Sometimes I just want to blow things up. If anyone was looking for the Rage in the title, I've got a bit of a fight for you. Obviously, Kira, Mu and the others will all need their own scenes written in at some point.
The Battle of Orb
June 15th, C.E. 71
ORB Union waters, Earth
Thomas looked at the screens, the ships flanking them bustling as side hatches opened to reveal rank after rank of Strike Daggers. And this was only the second wave. Ahead of them another line of warships was already duelling with the gallant but badly outnumbered ships of the ORB military.
He took a deep breath and forced himself to sit back. This would be unlike any battle he'd ever fought. For once he was forced to command from a chair rather than leading from the front, or better yet, merely fighting, without responsibility save for the flanks of those stood with him.
"Ready Igelstellung for incoming missiles," he ordered, running through a mental checklist of the Black Pearl's weapons. Fortunately, they were identical to those of the Archangel. "Helldarts prepare to engage Mobile Suits. Load anti-shipping missiles in tubes thirteen through twenty-four. Make Gottfrieds and Valiants ready to fire along our aft axis."
"All weapons ready," Natarle reported from her seat in CIC.
Thomas nodded. "Power up the Lohengrin's," he ordered, beginning the sequence of orders that would start their part in the fight. From his postion he could not see the powerful weapons push out from behind their covers. "Helm, bring us around ninety degrees to the left."
"Port, sir," Natarle corrected.
"Who gives a fuck?" Thomas growled as the big ship slewed around, perpendicular to it's previous line of travel and with the ships on their left now lined up in front of them like ducks. "Fire at will!"
Almost instantly the massive positron blast of the Lohengrins slashed out in front of the Black Pearl and the Gottfrieds began to hurl energy beams back towards the Alliance Navy's right flank, now in the renegade warship's aft quarter.
Most of the ships were assault carriers of the Powell-class , lacking the heavier armour of the missile cruisers in the first wave. Even worse, their hatches were open and clogged with relatively inexperienced mobile suit pilots carrying tonnes of ammunition and reaction mass. A trail of burning ships formed immediately, with the black-hulled spaceship squarely in the middle. Almost instantly the line began to break up as the vessels gave up on burning and took up sinking instead. Not all the ships had been hit of course, and even those hit first often managed to launch at least one mobile suit before they died. To the rear, where even the combination of linear cannon, high energy beams and missiles had failed to match the impact of the Lohengrins, entire squadrons managed to survive and began to launch themselves at the Black Pearl, hoping to avenge their motherships.
Ahead of the second wave, the leading elements of the Earth Alliance's Fourth Naval Fleet weren't having a good day either. Their Strike Daggers had managed to land on Onogoro Island, but weren't making any headway against the M-1 Astrays deployed in defense. Where the lines were stiffened by the Buster and the rebuilt Strike, the Alliance Mobile Suits were taking terrible casualties and that entire flank looked like it might be pushed back into the sea.
To make it worse, the missile cruisers were finding it almost impossible to support the suits with long range fire. That mysterious mobile suit piloted by the never-to-be-sufficently damned Yamato brat was shooting down their missiles almost as fast as they could be launched. Now that he saw it in action, Captain William Sutherland was beginning to believe the reports from Alaska, of how entire teams of ZAFT mobile suits had failed to break past the suit's defense of the fleeing ships. And there was another suit with the so-called 'Freedom', this one busily sinking the cruisers. The only mercy was that the pilot was apparently arrogant enough that he was only doing enough damage to sink the ships, rather than blasting them apart along with their crews. Casualties would be serious... but most of the crews should be able to escape.
"Djibril!" he snarled into a radio. "What are you waiting for? Send in the next wave! We need support now!"
"Ach, du liebe gott," came a harsh voice in reply. "Is that Starchy Bill Sutherland I hear out there?"
"Who the hell are you?" Sutherland demanded. "Where's Djbril."
"DJ Brill has taken a little step or two off the gangplank, matey," the voice replied, gloating almost visibly. "I'm afraid he's in Davy Jones' locker now."
"Captain!" shouted an officer, dashing across the bridge towards Sutherland. "Signal from the Bellerophon! The Dominion is firing on the rest of the second wave. They report heavy losses among both the carriers and the mobile suits."
"What!" Sutherland cried, turning to look out a window to the rear of the bridge. Sure enough, the first signs of smoke could be seen from just over the horizon, where the second wave should be. "Has -?"
