"What a lineup. It would seem you boys got your toys back." Marcus chuckled upon seeing a lineup of GAT copies.
'This is truly a Gundam War, and I love it.'
Testament Gundam swirled its blade as it was getting ready for more slicing and dicing.
"Marcus Anaheim! For what you did, I will blow you up!" Yzak roared angrily as his Duel was ready for a blow-up.
"What did I do? You got wounded by my daughter. But then again, I could take you to school." The Disguised Emperor teased the teen for a bit.
"Haah!!!" Duel rushed towards him, snapping from anger.
"Yzak! Damn you, wait!" Athrun rushed after him.
At that moment, the replica Gundams rushed right after Duel.
Marcus could sense them, how they were moving, and what they were going to do. It was basically precognition without even using his Geass.
'Simply glorious what you made for me, Patrick!'
Testament Gundam moved as the blade sliced through Duel's hand, chopping off the beam saber along the way.
"What the—" Yzak was speechless to see that! How fast was that!?
He was not the only one, as the other Gundams tried to do something, but Marcus simply sliced through their weapons as well.
In the Aegis case, its limbs got sliced off.
"Shit!"
Athrun once again realised how bad it was; his new machine got wrecked again. But that's where he switched into armour mode and shot a positron beam at Testament.
"Now that's not nice! You are using that at such a range!" Marcus complained as purple particles gathered around the edge of the katana as the Gundam sliced through the beam.
"..."
"..."
"..."
The aftermath left the trio speechless, as they had never imagined someone would cut through a damn positron beam!
Sadly, before could do more, GINNs began to throw themselves at him because these kids were from the big bosses.
~~~
"Damn that old man!" Cagalli complained as she looked at what was happening on the battlefield. There was a huge amount of mobile suits between her and her father.
The girl wanted to fight alongside him, but he was simply too fast!
'I want one of those! Can he make another machine with those wings? It looks so cool!'
Her Aegis turned into a claw as she grabbed a GINN before blowing through it with a positron beam. She moved forward towards another one as her limbs ignited into beams and then sliced through another GINN. The girl was slaughtering her way through the battlefield, each exchange making her better and better at fighting.
She was not the only one who was weaving through the battlefield, as Mu La Flaga, who was piloting Duel, was right behind her in terms of how many machines he took out.
Then, of course, Lacus, who was at the back, using her long-range sniper rifle to snipe from a distance.
A yellow streak burst from her rifle as in the distance a GINN lit up like a Christmas tree before blowing up like a firework.
'That would be the 13th one. Not bad.' She smiled a bit as her targeting system began to look for another.
Of course, there was another machine, a stealth one, as Blitz passed through the battlefield entirely and went to the warships.
~~~
All of a sudden, a black mobile suit 'manifested' in front of the bridge of a Laurasia-class frigate. It pointed its 'Trikerios' shield at the bridge and launched its needles right into them.
"Aaghhh!!!" The people in the warship screamed as huge needles slammed into them.
A chain reaction followed as the warship blew up afterwards.
The explosion caused everyone to look at it as it was a massive fireball.
GINNs immediately rushed towards it.
Jeanne snorted as she once more became invisible and simply drifted away towards another warship. With her Quantum Brainwaves, she can easily dodge most of the attacks, especially since no one can see her.
Once more, she appeared before another warship's bridge and proceeded to blow it up.
~~~
'This is worse than I have imagined.' Rau Le Creuset stroked his chin as he looked at what was happening.
They are taking out those Moebius armours, but those commander-class machines are balancing out… no pushing the scales towards Earth Alliance.
"Sir!" The blonde's second-in-command interrupted the pondering man.
"I am aware. Send a force to destroy that Blitz." The Masked Man leisurely commanded before returning to his thoughts.
"Understood!"
At that moment, one of their new Nazca-class warships blew up.
'This could work in my favour as well. Patrick should be seething at what is happening.'
~~~
"It's time, Admiral, order Daggers and 105s to launch." Marcus contacted the fleet while inspecting the battle. It would seem they have destroyed a decent amount of forces; now it was time for the main event.
"Understood, sir."
He then called the captain of his flagship.
"Captain, it's time to hammer it home, assume triangle formation with Archangel at the front and, of course, prepare to charge the Lohengrin."
The woman nodded sharply as she began issuing commands.
The ships began launching the mobile suits at the same time and assumed the formation.
As this was happening, the battlefield that was somewhat manageable for ZAFT turned for the worse as the Earth Alliance just launched their new mass production units!
At such a time no less!
~~~
"What is the meaning of this!" Patrick barked loudly as he saw massive movement on the Earth Alliance's side.
"Earth Alliance just launched mobile suits!"
"Mobile suits!? Impossible!" The man looked at the live broadcast from the battlefield. What he saw were indeed mobile suits with shields and beam rifles!
They looked somewhat similar to Strike, but they had visors.
Not only were there Commander units with different loadouts like positron cannons and missile pods, but there were also high-manoeuvre units in the form of flight support based on the Aile Striker pack.
When Patrick realised what was going on, he started raving in anger.
"No way… DAMN YOU ANAHEIM!"
As he was doing that, there was more…
"Sir! The Earth Alliance fleet is moving forward! The Legged ship is leading them!" The surprised officer said to the Supreme Council Chairman.
"Hmph! If they think they can survive a broadside exchange, then let them!" Patrick snorted, but his men were not as confident.
