(I don't own Pioneers characters. They don't own mine.) Old Foe, New Foe;Chapter 3:Dark Side of the Sun OPENING THEME:Radiohead-Paranoid Android Meilissa rested her head on her folded arms and stared out the big window in the side of the cafeteria aboard the AEON 5. The AEON was a big space cusier/carrier that by some means had come into Raven's posession. She didn't really care what it was, or how she got there. She was just glad to be safe. But she still missed her home. She'd been born on that planet. And even though most people there, including her parents that threw her out at age 12, disliked her....she was sad to see it being destroyed by the creatures Raven had dubbed "the Swarm". She swatted the bowl of soup aside, to upset to eat. She was still scared by the news she'd heard that morning. He'd said that he felt it was their duty to go to battle against the Swarm. He didn't want to, but he along with Mike and Washu had agreed that this would be the best plan of action. So now she was signed up for pilots training. The good thing being she got to pick the design and armaments from a big list, the bad being that their was no chance of survival, in her opinion. She looked around, seeing the crew that had been maintaining the ship while Raven was away. Most of them pilots of mechs or fighters. Their were also mechanics, engineers, and ground troops. They all seemed....so much better than her, she sighed. As she sank deeper into her dark thoughts she was inturupted by a voice over the PA "Will pilots A-231 and A-344 come to the training room at this time." Melissa grumbled and grudgingly got up from her table. She walked down the hall to the training room silently. She entered the room, and got a look at the instructor. The guy couldn't have been older than 16, with red eyes and a long blue pony tail. He adjusted the collar on his knee length brown leather jacket impatiently, eyeing her with dissaproval. She walked in in silence, viewing the other person in her class upon entry. 8:08 was standing against a wall with a bored look on his face. "Alright pleebs!! Front and center, NOW!!!!", the instructor bellowed before she could even so much as wave to 8:08. She walked to an area a few feet before the boy and stood in a normal "relaxed" position as she usualy did, 8:08 doing the same. She stood looking at the boy, she suddenly approached with an angry look set on his face. Without a word he struck her cross the face with a flat palm. In the suprise of being hit so, she fell back on her ass. 8:08 leaned over to help her up, only to be kicked in the ribs so hard Melissa swore she heard a crack. "When I say front and center I mean at ATTENTION!!! Now, get to your feet and....." as he began to chew them out he was suddenly grabbed from behind by the neck and lifted off the ground. "Gail. Haven't I warned you about abuse of recruits?" sounded a voice from behind. Gail nodded as best he could, before he was dropped revealing Raven standing behind him. "Now, if I hear of, or see anything like that again you're going to be in BIG trouble. Now get up, appologize and remember to treat them like you'd like to be treated for Gaia's sake...", he said with a slight grin on his face. He helped Melissa to her feet and made sure 8:08 was ok before walking out of the room. Gail coughed and shouted "I'm Jurian, I don't have to take this kind of crap from a mere human...", he then stood and slapped her again bringing tears to her eyes. At the sound of "human" Raven's ears seemed to prick up, "What did you say?", came from his mouth accompanied by a growl like and angry dog. ". "I called you a human. Thats all you are, just a rebel human teen. Thats not your real hair or eye color. Its all fake.", Gail laughed. Raven didn't speak, he stood there for a few seconds then leaped high into the air. As he flew up he twisted to face Gail and produced that scythe from the handel. He landed 3 feet before the red eyed youth and struck him with the blunt end of his weapon on the right shoulder. Gail winced and fell to his knees, or he would have had Raven not swung that end cross his face. Raven kicked Gail in the head after he hit the ground, causing him to roll back a few feet. He then picked up the boy by the neck and brought his face inches from his own. "Gail, I have two warnings for you. One, you strike Melissa or any other woman on this ship, and I'll personaly execute you. And two, never....EVER...call me....human....", he growled before tossing Gail to the ground. Gail groaned as he lay on the ground, bleeding. Raven produced a small device from his pocket and spoke into an end "Medic to aero training room. Medic to aero training room.", boomed over the PA. "Your new trainer Kerikan will be along shortly. Gail here is gonna need a good few days in the infirmirary before he'll be of any use. After that, I'll decide his future with the crew...." Raven said walking off. His workboots echoing hollowly on the training room floor. 