Mobile Suit Gundam SEED DESTINY

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Phase 48 - Light of Justice

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“You have just heard the Chairman of the PLANTs tell you that you can build a peaceful world, and become a people of transcendent Newtypes, if you follow him and evacuate the Earth as he asks,” Lacus said, calm and clear, as the world listened in shock. “Citizens of the Earth, please do not heed the words of this false prophet. He seeks to destroy you.”

The screens replaced Lacus’s face with the dark and terrible image of Solomon’s Sword.

“Chairman Dullindal’s intentions may appear peaceful,” Lacus continued, as the screens displayed the Orb Raiders’ footage of Solomon’s Sword from their attack, “but no man with peaceful intent bears a weapon such as this. No man with peaceful intent marches to Daedalus Crater to do battle with the Earth Alliance, even as he espouses peace. No man with peaceful intent escalates the war he claims he seeks to end.”

At Daedalus Crater, Lord Djibril’s eyes flashed furiously.

“Charge the Requiem!” he roared. “We won’t let that damned Dullindal get away with this!”

“The true path to peace,” Lacus urged, “lies not in moving people to space or forcibly evolving people. We must all learn not to impose our wills on others— we must learn that our weapons must be lowered. We cannot allow the world to spiral into its destruction. The leaders of the Earth Alliance and ZAFT, please, lower your weapons before it is too late; before you destroy everything that all of us are fighting for.”

The screens went dark. On the Deliverance, Rau smiled.

“Even to the end,” he chuckled, “you are still useful to me, Lacus Clyne.”

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“Man,” Sting sighed, as he made the final adjustments to his Chaos Gundam, “what the hell was that all about?”

“It’s all politics,” Auel sighed, arms crossed as he leaned against the boarding gantry. “I don’t give a shit about it.” He shrugged. “Wonder what’ll happen next.”

“That girl just fucked ZAFT over,” Sting grunted, as he closed up a cockpit panel and crawled back out. “ZAFT is probably going to attack soon. They were coming here to fight anyway, but now they’ve got no other choice, since that girl shot the Chairman’s speech down.”

Auel smirked. “And that’s when we…you know?”

Sting nodded grimly. “We need to find the captain,” he said. “I don’t want to leave him behind.”

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Athrun stared blankly at the intimidating shape of Solomon’s Sword emblazoned on the screen, floating in the crew lounge. It was all happening again— just like GENESIS three years ago, now the war was coming to its bloody climax, and once again, he was in the middle of it, following Lacus’s lead, trying to gun down a ZAFT superweapon before it destroyed the world.

At his side, Lunamaria glanced at him awkwardly. “We’re just going to destroy that thing?” she asked.

Athrun nodded dourly. “That’s what Lacus said,” he murmured. “But we’ll have to get to it.”

Luna looked back at the superweapon. “And they’ll be sure to be defending it heavily,” she added.

“Plus we’ll have to deal with the Alliance,” Athrun pointed out. He shook his head. “This will be a difficult battle.”

Luna glanced aside, pausing awkwardly. “When this is over, though,” she began, “what…will we do?”

Athrun closed his eyes. “I don’t know. Orb is part of the Atlantic Federation now, and there’s not much left in the Earth Sphere not controlled by the Earth Alliance.” He shook his head again. “We’ll find something. Maybe we’ll go to the Junk Guild station on Mars.”

There was a pause— Luna looked back at Athrun. “I’ll go with you,” she said. Athrun blinked at her. “So you’re not alone,” she added. “Nobody should be alone.”

Athrun looked at her for a moment, before he smiled sadly. “Then I’ll protect you,” he said, “so neither of us have to be alone.”

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The hangar was filled only with the clangs of work and the shouts of irate mechanics for a moment, as Yzak stood by, leaning against the railing of the gantry, standing silently next to Dearka.

“Don’t die out there,” Yzak said suddenly. Dearka smirked back.

“Do I ever?” he asked. “But don’t you go dying either. We’re friends, right?”

Yzak paused awkwardly. “Right.”

Dearka looked back at the hangar, still smirking. “After the war, we’re gonna party like there’s no tomorrow, I swear,” he said. “We’re going to survive this thing. We’ve made it this far, anyway.”

