Kira x Murrue fanfic continuation - Chapter 14
Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam SEED, Gundam SEED Destiny, or Gundam 00, so please point that damned lawsuit cannon at someone else!
Ten minutes later, the Freedom-Raiser stood in the Archangel's hanger bay, with the disabled Freedom Gundam to its right and the disabled Strike Freedom to its left, while Kira, Murrue, Shinn and Meyrin stood in front of the three machines staring at them in amazement.
"These are ZAFT machines, all right, the rescue systems are exactly the same as the Freedom and the Strike Freedom." Kira said as he connected a power pack to the external intercom connector in order to charge it.
Despite the Freedom and Strike Freedom being nuclear powered, the designers had anticipated that their systems would be used on a battery powered machine, such as the Ginn or the Zaku, and as a result they were kind enough to give external access crews a location to separately power the intercom. "Hey, pilot, you still alive in there?" Kira asked.
Everyone's hearts sunk when there was no reply, but when they opened the cockpit hatch, they were shocked to find that the cockpit was empty. After a few minutes, they got the cockpit hatch of the Strike Freedom opened as well, only to find that it didn't have a pilot either.
"What the hell is this?" Murrue asked, gesturing to towards the empty cockpits of the two machines. "How the hell can these machiness fight without a pilot in the cockpit?"
Meyrin was quick to answer Murrue's question. "Well, before we left two years ago, I had heard that ZAFT was trying to develop an operation system to be installed on mobile suits so that they could either be controlled from the cockpit, controlled remotely, or left to an advanced onboard Artificial Intelligence." Meyrin paused for a few seconds. "I believe that they called it the Mobile Doll System."
Everyone stared at the two machines with a mixture of horror and amazement.
Four hours later, Meyrin suddenly spoke up. "Ma'am, we have a message coming in from the Goddard Colony, audio only."
Murrue looked over her shoulder at Meyrin, she had assumed that all of the PLANTs had been destroyed, or at least were too damaged to sustain any inhabitants. "Put it through."
"This is the Goddard Colony, if anyone is still alive out there, please respond!" A paniced female voice called out. For some reason the voice sounded fimiliar, but at the moment everyone was much more concerned with rescuing any survivors.
Murrue was quick to reply. "This is the Celestial Being warship Archangel calling the Goddard Colony."
"That's impossible the Archangel was destroyed in the first days of the war." The woman replied, her shock obvious due to the tone of her voice.
"While the original Archangel was destroyed, we rebuilt it." Murrue replied.
"Whatever, can you come help us or not?" The woman asked.
"Yes, we can, what do you need?" Murrue asked.
"We need to be evacuated, the nuclear missiles which had been fired at us missed, but the colony still took damage, one by one our systems have been failing, and soon our life support systems will go out."
"We should be there in five minutes, maybe less."
With that Murrue cut the comm line, turned to Meyrin and said. "Set a course for the Goddard Colony. Signal the Ptolemiaos, let them know that we are going on a rescue mission." Meyrin nodded and relayed a message to the Ptolemiaos, then she brought the Archangel's Trans-Am System online.
The Trans-Am System which was now being utilized by the Archangel had been integrated into the Archangel's systems while they were in the Gundam 00 universe. The Archangel itself had a total of five GN Drives, in addition to the two which had been installed on the Freedom-Raiser.
Suddenly the Archangel blazed with a bright red light and sped off, leaving brightly glowing afterimages in its wake.
"This is the 'wrong' scale cranked up well past 11," Lockon Stratos noted a few minutes later as he launched his Cherudim Gundam from the Ptolemiaos, followed a moment later by the Infinite Justice Gundam.
Both Gundams began maneuvering around to try and find someone, anyone who was left alive. There were distress beacons here and there, but the two life boats which Nena had picked up earlier were simply grave markers for a family, which was lucky enough to get away from the destruction of the PLANT in which they lived, only to suffocate in the days thereafter.
