Armored Seed

Chapter 38

Orb's Last Stand Part 2

A/N: remember reviews are motivators for me to write faster.

-Ocean Near Orb-

"White Glint, and all those silly legends. They die today!" The voice over the comm. channels cried out in fury. Within moments, a pair of new signatures appeared on the radar, accelerating straight towards the four machines without warning or hesitation. Then just as soon as the two signatures started heading straight for them in opposite directions. Anyone could tell that they were trying to go in for a pincer attack.

As the two armored cores sped towards the group, Kira balked at the speed in which the two armored cores were both approaching them. It was almost the same level of agility that White Glint or the Freedom was capable of. The Freedom deployed its shoulder mounted plasma beam cannons and waist mounted rail guns and aimed them directly at one of the approaching armored cores. This one in particular had the word "Fragile" written on the side of its head.

In less than a second, the heavy weapons of the Freedom opened fire at the armored core known as Fragile. However the enemy unit seemed to have predicted this move and managed to evade the attack with relative ease. In fact, Kira noticed that the machine had engaged its thrusters milliseconds before he even fired. Such a reaction speed meant that whoever this person was they were probably a Coordinator, or a very, very skilled pilot.

Kira opened up a comm. channel to Hackett. He needed more information on these guys before he attempt anything else. Hackett and White Glint meanwhile were both trying to evade attacks from the other Armored Core who was relentlessly pursuing the both of them "Fiona just who are these people?" he asked.

Without missing a beat Fiona Jarnefeldt responded "The dark blue one is called Stasis, the pilot goes by the name of Otsdarva. He's ranked as number one in the arena matches back on the Raven's Nest. He's taken up jobs that most people would balk at doing alone and has returned without so much as a scratch. His unit, Stasis is equipped with a laser rifle, an assault rifle and missile launcher that primarily strikes from above, kind of like an artillery shell that seeks you out.

"The other pilot goes by the callsign of CUBE, he's a cyborg with class: A, implants. They increase his reflexes to the point where his skill are on par with that of a Coordinator. The unit he uses is called Fragile, It's armed with a pair of submachine guns and two machine guns mounted on the shoulders. CUBE likes to use Fragile's superior maneuvering to both dodge and flank the enemy, in the case of the latter it will bombard the enemy in a hail of bullets."

Fragile didn't seem like much of a threat. At first glance at least. Granted that while Phase Shift armor was all but completely impervious to most projectile weaponry that was in use by Mobile Suits or Armored Cores, it could still be whittled down over time depending on the size of the ammunition that was being fired. If someone could cause enough rounds to impact the Phase Shift armor without being destroyed in the process then the armor would eventually lose all power and deactivate. Then the Gundam was just another mobile suit.

Given that Fragile was made to bombard its enemy with a barrage of seemingly countless bullets all while using its thrusters to skillfully dodge any attempt at a counterattack it could quite possibly whittle down the defenses of the Freedom or the Seraph and then eliminate it while it was vulnerable. Kira couldn't allow that to happen. Somehow he had to find a way to hit Fragile before he could dodge the strike.

Before Kira could try to fire off another shot however the enormous Arms Fort, a Stigro, Kira thought that it was called, started to move towards the Orb fleet that was stationed a good distance away from the oversized Arms Fort. In fact it was moving very fast for its size. As it began to move towards the fleet a beam of energy appeared between two points in the front of the massive machine. Kira was instantly reminded of the now defunct, Strike's anti-ship sword. Suddenly he felt a very cold chill go through him. If that was what he was looking at – and he had no reason to think otherwise – then the Orb Fleet was about to get massacred.

Kira was about to request permission to go after it, when Frost's voice came over the communicator "Kira, you and Nathan go after the Stigro, we'll handle these two clowns."

"Will you and Commander Hackett be alright?" Nathan asked, a touch of concern in his normally stoic voice. There was a bark of laughter coming from Hackett "Hah, we'll make quick work of these two and be on our way to help before you know it." It was then that the commander's normally friendly tone turned much more serious "You boys get over there right now and take out the Stigro, that's an order."

