Archangel's Amazing Adventures

by CSS Stravag

Mass Crossover fic. Chapter 51 UP! Powerful magic draws the Archangel and the ZAFT Creuset Team into a world of magic and intrigue like nothing imagined by the straight-laced CE residents. Their battles on Cephiro are only the beginning of their nightmarish journey as they give Odysseus a run for his money in the 'bizarre trip home' category...

33. Thunderheads

(Section 4, Chapter 4: Thunderheads)

(13 November AC195, 1700 hours)

(Eastern Mediterranean, area of Isle of Cyprus)

"Two days to the Sanc Kingdom," Quatre enumerated, looking over the planned transit map and the course highlighted on the port-side monitors.

"I am amazed it will be that quick," Rashid said. "Given we have the whole of Europe to cross, I would have expected weeks by ground."

"I could get us there in 30 minutes, but every air search radar north of Victoria and east of Greenland would see us," Murrue admitted. She was referring to somewhere near 800 search radars, not counting independent radar sets for individual AA weapons.

"That probably would not be good," Rashid admitted after a moment of thinking about it.

"This winding route," Quatre indicated the route going from Greece to Poland to Germany and out into the Baltic; "This is to dodge cities and bases?"

"Yeah," Mu replied. "Dodging their bases is a no-brainer, but if our travel route took us over the suburbs of Berlin, it would be very safe to say someone would report the big white ship flying overhead."

"That would ruin our day in a big hurry," Sai said.

"Never thought about how hard it would be to dodge both," Quatre admitted. If he had to transit a city, he usually used a Mobile Suit Carrier and a tarp cover over his Gundam, then drove through by way of any heavy-equipment-capable highway. It wasn't exactly subtle by most definitions of the word, but it was surprising how frequently it worked.

"It's not always easy, but in this case we can mostly cross farmland and forests to get there," Mu commented.

"Conn, Helm, approaching surface shipping lane between Sicily and Tel Aviv. Should I take her down?" Newman asked.

"Sensors, surface traffic?" Murrue asked.

"No surface contacts within 200 miles, Captain," Sai replied evenly.

"Helm, hold altitude," Murrue ordered. The ship was far slower underwater than it was in air, which made every moment of air transit worth it.

"Holding altitude at 7-5 meters above sea level, course 0-1-0 at 225 kilometers per hour velocity," Newman reported.

"What do you intend to do once the shooting is over?" Quatre asked after a couple minutes of observing the bridge crew in silence.

"Whatever we have to do if needed, otherwise a vacation before we jump out," Mu said in jest, though Murrue figured it as good a plan as any.

"Vacation?" Rashid asked with a raised eyebrow.

"We don't get much in the way of peace and quiet, not with our track record," Murrue said with a slightly soured tone. "Whenever we can take a break, we do. We never know what the future holds, so on those days we can we enjoy these times of peace. The day after probably will not be peaceful."

"She does have a creepy sort of point," Quatre told Rashid.

"Conn, Sensors, got something here," Sai said. "Air contacts from Cyprus, estimate origin Cyprus Military Facility. Direct intercept course, ETA seven minutes."

"Not so peaceful," Mu said with a hint of forced levity to his tone. Everyone within earshot knew he was forcing himself not to vent frustration.

-x-

"105 Dagger, Command, deploy Aile Striker pack for anti-air operations."

"Command, Chevalier, roger and wilco," 'Mad Dog' Morgan replied immediately.

"Windam on right, ready for cat-shot," Fuu said from the 'cockpit' of her Rune God barely ten meters in front of Morgan.

"Windam, launch immediately," Miriallia ordered. "Strike Freedom, report status."

"Strike Freedom on left, standing by for catapult clearance," Kira declared his status. "Catapult is green, Strike Freedom is launching!"

Morgan's 105 Dagger jolted slightly as the catapult shuttles slammed forward into the arrester at the end of the catapult bay, but not enough to disrupt the installation of the Aile Strike pack. The beam rifle was a welcome addition, especially since most of the Romafeller (former Oz) units were not very resistant to beam hits (and those that were resistant were easy prey for the rest of the team).

"Command, Chevalier, moving forward to cat right," he said as the 105 Dagger trudged forward the ten meters to the catapult location. One of the structural upgrades on the ship had separated the Striker Pack storage / assembly and the actual catapult. It wasn't a perfect solution, since a unit receiving a striker pack still blocked the entrance to the catapult, but it wasn't impossible for a unit to queue up on the catapult before Morgan began taking on some firepower.

"Command, Buster on rear elevator, requesting clearance," Tolle asked with a tone unusually cheery to Morgan's ears.

"Come back alive, love," Miriallia ordered before she tripped the elevator to take him up to the ship's reardeck.

"105 Dagger, catapult right waiting for clearance," Morgan declared. Miriallia tripped the catapult release; "Aile 105 Dagger, launching!"

"Selesce reporting ready on left catapult," Umi made note as she watched the Duel trudge over to the rear-deck elevator. Rayearth had been the ship's standby unit, so Hikaru was already outside and waiting for intercept instructions. Only Nicol's GuAIZ remained to be deployed, and since it was not a flight-capable unit he would also be going out the elevator for foredeck guard.

Umi sighed mightily as she took stock of her fate, considering that all she really wanted was to go home, yet she felt she had a long way to go with many battles to come. Still and all, these were her friends and comrades on this ship; she would not have abandoned them for Prince Charming and a royal title if they had been handed to her. The Archangel was her home, her life and her resolution; such a combination was not something she could abandon.

-x-

"Enemy type classifications: Aries, Taurus, Cancer, and Pisces confirmed," Kira read off from his sensor systems display panel. "Reinforced Battalion strength, mostly weighted toward Aries and Taurus."

"I'm going under the waves," Umi said after the names of the enemy underwater machines registered. Her forward momentum slowed, then stopped, then her lift cut and Selesce dropped feet-first into the ocean below.

"Mobile Forces, Archangel, we will provide support fire. Draw them in close so our guns can hammer them flat," Murrue ordered.

"Roger that," Athrun answered for the team. "Hikaru, feel up to being the bait for today?"

"I'm in. Straight in, or try and draw them to the side?" Hikaru replied immediately.

"Draw them left, into the travel line of the Archangel. Kira, Mu, let's wedge them toward Hikaru; Fuu, can you handle any stragglers?"

"Ready," Fuu answered by way of drawing her sword and beginning an ascent to 2500 meters, far higher than the flight lines for the other units. A few of the enemy Aries machines jumped up to her altitude, guns aimed and missiles already acquiring their target. It put her 'on an island' in tactical terms, but it also drew off at least some of the heat from the other pilots.

"Here we go," Mu said with a hint of levity, but a small one at that.

In years past, the team would have split up when taking on a cluster of foes, but not in these new days and new battles. Hikaru broke left and Fuu went high, but Athrun, Mu, Kira, and Morgan all plowed straight into the enemy formation's right flank both faster than the enemy expected and in a charge that shocked the rest into temporary inaction. It was this minor psychological advantage, the instant of hesitation the charge caused, that the Archangel Team relied on for instantaneous advantage.

"Got two!" Morgan half-shouted as he swept down low to avoid any possible collisions and then jumped back up to reasonable altitude to continue the engagement when he was behind the enemy formation. A pair of the Taurus machines were quick to single him out for a counterattack. One missed wide with his shots, another put a shot on Morgan but his shield blocked the pilot's ministrations. Kira moved through next, his guns fixed forward and firing; of five separate attacks, he missed with the Callidus beam cannon, hit with both rail guns (a kill on a Taurus and an Aries), and got two partials on another Aries with his beam rifles. His foes fared terribly; of six separate missiles loosed at him, not one came close to striking.

"Stay away from my ship!" Athrun shouted on an open band, using it as an intimidation weapon as he closed. It served to highlight him on several enemy HUD displays, which served to draw fire toward him, but he needed only block one beam from a Taurus; the Phase Shift armor on the Aegis prevented the 50mm chainguns carried by the Aries from damaging him. He came to a dead stop and began applying pressure to their battle line with beam rifle shots, with the intent of driving them into Hikaru as was the plan – and they would follow Hikaru right into the field of fire on the Archangel. Or so the plan went. A Taurus Mobile Suit and an Aries went down in his attack, with a partial on a second Taurus (missing leg).

Mu said nothing while he brought up the rear of the attack formation; instead he simply fired beam cannon, beam rifle, and the rail guns from the IWSP Striker Pack into the enemy formation. He did as well as Athrun in his initial volley, but without the stop to begin blocking procedures; a third and fourth Taurus went into the waves with his ministrations as he passed through their formation low. A pair of 50mm chaingun bursts passed within yards of his fighter, but none close enough to damage him on the way past.

"Oh no, guys, they're blitzing the ship!" Fuu reported from her higher vantage point over the enemy formation; she had slowed down somewhat to track their progress. The units that had ascended to engage her took their shots as she tracked the formation, natively faster than her and overshooting Windam, but only one struck true – a pair of missiles into the wing joint of her Rune God. She screeched, again reminded that the Rune God's injuries translated to her.

"This isn't going to end well," Kira groused, then realized Fuu had lost flight control. "Athrun!"

"I see her! Cover me!" Athrun transformed his Gundam into the long-range Mobile Armor form to shoot up to altitude. Kira took a moment to peg two of the three Aries MS with beam rifle fire; one engine hit resulted in a spectacular explosion as its fusion reactor vented, the other simply lost a jet engine that shredded apart inside the shoulder housing and threw sparks forward and back before it began a descent toward the waves.

"Support fire from the Archangel! Eight missiles!" Mu shouted in cheer; the missiles were the longest-range option the Archangel had for taking out fighters and MS with reliability. Of eight missiles, one was intercepted, one failed to guide on terminal (1), and six hits scratched a previously damaged Taurus, a fresh Taurus, and one wound plus three kills on Aries machines.

Athrun closed up on Windam smoothly, then used his maneuvering thrusters to match her drop speed, then closed to grapple the injured Rune God. "Got her!" he shouted as he stomped on his main engines to slow their descent. "Aegis returning to ship with one, I need covering fire, I can't maneuver or defend!"

"Kira, Mu, cover the Aegis, the Archangel will take the primary for intercept." As if to accentuate the point, another eight missiles were loosed from the ship, this time from the port-side launchers, and four of these birds were anti-air shrapnel missiles, last used against the Magitek Air Forces with stunning results. "Hikaru, bring it straight in against the enemy's left rear, you are cleared for area denial attack."

