lr.10
MEGAZONE 23
"Upon first contacting another culture, the explorer
must always remember to present a peaceful and calm
perspective."
--The Explorer's Handbook, 7th Ed.
"Gryphon to the bridge. Gryphon to the bridge," the PA
system announced. Gryphon awoke, looking around in that
annoying post-waking confusion, and unzipped the room side of
the sleeping bag. He had the distinct feeling someone wanted
to speak to him.
"Nnn...what's going on?" Kei asked, sitting up beside
him.
"Dunno," he replied, shaking his head to clear it,
climbing out of bed, and pulling on his bathrobe. "I think
they want me on the bridge..."
"Hang on, I'll come with you."
A couple of minutes later, Gryphon padded into the
Wedge in his bathrobe, hair brushed and semi-presentable,
with Kei, in a set of WPI sweats, at his side. Everyone else
was already there.
"What's up, everyone?" he asked. Then he saw the view
from the windows. A blue-white planet, looking a great deal
like Earth, lay beyond the windows; between them and it was a
huge complex of girders, beams, windows, bunker-like
objects, and starship construction bays, stretching out in
either direction and vanishing in a band around the planet.
"Wow," said Kei. "I guess that about settles the
intelligent life question, doesn't it?"
"Just about," Zoner said from his captain's seat. He
seemed oddly relaxed, and he and Yuri had never looked more
natural together. Gryphon was forced to smile. "q, have we
picked up anything from the hailing frequencies yet?"
"Not yet, like I'll let you know. Hold that thought.
Like here comes something now."
"On screen."
"We don't have one."
"On speakers, then."
"Like right away."
There was a burst of static from the PA speakers, and
then a human male-sounding voice announced, in mid-sentence,
"--lanitia Shipyards welcomes the Wedge. Please allow your
automatic navigation system to complete docking maneuvers.
Lord Fahrvergnugen will want to speak with your command staff
as soon as you arrive. Once again, welcome." The
transmission was cut off.
"Lord Fahrvergnugen?!" said Zoner.
"Oh, no," was all ReRob had to say.
The Wedge moved as if with a mind of its own, swinging
up even with part of the huge complex and backing into place
with a clang; there were thuds and hisses as a docking collar
sealed around the Morgan doors.
"Well, shall we?" asked Zoner, rising and indicating
Gryphon.
"Me? Why me?"
"You're my exec, bonehead, they said this Fahrvergnugen
guy wants to see our command staff. That's us. You too, q,
and ReRob. Crocker, get a security squad together; Kei,
Yuri, give him a hand."
"Ok, I'm ready anytime," said Rob.
"NO!" shouted Android.
"You ok, 'Droid?" asked ReRob.
"You can't go dressed like that!" Android said, grabbing
hold of ReRob's Brockton High sweatshirt. "Go change your
shirt, what are you, crazy?!"
"What the hell--oh. Oops. I'll, ah, be right back."
He disappeared. He had forgotten in his anticipation of
meeting the people of Planitia that the color of Brockton
High was red...
"Five minutes, everyone. Meet at the Morgan doors, then
we go in. And be ready, we don't know if these people are
really friendly or not." Zoner adjourned the bridge meeting.
They met at the doors within five minutes (amazing in
itself; the Wedge Rats almost never did anything on time).
Crocker had a three-man security squad put together; he and
his men were wearing CVR-3 and carrying their Gallants in
rifle mode by the shoulder straps. Zoner was wearing his
standard outfit (Nikes, Blackbird shirt--today's Plane du
Jour: the F-117A--jeans, Rho Alpha Tau hat, denim jacket with
Eve airbrushed on the back). Kei and Yuri were in uniform,
their weapons holstered but ready. Gryphon had on what he
had taken to calling his "Wedge uniform": black fatigue
pants, WPI sweatshirt, old British Knights, Safematic hat,
bomber jacket with RDF patch on sleeve. Rob had changed from
his Brockton High sweatshirt to a tasteful beige chamois
button-up shirt.
A fitting party to go forth and meet the first
extraterrestrials humankind has yet to meet.
"Now remember," Zoner said, "I don't want anyone
screaming and running off, or puking, or anything if they're
really ugly, or slimy, or Cthuloid, or anything. That's not
the way to start off peaceful relations between peoples."
"Wow, Zoner...don't we sound captainly..." Gryph said
with a grin.
"Shut up," Zoner said good-naturedly, smacking Gryphon
gently in the back of the head. "Okay. Everyone ready?
Let's go." He reached up and tabbed the door control.
The doors swung open silently. Zoner wondered if
perhaps, just this once, they wouldn't close with that
Godawful noise. The party stepped through.
SKWEEEEEKrrkkkweequeRUNKwheeet!whio thud.
"Garh," Zoner muttered.
The inner doors, huge and smooth and metal and painted
with a neat, almost Starfleet-like logo, parted in the center
and opened up and down.
A small group of humans in lab coats and dress slacks
met them. They had stripes, probably denoting rank, on their
sleeves and little nametag pins, but aside from that, they
looked like perfectly ordinary scientist or technician-type
people.
