1: Unfixed Schedule

21 December, 0135 Hours (Local Time)

Spratly Islands

It’s an awfully extensive facility for such a remote island... Sagara Sousuke allowed himself to be impressed, momentarily forgetting the similar nature of his own force’s base.

His machine’s night-vision sensors made the sea around him look green. The island in question towered over it, a mere two kilometers across at its widest. The main mass was a rocky mountain dozens of meters high, which grew thick with grass and a small handful of trees. It was a common sort of topography, here at the edge of the Spratly island chain.

But that wasn’t all that he saw.

A variety of radar antennas topped the mountain’s highest points. Foot soldiers patrolled, equipped with night vision goggles. Electromagnetic-sensitive mines floated on the water, effectively preventing the approach of mini-submarines. It was impressive security for a pirate stronghold; most squads wouldn’t even be able to get close.

Most squads, that is.

The arm slave Sousuke was operating, the ARX-7 Arbalest, had just arrived on the north shore of this “pirate island.” According to the pre-mission briefing, the south shore was home to a small harbor and dock. The dock was apparently where the pirates moored the high-speed craft they’d been using to raid passing commercial ships for the past few months. It also hosted the warehouses in which they stored their supplies, ammunition, and plundered goods.

The north shore, meanwhile, was a treacherous cliff constantly pounded by waves. Sousuke was supposed to climb the rock face here, to ambush the base on the south side from behind. Any flesh-and-blood soldier who tried to scale the cliff would surely end up dead, dashed by the waves against the jagged rocks. Only the humanoid weapons known as ASes could handle a secret landing in terrain like this.

It was night, and the only light available came from the moon glowing faintly through the clouds. The Arbalest, painted a dark gray to blend in with the darkness, released the faintest of whines from its electromagnetic muscles as it scaled the rocky cliff.

Once he had gotten beyond the reach of the sea spray, Sousuke activated his machine’s ECS-enabled invisibility mode. The armor opened in places, revealing lens-shaped devices. These projected a hologram screen that enveloped the machine, and caused it to disappear into thin air.

Just then, he received a transmission from an allied machine. “Uruz-6 to 7. What’s the holdup? We’ve been waiting forever,” Sergeant Kurz Weber complained. He was in a sniping position on the south side of the island, where the waves were much calmer.

“Uruz-7 here,” Sousuke replied briefly. “I’m not there yet. Remain on standby.”

“So what’s the holdup? You’ve got a wire gun, right? Get up the damned cliff already.”

“If I knock any rocks down, the enemy foot soldiers will hear my approach.”

“Then shut ’em up with your taser. Just—”

“Transmission over,” Sousuke said, cutting him off, and then grumbled to himself. He’d worked hard to get this far unnoticed. A more mediocre operator would already be out of the fight after having triggered a mine, or he’d have ruined the whole mission after being discovered by a foot soldier.

《Alert message. You are fifteen minutes behind the expected attack time. Move to waypoint Foxtrot swiftly.》 It wasn’t just Kurz; the Arbalest’s AI was also hurrying him on.

“Shut up,” he snarled back.

《Roger. But first, a word of caution: statistics suggest that a sense of impatience doubles one’s potential for error. Singing is recommended to calm your mental state. I have prepared fifty of the latest hit songs. If you have any requests—》

It would have been one thing if he’d said it in a joking fashion, but Al’s voice remained matter-of-fact, and it just made Sousuke more annoyed. “I didn’t order you to prepare songs. Don’t waste your storage space without permission.”

《It is no issue. It’s a mere 1.2 gigabytes.》

“Delete it all, or I’ll destroy it myself, for the good of the mission.”

《I interpret this message to be a joke. Joking is also an effective countermeasure. I have prepared fifty jokes designed to make humans laugh. If you have any requests—》

“It’s not a joke, it’s a warning.”

《Excuse me.》 Al said nothing more.

In the cockpit, Sousuke shook his head irritably, and the Arbalest mimicked his motion. Who ever heard of such a pointlessly “helpful” AI, anyway? Imagine a machine’s control support system telling him to “sing,” of all things...

In the two months since Hong Kong, his AI’s behavior had gotten stranger and stranger by the day. It was making small talk regularly now, and lack of any obvious signs of malfunction made it all the more annoying. According to the maintenance crew, they’d hooked “him” up with FM radio and BS TV input on Al’s request, and he seemed to be receiving shows—now, Sousuke wondered if he should have stopped them.

The Arbalest used its manipulators and foot spikes to carefully scale the cliff. The machine’s ECS was working smoothly. He had to make countless stops to let foot soldiers on the cliff above pass by, and had a few close calls where he almost went plunging... but at last, five minutes later, Sousuke reached his designated location, and informed the team leader: “Uruz-7 to Uruz-2. I’ve arrived at waypoint Golf.”

A reply came after a pause. “Uruz-2, roger that. Let’s get the party started. Ready? Set your ADM to presets. All units run final checks, then give verbal confirmation.” It was their strike team leader, Second Lieutenant Melissa Mao, who showed no inclination to scold him for the delay.

“Uruz-6, no problems here.”

“Uruz-7, ready.”

“Gebo-3, ready.”

“Gebo-4, ready.”

After Kurz and Sousuke, the two “Gebo” responses were from transport helicopters, which were hovering on standby about a klick from the base. Thanks to their newly-integrated sound reduction systems, the Arbalest’s audio sensors could only barely make out the sound of their rotors and engines. The helicopters carried twenty infantry apiece, who would storm the island and lock it down after the ASes had finished their initial assault.

“Okay. Ahem.” Once everyone had reported in, Mao cleared her throat and shouted, “Then, attack commence! Go, go, go!”

“Al,” Sousuke ordered. “Drop ECS and switch to military power and combat mode.”

《Roger. ECS: Off. GPL: Military. Master Mode: 2.》

The ECS shut down, allowing all power to be diverted to combat functions. Blue sparks popped and hissed against the purple-black sky, and the white machine appeared, standing at the top of the rocky mountain.

A pirate dozing in a nearby watchtower stared in disbelief as he witnessed the phenomenon for the first time. He hesitated over whether to reach for the machine gun switch, the alarm, or both, but ended up collapsing with a howl before he could reach either of them. An electric pulse from the taser in the Arbalest’s hand had knocked him out cold.

“Starting up,” Sousuke said, without sparing the fallen man so much as a glance.

《Roger.》

Sousuke’s arm in the cockpit moved, and the Arbalest’s arm moved to match it. It pointed its Boxer shotcannon, made by the Italian OTO Melara corporation, directly at the pirate base right below. There were all kinds of targets to choose from: the control room, ammunition depot, old-fashioned ASes, SPAAGs...

He set his sights first on the roof of the depot and pulled the trigger. It hit hard. The 00 HEAT fired by the Boxer blew off the roof and set the ammunition ablaze. An explosion boomed out, and a pillar of flame raked the sky, acting like a starting gun for full hostilities.

《E3 destroyed. Great Balls of Fire!》

“Stop talking now,” Sousuke ordered, thinking that Al was sounding almost as flip as Kurz. Sousuke clicked his tongue and took aim at his next target.

