In Pluto space, to which Yamato was heading, Dengil’s solar system control fleet was waiting patiently. Centered around a mobile fortress mothership in the darkness of space, battleships and other vessels lurked with murderous intent, like carnivorous beasts waiting to ambush their prey. Earth’s fleet had been destroyed and its planetary bases had been wiped out, so the Dengil felt at ease.

On the bridge of the flagship, Commander Lugal II stood with his hands folded behind his back, staring out the window at space. From behind, he looked somewhat like his father, the Grand Priest Lugal.

The Chief of Staff slowly approached and stopped behind Lugal II, assuming an upright posture.

“Commander,” the Chief of Staff said in a low voice.

“What is it?” Lugal asked without turning around. “Did the Grand Priest send you?”

“No, sir. But I have just received a report that a new fleet has been launched from Earth and is heading for Pluto space.”

Lugal II’s mouth tightened for a moment and he slowly turned to his chief of staff.

“Oho. There are still space battleships left on Earth…”

“Sir. A total of ten battleships is heading this way in a circular formation.”

Lugal II twisted his mouth into a smile.

“I see. I didn’t think there were any more ships that could be launched from Earth. I withdrew all my battleships from Earth orbit. But no matter. In any case, it’s more convenient if they come all the way here. I’ll just have to destroy them again…”

“They’re probably the last battleships of Earth.”

Lugal II nodded lazily.

“Isn’t it courageous for the enemy to come, knowing that they will be defeated?”

The chief of staff raised his right hand to indicate the video panel. “Their image will be displayed for you, sir.”

“Well, let’s take a look at Earth’s last battleships before we destroy them…”

Lugal II left the window and walked over to the battle command seat in the center of the bridge. He looked up at the large video panel, the chief of staff standing beside him.

“Put the image on the video panel,” the Chief of Staff ordered to those at the instrument panel in front of him. The video panel switched on and a flickering image appeared: the Earth fleet drifting through space in a ring formation.

“Hoho. The last battleships of Earth…”

Lugal II glared at it with a smirk, raising his eyebrows.

“Give me a closer look at the one in the center!”

The image enlarged until only the central battleship filled the video panel. Lugal II stared at it. It was Yamato.

“Chief of Staff.”

“Yes?

Lugal II pointed at the video panel. “Do you recognize that battleship?”

“Ah, now that I think about it…” The Chief of Staff stared at the image of Yamato. “Yes! That’s…” He looked at Lugal II with a start.

“I’m certain that’s the battleship we destroyed near our home planet of Dengil,” Lugal II said.

The chief of staff nodded. “I think so, too!”

Lugal II stared intently at the image. “Why would the battleship that we destroyed be here? I didn’t realize it was an Earth ship…”

“It may not be the same battleship, but the same type of battleship,” the chief of staff said.

“That’s a possibility. But then, why was an Earth battleship sailing so close to Dengil at that time?”

The Chief of Staff fell silent.

“Either way,” Lugal II muttered, “that battleship was destined to be destroyed by us. Even if it is the same one we saw back then, this time it will be destroyed for good.

He raised his voice and barked a loud command. “Hyper thermonuclear missile squadron, prepare to launch!”

The Earth fleet centered on Yamato was approaching Pluto space.

Ota, who was monitoring Yamato‘s radar panel from the starboard auxiliary seat, sounded the alert.

“Enemy ships on the radar! Stationed around Pluto!”

The expressions of the main crew members on the first bridge tensed. Captain Okita and the rest were already at their posts. Susumu Kodai, who was sitting in the battle command seat, shouted into the mic on his instrument panel.

“Combat group leader Susumu Kodai, calling all crew members. We are entering the combat area! All hands to battle stations!”

Intermittent siren sounds echoed throughout the ship, and crackling voices echoed from the speakers.

“All hands to battle stations! All hands to battle stations!”

The crew rushed through the ship’s corridors to their posts.

“Aihara, contact the fleet!” Captain Okita said.

“Aye, sir!”

Aihara, the head of the communications team, contacted the cruiser Yahagi and the destroyers Fuyuzuki, Hamakaze, Isokaze, and the others, which were sailing with Yamato. They responded, entering battle formation.

Susumu was still yelling into his mic. “Prepare to launch Cosmo Tiger squadron! Equip all fighters with anti-aircraft and anti-ship ordnance!”

He left his seat and headed for the elevator. In response to his command, Kato and the rest of the Cosmo Tiger crew burst out of their quarters and ran full tilt toward the hangar.

“This is it!”

“We can do it! We’re ready!”

Once in the hangar, they grabbed their helmets and leapt into the Cosmo Tiger cockpits. The sleek, growling fighters were surrounded by maintenance crews, who moved quickly to prep them for launch. One by one, they made explosive noises as they fired up their engines.

The transparent canopy of the single-seat Cosmo Tiger which Kato had boarded was closed. Tightening his belt, Kato looked down at the maintenance man below. The man raised his hand to signal, and Kato raised his left hand to respond. He then activated the engine, and a muffled sound echoed in the cockpit.

The engine output meter on the instrument panel jumped for a moment, then returned to normal. Then it rose again, this time gradually. The sound of the engine rose in pitch. Kato checked the meters on the instrument panel one after another.

“Fuel gauge OK, voltimeter OK, gyro compass OK!”

The maintenance man below raised his right hand. Kato nodded and began to roll the Cosmo Tiger toward the launch ramp. A voice came through his helmet speaker.

“The launch ramp is about to open. Evacuate all personnel!”

