Archangel's Amazing Adventures

by CSS Stravag

Mass Crossover fic. Chapter 51 UP! Powerful magic draws the Archangel and the ZAFT Creuset Team into a world of magic and intrigue like nothing imagined by the straight-laced CE residents. Their battles on Cephiro are only the beginning of their nightmarish journey as they give Odysseus a run for his money in the 'bizarre trip home' category...

47. Grasp The Reason

(Archangel's Amazing Adventures, Section 6, Chapter 4: Grasp the Reason)

(Day 6, 1330 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, Cargo Deck 5)

"Another Archangel plan," Murdoch said pensively as he used a dolly to remove several unused storage boxes from Cargo Bay 5-A-2.

"Nuh-uh, boss, this one belongs to the Paxis and the Strike Freedom," Spazz answered.

"Still part of the Archangel," Murdoch said definitively.

"The stranger it gets, the more likely it is going to show up on our ship," Commander La Flaga said with some appreciation of the plan in question.

Gomer was the last person out of the room, in his case driving a Cushman with two pallets of 40mm grenade rounds on the back of the vehicle. "All yours, Kira!"

"Yeah, all yours," Murdoch said, and waved to the now-empty cargo bay.

Kira shrugged at the melodrama from the mechanics. He walked into the bay, set down a hexagon plate, and clicked an activation button on it.

"That's my part in this soap opera," Kira said on his way out of the bay.

Murdoch looked to the plate, then back to Kira as he walked away from the bay. "Serious?"

"Paxis and Strike Freedom will take care of the rest," Kira said before he turned the corner and was out of sight down a main corridor.

All eyes returned to the hexagon plate on the floor of the cargo room. "I'm having a bit of trouble… " Murdoch choked up after the plate in question began disintegrating and the remnants started spreading out laterally away from the plate.

"It's gonna take hours for anything to happen," Spazz predicted.

The nanomachine hive reached a crystal tendril that had built itself into the nearby wall of the room, and once contact was established both crystal and nanomachine pile began glowing blue. After about five seconds of glow, the pile began expanding at a massively increased rate from normal nanomachine processes.

"Okay, I stand corrected," Spazz admitted humbly after the nanomachine pile reached and supercharged off a second crystal chunk built into the wall.

"Holy crap, the nanomachines are consuming the crystal and power, using it as a nitrous system to expand massively," Murdoch gaped. In the space of three minutes, the nanomachines had completely covered the floor and were beginning to build themselves upward by consuming some of the debris from the scrapped drones.

"Okay, this is freaking me out," Spazz declared wholeheartedly.

Mu La Flaga reached out to the door controls and closed the bay doors. "Okay, let's let the machine do its job," he said. "We'll feed it salvage, it feeds the missiles and munitions for the rest of the ship. Nothing to it."

"Right, sir," Murdoch answered, but even to himself it was a bit of a hollow answer.

Even despite the attempted closure to the matter, none of the three Archangel Team members could force themselves to move away from the bay. In so doing, they were witness to something that seemed to manifest itself from the annals of horror stories pertaining to sentient machines: a machine out of control.

"What the fuck?" Spazz asked after he saw nanomachines begin leaking out of the center crack of the bay door.

"Is this thing trying to — " Mu began, but dropped his thought midsentence.

" 'Try' my ass, it IS consuming the whole bay, walls and all!" Murdoch said in clear horror.

"How do we stop it?"

"Stop what?" Yzak asked as he approached behind Mu La Flaga. "Oh, Strike has his manufactory plan in motion? Awesome!"

"Awesome? This thing is about to eat the ship!" Spazz complained.

"No way, I saw the program it is operating under," Yzak answered. "It's doing just exactly as planned, it will completely replace the bay, walls and all, with three sections. Far side is a salvage pre-processor, middle section is the manufactory, and near side is the finished component QC and storage area. Here," Yzak handed Murdoch a tablet with the plan for the manufactory in isometric view. "Don't tell me you guys think one of our own Mobile Suits intends to consume the ship?"

"I'm thinking it is possible?" Spazz said.

"Ah, excellent," Instructor H said after he stopped next to Murdoch. "The Nanomachine Manufactory is underway. Once it is complete, we Gundam Scientists have requested a materials laboratory equipment set so we can begin preparing new gear for the ship."

"And this doesn't worry you?" La Flaga waved to the mass of nanomachines that were rather alarmingly consuming the door.

"Certainly not!" Instructor H said. "I could wade through waist-high nanomachines that are doing these tasks and suffer no ill effects. Observe," the Gundam Scientist threw a clipboard onto the nearby pile of nanomachines, and contrary to Murdoch's expectation, it simply slid off the pile and was nudged toward the Instructor. "The programming involved is very safe, gentlemen."

"You say so," Spazz said warily.

"I know so, I've seen the code involved," H said before he stepped past Mu. Yzak followed suit, both of whom were headed toward the rear of the ship.

"Okay, maybe we are overthinking this," Mu said.

"I'm not a hundred percent convinced, actually," Spazz said.

"This is horror story material," Murdoch held out his last shred of paranoia on the subject.

"Eh, I'll take the gamble," Mu La Flaga put his hand down by the nanomachine pile just outside the (mostly consumed) door and dipped the end of his middle finger into it. After a few seconds, he removed his finger and everything came out intact. "Huh. Cleaned the dirt out from under my fingernail."

"Nothing else?" Murdoch asked.

"Nope, it's undamaged." the Commander stood up. "I'm convinced. Later, guys." Mu headed out toward the rear of the ship, likely to the springs since she was off-duty at this time.

"Okay, okay," Murdoch said. "Maybe this isn't the end of the ship. Anyway, Spazz, time to get back to it."

"Yeah, yeah," Spazz said to Murdoch's back as he headed toward the midships lateral. "I'm keepin' an eye on you, bots," Spazz waved a finger at the nanomachine hive, then headed off toward the hangar himself.

-x-x-x-

(Day 7, 0700 hours shipboard time)
(Pirate Ship, Cargo Deck 5)

Magno had not thus far been down into the brig cells and storage areas of the male half of the ship, so this was a learning experience for her.

It was also a learning experience that was a bit horrifying to her.

"This is a mess! Why was this ship mothballed in this condition?" Magno asked.

"Not sure, Captain," BC answered. "The last two entries in the ship's log were 'sealed cargo has been relocated planetside' and 'ship decommissioned'. No explanations on either entry."

"Sealed Cargo? What does that mean?" Parfait asked.

Magno knew exactly what the 'sealed cargo' was, but she could not explain what it was. The crews would need to know, but not yet. Maybe never, she figured. That secret was over a hundred years old, and so far only a handful of people knew it.

"No clue," BC answered. "We'll investigate that later," the commander continued, which blessedly spared Magno having to dodge the question.

Magno looked at the row of lockdown cells that had been haphazardly filled with low-value material and salvage and could only sigh. She knew it was poor management practice that led to this manner of junk pile, improper storage policy and discipline amongst the crew, the loading of these rooms was deliberate even if disorganized. It was singularly expected, though, as the officers on this ship before her time were not all that effective as commanders — which reality had created the preconditions for Tarak and Meijere, and thereafter her personal crusade.

The last cells in the third row were for the three male crewmembers, and in this case things were mildly better. Most of the material had been removed and relocated to provide bunk space for the pilots, but each of the rooms had a few boxes still in evidence. Of the three, probably the doctor's cell was the best, but not by much. Especially given that there was not much good to go by in these cells, or room for improvement.

"Captain? What brings you down here?" the pilot asked.

"Surveying the area," Magno replied offhand, given it was what she intended. She caught sight of the doctor, who was reading through some manner of medical manual as far as she could see. The only one outstanding was Hibiki, who took only about five seconds to locate by way of his snoring.

"Should I wake him?" BC asked after a particularly loud peal of snoring.

"Leave him," Magno decided on a whim. "Pilots need their rest in between operations, and if what the Archangel pilots have to say is true, we have a lot of work ahead of us."

"Understood," BC acknowledged the point.

"Half of this gear is unusable," Parfait said, picking through one of the junk storage cells. "Rust, dry-rot in the rubber components, damaged wiring, cracked screens, I might be able to restore a third of it? A quarter?"

"Some of these are ships' spares, I believe?" BC asked.

"Some," Parfait said, then sighed. "A little of it, really. Most of this is consumer junk."

"So, not really needed?" Magno asked.

"Not really, we have newer and better stuff in the new half of the ship," Parfait admitted.

"We could ask the Archangel if they want it? Small offering, goodwill token, and their mechanics might enjoy it," BC suggested.

Magno considered the matter for a moment, but she really had only one option in this case. "We do owe them a small favor. Make them the offer, BC, with the provision that they clear the entire deck."

"And the men's quarters?" BC asked in counter.

"We will need to find alternate lodging for them. Come, I have an idea as to a proper arrangement for these three," Magno began her ambling trek back towards the lift, and thereafter toward upper decks of the male ship.

-x-

(10 minutes later)
(Upper decks, Male half of the Pirate Ship)

Magno stepped off the lift and turned to where she remembered the quarters and stateroom were for the Ikazuchi. She would not (yet) admit that she had a history with the ship, even if that history was well into her past, but for now she would play off playing a guess that went right.

"I thought so," Magno said. "BC, where are the pilot's lounge and ready room from here?"

BC and Parfait both took to their maps of the ship's interior, but had no answer within twenty seconds. Parfait found it after forty seconds. "Got it! This level, this corridor, opposite end," Parfait pointed in the general direction she guessed.

Magno looked up the corridor to where the stateroom and officers' quarters were, then down the corridor to the ready room, then back up the corridor. "BC," Magno prompted her second.

"Captain?"

"Move them men up here, set them up in officers' quarters. We'll use the lower deck for storage from here on out. And plan on moving all the pilots to these quarters if we take on more crew."

BC was silent for a few moments. "Begging your pardon, Captain, but would that not cause trouble with the other crew?" she asked fairly after a moment.

"They're still in the male half of the ship," Magno pointed out, or more appropriately pointed out the disparity of the assignment vis-a-vis the main usable crew amenities in the female half of the ship. "You know how to handle it if things get out of hand."

"Aye aye, Captain," BC answered. "Parfait, these three quarters," BC pointed out three rooms adjacent on the starboard side of the corridor, "Verify the utilities and communication terminals, get them working if they are down. I'll get the men moving up here."

"Yes, Commander," Parfait said with clear hesitation to voice. She didn't really understand why the Captain would not leave the men downstairs, but she wasn't about to question orders. BC was a perfectly reasonable commander until you drew her ire, then you ended up in the brig with water and bread rations for as long as it took for you to see the error of your ways.

-x-x-x-

(Day 7, 1100 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, Cargo Deck 5)

"Listen up, both of you!" Ryback said. "This is the challenge line. From here on out, you are in competition for the next hour. Hope you brought your A-game, kids, everyone is watching."

"Great," Barnette said offhand.

"Yeah. Great." Kira acknowledged the point.

"This challenge will be done in four sections, each scored individually and combined for overall score. Each match will be done individually due to the close quarters, alternating Barnette - Kira - Barnette - Kira. First challenge is 25 meter slow-fire, seven rounds per string, five strings per series, two series for this challenge. How copy?"

"Understood, sir!" Kira answered.

"Got it," Barnette said.

"Second match is combat drill silhouette using B-43 silhouettes. Requirement is ten rounds per target or I want to know why. Shooter's technique is at their discretion, just make sure you have clean rounds to the vitals for scoring purposes, and Kira, head shots are valid, pelvis shots are not valid for scoring purposes, understood?"

"Understood, sir," Kira answered. The 'failure drill' for when chest shots failed to stop a target was a shot to the head, or if that target was unavailable, two shots to the pelvic region, and though crippling IRL the pelvic region was not considered an appropriate target for scoring.

"You will each have three silhouettes per series, two series for the challenge, and you will be on a timer so you had better put rounds downrange fast and accurate, how copy?" Ryback asked.

"Understood," Barnette said, given that she knew the 1911 her opponent favored was not the best pistol for this manner of challenge.

"I am aware that the silhouette string favors the CZ 75 that Barnette is carrying, but round three favors the 1911. Your third challenge is moving impact targets on a mobile shuttle. You will have ten targets per string, two strings. I know the impact targets can be done with a .45 slug in one shot, but the 9mm may require two for a clean break. Leftovers on the shuttle will count against a clean score. Good to go?"

"Yes sir!" Kira answered.

"Fourth challenge is a classic Hogan's Alley. You will have a variable array of targets and three minutes to service them. You will not be penalized for 'missing' a target, but you will be penalized for hitting an invalid target. There will be hostage silhouettes, so you will need to verify before you get on the trigger. This last round is a single run of the alley, again shooter's choice on technique and pace. Any questions?"

