Degwin Zabi pushed the intelligence room door open.
It was quiet.
Too quiet.
No Kycillia. No command staff. No raised voices barking orders. Just a single man standing near the central console, stiff as if he had been waiting for judgment itself.
Degwin scanned the room once, slowly.
"Where is Kycillia?" he asked.
The man flinched. "I… I don't know, sir. She left orders, then departed. She told me to wait here."
"To wait for what?" Degwin pressed.
The man hesitated, then stepped forward and produced a sealed envelope. "This. She said it was for you. Personally."
Degwin frowned. A letter—here, now, in the middle of a collapsing fortress. It already felt wrong. He broke the seal and unfolded the paper.
His eyes moved.
Once.
Twice.
Then stopped.
His face went blank, as if every muscle had forgotten how to move. A long silence followed. No anger. No shouting. Just the sound of distant explosions bleeding through the walls.
A tear slid down his cheek.
Degwin folded the letter carefully and turned to his adjutant. His voice was calm—too calm—like a man gripping the edge of a cliff with his fingernails.
"Stop her."
The adjutant stiffened. "All loyal units?"
"Yes," Degwin said. "Anyone still loyal to me. Seal hangars. Lock departure routes. Do not engage unless necessary. Bring Kycillia back. Alive."
The adjutant nodded once and moved immediately, issuing rapid orders as he left the room.
The man who had delivered the letter finally found his voice. "L-Lord Degwin… what happened?"
Degwin did not answer. He simply handed the letter over.
The man read it.
His eyes widened. His breath caught. Color drained from his face.
"…She's insane," he whispered.
He dropped the paper, spun on his heel, and ran from the room as if staying another second would curse him.
Degwin remained seated.
He let out a quiet laugh—soft, broken, almost amused. He reached for a bottle of wine resting on the side table, uncorked it without ceremony, and drank straight from the bottle.
"To think," he murmured to the empty room, voice trembling,
"I raised monsters… and called it a family."
The wine burned on the way down.
He welcomed it.
Somewhere in A Baoa Qu.
Gary Lin moved carefully through the internal corridor of A Baoa Qu, boots barely making a sound against the metal floor. No alarms. No gunfire. No resistance. That alone made his skin crawl.
Formation was tight.
Samus in front—calm, precise, lethal.
Gary in the middle—rifle up, brain racing.
Sayla at the rear—watching angles, covering blind spots.
Too clean.
Gary's mind drifted, uninvited. OG Gundam… Kycillia shooting Gihren in the command room. Then Char killing Kycillia. A Baoa Qu turning into a tomb because Zeon tore itself apart before the Federation even finished the job.
Did it already happen?
Or did everyone just launch out to die in space?
That's when Samus stopped.
Two fingers up. Enemy spotted.
A man sprinted across the intersecting corridor, panicked, not tactical. Before Gary could react, Samus moved. One step, one strike—clean, efficient. The man hit the wall and slid down, stunned but conscious.
Samus crouched, blaster aimed at his face. "Command room. Now."
Gary silently added a rule to his survival list: do not antagonize Samus Aran. Ever.
The man laughed weakly. "You're too late for that."
Sayla frowned. "What do you mean?"
The man looked at them—really looked—and his fear sharpened. "Take me prisoner. Then leave. Get out of A Baoa Qu. Right now."
All three froze.
Gary stepped closer. "You don't look injured enough to be hallucinating. Why are you scared?"
The man swallowed. "Because Zeon isn't fighting the Federation anymore."
Samus's grip tightened. "Then who?"
The man whispered, voice shaking.
"Each other."
Sayla stepped closer, voice low but firm. "What do you mean? Say it clearly."
The man's eyes darted down the corridor, sweat beading on his temple. "Gihren Zabi… is dead. Lady Kycilia shot him. In the command room."
For a second, only the distant hum of A Baoa Qu's machinery filled the silence.
"Slow down," Samus said, calm but carrying weight. "Say it again."
