SD Gundam Force GF
An SD Gundam Force fanfiction by Preventer Void
Episode 5: Turn-A, Visitor in the Moonlight!

The weather over Neotopia City that night was the worst it had been in decades. Deathly black clouds swallowed up the moon, the only natural light coming from the brilliant blue flashes of lightning that arced across the sky all too often. However, despite having all the trappings of a thunderstorm, not a single drop of rain came from the ebony sky. The meteorologists looked at their figures, scratched their heads, then went back to check their information for the tenth, the fifteenth, the fiftieth time. They had no way of realizing that weather had nothing to do with this night.

Because of the erratic lightning, everyone was staying inside. Had anyone chosen to ignore the mayor's advice and actually venture outside that night, they might have seen the cause of the bizarre weather.

Over five miles out of the city's limits, a bolt of lightning struck the ground. Less than a minute later, another struck in the exact same spot. Then another. And another. Within several seconds, an unearthly mass of electricity streaked from the sky and massed itself upon that same spot, coruscating with raw power as they stood, stolid as the trees. Slowly, the lightning seemed to detach itself from the clouds and converge on the ground, coalescing into a single point before exploding outwards with a shockwave that burned the grass and knocked the trees askew.

In the middle of where the shockwave had just occurred, a single figure stood. He looked up into the sky as the black clouds spontaneously parted and vanished. The full moon shone down on his face, as if an omen. He stopped to ponder this, then realized something more important.

"Wh...where am I?" he asked no one in particular.

"Alex, look out!"

With a sudden start, Lieutenant Alex used his thrusters to dodge to the side as a bazooka shell streaked past him. Following it back to its point of origin, he leveled his beam rifle and fired. The pink beam shot raced towards the Dom who had fired at him originally, destroying his bazooka and knocking him flat on his face. Without even stopping to regard his foe, Alex dashed along the ground, using his beam rifle and arm Gatling to rapidly deal with the Zakos on either side of him. "How's that?" he asked as he turned to his commanding officer.

Captain F91 nodded. "Great, kid...now don't get cocky!" The captain's back-mounted VSBRs swung into place by his sides and began peppering the Zakos with thin, rapid beam shots that knocked them down with ease. A Gouf jumped up at him, heat sword drawn, but he blocked with his beam shield before kicking the blue enemy in the face.

The enemy commander chose that moment to attack, leaping at the Captain from behind. Alex started to cry out, but a claw lashed out from nowhere and struck the commander in the face, sending him sprawling. F91 turned to look at his savior.

"You know, Captain...," said the tall, mostly white Gundam with a chuckle, "it's not good for your image for you to tease the rookie then commit the exact same mistake."

F91 shrugged in a nonchalant way. "Say what you will, Belphagor, but we're ALL rookies here."

"Some more than others," Belphagor said as he regarded the enemy he had just floored.

Destroid Kaempfer rose to his feet slowly, wiping oil from his face. "Any time you feel like helping..."

"Oh, you mean me?" asked Gyan Commander as he leaned casually against a tree. "Well, you were so all-fired sure you could do this by yourself...are you sure it's not an insult to your pride to let a...what was it you called me?...a 'dinosaur' help you?"

The heavily-armed soldier turned on his sword-bearing counterpart. "Why you..."

"Stop right there!"

The two soldiers turned to face their ship, the Zanshibal, as the feminine voice of their commander came over the loudspeakers. "Get back to the ship. This mission is a failure."

Muttering angry curses under his breath, Kaempfer gathered the remainder of his forces and, with Gyan shaking his head all the way, returned to the ship.

Alex turned to his two superiors. "Back to headquarters, then?"

"You guys were great!"

Before anyone could say anything, Alex found himself the victim of an enthusiastic glomp from behind. Feeling his cheeks heat up, he struggled to get out of the embrace. "Tiffa, were you there the whole time?"

The brunette girl laughed as she let Alex go. "I didn't want to get in the way, so I stayed out of sight. You three were incredible, like always!"

Captain F91 waved his hand, as if to shoo the praise. "It's just our job. If we didn't do it right..."

Commander Belphagor playfully punched the Captain's shoulder. "Learn to take a compliment, will ya...sir?"

Everyone laughed merrily, as if they would always be like this forever...