“I don’t want to fail again,” Yzak grunted. Dearka glanced at him, arching an eyebrow. “We’ve been failing a lot lately. We couldn’t topple the Seirans, we couldn’t save Cagalli, we couldn’t destroy that Solomon’s Sword…I don’t want to fail in destroying it now.”

“The rest of the Earth Alliance will undoubtedly be gunning for it too,” Dearka pointed out. “I don’t care who destroys it, as long as someone destroys it.”

Yzak and Dearka were silent for a moment.

“I mean it,” Yzak added quietly, “don’t die out there.”

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The screens came to life again— Lacus looked up in surprise on the bridge, as the face of a white-haired man, scowling, appeared against the backdrop of a military base’s control room.

“That’s Lord Djibril…” Murrue murmured. “What is he doing?”

Lord Djibril allowed a thin smile to pass his lips. “People of the Earth Sphere,” he said, his voice booming, “not long ago you witnessed the Chairman of the PLANTs, Gilbert Dullindal, standing up before the world to trumpet the praises of his plan to move humans off the Earth! And then, Lacus Clyne jumped into his path to show us all the pictures of Dullindal’s latest weapon, a weapon that can have only one purpose, after he just spoke of ‘evacuating’ the Earth!”

Shinn burst onto the bridge, eyes wide in disbelief as he saw Djibril on the screen, hands behind his back, regal and ominous.

“What is this…?” Lacus murmured.

Shinn stared in horror at Djibril. “He’s…he’s going to…”

“The transgressions of the Coordinators are far more numerous and grievous, from individuals to the natural order itself, than this one act,” Djibril continued. “But this act is the final straw! After conspiring to defy nature and fate, after waging war, after killing untold millions of Naturals all while calling us the aggressor, now the Coordinators seek to truly and completely destroy the Earth! We will not let this crime go unpunished! Finally, at last, having escaped your destiny three times already, you shall see the light of justice!”

“No!” Shinn cried, as Djibril held aloft a trigger in striped yellow and black.

“What is that?!” Murrue exclaimed.

“For Chairman Dullindal of the PLANTs!” Djibril cried. “For the Coordinators! And for a BLUE AND CLEAN WORLD!”

“DON’T!” Shinn screamed.

With a demonic cackle, Djibril pulled the trigger.

From the Moon, the world watched as a shimmering golden beam lanced out from the Daedalus Crater base, passing through a colony cylinder in orbit and arcing around the Moon. It aligned itself through three more colony cylinders— the camera panned over the PLANTs, floating idyllically in space. The beam went sawing through them, tearing them down through the center, blasting them apart, cracking open their hulls like eggs. As the shattered pieces slammed into each other, a cloud of dust and debris rose up throughout the airspace, and the hourglasses collapsed.

Shinn’s eyes went wide in horror. He clutched his head in agony, as millions of presences vanished; as a black hole opened up in the world, and the people of the PLANTs disappeared.

He screamed, and everything went black.

Hunched in her chair, Lacus winced as she tried to quell the feeling of a hole being torn in her mind. She looked up through teary eyes at the price of her failure— as the PLANTs vanished in fire and smoke.

“…L-Lacus…” Murrue managed to choke out, staring with bulging eyes at the burning PLANTs.

Lacus cringed, pressing her fingers to her temples painfully. “Take Shinn to the infirmary,” she whispered.

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Kira’s eye widened in disbelief as he watched the beam slice through the PLANTs— a feeling went ripping up through him from deep within him, a feeling of a painful, numbing lack of something. He realized in horror that it was the simple lack of human life— as human life disappeared in that pulsing golden beam as it cut down PLANT after PLANT.

Rau glanced at Kira. “Now you understand,” he said.

“These are…Newtype powers?” Kira murmured.

Rau nodded grimly.

“Davis,” he said, glancing at the captain, as he slowly wrenched him gaze from the spectacle before him. “Await orders from Messiah. The war has changed again.”

As he left the bridge, he couldn’t help but smile.

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As the PLANTs collapsed, Sting and Auel stared in disbelief at the main screen of the Girty Lue’s crew lounge, along with the shocked crew that until a moment ago had been trying to enjoy what time they had left before the battle.

