Phase Two: Rescue and Recovery

One of the major things we were supposed to do when we arrived at the colony was to start combat trails in conjunction with the newly built Astray Project Prototype Mobile Suits that Morgenroete had developed for Orb. Mainly working together and getting the crew used to working alongside mobile suits. I remember being kind of surprised that the Orb Union was developing their own mobile suits when I was briefed on their existence, but I really shouldn't have been since I knew that the leaders of the country were quite aware that eventually we would be dragged into the war. It was only a matter of time really. That said, I was furious when we all arrived at the recently destroyed Heliopolis and learned that Morgenroete was also developing mobile suit prototypes for the Earth Alliance. In fact, Morgenroete was using the Alliance's own G-Project in developing our own superior mobile suit prototypes in the form of our own Astray Project…

- Taken from an Interview with Rear Admiral Caridad Yamato by Independent News Reporter Jess Rabble, Circa. June of Cosmic Era 75

Main Hangar
OSDS Murakumo
Lagrange Three, Earth Sphere
Two Hours Later

A couple of hours later found Captain Yamato standing on one of the many walkways suspended over her previously almost empty and flawless-looking hangar. Now said hangar sported two of the six Mistral Workpods assigned to the ship, two half-destroyed hulks that once were fellow Mistral Pods, whose injured crews were managed to be rescued, and a trio of damaged Colony Lifeboats cluttering the hangar. Not to mention the various scuff marks, stains, smells, and other such examples of a now well-used hangar bay. Said lifeboats had a small stream of harried and bedraggled civilians exiting and being led further into the ship. The captain frowned at this knowing that they couldn't afford to take any other lifeboats because their life support would be overwhelmed by all the extra bodies. Still, she couldn't leave such damaged lifeboats out in the debris field. Luckily, she wouldn't have to since ships from both the nearby Green Noa Independent Space Colony and of the independent Junk Guild had arrived to help in the rescue operations. She turned her attention to that of large bear-like form of Senior Chief Petty Officer Jona Halsey the senior non-commissioned officer of the ship's company and the man in charge of the ship's hangar bay. His own heavy normal suit was barely able to cover his massive body which seemed to flex slightly as the man came up alongside her on the walkway.

"So, Captain, we managed to account for nearly three dozen Lifeboats spread across the debris field all damaged in some way. Including one, that I am sorry to say was pretty much a hulk with all of the poor folks inside dead from exposure from a hull breach," the large man mentioned in a voice like a pair of bricks grinding together. The man sighed sadly, and Caridad closed her eyes in some pain before waving the man on with his report.

"The three most damaged lifeboats we brought onboard as you ordered. The others looked to be in enough decent condition to wait for the arrival of further rescue ships. Still, it looks like we managed to find all of the damaged lifeboats in the debris field," the man finished with his report making Caridad nod at him before looking back down at the hangar floor.

"Thank you for the report Senior Chief, but with that done it is time to turn other matters," she looked back at the man with a small smile on her face before she sighed and looked a bit more serious before asking, "What about the secondary mission?"

The Senior Chief blinked at this before scratching a cheek with a large finger as he looked away from the captain towards the two Mistral Pods that remained in the hangar and the most prominent parts of the hangar: the three large scaffold-looking pieces of equipment that hung from the hangar's ceiling. As of one the main missions of the ship and its crew was to further the development of the prototype mobile suits in production at the colony including going through shipboard trails of said mobile suits. Hence, one of the main new objectives given to Captain Yamato and her crew was to investigate what had happened to these prototype mobile suits in the collapse of the colony. A moment later his gaze drifted back towards his captain who was waiting patiently.

"Well, after we got these lifeboats into the hangar, the Lieutenant Commander took four of the Pods and a couple of our space launches towards where the colony's former factory block is projected to be located at to see about recovering anything from the Project," the large man reported making the captain nod in some understanding at the man's report. She really shouldn't be surprised for she had known that Lieutenant Commander Brianna Carter had been quite worried at what happened to the prototypes. As she had a large hand in their development after all.

"She also took along a couple of squads of First Lieutenant Gurumin's grunts with her," he mentioned now with a scowl on his face mentioning the name of the officer in charge of the short company of Orb Ground Defense Force infantrymen serving the ship as Marines. The captain hummed at this knowing that the man wasn't upset over the idea of such ground-bound infantry working alongside naval personnel like many in the past would have, he instead was upset that they may be needed. The Murakumo and her crew had already chased off two ships picking through the debris for whatever they could find and selling to whoever wanted to buy such scrap. Such a thing was a fact of life in the modern world, and it was even more of a headache that one of those ships was actually a Junk Guild Registered Transport. Other Junk Guild ships had started to arrive to help in the rescue operations while one of their fellows was picking through the debris like a rat to find decent salvage.

"Understood. Keep up the good work Senior Chief and let me know if you have any further news on the Lieutenant Commander's mission," she mentioned patting the man on his tree-like forearm with a smile.

"Yes ma'am!" the man replied with a salute.

"Now I have an unruly hotheaded Princess to meet," the captain mentioned with a groan of annoyance and exasperation mentioning the real reason why she was in the hangar in the first place. The heir of their country's leader having been one of the first ones off the first lifeboat and making a ruckus. The senior chief only smirked at her and pushed from the walkway towards a cluster of his crewmen gathering in one corner of the hangar. She scowled at his back before sighing and pushing off herself heading towards the nearby hatchway leading deeper into the ship.

