Murrue opened her eyes to see a young brunette girl sitting next to her. "Are you alright?" the girl asked.
The lieutenant opted not to answer her but instead tried to rise from the place she was lying on. The girl supported her back and gently pushed her into the sitting position.
"Thank you," Murrue said as she looked around. She saw two young male teenagers playing around the open cockpit of a deactivated Strike while another was berating them. A grunting voice of frustration from the left attracted her attention.
She turned her head and saw the boy pilot, what's was his name again, Kira?, was on top of Aegis which was on its back. He seemed to be trying to wrench Aegis' cockpit hatch open. "What are you doing?" she asked, deciding to deal with the other three boys after she solved what seemed to be the immediate problem.
"I'm trying to open the cockpit to get to the pilot."
"Huh? Are you an idiot?" Upon seeing that he was about to answer, she held up a hand. "Stop, don't answer that. Wait for me and don't do anything. If the door opens, close it immediately."
Despite slight vertigo that she felt, Murrue made her way to the cockpit's entrance, aided in her climb by the girl. She pressed a button near the entrance which revealed a small console with a small screen. Thank goodness for small miracles as the emergency service module was operational. She entered some commands to thoroughly disabled Aegis save for its life support. Rather than forcing the prototype to shut down and open the hatch, she had forced it to remain closed.
"The pilot inside was armed, in case you forgot." Murrue berated Kira. "If you open the door just like that, he can get out and attack everyone. There's a protocol to deal with that. And on that note, while I appreciate you," she turned toward the girl and then at the rest of the ensemble, "and your friends providing first aid to me, you should have kept Aegis under watch using Strike. Not standing on its chest. What if the pilot is awake and is actually biding his time?"
Kira became alarmed. "Then we have to take him out immediately!"
"Don't worry. He wouldn't be able to start it up from inside. Only basic life support is operational," Murrue explained, wanting to show that she was a decent soldier who treated war prisoners with respect. The pilot inside could be heavily injured due to the forced crash and die if not given timely treatment, but she was not in the position to be that merciful.
"But he could engage the self-destruct function!"
Murrue looked at him in confusion before recalling what happened to the GINN they fought. "Don't worry. There's no self destruct function installed,"
Even though she told him not to worry, Murrue was stricken with it herself. She didn't know what happened to the other three prototypes she had sent earlier. Just like she told the boy, there were no self-destruct modules on them so there was no way to protect them from falling into the enemy's hand. While the decision to omit them seemed stupid in the hindsight, it was made due to necessity. Testing the prototypes was difficult enough without needing to worry that a small mistake like a mishandling or a bug in the software could cause them to explode.
"Are you sure? I recall…" the boy's words trailed as his face scrunched in confusion.
"I'm sure. ZAFT's mobile suits have that system because they're thoroughly tested. As for that unwanted guest in Aegis, the only damage he could cause inside there is by smashing his head against the console."
Kira seemed satisfied by the explanation.
"I need everyone to come down for a minute because I want to tell something important to all of you."
Once the five of them were assembled in front of her, Murrue considered scaring them by pulling out her gun but decided that persuasion would be more effective in getting their cooperation. "May I know your name?"
"Tolle,"
"Kuzzey"
"Sai"
"Miriallia"
"And Kira here," Murrue said before the said person could reintroduce himself. "I'm Lieutenant Murrue Ramius of the Earth Force. Now, Tolle and Kuzzey, next time Sai or any of your friends tell you not to play with an top-secret military hardware, you should listen to his or her advice." She motioned her face toward Strike. "Yes, it is interesting, isn't it? Who else, do you think, would find it interesting?"
Everyone paled as they arrived at the answer she wanted.
"But Orb is neutral!" the boy named Sai said, "And Heliopolis is Orb's territory."
Murrue gestured toward the destruction around them. "Did you really believe that ZAFT cares about that? If a sniper was scoping you messing around in Strike's cockpit from a half kilometre away, how would he know that you're a civilian?" She pointed at herself. "I'm wearing a technician uniform but I'm still a military officer." Murrue made a finger gun and pointed toward the one called Kuzzey. "They're not going to know from such a distance. It's easier to shoot first and not having to ask questions later." She made a shooting motion, making her point.
"Then, what should we do?" the boy named Kuzzey said in a panic.
What she was about to say did tinge on her conscience since she would be manipulating them a bit but Murrue had no choice. "Even as we talk, there's a chance that someone is watching us. Therefore, I'll have to declare that I'm taking all of you into custody since all of you saw the prototypes. If people ask any one of you, you will tell the same thing. If we meet my people, I'll say that I did so because you saw something you shouldn't have. Understand?"
