Inside the Archangel, in the crew quarters— Kira Yamato and his friends were standing opposite Murrue Ramius, who was now dressed in her Earth Forces uniform.
Though it looked like a confrontation, in truth it wasn't.
Murrue was requesting something, and Kira was simply refusing.
Because of Roz Links' involvement, the situation had shifted drastically from the original timeline.
This time, Kira showed an even stronger reluctance toward piloting the Strike Gundam.
He'd even muttered, "You already have that junkman from space protecting you. You don't need me to pilot anything."
If Badgiruel had been there, she would probably have tried every trick in the book—threats, persuasion, guilt trips—to get Kira back in the cockpit.
That was exactly why Murrue had volunteered to talk to him herself.
But faced with Kira's resistance, Murrue could only sigh helplessly.
Before coming here, she, Badgiruel, and Mu La Flaga—the only two real combatants on board—had already held a small meeting.
With all the trainee pilots dead, Mu had never received any proper MS training, let alone experience operating a mobile suit with the customized OS Kira had modified.
Meanwhile, Roz Links' Jegan ran on an entirely unique system—one he had coded himself from scratch.
In other words, the only person capable of piloting the Strike Gundam was Kira Yamato. And given how determined ZAFT was to destroy the Archangel, Roz alone couldn't possibly hold them all off.
That was why Murrue had come to plead with him.
Then—
"Beep… beep… beep…"
The wall intercom suddenly blared, cutting through the silence.
Murrue quickly tapped the panel to open the channel.
"Captain Ramius, please return to the bridge immediately! ZAFT's mobile suits are approaching—the junkman wants to launch!"
It was Badgiruel's voice—urgent, tense, and rapid-fire.
"Huh? Command? Me?"
Murrue froze for a second, clearly not yet used to the idea that she was now the captain of the Archangel.
"Have you forgotten? You're the Archangel's captain now—of course you're the one in command!"
Badgiruel's voice pressed on.
"Also—Miss Christina hacked into Heliopolis' surveillance network. ZAFT's gone completely insane! They've equipped D-type loadouts—fortress-class armaments! They're planning to blow up Heliopolis and the Archangel along with it!"
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In the gantry, Roz hadn't received launch clearance, so he ran through the ammo and systems checks by himself.
"Three rocket-launcher magazines… beam rifle status… grenades, grenades — all good, status nominal…"
Suddenly, the red Haro at the console activated.
"Roz, be careful. ZAFT is using fortress-class equipment — refer to the Jegan's assault loadout. Also, because there's no adapter, the Jegan didn't get a full charge earlier."
"Understood. I'll keep that in mind."
Roz had just answered Christina when the panoramic cockpit display shifted — the Jegan was already moving into the catapult lane.
At that moment Roz also saw the boy who'd earlier shown strong resistance on the deck — the one Murrue had rescued after Mu exposed his Coordinator status — climb into the Strike Gundam and power it up.
Roz paused, tapped a control on the left console, and dialed the comm channel he'd been given earlier.
On the other end, Kira had just settled into the Strike's cockpit and initiated systems when the incoming call came through. When it connected, Roz's face filled a small screen beside Kira.
"Ah… who are you—?" Kira blinked, surprised.
"Roz. You're Kira, right? And you're not wearing a pilot suit?" Roz asked, frowning as he took in Kira's appearance.
"Stay near the Archangel and protect the ship. I'll handle the ZAFT units," Roz decided aloud after calculating his suit's remaining power and assessing Kira's situation.
Roz had at least trained in Jegan cockpit sims for a long time. Kira might be a genius pilot in the Gundam world, but this was only his second real sortie in a Gundam.
"Sorry." Kira started to protest, but Roz cut him off.
"No need to apologize. You haven't done anything wrong. We both sit in these cockpits to protect something." Roz's voice was calm as he surveyed the Jegan, now fixed in the catapult cradle. He gripped the controls tightly.
"I might not be able to cover you. Watch yourself."
"Ah — okay. Got it."
Hearing Roz, Kira tightened his hands on the sticks. For the first time since climbing in, the reality of a life-or-death fight hit him.
The call ended. Another comm link opened almost immediately.
"Roz, we can only rely on you and Kira now. We'll provide cover as best we can," Murrue's voice came through.
