Mobile Suit Gundam- Ms Sensen 0079 -normal Down... «99% QUICK»

Rolf swore under his breath. Forty minutes. His GM’s fuel gauge read 14%. Leg actuators were squealing in the recorded playback—that telltale grind of sand in the knee joints. And the 100mm machine gun? Twenty-three rounds left. One burst. Maybe two.

The mono-eye flickered back on—emergency backup power. The Zaku’s torso twisted with a grinding shriek of damaged servos. Its remaining arm raised the heat axe. Not to swing. To throw.

He powered down non-essentials. No radar—gave away position. No comms unless encrypted burst. Just the hum of the reactor and the slow drip of hydraulic fluid from a bullet graze on the GM’s left thigh. He watched the Zaku. Mobile Suit Gundam- MS Sensen 0079 -Normal Down...

The Zaku’s mono-eye died first.

Rolf didn’t think. He squeezed the trigger. Rolf swore under his breath

The Zaku lay crumpled against a collapsed highway overpass, its heat axe still clutched in its right manipulator. Zeon ground crew had painted teeth on its shoulder shield. Cute. Now its pilot was either dead or leaking into the cockpit, and Rolf was supposed to sit here like a parked tank.

“He’s dead. For real this time.” Rolf’s hands were shaking. He flexed them inside the control gloves. “I’m Winchester. Zero rounds. Legs are yellow. Request immediate extract.” Leg actuators were squealing in the recorded playback—that

He walked the GM backward, each step a prayer to the actuators. The ruined city loomed on both sides—dead apartment blocks, a burned-out Type 61 tank, a Zeon supply truck still smoking. Somewhere, a child was crying. Or maybe it was the wind through shattered glass.

Twenty-three rounds. Tracer fire walked up the Zaku’s chest, sparking off the hardened steel, chewing into the cockpit hatch. The axe spun loose, clattering against the GM’s shoulder armor. Too close. Too damn close.

“Copy. Pull back to Nav Point 7. Don’t engage anything.”

“Normal down, Ensign,” the tech said, not looking up from the GM’s shredded knee. “You walk or you get carried. That’s the rule.”