Gundam Wing Fan Fiction ❯ An Ancient War Renewed ❯ Chapters 13 and 14 ( Chapter 7 )
[ Y - Young Adult: Not suitable for readers under 16 ]
By: the Humble Scribe 
Anime/Manga: Gundam Wing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Classic | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 03.31.2006 | Updated On: 05.23.2006 | Pages: 1 | Words: 2.9K | Visits: 199 | Status: Completed
Anime/Manga: Gundam Wing Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Classic | Type: Alternate Universe | Uploaded On: 03.31.2006 | Updated On: 05.23.2006 | Pages: 1 | Words: 2.9K | Visits: 199 | Status: Completed
13
Chai’dou felt the fear that swept the continent, even after such a stunning victory. Sky bases were now shadowing any major political state within reach. Only Cheng’du and Krai’kor were still isolated, but not for long. Director Maxwell saw the sky base on the horizon headed toward the dockyard. Spies returning from the pacifist Emirate reported a method to attack a sky base, so Duo could take the attack to the enemy without forcing his people to endure another bloody battle. He still felt the injuries from the last engagement, but he held a confidence capable of buttressing him for the task.
His own ascent would be somewhat hampered by the lack of height a seashore location afforded. But Chai’dou, ever a city defiant to circumstance, produced a launch ramp that could, theoretically, take a speeding Deathscythe high enough to reach the sky base. He had to use it as the sky base passed by, which most felt to be at the third hour after sundown due to the Alliance’s insistence to fight night battles. “Time enough to heal up.”
Upon the sky base headed for Chai’dou, Commander Warzimir was being fitted into a new armor and introduced to his squad of fellow armored. The new armor, named the “Sagittarius,” was a land dominating armor that put the soldier inside a four-legged chassis ran on twitch-sensitive hydraulics. True to the name, the Sagittarius looked like a plate armored centaur and was designed to be a harassing unit. Equipped with a compound bow and explosive munitions as well as a round buckler, these units were designed not to shock an enemy line by charge but by artillery. Warzimir’s armor was specially fitted, giving him a charge missile harquebus similar to the true armor Wing’s to complement the usual array. He refused to part with his blades, believing that he would have to use them in this battle.
The plan from High Command was not to bombard Chai’dou as was the plan in Jinghuan, but to use the sky base to transport the new armors to a deserted area of the coastline, drop them off, then annihilate the CFN from there. The Sagittarii were entrusted with the task of picking the CFA apart, slaughtering all the way up the coastline to Chai’dou. As they finished up, a contingent of Pisces would arrive at the landing zone to rearm the Sagittarii and guard the zone while the 4th Alliance Fleet transported an army of Leos and Aries to the zone. By sunrise of the next day, the combined force would rush Chai’dou, hunt and kill the true armor, then decimate the city to ease the occupation.
As the sun sank into the horizon, Warzimir rubbed his repaired jaw. Now using cemented bone and metallic spring twine to assist in its functioning, this new jaw hurt from time to time. These times gave Warzimir a chance to reflect upon his defeat at the hands of two true armors. For now, his vengeance will be met upon this third armor, but he lusted for the chance to kill the ones who destroyed his men and rendered him a shame unto his Gods. He would have his vengeance, or his ghost will.