Nathan knew this side of Hackett very well. Under most circumstances the commander of the Black Skulls was rather jovial in how he went about his job leading the group he did know when to drop the act and get serious. When that happened it was normally for the best if one followed his orders.

"Understood sir, we'll intercept the hostile Stigro now." Nathan declared as both he and Kira started to move as quickly as they could to try and intercept the enemy Arms Fort. As they left, Kira felt a small conflict in him. While he certainly did want to try and stop the Stigro from inflicting any casualties among the Orb Fleet. It was at that point that Kira was very thankful that the Archangel wasn't in the water. At least he wouldn't have to worry about everyone aboard the Archangel getting in that thing's path.

As they tried to chase down the hostile Arms Fort Kira noticed that the machine was already getting faster and faster as it continued to speed onwards. In fact it was almost getting to the point where it was moving much faster than something of that size should have been capable of.

It didn't matter though, the monstrosity known as the Stigro was still well within range of their heavy weapons. The Freedom's beam cannons and rail guns unfurled along with the Seraph's. The heavy weapons began charging at an alarming rate and within mere moments the oversized energy weapons fired at the Stigro.

It took less than a second for their shots to land on their target but much to their surprise, there wasn't even a scorch mark on the thing's armor. It was almost disturbing how fast it was able to move and still manage to be so well armored. Kira fired off his beam cannons and rail guns again, this time aiming for a different spot on the Stigro's armor. Like last time the shots didn't do anything except for maybe leave a few small scorch marks on the armor where the beams managed to strike.

The Stigro continued to gain more and more speed as it headed for the Orb naval fleet and as it did, Kira and Nathan continued to use whatever weaponry they had on hand but it clearly wasn't enough as the machine completely ignored them and still barreled forwards. In mere seconds the Stigro was upon the Orb ships and with its oversized energy blade it cut straight through the ships like a hot knife would cut through butter. The heat of the Arms Fort's energy blade was so strong that one could see the melted slag of a hull that was left of whatever ship was caught in its path.

Almost seven ships were cut down as the Stigro plowed through the defensive line like a mad bull. As the Stigro continued on Kira and Nathan continued to open fire at it with nothing to show for results. Even after it cut through several ships, the Stigro kept going and only started to stop after it ran out of things to run down. Instead it began to execute a turn even as whoever or whatever was controlling it started to slightly slow down somewhat. The way it was turning though, made Kira wonder how the pilot was able to handle all the G-forces being thrown at him without passing out.

The only reason that Kira, Nathan and Andreas were able to keep going when they were using the VOB unit was because of the suits that they were wearing plus the buffering systems put in place. Even with those safeguards put in place though, it was very difficult for them to try and perform any real maneuvers. If they tried something like that then they would probably end up blacking out even with the safeguards their mobile suits had.

This made Kira think to himself. What if the Stigro wasn't being controlled by someone in the field? What if it was being operated remotely? Or perhaps it was being controlled by some kind of an AI program? It was more likely that it was the latter. To use something this complex would require a lot on the part of a drone operator, besides remote control for something like the Stigro would be nearly uncontrollable due to distance and the N-Jammers that had been put into place. At best they'd have severe lag issues with the controls making it useless in battle as it would never be able to react nearly fast enough to the user's commands.

That meant that the only way something like the Stigro could work was if it was controlled by an advanced AI system. Given that while most military AIs were advanced pieces of hardware, they were still relatively predictable if you watched them closely. They could only perform actions that were within the bounds of their primary and secondary programming, they couldn't think outside the box as it were.

This might give them an edge if they were ever able to find a way around that monster's armor!

As Kira and Nathan left the field to go after the Stigro, Stasis and Fragile immediately pressed their own attack on the two other pilots. Stasis' pilot, Otsdarva was focused almost entirely on White Glint. Ordinarily any pilot ignoring everything around him to focus on just one enemy would end up getting blindsided by any allies that may be helping said enemy. However when someone like Otsdarva had capable assistance to keep any enemies away from him while he focused on White Glint.