"Greetings," said the one with dark brown hair and seven
stripes on his sleeve, in a placid tone of voice. "Welcome
to the Utopia Planitia shipyards. I am Decker. Please
follow me--Lord Fahrvergnugen is anxious to meet you."
"Right. You heard the man," said Zoner.
"The weapons are not necessary," Decker observed calmly.
"I think I'll hang onto mine anyway, if you don't mind,"
replied Kei.
"As you wish," Decker said. The group of technicians
led the Wedge Rats down a corridor, to the left, and into a
conference room. "Please take a seat--Lord Fahrvergnugen
will arrive shortly." And then he and the other technicians
left.
"This," said Gryphon as he sat down at the table, "is
extremely strange."
"You said it," said Erik Swimm, part of the security
division. "I don't like it."
"Oh, come on, you guys," said Zoner. "Don't be so
paranoid. It seems perfectly fine to me--Kei, Yuri, what do
you think?"
"I'm with Erik," Kei said. "It feels like some sort of
trap. I hate not knowing what's going on."
"I'm not sure," Yuri countered. "There's something
about this place..."
The door opened and in walked a most impressive-looking
figure. The man was alone, and, save for the huge sword at
his side, unarmed. He stood six foot eight if an inch, and
looked impressively muscled, so far as they could tell
beneath the ornate, gold-inlaid black plate armor he was
wearing. He wore no helmet; finely chiseled features and a
sharp hawk nose dominated his face, and a thick mane of
flowing red hair dropped below the fur ridging the top edge
of his large black cloak. Brown eyes flashed with
intelligence and fire from below his thick, bushy red brows.
"Lord Fahrvergnugen, I presume?" said Rob.
"You presume correctly," Fahrvergnugen boomed, in a
voice that shook the rafters. "Welcome, my children! I have
waited long for this moment and it has at last arrived! I am
Lord Wolfgang Fahrvergnugen, Duke of Planitia and the master
of this shipyard, and I bid you welcome."
"Wait a second--what do you mean, `my children'?" Zoner
asked coolly.
"You are!" Fahrvergnugen replied. "With the exception
of those two women," he said, indicating the Lovely Angels
with a sweeping gesture of one massive arm, "you are all my
children--the culmination of seventeen generations of subtle
genetic manipulation and environmental modification! While
you have biological parents, you owe who and what you are
almost entirely to me."
"Pardon me for sounding skeptical here," said ReRob,
"but you got anything to back these claims up?"
"If you only knew, Robert Mandeville," Fahrvergnugen
said with a smile. "Follow me, and I will show you your
history--and your future!" He turned and swept out of the
room; with a shrug, Zoner motioned everyone to follow him.
"This guy is cracked," Fritz whispered to Erik.
"You got that right," Erik replied. "And look at the
size of him--the guy's a Buma with a flashy paint job!"
"Shut up, you want him to hear you?!" Crocker admonished
them. "You're a security team, not a debate team."
"Do not worry, Robert Crocker," said Lord Fahrvergnugen
from the front of the group. "I expect you to think me mad,
until I show you the proof I have to support my claims--and
worry not, I have proof a'plenty."
They entered a huge auditorium, like a lecture hall;
Fahrvergnugen beckoned them be seated and, clearing his
throat, began to speak. "I was born Wolfgang Amadeus
Fahrvergnugen, on the planet Earth, in Germany, in what you
know as the fourteenth century. I was a student of the
natural sciences. One day, in the process of an experiment
concerning magnetism and electricity, something went wrong, a
terrible accident." On the screens in the room, still
pictures flashed, about one per sentence, illustrating what
he meant. "There was an explosion. I awoke here, on
Planitia, in the ruins of a huge and advanced city.
"I found out years later that my accident was no
accident; it was engineered by the being who is now my arch-
nemesis, the greatest evil in all of Creation, in an attempt
to slay me, who he had foreseen to be his greatest foe.
Ironic, is it not, that in attempting to kill me he placed
the tools of his own destruction in my grasp? I mastered the
technology of the city quickly, and returned home to gather
a small band of trusted acquaintances, for I knew I could not
leave the great menace unopposed.
"My friends and I were too weak to oppose the Evil. We
drove them back in the First War, with our faithful starship,
the Wedge; but something more was needed. I decided to
create a subculture, a race of beings back on Earth, to
combat it. I would make them warriors, scientists,
freethinkers. Through subtle genetic manipulation, and the
slight alteration of their environments here and there, I
would nurture my children through as many generations as
needed before the Evil arose. Further, I would give them
weapons. I selected the site of Worcester Polytechnic
Institute as my army began to grow, and caused the college to
begin; I rebuilt the Wedge and hid its secrets in its
computers, and, when the time was right, I placed it and
waited.
"When the Encore was installed I linked the Wedge
computers to it; I knew some of my children would be gweeps,
and my creation's secrets found, when the time was right. My
computer technicians created the HoloDECstation 31000 and hid
it in Fuller Labs. Everything was proceeding according to
plan--until Decker, my aide, pointed out a startling reality
I had overlooked.
