Chaotic Space

by Vimesenthusiast

Ranma learned on his 'grandma's' knee to look to the stars, and dreamed of going to space when they watched an alien ship crash land on Earth. Now years later after various plans have come to fruition he gets his chance. But is space and the space navy ready for Ranma? Pairing Ranma/Kasumi/Lisa/Miriya

29. Building up and Counting Down

I don't own Robotech or Ranma.

Some reviews I'd like to mention:

rdde: While you are correct that in a way the battle was a failure as an ambush, given the ill luck of the flagship appearing where it did in relation to the space fortress it could have been nothing else. The Space fortress doesn't turn very well in siege mode, I've always pictured it as a bit of a lumbering brute in that more really. So if they didn't kill the flagship with their first blast, and if it was far enough back in the formation relative to the space fortress and it's people, then Retsuc would have time to react, which is what happened. The longer the battle began, the more spread out the ships of his fleet, and the less effective the siege cannon was. I went back to make some changes to make this aspect clearer and other reasons will be detailed below. The comment about the BFS was also spot on, and I went back and changed that too. Oh, and Ranma's a little arrogant really, if you aren't at his level of devotion to the art, he doesn't consider you a real martial artist.

JohnC25: I will be continuing this story into the future dealing with the masters and the Invid, but that will take time and research to do, so at present the story will end by the end of January at most and will just cover the initial war against Dolza.

Wolfman-053: Thanks for spotting that. Yes, he's based off the character from the Belisarius novels as well as from history. Don't know if the general himself will make an appearance, and Valentenian and Anastasius won't. This story already has two characters as it's death and destruction thank you.

Narsil: Yeah, the near miss thing has been corrected, you're not the only one who spotted it. Again yes Rana Sanga was taken from the Belisarius series, and yes he may be Shampoos love interest, though going forward I won't have any time to devote to it 'on screen' as it were. Same with Motoko's reaction so far, though you will see a bit of that in this chapter second hand.

Cj-cold: Thank you for the great review. In terms of the salvage, not really necessary going forward, as you'll see in this chapter. The references to Jupiter and the change in name was a mistake, thanks for spotting it.

Chapter 28 Building up and counting down

The aftermath of a battle is always hard, yet this one in comparison to many is relatively painless, Lisa mused to herself. Despite the length of the battle they hadn't even come close to the casualties sustained in the last battle against Kyron's forces. The Macross had taken several hits, and was once more down to twenty mobile barriers, but none of the hits had taken out anything important. One from a Quiltra-Quelamitz gun boat had cored straight through the Daedalus, but casualties had been relatively light, and Kim's teams had moved in quickly.

Really the fight had only lasted so long because of bad luck, the size and three dimensional aspect of space combat, and the fact the enemies flagship was the same class as a little over half of his fleet. Azonia ran her fleet from a Queadol-Magdomilla, a class of battleship the humans had been told was often used as a flagship of the skirmish fleets, but not always. In this case the enemy admiral had flown his colors on a Thurvel-Salan, alike in appearance as any other, making targeting it extremely difficult with the systems on the Macross.

On top of this, they had been struck by bad luck because the flagship hadn't folded out on the same plain or even close to the space fortress. If it had, targeting it in particular wouldn't have been an issue, it would have died with the ships around it. But this lucky chance had allowed the fleet admiral enough time to flush his Regulds and move away even further. The Zentraedi also immediately responded to the danger the siege gun represented, moving out of its plane of fire and doing the best they could to keep away from it. Lisa wouldn't be surprised if, when going over the battle afterward, they found that the siege gun did more damage to the Reguld swarms than to the enemy's capital ships after their initial blast. 10,000 ships just didn't die quickly unfortunately, and the space fortress had done a good job to kill the 362 ships it had before Ranma had destroyed the 7th's flagship.

After that it was only because he kept sending out orders that they knew which ship was the flagship at all. Even then the ship had kept moving, making it an impossible target by moving to positions where the guns on the space fortress couldn't come to bear. That left the task of killing the admiral to the spacefighters, a task they did eventually, but not without having to go through quite a bit of the enemy fleet to do it.

The casualties among the destroids, Valkyrie pilots, and allied Meltraedi had been extremely light considering the size of the enemies though. The Meltraedi had only lost about two hundred of their troops, not even a drop in the bucket to Azonia's forces as a whole, or even a large percentage of their forces involved in the battle. They would have lost more if Lisa hadn't kept firm control of them and rotated them in and out of the outer edge of the battle for some respite, and the Meltraedi knew it and were grateful for it.

The destroid operators had lost ten operator teams, three Spartans, 2 Tomahawks, and five Defenders. Again it had been proven that if the Regulds could close the distance, Defenders were overmatched. Mannstein however had pushed his reserves in at opportune moments to keep such occurrences to a minimum. The Spartans had paid for it, and besides the three lost entirely, over three dozen machines were in need of repairs, and seventeen would have to be scrapped entirely.

Sixty-two Valkyries had been shot down but only lost fifteen pilots were confirmed killed so far, thanks to the armor strengthening technique around their cockpits. Lisa was even now directing the SAR efforts to bring in the other pilots, and wouldn't quit until they found all of them.

It would have been far more if not for the GPB-1S's firepower. Every squadron had three of them, and their range, firepower and ability to hit more than one target at once had proven extremely effective. That and the fact the enemy had to deal with the attackers right in their faces from the beginning of the battle had made this battle much easier than the last few engagements, though there was also the fact the veterans had earned their wings against the Queadluun Rau. The Regulds were ridiculously easy in comparison.

This was in part a sign of the deterioration of experience and skill from the constant losses the Zentraedi accepted as part of their normal mode of warfare. It was a very rare Reguld pilot that survived a full campaign, and only a scant handful survived longer than that. On top of this attrition, none of the survivors ever thought about passing on their skills to their less experienced fellows.

Really the losses were only so high because most of the pilots they had gotten from Earth just hadn't had the physical and mental endurance to last, and exhaustion had taken its toll. That, however, Lisa and the admiral could leave to Roy Fokker (whose return to combat had been greeted by cheers from his men and Rick especially, who stepped down from his position as Skull 1) and Ranma.

Lisa shook her head in amusement, watching Wildfire returning to base, last in as they had been the first out, the sight reminding her of Miriya and Ranma's little competition. She was interested in who won their bet, but in the end it didn't matter. Where the glowing blue-gold Valkyrie and the purple painted Queadluun Rau went they sowed fear and death in their wake, which Wildfire and Miriya's own unit had capitalized on.

Beyond that, the battle had been won by the Queadluun Rau and the Sabers, and she was even now thinking of a tactical doctrine to take advantage of the Sabers and the technology that made them possible.

The Sabers had their trial by fire, and though they had lost more than half of them the Sabers had accounted for far more capital ship kills than the guns of the Macross. That might not have been the case if the enemy had bunched up or had Regulds already out to stop the Sabers from getting close without paying for it, but it had.

And the Queadluun Rau powersuits were simply scary good against the Regulds. They were more durable even now than a Valkyrie, more maneuverable and had more firepower than anything but a GPB-1S Armored Type. Against what could only be called inexperienced pilots, they were like Velicoraptors among sheep.

All in all we did damn well, and I hope to hell we've bought humanity enough time to capitalize on it. She looked over when she noticed a familiar purple powersuit making its way toward the space fortress from one of the Meltraedi carriers. "Miriya, this is command 1, requesting reason for your visit." Her tone was playful, almost welcoming, but her words were delivered crisply. After all there were regulations to follow.

Miriya responded, her voice and lack of address showing that despite their military only lifestyle the Meltraedi lacked something in the way of organization. They didn't have any com protocols or regulations after all. Or perhaps, came the errant thought, they never faced an enemy that could hack their communications and never developed anything to counter it like call signs and signal discipline.

"This is Miriya Lisa, I'm coming aboard to talk to Ranma about how we should figure out how to see who won our bet."

Lisa shook her head. "I might have known. Wildfire is heading toward Hanger Four on the aft side, follow them in okay?"

Miriya responded in the affirmative and Lisa signed off, looking over her board and going back to directing the SAR teams in their work.

OOOOOOO

Ranma had planned to go over to see what Miriya wanted as well as the two power suits that had followed her in as soon as the air re-pressurized enough in the hanger for him to exit his cockpit. This plan was put on hold when he was intercepted by several of the other vets from other squads shouting, "come on Ranma we want a song! We want a song!"

The rest of them picked it up, even the Amazons shouting "Sing, Sing, Sing!"

Ranma growled a little but shouted back. "All right you lot! But if I'm going to sing for you, I'm going to go get someone first. I'll be right back." With that he sped off moving faster than normal, still a little high from the battle. The battle had been so short, well to him and the other vets, that he still had a lot more energy to space than usual.

He sped through the space fortress, bouncing off walls and speeding up with every second, heading straight to where he knew Kasumi would be waiting, by the elevator up to the command spire. She had taken to be there after a battle, because it would allow her to either go up to see Lisa or wait there for Ranma in the most opportune section, whoever she felt was necessary. How she could tell which was which he didn't know, but she did. It had begun back when the fleet broke out of Jupiter's gravity well.

He found her there now, leaning against a wall and seemingly working on something on her data-pad, though her eyes constantly left the screen to look around her.

Ranma skidded to a halt in the open area around the elevator, his shoes making a noise audible over the background hum of the ship on the metal underneath them.

Kasumi looked up, a wide happy smile on her face and Ranma once more felt his heart do a flip. No matter what all else happened, no matter what else they did together, Kasumi's smile always brought out powerful feelings in him. He loved Lisa, and even though he didn't really know it just yet he had come to care for Miriya as well, but there was just something about Kasumi's smile. Luckily he knew he wasn't the only one who felt that way, he'd seen how Lisa sometimes got a goofy little grin on her face when Kasumi smiled at her in the mornings, and even Miriya was not immune to its effects.

Ranma returned her grin, lifting her into the air and twirling her around before kissing her soundly on lips. Kasumi giggled a little, then pulled back and asked, "I take it the battle went well?"

Ranma grinned again, "The battle went very well, but the idiots want me to put on a bit of a show for 'em, and I figure if I'm going to have to put on a show I want someone in the audience who I actually want ta sing to."

So saying he flipped her around so that he was carrying her princess style turned and zoomed back the way he had come, her giggles ringing in her ears.

He returned to hanger three to find Miriya had gotten out of her power suit along with the other two and were talking to them as they looked around in incomprehension of the festivities around them, since even without Ranma there the pilots were still grinning and having fun partying after the battle. Ranma swore he saw someone with a bottle of something passing it around. It was obvious Miriya was trying to explain things to them whether or not she was having any luck Ranma couldn't tell. He raced up to the giantess then bounced off one of her power suits arms and up onto its hand still holding Kasumi.

