"LUNAR: Tales From Crystal Tokyo"
LUNAR: The Lost Episodes
By Jeffrey C. Branch
Volume Four: Episode 2-4.5
"Attraction"
Rating: PG
In the Alpha Zone, in deep space, 5 December 2737
The SLS Panther
The passageway on deck two parted like the Red Sea as the tall, scowling,
white haired woman in the sailor suit stormed by. The only sound was the rapid
click-clack of her spike heels on the deck as no one dared to utter a noise.
Crewpersons came to attention, but the woman paid them no attention as
she continued on her way. The looks on their faces were ones of collective
nervousness as their captain was clearly in a foul mood. Even in the best of
times, Sailor Magneta wasn't the most affable of ship drivers in the RSN.
While Sailor Magneta treated her crew with the utmost respect, her almost
always-grim demeanor made even the emotionless Vulcans in the fleet appear
highly sociable. And, at present, Sailor Magneta was quite angry at the
situation her ship was in.
It had been two days since Panther's encounter with the unknown
ship that had, without any provocation, destroyed the Hawk with all hands
aboard and disabled her ship, wrecking her engines and shields. Only Sailor
Magneta's last-ditch counterattack with the TPA spared Panther from the Hawk's
fate, still, the damage had been extensive, rendering the ship all but
inoperative. Worse, the enemy had
escaped; that was what Sailor Magneta hated most, watching the ship, heavily
damaged from an enhanced magnetic field she threw at it, limp away.
I ached to destroy those bastards! I wanted to reduce them to atoms,
but couldn't, thought a frustrated Sailor Magneta, thoughts of murder
swirling in her head. She fought to exorcise them. She was a starship captain, a
Sailor Senshi, a warrior, not a butcher. Or so she kept telling herself.
Entering the main conference room, six officers, seated at a long,
polished mahogany table stood at attention.
Sailor Magneta, in no mood for protocol, impatiently waved a hand at them
and they sat. After sitting at the head of the table, the white haired woman
focused piercing crystal blue eyes on the man who sat to her left.
"Report," she snapped.
Sorcerer Spirit, Sailor Magneta's First Officer, a full-blood Apache with
long, straight black hair and dark, penetrating brown eyes set into a ruggedly
handsome face, cleared his throat. "Maintaining course for the Sol
system,
Captain; our current speed is one half sublight. We should reach the inner
border of the Alpha Zone within six days, four if we can reach full sublight.
The RSN
Fleet HQ has been notified and a drydock will be ready to receive us and begin
repairs immediately upon our arrival. In
addition, a RIFT-capable tug has been dispatched to help us home; we should
rendezvous with them in seven days."
Sailor Magneta nodded. "Good. Hitch? How go things in
Engineering?"
Sitting to Spirit's left, Commander Arnold Hitchcock, "Hitch"
to the crew, a broad shouldered Irish-American with close cropped red hair, and
a beard to match, spoke up. "Does the old term 'Chinese fire drill' mean
anything to ya, Skipper?" he said in a rumbling Irish brogue. "I've
got repair crews bustin' butts 'round the clock on repairs, but some sections of
the ship can only be fixed in a drydock. The RIFT's still in pieces from
whatever those beasties hit us with, and it'll take awhile to get her back
together. Sublight engines holdin' firm. I
hope to have them at full power by tomorrow."
Another nod. "Tactical?"
Lt. Shokar, seated to Hitch's left, was a tall, lean muscled Isbanni, a
race that resembled catlike humans. Shokar
gazed around the table with his bright, greenish eyes. When the Tactical Officer
spoke, it was with a deep, guttural growl. "Shields are back up, operating
at fifty-five percent capacity, ma'am. Long-range sensors are still down, but
short-range sensors are back online. Weapon systems, including the TPA, are
fully functional, so we're not defenseless."
"After what we've just been through, that's a comfort," said
Sailor Magneta. She then turned to her right where a Vulcan female sat ramrod
stiff in her seat. "T'Kira, analysis on the attack."
Commander T'Kira, Panther's Science Officer, a typically
stone-faced Vulcan, who wore an unusually haughty expression, spoke. "Information on our assailants is non-existent, Captain as there is no
record of that vessel type in the RSN database. As for the attack itself, after
examining our sensor records, I have arrived at the conclusion that the ship had
used some sort of destabilization field which phased through our shields,
deactivated them, then disrupted the matrix of the power core to the main
engines, shutting them down."
"Leaving us wide open for those lasers they hit us with," said
Spirit.
"Precisely.