"Got it," Hikaru replied immediately. Mu went low and Kira leveled out with Athrun to provide close-in escort.

"Athrun, I have your back, floor it!" Kira announced.

"Have track two contacts underwater, how's Umi doing?" Sai asked in a brief pause of the comm chatter. A blast of beam rifle from a Taurus only roiled the surface of the water, having done nothing to the enemy below the waves.

"I think that answers that question," Hikaru noted as a severe whirlpool formed in the area shot by an enemy machine. Selesce bolted from the center spiral of the waves, glowingly faintly blue as it charged upwards in altitude to challenge the remaining enemies.

"Four down underwater, the rest are running home," Umi said in a rush while she closed on the remaining enemies.

"Twenty seconds to landing!" Athrun counted off. "Fuu, are you all right?"

"I—I think I'll live, but this is worse than last time," she complained.

"Kira! Two Taurus on your left!" Hikaru reported a moment too late for Kira to do anything about it. Missiles were already tasked to intercept the Taurus machines, and it looked to be a close call, but Kira knew the Taurus would get their shots off first.

"Athrun, drop al—" the convergence of events in time and space was almost instantaneous, but not enough to prevent the destruction to come. The pair of Taurus triggered their space laser cannons, followed a second later by a pair of the missiles striking the two wayward machines, and a half-second later the space lasers fired. Kira blocked the laser aimed at him, but the one aimed at Athrun was diverted from what would have been a miss to a solid hit against the rear of his Gundam.

The Space Laser was a through-and-through shot; for a brief instant, Kira could see daylight through the side of Athrun's Gundam. "My engines are toast! I'm going in!" The Aegis' Phase Shift armor decolored (and therefore depowered) moments before it struck the waves. Windam was loosed from the crab claw grip of the unit as the Aegis was sheared apart into more than a dozen pieces by its asymmetrical impact with the waves. Kira thought he noticed the cockpit area of the machine took little damage, so he figured there would be hope for his amigo to have survived.

"Athrun!" Kira shouted.

"Umi, priority SAR (2), rescue Fuu, rescue Athrun, now!" Captain Ramius ordered immediately after she watched the impact.

"On it!" Umi cut her flight thrust after chopping apart an Aries from head to navel on the machine; within moments, her Rune God was under the waves again.

"Enemy forces retreating!" Sai reported. "All forces are bugging out to base!"

"A pity we don't have cruise missiles to send their fucking bartenders a message," Chandratta commented coldly.

"Should I pursue, Captain?" Kira asked, shifting from instantaneous fright to white-hot rage.

"Negative, return to ship and provide overwatch for recovery efforts," Miriallia replied immediately. "Worry about what we have left, Kira, not what we can do to them. We'll get 'em back another day."

I have both, Selesce believes them alive, Umi reported by way of Selesce's telepathy to the remainder of the ship.

-x-x-x-

(14 November AC195, 0400 hours)

(Central Mediterranean, north of Sicily, underwater (150 meters))

Despite two of her friends being in the med ward, Hikaru knew better than to give into despair or fear. The day (morning, in this case) still had to go on, and with it the operations of the ship had to continue. Servicing and preparation of the Mobile Forces took priority in her mind; the comment Miriallia had used to justify Kira not chasing them down rang true and loud to the ship. They had to worry about what was left, not be hung up on what they had lost.

"Down slow, down slow, hold," Murdoch said into his radio. "Stand by while I get the part anchored, Hikaru."

"Standing by," Hikaru replied.

Murdoch pulled a wrench and pushed in on the part, seating it in the mounting brackets. A couple turns of his wrench had it held in place, though not completely seated or bolted in. He pulled the crane hook off and removed the chains. "Crane is loose, pick up assembly six for installation, girl," Murdoch ordered before he turned back to the initial part.

"Roger that, old man," Hikaru replied with a clear hint of tease.

"Old? Old? I ain't old!" Murdoch replied indignantly. "Thirty-three ain't freaking old."

"Yeah, you're right," Hikaru admitted. "Still, you're at the absolute low end to be my father, so that has to count for something," Hikaru replied nonchalantly.

"Damn, that worries me," Murdoch groused as he began dogging down the assembly bolts. "Hearing it put that way does make me feel like I'm getting old."

"Got the next part," Hikaru said as the ground tech gave her a thumbs-up to raise the part up. "Anyway, two out of three young farts have no problem with Christmas Cake, so not all hope is lost for you," Hikaru tried to cheer him up. "If they can find the right one, that is," she appended after a few moments.

Murdoch didn't respond immediately; he focused on torquing the bolts down to the right force. "Torque, lock, check," he repeated the old mechanic's mantra for making sure bolts were snugged down right.

"Do it right the first time or someone dies," Hikaru repeated the Archangel mechanic's mantra.

"Ain't that the truth," Murdoch said. "And I don't want nobody dyin' on my watch because of a mechanic's foul-up."

"Yeah, they get kicked in the face every time they go out, they don't need a kick in the ass to go with it," Gomer said on the same channel.

"Gomer? How's it going buddy?" Murdoch asked in a falsely comforting voice while he attached power and data connections to the assembly he was working on.

"Aquarius is almost ready to go, we're finishing up the armor work now, boss." Hikaru and Kira had only managed to finish the armor for the legs of the Aquarius, the rest was still left undone until Murdoch assigned a crew to it. "And I agree with the little lady on the ongoing conversation, with a caveat, of course. You have to be a little bit twisted to voluntarily be on this love boat, boss, which probably don't leave much in the way of ladies for us 'ye olde drunken sailors' to chase."

"Bring it left two meters and five meters toward, Hikaru," Murdoch requested. "This isn't the best conditions for anyone, much less a budding family to be hanging around on. It is a warship, after all," he admitted as he continued using hand signals to guide Hikaru placing the part where Murdoch needed it.

"Well, Miriallia and Tolle seem to be making out well..." It took Hikaru a few moments to realize why Murdoch was hanging off the part, laughing hard enough to drop his radio handset. "Wrong choice of words, sorry," she admitted after a few moments looking around to see other mechanics laughing just as hard. Miriallia and Tolle were infamous around the ship for their exploits, of which a goodly portion of the mechanics crews were in 'hearing' range to either of their quarters.

"You really need to watch your phrasing around this crowd, girl," Gomer said deadpan. "They tend to get the wrong idea with just about—"

"—Anything you say," Murdoch completed the sentence for the hangar 2IC. "One more meter to the left, girl, and take her down about a quarter, that should be good."

"One to the left and a quarter down, stand by," Hikaru moved the part as requested for Murdoch. "Close enough?"

"Oh yeah, close enough, stand by to loose crane." Murdoch answered. He pushed the part in place and threaded the large (and unique) retaining pin into the mount brackets on the part. A couple good whacks of the sledgehammer seated the pin properly, and that was that for the first phase of this assembly. With a flick of the wrist, he had the crane straps removed and dangling free. "Crane is free, secure the next part please," Murdoch requested.

"On it," Hikaru immediately began moving the crane away and toward the next assembly that needed to be installed. "Wait, we don't have any more parts remaining, Murdoch," she said after she realized the 'waiting parts' check zone was empty.

"Good. Get your butt to bed, you're well past curfew," Murdoch ordered.

"Oka—wait, what? You're not my father!" Hikaru replied indignantly.

"You just said I'm old enough to be your dad, so someone's gotta pick up the slack until further notice. Besides, you're even past your non-duty cycle, so you need to get to sleep." The necessity for sleep was recognized by every military in existence, as the human body started losing efficiency the longer the person remained conscious past sixteen hours. It was possible to remain awake for days, but fatigue led to mistakes, and mistakes led to injuries, failures, or even death. The Archangel was strict to a fare-thee-well on the requirements for crew rest; nobody remained awake for more than 20 hours at a time unless operationally necessary (rare) or combat dictated it (even more rare).

"But—" Hikaru stammered.

"They're stable, Hikaru. You can worry about them tomorrow, no more harm will come to them in the med ward. Get to bed. Now."

"Yessir," the Magic Knight groused.

-x-x-x-

(14 November AC195, 1200 hours)

(Central Mediterranean, 140km east of Rome, Italy, above water (5 meters))

"How are they?"

"Banged up real bad," Kira admitted as he applied a liberal amount of pepper to the lunch entree. "Nicol and Terra have seen to the worst of their injuries with magic, but the amount of abuse they took is insane. The sea is a very unforgiving thing to hit, especially when doing 330 kilos trying to run away from flying enemies. Nicol and Terra do have a plan, though, using various healing spells to fix 'em up over the next couple of days."

"And the Aegis is toast, and Windam is out for several days while it regenerates a whole set of wings," Yzak tallied up the remainder of the ship's woes. "Holy shit, Strike, you eat that much pepper and you'll blow five meters of flame out your arse."

"Extra jump-jet thrust may save my life someday," Kira countered with a straight face.

"This shit keeps up, we're dead by default," Tolle complained, ignoring the comment about flaming butts. "We only have so much to bleed before we run out of blood to give."

"This is typical of Oz," Rashid said as he approached the group. His was the same roast beef and cornmeal that the rest of the crew was eating; he studiously did not comment on the little green 'aliens' that were doing the bulk of the cooking behind the counter. "They have the advantage of numbers, and they will trade those numbers for an eventual victory. Body counts mean nothing to them, just results."

"Well, not to all of them," Quatre hedged his subordinate's estimation. "Just to most, to the Romafeller Foundation. There is a small and vocal minority in Oz that doesn't fight like that, rallying behind an old foe of ours: Treize Kushrenada."

"The enemy of your enemy is not necessarily your friend," Yzak replied candidly. "It would be real nice to believe we have friends out there, but you just said they are old foes of yours, and old rivalries aren't easily forgotten outside of the movies."

"Right," Quatre admitted. Rashid nodded at the sound logic the far younger Archangel Team pilot showed.

"For now, we still need to get you guys north to the Sanc Kingdom," Kira said to Rashid. "We can worry about who's friendly with whom once that pending disaster is stopped cold."

"Agreed," Rashid answered. "My men probably won't be able to make a huge difference, but it may be enough to draw out the battle into a stalemate, which works to our advantage."

"Anything left from the Aegis?" Quatre asked after a moment's silence.

"The only thing meaningful recovered from the Aegis was the cockpit housing, shield and beam rifle. The rest is on the ocean floor."

"Think they'll try to recover it?" Tolle asked.

"I wish them luck if they try," Yzak said. "Just on what splattered on impact, they'll take months to pick up the pieces, if they can find it all."