He set her down and she tried to regain some of her dignity fluffing out her hair and trying to straighten out her clothing. She turned to look up an Miriya who was smiling down at her. "Hello Miriya, I hope the battle went well for you as well?"

"Indeed," said Miriya quite a bit louder than normal, but given her size that wasn't exactly a surprise. "It went very well. I'm simply here to see how Ranma and I are going to figure out who did the best in the battle." She went on a little more hesitantly, leaning down as if she was going to try and whisper. "And afterwards, if I could talk to you for a moment I have some questions about human culture."

Kasumi looked up at the giant woman before her and smiled which cause a smile to bloom on Miriya's face in turn. "Of course, I'm always willing to help my friends." Miriya smile widened further at that word and she nodded firmly.

By this time Ranma had changed into his female form. He reached down into his cockpit, and flicked on the music player. The sound coming out of the speakers was a little louder than normal which surprised him, but given all the other differences between his Valkyrie now and before he wasn't going to question it. As the song began she reached up and pulled out the tie in her ponytail, letting her vibrant red hair fall loose for once. She then shrugged off the outer fighter harness, letting it fall back into her Valkyrie's cockpit.

When that was done she strode forward onto the tip of her Valkyrie's fuselage, and began to sing, ignoring the gapes and grins of those around her. Unlike most of her songs, this one wasn't one that could only be connected to battle however, and Shampoo, standing in the audience alongside Motoko, began to giggle as she listened.

"I'm on the train that's pullin' the sick and twisted, making the most of the ride before we get arrested, we're all wasted and, we're not going home tonight! Covered in black we lack the social graces, just like an animal we crawl out of our cages, they can't tame us, so if you're one of us, get on the bus!"

Ranma flipped off the nose of her Valkyrie, her hair rippling in the air around her head as she did a full flip before landing easily on her feet, spinning around and twirling as she began the chorus. "If you're a freak like me, wave your flag If you're a freak like me, get off your ass! It's our time now, to let it all hang out. So shout if you're a freak like me, you were born to burn this ain't no disease, you don't need a cure! It's our time now, to come out! If you're a freak like me, if you're a freak like me!"

Ranma stopped her spinning and leaping coming to a stop right before Shampoo and Motoko, with Tiger and Lynx, the two blooded warriors who had stuck with Motoko throughout the battle standing behind them, their somewhat feral appearances belied by the wide grins on their faces. Shampoo simply stared, a wide bright grin on her face as she realized that Ranma was talking, singing about their curses, that whatever anyone else thought, and there had been many even in Nerima who called them that hateful word, it didn't matter, they were better for it.

Ranma turned away now toward the wider audience, leaping to land on the top of the nearest Valkyrie, looking back up at Miriya and the other Meltraedi, who were staring in wonder at seeing the well known singer 'Ranma' in the flesh. Beside them Kasumi clapped her hands in time with the music, her face showing her love and devotion to the singer.

"We're underground, but we will not surrender, we're gonna give 'em something to remember, yeah so write your name in gasoline, and set that shit on fire! If you're a freak like me, wave your flag, if you're a freak like me, get off your ass! It's our time now, to let it all hang out. So shout if you're a freak like me, don't apologize, they can't hold you down, you were born to rise! It's our time now, to come out…."

OOOOOOO

Marcus looked up from where he was slumped in a chair in the ready room his Knight Squadron had been assigned. The moment he had arrived back at hangar three he had almost collapsed when the adrenaline left his body, having barely enough energy to leave the hanger. There were so many things pilots who were born and trained in atmosphere about fighting in space couldn't really understand, and the strength of the G forces that hit you when maneuvering through a dogfight for hours on end was one of them. Even with the specially designed suits a pilot's body took a lot of punishment, And Marcus's entire body felt like it was a giant bruise. So he was not in the best frame of mind when Roy Fokker shook him awake. "What do you want?" he said, growling a little.

Roy however merely grinned at him. "Not enjoying your first taste of space combat? I can understand that. But there's something you need to see."

Marcus groaned but allowed Roy to pull him to his feet. Roy dragged him back to hanger two, where Skull and Knight had both landed.

Marcus looked up as the music began to blare through the speakers and looked over at Roy wondering what the heck was going on but Roy answered his question before he could voice it. "Every battle isn't just a battle, every battle we survive means we are still alive, not just as individuals but as part of this ship. It means we still exist and we want to celebrate it."

He waved his hand at the speakers above them, and this is one of the ways we do. "After this," he said, shouting to be heard as the pilots from Skull and Marcus's own Knights danced around them stomping their feet to the music. "I'm going to find my Claudia and I'm going to get laid. Affirmation of life makes us fight all the harder to keep it. I think as soldiers we sometimes forgot that before all this began, but when you know your entire race is literally facing extinction it sort of heightens the joy of living."

Marcus nodded thoughtfully, trying not to concentrate on the fact he didn't actually have a girlfriend, but there were many single females aboard. "And the bitter pill of this conversation? You wouldn't be talking to me about this if you didn't have something else you wanted to say."

Roy nodded. "You and all the other Earth trained pilots are going to be put through endurance training and physical endurance training like you have never believed. I'm going to probably sic Ranma on you, or maybe Motoko. She's actually bit more sadistic than he is. Within a week I want all of you up to speed and able to fight for as long as the rest of us can without break. Any fight against the numbers we're talking about will be long as hell, and we need all our forces able to fight as long as we need them to."

Marcus groaned again envisioning quite a lot of pain in his future. Roy however clapped him on the back and said "cheer up. I found that the endurance earned doing this kind of thing tends to translate over into other physical activities."

That put a much more thoughtful smile on Marcus his face, and Roy left wading him into the crowd.

OOOOOOO

Back in hangar four, Ranma had sung another song in female form before surprisingly heating up a cup of water and changing back to his male form. He then jumped to the top of the largest object in the hanger, which happened to be one of the Queadluun Rau whose operator had left it standing straight up.

Below him the crowd of pilots and maintenance people had begun to rustle and move, thinking the concert was over, but they stopped when Ranma began to talk, his voice carrying to every person there and the receivers carrying his voice to the other hanger bays and throughout the ship. "You know I ain't one to know much about history, I was always too busy doing stuff, learning the art and everything. But one thing I do know, humans have often gone around enslavin' one another, mostly stupid ass reasons but whatever. The point is that eventually, either the slaves threw off their chains or someone else helped them do it."

He had their attention now, and there were many nods and some scowls from the few holdovers who still hated the Meltraedi.

Ranma decided to drive this point home with as much subtlety as he showed practically everything outside of the martial arts. He pointed at the three giant women standing together. All three pilots had enjoyed the concert, even if the reasons behind it happening were beyond the two newcomers understanding. "Our new allies the Meltraedi fought us because they didn't know they were someone else's slaves, all they knew was war. Now, we have a chance to work with them, to free them from that. But to do it we'll have to fight harder, better than ever before, we'll have to rise and meet all the challenges, united to create a revolution!"

With his impromptu speech over, Ranma began to sing. In this form he couldn't really hold a tune in a bucket, but that was beside the point, because he wasn't just singing now, he was trying to convey a message, and he had found that in this form he had better control of pure ki. His eyes and hands lit up with golden light in accompaniment to the words. "All I see is shattered pieces, I can't keep it hidden like a secret. I can't look away, from all this pain in a world we made! Every day you need a bulletproof vest to save yourself from what you could never guess! Am I safe today? When I step outside in the wars we wage! Our future's here and now, here comes the countdown! Sound it off, this is the call! Rise and revolution! It's our time to change it all, Rise and revolution! Unite and fight, to make a better life! Everybody one for all, sound off, this is the call, tonight, we rise!"

At this point everyone was stamping their feet, and they watched Ranma jump down to his valkryie, his whole body aglow with power now, causing shock and awe among most of the watchers. "Like a hand grenade, thrown in a hurricane, spinning in chaos, trying to escape the flame. Yesterday is gone, faster than the blast of a car bomb! And when the scars heal, the pain passes, as hope burns, we rise from the ashes! Darkness fades away, and a light shines on a brave new day!"

At this point Ranma's power was moving throughout his entire body and into his Valkyrie under him, which also began to glow with gold light shot with blue. It was when he unconsciously synced his own power with that of the ship in general, not that anyone could tell at the moment, that odd things began to happen. Deep in the bowels of the ship, in a room sealed and hidden away, something began to react, pouring out its own power in response to the surge around it as Ranma continued to sing. "Our future's here and now, here comes the countdown! Sound it off, this is the call, rise and revolution! It's our time to change it all, rise and revolution! Unite and fight, to make a better life! Everybody one for all, sound off, this is the call! Tonight, we rise, tonight, we rise!"

On the bridge Sammy and Vanessa both started to pick up odd readings, but when they tried to isolate found they didn't have the correct sensors to do the job. Lisa simply shrugged and put it down to Ranma trying to add some special effects to his act.

In Dr. Lang's expanded lab one of his chief assistants gaped in astonishment as the signal he had been trying to track for several days suddenly became strong enough for him to localize.

OOOOOOO

While the celebrations aboard the Macross was going on Azonia had swiftly removed the two humans from her bridge, and had begun to prepare a message she would be sending to Dolza. When the odd energy readings began to pulse out of the Macross she had immediately jumped on it, ordering her sensors teams to start recording it to add to the data package they were preparing, thus adding some more realism to it. She had her communications officer call over to see what was going on, but having been told it was the ace pilot Ranma's doing shrugged it off as not being related to anything important.

While her sensor specialists worked with their human counterparts to create the false report Azonia had the majority of her fleet reform on the Night Dagger near the Macross. She left her scout ships, about 8,000 ships, scattered around the outer edge of this star system. They couldn't cover the whole system obviously, but she had previously put them in position to cover the straight run through fold space to Sol from Zentraedi controlled space. That had worked against the skirmish fleet and she hoped it would continue to be enough. She also left over a thousand ships in Earth orbit however to take on groups of human scientists that were going to study them. Another two thousand had also been slated to be taken apart for their metal, their crews removed and their fuel, such as it was, added to the stores of the rest of the fleet.

Moving together the rest of the fleet folded out in short, energy saving jumps towards a rendezvous point between the third and fourth planets accompanied by the Macross. There they would meet up with the rest of the human fleet, including the SDF-2, which would be finished its start up flight by then.

The ship had yet to be named, since the name alas would have to be approved by a committee back on Earth. Prescott however had already dubbed it the Argo, he felt it was a fitting name for a ship that had so much resting on it and its sister-ship.

