Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam.
Thank you LW for beta reading with me all week to get this out. Words cannot express the gratitude I have for all the help you've give me!
Gundam Gemini
Episode Seven
Death at the Zodiac
Part C
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When the rumbling finally ceased and her eyes stopped spinning, Laura found the Orthrus lying in a pool of seawater battered but intact. Judging by that last earth-shaking tremor, the dome had just crash-landed onto the ocean floor which explained the sudden calm as it was transformed from rollercoaster ride to undersea coffin. Once she had confirmed her head was still screwed on properly, the technopath took hold of the controls and sat the Orthrus upright.
The high beams blaring from the Gundam's eyes swept across its pitch-black surroundings and revealed a half-submerged, claustrophobic chamber cluttered with floating debris as water seeped in through cracks in the bulkhead. The entire room on the monitor was off-kilter, tilted by the uneven seafloor the dome was resting on, and intermittent creaking and groaning could be heard all around as steel threatened to buckle under the intense water pressure. Amid the terrifying situation, Laura fortified her nerves with a long, deep breath before her purple eyes darted around the panoramic screen and that breath caught in her throat.
"Shana? Shana!"
The Orthrus leapt to its feet and the sudden redistribution of weight rocked the room but Laura barely paid it any mind as she screamed Shana's name. The unresponsive comm only buzzed and, finding no Raijuu, the Gundam swept aside debris and made waves as it splashed its way out into a flooded corridor. Fumbling through the dark, Laura found other side compartments and checked them as she moved down the passageway, all the while praying Shana's Raijuu had fallen into one like the Orthrus had. When she finally found the green mobile suit she cried out with relief.
"Shana!"
Unfortunately, Laura's fears were far from alleviated when she saw the state of the Raijuu. It had been crushed by a fallen bulkhead which had flattened the warped machine and trapped it facedown underwater. The technopath gasped and turned pale as she momentarily froze with shock; painful memories of the Death card and Tully tore through her mind like a hot knife, reopening old wounds and causing her to fear the worst.
That same dread propelled Laura into action and she grabbed the collapsed bulkhead with the Gundam's manipulators before slowly rolling the heavy slab off until it slammed into the water. Throughout her struggle, she called for Shana to answer but when she still heard no reply panic almost set in. The quivering pilot realised with a start that the Zodian's radio might be busted and quickly rested the Gundam's hands on the submerged Raijuu's misshapen body to form a technopathic connection. For one heart-stopping moment, Laura sensed nothing before a frightened voice called out to her and the woman's purple eyes went wide with alarm.
Moving with haste, Laura sat the Raijuu's torso up and leaned it against the wall, watching with horror as its chest drained liquid like a sieve. After securing it with one manipulator, she ripped the cockpit hatch off its hinges with the other and seawater vacated the cavity like a small flood. There was another anxious moment as Laura waited for signs of life to follow on her monitor, but a slender figure eventually clambered out and steadied themselves at the entry frame.
Laura finally sighed with relief; it was Shana. Her green g-suit was dripping wet and she was shielding her eyes from the Orthrus' bright lights but the girl was alive and well. However, their brief reunion was interrupted by another quake that caused the entire dome to shudder and groan, and was in turn followed by rising and choppy seawater. Thinking quickly, Laura had the Orthrus kneel and activated its cockpit door so that it swung open.
"Jump, Shana!" she cried and the Zodian leapt across the gap, landing and stumbling into Laura's arms before the hatch closed behind them. In a matter of seconds, the compartment outside was inundated with water until it reached the ceiling and the Orthrus was submerged in the cold embrace of the ocean once more.
"That was close…" Laura whispered, watching as the monitor blurred up with liquid before she checked on Shana. "Are you alright?"
The Orthrus' cockpit was large enough for two people but in the haste of Shana's rescue they had fallen back into the pilot's seat together with the girl landing on Laura's lap.
"I'm f-f-fine… t-thanks to you, L-Laura…" a pale-faced Shana managed to stutter through her helmet.
"God, you're shivering!" Laura exclaimed, grabbing her by the arms. "We've got to strip you out of that wet suit this minute!"
Shana's green eyes widened and her cheeks flushed.
"B-B-But…!"
"No buts! Strip!"
A minute later and a half-naked Shana had a thermal blanket draped over her shoulders while Laura adjusted the cockpit thermostat. The blanket was courtesy of Junko's foresight, the mechanic having stowed all her friends' cockpits full of emergency supplies after lamenting she couldn't help them while they were out fighting. She had concocted all sorts of outlandish situations in which they would thank her for the provisions including but not limited to being stranded on a deserted island. However, even her wild imagination could never have predicted that Laura would one day find herself entombed at the bottom of the ocean. At least the blanket was keeping Shana dry and decent, and the dark-haired beauty wrapped the foil material tighter around her body when she found Laura staring at her hidden curves.
"That's some interesting underwear…" the Gundam pilot commented, recalling Alice had something equally lacy.
"I-It's just something Zora pushed onto me!" Shana stammered her explanation as she blushed like a peach. "A-Anyway… thanks for saving me. I thought I was going to drown… or freeze to death…"
Seeing Shana's green eyes droop in such a Tully-like manner only encouraged Laura to be even more protective of her.
"Don't worry, you're safe with me now... I won't even let you catch a cold," Laura declared with audible defiance as she prepared to get the Orthrus moving again. "It would be tragic if we survived this only for you to die of pneumonia."
"You really think we'll survive?" Shana asked, leaning over the pilot's chair from behind. "The Orthrus won't make it to the surface by itself – not without my Raijuu."
"No, but I bet this underwater facility must have something we can use to get to the surface… and if not, there's always the relic."
On that note, Laura pushed on her controls and the Orthrus waded forward to the chime of its relic detection instrument.
The exploration of the sunken dome was painfully slow as the pair tried to conserve as much propulsion fuel as possible and they navigated the lopsided labyrinth one murky segment at a time. They made it back to the docking pool but as expected the exit had been obliterated by the crash and was blocked off by rubble. An inspection with their searchlights revealed bays for mobile suits and small ships but the Lemurians had left nothing behind that could be of use. Leaving empty-handed but not discouraged, Laura and Shana followed the sound of the relic detector instead and the growing technopathic waves led them deeper into the facility until they surfaced in a compartment untouched by seawater.
There, an imposing round hatch large enough for a mobile suit to pass through roused their suspicions and the Orthrus dripped with water as it approached the mysterious door.
"The relic is behind that hatch," Shana stated, having grown adept at reading the detector, before growing curious.. "...But how do we open it?"
"I've got the key right here," Laura boasted, cracking her fingers before trying to brute force the door open using the Orthrus' manipulators. But when the hatch wouldn't roll, give way, or generally budge in response to her gargantuan efforts, she promptly gave up with a sigh. "…Okay, not happening. Maybe if I beamsabre my way through…"
Shana rolled her eyes but smiled at Laura's ability to joke even in dire straits.
"Wait, what's that?"
Laura's gaze followed the Zodian's finger and discovered a light at the Orthrus' feet. Zooming in revealed it to be a wall console, presumably to be used by a person on the ground to open the hatch.
"It… still has power? Is there a fusion reactor that still works in this place?" Laura asked out loud and was reminded of the bunker on Lenos as she reached down with the Orthrus to make a technopathic connection before shaking her head. "…It's locked. I need some kind of passcode or key…"
To their shock, the console light suddenly turned green and machinery behind the wall began to rumble. The giant hatch in front of them stirred before gear-like teeth around its edges withdrew and the circular gate slowly rolled out of the way, exposing another layer of hatches behind it which also unlocked in turn. When the path was finally clear, flickering wall lamps illuminated the darkness and a long corridor graced their stunned eyes.
"…What did you do?" Shana asked, gaping at the Remian.
"Nothing…" said Laura, almost speechless as her stunned gaze bounced between the hatch console and Shana. "It said the Orthrus has authorisation…"
An eerie silence fell around the girls as they reconsidered their chosen course of action but the call of the relic prevailed and they pressed on in the Orthrus with heavy mechanical steps. At the other side of the corridor was a hexagonal chamber of immense proportions with a one-hundred-foot-high ceiling which peaked like a chapel. The steel walls were coloured laboratory white and lined with tiny observation windows and various pipes but it was the object in the centre of the room which caught their eye.
Encased in a giant glass tube filled with a viscous pink liquid was what appeared to be a white winged thruster pack. Four huge, tulip-like cone thrusters were mounted down the middle of the rectangular block in pairs while half a dozen wings fanned out on either side. The wings weren't long enough for it to be a flight pack but Laura was captivated by the relic not least because it appeared to be made out of Gundanium. She reached out with the Orthrus' hand to touch the glass and gasped when a technopathic connection formed.
