Gundam Seed: Killer's Realm
Yeah, I got tired of posting that disclaimer I came up with. Suffice to say, render credit unto the designer, that which is the designer's. Gundam Seed and its characters belong to Bandai.
Phase 35: Dies Irae Part 1: Aurora Irae
- The Lion -
Zenopolis City Outskirts, Central Command Base, Control Room
April 22, 71 CE
11:00 AM
Uzumi Nara Athha, Chief Representative of Orb and head of the Athha family, widely considered to be the man behind Orb's modern image (one of "touch me and die horribly in a trillion ways") stood at the forefront of Orb's surface command base. The base, while perfectly equipped for the command and control of Orb's myriad forces, was in reality the fake command center. With radio waves pouring out of it, it would serve as a perfect decoy, drawing strategic attention to it while the real base, buried thousands of meters underground, controlled Orb's forces with the help of SCAI-Net.
There was a reason Uzumi was here, the majority of the legislative government behind him, with representatives from two of the other four families. Their pasts were full of failure...the mere fact that Orb was now involved in the war was a great stain on their honor. Others, such as the Sahakus and the Seirans, argued that they couldn't have possibly managed to keep Orb out of the war, and used that as an excuse to not be present.
Nevertheless, those present were determined to go through. For their parts in Orb's current position, they would live or die.
"Are you all sure?" Uzumi asked, facing the console.
"Of course we are. If we weren't, we'd be as bad as the Seirans." One of the elder representatives growled amicably. Uzumi chuckled darkly.
- The Cosmonaut -
OMNI Enforcer 2nd Pacific Fleet, Grigori, Bridge
"Now should be a good time." Azrael said, smirking. Around him, the bridge burst back into activity with a tense air. The elder Abaddon stood next to his usual seat, now occupied by Azrael.
Outside, the Celestial-Class ship floated almost serenely ten meters above the water, surrounded by five of the seven surviving super carriers stationed in the Pacific Ocean, along with their respective escort forces consisting of destroyers and missile cruisers. Below, almost two hundred Megalodon mobile armors sifted through the sea, scale systems producing an annoying subsonic hum for the sonar crews.
The sensors and communications technicians looked back and nodded. Muruta picked up the phone set into the arm of the command chair.
"To the Chief Representative of Orb and his lackeys this is your final warning: As a nation of Earth, you are to join the efforts against the Coordinators, or be declared traitors to humanity and be occupied. Your continuing refusal to aid the rest of Earth against the Space Monsters has cost the lives of many. Now, what's your answer?" The lines were silent for two minutes, before a gravelly regal voice sounded from the speakers.
"Here is our reply: Orb shall never ally with the Earth Alliance, or any other power that seeks to suborn us to its cause. We shall not tolerate an attack on us, and will take all possible measures to ensure our sovereignty!" Muruta Azrael's face twisted into a cruel smirk.
"So be it." He hissed into the phone, before placing the phone back into its cradle.
-The Lion-
Zenopolis City Outskirts, Central Command Base, Control Room
As soon as a Uzumi heard the electronic tone indicating that the secure communication line had been severed he quickly tapped a key on the control room's digital conference table to open an immediate link with Orb's real CENTCOM facility. A split second later the red eyed hawkish face of Andrew Victor Payne filled the com screen.
"Awaiting your orders representative Attha."
A ghost of a smile briefly flitted across the old lion's face before he responded "Engage the belligerents at your full discretion General Payne."
A small wicked grin twisted across the white haired general's visage. "With Pleasure Sir."
- The Cosmonaut -
OMNI Enforcer 2nd Pacific Fleet, Grigori, Bridge
Settling back into 'His' new chair Muruta took a brief moment to pat himself on the back for what he considered to be a brilliant plan well executed thanks to the apparently stupid Prime Minister of Orb. Smirking again Azrael began to give his first order, "Contact the carriers and order them to-" His order however was interrupted rather suddenly by a rapid fire series of events, starting with the sudden screaming of just about every conceivable warning alarm in the Grigori's CIC, followed shortly by the cursing of its staff. The XO of the CIC beat the queries of the elder Abaddon and the Suit with his own slightly stressed SitRep.
"Admiral Abaddon, both the fleet and ourselves are currently being bounced by laser designators, active sonar, and dual band radar systems originating from not only the main island but also the majority of the surrounding reefs, atolls, and islands."
If it was any other day Edward Abaddon would have laughed at the priceless look on Azrael's face after the XO's announcement, he however was both not at all surprised by Orb's opening move but was now actually coming close to being worried.
"The logistics and funds necessary for that kind of outer defense would need to be massive, I guess you really do intend to make us pay in blood for every millimeter of ground we capture huh Vicious?" Those were the thoughts that shot through the elder Abaddon's head before he responded to his XO's alert.
"How many Lieutenant?"
"I can't count that high sir." was the XO's deadpan response.
Edward Abaddon glared at the main Island of Orb out of the bridge window while thinking "Alright. Now I'm worried."
The next instant one of the cruisers, the A.F.S Stratford, was suddenly broken in half by a series of explosions focused on its center, shortly followed by the uplifting waves of underwater explosions.
"Sir! We just detected the launch of...dear God, over five hundred torpedoes!"
"Velocity indicative of super cavitating ordinance!"
"We've lost contact with a third of the Megalodon force!"
"Sherman and Euphrates sunk!"
Another subsurface explosion peeled open the bow of one of the lead frigates.
"A.F.S. Pendleton has just been crippled; it and the Stratford were likely struck by mines!"
