A/N: I give my deepest apologies for not updating in so long. I had little idea on where to go after chapter 6..so I just stopped typing until I came up with something. I'm not sure if I have anything yet..but I'll do what I can for now. I made it long so..be happy and R & R!
Convert
"Where did you say it was exactly?" Nicol asked stiffly as he readjusted the coordinates.
Leer smiled at him sympathetically, "Relax, It's right over there." She pointed out a small hanger on the battle screen. It was ten minutes to six and the dim light of morning was coloring the sky in light shades of lighter blues and pale yellow.
Leer had managed to squeeze behind the seat on the Blitz Gundam. She tried to shift but got a painful poke of a protruding metal slab in her back. She grumbled, glad that they were almost here. Nicol examined the battle screen, searching for any threats. Feeling that they were safe he removed the Mirage Colloid. Nicol gave a deep sigh of relief as he landed the Blitz outside the hanger.
Leer sighed as well. Nicol made some readjustments to the calibrations in the Blitz's weapon system before opening the hatch and letting Leer out.
"Don't be long... I don't like it here." Nicol said looking around nervously.
"Stop worrying." Leer snapped irritably as she took hold of the thick cord that would lower her to the ground. "I doubt Lucus is even here."
"Who's Lucus?" Nicol asked suspiciously. He shifted from one leg to the other as she hung onto the line.
"Don't worry about it." she waved at him and descended to the ground. She gracefully jumped off before the line even touched the ground. She quickly jogged to the huge hanger doors which were slightly ajar. She glanced back at Nicol who was crouched at the edge of the hatch door. He waved her to hurry. She gave him a casual, careless wave back and entered the hanger.
She squinted in the darkness. She waited a moment till her eyes adjusted until she moved further into the hanger.
"Lucus!" she called. Her voice echoed eerily off the huge metallic walls. She waited, and then continued walking. Her guess was that Lucus was out drinking again, she didn't need him anyway, she knew exactly where her mobile suit was. She walked as fast as she could without running towards the far end of the hanger.
Leer jumped as she heard a loud clank, the sound of an empty metal can hitting the floor and slowly rolling. She looked to the middle of the hanger and saw Lucus reclined and asleep in his chair at a cluttered desk. She approached the desk running her fingers along the edge as she neared his chair. She looked at Lucus for another minute. He looked even more disheveled then usual. Her eyes then drifted to the empty beer can on the floor that had fallen from his limp hand.
She sighed, "Damn drunkard." she spat out loud. Lucus promptly woke and reached for the holster on his waist.
In one fluid motion Leer kicked the chair out from under the half drunk man. He hit the ground with a solid thud. His gun flew out of his hands and clattered to the floor a short distance away. Disoriented he attempted to sit up.
Leer approached him and stepped on his chest, "Never, ever, draw a weapon on me again." she stared him down.
"Lee?" Lucus asked, his words slightly slurred.
She raised an eyebrow and gave him her crooked smile.
"Oy, Lee...gave me quit a scare..thought I was dyin'.." she removed her foot and watched him stand. She watched him stumble and lean on his desk until his vision stopped spinning.
"I've come to collect what's mine. I'll pay you for keeping it this long.. and sorry about not replying to your last call about that. I'll pay you extra if I have to." she dug into her pocket and pulled out a check.
"Uh...yeah..Lee..that's what I was callin' about. I don't got it no more." Lucus said rubbing the back of his neck, he shifted nervously.
She laughed, "What are you talking about? I left it here. In your care. Where else could it be?" she looked around the hanger.
"Not here." he mumbled.
In an instant Leer went from casual-kind, to ravenous and deadly, "What the hell do you mean 'not here'!" she grabbed him roughly by the collar and lifted him off the floor. The muscles in her arms shook a bit as she lifted him higher. "What happened to it?" she raged.
"Someone came...was interested in storing something here..he saw it..he payed my money to keep it hidden..then he came back and picked it up..." Lucus chocked from her death grip.
"LIAR!" she snarled. She threw him to the floor, "How could you let something like that happen! It wasn't yours to give away!" she drew a pistol from her back pocket and pointed it at him.
He lay there on his elbows, "You didn't exactly tell me the truth either. You said that thing was a prototype...unfinished or something like that, that someone hired you and you were getting payed well for it. But that guy said no one had hired you to build it..and that it was dangerous ..unregistered in the government files. That I'd get in trouble if I was caught with it." his drunkenness faded
'He's been leading me on!' Leer thought horrified.
"Traitor!" she hissed, "You betrayed me! Not only that but your lying to me..I can see it in your eyes!" 'Why do I trust anyone these days.. ever since that happened..I never trusted anyone. Why did I start now? I only get hurt when I trust others.' She thought sadly, angry at her error.
