The best of two worlds combined!!!

Hello out there. This story spooked now for quite a while in my head around and now I finally decided to give it a try. Those of you, who are familiar with the movie Macross will undoubtedly recognise some of the mentioned things. I just took some of the technology and put them into the NGE-Universe.

Please keep in mind that as a German English is only my second language, so please excuse some of my errors.

Prologue

T

here are several dimensions existing at the same time, following sometimes nearly the same way than other dimensions. In one of them a war is raging for now 34 years. In that dimension the human race ventured out toward the stars, after the development of a new kind of interstellar engine type. That was when they realised, that they were not alone in the Galaxy. Some of the alien species they encountered were quite friendly and willing to share their cultural and technological achievements with the human race. Others were quite the opposite, they reacted hostile towards the humans and two of them, the Zentron and the Marduk, made it very clear, that they wanted the entire human race death and that better yesterday than tomorrow.

In the war, the most used weapon of the earth alliance are manned shape-shifting fighter crafts, mainly the two years ago developed F-19 "Retaliator", a superior deep space fighter with enough firepower to annihilate a small fleet detachment on his own. The fighter is equipped  with several different type´s of weapon. The weapons are combined in two categories. First are the inner-atmosphere weapons like a 40-mm chain-gun with a fire speed of nearly 2500 rounds per minute, together with several compartments for all kind of air-to-air and air-to-ground weapons. Second we have the outer-atmosphere weapons. The main weapon here is a particle-beam weapon which can be compared to a high energy laser system. The system is very flexible, depending on the used amount of energy the cannon inflict small- or really heavy damage. In the highest setting the beam-cannon is able to slice through amour-plates like a hot knife through a butter cube. Unfortunately this setting uses a great amount of the energy from the F-19th fusion reactor which left less for the other sub-systems. Accompanied is these device by several kinds of rockets, from the so called "Dumb-Rocket", without an active seeker warhead, to Heatseeking-Rockets and  IFF-Rockets (Those IFF´s are the definition of a fire-and-forget weapon. It isn´t necessary to make a direct look on the target, all you have to do is to fire the rocket in the general direction of your target and the integrated friend-enemy detection system will hunt the nearest enemy down.). As a weapon for desperate situations each of those fighters is in addition to his normal payload fitted with a powerful bomb, specifically a neutron bomb. That device has a unique characteristic. When the bomb detonate no structural damage is involved. The only thing that will be totally annihilated is every biological form in range of the detonation, regardless if that form is sheltered in the open space or in a bunker.

During a battle between two small fighting groups in a deserted planet system a cosmic phenomenon occurred and the F-19 of Lieutenant Maverick Phönix from the squadron "Screaming Demons" was catapulted into another reality. The reality of the NGE-Universe.

This is now the tale of his adventures, who will undoubtedly happen during his stay with the NGE-Crew.

Chapter 1                    "Strange Visitor"

Location: Vulcan Ridge                        Time: 28 minutes after the defeat of the sixth Angel

A heavily damaged Unit-01 stood beside a still in the damaged special environment suit clad Unit-02. Ikari Shinji, Unit-01 designated pilot, was tended in a makeshift medical ward for his heavily burned skin which he received during his unplanned lava bath with his EVA-Unit.

Beside him stood a group of people who all were displaying different emotions. Ritsuko Akagi; slightly angry with Shinji because of the damage his action inflicted to the EVA-Unit. Misato; pissed because he disobeyed her orders to do nothing and on the other side proud at his brave, heroic rescue of Asuka. Asuka was the hardest to read, she displayed a mixture of disbelief, anger, denial and surprisingly a touch of caring in her eyes.

Before now anyone could say something an extremely loud explosion like sound could be heard nearby. Scrambling to their feet´s the three woman went outside to investigate what happened. Looking around and not seeing any damage all looked up in time to see a huge fighter coming down.

"Hey what type of plane is that? I´ve never seen that design before!" Misato shouted above the high pitched noise of the powerful jet-engines.

Ritsuko shouted back. "Don´t know! It looks like it´s coming down right here!"

Looking intently at the descending plane, the three woman were in for the next surprise. When the plane was only 10 meters above ground, the craft started changing his appearance. Wide eyed and gaping the woman watched the craft changing from his plane form into a strange looking mixture between a plane and a humanoid robot. Not able to move even a facial muscle Ritsuko, Misato and Asuka stood in the entrance of the Med.-tent, gaping at the strange machine who settled down right in front of the two Evangelion Units.

