"And how did it affect you to hear about Sterling's longing to see her parents and the hopeless situation with the Tiroleans?"
"I felt bad for her."
Fredericks gazed at him. "Bad enough. Colonel, to supply the Shimadas with the fold codes for the ship, knowing full well that they would be passed on to Dana, who was herself desperate to reunite with her parents and save
the lives of the Tiroleans she had taken under her wing?"
Wolff's lawyer jumped up. "Sirs, Colonel Wolff has already stated that he had no knowledge of the codes. How many times are we going to cover the same ground?"
Fredericks made a placating gesture. "Colonel, didn't Sterling tell you that the Sensor Nebula couldn't be destroyed?"
"She did. But I didn't put any stock in what the Zentraedi said. For all I knew, they hated Dana for the role her mother played in the Malcontent Uprisings."
"Dana . . ." Fredericks smiled nastily. "So you encouraged her to accept the Nebula mission—even though you and your crew had been excluded."
"I did. Strategically, it made sense to keep the Wolff Pack on Earth." "Do you recall your words of encouragement to Sterling?"
"I think I said that she should do her best, and that she should take good care of the ship."
Fredericks approached Wolff and leaned on the podium, facing him. "Didn't you, in fact, tell her that she should use that ship as it was meant to be used?"
"I probably said something like that."
"Not 'probably,' Colonel. You said precisely that."
Fredericks turned an about-face. "And how was that ship meant to be used? As a two-way messenger. Colonel Wolff was sent to warn us about the Masters; that much is beyond dispute. But after discharging that responsibility, he was expected to return to Tirol. Separated from his ship, however, he had no choice but to send someone in his place. And that someone was Dana Sterling, with whom he had formed a . . . paternalistic relationship.
"No sooner did he supply the fold codes to Tokyo, than Sterling began to concoct her scheme to loft the Tiroleans to The Homeward Bound. She never had any intention of transferring them to the factory satellite, and I surmise that she only stopped there to take the surviving Zentraedi with her. Once aboard Wolff's ship, the Shimadas' machine assumed control. And the
rest, sirs, is, as they say, history."
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
It is also interesting to note that that year [2033] saw one of the mildest winters on record. This has been credited to the cloud of mecha and warship debris that had encircled Earth since the previous spring. But there are those who hold that the Flowers [of Life] themselves had an impact on the climate. They thrived because they had somehow convinced earth and sky to collaborate in their irruption.
Bloom Nesterfig, Social Organization of the Invid
The court deliberated for a week before rendering its decision. Owing to a lack of evidence, Wolff was cleared of all charges. The Shimadas and Dana Sterling were found guilty of conspiracy and sedition, though the decision carried little weight, since there was nothing the court could do to either of them.
Confined to quarters, Wolff received the news on Denver Base, and immediately began packing his bags for a trip to Albuquerque. Catherine had invited him to visit her and Johnny, though Wolff hadn't been able to determine from the phone call whether she had had a change of heart or she simply felt sorry for him. Before he left Denver, however, Nova Satori requested that he meet with her—unofficially—to discuss matters of mutual concern. In her note, she had suggested a truck-stop restaurant on the Denver-Albuquerque highway, about twenty miles south of GMP headquarters, where she assured him they would both be safe from prying eyes and listening devices.
Wolff found her at the appointed time, in a tattered corner booth, ignoring the looks she was getting from a group of redneck drivers seated at the counter. The looks ceased when Wolff slipped into the booth, largely because Nova and Wolff seemed made for each other—an inseparable two of a kind.
"Thanks for coming," Nova said, leaning back in the booth to appraise
him.
Wolff signaled for a waitress. When the waitress arrived, he ordered a
coffee, then changed his mind. "Make that a beer—a tall one.
"What's on your mind, Satori?" He mirrored Nova's relaxed posture. "Want to tell me that you're not finished with me yet? That you won't rest until you see me in the brig?"
Nova scoffed at the idea. "Despite what you might think, Colonel, your freedom was never in jeopardy. Oh, we had to present that little mock inquest for the public's sake. But the outcome was never in question. You're a hero, and there aren't too many of you left. Especially now that Dana and her boys are on Tirol, or wherever your ship sent them."