One Sonar Technician's eyes began to bulge out of his face at some apparently absurd data appearing on his screen.
"Large object surfacing under-"
As though lifted by the hand of a god, the A.F.S Washington rose into the air before its spine snapped in half, the Super carrier's precious cargo of almost thirty Constantines and fifteen Strategos spilling out along with crew and munitions before the metallic mass submerged again, leaving the broken carrier to sink amid its dependents.
"Well..." Abaddon said tonelessly, "It seems their offshore defenses were more...robust than we anticipated."
- The Butcher -
"Enma's Locker" Command Center
A small but satisfied grin made its rare appearance on the face of Andrew, as the holo-table showed the blasted and broken remains of several dozen Megalodons joined by the hulks of eleven ships, including one of the Alliances vaunted carriers. A low whistle sounded from next to him.
"That's a good first hit." Karl muttered.
"Indeed. Send Admiral Todoka my thanks." Payne commented. "And tell Jack he and the Fuujin may go now." Karl shook his head at the inanity of it all, keying the line open.
- The Madman -
Orb Waters
Jack grinned for the slight moment he was in control before Chimamare took over. The more bloodthirsty of the two alters stretched the grin into a crazed smile. Clothed in the Kanehada suit and OMU-P armor, the pilot sat in an ergonomic, free-floating command chair, with gauntlet and boot-like control mechanisms extending from the sides and bottom of it, attached to the OMU-P's own gauntlets and boots, offering a more flexible control scheme. The control gauntlets had joysticks attached as well, for the non-human controls.
The OMU-P's helmet was connected directly to the Kanehada's molecular rebreather, necessary not only in case of cockpit rupture, but also because the entire cavity was filled with a clear Non-Newtonian Gel, used as a shock absorbent to prevent the pilot's guts from liquefying through the forces normally exerted on him.
Not that Chimamare needed it, but it was a nice thought.
With a thought and a flex of his legs, Chimamare sent the Raijin shooting out from the undersea crevice Jack had hid the Gundam in, the gold-tinged Fuujin following closely, observing and recording the Raijin's actions in a fast-paced, computerized sort of self-training.
- The Fodder -
2nd Lieutenant Skeller shook his head inside of the cockpit of his Megalodon in a vain attempt to clear the ringing in his ears and to try and reorient himself after a fusillade of aquatic explosions that had knocked him around like a pebble in an empty beer can. Quickly checking his sensors to identify the FOF I.D. squawks from the surrounding forces he breathed a slight sigh of relief at what he found. Despite the mines and veritable wall of super cavitating torpedoes that had been thrown at them the main fleet seemed to come through remarkably intact. With so far only one Super carrier, two destroyers, one cruiser, one frigate, and only three of the ten McCourt class attack submarines guarding the carriers having been sunk, not including the score of Megalodons that had been taken down as well. Skeller took a moment for once to briefly give thanks to the bureaucrats for approving the budget necessary to add 'noisemaker' decoy launchers to the recently produced and refurbished Megalodons.
Noisemakers were originally created during the 20th century for submarine warfare to decoy enemy torpedoes. OMNI's modern versions of these devices incorporate a high and low frequency sound generator as well as a low output EMP field generator in order to confuse incoming torpedoes. The OMNI Enforcer main fleet had just however used well over half of all their noisemakers and anti-torpedo torpedoes to defend from the initial assault, a fact that would come back to haunt them later.
The Lieutenant then began an immediate role call to see who among the MA pilots in his unit were still functional after the turbulence from all the underwater explosions, disregarding that some of the 'debris' in the ocean weren't sinking like they should be…
- The Madman -
The Raijin's first taste of blood came when an incredibly unlucky Megalodon aimlessly swam into its path. Its pilot probably dazed by the explosions and sudden loss of so many of its comrades to sea mines and torpedoes that seemed to appear from nowhere. Exoskeletal armatures extended out from the Raijin's forearms, wrapping around the Gundam's fingers, and adding one-and-a-half meter long, sickle-shaped talons. The Megalodon might have noticed the silvery Gundam before the claws dug into its armor, slicing through hull and ripping apart the pilot. Mere moments later, Chimamare tossed the shredded remains towards the bottom of the ocean.
- The Cosmonauts -
Captain Vernes was goddamn scared out of his mind. Not only had he seen his ship's escorts sunk, with their lower hull practically disintegrating under the onslaught, but he'd just heard that the last of their escorting Megalodons had disappeared.
"Captain, two contacts, depth...rising rapidly!" The sonar officer called. "Impact...now!"
A loud THUD resounded throughout the ship, with the bridge crew cringing for a few moments before they realized that yes, they had not been blown up.
"HAH! DUDS!" One ensign cried.
SKREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE
They all turned and glared at him.
Down in the hold, where over four dozen mobile suits waited, their technicians and pilots looked on in horror as the glimmering, silvery chainsaw sliced through the multi-layered alloyed hull and the feet of several Strategos with a deafening shriek. As the saw finished its dreadful circle, five claws stabbed through the center of the ragged ellipse, before some unholy force pulled the slab of metal out.
And they all screamed when the silvery monster lifted itself out of the rushing seawater, bestial golden eyes glinting with a devilish glee.
Back on the bridge, Vernes stared at the deck, as it glowed gold-orange for a moment before a beam of brilliant red light cut through it, slicing up and down briefly before disappearing.
Two sets of clawed hands forced their way into the small gap, the metal groaning as they forced it wider, wider, until their owner climbed through, four-taloned avian feet causing the deck to crunch as the mobile suit settled. The suit's armor gleamed silvery platinum in the sunlight, golden hair-like strands of wires and filaments set in a top knot flowing in the wind behind it. Two bestial golden eyes glared out from under a heavy-set brow decorated with the twin antennae of a V-fin system, as the fanged maw gaped wide.
