Beautiful though it was, the endless void of space was, simply put, incredibly unpredictable.

Though not much tends to happen, various interesting phenomena were known to take place in the endless void of space. Said phenomena tended to be incredibly brief, however, with the various irregularities beginning and ending within a moment's notice depending on the intensity of their source.

The most common irregularity, however, was coined by some as a minor 'tear in the space time continuum'. These irregularities were rather common, though that in itself wasn't saying much as they too were also incredibly rare to come by, and like most other irregularities, they would typically last for less than a handful of seconds before they dissipated, a sign of the universe correcting its minor hiccup as soon as it could before going on with doing nothing once more.

And now, in a distant corner of the universe, within a small system that was not too far from the Solar System, a small phenomena was forming from seemingly nothing as the seconds ticked by. It was undoubtedly a tear in the space time continuum, and by all means, it would have lasted for no more than a few seconds before it would simply collapse in on itself and disappear.

Within a handful of seconds, however, it became rather apparent that this minor tear was not about to just disappear, as evident by how it had remained for over ten seconds. Shockingly enough, the tear seemed to grow larger in size rather than collapse in on itself, with its center slowly spinning until it became what could be described as a miniature wormhole.

Slowly, the wormhole grew in size until it was roughly twenty metres in diameter. Rather abruptly, however, before the wormhole could exceed that size, it almost immediately collapsed in on itself, though not before it ejected several chunks of debris and a pair of humanoid shaped machines in its collapse.

The chunks of debris included several light posts, multiple chunks of concrete and even the side of a house, all of which were damaged in more ways than one. However, all of those paled in comparison to the most noticeable things that were ejected from the wormhole; the two humanoid machines, two humanoid Mobile Suits, from a planet that was lightyears away from the one they were currently above.

The taller of the two Mobile Suits had the unit name of EB-AX2 and codenamed the Graze Ein, and stood at 22.2 metres tall, with a navy blue outer shell atop a light grey inner frame. Both its arm units were severed below the elbow, with both elbow stumps still sparking from the damage, and multiple gashes and slash marks were apparent on its chassis. An unidentified liquid was also flowing from the massive cut in its cockpit, though there was an obvious tinge of red in it, most likely the blood of its pilot, a clear sign that it was not going anywhere anytime soon.

As for the other Mobile Suit, however, it bore the unit name of ASW-G-08/F6, or more commonly known as the Gundam Barbatos Form 6. Standing at 18.8 metres tall, the unit had a predominantly white outer shell accented with dark blue, gold and red atop a primarily gunmetal inner frame. And, while the Graze Ein couldn't exactly be considered to be 'in good condition', Barbatos was not faring much better than its Graze counterpart. If anything, however, it was probably faring much worse.

Its white Nanolaminated Armour was very noticeably scratched, scuffed, dented and generally banged up, so much so that it looked as though it had just survived a war, though that wasn't exactly too far off the mark, considering the battle it partook in could very much be compared to one. Its left v-fin had been broken off as well, revealing its inner frame's antenna.

Despite looking as though it were damaged beyond repair, however, the Gundam was very much usable. The thing didn't survive over 300 years and an entire war by being fragile, after all. Similarly enough, its pilot, unlike the pilot of the Graze Ein, was incredibly hardy, so much so that even a sudden intergalactic warp immediately after an incredibly stressful battle wasn't even able to snuff him out.

Rather slowly, the aforementioned pilot of Gundam Barbatos began to wake up within the cockpit of his unit. It took awhile for him to actually regain consciousness, even longer to actually crack his eyes open, though he eventually managed to do it, and once he was conscious enough, the pilot groaned a little as he leaned up on his seat, placing a hand against his forehead and brushing aside some of his black hair all the while.

This was Mikazuki Augus, the ace pilot of Tekkadan.

"Tsk…" mumbled the Mikazuki as he regained his bearings, placing a hand against the side of the cockpit as he regained his marbles and slowly trailing it down to his cheek and brushing it against the dried blood that was stuck to his cheek. The young pilot didn't acknowledge it, however, as he slowly cracked his eyes open, frowning as he did so, with his left iris being its usual blue shade while his right eye… his right eye's iris remained its usual blue shade, though the sclera of his right eye was completely red with blood.