In a matter of milliseconds, a well of information overloaded Laura's mind and she had to pause to process it. At the same time, an alarm wailed before the hexagonal chamber was suddenly bathed in flashing red light and the roof began to slide apart, uncovering a titanic grated ring surrounding a dark tunnel in the centre. Water started to flow from the outer ring in the ceiling, cascading down the walls like a waterfall and flooding the chamber.
"Laura…" Shana whispered, watching the rising waters with concern.
"It's okay," said technopath, opening her eyes and giving the Zodian a knowing grin. "This is how we get out of here."
Once the chamber was filled to the brim with crimson-lit water, the alarm ceased and the giant glass tube in the centre began to sink into the floor. The viscous pink liquid that had presumably safeguarded the relic was released and mixed with the seawater before dissipating like a cloud of smoke, leaving only its white rectangular artifact floating in the water. Laura pivoted the Orthrus around so that its back faced the relic and the object was drawn to the Gundam by some unknown magnetic force.
Observing through the rear camera, the tongue-tied women witnessed the relic abruptly change shape so that it interlaced perfectly with the Gundam's existing thrusters before the axillary equipment attached with a clunk. A window of scrawling text immediately popped up on the Orthrus' monitor as its Relic Core processed the treasure trove of newfound data and Laura linked with the OS. Scanning the data both outwardly and inwardly, the technopath found the info she was looking for and the concluding program onscreen finished with the exact same words.
"Pulse Mode…" Laura whispered and turned to Shana with a widening smile. "Hold on to your panties, Shana. It looks like the relic pulled through..."
The raven-haired Zodian cocked her head and followed the pilot's gaze to the dark tunnel directly above them. Unbeknownst to her, the Orthrus' armour shifted from white to true blue at Laura's command and its newly adorned wings unfurled behind its back. The tulip thrusters in between glowed with blossoming power, boiling the water beneath the Gundam before the machine blasted off on pillars of cyan fire.
Shana screamed and grabbed onto Laura as they both battled the sudden g-forces. But as the Orthrus shot through the tunnel like a blue comet before erupting from a hatch on the dome's roof in a burst of bubbles, the White Hellhound could not stop grinning.
"Pulse Mode rocks!" she howled and the Orthrus launched back towards the ocean's surface like a rising star in the deep.
.
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Things were not looking up for the Militia.
What had started off as a simple relic extraction operation had devolved into a running undersea battle when the Ganymede had been ambushed by not one but two LIRA cruisers. Like a game of two cats and one mouse, they each hid in the darkness of the ocean's twilight zone, trading as many torpedoes as there were near misses. If that wasn't bad enough, squadrons of Lycans and Sea Wargs prodded their perimeter, whittling down Team Banshee's already depleted numbers as they safeguarded their mothership's location.
"Don't take them on alone! Regroup, stay in the shadows and pick your battles!" Ignacio ordered, sweat dripping from his furrowed brow as the Raijuu retreated from another assault. "Ban! Come in, Ban! Where are you?!"
Sheeban didn't respond but Ignacio had no doubt the Militia's ace was still alive and kicking; as good as the leader of Team Hypnos had been in their past encounters, they had yet to beat the Banshee one-on-one. However, even Ignacio knew that unless something changed – and soon – they were going to lose this fight. Meanwhile, they had been unable to contact Shana or Hellhound since the Lemurian dome had gone kaput; for all they knew, the two were already dead.
"Not that Hellhound would be much help here…" Ignacio muttered with a touch of sorrow only for his expression to switch to one of surprise when his sonar started to ping wildly. "What the hell?!"
"Something is rising from the abyssal zone, and fast!" the Ganymede's sonarman reported, his face contorting with disbelief as he listened in on his headphones. "It… It's a mobile suit!"
"The Orthrus!" Zora cried, smiling from ear to ear.
Sure enough, the blue object ascending from the ocean depths like a shooting star was the Orthrus Gundam. No longer a dead weight, the winged hellhound was propelled from behind by a mighty stream of cyan bubbles and the ocean parted in its wake. With the swiftness of lightning and only a stubby cyan beamsabre, it tore through three Lycans in a row and doubled back before its frothing victims had even succumbed to the deep with a final fizzle. The Gundam's new coat had glowed with an electric blue as it moved throughout the brief skirmish and Ignacio's eye were nailed wide with shock when it suddenly stopped in front of his Raijuu.
"H-Hellhound? You're alive?!" the Zodian managed to splutter, incredulous. "How?!"
"Gee, lemme think… I guess I remembered how to dogpaddle?" Laura quipped with a vengeance and took great pleasure in seeing Ignacio's dumbfounded expression.
"Laura! I knew you wouldn't go down so easily," Zora appeared onscreen with a hearty grin. "And Shana? Is she safe?"
"I'm right here, Zora," Shana answered before realising how little she was wearing and hid back behind Laura's seat while blushing like a tomato. "I-It's not what it looks like!"
The pirate captain raised an eyebrow along with the rest of the bridge but only chuckled.
"As much as I'd love to hear that tale, I take it you found the relic?"
"Pulse Relic. It looks like the Lemurians were experimenting with advanced propulsion systems on that dome," Laura nodded and tapped her keyboard rapidly, analysing and calibrating Pulse Mode as they spoke. "We've fulfilled our mission, Zora; now what do we need to do so we can get out of here? I'm worried about the fleet."
"Aye, me too," Zora murmured, folding her arms and biting her lip. "But the Ganymede can't surface like this; we need to sink at least one ship…"
"One ship? Leave it to me," Laura grinned and punched her throttle before giving Ignacio one last smirk. "Catch you later, slowpoke!"
The Orthrus took off and disappeared back into the deep, blinding the Raijuu with a cloud of cyan bubbles from its new thruster pack. Where exactly its pilot was headed without knowing the enemy's whereabouts was a mystery until Shana realised how Laura had found the Ganymede to begin with.
"Did you turn on your active sonar?" she demanded, raising one of her chiselled eyebrows. "They'll see us!"
"Don't worry; even if they know where we are, they'll never hit us," the technopath replied coolly and winked at her passenger. "But I'm sure as hell going to hit them."
To demonstrate her point, Laura pushed the Orthrus into a dive and savoured the rush of speed she had been missing with a whoop while Shana squealed. In Pulse Mode, the Gundam was given extremely hydrophobic properties as water simply flowed around its blue armour without resistance. Meanwhile, the relic's flexible wings folded back and steered the mobile suit by acting like rudders. The new tulip thrusters, combined with the Gundam's own, were propelling the Orthrus at three times its normal speed and when Laura checked she discovered Pulse Mode was also incredibly energy efficient unlike Solar Mode.
So when her sonar pinged back the presence of several Sea Wargs skulking close to the Ganymede's perimeter, Laura honed in on them at full tilt like a shark.
"Master Narick, I'm picking up the enemy's active sonar!"
"So, they've finally given up, eh?" Narick simpered in the cockpit of his Sea Warg, still basking in the glow of his recent victory. "Good! I was getting sick of all this flailing in the dark."
"No, it's coming in too fast to be the Militia ship…" Cecil cautioned his master before crying out. "It's a mobile suit!"
"What?!"
Immediately, Narick ceased combing back his blonde locks and craned his neck over the monitor. When he spied the blue apparition glowing in the distance, the young scion's stomach churned and he shook his head. His worsening feelings of impending doom only grew with the mobile suit's distinctive figure until there was no mistake.
The White Hellhound had come back from the dead – had risen from its watery grave with a vengeance – and the snarling beast was coming straight for him.
"N-No… No!" Narick screamed with wide-eyed terror. "Shoot! Shoot! Don't let it near me!"
The four Sea Wargs unloaded their gauntlets and a dozen torpedoes burst in the direction of the Orthrus. While they easily locked-on to its active sonar, catching the electric blue Gundam was another matter entirely. Using the sheer power of Pulse Mode, the Orthrus simply buzzed around the barrage and sent them tumbling in the wake of its jet stream before half the projectiles exploded. The surviving torpedoes eventually circled about and followed behind their target – back towards Team Ambion.
Wielding only its stout beamsabre, the wily Orthrus stabbed two Sea Wargs in quick succession, rending their curved armour as it passed. Bubbles exploded from their ruptured ballast tanks, sending the Wargs spinning out of control... and pinging the sonars of the inbound torpedoes. A frozen Narick could only watch as his remaining men transformed into exploding clouds of foam in front of him and grunted when the shockwaves slammed his Sea Warg back.
