Disclaimer: RANMA ½, TENCHI MUYO, ROBOTECH, BABYLON 5, STAR TREK, MOBILE SUIT GUNDAM, GUNDAM SEED, I Don't own them so please don't Sue me if I mess around with them.

Authors Notes: I thank for the many Reviews I got from my avid readers and sorry for the long wait...

Chapter 19
Before the Battle

Zaft Spacefortress Messiah

Zaft Engineers have been doing round o' clock repairs to the Neo-Genesis ever since a Sharlin slammed into Messiah which is still there. The Sharlin for now is being carefully cleared of its former crew who died from the crash as their gravity field and inertial dampers went offline from the sudden spacefold, loosing that made every object not bolted down became a flying bullet hitting a wall.

The members of the UN Spacys with members of the Plants, EAF, Orb and the DSSD scientist are inside the huge alien ship, and like children in Toyland, they have new toys to play with, ( to study actually) from the ships crystalline armor to the Sharlin's Quantum Singularity engine, everywhere it's a scientist playground loaded with toys.

In agreement, every technology discovered will be shared equally to everyone with no exceptions; even one member of the Junk Guild who got caught by the Spacys a while back have been contracted to help crack the ships secrets especially the ships databanks, which the Junk Guild will also benefit with the deal as promised.

An hour after the REF fleet Warp out of Earth Sphere, the scientist called on Admiral Talia Gladys and she was brought to one of the Sharlin imaging chambers where a scientists name Selene McGriff of DSSD and Dr. Erika Simmons of Morgenroete showed her what they found, and they found some things that are not so impressive

"These people has no imagination on data encryption whatsoever, I mean come on, my great grandfather's old Windows XP Home Edition has a better data protection and encryption than these alien computers, jeez" said the Junk Guild Professor and Dr. Simmons agrees

"Indeed, despite their millennium of advancements, they seem to lag behind in the finer points of computer software security protocols."

"Most probably," Dr. Simmons ads "But maybe likely that, they never expect to have outsiders hacking into their computers like we are doing"

"Got it" Selene McGriff declared from an open panel she was hacking thru with her laptop "Now we can see what these Minbari have been doing lately"

The most recent file they were able to retrieve first is a file that happens several months ago, and it turns out that this particular ship was part of the first assault on the Alpha Quadrant.

Even more surprising, it that the Sharlin was part of the force that tried to invade Alpha Earth.

The Sharlin is a survivor ship and what they are viewing now is a record of that assault

"Is that the Earth?" Selene asks curious

"No, that's not our Earth, no" Simmons said as she looks thru her padd on hand

"No, according to this…I think we are looking at the Alpha Earth… the UN Spacys homeworld"

"Oh my God… that's Judah homeworld" Gladys muttered in awe and shock, though she has seen footages of the planet, but this is the view of the aliens.

A close look shows a planet that's look a bit more desert than ocean, and yet they can clearly sees signs of vegetation and ocean and also on orbit… millions of warships that stood like a metal wall.

The Homeguard fleet of the UN Spacys is facing them and an ever increasing number of smaller ships and fighters blanketing space around the Minbari assault fleet.

They watch a one sided battle unfolds, where the invaders found themselves turned into barbeque calamari and charbroiled fish in a matter of a minutes. The ship was one of a few survivors sent home intact.

The ship also has a record of the Spacys giving the Minbari a message case from the Supreme Commander of the UN Spacys, Admiral Rick Hunter, and the United Nations President, Nabiki Tendo.

The survivors brought an official declaration of war from the UN Spacys, the Galaxy Alliance and the Jurai Kingdom. The message is to be given to the leaders of the Minbari Federation and the Vorlon Empire.

The Sharlin was towed thru space warp towards the border of the Alpha and Beta Quadrant where a Jumpgates was located.

