Disclaimer: I don't own Gundam SEED or any of its characters. Dr. Elizabeth Sanford, Serena Ridley, Squadron Commander Javier Sabato and Ensign Roger Doolittle are my own creations.
Chapter 6: Rescue
Archangel, Bridge/Mess Hall
In spite of the explanation she'd been offered, it still surprised Flay that black-market merchants would willingly aid legal authorities. Captain Ramius had said that it all came down to money: Orb had made a generous offer and the merchants had accepted. Flay still thought it was kind of odd, crooks and soldiers working together.
Her thoughts refocused as the bridge doors slid open and Lacus Clyne entered the room, her elegant white and blue dress flowing about in the weightless environment. Captain Ramius approached her and shook her hand, and Commander Herikawa bowed respectfully. Lacus nodded in acknowledgment.
"Thank you for allowing me to stay on board," she said. Captain Ramius waved the comment off.
"It isn't a problem, Lacus." The pink-haired girl smiled gently. She paused for a moment as her gaze wandered across the bridge, and then her eyes settled on Flay and she extended a hand in greeting.
"It's good to see you again, Flay," Lacus said. The redhead hesitated for a brief moment before taking the hand she was offered. It wasn't the fact that Lacus was a Coordinator that made Flay hesitate, although that would have been it in times past. This time the reluctance had nothing to do with Lacus and everything to do with Flay herself. The unease that gripped her did not go unnoticed.
"Flay, are you alright?" Lacus asked. Flay nodded quickly.
"Yeah," she said. "I'm okay." It had been the better part of six months since Lacus had last been to visit Kira, and even then, she and Flay hadn't really spoken much. Then, as now, it was nothing that Lacus had done. Rather, the problem was the ability for people to serve as anchors to memories.
You must be out of your mind! Why should I have to shake hands with you? I don't want Coordinators like you acting friendly with me!
Sometimes, those were memories of things that had happened to Flay, but sometimes…
I'll kill this girl! If they fire at Daddy's ship, I'll kill this girl!
Sometimes the hardest memories to deal with were those of the things she had said and done.
Kira had assured her that Lacus didn't think any less of her for how their first meeting went, but it was still hard for Flay to believe that.
Lacus was either satisfied with Flay's answer or understood that this was something that couldn't be discussed in front of the entire bridge, because she shifted topics.
"The captain of the mercenary ship has told me that we should arrive at our destination in approximately six hours," she said. Captain Ramius nodded.
"Did the mercenary captain say anything else?" the older woman asked.
"Only that her clients would not be happy to see us," Lacus replied.
"Okay, I've got one," Kenji said. "So I was tuning up my M1's beam rifle…" Maria started laughing.
"Ah, yes," she said. "The hyper impulse beam rifle." Roger's eyebrows rose.
"Hyper impulse beam rifle?" He looked across the table at Sara, who simply shook her head.
It had taken a good amount of convincing from Sara to get the two younger Astray pilots to allow Roger to sit with them. While Kenji and Maria hadn't participated in the Battle of Orb, they remembered full well that it was the Alliance that had invaded their country, and both had lost friends during the siege and subsequent space battles. Only after Sara had explained how she and Roger had been working together in the last few battles, and insisted that he didn't fit the profile of a Blue Cosmos thug, did the others accept him as part of the group.
Not that Roger blamed them. Back during the war, the "Evil Earth Forces" stereotype was so close to being justified that it wasn't even funny. The lingering mistrust just made Doolittle hate Azrael and his cronies all the more.
At the moment, however, the character of the average Alliance soldier wasn't the topic of discussion. Rather, the conversation had turned to the exchange of combat-, or at least mobile suit-related stories.
"I maintain that my idea was sound," Kenji said. "All I did was to install an extra electromagnetic accelerator in the rifle's barrel, sort of like the secondary accelerator on a hyper impulse cannon. I just made a mistake in the wiring." He paused for a moment, taking a sip of his drink. "When I reconnected the power lines for the accelerators, I kind of had the current running in the wrong direction, which caused the magnetic fields to, well, reverse." Maria chuckled slightly, and Sara bore a knowing smile when she looked back at Roger.
"So it didn't fire?" Roger asked.
"Hey!" Kenji shot back with mock indignation. "It fired," he said, paused for a moment, and then added "backwards." Maria burst out laughing, Sara chuckled and Roger laughed as he realized what might have taken place. "The beam destroyed the rifle and the mobile suit's arm."
"Not to mention that it punched through the hangar's shutter door and took out a heli parked on the tarmac outside," Maria added.
"I was forbidden from ever customizing my machine again." As the laughter died down, Sara spoke up.
"Well, I have one. This took place during the Battle of Onogoro," she began, eliciting groans from Maria and Kenji.
"Madre de Dios," Maria said. "This is the 'how I met Hiro' story again, isn't it?"
"I'm going to tell this story until I get tired of it," Sara calmly replied. "Anyway, this was back when the Alliance was invading Orb. This was the first time the Astrays were being used in an actual battle, so we were all nervous, but damn it if we weren't going to make those Earth Forces bastards…" she looked at Roger. "No offense."
"None taken," the Alliance soldier added, rolling his eyes.
"Anyway," Sara resumed, "we were going to make them pay for every inch of ground. For a while, it was actually okay. We took some casualties from the Strike Daggers, but they were taking probably double the losses we were." She laughed a little. "We were actually feeling pretty good, all things considered." Sara paused for a moment, and Roger took advantage of the break in conversation to address Kenji and Sara.
"Where were you two during all this?" Kenji shook his head.
"We're new at this. We finished our training in time to run a few mop-ups after the major fighting died down, but this is our first real mission. Sara, on the other hand, was actually in the thick of it during the war." Sara gave a small nod in acknowledgment.
"I started out at the Battle of Onogoro and served on the Kusanagi through to Jachin," she added.
"Impressive," Roger commented. He figured it was probably for the best if he left out that he was also at Jachin. He hadn't fired on any Orb mobile suits, but reminding the M1 pilots that he had been their enemy just didn't seem like the brightest idea.
"Anyway," Sara said, returning to the original topic of conversation. "About an hour into the battle, I caught sight of something on my CIS. I looked a little closer and saw that it was an Ereka, a jeep, driving through the middle of the battlefield despite the evacuation orders. At about the time I noticed the jeep, three Spearheads made a bombing run over the beach, tossing three cluster bombs at the Astrays; the pilots probably didn't even notice the smaller vehicle."
"Ah, the good ol' CBU," Roger said, smiling a little. "I remember hearing that in the First Battle of Victoria, South African Union troops made a whole company of GINNs disappear using those. They got a lot harder to supply after the April Fool Crisis."
"Well, they were making them again by the time of Onogoro," Sara said. "We had shields, but we still lost at least one platoon of Astrays right then and there." She paused, shaking the dark memory from her head. At the next bit, she smiled again. "Anyway, I saw that the jeep was about to get turned into spare parts, planted my shield in front of it and stopped the bomblet that would have landed on top of it."
"And the guy driving the jeep was this 'Hiro'?" Roger asked. Sara nodded.
"I think I scared him pretty badly when my mobile suit suddenly moved that close to him, because the jeep braked kind of hard and the driver fell out of the side." She laughed. "He didn't seem like the military type; he had short, brown hair and really dorky-looking glasses. It turned out that he was a medic, out in the field tending to wounded soldiers. He just happened to get a little too close to the action." Roger's brow furrowed.
"How'd you learn all this?"
"Later in the fight, a teal-colored Alliance G-weapon broke through our ranks, cutting down three M1s in about three seconds. My mobile suit wasn't directly in the line of fire, which is probably why I wasn't killed, but I got caught in an explosion from the thing's bazooka and ended up with a lot of shrapnel in my left side. When I woke up, I was in a medical tent, and I think you can guess who was tending to my injuries." Roger smiled somewhat at the irony of the situation.
"So things kind of progressed from there?" he asked. Sara nodded.
"We always joke that I'm his knight in shining armor." The conversation was interrupted by the soft hiss of the nearby door, which opened to reveal Lacus Clyne.
Well, Roger thought, here comes another uncomfortable conversation. If Orb soldiers had issues with members of the OMNI Enforcer, a PLANT-affiliated figure like Clyne probably wasn't going to be any better.
The four pilots watched as Clyne made her way to the pick-up line, requested something to eat and proceeded to an empty table. Roger started laughing, and Sara gave him a questioning look.
"The princess is about to eat cafeteria food from a warship," he said. "I'd imagine that's probably a change from what she normally has." Roger's prediction may or may not have held merit, but if Clyne found the food unpleasant, she showed no sign of it.
"I'm surprised she's able to act so comfortable here," Sara said.
"I'm surprised Kenji's not hitting on her yet," Maria added.
"Hey," Kenji responded. "I'm not an animal. Besides, Lacus Clyne is different; she can't be treated the way I treat other women." The pilot had been looking at Clyne, but when he turned around, he found himself facing heated stares from both Sara and Maria. He looked quickly at Roger.
"Yeah," the Earth Forces soldier said, nodding. "You said that out loud." He stood up. "Well, I'm going to run a system check on my mobile suit and make sure it's recharged and rearmed by the time we reach our destination." He said his goodbyes and dropped off his empty tray. As he opened the door to leave the mess hall, Roger heard someone call him. Turning around, he noticed Lacus standing a short distance away.
