Disclaimer: I don't own anything except the OCs in this story and probably the story idea? (shrugs) Oh and some mild swearing, but I try not. I swear! Some of the scenes and conversations are directly taken from the episode.
GSD: Shifting Shadows
Shift 02: Mission Start
Athrun Zala, once part of ZAFT's elite red coats, did a last minute check on the ZAKU's status. The last time he piloted a mobile suit, Cagalli got injured by his recklessness. He tightened his grip on the throttle control before he relaxed. 'Just piloting to support the breakers' he relaxed himself as he felt the ZAKU being moved into the launch catapult. The mobile suit suddenly jerked to a stop; he saw the signaller move the light sticks to the halt position. 'Something's wrong'
The intercom came alive with Meyrin's urgent voice, "Abort launch!" This halted all activity inside the hangar bay, she continued, "A change in situation. The Joule Team is engaged in combat with an unknown opponent at Junius Seven."
'Yzak?' Athrun said in surprise.
"All units, alter your equipment and prepare for anti-mobile suit combat." Athrun contacted the CIC, with Meyrins face appearing on screen.
"What going on?!" Athrun all but demanded the somewhat dismayed face of the operator.
"I have no idea, but your mission to support the Joule Team is still unchanged! Upon completing the equipment switch, please proceed for take off!"
"Roger." Athrun cut of the comm link; however, another one was established with Lunamaria, the pilot of the red Zaku. Even in combat situation she remains upbeat, he thought.
"The situation has changed," she said, smiling "It could be dangerous." Athrun didn't answer her disrepectful statement and she continued, "Would you rather not go?"
"Give me a little respect." Lunamaria cutoff the link. Athrun glared at the screen for a bit before adjusting the suit for combat in space.
Chimera Squad, two minutes until entry to Junius Seven airspace.
Ian Ran eyed the nav console when the computer alerted him of a sensor contact coming from his starboard side 174 kilometers out. It was the unknown battleship that attack Armory One and stole the three mobile suits. He debated on changing course and attacking the enemy unit.
"Sir" Joan radioed him, "Unknown Ship is launching Class-3 mobile suits, should we engaged?"
"Negative, stay on course. Primary objective is to meet up with the VIP." He cut of the link. Two minutes till communication range.
The radar operator, Ensign Burt Heim, watch the console closely as he took in the chaos of the battlefield. Out of nowhere, four new high speed contacts appeared at the edge of the screen. The cross section returns were minimal due to the debris field playing havoc with Minerva's sensors. Calculating their trajectory, his eyes widened as he found out the four new contact were on an intercept course towards Minerva.
"Captain! New contacts on an intercept course!"
"New enemy?" Arthur asked as he gave a questioning look at the radar operator.
"Mobile Suits?" Captian Gladys calmly inquired.
"Unknown. Minimal heat signatures. Intercept time, three minutes!"
Meyrin held a hand on her headset. The Captain noticed this and held her silence. "Incoming laser communication. F-from lead unknown!"
"Put it on screen."
"Y-yes Ma'am" the screen appeared pitch black before a person wearing a pilot helmet with a reflective visor materialized.
"State your intentions, or be fired upon." Captain Gladys threatened the new contact.
The pilot was quiet for a couple of seconds before asking, "Are you Captain Talia Gladys of the ZAFT battleship Minerva?"
Most of the bridge crew were taken aback by the question. Chairman Durandal appeared expressionless, while Cagalli's expression was of confusion.
"Yes, I am. May I ask who you are?" Again the person didn't say anything for a couple of seconds.
"Lieutenant Ran, IMC. Is representative Attha onboard?" This drew a questioning look to Cagalli who was bewildered. Captain Gladys stared at Cagalli, asking if to confirm or deny the man. Cagalli stepped down and stood beside the Captain.
"I'm Representative Cagalli Yula Attha, what do you want?" The person slightly nodded when he saw Cagalli.
"Ah. I'm to deliver a message to you."
"Yes?"
