We're almost at the end of Part Three. At least I didn't spend three years in this part, like what happened with Part Two, lol.
Chapter Sixty-Six: Unreconciled
I did the only thing I could do and engaged the HiMAT and opened fire with everything I had. I didn't even take the time to lock on; I knew that any second's hesitation would result in my death. The only thing I could do was to put them off balance right away and, oddly enough, go on the offensive. If I kept attacking, and kept them from preparing for a coordinated assault, I had a chance.
The moment the HiMAT barrage ended I targeted the 'Strike Alter' GUNDAM and accelerated right for it, aiming to destroy it using a melee attack. Much as I expected, Joan raised her own beam sword in time. She had been training for this opportunity her whole life, and I doubted all of her effort would be wasted in just five seconds of battle against me. After all, she had escaped certain death at the island . . .
"How are you still alive?" I shouted as we tried to outmuscle each other.
"I did it the only way I could! Everyone in the base had to die so I could live!" Joan shouted. "You think it was something I wanted to do?"
I found it an impossible story to believe. How could one girl manage to systematically kill every other person inside that Blue Cosmos base? They had trained soldiers, fledging assassins, doctors with evil agendas, you name it, all after us. How could Joan possibly kill them all? And even if she somehow did, why would Blue Cosmos put her in this position? What would make them trust her considering she had turned on them?
"Why would Blue Cosmos trust you then?" I asked her.
Joan just laughed bitterly. "Like I said, they own me with those drugs, Cagalli. They own the boys too. The fact I had killed everyone else in the base off left them little choice but to use me for this war. But it's a double-edged sword. They have the only thing that keeps me alive."
I knew what she meant. She was addicted to the same drugs that Sting, Stellar, and Auel had been addicted to. And they had hellish withdrawal symptoms. I remembered, then, that Joan had said she had been on the drugs too long to live without them. All it would take was withholding her lifeline and Joan would be on her knees.
That had to have been why Blue Cosmos decided to let her live. She had proven herself to be a merciless, elite killer, and she was putty in their hands thanks to the drugs. Coupled with that Joan was the only survivor left on that base, Blue Cosmos wouldn't have any other options other than to deploy Joan on a short leash. Not only that, but they clearly had copied the Strike's design while I was stuck on that base. That was the only reason the Strike Dagger existed, and had to explain this specialist one I was fighting too.
As much as I wanted to feel sorry for Joan, though, I knew that I couldn't. If this girl was capable of systematic mass murder to save her own skin, surely she would be deploying those skills on me if I got her back against the wall. I needed to end the Strike Alter and quickly before Joan decided she was going to die and did a Stellar-esque freakout or whatever it was that she did when she was in life-threatening situations.
"You realize if you don't withdraw, I will have to kill you, right?" I asked. Just to make myself clear to her.
"You can try." Joan smiled. "But you won't. We're actually quite alike, Cagalli. We are at our best when we're at death's door."
The Strike Alter made a defiant push and knocked me off balance, and I realize that Shani was going to take a potshot at me from long distance. I staggered the Freedom around to dodge the shot, and then shot the Freedom up into the air, as both Joan and Clotho took shots at me. The shots missed but wound up entering the city, blowing holes in multiple skyscrapers.
I had spent way too much time in this area. If I kept fighting here, even if I stayed out of the city, I would wind up witnessing its destruction anyway.
And even if the three crazy boys with GUNDAM machines wouldn't realize it, Joan would. She knew I would prioritize human life, and if she truly did want to live, she would take advantage of it.
I engaged the HiMAT and opened fire, just to keep Joan and Clotho out of formation. The shots blew past them and shot into the ocean, but that was okay. I had a clear shot at Clotho and the Raider due to his evasive maneuvers, and I aimed with the Lupus beam rifle and fired.
I connected with the Raider and I heard Clotho cry out. It was quickly clear, however, that despite the smoke, the blow I had given the Raider was not a kill shot.
All I had done was cause the Raider to crash into the forest below us, smoke trailing from the machine. It looked still flyable, it would need another shot to wipe him out.
I aimed for him when my sensors beeped. Shani was shooting at me again.
"Would you just die already?" Shani screamed as he opened fire.
I had to back off from the Raider before I could finish him off. I blasted off towards the mountains so Shani would avoid blasting the city behind us, but I didn't get very far before I saw Joan charging in, both of her beam swords activated.
