Phase Three – Forced Protection

Athrun waited outside of the room, his chin dropping to his chest as he fell asleep, but almost awoke instantly, his eyes trying to blink sleep out of them. It had been 12 hours since he had arrived at the hospital with Kira and now, the doctors were both operating on Cagalli and Kira and had told him to wait out in the waiting area. There was no news and he was beginning to worry.

A few family members of Kira's class had also been waiting just as long as he was, but they were sleeping on each other's shoulders or either just staring at nothing, lost in their own thoughts. He hated the silence, as silence always made him think and right now he didn't want to think.

It was the thoughts of what happened to him and Kira all those years before, during and after the war that always scared him. He had nearly killed Kira out of revenge and spite for his best friend killing Nicol, and now…he was in that lost state again – but this time there was no Lacus or Cagalli there for him.

As soon as he had heard that Cagalli and Kira were in surgery, he had immediately called Lacus and informed her of the situation. She had been following the news reports and had told him that she wished she was there for him and Kira, but she couldn't as the chairwoman of the Supreme Council, Eileen Canaver, was keeping her. But she said that there was hope that she would be able to return to Earth within a day.

"Tori!" a flutter of mechanical wings startled him out of his thoughts and looked up to see Kira's robotic green-yellow bird flying towards him before settling on his shoulder.

It inquired its head at him and seemed to say 'It's okay…don't worry,' as it raised and lowered its left wing. Athrun had forgotten how smart he had built the bird and smiled faintly at its attempted communication with him. Turning his head, as he had remembered leaving Tori in their apartment he and Kira shared in the downtown area of Orb's capital city, he saw Kira's parents walking towards him.

"Mr. and Mrs. Yamato," he greeted as they approached him. He noticed that Kira's mother was gripping her husband's shirt tightly in worry.

"Athrun, its good to see you again, though I wish it was better circumstances," Mr. Yamato greeted. After the war, Kira had confronted his parents and then suggested to Athrun that since they were on their own, they should get an apartment since he was working for the technological department and he finishing up his university education. Athrun had remembered that Kira's parents weren't happy, but they respected their son's decision. He himself had figured it was probably because Kira didn't really want to face his parents and ask them the question, why did they make him a Coordinator?

"How is he?" Mr. Yamato continued as he lead his wife to sit down on one of the chairs before she completely broke down.

"They've been in there for the past twelve hours, I don't know…" Athrun shook his head.

"And Cagalli?"

He shook his head again. "Same news. I'm sorry Mr. Yamato."

Mr. Yamato nodded before sitting down next to his wife, comforting her. Athrun watched the two with sad eyes before looking up as a doctor walked towards them. Perhaps this doctor would have news about Kira or Cagalli. A few of the parents waiting there also looked up in anticipation.

"Is there a Mr. or Mrs. Ren?" the doctor asked as he approached the group and two people stood up and walked towards the doctor, worry on their faces.

The doctor took them aside and started to talk to them in hushed voices and as Athrun watched them, he saw their worried expressions turn into elated joy and Mrs. Ren started to break down in tears while clinging onto Mr. Ren. Mr. Ren also had tears silently pouring down his face as he thanked the doctor and both of them followed the doctor, probably to see their child.

Athrun felt annoyance flare up inside of him as he watched the three walk down the hall and disappear into a set of double doors. What was taking them so long? Why wouldn't…

"Tori?" Tori chirped from his shoulder, sensing its temporary master's discomfort. "Tori!" suddenly flew from Athrun's shoulder and he looked up to see another doctor headed directly towards him and blinked sleep from his eyes.

"Athrun Zala?" the doctor asked him and he nodded. "And you must be Mr. and Mrs. Yamato, I presume."

"Yes sir," Mr. Yamato said and Athrun turned slightly to see a pensive expression on Kira's father's face.

"Where is Kira? Is he all right?" Mrs. Yamato suddenly spoke up, startling the small group.

The doctor held up his hands and nodded, "Kira is fine. He's lost a lot of blood, but luckily he has amazing healing skills for someone so young. We've patched him up, though the operation took for the better part of 10 hours because of his deep wound and other injuries that weren't visible at the time. He's now resting under anesthetics. You're allowed to see him, but only for a few minutes. Visiting hours will be available to him later this morning, all right?"

"Yes, yes…that will be fine," Mrs. Yamato choked out and Athrun smiled in relief as he heard the news. Kira was going to be okay…

"Mr. and Mrs. Yamato, you're Naturals, am I correct?" the doctor suddenly asked and Athrun stared at the doctor, unconsciously tensing.