But it was the rapid pinging of his sonar like a death knell as the vengeful beast returned which finally broke what was left of Narick Ambion's sanity.
"Noooooo!" the scion shrieked and his eyes bulged out of their sockets as he swerved his Sea Warg around before the White Hellhound could make another pass "Stay away!"
"M-Master Narick! Wait for me!"
Seeing one panicking Sea Warg flee with its tail between its legs and another following close behind, Laura got the distinct feeling of déjà vu and her lips curved.
"You're not going to attack them?" Shana asked, almost feeling sorry for LIRA.
"Not yet… Wait for it…" the pilot whispered as they shadowed the Sea Wargs and soon enough a long whale-like shape materialised out of the darkness on the monitor. "…Jackpot!"
The stealth cruiser was truly impressive because despite the Orthrus' active sonar it remained undetected – no doubt due to the bubbled layer of material covering the ship that was absorbing the soundwaves – and Laura heard nothing to indicate it was even there. On the other hand, the Gundam's Pulse thrusters must have been like listening to a blaring rock concert for LIRA and they responded by launching torpedoes from every tube they had. The Orthrus surged in the other direction before trying to lead the torpedoes back into the cruiser, but as expected they deactivated once they left their preprogrammed kill zone.
"What now? You're not planning on sinking it with your beamsabre, are you?" Shana managed to ask while hanging on to the pilot's seat for dear life.
"No… I have a better idea," Laura grinned and opened her comm. "Ganymede, can you still see me? Try firing a few torpedoes at the Orthrus."
"Are you crazy, girl?" the operator snapped. "Do you want to die?"
"Don't worry, you won't hit me," the RDF ace said matter-of-factly. "I'm going to lead them straight to LIRA."
"Do it. Target the Orthrus," Zora ordered and chuckled with a show of white teeth. "I like this girl!"I have
The operator stared blankly at her captain, genuinely perplexed. "Isn't she a bit young for you?"
As requested, two torpedoes left the Ganymede with a quiet fizz and when Laura heard them on her sonar she let them lock on to the Orthrus. With the warheads right on her tail, the technopath rocketed straight for the LIRA cruiser on a collision course... only to pull up at the last moment. The hard-gs thrust Laura back into her seat and almost threw Shana across the cockpit but they held on as the torpedoes kept going and ploughed into the enemy vessel.
The twin explosions rocked its hull, literally making the ship jump on a pocket of air before it fell back down and collapsed under its own weight. As the scuppered cruiser snapped into two yawning black halves, an expanding cloud of bubbles rushed to the surface and enveloped the escaping Orthrus in rising white foam. Once the foam and shockwaves had dissipated, Laura and Shana looked back down to find the shattered remains of the LIRA ship sinking into the abyss – presumably along with the two fleeing Sea Wargs who were nowhere to be seen.
"Ganymede, this is Orthrus; the LIRA stealth ship and its Sea Wargs have been sunk," Laura reported with a glint of pride and shared a high five with Shana. "Returning to base."
"Not bad, Hellhound…" the operator replied with a shake of her head before opening a channel to the Militia's mobile suits. "Team Banshee, return to base! I repeat, get your shiny metal butts back here pronto; we're finally leaving this deathtrap of a planet!"
"You're a miracle-maker, White Hellhound," Zora told Laura with an awe-infused smile and chuckled. "Or should I say, Wet Hellhound?"
"Oh god…" Laura groaned and was forced to listen to the Hyena's infamous laughter all the way back. "I hope that doesn't stick…"
The Orthrus reboarded the Ganymede without incident along with the surviving members of Team Banshee, reuniting Laura and Shana with Ignacio and Sheeban at the same time. The Militia ace was able to return after his Lycan rival had absconded back into the deep, no doubt having learned of the LIRA cruiser's destruction. Laura would have boasted about Pulse Mode and her exploits but everyone was ordered to ready for an immediate launch back into outer space.
"Zora, all mobile suits have been secured and every section has reported in," the operator informed the bridge. "We're good to go!"
"Right, empty the ballast tanks and fire up our thrusters!" bellowed Zora. "We need to surface on the double!"
"Aye, all hands prepare for emergency surfacing! Hold on to your butts!"
High pressure air was forced into the Ganymede's ballast tanks, driving water out and returning buoyancy to the ship as it floated towards the surface in a hurry. Combined with the propulsion of its burning blue thrusters, the vessel pitched up and breached the ocean waves like a green whale only to emerge right in the middle of a storm. As the Militia discovered, Undine's storms were notoriously sudden and the wailing winds, crashing waves and blackened sky could last for days.
"But the weather was just fine before!" the operator cried over the battering of the rain outside and squinted when she thought she saw mountains in the distance. "Um... Zora? Zora!"
"Set the Ganymede's engines to full power!" the pirate captain took charge and hollered. "Inject the metallic hydrogen as soon as we get airborne and add some 'special juice' while you're at it!"
"What?! Are you insane?!" the operator rounded on Zora and argued. "That stuff is already dangerous but you want to mix it with MH? What if we blow up?!"
"Then we either sink to the bottom of the ocean or die in a blaze of glory!" the Hyena shot back and picked up her comm. "All hands, prepare for an emergency launch! And if you have a god to pray to, start praying!"
The operator threw up her hands in frustration but complied and the Ganymede's engine roared over the storm before the ship cut through the tempestuous waters in a burst of blue fire. Against the wind and rain, the jade vessel gathered momentum and used a large wave as a launchpad, pitching up and lifting off from the ocean surface. Once airborne, metallic hydrogen was injected into its blazing thrusters and ignited to produce a thundering azure inferno, sending the ship rocketing towards the black sky with a sonic boom.
The rapid vertical acceleration flung the bridge crew back as the g-forces pinned them to their seats but they had no time to rest. On the monitor, the mountains the operator had seen in the distance had grown dangerously close and revealed themselves to be colossal waves that threatened to swat the Ganymede out of the sky. Over the deafening roar of the ship's thrusters, Zora shouted a barely audible command and the blue flames ejecting from the exhausts glittered before detonating with bright purple combustion.
With sudden renewed impulse, the Ganymede climbed to extreme altitudes on a turbulent trail of violet conflagration and narrowly avoided being engulfed by the massive waves as it cruised past them like a hypersonic bullet. It went on to rip through the clouds, scorching a starry hole in the black storm and leaving a long smoky plume in its wake.
The last glimpse Undine had of the Ganymede was a shining amethyst star departing for the heavens.
.
.
As the Militia ship reached escape velocity and disappeared into space, a lone figure raised their fist at the hole in the sky and shook it.
"D-Damn you, Hellhound!"
Narick snarled and shivered as he clung to the remains of his escape pod. His Sea Warg had been caught in the blast of the Paris' destruction but thanks to his well-honed instincts of self-preservation he had managed to eject his pod before he himself was swallowed by the explosion. Unfortunately, the escape pod had been damaged in the process and alarmingly filled with water as it carried him upwards to relative safety. It broke apart soon after breaching the ocean surface, leaving the nobleman exposed to the open elements as he held on to a floating section of wreckage for dear life.
But even as the scion of House Ambion was pummelled by harsh winds and freezing waves, he still managed to find the time to swear revenge on the Gundam and its despicable pilot.
"C-C-Curse you, Hellhound! This won't be the l-last you see of N-N-Narick Ambion!" he stuttered, feeling his blood boil. His usually impeccable hair was a damp yellow mess but he barely noticed, such was his rage. "I s-swear… once I get off this g-godforsaken planet… I'm going to hunt you down like a do–…!"
The floundering Luxite was cut off when an intense hail of rain whipped him in the face. Before Narick could do anything more than sputter, he felt an ominous shadow fall over his rear. His bewildered gaze rolled back and he froze as he witnessed the stuff of nightmares – an impossibly high wave like a towering mountain range was rising right above the insignificant Ambion's head and blocking out the sky. Narick's jaw dropped and his lungs hesitated for a moment as he tried to convince himself it was all a dream before he began screaming his head off.
The leviathan wave would have squashed the man if rescue had not arrived just in time – a Sea Warg surfaced right next to Narick's flotsam and its cockpit hatch opened.
"Get in, Master Narick!" Cecil cried.
Narick wasted no time; he got to his feet and leapt into Cecil's cockpit, falling into the loyal manservant's arms and hugging him like a babe. The Ambion heir was still screaming when the cockpit hatch closed and the Sea Warg dived beneath the waves just before the tsunami would have flattened them. But their false sense of security was betrayed when the tsunami crashed onto the water's surface with a thunderous boom, creating a powerful shockwave which rippled under the ocean and carried the Sea Warg away with its current.