The ship's laser batteries are less powerful than our proton beams, but with the
absence of shielding, they proved to be quite devastating. I seriously doubt
that even Dark Kingdom ships could resist such a weapon. An excellent two
pronged strategy, I must concede."
"And deadly. Comm, has all the information gathered on the attack
been sent to headquarters?"
Lieutenant Henri LaSalle, a thin, waspish man with light brown hair
nodded. "Oui, Captain.
Full burst transmission speed and top-secret security code as you
ordered. In addition, sensor records on the enemy ship and its weapons were
forwarded directly to Sailor Mercury for analysis."
"Very good." Sailor
Magneta then focused on the smallish, dark skinned woman with short black hair
who sat to T'Kira's right. "Doctor, crew status."
"No fatalities, thank Serenity," Dr. Marguerita Chavez replied.
"Most of the injuries were centered in the engineering sections, where the
attack was localized, but none of them were serious. Everything else was bumps,
bruises, and a couple of concussions and electrical burns from blown out
systems. That's all."
"Random chance seems to have operated in our favor, Doctor,"
said T'Kira.
"In plain, non-Vulcan Lunarian, we were lucky," Chavez replied.
"Opinions, people. What the hell are we up against?" Sailor
Magneta wanted to know.
"Clearly we're dealing with an aggressor species, Captain,"
said Spirit. "The attacks on the Hawk, and us, were totally
unprovoked. Their intention was to destroy us, plain and simple. This could be a
prelude to a possible invasion."
"You cannot be sure, Sorcerer Spirit. We have no way of knowing what
the intentions of those beings truly are," T'Kira countered. "The
borders beyond the Alpha Zone are, for the most part, unexplored. It is entirely possible that we
intruded into a colonized area and the inhabitants retaliated in the only way
they saw fit. Given our recent war with the DK, we may have been looked upon as
invaders."
Hitch snorted from disgust, his anger rising. "Hell's bells, woman!
That's the craziest thing I've heard in years! You're makin' it sound like this
disaster was our fault! If some
ornery neighbors wanted us out of their front yard, they shoulda just said so
instead of turnin' a shotgun on us!"
T'Kira gave Panther's Chief Engineer a cold, reproachful look.
"You
are assuming that other species subscribe to the same sort of protocols and
behaviors that Humans do. That, Mr. Hitchcock, would be a serious miscalculation
on your part."
"A miscalculation that cost us a ship and her crew," a somber
Chavez said.
There was a strained silence as the assemblage dwelled on Chavez's words.
Finally, it was Sailor Magneta who broke the silence.
"Panther, your thoughts."
"My opinion hardly matters, Captain. Nevertheless, I am compelled to
agree with Sorcerer Spirit," said the ship's artificial intelligence in a
female voice with a decidedly British accent. "We could well be dealing
with an aggressor who might be looking forward to taking advantage of the
current instability throughout the region after the war. More than likely,
today's incident was a probe, testing our strengths and weaknesses, the latter
that they were embarrassingly able to exploit with their weaponry. We must
assume that more attacks may follow."
"Most disturbing," said Sailor Magneta, her white gloved
fingers steepled.
"Well, you did ask for my thoughts, Captain," said Panther.
"Very well. Return to your stations. Hitch; expedite repairs as much
as you can. Get those sublight
engines back to speed. The sooner we're back to Sol, the better I'll
feel," said Sailor Magneta. "Shokar, maintain sensor sweeps.
Make sure
nothing's sneaking up on us. T'Kira, continue your research. The ship will
remain on yellow alert until we're out of the Alpha Zone. Dismissed."
Panther's senior officers stood and left the room as Sailor
Magneta closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose from fatigue.
Her anger faded, replaced by exhaustion. When she opened her eyes, she
saw that Spirit and Chavez hadn't left. "Anything else to report?" she
asked sharply.
"No, but I do have something to ask," said Chavez, eyeing
Sailor Magneta warily. "When was the last time you slept?"
"I don't have time for that, Doctor. In case you hadn't noticed,
this ship is in bad shape. My responsibility is to get her back home in one
piece," Sailor Magneta growled.
"I know that. But my responsibility is to keep this crew in one
piece. And, the last time I checked, the crew includes you," Chavez shot
back. "The situation is now manageable enough for you to get some sleep.
I
suggest you do so."
"Rita's right, Captain," said Spirit, his face lined from
concern. "Using the TPA to ward off the enemy ship drained you
considerably. I can sense your growing weariness from the last two days.
You
made sure the crew got rest when not at repair or battle stations. You should do
the same. Even Sailor Senshi need downtime. We can take over from here."
