9. Amuro’s Place

Designed for zero g, the electric cars (elecars) ran along guide rails, linked together like a train. There were also cranes driving to-and-fro around the Trojan Horse. Within the gaps of the busy dock the harbor employees crossed left and right, up and down.

“Where the hell are you going!?”

“Wha–?”

The deck crewman’s mouth was so animated that it was impossible to tell what he was yelling about. Being able to see that deep into the man’s throat just caught the boy by surprise. 

“Go get into your pilot suit!”

“Coming aboard!”

Since this wasn’t the sort of atmosphere to ask why, he drifted into the block where the briefing room was located. 

“…Mirai Yashima didn’t refuse?”

“Wouldn’t Side 6 take us in if we deserted?”

“The police here took our pictures. Get arrested and they’d turn us over to Zeon to be shipped off to the asteroids.”

“Hell no! I couldn’t stand never seeing the Earth again!” 

Those were the sorts of conversations happening amongst the crowd. 

“What’s going on?”

“The only reason we can be in this neutral side is due to an unspoken agreement between the Federation and Zeon, so from the Rank administration’s perspective they can’t have us staying here forever.” After checking the life support system on the pilot suit, Corporal Zemin, the combat nurse, pushed it towards Amuro. 

“You say we’re leaving, but aren’t the Zeons just outside?”

“That’s right.”

“What will the Rank administration do if the Federation wins the war?”

“They’ve calculated that Zeon is going to win. They gave us fuel and food, because they think it excuses things.” 

“So Ms. Mirai and the Captain agreed?” 

“There was no other choice, since Inspector Cameron was the one who delivered the expulsion order.”

“What do you mean?”

“That Rank lapdog is Mirai’s fiancé. If he tells us we have to leave she’s just going to say, ‘Oh, I see.’”

“They’re…engaged?” 

“Can you believe it? A marriage arranged by your parents, in this day and age.”

Amuro had known that Mirai, who served as the ship’s helmsman, came from a good background, but finding out that she was in a relationship with someone like that left him feeling betrayed. In which case acting captain Bright Noa, who had a crush on her, was probably even less amused. 

“So we’ve been dragged into a romantic quarrel, plus we’re being sent out to a waiting enemy?” Locking his helmet into his pilot suit, Amuro felt gloomy.  

“It sounds like there’s a whole combat platoon out there.”

“Where are we supposed to go?”

“Apparently the EFF are rallying their forces, but I’m hoping that the Newtypes come through and find a place we can retreat to.”

Corporal Zemin confirmed one final time that Amuro’s life support was functioning. 

“It’s in their favor to abandon the Trojan Horse here.” Saying that, Amuro remembered the color of his father’s eyes, squinting through a pair of glasses. Lalah’s emerald green eyes loomed behind him in the background.

“The Captain is intending to make off with Mirai.”

“…Huh!? Is that really true?” Acutely feeling his own cowardice, Amuro sighed.

<All pilots, to your mobile suits! Maintain level one battle stations as we get underway!> The acting captain’s nervous voice rang out through the intercom, placing the young man’s jealousy on full display.  

“I don’t want to.”

“That goes for me too.”

“What are you doing! Didn’t you hear your orders!?”

Surprised by the booming voice, Amuro reflexively saluted the short-haired blonde, Sayla Mass. The woman, her serious personality a product of a proper upbringing, floated towards her machine, clad in the armor known as a pilot suit. Despite that, it didn’t necessarily mean that she had the aptitude to be a pilot. The only thing that qualified her to be a combat pilot was the fact that she had experience flying space planes from a young age. But this wasn’t about her experience as much as it was because the White Base was so shorthanded. 

⌘

It felt like these human shaped machines had been given the name “mobile suits” just to spite him. Standing nearly twenty-five meters tall, they were controlled by an incomprehensible computer, and confining yourself to the cockpit located in the chest felt exactly like being sealed inside a coffin. Amuro’s bad luck all started when he got inside one of these war machines and was able to produce results. The reason he hadn’t been punished by the military was because they wanted to make use of him until he died. It was torture, and a proper sentencing would have been preferable. On the battlefield the white mobile suit instantly made him a target, and he could feel the enemy pilots’ thoughts hitting him, trying to gouge out the insides of his head and throat.    

After that, it seemed that if you directly took the brunt of the enemy’s consciousness you would die instantly. However he hadn’t died instantly, so he could only say “it seemed.” At any rate, he fought by sending his own awareness into the source of the thoughts attacking him, and with that the battle was over. 

In the case of a video game, you only needed to maintain your awareness as it was pulled into the screen. If you got a Game Over there was nothing to stop you from trying again. However, in real life fear was constantly chafing your nerves, and Amuro would fight through it, chilled and drenched in sweat, surviving again and again. 

Amuro, good job. It’s Sayla. You can see the ship, right? Come on back. Led by that voice, he took a deep breath and gulped down the contents of the drink Fraw Bow had given him. This was just compensation, so there was no satisfaction in it. On top of that, people had applied the label “Newtype” to him, but it was derogatory, a way to call him a freak with abnormal combat skills.