"Ammunitions supplies?" Barnette asked.

"Hope you have plenty of magazines and a can or two of rounds, pilot," Ryback answered. "Course of fire should be roughly 250 rounds for you."

"Good, I brought plenty," Barnette said with some relief.

"Remember eyes and ears, people. You are firing a pistol inside a laminated armor metal box, so you need protection. If there are no other questions, Barnette you are on the line first."

-x-

"Game time," Commander La Flaga said before he grabbed a handful of popcorn.

"Exactly how good is your pilot?" BC asked.

"Decent, all of the pilots can hold their own on small arms, but they're not Ryback's Commandos good," Mu answered. "I think this'll be a good contest unless your pilot is a serious shooter, in which case Kira is in trouble."

The room went silent as Barnette brought her pistol up to take aim at the first of five 25-yard bullseye targets for this string. There was no timer for this part of the match, no speed metric involved, the first series was entirely static accuracy. Seven shots did not take her long to put downrange, "Shooter advance to second marker and fire at will," Ryback ordered. Barnette moved down the line to the next cone and took stance when she was positioned.

"Slow and careful is the name of the game here," Murrue said. "No points for speed, it is all accuracy."

"How is the accuracy scored?" Magno asked, given that small arms were not her forte, much less competitions for small arms.

"We score everything on two levels," Warrant Officer Jonesy said. "Center of target is a 'mark', rings are scored from 10 down. So, three bullseyes and four 9-ring shots would be three marks plus 36. Highest amount of marks wins, tied marks goes down to the numbers."

"And if that ties?" BC asked as Barnette started on her third target of the first string.

"If they tie after 250 rounds, I'd be very surprised, Commander," Jonesy said. "There's a lot that can go wrong — or right — in a hundred rounds, much less 250. Still, if it happens, Ryback would probably have them shoot alternating silhouettes until someone folded."

The room remained mostly hushed while Barnette worked her way through her fourth target. "Not bad so far," BC pointed out Barnette's results thus far.

"Pretty good, actually," Murrue admitted. She wasn't worried yet, Kira had been practicing, but there was always the possibility…

-x-

The last shooter of the prior series did the first string of the next series, which meant that Kira was first on the line for the silhouette round. Three shuttles were downrange, each turned horizontally so the edge of the paper was presented to the shooter. At random, they would turn to face the shooter, simulating a sudden appearance of a threat.

"Shooter on the line, focus downrange," Ryback warned before he activated the random timer function for the silhouette shuttle.

Kira watched the shuttles carefully, any of the three silhouettes could be first and he would not have long to service them — doubly so given the mandatory reloads involved during these courses of fire. The first rotation was on the right side, the silhouette shuttle turned from edge on to front-on and a light popped on over the target to highlight it. By the time the paper stopped fluttering, Kira had his first round downrange. Six more followed closely, four in the chest and three in the face, then the obligatory reload. He dropped the magazine free at the same time he began extracting a new mag, and the reload action was completed before the free-falling magazine hit the ground. Three more rounds went downrange, all in the chest, and Kira brought his pistol down to low ready with two seconds to spare before the target went unavailable.

Okay, next target is center or left, Kira thought as he focused his vision roughly in between the two. Again, the time gap between targets was random, so he didn't really have an expectation when the next target would turn face-on to present for servicing. Four seconds after he finished calming down, and ten seconds total after his last shot, the left-side target snapped around to present. This time, Kira was a bit faster on the trigger for his first shot, which caused it to be a shade low on the target but his following three were in proper placement. Again, displaying the impressive reaction speed of the Coordinators, Kira dropped the empty, drove in a reload, and had the slide down on a live round before the empty magazine struck the ground; his first shot of the next six happened some 22 milliseconds after the magazine hit the ground. Three more in the chest, three in the face, and this string done.

Center target should be it, Kira thought. Given he had fired six rounds of a mag total of seven, he preemptively reloaded a fresh mag, which gave him a 7+1 load profile (chamber was still hot). Just after Kira had the new magazine in, the center target rotated and moved backwards a meter at the same time, which made the last shoot string a bit of a challenge to him but not overly so. Fire eight, drop mag and replace, fire two. A second later, the target rotated to edge and the string of three targets was done.

"Shooter, collect magazines and retire to the reload bench," Ryback ordered, then hefted a push broom to sweep the brass toward a vacuum chute that led to the new nanomachine recycler system. Two minutes later, the floor was clean and ready. "Barnette, you're up!"

-x-

"Damn, talk about a horse race," Murdoch said with some reverence on the results.

Hibiki groaned at the raw display of firearm excellence from both the Archangel pilot and the Dread Squad Captain. Barnette had given him a ration of shit or two since he landed on the combined pirate ship, now he knew why. Anyone with the ability to core a person's heart out with a pistol likely did not lack the confidence to chew anyone's ass as appropriate, and Barnette certainly qualified. She was also just the right blend of opinionated and forthright to make her opinion known to Hibiki, and now Hibiki was beginning to see why.

The flip-side of the competition was frightening and awe-inspiring for a different reason. What little Hibiki had dealt with Kira, he didn't strike the Vanguard pilot as anything like a hard soldier. Calling him the exact opposite of Barnette would not be unfair: quiet to forthright, humble to opinionated, unobtrusive to bold. In Hibiki's mind, The contrast was made all the more sinister by the job he had done on the silhouettes: his shots were fast and accurate, his reloads were so fast Hibiki almost didn't properly see what had happened, and his posture practically screamed experience on dealing lethal shots with the pistol. From what Hibiki had seen thus far, he expected Kira could lay waste to Tarak infantry with ease.

And the hellish thing was, Gomer had pointed out that Kira was a pilot, not a Marine or a Commando, two troops even nastier than what they were witnessing.

"Oh yeah, girl's got skills," Spazz said with some humor to voice. "Now I see why she was in such a hurry to do a rematch after Kira cleared leather and winged her while she had the drop on him."

The third challenge involved one of the target shuttles making its way laterally across the shooting range, where Barnette had to put rounds downrange to bust a clay pigeon suspended from the arm. The shuttle wasn't moving slow, it was booking along at a pace to cross the range in roughly four seconds, but nobody in the hot springs expected Barnette to get a first shot first kill on it.

"Okay, that was good," Yzak said. Ten seconds later: "Okay, that wasn't a fluke." Another ten seconds later: "I'm starting to see a pattern here," the Duel pilot said warily.

After the next pigeon was shattered by two shots: "No shit, sensei," Gomer said to Yzak.

After number five: "What a massacre! All those broken, shattered pigeons!" Spazz said.

"God rest the clay pigeons," Murdoch said in jest to play off the joke.

After number seven: "Unreal," Newman said. "At least, if I ever have to get into a scrap with her, I have the M82 to give me a range advantage," he pointed out.

"And if it starts in close?" Murdoch asked the pilot / sniper.

"Then I'm fucked," Newman admitted readily.

After number nine: "She must do this routinely," Murdoch guessed (not incorrectly).

"Well, Kira's either going to have to match her completely, or he'll have to play some catchup in phase four," Yzak said.

"Can he still win?" Hibiki asked.

"Oh hell yes, he can still win, but he needs to do it right or he won't win," Murdoch answered the question.

"I didn't think, uh, I mean I know the women are a bit scary, but I didn't think they were this dangerous," Hibiki said after Barnette did the tenth pigeon in one shot.

"Huh. Hibiki, I think you're running under a preconception that isn't exactly right," Yzak said. He pointed to the armored bulkhead that would have separated the men's springs and the women springs, but now separated the men's room from the family rooms. "On the far side of that bulkhead are three of the most lethal persons on this ship. Hikaru, Umi, and Fuu. Number one, they are not scary. Number two, they are not monsters. Number three, they don't eat men or men's body parts. With me so far?"

"Yes sir," Hibiki answered dutifully.

"Okay, now for another few points. One, those three possess magical skills that give them the ability to kill men or women at range and in ways that would take the curl out of your nut-hair. Two, all three are armed with swords that can filet even a target wearing full armor like the Elementals, much less anything less defended. Three, each of them is trained on the use of firearms just about as well as anyone else in the crew. They're not as fast as Strike or Barnette, but they can still get the job done. And, to make things even more interesting, they pilot the Rune Gods into battle, which is a whole nother level of death and destruction. Still with me so far?"

"I think so," Hibiki answered.

"So, now, the point of this example. After seeing Barnette in action, are you going to screw with her?" Yzak asked.

"No sir!"

"After what I just ran down about the Magic Knights, are you going to screw with them?"

"Also no, sir!" Hibiki answered.

"Good. Now for the golden secret of this issue. Men are not superior to women by default. Women are not superior to men by default. Each person is different, each person has their skills, strengths, and weaknesses. Training, aptitude, and desire to be the best you can is what determines how far you go, how dangerous you are. Just because you're a man doesn't mean you have an upper hand on anyone else. Just because Barnette is a woman doesn't make her superior to you, she got to that position by years of hard training on using that pistol. Follow?"

"I get it," Hibiki said.

"You've got a lot from your education on Tarak that you're going to need to unlearn, kid. Just because some jerkoff back home told you that women drink blood doesn't make it true. You're not dealing with demons or cannibals, you are dealing with the opposite sex of the human race. Sooner you stop thinking of them as an alien race, sooner you can start going in the right direction."

"And what is the right direction?" Hibiki asked in counter.

"That's for you to decide and work toward," Yzak said. "But for damn sure, if you live your life thinking that you're dealing with cannibal aliens, you're not going to have much of that lifetime left to pursue your 'right direction' before some lady cuts your quest short."

-x-

After the shooting was done, Barnette found herself suddenly dreading this last part of the challenge. She knew enough to know that the intrinsic challenge of the Hogan's Alley was rapid target identification (something she was really good at) and rapid target discrimination (something she was not really good at). For all her personal veterancy with firearms, she did not have a huge amount of time in ground action with them — she was foremost a Dread Pilot, not infantry. Kira would likely have the advantage in this one, mainly because he had done actions like this in his past.

Still, Barnette would not let herself back down from this challenge — her results from the prior round were very encouraging, and she had no disqualifying marks against her, so she was still in play. Certainly, if Kira had scored high enough to outright defeat her by now, she would have been informed of it.

Instead, it was Kira who called her to action. "Your turn, Barnette," Kira waved at the door. As she passed by the Gundam Pilot: "Good luck, pilot. Ryback didn't make this one easy."

"Understood," she said simply, given she didn't want any wishes of luck from the opposition (and a man, to boot), but she wanted less to make herself angry and chance throwing the match.

"Shooter to the line," Ryback ordered, and Barnette dutifully took a position roughly in the center of the range area. "Rules are as follows. You have no restrictions of movement or fire. Targets will repeat themselves, any scorable hits count as valid. Any invalid targets hit will detract from your score, so make sure of your target and anything behind it. Understood?"

"Understood," Barnette answered dutifully. One thing she had learned in the (admittedly small) gun culture of the pirate world, the range master was not to be ignored or trifled with, and even in this case of the range master being a man, Barnette knew better than to scoff at his authority over the range. The pistol he was wearing was easily just as lethal as Kira's, and Barnette figured the range master for this ship was very likely a cut above anything she had ever seen before.

"You have three minutes for this course of fire, and are allowed to recover and reload magazines should you need to, but keep in mind that the clock stops for no operator. Shooter at the ready," Ryback held up the range control, and when he pressed the activate button it caused the control to buzz and the motion targets in the Hogan's Alley to begin moving around.

The Alley consisted of five banks of barriers to simulate what would be a dirty (cluttered) environment in real life. Each side of the range had a full-length series of obstructions, the back wall had two-story simulates with over a dozen windows and doors to cover, and there were two intermediate barrier groups that concealed even more devious challenges. With the targets in motion now, the sheer volume of moving objects became impossible to accurately and completely discriminate in the space of a few seconds.

This must have been what Kira meant, Barnette admitted mentally as she traversed right to begin on that side of the range. As soon as her sights crossed the first target, she began firing at the chest of what looked like a low-class male thug armed with a lead pipe bludgeon. She got four clean shots into it before the silhouette creeped back behind cover, so she moved down to the next target. Another man, but this one didn't have anything in his hands, so she didn't shoot him despite the mental conditioned impulse to do so. The third target was a lady, so she passed it over automatically — never realizing that the knife she was carrying made her a valid target.