After a few moments, where the planes engines slowly came to a stop, an uncomfortable silence occurred. Finally able to do something the three woman started walking toward the plane, when the canopy covering the cockpit popped open. While Ritsuko and Asuka looked at the form of the pilot who climbed slowly out of his fighter, Misato noticed something on one of the tail-fins of the plane.

'What kind of logo is that on the fin? And what the hell is the EARTH ALLIANCE SPACE DEFENCE FORCE?' Misato was so enraptured in her silent musing, that she didn´t notice the pilot of the fighter who was now standing in front of their little group. When she finally noticed his presence he was unfastening the clasps of his helmet and pulling it of his head. For the first time Misato really looked at this man. 'Nice build. He looks like he has quite a body, what a shame those baggy flight-combos conceal most of his figure.' Travelling up his body with her eyes Misato finally reached his face and mentally gasped in surprise when she noticed his eyes. They had a light grey-green colouring and contained a burning fire in them that spoke volumes of his persona. 'How can such eyes look ice-cold and at the same time conceal a gentle warms in them' Misato wondered. Her silent musing was interrupted by the voice of the stranger.

"Who the hell are you and what the f*** have you done with the Command Centre?"

Ritsuko and Asuka were speechless, that was obvious to Misato, so she decided to answer the questions of the stranger. "I´m Major Katsuragi Misato of NERV tactical commander for the project E fighting prototypes Unit-01 and Unit-02 and you´re?"

Snapping to attention the stranger took a military pose and replied. "Brevet Captain first class Maverick Phönix of the Earth Alliance Space Defence Forces. Commanding officer of the "Screaming-Demon" squadron, currently assigned to the secondary earth defence line in the fight against the Zentrons. ID number Delta-Charlie-six-seven-nine-Yankee-Zulu-zero-one. Listen Major I´m currently a bit confused about the whole situation here, when you please be so kind to allow me to contact the flagship Gloria of the 12th Defence Division so that I can inform my people about my whereabouts I would be really glad."

"I´m kind of lost here Captain Phönix. I have no idea what you mean with your EASDF or your flagship Gloria and the 12th Defence Division. You´re are currently in Japan and this area is under the control of the UN-Organisation NERV." Misato said.

"UN-Organisation? Is that some kind of joke? The United Nations doesn´t exist since the arrival of the Tor´Ka 2189. "

At that Ritsuko stepped into the conversation. "Captain Phönix you said the UN doesn´t exist since 2189. What do you think which year we have now?"

"2279 of course."

Noticing the deep thoughtful look of her friend and deciding that she doesn´t like it one bit Misato said "What are you thinking Ritsuko?"

"I will explain it soon Misato. Captain Phönix, what´s the last thing you can remember before you arrived here?"

"We were in combat with a detachment of Zentron fighters when their battle cruiser suddenly exploded and a strange energy wave enveloped my squadron and the enemy´s. My wing-man "Crusher" got hit by the wave and his Retaliator exploded instantly. When I saw that I fired up my emergency thrusts and pushed my fighter trough a high-energy emergency break. After that I blacked out and the next I remember is pummelling into the earth atmosphere and spotting the formation of those strange planes over our heads. When I saw those I decided to land here and look for transportation back to my squadron. Why do you ask?"

"Captain this might seem ridiculous for you, but I believe you don´t belong here. I think …"

"Don´t belong here? Yeah right this sounds real crazy."

"I know Captain, but please let me explain what I think happened. This is just an assumption, but I believe you were sucked into an inter-dimensional vortex who spit you out in our time and space. For example have we never heard of those Zentrons or the, what have you called them? Tor´Ka?"

"Yes the Tor´Ka. They showed us the secret of hyperspace travels and introduced us to the other species living in the universe."

Asuka was up to that point quit, maybe because she didn´t understood what was going on, but this statement got her curiosity. "Other species? Do you mean there are really alien cultures out there in space?"

"Of course young lady. We´re currently in direct diplomatic contact with around 47 species. 29 of those are quite shy and don´t want to much direct contact with us. From the rest we are allied with 9 while 6 consider joining the alliance. With the Zentrons and the Marduk we´re currently fighting an interplanetary war. Of those two the Zentrons are those who are currently the biggest troublemakers, while the Marduk are still in the early age of space combat technology… Judging by the looks on your faces you have never heard of those cultures before, right?"