The first few minutes of combat would all but decide the outcome.

Their surprise attack had taken out the pirates’ control room, ammunition, and moored high-speed craft, which threw them into pandemonium. And as for the old-style Soviet ASes set up in the back of the base, the Rk-89 Shamrocks—Sousuke had no idea what they were doing on an island like this—they were instantly dispatched by shots from Mao’s machine, before their operators could even reach them.

Mao’s AS, the M9 Gernsback, was still in the ocean, making its way slowly toward the pirates’ dock while waist-deep in seawater. Mao was getting sniper support from Kurz, in position behind her, and from Sousuke on the mountain above.

“Whew. Just like a shooting gallery!” Kurz laughed over the radio.

“Uruz-6, keep your guard up. We haven’t taken out all the foot soldiers. And you know it’s when we get cocky that we—” There was a roar. Before Mao could finish, a pillar of water burst up, just to her right. Something must have exploded nearby. “What was that?!” she shouted, panicked. “It didn’t come from their base!” Sprays of salt water dashed against her M9 as she whipped it around, using its head-mounted radar to scan the area.

“Uruz-2! Three o’clock, distance four! Eight enemy HSC!” Sousuke had a better vantage point than Mao from on top of the mountain, so he gave her the verbal warning, while Al wordlessly used the machine’s high-speed advanced data modem to distribute their sensor information to all allied machines.

Eight high-speed craft were approaching, coming around from the island’s west side. It was a blind spot from Sousuke’s point of view, which was why he’d been slow to spot it. They were probably returning from a raid—the worst timing possible.

Their speed was forty knots—about 74 kilometers per hour—and despite their small size, each was equipped with 20mm machine cannons and infantry rockets. The eight boats kicked up a sheet of water as they unleashed their weapons on Mao, who cursed at this new wave of concentrated fire. “Yeek! I mean... dammit! What the hell?! Intelligence said they only had what was in the dock! Where’d the reinforcements come from?”

“It’s the usual: bad intelligence. I wish they’d give us a break, for once...” Kurz muttered.

“Stop bitching and do something!” Mao screamed at him.

“I am! ...That’s two down!” Kurz’s 76mm shots had hit their targets, taking out two pirate boats in a fiery explosion.

“Only two?!”

“Hold your horses! They’re far, and they’re pretty damned fast. Wish I’d brought a Hellfire or a Versile...” Kurz said, sounding a little panicked. The Hellfire and the Versile were kinds of guided missiles used by ASes. The position assigned to Kurz for back-up sniping was the perfect distance for safely taking aim at stationary targets, but it was less useful against targets moving at 40 knots. It was a testament to his skills that he’d been able to take out two already.

Six boats remained. They raced through the water around Mao’s M9, peppering it mercilessly with shells and rockets. Her head-mounted machine guns blazed and filled another boat with holes, but that still left five remaining.

“Ugh, so annoying!” she wailed. “Guh... this is really bad!”

The M9 sloshed awkwardly through the heavy water, taking evasive maneuvers. Even with the M9’s armor and maneuverability, it couldn’t endure such a fierce assault for long.

《Sergeant. Uruz-2 is in danger. We must open fire at the enemy HSCs,》 Al told Sousuke, who was simply watching from the mountaintop without firing any support shots.

“Inefficient at this distance,” Sousuke said dismissively. “We don’t have many shots left.”

《Shoot the high-speed craft. There is no other choice.》

“No choice, eh? I disagree.” Sousuke promptly took the Arbalest a few steps down the mountain, judged his timing, and launched into a starting run.

《Sergeant. This angle is—》

“Shut up and help me!” Immediately, he dove off the edge of the rocky mountain, and leaped the Arbalest over the ocean. Wreathed by the silver moon, the slender silhouette hung in the air. Just as it reached the apex of its arc and began to descend, Sousuke fired off his arm’s wire gun. When the anchor pierced one of the high-speed craft racing around down below, he immediately retracted the wire, closing the gap between the two in a flash.

The Arbalest landed on top of the boat with a scream of metal and a spray of seawater. The deck buckled beneath its feet, and it sank so far it nearly capsized. In human-size terms, the effect was like falling several stories to land on a pedal boat.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” Kurz shouted in surprise.

The men aboard the unfortunate HSC had fallen on their backsides in shock. As they gazed up at the Arbalest, it plunged its monomolecular cutter into the deck to regain its balance, then let loose with its head-mounted 12.7mm machine guns. The shots shredded the boat’s armaments and engine, effectively taking it out of the fight.

“Get the gist?” he asked Al. “Let’s jump to the next one.”

Kicking its way off of the now-smoking boat, the Arbalest jumped. Sousuke shot off the wire gun in its left arm again, this time at a high-speed craft racing just ahead. Then the high-powered motor quickly retracted the wire, and... Landing achieved! Sousuke sprayed machine gun fire across the violently rocking boat, taking out its engine and gun turrets.

The Arbalest’s sensors quickly scanned its surroundings. The closest pirate boat had just fired a rocket in his direction; its red light was closing in. With a grunt, Sousuke jumped a third time, managing it just before impact. The rocket hit the boat he had just been standing on, and exploded. His machine twisted through the air, backed by fire.

The Arbalest roared down from the sky, aiming for the enemy boat currently bathing him in cannon fire, and successfully completed his third landing. The pirates practically climbed over each other to escape, evacuating into the dark sea around them.

《Sergeant. Such tactics were not anticipated. They are nonsense.》

“Are they?” Sousuke said, manipulating his machine. “Tell me the definition of nonsense.”

《Impossible, reckless, irrational.》

“You really are just a machine,” Sousuke told him, as the Arbalest shot a Boxer shell into a now-empty gun turret and the engine section.

The battle thereafter was completely one-sided. All of the high-speed craft were destroyed, and the pirates in the base were in a rout.

Mao’s M9 made landfall and went around taking out their remaining defenses. With her external speakers on, she called for surrenders in Cantonese, Mandarin, and Vietnamese. Any who kept up their resistance got a zap from her taser.

Their transport helicopters landed, and their ground forces poured out. Decked out in thick body armor, carrying bulletproof plastic shields, and under the cover provided by Sousuke and the others, they swarmed into the structures that the ASes couldn’t enter.

Before long, each team had announced that they had secured their designated area. Several minutes after that, the pirates that had surrendered were chained up and gathered in the dock. Their mission was effectively complete.

“Yeesh. That was rougher than I expected...” Kurz’s machine, too, had moved from its sniping point to join them, striding through the smoke to eventually make landfall. The M9 Gernsbacks that he and Mao were operating had similar silhouettes to the Arbalest, with long limbs, slender waists, and gray armor that dripped with seawater.

“Let’s just be glad that no Venoms showed up,” Sousuke said, returning the shotcannon to the Arbalest’s waist hardpoint. It was standing next to a group of pirates, seated and stripped of their weapons, and the allied ground forces who were watching over them. The pirates were sulking as if they’d lost a game to a cheating opponent. They didn’t seem to like that their ‘impenetrable stronghold’ had fallen so easily to the weapons known as ASes.