"This file is dated less than a year ago,"

"Do they have any data that is just recent?" Talia asks "It could help us assess their military strength here"

"Let me see" McGriff scans the numerous files translated by their program

"This ship seems to have been on numerous battles for the past month" McGriff said

On the holographic image they see ships not from the Spacys, some looking more like they are made of wood

"I can't identify these ships, but it seems that, every encounter they have with them, they are forced to retreat time and time again"

"Could they be Spacys ships?" Talia asks

"They are allies of the Spacys" stepping into the light is Washu looking at the holoprojection "Many races and their governments are older and more powerful than Humanity" she look at the image of the ships and knows them well.

"They are from the Galaxy Alliance" Washu identifies "From the Markings, I say they belongs to a merchant guilds, and we have quite a lot of them back at the Alpha Quadrant"

"That's some firepower for a Merchant ship" said Dr. Simmons in awe "According to the Minbari sensor logs, that ship has more power than the Archangel"

"The space in and around the Galaxy Alliance space has alot pirates preying on interstellar shipping's and worlds, much like in the old sailing days of Earth" Washu said

"Piracy is a big business which is why the merchant ships are well armed and ready to deal with pirates, Dr. Simmons" Washu answered

"Unfortunately, the pirates are better armed, so keeping the space lanes clear and safe from criminal syndicates is a 24/7/365 a day tasks for the Galaxy Police or the GXP"

"I see" she nodded and then scans thru the records and finds a very peculiar ship

"Uh…what in the world is that thing?" Dr. Simmons pointed at a bizarre ship a sailing ship decorated with charms of all kinds. In addition, the kanji characters written on the ships sails translated to the name Pirate ship "Unko" then they watch a hailing broadcast from the rather strange new ship.

"ATTENTION MINBARI DOGS! FEAR AND TREMBLE IN THE POWER OF DALUMA PIRATE GUILD MIGHTIEST FLAGSHIP, MY BELOVED, BEAUTIFUL, UNKO!" he declared with the name of the ship echoes around the chamber

"I AM CAPTAIN TENNMAN SEIRYUU, AND I DEMAND YOUR UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER OR FACE THE MIGHT OF MY INVINCIBLE SHIP UNKO!"

When they heard that, everyone Sweatdrops on the ladies and their brow were twitching at the man, declaring name of his ship.

The word Unko which translates from the Japanese language means 'excrement' or 'POOP' in English. The ladies are lost and confused and holding down their hysterical laughter as to why anyone would name their ship that describes solid waste that came from a living thing.

"Oookay, now, is this guy a fool or an idiot, and does he not know the meaning of the name he gave his ship or is it a different translation?" Admiral Gladys asks as the rest are trying not to laugh at the somewhat amusing man

"Long story Admiral, but you guess the translation right" Washu shaking her head and sighing at seeing that fool and his ship again, "I can't believe he got that damn ship back from the pawn shop'" she muttered

"Despite the name and the rather 'ahem' his ship looking like the Hichifukushin (Seven Gods of Luck) on their Takarafune (Treasure Boat) it's a very formidable vessel so I advise caution when facing him in the near future, and if you do run by him then, just shoot the hell out of that guy. You will do the universe a favor"

Looking at the vids, Seiryuu ship seems to defy logic and common sense as it made a mockery of the Minbari in that encounter

"This is not helping" Washu said as she opens her link up to the ship's computer with her own super computer the size of an iPod, as more holo-screens shows data files and ships logs and the Sharlin's condition according to the computer.

The others watch in amazement in seeing Washu do her magic, as the Sharlin's computer core gave away all its secrets in just a microsecond of searching.

"Here we are, stellar coordinates of the Minbari Federation, their colonies, key military bases and installations in the beta quadrant, including their allies and…hmmmn" something caught Washu eye among the data "Interesting"

"What is it Ms. Washu" Dr. Simmons asks

"It seems that this ship is carrying something rather nasty at cargo hold 5," she shows them the ships manifest and found Minbari symbols of biohazard substances

"Not a good sign," she mutters loudly in concern as she reads the file on what they found

"Oh shit" now to those who knows Washu, hearing her curse is never a good sign

"Admiral, I need a squad of soldier in hazard suits ready and quarantine the ship and the fortress immediately!" Washu said

"You found something?" Ms. Simmons said

"This damned ship is carrying loads of some kind of bioweapons, lots of it!"

"What!"