“Sting…” Auel murmured, glancing painfully at Sting, standing next to him. “We’re gonna…we’re gonna destroy that thing, right?”

“They’re all…dying…” Sting breathed. “Is that…the Requiem’s power…?”

“We can’t let him fire this thing again, Sting,”’ hissed Auel. “It’s not right.”

Sting’s eyes darkened as he watched the PLANTs burn. “No,” he agreed. “It’s not.”

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No soldier, Talia reflected, was supposed to shed tears on the bridge. However, as she glanced up at her crew, silent, shell-shocked, and tear-stained, their eyes fixed on the smoldering remains of their mutual home, she could not find the heart to excuse them.

The PLANTs were collapsing— whatever PLANTs had not been destroyed by the initial beam were being crushed by the debris of their neighbors. It was too late to turn back and rush to their aid. The Earth Alliance fleet marshaled at Daedalus Crater would tear them apart if they did. Their only option was to continue forward, to take revenge.

“C-Captain…” Arthur began haltingly. “What is this…?”

Talia looked darkly towards Messiah— Gilbert’s machinations had brought them all to this point, with a battle to fight and no reason to fight it.

“Stand by for orders from Messiah,” Talia said, her voice quavering. “We have nothing left now but revenge.”

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Lord Djibril’s laughter filled the control room as the casualty figures came in. 113 PLANTs had been confirmed destroyed, either by the Requiem’s beam or the destruction of their neighbors. Millions of Coordinators were already presumed dead. ZAFT had been powerless to stop it— they had watched the light of justice melt their blasphemous domain away.

“Six PLANTs remain at L5, sir,” one of the soldiers in the control room added nervously, “and Armory 1 at L4 still remains unaccounted for as well.”

“It means nothing!” Djibril cackled. “Recharge the Requiem and we will finish off what PLANTs are left! Then we will turn our fleet upon Armory 1, and these damned hourglasses will be no more!”

Djibril swept out of the control room, still laughing victoriously. Left behind, forgotten in the shadows, Joseph Copland stepped forward, toward the base commander, trembling with rage.

“Lieutenant,” he said, motioning for the nervous deckhand. “Get me the captain of the new flagship, the Amaryllis.” He paused, glowering in the direction Djibril had gone. “And make sure that he is not informed.”

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Gilbert Dullindal took the podium, eyes flashing. His gamble had failed most disastrously, and he had paid for that with his nation and his people. However, the ZAFT fleet was unharmed by that blazing golden sword that had cut down the PLANTs— and so Lord Djibril could still be made to tremble before the might of an army with nothing to return home to.

“Soldiers of ZAFT,” he said, his voice a furious growl, “we have lost much today.” His fingers curled around the edges of the podium. “Lord Djibril’s weapon has torn from us our nation. But we will not be stopped here. No, today we sail no longer to end this war, but to avenge our people.”

He scanned over the faces of the soldiers, thousands of them assembled in a cavernous hangar, thousands more listening intently on their ships and in their mobile suits. The faces were haggard, dark, and angry, hatred smoldering in the fleet. They had nothing left to lose— they would drag as many Naturals to hell with them as they could.

“Our plan of attack is simple,” Gilbert continued, the air behind him flickering as a sprawling holographic map of the Daedalus Crater base activated. “Our fleet will engage and occupy the Earth Alliance’s fleet. We face crushing numbers— but like the Battle of Salamis, our smaller but more advanced fleet will overpower theirs. We will clear a path with the Neutron Stampeder, destroying their nuclear reactors and weapons, and then turn Messiah’s ultimate weapon, NEO-GENESIS, on the base itself. And when the base has been destroyed, we shall finish off the Alliance fleet, and take our war directly to the Earth again.”

He thrust his fist into the air. One way or another, he would have revenge.

“We have lost our people, our nation, and our being!” he cried. “So let us show Lord Djibril the ferocity of an army with nothing left to lose!”

The soldiers let out a furious cry, thrusting their own fists into the air. Gilbert’s face darkened.

After all, he reminded himself, I still have Solomon’s Sword.