The nature of Captain William Sutherland's question would forever be unknown. Even as he turned back to the radio, a beam of energy cut through the bridge, decapitating the command structure of the Fourth Naval Fleet's lead squadrons. Following this, Athrun Zala dipped low enough to cut a long slice through the side of the cruiser, opening half a dozen usually water-tight compartments, and flew off, leaving the cruiser to roll slowly to one side as it's crew began to hastily evacuate.
The Strike Dagger was a remarkable piece of engineering. Simplifying the design of the expensive and complicated Strike down to the level that the Atlantic Federation could mass produce it and quickly train Natural pilots to use it was a non-trivial achievement. To do so in the limited timeframe available was incredible.
The machine itself, however, was not the equal of it's illustrious forebear (which was currently being demonstrated ashore by Mu La Flaga). Nor was it the equal of the other G-series machines that had harried the Archangel for much of its career. As a result, the disorganised attack of almost eighty Strike Daggers upon the Black Pearl, its crew honed to a fine edge by Natarle Badgiruel, was considerably less effective than the Earth Alliance could have hoped.
It was, in fact, almost impossible to miss the suits as they brought their beam rifles to bear, attempting to overload the renegade vessel's laminate armour, and unlike their forebears, they did not benefit from phase-shift armour and were far more vulnerable to the Black Pearl's missiles than the pilots had been led to believe. For that matter, even the Igelstellung were capable of inflicting some damage if they happened to track across the suits while reaching out for the handful of missiles being directed at the Black Pearl by the surviving ships of the second wave.
Veteran Coordinator pilots in DINN suits could have made the attack work... Naturals with only a few weeks of training and zero combat experience with their machines didn't stand a chance. Well before the massed beam rifles could inflict sufficient damage to impede the Black Pearl's hull, the attack had been cut to pieces, the Strike Daggers brought down in almost equal numbers by rapid fire from the Gottfrieds and Valiants and by the surface-to-air missiles that the Archangel-class ship could fire in such numbers.
Thomas leaned forward in his chair, eyes intent. "Right then," he growled. "Time for phase two, I believe. Open the hatch."
It had not been possible, in the limited time available, to come up with a proper solution to losing the use of the Alliance's 'enhanced' pilots. Since they were apparently commited members of Blue Cosmos, no one would have trusted them even if Thomas hadn't gone to the trouble of disabling most of their implants for future removal. In the end, Natarle had simply had their machines' operating systems wiped and replaced with copies of the Strike Dagger system. It was a hopeless kludge, but the three advanced suits could move and fire after a fashion, although not at the same time.
For this purpose, that would suffice and down in the hanger, technican Bill Morgan was getting to try out the Calamity.
By the time the huge starboard hatch was open, the blue Gundam was already walking along the catapult towards the opening. Two Strike Daggers that were late to the party tried to rush the hatch - suicidal as it seemed, getting inside the Black Pearl would probably be their best bet for a successful attack. However, commiting themselves to trying to enter a confined passage doomed the unlucky pair as Bill paused a moment to brace the heavy mobile suit and then opened up with the Calamity's full and formidable armament, blasting both suits apart as they made themselves easy targets. A carrier that happened to be crossing the Black Pearl's path began to sink at the bow after the shot from the Calamity's huge bazooka missed the suits entirely and exploded against the ship's prow.
"Take us around in a slow arc," Thomas ordered, once Bill was settled at the open hatch, the power cord still linking him to the ship's powerplant. "Engage targets of opportunity with Gottfrieds and Valiants, otherwise spare the ammunition... we may need it. Let Bill enjoy himself with any suits that are left out there..."
There was an explosion outside that suggested that the technican was very much enjoying himself playing gunner with one of the suits he'd put so many hours of maintenance into.
"We may be needed closer to the shore," Thomas finished with aplomb. "See if you can make contact with ORB's military - it would be entirely too easy to get into a shooting match with them right now."
Less than a mile from the military factorys, the small civilian population of Onogoro was boarding a transport ship that would carry them to safety on the main island.
"Wait, my phone!" protested one girl as the pink handset slipped out of her satchel and bounded down the slope and away from the switchback path to the ship.
"I'll get it," her brother promised, jumping down from the path while his family continued to follow it. The dock was just below, he was sure he could make it down the rest of the slope as fast as the rest of the family could reach the docks by the path.
