The person responsible for setting off this entire chain of tension was none other than Mu La Flaga.
Naturally, he stepped forward to smooth things over.
“Sorry about that.
I didn’t mean to get everyone so worked up.”
He scratched his head, sounding apologetic at first.
But then his tone shifted.
“I was just curious.
On the way here, I watched quite a few simulated battles involving the G-series pilots.”
“Honestly, they struggled just to perform even the simplest maneuvers.”
He deliberately paused before looking at Jonathan, a complicated expression in his eyes.
“The difference is pretty incredible.”
It sounded like a casual observation.
In reality, he was blatantly stirring up trouble.
Everyone understood exactly what he meant.
He might as well have written, I’m trying to provoke a conflict, across his face.
Having said his piece, Mu didn’t linger.
He turned and headed toward the hangar, leaving everyone behind in an atmosphere that had once again become strangely tense.
That man was far more calculating than he appeared.
Of course, his complicated attitude toward Coordinators—something between hostility and another emotion he couldn’t quite define—was closely tied to his own experiences.
None of that mattered to Jonathan, though.
When Natarle saw Mu leaving, she immediately stopped him.
“Captain Flaga, where are you going?”
Mu glanced back at her.
“Where am I going?”
“My machine is still sitting in the hangar, and Creuset hasn’t gone far.”
“That guy is a real pain to deal with.” The source of this chapter is g.com.
“If it were up to me, I wouldn’t still be standing around here chatting.”
With that, he walked away without looking back.
Jonathan merely shrugged at Mu’s sarcastic attitude.
He couldn’t even be bothered to comment.
All he wanted now was to find a suitable door to use as a medium and return to the world between worlds.
He was about to leave the flight deck when the mechanics called out to him.
Jonathan stopped and asked what they needed.
The mechanics glanced at the Strike Gundam, then at him, looking somewhat embarrassed.
Their problem was simple.
Every member of the maintenance crew was a Natural.
None of them could operate the Strike Gundam.
That meant Jonathan was the only one who could move it into the hangar.
It wasn’t a big deal, so he readily agreed.
After helping the maintenance crew park the Strike Gundam inside the hangar, everything else proceeded much as it had in the original story.
Murrue assigned rooms to Kira and the others.
Jonathan’s presence meant they had to occupy one additional room.
Since Sai and the others barely knew him, Jonathan was given a room of his own.
He was quite satisfied with the arrangement.
Now he could return to the world between worlds without worrying about anyone seeing him.
As for the Archangel’s surveillance cameras, those didn’t concern him either.
Athena had already explained that the world between worlds existed within the gaps separating every universe.
Its frequency was completely different from that of any ordinary world.
In other words, the cameras couldn’t capture anything that happened there.
Therefore, all Natarle could see from the Archangel’s surveillance room was Jonathan entering his quarters and closing the door behind him. Get faster updates on g.com.
After that, the footage remained perfectly ordinary, as though nothing had happened at all.
Meanwhile, in the Marvel Universe…
Outside Jonathan’s house.
Today was a school day.
As much as he wanted to continue exploring the myriad worlds, he had no choice but to put his adventures on hold for now.
Time continued to pass in the other fictional worlds after he left, but its flow clearly wasn’t synchronized one-to-one with the Marvel Universe.
He still had no idea exactly how great the difference was.
He had confirmed that much when he returned home last night.
To keep Captain Stacy next door from noticing his sudden disappearance and launching a citywide search, Jonathan would have to limit most of his interdimensional journeys to school holidays.
Looking up, he saw Gwen Stacy waiting for him outside.
Unlike Murrue’s mature beauty, Gwen practically overflowed with youthful energy.
The morning sunlight fell across her face, casting a faint golden glow along the edges of her blonde hair.
“Hey, Jonathan.”
Her smile was as sweet as ever.
Her eyes curved into crescents, and her entire presence seemed bright and radiant.
The Gwen of this universe looked even younger and more innocent than the version Jonathan remembered from the movies in his previous life.
Her skin was fairer, and her features were softer.
Standing close to her, even her breath seemed to carry the freshness unique to youth.
After exchanging a simple greeting, the two climbed into the back seat of George’s police cruiser.
As Jonathan’s neighbor, George had taken care of him ever since his parents died in a car accident.
In many ways, George had already taken the place of a father in his life.
That was why he drove Jonathan and Gwen to school every morning.
As soon as they settled into the back seat, Gwen did what she always did.
She deliberately shifted closer until she was practically pressed against Jonathan.
Teasing him was one of the few daily pleasures her father never explicitly stopped her from enjoying.