Celestial Being Chronicles - Chapter 41
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Gundam series, nor any of the various series which are used or referenced in my fic, so please point that damned lawsuit cannon at someone else, also, don't read this if you are not of legal age to read such material. The story contains possibly disturbing content and should not be read by close-minded people (i.e., people who are easily offended.) Everything in the story is fictional. I am also not responsible for any actions taken by people who read this story and society's problems. I do, however, own my original character; Hope Yamato.
Author's note: I'd like to thank fellow member/reader KAZEONI for his help with this chapter. KAZEONI rightfully deserves credit for assisting me with this chapter, as well coming up with the idea which a majority of this chapter is centered around.
In one of the large hangers of the Excalibur, crewmen rushed to finish prepping the machines for launch. Hundreds of mobile suits and aircraft were quickly lined up in front of the many catapults of the warship, even as the ship itself prepeared to plunge into the atmosphere of the planet, which was now fractured between dozens of different timelines.
"Attention all hands." The voice of Lacus Clyne boomed from the PA system. "The Excalibur will be commencing atmosphereic re-entry in five minutes. Once the ship has reached crusing altitude, we will begin commencing multiple armed interventions across the globe."
Underneath JOSH-A, the Earth Alliance's headquarters in Alaska, the massive Cyclops System array came to life. The first to feel its effects were the Eurasian soldiers in the interior of JOSH-A and the ZAFT forces that had penetrated the interior. Unlike a normal self-destruct that would have engulfed the base in a massive explosion, the microwave weapon rapidly heated up the munitions and propellant of weapons used by both forces causing them to explode. It had the same effect on human bodies. Water in the human body would quickly heat up. The people affected inflated like balloons. Mercifully, this agonizing process only lasted a few seconds before they too exploded from the inside out.
They were the first victims of the Cyclops System but they wouldn't be the last. The system wouldn't stop until it reached the critical point and the base, as well as the array itself, was destroyed by the intense heat.
"We really fucked up this time." Hope muttered as the Excalibur, which was now shrouded behind the veil of its Mirage Colloid stealth system, leveled out above high above the Atlantic Ocean. Far below, the German battleship Bismarck was firing salvo after salvo of shells at a pair of Earth Alliance Arkansas-class destroyers.
Ten minutes later, Kira along with his many lovers and several members of the command staff were sitting in the Excalibur's briefing room with Kira at the head of the table.
"Alright..." Kira began. "We all know that the very fabric of time on Earth has become, in layman's terms; clusterfucked." He explained.
"That's not even the half of it!" Cagalli chimed in, motining towards the monitor. "Look at this! We have American civil war soldiers taking part in the D-Day landings, mobile suits from ZAFT fighting Erwin Rommel's Afrika Korps and ships from both world wars are slugging it out with vessels from the Cosmic Era!"
Kira glared at Cagalli, visibly annoyed with her outburst. "Thank you Cagalli...for stating the brutally obvious!" After a few tense moments, Kira was finally able to calm down.
"Now then, just as Lacus said before we went through atmospheric re-entry; we are planning to conduct multiple armed interventions." He explained. "However, we will not be at full strength." He added with an annoyed sigh.
"Why's that?" Athrun asked from the far end of the table.
"Well, we are down four units. Hope, Mayu, both of your Gundams are down for routine maintenance, and won't be operational for a few days." Kira explained as he looked in their direction.
"Okay, but what about the other two?" Hope asked, causing Kira to look in Asuka's direction with a visibly irritated glare on his face.
"What?" The red-headed Eva pilot innocently asked.
"Well, Asuka." Kira answered. "Thanks to that little stunt you pulled in training, both of the Evas are also out of action."
Before Asuka could retort Misato chimed in, while keeping a grip on Asuka's shoulder to keep her in her seat. "So, does this mean that the four of us are going to remain here on the ship?"
"No, you won't. I need the four of you to go on a mission of another kind for me." He said as he hit a button on the edge of the table, activating the holo-projector in the center and bringing up an image of the earth. "We will be conducting multiple armed interventions, but before we even begin, we need intel first. That's why I'm sending Asuka and Misato on a reconnaissance flight with Hope and Mayu as fighter escort."
"Now wait just a goddamn minute!" Asuka shouted as she stood up from her seat, clearly losing her temper. "Why do I have to be in the damn radar plane!"
"Because I said so!" Kira answered in a stern voice, but without losing his cool. "Think of it as disciplinary action for damaging the Evas." He said.
"But-" Asuka began, only to be cut off.
"Or would you rather I strip you of your clothing and throw you into solitary confinement, in the brig, leaving you completely naked for a few days?" The amethyst-eyed man asked, with an almost sadistic grin.
