novelThe Right to Become a Good Person and the Right to Reject It. Black (2)
| ← Ch.005 | Ch.007 → |
The ones the enemies would go straight for were Hamazura and Accelerator.
Their enemies.
The Freshmen.
"Hanzou, where are you!?" he said quickly once the phone connected.
The sports car had made it out of the parking garage.
"I managed to find Kuruwa somehow or other. But it's odd. Kuruwa wasn't captured or even attacked. She just had her service cut off by the phone company. Hey, Hamazura, what's—?"
"Fremea was captured."
Because they had no time, Hamazura ignored Hanzou's question.
For the moment, he drove off in the direction the four-legged powered suit had gone, but he didn't have any clue if he was on the right track.
"She was taken to the east of the private salon in District 3! But I don't know specifically where. Hanzou, where are you now? Can you cut ahead of them!?"
"What did they look like?"
"It was that bastard in the powered suit. This one has four legs and a giant propeller on the back. But I really doubt he would go all the way to his hideout in that thing. He must have a trailer or some large vehicle to store it in."
"So a large specialized vehicle instead of a normal car.... We might still be able to track them down."
"What?"
"There are plenty of ways."
The second he had heard that Fremea had been captured, Hanzou had breathed a heavy breath. This was because he had realized why Kuruwa's phone had been stopped.
Kuruwa was sobbing into her hands over having been used by the enemies.
"H-how could I, a ninja descendent, have been tricked into informing the enemy of a small girl's location... ?"
"This is a world of fool or be fooled, so the odds of a real ninja being fooled are about 50/50, really."
"No!! A ninja is supposed to... y'know, be a master of splendid intellectual tricks! A ninja group needs to be an elite group that can trick an evil prefectural governor guarded by ronin and bodyguards at every turn!!"
"Ninja was already an outdated occupation by the time the prefectural governors came into power during the Edo period, " responded Hanzou.
He brought his hand behind his back and pulled a thirty-centimeter-squared piece of thick paper out from a gap in his jacket. It was waterproofed like the spoons that came with one-hundred yen yogurts and it had lines on it to show where to fold.
He folded the thick paper and it became a rather tricky-looking paper airplane.
In a couple of places, he stuck on a couple of motors about the size of the nail on his pinky, added on some small flaps and a rudder, and taped on a camera and transceiver to the bottom.
It was an MAV, a micro air vehicle.
"There really is no place for a ninja now that you can make one of these things with objects bought at a discount shop, " Hanzou exaggerated in self derision and tossed the MAV into the air with just his right arm.
The remotely-controlled ninja of justice flew through the air to save Fremea.
"Hamazura. I've sent a flying radio-controlled camera your way. I'm sending the footage live to your phone. There shouldn't be too many vehicles large enough to carry the powered suit and it should be fairly visible from above."
"A toy plane, huh?"
Hamazura was holding the steering wheel and he set his phone to speaker phone and threw it to Accelerator. He was still pressing the gas pedal down as far as it would go, so it wasn't the time to be driving with only one hand.
"How fast can the camera plane go?"
"150 kph. If they're tuned like an F1 racer they could lose me, but I'm not restricted by the roads. I can send it on a straight course regardless of the terrain."
"Found it, " muttered Accelerator as he stared at the screen of the cell phone in his lap."It's five kilometers ahead. The powered suit is racing along next to a giant dump truck. The truck is empty. It looks like it's full of iron ore, but that's fake. It most likely has a large maintenance area inside. There's a tunnel ahead of them. It looks like it's going to enter the truck on the go."
Hanzou gave a puzzled silence in response to the new voice that suddenly cut in, but he started speaking again shortly thereafter. He must have realized that it wasn't the time to ask.
"That isn't good. The MAV observes from the sky and the signal is meant for a toy, so it won't reach that far. You need to catch up to them soon. Everything is lost if they get away."
Hamazura briefly looked over at Accelerator.
"... I know it's not my place to ask since I got you wrapped up in this, but is that kid okay?"
"Who are you talking about? It feels like I've been dealing with no one but brats lately."
"Umm..." Hamazura pictured the girl he had seen at the scene before in his head and tried and describe her."She looked about ten, had short brown hair, and looked completely thoughtless... or maybe even a little stupid-lookin-ghwhf!?"
Hamazura suddenly uttered a weird noise because Accelerator had grabbed his nose and slightly twisted it.
"... You don't need to worry about that brat. I had someone else with me back there."
"U-um, sir? Don't you realize I'm trying to drive here?"
Accelerator clicked his tongue and let go.
"A tunnel, huh?"
"You have the strongest power in Academy City, right? Won't this be easy for you to take care of?"
"..."
Accelerator didn't want to reveal unnecessary information, but he decided Hamazura most likely already knew since his leader, Komaba, had fought knowing his weakness. He pointed at his choker-style electrode.
"If I wanted to, I could chase after a fighter jet, but there's a danger that damage to the signal could cause me to lose control of my power. I don't like the idea of that tunnel. The greater the power I try to use, the greater the reaction if I lose control."
(... I caught a glimpse of what he could do in Russia, but just how far does his power go?)
He was a person that shoved Mugino Shizuri to fourth place. He had to have some kind of crazy power.
"So you're saying we can't rely on your power?"
"... I just said I didn't like it."
"Same thing." The tires squealed as Hamazura merged into a large bypass."We'll just have to catch up to them with this!!"
With a further squeal of rubber, the sports car accelerated. As the car cut between the family cars crawling along at the legal speed limit and cut further and further ahead, they saw their targets.
They saw the giant dump truck and the four-legged power suit.
"They're going in the tunnel, " announced Accelerator as their targets slid into a large cave made of reinforced concrete.
With a lag of a few seconds, Hamazura and Accelerator followed them.
Their vision was filled with orange lights.
Accelerator trembled slightly in the passenger seat. He seemed to be enduring something. Hamazura started to look over at him, but Accelerator stopped the trembling with a hand.
"... It may be empty inside, but that truck is still ten times heavier than us."
"Yeah, if we hit it head on, we'd just get blown away."
"Do you know how to stop it?"
"Yes, although it isn't really something worthy of praise."
The back of the dump truck opened before their eyes. It wasn't that its cargo of ore opened or that the giant container on the back did. A crack appeared across the entire thing at a ridiculous point and it opened up from there. It looked something like a trompe l'oeil.
The dump truck and the powered suit matched their speeds and the loading process began.
When one of the suit's four legs was placed on the inside of the dump truck, Hamazura moved forward with the sports car.
It was true that a mere two-door would do nothing if it slammed into a dump truck ten times its weight. It would literally just be repelled and the car would be done for.
However...
No matter how large the dump truck was, it still only had four points of contact with the ground, gained its power from the wheels rotating at high speed, and, most importantly, was moving forward. This of course meant that not every direction you applied force from would have the same result. For example, the dump truck was a weapon of steel moving at 200 kph, but the four-legged powered suit had matched its speed and succeeded in softly laying a leg on the truck.
Question time: What change would the two-door car cause if it rubbed up against the dump truck from the diagonal back corner?
The squeal of the tires rang out.
The dump truck had been moving with as much stability as a roller coaster that was supported by rails, but it suddenly stuck out of its lane by quite a bit.
Hamazura had not struck the truck with pure force.
Instead, he had matched its speed as much as he could, slowly gotten right up next to the truck's metal body, and then "pushed" it.
This was the kind of driving trick Anti-Skill used to forcibly stop out-of-control vehicles.
The reason Hamazura knew how to do this was simple.
"That Anti-Skill woman with the jersey and the giant tits used to do this to me all the time!!"
He didn't need a huge amount of power.
The dump truck provided that for him. Just by slightly shaking the flow of that power, it would lose control on its own.
If this were in the middle of the city, there would be the possibility of secondary damages, but there were only thick concrete walls on either side in the tunnel.
Sparks flew.
The dump truck had lost control and was scraping up against the wall. The powered suit was only just getting inside the truck and it had to go back out on the road due to the shaking.
"This is our chance!!"
The giant powered suit was running alongside them so close it felt like they could touch it if they reached out the window.
"Look inside the glove compartment, #1!! If you find something to write with in with the maps, break the marker in half and break open the ink!! If you can cover its lens, it won't be able to run anymore!!"
"... It doesn't look like that's going to happen."
Accelerator pointed and Hamazura couldn't believe his eyes when he looked that way again.
The driver of the dump truck that had been scraping up against the wall had turned the steering wheel as hard as he could as if fighting back in the truck's death throes.
A wall of steel approached them.
Knowing that the car would lose balance, Hamazura slammed on the brakes. The giant mass crossed right in front of them and their bumper was torn off, but the car itself survived. Hamazura and Accelerator had just barely survived.
But their car was not the only thing that had lost its balance. Having suddenly swung its giant mass around, the dump truck was now completely out of control.
The truck was now moving diagonally in the straight tunnel.
Even from outside it was clear that the driver attempted to correct the truck's trajectory by frantically turning the steering wheel as if he were trying to drive in a giant S shape.
However, its front wheels were already in the air.
The giant truck completely collapsed onto its side in the tunnel. Even though Hamazura immediately slammed on the brakes, it was clear which of the two vehicles was decelerating faster. The two-door car's wheels were still spinning and the dump truck was scraping up against the wall and the ground.
They were going to hit it.
Hamazura turned the steering wheel planning on hitting the truck with their side. He naturally chose to have the passenger side hit the truck and Accelerator put his hand to the electrode's switch preparing to shove the vector's to Hamazura's side even if that brought the danger of losing control.