Duo had one chance to get on the sky base as it approached the shore. He lined up his approach on the ramp and began his charge. Building up speed, he was able to clear the ramp, the sparks of his ascent the only sign of his presence. Within a moment, Duo connected with the bottom rungs of the sky base’s landing struts. He clambered on the strut and headed toward the inside, but was halted by the opening two massive doors and the lowering of a ramp. Duo was now face to face with a cadre of centaur-like armors who galloped forward, oblivious to his presence. Quickly reacting, the Deathscythe cut two of these at the legs, and the battle on the ramp began. The others figured only that the assailant was striking from below and to the fore, so their bolts sailed in that general direction. Not one struck the Deathscythe and the moment the front two were outstretched was enough to take a crescent cut and kill them both. The next two kicked the corpses out into the wide sky and fired more directed shots toward the last limelight flash. One struck the scythe’s blade, the other went wild, and those two were cut down at the chest. Before the next two could kick the fallen away, Deathscythe pushed the corpses viciously back upon them. This effectively forced the rest of the cadre to fight ineff-ectively, hacking through their own fallen for a chance at Deathscythe. Warzimir took another approach, lining his shot to one side as a crack opened. His shot was true, slamming Deathscythe in the shoulder. Duo winced, but did not crumple under the hit. A hail of bolts sailed over the corpses and pummeled the Deathscythe over the head and shoulders. These bolts did not pierce, but the thuds did cause a moment of pause, which gave Warzimir another opportunity to finish reloading and fire at the same shoulder. Another hit and Deathscythe showed signs of excruciating pain with a momentary quake. Warzimir prepared his next shot, almost tasting his enemy’s blood in his mouth. The next taste of blood came as a mist from his own men, the pain in Duo driving him upon them in a torrent of flashes and screams. Warzimir trotted backward, lined a shot and fired again into Deathscythe’s left shoulder, hearing a muffled scream signifying the effect of the third missile bolt. He loaded for a fourth shot, but never got a chance as the torrent of light and death overwhelmed him.
Duo, now blinded from the pain, kept charging forward and hacking away at the darkness. He made out a single standing centaur silhouette and slashed at its outstretched arms. The harquebus was cleaved in twain and fell from Warzimir’s hands. As far as Duo was concerned, the silhouette just lost its harquebus and was about to lose its head. He lunged for the head, but now the silhouette ducked low and hacked back with a pair of curved knives. The knives could not pierce the armor, but the blades glided into a chink and tore at the right inner thigh. This was not enough to cripple the Deathscythe, but the pain blinded Duo completely. Now the slashes were wild and sweeping, one tearing Warzimir lengthwise down the right arm, another flailing over his upper back, another tearing into his kidney, but Warzimir still stood. Duo pushed past the crumpling Sagittarius and blindly slashed and stepped his way to the upper deck of the sky base. With the clear air of the outside caressing him, Duo finally regained a measure of his sight. He saw the control tower and charged it while still favoring the shadows. His measure of caution proved adequate as an entire squad of Leos fanned out, trying to protect the control tower.
Duo felt the pain of his excursion with the new armors quite acutely, but he could still fight. His fight would not be alone, he found out, as an electrified shot blasted a Leo to embers and sent cascades of fire over the control tower. The second shot from the Wing armor cracked the observation deck of the tower, but the Leos did not seem to respond. The Deathscythe broke them out of their stupor with his attack, cleaving one at the navel and slashing another down the spine. The Leos fired their bolts wildly, hitting nothing but the base floor or the distant earth. The massacre from harquebus and scythe took another minute, but the death-dealing was done at last.
Or not. Warzimir, finding some animal strength to force himself to the upper deck, rallied the entire base complement to the control tower to finish the fight with the true armors. Secretly cursing his luck to have the dreaded Wing to deal with as well as the Deathscythe, Warzimir howled the “Huzza-hai-ha!” and galloped to his enemy with his one good arm bearing his one remaining knife. While Deathscythe braced for the new line of Leos, Wing lined up his shot and gunned down the charging Sagittarius. Warzimir fell howling his rage, now minus a leg as well as an arm and a kidney. His howling subsided to gurgling, his gurgling to murmurs, his murmurs to silence. Konstanz Warzimir felt his life leaving him, even as his last soldier died in a desperate bid to save the base.
Did his eyes deceive? Was the delirium of death so cruel as to let him believe that one last Aries was not cut down as the others? He felt as if he were being lifted, not by the warm palms of angel hands, but the cold arms of an Aries armor. He pleaded with the Gods to not look while he sobbed in pain, frustration, and self-pity. While he was spirited away yet again, the two true armors finished crippling the base and guided it down to the bay. The impact woke Chai’dou, but did not damage any of it. Duo glided back to shore, followed by the Wing armor.
