“Tieria, what's the status of the data audit in Veda's CPU?”
Near the computer console, several green particles, which were emitted from a holographic port, came together to take the form of the purple haired Gundam Meister. "I must admit it isn’t going as fast as I would like. However I am splitting myself between here and the Ptolemaios so some lag in the overall process is expected."
The blonde woman, who was dressed in a red color themed Celestial Being uniform, removed her glasses and rubbed the bridge of her nose. "There's too much going on. We still don’t know what phenomenon brought us here. On top of that, we’ve conducted two interventions which have exposed the Gundams to this foreign Earth." She placed her glasses back before she turned to address the hologram. “Tell me Tieria... are we doing the right thing by meddling like we have been? I know Celestial Being’s mandate is to intervene and stop all armed conflict, but shouldn’t we be focused on getting home?”
Tieria paused as he considered what Linda had said. He could understand her doubts as he, as well as the crew of the Ptolemaios, shared them at one point as well. "By all means of logic, our actions are indeed foolish. However if there is anything I have learned during the time I spent with my comrades, it is that sometimes it takes a fool’s reasoning to do what is right. By all accounts we’re aliens here. Our actions can easily be interpreted as an invasion. We should have kept our noses out of this world’s unfolding history and focused on the task of getting home. But the war with the Innovator’s and the A-LAWS has changed us all. Operating entirely by Celestial Being’s original mandates to the letter simply won’t cut it anymore when we see such injustice and tyranny being committed."
"Tieria..." She was surprised at the amount of resolve that she could pick up in his holographic eyes.
“Committing armed interventions against the Holy Britannian Empire is most certainly the last thing a bunch of lost fools should do, but we just cannot turn a blind eye...... even if it makes us hypocrites to our own mandate.”
“Wow, I guess the rumors about your change in attitude were true after all, Tieria Erde.”
Both Linda and Tieria turned to face the direction where the new voice came from. Entering their work area was a tall woman with flowing, white hair, and glasses; dressed in a uniform similar to Linda’s only with a blue trim and a black skirt. A darkened scar was visible on the left side of her face, partially concealed by her bangs which came down to her chin in a curve.
“Chall!” Linda got up from her chair to welcome the new arrival while Tieria nodded as his way of greeting her.
"Chall Acustica, it has been a while.”
“Not since the disbanding of Fereshte.” Chall exchanged a warm handshake from Linda before responding to the other Meister. “And lo’ and behold you guys trashed the Solar Furnace we returned to you.”
"I can assure you I didn’t intend for Ribbons Almark to snipe Seraphim, nor do I suspect Setsuna intended for 00 to surrender the 0 Gundam’s GN drive either.”
“I guess my humor still needs work if that went over your head,” said the white haired former commander of Fereshte with a wan smile on her face.
"I was joking as well,” replied Tieria in a completely serious tone.
Linda couldn't help but roll her eyes at the light banter between the two. “You’re both horrible jokers. Chall, I take it that the second generation machines have already been safely stowed away?"
"That's right. We made some room in one of the Innovator mobile suit docks that weren't in use to store away our remaining GNY-series models.”
“Exactly, how many of the second generation Gundams do we have left?”
Chall quickly ran through the inventory in her head. “We have the Astraea Type F2 fully intact. The Sadalsuud Type F is in pieces as we scavenged parts from it and the remains of the Dynames to repair Cherudim. The Abulhool Type F is also mostly in pieces since we had to strip it down for parts to get Arios up and running. Last but not least, we took apart the Artemie and used whatever was left to rebuild the GN-Archer.
"So we only have the Astraea and the rest are just spare parts at this point,” murmured Linda as she pondered how it would affect their repair schedule.
Tieria raised an eyebrow upon on hearing her report. "I’m surprised the Astraea wasn’t cannibalized as well for the Exia, given the state we found it in."
"The Exia R2 was in much better condition than any of the other Gundams such that there was practically no need for us to cannibalize the predecessor machine. And with some luck, we can find more caches of spare Innovator mobile suit parts and use to finish the repairs to the Seravee, Seraphim and 00. Heck, we can probably even get the entire GNY series up and running again. Obviously, we won't have enough working GN Drives unless you don’t mind slapping one of those false solar furnaces into them."
Chall's last comment brought a frown to the hologram's face. "I believe I speak for most, if not all, of Celestial Being in stating that we would like to avoid using the Tau Drives whenever possible. Unfortunately, the reality is that everything that is integrated with the satellite's infrastructure is reliant on power which is mainly supplied by the Tau Drives."
