Convergence

2/22/03 0:54 : JP with Wes(Yui, Hoshi, Hinosami) , Tyler (Ritsu, Lavina) ,

Nick (Alexis), Zack (Wazu) & John (Sgzyr)

GSS Yui (GD-30)

Ch. 1 Part. 2

The GSS Philosophy (GD-117) pulled alongside and then over the GSS Yui (GD-30), lining up its lift hatches to the elevator systems of each could connect. The two nearly identical blue-hulled starships sort of looked like mating fish.

Aboard the GSS Now and Forever (GC-04) the sparse crew was bustling with renewed life as they started their course to meet the USS Yui (GD-30). Chiharu sat on the bridge and looked over the space on last time, the ship had served her well and now it was time to say goodbye so the last time to go report to her new duty station, the GSS Yui.

The GSS Yui was going to be sandwiched, with the somewhat larger cruiser on the bottom...In the meantime, the Taisho stepped into the lift car from her new ship, and rode down into the GSS Yui. Above the GSS Yui, a fifth fleet Yui-class ship appeared also, the GSS Shindo (GD-121). It was expected already, and moved in position to dock on the topside of the Philosophy.

The recently-promoted and somewhat downhearted Chusa Hoshi Koigokoro, returning from serving on an alien ship under an officer exchange program, also moved into the lift once the ships had docked. She expected to run into Yui, but didn't realize she was right above the Taisho.

Time found Alexis sitting on the floor of the bridge, reviewing the information on the new CO that the avatar had provided. Megami had left long ago to tend to other functions of the ship. After finishing the dosser, the shifter decided to try on a neko form...they seemed to function tacticaly at a level he admired...small, agile, strong, and light. Perfect weapons.

A few moments later, the GSS Now and Forever blinked into existance near by the GSS Yui. Chiharu blinked in amazement at the 5th fleet ship already docked atop the Philosophy. "My my, busy day.." The Now anf Forever moved into position to dock along the bottomside of the USS Yui, glad that the smaller ship won't get squished like a bug under the weight of all the other ships, but hey, it's outer space. yay.

But Alexis's knowledge was limited to their appearence only, since he hadn't been allowed access to their technological data. "Well, here goes..." His form waivered, the molocules rearranging according to his thoughts. He maintained his internal structures, changing only his appearence. Ears lengthened, his sillouette slimmed in some areas and expanded in others. Only his eyes remained the same, retaining the trademark metallic orange irises.

The familiar yet imfamous old neko stepped out into the main deck of the ship that shared her name. She let out a smile, somewhat pleased to be back on the ship. The philosophy was very much the same, yet it would take a bit before it had that 'home' feel to it. The MEGAMI on the Philosophy was a copy of the one on the Yui, and the two were probably talking their odd computer-speak and whatnot, catching up on things.

Wazu was waiting by the lift system for the new arrivals when Yui entered the ship. "Hello!" He said enthusiastically.

And Koi made her way onto the Philosophy, carrying her belongings in a single black bag which bore the logo of the GSA 1st Fleet. Settling into her quarters, the as-of-yet untouched science and medical nest, she began to put up her uniforms in the locker-chests.

"Hello again, my friend." Yui grinned at Wazu, wondering what weird invention he was working on this time.

The shifter blinked, tilting his...her head as she examined her reflection on a console surface. "A fairly accurate representation, if I do say so myself," she said with a pleased tone, brushing a bit of maroon hair out of the range of vision. Her inspection was interrupted by a mental alarm. "Right! The CO is coming aboard soon!" Alexis exited the bridge and headed to the lift, spotting Yui and Wazu upon arrival. "Mistress Yui, welcome back!"

Yui bowed lightly to Alexis, taking a moment to deduce who she actually was.

"Who are you?" Wazu said obviously confused not knowing that the new neko was Alexis.

"I came back to introduce your new captain. I'm sure you'll be pleased with her." Yui stated with a confident smile.

