Hello, peeps~! Here's a new SD Gundam story! :) This one is a diverging fic from Little Wing, but will still follow the basic premise of penelopi's fic. :) Penelopi was kind enough to write out the first half of this chapter, so thank her for that! ;D Not gonna say much, other than that Shute goes through a major change in his life, and slowly learns to adapt to his new circumstances. New allies will be found, new enemies will surface, and some enemies may become friends while some friends will become enemies. It all depends on what choices the Gundam Force makes.

So, without further ado, welcome to...

REBORN

Prologue

Captain slipped near the top of the stairs and fell on his chin. He grabbed at the sides of the step to break his fall, but he missed. His stomach lurched. The stairs flew out of reach, shrinking rapidly as he plummeted.

"Captain!" Shute gunned for the falling figure. His heat sensors and motion detectors homed in on his friend. His rockets flared. With a smooth dip, he caught Captain in his bulky, hard arms.

"Oof!" Captain involuntarily groaned at the impact.

"Are you okay, Captain?"

"Yes, Shute. Thank you."

A blast suddenly punched Shute forward. "Aaaah!" He weaved out of the path of another missile, but his jetpack sputtered, and they began to angle to one side. Shute held Captain tight as he ducked and wobbled and weaved to the ground below, evading pot-shots and his foe's laughter.

They landed under the start of the roller coaster track. Shute slipped on thick mud, and Captain dumped into the mush. "Ow!" Shute exclaimed, pushing himself up. Brown smeared his armor. "Er, I mean, sorry Captain!"

Captain wobbled to his feet, shaking under the influence of adrenaline. "I'm fine, Shute."

Another warning whine, and Shute lurched again. "Ah!" His self-diagnostic system alerted him to a blown fuse in the other rocket and an open crack in his back's epidermal casing. Another projectile blast, and melted wires were added to the list.

"Shute!" Captain yelled in alarm. "Move!"

A shadow fell over them, and they looked to see a glowing purple eye leering down at them. "It was fun while it lasted, Captain Gundam." Grappler lowered his launcher to aim at Shute's head. "Night-night~"

Bang!

Shute watched himself flop into the mud.

"C-Captain?"

"Stupid organics," Grappler spat. "Always getting in the way."

Shute carefully cradled the head of his body. "Captain? Captain? Captain, say something!"

Captain's broken voice spoke. "Shute..." His eyes disconnected from the Gundam face, and his mud-stained skin paled.

"Captain!" Shute's sensors indicated that the heart was in spasms and the blood pressure was plummeting.

Grappler raised his gun again. "I won't miss, this time!" he sneered.

The blast of an arm missile cut short his glee: he flew headlong into the next building over. "Go away!" Shute shouted over the smoking nozzle of his arm cannon. But, the enemy robot lay unmoving. Zakos tiptoed in from the recesses of the rusted park to check on their fallen leader. Shute likewise returned his attention to his friend. "Captain, hold on. I'm gonna get you some help. I've always fixed you up, so just hang in there!" His V-fin flashed. "Chief Haro, we need medical assistance for Captain right away!"

The Zakorello Gate's purple glow and groans, and the rockets of many flight boosters, barely registered in Shute's conscious awareness. On the other end came an alarmed "What happened, Shute?!"

"He got hit by Grappler! He's..." Shute waited for the diagnosis of his emergency assessment program. "in shock!"

"Help is on the way! Keep him stable!"

Shute pressed on Captain's chest, just slight enough to hopefully compress some vessels; he had no clothes to tear and plug the wound. The breaths began to slow.

Sometime during this agonizing eternity, the Gunperry landed, and a human paramedic rushed to tend to the wounded boy. But, by the time she took his pulse, it was almost gone. As she angled his chin back to perform CPR, the synapses died. Shute watched the electrical impulses completely dry up in the brain and spine. "Captain?" He prodded a hand with his metal finger, then pinched it, but no response came.

The paramedic listened to the face, felt the wrist, and scanned vitals with a portable tool. She sighed. "Time of death: 20:53 hours, September 19th, 2313."

Shute stared silently at the lifeless body. In his frame, he couldn't choke up or cry. In his frame...

The realization hit home suddenly as his eyes shrunk a bit and he slowly glanced down at his…his shaking mechanical hands, staring in shock and horror. This… He… He couldn't be…! But he was.

