Thanks again for all of your comments so far. I'm glad you guys are still enjoying it, despite the lack of action the last few chapters. Well, this entire chapter is nothing but fighting, so I hope that satisfies the action fans out there (including those wondering what happened to Green Lantern and Young Justice on Cartoon Network this morning XD).

I am sure this chapter has already been predicted by you guys, and it will turn out accurate to your predictions. I promise future developments won't be as obvious. ^^;

I am altering chapter five's battle with Miguel, to modify the Monty Python reference and some of the circumstances behind Miguel's death. It doesn't really change the story, it's mostly cosmetic, but I think it makes the story hold up better.


Chapter Thirty-Seven: Lights Out

"All right, what's the current situation regarding enemy forces?" I said as I flew alongside the Archangel.

"We have the enemy flagship, the Lesseps, right on our tail, and a large force of mechanized units coming from the right side," Miriallia replied.

"The Lesseps?" I asked. "You want me to take care of them?"

"The Lesseps is my concern, princess, not yours," Mu La Flaga replied. "You just make sure those BuCUEs don't attack the Archangel or Desert Dawn."

"So we get all of the hard stuff, that's how it is?" I asked. This was unfair, though not a total surprise. Desert Dawn had no way to wipe out any of those ships. We were their only real shot at doing so.

"Yes, Ensign," Natarle Badgiruel said coolly. "Desert Dawn only gets the enviable assignment of leading the way for us. Now engage the BuCUE units. Sensors indicate there might be five of them. Seaman Haw will be guiding you from here, I need to make sure the Lesseps doesn't get any closer to us."

"Sounds good to me," I muttered as I turned to face the charging ZAFT units. Nothing like helicopters and wolf-like giant robots to start my day off right.

Miriallia. "There's no sign of the Aegis or the Duel Assault Shroud. You're cleared to engage."

It felt odd that neither one was charging us. What were they waiting for? Or were the BuCUEs some kind of trap, and if I bit, would one or both of the GUNDAMs suddenly spring out of nowhere and attack? Both were incredibly fast, and especially Athrun with that colossal cannon of his . . . the cannon that the Aegis had access to in Mobile Armor mode could cause serious damage to the Archangel. In space, that cannon was possibly lethal thanks to lovely side-effects such as depressurization.

I checked my sensors one more time. Still no sign of either GUNDAM coming into the picture. Was Waltfeld being conservative here, or was there another reason why neither GUNDAM was attacking?

I couldn't afford to sit around and think anymore. I accelerated right towards the BuCUE in the front, as it was about to engage a few jeeps and technicals from Desert Dawn. I could already tell the Dawn forces stood no chance.

I wondered briefly who the Dawn soldiers were as I moved in. Were any of them part of the group that had kidnapped me? There was no way to know for sure. I had to save them. For this battle, they were my allies.

I aimed my beam rifle at the BuCUE, which seemed unaware I was coming from above. Just as I locked on, the BuCUE's head turned and looked at me, but I already knew it was too late.

I fired and a shot went right through the BuCUE's head, and the machine collapsed in a heap just a few moments later, the head smoking.

One down, four to go. I slammed into the ground, right in front of the Dawn forces, to see another BuCUE charge straight at me, its beam saber in its mouth. I immediately aimed my rifle and fired it, and fired the Igelstellung machine-gun turrets from my GUNDAM's head as well for good measure. The rifle shots missed, but the machine-gun fire surprisingly didn't, and caused a few dents.

The BuCUE was still trying to charge me. Keeping up the machine-gun fire, I switched to my beam sword right as it made its lunge. I gave the BuCUE a forward kick and slammed it backwards, and then accelerated right towards it, jumping into the air at the last moment and stabbed it from above.

The BuCUE immediately began to spark and I jumped away just in time to see it explode into several pieces. Before I could take that kill in too a third BuCUE charged in from behind, firing lasers and also attempting to make a charge with its beam saber. I spun around and kicked the BuCUE in the head with the Strike's left leg, and then stabbed the BuCUE in the neck with the beam sword. Just like with the second BuCUE, I had to jump away to avoid damage as the BuCUE self-destructed.

I switched back to the rifle, and found myself gasping for air. I realized after a moment that I had held my breath the whole time during that exchange.

Miriallia. "Cagalli, are you all right?"