"Tch!! You fucker. Did you factor me into your decision!?"
"What? That four-legged power suit will be stopped by this as much as we—!!"
Hamazura trailed off and swallowed his words.
There was a space between the collapsed dump truck and the ceiling.
A normal vehicle had no way of getting through that area, but the four-legged power suit jumped through it like the truck was a hurdle.
"You're kidding..." muttered Hamazura dumbfounded.
The dump truck and the two-door car collided. Their speeds had been matched to a certain extent due to the brakes, but the shock had not been brought down to zero. Even though it was the side of the car that struck the truck, the steering wheel exploded and the airbag shot out. That completely cut off Hamazura's vision and the movement of his hands.
The two vehicles continued to slide.
They slid out of the tunnel.
After continuing on for a few dozen more meters, they finally came to a stop. The air started leaving the airbag and Hamazura struck it with his fist to speed up the process. He then yelled to Accelerator.
"Go after him, #1!!"
"..."
"We're out of the tunnel. Your signal's fine now, so nothing can stop you now!!"
The passenger side door was crushed up against the dump truck, so it couldn't open properly, but that didn't stop that monster.
He touched the switch on his neck.
A loud impact could be heard.
Academy City's #1 tore off the entire roof and chased after the fleeing powered suit.
Part 12
"Yes, yes. That's correct. It seems there was an accident near the exit of the tunnel. Hah? Yes, yes, it's fine. Nothing really happened here. We're just stuck in the tunnel. We can't go forward or backwards."
A middle aged maintenance worker was talking into his cell phone while he leaned up against the side of a large trailer and scowled at the orange lights and the smell of exhaust.
A small embroidery on his chest gave his name as Jousawa Michihiko.
The trailer behind him was not a giant container. It was made only of the metal framework, so the cargo could be seen from outside the box-shaped frame.
"I think it's going to take some time to get the cargo in. Well, it's a three-lane road, so bikes have been driving on between the other cars. If I only had permission to take it out directly... I can't? Yeah, that's what I thought."
He was definitely going to be late due to the traffic congestion, but Jousawa didn't seem that irritated by it.
In fact, he almost seemed to welcome the delay.
He hung up the phone and grabbed the radio hooked at his waist.
He was contacting the driver of the large trailer.
"I've informed them of the delay. They just said they want us to change the transportation route a bit."
"Yeah, it doesn't matter that much to them, " spat out the driver."This'll never be used again. Actually, I guess it was never used in the first place. It'll be sealed up completely airtight and then given eternal sleep in some warehouse. Later it might be taken out for some derivative research, disassembled, studied, and then put back to eternal sleep. It's like an insect specimen. There's no real reason to rush this. They'd just laugh it off even if we were late by half a year."
Listening to the driver, Jousawa looked at the contents of the trailer he had been riding on previously.
A vehicle was thoroughly bound with a number of metal fixtures and reinforced rubber belts.
"Isn't it a good thing it didn't have to be used?" he said.
"Well, it's a good thing it didn't have to be used in the war."
It was the HsSSV-01 Dragon Rider.
It was the ultimate monster of a military bike that had been scheduled to be brought into World War III.
As the war had ended sooner than expected, that new model had lost its chance to be used in combat.
It had been all over the news that the weapons that were no longer to be used in the war were being transferred to large warehouses in Districts 2 and 23.
"But surely there was some other way it could have been used, " added the driver."The Dragon Rider was originally supposed to be Anti-Skill's new patrol bike, after all. Instead, it was confiscated for use in World War III, spent the entire time of the war being remodeled, and now it's going for eternal sleep within a warehouse without ever having been used. I'm sure you people didn't develop it for this to happen."
Those two had no way of knowing, but Silver Cross's collection was a crystallization of the technology of the city's dark side while the Dragon Rider was created by the city's surface for an ally of justice to use.
"Bikes are a different genre, but does it make you mad as a driver?"
"How do you feel as one of the people that created it?"
Its top speed was 1050 kph.
The large bike within the box-shaped frame trailer had a jet engine put in as if it were sticking straight through the body of the bike, linear engines installed inside the wheels that were completely protected by circular armor, wing-like arms stretching back from the left and right of the front wheel area, and boosters that both gave auxiliary power and forced steering.
"Well..."
It also had gyros for stability, completely electronically controlled anti-shock suspension, and wings on the back to keep the machine on the ground aerodynamically. All of these devices were needed to ensure the machine moved along the ground properly when driving at full speed.
"As you said, I didn't really want this to be used in war."
Its specs had been solidified with the idea of being able to freely fly across the wastelands of Russia at over 1000 kph and to climb cliffs with a slope of 70 degrees at over 300 kph. The biggest problem in its development had been how to keep the monster on the ground when it would fly off into the air if you didn't do anything to stop it.
"I don't care how. I just want it to be useful to someone at least once."
The driver briefly remained silent after hearing that.
He finally asked the maintenance worker another question.
"Did they tell you why they want us to change our transportation route?"
"Don't change the subject. I know you're mad."
"I bet the darkness has made another move. The same darkness that is taking this and not letting anyone use it even once."
"They said some kid's been abducted."
"Hah. They tell us that and yet tell us to keep the road free for them."
Jousawa had heard some of it from his talk on the phone, but the driver must have been contacted by an official over the vehicle's radio.
"Complaining about it won't solve anything, " responded Jousawa with a bit of self derision."I'm in charge of the weapon's maintenance and you're the driver in charge of transporting it. We're the ones that fortify Dragon Rider's place. We can't hope for the position of the hero who gallantly appears riding it."
That was when Jousawa heard a clunk. It sounded like something had struck the outside of the trailer. When he went to check, he saw a person. A boy who looked like he was in high school was propping himself up on the metal frame.
Jousawa assumed he must have either been in the accident that was holding up traffic or he was feeling unwell from being stuck in the tunnel for so long.
He was wrong.
The boy was actually climbing up the frame. He then suddenly spoke.
"Ooh, this is nice. Let me borrow it."
"Hah?"
"That bike."
"Hey, hey, " Jousawa muttered under his breath.
The high school boy knelt down next to Dragon Rider while it was strapped to the metal frame with numerous reinforced rubber belts. It looked like he was trying to find the bike's keyhole.
Jousawa had been a bit on guard, but he relaxed when he saw that amateurish action.
"Give it up. You can't start something like that just by sticking some wires in."
"Oh, I got it. I got it."
"Hey!! What are you, part of a security team!?"
"I'm studying to work in road service."
"This is well beyond that level!!"
To prevent electronic hacking, it used an extremely elaborate analog lock. However, it wasn't something that high school kid should have been able to deal with.
The boy straddled the Dragon Rider while it was still strapped in by the reinforced rubber.
"Like I said before, I'm going to be borrowing this bike. I'd rather not explain the details, but I can assure you that you will be helping save someone's life if you help me here."
"Are you delivering a pregnant women who's about to give birth to the hospital?"
Jousawa had said that as a joke, but the response he got was completely serious.
"... It's more serious than that."
"I see." Jousawa pointed towards the reinforced rubber."But those restraints and bolts holding the Dragon Rider in can't be removed with your bare hands. You need special equipment and at least two large adults to do it. And a student like you wouldn't know how to use the equipment even if I gave it to you."
"..."
The boy grabbed a reinforced rubber belt, started to say something, stopped speaking, looked troubled, and then finally started speaking.
"... Did you see the four-legged powered suit that was running through this tunnel a bit ago?"
"No. This bypass tunnel is three kilometers long. How would I see something that was ahead of me in the tunnel?"
"That suit abducted a little girl."
Jousawa's eyebrows twitched when he heard that.
He had heard why the transportation route had been changed.
"She's about ten years old. She was abducted as a warning. They're going to kill her in as cruel a way as possible in order to stir up our anger. Enough that we join together. The reason they didn't kill her back there was most likely to give us the disgrace of having had her completely slip through our fingers. They're going to take their time in killing her now."
"What?"
But he hadn't heard that much.
Jousawa hadn't been informed that the girl was going to be killed.
"Maybe they'll send her back to us stuffed into a plastic bag later or maybe they'll send us a live broadcast. I don't know exactly how they'll do it. I don't want to think about it. So I need to chase after them again before we've completely lost them."
Jousawa heard a bit of static coming from his radio.
It was the emergency confirmation sign. If he didn't respond to it, it would be deemed that something was wrong and the driver would take action. And the driver was carrying a sawed-off shotgun in order to protect the military secrets.
"Wait."
However, Jousawa purposefully pressed further when the situation would have resolved itself with his silence.
No response came from the radio.
The high school boy turned around.
"What?"
"Tell me that girl's name."
"Why?"
"Just do it!! That will solve everything!!"
"It's Fremea! Fremea Seivelun!! She's about ten years old, has fluffy blonde hair, and blue eyes! Is that enough? Do you want more!? Should I also tell you that she's extremely interested in games full of blood spurting everywhere and she hates green peas!?" The boy was yelling in confusion."Please. I need to borrow this to save her!! I know you may not be able to follow this crazy story, but she really is going to be killed if I don't do anything!! That girl who was smiling just a bit ago will go cold and never open her eyes again... !!"
But Jousawa smiled.
Information from the darkness wasn't an easy thing to get. And this boy knew Fremea Seivelun's name and a bunch of other information on her that wasn't in the documents and that made it sound like he actually knew her.