"Are you the Earth Forces soldier who's been helping with the rescue?" the pink-haired Coordinator asked. Roger nodded quickly. He wasn't sure exactly what response he had expected from her, but it certainly wasn't what came next.
"I'm glad that you're here," she said, smiling. "I know that your nation has been at odds with the PLANTs and Orb in the past, and it is good to know that we do not have to see each other as enemies."
"Thank you, Miss Clyne," Roger said after a moment of surprised silence.
"Please," the girl said, "you may call me Lacus."
"Thank you again, Lacus." Roger turned to leave, thinking that he could be good friends with this girl.
Until…
"Haro!" a bizarre, high-pitched voice said, causing Roger to whip around in confusion, searching for the source.
What the hell?
His confusion only increased as a small pink ball rolled out from behind Lacus, two small mechanical flaps opening and closing briefly as the thing rolled to a stop.
What the hell?!
"This is my friend, Mr. Pink," Lacus clarified. "He goes wherever I go." The pink thing turned around to face roger, and the Alliance soldier realized that it had two small sensors, very much like eyes, mounted on its front.
"Haro! I'm fine! How are you?" it chirped.
"Ooh," Roger said, shuddering. "That thing is going to be like nails on the chalkboard of my brain."
Space station Azathoth, Debris Belt
Doctor Sanford drummed her fingers on the nearby console, growing increasingly frustrated. The Starglider was supposed to arrive an hour ago. Given the interference they'd suffered so far from the Orb military, she couldn't help but find the delay suspicious. While they didn't normally contact the mercenary vessel by radio, Sanford had requested it this time. Thus far, there was still no response.
"What do you think?" she asked, turning around to face Squadron Commander Sabato. His expression was pensive, and his right hand idly stroked his goatee.
"I don't like it," he said. "It could be a coincidence, but I don't believe we can afford to take that chance." Sanford nodded in agreement. She opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted when a technician at a nearby console called out in surprise.
"Radar is picking up multiple contacts!" Sabato whirled around to face the young man.
"How many are there?" he asked.
"I'm reading three ships," the tech replied. "Thermal profiles match the Starglider, a small supply vessel and…oh, my God. It's the legged ship!" Sabato swore.
"How far out are they?" he asked.
"ETA is approximately half an hour," the technician replied.
"Have they detected us yet?" Sanford asked, pushing off the wall and floating across the control room to join Sabato.
"It's unlikely, Doctor," Sabato replied. "The station has far more powerful sensors than a warship, and their thrusters are giving off far more heat than we are." He moved over to another console. "Get me Commander Stanton." After a moment, Stanton's face appeared on the computer screen. "The Archangel seems to have found another way to trace us here. Have your team in their mobile suits and ready to launch in fifteen minutes; have all ships take up positions around the station and ready their mobile suit complements. I'll take command of the Raleigh personally." Sanford heard Stanton give an affirmative over the com link.
"What about the defense of the station itself?" Sabato looked at Dr. Sanford when he spoke next.
"I believe that's Sanford's area." The scientist nodded, smiling inwardly.
This might actually be fun, she thought, turning to another technician and issuing a few orders of her own.
"Have all personnel withdraw from Level Ten," she said. "Let's see just how good these Orb soldiers really are."
Archangel, Bridge/Open Space
"How far out are we?" Murrue asked.
"We're approximately ten minutes from the station, Captain," Commander Herikawa responded. Murrue nodded quickly, turning her chair to face the parasite operator, Terrence Byron, a sandy blonde young man in his early twenties.
"Can you connect me to the pilots?" she asked. Since the station had appeared on their sensors about five minutes earlier, the Archangel's mobile suit pilots had been standing by in their machines. Byron nodded, hit a few buttons on his chair and gave Murrue the go-ahead. The captain picked up the telephone handset on the right armrest of her chair.
"We have nearly reached our destination," Murrue said. "We can't be sure of the enemy's fighting strength, but we have detected three Laurasia-class frigates positioned around the station. Our objective is to hold them off long enough for Athrun and his team to get inside the station and retrieve Kira. Cagalli, you are the only one here currently in possession of a G-weapon, and we'll need your help defending the ship."
"Understood, Captain Ramius," Cagalli responded.
"Ensign Doolittle, you will cover the shuttle until it reaches the station."
"Copy that," Roger came back.
"Ensigns Nakamura, Tiran and Velasquez, you will provide assistance as necessary." A quick trio of affirmatives followed.
"Enemy ships are deploying linear catapults," Herikawa called out from the CIC. Murrue nodded.
"All mobile suits, launch now. All hands, Level One battle stations!"
Roger swung the Duel Dagger over toward the shuttle, closing to within about a hundred feet of it and matching its velocity. Up ahead, he could make out the general shape of the space station, a cylindrical shaft supporting five rotating rings, behind the debris. He could also see enemy mobile suits approaching, but a combination of distance and debris made it nearly impossible to determine make and model.
"Archangel, what do we know about the enemy forces?" Roger recognized Sara's voice over his radio, followed by that of a petty officer from the CIC, Chandra if he remembered correctly.
"The enemy force consists of ten GINNs, two CGUEs and six GuAIZs." Roger swore.
Well, this is going to be interesting.
"Alright," Cagalli said. "We'll handle these guys. Roger, you keep that shuttle safe."
"Copy that, Princess," the Dagger pilot responded, smiling as he imagined the expression on Athha's face.
"Remind me to hurt you when this is over." Roger turned the Dagger slightly, looking back at the Strike Rouge. The pink machine now bristled with weapons. Two massive railguns were mounted over the shoulders, attached to a winged flight pack. The combined shield now mounted on the Rouge's left arm bore an immense, six-barreled Gatling gun and a beam boomerang. The final pieces of the combat ensemble were two nearly thirty foot anti-ship swords, mounted on the Strike Rouge's hips.
The Integrated Weapons Striker Pack, Roger thought. The girl's got class.
Perhaps one mile away now, the enemy suits broke into three distinct groups. The six GuAIZs made a beeline for the Archangel, while five GINNs and a CGUE closed in on the three M1s. Roger tightened his grip on the Duel Dagger's controls as the second five GINN team, led by a CGUE, advanced on him.
"Here we go!" he called out with an adrenaline-fueled grin, firing on the nearest GINN with the Dagger's shoulder cannon and beam rifle. The ZAFT-manufactured machine swerved away from the particle beam, which was exactly what Roger had been counting on. The GINN had unintentionally moved directly into the path of the cannon shot, and the shell struck it in the chest. The ensuing explosion tore open the mobile suit's chest, sending hunks of shrapnel flying away in all directions.
Kenji brought his Astray's shield up, blocking a rain of machine gun rounds from the nearest GINN. Moving quickly, he went on the offensive, locking onto the enemy mobile suit and firing his beam rifle.
The GINN didn't evade the shot, but the electron stream splashed harmlessly against a barrier.
While Kenji had been aware of the fact that the GINNs were carrying shields, it somehow hadn't registered that the defensive items might be covered with anti-beam coating.
Damn it. He quickly activated his com link.
"This is Ensign Tiran. All units, be advised, the GINNs have anti-beam shields. I repeat: the GINNs have anti-beam shields." The first reply came from Maria, whose M1 rushed past Kenji and went straight for the GINN he had fired on.
"You just have to use your head, hermanito," she said as she rammed her mobile suit into the GINN. The enemy machine drew its heavy sword and swept it through a downward arc. Instead of hitting the Astray, however, the weapon hit Maria's beam saber, which she had drawn as soon as the GINN went for its sword. The beam saber's hot plasma blade cut through the metal sword like a knife through butter, and Maria followed through with the attack, slashing from left to right and cutting the GINN in half. As the upper and lower halves of the machine exploded, Maria turned her Astray to face Kenji. "See," she said. "All you have to do is—,"
Her smart remark was cut off as a particle beam pierced her M1's right arm and blew it off at the elbow. Perhaps a hundred meters away, a CGUE adjusted its rifle, which Kenji now realized was the same type of beam weapon used by the GuAIZs, for another shot. Kenji raised his own beam rifle, but one of his cockpit alarms went off and he spun to the left, barely raising his shield in time as the nearest Laurasia-class fired one of its dual beam cannons, sending two massive electron streams at him. The nearly meter-wide particle beams scattered off the shield's magnetic field, but the kinetic energy hurled Kenji's Astray nearly forty meters before he managed to bring it to a halt.
"Puta madre!" Kenji heard Maria shout over the com link. "Hermanito, are you okay?" Getting his bearings, Kenji caught site of Maria's Astray. While her suit had lost the arm that normally held weapons, it still had its shield, and Maria was using her CIWS to return fire to the CGUE.
"I'm okay," he said, pushing forward on the throttle and rushing to rejoin the fight. Below Maria, Kenji saw Sara dispatch a GINN with a well-placed beam shot, and then dodge a stream of bullets from the CGUE's shield-mounted Vulcan cannon. Gritting his teeth, Kenji moved up beside Maria, opening fire on the CGUE as she turned her head-mounted Igelstellungs on an approaching GINN. Sara covered them from below, trading fire with the two other GINNs.
