Lipana: I apologize for Cagalli being a Natural, but the point of this story is Kira being a Natural and Cagalli being a Coordinator. I hope you enjoy the story anyway.
Jodeist: You get a look at Athrun in this is not the focus though.
I decided to post this chapter much earlier than schedule so people can get a look at the different direction. This isn't going to follow the SEED plot ad nauseum, though things will be familiar until after Artemis.
Chapter Two: Blue Monday
"Under attack? You gotta be kidding me," Kuzzey said. "Probably some idiot decided to have some fun with power lines and it blew up in his face."
"I don't think so," Sai said. "Putting this building under emergency lights would take serious firepower. I think Cagalli is right on this one."
I felt a brief flash of vindication before I realized how wrong that emotion was. There was nothing to feel vindicated for. If I was right, that meant Heliopolis was in serious trouble. And so was everyone on here.
What should we do?" Tolle asked.
"Obviously take the emergency exit," I said. "It's the fastest way to get to the shelters, and the last thing we need is them all filling up before we're safe. Morgenroete and the industrial college are surrounded by people, and they're all gonna come flooding here."
"Then the answer's obvious, we go now," Miriallia said. She moved up beside me, right in front of the door. "Let's hope we're not gonna die."
She pushed the door open, and suddenly we were standing in a metallic hallway, with a pair of armed guards nervously directing people inside a nearby shelter.
Tolle scratched the back of his head. "Well, that was easy."
Suddenly an explosion happened from above, knocking everyone to the ground. The support beams hanging over the shelter entrance gave way and crashed down, crushing multiple people underneath, including the guards. Dust filled the room, making everyone cough and sneeze, including me.
Tolle sighed after he finished his coughing fit. "I gotta learn when to shut up."
I looked at Sai. "Is there another way out of here?"
"Uh, yeah. Down this way. It leads to a restricted area, though. Full of secret Morgenroete stuff," Sai said.
I could hear the room getting louder as people were beginning to panic. "Can you hack into there?"
"Uh, yeah, I think so," Sai said.
"Then that's what we're gonna do," I said. I immediately raised my voice. "Everyone, listen up!"
The furor seemed to merely get louder. I responded by shouting at the top of my lungs. "Everyone, shut up and listen to me!"
That got enough silence in the room to make me satisfied. "All right, listen. We're not dead yet. My friend here knows a way to get into a restricted area shelter. That's where we're going. Now, does anyone have a clue as to what's going on out there?"
I heard an all-too-familiar voice. "It was ZAFT!"
"ZAFT?" I repeated.
I saw Flay Allster emerge from the crowd. "Yes! There were ZAFT Mobile Suits outside!"
That got everybody panicking again, and I screamed again. "We're not gonna die, okay? Now everyone follow my friend and I, we'll get you out of here!"
At first, I thought I hadn't made headway, but a guy said "That boy's got the right idea. Let's follow him."
They think I'm a boy? I was about to blow all of the goodwill I had won when Tolle placed a hand on my shoulder.
"It's all right, Cagalli. Look, you got everyone paying attention to you. To us. Let's get them out of here before they panick again."
I sighed. "Thanks, Tolle. I needed that."
"No problem," he said.
I raised my voice to command the ground. "Okay, follow me. And by the way, I'm a girl."
I followed Sai, who had taken the lead down the hall. "You know how to navigate this place?"
"Enough," Sai said. "I explore my work area wherever I can go. I think I can hack my way in, given a few minutes."
"If the ZAFT's attacking we may not have a few minutes," I said.
"I know. I'll do the best I can," Sai said.
"What was the grade Professor Busch gave you in International Relations?" Miriallia asked.
"An A. Why?"
"I am so asking her to drop you a grade after this is over."
I remembered my prediction earlier that morning. "Oh, give me a break. Like anyone was expecting the ZAFT to go psycho."
"She's got a point, Miri," Tolle said.
Sai interjected. "All right, we're here. Give me a sec." He yanked out some kind of machine and began typing away on it the moment he hooked it up to the entry pad.
Flay fought her way through the crowd. "Where are you taking us, Cagalli Yamato?"
"A restricted area."
"Who says they're gonna let us in?"
"They'll have to. Military personnel are not allowed to turn away civilians unless the shelters are full," I said.
"What if they still say no? It's not like you're the princess of Orb or something."
"Maybe not, but I don't think they can turn away families and children," I said. "If it means anything-"
The door shafted open before I could finish. Sai grinned as he pocketed his hacking device. "Got it. Let's go."
