AC 181: A horse-drawn circus wagon is caught in an Alliance air raid. Catherine Bloom's parents are killed and her baby brother Triton is thrown from the wagon and lost.
AC 184: Mercenaries discover a four-year-old boy with russet hair and emerald eyes wandering alone along the side of the road. The boy is thin, dirty, wearing clothes far too big for him and doesn't answer when asked his name. Taking pity on him, the mercenaries take him in.
AC 190: The boy, now ten years old and known as Nanashi (No Name), is a valuable member of the mercenary corps. His natural talents and their tutelage have molded him into a first-rate soldier and mechanic with a composure and poker face many of his adult comrades cannot match.
Returning to the Rebel Army camp after his mobile suit is disabled in battle, Nanashi stumbles upon Middie Une, a young female refugee. He kindly takes the blond girl back to camp because the are "the same." Middie gives him a cross as thank you for rescuing her, telling him that now God will watch over him.
On the road to the next battle, their caravan passes a Circus. Middie comments that Nanashi looks nostalgic as he gazes out the window; he tells her that's impossible because he's been a soldier since the day he was born. Middie shrugs at this and goes back to playing with the electronic game handing round her neck. At the Circus, young Catherine Bloom yells at the passing convoy, thinking of how much she hates war.
The mercenaries arrive at their destination and set up an ambush for the Alliance only to discover they have walked into an ambush themselves. Some of the mercenaries have decided they would rather fight on the winning side and have betrayed the corps' plans. Nanashi ignores the mercenary Captain's order to retreat and fires on his ex-comrades killing them. The Captain is astonished that the boy turned on the men who raised him and taught him to fight. Nanashi tells him that he doesn't regret his actins since he was just doing what they had taught him to do -- destroy the enemy before he destroys you.
The only survivors of the ambush, the Captain and Nanashi return to the Rebel Army camp. Middie is horrified that the boy doesn't show the slightest sadness regarding the death of his comrades. She accuses him of shutting down his heart and questions how long he plans to wear his tearless mask. Until the day I die, is his reply.
The camp is soon bombarded by an air raid as the Alliance begins a massive sweep of the Rebel Army. Nanashi commandeers a motorcycle on which he and Middie manage to escape with their lives. The mercenary Captain is not so fortunate. Kneeling next to the bullet-riddled body of the man who had been like a father to him, Nanashi asks Middie how much the Alliance paid her. Clutching the electronic game, she tells him they gave her enough to feed her three little brothers and sick father.
Having deduced that the game is really a transmitter, Nanashi confronts her. Angry and defensive, Middie confesses, pointing out that once again, he is the only survivor. Being a perceptive boy, he angrily rips the cross from his neck, tossing it at her feet. Middie gloatingly confirms that the cross was also a transmitter. Removing the tracker from her neck, she says he's fortunate not to have a name or a past or comrades, or anything to tie him down. Impassively, Nanashi waits until her tirade ends to tell her, she's the fortunate one because she has a place to go home to. He then fires a single bullet into her transmitter and walks away, thinking he'll look for a home in outer space.
AC 194: Nanashi becomes a mechanic for rebels in the L3 colony cluster working on a new type of mobile suit. His skills soon bring him to the attention of the project leaders, Dr. S and Trowa Barton -- son of Dekim Barton and designated pilot of the Gundam Heavyarms.
AC 195, April 7: Trowa discovers that Dr. S and his aids plan to subvert Operation Meteor, the objective of which is to drop a colony on the Earth and then send the five Gundams to seize control of the crippled planet. When Trowa threatens to turn them over to his father, the panicked aide shoots and kills him. Nanashi witnesses the scene and volunteers to take Barton's name and pilot the Gundam in his place. Dr. S agrees and from this moment on, the boy uses the name Trowa Barton. The shuttle carrying Heavyarms launches toward Earth... thus begins Episode 1 of the series.