Within a matter of minutes, the Sharlin was isolated along with its boarding party while Washu scans the entire ship thoroughly and the cargo hold with a fine tooth come.

Thankfully the cargo holds are intact and well insulated from inside and outside.

Washu with her personal forcefield barrier, enters the cargo hold and scans the remaining holds that contain vats of plague called the 'Drakh Plague' a nanotechnology virus developed by using Shadow technology.

When Washu finished her scans of all the cargo holds and then sealed them up with her virus proof barrier and then put up restricted signs. She then opens up one of her portals to the Minerva and there she explains and show what kind of plague their prize Sharlin have on board and how truly dangerous it is.

Minerva

Admiral Gladys, Dr. Simmons, the Professor and Dr. McGriff turns pale as they watch a scene out of their worst nightmare, of a planet dying when exposed to the plague, a Bio-genetic Nano-virus built to eradicate all life.

"We have seen this used on world the Minbari are unable to conquer and it is one of the nastiest WMD the galaxy has ever encountered"

"Who made this thing" Gladys asks

"The Shadows"

"Shadows"

"One of Two, alien races that turned the whole galaxy into their personal chessboard for millions of years" Washu replied "We call them the Shadows because, there is no human word for them and they are the counterpart of the Vorlons" Washu shows a holographic image of the of the Shadows which they look like an oversize spider with a neck and way creepy

"After the Ancients finally put an end of the Shadow Wars, the race we called the Shadows returned home supposedly settling down for good until they were betrayed by their own servant race called the Drakh and after the Drakh defeated their shadow masters, they took control of an arsenal of weapons on their homeworld called Za'ha dum, and this is one of the weapons of mass destruction in their arsenal" Washu change the picture on the big screen and shows Messiah.

"It's a good thing that not a single containers were damage when this ship crash on Messiah," she said "however we need to carefully remove those containers and send them off to the Sun to be destroyed"

"What if we can't remove them?" Dr. Simmons asks

"If we can't remove them, well then we can't salvage the Sharlin, plus we may have to send both the Sharlin and the Messiah to the Sun to destroy this plague its carrying" Gladys answered

"Destroying this ship is a great loss to us if we did that" Dr. Simmons said "I mean come on; this ship has a Quantum Singularity Reactor as a power source and a gravity drive!"

"I know that Dr. Simmons, but I must put the safety of everyone in the Earth Sphere first for I do not want that plague anywhere near any population"

"I-I understand"

"Ms. Washu is there a way to destroy them safely?" Gladys inquired

"The Bio-genetic Nanomachine-virus is inert which is fortunate for us because we can destroy them without the fear of contamination"

"Any suggestions for its disposal"

"We can use the Sharlin's own waste incinerator room" she suggests "It's sufficient enough to destroy the drakh plague but still I advise caution on moving them"

"Very well, I will contact the Admiral and tell him what we found"

SDF-2 Prometheus

"Drakh Plague, Washu are you sure"

"They are inactive and from my initial analysis they are unprogrammed nanomachine virus, so they are harmless" she reported "we are in the process of destroying the batch here, however, I suspect that the Minbari have brought more of these things. The amount here is enough to kill a hundred worlds with just one barrel alone"

"So it's that lethal"

"Very lethal"

"Washu, is there a way to use that to use it as a cure or a counter to the plague on a planet is exposed to it already" he asks

"I already made one Ranma" she answered "I already figure out how the plague works and took the liberty of creating a program to use our version to neutralize the plague on a planet is exposed to it"

"Now that was fast" he said "Are you positive it will work?"

"Hey! This is Washu you are talking to sweetie; I am the universe's miracle worker, Ha! Ha! Ha!" Washu answered laughing confidently at her abilities and Ranma just sweatdropped slapping his forehead and saying to himself 'of course you are'

"Okay, so what else do you have for me?"

"Substantial Info on the fleet coming thru the wormhole" she answered "It looks like the Minbari and the Vorlons are not just invading this part of the galaxy but also to colonize it, that is after they eradicate every sentient life they can find that might pose a threat to them" On the screens in front of Ranma are a list of ships names, classes, fighters and their weapons

"They have three Death Clouds and two Vorlon Planet Killers along with more than a quarter of a million ships of every type coming thru the wormhole, that's over half of their forces coming here…Ranma, they are running"

"Running?"