"All right, everyone, follow us!" I ordered, and I followd Sai down the hall.
"This better work," Flay grumbled as she ran.
I was hoping the same thing, but I didn't want to give her the satisfaction of responding so I kept quiet as we ran down the hallway. Eventually a bright light appeared at the end of the hallway, and the emergency lights and cramped space gave way to some kind of balcony.
"What is this place?" I asked.
"Cell block D-13," Sai said. "It's usually restricted because we're no longer in the college. We're in Morgenroete proper now. And they like to keep stuff secret."
I walked out to the railing, and got the surprise of my life as I looked down. "Are those?"
"What?" Sai asked, and he looked down with me.
There was silence. "Mobile Suits," Sai finally said.
"You sure?" Tolle asked. "They don't look like any kind of Mobile Suits I've ever seen."
"You think they're ZAFT machines?" Miriallia asked.
"The ZAFT was attacking us," Flay said. "Why would we build stuff for somebody attacking us?"
"Maybe they belong to Orb," Sai said. "Maybe Orb's making their own Mobile Suits."
One of the people who came with us, a middle-aged man who was starting to bald, came forward. "Listen, I know you kids love your giant robots and all, but you led us here. Get us to the shelters."
"Right," I said, and I fought my way through the crowd, trying to find something that made it worth traveling through a restricted military block. I finally found a shelter door at the end, and I pointed towards it for the man, who had followed me. "That's where we're going. Come on, get everyone with us."
"You got it," the man said, and before long the entire crowd was right outside the shelter door.
The man guarding the shelter, was, judging by his tone of voice, and choice of words, less than thrilled. "What the hell are you civilians doing here? This is a restricted area!"
"Our shelter got blocked off!" I exclaimed.
""What shelter?"
"Uh . . . C-11," I said, taking a wild guess.
There was a pause on the other end, and the man finally sighed. "Fine. News is getting bad anyway, we're getting our asses kicked. I'll take until capacity."
The giant shelter door slid open, and quickly everyone pushed past me, filing their way inside.
Tolle smiled. "Good job, Cagalli."
"It's what I had to do." It suddenly occurred to me that I was hearing firecracker-esque noises in the background. I walked past the crowd as they charged into the shelter, and as I did so, Tori landed on my shoulder. Tori had a tendency to do that, to fly around almost out of sight but then land on me when it felt it was needed.
In the distance, I saw Morgenroete personnel trading fire with some kind of attacking force. I couldn't tell who the side was, but the uniforms didn't look EA-esque. They were most likely ZAFT, just like flay said.
I heard Miriallia behind me. "Cagalli, Tolle, come on! The shelter's almost full already! Hurry up!"
Tolle grabbed my shoulder. "Come on, before we lose our spots."
I nodded. "You're right."
But as we charged towards the door, the invisible voice stopped us. "Wait. We can only take one more person."
"You're kidding," Tolle said. "One more person?"
Miriallia stared. "Does that include me?"
"No. You're technically inside the shelter. Besides you, girl, we can only take one more person. So one of the lovebirds will have to stay."
Miriallia frowned. "Then I'll-"
I almost didn't interrupt then. I wanted to be safe. I wanted no part of the war. And I didn't want to go rush out into imminent death.
But I could not let Miriallia face that. As tiny as my chances were, Miriallia's, Tolle's, and everyone else's were minute. I was the only one out of all of us with any ability to survive a war situation, and that was merely because of my genetics, and nothing more.
So I knew what I had to do. "Miriallia, no. I'm not letting you sacrifice yourself."
Tolle stared at me. "Cagalli, I'm not going to-"
I kissed him on the mouth, and then made him freeze. While he was still trying to process the kiss, I shoved him into the shelter and handed him Tori. "Take care of Tori until we meet up, okay? I'll find another shelter."
The first door slid shut, the holes giving me a brief glimpse of both Miriallia and Tolle as they stared at me. Tori chirped in confusion and surprise.
We knew that, most likely, we would never see each other again, because I was going to be running into a war zone. But I had to put a brave face on. "I'll be okay. You guys stay together, got it? Stay together."
The second, inner door slammed, leaving solid steel between us, cutting off any reply from Miriallia and Tolle. I sighed, and turned back towards the war zone.
This is the worst Monday of my life. And my stupidest. I turned down safety and I'm walking into a battlefield. This is what I get for being altruistic.