"Incoming!" Sara shouted, and Kenji looked up to see four missiles being launched from the Laurasia-class that had fired on him before. The explosives made it about halfway to the Astrays, and then two electron beams from the Archangel's Gottfrieds cut through the volley, destroying it.
The forward Laurasia opened fire with all three dual beam cannons.
"Evade!" Murrue called out. Neumann turned the ship hard to starboard, but one of the beam blasts still struck the Archangel, and the vessel shuddered with the impact. "How's the armor holding up?"
"It's intact," Commander Herikawa said, "but the temperature is up pretty high." He turned his attention back to the CIC, where he addressed Romero Pal next. "Target that ship with the Gottfrieds and return fire!" Four particle beams streaked out from the cannons. The Laurasia-class turned sharply, but two beams still caught its starboard engine, fire spouting from the wrecked thrusters.
"Byron," Murrue called out. "Find out how much progress the shuttle's made."
"Ensign Doolittle, how are you and Athrun doing?" the voice of the parasite operator came over the radio.
"Getting there," Roger said through clenched teeth. The space station was close, a little less than two miles away, but the enemy mobile suits weren't making this easy. No sooner had Roger spoken than the hostiles closed in again. Instincts and training alike screamed at him to dodge the CGUE's beam shot, but instead he threw himself in front of it, taking the blast on his shield to protect the shuttle behind him. Muttering under his breath, Roger cracked off a round from the shoulder cannon, forcing the CGUE to dodge while he fired at the nearest GINN, sending four electron beams at it in quick succession. One beam hit the enemy machine's shield, another took its head off, a third hit the right shoulder and the fourth went through the cockpit. Roger bore a grim smile as the dead mobile suit drifted away, flames leaking from its thruster pack and a smoldering red hole glowing where its cockpit had been.
The three remaining GINNs split up. One flew off to each side, while a third moved under the shuttle.
Son of a bitch!
Roger wrestled with the controls, swinging the Duel Dagger to the left while pointing its right arm and beam rifle to the right. Two missiles streaked from the Dagger's shoulder-mounted launcher toward the GINN on his left, a shot from the beam rifle destroying the one on the right. The GINN targeted by the missiles broke off its attack on the shuttle, retreating as it fired its machine gun at the explosives. Spraying CIWS rounds at the CGUE, Roger fired the Fortrestra thrusters and swept down under the shuttle, where the GINN was aiming its machine gun at the vehicle. Roger shot it through the cockpit, but his alarms went off, and as he spun around, he could see that the last GINN, having destroyed the missiles, was pointing its weapon at him. Above him, the CGUE had locked onto the Duel Dagger with its beam rifle. Even if he blocked one attack, the other would catch him.
The CGUE abruptly jerked back as an incredibly narrow, high-speed electron beam speared its cockpit. The GINN looked around for the source of the shot, and Roger took the opening, firing the grenade launcher beneath his beam rifle. The explosive struck the mobile suit dead center, and fire and shrapnel burst out into space. Roger released the breath he had been holding.
"Thanks for the assist there," he said, tracing the shot back to the cargo vessel. The ship's box-shaped hull, essentially one giant holding bay, had opened at the front, revealing four more M1s and a new machine. This new mobile suit resembled a standard M1, save for the fact that its legs and shoulders bore openings for additional thrusters, and the V-fin on its head was much longer, looking almost like horns. The machine was painted orange and yellow, and it held a beam weapon that resembled a massive sniper rifle more than anything else.
"You're welcome," the sniper said over the com link. "I'll cover you until the shuttle reaches the station. The rest of you, reinforce the other three Astrays."
"Understood, Captain Waltfeld," an unknown voice answered, presumably that of one of the four new Astray pilots. Roger spoke up again.
"Waltfeld…as in Desert Tiger Waltfeld?" he asked.
"Yes," the sniper pilot replied. "Is there a problem?" Roger hesitated for a moment, and then did another facial shrug.
"No," he said. "I'm just having a really weird day."
Cagalli moved back a dozen meters, drawing one of the anti-ship swords as the GuAIZs closed in again.
Initially, three of the six machines had gone after her while the others had attacked the Archangel. After Cagalli destroyed one of them in under a minute, the remaining five decided to focus on the Strike Rouge and let the warships fight it out by themselves.
"Strike Rouge, the shuttle has safely entered the station," Byron said over the cockpit speakers. Knowing that Athrun was safe removed some amount of nervousness from the blonde's mind, and she leaned forward a little as the Advent Faction mobile suits came at her from above and below.
Nice try, but you'll have to do better than that.
Firing the thrusters on the IWSP pack, Cagalli hurled the Rouge back again, moving out of the GuAIZs' line of fire. She targeted one of the two machines at the upper edge of her field of view and fired her railguns. The GuAIZ had been trying for a melee attack; it was simply too close for the pilot to block the supersonic projectiles, and they punched two jagged holes in the mobile suit's cockpit. As the dead mobile suit spun away, Cagalli shifted her focus to one of the lower two opponents, firing her railguns and Gatling gun. The railgun slugs exploded against the shield, twisting the GuAIZ to the right, and the machine gun rounds shredded the mobile suit's armor, cutting its right arm away between the elbow and shoulder joints. Within the Rouge's cockpit, Cagalli bore an almost predatory smile.
"Alright," she said, her com link activated on the off chance the enemy was listening. "Who's next?"
Azathoth
The room was quiet as Athrun and the eight Orb soldiers under his command stepped out of the Archangel shuttle. The room they'd entered after passing through the airlock was about nine meters wide, with four airlock doors counting the one they'd just come through. A set of rails led along the floor from each airlock door, presumably for conveying cargo from the forward hatch featured on both ZAFT and Earth Forces shuttles to the center of the room. Cables ran from the center of the floor up to the ceiling, eight meters above, where the walls featured four more doors. As opposed to the circular airlock doors at floor level, these were rectangular double doors. Currently, there was not a sign of life in the area.
"What do you think, Lieutenant Commander Zala?" one of the soldiers asked. His name was Pearce, an Orb native, and he was always one of the first responders in the case of an emergency on the Archangel. His face was grim as he looked over at Athrun.
"From outside, the station had five rings," Athrun responded, "all spinning around a central axis of rotation. Now there were four spokes connecting each ring to the central shaft, so those four doors above us are probably elevators that run down the 'spokes' and lead to the lowest ring." Athrun pushed off the floor, floating up to the level of the elevator doors, and gave a hand signal for the eight soldiers to follow him. A moment later, the troops settled next to him. "All four of these elevators should lead to the same ring, so it shouldn't matter which door we take." He turned to Pearce. "Can you get it open?"
"Give me one minute," he said, already working at the keypad next to the elevator door.
"Hurry," the emerald-eyed Coordinator replied. "We don't know what's going on outside."
"They're in the halls now," the technician said. On the video screen in front of him was a group of nine men, dressed in jet pack-equipped flight suits and armed with automatic rifles. They were moving quickly, covering each other as they turned corners and opened doors. "Do you want me to send troops down?" From her position beside him, Elizabeth Sanford laughed.
"If I'd wanted you to do that," she said, "I wouldn't have called for Level Ten to be evacuated. No, I have something different in mind. Turn off all the lights on that level and set the ultrasonic tone for Scenario Four." The technician paused for a moment, and then smiled, shaking his head.
"We're using the twenty-fives on them," he said. "I do not envy those Orb soldiers." He went to work, fingers tapping at the keys of his operation console. The last thing he did was to set the station's intercom system to play a tone inaudible to human ears for the next ten seconds. There were twelve such tones, each representing a different scenario Dr. Sanford's deadliest creations had been trained for. Scenario Four was enemy repulsion.
One of Elizabeth's trademark icy smiles crept across her face as she watched the lights go out around the enemy troops.
This will be fun to watch.
"Everybody, form up," Athrun called out. The rest of the team, undoubtedly as unnerved as he had been when the lights suddenly went out, rejoined Athrun quickly. "They know we're here; that's why they cut the power, so we have to move fast."
"I doubt they're keeping your friend on this level," Pearce said. "I take it we should go back to the shuttle docking area and look for some hatch that will let us head for the other rings." Athrun nodded.
"We'll double back to the station's axis of rotation. There'll probably be a way to reach the next ring from there." The group had barely started walking back before Athrun held up a hand, indicating for them to stop.
"What is it?" a member of the rear guard asked. Athrun shook his head, trying to make out what he was hearing. It took only a second to recognize the soft hiss as the sound of a hydraulic door opening, but the sound that followed it was something a little harder to place.
Tick-tick, tick-tick.
"What's going on?" Serena looked up from the notepad she'd been writing on, shifting her attention from Kira's medical data over to Kira himself.
"Someone's attacking the station," she replied, no small amount of fear evident in her voice.
"Who's attacking?" he asked. While he hoped that Athrun, Cagalli, Captain Ramius and Flay were out there, it could just as well be pirates looking to raid for supplies. The medical technician hesitated, which filled Kira with a new sense of urgency.
"Serena," he said, watching her blush as he used her name. "Please, I have to know what's happening." She looked away for a moment, and then assumed a more determined expression.
