Claudia stuck her nose in the air and struck a glamorous pose. She was taller than Lisa and several years older, with exotic good looks crowned by a cap of close, coffee-colored curls.
"You jealous? I had a late dinner with Commander Fokker."
Lisa had been joking, assuming Claudia had spent her last groundside leave visiting with her family, but suddenly the First Officer was angry.
"Claudia! You stayed out all night, knowing you and Roy both have flight duty today?" Duty was everything to Lisa; she had trouble understanding how anyone could be so casual about such an important mission.
But there was also something else, something about Claudia's love affair with the handsome, heroic Roy Fokker-not jealousy, but rather a feeling of Lisa's own loneliness. It brought an uncharacteristic confusion to her, a sudden emptiness that made her doubt the principles by which she lived her life. She shied away from it, reasserting control over herself by acting every inch the First Officer.
But Lisa wasn't the only one who was angry. Claudia set her hands on her hips. "So? What's the big fuss about, Lisa? We won't let it affect our performance on duty. After all, we're not children-and you're not our mother!"
Lisa felt her cheeks growing red. "Your responsibilities to the ship come first, Claudia!"
Neither one was backing away from the confrontation, and Claudia looked like she was running out of patience. And given her size and temper and the fact that she was an accomplished hand-to-hand fighter, Claudia was nobody to antagonize unnecessarily.
"My private life is my own business! Nobody else's!" Claudia stopped herself just short of some cutting remark: Why don't you try loosening up for a change, Lisa?, for example.
But she got hold of herself instead. "Now then, let's get to work, all right?" She pointed toward Lisa's duty station. "Get outta here."
Lisa hesitated, unused to backing away from a fight, and still angry but feeling she'd overstepped her authority. Just then Vanessa said slyly, "Lisa doesn't understand about men, Claudia. She's in love with this spaceship."
Claudia couldn't resist a grin, and Kim threw in, "Yeah, you got that right!"
That stung Lisa terribly, though she'd have died before admitting it. She knew she had a reputation as a cold fish among most of the ship's complement; maybe that was why, against the rules of good discipline, she'd found herself becoming close with the other women with whom she spent so much time on the bridge. Besides, Captain Gloval's informal and even indulgent way of running the bridge-rather fatherly, really-made it easy to make friends.
But now Lisa felt herself flush angrily. "That wasn't funny, Vanessa; we have an important job to do here-"
Claudia, still steaming, interrupted her: "You act like I don't care about our mission at all!"
Sammie, at twenty the youngest of the bridge crew, couldn't bear to hear her friends fight anymore. "Oh, don't argue!" she cried.
She was so plaintive that the danger level lowered a little. "I'm not the one who keeps butting into everybody's business," Claudia pointed out.
Not quite ready to retreat, Lisa let out a growl she'd somehow picked up during her time with Gloval. Even as she began, "I'm warning you-" she was aware of a new sound in the bridge, cutting through her anger.
Claudia wore a haughty look, nose in the air again. "I hate to interrupt, but hadn't you better check your monitor, Commander?"
Then Lisa realized that an insistent signal was sounding from her duty station. She crossed to it, trying to put the argument out of her mind as Kim called out, "It's an unidentified incoming aircraft, Lisa!"
Checking her monitors, Lisa saw it was on an approved approach path and signaling for landing instructions. Since none of the many military aircraft flying patrol around Macross Island had challenged or interfered with the new arrival, it could be nothing but a peaceful visitor.
Lisa opened a communication link, resolving to try to smooth things out with her friends. She'd so much wanted the day to be right, to be marked by excellence and top performance! Why couldn't anyone share her drive for perfection? Perhaps she was simply fated to be the outcast, the oddball-
"Attention, aircraft approaching on course one-zero-seven," she said coolly. "Please identify yourself."
A youngish male voice came in response. "This is Rick Hunter. I have an invitation for today's ceremonies, invitation number two-zero-three."
Lisa checked it against another computer display, although she found herself irked by the job. The SDF-1 was set to launch, and she was expected to act as an air traffic tech!
But she responded, "That's confirmed as an invitation from Lieutenant Commander Fokker." Fokker! Lisa kept emotion out of her voice and avoided meeting Claudia's eye, finishing, "Follow course five-seven for landing."
"Roger," the voice said cheerfully, and signed off.
With all the important things I have to worry about, Lisa mumbled to herself, they also have to saddle me with babysitting the Rick Hunters of this world?
CHAPTER FOUR
All right, you win, "Big Brother." I'll come to your party. I'll even put up with all those military types you hang around with. But try not to make it too boring, okay?
High above Macross Island, an unusual aircraft began to descend into the complex flight patterns of Launching Day, following course five-seven for landing, just as Lisa Hayes had instructed.
Rick Hunter whistled as he got a better look at the SDF-1. The descriptions and the newscasts just didn't begin to do justice to the astonishing size of the thing! The two supercarriers anchored among the flotilla of ships in the harbor were of the new Thor class-each longer than a 150-story office building resting on its side-yet they were modest in comparison to the battle fortress.
And the sky was full of the sleekest, most advanced-looking fighters Rick had ever seen-Robotech fighters, the newscasts had called them. Whatever that meant. For a moment Rick couldn't blame Roy Fokker for dedicating himself to this Robotech stuff.
After a decade of secrecy, the United Earth Government promised the wonderful new breakthroughs made on Macross would be revealed. To Rick, it simply meant that Roy wouldn't have to be so hush-hush about what he was doing, and perhaps their friendship could get back on its old footing.
Rick maneuvered his ship smoothly through the traffic, relying not on his computers but on his own talent and training-a point of pride. He was the offspring of a proud, daring breed: last of the barnstormers, the stunt fliers and the seat-of-the-pants winged daredevils.
He was eighteen years old and hadn't been outflown since-well, long before his voice had changed from a kid's to a young man's.
His plane was a nimble little racer of his own design. A roomy one-seater, white with red trim, powered primarily by an oversize propfan engine but hiding a few surprises under its sleek fuselage. Rick had named it the Mockingbird, a fittingly arrogant name for the undisputed star of the last of the flying circuses.
He tossed a dark forelock of hair back and adjusted his tinted goggles, then went into a pushover and power dive for the SDF-1. This Robotech stuff looked impressive… but maybe it was time somebody showed these military flyboys that it was the pilot that mattered most, not some pile of mere metal.
Far out beyond the orbit of Earth's moon, a portentous tremble shook the spacetime continuum as if it were a spiderweb. It was only a preliminary disturbance, yet it was exacting and of great extent. A force beyond reckoning was making tentative contact on a day that marked a turning point in the history of the unsuspecting earth.