Tale Eighteen: Chief Petty Officer Gustav Velt - MS-06F2 Zaku 2 - Two Weeks Before Operation Odessa

The three Zaku 2s lumbered across the plains of the North Eastern Ukraine. Despite being only a couple of months old the F2-type Zakus were well worn. Each machine had numerous scratches and the once immaculate green paint was flaking off in places. Chief Petty Officer Gustav Velt was immensely bored these long range patrols were very dull. Just because some idiot Luggun pilot claimed to have spotted the movement of Federal armour Gustav's squad had been sent to this isolated backwater. Gustav really hated missions like this. They almost always ended in nothing. Rumours had been knocking around for ages that the Federation was planning a new offensive.

"Ensign, my radar just picked up multiple incoming contacts," reported Warrant Officer Miller. The minovsky particle density was low enough for radio contact between the Zakus. "It could be the Feddie armour."

"Confirmed, Miller, I'm getting them as well," replied Ensign Araki. Araki was a young and energetic commander that rather annoyed Gustav. Many years Gustav's junior the young officer looked down disdainfully on the older pilot. Gustav had no idea why this was so. The general assumption was that the young man had a chip on his shoulder. "Okay boys lets clean up these pathetic Feddies."

The Zakus clambered over a small hillock and they discovered a whole company of Federation Type-61 main battle tanks. Gustav smiled broadly; he enjoyed battling Federal tanks. They were easy to destroy but he found it fun watching them squirm as their puny weapons proved ineffective against his armour. He aimed his MMP-78 120mm machinegun at the blue tanks and fired. Even when it was set to single fire the 120mm machinegun was enough to utterly destroy a Type-61 tank. The Zaku's towering height meant that they could easily hit the thinly armoured tops and backs of the tanks. Soon the plain was littered with burning tanks.

"And that makes fifty one!" yelled Gustav as he destroyed two of the little tanks in a row. "You see that Jackson! I told you I would do it before the end of the month!"

"Nice going Velt but you are no Silas Locke!" retorted Jackson as he dispatched another Type-61 tank.

"That's only because that dog has a Gouf!" snarled Gustav. "If I had a Gouf things would be different. I don't know why the hell they've stopped production already."

"Chief Petty Officer Velt shut the hell up!" roared Ensign Araki. "We are in the middle of a battle. Concentrate!"

"You call this a battle?" replied Gustav with indignation filling his voice. "This isn't a battle. This is practically a training mission. Heck I had more dangerous training than this on Lunar before the war." With great skill Gustav quickly turned his Zaku to the left and once again fired his machinegun. The 120mm shell sped through the air and caught the last remaining Type-61 tank as it attempted to retreat. "This joke of a battle is over."

"You think you are so great Velt just because you have an impressive kill score," snapped Araki. "But let me tell you that you are just a small minded little peon. I don't care how many kills you have or how long you've been in the service. You are a terrible soldier that only lusts after personal glory. Zeon doesn't need men like you protecting it."

"You want to come over here and say that, pretty boy!" yelled Gustav. In a flash of madness be brought his 120mm machinegun around and targeted the ensigns Zaku. "You should be careful out here in the wilderness pretty boy. You never know what might happen."

"Gustav, what the hell do you think you are doing!" shouted Jackson. He jammed his foot down on his Zaku's thruster peddle and shoulder barged Gustav's Zaku to the ground. "Are you insane? Do you want a courts martial?"

There was almost an ethereal pause as the three pilots waited to see what each other would do. Unfortunately the pause was broken by an outside source. A hail of unnervingly accurate heavy machinegun struck Jackson's Zaku from the left. The shells tore through the Zaku's super hard steel alloy armour as if it were paper. The left arm was ripped from its socket by the force of the attack. The head was smashed into thousands of pieces while the torso was riddled with more holes than Gustav thought possible. As the machinegun fire came to an end the Zaku swayed slightly before falling backwards. When the once mighty Zeon war machine hit the ground it crushed the remaining of several Type-61 tanks.

"Where the hell did that come from?" yelled Araki. There was an obvious trace of fear in his voice. He started to slowly back his Zaku away from where the attack came from. At the same time Gustav was desperately trying to get his Zaku back on its feet.

In the distance the two Zeon pilots could see a trio of figures moving into sight. They were clearly mobile suits but unlikely any they had seen before. The torso was red with the rest of the machine painted in a desert tan colour. The centre of the torso protruded out with vents on either side. The head was larger than that of a Zaku and did not have any obvious mono-eye camera. Carried in the right hard was what appeared to be some sort of machinegun and in the left was a large tower shield that was painted red.

"Those aren't Zeon mobile suits," breathed Gustav, "My god the rumours are true. The Federation has mobile suits!"

Araki opened first fire. A volley of 120mm shells hit the the lead Federal machine. However Araki's misses soon caused a cloud of dust to billow up hiding the enemy mobile suits from view. Gustav used this time to finally get his Zaku righted again and salvage the 120mm machinegun from Jackson's downed machine. Before long, however, the enemy mobile suits were moving through the dust cloud. As it cleared it became apparent the lead suit Araki had shot at was undamaged. This time both the Zakus targeted it and let ripe with all three of their machineguns. Gustav watched in amazement as he scored several direct hits. Each of the 120mm shells hit the desert tan coloured mobile suit with a discernible thud but other than causing it to pause in its advance momentarily there did not appear to be any damage. It tilted it's shield slightly to better cover its head but the hail of fire put up by the Principality soldiers did not perturb them in anyway.

The three RGM-79G land warfare type GMs levelled their 100mm machinegun at the Zaku with the command antenna. All too soon Araki's Zaku was a smouldering heap of scrap metal as the trio of GMs emptied their 100mm machinegun clips into it. Seeing that his situation was all but lost Gustav threw away both his machineguns. He throttled the Zaku up to full power and charged at the GMs while they were reloading. As he reached halfway he activated his thrusters to get that extra little boost of speed. It work just as he planned and he succeeded in shoulder barging one of the GMs to the ground. In a swift movement he brought his heat hawk into play. Bringing the hawk down in a long sweeping movement he hacked the machinegun of the leading GM in half. He could tell it was the command machine from the coloured bar on its shoulder armour. Turning the blade of the heat hawk he tried to slash up the GMs body but it backed away quickly. In a fluid motion a small hatch on it thigh opened and a small cylindrical object jutted out and was taken into the GMs hand. Gustav's mind was racing as he tried to work out what the object was. It looked far too small to be any kind of ranged weapon but it didn't appear to have any melee ability. He was taken totally by surprise when a pink beam appeared out of the cylinder. In one sweeping movement the pink blade cut through the Zaku's left arm sending both it and the heat hawk to the ground. The next move saw the GM plunging its beam sabre into the Zaku's cockpit.

End of the Tale