Captain Nu awoke from the dream then. With a groan, he rose from his bed and walked over to the wide window that overlooked Neotopia City. The lightning storm was still happening, but by some miracle, none of the errant bolts had struck Blanc Base.

Turning away from the light show, he clicked on the lamp on his nightstand. There, glinting in the light, was a framed picture of himself as Alex, along with the Captain, the Commander, and Tiffa. That had been over ten years ago. Tiffa had graduated from college and moved to another city to become a marine biologist. In a way, Nu envied her; she could just pack up and move on, trying to forget the past. He had to stay here, constantly being reminded of what happened. He had been there when the dimensional travel tests went wrong. That feeling of powerlessness as the portal just shut down, casting Captain F91 into the mysterious Minov Sea, was something he never wanted to experience again. A month later, Commander Belphagor snuck down and entered the portal himself, trying to find the Captain; he vanished as well. The only saving grace was that the mysterious enemy who had attacked them had been repulsed; with only one Gundam, Neotopia would have been next to defenseless.

Shortly after that, the SDG had been shut down. Its funding all but cut, they had to settle for very slowly advancing their technology. Unfortunately, the Secretary of Defense had refused to let them pursue dimensional travel. That grated on Nu more than anything else. It felt like signing the Captain and Commander's death warrants. Only the knowledge that things would be safe kept him whole. When things looked their darkest, Alex had offered to enter suspended animation so that the SDG wouldn't have to worry about his repair costs. Several years later, he was surprised to be re-activated, now upgraded to his current form and promoted, with the added responsibility of teaching a new generation of Gundams how to fight when he himself was still a rookie in so many ways.

Lying back down on the bed, Nu switched off the light and stared at the ceiling. He wondered if he would be able to get any sleep tonight either...

"...Are you listening?"

X looked up suddenly. "Huhwha?"

Sil rolled her eyes. "Zoning out again? Lemee guess, you were admiring the latest Hitomi Shimatani album, or were you admiring the artist herself?"

"Hey, I can't help it if all the singers I like are pretty girls!"

"No," countered V, "but that doesn't exempt you from being the butt of our jokes."

X fumed. "ANYWAY! What was it you were saying?"

"I was just asking if you heard those two old-style Gundams' story," Sil said as she shifted the bag of rice balls from one hand to the other."

When X shook his head, V explained. "Apparently, they come from a dimension similar to ours, except that they're in the middle of a feudal era. Each of them comes from a different kingdom, and they just recently entered a war. Each nation thought that the other attacked the villages along their common border."

"I heard that much," X said, "but why the change of heart?"

Sil picked a rice ball from her bag and took a bite. "While they were in the holding cells, they had time to think things through, and they realized that the description of the knights who attacked the villages didn't match either of their own soldiers, so someone instigated a war."

X looked up at the cloudless sky. "So, are we going to try and finally develop dimensional travel and help them out? Will the Secretary even LET us develop dimensional travel? And if we leave, what keeps those Dark Axis goons from attacking while we're gone?"

V set a hand on his fellow soldier's shoulder. "Those questions are for people beyond us mere ensigns, my friend. Just leave it to the higher-ups."

As the three friends walked back towards their ship, they never noticed the mysterious figure cross the street behind them, looking totally lost.

"So tell me again why we're doing this?"

The Zakos looked over at one of his countless doppelgangers. "Do you want the honest answer, or the one that won't get us shot at?"

Several Zakos tromped towards an old Musai, machineguns and heat hawks in hand. Standing off to the side was Blaster Zssa, pacing back and forth and muttering about her image and the General. Since they were a decent distance away, and Zssa seemed absorbed in her own ranting, the first Zako shrugged. "I feel lucky."

"Whatever," said the second. "Miss Trigger-Happy thinks that the General doesn't trust her, so she apparently decided that the best way to earn his trust is to take outdated soldiers and an old battleship (without permission, I add, and attack Neotopia."

A third shook his head. "That just has 'brilliant plan' written all over it, wouldn't you say?"

"Do you want to be the one to tell her that?" asked the second.

There was a pause, followed by all three Zakos sighing.

"Maybe the General will be nice enough to repair us after we get our butts kicked..." added the first hopefully as he walked up the gangplank into the Musai.

