Divergence
By: cjtokage
Disclaimer: I own no part of the Gundam continuum. I am making ZERO dollars on this work of fiction.
Warnings: Yaoi/Slash; in other words two (or sometimes more heh, heh) guys romancing each other. Athrun/Kira pairing; AU story that takes off from the cannon version fairly early. Perhaps a small hint of OOCness for those of you who worry about that type of thing. Proofread but not beta'd, so any mistakes are mine. Let me know and I will fix them during the final draft.
Chapter Three: Rip Out The Wings Of A Butterfly
Kira was hard at work studying the ZAFT military organization and he was surprised to see how loose that organization actually was. ZAFT, being made up of civilian volunteers had no formal rank structure and fewer regulations when compared to terrestrial armies both past and present. Coordinators also held themselves to higher standards than Naturals in their everyday lives and that standard was extended into their military and political organizations as well.
Kira was well into his eighteenth hour of reading when he came to the final set of regulations. He was currently on duty taking his turn as the five minute standby pilot¹ while Athrun slept. 'Two more hours' Kira thought to himself 'and I can get some sleep.' Kira had to laugh at the memory of the pout that Athrun had pulled when he tried to help his brunette friend study. Kira had always been an excellent student even surpassing the other Coordinator kids when he still lived on the moon and now he was using those skills to quickly adapt to life as a ZAFT soldier.
Kira and Athrun had yet to find the time to really talk about what had happened during the years of their separation and it looked like they would have to wait for a while longer, at least until they reached the PLANT capital of Aprilius One.
Eight hours later…
Kira awoke to the sound of an alert tone which he recognized as the battle stations alarm. He was almost finished pulling on his green flight suit when an overhead speaker announced "Kira Yamato report to the mobile suit hanger to prepare for battle, Kira Yamato report to the mobile suit hanger." He grabbed his helmet and dashed out of his and Athrun's shared room and sprinted towards the hangers. He arrived a minute later having already learned the shortest route to the hangers and was greeted by technicians prepping the Strike and Aegis Gundams. Athrun was waiting for him at the bottom of the Strike Gundam. He raised an eyebrow "good timing."
Kira grinned for a moment "I'm trying" he said to his friend then after Athrun returned his grin they both sobered up as they remembered the reason they were here.
"Alright" Athrun began "we have come across an Earth Alliance fleet that's not where they're supposed to be. We believe that they are attempting to block our route to Aprilius. Our mission is to destroy all opposition; you and Dearka will be attacking the warships while Nicol and I take out the Mobile Armors. Yzak and the GINNs will be defending the Archangel; this configuration should best suit our individual mobile suits strengths. We chose to outfit your Gundam with the Sword Striker pack because there are six warships out there including an Agamemnon class mobile armor carrier. Two of the escort ships are missile deploying frigates and the other three are destroyers capable of carrying fifteen mobile armors apiece. The frigates will be you primary target followed by the carrier and finally the destroyers. You must disable or destroy the frigates before they come within firing range of the legged ship or we risk losing it to the intense missile barrage those ships are capable of launching. Go ahead; mount up… and good hunting."
"Take care of yourself Athrun I just found you again I don't want to lose you."
"You too" Athrun then turned to towards the Aegis before turning back suddenly "I glad you're here with us Kira, where you belong."
Kira just nodded before kicking off lightly from the deck and floating directly toward the Strike's cockpit.
After bringing the mobile suit up using normal startup procedures Kira proceeded to the catapult and waited for launch authorization. A few minutes later he heard the officer in charge of the Vesalius's CIC² announce "we have multiple mobile armor launches, the enemy capital ships are maneuvering into an offensive stance, prepare to launch the Strike and the Aegis."
Kira watched the launch signal change from red to green "Kira Yamato, Gundam Strike launching" and suddenly he was accelerating out of the ship and he took a moment to note that the ZAFT catapults rate of acceleration was greater than the Archangel's which was obviously designed for Naturals. Then Kira was suddenly at the battle field and he no longer had time for extraneous thoughts. Kira noticed that his IFF³ system had been updated with ZAFT's newest code breaker program which now gave him the names of the ships he was preparing to attack. "Strike to Buster, Dearka I will go after the Pickett while you target the Priam. When they are disabled or destroyed we can concentrate our attack on the Nebuchadnezzar. Do you agree or do you have a better plan?"