"I don't know for sure," she said, "but from what I've heard, they're Orb soldiers. I was ordered to gather whatever data I could in case things get dangerous in here." Kira sat up in his bed, looking the girl in the eyes.
"They're here for me," he said. "I know how this sounds, but you have to let me go." Serena took on a pained expression, opening her mouth as if to speak several times before managing to get her statement out.
"But…they just don't understand what we're trying to do here," she said, her expression pleading. Kira stepped off the bed, free of the restraints due mostly to Serena's help. He stepped in close to the medical technician.
"Doctor Sanford might be trying to do something good, but she's going about it all wrong." He stopped, collecting his thoughts before continuing. "You heard about how they tranquilized me to bring me here?" At this Serena's voice took on the pleading quality of her facial expression.
"I didn't want them to do that!" she cried. "They said you wouldn't listen to them and that we had to use force!" Kira winced a little at the volume of the girl's explanation. He didn't want to draw too much attention to them.
"They didn't just tranquilize me," he said in as quiet a voice as possible. "They shot innocent bystanders to cover up their operation. People probably died. Please, Serena, you have to get me out of here." She shook her head, her expression now one of complete shock.
"I…I just…I don't…" she stuttered, her breath coming fast. Finally, she stood up and walked away, leaving the room without saying anything else.
Kira rose to his feet, attempting to follow her out of the room, but stopped upon realizing that the door was locked.
"Shit!" he spat out in frustration, pounding his fist on the door. What was he supposed to do now?
Unbeknownst to Kira, Serena was wrestling with that same question just a few meters down the hall.
I can't just let him go, she thought.
But you have to, you have to.
How do I know he's telling the truth?
He's Kira. He's kind; he's gentle; he's never lied to you or tried to hurt you, even though he probably could.
But they never told me anything about hurting people.
You know how cold Dr. Sanford can be. Does it really sound so impossible?
But…I don't want believe I was helping to do something evil.
You can help to do something good right now.
"I think it's getting closer," Athrun said. The acoustics of the interconnecting hallways made it difficult to tell where the clicking noise was coming from, but he knew it was getting louder.
"Okay," Pearce responded. He wasn't a Coordinator, but he trusted his superior's heightened senses. "I take it we're still heading for the elevator?" Athrun thought for a moment.
"I think that's still our best option," he said quietly.
"What about our flashlights?" Pearce asked, indicating the devices attached to their rifles. Athrun shook his head, although he didn't know whether the team could see it in the darkness.
"They'll help us see better, but it'll give us away in a heartbeat." Without any further discussion, the group started moving.
They were doing their best to avoid the clicking, but in order to go back where they'd come from, they couldn't move directly away from it. They passed several empty rooms, apparently used for storing medical supplies, judging by what little Athrun could see of the writing on the doors. The supply block was separated from a row of large, electronically sealed doors by another hallway, trailing off into the darkness. As they walked past the tenebrous offshoot, the rearmost soldier, a girl named Evin if Athrun remembered correctly, paused, staring off into the blackness.
"What is it?" Pearce asked her, trying to keep his voice low. Evin shook her head, breathing quickly, brown eyes wide.
"I thought I saw something," she said, taking a step toward the dark hall. It was at that moment that Athrun realized he could no longer hear the clicking sound.
"Wait," he said, but Evin disappeared around the corner, into the hall. After a second, there was a single click as her flashlight was turned on, and light washed into the hall intersection.
Pearce muttered an expletive and took a step forward, but froze in place. The light had revealed something back down the hall they were in now, in the direction the team had come from. A grey shape was briefly visible before it backed up and faded into the shadows. All of this happened in the briefest of moments; less than a second after the light came on, Evin screamed.
Even as Athrun and Pearce moved toward the intersection, the soldier's shrill cry was drowned out by a deep, menacing hiss. This wasn't the sound of a mechanical door opening. More than anything else, it reminded Athrun of footage he'd seen of dangerous reptiles from Earth: cobras, Komodo dragons and saltwater crocodiles.
Athrun rounded the corner first, catching sight of Evin. She had been covered with something; her light was shining through some sort of cloak or membrane supported by struts. To Athrun's horror, he realized that there were blood vessels in the membrane, and that the struts were elongated fingers. The flashlight was shining through some sort of bat-like wing. In the instant it took him to realize this, there was a wet ripping sound, and Athrun heard the girl's scream change into a sickening gurgle.
I don't know what you are, he thought as he raised his assault rifle, but I'll bet you're not bulletproof. Athrun squeezed off a three round burst, aiming just above the wing, and was rewarded with the sound of bullets striking flesh, followed by a hissing shriek. The muzzle flare revealed something white, leaping away from what was left of Evin as it cried out in anger. Behind him, Pearce and the other soldiers quickly turned on their flashlights, but the thing had already disappeared into an open doorway.
"Back up, back up!" The soldiers heeded Athrun's command, retreating from the dark hall back into the intersection.
"What the hell was that thing?" Pearce asked. His voice remained low, but it held both confusion and fear, and the soldier's face glistened with sweat. Athrun shook his head.
"That doesn't matter right now," he said. "We have to fall back to the shuttle, and—," he stopped as Pearce's eyes widened.
Tick-tick. The noise came from directly behind Athrun, less than a meter away, and he spun around, turning his flashlight on even as he brought the gun up.
It was right there, a massive white thing at least two meters tall, lips curling back from row upon row of needle teeth. Athrun leaped back a few steps, sheer terror coursing through his veins as he fired at the creature. One round grazed its shoulder before it dropped onto all fours and retreated, a few more bullets striking its back legs before it dove through another open door.
"Start moving," Athrun said as he turned to face the team again. "We have to get—." He had turned just in time to see another of the monsters leaping out of the darkness behind the soldiers. In the blink of an eye, its jaws clamped shut on one man's neck and it pulled him to the ground, and even as he struggled the creature gave a single, vicious shake back and forth. There was a nauseating crack, like a dry tree branch breaking, and the man's limbs went limp. The creature let go of the corpse's broken neck as a rain of bullets fell on it. Pearce and the others sprayed its torso with fire, bullets ripping into the beast even as it rose onto its hind legs, its leathery wings spreading to fill the hall. In the space of a second, Athrun took aim and fired three shots into the thing's misshapen skull. With a keening howl, the monstrosity toppled backward and went still, and Athrun felt some amount of relief wash over him. The things were tough, but they could still die.
"Stay back to back!" Athrun ordered. "Don't give them an opening. We're falling back to the shuttle bay." The team moved quickly now, searching the darkness around them for any sign of movement.
Open Space
Cagalli dodged to the left, the GuAIZ's beam claws sweeping through the vacuum no more than four meters away. She was successfully keeping her melee opponent between one of the other machines and her own, but the third and fourth GuAIZs were moving in from below.
Growling with frustration, Cagalli pointed the Gatling gun at the mobile suits below her and released a fifty round burst, forcing the enemy machines to back off. Her cockpit alarm went off, and she turned in time to see the melee GuAIZ rushing her again.
"Come and get it!" she said, gritting her teeth. This time, she didn't dodge. As the mobile suit attacked, she lashed out with the Rouge's left leg, kicking the enemy's shield out of the way. Releasing a fierce battle cry, Cagalli brought the anti-ship sword down hard. The sharp edge sliced into the GuAIZ's right shoulder, continued down through the cockpit and exited just above the left hip. As the halves of the suit separated, she fired her railguns at the one left in front of her, the impact of the rounds on its shield knocking it back and giving her time to point the Gatling gun at the enemies below her again. The pilots, having seen what happened to three of their companions, were putting as much distance between the Strike Rouge and themselves as possible, and the Lioness of Orb finally had some breathing room.
Several kilometers away, Waltfeld and the Astrays were having a field day with the enemy. Sara Nakamura had destroyed one of the three surviving GINNs attacking her team, and of the remaining two, one had been flanked by the reinforcement M1s and torn to shreds by electron fire. As Cagalli looked, the last one rushed Waltfeld's M1A, firing its heavy assault machine gun. The beam sniper rifle took two hands to operate, so Captain Waltfeld hadn't mounted a shield, which had probably made him look like an easy target to the enemy pilot.
This, needless to say, was wrong. The M1A Astray was built for maximum space maneuverability, and the Tiger moved upwards, evading the automatic fire with ease and swooping in behind the GINN. Before the Advent Faction pilot could react, a sniper beam impaled his mobile suit. The CGUE pilot simply lost it, firing madly at the M1s. Roger's Duel Dagger attacked him from behind, running the enemy MS through with a beam saber.
The three GuAIZs remaining hesitated where they were, uncertain of whether to attack or retreat. At this point, Cagalli could handle either option.
Archangel, Bridge
The Laurasia-class frigates launched another missile volley. The Helldart interceptor missiles rushed out to greet them, and sixteen of the enemy explosives were destroyed. Igelstellung fire destroyed five more, but three made it through, and Flay gripped the armrests of her chair as the bridge shook with the force of the explosions.
"Weapons Bank Four has been hit!" Chandra shouted from the CIC. "We're sealing bulkheads."
