Skysaber's Choice

Part Sixteen

by Jared Ornstead

=====

Shampoo twirled the wrench around her finger in imitation of her mentor 
before she began putting the final touches on the veritech transformation 
joint, built from scratch using machinery only to make the parts. Cologne 
looked up, all greasy and sweaty from having installed the protoculture 
engine.
The pair of amazons looked on as the rest of the girls raced on past the 
entrance to their hangar, on the testing field, using their new 
transformable hovercycles.
"Shampoo, does it ever strike you that it is taking us a bit long to 
catch up?"
"Yes Cologne, it does." Shampoo wiped the sweat from her brow and 
returned the handkerchief to the front pocket of her coveralls, then she 
grinned. "We'll still defeat them all in sparring, though."
"True." The only slightly older seeming teenage Cologne murmured. "Yet 
they beat us in both magic and technology. I'm thinking we need an edge 
to get more time with our husband."
Shampoo's grin turned into a pout. She flopped forward onto the fuselage 
of the fighter she and her elder had worked on, cuddling her head on her 
arms. "Shampoo wish *she* could be Sailor Scout."
Cologne grinned at the old quote, hearkening back to speech patterns the 
young girl no longer had. "Patience, Shampoo. They gained their power 
some way. Reincarnated or not at SOME point someone bestowed on them 
their powers. If we are watchful perhaps Fate will hand us an 
opportunity."
"Fate or our husband." Shampoo corrected, picking up her wrench again 
and putting another bolt in place.
"Yes, child, I place high hopes in him too."

Jared sat in an authentic replication of the Silver Moon Palace, looking 
out a window to the Earth. By now each of the girls knew enough about 
dreams that they could visit him easily in spite of the intervening 
distance, but the location itself was required for his studies.
He looked back at the book on Silver Moon magic that he'd been reading. 
It was one of thousands of like volumes without referencing or indexes, 
so he was having to read them all, one at a time.
There was nothing like a basic primer, unfortunately. It seemed someone 
either knew nothing or they were forced to become an expert. No wonder 
they'd set up the spells and magic powers of the Scouts to be 
instinctual! Also unfortunately, without a good background in the basic 
principles he was sure he was missing details and would have to reread a 
good part of what he'd already covered once those principles began to 
sink in.
It was comparable to learning how to run a computer by first learning 
how to build one. It wasn't any fun because the material *didn't* pull 
any punches on the terminology. It promised to be a real headache before 
it was through.
He wondered if Queen Serenity had ever read these books.

"And that's a wrap!" Lita caroled, as the rest of the girls left the 
set, tired but satisfied. So far they'd all had plays, musical numbers, 
and individual performances, but this was their first full length motion 
picture. It was exhausting and exhilarating to have it completed, and 
they all began to strip out of their costumes.
Mina paused in removing her wig to see Jared taking the film out of 
their camera. "Jay-chan, you never told us what that was for. This is all 
a dream, right? So what's the use in recording any of it?"
He shrugged. "Yes, it's a dream, but the whole purpose of dream magic is 
to blur the line between them and reality. I was able to create replicas 
of books in my possession that I had not yet read, I have hopes to be 
able to do something with this as well.
³It ought to be quite a picure.² Lita said with a smirk. ³Weıve had all 
of the expensive sets and special effects we could dream up.²
³True...² The Mage admitted.
They were swept off by maidens bearing buckets of popcorn to watch the 
movie theyıd just completed.

------------

Grey put down the parts carefully and seemed to be staring intensely at 
the ground.
After a long interval of this, Kasumi and Nabiki gave up all pretense of 
ignoring the (hentai?) cyborg.
"What's wrong, cyborg-san?" The twins asked in a curious chorus.
"It's been five minutes with no movement. They're still in the cave, i'm 
picking up heartbeats and respiration..." The cyborg seemed to come to a 
decision with a weary and oddly human sigh.
"Something's wrong with Jay-chan?" Kasumi unconsciously used the same 
term she'd heard the other girls using.
"At first, i thought it was something he'd done. Some sort of spell. But 
maybe it's some subterranean youma." Grey now was weighing options. He 
could dig a tunnel, the most obvious method of getting to the place. Ten 
minutes tops, even though it was quite deep. This cyborg body had its 
drawbacks but strength, speed, and endurance were phenomenal when he 
needed them to be. The other possibility was using the D-Hopper for a 
short jaunt. It *might* work, or it might throw him halfway across the 
planet. Or he might even end up in Asgard, which would be nice except 
that he had to do a rescue. Possibly.
A shovel was produced from a few pounds of scrap aluminum, and the 
cyborg blurred as he chose an out of the way area and quickly began a 
spiraling slope that took him downwards. What he could do against 
something that could stop the Sailor Senshi *and* the Pheonix Mage, he 
wasn't sure, but what else could he do?
Behind him, two girls timidly looked down the shaft, ducking the 
occasional shovelful of dirt.
"It doesn't look particularly safe," opined Nabiki.
"Not at all," agreed Kasumi. "We shouldn't go down. We have a job to do 
up here."
"Right," seconded Nabiki, beginning to go down the ramp noting that the 
cyborg was using his laser on a wide beam dispersal to seal the soil into 
a hot stone every few feet. "And this is way too hot for us to follow him 
anyway. I can feel this through my shoes."
Kasumi hummed and followed her sister. "Yes, much too dangerous."

