The Protoculture Wars
Aubry Thonon
Robotech:
Alternate Points
Of View
Thallin
Braywater
This book is dedicated to the following people:
K. Wiley kkwiley@uccs.edu Lieutenant Kay Landers
Alex profnut@nyongwa.montreal.qc.ca Warlord Agar
Derek Magic09@aol.com Sergeant David Marshall
Steve epustay@aol.com Augustine Rassimus
Kirstin adathono@cc.uq.edu.au Sergeant Tamara Sam'di
This work is c 1994-1996 Aubry Thonon, except for those names,
songs and concepts copyrighted to the appropriate owners (how
do *I* know who they are? They know, that's good enough).
Feel free to copy this book and distribute it as long as:
A) The copyright notices are left in;
B) If it is printed in a fanzine or any other free,
non-profit publication, could you mail me a copy
please?
C) It may *not* be printed in a commercial publication
without the prior assent of *all* the copyright
owners, myself included.
[Reality Check - Saturday Jun. 27 2009, 1326 hours, Macross Island SDF-1 Base]
"Would you be careful with that?", yelled Thallin.
"I've spent five months redesigning this plane."
The handling crew barely noticed his admonitions as
they prepared to load Veritech VX-001 into one of the SDF-
1's numerous storage bays. Thallin had been yelling at
them since the start, shouting orders, not actually
helping in any respect. Why should he? After all, that
was what the handling crew was there for, right?
He was preparing himself to yell a few more
instructions when a small plane swished past overhead and
disrupted a flight of fighters. Climbing vertically with
the help of its boosters, the little plane became part of
the formation of fighters as they continued their flying
display.
"Excuse me," asked one of the crew, "but where exactly
do you want this thing placed?" He pointed to a
contraption that looked like tubes and cables wired hap-
hazardly to a large box.
"I'd like it placed next to the VX. Make sure that
cables are connected properly," Thallin yelled at the
already retreating figure. He sighed and turned just in
time to see the small plane land just outside the hangar
he was in. The cockpit opened and a young man stepped
out in time to greet a pilot which had been running
toward the plane, microphone in hand. Thallin recognised
the latest arrival as Roy Fokker, one the of VF
squadron's best pilot. Fokker yelled a few things at the
young man, throwing down the microphone he had been
holding in the process, and dragged the civilian pilot
away. "I wonder what *that* was all about." remarked
Thallin out loud.
The Veritech had been stored away and the handling
crew had gone back to watch the preparations for the
launch of the Fortress. Thallin himself had simply
checked that the plane's mooring had been secured by the
scutter droids before leaving the ship. He was wondering
around the crowds in Main Square, stepping out of
everybody's way, when the klaxons sounded. Looking
about, Thallin noticed that the shadows around him where
changing, as though something was moving overhead. He
looked up and noticed that the front of the SDF-1 was
splitting in two, both halves rotating as they spread to
each side of the ship.
Thallin looked dumbfounded for a second. "Oh shit."
was all he could whisper in a small voice.
The SDF-1 fired its main cannon, the beam smashing
into the rocks in front of the ship, vaporising them as
it went. The firing itself had been silent apart for the
crackling of static energy as the charges built-up within
the tines of the cannon. However, a gigantic thunderclap
resounded a split second later as the atmosphere moved in
to fill the vacuum left by the beam's disintegration of
the air molecules in its path. Buildings shook as the
air rushed in with the force of a small tornado. Down on
the street, a small figure was lying on the pavement,
spread-eagled.
"Oh shit, oh shit, ohshitohshitohshit" Thallin
repeated over and over again. He picked himself off the
concrete and started running towards the SDF-1 and the
military base. "Gloval's gonna be pissed. The crew's
not even all here yet." He rounded a corner and came
face-to-face with a scene of utter destruction. A
Veritech had crash landed into several buildings, then
mechamorphed to Battloid *after* hitting the ground. It
was now trying to get to its feet, its internals having
obviously sustained heavy damaged as evidenced in the
shaky way it moved. "I don't have time for this. I
don't need this. I don't *want* to be caught in the
middle of urban warfare." He shut himself up, realising
he was beginning to whine. Then the missiles hit.
The volley, it was discovered later, had been
calculated by the Zentraedi to be `small, but effective
in creating large areas of open space.' Whatever their
intent, the results were destruction on a scale none in
Macross City had envisioned. Building simply disappeared
under the onslaught, returning to dust in an instant.
Thallin ran as fast as he could, trying desperately to
keep moving towards the SDF-1 and relative safety. But
the destruction of landmarks, the spraying about of
rubble and the thick black smoke rising from the ruins
made it difficult to be certain which direction was
which. Thallin could only hope he was going the right
way.
He clambered over a series of concrete blocks and
looked over to the high ground of the Island. High up on
the surrounding hills, coming down very fast towards the
remnants of the city, were a series of objects - very
large objects if the trees next to one was anything to
judge by. They looked like headless, wingless metal
ostriches with various barrels sticking out of their
bodies. Some even had what looked like rocket launchers
on top of them. A few looked like red-and-white fish
with the same reverse-articulated legs and arms ending in
weapons. They even had a large tank-gun above them.
"This is *not* good. I want out of here. This is *not*
what I signed up for!" Thallin shouted to no-one in
particular.
Thallin ran down the pile of rubble and up another.
Reaching the top, he spied something on the other side
and tried to skid to a stop to hide. The block of
concrete he was on slipped down the side of the rubble,
carrying him with it, and came to rest at the bottom of
the pile.