An aftereffect of pushing his side of the Alaya Vijnana system past its preconceived limits, the completely red sclera of his right eye was the only visible indication of his injuries sustained from pushing himself beyond his limits. At the moment, Mikazuki couldn't feel any of the injuries he sustained from overclocking his side of the system, though as soon as he disconnected from Barbatos, he'd no doubt feel it.

For now, however, Mikazuki didn't acknowledge it as he allowed his vision to focus. It took a short while, especially for his right eye due to the blood in it, though the stabilization of his vision came sooner than later and when it came… the young pilot couldn't help but widen his eyes in shock when he saw the heads up display on the optic to cockpit display.

"... eh…?" was the only thing he managed to cough out as soon as his vision was steady, his voice sounding rather rough thanks to his dry throat. He didn't acknowledge it, however, as he shook his head a little to hopefully help him regain his bearings a little faster, only for him to hit his head on the cockpit hatch of his Gundam as he attempted to shift his position on his cockpit's chair.

Wincing in annoyance as he ran his hands through his black hair, unconsciously hoping that his head wouldn't bruise thanks to that hit, the young pilot blank as he regained his marbles and pushed himself away from the top of his unit's cockpit hatch. It took him a few seconds to plant his rear back down against the cockpit chair of his unit, and by then, he had realized where he was exactly.

'Space?' thought the pilot, confused as he leaned against his Gundam's cockpit and stared out at the cockpit's optic to cockpit display. 'Wasn't I in Edmonton…?'

And, almost in an instant, he felt his connection to Barbatos strengthen a little. A quick jolt through his end of the Alaya Vijnana system told him that much, distracting him from his thoughts as it sent a small shock through his spine. Within seconds, the Ahab Reactors of his unit began warming up and its artificial gravity began to kick in, signifying that it had awoken from its 'sleep mode' in response to Mika regaining consciousness, allowing the pilot to sit down much easier. As soon as he was comfortable, the boy took a deep breath in and began moving his Gundam's head unit from side to side, observing his surroundings.

Indeed, he, and by extension, the Graze Ein, were both floating in space. The pilot scoffed at the now deactivated unit as he wiped his cheek with his forearm, remembering what he had to do in order to destroy it. Lowering his forearm, the pilot simply stared at the mostly dried flakes of blood that clung against it before turning back towards the front of his unit's cockpit. There would be time to think about his bloody eye and nostril later.

Turning away from the Ein, Mikazuki turned his Gundam's head upwards and let out a small gasp when he saw the moon floating not too far above either of them. The young man certainly wasn't expecting to see it there, and in spite of his initial shock, Mikazuki couldn't help but stare at his namesake for a short while, entranced by its natural beauty and imposing stature. Even from where he and Barbatos were at the moment, the moon was still large enough to eclipse them both.

It took him a while, but before long, Mika was able to tear his gaze off the moon and turn his Gundam's head unit towards another direction. And that direction was downwards.

Mika presumed that if the moon were above Barbatos and himself, then it meant that Earth was below…

And he wasn't wrong.

Right below Barbatos was the Earth itself, looking oh so beautiful from where both the Gundam and pilot hovered at, appearing like a perfectly formed marble hovering in the vast emptiness of space beneath it. As with the moon, the Earth looked impossibly large, even from where Barbatos stood, being more than enough to eclipse the unit if it were beneath it, and like the moon, Mikazuki took a moment to just stare at the blue orb, taking in as much of its natural beauty as he could, though before long, he tore his gaze away from Earth with a huff.

Best to not get too distracted, he reckoned.

Almost instantly after he tore his gaze away from Earth, Mikazuki reached for his unit's cockpit monitor and pressed his hand against it. And, as soon as his five fingers made contact with its screen, the monitor came to life, with Barbatos' unit name, ASW-G-08, and its actual codename being displayed on screen alongside the symbol of the Demon the unit was named after. Mika waited for a short while before the symbol faded away, with the unit and codenames moving to the top left of the screen as it booted up.