Asuka quickly returned to her seat.
"Also, you have training in electronic warfare and that's the main reason why." Kira added as he leaned back in his chair.
"What will we be flying?" Misato asked.
"This." Kira said as he hit another button on his control pad, causing the hologram of the planet earth to be replaced by the image of what looked like a scaled down biplane like version of a B2 Spirit. "The X-49 Night Raven." Kira explained. "It's one of our latest attempts at an aircraft powered by both jet engines and GN drives." He said, while both Misato and Asuka looked at the hologram.
"Where are the recon packages located?" Asuka asked.
"The whole underside of the bottom wing is where most of the sensors are located." Kira answered. "The aircraft also has our Mirror Coated Phase Shift armor, but due to its small size as opposed to a mobile suit, we were not able to fit it with a mirage colloid stealth system. So you have to make do with standard stealth mixed with the jamming from the GN particles." Kira said.
"Is it armed?" Misato asked.
"You two heavy beam cannons for point defense, but no missiles. Remember this is a recon plane not a fighter." Kira answered, and Misato nodded at the information.
Once he had finished his explaination Kira turned to Hope and Mayu. "Which is where you two come in. You will be flying escort in another new plane." He said as he changed the hologram from that of the Night Raven to another plane.
This aircraft was vastly different from the first; it had a long sharp nose, its wings were swept back from the root to mid-way before sweeping forwards the rest of the way giving it the look of a large 'W'. It also had three canards around the cockpit area, One on each side and another on the belly.
"Holy..." Mayu breathed as she looked at the hologram.
"This is the ADF-01 FALKEN, this is your new plane." Kira smiled.
"Wow...that's quite a looker." Hope said.
"It possesses the same GN propulsion, stealth and armor systems as the Night Raven, but is more heavily armed." Kira said. "You have a single beam cannon for point defense, eight GN missiles, and located under the cockpit..." The amethyst-eyed man continued as he hit another button, causing the hologram to animate, the underside of the plane's long nose opening like a mouth. "A miniaturized positron blaster cannon."
Mayu let out a low whistle as she looked over the specs of the aircraft that she and her wife would be flying. "Before I forget; the FALKEN uses the same COFFIN system as your Gundams but the Night Raven doesn't." Kira added.
"Why's that?" Misato asked, beating Asuka to the punch.
"For the same reason the Evas don't have two pilots. As you know the system is connected to the pilot's brain, and if we had two brains trying to control the system at the same time it could cause the system to overload and rebound." Kira explained.
"And I'm guessing that's bad." Asuka said.
"It certainly is unless you want to end up in a mindless vegetative state spending the rest of your days drooling." Kira answered as he stood from the table. "Now that you all have your assignments; all hands prep for action!"
"YES, SIR!" Everyone else shouted in perfect unison as they stood and left the briefing room.
Minutes later, the massive hangers of the Excalibur were alive with activity as hundreds of personnel quickly moved about, prepping for the rapidly approaching operations. Mobile suit pilots boarded their machines and began to check and recheck their systems. Misato was sitting in the cockpit of the X-49 Night Raven, going over the flight controls as she waited for Asuka to show up.
Elsewhere, in one of the many locker rooms on the hanger deck, Hope, Mayu and Asuka were busy getting into their flight suits. The flight suits where black in color with the G-suit built in, while still being form fitting. Asuka wore a relatively normal looking suit while Hope and Mayu's where slightly altered in that they had small patches of red along the backside of the suit. These areas were padded for comfort, as vehicles with the COFFIN system didn't have cushioned seats. Their suits also had small connection ports along the wrist's, ankles, waist, and three along the spine and one at the back of the helmet where the pilot linked with the computer.
Asuka looked over her shoulder, catching a momentary glimpse of Mayu's cleavage before she zipped up her suit. She glanced over at Hope and began grumbling something in German, even as she looked back at her own chest, and then back at the two well endowed women.
"What's wrong, Asuka?" Mayu asked.
"Nothing! Leave me alone, weibchen!" The redhead yelled as she stomped out of the locker room. Mayu looked at Hope as they began to leave. "What was that about?" She asked, and Hope simply shrugged in response.
A few minutes later, Asuka walked into the hanger with Mayu and Hope trailing behind her. Asuka scaled the boarding ladder of the Night Raven and plopped into her seat behind Misato.
"You're late, Asuka!" Misato said as she turned to face her crewmate.
"Yeah, yeah, let's just get ready for take off." Asuka said as she buckled herself in and began to calibrate her systems.