“Uruz-9 here. All ground squads have secured their areas; just two light injuries on our side, and no compromise to mission performance. Pirates have eight dead, four badly wounded, ten lightly wounded,” reported Corporal Yang Jun-kyu, the infantry team leader, over the radio.

Apparently they’d had to kill some resisting pirates—but then, these were people who had attacked any number of shipping vessels and killed their crews, as well. They were already being generous by employing tasers and tear gas and giving them a chance to surrender; it was the pirates’ own fault if they chose to die instead.

“But did we really have to come all this way just for some crummy pirates?” Kurz muttered, surveying the hostages with his M9’s head-mounted sensors.

“These are the Spratly Islands. It’s a jumble of spheres of influence: North and South China, Vietnam, Taiwan... That by itself makes it difficult for any national military to perform large-scale exercises here. This was explained in the briefing,” Sousuke said.

Kurz’s M9 waved its left hand in annoyance. “C’mon, I know that much.”

“Besides, this mission wasn’t just about taking out pirates,” Sousuke went on. “The name of the island is important, too.”

Badamu Island—that was the name of the isolated islet that the pirates had taken as their base. It had many names, as many as there were countries that claimed control of the Spratlys, and as many as there were languages that the Westerners who had once controlled the island spoke. This name, its Mandarin one, was similar to ‘Badam,’ the keyword that Gauron had passed to Sousuke in Hong Kong.

If it had just been the name alone, with nothing else distinctive about it, Mithril likely would have paid the island no mind. But the fact that it was also a stronghold for pirates causing trouble around the Spratlys made it a different story. Intense investigation and recon work suggested that there was little chance that the island was connected to Amalgam—but at the same time, they couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t.

“Uruz-8 to all,” Corporal Speck, the one investigating the pirate base’s storage block, said over the radio. “All I’ve got here is ammo and heroin. There are containers of vanadium, too... but they’re probably plundered. From the Peruvian vessel they raided a few weeks ago, I’d wager.”

“Vanadium?”

“It’s a rare metal, used to make that M9 you’re piloting now. It’s skyrocketed in price in the last few years thanks to the Soviet Civil War and uprisings in South Africa and such. It’s not as valuable as heroin, but... well, that’s a pretty high bar.”

“Oh? You know a lot about it,” Kurz muttered softly.

“I’ve been playing the stocks lately. Read an economics magazine now and then—When you make fighting your whole life, you get stupid.”

“Shut up, you gambling addict.”

Sousuke interrupted Kurz and Speck’s discussion. “Was there anything else that stood out? Any complex machinery, or AS parts?”

“Nope. It’s your standard pirate base, top to bottom,” Corporal Speck confirmed. “Nothing to connect it to those Amalgam guys.”

“We can’t be sure yet. We need to interrogate the base commander first,” Mao said. Her M9 had moved to the summit of the rocky mountain, where she was keeping watch over the surroundings.

“Uruz-9 here. Ah... about that...” Corporal Yang said. “The commander doesn’t seem to be among the hostages. Though that doesn’t mean he isn’t in the base somewhere...”

“Uruz-7 here. He could be hiding among the rank-and-file. Or he could still be somewhere on the island—” Sousuke got that far, then stopped as he realized something. The Arbalest’s sensors gave him a view of the rocky slope, and he could see a person moving around on the rock face that looked out over the harbor. The smoke and the darkness made it hard to see precisely, but it looked like the man had an anti-tank missile on his shoulder. No... he definitely did. The missile was pointing down at him from above. But by the time Sousuke realized it, the man had already fired.

“Sousuke, one o’clock—”

《Warning! ATM!》

Kurz’s and Al’s warnings came at the exact same time.

It was a close-range shot, but well within the range of what the Arbalest could dodge. Still, he knew that dozens of hostages and allied infantrymen were right behind him—in other words, right in the missile’s path. If Sousuke dodged, the missile would fly smack into the middle of those unarmed men.

He made the decision in a split-second: Sousuke didn’t dodge, but faced down the charging missile. There was a flash and a roar, and the anti-tank missile struck the Arbalest’s upper half.

“Dammit!” Instantly, Kurz’s M9 let loose with its 12.7mm head-mounted machine guns on full automatic. Bullets the size of Tabasco sauce bottles rained down in an instant, shredding the man who’d fired the missile, along with the rock he’d been standing on. “Sousuke?!” Kurz whipped around.

As the smoke cleared, the Arbalest could be seen, completely intact. It hadn’t moved from its arms-crossed position, but there wasn’t a single dent in the armor. Normally, a direct hit from a missile like that would have blown it to pieces.

“Not an issue,” Sousuke said at length. An invisible wall that had formed in front of the Arbalest had blocked the missile’s explosion—and the missile itself—dispersing the shockwave harmlessly.

“Uruz-2 here. What happened?! Status report!” Mao spoke nervously.

“Uruz-7 here,” Sousuke replied. “I was attacked by a remaining enemy soldier, but Uruz-6 took him out. No damage on our side.”

A small sigh of relief came out over the radio. “Uruz-2, roger. Be careful, okay?”

The transmission ended, and Sousuke stood his machine up. Kurz’s M9 was staring at him and the Arbalest. “Sousuke. Did you just...”

“Yeah,” he answered. “Did you register it?”

“I... I think so?” Kurz answered, flummoxed as he fiddled with the unfamiliar device.

“Al. It worked, didn’t it?”

《Affirmative. No damage to machine detected. Main capacitor voltage is stable, as well.》

“Good. Store the 120 seconds’ worth of data before and after into high-compression file Zulu-1.”

《Roger.》

Sousuke felt like he was starting to get the hang of this; together, he and the Arbalest were learning how to use the lambda driver.

“It’s a hell of a thing, though,” Kurz breathed. “Seeing it up close... You know that was a direct hit from an ATM, right? And you freaking brushed it off. That device scares the crap out of me.”

“I thought the same thing the first time I saw the ECS’s full invisibility mode,” Sousuke responded. “Don’t think too hard about it. It’ll seem completely natural, soon enough.”

“Well... maybe, I guess,” Kurz said over the radio in a thoughtful tone. “But I feel like when we brush this stuff off, we’re forgetting something important... when we start to think of the most out-there tech as being ‘completely natural,’ I mean. Even these things we’re in now... the ASes. There’s something really off about ’em, when you think about it.”

Sousuke just looked at him, non-comprehending.

“Ah, I’m just rambling. Anyway...” Kurz began, then changed his tone. “Uruz-6 here. You said you hadn’t found the base commander, right? Round him up quick and get him questioned. I’m ready to head back and get some shuteye.”

“Uruz-9 here... Um, according to the hostages, the commander is—” Corporal Yang spoke into the radio from where he was standing in front of the hostages. A few of them had gotten his attention, and were pointing in the direction that the missile had come from minutes earlier.

“What the hell is it? Spit it out already.”

“The commander was the guy with the missile that Kurz just gunned down.”

“Huh?” There was a long pause, and then, “Ah... I see,” Kurz said awkwardly.

Mao burst in. “What did you say? Gunned him down? You killed him? Why didn’t you use your taser?!”