------------

Malachite appeared in a swirl of cloak before Queen Beryl. "My Queen... 
there may be a problem."
"What is of such consequence that you come before me like this, 
Malachite?"
Malachite winced at the tone of voice his Queen had used. Not a good 
sign, still if he didn't tell her now what he suspected, it would go 
WORSE on him later. "The Pheonix Mage gathers allies."
"We are aware of this, Malachite." Queen Beryl frowned at a commercial 
showing the new Malachite doll. Apparently someone at that race track had 
kept a camcorder running even while being attacked. Must have been 
Japanese...
"One I strongly suspect was another of the Scouts... the other..." 
Malachite frowned. "I attacked as soon as I suspected but I think Nebula 
may have returned."
"The Knight of Duty?" Queen Beryl looked up from her globe, losing 
interest in the commercial for Pheonix Mage brand Squid-flakes! except to 
note that she'd attack that factory, drawing the Pheonix Mage to it (the 
commercial had a cartoon version of him saying you can't start the 
morning without squid flakes!), then arrange for his capture. A perfect 
plan. Except for this... "It is of no consequence."
Malachite blanched. The Scouts were a bunch of children playing with 
their elemental powers. He could dismiss them easily. The Pheonix Mage 
was a canny mage and warrior, whom he'd have to battle again. The 
Devilhunter was an unknown, but Malachite dismissed him as being a child 
and someone who had grown up in a weak environment. Nebula, though, 
Nebula had been a career soldier. A lot like that guy Aradicus. Tough, 
implacable, and if you hurt someone he cared about- a merciless killer 
you wouldn't know was coming until your chest exploded. Malachite 
couldn't believe children posturing and making speeches were a credible 
threat. A cold and remorseless assassin who didn't care if he died as 
long as he killed YOU, that was a horse of a different color.
Nebula had earned Malachite's respect as a soldier and warrior back in 
the Silver Millennium, even more than Eternal Bennu. Bennu had been 
tricky and many times more powerful than Nebula. Nebula, once he got the 
idea that something was his duty, would become completely absorbed 
towards that goal. Malachite understood Nebula more than Bennu, and it 
was that understanding that sent a cold shiver of fear through him.
"No consequence at all..." Queen Beryl had already turned her attention 
towards... oooh! The Devilhunter had been photographed wearing a Nuku 
Nuku t-shirt? "Malachite! I have another mission for you. Before the Mage 
attracts THIS minion, you will eliminate her!"
Malachite frowned. He was being sent after some ditzy-looking pink 
haired girl? Well, it was better than watching the Queen play with her 
dolls at least. 
"By your command."

------------

"Are you sure all this is really necessary?" Rae asked, dressed in 
animal furs as she left her cave for the weekly visit to Jared's cave.
"Unfortunately, yes." He handed her a scroll. "I know western magic, 
however I am not a western mage. The way I was taught was a hermitage to 
get close to nature, studying scrolls my master gave me. If it helps any 
you're getting a first rate magical education. Most instructors haven't a 
fraction as strong a grasp of magic as I have, and few who do give any 
personal attention."
Her eyes sparkled rebelliously. "I'm your *wife!* You better give me 
attention!"
He coughed into a hand. "Not what I meant. Anyway, let's discuss what 
you learned this week. I'll answer any questions you may have. Then I'm 
afraid Serena is going to be coming by for *her* lesson."
Rae blinked at him. "How's *she* standing up to this?"
Jared caught her gaze and shook his head in wonder. "It's all a game to 
her, and one she's surprisingly *good* at! She's well ahead of the rest 
of you and I'd be surprised if she doesn't graduate soon."
Rae's eyes melted kindly. "And then she'll make you take her on another 
trip through Candyland, I'll bet."
"True enough." He nodded. "But look at it his way. It normally take 
*years* for a student to learn to wield magic. Here you're all doing it 
in one night."
"It still *feels* like years." The perky brunette grumped, not happy 
about all of the primitive living conditions they had to endure.
He gave her a smooch. "Yes, but I love you."
She melted instantly. That made it alright. They spread out the scroll 
she'd studied last week and began to go over it, then snuggled.

