Story and art by Ryuko Azuma
See it in larger format on Comic NewType here
Narrative reads right to left
On the bridge of a UN Space Force 1st fleet ship, the captain orders positron guns to fire, but they have no effect on the Seireness. The enemy returns fire…
Right side: …wiping out several UNSF ships. On Vimana, Carlos tells the Topness pilots they have been gathered from all over the world for this day. They are the only hope for the human race.
Left side: “If Seireness reaches Earth, it will mean the destruction of humanity. They must be destroyed.” Yu Yamato will go out with them.
Right side: Abbey protests, since Yu hasn’t been formally trained, but Carlos says they have to face this battle with all their available strength. He officially appoints Yu as the Mark 6 Topness.
Left side: Laine says the rest of them can handle this, but Yu speaks directly to Carlos. “They dropped Deus on America, right? They took the lives of a billion people, didn’t they?” But Carlos is not open to this discussion; “The enemy of humanity is one who takes many innocent lives.” Yu has a flashback to childhood. “Mama killed them all, didn’t she?”
Right side: In an episode between Yu and his grandmother, he rejects being “the child of a devil that killed a billion people!” His grandmother says mama didn’t kill anyone. If he doesn’t believe in her, who will?
Left side: Yu agrees to go into battle. Laine objects, but Yu repeats his earlier words “The space-time crystals choose the Topness. I’m the Mark 6 Topness. The Mark 6 needs me now.”
Linne rushes up to the ops center as Yu syncs up with the Mark 6. She wants to know why this is happening.
Right side: “Why is Yu on the Mark 6?” Carlos says that since they can’t use the Mark 7, Yu will be used as a shield against enemy fire.
Left side: The first fleet is ordered back to Vimana and the Seireness pursue. The station is now their target. A pilot comments that now they won’t have to chase the enemy around.
Right side: The core ships begin taking off to dock into their battleships.
Left side: Yu docks with the Mark 6 and converses with Nina in the Mark 1. She tells him his only concern is to fire the Wave-Motion Gun at her command. No one knows the purpose of Seireness, but they have to fight and survive to find out.
Nina says “Let’s make this our debut match” and we are introduced to the anti-Seireness fleet NERFDIS.
Mark 1 (Nelson ship): Fleet commander that uses Second Sight (drones) to collect battlefield intel and produce real-time tactics.
Mark 2 (Missouri ship): An attacker who specializes in surprise attacks by deploying at the forefront, a speedster who boasts the fastest maneuvers in the fleet.
Mark 3 (Richelieu ship): A flanker that works with Laine at the forefront, using a drone that injects metallic hydrogen to destroy the target with an electric current.
Mark 4 (Fraser ship): Fights with the attacker team and deploys Frost Aster, a large ring-shaped ice flower shield to temporarily block attacks and cuts off the target group.
Mark 5 (Mezidier ship): A goddess of the battlefield who provides first aid to a damaged battleship using a 3D printer gun.
Mark 6 (Yamato ship): A battleship boasting the strongest firepower, an attacker/exterminator that ends the battle with a deadly single-shot Wave Gun.
“LAUNCH!!”
The Topness fleet flies into action and Nina deploys her “second sight” drones. On Vimana the raccoon bots cheer. “Everyone! This is Topness’ first campaign! Put your spirit into it!”
The two attackers prepare their signature weapons as they approach the Seireness. Mark 3 “Thunderstorm,” Mark 2 “bind needles.” Yu’s Wave Gun is ready.
Mark 4 releases her “Frost Aster” shield, confusing the Seireness and forcing them to split up. Mark 2 charges in.
Laine scores a hit and then shouts “disjunct,” causing his ship to suddenly jump sideways. Yu recognizes it as Laine’s special skill. Laine shouts “Yu, watch! This is how you beat Seireness!”
Laine fires 3-dimensial “bind needles” to pierce the giant target. “Gross,” he says to its leering face.
Meanwhile, Mark 3 (Hugo) cuts loose with his “thunderstorm” weapon over a wide area.
Yu is ordered to prepare for firing. “I won’t forgive you. You took mama’s life. You did it. I’ll never forgive you!” But the Seireness blasts everyone with a sound wave.