"IT'S A GUNDAM!" The ensign shouted.
Electrical arcs played between the two sections of the Gundam's jaws, before it vomited a beam of dark yellow-green energy with a pronounced electric-blue aura about it, setting the air aflame as the beam blasted into the bridge structure. The bridge simultaneously shattered and melted, superheated pieces of it flying in a cone from the blast as the now slightly-dispersed beam traveled further, striking a destroyer in the side and tearing open a gaping hole in its flank.
- The Mad-Machine -
A few meters to the side, the Fuujin and its complex AI observed the Raijin and its pilot, listening to the pilot's insane cackling as he arced the Gundam's head to fire the 'Chantico' Maser, carving out the ship's engine room.
Deep within its core, the AI, nicknamed 'Norman' by Jack/Chimamare, processed this.
- The Destroyer and The Torch -
"That'll be your boyfriend." One of the bridge crew chortled, a bit darkly. A glare from Lena served to silence him, but when she turned back to the main view he and the rest of the crew shared a look.
"Damn them!" Azrael snarled again, a bit quieter than the previous nineteen times.
"Sir, the Gundam has withdrawn." The sensor officer informed them. "No sign of the contact that destroyed the Washington, and there are no more submerged contacts on the scopes."
"Well, looks like the path is clear now." Edward commented.
Of the dozens of ships that made up the Pacific Fleet, two of the all important Super carriers were either sunk or too damaged to continue, along with seven destroyers that were outright...destroyed, and about four cruisers that were only good for salvage, if that, resting on the ocean floor.
"Guess we're going to need the reserve fleet and their Escort carriers sooner than we thought." the elder Abaddon stated tonelessly.
"Are we close enough to launch?" Azrael snapped.
"Well, the carriers can let the flight pack-equipped Constantines and Strategos out through their VTOL pad doors, but at this range they'll be vulnerable to-"
"I don't care!" Azrael interrupted, snarling. "Send them out! NOW!"
- The Trio -
Orb Beachhead, 10 KM outside of Zenopolis City
"Hey! They're launching mobile suits!" Juri reported to the Locker, the signal transmitted by an impossibly complex carrier wave consisting of tachyons and AM/FM radio waves that were encrypted in a quantum system to boot, making for an overall signal consisting almost completely of gibberish to any interceptors.
"Got it, activating SAM batteries" Colonel Hughes replied.
The approaching flights of Constantines, single teams led by a Constantine colored in a minutely-different scheme, squads led by a single Strategos, approached the beach with an air of contempt, even in spite of the devastation the off-shore defenses had wrought on their fleet. Then the missile batteries opened fire.
The first few flights were from the long-range batteries set up on the slopes of the volcano that made up the center of Orb's main island, green-blue thruster flares trailing behind as they smashed into the initial groups of flying mobile suits. The following groups were luckier, the Constantines' CIWS ports opening in time for the gunfire to interdict a number of the deadly missiles. The myriad explosions between the missiles' own warheads and the suits' physical munitions and supercharged capacitor banks made for a rather pretty pattern of fireworks across the morning sky. The missile barrage ceased all too soon as the batteries were exhausted.
Yet even as the SAM sites died from lack of ammo, the loud thumps and cracks of artillery sounded. None of those batteries were aimed towards this beach, so close to Zenopolis city, but towards the areas were other OMNI Enforcer troops landed with a bit less interference.
The OMNI suits that remained, a still formidable force even with almost a sixth of their original strength gone, landed as soon as they could to avoid any further casualties from any other surface-to-air fire. They moved quickly and carefully, with the higher-ranking troops practically pushing the grunts forward, and only following by stepping where said grunts stepped. The observing Orb units saw this, and chortled. There were more than a few grumbles as bank accounts exchanged virtual currency.
- The Suckers -
"You ever get the feeling that you're being watched?" Lieutenant Bertram said, his Constantine moving steadily behind the vanguard of Ensigns Wash, Herbert, Parker and Jones.
"Ever since I learned that the Vice-Admiral can and is tapping our frequencies, yes." Captain Gerome replied.
"Wait...really?"
"We're the first force on the beach Lieutenant. Orb is rather tricky, and the Admiral wants first-hand intelligence."
"...These rocks look really weird." Bertram changed the subject, motioning with his Constantine's beam rifle at the weirdly smooth rock formations around them. If it weren't for common sense, he'd say they looked a bit like old pictures he'd seen of the Damned writhing in agony...except colored exactly like the kind of ancient volcanic rock one would expect to find on an island like this. "Captain?" Bertram turned to see a stone-colored blade jutting out of the front of Gerome's Strategos, thin stains of blood coating the breadth of the blade. In a second, the top and bottom halves of the blade split apart, slicing open the Strategos as they did before a crackling glow blasted forth with a supersonic crack and blowing apart Wash's Constantine.
Bertram panicked, turning to bring his beam rifle to bear on the thing that had killed Gerome and Wash in the span of a few seconds. He froze.
A mobile suit, at least 5 meters taller than any of the OMNI units present, stone coloring fading to a two-toned coal black primary and bone-white secondary colored armor as the vaguely Gundam-esque head with vibrantly red glowing eyes turned to face Bertram. Idly, in the back of his piss-frightened mind, Bertram noted the suit's strange legs, like a bird's, and more disturbingly, a long multi-segmented tail that was languidly whipping back and forth like a cat watching a cornered rodent. Then the suit smoothly slipped its blade/rifle out of Gerome's Strategos, letting the corpse-like suit fall to the ground as the other three Ensigns turned to see what had just destroyed Wash.
