Xia Ya Blocked

Athrun Zala had actually joined the battle in person, taking part in this invasion of Orb!

This went beyond Xia Ya's understanding of the plot.

Yet after the initial extreme shock, Xia Ya's extraordinary calm swiftly forced his emotions back down.

His mind, tempered by brutal warfare, began running rapid simulations in a flash—though on further thought, perhaps this was not entirely unreasonable. Perhaps it was only natural.

If Athrun had truly received a death order from ZAFT's Supreme Council, or even from his father Patrick Zala, to recapture or completely destroy the crucial target that was the Freedom Gundam, then with Freedom engaged against the new G Gundam and Orb sheltered by the Archangel, joining the war would have been the most direct and natural strategic course for him to complete his mission.

In fact, in Xia Ya's memories of the "original work," during the course of events in that world, when the Earth Alliance invaded Orb, Athrun Zala had indeed appeared on the battlefield as a ZAFT pilot, just as he did now!

This was the "inertia" of history, the invisible turning of fate's "gears."

The only difference was—the factions. In the "history" Xia Ya had known before, Athrun Zala had stood on the same side as the Archangel, to which Freedom belonged. They had been comrades. They had briefly fought side by side.

But at this very moment, Athrun Zala and the Justice Gundam he piloted had joined the battle in the most utterly unwelcome fashion—right now, he was Orb's enemy, and Xia Ya's enemy as well!

That power had now become a formidable threat obstructing his efforts to protect this land.

It filled Xia Ya with a profound, almost sorrowful sense of irony.

Just as Justice Gundam pierced straight through Orb's defensive line at overwhelming speed,