“Use my taser?!” Kurz protested. “I was kind of in a hurry, y’know!”

“Shut up!” she screamed back. “How could you do this? We were just talking about having to take the commander in alive! You’ve completely ruined my debut sortie as a lieutenant!”

“Sh-Shut up! He’s an asshole who’s killed countless defenseless crews! He deserved that .50-caliber justice!”

“That’s not the damned point! We can’t interrogate a corpse!”

“He fired a missile at Sousuke!”

“Oh?!” Mao cried out, with mock concern. “And how’d that go for you, Sousuke?”

“Not an issue,” Sousuke told her.

“Ah, you asshole!” Kurz put in.

“See? This is your fault!” Mao lectured at Kurz. “You’d better write up one hell of a report! God dammit, Ben is gonna give me hell for this when we get back... Why’d I bother busting my ass to become an officer if I still have to deal with this crap?! I’ve made up my mind: next time we go out drinking, everything’s on you! Because of your short-sighted, simple-minded—”

“Shut up! Quit yelling at me!” Kurz yelled back. “You’re the one who blew away a hostage target-board with a 40mm shell last week at practice! That was—”

“Yeah, well, that was practice! This is real life!”

Sousuke interrupted the tedious exchange. “Excuse me. I would appreciate it if we could set questions of responsibility aside and begin making preparations to leave. If we head back now, I could still make it in time for my classic literature makeup exam. Mr. Fujisaki is very strict, and I’m in danger of failing—”

“Stay out of this, part-timer!” The two screamed in tandem over the radio.

Sousuke fell quiet.

《I agree, Sergeant. It would be wise to keep our silence in this case.》

“Al, I told you—”

《Forgive me. I’ll stop talking.》

For just a moment, Sousuke gave serious consideration to killing the AI while he could.

21 December, 0351 Hours (Local Time)

250 Meter Depth, West Pacific Ocean

1st Briefing Room, Tuatha de Danaan

“So, well...” They were finishing up the debriefing for the pirate stronghold mission, and Melissa Mao was awkwardly explaining how the Arbalest had gotten into a game of chicken with a missile. “In that instant, something bad and something good... basically happened all at once, I guess.”

“Start with the good,” First Lieutenant Belfangan Clouseau, leader of the SRT ground forces, requested. Up to this point, he’d been listening silently. He was a tall black man in his thirties, dressed in fatigues, with tense eyebrows and a masculine face.

Mao responded, “The Arbalest’s lambda driver activated, and blocked the ATM’s explosion. Gave us tons of data, too.”

“That’s excellent. Well done, Sagara, even if it wasn’t quite intentional. Just try to deal with them before they hit you next time,” Clouseau advised. “It’s an unnecessary risk.”

Sousuke, also in fatigues, sat in his chair and nodded silently.

“So?” Clouseau asked next, attempting to move things along. “What’s the something bad?”

“The pirates’ commander was the one who fired the missile, and Kurz blew him away. He unloaded his machine guns’ 12.7mm rounds... um...” Mao looked down at her clipboard. “...54 times in all, leaving no trace behind.”

“Ahh...” It sounded like he’d seen that coming, and he wasn’t exactly surprised... but Clouseau still closed his eyes, a vein in his forehead throbbing. “Wonderful. So, Weber, how do you propose we interrogate the man you just blasted into a fine red mist?”

Kurz Weber, sitting in the seat next to Sousuke, laughed hollowly. “We can’t. Well, we could ask an itako from Mt. Osore, maybe. But we’d need one that can speak Chinese.”

“I was being sarcastic, Sergeant,” Clouseau growled.

“I’m aware of that, Lieutenant.”

Clouseau and Kurz glared balefully at each other, and Mao let out a small sigh. The two men really didn’t get along; to say that they’d gotten off on the wrong foot would be a vast understatement. They’d had a few sorties together since their disastrous first encounter, and she was genuinely surprised that Kurz had never “accidentally” shot Clouseau in the back.

“Ah, excuse me,” Yang Jun-kyu spoke up hesitantly, as if to fill the silence. “If you don’t mind my saying so, it really was the only option at the time. Kurz’s M9 was just at the limit of taser range, and the smoke there was pretty thick, so that probably wouldn’t have worked. There was no guarantee the enemy didn’t have a second shot prepared, so he really had to dispatch him as quickly as possible.” Yang was the traditional mediator in these situations.

Clouseau took that in, then surveyed the room. “What do the rest of you think?” Everyone present, including Sousuke and Mao, signaled passive agreement, and Clouseau seemed to respect their judgment. “Very well. Maybe it was unavoidable, then. I’ll report this to the major—I think it’s clear that that pirate base has no connection to this Amalgam organization, which means we’re back to square one. We’re no closer to finding their base of operations than we were before.”

“Anything turn up in the analysis of the Venoms and the Behemoth?” Mao asked. Mithril had recovered a number of remains of Amalgam-made machines from previous battles, including the Behemoth from six whole months earlier. It was expected that if the research and intelligence divisions analyzed them in earnest, they could identify where the parts had been made and any corporations involved in their creation.

“Most of the core elements from the remains are ‘origin unknown,’” Clouseau answered. “The non-proprietary electronic bits have a variety of origins, including some made in Western Europe, and some in Japan.”

“No way,” she protested. “There can’t be many factories capable of building specialized machinery like that, can there?”

“Not many Western factories, anyway. They’re still reviewing particulars and commonalities between the designs, but for the Venoms, at least, the pervading theory is that they’re modeled on the Soviets’ next-generation AS.”

“The Shadow?” Mao questioned. The Zy-98 Shadow was the codename for a next-generation AS made by the Soviets’ Zeya Experimental Design Bureau, the successor to the Rk-92 Savage. Western militaries had only become aware of its existence a month ago, and not even Mithril knew its full particulars, but it was said to have a full electromagnetic propulsion system powered by a miniature high-output palladium reactor, and specs on par with the M9’s.

In other words, Clouseau was saying that the Venom was a modified Shadow. “We can’t draw conclusions just yet,” he cautioned them. “All we know is that, in terms of basic structure, the Venom is to Zeya’s new model as the Arbalest is to the M9. At any rate, we’re going to focus on that ‘Badam’ keyword that Sagara heard. Although... we still can’t be sure that that wasn’t some nonsense Gauron was spouting just to mess with us.”

“I’m certain there’s something to it, sir,” Sousuke insisted. Clouseau’s feeling was understandable, but for some reason, Sousuke couldn’t convince himself that what Gauron had told him in Hong Kong meant nothing.

“I know. Though it could also be a trap... best not to let our guard down, either way,” Clouseau mused in response, then shook his head dismissively. “Well, anyway, our job isn’t information analysis; it’s pest control. On any mission where there’s the slightest possibility of encountering a Venom-type AS, we always have to be on the top of our game. Major Kalinin feels the same way. Remember that.”

The group voiced a variety of, “rogers” and, “yeah, yeahs.”