As Cecil lost control and his master screamed hysterically again, the Sea Warg was sent tumbling towards the seafloor. When the Caliban eventually picked up their distress signal and rescued them, Narick regurgitated the tale of how he had braved the terrible storm in his Sea Warg to save Cecil's life for which the retainer was forever grateful.
.
.
With the loss of the Militia's destroyers, the fleet battle over Undine had deteriorated into a last stand for the RDF as they struggled to hold their line. The heavy exchange of red and blue beams had shortened to rapid intervals as LIRA's Fourth Fleet closed the distance with a swarm of Lycans. The RDF's Garm teams rushed out to meet them this time, combatting the agile mobile suits above and below the bright lights of the warship firefight.
On the left flank, beaten back but not defeated, the Lionheart and the surviving Militia Raijuu held off the advancing Blue Crow and a horde of Wargs. The motley company of allies were all that stood between the First Fleet and total annihilation should LIRA flank their Knight-class battleships... and the Lunar Fox was well-versed when it came to wreaking havoc among the First Fleet. As if that wasn't enough, the Space Wolves' campaign against the Relic Hunters was heartened by the return of their re-energised leader and the Scarlet Wolf directed the onslaught.
"Surround the Relic Hunter ship! Wear them down!" Vega ordered, watching the Garms struggle against their superior numbers with curved red lips. "Far from honourable, I know… but all is fair in love and war!"
Team Orthrus defended the Lionheart as best they could but their exhaustion was starting to show.
"Alice, support!" Ray shouted from the Hermes, dodging fire underneath the Lionheart as he fended off both the Scarlet Cub and their guardian.
"I have my hands full, Ray!" Alice shouted back from Lionheart's stern, sniping with the Jabberwock as she guarded their rear. "Freya, we need you!"
"I'll be right there, Alice!" an impatient Freya tapped her foot inside the Brunhild and contacted the maintenance unit in the hanger bay outside. "Junko, are we done?"
"Almost! Oi, you lot! Detach those propellant hoses on the double!" Junko ordered as the maintenance unit performed their duties under pressure while floating around in grav-suits. "Okay, you're good to go, Freya! The Brunhild has been recharged, refuelled and equipped with a new rifle and shield!"
"Thanks, Junko! Brunhild, heading out!"
The pink Garm launched down the runway and soared out the bow of the Lionheart only to run straight into a familiar Warg.
"This one again!" the Diva grunted angrily and brought up her shield as it was blasted with red plasma. "You're on your own, Ray!"
"N-No problem! I've got this!" the former ace answered with false bravado and tried to pump himself up. "Come on, Ray-Man… I'm Ray-Man!"
With that war cry, the Hermes corkscrewed around the Vega-clone again but targeted their guardian this time, trying to get a shot around their shield. It might have worked had the Scarlet Cub not skilfully blindfired behind it, miraculously clipping the blue Garm's thrusters and sending Ray off course. He ended up colliding with the Warg's shield instead – or rather the pilot bashed him with it – causing the Hermes to almost stop cold, and a dazed Ray-Man could feel the dynamic duo already lining him up in their crosshairs.
"Hellfire missiles, away!"
Square pockets on the Lionheart's skirt opened and guided warheads sprung from the silos, chasing the Wargs away and saving his hide.
"Thanks, commander…" the warrant officer wheezed. "That pair is really something else…"
"It looked like the Hermes was hit; you should go for repairs," Sofia suggested, keeping her red eyes on multiple monitors on the bridge.
"No time. They'll be back and I can't leave them to Freya or Alice."
"Commander! The Militia are requesting support!" an operator interrupted them.
"Tell them to hang in there. We have our hands full enough as it is…" the Demon Commander murmured with a bite of her thumbnail and monitored the numbers of the Raijuu and the Lionheart's Hellfire missiles – both of which were depleting rapidly. "Captain, permission to let the Militia's damaged Raijuu aboard so our maintenance unit can perform repairs?"
"Granted. It's better than nothing; just run it by Chief Petty Officer Moses first," said Milos, wincing from another tremor as their hull was grazed by the Lunar Fox's beam cannon. "The Fenrir must have recharged by now… If she uses Gravity Mode before Laura gets back, we're done for."
"Captain, the Hermes is in trouble!" an operator reported.
The main monitor switched to the camera underneath the hull and the bridge collectively froze when they saw small explosions coming off the back of the blue Garm.
"Ugh! Looks like they got me worse than I thought!" Ray managed to report in as he tried to regain control of the flailing Hermes to no avail.
"Hermes, watch out!"
At Sofia's warning, Ray whipped around and spotted the Cub closing in with their beamsabre. He throttled the erratic thrusters to get away but the Hermes had developed a mind of its own and lurched towards the incoming enemy. It would have been the end of Ray-Man... had a white mobile suit not swooped in and kicked the Warg in the back, sending it flying.
"Laura!" Freya and Alice cried out as one. "You're late!"
"Sorry, I got held up by LIRA," Laura explained before contacting the Lionheart. "Ensign Hartmann, back and reporting for duty, captain."
"Good to have you back, ensign," Milos replied, smiling at the sight of his daughter despite his efforts to contain his relief. "Where's the Ganymede?"
"Up here, Captain Hartmann," Zora appeared onscreen and the Ganymede entered the fray from above the Lionheart, flying upside down so it could aim its turrets at LIRA. "Admiral Turner already informed me of what's happened. I swear, the Reaper will pay for the Militia's sacrifices in blood!"
"Then we're in agreement for once," said an unruffled Sofia whose hardened red stare was a stark contrast to the turmoil of emotions on the pirate's dark features. "I must say though, you got here astonishingly fast…"
"Oh, the Ganymede is actually capable of astonishing things once you know what buttons to push," the Hyena released a husky chuckle and winked at the commander, her mood suddenly brightening. "Perhaps we can push them together later, Sofia?"
"Ahem… Captain Adesina?" Milos quickly intervened before his XO stuffed the Ganymede full of Hellfire missiles. "The Lionheart must hold this position while the First Fleet begins their retreat. Can I count on you and the Militia to continue covering us? I know your Raijuu pilots must be exhausted but if they could stall for time…"
"Don't underestimate us, captain. We're all guerrilla fighters; we'll stall LIRA until the next cycle if need be!" Zora declared with a display of her furious fist before directing instructions offscreen. "I'll send Team Banshee to assist you with the Space Wolves. Meanwhile, I'll rally the Militia."
"We appreciate it," Milos nodded and turned back to Laura once Zora had signed off. "I hope you found something useful down on Undine because the Scarlet Wolf is out there and she's raring for a fight."
"Oh, I found something all right… Just leave her to me," Laura signed off with a cocky grin before checking in on the Hermes. "You okay, Ray?"
"Yeah… Cheating death is just one of my specialties, you know?" Ray caught his breath and joked before his expression turned solemn. "…Thanks, Laura."
"Just returning the favour… Well, except for the friendly fire part," the blonde joked back and opened a few more channels. "Heads up Junko, the Hermes is coming in for repairs."
"Roger that! And glad to have you back, Laura!" the chipper mechanic replied. "I have so much I want to ask you but first you need to go and rip LIRA a new one so promise you'll tell me later!"
"I promise," the technopath smiled and looked up just as Team Banshee arrived in their Raijuu. "Sheeban, I'm counting on you to help out the Lionheart and Team Orthrus."
"Understood," said Sheeban, but before he closed the channel the taciturn Militia ace surprised Laura by adding, "…Good luck, Hellhound."
"What? She's not sticking around?" a completely clueless Ignacio stopped and asked as he helped haul the Hermes to safety.
"Watch out, Laura," Ray warned. "The Fenrir used Gravity Mode in the ambush only to retreat... and if I know the Scarlet Wolf, odds are she's all charged up again and waiting just for you."
"Laura, you're not thinking of going solo again, are you?" Freya piped in once she realised what was going on. "We had a strategy! You know the Fenrir is too dangerous once it activates Gravity Mode!"
"That's exactly why I have to go alone; without the Hermes, our rate of success drops significantly," Laura argued, making final checks of her instruments. "But now... If I'm right, the Orthrus just might pull it off…"
"What the hell are you talking about you dumb blon–"
"Wait, Freya," Alice interrupted the riled up Diva. "Look at the Orthrus…"
The pinkette closed her mouth and brought the white Gundam up on the Brunhild's monitor for a closer inspection. In addition to its solar rifle and shield, the Orthrus was sporting a new six-winged thruster pack she had never seen before.