Within seconds, a radar took center stage of the monitor alongside an on screen display of the current status of the Gundam's armour, all of which came up in the red, though the young pilot ignored it for now before he swiped through the cockpit monitor numerous times before finding what he was looking for, the LCS comm-links. Snorting a little when he found it, the pilot tapped the option before and was presented with a handful of other options in regards to who he could contact via LCS.

His first choice was the Tekkadan Armoured Assault Ship, the Isaribi, mainly because he was in space. Perhaps it could swoop in and pick him up.

And yet… he got no response from it, only receiving an Out of Range message on the screen the moment he attempted to contact the Isaribi. Raising a brow at that, Mika moved on and attempted to contact several other sources, including Akihiro's Gusion Rebake and Shino's Ryusei Go II, though every option ended with an Out of Range message on his monitor, something that worried Mika.

The last he remembered of the Edmonton battle was Kudelia getting delivered to the Parliament in time. Gjallarhorn were sore losers… and perhaps they… what if they…

No, Mika would rather not think of that. Shaking his head to rid himself of those bad thoughts, the boy thought of a different conclusion to ease his worries.

'No… maybe I'm just out of range, like Barbatos said I am,' thought Augus as he exited out of the LCS option and gripped the arm controllers of his Gundam tightly. 'They're down there… they have to be.'

And with that thought in mind, Mika gave himself a new objective, get down to Earth.

However, the pilot stopped himself from simply attempting to re-enter Earth's atmosphere so soon. Though he wasn't exactly educated on the topic, Mika was smart enough to know that unprotected atmospheric re-entry was ill advised. Barbatos would more than likely melt via the built up heat of re-entry and be reduced to nothing more than a charred heap before it hit the ground and exploded, and that was if it was lucky at least.

With that in mind, Mika took a second or two to figure out a better way to enter the Earth's atmosphere without burning up. Before he could find a possible option, however, a gentle clank could be felt against his Gundam's forearm unit. Turning Barbatos' head unit towards it, the pilot raised a brow when he saw the Longsword's edge resting against the blue arm gauntlet of his Gundam.

Without missing a beat, Mika had his Gundam grab the Longsword. He reckoned that if he made landfall, Gjallarhorn would most likely attempt to attack him, so he'd most likely require a weapon to defend himself.

However, Mika was still a novice at using the Longsword, and he knew it. If he brought only the Longsword with him and nothing more, Gjallarhorn could potentially take him out rather easily. In an attempt to perhaps solve this little issue, Mika had Barbatos turn its head around to perhaps find a better weapon…

… and it took him less than a second to spot the Wrench Mace floating idly around in space, a handful of metres away from Barbatos. Without any hesitation, Mika hovered his unit up towards it and grabbed its handle in his unit's manipulator. Pulling it down to optic level, Mika examined the blunt weapon for a moment before snorting.

The Wrench Mace was certainly worse for wear, with its entire top 'chainsaw segment' busted inwards being the most obvious damaged segment. However, aside from that, the weapon was still functional, so to speak, as it still looked solid enough to topple a Graze unit with little effort. Deciding that it was better than nothing, Mika decided to take it alongside the Longsword.

With his primary means of offense obtained, all Mika really needed now was a heat shield for atmospheric re-entry.

And at the moment, the only thing which floated among the floating heaps of debris was the other Mobile Suit that was sent up to space.

With an annoyed glance at the Graze Ein, Mika grumbled and boosted Barbatos towards it.

'This will work.'

Elsewhere

With a soft sigh, a young, black haired young girl looked out of her room's open window, staring up at the night sky, her eyes transfixed on the stars that dotted the world above without too much of a care in the world.

