4: The Executors

24 December, 2250 Hours (Japan Standard Time)

Shopping Center, Pacific Chrysalis

“...So I feel like I’ve established a greater relationship of trust with my subordinates than I had before,” Tessa whispered, holding her knees in the darkness. “But because of that, lately, I feel like it’s compromising our work relationship. Before, everyone was very proper in calling me ‘Colonel’ and ‘Captain’ and such. But lately, it’s more like “Colone~l” and “Capta~in.” Can you imagine? It feels wrong.”

“Hmm. I don’t know who’d want to give nicknames like ‘Colonel’ and ‘Captain’ to a kid maid like you, but that does sound pretty rough,” Sailor threw back as he rooted through the indulgence item counters.

“Excuse me. Sailor-san? I hope you’ll forget what I said about the rank names, but I am still talking to you seriously,” Tessa pointed out. “I’m attempting to open my heart to you, as a kindred spirit.”

“Yeah. I get it, I get it.”

“Are you sure?” Tessa wasn’t talking like this simply because she wanted a sounding board for her complaints. There was intent behind it. Talking to Sailor might help her to buy time, which would allow Clouseau and the others to locate and surround them. And finding out more about the kind of man he was would help her to better influence his behavior. Of course, the content of their conversation had ended up deviating significantly from those strategic objectives...

“Hey! There we go!” Sailor proclaimed as he picked a small box from a kiosk shelf, and held it up to the minimal light he had available.

“What is it?” Tessa asked. “Are you going to craft more dangerous weapons?”

“They’re cigars, dummy,” Sailor scoffed. “Whoa, Cohiba Lanceros?! These are Cuban! They sell these here? I had this pegged as a shitty-ass ship with crap security, but I guess it ain’t all bad!” He swiftly broke the wrapping, pulled out a cigar, bit off the end, and spat it out on the floor. It was hideously uncouth.

“Excuse me, but you can’t really intend to smoke here, can you?” Tessa demanded politely. “I would appreciate it if you’d consider my health...”

“Shut up! It helps me think. Smoke ’em if you got ’em!” Sailor lit the cigar with a lighter, then let out a blissful plume of smoke. “Mm... Whew.”

Tessa turned away and started coughing, but she came to a sudden stop, and looked back curiously. A strange feeling began to come over her as she sniffed at the air. There was a slightly floral scent to the smoke from Sailor’s cigar. It was like when you pulled the stopper out of a bottle of potpourri... Something about it seemed to take her back to childhood. She wasn’t sure why.

“Well? Not bad, eh?” Sailor declared proudly. “That bastard Castro aside, there’s two things I’ll give Cuba—baseball players and cigars. Even Kennedy was all-in on importing Cuban cigars.”

“Ah-hah...”

“A superior I really admired once said: ‘Oh, hear us when we cry to Thee, for those in peril on the sea... and give us fine cigars!’ Now there was a man who loved a good smoke,” Sailor declared in a sonorous voice. Tiny sparks popped out from the cigar in the darkness.

“Is that a parody of the Navy Hymn?” Tessa wanted to know.

“Yeah... but hey, how’d you know that?!” Sailor demanded suspiciously. “Are you really just a maid?”

“Oh, of course... Anyway, could you tell me the name of that superior officer you—” Tessa’s request was interrupted by a tremor in the distance.

Exactly one hundred seconds earlier...

Even as he felt his neck muscles and bones reach their breaking point, Kurz reached a hand under his vest. His neck was going to snap. It would happen any second now...

“Ngh... hng...” he wheezed, pulling his automatic pistol from its holster. It was an FN Browning Hi-Power. Why did I have to pack a single action? he lamented. The act of cocking it seemed to take forever.

Eventually, Kurz managed to press the muzzle of the gun against the wrist of the hand around his neck, and pull the trigger. Then he fired a second and third time. Instead of a blood spurt, shards of plastic and metal scraped his cheek.

The enemy’s hand relaxed immediately, with the suddenness of a rubber band snapping. Kurz didn’t have time to feel relief; he stuck the muzzle into the enemy’s glowing red eye-slit and let fire with a series of 9mm rounds. Sparks flew, a burning smell filled the air, and the enemy reeled back a bit.

Kurz kicked it as hard as he could. It was like kicking a 100 kilogram sandbag, and while he managed to force the enemy away, it didn’t seem shaken in the slightest. Mercilessly, determinedly, and with pure intent to kill, it charged him again.

Kurz lost his balance and fell to his knees, gasping for breath. He needed oxygen. The enemy’s right arm swung down at him, rattling uncertainly on its cracked wrist. An artificial hand? No... Kurz wondered. Just who the hell is this—

“Kurz!!” Someone came leaping out of nowhere to smack the back of the attacker’s head with a pipe. It was Yang. He was dripping with blood, coated with it head to toe, but he was still alive.

Kurz didn’t even have time to thank his lucky stars, as the large man, unfazed by Yang’s attack, swung out almost automatically with his right hand. Yang blocked with the pipe, but the force of the blow bent it in half, and sent the man flying into a nearby container.

Whatever this thing is, it’s not human, Kurz realized. In addition, blows to the head and the torso seemed useless. Kurz leaped out to grab one of the enemy’s legs, then pointed his gun at the back of its right knee. He took aim for the part that his experience and instincts as an AS pilot told him would be the least armored, and let off three shots. Gelatinous liquid and solid polymer scraps went flying. The enemy lost balance and crashed to the floor.

“Why... you...” Before it could even struggle, he unloaded two shots into its right shoulder, two into its left armpit, and two into the inner thigh where the leg joined to the hip—he would have done more, but at last, the pistol’s slide stopped in its rear-cocked position. He was out of ammo.

Even with most of its limb connectors destroyed, the enemy continued to struggle with what remained, searching for its enemies with its cracked head sensor.

“K-Kurz? You okay?” Yang asked haltingly, leaning against the container.

Kurz, panting for breath himself, swapped his gun’s magazine skillfully. “Yeah. Son of a bitch... What about you? You’re covered in blood...”

“Actually, that thing ended up firing through a stack of canned tomatoes over there... I think it just knocked me out cold,” Yang admitted.

“Oh, is that the gag?” Kurz asked. Now that he had a minute to think about it, it was clear that the room didn’t smell like blood at all. Still, he found a new worry entering his mind. I’m doomed, he thought woefully. All the tomatoes are gone... I’m gonna have survived all that, only for the cook to murder me. He decided to move the conversation along. “So, where’s Wu?”

“Dunno,” Yang mumbled. “He was right beside me, but...”

“Sorry, Sergeant, Corporal...” Wu popped out from a large wooden crate far behind Yang, also looking perfectly sound. “I decided to hide and play possum. That thing looked dangerous as hell.”

“You could’ve given me a little warning, dammit!” Kurz exploded.

“I’ll certainly do that next time.” Wu laughed awkwardly and rubbed the back of his head.

“Still, what the hell is this thing?” Kurz mused, his neck still aching. From what he could see, their assailant had lost most of its mobility. It had a human’s silhouette, but it was a machine, almost like a 3rd generation AS shrunk down to human size. Are these those human-sized Amalgam ASes that Kaname mentioned running into in Shibuya? he wondered. If she hadn’t told me about that, it would’ve taken me a lot longer to realize I should target the joints...

“Don’t ask me. It just burst out of the container and—” Yang suddenly stopped in mid-sentence, seemingly realizing the same thing as Kurz.

Would an enemy that’s given Mithril so much trouble in the past really hand over a machine like this so easily? he pondered. Wouldn’t they have thought up a way to dispose of its remains if it were ever immobilized?

The robot stopped struggling. In that exact moment, Yang took two or three steps back, and whispered, “K-Kurz. It’s...”

“...I know,” Kurz agreed quickly. “Run!” They all took off at almost the exact same time. A second later, the robot exploded, sending a fireball, shockwave, and anti-personnel ball bearings bursting through the hold.

Kurz threw himself to the floor. White smoke and dust hung thick around him, as he was peppered by fragments and debris. About on par with a Claymore mine, Kurz estimated of the blast, even while grimacing from the ringing in his ears.

“Hey, Kurz. Still alive over there?” Yang asked leisurely. It seemed like the other two had survived.

“Sorry to disappoint, but yeah,” Kurz replied, pushing aside the charred wood that had fallen on top of him with a curse. “Damn, what a mess...” The area around the explosion was a miserable sight of bent steel and torn-open containers, their contents scattered and burning. The sprinklers activated next, showering the hold with water.

