Macross Frontier: Labyrinth of Time

Ranka performs in concert on a colony planet and dedicates the last song to the people she holds dear. She then begins singing and a holographic projection appears of Alto’s crashed YF-29 on the Vajra homeworld. She then thinks about Alto’s disappearance and Sheryl being in a coma. Ranka’s friends cry in the audience, and she suddenly feels pain in her stomach, which coincides with the activation of ruins. Luca detects fold waves, but Ozma shuts him up. Later, the Galactic Heritage Bureau gives Ranka, Ozma, Michael, Luca, Klan and Nanase permission to investigate the Well of Souls, a ruin left behind by descendants of the Protoculture. Klan explains that according to local legends, it was used to speak to the gods and the dead. Nanase tells Ranka that she has to make this fast because she has song lyrics to finish and they need to depart for her next tour stop tomorrow. Ranka sets up taiyaki, tuna buns and a paper airplane for Alto since he promised to return, but Michael comments that it looks like a gravesite. Luca picks up fold waves and guesses that the ruins reactivated last night due to Ranka’s singing. Ranka feels that Alto is calling to her and runs toward the Well of Souls as a large pathway rises out of the water. Ozma gives chase, but Ranka jumps into a portal that dumps her in the flooded interior of the ruins. She sees an image of Alto and starts singing “Labyrinth of Time.” The others also see Alto on Luca’s computer monitors, but he explains that it’s just an external projection of Ranka’s memories. Ranka thinks of past experiences with Alto and one night in particular when she couldn’t sleep and called him on the phone. Ranka looks at Alto’s earring and thinks of Sheryl, which causes the ruins to move around her. Ranka runs through the ruins while thinking of Sheryl and past memories on the Macross Frontier. Ranka tosses a paper airplane from the edge of a platform and watches as it soars through the ruins before slowly falling into the water. Ranka stops hearing and hears Sheryl’s voice as the paper airplane flies again, surrounded by colorful butterflies. Ranka sees the ruins lighting up with color and imagines herself singing with Sheryl again. Ozma asks Luca if Ranka was able to reach Alto, and Luca doesn’t know but notes that the fold waves are continuing to increase. Sheryl, still comatose, starts dripping tears out of her eyes. A light emerges from the ruins as an amplified fold wave transmission and stretches out into deep space. Michael and Ozma wonder if Alto is at the end of that light. With all the visions gone, Ranka stands up and tells herself that she’s not losing Alto this time.