"Korinthos; Valiants, fire!" Commander Herikawa commanded. Through the main view port, Flay saw six missiles streak out toward the nearest enemy ship, followed by the yellow flashes of hypervelocity projectiles. The Laurasia's CIWS destroyed the missiles, but the Valiant rounds struck home on the underside of the hull, bright orange explosions bursting forth. The Archangel had dealt severe damage to two of the enemy ships now, leaving one with a damaged engine and the other with gaping wounds in its hull. The third Laurasia-class remained untouched, primarily due to its position on the far side of the station.
The ship with the damaged engine fired its two forward-mounted conventional cannons. Unlike the particle beams, Flay couldn't see the shells as they headed for Archangel, and she tensed, holding her breath.
"Drop the bow thirty degrees!" Captain Ramius called out. "Roll twenty degrees to port!" The ship slanted drastically, but one of the explosive rounds must have still struck the hull somewhere, as the bridge shuddered again. When Murrue spoke again, Flay almost jumped from nerves alone.
"Try to get in touch with Athrun," she said. "I don't want to keep this up any longer than we have to." Flay nodded and hit a few keys on her panel, pressing the earpiece of her headset closer to her ear.
"Athrun," she said. "Athrun, this is the Archangel. Do you copy?" A combination of the space station's walls and the N-jammers on the warships was creating a lot of static, but after a moment Flay could hear the reply.
"I copy," he said. Flay couldn't be sure if it was her imagination or not, but she thought she heard voices shouting on Athrun's end of the radio.
"What's going on in there?" she asked. There was a moment of loud static before the broken reply.
"There's somethi—…here with us; like some…—ind of animal. We…heading…—ack to the shuttle." Flay grew worried at the last statement. She couldn't ask them to stay in a hostile area, but the thought of abandoning Kira after coming all this way was awful. Apparently, Athrun was thinking the same thing.
"Don't worry Flay," he said. "I'm…—ot leaving him; we just need backup." Flay opened her mouth to tell Captain Ramius to send reinforcements, but she was cut off when Jackie Tonomura cried out from the CIC.
"Captain!" he said. "Heat sources are appearing above and below us, bearing Blue zero nine zero degrees and Orange zero seven five degrees relative!" Murrue's chair swiveled around to face them.
"How many?" she asked. Chandra replied.
"There are two of them; thermal profiles match Nazca-class destroyers." Flay inhaled sharply. Her hands shook as she spoke into her headset again.
"Athrun," she said, trying as hard as she could to keep her voice under control, "we can't send backup right now."
Raleigh, Bridge
"What's the status of our mobile suit forces?" Squadron Commander Sabato asked. One of the technicians stammered a reply, alarm clear in his voice.
"We have three GuAIZs left," he said, causing Sabato's eyebrows to rise.
Damn! Well, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised after Jachin.
"Very well then," the commander responded. "It's time to play our hand." For most of the battle, the Raleigh and Robespierre had been dark, with all of their electronics turned off and only life support running, ensuring that they would read as debris on the legged ship's sensors. The objective had been to force the Archangel to show its full strength, leaving no nasty surprises for the two Nazca-class destroyers when they finally moved. It appeared that that had come to pass; it was time to join the fight.
"Send word to the Robespierre," Sabato ordered. "Tell them to have Stanton and his team launch. At the same time, have our mobile suits launch while firing the electron cannons." There was a chorus of affirmatives and the bridge crew began to move.
Azathoth
Kira sat up as his door slid open and Serena reentered the room. The uncertain girl who had left the room some time ago was a far cry from the one who stood in the doorway now. Now she moved with a purpose, leaning back out into the hall to check for other personnel before turning to face Kira again.
"Can you find your way back to Level Ten?" she asked. The question was so unexpected that it took Kira a moment to answer.
"Yes," he finally managed. "I think so." Serena nodded, reaching into her pocket and withdrawing a small metal device several centimeters long, attached to a lanyard.
"Put this on," she said, placing the device in Kira's hand. "From what I heard, some soldiers got into the station, so Doctor Sanford might have the Eviscerators out; this will keep you safe."
"What is it?" he asked.
"From time to time, the Eviscerators are let out of their pen so they can familiarize themselves with the station," she said. "When they're out, we all have to wear these. The device is an ultrasonic tag that identifies you as an ally; the Eviscerators have been trained not to attack anybody wearing one." Kira briefly thought back to the creatures he had been trapped in the darkened room with, and placed the lanyard around his neck. As he got up, Serena handed him a card. He gave her a questioning look.
"It's for the lock on this door," she said, pointing to the only way in or out of his room. "When you get out, lock me in here." Kira nodded, opening the door and stepping out. "Kira?" she asked just before he could close the portal.
"Yes?" he replied. She looked away briefly, her cheeks flushing bright red.
"Be careful," she finally said, causing Kira to smile.
"I will," he said, before shutting her in and sliding the card she had given him through the reader beside the door. A light above the reader changed from green to red, signifying that the door was locked.
With a final glance back, Kira turned and started down the route he had taken during his escape attempt.
Open Space
In spite of the circumstances, Commander Stanton was in a good mood. The last time he had flown a sortie against the Archangel, he had been working with five people whose capabilities, loyalty and even names had been unknown to him. There had been only one ship to provide support and they had all been facing an enemy they had never met before.
Now, however, things were different. There were five ships backing his team. Lia and Alex had obtained some experience fighting the legged ship's pilots and analyzing their tactics. Most importantly, however, Stanton had his team with him. Lia was a skilled warrior, but she was even deadlier with the Amigos backing her.
"Well, well, well," Allen Rodriguez mused from his position behind Stanton. "We stay out of the battle and the whole thing turns into one giant shit storm." Stanton heard Virgil Hawke respond with a derisive snort.
"One man's shit storm is another man's opportunity," Hawke said. "It just means more targets for me."
"Same here," a third voice replied. A few dozen meters below him, Alex saw Joseph Masterson extending his GuAIZ's beam claws. "I've been sitting on my ass for way too long. I've got a lot of catching up to do." Rodriguez laughed a little.
"Yeah, it's time to see how well those Orb suits burn," he said, hefting his custom made Hellfire cannon. "Let's do this!" Stanton gave a half-smile.
"Judging by how the battle's gone so far, it doesn't look like Zala's here," he said, "so I'll work with some of the Meyers team on Commodore Athha. Lia, you and the rest of Meyers's boys take the M1s and then make your move on the legged ship."
"What about us?" Hawke asked.
"There are a lot of Orb mobile suits out there," Stanton replied. "Have fun."
"Damn," Roger heard Sara mutter. "We've got more hostiles incoming." He turned his mobile suit's head to look in the direction Sara's Astray was facing, catching sight of seven GuAIZs coming in fast. One in particular stood out, as it was carrying a long weapon that looked somewhat like the old Barrus heavy ion cannon the GINNs used to use, save for a larger reservoir at the back and a wider muzzle. Roger moved to target it, but he was interrupted.
"Well, it looks like the Orb soldiers brought their Earth Forces dog with them again," a familiar female voice came over the radio.
"I take it this is the pilot who pulled that clever little stunt with the solar panels," Roger said.
"Care for a rematch?" the enemy pilot asked playfully.
"I wouldn't mind," Roger answered. Without any further discussion, he opened fire with the shoulder cannon and loosed two more missiles. The GuAIZ took the cannon shot on its shield, the explosion pushing it back nearly a hundred feet. As the missiles approached, the machine darted away, firing its CIWS.
"Is that the best you can do?" the pilot asked. Roger laughed.
"Oh, I'm just getting started." As he moved toward the GuAIZ, he saw three other ZAFT-made suits break formation, moving away from the group and attempting to flank the Astrays while the remaining three provided cover fire.
The missiles detonated, destroyed by controlled bursts of machine gun fire, and the GuAIZ came flying through the dissipating fireball, beam claws extended. Roger quickly stowed his rifle and drew one of the Dagger's beam sabers, crossing blades with his newfound rival even as the undamaged Laurasia-class ship opened fire with its beam cannons, sending six lethal electron bolts at the Astrays.
Azathoth
Athrun sprayed the hallway with another burst of automatic fire, forcing the creature to duck around a corner, leaking blood from several bullet wounds. The albino monstrosities had been following the soldiers as they'd made their way to the shuttle, and while they hadn't killed anyone else, Athrun, Pearce and the others hadn't been able to bring any of them down either. The things were extremely resilient, and they didn't seem to feel pain either.
"We're almost there," Pearce said, pointing at the metal doors just down the hall from them. "Once we get into the freight elevator, those bastards won't be able to follow us. What's going on with the reinforcements?" Athrun shook his head.
"I'm not sure," he admitted, "but the Archangel's having problems of its own out there." As he finished talking, Athrun heard a bizarre popping noise, followed by a metallic clang as something hit the floor.
"What was that?" Pearce asked.
"I don't know," Athrun replied, "but it isn't good." If there was one thing he had learned since the start of the fight, it was that these creatures, whatever they were, learned fast. Athrun had noticed that they didn't just rush in blindly. Normally, the things remained out of the line of fire, but whenever an empty magazine hit the floor, they would charge, apparently recognizing the sound as a sign that the soldiers were unable to defend themselves for a brief moment. Whatever they had just dropped on the floor, it probably meant that they were up to something, and Athrun didn't plan on sticking around to find out.