I walked down the balcony, hoping no sniper would notice me. I was unarmed, and clearly wearing street clothes, so I was hoping that I would escape notice as I tried to make it to another shelter.
However, within ten steps I was already being shot at and I dove and hit the deck.
It didn't matter whether I was a civilian or not. I was a target.
I heard a young, nasal voice from below me. "What are you doing up there?"
I crawled over to the edge and I saw a young man, with brown hair, violet eyes, and a boyish face. He had hidden himself behind a bunch of military trucks. He was wearing the standard orange-and-white Morgenroete uniform, but was missing a weapon. I was thinking he had to be some kind of rookie who had been unable to get his weapon. But he looked familiar at the same time, like I should know him, but didn't. It was like I had seen him in one of my classes, not as a fellow student, but as the subject of a lecture.
I shook the thought out of my head. "I'm trying to get to a shelter," I replied.
"All the shelters that way got bombed," the young man said. "You're pretty much stuck."
I sighed. "So I have no choice but to come down."
"I think there's a way we can sneak past the ZAFT attackers if we move," the young man said. "There's a stairwell on the other end of the hallway. Think you can make it?"
"I won't have to," I said, and I stood up, got on the railing, and jumped on top of the military truck, and I jumped down from there again, right next to him.
He gaped. "How'd you do that? Are you a Coordinator?"
"Yeah," I said. "But I'm not with the ZAFT."
He nodded. "Well, I believe you. You led those civilians out of harm's way, I don't think a ZAFT person would've done that."
"I guess." I leaned out from the front end of the truck, and tried to take a peek. It looked like the Morgenroete security guards were making their last stand. A woman with long brown hair was giving commands, but the ZAFT commandos were frankly doing too much damage. The last machine-gun nest held by the Morgenroete was hit by a grenade, leaving the woman and a couple of remaining guards against the ZAFT.
"Actually," I said, "The battle's almost over. Maybe we should wait until they kill each other."
"You serious? Wait until the ZAFT take it over?" the young man asked.
"They don't have a lot of soldiers left either, I think there was only three or four."
"They only need three or four," the young man said. "They're after the Mobile Suits. I heard right before this position came under attack that they got three of the five already."
"Mobile Suits?" I asked.
"Yeah. They've got some kind of new designation, don't remember what it is exactly," the young man replied.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw a ZAFT soldier running up the stairwell. Clearly checking up on me.
The brown-haired woman had backed up significantly, she was right next to us, though she hadn't noticed that yet. In frustration, she threw down her machine-gun when it ran out of ammunition and drew her sidearm, still shooting at the unseen ZAFT soldiers.
"Lady, turn around!" I shouted.
The woman stared at me, and then turned around, right as the ZAFT soldier was about to take aim. She fired six or seven shots rapid-fire and one of them struck the ZAFT soldier in the head. He slumped over the railing and plummeted to the ground below. Unlike me, there was no truck to break his fall. The sickening cracking noises of bones breaking were audible even with the gunfire everywhere.
"Thanks," she said, and then her eyes widened as she looked past me. "You didn't get out of here?" she asked.
"Uh, no," the young man said.
The woman did a facepalm and ran over to us. "Why the hell not? Seriously, your father's gonna kill you for this!"
"Uh, what's going on?" I asked.
Both the young man and the woman looked at me, as if I had suddenly come into existence. Finally, the woman said "This is Prince Kira Yeley Athha of Orb. I am Lieutenant Murrue Ramius of the Earth Alliance. And who are you, boy?"
"I am not a boy!" I snarled. "Does this look like a masculine haircut to you guys? Do I have any facial hair?"
"Wait, you're a girl?" Kira asked.
"What did you think I was?"
Murrue facepalmed again. "Sorry. Now, what's your name?"
"Cagalli Yamato. I'm a student at the college," I replied.
Murrue nodded. "Thank you, Cagalli."
"Who's bright idea was it to bring the prince here?" I asked.
"The prince politely asked for a tour of the facility and his request was granted. He is the son of the Lion of Orb, no one wanted to turn him away," Murrue replied.
A sheepish grin crossed Kira's face. "Didn't exactly expect war to happen today."
I scoffed and stomped back both of them to look behind the truck again. "How're we gonna get out of here?"
"See that Mobile Suit in front of us?" Murrue asked.
Instead of peeking around to watch the firefight, I looked straight from my position. I realized it was one of the Mobile Suits I had seen from the balcony just moments before.