Lucus gave her a dirty smile, "Yeah, I'm lying. He said that wouldn't wash with you said you were too damn smart for that. Want the truth?" he asked the grin still on his face.
"I'll kill you either way." she said tightly.
He shrugged and stood, all drunken steps gone, slurred speech normal again. "He came here. He knew you were here. He's been watching you.." he seethed pleasurably.
Leer's eyes widened with horror, "Drez." she whispered. Spinning on her heel she ran to the end of the hanger. Now that she knew who her opponent was, she knew how he thought..she knew where her mobile suit was. Who would think of looking in the hanger after being told that their sworn enemy had been here and had seen it? Exactly what she was doing now.
She ran down the steps that led to the lower levels of the hanger. She swung herself over the railing and fell a good 15 feet before hitting the ground. She landed on her feet unharmed, left with only a gentle tingling sensation in her calves and thighs. She broke into a sprint across the huge room. She heard Lucus' foot falls on the metal landings that she had just jumped off.
"I was hoping you'd never come back so I wouldn't have to kill you myself." He yelled, his voice echoing painfully.
Leer winced from the noise as he opened fire with the pistol that she recklessly left behind. She leaped high into the air, much higher then any Natural could, and did a one hundred and eighty degree turn in midair. As she descended back towards the cement floor she shot, just once and landed on her feet, skidding a few feet before stopping in a crouched position.
She looked up, panting a little. Lucus stood there unmoving, "Damn you..." he whispered. He dropped to his knees as blood flaked his lips. He pitched forward and made a loud clanging sound as hit the landing. He didn't move after that.
Leer stood and jammed her pistol into her back pocket, "Your better off that way." she muttered to herself. Turning back to the direction she had been heading in she jogged to a darkened corner. Sure enough she found what she was looking for.
The Elemental stood tall and proud, its green, white and blue metal paneling shining. She smiled. Just as she had left it.. only not in the place that she had left it in. The Elemental was obviously small..for a mobile suit. It stood shorter then the Blitz and was a different shape. The Elemental was more smooth, less rigid compared to other mobile suits, it appeared to be more aerodynamic.
Admiring her masterpiece for a moment longer she walked up to the foot, which was still huge in comparison to her. Summoning up her strength she leaped up and landed on its foot, with another grunt of effort she launched herself onto an area of the knee that jutted out. She then jumped again but caught the edge with her hand and pulled herself up.
Upon reaching the cockpit she looked down at her watch and pressed the little greed button on it. With a hissing sound the hatch opened. She beamed and jumped onto the platform that folded out from the cockpit, careful not to fall..because it was a pretty long way down.
She dropped into the seat and pulled the keyboard towards her. "Hey baby, wake up. It's time to get movin'." she said as she typed in codes to start the elaborate system. The screen lowered from above her and pulled up warnings and other code protected files. She muttered to herself as her fingers flew over the keys. Finally she heard the system booting up. She leaned back staring at the screen that current was flashing "please wait...".
After another moment or so the system was ready. Closing the cockpit, she snuggled into the seat and clipped the harness together. Taking the controls she pushed the throttle up giving the mobile suit some power. The suit jolted into action.
"Easy. A little rusty are we?" I had been a long time since the Elemental had even moved. She was a little surprised that the battery was as full as it was.
The Elemental made it over to the lift and Leer pressed the controls, instructing the suit to press the large "lift" button. With quit a bit of noise the lift shuddered and carried it's load to the surface. Leer typed furiously to get the battle screen up and running. Unfortunately, a lot of the other smaller systems like weapons and minor mobility had gone off line because of the lack of continuous use. She had most of them back up and running or reformatting themselves by the time she reached the top.
Leer cocked her head to the side, was that a missel she was hearing? She quickly moved the Elemental forward and out of the hanger.
Nicol wasn't where she had left him...
"Dammit.." she cursed softly. She quickly searched for the communications file and brought it up. It was still reformatting to the signals that ZAFT used. Her eyes turned to the battle screen, scanning the area manually for the Blitz.
She easily spotted tanks.. heading straight for her and the hanger. 'Lucus must have called his buddies before coming after me.' Leer thought in annoyance. With the Elemental in this condition.. she wouldn't stand a chance against a well organized group, no matter how good her skills where.
Leer jumped as she heard some garbled speech cracking over her communications link.
"Le..r i.. that.. yo..?"
It was Nicol trying to reach her through the unmodified com link. The N-Jammers, a ZAFT creation, was scrambling her old transmitions. She growled loudly to herself. She didn't bother trying to talk back to Nicol. He'd only get confused. She'd just wait until the file was done.