Yang said, “We need to report this to the lieutenant. I don’t know what that robot really was, but it’s clearly a trap.”

“Got it,” Kurz agreed. “Uruz-6 to HQ! You read me?” He called into his radio.

Back at headquarters, Clouseau responded immediately. “HQ here. Was that an explosion in Area C32?”

“Affirmative!” Kurz replied. “One of those robots Angel told us about. We managed to take it out, but it exploded on us.”

“Robots?” Clouseau asked in surprise. “Those Alastor things, eh? Any damages?”

“Zero deaths, three light injuries! No one out of action,” Kurz reported. “The tomatoes got the worst of it.”

“Was it just the one?”

“Of course! If we’d had to fight even two or three of those things—” Kurz was cut off, this time by a loud bang that echoed through the hold. Further in from where they were standing, the door of a comparatively unscathed container had been blasted open from the inside. Something had kicked its way out.

“Hey...” Heavy footsteps rang out. Stepping on the door ripped from its hinges, a large black-clad man emerged from the container. It was identical to the enemy they had just fought, from its build, to its clothing, to its expressionless face. Its drive system let out a low hum, and its head sensor glowed in a single, horizontal red line.

“There’s more...” Kurz trailed off. It was the worst-case scenario; that single robot hadn’t been the end of it. They could hear more containers breaking open, one after another, all throughout the hold. More and more copies of the robot emerged, and began to slowly look around. Or... scan for hostiles, maybe? Kurz told himself. Eight of them... no, probably more.

“Uruz-6,” Clouseau demanded. “What’s wrong? Report, Uruz-6!”

“We... We just got about a dozen—” Kurz began to report.

“What? Say that one more—”

“Guys, break for it! This isn’t g—” Kurz turned to warn Yang and Wu, and found them already dashing headlong for the exit. Those jerks... He didn’t even have time to yell at them for their cruel abandonment. Darting around a grasping enemy hand, Kurz hurried to join them.

“Uruz-1 to all units. Code-13, top priority. A dozen or more of those ultra-mini ASes have appeared in the C32 cargo hold. Their abilities are likely as previously reported. If you disable them, they’ll explode with shrapnel. Be careful. Follow standard response procedures, with priority to the evacuation of hostages. Team Delta to C28. Team Echo to corridor C35. Hold the enemy at bay. AP shells permitted. If you can’t hold them back, at least slow them as much as possible.”

At times like these, Clouseau didn’t get angry, nor did he raise his voice. He doled out orders to each team with utmost calm. This precision of his did a better job than anything of communicating the urgency of the situation to the men. There was a faint smell of tension, different than before, as each team radioed acknowledgment.

What the hell are they after? Clouseau asked himself. What do the robots want? Are they here to kill everyone in Mithril and take control of the ship? No, from what Chidori Kaname had said, the robots’ programming wasn’t that sophisticated; their mission must be something simpler. Protect the secret of the vault, then? Kill everyone on the ship and sink it? No, they wouldn’t need robots for that... a high explosive of equivalent size would do the job just as well.

What did they want? How much of their plan had the enemy foreseen? There were too many things he didn’t know. The one thing he did know was that a powerful enemy had appeared on the ship, and that they couldn’t be intimidated or negotiated with.

A member of the PRT spoke up. “Lieutenant, what are they after?”

“We don’t know yet,” Clouseau answered tersely. “This whole thing could have been a setup, or maybe this deployment is a last resort option... Either way, they’ve gotten serious.” He then used his radio to call Mao by the vault. “Uruz-2. Progress report.”

“Not much to say,” she replied swiftly. “Could be as much as three hours, as little as thirty minutes. Something like that.” Clouseau could hear a drill whirring in the background.

“When you have a better idea, let me know,” he told her. “If it’s going to take a while, we’ll give up and withdraw.”

“Got it,” Mao agreed. “Going fast as I can. Out.”

Clouseau yanked away a PC a nearby sergeant was using, knocking a cup and a battery case off the table. “I’m going to have a look around the scene myself. You stay here. Monitor and direct the movement of all teams and hostages. Understand?” He scanned the map of the ship displayed on the 20-inch retractable screen. Then he grabbed a magic marker that had fallen nearby and drew on the screen—a thick line cutting off the back quarter of the ship.

“Ah—” the sergeant began.

“This will be our last line of defense,” Clouseau announced, cutting him off. “Get the hostages behind it, and hold the enemy in front of it. Understand?”

“Y-Yes sir—”

Grabbing a submachine gun loaded not with rubber bullets, but with special armor-piercing rounds, Clouseau flew out of the bridge. He was worried about the status of the hostage evacuation; the cargo hold where the enemy had appeared was close to the ballroom where the students were being held. He didn’t know what the robots were programmed to do. What if they’re programmed to kill indiscriminately? he wondered. What if a killing machine like that just bursts out into the midst of hundreds of students?

Naturally, the nearby explosion had put an end to the carousing of the students of Jindai High. Most of them were now craning their necks around suspiciously and wondering about the sound. The students around Kaname, Kyoko included, were no exception. They halted their game of Scotland Yard (a board game that Kurz had brought from the shopping area, along with a mess of other toys and games to ‘pass the time’), and looked over at their masked supervisor.

He was talking to someone on his radio. After an unusually long silence, the man waded through the crowd, ran up to the stage, and spoke into the microphone. “Um, hey... sorry to interrupt the fun, guys, but there’s a small fire in the hold below us. That explosion you heard earlier was just some cans bursting—” The students erupted into concerned whispers.

“Ah, but don’t worry!” he insisted. “Everything’s fine! It’s just a lot of smoke, but to be safe, we should evacuate to the hall in the ship’s aft. Understand? Watch my finger.” The man pointed first to the ceiling, then towards the tail end of the ship. “That’s the way you want to go. Please proceed slowly in that direction. Don’t rush; be quiet and calm. We don’t want a panic, okay? Just walk at your usual pace. We’ll start with those closest to the exits—”

Just then, there was a crash and a commotion from the kitchen: angry shouting, and the overturning of pots and dishes. Then the cooks came bursting into the ballroom in a panic, followed by Kurz. He must have been in such a fright that he’d forgotten to put his mask back on.

“Ah, Sergea— I mean, er, wait, everyone! Look at me! It’s all right. Please evacuate slowly—”

“No, no, no, no, no!” Kurz shouted, interrupting the man. “No time to lose! Run! Now! Crawl over each other if you have to! You’re all gonna die! Don’t waste time! Run, right now!” He shoved the male student standing next to him, then began firing his pistol into the air. The hundreds of students that had been standing there staring let out a collective scream, and began flooding towards the doors. The principal and the others who normally would have scolded them were so caught off guard that they simply stood in place, shocked.

“K-Kana-chan!” Kyoko was getting carried away from Kaname, caught up in the wave of students.

“It’s okay! We’ll meet up later!” Kaname just managed to shout, but Kyoko was already gone. Kaname fought back against the tide, heading for Kurz in the middle of the chaos. “Hey, Kurz-kun! What the heck is going on? Are you crazy?”

“We got a visit from those robots you told us about!” He said, shouting to be heard over the din. “And not just one, but a whole dozen of ’em! They nearly killed me in the hold, and now they’re on their way here. So get evacuated already!”

“What?” Kaname blinked in surprise. Those Alastor machines? But why? Is Leonard involved in this, too? Dismissing these questions as a distraction, Kaname continued to lay into Kurz. “S-Still, this is crazy! You’re going to get the students hurt!”

“Better hurt than dead. Hey, you!” Kurz turned around and shouted at his comrade. “Give me your P90 and AP rounds! Then round up the stragglers and evacuate to the aft! You’re Team Golf’s backup, got it?!”

“Y-Yes, Sergeant,” the man agreed shakily.

“Hostage safety is our number one priority,” Kurz instructed. “Move as carefully and calmly as you can. Now go!”

The Mithril man threw a Belgian-made next-generation submachine gun and a magazine of armor-piercing rounds at Kurz, then turned to go. He hurried along a handful of teachers and students still wandering aimlessly around in the ballroom, and also helped up a girl who had fallen.