"The Wedge Rats had become too numerous for their
intended craft; the Wedge was far too small. The Evil and
his soldiers had been preparing as well, also; thus, my army
was underequipped in the extreme. I set out to rectify that
immediately, racing against time, for it seemed that the time
for my children's Awakening was fast approaching.
"And then it happened; you were awakened prematurely by
that idiot Largo, a creation of my own HoloDECstation--fool I
was not to put safeties on it! It was never designed to
create life! Although--" he said aside to Gryphon, "I
congratulate you on these two lovely ladies. No errors are
they, but true undocumented features. Fine work, my son,
fine work."
Gryphon, Zoner, Kei, and Yuri had a brief four-way
puzzled look exchange as Fahrvergnugen continued, "In any
event...when I originally created the Wedge, I programmed it
to bring my children to me when it was activated, and such it
did. Now you are ready to receive the final steps of your
training--to be taught in the use of your new weapons and
organized into the steel and fire that must be used to combat
the Evil when it returns. My timetable is disrupted, but I
do not think any unrecoverable damage has been done."
"Uh...I hate to interrupt..." said MegaZone.
"Go on, MegaZone. Do not fear to ask me anything."
"Does that involve a larger ship, I hope?"
"But of course it does! You are just in time--your new
ship was completed mere days ago, and even now awaits its
final painting before it can be called truly finished. I
think you will find it more to your liking. Fear not, your
faithful Wedge will remain, as part of the new ship; I could
not discard my original creation after it served me so
faithfully in the First War."
"Can we see it?" Zoner asked.
"Certainly. Follow me."
They followed Fahrvergnugen to an observation bay; the
shutters over its huge klaster windows were closed. "Behold
your new vessel!" Fahrvergnugen announced, pressing the
control that opened the shutters. They swung back--and the
assembled Wedge Rat away team gasped. The bay looked out
onto a construction slip, fully enclosed and over a mile
long. Huge quartz lights beamed light onto the starship
enclosed in the slip.
It was nearly three-fourths the length of the bay, and
looked somewhat like a surface navy ship; the foredeck was
vast and swept back to tiered decks and a flying bridge tower
topped with a great sensor array, and behind that were huge
thrusters. What looked like two smaller spacecraft were
attached to the sides, just aft of two huge weapon barrels.
Everyone recognized it instantly, but Zoner was the first to
shout in a strangled voice:
"THAT'S THE SDF-1!"
"I thought it best to provide you with a vessel you
were already familiar with, and felt comfortable with,"
explained Lord Fahrvergnugen. "Besides which, Zor is a
sometime acquaintance of mine, and he agreed to let me use
the basic designs, which was a great timesaver. This ship is
the mightiest ship in space! It will serve you well. You
see there," he said, pointing to the flying bridge, which was
incomplete, with a great gaping hole in the front surrounded
by rigging and what looked like hinged panels. "There is
where your Wedge goes; it fits right into place, standing in
Battroid mode, and then the armor locks over it. Virtually
impregnable. The weapons are superior to anything else in
space. The Reflex cannon can destroy any adversary. This is
the ship of destiny!" cried Fahrvergnugen with an expansive
gesture and a guffaw of triumph.
He turned to the Wedge Rats. "Now go back to your ship
and tell the others what I have told you. I leave the
details of your organization up to you; your training and
final equipping begins in two days. Only remember: time is
short! The Evil is almost upon us!" So speaking,
Fahrvergnugen turned to sweep out of the room.
"Yo, Wolfgang!" Zoner called out.
Lord Fahrvergnugen spun, drawing his sword and sweeping
it towards Zoner's head. The blade stopped millimeters from
his nose; Zoner didn't flinch. He just assumed a very
strange expression. "I am Lord Fahrvergnugen to you!" Lord
Fahrvergnugen cried.
"Um, yeah, right. Listen, put the pigsticker away, will
you? You're a Wedge Rat too, and no Wedge Rat is going to go
by the name Lord Fahrvergnugen. So pick something, or we
will. You may end up Wolfgang, Wolfy, Fahrv, or something as
inane. Oh, and don't threaten me with that thing again or I
may have to hurt you."
Lord Fahrvergnugen let out a hearty laugh. "I like you.
You have the bravery needed to be a great leader. Very well,
you may address me as Wolfgang."
"Cool, Wolfgang, now, how about supplying a few sets of
new clothes, some home entertainment, etc. And nearly
everyone here needs a shower. First things first, right?"
"You are right, of course, here," Wolfgang said,
pressing a button on a comm panel. "This droid will guide
you to the rest and relaxation facilities." A small droid
glided around the corner.
"Excellent, oh, and can I talk to you later?"
"Yes, of course, I will summon you later."
"Yo, don't be so stuffy, loosen up. Don't `summon'
people, drop by and chill for a while."
"Very well, perhaps you are correct." Wolfgang said as
he swept from the room.
"Uh, like weeeeeird?" said q.
"Uh yeah," Gryphon replied. "But you know...it all
makes sense somehow..."