Meanwhile, Hope and Mayu were both just finishing their preflight walk around. Just as Mayu began to climb into the cockpit, Shinn came walking up to her. "Mayu, can I talk to you?" He asked.
"It's going to have to wait, Shinn." She said as she sat in the pilot's seat. "We're about to get underway, in fact we're behind schedule."
Before Shinn could say anymore, Mayu had sealed the hatch. Mayu locked herself into her seat and linked to the plane's computer, activating it. Moments later she, Hope, Asuka and Misato were all locked in to the catapult system. Before launch, Kira's face appeared on the main screen of the all three planes.
"Good hunting, ladies." He said as he gave them a salute. Once his face disappeared the voice of that catapult operator came over the communication system. "Recon flight, you are cleared for take off."
"Roger control, recon flight ready for take off." Misato said. At that moment all three planes maxed out their engines, the quiet whoosh of the GN Drives echoed throughout the hanger. A split second later all three planes lurched forward as they rocketed off the flight line and into the sky.
"YaaaaaaaaaaaHoooooooooooo!" Hope whooped over the radio, she had always loved flying jets more then operating mobile suits and it showed as she started to twirl and roll her plane. "This thing is awesome!"
"Hey, let's put on some music." Mayu said, as she activated a library of millions of songs stored in the aircraft's memory. After a few minutes of searching she found a perfect flying song. "Let's show Misato and Asuka what we can do." Mayu said, as she flew into formation with Hope and started the music. The song was from an old navel flying movie from the late twentieth century. The film known as 'Top Gun' with the song titled 'Danger Zone'.
While Misato kept the Night Raven on course, she watched in awe as the pair of fighters pulled off many maneuvers in time with the music. Both Hope and Mayu could be heard over the communication line, singing along to the lyrics. Within a few moments, Asuka's patience was wearing thin, and finally she slammed her fists into the console before her.
"Would you two stop that?" She shouted, just as the song ended and Hope and Mayu returned to their positions guarding the reconnaissance aircraft.
"Well, someone doesn't have any sense of fun." Mayu huffed at Asuka's outburst as the trio of aircraft continued to speed away from the Excalibur.
"Damn." Mayu muttered about ten minutes later as the three aircraft soared high above Banadiya in Africa. Far below, on the desert floor, a group of three TMF/A-802 BuCUEs, led by a familiar orange colored TMF/A-803 LaGOWE, was relentlessly purusing a group of fleeing German tanks. Hope was quick to notice that the fleeing tanks appeared to be highly modified Panthers. Her suspicions were confirmed when the LaGOWE fired a volley from its beam cannons, only for the twin energy blasts to smash harmlessly against a glowing positron reflector shield that had unexpectedly flared to life around the armored vehicles.
"So, now Nazi Germany has positron refelctor technology." Asuka muttered, her voice laced with more than a hint of sarcasam and contempt. "Wonderful."
"So what?" Hope smirked. "They still can't possibly beat us." At that moment, a single mobile suit seemed to appear out of thin air. The machine displayed vivid red, blue and white armor with a black and red backpack which posessed two pairs of wings, and everyone instantly recognized it as the GAT-X105 Strike Gundam.
"Wait, so now the Strike Gundam is here too?" Misato asked, not completely believeing her eyes.
"It sure looks that way." Mayu sighed. "Protector 1 to Excalibur."
"Excalibur here." Lacus's voice quickly answered. "Go ahead, Protector 1."
"We've found a conflict in the African desert which you might be interested in." Mayu quickly explained. "A group of TMF/A-802 BuCUEs, led by a single TMF/A-803 LaGOWE is fighting against the GAT-X105 Aile Strike Gundam."
"So what?" Cagalli's voice replied. "We've all seen that multiple times before."
"Have you also seen tanks from Nazi Germany equipped with positron reflector shields?" Asuka cut in.
"No." Lacus replied. "We haven't seen that yet."
"Well, someone may want to get out here and interve-oh shit!" Hope suddenly yelled, even as she pulled her fighter up and to the left, barely managing to dodge a pair of searing green beam blasts, which were closely followed by a charging ZGMF-X56S Force Impulse Gundam. Hope's eyes widened when she saw that this particular Force Impulse bore a color scheme perfectly matching that of the now legendary ZGMF-X10A Freedom Gundam. "Where the hell did the Force Impulse Gundam come from?"
"And why does it have the color scheme of my original Freedom Gundam?" Kira's voice yelled. "We'll have to place copyrights on our mobile suit color schemes too."
"Already done, Kira." Lexi's holographic image grinned from where she sat at the auxillary sensor station.