As she said that, here came two helicopters twelve o'clock. I blasted them both down in the next five seconds, and took the time to respond as their fiery remnants fell to earth. "Now I am."

"Keep it up. We're making good progress so far. There's two remaining BuCUEs trying to attack us from the the right flank."

"Starboard," Badgiruel interrupted.

"R-Right. Starboard flank," Miriallia corrected.

"Lieutenant-Commander La Flaga, how're you doing?" I asked.

"Well, I found the Duel Assault Shroud and the Buster. They're on top of the Lesseps and they aren't moving. The Duel doesn't even have its launcher pack attached to it."

"Why wouldn't they?" I wondered aloud. Maybe it was adrenaline, or just enough time with Kira, but I quickly realized a potential answer. "You think Waltfeld doesn't have the tech to recharge the Duel's launcher?"

"It's possible, and right now I'll take it," La Flaga replied. "I can't get in very close though. Both the Duel and the Buster are putting up heavy flak. I need some help."

The worrisome part of this whole deal was that La Flaga hadn't brought up the Aegis at all. That meant it had launched and was lurking around somewhere, waiting to attack when the time was right. Was Waltfeld planning some kind of ambush?

As I approached the two remaining BuCUE, I knew I had to voice it now. "Captain Ramius, I think they might be setting an ambush. The Aegis is not by La Flaga which means it's lying in wait somewhere."

"We have no choice, Ensign," Murrue replied. "If there's an ambush we need to plow right through it. Just finish off the BuCUEs."

"I'm already on it," I said, right before I divebombed the next BuCUE in line. It saw me and jumped out of the way, but I quickly repositioned myself, and after having my shield eat a shot from its laser, I returned fire and blew a hole in the midsection. It collapsed and exploded.

The other BuCUE wasn't going to go down the way its partners did. It was moving quickly, almost in a circular pattern, trying to keep ahead of my machine and its targeting. I had to hide the Strike behind the shield before the Phase Shift could take too many blows, but even that was a stalling tactic that wasn't going to work for too long.

Suddenly, explosions erupted all over the northwest corner of my screen, right by the Archangel. "Murru-uh, Captain Ramius! What's going on?"

Miriallia, sounding extremely panicked. "Cagalli, we have a minefield!"

Murrue spoke up next. "Desert Dawn ran right into a minefield. They can't move forward, and we're caught on something! We can't move either!"

A brief pause. "Ensign, we have the Henry Carter coming right at us! And the Aegis is on radar! It's coming right for us!"

Ambush. Just as I had thought. But it was worse than that. Waltfeld had put one of his three ships directly in front of the Archangel, and while it wasn't quite point-blank, it was damn close. The minefield and whatever was restraining the Archangel meant that the Archangel couldn't move without receiving heavy damage to the engines that allowed it to hover in the air. And, as the coup de grace, there was Athrun, who was completely mobile, and ready to dive-bomb the bridge and end the fight as quickly as it had started.

There was no time to waste. I took my shield and chucked it right at the last BuCUE, and I cleaved it right in half. I had no time to go and fetch my shield, or even register what I had just done. All I could do was take off and charge right for the Aegis' position. I knew that if Athrun was on my sensors, I was on his. He had to know it was me.

The Aegis changed direction away from the Archangel in the next few seconds, and I immediately got a hail on the public channel. Yep, Athrun knew I was here. And I knew why he was hailing me too. He was going to try yet again to make me switch sides.

I had many too many promises to too many people to take him up on it. I wasn't even going to deal with that right now. I was going to rebuff him and just shoot him down, and let the battlefield chaos sort everything out from there. I was sure Athrun would have plenty of time to catch up with me while he was stuck in the brig.

"Cagalli?" was the first thing I heard him say.

"Athrun?" I immediately realized what a big mistake that was to say, so I quickly shook it off to get to my point.

"Look, Athrun, I'm glad you survived our fall through the Earth's atmosphere too. What you did to save me means a lot. Really."

No response. I wasn't sure how to interpret that. Athrun usually answered.

"But it's just like I told you before! I have people onboard the Archangel that I have to protect! I am not going to join with you no matter what you say!"

Athrun finally responded. His voice was soft but strong. "I know."

"Huh?" I'll admit, not my smartest response, but the only one I could come up with.

"The only way to save you is to defeat you."

"Athrun?" The realization slowly began to hit me that Athrun was every bit of determined to shoot me down as I was to shoot him down. And it sent a chill down my spine.

