the Blaze Wizard pack instead," Tucker complained as he continued to block the attacks.

However, one of the DRAGOONs managed to land a shot on the right leg causing it to blow off of the Gunner DOM. This resulted in the Gunner DOM to fall onto the ground as it lost its balance due to the loss of its leg.

The builder of the Providence smirked before turning his attention towards the Phantom Epyon and flew towards it. Tucker noticed this and managed to roll his DOM off its right side so he can draw the rifle.

"Oh no you don't," said Tucker as he aimed the rifle at the Providence's back and fired.

The high powered beam hit the Providence in the back but it only destroyed the large turtle shell like backpack, causing the builder to eject the backpack off the Providence. Due to the backpack also being its main source of propulsion, the Providence came crashing towards the ground as the only other thrusters on it were the ones on the legs and they didn't have enough thrust to keep it in the air.

Once the Providence landed on the ground on its feet, it aimed its beam rifle at Tucker' down DOM. Tucker saw the Providence aim its rifle and fired at him just before he could activate his DOM's beam shield. The beam shot went right through the one legged Gunpla's head and the rest of its body causing it to explode.

"My Gunner DOM!" yelled Tucker in horror as it Gunpla was taken out of commission. "Avenge me guys!" he told his friends as he wept over the loss of his precious Gunpla.

Sam rolled her eyes when she heard Tucker's declaration because of how silly he was acting as she moved her Garazzo towards the Providence that was heading towards Danny's Epyon.

The Providence continued its run towards where the Strike Freedom and the Phantom Epyon were fighting as Danny's Gundam yanked the leg of Elliot's Strike Freedom off of its body. Elliot fired his Gunpla's abdomen equipped multi-phase beam cannon at the Phantom Epyon. However, Elliot forgot about the I-field Danny had installed in his Epyon as it used the I-field in its right hand to bend the beam blast around it.

Elliot was not pleased when Danny used the I-field again to counter his attack and was about to use his beam sabers, but the Phantom Epyon closed its hand and fired a powerful beam attack from the beam cannon mounted between its talons. The beam was very powerful as it tore a hole right through the Strike Freedom.

"NO WAY!" yelled Elliot in shock as his Strike Freedom was shot down. "But it's the Strike Freedom, the most powerful Gundam in Gundam Seed Destiny," he muttered.

"Gundam Seed Destiny is overrated dude," Danny told Elliot as the Phantom Epyon flew away from the Strike Freedom.

"Why you little…" growled the builder of the Providence as he was about to fire his beam rifle at the Phantom Epyon.

Before he could fire off a shot, five thin beam blades erupted from the Providence's chest. Behind the Providence was the Fang Garazzo with its right hand stuck in the Gundam's back.

"That was careless of you," Sam told her opponent as the Fang Garazzo ripped its claw out of the Providence's back. "How could you forget that there was three of us?" she taunted the guy as the Providence collapsed onto the ground.

Battle Ended

With that announcement the Gunpla team consisting of Danny, Sam, and Tucker had won their first team match as the crowd cheered for the trio's victory.

Danny looked at his friends and smiled at them as they smiled back at him while savoring their victory together.

Author's note: Well this marks the end of the second round of the Gunpla tournament and as you can see the matches are going to be team matches. However the team matches are not going to be limited to just battles because with only ten teams of three, that would be a very short set of battles. So to remedy that I was given the suggestion of having the Gunplas go through an assortment of other kinds of challenges that will test the teams skills and adaptability. These challenges range from racing, basketball, volleyball, capture the flag, endurance matches, and so on. If any of you have anything you would like to suggest, then do so in a review or private message.

For those of you wondering why Danny is using a new Gunpla, it is a temporary replacement until he can fix up and upgrade his GM Phantom Striker. So for the time being the Phantom Epyon will be filling in, and it is filled with surprises. However, the Phantom Epyon is not an overpowering Gunpla, in fact it is actually weaker than the Chimera Epyon in this story and is only slightly better than the original.

Also around the beginning of the chapter, I know that I may have upset a few Zeon fans of the Gundam fan base but here is how I looked at the events of Gundam 0083. A fleet of Zeon forces hijacked a Gundam armed with a nuclear warhead, they used this Gundam as a propaganda tool to cause an uproar against the Earth Federation, they used said Gundam to conduct a nuclear strike on Federation forces, and then they dropped a space colony onto the Earth. All of that was done so they could expose the corruption with the Earth Federation government and begin a rebirth of Zeon. However those Zeon forces did succeed in exposing the corruption in the Earth Federation, but they also gave those who were corrupt justification with what they did. What the Delaz Fleet did in Gundam 0083 was nothing short of terrorism and when terrorist do unspeakable things to a government, that government allows the more combat happy members to take control which restricts certain liberties in order to protect the people. So in the end, the Delaz Fleet and Anavel Gato made things worse for the people of the Universal Century.

What a bunch of morons.