"Tori!" Tori flew back to his shoulder, but it didn't calm him down.

"Yes…we are," Mr. Yamato replied in a neutral voice.

"Well, be lucky that you made your son a Coordinator. With his wounds, as a Natural he couldn't have survived. But do not worry, we Coordinators take care of our own and Naturals too here in Orb," the doctor smiled gently at them and Athrun relaxed, "come, follow me."

They followed the doctor down a long hallway before he turned and walked through a set of double doors that hissed open and closed as they also passed through. In this hall, there were rooms, most of the doors closed with folders and data readers on the side. The doctor approached one of the doors on the left and opened it.

"Please do not disturb him, he needs his rest," the doctor said as Mr. and Mrs. Yamato stepped through.

Athrun peeked in quickly and saw that Kira was covered in bandages and a breather was inserted into his nose and mouth to help him breathe. He saw the doctor shift, about to leave when a sudden thought occurred to him and tugged on the sleeve of the doctor's white jacket. "Doctor, can you tell how is Princess Cagalli?"

The doctor shook his head, "I afraid I don't know. Her condition is not released to the public and I do not have jurisdiction over that matter. I am sorry."

Athrun frowned, "But-"

"I'm sorry young man, but the Princess' condition is based on need-to-know information. When her camp has sent out a press release, then you will know. Until then, I apologize…" The doctor walked quickly away, leaving Athrun wholly confused.

L5 – PLANT – Martius 5…

Captain Andrew Bartfield considered himself a lucky man. He always had a knack of getting to places at the right time or to get out of sticky situations with little to no injury to himself or those around him. But his luck was tested during the war two years ago when he met an enigmatic young man named Kira Yamato and his friend Cagalli Attha.

His luck near ran out and he barely survived his BaCUE's explosion with only his right arm and right eye intact. His love, Aisha, did not survive and though one would expect the next time he met Kira on the battlefield, swift vengeance would follow, but Andy prided himself to be beyond such a trivial matter. He, Aisha, and Kira were all just following orders, doing what soldiers did in war. He believed that personal issues should never come between soldiers and things like vengeance were just something that kept wars going forever.

As he sipped his coffee, a mixture of Jamaican beans and old-fashioned American Navy brewed coffee with a hint of salt; he leaned back against the patio-like chair he was sitting on. He was waiting for a report by his crewmembers that had been scattered out for the past three days searching for any clues about possible insurgents.

A large TV screen over looking the strip mall he was sitting in was blaring out 24-hour broadcasts of what happened around twelve hours ago. Though it was nighttime in Martius 5's situation, nonetheless people awoke to find that terrorists of an unknown origin and group had bombed the neutral nation of Orb and that the leader of Orb was in critical condition.

Twelve hours later, there was still no word and just a repeat of reports by the news crews who were scrambling to find material. However, one thing changed – the graphic clips first shown were now replaced with edited footage to censor how devastating the blast was and to minimized blood to any viewers who were squeamish.

Andy had laughed at such a pathetic attempt. During the war, the embedded correspondents showed almost everything, though some things were edited, they showed how Cyclops devastated the Alaskan base and how Coordinator prisoners were treated in the hands of the Earth military – now everyone took a defensive stance a more passive way of censoring the media. Oh he knew that during the war both ZAFT and the Earth censored some of the things that wouldn't be great for their propaganda, but many of the bloody aspects were shown on both sides.

Right now, the media were trying to find out who was to be blamed for such an atrocious act and fingers were flying everything. Some analysts said that it was PLANT and ZAFT others were claiming Blue Cosmos and other right-winged anti-Coordinator group. But one thing for sure, was that both PLANT representatives and Earth representatives were caught in the blast.

Andy personally figured it was someone who wasn't happy with the outcome of the cease-fire and wanted war to start up again, after all, there wasn't an official peace treaty nor no one was disarming. In fact, it seemed like people were re-arming themselves with even more devastating weapons. At least there was the creation of the Liberation Front to stop the civilian population from taking arms and war into their own hands. He just hoped that the LF was a successful enterprise – after all, it was only created just mere months ago on the approval of both the Earth and PLANT, one of the few things both powers actually agreed on.

"Sir!" one of his crewmembers suddenly skidded to a stop in front of him and he raised an eyebrow, staring at the crewmember dressed in civilian clothing. To go undercover, he always had his crew dress civilian so not to attract any attention or to panic anyone.

