Gundam Wing: Ended Waltz
By: Qasur Zephlar Exlarr
Chapter 6: Sortie on Earth
The Barton's escaped transport came flying through space as it traveled lower in space below the equator. It then proceeded to enter Earth's atmosphere. The large transport flew through the burning atmosphere, rather easily for something as large as that size. Flames were erupting around the hull of the vessel as it came through the pressurized, invisible barrier. The evil, old man already had plans to take over the Antarctica base if the rebuilt Peacemillion were to be destroyed. It just happened that it was, which still angered him greatly. Keeping it a secret for so long was a gift he was glad of. More importantly was that he was surprised that the beam cannon actually worked, because they had never even fired a test shot.
The cruiser hurled through the atmospheric clouds above the blue earth. Below them they could see flashes of light and hear thunder. As they continued to descend, their weather conditions changed quite a bit. They went from a darkening day into a dreaded midnight lit storm that was raging around them now. From above, it was so peaceful that one could fall asleep to the simple rumble and faint pounds. Now it was all around them. They were nearing the country of Chili, deep down south in South American continent.
"We're getting closer and closer comrades," Max stated to his fellow legions of his army. "I have dreamed of this day coming for such a long time. Ever since my father tried to carry out the plans when I was just a little boy." He laughed a little at his part, before taking a swig from his bottle of vodka. "To bad I had to loose my dear beam cannon vessel, but I had a feeling that something would happen, but dreaded would I have ever thought of the day they would use nuclear warhead!" he continued to muse, in his slightly intoxicated stage. Ever since he left, he popped the top on his prize bottle he planned to save after taking the capital. He was just so eager to enjoy the fruits of victory, because he was so close. "Being on top of the world, what fun," he said, talking to himself. The others around the Barton just cheered him onto his own victory while savoring their own special punch.
After an enjoying ride through the earth's atmosphere, the next-in-line commander, presently taking Fenald's old position, James Harret, informed Mr. Barton that they were approaching the Antarctica Base shortly. They already knew there were mobile suits guarding this base and the Australia base like hawks on their prey. "I'll get the mobile suit pilots ready, Sir," Commander Harret said to him. He turned to walk away, before the old man grabbed his arm. "No," he said to his commander, "that won't be necessary. I'll take care of this myself!" He stood, with little help from the commander, whom he was leaning on. "They need to understand what I have in store for them! I can't just hide it, you know," he said smiling.
"Uh, yes Sir," he replied. James Harret turned around and called to the nearest officer. "Tell the technicians to ready the 'The Black Death'!" The man immediately took off through the door and down to the mobile suit bay. The Barton enjoyed the name of his beast. He liked to know that wherever he went, his mobile armor would plague those who went against him. "Sir, I wish you much luck and I hope that you don't take a bit of damage," he said to him. Max looked at him, "Why would I take any damage?" The commander looked like he wanted to hide, but he remained steady on his feet. "I meant nothing of it, Sir," he said taking a little bow. The Barton just looked him over with a grin face, then slowly drudged away as he traveled toward the exit of the room. The commander hurried after him to make sure that he didn't fall down on his way. He wasn't quite drunk, but well enough had his lot of alcohol for the day.
Down in the mobile suit bay, the technicians got right to work powering up the massive mobile armor. That's what Max Barton had called it when he built it. His father had disapproved of him building such a large mobile-suit-type mecha with so much armor on it. Max tried to explain to his father that the sheer size and power of it was enough to destroy measly mobile suits made of gundanium alloy. Since he didn't want to make it harder to build than it was, he just used most of his father's precious neo-titanium alloy to build the mobile armor.
He had built the huge mecha in the shape of the shenlong dragon of the Chinese culture. It had a long, continuous tail with a small pair of hands and feet. The mouth of the dragon was filled with heated gundanium teeth. When the mouth fully opened, it revealed small barrel that was the beginning of the huge particle cannon. They took the knowledge of what technology they had left on the buster rifle that Doctor J had created and used it to create a more scaled up version for his new monster. The mobile armor was colored with blood red with black lining and trimming. The eyes were light blue that glowed in the darkness of despair. Each of the claws on the hands and feet were made with heated gundanium, as the teeth. When they glow red, it's a danger. No suit could survive a swipe or directly grip of the claws, or even the teeth.
