[Episode 132148] [Episode 132148]In retrospect, it was a near thing. When gravity wells and Warp/Fold drives interacted, it generally wasn't pretty, and this was no exception. The outer planets had all manner of oddities, and this invasion was from some other system altogether; the same folks that created SDF-01 in the first place, apparently. To a man just now coming face to face with the reality that mankind wasn't alone (and that the neighbors were assholes), the urge to fall back before trying a Fold was understandable, seeing as no one had ever taken the time to explain to Capt. Henry Gloval exactly why Folds were never meant for a gravity well.
However, none of that was known by the Zentraedi ship commander. The commander figured that these odd beings were seeking a honorable demise, and being a entity of honor, he decided to oblige. Not like Zor's ship won't survive, just because it'll kill the crew, so why not? he thought calmly even as he ordered "Fire a gravity mine and detonate it as they begin Fold operations! We'll track and salvage the ship after it re-emerges. Wherever that is, we'll track it down again."
The lesser officers knew the commander was overstepping his bounds, but also knew they'd be the ones to suffer if they stopped him. Also, no one had told people this low in rank just how intact they needed Zor's ship, so they went ahead and fired it.
The mine dropped down, seemingly just another object falling down to Earth from the raging battle in the upper ionosphere. It almost fell too far to be a factor when Gloval's order to Fold was executed, in fact.
Almost.
The battle raged on. Dingo was extremely pissed. Bad enough he'd been resurrected to ride a flying bomb, but learning that that jackass Nohman had planned it that way in hopes of annihilating the entirety of humanity, well! He continued to Zero-Shift, using the teleporting tactic to offset any advantage the design of Anubis afforded.
It was coming to a head, and even with this tactic he was taking fairly severe damage. However, Anubis was hanging on by a thread. Hold on! Just a little longer! In this conflict, various nightmares had come to light for those involved, so it was understandable one more would rear its head. Tragic, but understandable.
As in other times and places, one person butting in made the difference. A member of BAHRAM to be precise in this case. He'd managed (before getting killed by Dingo) to plant a fairly nasty self-destruct device on Anubis, one that would only go active should the frame be used actively against the interests of the dominating organization.
As Nohman and Dingo dueled to seemingly assured mutual destruction, Nohman's explanations had been recorded on Anubis' on-board computer. While it was nowhere near as advanced as ADA, it was advanced enough to note the connotations, and that in turn activated the small Metatron bomb in a main processor bank.
Shame it happened in one of the energy nexus zones of the Auumon doomsday device.
The chain reaction was too fast to see when it happened, and only ADA could even take note, much less act, as it raised the shield function. Thus the killing pulse didn't take out Dingo. It was attenuated and weak to start with from being ignited more than detonated, but it was still sufficient to rend local space, and definitively end all life on Mars. Leo Stenbuck, the BAHRAM forces, the Martian colonists, the remaining Space Force, all were caught up in less time than a man could blink. They never knew what hit them. Nohman was of course killed when the device on Anubis went off in the first place. As for Auumon and Orbital Frame Jehuty, no survivor ever saw them again. They disappeared from the universe in the cataclysm, and are officially noted as lost.
Captain Henry Gloval shook his head. It had seemed like all his world had been spindled, folded, and put thru the wringer. Fold drive, indeed! "Lieutenant Hayes, report on our position. What's our situation?"
Lisa shook off her own shock and soldiered on. "Sensors coming online, we're ..Captain! We're, we" Her voice failed her, and Captain Gloval knew that was a REALLY bad sign. He watched with a premonition of chaos as Lieutenant Hayes' friend Claudia Grant looked over Lisa's shoulder and shuddered. Then he went into a bit of shock in his own right, as Lisa forced herself into speech.
"We're apparently in the cometary cloud of our solar system. There are no attackers, just two large masses aside from us and the comets. The first is a inactive artifact, looks quite different from our attackers. The second is ..Oh god!"
Captain Gloval stood silently and checked for himself, dignity be damned. His order got them here, and he was not one to shuck responsibility. What he saw appalled and flabbergasted him. The sensor suite's image was quite clear. Aside from that device, Installation of some sort, pretty well trashed, but useful I suspect. there was also a large white mass. Macross Island and quite a bit of the surrounding ocean had evidently made the trip with them! "Hayes! Pull yourself together and get teams out there! The shelters were made to survive a revival of the Nuke war, there's probably survivors!" As Lisa started, then promptly proved her worth in getting things rolling, he followed the order by turning to Claudia. "Grant, the Fold system did something very unintended. Ascertain the condition of SDF-01 and have a report to me as to what the blazes just happened to me. Yesterday!"
To the remaining bridge staff he ordered "Stay alert! We've certainly shaken off pursuit, but it may be only a temporary respite. We need to be on guard until we can attempt another Fold, once we've ironed out what happened this time." And thus life (as much as could be expected) went on.
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(Posted Thu, 17 Feb 2005 20:27)
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