Wolff inclined his head to one side. "Funny, I didn't feel much like a hero when Fredericks was grilling me."
Nova laughed shortly. "Come on, Colonel. We went easy on you." She narrowed her eyes. "We could have made a lot more of your 'paternalistic' relationship with Dana, for example."
"You should know, Satori. You were certainly watching me closely enough."
Nova shrugged. "Don't take it personally. It's simply part of what I do. Look at it this way: You probably wouldn't be off to see your wife right now if we'd revealed everything we knew."
Wolff shook his head in disgust. "You don't miss a trick. So, do we have matters of mutual concern to discuss, or did you get me here just to provoke me?"
"The former, Colonel. But first, answer one question: Would you have gone with the ship if you'd had the chance?"
"Back to Tirol?" Nova nodded.
"No, I wouldn't have gone. I left my share of problems there. Anyway, somebody has to give you the straight dope on what we're up against with the Invid."
Nova smiled in grudging admiration. "You actually do give a damn
about what happens here. You really are some kind of champion." "Sorry to disappoint you."
"You haven't. In fact, you've made things a lot easier for me." She paused and leaned forward. "I want you to work for us, Wolff."
He gaped at her. "For the GMP? Are you nuts?"
"Maybe I am, but try to be objective for a minute and listen to what I have to say. The Defense Force is in shambles. Seventy-five percent of the Southern Cross units have decamped with their mecha and have formed scattered bands all across the North- and Southlands. But, as we're hearing it, many of those bands are in total agreement with you as to how to combat the Invid."
"That's encouraging," Wolff said tentatively.
"I agree. And it can be more than encouraging if you'd agree to act as our liaison in communicating with them. We have the makings of a resistance, but we have no one to organize it."
Wolff's beer arrived, and he took advantage of the moment to think things through. "Seems to me that those units decamped because they had no faith in the leadership of the Southern Cross," he said at last. "So what makes you think they'll listen to me if I'm suddenly a GMP officer?"
Nova shook her head. "You wouldn't be. You'll be a singleton. Plus, a figure to rally round. And all we'd expect from you in return is to be kept apprised of what you're doing—just so we can have some sense of our troop and mecha strengths."
"What do I get for my efforts? Aside from the expense account., I mean."
Nova folded her arms across her chest. "Now you're beginning to sound like the Jonathan Wolff I've read about. The one who made deals with Zentraedi malcontents just to get replacement parts for his Centaur tanks."
"Don't believe everything you read," Wolff advised.
"I'll remember that." Nova allowed a smile. "In any case, here's what we're prepared to offer you: funding for a base of operations for the Wolff Pack."
Wolff raised an eyebrow. "We'll require more than a base. We'll need mecha and Protoculture and the authority to expand our forces, however we see fit. I'd also want to include Major Carpenter in this."
"I can arrange that."
"And anoth
er thing: I want some assurance from Aldershot and the UEG that they're not going to go off half-cocked when the Regis shows up. If they do, we're lost—no matter what I manage to put together in the way of a resistance force."
"I'll talk to Aldershot," Nova said.
Wolff grinned, roguishly. "Then we just might be able to work together after all."
Nova returned the look. "When you . . . finish in Albuquerque, we'd like you to go to the Southlands. There's a group of ex-Southern Cross in Brasília who are calling themselves the Stonemen. We've had our problems with them in the past. But their commander, a guy named Gavin Murdock, intimated that he might be willing to talk terms, if you'd serve as a negotiator."
"Sounds like a reasonable first request," Wolff said.
"We'll furnish you with an Alpha. And while you're in the Southlands, give some thought to where you and the Wolff Pack might want to establish themselves. I suggest you check out a town called Valhalla, in central Amazonas. The Southern Cross had a base there before the War, in a crater left by a crashed Zentraedi warship."
"Valhalla," Wolff mused. "I think I already like it."
He lifted the beer to his lips and drained half the bottle.
