Disclaimer: Please see first chapter.
Mobile Suit Gundam SEED: Fog of War
Phase 4: Into the Deep
The four pilots assigned to the Solomon were up early the next morning, their belongings easily packed into anonymous dark blue duffels and two satchel cases, all dressed primly and uncomfortably, ready to report for duty. Saying a last goodbye to some of the other former recruits on their way out, the team headed towards the drydock section of Boaz space fortress, floating through weightless corridors, walking through the occasional gravity-bound passage, and wandering with only half a clue as to where to go before they found themselves in the proper location, assignment orders in-hand and good for inspection.
On the way, they stopped at Logistics and picked up some of their back pay and were given their standard-issue equipment: a spare set of dress uniforms, a nine-millimeter pistol, two magazines, combat knife and a carton of ammunition, a couple days' worth of MRE field rations (Meals Rejected by Everyone), another copy of the ZAFT Military Justice Handbook, a datapad, communicator link, and toiletries.
The space fortress' drydock was massive, even when compared to the training launch bay. While the training bay held twenty GiNNs, this cavernous bay could hold an entire fleet of warships, support vessels, and fortress-based mobile suits. The bay was so long actually, that it stretched nearly a kilometer into the rock face of the Boaz asteroid. It wasn't even the only bay of its kind in the station. It was one of their first glimpses of just how large the ZAFT military apparatus was on Boaz, a sobering reminder that they wouldn't have the cozy feeling of the comparatively tiny training center anytime soon.
The Solomon, a sleek, curvaceous, disturbingly aqua Nazca-class vessel, weighing in at just over two-hundred fifty meters, sat berthed at the very fore of the line of ships present. It was currently the only one of its type at port, as the fleet was out on maneuvers, so it stood monolithically as a great neon sign in mid-vacuum. It would meet up with its sister ships, Jericho and Aurora just outside the station's near-space, two Lurasia-class destroyers. Though alone and swarming with repair crews, it was still very every bit as impressive as the famous Vesalius and Gamoff.
Lower, junior officers saluted them as they passed, politely returning the salute and reciprocating protocol whenever they drifted by higher-ranking personnel. As they moved about, they saw at least one 'Purple'—a fleet command officer—and another Red like themselves. A Warrant Officer, First Class, met the quartet at the docking gate with the Solomon.
"Name, rank, and serial number?" The male officer asked, extending a hand to receive their orders. Kunio, naturally, was first in line.
"Mimura Kunio, First Lieutenant, 201-29110-1-E." Kunio said quickly but clearly. The warrant officer scanned the papers, and waved him through. The young lieutenant pulled himself into the Solomon's median deck and waited for his comrades, all of who followed the same procedure without delay. Now, standing in the white and gray, glossy and well-lit corridors of the ship, they considered where they should head first.
"We're new personnel," Kunio said with as much authority as he could muster—which wasn't much, he was still new at this 'commander' bit—and looked at a little diagram. "So we head to the bridge and report for duty to the captain."
Solomon was fairly spacious for a space battleship. Crewed by only a few hundred personnel, pilots, and a dozen gunners, it didn't require particularly large amounts of crewers. In fact, it could run on much less, if need be. Thus, the ship was well-suited for long tours of duty, and with a very fast set of engines, the fastest in the fleet, a Nazca could easily perform RTB and re-supply at base. With several main beam cannons as armaments and the ability to carry a half dozen mobile suits, it was a formidable weapon of war.
Perhaps most impressive, they discovered upon entering, was the bridge. Located to the aft-dorsal section of the ship, it was framed by an exaggeratedly curved set of viewports, flight deck, and command promenade, affording a wonderful view even from the very back, where the lifts and ladders were located. It was there that the decidedly mismatched four pilots appeared, satchels and duffels in hand.
Captain Ray Yuki, a man of almost, but not quite thirty-six, was tall, thin, and lean, with light brown hair, dark eyes, and a chiseled face. He cut an impressive profile, standing on the command deck of the bridge of the Solomon, dressed in a black captain's uniform with distinctive lavender-gray shoulder accents. The large yellow rectangle with a red line through it on his left breast signified to the new arrivals that he was indeed the man they were looking for, and his narrow eyes focused in on them keenly.
