Science Ninja Team Gatchaman
Written by Toriumi Jinzō
Illustrated by Ōtori Workshop
Part 2: Alien Invasion
Chapter 1
The Ogasawara Islands were about 900 kilometers (about 560 miles) south of Fuji Speedway. The islands were called Chichijima, Hahajima, and Ogasawarajima; the suffix -jima meant “island.” The Ogasawara Islands were uninhabited for most of their history, though a few people lived on them now. They were also called the Bunin Islands because Europeans had struggled with their Japanese names.
Since 1998 or so, Chichijima had undergone a series of construction projects to make the island more habitable for people. Forests were cut down, mountains were cut in half, and several hotels and roads were built.
The island of Batu was located a few kilometers (a few miles) to the south of Chichijima. The island was mountainous and covered with old growth forest. This small island retained its natural beauty and was completely uninhabited. Tourists hadn’t learned of it, at least not yet.
The sun was setting over the western sea. Sunsets were spectacular on the Ogasawara Islands. The leaves of banana trees growing on Batu fluttered in the breeze.
A ship approached the island at high speed from the north. The ship left a trail of churned white water in its wake. The ship’s engine revved, sounding louder than it was in the surrounding stillness.
The ship was sleek and modern in design, about fifteen meters long from top to stern. A rubber ring lined the hull and separated the hull from the water, revealing that the boat was not actually floating, but hovering over the ocean. Twin propulsion engines burned at the rear of the ship. The engine design was so new that it hadn’t hit the commercial market yet. The bow flared outward about 1.5 meters (about 5 feet) like the tip of a spear, imposing and threatening violence.
As the white hovercraft neared the island, a young man peered out at Batu from the starboard side. His eyes flicked over the island rapidly, as if he were searching for something. He was short, stout and redheaded; the difference between him and the sleek look of the hovercraft was stark. The t-shirt he wore was dirty and torn. The young man was overweight to the point of obesity, but much of that weight was muscle. His face was perfectly round, and his features were good-natured and friendly. He looked like a gentle giant.
The young man’s name was Ryū Nakanishi, and he was nineteen years old. He had designed the hovercraft he was riding on at his parents’ request. His parents were part of an exclusive yachting group and owned numerous ships.
Ryū's parents were rich, but not commissioning-a-hovercraft rich. The request to design and create the hovercraft had come through a reputable advertising agency. There was a competition for different hovercraft designs; the winner would receive an enormous prize. Ryū had applied for the competition immediately after his parents had passed him the request from the agency.
Applying for the competition gave Ryū access to research and development funds, but winning it would earn him more money than he’d ever imagined. He wanted to win. He was a studying engineering and wanted to buy more tools and equipment for his own projects.
Ryū had applied for the competition, created his design, and then sent away for custom parts, which took a few weeks to arrive after being ordered. The parts had all come together inside eight large flat-packed boxes.
Ryū had noticed immediately that some of his custom parts didn’t match his schematics. The hull was made of a titanium alloy—much heavier and more durable than what he’d planned for his prototype. And the navigation system had been replaced with something more state-of-the-art.
Is this a military project? Ryū had asked himself. He’d guessed that he was being spied on and he didn’t like it. But he’d signed an NDA and had followed the instructions he was given so far, so he didn’t back out of the competition. He was too curious about what was going on to quit now—and besides, he really wanted that prize money.
When his parents had asked him how the project was going, Ryū had made up some convenient lie and told them he’d be gone for a few weeks. Then he’d rented a shipyard and got to work.
Putting together the hovercraft took months, not weeks. Today was the hovercraft’s maiden voyage. Ryū had been instructed to test his work before submitting it for review. He was here, off the shore of this remote and mostly uninhabited island, because the competition runners wanted his work to remain secret for as long as possible.
Ryū circled the island carefully, searching for witnesses. He didn’t see anyone.
After going around the island a few times, Ryū directed the hovercraft onto open water. He’d only gotten to pilot the hovercraft a few times and he was still a little clumsy at it. Every test he did made him feel more comfortable controlling his creation. He loved this incredible machine. It would be difficult for him to give it up.
I wish this hovercraft was really mine, Ryū thought as he thumbed the control stick for steering. But he was young. Someday he might create something even better than this. Ryū thought about his hopes and dreams as he drove the hovercraft over the sparkling ocean.