“Thanks for all your help. What’s your name, anyway?”
No answer.
“Name’s Duo Maxwell,” he offered his hand, which was ignored, “Not a friendly guy, are you?”
A detached response, probably not meant for Duo, “Mission accomplished.”
“Yeah, it was. Why don’t you get refitted at Chai’dou? We’ll do it free of charge.”
A nod, no words.
Chapter 14
The sky base, now plummeting to the center of Jinghuan, blazed with the grim glory of a cosmic meteor. Wu Fei calmed his mind quickly and surmised that he could yet save Jinghuan. He sprinted to the control tower, scaled the rounded wall in a bound, and entered through the observation deck. Quickly locating a globe framed in two wheel gears, he seized the wheel gears and pulled back the Y-axis until he felt the shift of the sky base’s stern point. From the observation deck, he noticed that the city of Jinghuan was slipping from view as he pulled back further on the Y-axis. He then turned the X-axis to cause the sky base to slowly bank away from the due north to a hill northeast of the city. When safe to do so, he pushed forward on the Y-axis to send the sky base into the hill. As he turned away to escape the plummeting hulk, he was confronted by a different armor than the Leos and Aries he faced earlier. This one was thick, hunched, hued in black, and bore an inhumanely pointed helmet. Two yellow orbs seemed to bore into Shen-Long’s green eyeslits, and the armor lifted a braced crossbow and leaped back in one movement. Shen-Long thrust his trident forward, cutting at the mysterious new armor. The armor sidestepped and shot, which caused the Shen-Long to sidestep and make another thrust. The armor, quicker than any before, dodged that strike and drew a gladius-style sword while firing another bolt at Shen-Long’s head.
This one hit him upon the forehead with great force, sending the Shen-Long into the globe. This nudged sent the sky base into a much sharper dive, and now the acceleration was too great to correct or even slow down. Wu Fei used the butt of the trident to shatter the window behind him and flung himself out. The enemy followed him out, activating its own thrusters to chase Shen-Long in mid-flight. Shen-Long finally got a strike upon the enemy, slashing its left arm clean off at the shoulder. Yet, for some reason Wu Fei could not fathom, the enemy did not flinch even as blood flew from it as a mist. The enemy, now shorn of its crossbow, lunged forward with the gladius in a desperate bid to kill the Shen-Long. This was not successful, and the Shen-Long finished the enemy in a baptism of fire. The armor only said one phrase, in a hoarse, detached voice.
“Remember this, armor of old. The paradise of Oz will come about, for its Sacred Shadow is cast over all.”
The people of Jinghuan rejoiced as their destroyer flew overhead, crashing safely beyond them. The great Shen-Long, for reasons unknown, had chosen to save them from destruction. They never heard the chilling words that Shen-Long let run through his head; luckily. Such words would have chilled their souls even as his lifted from the chill such words can cause. As a noble in the Cheng’du court, he had further privileged information concerning the Oz question. He knew how many archeological finds were attributed to the post-Gundam, pre-Jinghuan era. He knew how many of them could be attributed to a warlike, uncompromising culture known as Oz. He also knew how many of them were found in piles of scattered, shattered, and violently disturbed bones. The Oz period of human history was not one Wu Fei looked forward to seeing relived.
Before he could return to Cheng’du and give this report to the Emperor, he was waved down by the grateful citizen-soldiers of Jinghuan. Many knelt upon both knees and bowed their heads to earth, others burned grass, flowers, and the occasional incense stick as some form of saint or hero worship. Even Wu Fei was blushing from the adulation, but no one could see his face. They only saw the great figure and iris-less eyeslits of the Shen-Long, which inspired a rapture of extreme emotion that almost leveled him due to its sheer intensity.
