Chapter 12

[Reality Check - Friday Sep. 14 2009, 1017 hours, Space] 

They say that time slows down in periods of crisis. It is, of course, totally incorrect. When someone is threatened, the floodgates open and the body goes into overdrive. Actual physical danger is not required to trigger this reaction, all you need is a belief... And right now, Thallin really believed his ship was going to be vaporised. 

Adrenalin pumping through his body, Thallin's subjective time slowed down as his mind raced ahead, trying to come up with a solution to his problem. It was too late to back away, his plane having drifted well into the staging area of the Prometheus. Ahead of him, a Search and Rescue plane was taking off. This left only one avenue of escape. 

Thallin reached out and pushed the throttle to the 200% mark, swinging the plane's wings as far back as he could, and aimed for a spot somewhere between the bridge and the shoulder of the Macross. The plane screamed in abuse as the engines' turbines howled with the sudden demands put upon them, the jet lurching forward. Thallin closed his eyes... 

...And re-opened them, surprised to see telemetry still coming in from the Valkyrie's on-board computer. <Well waddayaknow... I made it.> With a sigh of relief, Thallin slumped in his seat, cutting the power to the jet's engines, letting it drift into space. 

There were not as many pods on this side of the ship, almost as if the enemy had never heard of sneaking up to their target. This was something he had noticed during the couple of skirmishes he had been involved in - the pods almost always seem to prefer a head-on approach to fighting, sometimes going out of their way to achieve this. <The casualty rate must be enormous!> he reflected. <But then again, they don't seem to have a shortage of pods or pilots to throw at us.>Thallin looked at the console, tallying the damage the plane had sustained. <Not too bad, considering. Still, better get the plane out of there and back into the bay before anything else happens.> 

The fighting had eventually subsided around the Macross after the Daedalus Maneouver. Thallin, too busy doing a visual inspection of the VX-001, did not notice the end-of-alert signal when it blared over the PA system. The plane had taken a few hits, including one through the cockpit. Had a pilot actually been in the seat, he or she would surely have been killed. <Score one for remote controls.>Eventually, Thallin looked up from the access panels of the Valkyrie and walked over to the computer console in one of the walls. Once there, he interfaced with the requisition system and downloaded his requirements into it. Checking back to see if the processing had been done correctly, he noticed that his requests had been pushed far down the line. A few queries later, Thallin whistled in appreciation. <Damn, but we took a beating.>Several hours later, Thallin was walking down the streets of Macross City, his legs moving shakily under him, trying very hard to resolve the conflicting orders they were receiving. It was not normally easy for Thallin to get drunk, but he had found out that persistence and the mixing of different alcohols would eventually wear down his body's natural immunity to the point were he could get plastered. <Natural Immunity my ass!> he grumbled to himself. <Always look twice before entering a closet. Learnt that the hard way, I did.> His thoughts were a complete jumble, so it was no surprise that it took him another half an hour to remember the direction he was originally heading in. Eventually, Thallin managed to find an elevator and pressed the call button. Looking at the display, he realised that it would be a few moments before the lift got to his level, so he turned around and leant against the doors. He was not certain he was in any shape to hear the lift when it arrived, and indeed the surface he was leaning against disappeared from under him before he was even aware of the lift's presence. 

Grumbling to himself, Thallin punched the level 5 button and waited patiently as the lift made its way past all of the civilian levels and eventually reached his floor. Thallin looked out into the corridor. Three or four identical sets of corridors and doors swam before him. Resisting the urge to shake his head, Thallin closed his eyes for a moment. When he re-opened them, the corridors still hadn't resolved into a single coherent picture, so Thallin slowly crossed his eyes until the world settled. Even more carefully, he uncrossed his eyes and was rewarded with a steady view of the corridor. Walking down it, Thallin reached his temporary-become-permanent quarters and punched in the access code. The door hissed open, causing him to wince at the sound, and he stepped through it, relieved to have finally made it home. 

"Thallin! Good evening." said a voice from the darkness beyond the ever-present light around Thallin's workdesk. 

"Izi...? Izzatyou...?" he slurred. 

"I received the package you sent for me." continued Izabelle. It is an interesting accoutrements, but are you certain it is appropriate?" 

<Wha...?> Thallin's tortured mind did not have more time to ponder the subject. Stepping into the light, Izabelle finally revealed herself to his sight. His jaw dropped. 

Izabelle was wearing what looked like a bikini made from tiger fur, with a set of thigh boots made of the same material. Although Thallin could not quite tell through the haze in his brain, he could have sworn she was now also sporting a small set of devil-horns. "Whxcvds..." was all he could manage to say. 

At this point, someone knocked on the door to Thallin's quarters. "EEeek yak!" Thallin exclaimed in surprise. The door opened, revealing the red-suited figure of a supply officer looking at the scene in front of her. 

"Tamara Sam'di, Sir..." she presented herself before stepping into the room. Thallin was having problem thinking, let alone registering this new presence. "Sir?" 

"...wha..." Thallin responded. 

"Sir, I have the other supplies you ordered." The supply officer raised an eyebrow, then turned towards Izabelle and presented her with a large cardboard box. "I believe these must be for you. I apologise for the costume you are wearing, see I thought... well never mind what I thought, but it was meant as a joke for Thallin. I hope these fit better. That top looks a little loose on you." 

"Thank you, but apologies are not required." Izabelle answered, smiling. 

"You're Izabelle Fate, aren't you? Kay Landers seemed quite emotional about you. You must be a very good pilot." 

"Yes, I am." 

Tamara's face gave a flicker of conflicting emotions. She turned once again to Thallin. "Sir, the MEMICs you ordered should be in next week. I've taken the liberty of adding a few personal items to Lieutenant Fate's pack. She doesn't seem to have much personality. Perhaps a few belongings will help. If you will excuse me, I have other orders to deliver." 

"..yuh...whi..." Thallin simply waved in the direction of the door, his mind still not registering much of anything outside of Izabelle's body. He vaguely heard the door swish close as Tamara left. 

"Thallin?" asked Izabelle. "Are you felling all right?" When Thallin failed to reply, Izabelle stepped forward, closer to him. This did not help with his state of mind. 

<What are you doing, you blubbering piece of trash? You're looking at a dead body containing a few custom-designed chips, and you're drooling at it? We have got to get you a girlfriend, fast> But no matter how much Thallin kept on repeating this mantra to himself, all he could think of was the sight in front of him. The conflicting emotions raged inside him for a while longer while Izabelle tried to roust him out. Eventually, Thallin came out of his tranced and looked into her eyes. 

"Oh boy." he said, before passing out. 

Forward to Chapter 13.
Back to Chapter 11. 

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