Sorry for the long wait, guys. I needed to take a break from this story for a loooooooooooooong time. But I hope it's worth the wait. I hope to begin regular updates momentarily, I don't have a "posting day" set up and I'm still trying to build a buffer. But I hope that there will be another long string of posts before I get burned out again. XD
Anyway, enjoy!
Chapter Twenty-Three: Pounding the Pavement
The rain lightened up a little bit, as did the lightning and thunder. I was totally drenched which made the relief moot. Combined with my general soreness my discomfort was the worse it had been since my ordeal had begun all the way back on Heliopolis.
It was actually kinda amazing I had no broken bones. Yeah, I smelled a little funny and was soaked, and probably had bruises for my bruises too. Then general sleep deprivation and fatigue. But nothing was broken. Maybe I had strained something somewhere but I couldn't tell. Finally, all I needed to do was look up at the sky and open my mouth for a little bit to get some water.
Basically, I needed sleep. And food. Both things looked like they were going to be impossible to come by.
I finally sat down in an alleyway, which had some kind of retractable roof covering over my head so I could get some shelter from the rain. The temperature felt surprisingly cold, and my eyes were aching. I so badly wanted sleep. But my fear was still keeping me awake.
I didn't even manage to get a disguise. I was still stuck in my pilot's outfit.
I had nothing to reward me for my trouble other than a ZAFT assault rifle that had an unknown number of shots in it. I didn't have any extra clips, I had no clue how to accurately fire the thing, and this was not the time or place to figure that out.
The rifle was more of a burden than a relief.
Finally, I could stay awake no longer and finally nodded off. I couldn't think anymore, couldn't act, couldn't function in any way minor or major.
It was stupid to fall asleep. I know that. But even though I seemed to be transforming into a soldier, I didn't have any basic training. No abuse from drill sergeants. No 5 a.m. wakeups. I was trying to transition from civilian to soldier without the six weeks in a camp somewhere. I just could not keep going like a soldier could. I can't function without sleep, without food, without water. No amount of reason or judgement could overrule my body.
Two hours would pass by before I woke up. And when I did wake up, it was not by under my own power.
Someone found me.
Something really strong washed through my sinuses all of a sudden and it jolted me from a murky dreamland back into the dark, harsh, wet reality. It shot my eyes open, and I saw myself staring into human eyes.
Before I could cry out, the man put his finger in front of his lips. "Ssh. Friendlies."
"Friendlies?" I repeated dumbly.
The man positioned his left shoulder in front of my face and pulled down on a piece of velcroed fabric, revealing the flag of the North American Federation. "Special forces. We're here to get you and recover the Strike."
"What?" I asked.
There was another voice, a woman's. "ZAFT patrols are beginning to move out. Looks like they're starting a sweep of the area. Desert Dawn's not doing so hot."
"They gotta hold out long enough for us to get this girl and the Strike out of Tassil," the man said.
"What are you talking about?" I asked. "The Strike's dead."
The man shrugged. "As far as we know ZAFT hasn't been able to move it yet. We have a transport on the way from the Archangel. Desert Dawn is to create a diversion to keep the ZAFT occupied while we get you and the Strike out of town."
As audacious as the plan was, what stunned me the most was a single word. "The Archangel is here?"
"Yeah," the man said. "They tried to get to you but couldn't make it. They wound up landing somewhere near here."
That, for some reason, made me feel like I was a part of the world again. Tears came to my eyes, not because of pain or sadness, but because of a sudden rush of hope that made my body come to life.
They haven't abandoned me. They're trying to save me.
This is not a small thing despite what an outsider might think. Here I was, thinking that the Archangel was off in Alaska somewhere and suddenly they were right next door. They had sacrificed their safety in order to find me. That meant that my friends, the Orb civilians, Melanie . . .
They were all waiting for me.
I knew right away that I could not die. For them to have given up their right on safety to land in Africa, just for me . . . even if the Strike was a motivation, I had to be part of it too. Someone had to pilot the dumb, overweight thing.
Plus, they needed protection if they were going to try to make it to Alaska, or wherever they were going, the hard way. That would mean me again. So if I died here, who was going to keep them safe?
Flay?
No, it had to be me.
Something else popped in my head then. While the Archangel made an effort to get me, what about Athrun? The person who actually did get me and prevented me from burning up in the atmosphere? He was important too, even though he gave me the impression of being a stalker before that heroic act. Would a stalker really risk his own life to save a girl?
