Clay

Clay

 

The office was surprisingly plain, containing only a garden-variety reception furniture set and a terminal for looking up information. The man who sat facing Washu was slender and bespectacled; to all appearances, a nervous clerical worker. Washu’s bosom and crossed legs clearly held his focus, although he hoped she would not notice.

So this is why Naja told me to come here in my adult form, Washu thought.

When she first arrived, the man looked clearly annoyed and eager to shoo away all visitors. As soon as he took a look at Washu, however, he let her in, albeit reluctantly, thanks to her curvaceous good looks.

“Naja…san? Yes, I know her. She’s in the Student Union’s Information Bureau. She told you about this place… So, what can I do for you?”

“I heard you were the best informant in the Academy.”

“I am not an informant. I am an information collector,” the man said, quickly and furiously, and grimaced. “I’m insulted that you would consider me to be in the same category as those sleazebags.”

“Oh, well, I apologize.” Washu recrossed her legs in an exaggerated fashion.

“Th-that’s no problem. They would seem the same to people who don’t know.” The man had completely fallen for her charms.

In fact, Washu came here precisely because she knew the difference. This man did not sell information; he was indeed a collector. He saw value in the process of gathering knowledge, and he did not consider using that information for business reasons. Thus, he had different priorities than informants did. Furthermore, despite the man’s indifference to information that was easily accessible, he spared no expense gathering information that he deemed useful. The problem was…

“Since you do collect information, how do you acquire it?”

“I buy it. People come to me with information from all over that galaxy, and it’s quite difficult to select only that information which is most valuable.”

“But I heard you’re the top collector in the Academy. You must have quite a discerning ear for information.” Collectors loved to boast about themselves. Some did not want to share their collections, but most liked to show off. This one was no exception, especially with such an attractive audience.

The man talked endlessly about his methods, preferred genres, memory capacity, hardships and struggles, and, to top it all off, his gripes about other collectors. Washu was not averse to such talk. And since she herself was a collector of books, it was easy for her to play along.

After the man finished his spiel, Washu got down to business. “Don’t you do any gathering yourself?”

“Meaning?”

“Wiretapping or hacking, for example.”

“Some people do engage in such activities, but they’re outside my area of expertise. We information collectors call that ‘restoration’ among ourselves, and there are definitely some who enjoy it. But my objective is solely to collect. Besides, those people aren’t collectors. They’re informants.”

“But you possess information from those people?”

“I see… That’s what you’re after. Yes, I do. Some of the juiciest,” he stated proudly, eyes still focused on her body. He probably thought he was being discreet, but his behavior was obvious. What he desired was plain as day. “S-someone like you, who understands, is so rare… Would you like to make this a regular thing and get together once in a while to talk?”

Hmm, he wants to start with normal socializing. I thought he was going to proposition me outright, but… Tsk, how boring. Drat. Washu’s thought patterns were growing similar to Naja’s.

“Is…anything wrong?” The man, bewildered by her body language, asked the writhing, displeased Washu.

“Huh? Oh, it’s nothing. Ho ho ho ho.”

Argh, it can’t be helped. It’s dreadfully dull, but I’ll proceed as planned. Washu removed the disc from her inside pocket, revealing her cleavage in the process, and held it out for him. “I’d think this should be to your liking.”

The man stared at the disc quizzically, but his collector’s curiosity got the better of him, and he played the disc. It contained his unspeakable secrets; all sorts of them. It was a shameless blackmail ploy. “M-my God!” The man stood up in surprise and turned pale.

“I don’t like doing this either, but…” Washu felt some pangs of conscience, but there was no other way. She had no time to lose. There were several things she had to do and consider.

She had to find Mikumo and bring him back.

She had to infiltrate Seniwa, which had closed its borders.

Supposedly, Seniwa had registered Washu as a security threat.

She had to leave the Academy to boot.

She had to acquire the most cutting-edge technology the Academy had to offer.

Washu could have developed the technology herself…

But that would have taken hundreds of years.

The only way for Washu to get the technology in a short amount of time was to steal it.

And for that, she needed the best hacking technology.

That was why Washu was here. She glanced at the man, still pale, and cleared her throat to state her business. “I would like to exchange this information…”

“This is…wonderful!!”

“Huh…?” Washu’s thoughts stopped short at the man’s unexpected reply.

“I never imagined this would be information about myself… Please, sell this to me. I’ll pay anything. Please!!” He grabbed Washu’s shoulders and shook her.

That’s not what you’re supposed to ask for! This turn of events fulfilled her goal. Still, Washu felt very, very sad for some reason.