"And without the cockpit, without the necessary control systems for the Phase Shift armor, they won't get anything of use out of it," Kira closed that line of thought. "At worst, they rebuild it, recommission it, and deploy it against us. Who here doesn't know the Aegis' limitations?" No hands were raised by the Archangel Team pilots, but Rashid and Quatre both raised theirs. "Well, grading curve for you two gentlemen, we've been working with the Aegis for years."

"Makes sense," Rashid replied thoughtfully.

"And without the Phase Shift, the major defensive advantage it had is down the toilet. We could intercept it with missiles in that case," Tolle said thoughtfully.

"What are you guys planning to do with Aquarius and Vayeate?" Quatre asked, realizing that they had three Gundams – and only two prospective pilots.

"Well, I think Athrun is going to take out the Mercurius, since Murdoch just gave it his seal of approval, I'll take the Aquarius since I'll probably have to real-time hack the Mobile Doll control systems, and the Vayeate is going to be the interesting one," Nicol hedged.

"Who?" Rashid asked directly.

Nicol half-twisted to point over his left shoulder. The indicated person was standing in the mess hall serving line. "The big guy with the green tattoos on his face," he indicated Pytor, the old Mechwarrior that had come along with the rest of the team and had little to do operationally in the past few battles.

"Old Mechwarrior, he's got a few years in the cockpit," Kira added.

"He'll need a workup to pilot the Vayeate, but it does have a big honking gun like the favored cannons he used to drive," Yzak commented. "I don't think he'll have any problems once he gets used to driving a Gundam."

"Ah," Quatre grunted in realization.

The intercom began blaring the electric guitar riffs of an old metal song. "Ah, that would be Me Wise Magic by Van Halen," Tolle commented. "Good old Classic Rock, and a good way to signal the second hour." A bell was used to signal the passing of the hour between songs; someone in the mechanics crew did the song, though who was doing it was not entirely clear (and if Murdoch knew, he wasn't saying).

"This happens all too frequently," Kira muttered after a few moments silence. "We push forward, we're just trying to get home, but every time we turn around someone is trying to kill us. Athrun got lucky on this one, we've had pilots go out and not come back."

"Hear, hear," Yzak replied. "If we don't all come home, none of us ever truly comes home."

"Yeah," Tolle acknowledged. "All we can do is hope."

"Anyone for a game?" Colonel Chevalier dropped a pack of cards on the table. "Something to get your minds off the nightmares and relieve a little stress."

-x-x-x-

(14 November AC195, 2100 hours)

(Northern Italy, area west of Turin)

"All forces on ground, moving now," Mu said. Unlike the last battle, he was in the Timber Wolf with a new weapons load and forewarning of what was coming.

"Nothing like field testing the latest and greatest equipment we can deploy," Nicol said. "Aquarius reports ready for action, jamming systems are at 100 percent power and on standby."

"Mobile Forces, Command, enemy will be just over the ridge 800 meters ahead of you. Prepare to activate jamming system and close on enemy formations."

"Ground copies traffic, preparing weapons now," Colonel Chevalier answered. He pulled the paired anti-ship swords from the IWSP pack and manually cycled the 35mm Gatling on his shield.

"Enemy formation will be commanded by manned units," Kira declared. "The Mobile Dolls will be helpless once Aquarius deploys its jamming systems, but the remainder of their formation is going to be a threat. Start with the command elements, but be prepared to strike down the Mobile Dolls as we come across them."

"Roger that, Strike," Yzak answered for the unit. The sound of his shoulder-carried missile launcher cycling missiles into battery, built from two salvaged Aries missile launchers, echoed through their external microphones.

"Stone Rhino has point," Pytor moved up forward to where he could guard the unit. The Stone Rhino had been pulled from storage for this mission with relish; the pair of Large Pulse Lasers and pair of Gauss Rifles would make short work of Mobile Dolls, all the more so that the virus was also supposed to render them immobile as well as incapable of resisting.

"Echelon right, anchor on the Stone Rhino; we'll hit them from west to east," Kira requested. It took about ten seconds, but the formation changed up their positions to allow the heaviest armor (Stone Rhino, Timber Wolf, Strike Freedom) to take up the forward guard.

"Aquarius reporting, I have track on four transponder codes for Mobile Dolls, beginning virus broadcast on four detected channels now."

"300 meters to the ridgeline," Chevalier noted with a bare hint of anticipation to voice. "275 meters," he continued to count down. "250 meters."

"Computer, build shoot-list of all manned machines and slug to friendly units. Guys, almost in position," Kira said.

"Archangel is on fire support detail, Kira, can you bird-dog for B-V-R (3) missile fire?" Miriallia asked.

"Computer, build MD shoot-list and slug to FCS on Archangel," Kira requested. It took no more than three seconds to build, process, and transmit. "Chandratta, keep an eye on our locations; those missiles will tear up any of our machines except Strike Freedom, Duel, and Buster."

"Way ahead of you, Kira."

"Line of departure, people," Chevalier said.

"Weapons hot, fire at will," Mu ordered as his machine crested the ridge south of the enemy column.

"Holy shit on a stick," Yzak complained as he came into LOS of the enemy formation. "These guys have a real hard-on for someone," he gaped at the columns of forces ahead of his position.

"No shit, this is a whole armored brigade, I count 744 contacts not including support vehicles and infantry," Chevalier read off his sensor panel.

"Archangel is approaching to provide close-in support and to deploy Maganac forces," Miriallia said. "Ground forces, sweep area and eliminate all threat machines."

"Wheat before our scythe," Pytor declared as he advanced his throttle to the stop. It didn't give him much in the way of speed, but the Stone Rhino didn't rely on speed to do the job. "I see only about forty enemy contacts moving now, I will focus on the left," he said before he snapped off his first shot. The Large Pulse Lasers, the native weapon of the Stone Rhino, gave him plenty of bite against a simple Leo MS. Two shots removed an arm and punched a hole in a leg, followed by a third shot that missed and a fourth that took it in the chest.

"Let's give these guys a really bad day," Yzak opined. His left arm tracked upward, bringing the salvaged Aries missile launcher assembly into targeting profile. He fired at machines one missile at a time, given the necessity of hitting immobile and non-resisting Mobile Dolls was incredibly simple – and a missile would cripple the Virgo Mobile Dolls easily when their Defensors were not deployed. Missiles tended to be hellishly effective against anything with homogenous armor, and the Virgos were plated in tough armor – but it was still one material with no reactive plates, easy prey for a shape charge.

-x-

"6-3-Foxtrot to all units, they're here! To the south, moving southwest to northeast and tearing the entire column up!" another APC shouted on the infantry band.

"All units in Foxtrot command, dismount and engage in close with AT weapons. Do not, repeat, do not try to engage from standoff range, they're better at range than in close!" the Major commanding the unit ordered.

"You heard the man! Drop your socks, load your gear, and pucker your assholes! It's showtime, ladies!" the Lieutenant, always the gung-ho one of the unit, was first out the door of his APC, followed quickly by an AT missile team.

"Holy hell, look at those things! Can we even damage 'em with missiles?" the Master Sergeant asked as he got his first eyes-on look at the Stone Rhino.

"We might be able to," the Lieutenant replied. "We'll start with a smaller target, though. Close up on that gray-and-blue machine with the gattling shield."

"We who are about to die salute thee," the Master Sergeant replied with the unit's unofficial motto. The very low emphasis the Romafeller Foundation put on infantry tended to show in their attitudes and mannerisms. As if any form of Armor can solve all the world's problems, the Master Sergeant completed the usual Infantryman's lament inside the confines of his own head.

"What the hell's up with the Dolls? They ain't moving or shooting while under fire!"

"I dunno, but I'll bet their ship has something to do with it," the Lieutenant complained. The infantry had precisely no weapons capable of damaging a warship, even from point-blank range. They could try to board the ship but that was a different, and very dicey, matter altogether.

"Damn boss, that blue-'n'-gray machine is goin' the other way, what should we try?" the unit's second asked.

"Go for that large gray machine, it looks like it's coming our way and it's slow enough to hit easily." The flash of two rapid-fire lasers from torso-mounted laser cannons gave everyone in the unit pause – just before the pilot fired a single massive slug from the right arm cannon. The slug tore through the chest of a Mobile Doll and dented the back of the armor plate, a testament to the sheer power and mass of the weapon involved.

"This is gonna suck," the Master Sergeant of the unit commented.

"F-U-C-K-E-D, A-G-A-I-N!" the three unit jokers chanted in sync on the unit band to the old 'Mickey Mouse' theme."

"Shut up and do it," the Lieutenant groused. "The Army don't pay you to like it. Nor me," he grumped after a moment.

"500 meters! Set up the AT Missiles! Target the large gray machine with the green trim!" the Master Sergeant put actions to his own orders, as he had his own AT missile launcher that he set up himself.

"Team 1, up!" "Team 2!" "Team 3" "Four is green!"

"Send your shots when you have lock!" the Lieutenant replied.

One missile, followed by two more, then a fourth AT missile was loosed. The squads immediately began the process of reloading even before the missiles came down on the torso of the enemy machine. The APCs also chimed in, firing their own wire-guided antitank missiles into the machine, followed by the 23mm chainguns each was equipped with. The impact of ordinance on the machine within four seconds was enough to knock it down sideways, where it crashed to the ground in a loud clanging and serious shock to the ground.

"Hell yeah! These bastards aren't so—" the Master Sergeant's declaration was cut short by something blowing his torso to shreds. It was the leading projectile from a massive area-denial attack from the enemy green Gundam, a blast from its combined weapons that practically annihilated the infantry and destroyed three of the four APCs they rode into battle with. The Lieutenant and two Corporals were the only ones left standing, though two more survived with missing legs.

The Lieutenant looked around his infantry unit in despair and then spared the Gundam that shot his unit a glance. The pilot of the large green Gundam had already transitioned target to another infantry platoon, and cut loose with practically the same result. A sound from the machine his unit downed drew his attention to the right, followed by sheer horror as the enemy machine began the process of standing up from the fall it took. Other than a single armor plate askew, it appeared their barrage did no major damage to the enemy frontline machine.

The sight of the enemy warship approaching the battlefield was enough to break his resolve. The lieutenant helped a solder that lost his left foot to his feet, then the private and the lieutenant began the process of hobbling away from the oncoming enemies.

-x-

"Maganac forces are deploying now, 70 seconds to full on the ground!" Rashid half-shouted the last as his machine hit the ground in front of the right catapult bay.