"I'm sorry."

Suddenly, this colossal wave of light came charging right at me and I barely got out of the way in time. Crying out both from fright and exertion, I forced myself to keep from plowing into the sand as I tried to get some kind of angle on the Aegis.

Athrun began ranting then, his voice edgy and shaky. "You've given me no choice, Cagalli! There's too much at stake here now!"

I tried to shoot him, but he was just too fast. It didn't help that what he had said was completely, utterly confusing.

"What the hell are you talking about? "

"It doesn't matter! You've made it pretty clear that my words don't matter!"

Wonderful. I had pissed him off.

As that lovely thought crossed through my mind, another shot from his cannon came right at me, and I had to halt the Strike in mid-air and stall it in order for the shot to fly right in front of me. Of course, halting the Strike means that I have a zillion tons immediately falling right to Earth, and I barely managed to take back off and keep from crash-landing.

"Athrun, you almost hit me there! You mean it, don't you?" It was hard to believe. Athrun was actually attacking me with the intention to shoot me down. That had never happened before in all of our previous fights. And he sounded desperate. Really desperate.

"You told me it yourself, in the park when we were kids, that I can't just sit around and feel sorry for myself. That I have to take action."

I knew what he was talking about. That was the day before he kissed me. He had gotten some serious bullying over his long hair that day, and had been in tears, and I had been trying to motivate him. I had not known that I had inadvertently motivated him to kiss me. Who knew that telling Athrun to get off his ass and do something about his situation would result in my first kiss? Really, who would?

Athrun still. "Well, I'm taking action right now, Cagalli! I'm sorry but there's no other choice!"

He was looping right for me. No time to dodge. I was bracing myself for the inevitable collision. "Of course, now you finally grow a backbone," I growled as I tried to draw the beam sword in time.

No dice. He slammed right into me and drove me back several feet. I tried to use the Strike's hands to pry the vise-like grip the Aegis had with its claws, but I wasn't making any kind of progress. He had grabbed me right below the cockpit, around the Strike's torso, and I could tell there was nothing I could do to get free.

"I won't let you die here! Not like this, not here, not anywhere!"

Dammit, Athrun, I thought. Don't even start with this right now. Please.

"You can't escape the Aegis when it's wrapped around you! The war ends for you right here!"

It was right then when I noticed the cannon was beginning to charge, and when it opened fire, it would be right at my mid-section.

"Athrun!" I cried in alarm, in surprise, in fear. I couldn't believe it. He was really trying to destroy the Strike. He finally had summoned the courage to do it. To destroy this machine and knock me out of the war by force.

"It's over. Forgive me, Cagalli," he said.

The cannon in the Aegis' midsection looked fully charged. It could shoot any second and annihiliate the Strike and end the war. So surreal.

"I'm going to shoot the Scylla now!" Athrun shouted. "It's aimed at your waist, below the cockpit. The Strike will be blown in half but you'll survive."

He was really going to do it. I could hear it in his voice. How long had he been psyching himself up to seriously try to shoot me down? What had given him the final push to go all-out on me?

"You can't mean this!" I shouted as I continued to try to pry the Aegis off of me in desperation. I wasn't making a lot of progress. The Aegis' grip was strong. Really strong.

I heard Miriallia. "Cagalli, we just had a stolen Skygrasper launch out of the bay! It's coming right at you! Watch yourself, it's-"

"Not now, Miri, I'm trying not to get a hole blasted through me," I growled back to Miriallia, but Athrun, as if he hadn't heard a thing, continued to rant at me.

"Too much is riding on this, Cagalli! More than you know!"

My intelligent response again. "Huh?"

But Athrun was through with words, through with talking, through with convincing me. He was going to bring me back to ZAFT and the PLANTs by force. "See you soon, Cagalli."

He was going to fire. He really was. There was no way for him to miss. Nothing.

But just as he was about to fire, came a flurry of missiles from my left, Athrun's right, where the Archangel was still struggling to progress.

I realized it was the second Skygrasper, and so did Athrun.

Athrun immediately let go of me and tried to blast off, but the missiles slammed into the Aegis just a few seconds later, before he could try any emergency maneuvers.

Athrun's cries as he was hit made it feel like my heart was taking a fist to it, and I realized right then and there that once again, Athrun had protected me. Those missiles could have hit me as well, at least from the explosion range, or, more sinisterly, Athrun could have tried to turn me into the missiles so I would become a shield.

