Jiliang's Dilemma

Rau Le Creuset's gaze was firm as he gave a loud order. "We can't leave those two machines alone. Prepare the D equipment and sink that battleship!"

His voice carried unquestionable authority and decisiveness—the responsibility and bearing of a captain.

"Yes, sir!" Michel replied without hesitation, his eyes burning with the desire to erase his humiliation.

He and the other two pilots who had received the same orders and were about to sortie swiftly gave a standard ZAFT Forces salute, their arms cutting through the air with resolute force.

Once the salute was complete, the three wasted no time. They turned and strode briskly toward the elevator leading to the hangar.

Their backs were hard as iron, like three arrows about to pierce the enemy warship's heart.

Just as they were about to leave the bridge, an urgent voice shattered the brief display of military efficiency.

"Captain! Please let me go too!"

Rau Le Creuset tilted his head slightly toward the source of the voice. Athrun Zala, the red-clad elite who was always calm as still water, stood there now with rare agitation and longing flashing in his green eyes.

His fists clenched slightly, and his straight back radiated an unmistakable stubbornness.

The eyes behind Rau Le Creuset's mask seemed to curve slightly, as though he was mildly surprised by Athrun's unusual agitation, but his voice remained as calm and objective as a captain's should be. "Athrun." He stated a fact flatly. "You don't have a machine you can sortie in."

The objective of this operation was to seize the enemy's new mobile suits, so ZAFT's aces had not brought along their usual machines.

"But—!" Athrun was at a loss for words. He knew the captain was right, but the unwillingness in his heart surged like a tide.

He could pilot an ordinary Ginn. He had confidence in that!

"This time, leave it to Michel and the others." Rau Le Creuset stepped forward and gently placed his white-gloved hand on Athrun's faintly trembling shoulder with almost tender pressure. "The resentment in their hearts is no less than yours. Give them a chance to reclaim their honor."

The warmth of that palm passed through the military uniform, carrying a soothing force, yet Athrun felt that something deeper and colder was hidden beneath that warmth.

Through the slits of his mask, Rau Le Creuset's eyes seemed filled with understanding and trust, as if saying, I understand you, but the bigger picture comes first.

Having said that, Rau Le Creuset did not linger. He let go, turned, and walked toward the other end of the bridge.

He knew the blazing, unwilling, conflicted gaze behind him was nailed tightly to his back, nearly burning through his uniform.

But he did not look back, leaving the main bridge area with steady steps.

There was a lightness to Rau Le Creuset's footsteps that ordinary people would have found impossible to notice, as though every step landed on the edge of an about-to-erupt volcano. Once he confirmed that he had entered his own empty room and the heavy metal door behind him slowly closed with an airtight hiss, cutting off all outside prying and surveillance, he finally cast off the heavy disguise that had nearly become part of him.

The emotions he had forcibly suppressed deep in his chest burst forth like a beast breaking free from its cage!

"—Heh, hehehe... Hahahaha! Ah—hahahahahahaha!!!"

His uncontrollable laughter echoed and crashed madly through the empty room. It was shrill, twisted, filled with indescribable delight, and mingled with bone-deep hatred.

He laughed until he bent over, one hand braced against the cold console and the other covering his face, his shoulders shaking violently.

Too interesting!

It was simply too interesting!

The threads of Destiny had become so chaotically intertwined. Enemies, friends, pawns... all of them were dancing on this stage called war in a dance he had never anticipated, yet had eagerly awaited!

The Earth Forces' new warship, a Coordinator boy piloting a Gundam, and... Char La Flaga! That name, that existence!

"Ah... this truly... gets my blood boiling..." He laughed so hard he could barely breathe, and even tears of physiological strain seeped from the corners of his eyes.

This unrestrained delight, this contradictory emotion mixed with the urge to destroy and the urge to create, nearly shattered the barrier he had painstakingly built over so many years.

"...No." He abruptly stopped laughing and took several deep breaths of metal-tinged air, trying to calm his heaving chest. "If this continues... it'll ruin the 'mask' I've worn all this time."

From the day he abandoned his past and set that ultimate goal of survival for himself, the identity of "Rau Le Creuset," this mask, had become his only support in this world.

It was his weapon, his shield, the tool he used to manipulate hearts and guide Destiny toward the ending he desired.

He absolutely could not allow it to crack because of a momentary emotional fluctuation.

He slowly straightened and adjusted his breathing again. The mirror-smooth metal wall reflected his masked figure—calm, elegant, and filled with the majesty and confidence of a ZAFT ace pilot.

He redefined himself—he was the loyal subordinate of Patrick Zala, chairman of the PLANT Supreme Council; the hero of the ZAFT Forces; the White Reaper who struck terror into the Earth Alliance—Rau Le Creuset.

"All right..." He whispered to his reflection in a voice only he could hear, with a trace of cold anticipation and provocation in his tone. "It's time to fulfill my duty. But before that... let's give that boy named... Char La Flaga a little 'welcome.' Let me see just what you're capable of."

Having put his "mask" back on, Rau Le Creuset turned and left the captain's quarters with steady steps, heading toward the main bridge.

He intended to personally oversee the command and enjoy the pursuit and slaughter about to unfold in space, a spectacle he had indirectly directed.