Fighting down a certain dizziness in her head Misato nodded her agreement. "That´s correct Captain …"

"Sorry Major, but please don´t call me Captain. I feel so old when I´m called by that. Maverick is just fine with me and if that´s to long call me Mav like everyone does in my squadron."

"Fine with me Mav. As I said we had no idea of the existents of alien species beside us, so what you told us is quite a shock, bye the way how old are you exactly?" Misato asked with a small smirk and a light glimmer in her eyes. Seeing that display of her friend Ritsuko could only shake her head.

'Misato will never change. She knows this pilot for a total of 10 minutes and she is already checking him out.' Turning toward Captain Phönix she waited for his answer, noticing by herself that he´s a quite nice looking man.

"Well Major, what do you guess?"

Taking her time to look him once again up and down, lingering some moments at certain areas of the human anatomy most females consider quite attractive Misato guessed "I would say something around 28." Inwardly Misato pleaded 'Please, don´t let him be some kind of long living alien in the form of a human, who is now around  2 8 0. He looks to good for something like that.'

Not answering Misatos guess Maverick looked at Ritsuko and Asuka. "What would you two guess?"

Looking at him Ritsuko said 26 while Asuka meant 20, which earned her a look by Misato.

Seeing the look Misato gave Asuka, Maverick chuckled a bit and walked in front of Misato. Bending down so he could whisper in her left ear (He was ¾ head taller than Misato) he said "Sorry if I have to disappoint you Major, but the young lady isn´t far from the truth. I´m 23 years old, not involved with anyone at the moment and quite looking up for the possibility of getting to know you lady´s better during my stay here." While whispering into Misatos ear Mav kept an eye at the blond woman in the Lab coat. 'Other dimension or not one thing is for sure, the woman here are just plain gorgeous.'

Ritsuko strained her hearing to listen to what Maverick was whispering into Misatos ear so she didn´t notice at first the look he gave her. When she noticed it she was shocked when his eyes told her quite a story. 'He´s checking me out? Why would he do such a thing? And why the hell am I having that tingling feeling in my head? Is Misato talking to me?' Snapping out of her thoughts Ritsuko saw Misato looking straight at her, expressing a wild mixture of surprise, anger … and jealously???

"Sorry Misato I was lost for a while. Did you say something?"

"I just asked you what we should do with our surprise guest now that he´s here with us."

Digesting the question for a few seconds Ritsuko decided on a course of action for now. "I think the best thing to would be to finish our business here fast and than bring Captain Phönix to NERV HQ and make a medical check to make sure the phenomenon left him unaffected. After that I think a meeting of the command staff to decide on a further course of action would be appropriated."

"Sounds reasonable to me Miss … I´m sorry I haven´t got your name."

"Doctor Akagi Ritsuko. Scientific head of project E."

"OK Doc, as I was saying I agree with your proposal. Is there some kind of way I could help you while I´m with you in this dimension?"

"I really don´t know Captain."

"What about me and my bot helping you moving your equipment while you do what ever you´re going to do?"

Looking at the strange looking mixture between a plane and a robot Misato and Ritsuko couldn´t think of a way to use the machine. Seeing the looks the lady´s were giving his fighter Maverick knew that they didn´t knew a way to use it.

"Lady´s let me shift my plane into his final form and just tell me what to and I will be fine."

"What do you mean with 'Final Form'?" Asuka asked.

"Well you see, the F-19 is able to shift into three different forms. First is his normal plane form where he acts like every other fighterjet, the second stage is what he is currently in as you can see and the third and last stage is his robot form which I usually use in space combat. Care to see?" Getting no other response than blank stares from the three woman Maverick decided to just go ahead and look what would happen than. Climbing up into the cockpit he engaged the warm-up and starting sequence for the main reactor and the twin-ion engines of his Retaliator. After a few moments the self control lights changed from red to green, indicating that the jet was in top condition and ready to fly again. Taken a quick look around to see if anyone was out of the danger zone of the jet-engines he pushed the throttle slowly open so that his jet slow and almost careful gained altitude.

Covering their faces against the powerful jet-blast of the engines the three woman watched as the strange fighter gained altitude and finally hover 50 meters above the ground.

"What´s he doing?" Asuka shouted, trying her best against the thunder-like noise of the jet-engines.