"In person. Captain, permission to come aboard your ship?" Gladys turned to Chairman Durandal. The Chairman was quiet for a moment, contemplating this new unknown development. He nodded to her.
"Permission granted; however, you will be escorted by onboard security."
"One more thing, Captain. My team wish to help you on your Junius Seven operations. Can you designate us as allies and forward us mission-critical parameters."
"Chairman?" Gladys turned to Durandal.
"The more machines we have, the better our chances. Permission granted."
"We'll forward you with the necessary data and informed the rest of ZAFT of your non-hostile designation."
"Thank you, Captain. Ran out." The IMC lieutenant switched to the squad's secure channel and barked out an order. "You three, run CAP around Junius Seven. The enemy hostile units are the ZAFT GINNs equipped with Mobility Packs. Also keep an eye out for the three stolen mobile suits. We don't know their intentions yet. Clear?"
"Sir!" The three responded in unison.
"Break!" The
Ensign Heim watched as the four new contacts' sensor signature change to resemble mobile suits. Specifically, the readings closely resemble a Gundam Unit. He turned his head on the big screen, the starboard external camera zoomed in on the three objects barreling towards the designated combat zone.
"They're CGUE's" exclaimed Arthur. "Are they part of ZAFT?" Captain Gladys quietly reprimanded her second-in-command.
Meyrin look out of the bridge's window, the lone CGUE lazily arc around Minerva, lining itself up on the portside hangar. The bridge crew watched as the CGUE cut off its main thrusters and use its maneuvering jets to adjust its alignment as it let Minerva's difference in momentum swallow it inside the maw of the open catapult deck.
Captain Gladys was perplexed by the pilot's unorthodox landing. Most mobile suit pilots would just barrel their way into the hangar and brake at the last second as they entered the catapult deck. She picked up the phone and called the hangar bay.
"Chief?"
"Yeah we got it. Though, I tell you whoever's that guy is one heck of a pilot. Didn't even leave a scratch on the deck as it touched down. Haven't seen one do that before. Anyway the modified CGUE's being locked down at the moment. Security's waiting for the guy to get out."
"What do you mean modified?"
"Get this, that CGUE's got Phase Shift Armor! And, is packing a MA-M21G Beam Rifle. Also I have a suspicion that the wierd protrusion on the left leg is a beam saber."
"It's a Gundam?" That statement drew a look from everybody.
"Or as close as one can get by modifying an existing mobile suit."
"Keep me posted."
"Aye."
Vivi kept her eye on the data stream coming from Minerva. 'This battle is really a mess.' Allied ZAFT were almost indistinguishable from renegade ZAFT GINNs from afar. Also the three stolen suits were adding more chaos by engaging a three-way battle between the remaining two.
"Hey, Commandy Boy" she heard him sigh in annoyance. She grinned behind her visor, "give us some covering fire."
"Affirmative"
"De Arc, you're with me. Cover my six. We're gonna do a strafing run on the GINNs."
"Copy that."
Vivi's CGUE increased its speed, raising its beam rifle as the targeting computer began picking targets of opportunity. Joan followed behind also raising her weapon and scanning the surrounding area. Saros meanwhile pulled back, firing his rifle at the GINNs ahead Vi and Joan's intended flight path. After that, he searched for a suitable overwatch position, attaching his CGUE to a floating chunk of rock big enough to cover most of the mobile suit. The data stream from Vivi's targeting computer helped him acquire targets from afar.
Athrun's ZAKU beep in alarm as an enemy mobile suit came from behind him. He turn around just in time to block the attack with the shoulder mounted shield. He aimed his rifle at the sensor array of the GINN, which is usually head of the mobile suit and blasted it away. He then systematically disabled the enemy mobile suits combat capability. He saw a green flash from afar, and within seconds, the beam went past him, several of meters away to his left. The ZAKU registered an explosion behind the mobile suit. Athrun turned to see it was a GINN, with its right arm missing. Undeterred, the pilot activated GINN's thrusters to try and tackle Athrun. Athrun raised his rifle, but before he could do anything, two plasma beams hit the head and then the upper chest in consecutive order. The GINN spiralled uncontrollably, before crashing onto Junius Seven.
