Mobile Suit Gundam SEED DESTINY

The New Coordinate

Story:
AU of GSD. Xander Darklighter, a pilot with attitude problem was just assigned to Minerva when three new mobile suits were stolen from Armory One. What will happen when he decided to take that path in front of him?

Notes:
Warp: -blinks- What do you mean...roll over and die?

ChibiRulz: Be patient about Xan-Luna, eh? It will happen.

Thanx for the reviews. Keep 'em coming!

I don't own GSD, their characters or anything else aside from Xander Darklighter.

Chapter 12: Mysterious Stranger

Minerva was sailing smoothly on the Indian Ocean. Xander, in his Dark Strike with Mirage Colloid enabled, watched the ship from a distance. He decided to check things out after promising Jess to meet up at Gibraltar.

"How's everyone doing down there? How's Luna..."

He slapped his head. "Damn, why do I think of her at this time?"

Suddenly, his sensor picked up a whole lot of Alliance's suits. Xander moaned. "Oh, great. All I want to do is check things out..."

With that, he distanced himself further from Minerva to see the battle by himself.

The Force Impulse launched from Minerva followed by the new Savior Gundam. Xander checked on his display to see a whole squad of the new Windam and Dagger lead by Chaos. The pilot decided to engage Savior while a customized version of Windam took on Shinn.

"What a cheap bastard." Xander cursed after seeing Impulse was cornered by many Dagger units. And it seems that Savior was too busy with Chaos to lend a hand.

"Dammit! What should I do?"

Moments later, Xander saw two ZAKU units came out and dropped into the waters.

"Must be Abyss. Shoot! I have to help Shinn."

With that, he turned off the Mirage Colloid and approached the battle where Impulse was.

On the bridge of Minerva, Xander's unit was detected by the radar.

"Captain! Another mobile suit coming in! It's going towards where Impulse is!" Meyrin informed.

"Bring it on screen." Talia said.

Talia gasped. "Strike?"

"Is that the one that appeared on Orb?" Arthur said.

Athrun, in his Savior unit detected Xander's Dark Strike. "Is that the new Strike the captain had been saying?" He tried to establish communication but failed. "He's cutting off the communication?"

Then, a text message appeared.

I'm not your enemy.

After sending the text message to Athrun, Xander saw Gaia running on the waters towards Shinn who was pursuing the leader piloting the customized Windam. Gaia then leap at Impulse but before it could hit its target, Xander appeared between them to block the attack. Using this to his advantage, Xander shoulder tackled the black quadruped unit away. Xander turned to Impulse and signaled it to go for the target. Shinn nods and continued his pursuit for the Windam while Xander was left to engage the now enraged Stellar in her Gaia.

"You..! Who are you?" she yelled and turned into its mobile suit mode. Xander pulled out his saber to ignite the flaming red beam.

"Come on. All I have to do is buy some time." Xander said.

Athrun watched the development and sighed. "Glad Shinn is okay but who is the pilot? He seems to be very good at using a unit that was supposed to be obsolete."

He avoided another attack from Chaos and transformed into its mobile suit mode and engaged his opponent directly.

Shinn tried to catch up with the Windam but it seems that his opponent preferred a long range battle.

"Damn! If this goes on..."

He glanced at the Dark Strike who was engaging with Gaia on land. But the Dark Strike seems to be content on blocking and dodging the attacks dished out at it.

"Who is that guy? He seems to enjoy the fight. And that flamboyant style of flying looks familiar..."

Xander was having fun in playing around with Gaia when his sixth sense tingled.

(This feeling. Someone's in danger but where?)

He quickly turned to Minerva and called out a name. "Lunamaria!" Almost instantly, his eyes turned into ghostly white. While Xander was distracted, Stellar used this opportunity to slice him with her saber. With quick response, Xander easily blocked the attack with its shield and sliced Gaia's hand off with his remaining hand.