He was truly a part of this.
Unlike the maintenance worker or the driver who just worked on the outside, this boy could avoid a tragedy with the Dragon Rider.
Thinking about it that way, Jousawa made his decision.
"Wait. You can't get on it like that."
"You don't think I'm about to go through all the official paperwork, do you?"
"It's something simpler than that. You can't control that dark horse on your own."
"... I don't have time to get pro sports training right now."
"That's not what I mean. Even the top ten legendary road racers wouldn't be able to have the grip or endurance to drive that." Jousawa pointed towards another machine lying in a corner of the trailer.
"It has to be used along with that special powered suit."
The HsSSV-01 was developed as a new model of powered suit.
Its design did away with the requirement of looking like a human body.
In other words, it wasn't a bike created for powered suits to ride; it was a powered suit that included a bike.
It was intended to maintain overwhelming mobility in all weather and in all environments and to suppress enemy forces with swift deployment.
It was meant to drive at over 1000 kph in wastelands, not just on a finely maintained circuit. It could drive up thirty-meter cliffs at a slope of seventy degrees in what seemed like off road bike acrobatics and could clear twenty-meter-wide rivers.
The machine's power reinforced one's physical strength and had thorough electronic control to maintain balance, so it was possible to let go with one hand to use a Gatling gun or smoothbore gun even at high speed. If it had actually made it to the war front, it might have completely changed the history of war.
"Not bad, right?" Jousawa called out to Hamazura Shiage who was "changing" behind a wooden box in a corner of the trailer that was fixed to the floor."The powered suit gives you the strength, endurance, and oxygen intake you need to operate the Dragon Rider. That suit itself is no monster. It's more or less human-shaped so your center of gravity won't shift and it doesn't have much weight of its own. Well, you can always put module armor on for various uses."
Hamazura opened and closed his hands to check it out.
The entire thing was exceedingly small. Unlike the models that looked like thicker versions of Western armor, this one was more like a riding suit with a full face helmet attached. It was gray with black protectors attached where needed.
The suit wasn't that much bigger than a human, so Hamazura's body stretched throughout the entire suit including the ends of the arms and legs.
"... It feels weird because it fits almost too perfectly."
Hamazura's voice was muffled because the helmet entirely covered his head.
There were no transparent portions on the helmet. Vision and all other information was acquired with electronic devices and displayed on the inside.
Even so, it didn't feel odd and he almost felt like he was seeing everything with his own eyes.
It almost made him afraid he would never be able to use his normal vision again if he used it for too long.
"You're going to be driving at high subsonic speeds on obstacle covered terrain. The speed will feel many times greater than in a fighter jet, so you wouldn't be able to control it without equipment like that."
"... Seriously?"
"Don't worry. Theoretically, you should be fine even if you bring out its top speed."
The driver who had been watching that exchange finally spoke.
"Is this really okay?"
"You helped release the Dragon Rider from its restraints, didn't you?"
"Aren't you just getting carried away on the idea of saving this girl?"
"A written apology and a bit of docked pay is well worth saving someone's life."
"..."
Jousawa ignored the driver's silence and turned back to Hamazura who was now straddling the Dragon Rider.
"Promise me."
"I'll try to bring it back undamaged, but it may be difficult to keep it completely unscathed."
"Use its specs to their fullest. If you end up scrapping it, that's fine. Also, let's see..." Jousawa's expression suddenly turned serious and the atmosphere cooled as if his previous appearance had been a lie."Make sure you save that girl."
"... Oh, I will."
The Dragon Rider carefully moved down the ramp from the trailer to the tunnel road.
It sped up from there.
With a loud roar, the Dragon Rider began speeding between the cars stopped throughout the tunnel.
Jousawa laughed as he watched the flame of the jet engine roar away.
He hadn't cared how.
He just wanted it to be useful to someone at least once.
"... Granny. Our cute grandkid is finally off saving someone."
"The result will give this meaning. Just going off to try to save someone isn't enough."
Part 13
To be completely honest, Hamazura Shiage wasn't able to control the Dragon Rider how he had expected.
In fact, his vision became distorted the second the bike accelerated.
"Gah.... !?"
He couldn't tell what was going on ahead of him or behind him. He was going so fast that he couldn't keep up with the processing of the visual information. By the time he had figured that out, the tunnel's smooth wall was approaching from the side.
"Fuck this. There's no way in hell I can control this thiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnngggggggg!!"
His vision darkened.
All sound disappeared.
His throat went completely dry.
But...
"Huh?"
Hamazura was in complete disorder, but he hadn't crashed yet.
His body, his arms, and his fingers were moving on their own.
(... What... ?)
Instead of feeling relieved that he wasn't going to die, Hamazura felt an indescribable uneasiness creep down his back.
(... This is just going too smoothly. I don't even know that much about bikes. Is something controlling my movements from outside... !?)
The powered suit Hamazura was wearing used motors and chemical springs to enhance the person's movements.
Normally, it would move in response to Hamazura's will, but it could of course do the opposite.
In other words, the powered suit was guiding him by supporting his movements.
This led to the body of Hamazura Shiage moving in top form.
At first glance it looked convenient, but...
(Ohhhh!? Th-this is like driving a bike in a ninin-baori!! How the hell am I supposed to relax!?)
His body and mind were separated.
The discord caused by other movements taking precedence over the movements he wanted to make brought fear.
It could be mistaken for doing something amazing, but it made him feel like he was trapped in his own body.
"Shit!! This feels wrong. First the weapons in Russia and now this! Why am I always surrounded by these crazy machines!?"
Jousawa had said the bike forcibly inserted "artificial feelings".
The Dragon Rider didn't need to be operated in any complicated way.
The basics of controlling it were closer to that of a scooter than of a bike. Hamazura just had to move his fingers within the handlebars that were completely covered in armor. There was no concept of gears or a clutch. It only had a throttle and a brake. In other words, it could only be accelerated and decelerated. Both could be controlled from both grips on the handlebars, so controlling it one handed was no problem. The bike had a jet engine, auxiliary boosters, and linear engines, but these various driving forces were controlled automatically to achieve the speed required.
However, even all that wasn't enough for someone to perfectly control it the first time they grabbed the handlebars.
There was no way it was that much of a monster.
The Dragon Rider had a jet engine piercing through its main body and the front was pointed to reduce friction from the air. It was a large and heavy bike, so driving it should have been fairly difficult.
And weaving between cars in a traffic jam would send the difficulty level soaring up. Getting a bike that big through the cars would have been difficult even for a driving instructor.
And yet the Dragon Rider was slipping between the stopped cars. When Hamazura looked down at the displayed speed, he choked. He had already exceeded 400 kph. For a normal car, it wouldn't have been surprising if the meter had shaken off at that speed.
Of course, Hamazura was not that skilled.
It may have been impossible even for a professional stunt driver to carry out such delicate maneuvers.
(... Come to think of it, a powered suit is a tool to reinforce human capabilities from outside. )
Powered suits weren't just machines used to increase the strength of one's arms and legs.
That suit was made in Academy City.
It did help him externally with the motors and chemical springs, but the odds were it didn't end there.
Normally, he would have been in a complete panic at that speed.
He would have been too afraid to think at all. He wouldn't have been able to think about what to do next.
That wasn't happening. Hamazura found it to be a bit disturbing, but he was giving the powered suit orders and the machine was calculating what the rider wanted and what would best carry that out. Hamazura was simply too calm for all that was going on.
Most likely, the suit was helping him out internally, too.
The suit had ways of connecting the human to the machine by applying electrical stimuli and distributing the temperature of the brain.
There was also the hectically changing information coming from his five senses. His vision was especially badly blurred. Everything looked like an aggregation of curves that looked like the laser beams from a shooting game.
Even so, Hamazura was obtaining information from it.
He wasn't seeing it in slow motion; he was getting information from the flowing lines. He wasn't seeing single objects frozen in place either. He actually felt like he was the resident of a world where things were always flowing by.
His cognizance had changed.
Perhaps it could be said to be similar to language. An alphabet looked like nothing but weird designs to those who didn't know it, but those who did know it naturally picked up meaning from it.
His senses were being modified inside and out.
His thoughts may have been moving even faster than when he was sitting at a desk studying.
He was a a single centimeter error away from crashing, but he was still able to perform those bike acrobatics.
The Dragon Rider left the tunnel.
Hamazura opened up the throttle all the way.
Immediately afterwards, he felt a shock.
The arms for the auxiliary boosters that had been folded up on either side of the front wheel opened up. The noise increased exponentially and a shock wave was formed as the energy created by the internal-combustion engine threw him further forward.
This was the bike's true form.
The speedometer jumped up to the 900 kph line.
At this speed, a flesh-and-blood human would have been unable to breathe in oxygen or even open his eyes and it wouldn't have been unusual to be burned by the frictional heat. This was a world where one would strike an object 250 meters ahead after a single second. The cars around him had to have been moving fairly quickly, but they didn't even look like they were standing still. It looked like they were flying towards him.
He forcibly carried on by using the corrections provided by the powered suit.
Even then, a fear great enough to interfere with the movements of his mind or body did not well up within him.
Just like the machine he was riding, his thoughts moved only forward.
He knew exactly where every little pebble and empty can on the road was and avoided them with the least possible movement.
He ignored several traffic lights and just cut through the intersection as the Dragon Rider continued on.
However...
He had a sense of the outer motors and chemical springs correcting his body's movements and he could tell the suit was interfering with him on the inside, too.