Athrun looked back to where he saw the green flash, the camera zoomed in to find a silver-grey CGUE hiding behind a rock. The CGUE raised its left arm in acknowledgement. Athrun noticed that the targeting computer designated it as an ally. He tuned his attention back to the battlefield and notice Chaos gunning for one of the breaker teams and proceed to intercept the troublesome Gundam.
"De Arc, 5 o'clock high." Saros calmly informed his teammate on the squad's secure channel. Joan without missing a beat turned around, raised her rifle and let loose a volley. The Class-3 mobile suit named Abyss dodged aside, but several beams hit one of the wings, damaging it, and another scratching the right arm.
"What the-" the Abyss Pilot cried out in open channel.
Shinn, noticing the Abyss's momentary shock gunned open the Impulse's thrusters to maximum, "RAAH!" to Auel's credit, he barely missed the killing blow. Shinn only swipe the right ankle.
"It's secure!" Saros heard from the ZAFT's communication channel. He quickly located the breaker team's location as the mobile suits separated from the Meteor Breaker as it drilled through Junius Seven along with the other units. A couple of seconds later, a momentary bright flash engulfed the battlefield followed by large cracks snaking across the surface, breaking the colony into two. All the combatants in the field froze in sight of the colony breaking apart. The ZAFT comms filled with cheers at the sight. While the Gundams broke off from their opponents and stared at the colony. The GINNs meanwhile froze in shock which the CGUEs took advantage of as Vivi and Joan streak across the battlefield reducing the number of rogue ZAFT force's combat-capable mobile suits to only a dozen or so.
A stern, commanding voice cut through the ZAFT's cheers, silencing them, "We're not done yet! We need to break it into smaller pieces."
"Athrun?!" Saros was taken aback. He thought that Representative Attha's bodyguard was onboard the Minerva. He heard a muffled squeal of delight on the other end of the squad's channel.
"I'm flying with the Athrun Zala!"
"Vi! Concentrate!" Joan reprimanded her partner.
"Bastard! What the hell are you doing here?!" snarled Yzak.
"That's not important right now! We must continue with our mission!"
Yzak smiled as he replied his former teammate, "Right! I know that!"
"You haven't change Yzak."
"Neither have you!"
Dearka just cracked his neck, remembering the old times. "Oh boy."
Yzak and Dearka's mobile suit took positions around Athrun's ZAKU as he carried with him a Meteor Breaker.
Saros watched as he identified Athrun's mobile as the green ZAKU he helped with earlier. From his vantage view of the battlefield, he noticed two GINNs on an intercept course to Athrun. "Vi!" he called out, "Two GINNs intercepting a Breaker unit at 8500 meters, 11 o'clock high."
"Copy!"
The GINNs fired a couple of shots at Athrun's group. Yzak and Dearka were about to break off when two well placed shots at the GINNs' thruster pods send the mobile suits at an uncontrolled spiral. Another two shots at both mobile suits engulfed them in fiery explosions.
Before Yzak or Dearka could say anything, they saw two CGUEs crossing their sights before disappearing behind a huge chunk of Junius Seven.
"Who are those guys?" Dearka asked, "they're not with the Task Force." Athrun was surprised at the revelation. He thought the CGUEs were like Team Le Cresuet.
"It doesn't matter, we have a mission to complete."
Just then, an unknown partially synthesized voice spoke through the three pilots' comm system, "Abyss, closing in at 5400 meters, 6 o'clock high!"
With out missing a beat, Athrun, Dearka, and Yzak moved out of the way as three powerful beams streak through and hit the location in front of them.
"Yzak!"
"Shut up! I'm the one in command here!" Yzak went on the Abyss's damaged right side. As Athrun distracted Auel by shooting his mobile suit on the already damaged right arm. "Stop giving orders! You damn civilian!" Yzak swung his halberd across Abyss's torso. Auel, backed away but not before the halberd cut off the mobile suits left arm and scraping across the Gundam's armored cockpit. Athrun streaked behind the Abyss and cut off its undamaged leg as he went to intercept Chaos.
