After the Planet Virginia had been pacified, the battalion of Outriders in that valley, in which SunTzu had fought alongside the New Frontier cavalrymen, had been the last heavy resistance on the planet and a few days later the Star Sheriffs and their unofficial fifth member would leave the planet again.
But not before they all had a small dinner at a local taverna on the world.
They had enjoyed a simple but tasty local meal and Fireball and April had soon said their good nights and left. Ramrod and AICA were both parked nearby, the huge mecha-starship dwarving the surrounding buildings.
Saber Rider followed the couple soon, he excused himself as he would check in with HQ about their new assignment, as on Yuma it was morning already, while Colt and SunTzu stayed at the taverna, enjoying a drink.
They were sitting at the bar and SunTzu had a great tasting local Whisky in a tumbler with a single ice cube in it in his hands and slowly sipped the flavorful but stinging liquid. Next to him Colt was drinking a whisky too, his cowboy hat resting prominently on his head.
A holo projector was hanging from the corner, showing the news and SunTzu just had put the tumbler to his lips when he froze from what he saw in the projector.
"Hey Man, could you put that louder?" He asked the barkeeper after setting his glass back and the man shrugged but did so.
"Ey… that's…" Colt yelled out when he saw who was shown in the report but he was cut short from SunTzu, who had read the scrolling text underneath the report.
"Yes… that's her."
Alone her outfit stated two things to him, first it was an important day and that she wanted to be seen and secondly, she was out on her warpath.
Of course she looked absolutely fantastic in this red three-piece suit, the epitome of a Girl Boss.
SunTzu toasted to the woman then took a sip with a smile on his lips while the news anchor reported what she had done.
"Imagine if this really gets proved! It could change everything!" Colt said, not believing what he just had heard. Around them rest of the service personnel in the Taverna now looked at the projector like they were spellbound.
"I always knew that she would find a way to support us in the Senate."
And while the anchor explained the details of the bill, which would greatly enhance the size and effectiveness of the regular Armed Forces by taking away most of the troops, ships and equipment of the Local Security Forces and deploying them back with the regular military, a bill the Senator of Sol had brought in with an incandescent and passionate speech, and which had earned her minute long standing ovations and great praise from all over the Galaxy, SunTzu couldn't help but to smile at the holo image of his former girlfriend, standing there with a firm expression inside the Grand Convocation Chamber.
That's my Rei.
He was so proud of her, she had kept her word and did her part for winning the War in the Senate. It took a lot of courage as young Senator from a new member world to bring in such a bill. But she had done so and the feedback was mostly excellent.
SunTzu had to smile again, when he saw the watch she was wearing on her wrist, a Cartier, black and gold. As if she would have known that he would see this broadcast.
Thank you for doing this for me, Rei. And for all the other warriors fighting for the continuity of this Galaxy.
After the meeting of the Galactic Senate, after talking with what felt like dozens of other Senators, Rei finally had arrived back in her office. She had told Izumi that she didn't want to be disturbed for the next ten minutes.
As soon as she had sat down at her desk she took a deep breather.
She had really done it and brought the bill in with one burning hell of a speech. There had been way more experienced Senators on their side, even more famous ones, like Daala, but she, Rei Hino, Senator of Sol System, had brought that bill in.
Rei really needed a cigarette now but first she had to make two phone calls. The first one was with Yuichiro, her boyfriend telling her how proud he was of her, and the second one was with the Leader of the Free Galaxy.
"Senator of Sol Hino. What can I say? That was most outstanding. I am proud of you, you bravely did what needed to be done."
"Thank you very much, Leia. I still can't believe I really held that speech."
"But you did. You proposed the bill to finally shift power from the local security forces to the Armed Forces of the Galactic Alliance. I might not be on her side often but I'm sure Admiral Daala is proud as well. And you shouldn't be surprised if the Forces' High Command and the Fleet Commanders will personally congratulate you as well. My father as well as my brother send their congratulations already."