As Kurz checked the clip with practiced hands and flicked the gun’s selector switch, he shouted into his radio, “Uruz-9, how are things where you are? ...Okay, hold that corridor for three minutes. ...Like I care! Figure it out!” He shut off the radio and barked at Kaname. “What are you doing? Get going already!”

“A-Are you sure?” she asked. “Those robots are super strong, and pretty agile, too...”

Kurz shot her a cynical smile. “I’ve faced them before. Your intel saved my butt, by the way. Now go.”

“Um... fine. Just don’t push it, okay?” Kaname didn’t hesitate a minute longer. She whipped around and ran in the other direction from the kitchen, towards the ballroom exit.

It happened very suddenly. Without any forewarning, the ceiling above her collapsed with a roar. Splinters and dust rained down as a huge object fell—no, landed—in the ballroom. One of the students who hadn’t made it out yet let out a high-pitched scream.

“What the...” Kaname wondered.

The thing straightened swiftly from where it had collapsed the floor beneath, then turned its red head-mounted sensor to scrutinize the face of a nearby girl. Kaname flashed back to that night in the rainy hotel district two months ago, and the scene played in her mind like it was yesterday: the sight of a robot, identical to this one, finishing off the assassin. It could snap a girl like that in half.

“Run! Hurry!” Kaname shouted as she took off in a dash, but the girl didn’t move, most likely paralyzed from shock and fear. She was a girl from the next class over, but Kaname couldn’t remember her name.

The Alastor was heading straight for her. At the same time, it didn’t seem overtly hostile. It looked the girl up and down as she crouched in fear—she was about the same height and build as Kaname—and peered into her face.

Kaname didn’t have time to interrogate the situation. Heedless of the danger, she rushed past the Alastor to knock the girl aside.

“Eek!” the girl squealed.

“I said, ‘run!’” Kaname yelled at her.

The enemy’s black coat rustled as it rotated its upper torso to face her. She could hear the servos buzzing behind its red sensor, suggesting a shift of focus. It was indeed the same kind of robot she had met before... but it looked much bigger now: the thick chest; the burly arms. It made the pro-wrestlers she’d seen up close in arenas look like children.

Intimidated, she took a shaky step back. The robot continued to approach, until its expressionless mask became all she could see. Behind her, Kaname could hear Kurz shouting something. He sounded about twenty meters away, and it occurred to her only a few seconds later that she was standing between him and the enemy. Her body was in the way.

“Kaname, don’t move!” Immediately, she heard a gunshot behind her, and felt a faint breeze pass between her thighs. The Alastor took three or four shots to the right leg and lost its balance. A moment later, she felt her skirt rustle.

Kaname went agape as she realized that Kurz had fired a shot between her legs. She was at once impressed by his aim and mortified by his choice. She wanted to turn around and scream at him, but there was no time for that—though less steady on its feet now, the Alastor was already reaching for her again. The shots to its leg didn’t seem to have done much damage.

She gasped as it grabbed the ribbon on her chest, realizing that it was going to pull her in. Kaname felt all the air wrest from her lungs in the form of a desperate scream.

“Chidori!!” Another gunshot; this time, the bullet hit the Alastor’s left side. She was released from its glare as its head turned sharply to the right.

The shot had come from Sousuke. He had run in from the bow-side entrance, trailed by two allies in fatigues. He fired again and again, one after another, and the bullets continued to hit the Alastor’s left side. Shredded fabric went flying as plastic fragments sparked off of it.

While Kaname yelped at the sight of the bullets hitting so nearby, the robot cast her aside and pointed its left arm straight at Sousuke. Then, it fired its internal rifle—the bullet missed and hit the pillar behind him. The shots it had taken seemed to have affected its targeting sensors, but no more.

The Alastor hunched over and began to move in a zig-zag fashion. Its movements were faster than its massive body seemed capable of.

“Sousuke?!” Kaname cried from where she’d fallen on her backside.

The Alastor closed in on Sousuke, and sliced its hand through the air in a powerful chop. While dodging the blow by a hair, Sousuke readied his gun at hip-level and let loose, at close range, on full automatic. The shots barked out, and the robot’s upper half trembled.

It wasn’t working. The Alastor’s movements were crude, yet nimble, and it was terrifyingly bulletproof. It took a light step with its right foot and then whipped around, causing its coat to unfurl like a whirling umbrella as it threw a back kick like a freight train at Sousuke.

Sousuke immediately brought up his gun to block, but the impact still sent him flying. Kurz charged on past him, unleashing more fury with his submachine gun. The shots hit their mark, but the Alastor rocketed off the floor, jumping higher than any human was capable of. It was almost like a third-generation AS—no, not almost: these things were miniature ASes in every respect. Their maneuverability and power simply weren’t subject to human limitations.

In standard AS terms, the power balance here was like fighting an M9 with four Rk-92 Savages. It would be hard to put it down without suffering heavy losses.

The enemy fired its internal gun. The shot rang out, and one of Sousuke’s allies fell back, having taken the blow square in the chest. He didn’t even manage a scream.

“Don’t rest! Keep firing!” Sousuke cried, casting aside his broken submachine gun and pulling out a pistol. Kurz and the others didn’t hesitate to bathe the Alastor in bullets. Fragments went flying as the bullets plinked off of it, the ricochets shattering tableware all around. Yet, the enemy kept moving, making it impossible to precision-target its joints.

“Dammit!” Sousuke went down on one knee and fired desperately with his pistol. Kurz swapped his submachine gun’s clip and kept shooting. Dodge the opponent’s charge, then strike it from close range—they were like bullfighters, patient and persistent.

Kaname could only hide behind a toppled table, cradling her head.

After taking at least a hundred rounds, at last, the Alastor finally began to slow. Then, a hard shot to a knee joint forced it to the floor. Sousuke and the others fanned out and began to unload mercilessly into their enemy, as if they were putting down a wild beast.

Kaname had seen her share of gunfights in the past, and this one was anything but elegant. The brute force at play here, the way they just soaked it in firepower—it was unsightly. But it wasn’t a sign of weakness, not by any means; the enemy was just so powerful that this was what it took to put it down.

Once the robot had finally stopped moving, Kaname was able to think again, and it was then that she realized that the ballroom had emptied. The students must have all evacuated, including the girl she’d shoved away before. She relaxed in relief—but she was the only one doing so.

“Get away!” Kurz shouted. “It’s going to explode!”

“E-Explode...?” she questioned nervously.

“Chidori! Why are you still here? Run!” Kaname was trying to stand up when Sousuke grabbed her hand and took off, his manner shockingly rough. Kurz and another soldier got on either side of the comrade who’d been shot earlier, helped him to his feet and took off in a panic.

“Get down!” Kurz screamed, and Sousuke pulled Kaname to the ground and covered her. A moment later, the Alastor exploded. Shrapnel blasted holes in the walls, the ceiling, and the light fixtures, and Kaname felt a dull pain in her eardrums as the shockwave slammed through her skull. Smoke hung in the air afterwards; the sprinkler system activated and began to rain down on them.

“Were you hurt, Chidori?” Sousuke asked her anxiously.

“Mm,” she managed at last. “You’re crushing me.”

“Sorry.” Sousuke pulled himself off of Kaname and helped her into a sitting position. Water dripped from her bangs as the sprinklers showered down. “Can you stand?”

“Yeah... thanks,” Kaname affirmed. She made an attempt, but it was hard, with her knees trembling like this. As Sousuke silently helped her, she could smell his sweat. “Is Kurz okay?!”

“Yeah,” he told her. “Howard is alive, too. The body armor stopped the shot... though he might have some cracked ribs.”

“I... I’m fine, Sergeant,” said the ally who took the shot before. Beyond the clearing smoke, she could see someone standing up and coughing. From the kitchen came a sound of dishes crashing to the floor. It was followed by the faint stomp of heavy footsteps. Multiple sets of them. Two people, maybe three—

“Reinforcements, huh?” Kurz commented.

“No need to have a shootout in a wide-open space like this,” Sousuke urged. “Let’s get out of here. Contact the lieutenant. Chidori, can you run?”

“Y-Yeah...”

The group ran from the ballroom in a hurry, tearing down the corridor that led to the aft. There was no sign of enemy pursuit, but Sousuke and the others stayed alert in every direction—even up. The enemy could appear from literally anywhere.

They could hear the sound of continued gunfire in the distance; the other teams must be fighting. “They’re tough,” Sousuke said, continuing to walk swiftly.

“Right? Good thing I had a Hi-Power on me. My lucky day, I guess,” Kurz put in.