Factory Section 22-B
Morgenroete Incorporated – Heliopolis Facility
Former Heliopolis Space Colony
Lagrange Three, Earth Sphere

While the Heliopolis Space Colony had been destroyed and collapsed into a large debris field that now started to spread across a good chunk of Lagrange Point Three. They're remained large intact pieces of the colony's skin which still had buildings, and such attached to said skin. One such piece of the colony retained one of the main factory facilities of the Morgenroete corporation that was partly owned by the Orb government and in such facility would be the jewel of the corporation's project to produce mobile suits for the Orb military. Such intact buildings and such were quite a draw for scavengers as there are bound to be intact pieces of equipment in such buildings. Therefore, it was no surprise to see a single transport anchored to the large piece of debris that was once part of a space colony along with a few work pods buzzing around the buildings. In one of the buildings, a trio of normal-suited figures searched through what was left of the interior of the now-ruined building for any sort of valuable loot to be retrieved.

"I really do not think there is anything left out here Lowe," buzzed the intercom of one of the bulky normal suits in what seemed to be a young woman's voice. The lead figure could be heard scoffing in answer to that statement as the figure moved the beam of a high-powered handlight across the nearest portion of the ruined interior of the building.

"So far, we only found some key pieces from the factory line in this building and a few other different pieces of valuable tech like those Acceleration Chips Kisato found earlier," a man's voice came from the third figure as he aimed his own high-powered light opposite direction of his companion as said companion scoffed once more through his own suit's intercom.

"I smell that there is something big that this place is hiding and that will be the jackpot that we need!" the first figure could be heard excitedly saying as he looked around the area and spotted a collapsed building nearby aiming his light over towards it. This saw the figure walking over to that of the collapsed building.

"All I smell is that the air quality in my suit is stale," the female figure almost deadpanned at this before aiming her own light over towards the walking first figure. Therefore, she was the first to notice the damaged floor the lead figure had stepped on and saw the said floor start breaking apart.

"Watch out!" she yelled out grabbing the man at her side pulling him back from the now falling apart floor around the collapsed building and the falling lead figure through the now large, opened hole in the floor.

"Lowe!" the other man called out as he recovered from being pulled back from the edge by his female companion. The two quickly moved towards the edge of the new hole to look down into the large open space that was now revealed to be underneath the collapsed building.

"I'm okay!" came the faint answer from the hole making the two other figures sigh in some relief, "All checks on my suit are coming up normal. I am going to check the area around this area."

The two figures still on the top looked at one another through the faceplates of their normal suits with almost matching exasperated looks on their faces as both knew that their friend had some of the best luck ever. That said, the man was almost like a bull in a china shop when they were going through wrecks like this in the past. He just had that peppy and ever-something-over-the-rainbow type of altitude that often got him in trouble like this.

"Damn! I lost my hand light in the fall," the faint voice said a moment later drawing the attention of the two looking down into the hole.

"Do you want me to throw down my handlight Lowe to help you?" the female figure asked making the other figure look over at her in some surprise.

"Nah. Looks like my helmet lights are still good," the voice of their friend came back up a moment later making the two shake their heads once more at their friend. Suddenly they saw a brief light flare up below them and both nearly fell into the holes themselves in surprise as even the dim light of their friend's helmet lamps, they could see several large figures of what looked to be mobile suits laid out on the ground in dedicated storage scaffolds. A moment went past between the three as they tried to come to terms with what they were now seeing before the first figure in the hole start to whoop and laugh in celebration.

"Jackpot! I told you guys that there was something here!" the man said excitedly as he started to climb over the nearest prone mobile suit.

"Liam! Kisato! Head back and get your pods over here! We are going to need some help in getting these machines out of this hole," he yelled up at the figures of his friends as he inspected the mobile suit he was now standing on.

"This doesn't make any sort of sense," the man up on top mentioned almost in a daze as he continued to stare down at the mobile suits below him, "Heliopolis was a Neutral Colony!"

"You forget Liam that plenty of equipment and weapons were constructed here for Orb's Defense Forces and the Earth Alliance thanks to contracts signed from before the start of the war. So, it sort of does make some sense that Orb and Morgenroete were developing their own mobile suits here" the female figure said with a scoff in her voice as she turned to follow the suggestion of their friend Lowe. However, she suddenly froze in some surprise at what she saw behind the two of them.

"Ummm Liam…We are not alone anymore," the female figure found herself saying making the man look up from his surprise to find that his friend was quite correct several figures had managed to sneak up on the two of them while they were distracted by the antics of their friend, Lowe down in the hole. All the figures wore the more streamlined, military model Normal Suits which were festooned with a couple of web belts with carried military equipment, at least all but one who wore a more skin-tight military pilot suit, who simply had a pistol belt around their waist. All of the mysterious figures were armed in various ways and all their weapons were pointed at the two.

"Ummm…Hello. I am Liam Garfield and this is Kisato Yamabuki. We are both with the Junk Guild," the man mentioned after a couple of moments of strained silence between the two parties.

"I am quite aware of who you are Mister Garfield and why you are here. I already met your leader earlier," the figure wearing the military pilot suit mentioned almost dryly still pointing what looked to be a heavyweight pistol at the two of them.

"Okay. Then why are you so hostile to us?" the man, Liam, mentioned a moment later with a confused look hidden by his normal suit's faceshield.