Now I really need a cigarette, this is almost too much praise…
Rei needed a moment while she thought about what to reply. Leia gave her a moment but then decided to take over for Rei. "I know this is all a bit overwhelming. But Rei, you earned that on your own, take this win."
"Thank you, Madame Chief of State."
"No, Rei. The Galaxy has to thank you. The first step to finally wake this Galaxy up and make it clear for everybody that this War is the most important ever fought."
"Leia… I… I don't know what to say."
"Just say nothing, Darling. But let me invite you to breakfast tomorrow. We both have to plan our next steps. Say nine?"
"Ye-yeah. Sounds perfect."
"Great, i will send someone to pick you up. Until tomorrow then."
"See you tomorrow Leia, thanks for the kind words."
After hanging up, Rei took another deep breather.
Maybe two cigarettes back to back were okay as well, just this time.
The next day, Ramrod, accompanied by AICA left Virginia and they took course towards the ever-changing front line.
At least that had been the plan, but before the group could jump to light speed the next emergency call came in.
A neighboring planet was dealing with some Outrider attacks.
As fastest available presence the Star Sheriffs got the job to check it out and Ramrod turned about to the nearby planet.
Ramrod sat down at the starport of the capital city soon after and it was decided that Colt, SunTzu and Fireball would investigate the places that got attacked and Saber Rider and April would stay ready as backup if anything should come up.
Three places had been attacked in the last days and so they went to the most recent place that got attacked, a small farmstead.
The inhabitants, a family of five, came out after they saw the famous Red Fury Racer, Fireball's mixture of racing car and wheeled tank, well known all over the New Frontier.
From far away the three officers already could see the remnants of at least three smoldering and smoking wrecks of Outrider Assault Fighters in a nearby agricultural field.
The head of the family and his oldest son were armed but they told their visitors that these three fighters had tried to attack them but before something severe could happen they had exploded, shot down out of nowhere in quick succession and nobody of the family could because of whom.
Without any further clue who saved the family, and soon after the local garrison had sent over a squad, the three heroes left again and moved further to the next closest place that had been attacked, a small village.
The village had actually been the first place that had been attacked and after talking with the local sheriff they learned that when the Outriders attacked, two fighters and lots of infantry, a group of travelers, which had stayed overnight in the city's saloon, had immediately began to engage them.
The battle was short and fiercely fought but because of the four strangers, two women and two men, although leaving quite a lot of collateral damage in the process, nobody in the village was seriously hurt.
But before the villagers could congratulate their saviors they were already gone.
"You guys think, these are the same as from over at that farm?" Fireball asked but his two comrades just shrugged their shoulders.
"Could be. At least these people have enough firepower to stop an Outrider Assault Fighter." SunTzu remarked, looking at the wreck of one of them. Empty Outrider Armor had been piled up by the villagers.
"Quite a lot of vaporized Outriders for four people." Colt commented.
"We should be happy that those four are on our side, then." SunTzu replied.
"Are they really?" Fireball chimed in and motioned towards a huge hole in one of the village's houses, apparently done as collateral damage as it was in the direction the enemy had been coming from.
"Maybe they're just bad shots. Not anybody is such a marksman like i am." Colt shrugged.
"Whatever you ol' drover. Let's check out the next place and see if we can find something out."
The last place, the place that had been attacked between the other two, was a small city, somewhere in the middle of nowhere in a dusty and rocky desert valley.
"Holy Bag of Nails, what in tarnation happened here?" Colt yelled out in surprise as he and SunTzu made a flyover over the city while Fireball entered the main entrance of the settlement.
"I have a guess." Fireball responded as he drove past the destruction and chaos that this part of the city was in. This destruction was not only the work of the Outriders, at least if they hadn't been switching to Scorched Earth Tactics. A whole block of buildings had been leveled. And houses on both sides of the main street showed signs of combat damage.
