RDF Life, by Weebee.

Summary: Ranma ends up on Macross Island a few weeks before the SDF-1 launches, due to Genma's stupidity. Now he has to deal with the war and his part in it.

I Don't Own Ranma Or Robotech Macross so leave me to my crossover writing shame.

Post Ranma manga, Pre Zentraedi attack.

Author's forward. If you skip this, Don't say I didn't warn you!

Y'know what, I wish this fic never existed, I Really do... Having said that, it seems that a certain group of people actually LIKE the very first, and very worst, fanfic I've ever written. I get a new PM every month or so, from SOMEONE who wants to read this thing, and I honestly don't know why. I gave up on really re-writing this thing to bring it up to specs with my other work, but this version does have two major improvements. 1, a few of the smaller, less story changing grammar errors HAVE been corrected, and 2, I've systomatically reformatted the whole thing, chapter by chapter, for easier readability. Having said that, here come the warnings.

WARNING: This was a first fic, and it shows. I mean, seriously, I can't even read through the whole thing at once anymore without cringing myself half to death. As long as you procede under the assumption that this thing's gunna suck, you're welcome to procede. Review all you want, bt I'd either make it humor, blind praise (I highly doubt this one,) or flames. C&C's futile, since my writing style's improved DRASTICALLY since this thing was written...

Oh, and I'd really like to see this thing MSTed someday... too bad EWIC's pretty much dead...

Okay boys and girls, here we go. Have a nice day.

Chapter 1. He's HERE!

Roy Fokker walked into his small 1 bedroom apartment on Macross island and dropped his hat on the table. Looking around he spotted a small white envelope, stuck under the frame of the front door. Yanking it free he opened it up and began to read.

"To: Roy Fokker. APT 142 Central towers.

Sinar street. Macross City, Macross Island.

From: The Macross city government, police division.

Dear Sir.

Due to the infraction you committed as of 4 days ago (Code 1442, Damage of public property,) and your admission of guilt of the crime, You have been given three possible sentences to choose from.

You may pay a fine of 1,500,000 Y to the town for replacement of damaged public property."

Roy grumbled about not having enough money at the moment to buy a decent meal.

"You may serve a sentence of 800 hours of community service."

"Yeah, on a military time schedule."

"or you may choose to take in, as part of a new program from the government, a child that children's aid has had problems placing for a period of from 6 to 8 months."

Roy dropped the letter in disbelief. "a kid? They can't be serious, but I can't pay the fine and I can't get enough time off to do THAT much community service so..."

HR.

Ranma Saotome scowled. "You can't be serious! I'm a seventeen year old and children's aid wants to remove me from pop's custody?"

"well, that's what they said." Kasumi Tendo replied evenly. "They said that due to a complaint of serious abuse, I believe it had something to do with cats, that was lodged several years ago they have to take you out of your father's custody until you become a legal adult. Fortunately, they said that that will be in about 6 months so this is only temporary."

As MR. Tendo created his own small lake in the background, Ranma shrugged and said, "Well if it's only for a few months. I guess I could use the opportunity to train outside of Nerima for a while, though I'll miss you and Akane a bit."

Kasumi smiled at Ranma, retrieving his backpack from where she had previously placed it near the door. "Be sure to call us when you get to wherever they are sending you Ranma-Kun. I packed all of your things for you and a light snack for you to eat on the trip.

HR.

Ranma packed all of his belongings into the back of the black and silver painted van that had shown up to pick him up 5 minutes earlier and waved at all of his friends that had gathered to wish him a good trip.

Even Ryoga had refrained from his usual "Ranma Prepare to die!" and only said "Good riddance!"

"Yeah, I'll miss ya too pig boy." The pigtailed martial artist grinned, ignoring the lost boy's glair as he walked over to Akane, who was standing with her sisters. "I guess I'll see ya later, Tomboy." He said, trying to be casual.

"Yeah…" Akane returned, looking away. "Don't go flirting with every girl while you're there, got it?" she continued, however there wasn't any heat in the comment.

As Ranma was heading for the van himself, he could have sworn he had heard a whispered "I'll miss you," come from the dark haired tomboy, however when his head snapped back she was looking away, talking to Nabiki.

"Hey kid, we have to get going!" Came the call from the, causing Ranma to look forward again and walk to the vehicle, jumping into the front seat.

As he rode off into the streets of Tokyo, Ranma heard the parting shouts of almost everyone that he had met in Nerima. It was too bad that he didn't know that he wouldn't be seeing them for A LOT longer than 6 months.

HR -2 days later.-

Roy Fokker waited on the front steps of his apartment complex for this kid that he was supposed to take care of to show up. "what was his name... Ransu? Ranko? AH, Ranma! That was it. Don't wanna get this kid pissed at me in less than 5 minutes. I think that'd even be a record for foot in mouth Fokker." Roy laughed to himself as he saw a Taxi cab pull up to the curb and come to a stop.

The door opened and a youngish looking man with a pigtail hopped out, a really big pack on his back. "Thanks for the ride." he said as he paid the cabby. He walked up to Roy, who was still sitting on the step and said, "Hi. I'm Ranma Saotome. I'm lookin' for a Roy Fokker."

"uh...yeah. I'm Roy Fokker. Aren't you supposed to be a kid? I was told that I'd have to put up a "Child" for a few months."

"Yeah. about that. Ya see. apparently there's some stupid law that says that I aint a legal adult for about six months n' that 'cuz of somethin' my pops did a few years ago I aint allowed to see or speak to him 'till I am. So they sent me here."

