Chapter 3

Gilbert Durandal spent the better part of his day out of the public eye, his injuries healing as he sat calmly as he could at his desk, reading files and reports about Shinn Asuka's escape, pondering his next move. He could let him run for now, have another unit go after him, regain his focus on stopping the War once and for all.

Regain the mask…don't let your enemies see your cracks… Gilbert Durandal thought as he took a few deep breaths before taking a small package of syrettes he kept in his desk. His hands felt shaky and his thoughts were clouded, it had been awhile since he had taken a proper dosage. In his early days, Durandal was a geneticist working for the betterment of Mankind and Coordinators, but accidents would happen during an experiment that did some neural damage via a viral test that effected his mental and physical state. Looking at the container, he noticed he was running low.

I will need to travel to the PLANTs…work on the Destiny Plan… There was a beep at the door. Durandal gave himself a dose in the arm before taking a drink of scotch.

"Enter." He said. Rey Za Burrel entered as soon as the door opened, he eyed the room and studied where some of the action went down.

"Chairman Durandal, I wanted to apologize for my failure to bring Shinn down-" Rey began but was interrupted by a single finger held up by the Chairman as he sat. His movements became a lot more relaxed, and less shaky, taking a deep breath he turned to look at Rey, the calm demeanor returning to him as the pills took their needed effect.

"Rey, please sit. I don't blame you for what happened. Frankly, the only ones here to blame is Shinn. But from what you wrote in your After-Action report, you said that Pilot Lunamaria Hawke went AWOL with Shinn?"

"That's right sir. She tried to get in the way of the shot, I tried to shoot her down as well." Durandal saw that there was some discomfort in the idea of Lunamaria getting in the way, along side all the confusion that fell on Rey's features. Bringing Rey closer into the fold took some crafty work on his part, and the next part would have to be careful. He didn't want another person going off and AWOL.

"You honestly did what you had to do, you did what was right and you tried to shoot her down from stopping you from shooting Shinn down." Rey glanced up as the Chairman spoke, a thoughtful expression from Rey as he was thinking his next words.

"Are you okay though, Chairman? Shinn did hit you pretty hard."

"I'll be fine and okay. I was perturbed that the capture team moved slow on the grab, I would have reprimanded them, but Shinn terminated them. That's a mistake I do not intend to make again."

"What do you have planned for Shinn and Lunamaria, anyways?"

"I'll send another team after them, Special Forces. But I need you as my number two, we're rotating pilots out of the Minerva after Operation Ragnarok, I need you to take the lead on the attack with our Mobile Suit teams to crush LOGOS at their Heaven's Base with the Legend Gundam. If all goes according to plan, the War should be all but won for us." Durandal explained "Then, we initiate the beginning stages of the Destiny Plan."

"What exactly is The Destiny Plan, sir?" Rey inquired, but Durandal had a smile about him as he looked at Rey.

"You will know in time."

Arriving in Edinburgh, Shinn and Lunamaria ditched the car the first opportunity they could. Luna hid the Python in her uniform coat as they walked through the city streets, her thoughts going back over everything she knew and back to Athrun's defection. At first, she was in a bit of a mindset of Athrun being a rat or a mole, but getting to know him over the year, it made her rethink somethings about him, thinking maybe she had him wrong from the get-go.

Then again, he could have played us all like a damn fiddle. Oh, Christ what the hell am I doing here? Lunamaria looked at Shinn who had a bit of a blank expression on his face as they walked towards the dock area. She worried about him, about where he was mentally right now. After just having so much shit and muck thrown at him, there was a perpetual fear in Luna now that this was going to end with Shinn getting killed. Going along with an idea and a plan like his, killing Durandal, was suicide. She didn't want to leave Shinn alone out here however, he was her partner and squadmate.

I must know what's truth in all of this. I'm in it now…

"We're here." He said as he came to a stop, Shinn looked at the area from an observation post overlooking the area, but he was a bit surprised when he looked down at the docks. There was an Earth Alliance flag flying overhead on the dock grounds.

"The Alliance holds the docks? I thought this place was neutral ground!"

"I thought so too."

"What now?"

"We stick to the plan, we steal one of the ships….and maybe just find out what the hell is going on here." There was a large force in the docks. Quite a few ships were refueling and getting ready for what looked to be a Military Offensive.

"Shinn look over there. Doesn't that look like the Archangel?" Shinn looked over to where Lunamaria was pointing and there was a ship that did match the description.

"Same model type yeah, looks…modified though. Definitely Archangel-Class though." Lunamaria looked in through one of the viewing scopes down towards the dock area. There were wandering patrols of Alliance Soldiers, most armed with the standard issue Alliance Assault Rifle, the ACR Mk-25. Over to the eastern side of the complex there looked to be a makeshift prison complex.

"How do you plan on taking a ship of that size?" Lunamaria finally asked him, taking her gaze and view off the docks and back onto her fugitive ally. Shinn looked like he was about to reveal a plan but shrugged.

"I thought maybe hitting that prison area, find some people who wanna strike back against the Alliance go from there."

"You've got to be kidding me." Lunamaria dead panned

"Listen I didn't say I had a good plan." Shinn told her bluntly

"You're planning on waging a personal War with the Chairman of ZAFT, I feel like that requires a decent and smart plan!" Lunamaria snapped at him. Their bit of bickering was interrupted by the sounds of footsteps, a few men approached the two of them, rather menacing looking people followed by a bald man of average build following suit with them, chomping on a cigar.

"Sorry to interrupt this spat 'ere between you two, but uh you guys took something from an associate of mine, both his car and his shit, so we'd like for the two of you to come with us." The men that flanked the bald man with the cigar had some sidearms drawn. Now while the hand cannon was tucked away, he'd be shot before he got the chance to draw, but it might give Lunamaria a chance to run.

"Alright we'll come with you, quietly. We can respect that." Lunamaria took charge and spoke out, breaking Shinn's train of thought leaving him both surprised and a little frustrated with Lunamaria.

"Smart girl!" the man with the cigar grinned before removing the cigar from his lips and chucking it off to the side, motioning to follow him. Shinn cursed his luck and his situation he was stuck in.