PTOLEMAIOS-CANTEEN

Umi and Kotori were both silent. They had the canteen to themselves.
Probably Nozomi's doing, Umi thought. "Kotori…" she began to talk.
"Umi-chan, I guess you should know. After all, you also had a past with this woman."
Umi nodded.
"Haruka Amami… she was a former advisor of my mother, the Queen. She specialized in the military aspects of the country. She was so friendly back then, especially to me. Although she's dealing with serious matters she never tries to show her stress about her work and manages to find time to play with me."
"Play?" Umi asked.
"Well, as a kid, I loved to play Airsoft, so she decided to play against me one time, and we had fun. We made it a daily habit. That's how… that's how I recognized her back during the attack of the Flying Get. That's how she fights."
"But that was a melee attack. I thought Airsoft was using guns."
"True, but she insisted to add close combat to it, to make it like a real battle," Kotori said.

Kotori fired using her rifle.
"Where could she be?"
There was movement to her right, and she fired at the bushes in that direction.
"Wait.. there's no one there! But where-"
She heard footsteps coming from the front, and she saw Haruka running towards her.
Kotori switched weapons, firing from her handgun instead, but Haruka dodged it. Panicking, Kotori brought out her knife and tried to attack, but Haruka knocked the knife out of her hands and placed her own knife at Kotori's throat.
Haruka lowered the knife with a laugh. "That was a close one, little bird," she said. "You're lucky these knives are just fake."
"You always win," Kotori pouted.
"That's because you panic whenever I get close to you", Haruka replied. "Keep at it, though, and maybe someday you'll beat me," she said with a laugh.
"Yeah, someday I will!"

"Of course, one day she betrayed my mother, leading a group of mercenaries into the palace. She…" Kotori paused. Tears were at her eyes.
"Kotori, if you don't want too, you can stop," Umi said.
"No. I have to get this out. I was there. When they stormed my mother's room, I was there. I was there when she shot my mother."

"Mom? What's happening?"
"Stay in the closet, Kotori, don't come out no matter what!" Hibari said to her daughter.
"But-"
"Please, just listen to me!" Hibari closed the closet door and confronted the group which had just entered her room.
"Amami. I trusted you. I would have never expected you to betray me."
In the closet, Kotori couldn't believe it. "Amami… Haruka-san? Haruka-san did this?"
"It's all business to me, Hibari-sama," Haruka replied.
"So you never were loyal to me, from the start."
"Don't be mistaken. There was a time when I was loyal to you. But times change. This country is going down, and I sure am not going down with it."
Kotori heard the unmistakable sound of gunfire. Afterwards there was silence, then she heard a loud thump as something fell to the floor. Her mother's body, she realized.
"Boss, we haven't found the kid," a voice said.
"It doesn't matter! Our target is dead. Let's get out of here before things get really chaotic."
Kotori heard footsteps as the group exited the room. Once she was sure they were out, she got out of the closet and saw her mother, lying on a pool of her own blood.
"Mom…"
Hibari opened her eyes. "Kotori…"
"Mom?" She was still alive! Maybe there' still hope-
"Kotori… please live. Live for me." Hibari closed her eyes once again, this time for good.
"Mom!"

"Afterwards I was rescued by a team from Celestial Being. They never found Haruka though."
What was sad was Haruka's words rang true. Mankind's expansion to space and the proliferation of Solar energy as a power source made Azadistan's stockpiles of oil useless. Eventually the country fell into ruin. Kotori could do nothing as she watched her country be slowly destroyed.
"Judging from what you said, my encounter with her happened afterwards," Umi said. "As you know, I came from Krugis, a place already torn by civil war. I was a child soldier, under her command. She filled our head with lies and forced us to kill our parents as a sign of our loyalty."
Kotori put her hands on her mouth. "That's terrible!"
"One time the mission wasn't going so well. She was the first to escape, leaving us to our faiths. Only Celestial Being's intervention saved me. There was a Gundam that appeared."
"Really? One of the ones we are using now?"
"No, it's something different," Umi replied. "I can't remember the exact details nor how the pilot looks. That was back then, and I tried to forget it."
Umi looked at Kotori. "I promise Kotori, I will protect you from Haruka Amami. She has destroyed both our lives, I will not allow them to be destroyed again."
"Thank you, Umi-chan," Kotori said. "But if there comes the time, I want to be the one to finish her myself."
Um nodded. "We'll do it. Together."

AEU CARRIER-PROMISE

Haruka stretched in her cabin. Well wasn't that a surprise earlier! The princess from the fallen country, and one of her best child soldiers, now her opponents.
Her phone ringed. It was the secure phone, the one her bosses had access to.
"Hello?" Haruka said.
"How was your flight?" The second voice this time, huh? Haruka thought. Over time Haruka recognized two voices who often called her-the first is what she thinks of is the general leader, the one who oversees everything. This one, however, is the one who calls here whenever there's a need for dirty jobs. She assumes that the girl, Anju, who is hanging around with the Union general, is also among her bosses.
"Oh, it was fine. Fought a few acquaintances too."
"That was unexpected. We did not know that you had ties to two Celestial Being pilots."
"Trust me, I didn't expect to meet those two again either."
"I hope this does not interfere with your job with us?"
"Of course not," Haruka replied.
"How about the operation this coming weekend?"
"Ah, the wedding? Don't worry, my men are working on it… and I'll make sure it will be blamed on Celestial Being, just as you said."

LadyHayakawa: Thanks for the review! Trust me, I don't hate Haruka, but I decided to throw her in after seeing the "Endless Combine Kisaragi" trailer. She looks so good as a bad guy there! :D
MU23 No.1 FAN: Thank you! Oh, it will only get more intense from here.
SleepyHydrilla: Thanks for the review! It will be revealed soon enough…

Slowly but surely this story is reaching is first climax! Stay tuned, everyone!