"Kaaren's feeling is that the Invid will concentrate their hives in the Northlands, where the Flowers of Life are plentiful," Misa was telling Terry Weston as they stood in the wooden building that served as a terminal for the colony's airport. On the runway, the Shimada jet was being prepped for takeoff. Towering above the acacia and eucalyptus trees that bordered the asphalt strip was the dome that harbored Napperson's Hope. "Besides,
there's no organized military presence in the Southlands. So the Invid might overlook us entirely."
"I hope you're right," Terry said, caressing Misa's right forearm. "But the Flowers have begun to blossom all around Buenos Aires, and that's not all that far from here."
"Kaaren's not saying that the Invid won't construct hives in the Southlands. But most of those will probably be far to the north, in the Venezuela Sector."
Terry snorted. "HEARTH country—which they're not going to surrender without a fight."
"So let them fight. So long as they leave us alone."
Terry had been in Argentina for over a month now, but with the inquest ended, it was time to return to Tokyo. From the start, the Shimadas had trusted that the GMP wouldn't subpoena testimony from Kaaren Napperson about the cult's ties to Tokyo—not if the GMP expected to conceal their hand in the raid that had damaged the saucer. But just to be on the safe side, Terry and several yakuza troubleshooters had been dispatched to the colony to make certain that Napperson didn't testify if summoned.
Misa had guessed the truth the moment Terry and the others had emerged from Kan Shimada's private jet, and she had spent the first two weeks vacillating between concern for Kaaren's safety and anger at the Family for once again resorting to intimidation. Terry supposed it was during that anxious period that she had made up her mind to remain with the colony and distance herself from the lush life she had known in the Tokyo geo-grid.
"I don't suppose I could get you to change your mind about staying here," Terry said, after a moment.
Misa shook her head. "I'm sick of Tokyo's ends-justifies-the-means mentality. We all want to survive, Terry. But the people here wouldn't sacrifice their ideals to ensure survival."
Terry grimaced. "They were ready to accept Wolff's ship when we
offered it."
"Kaaren would never have allowed it, Terry. Okay, she didn't turn down Mr. Shimada's funds. But that was only to get the ship launched. Commandeering The Homeward Bound would have gone against everything the Starchildren stand for."
"And everything you stand for, it seems."
"I don't know how to feel about what everyone did to make sure The Homeward Bound would disappear. For all I know, Dana will return with the SDF-3 and the ends will have justified the means. But until then . . ." She sighed, then gazed at Terry. "Do you miss her?"
Terry hooked his long, blond hair behind his ears. "It's weird. I do miss her, but not in a private way. I think I miss not having her on Earth, if that makes any sense."
"Like she was a kind of lucky charm?"
"I'm not sure. But being with Dana always reminded me that we're not alone in the universe. That Human beings don't have any special claim to the stars."
Misa reigned in an amused smile. "You could always buy a telescope and stare at the factory satellite."
Terry laughed. "Maybe I will." He was quiet for a moment, then said, "What am I going to do when you leave?"
"Me? I'm not going anywhere. I didn't make the final cut." "Is the new launch date set?"
"Three months from now."
"What are you going to do after it launches?"
She shrugged. "Help to build another one. Go on living the simple life. That's the real reason I'm not returning to Tokyo. I wasn't born to live in a tower. Fairy tales are all right to read, but not to live."
Terry took her hand once more. "You see? That's what I've always liked about you."
"Then you should stay here."
He rocked his head. "Who knows, I might come back. In the meantime,
it sounds like you're well taken care of."
Misa had told him a little about Izumi Sasaki, but she blushed anyway. "I've finally found a home here—among people who aren't afraid of the future."
"Whatever gets you through the War," Terry said.
She nodded her head slowly, in thought. "When will they come?" "Nobody seems to know—not even Wolff."
"At least we had the advantage of knowing that the Masters were on the way."
"This next one's going to be like the War against the Zentraedi: Lang and his Macross Island teams predicted that the owners of the SDF-1 would come looking for it, but they had no idea when that would happen. Substitute the Flowers of Life for the SDF-1 and we're back where we started."