888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888 88888 Mike chuckled evily. In retort to the INSULT of having to take that Gail moron Raven had booted off his ship yesterday, he'd sent Tenchi over to the AEON 5. He leaned back in the leather chair in his office. "Kraft. Pull up view screens of training rooms 3, 6, 17, 32 and 5.", he said to the apparently empty room. "Yes sir.", spoke a soft female voice as the screens came into view. On the first screen Ryoko stood instruction some of his "friends" who were on his ship in hand to hand combat. He'd left this up to her, seeing as she was the most computent fighter he'd seen yet. On screen two, he watched Kitty battleing with a training bot. In her "human" form she'd been rather hot. Now, as her catgirl form, she was stunning. And she wasn't half bad at fighting either, She was easily dodging and blocking the cyborgs advances. She'd make head of a platoon, he'd see to that personaly. The third screen showed Patrik and Ayeka sparring. Pat came at her with a few quick bo strikes. She came back with a similar series, plus an un-orthadox manuver that knocked him to the floor. "Jurai luck..." he laughed to himself. He knew that they would be using guns, mechs and conversion tanks on the ground. But Raven and Washu insisted that if they knew hand to hand, and we're in good shape they'd have better odds of comming out alive. Screen four displayed the inside of a trianing simulator where Gravey was working on taking out a small squad of mechs from a "Havok" class ACT. Suprisingly the fatass was winning. "Nice piloting. Good use of weapons. Tageting is pretty good. Hmm...We might be able to use him....", Mike thought and laughed. The final screen was his friend Roxy. She'd watched the ship while he was away on Earth. She'd kept it in good order. Especialy because it wasn't likely that anyone would screw with a 5'10", 145lb brunete who could bench press an Oldsmobile. Well, the engine anyway. But that was beside the point. She was one of the best they had. She was in the sniper simulation Mike had designed. She was the only person he knew that could outscore him, he didn't know how, but she did. "Kraft. Screens down, I've seen enough.", he said turning his chair so as he could look out the Cerberus's window. The screens dissapered, as he had commanded. He just stared out, literaly into space. In complete silence. The only thing that made tis seem real at all was the sun. It sat several million miles away, Earth somewhere on the opposite half. This hadn't been the best place to hide from the swarm, but it was better than nothing. 888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888 88 Kiyone yawned and stretched. She'd been sitting at the communications screen on the bridge for what had seemed like days. She and and Mihoshi had been talking with the head of the GP since lunch, trying to get some help in "swarm area". They'd finaly gotten the help they needed though. The Galaxy Police and Space Defense Force we're sending a carrier each to the solar system. They were to rondevouz in the asteroid belt, from there they'd decide the best course of action. She got up and began to walk out of the bridge. "Kiyone, where are you going?", Mihoshi asked. Kiyone sighed, "I have ST training today. Get to pick my mech and weapons systems, then I get to train for 6 hours in the simulator.". "I wonder why I'm not signed up for training. I'd really like to get out there and kick some swarm ass! Destroying our home, crashing your plane...THE NERVE OF THOSE BUGS!!!!!", Mihoshi began ranting. She didn't stop till Kiyone spoke up, "Mihoshi, Raven's letting you use Nightshade. All you need to do is learn the crafts weapon systems.", that quieted the blonde down. But only momentarily. Kiyone left before the next rant could begin, she didn't need a headache at this time. Kiyone sat down at the small table. She'd found that all mech creations started with a one on one with the head engineer. Kiyone sat patiently waiting on who ever it was. She was guessing it'd be some psyco like Mike. She heard a door open, and turned to see who it was. Who came in was a teenage girl, Kiyone guessed 17 Earth years