"I guess he´s going to show us the final form of his fighter as he said before." Ritsuko shouted back.

"Well one thing is for sure, his fighter makes an awful lot of noise!" Misato shouted.

While the women watched the fighter began to change his appearance. The long nose clapped down and was replaced by a humanoid looking head, the wings folded and gave way for a set of powerful looking arms. When the transformation was finished they saw a robot about ¾ of the size of their EVA-Units and the weapons he showed made it very clear that this one was a machine build for combat.

'How is this robot powered? It´s smaller than our EVA´s but those rifle looks deadly. Are those weapon compartments under those bay-doors? God! I hope he allows me to look trough the data´s of that fighter. Maybe I can adapt his power source to the Evangelions so that we not have to wait for the US-Branch completing the tests on Unit-03 and Unit-04.' Ritsuko was in her own little world wile she studied the design of the fighter. 'It looks like a real predator, build to conquer every opposition it might encounter in his missions.' So enveloped in her thoughts Ritsuko didn´t notice the side-way glances Misato and Asuka where giving her, both for several reasons.

Misato: 'Is this my old pal Ritsuko? I´ve never seen her with such a longing and excitement in her eyes.'

Asuka: 'What´s wrong with her?'

After a few seconds the jet came down again in front of the group. "So is there anything you think I could do now?" Mavericks voice came from the external speakers of his fighter, startling the assembled group.

One of the technicians came than with a megaphone and said "We could use some help in lifting the on-stage generators and some other of the more heavier equipment, Sir!"

"All right pal, lead the way." With that cleared the technician walked towards the mentioned place, followed by the now humanoid appearing robot.

"I don´t know about you Misato but I want to look what this machine can do, care to join me?" Asuka asked her guardian.

"I will check first on Shinji, but afterwards I think I will join you Asuka. What about you Ritsuko?"

"Well, I have to finish some things first, but I think I can join you two afterwards."

"OK Ritsu. See you than."

Location: Medical Tent;           Time: 19 minutes later

After checking on Shinji one more time Ritsuko went outside to look for Misato and Asuka and of course Maverick. She hadn´t look long for them, it´s kind of hard to miss a 40 meter high robot walking around lifting all different kind of equipment. To her surprise she wasn´t the only one looking, almost everyone who wasn´t on duty or who was able to watch for a moment was although there. What surprised her even more was the fact, that the work of loading the equipment was almost finished and that the robot now was making kind of a show of his abilities. Currently he was balancing one big crate with one hand while with the other hand he made some kind of target practising using a deadly looking rail-gun.

"So Misato is there anything else you want to see?" Mavericks voice questioned.

"Well, what about you show us some combat manoeuvres you usually use in a fight?"

"Fine with me. Can you see that energy mast at your 5 o´clock position Misato?"

"Yeah."

"OK, what about I pretend that that's an enemy robot and I attack it from several positions while changing my combat forms?"

"Go ahead Mav and do your worst."

Acknowledging that with a strange looking nod of the robots head he jumped in the air and shifted into his plane form. Pushing the throttle all the way to full power the jet roared into the sky heading toward the imagined enemy. It was an impressive display of skill and power when the robot moved through the attack steps, shifting through his forms in wave like motions and finally returning back, landing in his robot form.

The officers of NERV followed every movement of the robot and were quit impressed by the abilities of the machine. It was obvious to them that the craft was more flexible than the Evangelion Units, while those had apparently a better close combat ability. Because of the fact that Maverick didn´t use his offensive weapons they couldn´t judge his potential in that area, but they assumed that it had to be on a high level, considering that this was a design used in both, atmospheric and outer space battles.

"I hope you liked the show." Maverick said after he climbed out of the cockpit and now stood again besides the NERV crew.

"It was quite impressive Mav. I just hope you will allow us to take a closer look at you fighter once in a while I´m quit interested to look through the specifications of  the energy systems. How is it powered anyway?" Ritsuko asked, her voice showing clearly her excitement at the possibility of studying the foreign design.

"I can´t see why not. After all you´re letting me stay here with you, so I think it´s the least I can do to compensate while I´m here. The F-19 operates on a single fusion-reactor witch powers the main- and support-systems together with the twin-ion engines. When within the atmosphere the Vmax. is Mach 4,5 and in space it´s about 140 MGLT."

"What´s MGLT?" Asuka asked.