"All those fancy aerial maneuvers won't save you now!" Otsdarva yelled as he fired off several missiles from the shoulder mounted launcher at White Glint "I've surpassed you and now I'll prove it!" As the missiles closed in on their target, Stasis started opening fire on White Glint with its beam rifle. Unfortunately for the number one ranked pilot, not a single shot from the energy weapon managed to connect with Otsdarva's opponent as White Glint lived up to its well-deserved reputation and dodged each and every last shot fired at it.

To make matters even more infuriating, every time one of Stasis' missiles started to close in on the white armored bastard, Andreas would simply deploy flares while he engaged evasive maneuvers. It was ridiculous, there had to be some way to hit the bastard. Everyone had a weakness somehow he just had to find it!

Otsdarva gritted his teeth even as White Glint opened fire with its dual machine guns. He had to evade his enemy for now, eventually though, the sheer g-forces from those fancy maneuvers would catch up with the machine's pilot. The only way that he could still be alright is if he had some kind of special kind of shielding from the g-forces in his cockpit.

It made sense, since while most armored cores had shielding to protect the pilot whenever they used the thrusters. However most ACs weren't capable of going at the same level of speed that White Glint was capable of, therefore it was obvious that that annoying bastard must have had some kind of new type of g-shielding installed into his AC.

Still though, the speeds in which White Glint was moving almost certainly had to be causing a drain on the machine's energy supply. If that was the case then all Otsdarva had to do was last long enough for White Glint's power to lower to the point where it would have to slow down. When that happened he would kill the bastard Andreas Frost and he would show the world that Otsdarva was the better pilot. Sure Otsdarva was the number one ranked Raven back at the Nest but then this showboat decided to appear.

When two individuals became powerful they would clash whether they wanted to or not. Such a thing was as inevitable as breathing. When such individuals clashed, only one would be left standing when the dust finally settled. Otsdarva had every intention to make sure that he would be the one left standing after this encounter and not the pilot of White Glint. This seemingly one sided rivalry that Otsdarva had partially come from the fact that many jobs that would have originally gone to him had instead gone to Frost and his partner.

This kind of competition was something that Otsdarva couldn't allow. He needed to maintain his standing as one of, if not the best Raven in the business, no matter what. A Raven's reputation was something that was perhaps their greatest asset. It allowed them to take on more profitable missions (and also more dangerous ones but that was beside the point) from their clients. Adding to that, their reputation also gave them an edge on the battlefield. If the Raven was feared then it would cause the morale of those he or she was fighting to plummet to the point where some of them would actually flee before them.

Otsdarva continued to fire his weapons at White Glint. His weapons continued to unload at his opponent even though Frost was able to nimbly dodge almost each and every shot that was thrown at him even as he fired back with his own weaponry. While Stasis was a powerful machine and was quite maneuverable it still was not nearly as fast or agile as White Glint. It was only a matter of time before a shot from one of White Glint's rifles or scatter missiles finally found there mark.

And find their mark they did. One of the missiles managed to land directly on one of the primary thruster units on Stasis' back. The scatter missiles weren't powerful enough to cause too much damage to the craft itself but it was able to damage the thruster enough so that it wouldn't engage other than sending out small spouts of exhaust every couple of seconds. It was not nearly enough to keep the thing up in the air for very long.

As Otsdarva struggled to keep his machine in the air those that were fighting heard his voice over the comm. channels "Primary thruster hit, thrusters weren't engage! So that's what you were aiming for?!" Otsdarva continued to fire Stasis' weaponry at White Glint even as his armored core hit the water beneath him and started to sink into the ocean's depths "Hull breach, I'm taking on water!"

The next thing the man said and the way he said it was very strange; "So, this is how everything is going to end for me, huh?" Unlike the panic that had filled his every word when he spoke just a few seconds earlier, the man known as Otsdarva spoke in a calm albeit very resigned voice. The way he simply accepted his death even though he could keep trying to struggle to survive, was very disconcerting. It was as though he had already accepted this as a possibility despite his insistence earlier that he was clearly superior to the pilot of White Glint.