There was a cry of alarm from the docks and Shinn Asuka looked up, fingers barely touching his sister's phone. Surface-to-surface missiles were arcing up and over the ridge seperating the little bay from the main port. Although he couldn't know their source, one of the Earth Alliance cruisers had been firing a volley when the Justice had torn it open. The warship had slewed wildly under the impact, the missiles losing their targeting data moments after leaving the vertical launcher and flying wild on ballistic trajectorys.
There was no time to do anything but watch as the missiles slashed towards the docks. Lances of light reached up and obliterated most of them in globes of fire as the Freedom interceded, but even Kira Yamato was not infalliable and the first pair of missiles was below the ridgeline before he could target them.
The refugee ship broke in half as missiles designed to break open armoured bunkers exploded against the thin hull and fire consumed the crowded decks. The handful of people still on the docks dived for cover as a second explosion reported that the fires had reached the fuel bunkers.
A hundred yards inland, Shinn clutched the phone and hugged the ground, tears running down his face. Only a short distance above him, his father held wife and daughter behind a rock outcropping so that neither would have to see the pyre that held so many of their neighbours.
On the bridge of the Archangel, Mirialla paused and checked the transmission that was being received. Since Kuzzey had left the ship, she had started running the flight operations through his communications station so that she could double up the roles.
"Captain," she said hesitantly. "I think I'm receiving a transmission from Lieutenant Badgiruel."
"What?" Maria exlaimed, turning in her seat. "Natarle."
"She says..." Miriala halted. "She says she's in command of... the pirate ship Black Pearl?"
Maria frowned. "Natarle's gone pirate? That's insane... it's the sort of thing that,,," The two women looked at each other and then Mirialla adjusted her controls.
"Lieutenant, this is the Archangel. Did you say that you were aboard a 'pirate ship'?"
Badgiruel's embarassed voice came crackling over the speakers. "Ah... Doctor Finn wants to know what else it should be called when we stole the ship. The Do.. Black Pearl is a black Archangel-class ship. We've engaged the second wave of the invasion force, but we're now closing in on the rear of the first wave."
"Thomas!" Maria gasped. "He's alive!"
Natarle paused. "Yes... Blue Cosmos found him on the edge of the JOSH-A blast zone. Commander Djbirl brought him aboard so he could continue to interrogate him while we travelled."
A chill went down Maria's spine. "Interrogate him?"
"I'll put him on the line. Doctor," she called, obviously not to them
"Maria!" Thomas called. "How are you?"
She wiped at a tear that had formed at the corner of one eye. "Thomas, what happened, are you alright?"
"I took a bit of a knock in Alaska," he replied laconically, "But I'm feeling much better now."
"There's something familiar about this," Thomas noted as he looked out of the open hatch at the little cluster of ORB civilians gathered at the headland. Behind them he could see the smoking ruin of the transport that should have taken them to safety.
"It's almost as if the Archangel-class are destined to have civilians aboard," Natarle agreed in a serious voice.
Thomas looked at her sideways. "Well, there are archangels and archangels, I suppose. Those of war and those of mercy."
"And some who are a little of both?" she asked him. "We certainly brought death to enough people out there."
"Perhaps this will balance the scales a little," Thomas agreed.
The hatch drew level with the headland and as the ship came to a halt, he manhandled a short ramp to drop down to the shore from the edge of the hatch. A moment later, the ramp boomed under his feet as he bounded down it. "Anyone injured?" he asked the nearest man. "I'm a paramedic."
The man gestured worldessly towards the back of the group, where those seated against the rocks bore marks of blood and burns. He glared up at Natarle where she still stood at the hatch. "You're with the Alliance?"
"Bless you, no," Thomas answered, pushing towards the wounded. "We're pirates - a renegade ship just like the Archangel over at the military base. The Alliance are pulling back - for now at least." He knelt by the side of a woman with a bloody arm and pulled a roll of bandage out of his bag. "Now then, this is going to hurt for a minute, but I need to see how bad it is before I treat it," he advised, biting off a short length of bandage to use as a wipe.
The Asuka family were among the last to board the Black Pearl, followed only by Thomas, who was rolling up what was left of the bandages he'd brought as he walked up the ramp.
"Why did this happen?" muttered Shinn, looking back at the destroyed ship.
Thomas caught his eye. "That's a question with a lot of answers, kid. Give me a hand with this and I'll tell you what I can."