"Because Mister Garfield, one, you are trespassing on Orb Government-owned property, and two, you are not with the rest of your fellows helping with the rescue effort of the colony's lifeboats alongside the Orb warship Myoken. Therefore, all I see right now is some salvagers and pirates," the figure coldly mentioned making the two figures, Liam and Kisato, blanch in some sort of shock at this statement.

"What! But the Professor mentioned it was okay!" the figure of Kisato mentioned in some surprise at this statement.

"Not to mention ma'am, it looked like your ship and the other ships arriving had everything well in hand in rescuing the lifeboats. Therefore, we decided to do what we do best and salvage wrecks," Liam now calmly mentioned looking at the lead figure who he saw was a woman.

"Oh. Normally I would have no problem with you going through wrecks and such, as I have a few friends who are Junk Techs, but this colony hasn't even been destroyed for a day, Mister Garfield. And we found your team already going through the remains like you are some sort of rats," the woman mentioned in reply making Liam pretty much flush in some shame at that statement.

'Damn it, Professor! And while I am it damn you Lowe!' he thought angrily at the leader of their crew who had said it was alright that they were not helping the other Junk Guild Crews with the rescue effort and the man who had dragged them into the wreck of the colony.

"Yeah! Where are those Pods? These machines are not going to dig themselves out after all," as if summoned by Liam's thoughts the voice of their friend Lowe came up from the hole behind him. This saw the figure in front of the two of them stiffen in some anger before she seemed to sigh and turned towards the figures at her sides.

"Corporal you go ahead and take these two into custody. I shall take the rest of the troops into the factory section to take possession of the remaining prototypes," the woman mentioned placing her weapon back into the holster at her side.

"Yes Commander!" the man mentioned waving a pair of his fellows towards the figures of Liam and Kisato. The lead figure then led the rest of the armed troops past the two of them towards the hole and the now unhidden mobile suits. After inspecting the sides of the hole, the female figure easily jumped down the hole due to the lower gravity of the remaining piece of the colony. As one of the armed figures brought his arms behind his back he watched as the rest of the armed figures followed behind her jumping down the hole where his friend had found some prototype mobile suits.

"Who the heck are you guys?" came the voice of Lowe before a struggle could be heard, "Yeah! Get your hands off me!"

Liam heard as he and Kisato were gently led away from the collapsed building and the hole towards what he was surprised to see a standard Mark-15 Launch, painted in Orb colors, that had been landed nearby to their position. He hadn't even heard it landing and what were bound to be Orb infantry departing it. He could only shake his head in some shame and a bit of anger at what was happening to them. A moment later he could see a trio of Mistral Work Pods starting to descend towards the hole their larger work lights lighting up the entire area showing that the entire series of buildings that they had been exploring had once been a large industrial complex. He sighed as he pushed into a seat along one side of the launch along with Kisato. Then as the side door of the launch started to close, he could just see Lowe being escorted out of the hole. The other man was struggling in the grips of two large Orb infantrymen making Liam shake his head in brief amusement before the launch took off. A moment later he could see through the window built into the side door of the launch that their transport the Home had another launch docked with it along with a couple of further work pods swarming around it making him sigh once again.

"Liam what is going to happen to us?" came the almost whisper-like voice of Kisato at his side making him turn to look down at her scared-looking form. He tried to smile down at her for she had never been in a similar situation after all, but he really could not. They really got themselves in a mess this time.

"I do not know Kisato. I do not know," he managed to say instead with a sigh before turning and watching as the launch swept past the Home on a heading towards the outskirts of the new debris field that had once been the colony Heliopolis.

Captain's Quarters
OSDS Myoken
Lagrange Three, Earth Sphere

Deep in the ship and built into the ship's very small gravity deck were the quarters for the overall commander of the Myoken, Captain Caridad Yamato. The quarters took up just under a quarter of the gravity deck and even then, were not all that large. Basically, one decent-sized rectangle-looking room with a small one-person bed taking up one corner of the room. Right up next to the bed was an armoire-looking cabinet complete with several drawers. A comfy-looking couch and similar looking comfy chair took up the opposite corner/wall from that of the bed. While a large desk took up the rest of the wall next to that of the sofa. Then a small door leading to a tiny bathroom facility was in the corner above that of the bed before finally, a large hatch took up the final corner of the room. Up on the walls of the room were a few pictures, mostly of the captain's family and a couple of comrades from the military, while a penciled sketch of the Myoken herself took up the wall next to the room's desk. It was these pictures that drew the attention of the single person now in the room, a blond-haired young woman who was frowning at one picture right next to the room's sofa. It showed a young short purple-haired woman in an Orb Naval Defense Uniform alongside a familiar-looking brown-haired woman in a simple dress but had what looked to be a gradation robe over one arm. She was suddenly drawn from the picture when the hatch opened to admit the older form of the uniformed woman in the picture she had been observing.

"Lady Cagalli. I hope Andre took care of you," the woman mentioned as placed her naval cap on a hook by the hatch before walking further into the room.

"Andre is quite used to taking care of me Captain," the young woman mentioned with a snort and a shake of her head. The last thing she expected to find on an Orb Space Warship was the figure of one of her family's servants in the uniform of the Orb Defense Force.