But he had done neither. He had taken the path that would result in the most damage to him and the least to me.

"Athrun!" I couldn't help but cry.

The Aegis was smoking. Immediately, the Aegis blasted away from me, and Athrun would not answer. I yelled his name again, and there was still no answer. But at least he was still alive. If he was dead the Aegis would've crashed into the ground.

I switched back to the encrypted channel. "The Aegis was hit by the stolen Skygrasper, he's withdrawing. Miri, what's going on?"

"We can't get free!" Miriallia wailed in response.

I flew in the Archangel's direction and saw that it was leaning in a peculiar way right next to the old factory. I realized immediately that this was yet another part of Waltfeld's trap. I couldn't see what had ensnared theArchangel, but it was enough to keep the Archangel from moving. And the ship was rapidly becoming surrounded, all three ships were rapidly closing in.

I had half of my power left, and no shield. I knew I had to do something, though.

Why wasn't the stolen Skygrasper operator responding? I sent out a generic hail towards the stolen Skygrasper. I was going to need this person's help in order to protect the Archangel.

When the channel opened up, I breathed a sigh of relief, and then got to work. "Skygrasper 2, identify yourself. This is Ensign Cagalli Yamato in the Strike GUNDAM."

A soft chuckle confirmed the person's identity before any words were said, and it made my heart pound as the person spoke. "Seaman Second Class Flay Allster."

Dammit, Flay. My worst nightmare, my ultimate unintended consequence of shoving Flay into the Skygrasper simulator. It had come to life.

Wait a minute, this shouldn't have even been possible in the first place. "How the heck did you escape from the brig?"

"We lost power briefly when the Archangel was caught," Flay replied. "I escaped then. I have a pressure suit on so I can take the G forces. Just tell me what to do, Cagalli."

Natarle Badgiruel. spoke before I could. "Land the Skygrasper immediately, Seaman Allster! You are not authorized to fly that Mobile Armor! You are facing a-"

Murrue. "Natarle, enough. Seaman Allster, follow my orders to the letter or I will let the lieutenant-commander have her way with you. Clear?"

A pause. Then a soft "Clear."

"Good," Murrue said. "Lieutenant-Commander La Flaga is trying to keep the Lesseps from attacking us point blank. The Henry Carter is directly in front of us, and we're stuck on something. Ensign Yamato, engage the Carter. Seaman Allster, cut us loose and then engage the Carter as well."

Something beeped on my sensors. "What if Waltfeld is attacking us? I have a command-type BuCUE approaching, it must be his LaGOWE."

"Waltfeld gets priority over the Carter, Ensign. Engage him. Allster, your orders are unchanged."

"You got it, ma'am." I blasted right towards the command-type BuCUE, and I saw it within seconds. It was bright orange, and seemed highly advanced, almost prideful, in its appearance. I left the Henry Carter alone, and the ship seemed content in letting me go as it engaged the Archangel directly.

As much as I wanted to worry about Flay, and what path I had put her on, I knew I had to concentrate on one thing and one thing only: fighting Waltfeld. I didn't have much time to beat him, not when my power was already getting low.

There was the LaGOWE, its twin saber in its mouth. I reactivated the public channel. "I assume we're having a duel of some kind considering the Henry Carter isn't trying to kill me."

I heard Andrew Waltfeld laugh. "The truth is that the Archangel is keeping the Carter's hands full, Ensign Cagalli Yamato. But that's fine. I want it this way."

"Is that why the Duel hasn't attacked?"

Another chuckle. "I warned her that I didn't have the equipment to recharge that specialized pack she brought with her, and she wasted it attacking you outside the ruins of Tassil. That's all there is to it, kid. Again, you assume I am bound by some code of medieval honor when the truth is merely circumstances."

Missile flurry, coming my direction. I forced myself to zigzag out of their way, and tried to get an angle on Waltfeld. The LaGOWE was surprisingly quick, quicker than the BuCUEs, and I was having a rough time trying to get the edge.

"I think we have the upper hand, Waltfeld," I said. "Are you sure you don't want to surrender?"

"The battle isn't over with!" Waltfeld replied. "Never assume you've won the battle! After what you did with my BuCUEs and to the Aegis, I doubt you have much power left anyway! All I have to do is outlast you!"