I had walked into a trap.
This settled it. Joan did know that I would try to keep civilians alive, and she would take advantage of it. She apparently wasn't going to tell her wingmates this, but that was of little consolation.
In desperation I shot at Joan with the Lupus and basically did a loop-de-loop with the Freedom to avoid Joan's attack, which made me feel dizzy for several seconds, but there was no apparent damage done to the Freedom.
I could hear Clotho snarling on the radio too. "That's it! I hate losing! How dare you try to beat me! I'm the best, you hear me? I'm the best!"
I knew I wasn't going to hit him, but I engaged the HiMAT and fired anyway in the Raider's general direction. The explosions erupted all around the downed Raider, and Clotho screamed in terror.
I didn't have enough time to aim and lock on, not with Shani continuing to shoot at me from afar and Joan readjusting her stance to take shots at me too. But it would keep the Raider pinned down for a few crucial moments, in which I could figure out how to dispatch Joan and Shani.
Plus the Orga guy had to be lurking around somewhere. Joan had shooed him away, but it would not shock me if she had sent him some secret instructions to try to catch me by surprise. Problem was, even if I suspected the attack was coming, there was no way for me to tell when the attack would occur, or what conditions would cause it to happen. It was a trap I knew was there, but didn't know the circumstances that would activate it.
"It's hopeless, Cagalli. You won't be able to finish any of us off," Joan said calmly.
"Maybe I won't have to. Your drugs are on a time limit, aren't they?" I asked.
Joan stared at me in shock.
I realized then I had another way to win. Even if I couldn't shoot them down, all I had to do was keep them busy until the drugs wore off. The moment they did, these pilots would all have to withdraw, which would spare Onogoro their rampages, and allow me to catch a break.
No matter how good Joan's strategy was, even if she did manage to wear me down, if she didn't accomplish the task in time, it meant nothing. I would still be alive, and Joan and her wingmates would have failed in their mission.
I heard Orga's voice. "We have incoming!"
I checked my radar. Looked like Astrays. Friendlies, at last. A few of them had splintered off to deal with the Calamity, but the rest were coming to keep me backup.
I looked at Joan, who looked alarmed. She knew the tables were turning on her. "Looks like you're just about out of time one way or another. Good luck, Joan."
I killed the communications then and switched to the Orb military channel. I heard Asagi Caldwell's voice right away. "Our mission is to assist the GUNDAM Freedom! Beat them out of the city! Allster, you go and help the Freedom, I'll deal with the machine trying to snipe us!"
Allster? Did she mean . . . Flay Allster?
Damn, Flay was moving up in the world.
Several Astrays shot past me and began engaging both the Strike Alter and the Raider then. The Raider flailed about, trying to keep the two Astrays that had chosen to engage it off of his back. Joan fared better against her two Astrays, keeping them at arm's length.
Joan was shooting high into the sky to try to outfly the pursuing Astrays, and I decided that Joan took priority. I joined the chase in the sky, shooting high towards the clouds, as Joan tried to outfly the two Astrays.
One of the pursuing Astrays I checked out did identify Flay Allster as its pilot, and I got in touch with her. "Hi Flay! Leading your own wing now, huh?"
Flay just chuckled. "Hi, Cagalli. Looks like you picked up a new GUNDAM."
"Yeah, it's called the Freedom. Top of the line, stole it from ZAFT. I don't think they're happy about it." Even though this was Flay I was talking to, I felt better talking to her than I ever did talking to most ZAFT soldiers. Flay felt like a true companion, in spite of us having a antagonistic relationship for much of the time on the Archangel. Maybe we were finally beginning to understand each other since we had both become soldiers.
"I wouldn't expect they would be," Flay said.
Joan was still evading us as she took us into the clouds. Losing visual wasn't the same as losing radar, though, but it meant flying in an entirely different way. We needed to track Joan by radar now, not by sight.
"Watch it Flay," I said. "I would expect her to unleash decoys to confuse us while we're blind like this."
As if on cue, that's precisely what happened, all of a sudden my radar was clogged with possible Strike Alters.
"Everyone, out of the clouds!" Flay shouted.
Flay and her wingmate suddenly switched gears and shot downwards, and I did the same thing. The G-forces felt like they were crushing me as we fell towards Onogoro for several seconds, and I struggled to twist the Freedom would to take aim at the sky, to wherever Joan might come popping out of.
