Chapter 6: Protector

A wave of green flashes flowed within an open island area, as Freedom's short-range combat training continued. After one week's worth of rigorous training with his ranged combat training, Alan thought that he should spare no time in training with his beam sabers. His form, and skill increased with each passing hour, until he felt he was truly ready for anything.

Five more days passed of melee training, and Alan decided it was time to take a break. He powered down, and walked to a balmy beach area, where he set up camp. He had been eating the bananas and oranges that had been growing on the island's trees, in order to preserve time going back to a city and buying food. He relaxed a little, while eating a banana, and decide to take a nice swim in the water to cool off after a hard day of training.

After returning from the water, Alan grabbed a towel from his duffel bag, and dried himself off. Not long after, did his Civilian Sensors detect motion in the air, not far from him. According to the sensors, Four mobile suits were moving at high speeds. Just then, a new sensation came from Alan's bracelet. It was a communication. a female voice started coming out of Alan's bracelet.

"Please! If anyone is out there! Please, Help me! I'm being chased by three mobile suits, and I'm badly damaged, and almost out of power. If there is anyone in the area that can help, Please come quickly!"

"Three against one!" Alan said angrily, "Where's the honor in that?"

Alan stood up, with full intent on helping her. "Alan Drake, Freedom, Launching!" he shouted, with a fire in his eyes unlike his previous battles. His other battles were, for the most part, one on one, and had at least some sense of honor. To him, the concept of a gang-beating was wrong, and should be punished. His armor fully materialized and Freedom erupted off the island at top speed, causing the sand to blow everywhere.

It didn't take Freedom long to locate the chasing party. there were two mobile suits, one riding the other. the rider was a blue mobile suit, which seemed well armed with beam cannons, both on the shoulders and on his arm. The other was a black and red armor, which seemed to look more like a bird. The third pursuer looked more like a green octopus holding a scythe. Freedom's computers identified the blue mobile suit as the Calamity, the bird as Raider, and the Octopus as Forbidden. The damaged mobile suit being chased was white and blue, with a large black and red jetpack on it's back. Freedom indentified this suit as the Strike. It was trying to maintain evasive action, but found it difficult with its power so low. Freedom decided it was time to intervene.

The three pursuers had not noticed that the Freedom was nearby, so Alan took that to his advantage. He came in from below, and armed his HiMat cannons, firing a wedge between pursuers and pursued. the three suits pulled back to avoid getting hit, as the Strike stopped and turned around. Freedom retracted its cannons and allowed his wings to span in an intimidating fashion, as he rose to meet them at eyes level.

"Now people," Freedom spoke, "Don't you think three on one is a bit overkill?"

Calamity spoke, "Who the hell are you to interfere with what we're doing?"

Freedom stared blankly for a moment. "That's not your concern." He said as he looked back at the damaged Strike. He began feeding the Strike the coordinates of Alan's island camp.

"You!" he said, "Go to those coordinates, start your repairs, and don't go anywhere until I get back. Understand?"

Strike looked at him for a second. "Y-Yes, I understand. Thank you so much!"

"Don't thank me yet." Freedom responded. "We still have to live through this first."

Forbidden charged at him blindly, "The hell you'll survive. No one survives the Triple Threat!"

Freedom saw the charge from behind on his scanner, and flew over it rather quickly. he drew his beam rifle and started blasting. His aim was flawless, except that Forbidden was equipped with a special armor called Transphase armor, which allows typical beams to reflect off of him.

"Guess I'll try the direct aproach, then!" Freedom exclaimed as he charged toward Forbidden, putting away his rifle, and pulling out a beam saber. He made a lunge at Forbidden, which was then stopped by, what appeared to be, a spiked ball which rammed Freedom in the side, denting his armor. Freedom shifted his attention to his right, where he saw, what once was the black bird Raider mobile suit, now transformed into a warrior mode. Freedom then charged at Raider with a full thrust of his saber, only to have Raider duck, with Calamity right behind.

"Did you forget about me, boy?" Calamity said as he fired four blasts at Freedom. One from each shoulder cannon, one from his arm mounted blaster, and one from his blast cannon. Unexpectedly, Freedom took the full brunt of the blast, severely damaging his front side. Freedom grabbed his chestplate as he was now surrounded by three mobile suits. At first, he thought they were just a group of eratic lunatics, but now he realized that they were a perfect combination for eachother. They began each taking turns in the circle attacking. Forbidden lunged at Freedom with his scythe. Freedom managed to barely dodge a mortal wound, and let his armor take most of the damage.

Raider then followed with blasts and his mace projectile, as Calamity distracted him long enough to take the hits. The Freedom had never been damaged like this before. The strain was too much for Alan to take. Pound for pound, Freedom was nearing critical levels. A large warning appeared in front of Alan's eyes, warning him that a few more hits could rupture his nuclear power cells and cause a nuclear explosion. The thought of loss, and what the world would become if no one stood up to people like these three caused Alan to snap. A moment of clarity passed before him, a feeling he recognized as the bond between himself and Freedom, but to a strength he had not felt before. He knew that this was his moment to act.

Alan stood up straigh, and with a staggered voice, activated a new command. "Alan Drake... Freedom, Upgrade!"

A flash of light surrounded him, and a newly powered, and repaired mobile suit appeared before the three enemies. what arose was the Strike Freedom, the newest form of Freedom, with a larger wingspan, and a cannon coming out of his chest. He looked at his enemies with a sense of calm and clarity. It was as if he was barely in control. Without motion, four pieces of his wings separated from his body, and rocketed at an incredibly high speed toward the pursuers, keeping in an evasive, but offensive pattern. they fired beams all around. The speed of the assaults were too much for Calamity and Raider, and they were damaged quickly and decisively, only disarming their weapon systems, but since the beams were still bouncing off of Forbidden, Strike Freedom took a newer course of action. The wings were called back, and he then set his wings up for HiMAT assault blast. The difference between this blast and the old blast, was that his wing pieces, which he learned from his system were called Dragoon Units, surrounded him, and the cannon on his chest fired as well. He concentrated the beams together so they would combine, and fired a brilliant flast of red, yellow, and green forced it's way to Forbidden, piercing his Transphase armor, and crippling it.

The fighting was at a standstill, as, for some reason, Strike freedom reverted back to freedom, just after the blast. Both sides were now damaged, and no one could continue. Freedom decided to stay as confident as possible.

"Any time you three need another ass-whooping, come find me!" He said as he flew away, back toward the island.

"This isn't Over!" Calamity shouted, "Once we're fixed up, We'll come for you, AND that little Bitch!"

The three crippled suits flew away, and Freedom decided to keep track of their whereabouts. He had a feeling they would make good on their promise to come back right away. He headed back to the island, hoping to get some answers.

Upon his arrival, Freedom found a young girl, roughly his age, with brown hair down to her shoulders, medium build, but still relatively attractive sitting on a towel. She looks up to see the tattered remains of what was, in her mind, a godsend. Freedom touched down, and reverted back to its bracelet for repairs. The girl rushed over to him.

"My god, are you all right?" she asked frantically.

"That's not important right now." Alan replied, " You got a name?"

"I'm Sandra," she told him, "Sandra Robins."

"I'm Drake." Alan replied, "How long till you're back at full strengh?"

Sandra checked and responded, "at least fifteen hours."

"Great!" he said sarcastically, "I got at least twenty four."

Alan started gathering his things. "Come on, let's go."

"Where are we going?" Sandra asked curiously.

"Into the jungle area. It'll be easier to hide out, in case those assholes come back."

"Right, good idea." She agreed as she helped him get his things as they head into the jungle.