PART 2: SUMMONED BY THE RUINS
Chapter 8: The Vajra's Guardian
A few days passed and Rion and Roy continued to work with Mina on her piloting, with Aisha pitching in when she wasn't coordinating with the Hunter Guild, working on the Gefion's menagerie of half-assembled variable fighters or researching the ruins. Today, Rion was showing Mina how to adjust the cockpit controls on her Valkyrie, both because a pilot should be familiar with such things and because of the Gefion's reduced maintenance crew.
"I see, so if you do it this way you can react quicker," said Mina, as Rion showed her how to make some adjustments to her controls.
"Just a little trick I picked up," replied Rion, just a little bit proud of himself. Just then the main monitor on Mina's control panel beeped and Aisha's face appeared on the screen.
"Sorry to break up the mood you two, but we're getting an urgent message from Leilong."
"Oh? What does she want?" asked Rion.
"I don't know, which is why I'd like you all to come up to the bridge so we can all listen to her together."
"Well, hopefully it won't be another pickup job," Rion muttered as he and Mina climbed down from her VF-11.
Once Rion, Mina and Roy had arrived on the bridge, Aisha quickly established a connection with the Hunter Guild headquarters in Britai City.
"This is bad, everyone! We're seriously going to need you help! A Vajra swarm has appeared at Point X61! Fortunately, nothing there has been damaged or any civilians put in danger, yet."
"If there's no one in danger then what's the urgency?" asked Roy.
"Because when the local militia showed up to drive the Vajra off, some guy in a Valkyrie appeared and attacked them! And not just any guy either, he was flying a VF-25 Messiah!"
That certainly got everyone's attention.
"A VF-25? I wonder where it came from?" wondered Aisha, "I have trouble believing that bandits or some sort of animal protection group could have got a hold of one."
"I take it since this bird's got an even higher number than Aisha's plane, this could be a bit tough to deal with?" asked Roy.
"Yeah," replied Rion, "The VF-25 is one of the latest Valkyrie models, only the Unified Forces and SMS should have them."
"That's just it," continued Leilong, "One of the militia managed to scan the bogey's IFF and it registered as being from the Macross Frontier fleet! Specifically from the SMS Frontier branch!"
"What? I was never told that anyone from SMS Frontier was coming to Ouroboros," exclaimed Aisha.
"Well whoever it is, you need to deal with it fast," said Leilong, "Someone from SMS shooting at government forces and protecting Vajra will make you guys very unpopular, very quick, no matter if he's from a different branch than you." With that, Leilong signed off.
"So, we've got a self-styled knight who's protecting the Vajra, huh? I guess this planet has all kinds of people," remarked Rion.
"Wouldn't you do the same if you were in his position? I wonder if he's doing this because he loves the Vajra just that much…"
There was a pause, just long enough for Mina, Rion and Roy to trade looks over Aisha's odd romantic detour.
"Anyway, we should get ready to fly out there, right guys?" asked Mina. Rion and Roy nodded and the three of them exited the bridge.
"As I thought, I'm the only one that thinks like that…" sighed Aisha.
Down in the hangar, Rion had just finished briefing Roy and Mina on the capabilities of the VF-25 Messiah. The look on Roy's face matched the feeling in Rion's gut; they were going to have a hard time of it, even if it was just a single Messiah. Their current force consisted of Rion's VF-0S Phoenix, Roy's VF-1S Valkyrie, Mina's VF-11C Thunderbolt and Aisha's VF-19E Excalibur. Not exactly a balanced force.
"We have two things going for us, " said Roy as Aisha entered the hangar, dressed in her pilot suit, "The bogey doesn't seem to want to use lethal force and we outnumber it. If Mina and Aisha in their faster fighters can corral the guy, Rion and I can barrage him from a distance.
"Sounds like a plan to me," said Aisha, "Everyone get to your Valkyries and let's get out there!"
A few minutes later, the quartet was soaring towards point X61, their Valkyries laden with as many weapons as could be carried.
For Rion's part, he was equal parts excited and nervous. Having piloted the YF-25 Prophecy, he was the most well aware of the group about what the Messiah line was capable of and part of him was desperately wishing that he was flying something, anything other than an old VF-0 against a Messiah. Another part relished the challenge of trying to take on a superior opponent.
"Rion, from what you said the other day, it seemed like you've fought the Vajra before?" asked Mina.
"Yeah, and now I'm fighting them here as well."
"I know that the Frontier and Galaxy fleets fought them but we didn't get all the information from that before the Aura happened," added Aisha.
