The door chime woke Amuro up from his sleep, the veteran soldier in a teen's body snapping to full awareness immediately. Pressing the button above his bed, he simply said – "One moment." – before reaching for yesterday's pants. It wouldn't quite do to prance around the ship in only shorts, after all, not to mention that the only clothes he actually had on hand were the ones he wore back at Side 7 when all this started. Helping the crew of the White Base load equipment didn't leave him any time to go back home and grab some spares, nor did the captain let any of the refugees disembark for that purpose in case Char came back and they needed to leave in a hurry.

Even though he hadn't gotten the chance to get to know the man before his death, Amuro could already tell that Paolo Cassius wasn't one of those Federation officers who considered everyone beneath them, soldier and civilian alike, to be dirt to be stepped on in the name of one's career (of whom not all were even Titans to begin with, the regular forces' officer corps had plenty to go around as well). Not that Bright was any different in that regard, of course; rocky start or not, Amuro did eventually grow to respect the man on a personal level once he got old enough to look back at his own wartime behavior from Bright's point of view, respect that had nothing to do with how both of them got shafted by the brass after the war for not locking steps with the party line.

Granted, Bright was forced to become acting captain and make some drastic decisions and snap judgments to get his understrength crew out of the hairy situations they kept getting into time and time again despite having been a mere ensign fresh out of command training when it started, but said crew almost all came out of it alive in the end, sneering admirals be damned. Which was the very reason why, when Amuro was quietly and unofficially approached for input regarding personnel recommendations for what eventually became Londo Bell, he pointed in Bright's direction and felt vindicated upon being informed that the man was already under consideration as it is.

Or, for a more recent example, why Amuro had half a mind to hop back into the Core Fighter and go turn Char into a red (heh) smear on the nearest asteroid when he returned back to the White Base after the recent sortie and heard how close Bright came to being spaced.

Only time will tell whether Paolo Cassius will end up on the same page in his books – or what will become of Bright now that he wasn't under the pressure of command in impossible situations (for now, at least). Amuro certainly wasn't going to spite either of them.

For that, he unfortunately had a much better candidate... as when the door to his impromptu quarters slid open, it was his father on the other side.

"Get dressed."

Minutes later, the two of them were floating down the corridors of Luna II away from the White Base, Tem in front, Amuro behind. Where to, Amuro couldn't tell – but at least it wasn't in the direction of the brig this time, nor were they accompanied by any of the non-military personnel on the ship. Which naturally couldn't exclude the possibility of him being singled out due to being the only one who actually used the Gundam without authorization, with Tem being the one taking him in so that he won't realize what was happening until he was swarmed by MPs like funnels.

"So, how was the Gundam?"

If they hadn't been moving in microgravity, Amuro would've tripped up on the spot. Did the man seriously just casually ask that?

"...that's it? That's all you have to say?" – he forced out in incredulous disbelief.

"Don't be such a child. We're at war."

Amuro rolled his eyes. – "Yes, I noticed."

"Besides, you're the one who kept insisting that everything was fine." – Tem reminded him.

"Says the one who read me the riot act after I risked my own life to save everyone else's."

"Watch that cheek, mister. You're still not off the hook."

Amuro rolled his eyes again. – "When am I ever?"

"What's gotten into you?"

And again with the 'I see something wrong and it's your fault', which was the point where Amuro's patience with the man finally ran out.

"What the hell do you want me to do?!" – he barked, prompting his father to look back over his shoulder with a deer-in-headlights look. – "All you've ever said to me since mom left is 'Amuro, don't do this! Amuro, stop doing that!', never what you actually want from me! One moment you chew me out for risking my life, the next moment you ask if it was fun as if all I did was taking an expensive sports car on a joyride, then when I actually have a valid reason to do something good with my life for once, you go right back to saying no - and I'm the one acting weird?"

For his credit, Tem was caught off-guard by the tirade, taking more than a second to rein himself in at the glare his suddenly very hostile son was giving him. – "I- Wha- I don't understand a single word of what you're saying...!"

"Well, that's the thing: I don't understand you either." – Amuro grumbled, pushing past his father and continuing onward at a slow enough pace for Tem to get the hint and take the lead once again.