It was helping him out, but it felt like his awareness of where the center of his being was would be destroyed if he used the bike for a long period of time.
(... My phone. )
He was wearing a military vest over the powered suit that could have various objects put it in it. His cell phone was inside it.
He started to consider whether it was okay for him to let go with one hand in his condition.
(... If I don't get a look at the data from Hanzou's MAV, I won't know where my target is. )
Before he could even complain in his heart, something changed.
At the edge of the images that constituted Hamazura's vision, a small window appeared. Needless to say, it contained the data from Hamazura's cell phone.
(How is it forwarding the data!? I didn't do anything!!)
Academy City-made military weapons were as abnormal as ever. From what had just happened, Hamazura decided that conspiracy theories about machines spying on your mind may not be something to laugh at anymore.
The distant view given by the cell phone data had pretty much lost sight of the target. Something indistinct was moving deep in the image, but the shapes of the moving object was indistinguishable. It looked like it would be easier to look for a nearby building or billboard to use as a landmark.
(It looks like Hanzou's MAV isn't going to be much more use... )
It had gotten too far away.
If he let the enemy do what they wanted much longer, there would truly be no way to guarantee Fremea's life.
(No. )
"Wait, " Hamazura mumbled.
He looked up while racing along at high speed. The sky filled his vision. In the jumbled cityscape, it was difficult to spot things two hundred meters ahead, but the sky was different. There were no objects to obstruct his view and nothing was hidden behind the horizon, so he could even spot things that were a great distance away.
Even if he couldn't spot the four-legged powered suit that had abducted Fremea, he would be able to find it if he could spot something that was chasing after the suit.
Of course, he couldn't exactly spot an MAV that could be as far as ten kilometers away. Even with the powered suit reinforcing his senses, searching for an MAV the size of a paper airplane was no small feat.
But Hamazura was following something else.
Academy City's strongest Level 5 could chase after a fighter jet if he wanted to.
Part 14
Silver Cross Alpha was on the run.
The plan was supposed to have been complete.
The targets, Hamazura Shiage and Accelerator, had joined together to protect Fremea Seivelun. Now that they had become a force that the upper levels of the city couldn't ignore, Silver Cross's objective was mostly complete. All that was left was to kill Fremea in such a way that the force that couldn't be ignored would bare their fangs in revenge against the dark side and upper levels of Academy City.
It didn't matter whether they would truly oppose the city.
It was like attaching a detonation fuse into a large pile of gunpowder. Whether anyone truly wanted to detonate it or not, it had to be defused. As such, the Graduates would have to be exterminated.
That was how it was supposed to go.
So why could he still not get to a safe area?
The four-legged powered suit did not have a human form. As such, the lenses that acted as eyes were not installed only on the front.
One of the lenses on that model had spotted his pursuer.
- 1.
Academy City's strongest.
It was a white figure called Accelerator.
(This isn't normal. )
Silver Cross's breath caught in his throat from shock when he looked at the speedometer.
750 kph.
He was near the limit for vehicles that raced along the ground.
And yet that monster was still right behind him.
(He's at the level of an airplane. )
"That monster!! I knew he was a monster, but I never thought he was enough to rival the Highway Cheetah!!"
Silver Cross was looking up.
Twenty meters up.
His pursuer had four whirlwinds on his back and was literally slicing through the air after Silver Cross.
"Silver Cross."
"I can't do it. I can't lose him even with the speed of the Highway Cheetah. A couple of undercover vehicles come to mind, but I can only use them once I've lost my pursuer, so they're useless now!!"
His powered suit was not a car. By folding up and unfolding its legs to match the ground, it could race across areas with large ups and downs and even down extremely narrow passageways.
And yet he still couldn't get away.
His opponent was the size of a human after all. Even if his four-legged powered suit could slip into various gaps, it was hard to find a place that the suit could go but the human couldn't.
"If she gets taken back now, this was all for naught. Should I dispose of her now?"
"Don't assume you're going to lose. You can't be losing your way."
Kuroyoru's voice so calm it sounded like she didn't care about the situation. That may have been the case.
"Accelerator has great power, but why didn't he go all out from the very beginning? When he first came after the vehicle disguised as a dump truck, he rode in Hamazura's stolen car. Think about it, Silver Cross. In a situation like this, he wouldn't have done that without a reason."
"... I see." Within the thick powered suit, Silver Cross sat within the smaller armadillo-like model and chuckled."Signal interference... the tunnel!!"
Now that he had figured it out, the rest was easy.
Silver Cross moved over to the subway line running alongside the road. In order to reduce the noise, it was an area one step lower than the rest of the area sort of like a river made of concrete.
Of course, further along was the complex group of tunnels for the various lines. The layout of the tunnels was reminiscent of a spider web.
The suit's lens caught Accelerator's lips moving in a curse.
Shortly thereafter, the sky was covered by thick concrete.
He had entered the tunnel.
Of course, just a tunnel wasn't enough to completely seal Accelerator's movements. If so, he would have been assassinated long ago. The interference was only something that may happen. That meant his power could end up being weakened by some unknown amount.
However, if he lost control of his power even for a few seconds while surrounded by concrete and chasing after someone at over 700 kph, he would be dead. Scraping up against the wall would be enough to turn him to mincemeat.
He couldn't continue the chase.
If he was willing to destroy and rip off the top of the tunnel that was also part of the city, he could continue, but he most likely wouldn't do that. If he was a complete villain, he might have done so, but sadly the #1 was no longer that far down that path.
Simply put, he wouldn't sacrifice others to carry out his own goals.
Even when refusing to do so put the life of the person he was protecting at risk.
"Kuroyoru. I've managed to escape. This tunnel is shared by a number of lines. A great number of routes connect here to save time on construction. They won't be able to track my escape path from the air now."
"The #1's power is maintained by the battery of the electrode around his neck. We don't know the exact time limit, but I doubt he'll keep using it at full power when he has no clear objective. He's sure to turn it off at least for now. Get some distance between the two of you while he's stuck there.... There's also the matter of 'them'. We can't be delayed at this stage."
"Understood. Now that I've lost him, everything can go ahead as pla—"
Silver Cross trailed off.
It was odd.
He felt something overpowering from behind him.
The tunnel was dark. Unlike a tunnel for cars, light wasn't needed for trains to avoid a sudden curve because they had set tracks. The evenly spaced fluorescent lights were of little use and a seemingly impenetrable darkness stretched before him and behind him.
However, this didn't matter to the four-legged powered suit. Its numerous lenses allowed it pick up information even in that almost complete darkness.
Silver Cross's face stiffened when he looked at the window displaying the revised footage.
"What... ?"
It wasn't Accelerator.
A giant mysterious bike was approaching from behind. As if the bike were saying it had caught sight of Silver Cross's lenses, a number of boosters lit up.
With a roar, the darkness was wiped away.
Other than Accelerator, there was only one person who could possibly be chasing after Silver Cross to protect Fremea Seivelun.
"It couldn't be... !!"
Part 15
A great roar surrounded Hamazura's body.
The subway tunnel had only just barely been made so the construction workers could walk through it. Efficiently constructing the track had been the priority, so the ground was covered in bumpy concrete tiles.
Normally, driving through there at a few hundred kph would have been suicide.
But that didn't matter.
Hamazura twisted the throttle lever releasing all three means of propulsion without hesitation.
(I can do this... The Dragon Rider simply has more speed!!)
The problem was how to stop that thickly armored powered suit and rescue Fremea from it once he had caught up. Somehow breaking the propeller blades might work, but...
"If you're short on firepower use the auxiliary boosters, " said the voice of the trailer's maintenance worker."If things are looking bad, there's a mechanism to eject some of the fuel in order to reduce the damage. If you do it right, you create a 3500 degree explosion. However, you can only use it once on either side."
"Wait. I don't know how to do anything special like that..."
"You do. While you're linked with the powered suit's information controller, you can borrow the needed knowledge and skills."
He shivered.
Before he knew it, Hamazura had learned how to do an emergency eject of the rocket fuel. It was less like he had memorized a thick book and more like he had learned how to ride a bicycle. In other words, the slow accumulation of "experiences" one gained after having practiced again and again had been overwritten into him in a concentrated manner.
He felt that life would be much easier if school lessons and studying road service skills were that easy. But it also scared him. He had no idea what could have been added to his head without him knowing. He decided that learning things on his own was best.
(I don't have time to think about this too much now. )
Hamazura consciously pushed away his questions and focused on the target ahead of him.
(I have a method to save Fremea. That's enough!!)
The auxiliary boosters were a type of arm and could change their angle depending on the situation. However, they were still primarily used to point back and provide propulsion and moving around parallel to the sides of the bike was as far as they went. They couldn't point forwards.
Which meant...
(I have to at least get next to him in order to get him wrapped up in the explosion!!)
That was when a change occurred with the movements of the four-legged powered suit running ahead of him.
The back right leg suddenly moved as if it were kicking up like a horse.
Some lighting equipment had fallen to the ground and the suit was firing the remains back at Hamazura at high speed.
"... !!"
It was a hunk of metal with a weight of about three kilograms. He didn't know how durable Dragon Rider was, but he couldn't let any unnecessary loads destroy its balance.
He steered out of the way of the remains of the lighting equipment and between the pillars on the side of the track putting some horizontal distance between them. Dragon Rider was faster in pure speed. If there were no obstacles, getting alongside the powered suit would be simple.
But then Hamazura noticed something unusual.
