Queen Emeraldas (Ship)

The Queen Emeraldas is the personal ship of Emeraldas, the Pirate Queen. It was built for Emeraldas for her to find and use throughout her life.

Overview
Due to loose continuity, the Queen Emeraldas has at least two different origins. In the manga, the ship was formerly owned by a woman named Zonarana of Mosgart. After a few failed tests however, it ended up on Jura. In another, it was the last ship created by a lost civilisation that was later found drifting or buried in sand by Emeraldas on Meta-Bloody. None of the animated stories bother discussing its origins. In any case, Tochiro Oyama was well involved in the process, subsequently repairing and restoring the vessel to the best of his ability and making a few modifications to better suit some needs. After coming into contact with Emeraldas, it was adopted and used by her in her never-ending journey through the cosmos since.

Appearance
The Queen Emeraldas resembles a large blimp or zeppelin with a sailing ship-of-the-line made of a wood-like material used as a makeshift gondola-style cabin attached to the bottom via the masts, and a fourth support from the stern. Almost all the lighting, lanterns, and windows of the ship glow yellow, while some effects at the nose and tail may glow white. On the bow of the ship-of-the-line is a bronze or golden figurehead reportedly in the style of a goddess, and the Jolly Roger flag it flies from the stern support is coloured red. The decks of the ship-of-the-line are also visibly lined with cannon.

The vast majority of the ship's mass and hull is composed of what would equate to a zeppelin's large air sac. The hull is full of hidden panels and hatches and is usually colored blue (grey or a two-tone blue camouflage in some media), with a black nose and red underside. On the very front of the nose is a circular cavity or indentation marked with a skull-and-crossbones, in a similar manner to the prow of Arcadia. Four vents encircle this hole. The tail end of the vessel is where the four stabilising fins and afterburner vents of the Gravity Wave Engine can be found. Four auxiliary engines are found between the stabilisers. Behind each auxiliary engine is a thin wing ending in a wingtip pod. On each side of the hull is a skull-and-crossbones insignia emblazoned onto a red heart or diamond shape, depending on the series.

In comparison to many other designs by Leiji Matsumoto, Queen Emeraldas is notably sleek and smooth, making it stand out quite a lot when put side-by-side with other spaceships of the Leijiverse.

Weapons
The gondola's decks are equipped with particle beam cannons that can be used offensively or defensively. The main body of Queen Emeraldas on the other hand, has more than enough guns and missiles to destroy most of an entire fleet in a single volley. The amount of guns invested in the ship's armaments is quite overkill, with countless homing laser batteries and missile hatches lining and encompassing the whole circumference and surface area of the vessel's hull. Some series offer different weapons including a Wave Motion Gun-style beam weapon on the bow where the skull-and-crossbones indentation is located.

For defencive equipment, it features a shield generator that can block most attacks and can even expand. In terms of thermal shielding however, Tochiro Oyama stated that Queen Emeraldas is slightly inferior to the Arcadia, but it can still withstand the bombardment of an entire fleet. Queen Emeraldas also possesses powerful stealth capabilities using the same system including jammers, making it completely invisible to radar. It is however, able to seen with the naked eye, but with the infamous reputation of the lady on board, most people consciously choose to ignore it. Though depending on the series, the ship may also possess cloaking to hide itself.

Operation
Queen Emeraldas is equipped with special features to travel through space and provide for its only occupant. As it was built solely for Emeraldas, it has a one-person room that features everything that suits her, and the ship has no need for a manned crew. It is equipped with an artificial intelligence system that speaks in a voice and personality similar to Emeraldas as it was actually based on her, resulting in an interesting identity bond between the vessel and the captain.

It is unknown if the hull is hollow or not, but one can presume it is full of either fuel, a lifetime's worth of food and supplies, or an endless amount of munitions.

In Der Ring des Nibelungen, there is a hanger compartment in the underside of the hull that houses Emeraldas's personal starfighter.

Trivia

 * The initial Queen Emeraldas design lacked the ship-of-the-line gondola and was coloured black with white ribbing. Also, where the older shows had Queen Emeraldas only ever firing from the ship-of-the-line, the new OVA series shows half the zeppelin hull opening up to display enough weapons to fill a tremendously oversized whale monster.
 * In the first Queen Emeraldas OVA, the ship briefly mimics this older design as it de-cloaks.