Despite the mecha's large size, it was incredibly maneuverable. It packed quite a punch with its standard close-combat weaponry alone. The nostrils of the suit contained two simple beam vulcans. The tail of the dragon was sharpened into a blade, made of gundanium. The tail had a special thruster system built into it so that the pilot could use it as an offensive weapon easier than relying on the large motor control system built into the dragon. The lower belly of the dragon, and along it's top, housed huge, built in vernia rocket boosters. Many control nozzles were built into the recesses of the folds. A large generator was housed toward the middle of the suit, where the arms and legs were attached. To make his monster more destructive, he built a small beam sabre into the end of the tail that would extend quite a length outward for attacking. Then, certain scales from the tips of the joints of the neck and tail would loosen and become alive, as they would generate a massive energy shielding system.
Many people fancied this large 'mobile suit' as he often called it. It was a monster, and they all knew it. The technicians who helped him build it didn't believe that it would truly be as powerful as it turned out. Many of them would become the top engineers and heads of countries once the world takeover was complete because they kept with his idea of it being grand. "Delusions of Grandeur" his father would tell him when he took his precious time to travel deep into the colony to exhibit himself to the construction of the metalloid sarcophagus his son was created.
Max climbed up to the middle body that controlled it all. He had the pilot's housing built there. Technicians were still running around checking every little detail to make sure nothing was wrong with it. He walked over to the open hatch and slowly climbed down into the belly of the beast. "All right, you can all leave now. I'll take it from here," he said to men outside. Each of them nodded before padding away to safety. The hatched hissed as it came down to seal him inside. He flipped a few switches and different fields of screens that created one, big, panoramic viewing screen started to all come alive with vivid images of video from the outside. "Well, I guess it's time," he said to himself. He turned on the com system, "Open the main bay door." The officer on the other side of the transmission completed the request and soon the huge bay door began to creak open slowly.
The old Barton continued to push buttons, flip switches, and input data into the computer controls at his right. One of the panels of the huge screen before him popped up an image of the system analysis as it ran through checking each system for their performance ratings. Each entry reached 100% and turned green. He pressed enter and the panel turned back to live video feed. "I'm heading out," he said as the large transport slowed in the air as it prepared for its departure. The Black Death started to rise as the vernia engine boosters were fired. The transport momentarily lifted with the mobile armor do to the large weight it no longer had to bear. Once it was free from the floor of the transport, Max Barton fired all the forward boosters at once. Each of the boosters along the main body and the ones hidden inside of the neck and tail segments all popped open and fired a bluish blast as the mobile armor darted out of the bay.
"My god! Such a heavy thing flies through the air as if it was a piece of paper being blown around by the wind!" said one of the Barton Foundation officers as they watched it fly out ahead of the transport. It moved with such as grace, with each segment of the mecha waving as if it were swimming through water, but it was air-borne. "Glory be to thee, it works!" Max yelled over the com system. Then you could hear him laugh loudly.
"An evil mad man with his demented tool of death, and he's laughing," said the newly appointed commander. He continued to watch the leader of their foundation as he flew on toward the Antarctica base directly ahead of them. Many of their bases mobile suits were already flying toward them for anticipation of a battle. How could the base's radar not detect two huge objects flying towards it?
Among the compilation of suits were many Aires units and Taurus'. Each of the captains of the squads was distinguished enough to have been given a rare Serpent unit. Although this was a large force, 53 units weren't enough to even believed to cause any massive damage, beyond standard wear and tear of battle to the mobile armor.
"Holy shit! Look at the size of that thing!" one of the pilots said to his fellow camaraderie pilots. They all stared in amazement at it. The Black Death continued to fly through the air in a wave-like motion from side to side in front of the pilot's screens. "Ready for attack," said the captain of a squadron. "Team One, attack to the left and come around to its back," he continued on. As the orders were given, 20 Aires suits fired their boosters and flew off toward the left of the large group. "All right, now the Serpents will stay low and attack from the underneath, we'll form Team Two, while Team Three, the Taurus', will go into a strait on battle," said the commander in charge. "Align yourself into groups, which are 3 suits. Each group will attack the target, but one group at a time," he said to them all. "Keep a random attack from each side so we can confuse the pilot or pilots of this monstrous object. If two suits of the group are destroyed, the remaining suit will peel off his attack and fly off to regroup with other diminished groups. We'll keep a steady attack on it. It shouldn't be too hard, guys," the commander said, trying to reassure them. "It's huge, bulky, and looks quite slow; it shouldn't be a problem. Best of luck to you all!" the commander bowed his head to himself, before moving his right hand to his head, then lowering it to chest as he moved it from his left to his right in the shape of a cross. "God help us if this goes wrong," he muttered under his breath, making sure no other pilot heard his musings.