Until then they would have to physically communicate with the mobile suits. The Elemental raised a hand and gestured for the Blitz to follow. The Elemental rose into the sky with low powered jets (battery wasn't strong enough for anything of higher power) and began heading back the way they had come. Nicol took off behind her, understanding.
The tanks below didn't hesitate, they opened fire, hoping to get at least one of them before they got out of range.
The Blitz was hit hard on it's right leg and the left hip was grazed. He turned, while still flying back the way they had come and returned fire.
Leer looked further ahead towards the city of Saylin.. which they had to pass again. She spotted several more tanks and trucks with anti-aircraft cannons. Leer cursed and smashed her fist into the arm of her metal seat.
A soft beep from the battle screen brought something to her attention. The com link was up and running again. She quickly opened it and linked to Nicol.
"Amalfi, we have a problem."
"That's an understatement." he paused as he took out two tanks, "How did I know this was gonna happen!" he moaned.
"Life isn't life without risks." Leer snapped.
"Great, your starting to sound like Creuset. You two will certainly get along well." Nicol mumbled coldly.
"I guess I really am one of you ZAFT people now.." Leer mused thoughtfully.
Leer looked to her screen as more finished files popped up and more systems were running. Now she had a chance against their foe. She took a firmer grip on the controls and quickly came up with an offence strategy.
She easily dodged their slow and ill placed shots, "Bah, is that really all you got!" she taunted. She went to the weapons files and selected one of her favorites.
On the outside, a hatch on the mobile suits right and left forearms arms opened and a small cannon lifted out of each. They were high energy cannons, built with both accuracy and power. She opened fire and took out several of the opposing tanks in a few blows.
"We can't win!" Nicol cried over the com link.
"We got this! There's only..." she began confidently as ten Sky Graspers whizzed by, appearing out of no where. "Oh..." she muttered in mild surprise, "Damn.."
"There too many. Run for it!" Nicol ordered, sounding panicked.
"I concur." Leer agreed, making the Elemental wheel out of some anti-aircraft fire.
Nicol and Leer quickly abandoned the fight and headed back towards the base, avoiding enemy fire as they went.
"Where do ya think your goin'!" an enemy Sky Grasper piolet yelled as he dove at them from above. He fired his four machine guns and both medium cannons at Nicol, unable to fire at them both at the same time. Nicol couldn't avoid it all and one of the medium cannons took off the Blitz's right arm and destroyed the 50mm high-energy beam rifle with it.
"AH!" Nicol cried as the Blitz shook violently.
"Nicol!" Leer yelled, watching as the Blitz fell from the sky at an alarming rate. She quickly followed, she had to at least slow his decent or he could get really hurt..may be even.. She banished the thought and plummeted after him. "Nicol," she called again, "Pull up!"
"I...I can't.."Nicol grunted desperately, "My energy is in the red zone..I've been out too long!" His jets failed completely and his Phase Shift Armor faded back to it's dull grey, he began to free fall.
Leer didn't say anything as she went into a nose dive after him. As she dove, she activated another weapon. On the outside the Elemental's shoulders pushed out and up dropping long coils of metal into its hands. Catching the handles of these metal whips the Elemental lashed out with its right whip. It wrapped firmly around the Blitz's leg and the other wrapped around an arm.
"I won't let you die!" she growled, desperately working the controls.
Leer quickly pulled out of the dive and put her jets to max. power to slow them down. Unfortunately, throughout this whole process both of them were vulnerable and received a lot of damage.
Five Sky Graspers swooped by firing their medium cannons. Leer gauged that Nicol would easily survive the fall from their current altitude so she jerked him upwards and the whips released him. Nicol yelped at the sudden jerk and yelled some pretty interesting things at her. She smiled and began defending herself. The other five Sky Graspers turned towards her.
"Great. Ten on one, I love those odds." she mused sarcastically. Without warning, they all opened fire, sending a hail of gunfire at her. Leer performed the needed maneuvers to avoid them. She somehow came out untouched but Leer had a feeling her luck was going to change, quickly. The ground forced had regrouped and where firing.
"Gah!" she cursed as she missed a missile, she fired again but her weapon didn't respond. She looked at her energy levels. She didn't have enough to use energy-based weapons anymore, and would soon loose flight as well. Another group of missiles headed for her. Warning beeps told her that it was too late to avoid them.
'This is it.' Leer thought darkly, 'and what a pathetic way to go.' she added dryly to her thoughts.
A green blast streaked down in front of her, destroying the missiles. Shocked, Leer looked up. It was the Aegis.