The footage from the battle had been interesting in the extreme to those that on Earth, and plans for new ship types had already begun, replacing the current vessels under consideration. The missiles ships were still going forward, as were the carriers, but new types of Sabers were being designed all the time as scientists and weapons designers put their heads together trying to create a mix that would allow them the most punch for their buck. The numbers of ships, and more importantly the numbers of Regulds in a skirmish fleet had jarred loose many of the opinionated groups of the military who had thought that drones like this would be at best a sideshow. Now it looked as if it would be the only way for the humans to in any way come close to offsetting Zentraedi numbers.

One of the most promising new designs was a ship about half again the size of the Saber called the Catapult. Instead of being armed with a grazer, it was built around a large missile launcher housing several nuclear missiles (or would once they figured out how to build them without the public of the world going into a panic about it) that it could rapid fire and order to detonate like mines when it got close enough. It was thought that enough of them could wipe out a fleet's force of Regulds, and then the Sabers could go in to tear up the capital ships. The Sabers had proven to be very effective a capital ship destruction, maneuverable enough to avoid most of the antiair fire from capital ships, but not mobile enough to tangle with the battle pods.

The good news however was that the Sabers were relatively easy to create, and several hundred factories the world over had already been repurposed to that effect. Shields had also begun to come out in larger and larger quantities as the problems of their manufacturer were solved. The SDF-1 would actually be picking up over 4000 barrier shields, which it would distribute to its fleet and the Macross. The Macross had of course already begun to replace its lost barrier shields, and work had begun in the Argo to equal the number and types of factories on the SDF-1. Once that was done the two of them they would be able to refit, replace, and rearm a fleet several times the size of the fleet they had currently if given resources and time. Two other ship designs had already been discussed, but when the Meltraedi had agreed to join with the humans that plan had gone by the wayside, which was one reason why Admiral Prescott was journeying out to talk to Azonia and her command group in person.

OOOOOOO

Dr. Lang looked askance at his communicator, which was now beeping incessantly. Admittedly they were due back soon now that their initial survey of the Meltraedi flagship was over, but the fact that it had interrupted his musings on the reasoning behind the energy core of the Meltraedi ship was irritating. He looked over his shoulder at Cologne, who had also been looking at the power core since the battle ended, but unlike him, her expression was disgusted rather than baffled. She had said it was like running a whale on the energy that you could find in an elephant, not enough energy there to do the job properly. He had understood the point of course and had agreed, but that didn't mean he wasn't intrigued by what he saw, and some of what he didn't see.

Cologne chuckled at his expression. "You should probably answer it, they wouldn't be interrupting our survey of the ship if it wasn't important. Besides," she said thoughtfully looking around. "I don't know about you but I don't think we can learn anything more here. We should hand this over to that Drake fellow, the one with a nice ass."

"So didn't need that image in my head elder," said Emil, chuckling a little. On the Macross commander Drake, second-in-command of the intelligence division felt a shiver go down his spine and he whirled, his hands almost of their own accord reaching behind him to cover his ass before he stopped himself when he realized no one was there.

Despite the disturbing knowledge that the ancient crone in front of him still might have a libido he took her suggestion and opened up the communicator. "Yes this is Dr. Lang, what is it?"

"Sir this is Terry, I continued with the work you wanted me to do, trying to find that strange power source, well something happened, and the signal strengthened enough for me to get a read on its location. I'm not certain how easy it'll be to get there, but we know where it is on the ship now."

That grabbed both Cologne and Lang's attention. They stared at one another for a moment then nodded. Hunting down that power source was much more important in the long run. Nothing here needed their attention, they had already learned enough.

The engines of the Zentraedi ships were designed for durability and to last a long time, their fuel much like the unrefined hydrogen helium mix that the Robotech technology ran on outside of the SDF-1. But that was so far below what could be, what the refined power that the SDF-1 used, and what Lang could tell they were designed for.

If that strange vine plant, or the crystalline structure around it somehow refined that fuel into what it was used by the Macross then figuring out how to replicate the process was of incredible importance. For instance, if a single battery could perform as much as the large battery for the Valkyrie and the two smaller batteries needed to run the strengthening technique around the cockpit (and for some like Ranma and Motoko, or what was being called the martial artists special) then maybe they would be able to run the strengthening technique through the rest of the chassis. That didn't even consider what could be possible with the Meltraedi ships or power suits. The power suits were amazing examples of technology, but if you could up their output they would be even better. For instance the output of the lasers could be enhanced considerably, as could their speed in real space and possibly in fold space as well.

That plus introducing maintenance and suggesting that the crews be enlarged by at least half again were among the suggestions that the human teams were going to make to the Meltraedi.

The two looked at one another then nodded. "We'll be over as soon as possible, do not do anything, do not even search for it until we get there! I will be most disturbed if I get into the shuttle and find out Macross is no longer there because someone tried to cut into something they shouldn't and the ship exploded.

The young man on the other end of the line answered in the affirmative and signed off. A moment later, Cologne and the Emil were making their way back to their assigned team of Meltraedi, and from there to the hanger bay.

OOOOOOO

The day after the battle Lisa was pulled from overseeing the repairs by Vanessa, who drew her attention to 2 Queadluun Rau zooming from the Night Dagger, escorting some kind of craft that the humans hadn't seen before. Eyebrow raised he looked over at Claudia who shook her head, indicating that the approaching was unscheduled. One eyebrow rose but she shrugged and waved at her friend to call them.

Since it wasn't a combat situation she didn't have to deal with it, and she was busy coordinating the exterior repairs. The crewmen they had taken on were all veterans, but water trained vets, and much like the new Valkyrie pilots they had a lot to learn about being in space. She was not going to have these idiots break her zero accident record, not if she could prevent it.

Claudia nodded and turned back to her board. "Incoming Queadluun Rau flight, this is command 2, requesting reason for your approach?"

She wasn't surprised to hear Miriya's voice answer, though it sounded a little odd. The two of them had met a few times both before and after Miriya had come forward to officially approach Gloval with Azonia's proposal. She hadn't really had a clue to the fact the green-haired girl was an alien, simply thinking she was another Amazon, but it hadn't really mattered to her, though she was amused by the fact Lisa had kept it a secret, since it was so beyond the pale for the formerly by the books commander. "This is Miriya I'm to be part of an official, liaison? That is the term I believe. I and a few others will begin to live on the Macross full time. Most of us are volunteers to study how you organize your military; others are people who wish to learn the sciences, the first of many of those admittedly. A few others are here to learn about your fashions first hand. And the rest, well, um, I'm not certain what the word is. Do you have a word for people who just want to go and look at something?"

Claudia blinked, and then blinked again. "The word is tourist Miriya. Are you saying you have a group of tourists aboard?"

"If that is the word then yes that is what I mean. Several hundred tourists, and about fifty people who actually have real reasons to come aboard." Miriya's voice was desert dry as she said that and Claudia could hear a few rumbles of discontent in the background. "Oh and Athena wanted to come along too, she wants to meet a pilot of yours she fought when you were attempting to get back to Earth."

Claudia frowned as a shiver of concern went through her. "Did she say why?" Behind her Lisa continued to listen to the conversation with half an ear while directing the work teams, but something about that phrase seemed to have amused her if her quiet chuckle was anything to go by.

"No, but I would presume it is because she wants to compare notes with him, nothing dangerous I assume. She's not the type to be underhanded like that."

"Alright, well, head to hanger six. Um, I'll see if I can get a welcoming party of some sort together." After that Claudia cut the connection and turned to her friend. "All right, what the hell is so funny?"

Lisa chuckled and shook her head. "Oh nothing, just thinking you should probably be grateful the Meltraedi aren't Amazons and haven't been corrupted by them too much just yet." She then scowled. "Damn it team four, you have two workers still in the area of the welding Spartans, get them back, those welders can cut your suits much easier then they cut metal!" Even when talking to her friend she had kept her attention on her job.

Claudia waited until the team leader replied, then asked, "And why's that?"

Lisa didn't turn away from her screen most of her attention on her job, but she was still able to answer easily. "Oh they have this odd law called the kiss of marriage, about how they need to marry outsider males who beat them. Team seven you're clear to move panel 32 into place, remember this is space, you'll have to hold it in place carefully. Team six, that line is going to build up excess energy the moment you let it loose, remember to prepare for that." She then turned and looked at Claudia. "I'd suggest getting Nodoka involved, and maybe one of the business owners and someone from Lang's cabal of mad scientists. Oh, and an Amazon rep, call Cologne she might have an idea of who to send." Having said her piece Lisa turned back to her present job, determined to keep her no accidents record from being broken.

Claudia frowned, at her friend's joke at her expense but nodded and activated the internal communication gear.

OOOOOOO

In point of fact Cologne was free at present. Emil and the other doctors were trying to cobble together a portable sensor array that could track the odd energy point and lead them straight to it, but making it man portable was giving them trouble. So she, one of his assistants, Nodoka, Mousse, Ukyo (as business owners) and two representatives of the farming community were waiting just outside hanger six for their visitors.

The odd craft, a re-entry pod designed to protect Regulds against enemy fire as they were employed to a planet's surface landed in the hanger, soon came in for a soft landing, accompanied by two Queadluun Rau. One of them immediately turned around and left, but the other opened and Miriya and two others leapt down from its confines.

The Micronization process took quite a bit of energy, nearly as much as a full campaign for a battleship, but given the fact that two thousand ships had been turned into salvage, and the humans had begun to bring up batteries full of power from deep within Jupiter's atmosphere, the fleet had a bit of power to spare. Not enough, but enough for this.

Given the size disparity they had to work together to control the powersuit, but Miriya refused to leave it behind, and none of the others on this jaunt were going to argue with her. Even Athena, who was nominally the green haired girls superior by virtue of seniority, didn't want to make a fuss.

For one thing she was slightly in awe of Miriya's skill, which had had been getting steadily better since her first clash with Ranma. Her kill rate in the last battle had been simply unreal, even against Regulds. She and Ranma between them had killed the better part of 47,000 Regulds, most of them with nothing more than their fists and feet, and thirty-two capital ships.

For another, she wasn't going to make an issue of Miriya's strangeness as long as the younger girl didn't point out her own. Athena was here for one reason, she wanted to get to know the one who got away, the human with the skull motif on his machine who had lead the defense of the ship during her assault and did so well at it. Part of her wanted to simply compare notes with a human wing commander. The other part wasn't certain why she was so interested, just that she was.

Miriya led the way forward, smiling at seeing the elder and Nodoka waiting there. "Nodoka, Elder, how are you? I and my fellows are here, well some of us are here for work, the rest, odd as it might sound are here to simply look around."

Nodoka smiled in welcome, pulling the young girl into a hug which was returned, though it caused some exclamations of surprise among the Meltraedi behind her at the strange ritual. "Welcome back dear." She released Miriya and looked at the girls behind her. "First thing however will be to take you all to get some real clothes rather than those smocks. And I see some familiar faces among you."