The new neko blinked, then smirked at the Doc. "I'm Alexis. Sorry, I was just trying something new."

When the Now and Forever docked with the GSS Yui, Chi boarded the lift that would take her up onto the Yui. And she glanced about at what was to be her new ship.

ui bowed lightly to Alexis, taking a moment to deduce who she actually was. "Alexis?" the Taisho finally asked, not ever having seen a neko with maroon hair before. It was as unnatural to her as pink hair was to humans.

"who are you?" Wazu said obviously confused not knowing that the new neko was Alexis.

"I came back to introduce your new captain. I'm sure you'll be pleased with her." Yui stated with a confident smile.

The strange neko smirked at Wazu. "Recognize me now?" she asked with amusement, her eyes glowing slightly with an orange light. "I decided to try out a new form, that's all."

Chi exited the lifted and glanced about at the hulls and hatchways that connected the lift to the rest of the ship, not quite sure where exactly she was at the moment. "I wonder if I'll get lost again.."

"Alexis?!" Wazu was obviously suprised "It is you!"

Luckily for Chi, the Yui was not a big class of ship, and the conversation of Yui, Alexis, and Wazu could be easily heard down on the other end of a hall filled with a single layer of boxes.

After smirking at Wazu again, Alexis acknowledged Yui with a bow, then stepped back and stood at attention. Wether it was required or not didn't cross her mind, but she nodded curtly at Yui. "Yes, Taisho, I'm sure anyone you chose will be a good commander."

Chi smiled hearing voices and jogged towards them, resisting the urge to prance on all fours towards it like an actual cat.

Yui couldn't help but look around her feet making sure there wasn't more skittering experiental creations running around down there. "She should be here anytime." Yui observed, and laughed in amusement as just then the one they spoke of arrived. "Hail to you, Chujo Ketsurui!" Yui smiled.

Chi skittered to a stop, wow, that was fast, as she found her old friend and the bridge. "Hello again Taisho Kitsurugi." She smiled brightly to her friend and then to the other, if odd, Neko and the man. She smoothed back her dark brown hair, almost as if to pull it into a ponytail and let it drop again, looking over the trio with curiousity shining in dark red eyes. "Are these some of the crew? And a new type of NH-7??" She looked over the Neko like a new child would over a brand new toy.

Alexis pointed to herself tenatively, raising a brow as if to say "Who, me?"

The Taisho looked at Wazu, then to Alexis, then back to Chi. "These two are part of your new crew. This..." she pointed to Alexis, "...is Alexis Jaren. And this..." a finger indicated Wazu, "Is the famous Heram J. Wazu, designer of the Wazu and Wakizashi class starships."

"Pleasure to meet you!" Wazu said giving a slight bow to Ketsuri Chiharu

Chi smiled brightly again, tilting her head to one side as she looked Alexis over again. "Nice to meet you Ms. Alexis, Mr. Wazu. So you're not taking this Neko with you Yui-san?"

Smiling, Alexis followed Wazu's lead and bowed as well. "It's an honor to make your aquaintence, Chujo Chiharu...Wait, miss?" The neko looked a bit confused, then shook her head and shrugged. She'd let it go, for now. The Chujo would find out soon enough.

Yui stepped up next to Chi and then moved behind the new admiral, rubbing her hands on Chi's back, feeling her up for VDF flaps and CPPO outlets, finding none. She then ran her hands through Chi's hair, admiring its odd color, which seemed nearly as out of place as Alexis' hair. "Ooh." Yui raised her eyebrows. "You're an X, aren't you?" Taisho Yui, also a test weapon who would might be recieving an X body, asked. "Alexis will be staying aboard the Yui."

Chi nodded again at Alexis. "You look squishy enough unless you're married." She pondered the idea, it kinda makes you wonder if she's just playing, as Yui examined her. "Mew?" She blinked a bit and then nodded to Yui. "Yes Yui-san, I'm now an X."