No more words needed to be said. And none were said as the two continued onward. Nor did Amuro want to say anything. The last thing he remembered of the man was of his slurred babbling at Side 6, insisting that a circuit board even Amuro could immediately tell on sight was nonfunctional would supposedly make the Gundam unstoppable. They never spoke again afterwards, never even saw each other afterwards. Tem Ray was gone from his life, had been gone for a long time; no goodbyes exchanged, no lingering regrets resolved, nothing. Done and over with as surely as a full stop at the end of a sentence. But to suddenly have the man back, be endlessly criticized and looked down on by him, be reminded that he was never anything but dead weight, on top of everything else going on after the world having decided to jump headfirst into the bizarre and improbable territory that came with being a Newtype but seemingly decided to switch to full crazy gear for the sole purpose of making Amuro Ray's life even harder than it already was?

He had enough on his plate already, goddamn it. He did not want to have to deal with this shit right now.

They eventually entered a part of the base Amuro did not recognize. He didn't exactly have the opportunity for sightseeing the first time he was here, nor did he have the chance to make up for it later on. In fact, he spent more time in Londenion during his years in Londo Bell than he did in Luna II during the rest of his (admittedly intermittent) military career. Like all soldiers, he went where he was ordered and there was simply no point in stationing a soldier of his caliber here - especially not by certain circles who'd rather prefer people like him being out on the battlefield than in a posting where he might end up promoted into a command rank sufficient enough to start making waves.

It was only when they passed a guard post where Tem had to show his ID and subsequently arrived to a room packed to the roof with mechatronics equipment that Amuro realized it was the base's R&D wing.

As soon as they entered, all of the technicians in the room looked in their direction. – "This is the pilot?" – one asked.

"Yes. Are the simulators warmed up?"

"Yes, sir."

"Mobile suit simulators?" – Amuro guessed, forcing himself down to a level tone while the technicians continued their work at their terminals.

"Yes, well..." – Tem replied a bit uncertainly, still visibly uncomfortable after the scene in the corridor. – "My colleagues spent the whole night analyzing the data recorded by the Gundam's learning computer during your fights against the Zakus. In fact, we're still trying to make sense of it, which is why I went ahead and got us clearance to bring you in."

"To gather more data under controlled conditions."

"Exactly. This is just a quick preliminary study to establish a baseline for what to expect from you. All we need from you is to do what you did back then. And, of course, to keep in mind that whatever you see here is confidential, in case you feel the temptation to brag about it to Frau Bow."

Amuro rolled his eyes for the third damn time that day. – "I don't brag to her."

Tem sent him an almost smug look in response. – "I've been your age myself once, son. I know how boys think around pretty girls."

That being the truth aside, Amuro had no intention of hitting on a fifteen year old girl. At the very least not while she was still fifteen. Even if nobody else would ever know, he would – and he had no idea how he'd be able to look Hayato in the eyes ever again if he did. Besides, he had better things to do at the moment and it didn't exactly kill him that he hadn't gotten laid since Beltorchika.

Nope, that honor definitely went to Char Aznable and his bullheadedness.

"Besides, this isn't going to be a top secret project for long." – he changed the subject. – "Char has seen the Gundam in action and lived to tell the tale."

Tem just shrugged. – "There's nothing we can do about that now. Anyway, for this first test we'll be putting you up against one of the same training programs used by our official test pilots. We didn't bring the Gundam here, but its performance parameters have already been uploaded into the system, so the virtual unit should handle the same way."

"Do you use these for pilot training?" – Amuro asked, deciding that he'd rather 'talk work' than to incense himself with personal issues. Especially in front of other people.

"Not the ones in the lab. These are for testing only. Why?"

"The White Base is a mobile suit carrier, right? Do our pilots have clearance for those?"

Kilometers away, on the other side of millions of tons of asteroid, no one could see the lone figure floating through the silent darkness.

Sipping some of his normalsuit's drinking water reserve through the straw inside his helmet, Char checked his chronometer. With how little heat a single human body radiated in comparison to an engine, none of the Federation patrols he ran into in the past hour noticed him on infrared. Especially since he was alone, rather than leading a commando team like last time, he was the proverbial needle in a haystack. Which worked for him just fine.