Indeed beside Miriya who wore some clothing she had from her previous visits (mostly from Lisa, whose body type she most resembled, as well as the first stolen uniform she had grabbed from an untended laundry cart) the others were all dressed in drab scrap of clothing torn from old uniforms. While fashion was well known among the Meltraedi, in their normal form they simply lacked the finger dexterity to make anything suitable for a human sized person.

At the last part of what the older woman said two of the crowd of Meltraedi stepped forward. Lucretia and Anya sheepishly looked down at their feet, but they needn't have worried. Nodoka merely smiled happily at them. "It's lovely to see you again dears and I'm certain that there are others aboard who will feel the same. Motoko in particular was very put out when you disappeared, Lucretia," she said sternly.

Lucretia shuffled her feet, wondering how the human female could make her feel as if she was up in front of the captain for some disciplinary problem. But the thought of seeing Motoko for some reason sent a bit of a thrill down her spine, though she didn't know why. "Um, I'll go and look for her once we get some real clothing ma'am." Both of the spies had used their clothing from the spying trip to get some chocolate and other delicacies, though obviously as it was scaled for a human it hadn't been worth anywhere near as much as the other things they had brought back with them.

"Very good, now let's get you girls situated, and then I think a trip down to the intelligence section to pick up captain Drake and a few of the others there to show those of you who aren't here for a specific reason around."

The Meltraedi nodded as one obeying the voice of authority, while Nodoka swiftly took control and moved them out of the hanger.

OOOOOOO

Kasumi looked up from her current design project as someone knocked on the front door of the Sugita apartment. After setting her data-pad down she stood up and moved to the door opening it and smiling warmly seeing Miriya there. She reached out and enfolded the other girls in warm hug, which was quickly returned then she stepped back and out of the way, motioning Miriya inside. "Hello Miriya, I see you were miniaturized again. Are you looking for Ranma or are you going to be moving in with us again?"

"If that is alright I would like to room with you all again. "I'm here as a part of a sort of liaison group with the Macross. Lady Azonia doesn't make too big a deal out of it, but she much prefers to work with those of you who live on this ship rather than the ones on your home planet, though other than instinct I couldn't tell you why that is."

Miriya went on much more hesitantly as the two of them sat down on the large bean bag sofa. "I, I would also like to have that talk about human culture I mentioned the other day."

Kasumi nodded. "What exactly did you want to know?"

"I, one of the nights I slept here, I was awoken by strange sounds coming from your bedroom."

Kasumi began to blush, already seeing where this was going. Oh my, this is the second time Ranma and I have been spied on, any more and I may start to think I leave that door ajar on purpose.

Unaware of her friend's thoughts Miriya went on. "I investigated it and saw the three of you doing… something together. It resembled something a few of the other females found on the human internet, but… better somehow, I cannot explain it. With those images and video files I never had an inclination to look, but when I saw the three of you I could not look away. It also made me feel odd, both inside, and on certain areas of my body. I was wondering if you could explain it to me."

Kasumi was silent for a moment, holding up a finger to her mouth to indicate she was thinking, and Miriya obligingly stayed silent. She had known since Miriya started living with them that she may well end up joining the family fully, and she knew that the way she answered this question could postpone or hasten that time. Part of her was a little sad that she wouldn't get to know Miriya more than she already had before she joined them, but another part was more than happy to welcome her into the fold as it were. After a moment's thought that line of thought won out and she smiled gently. "Tell me my dear, how do you feel about Ranma?"

"What do I feel about him? I don't understand. He's a fine warrior, a decent person, a driven martial artist. What exactly are you asking?" Miriya cocked her head to one side in confusion, though to Kasumi it looked unbearably adorable.

"No my dear, what do you feel when you are near him here?" She reached out to lightly tap the other woman's chest right above her heart. "What does he make you feel?"

Miriya paused for a moment, looking down at her own chest before looking back up at Kasumi. "He, he makes me feel warm, like I have a reactor burning inside me sometimes. Other times he, he challenges me to be better than I am, and that too makes something in me react. I don't have the words for it, nor can I explain it well I suppose, I just enjoy being near him."

Kasumi nodded. "I think for someone coming from your background you did very well. That feeling Miriya is love." Kasumi leaned back contentedly. "You might want to get comfortable. This is going to be a little hard to explain."

OOOOOOO

Cologne and Dr. Lang made their way down into the superstructure of the Macross following the readings on a handheld device that Dr. Lang's assistants had cobbled together.

For about an hour they made their way along using a jeep, with traffic and people all around them. Then for another two hours they continued, their pace set by Dr. Lang's walking pace through the innards of the ship.

Now they were finally nearing the target location, but as they rounded a corner were surprised however to hear voices ahead of them, so far distant from the normal hustle and bustle of the space fortress.

The two of them followed the voices forward, and were surprised to find Ranma and Miriya along with several other Meltraedi and several Amazons including Tiger, Lynx and Shampoo as well as Kotatsu. Cologne recognized all the others as those that had become the most adept at space warfare, and she whistled in approval as she looked around at what was obviously a training area for learning midair combat and 3-d danger training.

Their arrival and Cologne's whistle brought a halt to the combat going on across the area, and as one the martial artists turned to them. "Hey doc," said Ranma waving as he leapt from one midair bar to down onto the floor easily, knees barely bending under the impact. "What're you doing here? Were you looking for me for something, er, I don't think I turned my communicator off again did I?"

Ranma had been enjoying this training session a lot. At first he had been a little ambivalent about Miriya's suggestion of telling other people about this place. However he couldn't argue with the fact that Motoko was certainly at a level now where she could get a lot out of training here so including her didn't bother him. The others which Miriya invited also seemed to be doing better as the day went on.

It had also been amusing to see Motoko and Lucretia around one another. The day before Lucretia had gone to apologize to Motoko, who had calmly invited the buxom blonde into her apartment (she had one in the ship area of the space fortress actually pretty close to where Ranma and his ladies lived) then calmly shut the door behind her. Then she not so calmly attacked Lucretia's lips with her own, pulling her ever deeper into the apartment despite her confusion, shock and wildly waving arms. After a few minutes thankfully Lucretia lost her hesitance and became a willing participant.

Today Motoko was walking around with a spring in her step and a glow about her while Lucretia was walking around slightly glassy-eyed, blushing whenever Motoko looked her way. To Ranma and the others in the know about what had happened it was extremely cute, and Ranma hoped for his little sister's sake that she hadn't scared Lucretia off.

Dr. Lang shook his head bemusedly. "No, actually I wasn't. We're hunting down an energy reading that is much like that vine in the main reactor. I don't know if you've heard of it."

Ranma shook his head. "I haven't heard anything about a vine or anything like that, what the heck was it doing there of all places?"

"You've had other things on your mind," replied Emil. "Suffice to say we think it is somehow acting as an amplifier, making the fuel of the power engine work several dozen times better than it would otherwise, so you can see how interested we are at finding another source. I believe that secondary source is beyond that wall over there," he said after consulting his scanner, pointing. He moved forward, paused then looked up. "About two stories up from here I think."

Lang gasped suddenly as Ranma picked him up and jumped up to land easily on a metal bar at the appropriate sticking out from the wall in question. "Here's good right?"

Lang shakily ran his scanner over the wall, trying unsuccessfully to ignore the snickers from the martial artists and the cackles from Cologne at his reaction. "Ye, yes, its right here, whatever the source of the odd energy readings is behind this wall." He looked around frowning thoughtfully. "Maybe there's some kind of switch or something."

Ranma shook his head. "I've been using this place on and off for over a year now and I've never seen anything like that."

Emil frowned a little. "We'll need to figure out some way of cutting into this wall then, only we'll need to know what's behind it first. We can't afford to cut into anything that we don't want to."

Cologne had jumped up to join them balancing easily on the bar with the tip of her walking stick. "If you give me the scanner, I'll do a walk around and see if I can find another entrance, while you radio back that you'll need some equipment."

Lang handed over the scanner and Ranma jumped down with him to the ground. Once he had firm ground underneath him again Emil immediately requisitioned Ranma and three of the other martial artists to head back to his lab. Once there they were to grab a few of his assistants and some equipment that he wrote down on his data-pad which he gave to Ranma.

This proved to be a good move because the martial artists were able to cover the same ground that had taken him three hours to cover in only 20 minutes.

They swiftly returned with the cutters and the rest of his equipment. Lang purposefully did not notice the grinning face on one of the Amazon warriors who had hurried his assistants along by the simple expedient of picking each of them and running along with one under each arm like a sack of rice.

Soon with the help of the martial artists the group of doctors had set up a small platform about two stories up the wall of the large chamber. Cologne had also returned by this point, not having found any other place where entrance would have been any easier. Lang used a portable sonar scanner to see what lay beyond the wall and used this information to make out a rectangle that wouldn't cut into anything beyond the wall. After that his assistants went to work with laser cutters.

Done helping for now, the martial artists now perched all around them on dozens of the variously sized bars. It was very odd for the group of scientists to have a peanut gallery, with bags of popcorn that they passed around included.

However about three minutes in the cutters ran into problems. Behind the initial section of the wall was another portion that was made out of far denser metal or something else that they couldn't cut. "It's no good Sir, that second layer, we can't get through it." One of the interns complained.

Cologne cackled a little. "In that case it's a good thing least we still have these young ones around isn't it?" She turned and looked at her tribeswomen and the other martial artists. "Tiger, Lynx come down here, Motoko you and Kotatsu too. You've learned how to use your ki to amplify the cutting edge of your sword correct?"

The young Hawaiian native nodded, jumping down to join Cologne and the scientists on the makeshift platform. "Yeah mom taught me that trick elder. Where do you want us to start?"

The other two middle-aged warriors took out their own weapons, a glaive for one, and a pole-axe for the other. Kotatsu too jumped forward to join the effort. He had learned the technique from his family, and his tanto blade now glowed white as he readied himself. Lang took charge again pointing out the places they were he wanted them to cut at each of the rectangle corners.

Above them Ranma pouted a little. She knew how to shatter things, break or pierce metal and stuff like that, but he didn't have any techniques to simply cut, not ones that he could control to this extent. His vacuum blades were uncontrolled after all.

The two interns looked on this contemptibly, wondering how the hell Lang could think these primitives with their ancient hand to hand weapons were going to perform better than their state of the art laser cutters. Their contempt soon turned to shock as the four warriors began to force their weapons along the edges of the rectangle to the sound of squealing metal.

After a moment they ran into the same problem the doctors had but they simply poured more of their ki into their blades and started to slowly cut into it. By the time they were done Tiger and Lynx were both exhausted, and Kotatsu was close to it. Motoko still looked as if she could continue, but even she was looking a little weary.

"I just thought of something," said Lang as they were about to finish cutting. "That slab might fall inward, and if it does it might hit something we don't want it to."

