Everyone on the bridge of Archangel watched in silence as a metal claw slowly moved to tighten itself around a rescue "handle" on Silverwind.

"Secured," the young man named Tolle said as he finished manipulating the said appendage.

There was a collective sigh of relief as let out a breath of relief as the final extension was connected to the Silverwind. A few more minutes would pass before the damaged shuttle was fully secured to the ship, but at that point in time, it was as good as done.

"Good job, everyone," Murrue said, "At ease,"

Arnold, who was sitting at the helmsman seat leaned back and put his hands behind his head. "It's going to take a while, isn't it?"

"Seems like it." Murrue looked at the screen showing the shuttle. A door opened and two people wearing space suits got out to assess its damage. The standard operating procedure for a ship conducting rescue was for it to send out personnel to help in the repair; Archangel was barely functioning with its small crew so doing so was out of the question. Furthermore, even if she could scrounge up some people, getting Silverwind to accept that help will be difficult seeing that the ship that rescued them belonged to the Earth Alliance. In Murrue's opinion, trying to repair the shuttle was for nought. The ship was so heavily damaged that it was a matter of time its systems would go down. The logical thing to do there was to have the passengers transfer to her ship.

Murrue caught herself. The decision to captain the ship was made then due to the circumstances then and even though it was a temporary arrangement, she still carried out her responsibility as needed. However, she had never accepted the position in her heart. By finally acknowledging that she was the ship's captain, Murrue had invested emotionally in the position.

Was it a good thing?

She couldn't be sure. However, it was going to be pushed aside for a while to deal with the current issue of managing Silverwind's rescue. She had made the offer of letting the passengers transfer to her ship. On the other hand, she didn't really want them on the ship but had to make the offer because she would fail the mission otherwise.

Suddenly, Dalida who was drinking from his bottle choked, coughing a few times before regaining control of himself.

"Are you okay, Dalida?" Murrue asked with a bit of concern in her voice.

"Sorry, Ma'am. Just had something passing in my mind just now,"

"Do share,"

"It's nothing, really, just that this ship got its name from an angel but it occurs to me that right now we're more like Noah's Ark," Dalida waited a few seconds before delivering the punchline, "full of political animals,"

The statement got a few chuckles from the crew including the normally stoic Natarle.

On the other hand, Murrue wished that she could laugh at the joke. The temporary captain of the ship had developed a stomach ache while in Artemis and had chalked it up to something she ate. Frowning slightly, Murrue put an arm over her stomach. The pain had returned, just as she was thinking about how troublesome it would be to arrange for security details for a group of potentially hostile Coordinators.

As Kira floated away from Strike, his eyes roved in the direction of Aegis. Strange. The mobile suit had landed earlier though the cockpit hatch wasn't open. His experience with Strike told him that after he had disembarked from the mobile suit, he was supposed to leave the cockpit open to indicate that he wasn't in and to make it slightly easier for the technicians to conduct maintenance.

Deciding to investigate further, he grabbed the railings he was approaching, plant his legs on them and pushed away toward Aegis. Once close enough, he called out, "Flay," knowing that she could hear him from inside. "Are you in there?"

A few seconds passed before the door slowly moved away, revealing the cockpit. Flay, still in her flight suit, was seated, hyperventilating as her hands held the controls tightly.

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah," she breathed, "let me have… a few minutes. Can you… check… on Silverwind?"

That statement was unexpected since she already knew the shuttle was connected to the ship and there was no risk of it drifting away. It was as if she was trying to get him to leave. However, before he could say anything, Murdoch interrupted from behind. "Idiot. You know this is going to happen, aren't you?" the man accused.

Kira turned toward him questioningly.

"Step aside, kid," Murdoch said, while gently pushing him away.

"What's wrong with her?" Kira asked as a few more people moved in toward the open cockpit. It took some effort but they managed to get her out. One of them removed the helmet revealing that she had gone pale and her expression was one of pain.

"I guess her body cramps all over,"

"Cramps?"

"Yeah, that's what you get when a rookie gets inside a mobile armour or mobile suit and performs all those fancy-schmancy moves. She strained her muscles, and ended up like that."