“You said there were about a dozen left, right? That’s trouble,” Sousuke said with a frown. “We can beat them, theoretically, but we don’t have the firepower available here. Our ammunition is lacking as well. Fighting them head-on will just get our men killed, and make it difficult to protect the hostages.”

“Ahh, dammit,” Kurz sighed. “So what’s their plan? Just to kill everyone?”

“I don’t think so,” Kaname said. “That’s not what those robots were after. It’s something else.”

“How do you know?” he replied. “The first one definitely didn’t think twice before it jumped me in the hold.”

“Well...” Kaname’s vague suspicion from earlier was starting to take a clearer form: the robot’s odd movements; the similarities and differences. What was everyone on the ship after from the start? The vault, of course—No, it wasn’t that. She stopped and looked up at a corner of the hall. “They’re looking for a certain physique,” she concluded.

Kurz watched her questioningly.

“They won’t attack girls around 165 centimeters tall, weighing about 50 kilograms,” Kaname observed. “If they find a girl who fits that category, the next thing they’ll do is scan her face—not just reading her external appearance, but patterns in bone structure, membranes, and blood vessels. If it matches the data they have for me on file, they’ll move to the next routine, which will be either to protect me and escape... or to kill everyone except for me.”

The out-of-her-depth high school girl from moments ago was gone without a trace. Sousuke, Kurz, and the others couldn’t help but be shocked by the sight of her explaining things so logically and coherently, even after everything she’d been through.

“You shot him after he grabbed me, right, Sousuke?” she asked. “Didn’t you think it was strange then?”

Sousuke, who had been distracted by the sudden change in Kaname’s demeanor, snapped back to reality and nodded his agreement. “It threw you out of the way, even though the standard tactic would be to use you as a shield.”

“Hey, hang on,” Kurz interrupted. “Are you saying they’re after Kaname-chan?”

“I think so... no, I’m sure of it,” Kaname told him. “That captain was after me from the start, remember?”

“Okay. So if that’s true, what do we do? Charge those dumb robots with you in the lead?”

Sousuke glared at Kurz. “We are not using Chidori as a shield.”

“I know, it was a joke,” Kurz protested. “Anyway, we can’t just stand here. For now, we just need to get away from them.”

“Wait.” Kurz and the others were about to hurry forward, but Kaname stopped them in their tracks. “You can’t use me as a shield, but I can act as a decoy,” she observed thoughtfully. “In fact, it might be our only way out of this.”

Sousuke’s brow wrinkled in response. “It’s too dangerous,” he protested. “Even if they won’t actually attack you, you might still be hit by stray fire, or a ricochet.”

“I don’t care if it’s dangerous!” Kaname shouted back. “I’m not the only one in trouble, remember?!”

She was right: it was a bad situation. There were still any number of those dangerous enemy robots on the ship, and while their schoolmates seemed to have gotten to safety for now, they were still on board. Without decisive action, sooner or later, a tragedy was going to take place. People were going to be hurt and killed, and it would be all her fault. Kaname couldn’t let that slide; she had to stop it, somehow.

“Please,” she begged. “If anything happens to my classmates, I could never show my face again. Is what I’m proposing really that unreasonable?”

Sousuke didn’t say anything at first, glaring hard at Kaname’s desperate expression. He really didn’t want to put her in danger, it seemed. He vacillated for a time, indecisive and questioning—and then, as if to clear it of all doubts, he at last shook his head and sighed. “Very well,” he conceded. “I’ll consult with the lieutenant. But for now, we need to get our distance.” Sousuke pressed the button of his radio.

Clouseau had just reached the starboard corridor on the second deck when the sound of unrelenting gunfire reached his ears. Team Echo, led by Sergeant Roger Sandraptor, was trading fire with the enemy. “Roger! What’s your status?” he called to the large Native American, who was kneeling behind a bend in the corridor and changing his clip.

“Two enemies. Two injured. Zero dead. Concentrated fire succeeds in holding it back, but we’ll be out of ammunition shortly,” Roger reported, sounding almost like an M9’s AI. The narrow, straight hallway appeared to be helping them to keep the things at bay; they were forced to take cover in a passenger cabin. If one peeked its head out even slightly, the soldiers would bathe it in fire.

“Lieutenant, these things are tough,” Roger continued. “They’re as aggressive as a pair of raging buffalo, but they’re smart enough to dodge bullets.”

“Can you beat them?” Clouseau wanted to know.

“If it’s just the two of them, probably. But we’re running low on ammo.”

Clouseau knew that this wasn’t sustainable. If someone as reliably objective as Roger was predicting doom, then it had to be so. They weren’t equipped to fight these things, and the ace in the hole he was keeping on standby in case of emergencies wasn’t compatible with the situation as it stood. We could lead the crew and passengers to the lifeboats, maybe? He pondered. But the front half of the ship is a danger zone... It would be difficult now to get everyone off safely.

To make matters worse, he had no idea where Colonel Testarossa was. If she was in the fore, she was in danger. And there were so many things he wanted to discuss with her right now... Clouseau caught himself looking for a way to defer responsibility, and shook his head. Stop it, he lectured himself. You’re the one in charge right now. It’s your job to be strong for the men.

“Buy us time,” he told Roger. “Pull back slowly.”

“Roger that.”

Just then, Clouseau got a transmission. It was from Sousuke. “What is it?”

“I have a proposal.” Sousuke explained Kaname’s idea in brief, and offered up a few plans.

“Make her a decoy? It’s risky,” Clouseau said with a frown. “And they’re scattered all over the ship. How are you going to round them all up?”

“She says it’s likely that they have a data link function,” Sousuke told him. “If we bait them carefully enough, the enemy machines will all contact each other and gather in the same area.”

“The girl said that?” Clouseau blinked in surprise.

“You might only know her from my reports, but she’s extremely reliable at times like these,” Sousuke replied. “Please consider—” His plea was interrupted.

“What’s taking so long?!” came the voice of a young woman. It was Clouseau’s first time hearing the voice of Chidori Kaname, who must have snatched Sousuke’s radio away from him. “Grant permission or give an order or whatever! Right now! If something happens to anyone from my school, you’ll pay for it, you balding old jerk!”

What is she talking about? She can’t even see me... Clouseau wondered. Then he said, placatingly, “Okay, I’ll do it. Put him back on.”

“Are you sure you’ll do it?” Kaname demanded to know. “You better not be lying!”

“Just do it!” Clouseau bellowed back at her.

Sousuke returned. “I’m sorry, Lieutenant. It’s one of her worst faults—”

“I don’t care. I shouldn’t have let my conscience distract me. We’ll do it her way,” Clouseau acknowledged, with a faint sense that he was grasping at straws. He and Sousuke shouted over the sounds of gunfire to work out the details of their plan.

Once the discussion was over and the transceiver was off, Clouseau whispered, too low to be heard, “Ugh. ‘Angel,’ my ass.”

24 December, 2324 Hours (Japan Standard Time)

One kilometer south of Pacific Chrysalis, Tuatha de Danaan

“Con, sonar. Towed array’s got a new contact on bearing 0-8-3,” Sergeant Dejirani said to Lieutenant Colonel Richard Mardukas from the sonar shack. “Ah, spherical array’s got it, too. Designate contact number Mike-13. Distance... what? Oh, huh, weird...”

Mardukas was in the control room, dishing out commands from a standing position next to the empty captain’s chair. He was worried about the cruise ship enough as it was. He’d been told that the captain had gone missing, that a mysterious enemy had attacked, and that things were looking grim. He was further concerned about a set of Japanese patrol boats passing just four miles away. And now, here was the sonar technician with more bad news.

“Make your reports clear and concise,” Mardukas ordered with a frown. “You—”

“Quiet! You’re distracting me!” Dejirani snapped. “There’s more than one. Underwater, over the thermal layer. And... moving fast. Over 50 knots?!”

“A torpedo?” Mardukas said with alarm. “Battle stations!” A shot of fear ran through the control room. The officer of the deck hit the alarm, and the order was broadcast shipwide. A yellow marker displaying the contact appeared on the nautical map on the front screen.

“No! I’d have noticed a torpedo way sooner! The shape’s all wrong!” Dejirani objected. “They’re submarines! Damn, now two more! Designate Mike-14 and Mike-15! All about ten miles away and closing!”