Ranma grinned, happy that he could help, and he and Miriya looked at one another and nodded. They jumped down and grabbed along the edges of the square that had been cut out of the wall nodding at the other martial artists. "We've got it."

The martial artists nodded back, and finished cutting, the last of their separate cutes meeting, whereupon Miriya and Ranma gripped and pulled the whole rectangle of reinforced hypercarbon and whatever the second layer was out. The scientists scrambled and ducked out of their way, while the martial artists jumped down or up to safe spots. A moment later the two ace pilots threw aside the hunk of metal and the space beyond was revealed.

On the other side of the entranceway, which obviously was intended as an entrance way since there was nothing actually blocking it, was what looked like a cross between a hydroponic garden and an incubation chamber.

Lang quickly counted down that there were 20 small incubators about the height of an adult human and four feet across running down each side of the large chamber, with little space between them. The incubators were circular in nature, connected by tubes that were feeding them something that kept the plants he could see inside through the crystal tops of the incubators alive.

Each plant seemed to have a flower that looked larger than his head, and Lang was struck by the fact it resembled a Rafflesia arnoldii, a flower found in the rainforests of Indonesia which his biologist friend Pierre had introduced him to when Emil had foolishly gone with him on one of his excrusions into the rainforests. Below this massive flower the plants seemed to have hundreds of vines moving gently in what he supposed was some kind of clear nutrient solution, along with several larger roots right below it.

At the far end was an even larger blooming flower, separated from the rest of the room by what Lang recognized even from here as another crystalline frame like the one that held the vine they had found in the generator. Below it were what looked like some kind of catcher system for something that the flower would let drop, but it was closed for now, and he wondered what the purpose behind it was.

Everything was lit be soft overhead lights, which came on as soon as Emil and the others crossed over the threshold of the room.

"All right doc," muttered Ranma looking around his eyes wide astonished and wary, "What is all this?

"I don't know," said Lang looking around him in astonishment. "I honestly have no idea, but I think it might very well be the proto-culture generator the Zentraedi want so badly."

Miriya and the other Meltraedi looked around interestedly, but the ace pilot shrugged. "We were never told what the proto-culture generator looked like, so your guess is as good as any Dr., but, but the power coming off these plants…" She shook her head in wonder.

Ranma and most of the other martial artists nodded agreement and Cologne looked as if she was having a stroke. She had become used to being around very high levels of power since coming aboard the Macross. Ranma for example radiated enough power to dwarf even Saffron these days despite his incredible control over his aura. Miriya too wasn't exactly a slough in that department, and the ship as a whole had a ki signature far larger than even that, though thankfully it was only visible in certain places. But this place, it was mind boggling. The power these plants were each giving off were higher than anything she had ever seen, and was very odd at the same time.

All living things had a bit of ki in them of course. She had seen plants before that had more life force to them than the norm, ancient trees and so on. Yet these plants, it was hard to put into words, but if she used sound as a metaphor they radiated energy on a different frequency, a higher note than was normal.

It reminded her of the power Ranma had radiated in his last fight with Miriya, which she had witnessed from the bridge of the space fortress. At the end of that battle Ranma had somehow reached out to what could only be called the ki of the universe as a whole, bringing it out in his Valkyrie for a short amount of time. These plants felt like just a step below that.

The scientists moved forward, not touching anything yet on Lang's orders (issued with many a dire threat and with the martial artists there grinning evilly) simply looking at everything and documenting it, murmuring in low voices to one another.

The martial artists retreated outside, but most of them stood on the platform looking in.

Cologne closed her eyes for a moment, letting her senses wander, trying to ignore the pulsing power coming from each of the plants, looking for the underneath, for the hidden. After a moment she opened her eyes and hopped past the scientists heading towards the plant at the far end.

One or two of the scientists tried to stop her, but Lang waved him aside and moved in her wake.

Right behind the huge blooming flower was a small alcove, hidden so neatly that even if you knew what to look for you could still miss it. And even then you have to have very small, dexterous hands to reach inside and pull out what looked like a highly advanced data-chip from its hiding place.

"Dr." Cologne said calmly, "I believe this is a message for us, a message left for whoever found this place."

"I am wondering how much this room resembles the Pandora's Box right now," said Lang looking around them and then down at the data chip in Cologne's gnarled hand. Already plans were speeding around in his mind, wondering what this room could entail, wondering what the properties of these strange plants were, wondering how they could help humanity survive. "I feel very much like someone is about to bang two pieces of uranium together to see what happens, but if it can help us…"

"Indeed," Cologne said dryly. "Any alternative is preferable to extinction." With that the two turned and began to direct the other scientists in their work.

OOOOOOO

It had been a very long day, and Ranma was looking forward to some quiet time with his little family. Miriya however, had other plans in mind. Her discussion with Kasumi had been most informative, and she now knew what she wanted Ranma's forfeit to be. She had won their little bet by a mere two Regulds, but a win was a win.

She had of course first cleared it with Lisa and Kasumi, and both of them had agreed to it. Lisa had more reservations than Kasumi, but in the end, she had noticed the growing attachment between the two aces just as Kasumi had. In the end she could not really find it in herself to turn Miriya away. She didn't care for Miriya as much as she had Kasumi when she first joined her and Ranma, but she knew that could come with time. She did put her foot down however, saying that sharing between three of them was the limit her pride as a woman would allow.

Ranma entered the apartment, and was surprised to see a meal waiting for him there but no Kasumi or Lisa. "Kasumi, Lisa, anyone home?"

Behind him Miriya entered, dealing a sudden case of nerves.

After a moment Ranma noticed a card by the meal, which told him to enjoy the food but that Kasumi was going to spend a girls only night with Minmei and that Lisa had been called back to the bridge for some reason. He frowned then shrugged. "Well I guess it's just us Miriya."

Miriya nodded, and the two sat down to eat. Ranma made small talk, not noticing how strangely tense Miriya was. The two talked about the martial arts, and Ranma described several exercises and meditation methods to learn the armor strengthening technique.

After they had washed up, Ranma decided to go take a shower, leaving Miriya in the main sitting room. After a moment she gathered her courage and began to strip.

Ranma looked up in shock as the door to the bathroom opened, and Miriya walked in stark naked. He blushed and turned away swiftly, staring at the far wall. "M-Miriya, what the hell are you doing!? I'm still in here!"

For some reason Ranma's response to her nude form gave Miriya courage. The sight of his muscular back, wet and glistening from the shower also began that warm feeling Kasumi had told her about deep inside her. "I've decided what I want to order you to do for our little bet Ranma."

"Wh-what! Is now really the time for that, you could wait for me to get out at least!" Ranma exclaimed.

"I, I order you to kiss me and hold me, kiss me like you mean it." Miriya replied, walking forward to join him in the shower.

Ranma's blush intensified at the idea of kissing Miriya, something he had found himself thinking of since she had moved in with them, no matter how much he tried to get rid of it. He blushed further, feeling Miriya's firm breasts pressing into his back and he closed his eyes, trying not to picture how good the green haired ace probably looked with the water from the shower making her skin wet, her hair plastered to her head… "B, but what about Kasumi and Lisa? I mean, you know I can't, I won't cheat on them like that."

"I cleared this with both of them," Miriya replied, her arms going around him and trying to turn him around to face her. "They were both fine with me joining you three." Though admittedly, Lisa did take far longer than Kasumi to convince, after all Kasumi was okay with it before Miriya even brought it up.

Ranma would have questioned her about how that agreement came about but Miriya had by this point turned him around, and her lips, wet from the showerhead above them, found his. After that, he was far too busy to have time to think.

Later that night as the two cuddled in post-coital bliss, Lisa and Kasumi entered and joined the two of them in bed, proving behind a doubt they were both fine with the new member of their little group.

OOOOOOO

Azonia straightened her uniform, immaculate as usual and nodded at Sonya who was standing alongside one of the communication devices. Her friend nodded, and the communication device opened, connecting her flagship to Dolza's fortress thousands of light years away.

"Lord," she said bowing her head deferentially. "An… event has occurred here."

Dolza frowned heavily. "The last time you contacted me, it was with news of the strange readings. I trust this is not more of the same." he said, his voice and tone menacing, sending a shiver down human Azonia spine. Despite knowing what she did about him or at least what they had guessed about him, the aura of fear his very image imposed on both Meltraedi and Zentraedi was still present.

"The skirmish fleet under Retsuc attempted to assault the space fortress, but lost more than half of its members to the siege cannon before it could disperse." She sent over several copies of doctored video recordings taken from ships in the skirmish fleet. "By which time, our ships detected more odd images, and then one larger than all the others." Here she showed an almost entirely fictional reading, showing the energy readings from the Macross during Ranma's impromptu concert occurring during the battle. "The energy wave somehow disabled the ships in the skirmish fleet and before we could come to their aid Retsuc and his flagship were gone, followed by the rest of his fleet."

Dolza stayed silent a moment, staring down at his own screen in his distant fortress as the short fight played out, his anger growing on his face.

Azonia went on, making her voice as hesitant as she could (which wasn't much admittedly). "Do you, do you wish me try and assault the space fortress, or continue to monitor it only?"

Dolza growled. "No," he said, using one hand to make a sharp gesture in the air, cutting her off. "Remain where you are at a distance, this news of the space fortress once more having some kind of strange emission worries of me, but Breetai is on his way and he will deal with it."

Azonia felt as if the universe had just dropped out from underneath her. "Lord Breetai?" she said, and never was she prouder of her self-control then when she realized her voice had come out even and unconcerned. "Lord Admiral Breetai has been sent again? What of his campaign against the Invid?"

"The war front is neither your concern, nor his any longer," Dolza said angrily. "The space fortress takes priority. He should be there in about another local week, once he is give him all the data you have collected on these odd readings coming the space fortress, he will handle it from now on."

"Of course my Lord," said Azonia bowing her head. With that the connection cut off and she turned to stare at her friend in dread who was looking at her in turn, her eyes shocked, indeed she could feel the shock and even a bit of fear going through the other Meltraedi on the bridge. Against any other main battle fleet admiral maybe humanity and the Meltraedi could win, but against Breetai, there was no chance.

OOOOOOO

Unfortunately for Miriya and the humans, they didn't realize how closely the Robotech masters were monitoring the situation. While distance didn't let them monitor it as much as they could, the triumvirate was easily able to view the footage sent to Dolza. More they were able to separate it, and find out what had been modified.

One of them slammed his fist down angrily on the desk between him and his fellows in a rare show of anger. "More than half of this data packet has been modified or outright created! The Meltraedi bitch is lying out of teeth, she must have had a hand in destroying that 7th skirmish fleet."

The second to speak was much calmer. "Wait, let us review the facts. The portion that was not fake was the fact the space fortress is still heading out of the system not using its fold drive. And the energy readings and the video of the golden glow emanating from it are both real, unless you think the Meltraedi have found some way to fool even our systems?"