Of course, he was fully aware just how risky going in alone was, even as he reached his first objective and flipped his helmet's integrated flashlight on to illuminate the fake rock formation attached onto the actual asteroid after the fact to hide the concealed maintenance airlock underneath. If he didn't know where to look from the admittedly sketchy pre-war intel Zeon had on the base, he couldn't have found it from far away just by random chance, especially not with his senses being as dulled as they were since... since whatever phenomenon that could send people back in time happened. To be fair, his most recent encounter with the Gundam did leave him wishing for a second yesterday that he was still in the Sazabi's cockpit and being cooked alive by atmospheric entry – but since fate had other ideas, he might as well make the most of it.

All it would take is one guard in the wrong place and the wrong time and he'd be in the middle of an enemy fortress with no allies, no way out and nowhere near enough ammunition for his Federation standard-issue sidearm to shoot his way out. But he was too far in to turn around anyway, even if he wanted to.

Ten minutes later, Char smoothed out his Federation uniform before hefting the duffel bag containing his normalsuit onto his shoulder and disembarking the airlock on the opposite end of where he came in. With the bulkheads in the corridor being designed to shut on their own in case of decompression, opening and closing the airlock didn't trigger any alarms.

Sometimes, cutting the human element out of the equation is not strictly beneficial.

"Umm... excuse me."

Cassius looked up from his tablet to see that young girl – Frau Bow, was it? – trying to get his attention as he was sipping his coffee in the ship's mess hall. – "Looking for mister Ray?"

"Yes, sir." – the girl nodded. – "I can't find him anywhere."

"He's ashore right now, with his father."

"OK, I'll wait then. Is he still in trouble?"

"More like they can't figure out what to do with him." – Cassius replied as he noticed Bright enter the mess hall and head for him. – "What he did for us got noticed by someone up high. Isn't it a bit early for you to discharge yourself from the infirmary, ensign?"

"I'm not in that bad condition, sir." – Bright replied as he sat down, Frau silently excusing herself in the background and leaving the officers to talk business that didn't concern her.

'Smart girl.'

"Well, we're not going anywhere until the repair crews put our starboard engine back together." – Cassius noted, taking another sip. – "Should be about 2 or 3 days. But you shouldn't be taking that as permission to push yourself. I still need an XO and you're the best I've got, so you're it."

"Understood. On that matter, most of the wounded from Side 7 have been offloaded. I was the last one to leave."

"Good to hear. We're still yet to receive new orders from Jaburo and Lt. Ray finished assembling another mobile suit overnight, so hopefully we'll have a little more firepower going onward once we'll be heading for Earth."

"Who will pilot it?"

"Ensign José. Lt. Kemp will be in the simulator with him this afternoon."

"What about Amuro?"

"We don't have enough mobile suits to hand them out to everyone. And that's presuming he stays with us."

"Did he change his mind about enlisting?"

"No, but after what he pulled, I wouldn't be surprised if R&D called dibs on him as a test pilot. That kid is either a genius savant, or just plain batshit crazy."

"I heard about his latest adventure. Kemp really didn't like it, from what I hear."

"To be fair, I can see where he's coming from." – Cassius conceded. – "We shouldn't need to send kids into the meatgrinder to do the work of adults."

"I'm not that much older than him, actually." – Bright noted.

"...point taken."

Two hours later, Tem tried to take a sip from his coffee thermos, only to notice it was empty again. Pushing himself out of the seat with a sigh, he left the multi-display array he's been staring at for the past hour behind to head for the one corner of the laboratory with more of the precious substance that's been keeping him going for the past 48 hours.

He was about to head back to his impromptu nest before he was accosted by one of his subordinates. – "Doctor?"

"How is he doing?"

The technician shook his head, handing over the tablet he was holding to his senior. – "He's already on the highest control sensitivity the simulator is programmed for, but isn't having any difficulty whatsoever. We've never seen anything even remotely like this in our previous test pilots."

"Is he handling the controls differently than the others?" – Tem asked as he casually scrolled down the screen, eyebrows slowly rising as he took in the contents.

"He definitely didn't start yesterday." – the engineer continued, his words barely registering to Tem as the latter's brain was working at overdrive trying to put the data supplied to it together with the mental image of a barely-dressed teenage son wading across the ankle-deep trash of fast food wrappers he couldn't be bothered to clean up without being yelled at first. – "There's a level of fluidity in his input that can't be faked, he knows what he's doing. But it's not just the way he's using the controls; his reflexes and spatial awareness are far above average and he's consistently hitting moving targets at medium range without the gunsight camera or even the rangefinder."

