Gundam Seed: Killer's Realm

Pseudo-Phase: Blessed Are The Gunmakers

Orb, Zenopolis City, Huynh Industries Global HQ
April 18, 71 CE

"Aw, man, it's soooo nice to be back." Drake groaned, slumping into the office chair. He stroked the remarkably realistic faux leather with appreciation, glad to be rid of that confining suit and that horrid gas mask.

"Indeed." His twin replied smoothly, browsing through the company's latest financial reports. "The PMC division has suffered in your absence. Inoue and the others in the Military and Mobile Weapons divisions have been distraught over your absence. It would do them some good to see you back there, working. rather than slacking off again."

"Pfft. Good job, trying to get a rise out of me. I intend to spend these last few days of 'peace' relaxing, as is my reward for having to act like a stuck-up version of you."

"You could very well relax on the Ame-no-Mihashira with your divisions. Safe from all the combat, from the explosions, the flying linear-accelerated shells, the super-heated plasma beams...which would be perfectly satisfying for a normal person. I assume you've already selected your Waijin?"

"Of course."

"Very well." The twins glanced at each other from their respective positions, Jake from behind his desk and over the top of a stack of reports, Drake from his position leaned back onto the wall, feet stacked on the desk. Both sets of eyes, just as startlingly purple as Kira's, gleamed maliciously.

Huynh Industries HQ Hanger, 5,000 M below sea level
Later

The elevator door slid open smoothly, permitting the Huynh twins to move forth into the spacious area. Not even a tenth as vast as the hangers that held Orbs assortment of Tetsujin mobile suits, but more than big enough for the weapons stored there. They moved towards the line of consoles, running independent of any other computer system, set up in front of the unit.

Standing before them was the mobile suit equivalent of a dwarf. To give a brief, and somewhat general description, the unit looked like a Tetsujin scrunched down to maybe two-thirds its original height, about twelve and a half meters, if that.

It had the same physical build as the Tetsujins, raptor-legs included. It's coloring was a very dark purple color that would be indistinguishable from black in shadows and darkness, with tracings of gold around the scarlet-red cameras, along the thruster nacelles protruding from either side of the backpack, and edging the small claws topping each finger and toe.

The head was most definitely different from the Tetsujins. A short serpentine wedge, the middle of it was interrupted by a mono-camera eye system, while either side plane held a powerful Gundam-type camera. Above each eye protruded an antennae that angled up from the head before sweeping backwards. A zig-zag line cut across the head horizontally, edged with pure black, and cutting the upper two-thirds off from the remainder. The chin housed a small crystalline sensor.

On either hip, a metal holster held a comparatively enormous handgun, the barrel itself two and a half meters long, and about fifty centimeters wide if not more. The bottom of the barrel hosted a large bayonet-like piece of metal. Two beam saber hilts peeked out from their charging ports on the back, under the armpits. On the shoulders were four small turrets, two with long multiple barrels, and the others short and ending in a lens; one of each type per shoulder. Attached to a NAMA point on the shoulder was a rifle almost as long as the suit was tall, with a large cylindrical attachment at the end of the barrel taking up a full third of the length.

Slim ports in the shoulder-blades showed small micro-missile launchers, and long flanges parallels to the knee and elbow armor were beam-blade emitters. Along the spine were at least a dozen short and moderately thick cylinders that stuck out from the back by a miniscule degree.

"Nice isn't it?" Drake said, grinning, a far cry from his displayed personality as the Blue Cosmos' pet Coordinator.

"Probably your best MS design yet." Jake allowed, moving along to see the suit from different angles. "Stealth paint?"

"Phase-Shifted Jaumann design incorporating hyper-absorbent Micro-Crystal Colloid."

"Armor?"

"The Gundanite Hyper-Alloy Superlattice of course, with interdicting micro-meter Phase Shift layers, and an underlying reflective nano-crystal ablative armor."

"Sensors?"

"Antennae-based radar, ECM, ECCM, and chin-based LA/IDAR and laser designator, foot-based seismic/sonar systems. Multi-wavelength camera lenses and a super-telescoping omni-spectrum mono-camera. Access to OMNI, ZAFT, and Orb Geosynchronous Satellite Surveillance Systems."