"I know what you mean," Nena Trinity replied, from the cockpit of the Infinite Justice Gundam as they watched another colony chunk drop to the planet below, this one landing in the Indian Ocean off the southwestern coast of India and causing a tidal wave which was even visible from space.
The survivors in the Goddard Colony were all huddled in the docking bay control room and most of them peering out into space through the huge window, but they quickly jumped back from the window when the Archangel suddenly appeared from the blackness of space, glowing with a bright red light. The Archangel stopped glowing, then it quickly docked inside the colony and only thirty minutes later, everyone that was still alive was onboard.
As the Archangel left the docking bay of the Goddard Colony, Kira floated into the, now much more cramped, crew lounge. As he floated towards the fully stocked refrigerator, he thought that he saw a young woman with blonde hair and golden eyes, along with another women who had pink hair and blue eyes. Kira was instantly reminded of Cagalli and Lacus, as the two women sat at one of the tables talking with each other.
'That's impossible, Cagalli and Lacus were both killed in the final battle of the second war.' Kira thought to himself as he opened the refrigerator door and pulled out a Wild Cherry Pepsi.
Even though it should have been impossible, it was true. Cagalli Yula Athha and Lacus Clyne were currently sitting at a table in the Archangel's crew lounge, discussing what they should do now since humanity was all but extinct.
Kira blinked a few times, just to make sure that he wasn't dreaming. He then began to slowly float towards the two women. As the young brunette man floated towards them, Cagalli checked the placement of her personal weapon, a beam pistol, while her arms were crossed, since she was carrying it in her right sleeve, against her upper arm, on the inside, between the arm and the side of her body. All she had to do was to straighten her arm in a particular rapid fashion and the weapon would drop down into her waiting palm, ready to fire in less than a second.
Her right arm held the beam pistol that had been her personal sidearm for months now, which could fire up to twenty times at ranges of one hundred meters before exhausting its battery, each shot more than sufficient to kill a human sized target from thermal shock with any hit to the body from the knees to the head. The actual hole the beam made was less than impressive, it was the cooking of the flesh and massive agony of the large third degree burns the hit caused which would stop the heart and overwhelm the brain, causing death.
As the young man approached them, the blonde woman glared at him and said. "Do you mind?"
Kira blushed slightly as he thought. 'She's just like the twin sister that I remember, but how is this possible?'
"I'm sorry to disturb the two of you, but may I please ask your names? You both look like people whom I used to know." Kira asked.
The pink haired woman smiled as she politely replied. "I am Lacus Clyne." Lacus smiled as she then gestured to the blonde. "And this is Cagalli Yula Athha."
Kira's eyes widened in shock as his mind screamed at him. 'This is impossible!'
"T-thank you, and again I'm sorry to have disturbed you." Kira said, before then turning and floating out of the crew lounge, his brain struggling to understand how Lacus and Cagalli had survived.
"That's impossible." Kira said out loud as he floated onto the bridge a few minutes later.
Murrue looked over her shoulder at Kira as she asked. "What's impossible, Kira?"
Kira floated over to Murrue and hesitated for a moment, but finally he said. "Lacus and Cagalli are alive, they are in the crew lounge right now."
Murrue stared at Kira for a few short seconds, before she saw that he was completely serious, then she asked. "But, how is that possible?"
"I'm not sure, but I think that they may be clones of the Lacus and Cagalli that we knew." Kira said as he shook his head in disbelief.
About ten minutes later, Shinn floated onto the bridge, he quickly floated over to Kira and said. "Kira, you're not going to believe this, but I just passed Lacus and your sister, Cagalli, in the hall."
Kira nodded as he replied. "I do believe you, Shinn, because I saw both of them earlier."
"Well, the Goddard Colony was damaged, but compared to the other PLANTs it was in very good condition since it was still able to support its inhabitants. I wonder..." Murrue said after a moment, trailing off, then after a few seconds, she turned to Meyrin and ordered. "Meyrin, take us back to the Goddard Colony."