The girl was little undersized for a twelve year old, though in her defence she was, by all means, moderately sized when compared to most other twelve year olds in her current district, Trost. Her long, thick black hair was parted when it reached the nape of her neck and tied into twin, adorably thick pigtails. Her eyes were a light shade of grey that were full of youthful joy, and her skin was rather fair, albeit just a little darkened by the sun. Her outfit was a long sleeved teal blouse, black pants and a gray shirt, an outfit hand sewn by her mother herself.

Her name was Mina Carolina, a former resident of a neighboring district of Karanese alongside her mother, who used to work as a small-time doctor. Roughly two years ago, however, both she and her mother were moved to the Trost District for reasons that were only known to Mina's mother.

The house which the two of them resided in was a decently sized, two story apartment located east of Trost, an area which was largely uninhabited due to the fact that the sun had a tendency to glare down here most often. The actual reason why they picked this place to live in was because the cost of the house was much, much lower than anything which was towards the northern or western sides of the district. That, and the house they lived in was just a ten minute walk away from Ms Carolina's new workplace, a small hospital which probably didn't conform to most sanitary requirements.

Ms Carolina had to work for about nine hours per day, often leaving her home at six in the morning and returning at six in the evening, though it was never really consistent. This meant that Mina tended to be alone for a majority of her first few weeks since moving into this district. Sure, she had a knack for heading out on small journeys through the area close to her house, though the eastern side of this district didn't exactly have much in the way of other children, something which made making friends rather hard for the young Carolina.

At least until a rather fateful day, where she met a certain brunette, a very tall one at that.

"Mina, you in there?" came a voice from outside her room, making the black haired girl squeak and straighten herself out and turn to the door to her room. Swiftly, she dashed up in front of it and swung it (inwardly) open, and as soon as it was open, and when she saw who had spoken, a massive smile appeared on her face.

The guy's black hair and lightly tanned skin were still visibly wet, though he didn't smell like the Trost ravine, which crossed out the possibility of the guy before her going for a swim in it,much to her relief, which meant that he just took a quick shower. He stared at her with a pair of brown eyes and a friendly smile which Mina always responded to with one of her own, though she had to stare up a lot if she wanted to look him in the eye, most definitely thanks to the fact that he was close to two metres tall, perhaps nearly twice the height of Mina. He wore the typical Trost type attire, a simple brown shirt and dark brown pair of pants.

"Good to see that you didn't forget to wash up again, Nac Tias," greeted Mina in a mocking tone as her colossal friend walked up to one of the two beds in the room, offering a mild chuckle all the while. As he did so, Mina gave a snort as she shut the door behind her and remembered that the only reason her room had two beds was because Nac had moved in with them not too long ago.

She still remembered that day like it was yesterday, and it always managed to make her smile. The short girl had been sitting under a tree in the eastern half of Trost, simply minding her own business in a rather awkward manner as she did, and Nac had quite literally marched up to her and essentially declared the fact that he wanted to be her friend. As one would expect, Mina was a bit put off by that, but with her being as carefree as she always was, she took the boy's request.

Long, long story short, the two of them became very good friends. Nac, for his part, was extremely friendly and polite… so much so that it was actually a little unsettling. No matter what Mina said or did, Nac's friendly nature persisted, and he would never not give Mina a smile at every chance he got . When Carolina asked about it, Nac simply laughed it off and told her that it was just how he was, something that didn't exactly answer her question, but Mina decided not to think too hard about it.

"Y'know, you don't need to rub in the fact that I stink as much as I do after a walk around Trost, Mina," retorted Nac in a somewhat irritated tone, making Mina snicker as Tias sat down on his own bed, one which was about a metre or two away from Carolina's, making a soft 'oof' on impact, a sound which caught Mina's attention and made her smile.

At times, Mina did kinda forget that her best (and only friend in Trost) used to be an orphan. According to what Nac was willing to tell her, he was given the orphan status when he was at the age of three, more or less, and for about fifteen years he had been living on the streets of the district from the day he was orphaned until the day he met her. According to him, the only beds which he slept on were the ones which people had thrown out, so to have a proper bed was a proper privilege to him.