He had a point. My power was down to about forty percent at that point, and it was going down with each shot I fired at the LaGOWE. I had to end this and quickly before I ran out of power, or Phase Shift, or both.

I could hear Aisha chuckling as we continued to charge around each other, trading fire. "You're not bad!"

The sensors were going crazy around the Henry Carter's location. I heard Flay laughing on the com. "That's right! That's right! How does it feel to be the ones terrified and helpless, huh? Now you know how my daddy felt when he died! No, now you know how I feel! How I feel every single damn day!"

Waltfeld sighed, and I realized he had heard Flay's rant. She probably wasn't tuned to the public channel, but I was. So I, and Waltfeld by extension, could hear her, but Flay probably couldn't hear Waltfeld. "Sounds like you have another Asta Joule in your midst."

Again with the pilot of the Duel Assault Shroud. "How does this have to matter with anything, Waltfeld?"

"Her hatred will burn her out from the inside. She will become a symptom of this war and its harshest motivations unless you do something, kid . . . assuming you survive this battle of course."

"If you're so critical about this war, why are you fighting me? Why are you risking your life? Answer me that!"

"It's my duty! In war, you fire at the enemy no matter who he or she is! There can be no hesitation!"

So, Waltfeld's "duty" was going to decide whether my friends, whether Elle, would live or die.

I knew that I had no choice.

"I guess this means that I have to kill you now," I said.

Waltfeld chuckled. "Feeling's mutual, kid."

I discarded the beam rifle. I was down to a quarter of my power left. I drew the beam sword, and here came Waltfeld, charging in.

Missile barrage coming from right in front of me. I immediately activated the thrusters and sent the Strike high into the air, as massive explosions erupted directly underneath, blowing up much of the sand. I moved the Strike forward, and then immediately plunged down.

Waltfeld saw it coming. He immediately got out of the way and I crashed into sand, causing a sand plume to erupt in my spot and temporarily blind my vision. I doubled back, trying to get out of it, when suddenly the LaGOWE lunged right at me, leaping in the air as part of its twin saber aimed for my cockpit.

In desperation, I sliced upwards.

I cleaved a gaping hole in the underside of the LaGOWE and, using my beam sword's momentum, I sent it crashing into the sand in a heap.

It sparked several times, and then died. All of it. The twin saber vanished, as did the glowing red eye on the LaGOWE's head. It was like roadkill at the side of the road, motionless, silent. Pointless.

I walked over to the fallen LaGOWE, and I switched my channel back to exclusively the Archangel. The battle was going well. The Duel and Buster were forced to abandon the Lesseps, or had chosen to, and now were floundering in the desert. La Flaga was causing a lot of damage, and so had Flay after she had freed the Archangel from whatever had ensnared it. She still had not been shot down, and she was racking up the kills, mostly picking on the helicopters and the archaic Mobile Suits on top of the Henry Carter.

We were going to win.

Still no sign of Waltfeld or his lover Aisha. I marched right next to the fallen LaGOWE, and nothing was moving. I wondered if I had killed them.

The thought was unnerving. Although they hadn't saved my life in the same dramatic way Athrun had, Aisha had disarmed Asta Joule and prevented my death. And she was operating under Waltfeld's orders, making him my indirect savior as well. And this is how I repaid them? By killing them?

Battlefield or no battlefield, that just seemed horrifically wrong.

I switched off the Strike and lowered myself down on a hook, my pistol in my free hand as I got on the ground and ran towards the fallen, cracked LaGOWE.

Was this a preview of the end with Athrun? Where I would have no choice but to attack him this way? That I would have to risk killing him? Back up in space, when Athrun had just seemed to be like a stalker, the choice seemed easy. But down here, nowhere even close.

When I reached the fissure I had left in the LaGOWE, I could hear Aisha's soft, mildly husky voice. "Andy. Andy."

It was a lament, full of emotional pain, not physical pain. I crawled my way inside, and I saw Waltfeld's two-person cockpit, and there was Aisha, kneeling in front of Waltfeld, a sizable shard of metal or something else in Waltfeld's left leg.

He saw me, and managed a weak smile. "Not bad, kid."

Aisha spun around. "Cagalli."

I raised my pistol. "As of right now, you're both my prisoners."

Aisha stared at me, and then Waltfeld just chuckled. "Kid, it's just gonna be Aisha."

"Andy!" Aisha exclaimed.