Fifteen minutes later, the Archangel once again approached the Goddard Colony. This time however, all of the ship's weapons were online and fully charged. In addition, the Destiny Gundam had been prepared for battle and was standing on the launch catapult. Shinn was ready to launch if the need arose.
As soon as the Archangel had once again docked in the Goddard Colony's space port, Kira began to rapidly type into his computer as he sat beside Murrue on the bridge. He quickly established a data link to the colony's computer systems and began to scan through the contents of the colony's computer.
As he expected, it had the normal systems for a colony; enviormental controls, life support systems, lighting systems and power disturbution systems, to name a few. But as Kira continued, he noticed multiple system which he knew shouldn't be in any colony. After continuing his scan for a moment more, he suddenly froze, and after a few long seconds, Kira recovered from his shock.
"Natarle Badgiruel. Date of birth: C.E. 45. Blood type: unknown. Sex: female. Used to be second-in-command on the Archangel in the first war, and later became the Captain of the Dominion. Killed in battle by the Archangel on the last day of the war. Traces of her DNA were recovered from the wreckage and were later used to clone her. She is currently the Captain of the Earth Alliance warship Soveregin." Kira read aloud from his computer screen, causing everyone to turn and look at him.
Murrue let a slight sigh escape her lips as she said. "Well, now we know how Cagalli and Lacus are still alive, they were cloned."
"Yea..." Kira nodded, and as he continued to look through the colony's computer he saw blueprints for more then two dozen new mobile suit models, at least ten of which were Gundams, and all of which, at least according to their blueprints, were mass-produced.
"Captain, we have three Gundams coming towards us from behind!" Meyrin suddenly announced, ten minutes later. "Sensors have already confirmed that the machines are the Destiny, the Strike Freedom, and the Infinite Justice!"
"Athrun, Luna; you two handle the Freedom-Raiser, I will deal with my brother and his Destiny Gundam!" Mayu Asuka shouted from the cockpit of the Strike Freedom Gundam.
"Roger that!" Athrun Zala and Lunamaria Hawke said as they ignited their thrusters and streaked toward the Freedom-Raiser, which had launched from the Archangel's port side launch bay only a few seconds earlier.
As the Gundams moved to combat each other, the Archangel quickly manuvered out of the colony's docking port. Once the ship was clear of the docking port it activated its Trans-Am system, ignited its Wings Of Light, and streaked away leaving blazing red afterimages in its wake.
"Why are you fighting with the Clyne Faction, Shinn?!?" Mayu screamed through the open-channel communications line.
"M-Mayu? How are you alive? You were killed by the Calamity Gundam during the battle of Orb in the first war." Shinn said in confusion.
"Well, I came back, big brother. If you don't like it, you'll have to kill me! Can you do it, Shinn? Can you kill your own sister?" Mayu taunted as she slashed her beam saber at her brother's Gundam, forcing Shinn to back away.
"Fuck you, you're not the sister that I knew." Shinn spat as he deployed his GN Field, firing his beam rifle through the field.
As soon as the Archangel was clear of the colony, Kira transformed Freedom-Raiser into its flight mode, while the Destiny ignited its Wings of Light and with a blur of blindnigly glowing afterimages both machines streaked out of the docking bay and away from the colony.
"They're running." Athrun noted as both the Freedom-Raiser and Destiny streaked past him.
"Go after them!" Mayu ordered and Athrun nodded as he boosted after the Freedom-Raiser.
"They're coming after us." Kira muttered as he hit a button on his control panel. All along the wings, just above the DRAGOON mounts, multiple panels opened revealing missile tubes, and with a pull of the trigger the missiles shot off, flying toward Athrun.
Athrun rolled out of the way of the missiles but half of the missiles hit the colony wall to his left, the impact of the weapons throwing out a cloud of smoke and a rain of shrapnel. The other half of the missiles hit the exterior wall of the colony or concealed mobile suit hangers. While Athrun was inside the cloud of smoke Kira and Shinn both punched their engines to max and rocketed away, moving too fast for anyone to follow.