There were several possible positions the Strike Alter could take, judging by how many decoys had been unleashed.
I engaged the HiMAT and prepared myself as I continued to fall towards the earth. I could not stay in this position, I was in free fall like this, but I knew Joan had to be aware she was running out of time. She wasn't going to wait for me to hit the ground, she was going to do what she needed to do to kill all three of us before she had to withdraw.
Suddenly, she blasted out of the cloud, to my left. She had not take aim at me, but at Flay, and she had chosen the melee option with her beam sword. Flay barely got her own beam sword out in time to deflect Joan, but the momentum of Joan's assault caused Flay to plummet towards the ground, almost out of control.
Joan was now in-between me and the other Astray pilot, and I could not open fire with the HiMAT without hitting the Astray pilot too, which had to have been what Joan was counting on. I had to waste the time to disengage the HiMAT and switch to standard weaponry, but at that point Joan had spun towards the other Astray and opened fire.
The Astray erupted in golden fire just as I got my Lupus ready to shoot.
I opened fire.
Joan saw it coming, but she was unable to keep part of her right leg from being blown off from my shot. The force of the explosion knocked her off balance, but she quickly regained control of the Strike Alter and made a move towards me.
It hit me, then, how they had improved the Strike for Joan.
This Strike was a hell of a lot faster. Faster than the Dagger, and faster than the original.
Both of us continued to plummet towards the ground, trading shots at each other, but neither of us able to hit the other. We were essentially going too fast and firing too wildly to have any chance of hitting the other with beam shots. Problem was, Joan's maneuvers were driving me towards the ground, which was rushing to me quickly. This was a battle I was going to lose in a matter of seconds.
I stopped shooting at Joan and concentrated on dodging as we rocketed towards the ground. I instead pulled out my beam saber and then hit the thrusters full blast to keep from crashing into the ground. Joan realized what I was going at the last second and she made an evasive maneuver to the right as I aimed to cut her machine in half.
The result was that I grazed her as she moved to the right and shot past me, flying just above the trees of the forest we were over.
Flay had recovered from being knocked away and went right back into the pursuit, shooting at Joan with renewed vigor. I could tell, even without communicating with her, that Flay was furious. Her shots were too rapid and too wild to mean anything else.
I rejoined the pursuit too, following Flay as we chased Joan above the trees. We seemed to be in a slightly different sector than before, and we seemed to be heading right for a skirmish between Earth Alliance Daggers and another Astray squadron.
"We're coming in hot, Flay!" I shouted as we were about to blow right through the battle.
"You don't think I don't see that?" Flay replied.
We shot through, both of us blasting at the Strike Daggers in our way as we continued chasing Joan. It became clear to me that we weren't just chasing her to any random location on Onogoro, but back to where the battle had begun. Joan was heading back to her teammates.
"I think she's trying to get back to the rest of her squad, Flay!" I said.
"Well, we'll take her out before she gets there!" Flay punctuated her words with more shots at Joan but Joan was still able to dodge them.
Suddenly, Joan landed on the ground and pivoted, aiming right at us. "Dodge it, Flay!"
We veered to each side as Joan shot at us desperately, but she missed, and we wound up blowing past her. We were right back to where we started, and the three drug-addled boys were engaging Asagi Caldwell's entire squadron of Astrays on their own.
I wondered where Mu La Flaga was. His help would have been appreciated.
I turned the Freedom around, to see that Joan had already taken off in the air. That was when a shot from afar blasted past her, and it didn't look like a shot from either the Strike or the Astray.
My radar was screaming. "Flay, Asagi, I have a lot more bogeys incoming! Four of them!"
They weren't Earth Alliance, otherwise they would have been identified as hostile. That meant . . .
ZAFT.
Finally, my seed went away. I had lost my focus, and I knew what was going to happen to me. ZAFT had reacted quicker to my betrayal that I had dreamed.
At least ZAFT was shooting at the Earth Alliance before shooting at me.
Joan and her squad were already flying off. Either the drugs were wearing off or Joan had decided that their chances of winning the battle had hit slim to none. And the four bogeys continued to come closer on the radar, flying past the friendlies, but still not shooting. I was shocked that the Astrays were not defending their position, and then it occurred to me there had to be a reason why.