All five nodded.
"Good. Now to make you really understand what I'm talking about." she whipped up her pistol and fired a shot in the air before aiming at each one of them consecutively to make her point. "I will have all of you cooperate with me or else," she said in a more stern and louder voice.
"But taking civilians hostages is a war crime!" Tolle uttered, forgetting that it was an act on her side.
Murrue aimed way above his head and fired again, causing him to cringe and put his hands on his head. "ZAFT didn't care and I don't care! We're in the middle of the war or have you forgotten?"
The motley group of survivors led by Natarle made their way to the said warship to see that its physical appearance was in the worse for wear but no significant damage was evident. A few minutes later, she reached the bridge and began turning on the system. "As expected from Archangel," she muttered as the diagnostic indicated that it only suffered minimal damages."
"But we're trapped here. The harbor's exit is blocked off with a heap of rubbles."
"It would take some time to clear them," Natarle mused as she tried to engage the communication system only to hear static sounds. "It's still being jammed? Even though they have stopped attacking?" She gasped as she realized what was going on, "Damn! This is a diversion! They're actually going after the G-weapons!"
"05… rike… here… forces…. respond…"
The voice was riddled by statics but to Natarle and the rest, it may just have been the sweetest and most melodious voice that they've ever heard.
"Is that you, Rau?" Mu said as he fought against the man who used to be known as Rau La Flaga but adapted the Le Creuset name to distance himself from the La Flaga family. Rau was, by all accounts, his brother.
As well as his father.
Mu's father, Al Da Flaga was an influential and affluent politician in the Atlantic Federation. However, his father held a rather convoluted Aryanism ideology and viewed himself as one of a superior race due to his genetic. That view was quite strange and unique by itself since Al Da Flaga was a Natural, whose genetics wasn't modified. Even though Al loved Mu in the beginning, the man scorned him when it was found out that Mu was "genetically impure" due to his "inferior" mother's DNA, whatever garbage that meant.
It was as if Al Da Flaga was one of those Coordinator extremists that viewed themselves as being superior to everyone else.
Sure, Mu was just a dumb mobile armor jock but he had learned enough about biology to know that it was a fantasy holy grail of genetics. DNA evolved due to necessity, not due to superiority. A chameleon needed to survive against its predator? It developed the ability to change color. Arguably, a color-changing chameleon was superior to a normal colored species, but a superior trait would entail something else, such as a higher food requirement.
But his father probably paid to skip that Biology 101 class and instead to clone himself to make himself 'immortal' which also didn't make sense since even if the whole body was thoroughly cloned, his consciousness couldn't be transferred into the new body, essentially making the new clone, another person.
Due to that mistake, Rau was born, or in this case, created.
Mu was away when tragedy hit their home but he later found out that Rau ran to PLANTs after it happened. At first, Mu thought that Rau was trying to come to terms with what happened but then the latter changed his family name to Le Creuset causing Mwu to suspect that the man was involved.
Mu yanked his joystick hard, to evade the shots fired by the enemy CGUE. Getting lost in memory in the middle of a life-risking fight was a cardinal sin his trainer has knocked into his thick head time and time again. "Damn, if that's you, Fuck you! Fuck you if you're not Rau either!"
The two traded shots a few times and slowly made their way to the colony. He tried to overcome the CGUE but due to the pilot's skills, found himself being overwhelmed instead, losing all of Moebius Zero's gunbarrel units.
Kira watched from the open cockpit of Strike as Sai arrived with the vehicle Murrue requested to be retrieved. As per her instruction, Strike's right hand was in front of the cockpit, with palm open and facing forward to prevent any possible sniping from that direction.
"This is it," Sai said as he climbed down from the lorry. "The one's with extra batteries."
"Thank you," Murrue said. She looked over to Kira. "Any luck contacting Earth Force?"
"No."
"Well, replace the battery and try again."
"Even though there's more than sixty percent?" Kira said incredulously. "The battery's not going to like it."
"Killing battery prematurely is the least of our concerns. Hurry up!"
"Yes Ma'am," Kira said as he quickly went through the battery change.
"Resume contacting them," Murrue said once the change was done.
There was a sound of an explosion and everyone turned their heads toward the source. A gaping hole appeared on the colony's main shaft, caused by an explosion. Once it abated, a ZAFT CGUE unit appeared, followed closely by an Earth Force Moebius Zero, sans its gunbarrels.