"...B-But sir… our ships we didn't design them to exchange fire…"
That's right! ZAFT designed their ships to support mobile suits from the back. They are not meant to exchange fire from the side like ships of the old.
And from the looks of it, Marcus is banking on that as the Earth Alliance ships are moving towards them. The mobile suits are making way for warships.
"And so are theirs!" The Leader of ZAFT replied with an assured tone. Earth Alliance was the first one to utilise Carriers that launch Mobile Armour and then stay at the back.
So it makes no sense to him!
"...Ummm… sir… we got an update! The Earth Alliance ships have some sort of shielding technology!" The Comms officer started to panic!
When Patrick heard that, fear replaced his anger as he knew that if they lost here anymore ships, it would be a death sentence for his carrier and his plans for the extermination of Naturals!
"Retreat! Tell them to retreat to Boaz swiftly!" The Supreme Council Chairman barked orders with a sweaty forehead!
~~~
"And there you have it. 16th century or 23rd century, tactics like these are what win wars." Marcus watched from inside his Testament Gundam as Archangel ripped apart the Nazca-class Destroyer in a broadside exchange after blowing another one with its massive Lohengrin main cannons.
Even if the ship was not designed to do this, there are still batteries that rotate for this particular move.
Same with the slightly smaller Agamemnon-Class, which Earth Alliance designed like a dagger. It has turrets that rotate to the side.
But there is one warship that is perfectly suited for broadside exchange: the Nelson-Class Battleship, built to dish out damage. In this situation, this ship was just the right one to destroy ZAFT's fleet.
Yet the victorious move was releasing Daggers and 105s to overrun GINNs. ZAFT's mobile suits are fewer in number.
Yet they were winning in sheer technological superiority, and now the Naturals have mobile suits. Whatever advantage they had was nullified, and worst of them all… Earth Alliance attack them at a critical time.
When ZAFT was expecting to push for victory and gain a decisive advantage with Operation Spitbreak, it suffered a crippling blow.
Marcus grabbed them by the 'balls' as they say, as someone who fought in several wars, battles became an art form for him, especially when everyone around was, by all means and purposes, a novice who hadn't fought in any wars before.
Just like that, the supposed invasion fleet lost more than 60% of its fleet, and a few Nazca and Laurasia began to run away with just a few remaining GINNs to assist in the retreat.
"Should we pursue?" Admiral asked Marcus as he watched them run away.
"No, keep the formation and find out what kind of losses we have suffered. I want logistics to immediately resupply us as we will make a move towards Boaz."
Boaz is the first line of defence for PLANTs.
PLANTs are hourglass-shaped, extremely fragile colonies. That is why Junius Seven got blown to bits. There was literally no protection until the war started.
ZAFT brought over asteroids that work like fortresses, creating defensive lines around PLANTs
The first line is Boaz, a massive asteroid fortress.
"Understood, sir."
~~~~~~Aboard Vesalius~~~~~~
As the escaping Flagship Nazca-class destroyer was reeling in from the absurd loss, the pilots were in an even worse state.
"N-No way… we lost…" Athrun was sitting in the locker room, speechless, with an aimless look on his face.
He would have understood something like where Mobile Suits battle each other, where machines overrun the ships at the end of the battle, but this was worse.
Earth Alliance used sheer numbers and tactics; the ships literally exchanged fire like in those movies. He watched with his own eyes how warships next to his ship went down in flames, watching how tens of people died, and he couldn't do a thing.
"Damn- Damn- Damn it all!" Yzak began to punch the wall with growing anger.
"If you haven't noticed, the wall can't hit back, Yzak," Dearka said with eye roll.
"Shut up! Haven't you noticed that we lost!?"
"Oh, I am pissed off, but punching the wall won't do anything." The guy shrugged.
"Whatever! What now? We are going to run like dogs!? There isn't much we can run! Boaz and then Jachin Due, and that's it!" Yzak looked at his two teammates.
"Most of all, they have mobile suits now!"
"..." Athrun didn't say anything as he simply stared at the floor; there was frustration in his eyes. How is he supposed to do anything! He gets beaten all the time!
But then they got called by their Commander.
~~~
"We received a word from the Supreme Council. We are to join the defensive line at Boaz, and the new GuAIZ are rolling out soon.
Our job is to keep the line for as long as possible, until the new models arrive." Rau Le Creuset explained to his pilots.
Yzak was speechless! That was it!? Are they to keep the line? That's all they can do!?
"Is there anything else we can do!? Just hold the line!?" The silver-haired teen gnashed his teeth in frustration.
"No. That's all we can do. We lost close to 80% of our attacking force. It will take months to rebuild our strength, while all that the Earth Alliance lost were their old models.
They literally threw garbage at us so that they could have more space for their new machines."
'Honestly, a genius move. I can feel that Marcus Anaheim is not new to war. It's like we are fighting an old war hero…' Rau Le Creuset thought to himself.
"Then we can assume that the next attack from them will be full of those mobile suits?" Dearka asked with a pondering look.
"Precisely, and this time around, don't be stupid and just rush at Marcus Anaheim. Our job is to hold the line." The masked man said with a deadpan tone.
It was embarrassing to watch!
~~~
Book Two is approaching finale, I still have a bunch of lemons to write, and a couple interludes, among them 'First Contact' before Book Three so there won't chapters for a week or more until Book Three starts
~~~
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