Mina's response to the revelation of Nac being an orphan was a little… intense. She had essentially demanded he live with them, and she had never stopped insisting, so Nac eventually gave in to her pleas/demands. Ms Carolina was not exactly fond of the idea of Nac sleeping with Mina, but her daughter was so insistent on that, so much so that Ms Carolina eventually gave in. The two of them slept on separate beds, of course, though to be fair Ms Carolina didn't need to enforce that rule too much. Mina and Nac were friends, sure. But they were not comfortable with sleeping that close to each other.

"So, anything happened which I should know today, Nac?" asked Mina, prompting Nac to sit upright and rub his chin in a dramatic fashion. Mina knew that it was just for show, though she played along with it to humor her friend.

"Well, not really. The Wallists are still on their daily grind. But aside from that… nada," responded Tias in a short and simple way, though when he mentioned the Wallists, Mina gave a sharp snort and huffed.

The Wallists were, in short, a cult dedicated to the Walls, something which the name strongly implied. Mina never really saw many of them in the eastern sector and even back at Karanse, they were few and far between. Nac, who loved to travel around Trost to satiate his more adventurous side, however, knew more about them and had told Mina the basics, such as their aforementioned blind love for the Walls (all fifteen of them), the fact that they all wore identical Priest Robes, how they spoke in a rather fancy way and a small theory which circulated between residents of Trost (and presumably all other districts) which said that the Wallists were directly associated with the King which rules the interior, though said rumors weren't confirmed.

"Did they annoy you while you were out on your daily stroll?" asked Mina in a somewhat joking manner, prompting Nac to chuckle uncomfortably, scratching his chin in a slightly nervous manner as he did.

"Well, no… they don't know about my… interests, after all. Least I don't think they do," muttered Nac, pausing to amend himself at the end. Mina, in response, gave a soft snicker, something which went unnoticed by Tias. "They just pestered me on the usual things, joining their little group and praying to their Gods."

"That's a relief," quipt Mina with a smile, prompting Tias to snort as he leaned back on his bed and rubbed the back of his neck, smiling all the while at his friend.

"Yeah yeah, whatever you say," replied Tias with a chuckle as he offered a thumbs up from where he was laying at, prompting Mina to giggle, before he glanced off towards the window.

From where he laid at, the tall boy could stare out of the window with little issue, and he would rather easily see a handful of stars dotting the skies. It was always a fun thing for him to do when night came along as, to Nac, the stars which hovered above them could very easily be a reflection of what humanity could be if the Predators which lay beyond the Walls did not exist. Free to wander around an endless landscape without anything outside of other people to stop them from pursuing their ambitions.

And suddenly, he saw it. A star… it was one for sure… but it appeared to be… moving. At an impressive speed, too. With wide eyes, Nac was quick to launch himself up to his feet, causing Mina to blink in surprise, before he rushed up to the window and inadvertently squished his face up against the glass to get a closer look.

"Whoa…" muttered Nac, not exactly loud, but loud enough that Mina heard him. And almost immediately, Mina was by his side, squeezing to get a slot at the window beside her friend.

"What is it?!" exclaimed Mina in excitement, only to widen her eyes when she saw what Nac himself also saw. "Oh my…"

The thing which the two of them saw was, simply put, a shooting star. The star was beautiful, and perhaps the first real shooting star which those beyond the walls could see with complete clarity.

"The heck is that, Nac?" asked Mina, dazzled by the comet which was zipping through the sky. Her response was silence. Nac did not know for sure, so he promptly shrugged.

"I have no clue. Looks kinda like some sorta… 'shooting star', though," responded Nac thoughtfully. Mina giggled at that and smiled at her good friend.

"Shooting star. I like that name! Sounds… cool," said Mina, giving Nac a small burst of pride, what with him having made that name up on the fly. Though after some time, Mina began rubbing her chin thoughtfully.

"Yeah. It really is…" agreed Nac sheepishly as they stared out at the window and watched as the shooting star flew out of view, leaving the two of them breathaken as they sighed in disappointment. "And it's gone now…"

"I'm sure we'll see it again… right?" muttered Mina, to which Nac blinked before he chuckled and shrugged.