Saros watched with interest as the two mobile suit aces cut apart Abyss and Chaos with excellent teamwork against a better performing machine. The Chimera squad's sniper, also noticed another set of Meteor Breakers drilling through the surface. Both Abyss and Chaos retreated away from the battlefield as the bigger piece of the colony broke into another half. The Abyss spluttered along due to the heavy accumulated damaged it took from the both the CGUEs that showed up and being hacked apart by two annoyed ZAFT aces. A thought occurred to Saros as he set his sights on the limping mobile suit.
"Dammit!" Auel punched the controls in frustration. He's going to kill that green mobile suit and the other guy too. Another punch and his mobile suit shuddered and jerked violently. It spiraled out of control. "Uurgh!" Auel tried to regain control but from what the computer's telling him, he lost his main thrusters. Also, his energy filler is almost empty with at least 10 minutes of operational time. He jerked the controls trying to see if he still has control, but to no avail.
"Sting!" Auel cried out to his teammate. "I don't have any controls of my mobile suit!" Just then, Girty Lue launched the retreat flares.
"Coming to your left." Auel heard Sting as he stared at the retreat flares and he clucked his tongue in frustration. Before Sting could reached Auel, a brilliant green streak from of a beam rifle stopped him on his tracks. "What the-" he searched where the beam came from. In the darkness of the void, he spotted a green flash of light before his mobile suit shuddered at the impact and his view replaced by static. Sting frantically weaved about trying to make himself a much harder target, but without the suit's head, he flew blindly about and crashed onto Auel's disabled Gundam.
"Sting! What the heck are you doing!" Abyss drifted farther from the flailing Gundam. "Stella! Help!"
Stella's daydreaming, if one could call it that, got interrupted by Auel's cry for help. She maneuvered her mobile suit away from the battlefield and transformed into a mobile armour. She leap from debris to debris as she came closer to Auel's drifting gundam.
"Stella! Stay back, there's a sniper somewhere here!" Sting warned the blond girl. As if on cue, a green streak of light hit the small asteroid she just landed on. The rock sprayed out dust and debris as it tumbled away. Stella quickly changed into a mobile suit and moved in an erratic manner trying to approach the disabled Gundam. However, every time she gets close, the sniper shoots in front of her.
"Stella, grab Sting and return back." The Gaia pilot heard Neo Roanoke's voice through the radio.
"Neo..." Stella backed away and grabbed Chaos's frame and blasted towards Girty Lue, and into the waiting arms of Neo.
"Stella! Sting!" Auel screamed at them through the open channel. He punched the screen in front of him, making it crack across the retreating forms of Gaia and Chaos before his mobile suit lost its main power. He shook uncontrollably before letting out a blood-curdling scream that everybody could hear on the open channel.
Saros, satisfied at his handiwork, smiled. He considered the frustrated scream of the pilot an added bonus. He turned his sights on the Unknown ship as it opened its catapult deck to receive the battered Chaos and the slightly scratched Gaia. He took aim from a great distance at the tiny speck of the battleship's exposed hangar. Even though he was inside a mobile suit, and jerkiness wasn't a factor when shooting. Saros slowed his heartbeat and held his breath as he pulled the trigger and let loose a green bolt as a parting gift for the retreating EA forces. He followed the beam as it made its way to its target.
Neo Roanoke was less than pleased at losing one of the stolen Gundams. The pain would be less if it was destroyed, but curse that sniper. He appreciated its strategy, using an age-old technique of luring, but being on the receiving end only ended up as annoying him.
"Have you located the sniper's position?"
"Negative, the debris around here makes it nearly impossible to pinpoint its location." Neo narrowed his eyes behind the mask as he caught a glimpse of a green flash. He's brain worked into overdrive on why the sniper would target this ship. As far as the battle went, the sniper's weapon isn't graded to pierce through anti-beam laminated battleship-grade hulls. Neo's eyes wandered at the catapult deck extending out to receive the Gundams; his eyes widen as realization fell upon him.
