Chapter 5: Enter Patrick Zala: Part 2

"Welcome, Athrun. Long time no see."

Athrun slowly started into the extremely large room, unsure of his father's reaction to his disappearing act.

Chairman Zala stood up and went up to Athrun with the same cold look upon his face. He held out his hand, as if he wanted to shake his hand. But, as quick as lightning, he raised it up and struck Athrun across his face.

"Why are you with those filthy deserters? Coordinators are supposed to fight Naturals, not save them!"

Athrun placed his hand on his burning cheek, very surprised at his father's actions. He could feel the anger rising inside of him just thinking about what he said. "WE aren't deserters, and we only protect the innocent! Is that so wrong! Because of East Earth Forces and West EA, everyone but the savages have to hide and give up everything, just to have even a small chance of living! Why must you kill these innocent people?"

"Because they started it! They can't accept the fact that we're more evolved than them!"

"But not everyone feels that way! The West Earth Forces are just as much to blame, but you're blowing it out of proportion! Not all Naturals are the same! Unlike you, some can think for themselves and be peaceful!"

Zala's demeanor suddenly turned even darker. "It doesn't matter what you think, because you aren't going back! You won't leave this base until I figure out what to do with you!"

With one swift chop (and a little help from his coordinator abilities) he knocked the blue haired teen unconscious. Meanwhile outside the room, Cagalli heard Athrun hit the ground. "Athrun!" She pulled out a handgun and entered the room. There were two guards who were there, but she didn't care. She aimed and fired at Zala, but only hit his shoulder.

"Urrgh! My arm! Guards… get… her."

"Damn, I missed his head." Cagalli muttered under her breath. Both of the guards charged at her furiously. Cagalli raised her gun, but it was knocked out of her hand by the guard. The other one was about to fire his gun, but was stopped by Zala.

"Wait, don't kill her. If we keep both of them here, the rest will come and we can kill them all."

The guard nodded, and knocked her unconscious also with the butt end of his gun.

Back at the Forsaken Sector, Kira and the rest of them were getting along great with the resistance fighters. Since Kira and Lacus couldn't fight very well, they learned proper fighting techniques and how to survive. After they learned this, the fighters sent them out on their own and then they'd have to get back to the sanctuary. They had to send a search party to find them. After they'd returned, the fighters decided to give them a break, so the two of them met up with Yzak and Dearka.

"So how did you guys do?" Dearka asked.

"Uh, we got lost…" Kira replied, not very happily.

"Ha! You owe me 40 bucks, Dearka!" Yzak exclaimed happily.

"Hey, we didn't shake on it Yzak!"

"What? You bet on us?" Lacus asked, shocked at her friends actions.

"Uh…" Yzak stuttered.

"I said you wouldn't get lost! It was all Yzak who didn't believe in you"

"Shut up Dearka!"

While they were busy yelling at each other, Kira realized that Athrun and Cagalli have been gone for a long time.

"Hey guys, don't you think that Athrun and Cagalli should be back by now? It's been over 8 hours."

"I knew we couldn't trust that guy!" Yzak said angrily. "We have to go and get them back from those ZAFT dogs! You guys up for it?"

They all nodded.

"Alright then, let's go. But since you don't have a suit, Lacus, you should stay here and make up and excuse on why we left."

"But why don't you take them with you? You'd have a better chance." Lacus said.

"You heard what Mwu said. They aren't good in these kinds of situations. They'd only get in the way. Dearka, Kira, let's go."

They suited up and got ready to take off, but Lacus stopped Kira.

"Kira, be careful. I'm sure that Patrick Zala has many soldiers at his base."

Kira blushed a little under his thick helmet. He activated his communication systems. "Don't worry, Lacus. I'll be just fine, and so will Athrun and Cagalli. I promise."

With that, he activated the thrusters and took off along with Yzak and Dearka.

…………………………………..

As they got farther in the sky, both Yzak and Dearka both turned to Kira

"Lead the way, Kira." Yzak said.

He nodded and activated his tracking system. The Strike Suit has the ability to track ships because of the pollution trail ships leaves behind, no matter how long ago or how small the pollutant. Kira he quickly looked at the path and changed the direction he was going by about 90 degrees, with Dearka and Yzak at his tail. But, eventually, they were stopped by a group of enemies in the new GINN suits.

"I think we're getting close to the base. And the defense looks pretty strong." Dearka said.

Kira said nothing, but instead focused completely on wiping them out. He quickly drew his sword and charged. But the GINN suits were also equipped with swords, so the two of them clashed swords. The person in the GINN suit was stronger than Kira, and his blade inched closer and closer to Kira's head. But, Kira wasn't done yet. He quickly activated the beam of the sword and easily sliced the GINN's blade in two. Then, he stabbed the sword through the enemy, making the suit explode. "When are they going to learn?" Kira asked himself.

