It was 2020. Six years had passed since the destruction of the Super Dimensional Fortresses 1 and 2, that final tragedy of the First Robotech War. But Earth was on the mend now, and from the wreckage of those ships the Robotech Defense Force had succeeded in fashioning a new battle fortress -- the SDF-3. Its mission: to cross the galaxy and make peace with Tirol's Robotech Masters.
It sounded straightforward enough; but unknown to Admirals Rick and Lisa Hunter and their crew of thousands, the Robotech Masters were already on their way to Earth!
Nevertheless Tirol would have a greeting in store for the Expeditionary Mission: an incendiary salute from the warlord whose hordes had conquered half the galactic Quadrant -- the Invid Regent! Threatened with a swift and violent end, and suddenly torn by internal struggles for power, the RDF would find itself thrust into a savage war for survival!
Release date:
April 30, 2014
Publisher:
Del Rey
Print pages:
208
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I leave it up to the historians and the moralists to judge whether our decision (the Expeditionary mission) is right or wrong. I know only that it is prudent and necessary—necessary for our very survival both as a planet and as a life-form. If the Protoculture has taught me anything, it is that one must simply act! When all is said and done the inevitabilities and reshapings will have their way, but to remain either complacent or inert in the face of those fatalities is to invite catastrophe of a higher order than any of us dare imagine.
From the personal journal of Dr. Emil Lang
In the middle of the night on an alien world, an army of insentient warriors dropped from the sky. Tirol, as this small moon was known, represented a prize of sorts—the end of a long campaign that had taken the invaders through a dozen local star systems and across the varied faces of twice that number of worlds—the remote realms of the once great empire of the Robotech Masters, forged and secured by their giant soldier clones, the Zentraedi. But Tirol itself was all but deserted, abandoned almost a generation earlier by those same Masters. So in effect this conquest was something of a disappointment for the horde who had raised savagery to new heights, something of a nonevent.
But just as a rock tossed into a pond will make its presence known to distant shores, the Invid’s arrival on Tirol would send powerful waves through the continuum; and nowhere would the effects of their invasion be more greatly felt than on the world already inundated by previous tides from this same quarter—a blue-white gem of a planet that had seen better days, but was struggling still to regain control of its own fragile destiny …
Earth had captured its second satellite in the year 2013, when a joint Terran and XT force had wrested it from the control of the Zentraedi commander, Reno, faithful to the Imperative even after Dolza’s fiery demise. The factory satellite was an enormous monstrosity, well in keeping with the grotesque design of the Zentraedi fleet, that had been folded through space-time by Protoculture-fueled Reflex drives. It was radish-shaped and rose-colored in starlight, with fissures and convolutions suggestive of cerebral matter. Attached along its median section by rigid stalklike transport tubes were half a dozen secondary sacs and appendages, smaller by far, but equally vegetal in aspect, veined and incomprehensible.
There were some 15,000 Humans and Zentraedi living onboard, a sizable portion of Earth’s post-apocalyptic population. The majority of these men and women had labored for eight years inside the factory’s weightless belly to construct a starship, a dimensional fortress soon to be Tirol-bound—there to confront the Robotech Masters, and with luck curtail any threat of continued warfare.
Among those onboard were Vice Admiral Rick Hunter and his close friend and trusted commander, Max Sterling. From a viewport in the admiral’s quarters, the two men were watching null-gee construction crews put the finishing touches on the massive ship’s deliberately misleading superstructure.
“I just don’t know whether we’re ready for this,” Rick was saying. He had turned from the viewport and was three strides toward the center of the room. “There are so many variables, so many things that could go wrong now.”
Max followed him, a grin beneath the sympathetic look he had adopted. “Come on, what could go wrong?”
Rick whirled on him. “Maybe I’m just not ready, Max!”
Rick’s voice cracked on the word and Max couldn’t suppress a short laugh. “Ready? It’s been eight years, Rick. How much more ready can you expect to be?”
“Guess I’m not as good up against the unknowns anymore.” Rick shrugged, lowering his gaze. “I mean, we’ve got something good going already. So why jeopardize it, why tamper with it?”
Max took his friend by the shoulders and gave him an affectionate shake. “Look, you and Lisa love each other, so quit worrying. Everything’s going to turn out fine. Besides, everybody’s excited about the wedding. And what are you going to do, walk out on ten thousand guests?”
Rick felt the wisdom of it sink in, and smiled, self-mockingly.
They had both aged well, the rigors of life on- and offworld notwithstanding; both had turned thirty-two recently and had at least a few good years left in them. Rick stood taller and straighter now than he had during the war, and that combined with some added weight gave him a stronger, more capable look. This was enhanced by the cut of the Expeditionary Force’s high-collared uniform and torso harness, a crisscross, tailed, and flare-shouldered affair of black leather worn over tight-fitting trousers. He still wore his black hair stylishly long, though—a fashion the Veritech flyboys of the Robotech Defense Force had been largely responsible for. Max, too, had left behind the innocent look that had been something of a trademark. While Rick, Dr. Lang, and Lisa Hayes had devoted themselves to the SDF-3 project, Max had been busy distinguishing himself in the Southlands, especially during the Malcontent Uprisings of 2015–18. He still favored the blue hair tint he had affected during the war, likewise oversize aviator glasses to contacts or corrective microsurgery. Less than perfect vision had never handicapped his flying skills, in any case.
Rick was glancing back at the SDF-3 now. “And everybody gets to ride in the limo.” He smirked.
Fabricated from the hull and power drives of Breetai’s dreadnought and the salvaged remains from the SDFs 1 and 2, the ship was itself a wedding of sorts. Pursuant to Lang and Exedore’s requests, it was more Zentraedi than Terran in design: a nontransformable deepspace leviathan, bristling with antennae and blistered across its crimson surface with scanner ports and laser-array gun turrets.
“We’ll make sure you two get the backseat,” Max said. “For at least a couple of hours, anyway.”
Rick laughed from across the room; Max joined him at the external viewport, Earth’s incomparable beauty filling the view. Sunlight glinted off the alloyed hulls and fins of dozens of in-transit shuttles. Rick was staring down at the planet wistfully.
“When’s Lisa due back?” Max asked him.
“Tomorrow. But I’m thinking of shuttling down to meet her.”
Max made an approving sound. “I’ll ride with you.”
“When haven’t you,” Rick said, after a moment.
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