"Such fools, moving in formations trying to attack me… just wait you stupid fools!" Max Barton said. He immediately used his feet to start the main boosters again and shoot the suit forward flying straight at the oncoming Taurus suits. He laughed all the way as the huge monster he created was extremely agile and maneuverable.
"Damn, watch out, it's coming right for us!" a pilot yelled out as he barely dodged the super-fast mobile armor. The red dragon mobile armor destroyed nearly ten of the mobile suits with its suicide run into the oncoming mob. "It's incredibly fast!" another yelled. "Change of plans! Team one, attack from behind Team Two and the Serpents will continue their low assault from the ice surface," their commander yelled. He knew that they wouldn't be able to defeat such a large enemy, especially if it was far more maneuverable than they were. "Yes sir," many of them replied as they reformed and continued their assault.
"Stupid fools!" Max yelled, as he spun his dragon around and started firing his nose-mounted vulcans. The laser blasts ripped through many Taurus suits, causing them to explode with a fury of fire. The other pilots hurled their suits off to the left and right to shake the wake of fire. A few groups of suits flew in and shot at the large suit. Many of the first shots had direct hits, but the armor was so powerful that they didn't even manage to scratch the paint job.
Another wave of suits flew in over the top of the mecha firing down upon the middle of it. Most of the Aires were armed with chain machine guns, while the Taurus suits had beam rifles. The serpents were all armed with dual gatling guns and their shoulder-mounted 8-missile packs. The serpents were giving a low assault to the mecha as it flew around above them. The dragon destroyed more of the old OZ and Alliance suits suit. Some serpents popped open their shoulder packs and started to fire volleys of missiles toward the mecha. Many hit the tail and neck segments, exploding, but only to reveal black marks where the explosions went off, but didn't break the armor.
"This is wasting my time, and the suits are a bit harder to keep up with, so," he entered a few things into the computer console on the right arm rest, "we'll just destroy them all at once." He finished and pressed the enter button. A multiple targeting display came up in one of the panels. It was calculating the arcs and angles of trajectories for the 31 remaining mobile suits. "Heh, here we go," he said as he pressed the fire buttons on the mobile suit's joystick controllers. Panels on two of the tail units and on two of the neck units slid open and nearly a hundred mini-missiles came rocketing out of it to the sides of the suit. They each curved and flew off to their specified target. They were fired in pairs for the most damage.
"Sir, a volley of missiles! We're all gon—" he was saying as two missiles slammed into his suit, one from the front and the other from the rear. It destroyed the suit easily. It was a mess all around the mobile armor. It was like a mess of flies buzzing around a dead animal on the road as the suits were flying in all directions trying to escape their death trap. Many of the missiles were easily meeting their scared targets and annihilating them. The Barton even individually killed many pilots that he was able to with the claws of his dragon.
He flew up fast to the commander's serpent on the ground and the head of his suit came crashing down on each side of his serpent, sealing the suit in the mouth of the dragon. The commander was screaming over the com. "You all have been plagued!" Max Barton said before clamping the mouth of the suit shut, melting and crunching the suit in the red-hot toothed mouth the dragon. The suit eventually exploded, not damaging the mobile armor. Max took off from the surface of the ice to see that his job was completed. Every single mobile suit was easily destroyed and the path to the base was cleared.
In the distance the Commander of the Antarctica Base could see the large, red dragon that the commander of the mobile suit force had pointed out to him as the attacker. He got the base on Red Alert status as they prepared to evacuate the base. It was too late for them, though, although the commander didn't know that. The old Barton was flying straight at the base, with the mouth of the dragon fully opened, and the tip of the barrel in the back of it's mouth glowing yellow.
"Sir, we must get going," the Commander said to the pilot, who had the transport now lifted into the air. They had a suit about the size of Barton's, but theirs was not quite that large. They had stored it away at the base with a quick getaway purpose for this occasion. "I… don't think we're gonna make it…" the commander said. He turned to look at the video screen displaying the rear of them. The Black Death just roared over the top of the base's largest radio control tower, before launching it's waiting particle beam cannon at the transport. "AHHHH!!!" people were yelling on board as the cannon's blast directly hit the rear of the transport, melting through the engine core, causing it to explode and start a chain reaction. Between the engine's meltdown and reactor explosion and the particle cannon that shot directly though the transport, everyone on board had died and the transport exploded in a fury of lovely fireworks, at least to the Barton.