Directly in front of him, a bright light came from the darkness.
(A subway train... !?)
A chill ran down Hamazura's spine.
A huge mass sped towards the Dragon Rider.
As the huge mass passed through the tunnel, it caused a great wind, a loud roar, and a violent vibration. The train operator must have seen him a moment before. The train braked and a horrible noise rang out as the metal wheels scraped along the rails, but it was too late. With a shower of sparks, the train slid another three hundred meters.
The four-legged powered suit calmly passed by to the side.
Perhaps because the powered suit was not a normal vehicle, it almost looked like joy over its pursuer being eliminated was radiating from the suit.
But then Silver Cross saw the large bike on the other side of the train through one of the gaps between cars.
It was the HsSSV-01 Dragon Rider.
Hamazura had stuck the bike in the tiny space between the subway train and the wall. He raced along at high speed just barely managing not to hit the wall.
As said before, the Dragon Rider was faster in pure speed than the four-legged powered suit.
Now that the obstacle was gone and his opponent had let down his guard, there was no reason he couldn't catch up.
"Tch... !!"
Silver Cross decided to slam into the Dragon Rider himself.
In other words, he would use the difference in weight to knock his pursuer to the side.
But Hamazura was faster.
There was a difference between someone who immediately reacted and someone who was already prepared.
The auxiliary booster arm moved to the side and a large amount of rocket fuel was ejected. When it dispersed in a great wind, it scattered out a bit from the booster and created orange sparks.
There was less than a tenth of second between the ejection and the ignition.
The fuel exploded.
All sound was drowned out and a shock wave exploded out in what seemed like a transparent wall.
The left auxiliary booster got wrapped up the explosion it had caused and was torn from the Dragon Rider. The large bike that perfectly maintained its balance using electronic controls slid to the side oddly.
The four-legged powered suit didn't get off easily.
It had been showered in the rocket fuel before the explosion. The explosion didn't manage to destroy the propeller blades, but the large suit was knocked a few meters to the side and it struck the tunnel wall. Orange sparks were created as the suit attempted to continue to run forward.
But something was wrong.
The damage from the extremely high heat and the shock wave had been too much to ignore. The two right legs weren't moving properly. They could still glide properly, but they had lost the function to alleviate the shocks by conforming to the land. If it continued to run like that, the great shocks would cause the internal workings of the suit to break.
"I see."
An unfamiliar man's voice suddenly reached Hamazura's ears.
It was a transmission.
"I was wondering how you managed to chase after me, but it seems the answer was simple. That isn't a bike made for powered suits to ride. The bike is part of the powered suit. That is one idea of how to overcome the joints in the human body.... I never thought I would come across model from the same series."
That must have been why they were able to communicate.
As he controlled the large bike, Hamazura quietly but clearly spoke.
"You're going to give Fremea back."
"And if I refuse?"
"Then I'll create another explosion."
Dragon Rider had lost one of its auxiliary boosters and some of its balance, but the four-legged powered suit had even more damage and had lost some speed. The suit could no longer get away.
In response, Silver Cross gave a slight smile.
"I have the hostage with me. Do you not realize that I hold your victory in my hands?"
"You can't do anything to her, " Hamazura plainly denied him."That isn't an automobile or a tank; it's a powered suit. I don't know how everything is divided up, but every movement of your arms and legs is directly linked to the powered suit's movements. If you make any unnecessary movements in there, it will have an outward effect. If you really wanted to hurt Fremea, you would have to stop the powered suit and get out. In fact, you must have taken away her consciousness so her movements don't have an outward effect. Am I wrong?"
The theory itself was Hamazura's, but the foundation of knowledge supporting it came from elsewhere.
He didn't even have time to consciously think about what he wanted to do. A deeper portion of his mind was read and the machine searched for the information in an offline database and put the needed knowledge in his brain.
How smoothly this process went and how much confidence in the accuracy of the information he had made him shiver, but he was in no position to worry about that.
"True, " briefly responded Silver Cross.
Even so, Hamazura didn't think Silver Cross was just going to hand over Fremea. He had to have something else up his sleeve. Hamazura focused in all directions. He didn't know how it worked internally, but the machine was most likely revising and amplifying this.
"It's true that this isn't a good situation. I'm at the disadvantage here. As such, I suppose I will ensure my own safety even if it requires changing my plans a little.... Because of 'them', I can't allow myself, one of the Freshmen, to be lost. Simply put, I am going to flee no matter what it takes. Luckily, this Life Armor gives me the durability to do just that."
Immediately afterwards, the front hatch of the four-legged suit opened and the small, armadillo-like suit came out.
Fremea was still inside the four-legged suit.
And the suit was still moving along at over 500 kph.
"You... bastard!!" Hamazura yelled, but the armadillo had already curled up into a ball and moved in the opposite direction while it absorbed the shock.
The thick front hatch on the four-legged suit closed again.
Without a pilot, the suit was sure to end up in a fatal accident eventually.
"Is this any time to be focusing on me? Out of respect for her determination, I removed the impromptu 'chip'. But the Highway Cheetah doesn't have two arms and two legs. She won't be able to properly control it."
Basically, he had awakened her so she would panic. He sounded like he was sneering in his transmission.
"I don't like letting go of the line binding you and Accelerator, but having her die here will 'settle' that. The order is a bit different from the plan, but this will still lead to the upper levels of the city treating you Graduates as a target."
"Fuck!!"
Focusing on the armadillo wasn't going to help.
He had to get the four-legged suit's front hatch open and save Fremea as quickly as possible.
He didn't know how the maintenance worker was monitoring him, but the worker spoke to him again.
"Your suit's arms are just made to control the bike. They aren't strong enough to force open the hatch."
"Then what am I supposed to do!? Are you saying I just watch!?"
"Scrape it off."
The maintenance worker's response was brief but precise.
Even more so than the computer that supplied knowledge and experience to Hamazura.
"The four-legged suit is being pressed up against the wall, right? Push it diagonally so that the edge of the hatch contacts the wall and keep it like that. If it looks like it's going to leave the wall, just kick it back or something. Even if the bolts holding the hatch on are made of tungsten alloy, the hatch should be scraped off after about seven kilometers of that."
"... !!"
Hamazura readjusted the Dragon Rider's throttle to match the suit's speed and followed the instructions. Without Silver Cross at the controls and with the suit's sliding characteristic, turning it diagonally was simple. It continued forward even in that state.
The four-legged suit had been contacting the wall that whole time and it was both making a horrible scraping noise and creating a large band of orange sparks. However, its legs that maintained its balance were acting oddly. They began to move up and down unnaturally.
(I guess it can't deal with the unevenness of the ground anymore. )
The powered suit shook greatly.
With no pilot, that slight movement was enough to make the suit begin to leave the wall.
Still straddling the Dragon Rider, Hamazura used one leg to forcefully kick the body of the suit. The push from the bottom of his foot moved the giant suit back to the tunnel wall.
The tremendous scraping noise continued.
(It's working. )
He had no proof, but Hamazura was sure. It may have been due to knowledge he was being given from outside.
The bolts holding the hatch closed would scrape off soon. Then he could rescue Fremea from within.
But then something unexpected happened.
One of the legs that had gotten caught in the explosion from the auxiliary booster suddenly sank down. It was reminiscent of a shoulder dislocating. The large explosion and the vibrations caused by the continued contact with the wall had greatly damaged the machinery within.
Its balance suffered greatly.
Hamazura couldn't support it on his own.
In order to avoid being taken down with it, he temporarily moved the Dragon Rider away. The joints for the front and back right legs broke and began dragging across the ground. The suit continued on creating tons of sparks along the ground and the ends of the legs stopped making contact with the ground.
If that slowed the suit down, it was a good thing.
Since the ends of the legs weren't contacting the ground, it would decelerate to a certain extent. Even if the suit didn't come to a complete stop, Fremea would be safe if it slowed down enough that it could safely run into a wall.
But then...
(You've gotta be kidding me.... !!)
As Hamazura watched, the tough hatch began shaking unnaturally. The vibrations had scraped away the armor and it was clear the thick bolts were about to break.
The hatch was going to open and Fremea Seivelun would be thrown out.
The suit had finally started to decelerate, but it was still going somewhere between 300 and 400 kph.
If a flesh-and-blood human fell out of there, they would be pulverized like a shredded radish.
"Fuck that!!" yelled Hamazura as he opened up Dragon Rider's throttle again.
His only option to save Fremea was to get on the four-legged suit himself.
He brought the bike right up the front right leg of the shaking suit. He grabbed the leg's armor with his hand and slowly stood up from his seat.
If he moved over to the suit, he would lose the bike.
He hesitated for an instant, but soon made up his mind.
He grabbed the leg with both hands and moved his legs from the bike to the suit as it continued on at high speed.
Having lost its driver, the bike fell to its side and got caught between the ground and the back right leg of the suit. A tremendous amount of orange sparks flew out.
Hamazura moved across the armor on the front right leg.
He was moving towards the front of the suit.
He was moving towards the one place where the four legs connected.
(Please make it in time... )
Hamazura forcefully grabbed the handle on the hatch.
Normally, he would have had no chance of opening it.
However, the thick bolts holding it shut were about to break.
"Open, damn you!!"
He used all the strength of the suit he was wearing and he heard something break within the four-legged suit.
The front hatch opened wide.
If he hadn't done anything, Fremea would have fallen out and onto the ground.
But Hamazura was waiting in front of the hatch and caught her small body in one arm.
