Eureka Seven: The Chosen Ones
By Aditya
Chapter 6-The Encounter
It was 6:30 in the evening. The sun had just set and the moon with 'Renton and Eureka' started to appear slowly and steadily. The Gekko-Go was flying over 'Bozer' province in 'Dreader Hond' sector. Its landscape was not so friendly. There wasn't any sign of vegetation except for trees here and there, it was covered with rocks and there was definitely no sign of Sky Fish. They hadn't stopped to rest since they saw the compac drive's reaction. Everyone was getting a little tired.
Holland was really pissed off.
"When will we leave this place?" he asked in an irritated tone.
"We will be out of 'Bozer' province in approximately 2 hours" replied Gidget
"What? Still 2 hours?" he paused and continued "Moondoggie, can't you go any faster?"
"You do know; don't you" replied Moondoggie "Bozer is one of the driest place in the world. We are at vehicle mode here. How hard do you think it is to pilot at a place where Trapar density is 12%? Besides, I don't have much experience piloting below Ray-Line"
"Holland, don't lose your patience" advised Ken-Goh "It is crucial that a leader should always have a calm mind"
Holland didn't reply. He didn't even wanted to go to a place where there were no Trapar. He even wouldn't looked at that place if it wasn't for Renton and Eureka.
"Why are we in a place like this?" asked Gidget, "I have this feeling that nobody wants to be here!"
"I know that, but we can't disobey Leader's orders" replied Moondoggie
"I never even knew that a place like this existed" said Gidget as she sighed.
"Bozer is a deserted province. It is infamous for having recorded the lowest Trapar density in the world. It was drier than any desert in the world. This was because of the mining activity in the past. The province had a great source of L.F.O skeleton colony. So, many mines were established and had destroyed the area completely. Eventually, the resources were exhausted and province was deserted" said Woz.
"I didn't wanted to know its history" said Gidget in a uncaring tone
"Will there be any increase in Trapar here?" Holland asked Hap
"No, just the opposite" Hap replied, "The further we advance, the lesser it gets."
"How much lesser?" he asked in an uncurious tone
"There is a place called Oaser which has the minimum Trapar density of…let me check 4%!"
"4….4%?!" sighed Holland with a despair "I didn't even know that the world has places with low Trapar!"
Everyone felt the same way Holland did. No one wanted to be there. But, it was crucial. When Holland was asked where to start looking from, he said 'Dreader Hond'- the worst place on the earth. The last place where anyone would even dream to look as many of them had never even heard about it!
"Don't act so gloomy" ordered Talho, "You are making everyone loose their will"
He didn't reply.
"Did anything showed up at the radar?" he asked
"Nothing yet" answered Woz.
"Look at you, you are gloomy again" Talho said in an irritated tone
"Give him a break Talho" said Mischa
"It's alright," said Holland
"I will put them in the brig as soon as I find them" continued Holland
Everyone was wondering why Holland was so confident. It was like he was sure that they would find Renton and Eureka. But leader should always inspire the team, they thought..
Maurice entered the Bridge. No one except Talho and Mischa seemed to look at him.
"Where is Helga?" asked Talho
"She is with Maeter and Linck. They are at Renton's old room looking at that box with Anemone" replied Maurice
"Those kids, haven't I told them not to go there…" Talho left the bridge mumbling.
"Did we get something on them?" he asked
"Naa" replied Holland "We don't even know if they are here"
"I think we are getting closer" he said as he removed the compac drive from the box, "This thing is getting brighter and brighter"
Everyone looked at it. It indeed was brighter than before. They got a feeling that, they would find them this time.
At the same time the L.F.O.'s searching parallel to Gekko-Go contacted.
"This is 606, no trace of them in east" a contact came from Matthieu.
"This is 808, same here, no vision of life in west" came from Hilda
"Same with 303 here" reported Dominic
"Received loud and clear" said Gidget
"I think we can't ride any further Leader, The Trapar is here getting too thin" said Matthieu.
"Yeah, and there is not a single thing to shoot here" added Stoner.
"Yeah, the Trapar density is going below 10%, our boards can't ride them although they are Traparated" said Dominic
"What now Holland?" asked Gidget
"Ask them to come back" said Holland with no much thought.
"I still don't think they will be at such dried up land" said Mischa and continued "I mean, don't you remember how Eureka acted when she was at the Izuki caves?"
"We still don't the exact reason she acted like that, because of Nirvash or because of the less Trapar" replied Holland
"But still at a place like this…"
"Yes, I know what you think but my instincts tell me that we shouldn't neglect this place and a captain should follow his instincts" replied Holland plainly
"Then why are you so eager to get out of here?"