Crackle! *BOOM!*
Everyone looked to where Lita had just been struck by a first class 
lightning bolt, then their gazes immediately tracked over to Shampoo. "I 
didn't throw it!" The bouncy amazon immediately and reflexively defended. 
She'd learned magic, however her control was as bad as her martial arts 
were good.
Serena crossed over to where the crisped Lita was fading in and out of 
view. "Moon Healing Activation!"
Jared smiled in recognition of her achievement as Serena went through 
the standard windup without the Crescent Moon Wand and began to repair 
the harm to Lita's dream self. They hadn't had any of the standard tools 
to help her go through her attacks, so Serena had surprisingly risen to 
the occasion and reached deep within herself to learn to do without them. 
Jared was beginning to suspect that Silver Moon magic was engraved on her 
genes.
"What happened? What was that? Jay-chan?"
Jared sighed and ducked his head, hiding a frown. He'd actually grown 
used to this, but now... He raised his face and met his ladies' confused 
and apprehensive stares. "Good news. Someone's trying to rescue us. The 
bad news is that it's *not* a mage and they're trying an electric shock. 
That was just Lita's dream interpretation of the effects her body just 
suffered. It was probably quite mild, unless we're in some bad guy's 
clutches 'cause they found us first. But somehow I doubt that. Anyway, 
we're not able to do much about it."
He fashioned a wry grin. "Sometime next week we ought to see our next 
effect like that, and I suspect that soon we'll learn one way or the 
other."
Amy's eyes were wide with fear. "Jay-chan, if this *is* a rescue, will 
we remember any of this? We won't forget when we wake up, will we?"
The archmage fashioned a reassuring smile for her. "Don't worry, Amy 
darling. While fighting a guy named the Lord of Nightmares I learned how 
to blur the line between reality and dreams. We'll remember *everything*."
"I certainly *hope* so!" Lita cried.
"Yeah," Mina put her two bits in. "Otherwise we'll have done all that 
schoolwork and studying for nothing!"
The rest laughed, but Amy took Jared's hand. "Good. I just wouldn't want 
to forget this time we've had with you."
"Mushy stuff." Serena told her friend Holly, who just nodded and 
continued to drink her milkshake. Marriage seemed to make grown ups all 
weird, though mark her words, SHE still intended to do it someday, just 
not now.

They all sat in the briefing room while Susan went through her papers at 
the stand. It took only a moment for her to bring technical schematics up 
on the display board. "Since our graduation, having mastered all the 
Macross era mecha, Jay-chan has asked that I introduce us to this machine 
for our Southern Cross segment: The AJACS Veritech Helicopter."
She brushed a lock of long green hair out of her eyes. 
"The wartime life of the AJACS veritech copter was extremely short. It 
was rushed into production halfway through the Second Robotech War and 
many complained it had the look and feel of a design not yet completed. 
It has only two modes (battloid and helicopter) and many aspects of the 
design seem very rough.
"The AJACS is a specialized space fighting machine. The project failed 
when it was pointed out that there is no aspect of its design: speed, 
armor, versatility or payload, that is superior to the VF-1 veritechs it 
was supposed to supplant. A short production cycle and high combat losses 
make the AJACS rare indeed. Not that many mourned this shortage."
The board continued to show running schematics of the vehicle as she 
talked.

"Beautiful!!!" A dozen gushy hearted young ladies watched with ice 
skates still in their hands as Jared traced an incredibly complex dance 
of wonder and delight on the ice.

Michelle stepped up to the podium and began her lecture.
"The airforce of the Southern Cross was made up of Logans. Fast, 
modestly armed and agile they were intended to be given generous ground 
support when caught in long engagements, as their armor was exceedingly 
light."
She made a pout. "And we'll all have to learn to use the tinfoil things."
There came a groan from her audience.