Covering each other, the team passed the final hall intersection, arriving safely at the elevator.
Nothing sprang from the shadows; nothing came up behind them.
Somehow, that only made Athrun more uncomfortable.
Kira stumbled again, tripping over something heavy on the floor. It was the second time this had happened, and he was working very hard to ignore the fact that the objects were warm, soft and about the size of a human body.
He'd heard gunfire as he made his way through Level Ten, and a few moments ago, Kira could have sworn he'd seen flashlight beams sweeping through the hall he was in.
It had crossed his mind several times that he should have called out.
But gunfire wasn't the only thing Kira had heard. He had also noticed the hissing shrieks, low growling and the unmistakable tapping of claws on metal. Serena had told him that the ultrasonic tag would protect him if one of the Eviscerators came after him, but he didn't know just how well the creatures were trained. If they were really bent on killing, they might not recognize the protective device until it was too late.
A sudden, metallic noise startled him. The distorted acoustics in the station made it impossible for Kira to tell exactly where it had originated, but as he focused on the sound, he heard something that made him forget about the creatures completely.
"What was that?" an unfamiliar voice asked.
"I don't know, but it isn't good."
Athrun.
The team was close enough that he could hear them even at their relatively low volume. The knowledge that they were so close, and that Athrun was with them, was enough to override any fear of the Eviscerators.
"Athrun!" he called out, moving with a purpose as he tried to focus on where the voices had come from.
"Kira!" the reply came from around the next corner, and as Kira made the turn he finally saw his friend, along with a group of six other armed men and women. They were standing at a large set of metal doors, just past an intersection between the hallway Kira was in and two others. The brunette couldn't keep his face from breaking into a grin as he started off toward the group.
"You have no idea how glad I am to see you," he said, prompting Athrun to laugh.
"Yeah, well, we've been having issues of our own in—," Athrun stopped, his face contorting with fear. Kira heard a sound from above him, almost like thunder, and he thought for a moment that the noise was the source of Athrun's worry, but then he saw movement off to his side as he reached the intersection.
A piece of the darkness in the left hallway detached itself and sprang out in front of him: a hulking shape silhouetted in the illumination from the soldiers' flashlights. It was easily bigger than Kira, crouching down on four legs, needle teeth gleaming in the dim light. Some serpentine appendage, a tentacle or tail, lashed out and struck Kira in the chest, the force of the blow knocking him over. A heavy, clawed hand was placed on his chest, pinning him to the ground, and a gust of fetid breath blew into Kira's face as saliva dripped from the creature's open jaws onto his forehead.
"Shoot it!" someone cried.
"Don't, you'll hit Kira!" Athrun warned. Bullets, however, were unnecessary. The jaws hanging above Kira's face swung shut, lips sliding closed over the teeth, and the creature lifted its claw off of him with a dismissive, hissing grunt. As quickly as it had appeared, the Eviscerator vanished back into the darkened hallway, and Kira suddenly remembered the ultrasonic tag he was wearing.
Thank you, Serena!
Wasting no time, he got to his feet and ran to join Athrun and the others. As he reached them, he heard the thunder-like noise again, this time directly above them.
"I've got it!" an older man with grey hair and a light tan said, a triumphant grin on his face. Just in front of them, the metal doors slid open. The noise reverberated through the hall again.
"What is that?" Kira asked. Athrun shook his head, frowning.
"Sounds like sheet metal being bent or something," the older fellow said, looking up at the ventilation shaft above them. Kira suddenly remembered the first sound he had heard: the pop and clang. He realized with no small amount of fear that a vent covering being pulled loose from its fittings and tossed to the floor would have produced a sound very much like that.
"They're in the—," he began, but was cut off by another demonic shriek. The vent cover above them popped loose and fell to the floor, and a white arm reached down and grabbed the older man. Two fingers and an opposable thumb, tipped with scythe-like claws seven or eight centimeters long, seized the soldier by the face, and he was hauled bodily into the air.
"Pearce!" Athrun cried, rushing forward. Several soldiers tried to grab Pearce's legs, but he was pulled up into the ventilation shaft and out of sight. There was a thick cutting sound and the man's screams stopped abruptly. Athrun cried out in anger, firing a burst of automatic rounds into the vent, and eliciting an angry shriek from the Eviscerator above. The thunderous sound of metal bending with the creature's shifting weight became audible again, moving away from them this time.
"Damn it!" Athrun shouted, slamming a fist against the near wall. There was a moment of silence while everyone dealt with the loss of another teammate. Kira didn't say anything; he didn't feel that he had the right to interrupt them. Finally, Athrun spoke again.
"We're getting out of this Hellhole, now."
Open Space
Roger Doolittle muttered a string of obscenities as he brought his mobile suit's shield up. The GuAIZ's beam claws crashed against the barrier, the shock of the impact jolting through the Duel Dagger's cockpit. Pushing back, the Earth Forces pilot brought the suit's right arm around and pointed the beam rifle at the GuAIZ's head. The olive-colored machine pulled its head to the side, avoiding the shot, and then planted its left foot on the Dagger's shield and pushed off.
"Why are you guys doing this?" Roger asked, growing a little frustrated. He brought up his shield and blocked a shot from his foe's beam rifle.
"We're doing this because Naturals are a threat," she said, "especially people like you." Roger groaned.
"You mean people in the Alliance," he said.
"You conquer other countries and kill other Naturals just so you can have the resources to kill Coordinators," she said. "You may have somehow managed to mix a few good people in, but by and large you're vermin, capable only of hatred and deserving of nothing but death." Roger paused for a moment, incredulous.
"Holy shit," he said. "You know, Missy, not all the people in the Alliance are like that. There's a lot more good men and women mixed in there than you seem to think."
"Then what about the Mandelbrot Incident, the Copernicus bombing, the Bloody Valentine and the Cyclops at Alaska?" the Advent Faction pilot asked, raising her voice with each atrocity she listed. Roger silently hoped Azrael was burning in Hell right now.
"Come on! That was Blue Cosmos!" Roger shot back, firing his beam rifle and shoulder cannon simultaneously. It had worked on the GINNs: they'd dodge one shot and get hit by the other. This pilot, however, was a good deal cleverer, and she fired the GuAIZ's thrusters and launched herself upward, evading the explosive round and the particle beam.
"You can't escape responsibility," she said. "Blue Cosmos is the Alliance, and that means you worked for the butchers that committed those crimes. You're an accomplice to mass murder."
"Oh, for God's sake, it's not like the Bloody Valentine was me personally!" Roger shouted back.
"Personal? You want to talk personal?" the enemy spat. "You people murdered my friends when you attacked Victoria, and you cost me the best man I've ever known when you took Gibraltar!" Roger opened his mouth to protest, and then shut it as he remembered that he had destroyed quite a few ZAFT mobile suits at Gibraltar. He performed another facial shrug.
"Actually," he said, the faintest hint of amusement in his voice, "that last one really might have been me personally." The enemy pilot hissed in anger, probably through clenched teeth if the sound of it was anything to go by.
"You soulless Earth Forces bastard!" she shouted, extending the GuAIZ's beam claws and rushing forward. Roger lowered the Duel Dagger's electron rifle, moving to stow it and draw a beam saber, but as soon as she saw him lower the weapon, the Advent Faction pilot raised her own beam rifle and sent an electron stream tearing through Roger's weapon. The shot blew the Dagger's beam rifle apart, and Roger swore and tossed the useless handle away, drawing a saber as the GuAIZ slashed at him with its beam claws. The Earth Forces pilot tilted his mobile suit hard to the left, but the claws still sliced away the cannon and Fortrestra thruster on the Dagger's right shoulder.
Swearing profusely, Roger backed away and lashed out with the beam saber. The GuAIZ fired its thrusters and backed off perhaps seventy feet, dodging the attack. The ZAFT-built machine spread its arms and launched the two extensional arrestors. While the claws were essentially the same grappling weapon used by the Sword Striker pack, Roger realized that the ZAFT designers must have added a magnetic generator and plasma emitters to the design, as red beam blades sprang into existence inside the claws. While he managed to stop one arrestor with his shield, the other struck the already damaged shoulder, cleanly slicing the Dagger's right arm off.
"Come on!" Roger cried out in frustration, firing his CIWS and opening the missile launcher. The enemy, however, must have anticipated the move, as she fired a precise beam rifle shot while retracting the arrestors. The electron beam struck the missile launcher dead center, and the resulting explosion destroyed the Duel Dagger's head and some of its upper torso, spraying shrapnel into the cockpit. Roger instinctively shielded himself with his arms, crying out in pain as several jagged pieces of metal tore into his left arm and side.
Things weren't going well for the other combatants either.
At first glance, it had appeared that the Archangel's complement of mobile suits would be more than sufficient to handle the twelve machines the Advent faction had released as its second wave, along with the three survivors of the force that had attacked Cagalli. The eight M1s and Captain Waltfeld's M1A, along with Roger's Duel Dagger and the Strike Rouge, were a formidable force, and it looked as though the fifteen GuAIZs were sorely outmatched in spite of their numerical advantage.