"MGLT is a speed standard we took over from the FalDari, one of the more friendlier races we encountered during our space travels, you can say it´s a inter-galactic speed measurement. Actually 140 MGLT is within the top ranks of space fighters in combat, the only ones who are faster are a handful of prototypes or those equipped with emergency afterburners, but those are only good for a total of 40 seconds. After those 40 seconds they need at least 5 minutes to cool down, before you are able to use them again, so we regard them as last chance measures like the nuke."

During Mavericks talk Misato was listening carefully, as the tactical commander of NERV you never knew when extra information would become important so she was always eager to listen. When Mav said the word 'Nuke' suddenly the major warning light in her mind went active. 'Nuke? What kind of thing is that? Does he mean some kind of nuclear weapon?'

"Maverick. What do you mean with nuke?" Ritsuko asked, her facial expression telling Misato that she was thinking in similar ways as herself.

"It´s a weapon design for nothing to lose situations. Let me explain, once in the war about 20 years ago we were desperate. The Zentrons had broken through our defence lines and were approaching the earth sphere. Our only hope was a newly developed weapon system which was actually never tested before, the nukes. Unfortunately for us we had only the two prototypes and the only way to use them was to pilot a fighter in some kind of suicide attack against their fleet. The original Demon-Squadron was chosen to make this attack and, as you might have guessed, was successful, but they paid a high price for their victory; the whole squadron was annihilated."

At that point of the story Maverick could no longer hold back his sadness and tears were forming in his eyes. Not really thinking just reacting, Ritsuko put a hand on his left shoulder and tried to comfort him to the shock of all who were listening, herself included. After a while Mav had himself again under control and looked Ritsuko thankful in her eyes. It was than that he noticed their close proxy and to his surprise it felt just right to him.

'Damn, she has really nice eyes. … Cut that crap Mav, She´s just trying to comfort you nothing more. Even when she looks a lot like your Jessica. SHE`S NOT YOUR JESSICA. GET  THAT FACT INTO YOUR THICK HEAD!!!.'

"Thank you Ritsuko. I´m OK now."

"Maverick what´s wrong?"

"It´s nothing really."

Looking intently at his face Ritsuko decided on a course of action. 'So Ritsu, you have to made a choice here. Drop the topic or try again from a different angle.' "Maverick I may be just a stranger to you, but I´m also a doctor and I´m here to listen if you want." You could see the clashing emotions running through his head via his eyes. As strange as it may sounds but Ritsuko felt herself strangely compelled to help him.

Regarding the doctor for a few more moments Mavericks face changed from troubled to determined. Reaching into one of the many pockets of his flight suit he produced a small locket which he held out for Ritsuko to take. At first Ritsuko didn´t know if she should take it, but the determined look in Mavericks eyes made her come to a decision real quick. Taking the locked in her hands she studied it closely. It was a simple oval gold locked with a small blue gem in the centre; after that quick inspection she tried to open it not noticing the sharp intake of breath from Maverick.

Feeling a little bit left out of the loop, Misato and Asuka were listening closely to the conversation between Ritsuko and Maverick so they noticed quite away the strange expression coming from Maverick.

Leaning over to Asuka Misato whispered, trying her best to keep her voice down. "Did you notice it Asuka?"

"Yeah, something is troubling him and it has to do with Ritsuko, but I´ll be damned if I knew what´s going on exactly."

"Me ether."

Finally, Ritsuko had found a way to open the locked and looked inside. What she saw there made her shiver violently. Inside were two small pictures, one in each half. The one in the left side was of an older looking woman who she couldn´t identify but the other was one of herself in a white wedding dress.

Noticing Ritsukos reaction to what ever was inside the locked, Misato stepped to her side and took a peek inside, to see what had shocked her youth time friend in such a manner. Not surprisingly her reaction was nearly similar as the one of the blond scientist. Looking up she tried to determine Mav´s reaction to the whole situation, but he was looking down on the ground, his long bangs covering his eyes. 'What´s going on here? Why does he have a picture of Ritsuko in that locked?'

The End for now!

So. What do you think? Please keep in mind, that as a German my English might be not so well, so please don´t be to hard with me. Any comment or well meant criticism is highly appreciated. Let me hear what you think about idea of combining NGE with the parts of the Macross universe. Should I drop the topic or write a sequel? I´m open for suggestions.

Until next time.             Mav Phönix/DJähn