That finally made Tem look up, features in clear disbelief. – "Are you telling me he's shooting with manual aim only?"

"Exactly. By the time the targeting computer has a firing solution, he's already pulled the trigger and hits more often than he doesn't, despite shooting entirely using the main camera. And even when he's on the defensive, his thruster usage is very minimal: he doesn't boost out of the way, he just leans out of the way. Shoot at him from multiple directions at once and he always immediately assumes the one single posture that puts every single body part outside every incoming shot's line of fire simultaneously. Only times he ever got hit, it was always something that came from above, below, or behind, and didn't trigger a collision alarm." – The man just spread his arms, completely at a frustrated loss. – "It's as if the mobile suit is his own body: he's always aware of its posture on a purely instinctive level and moves it without even thinking."

Tem shook his head with a bit more vehemence than he intended. Surely that wasn't possible and he said as much. – "That's conjecture."

"I know, doctor, but we can barely make heads or tails of what he's doing as it is, and the simulator isn't faring much better. Hell, even the learning computer is running at full load trying to keep up with him. Where in the world did you find this boy?"

A question for which Tem Ray had no answer.

Even once he was back in his chair, staring at performance charts, component stresses versus tolerances, learning computer data output diffs, he couldn't concentrate. All he could hear was Amuro's bitter words.

'I don't understand you either.'

What was all this?

Just who was his son?

Even if he never talked about it to his colleagues, Tem was very much aware of the fact that he wasn't father material. As much as Amuro grumbled about him never being home before, there was nothing either of them could do about it. His work was just too important and most of it was too sensitive to be done from home. Hell, he didn't even remember when was the last time he checked on his son's school grades – and even though he'd be the first to admit that he wasn't exactly a people person, Tem was also nowhere near naïve enough to assume that his work habit didn't have anything to do with the failure of his marriage years ago.

And now he was only a room away from the young man who was supposed to be his son – but as it was becoming undeniably clear, was closer to being a complete stranger.

'What the hell do you want me to do?!'

Was he really being unreasonable with the boy? This was an important matter they were talking about here, one that could potentially turn this bloody war around, and Amuro definitely knew that, based on how surprisingly level-headed he was about the idea of risking his own neck. Hell, he practically dropped into their laps as the answer for their problems and was nothing but helpful all the way, unlike the bratty slob he had always been.

But he was his son. What was wrong with not wanting to send one's own child to a battlefield? What was wrong with said child to want to fight and kill despite always having been safely away from the war?

What in the world happened to Amuro while they were apart?

Something was missing from the picture and that one thought kept festering in Tem's mind even once he was headed back to the White Base to go over the results of the diagnostics he left running on that Guncannon the hangar crew assembled last night.

Glancing at his tablet as if the data on the screen held the answers he sought, he didn't notice the blonde man in a Federation officer's uniform pass by him.

"Halt. ID."

"Lieutenant Quattro Bajeena, reassigned to this ship." – Char replied smoothly. It took him longer than he'd have preferred to find the dock from within Luna II while avoiding restricted areas. Acting as if one was supposed to be there could only take him so far if someone were to somehow single him out as an infiltrator and asked for his nonexistent ID.

Just as it happened right now.

"I haven't heard anything about any transfers." – the Federation soldier on the other side of the White Base's airlock replied without taking eyes off him, low-recoil submachine gun held at an angle that could snap up and fire too quickly for Char to charge in and knock him out in zero-gee before he could raise an alarm.

An actually competent guard. Just his luck.

"What, Bright didn't pass it down? I just ran into him outside." – Char replied, gesturing with his head back the way he came.

Because as the same luck would have it, he happened to know who was in charge on the newly-docked ship, unlike well over 99% of everyone on Luna II.

Which was evidently enough for the guard to buy his story. – "Probably forgot; he did get spaced a while ago. Go on in."

Char had to fight to suppress his smile as he floated past the guy. This was too easy.

By the time Amuro was escorted back to the dock, this time by a soldier, he was about ready to call it quits for the day. Make no mistake, it was refreshing to be able to get some practice without getting yelled at, especially with these cockpit layouts; the limited vertical field of view of the cockpit display in particular was the source of no small amounts of frustration for him. He'll just have to get used to it again. But he also couldn't deny that being put through every single training scenario repeatedly because the technicians couldn't believe his performance wasn't a fluke was mildly annoying.