"Sorry, Freya," Laura whispered, hearing only silence from her friendly rival's comm. "I hate to say it but... where we're going… you won't be able to keep up."
With a push of her throttle, the Orthrus zoomed straight into the battle and the roaring blue flames of its new tulip thrusters drowned out Freya's cursing. The horde of Wargs, who had been made wary by the Ganymede's appearance and the Raijuu's sudden renewed vigour, wavered at the sight of the White Hellhound. Even the Space Wolves exercised caution – all except for one pilot. Charlotte, still stinging from Laura's humiliating kick, charged ahead of the pack and challenged Vega's so-called rival with her Warg.
"White Hellhound… So you're the one who made Lady Vega suffer!" the fearless prodigy snarled with naked resentment. "I won't forgive you!"
The Scarlet Cub closed in with a series of erratic movements, dashing her Warg up, down and side to side before getting right in the Gundam's face. Charlotte's beamsabre swung for the enemy's cockpit only for her Warg to zip past when the Orthrus dodged out of the way with a timely burst of its thrusters. But the Cub simply inflated her cheeks with a huff and only a second later she was back on the Hellhound's tail, firing her rifle. Like a savage bee, she buzzed around the Orthrus with blinding speed making extraordinarily quick and relentless passes. It was as if her Warg had a nonexistent turning circle, her tiny body fobbing off crushing g-forces that would normally send a regular pilot unconscious.
Faced with such an aggressive piloting style, most pilots might buckle under the pressure and make a fatal mistake but Laura kept her cool and evaded every attack using minimal bursts of her new thrusters. The Warg pilot might fight and dual-wield like the Scarlet Wolf but Laura had gone up against the real thing and this clone wasn't on the same level. However, her refusal to engage only seemed to make the enemy angrier and the Warg's performance increased dramatically, putting the Orthrus on the backfoot. Realising she had underestimated the enemy technopath, Laura admired their tenacity and she couldn't help but wonder – was this what Vega Aurelia had felt when they had first met on the battlefield?
But it was only for a moment.
"I don't know who you are…" Laura's brow furrowed with annoyance. "But I don't have time to waste with you!"
Her purple eyes darted about, following the Warg's nimble movements across the monitor before suddenly narrowing. With uncanny prescience, the Orthrus slammed its shield into the sprightly mobile suit on the next run, sending it veering off into space. Laura reflexively followed up by pointing her Solar Rifle at the easy target but a Warg with a shield got in her way and she eased off the trigger. Loathe to waste ammo or energy, the White Hellhound fired up her thrusters and continued on her way, leaving the enemies behind.
"Hey! Don't turn your back on me!" Charlotte cried as she tried to shake off her dizziness and was about to chase after the Gundam when her comm activated.
"Stand down, Charlotte," a cool voice instructed.
"Lady Vega? But…"
"That's an order."
Something in Vega's voice gave Charlotte pause – something she realised she had never heard before.
Excitement. True, uninhibited exhilaration. As if the Scarlet Wolf's mask had slipped away just a little.
"All of you… Don't interfere," Vega went on to warn every Warg on every channel as she licked her red lips. "The White Hellhound is mine."
The Fenrir's exhausts erupted with crimson flames, signalling her presence to the Orthrus on the opposite end of the battlefield and they instantly transformed into red and blue trails of light on a fated collision course. The fighting Wargs and Raijuu parted in their wake as if subconsciously scurrying from danger, and as if by some unspoken pact the destined rivals pulled up at the last second before they met in the middle. Like a pair of soaring eagles, they rocketed away from the battle and circled one another, intertwining the red and blue pillars of thruster contrails beneath them as they waited for someone to make the first move.
"You kept me waiting, Hellhound," Vega grinned and savoured the moment. "Now… entertain me."
"You probably think I'm here to play with you," Laura guessed and gave a smile of her own. "But I'm not going to be drawn into your games – not this time!"
Right before Vega's eyes, the Orthrus began to change colours from white to blue from its armour down to even its rifle and shield. Gundanium equipment was the first thought that came to the masked woman's fascinated mind – perhaps a composite considering their Remian designs – but it was the thruster pack on its back that stole her breath away. The White Hellhound spun around as if showing it off and Vega turned green with envy at the feather-like wings and the additional tulip thrusters which spurred the Orthrus forward with cyan fire.
"Ambion…! That useless fool!" the Scarlet Wolf hissed out a rare curse and grit her fangs. "That relic could have been mine!"
To add insult to injury, the blue Gundam flaunted the swiftness of its new mode by suddenly boosting ahead and leaving the Fenrir to eat its space dust. Pursing her lips, Vega hurriedly cast aside any feelings of jealousy and shifted the Fenrir to the maroon coat of Gravity Mode before falling after her rival. But as the glowing cyan comet on the monitor continued to drift ahead, it soon became apparent that Gravity Mode and the Fenrir's base thrusters were not going to cut it.
"I can't catch up…?!"
Watching the Fenrir fall behind on the monitor gave Laura a sadistic sense of pleasure and the blonde smirked just imagining Vega's expression when the Scarlet Wolf realised she had lost her title as the queen of speed. Gravity Mode might give the Fenrir a marked boost in velocity especially over long distances but Pulse Mode and its instantaneous acceleration had the maroon suit beat by a mile, forcing the Scarlet Wolf to play catch up. But Laura wasn't done there; with a cyan burst of ignition, she extended her lead and headed straight towards the flashing lights and explosions smack in the middle of the fleet battle.
There, above the fierce crossfire of the RDF and LIRA warships, the Garm Teams were doing their best to hold back the agile Lycans but found themselves in a retreat. The tide only turned when an azure comet streaked past their monitors and they found the White Hellhound zipping between their enemies like a ravenous dragon. With her Solar Rifle mounted behind the Orthrus' hips, Laura swung her cyan beamsabre freely and carved open Lycan after Lycan in mid-flight like a heat-seeking blowtorch until she had eviscerated an entire squad.
Having procured the enemy's attention, Laura watched as the rest of Team Hypnos swarmed her and tried to hit her speeding Gundam with a deluge of red beams. It still would have been a futile effort if Laura so wished but instead she Mode Changed the Orthrus from blue to gold, flying directly into the oncoming plasma and absorbing it with her Solar Armour. At the same time, she rallied the Garms Teams on the comm which let loose a blue barrage at both the distracted Lycans and the Orthrus behind them without fear of friendly fire as the golden Gundam absorbed their stray beams painlessly.
"Thanks for the meal!" the White Hellhound shouted before shifting back to the electric blue of Pulse Mode and taking off. The Garm pilots cheered after their saviour who had helped them rout a score of Lycans in well under a minute... only to gasp when a red streak spun them off their axes.
Vega followed the Gundam's trail of destruction and gathered up the grey parts of the demolished Lycans into the Fenrir's gravity field as she passed. Thanks to the Orthrus' short stopover to assist its RDF allies, the Scarlet Wolf was finally catching up to the White Hellhound as her maroon suit surpassed hypersonic speeds.
When the Orthrus dove away from the mobile suit melee and into the field of warship crossfire below, the Fenrir shadowed it without hesitation. They played a game of chicken, weaving through titanic red and blue beams that could easily swallow their mobile suits whole. Just one false move would see them vaporised from existence but Laura and Vega raised the stakes by blasting at one another as they performed their daring manoeuvres.
The Orthrus turned on its back and fired in mid-flight, the White Hellhound's signature move which turned defence into offence. The Fenrir responded by Gravity Throwing the collected Lycan parts, neutralising the cyan beams with perfect aim all while discharging her own rifle. Vega attempted to overwhelm the Orthrus by slingshotting more Lycan debris at it amidst her plasma bursts but when they fell by the wayside it became painfully obvious Gravity Mode was most effective at close range.
A giant wall of azure plasma from a Knight-class battleship materialised between them, obliterating their projectiles and obscuring their view of one another. When it passed by only a split second later, the Orthrus was gone, having turned into a shooting star the colour of twinkling cyan as it headed straight for the advancing LIRA fleet.
"Oh no…" Vega murmured with understated alarm and quickly rammed her throttle all the way forward.
The Fourth Fleet had shifted into a V-formation as it pressed the RDF into a retreat and the Tempest was safely positioned at the back directly behind the Wyvern cruiser leading the offensive. When the White Hellhound came calling, approaching on its radar at blinding speed, the vanguard cruiser did not take the ace lightly and redirected its beam cannon whilst launching every available missile and mobile suit it possibly could. With the Orthrus in its sights, the black vessel blasted it with a long, sustained red beam only for the blue Gundam to spiral around the massive attack.