"Yeah, I was quite shocked that your father assigned him to be my steward when I took command of this ship," the captain replied as she took a seat on the couch before waving to the young lady that was the heir of her country's leader to the comfy-looking chair that was angled just right next to the couch. After a brief moment of hesitation, the young woman took the offered seat and looked at the woman who leaned back on the couch with a deep sigh.

"I do apologize My Lady, but I haven't got used to zero gravity as of yet therefore take any moment on the gravity deck to relax some. Not to mention I had to use my sea cabin over the past couple of days as I needed to get used to sleeping in zero-gee," she mentioned a few moments later looking over at Cagalli who blinked at that admission before she looked around at the surroundings of the cabin.

"I did notice that this ship had a very small gravity deck when Andre showed me around," she mentioned with a frown, "I would think that our new space warships would have better accommodations than this."

This saw the captain blink in some surprise at this before snorting in some agreement. As she too looked around at the surrounding cabin and the rest of the ship's gravity deck beyond the walls of the cabin itself. Beside her own quarters the gravity deck also a slightly smaller version of her own quarters for the ship's executive officer who also sported a vastly smaller quarters up in the superstructure below the ship's bridge. However, unlike her own pair of quarters, the XO's quarters here in the gravity deck weren't really used all that much for sleeping instead was a sort of office space for the executive officer to deal with the needs of the crew. Combined this pair of quarters took up a quarter of the gravity deck's space. The rest of the gravity deck was given over to a dedicated exercise room to keep the crew in needed fitness, a combined crew lounge and library, a single small visiting officer quarters, a dedicated private pantry/mess area that served both the captain's quarters and that of a separate dining room/state room that made up the last bit of the gravity deck.

"Agreed, but I am formerly an officer of the Naval Defense Forces which sometimes has worse crew amenities than what we now have onboard. Though from what I understand some other ships do not even have what we do have here on the ship for amenities. For example, the Alliance's Drake Class Missile Frigates do not even have a gravity deck and barely any amenity for its crew, while ZAFT's Laurasia Class Frigates do not have a gravity deck but does have some basic amenities for its crew," the captain mentioned in a thoughtful tone of voice making Cagalli look on in surprised interest.

"Our Naval Ships do not have dedicated crew amenities at all?" Cagalli asked in some concern, making the captain look at her in some surprise before shaking her head with a chuckle.

"My Lady you have to remember that ships of the Naval Defense Force are often at sea for a few days at most. Therefore, the designers and the builders of the ships believed that such amenities as say a dedicated crew lounge or a crew library are not needed when the ship is only at sea at most for a five-day-long patrol," the captain explained making Cagalli blink in surprise at this explanation.

"While our new space warships of the Space Defense Forces will often be away from ports for a couple weeks to a month at a time. Hence the need for more dedicated amenities to keep the crew on their toes and their morale high," the captain went on to explain before she got up from the couch to stretch a bit.

"That said, from what I understand the next production run of these ships will have their hull extended by ten to fifteen meters to make room for a similar gravity deck to that of those onboard the Alliance's Agamemnon Class Command Carriers. They are a bit more expensive to maintain but they are far easier to place in a hull than these small cumbersome rotating gravity decks that these ships inherited from the Izumo and her sisters," the captain finished up her explanation and sat back down in the couch now a bit more relaxed then she had before now.

"That is great, but I believe need to change the subject," Cagalli mentioned after several moments of a comfortable silence between the two as she stared back over that photo that she had been inspecting when the captain had entered the room.

"Oh?" the captain replied with a raised eyebrow and noticed the attention of the younger woman shifted to one of the photos on the wall of the room.

"This woman looks quite familiar to me, but I do not know the reason for it," the confused-looking young woman as she continued to stare at the photo. The captain smiled a bit sadly as she looked over at the photo herself before shifting her attention back to the young woman.

"That is a photo of myself and my younger half-sister Via Kuwa at her graduation from MIT at twenty-two with a Ph.D.," she managed to say with a sad sigh and a thoughtful look on her face as she remembered that time. Before she suddenly smiled and looked down at Cagalli who was listening in some confusion as she was staring at the photo.

"And she happens to be your birth mother from what I understand," she mentioned with a hint of mischief on her face as she stared at Cagalli who jolted in complete shock at this statement.

"What?" she managed to say after a few moments of looking over at the captain in surprise and a bit of shock.

"From what I understand your father mentioned to you that you were adopted a few months ago, but never told you anything about your birth parents or if you had any other family," the captain continued with her story. This saw Cagalli barely managed to nod in answer to this through her shock making Caridad nod herself before turning to look at the photo once more.

"We had the same father a notable Atlantic Federation Navy officer, Geoffrey Kuwa, and different mothers, her mother was his actual wife from New York in the Federation. We grew up as only children till when we were teens when Via's mother found out about the various affairs that Geoffrey had when on deployment. This led to a very messy divorce between the two and is when the two of us first met one another along with two other older half-siblings from Geoffrey's other affairs," Caridad mentioned with a sigh of memory before continuing with her story, "The two of us pretty much clicked, as we loved the idea of having a sister, and kept in contact after the divorce. Then when both Geoffrey and Via's mother were killed by someone unknown party during a meeting between the two things changed. That was when Via came to live with my mother and her family in Orb. Which saw our relationship grow as we both entered the final year of high school together and started to think about what to do with the rest of our lives."