General Haro entered the mechanical room, hands behind his back, wondering just what Kao Lin had asked him to see. He had gotten the message while in the middle of debriefing Wing and Strike, and the eccentric scientist had insisted that it was important, but he was too excited to say what it was over the comm line. And so, here he was.

"Ah, General! I'm glad to see you here!"

Haro turned around, surprised by the odd man. "You wanted to show me something?"

"Yes indeed, and I guarantee you'll be pleased! Right this way!" Not waiting, the engineer swept past the general, his Chinese-style clothing flapping behind him. He lead Haro to a barrier, the kind used to observe the testing of new weapons. Through the vision slit, Haro could see a metal ring, about five feet in diameter. After looking it over, he turned to Kao Lin.

"Just a second, I have to check the connections!" After fiddling around underneath a console for several seconds, the scientist stood up, waved his hands for dramatic effect, then pressed a red button. The ring began glowing with golden energy, which shot to the center in lightning-like bolts. Slowly, the lightning seemed to pull space open, revealing a tunnel made of swirling purple energy. Beneath his domed mask, the general's eyes widened.

"This is..."

"Quite right!" Kao Lin said excitedly. "General, I have managed to construct a dimensional gateway that would allow us to travel to any other dimension we can locate. The process is a little unclear, but if you let me get a little time to study our knightly friends, I'm pretty sure I can isolate the energy from Lacroa and have the gateway make a connection. Of course, this gate is much too small, but we can build one big enough to hold the Pegasus in a matter of days."

Haro nodded as the scientist shut the gate down. "Excellent. I'll..."

Before the general could finish, the alarms started blaring. He hurried over to the communications system built into the wall near the door and opened a line to the bridge. "Julie, status report."

The operator shook her head slowly, as if in confusion. "Well sir, something from the Dark Axis dimension seems to be coming at us, but it's not their usual make of ship...it appears to be the old Musai."

That left the general speechless. "The ship from a decade ago? Well, who knows what they're planning...scramble the Gundam Force!"

The lost figure looked up at the sky; the sun was slowly sinking beyond the horizon, and he had been virtually everywhere in the city, but it was no use. He was just as lost and lonely as he had been when he showed up that night. Now it was starting to get dark again. He wondered if he would be able to get to some form of shelter before it got cold or worse, it started raining again.

He sighed. "Man, why can't I remember?" he said to nobody in particular. He had spent the whole day wandering the length and breadth of the city, wracking his brain to find some memory that might help him figure out who he was or at the very least, WHERE he was. Unfortunately, his luck wasn't any better now than it had been almost twelve hours ago.

Just as he was beginning to feel even more lost than before, he looked up to the sky again, and noticed something that caught his attention. There was a cloud shaped like a hand, its fingers fanned out. Almost automatically, he held out his arm and fanned his fingers, making them look just like the cloud. There was something about it...

Then he saw it. Following the path "pointed to" by both the cloud's index finger and his own, he saw a black speck against the blue sky. He could feel as if his range of vision were growing stronger, allowing him to get an almost telescopic view of the object. Now, he could see that it was made of metal, painted white and blue, and had several wing-like extensions all over its body.

"A ship..." Operating entirely on instinct, the mysterious figure began running as fast as he could, following the vessel to wherever it was headed...

With a loud crunch, Captain Nu landed on the ground nearby the Pegasus, followed by the ground-bound members of the SDG. Taking out his beam rifle, he pointed it at the enemies and started to order their surrender...but was cut off by what he saw.

Javelin scratched his head. "Sir? Aren't those Zako Soldiers?"

"There's no way," Leopard replied. "Those guys were outdated even back in the day!"

Nu looked over the ranks of the Dark Axis forces and slowly shook his head. "Actually, Javelin's right. These ARE Zakos. What the heck is going on?"

At that moment, Zssa landed nearby and leveled her gunspear at the Gundams. "Hah! It doesn't matter what weapons we use, you punks are going down this time! Right, guys!"

As the Zakos sweatdropped, one responded in a rather wooden voice. "Yes, ma'am. We'll get those Gundams for sure." When his unwanted commander's back was turned, however, he held up a hastily-written sign, reading "PLEASE HELP US".