By the time her sights crossed the fourth target on the right, she was completely in gear at a mental level — her mind had crossed out most conscious thought, turning her brain into an analog of a targeting computer and her body into the guidance system for her pistol. The four shots she laid down were almost automatic in both delivery and placement, and with it her mind moved on only slightly ahead of her front sight post.

She lost track of time and process in her near-trance state of combat focus. It was only after the lights went off in the downrange area that she realized her time was up, and with it she could not account for the entirety of her actions, but the eight expended magazines on the floor of the range told enough tale.

-x-

(10 minutes later)
(Warship Archangel, Cafeteria)

Neither pilot expected much of anything when they entered the cafeteria. They certainly did not anticipate a standing ovation from both the pirates and the Archangel Crew, which lasted over a minute on their arrival.

"Damn good shooting! Damn good!" Commander Chevalier said.

"That was a competition!" BC said.

"Had us all on the edge of the seats to the end!" Commander La Flaga admitted.

"Definitely fun to watch!" Magno said.

"Alright, everyone, settle down," Captain Ramius ordered, though the clapping lasted for some ten or fifteen seconds afterwards. "Time for scoring and analysis. Jonesy and BC have the numbers assembled for us, so take it away," Murrue handed it over to the designated scorekeepers.

"First off, I want to say damn good shooting to both operators," Jonesy said, which elicited a quick round of clapping again, just as much from the Pirate crew that was watching as from the Archangel crew. "Series 1, 25-yard slow-fire pistol, Kira 51 Marks, 151 points, Barnette 42 Marks, 230 Points. No missed shots at 25 yards for either shooter."

"Oh, wow, didn't think I did that well on the first round," Kira admitted.

"You did better than practice," Athrun pointed out.

"Second series, Silhouette fast-fire drill," BC picked up her notes. "Kira 30 Marks, 252 Points. Barnette 48 Marks, 89 Points. No missed shots for either shooter."

"Damn, that's a score difference," Mu La Flaga said.

Jonesy picked up his third sheet of notes. "Third series, clays on shuttles, Kira 18 Marks, 17 Points. Barnette scored Possible, meaning a full 20 of 20 Marks." Again, the announced score elicited a minute worth of clapping from the assembled sports fans. "There are two shooters on this ship that have ever scored Possible on the Clays shuttle challenge. Ryback is one, Barnette is the other, so your name will be added to the Possible board down in the memorial hall."

That revelation caused Barnette to gasp in shock. "Even if I'm not a member of your crew?" she asked.

"Credit where due, affiliation doesn't matter," Jonesy said. "BC, you have last," the Commando-Chef turned it over to the Pirate XO.

BC nodded. "Fourth challenge, three minutes in Hogan's Alley, Kira 73 Marks, 171 Points. Barnette 70 Marks, 169 Points. Match totals: Kira 172 Marks, 591 Points. Barnette, 180 Marks, 488 Points. Match winner: Dread Squad Commander Barnette Orangello by eight!"

The entire room broke down in cheering again, but in this case the loudest bunch was the Pirate crewmembers. It lasted for a good several minutes, until Captain Ramius called for silence from the crews.

"Now that the shooting match is over, I guess that means Kira owes Barnette a bottle of her choice of wine or spirits as wager for the match, unless your crew pays off a lost challenge in a different fashion?" Murrue asked.

"Actually, we usually do a meal for the winner," Barnette admitted.

Kira groaned. "Gonna have to practice my cooking skills, that's not something I know very well," Yamato admitted.

"Then your ass is in the galley for the next week for the crash-course in meal planning and preparation, follow?" Ryback ordered.

"Yes sir!" Kira responded automatically.

Magno took the resolution of the match and wager as her cue. "My crew, finish your snacks and prepare to return to our ship."

"Archangel Crew, finish up here and return to your prior crew rotations," Murrue ordered.

"Fun's over, back to work," Commander La Flaga grumped, which caused some chuckles from the mechanics.

As the two crews began dissipating, Kira had only one question for Barnette. "That was a fun competition," he admitted. "Rematch in about a month or so?" he asked offhand.

Barnette smirked. "Maybe. Depends on how well you cook."

"And what is your preference for a meal?" Kira asked in series.

"Seafood, shrimp if you have it," Barnette said automatically.

Kira groaned again. He didn't know the first thing about cooking seafood.

-x-x-x-

(Day 8, 0500 hours shipboard time)
(Pirate Ship, Modified Dread Hangar)

"Feels kinda weird to keep calling this ship 'the pirate ship', really," Murdoch said as he walked behind Gascogne toward their assignment ("request", in the parlance of Captain Vivon, but a full-up maintenance work order per Commander Haww). "I mean, this thing just doesn't feel anything like a pirate ship, either from the inside or the outside."

"I feel the same way, but I can't think of anything," Parfait said offhand. "We are running a name contest, crew suggests names and the Captain picks one. I just can't decide."

"The name will help people get used to the new ship as a ship, not as a mismatched assembly of two other ships," Gascogne pointed out.

"Yeah, from what we can tell, the two halves are pretty much inseparable now," Athrun noted from his study of the ship over the past days. "On the plus side, that gives you the Paxis engine in the old ship, which after it finishes reconfiguring itself should be a very powerful interstellar drive."

"Wait, what?" Parfait asked in shock. "How do you — oh, yeah, the Paxis in the Archangel. I keep forgetting about that."

"And what would you name the ship, if you had a vote?" Gascogne asked offhand of Murdoch.

"Oh, easy. Nimitz."

"Nimitz?" Gascogne asked, confused by the complete unrecognizability of the name (at least to her).

"Oh yeah, that's military history from our timeline, not necessarily yours," Murdoch grumped at the short-sight on his part. "Nimitz was an Admiral from our history, a damn effective one. They named a class of carrier ships after him, ships that with their squadrons in good working order could scare the bajeebus out of any other nation. I figured since this ship acts like a carrier, the name would fit."

"Okay, that sounds different," Gascogne opined, not really having considered that the ship was in essence a carrier as opposed to a more contemporary battleship (or an assault ship like the Archangel).

"Well, this is it," Parfait said. "Since we can't fit these three Dreads in the Dread bays, we've moved them down to here and modified the bay for them."

"Nice, custom launch and recovery equipment as well," Athrun pointed to the recovery gantry for the red fighter. His gesture drew a dirty look from the pilot of the silver fighter (Athrun vaguely remembered her name as Meia).

"So, what's the op here? Our instructions didn't tell us what we were going to be working on," Murdoch asked.

"Dita's Dread, we asked for some help on the particle guns," Gascogne explained. "Mainly with figuring out how to remove the new guns without tearing most of the fighter apart," the crew chief admitted.

"Periodic maintenance?" Athrun asked.

"That and replacement parts," Parfait said. "Equipment does wear out, eventually."

"True," Athrun conceded the point. "Okay, these pylons are the guns, which means the actual control systems are going to be back toward the rear," Athrun pointed down the length of the crystal spires that were also particle beam generators for Dita's craft.

"Meaning the pylon itself is a barrel?" Gascogne asked.

"Yeah, that or a focusing lens," Murdoch confirmed. "Depending on how much power it can take, these assemblies could do a lot of damage in a single shot. What d'ya think, Athrun? Whole Mobile Suit in one shot?"

"Significant hole in either of the ships," Athrun guessed. "Dita needs to keep an eye on where she is aiming, and what is beyond her intended target. She could very easily put holes in either ship with these guns. Hunh," he grumped, tracing a line in the cowling at the base of the focusing spire.

"Found something?" Parfait asked.

"I think I have," Athrun said. "Is this a — " he stopped when pushing the fitting in one direction caused it to audibly latch out of place. "Okay, this here, and this here — got it!" He rotated several more of the plates clockwise, which caused the cowl around the base of the gun to disassemble into four exterior plates. "Latching screw fittings nested together and locked in place by mechanical compression. In flight, they'll hold against 60 or 70 Gs of acceleration, I'd guess," he said. "On the ground, you push in two directions and twist to remove."

"Wow, that simple?" Parfait asked. "Yeah, it is!"

"And the next two layers of exterior plating are the same," Athrun moved backward down the combined engine / gun nacelle and slipped the plating off with near zero effort. Pull the plate section forward, then up, then twist clockwise to release the mechanical hold on the plates. "Murdoch, you have a white grease pen on you?"

"Yeah, here," Murdoch handed it off to the one combat pilot amongst their group, then took possession of the suddenly-released second layer of cowling.

"Need a hand?" Gascogne asked after it became obvious that Murdoch was trying to juggle plates and failing.

"Yeah, grab two please," Murdoch requested with some anxiety to voice. Gascogne relieved him of two plates quickly enough. "Thanks."

"Okay, I think I've got it," Athrun said, then relieved Gascogne of her two plates. While juggling them, he was able to mark on the inside of the plates with the grease pen a series of numbers. He traded plates with Murdoch, and again managed to deftly mark the plates with identifiers "Done. Each plate is marked with two numbers: first number is the fitting series, being first, second, and third going back toward the engine, and the second number is the order in the fitting series, so one - one is first fitting top plate, one-two is first fitting second plate, and so on. Four plates per group, and you assemble them in the numbered order and simply screw them into place, then push back until they latch in."

"Easy enough for the deck crew to learn," Gascogne said with a nod.

"Okay, now that we have the gun exposed, here's what you do to take it apart." Athrun took hold on a latch fitting, pulled it out of the lock point on the particle gun assembly, and swung it aside to clear the gun. "Three latches, top, bottom left, bottom right. Pull them, rotate out of the way, and now you can slide the gun out from the mounting bracket."

"How heavy is it?" Murdoch asked.

"Best guess, couple hundred kilos," Athrun wagered. "You'll want to use a crane or lift to pull it, it's a bit much to remove by hand."

"We're in luck!" Parfait stepped away from the Dread for a moment, took hold on a controller hanging from an assembly on the ceiling, and used the buttons on the control to walk a bar crane over to the fighter. "We put this in to lift heavy equipment!"

"Just what is needed here," Murdoch said. After Parfait had the crane in position, both Murdoch and Gascogne leaned in to place the first of the cables, and ended up colliding at the head. The impact was enough to cause Gascogne to slam back against the Dread, and Murdoch lost his footing and simply collapsed in a heap next to the particle gun.

"Oh dear!" Parfait said. "Gascogne! Murdoch!"

Athrun looked over the particle gun focusing crystal and down at Murdoch. "He'll live. I'm more worried about Gascogne."

"Unh," Murdoch grunted.

"I'm alive," Gascogne said, bracing herself against the side of Dita's Dread. "That's not a pleasant feeling, especially after the hit I took last week." She wouldn't directly admit it, but after her own safety, her first concern was that of the man she headbutted into an heap on the far side of the weapon system. "And him?"

"He'll be all right," Athrun hoisted Murdoch up and draped him over the focusing crystal. "The mechanics' heads are all at least as hard as gundanium armor, maybe harder."

"Unh, I ain't felt this bad since that one time in band camp…" Murdoch complained.

"Told you he'd be all right," Athrun said offhand. "Couple minutes rest and we'll get back to it."

It wouldn't be their last impact encounter of the day, and the next one would result in infirmary time for both crew chiefs. Athrun and Parfait would have to finish the disassembly, cleaning, and reconditioning of Dita's particle guns alone.

-x-x-x-

(Day 8, 1330 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, stateroom)

"So far so good," Commander La Flaga said. "They definitely don't trust us, still that whole male-versus-female thing, but it's headed that way."

"Yeah. One ship about to have a war of the sexes, the other ship about to have children. This trip gets stranger by the day." Commander Chevalier folded his arms over his chest and nodded, smiling just the same. "Wouldn't miss it for the world, though. I'll admit I was a bit worried when I heard what you were intending, random jumps until we arrived at home, but this has turned out to be a lot more interesting than I ever expected."

"I think we're still on unstable ground with the Pirates, but I think that is mostly low-level stuff," Murrue said. "Like you said, Morgan, it is a war of the sexes contained inside a large spacefaring ship. The command level and the specialists aren't really concerned about it. In fact, I don't think we're getting the whole story from Magno and Buson."

"Oh hell no we're not getting the whole story, that much is obvious from the way Magno is acting. I think BC is acting on a baseline, but I'm pretty sure there's a story or three there as well." Morgan dropped his arms and took a sip of whiskey since he was off-duty at this time. Murrue was drinking milk, and Mu had a protein drink as recovery from some weightlifting he had just completed.

"How much can you hear?" Murrue asked Morgan.

"Only loud mental shouting and strong emotions, nothing like yourself or Miriallia," the commander admitted.

"Well, keep an ear out, anything might be useful in these circumstances," Murrue ordered.

"Oka — " Morgan was cut off by the growler phone beeping.

Murrue answered. "Stateroom," she identified herself.