He swallowed hard and repeated it, words tumbling out faster now. Gihren killed. Kycilia seized command. Degwin searching for her. Orders flying everywhere.
Gary felt a chill crawl up his spine. So it already happened. In the original history, this was the point of no return. He almost expected Char to appear out of nowhere and end Kycilia himself. Clean. Inevitable.
"Then why are you panicking?" Gary asked. "If Kycilia took command, what scares you this much?"
The man broke.
"Because she's going to destroy A Baoa Qu," he shouted, voice cracking. "She plans to overload the fortress once she gets close to the Federation fleet—Tianem's forces, the Gundams, anyone still fighting. She'll wipe everything out after she escapes!"
Sayla's breath caught. Samus's hand tightened on her weapon. Gary's mind raced.
This wasn't desperation.
This was scorched-earth fanaticism.
"And if she succeeds," Gary muttered, "everyone still inside this place dies with it."
A Baoa Qu suddenly felt a lot smaller—and a lot closer to exploding.
Amuro, Athrun, and Lockon split off at the last junction, moving fast through a dim service corridor that branched deeper into A Baoa Qu. The air smelled sharp—ozone and burnt propellant.
Then they heard it.
Gunfire. Close. Automatic bursts echoing through metal walls.
"That's Gary's route," Athrun said, already breaking into a run.
They rounded the corner—then stopped short.
Zeon soldiers were firing at other Zeon soldiers.
One group wore standard fortress security markings. The other had Kycilia's intelligence insignia. Orders were being screamed, accusations thrown, panic bleeding into every shot. It wasn't a battle; it was a purge.
Amuro tightened his grip on his rifle. "They're killing each other…"
Athrun tried the comm. "White Base, respond—"
Static. Thick, dead static. The jamming was absolute.
Lockon raised a hand. "Hold it. Jumping in blind is stupid."
"So we just watch?" Athrun snapped.
"We watch," Lockon said calmly, eyes sharp behind the visor, "and we learn. This isn't random. Command collapse. Internal execution. Someone's tying off loose ends."
Another volley rang out. A Zeon officer fell, shouting Kycilia's name with his last breath.
Amuro felt it then—the pressure, the fear, the wrongness.
"This fortress is tearing itself apart."
Lockon nodded. "And when it's done… whatever survives will be dangerous."
They stayed in the shadows, weapons ready, waiting for the shooting to end—and for the real threat to show itself.
They didn't have to wait long.
The last burst echoed down the corridor, then silence. Smoke drifted low across the floor. The Zeon troops with Kycilia's markings were the only ones left standing. A few checked bodies. Others looked around, tense, hands still on triggers.
"They're moving," Athrun muttered.
Before Amuro could answer, a single precise shot rang out.
One Zeon soldier dropped instantly.
All heads snapped toward the shadows.
"Lockon," Athrun hissed, half-angry. "We were waiting."
"They're done," Lockon replied coolly, already lining up his next shot. "And I don't like survivors who know too much. Instinct says don't let them pass."
The Zeon unit scattered, returning fire blindly down the corridor.
Amuro didn't hesitate. He stepped out, rifle steady, movements sharp and efficient. Two shots—one soldier down, another spun and collapsed before he could shout an order.
Athrun clicked his weapon to full auto. "Then we finish it."
He moved fast, aggressive, suppressing fire forcing the Zeon troops back into cover. Lockon shifted angles, calm and surgical, each pull of the trigger ending another threat. No wasted shots. No noise beyond what was necessary.
The fight was short. Brutal. One-sided.
When it ended, only bodies and the smell of burned metal remained.
Amuro exhaled slowly. "You were right. Letting them go would've been a mistake."
Lockon lowered his rifle. "Internal cleanup like that? Means something big already broke."
Athrun glanced down the corridor they had tried to move toward. "Yeah. And whatever Kycilia's planning… we're already late."
They moved on at a run, no longer just reacting—but racing the clock.