"I fought them briefly around the time their war with Frontier was coming to end. But then they just vanished so I don't know as much about fighting them as I'd like."
"What we do know is that they're fast for being as big as they are, have natural armor that's equivalent to a Valkyrie's energy conversion armor and are armed with energy weapons and missile-like objects that they fire from their bodies. That about right, Rion?" asked Roy.
"Yeah, unfortunately that's all I've got."
"And here I thought fighting Zentradi battle pods and powered armors was tough," replied Roy.
"Regardless of what we do or don't know, we need to get to Point X61 and figure out what's going on," Aisha said, grimly, "Still, I can't help but wonder why the knight is so intent on protecting the Vajra?"
"Maybe you're right, Aisha, and the knight really does love Vajra that much," added Mina. Rion couldn't help but sigh a bit that even Mina was getting on this tangent now. Really, the Vajra were just big, dumb space bugs, right?
"It's faster to ask the knight in person, so let's go," he said, pushing his throttle forward a bit more.
A few minutes later, they arrived at Point X61 and were almost immediately set upon.
The small swarm of Vajra consisted of both the small and large soldier-type Vajra but as they engaged them, Rion noticed the same erratic movement patterns he'd seen the other day, almost like the Vajra were kind of dazed somehow.
"It doesn't seem like the knight is here; I'm not reading any Valkyrie IFFs in the vicinity," said Aisha.
"Then we'll worry about him after we take care of the Vajra," said Rion, "Siegfried 1, engaging the Vajra!"
Rion's initial worries that he'd have a hell of a time trying to fight Vajra in a Phoenix were somewhat unfounded. The erratic behavior he'd noticed earlier translated to a lack of combat capability and both he and Roy found themselves on fairly equal footing with insectile aliens.
But just as Rion dove under a pair of small Vajra, transforming to battroid in mid-dive, turning and blasting them with his gunpod, Aisha called over the radio.
"Rion, I'm detecting a Valkyrie IFF signal closing in! It has to be the knight!" said Aisha, sharply.
Rion saw the dot on his radar display and turned his head to the left. Sure enough he could see a distant silhouette that looked awfully familiar closing in on them. Suddenly, he could hear voices crackling over his helmet radio; the knight must have been broadcasting either in the clear or on an SMS channel.
"I won't let anyone mess with the Vajra! Not after what we've been through!"
"I don't know, Alto, I have a bad feeling about this," replied a young woman's voice.
"Sorry, but we've got to do it. Skull 4, engaging!"
"Waitaminute! Did that guy just say 'Skull 4?' What's that about?" asked Roy.
"The Frontier fleet had a VF-25 flight named after your squadron!" grunted Rion as he tried to loop in behind the white Messiah. Despite his Phoenix replica's reaction turbines the old fighter was struggling to keep up with the newer model.
"This is Second Lieutenant Rion Sakaki of SMS Ouroboros to Frontier pilot: disengage now, we don't want to fight you and the Vajra both," Rion called over the radio.
"Doesn't matter if its SMS or the regular military, you can't trust anyone on this planet! Leave the Vajra alone or I'll be forced to fire on you!" came the terse reply of the Messiah pilot, "Sorry, Sheryl, but it looks like I'm going to have to do some fancy flying against these guys."
Rion's eyes narrowed slightly; did the knight have someone backseating him or was he just carrying a passenger? And an SMS Frontier pilot flying with a woman named Sheryl? It couldn't be… could it?
"Alright guys, remember the plan, Mina, Aisha, close up with him and Rion and I will fire from range!" said Roy as he transformed to GERWALK to slow his Valkyrie down and get a solid lock on the Messiah.
"Roger!" replied the two young women and their blue and pink Valkyries angled in on the Messiah from above and below, trying to catch it in a pincer attack. Rion transformed to GERWALK as well, his targeting computer beeping as it locked missiles onto the Messiah. The VF-25 pulled a sharp, banking turn to escape from Mina and Aisha's fire and as soon as it was clear of the blue and pink planes, Rion and Roy fired. Two trios of missiles burst off of their wings and arced towards the Messiah, which corkscrewed skywards, a stream of flares trailing behind it. Some of the missiles took the bait but a few followed the Messiah on its skyward flightpath. For a moment, the VF-25 looked like it was going to stall but then transformed to battroid, twisted around and fired its head lasers at the pursuing missiles, detonating them in bright flashes of fire. Rion, Aisha and Roy weren't waiting to see if the missiles would hit or not; Rion and Roy were already flying up towards the Messiah while Aisha was diving in from the side. But as soon as the missile threat had been removed, the Messiah transformed back to fighter mode and zoomed out of their crossfire with a burst of speed.
