The Clyne residence was vast. It was impossible for the official residence of the former PLANT chairman not to be.
This was true even on a Colony Satellite, where every inch of land was precious.
And thanks to Clyne's personal cultivation, his residence, in addition to its size, was furnished with gardens and more.
It was not ostentatiously magnificent, but it was absolutely captivating.
All who had visited it had been full of praise for its environment.
It would not be an overstatement to call it a tourist attraction.
But that was all in the past.
Athrun strolled through the residence he had once visited many times.
In the short time that had passed—strictly speaking, a mere three to five days—this once-bustling manor had already fallen into ruin.
The outer walls of the estate were covered with graffiti, curses scrawled by angry Coordinators to vent their indignation.
The inside of the manor was no better. Before Athrun and the others arrived, it was unclear whether it had been searched by the secret police or trashed by their fellow Coordinators, who had always been touted as being of high quality.
In any case, the interior was also in shambles, a complete wreck, bearing no resemblance to the place Athrun remembered.
"Lacus."
Athrun arrived at the garden, looking at the place where his nominal fiancée had often spent her time.
He and Nicol had returned from Earth, ordered by his father, Patrick, to return to their homeland to receive new equipment. They had luckily avoided the Battle of Alaska.
However, he had witnessed everything that followed and personally experienced the vicissitudes of life.
"Perhaps it would have been better if I had participated in the Battle of Alaska back then?"
Moved by the scene, the blue-haired young noble, for reasons unknown even to himself, uttered words tantamount to suicide.
"Athrun, did you find anything?"
Nicol walked over and asked. His friend's words just now, though spoken softly, had not escaped his ears.
However, he pretended not to have heard and made no attempt to console Athrun on the matter.
"No."
Shaking his head, Athrun had not actually taken a single step into the main house of the Clyne residence since entering the estate.
He had merely been wandering aimlessly through the manor grounds.
"I see." Sighing, Nicol forced a smile under his full-face mask.
Although Nicol wore a mask, he believed Athrun could still guess his expression, if he had one at all.
"Mr. Clyne was wrong."
"Hm?" Hearing his friend's words, Athrun showed a slight reaction.
"You also believe Mr. Clyne really committed treason?"
Athrun would only say such a thing to Nicol. If he dared to say in public that Clyne had not committed treason, or that Clyne had his reasons for doing what he did, he would probably be beaten up on the spot by any Coordinator who heard him.
The defeat in the Battle of Alaska had caused nearly every household in the PLANT homeland to hang white banners, and cries of mourning could be heard everywhere.
"He didn't commit treason?" Nicol asked in return.
"You've seen the video from the ZAFT Forces warehouse where the Freedom Gundam was stored, haven't you?"
"And the Freedom Gundam did indeed appear on the battlefield of the Alaska campaign."
"That provides a reasonable explanation for how the East Asian Army managed to ambush our forces so perfectly."
"Our former Chairman, Mr. Clyne, secretly leaked our army's deployment plans to the East Asian Army long ago!"
"This..." Faced with his friend's logical and well-founded analysis, which was also the analysis widely accepted by the general public in the PLANT homeland, Athrun could not utter a single word to exonerate Clyne or Lacus in the face of ironclad facts.
"Is that really how it is?"
But Athrun was not like his father. Even though Mr. Clyne had later turned against his father and become a mortal enemy, he still felt a heartfelt closeness to Clyne.
"I'm going to take a look inside."
Athrun, who had been pondering why his future father-in-law would do such a thing ever since it happened but could never figure it out, said to his friend.
Then, without waiting for Nicol's reply, Athrun quickened his pace and fled as if escaping.
Watching Athrun flee in disarray, Nicol stood his ground, watching the other's retreating back.
"Athrun Zala, don't forget the surname you bear. As a Zala, you have only one choice."
Muttering, Nicol stroked his mask. The cold mechanical prosthesis touched the cold mask.
No sensation at all!
"Lacus." Having escaped from his friend Nicol, Athrun now found himself in Lacus's former private chambers.
Perhaps part of the reason Athrun didn't want to believe Clyne had committed treason was because of the pink-haired diva who once lived here.
After all, they were once de facto fiancés. If not for the current war, they might have even been married soon.
"Wait, what's this?"
As Lacus's fiancé, there was a certain tacit understanding between them. Athrun noticed something that others had missed.
Staring at a certain spot in the messy room, Athrun looked thoughtful.
"Did you find something?" But before Athrun could step forward for a closer look, his friend Nicol popped up again.
"No, nothing."
Glancing at it a few more times, Athrun forced a smile and claimed he had found nothing, then once again fled in disarray before Nicol's eyes.
