category: Gundam SEED
disclaimer: I don't own it.
TWO.
Even before the peace conferences at Orb began, Lacus started appointing her right-hand men. As the provisional chairwoman of the PLANTs, she found herself suddenly in control of a nation still reeling from battles long past, alone. She looked to the spirit of her father for guidance, and started the long process of building up her bureaucracy around her.
She promoted Yzak to the position of general, and only hoped that he didn't drive himself to a breakdown with the new pressure of heading the entire ZAFT military. Out of all the commanders during the second war – with the exception of Talia Gladys – he had proved himself the most capable. But more importantly, she trusted him more than any of the other candidates, so the title was his. Somehow she knew even before he accepted that ZAFT would flourish under him.
She made Kira a lieutenant general, right under Yzak. There was a small protest from the Supreme Council at that, but she silenced them quickly. Although Kira hadn't even properly enlisted at that point, she had complete faith in him. (Inwardly, she noted that the white uniform suited Kira very well.) He was an ace pilot in both wars, she reminded the Council coolly, and then they all quieted. Neither she nor Kira had wished for him to get formally involved with a military ever again, but he insisted that being close to her was what is most important to him, so she ensured that he was tied to national defense and not to field operations, and together they hoped that he would never have to be put in charge of an actual fleet.
There was a handful of other captains that she promoted to lieutenant generals, and more officers that she bumped up to major generals, including Dearka. Yzak stalked into her office the day after she handed him the list of new positions and roared at her about how he had never seen a soldier move up from a green uniform to a black so fast, and Dearka certainly didn't deserve the boost. She only smiled placidly and informed him that she had also specifically placed Dearka as his immediate subordinate, because she thought the two of them would appreciate seeing each other every day again. Yzak stormed out as irately as he had came, and the door slammed shut over the sound of her quiet laugh.
Lacus disassembled FAITH and held memorial services for the dead and reined in the berserk media outlets that would still not leave the death of Chairman Durandal alone. Still, there was more to be done.
The Supreme Council was an elected group, so she couldn't do much about some of the corrupt members already serving, but she pulled strings and started campaigns to make sure certain people that her father had valued (Ezalia Joule, Tad Elsman, and Yuri Amalfi) regained their positions and other honorable incumbents (Orson White, Alan Clarzec, and George Adaman) maintained theirs after the upcoming elections. The Council was the backbone of her administration and she needed balanced, experienced viewpoints behind her.
All this spanned several weeks, and when she finally had some sort of support structure fixed around her, Lacus breathed easily and enjoyed an hour's worth of tranquility before drawing a mountain of documents toward her and getting back to work.
notes: Kind of dull, I guess, but I'm really obsessive about details such as ranks and things whenever I read GS/GSD stories. But it's smooth sailing from here on out. I just wanted to put some sort of explanation out there for the GSD Special Edition IV ending, where we see many characters in new posts and the like.
NEXT PHASE: Cagalli struggles with goodbyes as her comrades fade into civilian lives.