He only wished that this sheer explosion of relief was appropriate. But the Umbrum Sanctum was acting very boldly now, and the Westland Alliance seemed to echo their movements. When did the organization take over the system? When did this great beast follow its own tail? The relatively obvious state of affairs disturbed Wu Fei, and would disturb the entire Court. What if the Umbrum Sanctum, or Sacred Shadow, really is preparing rather than just hoping for the coming of their cherished Oz?
Trowa and Quatre returned to the city of Bah’rain as heroes, but neither had the internal strength to respond to the adulation. Some chanted for their heroic Prince, others for the great Krai’kori savior. The sapphire blue eyes had dulled somewhat, still comprehending just what happened on that mountain, on that skybase. He would not hear about Jinghuan or Chai’dou for some days, but Prince Quatre had heard of other true armors operating. He now had one such armor as his ally, which gave some cheer to the otherwise bleak situation. Trowa’s emerald eyes had completely dulled, noting little of the outside world. His mind pondered, systematically, just how Krai’kor would survive the horde of sky-bases that will come. How will he hold back the tide of death that the Westland Alliance will bring forth? Perhaps the new ally, and the weather of Krai’kor, would be enough. Or, maybe, the best policy would be to begin the halt of this tide not at Krai’kor’s frontiers but at the western mountain range overlooking Bah’rain. At least then he could have a buffer of retreat, as well as an ally.
Supreme Commander Treize Krushrenada put on his calmest face as he laboriously read each and every report coming from the invasion lines. Bah’rain was no longer even a front, Jinghuan’s now revitalized People’s Assembly sent a letter offering a truce to their exhausted foe, Krai’kor was as of yet considered inpenetrable, Chai’dou was blooded and now acting eager to strike back against the Alliance, and Cheng’du’s official statement on the whole matter is “We dislike Jinghuan, but we despise the Alliance.” This was not going well, but someone in the Umbrum Sanctum felt that this was satisfactory. Lately, the Umbrum Sanctum has moved with a measure of cavalier recklessness, but the Western Alliance Armed Forces were paying the price. All he knew was that the organization did openly flare at the report of the Tallgeese’s destruction and the failure to produce any of the true armors. The grand quest of obtaining or reconstructing a true armor seems to be the cause of Umbrum Sanctum’s near fatal sense of abandon. But another issue troubled Treize personally: What of Commanders Marquis and Warzimir? Why did the Umbrum Sanctum make such efforts to keep them alive, then abscond them at this crucial hour?
Chai’dou felt the fear that swept the continent, even after such a stunning victory. Sky bases were now shadowing any major political state within reach. Only Cheng’du and Krai’kor were still isolated, but not for long. Director Maxwell saw the sky base on the horizon headed toward the dockyard. Spies returning from the pacifist Emirate reported a method to attack a sky base, so Duo could take the attack to the enemy without forcing his people to endure another bloody battle. He still felt the injuries from the last engagement, but he held a confidence capable of buttressing him for the task.
His own ascent would be somewhat hampered by the lack of height a seashore location afforded. But Chai’dou, ever a city defiant to circumstance, produced a launch ramp that could, theoretically, take a speeding Deathscythe high enough to reach the sky base. He had to use it as the sky base passed by, which most felt to be at the third hour after sundown due to the Alliance’s insistence to fight night battles. “Time enough to heal up.”
Upon the sky base headed for Chai’dou, Commander Warzimir was being fitted into a new armor and introduced to his squad of fellow armored. The new armor, named the “Sagittarius,” was a land dominating armor that put the soldier inside a four-legged chassis ran on twitch-sensitive hydraulics. True to the name, the Sagittarius looked like a plate armored centaur and was designed to be a harassing unit. Equipped with a compound bow and explosive munitions as well as a round buckler, these units were designed not to shock an enemy line by charge but by artillery. Warzimir’s armor was specially fitted, giving him a charge missile harquebus similar to the true armor Wing’s to complement the usual array. He refused to part with his blades, believing that he would have to use them in this battle.
