Jiliang's fingers clenched around the controls until her knuckles turned white. Cold sweat seeped into her palms, making the inside of her gloves damp and sticky. Just moments ago, Clotho Buer, the Earth Forces Extended who had been rampaging across the battlefield in the Raider Gundam, pouring out firepower without restraint, had been deprived of even the chance to struggle before the gray reaper known as the Providence Gundam. Its DRAGOON system, freely controlled through quantum communications, had formed a beam net without a single blind spot, reducing everything to meaningless cosmic dust.
Jiliang's breathing became rapid and uneven, as if the air in her lungs had been sucked away by that horrific sight. For that instant, she even forgot to control her machine, staring blankly as the blip representing the Raider Gundam vanished completely from the radar screen and turned into a jumble of signals representing wreckage.
The gray giant's head slowly turned, the glow of its monitor cold and piercing against the dim backdrop of the Mendel Sector. Even through heavy armor and the vacuum of space, Jiliang could feel the undisguised malice locking onto her.
Was she next?
The thought exploded in her mind without warning. It was the instinctive shudder of a living creature facing its natural predator. The Providence Gundam raised the massive Judgment Beam Rifle in its right hand, its dark muzzle aimed directly at the Freedom Gundam's cockpit. At the same time, the small cone-shaped mobile weapons—the DRAGOONs—that had been floating around Providence and harvesting lives only moments before once again fired their tiny attitude-control thrusters. That meant they had completed a new lock-on.
The moment the enemy pulled the trigger or issued a telepathic command, beams that were certain to hit would pierce the Freedom Gundam from every direction.
Jiliang suddenly bit