Undeterred, the Wyvern released a hot wave of missiles next only for them to also whizz by their agile target and when Laura reached the cruiser, she continued to spiral around it. Witnessing everything from behind, Vega rushed to the Wyvern's aid and gathered up the missiles in the Fenrir's gravity field as she passed before they pointed back home. She discovered the White Hellhound twisting down the ship's length like a cyan corkscrew, goading heavy turret fire like it was child's play and dispatching the Wargs stationed nearby with her rifle.
Vega tried to intercept the Orthrus from overhead but, like the Wargs who were forced to aim at their own ship, the risk of friendly fire was too great. Once the blue Gundam reached the stern it dived over, passed the thruster exhausts and disappeared under the belly of the cruiser. Rather than follow, Vega took a sharp fall instead and fell back the other way with the missiles in tow, predicting the Orthrus would reappear at the bow. She might have gotten there before Laura and ambushed the Gundam... if a purple beam hadn't pierced through the Wyvern's hull.
Only Vega's honed instincts and technopathic reflexes saved her as the Fenrir thrusted sideways. The Solar Beam missed by a hair but clipped a missile orbiting the mobile suit instead, triggering an explosion which almost sent the Scarlet Wolf hurtling through space. Regaining control in an instant with the pull of Gravity Mode, Vega fell back towards the cruiser's bow and found the Orthrus had changed to gold.
As the masked pilot suspected, the Gundam had deceitfully Mode Changed while out of sight and its golden rifle had split down the middle like a beak as it pulsated with residual purple energy. That shot had definitely been aimed at the Fenrir but Vega had no time to compliment her foe; her mind raced with a burning question: Why fire the rifle and not its chest cannon?
The Scarlet Wolf found the answer when she saw the gold Orthrus position itself in front of the Wyvern and open up its chest plate.
As the cannon inside charged with glowing purple energy, Vega's jaw dropped and she rushed to the scene; the White Hellhound had calculated everything.
"Now! Don't let it fire!" she ordered the Wargs with rarely heard urgency and threw every missile she had at the Gundam. The Wargs complied at once and fired their missile launchers, exploiting Solar Mode's weakness to conventional weaponry. The host of warheads rocketed away at the golden Orthrus which had become an ideal and immobile target while its chest cannon charged.
But inside its cockpit, Laura grinned and flipped a switch. Twin compartments on the sides of the Gundam's head opened, revealing Vulcan gatling guns which were already whirling to life. In a textbook case of point defence, they fired a hail of bullets which tore through the missiles and neutralised them in a cascade of explosions.
At any other time, as she observed another perfect answer from the White Hellhound, Vega might have bemoaned the inelegance of Vulcans mounted on the Gundam's head unit. Instead, the Scarlet Wolf actually found herself gaping like a mute and as the Orthrus' chest cannon finished charging, she hastily propelled the Fenrir out of its path with clenched teeth.
"Solar Flare!" Laura shouted as all the energy she had collected throughout the battle was condensed into a single beam which leapt out of the chest cannon like a purple flood.
The titanic beam, far exceeding the size of the barrel that had fired it, ripped straight through the Wyvern-class ship at point blank range. The ill-fated vessel combusted from bow to stern, rippling inside out with explosions of devouring flames and blinding violet light. No Warg was spared and each ignited with purple fire as they were caught in the blast before vaporising into dust.
But, as Vega had deduced, the ship had never been Laura's true target – that dubious honour belonged to the vessel directly behind the Wyvern.
The flagship of the Reaper, General Leonidas Cypher – the unholy Tempest.
Purple energy erupted out the back of the obliterated Wyvern and surged forth, the power of Solar Flare undisrupted. The raging inferno flew straight for the Tempest and would have landed a clean shot if not for a LIRA cruiser that suddenly threw itself into the path of the beam. It exploded much like its recently departed sistership, detonating from the molten chasm in its hull, and the beam that left through the other side dissipated like lavender phantoms.
While the Tempest had been left intact, this was unknown to both Laura and Vega who had been blinded by the thick smoke and eclipsing debris from the first Wyvern's destruction. The knowledge their rival was somewhere out there in the fog was bolstered by the strange connection they shared. They had always felt that they could sense one another and the technopaths felt it more strongly now than ever before. As they waited and hid in silence, their chaotic minds were completely encapsulated by thoughts of the other.
For Vega, the destruction the Hellhound had wrought all in a matter of minutes had left her speechless at first. But as she continued to ponder it, the Scarlet Wolf's red lips curved into a wide smile and she almost chuckled.
"We are alike, you and I… are we not?" she whispered with a tone caught between warmth and sympathy. "What doesn't kill us makes us stronger… and we are strong."
As if hearing her rival, Laura shook her head and blinked her purple eyes; thoroughly confused by the connection she felt. However, she could not deny what her feelings were telling her.
"I should hate you… You killed Tully. But…" she faltered and her perplexed expression slowly took on a look of clarity. "But when we fight… It's like my heart dances and weeps at the same time..."
Baffled, Laura gave her head another shake and focused by switching on the infrared sensors. The darkness on the monitor was replaced by brightly coloured dots; the floating, superheated fragments of the Wyvern cruiser after Solar Flare had blown it into chunks. Any of them could be the Fenrir but they all drifted in an outward direction at the same pace – and one of them was going against the grain.
Trusting her instincts, Laura thrust out her Solar Rifle and its golden barrel split open into two halves. As it charged with radiant purple energy, she checked Solar Mode's power reserves and found it had enough for one last shot before the Orthrus would be forced to revert to its default mode. With a bite of her lip, the technopath resolved to make it count and when the blinking targeting reticules converged, she pulled the trigger.
A Solar Beam discharged from the beak-barrel like an amethyst lightning bolt and pierced the Fenrir far across space, parting smoke and vaporising debris in its wake. Solar Mode simultaneously powered down, returning the golden Orthrus to its pure white form, and Laura engaged her thrusters to follow up on her shot. As she neared, something told her the Scarlet Wolf would never go down so easily... and sure enough a closer inspection revealed her worst fear.
What she had in fact sniped was an intact Warg husk – a decoy sent sailing through space on the hunch Laura would notice and take the bait. The blonde swore and whirled the Orthrus around to hightail it out of there but it was too late; an invisible force weighed the Gundam and its pilot down, pushing Laura into her seat like she was suddenly made of cement. Fighting against what she knew was gravity, the technopath managed to roll her eyes up and peek at the monitor where she found the maroon Fenrir directly underneath the Orthrus with its manipulators outstretched.
"Like I said, White Hellhound… we are alike," Vega chuckled and watched as the Gundam flailed about, blasting its new thrusters at the Fenrir only for the noblewoman to increase the potency of Gravity Howl until it could barely move. "What doesn't kill us makes us stronger… but unless you've survived death itself – unless you've lost everything – you will never be as strong as I."
The eyes of the Scarlet Wolf hardened beneath her mask and, sensing dire peril, Laura technopathically activated Pulse Mode. The Orthrus shifted to electric blue and ignited its cyan thrusters with renewed might, futilely trying to escape the pull of artificial gravity only for it to flounder in place. The groan of warping Gundanium echoed inside the cockpit and Laura grimaced, truly fearing she was about to be compacted at any second.
"It's a shame. You've been a worthy foe – a kindred spirit, even. But I've come too far to stop here…" Vega mournfully declared, her curved lips withering as she slowly squeezed the Gundam on the monitor and burned her rival's final moments into her memory. "…Farewell, Hellhound."
The overpowering force squashing Laura into her seat rapidly intensified and as several instruments cracked inside the cockpit, she swore the walls were closing in on her. The technopath grunted in defiance and glared at the Scarlet Wolf, refusing to go down this way. That was when she saw it, stirring and parting the smoke behind the maroon Fenrir before it came storming out through the debris: the bow of a white battleship. Rather than retreat, the Baselard had charged across the battlefield to the Orthrus' aid and was poised to ram the Fenrir in the back.
Vega was so focused on channelling the power of Gravity Howl and witnessing her rival's demise that she never saw the speeding iceberg coming before it was too late. The full weight of the battleship slammed into the Fenrir like a planet-sized freight train, stunning and almost knocking Vega out as she was suddenly sent spinning. The Scarlet Wolf was so disoriented that she lost control of Gravity Mode in the mayhem and the Fenrir's maroon armour reverted back to red before the gyrating mobile suit disappeared into space.