I turned on the public Orb channel, and I was stunned to hear the voice I did.
"I repeat, this is Athrun Zala of ZAFT special forces. I have no interest in harming the Orb Mobile Suits defending this position. I am here to speak to Cagalli Yamato, pilot of the Freedom. Can you hear me, Cagalli Yamato?"
It was Athrun. I couldn't believe it. I really couldn't. It felt like the weirdest dream to hear him at that moment in time, and it made my heart skip a beat, just one.
Finally I spoke. "Yes, this is Cagalli Yamato. I'm here."
The bogeys came in sight then, and I saw four of the ZAFT GUNDAMs. I saw the Justice, I saw the Blitz, I saw the Buster, and I saw the Aegis. From the looks of it, Athrun was speaking from the Justice, so he had taken my old machine and someone else was piloting the Aegis.
The Justice came to a stop, and the cockpit opened up, and I saw Athrun standing a moment later, exposing himself, just to show he meant no harm.
"I need to speak to you, Cagalli, now that the battle's ended for now. Can you?"
The thought of talking to Athrun immediately after a cruel and vicious battle confounded me. I had just found out Joan was still alive. I had spoken to Mu. I had fought with Flay. My country was under assault. And Athrun wanted me to take time away from this just to speak to him? How important did he think he was?
But I knew why. He wanted to make sure I was all right, and . . . he was probably looking for Lacus. And it was not an answer I could give on the radio.
"Okay," I finally said, after a moment. "Let's talk."
We wound up on a beachhead. Athrun was escorted by Nicol, Dearka, and stunningly, Hilda Harken. I guess that identified who had taken the Aegis.
Next to me was Flay. Only Flay. But she was ready to shoot. She was not the Flay I had known on Heliopolis, not anymore. Her eyes were that of a hardened soldier, her eyes reminded me of my own. How we had changed since Heliopolis, in similar yet different ways.
"You've moved up in the world," I said to Flay as we walked towards Athrun's group. "Commanding people now, huh?"
"I bring something that most Orb pilots don't have," Flay said softly. "That is combat experience. I'm quite valuable that way."
That made a frightening amount of sense. Flay had indeed seen battle, seen plenty of it. She had flown at least four sorties that I could remember from the Archangel, and she had done countless live drills with Mu La Flaga too. Of course Orb would want to put a battle-hardened pilot in charge of rookies, even if said pilot was a teenager who ordinarily wouldn't do battle.
"I guess that makes two of us," I finally said as we got to within earshot of Athrun and his group.
There were other witnesses, but they were at the edge of the beach, watching us closely. I saw Natarle Badgiruel and other crewmembers of the Archangel among those witnesses. That meant a long reunion was in order after this conversation ended.
I stopped, and so did Flay. As if on cue, Athrun held up his hand and his group halted too.
Staring at Athrun now put the oddest feeling in my chest, like a lump grabbing my heart. It was hurting me just to take breathes, I couldn't quite find the words I wanted to say. But I knew I had to say something, something that he would accept.
"Athrun," I finally said, "What are you doing here?"
Athrun remained calm. "I am here to find you and Lacus, by orders of Siegel Clyne."
Athrun had sided with Siegel Clyne against his own father? As noble as that sounded, and how badly I wanted to believe him, I couldn't just take that as a straight answer. Even if Hilda Harken, who had worked for Siegel Clyne for so long, was standing right there too.
"You expect me to believe that?" I asked. "Why would you turn on your own father?"
Athrun remained resolute, as if he had expected that question. "Because he wanted to harm people I care about, that's why. I'd be lying if I said I want to fight my father instead, I don't know what he's thinking, or what his intentions are. But I know that . . . that I don't want to fight you or Lacus."
He had no idea. He truly had no idea at all. I wasn't sure what to say to him.
Hilda stepped forward, so she was directly beside Athrun. "I can vouch for Athrun, Cagalli. In fact, I was the one who made sure Athrun and everyone here could get away from ZAFT in the first place."
Nicol added "And I wasn't going to betray Athrun either. Where he goes, I was going to help him."
Dearka, for his part, looked embarrassed. "Um . . . to be completely honest, the only reason I'm here is because I know you and Athrun would completely kick my ass. I'm more likely to live fighting with you guys than against you."
Dearka's testimony would have been lightly amusing, if what I was going to tell Athrun didn't have to be told.