All around them, the 'stone' formations split apart into smaller tailless bluish-black colored carbon copies of the suit in front of them, colors shifting into the same strange insect like coloring as various weapons, from smaller versions of the blade/rifle the one in front of Bertram had, to enormous double-barreled assault weapons with one hand on a foregrip while the rest of the weapon was slung underneath the suit's opposite arm.
"Oh...fuck." Was the last thing Bertram muttered before he saw no more.
- The Stalker -
Juri Wu Nien, the blue haired Megane of Orb's project testing trio, was rather conflicted at the moment. On the one hand she was glad to finally be testing her IBF-VX5 Scythian command suit in live combat against OMNI Enforcers fascist piglets, but on the other hand she wasn't happy about it occurring during an assault on her homeland, with said suit only partially complete. And perhaps most frustrating of all was that she couldn't be out helping Jack.
Life just wasn't fair, she pouted.
"Then again these guys are probably thinking the same thing." she thought while gazing at the remaining four Constantines after having dispatched what she was fairly certain were the squad leader and second in command of the six suit team. Juri then coolly attached her Karasawa Mk.I to her right hip armor before lashing out at the closest machine with her now free right hand.
The VX5 series of Orb MS are essentially based on the MP5 Tetsujins except using many of the design concepts of Orb's progenitor Mobile Suit, the Nemesis Prototype. These suits are also the predecessors of Orb's true G-Destroyers, aka Gundam Killers, and are somewhat similar in their semi-experimental nature to a Gundam unit. Excepting the fact that their weapons are usually already out of the testing phase and that their base designs are all virtually identical. The only alterations to them are some cosmetic changes or slight differences in armament/armor, and maybe a change in their power plant or a limb's design to differentiate them. That said these units all boast an insanely high performance level comparable to and exceeding most any Gundam in existence. Their armor typically consists of some Quantum Crystalline material and other hyper alloys or experimental armor, Quantum Crystalline armor is an armor material of a very unique form of molecular allotrope that does not normally exist outside of a Neutron Star. The armor's molecular lattice forms a crystalline structure all the way down to the quantum level, hence the name, as such the strength and density of the inter-molecular bonds is so great that it borders on being indestructible, literally requiring the point blank detonation of a relatively large tactical nuclear weapon to even damage it in the slightest. And like the Second Stage Gundams these suits are nuclear powered, except by a low output Fusion Pulse Reactor instead of a Fission one, they also replace much of the Tetsujin's Titano-Polymer Musculature with Electroactive Platinum Titanium Nickel Alloy Springs. These electrically reactive springs have over 80 times the inherent power of the Tetsujin's musculature, giving them a power to weight ratio of roughly 500:1. Additionally the contraction and expansion speed of the springs can occur in under a millisecond, translating to ungodly amounts of speed and power.
Luckily for Ensigns Bertram, Herbert, Parker, Jones, and the rest of the OMNI Enforcer invasion fleet the VX5s as a whole were mostly incomplete when they were first fielded for combat on April 22nd C.E. 71. Meaning that most of their armor consisted of relatively speaking "weaker" materials and that their motive and power systems weren't fully complete either, resulting in lower than specified performance.
Unluckily for OMNI though was that the VX5s "lower than specified performance" still made them monsters, especially with Symbions for pilots.
Juri frowned slightly as she gripped the decapitated Constantine's head in her Scythian's right hand. She had intended to simply grab the OMNI suit by its head so she could pull it closer and dismember it in front of its buddies. Unfortunately as marvelous as the COFFIN system she used to control her suit was, it at times was a bit too responsive for even her to control. As a result she'd ended up just yanking the things head off without even tipping the enemy machine in her direction. Sighing slightly she watched the OMNI units respond to her assault in slow motion as she reconsidered her plan of attack.
At the moment Juri had compressed her awareness to the point that from her perspective time seemed to have actually slowed down. A feat she and the other Symbions had discovered the ability to do by intensely focusing on one particular sense, in this case 'sight', at the detriment of shutting down or lowering the acuity of all her other senses. As such Juri was just taking an extra long moment to consider her options while her opponents seemed to be frozen in time. Locking her gaze onto the cockpit of one of the decapitated suit's friends she underhanded the newly acquired head into the farthest Constantine with the force of a Celestial class ship's linear cannons, all but ripping the suit in half. Returning her attention to the decapitated machine, which was bringing its beam carbine to bear on her using its gun camera, she swatted the offending weapon with her VX5's left hand, causing the weapon to shatter like a crystal sculpture. Planting her machine's taloned foot into the headless suit's chest she kicked it violently into another of its brothers, the two suits colliding with a thunderclap of crunching and twisting alloys before exploding. The last Constantine raised its shield to protect itself from the shrapnel thrown from its destroyed kin and to try and put a barrier between himself and his terrifying opponent.