An interesting bunch, he thought to himself, watching them salute and come to attention. Two similar-looking Asian boys, a clearly Anglo, massive youth who probably did rather well for himself with females, and an aforementioned female with surprisingly striking, soft features and powerful gray eyes, with hair only a couple of shades darker than the captain's own. They certainly were a handsome group, and it made Yuki wonder momentarily if elite pilots were promoted by photogenic merit alone. Save for perhaps 'Helmet' Joule, he'd yet to run into any ugly elites…
Banishing the frivolous and uncouth thought quickly, he nodded to them with a small salute in return. "I'm Captain Ray Yuki of the Solomon."
"Sir," The shorter of the two Asian boys said—Mimura Kunio, he recalled, from the photo on the bio he'd read the day before—stepped forward. "First Lieutenant Mimura Kunio, reporting for duty, sir."
The young lady matched his action, coming to a halt exactly next to him. "First Lieutenant, Junior Grade, Suzuka Hayes-Sato, reporting."
"First Lieutenant, J.G. Mimura Nagisa," the remaining dark haired-boy said, saluting, "Ready for orders, Captain."
"Second Lieutenant Lyles Doyle, reporting for duty, sir." The blond one affirmed with a final salute, standing erect, dominating over the others in terms of height and physical mass. He was even larger than Yuki, and could probably knock him out. That really amused the Captain.
"At ease, pilots." Yuki offered a slight smile, scratching his clean-cut chin. The young pilots before him, while probably a little too good-looking for their own good, struck him as both green but very promising. He'd read their bios before accepting their assignment to his command, and was surprised to find that both Mimuras were the children of his old friend Hyosuke. He knew of Satoshi, who was now with Fleet, but he didn't get a chance to meet either of the younger boys. Of course, he'd heard about the odd young woman who became an ace at the academy as an MS pilot, a rarity, considering most of the female enlistees became noncombat officers or ship crews, least of all Infantry and Mobile Weapons qualifiers.
Yuki himself came from the ranks of Infantry, then transferred to Fleet Command when he'd gotten promoted enough to be a pilot, then an Executive Officer—on the Vesalius, no less—and then earned his own command after working at Boaz as an instructor. He was something of a protégé of Fleet Captain Addess, but didn't let that go to his head. He was generally a mild man, easy to work with and most considered him charming to an extent. By and large, Ray Yuki wasn't a man with any outstanding talents; instead, he served with dedication and steadfast reliability, preferring to let others do the grandstanding and hot-dogging.
He continued smiling. "As you can see, we're about to leave port. Once out of Boaz, I'll brief you on what our current mission profile is, and what your duty assignment aboard the Solomon will be for the time being. Until then, you're dismissed to quarters. Relax, shake the dust off your shoes, and get settled. We have a long ride ahead."
"Taicho!" Kunio nodded smartly, and turned on his heel, gesturing for the others in his command to follow suit—which they did, almost as one entity, filing into a lift tube and disappearing soon after.
What a strange group of pilots! Yuki reflected with amusement, before redirecting his attention to the launch of the Solomon. To his navigator, he asked, "Are we currently still hooked up to Boaz?"
"No sir," The fresh-faced ensign said, taking a moment to listen to his earpiece. "We're fully cleared for launch."
Yuki nodded, resting a hand on the forward rail of the command deck. "Take us out, one-quarter thrust. Plot a rendezvous course with the Jericho and Aurora."
"Aye sir. Engaging engines, rendezvous point is at Green two, Yellow ten, distance fifty. ETA two minutes."
There was a slight lurch, and Yuki was forced to hold on tight to the railing as the four main engines of the Solomon engaged at a quarter of their full potential, propelling the Nazca ship out of the main Boaz docking bay at a stately pace.
The rooms they found weren't bad at all. As commissioned officers, they received accommodations that allowed each a small, private room, in the gravity-controlled section of the ship, where all the crew quarters were. Theirs however, were closest to the ship's centrally-located launch bay, within easy access during an emergency or immediate combat deployment. Only one deck down was the pilots' lounge, and beyond that, the actual bay. Each room was outfitted with a bunk, a desk, a desk-terminal computer, and a tiny bathroom with a shower unit. Surprisingly, Fleet Logistics also gave them a standard-issue potted plant and towel. Not far away were the commander's quarters, which were, by extension, more opulent, but not by very much; after all, it was a warship, not a luxury liner.
Once they knew the ship was underway, and their bags were unpacked save for their flight gear, which would be put in their lockers, they headed up to the bridge, drifting in noiselessly.
On the way, Nagisa said lowly to Kunio, "Do you think we're in for action, so soon?"