The sky had been clear when he’d set out, but now clouds drifted over the sun. Ryū frowned and turned the hovercraft around. He didn’t want to risk damaging the hovercraft in a storm. He heard the rumbling of a plane engine and frowned deeper. Passenger planes never came this way. He searched the clouds for the plane and found a small white Cessna descending at high speed. The eagle painted on the plane’s wings drew his eye.
Ryū didn’t know this, of course, but this small plane was the same one that had saved Joe during the Fuji Speedway World Sports Prototype Championship.
The Cessna loomed over the hovercraft, intimidating, before passing over just overhead. Too close, Ryū thought, though there was no obvious damage to the hovercraft. “Who is that?” he muttered at the sky.
Just as Ryū thought that the plane would pass him by, it turned in the air and faced the hovercraft again. The plane was clearly targeting the hovercraft. It was like something out of an old war movie.
What are they trying to do? Ryū thought. He wasn’t worried. There hadn’t been any large-scale wars in decades. The world was largely at peace; he had no reason to fear an attack.
Machine gun fire echoed in the air. Projectiles hit the water in front of the hovercraft, causing huge splashes.
Ryū was briefly stunned. He couldn’t let this hovercraft be damaged before handing it over to the agency that had asked him to create it. He would lose the research and development money as well as the prize money if that happened.
More than the loss of money, Ryū feared for his life. He hated that the hovercraft, which had taken him months of work to create, was being threatened by this strange plane that had appeared out of nowhere.
Ryū gripped the control stick and shoved the hovercraft into high gear. The hovercraft had no weapons. His only option was to run.
The hovercraft’s twin engines roared as it sped over the ocean’s surface. Its top speed was over 200 knots (about 370 kilometers per hour, or 230 miles per hour). Ryū pushed it beyond top speed as he fled the Cessna plane.
Ryū glanced in the rear view mirrors to try to get a better look at the Cessna plane and cursed when he saw that it was following him and picking up speed. His heart hammered. His face was bright red and covered in sweat.
The plane was descending again, almost directly overhead.
Ryū turned the hovercraft to the left hard. Machine gun fire just barely missed him and the hovercraft. He considered himself a so-so pilot, and this hovercraft was something he’d designed and invented. He wasn’t about to let any harm come to the hovercraft if he could help it.
“How did they find me?” Ryū asked himself as he dodged machine gun fire across the open water. The thought that he’d been tracked here was disturbing.
What if the plane wasn’t trying to damage the hovercraft? Not a single bullet had hit it so far.
What if the plane was trying to kill him and steal the hovercraft? Could the people piloting the plane be working for a rival company or something?
Dark clouds covered the sun as the plane followed the hovercraft from above. This was a cat-and-mouse chase. Ryū fully anticipated another attack. The Ogasawara Islands were behind him now, but he wasn’t too far from Iwo Jima. There was supposed to be a military base there. If he got close enough, he could signal for help.
Ryū grinned, then rubbed his nose with his fist—a sign that he deeply approved of his own plan—and pushed the hovercraft to go even faster.
The Cessna dove, firing on the hovercraft again.
Ryū zig-zagged the hovercraft out of danger and kept going.
The plane kept descending.
Are they trying for a water landing? Ryū asked himself. In the middle distance, he saw three small rocky islands that he didn’t recognize. One of the islands had a high volcanic cliff split mostly in two by a waterfall. He consulted his map and found that the islands were absent from it. Where was he?
But Ryū had no time to figure out where this place was. He steered the hovercraft toward the waterfall, hoping to maneuver the hovercraft through the cliff to the other side. Rocks blocked the way; there was no way through.
Ryū had a choice: push the hovercraft through the gap and tear the hull and its lining, or stay still and be attacked by the plane again.
The choice was simple. Ryū urged the hovercraft over the rocks and through the gap at top speed. To his great relief, the hovercraft managed to get through, leaving him in a sheltered area beneath the waterfall. He caught his breath. The plane couldn’t follow him here.
It was nearly dark. Ryū listened to the Cessna circling overhead, but he couldn’t see the plane and the plane couldn’t see him. The Cessna would run out of fuel soon; it had to. Then it would have to leave him alone, at least for a little while. He could escape.
Ryū turned off the twin engines to conserve his own fuel and heard an alarm blast from the rear of the hovercraft.
It wasn’t an integrity alarm. The hull was fine.
It was a proximity alarm.
There was a great rush of water, and then the Cessna was dropping through the waterfall and zooming over the hovercraft. The plane came so close that Ryū could see the pilot’s face.
“What…. what…” Ryū was incoherent.
The pilot of the Cessna plane was a young Asian man. He grinned at Ryū and gave him a jaunty wave.
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