Dearka was annoyed by the newbie's presumption at telling him how to fight and he made no effort to keep it out of his voice as he answered; unfortunately the brat had correctly identified the scenario that was most likely to be successful so he reluctantly answered "I concur" before cutting his end of the laser link.
Kira ignored Dearka's sarcastic tone and firing his vernier engines he maneuvered towards the nearest missile frigate the OANI Pickett. Approaching the ship from above Kira paused for a moment to study its design and immediately picked out several flaws that could be exploited. He grabbed his beam boomerang and hurled it at an approaching mobile armor striking it on the first try and disabling another on the rebound. He grabbed it out of mid-flight and replaced it while grabbing the Schwert Gewehr, the fifty two foot long anti-ship blade that gave the Sword Striker pack its name. Again Kira fired his verniers and blasted directly towards the maneuvering ship below while slicing into any mobile armor that came within range. By the time he had made contact with the rear deck of the Pickett he had destroyed an additional four mobile armors bringing his total up to five destroyed and one disabled. The Strike now stood on the spot Kira had previously noticed to be within the ships blind spot where no weapons fire could hit him without doing serious damage to the ship he now occupied. Kira raised his blade and with a whirl brought the laser edge of his sword slicing directly through the ships bridge thereby crippling it. He then rapidly maneuvered down to the side of the Pickett and before he could talk himself out of it he slashed a vertical line down the entire length of the ship before racing away from the resulting explosion. He destroyed two more mobile armors that had tried to maneuver behind him and proceeded towards the Agamemnon class carrier the Nebuchadnezzar.
Meanwhile Athrun, Nicol, and two of the GINNs were making short work of the EA's mobile armors; the only problem was that there were so many of them that it was taking time. Athrun had just used his beam rifle to destroy another mobile armor when he noticed an enormous explosion on one of his side monitors; he at first thought that it was Dearka until he noticed the Strike leaving the area on a course towards the enemy fleet's carrier. 'So Kira really is capable of doing what needs to be done. I was a bit worried that he would be unable to fight with that type of aggression during battle. I just hope that this war doesn't harden his heart so much that he becomes another Yzak.'
Yzak was both ecstatic and frustrated at the same time. He was ecstatic because he busy turning the EA's mobile armors into scrap and frustrated because he was stuck guarding the legged ship on Commander Creuset's orders. He had just finished off the last armor in the current cluster he was fighting when one of the GINNs that was under his command sent out a call for help. "Yzak, Athrun, anybody I'm being swarmed over here, left arm disabled, verniers down to sixty percent, I need…" and suddenly Yzak notice an explosion to his left as his fellow Coordinator succumbed to enemy fire. Immediately after the destruction of the GINN the dozen mobile armors turned towards the legged ship where they were met with a barrage from the ships Igelstellungs and its surface-to-air missiles. Within moment the enemy squadron was decimated even as the next wave of mobile armors came charging at the two remaining mobile suits protecting the Archangel.
Dearka was ready to curse his luck as he notice that the Strike had already destroyed its first target and was on its way to the next one 'that runt is beating me' he thought to himself as his next shot scored directly atop his last one coring the enemy frigate before it was able to launch a single missile. 'Well the main threat is destroyed now to leave those mobile armors with no transport home, if there are any left after we are done with them.'
Dearka keyed is laser communicator to the Strike "Buster to Strike; Kira I'm leaving the Nebuchadnezzar to you, don't worry you can handle it, meanwhile I'm going after those three destroyers before they get into firing range of their linear cannons."