"Sandrock is on the ground!" Quatre declared. "Archangel, where do you want me?"

"Sandrock, Command, start chopping up the Mobile Dolls. Plenty of them to take down."

"This isn't a battle, it's a massacre," Mu grumped. "The manned units have fled northeast, all we have are these dolls." Even still, his own fire had not slacked off; Mu was hocking as much in ordinance as any of the Mobile Suits, and the combinations of ballistic and missile weapons were working wonders on the armor used by the Mobile Dolls.

"If it was manned units, I'd call it a massacre," Kira replied staunchly. "If it's just soulless Dolls, it's taking out the trash."

"Wow, Strike, that's a bit of an opinion there," Yzak replied. "I think my respect for you just went up a point or two."

"Four hundred more," Tolle said. "I'm running out of ammo, going just on beam cannon now."

"Use this, it's faster than the beam cannons," Nicol handed him a beam saber from his own kit.

"All right," Tolle racked his cannons and lit off the beam saber. "Here goes nothing!"

"Save ammo, get up close and personal, I like it," Yzak racked his beam rifle and joined the slice-'n'-dice action toward the front.

A group of missiles passed overhead and nosed down into the Mobile Dolls north of the ground teams. The tons of explosives sundered the enemy machines and threw body parts in every direction. "How's my aim?" Chandratta asked.

"Good shooting, we've only about 350 more, so..." Kira answered.

"Just another day on the job," Nicol said with a neutral inflection to voice.

"Maganac forces are deployed now, we'll take the left flank," which amounted to the western and southern columns of the enemy brigade, some 200 of the remaining enemy Mobile Dolls.

"This one is in the bag," Mu said. "All we have to do is finish scrapping them out. Kind of a hollow victory, but it is a victory."

The Mobile Dolls did not flinch for the remainder of the battle, their control systems jammed by the virus being transmitted by Aquarius. In less than an hour, the entire formation was destroyed and the Archangel had departed the scene.

-x-x-x-

(15 November AC195, 0500 hours)

(Northeastern France, over the Ardennes Forest)

"What's this about?" Nicol asked as he joined the pilots in their customary position toward the front of the hangar assembly area.

"Not sure, pilot. Captain has something important for us," Chief Warrant Officer Ryback said, still wearing his galley uniform though without the typical apron he wore.

"Attention on deck!" Though few actually came to attention, the entire crew of the ship silenced itself within four seconds.

"At ease, people," Murrue requested when the room was silent. A few people shifted from their positions, but nothing major came of it.

"Did I miss anything?" Tolle asked as he joined the pilots. Miriallia joined the bridge crew a few moments late as well, and both were looking a bit disheveled.

"Just started," Nicol replied.

"Archangel crew, as of right now we have a decision point we need to make," Murrue began her briefing. "Two hours ago, the Romafeller Foundation began a concentrated assault on the Luxembourg base of the Treize Faction. In all real terms, this battle seems like it has nothing to do with us, but in practice this battle may well determine the outcome of our mission to protect the Sanc Kingdom. The forces at Luxembourg are part of the reserve assigned to the battle for the Sanc Kingdom, and as such if we do not engage them now we can rightfully expect to face off against the leftovers in a week or so."

"Well that's no fun," Yzak complained.

"More trash to take out, just a question of now or later," Kira added to the standing complaint. What disdain he had for the Mobile Dolls nobody had heard, but that he didn't like them was evident to anyone.

Murrue waited a few more moments for the comments to subside. "Our decision is a simple one: We can take to the battlefield now, and engage this force of Mobile Dolls in the hope of not also having to do battle with the Treize Faction, or we can bide our time and do battle with these Dolls in the Sanc Kingdom. Neither outcome is technically more or less correct than the other, but we will have the advantage of better odds should we engage the two forces separately – we have a brigade of enemy machines to face here, and two brigades to face around the Sanc Kingdom. If those forces combine for a weighted assault, we would have to face a small division in one go."

"Ma'am, even with the virus jammers on Aquarius, we couldn't hope to slag down a whole Division on our own," one of the Mechanics pointed out. There were several audible assents to his point from other mechanics and even from some of the ship's crew. The sour look on Kira's face was ample evidence that he thought it unwinnable as well.

"Concur," Commander La Flaga replied. "Two brigades is not a pleasant force to face itself, but three is entirely too many."

"One Tango (4) is never enough, two is entirely too many," one of the cooks complained.

"Three is an orgy," another cook said, which caused a few around the hangar to suppress giggles.

Murrue plowed on: "I present this to you to decide, based on the fact that the Treize Faction is not likely going to take kindly to us, regardless of how we run the battle. We may end up winning the battle only to generate yet another enemy in this deal. The decision belongs to you." Murrue took a short bow to the extended crew of the ship.

"All in favor of bypassing Luxembourg, repeat, bypassing Luxembourg, raise an arm," Mu requested. After ninety seconds, not one arm came up in response.

"Sir, I think I speak for the enlisted on this one, we kill 'em all and count the craters. 'All' in this case being a completely subjective term," Murdoch said loud enough to be heard throughout the hangar.

"HELL YES, SIR!" one of the cooks / special forces soldiers shouted in response.

"Any final objections?" Murrue asked. Nobody spoke up. "Very well, our battleplan is as follows. Primarily, our objective is to eliminate all Romafeller Mobile Doll forces. Secondary, we are to minimize casualties to the Treize Faction forces, unless we are attacked by them in which case we are to force a defeat scenario hopefully without killing them all. Secondary, we are to prevent civilian losses of life in the affected area of the battle. As an optional objective, if we can capture or eliminate command assets of the Romafeller assault force, we can probably make further battles far easier."

"We don't have much in the way of intel on the enemy forces yet, the area isn't exactly heavy with camera crews," Mu admitted. "The catch is we know the southern flank of the base is reasonably safe; we just destroyed the forces that were supposed to attack that part of the base. On the other hand, we do know the enemy is reinforcing the area with space-drops of Mobile Dolls, so we can expect things to get worse for us as the battle drags on."

Murrue continued when Mu hesitated. "The Archangel will provide primary fire for air targets, specifically their Mobile Doll Carriers, to prevent reinforcement-in-place operations, and will provide primary indirect fire for ground targets with missiles. On the ground, our main effort will be the Mobile Forces, with a move-to-contact engagement profile to fix the enemy's flank and call in fire from the Archangel. Once their numbers are thinned, hopefully the Treize Faction forces can join us in eliminating the remainder of the Mobile Dolls and we can call it a day."

"All sections are to be battle-ready no later than 0700 hours," Mu said. "The gunfight starts no later than 0800. Dismissed!"

"There you have it, kids," Chief Ryback said to the pilots. "Time for us to throw in for real."

"Sucks," Tolle griped. "Can't someone leave us alone for a jump or two? Is that too much to ask?"

"Of course," Ryback replied. "We've pissed someone off, and now we get to wander the interdimensional equivalent of the Mediterranean in search of home. Just like Odysseus, only nastier."

"Welcome to the Odyssey," Tolle said in a singsong voice, matching an old band called Orgy and their song by the same name.

-x-x-x-

(15 November AC195, 0745 hours)

(Southern Luxembourg, Luxembourg Military Academy / AFB)

"This is insane! They must really want Lord Treize dead!"

"It's their way or the highway, Corporal," Sergeant Blesser replied. He edged the muzzle of his Dobergun out from cover and took aim at one of the approaching Mobile Dolls, then squeezed the trigger. The shot went straight and true, struck the OZ-06MD Virgo in the left knee, and sheared the entire lower leg off the machine. It toppled to the ground, now too damaged to continue the fight.

"Yeah, their way or the highway to Hell," the Corporal groused. He did the same as the Sergeant, he fired his bazooka from cover to prevent the Mobile Dolls being able to track in on him, though his shot missed between two of the front-line units and hit a tango three rows back.

"Honorless bastards," a Lieutenant said. His machine had the shoulder cannons that officers tended to favor, but he had eschewed the standard beam rifle for a pair of the 105mm machine cannons, weapons not stopped by the eponymous Planet Defensers the Mobile Dolls carried. "Why don't these Romafeller pussies come down here and fight us like men, not Terminators?"

"They fear us, fear Lord Treize, fear anything that would challenge their ancient conspiracy. They have to slaughter us and the Sanc Kingdom, or they can't have their perfect little world," Sergeant Blesser groused. Another shot landed on target and struck down another Mobile Doll, but a second shot missed wide and blasted a tree in half in the distance.

"Bet they're crapping their pants over that big white ship that's free-roaming around the Med, striking down their Mobile Doll and air force units," the Corporal commented.

"What I'd give for a tenth of their combat power right now," the Lieutenant bemoaned. His Leo raised both machine cannons over the roof of a damaged water processing plant and began spraying ordinance in their direction.

"1200 meters before they're on top of us," the Sergeant said with a clearly hardened heart. He didn't expect to see them approach within 600 meters, he figured he would be dead before that.

"God damnit!" the Corporal shouted as his machine recoiled from a shot and slammed backward into another building of the water treatment plant. The bazooka to which he was using was thoroughly trashed, now blown in half and on the ground. "Not good, I just lost both hands in that attack, I'm out."

"Gah!" the Sergeant's machine was next to take a hit, this time the beam cannon blast blew through the dobergun and annihilated the right arm of his Leo. "Well, at least I'm in good company. Can't ask for finer men to die with today."

"I seriously wish we had some kind of help out here," the Lieutenant said. His 105mm machine cannons were doing damage, but not enough damage fast enough to matter.

"Ask and ye shall receive, Lieutenant," the Corporal said. The Lieutenant looked first to the Corporal, whose Mobile Suit was staring toward the rear of the Treize lines, then he looked toward where the Corporal's MS was staring. What the Corporal was referring to was completely obvious once the Lieutenant saw what was coming his way.

"Good God, it's more frightening in real life than it is in briefing," Sergeant Blesser said.

"Holy Hell," the Corporal groused as the ship was haloed by the rocket engines of missiles being launched – big missiles. The flight of SRAMs (5) streaked up to 600 meters AGL, then nosed down at a nearly ninety-degree angle onto the top of the Mobile Doll formation; four of the missiles burst open at 400 meters, spreading a swath of cluster munitions all over the ground, the rest were 'common' missiles that blew fifty-meter rents in the Mobile Doll lines.

"Hell yes! Let's see if I can get them to walk their fire in closer," Sergeant Blesser said with a tone of approval. "Warship, this is Treize Faction forward line, do you read me?" For visual reference, he flashed the mono-eye on his Leo at the ship.