Roy blinked. "So what exactly did your "Pops" do?"

"he he...um. A lot of stuff. What I think they mean is the Neko-Ken. It's a martial arts technique where you wrap the student in fish products and drop him into a pit full of starving cats. a whole buncha times."

Roy blinked again. "Well... That's...um disturbing. Anyways. Let's get your stuff inside. Apparently You'll be staying around here for a while."

Ranma shrugged, picked up the REALLY big backpack and walked into the house.

HR

Roy Fokker watched in a state of shock as his new house guest demolished the entire contents of a large bento that had been packed in his backpack in the time of about 15 seconds.

"Ah Kasumi's cooking really hits the spot." The aforementioned house guest said, with a burp as he put the wreckage of the meal into Roy's garbage bag.

Roy just kept opening and closing his mouth until he croaked out "H-how'd you do that? Do you eat that much all the time?"

"Anything goes martial arts Food-foo combined with a modified version of the parlay du foie gras technique." The boy explained. "As for eatin' this much all the time, Nah. I can go without food for quite a while. This is just how much fills me up."

Roy just grimaced as he realized that his food bill was going to go up while this kid was here.

As Roy despaired over food bills, Ranma debated as to whether to tell him about the curse or not. This quickly became a moot issue as, with the uncanny accuracy with which all Jusenkyo cursed people are familiar, a hurled water balloon from a kid's party across the street came flying into Roy's apartment window and straight towards the nearest water magnet. "C'mon, THIS is ridiculous." Ranma groused to herself as she peeled the fragments of the exploded water balloon out of her damp red hair and noticed Roy staring at her in dumb shock.

"Erm...eh...Wouldya believe Ranma just ran out the door and I'm his sister?" Ranma questioned hopefully. Roy just shook his head before passing out on the floor. Ranma sighed.

HR

"Bwahahahahaha!" Roy laughed almost hysterically.

"it aint all THAT funny, y'know!" Ranma groused as she put a pot of water on to boil.

"Hahahaha..." Roy continued laughing, until he managed to regain enough composure to speak. "You expect me to believe that? That's the funniest thing I ever heard. "Cursed springs," I mean come on…"

Ranma growled.

Roy's fresh disbelieving comment quickly died in his throat as he saw Ranma dump a boiling kettle of water over her head and resume his male form.

"You still laughin' now?" Ranma said, annoyed. Roy just blinked... again. Something told him that he would be doing a lot of that while this kid was living here.

HR

The next day, Roy walked into his apartment, cursing his new trainees to high heaven. "You'd think they'd know the difference between a practice target and the control tower but NOOO!."

He stomped towards the back room to crash on his bed and froze at the sound of loud crashes coming from his backyard. He ran to the window, looked out and began cursing not just his students but the Kami for having FAR too much fun at his expense. Now he was seeing things.

His new houseguest, who had only been around for about a day, was hopping from wall to wall of his enclosed backyard, making a loud THUMP every time his feet slammed into the concrete. "What the HELL are you doing?" He yelled out the window to the wildly jumping martial artist in his backyard.

"Speed training. Been tryin' ta work up my midair skills. Oh I borrowed those cinder blocks that you had your alarm clock on. Hope you don't mind." Ranma said, stopping in place for a moment to answer the question.

As Roy wondered what in the world the kid could need cinder blocks for, he finally figured out what was making that thumping sound as Ranma bent down in order to untie the large stone blocks that were tied to his feet. Roy just put a hand to his head and stalked back into the kitchen, muttering about a REALLY strong drink.

HR

Ranma hopped from rooftop to rooftop in Macross City, trying to find something to do. That Fokker guy was pretty nice to let him stay in his apartment but the place was rather empty and he couldn't even practice any of his more advanced martial arts there.

As he hopped, Ranma thought of all the people back in Nerima. "Wonder if Akane has tried to cook anythin' lately." He thought with a shudder at her last attempt. Then again, maybe without him around to take the flack her family would put in an effort to try and stop her from cooking, or even try to teach her to do it better. As he thought this, he caught a flicker of a face that he recognized in the street below. "Nah. Couldn't be." He thought as he jumped down from the roof top.

"Hey Hiro! Long time no see man!" Ranma hollered.

Hiroshi Neomoto stopped in his tracks and whirled around. "Hey Ranma. What are you doin' here. Come to get more Fiancées?"

"Nah man, just more of pop's stupidity, What else?" Ranma said, having to give no more explanation than that. "Anyways, Why are you 'round here. I mean you disappeared from school a few weeks ago. Me n' Dai were goin' nuts tryin to make sure that ol' Coconuts hadn't kidnapped you or somethin'."

Hiroshi Laughed. "Nah. My dad just got transferred is all. He's a JSDF fighter pilot and there's a new squad being formed out here with some really cool new planes." Suddenly, the brown haired boy had an idea. "Hey! I can show you 'em if ya want."

Ranma shrugged. "Ya caught me on a bored day. I aint that into planes but let's go see 'em." Hiroshi walked off towards the air force base, Ranma following close behind.

HR

Hiroshi and Ranma walked up to the guard post. "Hey Tojo! It's Hiroshi. Can you let me in?"

"Hey Neomoto! Sure. Just a sec." As the guard was preparing to open the gate, he noticed the person standing with Hiroshi. "Who's your friend, she's cute."

Hiroshi raised an eyebrow and turned to Ranma, who had just managed to find the only water fountain in Macross city and promptly get sprayed.