Susan approached Jared when the group was hot tubbing.
Crackle! *THOOM!!*
Serena and Holly both raced over to the tub full of smoldering Lita. 
Holly got to her first and began to cry out. "Saturn Healing Escalation!"
"Jay-chan, may I ask a little of your history? I know nothing of this 
sort occurred in our world's past. Only when you arrived you didn't know 
it either. I know you didn't learn this in the Moon Kingdom. So where?"
Jared shrugged, pulling her down into the water with him. "One of the 
random magic effects I was subject to caused a space cruiser to crash on 
the moon while I was there. Our ever-good-intentioned, yet bumbling Queen 
got in trouble inside there, and unable to rely on my own magic at the 
time, I made a wish for the power to defeat what was threatening her." He 
put an arm around her. "So I got merged with a character I'd once played 
from the game that cruiser would fit into from my home world's 
perspective. That's how I got all of the technology I know. Well, 
*almost* all."
Susan snuggled more comfortably against his side."You know a little more 
than your average foot soldier. Do you know where this character got that 
skill?"
The redhead smirked. "Yes, actually, this is one of the few characters 
that I'd ever prepared a history for. Kind of odd, really, as I'd never 
bothered to give him a name, only a callsign."
"Callsign?" Helen echoed, joining them in the tub with a floating dish 
containing three ice creams. Holly and Serena immediately dove in and 
grabbed two. Jared smiled as he summoned two more for himself and Susan.
"White Angel. After the Mars campaign I had some dimensional hijinks and 
then got transferred to Jupiter when I got back. Unfortunately, we'd 
broken their backs at Mars. The enemy *tried* to bounce back, and it was 
interesting for a while, but they just were never as challenging. I got  
a squadron named after me: Angel Squadron, but with it came the hint that 
the rest would be downhill until I retired from off a desk job, which is 
a horrible thing to do to a combat pilot."
"So what was your childhood like?" Michelle found her way to the tub and 
squirmed herself into his unclaimed side. It was turning into a major 
snuggle fest in there as Helen lifted and began to massage his feet.
He sat back and enjoyed it, but noticed they were now surrounded by a 
small field of young ladies giving them their sole attention, wanting to 
hear his answers. He cast Body Outside Body again and had his extra 
doubles give the unattended ladies backrubs and warm arms while he 
answered, feeling like a total hedonist as he felt himself through his 
doubles perform the physically impossible feat of snuggling with all of 
them at once!
"Ahhh, that feels *so* nice! Ahem... I was born on the North American 
continent just days before the breakout of the Global War. My father was 
killed in the early battles and my mother, who was a scientist, took me 
with her wherever she went. Wanting to do the best for me, she divided 
our day into three parts: eight hours for work, eight hours for play, and 
eight hours for sleep. As a direct result, most of my formative years 
were as much labs and scientific company as they were playgrounds and 
other kids."
The mage freed one of his hands to summon an illusion, showing them the 
downed Robotech spacecraft of alien design and origin that the earth 
forces would rename the SDF-1, and the island on which that spacecraft 
rested. "When I was six my mother and I moved to Macross Island so she 
could contribute her genius to deciphering the riddle of the alien 
spaceship whose crash had stopped the Global War. Security was tight and 
so I rarely got into the labs, instead I was handed off to a military 
sergeant who had NO idea what to do with kids, and so not knowing much 
else he could do he began to teach us all his martial art: Flying Tiger 
style kung fu. Most of the kids weren't interested and when the military 
airlifted in some play equipment they never looked back, but I was 
*fascinated* and became a devoted student. I even graduated beyond the 
simple punches and katas into some degree of mastery, to where the old 
soldier agreed to pass on the hidden techniques of his dying art."
"Why was it a dying art?" Mina asked with a gaze of open affection as 
she chomped hungrily on a pocky stick.
Jared shrugged. "He'd never agreed to teach anyone else. I guess he saw 
us kids as his last chance, but he never told me why he did it. Anyway, 
back to my mother. Since she trusted me absolutely we spent our evenings 
together discussing all of her work. She said that my familiarity with 
all of the scientific terms and devices, and the insights of a fresh, 
young mind, allowed her to solve many problems the other researchers were 
pulling their hair out over. Also, since she disagreed with overworking 
herself, she had the energy of being more relaxed, and I know for a fact 
that she was one of the most effective scientists working at the 
technology, though she never did get all the prestige or acknowledgment. 
Dr. Lang stole credit for her work more than once. Mom never did excel in 
all of the political and backbiting side of things. She always said that 
the more scientists you gather together, the less they know. She called 
it the Aggregate of Stupidity principle;that all those men hunting after 
awards or seeking positions were not trying to establish truth, merely 
those positions, and once you lose the quest for truth you are no 
scientist. She wasn't well regarded by her colleges for saying so. 
However true it was, they didn't want to hear it."
"The same is true for all sorts of people, not just scientists." 
Michelle observed.
"Sad, yet true." He sighed. "Well anyway, the martial arts kept me from 
getting too cerebral, and all of those experiences growing up, with all 
of the discussions and the rare lab work, combined with much more 
frequent use of the less-security-intensive labs, gave me the equivalent 
of several PHD's and an understanding of Robotechnology not easy to find. 
As the project grew the base grew, and as more men moved in and brought 
their families competition for a social life got pretty fierce, and 
military pilots had the lion's share of it. So I became an amateur pilot 
just to compete. I already had few enough friends and in a chaotic 
situation like that base was they kept moving or getting shifted around 
and I always had to be able to make new ones. Losing any social status 
would've been crippling, and I was already something of an oddball from 
my martial arts dedication and technical expertise. I had to do 
*something* to fit in."
"You mean you were a GEEK!??" Serena asked in horror. It couldn't be 
true of HER big brother, could it?
He playfully ruffled her hair. "Nobody likes to be dumb, Serena. And 
people who are looking usually want to find people who are like them to 
be friends with. I wasn't much like anyone around me, and so I tried to 
gain a skill which could form bonds."
Serena quieted, mollified. She didn't understand totally, but trusted it 
must be okay. Maybe it was *everyone else* that was weird! Her brother 
had to be perfect!
Jared shrugged. "I was fourteen when the opening ceremonies that were to 
have launched the refurbished SDF-1 were interrupted by aliens that 
arrived to take the ship back by force, and didn't mind wiping out a 