“Now, I want a report from all of you by seven in the morning,” Clouseau instructed. “Weber, you’ll handle the watch over the three pirate lieutenants we captured.” They had brought the prisoners they’d taken on Badamu Island on board, where they were bound and blindfolded. The minute they arrived at Merida Island, the men would be interrogated by operations HQ staff.

“Huh?! Why do I have to—”

“That’s an order,” Clouseau said, cutting him off. “Pick PRT members to serve as the watch team and tell them what they need to know. Got it? This is all on you now; I don’t want a repeat of the Perio incident.”

“Roger,” Kurz responded after a second. He sounded surprisingly earnest about it; perhaps he was remembering what had happened to Clouseau’s predecessor, McAllen.

“All right, dismissed,” Clouseau finished. “Good work today, everyone.”

The soldiers stood up and left the briefing room, chatting.

“Hey, Ben,” Mao said to Clouseau, once the others were gone.

“Yeah?”

“Why’d you make Kurz do it?” she wanted to know. “I’d be happy to run the watch.”

“He needs a little more proper NCO experience. I’m teaching him responsibility.”

“Oh, I get you.” Mao nodded as if in perfect understanding.

“And it’s more than that,” Clouseau went on. “I spoke with Major Kalinin and Colonel Testarossa. Now that you’re a lieutenant, we need to promote someone from the SRT to master sergeant: the only options are Sagara, Sandraptor, and Weber. But Sagara is too young and he’s a part-timer, and Sandraptor’s not cut out for command. Plus...”

“Plus...?”

“That girl, Chidori Kaname, told me that McAllen’s last words to Nguyen during the Perio incident were ‘Call Weber and the others.’ At the time, the major was off-ship, and you were wounded—I guess the next name that came to mind was Weber’s. I think Senpai might’ve seen something in him.”

Mao remained quiet.

“I don’t like the man, but he has potential, and he cares about his comrades,” Clouseau admitted. “I thought I’d put him through his paces a while and see how he takes to it.”

“Hmm...” Mao hummed, her lips curving up into a smile.

Clouseau answered her pleased expression with a scowl. “What now?” he demanded. Once Clouseau was alone with her, he returned to talking like an NCO.

“Nothing,” she protested innocently. “I was thinking, ‘you’re so responsible.’”

“Get off my back. The major isn’t here most of the time,” Clouseau growled back. “Who’s going to do it if I don’t?”

“Fair enough. We’re all counting on you, Ben.”

“Darn it...” Tucking his file case under his arm with another scowl, Clouseau left the room.

After returning to the SRT duty room, Sousuke opened his laptop and began composing his report. Kurz had gone off to run hostage watch (grumbling all the while about unfairness), and that left the room quieter than usual.

Sousuke was thinking that he would polish off his paperwork, and then, once they surfaced, he’d take a helicopter to Tokyo. There were more than a few members of the crew who didn’t like the idea of an NCO like Sousuke getting this sort of preferential treatment, but he didn’t care. His grades were on the line, and he’d gotten the clause “can charter transport whenever reasonable” added to his contract (though the fuel costs still came out of his paycheck).

His report was about 80% finished when he felt his stomach rumble. If I go to the mess, he thought, I might find something left over.

“Where are you going?” Mao, who was fooling around on her laptop as well, asked him as he stood.

“To eat,” Sousuke answered her shortly.

“Ahh... gotcha. See you later.”

“See you.” As Sousuke left the duty room, he caught a glimpse of Mao reaching quickly for the on-board phone, but he didn’t pay it much mind. Instead, he just climbed the nearby stairway and walked down the passage beyond.

As he made it up to deck two, he ran into the submarine’s captain, Tessa—full name Teletha Testarossa—coming around the corner of an otherwise unoccupied hall.

“Ah... Sagara-san,” Tessa said. She was a petite, slender girl with ash blonde hair done up in a braid. Tessa was about Sousuke’s age, and wore the rank of colonel on the shoulders of her khaki-colored uniform. For some reason, she sounded out of breath.

“Colonel.” Normally, Sousuke would come to attention and salute... but he had recently learned that she hated being treated that way, so he just offered her a casual greeting, instead. “Are you taking a break?” he inquired next.

“Yes, now that we’re underway... I was a little bit hungry, so I left command to Mardukas-san.” Tessa then turned her eyes up to meet his, and said, “Would you like to share a meal with me?”

“In the galley?”

“Yes. Escort me, if you would.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he responded. “I was intending to.”

They walked side-by-side down the corridor and soon arrived at the mess hall, which was pitch black. Nobody was present in the middle of the night, and there didn’t seem to be any food left.

“Please sit there,” Tessa insisted, running into the galley. “I’ll cook.”

Sousuke quickly started, “Colonel, please. Let me—” but managed to stop himself mid-protest.

Tessa was glaring at him reproachfully. “Are you suggesting that I cannot prepare food properly?”

“No, certainly not.”

“You always eat what Kaname-san prepares,” she pointed out, and Sousuke fell silent. While he groped around for an answer, Tessa giggled. “It’s all right,” she said. “But please, try my cooking for once.”

“Yes, ma’am. I’d be happy to.” In the past, nerves and awkwardness would have overtaken him, and he’d have said something like, ‘No, I really should make it myself,’ or ‘allow me to assist you, at least,’ but... Well, maybe it’s not so bad, Sousuke decided, and then sat down at a table.

“It sounds like things were difficult on Badamu Island,” Tessa called out from the galley.

“Not at all,” Sousuke replied. “It was an easy mission.” He heard the refrigerator door open and close, followed by the sound of cooking tools being pulled out and placed back.

“But you used the lambda driver, didn’t you?” Tessa wanted to know.

“My apologies,” he answered. “If I’d been more careful, things wouldn’t have come to that.”

“All’s well that ends well. Are you growing accustomed to the Arbalest, then?”

“Yes. But Al’s turned into a chatterbox, and I don’t know what to do about it,” Sousuke admitted ruefully. “He just says one useless thing after another... I’ve never heard of a control system like it.”

“He’s not a control system,” Tessa clarified.

“What?”

“Didn’t I tell you before? The Arbalest is an extension of you,” she explained. “Al... Al is how you might have turned out, if you had been raised in a different environment.”

“That’s a horrible thing to say,” Sousuke objected with a grimace, then heard the chopping on the cutting board suddenly come to a stop.

“Oh. I’m sorry,” she called back, with a note of surprise.

Sousuke cringed, realizing he’d said something rude in the heat of the moment. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

“It’s all right,” Tessa said reassuringly. “After all, you were speaking to me like you would to Melissa and Weber-san.”

“I was?”

“Yes. I found that rather pleasing.” She giggled.

“It feels... strange, for me,” Sousuke admitted.

“And for me as well. Very strange.” Regardless, Tessa sounded delighted.

The food preparation went on for a while. Sousuke heard something get mixed together in a bowl, something boiled in a pot, something fried up in a pan...

This had been the tone of their interactions for about six months now. Tessa, who had once seemed like an otherworldly being, was now someone Sousuke felt quite close to. He couldn’t claim he didn’t enjoy her attentions, either—Tessa was a very appealing girl, and he liked that she was willing to engage him this way. And in moments like these, with her eyes pointed down studiously as she focused on her cooking, Tessa reminded him of Kaname.