Their dark-haired front man only shrugged, as the lift doors opened. "Your guess is as good as mine, Nagi."
They found Yuki-taicho standing near a holographic projection unit, which was mounted onto the center of a tactical map-table, currently displaying the immediate planetary space around Boaz and the edge of ZAFT territory. Everything beyond the tinted emerald sectors was either no-man's land, or Earth Alliance space.
After they fell in and announced themselves, Yuki gave them a rundown of their situation, his hands flat on the table. "Ever since the fiasco at Heliopolis, the La Cruise squadron has been chasing the Naturals' newest mobile weapon, the GAT-X105 'Strike' and its carrier vessel. So far, they've had little progress, and despite running down the Alliance's 8th fleet, destroying Eurasia's Artemis base, and chasing them halfway across the Earth sector, have only managed to force the ship to ground on Earth, out of our hands."
No one dared remark that those states represented an awful lot of collateral damage. Two space colonies, a fleet…no one could doubt that the La Cruise team was incredibly destructive.
"Currently," the Captain circled the section of space between Earth and Boaz, which included the L3 colony, "We're shifting our forces. Since we lost the Gamoff, and Vesalius is damaged, more ships are being cycled in to patrol this, the most turbulent sector of space. Admiral La Cruise is back in the homeland, answering a High Council inquiry about Heliopolis—L3—and he's taken valuable resources with him. We—the 4th task force—have been assigned to take over their patrol routes and secure this sector. Additionally…" He paused for a moment to change a screen, causing the four to step back slightly for a more comprehensive view.
"We're going to be doing some intelligence gathering. Between Boaz, L3, and the Moon, there is a lot of space. We believe that while we currently have the superior space technology, the Naturals' recent ability to produce mobile suits, even in limited quantities, is alarming, and could possibly change the tide in the war." Yuki stated darkly, looking each pilot in the eye. No one turned away, but they were far from silent now.
"Sir, what can a single fleet group do to stop development we don't know about?" Nagisa asked semi-casually, leaning back slightly, feeling his feet leave the deck.
Yuki smirked. This boy would have to learn to trust his superiors. "Recon. We're going to go in deep and start watching the enemy as close as we can. We'll find out what they're doing on the Moon, near L3, anything."
"Recon duty?" Kunio asked suspiciously.
The captain nodded sagely. "You're being temporarily issued two ZGMF-LRR-704b GiNN Recon two-seater types, for use in the next few missions."
"Why two seats, sir?" Suzuka inquired, adjusting her stance. She didn't see the need for two pilots in one mobile suit.
"One person pilots, the other person handles the sensitive sensor equipment." Yuki explained with infinite patience. He needed to remind himself that these pilots, though of the 'elite' grouping, were still fresh recruits. "Don't look so glum; it's an under-appreciated mission profile, but very hard to do well, and also one of the most dangerous assignments. Your saving grace will be how well you can slip in and out, undetected."
"Deep into enemy territory. Little backup, huh?" Doyle commented dryly, scrutinizing the course layout of the Solomon and her companions. "High-risk, low survival chances?"
"Essentially." Yuki affirmed with a nod. "Though, that's the reason you all were chosen for this detail. All of you are highly qualified, top-notch soldiers in both piloting skill and technical knowledge. There's no better mix for special operations pilots."
"Those damned Naturals," Suzuka mused quietly, "Deciding to make mobile suits. Now things can really get messy."
Kunio felt the urge to reprimand Suzuka for her derogatory commentary, but he knew it out be out of line and far too out of character. He might have felt differently, and even have joined in, if not for the presence of Nagisa in his life, but with a strong tie to a Natural, he felt very sympathetic. In spite of this, he remained silent.
"True that." Yuki-taicho shoved off from the display table, soaring towards the relatively low ceiling bulkhead, stopping himself with a hand. "Your first mission won't be for a few hours, but I suggest you get used to those Recon GiNNs fast. Dismissed."
"Yes sir, understood." Kunio saluted, and before he could even gesture, he saw his fellows drifting to the back of the bridge, anticipating his orders.
Nagisa sighed. This sounded like a pretty tedious detail: look around, snoop around until you got shot at, and figure out if what shot at you was better than what shot at you last time. Essentially, target practice for the enemy. That didn't sound appealing, and left a bad taste in his mouth. Not exactly his top choice in assignments, but that was the way of things. He had no right to complain, but he could be dissatisfied.