Small chunks of the large transport burned as they well from the sky onto the icy planes of the Antarctic, where they melted the ice and led them to a frozen chilled, water grave. Barton took his mobile armor and maneuvered it around waving in the air as it had been flying before, and landed upon the large powered concrete runway. The Barton Foundation's transport was only a few minutes away from landing and taking the base. He knew they must have all evacuated, for they wouldn't leave a soldier to die on the ice continent. Max Barton sat laughing to himself in his mobile suit, taking a swig of vodka now and then from his flash that he carried. "Mission Completed," he said last before closing his eyes and envisioning his future to come.
In mere hours, the Barton Foundation had cleared out the Antarctic base and found no people remaining there. None of the mobile suits were stored aboard the transport that tried to escape, so that left them quite a few extras to use for their own purposes. They establish 12-hour guard routine for the mobile suit pilots and for around the base. The food and all of their supplies are gathered to see how they can support themselves upon this ice rock. They realized that by now someone has heard of their attack on this base.
"I doubt their Commander was stupid enough to not ask for help in such a desperate situation," Max said to his highest ranked officers. "Do we still control anyone from the conglomerate?" He looked around at his officers. None of them spoke up, but looked around at each to see if anyone knew the answer. "Well, this helps. I was hoping we could get them to kidnap one Relena Darlian, again, because I know they would come after her," he finished.
"Sir, what are we going to do now that we have this base here on earth? It's going to be harder to win over the Earth now that we have lost the Peacemillion. We'll have to rely on your mobile armor to scare people," said Commander Harret. He was decisive and quick to think of a plan, but he was out of options in the ice. He truly needed the right equipment, but he would have to suffice. "Oh, they will be scared. When they here that my mobile armor took out about 50 mobile suits in minutes and then completely destroyed a transport, oh, they'll be afraid," he said, "if not more afraid realizing that we might have even more goodies."
"Well, this operation is coming to a close. It's getting late my friends. Thanks for all of your help and support, but it's time for my rest. It's going to be a busy day tomorrow," he said to them all before exiting the radar tower, which has become their command room. The rest of the men each left room and headed to their assigned quarters for the evening.
* * *
Presently, the Preventor's were packing things up aboard the space colony they were using and planning to move back to the Earth. There was no use to remain in space since the enemy returned to Earth, and as they found out, took for himself the Antarctica Base. "Oh, brother, how that base carries memories," Relena said while pushing her brother, Milliardo, in his wheelchair down the hallway to the waiting transport. "Yes, it does," he replied to her smiling. "If I'm correct, it is where you first learned that I was your brother and it was also where I we both truly found out that Heero was still alive in person," he continued to tell her. She nodded her head, "yes, brother."
"I hope Wind is doing fine. He and Solo left almost two days ago to go down to Earth. I haven't heard anything from him since then," she said. "I trust my son enough to know that he'll be alive. He's almost like me when it comes to communicating, he's very shy," he told her, turning his head to look back at her.
They reached the entryway leading into the bay. "It's time to leave then, brother, to head back to the Earth," Relena said. She helped him out of his wheelchair and handed him his crutches. He didn't want to act too handicapped in front of everyone. He still carried a lot of pride about being as strong as the gundam pilots are, so he always chose to show it as little as possible.
Everyone was now aboard the transport. They decided to load the gundams aboard the transport as well, instead of have them guide them down as protection. They had their ace pilots out guarding the transports and the gundam pilots themselves kept alert to all security precautions. The technicians, with Heero's help, managed to repair a good deal of his gundam over the last two days. They replaced just about all the armor and were currently in the process of re-creating the wing system. Most of it had completed melted away. Their small supply of gundanium was diminished now, so they were left using neo-titanium. That was until Heero Jr. spoke up and said that they could continue to repair his suit at the New Edwards Base in California where he said Solo and him still had a supply of Neo-Gundanium alloy left. His father said that would be good, and it also gave them a base that wasn't in a large city of importance to work from.