"Roger that Buster" Kira said as he attempted to find a weakness in the Nebuchadnezzar's defenses, which was proving to be difficult because it appeared to be a well thought out ship design. Then suddenly Kira had an idea which he immediately implemented; he pushed the verniers to their maximum output and raced towards the ship again coming in from above only this time he flew past the ship but only after launching his rocket anchor at the ships portside hull. He then used his momentum and the attached cable to slingshot rapidly around the hull of the massive ship faster than the enemies' guns could track his suit. He came out of the arc near the bridge of the ship on the starboard side and again using his sword he decapitated the enemy vessel bringing its coordinated assault to an end. With the ships weapons controller gone many of the carrier's ship-to-air defenses went into standby mode and ceased firing. Kira then proceeded towards the rear of the ship where the engines were located and began systematically rendering them into scrap. As Kira was working his way through his third engine block he received a call from the Vesalius's CIC "Strike, status update, the frigates Pickett, and Priam, have been destroyed, as has the destroyer Botha; disabled enemy ships are the Nebuchadnezzar, and the Bonaparte. Proceed to the remaining destroyer the Custer and destroy it on Commander Creuset's orders, over."
Dearka fired a final round from his high-energy beam rifle coring the destroyer Bonaparte causing it to explode brilliantly as its internal oxygen supplies and its weapons magazines ignited and just as suddenly the fireball disappeared as the blast lost its fuel supply to the vacuum of space. He noticed Kira disengaging from the listing Nebuchadnezzar leaving it relatively whole except for its engines and bridge areas. He was making a mental note to rib the newbie for leaving a job half done when combined fire from the Vesalius and the Gamow hit the massive EA carrier both fore and aft causing it to break apart into three separate pieces each of which were being consumed by internal fires and explosions. 'Damn I guess I would leave too if I was in the way of that kind of firepower.' Dearka then turned his attention towards the sole remaining ship to 'help' Kira remove it from the battle field faster.
Kira this time approached the enemy ship from below to take advantage of the ships huge blind-spot. The ships designers left the underside of this particular ship model virtually undefended underneath and even though the Custer was attempting to roll the ships weak area away from the approaching mobile suit they just weren't fast enough. Kira used his anti-ship sword to carve a gouge from the ships foredeck all the way back to the engines. Meanwhile on the ships upper-deck the Buster had converted its long range sniper rifle into its alternate configuration as a beam firing shotgun and was using it to blast away at the ship's bridge and laser cannons as well as taking out any stray mobile armors that attempted to come between him and his target. Reading increasing temperature and energy levels inside the destroyer both the Buster and the Strike jetted away even as the ship blasted outwards in an expanding, though short lived, fireball.
The battle was now for the most part over with only a few scattered mobile armors either fleeing the battle scene or futilely attempting to penetrate Yzak's defensive perimeter around the Archangel. Seeing as they were getting low on power, Kira maneuvered towards the Vesalius will Dearka made his way over to the Gamow. Athrun and Nicol spent several more minutes chasing down and destroying any of the enemy mobile armors that stuck around the combat zone before they too were forced to head back to the hangers because of rapidly depleting energy levels. Yzak was also forced to return to the Archangel and leave the few brave or perhaps foolish, mobile armor pilots to the Archangel's gunners.
Kira was waiting in the pilots' ready room for Athrun to dismount. He was still wearing his flight suit and his face held a somewhat sad expression though he did perk up when Athrun finally entered the room "hey Athrun, I'm glad to see you made it back in one piece."
"You to Kira, I was worried about you going up against those warships on your first real sortie, but there was nothing I could do about it what with all the mobile armors that they launched. So why are you still standing here and not in the showers already?"
"I wasn't sure about the post combat debriefing situation. Do we have time to shower and change uniforms or does Commander Creuset want us to meet with him straight away?"
Athrun laughed at the worried expression on Kira's face before answering "no we have a while before we're expected to appear before the commander. After all we still have to wait for the technicians to recover our suits' battle recordings and for Nicol, Dearka, and Yzak to shuttle over for a post battle discussion. Or rather a post battle put down fest by Yzak and Dearka. Those two never have anything positive to say about anyone. If only they would lay off the attitude then they would engender a lot more support for themselves. Oh well the best we can do is restrain our temper and not give them the satisfaction of reacting."
A thoughtful expression appeared on Kira's face before he turned to his locker and began striping out of his flight suit. Once nude he grabbed his toiletries and headed for the open shower room, quickly followed by Athrun who was observing his friends slim figure and taut backside.