"Treize Faction forward, this is Archangel, I read you five by five," the radio operator sounded like a young man at best to the Sergeant. "What can I do for you?"

"Can you walk your next missile barrage in 500 meters?" the Sergeant asked.

"Warning, that is danger close (6) for our ICM (7) missiles," the Archangel operator replied. "We run a severe risk of hitting your position, Sergeant. Are you sure you want it that close?"

"Archangel, Lieutenant Canser, Pump House defense. If you're here to help, God bless you all for the assist. Send your shots close-in, we're about ninety seconds shy of being overrun here."

A four second pause followed, a creepy silence from the approaching ship. "Archangel rogers your last, stand by for support. Warning, danger close on fire support, splash in seven seconds after fire. Launching in three, two, one, now!"

Another wave of missiles was launched from the ship, this time starting with rearward-facing silos and continuing with forward-facing silos once the first barrage reversed course. True to the operator's word, seven seconds after launch the first missiles began impacting on the ground a thousand meters north of the pump house and somewhat to the east, with explosions cascading west along the enemy lines. Also true to the operator's word, one of the cluster munition missiles opened up and dumped its bomblets across the enemy front line as well as the remnants of the water treatment plant.

When Sergeant Blesser blew open the emergency release and exited his now thoroughly trashed Leo, it was to the sight of the Rune Gods, Omnimechs and Gundams dropping from the decks of the Archangel to the tarmac below. He held fast to the frame of his downed Leo as the blue Rune God landed on the roof of the last standing water treatment building—and promptly collapsed it. He was not quite happy that the Lieutenant used an area-denial fire support call on his position, but the erasure of most of the Mobile Doll front line was welcomed.

-x-

"You did warn them," Hikaru commented dryly.

"Still doesn't help our position much," Chandratta answered coldly. "We need as much help as possible."

"Time to get to work, people," Commander La Flaga ordered.

"Gotcha," Hikaru answered. Rayearth drew its massive broadsword and began moving against the front lines area that had been sundered by the missile barrages. Nine Mobile Dolls remained to be destroyed in this battalion section, of which four were in one small cluster.

"Archangel, Chevalier, long-range fire call," Hikaru heard over Rayearth's retransmit of the radio. Whatever else he had to say was not heard on the radio, probably because he either changed channels or used a TacFlash message to send strike coordinates.

"Nicol is down, preparing jammers now," the green-haired pilot declared.

Hikaru closed on the nearest of the Mobile Dolls with her shield forward, a prudent measure in knowing they were tracking her with the hellishly powerful beam cannons the Virgos carried. Her defense against the four nearest her was outstanding, as two missed shots and two blocked strikes proved, but opposition units from the enemy left were able to take a clear shot at her from her sword-arm side. She managed to bury her sword into the chest of a Virgo up to the hilt, but a Mobile Doll standing out some 900 meters put a round in her chest just the same, a hit that knocked her to the ground. "Rayearth is hit, Rayearth down!" Kira reported.

"Ow! That HURT!" Hikaru shouted as she gripped at the top of her sternum, equivalent to where the shot hit the Rune God. "What—ah, crap," she groused as she realized she was staring down the barrel of one of the other Virgo units that was now standing over her.

The Virgo preparing to execute her never had a chance to fire. A pair of Gauss slugs tore into its chest and right arm, a pair of shots that destroyed the beam cannon generator and the jump jet fuel bunker for the machine. Contrary to Hollywood, hitting the fuel bunker in a unit does not automatically result in an explosion, and this one was no different, but the internal slow fire only took four seconds to compromise something important in the unit and shut it down. "You all right, kid?" Pytor asked as his Stone Rhino moved forward of her to draw fire.

"I'll live," Hikaru replied evenly as she struggled to control Rayearth and get it to its feet.

These weapons are very energetic, Rayearth half-complained to her by way of telepathy. We should be cautious about exposing ourselves to fire.

"I hear you," Hikaru groused. She took the pace distance to the downed Virgo and reclaimed her sword. "Rayearth is returning to battle."

"Rayearth, control, move north 500 meters and east 200 meters to reengage enemy exposed right flank," Miriallia ordered.

"Hikaru, follow me in," Kira said as he began the requested movement, with his left arm forward and a beam shield active to defend against their attacks.

"Jamming coming online now," Nicol declared. "Jamming active, virus broadcast confirmed."

"Assault forces, Control, confirm jamming is online," Miriallia requested.

"Command, Timber Wolf, good jam, enemy is stopping fire and maneuver," Mu reported.

"Housecleaning, front and center," Yzak snarked as he began firing missiles at the Virgo units in the distance.

"Oh crap, Command, it's not jamming all the enemy machines," Chevalier reported. "It works out to 1500 meters, but the enemy front line extends another 900 meters past that and they're still going."

"Understood," Miriallia replied evenly.

"Ground forces, Captain Ramius, reduce the enemy as we move east. As we advance, more of the enemy units should come under our jamming umbrella and allow the Oz forces to attack without risk to themselves."

"Reduce enemy forces, aye Captain," Morgan acknowledged the change in plan.

-x-

"Jimmy! Four on your left!"

Jimmy ducked his unit's shoulder shield into blocking position and used his thrusters to bound back another hundred meters to cover. In his short flight, he took two hits with both to the shield, which threatened to knock him to the ground but neither did. "God damn this whole scenario! They just keep coming! Steve, you have a shot?"

"Hell no!" Four beams passed by his location, not aimed at anything specific so much as they were meant to suppress the Treize Faction Leo machines in place. "If I can jump for cover, I'll be doing damn good to survive."

"I'll knock down two on your right, try jumping for Hangar four," Jimmy declared. His Leo came partially out of the cover and brought the 105mm machine cannon up into place, then ripped a burst into the nearest Virgo's chest and head. One machine went down from repeated penetrations, but the enemy targeted him and began suppressing before he could walk the burst onto another. "Got one, go!"

"SHIIITTT! Steve shouted as he hammered his jets to the red-line to get clear and make it to the hangar before something shot him in the arse. A few shots came close, but none hit the erratically maneuvering MS. He landed next to the main door of the reinforced hangar and side-jumped to get behind the concrete revetment. "Oh, oh, oh, oh, stayin' alive!"

"Stop singing Bee-Gees during a crisis situation, unless you want to attract their wrath?" Jimmy asked.

"Just tryin' to get them to ease up on you, Jimmy," Steve said.

"If you start struttin' like Travolta, I'll spare them the effort and shoot you myself," A beam round blew through the corner of the building he was hiding behind, with the beam removing the barrel of his machine cannon.

"Not without a gun, you won't," Steve said deadpan. "Jump for cover in three seconds, two, one," and Steve ducked around the corner to attract their fire and take a few shots himself, "NOW—WHAT?" Steve shouted as the fire all up and down the line stopped.

"What the hell's goin' on, Stevie Wonder?" Jimmy asked as he cautiously looked around at the suddenly-stopped Mobile Dolls. "They all stopped! What does a red eye mean?"

"Software error?" Steve asked nobody in particular.

"Weird time for 'em to get a software error." Despite his misgivings, he was still amused by the thought.

"Who called time out?" someone else asked on the unit master frequency.

Several of the Mobile Dolls nearby Jimmy were hammered by a rapidly-moving object slamming through their legs. The object, a twisted rail gun slug, came to a rest against the side of a building another three hundred meters east of his position, which meant the rail gun in question was to the west... "Holy shit on a stick," Jimmy groused. "It's that damned white ship!" To accentuate the point, a quad of emerald beams streaked over the battlefield, two beams each to a pair of Mobile Doll carriers that were reinforcing the middle of the Romafeller lines with paradropped Mobile Dolls.

"What? Serious?" Steve asked.

The emergency radio in his console crackled. "Warning, warning, warning, all Treize Faction personnel, this is the independent warship Archangel, be advised we are preparing to fire our positron siege cannons in a grazing shot along the enemy line! All forces, take cover immediately! Severe blast hazard, radiation hazard! Thirty seconds!"

"Erm, what the hell's a positron?" Jimmy asked.

"Antimatter," Steve replied, having been a science-fiction buff his whole life. "You heard the man! Fall back, get some damn good cover and pucker your assholes!"

"Put some concrete or steel between you and the blast line! Now!" a Captain shouted.

-x-

"Twenty seconds!" Kuzzey declared on the radio.

"Positron generation chambers online, charging cannons now," Chandratta said as the ship sunk lower and lower to the ground.

"Captain, I have an uninhabited hill as a backdrop just west of the base, we have a clear shot," Newman said.

"Ten seconds!"

"There ain't gonna be no hill after this," Chevalier pointed out fairly.

"Lohengrin blast, danger close! (6) Five seconds!" Kuzzey half-shouted. "Four, three, two, one, now!"

"FIRE!" Murrue shouted. Chandratta obliged her request with a single blast, holding the second cannon in reserve in case something went wrong or a second strike was needed.

The effect of the Lohengrin was simplicity itself, and not even the vaunted Gundanium armor of the Mobile Dolls could save it from certain physical annihilation. As the positron beam moved laterally through the Mobile Dolls, the positrons mixed with the molecular structure of everything they crossed: air, metal, fluids, even the dirt of the hill in the distance. As each positron moved along, it eventually encountered an electron, its normal-matter equivalent, and caused a matter-antimatter subnuclear annihilation. Each such annihilation released a lot of kinetic energy and a relatively small amount of hard gamma radiation.

Enough of these reactions began converting the Mobile Dolls, even the air itself, into a blast front propagating away from the core of the positron beam. More targets, more beam, more reactions and more Mobile Dolls seemed to disappear in a nasty blast-front explosion, to those looking on from a safe distance it appeared each machine was disintegrated that came into contact with the beam. Even the gamma radiation released by the annihilation became its own form of attack, as the radiation was absorbed by nearby objects and excited those objects into a semi-kinetic, semi-thermal explosion similar to a traditional nuclear weapon. For 2000 meters this was repeated time and time again as the Lohengrin cut through the enemy line with practically zero resistance.

A couple Treize Faction Mobile Suits were caught in close with some Mobile Dolls, and suffered the same fate as the soulless killing machines. They were the absolute minority of the issue; most of the Treize Faction had taken cover when instructed and watched the show as Murrue cut a swath through the enemy ranks. Contrary to Chevalier's claim, by the time the leftovers of the beam reached the backstop, it was mostly depleted and simply blew a large crater into the side of the hill.