Shinn looked appealingly at his father, who nodded reluctantly. Thomas promptly handed over his bag, freeing his arm to more efficiently wind the bandages into a neat coil. "The outer layer of the onion, so to speak," he explained, "is that there was a big fight. But you know about that. The why of the fight is that the Earth Alliance - to be more precise, the Atlantic Federation, whose government works for Blue Cosmos these days - want to kill the Coordinators. Most of whom live on the PLANTs, which are in space. In order to get into space, they need a massdriver, of which they had three until ZAFT, very sensibly, captured two of and destroyed a third. This means that Blue Cosmos don't have access to a massdriver unless they take one back from ZAFT or..."
"Or take ORB's," Shinn replied in realisation. "That's what this was all about?"
"Yep," Thomas nodded. "Stupid of them, really. I met Uzumi once and there isn't a chance in hell that he'd let them take over the mass driver. He'd blow it all straight to hell first. The trouble is, fanatics like the one's running Blue Cosmos believe that theirs is the only real cause, so they can't believe that anyone would make sacrifices for their own, less important goals. They, of course, tend to lurk at the back, well out of any personal danger while they sacrifice thousands of their own soldiers. Bastards."
The little group walked into the gravity deck and Thomas pointed them towards the suite that had previously been occupied by Djbril. Over the last two days, they had been rearranged into a medical ward larger and better equipped than the old medical room, which was now being used to confine those of the crew that Natarle and Thomas didn't trust. Among those confined there was the Dominion's medical officer, so Thomas was now filling that role for the Black Pearl.
Now that space was filled by the more seriously injured civilians and Thomas could feel the slight vibration through the deck of the engines as the Black Pearl made best speed towards ORB's hospitals. "Thanks for the help, lad," he told Shinn. "You probably don't want to see the next bit though. Once you see what's inside of another human being, you'll never really look at one the same way."
"I'll be alright," Shinn said, but his father put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back.
"Besides," Thomas added, "You could do with cleaning yourself up. There's a washroom next to the mess hall - that's probably the best place to wait until we drop you off."
"What will you do then?" asked Mrs Asuka.
Thomas shrugged. "In the short term? Make sure the Alliance have really backed off and that they're not just regrouping for another try. After that? Try to stop the war, I guess."
D for Drakensis
Contagious, rampant insanity isnt against the rules.
D for Drakensis
You're only young once, but immaturity is forever.
The Battle of Orb
June 15th, C.E. 71
ORB Union waters, Earth
Thomas looked at the screens, the ships flanking them bustling as side hatches opened to reveal rank after rank of Strike Daggers. And this was only the second wave. Ahead of them another line of warships was already duelling with the gallant but badly outnumbered ships of the ORB military.
He took a deep breath and forced himself to sit back. This would be unlike any battle he'd ever fought. For once he was forced to command from a chair rather than leading from the front, or better yet, merely fighting, without responsibility save for the flanks of those stood with him.
"Ready Igelstellung for incoming missiles," he ordered, running through a mental checklist of the Black Pearl's weapons. Fortunately, they were identical to those of the Archangel. "Helldarts prepare to engage Mobile Suits. Load anti-shipping missiles in tubes thirteen through twenty-four. Make Gottfrieds and Valiants ready to fire along our aft axis."
"All weapons ready," Natarle reported from her seat in CIC.
Thomas nodded. "Power up the Lohengrin's," he ordered, beginning the sequence of orders that would start their part in the fight. From his postion he could not see the powerful weapons push out from behind their covers. "Helm, bring us around ninety degrees to the left."
"Port, sir," Natarle corrected.
"Who gives a fuck?" Thomas growled as the big ship slewed around, perpendicular to it's previous line of travel and with the ships on their left now lined up in front of them like ducks. "Fire at will!"
Almost instantly the massive positron blast of the Lohengrins slashed out in front of the Black Pearl and the Gottfrieds began to hurl energy beams back towards the Alliance Navy's right flank, now in the renegade warship's aft quarter.
Most of the ships were assault carriers of the Powell-class , lacking the heavier armour of the missile cruisers in the first wave. Even worse, their hatches were open and clogged with relatively inexperienced mobile suit pilots carrying tonnes of ammunition and reaction mass. A trail of burning ships formed immediately, with the black-hulled spaceship squarely in the middle. Almost instantly the line began to break up as the vessels gave up on burning and took up sinking instead. Not all the ships had been hit of course, and even those hit first often managed to launch at least one mobile suit before they died. To the rear, where even the combination of linear cannon, high energy beams and missiles had failed to match the impact of the Lohengrins, entire squadrons managed to survive and began to launch themselves at the Black Pearl, hoping to avenge their motherships.