"Who knows? Perhaps we will, perhaps we won't. Let's just wait and hope."

"Earth's gravity is amazing…"

Those were the words muttered by Mikazuki as he and Barbatos re-entered Earth's atmosphere. Similarly to what did when he first entered the atmosphere during his first battle against those Graze Ritters, he had positioned the Graze Ein below Barbatos like some sort of heat shield to soak up the heat from re-entry, stabbing the sword into the MS' cockpit and using it as a handle to keep Barbatos firmly latched onto the Graze Ein. The other manipulator of his unit gripped the handle of the Wrench Mace tightly as it descended.

Once Augus was certain that his Gundam had completely entered the planet's atmosphere, he pulled the Longsword's blade out of the Ein's cockpit and kicked his unit off the dilapidated MS, which crashed down several miles away from Barbatos, causing a massive explosion on impact.

As the ground approached the Gundam, Mikazuki activated the back and leg thrusters alongside both the Land Boosters at full power to slow his descent. He managed to slow his MS' descent down by a substantial amount, though it didn't stop Barbatos from making a massive crater and kicking up a massive amount of dust when it landed. Hell, the ground below the Gundam shook intensely on impact and the shockwave unrooted multiple trees and flattened countless blades of grass.

Through the dust, two piercing light green optics were seen gazing left and right, before their owner, Gundam Barbatos,stood up straight and began scanning its surroundings. Despite the dust which had accumulated around it, the internal sensors in the unit, especially the radar and data from Alaya Vijnana,allowed Mika to detect if an enemy unit was nearby, and he made sure to keep an eye on them for signs of approaching Gjallarhorn units. Surprisingly, however, there were little to no indications of any kind activity anywhere close to where he had landed. Hell, even when Mika checked the radar, he saw that there weren't even any signs of movement, be they Mobile Suit or human.

But still, despite the on board units assured him that nothing dangerous was close by, recent events with Gjallarhorn made Mikazuki a little weary, and his instincts told him to stay alert as, in its current condition, Augus doubt that Barbatos could survive an attack from a platoon of Graze units, and as such, he reckoned that it would be best if he kept his unit out of view for now. Quickly looking around, the pilot noticed a massive grove of trees, each of them being much larger than Barbatos. The perfect spot to hide in, at least physically as another Mobile Suit would be able to detect Barbatos' Ahab Reactor frequency and track him down. But still, it was better than nothing.

Flipping the thrusters on, Mika hovered his MS towards the area, kneeling the Gundam Frame behind the grove of trees. Though as he shifted his unit down to a kneeling position, Augus felt a sticky sensation, almost as though the unit had stepped on blood, though he ignored it for now.

Once he was sure he was hidden, Mikazuki detached himself from the Barbato's Alaya-Vijnana cord, causing the optics and the power emblems of his unit to go dark, and took in a deep breath to recollect his thoughts. As he did so, however, Mika felt the senses in his right arm numb a little, and similarly, his right eye blurred a little, though they were still able to move, and outside of a mild aching in both his arm and eye, they felt no different from usual.

Rather weakly, Mika raised his right hand up and rubbed his right cheek, in turn wiping some of the blood that was smeared on it off with three fingers. Moving his three fingers up in front of his face, Augus saw that it was mostly dried, and as he stared blankly at his bloodied fingers, Mika silently pondered on what the heck had happened.

The last thing he remembered was the battle between Barbatos and the Ein. He ordered his MS to give him it's all, and it complied with him, feeding him a lot more information than it usually did through the Alaya-Vijnana system. That much was certain to him, though everything else was… blurry, to say the least. So surreal that, if Mika were younger, he would have considered it a dream.

The last logical memory he had was him and Barbatos being sucked towards that Graze unit which was apparently intending to blow itself up. But if so, shouldn't he be dead? He also didn't feel dead. He still breathed, he felt his heart slowly thump against his ribcage and he still felt all his joints moving as usual, even if his right hand did feel a little heavier than usual. Maybe this place was Hell or something. Perhaps purgatory? He doubted that, as this place, even if there was no sign of life or activity, seemed brighter and less fiery than what Mika expected Hell to be like.