They had only been separated for about half an hour, but he felt relief strong enough to take the strength from his entire body at their reunion.
"... !? Wh-what!? In the first place what is—!?"
Fremea couldn't see his face, so she must have thought he was someone suspicious.
(... Well, at least I kept her from falling to the ground. Now I just have to hold on until the suit stops. )
That was when a new problem occurred.
The engine that moved the propeller that provided the four-legged suit's speed started spewing black smoke.
It was probably due to the explosion or the vibrations afterwards.
It was also possible it was a self-destruct function.
Either way, he couldn't wait around for the suit to slow down now that it might blow up.
"God damn it..."
However, the suit was still moving at 300 or 400 kph.
The Dragon Rider suit might have been able to withstand it, but Fremea wouldn't make it. If he fell to the ground with her, he would pulverize her.
"What the hell am I supposed to do!?"
Part 16
Accelerator had landed at the entrance to the subway tunnel.
Just a few minutes before, his feet hadn't been touching the ground. He had created four whirlwinds on his back and been using their power to fly with tremendous speed.
However, he couldn't use that power inside the tunnel because of its strong electromagnetic interference.
He had only lost a few minutes, but that had to be a pretty major loss given the speed of the powered suit he was after.
(He has to exit the tunnel somewhere, but there are too many options. A lot of subway lines use this tunnel, so he could move to almost any part of the city through there. )
Accelerator could "fly" along the shortest course ignoring speed and road layout, so he had the option of randomly going to each of the possible exits, but that would eat up his battery. His power would be his greatest trump card when it came down to rescuing Fremea Seivelun. He couldn't deny that using it all up on the problem currently before his eyes could lead to worsening the situation down the road.
He thought for a bit and then pulled out his cell phone.
He called Misaka Worst.
"How's that brat doing?"
"Misaka supposes that is the first thing her father would ask, isn't it? We've made it back to the apartment. We're being questioned by Yomikawa, the landlady."
Yomikawa was part of Anti-Skill and she was the type of person that would act beyond what the manual said. She may have caught a glimpse of the problem on her own despite the darkness attempting to control the information.
"Have you seen any sign of the Freshmen?"
"Two groups of four. But they didn't feel like the main force. They were most likely just lookouts. Perhaps they were planning on abducting their targets for some psychological warfare in case you worked a little too hard and got in the way of their plan. But Misaka already took them out."
"Set up sensors and cameras around the area and prepare a number of escape routes, but don't let on that anything's wrong. If you try to move to a hideout unprepared, they'll target you en route and you can't let Yomikawa catch on. If those two groups are still alive, threaten them with a knife. Make sure they keep reporting that nothing's wrong at their designated intervals."
"Is that all? Misaka has already done all that. She tied them up in a sheltered area with their radios and remote traps next to their mouths. Misaka may not look it, but she's the type who finishes her summer homework early."
Accelerator ignored her joke.
"... While somehow not letting Yomikawa or the others pick up on what's going on, I need you to get all the information you can on the third shared subway tunnel. The powered suit that abducted that brat called Fremea Seivelun is running through there and I want to know what exit he's going to come out of."
"Somehow, huh? How far can Misaka go? Is punching them out an option?"
"..."
"Hey, don't get all silent on Misaka. Fine, fine, Misaka gets it. She'll hide it with peaceful means." Misaka Worst's voice was devoid of tension and it made one imagine that she had a smile in her eyes."But is which exit he's going to come out of really enough? You know full well that the darkness we're from is merciless. It's possible he'll give it all a bloody end while he's still in the tunnel."
"No one can deal with 100% of the possibilities. In fact, the odds I would fail if I just blindly charged into the tunnel are quite high. Also, a different powered suit on a bike went into the tunnel after I got there. If it's who I think it is, the bastard won't give him a chance to touch Fremea."
"Oh, you're relying on someone else? How rare." Misaka Worst's words were filled with sarcasm."But then wouldn't it be faster to directly ask the guy in the tunnel what's going on?"
"Do you really think we exchanged numbers?"
"Don't we just have to get his number some other way then?"
"Don't focus on that. It's possible the signal won't reach him in the tunnel. It's better to have multiple sources of information."
"You're free to order Misaka around, but surely you'll be working on gathering information too, right?"
The strained atmosphere continued until he hung up.
Fighting wasn't simply rampaging around.
Getting a grasp of the state of things was part of the fight.
Part 17
As Silver Cross Alpha headed into the depths of the tunnel's darkness while wearing the powered suit with the armadillo-like armor, he heard an explosion.
He chuckled and exited to the surface through one of the exits for construction workers instead of one of the subway stations.
Obviously, his suit had been a military secret. There were measures to take once it was severely damaged and about to fall into the hands of the enemy. The important bits of machinery and circuits were dissolved with a strong acid and then the suit was detonated by igniting its fuel.
A screen in the armadillo suit displayed the level of damage to the four-legged suit.
It wasn't to the extent of that large bike with its jet engine and rocket boosters, but Silver Cross's four-legged suit didn't use normal gasoline. And its fuel had been completely ignited.
The suit most likely no longer had its original form.
It wouldn't have very many properly functioning circuits left and the icons for ways to dispose of them to keep them from being captured were lined up on his screen.
(It's over. )
Silver Cross's genuine feelings leaked out.
(The only question is whether Hamazura Shiage died along with Fremea Seivelun or not. Even if they both died, Accelerator can still easily be made a big enough threat to require immediate action. If we just stir up Mugino or Kinuhata of Item and have them contact Accelerator, it should work. )
Silver Cross started to open a communications line connected to Kuroyoru Umidori in order to report what had happened.
Before he could, he froze.
He had seen something.
He saw it remotely through one of the camera lenses on the four-legged powered suit that wasn't functioning properly anymore.
A figure was standing in the blaze.
That figure was holding a small girl in his arms.
"Hamazura Shiage... !!"
Silver Cross hadn't realized something.
Hamazura had stood on the Dragon Rider bike that had been caught between the four-legged suit's broken back right leg and the ground. He then used all his strength to lift up the broken leg a few centimeters and had partly surfed on the bike as it separated from the four-legged suit.
But Silver Cross couldn't believe it.
(How? How did he survive? And that's Fremea Seivelun. Unlike Hamazura, she didn't have the benefit of any armor!!)
He wanted to get more details on the figure standing in the flames and the four-legged suit wasn't any help, so he directly connected his armadillo-like suit with a cable to the subway's security network so he could use the security cameras.
That backfired on him.
"You're there, aren't you?"
A voice stabbed into him.
A gaze turned in his direction.
The image on the monitor and the voice coming from the speakers accurately pierced straight through Silver Cross.
(Did he compute it from the communications equipment in both the powered suits? No, that isn't it. This is... !!)
A cable was stretching from Hamazura's arm as he stared directly at the lens of the security camera Silver Cross was using.
He had stood in front of the security camera for show and spread out his electronic "net" and then waited for Silver Cross to make his move.
Of course, this was beyond the level of a mere delinquent.
But Silver Cross knew that the missing knowledge and skills would be forcibly reinforced giving the boy the proper level of experience.
He brought his hand to the spinal area of the armadillo.
(... He's getting mind support from the powered suit just like me!!)
It was all temporary. Once he left the powered suit, he would lose it all. But as long as he continued to wear the suit, that knowledge and those skills were his to use as he pleased.
The figure in the flames moved.
Another person appeared who must have entered the tunnel either through a subway station or through a construction entrance like the one Silver Cross had exited through. It wasn't Accelerator. It appeared to be the delinquent that had been used to track down Hamazura and Fremea when they were hiding in the private salon.
Hamazura handed Fremea to the boy.
She was alive and, if she was handed over, Silver Cross and Kuroyoru's plan would end a failure.
But he didn't have time to worry about that.
He had something else to think about that took priority.
He had to survive.
When had he ended up in a situation where he had to seriously consider that?
"... I'm sure I don't have to tell you what I'm going to do."
With those words, the security camera was destroyed and the image was replaced with static.
At the same time, the voice transmission cut off.
In that instant, the positions of chased and chaser were reversed.
Part 18
Takitsubo Rikou, a girl wearing a pink jersey, was standing blankly in front of a roadside vending machine.
She wasn't just holding a normal drink can in her hand. She had the authorized iced tea of a famous tea shop. At least it claimed to be. It had a lot of milk, sugar, and honey put in by default, so the flavor had been lost. Its sweetness was on the level of strawberry milk.
(... My feet hurt. I'm tired of walking. )
Takitsubo was there for a very simple reason.
The three members of Item were still on the Hamazura Search that they had made the humiliating bunny bet on, but, unlike Mugino and Kinuhata, Takitsubo had no real basis with which to search for Hamazura. And since she had the ability to sense others' AIM diffusion fields, she gave her "intuition" a lot more importance than she herself thought.
To fully use her power, she had to use the Body Crystal powder that had powerful side effects, but she could still vaguely sense the weak power that espers subconsciously emitted even without it. However, since it was just a vague sense, she couldn't tell what kind of power it was, who was using it, or where they were. It really wasn't that useful.
As such, the "invisible power" that was backing her up, the thing that her actions were based on in the end, was really just vague and uncertain "intuition".
Since she had managed to make it through Academy City's darkness safely with that intuition, it might have been something worth researching.
"Nn..."
Takitsubo looked vacantly up into the air.
(A signal is coming from the north east... That way, I think. )
Then her cell phone started ringing.