"It's simple, I hate places with no waves"
Mischa just sighed and went inside the ship.
"606,303,808 are returning. They will all be here in approximately 2 minutes" announced Gidget
Holland took a deep look at his crew. They were all exhausted. He understood that couldn't go on. Realizing that they are at their limit, Holland declared "Let's stop for today"
"What..?! O.K"
Everyone wanted to continue the search but they too realized that they were at their limit. So, except for Moondoggie, Ken-Goh, Woz and Maurice the rest walked towards the cafeteria to grab a bite.
"Aren't you guys coming?" asked Holland
"No, we will stay here until you guys come back" said Moondoggie.
"Alright, don't over do yourself" said Holland and exited the bridge.
"Do you think we will find them?" asked Maurice again
"What do you think?" asked Woz while working on something on his computer
"I…I don't know" answered Maurice
"Don't worry kid" comforted Ken-Goh "we will find them today"
"But what if we don't find them today?" asked Maurice
"Then we will find them tomorrow" replied Ken-Goh
"But what if tomorrow…" stopped Maurice as he was interrupted again.
"Then we will find them day after tomorrow. We won't give up looking for them"
Maurice didn't know what to say. He just stood still looking at the compac drive. Looking at his disappointed face, Moondoggie asked
"You don't know Renton too well do you?"
"What?um…um… I don't" answered Maurice in a slow and silent voice
"That is the reason why you are worried?" said Moondoggie with calm face.
Maurice didn't understand what Moondoggie was saying or what his point was. He just kept looking at him like Ken-Goh and Woz for his response.
"That kid" Moondoggie said, "That kid is special. He makes miracles happen"
"What does that mean?" asked Maurice
"Yes he is right about that" agreed both Ken-Goh and Woz.
Moondoggie put his hands behind his head and stretched his legs in the cockpit and started to say, "Just think about it, he changed Eureka from a machine to a human-no offence. I mean, she started to smile after he came right?"
Maurice agreed. He remembered how Mama was happy when talking about Renton or being near him, when he first joined.
"Along with that; he controlled Nirvash better than Eureka with just few months of training. I mean I had heard Holland say that Eureka was the only one who could even move Nirvash let alone pilot it!"
"Yes that was the truth. When other than Eureka moved the Nirvash, it didn't move more than 4 steps" commented Ken-Goh.
"Along that, we can't forget about Seven Swell Phenomenon!" he continued, "Is he a wizard or what? He makes impossible things happen so naturally! He reminds me of the 'Trapar King' many times" said Moondoggie
Maurice was left blank. He had never thought of these things when he thought about Renton. Maybe because he was just a 6 year old kid back then. He had admitted that, although he liked Renton, he was a bit jealous and angry at him for taking Eureka away from him. He didn't know how exactly he would face Renton when he returned home. He now felt relieved as those feelings about Renton were lifted from his heart now. Now, it looked to him like Mama had made right choice choosing Renton.
"Thank You" he said to Moondoggie.
"Don' sweat it?" Moondoggie replied
"No…it's not that", said Maurice and ran to find his siblings without waiting for a response.
"He is special, isn't he?" asked Ken-Goh after Maurice left
"Yeah! He will be all grown up adult now; won't he?" said Moondoggie and he thought "4 years, I wonder what are they both doing all this time and why are they making us await them?"
"Resume now" warned Ken-Goh "We are about to enter Oaser"
"I am on it" replied Moondoggie as he resumed with his cockpit
The rest of the crew except for Talho, Hilda, Matthieu, Stoner, Dominic, Anemone and the kids returned to the bridge. Gidget brought some with some bread with her.
"How is it Moondoggie" she asked as she threw one at him
He caught the bread piece and put it in his mouth
"umuummummuumm"
"Don't speak with your mouth full" said Gidget with a disgusted tone and distributed the rest to Ken-Goh and Woz
"Did something happen?" asked Holland
"Not much in this kind of place" replied Ken-Goh
Holland just sighed deeply
"Holland look at this" called Hap
"What? Did we find them?" asked Holland
"That's not it, look at the Trapar sensor"
When he turned towards the sensor, there was not much to look at.
"What am I looking at again?" he asked
"Didn't you understand?"
"I have no clue what are you pointing at"
"Look, this is the world's driest place in accordance of Trapar. This is the first time our sensor has gone this low"
"And?"
"I thought a Reffer like you would be quite interested?"
