"He's a ZAFT soldier?"
"He looks so young."
"He looks about our age."
It was the first time Kira and the others had seen a ZAFT soldier, too.
They couldn't help stopping to take a closer look.
Perhaps sensing their gazes, Kira noticed the young man, who looked about his age, smile and nod at him.
A little taken aback, Kira instinctively nodded back.
"Hey, kid. How are you feeling? Are you hurt?"
Mu leaned toward Kira, wearing a broad smile.
"No, I'm not hurt."
Kira came back to his senses and answered Mr. Mu.
"Good. You really are something, though. No wonder you're a Coordinator."
Mu patted Kira on the shoulder, chuckling.
He had actually said that for the benefit of the soldiers who didn't know the whole story.
"What?"
"A Coordinator?"
"He's a Coordinator!?"
Mu's words made the air around them grow tense.
Murrue, who had come down from the bridge, shot Mu a troubled, surreptitious glare. Kira hesitated, then looked back at Mu with some displeasure.
"...Yes."
In an instant, the soldiers waiting behind Murrue and Ensign Natarle Badgiruel instinctively raised their guns and aimed them at Kira.
This was the war in miniature: Naturals against Coordinators.
Coordinators were humans born with genetically engineered genes.
They could reach the limits of human potential—in a sense, they were superhumans created by humanity itself.
Coordinators surpassed ordinary Naturals—people born without genetic modification—in both intelligence and physical ability, and were nearly immune to disease.
Because the technology could effectively cure increasingly serious hereditary diseases, a wave of genetic modification swept the globe in the 20s of the Cosmic Era.
But the obvious gap in ability between Coordinators and Naturals also gave rise to prejudice.
Humanity began repeating its bloody history. Coordinators, better suited than Naturals to life in space, moved to regions beyond Earth.
The place where they eventually settled was PLANT, a group of space colonies built in the L5 region.
So it was only natural that the soldiers would instinctively react with hostility when they heard the word "Coordinator."
"...What the hell are you doing?!"
Tolle shouted and rushed in front of Kira to shield him. "Even if Kira is a Coordinator, that doesn't mean he's the enemy! He fought ZAFT to protect us! Didn't you see that?"
He glared fiercely at the guns pointed at Kira and spoke with such conviction that he looked ready to fight them himself.
"Lower your guns," Murrue ordered.
Mu stepped forward and said with a smile, "What's there to get so worked up about? Heliopolis is a colony belonging to a neutral nation. It's hardly surprising that Coordinators who don't want to get caught up in the fighting would move here."
"Yes... And I'm a first-generation Coordinator..." Kira murmured.
A first-generation Coordinator was someone whose genes had been modified for the first time.
In other words, they were children born after their parents, who had been Naturals, had their fertilized eggs genetically modified.
"Goodness, I'm sorry. I didn't expect to cause such a commotion. But this is a normal reaction, and I suppose I overreacted."
Mr. Mu, the one who had caused all the trouble, chuckled.
"Why don't you keep quiet, Captain Flaga!" Murrue snapped. After shooting Mu a fierce glare, she turned to Kira and the others. "I'm sorry for causing this disturbance. You've been fighting for a long time, so you must be exhausted. We'll take care of things from here."
"Okay."
Kira wasn't stupid. He could tell that Captain Murrue was asking him to leave.
After all, some things couldn't be explained away just by talking. Before he left, though, he looked toward the young man nearby. "What are you going to do with him? That ZAFT soldier?"
Kira and the others had heard that all ZAFT soldiers were Coordinators—
even though they had never been on a battlefield themselves.
They just hadn't expected the other side to be so young.
"Um..."
"We'll keep him under guard and leave the decision to military command once we return to Lunar Base."
Seeing that Murrue didn't know how to answer, Mr. Mu spoke up first.
"But what about him...?"
"Don't worry. Every side captures enemy soldiers during a war. They can't kill them all, can they? So usually, nothing too serious happens."
Mr. Mu chuckled and cut off Kira's question. It was better not to let Kira know certain things—not at this point, anyway.
"That's good."
Kira nodded, though he wasn't entirely convinced.
After taking one last look at the young man, he turned and left with Tolle and the others.
There were things he wanted to ask him, too. About Athrun, for instance...
But now didn't seem like the right time to ask.
Before you continue