Inside A Baoa Qu's command chamber, the atmosphere was thick with certainty—manufactured certainty.
Gihren Zabi stood before the panoramic display, hands clasped behind his back, eyes fixed on the unfolding battle. Federation icons flickered and vanished under layers of laser fire. The Solar System array cycled again, its massive recharge completed. The A Baoa Qu defense grid tracked targets with mechanical patience.
Yet one vector remained conspicuously empty.
Lelouch's fleet.
Gihren narrowed his eyes almost imperceptibly. They should have struck by now. The plan was elegant in its brutality: Lelouch would annihilate the Federation rear, collapse their command chain, then pivot—Luna II, Revil, Earth, Europe. Decapitation warfare on a civilizational scale. Humanity reshaped under Zeon's rule.
And yet… nothing.
He shifted his attention to a lone marker forcing its way forward—Tianem's flagship, crippled but still advancing. Persistence bordering on insolence.
"Fire," Gihren ordered calmly.
"Solar System array and A Baoa Qu batteries. Ignore secondary targets. Erase that ship."
The command was relayed. The fortress hummed as energy surged through conduits older than most of the men operating them.
Then footsteps echoed behind him.
Gihren did not turn. He already knew who it was.
"Kycillia," he said evenly. "You've arrived late."
"Not late," Kycillia Zabi replied, her voice smooth, controlled. "Precisely on time."
She stepped beside him, eyes also on the battlefield. For a moment, they looked like allies again—siblings bound by blood and ambition.
Gihren spoke first. "Lelouch is taking longer than expected. But that is his nature. He waits for the critical moment."
Outwardly calm. Inwardly, doubt gnawed.
Kritikal? Or defiant?
Kycillia raised her hand—and with it, a pistol.
The room froze.
Gihren finally turned his head, eyes settling on the weapon pointed directly at his forehead. His expression did not change.
"Why," he asked calmly, almost mildly, "are you pointing that at me?"
"For Zeon," Kycillia said.
"And for my ambition."
The shot rang out.
A single, sharp crack.
Gihren Zabi fell without a word, his body collapsing against the cold floor of the command room. Even in death, his face carried no comprehension—no calculation, no contingency for this outcome. The idea that Kycillia would dare had never truly existed in his mind.
The command room erupted.
"Lady Kycillia—?!"
"Why?!"
"What have you done?!"
Kycillia turned slowly, weapon still smoking, her posture composed, almost regal.
"Gentlemen," she said coolly, "I am now the Supreme Commander of Zeon."
Silence followed.
Not agreement—fear. But fear was enough.
No one moved to challenge her. Not here. Not now. Not with the Federation still pressing and the fortress mid-battle.
An officer swallowed hard and stepped forward. "What… what are your orders, Lady Kycillia?"
Kycillia didn't hesitate.
"Destroy Tianem's ship," she said. "Finish it."
She turned back to the tactical display, eyes sharp. "Then advance operations toward Luna II. Revil must not be allowed to interfere."
A pause.
"And send immediate orders to Lelouch's fleet," she added. "The time for waiting is over. They are to attack—now."
The officers snapped to attention, hands flying over consoles, orders cascading through the fortress.
Outside, A Baoa Qu's guns continued to fire.
But inside, the war had already changed hands.
In a secluded chamber deep within A Baoa Qu, far from the roar of guns and command displays, Degwin Sodo Zabi sat alone.
The room was quiet—unnaturally so. No triumphant reports. No decisive confirmations. Only the low hum of the fortress and the distant vibration of its guns firing again and again.
Degwin stared at nothing.
He had already accepted two possible endings. Victory followed by a counterattack that would drown the Earth Sphere in blood, or defeat and death here, entombed in the fortress he had helped build. What he knew with certainty was this: Gihren would never surrender. His son's idea of peace was annihilation.
Footsteps approached.
An officer entered—no, not just an officer. An aide Degwin trusted. One of the few left who spoke to him as a man, not as a symbol.
The aide hesitated.
"Lord Degwin," he said carefully, "there is… urgent news."
Degwin did not look up. "If it is another casualty report, spare me."
The aide swallowed. "Lady Kycillia… has shot Lord Gihren. In the command room."
For a moment, Degwin did not react.
Then his hand trembled.
"What did you say?" His voice was thin, fragile.
"She killed him, sir. Declared herself Supreme Commander."
The world tilted.
Degwin's breath hitched violently, pain stabbing through his chest as he clutched the armrest. His body sagged forward, and the aide rushed to him, supporting his weight before he could fall.
"No… no…" Degwin whispered. "Not Gihren too…"
His composure shattered.
Tears streamed freely down the old man's face, his shoulders shaking as years—decades—of regret finally collapsed inward.
"Garma… Dozle… and now Gihren…" His voice cracked. "All my sons. All of them."
He covered his face with trembling hands.
"I loved them," he sobbed. "I truly did. So why did everything end like this?"
The aide said nothing. There was nothing to say.
Degwin's thoughts spiraled inward, clawing at memories he had buried long ago.
Is this punishment?
For Deikun? For what I allowed to happen to his family?
Or is this my failure as a father?
Perhaps both.
A bitter laugh escaped his lips, choked by grief.
"At least… at least I sent my daughter-in-law and my granddaughter away," he murmured. "If they were still here… Kycillia would have killed them too."
That realization brought no comfort. Only exhaustion.
Slowly, with the aide's help, Degwin pushed himself up from the chair. His legs shook, but his eyes hardened—not with ambition, but with resolve born of despair.
"Take me to Kycillia," he said.
"Lord Degwin, you should rest," the aide urged. "Your condition—"
"I am their father," Degwin snapped weakly. "And she is about to destroy what remains of Zeon. I will speak to her."
They moved toward the door.
Two guards stepped in front of them, weapons lowered but firm.
"Lord Degwin," one said respectfully, "by order of the Supreme Commander, you are to remain here. For your own safety."
Degwin straightened, fury cutting through his frailty.
"So it has come to this," he whispered. "Even I am a prisoner now."
He stepped forward anyway.
The guards moved to restrain him.
They never got the chance.
Degwin's aide acted instantly—precise, efficient. A sharp strike to the first guard's neck, a second blow dropping the other unconscious before an alarm could be raised. The bodies fell silently to the floor.
The aide turned back, breathing hard. "We must move quickly, sir."
Degwin looked down at the fallen guards, then toward the corridor leading to the command room—toward the daughter who had just killed her own brother.
"Yes," Degwin said quietly.
"Let us go."
Behind them, A Baoa Qu continued to burn through the lives of soldiers and pilots alike.
And somewhere ahead, the last Zabi patriarch walked—unsteadily but deliberately—toward the consequences of everything he had built.