Ranma shrugged. "Feh, I said I was a water magnet."

"Oh she's just a friend of mine from school. Her and her brother are down for a while. Oh and the brother's got the over protective thing down pretty well so you probably shouldn't hit on her." Ranma threw an appreciative glance at Hiroshi before the guard shrugged and let them through the front entrance.

HR.

Ranma stopped in her tracks to gawk at the huge bulk of the visitor, Parked next to the main base complex. "Hey Hiro. What in hell is that?"

"Oh that's the SDF-1. Dad says it was an alien ship and the government rebuilt it. C'mon let's go out to the flying field n' see dad's flight wing. These planes are so cool, I'm thinking of joining up just to fly them." Ranma followed Hiroshi to the main flying field, where she saw, "Hey Fokker!"

Roy stopped in his dressing down of Cadet Neomoto for his incredibly stupid stunt of switching from battleoid to fighter mode 2 feet off of the ground and turned to see Ranma, standing with Neomoto's son next to the tarmac. "Hey Saotome, what the hell are you doing here?"

"Ah, one of my old school buddies is here and he was going to the complex. I was bored so I tagged along." The redhead explained, shrugging casually.

"One of your school buddies?" Fokker asked, throwing a questioning glance at Neomoto.

"I don't think we've met miss." Mr. Neomoto asked. "Are you Roshi's girlfriend, Yuka, I keep hearing about?"

Ranma and Hiroshi both burst out laughing at this. "No sir. You've met me. I believe you referred to me as "That punk Hiroshi hangs out with at school, putting unbelievable stories in his head." Ranma chuckled.

Mister Neomoto boggled. "Y-you were telling the truth about that curse thing then?"

"Yep!" Ranma said with a smirk, whereupon Neomoto shook his head and said, "Sir, I think I NEED that trip to the meds now."

Roy began laughing hysterically and clapped Ranma on the back. "You're alright kid. I've been trying to get that guy to go see the med techs all day about an eye problem, you just walk up and say like 5 words and he goes."

Ranma just shrugged her shoulders and grinned. "It's a gift."

"Yeah, a gift to make people go nuts." Hiroshi said, to which he got a playful knock to the elbow from the redhead.

"Anyways. I'm goin' to see if I can get some hot water. I'll be back in a bit." Ranma said as she ran off, heading towards what looked like a Chinese restaurant in the distance.

Roy looked at Hiroshi and said "you still going to join up kid?"

"Yeah, I'm probably going to sign on today or tomorrow. Why?" Hiroshi asked, curiously.

"Well. I've been watching Ranma since he showed up. He has some serious potential for aircraft. I mean some of our best pilots are martial artists and he says he's the best there is."

Hiroshi grinned. "He aint lying. Has he shown you his Chi blast thingy yet?"

"Chi what?... Never mind. Anyways what I'm asking is if you can see if you can get him to join up with you." Roy explained.

Hiroshi grinned again. "Oh, That'll be easy. All I gotta say is "Hey Ranma. I bet that if we both signed up at once, I'd get to a higher rank than you." He'd take it as a challenge and immediately sign on to prove me wrong."

Roy blinked. "Are you serious?"

"Oh yeah. You wouldn't believe this but there was this one time..." Hiroshi said, falling back to the role he usually had at school, where he told most of the newer students all about the weirdness that surrounded Ranma in order to keep them from going insane when they saw it.

HR

Ranma walked into the small restaurant on base and up to the counter. "Hi! I'm Minmei, May I take your order?"

"Yeah, Can I get a glass of hot water?"

Minmei Blinked. "That's all miss?"

"Yeah, that's all." Ranma confirmed.

"Alright that'll be 50 Yen." Ranma dug around in her pocket and pulled out a fifty yen piece, that she had actually stolen from Ms. Hinako, and paid the waitress.

Accepting the hot water, Ranma walked into the small recessed alcove that was used for the washroom doors and pored it over her head. Straightening his Chinese shirt and toweling his hair dry, He walked out of the alcove and through the door.

HR.

As Ranma walked towards the landing field, he heard Roy shout, in a disbelieving voice "...Martial arts TEA CEREMONY?" He began chuckling as he picked up speed and ran towards the tarmac.

Roy and Hiroshi saw Ranma, now back to normal, pelting towards them and the VF-1D Training veritech fighter that they were standing in front of. "Hey guys! I'm back." he shouted as he put on the breaks and stopped just short of whacking his head off of the wing.

Roy laughed. "hey kid, be careful. Those planes are expensive and if you break the wing by whacking that hard skull of yours against it, Command'll have mine."

Ranma shrugged. "So anyways, what'cha doing?" "Mr. Fokker said he'd take us up in a VF-1D practice plane as "incentive" to consider joining the RDF."

Ranma grinned. "Sounds fun. I dono about joinin' the RDF though. I'd probably just accidentally insult the high commander or somethin'."

"Aw, I told you he'd say something like that Mr. Fokker. Anyways, I bet I could get higher up in the RDF than Ranma even if he DID join." Hiroshi said, pulling off a fair imitation of Ranma's classic overconfident smirk.

"Hey Hiro, is that a challenge?" Ranma said, with a raised eyebrow.

"Well yeah, since I KNOW I can't compete with you in martial arts, I'll just go another way. So ya up for it?"

"Sure. Stakes?" Ranma said, responding with the same smirk.

Hiroshi grinned, and without thinking, Said, "Loser sings "White reflection" On the base broadcasting system," with a chuckle.