Freed from Gravity Howl, the Gundam's already blaring thrusters slingshotted it above the Baselard, just barely missing the battleship before it turned the Orthrus into roadkill like the Fenrir. Once the Orthrus was clear, Laura pulled up on her throttle and reverse-thrusted to a stop, panting and blinking with surprise as she floated above her immense white saviour. The pilot's closest brush with death yet at the hands of Vega Aurelia had left her visibly shaken but she steeled her nerves with a long, deep breath and by the time a familiar white-bearded captain appeared onscreen, Laura was ready to get back into the action.
"Fall back, ensign!" Admiral Turner bellowed, taking Laura by complete surprise. "Return to the Lionheart and retreat!"
"Admiral?!" she gasped, staring at the old man with defiant shock. "But… But I can still fight!"
"No, Ensign Hartmann," the admiral dissuaded the ace pilot at once with a grave shake of his head and closed his eyes. "No amount of fighting – not even with the awesome power of the Gundam – will do us any good… Not anymore."
Admiral Turner's words left Laura perplexed until her purple eyes widened with horror and she whirled the Orthrus around. She prayed it wasn't so, but what met her fearful gaze on the monitor was the harsh undeniable truth: the once mighty Knight-class battleships to their rear had been reduced to seven crumbling and lifeless white wrecks. In the time Laura and Vega had been missing in the smoke, the First Fleet had been decimated and not a single ship remained.
They had lost.
.
.
The First Fleet and their Garm Teams, buoyed by the return of the White Hellhound, had been making a successful fighting retreat. When the Hellhound had single-handedly destroyed LIRA's vanguard cruiser and almost their flagship with it, breaking the Fourth Fleet's advancing formation in the process, the RDF and the Militia's escape had seemed assured. But little did they know that the Reaper was far from done.
"General, I believe we have collected sufficient data for Phase One."
On the shadowy bridge of the Tempest, a scientist in a white lab coat spoke from a portrait on the main monitor while the battle played out behind him. Previously, LIRA had held the advantage and were poised to crush the RDF Fleet but the appearance of the Gundam had altered the course of the battle. The Blue Crow's flanking manoeuvres had been hindered, the Lycans had been unable to fight through to the retreating Knight-class battleships and the White Hellhound had just opened a gap in the middle of their formation by sinking both the Alonso and Antonio with one shot of its chest cannon. If General Cypher had not ordered the nearby Antonio to move in front of the Tempest beforehand, it would have been the flagship that had been struck.
Now, the lead RDF battleship was making an opportunistic break for the hole in the Wyverns' formation, no doubt hoping to wreak even more havoc with the Gundam by getting behind the Fourth Fleet. At this rate, LIRA would lose not just the relic but also the battle. However, General Leonidas Cypher's pale features did not look worried in the least.
"It's time to end this," the Reaper boomed from the captain's chair and gestured to the scientist with a bony hand. "Begin Phase Two testing; activate Team Hypnos!"
In a command centre deep in the belly of the Tempest, the scientist nodded to the image of Cypher on the main monitor before throwing out orders behind him. Scores of white-clad, black-visored operators began working their consoles and their screens flashed with seemingly innocuous information which included the vital readings of whole squads of the Lycan pilots currently in battle. Each operator finished their inputs by flipping a switch and the green vital signs of Team Hypnos all changed to red, illuminating the entire command centre with bloody light.
At the same time across space, the masks of Team Hypnos lit up with red LEDs inside their cockpits and a faint hiss could be heard coming from their gas mask canisters. The bodies of the pilots began to convulse violently as a mysterious gas was pumped into their lungs and they were only saved from self-injury by the tight straps which kept them in place before they suddenly went eerily still. Outside in the mobile suit battle, the Garms witnessed the lone eyes of the Lycans all transform to red at once and a chill went down the spines of the defenders.
When the grey mobile suits attacked next, they were no longer mere Lycans – they were ravenous beasts. They overran the RDF like an unstoppable horde, exhibiting heightened speed and aggression as they systematically destroyed every foe in their path. The stunned Garms fired their rifles from behind the safety of their shields only to discover they might as well be holding cardboard. Beams could not touch the Lycans, shields meant nothing to their eye-popping manoeuvres and their marksmanship had become frighteningly accurate.
It was as if every member of Team Hypnos had transformed into a technopathic ace… and the Garms had become their prey.
Red plasma began to pierce the white mobile suits at the fore and they detonated in droves. Those that tried to retreat were swiftly hunted down and disembowelled with beamsabres before exploding. The entire horde seemed to move as one and any pockets of resistance were snuffed out with synchronised tactics. Before long, the grey swarm had swiftly engulfed the white defenders in a shrinking ripple of fireballs until none were left.
But the surge did not stop there; now there was nothing left standing between Team Hypnos and the Knight-class battleships.
The horde continued their onslaught and hounded the unguarded vessels like buzzards did a dying herd as they blasted their hulls from every direction. The First Fleet fought back with fierce volleys from their swivelling anti-mobile suit turrets and the last of their deadly Hellfire missiles but the slow-moving battleships were sitting ducks. Most of Team Hypnos evaded the projectiles with ease before those that carried missile launchers gutted the warships with multiple warheads.
The Knights that did not succumb to a fiery demise and had managed to hold on unfortunately discovered the lunacy of Team Hypnos. Despite being pushed beyond their physical limits by the RDF defences, the Lycan pilots continued to perform high-g manoeuvres and began to bleed from their orifices as they reached breaking point. It was as if they had become more machine than human and, upon a signal from the Tempest, those closest to death steered their mobile suits directly at the enemy ships with coordinated precision. Like a shower of explosive meteors, the Lycans slammed into the battleships with hull-shattering force before self-destructing and instantly transforming the last of the Knights into smoking husks.
Finally, Team Hypnos' rampage ceased and the battlefield fell silent. In only a short amount of time, they had eradicated the First Fleet and horrified all the Rem, Zodiac and Lux observers alike. The only ones who appeared pleased with the outcome were the Tempest's scientists who reported their findings with undisguised exhilaration.
"The odd-numbered squads reacted positively to the new concoction – beyond our expectations, in fact!" one black-visored technician exclaimed as they pored over the information on their monitor. "Their performance and reaction time indicators are off the charts – even those that were given low dosages."
"We're getting similar findings with the control group, curiously," another tech stated. "This could be more proof the gas allows them to link up technopathically like a hive mind…"
"Or a shared dream, one might say," the lead scientist chuckled and turned to the main monitor where General Cypher was listening in. "Phase Two testing has been a resounding success, General! We lost almost fifty percent of Team Hypnos but only ten percent died due to combat; twenty percent overdosed and the rest broke due to combat-related stress. The latter was disposed of once all possible data was extracted and, as usual, I expect the analysis to show the fault lies with their Lycan mobile suits and not our latest concoction of Hypnos Gas. Unfortunately, our subjects still seem to suffer from varying degrees of withdrawal symptoms soon after activation has ended but I'm sure you'll agree it is only a minor setback considering the experiment's outstanding results."
"Excellent," nodded the general – the highest compliment one could receive from the emotionless Reaper – before turning his hollowed eyes towards the lone battleship left in the middle of the field. Cypher could easily surround and destroy the survivor if he so desired but even he could not resist the opportunity for one final experiment. "Find me Major Aurelia. I must witness the full power of the Gravity Relic for myself…"
.
.
The devastation on Laura's monitor was enough to make her stomach turn and it showed on the blonde's tortured expression. The orphans had flown with the First Fleet to Lemuria and its untimely demise filled her with heart-rending anguish; those lifeless bodies drifting amongst the debris had once been their comrades-in-arms. Laura's grief soon boiled over into lip-biting anger and she was about to argue more with Admiral Turner when another familiar face popped up onscreen.
"Listen to the admiral, ensign," Milos ordered her, his grim visage that of her superior officer rather than her father. "You know what has to happen next. Don't… Don't make it any harder than it has to be."
"But Milos…! Captain!" Laura shouted, ready to let her emotions fly. If Milos was suggesting what she thought he was, there was no way she was going to agree.
"Laura Hartmann…" the composed voice of Admiral Turner cut her off before she could get started and the veteran suddenly began to smile. "You know, when you were first stationed aboard the Baselard, I knew I could expect great things from you. Watching that young woman become the best pilot I've ever seen has been one of the greatest joys of this old man's life… and that's why you have to leave. Don't let me down now."
The look in the admiral's brown eyes at that moment was one Laura would never forget; like the gaze of a kindly old grandfather, they shone with complete faith in her. With gritted teeth, the technopath knew what she had to say and forced the words out of her mouth.
"Yes, sir…" Laura whispered only to shake her head and salute before shouting out her guts. "Yes, sir! I won't let you down, admiral!"