"Hmm...Very good." Jake nodded, completing his circuit around the Mobile Suit, Drake's customized Waijin, the Hachujin.

"And yours?" Drake queried, nodding at the other side of the hanger.

There, a Waijin with the exact same body type as the Hachujin stood. Slightly taller at almost thirteen meters, this was painted a deep black, with gold-tinged platinum edging the knee, elbow, shoulder, and backpack.

The head was, instead of the ninja-style of the Tetsujin or the Hachujin's wedge, a pure Samurai-like Gundam head, with all-encompassing royal purple crystals for cameras. Two recessed ports with barrels protruding fifteen centimeters out were placed on the brow, flanked by similar ports outfitted with bright violet lenses. The standard V-fin was warped with a third arm jutting out directly from the forehead and the other two angling towards, and then later out from the head, conforming to the points of a tricorne hat and looking like the silhouette of a malformed trident when viewed from the front. At the center of the sensory array was a large golden gem-like camera. The spine hosted an array of small antennae, based on ball joints that allowed them a wide range of motion.

Adhered to the right shoulder was a long naginata-style weapon, the blade equipped with small protrusions on the tip and base that indicated it to be a beam-edged weapon. The other shoulder hosted an arm to which was attached a tower-shield, large and wide enough to completely cover the Waijin suit from a single angle. Small notches about two-thirds down its length, separating a wedge-shaped section colored blood-red from the rest of the uniform black shield. The same beam sabers on the Hachujin peeked out from under its armpits.

The shoulder-blades practically sagged under the weight of two heavy weapons turrets, each one occupied with a different type. The left one was large and boxy, with six separate barrels, while the other had a standard rifle-like setup with an elongated barrel. Either arm hosted a Gatling cannon jutting out just above the wrist, and the ring fingers of each hand ended in an elongated, claw-like emitter.

"Enhanced sensory jamming and interception capability." Jake extolled. "Extended-range C3 systems, semi-automated active defenses, Tri-Camera electro-optical system, beam-absorbent energy charging system, and Colloidal anti-beam mist dispensers."

"Damn good." Drake commented, admiring Jake's Majin.

"The others have received their Waijin. They're gathering in Moon-Earth Lagrange 2, and awaiting us." Jake said, striding back to the consoles. "Are you ready for this? We'll be fighting in Zenopolis. You haven't fought in urban conditions since-"

"Yeah, yeah, you worry about the strategy. I'll take care of the tactics, as always." Drake interrupted, plopping himself onto the foot of the Hachujin. "I haven't waged a war since Vietnam, brother. This battle has been a long time coming." He grinned a shark-toothed smile, leaning back as he recalled...all the battles he'd been in during the wars he'd fought.

Jake noted the grin, suppressing a sly smile of his own. Sitting in a chair before the console, he booted up the active programs, scanning through systems and taps, bug reports and spy records before he found the files he wanted. He blinked in slight surprise.

"What is it?" Drake asked, sitting up at the amused look on Jake's face.

"They've stepped up work on the Mephistopheles." Jake replied with a wry grin. "Seems like they took your 'loss' rather hard."

"Well, they would." Drake muttered, leaning back again. "After all, ZAFT hasn't exactly kept the growing Panthalassa's hulk secret. It sits right in the middle of the Maius colony cluster after all. Any Common Joe with a powerful enough telescope can look and see it."

"Good thing Morgenroete and us have the Yamato-class ships." Jake nodded.

"The competition is still going strong." Drake cackled.

"Maybe this will be The War." Jake whispered. Drake snorted at that.

- The Cosmonaut -

Pacific Ocean, Grigori, 15,000 M out from Orb
12:52 PM

Azrael sneered at the report scattered across the screen of his personal laptop.

"What the hell is taking those idiots so long!" He snarled. The Mephistopheles' development was a month behind schedule, and still the Verin's team lagged in its refit! It was infuriatingly frustrating! The attack couldn't go ahead until the Verin was completed, and the Mephistopheles was maddeningly crucial to the war strategy! Azrael didn't spend his days manipulating the Alliance Council for everything to fall apart in the endgame!