“It’s finished.” Tessa came out of the kitchen, carrying a large dish of pasta. “It’s spaghetti carbonara,” she explained. “I frequently make it for myself after work.” Tessa piled the pasta onto a small dish using a fork and spoon. The steaming dish was coated in thick cheese and cream sauce, and fragrant with pepper and garlic.

“It’s quite easy to make,” she went on. “I find it easier than Kalinin-san’s borscht, at least... I’m sure you’ll like it.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Sousuke said pointlessly, before bringing a forkful of pasta to his mouth. Suddenly, his eyes opened wide. It really is... “Very good.”

The moment he’d said so, Tessa scrunched up her shoulders and flashed a V-sign. “Ah... all my training paid off. Now Kaname-san’s lost her sneaky advantage...” she whispered to no one in particular.

Sousuke stared up at her suspiciously. “What?”

“Oh, nothing... Go on, eat up!”

“Ahh...” Though still dubious, Sousuke continued downing the pasta. His empty stomach helped.

Tessa watched him eat for a while, enraptured. Then she said, “Sagara-san, would you like more?”

“Please.” Sousuke typically didn’t stuff himself, but he found himself holding the dish out for more.

If they had had a mission coming up, he might have refrained. They weren’t supposed to fight on a full stomach; it slowed your reaction times, and raised the chances that a bullet to the gut would prove fatal. But they were currently on board their submarine, so that was probably unlikely. As long as Kurz doesn’t make some stupid mistake on watch duty, at least...

“Is it very good?” Tessa asked again, interrupting his thoughts.

“Yes,” he told her. “It’s... very good.”

“I’m so glad!” Tessa grinned.

Is that what people mean when they say, ‘a radiant smile’? Sousuke wondered idly. He felt warmed by the sight, and at the same time, slightly guilty.

“Hey... did you know that next week is Christmas?” she asked hesitantly, changing the subject.

“I’m unfamiliar with the specifics,” Sousuke answered. “But it does appear that way.”

“Do you know what the 24th is?” she asked curiously.

“I’ve heard it’s a custom known as Christmas Eve.” Sousuke knew that Christmas was a Christian custom, but as someone who had fought with an Islamic mujahideen, it had little meaning to him. He was actually much more conscious of Ramadan, which was beginning three days before it this year. To Sousuke, Christmas was primarily a period when the alertness of his enemy in his Afghani days, the Soviets, was reduced... and nothing more.

Why is she bringing up Christmas? Sousuke wondered, and found himself tensing up a bit. He was fairly certain that Tessa was a Catholic, and while he didn’t think that she was about to engage him in a religious debate, the topic still made him vaguely uneasy.

“I see. You really don’t know...” she mused.

“Huh?”

“Nothing. Well, Sagara-san...” Tessa said hesitantly.

“Yes?”

“On the 24th... the squadron is going to hold a party together, you know? And I was going to hold a smaller, secondary celebration in my room afterwards, with Melissa and some of the others. Would you like to join us?” Tessa’s eyes, brimming with sincerity, now gazed into his.

“On the 24th?” he clarified.

“Yes.”

Sousuke fell silent. He felt uncertain, because that was the day of the school’s make-up trip. He’d just finished declaring that he’d take all measures necessary to ensure the class’s safety.

Then again, he also didn’t get many chances to deepen his friendship with Tessa, who was typically a very busy person. These last few months, he’d vaguely become aware of her affection for him; it might be cruel to dismiss her invitation out of hand.

She spoke into the silence. “I suppose you’re too busy with school?”

“No, it’s not that... It’s just a bit...” As Sousuke struggled to form a response, he suddenly heard hurried footsteps in the corridor outside.

“Hey, hey!” Sounding panicked, Mao burst into the mess. The last time he’d seen her, she’d been using her laptop to investigate something, so he assumed it must be related to that.

“What is it, Mao?” Sousuke asked.

“Sousuke! You speak Persian, right?”

“A bit,” he told her. “The Afghani dialect, anyway... What about it?”

For some reason, Sousuke’s response caused Mao to groan. “Then why didn’t you catch on sooner?! Sheesh!”

Sousuke tilted his head questioningly.

“That ‘badam’ thing you mentioned... I’ve been looking into it,” Mao explained impatiently. “I was running it through various languages Gauron might know, given what we know about his history. Do you know what the word romanized as ‘badame’ means in English?”

Sousuke was a bit taken aback by the suddenness of the question, but he did offer a word he knew, “I think it means... almond?”

“No, that’s B-A-D-A-M. What if you add an ‘e’ at the end?”

“I don’t know,” Sousuke admitted, feeling a bit bad about his answer. When he’d lived in Afghanistan, he’d used Tajik and Farsi—the Afghani dialect of Persian—daily. He also knew some conversational Pakistani Pashto. Afghanistan was a country of diverse cultures, after all.

The reason Sousuke knew so many languages wasn’t due to any particular talent in that regard; he’d just lived in that region during the age when the brain was open to learning such things, and he’d just naturally picked them up. Still, his Farsi had gotten very rusty by now, and he’d never been able to read or write it. He could only write in English, Japanese, and a tiny bit of Russian.

“So, what does it mean if it’s ‘badame’?” Sousuke asked suspiciously. Tessa, who could speak close to ten languages fluently but didn’t appear to know Persian, stared at Mao as well. She mainly looked hurt about the fact that her dinnertime had been so rudely interrupted.

“Chrysalis,” Mao burst out. “It means chrysalis!”

“Hmm?” Sousuke asked.

21 December, 1537 hours (Japan Standard Time)

Jindai High School, Tokyo

“Hey, Sagara-kun.” After school was over for the day, Sousuke’s classmate Tokiwa Kyoko approached him. “Did you know that Kana-chan’s birthday is the 24th?” Her question was met with silence. “Hello? Earth to Sousuke!”

“Oh, that’s... right,” Sousuke responded awkwardly. He wasn’t in the habit of celebrating birthdays, so even though he’d seen Kaname’s noted in her profile prior to his infiltration of the school, it had completely slipped his mind. He’d also ended up making plans with Mithril for that day.

Ignoring Sousuke’s sudden discomfort about his oversight, Kyoko continued. “You’re coming on that cruise with us, right? I figured we’d put together a big surprise for Kana-chan, to wish her a happy birthday.” She cast a glance at Kaname, who was on the other side of the classroom, clapping erasers out the window. “See, I think she’s not expecting to get anything this year, so the timing is perfect. I was thinking we’d all buy her flowers. You want to chip in?”

“Chip in?” Sousuke questioned.

“You don’t know what that means? Um, it means we all put in a little money for the whole,” Kyoko explained. “In this case, 300 yen each. Please?”

“I see. I’ll pay the money,” Sousuke promised. “But...”

“But...?”

Sousuke hesitated, gripping his wallet. “I’m sorry, but I won’t be going on the cruise. Something else came up.”

“You won’t be coming?” Kyoko asked in shock. “But you were all worked up about it! You said you were gonna come loaded for bear this time!”