"That's right," said another Zako in an equally forced tone. "Your state-of-the-art armor is no match for our outdated machineguns and bazookas." Like his predecessor, he held up a sign, this one reading "WE DON'T WANT TO FIGHT".

A third Zako chimed in, just as unenthusiastic as his brothers and sisters. "You should surrender now, before we really get mad." His sign read "PLEASE DON'T KILL US".

"That's right!" cried Zssa, hefting her gunspear into the air and firing off several rounds. She whirled around to look at her "forces", who quickly hid their signs. "We'll get 'em this time for sure!"

Silhouette blinked in surprise as she leaned over to the Captain. "Um, sir?"

Nu sighed and rubbed his forehead before activating the secret comlink in his helmet. "Everyone, go easy on the little guys. They really don't deserve it..."

Coming to a stop, the mystery figure took a second to catch his breath; all that running was hard work. After a couple of minutes, he heard clashing weapons and pained yells. He looked up and saw the site of a battle, but something immediately caught his attention.

"Is that...a Gundam?" he wondered out loud. "It is...and there's another...wow, there's a lot of them...maybe THEY can help me figure out who I am."

Straightening up, the figure ran towards the battlefield, waving and shouting. "HEY! CAN ONE OF YOU HELP ME?"

Zeta grunted as he used his shield to stop a half-hearted heat hawk attack, executed by a less-than-enthusiastic Zako Soldier. The green robot shook his head slightly and whispered, "Sorry about this" under his breath.

"No need, I feel sorry for you guys," Zeta replied as he pushed the Zako back with a shield bash, causing the little guy to land on his back. Zeta noticed that he was staying down, feigning unconsciousness. Inwardly, the Gundam mused that the Zakos were on the whole smarter than their commander.

Said commander looked at her troops getting their butts kicked and growled. "What's wrong with you guys! Where's your spirit!"

One of the Zakos crawled up to Zssa and made a big show of acting injured. "Ma'am...we haven't fought in...over ten years..."

"That's no excuse!" yelled Zssa as she waved her gunspear frantically. "We should still be able to..."

"HEY!"

At that moment, the battlefield stopped. Everyone's gaze was directed to the source of the voice, a very Gundam-esque figure who was running towards them, waving. "CAN ONE OF YOU HELP ME?"

Captain Nu almost rubbed his eyes in disbelief. "Who is that guy and what the hell's he thinking?"

"Is that guy a Gundam?" asked V as he shielded his eyes against the sinking sun.

Zssa's immediate response was to open up her missile bays. "It doesn't matter what he is now, 'cause in a couple of seconds, he'll be scrap!"

Everything seemed to go into slow motion as the missiles streaked towards the newcomer. X raised a hand as he yelled out, but it was too late...

The smoke began drifting away slowly, stirred by a weak breeze. The Gundams looked on in shock; the Zakos tried to hide their embarrassment. For her part, Zssa was laughing maniacally.

But as the black wisps dissipated, something was there. The first thing they saw was a white oval shape, lined with red trim. With the last of the smoke gone, the mysterious figure stood from behind the shield, completely unscathed. There was a determined look in his eyes, and the symbol on his forehead was glowing a bright green.

One of the Zakos slowly went over to his commander and nudged her. "Um, ma'am?"

Zssa kicked the Zako away before growling, "Not now! I'm enjoying the way that punk blew up!"

"But...he didn't."

"WHAT!"

Now totally infuriated, Zssa jumped to her feet and looked at the figure. "Kid, you just made the list!" She opened up with the gunspear's beam Gatling as she fired off all of her missiles and beam cannons in unison.

The figure looked at the weapons coming impassively. In his hand, the shield began to glow in bright rainbow colors before melting and deforming into the shape of a hammer with an exceptionally long chain. Hefting the handle, the figure started spinning the hammer over his head, picking up momentum rapidly, before lowering it so that the chain formed a barrier, blocking all of the wildly-fired attacks. Once more, a cloud of black smoke formed where the mystery Gundam had once been.

"BOO-YAH!" cried Zssa as she did an impromptu victory dance. "How'd ya like me now, ya..."

Her cheering slowly drained away as the Gundam came running out of the cloud, dragging the hammer on the ground behind him. As he neared the warriors, he spun it again, this time whipping the spiked head of the weapon at the Dark Axis commander.