That idea was met by derision from both his fellows, and the first calmed down visibly, but his anger was still apparent on his face. That unfortunately meant there likely was something wrong with Zor's proto-culture generator, which meant their search for alternative energies needed to continue, as well as their plans regarding the Zentraedi.

The third spoke next, shaking his head. "Could the contamination have spread so quickly? Are the Meltraedi working with the Micronians in this, or alone?"

"Does it matter?" The first retorted. "They are working against us and our commands. They must be destroyed."

The second cocked his head thoughtfully. "Yet this level of sophistication isn't something I would think a Meltraedi was capable of. That argues for them working with the Micronians. As for the spread of cultural contamination, it was only a matter of time before any Zentraedi force that came in contact with the humans felt its effect. The question is do they know of our presence? Have they wondered about why they don't have the same kind of culture?"

"Again, it doesn't matter," the first reposted again. "Their reasons don't matter, only the fact they must be destroyed before the contamination can spread."

"Any message to Breetai would not arrive before he did. Indeed, the Meltraedi might have a chance to speak to him before Dolza can warn him of their betrayal." Said the third thoughtfully, and this was unfortunately true. Even for the Robotech Masters communicating to a ship in fold space was impossible, even tracking a ship in fold was difficult. And Zentraedi fold-space hyperlinks were temperamental beasts, able to run on low power and work for millennia, but they paid for this by being very susceptible to being whited out by fold-out.

It would be about ten hours after they fleet folded out into Sol before their systems could react to a incoming connection. "Still, I think we need to prepare for the worst. We were going to order Breetai's death after this campaign anyway, and his fleet was in contact with the humans before this. I think we need to send another fleet after them to destroy both."

"The only fleet large enough to destroy Breetai's and the Meltraedi is Dolza's, and we can't send all of it, not without stripping the Zentraedi factory satellites of their defenses." The second one cautioned.

"Yes we can. Strip his fortress of half its fleet and several of the factory satellites of their defense fleets, while consolidating their charges under the remainder. All told that should equate to a little under a million ships. That will be more than enough to destroy Breetai and the Meltraedi, and leave the factory ships and Dolza protected sufficiently to prevent them from being destroyed on the off chance the Regis returns or the Invid can free up a fleet to attack them form the defense of their territories."

The campaign against the Invid had bogged down the moment it began, as the Robotech Masters had intended. Billions of Zentraedi were being fed into the furnace now, but they were slowly wining through. The losses would have been far less with Breetai in command, but then that wasn't the point. The masters wanted the Invid defeated, but they needed the Zentraedi to be broken doing it.

"That sounds fine to me," replied the third.

The voice of caution nodded as well, but added a caveat. "Perhaps we ourselves need to take certain precautions." The other two listened to his ideas, and nodded their approval and soon enough a certain signal went out.

OOOOOOO

The meeting aboard Azonia's flagship was grim, despite the obvious amusement taken by Azonia and her officers to see the tiny Micronians all sitting on top of the conference table, a makeshift table taken from the cafeteria and placed in an empty room near the bridge years ago for just such occasions.

"Was this Breetai the first admiral we faced?" Henri leaned back in the makeshift chair they had brought aboard. He, Prescott and his flagship Captain an American named William Bainbridge along with the captains of the two carriers that had been used in the previous battle, Lisa, Roy, and Ranma were all there. Ranma was there as the next senior Valkyrie pilot, though he really didn't want to be, since this looked boring as hell talking about things that didn't matter or other things that couldn't be changed.

Still, everyone there had personally seen or heard about his prowess in combat and he and Lisa had both met Breetai in person. Their knowledge of him, and more importantly possibly of Dolza, would be important to this discussion.

"Yes. He is the most dangerous and capable admiral our people can boast. It isn't even close" Azonia said despondently. "There have been rumors about Breetai being around for the first clash with the Invid, and I know he's been in every major campaign since I joined the Meltraedi fleet. Or ever since I woke up anyway."

That last was said a little bitterly since the knowledge, the certainty of her people's enslavement was still very fresh in her mind and those of her officers. The human doctors had shared the news that the Zentraedi and Meltraedi were now seeing the downside of repetitive cloning, and the effects of it had struck her and Sonya harder than anything. The knowledge that their whole race had possibly been created merely to be cannon fodder for someone else had appalled them; it made all their beliefs in their superiority, their faith in the rightness of the fleet as dust in the wind. More the doctors had found that the Meltraedi were as close to humans as they could be genetically, except for in the area of the brain. Mental acuity dipped sharply in every generation of clones. That study had taken far longer for Lang's friend back on earth to figure out, but the bottom line was damning to say the least.

"There must be some way we could take on Breetai?" Prescott asked. "Our Sabers proved incredibly deadly didn't they? A series of long distance attacks, paring down his defenses and aiming to take out his command structure perhaps?"

"It comes down to a numbers game," Sonya responded bleakly. "If you face a battle fleet commander who knows how to use his numbers and knows how to use tactics and strategy then you cannot win. With my fleet's help and similar strategies to enrage them into mistakes you could possibly win against a normal battle fleet Commander, though the losses would be horrendous. Against someone like Breetai, no chance. Breetai won't bunch up his ships enough for the siege canyons of your SDF models to do enough damage to turn the tide against a main fleet's numbers even when he isn't expecting trouble. You don't have enough of those Sabers of yours to make much of a difference, and after fighting alongside a force of Meltraedi I have no doubt that Breetai knows exactly how to blunt my own fleets effectiveness. A tactic such as you just described could be countered by either folding out right on top of you the moment you engage a portion of his fleet with several dozen Thurvel-Salan multi-purpose battleships or by simply keeping a large enough force of Regulds out to blunt any Saber assault. Those are just off the top of my head, Breetai could come up with more I have no doubt."

Prescott scowled a little, having forgotten about the mobility the fold drive allowed. He should have remembered since the missile ships and the carriers were made to make use of it, but he had forgotten the enemy would know how to use them too.

"So what're you saying?" asked Ranma angrily. That we just have to run for it, take the Macross and run?"

"That might actually work" said Prescott sadly. "If this Breetai has still been ordered take the SDF one intact then you're leaving the Sol system entirely could lead him on a wild goose chase away from Earth and the rest of humanity."

Ranma frowned. "I wasn't really serious but if ya think it could work…"

Lisa and Henri both stiffened at the suggestion. They well knew how the troops and more importantly (or more loudly) how the civilians would react to being sent out on a long-term mission as a lure.

"There might another way," Roberto Esquitore said thoughtfully. "As I understand it, Breetai is the key. If he dies, I have no idea what his command structure is like, but there is no way that he has a second-in-command could be as effective as he is correct? Take him out, and the equation changes."

"Easier said than done," said Azonia bleakly. "Nupetiet-Vergnitzs class command battleships are on a level of magnitude tougher and deadlier than any other ship in the Zentraedi fleet." She said this rather bitterly, since she by all rights should have been commanding her fleet from one, but the bias against the Meltraedi and their smaller numbers had allowed generations of Meltraedi to only serve on Queadol-Magdomilla class battleships like the Night Dagger.

"Still, we shouldn't jettison the idea entirely," said Gloval thoughtfully. "It could work. Make the battle occur somewhere of our choosing, somewhere where we can hide in siege mode and figure out where his ship is in the fleet, and then take it out as soon as it is in range. It couldn't survive a main done siege attack could it?"

Azonia shook her head. "The only ship I know of that might survive one of your siege guns blasts is Dolza's command craft and that's more like a large planetoid rather than any kind of ship."

Ranma frowned, a thought niggling at the back of his mind about that but he couldn't quite bring it to mind just yet.

"And what will your people do if we fail in that?" Prescott asked looking up (and Up, and up and up some more) at Azonia.

"Die," said Azonia bluntly. "Neither myself nor any of my officers or even my regular females wish to go under the yoke of Dolza and his Masters again whoever they are. If we're going to die, were going to die free."

"And you're certain he'll be here in a week or so?" said Bainbridge almost plaintively, speaking up for the first time in this meeting. He had been watching events back in America unfolding very carefully, and knew that his nation, which even now was the most powerful on Earth, had just hit its wartime stride. If we had a month maybe we could have built up our forces enough to, to do something! He shook his head he knew that was a lie. It would take Earth at least 3 to 4 years to build up the requisite number of carrier ships to really be effective against a force the size of a Zentraedi main battle fleet, and to do that it would have had to completely ignore building any other ships. There was just that vast difference between 10,000 and 600,000 plus. He had no doubt that even now humanity would go down swinging, but the colony ships in Jupiter and Jupiter's orbits were scant percentage of the total of humanity.

"Somewhere around Pluto would be best," muttered Gloval thinking of where to set his ambush. "If we could blow off sufficient chunks to create an asteroid field to hide in…"

With a firm goal in mind, but with little hope that it would really matter in the long run the admirals and other officers got to work, while Ranma watched thoughtfully trying to bring to mind the idea that had tried to come alive in his head.

OOOOOOO

Azonia waited with about a third of her fleet out past Pluto near what the humans called the Oort cloud along the straight line route through fold space from Zentraedi held areas to Sol. She knew this was at a forlorn hope at best, and that Breetai might have even been ordered to annihilate her fleet, which meant that Breetai would assault her and her force here first. But their destruction would tell humanity and the other Meltraedi, under Sonya's command despite the fact that Azonia didn't really want to be parted from her friend, what to expect and they would be able to hopefully make of it what they would.

The humans had worked feverishly for over a week to bring as many of their warships online as they could, refitting as many of the Meltraedi ships as they could, working teams of hundreds into exhaustion. Her fleet now had 10 ships that had been completely refitted into farming ships, though of course it would be a long while before they could produce food, and the human fleet now number fifteen carriers, sixteen battleships, and ten long range missile ships along with the two space fortresses. The carriers and the missile ships had full loadouts, and they all had a minimum of a hundred mobile barriers. Even her own ship and forty others had the same amount, and the SDF's both had even more, and were creating as many as they could as fast as they could. The Macross was now hidden in the asteroid field that had been Pluto, while the rest of the human fleet was hidden in Saturn's rings, her own fleet scattered across the star system.

It wouldn't be enough, not against Breetai. Not even if they could lure him into the third planets orbit where the humans Grand cannon's could be brought to bear. Not unless they got lucky and killed Breetai, then all bets were off, but somehow that thought brought her no comfort.

If Sonya decided to cut and run and leave the humans to their fate Azonia wouldn't be in any position to argue, and in point of fact would probably have agreed with it anyway. Their duty was to their people, and no matter how much she had come to like the humans (though she could do without those parasites called politicians) that duty overrode everything.

