Extension of the fighter, pilot of the sword

Universal Century 88

Opportunity From the Past

Ginko Urst woke up to the pop of the fire that he had set up the night before. The quietly sparkling fire that was once present was now a small pile of glowing embers the wood still retaining its shape as it popped and hissed form the morning dew. Urst slowly closed his eyes again and went back to sleep, knowing that since the sun was not warming yet, he still had time to catch the sand that he always needed.

The sun was nearly overhead of him, and he slowly opened his eyes as he felt the sleeping bag's collected warmth from the sun caress his body, like the warm body he so long for when he had one next to him long ago. He sat up, bringing his knees to his chest them letting them spread back down, his hands between them. He looked up and saw his Mobile Suit, an MSA-003 NEMO. Most would not agree on having such a mass-produced machine for use on a battlefield. For Urst, he preferred the machine, knowing that lack of spare parts would be rendered null as long as he came on to battlefields in their aftermath.

He got back from his cold bath in the stream a short walk from his campsite. He went out in the nude since he saw no reason to wear a towel except to dry the long mane of hair that he neglected to cut. He pulled out a fresh set of clothes that he washed the day before, puling it off the cooling vent of the foot pad joint of his NEMO. The warmth of the clothes felt just as good as the sun on the sleeping bag. He made breakfast, a mix of field rations and some real foodstuffs, and he boiled a small kettle of green tea in a multipurpose canteen.

He sat after he was done preparing his breakfast and gave a small offering of thanks. He took his Luna titanium mug that he fashioned from an unsalvageable oil cup from a felled mobile suit. He took a small sip from the mug, savoring the rare taste of the tea that he often went to great lengths to bargain for, letting the flavor of the drink run down and warm him inside. He proceeded to stuff his face, yet always sued his napkin, with breakfast.

Urst cleaned off from breakfast and carefully packed up his tent and cleaned his campsite. He dumped the remainder of the unused kettle of water on the fire to douse it out and then kicked dirt on the remaining embers to snuff them out. He stowed his camping equipment in the left skirt flap of the mobile suits armor and locked it tight in the locker. He walked up to his mobile suit, the cable lift dangling a foot off the ground, and mounted it, he waited for a second as it sensed his weight and it lifted him up. The cable lift stopped just enough for him to reach out with his other foot and touch the footplate to his cockpit. The footplate rose up to give him an even keel and he walked inside. Pulling on the flight suit, he checked the seals and then placed his helmet on, not sealing the visor.

He initiated the start up sequenced and the mobile suit hummed to life to nominal levels of operation. He sealed the cockpit hatch, as the overhead hatch clamped and sealed in to place, seals of the door and cockpit disappeared as he received a 360 panoramic hemispheric view of his outside around him. He looked at the amour board and all his systems where blue, except his antennae, which was black, meaning that the Minovsky particles where too dense for him to detect any one on radar or sonar, but so that no one would detect him.

He sighed and then breath in deeply, the Psycumu equipment he salvaged imitating his every thought to the mobile suit, as the torso and chest area moved in a crude mimic to imitate his breathing exercise. He slowly thought through the process of taking his right hand while lifting his foot and placing it forward. Though he used the pedals and the control grips, his mobile suit moved forward like an extension of the fighter inside. The magnetically coated joints he once salvaged from a colony research site where moving fluidly to mimic the movements of his exercise, the mobile suit performing with its own mechanical grace the exercises its warrior inside extended it to.

He finished off the last of his exercises, moving his NEMO toward the heading that he had set up the day before. He was certain that what he was heading for was an AEUG out post, and he hoped to hook up with possibly the main fleet up in space. He set his unit on autopilot and sat back, taking a nap.

"Why is that your shield is mounted on your right hand of your mobile suit?"

"Well, since I'm actually better with my left hand with my beam saber, I moved it to the right, because as I see it, I would rather have control in melee where a beam rifle is more of only a burst of concentration, rather in which a beam saber requires my full piloting to control properly. Also, its because I'm left handed with my saber, and right handed with my gun"

"Right, your shield is like the ZEON and TITAN units that have their shields on the right"

"Don't even think about suggesting that I was from Zeon or the Titans. You'll leave it at that"

He woke up to see 3 NEMOs in forest camouflage scheme pointing their guns at him, one on his head, two at his knees. The one pointing at his head placed the muzzle of the beam rifle on his head.

"Are you lost or something? Because you have been standing outside the entrance for the last one and a half hours"

"In a way yes, I am looking for the AEUG out post Araldana Phentus"

"You can be taken in pieces or we can take your weapons for you, including your beam sabers, and please jettison your head Vulcan's ammo"

"You may retain your shield"

He released the hostler for his beam sabers taking one in each hand. Then placed his hands next to his head and caught the ammo boxes that where dumped out. He handed it out towards the mobile suit with the contact linked gun to his head. Upholstering the beam rifle, he passed it behind him but first. He then placed his hands behind his head.

"Is that satisfactory?"

"Yes, no need to place your hands up like that, just move forward, it's only a precaution so that we know that you say who you really are"

The unit with a contact link to his head with the muzzle pointed an index finger at him and a thin contact cable attached itself magnetically to his chest.

"Just keep in range of the wire, Minovsky particles are being dispersed right now and it's all just for you. By the way, what's your name, I know we where supposed to get a conscript, but you look freelance."

"Ginko Urst, of the former 57th squad platoon"

"57th SP? Oh, sorry about the whole fuck up with that."

"Its fine, I'm not as bad as I was when it happened" They let the conversation drop right there, as they finally approached the inner hanger of the caver nose underground base. Ginko let his suit kneel down and opened the cockpit door open up and let out the lift cable. He stepped on the cable and it let him down. He looked up and around him and saw that for some reason or another, that this time, this job might actually be better, and permanent.