 

“How’d it go?” Noticing that Washu seemed depressed when she got back, Naja opened her mouth in surprise. “You didn’t fail, did you? Are you okay? Did he do anything to you?” She worriedly peered into Washu’s face.

“No, everything went well… I just feel a little vexed,” Washu answered weakly.

“…?” And then… “Ha ha ha ha! Gah ha ha ha ha ha! Haaaaah ha ha ha hah ahaha aha hahah!!” Upon hearing Washu’s story, Naja rolled on the floor, laughing like she never laughed before.

“Grown-ups are the worst…” Washu took on her child form and pouted in the corner of the room.

“I-I’m sorry… Heh, s-sorry. Heh heh heh…” Naja laughed too hard, and the muscles of her stomach contorted in a spasm. “But isn’t it a good thing that you got what you wanted?”

“Yeah, but…”

“You know what they say, time is money.” Rushed by Naja, Washu played the disc she got from the collector.

“Wow, this is amazing. I never imagined this way of organizing it.” Naja exclaimed, seeing the disc’s information categorization. Jurai later adopted the structure and used it continuously, unchanged save for two upgrades. “This is a lot of information. Say, Washu, what is this…?”

Washu played back the part that Naja pointed out. It was a porn film. The two of them gazed intently at the monitor for a moment, entranced.

“I’ve never seen one so…intense before. Say, Washu.”

“You want a copy of this?”

“Yeah.”

Eventually, they finally fished out what they were looking for: the identity of the Academy’s greatest hacker. “H-him??” they muttered, staring at the monitor, dumbfounded. The picture on the monitor was none other than Clay.

“Well, it’s darkest under the lamppost, as they say,” Naja mused. “I suppose it’s not surprising. Still, this could be a nuisance. Maybe we could get some dirt on him and make him cooperate? But then he’d have dirt on us.” Dealing with Clay would be tricky. Naja was lost in thought.

Washu turned to her, determined. “But…”

“I know. We need his help.”

“His skills, you mean,” Washu said, despondent.

“Yes… That’s it, Washu-chan!”

“What?”

“We only need help from his skills. Heh heh heh.” Having come up with a cunning plan, Naja laughed suggestively. “We hack into his system, the whole thing. Figure out which parts are heavily guarded. Oh, and be sure to use my lab equipment…” As soon as Naja got an idea into her head, she carried it out at once. That was who she was and what made her great.

Seeing her friend working briskly gave Washu confidence, but she also felt a little bit sorry for herself. This meant she had to cross paths with Clay.

 

Before the day was over, they identified the location Clay used to store valuable files. Washu talked to Naja, who was furiously tapping away on the keyboard. “What are we going to do now, Naja?”

“Like I thought, there are traps and malware set up to guard against any outside access… But his own equipment shouldn’t have anything like that.”

“His own…? You’re not actually talking about…”

“Yeah. We’re going to sneak into his house and take the information.”

Washu now understood what Naja had been laughing about earlier. “But how? The security system…”

“Washu-chan, the Academy develops its own security. It’s good enough for official use in Royal business, so why would anybody use some other system? That stingy Clay would never actually pay for anything when he didn’t have to. Besides, the security is controlled by the Department of Philosophy’s office, and it’s further supervised by the Student Union Information Bureau security department,” Naja said, a broad smile of satisfaction stretching across her face.

“Just like handing a spare key to a thief… Oh! Wait, you mean the security system you put on your own system at your expense…?”

“Duh. I couldn’t let the office handle it, that’s too dangerous.”

“I hate grown-ups…”

“I didn’t have much choice. I blame the people who weren’t doing their jobs.”

“…?!”

“Don’t you know, being in the Department of Philosophy?” Naja asked. “Each researcher, upon request from a researcher above Class 3 in the Department of Philosophy, is obligated to submit their findings… But quite a few don’t bother.”

“If they’re in the middle of the study, they should be excluded from that obligation.”

“You should know, being a scientist. The point of completion depends on individual interpretation. It’s the same logic used by a new highway that refuses to reduce its toll to pay off the road even after the promised numbers of years of higher prices has passed.”

“Urk, that’s quite a persuasive comparison…”

“Is it usable or not? The Philosophy researchers will decide. This place isn’t for hobbyists. If people can’t use the results… For example, even if a car could be built with a new technology, some kid’s tricycle is still more useful to society if that tech is just a report sitting in a desk drawer.” Naja’s tone became increasingly rough.

“You must’ve had a terrible experience, Naja.”

“They said, ‘Nobody appreciates the true value of my research!’”

“Now, now.” Washu soothed her. “I bet you doled out some payback.”