Ranma began laughing hysterically. "Hiro, you do realize that I won't really mind that if I lose, which I won't. Got two words for you. Jusenkyo Curse. In fact, I once tried singing that in girl form out of boredom and sounded pretty good." Hiroshi Cursed as Fokker almost keeled over from laughter.

"Anyways…" Fokker said as he got his chuckles to a bare minimum, "Who's going up first."

"Let Hiro go up first." Ranma said. "He's the real flight lover here not me." Hiroshi grinned in thanks and hopped into the VF-1D.

Ranma watched in some aw as the VF-1D did things in the air that Saffron would have problems emulating. When he first saw the veritech transformation, his jaw almost hit his feet. The, Now guardian mode, veritech finally hit the ground again and an incredibly excited Hiroshi jumped out. "Man I have to fly one of those." Hiroshi said, with perhaps a little less enthusiasm than Ranma usually shows when faced with a cure to the curse...but not much less.

"Yeah, that thing looked pretty cool. Is it my turn to try it out?" Ranma said, with eagerness in his voice.

Roy chuckled. "What was that about this guy being the flight nut? That grin you got on right now after seeing me fly is big enough to land a harrier on."

Ranma laughed and scratched the back of his head. "It's just cool lookin' is all." he said.

Ranma secured the last strap on the flight suit he had had to borrow and put on the helmet. "All right, I'm ready to go Roy. Let's do it."

Roy checked his glove and helmet gyro units and started the Veritech. He was surprised when he heard Ranma muttering something. "What was that Ranma?"

"Oh...umm not much. Just a quick question. When did the government figure out how to do THIS to my chi sense?"

Roy looked puzzled. "Chi sense? What's that."

"You mean you don't know?" Ranma questioned, before continuing. "Well chi sensing allows you to feel an opponent's aura in a fight to know where they are but When you turned on the power, mine went NUTS. It's like we're sittin' inside a gigantic chi ball or something."

"Well I don't know much about martial arts but this bird does run on a new type of power source." Roy said, before dismissing the comments for now. "Anyways, let's get up into the air."

Roy cranked the throttles back and the Veritech taxied forward. He cranked them all the way up and it catapulted off of the runway. He liked doing that to trainees to scare the daylights out of them but Ranma didn't seem troubled at all. "OK Kid now it's time for some Midair fun." Roy said, with a laugh.

After about 20 minutes of flying in loops and patterns, Roy decided to have some fun. "Hey kid, You want to try flying this thing?"

"Roy, you call me kid one more time and I swear I'm gunna beat you but yeah I'll try it." Ranma said, annoyed.

Laughing, Roy did another one of his freak out the noobie tricks and flipped control over to the kid without telling him. To Roy's surprise, Ranma seemed to figure out the controls rather quickly, as the plane didn't start shaking or rolling, it kept on course and at steady speed. "Hey Kid, You sure you've never flown before? You're pretty good at it."

"Huh? Oh yeah. I Just watched you. I don't got any idea of how ta fly this thing. I just figured that all I had to do to keep goin straight n' level was hold the stick steady." Ranma explained, looking back at Roy for a moment.

Roy blinked. In fact that was not all that you had to do, you also had to correct for drift, which Ranma was doing. Then Roy caught a look at one of the new instruments that the scientists had installed. Called a "Reflex energy readout," it apparently displayed the pilot's Intuitive control over the plane. Roy always red as a yellow group of lines, apparently VERY good, as the scientists wouldn't stop talking about it but this kid red with a whole bunch of blue lines and some small bunches of yellow mixed in. If Roy had learned to read the instrument correctly, that meant that this kid had almost FULL mental control over the bird. Roy HAD to get this guy into the RDF, and he thought that he rather unorthodox, and technically against regulation, flight that he and Hiroshi had both participated in was sure to do so. "So Ki...er Ranma, how do you like the Veritech?"

Smirking, Ranma responded. "If it's this easy to fly, and can let me pull off that stuff you were doing earlier, this thing is damned cool!"

Roy smirked under his flight helmet. "Yet another one joins the flight nuts." he thought.

HR

Ranma and Hiroshi walked into the main office in the base command center, personal records in hand. The smiles on their faces told anyone who cared to look that they'd just been bitten by the flying bug, big time.

Ranma walked up to the front desk, dropped his papers on it and said, "Hi, I'm here to register in the RDF Pilot Training Program."

"All right son." The elderly man at the desk said. "You'll have to fill out these forms and bring them up to the front desk after you're done. In the meantime, I'll run your records and do the background checks. Please come back in 5 minutes."

Ranma walked over to the benches at the side of the room, pulled a pen out of...nowhere and began filling out the papers as he saw Hiroshi walking up to the desk out of the corner of his eye.

Five minutes later, Ranma had filled out the forms, only pausing for a second on the mother's maiden name question before remembering that it was "Himura" and another second to wonder if there was a "Special circumstances" box in the "Sex" aria, with a quiet chuckle.

He walked up to the desk and put down the forms. "All finished sir." He said, with barely suppressed enthusiasm. The sooner he got behind the controls of another one of those "Damned cool" planes the better.

"Alright son, aside from some rather ...odd records involving two Ranma Saotomes in Nerima, your background check was clean so you can now proceed on to the physical evaluation." The man said, handing Ranma a new form.

"Erm...where is that?" Ranma asked, uncertainly.

"You may wish to try the hall marked "Medical."" The man remarked, trying to repress a laugh.

"Thanks!" Ranma said, as he ran off down the hall.

HR.