However, just as he was about to step onto the bridge's command platform, an unexpected report from the communications officer made him pause slightly, and the corner of his mouth behind the mask curled into an even deeper arc.

"Report, Captain! Pilot Athrun Zala has launched from the hangar in the X303 Aegis Gundam alongside Michel's squad!"

Athrun... in the end, he still could not restrain himself? Piloting the Aegis Gundam that Rau Le Creuset should have handled personally.

That impulse, that persistence... really was so much like his father's.

Rau Le Creuset smiled soundlessly. He neither stopped him nor commented. When the pieces on the board moved on their own once in a while, perhaps they could bring even more unexpected amusement.

Xia Ya's expression was calm as he said indifferently, "I don't mind."

His voice echoed through the somewhat empty space, carrying a sense of detachment and ease, as though what awaited him was not a life-or-death battlefield but an insignificant game.

When Jiliang heard those words, something seemed to gently stir in her heart.

An indescribably powerful thought sprouted and spread through her heart like a shoot breaking through the soil—she could not let this person, this boy named Xia Ya, face that cold and cruel battlefield alone. Absolutely not.

Even Jiliang herself found this sudden obsession strange, even absurd.

They had only met for the first time today. Including their brief introductions earlier and the few words they had exchanged just now, they had probably spoken fewer than ten sentences to each other.

To her, he was like a mystery that had suddenly intruded upon her peaceful life, emanating an indescribable sense of distance from every inch of his being.

But... why did she care about him so much?

Why did merely looking at his tranquil profile, merely being somewhere near him, make her feel an inexplicable... an inexplicable warmth that put her at ease, as though it could dispel the chill brought by the cold metal around them?

The first time their eyes met, in that instant, it had felt as though a faint yet distinct current ran through her entire body.

It was a wondrous feeling she had never experienced in her sixteen years of life.

Her heart was filled with confusion, yet strangely, she did not feel repulsed or uncomfortable. Instead, it was like unexpectedly holding a cup of warm milk on a cold winter night, its warmth slowly and firmly spreading through her heart...

"If you're going, then I'm going too."

Char La Flaga. She silently repeated that name.

As long as she was with the boy who called himself Char, the battlefield that had seemed as terrifying as a man-eating beast moments ago somehow... did not seem so impossible to face.

By the time she came back to herself, she realized in shock that she had already shouted, "I'm going too," with all her strength and without hesitation.

Even she was surprised by that determination.

"...Um, Yamato, why are you going to the battlefield?"

At that moment, Jiliang was already seated in the somewhat cold cockpit of the Strike Gundam.

The main screen before her glowed with a dim blue light, displaying complex machine parameters and simulated images of the outside environment.

The cockpit communicator suddenly came alive with Xia Ya's voice.

Immediately afterward, a small window popped up in one corner of the main screen, showing his still-calm face, though it was now clearly filled with confusion.

Through the Blaze Gundam's communications system, he looked at her in disbelief and asked softly.

Jiliang froze slightly, and a thin layer of sweat seeped into the palm gripping the control stick.

She fell silent for several seconds, seemingly organizing her thoughts, before speaking in a low voice. "...Because if I don't fight, you'll be alone, won't you?"

In the window, Xia Ya's eyebrows seemed to rise almost imperceptibly, and there was a trace of surprise in his voice. "...For me?"

"Mm..." Jiliang nodded, her cheeks growing slightly warm. "Although that is one reason... there's actually something else I want to confirm."

Not wanting him to step onto the battlefield alone was indeed one of her most genuine impulses at that moment.

But what drove her to make this decision was not merely this sudden bond that even she could not fully understand.

Deep in her heart, there was another reason, more private and more burdensome.

—Kira.

The scene from not long ago in the internal factory of the Heliopolis colony flashed uncontrollably through her mind. Before she and Captain Ramius had frantically climbed into the Strike Gundam's cockpit, a soldier in a ZAFT Forces uniform had suddenly appeared and pointed a gun at them.

Because he had been wearing a helmet that obscured most of his face, and because the situation had been so chaotic and tense, she had been unable to see his features clearly...

But when she instinctively called out that name buried deep in her memories, a name she had nearly forgotten... she seemed to vaguely hear that soldier call her name in a faint voice during that moment of shock and hesitation.

They had attended the same kindergarten class in the lunar city of Copernicus.

As fellow Coordinators, in an environment that was not entirely friendly toward Coordinators, they had naturally come together and become each other's best, most inseparable friends.

In her childhood memories, he had been the warmest and most important splash of color.

—Was it really you, Athrun...?

Jiliang's heart suddenly clenched. Desperately, recklessly, she wanted to know whether the soldier in a ZAFT Forces uniform standing against her truly was the Athrun Zala from her memories.

If it really was him, then why?

Why had he, who had always been so gentle and hated conflict and war so much, become a ZAFT soldier now, even... pointing a gun at a former friend?

What had happened during the years they had been apart?

Countless questions churned and circled in her heart like an impenetrable fog, like countless tiny needlepoints pricking her until she could not sit still.

This powerful desire to find answers, mixed with her inexplicable worry for Xia Ya, ultimately overwhelmed her fear of war and pushed her toward this unknown battlefield.

She had to go. She had to see for herself and confirm it.