planet to do it. Since we were on that planet we had rather a bit of an 
objection to those plans. My mother's quarters by that time were all 
inside the battlefortress, so we had first row seats to that formative 
battle and war that ensued."
He was now surrounded by a rapt little audience that were making all of 
those little appreciative noises that said he had their full attention. 
In fact the way Mina and Rae were cuddling with their copies of him they 
were acting like teenagers at an exciting show at the movies.
He looked at his full motion illusion and realized that's what it was.
Pinking a trifle from the  realization that he was usually less in 
control than he thought he was, Jared went on. "The SDF-1 made a space 
fold to get some breathing space away from the enemy armada, and not 
understanding the technology all that well we ended up taking the island 
with us. We could rebuild the tech, only we'd never used it. It should 
not be surprising that our theories were close but a little off. We were 
lucky the consequences were no worse than that and loosing the fold 
device."
He shrugged, but his smile was alight with mischief. "As it was, 
everybody became so supremely busy they were a great deal less cautious 
about security clearances. The city was rebuilt in the empty bays at the 
center of the battlefortress, and as all of the real brains were busy on 
other tasks I wound up the chief problem solver for that whole project." 
Here the Mage twiddled his fingers a bit. "And, I uh, made some mistakes, 
too. I forgot to place the whole thing in such a way as to be out of the 
way of modular shifts. So later when they transformed the battlefortress 
to compensate for battle damage I had to start redesigning things because 
parts of the city got crushed." His ears pinked as he admitted to more. 
"It wouldn't have been so bad if it weren't for the fact that I'd 
forgotten to calculate for a teeny weeny error in the modularization and 
exposed the whole city to open space for a second or two in the middle 
there."
The blush eased as Jared went on. "Anyway, my mom got to help Dr. Lang 
in the deepest labs, and she was instrumental in converting his theories 
for a force field defense screen into a functional reality. Though *he* 
messed up on the implementation and got it so the main gun shut down 
whenever the force field system went on. Lucky the people on the bridge 
had some brains or that one would'a gotten us all very dead because we 
only found that out in a situation where we needed them both, and 
obviously the enemy wasn't about to sit back and let us debug the whole 
thing. Mom and I had a work around set up within two days but Dr. Lang 
sat on it and I don't think that it *ever* got implemented. That man was 
*SO* obsessed with not looking bad. It was easier for him to say 'it will 
never work right, that is the limits of the system' than to admit he'd 
screwed up on design. I know alot more about this because trained lab 
assistants were in short supply and no one was too busy checking security 
badges, so I got to learn stuff about Robotechnology that only a handful 
of *really* top ranking scientists ever got to touch, and most of them 
misunderstood it."
Amy giggled, then gladly nodded. "Yah, I know. I've been there. Showing 
up stuffy scientists, I mean." They shared a gaze that was triumphant in 
knowing they'd bested the best of the best.
Embarrassment forgotten, he forged on. "Sum it all up and I was in an 
ideal place to be involved in the greatest stage of the war. 
Opportunities were endless. I was the only trained pilot I know of who 
wasn't involved in any fighting those days, youth having spared me from 
any combat duties. I wasn't even a member of the defense forces, but 
hanging around the labs as I did I frequently found myself yanked from 
one project or another 'cause the guys working on the fighting machines 
desperately needed someone to try them out. It was mostly veritechs, 
because they were taking the brunt of all the combat and needed all the 
upgrades we could give them, so I was the test pilot for all sorts of 
systems. Dry testing inside the base, mostly, or at least at first. 
Though I got my first kill when we were putting the first Super Veritech 
through its paces and a surprise attack caught me outside the fortress. 
I'm sure the military would've grabbed me then, but I was well suited 
where I was and mom defended my right to stay. The scientists were all 
caught up in their theories, and whenever it came time to try out a new 
control system for this or that fighting platform I was both handy and 
skilled, increasingly so as the assignments grew in complexity and scope."
He shared with them a fond smile. "You know, it didn't start like that. 
At first I was just the handy body to fling into the seat of a mecha 
because I didn't have to be looking at all of the external readouts. They 
wanted to see if any of the joints were constrained and told me to move 
around a bit. They told me to walk, and after a while out of sheer 
boredom I began putting the thing through some of my martial arts katas. 
This turned out to be ideal, working so well as testing material it 
earned me a permanent place in the labs without having to stay out of the 
guards' views as I scampered in and out so long as I agreed to pilot test 
mecha. So of course I did, and over time became the very first warm body 
in the seat of armored and super veritechs, not counting the dozens of 
designs that didn't make it."
Jared took a big sigh and concluded. "I was sixteen and a devoted Minmei 
fan when the time came for the defense forces to meet the main force of 
Zentraedi in what was to be our final battle. Everyone who was able to 
fit was put in the cockpit of a veritech for that fight, including me. A 
ton of people didn't make it home again. I did." He shook his head sadly 
at the memories. "After that, the battlefortress was ruined, being forced 
to make a desperate landing in a lake on the Earth. Research was cut to 
zilch, so when I officially joined the RDF expecting a science slot I 
instead got sent into veritechs. They put me through basic, then I got 
assigned to a super secret special ops group, with a satellite base 
hidden among the wreckage floating around the planet. I didn't stay long, 
as my unit was sent immediately to Mars. After that I can't tell you."
"What happened to your mother?" Michelle inquired, concern in her voice.
His eyes were moist. "I never saw her again after I joined up. I hear 
she got busy with the rebuilding. Only I got so tied up in absolutely 
secret events up on Mars that they didn't let me out much, and I gather 
with her it was the same, different emphasis probably." He smiled 
obscurely. "This is a dream and I'm still not able to tell you about it."
"What was her name?" Susan asked in a deeply heartfelt way that had the 
redhead answering before he'd given any thought to it.
"Nodoka Saotome."
Jared made a weird expression as he tried to stare at his mouth as if it 
had betrayed him. He blinked in confusion several times. "Now that's odd. 
I'd never given her a name in the game. I wonder if this has something to 
do with the merger?"
Susan smiled enigmatically. "Perhaps it's the truth only now coming to 
light."
Jared blinked at her, wondering what she meant.

