A/N: Written for the 100_tales challenge on livejournal, prompt #066 – pain, and for the 50_rivalries challenge on livejournal, prompt #029 – silicate and the characters Natarle and Azrael, and for the 5,10,20,50,70,100 fandoms challenge, fandom 27: Gundam Seed.
Second in Command
The bridge was empty save for the two of them, but their presence was enough to make the empty space shudder. Natarle clawed for some footing, attempting to drag herself up despite the crippling wound in her side, eyes flickering, seeking our her commander, and enemy.
Azrael's eyes were wild as they focused on her; her own gaze was defiant as she glared back. Beyond, they both could hear the bangs, see the flashes, of their final flare being overcome by the Archangel. Could hear the anguish that echoed across space at the fragments of the Skyscraper that floated between them.
But that was all beyond the ship. Beyond the battleground.
'You bitch,' he spat in her direction, and Natarle found her lip twisting despite herself or the pain that rippled through her form. One hand plugged the whole that had been left behind; the other tried to support her as she pulled herself over the Captain's chair.
Her chair; it should be her chair, but Azrael was stalking towards it now. And it had been Azrael giving the commands, a man who should have had no jurisdiction upon her ship.
'No,' she said quietly, as he reached for the controls. There were many, but she knew them all. Knew them since she had been a part of the team building the Archangel on Heliopolis. Knew them since she had taken command to fly the ship to safety, and then led it through wars under Commander Ramius' command.
But Azrael was no Commander Ramius, no soft-hearted woman who was more a mother than a war veteran. Murrue Ramius had been above her; Azrael had shoved her aside, and she was not a woman to be shoved –
She gritted her teeth at the spasm of pain, reaching forward. When she couldn't reach her goal she threw herself instead, knocking him off balance and receiving another hole in her form. She cried out a little, the sudden punctured shock ripping more than tissue and blood from her, but then she pitched herself forward again, knee coming up in all its shuddering strength.
He struggled; he seemed to forget himself, who he was fighting. Blasphemy, all targeted at the Coordinators, fell from his lips. Fingers twitched, as though they were firing little toy guns at the enemies. Limbs flailed as if she were one of his "mates" to tussle with in the school playground.
He hit her wounds – once, twice – and she found herself crumbling in the pain. But now she clung to him, the only strength left being the words on her tongue and her silicate-fingers clawing his Earth Alliance uniform.
Captain or not, they would both die with the ship.
Murrue…Natarle imagined her still anguished face, burning with the Skyscraper's destruction, and of its pilot. It tugged painfully at her as well: Mu La Flaga had been a man precious to them both. But the entire Archangel was a precious thing to her, and it had become the adjudicator in a war that took place on her own precious Dominion.
Azrael finally pushed her off…too late.
'Murrue Ramius.' The words fell from her lips with a sigh, but she struggled to propel them further as she saw the Blue Cosmos man crawling to her chair again.
She saw the beam coming almost before she finished the word: 'Fire!'