Andreas Frost just watched as the armored core known as Stasis sank beneath the waves, its now empty left hand reaching upwards, as though hoping that someone or something would take hold and pull it out of the water. Of course nothing happened as the mechanical hand too found itself underwater.

The dull, nearly monotone voice of CUBE resounded through the airwaves "Ah, now it seems as though it is two against one. Excellent, this means that the test applicability has increased." It was disturbing to hear someone speak like that about their ally's death. It was like a computer was talking rather than an actual person. CUBE didn't even pretend to feel upset at his partner's demise.

Without any hesitation, Fragile went after Captain Hackett's unit again. The lightweight AC's agility was more than on par with White Glint's in fact it was darting back and forth at speeds that seemed to surpass even Frost's machine. To make matters worse, is that it showed no real signs of slowing down. Whatever form of reactor was powering Fragile it was definitely providing a lot more energy than White Glint's was. That meant that they couldn't necessarily wait for it to run out of steam before attacking it again as their energy would doubtlessly run out long before Fragile's did.

That left the two only one option, a pincer attack from both sides, it was the only way they would even have a chance at taking out the little bastard. If either of them made an attempt to take him one on one then it definitely would not work. Captain Hackett then proceeded to open up an encrypted channel to the pilot of White Glint "Frost, I have an idea on how we can take this little bastard out, I'm going to need you to get his attention for the next ten seconds, then I need you to charge straight at him while firing every piece of ordinance you have onboard."

Hackett seemed to sense the strange look that Frost was doubtlessly giving him on the other side of the comm. channels and simply said "Just trust me, I have an idea that I think just might work against this son of a bitch. If not well, we can't say we didn't try to kill this asshole."

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the line before Jarnefeldt's voice came over the comm. channels again "Whatever it is you two intend on doing I suggest you do it quickly. The Stigro is already destroyed fifty percent of the Orb fleet and shows no signs of slowing down. Casualties are mounting by the second so you have to move!" Well if they didn't already have enough pressure on them as it was now they had to take out this little bastard quickly too.

While Andreas wasn't too keen on taking a chance like this in combat, he had to admit that they didn't have all that many options available to them, especially if they wanted to get back and help Kira and Nathan destroy the enemy Arms Fort. "Alright what the hell, if I die I may as well look like a badass while I do it!" he declared with an almost goofy grin on his face.

White Glint then began to engage Fragile using its usual tactics. All the while Fragile seemed to almost effortlessly dodge whatever attacks were thrown at it. Even though CUBE knew that White Glint was a serious threat he didn't neglect to notice that Captain Hackett had disengaged and was now moving towards Fragile's left flank. Immediately Fragile turned and the shoulder mounted machine guns opened fire on the yellow and black painted Armored Core.

Even though the machineguns mounted on Fragile's shoulders weren't the most powerful weapons they were still more than enough to cause damage to the Jaguar's hull. Holes appeared in the almost skeletal left arm of the machine and they only stopped when the Jaguar activated its arm mounted energy shield. It didn't protect the entirety of the Jaguar's body but it was enough to at least keep some of the damage from getting too severe.

As the Jaguar increased power to its main thrusters to try and get away from the bullets that were peppering it up from the side the pilot spoke into an open channel "Were you really so stupid as to think that I would fall for such a transparent and childish ploy? Your data suggested you were at least somewhat smarter than this."

Before CUBE could continue to deride Hackett, White Glint flew forwards at Fragile at the absolute maximum speed it could manage, firing off its combat rifles and launching scatter missiles at Fragile. For a moment Fragile's pilot seemed to be taken aback, not having anticipated this kind of move from his opponent. White Glint was made for hitting the enemy while dodging the enemy's attacks, it wasn't supposed to charge forwards at its opponent, firing all its weapons at once. For the first time in several years, CUBE's mind operated completely on human survival instinct rather than cold hard logic like it normally did. In less than a second, CUBE used his thrusters in reverse in an attempt to escape his enemy.