Cagalli listened to the older woman in some awe and watched the face of the captain as he remembered her sister. A moment later she shook her head to clear the memories and focused on Cagalli seeing the surprised look on her face. This amused the Orb Captain for the young teenager looked more like Via right now than ever before now. She turned back to look at the photo on the wall that showed the two of them with a sad sigh escaping her lips before she turned to look back down at Cagalli, who looked a bit confused.

"Can I ask the reason why I was adopted by my father instead of going to you? Since you are my Aunt therefore I should have gone to my closest family after all," she asked, making Caridad frown in concern for she knew the real reason but she couldn't mention that to Cagalli without the permission of Lord Uzumi. However, still she had the perfect half-truth to tell the confused-looking young teen.

"The reason was that I had recently had my son and since I wanted to keep with my military career, I couldn't put the time for a second child. That said, for the first year or so of your life I did meet with Lord Uzumi a couple of times to check on you when I was on leave, and you did spend time with my son as he was often at the Attha House with you as my husband worked at the Government House as an aide. Since there was some relation between the two of you it was seen that it would be better for Kira, my son, and yourself to be together during the day," she mentioned with a wistful smile on her face as she remembered those days while Cagalli kind of blushed in embarrassment a bit at this statement. However, after a moment she recovered from the embarrassment and looked thoughtfully at Caridad.

"Do you have a picture of your son Miss Caridad?" she asked out loud making Caridad blink at this before smiling and moving off the couch heading towards her desk.

"Of course, I do! I am a mom after all!" she mentioned in a teasing tone of voice before looking over a couple of photo frames on her desk before nodding and picking up one of them with another smile on her face. She then walked back over to the couch and handed the photo frame over to Cagalli who took it. She looked down at the three people standing in the photo and she nearly dropped it in some shock as she recognized all three people in the photo. The tallest and center person was obviously the woman now standing in front of her but with her hair longer and wearing simple pants and a shirt. The two shorter people on either side of her both wore fancy dress as if they were going to a party or something like that. However, she knew these two people, she didn't know their names of course but they had been in Professor Kato's lab when she had been waiting for the man.

"I know these two," she mentioned slowly in some shock and Caridad looked down at her in some shock at the admission. "I had been waiting in Professor Kato's Lab for him to arrive to answer a couple of questions I had about the Alliance's G-Project. I found out about it when I was visiting the Top-Secret Weapon Development Lab at Morgenroete's Site-B Facility."

Cagalli continued to say looking down at the photo in her hands before looking up into the surprised face of Caridad who managed a single-word reply, "What?"

"I was so angry and everything about it. Oh. I had known about the Astray Project for a couple of weeks by this time since a couple of my older friends from my school had been recruited into the project. However, I hadn't known about the G-Project which was being worked on alongside our own Astray Project. Therefore, I wanted to get some answers myself directly from the source therefore was waiting on Kato and these two teenagers had arrived at the lab with another pair of teenagers. They then started to work on some sort of mobile suit cockpit block while I continued to wait for Kato along the sidelines. Then about an hour or so after I entered the Lab the ZAFT attack started," she said before setting down the photo frame on the table in front of her not noticing Caridad had barely managed to make it to her couch and pretty much dropped into it as she listened to Cagalli's story.

"We all exited the lab and headed towards the emergency stairs where we learned of the ZAFT attack on the colony. I was shocked to learn of this, but unlike the others in the group, I had a pretty good idea of why ZAFT was attacking the colony. Therefore, I started to run towards the Morgenroete's Main Development Facility however these two told their friends to go ahead and run after me," she mentioned with a sigh leaning back in her chair as she stared up at the ceiling of the quarters. Caridad was literally in the corner of her seat listening to this for this was something she hadn't expected to hear from her niece.

"In hindsight now that was kind of a stupid thing to do really but still, I needed to know if everything was true. True that my father had agreed to use Heliopolis as a development facility for the Earth Alliance mobile suit development program. Still, though the two of them managed to catch up with me pretty quickly and something exploded behind them cutting them off and myself from returning to the group. Still, after some talk between the three of us the boy, Kira was it, grabbed my hand and started to pull me in a random direction. The girl followed behind us and eventually, we arrived on a catwalk over the main development hangar of the facility where two of the remaining Alliance mobile suits were being readied to be moved out towards their new ship. However, the ZAFT commandos had arrived before they could and started fighting the Alliance personnel in the hangar. One of which tried to shoot at us after I kind of broke down and loudly proclaimed that my father betrayed us all. This other girl pushed me down making the shot miss while Kira ducked down beside me. Then the girl kind of unloaded on me about attracting the attention of trigger-happy soldiers in the middle of a fight for their lives," she mentioned a bit sadly at what she had done. Caridad meanwhile had started to be a bit fearful for her son and the young lady in the story that she was sure was her son's childhood friend and now girlfriend Fiona Alexandar. She also was surprised at Cagalli's mentioning her father betraying their country to the Alliance.

"They then dragged me off the catwalks towards one of the facility's emergency shelter locations where they then managed to push me into the shelter. However, the shelter was already pretty much at full capacity. From there, I knew there was a large explosion that happened in the nearby development hangar as the emergency level had gone up and loud noises from what I was pretty sure was a mobile suit battle of some sort going on nearby. Then everything was quiet for a while before more explosions started and another larger battle was taking place not far from our shelter. Then the emergency level was rapidly increased with the shelter being sealed and then finally the destruction of the colony," she mentioned pretty much finishing up the story and looking up at the shocked face of Caridad before looking back down at the face of her -what- cousin in the photo in front of her.

