Rick couldn't believe what he had heard but as he looked in his screen that displayed his rear visuals, he could see the SDF-2 starting to shimmer and shake and knew a fold operation was about to take place.
This can't be happening he thought, realizing what this meant, that there was no guarantee where the SDF-2 would end up and there was a chance that the would never see Lisa again. Not willing to take the chance, Rick opened his comm to Max and said, "Max, I've left something behind I gotta go back for."
Max, confused by Rick's comment as there was nothing possible to go back for, and realizing the SDF-2 was about to fold, yelled at Rick to come back as Rick turned his Veritech, lit his afterburners and started to fly back towards the SDF-2.
Lisa and her bridge crew held onto the stations as the fold operation started. She was pleased to hear that a large portion of the Zentraedi cruiser would be carried away to space with them. All of a sudden, Lisa heard Sammie exclaim, "Oh no, what is he doing there! Captain Hayes, it looks like Captain Hunter got caught in the fold, he must not have heard the order to clear out, but I was sure the field was clear when we started the fold!"
Speculation ran rampant as to what could have happened, that maybe his fighter was hidden by a pod or that there was a malfunction in the radar systems.
Lisa, extremly worried about how the Skull leader would survive the fold, quickly ordered that the fighter be recovered once the fold operation was completed. She didn't know if Rick's Veritech was still equipped for deep space and knew they needed to get him onto the ship as soon as possible. Lisa also felt a sense of personal panic to having Rick onboard. One, he knew that she loved him and two, that she would be the reason that he wasn't with Minmei.
At first Rick was worried he hadn't made it in time but as he felt the shaking of the ship, and then starting to see stars, he realized that he had made it. He didn't want to dwell on what would have happened if Lisa had left Earth without him and couldn't wait to see the look on her face when he showed up on the ship. It was his last thought as the fold operation completed and Rick found himself surrouded by space debris from the Zentraedi cruiser. It was a large piece of that very ship that broke away and collided with Rick's Veritech causing him to hit his head and lose consciousness.
"Fold operation completed, I am happy to report that we took over 60% of the Zentraedi cruiser with us and has started to break apart." reported Sammie.
"Good," replied Lisa, "Please raise Skull Leader and see if he needs assistance back to the SDF-2 and start the recycling process and recover the materials from that ship out there, we never know when we may need it. Vanessa, I need you to figure out where we are and how far are we from Earth, we don't know if any of Dolza's fleet is still out there so keep the ship on red alert and defences up. Kim, I need a readout of all personnel on the ship in 10 minutes and will address the crew afterwards."
"Captain, " said Sammie, "Captain Hunter is not answering, there might be something wrong."
Trying to hide the panic and fear in her voice, Lisa ordered that a rescue effort be initiatated and was relieved to hear an hour later that Rick had survived but was knocked unconscious during the fold and was currently in the base hospital. It had been one of the longest hours of her life waiting to hear whether or not he survived or not, but as captain of the vessel, she couldn't let her personal feelings keep her from her duties to those onboard the ship.
According to Vanessa's calculations, the SDF-2 had defolded near Neptune about 30 AU away and that the return to Earth would take close to two years, given the original journey home from Pluto had taken a few months over two years and having to deal with battling the Zentraedi fleet. Luckily, the warehouses had been aleady stocked for the journey to the home of the Robotech Masters, but it was not a journey they were to take alone. The original plan was for the SDF-2 to rendezvous with the Zentraedi forces near the satelite factory and start their journey from there with additional ships provided by Zentraedi forces. Lisa had no choice but to try and reach the satelite factory and hoped that Gloval and Claudia as well as Macross City was safe. Unfortunately, without the coordinates of the satelite factory and uncertainty of the fold system reliability, Lisa had no choice but to try and reach home as fast as they could.
Back on Earth, after Khyron's ship had been destroyed, Max had gone to Admiral Gloval to report on what happened to Rick. They couldn't understand what he had been trying to accomplish and had no way of knowing if he survived the fold or not. Until they were able to establish contact with the SDF-2 and determine his fate, Rick Hunter was declared MIA, missing in action. Max , who was one of the few people that knew that Minmei was staying with Rick, had Claudia and Miriya on hand when he had to break the news to Minmei about Rick's disappearance.
Sensitive to the situation Minmei was in, they willingly allowed her to stay in Rick's home for the next few weeks until she could find another place to live but let her know that she could not stay there until his fate was known since she and Rick were not married, nor was their relationship of a duration that would have given her partnership rights. Minmei wisely kept quiet about the visit from Lisa that morning and of Rick's decision to follow her.