The pilot of Fragile was a mix between confused and completely shocked at this latest development. All the data he had read up on White Glint's strategies and tactics specifically stated that this should not be happening. The armored core he was using wasn't made for this kind of combat it made no logical sense that this would occur. This sort of scenario was impossible, the prediction algorithms in his cerebral implants that he relied on for fighting told him that this shouldn't be happening!

CUBE engaged his Armored Core's thrusters in full reverse. Unfortunately for the cyborg this was exactly what Hackett had been hoping for. While CUBE had been shocked by this seemingly unforeseen turn of events, he was by no means so shocked that he wouldn't react other than that. Fragile opened fire with its SMGs in an attempt to at least slow the opposing machine down.

Several of the oversized bullets struck White Glint's hull but thankfully the areas around the chest area managed to hold, for the moment at least. However there was still some structural damage on some of the limbs and while it wouldn't put the machine out of commission it would slightly hamper some of its mobility until it was fully repaired.

As Fragile continued to engage the enemy that was right in front of it, the Jaguar was finally able to get close enough to the left side of the nimble machine. By the time that CUBE had realized that he had made a serious error it was far too late. The Jaguar raised its shotgun at Fragile's head and unloaded onto the guy on full auto. The first two shotgun rounds made it into the side of the lightweight Armored Core's face. The first group of scatter pellets tore straight through a good chunk of the machine's primary optic scanners and blinded the pilot that was inside the cockpit. The second round completely obliterated the last of pieces of the thing's head.

For the first time in several years CUBE was actually starting to panic. It was a strange and unwelcome feeling; the feeling of the more visceral part of him that was once almost completely squashed by the cognitive implants that increased his cerebral abilities on and off the field battlefield. Only now it seemed as though the reverse was happening. Still CUBE didn't have to deal with this visceral sensation for very long. Within seconds he saw a red flash and then there was nothing but darkness.

Outside of Fragile's cockpit, Hackett watched as the once nimble machine had finished being vertically sliced in half by the Jaguar's energy blade. Arcs of electricity crackled from various parts of the areas that were sliced through for a few milliseconds before the machine's reactor exploded. When that happened, what was left of the machine (mostly just bits and pieces at that point) fell to the ocean's surface below and sank down beneath the waves.

Not wanting to waste any more time, the two pilots decided to go and help their comrades who were still fighting against the Stigro.

Nathan was gritting his teeth in barely contained rage as he watched Arms Fort Stigro plow through more Orb naval ships. At this point the fleet was almost completely wiped out and nothing that Nathan and Kira fired at the thing managed to do any real damage to the monster. Stigro was clearly the most resilient Arms Forts that Nathan had ever fought against in his entire life. It was ridiculous how this thing was able to do so much damage with only one weapon!

Hell the only reason that he and Kira had managed to keep themselves alive was that their mobile suits were maneuverable enough to move out of the way before Stigro could hit them with its oversized energy blade. The Orb ships however weren't nearly as maneuverable as they were usually sliced to pieces when Stigro came charging at them at full speed.

The pilot of the Seraph watched as Kira once again opened fire with the Freedom's beam cannons and rail guns again. To the surprise of none who had been watching the battle, the beam cannons did very little damage at best to the hull of the machine. Hell earlier when the thing had slowed down and stopped, they had tried to use their beam sabers on it, hoping that the constant plasma that was being generated by it would eventually wear out the enemy armor the longer they kept striking it with the beam saber.

Somehow though, it was completely impervious to energy weapons and conventional rounds if the lack of damage whenever a missile or a cannon shell would hit it was anything to go by. Every attack they tried failed to do anything other than minor superficial damage to the massive machine.

Nothing was built perfectly, everything had some kind of weakness somewhere. The question was: where?

Nathan was brought out of his thoughts by the sight of the Stigro turning just after its latest attack run and it looked as though it was about to plow into what was left of the Orb Fleet.