With Gaia holding its stump, Xander left and headed towards Minerva and spotted Abyss from his sensor. He also detected the presence of both ZAKU units. Without much thought, Xander hit the waters to see Lunamaria's ZAKU had been hit by one of Abyss' torpedo missile. He caught the red unit and grabbed its bazooka launcher and aimed at the amphibious unit.

"HOW DARE YOU DO THAT TO HER! HOW DARE YOU!"

He pulled the trigger and the missile hit Abyss with deadly accuracy. Not having enough, he fired more rounds until it eventually went out of ammo with most of his attacks hit Abyss so hard that it was forced to retreat but not without taking down the ZAFT submarine Neila Bongo.

Xander turned to the red ZAKU which was now able to move. His eyes had now turned to normal.

(Lunamaria...)

He saw Rey came in and he decided to leave.

The battle was over by the time Xander emerged from the waters. He could see Savior and Impulse made their way back towards Minerva and both ZAKU units did just the same. Then, Xander got a message of thanks from Athrun. Smiling, Xander replied no problem to him.

"Well, no point with me hanging here much longer. See you...Lunamaria."

With that, the Dark Strike turned around, spread its wings and left the battlefield, enabling the Mirage Colloid.

"Captain, the Strike signal just disappeared. Probably because of Mirage Colloid." one of the crew said,

"I see. We don't know who it is but he was a big help to us." Talia remarked.

"Yes. Who knows what will happen to us if Abyss managed to get to us." Arthur added.

Talia nods. "Indeed. We'll be taking a few hours rest before continuing our journey."

Lunamaria and Rey were discussing about the Dark Strike when a loud slapping sound could be heard. Athrun slapped Shinn because of his disobedience during battle.

"I don't mind if you want to hit me, but I haven't done anything wrong! The people there were saved by my actions!" Shinn said in protest.

Another slap hit Shinn before he could finish. Athrun looked at Shinn in anger.

"A war isn't about being as hero! Don't go around making decisions on your own! If you have the power, then understand how to utilize it!"

Shinn looked at Athrun in disdain. Ignoring him, Athrun continued.

"Take that Strike unit as an example. I'm sure he already seen the prisoners but he did nothing. Why? Because this is war! You have to think of your own survival before thinking about others!"

With that, Athrun walked away from him.

On the bed in her quarters, Lunamaria was wondering about the mysterious Strike unit and how it saved her from Abyss. She was dazed during that time but she was sure that she heard Xander's voice through the line though it was scrambled.

(Xander, was that really you? Or my mind is playing tricks on me? I'm sure you're still alive out there. What are you doing? When will you ever return? When will I see you...again..?)

Tears fell off her eyes as she slowly drifted into slumber land.

At the mountains near the river of Suez, Xander had reached the rendezvous point where Jess was waiting for him with his unit. The sun already set in the west.

"Hey, where were you? I don't think it took the whole day just to check things out with Minerva." Jess said with a sarcastic tone in his voice.

"Well, battle seems to follow me everywhere I go. Minerva was attacked again and I was forced to help out."

Jess' jaws opened unhinged. "What? A battle? Aww man! I missed out the good stuff!"

Xander laughed. "Hahaha. Too bad, my friend. Is that a town I see below?"

Jess nods. "Yep. It is currently occupied by the Alliance and they put up a stronghold here. ZAFT tried numerous attempts on taking it out but they failed so far."

"Eh? Why's that? It supposed to be a normal base, right?"

Jess shook his head. "Too bad it's not. The base was located strategically in the mountains overlooking that small path you see. In fact, it is the only path in order to get through it. To make things worse, they put up a positron cannon at the top and that alone had virtually wiped all ZAFT forces who were brave enough to face it."

"I see. I bet this will be a good location for your next photo session."

"Yup. Well, let's go down and have some chow."

Xander grinned. "Sounds great. I'm sick of having your grilled fish every single day."

Jess glared at him. "Oi, that's an insult to my cooking skills."

"Skills? Hey, even a seven year old boy scout could do that!"

"Why you..."

They continued their bickering as they walked down into the small town.

To Be Continued...