"You know as well as I do that I've had an artery cut," Waltfeld said. "Nothing is going to save me."

I walked closer to where Aisha was kneeling, and where Waltfeld was sitting, and I could see dark liquid around where the metal shard had embedded in Waltfeld's leg. It looked like the cockpit had partically caved in, and the way the LaGOWE had crashed, along with the damage from the Strike, had caused the cockpit to invert itself, it was facing the rest of the LaGOWE's body.

Waltfeld groaned as he tried to straighten up in his seat. "Kid, I've already issued my forces the order to retreat . . . what you need to do is get Aisha out of here. Get her somewhere safe. She's had enough violence."

"Andy, don't say that! Please!" Aisha pleaded.

"Aisha, don't be stupid!" Waltfeld replied. "I won't let you die out here. It's better that your life is on hold than it being permanently over."

"Andy . . ." Aisha threw off her helmet, revealing her long hair in a bun, and she held Waltfeld's hands. "Andy, I . . . I'll do it . . . okay?"

"You . . . promise?" Waltfeld asked.

"Yes, of course. Of course I promise, Andy," Aisha replied.

She was starting to cry. "I love you."

"I know." Waltfeld was fading, his head was beginning to dip to the side, and his breathing was getting shallower.

"Goodbye," Aisha managed through her choked up voice, and she kissed Waltfeld on the mouth, still holding his hands. A couple of seconds later, Waltfeld's grip began to slack, and Aisha separated.

Tears pouring from her blue eyes, Aisha whispered "I love you. I always will."

Waltfeld did not respond.

It felt like to me like the man named "Wilson" I had killed in Tassil by shooting him with my pistol. It was one thing to kill pilots hiding inside gigantic machinery. But watching him die in front my eyes felt hollow and inhuman, like I had committed some savage act. Which I had. The was act was called murder.

Aisha whimpered a few times, and finally she let go of Waltfeld's slack hands. She raised her arms above her head. "T-The last thing that goes away . . . is people's hearing. He needed to hear me . . . one last time . . ."

"I didn't know that." Which was the truth. My path through college didn't involve many medical classes. "But I understand. Now please, I'm going to take you back to the Archangel. Don't force me to kill you too."

"I'm not breaking my promise to Andy," Aisha said through her tears, and then she walked back towards the gaping hole, and I followed her.

Some would think I would be feeling joy in what I had done. I had beaten a top-level ZAFT officer. Smashed his forces, sent them retreating in disarray, and killed the officer personally. I had struck a big blow in terms of ending the war and crippling ZAFT's forces.

But as I escorted Aisha out of the fallen LaGOWE, and directed her with my free hand towards the Strike, I didn't feel any sense of victory or jubiliation.

All I had done was do mercenary work for a rebel organization that ZAFT probably regarded as terrorists. That's all this was. Making matters worse, I had spoken with Waltfeld and Aisha. They had saved me from Asta Joule. I had gotten to know them both. And this was their reward for it all. Waltfeld was dead, and I had just made Aisha a P.O.W.

Something was not right with this picture.

But it made me feel like crying too. All this reminded me was that there were people inside all of the metal contraptions I had destroyed since Heliopolis. People who had lovers and families, all of whom would be broken forever because of me.

And Aisha was the first one I had not killed out of the people I had shot down. And she was still Waltfeld's lover or girlfriend or something, and she had to watch Waltfeld slowly die in front of her eyes.

What a horrific survival rate.

What a horrific war.

Athrun . . . there was no way I was going to beat him without killing him, was there? The chances were just too low.

And then I would just be like Aisha, crying in plain view but in reality all alone because there would be no one who would understand.

It made me realize something I had never thought about before.

All I had done was think about how I suffered from the war, and how I could not escape it. Even when thinking of Flay, Sai, or others that were struggling, it all revolved around me, from my perspective, from what I had done or not done. Not from their own perspectives or how their choices had resulted in their own suffering.

The truth was that war is this pandemic that affects every single person that's caught in it.

War is inescapable for everyone, no matter who is caught in it.


I remember saying at the beginning of this fic that Cagalli's personality alone would alter serious events. Unlike Kira, who tried desperately to avoid killing Waltfeld, Cagalli grimly accepted what she had to do and went ahead and did it. Waltfeld is dead.

If you've watched Gundam SEED, this means major ramifications for the second half of the story.

Things are only going to break more from the original story from here. Enjoy the ride.