Holly wiped the sweat from her brow and continued gardening, as the 
sounds of fighting came from elsewhere in the Amazon village.
"Hentai! Why weren't you looking at me in the nude?"
"But I..?"
WHAM!
Mina wandered by wearing a towel, dragging an unconscious Pheonix Mage 
with one hand while she toted an impressively large war club in the 
other. "I swear. The effort that it takes to get a little attention when 
a girl feels the urge..."
Holly looked aside to Lita, who was gardening with her. The older girl 
giggled and said something about 'third time today she got the urge.' 
Holly only just shook her head and wondered if Serena would be interested 
in a chocolate fudge sunday later. Then corrected herself, and began to 
hurry lest the younger girl ate it all before she could get there.

Amy cleared her throat.
"The combat philosophy of the Southern Cross had multiple independent 
forces acting in concert employing highly specialized mecha. It did not 
work nearly as well in use as they had designed it in theory. The logans 
and battloid forces, deemed more than sufficient against a zentraedi-like 
mecha army, were torn to pieces in battles against the Robotech Masters' 
more highly advanced Bioroids.
"It was on this battlefield that the hovertank proved its worth. More 
flexible than the majority of SC designs, and more powerful as well. The 
hovertank proved a near invincible foe. With an entirely energy based 
weapons arsenal they had no problems with resupply, it was even taken 
into space to do battle with the motherships, even though theyıd had to 
adapt them to do space battle. Once again proving that cheapness of 
construction was not a factor the earth forces should concern themselves 
with when designing their defensive structure.
³Of the enitre Second Robotech War, the only mecha to survive in 
quantity or be remembered with any fondness was this massively armored 
tank. This in spite of some flaws put in by short-sighted designers 
working off incorrect assumptions, like the availability of support mecha 
limiting its own need for versatility. But in spite of those, it has a 
massive gun and great survivability."
Amy glowed at her audience. ³And we get to try it out!²

"Can I ask you a question, dear?" Cologne asked. 
³Hmm?² Jared focused his attention on her.
³Just where did you pick up your knowledge of...²
Jared stared at where Cologne had been. Where had she gone?