Deciding to leave the question in regards to where he was and how the heck he had even managed to get here, Mikazuki leaned forward, ignoring the somewhat irritating feeling in his right eye thanks to the blood, and tapped on the cockpit monitor of his Gundam. Seeing as how he was on Earth now, the boy reckoned that he could perhaps contact his comrades without much issue.

Within a handful of seconds, the boy managed to navigate his way to the communication segment of his monitor. His first search was rather obvious: Tekkadan.

And yet… even though he was on Earth, the place where his comrades were most likely at, the boy still got an Out of Range prompt. With raised eyebrows, Augus tried contacting them multiple more times, only to get the same results.

Deciding to take another route, Mika tried contacting Teiwaz, the company which technically owned Tekkadan, though as with Tekkadan, Teiwaz was Out of Range as well, though Mika reckoned that was more understandable, considering how they were in space and not on Earth. At that, out of desperation, Mika frowned before he attempted to try and contact Gjallarhorn, only to get the same, Out of Range message.

As a last ditch attempt, Mika did a proximity search for even a single comm-line, only to get a No Signal prompt every time. Blinking in mild surprise at this revelation, Mika gave out an annoyed sigh as he slouched down in his cockpit seat in defeat. As he did, the boy felt an odd feeling of worry build up in his chest. It was a rare thing for him to feel something like this, but he suspected that the lack of communication with Tekkadan made him wary about their safety. It wasn't common for him to feel any sort of emotion other than complete neutrality, but he supposed that this was an exception.

Thankfully, before Mika could let his worries take over, a rather loud sound snapped him out of his out of character thoughts. It sounded like a footstep of sorts, though they were too soft to be made from a Mobile Suit, and the prospect of it belonging to a human was out of the question as the built in audio sensors were typically unable to detect human footsteps unless the conditions were just right. Looking at his unit's radar, Mika noticed a figure coming at him slowly. At first, he thought… he hoped, it was a Graze or perhaps the Gusion Rebake or Ryusei Go, as it would mean his comm links were just damaged and he couldn't contact anyone. Plugging back into the Barbatos, Mika turned its head unit towards where the sound came from.

And that feeling of hope was squashed when he saw what it was, and it admittedly freaked him out quite a bit.

The thing which made the noise was no Graze, Gusion or Ryusei. No, instead, it was a rather tall humanoid thing, about 7-8 metres, with terribly out of proportionate limbs, a pot belly which made Biscuit look thin, a head larger than the Barbatos' which had an eerie grin that showed two rows of slightly yellowed teeth, some black hair, no clothes, and, strangely enough, no genitals (though that was possibly a good thing). That was probably what convinced the Tekkadan pilot that he was probably in some weird part of Hell, or perhaps on another planet, as he knew that, to his knowledge, giant human things don't exist on Earth. Even with his slight shock, however, Mika managed to plug himself into the Barbatos and stand it up to its full height to get a good look at the damn thing.

For a moment, Augus simply stared at the… thing while it simply stared back at the ASW-G-08 with those lazy orbs in its head which could very charitably be called eyes. For a long moment, Mika was left speechless at what he was looking at, though his minor trance was broken when the thing began to take a step towards Barbatos.

And another, and another, and another. Before long, it began to charge straight at the Gundam, albeit clumsily like some drunk person, both it's arms raised up as though it were trying to tackle his MS down. Mikazuki, on the other hand, was a little dumbfounded. This 7-8 metre, unarmored humanoid thing was charging straight at an 18.8 metre Gundam Frame which was armed with a Longsword, two arm mounted Autocannons and a broken yet usable Wrench Mace.