While she walked along the street, she took her phone out of her pocket with her small hand.
It was from Kinuhata Saiai.
"Yahoh. Have you super found Hamazura yet?"
"Nnn."
"Mugino ran into a problem with controlling the security company and getting video data got super hard for her, so I guess I'm going to be super first."
"Kinuhata, do you know where Hamazura is?"
"Well, yeah." The voice coming from the phone dropped a tone."But I spotted someone super annoying nearby."
Part 19
Incidentally, Silver Cross Alpha's face had been burned as a punishment in the past.
He had experienced firsthand how useless the nonsense about what is inside a person being important was.
Ever since it had happened, he had spent his life attempting to regain his face. As he completed various "jobs", various bits of Academy City technology had been used to repair his face bit by bit as if it were a lump of clay having details added. It was like a horrible game of fukuwarai[1].
But he realized something when he had finally regained his former graceful face.
Even though so much money and technology had been used to perfectly bring back his face, the disgrace he felt when his face had been burnt away continued to warp his looks into something unsightly.
Consequently, Silver Cross fundamentally had no sense of aesthetics towards his own body.
His habit of switching between numerous powered suits was largely due to the fact that he had arranged his mind so he held no attachment to his outer appearance, his features, or his form.
To control a four-legged powered suit, he had to become a four-legged animal.
To control an eight-legged powered suit, he had to become an eight-legged animal.
Even if some of the controls were left to a program leaving simplified controls for him to use, in the end, that was what was required to truly control a powered suit. In fact, getting used to everything going smoothly due to the program made the problem worse.
Obviously, the behavior required to control an eight-legged form with a two-legged form were of no use when walking with your own two legs. If he got used to the method for eight-legged walking, he would forget how to walk with two legs and his commands would be thrown into confusion.
And that's just talking about the legs.
It should be clear how severe the problem would be once it spread to the entire body.
What is the true form of my body? How do I move it?
Everyone knew those things and had no problem with the answers and Silver Cross could analyze those things in his mind each time. He overcame the reason that power suits beyond the shape of a human hadn't become mass produced.
That man who had abandoned his own body had a sudden thought.
He was watching the man who stood up amid the burning flames holding Fremea Seivelun.
He was looking at that scene and the spot the man stood in.
He thought that he might not ever be able to stand in a place like that no matter what model of powered suit he used.
Chasing him was simple.
Hamazura had lost the Dragon Rider bike, but it was still much easier to move in the powered suit than with nothing. He was running through the subway tunnel. He couldn't avoid the loss in stamina caused by moving his own limbs, but he was glad that he could move faster than the speed limit on those two legs.
Searching for him was simple.
He had used the powered suit's data to spread out an electronic "net" and Silver Cross had gotten caught in it. He wasn't far away. With his machine-assisted legs, Hamazura could catch up to him very soon.
Reading his movements was simple.
Silver Cross had two options at that point.
First, he could run away as quickly as he could, meet up with his comrades, and change into a more powerful suit. But he wouldn't choose that. The biggest weak point of a powered suit was in the instant of changing from one to another. Since he didn't know when Hamazura would catch up to him, Hamazura doubted he would make contact with one of his mobile "bases".
Therefore, Silver Cross would choose the other option.
He would give up on changing to a better suit and attempt to capture Fremea Seivelun as quickly as he could using his current armadillo-like suit. It was a self-evident truth that Fremea's life could be used to keep Hamazura and Accelerator in check. And, using the security camera, Silver Cross had seen Hamazura in the powered suit hand Fremea over to Hanzou who didn't have a suit. He also knew that Hamazura had split up from Hanzou and Fremea in order to chase after Silver Cross who was far away.
Silver Cross was sure to think this was his last chance.
If he could sneak past Hamazura, attack the defenseless Hanzou, and abduct Fremea, he could still turn the situation around.
Because of this, getting a surprise attack on him was simple.
Silver Cross was certain to use the tunnel again in order to get Fremea back as quickly as possible. And since he wanted to sneak past Hamazura, he wouldn't use the shortest path.
He needed a path that was a detour but still allowed him to get Fremea back as quickly as possible.
He would be second.
Once Hamazura had worked all that out, he just had to wait for Silver Cross to arrive in his armadillo-like suit.
With a crash, Hamazura jumped from cover and struck the back of the armadillo with a flying kick.
The armadillo was knocked to the ground and bounced five or six times. The model finally stopped when it struck the gently curving wall and then slowly stood up.
He had succeeded in his surprise attack, but Hamazura still felt impatient.
(... I used the best timing and hit him with all my weight when he was off guard and he can still move. He really is tough. )
The armadillo had unhesitatingly jumped out of the four-legged suit that was running at over 500 kph and it still kept its normal specs. It must have been guaranteed to protect the life of its controller. It didn't seem like it was just that its armor was tough. It may have also had some kind of electronic control mechanism that let it escape the shock.
Hamazura was wearing the control suit for Dragon Rider, a crystallization of "official" technology that had originally been created as a large Anti-Skill patrol bike.
Silver Cross was wearing a part of his collection that was a crystallization of the technology of the dark side of the city.
They each had to defeat the other, and they stared each other down.
The control suit and the armadillo suit did not exchange words.
The first step was taken before they could.
Their fists crossed.
A loud creaking noise rang out.
It wasn't the sound of a flesh-and-blood body being hit. But it wasn't simply the sound of the powered suits' armor striking each other.
Hamazura's right fist had parried Silver Cross's fist.
He had struck Silver Cross's lower arm from the outside to forcibly alter the trajectory of his fist.
Hamazura threw a punch with his left fist in response.
It was an uppercut.
The armadillo purposefully moved its shoulder towards the fist in order to keep the damage as low as possible.
Of course, these weren't Hamazura Shiage's techniques.
Nor were they Silver Cross's.
The computers inside the powered suits were searching for knowledge and skills and reinforcing the two of them. They were using that to its fullest in this exchange of punches that were stronger than a standard shotgun. They were predicting their opponent's moves, calculating the trajectories of their fists, parrying, and then beginning their own attack. And this process was being carried out at a speed of three times a second.
The motors and chemical springs were correcting their fists' momentum vectors to create destructive forces on the level of a gun.
As Silver Cross was controlling a weapon in the shape of a human instead of a machine that reinforced human actions, he could most likely produce the most destructive force.
The noises of strong blows and sparks flying continued on and on.
(... Just plowing our tough armor into each other isn't going to do anything. Both these suits were created to be indestructible. A frontal attack is just a waste of time. )
Hamazura was thinking while he controlled the suit that was amplifying his fist to the point that it could plow right through a car door.
(But these aren't tanks or armored cars. They're just powered suits that match the movements of the body within and amplify the momentum. That's a weakness I can use to stop his movements. )
In other words, he had to stop the soft human inside not the tough powered suit on the outside.
Hamazura didn't bother to avoid the armadillo suit's fists while it was focusing on his face most likely in an attempt to destroy the sensors there. Hamazura restrained Silver Cross's arm by wrapping his two arms around it.
The arm of a powered suit was different from the arm of a mere machine. A human arm was inside the powered suit arm.
That meant if one used his weight to break the arm at the shoulder and elbow, the human arm within would break, too.
Of course, Hamazura wasn't versed in joint locks.
He didn't know how to break someone's joint when they were still standing and on their guard.
It was all due to the machine's reinforcement.
It felt like pushing a rail car and looking down the rail.
His limbs moved quickly and he broke his opponent's arm more calmly than he normally would have been in that situation.
"Gaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhh!!"
"Judo and wrestling sure are scary, huh? I wouldn't want to deal with them in a street fight with no referee!!"
A powered suit was made up of machines and could alter the degree of freedom its joints had. It may not even break if it was bent completely backwards.
But the human arm inside was different.
And since the powered suit operated by matching the movements of the human, an injury to the human greatly decreased the types of orders that could be given to it.
(I don't need to break both of his arms and both of his legs. If I can just break one leg, he won't be able to move anymore... !!)
That was when he heard an odd noise.
The right arm of the armadillo suit that Hamazura had supposedly broken began to shake unnaturally.
It was as if it was changing modes of some kind.
"Don't underestimate meeeeeeeeee!"
"!?"
Silver Cross used the power of his left hand to tear off the portion below the elbow of the broken right arm that Hamazura was still grabbing.
Hamazura lost his balance and Silver Cross delivered a strong kick to his gut.
Hamazura's back struck the concrete wall and thin cracks raced along the wall.
"Gah!?"
Then came a second hit.
And a third.
"... !!!!!!"
Even while wearing a powered suit, it was enough to knock the wind out of him. As he was struggling to breathe, he let go of the armadillo suit's right arm.
That wasn't normal.
Of course, an attack like that would damage Hamazura, but the pain of having one's arm ripped off should have been greater. It wouldn't have been surprising if someone bit their tongue in shock when it happened.
Hamazura looked straight ahead with his dim vision and saw something unusual regarding the armadillo suit.
Its armor was crumbling away as if it were mud.
"... You were wrong if you thought you could stop a powered suit by breaking its 'contents'."
Some kind of viscous black oil and something like a belt-shaped piece of rubber stretched out and began wrapping around the arm that had fallen to the ground. Then the supposedly severed arm was forcibly reattached from the outside. It looked more like a black arm with a captivating unevenness to it than it did armor.
(... It's just like a crab's shell. He used the shell to connect the torn off arm... !)
As the armor left his face, Silver Cross's voice became clearer.
His voice was as beautiful as a bell.