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The world slowly returned as Shinn Asuka cracked an eye open, fighting the haze in his mind to look around. He slowly sat up, rubbing his eyes, finding himself in the Megami’s infirmary.

“Shinn!” he heard a voice exclaim— Stella threw her arms around Shinn’s shoulders urgently. “Is Shinn okay?”

Shinn blinked— the void was still there, the void that had swallowed up the PLANTs. He rubbed his eyes again.

“I’ll be okay,” he murmured.

He looked up at the feeling of another presence, finding Athrun on the other side of his bed. He looked down grimly at Shinn.

“What happened?” he asked at last. Shinn squeezed his eyes shut.

“Too many people…all at once…” he grunted, pausing to glance meaningfully at Stella. Athrun nodded hesitantly.

“I…felt it,” he said, closing his own eyes. Shinn glanced up at him, surprised. “I felt them…disappear.”

Shinn studied him for a moment. He felt Athrun’s presence, but there was a faint, underlying pressure from him now— he wondered if the simultaneous deaths of so many people had brought out some kind of latent Newtype powers in Athrun.

“This feeling,” Athrun continued uneasily, “is this…the power that you and Lacus have?”

Shinn paused for a moment, running the idea through his mind. “You’re a Newtype,” he said at last. Athrun seemed surprised, but kept it outwardly hidden— not that it stopped Shinn from sensing it anyway.

“That feeling, when the PLANTs were hit,” Athrun said, “…will it stop me during a fight?”

Shinn squeezed his eyes shut, thinking back to his battles long ago, fighting in the Impulse to protect the Minerva, fighting against his own mind betraying him as much as he was fighting against the Alliance. “It’ll only stop you if you let it,” he answered. “If you really believe in what you’re fighting for, you won’t let it get in your way.”

Athrun nodded dourly, and said nothing more. Shinn rubbed his eyes again.

So many people died…

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Shiho Hahnenfuss stared blankly at the empty space where the PLANTs had once been. It was her home, smoldering and spewing smoke; her home, her friends, her family, her world, now the same casualties of this war as Ruumari, as Heine, as Lunamaria. Now they were charging forward to throw away everything they had left, when everyone knew that it would not bring the PLANTs or their people back.

She glanced away, towards the others in the crew lounge. They were all muted, some by shock, some by fury. Aoma drifted up next to her, staring lifelessly at the empty space.

“I guess I don’t have to tell Ruumari’s parents that I couldn’t protect him,” she said quietly. “I couldn’t protect them either.”

Shiho looked sharply at Aoma. “Don’t say that,” she snapped. “None of us could have stopped this.”

Aoma paused for a moment, regarding Shiho in surprise, before she looked away, crestfallen. “I know, ma’am,” she said awkwardly. “But…I just feel so powerless.”

Shiho returned her attention to the empty space. Everyone had felt powerless— everyone had been powerless— but that was no reason to mope about it.

“We have a duty to all those who died, to fight on in their memory, so that their deaths won’t be in vain,” Shiho said resolutely. “And we have a duty to survive, so that we can rebuild.” She looked over at Aoma. “When this is all over, I want you to leave ZAFT. Or escape capture, if that‘s how this battle will end. Whatever it takes, I want you to survive, to live your life the way you want to. That is our duty.”

“Commander— ” Aoma started. Shiho took her by the shoulder, looking into her astonished red eyes.

“I grew up fighting in the Valentine War,” she continued, “and I became a soldier at heart. I am proud of my service to my country, but I’m still just a bitter old war veteran. You’re not. So promise me that you’ll survive out there, and that you’ll leave this all behind you. There’s more to life than fighting and dying.”

Aoma smiled and saluted. “Understood, commander,” she said. “But if I may, the same goes for you.”

Shiho smiled back. “No giant cannon can take that away from us.”

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Neo Roanoke smiled up at the imposing form of his new GAT-X723 Apocalypse Gundam. Built on the general frame of the Windam, with the intimidating face of a Gundam, and with two enormous binders stretching off the machine’s back, it was equipped with a positron reflector that could stop weapons of almost all kinds. He gleefully inspected the armaments— four CIWS, two beam sabers, two beam shields, a long beam rifle, and a total of seven beam cannons on the binders, head, hips, and forearms. It was unstoppable.