"This is bad!" Murrue exclaimed. "Kira, activate Strike immediately! The rest, please get away from here!"
Kira quickly activated Strike and its Phase Shift armor. It was just in time as the CGUE dived in to make a strafing run. The bullets bounced off harmlessly off Strike and Kira let out a breath he held. As Lieutenant Murrue had said, the Phase Shift armor worked well against physical attack. That ZAFT pilot must have realized that so why was he turning around as if trying to attack again. Realization dawned on him about the pilot's true intention. "You're not destroying Aegis!"
Strike quickly moved to block the CGUE's attack against the unactivated mobile suit. Once again, bullets ricocheted against its border, heavier this time but still didn't leave any mark. Wanting to chase the single opponent away, Kira drew the beam rifle stored on the side skirt armor, took aim and fired.
The shot widely missed the agile CGUE but almost hit the Moebius Zero. "SORRY!" Kira said even though he didn't activate the communication device. However, the Moebius Zero pilot probably realized what was happening and instead manoeuvred so that the mobile armor would be far away from CGUE. Kira fired toward CGUE again and again, missing but at the same time forcing it to be on the defensive.
Then another explosion occurred and a white battleship appeared from what seemed to be an artificial hill. The explosion caught everyone's attention except Kira who managed to score a hit against the CGUE's head, destroying it.
The white battleship seemed to belong to Earth Armed Forces as it quickly launched missiles aimed at the CGUE which nimbly evaded, causing the missiles to hit the colony structure. One missile even hit a colony wall, causing a small hole that the CGUE used to escape.
"This is Archangel! Calling all Earth Armed Forces in the area!"
Having chased off the enemy, Archangel landed in the open area next to Strike. A few minutes later, the Moebius Zero landed on its deck. Simultaneously, Kira, which was still in Strike, carried Lieutenant Ramius and his friends in its hands and gently put them on the deck.
"Lieutenant Ramius!"
Murrue turned toward the sound to see a group of people coming from the direction of the hanger. "Ensign Badriguel," she said, acknowledging the woman who was leading the group.
"I'm relieved to see that you're safe, Ma'am"
"Thank you. And I would like to thank all of you for protecting Archangel and saving all of us."
Kira, having deactivated his mobile suit, open its hatch and got on the winch system to descend to the deck.
"Hey, don't tell me that kid's the one piloting it?" a man remarked.
"Lieutenant?" Badgiruel asked.
Murrue shrugged, confirming the fact.
"Well, this is a surprise," Mu interrupted, walking over. "I'm Lieutenant Mu La Flaga of the Seventh Orbital Fleet." He saluted. "Pleased to meet you."
The rest of the Earth Armed Forces soldiers saluted in return. "I'm Lieutenant Murrue Ramius, Sector 2, 5th Special Division,"
"Ensign Natarle Badgiruel of the same division."
"I would like to ask for permission to board this ship" Mu looked at Murrue and Natarle, "May I ask who's in charge around here?"
Natarle frowned a bit but then schooled her feature. "The Captain and other senior officers perished in battle. "Therefore, Lieutenant Ramius is next in command. Apart from her, all other survivors are non-commissioned officers."
Mu sighed. "That's bad. Anyway, please permit me to come on board, Lieutenant Ramius; the ship I was assigned to was destroyed by the enemy."
"Permission granted, Lieutenant," Ramius said quickly.
"And the pilots? I was assigned to escort them earlier. Where are they?"
Ramius turned toward Natarle who shook her head. "They were with the captain when the bombs went off…" the ensign said, trailing off in the end as she turned her attention toward the teenager who was approaching them.
"Lieutenant Ramius! Sorry to disturb you but..." Kira said.
"What is it, Kira?"
"How about Aegis?"
Murrue turned toward Kojiro. "Get the mobile suit on board," she then turned toward Kira, "Can you and your friends assist? The faster we can clear it, the faster the ship can leave and prevent further attacks."
Kira and the rest of his group nodded and left with Murdoch's.
Mu watched them leave with a hand on his hip. "So, he's a Coordinator?"
"Most probably," Murrue agreed. "He managed to reprogram Strike's OS in such a short time."
"Lieutenant, I request an explanation on why you let him pilot Strike," Natarle demanded.
"He saved my life from a ZAFT soldier."
"But he could have done that to gain your trust!"