"Captain, signal from the pirate ship, they are ready to begin the trip back to Tarak and Meijere," Miriallia said.

"Acknowledge all, signal helm to form up with their ship and maintain pace," Murrue ordered.

"Archangel follows along, will do Captain. Bridge is out."

Murrue set the growler phone back down in the cradle. "Well, we're going, and we're looking at a travel time of roughly 380 days to get to Tarak and Meijere," Murrue said.

"Then what?" Mu asked the question on roughly everyone's mind.

Murrue inhaled like she had some manner of major answer, but let it out in a gusty sigh after a few moments. "I don't really know what after that," she admitted. "Two whole planets with populations that have not gotten along in four generations?" She asked rhetorically.

…To which there was only one proper answer: "Yeah, we're more likely to convince a honey badger to play nice as opposed to the risk of winning this dating game," Commander Chevalier answered.

"Eh, I think we may have an option," Mu said slyly. "The Pirates are, as you said Captain, on unstable ground. Some of them are resisting what they see. Some of them aren't."

"Problem, Mu: Pirates," Murrue pointed out. "Or, yeah, okay, I see what you're thinking. Poison the waters, eventually the problem goes away."

"Exactly," Mu said with a smile. "Four generations of unresolved sexual tension isn't going to evaporate in one. We can break the cycle by showing some outcasts how it is done, and maybe the mainlanders will pick it up? Call it two generations, and if the two societies don't shred each other to bits with all that pent-up frustration, then they may end up reintegrating in sections."

Commander Chevalier sighed, rubbing his temples to try to relieve stress. "Why does this make me think we're going to have to run a sex ed class or two?"

Murrue giggled briefly at Morgan's consternation. "No 'think' about it, Commander. Eventually someone's gonna come asking, and we're the nearest raw information supply on that subject, so…"

"...So, I think we're going to have to prepare for that, but I don't think it is going to be as easy as a four-hour classroom module," Mu said. "I think this one is going to start on the down low, either with Hibiki or their Doc, whatsisname? Duello?"

"Yeah, that's it," Murrue remembered the name because it was rather unusual. She had secretly slipped it into her list of possible baby names for her child, should her firstborn be male.

"If I had to bet, I'd say the doc, mainly because Hibiki is a bit turned off by being chased by Dita, and even if Kira cautioned her to slow it down, she's still being a bit rambunctious with the Vanguard pilot," Mu guessed offhand. "The doc, though, he would have a medical excuse to study up on the subject."

Morgan finished his whiskey and poured himself a half-tumbler, then capped the bottle and handed it back to Murrue. "There might be a couple dark horses in their ranks as well. I heard from Athrun that their crew chief was a bit nice to our crew chief when they were working on one of the custom Dreads."

"Murdoch and Gascogne? Oh wow, that sounds like a recipe for mayhem, or a recipe for calming Murdoch down, one of the two," Murrue gauged. "What other surprises do you have in store?"

"Barnette and Kira is an outside long-odds bet, given their rivalry on the pistol range, but stranger shit has happened on this ship," Morgan said.

"I think Yzak and Umi would hook up before Barnette and Kira," Mu countered that logic. "Besides, I think Hikaru would make a power play for Kira before Barnette made significant progress — assuming the pirate gunslinger had any such inclination, that is. Other than their pistol dueling, Barnette doesn't seem at all interested in Kira."

"Bleh, how did this conversation devolve into we senior officers discussing the dating scene around the ship?" Murrue asked neither of her subordinates in particular.

Mu winked at his beloved. "Same way any conversation forms or mutates around this ship. Welcome to the Archangel Team."

"Too true," Morgan acknowledged the backhanded admission of weirdness from the other Commander.

-x-x-x-

(Day 9, 0915 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, Hangar)

Paiway Underbeg found herself in a very unusual position.

She was the nurse on the ship, but now her duties were largely obviated by having a doctor on board — disregarding that he was a man, that is. A lot of the crew were coming to her because they didn't want to be seen by a male doctor, but the numbers were starting to slide in Duello's favor. Paiway was considering combining practices with him, but her stomach could not yet tolerate that thought.

So, with a reduced workload, Paiway had time to explore — and as these things happened, BC had caught her moping around the ship with no active task, and assigned her to a detail headed over to the Archangel to study 'crew integration and industrial processes'. Paiway had railed about going over to that 'stinky ship', but did as ordered because she didn't want time in the brig for disobeying a direct order from the Commander.

Once the door opened on the shuttle, Paiway was immediately slammed by both the noise of the environment in the Archangel hangar and the smell of it — the same smell as the Dread hangars, but this was louder, more pronounced. And for less machines, even! The obscenity of it almost drove Paiway back into the shuttle, except that she knew there was no escape from the smell of the hangar in the shuttle and BC would definitely brig her if she chickened out.

"Welcome aboard the Archangel, Commander," Murdoch acknowledged the highest-ranking officer in their party for the day. "Captain's already briefed me in. Where do you want to start?" Murdoch asked loudly over the din in the hangar.

"Split up and attack both plans an option?" BC asked.

"Sure, your two for the integration study need escorts?" Murdoch asked as he waved the group across one of the taxiways.

"No, just Paiway is on that detail," BC said as they entered one of the ship's corridors off the hangar. "Any restrictions?"

"Yeah, don't enter any areas that are marked red wall stripes, orange or yellow wall stripes," Murdoch pointed out the wall stripe that was marked royal purple for the hangar area. "Other than that, listen to the crew for instructions, but feel free to ask questions. Most of 'em are pretty easy going, you won't get guff from them for asking stuff. Enjoy!"

"Got it, thanks!" she said automatically, and was down the hallway away from the group of technical operators without another thought. It would be later that she regretted saying 'thanks' to a guy shortly afterwards even if it both felt right and was warranted.

Inside the labyrinthine guts of the Archangel, it did not take Paiway more than three turns and sixty seconds to get lost. So, barring any clear guidance on what exactly she was supposed to be doing, Paiway figured her best bet would be to just do some general searching, maybe some more directed spying if she could find something worth spying on.

Another minute of wandering and Paiway found her first interesting person to follow: A lady with green hair and some kind of short sword across her lower back. Immediately Paiway had to duck out of sight to avoid her gaze as she went up a ship's ladder, but catching up to her was not difficult. Whoever she was, the lady was not in a hurry to go anywhere. Paiway followed her up another ladder, then laterally across the ship and toward the rear of this deck.

After about six, seven corridors, Paiway started smelling something that smelled like steam? Maybe a hint of bath soap in the smell as well? It was hard to tell, given most of the ship smelled of heavy metal, motor oil and gunpowder to her. The exact nature of the steamy smell came to her after the lady with the green hair turned another corner and Paiway could hear the sound of running water: the Hot Springs of the Archangel.

"Ready to start, Terra?" the guy at the podium and supply racks asked. "If you're still not 100 percent, I can cover the rest of your shift."

"No, I can do it, just some bad cafeteria food," Terra (?) told the guy. "I officially relieve you, Nicol."

"Hot Springs are yours. Give me a call if you need anything, I'll be in the pilot's lounge on the piano." Nicol and Terra traded salutes, which Paiway caught on camera — if nothing else, it would be usable as rumor fodder around her ship, and possibly what the Commander was looking for? The exact nature of this 'integration' that she was supposed to be studying was equal parts impossible and revolting to Paiway, and not easily found to boot.

Yet, despite the sheer impossibility of it, Nicol did not act hostile, he was actually solicitous to her? Paiway figured this had to be part of the great mystery that BC was trying to prove / disprove, so Paiway waited at the opposite corner of the block section that abutted the corridor to the Hot Springs, watching for Nicol to come down the far-side lateral corridor. He wasn't prompt about moving, either, but he did show up where Paiway anticipated him and continued down the central corridor toward the front of the ship. That much briefly frustrated Paiway, in that she now had to cross back over her own steps to continue the adventure.

Paiway tailed him at the distance of a corridor, which she considered excessive, but she also knew that some of these Archangel Team troops were extremely good at detecting persons in their vicinity. It would not serve her spying well to be caught by the person she was intending to spy on, so…

(Paiway had no idea that the Paxis Archangel was aware of her 'quest', given that she had passed multiple of the crystal nodes the Paxis had set up throughout the ship as power capacitors for the weapons systems. Her attempt to follow first Terra and second Nicol was well known to the Paxis, and by extension to the bridge staff after it was reported to them. Miriallia had quickly checked Paiway's intentions, and decided it was harmless enough.)

Nurse Underberg tracked Nicol into a yellow-stripe area — something she was forbidden to cross — but she decided quickly if she intended to actually follow through, she had no choice but to break the rules. So, with a stout heart, she ventured into the 'restricted' area and tracked Nicol to where he entered a room.

Paiway approached the door quietly, listening, until she heard the sound of a piano playing. With the audible distraction, Paiway looked in and verified that Nicol was looking aside, facing port from the doorway which allowed the attempted spy an opportunity to enter unseen and take up position nearby a shrub to spy in close. It just so happened to be a fortunate accident that the shrub was big enough and purple enough to act as camouflage for the pirate spy, because no sooner than she had her notebook out did someone else in the room stir to the sound of the piano.

"Nicol? I thought you were working the hot springs today," one of the lady Magic Knights asked. From rumors, Paiway guessed her to be Magic Knight Fuu? The glasses and mouse-brown hair matched the expected description of the green Magic Knight, at the least.

"Was. Terra took over for the second half of her shift. Bad cafeteria food strikes again."

"More of the stuff from Halkegenia?" Fuu asked as she entered and took a seat at the piano bench next to Nicol.

"Yeah, this time pasta grains," Nicol said. "I think they may not have been happy with us, despite saving their country."

"Princess Henrietta was perfectly happy with the unit. The nobility, not so much," Fuu pointed out the discrepancy. "We were proof that you did not have to be of station to be a frighteningly powerful military force."

"And we scared them enough that they wanted to be rid of the example," Nicol completed the thought, then flexed his fingers and returned to the piano.

Paiway had to admit to herself, Nicol was a far better piano player than her music teacher in school. He moved through the notes and scales of whatever piece he was working on right now with speed and accuracy that she knew was mastery-level — some of the best piano players on Meijere weren't up to his level, and this guy was supposed to be a pilot?

"Aria De Mezzo Catarre, that is one thing I truly miss from our days in Vector and Figaro, a night at the opera house," Fuu said wistfully.

"Those were good nights," Nicol admitted. "Peaceful nights on the town in Vector, Jidoor, between the days, weeks out in the countryside, crashing through caves and ruins, trying to solve the mystery of what exactly went wrong on that world."

Paiway had to fight hard to prevent herself gasping at Fuu's next action, but she did master her initial reaction to maintain stealth. Fuu leaned back against Nicol's right shoulder lightly and rested her head on his shoulder. Such a gesture, was it common in their society, or was this personal affection? She did not know, and suspected that this was part of what BC was trying to find out, so…

"All these years, all these campaigns, I kept coming back to a thought, that this was some real-life echo of some video game, some of the games I have even played or heard of." She sighed. "It is Hell to know the things I did in video games in years past, the random questing and morally-dubious plot lines, those are a reality I have lived. And those actions are infinitely worse than I imagined in those days long past."

"I know," Nicol said. "I grew up idolizing the military. I quickly found out, even for the son of a Councilman, the military is an entirely different world from what is seen on the outside. And then came the war, and the pursuit of the Archangel, and then our quest in Cephiro, the Inner Sphere, Vector, the Earth Alliance, and yet more." This time, it was Nicol that sighed, but he was still playing amazingly to Paiway's way of thinking.

Both were silent for a minute while Nicol played onward through the operatic piano score that he was playing. From where Paiway had stationed herself, she could see that Fuu was probably on the order of 18 years age, maybe 19, and easily as beautiful as most of the crew of her ship, and better than most. She wasn't as big as most of the crew, in fact she was just as flat as Dita and only slightly visibly bigger than herself, which was curious to Paiway. She figured that a society that artificially created their babies like the Men did (the Tarak men) would put a bit more emphasis on appearance? Paiway figured it would not be difficult to do so for such a society. Her analysis did not cover that the only persons on the ship that were artificially bred were the Clansmen, and the Clansmen gave near zero value to appearance in genetic traits, instead preferring a genome optimized for warfare.

"How do we live with ourselves, with our adventures and tragedies, when it is over?" Fuu asked during a lull in the piano score.

"My instructor in Basic said it becomes easier with time," Nicol said. "The key is we live to tell the tale. We live to tell the tale," he concluded.

That prompted a raised hand from Fuu. "Will you be with me for the coming quest?"