"Lexi, I could kiss you." Kira praised, causing the woman's holographic image to blush slightly, even as he sprinted towards the door.
"Kira, get back here!" Murrue's voice called out as the amethyst-eyed man ran towards the door, clearly intending to launch the Divinity Gundam.
"Ok, if you want to fight, I'll be happy to oblige." Hope scowled, charging her positron cannon and pulling her FALKEN into an Immelmann turn. "Eat shit and die!" She snarled, unleashing a searing blue-red energy blast from the underside of her fighter. The pilot of the Impulse tried to avoid the huge energy blast, but even so, the entire right side of the machine was caught in the blast, rendering the mobile suit unable to fight and forcing it to set down on the desert floor below.
With the recon sweep of the current area complete, the trio of aircraft quickly regrouped, ignited their afterburners and sped off towards their next objective. As the three aircraft quickly moved to regroup, they were fired upon by the TMF/A-803 LaGOWE, one of the searing beam blasts grazing the left engines of the Night Raven, while the other energy blast sliced through the right tailplane of Hope's Falken.
"Oh shit!" Hope, Asuka and Misato cried out in unison as their respective aircraft began to spew clouds of thick black smoke.
"Protector 1 to Excalibur." Mayu called, her voice urgent, but still calm. "Protector 2 and Raven 1 have been hit."
"Understood, Protector 1." Lacus answered, quickly going over the information being sent to her on the Excalibur. "It looks like the Night Raven's left engines are down to only 25% of their standard output." The pink-haired beauty paused for a few short seconds before continuing. "Protector 2, you appear to have lost your left tailplane."
"Oh, really?" Hope growled, struggling to keep her fighter aircraft flying straight and level. "Whatever makes you think that, Lacus?"
"Don't talk back to me." Lacus scowled. "Recon flight, you are hereby ordered to return to base."
"Understood." The three pilots replied in perfect unison, as they climbed high above the clouds and turned back towards the Excalibur.
"Protector 2, since you have the most damage, you will be landing first." Lacus ordered. "Raven 1, you are to come in immediately after Protector 2 has touched down."
"Understood." The three pilots answered in unison.
Hope quickly lined her Falken up with the deck and touched down, only to find that she had somehow missed all of the arrestor cables. "Oh, shit." She muttered, before her plane slammed into the crash net and finally came to a stop, but her feeling of safety was short lived.
Asuka and Misato didn't even have time to scream as the Night Raven plowed into the rear of the Falken, shattering both aircraft into a pair of orange-red fireballs. All three pilots blacked out upon impact.
Mayu landed just as the other two planes exploded.
"HOPE!" She screamed, and without even bothering to taxi off the landing zone or even waiting to reach the boarding ladder, she popped her hatch and leapt from the cockpit to the ground, breaking her ankle on landing.
After a brief moment of intense pain she got back to her feet, threw her helmet aside and sprinted over to the pile of burning, mangled steel that had once been the two planes. Fire crews had already sprung into action and were busy suppressing the flames. Mayu found that the cockpit of Hope's Falken had been turned on its side.
"Hope, can you hear me!" She screamed over the roar of the flames. When she didn't hear a response, Mayu seacrhed frantically for the emergency canopy release lever. Finally, finding what she was searching for she grabbed the lever but instantly recoiled as the intense heat from the fire burned her hands through the gloves.
"AHHH!" She yelled, and after a quick second, she grabbed the lever again, ignoring the sizzling in her hands and yanked the lever triggering the explosive bolts on the cockpit hatch.
What greeted Mayu when she looked into the cockpit made her heart sink. The crash had tossed Hope's body around the cockpit like a rag doll. Her blood had been splattered all over the interior of the cockpit. Mayu quickly but carefully pulled Hope's limp body from the wreckage and away from the fire. Mayu quickly noticed that she couldn't see inside Hope's helmet visor and moved to remove her helmet.
"Hope..." Mayu whispered as she released the clasp on her lover's helmet, causing a small fountain of blood to pour from the opening like paint from a can. Mayu cradled Hope's upper body as she removed her helmet. Mayu could now see the shape Hope was in. Her left eye had ruptured, she had many broken bones and even a large gash were a piece of the plane had punched into the seat from the back and out Hope's right side. Mayu checked Hope's pulse and felt nothing. Hope was for all intents and purposes dead.
'Why isn't she healing?' Mayu thought as she looked back at the wreckage.
"MEDIC!" Mayu screamed at the top of her lungs. Within seconds two medical personal had arrived and placed Hope on a stretcher and quickly moved to the medical deck.
By now the fires had been dealt with and both Asuka and Misato had been removed from the wreckage; both of whom were covered in severe burns.