"Oh?" Clenching his mechanical hand into a fist, Nicol wasn't about to believe Athrun's nonsense.
He beckoned, and the Coordinator agents from the secret department who had accompanied them appeared before him like ghosts.
"Follow Athrun."
"Yes, sir."
Still unaware that his every move was being closely monitored by his own friend, Nicol, Athrun acted perfectly normal for a while after leaving the Clyne residence.
When he deemed the time was right, the blue-haired young noble quietly left the PLANT capital.
He appeared at the entrance of the "White Symphony," a theater in Junius City's 5th district that was slated for demolition due to its conversion to agricultural land.
A promotional poster for one of Lacus's concerts still remained here.
"This should be the place." Athrun glanced around and saw nothing out of the ordinary.
He hurried inside.
"Is this the place?"
Nicol, who had been following right behind him, waited until he saw Athrun go inside.
Then, Nicol and a large number of special department members began to surround the entire theater.
Unaware of what was happening outside, Athrun entered the theater with a gun in hand, his senses on high alert.
"What's this?"
Suddenly, a beautiful singing voice reached his ears, as if guiding him.
"Lacus!" Tilting his head to listen carefully, Athrun rushed toward the source of the singing.
Following the song to its end, the person he had been longing for appeared in his line of sight.
On the stage, which looked like a ruin, a single beam of light shone down on Lacus.
It was Lacus Clyne, dressed in a blue performance outfit with her hair in twin tails.
She seemed not to have noticed Athrun's arrival, still singing her heart out on the empty stage.
"It's her." Athrun confirmed that the person before him was Lacus. He slowly walked over, placed one hand on the edge of the stage, and vaulted onto it.
Raising his gun, Athrun questioned his former fiancée.
"Why?"
"Didn't you come here because you already understood the situation?"
Lacus smiled as she looked at Athrun, who was pointing a gun at her.
"So it's true that you colluded with spies?"
Staring at her pretty face, Athrun felt like he was in a fantasy.
Why? Why did the Lacus before him show no remorse for doing something wrong?
Or was it that things were not as he, as everyone, thought?
A sliver of hope rose in his heart. Athrun was desperate to know the real story.
"I didn't collude with spies. I just gave a new sword to Kira."
Tilting her head slightly, Lacus had a firm grasp on Athrun's psyche.
She attempted to guide Athrun step by step.
Sure enough, when Lacus said Kira's name, a strong emotional fluctuation was visibly apparent in Athrun.
"Impossible." Athrun stared at Lacus in disappointment.
"Kira is already dead. In..."
"Off the coast of Orb, killed by Athrun's own hand."
"Athrun avenged Captain Creuset and redeemed the honor of many, many ZAFT Forces comrades."
Suddenly, in the middle of Lacus and Athrun's conversation, the doors to the concert hall were thrown open with a bang, and Nicol, wearing his steel mask, walked in.
"Well done. As expected of Athrun. Thanks to you, we were able to find the traitor, Lacus Clyne."
"Nicol?" Seeing the uninvited guest, who was also his friend, Athrun's mind raced for a moment, and he immediately understood why Nicol was here.
Besides the fact that he had been monitoring him, was there any other reasonable explanation?
However, looking at Nicol who had just pushed open the door, Athrun couldn't even bring himself to say a word of blame.
In the end, he was the one who had deceived him first!
"Nicol."
Lacus turned her head, momentarily forgetting about Athrun. She looked at the former little piano prince who had stormed in so aggressively.
Today, he was suffused with a murderous aura, and he wore a steel mask on his face.
Lacus glanced discreetly at the neat and orderly rows of chairs below the stage.
"Lacus Clyne, you've been accused of treason. What do you have to say for yourself now?"
"I advise you to come back with us obediently."
After entering, Nicol didn't say much to Athrun. His objective was clear.
To capture Lacus and bring her back for trial!
"I did not commit treason."
Facing Nicol's accusation, Lacus shook her head. Deep down, she had hoped this unwelcome guest would have arrived a little later.
But fortunately, it was Nicol who had come. On second thought, Lacus figured this might be a good thing.
"Nicol, what is your reason for fighting? For a medal, or for an order?"
Using the question she had prepared for Athrun, Lacus tried to shake Nicol's state of mind.
However, the Athrun of the original timeline would have had his resolve shaken by the news that Kira was still alive, and he would have been unable to quickly answer Lacus's series of questions.
But Nicol!
As an inheritor of Creuset's will in some respects...
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Gunshots echoed through the opera house.
Nicol, standing at the entrance, fired several shots. From his position, it should have been impossible to see the skilled members of the Klein Faction who were hiding under the chairs to protect Lacus!
But now, those skilled fighters were all dead bodies on the floor.
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