"Something about him was familiar to me when he grabbed my hand and now, I know why he was so familiar," she managed to say almost softly as she stared down at the photo. Caridad had managed to slide off the couch and position herself in front of the seated Cagalli. She grabbed the hands of the girl and smiled up at her with tears in her eyes.

"Thank you, Cagalli. I have been worried and everything about Kira since I first saw the colony destroyed. While I do not know what happened afterward since you got shoved into the shelter, I still know that he was okay then," she mentioned with a smile on her face. However, she soon sighed and looked back up at Cagalli.

"Also, Cagalli your father did not betray Orb in the matter you are thinking. He did not know about the G-Project at all," she mentioned making Cagalli straighten up in her seat in some surprise at this admission looking down at Caridad.

"After we arrived here at the destroyed Heliopolis and chased off a ZAFT ship from the debris field I reported personally to your father about the destruction of the colony. Along with what the captain of the ZAFT ship had mentioned to me in our discussion. Since I managed to contact him while he was still meeting with the council, we got to witness the almost guilty looks of the Seiran Family Representative when I mentioned the reason for ZAFT to attack the colony," she continued with her own story making Cagalli look in some confusion.

"From Lord Uzumi got from the Representative it was the Seiran Family who had made the deal with the Earth Alliance through the upper management of Morgenroete. An extension of the pre-war production contract between the Alliance and Morgenroete for both the Bulldog Missile Truck and the Linear Artillery Vehicle. Since the former Governor of Heliopolis was in debt to the Seiran Family and the overall man in charge of the Morgenroete Facilities on the colony was part of the Seiran family no one knew what was going on behind the scenes," Caridad angry shook her head before continuing on with the story, "Also apparently the Sahakus knew about the G-Project and used the data from it to develop the Astrays."

Cagalli was staring off into space with wide-eyed shock and some surprise on her face while Caridad shook her head in some anger at what had happened. After a couple of moments of silence between the two Caridad got up from the floor of her quarters and looked down at the still shocked-looking Cagalli.

"All that said I do believe we need to get you back to the mainland," she mentioned with a frown looking up in some thought jolting Cagalli from her shocked daze.

"What why?" Cagalli said once more with some passion and a glare on her face. Caridad smiled down at her with some sadness on her face as she really did look like a blond-haired teenage Via.

"Right now, my own Myoken is the only Orb registered ship in Lagrange Three and needed to continue the investigation into what happened here. Also, I may have to chase after that new Alliance ship that was built at the colony to further figure out what happened here. Hence, you cannot stay onboard for much longer and I cannot transfer you over to one of the independent ships now helping us for we cannot have anyone know you were on the colony as of the destruction of the colony," she explained with the careful patience of a mother and a bit of command authority of a military officer. This saw Cagalli calm a bit down and blink in some confusion at what her aunt was now saying.

"Why shouldn't I have been known to be on the colony when it was destroyed?" she asked in her confusion, making Caridad smile once more sadly.

"Because with the destruction of the colony and what happened with the Alliance on said colony, it is a political hot potato right now. Therefore, we cannot let it be known you were on the colony for that may make said potato a bit hotter in the scheme of things. Besides I do not think your father would want any of this to splash on you politically," she mentioned making the young teen who only had recently been made Lord Uzumi's heir take a few more moments to get what Caridad was telling her at this moment.

"Okay, then. How am I going to be snuck off the ship and back home?" she asked with a frown on her face. She did not like it, but she understood, barely, what was going on. Her aunt smiled a bit and chuckled as she remembered what she had planned to get Cagalli back to the mainland promptly.

"Well first of all I need you to retell that story you told me along with whatever data you managed to find out about the Alliance's project on the colony to one of my officers to further help us with the investigation," she mentioned with a more military manner and bearing looking down at Cagalli who looked kind of a bit annoyed that she had to talk to someone about what had happened to her over the past couple of days. She understood the reason why but was still kind of annoyed.

"Then we load you onboard the ship's Pinnace Class Shuttle which with some exterior boosters attached to the side of the shuttle will allow it to make it back to Earth orbit in record time and from there onto the mainland itself. Meanwhile, we will be telling everyone around here that we sent it off back to the mainland with what we currently know about what had happened. As with the Blackout N-Jammers Units ZAFT has in orbit has cut off direct radio communications from making it to the planet an in-person report and such would be needed. You will be disguised as a junior officer from my ship's company and since not many know your face right now you can easily slip past anyone observing what is going on here," Caridad continued with a small smirk on her face. While those living in space had other means to communicate with those on Earth itself, like laser links and other such means, Orb recently introduced a new communication system that allowed free instant communication between the different units of the new communication system.

"What's a Pinnace Class?" Cagalli mentioned with a frown and tilt of her head in some confusion making Caridad blink in some surprise before sighing and moving across the quarters to look at the pencil sketch of her ship.

"When the new Orb Space Defense Forces was first being formed some idea for a new space warship design was being considered. Including a variant of the popular and ubiquitous Nike Class Light Cruiser which sports a Pinnace Class Shuttle docked externally underneath the ship's bow. However soon afterwards it was decided that the new space warship design for the OSDF would be based on that of the Izumo as it was already around and very simple to build with its modular nature. Still, when the new ships of the class were being constructed someone had the bright idea to include a Pinnace Class integrated into the new Izumo Class design which is located here on the ship right in front of the ship's ventral turret bay," she mentioned pointing at the sketch of the ship which clearly showed a weird looking attachment at that part of the ship. An attachment that did indeed resemble some sort of lightweight shuttle design. However, before Cagalli could question anything further an alarm started up surprising the two of them.

