Story

"**Mankind was born on earth. It was never meant to die here."**

## Background

In the distant future, a new energy source is discovered, named "Crystal of Hope". Said to have created a new generation of human beings, it caused universal conflicts and struggles for the immense power it holds. Thunder Strike is assembled to combat the enemies that threaten their Earth.

**Warning: Spoiler Alert below!**

## **Plot**

### **Aries Star Field**

In this group, the player is placed with Lisa and Roy, two pilots that accompany it throughout the journey. After a brief test flight, they are attacked by the Star Alliance, but successfully eradicate them. To prevent further tragedies, The team moves to prevent enemies from seizing an energy station.

Upon arrival, they are faced with the ace pilot of the Star Alliance, Leah, piloting an enormous ship known as a Mech Armour. The ensuing battle allowed the enemy to escape so Roy quickly pursued them. The crystal is used as a trap, and the team is forced to space jump to escape.

They end up in the Aries Satellite Military Base, where Blade, the first Zodiac Guardian, awaited them. He is killed, and the team successfully escape to the Taurus Star Field, where they ally themselves with The Federation.

### **Taurus Star Field**

The appearance of another enemy, the Planetary Alliance, surprises the team and they are forced to fight back.

The ship suffers severe damage from the seemingly endless swarm of enemies, and tries to take shelter in the Mobile Fortress of the Federation. Unfortunately, it was occupied by the enemy, who had set up an ambush, with Leah leading it. Roy managed to reseize the Fortress, but not before the enemy alters the course.

They land up at the Taurus Satellite, the base camp of the enemy. The camp is overpowered, and the enemy is forced to retreat. Perry, the Second Zodiac Guardian, stalls long enough for his subordinates to retreat, but ends up losing the battle and escapes.

### **Gemini Star Field**

Entering the Gemini Star Field, Roy has to rescue hostages in the territory of the enemy, breaking through the siege of enemies when he realised the enemy was not interested in negotiation. Although he planned to return to the Taurus Satellite, he ends up being transported to an unknown place by a space jump.

Leah once again fights the clueless team together with the enemies but is defeated. Now knowing where the hostages has been locked up, he was considering a rescue plan but had to destroy the surrounding enemies. Another Mobile Fortress appears, controlled by the enemy, but Roy was able to occupy it and allow Lisa to alter the course towards the Gemini Satellite. The alerted enemies are initally subdued, but an enemy Mech Armour appeared, controlled by Roxan, the third Zodiac Guardian.

### **Cancer Star Field**

Roxan is eventually defeated, and Roy occupys an arsenal in the Cancer Star Field so that Lisa is able to upgrade the fighter. The Federation soon reports of two war machines incoming, The team ends up fleeing pursuing enemies, defeating Leah (again) and the accompanying enemies to do so. Detecting traces of energy leakage on his radar, Roy ends up discovering the Crystal Furnace, not just an arsenal for the enemy but a lab experimenting on humans, led by Morgan. Before he could discover what they were doing, they were discovered and Roy had to escape. He is stopped by Clark , the Guardian of Cancer, the fourth Zodiac Guardian. It is attacked heavily enough that Roy is able to escape to the Leo Star Field, but cannot return immediately as the Guardian was still there.

### **Leo Star Field**

With energy depleting fast, Roy detects a Crystal and pursues it. Just as they were on the brink of defeat, Leah appears one more time to prevent them from obtaining the crystals. She is defeated (for the last time) and  the energy of the team was replenished. They quickly concealed themselves and prepared for the next battle. Despite this, they are forced to retreat from the seemingly endless wave of enemies when a familiar Mech Armour appeared again. It belonged to Leah. However, it is now controlled by Watson, the Leo Guardian who informs them that Leah was captured for being a spy. He proceeds to do battle with the improved Mech Armour but is defeated.

### **Virgo Star Field**

Due to Roy and his heroic deeds, he is invited to officially join the Federation and is tasked with securing the 5 satellite cities, in addition to occupying the Virgo Satellite in the Virgo Star Field. At his request, Lucas, the leader, allowed them to rescue Leah with his troops. They attacked a base at the frontline where Leah was held that looked easy to capture, but it is discovered that Blade had been reincarnated and had become one with his Mech Armour thanks to Morgan and his experiments. Despite being more powerful, he was defeated, and suffered his second death, imploding.

Leah is rescued, and Roy with a burning hatred for Morgan, decided to chase after the Star Alliance and stop them. Guided by Leah, they destroyed testing grounds, including a spaceship controlled by Clark, the fourth Zodiac Guardian which had escaped from the Cancer Star Field. However he escapes, and as Roy discovers that the satellite city had been converted into a testing ground, Clark manages to pilot another Mech Armor in an attempt to defeat Roy. He is defeated, and with the surprising approval of Lucas, Roy entered the Libra Star Field with a troop of allies with the intention to occupy the Libra Satellite.

### **Libra Star Field**

Roy suspects that the manpower of the enemy has been reduced, and after an outpost is occupied, Lisa confirms that this is true. However, reinforcements from the enemy were on the way, but knowing this Roy still charged foward to meet them. In the midst of this, Roy finds and does battle with Perry. Defeated but not killed, the team moves in to quickly occupy the Libra Satellite the retreating enemies had seemingly left behind. However, they were tricked and were attacked by the intelligent forces of the enemy. They still defeated them.

Federation troops asked Roy for help as they encountered great resistance from a Mech Armour. It was none other than Perry, thirsting for revenge after his escape in his Mech Armour.

Perry fights loyally for Morgan to his last breath, before exploding in an attempt to catch the team in the blast. This fails, and the Libra Satellite is occupied, but enemies accelerating towards the Scorpio Star Field are found to have captured many outstanding scientists, including Lisa.