"Shot complete, securing starboard Lohengrin," Chandratta said.

"Good shot," Murrue said with a smile. The swath of destruction caused by the nuked Mobile Dolls encompassed the bulk of the brigade assigned to the Luxembourg battle, with only those Mobile Dolls more than 100 meters away from the beam line still standing, and few of those still functional due to the continued virus broadcast from Aquarius.

A cheer came up from the Treize Faction forces, as Leo and Aries Mobile Suits stood up and waved their weapons in the air in salute of the Archangel. With a single stroke, a defiant last stand was converted into the last, best hope for a rational end to the war with the Romafeller Foundation, in the confines of their minds.

The fighting was not complete, however. Romafeller had not staked this battle solely on the efficacy of their Mobile Dolls.

-x-x-x-

(15 November AC195, 0815 hours)

(Southern Luxembourg, Luxembourg Military Academy / AFB, Main Castle)

Entering the castle was the easy part. The Romafeller infantry had blown their way in with speed and precision, which also left an easy entrance for the Archangel Team Special Forces, augmented by the pilots that decided to join in lieu of finishing off the Mobile Dolls.

"Rear security, four contacts," Chief Ryback warned as they approached the galley of the castle. "Two, three, do 'em."

Three silenced rounds went downrange, followed by a pair and another pair, then another burst of three. The silencers made it absurdly easy, given the sound of light machine gun fire inside the structure and the generated noise was about the same as a piece of fabric flapping in the wind. The bodies collapsing to the ground made more noise than the actual shots that downed them.

"Moving in!" the sauce chef said as he bolted from his cover position and moved toward the galley. Rifles bristled in multiple directions and elevations, with aim points (8) on the windows to verify that nobody would take a shot at the team unhindered. Mu, Kira, Hikaru and Umi were the last to enter the building as trailers for the specialists in doing spooky things to unsuspecting people.

Inside the galley, the team stopped to regroup and defend the present location for a moment. One of the kitchen tables was upended for Mu to set up a light machine gun on to provide a base of fire on the two doors in the northeast corner of the room. The others in the team took a few moments to look over the galley, given that their common day-job was as cooks. "Damn, I think we need to raid this place for methods and madness when we're done cleaning out the rats," the baker noted.

"I agree," the meats specialist answered.

"Soup's almost done," the sauce chef commented as he ladled some of the clam chowder out of the pot on the hearth.

"North door, breach and clear," Ryback ordered before the team became distracted by the cooking.

"Stacked," the vegetable specialist / entry specialist said.

"Go op," Ryback ordered the jump-off. Within moments of the order to go, the first four were in the stairwell headed downstairs. The opening of the door was an ample reminder for everyone gunfire that was absurdly loud when inside a structure, far more so than in open air. A dental mirror sufficed for a corner check, revealing a bare squad of enemy infantry surviving against a last-ditch guard of Treize Faction personnel.

"Nine tangos pinned in place, boss," the vegetable specialist said.

"Bang and clear," Ryback ordered. A flashbang grenade went around the corner and landed roughly in between the two enemy groups, one of five and one of four, that were hiding behind a pair of low brick walls. A half-second after it landed, the magnesium charge inside the flashbang detonated, filling the room with a deafening concussion and vision-negating white flash. "Go!"

The Commandos moved around the bend in the stairs and down to the dais entry before the ringing of the flashbang cleared. The stun of the soldiers on both sides made the task of 'clearing' (killing or capturing) the remaining Romafeller infantry pathetically easy. Silenced pistol shots were the order of the day for seven of the nine; the other two were pinned and expertly disarmed by the cooks in seconds, long before their proper vision returned from the aural and visual abuse.

"Trailers!" Ryback issued a one-word order; when entering and clearing a building, the entry forces commander (Ryback) had command authority over both the entry team and any support personnel (the pilots, in this case).

"Hikaru, grab the one on the right," Kira ordered as he put a pistol to the back of the neck of the one that was captured to the left. "Follow all orders and you will live, infantryman; I don't give second chances," he added the second on as an impromptu piece of intimidation, to ensure his prisoner did not do anything overly threatening. He didn't intend on eliminating a prisoner, of course, but the enemy would not know anything more about the Archangel Team than their reputation.

"Understood," the defeated and cowed Romafeller Corporal replied. Hikaru used her sword for the same purpose that Kira was using a pistol, but both achieved the same effect.

"Mu, Ryback, four coming up, two prisoners and two pilots. No friendlies downed."

"Got it," Mu replied informally. "Nothing happening up here at the moment."

"Treize Faction Infantry, any other Romafeller troops in the house?" Ryback shouted at the impromptu defensive bulwark put in place by the loyalists.

"No, those were the last," a fairly young soldier shouted back in response. "You Archangel Team?"

"Yeah, we are," the baker replied evenly, though his was not a shout for the effort of lighting a cigar.

A young Sergeant stood up, safed and set down his rifle, and approached the dais now occupied by the Commandos. "Master Treize wants to speak with you in the library area, if you are willing."

"Huh," Ryback groused, then hit the 'press to talk' switchplate on his gear harness. "Mu, Ryback, looks like the good Colonel himself wants a word. You can stand down the big toy as well, what infantry we didn't nuke or silence is now up in the kitchen with you guys."

"Roger that, the Elementals have taken the two prisoners in, so we'll be down shortly."

"Cookie, Muffins;" both of the named Commandos sounded off immediately. "Head upstairs and start checking their APCs and dead guys for intel. Maps and oporders are a priority. Keep an eye on your geiger counters, if it gets too hot head back into the ship."

"I'll serve it with fries, boss," 'Cookie' acknowledged.

"Now, how did you guys get the name of our old mercenary battle group?" Ryback asked.

"Romafeller put out a bounty on your ship and heads last week," the Treize Faction Sergeant replied. "We've been trying to get a hold of you guys for some time, see if you really are mercenaries."

"Captain might be willing to negotiate," Mu said from the stairs directly behind Ryback. "Lead the way to the colonel, please."

-x-

"Colonel Treize, may I present Naval Commander Mu La Flaga, Chief Warrant Officer Casey Ryback, and, erm, Magic Knight Umi Ryuuzaki. Sir."

"Thank you, Sergeant Wilson. Please send for refreshments for our guests," the man standing at a bookcase said calmly.

"Yes, sir, by your leave, sir." With nothing more said, the Sergeant departed the room and closed the doors behind.

"I have watched your battles over the past week, and I find myself a little bit surprised." Mu found himself more than a bit surprised that Colonel Treize was younger than himself, but he held his tongue on that matter. "A whole ship, displaced four times from its home world, picking up transients and fighting bizarre wars as it goes along. A modern-day Odyssey, less the Greek arrogance and with a surfeit of blood. What that it was a sun-dream or a fairy tale, but the crater in the side of the western hills significantly disproves that."

"Story of our lives, sir," Ryback replied.

"Does your ship have a clean copy of the Odyssey?" Treize asked before he removed a book from the book case he was standing in front of. After a few moments, the bookcase next to him slid back a few centimeters and into the wall, to reveal a staircase leading further down. "Please, follow me."

"It is an old castle," Umi said in a tone of voice clearly intended to strengthen her resolve.

"You tight?" Mu asked Ryback.

"Damn straight, sir," the Chief Warrant Officer replied.

"After we get out of this, remind me to talk to the Captain about having you promoted. Petty Officer Second Class sounds about right," Mu said.

Ryback chuckled. "Do I get a pay-raise as well?"

Mu snorted. "You're going to have to talk to Sutherland about that," he answered as Ryback took the first step on the spiral stairs down.

"Wonder what's down here," Ryback asked nobody in particular. "More books?"

"Smells like a cave," Umi half-whined. Of the three Magic Knights, she liked dank caves the least of all.

"Whole castle smells like that," Mu commented. "Better than what it could smell like, of course."

The stairs opened up to what amounted to an artificial cave – it took Umi and Mu no more than three seconds to recognize the form of a hangar around them. Treize had not entered far into the hangar himself, but did stop at a breaker panel on the wall. "Your ship's compliment is loaded with Gundams – machines of frightening power and intimidation value. I had made two, myself: one to lead the people toward a proper future, another to cripple the demons that now threaten that future."

"Cripple the demons—Aquarius?" Umi guessed after a bare moment.

"And your force has put that Gundam to excellent use thus far – two brigades of Mobile Dolls destroyed, a significant amount of Romafeller's forces on planet, crippled at your hands. Odysseus, nay, the Gods themselves of the Odyssey would be hard pressed to match your sheer determination and destructive skill. But, I must ask, what is your determination for?"

"The same reason as Odysseus," Mu replied deadpan. "Go home. Preferably alive."

Treize nodded twice, though nobody was able to guess why offhand. "You received the right machine for your task. This one," and he waved to the Gundam standing in the hangar area; "This is meant for someone to guide the future, not slay the demons of the past."

"Geh," Umi grunted, having seen right through his phrasing immediately. "What is stopping you?"

"Pardon?" Treize asked of the three-years-his-junior Magic Knight.

"You went to the effort of building it, why not use it?" Umi asked in a more pointed fashion.

"Mine are old-world hands. I have no right to guide the future."

"A well-phrased excuse, but still an excuse in the end," Umi challenged him directly. "Last I checked, the world doesn't run on excuses and hand-wringing."

Treize smiled thinly at the Magic Knight. "You have the headstrong attitude of certain rather rebellious princesses I have dealt with," the colonel responded. "What makes you believe I am the right person to use such a powerful machine?"

Umi smiled serenely, knowing she had broken his defiance with his question. "You strike me as a man with a plan," she replied. "You wouldn't have built this thing without a reason. I have a general idea how expensive Gundams are, half my team uses them, so you either blew a good chunk of resources and time for a daydream or you actually intend something. I lean toward the second option."

"Not a bad piece of circumstantial analysis," Treize admitted. "What if I said I intended to remove you from the equation?" Treize baited her.

"Sinking the Archangel is a death-wish in common practice, or in other terms it is an oporder, not a strategy." Treize grimaced, wondering what she was referring to. "The ship's tally is over thirty blown ops, we've had everything short of ancient Gods try to sink us. We make the impossible battle a possible victory," it was Mu that grimaced this time for her corruption of his favorite motivational phrase. "You're aiming a lot higher than one perpetually-lost warship."

"Fair enough," Treize replied. "I want to end the mechanism by which elite parties use warfare to control the socio-political strata of the world. Is that a believable goal to you, miss Magic Knight?" Treize asked in a completely deadpan manner.