Maybe, maybe not. I've never been stalked before. I don't know what typical "stalker" behavior is.
"The Aegis," I said. "What about the Aegis?"
"The Aegis crashed in a different part of the town. ZAFT has it locked down pretty well," the soldier said. "They're secondary objectives, targets of opportunity, nothing more."
He signaled something to his compatriot, and I realized that they were the only two Earth soldiers around. "Uh, what happened to the rest of the squad?"
"We're it," said the woman. "We got scattered due to the anti-aircraft fire and the storm. I don't know how the others are doing. Radio coms are a total mess."
"Cut the chatter, Noriko," the man said. "We've moving, now."
He turned his attention back to me. "Can you keep up with us?"
"Uh, yeah," I said.
"Then come on. We're going to take you to the rendezvous point and wait there for extraction," the man said.
I knew there was no point in trying to stay sitting down. It was time to leave. No matter how tired I was, no matter how miniscule the relief of my brief collapse was, the only way I was going to get a lasting rest was by getting to this rendezvous. I could doze off on the way to the Archangel.
I followed the unnamed man through the alleyways, while the woman named Noriko backpedaled behind us, her back to me. Clearly, Noriko thought that ZAFT was right on top of us.
At the edge of one of the ways out lay a public square. There was nothing but wreckage and a few bodies . . . and a distant ZAFT patrol. There was no way any of us could try to get through that way, not without causing attention.
Or so I thought.
The man looked at Noriko and I. "You think we can sneak past them?"
Noriko shook her head. "Wait for them to pass. Get behind something."
We ducked behind the nearest piece of cover. The ZAFT patrol was not leisurely walking around. They were actively searching all around, their rifles aimed at every window in every building around them.
"They know you're here," I said.
"I'd be surprised if they didn't. I know at least a few of us made contact with the enemy. They know something's going on," the man said.
Noriko looked up. "We need to go, now. They going in the opposite direction, around a corner."
"Let's go." The man got up and took off and I only just managed to keep up as we ran across the square and into a shattered storefront. We take cover in there, and face the buildings across from us. Nothing is heard or seen moving, not even a stray animal.
At least in here it's dry. I'm sick and tired of rain at this point.
The man sighed. "Radio's still a no-go. Too much interference."
"We're not too far from a Desert Dawn pocket," Noriko says. "If we can make it there, that'll be as good of a place for Ensign Yamato as any."
"You know my rank?" I asked dumbly.
Noriko smiled. "We were notified of Halberton's promotion before we deployed, Ensign."
"And we outrank you," the man says. "Follow our orders and you will survive this city. Tassil isn't going to last much longer but there's some mountain redoubts not very far from here. Desert Dawn's busy making them their new hideout and the Archangel is hiding there as well. Just do as we say and you'll be on your way there."
While their orders and their reasoning were clear, I still had questions. A lot of them. I wanted to know everything that was going on. I had been cut off from everything and now that I kind of-sort of wasn't, I didn't care what I found out as long as I did. Does that make any sense?
In the distance to my left, where the square was, I could see the sky beginning to lighten up. It was still dark, as the rain remained unrelenting, but now I could see the clouds. And they were beginning to break up. The rain was not going to last much longer, and would fade as the sun rose in the sky.
After getting drenched repeatedly and mercilessly, some desert sun sounded appealing.
Noriko gave the man a look. "Out the back or down the street?"
"Out the back if it'll open."
Noriko moved, and she tried the back door. "It won't budge."
"No point kicking it down and making a noise," the man said. "Through the street."
"We're more exposed there," Noriko said.
"No time to argue. We have a primary objective, we need to get her to extraction," he said.
He motions Noriko out the front, and she takes the lead, and I follow her, the man right behind me. An uncomfortable realization hits me, that these soldiers were acting as shields for me, blocking any bullets bursts that may come from front or back. They really didn't want me to die, even if it was at the cost of their own lives.
Why would people sacrifice themselves just for me? I had never claimed I was going to keep fighting for the Earth Alliance. I never was fighting for the Earth Alliance. I was fighting for the Archangelalone! Why were they insisting on treating me like I was one of their soldiers?
Was I really that valuable? Or were they trying to foster some sense of comradery to make me feel as if I belonged in the EA? So I would want to fight for them?
The thought was surprising and mildly frightening. If the Earth Alliance was going to risk their finest special ops soldiers just for a girl who had not guaranteed her involvement in this war until she got on Orb soil, they must be hurting for a pilot capable of shooting Coordinators down. I guess Mu La Flaga isn't good enough on his own. A Coordinator girl, no matter what her inexperience, in a GUNDAM machine, had proven herself valuable in the fighting she did in space.