Kira could only watch in concern as she was brought to a nearby clearing and her flight suit was removed. Murdoch didn't do it intentionally, but the man had highlighted the difference between a Natural and a Coordinator. While Kira neither participated in sports nor engaged in regular fitness exercises apart from what was normal he had no problems performing all the said movements. There was Mu who could do wonders in his Moebius Zero. However, that man was a trained pilot.

But Flay, she was not properly trained for high-g combat maneuvers. While she certainly had conditioned herself to live in a space colony, and with it, surviving in a spaceship just like everyone else, it was not enough.

"Is she going to be okay?" he asked.

"I wouldn't worry much," Murdoch said, seeming to understand what he was thinking. "The pilot support system says that it's just a mild case and we've administered some pain killers and muscle relaxants but it's good to get the doctor to take a look over her. Once she gets some rest, she should be okay. Later on, she'll get used to it."

"Get used to it?"

"Yeah. Next time we'll have to prescribe something and she has to work on her fitness a bit,"

"Next time?" Kira uttered, not wanting to believe what he was hearing. It was as if she would be piloting the mobile suit again.

"Moebius Zero has landed!" someone announced, breaking his line of thoughts as the said mobile armor was stopped by the arresting net.

"Okay people, on to the next agenda," Murdoch said. He gestured toward one of the crew members near Flay, "Give her to the kid. He'll get her to the infirmary,"

Kira took Flay into his arms gingerly, holding her shoulders. Together, they moved to leave the hangar.

"Sorry for always troubling you, Kira," Flay said.

"It's okay. I fight to protect everyone," he replied while smiling wanly.

He got a forlorn look, and she became incommunicado for the rest of the trip, only saying few words to the doctor who examined her. Feeling that he had done something wrong, Kira kept quiet. But after he had set her on the bunk and was about to leave when she pulled on his hand. Surprised, Kira let himself engulfed in a hug.

"I'm sorry," Flay whispered.

"Sorry? What do you mean?"

"You shot them because you wanted to save me."

Kira's eyes widened.

"That's why it's okay. Blame me,"

Her words caused Kira's repressed emotions to come to the front and he began to cry, no longer able to deny what he knew deep down: he had willingly killed. He buried his face in her chest, gripping her body in desperation. Meanwhile, the girl he held grimaced for a moment before closing her eyes and schooled her expression. She rubbed his back soothingly until he ended sleeping in her arms, following after him a few minutes later.

The conversation went well, in Mu's opinion, all matters considered.

Nellie Waterman, the leader of the delegation was understandably suspicious of them, just like all of them would be suspicious of her if the situation was reversed. After all, Silverwind was under attack by an unknown enemy utilising Moebius and Archangel appeared right on time to save it.

Mu replied, admitting that while that was true, Silverwind was also attacked by mobile suits. While mobile suits could be piloted by any Coordinator not affiliated with PLANT or ZAFT, it would be easier to pin the attack as some sort of a false flag operation; an operation conducted to pin the blame on another party. He then had Murrue show the mission request from Artemis.

In the end, Murrue, Natarle and he managed to convince Nellie and the VIP with her, the daughter of Siegel Clyne, that Archangel has nothing to do with the attack. With that part settled, the next part was transporting everyone from Silverwind to Archangel. Here, Murrue showed her mettle by preemptively preparing for the transfer from their side. Once the discussion was concluded, the operation would start right away.

The talk then delved into assigning the Silverwind's crew their living quarters as Murrue wanted to make sure all will run smoothly and at the same time prevent misunderstanding as which would certainly lead to unnecessary friction.

Apart from the injured people and the medical personnel, the rest were to be cordoned in one section of the ship. The injured people, for obvious reasons, had to be put up at the infirmary. The medical personnel, which were needed to assist in treatment, would be placed at nearby rooms and escorted to and from the infirmary. Of course, due to security reasons, the section would be locked and security details would be maintained at all times, which was something already in place since that ZAFT underage militarized hijacker was there. The young soldier would probably be afflicted with a severe case of stupidly-suicidal-plan-itis and infect others so anticipating that, security had to be increased.

Then assistance came unexpectedly. Nellie requested for Lacus, the said daughter of Clyne, to be placed somewhere near the PLANT's medical personnel along with her guards. That was understandable since the standard operating procedure was to have a VIP to be accompanied by medical personnel in case his life was in danger. Then again, that kind of request was too much. Archangel was neither a cruise ship nor it was a ship under PLANTs or ZAFT hotel. Before Murrue could refute that request, Mu signalled her by touching her leg with his, and then signalled her to leave it to him.