"Once a powered suit goes past a certain point, it essentially becomes the same as a cyborg. It's just the difference between being reinforced from without or from within."
With a water-like sound, Silver Cross's "shell" transformed. Inside was a young man with long hair and a graceful face. The "shell" changed so that it looked like he was wearing a dirty cape.
He didn't look at all like the robot surrounded by thick armor that had been there before.
Half of Silver Cross's body was covered in the artificial muscles that forcibly reinforced him from without, but they looked like a half complete design.
The writhing fibers of the chemical springs were directly visible.
On that somehow captivating unevenness, the model name, Emergency, was displayed in red letters.
"Therefore, destroying the body inside is pointless. It can still be reinforced by the shell. If you destroy the bones and muscles of my arms and legs, destroy my blood vessels so I lose blood, or even damage or stop my internal organs, the suit can bypass all of that and allow me to continue to fight. Even..."
A noise that sounded like creaking gears could be heard and a number of long and thin but warped arms with pointed ends shot out of the part of his right side of his body that was covered by the cape.
"My brain."
A chill ran down Hamazura's spine.
His knowledge and skills were being supplemented by the computer.
"... This power was supposed to be for using against 'them', so of course it isn't going to be something normal"
Hamazura didn't know how much damage the suit could bypass, but the fight had clearly gone beyond the point of a battle between two flesh-and-blood humans. The battle could no longer be settled by putting a bullet between his opponent's eyes.
"Realize that and then we can enjoy this. I'll show you just how repulsive it is to go beyond being human."
In actuality, Silver Cross's tactic had begun before he had changed the suit's silhouette, before the armadillo-like suit's right arm had been torn off, and even before the fistfight on the level of shotgun blasts had begun.
It had started the instant he had been hit by the surprise flying kick.
It came down to a difference in experience. Silver Cross Alpha had been using all sorts of powered suits for a long period of time, so he knew what was important in a powered suit battle and he knew what to do to defeat an enemy when they showed up.
He knew the most important thing.
It wasn't the armor or exterior joints and it wasn't the battery or the motors either. There was something that had to be grasped first before those surface things.
(The reinforcing and supplementing of knowledge and skills by the computer. )
No matter how strong the punch, it was meaningless if it didn't hit. No matter how solid the armor, it was meaningless if an attack could get through a gap.
(Neither of us are experts in battle or in martial arts. The readjusted thoughts calculate the most effective attack pattern based on your level of experience.... So if you can figure out what the reinforcement script is, you can pull of a cross counter with 100% accuracy. )
For that reason, Silver Cross had put the camera mode to high speed and started analyzing from the second the battle began. He was fighting Hamazura and having the computer work at the same time.
And he had gotten an answer.
The infinite possibilities had been narrowed down to finite options.
Obviously, Hamazura Shiage had an almost infinite number of attack patterns he could freely use. But he only had five patterns for a first move. Silver Cross was preemptively crushing the explosively spreading possibilities that were held in 0. 1 seconds. If he created a situation where he could pull off a cross counter for every single first move, his victory would be assured. That was why he had changed his suit's silhouette. The seven warped arms with pointed ends were prepared to pierce through a gap in Hamazura's armor at the armpit and into his lungs and heart and to also destroy the computer on his back. The arms were prepared to do this for every move Hamazura could take.
Hamazura did not realize this.
That was why he took the last step forward to attack Silver Cross.
He had no idea that act would lead to his chest being pierced.
(... So he's going for the barrier of pursuing destructive power. )
Hamazura was in a cage called possibility.
His future was a dead end.
(Come face your prepared death, Level 0!!)
A dull noise rang out.
It was the dull noise of a human body being destroyed through the gaps in the joints of a powered suit.
In that instant, the seven pointed arms had accurately captured all five possible first moves. They were to intercept every single one of Hamazura's possible actions, pierce his heart, and destroy the computer controlling his powered suit so it couldn't bypass his heart.
And yet Hamazura slipped past them.
The seven arms missed.
Hamazura sent his fist at Silver Cross Alpha with tremendous force in an attack that wasn't any of the preset five first moves.
(Wha—?)
Silver Cross's breath caught, but then he realized what had happened.
(He turned off the computer reinforcement at the last second to go beyond its breadth of options. )
"... !?"
He immediately swung the seven arms in, but it was too late.
Those weapons had been deployed so that they could apply their maximum destruction within the range he had set. They weren't going to intercept Hamazura successfully now that he had left that range.
The pointed ends lightly tore at Hamazura's suit.
But that was all they did.
They didn't stop him from moving and the fist that could plow straight through a car door slammed into Silver Cross.
Hamazura rotated the strike to the side and hit Silver Cross's torso.
It hit the battery and the computer.
A grating noise was heard and all of Silver Cross's movable parts stopped. His state-of-the-art weapon had become nothing more than expensive shackles.
"... So you..." Silver Cross couldn't move his arms and legs and he was stuck bent over forward. He could only just barely move his mouth."... read that I was reading your attack pattern..."
"What the hell are you talking about?" spat out Hamazura in response. He still truly didn't know what Silver Cross had been trying to do."I just realized that this was something I had to do on my own."
Part 20
Silver Cross Alpha had been defeated.
He seemed to still be conscious, but his control computer had been destroyed, so all of his joints had frozen up and he couldn't even take off the suit himself. He was trapped inside the partially collapsed suit.
Hamazura checked to make sure of that and then leaned his back up against the tunnel wall. He gave a sigh of relief.
The last half hour had been intense.
A horrible sweat caused by the danger he had been in was still coming from his entire body.
"Hamazura!!" Hanzou came running over from farther down the dark tunnel."Are you okay?"
"Somehow or other..." As he spoke, Hamazura opened and closed the powered suit's hands."But this suit is shot. It can't amplify the momentum of my actions anymore and its thought reinforcement is based on having that power. If I tried to follow what it told me to do, I would just end up destroying my bones.... It's really just a riding suit now."
He was just glad that it hadn't frozen up like Silver Cross's suit had. And it was still tougher than normal clothes even if it couldn't amplify the momentum of his actions.
He took off the helmet and breathed the air directly before asking a question.
"Where's Fremea?"
"Nearby. It seems she mistook you for a transforming superhero."
"Hey, if I could get away with anything just by having my face hidden, I'd give it a try."
They heard a creaking noise and turned their eyes towards the darkness.
Deep in the dark subway tunnel, they heard a slight noise. It wasn't a natural noise. It sounded something like the creaking of a thick spring.
Hamazura put his helmet back on and switched it to night vision mode. He stopped breathing once he did.
"... Oh, fuck..."
"What is it, Hamazura? What can you see?"
Masses of metal.
Crawling legs.
Cold lenses.
"Powered suits."
"Didn't you just defeat the powered suit guy!?"
"This isn't just two or three. There are more than ten of the damn things. It wasn't just Silver Cross!!"
"So that's it..." muttered Silver Cross while he was still frozen in place inside the broken suit. His voice was tinged with self derision."That girl is sending my collection out of my hangar without my permission."
Looking at the threat, Hamazura took a step back and Hanzou moved even further back pushed by an imagined fear of what he couldn't see. Then the two started running. The relief and sense of release from before was gone.
"Let's meet up with Fremea! You said she was nearby, right!?"
"I left her with Kuruwa. She has a hideout nearby, so let's head there! But we can't deal with a bunch of powered suits like that. What are we going to do, Hamazura!?"
"That should be obvious..."
He couldn't use his suit anymore.
The enemy kept sending in more and more forces making their strength seem infinite.
The end was nowhere in sight.
How far did they have to run? Could they continue to run? Was running even the right thing to do?
Hamazura was being chased again, but he stared ahead and gave his answer.
"We have to forestall them in order to save Fremea!!"
Between the Lines 4
They would temporarily paralyze the city's communications so reports couldn't be sent to Anti-Skill or Judgment and then attack as a group to incapacitate the targets on a list of dangerous espers.
The plan was moving ahead nicely. Skill-Out was made up of a number of groups, but they had been contacted and each one had approved of the plan.
People, money, materials. Komaba and the boys and girls around him could tell they had gathered enough of those things to carry out the plan and they rejoiced.
But, at the same time, Komaba Ritoku had a thought: It won't be that easy.
Even if they surrounded the powerful espers with large numbers, it didn't guarantee that they could defeat them. And defeating them once didn't guarantee that they would be incapacitated. Most importantly, they were causing the battle between Level 0s and espers to spread even further. Also, the higher ups of Academy City were powerful enough to keep the city running and they would probably take actions to obstruct Komaba and the others' plan.
Another step was needed.
He needed to create a situation where the attacks on Level 0s would stop whether the plan succeeded or failed and no matter what other result it brought.
But he couldn't come up with such a step.
While he was trying to do so, it all began.
The higher ups of Academy City had sent the worst possible assassin to stop Skill-Out's plan. He was known as Accelerator. He was Academy City's strongest Level 5. He was fighting to protect the city from a completely different angle than Komaba.
After seeing him and fighting with him, Komaba Ritoku finally smiled slightly in his heart.
He had found that last step.
He had found the final piece needed to solve the problem of the Level 0s being attacked whether the plan succeeded or failed.
I win.
That was the last thing he muttered in his heart towards Academy City when the battle ended.
He was thankful that he had been fortunate enough to come across someone he could entrust his feelings to.
Notes
1. ↑ en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Fukuwarai
| ← Ch. 005 | Ch. 007 → |