Nicol stopped playing to take her hand. "I will always be here for you."

Paiway only barely managed to avoid reacting in any fashion, mainly on the raw shock of such a scene causing her to seize up in a combination of dread and revulsion as to how much what she just saw echoed the romance stories of Meijere. Her retelling of the scene would be word-perfect in the days to come, and would elicit much the same reaction from the rest of her crew, but even if it was discredited initially, the story did plant a seed of understanding in the pirates…

-x-x-x-

(Day 10, 2040 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, Bridge)

The problem with interior decoration on a warship is that options are limited, Murrue grumped inside the confines of her own mind. Doubly so when planning out the arrangement and decoration of a nursery on a warship. She took her third bite out of a freeze-dried ice cream sandwich bar while scrolling through the ship's inventory of paints and supplies. The colors on the ship were limited, basic red, basic blue, basic green, camouflage mottling, urban camo mottling, various grays, some primers, similar. Though paint was an integral part of ship maintenance and protection against the environment, the actual color selection was thin; there were not too many color schemes that were otherwise compatible with day-to-day life on a warship, all else being equal.

She did notice one thing, though, in that the ship had color cartridges as well as liquid cells for bulk paint storage. That made her wonder as to their purpose while she chomped on her fourth bite of freeze-dried ice cream. She had been craving actual ice cream, but the ship didn't have any in stock and Ryback had said it would take him several hours to prepare a proper batch. (On the plus side, the ship had all the ingredients to make butter pecan ice cream, Murrue's favorite flavor. Ryback had the first two gallons of said flavor of ice cream in the freezer, ETA 2230 hours for ready to serve.)

Murrue picked up the growler phone and dialed a number from memory. "Hangar from Bridge, please contact the Captain at first available, non-priority consultation issue." She hung up but didn't take her hand away from the growler phone, since she knew someone was bound to answer fairly quickly.

The ring only took about seven seconds. "Bridge, Captain Ramius," Murrue identified herself.

"Murdoch, ma'am. What can I help you with?" the hangar boss replied.

"Paint inventories," Murrue said. "I'm showing in records that we have both liquid cells of base paints, and color cartridges. What is the difference?" Murrue asked directly.

"Oh, those? That's another one of Gomer's Follies, he had a professional paint mixing rig installed in the machine shop in case we wanted to do any custom coloring schema," Murdoch answered, though with some pride in voice. "The color cartridges are to feed the mixer so we can dial in any color needed."

"Did not know that," Murrue admitted. "What's the smallest size you can mix up?"

"Quart cans of paint, Captain, I can also do half-gallon, gallon, two gallon, five gallon, and seven gallon buckets. Got a project in mind?"

"I may be planning something," Murrue half-answered the question.

"If you need room painting supplies, Captain, I can gin some up," Murdoch inadvertently stumbled across what she was planning.

"I'll put in a work order when I have an idea what is — "

"Conn, Sensors, multiple inbound pod ships detected off the port bow!" Sai shouted.

"Murdoch, we have contact, get the machines ready for battle," Murrue ordered, then dropped the growler phone on the hook. "Morgan, signal battlestations and get to your mobile suit. Sai, track steady, I need a solid count on ships. Chandratta, begin preparing fire solutions for capital-scale fire."

"On it, Captain," Chandratta answered immediately.

"Captain, I am showing total count 20 ships in one attack wave," Sai reported. "Estimate 960 potential drones," he calculated the raw enemy force figure.

"That's a lot of units," Chandratta said. "Of course, we have the new missiles," he indirectly suggested to the Captain.

"There is that," Murrue admitted. "What is the usage guidelines again?"

"One missile per five ships with an estimated survival rate of four enemy drones per missile," Chandratta read off the sheet that Kira had written up on the new weapon system. "And each missile body will do one of the pod ships for us, we won't need to go to guns on it."

"Reel them into gun range, then prepare to deploy Hydra missiles," Murrue ordered, using the name that Kira had chosen for his upscaled and heavily-improved micromissile system. "Remaining units are to be engaged with Helldarts and pod ships are to be engaged with Valiants, Gottfrieds, and Lohengrins."

"Loading tubes 1 to 4 with Hydra Micromissile systems," Chandratta said. "Tubes 5 to 10 are loaded with Wombats, tubes 31 to 40 are loaded with Sledgehammers."

"Hold fire until the ships are in range," Murrue ordered. "Dorothy, status of the Mobile forces?"

"Only machines not ready to go are Vayeate and Selesce, both pilots were down in the hot springs area," the operator reported.

"We've still got it where it counts," Newman said with some pride to voice.

The bridge was relatively silent for a minute, as the ships continued closing toward each other. The Pirates had begun launching Dreads, but the pod ships had not yet released their units. The latter deployment changed in a hurry, as the pod ships dumped their machines in rapid succession, likely as a single crushing blow strategy. "Conn, Sensors, pod ships have dumped full forces onto the field, ships are in range for all capital guns."

Murrue did not respond for ten seconds. "Captain, all targets in range, enemy drones are closing," Chandratta prompted her.

"Deploy Hydras and conduct follow-up attacks as directed. Dorothy, begin launching our machines," Murrue ordered.

"Firing tubes 1 to 4," Chandratta released those firing solutions to the missiles, which immediately lept out of the tubes and streaked forward of the ship. He then began issuing secondary fire commands for the main guns to target the enemy ships, which were now too close to escape even if they were already headed away (they were not).

-x-

"Archangel has launched four missiles, is opening catapult doors," Ezra reported of their comrade ship's actions.

"Only four missiles?" BC asked. "That's…"

"Underwhelming?" Magno answered with what was on her mind.

The four missiles spread out to cover the area evenly, clearly visible on the sensor screens. "Something else is going on here," BC judged. She was proved correct four seconds later, as the airspace around the first of the missile quickly became saturated with dozens of smaller contacts, then hundreds, all headed into the swarm of enemy machines.

"Captain, I can't track the amount of contacts in space around us," Ezra said as her monitor bogged down from the sheer volume of entities it was trying to track. After fifteen seconds, it began refreshing again at a normal rate when most of the contacts began dropping off the screens, meaning they were no longer maneuvering.

The video screen told the tale more adroitly. "Was that…?" Magno asked in shock.

"A massacre? Oh yes," BC said.

"That can't be real," Operator Belvedere Coco said warily. "No way they have a weapon that powerful," she said a bare moment before the Archangel targeted and destroyed four separate pod ships with their naval beam cannons. With four out of commission from the main missiles already launched to destroy the fighters, their total was sup to eight in less than a full minute of fighting. And most of the fighters.

"It is real, and they just used it," BC said darkly as more missiles were fired from the starboard side of the ship, these aimed at the pod ships directly. A second brace of naval beam cannon beams went downrange, again with four kills to join the capital anti-ship missiles that scratched five ships in two pairs.

"Captain, I count roughly a dozen cube fighters still active," Ezra said.

"Belvedere, send in our Dreads to finish the job with the fighters. They are to avoid fire lanes for the Archangel to finish up the enemy pod ships," BC ordered.

"Relaying commands now," Belvedere acknowledged.

A third beam cannon brace was fired, targeting the last three ships active before they could escape the gun range of the Archangel. Only after the last three ships were downed did the first of the Archangel's Mobile Forces leave their hangar — the Strike Freedom.

"Uh, Ezra, how fast was that?" BC asked.

"First shot to last shot, Commander?" the sensor operator asked.

"Yes."

"70 seconds, Commander," Ezra said.

"They just sunk more tonnage in slightly more than a minute, than our pirate group has captured in the past four years," BC admitted.

-x-

"All hail Kira, king of the assbeaters!" Tolle said with clear reverence.

"Worked just as I planned," Kira said. "They're simplistic, but there's room for improvement, hardening against ECM and improved warheads."

"Worry about that if the enemy grows a brain, Strike," Yzak said. "Hot damn! 40 squadrons of the drones eliminated in the first half-minute, and how many of these do you have?"

"Six more in the racks, ten being machined right now," Kira admitted. "I also have about 300 tons allocated to building spare parts for the machines, the ship, and building new striker packs for the Strike Freedom and 105 Dagger."

"Kira, Command, be advised that Captain Ramius sends congratulations on the stunning victory and wants to discuss expanding manufacturing when you are done with the salvage collection."

"They'll wise up soon enough," Commander Chevalier said. "We've won handily for today. Tomorrow is another story."

"I know," Kira admitted as he approached the first of many combat-disabled cube fighters. The tons of titanium, miles of cabling, dozens of actuators and servos, and the electronics package would be perfectly usable by the nanomachine hive when deconstructed into raw material and repurposed to other productions.

"Kira, after this, I owe you a drink," Mu La Flaga announced. "You may have just saved our lives in the long run."

-x-x-x-

(Day 10, 2200 hours shipboard time)
(Archangel, Hangar area)

"Come on, people!" Murdoch said in an attempt to motivate. "We ain't got all day!"

"Chief, got something different here!" Spazz reported from the number four salvage processing area.

"On my way," Murdoch acknowledged the call.

For all that the Archangel had a reputation for manhandling enemy forces in the past, there was no systematic plan in place for dealing with massive quantities of materials salvage and equipment disassembly. The salvaging of machines had thus far been a haphazard process, or at best something conducted by an outside party and the Archangel received the semi-processed take. Even in the best of victorious battles long past, the Archangel never had to worry about handling more than a few hundred tons of salvage at any given time.

Kira's Hydra Micromissile system had, in one salvo of four missiles, busted the records for available salvage and inducted salvage in one engagement. With each cube fighter weighing in at 5 tons, and some 466 of them recoverable in a mostly intact state, just that classification of recoverables alone well exceeded the total tonnage of Clan combat gear recovered by the Archangel during its time in the Inner Sphere. The amount of partially recoverable machines filled the rest of the free space and led to salvage being collected en masse and tied to the reardeck of the ship for later processing.

And with the massive influx of junked enemy machines, the mechanics had set up four processing lines to disassemble the scrapped machines for material and munitions. The Igelstellung guns around the ship needed rounds to work properly, and the rounds provided by the cube fighters were almost exactly what the doctor ordered, so…

Murdoch dodged his way around salvage piles over to Salvage Line 3 (commanded by Spazz). "Is this supposed to be some kind of limpet mine or something?" one of the junior mechanics asked.

"That's what it looks like," Spazz answered. "Boss, over here. I don't think this is standard hardware, but we've recovered four of them so far."

"What's on the menu, Bosun?" Murdoch asked.

"Check this, sir," Spazz lifted the end of one of the devices. "Low-impulse rocket engine, magnetic clamps, and an actual shaped-charge warhead. Looks like they intended to get up close and personal, fire these babies off en masse, then let the shaped charges do the talking when in contact with the hull."

"Okay, that's not very friendly," Murdoch said as he slid in next to one of the devices. "Have you taken one apart yet?"

"You kidding, sir? Do I look crazy enough to do EOD?" Spazz asked in counter.

"Okay, then call in Ryback's boys, they can do it," Murdoch rebuked his 3-I-C. The Galley Commandos were all trained in demolitions, and half of them were trained in EOD (Explosives Ordinance Disposal), meaning they had knowledge of how to disassemble bombs and munitions whenever encountered.

"Got it," Spazz bent to the ground to pick up his radio handset from their break table, a move that would save his life adroitly.

In Salvage Line 2, one of the mechanics got too close to a 76mm shell casing with an oxyacetylene cutting torch, and when the flame crossed the primer it cooked the round off in the feed line. Contrary to Hollywood mythos, the blast of a shell in that fashion is not catastrophic, nor was it akin to a grenade; for anything resembling a massive explosion, the entire magazine would have had to go up (as opposed to just one round). The welder suffered only a minor cut from brass spall and a serious case of browned pants, with nobody else in Line 2 taking injuries.

A seven-centimeter piece of shrapnel found its way across the hangar area to where Line 3 was stationed, and herein the decision to duck down for a radio spared Spazz — the shrapnel had transited airspace occupied by his carotid artery four seconds prior. Past Spazz, the next person at hazard was Murdoch, and the chief mechanic was not out of the line of transit: the low-velocity and ill-shaped shrapnel caught him in the back of the left arm and rotated around the outside of his arm in a classic 'buzzsaw' trajectory. It was enough to flay his arm open, but not fast or massive enough to cripple him.

"SON OF A BITCH!" Murdoch shouted after the pain from the hit registered.

"The Hell?" Spazz asked as he looked to Murdoch. "What the fuck happened?"

"Everyone alright?" a trembling voice asked on the radio.

Spazz picked up the radio. "Hell no! Murdoch's hit! Need a medkit to Line 3 immediately!"