Sailor Magneta snorted. "I'll rest when we get to the Sol system.
Not before."
Chavez rolled her eyes and let out a long sigh borne of annoyance. "Captain, I really don't want to do this, but if you insist on being
stubborn, I'll invoke RSN regulations Section 41-2, giving me full authority as ship's Medical
Officer to relieve you of duty because of reduced capacity and confine you to
quarters."
The Senshi's anger spiked. "You
wouldn't!"
"She would. And I support her. As you know, if 41-2 is
invoked, that requires an official entry in the doctor's log, which is then
relayed to the Chief Surgeon's Office on Luna for review, followed by a report
to the Magistrate General, then to Neo-Queen Serenity."
Spirit then smirked. "Her Highness is short enough on ship drivers
without losing another one because she wouldn't go to bed when ordered.
And, frankly speaking, Veronika, haven't you been called on the carpet
enough over the past year?"
There was another silence, and then Spirit and Chavez saw Sailor Magneta
do something exceeding rare for her. Her lips curled into a grin and she
chuckled.
"All right! All right! I surrender!" she said, raising her
hands. "I hate it when you two gang up on me. I'll go to bed, Doctor.
Sorcerer Spirit, you have the conn. But if anything happens...."
"Trust me, you'll be the first to know," Spirit replied. "Now get out of here."
Standing up, Sailor Magneta came to attention and gave her First Officer
a salute. "Yes, sir!"
Entering her quarters, Sailor Magneta powered down from her Senshi form,
leaving the white haired woman in her RSN uniform.
Almost immediately, Captain Veronika Steiner felt the aches and pains of
the last several days as she worked around the clock to keep Panther
together. Stretching like a cat, Veronika walked over to her replicator station.
"Earl Grey, hot, no sugar, please."
At least these were working.
A few seconds later, a white porcelain cup, bearing Panther's insignia,
filled with a steaming hot beverage appeared on the pad on a saucer with a
spoon. Veronika removed the cup and saucer and took a sip; she smiled at the
soothing warmth of the tea. Already, she was starting to feel better.
"Panther, let's have Beethoven's Violin Concerto Number One in D
Major, Opus 61," she said aloud.
"Yes, ma'am." Soft
classical music filled the spacious cabin. Sitting down at her desk, Veronika
leaned back in her plush black leather chair, put her feet up on the desk,
closed her eyes and sipped at her tea while the music relaxed her. If she wasn't
so tired, the white haired woman would have broken out her carefully stored
800-year-old Stradivarious and played along with the concerto.
The melodic sounds carried Veronika away, made her forget her
often-arduous duties as a Sailor Senshi and a starship captain. It took her back
to the time when her uncomplicated life changed forever...
City of Berlin, Europe, Planet Earth, Sol system, 5
December 2437
Violin music filled the den as 16-year-old Veronika played passionately
alongside her father, Klaus, an accomplished violinist with the Berlin Symphony
Orchestra. These were the times the young girl cherished most, playing the music
she loved most in the world with her father.
When the couple stopped playing, Klaus looked at his adopted daughter and
smiled warmly. "You played very well today, Ronni. You picked up the
nuances of the third stanza from Beethoven's concerto quite well."
Veronika returned her father's smile. It pleased her to have been
complimented. "Thank you, father. I most enjoy playing this piece."
"It shows. I played this piece at the Met during a tour of America
ten years ago. It was well received. I'm glad you like it as well."
"Father, do you think I will ever become as good as you are?"
Klaus chuckled and put an arm around Veronika's shoulders. "Dear
heart, as long as you believe in your talent, the sky is the limit. Your
performance at the Youth International Symphony in Tokyo last year was
remarkable. As I recall, even Lady Michelle Kai'oh was moved by how well you
played. I believe you can do anything you set out to accomplish."
Veronika smiled. She remembered how nervous she had been when the
world-renowned Japanese violinist, Lady Michelle Kai'oh, invited Veronika and
her family to dinner where the teal haired musician greatly complimented
Veronika on her performance. The highlight of the evening was getting to play
with Lady Michelle at her home. For the star-struck Veronika, who was a huge fan
of Lady Michelle, it was a tremendous honor.
"Then, I will work as hard as I can to be the very best. And to make
you proud, father," she said.
The next morning, Veronika was reading a textbook on violin construction
as she rode the bus to the private school she attended outside Berlin.
Two of her long-range goals as a budding musician was to compose her own
concertos, which she had begun working on in private, and to build a violin to
her own exacting specifications. Her father told her how he had built his own
when he was twenty-one and Veronika was eager to try that herself.