Ahead of the second wave, the leading elements of the Earth Alliance's Fourth Naval Fleet weren't having a good day either. Their Strike Daggers had managed to land on Onogoro Island, but weren't making any headway against the M-1 Astrays deployed in defense. Where the lines were stiffened by the Buster and the rebuilt Strike, the Alliance Mobile Suits were taking terrible casualties and that entire flank looked like it might be pushed back into the sea.
To make it worse, the missile cruisers were finding it almost impossible to support the suits with long range fire. That mysterious mobile suit piloted by the never-to-be-sufficently damned Yamato brat was shooting down their missiles almost as fast as they could be launched. Now that he saw it in action, Captain William Sutherland was beginning to believe the reports from Alaska, of how entire teams of ZAFT mobile suits had failed to break past the suit's defense of the fleeing ships. And there was another suit with the so-called 'Freedom', this one busily sinking the cruisers. The only mercy was that the pilot was apparently arrogant enough that he was only doing enough damage to sink the ships, rather than blasting them apart along with their crews. Casualties would be serious... but most of the crews should be able to escape.
"Djibril!" he snarled into a radio. "What are you waiting for? Send in the next wave! We need support now!"
"Ach, du liebe gott," came a harsh voice in reply. "Is that Starchy Bill Sutherland I hear out there?"
"Who the hell are you?" Sutherland demanded. "Where's Djbril."
"DJ Brill has taken a little step or two off the gangplank, matey," the voice replied, gloating almost visibly. "I'm afraid he's in Davy Jones' locker now."
"Captain!" shouted an officer, dashing across the bridge towards Sutherland. "Signal from the Bellerophon! The Dominion is firing on the rest of the second wave. They report heavy losses among both the carriers and the mobile suits."
"What!" Sutherland cried, turning to look out a window to the rear of the bridge. Sure enough, the first signs of smoke could be seen from just over the horizon, where the second wave should be. "Has -?"
The nature of Captain William Sutherland's question would forever be unknown. Even as he turned back to the radio, a beam of energy cut through the bridge, decapitating the command structure of the Fourth Naval Fleet's lead squadrons. Following this, Athrun Zala dipped low enough to cut a long slice through the side of the cruiser, opening half a dozen usually water-tight compartments, and flew off, leaving the cruiser to roll slowly to one side as it's crew began to hastily evacuate.
The Strike Dagger was a remarkable piece of engineering. Simplifying the design of the expensive and complicated Strike down to the level that the Atlantic Federation could mass produce it and quickly train Natural pilots to use it was a non-trivial achievement. To do so in the limited timeframe available was incredible.
The machine itself, however, was not the equal of it's illustrious forebear (which was currently being demonstrated ashore by Mu La Flaga). Nor was it the equal of the other G-series machines that had harried the Archangel for much of its career. As a result, the disorganised attack of almost eighty Strike Daggers upon the Black Pearl, its crew honed to a fine edge by Natarle Badgiruel, was considerably less effective than the Earth Alliance could have hoped.
It was, in fact, almost impossible to miss the suits as they brought their beam rifles to bear, attempting to overload the renegade vessel's laminate armour, and unlike their forebears, they did not benefit from phase-shift armour and were far more vulnerable to the Black Pearl's missiles than the pilots had been led to believe. For that matter, even the Igelstellung were capable of inflicting some damage if they happened to track across the suits while reaching out for the handful of missiles being directed at the Black Pearl by the surviving ships of the second wave.
Veteran Coordinator pilots in DINN suits could have made the attack work... Naturals with only a few weeks of training and zero combat experience with their machines didn't stand a chance. Well before the massed beam rifles could inflict sufficient damage to impede the Black Pearl's hull, the attack had been cut to pieces, the Strike Daggers brought down in almost equal numbers by rapid fire from the Gottfrieds and Valiants and by the surface-to-air missiles that the Archangel-class ship could fire in such numbers.
Thomas leaned forward in his chair, eyes intent. "Right then," he growled. "Time for phase two, I believe. Open the hatch."