Juri couldn't help a rather unladylike snort at seeing this and was half way tempted to use the "Sepia" on the Constantine's shield and reduce it to splinters; instead she opted for the more direct approach. Her VX5 crouched slightly before using its avian legs to propel towards the OMNI suit like some demonic mechanized kangaroo. The OMNI grunt got to fire one wildly aimed shot before the massive MS collided with his suit in a titanic body check that caused the various materials that made up his machine to scream and groan as they gave way to the force of the impact. The Constantine flew backward still clutching its now crumpled shield before crashing into the top edge of a nearby jetty and flipping over itself, its pilot having been knocked nearly senseless by the multiple concussive impacts. More than happy to kick an enemy while they were down, the two toned Orb death machine 'hopped' the roughly 80 meter distance separating it from its victim to land elegantly by the OMNI grunt suit's legs. Reaching down with the Scythian's manipulators Juri grasped each of the Constantine's ankle joints before swinging the enemy machine up over the top of her VX5's head and slamming it full force into the large ragged volcanic rocks that made up the jetty. Before exploding the Constantine made a surprisingly good impression of an egg being hurled against concrete, shattering like porcelain and hurling its contents everywhere before detonating.
"Well, I wonder how 'The Admiral' likes his first hand intelligence now." Juri stated with a cheerful smile on her face as she turned to face the rest of the OMNI hoard that had faltered in its approach at the sudden appearance of such alien MS designs. Only to be blasted to smithereens a few moments later for their inattentiveness. Juri shook her head slightly as she drew her own ranged weapons, her suit mimicking the exasperated body language.
Seriously, with training like that how do they expect to survive? She thought before opening up on the fodder.
- The Fodder -
Waaaaay in the back of the OMNI Enforcer formation, Commander Richard Heading snorted at the reports from the front-line.
"What a bunch of pansy weaklings." He muttered. "No training at all. These East Asian bastards couldn't hold a pre-school!"
"It doesn't look like it sir." Lieutenant Commander Dapler commented. The two were in their respective Strategos, Heading in his standard blue-on-white painted one with a Swordsman pack, and Dapler in a red-on-silver Strategos with the new High-Energy Assault pack, a heavy beam rifle with an elongated barrel attached via a power cable to a large capacitor bank on his Stratego's backpack.
Behind them, landing boats from the ships disgorged another platoon of Consantines, with many others unleashing tanks and APCs laden with infantry for the urban combat portion of the assault. A small beep called Heading's attention, opening a comms window with the Vice Admiral and Azrael
"Commander. How is the deployment proceeding?"
"Quite well sir." Richard boasted.
Orb's Northern Beach, 12 KM outside of Thiríopolis City
Commander Jiàn Dōng Lóng, survivor of over a dozen battles with ZAFT's Coordinator scum and expert mobile armor pilot, slunk his group past the sheer cliff that bordered a part of the beach.
Getting there had been hell. Most of the landing craft from the E.A.S Xià Cháo had been struck down in the middle of the short trip, men and mobile suit sent drifting to the seabed. While in theory that should be only a temporary inconvenience to the MS forces who could slowly slog their way across the seabed up to the beach it still left their force projections drastically underpowered till they actually got to the Glen Damned shore. And to make matters worse, the Commander had no idea what to expect beyond these cliffs.
"Ni! Zhuan dào qiánmiàn!" He shouted, pointing at some private lagging behind and telling him to go to the front. Muttering in some Cantonese dialect, the Constantine pilot jogged his suit up, rising above the last bit of rock -
And with a crack of thunder and searing blue white light that burned into Commander Jiàn Dōng Lóng's retinas the Constantine fell to the ground in four pieces as gobs of molten alloys blown off the suit rained down all over the rest of the unit. A split second later whatever had destroyed the Constantine collided with the sea floor a few hundred meters away after flash vaporizing several hundred thousands of gallons of seawater and subsequently detonating.
"Mā de!" Dōng Lóng swore, hunkering his Strategos down as the rest of his team dove for cover as well. As though the private's demise was a signal, the beach erupted in explosions, artillery shells appearing out of thin air to slam down and blast a crater in whatever it hit, whether the innocent ground or some poor mobile suit. Dōng Lóng, still blinking the spots out of his eyes, took another moment to assess the dead private's Constantine that had been destroyed by the Celestial's knows what. He had trouble suppressing a frightened gulp. The particle beam, or whatever had struck the anti-beam coated shield on the Constantine's left arm first had apparently vaporized a perfectly neat 4 meters in diameter half circle through the left side of the shield. Then continued on to vaporize the left arm's elbow joint before continuing on to reduce much of the lower torso to so much rapidly cooling plasma and molten alloy, effectively cutting the suit in half, before finally burning off the right arm, still grasping its beam carbine, and then colliding with the sea. Perhaps even more unnerving was the fact that the suit hadn't exploded after being hit. The only logical reason Dōng Lóng could think of for that happening was that the energy beam had been so hot it completely vaporized the Constantine's power cell before the chemical reaction necessary for it to explode could occur. The Commander was suddenly feeling even less safe hiding behind this cliff wall than he already did.
Gathering his wits Dōng Lóng snapped over the radio "Zhao chū zhè shì lái zì!"
"Speak English you crazy Chink!" The carrier communications officer snapped back.
"Find out where that's coming from!" The East Asian Commander shouted.
"Alright, alright!"
"Don't alright me!" An explosion scattered Corporal Máo's Constantine all over the beach. "Soldiers are dying here!"
"Hold up…damn….we can't track their projectiles…."
"What?" A close explosion nearly tore one of the Strategos leaders in half, only luck saving the mobile suit by sacrificing its legs instead.
"The radar can't see them!"
"Mā de!"
Orb Beachhead, 10 KM outside of Zenopolis City
"Unlike that mess the Asians are making of the assaults." Heading finished smugly.