As Ranma walked into the Medical wing of the command center, He noticed a Familiar skeleton standing in the window of one of the offices. "Is that what I think it is? well he did disappear a while ago." Ranma's thoughts were derailed as he slammed into a young dark blue haired woman that looked almost exactly like Akane. "Oh! I'm sorry miss. Guess I should've been watchin' where I was goin'."

"That's alright miss, I was lost in thought." Ranma blinked, and noticed some red hair hanging in front of her face. She pulled it back and then saw the culprit. The young woman's Iced Tea cup laying on the floor about 2 feet away.

Ranma growled. "How am I supposed to go for a physical NOW? I mean I want to join the military as a guy and my registry papers say Male so..." were her thoughts as she tried to think of a way to get a hold of some hot water. Then she had it. "I hope I'm right about who's office that is." she muttered under her breath as she moved towards the room with the skeleton in the window.

The door swung open and a brown haired man with glasses greeted Ranma with a surprised look on his face. "Oh! Hello Ranma, Long time no see."

"Hi doc. Say, I don't suppose you've got some hot water in there, Do you?" The redhead asked, hopefully.

Doctor Ono Tofu smiled kindly and ushered Ranma into his office. "These taps don't get very hot water but I think it's hot enough to change you back. So what're you doing here."

"Ah well. I saw those new veritech things and thought it'd be cool to learn how to fly one, so here I am."

Tofu handed Ranma a cup of hot water, which she dumped over her head. "Thanks doc! I wouldn't have bothered you but it'd look a bit strange if a Ranma Saotome, Registered male walked in as a short Redhead."

"Don't worry Ranma, I understand. Good luck in your examinations. I'm certain you'll make the Medical requirements." Tofu said, waving as Ranma exited the room.

HR

Ranma walked out of the Medical lab, Feeling like a lab rat. He had been put through such a battery of tests that if the RDF didn't know the width of every one of his hair follicles, he would be surprised. At least none of the tests had involved psychological exams. He was pretty sure that the Neko-Ken may have been disqualification material.

Ranma walked up to the front desk and slammed his Medical exam approval papers onto it. "There. Is that it?"

The man at the desk chuckled. "No son, not by a long shot. Now we get to string you along for a day or two. Your acceptance or rejection letter will be along in 3 days."

Ranma groaned and walked out the door, where he met Hiroshi, looking like an extra from night of the living dead. "Man, tell me I don't look like that." Ranma and Hiroshi said simultaneously. They both broke out laughing and headed in opposite directions, to they're respective homes.

Ranma and Hiroshi spent the next two days waiting for the letters to say weather they were in or out of the RDF. Ranma, constantly doing Katas out in the back yard of Roy's apartment and Hiroshi, asking his father countless questions about the RDF.

On the morning of the third day, Roy had just chucked his alarm clock at Ranma, who was always far too cheerful for his tastes in the mornings. He said something about his "Pops "not throwin' me into the Koi pond every mornin' feels kinda nice."

As Ranma picked himself up off of the floor from where the rapidly flying chronometer had knocked him, he heard a knock at the door. He walked across the apartment and answered it. "Hello, Ranma Saotome? Letter for you." said the short stocky man at the door.

"Thanks." said Ranma as he grabbed the letter, closing the door and taking it inside to read it. A few seconds later, he began to dance around the apartment. "I got in!" He abruptly stopped dancing around as he got hit over the head by a pillow thrown by Roy, who still wanted to sleep in just a bit longer on his day off.

Later on that day, Ranma found out that Hiroshi had also gotten into the RDF. They immediately went to the local pizza joint and bought two extra large pepperoni, downing them in a record 15 minutes. After the rather odd, "Ranma Style" celebration the two newly enlisted cadets reported to the barracks for assignment...

HR.

Hiroshi was jerked awake, for the third time this week, by the strains of a VERY badly played trumpet.

He threw his pillow at the poor unfortunate trumpeter, as did every other guy in the barracks accept one. This one man, by the name of Ranma Saotome, thanked the now slightly bruised trumpeter for the wake up call and began doing pushups. This, as you may imagine, annoyed the rest of the troops but they didn't do anything. Oh no. They had they're revenge all planned out.

The only person other than the aforementioned martial artist who was not planning revenge, Hiroshi promptly came over and said, "Hay, Ranma?"

"Yeah, Hiro?" The martial artist asked, not interrupting his pushups.

"How the hell can you put up with being woken up buy... that... every morning?" his friend asked, with a shudder.

"Feh, It's better than pop's Koi pond or Cold water bucket wake up calls, That's for sure."

Hiroshi thought for a second. "I guess it would be at that, eh?"

As the troops marched out, for the first day of real military training, the first two had been assessment and physical testing, they wondered what to expect. What they got was... a surprise.

They were told to line up in a row and then stood there for two and a half hours before the Drill Sergeant finally showed up. "I trust your waiting woke you up Maggots!" He bellowed, as he walked up and down the line, smacking anyone who he caught slouching with a large metal poll. "Alright, My name is sergeant Swain and I will be the man forced to put up with you sorry excuses for humanity for the next week. Since you arn't going in for ground training, you don't have to deal with me for three months like the ground pounders." Here, half of the men in the line breathed sighs of relief. The sergeant stopped at a random point in the line. "You! What's your name?"

"H-Hiroshi Neomoto." Hiroshi stammered, slightly intimidated.

"Well Neomoto, The first and last words out of your mouth while addressing me are to be SIR. Do I make myself clear?" The sergeant barked, loudly.