"Evasive Maneuvers! Hard to Starboard! Now!"
To the helmsman's credit, he didn't flinch at the sudden outburst and jerked the helm hard to starboard. The captain also gulped in nervousness as he came to the same conclusion. Slowly, the Girty Lue swiveled a few degrees to the right before the beam clipped Chaos and splashed harmlessly onto battleship-grade hull. Everybody on bridge relaxed believing it to be over.
"Activate Gottfried and blast that sniper into oblivion."
"Acquiring targeting solution. Target acquired!"
"Fire!" The captain raised his right hand. Three Gottfried turrets turned their turrets and fired a volley of green lances at the sniper's location.
Saros turned around just in time to see his previous hiding spot got blasted into space dust as he drifted towards his next hiding spot, this time it was a part of a damaged solar array. He turned his attention back from harassing the Unknown ship to the battlefield 'below' him.
Lieutenant Ran opened his cockpit and was greeted by the ship's waiting security personnel, their weapons pointed his way. Behind the reflective visor, Ran smiled. He tilted his head forward to acknowledge their presence before turning around and locking the mobile suit's cockpit.
"Can't be too careful nowadays." He said to the engineers floating behind the security personnel much to their visible displeasure. "If you're willing to try and hack the lock, go ahead. It rated as a Class-10." He pulled out his sidearm, which the guards immediately tensed up and raised their weapons. Ran offered it to them with the dangerous end pointed away from them. "And, if you're desperate to try and cut you're way through," he paused and shrugged not saying anything more. "Now, take me to the Chief Representative of Orb." The engineers, now wary about that unspoken bit, edged away from the mobile suit.
Cagalli watched as the battle unfolded before her eyes. Before the mysterious CGUEs arrived, the battle seemed to be in a stalemate between the three factions. The ZAFT's breaker team kept being interrupted by rogue GINNs, while the ZAFT forces try to keep them at bay. In the meantime, the stolen gundams wreck havoc all across the battlefield.
Since the CGUEs entered the battlefield, the battle tipped towards the ZAFT's favor. The reaction of the bridge crew of the Minerva were perplexed to say the least. Captain Gladys remained compose, albeit relieved to have such capable force fighting at their side. Also, she kept a wary eye on the mysterious guest pilot. From the reports she received, the phase shift armour and a couple of weapons were not the only upgrades his mobile suit received. It also got top-notch security against hacking, and the implied protection against forceful entry. The pilot also didn't remove his helmet upon leaving the hangar, creating a stir amongst the inexperienced crew members.
Meyrin in the CIC watched and listened with a mixture of awe and horror as the CGUEs tore through the battlefield. Among the chatter of the ZAFT forces, she could hear a partially synthesized voice giving out warnings to various ZAFT mobile suits. It was always the position of the clock hand, either 'high' or 'low'. Or, a simple 'above' or 'below' along with estimated distance. She tried to pinpoint the sniper's location through the radio, but the debris bounced off the signal, echoing around. Then, it click as to why the sniper CGUE chose the dangerous debris field to hide. It was the same principle Bogey-1 used a day ago, masking its signal to essentially disappear off the radar. The only way for somebody to locate the CGUE is when it fired its weapon or somebody actively hunting it inside the debris field. Even then, it was difficult to spot the sniper. As how a flight of GINNs discovered when they tried to enter the dense debris field.
Four of the seven GINNs were shot down as they approached the debris field. The remaining three had a hard time maneuvering through as they check each nook and cranny. Each one jumping on stray shadows, firing wildly breaking up more debris and creating sensor blind spots. One of the GINNs got impaled by a heavy sword that came out of nowhere creating a bright explosion that lengthen the shadows around. Saros used the momentary brightness to fire a shot behind another GINN. This created another explosion as the green lance pierce through the mobile suit's torso. He then, unsheathed his beam saber and slashed the last remaining GINN, cutting the mobile suit from the waist down. Meyrin then heard an odd statement through the ZAFT communication channel. She believed the pilot forgot to switch channels
"Now, where did that sword go." It dawn to her that the pilot of the CGUE was a veritable expert in debris combat in stark contrast from her sister's dismal performance.