for this one. She had her pale green hair tied back in two pig tails, that reached to her shoulders. Her eyes were a weird shade, kind of a bright orange. She had a tanktop and jeans on, accompanied by a pair of heavy work boots, all of which had grease and other filth on them. The girl approached Kiyone and held out her hand for a handshake. "Naomi Traverse, head engineer of AEON 5.", she introduced herself. Kiyone was a bit shocked, seeing such a young girl on this ship as the head of enigineering. "I know, your wondering how such a girl as me could be an enginner at all. Listen, all I know is given the materials and time I can fix or build anything you need. I'm the best there is, was, or ever shall be on the AEON 5. So just put those thoughts aside and we'll build you a mech you can take pride in." Kiyone nodded, a little dumbstruck. But she decided to listen and pick what she needed. The first thing to do was choose a mech. They cycled through about 20 or so when Kiyone found the "Stryder J-550". The thing was basicaly a circular cockpit with a engine and weapons base built around it, and two long legs to move the thing. For her weapons, she chose two medium lasers, two heavy lasers, a 3x barrel rail gun, and a rocket launcher. The whole time, Naomi was typing this into a laptop. At the end of the talk the computer made a *beep whir click*, and Naomi grinned. "Time to train Kiyone. Follow me, we'll go to the sim pods." Kiyone sat down in her pod, and the doors closed. It was totaly dark for a second. Then their was what looked like a window opening up. She saw that was how the "eyes" of her mech would look. She could see a long coridor stretching out for a good 70m in front of her. "Ok Kiyone, this is the jump tube where we launch the mechs from the ship. Lets just make sure your harnass is in place...." the transmiton came in. Atthat moment a padded shoulder harnass came down over her, stoping at the top of her thighs, pinning her legs in place. It suprised her at first, but it was for her safety. Even in simulators you had to know everything to do for the real stuff. After the harnass locked down, Kiyone heard Noami doing a countdown. Soon after, she found herself flying forward at an alarming pace. She scremed and broughther arms up to sheild herself. As she burst out the end of the tube, the mech spun wildly upsidown, right side up back and forth between the two. Her whole world was a blur. "KIYONE GRAB THE CONTROL LEVERS ON THE SIDES OF YOUR CHAIR!!!!", Naomi yelled her voice booming in Kiyone's pod. She grabed on to them asordered and the mech came to a screeching halt, giving the pilot a severe jolt. "Damnit Naoimi....", Kiyone said rather dazed, "You could have warned me about that..."."Well excuse me, I thought since you'd been with the GP you knew how to pilot a mech.", came the reply over the speakers. This was followed by a few minuters of control explanations by Naomi. Kiyone gave the flight controls a few minutes of trying before she headed to the planet. When she got there, she saw a few other mechs standing around. Her object was to defeat them as quick as possible. The first time, she barely made it out. But the more she did this the better she got. She learned more manuvers, jumping and such. Before too long, She was entering the higher combat levels, she was having difficulty but doing well for her fisrt time behind the controls. As she exited the sim six hours later, Naomi patted her on the back. "You'll do well in combat. I'm not sure how you'll do against the swarm, but you did well against mechs. I'm surre this shouldn't prove much differnt." she said ginning. Kiyone slowly made her way to her room. As soon as they'd all completed training, they'd head for the belt. She just hoped that this would be a short battle. Though, she thought as she smiled to herself, there wasn't much chance of bugs standiing up to a fully functional mech. As she neared her room she saw a crowd of people running the other way. Amongst them were Washu, Drew, Cass and a few others. She grabbed Cass as she ran by, "What everyone running for?". Cass shot her an annoyed look, "Haven't you heard. Raven and Tenchi are going to fight down in the arena.". Kiyone stood there for a second in shock. Then she followed Cass, pushing back the thoughts that the boys might kill each other. 