The plan from High Command was not to bombard Chai’dou as was the plan in Jinghuan, but to use the sky base to transport the new armors to a deserted area of the coastline, drop them off, then annihilate the CFN from there. The Sagittarii were entrusted with the task of picking the CFA apart, slaughtering all the way up the coastline to Chai’dou. As they finished up, a contingent of Pisces would arrive at the landing zone to rearm the Sagittarii and guard the zone while the 4th Alliance Fleet transported an army of Leos and Aries to the zone. By sunrise of the next day, the combined force would rush Chai’dou, hunt and kill the true armor, then decimate the city to ease the occupation.
As the sun sank into the horizon, Warzimir rubbed his repaired jaw. Now using cemented bone and metallic spring twine to assist in its functioning, this new jaw hurt from time to time. These times gave Warzimir a chance to reflect upon his defeat at the hands of two true armors. For now, his vengeance will be met upon this third armor, but he lusted for the chance to kill the ones who destroyed his men and rendered him a shame unto his Gods. He would have his vengeance, or his ghost will.
Duo had one chance to get on the sky base as it approached the shore. He lined up his approach on the ramp and began his charge. Building up speed, he was able to clear the ramp, the sparks of his ascent the only sign of his presence. Within a moment, Duo connected with the bottom rungs of the sky base’s landing struts. He clambered on the strut and headed toward the inside, but was halted by the opening two massive doors and the lowering of a ramp. Duo was now face to face with a cadre of centaur-like armors who galloped forward, oblivious to his presence. Quickly reacting, the Deathscythe cut two of these at the legs, and the battle on the ramp began. The others figured only that the assailant was striking from below and to the fore, so their bolts sailed in that general direction. Not one struck the Deathscythe and the moment the front two were outstretched was enough to take a crescent cut and kill them both. The next two kicked the corpses out into the wide sky and fired more directed shots toward the last limelight flash. One struck the scythe’s blade, the other went wild, and those two were cut down at the chest. Before the next two could kick the fallen away, Deathscythe pushed the corpses viciously back upon them. This effectively forced the rest of the cadre to fight ineff-ectively, hacking through their own fallen for a chance at Deathscythe. Warzimir took another approach, lining his shot to one side as a crack opened. His shot was true, slamming Deathscythe in the shoulder. Duo winced, but did not crumple under the hit. A hail of bolts sailed over the corpses and pummeled the Deathscythe over the head and shoulders. These bolts did not pierce, but the thuds did cause a moment of pause, which gave Warzimir another opportunity to finish reloading and fire at the same shoulder. Another hit and Deathscythe showed signs of excruciating pain with a momentary quake. Warzimir prepared his next shot, almost tasting his enemy’s blood in his mouth. The next taste of blood came as a mist from his own men, the pain in Duo driving him upon them in a torrent of flashes and screams. Warzimir trotted backward, lined a shot and fired again into Deathscythe’s left shoulder, hearing a muffled scream signifying the effect of the third missile bolt. He loaded for a fourth shot, but never got a chance as the torrent of light and death overwhelmed him.
Duo, now blinded from the pain, kept charging forward and hacking away at the darkness. He made out a single standing centaur silhouette and slashed at its outstretched arms. The harquebus was cleaved in twain and fell from Warzimir’s hands. As far as Duo was concerned, the silhouette just lost its harquebus and was about to lose its head. He lunged for the head, but now the silhouette ducked low and hacked back with a pair of curved knives. The knives could not pierce the armor, but the blades glided into a chink and tore at the right inner thigh. This was not enough to cripple the Deathscythe, but the pain blinded Duo completely. Now the slashes were wild and sweeping, one tearing Warzimir lengthwise down the right arm, another flailing over his upper back, another tearing into his kidney, but Warzimir still stood. Duo pushed past the crumpling Sagittarius and blindly slashed and stepped his way to the upper deck of the sky base. With the clear air of the outside caressing him, Duo finally regained a measure of his sight. He saw the control tower and charged it while still favoring the shadows. His measure of caution proved adequate as an entire squad of Leos fanned out, trying to protect the control tower.