"Understood. Prepare for Heliopolis' possible destruction," Roz replied. Honestly, Roz had no confidence in being able to protect Heliopolis amid such intensity, but making the worst-case plan was the only sane move.
Boom.
An explosion echoed into the Jegan's sensors.
"ZAFT detonated charges!" someone shouted.
Roz unclipped his goggles and lowered his visor.
"Roz Links — Jegan, sortie!"
The Jegan's knees flexed. The catapult sled, magnetically driven, rushed the suit down the launch tube. Indicator lights streaked past along the lane as the cradle accelerated.
At the end of the lane, the sled flung the Jegan out. Like in training, Roz shoved the throttle and stomped the pedals. The Jegan's verniers spit blue flame as it rocketed for the sky.
The panoramic HUD marked ZAFT contacts that had just entered Heliopolis.
"Four GINNs… and a Gundam?" Roz swallowed hard when he saw the red Gundam trailing the GINNs.
"That's an X303 Aegis Gundam. Beware — its PS armor is immune to conventional projectiles," Murrue warned over the link.
"I know. But once you strip its weapons, its PS armor is just a shell," Roz replied.
Clutching the rocket launcher tucked into his right crook, Roz piloted the Jegan and charged toward the incoming ZAFT force.
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Passing through the blasted gap, Athrun once again saw the devastated ruins of Heliopolis.
"All units, target sighted — the 'cub' and the 'long-legs.' Commence operation!"
Beside Aegis Gundam, a GINN led the squad, commanding the other mobile suits.
"Athrun, you and I will take care of the cub and the Gundam."
The leading GINN and Aegis Gundam accelerated toward Roz's Jegan, while the remaining GINNs veered off toward the Archangel.
"Athrun, be careful! The pilot of that 'cub' might— wait, evade now!"
Before he could finish, two rockets streaked toward him.
Prior to deployment, the ZAFT team had already analyzed the mysterious Jegan, which they nicknamed "the cub." So far, all they'd learned was that its pilot had remarkable proficiency with rocket launchers.
Thus, when the Jegan fired two rockets, only Aegis, protected by its Phase Shift Armor, advanced calmly — the rest of the ZAFT pilots broke into cold sweats.
"Kira, be careful! Two GINNs are heading for the Archangel!"
Roz could see the split in their formation, but with a GINN and Aegis Gundam rushing him together, he had no room to worry about the others.
The Jegan raised its rocket launcher and fired two more rounds. The explosions scattered metal fragments like a localized storm, raining down on the two enemy units.
While the GINN twisted away from the shrapnel, Aegis Gundam, confident in its armor, simply raised its shield and charged straight through the barrage.
Though the armor held firm, the beam rifle in Aegis's hand — unprotected by PS Armor — was shredded to pieces.
Athrun discarded the ruined rifle, drew a beam saber from the Aegis's built-in storage, and slashed down at the Jegan.
Roz raised his left arm, deploying his shield to block the strike.
"Tch… as expected, there's still a gap in performance between a Jegan and a Gundam."
The beam saber sparked violently across the Jegan's shield, energy arcing but failing to penetrate either machine's armor.
Roz gritted his teeth and twisted the controls, redirecting the Aegis's downward force.
The two mobile suits locked together in a midair struggle, spinning from the redirected energy.
"Now!"
Roz slammed his foot on the thruster pedal. The Jegan suddenly broke free, sliding past the Aegis and shooting upward.
"Uwaaah—!"
As he pulled hard on the controls, the Jegan traced a smooth arc in the air. In the same motion, Roz deployed the beam saber from the left forearm, gripping it tightly.
"Got you!"
The GINN, having just cleared the shrapnel zone, raised the beam sniper cannon mounted on its shoulder, taking aim at the maneuvering Jegan.
A sharp electric pulse flashed through Roz's mind — his instincts screamed. He forced the Jegan to an abrupt stop.
A beam of golden light tore past in front of him, slamming into the ground of Heliopolis and blasting a hole straight through the colony's wall, exposing the void of space beyond.
"A beam sniper cannon? At that output?!"
He had expected something powerful, but witnessing the destruction firsthand sent a chill down his spine. Then — an alarm blared inside the cockpit. Enemy detected from behind.
Out of nowhere, Aegis Gundam lunged forward, its beam saber raised high.
"Got you!"
"Not a chance!"
The Jegan spun on its heel, twisting its torso as its left leg whipped out in a clean, fluid roundhouse kick.