"Anyway," Athrun said, "Where's Lacus? I knew she came with you."
How could I tell him? How I could say the words?
He would figure it out anyway, because I couldn't say anything at all, but I didn't want Athrun to realize things that way. Lacus deserved better. Athrun deserved better. My cowardice or sentimentality or whatever it was that was keeping me from talking about Lacus wasn't acceptable.
"Lacus is dead," I finally said.
My voice came out softer than I had wanted, and I wasn't sure that my voice would carry the distance to Athrun. But, even from this distance, I saw his blue eyes widen, just a little, and I knew. I knew he had heard me, and the sight of seeing him in such shock brought me to tears.
"Lacus . . . Lacus is dead, Athrun. She . . . she took a bullet aimed at me, and . . . and s-she died in the . . . in the Freedom's cockpit."
I could not see Athrun's face anymore, but he was standing perfectly still. Clearly in shock. Such in shock that Hilda Harken, the oldest and most battle-hardened of us all, wound up speaking next.
"Where is her body?" Hilda asked gently.
"I . . . I couldn't bring the body here to Earth," I said. "I-I passed by Junius Seven, and . . . a-and I left her body in the interior. I . . . I, um, marked the location so . . . so we can find her."
I felt an arm around my shoulder, and I realized it was Flay's. She felt strong, stronger than she had been on the Archangel.
Damn it, had we really become friends? Or comrades? Had we really become that to each other?
I didn't want Flay to speak for me. She only had a grasp of what had happened. There was no way she was taking over the conversation for me, especially if it was to comfort me or protect me. Even if Flay thought of herself as my comrade, I still couldn't wrap my head around the idea.
"So . . ." I said. "What . . . what will you do now? Your mission is a failure . . . Athrun . . ."
Athrun's voice was soft. "I . . . I . . ."
"Why don't you listen to what's in your heart?"
That voice. It was . . .
He was approaching us from the right.
Prince Kira.
My twin brother, who still probably didn't have any idea of the truth.
He looked calm, gentle, as he walked between us. "If . . . if you think that you're doing the right thing by staying here, then help us. Help Orb. If you feel that where you need to be is back at PLANT, Carpentaria still hasn't fallen. I'm sure they would give you a lift back."
Hilda chuckled lightly, sarcastically. "Carpentaria is held by supporters of Patrick Zala, and in any case it will probably fall within days. All ZAFT bases are being held by skeleton crews, we'll likely have to abandon our Earth footholds over the next several weeks."
"Then it sounds like both your heart and your mind is telling you people to stay here," Kira said.
Hilda looked down, clearly affected by his words. Kira had made sense. He always did. He had that calm, methodical mind. He was the son of the Lion of Orb, in situations like these, panic wasn't in his nature.
He finally turned towards me, and he gave me a gentle smile. "Hi, Cagalli."
Seeing him again just brought the dumbest smile to my face, even though all I could think about was Lacus. Just seeing him standing there, in front of me, made me realize that there were still a lot of people alive. A lot of people I cared for and lot of friends, comrades . . . and Flay.
Athrun and I were going to need to sit down for a long while, discuss Lacus, discuss what was happening, and I was going to need to apologize. Nothing I could say would ever make it up to Athrun for allowing Lacus to die on me, but at the same time, I could at least give him Lacus' last words. The message she had given me spoke more profoundly than any public speech she could have possibly made.
Even if we couldn't reconcile, he deserved to know.
And so did Kira, about a secret that I knew but he didn't.
I smiled at him, my twin brother. "Hi, Kira. I . . . I have a lot to tell you."
Kira nodded. "I don't doubt that you do."
That was the beginning of the Three Ships Alliance, right there, I think.
But we didn't know it yet. How could we?
We hadn't seen the other two ships yet. But we would, eventually.
This was the moment that changed all of our destinies. Everyone here, and everyone who had yet to join us. This was it.
And we were behind the young man directly in-between me and Athrun, the young man who had single-handedly gotten everyone here to listen to him.
Kira Yeley Athha.
Cagalli sure likes thinking of Flay as her group's Zoidberg. Not entirely undeserved on Flay's part, but . . . yeah.
Anyway, there's one chapter left. There will be a hint at the direction of the sequel to this fic, if it is written. I have not decided whether to make it obvious or make it subtle. We'll find out, won't we?