Having not seen an NH-7 in great detail, all Alexis has is the basic shape and face, but none of the ports or flaps...

Again, Alexis frowned. "'Squishy'?"

Yui smiled at Alexis' frown, holding back a chuckle.

Once again Chi looked at Alexis. "Unless you have a hard body." She smiled again.

"I'm not married or otherwise engaged...sorry, what did you mean by 'squishy', ma'am?" A look of thinly veiled confusion accompanies the shifter's question. "My skin is molecularly identical to a standard neko, at least, as far as I have been able to replicate it. I haven't exactly been able to do any in-depth study to its make up yet."

"Bony hips." Yui joked on Chiharu. Chi had always preferred the firmer settings of the NH-7, and a quick feel on the admiral's hips confirmed the Chi and set the body up as she always had.

Wazu looks confused but simply shrugs it off

Chi blushed a bit at the taisho's comment. "She's no fun." she said in reference to Alexis. "You can shape shift according to DNA then?"

"Don't try to decode the NH-7 or NH-X DNA." Yui warned. That sort of thing would always end up in injury or death to someone.

"I go deeper than genetic coding," Alexis said, her unease evaporating as the subject became less mysterious. "I start with the basic molecular construction, if that includes DNA, then I do my best to copy it. But first I have to obtain a sample, this is only a copy of your shape and mass."

Chi looked towards Yui, "Alexis is my... ?" There was a questioness in her voice and her posturing.

Yui gave Alexis a stern look of warning that said "don't try it." To Chiharu, Yui answered, "Alexis is your first officer, and the pilot of this ship."

"Visual data is limiting, and Megami wouldn't allow access to anything more..." The orange-eyed neko's outline shimmered as a glow eminated from her irises. "Eh, all I have to do is have a blood sample or touch you...but I'm not going to try, so don't worry. I don't copy people without permission or unless it's an emergency." Her form remained at the 5'4 hight, but lost the shaply hips and breasts of a neko, becoming the form of a fairly lankey and thin 15 yr old human. His eyes lost their glow as the transformation completed. "I'll stick with this form, though. I have more experience in working it."

Chi nodded again. "Ah ok. He? is a transexual shape shifter too?" The tone in her voice left no question that she was joking.

Wazu gave out a small laugh but quickly stopped knowing it isn't smart to laugh at a superior officer

Chi shot a friendly smile to Wazu and hoped that her new first officer had a sense of humor.

Sensing the need for clarification, Alexis decided to interject. "I am a shapeshifter, of a sort. I don't have a sex, though, so 'transgender' doesn't exactly apply in a technical sense."

If he had a sense of humor, it was buried or not evident at the moment...

"The NH-7 and NH-X have intense built-in measures which will destroy the cells before it can be analyzed. Thus our extreme aversion to sensors, transporters, and analysis..." Yui explained to Alexis. "Trying to analyze a blood sample would turn it into ash. You get the idea?"

Chi sighed a bit at Alexis's response. Maybe there was hope for this boy, thing, yet. "Okay, Alexis, better question what would you like to be referred to as, he, she, it, kitty, what?"

"Oh." Alexis's face paled a bit, then he frowned. "Now, if Megami would just let me look at the file on you guys, I'd know that...Whatever you want, he is fine since I'm going to retain this form unless I don't think it's appropriate."

Her ears perked up at the sound of a female name, "Megami?" She looked towards Yui again and then nodded to Alexis. "okies, he. Can I call you Fluffy?" She grinned a bit, my she is kinda strange.

Alexis rolled his eyes good-naturedly. "If you must, you're the commander," he replied.

Chi smiled brightly again and strikes the cliche anime victory pose. ^_^V "Yay, I have a Fluffy now."

Sgzyr walked around the cargo hold once more, the baton weighing nothing in his heavy hands. He stared cautiously at the test dummy that he had systematically beaten to shreds with this small bit of metal. He smirked as he wondered what was going on, but was too lazy to go check it out. He continued to pace around the dummy, a plan was beginning to present itself in his mind.