When she acquiesced, Mu told Nellie that her request wouldn't be entertained but if Lacus was willing, she would be put in the infirmary itself. That way, the medical personnel could keep an eye on her at all times, since they were bound to work in shifts. Of course, that arrangement didn't include Nellie and the rest of the guards so to smooth things over, Lacus would be allowed to communicate periodically with them through a supervised network.

It was something that they learned from those damned Eurasians recently and Mu wasn't too arrogant to borrow the idea from them.

In the end, Nellie accepted the offer reluctantly after Lacus stated her agreement.

After the two left the room to return to their ship, Mu asked Murrue and Natarle, "Well, what do you think? Ours or theirs?"

"It's difficult to ascertain," Murrue replied. "So, the next thing is where do we go to drop off our guests? Any ideas?"

"Why do we need to think about it? Artemis is near," Natarle replied.

Mu crossed his arms and leaned back. "In case you forgot, our so-called allies were quite clear that they don't want them there. International incident and all that."

"Then we should bring them to our base,"

"To tell you honestly, I don't want them to be involved,"

Natarle gave Murrue a disbelieving look.

Mu understood very well why she did that. After getting the Orb teenagers involved, Murrue wasn't in the position to say such words. But he was being partial to her so it couldn't be helped; he had to save the day. "I don't think bringing them to Ptolemaeus will fulfil the mission parameter. Remember, we must hand them to a neutral or non-hostile actor," he said, knowing that it was easier to get Natarle to swallow his reasoning if it was backed by some regulation or anything formal-sounding.

"That is sound," Natarle said while nodding her head.

"But, after those GINNs, I'm not going to give them to any ZAFTies just like that," Mu continued, "I don't need a parade or an award ceremony, but I don't want people accusing us of killing them and then putting bounties on our heads."

"Then what do we do? Send them to PLANTs?"

Mu rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"COMMANDER!"

"Nah. Just joking. They'll blast us to smithereens if we get within 10,000 kilometers range from PLANTs,"

"Look like we have to go to Copernicus," Murrue said, her face showing that she didn't even like the suggestion.

The door opened and the three of them shifted their attention to the newcomer.

"Look," Mu began drawling, "It's becoming a pattern to have you come at the most inopportune time, so can you stop it? In return, I'll stop with the name-calling,"

He got a head shake as an answer.

"Yeah, I guess it's too much to expect,"

Kira knew that Sai, Miriallia, Tolle and Kuzzey had the same question in their minds as they sat in front of Mu, Murrue and Natarle in the briefing room.

"This is putting the cart before the horse," Mu remarked.

"It's required under the regulations, so it couldn't be helped," Natarle said, her eyes reading something from the computer in front of her. "But in case it couldn't be done before, it has to be done after, as soon as possible.

Murrue nodded at her, "I trust that you will prepare the report,"

"Yes, Ma'am,"

"May I know why we're here, Commander?" Kuzzey asked.

"As per regulations," Natarle explained, "we have to provide counselling to our volunteers. Since we don't have a psychiatrist on board, the duty falls to the next chain of command with experience."

"Which is me," Mu answered. "And assisted by Captain and Ensign here,"

The two hours session that Kira, Sai, Miriallia, Tolle and Kuzzey were subjected to by three officers was quite intense, in his opinion. The tired expression on their faces didn't match the spirited delivery of what seemed to be a greatly redacted military orientation programme hurriedly, and probably haphazardly, put together.

They first began by framing the current situation as Archangel was trying to get away from ZAFT which was hell-bent on destroying them.

Kira wanted to protest that wasn't true but he recalled the response he got earlier. As if reading his thought, Murrue explained the reason why the teenagers were brought on board. She then defended his action by saying that it was on her order to rescue the damaged lifeboat.

Mu then took over, explaining the fundamental principles of fighting and taking a life. He shared an observation made by a general named Marshall who served during a great war. The general observed that about only fifteen to twenty per cent of soldiers shoot their rifles aimed at their enemy. That assertion was questionable, but many armed forces rethought their approach to training soldiers. Marshall's fundamental conclusion was that normal human beings, by nature, had aversions to killing other human beings. The only way to overcome that nature was to make a killing action to be instinctual and almost automatic.

