The shuttle docked with the Gilgamesh soon after it broke out of orbit. The team of pilots came onto the ship worn out. The mission had been a success in that they had reduced Asia's power, but if they were wrong about how many mobile suits they had before the mission started, they wondered how wrong they could be about everything else. Everyone, Zach, Han, Eota, Base, Ess, Stacy, and Lisa, met in the meeting room. The pilots had taken off their helmets and their hair was pinned to their foreheads with sweat, except for Base' who's bandanna prevented that.
Ess - I take it everything didn't go according to plan.
Base - What gave it away?
Han turned glaring at Base a little bit.
Han - She's technically a superior officer, so be quiet, Ensign Rynolds.
Base sighed and plopped down in a nearby chair.
Base - Yes, sir.
Eota sat down on one side of Base, Stacy on the other.
Stacy - Are both of you alright?
Eota - We're fine...Base wasn't the only one to take any major damage this time.
Base - Yep, you all should be proud of me!
Eota - That's nothing to be proud of...
Base rubbed the back of his head.
Base - I thought it was a compliment?
Han crossed his arms closing his eyes and lowered his head standing beside Zach, Ess, and Lisa.
Han - There were a lot more mobile suits than we thought. Asia is far more along than the reports you had said.
Zach - We were lucky, most seemed to be unskilled pilots, not to mention hey were only Targos and Aries mobile suits.
Ess - Did you destroy the factories and the base?
Han - We didn't have to.
Ess look quizzical at Han who slowly opened his eyes.
Han - They blew it up. It was all a trap. They were trying to capture the Epiphany.
Ess looked surprised as Lisa shook her head.
Lisa - We should let Kiyoshi know. Him and the }{G might be better suited to deal with the threat if that was just a taste of what Asia had.
Ess - I'm sure we, as the Defenders, can handle it.
Lisa - No offense, and I don't blame you on this, but Asia is a lot different than what we first thought.
Zach - No, we can handle this ourselves.
Lisa - What if they have more powerful mobile suits next time! Hell! What if they have a Gundam! What are you going to do!?
Zach - What I have to!
Zach looks at Ess his eyes hard with anger.
Zach - Do you see now what the production of Mobile Suits do to people!? Asia wasn't even under one leader before Jytokia! Look what Mobile Suits did, they brought them together to fight, if they weren't around those people wouldn't have been inexperienced pilots.
Ess - We're not having this argument now, Zach!
Han moved in between everyone and held up his hands.
Han - Alright everyone, calm down. Let's not go to everyone's throats. So, there was a miscalculation...that's what happens. You have to adapt to each mission.
Eota, Base, and Stacy just blinked at the others.
Han - We all made it back alive, let's be thankful for that. Yes, I think we need to contact Kiyoshi, but let's not go asking for his help yet. Kiyoshi sent us here because he knew we could get the job done. Now, let's just cool down. We're lucky to be alive. Now then, the Taurus suits are badly damaged from the attacks and the explosion, they'll need a lot of repair. Epiphany probably needs it too.
Everyone looked to Han as he took charge of the situation.
Ess - Yes, I'll get to work on all of that right away...Zach, we'll discuss all of this later.
Ess started to storm off, she was a bit hurt that Zach had undermined her in front of the others. Zach could tell she was mad, but continued to push the envolope.
Zach - Don't storm off like that! If anyone should be upset it should be me, since you're so damn insensitive to know how much the codename Charon would effect me!
Ess glared at Zach and then walked out. Han shook his head.
Han - Young romance...it never gets old.

Tip jar: the author of this post has received
0.00 INK
in return for their work.