She prayed it wouldn't come to that, but against an opponent who could think, who she knew was her superior in both numbers and strategy and tactics, and possibly even will, it was best to prepare for the worst.

She bided her time, outwardly calm, portraying an image of utter certainty and control as was her duty as an admiral. Yet if someone looked close, they could see that she hadn't actually turned a page in her book, the first made large enough for the Meltraedi to read, and was simply staring at the page.

That first day was a reprieve, but that only made the tension aboard all of her ships higher, and it was almost a relief when the sensor specialist turned to her. "Lady admiral, we have incoming fold space phenomenon, spread out along 220° from our position."

Azonia nodded bleakly and watched as Breetai's battle fleet came out of fold space. Even here the organization he had drilled into his fleet was seen, and they came out in serried ranks.

Rank upon rank of battleships, carriers, gunboats all in their separate divisions, spread out but in organized formations, not a mob. Almost directly in front of her appeared the largest division, a mix of classes taking up position around the monstrous form of the Nupetiet-Vergnitzs upon which Breetai flew his flag.

If the space fortresses had been here and ready maybe they could've gotten off a shot each before they were utterly destroyed, but even that wasn't likely. The space between each ship was quite large, and obviously had been chosen so that even in siege mode the Macross would have to traverse itself to take out more than one ship.

For over an hour it continued as Breetai's ships folded out one division after another, spreading out even more above and below those that had already folded out and Azonia felt despair well up underneath her iron control. She shook her head seeing that another division had come out 'near' Breetai's own division and she recognized the ships she had assigned to serve under Delmera, 22,000 strong even now.

"Can you get me a final count?" she asked, and was pleased to find her voice came out filled with dry humor rather than fear and despair.

Her sensor specialist nodded taking strength from the apparent unconcern of her admiral. "Y-Yes ma'am, final count Meltraedi forces 22,242. Breakdown is 10, 242, Thurvel-Salan battleships, 2,500 Quiltra-Quelamitz gunboats, 9,500 Quiltra Queleual carrier class. Final count for Zentraedi forces, 400,276, the breakdown is…"

"Azonia waved her to silence. "Unimportant really."

Before she could go on to say something, something like size not mattering or numbers not equating to quality or some other morale boosting lie, the communications officer raised her hand. "Lady admiral, we have incoming signal from the flagship."

Azonia nodded, not even letting her relief show. It looked as if her fleet would not die today, unless Breetai wanted to give her a courtesy call before destroying them all. "Put it through."

A second later Breetai's image appeared in the a holographic display, staring out at her and her crew, his uniform immaculate, his face stern but not hateful or grim.

Before he spoke the communications officer gasped a little. "Lady admiral, it's not just sent to us, he's opening communications with every ship in the fleet."

Azonia's eyebrows shot up in surprise but before she could do anything Breetai spoke. "Lady Azonia of the Meltraedi, it has been an honor to serve with your ships in this past campaign. Without them the victories against the Invid would've been far more costly and possibly even impossible at times."

Breetai shook his head. "I know not why the animosity between Dolza and the Meltraedi exists, nor have I seen any military reason why he should look down upon you as a lesser race. All I know is that you are competent and dangerous soldiers and that is the highest praise I can give. I know not why Dolza believes that you are in some way responsible for what has happened here rather than the vagaries of battle and Kyron's stupidity. Regardless of his opinion, Delmera and her forces were among the finest the Zentraedi could field, and I have no doubt that you and yours will perform as well as them. I hereby take official command of your fleet, and together we will succeed where I personally have failed before and where you have failed in turn. And then we will get back to our real work, that of crushing the Invid and wiping them from space for all time!"

Azonia looked around her and realized that despite his natural brevity Breetai was quite an orator. With that one speech he had completely disarmed the fear the Meltraedi had felt at his coming, reminded them of their shared enemy, appealed to their egos, and absolved them of their apparent failings, while also showing a bit of esprit de corps between them against Dolza.

But there was something else in his tone, some anger there. Azonia heard it, even if none of her officers could. Instincts, instincts that had served her well throughout her career, had served her well before she was even an admiral and had served her people in this present crisis screamed out to her, of a chance, and with lightning reflexes she took it. He's already questioning Dolza for his own reasons, take advantage of it!

She nodded to her communications officer who opened up a signal towards the flagship, and she spoke, her words formally, and measured yet urgent full of force. "Lord Admiral Breetai, your deeds precede you. I thank you for the honor you have done myself and my people, and I have no doubt that you would lead us to victory. However I am sending over a data package for you to look at, and I pray that you look at it completely through before deciding on what to do going forward." With one hand she started to pull up all the information the humans had acquired and shared, all the information her fleet had compiled, putting it into one large data pack.

OOOOOOO

On his bridge Breetai's eyebrow rose, and then his eye narrowed in sudden contemplation. There was something in Azonia's tone something guileful, an undercurrent of something beyond the mere words. Oh, he knew Azonia could be guileful, Delmera had been effusive with her praise of Azonia as a tactician and strategist, and the fact that she had kept the losses among the Meltraedi down ever since becoming admiral was well known to him. But there was a sneaking hidden nature to something she had said, as if things here were not as they seemed.

Still, she had done nothing to earn his ire or mistrust, and her forces had done much to earn his respect, he had spoken nothing but the truth in that little speech. The least he could do would be to agree to her proposal. He hit his communication button and said "I will agree to that, it does no one any good to run into a situation without completely understanding it first."

His eyebrows rose at surprised at the size of the package that his computer had just blinked at him. He quickly estimated how long it would take him to look over it and nodded. "I will be back to you within seven hours. Until then, my fleet will remain in position. Bring your fleet out here as well, save for the ships that are shattering the SDF one."

Even as Azonia turned to bark orders, her mind aflame with hope Breetai stood up. "This is going to take a while," he said looking around at the crew. "Rest the crews on every ship, we will not be fighting this day it seems." With that he nodded at exit door and left the bridge heading towards his own flag room.

He sat down in his chair, a simple utilitarian one but one that had been molded by his body over hundreds of years to fit almost comfortably, then with a sigh of resignation he opened the files.

He really wasn't looking forward to this campaign, if campaign it could be called. He had come to respect the humans as wily and canny foes. He knew that they would cost him far more than their numbers or level of technology would suggest, but the outcome was never in doubt, and that displeased him. The Invid were his people's real enemy, and it was them he should be facing now in command of the Zentraedi forces as they rolled forward to final ultimate victory over them, regardless of what Dolza felt they could glean from the proto-culture generator.

On top of that his brief interaction with Ranma had amused him greatly. Looking back he couldn't see the point of the whole kissing thing, but neither did he see it as something that should have evoked such a negative response as it had. Now however he shook off those thoughts and concentrated on the data packet Azonia had sent him.

The first document in the packet was labeled 'long term effects of cloning on the Zentraedi/Meltraedi biology and culture'. His eyebrows rose in shock as he read on and half a paragraph in he began to be angry. But he stamped hard on his first response which was to strom back to the and order the Meltraedi fleet's destruction for coming up with something like this. Two pages later he was still very angry but he ruthlessly stamped down on it and opened up the next packet. 'Progress, and what it means'. For over five hours he continued, reading through each essay, each video, each file that Azonia had sent.

Azonia had sent everything, everything her people had discovered since Sonya and the other spies had ordered the SDF one, all the questions they had been asking, all the rumors that had been proven true, all the things the humans had found out and passed on, and at the last he could not come to any conclusion but the ones Azonia and the other Meltraedi had reached.

"We have been used for so long," he said softly standing up.

The moment he was up however his calm manner disappeared into a towering rage and fury, as the information given to him had at some point broken through the mental conditioning that had been inflicted on him 479 years ago.

He remembered everything, being a miner and a leader of miners on a heavy grav planet. He remembered being called into a building run by the overseers of the Tirolian race with his twenty thousand strong work unit, a beam of light hitting him and suddenly becoming a soldier. He remembered leading soldiers against the Tirolian people, suppressing them in the order of the Triumvirate of the Masters. He remembered his first meeting with Dolza and how he had been given command of the Zentraedi and the swiftly growing expanding forces. He remembered that first assault by the Invid and Zor's rebellion, of being brainwashed to believe that only the Zentraedi fleet mattered, that only the Zentraedi fleet existed, that the space fortress was some kind of prototype created by them then stolen by a race they had suppressed. He remembered everything, and he knew there were no words for the depth of the masters betrayal.

"REAAGH!" With a roar he reached down and lifted the multi-ton table, ripping it from its bindings to the floor and over his head before he threw it against the wall where it crashed and shattered, making a lout booming sound. He roared again, turning and slamming her fist through the chair then leaned back up and throwing it aside and pounding the pieces to flinders gripped in a total fury the likes of which he had never come close to feeling before.

It took several hours for him to calm back down, and when he did his hands were bloody from pounding on the metal and steel fragments of what had once been his flag room, but he ignored them, not even bothering to wipe of the blood.

It was with a clear head and mind that Breetai emerged and strode toward the bridge. He ignored the looks of fear and shock on the few Zentraedi who had been close enough to hear his bellowing fury, until he came upon Exedore, who must have come in search of him. He grabbed his aide and dragged him to back to the flag room.

Exedore's face paled at the carnage revealed inside, and for just a moment he feared for his life, but Beetai merely grabbed the one thing that remained intact, the computer he had used to view Azonia's data packet, and pushed Exedore down to sit in front of it where it had fallen to the floor. "Read," He commanded.

Exedore was not his aid simply because the two of them were the only living remnants of that first batch of Zentraedi, but because the diminutive and crippled Exedore was by far and away the most brilliant Zentraedi that Breetai had ever met. What had taken Breetai six hours of slogging work took Exedore an hour. Most of that time was taken by reading the first paper and trying to figure out the words in it. After that his own mental blocks broke, and he absorbed the rest much more easily. And while he had none of the towering rage and fury of Breetai his mind went cold and calculating.

Moments later he was racing after his Admiral toward the bridge. "My Lord, what will you do?"

"I will do what I must," said Breetai coldly. "We have been used Exedore, our entire race made to be nothing but drones like the stinking Invid! I will not stand for this, I will fight back, and free us from this yoke!"

"But my Lord, you realize that you would be fighting Dolza and the rest of the Zentraedi forces. Against such numbers…"

Breetai cut them off sharply. "I know that as well as you Exedore, but there comes a time… he stopped as he was about to enter the bridge turning to look down at Exedore. "There comes a time when you must throw caution to the winds and stand for your principles. And this is that time. I will free our people, or I will drive us to extinction. If we cannot atone for the crimes we committed, we must at least pay for them."

Exedore stared up as his admiral, realizing that he would not be able to dissuade him from this course and he sighed and nodded his head. "Your fleet will follow you," he said simply.

"I know I'm counting on it," Breetai replied.