"We're gonna fly that thing?" I asked.
"Hopefully. I'm not a trained pilot," Murrue said, "But I think I can at least get that thing to walk. Foot soldiers can't do much against a Mobile Suit, not unless they thought to bring rocket launchers."
She came up beside me, and took a deep breath. "Come on, both of you. While we still have covering fire. The cockpit will have trouble holding three of us but we'll have to manage."
I saw the lieutenant's needs brace to run, and I quickly did the same. Kira, for his part, looked somewhat confused. "Wait, we're seriously gonna-"
"Go!" Murrue barked, and I quickly grabbed Kira by the hand and dragged him after us.
He screamed the whole way in terror until we reached the machine.
I saw one of the two remaining security guards get shot in the head, leaving just one left. He wasn't going to last much longer
Kira's face was filled with disgust and terror. "I didn't imagine war to be like this."
Murrue sighed. "I'm sorry, Prince Kira. I'll try to get you out of here. I'm not from your nation but I think I can at least give your father his only son back."
"What's an EA person doing here?" I asked.
Kira's face fell. "Well-"
Suddenly, a ZAFT soldier in a red uniform appeared above us. Murrue immediately blasted him and he fell off the Mobile Suit, hitting multiple obstacles before he laid to rest to the left of the Mobile Suit.
I immediately heard a masculine scream of grief and anger, and I saw another red ZAFT soldier make a charge up the Mobile Suit. He blasted the last security guard with a bullet burst, and came right at us. Murrue fired, but she was out of ammunition, leaving her helpless as she was shot in the arm.
Murrue fell down in front of us, grabbing her arm, and we were in the ZAFT soldier's mercy.
Then the ZAFT soldier hesitated, and his arms began to shake. Finally, I heard him whisper "Cagalli?"
The voice was older, teenaged, broken, but I recognized it. It had just enough similarity to my best friend's voice that I knew so well that I recognized the voice in an instant.
"Athrun? Is that you?"
Finally, I got a good look at his face. It was unmistakably Athrun's. I could even see the hints of his blue hair, soaked in sweat.
His eyes were filled with surprise and horror. "I . . ."
He lowered his rifle. "I'm sorry."
And then he activated his rocket pack and shot away from us. Murrue had managed to reload her pistol in the meantime, and took a few futile shots at him before throwing her pistol down in anger.
"Damn it . . . come on. Both of you, get in," she said.
She got down on her hands and knees and entered something into a keypad, and the chest cockpit opened up.
Both Kira and I had hesitated, and Murrue growled as she walked over to us. "Let's go!"
She pushed both of us into the cockpit and jumped in after us, shutting the cockpit behind her. "Both of you, get behind my seat! Don't touch anything! I should get this thing moving at least!"
She switched it on, and I saw lights flashing all over the console as the Mobile Suit came to life. On the display screen, I saw an acronym appear. "General Unilateral Neuro-Link Dispersive Autonomic Maneuver". GUNDAM.
I see the Earth Alliance is taking lessons from the ZAFT in nonsensical designations, I thought.
The Mobile Suit shook violently as it first sat up, and then clumsily rose to his feet, as the Morgenroete factory behind us exploded into flames. The shockwave was so much that Murrue could barely keep the GUNDAM from falling on its face, which surely would have killed both Kira and I.
In front of us, I saw another GUNDAM rise. It looked different, bulkier, than the model I was stuck in.
I quickly realized that Athrun had to be the pilot of that one.
"They took the Aegis," Murrue said, her words sissing a bit as she was working through her pain.
"The Aegis? What's the one we have?" I asked.
"The Strike," Murrue replied.
The Aegis rose to its feet, and seemed to stare at us in the eye.
"Oh man," Kira said. "Lieutenant Ramius, ma'am, please tell me you know what you're doing."
"I hope I do," Murrue said, as she made the GUNDAM take an awkward step towards the aegis.
The shaking in the cockpit told me she didn't have a clue how to operate this thing.
"Are we going to fight it?" Kira asked.
"If we have to," Murrue said, as she struggled to make the GUNDAM take another step.
The Aegis just stayed in place, as if patiently waiting for us to move.
Athrun was waiting for us.
I braced myself for Athrun's inevitable attack. He probably had a better idea of how to operate a GUNDAM than the three of us did. He could, no, he would kill all three of us at any time if he chose to attack.
We were at my best friend's mercy.