During the flight toward Earth, Heero Jr. sent an electronic message to Solo's gundam to tell him that they were going to be at the New Edwards Base for the operations now while they repaired his father's gundam. Heero knew he was going to make Solo a bit happy because, when he would return, he would be able to see Aria again. Heero Jr. was sitting near the window starring out into space realizing that he would be returning to earth. He never realized how much he would miss it. He now understood why so many of the people who grew up in space were amazed at it. It was beautiful, nothing that could be mimicked in space by any standard. Even the best colonies that looked like Earth weren't earth, just mimicking relics of over-crowded cities with parks of grass. It was more than just the grass and the trees and the air… it was the overall environment. Weather that changed constantly, pollutants in the air, large lakes that had over-grown forests. Desert areas that stretched as far as the eye could see. Extremely overcrowded cities that were the darkest of hell, even during the heaven's brightest daylight.
Nataku crept up on the younger Heero sitting on the floor. She came up behind him and wrapped her arms around him and sat there hugging him from the back. Heero didn't expect it, but he didn't turn to see her. He knew it was she, and was just glad she was there with him. He could feel her warmth from her hug and felt rather good and he sat there. He smiled and closed his eyes remembering the first moments that he and Nataku had admitted they loved each other. It was quite like this day…
…Heero had been sitting near a window, on the floor, in a secluded Preventor's office room with the lights off watching the snow come down heavily. Nataku came up silently behind him and playfully hugged him. Heero and Nataku were good friends and spent a lot of time together when their parents were busy at work during the day. They had lots in common. Heero had taken martial arts as well, for one thing. Heero turned his head around at looked at her after what she had done, and he saw it then. The desire in her eyes had shown brightly to him. They were sparkling greatly with love that he thought he had seen sometimes from her, especially when she thought he wasn't looking at her. Nataku saw the same thing radiate from Heero's eyes as they looked at each other intensely. Heero smiled at her, and then slowly moved his head in closer and gave her a kiss. She wasn't expecting it, but willingly didn't resist it either. She slid her lips apart to let his tongue delve inside of her mouth. When they withdrew from each other Nataku just starred at him for a minute, before smiling. Heero smiled too, before turning his head back around. Nataku continued to hug him, but tighter now, with more affection and she rested her head on his left shoulder as she too watched the snow slowly fall from the sky. "I love you," she whispered into his left ear. Heero's eyes widened a bit, but rather realized it. "I love you too," he said back to her, taking his right hand and wrapping it around her hands that were hugging him. They stayed that for awhile, not even realizing when they had both fallen asleep. Later that night, Sally found them sleeping against each other in the dark office. She stopped and looked at the couple sleeping there restfully. She didn't want to disturb them, so she let them sleep…
…Heero came back to reality as Nataku laid her head on his left shoulder, and then whispered "I love you" into his ear. He tried to reach for her hugging hands again, but forgot about his right arm and winced in the pain he brought upon himself. Heero's right arm and shoulder were still heavily bandaged and he rarely wore his arm sling, which angered his mother. "Baka," she whispered playfully into his left ear before closing her eyes and staying there. Heero just sat there smiling until they both fell asleep against each other again.
* * *
During the night after the Antarctica takeover, Solo and Wind arrived safely in the Arabian Desert. The Maganac's had given them the proper coordinates for their hidden, underground military base that resided after the one-year war in UC 195. Quatre didn't that they were coming there to help him. Abdul's son, Ali, didn't tell him. Ali wanted to surprise him, he supposed. Eleven years after the New Year's Eve crisis with the Barton Foundation, Abdul passed away in his sleep. He had a son that was growing up away from the desert. Abdul wanted his son to be educated and not tied into the war that he was trying to help Quatre with. At that time, his son was nearly 7-years old. Now, Ali is 24 and he came back to the desert to take his father's place, even after all of the protesting that his father gave him before he died.
Solo and Wind found Quatre in his old study with a few of the Maganac's that were still helping him. Only 9 of the original 40 members were alive and they readily helped. Fourteen of the members had sons who readily came in their father's places to give their assistance to the cause. The two young gundam pilots entered the study with silence and came upon Quatre, who was turned around with his back facing them placing the piano. He was playing a melancholy song, as he always did during times of depression or war.
"Mr. Winner, it's good to see you again," Solo spoke up, getting the man's attention. He turned around smiling as he recognized the voice. "Solo!" he stood and walked to them both. He sent a rather awkward look to Wind, for he had never seen him before, but Wind's features gave Quatre a best bet at his mother and father. "Wind, I presume?" he asked him. "Why yes, that's me," he said, shaking Quatre's hand. "You must be another of the famous gundam pilots?" he asked. "Well, not famous," Quatre said, "but yes, I was the pilot of the Sandrock gundam."