"What is it Lieutenant?" he set his coffee mug down.

"Februarius 3! They're being attacked by a rogue group of mobile suits! ZAFT forces require our aide!" the Lieutenant tried to steady his own breathing.

"What about our search so far?" Andy held up a hand to try to calm down the Lieutenant.

"I don't know…Mark and Irene haven't reported back yet. The rest of the crew is on standby. Should I tell them to prep for launch?"

"No. Not yet. I want to be sure that this isn't a diversion. Can you hail the Kusanagi?"

"Yes sir. What shall I tell Captain Misali?"

"First contact Headquarters. Ask them if the Archangel is supposed to be launching to Februarius 3 as scheduled. If not, contact Quinn Misali and tell him that the Kusanagi needs to go help them suppress the forces. That should give the Kingfisher something to do."

"Yes sir," the Lieutenant saluted him quickly before running off towards the hanger bay.

Andy picked up his coffee mug again and took another sip. War was happening again, he could feel it…it was only time until things went straight to shit and he had a feeling that the peace he had enjoyed for the past two years were going to be gone in a matter of days. He just hoped his premonitions were wrong…

Ledonil Kisaka stared around the office that Cagalli worked in. With all the members of Orb's ruling council out of commission and in the hospital, he was effectively in charge and he never thought he would actually find himself in this position. He didn't want it and never wanted it, and for once in his life, he felt unease gripping him tightly. He didn't have the charismatic know-how of some of the council members or Princess Cagalli's fiery determination. He was just a soldier who lived his life on the battlefield.

He had received reports from his staff guarding Cagalli in her hospital room that she was doing fine and that was one worry that was off of his mind. He decided against telling Athrun Zala, the boy Cagalli was fancying, not because he didn't trust Athrun or his intentions, but because he felt that with both Kira and Cagalli injured, the boy would be torn between moving back and forth between the two.

Though now he was regretting his initial assessment as he knew Athrun would probably end up figuring out where Cagalli was and when he attempted to see her, he would in all seriousness be locked up. He just hoped that Athrun had enough sense to realize that she needed to be in protection as assassins might still be after her.

Now there were reports of Februarius 3 being attacked by terrorists and ZAFT needed help. He had placed the Archangel on standby, canceling their initial orders to go to Februarius 3 and when he received a call from Andy Bartfield's second in command asking if they should contact the Kusanagi to go to aid ZAFT to contain the Februarius 3 incident. He had okayed it and then turned to up the security guard around Cagalli and the other council members.

If Februarius 3 was being attacked, there was a possibility of Orb being attacked again. If that was to happen, then Kisaka wanted to be prepared. They weren't going to be caught off guard again.

He suddenly pressed the intercom button, "Get me Detective Owani." He wanted to intensify the investigation. It had to be someone who worked maintenance in the building who was able to plant so many bombs and be near to detonate it. He was sure of it. So far there was no culprit caught, but he had closed off all the ports and highways, only allowing those with I.D. to leave Oronoge Island. Some of Orb's civilians complained, but many of them were still in shock. It was this shock that he could investigate to his heart's content.

It was effectively martial law, but yet it wasn't. Orb would unite in and effort to keep the peace – after all Orb was neutral.

When Kira opened his eyes, he didn't feel any pain, or anything at all. He blinked as he found himself standing in an open field in the flightsuit he used to wear while piloting both the Freedom and Strike. The last thing he remembered was sitting along the wall of the rubble covered Senate Hall, Athrun's face looking down on him. The next thing he remembered was a darkness that had engulfed him…

"Am I dead?" he whispered to no one in particular.

A breeze suddenly picked up, ruffling his hair and clothes. He looked around as the breeze swirled around him, seemingly laughing lightly at his question. It seemed to say, 'No, you are not dead…only sleeping.'

"Sleeping?"

The breeze suddenly condensed in front of him and the least likely person that Kira would have ever thought to see appeared in front of him.

"Flay!" her smiling face sparkled and he felt tears spring to his eyes as he saw that she was holding the cute child from Heliopolis that had gave him the origami flower. The little girl was also smiling and waved to him. Flay mouthed something to him, but Kira couldn't hear it.

"What? Flay, I can't hear you!" he cried out, walking towards her, but she seemed to back up with each of his steps. "Flay, don't go. I want to…to talk…"

She suddenly disappeared in a bright flash of light and Kira held up an arm to keep himself from being blinded. As soon as the light died down, he lowered his arm and found himself floating in a vat of reddish fluid.