"Medkit's on the way!" Gomer replied by radio immediately.

-x-

Trowa was on scene with the trauma kit inside of twenty seconds, as he had been in the tooling room where the medkits were stationed he simply grabbed one and began moving in that direction. He arrived just after Technician Rayeline Figaro (no known relation to the royal house of Figaro) used a razor knife to cut the sleeve and back of his shirt clear so they could see and treat the wound properly.

"How bad is it back there?" Murdoch asked as Spazz removed the last of his sleeve with a combat knife. Trowa took a few moments to open up the trauma kit for the other hangar staff to use the contents on Murdoch's arm.

"You need a back wax, for certain," 'Raye' said. "Cut's reasonably deep, surgeon should probably take a look at it. For sure, your left arm isn't doing a switch-hit tonight. How's it feel?" She asked plaintively.

"It hurts like hell," Murdoch said deadpan.

It hurts like hell, the words echoed in Trowa's mind as he seized up and he remembered seeing something explode — then a guy in a hospital bed, who said 'it hurts like hell' in the exact same fashion. In his shock of memory recollection, Trowa at least was smart enough to take a seat even if he did not yet realize he had lost most of his ability to conduct voluntary thought or action at the time.

"Oi! Coming through! Someone clear out, you're all bunched up!" Gomer said, escorting Fuu into the scene so she could do first aid by magic.

You're all bunched up! This time, he wasn't sure if he was seeing his mind's eye say that, or if someone else had said it in his presence, but he did briefly remember seeing some kind of streaks headed away from him, explosions, then he heard the phrase — it had to be him saying it?

"That is pretty rough," Fuu said as she used a gauze pad and isopropyl alcohol to rub away some of the blood around the cut.

"Can you do anything for it?" Murdoch asked.

"Not until the surgeon removes some of the metal fragments," Fuu said. "You have several large pieces of shrapnel still embedded in there."

Murdoch groaned. "Looks like for today my mission is over."

Mission is over, Trowa's mind echoed once, then twice, ten four times in a staggered offset that modulated from Murdoch's voice to his own. The last echo was someone shouting his name over a radio in a near-wail of anguish, at the same time as something nearby him exploded in his memories. In his wandering mental state, his eyes crossed the Vayeate Gundam against the back wall of the hangar, then crossed the next-door Gundam, the Strike Freedom. The eyes on the Gundam flashed green as he focused on the helmet of the machine, and with that one flicker of the eyes of a Gundam Trowa's subconscious cut loose.

Several other random images played in his mind, the sight of a lady with throwing knives, an orange-and-white Mobile Suit, another Gundam self-destructing followed by a man in a bed saying 'it hurts like hell', and the feeling of that lady with the knives punching him in the face played through his mind. In the space of ten seconds, his mind replayed years of memories from being a child soldier in a hardscrabble mercenary unit all the way to being the feared pilot of Gundam Heavyarms — and with the replay, he now knew what he had forgotten, what he was.

Our mission is over, he remembered himself saying to Quatre.
I'll warn you right now, it hurts like hell, he remembered Heero warning him about the use of self-destruct functionality in the Gundams.
Because you're all bunched up! He remembered shouting at two then-unidentified Gundams that were mixed in with Oz machines at the Victoria Base in Africa.

This time, Trowa didn't black out from the rush of memory processes. He remembered that the Archangel had indeed completed the mission the Gundams had set out to do, and now he was a part of that crew. While the Gundam Pilot's mission was indeed over, his personal quest was only beginning.

-x-x-x-

(Day 11, 0600 hours shipboard time)
(Pirate ship, Male Section junk storage deck)

CREE Diode lights made up for the utter lack of working lighting in the area. "Damn good thing we packed in the heavy lights," Murdoch said.

"Good call, chief," Miriallia admitted the logic of it. "This is it?"

"All yours," Jura said with a smile. Inwardly, she was glad that the operation was being commanded by Miriallia, as it reinforced the thought in her mind that the ladies were in command even on the Archangel (which they were, technically, but not at all levels in the ship). It also meant that the junk pile was not the responsibility of the Pirate crew as of when the Archangel Team accepted the offer: clear it all out, and anything of value may be retained by the Archangel Team.

As it happened, it was an offer that made more than one of Murdoch's Madmen salivate, and for different reasons.

"Okay, priority of effort, there is a cargo lift in the starboard corridor. I want it running or I want to know why," Murdoch said to his troops. "Voltage, you have lead on that one."

"I'll need two," he said. "Byrnes, Hardass, with me." Both named mechanics headed that way immediately.

"Second, I see pallet jacks and pallets in one of the storage rooms. Skid everything up and secure it expediently for transport. We'll sort it out on the backend," he said to the rest of the mechanic and ship's crew brought along.

"Everything, sir?"

"If it's not welded to the ship's structure, it goes," Murdoch said.

"Aye aye, chief," several of the mechanics saluted the orders.

Murdoch pulled out a pair of gloves from the back pocket on his pants. "Whelp, time to have some fun," he said while fitting and strapping down the mechanic's gloves.

Miriallia deliberately stayed behind with Jura, well out of the way to ensure they did not cause any major delays for the mechanic crew.

"Are they always so energetic about something so, well, mundane and menial as a job like this?" Jura asked after one of the lead mechanics began handing out pallets for the team to array in the corridors and begin loading.

"It's not the task," Miriallia said cheerily. "They are gearhounds. The stranger and more rare the gear, the more they like it. I heard one of the mechanics say that if they find a working betamax in here, they'll build a monument to BC for it."

"That…" Jura let her sentence trail off, not sure how much leeway she had with speaking to the Operations Commander for the Archangel Team. See seemed like she was on the level, but had zero contempt for the men in her crew?

After a fashion, it fit the pattern. Jura could not thus far remember any cross-gender contempt throughout the 'enemy' (she still sometimes thought of the Archangel as an enemy) ship and crew. She knew mentally it was an incorrect position, but her heart had not yet completely made the leap of faith to believe that the Archangel was an ally, nor had it completely accepted that men were on the level.

Which led to a question that Jura wanted to ask, but was stopped by some noise being made by one of the salvage crews. "Holy shit! It lives!" the guys at the cargo lift said.

"It's alive! IT'S ALIVE!" 'Voltage' said as he began riding the lift up, until it ground to a screeching halt after about a meter of travel. "Well, that sucks."

"Movement gears on this side are rusted as hell, boss," 'Hardass' reported after inspecting the bottom of the lift.

"Lithium Grease corrects a multitude of sins," Murdoch slid a grease gun across the floor to where Hardass was hanging under the lift. The mechanic stopped the grease gun before it slid into the elevator shaft, then made judicious use of it and some foul language while working on the bottom of the cargo lift.

Thirty seconds later, Hardass climbed out from under the elevator car and stood up. "Try it now!"

'Voltage' ran the lift back down to the bottom position, then began climbing again with it. This time, he didn't stop until he reached the hangar deck. "I think we got it, boss. Lift is open for business!" 'Voltage' reported by radio.

"Good, you're volunteered to take skids up to the shuttles," Murdoch informed him. "Now get down here and get on that jacker."

"I'll ride it like a borrowed mule," 'Voltage' said as the lift could be heard descending.

So, with activity returned to their baseline (Jura would not dare to call their actions any measure of 'normal'), she figured the present time was a decent time to ask a few questions of the Archangel CIC Commander.

"Have a question for you, if you're willing to answer?" the Dread Commander asked of the Operations Commander.

"Sure, hit me," Miriallia answered immediately.

"Can men and women have relationships?" Jura asked. "I mean, really, not just, well," she trailed her thought off, not sure how to phrase it in such a fashion that it would be understandable to Miriallia. For all she knew, the Archangel Team were like the men of Tarak, who didn't really have relationships, per se…

"Yes," Miriallia said. "A person can have a relationship with whomever they want, what matters is that the two want the relationship."

That response led to the inevitable question: "Are you really married to a man?"

Miriallia's answer was to hold up her left hand, and on it the wedding ring. "You probably saw the picture down by the hot springs, I guess?"

"I did," Jura admitted.

"We were married two contracts ago, the wedding was a gift courtesy of our contracting party for services rendered. It was kind of a surprise wedding, we'd been thinking about it for months but we jumped at it when offered a break," Mir explained casually. She knew that someone was bound to ask, and here was as likely a time as next.

Jura mentally shuddered at the thought, but something inside her was not reacting with the horror that she thought she should be feeling on the subject. That was more curious to her than anything else, the fact that she wasn't recoiling in horror from the subject, and that her subconscious wasn't fighting the subject, either.

That natural curiosity led to another question: "If Men and Women can have relationships, can they have children? I thought it took two women or two men to make a child," she pointed out how Tarak and Meijere did things.

Miriallia nodded her understanding of how things went. "We can have artificial methods of creating children, but I think I need to clear something up for you, Jura."

"Yes?" Jura replied automatically, both wanting to know the answer and silently dreading it just the same.

Miriallia took several good seconds to decide how to go forward with the explanation, to make it as graceful as possible. The tack in question came to her when she remembered the Clans' genetic programs. "There are societies that are built on genetic splicing to make children. Tarak does it. Meijere does it. We have personnel on our ship from the Clans of Kerensky, the Jade Falcon Elementals and Pytor, they were created artificially — in their case, they were even raised to term and born without a traditional mother, it was all done in the artificial gestation program, they don't have a traditional mother as you or I would understand. With me so far?"

"Yes, makes sense," Jura answered. It was also somewhat relieving to her on a subconscious level to know that someone on the ship was not far removed from Meijere society.

"Those societies are rare, Jura. Most societies, men and women coexist, and they don't use genetic splicing to create children. When the timing is right, a man gives the woman his genetic material through their, erm, special touch, and that creates the embryo of a new child, which can be either male or female."

"Wait, you're saying that a man can help a woman create both men and women?" Jura asked as a way to take her mind off the possible complexities of how exactly a man would give a woman some genetic material. She didn't realize that such societies didn't have to have the egg outside the woman's body to work on it, so...

"Yes," Miriallia said as she waved Jura toward the next row of storage cells.

Along the way to the next storage cell, Jura's foot found an object on the ground, though it was not massive enough to hurt. "What's this?" she asked as she picked it up.

"Looks like a recording tape?" Miriallia received the item and looked it over. The actual cassette was inside a protective sleeve, the one saving grace for the data contained within. "Says 'home movies'. Maybe home movies of someone on the ship?"

"Makes sense," Jura admitted. The hardware in question looked old.

"You want it? I'm not a home movie fan, myself."

Jura retained the tape she found by accident, a decision that would change the course of her mindset — and with it the course of her life.

-x-x-x-

(Day 11, 1000 hours shipboard time)
(Pirate ship, Captain's Quarters)

Magno had made her choice from the various suggestions for ship's name, and though there was something charming about Murdoch's suggestion for Nimitz, she had gone with Buson's choice of Nirvana. It was a graceful name, a serene name that reminded her of the past that she swore she would never forget, but as she grew older she found she could remember it less and less.

Nirvana, she thought forcefully, now more than prior convinced that it was the right name, not necessarily for a pirate ship but the right name for a ship that she saw as the proper way to create a serene state of being amongst the split parties. Achieving that harmony would take time and work, two things the coming trip had in spades, but it would be a difficult journey forward…

… Through a minefield that hd just suddenly cropped up in front of Dread Squad Leader Jura. "I have to ask this, Captain, could this information be deliberate misinformation by their CIC commander to instill chaos in our ranks?" BC asked.

"No, I can confirm that everything Miriallia said is true," Magno said before she sat Jura's report down on her desk. The report was transcribed by a speech-to-text device that BC had personally wiped after the report was written, and Jura had left the room with strict orders to investigate further but not to noise her findings around to the rest of the crew.

"You have run into other societies in years past, Captain?" BC asked. Magno was on her ninth pirate crew and ship, having been at the task of piracy for decades, and her exploits of the past were not common knowledge.

"I have firsthand knowledge of such a society," Magno said. "Our society."

"What?" BC asked, shocked that at one point Meijere was a 'two gender society'.

Magno sighed. "No history book you will ever read on Tarak or Meijere will tell you what I am about to, and for now what I am about to say does not leave this room. Clear?"

"Crystal clear, Captain," BC acknowledged the restriction. This was a classified meeting, and she would respect that.

Magno took her seat across from the Commander and picked up her small bowl of ice cream. "Tarak and Meijere are new worlds, only a little more than a hundred years old."

"I kind of guessed that was the case, after a hundred years there is dwindling historical records on Meijere, and after about a hundred and seven years, nothing," BC acknowledged what she had inadvertently stumbled upon.