Umi made a show of considering it. "Aggressive, direct, far-reaching, but not quite developed on method," Umi judged. "You have the 'why' cemented, you built a 'how' with this Gundam and your forces outside, so I ask: 'when'?"

Treize chuckled heartily. "Now I see why you have made it this far mostly intact. You are the kind of person who never lets it go, are you not?"

"Hang a 'roger' on that one," Ryback commented. Her exploits with 'correcting' Yzak's foul mouth were legendary in the unit and the perfect example of what Treize referred to.

"To answer your question, I may just do as you say," Treize said looking over the Gundam he commissioned once again. "Before I begin, though, I must know what convictions lie outside the grasp of the Romafeller Foundation, and whether or not it is worth it to try to correct the mistakes of the past."

Mu caught the veiled allegory without issue. "What do you think of the convictions of the Sanc Kingdom?" he asked.

Treize simply smiled.

-x-x-x-

(Side Story: Messy Echoes)

(15 November AC195, 1300 hours)

(Archangel Hot Springs)

(Ship location: Southern Luxembourg, Luxembourg Military Academy / AFB, Southern Resupply Area)

Unlike the bulk of the other pilots, Quatre was not asleep. He had decided on a run through the hot-springs, given he had just woken up when the assembly had been called prior to Luxembourg. For him, sleep was still another 9 hours off at the minimum.

"What do you think, Master Quatre?" Rashid asked after a minute of silence. "Is Treize after power, or does he intend something else?"

"He may have intended this outcome from the outset," Quatre admitted. "It would not surprise me if our initial operation orders were just as hollow as the original Operation Meteor."

This caused Rashid to tilt his head. "Yours was a different Operation Meteor?"

"Yeah, it was...messed up," Quatre admitted. "It was the Alliance, writ bloodier. It would have started off with a colony drop, and the Gundams were to ride down on the chaos to assert power for the Barton Foundation."

"Dekim Barton," Rashid groused. His name was synonymous with back-room plotting and sneakiness; if he was planning something, nobody would know about it until after it had happened.

"Yeah, Dekim," Quatre answered. "I—I couldn't do it as he wanted."

"Be at ease, Master Quatre," Rashid answered. "We will deal with him after we have ended the tyranny of the Romafeller Foundation."

"Yeah," Quatre said.

"I will turn in for the evening," Rashid said. "I will pass on to the Maganac Corps that you are now in command."

"Thank you, Rashid."

"When we have purged the invaders from our desert homeland, it will be I who owes you thanks, Master Quatre." Without another word, Quatre was left alone in the springs.

Quatre relaxed into a reclining position, reminded of the eerie fact that he was sitting on stones taken from a desert planet in a completely different dimension. It was creepy to him in no small terms, to know there were whole orders of Existence that were wildly different from the history, culture and war he knew on this one world, and to know there were beings of infinitely greater power and mystery in those worlds. Quatre had considered working on Nicol to get him to publish the Archangel Team's record as a novel; an incomplete fraction of their journey, but still a noteworthy tale in its own right. The sales could certainly go a long way to augmenting the ship's already impressive arsenal, cargo and financial reserves.

After a few minutes, he let his mind go, which freed his empathy up to sense the low-level happenings around the ship. He could sense the people in groups, the cafeteria watching a soap opera in three dimension holoprojector, the engine room and their dirty jokes, the hangar deck as they loaded supplies from the Treize Faction bunkers and repaired Treize Faction MS in payment, the Maganac pilots drinking java and playing cards, and the silence of the sleeping pilots. The ship that never sleeps, Quatre reminded himself.

As his mind was wandering through the pilot's area, he began to sense something else...something significantly different from what he expected. At first, it seemed as if it was the flare of emotion that accompanied battle, but something felt off about that thought. A few moments and he realized it was not battle, but something totally different...something he had only sensed around mature persons. Another few seconds and he could sense it as perversion, desire between genders. He couldn't tell who it was, but the increasing feeling reminded him of winds on an open plateau.

Then it began in earnest, and Quatre knew he was in for a rough one. A second set of such emotions and reactions came to his empathic sense after a few moments, an action that told Quatre both the logically 'should-be-married' couples were having intercourse. The raw feeling of it was like nothing he had ever felt before, given that the male mind usually never knows what goes through a lady's mind during intercourse, and the conflicting emotions, physical reactions, and expectations began yanking his psyche in four different directions all at once. More egregious was the physical sensory experience of the two ladies involved, something he never expected to feel in his life in any fashion, which was alternately a completely enthralling feeling, mentally unsettling to ever have felt it, and pervert's best dream all wrapped into one.

The mental confusion caused by the overload of sensory and mental inputs caused him to try to scramble from the hot bath and try to get dressed so he could get away from the perverts in the ship. He made it as far as halfway climbing out of the baths and onto the sauna rocks around the bath before the overload actually did overload him. His last conscious sight was seeing a stream of blood from his nose landing on the stone floor as it rapidly approached his face. He blacked out before impact.

-x-

"You found him like this?" Mu asked.

"Aff, Commander," Pytor admitted. "I checked, he is not dead, but the nosebleed is a bit unsettling."

"The pose is unsettling," Mu admitted just the same. Quatre had tried climbing over the sauna rock seats to get to the door, but apparently didn't make it for some reason. As such, his face was planted on the stone floor about ten centimeters away from a drain vent that had a blood trail leading to it, with his legs hanging down on the far side of the sauna rock and his toes in the hot springs water. As a result of it all, he was doubled over at the waist and his arse was pointing skyward. "The doc is on the way. I think he should deal with this."

"Aff, Commander."

"This never occurred," Mu said, having a fairly decent idea why it happened. The white-yellow streak down the side of the rock was ample evidence, as well as ship lore about certain incidents and parties. That he was involved (at least partially) in the matter was something he was not going to comment on.

"On my honor, this shall never be spoken of," the aged Mechwarrior replied solemnly.

---

Author's Chapter Afterword:

This chapter was a perfect case of 'Unibrow Theory': It took me three months to write the first 8000 words, then four days to write the second 8000 words. Go figure. The unibrow comes in thusly: I decided I was going to finish this chapter at all bloody costs, so I did.

Spring is here, and before anyone starts singing a certain 'springtime' song, you can allay any such thoughts forthwith. Spring == home maintenance season around here; I probably could have had this finished and published about four weekends ago if I was not laying Linoleum. On an aside, so long as you do Linoleum right it looks wonderful. If you can do it yourself, and are reasonably competent with a razor knife, so much the better (Emos don't count here, sorry). If you don't understand the basics, call a professional: a screwup on this task can cost you $500 in a hurry, or more depending on how much the linoleum in question costs.

Athrun and Fuu were the latest casualties in my never-ending struggle with the dice, though this one turned out better than I initially expected. 23 for the retreat check, then 88 for survival on impact. I have not checked how long before they are back in service, but next episode is not beyond the realm of possibility. Aegis is toast, but as was mentioned in this chapter Athrun has a Gundam waiting for him...a bit of a step down in terms of long-range firepower, but both a bit heavier in armor and a lot more fierce in close quarters. Windam will be back up on its feet (wings) shortly, just needs a new pair of wings and problem is solved.

One of the things I wanted to put in the end notes for the day is a bit of a technical issue that is assured to come up about two defensive issues in this chapter. The first is the efficacy of Gundanium armor, of which I show the armor as actually vulnerable to repeated hits in this chapter – as well as being vulnerable to missiles. The issue here is simple: Gundam Wing is better than some of the Gundam offerings, but it still has a tendency to flip-flop on the efficacy of armor and firepower. My position is to respect Canon, but not to the point of god-mode in any case (unless I can justify it by the numbers). In this case, since the show is not consistent as to how effective Gundanium armor is, I have to assume its lowest common denominator is the rotary autocannons on the shoulders of Wing Zero in the case of the Virgos. That being said, heavier weapons (the 105mm MG on the Leos, Doberguns, etc.) would also be effective, but I do give a hedge: destroying a Virgo with the 105mm MG requires a significant outlay of hits to give a verified kill.

Also, the thing on missiles is pure physics: there is no metal in the entirety of the periodic table that can completely resist a shape charge, and even the heavier metals (depleted Uranium being one of the top choices) is not proof against shape charges. Simply stated, shape charges apply millions of pounds of force onto a spot usually no larger than the palm of your hand, and often no larger than a silver dollar piece. Chobham armor gets by with avoiding the penetration by providing a layer of ceramic tile inside the armor laminates to allow a shape charge to disperse its energy; this is not possible in homogenous armor systems, where the jet of explosive simply keeps blowing through the material until it gets inside the armor. Gundanium lands in the same boat as other homogenous armor materials: it will resist the penetration somewhat, but the amount of armor thickness necessary to completely outright stop a heavy-target shape charge well exceeds the amount of armor a Virgo can carry.

The Planet Defensers (that is how they are spelled in canon) are an interesting take, and again are also subject to Gundam Wing flip-flopping on how effective they are. Leos firing machine guns at them are useless, Trowa rattling his gatlings at the Mobile Dolls is not useless. The Leos should have the higher penetration and velocity, so it looks like the producers are trying to have it both ways. In this case, I have to side with physics in the interest of consistency. I'll give the Planet Defensers beam weapon immunity (except lasers), no problem there. I'll even give them missile immunity, though in some circles that may be arguable; there are few components inside a missile that are truly magnetic, given that most of it is nonmetallic or nonferrous material (aluminum is not magnetically reactive, and most missiles are constructed with unitary aluminum or carbon fiber bodies). Ballistic weapons are where I draw the line: the physics favor the fast-moving slugs without issue. The Mythbusters tested what it would have taken to deflect a simple handgun bullet in terms of magnetic influence (they were testing a Bond myth, forget which movie), and to deflect a .45 caliber slug took something on the order of 3000 pounds of magnetic force to change its trajectory even marginally. Now, a 105mm APFSDS (what I am assuming the Leos use for anti-armor work) weighs over 350 times more than a mere .45 slug and has around six times the velocity, meaning the magnetic exposure is six times less than the slug the Mythbusters tested. That said, the necessary magnetic force involved in the Planet Defensers would have to be on the order of kilotons of magnetic pull to even deflect a bullet from its initial course, and megatons of magnetic force to outright stop it. That kind of supermagnetic force would easily disrupt the fusion plants powering the Virgo just as a start, much less what it would do to their own weapons or the environment. Such power is way the hell beyond reasonable expectation for any form of defensive implement, so I have to draw a line here.