“I developed it myself—something better than theirs. And I wrote up all their defects and shortcomings in a report and sent it to them.”

“I can just imagine their mortified faces.”

“It made me feel better, but I wasted my time,” Naja said. “In any case, this institution’s original point has been twisted. And the laws can’t be revised because the legislators are all on the other side.”

“So that’s why there’s an Information Bureau.”

“It’s supposed to be there to protect the technology…”

“Is it really a part of the Student Union?”

Naja paused, apparently lost in thought.

“What?”

“It’s a secret. ♥” They blankly stared at each other.

“Maybe I should pay to install my own security system.”

“I’ll do the installation for you.”

 

That night, Washu and Naja staked out Clay’s mansion, waiting for an opportunity to sneak in. Clay, having breathed in the sleeping gas Naja fed into the security system, was snoring in bed.

“Nerds are so sad. He may boast an ironclad firewall online, but he’s defenseless against a simple physical burglary.”

“How is this a ‘simple burglary?’” asked Washu. “We have military-grade special ops equipment.”

“Of course we do. It was all developed by the Academy.”

“The Academy is kind of a nasty place.”

“Here it is.” In a few minutes, they found Clay’s hidden safe.

“How did you find it so fast?”

“I have a monopoly on that kind of information.”

“Even details like that are leaked?”

“Only what could be located where.”

Washu put the data disc from the safe into her portable terminal and booted it up. “You were right, it doesn’t even have a password.” The data was already compressed, and she copied it quickly. “I’m done.”

“Then we don’t need to linger.”

Washu put the disc back into the safe and got up to leave at once.

“Washu-chan, this outfit is in rather bad taste, isn’t it?” Naja pointed to the clothes by Clay’s bedside.

“I’ve only seen him in his uniform or his lab coat.”

“Isn’t this outfit Medici?”*

“So he splurged, for once. Let’s go, Naja.” Naja did not move. “What are you doing? Come on.”

“It’s got to be for a woman,” Naja muttered in conclusion, arms crossed.

“Naja! This is a bad habit of yours. Come on and let’s go.” Washu seized Naja by her collar, and they escaped from Clay’s mansion.

 

For thirty whole hours afterwards, Washu did not sleep a wink, spending every minute looking through Clay’s data.

“You should get some sleep. This is a long haul.” Naja emerged from her nap.

“There isn’t anything that looks like information on hacking techniques…”

“What? Aw, man. From his personality, I was sure he’d preserve his data… I thought for sure it was this one…” Naja mumbled, troubled.

“I thought we copied everything on that disc. What should we do?” Washu’s expression clouded over.

“We’ll figure something out. Cheer up,” Naja hugged Washu’s shoulders and stroked her hair. “Hey, what’s this?” Noticing some data on the monitor, Naja leaned in to type some keystrokes. “What… ‘My Glorious Achievement Log?’ Heh…sounds great. Let’s take a look.” She merrily removed Washu from the chair and started typing.

“Naja, private data is off limits.”

“As if he ever respected anyone else’s privacy… Here we go… What’s this…?”

 

Day X: I accessed Naja’s data banks today, the entry read. I couldn’t even call it a warm-up, as there was no resistance whatsoever. That security level is nothing to me…

 

Naja’s face twitched, rage slowly taking over her expression. In the journal, Clay sang his own praises, touted his hacking skills, and, all the while, sprinkled in ridicule for the people whose data (mostly private information) he obtained.

“Th-that bastard!! I’ll murder him!!” Naja grabbed the nearest military-grade special ops weapon and deliberately rose from her chair. Washu had to hastily hold her back.

There were entries about Washu, too, but she chose not to look at them. She knew that, if she did, she might just let Naja do as she pleased.

 

A few days later, as they finished up analyzing and organizing Clay’s data, Naja came home from buying groceries in a good mood. “Washu-chan, Washu-chan!!”

“What happened? Anything good?”

“Oh, this is great… Remember that awful outfit we saw when we snuck into Clay’s house?”

“The one you were convinced had to do with a woman?” Washu asked.

“Yeah. As you know, new students get a volunteer guide to show them around the school and help with administrative formalities. That was supposedly the outfit he chose to act as host for a new student.”

“Clay? No way. He wouldn’t pick something so expensive…”

“Turns out, he was actually aggressive about it. He used some shady tricks to get the other hosting candidates booted from consideration.”

“So, she was cute…?”

“Exactly. The rate at which hosts and new students eventually marry is pretty high, you know.”

“Well, well, so spring has finally arrived for Clay? I hope this’ll calm him down,” Washu answered, already disinterested.