"Damn those laggards!" Azrael growled, slamming his fist on the desk the laptop rested on.

- The Destroyer and The Torch -

The two Abaddons grinned at the suppressed display of fury. The only reason Azrael wasn't leaping about in a screaming tantrum was because of his position on the Grigori. A small giggle escaped Lena's lips at the imagined scene, and Edward displayed a small smirk at the thought as well.

Then business had to take over pleasure, Edward switching the computer screen from the spy-cams to the pilot biographies, examining Mercis and Archer's specifically.

"Well Lena...it seems your pilots have been spending quit a lot of time in the infirmary." Edward commented dryly. "Mercis has been in for...ulcers, broken ribs, fractured tibia, sprained knees, bruised sternum, Achilles tendon, severed hamstring...Archer, meanwhile, has suffered skull fractures, broken phalanges, a 'mild' case of internal bleeding, bruised humerus, torn biceps and quadriceps...hmmm...judging by their charts, you've either put them through enhanced physical and mental training to attempt to mold them into the best Coordinator fighters you can, been beating them for every attempt either one has made to hit on you...or both." Lena chuckled.

"It's not funny Lena. You could kill them." The Vice-Admiral admonished sharply, glaring out of the corner of his eyes.

"Don't worry Dad." Lena chirped. "Those two are tougher than they look. Besides, they'll need it to keep up with me and the Extended BCPUs." Edward merely inclined his head slightly, tapping on the keyboard again.

Images popped up, satellite photo-maps of Orb, data files retrieved from Intel operations, transcriptions of 'intercepted' transmissions...much of the data they had on Orb and its forces.

"All of this is crap." Both Abaddons muttered.

"We know the Intel data is false." Edward detailed. "Orb's military probably sent the data out themselves using our comms."

"The maps are twelve years out of date." Lena said. "Every time a camera-sat orbits over them, they jam its transmissions, and the civilian brochures don't exactly have a nice list of every military base."

"The broadband transmissions are falsified."

"Individual spies disappear days after insertion."

"Networks are wiped out within the year."

Quite simply, in the map of the world covered by the bright spots of OMNI Intelligence's knowledge, Orb was a deep, dark island on the face of the Earth.

"How are we to compensate for this?" Lena wondered.

"Battlefield intelligence." Edward stated grimly. "Put out forces, and pull battle footage and sensor data from the survivors. Thanks to Orbs probably stellar ECM and our own ECCM, not to mention N-Jammer interference, the sensor data will be spotty at best, but the gun- and suit-camera footage should be reliable enough. We'll likely be taking heavy losses though."

"That's an understatement."

- The Author -

Alrighty, well. Still lagging behind on the Big Battle of Orb stuff. This is a very informative Pseudo-Phase though, despite its brevity. I wonder how many of you will figure out the truth of the Huynh Twins?...I'll tell you first though, I'm not confirming anything.

("I doubt they'll catch half the things.")

Quiet.

I caught the second episode of the Gundam Unicorn OVA. Damn, I love that Gundam. And the Sinanju ain't bad either.

("Oh gods, please stop, I'm gonna vomit!")

I'd love to get an idea on the Unicorn's Beam Magnum though. How they manage to get Mega-Beam Cannon output from a Beam Rifle...and that reload system of it is interesting.

Also, I've planned enough ahead for this series that I can announce one part of where it will go eventually, no matter the ending.

To put it succinctly, you all will get to read about a Gundam sodomizing an AT-AT with a beam saber.

Review Replies:

Robby Cartwright: Thank you.

Alex Yamato: True enough

00virtuezero: Indeed
Not quite yet, sadly.
Oh yeah.
It's very exciting, and just the thing I thought the movie needed (that, indeed, I was already thinking of adding to my version of it)
That's a pretty good idea. Sure, why not? Nice design...

Kojiro Kun: Yep.

Lord Edric: It's SEED Mode. In it, Kira pretty much acts like a targeting supercomputer, and has above-human (heck, above-Coordinator) reflexes and accuracy. Outside of it though, his aim is...dismal. And since SEED only activates within combat or other-wise high-stress situations, he's abysmal with firearms.

Knightmare Gundam of Ni