Ten minutes later the Archangel and the Ptolemiaos had rendezvoused in Earth orbit. All of the pilots had been assembeled in the briefing rooms on the two ships, and they were currently discussing whether or not it would be worth the effort to try and establish peace in the Cosmic Era.
"Earth is in ruins, as far as we know only a single PLANT is still able to support its inhabitants and anyone with a warship won't hesitate to open fire on anything that approaches if it shows up as an enemy or an unknown." Murrue said, outlining the current situation.
After a few seconds of silence, Kira spoke up. "I don't really care if we leave the military personnel here to kill each other, but it's not right to leave civilian survivors here to watch as the remains of the two sides completely exterminate each other. Despite the destruction that we've seen, I would not be too suprised if there are at least some civilians alive on Earth's surface, and maybe in one or two of the remaining PLANTs."
"Well, both the Archangel and the Ptolemiaos are capable of athmosphereic re-entry and planetary landing." Sumeragi said through the video communications line. "Are you suggesting that we land our ships on the surface and conduct a planet-wide search and rescue mission?"
Kira nodded as he replied. "Yes, that is exactly what I am suggesting."
"Not to throw a dampener on your hopes, Kira, but this entire section of the solar system is a graveyard." Cagalli commented as she floated into the briefing room. "Sure, a few of the PLANTs have maintained their positions even after being bombed out by nuclear weapons, but most of the deceased colonies are either headed for Earth or are already there." Cagalli paused for a moment, then she finished. "Only three of the PLANTs currently remain intact. Even then, there is probably nothing inside of them, aside from millions of corpses."
After another moment of silence, Sumeragi spoke up. "As you are aware, Captain Ramius, earlier we salvaged a dozen Murasame Reconnaissance Type mobile suits." Murrue nodded, silently telling Sumeragi to continue. "Well, we took the energy battery out of one of the Murasames that we captured, then we fitted the mobile suit with one of our extra GN Drives before finally loading the reprogramed Mobile Doll System into its computer. Once the Mobile Doll System had been loaded, we sent the Murasame on a recon mission, and when it returned we were actually kind of intreged by what we found..." Sumeragi explained, trailing off.
Sumeragi smiled slightly as she read the report. "As Cagalli said, only three of the PLANTs are left in stable orbits; the Maius 2 PLANT colony, the Goddard PLANT colony and the Januarius 10 PLANT colony. In addition, all three of the colonies have somehow been spared from receving lethal levels of radation."
Murrue thought for a moment, then she turned to face Sumeragi and asked. "I know it may sound crazy, but would there be any way to bring the Celestial Being, the colony ship, into this universe."
Instantly, Teria Erde, the pilot of the Seravee Gundam, was on the screen. "While possible, it would take at least a few months to install jump drives onto the Celestial Being. By that time, anyone who is alive right now would most certianly be dead by the time we returned."
"That's what I was afraid of..." Murrue muttuered.
Sumeragi let a slight smirk appear on her face as she nudged Teria out of the way and said. "Actually, Captain Ramius, we had jump drives installed on the Celestial Being at the same time that we were upgrading the Gundams."
Murrue smiled, then she said. "Well, if that's the case, what are we waiting for? Let's bring the Celestial Being colony ship here, and begin the evacuation of any and all civilian survivors."
Well, here's Chapter 14.
A few question to the readers;
1) I haven't decided where the clones should be produced, at first I thought about having them being produced at the Goddard Colony, but that seems too obvious for some reason...
2) Should Kira ever allow Murrue to launch in the Strike Freedom again, since they have three kids now, and if he does allow her to launch, under what sort of conditions/situation?
3) Should Celestial Being cannablize the captured Freedom and Strike Freedom Gundams, or should Cagalli and Lacus be assigned to pilot them?
4) Do you guys think that Shinn will be able and willing to shoot down both his sister and Lunamaria?
5) Do you guys think that Kira will be able and willing to shoot down Athrun?
AS ALWAYS, PLEASE REVIEW!