Meyrin caught the tail-end of the discussion concerning Bogey-1's involvement in Junius Seven. "Meyrin," Captain Gladys looked at her, "send this message through the IRC, make sure that Bogey-1 gets the message."
"Yes, Captain."
The door to the bridge opened revealing the security personnel that escorted the IMC pilot. "Captain, we bought you the pilot." The security personnel moved aside, revealing the pilot wearing a bulky bright white flight suit.
"Welcome aboard the Minerva, I'm sorry for not greeting you earlier." Captain Gladys greeted the guest.
Ran saluted the Captain, "no need to worry, you have a situation in your hands at the moments." He looked the person on his right and recognized him as Chairman Durandal of the PLANT government. "Chairman" he gave curt nod at the leader of PLANT. Chairman Durandal eyed the Lieutenant critically.
"You and your squad's timing is impeccable lieutenant. On behalf of PLANT, I thank you for your assistance."
"Hn" Ran replied to the Chairman. He, then, looked at Cagalli, "Chief Representative. I'm glad you are unharmed" the lieutenant saluted the leader of Orb. "I am Lieutenant Ianius Ran, Chimera Squad, IMC. Here to give you this and provide detail protection until you reach Orb." Ran reached inside one of the more protected pockets design to house mission critical items and handed it over to the young woman. Cagalli, accepted the heavy box and tried to open it. Ran stopped her by placing his gloved hand over and shook his head. "Not now, Chief Representative opened it in a secure place."
"O-okay" Cagalli handed the box back to the lieutenant, "Give me this later when we're secure."
"Yes, ma'am." Ran put the box backed into the same secure pocket.
The curiosity of the bridge crew plus Durandal broke when one of the crew cried out, "Bogey-1 has fired its flares!"
Meyrin watched from her console as the three stolen gundams tried to retreat back to their ship. Apparently, the sniper CGUE had other ideas as it crippled the Abyss just seconds before the signal flares from Bogey-1 were fired. Chaos tried to helped out but suddenly jerked haphazardly and inadvertently hit the crippled Abyss. Gaia tried to get to the crippled gundam, but was always stop, when finally Gaia grabbed Chaos and gunned back towards their ship, leaving Abyss standed in space. The scream of the pilot echoing through out the open channel.
"Minerva," Meyrin leaned forward and grasped her headset tightly, as she heard the same voice speaking directly to her, "one of your stolen mobile is available for retrieval."
"Captain!" Meyrin turned towards the Captain, "A-Abyss is crippled and disabled!"
"Captain! This is a good time to retrieve one of the gundams!" Arthur exclaimed. Talia put her thumb and index finger under her chin as she thought through it. Altitude was nearing the danger zone and the call for retreat has already been passed out. Lunamaria's damaged Zaku was already on final approach, which left Shinn and Rey to retrieve the mobile suit.
"Meyrin, tell Rey and Shinn to retrieve Abyss before its too late." Meyrin nodded in acknowledgement and turned around to face her console.
Vivi and Joan kept up the CAP even though the ZAFT forces were retreating. Only a few more enemy mobile suits were left. The GINNs were concentrating on the few remaining ZAFT mobile suits that were doing last minute deployment on the remaining meteor breakers.
"Vi! We need to split up. We only have less than two minutes before we hit atmo!" Joan heard Vi breath out a curse. Vi scanned the surface and found a few meteor breakers lying on their sides.
"De Arc you grab a breaker I'll grab another. Commandy Boy! Cover us!"
The sniper CGUE after more than half an hour of hiding, finally appeared solidly on radar. It made a beeline straight towards Junius Seven's cracked surface firing at a rapid pace. Captain Gladys noticed the CGUEs were not breaking off. He turned towards Lieutenant Ran, "Lieutenant, I know I can't order your squad but, are they going to fall back to Minerva?"
"Where's your communication console?"