Dearka and Yzak were having a tough time handling both of their adversaries. Dearka drew his beam rifle and fired at the GINN, but it was too fast. The suit was designed with superior thrusters, so Dearka couldn't land a single hit on it. The enemy came in for an attack with the machine gun, but the bullets only dented Dearka's suit. But this still hurt like heck because the metal was pounding Dearka. But he had a plan. He spotted Yzak getting fired at from the last GINN suit. Dearka flew behind the enemy suit that Yzak was fighting, with the other one on the blonde haired coordinator's tail. The suit saw Dearka behind him, so while he was firing at Yzak still, he drew his sword in his free hand and tried to strike Dearka, but he flew up just in time, making him cut the other GINN suit. The enemy had accidentally killed his own partner! While he was realizing what had just happened, Yzak whipped out his rifle, shot, and destroyed the enemy suit.

"We make a great team, Yzak."

"Yeah, whatever… Hey, Yamato, how'd you fare?"

"It was no problem, Yzak. Now let's get going. Athrun and Cagalli could be in danger."

The three of them continued to make their way towards the main ZAFT base.

Back with Athrun…

Athrun awoke with a start and a sore head. "What the… Where am I?" He looked around to see a bland and bare room, almost like a prison cell. Then he remembered what his father told him.

Flashback

"It doesn't matter what you think, because you aren't going back! You won't leave this base until I figure out what to do with you!"

Athrun quickly got up from the bed and desperately tried to open the door. He banged on it with his fist, yelling for help. But it was no good. His father was going to keep him here, trapped like a white lab rat. His father gave no mercy, not even to his own son. Who knew what would happen to him? Would he send him to another academy? Or would he just kill him altogether? Athrun just decided it was not a good time to try and fight back. As came to this realization, a soldier came in and grabbed him by the arm and started to bring him to his father's room.

With Kira, Yzak, and Dearka…

After a long period of flying, they finally reached their destination. But there were no guards on the outside for some strange reason.

"It's almost as they want us here,"Kira thought to himself. Nonetheless, they entered the esteemed ZAFT base. The group traversed down the hallway, checking potential areas that Athrun or Cagalli could be in, but they weren't in any of them. They came upon the biggest room of all. Somehow, they just knew they'd find something in there. When they opened the large doors, they were shocked to see about 15 guards, Athrun and Cagalli tied up, and Patrick Zala in front of it all, with an evil grin on his face. He pointed at the three teenagers, eager to see them die.

"Guards, take care of our guests."

Then, simultaneously, all three of their eyes dulled and lost their shine. Kira drew his blade, while Yzak and Dearka took out their beam rifles.

The guards fired rounds from their machine guns, but they did no good at all. The three teens charge forwards and took them all out with no mercy at all.

Shaking in his boots, Zala took out a knife and put it up to Cagalli's neck.

"If you make one more move, I'll kill her! Now drop your weapons!"

Kira, Dearka, and Yzak went back to normal, and did as he said. There was no way that they'd let him kill another one of their teammates.

"Remove your armor!"

They obeyed, and stripped down to their normal clothes.

"That's better…" He grabbed Cagalli's handgun off of the ground and pointed it towards them.

"Say goodbye, Gundam Force!"

But just as he was about to shoot, multiple explosions were heard and a West Earth Alliance ship crashed into the room and destroyed nearly half of the room. The ship was a light shade of orange and had multiple cannons on the back. Mwu, Lacus, and the rest of the fighters got off of the ship. "Lacus is a terrible liar," Mwu said with a smirk. One of the resistance fighters shot the knife and gun out of Zala's hands.

Mwu went up to them and untied Athrun and Cagalli. "We've got to get out of here. The base is crumbling as we speak!"

They all quickly climbed aboard the ship except for Athrun. He looked towards his father.

"Father, why did you have to do all of this? Do you really hate Naturals this much?"

Patrick turned away in disgust. "Don't call me father. You're no son of mine."

"But-"

A large piece of debris fell and separated them from each other. Patrick hit a button on the wall that made the platform he stood on descend into the hangar and into and escape pod. Immediately, followed by others, he launched into the sky. "The next time we cross paths, Athrun, I'll kill you."

Athrun stood in shock at what had just happened. Kira poked his head out of the ship to call him. "Athrun, we have to get out of here right now."

"Huh? Oh, right." He came back to his senses and got aboard the ship.

When he came aboard, he saw that some people were wearing West Earth Alliance uniforms.

"Hm, that's strange…" he said to himself. "Uh…"

"Mwu, Mwu LaFlaga."

"Right, Mwu, why are there West Earth Alliance soldiers here? I thought you were fighting them."

"Well, we made a truce when we thought you were the enemy, so I guess it just hasn't ended yet, eh?"

One of the West EA soldiers in the controls took a look outside. "Hey, it looks like part of the base hasn't collapsed yet." He attempted to push the button for the main cannon, but Mwu caught his arm.

"I think we've done enough to them already."

"Awwww…" At this, everyone got a little bit of a chuckle out of it, except for Athrun. He stared out the window, thinking of his father.

"Father, when will you ever see things in the right light?" Athrun asked himself this in his head as the ship continued back to the Forsaken Sector.

A/N: Yessss! Two updates in one day! Also, please review.