Such an initial analysis, however, would have been wrong.
Almost as soon as the fighting restarted, things began to go wrong for the Orb forces. The one undamaged Laurasia-class had moved forward and had begun firing into the midst of the Astrays with its dual beam cannons. While the suits were maneuverable enough to evade the particle beams, they were forced to break formation, which was exactly what the GuAIZ team had been waiting for.
Five machines, led by the distinctively marked command unit, had joined the three engaging Cagalli and had swarmed the Rouge, keeping it isolated from the rest of the fighting. The other seven had attacked the Astrays and Dagger. While Roger Doolittle and Lia Cromwell had spun off into their own vicious duel, the Amigos had broken away from the other three GuAIZs, flanking the Astrays.
All Hell broke loose.
Virgil Hawke opened fire with his beam rifle, shooting three or four times at one of the M1s at the edge of the group. The orange mobile suit brought up its shield and blocked the beam shots, and as such the pilot never saw Allen Rodriguez as he moved into position behind it, a tactic he'd practiced with Hawke many times before.
"Bye-bye!" he shouted, locking on with the Hellfire. A stream of red-white plasma, sheathed in arcing electricity, surged from the barrel of the cannon and hit the Astray in the back. The cockpit and chest superheated and sublimated violently, flashing into an orange cloud of vaporized metal as the plasma beam continued through and struck another M1 in the shoulder, vaporizing the joint and blowing apart half of the chest. The fatally damaged machine twisted in space for a moment before its energy battery overcharged and it exploded.
A third Astray leveled its beam rifle at Rodriguez, only to have the metal claws of an EEQ7R extensional arrestor plunge into its face, shattering the optics and embedding themselves into the head. At the other end of the cable, Joseph Masterson reeled the tether in and pulled his GuAIZ up to the M1 in short order. The second he reached melee range, Masterson stabbed his beam claws through the Orb suit's cockpit. He darted away in time to escape a vengeful beam shot from another Orb mobile suit.
Waltfeld opened fire with the M1A's rifle, the sniper blast tearing through one of the three GuAIZs still holding formation, and Kenji Tiran attacked a second with his beam saber, slashing downward through the Advent Faction suit's torso. A fourth Astray got caught between Rodriguez and Hawke. Having seen the lethality of the Hellfire, the Orb pilot blocked the plasma beam with his shield, only to have a precise shot from Hawke's beam rifle drill through his cockpit.
Two GuAIZs had been felled, at the cost of four M1s.
Cagalli growled in frustration as the snake-tattooed command suit got in her way again, firing its arrestors at her. The beam blades sprang into being as the claws reached the Strike Rouge, but Cagalli managed to bring the combined shield up in time, and the shield's magnetic field repelled those of the beam blades, causing the arrestors to bounce away harmlessly. As the command suit retracted the arrestors, Cagalli rushed it with the anti-ship sword, firing her railguns at another GuAIZ as she did so. The grunt suit was destroyed, but the command unit blocked the sword with its shield, firing its beam rifle as it pulled away from her. Cagalli took the particle beam on her shield, and then her cockpit alarm went off again, and she barely avoided another beam shot from behind her. She dodged two more shots, one from below her and one from somewhere above. Even as she readied to fire her railguns at another enemy, the command GuAIZ came straight at her, beam claws extended. She dodged the swing and returned the attack with her sword, which her enemy took on his shield.
"Well, Athha," the enemy pilot said over her radio, "you certainly don't disappoint." The GuAIZ's mono-eye sensor slid over to look at the other Advent Faction units. "Reynolds, Ishida and Dobson, you three head over and take the remaining M1s. Rodriguez, Hawke and Masterson, you've done enough damage over there; come say hello to the commodore."
I'll teach you to take your attention off me.
Cagalli slammed on the controls, causing the Rouge to head-butt the command GuAIZ. As the enemy mobile suit lurched back, she aimed the railguns at it.
Just before she could fire, however, her cockpit alarm went off. She twisted the Rouge enough to avoid being hit in the cockpit, but the electron beam blew away part of the IWSP module's right wing. Turning, Cagalli caught sight of three new GuAIZs entering the fight as the three others left. One member of the new trio held its beam rifle steady, having just taken the shot she barely avoided. The second had its beam claws extended, and the third held some sort of massive cannon.
"Alright, boys!" a new voice came over the speakers, presumably one of the pilots from the trio. "Looks like we've got ourselves a G-weapon kill!" Cagalli fired her Gatling gun, but the three new GuAIZs dodged the bullets, and she was forced to dedicate her energy to dodging as electron beams came at her from three separate directions. During one of her evasions, she got a glimpse of the shuttle. It had left the station and was now about halfway to the Archangel. The ship was doing its best to hold its position for the shuttle, but beam fire from multiple enemies was forcing Murrue to move her vessel quite a bit.
Cagalli's attention refocused as several beam shots came her way. She launched upward, evading the electron fire, pulled the Midas Messer off of the shield and hurled it at the command suit. Before the beam boomerang could reach the enemy, a precise electron shot speared and destroyed it.
"Nice shot, Hawke," Cagalli recognized the voice of the commander. Another cockpit alarm went off, and as she turned in the indicated direction, a beam from the one GuAIZ's massive cannon came straight at her. Cagalli brought the shield up, and the Rouge shuddered with kinetic force as the plasma beam crashed against the defensive item. She aimed the Gatling gun at the cannon wielder, but when she pulled the trigger, the multi-barreled weapon wouldn't spin. Looking at it, Cagalli now realized that the back end of the gun had warped from the heat of the plasma attack; the machine was no longer functional. At the moment she realized that, an alert screen popped up on the CIS, warning her that her shield had reached its Curie point. The plasma beam had superheated the anti-beam coating, causing it to lose its protective magnetic field.
"Damn," she hissed, twisting her machine to avoid more beam fire. The command GuAIZ made a run at her, extending its beam claws. Cagalli blocked the attack with her anti-ship sword, only to have another cockpit alarm activate. She fired the upper thrusters, dropping down far enough that the GuAIZ attacking from behind didn't cut her in half. Rather, the beam claws sliced through her railguns.
Jetting downward even further, Cagalli broke away from her attackers, gaining enough breathing room for a quick check on the rest of the battle.
Judging by the IFF tags, Kenji, Sara and Maria were all okay, but the four reinforcement M1s had all been destroyed. Waltfeld was giving the Advent faction pilots fits with his M1A, darting around faster than they could keep up with him. As for Roger, he was…
Oh, no.
The Duel Dagger had been severely damaged. The cockpit hadn't been destroyed, but the head and arms were missing and the mobile suit's upper chest had been damaged. Cagalli hit her com button, switching back to a coded transmission her allies would hear but her enemies wouldn't.
"Ensign Doolittle, Roger, are you okay?" There was a burst of static, followed by a reply.
"Well, I…—een better." Cagalli sighed with relief. She ducked away from another beam shot and opened fire with her CIWS. The rounds struck the command GuAIZ's shield and it backed off. As she traced its movement, Cagalli noticed one of the other GuAIZs turning away from her, changing its target.
With no small amount of horror, she saw that the stray machine was approaching the shuttle.
Throttling forward, Cagalli was forced to stop as the GuAIZ holding the plasma cannon suddenly appeared in front of her, leveling its weapon at the Rouge.
"No you don't!" the voice of the enemy came through the speakers.
"That's our subject, thank you very much," the snake-tattooed machine came into view, followed by the other five suits. Cagalli would lose time fighting them, time she needed to get to the shuttle. She didn't know whether they would capture the shuttle to get Kira or destroy it just to keep him from escaping. Either way meant death or suffering for her brother and for Athrun. The Gundam pilot's mind filled with a plethora of emotions: love for the brother who had supported her when she'd lost her father, appreciation for the boyfriend she so often took for granted, fear that she could lose them both right now, and hatred for those who would take them from her.
Behind Cagalli's eyes, a golden seed exploded.
Hands flying across the controls, she threw the Rouge's useless shield at the cannon-carrying mobile suit. The pilot was caught completely off guard and the shield slammed into his machine, sending him tumbling through space. As the first enemy reeled from the shield attack, Cagalli used the now empty left hand to draw the other anti-ship sword. Another GuAIZ made a run at her, and Cagalli rammed both nine meter blades through its cockpit. She pulled as hard to the right as possible, hurling the dead machine off of her swords and sending it crashing into another GuAIZ at high speed. Before the surviving mobile suit could disentangle itself, Cagalli opened up with the Rouge's head Vulcans and riddled it with 76mm rounds.
The command GuAIZ came straight at her, beam rifle firing. Cagalli dodged the electron streams and fired the Vulcans again. Most of the rounds impacted harmlessly against the enemy machine's shield, but a cluster of them took out its right shoulder thruster. The commander narrowly escaped death, firing his remaining thrusters and retreating just fast enough to avoid the Rouge's sword strikes. Ignoring him for now, Cagalli accelerated to maximum velocity and closed in on the suit targeting the shuttle.
The pilot didn't see the Rouge until it was only thirty meters away, and by then it was far too late. The GuAIZ began to bring its beam rifle to bear, but Cagalli was faster. Her left sword cut away the arm holding the rifle, and she swung the right blade through a lateral arc, cutting the mobile suit in half.