Of course they would want her to stick around and kill more people!
As we moved down the street, I hoped I wouldn't have to kill any more Coordinators. At least not right now. At least until I could have the cold, impersonal way of a Mobile Suit. That was, of course, considering the possibility that the Strike was even operable. That thing had to have taken a hell of a beating.
But then, suddenly, things stopped going according the plan.
A ZAFT patrol emanated from around the corner. They spotted us immediately and began shouting alarms right as Noriko opened fire. Two ZAFT soldiers fell backwards, their guns firing wildly, and crashed into the ground.
I felt a force grab me by the shoulders and send me down the nearest alleyway. I heard the man's voice. "Move it! Hurry!"
I took off running.
I heard Noriko cry out, and I spun around just to see her collapse at the beginning of the alleyway. She was clearly dead or dying, the ZAFT must have shot her multiple times.
The man gets up in my face. "Go! We're not too far from the Desert Dawn pocket! Get there! I'll hold them off as long as I can!"
Behind him, I saw Noriko get shot a final time, and now she no longer moved.
The man cursed under his breath and raised his rifle. "Go, damn it! All of this is for nothing if you don't get out of here!"
"Y-Yes sir!" I didn't know how else to object, and I knew full well what he was planning to do, and there was no time to talk him out of it. When someone decides to make a brave sacrifice and become a dead man walking, it's best to make sure that sacrifice proves to be worth something. Like if it was for my life.
Once again, my life was more valuable than a pair of special-ops soldiers, who must've been trained and fighting for years, and had to be the best at what they did.
I took off running down the alleyway as gunfire roared behind me. I heard multiple people scream in pain and agony, and none of them sounded like the man. He was a good and efficient shot.
I rounded the corner and kept running. Being spotted meant nothing to me right now. All that mattered was getting as far away from the gun battle as possible.
When it felt like I couldn't keep going any longer, I found an open garage and collapsed inside it, and hugged the wall. I just could not keep running anymore, adrenaline wasn't good enough of a fuel alone. My reserves were completely gone, and my body felt like it wanted to shut down.
I just concentrated on trying to catch my breath so I could keep moving. No matter how badly my body wanted to collapse, like it had run an epic marathon, I was still too close to that ZAFT patrol, and probably to other patrols as well. A battle like that is going to get attention. Maybe the man would get some backup from his other soldiers in the area. Or maybe the ZAFT patrol would get other patrols to close in on the man and . . .
It occurred to me then that I didn't know the man's name.
That made me freeze for a second. It was almost if he had never existed, then. Just a nameless figure in my life, with me for maybe a half hour or an hour or so, and then he's gone, just like that. Same with the woman, Noriko.
Almost like phantoms.
That reminded me of Halberton talking about the "fog of war". Yeah, phantoms sound just right.
That's what people become when they're hidden in the fog of war.
Ephemeral phantoms, seen once, and never seen again.
I kept trudging down the streets and alleyways aimlessly. One thing was sure: I was completely lost.
The soldiers knew where they were taking me. They were moving with purpose, with direction. But I had none of that. The man had never given me an explicit idea where to go. He had merely told me that a Desert Dawn pocket wasn't very far.
It was beginning to lighten up around me, it was early in the morning. Darkness would not hide me for much longer. And my pilot's suit wasn't exactly meant for Earth camouflage. It was designed to be seen in the darkness of outer space so I could be rescued after being shot down in a battle.
I really needed some new clothing if I was going to keep running around.
However, the devestation to this city was becoming obvious. Nooks and crannies that never existed before now do. These created more hiding spots than ever. Of course, these things work both way, an enemy could come out of a shellhole or a collapsed building and either kill or capture me just like that.
As the day rose, so did the gunfire. It sounded like the ZAFT hadn't secured the city as much as it had appeared in the night. Desert Dawn might've just been probing around, and now that day was approaching and the ZAFT's advantage in night-vision was disappearing, Desert Dawn was eager to restart the battle on their own terms.
Tassil was not going to fall without a fight. And blood and death, for that matter.
How long before one of those battles erupted around me? Or for me?
I sat down in one of the corners and gobbled up my last protein bar. I was going to need the energy if I was going to get out of here, especially if I had to fight.