- The Surgeon -
Orb, Northern Slope of Mt. Haumea, 15 KM Southwest of Thiriopolis City
Mayura Labatt, the maroon haired tomboy of Project Shuurajou's testing trio let the soft features of her face descend into a slight frown. Her orders dictated minimum exposure to the enemy while providing support to the regular forces and despite being perhaps the most cautious and well behaved of her "sisters" she still felt slightly cheated. Being a naturally gifted sniper had placed her in her own VX5 Scythian up on the highest slopes of the main island of Orb's largest dormant volcano with a small team of 3 Tetsujins equipped with the mass production "Wyrm" sniper rifles. Similar teams were also situated on the mountain's other slopes looking over the island's five major cities and military port but thus far all of their action and had been relegated to one or two pinpoint engagements. Mayura had only personally destroyed one enemy unit, a Constantine that just screamed FNG who had scaled some of the beach's volcanic rubble to kindly skyline himself on the shoreline's cliffs. Ordinarily she would have left such obvious bait alone and waited for the rest of the unit it was with to expose themselves before firing on them but she had her orders. As it stood she had her Scythian lying against the side of the Mt. Haumea with its "Fenrir" Hyper Velocity Ion Particle Emission Rifle in the ready position allowing the energy based sniper weapon the size of a MS based hyper impulse cannon to gradually cool after being fired. Her suit and the surrounding Tetsujins had the artificial chromataphors covering their suits adapt a color scheme that perfectly matched the pock marked slopes of the volcano, while simultaneously using the high power optics on their respective machines to watch the unfolding spectacle.
Mayura suddenly felt an oddly warm sensation within her head followed shortly by the equivalent of a text message popping into the forefront of her mind's eye.
AC: How are you doing Mayura?
ML: In a word? Bored.
AC: LOL, dido that, but probably not as board as I am hanging out her in Zenopolis's under city with the Urban combat teams.
ML: True, but if everything goes as the General predicted were going to be wishing for our boredom back by night fall tomorrow. Not that Juri seems to care.
AC: You know she's childish and it's just her way of showing she's worried by acting like that.
ML: Well I suppose I can't begrudge her the opportunity to be such a terror to someone besides us for once.
AC: That's the spirit. Oh yeah, Arturia do you think you could send the combat footage from Juri's assault team to Mayura?
Mayura cocked one delicate eye brow at "hearing" that and began wondering what her and Asagi's youngest sister had gotten into to warrant the need to watch some combat footage. An instant later a beep on Mayura's HUD indicated the reception of a data package, followed by the voice of SCAI-Net's Command A.I. Arturia over her speakers.
"Sent, and of course I can Asagi." was the succinct reply of the A.I.'s almost musical voice.
Opening the video package Mayura was treated to the multiple points of view from Juri's Scythian and the rest of her assault team as she single handedly swatted the OMNI MS team around like they were mentally impaired toddlers.
ML: Honestly she has no understanding of the meaning of discretion and with the way she fights like a savage the R&D department should have just made her either a giant axe or cudgel and told her to scream "UNGAH!" and have at them instead of wasting their money.
The garbled mental response Mayura got from Asagi led her to believe that her eldest sister was laughing too hard to respond.
- The Cosmonaut and The Destroyer -
OMNI Enforcer 2nd Pacific Fleet, Grigori, Bridge
Edward shook his head at the sheer stupidity on display even as Muruta made proud noises.
"- very good Commander. I'll see that you get a promotion when this business is over." Azrael promised, leaning back in his - Edward's - chair, before turning a mocking eye to the Admiral.
"There, you see? The main force is deployed, and Orb will fall soon. You're worrying over nothing." The bridge went eerily silent over that. And when Edward turned a pleasant smile on the idiotic Cosmonaut, they all started wondering just how bad the punishment for cowardice under fire could be…..
"That may be. But I sincerely doubt that they would spend so much time on their off-shore defenses, and then neglect terrestrial fortifications of some sort-"
"Sirs! Reports coming in from the secondary assault fleets." The image of one of the lesser flag officers in command of one of the fleets responsible for attacking one of two minor cities on the northern side of Orb appeared in a window on the main screen.
"Vice-Admiral, sir. Mr. Azrael." Rear Admiral Dragovich greeted a bit stiffly. Understandable, when one considered the complete annihilation of the Eurasian fleet at JOSH-A, and his nationality. Really, he wouldn't even be here if Edward hadn't lobbied the Admirals. Like Abaddon, he was one of the 'old-fashioned' ones, from back when soldiering and military service meant more than a paycheck and rank bigotry. "The assault….it is not going well."
"What!" Azrael snapped sharply.
"Our terrestrial units are making landfall…but only barely. Many of the landing craft are blown to pieces halfway to the beach, and those that do make it must advance under threat of what seems to be long-range artillery fire. Some of the footage….well, it resembles clips from those theatrical films about the one of the World Wars a few hundred years ago, the one with the Nazis."
"You incompetent- Agh! Take out their artillery!" Azrael shouted.
"We cannot. Our flying units dare not lift off for fear of anti-air fire, and none of the fire-finding radars can find the originating points of the shells."
"Cease landing operations and withdraw from the shore." Abaddon butted in before Azrael could alienate the man any further. "Await further orders."
"What the hell is wrong with you!" Muruta demanded, actually getting up out of the chair.
"Something is very wrong here." Edward snarled at the fool. "By all accounts-"From your propaganda "-Orb should have already been crumbling under our assault. And yet, they had enough firepower to damage a significant portion of our fleet before we even reached the shore. And now our land forces are being bogged down, and they're shooting our air units out of the sky until they run out of missiles, or our people land out of fear!" With Azrael now white-faced and recoiling from him, Edward calmed himself.