It was late night before Lisa had a chance to visit Rick in the infirmary. So many things that needed her input, review or orders, she wondered a bit herself how she did it, but remembered that she had been trained for this since academy days and had learned much the last few years from her mentor Admiral Gloval. Given permission by the nurse to enter Rick's room, she was dismayed to see a large bandage on his head. The nurse had let Lisa know that there some swelling but that it was decreasing and that given time, the doctors were positive he would wake up. Pulling a chair up next to his bed, Lisa sat there for a few hours, holding his hand and talking to him about her heavy day. She left when she started to get sleepy and before she left, she asked him to wake up soon.
It was two days before Rick woke up. Ugh, he thought, I don't remember getting knocked out because of a fold before. Recognizing the room decorations as a standard military hospital, he searched around til he found the call button and rang for a nurse.
He didn't have long to wait, as a nurse promptly entered his room, only moments after he rang. "Well, look who finally woke up, how are you feeling Captain Hunter?" said the nurse as she started to take his vital signs.
"Like I got trampled by 50 non micronized Zentraedi,"said Rick with a groan.
The nurse smiled, "if you're joking around then you must be feeling better. Your vital signs are good, I'll let the doctor know so he can stop by and check on you."
Wondering if Lisa had come to visit him all, Rick asked, "Did I get any visitors?"
The nurse just laughed, "as a matter of fact you did, almost everyone you know must have stopped by to check on you. You are one popular guy. We had to turn them away since you were in no condition for visitors. We'll let you know if anyone stops by."
Rick wanted to ask if Lisa had visited him, but didn't get a chance before the nurse left. Feeling better after taking some meds and getting some food in his system, Rick was able to take a few visitors from the squad leaders that were surprised to find him on board. After hearing from them the number of days it had been known that Lisa was given command of the SDF-2, Rick wondered why she had delayed in coming to see him and letting him know about it and wondered if things would have been different if she had come to see him earlier.
Rick waited all day for Lisa to come by and was disappointed after dinner when she still didn't show up. He wondered if Lisa regretted saying those things to him and maybe had second thoughts about her feelings for him. Taking the pills that the doctor left for him, Rick drifted off to sleep wondering if he did the right thing.
Rick had been asleep for about two hours when Lisa slipped into his room to check on him as she had every night since he'd been brought aboard. She had been unable to get away during the day to visit, but was glad, because honestly she didn't think she could face him. This was the second time he was hospitalized because of her and she didn't want to see him after bearing her soul to him. It was bad enough that Minmei had been there to witness it, but it hurt when he hadn't even tried to come after her. Lisa only stayed a few minutes, glad to see him sleeping so peacefully, she didn't dare to stay any longer, afraid he'd wake up and find her in his room.
Rick was glad that the doctors thought to discharge him the next day. He couldn't stand being in the hospital and was bored just watching TV and chatting with his visitors when it was only one visitor he truly wanted. It was late in the afternoon, when the door to his room opened and Rick was surprised to see Kim and Sammie from the bridge in his room. Seeing their smiling faces, Rick welcomed them and decided to see what he could get out of them about Lisa and he wasn't disappointed. They gave Rick updated information about the ship's location and all the things that they had to do. They told him that Lisa had been incredibly busy and looked very tired, but had asked them to check on him and to make sure he was given a room assignment as he was to be discharged the next day. They didn't seem surprised that Lisa had known that he was going to discharged and as Sammie said, "I dunno how she does it, she's on top of everything..it's scary."
Kim showed him the options for housing that was available to him and gave him a choice of being with the squad leaders or with the officers. The other squad leaders were working on putting a small squad together for him, but given his rank, for housing purposes he was given an option. After reviewing both options, which in his mind were both too far from Lisa's quarters, he noticed another room near Lisa's quarters that seemed to be unassigned. Nonchalantly, he asked about the room and Kim let him know that it was available but smaller than the other two rooms that were being offered and that it may be noisier as it was the one closest to the corridor, while Lisa's quarters were further down the corridor away from the noise. Making up some reason that he even thought was far fetched, he asked if he could be assigned to those quarters instead of the other options. Kim, not seeing any reason to refuse the request, quickly updated her tablet to assign that room to him.
Kim and Sammie left Rick's room, giggling to one another, as much as Lisa denied it, they knew she was in love with Rick and the way that Rick had tried to be slick about asking about Lisa and picking the room near her on her floor, made them think that maybe Rick had finally gotten hit in the head hard enough to realize how perfect Lisa was for him. They decided to not report to Lisa the room that Rick picked and hoped they wouldn't get thrown into the brig when she did find out.