"Uwaaaah—!"
The kick slammed squarely into Aegis's waist. The force distorted the Gundam's posture; its descending saber veered off-course, narrowly missing the Jegan.
Roz stomped the pedal again, and the Jegan's leg thrusters fired, blasting the Aegis backward.
Using the momentum, Roz dived toward the ground — directly at the GINN still lining up its sniper shot.
"Damn it… Miguel, look out!"
Athrun regained control of the Aegis just in time to see the Jegan closing in on the sniper-type GINN. He pushed his thrusters to pursue.
"I'm fine! I'll handle him! Athrun, go take down the other Gundam!"
Inside the GINN, the blonde pilot Miguel aimed his sniper cannon squarely at the oncoming Jegan.
"Alright… Miguel, be careful. He's strong."
Athrun clenched his jaw, then turned Aegis Gundam toward the Strike, which was defending the Archangel nearby.
The GINN kept firing at the ground where the Jegan was, the beam sniper cannon ripping open hole after hole in Heliopolis's hull.
"Closer… just a bit closer…"
Roz watched the markings and range readouts on the panoramic HUD for the GINN with the sniper cannon.
Before closing in on that sniper-armed GINN, Roz had glanced at the Archangel's status and judged Kira could hold the line for a while — so he decided to deal with the immediate sniper threat first.
Leaving a skilled marksman with high-powered hardware on the battlefield was a terrible option.
"Now!"
Roz yanked the stick and the Jegan climbed sharply, closing on the GINN in midair.
"Got you, you nimble rat!"
Miguel, manning the GINN, opened fire on the rapidly ascending Jegan with his shoulder-mounted beam sniper.
Roz shifted the Jegan's flight angle with split-second corrections and narrowly dodged the high-energy beam. He braced the rocket launcher in the crook of his right arm, aimed roughly at the GINN's position, and fired the remaining salvo.
Thanks to the electromagnetic launcher using forged-shard warheads, once the proximity fuses were set they produced a very wide lethal cone.
Roz didn't plan to destroy the GINN outright — the goal was to wreck the GINN's beam sniper, and limit its movement.
From their earlier skirmish it was clear this GINN's design and the pilot's skill were strong — likely an elite.
The rockets arrived in a flash, detonating into sheets of forged shrapnel.
This barrage could no longer be dodged. Miguel reflexively raised the beam sniper and held it before the cockpit — exactly the reaction Roz wanted.
The forged shards tore the sniper to pieces; fragments shredded Miguel's right hand holding the cannon and peppered the GINN's rear stabilizers. His status displays began lighting up in red.
"Tch… Athrun, I'm pulling back—"
Miguel tossed the ruined sniper away from his smoldering right arm and prepared to retreat.
But in the next instant the Jegan's icy-blue visor filled Miguel's cockpit display; the mono-eye glared like an executioner's gavel.
With a single, fluid diagonal stroke from lower right to upper left, the Jegan's beam saber sliced through the GINN like butter — splitting it cleanly in two.
"Uwahhh—!"
Miguel's scream echoed through the ZAFT comms.
After cutting the GINN in half, the Jegan didn't linger. It turned and accelerated toward the Archangel, which was under attack.
Athrun — who'd been dueling Kira in the Aegis — saw the GINN explode.
"Miguel!" Athrun's face went blank for a moment.
Only then did he feel the cruelty of war: old friends could stand on the other side, and new friends could die in the next instant.
A thick particle beam then struck a GINN that had just finished a maneuver. Its anti-ship missile slipped free in the blast, ignited, and exploded near Heliopolis's central shaft.
Another GINN, as it was destroyed, launched its anti-ship missiles; they hit the satellite's central spine dead-on. Four anti-ship missiles struck the shaft with surgical precision.
Blow after blow, the central shaft reached its limit — sections began to snap away.
What had been barely stable started to come apart. Heliopolis began to disassemble.
"Uwaaaah—!" Kira screamed in agony inside the Strike, yanked out into space without a pilot suit.
"Kira!" Athrun shouted as he himself was being pulled toward the void — the name of the friend he'd been facing seconds before.
"Jegan, be careful — Heliopolis is breaking apart!" Badgiruel's voice crackled over the channel. Inside his cockpit Roz watched everything with a calm face as he let himself be pulled out of the colony.