It was at that point that Kira sprang into action. Apparently having gotten fed up with watching those soldiers and sailors die at the hands of this mechanical beast, he flew forwards, firing all of the Freedom's onboard heavy weapons. As per usual the beams ended up doing very little (if any at all) damage to Stigro as it continued to plow its way forwards. Then Kira did something very unexpected. He all but slammed his mobile suit into the side of the Stigro and rerouted power to the main thrusters to try and get the machine to at least divert the Stigro away from the remaining Orb ships.

At first the attempt didn't seem to be working, the difference in weight clearly put things in Arms Fort's favor and the only thing that kept the Freedom fully in one pieces was that it had Phase Shift armor. The only time that Stigro even looked as though it was moving in a different direction was when it was turning slightly so that it would be able to run down several of the Orb ships that were trying to get out of the monster's way.

As he was desperately trying to keep the Stigro from running down more Orb sailors Kira noticed something in the corner of one of the viewing monitors. It looked like a moderately sized, for lack of better term, air vent that was almost constantly spewing out what looked like steam. Such a thing made sense as this machine was probably building up a lot of heat, it had to exit the machine somewhere or else it would build up and cause excessive damage to the internal components.

It was at that very moment that an idea formed in Kira's mind. If they could destroy these heat dispersion ducts, then they might cause the machine to shut down through either a built in safety feature or because the heat would possibly melt the Stigro's vital internal components. However it was probably the former as an Arms Fort like this would probably cost a substantial fortune to replace making it much easier (and quite possibly cheaper) to simply repair it than completely replace it.

The Freedom broke off from its place on the Stigro's side and flew to what he assumed was a relatively safe distance before Kira opened fire on that small ventilation unit with the Freedom's beam cannons, rail guns and of course, the hand held beam rifle. The results of the attack were almost instantaneous.

The machine started to lurch to one side and slow down as loud booming noises started to come from within its massive hull. Fire began the heat dispersion duct on the side of the machine but soon a several small chunks blew off the Stigro before the rear portion of the machine exploded.

When that happened the Stigro's enormous energy blade depowered and the front of the massive Arms Fort tipped upwards as it began to sink beneath the waves.

As Kira watched this happen he felt nothing but relief that that autonomous monstrosity was finally destroyed. For several seconds he heard cheering come over the communications channels, the other soldiers and sailors out there full of joy that the monster that had been cutting them all down like wheat before a thresher was finally beaten.

Eventually the comm. channels came to life once more, this time with Captain Hackett's voice "This is Captain Hackett of the Black Skulls, the hostiles known as Stasis and Fragile have been defeated and judging by all the cheering on the comm. channels, I'm going to go and guess that the Stigro is also destroyed?" He asked. Nathan gave an affirmative to his commander even as yet another person started to talk into the radio. This time it was the leader of Black Squadron, Donovan Cross.

"Captain Hackett, this is Commander Cross, I am pleased to report that all hostile air forces are either retreating or have been neutralized." Before Cross could close the comm. link, everyone who was listening could hear Drake yell "Yeah that's right you little bitches, run back home to mommy!" he taunted before the man turned his attention to one of his teammates. "Oh and before I forget, Adam you owe me twenty bucks! I got more kills than-"

It was at that point that Cross decided to close the comm. channels before anyone else was subjected to more of Drake Mabuto's idiocy. For a small brief moment it seemed as though those that were fighting to defend Orb would be given at least some time to at least catch their breath before the next attack wave on the once neutral nation. Unfortunately it appeared as though that would not be the case for the defenders.

"Attention is the Morgenroete facility, we're under heavy attack by a ZAFT strike team, and we need immediate assistance! They have one of the stolen Gundams and are being assisted by three Armored Cores! I repeat we need-"

At that point the message was completely cut off and was replaced with nothing but static. Kira's face was frozen in shock, it seemed as though now his former friend had decided to come back to haunt him and the rest of the Archangel crew once again.

To be continued