“Ah. Well, I...” Sousuke dissembled.

“Plus, it’s Kana-chan’s birthday!”

“I’m sorry, but I’m afraid I’ve made other plans.”

“Jeez... Kana-chan’s gonna be crushed, y’know,” Kyoko told him.

“It’s unavoidable,” Sousuke said shortly.

“What’ll you be doing instead?”

Of course, Kyoko didn’t know about Mithril—none of the students of Jindai High did. “I’m very sorry, but I can’t tell you.”

Just then, Kaname strolled up to them. She lay down the erasers on the blackboard nearby, then started arranging the chalk. “What’s going on here?” she asked, casually.

“Huh? Ah... nothing! Ahaha...”

Kyoko’s protestations just made her more curious. “Seriously, what is it?”

“N-Never mind. But did you hear, Kana-chan? Sagara-kun isn’t coming on the cruise! Sucks, huh?” Kyoko said, fists balled, as she forced a change of subject.

This announcement caused Kaname to suddenly cease her chalk arrangements. “Oh, really?” she said coldly.

“There are mitigating circumstances,” Sousuke said, trying to explain himself. “I’m sorry.”

“Hmm... I wonder why you feel the need to apologize to me...” Kaname mused.

Sousuke’s eyes opened in surprise. “Um, well, I—”

“I mean, it sounds good to me,” she went on. “Things will be quieter with you gone, anyhow. I guess it’s some kind of mission or whatever, so merry Christmas and all that. Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine.”

“Actually, I just—”

“You just what?” The power of Kaname’s side-eye caused Sousuke to falter. He couldn’t bring up Mithril with Kyoko standing right there.

“Wow,” she went on icily. “Something so important you can’t even tell me, huh? Well... I’m sure it’s none of my business, anyway. Bye, I guess. Don’t expect a souvenir, okay?” Then she strode out of the room.

Kyoko, watching the exchange, let out a deep sigh. “I told you! See? You totally bummed her out!”

“It does... appear that way,” Sousuke said, feeling greasy sweat rise on his temples. “But I don’t understand. Why was she so upset?”

“Why do you think?” Kyoko retorted. “It’s her birthday. She’s sad that you won’t be coming. She just won’t admit it because she’s stubborn and full of herself. C’mon, it’s not that hard!”

Sousuke understood every word in Kyoko’s statement, but its meaning as a whole remained elusive. “I don’t quite understand,” he admitted. “Are birthdays that important?”

“Um, yes! And you’d better not forget it!”

“Understood,” he said, acknowledging the point. “But regardless, I’m not free that day. I’m sorry.”

Kyoko’s pigtails drooped. “Okay... got some party to go to, huh?”

“Party... I suppose so,” Sousuke reflected. “It is a party, in a sense. My party plans became another kind of party.”

Kyoko shot him a curious look.

“Ah, it’s nothing,” he said hastily.

After class, Kaname headed alone for the shopping street near Sengawa Station. She entered a teen-oriented shop that sold cute stuffed animals and such, and while she was hunting for Bonta-kun goods, a nearby man approached her. He looked like a white-collar worker. “Hello, my dear. Would you like to join me this evening?” the man asked, somewhat awkwardly.

“Get lost, asshole.”

“Don’t be like that. I’ll treat you to something nice.”

This line, too, was said entirely without commitment. It caused Kaname to snort in derision. But she still said, “Good, you remembered the password.”

“Couldn’t you pick a less awkward line and location?” the man asked, his voice low.

“This is fine,” Kaname told him. “It means I’ll never mistake you for someone else.”

“But it’s so unnatural,” the man complained. “The things my bosses would say if they knew we were making contact like this...”

“Don’t tell them,” Kaname suggested flippantly. “Then they won’t find out.” She cast another glance at the man, who was an agent with Mithril’s intelligence division. His codename was Wraith, and his mission was the monitoring and protection of Kaname (though she had her doubts about the ‘protection’ part).

He seemed to be a master of disguise, and looked different each time she saw him: sometimes a well-to-do older woman; sometimes a young freelancer; sometimes a middle-aged white-collar worker; a 40-something housewife; a construction worker; an insurance salesman... anything you could imagine. Kaname didn’t even know for sure if “he” was really a man.

“But... I gotta say, this is another awesome disguise,” she told him. Kaname found Wraith’s disguise skills extremely impressive; he could even change his voice at will. “Why not ditch the whole ‘lonely spy’ racket?” she suggested. “I bet you could make real money in show business.”

“Butt out.” Wraith slumped over, seemingly annoyed by her comment.

“Ah, sorry if that struck a nerve.” Maybe he really had tried to make a life in show business at some point? But the world had proved too harsh a mistress, and his dreams had been shattered, and he’d been reduced to living the life of a spy for a shady organization. Kaname found herself imagining it, unprompted, and gave him a sympathetic look. “I didn’t mean to be insensitive. Really...”

The spy sized her up suspiciously. “Are you imagining something very offensive right now?”

“Of course not,” Kaname protested. “Everyone has their circumstances. Cheer up!”

“For some reason, I don’t like your tone...”

“Besides, you get to do some artistic expression in this job, too,” Kaname nattered on.

“I told you,” he finally burst out. “I don’t want to be in show business!” This was more or less how all of Kaname’s interactions with Wraith had gone lately. No matter who she was dealing with, be they mercenary or spy, she seemed to have a real talent for disrupting another person’s rhythm.

Kaname called on Wraith whenever she wanted to know something, and sometimes just when she was bored. He and Sousuke hadn’t actually met yet; Wraith had stubbornly insisted against it, and they’d reached an agreement that she wouldn’t call him out when Sousuke was nearby. From the way each of them talked, Kaname had a vague idea that some bad blood existed between Wraith, of the intelligence division, and Sousuke, of the operations division.

“So, did you look into it?” Kaname asked, broaching the subject she’d had in mind.

“Somewhat. I’m not privy to everything that happens in the operations division, so I can’t be sure, but... the Tuatha de Danaan battle group currently have no operations scheduled around Christmas that we know of,” Wraith told her reluctantly. “Though they do appear to be preparing for a party of some kind.”

“Hmm... I see.” Kaname’s mood plummeted. She’d thought maybe the reason Sousuke wasn’t coming on the cruise was because he had a mission with Mithril, but if there was nothing scheduled...

Had he canceled their trip to go to some party with his squad, then? It was understandable that he’d prefer to spend his time with the people he faced danger with daily—and with her. She could have just questioned him about it, of course... but with their relationship in an awkward place right now, Kaname had found that she couldn’t lay into him as aggressively as she once had.

“What kind of party is it, I wonder...” she mused, mostly to herself.

“How should I know?” Wraith retorted, sounding surly. “You should be more concerned about this make-up class trip of yours.”

“Did you look into that, too?” Kaname asked next.

“Yes. According to our analysis, the ship should be safe,” Wraith confirmed. “Its background is clean. Though there’s no guarantee the enemy won’t try a repeat of Sunan...”

“A seajacking, you mean?” she clarified.