As it approached, Mikazuki simply stared in slight disbelief. Though through his still lingering shock, however, Augus did manage to lift Barbatos' right leg back as the thing charged. When it was just about to reach him, Mikazuki swung the leg of his MS forward, sending it flying towards the 7-8 metre thing. The impact was so strong that the leg unit of the Barbatos pulverized the entire body of the 7-8 metre creature, with its torso and head exploding in a gory mess of guts, blood and bone, staining the grass and a couple of nearby trees.

Stomping the bloody foot of his Mobile Suit down, Mika turned his unit to look at what remained of the creature. And he only raised his brows when he saw what little of it that remained began to evaporate, the blood, the few chunks of flesh and guts, all of it began to slowly dissipate as the seconds went by.

While the thing faded away, Mika leaned back in his cockpit seat, looking a little thoughtful as he wondered… what the Hell was that thing? He had never seen anything like that on either Mars or Earth and, sure, he hasn't been on Earth for more than a week or two so his knowledge on the place was sparse, but he was at least 80% sure that these things don't exist anywhere on that damn planet. That, and Kudelia had never mentioned these things before.

'Maybe I really am on another planet,' was a thought which ran through Mika's head. More of a sarcastic thought than anything, really, though it did little to lighten his mood as he gave a mild grimace.

Mika soon found himself more confused than he was a few minutes prior. Deciding to let the topic drop for the time being, Mika simply assumed it was just a random freak occurrence as he began to get the Barbatos moving, but as time went by, he encountered more and more of these creatures. They came in a surprising amount of varieties, ranging from various tiny three metres to roughly fifteen metres in height, though that was all that differentiated them as, excluding size and the size of their stomachs, these large humans were almost exactly the same, visually anyways. Derpy expressions, disproportionate limbs, oversized eyes, and all had the urge to charge at Barbatos after a few seconds of staring at it.

There was the occasional muscular variant, though in the dark, Mika couldn't really tell. Besides, their muscles didn't really mean anything, considering how Barbatos was more than capable of pulverising them without even using its weapons.

Everytime an oversized human charged at Barbatos, Mika would react almost instantly, swinging the Gundam's Wrench Mace, the Longsword or just stomping and/or kicking them. And everytime he did so, the oversized human who tried to charge at his MS would almost immediately get pulverised, telling Mika that these weren't exactly the strongest of combatants, at least against a Mobile Suit, though he did occasionally wonder how a human fared against them. He also wondered why these things were charging at Barbatos. The Mobile Suit and it's pilot, while he was dangerous, wouldn't bother with someone who wasn't hostile towards him.

Right after he squashed a five metre humanoid, a small on screen alert in his cockpit flared up. At first, Mika felt hopeful, though his hope quickly flickered out when he realized it wasn't an incoming Ahab Wave. Instead, Mika realized that the on screen alerts were alerting him that something had been shot up into the air not too far from his current position. Turning Barbatos towards its general direction, Mika took a second to notice the still ascending cloud of smoke in the sky. Small and purple in colour, the object flew up into the air with a slight arc to the left, roughly half a mile away from where Mika was right now.

'Signal Flare?' thought Mika as the optical units of his Gundam zoomed into the flare. And he was right, giving him some hope that there were other humans here. Perhaps his LCS comm link was indeed damaged, and whoever shot that flare up could offer assistance. Mika was still a little doubtful of that, but he knew that this was a better thing than nothing, so he took this chance.

Turning to the area where the flare was potentially shot from, Augus began boosting his unit towards them, though as he did, Barbatos' local radio comm links picked up some close by chatter. The system was powerful enough to pick up human voices from nearly a kilometer, and it picked up a male voice, which came up on the radio so abruptly that Mika actually flinched.

"Hanji! What have you done?!"

So yeah, here's C2 of the RM. Now, I'll just admit straight up, this chapter is kinda a mix of various drafts and rewrites. It's an odd combination, but it works alright.

I originally intended on Barbatos still having the Graze Ritter shoulder pads and Graze Ein axes, though I scrapped that idea after power issues popped up. Barbatos is powerful enough in this world, and to give it extra weapons would make things a bit too excessive.

No review replies today, so see you all next chapter!

Even more minor edits made on: 10/12/21