"If that was the case, he had multiple chances to kill me, when I was inside and outside Strike. He didn't, and he even took down Aegis." Murrue turned, wincing at the accidental irony in that statement. "When you think about it, it's not so hard to imagine why a Coordinator helped. This colony belongs to Orb, which is a neutral country that has Coordinators among its citizens. Some of Morgenroete's staff are even Coordinators."
"Well, I have no problem with him," Mu said, "Just a bit curious, that's all. The pilots that were supposed to test the prototypes could barely make them move but the boy made it look easy."
"And now that you're here," Natarle began but Mu cut her off.
"Unless the OS is significantly improved, I'll be useless."
"But..."
Murrue intervened. "We don't have time for now. We get Aegis onboard and get the hijacker out."
"Then we escape the colony," Mu said, "through the same route this ship came in."
"We can't," Natarle said. "The exit is blocked."
"Crap."
Murrue agreed with Mu's assessment. Unlike ZAFT, Archangel and the prototypes were hosted by Orb so blasting the way out indiscriminately was not an option.
"Well," Mu said while shrugging. "I wouldn't worry much about that right now since it will settle by itself. Instead, we should look at this Aegis you're talking about just now."
The three of them joined the rest at the hangar where some people are already surrounding the recaptured Aegis.
"Lieutenant Ramius," Kira said as he approached them. "They are waiting for you."
She went to the same man who remarked about Kira being just a kid and talked a bit before rejoining the group. "Murdoch will get him out," Murrue said to the other three. "You'll have to watch from here, Kira. Safety protocol,"
Kira nodded but fidgetted a bit.
"Don't worry. Murdoch told me that the vitals are steady."
"He's awake?" Natarle asked cautiously.
"Not sure. But life support system indicates whiplash and soft tissue injuries, among others. But there's no damage on the outer sides. My guess is trauma through impact,"
"Trauma through impact?" Kira asked.
"Many injuries are caused by sudden deceleration or an impact. In the case of Aegis' pilot, the crash injured him a bit." Murrue gestured toward a medical orderly connect a portable tank to a faucet near the cockpit.
"What is he doing?" Mu wondered out loud.
"Connecting Nitrous Oxide to the air supply. Helps to reduce pain due to injury,"
The mobile armor's pilot whistled. "Relax as well?"
"That too." Being an analgesic gas, the nitrous oxide would ensure that whoever in the cockpit would be sluggish and could be handled easily. Mu probably knew about that particular usage, apart from combustion catalyst. The pilot's asking that question was probably for Kira's benefit.
After another few minutes, the hatch was finally opened and someone cautiously peered inside using a remote camera before they finally brought out what seemed to be an unconscious pilot.
Kira gasped as he had a good look at who the pilot was. "Athrun."
Murrue shared a look with the other two.
Murrue had Kira join his friends and asked Natarle and Mu to come with her to the bridge. The din inside the hangars as what remained of Archangel's personnel tried their best to bring in and organise all the supplies that they had.
"So, future drama on this bucket of bolts, eh, Captain?" Mu said while smirking once they were there.
"Which I don't need, thank you. What are the odds of him knowing the pilot?"
"That's why we can't trust him," Natarle insisted.
"Sure, we can have the kid confined to the brigs," Mu said, "But who's going to replace him? You?"
Natarle shrunk a bit.
"Coordinator or not, he's a civvy and isn't subject to military laws," Mu said. "Then again, Captain Beautiful here is already breaking several laws letting him pilot Strike."
Murrue was about to protest but Mu raised his hands.
"As I said, we need him if we want to fight our way out of this colony before ZAFT turned it into floating debris." He grinned at Natarle, "Unlike Ensign Gorgeous here would like to a have a go convincing our enemy to go home quietly."
Meanwhile, the group of five teenagers tried to relax in the crew area they were led to by a soldier. At first, Kira wanted to go to the infirmary to see Athrun but was prevented from doing so due to medical and security reasons. Without anything to do, he lay down to sleep, exhaustion finally catching up from him.
"I'm surprised Kira can still sleep in this kind of condition," Kuzzey remarked. "Then again, it's to be expected, I guess."
"What do you mean by that?" Miriallia asked.
"All of us were too scared to relax properly, but Kira," Kuzzey hesitated, "to him, this is nothing I guess." He looked at Tolle. "You know about him, do you?"
"Kuzzey?" Sai asked, not understanding what was being asked.
"The pilot and the other officer were looking at Kira intently; the latter with suspicion. That's not the look they should give to people helping them. Kira is my friend and I think that he's amazing… but… Tolle, he's a Coordinator, isn't he?"