“I wouldn’t be so ecstatic if that was where the story ended. There’s more! So, after they filled out the paperwork, Clay took her on a campus tour and to his own room. Then he started lecturing her all about himself!”

“You mean like in the diary?” Washu gasped. Naja nodded. “Ouch, sounds painful.”

“And then he tried to show her some slides of his achievements. And then…” Trying to suppress her laughter, Naja found it hard to continue.

“What’s the matter, Naja?”

“What showed up on the monitor was hard-core porn, full screen and full volume! Ha ha ha ha ha ha!!” Naja burst out laughing and started rolling around on the floor.

“What…?” Washu suddenly seemed uncomfortable.

“And what an uproar. The new girl ran crying to the office, and everyone from the admin to all the students with grudges against him stormed over. Even the newspaper reporters came! The judicial administrator is going to decide on his fate.”

“What’s Clay saying about this?”

“That it’s a conspiracy, of course. I mean, there are plenty of people who have something against him. But then, it’s still his fault. He brought this upon himself. The newspaper and magazine reporters are out searching for the culprit.”

“Wh-why?”

“It’s obvious. This incident will go down as one of the year’s top three news events. Whoever did this is a hero. What’s wrong, Washu-chan? You look pale… No—you didn’t! When we snuck into his place?” Naja drew closer.

“I-I mean… I felt sorry that he was alone, so I did it to thank him for the data. I thought it would serve his needs. I wanted to surprise him. I didn’t mean any harm…”

“Oh my god! Well done, Washu-chan!!” Naja hugged Washu in joy and twirled her around. “The Department of Philosophy will win News Topic of the Year!!”

“You’ve got to be joking! Everyone will find out we broke into his house.”

“Urk, that’s true… But, Washu-chan, we could leak just a little…”

“I don’t want to be involved with Clay.”

“Well, all right.”

Later, Clay was suspended for a month and earned the nickname “octopus” from the other students. The Academy planet contained a creature similar to Earth’s octopus, which lived in a shell. The male would use bait to lure a female out of her shell, then drag her into his own shell to copulate. Furthermore, with a year-round mating season, they multiplied like rabbits. That was why Clay earned his nickname.

“I’ll find the culprit and shove the prize and plaque for the News Topic of the Year down their throat!” shouted Clay venomously in his awards ceremony interview.

Even though they could not identify the award winner, the judges were unanimous in their decision. Never in the award’s history had the recipient remained unidentified, but that just added to the notoriety of the year’s winner. Washu vowed to herself that she would never be discovered. However, she did not realize that this would be the beginning of a very long, protracted, and mostly one-sided battle with Clay.

 

Washu took several months to apply and develop Clay’s technology, and soon completed a system that could freely infiltrate anything not managed by Jurai’s Royal Trees. Procuring the necessary technical materials, and having absorbed all the relevant technology, Washu was approaching the level of expertise possessed by the Academy’s best, such as Professor Ikuma or the grad students.

Then, one day, two things happened.

The first occurred while Washu was searching through Jurai’s top secret files. She discovered and accessed a familiar item. “Report by Tatsuki Nishia Jurai… Nishia-dono.” It was the report on the incident that had alarmed Nishia, a Juraian Royal, when Washu first arrived at the Academy.

“Someone you know?” Naja paused in her work and peered at Washu’s monitor. “Nishia? Oh, the Juraian Royal. He was your bodyguard.”

“Yes… What?! The Jurai fleet that struck the Shank base along with Shippris…was devastated?!”

“I see. That was why they made a fuss about it up top.”

“You knew?”

“I didn’t know the details, but Professor Ikuma received a confidential analysis request.”

The gist of the report was that the Juraian fleet had discovered a Shank Guild base the size of a nation state. It was a plant, producing everything from food and commodities to planetary-class battleships. Considering its scale, it was an important interchange. That was why they so relentlessly pursued Kanamitsu.

Bulldozing Shank’s fierce resistance, the Jurai fleet had just annihilated about half of the facilities. An energy reading detected a large battleship several hundred times the size of a planetary-class ship. The battleship’s name was Shippris, and it was an unusual vessel, in that most of its structure was an energy generator. Internalizing a quantity of energy so tremendous that it rivaled a star, the battleship fired directly at the Royal Ship.

“That’s weird. For the energy readings generated, the attack was actually strangely weak.” Washu looked quizzically at the data set’s values. Actually, the weak attack wasn’t much of a surprise. The fired energy was only a small fraction—a few thousandths—of what was generated in the reactor. Of course, even if Shippris used all the reactor’s energy, the opponent was still a Third Generation Royal Ship. Penetrating its ethereal Light Hawk Wings was impossible.