"A hundred and seven is about right," Magno said. "Meijere was founded as a society separate from the Men when I was ten, when we arrived at Tarak the men were offloaded to that world, and the women were taken to Meijere to found separate societies," she semi-lied about the circumstances involved. The men and women had been left in their hibernation state and buried underground on each planet, with the population above created artificially.

"That was the log entry referring to 'sealed cargo' being relocated planetside?" BC asked, putting one detail to another.

"Yes," Magno again semi-lied to her subordinate. The 'sealed cargo' (hibernating colonists) were still sealed below the surface of Tarak, those that were not released to found the new societies.

"So, if we were supposed to be integrated, why go the separate ways?" BC asked, and in this her (his) natural curiosity on the reason was the driving factor of the question.

"I do not know," Magno admitted. "When I asked for an explanation from Lady Grandma, I was ruthlessly slapped down by her administration for daring to mention the fact in the new society. So, rather than try to fight my way through the courts, I swore I would beat the information out of her by force."

"And so began your career in piracy," BC wrapped up the enigma that was Magno's Pirates.

"That is where it started," Magno said, then reached into her robe and came out with a picture. "This is why it started," she handed the picture to BC across her coffee table.

"Who is — wait, you?" BC asked after she looked from the picture to Magno.

"I was nine when that picture was taken," Magno admitted. "I was one of the few who stayed awake for the whole trip from Earth to Tarak. The infant I am holding was born during the trip — we did not have a genetics lab set up on the Ikazuchi, so that much of Miriallia's tale is very much true."

BC nodded slowly, her (his) mind working overtime to try to figure out what gaps from Tarak history could corroborate this story, or more appropriately, try to figure out how exactly a man and a woman were supposed to have a child?

"Okay, so, this leaves several open threads," BC thought aloud. "First, why split the societies?"

"We need to spank that reason out of Lady Grandma," Magno said.

"Second, if we can coexist, should we try?" BC continued.

"I believe we should try," Magno said. "At the least, we can try it in small-scale on this ship."

"Nirvana," BC echoed. "When I recommended that name, I wasn't expecting this." She passed the picture back to Magno.

"You may not have anticipated this, but you may have just described our intention perfectly," Magno assured her subordinate. "Third, these attackers need to be found and dealt with, harshly."

"The Archangel agrees with that much," BC reported staunchly.

"Captain Ramius reminds me quite a bit of myself when I was her age, but with the added bonus of military background and not having to fight the men versus women conflict we face." Magno finished up her strawberry ice cream and set the small bowl down on the coffee table. "Maybe they can help us persuade Lady Grandma and Lord Grandpa to explain why they separated the societies?"

"Or, if it was not them, who did give those orders," BC pointed out a possibility that they did not know was accurate. They would understand the horror of that accuracy in due time.

---

Author's Chapter Afterword:

MERRY CHRISTMAS 2016! Splash in five, four three, two, one…

I took a year's hiatus from AAA writing because I was burnt out on writing this chronicle and almost completely burnt out on writing overall. I had to pull together to do some more specific and directed work that I was highly interested in to keep my pace even marginally up, mainly because I was starting to lose any motivation to write. That, and I had a lot of project work to do around the house, some of which is still ongoing.

That said, I am actually looking forward to resuming work on AAA in parallel to my other works. Of course, I need to finish up the work on my Sigma database that I have been poking bit by bit over the past year, and I want to move forward heavily on Sigma work because that story is so random it is far more entertaining (at least to me) than a lot of video games. And I would like to at least finish up JW and MMC in their current sets to free up some more focused time to work on stories — having a wide rotation is good for variety, bad for completing a work promptly.

So, onto the story! This chapter is kind of a bridge toward the series' main action points and away from the story's rather contrite plot toward something that's more dark and conspiratorial in terms of reasons to exist and reasons for the harvest. To me, the anime seems to have sugar-coated quite a bit of material, though not all of it; there were some good points in play, but the entire concept of the overarching conflict was damn near downplayed in places. Since the Archangel just happens to be a warship with a lot of personal happenings going on, and its primary purpose is to get home by way of stepping over the deceased remains of its foes, I don't think I will be downplaying or sugar-coating the actions of the local Terrans.

That said, I do realize that the bulk of the Vandread story and action is romantic comedy, and a lot of people are going to be looking for that. Well, now I have a new angle to throw in: rather than the Nirvana coming to grips with the issue on its own, now they have to come to grips with how the Archangel does things, and how they're supposed to do things, and oh, by the way, who knows if the crews might take a liking to each other? The dice have made some noise already, but there will be more — and deeper — checks to come in the future. Don't expect this to be a short set, I'm pretty sure I have material for at least 12 chapters more in this world. In all honesty, Vandread deserves the Archangel Treatment, there was a lot of juicy potential in Vandread that wasn't necessarily exploited properly by the writers.

The length of time in this world means that there will be a few babies born — both Ezra from Vandread, but others as well. They have over 300 days just to get to Tarak and Meijere, and if they're going to the home of the drone ships (Terra), the journey will be even longer. Who knows? Could be plenty of time for some more relationships to shake themselves out. The dice shall ruminate on this subject in short order.

On the writing front, now that most of my remodel work is done, I will be returning to a more normalized writing schedule, maybe as much as four hours writing a night if I don't have anything else going on. I am still taking weekends off, mainly to relieve stress and recharge, but with the possibility of upcoming business ventures I may end up dropping time for writing overall. Not sure yet how things will shake out, but I am keeping the skeer up as much as possible. FYI, my next chapter is going to be Jokers Wild 2-17, so expect that early in January.

NEXT UP: The bots step up their game against the Nirvana and Archangel, and in response the two teams step their assbeating up.

SCORECARD: Before publishing this chapter, 23 December 2016 2115 Eastern, I have:

46 Chapters
729 Reviews (Average of 15.85 reviews per chapter)
172,058 Reads (Average of 3740 reads per chapter)

12 C2 positions, 271 story favorites, and 221 story alerts.

Thank you all for the continued patronage of this story! Numbers like this is what motivates me to keep on!

---

Takeshi Yamato's Afterword: Another chapter done. Also, a bit of a notice from me, as well, people.

I'm about as interested in Sigma as Stravag is, if not more - and he and I also have a related story in the works. I'm hoping we can start it after finishing the current arc of either JW or MMC, and work on it alongside Sigma. The story would be to Sigma what JW is to MMC.

Look forward to that! :D

Author's note on Takeshi's note:

Takeshi has this thing about generating side stories of side stories of side stories, and that is not any manner of joke in this case. I'll admit that it is an interesting thing to experiment with oddball plotlines, but I have a lot on my plate at this time. Before then, I have to establish the baseline for Sigma (side story), then I have to establish the future build of Sigma involved in this plotline (side story of side story), then I have to set up the preconditions for the contract involved and at least a third of that plotline (side story of side story of side story), then we get to the part that I am presently writing out with Takeshi. If your head isn't spinning yet, you may want to check and make sure your pulse is still working.

That said, I may just write it out completely standalone and release it without the prerequisites, because it goes a very long way into looking into the dynamics of the primary job of the Wills Transcendent — management of life, death, and rebirth for the area of Existence he controls. Oh, and it also explores the concept of death and afterlife all the little idiosyncrasies involved for persons who are dead, and especially touches on some of the aspects of Valhalla and the Valkyrie. So there is that, and that goes way the hell different from what most people think of the afterlife, so...

I should also mention beforehand that this fourth-order sidestory also has a bit of a romantic bent to it, which may go a bit lemonish. I haven't gotten too far into the story planning yet, so that is not yet set in stone. One thing is for certain, what you thought you knew about the afterlife, ain't going to be what you read about in this story when I start moving it.

---

Review Replies: I have a total of 48 reviews since the 46 chapter was posted. HOLY SHIT HOUSTON! I like that level of feedback, plenty of motivation to get back into this work and plenty of ideas for new material. Keep it coming!

DS Gundam 00: Star Wars has been a repeat recommendation from more than a few readers, so it is entirely possible as an addition, but be wary: the weapons and defensive tech of Star Wars is FAR beyond Cosmic Era technology. It wouldn't take a huge amount of effort for an Imperial Star Destroyer to completely murk the Archangel, even in its present form, and with it an abrupt end of the story, no?

Infinite Freedom: You were not wrong about the micromissile system, four missiles scratched the contingents of twenty of the pod ships and four of the pods themselves.

The red crystal thing — Prismatic Ruby Lattice — is one of the few nonmagical defenses against psionics in the MMC / JW / AAA ethos, though the sheer amount needed to defend a large area is prohibitive in both acquisition and assembly — unless you have access to nanotechnology. I'll cover it in depth more when the installation occurs.

I have not yet exceeded the HP length, as Rowling has over a million words in her seven books, I have only about 740K so far. Once I am done, though, expect a helluva lot longer than Rowling's first seven. Thanks!

Avtar Angel: The FCS on the Archangel has been massively upgraded by the Paxis, so overloading is harder but not impossible. That said, the missiles themselves are super-smart and can be launched on 'Special Auto', meaning that the missiles prioritize targets immediately after launch, and will coordinate with each other to ensure an optimal attack pattern.

Thanks for the recommendations. Mass Effect and Robotech are both repeat requests. Thanks!

Deathzealot: Here's another Christmas Gift for ye!

You are right, the Lohengrins have not yet been fired in the presence of the Nirvana, so that is still to be revealed…

On your questions:
1. Yes, I have a couple possibles for that already.
2. Definitely, especially with the increased threat to the ships.
3. Maybe, depends on the dice. I don't really have any solid plans there, but up-gunning the Nirvana is also a possible.

It's taken a year, but here's the next chapter. Hope it meets spec!

Royal Twin Fangs: Have not yet considered METEOR units, and in all reality having those on the ship would complicate atmospheric operations to a degree. I'll have to consider this carefully, as the firepower would be handy but there are other considerations in play. Technically, it would be very easily doable…

Flawless Cowboy 2552: The shielding is known but has not been discussed yet. As to the Archangel having a FTL drive, Paxis Archangel is that interstellar drive now and the ship has it in use. Also note that with the ship's present size, it is now impossible to carry it on a JumpShip, should they return to a Battletech timeline, so...

Someone from the Pirate crews is likely to get caught up in some psionic echoes, just a question of when and who. I don't have any definite plans on it yet, so…

Keep in mind, combining units like that changes flexibility, it does not necessarily increase it. You are combining two units to make one with different capabilities, and sometimes two units are better than one advanced unit. Also, the transforming units apply to the units affected by the Paxis only, and the Paxis Archangel did not alter any of the Archangel's units in that fashion.

You are right about potential in Meia's unit, and even in the show the use of her unit is rather limited in scope. I think there needs to be a little better use of it, but how to go about it is still in question…

Thanks for the solid review, amigo!

Wing Zero 032: Trowa now has his memories back, I think next chapter he'll start working his way back into proper service. I also think he is going to do some serious training alongside Hibiki in the next chapter, so…

On your ideas of places to go, I have a long list of ideas, and every recommendation is added, so…

As to Cosmic-Era hijinks, I have more than a few planned. More than a few, and your idea of coexisting with the nominal Archangel is entirely possible in more than one scenario I have plans for. Thanks!

Wraith Five: Dita still hasn't completely come to grips with the consideration that Hibiki is not an alien, but that plot thread isn't completely strung out yet, so for a little while longer that shenanigans will continue. Shortly, though, the story will change.

Remember, Miriallia deliberately suppressed any loose chatting about the Vandread, and that to help prevent problems with gender integration. I think there will have to be a frank conversation or two on the subject in coming chapters, maybe more prevalent happenings to come…

Trowa is about ready to reintegrate into the ranks of pilots, so stay tuned on that note.

Here's another Christmas Present! Enjoy!

Reishin Amara: I took a year's hiatus for this story, but I intend to move it more in 2017. Stay tuned for further!

Sabakunoyokho: Another Christmas present for ye! Not much asskicking this chapter, but there is the promise of plenty more!

Guest (ANON Review): The Strike Freedom has data on a huge list of weapons from a multitude of timelines, including the UC timelines. When the true origin of the Strike Freedom LRRP-MP is revealed, the reason will become clear. Thanks for the question!

Arm514ve: Thanks for the accolades! And my apologies for taking a year to get to the next chapter, but I had to take a break from writing AAA because I was extremely close to burnout as of the last chapter.

Misty is going to be an interesting scenario, depending on A: whether or not the Archangel or Nirvana recovers her, and B: how well she adapts to the new environ.

Thanks for the recommendations, not sure if the next location is going to be a fantasy arrival or a one-shot. Stay tuned for further!