“Use this to penetrate the ZAFT lines and wreak havoc in their fleet,” Djibril instructed venomously. “The ZAFT fleet was observed with one of those Neutron Stampeder things they used to stop our nuclear warheads at the beginning of the war. Destroy it before it can irradiate again.”

“And after that,” Neo continued, still smiling, “I presume you want me to aim for that other weapon.”

Djibril scowled. “Of course,” he said. “The Coordinators will not be allowed any measure of victory.”

Neo chuckled as Djibril turned and drifted down the gantry.

First we destroy their homeland, he told himself, and then we destroy them…

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“It was wrong,” Lee agreed, watching Sting and Auel dourly as they stood by him on the Girty Lue’s observation deck. “There was no reason to target all those civilians. Djibril has committed the same crime that the Coordinators who dropped Junius 7 committed.”

Sting glanced at Auel. “We’re going to destroy the Requiem,” he said. “We want you to come with us.”

Lee was silent for a moment. “I can’t do that,” he answered.

“Why not?!” Auel demanded. “They’ll just kill you if you stay here!”

“We can get you out of here,” Sting added. “Just get into an escape launch or something.”

“Then that is one less vehicle for the crew,” Lee countered. “I will not leave the crew to die. Either the captain is the last to evacuate, or he does not evacuate at all.”

“But captain— ” Sting protested.

“I am a bitter old man,” Lee interrupted, “sabotaging my country’s war effort because that effort is led by evil men with evil intentions. Their machinations have cost me everything I would have had to fight for and return to. With no family to protect and support, my life is meaningless. I have my own battle to fight.” He looked back at Sting and Auel. “I am glad to have met you both, and I am proud to know that I helped you break your mental conditioning. Now my last request is that you leave the Alliance behind when your revenge is complete, and live the lives the Alliance tried to steal from you. The Alliance has tried to turn you into weapons, but they could never crush your humanity. That is why I saved you— and that is why I want you to survive, and live life as you see fit.”

Auel was silent a moment, as Sting tried to come up with an answer. “You know,” Auel said, looking up sullenly at Lee, “I never had a father at Lodonia.”

Lee put a hand on Auel’s shoulder. “I tried to be your father,” he said, “and all I could do was help you free yourselves from the Alliance. But all men must part with their fathers at some point. As long as I can help you two become men, I will have done my job.”

Sting squeezed his eyes shut. “We’ll never forget what you did for us,” he said. “We’ll be fighting for you.”

“And I,” Lee said, smiling thinly at them both, “will be fighting for you.”

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The magazine snapped into place on the underside of the bazooka, and with a sigh, Lunamaria took a step back on the hangar gantry, examining the four-clip bazooka for anything more that needed to be done.

“They loaded the magazines with high output shells,” Athrun explained at her side. “You’ve got twenty-nine shells total, with one in the chamber and seven each in the clips.”

“I guess it’s better than the Cattus,” Luna said with a shrug. “Thanks. This’ll come in handy.”

Athrun lowered the crane carrying the bazooka, setting it in the weapons rack behind the inert Strike Rouge. “We have to do everything we can to make sure we all come home,” he said. “I don’t want you to die.”

Luna smiled. “I’m a ZAFT Red,” she replied. “You know what we can do. I wasn’t third in my class for nothing.”

“That didn’t save Nicol,” Athrun said bitterly. “Be careful out there. I don’t want to lose you the way I lost Cagalli.” Luna blinked in surprise. “You’re my friend, Luna. I will not let you die.”

Silent for a moment, Luna smiled again. “You worry about yourself out there,” she answered. “I’ll be alright, with you protecting me.”

Athrun nodded grimly.

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As Shinn drifted across the observation deck, he looked curtly at Lacus, staring blankly at the empty space where the PLANTs once were.

“I miscalculated,” she said plainly, as Shinn drifted by. He came to a stop next to her. “I apologize for it, but no apology can set it right.”

Shinn said nothing for a moment. “We still have to destroy Solomon’s Sword,” he said. Lacus looked over at him sadly. “So that the Chairman can’t do what Djibril did.” Another pause. “So I guess we haven’t totally failed.”

