Gundam Iron-Blooded Ophans belongs to Sunrise/Bandai. Mass Effect belongs to EA/Bioware.

Gaelio Must Suffer #3

Glaosheimr 2, one of Gjallarhorn's orbital Earth bases, was plenty familiar to Gaelio Bauduin. An absurd amount of Gjallarhorn Military Academy exercises had been performed here, and even though they'd been massive pains in the ass, they'd paid off. He knew he wouldn't be half the pilot he was if they weren't in the curriculum, but that didn't really do much to quell the negative associations with loud, in your face drill instructors.

But Gaelio was here on a totally different mission – getting his subordinate to take a break.

He tapped his foot on the deck outside the officer's barracks; it'd a massive pain in the ass to go from Glaosheimr 2 down to Vingolf and back again a day later. For whatever reason, the only shuttles going to and from both locations were scheduled to run at the most inconvenient times, so he'd had to schedule everything around this short jaunt that he shouldn't have had to do in the first place. The only good thing was that it let him duck out of a meeting with McGillis about the whole alien thing…

"Specialist Major! What are you doing here?"

Gaelio turned around to face Ein Dalton, who looked utterly clueless. "There you are, Ein! I was wondering why you didn't accompany us down to Earth, especially since I made arrangements for you on Vingolf."

The young Martian ensign shifted uncomfortably. "I… I wanted to be ready whenever Tekkadan showed up, sir."

Gaelio tried his best to look understanding, although he was more than a little tired of hearing about Lt. Crank and Ein's quest to avenge him. "I understand that, but I just got some news. Tekkadan is out by Jupiter and McGillis used some connections to get some pirates to go after them. We might not even get a shot to take them on."

Ein seemed to deflate a little.

"But the good news is that you've got a chance to get some stories you can tell your kids and grandkids," Gaelio added, trying to lift the younger man's mood.

All Ein could muster was a half-hearted shrug.

Thankfully, the trip back down to Vingolf only required hopping on a sparsely populated shuttle with Ein and his duffel bag, which supposedly had some civilian clothes in. Gaelio didn't entirely believe that, mostly because Ein, for all his virtues, didn't seem like the kind of person who had taken a vacation in a long time. In fact, if Ein did have civilian clothes, Gaelio suspected they were many years old and probably wouldn't fit at all.

The shuttle lazily drifted down to Vingolf and touched down with little fanfare. As everyone filed off, Gaelio and Ein, who were sitting toward the back, waited until the last minute to leave. While Gaelio found this odd, he didn't think too much of it until he noticed Ein was marching like a dead man on the way to the firing squad. While he figured Ein was stiff, he didn't think the guy was that stiff.

Once they stepped outside, things came into focus. Ein gazed upon the unending blue expanse that was the ocean and froze, his bag nearly falling from his nerveless hands. It took Gaelio a few seconds to realize that Ein was not awed by the sight of the ocean – he was terrified by it.

He gently hooked his right arm under his pale, trembling subordinate's left arm and slowly guided him through the arrival terminal. Gaelio felt thousands of eyes fall on them, whispering amongst themselves about the odd sight, even though there was probably only a hundred or so people there. Getting into the elevator was a relief, especially since Ein had started quietly babbling about "the bottomless void," "basking sharks," and all sorts of weird stuff. The last thing Gaelio needed was a subordinate having a mental breakdown, especially when the world seemed to be getting crazier by the day.

Somehow, he managed to ease Ein into a monorail car that hurtled them a kilometer "south" of the spaceport, where the Gjallarhorn military garrison was stationed. Thankfully, for the now sweaty and anxious Gaelio, Ein had reached the point where he just was a zombie, incapable of anything more than shuffling around and obeying simple orders. On one level, he fully sympathized with his subordinate; as a child, he'd been deathly terrified of falling overboard and drowning, a fear that had died once he took the mandatory swimming classes in kindergarten. On the other hand, seeing a grown man (albeit one who grew up on basically a desert planet) react this way felt like watching a slow motion collision between two Zambonis driven by drunk monkeys. Gaelio found himself wishing he was a little boy again, so he could hide under a pile of coats, like he'd done many times in his youth, mostly when he'd done something trivially bad.

Thankfully, Ein managed to sign in at the officer's barracks with minimal prompting, allowing Gaelio to set him down on a bed like a good little boy.

"Alright Ein," Gaelio said, wiping his brow and heading out the door, "you and me are going to see the sights once I'm done with… whatever the hell I have to do tomorrow. You better be ready to have a good time."

And I'm going to make sure you don't see the ocean, because I'm not putting up with this again, he mentally added.

Ein mumbled something Gaelio interpreted as an acknowledgement, and he left the building with as much dignity as he could salvage, praying that this incident wouldn't get around too far.

Author's Notes: This takes place right after the first scene of the last chapter, which is a few days before the rest of that chapter.

It might seem a bit unfair to shit on Ein, but the guy has literally nothing going for him besides A) being the embodiment of Woolie from Super Best Friends during the Danganronpa Ultra Despair Girls LP (aka KILL CHILDREN), B) the fact he has Saitama from One Punch Man's dub voice actor (which ties into the next point), and C) he becomes a Warhammer 40K reference at the end of the first season. Him being a dude with no life and Gaelio trying (and probably failing, given what we see) to make him loosen up at least gives him some dimensions.

Also, since IBO Mars isn't that terraformed, Ein not being familiar with the ocean and freaking out seemed like a thing that could happen, especially since it seems like he's never actually been to Earth.