Because humanity moved to space, Newtypes are the people who evolved as a response to their new environment…that’s the theory proposed by Zeon Deikun. However, if Side 3 launches a war for independence then the rest of humanity is going to respond, and so people are still behaving the same as they were in Ancient Greece or Rome…I suppose human intellect didn’t develop due to the evolution of tools, but I wonder if shape memory just doesn’t work in humans, perhaps? …You get it, don’t you? Even though nature itself, and the places that nature’s found in should have the power to remember, it’s like the human form doesn’t have a memory capable of evolving…but you know, if history up through the 21st century was what led humanity to make the decision to go to space, to an environment where there’s no choice but to make thorough use of tools, then this idea of waiting for Newtypes to appear is about testing the upper limits of human intelligence, with the chance that it might make us all a little smarter, right?  

That was Mirai’s explanation. But when it came to the understanding of people like Kai Shiden, that is, the general population, when used to refer to their best pilot the word “Newtype” was twisted by jealousy, another way to say weirdo. 

The complex, human-shaped machines were governed by computers which took into account their mechanical limits, but due to the overuse of all sorts of dummies and decoys on the battlefield, and particularly the practice of scattering interference-causing Minovsky particles, the robots’ ultra-fast reactions became bogged down in the heat of battle. So the robots became manned, and once the effectiveness of that was proven with Zeon’s initiation of the One Year War, mobile suits were piloted in order to ensure their analog technologies.   

He was a guinea pig. It seemed like Amuro possessed the reflexes to instinctively react to the outside world, responding to the gaps in the computer’s control, or rather, controlling his own breathing as he piloted, which appeared to be the reason for his continued survival.     

Raising up the armored plating over the cockpit, Amuro took a look outside. The only thing between him and space was a layer of flowing air. This was an application of the Casimir effect, an electromagnetic wave-like field that even worked in a vacuum. It would be very easy to reach his hand out, but if he did that his cells would asphyxiate, he’d be burned and frostbitten, and he’d die. As long as he stayed behind the Casimir wall he was in no physical danger, even though the air did feel cold. Sensing that he could perceive the outside world from here, Amuro even went and opened his visor.     

Ahead of him, beacons marking Side 6’s airspace approached from beyond the colony pilot boat. 

“If it’s three cruisers, that means three Dom-types…no, it could be as many as nine…on our side we’ve got two Cannon-types, as well as Sayla and Sleggar’s two Core Boosters.” Against the curtain of stars extending out in all directions, he spotted a light leaving a trail behind it.

*VRMMM!* 

*THUD!*

A plate-like wall appeared, so closely timed that it was almost as if it had been the source of the sound, and he jumped back. A formation of three Doms had violated Side 6’s airspace. It’s a bluff… It was forbidden to open fire inside of neutral territory. If nothing else, the three cruisers on their way to intercept Amuro and the others would respect that. That was why the Dom pilots were only threatening them, to try and get them to surrender now.

There were ten mobile suits. The trio of Zeon cruisers cut across Side 6 space, trying to ensnare the Trojan Horse from the left, right and north.  

“We are not going to give in…in one minute’s time we’ll be clear of Side 6’s airspace.” The contact link worked the same way as a wired communication line. Bright Noa’s voice cracked. 

“…Goodbye…Cameron…” It sounded like Mirai was crying. 

I wonder what’s happening? For Amuro, listening to the exchange on the bridge over the ship’s internal comm line felt like it was coming from a different world.  

When the Trojan Horse entered Side 6, the inspectors sent by the Rank administration covered the ship’s weapons with “red tape,” and they had the authority to seize the entire ship without argument if the weapons ban was broken.

Amuro was not ignorant of the rumor that one of those inspectors had gotten into an argument with Mirai. However, he finally understood the situation as he watched the movements of the pilot boat leading the Trojan Horse. Mr. Cameron is on that ship… The pilot boat had been staying close to the left side of the warship’s bridge, but now it turned its bow and started to angle back towards Side 6. Watching the boat’s path, following behind the Trojan Horse to make sure it had left the colony space, Amuro could tell that Inspector Cameron was feeling regret over his parting with Mirai.   

What is the acting captain going to do? Fight in order to protect Mirai, pretending like he’s her lover?

The beacons signifying the territorial border also made use of the Casimir effect, sending floating streaks of light in all directions. The three enemy ships surrounding the Trojan Horse from the left, right and overhead began to turn.  

“You idiots…” Watching their actions, Amuro closed his visor. A screen rose up on the surface of the hatch, giving him a view of outer space.

“Too bad for them, but we’ll be attacking first!”

Hearing the voice of acting captain Bright, Amuro applauded the decision. If the very tip of the Trojan Horse was able to reach open space, it wouldn’t be a violation if the red tape ended up destroyed by the cannons and guns mounted to the prow of the ship. Once the forward guns crossed the boundary line and started releasing streams of beam fire, Kai Shiden and Hayato Kobayashi’s red mobile suits began to shoot as well. 

“This is Amuro! I’m going out above!” Speaking into the ship’s internal line, Amuro raised his machine. His movements were difficult to spot, due to the burning Zeon cruiser caught by the Trojan Horse’s opening attack and the intersecting beams coming from both sides. Amuro’s machine cut through the surrounding stars, hiding itself inside the band of light over the northern sky.