It had not been possible, in the limited time available, to come up with a proper solution to losing the use of the Alliance's 'enhanced' pilots. Since they were apparently commited members of Blue Cosmos, no one would have trusted them even if Thomas hadn't gone to the trouble of disabling most of their implants for future removal. In the end, Natarle had simply had their machines' operating systems wiped and replaced with copies of the Strike Dagger system. It was a hopeless kludge, but the three advanced suits could move and fire after a fashion, although not at the same time.
For this purpose, that would suffice and down in the hanger, technican Bill Morgan was getting to try out the Calamity.
By the time the huge starboard hatch was open, the blue Gundam was already walking along the catapult towards the opening. Two Strike Daggers that were late to the party tried to rush the hatch - suicidal as it seemed, getting inside the Black Pearl would probably be their best bet for a successful attack. However, commiting themselves to trying to enter a confined passage doomed the unlucky pair as Bill paused a moment to brace the heavy mobile suit and then opened up with the Calamity's full and formidable armament, blasting both suits apart as they made themselves easy targets. A carrier that happened to be crossing the Black Pearl's path began to sink at the bow after the shot from the Calamity's huge bazooka missed the suits entirely and exploded against the ship's prow.
"Take us around in a slow arc," Thomas ordered, once Bill was settled at the open hatch, the power cord still linking him to the ship's powerplant. "Engage targets of opportunity with Gottfrieds and Valiants, otherwise spare the ammunition... we may need it. Let Bill enjoy himself with any suits that are left out there..."
There was an explosion outside that suggested that the technican was very much enjoying himself playing gunner with one of the suits he'd put so many hours of maintenance into.
"We may be needed closer to the shore," Thomas finished with aplomb. "See if you can make contact with ORB's military - it would be entirely too easy to get into a shooting match with them right now."
Less than a mile from the military factorys, the small civilian population of Onogoro was boarding a transport ship that would carry them to safety on the main island.
"Wait, my phone!" protested one girl as the pink handset slipped out of her satchel and bounded down the slope and away from the switchback path to the ship.
"I'll get it," her brother promised, jumping down from the path while his family continued to follow it. The dock was just below, he was sure he could make it down the rest of the slope as fast as the rest of the family could reach the docks by the path.
There was a cry of alarm from the docks and Shinn Asuka looked up, fingers barely touching his sister's phone. Surface-to-surface missiles were arcing up and over the ridge seperating the little bay from the main port. Although he couldn't know their source, one of the Earth Alliance cruisers had been firing a volley when the Justice had torn it open. The warship had slewed wildly under the impact, the missiles losing their targeting data moments after leaving the vertical launcher and flying wild on ballistic trajectorys.
There was no time to do anything but watch as the missiles slashed towards the docks. Lances of light reached up and obliterated most of them in globes of fire as the Freedom interceded, but even Kira Yamato was not infalliable and the first pair of missiles was below the ridgeline before he could target them.
The refugee ship broke in half as missiles designed to break open armoured bunkers exploded against the thin hull and fire consumed the crowded decks. The handful of people still on the docks dived for cover as a second explosion reported that the fires had reached the fuel bunkers.
A hundred yards inland, Shinn clutched the phone and hugged the ground, tears running down his face. Only a short distance above him, his father held wife and daughter behind a rock outcropping so that neither would have to see the pyre that held so many of their neighbours.
On the bridge of the Archangel, Mirialla paused and checked the transmission that was being received. Since Kuzzey had left the ship, she had started running the flight operations through his communications station so that she could double up the roles.
"Captain," she said hesitantly. "I think I'm receiving a transmission from Lieutenant Badgiruel."
"What?" Maria exlaimed, turning in her seat. "Natarle."
"She says..." Miriala halted. "She says she's in command of... the pirate ship Black Pearl?"
Maria frowned. "Natarle's gone pirate? That's insane... it's the sort of thing that,,," The two women looked at each other and then Mirialla adjusted her controls.
"Lieutenant, this is the Archangel. Did you say that you were aboard a 'pirate ship'?"
Badgiruel's embarassed voice came crackling over the speakers. "Ah... Doctor Finn wants to know what else it should be called when we stole the ship. The Do.. Black Pearl is a black Archangel-class ship. We've engaged the second wave of the invasion force, but we're now closing in on the rear of the first wave."
"Thomas!" Maria gasped. "He's alive!"
Natarle paused. "Yes... Blue Cosmos found him on the edge of the JOSH-A blast zone. Commander Djbirl brought him aboard so he could continue to interrogate him while we travelled."
A chill went down Maria's spine. "Interrogate him?"