"Snoop and poop, how about that?" He said to no one in particular as they rode the lift down to the median deck.
Doyle snorted, stretching his arms. "No shit. Guess our luck runs out here."
"Better hope not," Kunio said sternly, facing the door. "If it runs out now, we're star-food."
"Good point." Suzuka chimed in, the first out of the lift when the elevator doors parted. "Kunio, who's doing what then, since not all of us are piloting?"
Kunio paused, freefalling into the corridor, passing a couple of crewers and offering passing nods. He considered the question for a long moment. He would pilot one of the Long-Range Recon units, and he supposed that it would be best to have someone scientifically capable to do the sensor work. Unfortunately, both Nagisa and Suzuka were equally qualified for either, and Doyle was also well versed with engineering. It was a toss-up.
"Who wants what? I'm taking the wheel on one." Kunio stated.
Nagisa shrugged. "I'll pilot, if that's okay."
"Knew you'd say that." Doyle grinned. He looked over at Suzuka. "Who do you want to ride with?"
"Ladies first? How gentlemanly." She smiled cynically, before lifting her hands in surrender. "I'll go with Nagisa, I like his flying style better. No offense, Kunio, you're just too straight-arrow."
"Uh-huh." Kunio nodded knowingly, suspecting there was a little more to that decision than what was being presented, but unwilling to probe further. Even though a little on-edge because of the impending sortie, he managed a smile. "Looks like I get to hang on to Lyles for now. We'll be able to trash talk more that way I guess."
As if to prove the point, Doyle grinned, headed for his room. "Hell yes, sir."
After grabbing their flight gear from their bags, they took to the halls, pulled along by the locomotion treads located on the sides of the bulkheads. By simply putting a hand on one, they were dragged along until they let go. In the locker room, which was just a jaunt away, they changed into their flight suits, finding a couple of pilots already laying about the pilot's lounge.
When it came to Suzuka's turn to change, nobody seemed to notice. Though there were few female pilots in the mobile suit corps, the soldiers respectfully paid no mind as she got dressed in the same crimson and gray flight suit as her friends. Two orange stripes adorned her gray shoulders and red arms, and her fingers towed her dark garnet helmet along. The one thing she disliked about the flight suits of any variety were that they were rather form-fitting, showing off her curves more than she felt comfortable with. Putting modesty aside though, she met up with the guys, pulling her scrunchies out of her hair, and placing one on each wrist, so she could slip on a helmet without a struggle.
They were talking to the other pilots, all of who were GiNN pilots, around their own age. There was Drake, a dark-skinned, seasoned junior-grade, Elias, an ensign, and Katagiri, a Major, commander of that GiNN squad. The other pilots were either out on leave, aboard the Jericho, or just in their rooms.
"Ready to go?" Suzuka asked, hanging in between Nagisa and Kunio, poking her head into the group.
Nagisa nodded. "Ready. Kunio, Lyles?"
"Let's do this." Lyles said, bolting for the door, which opened with a whirr as it detected his presence. "I don't like the assignment, but whatever. I want to see how these things work."
"Fall in people." Kunio said, and led the way.
The ZGMF-LRR-704b recon GiNN was something of an oddball. Painted black, dark gray, and dark purple, and splotches of orange, with the standard red monoeye, it wasn't very good-looking. It was almost identical to the GiNN, but had extra fuel tanks behind the legs, and a modified chest compartment to house two flight crewers. In addition to added verniers, it carried a long-barrel sniper rifle instead of the MM1-M8A3 machinegun, and no sword. They also carried a large array of sensor antennae, as well as a modified head fin. Two of these unsightly beasts sat in the belly of the Solomon, prepped for launch on the order of Captain Yuki. When the four pilots of the Mimura squad showed up, the maintenance crews asked what was the matter—after introductions—and then let them get in.
Nagisa settled into the forward flight chair, feeling a bit cramped in the tightly-packed cockpit. The flight controls, fortunately, seemed identical to the GiNN trainer. There was only a little bit of variation as to where certain indicators and switches were, but nothing he didn't understand. As he sealed his helmet, the visor coming down with a click, he heard Suzuka slip in behind him. Then, he removed his helmet, remembering something.
The disc…he thought suddenly, feeling the square data disc's pressure against his jugular. How was he going to get the disc in, and override the standard OS to replace with his MS-DOS, with her watching? He felt his pulse pounding in his ears and his heart seemed to leap into his throat. He needed to think quickly.