Impossible, Mardukas thought. The de Danaan was the only submarine in the world capable of speeds faster than 50 knots. But he’d never known Dejirani’s analyses to be wrong, and so he believed it. Enemies? he wondered. A foolish question; of course they’re enemies.

Mardukas took a deep breath. “Contact the ground team,” he ordered. “Sever the communications cable. Helm, course 1-0-5, speed to 30 knots! Twenty degrees down bubble; make your depth 300! Prepare for anti-submarine warfare!”

24 December, 2325 Hours (Japan Standard Time)

Underwater, 16 Kilometers East of Tuatha de Danaan

The sound of superconductive drives and rushing water rang out as three Leviathans cruised forward, piercing through the black ocean. Their speed was far beyond what any conventional vessel could hope to match.

“Shark-1 to all. The TDD seems to have noticed us. It’s stopped running parallel with the Pacific Chrysalis and changed to course 1-0-5,” announced the pilot of one of the Leviathans, Shark-1.

Most submarines, when moving at top speed, would find it impossible to scan for enemies due to the noise they were producing themselves, but their machines were different. They were pulling information from the sonobuoys they’d dispersed in advance, which could tell them precisely where the enemy was, regardless of their own speeds.

“Shark-2, roger. Textbook navigation there, eh?”

“Shark-3, roger. What a mediocre captain. They don’t seem to realize how outmatched they are.”

The responses came from Shark-1’s “wingmen” as they trailed a few hundred yards behind. Their machines, revolutionized takes on the concept of the submarine, used fighter pilot jargon to describe their maneuvers. In fact, the concept of “Plan 0601,” the Leviathan, was that of “undersea fighter jet.”

With a crew of two each, these brand new weapons platforms made use of arm slave control technology, which allowed them to approach a target swiftly and execute strikes that couldn’t be dodged. They were capable of close-combat tactics, too, and their general purpose was to use their exceptional maneuverability to quickly dispose of slow-moving vessels carrying crews of several hundred.

Their bodies were streamlined, like throwing knives, and somewhat resembled scaled-down Tuatha de Danaans. Each was affixed with a pair of arms for close-range combat, which enabled the Leviathans to grapple a target and breach its hull with their monomolecular cutters.

These machines, which applied the versatility of ASes to undersea combat, were untouchable by all conventional ships. They’d already had live combat tests sinking Russian and Indian naval submarines, as well as several commercial vessels. All were written off as accidents, and the crews that had died at their hands probably didn’t even know what had hit them.

The Shark team that operated the Leviathans had found these early targets pathetically easy to dispose of, and this went doubly so for the captain of the Shark-1; he had once been an elite submariner in the British Navy, but the whims of a tyrannical superior had sealed him off from a path to captaincy. Yet now here he was, master of the world’s greatest underwater vessel—and he was deeply grateful to Amalgam, who had given him this chance.

The Tuatha de Danaan would be the ultimate prey. According to reports, its formidable female captain was not currently aboard, so the hunt wouldn’t even prove especially difficult. The vessel was probably currently under command of that man—that incompetent, neurotic officer who had ruined his life. It was finally time for revenge.

“I’ll teach you a lesson...” In the stuffy cockpit, he smiled cruelly to himself. “As usual, we’ll attack from three directions. Break!”

The three machines, sailing in a reverse V-formation through the dark water, split apart at his word, each going in a different direction. They turned with the precise ferocity of a raptor in flight; by comparison, their prey seemed especially slow and pathetic.

24 December, 2327 Hours (Japan Standard Time)

Casino, Pacific Chrysalis

“Not yet?” Sousuke whispered into the radio from a corner of the casino, as he readied his Belgian-made submachine gun. The sprinklers were still raining down on them.

“Not yet,” the soaked Kaname responded in a trembling voice, standing next to the roulette table a few dozen meters away. An Alastor was standing right in front of her, close enough to grab her with just one leap. “Keep holding,” she told him. “Once it realizes that I’m the one it’s after, it definitely won’t hurt me. Don’t worry.”

“But what if you’re wrong?” Sousuke fretted. “You’ve done enough, haven’t you? Get away from it, Chidori.”

“I haven’t done enough!” Kaname’s voice cracked. Sousuke, who had his sight trained on the Alastor from afar, could hear her even without the radio.

The robot approached her, slowly. As it stared straight at Kaname, the robot’s hooded sensor glowed. With one or two more steps, it would be close enough to tear her in half with one swing of its arm.

Sousuke had plenty of experience with decoy plans, but he’d never had to fight so hard against the urge to pull the trigger. I feel like a new recruit... he thought. What if that metal mountain just swats off her head? What if it shoots through her with its arm rifle? What if it grabs her throat with its hand, and twists... He was shocked by where his own imagination was taking him.

How many times has Kaname faced an imminent threat like this now? Sousuke wondered. Why do I always get this way? I lose all my cool the minute she’s in danger. My emotions race and my blood runs hot. I don’t feel this way about my other comrades... Why is that?

He narrowed his eyes. Kaname held stock-still before the Alastor, wreathed in light mist from the pouring rain. She was standing in the one faint beam of light in the room, which illuminated her droplet-covered face and her trembling shoulders. As she stood there, almost symbolically, he finally understood. The understanding was sudden, and inappropriate, and unforeseen. There was no logic to it at all. She was just special.

She’s strong. She’s beautiful. I want to protect her. Comfort, hope, inspiration—she is the symbol of all those things, Sousuke realized. I want her all to myself. I can’t stand the idea of anyone having her; especially not an enemy. That’s how I feel right now. Knowing that is all I need. I finally understand—

But as he was about to come upon the final answer, Sousuke’s ruminations were interrupted by the sound of Kaname’s voice. “Ah... wait. Er... Tessa? I’m a little occupied right now...”

“What is it, Chidori?” he asked, staring at her in confusion.

Kaname’s tone abruptly changed, and her voice came through the radio in a whisper. “I’m sorry, Kaname-san. This situation is... oh, my goodness. Very dangerous. But ah... I see. I’ll leave it to you...”

What is she talking about? Sousuke wondered. It was bizarre, just like that day in the depths of the de Danaan, in the Lady Chapel. She’d been talking to someone, as if she was a different person—specifically, as if she was Tessa.

But Sousuke didn’t have any more time to think it over, because Kaname was herself again, and shouting, “All right... do it!” In his sight, he could see the robot reaching for Kaname, and he opened fire without hesitation.

The stricken enemy turned to face him as Kurz bathed it in fire from the other direction. “Run!” Sousuke cried, pulling the safety off of a flash grenade.

Clouseau was at all ends trying to deal with everything at once: getting hostages to safety; organizing his subordinates; fighting off the encroaching enemy; the condition of the mothership they were no longer in touch with; the progress of the safecracking. It never rains, but it pours... he thought gloomily.

“Team Golf, move back from E13 to E15,” he ordered. “As slowly as you can. Don’t let them through to E14. Gebo-9, how’s Santa Claus coming? Kaun-6, prioritize the hostages—” Clouseau continued to shoot while dishing out his orders. Empty shell casings littered the floor around him, and the smell of smoke filled the hallway. On the other side of the corridor, a dark silhouette flew back and hid around the bend. Dammit... The stupid robot. Was it intentionally making him waste ammunition?

It was learning.

Just then, he got the call he’d been waiting for. It was Tessa; she was calling from the phone in the women’s bathroom, routed through the radio on the bridge. “Uruz-1, Ansuz here. Status?”

“Colonel?” Clouseau responded. “Where are you? Is that passenger—”

Tessa interrupted him in a whisper. “I’m still with him. I managed to sneak away to speak with you. He hasn’t done anything to me. But it sounds like those robots have appeared?”

“Yes. About a dozen, I think.”

“Follow Angel’s plan,” Tessa ordered.

How does she know about that? She should have only just now gotten in contact with us... But Clouseau didn’t have time to think about it any longer.

“Have Team Golf on standby in G10, as well,” Tessa continued. “That will be the one gap in the net, and Corporal Yang is better cut out for that. And I’m sure the robots are craftier than you were expecting.”

Hearing Tessa sounding clear and confident for the first time that day, Clouseau decided to set all questions aside. He could think about all of that later; she was his commanding officer, and worth trusting in situations like these.

Tessa launched into a series of rapid-fire questions next: “How’s the hostage evacuation?”

“Almost completely finished,” he told her.

“Captain Harris?”