------------
Real World, several moments earlier:

Grey frowned. Voltage hadn't worked, and it was safest to try a quick 
jolt to Lita. Inside his chest was a micro-fusion generator that 
maintained power to a number of his systems. It was relatively easy to 
take an external hookup and rig a damper to regulate the voltage down to 
what he thought Lita could handle.
There was an impressive amount of magic here. That much he could tell 
just by the rainbow sheen of light cascading across all of the frozen 
bodies.
Magic wasn't his department, and had never been his specialty. That 
still left a few options. The next one was the same drug injector system 
he'd used to give Shampoo a dose of Sleepy-Bye earlier. He had a number 
of useful things, though he wasn't sure what they'd do exactly as Urd had 
worked on them, stating that this was an opportunity for experimentation 
she couldn't pass up.
"What are..." Kasumi touched the Mage, intending to just wake him up. 
She slumped to the ground, acquiring the same rainbow sheen to her flesh.
"Kasumi!" Nabiki grabbed her sister before she could hit the ground. 
Nabiki gave a puzzled moan and slumped, also gaining her own small light 
show.
"Great," Grey said, catching the two and laying them out next to the 
Mage. Crossing over to Cologne, he thought he'd try a quick injection 
into her. Maybe any weird effects would be negated by Cologne if she was 
awake, and she might have a better idea of what would be needed.
Grabbing her arm in his left hand, Grey commanded the online system to 
bring up a dose of "StimFast!" and inject it into the Amazon Matriarch. 
Similar in effect to a NATO dose of "Hot Shot" - if this didn't get the 
patient moving it was time to call the coroner.
Cologne spasmed and gasped and twisted. Her eyes shot open and rolled up 
in their sockets. Worried, Grey grasped her shoulders and held her down. 
It wouldn't do to have her recover but injure herself from the side 
effects of the cure.
Cologne felt herself being restrained as she came out of the dreamscape. 
She reacted appropriately, finding a nearby breaking point and using it 
then hurling her attacker into the wall.
Grey tried picking himself up, but as servos failed he caught himself 
and stared for a moment at the ragged hole that now occupied his vacant 
chest cavity. As his system shut down it did it with what sounded like a 
deep and heavy sigh. (It has been said (by Edema) that Grey has as many 
sighs as Soun has wails and Nabiki has smirks. There is some truth to 
this. This was the weary "oh heck, again..." sigh.)
"Oh..." Cologne said, realizing what had happened. She felt like 
chastising the fellow for manhandling a woman of Amazon birth, but he 
*had* apparently succeeded in waking her up, and the poor fellow was in 
no condition to notice in any case.
Eyes flitting about the room, Cologne caught a blanket and tied it 
around her, then caught a brief skip over to the Pheonix mage and lightly 
touched his side.
"GAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!" The Mage leapt seven feet straight up from 
lying supine on his back, then turned about in mid air and landed on the 
balls of his feet as a reflex before the shock had even faded.
He shook his head as if to still it. "Now I get the impression I know 
what an overdose of caffeine feels like. Make that a MASSIVE overdose, or 
perhaps just a trifle less than replacing all the blood in my system with 
cola. But I'm basing that off rumors and couldn't tell for certain."
Cologne chucked, then clutched him tightly as the wound up magical 
energies of the ever-growing Sleep spell came loose. The Mage had 
gathered all the girls into his own dreamscape. When he was ejected it 
had also brought out all the people gathered into his dream. The magic 
erupted and struck the nearest grounding agent. This happened to be a 
heavily armored cyborg. 
Heavily armored bits rained down around the room as the girls sat up. 
Nabiki was rubbing her head and complaining about wanting another month 
in the Bahamas. Jared took note of the position of everyone, and the 
empty blanket set apart where he'd *first* gone to sleep, and mentioned 
something about Dimension Dooring in his sleep again, while he shook his 
head and crossed over the floor to the ruins of the cyborg.
Cologne smirked, tucking the blanket about her more tightly. "Now girls, 
you *may* want to all get dressed. We are no longer alone."
Thee were several Eeeps and mass scrambling for clothes, stopped when 
Susan halted in the midst of pulling her skirt on. Amy blushed to her 
toes, but joined the others in engaging in a brief moment of personal 
examination.
"We... changed." Lita didn't know how else to put it. She reached up and 