"Heh, not bad," remarked Roy, his lips stretching into a grin, "This guy's actually gonna be a challenge!"
Inside the VF-25's cockpit, Alto Saotome had the same grin on his face, despite the protests coming from his passenger seat.
"Hey, Alto! Maybe we should try talking to them instead of shooting at them? Alto? Hey, Alto!" The young woman in the back of the VF-25 was getting increasingly annoyed at her pilot but also couldn't help but sympathize with him as well. This sort of thing was what he had been longing for, to fly in a real sky, unfettered by Island 1's dome. He'd only gotten to do it briefly on Gallia IV and she hadn't even been present for that.
She didn't much care for the G forces of combat though.
"Here we go!" he cried out as he came out of diving loop, bullets from his gunpod trying to clip Mina's wings.
"Oh? I can see you're really getting into this, huh? Well, it wouldn't do to let Sheryl Nome be outdone."
She reached up to the collar of her pilot suit and after a moment of fumbling, disengaged the lock on her helmet. Pulling it off allowed golden tresses to spill out from the helmet and Sheryl Nome's eyes flashed as she pulled out her microphone from under her seat. She grinned as she punched in a command to the small rear seat console in front of her and brandished the microphone with a flourish.
"Now everyone, LISTEN TO MY SONG!"
For their part, Aisha, Rion, Roy and especially Mina couldn't believe what they were hearing over their helmet headphones.
Jyuuryoku hanpirei
Kazan mitai ni hikaru fin
Kimi wa shitten no
atashi no beating heart
Mousou no galaxy-suberiochitara poison sea
Nan'oku kounen daitan na kiss de tobikoero
harapeko nano
tsugi no sute-ji ni ikimashou!
"W-what? Sheryl?!" stammered Mina.
Motteke! Ryuusei chirashite date
Koko de kiyuu na fight ecstasy-kogashite yo
Tondeke! Kimi no mune ni sweet
Omakaseshinasai
motto yoku shite ageru ageru
Iteza gogo kuji Don't be late!
"Is this for real?" exclaimed Aisha.
"I think it is," mumbled Rion.
"Not a bad tune," commented Roy.
Then, as if the revelation that Sheryl Nome was onboard the Messiah wasn't enough, the Vajra, which had been so aggressive until now, began to calmly hover down to the island below and land. The VF-25 followed and began to circle protectively over them.
"Sheryl?" Alto asked as the song came to an end.
"Hey Alto, why don't we try listening to them, ok?" she said. That was when Rion chose to break in.
"Look, we don't really want to fight you if we don't have to. Why don't you follow us over to our ship and we can talk there?"
"OK, let's do that," replied Alto, cautiously.
The flight back to the Gefion was thankfully uneventful. After their Valkyries were landed and given over to Gerrol's maintenance crew, the Messiah pilot and his beautiful passenger were escorted to the lounge. Alto was still on guard however. Sure, much of the Gefion and its crew reminded him of the Macross Quarter, but there had been nothing but trouble since he and Sheryl arrived on this planet and he wasn't going to trust these people just yet.
This was reflected in the fact that Alto and Sheryl sat at the lounge's bar, opposite to everyone else. Roy sat a bit off to the side, watching the two new arrivals intently (and paying a bit more attention to Sheryl rather than Alto.) Mina also couldn't take her eyes off of Sheryl, though it was for more starstruck reasons than Roy.
"You pushed us pretty hard out there," said Rion, handing Alto and Sheryl some cups of water.
"Thanks, you weren't too bad yourselves, especially since you were all flying outdated Valkyries," replied Alto, causing Aisha to snort in disgust at hearing her personal Excalibur referred to as 'outdated.'
"So, can you explain what was going on?" asked Rion.
"First, let me introduce myself. I'm Second Lieutenant Saotome Alto of the SMS Macross Frontier branch's Skull Flight. And this is… well, do I really need to introduce her?"
"Even so, I'd still like to do things properly," said Sheryl, flipping a strand of hair behind her back, "I'm Sheryl Nome. Some people call me the Galactic Fairy," she said, finishing with a roguish wink. It certainly worked on Mina, who was staring at Sheryl, enraptured.
"Sheryl's really here…" she said, dreamily.
"Mina, not that I don't kinda feel the same way, but we need to stay focused," reminded Rion.
"The reason we were protecting the Vajra is because they aren't our enemy and never have been. They're sentient beings so when we found ourselves here, we decided to make sure nobody attacked them."
"Is that why you said nobody on this planet could be trusted?" asked Roy.