"AICA, inform the fleet. We'll need engineers and medics down here." SunTzu ordered his ship's AI.
Five minutes later they were talking with the Mayor and the Sheriff of the town. It was a damn miracle nobody had been seriously hurt here as well, except for the dozens of Outriders that had been sent back to the Phantom Zone of course.
Most of the damage had been collateral damage though, caused by the defenders, among them the Sheriff and his deputies as well as some Cowboys. A duo of individuals had stood out though, not only had they taken out most of the Outriders and all their snubs, but also had destroyed the houses while doing so. It hadn't been in bad faith but they're fighting style had been so crazy that it seemed to have drawn chaos and destruction just naturally. Outrider Fighters had crashed into buildings, missile strikes had missed them and hit houses and so on.
Brows furrowed while looking at each other the three Officers of the Galactic Alliance followed the two city official's narration.
"Sir, can you tell us where these two men are now? Or how they look like?" Colt finally asked.
"I'm sorry, they left in a hurry after defeating the Outriders. I don't know where they went." The Mayor said, obviously feeling bad about it.
"They're gone, but I can tell you how they looked like. The men were a pretty unique pair. One of them was a Priest carrying a huge cross around. And I swear that that cross had guns built inside. And the other guy was flashy as heck, had strange spiky blonde hair and a huge red coat on. Strange guys. Oh and before I forget, a few minutes after they left, two women, a smaller one with black hair and the other a tall brunette went after them on mounts." The sheriff then added.
"Yes, they left me a card, told to call there for the damage." The mayor pulled out a business card of an insurance field agent.
SunTzu, Colt and Fireball looked at each other in amused disbelief.
Suddenly SunTzu's communicator sprung to life and AICA called.
"Guys, I don't know if you're done playing detectives already but I got Saber on the line, we're ordered back to the fleet. Looks like they could need our help."
The three friends looked at each other and shrugged their shoulders in unison. Help for the reconstruction of the city was on the way and the quartet they were searching had gone into the desert. There was not much left they could do here anyways. It was time to go.
A few moments later they were back in their cockpits and started their engines, about to get back to Ramrod and then head off to Space.
"A priest with a huge Cross that can shoot."
"And a guy in a red coat with a strange hairdo. What the fuck?"
"Yeah, you can say that again. The New Frontier sure has it's share of freaks. Must be the heat and that dust everywhere."
Thousands of light years away, a young king, next to his also young, and dearly beloved, Queen, was in an important meeting regarding the next steps of their kingdom, lead by it's Queen, and it's military, lead by the King.
And even the always so calm, sometimes even cold, appearing Endymion needed all his will of strength to calm himself down to not jump over the table and smack the Chief Officer of Crystal Tokyo around.
Everything had been either already paid or it's payment had been secured, from the new equipment, to the training and pay of the soldiers, why Umino still needed to talk that long about the financial expects of the new deployment of Taskforce Sol? And why he had to discuss every bill in detail, the Galaxy was at stake here, the Kingdom was richer than ever before, it's economy booming, and even Coruscant and the UN, or rather the Earth's nations, had sent subventions to built up Taskforce Sol as main Expeditionary Force of the Sol System?
Suddenly Endymion noticed Serenity II.'s gentle touch of soft fingers on his hand.
While Umino got lost in a lengthy explanation over some expense factors, Serenity leaned in.
"Don't be mad at him. You know it's his job and he takes it serious." And then, hushed by her other hand in front of her mouth, he heard that certain giggle, that one that every time he heard it made him fall in love with her again. "And I think he's nervous because of Naru's new position."
That said Serenity squeezed Endymion's hand again and looked at the person next to Umino, Umino's wife, Naru Gurio and gave her a wink to what the other woman replied with a smile.
Endymion's mood had changed, his wife was right. And he knew he should fix his mind on other things than being annoyed by lengthy cabinet meetings, in a few day an enlarged Taskforce Sol would disembark and get back into the fight. The fight to save the Galaxy.