"What in the..."

The hammer landed square in her stomach, propelling her across the grassy field at high speeds. The Zakos looked at the new enemy, sweated profusely, then ran to pick up their fallen leader and retreat.

Slowly and unsurely, Captain Nu went over to the new Gundam. "Can...can I help you?"

The hammer glowed briefly, then faded into nothing. With a relaxed sigh, he turned to the Captain. "Actually, yes...can you tell me where I am?"

In the medical bay, Kao Lin examined the newcomer with a mix of confusion and interest. The Gundam Force itself was there, as well as Wing and Strike, who had been called in on the off chance that the new Gundam was Lacroan. That theory hadn't panned out, however, and now the SDG's top mechanic was giving his expert opinion. They looked on from a one-way mirror as things unfolded.

After a five-minute examination, the robed man turned to General Haro. "Well, sir, I'm not going to lie to you. I've never seen anything like our young friend here. As near as I can tell, his armor uses an advanced nano-skin system that allows him to repair damage instantly, as well as letting him produce weapons out of thin air, as we saw earlier."

The general thought about this, then looked at the newcomer. "And you don't remember a thing?"

"No, sir," he said. "All I remember is waking up last night in the middle of a field. I don't even know my own name."

"Hmm...I wonder if it's at all related to the disturbance that brought our Lacroan friends here," the general mused out loud.

Kao Lin, however, was busy with other things. He leaned in and took a good look at the Gundam's forehead then laughed to himself. "Well sir, I believe we have a name for our friend here."

That was enough to catch Haro's attention, as well as the Gundam Force's and the Gundam himself. "What is it?" he asked.

The eccentric scientist made his way to a well-worn chalk board and, picking up a sliver of chalk, proceeded to draw...

"...An upside-down A?"

"Not quite," he replied with a laugh, "but I can understand your confusion. This is an advanced mathematical symbol called the universal quantifier. Simply put, it's meant to encompass all items in a set."

The Gundam rubbed his head, as if to stave off a migraine. "So I'm Universal Quantifier Gundam? Oi, that's pretty bad."

Once more, Kao Lin laughed. "Don't worry, my boy, this symbol has a much easier-to-pronounce name. It's also called Turn-A."

Jamitov looked at the information he had been given and frowned. That wasn't exactly an unusual occurrence; whenever he was dealing with matters related to the SDG, he often found things to be unhappy about.

His assistant Bosque was more open with his displeasure. "So that disobedient brat Haro went and constructed a dimensional gateway without our permission! Why that..."

Whatever could be said about Jamitov's displeasure with the Gundam Force, it could also be said that he did things professionally. "Let's not go passing sentence without evidence, Bosque." He turned to his chief scientist. "You're sure there's no other possibility?"

Doctor Baund nodded his jackal-like head. "Positive. The only other possibility is that a localized dimensional rift appeared right in the middle of Blanc Base, but I don't think the General would keep quiet if that happened."

"Besides," added a blue-gray figure standing near the door, "I've seen the old man working on the gateway for some time. Based on the parts, I'd say that the one they have is only big enough to send a single person or Gundam."

"Indeed, but if they have the ability to build a small one, they can build a larger one," Doc supplied.

Jamitov folded his hands and thought for some time before speaking. "Let us wait before we act. This turn of events could prove useful. Doctor, see to it that all of our members are prepared, should we have to use our gate. As for you," he said to the larger figure, "step up the training. I want Project Titan to be up and running as soon as possible."

"Yes sir!"

Zako...Zako...

Zako...Zako...

Zako...Zako...

Zako 1: What the heck is going on!

(The lights rise on the stage.)

Zako 2: Yeah, why aren't you saying your...

(They look and see that Zako 3 is nowhere to be found.)

Both: AAAAGH!

Zako 2: He's not here! Where is he!

Zako 1: (into his microphone) Attention all Zakos! We have an all-points bulletin. One of the hosts of the Zako Zako Hour has gone missing, and we need your help finding him!

(The audience begins searching.)

Zako 2: We can't do the show without him...so what now?

Zako 1: I guess all we can do is...

For the future of the Dark Axis, ZAKO SOLDIERS, FIGHT!

(Fade to black.)

Zako 2: Where IS he!