"That includes Veda," added Linda.
"Precisely. Aside from the satellite power requirements, I would rather not touch those accursed things.” Both women nodded in silent agreement at Tieria's statement. The introduction of the GN Drive Tau was one of many turning points that threw all the hard work Celestial Being had put into the plan into a black abyss of almost no return. Even though the false solar reactors had inferior performance levels compared to a genuine GN Drive, the damage had been done and one of their prized resources had become known to the world and used against them. It was no wonder that many members of the organization loathed the GN Drive Tau, and would rather have little to do with them.
The silence in the room was interrupted as one of the consoles begun beeping. Linda floated over and hit the flashing panel to open the line. “This is Linda in data-center 0023.”
One of the data screens that had been used earlier during Linda's analysis changed to the image of a young woman with dark skin, blonde hair and Indian features, wearing a yellow Celestial Being uniform. ”Chall, you wouldn't believe what I found!!” She paused a moment before noticing the other two people in the room and smiled sheepishly. "Oh... hi, Mrs. Vashti. Mr. Erde."
"What did you find for us, Sherilyn?" asked Chall.
“Eco, Hanayo and I were checking out this section designated as ‘Experimental MS Bay No. 1979’ and found something that may be of interest to all of you.” The young mechanic begun inputting in some commands on her console keyboard and brought up a secondary screen on the terminal for the others to view.
And as expected, it got quite the reaction from the trio. “Is that...?"
”A Gundam,” said Tieria to complete Linda's sentence. There was no mistaking the mobile suit's design, especially with the way the head was built. ”Sherilyn Hyde, what exactly is this machine you discovered?”
“Judging from the data, it seems it was built based on the wreckage of the Gundam Plutone that Team Trinity recovered, as well as data based on Virtue’s design. In fact I can say with one hundred percent certainty that this machine is the predecessor machine to all of the Innovator’s GNZ series mobile suits. The official designation is GNZ-001: GRM Gundam.”
“That explains why it heavily resembles the enemy units that kept attacking us back then.” A deep frown settled on his features as yet another stab at their organization was unveiled.
"They used... the Plutone’s remains?" A sense of horror dawned on Chall as she realized that her former Gundam, a mobile suit that was the centre of a tragic part of her past, was used as a template for the personal mobile suits of the Innovators. 'Just when I had made peace with Plutone’s existence, those damn Innovators included it among their many perversions of our technology!'
"Why did they keep this unit off the field?" asked Linda in a puzzled tone.
Sherilyn glanced at the footnotes that came with the blueprints and mechanical information. ”It seems it was meant to just be a prototype for their own mobile suit series. They forecasted that they would need them in order to go head on against the Gundams in the event that we would return. The design was that in case anybody caught sight of it being tested, it would be mistaken for us. Plausible deniability..." She paused as she checked a few more notes. "This was probably rolled out when they were perfecting the information suppression system with Veda.”
Chall took a small breath to get herself back together before speaking with her old subordinate from Fereshte. “Is this unit viable for deployment?”
"Oh, most assuredly. I would like to tinker with it a bit to fine tune its systems. Originally, it did use a GN Drive Tau during the testing phase so are you positive you want it whipped into shape?”
“I don't think we need to do anything with it..." Linda trailed off for a moment before coming to a decision. "... but considering our current situation, it wouldn’t hurt to have a few extra aces in the hole.”
Tieria nodded in agreement. ”A wise idea, Linda. Even if it’s an Innovator machine, it could come in handy.”
Sherilyn flashed a quick smile. "I’ll get right on fixing the GRM Gundam up! I’ll have that mobile suit purring in no time!"
"Any chance they need someone to pilot it?” asked a male voice heard on Sherilyn's end.
”I believe that would be Chall or Miss Sumeragi’s call on that one, Mr. Eco,” replied the mechanic as she glanced her head to an unseen man.
”In layman’s terms...... not on my life.”
”Ah- I didn’t mean...!" Sherilyn quickly stopped before she bowed to the trio on the other end. "I’ll talk to you all later!”
Chall merely sighed upon the transmission being disconnected. “Sounds like Eco’s still being a sour grape.”
“Eco Calore... he was one of your Gundam Meisters that served with you in Fereshte, correct?” asked Linda.
“Yes, along with Fon Spaak. However the near destruction of Celestial Being four years ago, and the turbulent times we faced avoiding the U.N.’s search and destroy squads, not to mention the Innovator’s machinations to acquire the solar reactors did plenty to sour his usual optimism.”