"It wasn't just because people were attacking the Vajra, they were trying to shoot implants into them to control them. We've seen that happen before and we weren't going to let it happen again."
"Implants? You mean cybernetic implants?" asked Aisha, "I know they are used on some fleets like Galaxy but I didn't know that they'd developed a version that could control the Vajra…"
"So how were you able to calm down the Vajra like you did?" asked Mina.
"Through singing," replied Sheryl, "It's a long story but I can communicate to the Vajra through my songs, that's how they calmed down. You could call it a kind of 'special ability.'"
"And the same people who were trying to control the Vajra even came after Sheryl, possibly because she can talk to the Vajra with song. So I've been trying to protect both of them ever since we came here," explained Alto.
"That brings us to a question of my own," interjected Aisha, "Was it your mission to come here and protect the Vajra? I'm the regional director of SMS here and I wasn't told about anyone from Frontier coming to Ouroboros?"
"We didn't come here on purpose, at least I don't think we did. One minute we were at the Frontier Fleet, the next we defolded near some ruins on this planet," explained Sheryl.
"Defolded? But shouldn't the Ouroboros Aura have prevented that? How did you do it?" asked Rion.
"Sorry, but our memories before arriving here are kind of hazy, I can't remember exactly what happened," said Alto. "When we came to our senses, we found ourselves inside some ancient-looking ruins and then made our way to the surface. From there we found the Vajra and you know the rest."
"Then it looks like you two are in the same boat as me," Roy said, leaning forward in his chair.
"What do you mean?' asked Sheryl.
"Well, what year do you think it is right now?" the older pilot asked.
Alto and Sheryl traded a look and Alto said, "It's 2059, of course."
"You think so? Might want to check that display there," Roy said, pointing to a large display screen on the one of the lounge's walls. It was currently blank except for the date and time in the bottom-right corner: September 7, 2060.
"Are you serious? There's no way that's right…" gasped Sheryl.
"There's no way that Sheryl and I could have skipped over a whole year, even with time dilation caused by Fold Faults!" exclaimed Alto.
"It's not so much a problem with Fold Faults as it seems to be a phenomenon native to this planet," explained Aisha, "But despite some of the stories I've heard, none of the data has suggested time travel like this. Until now," she said, gesturing to Alto, Sheryl and Roy.
"Maybe we should call SMS Frontier," Alto suggested cautiously.
"Sorry," replied Rion, "But thanks to the Ouroboros Aura, we haven't been able to communicate with anyone. Sepheela, Eden, Frontier, we're cut off from all of them."
"And what did you mean when you said 'you're in the same boat as us?'" Sheryl asked Roy.
"I was out flying and then I woke up in some ruins on this planet as well," he replied, "I'm actually a little hurt that someone who flies with the Skull callsign doesn't recognize me. I'm Roy Focker, SDF-1 Macross Skull Squadron."
Sheryl found the name familiar but couldn't quite place it, whereas Alto actually stood up from his seat, staring wide-eyed at Roy.
"You… yeah, I recognize you from history class! But… how?!"
Roy had winced a bit at hearing this teenage pilot mention him and history class in the same sentence but said, "I wish I knew. It has something to do with those ruins, right, Aisha?"
"Yes, although we're still looking into the exact cause, so I'm afraid you two will be stuck here for a little while."
Alto sat back down heavily and rubbed his forehead for a moment before looking up at the Gefion crew again.
"There's really nothing you can do right now?" asked Sheryl, a definite note of desperation in her voice.
"I'd explain the Aura and its effects in detail but that would take a lecture and a half and…" Aisha covered a yawn and stretched her neck from side to side, "I think we could all do with a good night's sleep before we do anything else, yes?"
"I agree," said Sheryl, standing up from her seat and running a hand through her hair, which the Gefion crew noticed for the first time was a bit matted and tangled.
"Camp life with Alto was fun," she said, casting a mischievous glance at Alto, "but I'm not passing up the opportunity to sleep in a real bed and have a hot shower, maybe a bath too. Since you're also SMS, could I trouble you to put up Alto and I for the time being?"
"It won't be any trouble at all, there are plenty of empty rooms on the Gefion at the moment," said Aisha, smiling up at Sheryl.
"I guess that means you're now officially part of the team, Alto, Sheryl," said Rion, standing up and shaking hands with both of them. They returned the gesture and shook hands with Aisha and Roy as well but Mina couldn't quite bring herself to do it. She was still starstruck by seeing her singing idol in the flesh so soon after becoming a fan.
"Sheryl's going to be spending time with us… it's like a dream!" she sighed, happily.