When asked why he was telling them all of that, Mu explained that all military were like that, whether it was the Earth Alliance, ZAFT or even ORB. While checks and balances were in place to prevent unlawful murder, once there was a need to do so, a soldier will shoot without any hesitation. The Moebius Zero pilot had chalked up a few kills under him.

On the other hand, Kira and his friends were surprised to find out that despite her kind countenance, Murrue had killed six people during the attack on Heliopolis. Kira saw her shooting at the ZAFT soldiers but the fact didn't sink in until she made that admission.

Natarle, despite her stern appearance, has yet to kill anyone yet.

Mu, Murrue and Natarle reassured the young adults that they wouldn't be placed at the 'trigger' or 'fire' part of the kill chain. That was the reason why they were only assigned to communication or detection instead of targeting and firing.

After the session had ended, Kira would have left with others but Mu pulled him aside. The two had a private conversation where the older man apologized for not mentioning the truth that because of Kira's skill at piloting Strike, it was almost impossible to prevent him from having to pull the trigger. Instead, Mu offered to be the one to make the call, meaning that all Kira had to do was simply follow his order. Truth be told, he didn't see the difference since he's the one who will do it but he accepted it nonetheless.

But there was another reason why Mu had him stay back.

The door opened and Athrun was hopeful that it was Kira who came to visit. To his delight, it was indeed his friend, even though it was tempered a bit by the sight of Kira still wearing the Earth Alliance uniform. That happiness plummeted when the next person entered.

"Oh? Hello, Athrun. Nice to meet you here."

"Nice to meet you here?!" Athrun asked in disbelief. He then levelled a betrayed look at his close friend who was looking at the door, "Kira! Why is Lacus here?"

It wasn't Kira but Lacus who answered, "Because the captain told me to be here..."

"Excuse me, Miss Clyne, please move aside a bit," Kira interrupted while turning his head toward the open door. "They're coming."

"Ah, sorry. Please excuse me," Lacus said as she moved away from the entrance.

A few seconds later, a group of people entered, carrying wounded people into the room. Athrun noted that two of the casualties were heavily wounded and unconscious while the remaining four only suffered from light injuries.

"That way, I can help look after them," Lacus continued before noticing the bandages on Athrun. "And you," she added before cocking her head and asked, "Say, why are you here? Did you decide to join the Earth Alliance?"

"I DID NOT!" Athrun protested in a loud voice, startling everyone in the room. Lacus put a hand over her lips while the rest stood frozen in their place. Moments later, two fully armed Earth Alliance soldiers entered the room

Kira had to go and convince them that there's nothing wrong. One of them gave Athrun a very dubious look for a few seconds, before finally relenting and leaving the room.

Once they left the room, Athrun answered, "I'm still with ZAFT," He considered his next sentence carefully. "I was involved in a crash and Archangel picked me up."

"An accident?" Lacus asked.

"Yes, an accident." He did crash and was subsequently captured; there was no lie there. To his annoyance, the cause of that crash was standing next to Lacus and nodded in support, as if helping him to cover the truth. The captured ZAFT pilot eyed other people in the room. "So how did you end up on Archangel? Aren't you supposed to be on the trip to survey the Junius Seven site?"

"We did, though we're attacked. Kira and his friends saved us," Lacus gave him a short version of what happened that caused her and the rest to end up onboard Archangel. While having his fiancee attacked by ZAFT mobile suits caused major consternation, Athrun didn't fail to notice that Archangel managed to get Aegis operational and decided to stow the information away for later.

As he pretended to listen to Lacus's words, he cursed the fact that more and more hostages were being held against his attempt to escape captivity, and two of them were talking to him right at that moment.

After ensuring that Lacus had settled in the infirmary, he searched for Flay all over Archangel. In the end, he found her at a place he didn't expect; she was found floating just outside of an open Aegis cockpit. Flay was typing on a computer, which was connected by a cable to the inside of the cockpit.

He approached her slowly. "Here you are,"

She turned to nod at him before resuming her work. "Hi, Kira. How can I help you?"

"What are you doing?"