Silence reigned again.

“I am sorry that my miscalculation caused you such pain, Shinn,” Lacus said quietly. “To feel one death, for us, is pain enough, but to feel millions…”

“Quit acting like you’re the one who shot down the PLANTs,” Shinn grumbled. “Djibril did it, and he probably would’ve done it whether or not you’d exposed the Chairman’s ruse.”

Lacus was silent for a moment, before nodding in dour agreement. “I suppose you’re right,” she admitted. “But…to see the PLANTs destroyed like that…” She shook her head. “We are in a terrible position now.”

Shinn crossed his arms. “Yeah,” he agreed. “ZAFT has every right to go gunning for revenge now, and we‘re gonna be there telling them all to stop.”

“Is that not the correct course?” Lacus asked. “We have already seen one side do something terrible— we cannot let the other side reciprocate.”

“No,” Shinn agreed, “but can we really go and say that ZAFT shouldn’t fire that thing when Djibril just destroyed the PLANTs?”

Lacus said nothing. Shinn let out a sigh.

“This will be our final battle,” Lacus said quietly. “I am sure of it.”

Shinn glanced at her— she was focused on the remains of the PLANTs. He sighed again and headed out the door.

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The fleet was nearing the Moon— already, with his rudimentary Newtype senses, Kira could detect the pulsing mass of millions of lives surrounding the Daedalus Crater base. He paused as he worked on the final adjustments to the Strike Freedom Gundam, feeling a familiar, comforting presence nearing him. Valentine appeared at the edge of the cockpit hatch.

“How are you adjusting to your new powers?” she asked, leaning into the cockpit.

Kira sat back. “I could sense you coming,” he said. “But will I be able to fight?”

Valentine smiled. “Don’t worry about anything else but fighting,” she said. “This is the last struggle we have to overcome. As long as you fight and protect us and the Sword, victory will be ours.”

Kira looked back down at the Strike Freedom’s panels. “Where will you be during the battle?” he asked.

“I’ll be protecting the Sword, the same as you,” she said, still smiling. “We’ll fight together, Kira.”

“Then I will protect you,” promised Kira, reaching up with his right hand. He paused, remembering the skeletal fingers, but Valentine took it anyway, smiling gently at him.

“I knew you would,” she said.

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“Will Shinn be okay…?

Sitting at the foot of the slumbering Gaia Gundam, Shinn smiled comfortingly at Stella.

“I’ll be fine,” Shinn assured her. “I won’t pass out again like I did earlier today.”

“But Shinn didn’t feel good…” Stella protested. “…Shinn might get hurt…”

“I won’t,” he said. “I can’t protect you if I get hurt.”

Stella paused for a moment, before putting her head tiredly on Shinn’s shoulder. “Stella doesn’t want Shinn to get hurt…” she said. “Being hurt is no fun.”

Shinn put his arm around her, rubbing her shoulder. “I know,” he agreed. “But this is the battle where it all counts. We have to destroy that giant ZAFT weapon, in order to end the war.”

Stella was silent for a moment, before pulling away from Shinn far enough to look earnestly into his eyes. “When the war is over,” she began haltingly, “will Shinn take Stella to the sea…?”

Shinn smiled— even after everything they had been through, she still wanted to see the ocean.

“Of course,” he answered.

Stella smiled and kissed him.

“Stella will protect Shinn,” she said as she pulled away, “so Shinn can see the sea too.”

——————————————————————————————————————————

The ZAFT fleet hung menacingly over Daedalus Crater, with the alien structure of Messiah at its center, charging forward. Behind the fleet loomed the imposing shape of Solomon’s Sword. The massive Earth Alliance fleet rose from the base, as thousands of mobile suits charged at each other.

In the Megami’s hangar, sitting in the cockpit of the Destiny Gundam, Shinn Asuka looked up at the two converging fleets dubiously. Solomon’s Sword was there; Rey was there; Kira was there.

“This is where it counts,” Murrue’s voice told them all, ringing through Shinn’s ears. “All of you, be careful out there.”

Shinn narrowed his eyes. One way or another, it would all end here.

“Shinn Asuka, Destiny…going out!”

The Destiny took off with a flash.

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To be continued…