"Oy! Suzuka!" Doyle's voice called from a few meters below, floating near the Long-Range's knees. "Oy!"
Thank god…Nagisa sighed, as Suzuka rushed out of the cockpit, grumbling about overactive testosterone. She floated away, leaving him to his business of powering up the Long-Range.
"What?" Suzuka said, her voice muffled because of her helmet. Nagisa ignored her chat with Lyles and began inputting his modifications, removing the disc, placing it in the reader, uploading the OS, replacing the disc, and rebooting the entire system, causing the appearance of a failed startup. To observers, it would look as if he'd just run into a stubborn mobile suit. He prayed silently as seconds melted away, counting down until when MS-DOS would take hold and clandestinely rewrite the system. When he heard a crash behind him as Suzuka disdainfully settled in again, he saw that the system was already prepped for flight.
In effort to make conversation, as the hatch closed, he looked over his shoulder, adjusting his helmet. "You alright, Suzie?"
"Fine." The young woman replied with a gruff rasp. "Doyle's just being annoying."
"Probably just worried about you. So am I." Nagisa said, checking the systems and waiting for Kunio's word to launch. He added helpfully, "I think we're all a little nervous, you know? First sortie and all."
"Yeah," Suzuka smiled faintly, accepting the olive branch-bearing surrogate. "It'll pass. We ready to get going?"
"Just about." Within moments, they got clearance to get on the linear catapult and make a patrol run ahead of the Solomon and the escort ships. With Kunio as squadron leader, in the top slot, they followed him out, launched simultaneously by the two catapults, streaking into the dark of space. Nagisa was pushed back into his seat, and Suzuka let out a groan. It was a few days since their last flight, enough time to get a little disaccustomed to the multiple g's of a launch.
"Long-Range 2 clear." Nagisa said over the comm unit, patching into the squadron link with Kunio and Doyle's unit, which flew a dozen meters ahead of them. "Orders?"
Kunio, inside his own snooper MS, fiddled with the controls a little, adjusting the trim and speed, gesturing with a gigantic mechanical arm to his wingmate. "Follow me. We're going to put these Recon types through some maneuvers, and see if anyone's tagging along with us."
"Copy."
The two Recon units, sniper rifles in hand, began chasing each other through some fairly standard flight patterns, taking turns to be in the lead. Nagisa discovered that the Recon unit was slightly more difficult to pilot, as it had added mass and a different distribution profile, but it wasn't anything he would have to adjust for in the OS. All it took was a few tentative rolls and turns to get a real feel for how the machine handled. There was a disconcerting tendency to want to veer right because of the inordinately long barrel of the main gun, but that was about it. It was faster than the standard GiNN, but not more maneuverable.
"Sensors?" He asked Suzuka, leaning back in his flight chair.
The nineteen-year-old Coordinator gave a noncommittal sigh, as she scanned her screens, detecting no enemy presence around them. Initially, she had to work at finding what gain levels and scan settings to use, but the equipment itself wasn't anything unorthodox. In fact, they were all schooled on how to use basic scanning gear, so the complex electronics of the LRR were only a couple of steps removed from that. It wasn't anything she couldn't figure out.
"All quiet on the western front, boys." She said into her helmet microphone pickup. "I don't suppose we're close enough to any enemy installations yet to pick up any Earth Alliance craft."
"Same here." Doyle reported sedately, tapping some keys on the diagnostic keyboard. "Hell, this place is just empty, from here to sector seven and L3. Of course, that excludes the debris belt, but we're not going there…are we?"
"No," Kunio said firmly. "We're to stick around the Solomon and act as an advance scout until otherwise notified. Captain Yuki's orders."
"Alright…. hey…what the hell is that?" Doyle swore, pulling up a tight-beam scan. "Check that out, Kunio!"
Suzuka was already on it. Ahead of them was an unusual concentration of dense materials, drifting in a loose arrangement of clumps and sporadic walls of rock, metal, and plastics. Something died here, something huge. "Looks like a station…but…there aren't any stations here…"
"Not anymore," Kunio countered pointedly, bringing his mobile suit to an abrupt halt with a flurry of jets. "Check your maps. This is where the Umbrella of Artemis used to be. We're not at L3 yet, but drift could have caused this."
There was no mistaking it. At the very center of the wreckage was a blown out core of rock and asteroid ore, with metal protruding here and there. They still weren't anywhere close enough to actually be seen from there, but they weren't taking chances. The fleet was far behind them, and they were a little too far from backup.