"We need to regroup, work out a new plan. Orb isn't going to fold anytime soon. Have Commander Heading secure his position." The latter was directed at the communications officer. "And relay similar orders to any units that managed to make landfall with minimal or no resistance. To the rest, issue controlled retreat orders back to their ships."
- The Butcher -
"Enma's Locker" Command Center
"Hmmm….should we let them?" Karl asked, turning to Andrew.
"Yes. At this point, they only have corrupted footage of the Tetsujins, and less than that of one Scythian. Edward Abaddon is no fool, but with Azrael there forcing matters, they'll attack around dawn tomorrow. We'll hit them before that. Cagalli's been wanting to see her Gundam, and I believe it would be….cathartic, for young Zala to work out his recent parental frustrations on an enemy he's familiar with." For a moment, there was silence.
"That's going to be an….interesting conversation…."
"What is?"
"Explaining the Magatama to Cagalli."
"…."
- The Redcoat -
"Enma's Locker" Construction Hangar
Dearka was typically the epitome of calm, possessing the unique ability to keep his head straight even if say some axe crazy girl was trying to kill him. At the moment however he simply could not sit still at all for the simple fact that he and Kira were apparently the only ones of their original "Gundam Team" as he called it that would not be entering immediate combat.
While most everyone else's machines had been successfully refurbished or completed in time for the battle his own machine the Ferox was still sitting in its construction gantry partially disassembled. From his spot in the observation room he could also see the other machines present including the shadows of Kira's new suit which he'd been hearing the Orb grease monkeys refer to as "The Nemesis Prototype". The best he could understand it was that it was the grandfather of all of Orb's MS designs made into a functional test bed and that it was somehow a strategic weapons platform.
But as interesting as that machine was bound to be Dearka was more concerned with his own machine and the fact that Liene, aka 'Mad Scientist #1', had managed to squeeze an N-Jammer Canceller and an untested Thorium based Fission reactor into the Ferox. Even after seeing the XGAT-109's thorough list of upgrades he was still not too thrilled about the concept of more or less sitting on a nuclear bomb as a power source. Despite the apparently substantial safety measures the whole thing still stank of a rush job, which had apparently been the case with a number of other secondary projects if the gossip he heard thus far was true.
Sighing he turned around to try and engage Kira, who was waiting with him, in conversation, only to find that he had apparently disappeared. Without even a whisper of sound to give away the fact that he left. Dearka shivered. Kira was one stealthy bastard when he wanted to be.
- The Lion and The Killer -
Zenopolis City Outskirts, Central Command Base, Control Room
The Representatives were settling down now. The battle had not yet progressed to the end-point, and their sacrifice was not yet called for.
The front entrance of the control room hissed open, allowing a figure suited up in Kanehada and OMU-P armor to step through. Pausing and looking around, he took off his suit's helmet.
"Kira!" The Coordinator turned to look up at the main console; smiling and striding up to join his father.
"Dad. How's it going?" Kira asked, the smile turning bitter at the thought of Uzumi's chosen fate.
"Fairly well. Juri seems to be handling herself well, and I suspect those training scenarios you've been putting her and the rest of them through may have helped a little."
"Yeah….." Kira said shyly, rubbing his neck. "Now if only she'd stop stalking Jack…." Both Athhas paused to consider the sheer insanity of that statement.
"At any rate…" Uzumi said, motioning Kira forward. "I have a few gifts for you." The Chief Representative brought forth two items: a sheathed katana, and an inordinately large handgun. He handed Kira the katana first, even with the technologically enhanced strength of the Kanehada powered suit Kira was surprised at the immense weight of the sword as he slightly unsheathed the blade to inspect it….and gasped at what he saw.
"This katana is made out of the first sample of quantum crystal Orb's factories made." The blade was a glossy black color, like obsidian, but with veins of gold tracing throughout the structure, very faintly visible. "Be careful with it." Uzumi warned. Kira gave his father an odd look at those words "Smell the air around the edge of the blade. " Still giving his father the odd look Kira did as he was told and was surprised by what he smelled "Ozone?" Uzumi simply nodded. "According to Liene the edge of that sword can literally carve the electrons of an atom, as such the inner surface of the sheath itself is also made from a layer of quantum crystal. He also told me to tell you that if you so much as fart at the wrong time you'll slice yourself in half and never even realize you had an accident." Both Father and son had to choke off a laugh at the absurdity of the Engineer's comment but both knew he wouldn't have said it to Uzumi unless there was some truth to it. Next was the handgun. It was…different than any other sidearm made in the last two centuries. First off, it was a revolver, with eighteen rounds in it, 3 per each of its 6 chambers. Second, the actual barrel was mounted in line with the bottom most chamber instead of the top one; this made sightless aiming easier and more instinctive. Additionally the change of barrel position means that more recoil energy is transferred straight into the arm and thus greatly reducing muzzle rise when the gun is fired and subsequently shortening the recovery time between the following shots. Third, it was extremely light for its apparent size, the entire gun being as long as Kira's forearm, with a very thick body at least thrice that of a conventional revolver. "This is the Lion's Roar." Kira looked up at his adopted father in astonishment.
The Lion's Roar was one of the heirlooms of the Athha family, supposedly dating from back when Orb was first formed. It was apparently quite advanced for something of its age, using the same linear firing mechanisms as the Izanagi did. In fact, the Izanagi was developed from technology reverse-engineered from the LR. Angling the firearm, Kira saw the trademark lion-head insignia covering the cylinder reflecting golden light off of it.
"I…I can't take this!' Kira gasped.