Duo felt the pain of his excursion with the new armors quite acutely, but he could still fight. His fight would not be alone, he found out, as an electrified shot blasted a Leo to embers and sent cascades of fire over the control tower. The second shot from the Wing armor cracked the observation deck of the tower, but the Leos did not seem to respond. The Deathscythe broke them out of their stupor with his attack, cleaving one at the navel and slashing another down the spine. The Leos fired their bolts wildly, hitting nothing but the base floor or the distant earth. The massacre from harquebus and scythe took another minute, but the death-dealing was done at last.
Or not. Warzimir, finding some animal strength to force himself to the upper deck, rallied the entire base complement to the control tower to finish the fight with the true armors. Secretly cursing his luck to have the dreaded Wing to deal with as well as the Deathscythe, Warzimir howled the “Huzza-hai-ha!” and galloped to his enemy with his one good arm bearing his one remaining knife. While Deathscythe braced for the new line of Leos, Wing lined up his shot and gunned down the charging Sagittarius. Warzimir fell howling his rage, now minus a leg as well as an arm and a kidney. His howling subsided to gurgling, his gurgling to murmurs, his murmurs to silence. Konstanz Warzimir felt his life leaving him, even as his last soldier died in a desperate bid to save the base.
Did his eyes deceive? Was the delirium of death so cruel as to let him believe that one last Aries was not cut down as the others? He felt as if he were being lifted, not by the warm palms of angel hands, but the cold arms of an Aries armor. He pleaded with the Gods to not look while he sobbed in pain, frustration, and self-pity. While he was spirited away yet again, the two true armors finished crippling the base and guided it down to the bay. The impact woke Chai’dou, but did not damage any of it. Duo glided back to shore, followed by the Wing armor.
“Thanks for all your help. What’s your name, anyway?”
No answer.
“Name’s Duo Maxwell,” he offered his hand, which was ignored, “Not a friendly guy, are you?”
A detached response, probably not meant for Duo, “Mission accomplished.”
“Yeah, it was. Why don’t you get refitted at Chai’dou? We’ll do it free of charge.”
A nod, no words.
Chapter 14
The sky base, now plummeting to the center of Jinghuan, blazed with the grim glory of a cosmic meteor. Wu Fei calmed his mind quickly and surmised that he could yet save Jinghuan. He sprinted to the control tower, scaled the rounded wall in a bound, and entered through the observation deck. Quickly locating a globe framed in two wheel gears, he seized the wheel gears and pulled back the Y-axis until he felt the shift of the sky base’s stern point. From the observation deck, he noticed that the city of Jinghuan was slipping from view as he pulled back further on the Y-axis. He then turned the X-axis to cause the sky base to slowly bank away from the due north to a hill northeast of the city. When safe to do so, he pushed forward on the Y-axis to send the sky base into the hill. As he turned away to escape the plummeting hulk, he was confronted by a different armor than the Leos and Aries he faced earlier. This one was thick, hunched, hued in black, and bore an inhumanely pointed helmet. Two yellow orbs seemed to bore into Shen-Long’s green eyeslits, and the armor lifted a braced crossbow and leaped back in one movement. Shen-Long thrust his trident forward, cutting at the mysterious new armor. The armor sidestepped and shot, which caused the Shen-Long to sidestep and make another thrust. The armor, quicker than any before, dodged that strike and drew a gladius-style sword while firing another bolt at Shen-Long’s head.
This one hit him upon the forehead with great force, sending the Shen-Long into the globe. This nudged sent the sky base into a much sharper dive, and now the acceleration was too great to correct or even slow down. Wu Fei used the butt of the trident to shatter the window behind him and flung himself out. The enemy followed him out, activating its own thrusters to chase Shen-Long in mid-flight. Shen-Long finally got a strike upon the enemy, slashing its left arm clean off at the shoulder. Yet, for some reason Wu Fei could not fathom, the enemy did not flinch even as blood flew from it as a mist. The enemy, now shorn of its crossbow, lunged forward with the gladius in a desperate bid to kill the Shen-Long. This was not successful, and the Shen-Long finished the enemy in a baptism of fire. The armor only said one phrase, in a hoarse, detached voice.