"How far is the Solomon from our position?" Nagisa asked, a little unnerved. This would be the perfect place to set up an ambush, if one wanted to. It was practically on Boaz's and Jachin Due's doorstep, near L5—PLANT—the primary reason Artemis was there originally. Now nothing more than a burnt-out hulk, it was so much floating rubble. But rubble meant cover, and cover meant hidden units.
Suzuka checked her map screen. "Yellow five hundred, Green One, Mach 20 Alpha. At present speed…they'll be here in ten minutes."
Kunio resisted the urge to spit. His hands flying across his dash, and then gripping the flight bars tightly, he spoke into the link. "Keep scanning for any enemy activity. We're not going to back up from here until we're sure there aren't any nasty surprises for Captain Yuki and the task force. Radio silence protocols unless you come into contact with the enemy, or I recall."
Nagisa replied with a double click of his communications unit, and cut his microphone off so he could talk to Suzuka without broadcasting his speech for kilometers around. Gently, he guided his LRR towards the ruins, following Kunio's visual cues and mobile suit's hand signals. In a backdrop of black and gray-brown, the unit was almost invisible save for its occasional bursts of vernier rockets, and telltale heat signature when those thrusters came to life.
"This place gives me the creeps…" Nagisa hardly noticed that he'd said that aloud, as he strained his eyes for signs of any Earth Alliance craft or other movement. They weren't far from the remains of Heliopolis, either…
Suzuka was busily working the sensors. "This debris is really mucking up my reception. Can you bring us in closer, so I don't have to bounce through so much crap?"
Nagisa obliged by tapping the thrusters a little more, using them judiciously as to not produce a bright heat trail that would give them away to any would-be ambushers. Ahead of him, the warped helix of the now-uninhabited station platform blotted out the stars, and every so often he thought he could see a rather disturbing sight: bodies, flash-frozen in mid-death, now lifeless blobs of orbiting carbon. He focused hard to not notice them.
"I'm getting something here…it's kind of faint. Hold up."
The LRR came up against a boulder, and stayed put, twirling about along with the skyscraper-sized rock as it spun on all three axes. The movement generated a strange sort of gravity that made it feel as if they were all strapped in sideways to the inside of the MS. "God…"
"That's it…" Suzuka said loudly. "Listen to this."
She turned up the audio volume and the gain so that Nagisa could hear it in the chair ahead of her. All the while she fought to dispel the notion that she was on a bad carnival ride in a sixty-five foot, cramped coffin.
"Alpha…-bravo seven come closer---Moon base?" a faint, static-filled voice said in incomplete snippets as the signal degraded either due to distance, or the rubble. "towing…---how much more---recovery squa---"
"That's definitely not natural." Nagisa said eventually, shaking his head. What were people doing around here? This place was just trash. Then a thought occurred to him, even before Suzuka began an analysis of the code signal. One man's trash is another's treasure…
"I'll bet you five credits that we just sniffed out a Eurasian recovery crew." Nagisa said, shifting the GiNN Recon so that it was crouched on the twirling piece of space ore. "Tight beam that to Kunio, see what he thinks. Line of sight only."
"Hai, wakarimashita." Hayes-Sato worked quickly and deftly, angling a laser-light transmission to the other GiNN Recon unit in the area. It took multiple attempts before the other unit received the signal because of their erratic rotation, but eventually she got a signal bounced back.
maintain radio silence, sneak in for closer peek—kunkun.
copy. She sent the terse message back to their squad leader and relayed the information to Nagisa in the command chair.
"The hell?" Doyle muttered, strapped tightly into the sensor officer's chair in Kunio's sardine-can GiNN Recon, fogging up his visor with the scoff he emitted. This was a little too much to bear: first they stumble upon the Artemis wreck, then a recovery squad. What the hell could they have been hoping to recover, in a total write-off like Artemis?
"Huh?" Kunio grunted inquisitively, edging the GiNN ever closer towards the source of the emissions. To achieve this, a stealthy approach, he resorted to the precarious practice of pushing off from rock to rock, groping out with his mobile suit's arms for support here and there, eventually coming to a soft landing on the second-largest chunk of rock-ruin.
"Whatever it is they're trying to recover here," Lyles started, flipping between screens, "I can't make heads or tails of it. The N-Jammers are fouling up my readings like all hell, almost as much as the rocks."