"Sir, Yes, Sir." Hiroshi said, quickly.

"Alright, now that we have that cleared up. C'mere kid.' Hiroshi stepped forward, a bit shakily. "Can you fight kid?"

"N-not well sir. I only know some stuff that my friend taught me sir." Hiroshi said, being sure to add the title as ordered.

"Your friend eh?" Sneered the Drill Sergeant. "What friend would that be?"

"Ranma Saotome sir."

"Well, if this Saotome is good enough to teach you how to fight, where is he."

"Sir, I'm right here, Sir." Ranma said, waving his arm from half way down the line.

Swain walked into the middle of a patch of concrete, 5 feet away from the troops and yelled for Saotome to come and fight him. Ranma, with his usual big cocky grin on his face, walked into the square and took his traditional almost non-existent fighting stance. Now, normally swain did this to re-enforce to the troops that he was better than any of them and that they should listen to him. Unfortunately, he had just challenged a powerful Chi using martial artist without knowing it. "Sir, you ready sir?" Ranma asked, with a smirk.

"I'm always ready kid, bring it on."

Now, to understand what happened next, you have to understand that the last fight Ranma had had was with Ryoga and, although mostly strength based, Ryoga had had to build up his speed in order to keep up with Ranma. That's why Ranma raced in at full speed and delivered a jackhammer blow to the Sergeant's gut, to try and get him off guard for "Real attacks". The problem here was, that Ryoga regularly hit himself over the head with rocks and...the Sergeant...well... didn't. That's why Ranma quickly found a rather large man shaped dent in the wall of a nearby gunpowder magazine and the sergeant nowhere to be found.

HR

After a full day, well a full day after the Sergeant had gotten out of the hospital, of heavy training, everyone, including Ranma, was ready to crash on they're futons like humanoid looking meteors. Some of the older ground pounders in Ranma's Barracks though, had other ideas. That punk kid had shown them up ever since he arrived and they wanted some revenge. That's why one of the men went out into the base and found an alley cat. As a prank on new recruits that were getting too big for they're fatigues, a Live and preferably very annoyed, cat was thrown into they're futon in the middle of the night for scare tactics.

Hiroshi heard a scrabbling sound in the middle of the night and opened his eyes. He saw a large man, holding a box that was emitting scrabbling and yowling sounds, standing over Ranma's bed. He shot up and whispered harshly, "What are you doing?"

The man looked up and said, "None of your business Rookie, we're just gettin' a bit of revenge on the show off here."

With dawning horror, Hiroshi realized what must be in the box, as it kept making sounds that sounded a lot like "MEOW!".

"NO...Don't do that!" He shouted, startling the soldier into dropping the box, cat and all, onto Ranma's bed. Hiroshi Jumped out of his Futon and ran for the door. "C'mon. If you wanna survive, RUN!"

As all of the soldiers in the barracks got out, Hiroshi heard a telltale MEEOOWW! from inside. Several people blinked at this. "Was that a cat?" "Nah, sounded like a person imitating a cat."

Hiroshi looked around frantically, trying to find some way to salvage the situation without shooting Ranma or getting someone mauled, when he remembered something that Ranma had told him about the Neko-Ken. "Quick, get the fire hose from the next barracks over. Hurry up!"

As confused troops scattered to comply to an order given by a panicked rookie in pajamas, the sounds of chaos from inside the barracks were getting louder. Scrapes, screeches and ripping sounds abounded. Commander Lisa Hayes and captain Henry Gloval, called by a rather panicked recruit who had begun raising the alarm, Dashed up in rather rumpled uniforms.

"What the hell is going on here?" Gloval asked, exasperated.

"Sir, someone let this cat into the barracks as a prank on one of my friends, the problem is, My friend has an incredible fear of cats that drives him into a blind panicked rage. I've seen him tear down half a building while in this state sir." Hiroshi said, still panicked.

Gloval and Hayes both blinked. "Fear of cats?" "Tore down a building?" They said, at the same time.

Suddenly, three long gashes appeared in the door of the barracks. "Hurry up with that water!" Hiroshi yelled. "He's almost out."

Someone ran up with a water hose and turned it on the doorway. A howling sound that sounded vaguely different from the rest emanated from within, before all went silent.

Gloval, Hayes and Hiroshi slowly pried the wreckage of the barracks door back, to find something that wouldn't look out of place on the set of alien. The walls were gouged and scratched, the beds were almost all completely destroyed and one of the lights hung by one support. In the center of it all, a red haired girl lay, curled into a fetal position and snoring contentedly. "Well. This is..." Lisa said, with slight aw in her voice.

"What could have possibly done this?" Gloval said.

"It was Ranma. I told you. He goes a bit nuts at the sight of a cat and he's a martial artist. He's the guy who put that guy in the hospital by accident today." Hiroshi explained.

"Well, where is he?" questioned Gloval. "All I see in here is this girl."

"Um...well...you see. That girl is him." Hiroshi said, nervously. "It's a long story and I'm not too good at telling it because it didn't happen to me. Just trust me, ask her the questions and you'll get the answers. Now I gotta get to bed."

HR.

Ranma jolted upright in the bed she was laying in, in a cold sweat. She began panting and shuddering. "D-damned C-Cats..." she muttered, as she looked around to see two rather sleep deprived RDF officers staring at her. "Aw great, What the hell did I do this time? Shred the officer's quarters?"

Captain Gloval blinked. "No, Miss. As far as we can tell, all you shredded was one of the barracks. Now do you care to tell us what happened and why you have the exact same identifying characteristics as one of our soldiers?"