Closing the book, Veronika looked out the window as the bus, riding on an
anti-grav field smoothly sped through the countryside at 125 kilometers an hour
along a twisting, winding road. The white haired girl enjoyed the daily
thirty-minute trip as she found the country to be serene and pleasing compared
to the hustle and bustle of the city. With a smile, Veronika envisioned herself
living in a country cottage one day where she would raise a family and composed
the music she loved.
Suddenly, there was commotion as the driver cried out, and the sound of
crackling circuitry could be heard, followed by a salty curse as he worked the
controls.
"Blast! We've got
trouble! Transmission controls have shorted out!" cried the
driver. "I can't slow or stop
the bus!"
Veronika, seated halfway towards the back gulped from fear as the bus
increased in speed while the driver furiously tried to override the controls and
stop the bus. Other students screamed from terror as the bus continued to pick
up speed. The driver glanced at his gauge, the digital speedometer now reading
195 kilometers and rising. Bedlam ensued as the bus became a speeding missile,
weaving all over the road, striking other vehicles and causing numerous
accidents. And the bus continued picking up speed.
The kids were now out of their minds from terror as they feared that a
crash and a fiery death was now only moments away as a sharp right turn was just
ahead, and to miss that turn meant plummeting into a deep, rocky gorge.
Veronika,
equally as frightened, crouched low in her seat, closed her eyes and begged for
a miracle.
"Please, someone, anyone! Help us! Please! Stop this bus!
Don't let
us die!"
As Veronika prayed, she suddenly felt hot all over, as if she had been
thrown into a volcano. Her breath came in short, hoarse rasps as it had become
increasingly difficult for Veronika to breathe, and then her body began to glow
from a bright, reddish aura that pulsated to the rhythm of her pounding heart.
While the frightened girl continued praying for the bus to stop, the aura
surrounding her body quickly expanded, encompassing the entire vehicle, which
was then pulled down onto the road as if attracted to the tarmac.
Sparks flew from the vehicle's undercarriage as friction from its contact
to the road caused its speed to rapidly decrease as it grew nearer to the turn.
Veronika prayed harder and harder, as she did, the reddish aura surrounding the
bus grew pulsed faster and faster and grew so bright that everyone had to shield
their eyes from the light. Still,
the vehicle's speed decreased at a tremendous rate as the undercarriage now dug
into the road itself, creating an increasingly deep furrow, almost as if the bus
were being pulled under the road.
Finally, with the lower half of the vehicle almost completely buried, the
damaged bus was brought to a jarring stop only fifty feet from the edge of the
precipice. Once it stopped, the reddish aura slowly receded into Veronika's
trembling body. Leaning back, the white haired girl, panting and wheezing from
exhaustion, opened her eyes, but instead of stark whites, everything was crimson
red and softly crackling from the energies that erupted from her body. A second
later, her glowing eyes returned to normal and Veronika looked around her, as
did the other kids, then they cheered, lucky to be alive.
An hour later, the scene where the wrecked bus sat was a frenetic hotbed
of activity with emergency vehicles and ambulances tending to the kids, most of
whom were injured during the perilous ride. Meanwhile, police officers were
staring at the deep trench created by the bus that stretched nearly six
kilometers behind it.
Veronika, still shaking, but unhurt from the incident sat on a rock
hugging herself, trying not to dwell on how she very nearly died. Yet, she was
puzzled as to why her body became so hot while she prayed for the bus to stop,
or why she had been so tired afterwards. It was like I did something to stop
the bus from crashing, she thought. But that's impossible!
Suddenly, there was an added commotion as two colorful figures arrived on
the scene. Veronika gasped and her eyes widened at recognizing them. The famous Sailor Mercury and her husband, Mercury Knight,
talked to the detectives investigating the scene. It was common knowledge that
the Mercurys were always sent to investigate strange occurrences, but Veronika
never expected to see them in the flesh.
Veronika looked on in awe as Sailor Mercury activated her VR visor and
looked at the long trench furrowed into the road. The Ice Senshi's gaze then
took her to the bus, which she looked at for several moments. Finally, Sailor
Mercury stared directly at her for what seemed like an eternity. That concerned
Veronika more than a little.
Deactivating her visor, Sailor Mercury pulled her husband aside and
talked to him for several moments, stealing glances, and then pointing right at
Veronika who now became openly worried. The two heroes then walked right up to
Veronika, now borderline frightened.