Tieria and Linda both frowned upon hearing this but before either could comment, the console started flashing an alarm warning. ”Now what?”
Linda sat down at the console and her fingers flew over the keyboard, easily enabling her to pinpoint the origin of the alarm. “It’s from one of our long range sensors the Ptolemaios deployed on its way to earth to strengthen our orbital sensory array system." She kept on typing in commands to clarify the exact nature of the event that triggered the alarm. “It’s picking up a flux of GN particles from Earth concentrated at a single source.”
Tieria’s eyes flashd a golden color as he reconnected to Veda which caused his holographic body to vanish completely. "These readings are... these particle readings match Exia’s solar reactor! But it’s impossible for Exia to produce GN particles as such a high rate even with Trans-Am activated!”
"And I think someone else has picked it up as well!" commented Chall as she leaned over Linda's workstation.
"A large Britannian strike force is converging on Exia’s position. Some members of that fleet have already reached the island that Setsuna was supposed to investigate while the remaining reinforcements are coming from the Britannian Settlement in Japan en mass. Keep monitoring the situation, Linda. I’m informing the Ptolemaios of this turn of events, assuming they aren’t already aware of it.”
“Understood!”
"Setsuna F. Seiei, just what have you gotten into this time?" muttered Tieria as he worked from within Veda's massive quantum processing network.
On the bridge of the Ptolemaios, things were hectic as they scrambled to find out what just happened with the sudden GN particle outburst. “You still can’t reach him, Mileina?”
The young pigtailed brunette shook her head. “Negative Ms. Sumeragi! Exia isn’t answering my hails!”
From her station Feldt nervously bit her lip as she continued gathering feedback. “I can’t re-establish the back-up link to Exia. The last readings I got before we were cut off were a huge surge from the solar reactor, along with a sudden activation of the Trans-Am system. As it stands we cannot ascertain neither Setsuna’s condition nor the Exia’s. All we can get is the GN particle readings from the island, and the large concentration of incoming Britannian forces moving in on Exia’s location.”
Sumeragi slammed her fist on her chair's armrest. “Damn it all! Just what did that boy find to cause this? This is a major disaster... we're already on course to rendez-vous with Allelujah from the EU. There's not enough time to make a return trip and carry out a covert recovery operation.”
"Would operating covertly even be worth it at this point?” asked Lasse from the helm. “The Britannians already have forces moving in on Setsuna’s position. If something’s wrong with him or Exia then he’s screwed.”
“I know... I know, Lasse!” She rubbed the sides of her face as her mind started running through all sorts of scenarios and potential tactical action plans.
"Setsuna... they would either kill him or interrogate him to get information about the Gundams and who built them."
Lockon shot a glance towards Feldt as he picked up her softly, spoken words. 'She’s really worried about him... then again we all are, but I know that look.' Without hesitating, he approached the captain. "Ms. Sumeragi, how about I launch after him?"
“Lockon?"
Once he saw he had her attention, he laid out his proposal. "Look, I understand the need to not show off all our cards since we’re still deciding our overall long term plans. At least in terms of the Ptolemaios, we should keep the old girl hidden until the right moment." The Meister then winked. “However, we’ve already shown off two of our Gundams. It can't hurt to show off a third coming to rescue his comrade. Time is of the essence, especially since we don’t know if Setsuna is still safe inside Exia’s cockpit or if this happened when he stepped out of it. If I use Trans-Am to boost Cherudim’s flight speed, I can probably reach him in half the time, wipe out the capture force and save his butt.”
Sumeragi gave the suggestion some thought before nodding her head in approval. “Get to the hanger and make your preparations. Lasse, ascend to the ocean’s surface so we can launch Cherudim!”
“Yes ma’am!”
Before the Irish Gundam Meister could leave the bridge, Sumeragi gave him one last set of instructions. "I’ll send you a tactical plan en route. The only suggestion I have to make right now is once Trans-Am runs out, submerge and travel underwater to help mask your arrival. It'll give yourself the element of surprise as well as cover from enemy fire while your particles recharge.”
“Roger that. Let’s roll out, partner!”
"Gotta rescue Setsuna! Gotta rescue Setsuna!” chirped Haro as it bounced into Lockon's hands.
“Again...” Lockon couldn't help but smile, wondering if the pilot of Exia gave his older brother this much trouble in the past.
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(Posted Thu, 14 Jan 2010 00:28)
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