"Um...that's actually quite a funny story. Are we being recorded or anything?" Ranma asked.

"No. We aren't being recorded, although I will write a report on what you say and store it in records." Hayes replied.

Ranma sighed. "Well, it was inevitable that SOMEONE would find out. Might as well be the Base commander and the SDF-1 XO eh?" she said, with a bit of resigned humor. "Can I get a glass of warm water?"

Gloval walked over to a sink and pored a glass from the hot water tap. "Here you are, now start explaining."

Ranma emptied the glass onto her head. "It's called a Jusenkyo curse and is the reason Hiroshi probably told you to pore cold water on me. It snaps me out of...well pretty much any mental problems, the shock of the change I mean. As for what I did to that barracks... well the last thing I remember is Hiro screaming "NO don't" and then a C-C-C-Feline landed on my head."

Ranma spent the next twenty minutes explaining the Neko-ken and Jusenkyo curses to the captain and his XO before he was let out of the room and told to wait out in the hall.

Captain Gloval and Commander Lisa Hayes sat, in stunned silence as the rather odd new recruit walked out of the small room.

"So, Lisa, still think the RDF is going to be straight forward paper work for the rest of our lives?" Gloval asked.

"No sir, not if more people like him show up. Should we drop him from the program?"

"I don't see why we should, I mean if odd personal quirks were reason to drop someone from the program, Fokker would have been gone YEARS ago."

Lisa shrugged. Captain Gloval had made a pretty good point.

HR.

The rest of that week went similarly to the first three days, without the insanity, of course. Unless you count the time Ranma had been told to drop and give twenty and he had pulled out twenty yen and handed it to the sergeant, and soon enough Ranma, Hiroshi and all of the other people in their class were put into basic flight training.

Ranma learned at his usual insane speed, mastering the flight controls of a VF-1D in less than 2 days, and Hiroshi wasn't far behind. They, along with a few others, were to become part of one of the Main Macross Island squadrons for training in about 3 days, the day before the SDF-1 would launch. Ranma was hoping for Skull squadron while Hiroshi's hopes weren't all that high. He'd settle for Wolf or Vermillion but skull would be really great.

As Hiroshi and Ranma kicked back on their Futons, it being an hour long break period, they heard a guy at the front door to the Rebuilt barracks yell "Mail Call! Saotome and Neomoto!" Ranma and Hiroshi hopped off they're futons and ran for the door. Accepting the envelopes, they tore into them and found they're squad assignments.

"I got skull!" Ranma yelled, his hand in a victory sign. "What'd you get?" Hiroshi just stared at the paper, his eyes wide. On it were the words, "Hiroshi Neomoto, Commissioned to Skull Squadron, flight 1."

Ranma looked over Hiroshi's shoulder and read. "Alright! We're in the same flight group man. What're the odds?"

Once again, The Saotome and Neomoto Pizza eating contest began, with two extra large pepperoni pizzas. Ranma won. Was there any doubt?

HR.

Roy Fokker's skull flight flew over the christening ceremonies of the SDF-1, they're freshly painted VF-1A aircraft gleaming in the morning sun. Ranma flew, truthfully, only his fourth real flight sortie today, but he was confident and his hand never wavered on his control stick. He would not screw up on his first real flight mission, after all he WAS Ranma Saotome and Ranma Saotome Don't lose.

The squadron stayed in close flight formation, doing aerobatic maneuvers and low flybys of the SDF-1 and the bandstand where the officials sat. Suddenly, Ranma felt something. The Veritech somehow augmented his chi sense and it reached about as far as the radar. Something was moving this way Really fast. "Skull 3 to lead." He called over the radio.

"This is lead, go ahead."

"I got a bogie, movin' in at high speeds. IFF squawks civilian." Ranma had had problems trying to learn the military jargon but he knew enough to get by on a public radio frequency.

Fokker glanced down at his Radar display and saw a blip, just barely at the edge of his radar range. "How the hell does the kid do that?" he wondered to himself before saying over the tactical frequency, "Skull lead to flight, form up, arrow head formation. We're going to check out an unidentified target."

Skull flight 1 pulled out of they're aerobatics show, formed into a roughly arrow head shaped formation, with Skull 1 in the middle and 2 and 3 on each side. They took off towards the unknown plane.

Rick Hunter boggled as he saw a full flight of military aircraft screaming towards his small fanjet at high speeds. He heard a beeping sound and realized that the military planes were signaling him.

"This is Captain Roy Fokker of skull squadron to unidentified aircraft. You are in restricted airspace and we strongly suggest that you turn around." Came a familiar voice over his radio.

"Fokker? This is Rick hunter! Long time no see. I'm just taking a quick fly over to see the ceremony."

"Look hunter, You are to turn around immediately. This is restricted airspace. One of my wingmen will escort you to a civilian airstrip and ensure that you land there. I recommend that you follow his lead, as if you do not, force will be used." Roy's voice was firm, however he didn't really want to be mean to his almost brother. Still, he had been dressed down for his little stunt of letting Ranma and Hiroshi fly in Veritechs when he recruited them and knew he was on thin ice, so decided to follow regulations to the letter this time.

"Lead to Skull 3, can you escort this plane to a strip?"

"Confirmed lead, but you're gunna buy some food for me to make up for missing the fun right sir?" Ranma asked, laughing.

"Shut up and follow orders Skull 3." Fokker retorted, with his own chuckle.

"Alright civilian craft, please follow my lead." Ranma said, disappointed at missing the aerobatics show.