"Yes, you can." Uzumi said firmly. "One way or another, I will not be the head of the Athha family anymore. You will." He held up a hand to halt Kira's panicked stammering. "I know you don't feel yourself up to the task. Haumea knows, I felt the same way when my father died. He had this to say to me, that I now say to you: A man's time as ruler rises and falls like the sun. The sun is setting on my time here, and will rise with you as the new ruler of our family, and of Orb. Kira….you don't have to rule Orb. But you will lead our family….And I know you will do far better than I ever did."
"I….." Kira looked down, silent tears streaking down his face.
"Kira." Was the stern, but kindly reprimand. Kira sniffed once, and looked back up, clamping the quantum crystal katana and the Lion's Roar to his suit's hips, and started to salute Uzumi, but paused.
He hugged him instead. Uzumi hugged him back, not at all surprised.
"Take care of your sister."
"I will."
- The Destroyer, The Torch, and The Crazies -
OMNI Enforcer 2nd Pacific Fleet, Grigori, Pilot Briefing Room
1100 Hours
Except for the glow of the screen, the room was dark. Shadows cast by the collected pilots and commanders danced across the back wall, and quite frankly, the way the light illuminated the two Abaddons' faces creeped the others out.
"Alright." Edward said, and paused the video. The quality wasn't all that great, in part due to the ECM flooding the airwaves from Orb's various fortifications, but one could still make out the basic form of Orb's mobile suits.
They looked alien in their design, simultaneously insectile and avian.
"As you can see..." Edward began, staring at each pilot in turn to make sure they paid attention. "Rather than using the standard humanoid base design, Orb's mobile suits follow a digitigrade leg design similar to birds, making them that much faster than our mobile suits and a hell of a lot sneakier too."
"So they're cowards that can run and hide faster." Orga growled, his fellow BCPU Extendeds chuckling with him. Abaddon said nothing, merely playing the video. While static-filled and shaky, the image was clear enough to see some enormous mobile suit, of the same shape as the others but much larger and with some anomalous fifth appendage, pick up a Constantine and smash it on one of the large volcanic rocks dotting the beach with enough force to smash it open like a watermelon.
"That can also single-handedly crush your mobile suit into a soda can." Lena snarked.
Edward switched the video to the East Asian force's footage, showing the Ensign climbing the cliff….before being summarily vaporized.
"The report from Commander Dōng Lóng shows that whatever beam weapon used overpenetrated the anti-beam shield - which, as you all know, uses an ablative gel coating for anti-beam defenses, in addition to being constructed of various high-density non-conductive materials. Whatever penetrated it also managed to destroy the arm, everything from the middle torso down, and still managed to travel far enough to evaporate over two hundred thousand liters of seawater, at the least, according to increased humidity." Abaddon stated frankly. "Ergo, we can expect your current units would be much, much more vulnerable to such weaponry, considering that the majority do not even possess anti-beam shields of any sort. The most we can expect is some interference from the magnetic repulsors, and even then not much. Well, maybe the Verin's armor will be resistant." Edward amended.
In the back of the room, Clotho took a moment from his handheld to snicker at his two compatriots, earning himself two harsh glares from them.
"At any rate, Orb's military capabilities have been proven to be beyond what our….political analysts…believed." Edward finished. "Thoughts?"
"Bah, let me go at them with the Cimeries!" Orga growled, again. "I'll vaporize all of them in a few shots!"
"Or you'll miss and hit the fleet." Shani said snidely.
"You want to repeat that freak!" Orga shouted.
"SHUT UP!" Lena roared, adopting a drill sergeant-like tone and volume. The two quieted, but not with a few glares directed at each other and Lena.
"Hmm… while I will admit, Ensign Sabnak, that any weapon that operates on the basic principle of a big powerful gun is always of some tactical worth…" Edward allowed, before flicking through the video footage again. "It hardly matters if you are lacking in an inclusive strategy. Now I'm going to confer with the other Commanders, the rest of you are to go over this footage with a fine toothed comb and glean whatever you can from it about the enemy and their tactics. Understood?"
"Sir, yes sir!" was the pretty much unanimous response of the room, though a bit surly in the case of a few BCPUs.
- The Pawns -
North America, Florida, Miami, Djibril's Estate
11:49 AM
"-And that is how things stand now Djibril." Muruta Azrael finished, going into a half-fearful, half-resentful silence.
"That's it? You've lost practically a third of your fighting force and still haven't taken Orb in over two hours?" Lord Djibril, a thin, aristocratic, and fairly feminine-looking man with grey hair and green eyes asked.
"…..yes."
"How disappointing. So much material….but at least it seems Azrael Industries will make a big profit in the near future." Djibril said slyly. Azrael, on the screen, fumed silently at the remark. After all, it wasn't he who was CEO of Azrael Industries, no, his younger brother, Bruno held that position. "Considering all the mobile weapons it will have to replace…..and the ships! Ah yes, I should buy stock in Spengler Naval Manufacturing."
"Would you stop with the business crap! I'm fighting a war here-"
"And you're making a mess of it." Djibril interrupted icily. "I don't see why, since your forces must outnumber Orb's pathetic few over a dozen times."
"I-i-it's Abaddon's fault! He's been stalling ever since we started-"
"I don't care. If Edward's acting up, let him go and get killed. His Biological CPUs are almost out-of-date anyway, including that daughter of his. All that matters is you capture Orb's mass driver so we can resupply our fleet at Ptolemaeus. So get to it, or I'll get someone else to do it. Maybe your brother." Before Azrael could complain, Djibril cut the link.
- The Author -
Woooo! We're back, baby!