No one knew yet whether anyone else aboard the warship that had fled to this planet with Kira had somehow survived.
Because even after more than half an hour had passed, and Li Kui and the others from the search team had driven to the scene, none of the three mobile suits—including Annie's, which was charging—had received a distress signal!
Perhaps it was because the escape pods had scattered across other parts of the planet?
After all, the six machines from the Mechanical Clan had been hot on the heels of the Freedom Gundam and the burning warship all the way here. Anyone escaping in an escape pod who wasn't stupid would have tried to get as far as possible from the ship's crash site and the area where the mobile suits had fought. That was beyond doubt!
And if they were far away, on another hemisphere, say, then it was perfectly normal for their signals not to get through amid interference and all the obstacles posed by the complex terrain.
Of course, it was also possible that not a single person had survived and they were all dead.
Kira didn't know whether that possibility was true, and he didn't dare dwell on it. He simply waited patiently after seeing the soldiers in the two vehicles receive orders and start searching the area around the crash site with their instruments.
"Ah-ha!"
"Come over and look! I dragged this Mechanical Clan machine out of the cockpit!"
The cheer of a certain troublesome little girl rang out nearby, drawing Kira and Li Boli's attention.
"!!"
"The Mechanical Clan?"
"Let me see, too!"
Hearing that it was one of the legendary Mechanical Clan, Li Boli was naturally curious. She hurriedly slid down from her mobile suit's cockpit and ran over.
Then she saw