"My call sign is mocking bird." Rick returned, annoyed.

"Understood." Ranma's Veritech streaked off towards the small corner of the base that was reserved for civilian aircraft.

Rick studied how the pilot in front of him flew. He wasn't an ace but he was definitely an experienced pilot. He would say a few hundred hours under his belt. He decided that since he was bored, he would make idle conversation with the pilot. "This is mocking bird to skull 3. So, How long you been in the RDF?"

"About 2 weeks, why?" Ranma responded, casually.

Rick almost put the mocking bird into a spin and slammed it into the ground at that revelation. This guy was a rookie? He wasn't a great pilot but a two week Rookie shouldn't be able to fly a plane like that. He decided to shut up as to save his sanity.

HR.

Roy Fokker, Rick Hunter, Ranma Saotome and Hiroshi Neomoto sat down at a table in the "White dragon" Chinese restaurant on base. "So Rick." Roy started, "what're you doing up here."

"Well I just got this new fanjet prototype and thought it'd be neat to show 'er off at your little air show." Rick responded.

Roy started grinding his teeth. "So you tried to violate military airspace, where you could have been SHOT DOWN just to show off?"

Rick shrugged as if to say, "Pretty much" and then went back to eating.

"Hay sir? How do you know this guy?" Ranma asked, from behind a rather large bowl of noodles. Actually he had asked "ai sr? Ou d' y know is goy", but Fokker had started to get used to Ranma's strange method of speaking through food.

"I was in his father's flying circus when I was younger. We were kind of like brothers."

Ranma nodded. "Kind of reminds me of this guy I used to hang out with at school...accept he wants to kill me now."

Roy just sweat dropped. He really didn't want to know.

Suddenly the four pilots heard a loud explosion coming from the direction of Macross base's central area. "What the hell was that?" Questioned Ranma.

"Sounded like the SDF-1's Main gun. I heard it fire once." Answered Roy. "Let's go, whatever it is, they probably want the Veritech pilots on stand by. Rick, find a shelter." Roy ran out of the restaurant, quickly followed by Ranma and Hiroshi.

Skull squadron made rapid preparations for launch, both flights were to be scrambled. Reports were sketchy but apparently the main gun had taken out some sort of scout ship and a whole bunch of small attack craft were moving into the atmosphere.

Roy, Hiroshi and Ranma all pushed they're throttles forward at the same time on three different runways, instantly locking into standard formation. Flight two was up about 8 seconds later.

"Alright flight, feed target data to my computer and prepare for missile launch." Roy commanded, as he got two confirmation beeps from his wingmen.

"I got 'em sir...damn there are a lot of 'em." Ranma said.

Roy glanced at his radar and only saw a few blips. "What do you mean by that kid?"

"There're a few advanced scouts up front but the main body of the fighters is behind 'em. I got 'em on my Chi sense but the radar aint showin' 'em yet."

"Confirmed, thanks kid." Roy said, STILL wondering how the hell the kid did that.

Eventually, all of the targets showed up on radar. "All missiles locked. Fire when in range." Roy said. The Veritechs released a wall of firepower once they got into range and stripped the front line of enemy fighters away. Flight two came up behind them and did the same to the next layer. Then, the dogfights were on.

The Robotech forces seemed to be winning most of the dogfights. Only one of the Skull flight planes, that of skull 5, a pilot in wing two, was shot down. The fighters from wolf and vermillion squadrons however were not having as much luck. Half of wolf was gone, only units 7, 8 and 10 remaining. Vermillion was doing a bit better, with only two of they're units downed.

The enemy seemed to be built of less sturdy materials than a veritech, as a few shots with a GUI-11 gun pod seemed to be enough to take one out. Between Roy, Ranma, Hiroshi and the others in Skull flight, the enemy was suffering hundreds of casualties, and if this had been a traditional fight, with equal odds, the RDF would have won long ago. As it was, the RDF forces couldn't keep all of the enemy at bay and the units from Wolf squadron had been sent back to try and keep the enemy from overrunning the city.

"Lead, this is Skull 3. My gun pod just spun down to empty. I just used my last leg clip. Permission to go back to base?"

"Granted. Saotome, get back as fast as possible." Roy said, repressing the curse he wanted to let out as his squadron was now effectively down to four planes, and only two in his flight including himself.

Ranma flew his fighter back towards Macross Island to Refuel, when he saw the SDF-1 lifting off. "Saotome to Fokker, the SDF-1 has just left the ground. It looks like they're trying to join the fight. I think I can get a clear landing zone on there and get back faster."

"Confirmed, hurry up. It's getting hard to hold them off with just two of us out here."

Ranma swung his Veritech onto one of the landing zones in the SDF-1, having to switch to Guardian to do so, and waved a maintenance crewman over. "I need ammo to get back into the fight!" The crewman nodded and got a group of Munitions techs to reload Ranma's Plane.

That's when the call came over the radio. "This is captain Gloval to all Veritechs still airborne. If you are in the near vicinity of the SDF-1, either land aboard or get out of the area. We are about to commence a space fold. I repeat..."

Ranma blinked. "Space what?"

Roy scowled, "That system is still untested. This is skull lead to all aircraft, make your way with best possible speed to the SDF-1. Prepare for immediate quick and sloppy landing."

The pilots of Skull squadron turned in Mid-air and headed back to the now airborne SDF-1, at top speed. Before he landed, Roy noticed something odd. The SDF-1 was descending towards the island. Then everything went white.

END CHAPTER.