"What is to get impressed upon?"
"About the low waves I mean?"
"There are no waves! Why would any Reffer be excited?"
"You're just being complicated"
"What part of me is complicated, huh?" asked Holland raising his voice.
"You are saying you want to get out of this place and at the same time, you are saying we will find them here, what's going on with you?"
"For the first question, I don't like this place. That's why I want to get out of here"
"That's the point! Why would they want to be here while no one else wants to!"
"Did you know?" he asked, "Why Dreader Hond has such less Trapar density?"
"You are going off the point…" replied Hap.
Holland didn't respond. He just continued "Dreader Hond once had a top-secret bio-chemical lab. It produced the cutting-edge technology of the time back then"
"Then what happened to it?" asked Mischa
"It disappeared!" answered Holland
"What?! What the heck does that mean?" asked everyone
"I don't know" he said, "It was a top-secret classified information, I only overheard Adrock talking about some lab here when I was a kid. I didn't really understand what they were saying but I definitely heard about something to do with Renton?"
"That doesn't even make any sense" replied Moondoggie "Did you think Renton made the lab and the Trapar disappear while he was a baby?"
"Maybe they moved it to different location. That doesn't mean we will find Renton and Eureka here!" added Hap
"I don't know; I don't even know who Renton was at that time!" sighed Holland. Then for unknown he raised his voice and commanded, "Don't slack off. We will be searching them throughout the night."
Nobody felt like replying, but everyone just said Yes
"This is strange!" said Woz in an unbelievable voice
"What is it now?" asked Holland in his usual ignorant way
"I am getting some L.F.O signatures!"
"Are they from Military?"
"No, I can't determine them but they are moving very fast towards us"
"How many?"
"One, I think…wait, I think two!"
"Don't worry about them, They can't come near us in such low Trapar"
"But in the vehicle mode they can; can't they" suggested Moondoggie
Holland just took a deep breath and said "O.K guys, ready the missiles just in case"
"Are you sure?" asked Ken-Goh
"Don't worry, we won't fight them, we just want to confirm their identity" replied Holland
"How far are they?" he asked turning towards Woz
"Let me check, 152 miles in south-east" Woz replied
"They are still that far. Why did you even bothered reporting that? In vehicle mode, it will take more than 2 hours to reach us as we are moving alongside"
"No, according to my calculations they will be here in 15 minutes! It seems like they are reffing"
"Looks like we need to fix our radar then" sighed Holland.
Suddenly, a series of missiles were spotted by them
"We are being attacked!" shouted Ken-Goh
Thanks to Moondoggie's reflexes, they put on the barrier and made it through
"What just happened?" asked Holland
"Now our radar is picking up some compac signatures… Let me check its from 'the rebellions'!"
The view in front of them blocked by the smoke of explosion cleared up and they saw battleships which were in orange color with silver linings. The ships were spitting copy of Military ships.
"Those scums! They ambushed us" said Holland with an angered face. "How far away are they?"
"Looks like 30 miles" answered Woz
"Isn't that too far away for an ambush?" asked Moondoggie
"Our preparing the missiles made them think we spotted them" replied Ken-Goh
"How many are there?" asked Holland
"Looks like about 62!" answered Woz
"62 huh? This should be no problem. Engage the battle sequence. We will tare them apart" ordered Holland
"Hey aren't you forgetting something!" shouted Hap, "There is no Trapar here!"
"I know that, so we both can't use any L.F.O.'s we are at a great…great…disadvantage" he slowed his response in the end. The factor of no Trapar got to him a little late
"What do you think we must do now?" asked Moondoggie dodging the missiles.
"Are they trying to surround us?" asked Holland
"No, their formation doesn't look that way" replied Woz
"Why could that be?" asked Moondoggie.
"You can't even understand that?" asked Ken-Goh "It's because if they surround us, then their missiles we dodge could hit each other. You are a member of our Gekko-State. You should know better"
"Stop fighting you two" ordered Holland and scanned the area and spotted something about 800 meters to his right. It was a mountain, more like a steep rock that was an ideal place for cover.
"Moondoggie, steer the ship behind the mountain"
"Roger"
"Ken-Goh, start charging our cannons"
"It is best if we just retreat" suggested Hap
"We have those L.F.O.'s on our tail. We don't even know who they are!"