As was the fact that he couldn't decide whether not having spoken a single word to his father since the start of the simulator run was something he was glad about or not. On one hand, he didn't want to have to deal with that particular issue right now - but on the other, a small part of him questioned whether he was being too hard on the man.

One piece of good news, however, was that when he passed by the guard at the airlock, he spotted Bright heading in his direction, seemingly none worse for the wear.

At least until they both noticed the surprise on the guard's face. – "Sir...?"

"What is it?" – Bright asked.

"I thought you weren't on the ship."

"I haven't even left."

"I just had a guy tell me he ran into you outside."

"Who?"

"Lt. Bajeena. He said he's been reassigned to the ship."

But Bright didn't hear the latter part. Because as soon as the name was spoken, Amuro instantly tensed up as his senses faintly felt something they shouldn't have.

"What is it?"

Instead of answering, the teen broke off into a sprint towards the hangar.

Char's eyes immediately found the sharply contrasting white of the Gundam's armor, the mobile suit that was his nemesis currently split in half at the waist with thick bundles of cables coming out of both ends. It very much did not look flight-worthy at the moment, especially with Char knowing just enough about the design to conclude that not even the upper torso by itself would go anywhere without plugging in a Core Fighter first.

Pity. If he still had his Zaku, he could've caught the whole ship with their pants down. Instead, he walked right into the lair of the wolf.

Sending a subtle glance across the hangar to make sure there were no suspicious stares in his direction, he casually vaulted over the walkway's railing and kicked himself off towards the empty gantry around the Guncannon standing next to the partially-disassembled Gundam. Now that was a mobile suit he hadn't seen in a long time; in fact, the time he remembered seeing Guncannon-types in action was at AEUG (not that it necessarily meant the Federation couldn't have had something in that regard in the works that he wasn't privy to).

On the other hand, it was fully assembled... and from the looks of it as his feet touched the gantry, in the middle of diagnostics, judging from the portable terminal next to it with cabling visibly leading off towards the cockpit. And was that-?

Oh.

Oh, come on.

He can't possibly be this lucky, can he?

Beelining straight to the terminal, he picked up what looked very much like a Project V operations manual. Flipping through its pages, he had to force his features to remain under control as his eyes took in the schematics, diagrams and datasheets within.

Yes, it would appear he was that lucky. This was the motherload that singularly justified this excursion. Not that what came next wasn't the hard part: wait until the guard at the airlock is rotated by the next shift so that he can walk back out with the manual in his duffel bag and leave the way he came. And that's presuming the next shift arrived while he still had enough time to get back to the Falmel before Dren left him behind on Char's own orders.

But as he looked over a cutaway diagram of the Gundam's beam rifle, Char knew that pulling this off would be worth it just to see the look on Dozle's face. Or even better, Amuro's face.

"What are you doing?"

He looked up to see a middle-aged engineer peering at him from around the mobile suit, suspicion evident on his face.

"Is it really a good idea to leave a technical manual lying out in the open?" – Char asked in a casual tone, closing the manual. This certainly complicated things, but all was not lost yet. He just had to get rid of this guy without anyone seeing and get out before the body is found.

"Well, I-"

"CHAR!"

The instant he heard the shout, Char's free hand snapped up, grabbed a handful of the other man's hair and smashed the man's face into the Guncannon's armor plating hard enough to smear blood over it before drawing his fake uniform's service pistol and firing a shot into the air that got everyone in the hangar instinctively ducking for cover.

And yet, as his next shot was directed at the hangar entrance, his eyes couldn't miss the unmistakable sight of Amuro Ray diving behind the doorway.

'How the hell did he recognize me?!'

Well, he was not going out the way he came in. Though as he looked ahead at the closed hangar door, he realized he didn't have to.

Because as Char Aznable glanced at the Project V manual he dropped in the commotion, then at the unconscious engineer at his feet, and finally back at the mobile suit he was standing next to, he flashed the smirk of someone who knew for a fact that right at this moment, he was the one holding all the cards.

Snapping off two more shots towards the entrance, one of them catching a newly arrived guard in the shoulder, Char bent down, yanked up the engineer by the back of his collar and threw him into the Guncannon's open cockpit before leaning out and firing the rest of his gun's magazine at the door before snatching up the Project V manual and jumping into the cockpit as well.