The two turned and entered the bridge, with Breetai striding over to the communication gear. He had yet another speech to make, but this one would be the most important he ever made.

OOOOOOO

In the end it was truly rather anticlimactic to the Meltraedi and the humans. The idea that Breetai would have listened to Azonia wasn't farfetched, but the fact he had grabbed it with both hands and run with it was. Not to mention the fact that his entire fleet was willing to follow him into treason against Dolza, though that was much easier to explain then Breetai's own reaction.

"The data package was only the beginning," Breetai explained, looking down at the human delegation to this meeting, which was happening on his flagship. Beside him stood Exedore and his two senior division commanders. The Meltraedi was Delmera, Sonya and Azonia, who were once more together. Azonia had decided after this excitement that she was going to go through with her idea to invite Sonya to view some of that female/female 'porn' and see what she thought of it. Azonia rather hoped Sonya would have the same reaction she had, and wish to try some of it.

The human delegation was composed of Prescott as the senior member, Fokker as senior CAG, the senior carrier captain whose name was Andre Sullio, Roberto, Pierre, Lang and Gloval. Surprisingly Lisa and Ranma were also there at Breetai's request, as two humans he had personally met, and respected (Ranma more than Lisa admittedly).

"The package broke the mental blocks the Robotech Masters put on me and the rest of the first generation Zentraedi. At that point of course our people hadn't been separated by gender, though actual families were not the norm."

The humans all got comfortable with the scientists and Roberto taking notes as Breetai went on, speaking for their benefit as well as the Meltraedi, who were going to find out the answers to many of the questions that had plagued them. "We were miners, genetically modified to live on heavy gravity worlds. Even back then there weren't as many Meltraedi as Zentraedi, I think the ratio was something like 1 to 4. We were genetically modified from the Tirolian people at first, made tougher, more durable, and of course larger, and Exedore and I are the last survivors of the first born from that initial stock."

Pierre interrupted eagerly. "Can you tell me how many generations there have been since then, between you and someone like Kyron for example?" Kyron and his fleet were the 'newest' clones as far as we can tell, and they had the most obvious genetic defects."

"In truth I cannot. New clones entered the fleet in million man lots to replace combat losses, and I have no idea how often. A thousand, more?" Breetai shrugged and went on. "The original genetic modifications were made upon us by Zor and his assistants, and we were given rights and representation in the Tirol Republic. That ended soon after Zor left. He was always an explorer at heart, a searcher for new knowledge. He took a crew of his people and ours and left Republic space. Soon after that, things began to go wrong. There were rumors in the mining camps of talks between the Invid and the Tirol high council, then all communication with the Invid ended, I don't know why, nor do I care. Some time after that Zor's assistants came to our world, and called us in groups to come and talk to them. It wasn't unusual, sounding out the public for some law or other, the republic was always doing that. And suddenly we were no longer miners, we were soldiers."

Roberto frowned. "Where did they get the weapons, armor etc, for you to be soldiers? And how was the brainwashing accomplished, do you remember?"

"No, I remember only a massive bright light, then I woke up and I was no longer Breetai, senior Mine Leader, I was Breetai, captain of the Zentraedi, fist of the masters. Where they got the weapons, they controlled much of the means of production, it would have been a simple matter for them to repurpose one of the factory satellites to creating weapons," Breetai shook his head. "The masters, hah! They were Zor's three main assistants, the trio that hadn't gone with him on his voyage of discovery. They called themselves masters because they understood the secrets of proto-culture and the Flower of life, but their knowledge never came close to that of Zor, I should know, I served on his ship when I was younger before returning to the mines. But it was enough for them to use it to control us, and we in turn allowed them to take control of the Republic. We were larger by far, stronger by far then the normal Tirolian, and we were armed for war, where they were not. We took the capital on Tirol itself, and after that the 'rebels' never had a chance really. They never had a chance, and after a while there were only the Masters and their followers."

"Zor, he was the one who designed the space fortress correct?" Emil frowned, remember the data chip Cologne had found, and continued to pester him into looking at. But he was far more concerned about the plants and what they could do than to try to figure out how to read the data on the chip. After all it was unlikely to be in any language they could comprehend. And with the effort made to hide the generator, Lang was worried it would have some kind of protection on it. Given the trap left in the ship's system that made the main gun fire back when the Zentraedi first showed up, he felt his concern was justified. Cologne on the other hand was much more willing to just hook it up to a computer and see.

"Indeed, it was his ship. You see, Zor returned twenty years or so after the masters took power, and found they had overthrown his republic and killed his father. Instead of simply charging in, he planned out his assault to perfection. When he did attack, his campaign was brutally simplistic, he targeted the proto-culture generators, the incubators and the data-net. Within two weeks the flowers of life were destroyed, their incubators gone, the generators they powered idle, and the information needed to repair or build new ones gone. The Masters had stored massive amounts of proto-culture of course, but nowhere near enough to power their empire."

"And while the Masters regrouped and began to search for Zor, the Invid returned." Breetai scowled, his face bleak as one hand reached up to tap the half mask that covered the ruin of half his face. "It was only the fact the Masters had kept adding to our numbers that the Zentraedi were able to push them back, at great loss of life. The Invid knew no mercy, and they utterly wiped out dozens of planets before we pushed them back. It took us hundreds of years to push them back that first war, and we lost much of the horded proto-culture doing it, and we were again brainwashed, now to forget the so-called masters and their race ever existed, only the will of Dolza mattered now. After that, we were sent against Zor, and wiped out his forces. But his own ship broke our cordon and escaped into fold space. I know not why, but it simply disappeared into fold and stayed there. Several skirmish fleets were assigned to look for it, but for another two hundred plus years, years filled with war, there was no sign of it."

Emil frowned at that, wondering how such a thing could have been accomplished. It probably wasn't done on purpose, but what kind of accident could have made a ship go into fold and not come out?

"Then our long range scanners picked it finally emerging from fold space, though it took us years to localize it to your system. The rest you know."

Pierre frowned. "The cloning, how was that done? You speak of it as if it was commonplace among these Tirol."

Emil nodded, and added his own question. "You keep using the word proto-culture, what exactly is it."

Exedore fielded that question. "Proto-culture is the term used for the fuel and for the process used to create it, so I can see how that could be confusing. The process uses the flowers of Life to somehow change the helium/hydrogen fuel into a higher order of energy. The process is called that and deals with any energy manipulation. Somehow, I know not how, the energy you get out can be used to do practically anything. It was used to offset the problem with cloning somehow, and effects living things in a profound manner."

Exedore sighed sadly. He had read over the effects the multiple cloning process had on his people. The females, since they didn't have quite as many generations removed from their original, didn't have as many problems. The males however, well the more generations cloned, the more problems. Sterility was but the start of it.

Breetai nodded down at Ranma. The two of them had greeted one another when the humans came aboard, and the strange mix of respect and amusement had gone a long way to getting over the initial awkwardness. "Your use of this ki thing you mentioned, before we met I had thought that kind of thing was only possible through use of proto-culture. I imagine the masters thought the same, the idea what they would make of you now amuses me greatly."

Exedore spoke next, his face far more concerned. "What does not amuse me, is that much of the information of Zentraedi controlled space has been deleted from our systems since we arrived here. All that is left is the emergency retreat point, which takes us to Dolza's fortress."

Prescott scowled and was about to ask rather incredulously if they were supposed to believe the Zentraedi now had no idea where their area of space was, but Azonia spoke up first. "That means someone, the masters most likely, knows enough about our dealings to prepare against us moving against them. Strange."

Exedore shook his head. "It is not martial force they fear, but the erosion of their power over the Zentraedi people through contact with the Micronian culture. You and your fleet are proof that it has power. If the contamination spreads far enough, then the Zentraedi will splinter, half the forces intrigues by it and what it could mean, and the other half fearful and lashing out at it."

Gloval frowned. "I doubt that simply wiping your data such that you cannot find them would be enough to assuage them. What else are they likely to do?"

Breetai shook his head, his face grim, like someone contemplating a inescapable avalanche coming toward him. "They will dispatch the main reserve force. Dolza's fleet. I don't know when they'll arrive, that depends on if they began to suspect and moved after Azonia sent back a report of the 7th fleet's destruction, or when my fleet arrived here."

Lisa paled visibly while Ranma's eyes narrowed, but Prescott wanted it spoken aloud. "So how many ships are talking about here?"

"That depends on what percentage they wish to send. Upper amount would be 3 million ships, all with full load out of Regulds and Dolza's special forces, the Nousjadeul-Ger powersuits. That powersuit isn't equal to the Queadluun Rau, but there will be many more of them than Azonia can field. I doubt they'll send that amount, but perhaps half that, I can imagine them peeling that from the defense of the factory satellites and Dolza's fortress. A large enough amount, but beatable if they come in as they are liable to, like a mindless horde." Breetai steeled himself and looked at the humans. "If they come however, your planet is doomed. Against that number, we will not be able to protect it, no matter what we do. It's simply too big a target. If we tried to defend it, we would lose our mobility, and they could overwhelm us."

Prescott scowled angrily. "Our duty is to defend the Earth to the best of our ability!"

Breetai cut him, scowling down at him. "Your duty, not ours. Our duty is to our men, not to your planet. I will not lead my men into a battle we cannot win! The only way to face those numbers is to use tactics and strategy, the Grand Cannon alone cannot make up the difference in numbers."

Before the argument could escalate Ranma butted in for the first time. "So, you've got the coordinates to Dolza fortress right?"

Exedore blinked at this and nodded. "Yes, why?"

"How long would it take Dolza's fleet to begin moving?"

Breetai frowned. "A few days to assemble and reposition, possibly up to a local week to bring the factory satellites together, why?"

"Well," Ranma drawled, "It seems ta me, if you can't defend, you have to attack."

End chapter

Heh, bet no one saw that coming. Many of you might have noticed, but as the action heats up I've devoted less time to romance and the regular Ranma high jinks. This is partly because I just can't fit it all in, and in this story the action is the main thing, with romance and comedy taking a second seat. The other reason is because in real life under the current crisis there would be less time to spend on such things.

Also, realize that I never read the comics, I read a few of the Southern Cross books but they were god awful, so my remaking of the Robotech past might be off canon more than slightly, but I also don't care.

And now, a confession I have to make. I know I've made mistakes in grammar and numbers and stuff, but it didn't really occur to me how small I had made a skirmish fleet until I saw it next to a main battle fleets numbers. The number for a skirmish fleet should be ten thousand, not a thousand. But that means I need to go back and change a lot of the numbers in previous chapters, so that change, and the changes to the fights it will necessitate, will be made after I've finished book 1 of this series.

Next chapter will be the last one hopefully, then maybe an epilogue, or maybe I'll put the two together, I don't know just yet. Until then, as always read and review.