Of course, you can expect the same weaknesses to apply to the Gundams in use by the Archangel Team...

On the flip side of the battle, there are the Archangel's creative use of interesting battle tactics. The first and the loudest is the game-breaker Aquarius. It worked today, but don't expect it to go without limitations and eventually flaws in the chapters to come. Nicol is good, but he's just one man against an army of Romafeller counterintelligence and research personnel. He isn't going to be able to stem them for long. The second one is the use of missiles from the Archangel; nothing beats a five-ton unitary explosive charge in terms of blowing the shit out of stationary targets. Of course, the improved cluster munition also helped, as it spreads the love around a lot better than the standard unitary charges without reducing blast effectiveness at range. Of course, they have a LARGE footprint, as some of the Treize Faction machines found out...

The crowner for the day is the Lohengrin, the oft-overlooked heavy hitter of the Archangel's arsenal. There is no better way to say 'go to hell, do not pass go, do not collect $200 dollars' than a positron projector cannon. One shot will give the average enemy heartburn of a type not readily solvable. Of course, this being antimatter we are talking about, it is rather indiscriminate, so care must be taken when you point it at your target, lest you really take out something you don't want to take out.

And, now that the technical matters are all done, I have to say that the stinger for the chapter is a little bit of a psionic quirk that goes along with my theories on magic and psionics. With three of the four involved parties being magically-trained persons, there is some amount of psionic bleed to their emotions. Two of the persons involved are out-and-out telepaths, which also causes Psionic bleed. Two of the involved parties are linked to the same Rune God, which increases the net yield of the psionic bleed. In short, someone is getting an emotional overload from their romp. Quatre, who is an empath and can sense the pain when Heero blows himself up along with his Gundam, is the likely candidate for an overload in this case. And this is how it turned out. Such is life, such is humor :)

On a non-prose aisde, I have some interesting numbers.

On Sunday, 17 April 2011, Archangel's Amazing Adventures surpassed 50,000 hits to the whole story. Every one of the last four chapters has been over 100 hits each, with one chapter above 1700 hits and counting. This is motivation for me, motivation to keep writing: each individual chapter has been read more times than some SEED or crossover stories have words total. It still blows the mind how popular this is, for something so off-beat insane.

AAA has 323 reviews as of this chapter, which exceeds the 10-reviews-per-chapter benchmark average I have been aiming at for some time. That is also mind-blowing, but for a different reason than the above. That I have been receiving this much reader feedback for the story is warming, to say the least: I didn't expect this to go far at all, and here I am, 33 chapters in and receiving all manner of encouragement, ideas, technical arguments, and even more as the story progresses. Insane, insane! Keep 'em coming!

Another interesting benchmark is the favorites / alerts. 94 persons call this favorite, 74 call it an alert. Also, if you search the story name in Google, AAA shows up in a site called FavoritesTracker as part of several different lists on said site, and has been subject of several message board posts. My thanks to those who continue to read, and to those who spread the word around the message boards of the internet. This manner of publicity is well beyond anything I ever expected to see, and for that I am honored.

That's pretty much it for this chapter.

NEXT UP: The Archangel turns North from Luxembourg, headed back to the Sanc Kingdom to fulfill a request laid in by Noin. With the ground situation heating up, battle is just around the corner, and space is just starting to stir of its own right...

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Review Replies: The reviews for this chapter take two and a half pages, which should tell you something. Since some of the reviews were multiple-chapter-0postings, I'll give a tally at the end.

FraserMage: the Relena Expy in question was the Lacus of Chapter 12 in Legend JW Rev.

Knives91: That is what a proper surprise attack looks like in naval terms. Of course they didn't stand a chance, Murrue is a veteran captain and knows how to fight right, not fight fair.

One-Village-Idiot: Good to see my chapter draws such accolades, and I hope to start cranking these out a bit faster. I have a long way to go, after all :)

Of course, I can only answer those questions in prose, you know my rule against spoilers :) The next chapters should answer some of those questions, rest assured.

Infinite Freedom: Romafeller was poised to hamburger the Sanc Kingdom before the Archangel even arrived on planet. For they to move forward with their policies, they don't have a choice. Of course, they may end up hitting the brick wall built by the Archangel Team and stopping dead...

2ndsly: Of course, when you say they are in demand, circumstance tends to artificially inflate that demand, so...

As I replied in PM, I have a general disdain of survival horror, so RE3 may be out. 40K, however, is on the random gen list.

Rc1212: I have not watched BSG, either the original or the 2K3 remake, strangely enough. That is one of the stories I have managed to miss over the years. May have to look into it.

Alex Yamato: Your hunch, of course, leave plenty of open room on the battlefield, as was demonstrated by the opening battle of this chapter. Expect more of that where it came from.

Hope the stinger here qualifies as 'more relationship action'. You know this is going to add up to something eventually :)

Atlan: thank you for the countoff of the stats. As to the TO&E, I'll probably drop that in the next chapter or two, when I have a better idea what is happening with the Archangel's transient/organic attachments (Maganac Corps at this time). Wouldn't be fair to include them in the countoff and then the next chapter they're out of the picture.

C0dy88: Well, the problem with modding a Warship is that it takes time and engineering expertise, and the whole Wing storyline is just barely long enough to engineer a mod to the escort 'cans before what would be Ep 50. Mods would have begun the January after the massive scrap in space, provided the army wasn't abolished...

chm01: I hope this chpater answers at least a few of those questions. As to what makes the Archangel look weak, well, Barge and Libra could easily turn the Archangel into a toasted wreck in one shot, so not all hope is lost...

Victor M. Sarks: 0083 is on the list of possible random drop locales, so stay tuned on that front. As to the salvage and its use, well, not all of it has been used yet, so...

Deathzealot: I think I would have trouble doing a Relena versus Lacus argument like that, I can never seem to get Lacus right, but I do get close. As to the rest, I hope this chapter has planeted some more f33r in ye for the coming future...

EtienneOfTheWestWind: The dice have not spoken on this point of conduct yet, but may in the future...

Mega1987 (Repeat Anon review): Writers block comes in many forms, amigo. As to unit mods, they may have to do so to keep pace with some of the locations listed in the random locations to come...

Arbl A-17: The dice system is a sliding scale of random results, where I think a decision point should be made random I let the dice decide it. I commonly use a 1 to 100 roll, with 1 being a failed roll and 100 being a perfect result (or as close to perfect given the circumstances). Not everything is subject to the dice, just the honest decision points.

Flawless Cowboy 2552: I am still looking forward to the opportunity of a Yzak versus Wufei myself. Should the dice let it happen, expect a lot more than fur to fly.

As I explained in my notes above, the virgo shields are a case of the producers trying to have it both ways with ballistic weapons, so I go with the physics of the matter.

Well, there is at least one ZERO equipped unit in play, and it can get messy fast. Stay tuned on that note.

MantaArms1989: Good that I got a laugh out of someone. Aquarius is a semi-canon immigrant from the SD Gundam franchise, but my dice say it is a live unit here, and man did it come in use already...

Necroblade: Much thank you again for the beta work, amigo.

Paper battles are all well and good, but remember that when I write, I write battles as if they are not just a paper engagement, they exist in otherwise real-world minutiae. Terrain, tactics, experience, training, and support will play a role in those battles, just as they did here today.

Strata-Assassin: Also to ye, thank you for the beta work once more. There will be some more everyday life stuff in the next chapter, of that I guarantee. As to the rest, well, you have to adapt or fold in these kinds of situations, and the crew chose 'adapt'. This is the end result.

Cyspark01: The Junk Guild would have been helping collect the last living beings for transport to Mars to start over. On the rest, well, most the ZAFT personnel went the way of Mars, though an oddball or two joined up as ship's crew. Luna and Meiryn are assumed to have been killed prior to the timeframe of the chapter.

Gulping (Anon Review): The challenge, of course, being peaceful downtime, of which a competent commander in Romafeller would deny to the Archangel. Of course, even under stress things can get done...

Metal Vile: First review, an honor and my thanks. Stay tuned for far more hijinks in this story, much is yet to come :)

I used part of your notes here, and another part of your notes will come into play in the next few chapters. I have said it before: reviews will be used for idea fodder, so the more you throw out, the more I am likely to pick up :)

Nightblader 1021: I did have a few runs with SEED early in the story, but nobody has been put under non-instantaneous do-or-die pressure in some time. That will likely change in this arc, so stay tuned there. Of course, SEED + ZERO = insane-o ass-whoping carnage for the enemy, so be on the lookout for such a nightmare :)

Mordalfus Grea: A goodly portion of those suggestions are already in the random pile, so stay tuned :)

THANK YOU ALL FOR THE REVIEWS! KEEP IT COMING, KEEP FEEDING MAGNESIUM INTO THIS FIRE, AND THIS IS WHAT YOU GET! THIS INFERNO WILL NOT BE STOPPED!

Seriously, the more reviews, the more ideas, the more point debates, the better the story becomes overall. Your input is assistance and fuel to keep going, so keep adding those reviews when you have something to say! It is what we authors love to hear at the end of the day!

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The Gripe Sheet: No major gripes from the last chapter, thanks again to Strata-Assassin and Necroblade for the assist in prepping the chapter. Necro, I added a couple extra footnotes to answer some questions you had outstanding (7, 8).

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Footnotes:

(1): Failed to guide on terminal is a problem with some missile systems that use different guidance logic for the 'cruise' (long-range transit) phase and 'terminal' (close and kill) phase. Sometimes, a logic or hardware fault can cause the missile to lose the target or (rarely) accidentally target a different unit, which results in a miss or a kill on a different target. This is a VERY RARE fault in properly-designed weapons systems; hardware or software faults are less than a 1 in 1000 occurrence, however they are not impossible. You will note in this salvo it was 6/2 hits to misses, which is 75% kill rate, which is less than modern SAM weapons systems can expect.

(2): Search And Rescue

(3): Beyond Visual Range

(4): Tango is a special forces shorthand reference for either 'target' or 'threat', depending on context.

(5): Short Range Attack Missiles

(6): Danger Close refers to an attack that is so close to friendly troops that it runs the risk of being friendly fire. In both cases listed above, it actually did end up being friendly fire as well as severely damaging to the enemy.

(7): Improved Cluster Munition. Uses a specially modified cluster munition that can penetrate 800mm of hardened homogenous armor and has a blast radius of 5 meters shrapnel effect for anti-personnel work.

(8): There seems to be some confusion about the term aimpoint / aim point. Simply stated, this is where you are aiming your gun, or your point of aim.