“Haven’t found him yet.”

“The vault?”

“Not through yet.”

“The de Danaan?”

Clouseau hesitated for a second. That was right—that was the next most urgent matter after the robots. “‘Three high-tech submarines approaching at fifty knots. They probably mean to sink us. Taking countermeasures now,’ they said. The XO is still in command.”

Like most of the members of the ground team, Clouseau didn’t know much about submarine combat, but it was obvious that the de Danaan was in danger. Besides that, it was three-on-one—this might be the greatest threat the mighty sub had ever faced. And in the past, the one who’d always gotten them out of trouble was the wunderkind, Teletha Testarossa. But she wasn’t aboard right now. She couldn’t issue orders or give advice.

It’s probably hopeless... Clouseau didn’t want to admit it, but with that unimpressive-looking XO in command, there was no way—

“We’ll just have to leave it to him,” Tessa said, with utmost calm.

“Yes, ma’am. But Colonel—”

“Clouseau-san,” she said, cutting him off. “Do you know what Lieutenant Colonel Mardukas was known as in his Royal Navy days?”

“No...”

“‘The Duke.’ His navigation was serene. His strategies were clear-headed. He’s a top-notch submariner and an unbeatable chess player. He was awarded countless medals for top-secret live combat missions,” Tessa told him. “There is no one in the field of underwater combat who doesn’t know the name ‘the Duke.’”

“Him?” Clouseau questioned incredulously. “The lieutenant colonel?”

“Did you think he was merely a fussy technician?” Tessa asked, her voice betraying some amusement despite the seriousness of their situation. “When he’s about to show his true skill, ‘the Duke’ has a certain habit... I’m afraid I’ve never witnessed it myself, but our crew might be seeing it at this very moment.”

Same Timeframe, Tuatha de Danaan

Richard Mardukas was indeed displaying his “habit” for the first time in six years. He pinched his hat brim with the fingers of his right hand and put his left hand on the back of his head. Then he slowly reversed the positions of his hands, rotating the cap 180 degrees.

He pressed a button. “Gentlemen. We are entering battle,” Richard Mardukas said, running his narrowed eyes over the screen. “The enemy believes that they are hunting us. We may be large and slow, indeed, but we will show them that it is they who are the prey. Our lady’s vessel is the true queen of death, and she reigns over these seas.” He paused a moment, and then called out, “FCO, report.”

“FCO! Loading of first and second ADSLMMs complete!”

“Load MAGROCs onto all MVLSes.”

“Aye, sir. Loading MAGROCs onto all MVLSes.”

“Maneuvering. New course, 2-0-5.”

“Aye, sir. Coming to course 2-0-5.”

“FCO. On my signal, open tubes one and two.”

“Aye, sir. Ready.”

“Maneuvering. Halt EMFC and reduce forward speed. Sonar, tell me when we’re cavitating.”

“Aye, sir.”

It felt like an esoteric chant that only they knew; a pre-battle ritual, performed by ancient priests. With their words, the sleeping giant around them began to hum with power.

A report came in from the sonar shack. “Con, sonar. I’ve got it. Estimating five seconds. Two, one... cavitating!”

“Open one and two.”

“Aye. Opening one and two.”

“XO. We’ll be in plain sight,” said the officer of the deck, Captain Goddard, nervously.

“We already were,” Mardukas told him dismissively. “Swim out one and two.”

“Aye. ADSLMM, fire one. Fire two.”

Mobile mines spat out from the de Danaan’s torpedo tubes. These were weapons designed to sail silently to pre-input coordinates and wait for the enemy there... but their speed was only twenty knots, one-third the speed of the enemy.

It was a good thing that the noise of the de Danaan’s high-speed cruising, caused by the stoppage of its electromagnetic flow control function, covered the sound of the smart mines’ launch... but their effective range was in the opposite direction of the route the enemies were taking.

“Hold course. In twenty seconds, activate the EMFC on Captain Dinh’s mark. Then decrease to one-third speed. Slow to twenty knots.”

“XO. But then the enemy could attack—” the navigation officer said.

“Hurry, Captain Dinh,” said Mardukas, cutting his subordinate off.

“Ah... aye, sir. EMFC, on my mark. 5, 4, 3... contact.”

“Contact. EMFC, activate,” the AMC officer replied. The electromagnetic flow control silenced the noise generated by the massive submarine’s passage through the water.

“Well done,” Mardukas commended him. “But the enemy can still see us. Sonar, keep an ear out.”

“Aye, sir.”

“New course 2-9-5. Make your depth 120. Twenty degrees up bubble.”

“Aye, sir. Course now 2-9-5. Make my depth 120. Twenty degrees up bubble.”

Mardukas gave orders, and his subordinates repeated them.

As he listened to the reports coming in, Mardukas spoke quietly, without so much as a smile. “Excellent. Gentlemen, don’t be overwhelmed by the enemy’s speed. Impatience leads to unforced errors. Enjoy this moment.”

Pacific Chrysalis

Tessa finished her instructions to Clouseau and came out of the girls’ bathroom, when she found Sailor standing right there.

“Took you a while,” he said. She had expected him to lay into her, but his manner was strangely subdued.

They were currently on the lower deck in the ship’s fore, so there was no one else around. Ever since that first explosion, she’d been hearing the sound of intense gunfire in the distance. Sailor had gotten excited by the noise. “The Navy SEALS are here!” he’d exulted.

“But it’s too early,” he’d concluded directly afterwards. “We’re still only sixty minutes into a two-hour movie. They’re gonna get wiped out. I have to save them!”

It would be too dangerous to let this stubborn soldier throw himself into the danger zone, which was why Tessa was finding every excuse she could to buy time. She could sense his irritation rising every time she did so, but... “S-Sorry for the wait. Shall we, then?” Tessa asked as if nothing had happened, but Sailor’s response surprised her.

“We can go later.”

“Er? Is there some problem?” Tessa asked.

He’d been raring to go just minutes ago, but now Sailor’s manner was entirely subdued. His square jaw was twisted in a scowl, and he stared carefully at Tessa. “You might not think it from looking at me, but I’ve got pretty good hearing. I couldn’t make out everything, but I heard a lot. Who were you talking to?”

Tessa gasped.

Sailor, holding his submachine gun in one hand, walked swiftly up to her. “I heard you say something about ‘the Duke.’ You knew his real name, too. How does a maid like you know Mr. Mardukas?”

“Ah, er—”

“When I was an officer of the deck, he saved the ship I was serving on. And me,” Sailor admitted. “We were on maneuvers in the Barents Sea, and started taking on water from an accident and Soviet attacks. It was the British nuclear sub, the Turbulent, that saved us; the Duke was its captain. After things quieted down, my captain—Commander Testarossa—partly out of gratitude, partly out of respect, and partly as a joke, sent him an American-style Turbulent cap.”

Tessa was so shocked by his words that she forgot everything else about their current situation. Sailor used to serve under my late father? she wondered. And Mardukas and my father were friends? Mardukas had never mentioned that in the past...

“I heard that after Mr. Mardukas retired, he joined some civilian shipping company... What’s this all about?” Sailor demanded to know. “Is he on board here? I don’t get it. Are you hiding things from me?!”

“W-well, all girls have to have their share of secrets... ah, please don’t lean in so close. You smell like cigars...” Tessa turned away, wincing, as the angry Sailor bore down on her.

“Don’t change the subject!” he bellowed, sounding absolutely serious. “Who the hell are you?! If you don’t tell me right now, I’ll tie you up and throw you into the boys’ latrine!”

Tessa didn’t even have time to be shaken by the strange coincidence. It was time, she decided, to explain her position and the situation as simply as possible, and try to earn his cooperation. She couldn’t be stuck here, playing some comedy of errors with some old man, while everyone else was out there, struggling. It was completely unbecoming of a commander-in-chief.

Even so... “I don’t think you’d believe me if I told you,” she told him reluctantly.

“I’ll be the judge of that!” Sailor declared. “Now, tell me everything. As fast as you can!”

“Er... the truth is, I’m a captain, like you,” Tessa admitted.

“I’m being serious!”

“See?” she complained. “I knew you wouldn’t believe me...”

“Of course not! Are you a spy with the CIA or something? Trying to steal my glory before I—” Sailor was interrupted midway.

In the dim light of the corridor stood a large man. He was wearing a hooded coat, and a faint light shone from a horizontal slit on his face.