"Right, here sir" Meyrin slightly raised her hand. Ran floated towards the young communications officer's station.
"Is this tuned to your battlenet" asked Ran as Meyrin handed him a microphone. She was confused at the term he had given. If he meant ZAFT's combat frequency, she nodded in affirmation. "Squad, Status?"
A partially synthesized voice of a girl spoke through, "Setting up the last of the Meteor Breakers. Chimera 20 is providing cover to a single Class-two mobile suit at the moment."
"Minerva will be firing its main armament, can you return on time?" There was a slight paused, where only a whispered breathing can be heard.
"Unknown." On the screen Junius Seven further broke apart into smaller pieces.
Athrun saw the huge crack that spread out through the surfaced and decided to get out of dodge, only less than five minutes left before Junius Seven entered earth's atmosphere.
"This is Athrun, returning to-" a loud beep interrupted him. He turned around to find a GINN gunning for him. The ZAKU, nimbly dodge and blasted its head with a single shot. The rest of the GINNs converged on his position. The beep constantly sounded as he tried to dodged all of the concentrated firepower. One shot destroyed his rifle and was now forced to fight with the ZAKU's axe. He heard one of the pilot started to incoherently preach on the open channel. Before he could hear anything more, two silver blurs cut the GINNs with beam sabers with the remaining two destroyed by well-placed shots to their torsos. The CGUEs stood over the him.
"You alright?" Vi asked while keeping her voice steady through the open channel.
"Yeah, thanks for the assist."
"157 seconds till atmo, better gun it back to Minerva." The CGUEs hightailed towards Minerva with Athrun trailing behind the two while the CGUE that carried an abnormally long beam rifle who he recognized earlier flew right beside him.
"Athrun and the Chimera squad are approaching Minerva!" Cagalli's face visibly relaxed at the news.
"Anybody else on Junius Seven?" The Ensign Heim look closely on his console.
"No, Captain. The colony is all-clear of friendlies."
"Ensign Yi, Ready the Tannhauser!"
Lunamaria Hawke gawked at the sight of the mutilated gundam securely strapped to the hangar deck. A security force escorted the pilot as he trashed about and screaming curses.
"What- How?" Vino looked at Lunamaria and followed her gazed towards the damaged Gundam.
"Shinn and Rey bought it back."
"Did Shinn do this?" Lunamaria motioned at the gundam. She remembered Shinn engaged the aforementioned mobile suit. Vino shrugged.
"You have to asked Shinn about that."
"Clear the deck!" Everybody scrambled out of the way, knowing a mobile suit was landing. Lunamaria looked around to see that the green ZAKU that guy piloted is currently missing. A smiled tugged the edge of her lips. However, her expectation was off the mark as a silver CGUE slid silently into position on the starboard catapult deck. Seconds later, another CGUE landed on the portside deck. The deck crew, without even missing a beat, hurried to move the mobile suits out of the way and securely fastened the suits for planetary re-entry.
"Clear!"
Lunamaria finally saw Athrun's ZAKU landing. The green mobile suit was slightly battered and worse for wear, its rifle missing. The whole ship shuddered slightly. What was that, she thought. Her thoughts were interrupted when another CGUE landed on the portside deck. This CGUE carried a different armament from the other two. She didn't recognized the weapon's silhouette from any of the hand books and the length of the weapon was longer than her ZAKU's beam cannon.
Athrun opened his cockpit and was about to unlock his harness when the intercom came to life. "Stay on your suits we're on Phase two of re-entry." Opposite of his mobile suit, the last CGUE was securely fastened, the mobile suit was still powered, its red 'eye' moving slowly, watching everything inside the hangar.
"Fire!" The Positron Beam Cannon blasted the chunk of rock into a million pieces.
"Recharging!" Ensign Chen Zheng Yi loudly spoke through the noise.
"Ten seconds till Phase-3." Ensign Malik Yardbirds, helmsman, informed the rest of the bridge crew.
Little did the crew of Minerva know, their trajectory would take them to the worse possible area to be a ZAFT battleship.
Shift 02 End