Neutron Jammers…Kunio thought bitterly. A necessary evil, to stop the fast-neutron bombardments that caused nuclear reactions, otherwise there would be no telling how many nuclear missiles would be crossing space to hit PLANT or vice-versa. He didn't doubt for a moment that the Earth Alliance would try to use nukes again if they were able. He may have felt brotherly love for a Natural, but one good person didn't make everyone else good either. He wasn't as trusting as Nagisa, no, not in the least. Not nearly as naïve.
"See what you can do to clean it up." Kunio ordered. "How long until Solomon gets here?"
There was a momentary silence, a few clicks. "Seven minutes. About five before whoever it is begins to notice that something big and mean this way cometh." This Lyles said in English, for emphasis.
"Any idea what's out there?" Kunio asked, treading carefully closer to the 'terminator' separating them from the concentration of the emissions. If he went too far, he might been seen visually, no matter how low-profile a Recon GiNN was. He was also mindful to keep the obscene head-fin under cover as well.
"From these signals, I'd say at least five different units. Give them a ship or two…" Doyle did a quick tally in his head from what he'd learned about Eurasian military craft. "Maybe ten mobile armors? A frigate? Who knows?"
"We could be facing a task force-sized group." Mimura concluded gravely. This didn't bode well, and they had to warn the Solomon of the impending danger. However, so far out, and deep in the rubble, they were out of communication with their command ship. Someone would have to go and tell the Solomon, while someone else sat in on the Eurasians, playing a dangerous game of hide and seek. Whoever remained behind would eventually have to fight in the Recon GiNN.
As he was the leader, it was natural that he take responsibility. Kunio looked over his shoulder. "Beam Nagisa and Suzuka. I'm ordering them back to the Solomon, as fast as they can, so they can give the Captain a warning. Try and get the Solomon to come in from a higher angle and surprise the enemy."
Doyle nodded, and worked hard to condensing the message as much as possible for an accurate transmission.
go warn solomon. advise coming in at red thirteen, orange thirty beta. we cover.The message from Kunio's unit was short but got to the point. It was now a direct order from the squad leader. Nagisa didn't want to leave Doyle and Kunio behind, but he couldn't refuse; there wasn't any time to argue the point, as the Solomon was about five minutes from the potential engagement zone, one minute at the recon GiNN's full acceleration.
Putting as much solid rock between him and the remains of Artemis, Nagisa turned the twenty-meter black GiNN around and pushed, headed towards the direction that they came from, throwing the throttle to the max. Both he and Suzuka were suddenly glued to their seats in an already constricting cabin.
"How…long…do we keep this up?" Suzuka asked, as they passed three g.
"A Slalom's worth." He said behind gritted teeth, checking his indicators. No one seemed to be following behind then, and now he could just detect the Solomon at the edge of his sensors. They were going to be in range soon.
"…GiNN Recon 2…in." a voice crackled unsteadily.
"Solomon, this is GiNN Recon 2 Lieutenant J.G. Mimura, we have Earth Alliance units up ahead in an asteroid ruin, repeat, we have enemy units." Nagisa said as soon as he was sure the transmission was coming from the Solomon. As of on cue, he could now make out the outlines of the Solomon, Aurora, and Jericho.
"Lieutenant, this is Yuki. There are Naturals hiding out at the Artemis ruins?" The older man's voice was loud and clear now.
"Yes sir, Kunio is still over there, he covered our retreat so we could get you the word." Nagisa confirmed, slowing the GiNN down, as Suzuka warned him he was going too fast. The Autobalancer did the rest, killing their angular momentum. "Looks to be a task-force sized recovery crew. Probably picking up after we smashed them last month."
"Understood, Lieutenant. Nagisa, Suzuka, recover to the Solomon and get out of the GiNN Recon." Yuki said as they neared. The mouth of the launch bay was lining up with them, and Nagisa pivoted around so that they drifted in, back first. When they bungled into the crash webbing, they were none too gently pulled to a halt.
"Sir?" Suzuka asked.
There was a chuckle. "You'll see, Lieutenant Hayes-Sato."
-End
of Phase 4.
A broken fortress, two youths trapped in a tight place. Never before for these young men and women have the stars shined so ominously, in this place of death and destruction. Trading fire with the enemy, it becomes obvious how real this war is. In the chaos, a new star burns brighter than the others.
That deadly light---Make it your own, Gundam!
Phase 5 of Mobile Suit Gundam SEED: Fog of War - The stars from Hell!