"Running through permutations to optimize Aegis's automation,"

Kira moved next to her to have a look. "Is this the Decree layer?" he asked as what seemed to be modules related to movements being displayed.

"Yeah,"

Kira watched her working on the system for a few minutes in silence. In the end, while he was nowhere near knowing what the system was all about, he did gain a rudimentary perspective of what she was working on. "May I suggest something?"

"Go ahead," Flay answered as she handed the computer to him,

Taking a closer look, Kira smiled softly as he noticed an icon named 'GUNDAM' amidst numerous generic and mundane-looking acronyms such as 'ACR', 'MOS', 'NJC' and 'YFX' on the screen. It seemed that even she was referring to the prototypes as such. "If you do this conditional check," he said as he type some commands, "link this library," some more commands, "perform this loop exit, the stopping movement of the limbs will be slightly slower,"

"Decreasing the strain on the servos," Flay remarked, "Decreasing maintenance work and increasing the operating hours,"

Kira handed the computer back to her.

"Thanks, Kira," Flay said as she started on the next task. "By the way, when hacking into Eurasian network next time, search for the slower lines. They purposely let the faster ones have weaker protection but better monitoring. It's like a honeypot trap to entice intruders to attempt entry through them. Weird, I admit, but that how it is,"

Kira felt as if his face was splashed with freezing water. "They knew,"

"Probably, probably not, I don't know. If they knew, they probably didn't take action because there was no need to do so. But Kira, up till that moment, Sai didn't know about Decree,"

"Sorry," Kira apologized as his slip of the tongue had revealed that he had watched her interaction with the Eurasian officers. "When they took you away, I was very worried, since," he hesitated, "you're our friend,"

"Thanks," she said while smiling even though she didn't stop with her work.

"Which leads me to the second thing. They say that you're a mercenary so you don't fall under the same regulation."

"Mercenary?" Flay said before understanding hit her and she stopped typing, "Oh, that. I'm registered as a temporarily allied combatant and so shouldn't be subject to the legal requirement," Her fingers glided above the keyboard as if caressing it. "But they wanted too… but they can't,"

"But during the previous battle…" Kira trailed.

"I was prepared and had an experience similar to pulling the trigger before,"

"Oh, I see," Kira said, feeling a slight disappointment at the admission though he didn't know the reason why. Despite that, he had to accept her doing it to save Silverwind. The trail of thought reminded him of something else. "By the way, if possible, Lacus would like to meet you in person,"

The hand touching the keyboard stopped. "Oh, already close enough to be on the first name basis, aren't you?"

The tone used was normal but Kira couldn't help feeling that she was accusing him of doing something he wasn't supposed to. "Er, no," he said, his mind churning through words that would be needed to deflect the topic. "Miss Clyne is feeling very grateful for your heroic act in protecting Silverwind."

"Kira, I'm a dumbass who couldn't do her work properly," Flay said as she resumed her work. "It took me three years just to achieve this level of proficiency,"

"No! Despite what you say, it is the truth that if you weren't there, the shuttle would have been destroyed! "That's why you should meet her. So that she can see what kind of person you are, Flay," Kira stopped for a moment, "I personally think that you're amazing," He wasn't saying that just to mollify her. The work that she was doing on Aegis was rather advanced even for him.

The redhead shook her head. "No, I am not, and I would prefer not to meet her. She reminds me too much of what I'm not."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Kira, I'm the kind of person who lets my irregular feelings and emotions trap me in the present. I hold a grudge even though I'm supposed to let go. I can't move on even though it's time to do so. But that girl, she's different. She's a person a tomorrow. I know, because I've met her once upon a time,"

"That sounds like she's a new species,"

"Kira, I think I was being clear just now,"

To Kira's consternation, his observation sounded as if Flay was making a fuss about Lacus being a Coordinator. "I'm sorry for assuming wrongly. But even if she possesses seed, she is still a normal person,"

"Creed?"

"Um… what I mean is Naturals and Coordinators are human beings in the end, if we strip away the terms," Kira remarked, not understanding why he mentioned the word out of the blue. "There's no reason to be jealous of her, and I know that two of you can be great friends,"

Flay chuckled, "I'm very sure that wouldn't happen. The two of us are so incompatible that it's not even funny. Acquaintance, sure, but not more than that,"