He was stuck, now. Stuck in the body of the friend he'd failed to save.

Squishes sounded in the mud, and a green-masked man knelt and put a hand to Shute's shoulder. "Shute."

Shute turned his helm wearily.

Chief Haro stared into his eyescreens for a moment, then reached up to his face. The mask slipped over his head, and a blond head of hair showed itself. Shute gaped into his father's grizzled face as Mark said hoarsely, "I'm sorry, son."

Shute stared, his ventilation system, the movement of GMs, and the trickle of rain the only sounds reaching under the track. No goo filled his nostrils, no heat filled his face and eyes, and no thickness in his throat tempted him to make the impossible motion of swallowing. His mouthguard slid apart to expose his rigid face. "You... waited until now to tell me?"

"I'm sorry, Shute. I made bad calls. This is my fault."

"Shute!"

Father and son turned to see a dirty-blond girl running towards them. A GM stepped in her path. "It is not safe. You cannot pass."

"My friend is there! Let me through!"

"Let her through," Mark ordered.

The GM side-stepped, and Margaret ran to the limp boy. "Shute!"

"He is dead," Mark said.

Margaret fell to her knees, reached out a tentative hand to touch the cooling arm, then slid to his hand. Gripping the cold fingers, she cried, the tears dripping onto the mud and the body, indistinguishable from the sky's drizzle. Shute had never felt so envious.

...

Bakunetsumaru and Zero stood on either side of Shute, staring down at the coffin with the brown-haired boy inside.

Keiko cried into her tissue behind her son, and Mark, in full SDG regalia except for his Haro mask, held her consolingly. After the devastating events, Chief Haro had decided that it was time to reveal everything to at least his family and the inner circle of the SDG: Keiko could not be left to think her son was dead, and there was no hiding from the Gundam Force Mark's inner turmoil at the sight of his son's tragic split with his best friend—plus the end of Shute's human life.

After the casket had been lowered into the ground and buried, Keiko stretched her arms around Shute's bulky frame for a hug. "Your father, Nana, and I are all still here for you, Shute," she whispered. "We'll help you through anything, no matter what."

Baku and Zero each laid a hand on Shute's shoulder. "We're here for you," Baku said.

"We'll take care of him, Miss Keiko," Zero reassured. His gaze dipped. "Besides, it's the least I can do, after my negligence—"

"Zero," Baku growled in warning.

The Knight Gundam shook his head. "Sorry... We will help you to learn your new form, Shute."

Shute nodded numbly. "Thanks, guys."

Half-an-hour later, Zero and Baku passed Shute off to Kao Lyn for more check-ups, tune-ups, and upkeep instructions. After the door slid shut, Shute could still hear their continued whispering. "Where's Aleda?" Baku hissed to Zero.

Shute could imagine Zero shaking his head sadly as he said, "In her room, since last night. She feels responsible for what's happened..."

Shute temporarily lowered the sensitivity of his audio sensors and tried to refocus his attention on Kao Lyn's stream of words on the importance of regular oiling. Even the scientist himself, though he attempted to maintain his usual bubbly persona, seemed to waddle through a depressed mire. "Chief Kao Lyn?"

"Yes, Cap—er, Shute?"

"I'm going to be like this forever, aren't I?" Shute said, staring at his metal hands.

"Well, you know, a Gundam body has a lot of perks! I'm sure you'll get used to the idea after a while," Kao Lyn babbled. "After all, you've adjusted pretty well in just two weeks..."

As he continued to ramble, Kao Lyn laid Shute on a table in his lab and hooked him up to monitoring machines. The tools hummed in the background, and Kao Lyn paused his rambles. Shute dimmed his eyescreens and clenched a fist over Captain's Soul Drive—his own Soul Drive, now—feeling its slight hum beneath the armor. His memories of Captain Gundam came forward as his software drew them from his memory banks, sharpened to exacting detail by his new mechanical mind: every motion, tonal shift in the voice, and change in the eyescreens, which had subtly conveyed his emotions in ways that only Shute had been able to read.

At least he'd never forget his best friend.

…

Things were never the same after that day.