"Two can't hurt us"
"What if they are suicide L.F.O.'s? These guys are notorious for that"
"Then…uh…that" he couldn't reply
Just as they were on their way to cover, they were attacked using Laser's
"Leader, our barrier can't hold on much longer!" reported Woz
"Ken-Goh, do something" shouted Gidget
"You can't blame me for being outnumbered. I already took out 3 of them"
"Yeah… and also turned me off the course" complained Moondoggie
"Just concentrate on piloting the ship, kid" ordered Ken-Goh
"You try it. It's hard enough to move along side the barrier, along with that I have to balance the recoil too"
"Don't worry! Once we get behind the mountain, we will plan our counter attack" said Holland
"What? Haven't you planned it yet?" asked Moondoggie
"Matthieu and the others are asking what to do?" reported Gidget
"Tell them to be in the standby mode" we will attack them as soon as we get to the Ray-line"
"I doubt they will allow us to reach it" commented Mischa
"Don't worry, if we use them, we will be alright"
"That's pretty risky!" said Ken-Goh
"It's our only option!" replied Holland "Alright, we will shoot a series of EMP missiles. How many do we have?"
"Um… two at this moment" replied Woz
"What? Didn't we had about 10 of them?" he asked surprised
"You were the one who said they weren't necessary and didn't install them" replied Ken-Goh
"Alright, Alright. This means we will have to take them down with only one missile" he said in a calm face. It was like he was saying-No problem, we will make it through
The Gekko-Go was guided behind the Mountain without much casualties. They lost their missile units and got some of their 'reflection film' peeled off"
"So far, the damage doesn't seem to have affected the ship major. But still, we have to end it quickly before we loose our Reflection Film's" reported Woz
"Alright, track the trajectory of the missiles and aim towards their centre" ordered Holland
"Analyzing complete, the data is being sent" reported Woz
The massive missile launchers appeared at the upper part of the ship, in the exact centre of the Gekko-Go. It had two extensions.
"EMP missiles online" reported Ken-Goh
"O.K. lets teach them what happens if they mess with Gekko-Go. Ready…Fire!" ordered Holland
At the same time, a few missiles were shot from their sides. Although every one of them was destroyed, one managed to explode and knock the ship off the balance. The explosion and the launch were simultaneous.
After recovering from its impact, Holland asked, "Did we get them all?"
"No, the explosion seemed to put the missiles off course. It only disabled about 20 of their ships" reported Woz
"I hate them…" he said "Then get ready for another one then" ordered Holland
"Oh no…" said Woz with an unbelievable voice
"What happened?" asked Holland
"Our EMP launchers were weakened by the last explosion and couldn't handle the recoil"
"What?! What did you say?"
"We are toast" said Moondoggie "Is the Gekko-Go going to end here?"
"Stop saying like that" shouted Holland "I won't let it end like this"
As he thought, he looked at a mine's entrance right below him.
"Leader, our barrier is falling apart" reported Gidget
"Don't worry about that. Ken-Goh point the laser downwards and shoot with maximum power" he ordered
"Are you out of your mind? There is a mine below us, if we do that, then…"
"Don't worry, about the mine. Just point the cannons next to its entrance and fire, the screen from it has to give us some time until we reach the Ray-Line"
"O.K. you're the leader"
"Leader, it's about those L.F.O.'s I am getting their signature" reported Woz
"Who are they? Friends or Foes?"
"The signature is… FAC-51 and FAC-73!"
"FAC series! It is signature of…" thought Holland
He smiled and paused for a moment.
He then asked "Hap, tell me about the Trapar density?"
"It is slightly increasing it is now about 7%"
"Ken-Goh, stop the cannons charging and prioritize the Defense of Gekko-Go for now?"
"What?!"
"Just trust me!"
"Does this mean they are our friends?" asked Gidget
"More than that!" replied Holland
"Then why aren't they contacting us?" asked Gidget again
"You will see"
"Woz, how far are they?" he asked
"Distance doesn't seem to be the matter with these people; they will be here in 3 minutes!"
"Alright, we have to hold on until 3 minutes!"
"Holland, there attacks are getting stronger and stronger. I don't think we can hold on!"
"Put the boosters on the standby mode for now. We will escape as soon as possible"
"But…"
"We will make it. Trust me"
At the same time
"Oh no…This is bad" exclaimed Woz
"What is it now?"
"Two of their ships are approaching us from both sides. It looks like they are planning to collide with us"
"Holland, we can't go either left or right now" reported Hap
"Just a moment, lets hold on a couple more seconds"
"We are not going to make it" said Moondoggie
"Just a couple more seconds"
"Holland, they are here"
"Trust me!"
"Holland!" as he finished speaking; both the ships approached from left and right and detonated before anyone could do anything.