### **Scorpio Star Field**

Although Roy is able to defeat the first wave of enemies, Lucas instructs Roy to remain where he was as reinforcements were sent. However, Roy was unable to let the fleeing enemies escape and went against his command, despite's Leah's persuasion. They find Roxan holding Lisa captive, and Roxan refuses to release Lisa unless he is captured. Although being defeated again, he escapes in his backup ship. As it was slow, Leah, now having seemingly forgotten Lucas's command, chases after him.

Roy defeats his backup ship, but Roxan warns them that reinforcements were already on the way. Regardless, the team is forced to flee as they had been noticed by the enemy.

However, they are soon surrounded by enemies. Mirna, the eighth Zodiac Guardian, arrives, intending to surrender. At first, Roy does not believe them, instead defeating the enemies and destroying Mirna's Mech Armour. It is only afterwards does he hear out Mirna.

Perry had been Mirna's best friend, and together they had both loyally served Morgan. It was only after he took advantage of Perry's loyalty,causing him to die, that Mirna and a group of Star Alliance troops realised it had been to fuel his plans. Not wanting others to suffer in vain, she pledges her allegiance to the Federation, agreeing to hand over Scorpio as long as their troops are not harmed.

### **Sagittarius Star Field**

After Mirna's surrender, Lucas agrees to allow Roy and his troop to take over the Sagittarius Star Field, on the grounds that they no longer disobeyed him. Entering Sagittarius, Mirna informs the group that Morgan is changing his ship in another Crystal Furnace, what was once a city. The group headed to the Crystal Furnace, similar to the one at Cancer, in the hopes of finding Morgan there to defeat him and subsequently rescue Lisa.

To avoid enemies, they had to use a transportation tunnel to get to the Crystal Furnace, which was protected by a Machine Guard piloting an Iron Beetle. Roy easily defeats it and the group is transported to the Crystal Furnace.

Leah leads the team the rest of the short distance towards the Crystal Furnace, but there were some enemies to be taken care of. They approached the Crystal Furnace, where Clark was waiting for them. Mirna speculates that his presence confirmed that Morgan was inside, but to get to him, they had to fight Clark once again.

Clark is shocked that Mirna is with the allied troops, and turns this shock into actions, attacking the pilots furiously. Mirna remains to battle with Clark, allowing Roy and the rest of the party to escape inside the Crystal Furnace.

The Furnace alarms sounded, causing the semi- finished machines to be activated. Leah believed that they were not the reason the alarms had been sounded, but the party soon has to fight their way through a wave of enemies. They observed that the machines were attacking each other, a weird sight probably connected to the alarms being sounded.

They had no time to ponder over it though, as Clark soon rushed up behind them, overtaking them. Mirna arrives shortly after, stating that Clark had suddenly escaped, and had assumed that he would be pursuing the rest of the group.

Seeing as this was not so, the team fought their way back to Clark, intending to find out why he had done otherwise. It turned out that Morgan had upgraded Clark's Mech Armour at the last minute, and he himself had fled to the Capricorn Star Field after his experiments began to fail on him. Leah had reached Lisa, but Clark intercepted them in his new Mech Armour. Roy had to battle Clark to save Leah and the hostages, destroying him once and for all. Clark perishes, his last words praising "Chief Morgan."

### **Capricorn Star Field**

After all the chaos at the Sagittarius Crystal Furnace, the group rescued the hostages and were prepared to chase Morgan through Capricorn, while the Guardian of Sagittarius was doing the same way ahead. Encountering a broken Mech Armour, they realise that Morgan truly was losing control. They battle further, and soon Watson arrives. A tough battle ensues, but ends in Watson's defeat. Star Alliance entirely loses control of Capricorn Star Field, as Morgan turns on his subjects. The group captures a deserter and asks for Morgan's whereabouts. Soon, they find Morgan up ahead. Roy finally takes on Morgan, and after a horribly intense battle, destroyed the dread lord's ship, presumably killing him.

### **Aquarius Star Field**

Star Alliance was not done for even after Morgan's defeat. While the Federation was celebrating Morgan's defeat, Roxan carried out a surprise attack, causing Roy and Leah to chase him into Aquarius. Leah managed to catch up to him, but was quickly surrounded and attacked. Roy battled towards her, and confronted Roxan once more before he could defeat Leah. Defeated, Roxan fled: again.

Just then, Federation Troops discovered a hidden palace - Aquarius. Believing Roxan to have escaped into it, Roy and Gang enter the castle, following a dark path. At the end of the path, they were ambushed, but the enemy was weak and easily defeated. Another path appeared, and the gang decided to follow it, allowing themselves to be ambushed again, this time by Aquarius Guardian, Meier himself.

After a long and strenuous battle, Meier is defeated, and reveals that Morgan is still alive before dying. Lisa tracks Morgan's location to the heart of Pisces Star Field, and the gang head there in an attempt to find and destroy him for good.

### **Pisces Star Field**

Upon arrival to the Pisces Star Field, Roy and gang try to decide whether to enter from the East or West gate, as they were the closest chinks in the armour of Pisces' tight security. They tried to enter from the West Gate, but someone sounded the alarm, and Morgan's personal troops, the Iron Guards, launched an attack on the gang.

Roy was able to hold them back, and Lisa discovered that the security of the East City was suddenly ramped up, inferring that Morgan was hiding there.The gang headed there, but was surrounded by more Iron Guards in an ambush. The enemy attack failed, and the gang moved on, only to find that Morgan had cloned his deceased general, Perry, and had turned him into a war machine bent on destroying Earth's Federation.

To be continued...