"I'll put him on the line. Doctor," she called, obviously not to them
"Maria!" Thomas called. "How are you?"
She wiped at a tear that had formed at the corner of one eye. "Thomas, what happened, are you alright?"
"I took a bit of a knock in Alaska," he replied laconically, "But I'm feeling much better now."
"There's something familiar about this," Thomas noted as he looked out of the open hatch at the little cluster of ORB civilians gathered at the headland. Behind them he could see the smoking ruin of the transport that should have taken them to safety.
"It's almost as if the Archangel-class are destined to have civilians aboard," Natarle agreed in a serious voice.
Thomas looked at her sideways. "Well, there are archangels and archangels, I suppose. Those of war and those of mercy."
"And some who are a little of both?" she asked him. "We certainly brought death to enough people out there."
"Perhaps this will balance the scales a little," Thomas agreed.
The hatch drew level with the headland and as the ship came to a halt, he manhandled a short ramp to drop down to the shore from the edge of the hatch. A moment later, the ramp boomed under his feet as he bounded down it. "Anyone injured?" he asked the nearest man. "I'm a paramedic."
The man gestured worldessly towards the back of the group, where those seated against the rocks bore marks of blood and burns. He glared up at Natarle where she still stood at the hatch. "You're with the Alliance?"
"Bless you, no," Thomas answered, pushing towards the wounded. "We're pirates - a renegade ship just like the Archangel over at the military base. The Alliance are pulling back - for now at least." He knelt by the side of a woman with a bloody arm and pulled a roll of bandage out of his bag. "Now then, this is going to hurt for a minute, but I need to see how bad it is before I treat it," he advised, biting off a short length of bandage to use as a wipe.
The Asuka family were among the last to board the Black Pearl, followed only by Thomas, who was rolling up what was left of the bandages he'd brought as he walked up the ramp.
"Why did this happen?" muttered Shinn, looking back at the destroyed ship.
Thomas caught his eye. "That's a question with a lot of answers, kid. Give me a hand with this and I'll tell you what I can."
Shinn looked appealingly at his father, who nodded reluctantly. Thomas promptly handed over his bag, freeing his arm to more efficiently wind the bandages into a neat coil. "The outer layer of the onion, so to speak," he explained, "is that there was a big fight. But you know about that. The why of the fight is that the Earth Alliance - to be more precise, the Atlantic Federation, whose government works for Blue Cosmos these days - want to kill the Coordinators. Most of whom live on the PLANTs, which are in space. In order to get into space, they need a massdriver, of which they had three until ZAFT, very sensibly, captured two of and destroyed a third. This means that Blue Cosmos don't have access to a massdriver unless they take one back from ZAFT or..."
"Or take ORB's," Shinn replied in realisation. "That's what this was all about?"
"Yep," Thomas nodded. "Stupid of them, really. I met Uzumi once and there isn't a chance in hell that he'd let them take over the mass driver. He'd blow it all straight to hell first. The trouble is, fanatics like the one's running Blue Cosmos believe that theirs is the only real cause, so they can't believe that anyone would make sacrifices for their own, less important goals. They, of course, tend to lurk at the back, well out of any personal danger while they sacrifice thousands of their own soldiers. Bastards."
The little group walked into the gravity deck and Thomas pointed them towards the suite that had previously been occupied by Djbril. Over the last two days, they had been rearranged into a medical ward larger and better equipped than the old medical room, which was now being used to confine those of the crew that Natarle and Thomas didn't trust. Among those confined there was the Dominion's medical officer, so Thomas was now filling that role for the Black Pearl.
Now that space was filled by the more seriously injured civilians and Thomas could feel the slight vibration through the deck of the engines as the Black Pearl made best speed towards ORB's hospitals. "Thanks for the help, lad," he told Shinn. "You probably don't want to see the next bit though. Once you see what's inside of another human being, you'll never really look at one the same way."
"I'll be alright," Shinn said, but his father put a hand on his shoulder and pulled him back.
"Besides," Thomas added, "You could do with cleaning yourself up. There's a washroom next to the mess hall - that's probably the best place to wait until we drop you off."
"What will you do then?" asked Mrs Asuka.
Thomas shrugged. "In the short term? Make sure the Alliance have really backed off and that they're not just regrouping for another try. After that? Try to stop the war, I guess."
D for Drakensis
Contagious, rampant insanity isnt against the rules.
D for Drakensis
You're only young once, but immaturity is forever.