“Yes, but the chances of that are extremely low. I believe the enemy organization has learned its lesson about the incredible mobility, power, and covertness of the TDD. They probably won’t try to abduct you like that again. But the trade-off there is...” Wraith paused.

“Is... what?”

“Well... it means that you’re that much more likely to be targeted in your everyday life,” he admitted reluctantly.

Kaname said nothing.

“But they haven’t come after you yet,” Wraith went on. “So we can assume they’re biding their time. They may be confident that they can dispatch both myself and Uruz-7 any time they want to, and abduct you then.”

“You seem very unconcerned about that,” Kaname observed.

“I’m just stating the facts.”

“You guys are biding your time with me too, right?”

Wraith fell silent, as he always did when this subject came up.

Trying to restrain her nervousness, Kaname spoke again, her words pointed. “If you ask me, you intelligence division guys are as shady as ‘the enemy.’ And outside of Sousuke and Tessa, the operations higher-ups seem pretty questionable, too.”

“Your doubts are understandable, Chidori Kaname... I hope you can trust in my good faith, as well,” Wraith sighed. “I would be in deep trouble if the top brass knew I was contacting you one-on-one like this.”

“I appreciate it,” Kaname told him sincerely. “You should drop by my house sometime, by the way. I’ll whip up a little thank-you meal. You like hot pot?”

“I love Korean hot pot... Wait, did you hear what I just said?!”

“Yeah, yeah. ‘Don’t call unless it’s an emergency,’ et cetera. I get it, okay?”

“Heaven’s sake...” Wraith let out another sigh. Then he turned and began to walk away from Kaname. But he paused once more on his way and said, “Anyway, be careful on the trip. I’ll be infiltrating the passenger roster just to be safe.”

“Oh, okay. Thanks,” Kaname said, while wondering what ‘he’ would be dressed up as this time. As she watched Wraith leave the shop, she tried to imagine the cruise without Sousuke. I guess he does find Mithril more important than me... Now in a melancholy mood, she left the shop without buying anything.

The air outside was cold, and her breath came in white puffs. These were the shortest days of the year, and the sky was already pitch black, but the shopping street was still bustling. Christmas songs played, and the place was lively with chatter and laughter.

“Ah...” she exclaimed softly, as she caught sight of Sousuke, standing in front of an old shoe store across the street from the shop she’d just left. He slowly walked toward her through the throng. Her first thought, rather than consider that he’d seen her meet with Wraith, was to wonder if he’d decided to go on the cruise after all.

“Wh-what were you doing over there?” Her response came out curtly despite herself.

“I was waiting for you to come out. A suspicious man entered the store and then left... but it appears you were unharmed,” Sousuke said.

“O-of course I was,” she retorted. “Put that stupid gun away!”

“Hmm...” Sousuke returned the gun he was holding, hidden behind his bag, to the holster under his jacket. He hadn’t recognized Wraith, then—or perhaps he had suspicions, but nothing more.

Of course, Sousuke wasn’t stupid; Wraith’s disguises were just a cut above. Kaname had been getting the better of him lately, but he appeared to be quite an excellent agent otherwise. He really did seem to disappear into a crowd. Even Sousuke, who was very sensitive to hostile intent around him, seemed to have a duller antenna when Wraith wasn’t behaving with active malice.

Kaname started walking, and Sousuke followed her from behind.

“Chidori,” he began.

“What?”

“Are you hiding something from me?”

“Um...”

“Ever since Hong Kong, I’ve had the sense that... No, perhaps it’s my imagination.” Sousuke seemed to have a nebulous idea that Kaname was keeping something from him, and in fact, she was: both her meetings with Wraith and her encounter with the young man, Leonard, two months ago while he was gone.

Kaname did intend to tell him about Wraith when she had the chance. She’d been halfway serious about her offer of hot pot earlier; she wanted to get Wraith and Sousuke to sit down together so she could show off her cooking. Wraith didn’t seem like a bad guy, and things could only get better if he and Sousuke would make peace.

There was no way she could tell him about Leonard, though. She had explained about the assassin attacking her in the hotel district, and told him that someone else had finished the assassin off. She’d also brought up the robots she’d seen then. But what she and that “someone else” had talked about, and what he’d done to her... those were things that Kaname could never bring herself to say.

So far, Sousuke hadn’t pressed her about it, either. Today was the first time he’d voiced his suspicions. The near-miss with Wraith might have really made him nervous.

“You think I’m hiding something?” she asked innocently.

“Well... perhaps it’s not hiding, exactly... but are you keeping something to yourself?”

“No. You’re the one keeping something from me, right?” For some reason, Kaname couldn’t keep the comment from sounding barbed.

“Me?” Sousuke asked.

“About Christmas,” she clarified. “Why aren’t you going on the make-up trip?”

“I have a mission.”

You liar, Kaname thought. You’re going to a party with Mithril. You’ll all have fun while things get serious between you and that girl, right? I didn’t think you were such a liar... but I guess eight months living in Japan was time enough to learn how to be a snake... “Yeah, okay,” she said out loud. “A mission. Everything’s a mission. Why don’t you go marry Miss Mission, then?”

“I don’t understand that,” Sousuke told her, sounding genuinely confused. “If you have something to say to me, can’t you explain it in more concrete terms?”

“Are you being serious right now?!” Kaname glared at Sousuke. “You think... you think you can always get out of things by playing dumb?! Well, you’re wrong! Because I know everything!”

Sousuke was baffled. “I don’t understand. But I wanted to tell you something that—”

“Oh, shut up!” she yelled. “I don’t want to hear it!”

“Chidori—”

“Stay away from me! I’m sick of you!”

“This is so typical!” Sousuke fumed. “Why do you—”

“I said this conversation is over!” Kaname said brusquely. Then, brushing through the crowds, she strode away from Sousuke.

That night, it was needless to say that Kaname regretted her words, as usual. But even repeating their exchange in her head dozens of times, she couldn’t stop being angry. What the hell is his problem? she kept thinking. And, as usual, that was where her thought process stopped. All of his charms, which usually came to mind easily, disappeared, leaving only negative thoughts behind.

After all, he’s completely inconsiderate, and the way he thinks he can play dumb to get out of trouble proves that he thinks I’m stupid, Kaname reasoned. Actually, when I really think about it, he can’t really be that stupid, can he? Maybe that was just a character he’s been playing from the start. If that’s the case, he’s the biggest creep ever! The absolute worst! I can’t believe I fell for him, even for a second. I’m so glad I didn’t confess to him in the heat of the moment!

Every single man is a con artist, anyway. Every word out of their mouths is a lie to make themselves look good. They’re crafty, evil, super-energy beings, and you can’t trust them for a second!

Yeah, there’s no way I’ll ever date a man, she told herself fiercely. Especially not him! I hate you, Sousuke!

Over the next few days, Kaname barely spoke to Sousuke. He’d approached her reluctantly a few times, but Kaname wouldn’t give him the time of day. He sent her emails on her PHS, but she deleted them without a glance. He’d ask her, “Did you see my email?” and she’d say, “Yeah, I saw it. Go away now,” and brush him off.

It wasn’t unusual, as far as fights between them went...

But this time, their quarrel would cause a minor panic.