Archangel/Raleigh, Bridge
"Captain," Byron called out, "the shuttle has docked successfully. Commodore Athha has retrieved Ensign Doolittle and is on her way back." Murrue heard sighs of relief from several members of the bridge crew, and when she looked back she caught Flay very nearly laughing, overjoyed at the news. The captain turned back to face the forward view screens.
"Recall the M1 team," she said, and Byron hesitated. "What is it?"
"What do I tell Captain Waltfeld?" he asked. "We had to tell the supply ship to retreat."
"Tell him to head to this ship. We have room."
"Squadron Commander," one of the technicians called out. "The enemy ship is withdrawing its mobile suits." Sabato's brow furrowed.
"What's the status of our mobile suit forces?" The parasite operator spoke into his headset for a moment.
"Sir, Commander Stanton and his team are alright, but the Meyers team has taken heavy losses. They're requesting permission to withdraw to the Tesla." Sabato nodded, granting permission.
"Tell Stanton and his men to do whatever they can, and get Doctor Sanford on the line. I want to know what the situation is in there."
"All mobile suits have returned." Murrue nodded.
"Alright," she said. "We're getting out of here. Neumann, drop the bow by forty-five degrees and get us maximum thrust."
"One of the Nazca-classes is in our way if we use that trajectory," Commander Herikawa said. "It won't be easy to get around it." Murrue gave him a grim smile.
"Then it's good that we're not going around it." She paused for a moment, satisfied when the commander displayed a truly diabolical grin.
"Aye, Captain," he said, and then turned to address Pal. "Bring both Lohengrins online. Drop proton shielding and set beams for maximum cancellation."
"Sir, we're detecting measured irradiation being directed at the Robespierre."
"Very well," Sabato said. "Aim our main cannons and railguns at the legged ship and prepare a missile barrage. We'll hit them with everything—." He was cut off as two massive beams launched from the Archangel's "legs". Red-white and sheathed in electricity, their appearance didn't distinguish them from any other heavy ion beam or plasma weapon. But Sabato was familiar with the legged ship, and he knew that only one weapons system on that ship looked like that: the positron cannons.
The Robespierre yawed hard to port and accelerated, and one of the antimatter beams went wide, burning its way through the omnipresent debris as it streaked off into the distance. The other shot, however, struck the Nazca about ten meters behind the bridge.
The impact point flashed into a massive, searing white fireball, and the entire vessel warped as the shockwave crashed through it, smashing bulkheads and tearing open hull breach after hull breach. The positron beam continued burrowing into the hull, annihilating more and more matter and releasing a rapidly expanding wedge of flame and blast force. The Robespierre's bridge burst, squirting air, fire and shattered glass into the vacuum. The central thrusters at the stern coughed up exhaust and vaporized metal before tearing apart, and no more than a second after the beam struck, the entire hull swelled outward and tore apart at the seams, masses of violet fire erupting hundreds of meters into space as what was left of the bow and engine pods were hurled away at high speed.
The legged ship flew directly through the explosion, picking up speed as it did so, and quickly began to grow smaller with distance.
For a few moments, everyone on the Raleigh's bridge was left in stunned silence. While they had all inflicted damage on their enemies during the war, it couldn't prepare them for seeing an entire ship destroyed so quickly. After a moment, one of the technicians spoke up.
"Do we follow them, Sir?" Squadron Commander Sabato clenched his jaw. He would see that ship reduced to scrap metal, but as of now, the Tesla and the Raleigh were the only undamaged ships they had. At the moment, they needed to get their bearings.
"Not yet," he finally answered. Sabato picked up the handset on his chair and had the communications officer connect him to Azathoth. After a moment, he got an answer from an unnerved technician. "Calm yourself," he said. "What's the status of the subject?" Sabato's eyes widened as he received a brief summary of events. "How did that happen?"
Azathoth
"He overpowered you, locked you in this room and escaped?" Dr. Sanford asked. She and Squadron Commander Sabato were now standing in the room that had been used to house Kira, debriefing Serena on the details of the teen's escape.
"That's what happened," Serena said, looking away from her superiors. She wanted it to look like she had been through something traumatic, so she figured she'd just stare into space while describing the "ordeal".
Sabato swore and turned away for a moment, walking toward the door. He stopped just short of walking out into the hallway.
"Wasn't he restrained?" the commander asked, and Sanford looked back at the young medical technician. Serena grimaced.
"I thought he'd be more cooperative if he was allowed more freedom," she said, trying to add just the slightest hint of regret into her voice. "I'm sorry." Sabato exhaled slowly, rubbing his forehead as though he had a migraine.
"When we get him back, I want him restrained at all times, is that understood?" Sanford nodded, and Serena mumbled an affirmative. The military officer walked out of the room.
After a moment, Serena looked up and noticed that Dr. Sanford was still there, looking at her curiously.
"Since I utilized the Eviscerators during the attack," the older woman said, "I felt it prudent to dust off the equipment for working with them." She folded her hands behind her back and stepped just a little closer to Serena. "I noticed that we're missing one of the ultrasonic identifier tags." Serena hesitated for a second.
"I guess he must have taken it after he escaped," she said. Sanford looked right at her, and Serena suddenly understood the rumors about the doctor's unnerving stares. It was exactly like what others had described. Sanford's piercing red eyes seemed to be able to see right through her, stripping away her carefully crafted deception with frightening ease.
"How very clever of him," the scientist said slowly and quietly, and then, finally, she left Serena alone in the room.
Archangel, Crew Quarters
The alert had finally been dropped, and Kira was allowed out of the hangar. They had put a good distance between themselves and the surviving Advent Faction ships and mobile suits, but they couldn't be certain of not being pursued.
Athrun had been wary of leaving Kira, asking several times if the brunette was sure that he was okay. Kira had assured Athrun that he was unharmed, and had finally been allowed to return to his quarters.
As he reached the hall that led to his room, Kira began to feel the full effect of his ordeal. During his run through the darkened tunnels, during the harrowing shuttle ride through the battle zone and during the following time waiting in the hangar while the Archangel made its escape, he had been on a sort of adrenaline rush, able to ignore the effort he was putting forth. Now, in the absence of any danger, exhaustion hit Kira hard, and he felt his legs getting heavier, causing him to slump against the wall.
He was beginning to think that it would be okay to just sit down, back to the wall, and fall asleep, when he heard soft footsteps coming toward him. Following the sound, Kira looked up, and there she was, one fist held over her heart, her eyes brimming with tears, a disbelieving smile on her face.
"Flay," he said, the relief at her safety crystal clear in his voice. Without a word, she ran to him and wrapped her arms around him, and Kira lost himself in the warmth of her embrace, her natural scent, and the feel of her warm, soft lips pressing against his.
Author's Note: Well, I know it took me quite a while to get this to you, but this is a major chapter and I didn't want to rush it. Hopefully, it's worth the wait.
Flay's thoughts on meeting Lacus are part of what her inner conflict is in this story. She has to deal with a lot of guilt over her actions during SEED. Specifically, that thought comes from my many arguments with Flay's anti-fan club. The most common thing I hear is that her repentance and redemption were too little, too late, and that she shouldn't be forgiven so easily, if at all. I wondered what it would be like if Flay ever felt that way about herself.
As to Kenji's remarks about Lacus, that was done purely for humor. Don't worry, I'm not going for a Kenji x Lacus pairing.
Something you may also notice about this chapter (although I've done it all through this story and in Second Chance) is that I'll switch back and forth between feet and meters. This is not a slip of the mind. The only two people who see things in feet and inches are Roger and Flay, both of whom come from the Atlantic Federation. While the EA seems to have adopted the metric system, I figured that average people might still use feet and inches out of habit. Kira, Athrun, Cagalli, etc. all use the metric system in their descriptions.
As for the Eviscerators, I have a very specific scene planned where we'll get to see just what they look like, but until that time comes I want to keep them in the shadows, and I hope that didn't hurt the battle scene too much.
Finally, two technical terms used in this chapter. The Curie point is a real thing. When ferromagnetic materials (like many metals) reach a certain temperature (their Curie point), they lose their magnetism. I figured that anti-beam coating had this quality because of something in Phase-49. Shani Andras fires his plasma cannon at the Duel. The first shot scatters off the Duel's shield, as expected, but the second shot causes the shield to explode. I figured that the first shot, while it was deflected, heated the anti-beam coating to its Curie point. Without its magnetic field, the next shot hit the shield full on, destroying it.
The second term was proton shielding. Firing a beam of antimatter into air is a bad idea, seeing as it's probably going to cause an explosion. Stormturmoil came up with the idea of surrounding the positrons with a shell of protons. Since they have the same charge as the positrons, the two repel each other and therefore don't cause an explosion, and the protons keep air from hitting the positrons. Because the protons have much greater mass, they hold the positrons in check, rather than the positrons pushing them away. The end of the proton tube would remain open, so that the positrons could cancel out some of their target and cause an explosion. Since you don't need the proton shielding in the vacuum of space, I figured the Archangel and similar ships like the Minerva might have the ability to drop their proton shielding in space, which would leave more of the beam's surface area available for matter-antimatter cancellation.