“And yet, the Royal Ship was destroyed.”

Washu nodded at Naja’s words. The Juraian fleet, in shock over the sinking of the Royal Ship, underwent a Shank counteroffensive; the report described how the Juraian fleet finally destroyed the large ship and Guild relay point, sacrificing 80% of the fleet in the process.

“I see. So this is the data Professor Ikuma was asked to analyze.” Naja reached over Washu’s shoulder and opened the data file on the Royal Ship’s destruction.

“What’s this…?” Looking at the image of the moment the battleship’s energy blast struck Shippris, Washu noticed a unique streak of energy.

“What? I don’t see anything.”

“How can that be? It’s right here,” Washu pointed at the streak of light on the monitor.

“I see where you’re pointing, but I still don’t see a thing.”

“B-but…” Washu checked over each data type. No data was detected on that streak of light.

“Washu-chan, can you really see something?”

“Yes.” Washu could only nod at Naja’s question because it was true.

“It’s not in the databanks, and it’s visible only to you. It’s concerning that the Light Hawk Wings have a similar quality. When attacked, the Royal Tree undoubtedly deployed its Light Hawk Wings. But it was still destroyed.”

“What happens when Light Hawk Wings strike each other?”

“There’s no record of anyone conducting such an experiment. That might be why the Royal Ship was destroyed.” That was as far as their deductions went. They would get into serious trouble if they were discovered perusing the data without permission. Even in the Department of Philosophy, Academy students were forbidden from any type of involvement with the Royal Trees, Jurai’s most carefully guarded secret.

The second incident took place when Washu carefully copied the data and returned to the directory level. She suddenly found herself connected to the deepest part of Jurai, which she had previously been unable to access: the archives of information on the Royal Trees. It was not clear why, but it was not due to any improvement in Washu’s hacking skills.

“We’re connected to the lower level. Washu-chan, what did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything. What is this?”

She had found the biological data of the entire Royal Family, from the very first Emperor to the present day.

“Genetics, astral…assembly, bio-fortification… What is this?! What are they creating?” Only part of the data was remotely understandable to Washu and Naja. It was common knowledge that the Jurai Royal Family possessed some form of bio-fortification, but that in itself was not a rare thing. Most of the intelligent life in the galaxy benefited from bio-fortification. The major difference was that the Jurai Royal Family’s technology was far more advanced.

“From analyzing tiny fragments of cellular remains from the Shank Guild representative you encountered when you first came to the Academy, we know he was a soldier, carefully bio-fortified over generations…”

“And yet, he didn’t stand a chance against Nishia-dono.”

“Yes, but if we were to believe this data here, even civilians who become a part of the Juraian Royal Family through adoption or marriage gain the Royal Family’s power through this bio-fortification. That’s impossible, even with the Academy’s technology!”

Washu and Naja stared at each other. They seemed to have come across something they were not supposed to see. However, their pure curiosity as scientists overruled their fear. As they tried to dig deeper, wading through the waves of incomprehensible data, their access was suddenly denied.

Were we discovered?! They both thought for a second, but there was no anti-hacker counterattack that they could see. Was this an accident or on purpose? There was no way for them to find out.

“Oh well. It’s too dangerous to dig deeper.”

Washu nodded at Naja’s words. “How should we deal with this—gack!!” The most deeply buried data she had recorded was gone. The rest of the top secret information was unscathed.

“What’s going on?” Naja’s face showed only confusion, but Washu had formed a hypothesis from the brief glimpse of the data.

“Naja, I’m only speculating, but what if Jurai’s bio-fortification is a kind of biological and mental recombination by something that forms a core?”

“Could be. We might only understand a bare minimum of the data. The other thing I could imagine is that this core still receives biodata feedback from current Royal Family members.”

“Yes… But what are they trying to do?” Washu was very interested. Not only as a scientist, but also from a deep-rooted impulse.

“Washu-chan, this was very interesting to us, but it’s not important right now,” Naja reminded Washu, aware of her friend’s feelings. “It has nothing to do with your current goals.”

“Yes… You’re right.” Washu closed the data file and returned to the work she should have been doing.

 

Four years passed. Washu stood on Seniwa. Everything she had done—whether interfering with the various systems of each country, disrupting Jurai’s storied information network, improving high-speed interstellar spaceships and designing new engines, rewriting personal data, or developing a lifelike android—was for this moment. Washu watched the snow falling relentlessly from the skies and thanked Naja for sticking by her all this time.

“I’ve arrived at last…”

Her boy was here. She was finally going to see him. Deep emotion overcame Washu as she gazed toward her child’s home.