The pilots all continued to converse about the past and the present. They started to drift into the situation that occurred in Luxembourg and Moscow. Quatre was most displeased about Luxembourg. He said they nearly wiped out the entire city. Only about a 5-mile radius on the outskirts of the city was still intact from the mighty blast. The rest of the city is a smoldering, hundred-foot deep crater. Quatre said that he had his friends at their underground base help him create a personalized mobile suit. He took one of the recovered Serpent mobile suits and completely removed the entire armor and began to rebuild it from the ground up. He added back most of the chest armor and little of the leg armor. In place of the shoulder- mounted missiles, he places two beam sabres in charging devices. They took up nearly no space at all, and were lightweight. He upgraded the booster pack with an older test model the Maganac's had created for the never-tested space version of Sandrock. As most knew, Sandrock was refitted for space combat aboard the Peacemillion after he went to space. He never had time to refit it before his launch back to help the gundam pilots ward off the White Fang organization. He had an old pair of his heat shortels to use for the main weapons on his suit. They painted the newly dubbed "Sand Serpent" a bluish-green color to help satisfy Quatre's taste for blue and to help give it a sea color to satisfy the name of the mobile suit. The green, also, when sighted from above it glowed a rather light green that almost resembled a light brush. This all to help Master Quatre's suit to be well hidden with camouflage.
"Well, we must get some sleep. We'll begin our assault in the morning," Quatre said to younger pilots. They nodded and waited for someone to escort them to their sleeping areas. Quatre had told them that the suits that attacked Moscow were spotted in a makeshift base about 150 to 200 miles north of Luxembourg. He guessed they would lay ruin to the rest of the city, if it weren't destroyed enough. Wind and Solo were assigned different quarters to sleep in, while Quatre had his master room still from the old days.
Morning came awfully fast for Wind. He had still not truly experienced real combat and had only flown in a through a few battles and did training with missile Leo's against asteroid fields, so he was nervous about the days operation. He went to check on Solo, only to find him sprawled out in his bed, with the sheets and cover twisted around him and he was snoring. His braid was lying across his neck, going down his bare chest as he continued his deep sleep. Wind smirked at the site; but then again, Solo was very open about everything and had the same happy-go-lucky attitude that he saw from Duo, his father.
Quatre had awaken around five that morning to prepare for their launch. Wind had awoken at nearly seven thirty and Solo was still snoozing in bed. They were going to leave by eight, so Quatre had a servant go and 'awaken' Duo's son from his dream and get him ready to leave. Solo ate a rather rushed breakfast. He hurried on a pilot's suit and ran after Wind and Quatre who became very well aquatinted with each other as they talked just about all morning about everything. Each of the pilots climbed into their suits and powered them up for combat. Quatre had his technicians run a maintenance check on the two new mobile suits and replenished what they were missing in fuel and ammunition.
"Ali, we'll be back by this evening, I hope," Quatre told the new Maganac commander. He waved them off from the floor with the other present Maganacs behind him. "Good luck!" he said as the mobile suits walked toward the base's exit. The ground was shaking outside and then slowly a platform from the sand rose up in an arc. It opened, revealing the three mobile suits from beneath it as they walked out onto the sand of the desert.
* * *
The Serpent Squadron from the Barton Foundation had slowly taken their camp apart. Many of the pilots were still groggy from just waking up. A few were inside their suits running a quick maintenance check before their time to leave. Others were scattered on the ground finishing up breakfast or just talking with each other. It was nearly ten o'clock and that was their mission time to start. "Hey, we need to get going. ETA for Luxembourg is 1 hour 15 minutes," their commander said over a speaker from his mobile suit. "That will only leave us a window of 1 hour and 45 minutes to complete the mission. Remember, we're looking for an underground base," he continued to say. All the men got into their suits and they started to walk away toward the city.
* * *
The remaining citizens of Luxembourg that gathered near large buildings to take refuge were still in shock. Supply ships came to help them recover from the tragedy. One supply ship was landing, as 3 missile came slamming into its port side, blowing the ship up in the air. Many people starting screaming and running like mad people around scarred to death. The Serpents had barely made it to the city on schedule.
