Vandread

The crew of the Nirvana, minus the men, find themselves at an absolutely crucial moment. They're facing off with an alien flagship, and at the same time, learn some very disturbing details about the aliens' origins. The aliens themselves have some secret weapons, which prove to be a very unpleasant surprise for Meia and her Dread squadrons. Meanwhile, the men free themselves thanks to Rabat, although Rabat's reasons may be far from virtuous. Despite the men's latecoming help, the Dreads are badly beaten and outnumbered, and the Nirvana retreats to the temporary safety of a gas giant. Once there, Hibiki starts working on his attack plan. All he has to do is destroy the enormous enemy force, by himself if he needs to. But with everyone's confidence except Dita's flagging, will he come through?

If there's one thing Hibiki is good at, it's playing pack mule for Dita's hairbrained schemes. This time, the two are stealing around the ship, gathering food for some unspecified purpose. Are they surprising the ship with dinner, or just being greedy? Their suspicious actions end up piquing Paiway's curiosity, but she only ends up with hurt feelings after being seemingly brushed off by Dita. Meanwhile, Bart isn't feeling comfortable. No matter what happens, he complains, the crew just doesn't seem to be warming up to him. Fortunately, Duero has some advice prepared that might help - though Bart tends to take things quite literally... Unfortunately, a few misunderstandings, coupled with Paiway's hurt feelings and an impressive chain of assumptions and lies turns the women of the Nirvana hostile towards the men once again. Hibiki escapes in his Vanguard, and the other men are locked in the brig. Alone once again, Hibiki wanders space until he finds a fleet comprised of both men and wome

The crew of the Nirvana come across a planet that is almost completely covered in water. There is one island on the planet, but before they have time to investigate they must face cubed shaped opponents. Jura is as determined as ever to unite with Hibiki, and this is the perfect opportunity for her to do so - although the result may not be what she was necessarily expecting. As Hibiki and Jura crash onto the surface of the planet, the Captain and B.C. go down to investigate, and meet the locals, who seem to be willing to be harvested by the Harvest fleet. Meia and Dita try to desperately hold off the new Harvest fleet ship that is approaching the planet, but it may take Hibiki to motivate an extremely depressed Jura to fight in the new Vandread in order to save everyone.

Now that things have calmed down relatively, Hibiki now discovers that he still has a major problem - Dita, who still is very interested in him, and whose highly curious actions are starting to get on his nerves. Hibiki having no experience with dealing with women, is at a loss with what to do about the situation, and ends up inadvertantly hurting Dita's feelings. In a rare moment of depression, Dita goes so far as not to talk to Hibiki and state that in battle she won't even combine with his Vandread. The rift may seem impossible to bridge, but Hibiki even goes to Gascogne for advice on what to do. Dita begins to realize that her feelings for Hibiki may go beyond simple curiosity, but hopefully it won't be too late to forgive and forget...

The ship has a new name thanks to Parfet… Nirvana, a name that symbolizes Harmony, Stability, and Joy. Dita still has an interest in the ""alien"" Hibiki, who finds the highly energetic girl annoying and would rather spend time trying to find out more about his Vanguard. Meanwhile, Jura schemes to find a way to unite with Hibiki's Vanguard. The Nirvana then comes across a barren desert planet, where they find a artificial structure that is partially buried in the sand. Hibiki isn't happy when the female pilots start to train on the other Vanguards that are left to go down to the planet's surface - especially when they decide to paint them all sorts of ridiculous colors. Despite Hibiki's unhappiness, the Vanguards go down to the surface and find themselves in trouble - but getting out of the situation may be the only way to find out what exactly the mysterious enemy's motivation is.

The threat is past, but the new ship is unstable, leaving the crew baffled at how to operate it. One by one, the men are taken from their cells in order to try to help out with the repairs of the ship. However, there may be no time for lounging around, as Dita and Gascogne go missing on a supply and information-gathering mission, and the ship plunges into a nebula and asteroid field that threatens to tear the ship apart. It's left to the crew to once again work together to overcome their difficulties. In the aftermath, the crew discovers that it will take 270 days to get home, as they have been thrown to a remote part of space. With this new knowledge, the men and women realize that working together is a necessity to get themselves home.

Hibiki Tokai is a third-class citizen who is a parts mechanic. When he boasts to his co-workers that he can and would steal a Vanguard, which is one of the Empire's elite combat vehicles used for defending themselves against the Mejale, he finds himself boxed in by his own words. In order to silence his doubting co-workers, he has to sneak abord the battleship Ikazuchi and find the Vanguard with the marked part on it that makes it his. However, everything doesn't go as planned, as the Ikazuchi takes off for orbit 2 hours ahead of time with Hibiki stranded on board. As if things couldn't get any worse, the Ikazuchi also comes under attack by a group of fearsome women from Mejale - and not just any Mejale women, but pirates! Found out by the Tarak crew and facing execution for being a stowaway, Hibiki comes face to face with a real live woman in the midst of all the fighting, who he immediately runs away from, despite her overly friendly attitude. But the real threat may not come from th