"Yes, looks like our Beta Quadrant enemies have bitten more than they can chew in this war" she said "they are coercing several alien races in their quadrant to join them like the Centauri and from the personal logs of the ship's captain, the Minbari and Vorlon forces are quietly pulling out of the frontlines and letting their allies do the fighting"

"Hmnn" Ranma rubs his chin at the information he received from Washu "Sounds like they are preparing a run for it"

"Maybe, but I'm still sifting thru the ships database, you will know more later on"

"Alright then" he said "we have just initiated the plan,"

Ranma showed Washu a salvaged Minbari tachyon beacon they rip out of the wreck of a Sharlin "We activated the Minbari tachyon distress call, and it will bring the Minbari fleet here where we will engage them" he said

"We are really going to play bait"

"Bait with a nasty fish hook onto it" he replied "we need to thin out their strength at the mouth of the wormhole for Claudia fleet to hit it and hit it hard"

"Still, it's very risky Ranma"

"Yes, yes, everyone keeps telling me that" Ranma groans in irritancy of kept hearing other people's opinions about this plan

"War is all about risks," Ranma remark "besides, this is not my plan to begin with you know"

"Well I have you know that, I have the your engineers upgraded the Requiem on Daedalus Base and redeploy all the relays repaired and sent to a defensive position should the Minbari come here by accident"

"What about Zaft Neo Genesis weapon," he mentions "is it operational?"

"Zaft engineers have already got it up and running yesterday since the damage to the weapon was minimal" Washu answered "the gamma ray laser is sufficient enough to bring down a Vorlon Dreadnaught, problem is, this thing can only fire once and then you have to replace a lot of its burn out parts and replace nuclear cartridges, and that takes at least 4 to 5 hours minimum"

"Both of those weapons will have to do" Ranma said when Ranma cut off communication from Washu; he turns back to look towards Saturn where Lacus Clyne, Eternal is patrolling that part of space.

Terminal's Battlegroup Eternal leading

Twenty ships of Terminals battlegroup is patrolling near Saturn's dark side. The Eternal flying beside it are the Strike Freedom and Justice in their METEOR, is giving that part of space a thorough scanning

"It's beautiful" Lacus remark as she enjoys the view of Saturn's Rings again

"I wish we have time to admire the view guys, but we have a job to do" said Athrun flying the Justice the METEOR next to the Freedom Kira mobile suit.

"Colonel" Da Costa calls his attention "there is something ahead of us at ten thousand kilometers at the dark side of Saturn" Waltfeld aide, Da Costa spoke up as he shows an image at the main screen and what they see is a massive disc shape object, over eight thousand meters in diameter and what looks like structures that resembles a city. But something was odd at the image

"It looks transparent," Waltfeld said "Da Costa, is there a problem with the equipment?" Waltfeld asks

"No sir, all our equipment is in top form" he replied "the object there is being transparent"

"It's almost like one of the Plants Colonies" Kira said

"But it's over eight thousand meters in diameter, eight times bigger than the Plants and it's not showing up on our subspace scanners at all" Athrun said awe at the size

"Must be using some kind of advance cloak or stealth field" Da Costa said "All our instruments is showing empty space at a kilometer from the alien city"

"It's pretty beat up" Kira adds as his cameras show signs asteroid collisions and weapons fire damage "looks like it got into a fight"

"We were here a month ago, testing the Eternal new upgrades" she up the ships log and back track the Eternal flight path "we miss seeing this during our test flight" and then Lacus has a thought that came in mind

"Could this be one of the Atlantean ships that Admiral Saotome spoke about?"

"The ones he said to belong to our ancient ancestors, who said to be responsible of creating multiple Earth all across the galaxy?" Waltfeld asks

"If this is a Atlantean ship, then there should be a name identifying itself" Lacus said and then she calls Kira on the Comm.