touched her long hair; always silky, it was now fine and softer than 
she'd ever remembered it, with a hint of red buried deeply before but now 
evident and obvious.
Helen was touching the skin on her face, amazed at how soft and smooth 
it felt.
Michelle scrambled into her clothes, but not before determining to spend 
a great deal of time at home in front of the bathroom mirror. Shampoo 
stood and stared at her reflection in the mirrored sides of the cavern, 
occasionally touching parts of her arms and face.
They were all the same at a glance, but observation proved them to be 
without all the minor blemishes and flaws normal women took for granted, 
and makeup companies spent so much time and energy marketing ways to 
hide. In appearance they were divine.
"It would be a crime to put any makeup on this face." Mina said to her 
reflection, as their resident expert and most successful of the local 
cosmetic fanatics.
Cologne cleared her throat loudly.
Mass scrambling for clothes resumed. Time with mirrors later was 
scheduled. This had to be checked out!
Nabiki turned to see Kasumi already regarding her. Both were impressed, 
changes hadn't seemed to diminish for having less time. They blinked 
together, then Kasumi sighed and said. "I'd normally be grateful..."
Nabiki was shaking her head. "...but with what daddy has planned..."
"This could be dreadful." They concluded together in a chorus.
A wrenching of metal dragged their attention as the rest of them 
concluded getting hurriedly dressed. Jay-chan had pulled what looked like 
a basketball sized metal egg from the rubble of what had been their 
cyborged friend and companion.
Jared was shaking his head. "I know he replenishes if he dies, but I've 
heard that it's uncomfortable, and with the amount of untapped magic now 
in this room who knows what might happen?"He paused to watch the swirls 
of energy now roaming undirected about the cave. It *looked* harmless, 
but so it had at first when he'd first seen the Scouts fall asleep. He 
wasn't about to take chances. Grey might come back as... well, any number 
of objects either ridiculous or absurd, and knowing the poor man's luck...
Jared held the object and knelt within the ruined scraps of metal.
Mina touched an earring and began scanning through the yellow visor that 
caused to spread over her face. "That's Grey's survival center, isn't it?"
Jared nodded, clearly distracted. "Yes. His remaining organs, all neural 
tissue by the look and feel of it, are wrapped up in here. I'd say he has 
a few hours of backup emergency life support in this thing. Maybe more, 
but that *isn't* a way that I want any of my friends to go." He chose not 
to mention that he guessed that it would be a close mixture of drowning, 
starving and claustrophobia all rolled up into one. Hopefully the poor 
guy wasn't awake, but again, knowing Grey's luck...
The Mage summoned a globe of energy around his fingers that caused all 
of the remaining parts and metal objects to begin slowly spinning around 
him in a circle. With a flash of deep purple light they swiftly assembled 
themselves together, with a brief hint of something approximately 
man-shaped in the center before the cyborg once again stood among them.
Grey began checking out his now-intact limbs. "Funny, i'm usually the 
medic, though when i go down there's usually no one left who can fix me."
The Mage adopted a MOST embarrassed posture, rubbing his toe on the 
ground while he tried not to look at the cyborg. "Yeah, uh, well... 
*This* time I was able to put ya back together..." more than one person 
heard the mutter following "somewhat." The mage then raised a happy, 
smiling face to his friend. "...Like new!" He then began to scoot away. 
"Ahehe, um, glad the speech centers are all working, um, right. So, uh... 
I never *did* get to study Robotech androids. That was Dr. Lang's 
secret..."
If Grey could've sweatdropped, he would've, joining the rest of those 
there doing it. "Hold it. There's two things my sensors are picking up. 
There's a background increase in blackband magic, but there's been an 
eruption in Nerima." The cyborg waved a hand on which paint sparkled like 
new. "Looks like a pretty strong attack group. i'll need to get above 
ground for details but it looks like it's near Bluebird Senior High 
School at..." Grey rattled off coordinates.
Jared blinked. "Bluebird?" Why did that sound familiar?
Kasumi and Nabiki eeped. "Nerima?!"
The Scouts automatically joined hands, forming a ring around the others. 
³Scout Planetary Teleport!²
They blinked out and arrived at the scene, and promptly began screaming.

Coincidence is God's way of remaining anonymous