Hellhound D. O. W.: Any material or recommendations welcome as always! And thanks for the error trapping, I think I corrected at that time. Sorry for the massive delay on this chapter!

Extreme Ninja 09: Thank you for the recommendations! As to the greedy government of A0, keep in mind that such a request the Archangel is likely to tell them to get bent (or much worse), so that could be a serious conflict point, maybe even enough to turn it into a three-way scrap?

The dice have been fairly kind to the crews so far, but that can change. Stay tuned for further!

Forlorn 1818: advise you never ask me how weird I can make things, amigo. I'll find some way to really mindscrew things up as I go forward, and I'll enjoy it. Of course, the Dice help quite a bit in that effort, so...

WinBlades: Not sure if I answered your overarching programming question in PM last year, but my offhand recommendation would be using either Java or VBA through either LibreOffice Base (free, what I am working with right now for Sigma) or Microsoft Access (paid, and the standalone license isn't cheap). Yes, technically you can do what you intend in SQL and PHP, but a full-on SQL database for something of this nature is two levels of overkill above and beyond what you intend. There are various opinions on when exactly you need to use a separate DB handler, but for what you intend, I think you can get away with either Java (if you want to go that way) or LibreOffice up until about 40K records on a reasonably-powerful x64-architecture windows machine.

SQL databases require a whole administration backend in addition to the actual programming effort, which tends to make running the database on the same machine you intend to access it with the production program a bit of a dicey affair. In normal practice, it is considered bad form to co-host your backend (database) and frontend (program shell) on the same machine, but if you have a spare machine lying around that you can use as a rump SQL server, there are free SQLDB providers out there. I can't vouch for them from experience, I do very little with SQL in my day-to-day ops (most of my work is standalone programming), but I have seen them in action and the freebies work just about as well as M$oft's paid SQL products, and easily more than enough for what you intend.

Hope that answer helps!

Hellhound D. O. W. (Review Chapter 8): You have a point on a revisit tour of Cephiro, and with it comes some changing exigencies for the whole Pillar of Cephiro incident. That said, you are right and the challenge should be beefcaked a bit. Of course, I'm not sure how I will manage that, but I may be able to come up with something even more nefarious than just the storyline. After all, the Archangel right now could toast either of those rival ships, so…

Knives 91: Always a pleasure to have your reviews in my chapter lists. Thanks!

More weapon systems are not necessarily on the table right now, but upgrades are a possibility. I may be working on a plan or three for that concept. As of right now, though, the Archangel has the Micromissile Canisters, so that evens the odds a bit…

You can rest assured, though, I will be throwing shit at the ships en masse, so stand by for further :)

Sabaku No Yokho (Another review): The anti-beam depth charges are both positional (they only somewhat remain with the ship so long as it does not maneuver) and temporary (they lose effectiveness over time).

The reason the Strike Freedom MP has not transferred its entire database to the Archangel is storage limitations on the ship. The Paxis is an energy being, not necessarily a database, and the ship's mainframes aren't big enough for the data offload or powerful enough to do timely data searches.

Not sure about ABDC against GN-Particles. Need to study 00 a bit more before I can make that call.

Your suggestions are a bit unorthodox, but I'll think about them. Thanks!

Dragoon 725 (Another review for Chap 46): Oh, as I have said more than once in the afterword, I am upping the arsenal in more ways than one for both sides. Stand by for further!

As to Athrun, well, I'm not entirely sure what direction he is going to go yet, but as I have stated he will have to go somewhere sooner rather than later. Might be someone from Vandread, might be in the next series or three. Only the dice shall know for now, and they don't always tell me their intentions…

Bloody Wrecker: Oddly enough, at one point or another the complaints you have listed have all been echoed by other readers of this story, more than a few of those readers are still reading and reviewing. I have somewhat tried to clean those parts up, but one thing to keep in mind: I try to write a bit more realistic and scientific than canon in a lot of cases. It's just the way I operate.

I don't know about brainwashing, maybe your heart is hooked despite your brain rebelling against the deviations from the nonsensical stuff I have corrected? Or maybe you are secretly a closet technical jargon / techie fan and haven't yet come to grips with the concept? Hard to say, but I do know that my writing either hooks or completely turns off readers fairly quickly. Which I expect to a degree. I aim my writing more towards people who read along well with Tom Clancy and John Ringo.

On the matter of your suggestions, I can tell you right now that at least one of those is an expected destination for the Archangel. As to which one, can't say, no spoilers. Thanks!

Shin 5700: Now that you mention it, I can't really use that idea since someone else has. That said, I think I can come up with something a little more threatening than the cube drones, and make sure the Harvesters have some beefcaked arsenal. Stand by for further!

Dragoon 725 (Another Chapter 46 Review): Your analysis of Code Geass limitations is fairly solid, but your analysis forgets that the first and foremost asset a CG attack would deal with would be the Archangel herself. Warships don't exactly fight with CIWS or machine guns, or even mobile-army-level autocannons and machine guns because the armor belt on a Warship will simply shrug off or absorb such tender ministrations. On the flipside, the Archangel has almost a hundred individual point weapons (for use against Mobile Suits, fighters, or similar), and capital-scale weapons that could tear a Mobile Suit down to assorted spall and bad memories. A Knightmare Frame is not likely to carry a weapon capable of penetrating that level of armor or capable of out-ranging the Archangel's arsenal. Remember, he who lands the killshot first is typically the winner.

Ryuma 0085: Thank you for the amplification of points on Dragoon's review. On your final point, armor materials and thickness, if a simple crew-served machinegun can damage a Knightmare Frame, then the expectation is the KF probably has about as much armor as a M113 APC, likely an aluminum RHA (Rolled Homogenous Armor) panel just barely heavy enough to stop small arms fire and that is it. Any of the Archangel's point defense weapons would shred it a new asshole in seconds, never mind the effects of capital guns on such a light target.

Shin 5700: Now that Trowa is possibly back on the field in the next chapter or two, there is some breathing space for an armor overhaul. Your question falls into a trap that I see to varying degrees in all the Gundam series: no demonstration of time or actual effort required to execute a given maintenance task. Replacing one armor panel on a machine might take several hours to cut, fabricate, drill and tap, and finally secure in place. That's one thing that I have learned fairly well in the aerospace industry, any manner of maintenance on complex multimillion dollar craft that exceeds filling the gas tanks and changing the toilet water is neither easy nor fast.

I didn't specifically explain why Nicol took damage, but in this case it wasn't cannon fire but a debris impact from a destroyed enemy machine that knocked out his leg. Armor is all well and good for stopping penetration trauma, but not all equipment can survive impact trauma.

Thanks for the reviews!

NHO: I think Space Battleship Yamato has been mentioned once or twice, so I may have to look into that. Thanks!

Massacrer: I need to watch Iron-Blooded Orphans first, but it is possible. Thanks!

Redemption Warrior: Flay's actions were entirely the result of the dice deciding that she went apeshit when she realized that there was no easy way home for her. A good, sudden change of circumstances has caused people to hit the deep end with impact trauma, so…

Armored Core is possible, but also a bit limited in circumstances. The arsenal on the ACs is not massively impressive compared to AAA Mobile Units. I will need to think a bit about this.

Redemption Warrior (Chapter 13 Review): You are right, the dice determined Flay's actions. She cleans up and improves in Dilemma of Flay Allster, after she realizes what she did wrong and how to fix it.

Ryuma 0085: Copy all, I may be looking into the series sometime in the near future.

SabakuNoYokho: Robotech / Macross are both very strong possibles. Stay tuned for further!

K Phoenix: Here's the rematch, and the margin is razor thin in this case.

On Jura, well, things may start leaning in that direction shortly. The exact direction she goes, not so sure as of yet. The dice may have to choose.

The Harvesters are going to be a more major threat this time around. I've got a few ideas to come. I think you'll like it.

Paiway has made some noise in this chapter, and she will make quite a bit more before she realizes where she's going wrong. Stay tuned for further!

Deathzealot (Chapter 45 Review): I am still having a bit of fun with the rank structures, I think I need to do a master list of personnel ranks and names, to make sure I have everything logged. As to the confusion about machines, I do need to be a bit more clear on that note.

Sorry about the deploy delay, I was burned out on AAA and had to switch to writing something else — or stop writing altogether. I think I'm back in action now, so expect more chapters to come! That said, I'll have to work with the point weapons grid in coming chapters, increase the firepower.

There have been no other transfers between Gaia and the Archangel, but the next one will make some serious noise. As to another ship / possibly a counter-travelling ship, well, not so sure about that yet. There are possibilities, of course…

Thanks for staying with this story, amigo! I have not surrendered yet!

UDL LORD: Your recommendation of Valvrave may be the first, I'm not recognizing the name. I might have to look into this. Thanks!

Sabaku no Yokho (Another review): Like I said, I was burned out on Archangel's Amazing Adventures and almost completely burned out on writing, I had to change gears or risk simply going on full hiatus.

As to Gundam series, keep in mind that there are more than a few destinations I may be going to, so stand by for further. Hope this chapter is up to your expectations!

DM Busta (two reviews): Yours is a solid list of recommends, I think I need to look into a few of those! Thanks for the hits!

Siegfried Knighthawk: You know, Final Fantasy VIII is a personal favorite, and I think it would be an interesting reaction to see what a titular Merc Unit (SeeD) has to say about seeing a real merc unit (Archangel Team) in action. Oh, and time-compressing sorceress? Say hello to the Rune Gods and Magic Knights, neither of which would appreciate having their reality compressed like that…

SVN Bad 2: Thanks for the errata checks, I'm going to need to go back through and correct those eventually. Which will be a challenge, given that my present writing effort may not have full access to the source...

Dragoon 725 (I've lost count how many reviews this is): Strike Freedom and the Gundam Engineers are going to get some Mad Scientist on here in the next chapter or two, mainly due to the increasing threat of the Harvest fleets. On that note, you can expect some serious shit, because I will have plenty to deploy.

Stealth forces are a big thing, actually, and I need to reintroduce Mirage Colloid to the battlefield for just exactly that reason. Thanks for the reminder!

Bleach 5700: Good call on the update recommendations. The engineering side of this will be a bit of a challenge for the crew, so I'll have to roll some dice on the matter before anything happens. Stay tuned for further!

Thor 213: I have some possibles lined up for Gundam hijinks, and even more possible Gundam SEED one-shots before they get home. Standby for further, this story is back in action!

Bleach 5700 (Review Chap 1): The Gunbarrels have limited effectiveness in atmosphere, mostly as extra railguns, and the arsenal of Striker Packs on the ship is a bit thin given the damage the ship has taken. That said, the nanomachine factory may need to rectify some of these material deficiencies in coming chapters…

SYN Bad 2 (Another review): Stargate has been requested more than once, so...

Requiem Cross: Thanks for reading all the way through! Every now and again, I get someone who mentions they read the entire thing, and given the story length is just over 720K words, that's a helluva lot of reading! My apologies on the chapter that took a year to finally eke out, I just have been bordering on burnout for this story so I took a year hiatus to get back in battery with my other writing.

Sabaku No Yokho (Repeat reviewer): Okay, this review harkens back to some of the crazy reviews I have had in the past, and after 729 reviews, that can add up to a shit-ton of insanity. I salute you with this new chapter, good sir!

Sabaku No Yokho (Here we go again…): Ulysse 31? Lolwut?

Finnzo: Magic Knight Rayearth was a show I actually picked up from an AMV (Anime Music Video) done to some 90s easy listening song that the song really didn't impress me, but the combination song and video had me hooked. So I went there, and it was surprisingly worth watching at least once. Then came the plot bunny, how would throwing the Archangel into MKR change things up? And 760K words later, boy howdy!

As to new chapters, I hit a nadir and lost motivation to do AAA, but that funk is now over. I am going to do at least a chapter every third that I produce. Stay tuned for further!

Dragoon 725: Well holy crap, wasn't expecting a mention of my other fics here in a review. Thanks!

On the matter of the 'Glory of the Losers' timeline, that is not considered canon to my stories. That said, there is a HELLUVA LOT of room for improvement with the Heavyarms, and Strike Freedom will definitely trot out some interesting suggestions to that note for the Gundam Scientists to pick and choose. Thanks!

THANK YOU ALL FOR THE REVIEWS! The more, the merrier! And now that I am back in service, I will be replying to reviews both immediately and in Chapter Afterwords! Keep those ideas coming!

---

The Gripe Sheet:

A few errors were caught and corrected. For the bulk of the fix, though, credit is due to Takeshi Yamato, Sieben Nightwing, and Necroblade for keeping my prose straight.

---

Footnotes: No footnotes for this chapter.