888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888 Tenchi had suprised himself. He never thought he'd do it, but he stood up for himself. Raven had bullied him a bit, telling him that he didn't think he could give him control of any troops because he had no idea how to maintain control. Tenchi hadn't minded this, till Raven said something about sending him back to basic training. He'd trained all his life to fight, and now he was being told he had to do that again!?!? At that moment he'd pushed Raven and told him that he had two choices. One was not send him back, two was to find out about his training the hard way. Raven chose number two, not smart, atleast thats what Tenchi thought. Now Tenchi sat at one end of the subspace arena Washu had created for the occasion. He saw all his freinds and crew mates in the stands. Talking amongst themselves and placing bets on one or the other. He spun his wood training sword around a bit, he then laughed to himself and thought about how easy this was going to be. At exactly 5:00pm Earth time, twenty minutes after Tenchi challenged Raven,a horn blared over the PA in the room silencing the crowd. Washu's voice boomed over the PA once the crowd had fallen quiet. "At the south end of the arena, standing at five feet seven inches and weighing one hundred and twenty seven pounds, TENCHI MISAKI!!! And at the north end, standing six feet tall and weighing in at one hundred and thirty eight pounds, RAVEN MAKIBI!!!", after that a mad cackle bellowed over the speakers followed by the word "FIGHT!". Tenchi lunged at Raven with his "blade". Raven, having opted for a wood scythe, side stepped and swung hitting Tenchi with the blunt area opposite the blade. Tenchi grunted and fell forward. As he fell he put his hands forward and did a hand spring forward. He landed rather unsteadily on his feet than ran back at Raven, sword poised to be swung. His wood blade came down with a *CRACK* against the pole of Ravens weapon. He then pulled the weapon back and used an "upstrike" trying to knock the weapon up and out of his oponents hands. It might have worked had Raven not back stepped. Tenchi's blade went up into the air hitting nothing. Raven used this opportunity to kick Tenchi's hand and send the training blade spinning out of his grasp. Tenchi leaped, as Raven followed the kick up with a wicked swing for his feet. Raven spun in a 360, and knocked the Misaki kid out of the air. Tenchi landed next to his training weapon, and grabbed for it in desperation. As he reached his feet Raven had come in with a overhead strike. Tenchi barely blocked in time. For the next five minutes were a brutal sequence of strike and counter strike. "This is stupid, I can't defeat you with toys!!", Tenchi yelled throwing his sword aside. "So you admit defeat?", said Raven in a tone of mock boredom. "No, just improvising....",laughed Tenchi summoning the lighthawk key to his aide. The crowd gasped, and Kiyone gulped. This wasn't in the rules. It was just a dispute, not a battle. Now it looked as if Tenchi ment to skewer her brother..... Tenchi lunged forward, and had Raven not fallen to dodge, he would have been a humanoid sish-kabob. Tenchi missed his target and turned angrily to see Raven dusting his shirt off. "Ok, you cheat and I'll cheat.", Raven said completely calm. He clenched his fist, and a swirling cloud of dark blue and black fog appeared around him. He unclenched and pointed his fingers at Tenchi. From the cloud burst four large gray wolves. The animals snareled and glared at Tenchi with glowing eyes. Tenchi stepped back a few feet, a look of panic and disbelief filling his eyes. He deactivated the tenchiken, and hung his head in defeat. Raven smiled, and swung his arms out dispelling the fog and wolves. He bowed in acceptance to Tenchi's surrender. Tenchi just fainted. 88888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888 Mike and Ryoko chuckled as they watched the fight over telecast from the AEON 5. The only thing that troubled Mike was the weird was Raven had avoided that first real sword strike. Falling on your back was not a typical manuver in a hand to hand, or any other battle. Mike had Kraft edit that part out and replay it. He did it again and again. Finaly he noticed something. It was un-intentional. He could see the suprised look on Raven's face as he fell. He looked closerand he saw a silver shimmer in the picture, behind Raven. He studdied it for a minute and could make out the form of a young girl. "Bird boy got himself a guardian angel...."he said to no one in particular. Well, if thats what it was, it'd had best be able to defend more than one person at a time. That would make winning one HELL of alot easier. 888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888888 888 Closing Theme: SilverChair, Anthem for the Y2K