Editing KSGU:Volume 2 Chapter 3 (section)

===Part 8===

The explosion seems to happen at the port as the impact reaches the gateway nearly, causing the air in the central port 1km away to vibrate slightly. It’s not really a clear tremor, just a shaking of the air, a trembling that’s like touching skin—

Inside one of the 4 ships floating there, at the deck of the <<Garencieres>>, Marida senses this sensation from inside the cockpit of the <<Kshatriya>>. It’s the cry of a person before the life vanishes—I’m here. Listen to me, everyone. After such a cry, the shockwave that came over like a burden rocks the air, creating goosebumps in her body and heart. She grips onto the control panel, and that horrifying chill that passes through her body made her tremble. Don’t get swallowed by this, Marida told herself. Don’t empathize with a life that’s gone. I’ll show weaknesses if I do that, and I’ll share the same fate one day.

On the all-view screen, she can see the workers who were preparing to leave the port suddenly stop and look around. The other crew members were also shocked by this slight tremor. (What is it? An explosion…?) Gilboa’s voice came through the wireless communicator. He can feel this shockwave he can’t understand, and Marida’s angry over their slow-wittedness. Why are ‘normal humans’ so casual?

“IT’S SAVOIR! CAN’T YOU HEAR!?”

She can’t help but roar out, and immediately regrets it. Gilboa’s just an ordinary veteran pilot, and can’t possibly hear Savoir’s ‘voice’. (Savoir?) Marida ignores Gilboa’s surprised voice and asks, “How’s the contact with the captain!?”

(It’s cut. The Minovsky Particles got thicker. Activate the <<Kshatriya>>, save the captain, and get out of here.)

With any means necessary. Marida can slightly feel that Gilboa’s panicking too, and asks again, “Are we going to start fighting inside the colony?”

(There’re enemies outside. We can only break through from the inside of the colony. Faster!)

It’s been more than ten minutes since they detected the enemy’s presence, and though they started getting ready before Savoir notified them, it’ll take some time before the <<Garencieres>> can leave. Besides ‘her’, there’s also Zinnerman—her master that she can’t leave behind, which means that there’s a lot less things she can do. “Really…!” After grumbling, Marida lets the mechanical arm of the <<Kshatriya>> give a thumbs up to indicate to the deck personnel that she’s ready to sortie.

The cargo hatch over, and the sliding cargo rack slides, pulling the <<Kshatriya>> out of the ship. The <<Kshatriya>>’s mono-eye lights up, releases itself from its restraints and bends its upper body. The wing-shaped emblem on the sleeve—the insignia of Neo Zeon is flashing. As it deploys the four large pods, the large body of the <<Kshatriya>> stands up at a corner of the dock.

While the other ship workers and port workers are all staring in disbelief, Marida puts on the helmet and pulls the visor down. The port doesn’t have zero gravity, but it’s rather inconvenient to move with all the air around. She has to consider the air resistance and increase the thruster burst, but if she just randomly shoots them out, she’ll send the surrounding people flying. She lands on the floor of the port, letting the soles hook grab onto the rails, and then watches the workers frantically leave. She lets the <<Kshatriya>> move forward and chases away the people floating in the air until she can finally use her thrusters safely. Suddenly, she feels a sharp killing intent.

''The enemy’s here.'' Marida sees this instinct that’s transformed into a flash pass by her forehead, leaving behind a tiny vestige of light in her mind. The flash causes the psycommu’s power to increase, shooting out from the cockpit and activating the funnels that are hidden in the <<Kshatriya>> pods. Before Marida even realizes it, three funnel binders fly out from the pods and start moving like they were shot out by her.

The 2m-long attack drones shoot out its boosters, and the funnel-shaped machines all fly towards the port. The front unit flies past the heads of the port workers, through partitions that are sealed up, and immediately reaches the port before firing the mega-particle beam, breaking a small hole through the thick wall that’s separating this place from vacuum. As the air flow becomes stronger, the other two units fly out of the port.

The enemy that’s entering the port—the Federation’s main unit <<Jegan>> is showing signs of wavering as it moves through the large gateway for ships. The funnels fly out from the melted hole and shoots out its thrusters for a short while before surrounding the <<Jegan>> in three directions. Marida closes her eyes and analyzes the situation inside her heart. She can clearly sense that the <<Jegan>>’s feeling killing intent from the three small objects and intends to retreat.

“Too slow.”

She opens her eyes as she said this. The beams shot from the funnels burn through the cockpit of the <<Jegan>> and pierce through the control panel. The bright green machine has a burned hole there, and the <<Jegan>> that can’t move anymore floats out of the port. The funnels immediately return and fight their way through the air that’s flowing out. The anti-fire system activates on detecting air flow outside, and as the large amount of rubber balls that are filled with lots of drying wall foam reach there, the last unit has already left the port. As her consciousness capture the trails of loyal hunting dogs, Marida holds her breath and grabs onto the ball-shaped control panel.

There’s still a lot of enemies behind her. Since the front unit’s defeated, they’ll get ready to fight as they enter the colony. As she shakes off this uneasy feeling clinging on her, Marida steps on the pedal. The thrusters that are equipped on the 4 pods light up, and her body feels the acceleration as she’s held down on the linear seat. She continues to blow aside workers and preservation materials, and the huge mass of the <<Kshatriya>> that’s more than 74 tonnes in weight flies in the air.

The machine flies through the final gateway leading into the colony and enters it through the airtight wall covered by the ‘hills’. She moves down the artificial sun pillar and heads to the airtight room on the other side. The street lights that cover the inner wall light up the air, and a starry night-like scene surrounds Marida.

These little dots are all human living habitats, looking like normal daily lights that are as weak as glass—the images she saw in the day appeared in her mind. Marida bites on lips. ''Now’s not the time to think about such things. The enemy’s behind me.'' She has to do something big to lure the enemy away from the <<Garencieres>>.

She glides through the heavy air, and the moss-green machine that’s mixed in the night stops suddenly. Marida lets her body and machine feel the friction that’s different from piloting in real life, and lets the <<Kshatriya>> face the pursuers.