"Action Stations! We are now at Alert-Level One! Action Stations! Captain Yamato to the bridge! Captain Yamato to the bridge!" came the call over the ship's intercom making Caridad blink in some surprise before looking over at her niece to see her confused as well and a bit scared of what was going on right now.

"Stay here Cagalli. I shall see what is going on right now," Caridad directed her before retrieving her cap from the hook and running out of the quarters towards the distant bridge of her command leaving Cagalli to blink in some confusion.

Radio Room
OSDS Myoken
Lagrange Three, Earth Sphere
Over an Hour Later

"Basically, if it wasn't for the assistance of Mister Lowe Gear and his Team there would have been further damage to the remaining prototypes. Not to mention whatever those pirates had originally planned on doing here," the figure of Captain Yamato said to the large video screen on one wall of the ship's radio room, located right behind the ship's bridge. Thanks in part to Orb's new advanced communication system she could provide her superiors with dedicated reports without any interference from any jamming or anyone listening into said report. On the video screen in front of her was the figure of her country's leader Lord Uzumi Nara Attha and the figure of a red-vested woman that she did not know but was introduced earlier as Erica Simmons of Morgenroete and the leader of the Astray Project.

"Very good Captain. I am quite glad you managed to recover four of the prototypes, but you mentioned that you had passed on the MBF-P01 Astray Red Frame Prototype to that of this Mister Gear and his team. Any particular reason for that?" Lord Uzumi asked with a frown on his bearded face, while the face of the woman at his side looked a bit thoughtful. The captain sighed at this question before shaking her head.

"Honestly my lord, I only had room in my hangar for three of the prototypes with all the extra parts and such for said mobile suits my men recovered from the chunk of the colony's factory district. We also managed to recover numerous supplies and parts from the Alliance's G-Project, therefore my hangar and cargo bay are quite full at the moment. That is even with loading the remains of the sixth prototype and whatever parts recovered that I did not have room for in the Pinnace before I launched it. Also, Mister Gear was quite persuasive about him keeping the Red Frame in his possession. Besides he did help us even though we had taken him and the rest of his team into custody," she answered a shrug of her shoulders at her leader. He nodded at this with a frown before sighing and looking over at Miss Simmons at his side.

"Do you have any objection to this Chief Simmons?" he asked her with a concerned look on his face. The woman simply chuckled lightly before looking through the camera at the captain.

"No. I do not have any objection to Captain Yamato and her crew retaining the Blue, Silver, Green, or Yellow Frames Lord Uzumi. As that was part of her original mission after all. I also do not have any objection to this Mister Gear retaining the Red Frame for their own use. I just require that the captain and her crew keep be appraised of any data on the four prototypes under her command," she mentioned before looking back at Lord Uzumi and continued, "I shall see about sending a courier to Barnacle to have my old friend send the data on the Red Frame sometime tomorrow."

This made the leader of the Orb Union nod at the woman before turning his attention back to Captain Yamato who remained standing at attention in front of the radio's room camera. He now looked a bit less of a leader and more like a concerned father.

"That said, what of my daughter Captain?" he asked in some concern making Caridad settle back from attention.

"She is on the Pinnace disguised as one of my junior officers overseeing the parts and such, we shoved into the cargo bay of the shuttle. Therefore, she should be back home in a few hours' time Uzumi," she mentioned with a nod of her head before eying the woman at his side and deciding to give a hint at what was coming his way with his daughter now knowing a bit of her remaining true family and past.

"I also let her keep a picture of my sister as we had a lengthy discussion about her before this little pirate attack of ours," she mentioned with a small smile on her lips making Uzumi on the other end of the camera blink in some confusion for a moment before his eyes widened at what she was telling him. Miss Simmons just raised an eyebrow in some confusion before she got that whatever was just said wasn't for her ears to hear therefore ignored the look on her leader's face.

"Understood. I think that is about it captain," he mentioned with a nod and started to reach for the control to end the communication between the two of them. However, the raised hand of Caridad stopped him, making him frown at her.

"My lord what about my earlier request?" she asked making the man look a bit surprised before he looked off camera in some thought for a brief moment before looking back at the camera.

"Can you do this without making things worse for us?" he asked making Caridad look a bit offended, but she understood what he was saying to her.

"Yes, they will have the most complete story on what happened with the colony. Besides I figured I return what my people took from their G-Project," she mentioned with a shrug of her shoulder making Lord Uzumi smile slightly a bit at this before nodding at her.

"Very well, once the Serpent Tail Mercenary Group and the Izumo arrive then you can start tracking down the Alliance's new Assault Ship. I too think they would have the most up-to-date story on what the heck had happened on the colony," he mentioned making her nod with a smile on her face. This saw Uzumi once more reach for the control to shut off the communication before he stopped once more but at his hand.

"That said, go get some rest Caridad. You look like you need it," he mentioned before tapping the control making Caridad blink in some surprise before she nodded knowing that he was most likely quite correct. A moment later, the screen went black as the communication link was cut off between the ship and the mainland. Caridad sighed at this before rubbing her eyes everything going on since she first discovered the destruction of her home hadn't really gotten her any sort of rest outside of that brief discussion with her niece. Therefore, Lord Uzumi would be quite correct, before she suddenly smiled as a thought entered her head. A moment later, she pressed a button on the controls of the nearby internal communications unit.