“Remember this, armor of old. The paradise of Oz will come about, for its Sacred Shadow is cast over all.”
The people of Jinghuan rejoiced as their destroyer flew overhead, crashing safely beyond them. The great Shen-Long, for reasons unknown, had chosen to save them from destruction. They never heard the chilling words that Shen-Long let run through his head; luckily. Such words would have chilled their souls even as his lifted from the chill such words can cause. As a noble in the Cheng’du court, he had further privileged information concerning the Oz question. He knew how many archeological finds were attributed to the post-Gundam, pre-Jinghuan era. He knew how many of them could be attributed to a warlike, uncompromising culture known as Oz. He also knew how many of them were found in piles of scattered, shattered, and violently disturbed bones. The Oz period of human history was not one Wu Fei looked forward to seeing relived.
Before he could return to Cheng’du and give this report to the Emperor, he was waved down by the grateful citizen-soldiers of Jinghuan. Many knelt upon both knees and bowed their heads to earth, others burned grass, flowers, and the occasional incense stick as some form of saint or hero worship. Even Wu Fei was blushing from the adulation, but no one could see his face. They only saw the great figure and iris-less eyeslits of the Shen-Long, which inspired a rapture of extreme emotion that almost leveled him due to its sheer intensity.
He only wished that this sheer explosion of relief was appropriate. But the Umbrum Sanctum was acting very boldly now, and the Westland Alliance seemed to echo their movements. When did the organization take over the system? When did this great beast follow its own tail? The relatively obvious state of affairs disturbed Wu Fei, and would disturb the entire Court. What if the Umbrum Sanctum, or Sacred Shadow, really is preparing rather than just hoping for the coming of their cherished Oz?
Trowa and Quatre returned to the city of Bah’rain as heroes, but neither had the internal strength to respond to the adulation. Some chanted for their heroic Prince, others for the great Krai’kori savior. The sapphire blue eyes had dulled somewhat, still comprehending just what happened on that mountain, on that skybase. He would not hear about Jinghuan or Chai’dou for some days, but Prince Quatre had heard of other true armors operating. He now had one such armor as his ally, which gave some cheer to the otherwise bleak situation. Trowa’s emerald eyes had completely dulled, noting little of the outside world. His mind pondered, systematically, just how Krai’kor would survive the horde of sky-bases that will come. How will he hold back the tide of death that the Westland Alliance will bring forth? Perhaps the new ally, and the weather of Krai’kor, would be enough. Or, maybe, the best policy would be to begin the halt of this tide not at Krai’kor’s frontiers but at the western mountain range overlooking Bah’rain. At least then he could have a buffer of retreat, as well as an ally.
Supreme Commander Treize Krushrenada put on his calmest face as he laboriously read each and every report coming from the invasion lines. Bah’rain was no longer even a front, Jinghuan’s now revitalized People’s Assembly sent a letter offering a truce to their exhausted foe, Krai’kor was as of yet considered inpenetrable, Chai’dou was blooded and now acting eager to strike back against the Alliance, and Cheng’du’s official statement on the whole matter is “We dislike Jinghuan, but we despise the Alliance.” This was not going well, but someone in the Umbrum Sanctum felt that this was satisfactory. Lately, the Umbrum Sanctum has moved with a measure of cavalier recklessness, but the Western Alliance Armed Forces were paying the price. All he knew was that the organization did openly flare at the report of the Tallgeese’s destruction and the failure to produce any of the true armors. The grand quest of obtaining or reconstructing a true armor seems to be the cause of Umbrum Sanctum’s near fatal sense of abandon. But another issue troubled Treize personally: What of Commanders Marquis and Warzimir? Why did the Umbrum Sanctum make such efforts to keep them alive, then abscond them at this crucial hour?