Aleda still refused to come out of her room, and only after a very successful prank by Guneagle did she chase down the poor flier and pin him to the wall with a spell before storming off, leaving the poor mech to plead and beg for someone to get him down. (His prank consisted of him triggering the sprinklers on the base and soaking everyone, including Mark and Kao Lyn.) Thankfully Zero helped him, but that did little to ease the tension created by the death of Captain Gundam.

Shute was also very distant from the rest of the Gundam Force, and he sometimes found himself wandering the halls of the base or outside in the bio dome that overlooked the city. He tried to stay away from the others, but they were determined to help him adapt to his new life as a Gundam. So far, though, there was no chance of that happening, and he sealed himself in his room every time they tried to communicate with the him.

Bakunetsumaru and Zero got into more arguments, and at one point a fistfight, resulting in both getting hauled down to medical by a very irritated Guneagle, which was very rare considering how outgoing and energetic the flier was. But even he was feeling the effects of the void between them.

Mark was also noticing this, and as a result, he implemented an order to have them separated for a few days. This did help, but not to the extent he had hoped for. The group was tense, even when separated, so he had to relent and let them come back together.

Still, any progress was better than nothing.

By the end of the first week after Captain's death, Shute wasn't willing to talk to anyone, anymore. He currently sat on top of one of the entrances overlooking the bio dome, his legs swinging gently as he eyed the distant city. As the sun set beyond the horizon, throwing the city into a reddish-orange glow, he sighed, wincing mentally at the sound of his friend's voice coming from his mouth. He still couldn't accept this, that he was now a Gundam for the rest of his life.

He looked down at his metallic hands, the hands that had once belonged to Captain Gundam, and flexed them. He wasn't sure if he'd ever get used to this. And to be honest, he was starting to regret having accepted Aleda's help with that spell. He knew it wasn't entirely her fault, but he still couldn't help but feel that she had been responsible for his situation. He let one of his hands fall to his side, and his other hand drifted to his chest, lightly touching the compartment for his Soul Drive, feeling the soft hum beneath his chest armor. He clenched his hand into a fist, feeling the resistance between his metal digits and palm.

He wished he could feel things again, but he knew that it was impossible now. He dimmed his eyescreens and lowered his head, regretting not having acted sooner to defend Captain. Not like he could've…

He didn't even hear the sound of footsteps until they were practically right next to him.

His eyescreens returned to full brightness as he turned his body partially, coming face-to-face with Guneagle. The younger mech had a pained look in his eyes as he sat down next to Shute.

"Hey," he muttered.

"Hey," Shute said softly.

The two sat in silence for a moment before Guneagle spoke, shifting a bit as he did so. "You doing okay?"

"No…" Shute whispered. "I… I just lost my best friend… and now I'm stuck like this…" He raised the hand he touched his Soul Drive compartment with and studied the palm.

Guneagle flipped his eyescreens to a tight-shut expression for a wince and nodded. "Yeah. I know. I… Shute, I may not fully understand what you're going through, but… we're here for you. If you need to talk…"

The ex-human nodded. "Thanks…" he said.

Silence reigned again between the two mechs.

"Hey, Guneagle?"

"Yeah, Shute?"

"Did you ever think… we would lose someone close to us?" Shute asked, still studying his hand. He flexed it a few times, trying to consider the possibilities. "I mean… I never thought…"

The flier sighed and placed a hand on Shute's shoulder. "Shute… I never thought it would happen either," Guneagle said, wrapping his arm around the other Gundam's bulkier shoulders. "I… I mean we did consider it, but it seemed like a far off possibility…"

Shute's eyes locked onto Guneagle's green ones. "What…?"

"We did consider the possibility of one of us getting deactivated, but… nothing like this…" the flier admitted. "It took this to fully realize that we can't prepare for everything… It's just not possible. And Shute… I… I really am sorry for what happened to you. I… Just know that if you want to talk, you can come find me. You know my room number."

He wrapped his other arm around Shute's frame and gave him a light hug before letting go and getting up.

The flier turned and walked off, leaving Shute to stare after him as he too got to his feet. He gazed down at his hand once more, the same one Captain had always used for his signature attack. What was going to happen now? How was he supposed to live his life now? He sighed and let his hand fall down to his side. If only he had been more active in defending Captain that day...

No one anticipated the consequences this would have on the fight against the Dark Axis.