"I keep thinking, if the Invid come, long-distance travel will probably be impossible." Misa bit her lower lip. "This could be the last time I see you, Terry."
He forced a laugh. "Tokyo will pull through. And so will this place. With the ship launched, how could the Invid regard you people as a threat?" Misa's grin was slow in forming. "Even so, maybe I'll recommend to Kaaren that we should do as Mr. Shimada suggests: Welcome the Invid with
bouquets of their Flowers."
"It doesn't look particularly sinister," Kan Shimada said of the triple- petaled flower Louie had handed him. They were standing under a tile- roofed pavilion of recent construction, which overlooked a broad valley, south of Tokyo, in the rain shadow of Mount Fuji.
Louie nodded uncertainly. "One person's beauty is another person's beast, sir."
"It is the nature of all things to possess a measure of good and a measure of evil," Kan replied. "But until I know differently, I shall elect to see only the good in this Flower, in the expectation that the Flower will
repay me in kind."
Notwithstanding his remark, the head of the Shimada Family was wearing leather gloves that reached his elbows and a beekeeper's helmet. Louie had told him about the time Dana, Bowie, and Zor had ventured deep into the SDF-1 mound of the Macross trio and a Flower of Life had wrapped itself around Dana's arm like a predatory vine. Just the same, Louie was sorry he hadn't gone along on that jaunt; by the time he had gotten his first good look at the Flowers, they had already gone to seed.
Kan Shimada was turning the Flower about in his hand. "From this innocent-looking plant comes Protoculture," he mused.
Louie's eyes narrowed behind the tinted lenses of his goggles. "Comes war," he mumbled.
Once the hunting grounds of the Imperial family, the rolling terrain was dotted with picturesque lakes, cypress groves, and the ruins of ancient temples and twentieth-century ski resorts. Many a Shimada Enterprises annual banquet had been held at a nearby inn, called the Gotenbu Onsen. But today the Family—sons, relatives, advisors, otaku, and researchers— were gathe
red to enact a ritual of a novel sort, one that was new to planet Earth, at any rate: a Flower of Life benediction.
A swath of fecund land in the valley had been cleared, leveled, and planted with triads of Flowers of Life seedlings, which in a few short weeks had grown to mature plants, pendulous with twisting buds that resembled elongated teardrops. And moving among them were a dozen Shinto priests, who, at Kan Shimada's request, had journeyed from Hakone Jinga, a sacred shrine on Fuji, that dated to the year A.D. 757. The priests were attired in saffron-colored robes, and they chanted as they wove among the clusters of Flowers. Some carried incense braziers or drums, and others Wore finger cymbals.
Kan Shimada turned slightly to face Wilfred Gibley. "You are certain that the Flowers will thrive here?"
"Climatically, it's similar to the banana-belt valleys south of Macross and Monument City," Gibley answered. "Warm, sunny days; cool nights.
Less rainfall, but the Flowers don't appear to be affected by underwatering. In fact, they seem to derive most of what they need from sunlight and from the ground—from the Earth itself."
Shimada lifted his face to the cirrus-streaked sky. "Winter is fast on the approach. We'll see how they fare when the weather changes."
A sudden, cool breeze ruffled Louie's hair. "Let's hope it's not too brutal a season."
Everyone fell silent for a long moment.
Below them, the buds and newly sprung petals of the Flowers bobbed and danced, as if in joyful anticipation of a long-overdue reunion . . .
EPILOGUE
Astronomers who monitored the Sensor Nebula during the Invid occupation have reported that the "cloud" began to diminish in size and volume coincidental with the Regis's invasion, and continued to do so throughout that year [2033], until October; when it expanded to half its original size and underwent a series of changes in hue and reflectivity. Whether the changes were inspired by the arrival of the ships of the REF Mars Division has never been established. However, the Nebula did return to the Earth-proximal position it had reached during the final stages of the Masters' War [sic], only to be dispersed or destroyed the following year, along with the numerous ships that comprised the REF Tirol fleet.
Before the Invid Storm Page 18