The nice thing about living and working on a ZAFT vessel is the fact that they had water purification and moisture collection down to an art. They were able to recollect large amounts of water that otherwise would have been wasted. This meant that unlike on Earth Alliance vessels the ZAFT crewmembers were able to spend more than a few minutes getting cleaned up and had time to allow the hot flowing water the chance to loosen muscles that were stiff from the abuse that piloting a mobile suit has on a person.
Kira was absentmindedly soaping up his chest and arms but most of his attention was directed at observing what a great job puberty had done with Athrun's body. Like most Coordinators, Athrun was slim, with average musculature that hide the great strength his body possessed. His stomach and chest was firm and sculpted in a v-shape down to narrow hips and long perfectly shaped legs and thighs. Kira glanced up to be sure that Athrun was still preoccupied with washing out his hair before risking a look first at his best friends tantalizing butt and a slightly longer glance at the other's package. Kira then returned his attention to cleaning his own body even as his mind was processing the new knowledge he now had about his best friend's perfect physique. Kira couldn't help but compare his body with Athrun's; he was slimmer and obviously weighed less than his more muscled friend, they were about the same height, and as for equipment Kira could not really tell as they were both flaccid but they seemed to be about the same length with Athrun having slightly large testicles. Noticing a stirring in is own groin as he pictured his friends body Kira turned his thoughts to more mundane subjects as he finished rinsing off before walking over the rack were his towel hung and began drying off.
Athrun couldn't help but smirk at his friend's subtle observation of his body. He didn't mind the attention; after all it had been years since they had last bathed together and Athrun had made his own observations when the other boy had been washing his hair with his eyes closed. Athrun didn't know if Kira might be interested in more than the friendship they had previously had, and right now wasn't the time to focus on something like that anyway. Besides there was Lacus to think about and his own fathers expectations to deal with; Kira also had to deal with his pacifist parents' reaction to his join ZAFT and settling into a new, more structured environment. No, for now Athrun decided to work on renewing and strengthening his and Kira's friendship with each other and if sometime in the future something more developed they would deal with it then. After all they still had years of catching up to do first and they need to learn all the new and different personality quirks that would have appeared growing up with different backgrounds. Resolute, Athrun retrieved his own towel and while still drying off he strolled into the locker room to retrieve his clothing before heading to his and Kira's quarters for a clean uniform.
TBC…
A/N 1: On board aircraft carriers they keep one or two pilots ready to take-off immediately and another set of pilots suited up and ready to take-off within five minutes. The ZAFT ships are doing the same thing with their mobile suits until they reach ZAFT controlled space and being as there are only nine pilots (five Gundam pilots and four GINN pilots from the Eddington) they are switching off shifts to give each other breaks.
A/N 2: CIC- Combat Information Center
A/N 3: IFF- Identify Friend or Foe
A/N: OANI- Opposes Aggressors & Neutralize Invasion
Pickett, George E. 1825- 1875, Confederate General
Priam, King of Troy during the Trojan War
Nebuchadnezzar II?-562? B.C., king of Babylon 605- 562 B.C., conqueror of Jerusalem.
Bonaparte, Napoleon, 1764- 1821, French General and emperor of France.
Custer, George Armstrong, 1839- 1876, U.S. General
Botha, Louis, 1862- 1919, Boer General; first prime minister of the Union of South Africa.
Him – Rip Out The Wings Of A Butterfly
Heaven ablaze in our eyes, we're standing still in time
The blood on our hands is the wine we offer as sacrifice
Come on and show them your love
Rip out the wings of a butterfly for your soul
My love, rip out the wings of a butterfly for your soul
This endless mercy mile we're crawling side by side
With Hell freezing over in our eyes
Gods kneel before our crime
Come on and show them your love
Rip out the wings of a butterfly for your soul
My love, rip out the wings of a butterfly for your soul…
(Rip out the wings of a butterfly)
Don't let go…
(Rip out the wings of a butterfly)
For your soul
(Repeat chorus)
Final Note: This is all that I have typed up for this story. I am not sure when I will have more ready seeing as how my work schedule is 'flexible' right now. I am working fifty to seventy hour weeks and am typing as time permits. I apologize in advance for the inevitable delays that will occur.