They also hear it on Vimana. It’s a singing voice that emits destructive gravitational waves. The song of Seireness. Linne watches silently. The Mark 6 Yamato ship has lost 40% of its armor. Mark 5 Aisha is ordered in to provide backup.
Yu’s ship is out of control and in mortal danger. Abbey says she knew it would be impossible for a beginner. Mark 4 Melina says she can’t use the Frost Aster against that song.
“…how can we fight against such a cheat?”
Carlos reminds Linne that her ship is ready for launch. She smiles and takes off running.
Right side: despite his damage, Yu charges forward to fire the Wave Gun at point blank range. Laine shouts that this isn’t a game and he’ll die. He says that he can see his mother again when he dies.
Left side: Linne shouts that instead of mama, SHE will protect him. And everyone should brace for the shock.
Right side: the song is stopped and Nina is ordered to provide all data on the gravity field. The order comes from the incoming Mark 7.
Left side: Linne says, “Calm down, Yu! You can’t function without me! Let’s completely cancel that song! Fire on my signal!” A controller says that Mark 7 is disabling the enemy’s gravitational waves with her own anti-phase waves.
“Now, Yu,” Linne yells. “Blow away this f*cking b*tch!”
Right side: unruffled, Carlos makes his observation. “Yu Yamato, the child of Arjuna. Linne Aigis, incarnation of the guardian Vishnu. We are free of the laws. Salvation for all the souls in space.” The mission is complete, the enemy has been defeated. Everyone is amazed at the power of the Mark 6.
Left side: Yu wakes up after passing out. Drifting in space, Linne observes that the mother computer is still stable.
Ryuko Azuma’s Production Memo for Chapters 1 & 2
There were three things that kept coming up in chapters 1 and 2. I spent a lot of time trying to figure them out one by one.
• What is a space-time crystal?
The space-time crystal is the main character behind the first chapter. The concept was shaky until the first chapter was ready, so I couldn’t explain it well in the story. I had a vague idea that it was an unknown object that emitted high energy according to superphysical laws, through feedback with Topness.
By reading various books, I have come to understand the micro universe concept. It’s another universe within this universe, crystallized by time crystals. That solidified the idea. The experiment conducted at Deus was to release the original space-time crystal and collide it with high energy particles (axions?) to create a copy, a small universe.
But I was like, “What are you saying?” I needed an easy-to-understand explanation. So, I went with a “four-dimensional crystalline body that adds a time axis to a three-dimensional crystal.” This is a simple yet unknown object, and I was able to explain it in one sentence. However, since it is Yamato, I thought about using “wave crystal” instead of “space-time crystal.” But it’s not waves, it’s space-time, so people still couldn’t understand it.
However, in a timely manner, Nikkei Science published a feature article on time crystals. So I settled on “space-time crystals.” The explanation tends to be long, but Laine says it in one sentence and it’s rhythmical, so I like it.
• High school students (Yu was originally a high school student)
The main character, Yu, was originally a high school student, but I kept asking myself, “Do you think a high school student would want revenge for his mother’s death 10 years earlier?”
I had been working on the script without being able to solve the problem, but I had to make a bold change to the story. So I changed Yu to an elementary school student, and he became a trickster who stirred up the story with his contradictory personality. I wondered if it would work.
I was thinking that since the other Topness pilots had unique personalities, the protagonist would be a character with no personality who would stand out from the others. With Yu becoming an elementary school student, the protagonist became a different image from Amuro (from Gundam) and Shinji (Evangelion). The story is the same, but Yu moves from place to place and becomes a character that is easy to relate to.
• In hit anime such as Gundam and Eva, drama comes from the conflict before boarding the plane [mecha]
In the second chapter, Linne is the main character, and it’s not a drama about the hero’s struggle to get on the plane, but about the heroine’s struggle to get off the plane. The reason for this is that “heroine” instead of “protagonist” is a technique that is not used very often.
Linne’s principle action is to protect Yu. “Then shouldn’t she go with Yu as soon as he goes out?” But Linne has her own reasons for not wanting to get on board, so it’s a game of chance with Jones. Linne is the tactical counter to the Aria-type enemy, and Yu cannot function without her.
Jones wins this time, but a buddy feeling comes out between Linne and Yu, and I think it’s a successful direction. From here on, the power game will continue between Linne and the underworld organization that Jones belongs to.