"Go find Kira. I'll be fine here."
Roz weaved the Jegan to avoid streaming debris, checked his remaining power and the ZAFT ship locations tagged on his HUD.
Retracting the beam saber into the left arm, he swapped a fresh magazine into the electromagnetic launcher. A reckless idea sparked in his head.
"Limiter Removal… you can do it, Jegan."
Roz flipped the controls to remove the propulsion limit.
When he'd built and modified this Jegan on Heliopolis, he'd anticipated mounting more gear and had optimized the propulsion system and battery capacity accordingly.
But full-throttle without limits generated extreme strain on the pilot — that mode could normally only be used after fitting the Stark components and converting to an Stark Jegan.
Now, with only a beam rifle and rocket launcher mounted, the Jegan was still relatively lightly equipped — but Roz had just cleared its restraints.
Roz pushed the throttle forward, and the Jegan shot toward the two ZAFT warships ahead.
"Jegan? What's going on? Radar shows you're getting farther away from us!"
Badgiruel stared at the radar, frozen. The Jegan's signal was rapidly moving toward the ZAFT ships.
At that moment, the Archangel had just stabilized its balance, and a large number of escape pods were still launching from Heliopolis.
"...I see them... ZAFT's warships."
Roz's voice came through Badgiruel's headset.
Noticing that the ZAFT ships were locking onto him, Roz shoved the throttle to maximum.
On the radar, the Jegan's speed suddenly tripled as it closed in on the ZAFT vessels.
"Uoooooh—!"
Fighting against the crushing G-forces, Roz glared at the massive ZAFT ships that filled his vision. Meanwhile, aboard the ZAFT vessels, alarms were blaring.
"Captain Creuset, an MS is rapidly approaching us — its speed is three times faster than before!"
The radar operator's voice trembled as he stared at the rapidly advancing blip on the screen.
"All hands to battl—"
The ship's captain didn't even finish the sentence before a violent shock threw the crew off their feet.
The Jegan unleashed its entire rocket magazine across the deck cannons of both warships. The forged-shrapnel barrage tore through armor plating with ease, triggering a chorus of alarms.
Roz discarded the empty magazine, swapped in a fresh one loaded with anti-ship missiles, and roared: "Grrraahh! Bow Down Before me , God!!"
The Jegan darted between the two warships, streaking straight for their engine blocks.
Eight anti-ship missiles split evenly between the two ships and detonated at the thrusters.
"First, third, and fifth engines severely damaged—second engine offline!"
The helmsman shouted in panic as the propulsion readouts plummeted sharply.
"Fire in Section 3! Section 5 heavily damaged!"
Reports poured in one after another, and even the experienced captain felt a pounding headache.
"MS attack incoming again! Approaching rapidly from the rear!"
The radar controller was on the verge of breaking down. The fire-control radar couldn't lock onto the Jegan at all—manual targeting was their only option, but it couldn't turn fast enough to track the mobile suit.
The Jegan flashed between the two warships again, but this time it carried a large beam rifle instead of a rocket launcher.
A GINN that had just launched tried to intercept the rampaging Jegan, firing its heavy machine gun.
But in the next instant, a yellow beam pierced the GINN's cockpit dead center, melting through its armor and detonating its power cell.
Despite the overwhelming G-forces and the nosebleed running down his face from the strain, Roz's mind was eerily calm. It was as if he had trained for this exact scenario thousands—no, tens of thousands—of times in simulation. His instincts took over.
The Jegan moved like an extension of his body, firing the beam rifle with mechanical precision—each shot drilling into enemy cockpits.
After vaporizing two GINNs, the Jegan maintained its triple-speed flight, leaving behind two crippled warships—each missing four thrusters and belching fire into space.
Such a swift and devastating strike—even Char himself would have applauded it.
"The triple-speed MS has withdrawn…"
Behind his mask, Rau Le Creuset's expression darkened. This was the second time he'd suffered defeat at the hands of that "cub."
"The ship's taken serious damage—should we pursue?"
The warship's captain had just finished relaying orders before hesitantly asking Creuset if they should continue chasing the Archangel.
"Our current condition doesn't allow pursuit. Retrieve the Aegis Gundam, then we'll withdraw for repairs."
Though Creuset burned with the desire to destroy both that "cub" and the "long-legs" right now, he wasn't the kind of man to lose his cool.
"We'll meet again."
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