The distant gunfire gradually got more intense. I could hear explosions now. Even the whooshesof RPGs launching, followed quickly by additional explosions. No, these skirmishes weren't going to stay that way. They were becoming full-on battles. The entire city was going to become chaos in short order and I was still caught inside it.
At this point I didn't really care how I got out of this city as long as I got out.
I gave up on figuring out how to handle the rifle I had taken from the dying ZAFT soldier. I had slung it over my back and had my pistol out. The pistol I could figure out how to use and I still knew how much ammunition I had. The rifle was just too much of an unknown entity at this point.
I walked through the buildings slowly, cautiously, using any hole in the building or side or back door to manuever between them. There weren't any living civilians in any of them, unless they were hiding in corners I didn't wish to explore. Which was good. My goal was to avoid contact.
But, at the fifth or sixth building, contact became unavoidable.
I edged out the door, and stumbled right on a small ZAFT squad that had taken cover in the alleyway.
"What the-" a ZAFT soldier cried.
On pure reflex, I shot him in the chest.
I ducked back behind the door as a hail of bullets followed, riddling the back wall.
I heard the wounded ZAFT soldier groaning and yelling in pain and anger, and multiple yells for a medic by everyone around him. Above his din I heard a different soldier shout "Hey, that was the girl, wasn't she?"
"The Coordinator girl? The Strike's pilot?"
"Yeah, her! We gotta take her alive!"
"Then let's go! Take point!"
"You take point, wiseass!"
Ah, the brave, powerful ZAFT army, afraid of a civilian girl holding a pistol. It would be hilarious if this was a movie or a game or something. Unfortunately, in real life, when the bullets are real and so are the people, these kinds of situations aren't funny at all.
I didn't know whether to run or to try to fight it out. I backed away from the door, slowly, surely, all of my attention trained on that open doorway for the first sign of a ZAFT soldier breaking in.
Shooting that soldier had been easier than the last time. Like it almost wasn't a big deal. I felt like I could pull the trigger at will now. Like it was an extension of myself.
It wasn't much different than learning how to pilot the Strike.
It's just another way of learning how to kill.
Com eon, I thought. Come on, come on. I'm not scared! Come and get me! I dare you!
Of course, I was terrified, but adrenaline makes you think funny things no matter how scared you are. Without meaning to, I was psyching myself into a frenzy, and suddenly firing this pistol was nothing more than pure instinct.
But I didn't need to.
Suddenly, I heard an explosion go off, and multiple gunfire sounds. The cries of the ZAFT soldiers were quickly silenced.
My first inclination was that the ZAFT soldiers had been killed by either Desert Dawn or EA soldiers, but at this point doubting something was easier than trusting something. But I was nervous enough about getting shot by a so-called "friendly" that I made my presence known.
"Who's there?"
"Desert Dawn," shouted a young voice from beyond the door. "Who are you?"
Part of me felt liberated at the sound of that name, but enough of me remained suspicious to not let down my guard. "Ensign Cagalli Yamato, Earth Alliance forces."
Was I Atlantic Federation? Eurasian? East Asia? It occurred to me that I didn't know which Earth Alliance federation I was serving. Halberton was from North America, part of the Atlantic Federation, so I guess that? Did it really matter to anyone, though?
"Atlantic Federation," I finally added as an afterthought. "I'm really from Orb, but I'm serving-"
"Yeah, I get it. I heard you're from Orb."
Then he showed himself, and he was every bit as young as he sounded. He had medium-brown skin and his hair was the same shade. Most surprisingly, he had blue eyes, hinting at a mixed heritage.
"You're also speaking English, which I heard you're pretty good at," the young man said. "So, you're looking for a ride back to the Archangel, I assume?"
"Yeah," I said.
He grinned. At that point he looked like an ordinary teenage boy, not like someone who just helped kill a bunch of enemy soldiers. "Good for you. The Earth Alliance special forces and we just retook the Strike. Now you can pilot it and kill the Desert Tiger for us."
"Desert Tiger?" I asked, having no clue what the heck he was talking about.
"Ah, I can fill you in on that later. We need to get you out of here and underground. The underground still belongs to us. The ZAFT didn't search it well enough, they were caught completely off guard this morning, we have them on the run . . ."
The young man sighed. "Never mind. We can talk once we're underground."
"Uh, just one thing," I managed. I had made this mistake with the special forces soldiers, and I wasn't going to repeat it here.
"Yes?" the young man asked.
"What's your name?"
The young man smiled warmly. "My name's Ahmed."