Holding his breath, he looked around, seeing nothing but red bubbles and a murky picture of what was happening outside of the vat he was in. He moved closer to the murky window and tried to peer outside. There were blurred images of people moving around…doing something… Where was he?

He blinked again and again found himself in the arms of someone. He was being carried…another baby was directly in front of him, except the baby had blonde hair and was tearing up from crying. He reached out with his pudgy hands to try to comfort the baby in front of him. "Don't cry…mommy will take care of us," he tried to say, but nothing came out of his mouth except for a few gurgles and he looked up to see the face of the person carrying the two of them.

Blood ran down a part of her face, matting her wavy purple hair. She looked scared and he tried to reach up to comfort her. He didn't want her to be worried…after all, he was here so why should adults be scared?

"Where's Katherine!" a loud booming male voice suddenly made him wince. As a baby his ears were very sensitive.

"She's dead! They got her! We have to go now, Uzumi!"

Kira blinked again and this time found himself back in the laboratory on Colony Mendel, except he was like a ghost hovering over the scene, watching as he and Mu LaFlaga dodge bullets from an insane Rau Le Creuset.

"Shouldn't you be familiar with this place, Kira Yamato?" Rau asked.

"Why should I?" his other corporeal self shouted back.

"Why Kira, this is your birthplace…"

Kira suddenly opened his eyes with a gasp and saw the white hospital ceiling. He didn't know why he was having so many nightmares, but he knew that he wanted them to stop. "No…" he whispered as tears began to fall from his eyes as he closed his eyes once more.

Mrs. Kanoko Yamato deeply prided herself on keeping her cool in tough situations, but to see her only son like this…it was heart wrenching. Ever since Kira joined the Earth Alliance in the war against ZAFT and even after the war, she had felt that Kira was distancing himself away from them. She constantly wondered if he knew about his own heritage…the circumstances surrounding his birth and if he knew that he had a twin.

Of course with Uzumi Nara Attha dead, Kira would have found out about Cagalli being his twin sister, but the rest of his heritage…she didn't even know where to begin if she was to tell him. She had seen tears form in her son's eyes as he lay unconscious in his bed and wondered what he was dreaming about.

A sudden gasp from Kira's bed made her jump up from the chair she was occupying next to his bed and she looked up to see his eyes wide open before tears started to flow out. "No…" he whispered and she watched as he closed his eyes once more.

"Kira…" she wiped the tears off of his face with her thumb before settling back down onto the chair. Her husband had already gone home to get them a fresh change of clothes and some food, leaving her here.

Kira's best friend Athrun, whom she had known on a couple of acquaintances during their stay on the moon a long time ago, had gone down to the hospital's cafeteria to grab himself something to eat and was due back sometime soon. She had seen Athrun giving her curious looks every time their gazes met and she knew that Athrun had questions for her…probably the main question was why was Kira a Coordinator if they were Naturals.

She wanted to answer that it was for a better life, but that was pathetic…and she didn't know what to ultimately say. She didn't want to tell Athrun the secret behind the reason why Kira was a Coordinator, nor reveal that Kira wasn't actually her son, but the son of Dr. Ulen and Katherine Hibiki. Revealing that would also reveal Cagalli's secret, and from the news she got from Ledonil Kisaka who had also been in on the plot to secret Hibiki's children away from his madness, was that Cagalli and Athrun had taken a liking to each other and were lovers.

She didn't want to break Athrun's faith in his friends, after all, they were his only family now since his mother died in the Bloody Valentine incident and his father killed by his own madness when he tried to use Genesis to destroy everything. She just didn't know…

She had wanted to tell Kira as soon as he turned the legal age for an adult, but now…he had so much to deal with, especially in light of what happened yesterday… Telling him about his own past just wasn't the right thing to do at the moment… It can wait…

"Yes, it can wait," Kanoko replied softly to her own conviction as she stared at her son. "Kira…"

In the early morning hours during the change in guards a man crept in quietly, unnoticed by anyone or the security cameras. He wore the uniform of a hospital worker, a perfect cover for his own assignment. He had gotten the message from his superiors to finish the job and finish the job he would.

His inside contact had told him where remaining councilors of Orb's ruling council were located in the hospital and ultimately where Cagalli Yula Attha was being sequestered. He had to do this swiftly before any alarm was raised. Stuffing his brown hair underneath a cap, his purple eyes glinted like hard amethyst crystals.

"Let's do it!" he whispered.