Tessa gasped as the figure began to approach them, silently, step by step. She immediately recognized it as being one of the robot attackers. Had it slipped through Clouseau’s line of defense and made it this far?

“The hell is your problem?” Sailor asked it quizzically. “What’s with the mask? Hey, stay back! I’ve got a gun, see?!” Sailor pointed his submachine gun at it, still unaware that it was loaded with rubber bullets.

“That won’t work! Throw it away!” Tessa screamed, leaping for the gun... but it was too late. Reacting immediately to Sailor’s aggression, the robot stooped over and took aim with its arm-mounted rifle. “Ah—”

It fired. Sailor was lucky that Tessa’s leap had thrown him off-balance, because the three-round burst just missed his head to spark against the wall behind him. “Huh?!” he exclaimed, sounding perplexed. Meanwhile, the enemy’s drive system hummed to life as it stopped firing and charged, its coat billowing behind it.

Tessa interposed herself between Sailor and the enemy. She was betting, based off of the inferences she’d inherited during her resonance with Kaname, that the robot wouldn’t target her.

“Run—” she began to say.

But the Alastor didn’t hesitate to swing its right arm at Tessa, sending her small body flying into the wall. Maybe this was its version of “going easy on her”... but it was still a painful and disabling blow. The impact forced the air out of her lungs. The world around her went black, and she lost all feeling in her body.

She could hear Sailor shouting and firing his gun recklessly. The rubber bullets bounced off the wall and rained down on her where she lay on the floor. “Urgh...” Shaking her swimming head, Tessa sat up, and saw the hand at the end of the enemy’s thick arm holding Sailor by the throat.

“Sailor-san?! Stop! Please, stop!” Tessa stood up and grabbed the robot’s arm, but all she could do was dangle helplessly. No matter how the two of them punched and scratched, their enemy remained unfazed.

“Going to... die...” Sailor wheezed.

“Stop it, please!” she cried again, and it was in that exact moment that the robot relaxed its grip.

“Urgh... guh.” Sailor thrust himself away desperately from the robot’s chest. He and Tessa both swayed and fell on their backsides, but the enemy didn’t attack again.

“What...?” she breathed, while Sailor coughed and retched.

Seemingly to have lost all interest in both of them, the Alastor slowly turned around and tilted its faceplate upwards. It was looking toward the upper decks of the ship’s fore. The next instant, the robot whipped around, leaped, and crashed through the deck above. Fragments of plaster and pipe rained down, and when the dust settled, they could see a perfect hole torn in the ceiling.

The robot was gone.

Could it be that its designer had programmed it to listen to her pleas? No, not possible; he wasn’t that kind of person anymore. Which meant... the diversion had worked.

Kaname-san, Sagara-san... be well... Tessa prayed to herself.

Meanwhile, Sailor stopped coughing long enough to curse. “Ugh... the hell is going on here? How was that thing so strong? Guh...”

“Are you all right, Sailor-san?”

“I’m fine! But I want to know what’s happening on this ship!” he demanded. “Who the hell was that? And who the hell are you?!”

“Well...” Tessa began, and trailed off while considering her next move. Sailor was in so deep at this point, that it occurred to her she might as well come clean with him—but just as she made up her mind to do so, she heard another voice.

“That girl is the captain of the Toy Box, sir. And the leader of the terrorists.” She turned to see Captain Harris standing there, holding a German-made automatic pistol.

Tessa froze up, and Sailor looked suspicious. “Captain,” he said. “Where have you been hiding? And... what’d you just say? The Toy Box? Captain? Leader? Her? Don’t give me that crap—”

“I don’t have time to explain. I need you out of the picture right now.” Then, without warning, Harris shot him. The sound echoed through the room, and Sailor dropped like a sack of potatoes.

A bloodstain spread out across the floor as the big man let out a moan. “Run... strange maid.”

“Sailor-san?!” Tessa gasped. “No! You have to hold on!”

“I don’t know what’s going on, but... please run,” Sailor told her weakly.

“No! You need treatment—”

“He doesn’t need treatment.” Harris calmly pointed his gun at Tessa as she clung to Sailor’s body. “They’re going to sink the ship soon enough. At least, that’s what I’d do, if I were an Amalgam executive. Even with treatment, he won’t last long in the open ocean at this time of year.”

Tessa glared at him. “How could you? He saved you when you were a prisoner, out of the goodness of his heart!”

But Harris just shrugged. “Yeah, right. I think he was just trying to play hero. He’s a stupid man. And let’s not forget... the one who got him, the crew and passengers all mixed up in this, was you—Mithril.”

Tessa had no response for this.

“We don’t have any time left,” Harris announced abruptly. “I’ve given up on catching Chidori Kaname, and I’ll be taking you with me instead. The organization has to forgive me if I bring them the captain of the Tuatha de Danaan.”

He’s going to take me and escape, Tessa realized. The captain is going to abandon his ship, its passengers and its crew, and run away. “You coward. You’re unworthy to captain a ship!” she shouted angrily. “Captain Sailor isn’t the stupid one. You are!”

Harris’s response was simply to sidle up to her with a grin. “I certainly am,” he agreed. “There I was, scolding you on the observation deck, and I didn’t even recognize you. It never occurred to me that the much-rumored Miss Testarossa could be such a beautiful, frail... easily wrangled little girl.” His hand reached for the back of her neck.

Kaname was running up the stairs. She took them three at a time, grabbing the railing—which was white, with anti-corrosion paint—for support. How long until the rooftop deck? She wondered. She knew the ship couldn’t really be a hundred stories tall... but right now, it certainly felt like it was.

“Don’t stop! Keep running!” Sousuke shouted from behind her, before turning to unload briefly on their pursuer. The ear-splitting gunshots made it almost impossible to hear his rebuke.

Kaname panted as she kept running. “Sheesh!” she wheezed. “Who thought up this plan?!”

“You did, remember?” Kurz said, injecting some of his reliable snark as he took his turn against their pursuers with his submachine gun. The two men were alternating regularly in firing back at the Alastors chasing Kaname.

“Uruz-7 to all! We’re about to reach the jogging track! Don’t shoot us, okay? We have three enemies in sight right now... no, now four! Team Echo, come from the starboard side—” Sousuke spoke into the radio, swiftly updating his comrades.

Struggling for breath, Kaname mounted the top stair and slammed the door open before exclaiming in shock. She had made it to the highest deck at last—but now, there was Alastor standing right in front of her eyes.

Did one get ahead of me? she wondered. No— Just as the Alastor began to reach for her, a hail of bullets assailed it from the side. Squeals rang out from the bulletproof metal, and sparks from ricochets showered down on her.

“Team Golf here! I think we made it in time. Get Angel to shelter—You hear that, Kaname? Run, run, run!” Just five meters to her right, around the corner of a hallway leading to the fitness center, stood an armed Mithril crewman who was shouting at her. She remembered that his name was Yang.

“Ah...”

“Hurry!”

Sousuke grabbed Kaname and ran in the opposite direction from Yang and the others. The Alastor in front of them was about to fire back, but Kurz unleashed a burst to distract it.

They never had a chance to catch their breath. Just as they thought they’d evaded the enemy, another Alastor would appear from the darkness and charge at them. Enemy after enemy came out of the woodwork, then pursued, hot on their heels. Just how many were there?

At last, they made it out into the vast open space on the roof of the ship. Seeing that it contained both a tennis and a basketball court filled Kaname with a renewed sense of disgust at the ship’s sheer size.

“Run! Hurry—” She turned back for a second, and gasped as she saw not one, but three Alastors advancing on Yang and the others, raining down gunfire and forcing the team into retreat. Kurz was under fire, as well; he’d just barely managed to dive behind a bench and run off into the darkness, herded by the shots coming down all around him.

“Don’t stop!” Sousuke called out urgently. “Go, go!”

Kaname ran with all of her might. Even when she wrenched her ankle and stumbled, Sousuke just grabbed her arm and kept running, pulling her mercilessly along with him. He didn’t even acknowledge her protests of pain and exhaustion.

“Eyes up, comrade! Our goal is near!” Sousuke said, trying to encourage her.

Comrade. It was a plain, vulgar word, and the opposite of romantic. Despite that, Kaname found herself reluctantly accepting it. Maybe this suited their relationship better than a pet name like “honey” or “darling.” But how did they keep getting into these situations?