While the maintenance crews ran for cover, Kato turned to his right and looked at the pilot positioned next to him. He also glanced in Kato’s direction. Kato raised two fingers of his right hand and got the same gesture in response. Kato chuckled, then immediately looked ahead with a grim expression on his face.

“All personnel have cleared the hangar!

“Confirm airlock is sealed.”

Kato could hear every word of communication.

While Kato and his crew were boarding the Cosmo Tigers, Susumu Kodai was in the cockpit of his beloved Cosmo Zero. From now on, He would be in charge of everything. As the Cosmo Zero emerged onto the upper deck catapult, Susumu gave an order.

“Cosmo Tigers, launch!”

The launch port at the bottom of Yamato opened, and Kato’s Cosmo Tigers launched into space one after another. When Susumu confirmed that they had all departed, his Cosmo Zero launched from the catapult and set course for the squadron.

The Cosmo Zero was Kodai’s favorite. Its official name was the Type 52 Zero space fighter. 17.4 meters long and 8.2 meters wide, it was equipped with four pulse laser cannons. Susumu was flying a double-seat type, an advanced reconnaissance and fighter-attack aircraft for use in space and atmosphere.

Kato’s Cosmo Tiger was the Earth Defense Force’s main fighter. Like the Cosmo Zero, it was 17.4 meters long and 8.2 meters wide, and shaped like a triangle. Its maximum speed was Mach 12. It was equipped with a 30mm pulse laser cannon and a 12.7mm solid-round cannon.

Susumu’s Cosmo Zero quickly caught up with the Cosmo Tigers. He and his team deployed in front of the fleet. Susumu looked through his canopy at the squadron and gave an order.

“Attention all aircraft! The hyper thermonuclear missile carrier is probably not a mothership, but a smaller torpedo boat. Each of you should have the data of the enemy ships in your head. Destroy the torpedo boats as soon as you see them!”

“Yes, sir!” Kato replied.

There was still no enemy fleet in sight ahead.

Captain Okita was seated in his chair on Yamato‘s first bridge. He confirmed the fighter launch and gave an order.

“All vessels, form up for assault.”

With the destroyer Fuyuzuki in the lead, Yamato and the destroyer fleet shifted to a vertical formation as they plunged forward through space.

Inside the ruins of the destroyed Pluto base, survivors in space suits were hard at work. Only a dozen were left, including the base commander. The bodies of other personnel were buried under wreckage. The survivors pulled them out and placed them in the back of a working air car. The bodies had been exposed to vacuum and were completely frozen, looking like wax dolls.

“Damn it…” one of the team members muttered in his helmet after dragging his friend’s corpse out from under turret wreckage. “Kameoka, you’ve turned into this…”

The corpse’s mouth was wide open with a pain-filled expression on its face. Part of its abdomen was missing.

The survivor called out over the communicator in his helmet, “Hey, help me over here.”

His helmet speaker replied with a muffled noise. “Hold on a second.”

A man made his way over from the left.

“Help me get this body on the work truck.”

“Okay.”

“You take his feet, I’ve got his shoulders. Be careful, he’s my best friend.”

“Got it.”

The two men in their space suits started to carry away the body, frozen like a stone. As they walked to the vehicle, the man holding the feet tripped over wreckage and his hand slipped.

“Whoah! Ah!”

The man holding the other end also slipped, dropping the body onto hard rock. The two men stood there, staring down, dumbfounded. The body had shattered with the shock of the fall. The head had broken off at the neck, and the limbs were in pieces. It already looked more like rubble than a corpse.

“Oh my god…I’m sorry, Kameoka…”

The head, lying on the frozen ground, was at the foot of the first survivor, its eyes wide open and staring at him. The man bent down and held his friend’s head like a ball. He placed it gently in the back of the air car, which was already piled high with its gruesome cargo. The other man collected the limbs and torso.

“I’m sorry,” said the second man. “My hand slipped.”

“No, it’s all right, even if he was my friend. It was all over for him already.”

“But still, there’s no end to this…”

“No. We’re all gonna die sooner or later.”

“Right…”

Pluto base had been completely destroyed, and there was nowhere to run.

The survivors were barely protected by their space suits with very little spare air left. There were still tanks of air that could be dug out of the storage room, but it was impossible to survive for long in the harsh environment of Pluto in a space suit. The two crew members sat down side by side on the rubble.

“No rescue from Earth?” one of them said.

“Impossible. There’s no way they can afford to come help us. They can’t manage it now.”

“Have the other planetary bases been hit as hard as this one?”

“Probably…”

“Damn it!” The man on the right looked up into the sky.

“Somewhere out there is the Dengil fleet that destroyed our base!”

The other crew member looked up and squinted. “Huh? Hey! What are those moving lights? Several of them…it can’t be Dengil’s fleet.”

“Maybe…”

They looked at each other through their helmets. Then they heard a muffled voice from their speakers.

“Everyone, look up! It’s Yamato! The last of the Earth fleet, including Yamato, is now passing over Pluto! The portable transmitter is receiving comms between them!”

It was Commander Goji’s voice. He had been working with some of the other survivors to fix the portable transmitter.

“Yamato! It’s Yamato!”

They stood up and cheered.

“Come on, Yamato!”

“The Earth Fleet is approaching in a column.”

On the flagship of the Dengil mobile fortress carrier, Lugal II sat in the battle command seat, staring at the Earth Fleet on the video panel.

“Here it comes, the last of the Earth fleet.”

Hearing the voice of the radar officer, Lugal II chuckled and gave the order.

“Torpedo carriers, launch! Commence hyper thermonuclear missile attack!”

The Earth fleet was now approaching the Dengil fleet in Pluto space.

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