Thallin looked up the length of the enemy's rail-gun.
<All these years>, he thought, <and I'm gonna end up as
minced-meat on a pavement. What a way to go.> He looked
quickly left and right but could find no cover. He
closed his eyes and waited.
Inside the enemy pod, the Zentraedi lined up the puny
micronian with his gun. Obviously, this must be one of
the slave-races of the planet. After all, the pilot had
engaged in battle a Zentraedi-sized opponent in some sort
of bizarre armour. Nevertheless, slave or not, all were
to die to fulfil the imperative.
His thumb moved to the trigger as the sights settled
on Thallin's head. The Zentraedi's smile was cut short
as his computer started to print information about his
target onto the screen.
Thallin waited for the slugs to rip his body to
shreds. He waited. And waited. Finally, he opened up
his eyes to find that the enemy craft was still standing
over him, but no longer pointing its gun at him. It was
now busily destroying any egg-like mecha that tried to
approach it. <Wow. A defector?> wondered Thallin. This
line of thought was quickly cut short as the craft above
him - an officer pod, he would later find out - turned
its guns against a Veritech Valkyrie Battloid and utterly
destroyed it.
<OK. I've had my quota of weirdness for the day. I'm
outta here!> Thallin started to run down the street,
towards the SDF-1 and, he hoped, safety. The Officer pod
behind paused for a moment then started to chase him.
The Zentraedi officer was confused. His target was
not behaving as predicted. Instead of standing and
fighting, it had started to run away. He reflected upon
the data from his battle-computer. Maybe the target was
leading him to better victories. Smiling at this
thought, the Zentraedi turned to pursue the fleeing
micronian.
Thallin ran down the road as fast as he could.
Looking over his shoulder he noticed the re-and-white pod
following him. <Oh, *great*. He's playing cat-and-mouse
with me.> He ducked to his left, fleeing through the
front door of a building and back out its rear exit,
hoping to loose his hunter. No such luck. As he looked
back, he saw the pod emerging from the building. It had
not even bothered to slow down as it crashed through the
walls.
Thallin panicked. The ground underneath his feet was
shaking with every step of the enemy mecha as it ran
after him. <What am I gonna do now?> he asked himself.
He looked about as he ran and spied a man-hole in the
street. He ran towards it, heaved the cover off,
breaking a couple of nails in the process, and jumped
down to the sewers.
He paused, trying to catch his breath and sucking on
his bleeding fingers. The ground above him shook as the
Pod searched for him in the surrounding rubble. "Keep
looking, sucker. I'm gone!" he said out loud, rejoicing
in the sound of his voice. <waddayaknow. I'm still
alive.> He proceeded down the tunnel towards the SDF-1,
pausing every so often to read the signs and re-orient
himself.
He had been crawling down the sewers now for a good
ten minutes. According to the signs, he was back at the
SDF-1 compound, just a few hundred yards for the Macross
itself. During his flight down the tunnels he had tried
to draw parallels between this attack and the previous
aborted attempts by the Anti-Unification Forces to seize
control of South Atalia Island. But he could find very
few points in common. For one thing, the Valkyries had
never had to be deployed in Battloid mode to fight off
the AUF. And for another, at least you could anticipate
the reactions of the AUF. But this new enemy was not
human. And if it was even half as brutal and savage as
the records of the Bahamoud computer core found in the
Macross implied, then humanity was in for some rough
times ahead. "I never should have accepted this posting.
Why didn't I stay in Tokyo? A cushier job I'd never
find. All I had to do was pour through the computer
memory of the Bahamoud. But, nooo. I wanted to stick my
nose into Robotic Technology, didn't I? I wanted to be a
big shot. Well, mister Big Shot, how'm I gonna get
myself out of this one?"
He crawled to the nearest exit and took a peek
outside. Nothing moved out there except as blown about
by the odd missile impact. "All you've got to do is
climb out of this hole and run the last few hundred
yards. No problems." he lied to himself. He clambered
out of the hole and laid on the tarmac, waiting for a
group of explosions to die down. He looked about and
spotted a service door on the SDF-1 that was still
opened. Better yet, it was sheltered by one of the
support pylons that held the SDF-1 suspended above
concrete of the compound. He got up and ran towards that
door.
No sooner had he started to run that the ground shook
beneath his feet. Thallin looked around in fear and saw
a red-and-white shape rise from behind the rubble and
walk towards him. "No, not you again! It can't be! I
lost you in the sewers! I lost you, Damnit!" Thallin
ran headlong towards the door, concentrating his thoughts
on it and excluding all else, particularly the pod
bearing down on him.
He was fifty feet from the door when the hatch swung
shut and locked. Thallin stumbled to a stop, dumbfounded
at this stroke of lousy luck. To make matters worse, he
could hear engine noises coming from the fortress. His
legs gave out under the realisation that hit him.
Slowly, majestically, his last refuge lifted from its
support and gained altitude.
Thallin looked on in shock, barely registering the
approaching metallic footsteps. "Oh boy."
Neoculture (Crash-Test Dummy On The Information SuperHighway)
-------------------------------------+------------------------------------
Dans le froid glace de l'Olympe noir | Dans le vide de l'espace infernal -
Les Dieux malins ont en vain | Fatigue, lasse, vainqueur -
Use de leur puissance, leurs pouvoirs| Ulysse pres d'une Aurore Boreale
Contre Ulysse 31. | Rechauffe un peu son coeur.
-------------------------------------+-------- Aubry.Thonon@qed.qld.gov.au