"MEGAMI is the Mentafexic ElectroGravitionally Accelerated Memory Intelligence." Yui pointed out. "It's a new system, similar to the Now and Forever's OS Ava computer system. An artificial sentient intelligence."

"We've met. Interesting personality..." Alexis mused.

As the encirclement continued around the practice dummy, Sgzyr flipped the weapon around from hand to hand. It appeared to him that the head was about to fall off, so he decided to finish the job himself. Sgzyr slowly dropped to his knees, landing in a crouching position behind the dummy, as he began to pace backwards, sweat began to develop on his brow. Almost exhausted beyond belief, he began to make a call inwards, to get those tiny whatcha-ma-callits to work inside of him. Only a few more seconds before he could make the blow.

Chi nodded again, "I keep forgetting that other ships have spiffy new shiny things. So how is the Megami different from the OS Ava, better behaved i hope?"

Yui made a gesture signaling everyone to follow her, and led them to the bridge, where they could all take seats. On the way, she explained Megami. "Megami is recently-created system which doesn't have the indenpendance of the old OS Ava. Her powers are limited to the ship itself, and she functions as an extension of the ship, not the other way around like the old avatars. Megami is a bit more friendly, too, I believe."

"Unless you're trying to gain access without her approval," the shifter muttered, looking over at Wazu.

Chi followed and soon took a seat, glancing about the room again and pondering what to call Wazu now that she's established Alexis as Fluffy.

Hinosami's young voice came over the GSS Yui's intercom, "The Shindo is detaching and returning to Tabisdatsu."

Wazu walked over to his normal station and sat down

"The Now and Forever is now departing." Hinosami added. the ship rocked and lurched slightly as the larger ship flew free of the Yui and the Philosophy. Meanwhile, Yui was walking around the bridge since her normal seat was taken by the new captain. She instead took a seat in the defensive systems station's chair, placing her arm on the green backlit panel's sleek black surface. "How do you like it?" she asked Chi.

Alexis looked at the pilot's pit....if he sat there he would be away from everything else, so where should he sit?

Chi's ears perked up again at the sound of the Now and Forever's departure, her eyes seemed to fill with sorrow for a moment before she blinked and looked at Yui again. "It's all shiny and new. I like it alot." She smiled brightly, although she actually felt a bit ackward about the whole situation.

Spotting the Nav station, he shrugged and walked over to it. Next best thing...The Chusa sat down and swiveled to survey the station...hmm. Looked fine as far as he could tell, so he turned back to watch the nekos.

~Do I need to hurt you?~ Yui frowned, sending a short telepathic warning at Chiharu. She was annoyed that the new admiral was acting so...childish, talking about shiny, and giving the crew weird human names like fluffy.

Chi blinked a bit at the warning, shaking her head a bit. ~Gomen.~ She looked for a moment and closed her eyes taking a deep breathe. Trying to calm down, she got excited and her disorder surfaced, the only way to make it go away is to calm down.. She sat there quietly, her eyes closed as she tried to get her head back on straight.

Yui took a deep breath, too, and then saw Chi taking a breath too and tried to stifle her own, which resulted in a small fit of coughing. "Ack"

Chi opened her eyes again and looked over to Yui, "Yui-san are you okay?" She straightened her posture a bit, seeming to have regained herself again.

"I have a combat mission for you." Yui said, avoiding the question with the sudden information.

"What's the mission Taisho Kitsurugi?" Chi replied, seeming more dignified now than she did only a few moments ago.

"SAINT spotted a bunch of Angel ships, heading out into space. We believe they are colony warships which will turn worlds into factories that will be making starships and weapons which will be used against the GSA. And worse, that the ships may be after some discovery which would break down our way of life...your mission is to intercept, board, and capture the angel ships."

