REPORT Breathe, Cenes, breathe... okay. Let's do this. My name is Cenes Crawford. I'm the commander of the Thunder Force squadron. The starfighter I'm currently strapped into is slowly and helplessly tumbling through space. The navigational computers are crispy-fried; I can still smell traces of the acrid smoke that filled the cockpit when the circuits overloaded and burst into flame. The nuclear-fusion power plant is no longer fusing jack squat; a trickle of radioactive waste is leaking out of its cracked shell and forming a thin trail of droplets in the endless void behind me, the reflected sunlight making them sparkle like gelatinous diamonds. I've diverted all output from the emergency batteries to life support, but that's only going to last for twelve hours, tops. So...why am I wasting precious power on a long-winded radio-wavebroadcast? Two reasons. First, if I don't do something to focus myself, I'm going to panic, snap, and spend the last hours of my third and final life drooling like the recent recipient of a frontal lobotomy. Second, because it's vitally important for the human race to understand what I'm about to do. And to know this: I was the last pilot to melee with Guardian.

My first death was in 2141. Got into a firefight with two SW-03 Priests, then watched seven more appear out of nowhere on the short-range scanner. Managed to take out three of the bastards before a laser boltripped through my cockpit and most of my abdomen. (More than a bit painful, I'll have you know.) My second death was in 2146, during the Lunar Skirmish. An embarrassing one, too--I wasn't even in combat at the time, just lazily reading the analysis of my last sortie and drinking a cappuccino while sitting on the bridge of the battleship to which I'd been assigned. A high-powered and well-concealed laser on the Moon's surface aimed, fired, and poked through the weak spot in the battleship's shields with ridiculous ease.Suffice to say I'm always jittery when I'm on a battleship these days. But, hey, only two bucket-kickings at the age of 32--I know pilots with twice the deaths in half the flight time, not to cut myself too much slack. And there was a benefit to croaking: I was reborn in an 18-year-old body, my reflexes at their peak, my wits lightning-fast. It's called "Circulate-Death." Each member of the program has his DNA sampled, and the contents of his cranium constantly archived. If the pilot is killed in action, the DNA is used to cultivate a clone, which--with the considerable help of genetic manipulation--takes roughly two weeks to grow from fetus to young adult. The memory archive is essentially stuffed into the clone's brain, and after a 48-hour adjustment period, the pilot walks out of the lab, good as new--better than new, even. A perversion of science? An affront to nature? Before my first death, I might have agreed. After that, of course, I thought it was swell. It's also the highest honor a pilot can be given. The technology and resources involved are far too expensive to be wasted on average pilots. When you're invited to join C-D, you know you're the best of the best. Which brings its own pressures, of course--but the best of the best can handle them. I didn't hesitate to join, didn't even think about the consequences. Besides, I was 18 at the time. When you're that age, immortality is reality, not fantasy, anyway.

Circulate-Death, like so many of our technological wonders, was derived from Vasteel technology. Everyone on Earth knows about Vasteel, ofcourse--a heavily damaged starfighter plucked from the outskirts of the solar system, our "first contact" with an alien race. (Not everyone knows we recently learned what we believe to be its true name: Rynex.) Almost every scientific advance of the early 22nd century can be traced directly to Vasteel. Nuclear-fusion power plants and their inexhaustible energy supplies? Based on Vasteel's propulsion system. Molecular superconductors running at room temperatures? Taken directly from Vasteel's anti-gravity system. Time-space distortion fields to allow for short-range leaps through the very fabric of the cosmos? Yet another wonder made possible by Vasteel technology. But there were still aspects of Vasteel's technology that science didn'tunderstand and couldn't crack. So, in the Year of Our Lord 2139, the scientists built something to crack it for them. Guardian, the largest and most powerful supercomputer in the history of mankind, equipped with the most sophisticated artificial intelligence ever developed. Guardian constantly delighted its creators with its discoveries and theories. Until 2150, that is. It was the year of the First Annihilation.

Guardian used its vast resources to produce thousands upon thousands of weapons. All of them were utterly unique, and all were controlled by Guardian itself, affording them uncanny precision in battle. The Unification Government, by comparison, had an obsolete arsenal of long-range nukes and short-range fighters. Guardian managed to disable most of our weapons simply by taking out their computers. The weapons it couldn't disable, it simply blew to bits. The only weapons able to withstand Guardian's assaults were, of course, the ones imbued with Vasteel technology. But the Government didn't have enough of this weaponry to mount any kind of attack; after all, it's impossible to score when the other guy has the ball. Guardian never demanded surrender, or declared an end to the war, but weknew it had won after we started to drown in the blood of our loved ones. One-third of the Earth's population killed, five and a half billion lost souls, in a matter of months. The Government scraped together all the resources remaining and formed Combat Unit 222, made up of seven RVR-01 Gauntlet starfighters with a grand total of three test flights between them. The unit--my unit--was called Thunder Force. Overly bombastic? You betcha. But we needed every psychological advantage we could get, including flying in a squadron that sounds like an organization of exhibitionist superheroes. Besides, according to all the computer predictions, we were already dead, so why not indulge in a little ego-boosting? AI analysis programs rated our chances of survival--not success, simply survival--at less than 1%. The odds of destroying Guardian and liberating the world? 100,000 to 1, according to our machines. That's why Circulate-Death pilots were chosen for Thunder Force. The best of the best. It's a strange feeling, knowing that you're going to die. The night before our first mission, I sent email to friends I hadn't written in months, videophoned relatives I hadn't seen in years. I made as much peace with myself as I could. And, I wondered how much longer mankind would suffer before Guardian brought an end to the world.

Our first mission was to attack Guardian's Earth-based forces. And--here's the crazy part--we destroyed everything. Wiped the planet clean. After that, we flew into space to take on Guardian's orbiting forces. And we creamed them, too. Then we realized we were being hustled. Guardian was letting us win, making poor tactical decisions and fleeing battles even when it had an overwhelming material advantage. Was Guardian messing with our heads? Because it was doing a great job. Then, a bizarre turn of events: Guardian infiltrated WorldNet and wiped out every piece of data remotely related to Vasteel. We suddenly realized what was happening: Guardian was losing because it wanted us to destroy Vasteel technology--including itself. Guardian couldn't commit suicide, but it could be murdered. And we happily accepted the role of Grim Reaper, shooting, blasting, and cutting through Guardian's metallic guts, blowing apart the technology that had risen up against us.

After what we thought was the final battle, we located the core unit of Guardian in a high Earth orbit. We prepped our last remaining RVR-02 Vambrace, the most powerful starfighter humanity has ever built. And it was decided that I should fly it to the core, where I would fight Guardian, and where my ship was to be mortally wounded. The core transmitted a message just before I destroyed it. It begged me to destroy the Vambrace. To extinguish Vasteel technology. For the sake of humanity, it said. It seems that Guardian had not only achieved sentience, but a kind of conscience as well. Freaky, but fortunate. Vasteel changed the course of human history forever, and until the First Annihilation, it was all for the better. But what did Guardian know about Vasteel that we didn't? How did it turn Guardian into a killing machine? How did Guardian manage to overcome Vasteel's influence and allow itself to be destroyed? It would be easy to make Guardian's wish come true. I could trigger a power surge in the batteries that would rip the Vambrace apart. Or I could remain adrift until the Government is able to scrape together another starfighter and send it up after me--by which time I'll be extremely dead, and for the last time. No Vasteel technology, no cloning technology. Three strikes and I'm out. "May your future be blessed." Those were the last words of Guardian. And now for my last words: I hope this ship blows up REAL good. :Cenes Out