"Kira, can you see anything that resembles a written language of some kind"

Right now, Kira is flying overhead above the city and spotted something below, a park of some kind, at the center is a structure, possibly a monument and quickly radioed in.

"I think I found something" he said "relaying pictures now"

On the bridge the crew sees a black monolithic structure, some twenty feet high to fifteen feet wide and five feet thick with writings all over. Lacus immediately recognize the language as Atlantean.

"That's Atlantean writings" she declared "can we translate it?"

"With the Prometheus database they shared, I think so" Da Costa answered Da Costa focused on the largest letters that dominate the monolith and the computer instantly translate it in English text.

"LEMURIA" the next line

"WE ARE THE ATLANTIANS, BOLDLY WE GO, TO THE STARS AND BEYOND"

SDF-2 Prometheus

"That's an amazing find Princess" Ranma said impressed at the discovery "The Atlantean city we discovered we named Atlantis, in an Altira-class, that's a mobile autonomous colony installation and compared to ours it seems to be intact while ours, well we found it sunken under the Atlantic Ocean and we raised it up"

"According to your scientist onboard the Eternal, the city seems to be slightly out of phase with reality, which is why it looks transparent, and they said it's probably why our scanners can't detect that space city" Ranma remembers that kind of technology

"You shouldn't be able to see them because the Atlanteans have something called phase-thru-cloak meaning you can't both see them and touch them" he told her "phase-thru-cloak is also a safety precaution to avoid collision when they use their FTL. Now if you can see them now, then that means the phase-thru-cloak is losing power"

Ranma sat back at his command chair and put up the image of the space city on the big screen and the one they found back on Alpha Earth. There was differences between the two but one thing stands out above all else,

"The center of both space cities is exactly the same, so it's an Altira class, no doubt about it" he noted

"The central spire where the command and control center is located, same ones we found back home" Ranma said "It would be great to explore that city, but unfortunately, we have a war to fight" Ranma changes the screens to show Lacus

"Lacus I," the moment Ranma started to speak, angry RED ALERT warning lights have start to light up "They are here"

On the Eternal, the word muttered 'they are here' by Ranma made everyone pale white as Ranma shouted out order, demanding information

"Talk to me people!" he said to the bridge crew and one of them responded first

"Confirm Minbari fleet, numbering one hundred thousand and…six Death Clouds… at three light minutes at coordinate's one alpha, heading for the distress beacon"

"They have taken the bait" Ranma declared

"Maybe a bit too well I think" muttered by one of the bridge crew as they watches six Death Cloud moving towards them while Ranma assess the movements of the enemy fleet and he sees that the Death Clouds are spreading in an encircling pattern before jumping back to normal space, and one of them is moving just too close to the location of the Eternal.

"Lacus, there's a Death Cloud and its Minbari escort fleet jumping by you anytime now" he said

"Understood Admiral"

"Stay in the dark, stay out of sight and remain silent"

"Yes sir" and when Lacus cut communications, Ranma started barking orders again "get the fleet into defensive formation, have VFs and Mobile Suits in skirmish formation

By combined force of the UN Spacys, Zaft, EAF and Orb numbered only around twenty one thousand strong is out numbered 4 to 1 is not a problem, what is the problem are the six Death Clouds the Minbari sent was a bit of an overkill in Ranma opinion.

"They really, really hate us don't they Scott" he said as Scott Bernard, Ranma second in command is at the hangar bay inspecting the VFs where engineers and mechanics are installing a weapon of mass destruction on their wings.

"Status" he asks him and Scott replied

"We put the last Tri-Cobalt missiles on the VF-17 Nightmare's Stealth Admiral" he replied

"Get every WMD we have in our arsenal and deploy them immediately" Ranma ordered "The Minbari sent six Death Clouds on us and that too many to fight against, even with the New Macross Cannons with us" He put up a tactical display of battlefield

"If I am right, they will try to box us in on all sides…cutting our escape, so we can't let them do that" he said and then open a line to all ships

"All Ships, prepare for long range attack, fire at maximum effective range, all VF's and Mobile Suits, harass the Minbari fighters and smaller ships, stay away from the fleet weapons fire" he ordered and then adds lastly

"God Help us All"