"Hello, dear. How are you feeling?" asked Sailor Mercury in a
soft voice that was filled with genuine concern.
"Uh, okay, I guess," Veronika replied haltingly. "Is
anything wrong?"
"I'm not sure. What is your name?"
"Veronika Steiner. Did I do something wrong, Lady Mercury?"
The Ice Senshi, seeing how nervous Veronika was gave her a warm smile.
"Please calm down. And
no, Veronika, you didn't do anything wrong. In fact, I believe you were
responsible for saving all those people."
"Me? But... I didn't do anything!"
"Not directly, Miss, but your actions did save everyone," said
Mercury Knight.
"How?"
"I did a scan of the road and detected traces of magnetic energy.
The bus was surrounded in the residue of a powerful magnetic field which,
amazingly enough, had been generated by you," Sailor Mercury explained.
"Somehow, you tapped into the magnetic ley lines that run beneath the earth
and used that to attract the bus to the ground, bringing it to a halt before it
flew off into the gorge."
Veronika, hearing that, was shocked. "I did that? No way!"
"You most certainly did, Veronika. According to my scan, you possess
enormous power, Veronika. Power equal to that of a Senshi."
"I... I don't get it. Where did this... power come from?"
"I'm not entirely certain, but it would appear at first blush that
your power is the result of a one in a billion genetic anomaly in your DNA
structure."
Veronika stared down at her hands and was scared, feeling her entire
world had been turned upside down. She was a science major at school, so she
knew right away what the implication meant. "What you're saying is, I'm a
mutant."
Sailor Mercury nodded slowly. "Your anomaly had lain dormant within
your genes since birth, waiting for some sort of trauma which triggered your
latent powers to life."
"I guess that being on a runaway bus qualified as a trauma."
Veronika's face then took on a look of sheer anguish and horror. "Sailor Mercury!
What am I going to do?
What will people think of this? How
will they react? Please! You have
to help me!"
Sailor Mercury and her husband looked at each other for several moments,
then the Ice Senshi stared intently into Veronika's eyes. "I believe I can
help you, Veronika. But it's going to require an incredibly drastic change in
the course your life takes. It will require complete and total dedication and
commitment from you in mind, body and spirit. You'll undergo hardships,
loneliness, even danger. But the rewards are unmatched anywhere. But, I must
warn you, if you agree to what I'm about to propose, if you decide to make this
change, there can be no turning back. Ever."
"Uh, what sort of change are you talking about?"
The Ice Senshi's lips curled into a wry little smile. "How would you
feel about becoming a Sailor Senshi?"
In the Alpha Zone, in deep space, 5 December 2737
The SLS Panther
Veronika Steiner's eyes opened as her reverie ended. Looking around, she
found herself back in her cabin aboard the Panther instead of in the past.
The white haired woman looked over to an 8 X 10 inch picture frame that
sat on the far left corner of her desk. The photograph, lovingly maintained,
despite being three hundred years old was of then 16-year-old Veronika,
surrounded by her stepparents and younger stepbrother, while, in the background
were the sprawling hills in Tokyo's countryside and the campus of the Tsukino
State College. The place where my life changed forever, she thought.
"No, not quite," Veronika whispered. "Everything really
changed when I stopped that bus from crashing that day. Everything else was
secondary."
Picking up the frame, tears filled Veronika's eyes as she stared at the
photo. Everyone was so happy that day, she remembered. Her parents, initially
shocked at discovering their daughter was a mutant were proud beyond measure
when Sailor Mercury sponsored her into the mysterious school that produced
Sailor Senshi. At the time, Veronika was excited about the new adventure she
would embark on.
Then Veronika recalled the hardships and loneliness Sailor Mercury spoke
of when she graduated with honors and became Sailor Magneta, the Senshi of
Magnetism. When she was blessed with immortality by Neo-Queen Serenity and would
eventually watch her parents, friends and loved one grow old and die while she
remained eternally young. Some
days, Veronika viewed that more as a curse than a blessing.
Then Veronika thought about the rewards. How her actions, and those of
her fellow Senshi and Sorcerers kept their corner of the Milky Way Galaxy and the Golden
Millennium safe from the evil forces that threatened it. These were the days
Sailor Magneta treasured most now, fulfilling the duty she had been entrusted
with all those years ago.
"Mother, Father, Hans, there's been good, and bad in the different
course my life has taken," Veronika said to the picture while tears rolled
down her cheeks. "While I miss you all, each and every day, I am content
with the road I have traveled these many years. It was if I had been...
attracted to the life I now lead. And I will always make you proud."