"Take out the remaining supply ship, we don't want these witnesses to get too involved, more than they have too," the commander said before closing his missile pod shoulder launchers. He fired his boosters and flew off toward the crater. He and many of the men with him were in search of an underground base that was rumored to be under Luxembourg, the secondary capital of the world. The serpents were laying waste to the rest of the city. Few Serpents where flying down into the crater searching for any signs of the base they were told about. After an hour, the suits gathered to leave.
"We'll have to go back and tell them we couldn't find anything, " the commander said. The Serpents started walking away from the city. Only about twenty or so buildings remained standing, but they were damaged beyond repair and were about to fall. The people of the city fled, but many weren't lucky enough to make it to safety. A few people were still climbing out of rubble in an attempt to live to see another day. They looked up and a large object flew directly over their heads.
"You're just as bad as the damned Alliance was years ago in the colonies!" yelled Quatre as his serpent flew over the city toward the enemy Serpents. "What the?!", a few pilots were saying. Two serpents turned around, but only to have their heads of their suits sliced off by the heat shortels. He spun his suit and sliced off the arm of another that was carrying its double gatling gun. "They too destroyed people's homes that weren't involved!" he spat out again before slicing the legs of another suit off.
"Get that damned suit!" the commander yelled. Wind flew up behind the Serpent commander's mobile suit, and stabbed his beam sabre through the back of it. The sabre melted straight through the cockpit. Wind yanked the sabre to the right and it melted out the right side of the suit, before exploding in front of him.
"Wind!" Quatre yelled frantically, "don't kill them!" Before Quatre got his mind back on track, a serpent flew up behind him and shots its dual gatling at him. The shots ripped through he left shoulder of his suit. The shoulders beam sabre exploded, disabling the lower arm. When it powered down, the hands released their grip and dropped the heavy heat shortel. Quatre spun around and flew at the suit. He sliced the gun barrels off of the suit, before slicing the head off in a backhand motion.
"I'm sorry, Quatre, but it's the way my father taught me how to fight," Wind said. "He said to get the enemy as fast as you can efficiently," he started, "and destroying the cockpit, killing the pilot, is the easiest way." He felt sorry, but he did as he was told.
"It's ok Wind, I understand now why, but please, we fought hard to stop fighting and killing," Quatre said with his pacifistic passion coming back to the surface. "Please, try to only disarm them or disable their mobile suits," he pleaded with Zechs' son.
"I will Quatre, from now on," he replied to the strong pacifist. Quatre smiled greatly in his mobile suit, before flying off to disable another mobile suit. Wind and Solo too were slicing up the other serpent mobile suits. Solo was in hand-to-hand combat with about six serpents as they were surrounding him. He had his warblades ignited, and was stabbing and slashing with them barely connecting with the suits. He sliced off a few arms and even managed to get the legs of two suits, causing their massive hulks to drop to the ground.
"Only a 4 suits remaining, Quatre," Solo said as he approached another suit to the gundam pilot. This serpent wasn't out of missiles and was having a field day trying to target-and-fire at once at Solo as he flew at him. Solo was like a fly buzzing around. He dodged each of the pilot's shots, before getting close enough to fire the head-mounted laser cannons slicing off the arms of the suit. For good measures, he turned quickly igniting his beam scythe and sliced off the legs of the massive mobile suit, letting it topple to the ground with a great thud.
Wind threw out his left arm, letting the heat rod extend right through a mobile suit's chest section. He pulled it back and the suit fell, after losing power in the right leg and right arm. The quickly fired his vernias to fly straight up, avoiding the machine gun attack he picked up on radar from behind him. While boosting in the air, he flipped over and landed behind the mobile suit. With the beam sabre, he sliced off the serpent's booster back, letting it drop onto its legs from its hovering position. He then wrapped the heat rod around a leg, before yanking on it. The Leg gave way back and fell face-forward. He stabbed the beam sabre down into one of the shoulders and left it there, swirling it a bit making sure the missiles exploded. The suit smoked from the present explosion and the pilot managed to jump out of the cockpit.
Quatre was flying straight at the last serpent as it was firing its machine gun directly at him. A few rounds were soaked into the low-armor suit, but it still flew at him. Quatre's serpent stopped a sudden halt, landing on its feet, before he pushed off firing his boosters to send the suit flipping up in the air. The Serpent righted itself, before coming straight down on top of the enemy serpent. Quatre swung the heat shortel from the right side of the serpent's head down across the lower leg arm. The suit's left chest, head, and left arm fell off as the attacked melted straight through the simple metal.