“Some Christmas, huh?!” Kaname howled up to the sky, over all the gunfire and shouting. Okay, maybe it’s time to accept it, she told herself. I’m in love with him. I don’t know why these are the only times I can admit it to myself. Maybe it’s the sense of trust. Maybe it’s the touch-and-go nature of a firefight making it impossible to deny...

Tonight is Christmas. Normal couples all over Japan are whispering sweet nothings to each other, gazing out over beautiful nightscapes and listening to romantic music. Delicious dinners and intimate conversations; the kind of things Yamashita Tatsuro would sing about. There was a time when I thought that was what I wanted. But when I’m with him...!

Chased around by creepy robots, flinching from close-range ricochets, running for our lives, out of breath and soaked to the bone... Whoever heard of a couple like us?! “It’s got to be karma!” she yelled. “One of us was a real scumbag in a past life!!”

“I don’t quite follow, but I’m sure it’s not an issue!” Sousuke bellowed back.

“It so is!” Kaname wailed. “You’ve ruined my youth, and my 17-year-old Christmas Eve!”

“Really? This seems like an appropriate sort of night for you!”

“I hate it!”

“Then why are you laughing?” Sousuke wanted to know.

“This is crying!” she retorted.

Just then, their flight came to a stop; they’d hit a wall. A smoke stack, otherwise known as a ‘funnel,’ towered in front of them, while behind them was the wide-open tennis court. Panting for breath, they turned around and saw that roughly eleven Alastors had fanned out to surround them.

Clouseau spoke over the radio, “Uruz-1 to Uruz-7. Nearly all teams are out of ammo. There’s nothing more we can do for you. Good luck.”

“Uruz-7,” Sousuke briefly acknowledged. “Roger.”

Slowly, the eleven Alastors began to approach. They were crouched over, and ready to charge at any time. Their arm-loaded machine guns were exposed, their aim fixed on Sousuke and Kaname.

“We’re cornered,” Kaname announced with resignation.

“That’s right,” Sousuke agreed. “It’s all going just as planned.”

A faint metal scraping sound came from somewhere above them, but Kaname could barely hear it. She just clung to Sousuke’s arm as she looked out over the field of executioners. “They’re going to kill us,” she muttered.

“You’re the one who assured us they wouldn’t.”

“Well, I’m a little less certain now! And they might not kill me, but what about you?!”

Instead of responding to Kaname’s panicked concerns, Sousuke whispered into his radio. “Uruz-7, here. Have you arrived?”

The response came a minute later. It was an electronic voice, low and male. “Affirmative. I am in position. And here I thought I would never get my time to shine...”

“I’ve told you to stop using human turns of phrase,” Sousuke scolded back.

“And I have informed you that dangerous situations like these require jokes.”

Sousuke seethed. “If we make it out of this alive, I’m disassembling you.”

“I fear that you lack that authority, Sergeant.”

The Alastors prepared, and their attack would come at any moment. Sousuke clucked his tongue and said to the one on the radio, “They’re coming. I give you permission to fire at the targets. Fire, fire, fire!”

“Roger. Fire at will!”

“Do you even have will?” Sousuke muttered, but Kaname almost didn’t hear it as a new roar ripped out, louder than anything she’d heard that night.

Suddenly, a hail of 12.7mm shots came streaking down from the funnel above; each packing far more power than the rounds from the rifles and submachine guns the others had been using. This wasn’t fire meant for infantry, but for military LAVs. Any one hit could easily tear through an engine block, and they were coming at a rate of thirty per second.

The incredible curtain of fire did a full sweep: right to left across the line, then back again. It ripped the robots crowding around them to pieces. Several of the robots’ auto-destruct sequences seemed to have engaged, but Kaname and Sousuke took cover in a gutter at the end of the tennis court, so most of what hit them were wood splinters. Nevertheless, Sousuke threw himself over Kaname to protect her as tiny particles showered down on them.

Even with all of that, one Alastor seemed to have avoided fatal damage. Kaname was still its target, and it used what remained of its arms and legs to approach her. Sousuke dove in front of her, protectively...

And then suddenly, the Alastor flattened out, as if crushed from above by an invisible hammer. The air rippled faintly above it, like a heat haze.

“All targets destroyed. Orders, sir?” prompted the voice over the radio.

“Hold your fire. Stand by on Master Mode 4.”

“Roger. Holding fire. Mode 4: Stay alert, ready.”

“Disengage ECS.”

“Roger. ECS off.”

Above the machine, mercilessly crushed without a trace... a faint light appeared and began to pool out, like ink. The ‘spill’ in space slowly began to take shape, until at last it defined itself as the form of an AS.

It was the ARX-7 Arbalest. It was kneeling on the tennis court, smoke billowing around it, with the final Alastor crushed beneath its weight.

“Wow...” Kaname found herself breathing, even as she winced from the ringing in her ears. When she’d explained her plan to lure the robots out to the only wide-open part of the ship and finish them all at once, Sousuke and the others had said they would ‘use the AS loaded in the helicopter above.’ But even knowing that it was coming, she couldn’t help but be taken aback by the sight of the AS’s power in action.

After all the trouble the Alastors had given the flesh-and-blood humans, it had taken just a few rounds from the Arbalest’s head-mounted 12.7mm machine guns to polish them off—and those were its lower-powered integral weapons, barely useful in battle against other ASes. Imagining the destructive power of its more high-powered “optional” equipment—the 40mm rifle and 57mm shotcannon—was enough to make her dizzy. The maneuverability, the firepower... ASes were often called the ultimate land weapon, and it was clear that this was no exaggeration.

“Is it over?” she asked quietly.

“Yeah. Things are looking up,” Sousuke whispered back, hands on his hips as he stood up in the smoke. “Though I’d feel better if the view wasn’t the back of an awful AS.”

“Ah...” Kaname breathed vacantly, in a combination of relief and surprise.

The Arbalest responded over the radio. “Sergeant. Are you referring to me as ‘an awful AS’?”

“Guess,” Sousuke said shortly.

“Guessing complete. Do you wish to hear my conclusion?”

“No.”

“Roger. Please provide a rating of this machine’s autonomous battle function.”

“Well done. That is all.”

“Learning message: explain the meaning of ‘well done,’” the Arbalest requested.

“Figure it out,” Sousuke barked back. “And shut up until I give further orders.”

“Roger. Though I would prefer not to.”

“I told you to shut up.”

“Roger.” With that final rejoinder, the Arbalest’s AI fell silent.

Kaname, who was quietly listening to the exchange, found herself thinking what a strange operator—AS combination they were. It vaguely reminded her of the way conversations between her and Sousuke typically went. And with that realization, it all made sense.

The lambda driver-mounted AS was designed to shadow its operator as closely as possible. It could intuit the operator’s psychology and emotional state, and synchronize with them, not by copying, but by complementing. The further that process progressed, the more efficient the machine’s dynamic response rate with the omnisphere would become. This meant that while their enemies could only execute what was programmed into them from the start, the ARX-7’s potential was nearly limitless.

The one who made the machine—Tessa said his name was Bani—he must have been very talented, with a real romantic spirit... Kaname could tell that he’d loved Tessa, as well.

“Chidori?” Sousuke’s voice snapped her out of her reverie. The train of thought disappeared in a flash.

“Huh?” she said.

“How are you? Were you hurt?”

“Ah... no. I’m okay,” she told him. “But where’s everyone from school? And we need to get Tessa—” Suddenly, a new train of thought jolted through her, stopping her mid-speech.

Kaname-san. I’m sorry to interrupt again. I see it went well... I’m glad. But I’m afraid something awful has happened. Please send medics to Area H21 in the starboard corridor. There’s a man there, Sailor-san. He’s injured, and he will require a significant blood transfusion. He will die if nothing is done.

“Tessa...?” she asked uncertainly.

I’d ask you to send my men to the C16 observation deck, as well... but I know that it won’t be in time. Harris is finalizing his preparations to escape with me. This might be the last time we speak.

“Tessa?” Kaname tried again, through a rising sense of alarm.

I hate how powerless I am. If only I had your strength... Please, be of use to everyone. You’re the only one who can replace me. And regarding your relationship with Sagara-san... ah... it’s fading...

“Tessa?!” Kaname yelled, but that was the end of their resonance. A stinging in her right cheek, the pain of handcuffs on her wrists, and an afterimage of that captain’s sinister grin were all that remained with her.