"He is. But he's first-generation," Tolle said, his statement revealing that Kira's parents were Naturals. Because they and Kira's were citizens of Orb, their loyalty lay in the country and shouldn't be questioned.
"I don't mean anything bad by it," Kuzzey said slowly. "But Kira told us that he reprogrammed that mobile suit's OS. I can't imagine he knew about it beforehand," he said, implying that Kira did so during the fight. "Tolle, you were in the cockpit, weren't you? Can you imagine piloting it right off the bad?"
Tolle shook his head.
"I can't imagine myself doing that either," Kuzzey said. "But all of us saw what happened earlier. He almost hit that white mobile suit a few times. Coordinators, genetically enhance can those mind-blowing things even though they're beyond us. And you saw that pilot just now, he looked to be of the same age as us but he's already in the Red Coat. And to think, ZAFT is full of people like that," he smiled wanly, "Do the Earth Armed Forces stand a chance?"
The rest kept quiet.
The conversation would have died just like that if not for the woman named Murrue who wanted to talk to Kira. Reluctantly, Tolle roused his friend from his short respite.
"Kira, I'll be honest. I need your help to pilot Strike again,"
"I'm not going back inside that thing!" Kira said, flat out refusing her. "Even though there's a war outside, we don't want to be a part of it."
"You're a part of it whether you like it or not," Murrue responded. "This is not what we wanted as well, but right now, we can't let you off the ship,"
"Because we saw what we shouldn't have?" Tolle asked
"Shelters have been locked down fully so no getting you there. And there's a higher risk of the colony environment collapsing if we have to fight again so the option of letting you go down is not in my hand as well."
"This isn't fair!" Kira responded.
"Kira, I can't and wouldn't force you to pilot Strike to defend the ship. The fact is there are two mobile suits and a mobile armor but only Strike that's ready for launch."
Kira gritted his teeth in frustration. "Very well, but on the condition that we have to launch now.!"
"But... "
"Captain Murrue, ma'am, if what you're saying is true, then the enemy is going to attack this ship. The longer we wait, the higher the chance that we will be caught unprepared.
Murrue stared at Kira before nodding. "Suit up now," She then moved to a nearby terminal and contacted the bridge. "Prep for launch immediately. I'll be there."
In the end, he had to do it. Even if he didn't fight, the ship will continue to resist ZAFT's attempt to disable it. In the end, the likelihood of the battle damaging the colony is higher. Most of the population has been evacuated to the escape pods but the less the fighting happened inside the colony, the better chance for them to survive. Kira hoped that by doing his fight, he would at least help to ensure that his parents are safe.
Ten minutes later, Kira launched, with Strike being equipped with the Aile Striker. He wanted to mount the Sword Striker to reduce the risk of causing damages to the colony at first but then changed his mind, reasoning that he was not skilled in close-quarter battle. He is, after all, is a civilian who just wanted to keep the enemy away.
His launch was quite timely, as ZAFT renewed its attack. A side of the colony was breached and four GINNs entered, three armed with big missiles while the other had a beam cannon. The GINN with the beam cannon immediately pursued Strike, as if the pilot had a personal vendetta against him.
Strike and the GINN traded pot shots with each other. The shots missed each other, causing damages to the surrounding. One of the shots from the GINN melted a cable supporting the colony shaft when Kira evaded it.
Meanwhile, around them, the colony was slowly being destroyed. A shot from Archangel's Gottfried beam cannon pierced through the cockpit of one of the GINNs and hit the main shaft. The pilot was killed immediately, but the anti fortification missiles it was carrying misfired, causing more damages. Eventually, the damage became too great that the colony began to collapse.
"Strike! Come in!"
Kira stared at his opponent amidst the call as he didn't want to lose focus. The GINN which was floating right in front of him was being piloted by someone more skilled than he was. Not a few times he had to block the shots accurately aimed at Strike's cockpit. His eyes stole a glance at the power indicator. Kira had around thirty per cent of power reserve left. He wasn't familiar with GINN's beam cannon power usage but Kira knew that all those shots would sap a lot of power from it.
Then there was another transmission, this time revealing that the disintegration of colony's structural support had become too great and partial compulsory evacuation orders are implemented in areas directly damaged.
This time, the transmission caught Kira's attention so much that he barely raised the shield to block the shot aimed at him. Then, before he felt a very strong impact against Strike, knocking him away at high speed toward a hole at the side of the colony.
1
A/N
Heliopolis means "City of the Sun. The chapter's name alludes to its fate