The channel closed and the Orthrus thrusted back towards the Lionheart, leaving only Milos and Turner. Now it was the Lionheart captain's turn to be gobsmacked.
"Admiral… I don't know what to say…"
"Just promise me you'll get the Lionheart home with those relics… and don't let the Reaper get his hands on the Gundam or Laura," said Turner and he finished by staring his old friend right in the eye. "It's up to you now, Milos."
"…Yes, sir!" Milos saluted and took one last glassy-eyed look at his old captain. "It's been an honour, admiral."
The commlink to the Lionheart disappeared and Turner leaned back with a sigh that seemed to echo in the empty bridge. He was all alone, having ordered his crew to abandon ship, and a quick check with his chair console confirmed they had all made it out on the Baselard's escape pods. Now the admiral's only company was that of the Reaper and his Fourth Fleet on the monitor, which had begun to encircle the Baselard like jackals.
"Okay, Reaper…" George Turner growled and made his last stand. "Let's dance!"
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Jonas Sparrhorn had seen a lot of crazy things throughout his long career. From suicide bombers in the Outer Rim conflicts and massive fleet battles at Lemuria to a Gravity Relic wielded by the most brilliant and insane pilot he had ever met... The commodore thought he had seen it all.
But this... This took the cake and ran away with it.
"Vega…" Jonas activated his comm and somehow found the Scarlet Wolf without tearing his eyes away from the Blue Crow's monitor. "Are you seeing this?"
"I am… I have a front row seat," Vega, equally astonished, replied from near the Tempest where the Fenrir had been thrown. "It appears to be… dancing…"
The last Knight-class battleship, alone against six Wyvern-class cruisers, should have been an easy kill – an expectation only bolstered by the launch of its escape pods. However, it appeared its captain had remained behind and their… unorthodox methods… were actually keeping the Fourth Fleet at bay.
By purposefully going into a rapid tailspin on its x-axis and firing its beam cannon in long arcs at the same time, the battleship singlehandedly threatened the entire Fourth Fleet with every revolution like a swinging azure blade. Smart use of its thrusters even allowed it to change its trajectory while spinning, making it an even more erratic target for the Wyverns' red beams as they tried to aim their cannons and avoid being severed in half at the same time. The tip of the giant plasma sword even reached the Blue Crow on the battle's flank and forced the stealth ship to suspend its chase of Rem's Relic Hunters.
As a fellow soldier, Jonas was in awe of the captain. Not only had they valiantly stayed behind to hold off the enemy while their allies escaped, they were laughing in the face of the Reaper – in the face of death itself. However, the Knight-class battleship was obviously not intended for such rigorous manoeuvres and it was only a matter of time before its reactor overheated or its hull broke apart. Without a doubt, the captain intended to go down with the ship… and they were doing it in style.
"Major Aurelia," the icy tone of General Cypher on the Fenrir's comm distracted Vega from the indigo lights of the spinning battleship-top on her monitor. "The RDF ship will make a perfect test subject for the Gravity Relic's powers… Destroy it."
"But, general…" Vega inquired and raised a perplexed eyebrow. "What about the Relic Hunters? And the Orthrus? They will escape with the relic at this rate."
"They have nowhere to flee and will be hunted down in due time," the Reaper replied and Vega swore his voice hummed with glee with his next words. "Now… Show me this Gravity Howl."
"…Yes, general."
It gave Vega no pleasure to be the one who extinguished the brave soul still on that ship but it did her no favours to defy the Reaper. In silence, she set her throttle to maximum power and the Fenrir shot towards the gyrating battleship in the distance on blue contrails. The captain must have seen the speeding red mobile suit coming because they pivoted the ship's beam cannon in the Scarlet Wolf's direction and followed it up with a stream of missiles.
Vega guessed what the captain was attempting to do and smiled at their ingenuity. With a flourishing display of piloting, the noblewoman skilfully manipulated her control sticks and the nimble Fenrir dodged the first several warheads before discharging its beam rifle at several more in the barrage. When the battleship's titanic plasma cannon eventually swung past like an oversized azure beamsabre, it also burned through its own missile salvo and started a fiery chain reaction of explosions that would have destroyed the Fenrir in the inferno, gravity powers or not. But the Scarlet Wolf had already cleared a path to safety through the missile minefield and the red suit erupted out of the flames only partially scorched.
Conserving energy until the last moment, the Fenrir swerved to a halt directly underneath the belly of the spinning battleship and its armour finally shifted to the radiant maroon of Gravity Mode. Closing her eyes, Vega technopathically recalled the awesome power she had felt at the abandoned colony and tapped into it effortlessly. She sensed the Fenrir's gravity field expand and swallow the white vessel in a swirling storm of ship and mobile suit debris. The mass of debris began to pummel the revolving battleship like bullets while metal fragments were stripped from its warping hull and transformed into more projectiles for the storm.
The once mighty ship's bow and stern disintegrated more with every revolution but defiant blue fire continued to sputter from both its cannon and thrusters. Despite knowing its fate was sealed, the Knight-class battleship's captain was determined to fight until the bitter end. Finally, inside the black sphere devoid of light at the centre of the tempest, the Fenrir's eyes glowed red and Vega answered the captain's valour.
"Gravity Howl!"
.
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For over two decades since becoming its captain, George Turner had been through thick and thin with the Baselard. The old man had grown so attached to the ship he considered it as a second home and the countless crewmembers who had served aboard it over the years were like family to him. But now it had all finally come to an end for both of them.
Momentarily swept away by the memories, Turner opened his eyes and found himself anchored to his chair by the same formidable gravity pulling the Baselard apart. The admiral could almost feel her pain as its hull groaned and fractured around him but like her, he was powerless to resist the fate foisted upon them. As the forces crushing the captain grew stronger so too did the ship's burgeoning cries, and he knew the Scarlet Wolf would soon reach the final crescendo.
"It's okay, Baselard… You're not going alone…" Turner whispered and somehow managed to manipulate the console on the armrest with his fingers.
The Baselard's hazy monitor switched in and out of space until it settled on a set of blurry ships in the distance: the Lionheart and the Ganymede. Like a pair shrinking dots, one white and one green, the monitor showed them safely escaping from Undine before the screen cracked and blacked out. Turner sighed with relief and felt the tension leave his body as if freeing itself from the artificial gravity keeping him pinned in his seat. The future was in safe hands and all an old fossil like him had left to do was wait for the end.
"…George Turner's Last Stand…" he whispered, thinking of how he would be remembered by the history books and chuckling. "No… George Turner's Last Dance…!"
The dim lights began to flicker on and off before the bridge was thrown into complete darkness. A terrible screech could be heard next as the room was ripped in half and a deathly silence followed as everything inside was ejected into the cold void of space. But right up to the end… George Turner was laughing.
"Run, Lionheart… run..."
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On the Lionheart's bridge, the Baselard buckled and shattered into countless pieces on the main monitor. Just like that, the distinguished ship and its admired captain were gone… and the Lionheart's bridge crew could only look on in despondent silence. Everyone knew there was nothing that could have been done but it still hurt all the same.
In the captain's chair, Milos performed a sharp salute and a rare tear formed in his eye. One by one, the bridge crew led by Sofia did the same and paid their respects to the departed admiral who had saved their lives. So it was on the Ganymede with Zora and her crew as well as Jonas on the Blue Crow and the Space Wolves. Last but not least, Team Orthrus saluted in their cockpits and lingered behind for a moment before rejoining the fleeing Lionheart.
Laura went last, keeping up her salute for a moment longer as tears streamed from her reddened eyes and the steady trail of droplets splashed onto her monitor. Finally, when she was ready to accept the reality of the Baselard's disintegrated remains, she squeezed her eyes shut and whirled away along with the Orthrus.
Thanks to Admiral Turner, they had survived. But because they had survived, they had to face forward. Because now, not only were they alone…
…They were on the run.
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END OF EPISODE SEVEN
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RAY: Admiral… I can't believe you're gone. It felt like only yesterday you were tossing me into rehab, saying 'Don't stop fighting… not until the end.' It will never repay the debt I owe you, but I will honour your memory by living up to those words for the rest of my life.
Next time, on Gundam Gemini:
Sinister Sanctuary.
Vale George Turner. You were already a giant in life but in death you have transcended us all.
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Finally, after over three months, Episode Seven is complete... I'm very sorry for all the delays but I hope it was worth the wait. Thanks again to my beta, LW, for helping with all three parts - I couldn't have done it without her wisdom and eye for detail. I will be taking a short break to work on some GG side projects before starting on the next episode; all will be explained in an announcement on my profile, so stay tuned.