It didn't matter that he had never used one of these before. It was still just a mobile suit and the control scheme wasn't that different from a Zaku. Thus, as soon as the external cameras turned on, the very first thing he did was to flip the molly guard off the right-hand control stick's thumb button and hose down the walkway with the Guncannon's head vulcans, the brutal barrage of 20mm autocannon rounds sending metal scraps, blood and dismembered limbs flying in every direction in the low-gravity environment.

Next, he turned to the nearby wall rack and contemplated the weapons before reaching out and grabbing a beam rifle whose short-range wireless readouts indicated full charge.

With which the very first thing he did was jab the rifle into the Gundam's knee and pull the trigger. As satisfying as it would've been to just blow it away and likely cripple the White Base completely in the process from the reactor explosion inside the ship, he wasn't sure whether a Guncannon's armor was rated for that blast yield at this range. Coming all this way only to blow himself up would've been quite silly.

Thus, as soon as he was satisfied that the Gundam was in no shape to pursue, he reached up and tore off one of its beam sabers as well. – "I'll be borrowing this." – he quipped before turning around and bringing his rifle to bear against the sealed hangar door. It took only three shots before he judged it sufficiently weak to fire the Guncannon's engines at maximum power and plow through the door like a battering ram.

And once he was outside, coasting on momentum in the middle of the debris cloud, Char couldn't resist the grin as he flipped over upside down, lined up his beam rifle's sights dead-center on the helpless Gundam and pulled the trigger, the pink beam of fused Minovsky particles lancing out and coring the mobile suit he hated the most in the entire world straight through the reactor.

No explosion.

Of course, Char realized a bit sheepishly. For a beam weapon to trigger a runaway prompt critical reaction inside a fusion reactor, said reactor needs to be fueled and powered first – and keeping it running in the hangar without imminent combat ahead was a waste of helium-3, especially for a reactor with sufficient wattage to power beam weapons. An inactive reactor was nothing but just another hulk of metal.

Even so, what was now in front of him was a barely-existing torso of a Gundam limply hanging off the top of the hangar, arms and head all fallen off from the half-molten hulk no longer being able to keep up their weight. Not to mention the glowing hole straight through the back of the White Base's hangar, through which a molten furrow in the starboard engine nacelle was clearly visible.

And as Char Aznable caught a glimpse of Amuro glancing around the corridor, he let go of the firing button as his entire body tensed up... a second before the man erupted in the loudest, most cathartic fit of laughter he ever had in his life.

"What do you think of THAT?!" – he taunted at his unhearing nemesis before turning back around and leaving the White Base behind as alarms began sounding in his wake.

And as he blasted his way through the outer door and to freedom without even slowing down, he glanced down at the limp form of Tem Ray and knew his mirth wasn't going anywhere soon.

The Red Comet was back in the saddle.

Post-it author's notes – 2021.11.16.

Amuro's relationship exploits differ from adaptation to adaptation. In the novelization of the original series, Amuro asks out Sayla at one point and they eventually become physically intimate but since that version of Amuro died at A Baoa Qu, nothing long-term came of it – and of course, Tomino likely couldn't portray such things in the original show, even with different standards of what level of sexual fanservice was acceptable for TV at the time. In Zeta, Sayla's voice actress was unavailable and the anime industry is generally reluctant to recast high-profile characters (with the notable exception of Bright, whose original VA died shortly after the release of the third Zeta compilation movie and was subsequently recast for Unicorn while the Banpresto games continue using pre-recorded lines of the original VA), so Beltorchika's character was introduced instead. Despite having a rather rough start over Beltorchika white-knighting Amuro, much to the annoyance of both Kamille and the fans, they hit it off well enough that in the Beltorchika's Children novelization of CCA, they're expecting a child; in the animated continuity (and presumably the Hi-Streamer novel that got animated into CCA), they broke up sometime during Amuro's stint at Londo Bell, with Amuro courting Chan instead.

Amuro, of course, died in both continuities on March 12, 0093, roughly half a year before he would've turned 30. In the main continuity, he had no known descendants (that I'm aware of) outside a failed attempt by the Jupiter Empire to clone his brain for weaponization purposes 43 years later.