"Yes Captain?" the voice of Commander Reed came through the hidden speakers in the room a few seconds later.

"The report on the pirate attack and everything else going on is now finished, Commander. That said, I shall take a few hours to rest in my main cabin, so you have the bridge and command of the ship till this evening. Though please if anything further goes on with the search or the appearance of the Izumo feel free to contact me," she ordered the man before turning away from the advanced communication equipment that dominated the small room.

"Understood Captain. Have a good rest, I shall take care of things here," the amused-sounding voice of the commander soon came back before a click sounded signaling the end of the connection making her roll her eyes before exiting the room entirely and making for her main cabin to get some actual rest in some form of gravity.

Post Chapter Notes

Well, that was the second chapter of this new story of mine. And I must say I was really surprised I managed to get it finished. I was kind of coming to a stop with the whole idea before I recently decided to come back to the whole idea. The whole thing was quite frustrating to me as many parts of this story kind of fought me to write. This included the mentioned parts in the last chapter and the whole main battle scene with the pirates in this chapter. It only gets a brief mention at the end, but I really couldn't get the whole darn scene to work correctly. As I took the basic idea of the battle from the Astray Manga and inserted the Murakumo into the story replacing that of the Serpent Tail group. I also put in a few neutral ships into the whole thing and everything kind of fell apart in the long run. Therefore, I kind of lost any sort of interest in the story, but I have since gotten a bit more interest in the whole story and come back to it. Still, a few quick things to go over before I try to start on the next chapter of this story of mine.

The first bit is that since I first wrote this whole thing, I have made a few different changes to the overall storyline. The first major thing changed would be the change of Captain Yamato's ship from that of my own created Nike Class design to that of a design based on a modified form of the canon Izumo Class design. As I mainly questioned the reason for a second entire class of ships alongside the Canon-built Izumo Class ships at this point in the story. Therefore, made the decision to change the whole ship design, and I came up with the Izumo Class Space Battlecruiser design, for those tech-hounds and such feel free to hit up the Gundam Fanon page on said design. It is a bit different from that of the original Izumo Class design, with one new feature seen in the previous chapter, and a second one seen here in this chapter.

The first of course was the linear cannons replacing those of the Lohengrin Cannons along either side of the ship. These weapons make up the secondary armament of the ship alongside the canon Gottfried Turrets along the front end of the ship. They are used briefly in the last chapter and will be a main part of the ship's offensive options in the rest of the story. That said, they kind of fold up similar to the Valiant Guns on the Archangel Class though instead of mainly pointing forward with the Archangel they unfold pointing backwards. If that makes any sort of sense at all really in the scheme of things. Shrug.

Anyways. The second major change to the design was of the addition of the Pinnace Class Orbital Shuttle, Salamis/Magallan Style, on the ship's ventral bow. Though for the Murakumo and her sisters, this would be right in front of the ventral main turret. This also prevents this bottom section from having the same new torpedo launchers built into the top portion. This mainly was kept in the story from the first version to get Cagalli back to Earth in a timely matter, along with the canonically half-destroyed Gold Frame in its cargo bay.

This brings us to the change to the Astray Project. As in canon, there are five official Astray Prototype frames produced by the project. However, here I mentioned there are six prototypes instead of five. The Silver and White Frame are brand new designs I created for this story which are based on ideas I had for similar named mobile suit designs for some of my other Gundam SEED story ideas. The MBF-P04 Silver Frame is a dedicated command machine, while the Green Frame goes from the MBF-P04 model number to that of the MBF-P05, which it along with the new MBF-P06 Yellow Frame is pretty much the same as the other canon Astray Frame Prototypes. Basically, bog-standard X100 series machines complete with head guns, beam rifles, beam sabers, and shield combo. The only difference between them all is their different colors, and the Gold and Silver Frames are rated Command-Level machines complete with a few extra pieces of equipment included in their designs. This does include the canon ability of the Frame Prototypes to raise their backpacks for extra equipment.

All that said, I bet you are wondering about why Orb is keeping the Blue Frame, while Lowe still gets the Red Frame. Well, if you noticed the Serpent Tail are arriving a bit late to the party, as I replaced them overall in the larger Astray story with that of the Murakumo and her crew. So why not have the Murakumo keep the Blue Frame? This does give the ship and her crew a compliment of four mobile suits. A basic squad of mobile suits really. Which does allow Captain Yamato and her crew an easier time in the future. As I do have some plans for what is going to happen to the ship and its crew after all this mess with Heliopolis is finished.

That said. Yes, the Murakumo will indeed catch up with the Archangel eventually, but outside of that meeting and the addition of some surprises, briefly mentioned in the last part of this chapter, there will not be all that much difference overall with the general storyline of the Archangel and its crew. Kira will remain as the Strike's Pilot and the Archangel continues on with its journey to JOSH-A. However, I do want to mention some bits of the story will change in the background as I do have plans for some consequences happening to that of the PLANT Supreme Council and such for what happened at Heliopolis. So, things will change in the long run. Somewhat.

Alright, that is about it for this lengthy bit of notes, and I really need to get started on the next chapter of this lovely story of mine! Till then then folks.