(Note: SAINT = Star Army Intelligence )

Chi said quietly under her breathe. "The Angels are causing trouble again." She spoke louder this time to be more easily heard, "Do we know what their first target might be?

Alexis raised his hand. "Uh...what're Angels? And why are they attacking you- I mean, us?"

"Actually, one group has already gone before we knew about it. I myself will go on a long mission to find, recon, and take action agains them."

Too late, the shifter thought better of the action. He should have waited until after the briefing to ask questions.

"Angels" Yui explained, "Are a winged humanlike species...they live in small transitory realms called heavens. We've fought wars with them before." Yui looked to Chiharu, remembering the seemingly endless marches through snow and clouds and the bloody melee combat that characterized the battles.

"They're competent genetic engineers who create weapons called seraphim to fight for them. The majority of angels live in poverty, while the archangels rule over them with golden chains, driving their quest to eliminate the Geshrin."

Chi solemnly nodded towards Yui, remembering the sight of the countless battles through the supposed heavens. She shuddered a bit at the memory and then smiles slightly remembering that the wars was also were she first met Yui..

Yui looked at Chi and sent an encrypted telepathic message that was only for the Chujo. ~They want to raise God.~

Chi replied telepathically with the same encryption, ~Why do they want to bring him back?~. She frowned a bit, this was just getting worse.

"Are you going to be able to hunt these ships down?" Yui asked seriously. A lot was at stake here.

Getting the distinct idea fighting these beings was not going to be the proverbial walk in the park, Alexis just nodded and fell silent.

~Well~ Yui looked Chi in the eyes ~They've always been after that, ever since the great collapse and the creation of Geshrintall by the godkiller avatars. The point is even if it isn't possible, we can't take the chance that these fanatics are correct. Besides, they'll be building up forces that would eventually outnumber and attack the GSA and our homeworld.~ Yui still waited a response from her verbal question.

"We will hunt their ships down or we will die trying. I have confidence in this ship and her crew." Chi nodded to Yui meeting her gaze. ~Promise you'll be careful out there.~ Chi asked softly in the mind link.

Yui walked over to Chi and planted a kiss on Chi's forehead. "I will return." she comforted in Japanese,

"I hope so." Chi offered a soft smile softly speaking in Japanese, as she hugged Yui to her and then, she blushed a bit as she realised the crew probably has no idea of thier Taisho and their Chujo are doing while discussing the latest combat mission.

"Your expeditionary group will be taking the 2nd Assault Group, under Taisa Elena Kelahame and 2nd Carrier Group, while I and the 1st Expeditionary will take the 1st Assault and 1st Carrier group." Yui explained, dividing the fleet's firepower roughly in half. "The other groups will stay with your division, to the rear. We will attempt capture of the angel ships when possible, since most of their population is civiilian."

Based on the looks on their faces, the shifter turns in his chair and pretends to work his station. The two were obviously close at one time, this was not the time to play intruder. Besides, he had to figure out where everything was on this system. Basic functions he had down; at the moment he decided to work them into memory. If they were going into battle, he would need to know these like the back of his hand....or at least have it be second nature to him.

Chi nodded, dedicating the mission knowledge to memory.

Yui let out a tired yawn and rubbed her eyes. "I'll return to my ship now. I haven't had much sleep lately over this, and time is a deciding factor in this assignment. My love to you all, and may victory light your hearts and souls like wonder lighting the face of a child."

Chi stood up and looked at Yui with a soft smile. "Good night Taisho Kitsurugi, I hope you can get some sleep." ~Sweet Dreams Yui-san.~

Alexis stands and faces Yui, a slight smile on his mouth. "G'night, Taisho. Rest well."

"Good night, Alexis." Yui bowed to her former crew and to Aya, Kuru, and Chiharu, then went back to the lift and returned to her own ship. In a minute or so, the destroyers were again seperate in space. The 1st Fleet's Yui division then shot off into the stars using their CDD engines.

Chi stretched a bit. "Well this is going to be an interesting mission.."