"Phew," Quatre said, rubbing the sweat from his forehead, "it's all over now, but we were too late." The pilots scanned the now completely destroyed city. It lay in complete ruins. Wind and Solo were breathing hard and sweating badly after such an intense battle. "It's time we headed back," Quatre said.
"Yeah, once we get there, we can all head over to California. That's where my dad said they were going, to the New Edwards base where Heero and I built our gundams," Solo announced proudly. He thought about everything that had happened over the last many months. It was amazing, yet still shocking. He believed he was still living in a dream, but he truly knew he wasn't. He was also very happy to know that he could see Aria again. He smiled, before launching his suit into the air to follow his comrades.
* * *
The next day, Quatre, Solo, and Wind were traveling aboard a huge transport ship. Unlike the space transports, this one was a plane model designed for mobile suit storage. Quatre left his damaged suit back in the desert, which Ali said his men would still fix it for him, despite Quatre telling him it was not needed. Solo and Wind might need their suits more, and so they stored them aboard.
"It's an old relic from the One Year War," Quatre said, looking at the 'OZ' symbol that was hand-carved into the table that sat in front of them. "I heard this old transport was Treize' personal transport," he added. Solo began to think about that name, he knew he had heard it before. Then it hit him, he was the leader of OZ and staged the final war in space against the White Fang organization.
"We'll be there fairly soon, then we can get back to business on finishing off the Barton Foundation," Solo said, happy that he was returning home. He had been away for many days now. His mother had to be extremely worried about him.
Three hours later, the old OZ Transport landed on the runway at the New Edwards base. Heero Jr. knew the base well enough that he was able to turn on most of the working controls around the base to allow them to be able to store the transport in an underground hangar and get the radar and communication equipment re-operational. It had been around 15 or 16 years since most of the stuff in the old base was used.
Solo and Wind unloaded their gundams on the large truck transports and drove them down into the depths of the large base. Solo noted the smoke and fires of the missile room as he traveled back its length the elevator to go back up to the top of the base. Wind followed behind him. They had placed their Gundams in the open room where Heero and Solo first used their completed gundams.
The explosions and fire from the mobile doll construction room had destroyed the entire room. It was luck that the fires weren't strong enough to melt the walls of the room, or the facility would have burned down. The large walkway leading back to the elevator had a black film on it from the explosion of the Mk .82 warhead that was fired out of the base.
Everyone collected at the control tower of the base to start to establish a new plan to go after the remaining members of the Barton Foundation. They knew that his transport landed in Antarctica and that he had taken over the base, killing everyone that was stationed there. It was decided, rather quickly, that everyone gets some sleep until the next day. They were going to launch a full-scale, head-on battle. They were first going to fix the Wing Zero, of Heero. Solo and his father were going to go visit their family and Trowa tagged along after Solo mentioned that he told Aria and Catherine to go stay with his mother. And so it was, the pilots slept a bit easier that night, but not so comfortable knowing they had a big day ahead of them.
* * *
Max Barton was standing in the control tower of the Antarctica Base starring out onto the land of ice around them. A snowstorm had picked up and was swarming their little base with cold, white dust. He knew the snow wouldn't effect this base, because it was built to survive. He was interrupted as his new commander entered the room. "Mr. Barton, the Serpent Squads reported to us before they launched their attack on Luxembourg," he started to tell him, "and after their mission started, they were assaulted by 2 gundams and a modified serpent unit." The Barton shifted uneasy on his feet, then turned toward his officer.
"Did they complete their mission? Or did the suit fall into the wrong hands?" he asked him. "They didn't find the suit their sir, and they were all destroyed. But they did completely destroy the entire city before they were assaulted," he said, weary of what was to happen. "Hmm, that's odd," the Barton said. His eyes widened, "It's not there… I remember now, its in Brussels. It was built under the old Brussels' Presidential Palace!" he got to work gathering some troops to hurry and to retrieve his prize.
"I'll have it before they find, that's for sure. They can't… but if they have it, I'll have to take caution. It's the only suit that can hurt me!" he said, before retiring to his quarters for the evening. As he went to sleep, his night-squad was launching their Aires mobile suits and heading toward Brussels, Belgium.
Chapter 7: Explanations
