Chidori Kaname barely listened to the explanation as she gazed at her form blankly, and Tokiwa Kyoko, from the seat next to hers, spoke up in a whisper. “Hey, Kana-chan. Are you going?”
“Hmm? Ah... I’m not sure. I mean, it’s free, so I guess so?” Still, her eyes were fixed on the date of the trip. December 24th—that would be Kaname’s 17th birthday.
Some might find the idea of being born on Christmas Eve romantic, but Kaname had always found it to be more of a problem than anything. While her little sister, born in May, would get discrete Christmas and birthday presents, Kaname’s were always conflated. It had been a real source of friction between them when they were younger.
Of course, any arguments about this always ended the same way, with Kaname being told, “You’re the big sister; endure it.”
Apparently, said sister was planning to spend this Christmas with their father in New York, where he worked. Kaname’s relationship with her father wasn’t the best, so she couldn’t pretend it wasn’t easier not to see him, but...
While Kaname was thinking, Eri was wrapping things up. “That should just about cover it. Any questions?”
“I have one.” Immediately, a male student sitting in a seat by the window, Sagara Sousuke, raised his hand. He was wearing his usual sullen expression, with his mouth set in its usual tight frown—and amid a student body uniformly excited about the unexpected event, he was the only one sporting a wrinkled brow and troubled eyes.
“Sagara-kun,” Eri acknowledged him. “What is it?”
“This consent form is insufficient,” Sousuke said, waving around the paper she’d passed him. “It talks about precautions in case of accidents occurring during the trip, but it says nothing about what the school has done to prepare for a terrorist attack.”
“What in the world are you talking about?” Eri asked him incredulously.
“I thought we had learned our lesson back in April,” Sousuke shot back.
“Don’t even suggest something so awful. It’s not as if the exact same thing could happen twice! If we had to prepare for every minuscule possibility, no school would ever be able to go on a trip!”
“It’s dangerous to make light of it,” Sousuke said gravely. “We got off easy the last time, but we might not be so lucky again. Think of the 1985 seajacking of the Italian cruise ship, the Achille Lauro.”
“I... I don’t even know what that is...” Eri was forced to admit.
“The passengers were mostly defenseless old men in wheelchairs,” Sousuke explained. “Yet one hostage was shot in the chest and the face and thrown into the sea.”
Eri just stood there, stunned.
“In addition,” he went on, “the terrorists made three hostages hold grenades with the pins removed, with the rest of the hostages gathered around them. Their fear must have transcended language—one careless moment could lead to the deaths of everyone around them. These deaths would be painful, too: brains and organs scattered everywhere. Fear and chaos are a terrorist’s MO; it’s important to remember that.”
A leaden air hung over the room. The class, which had been humming with excitement over the opulent proposal, was now dead silent.
“But don’t worry. This time, as aide to the student council in charge of safety and security, I intend to protect you all,” Sousuke promised. “I therefore request permission to bring a submachine gun, C4 explosives, and directional mines on board. With proper armaments and planning, I will dispose of the seajackers one by one, drown them in their own blood, and—”
Smash!! Kaname was there in a flash, and sent Sousuke flying with a kick. He crashed through multiple desks before landing in a heap on the floor.
“What are you doing, Chidori?” he groaned.
“Shut up!” she told him angrily. “You saw how excited everyone was! Maybe you could try not to ruin that?!”
“But the alarm bells of tragedy—”
“No one wants to hear about alarm bells of tragedy!!”
“But the Achille Larou—” he began, trying to defend himself.
“Shut up! You stupid... little...!”
“That hurts, Chidori. It’s painful.”
“Being around you is painful!” Kaname kept kicking Sousuke until her classmates, unable to watch any longer, finally pulled her off of him.
1: Unfixed Schedule21 December, 0135 Hours (Local Time)Spratly Islands
It’s an awfully extensive facility for such a remote island... Sagara Sousuke allowed himself to be impressed, momentarily forgetting the similar nature of his own force’s base.
His machine’s night-vision sensors made the sea around him look green. The island in question towered over it, a mere two kilometers across at its widest. The main mass was a rocky mountain dozens of meters high, which grew thick with grass and a small handful of trees. It was a common sort of topography, here at the edge of the Spratly island chain.
But that wasn’t all that he saw.
A variety of radar antennas topped the mountain’s highest points. Foot soldiers patrolled, equipped with night vision goggles. Electromagnetic-sensitive mines floated on the water, effectively preventing the approach of mini-submarines. It was impressive security for a pirate stronghold; most squads wouldn’t even be able to get close.
Most squads, that is.
The arm slave Sousuke was operating, the ARX-7 Arbalest, had just arrived on the north shore of this “pirate island.” According to the pre-mission briefing, the south shore was home to a small harbor and dock. The dock was apparently where the pirates moored the high-speed craft they’d been using to raid passing commercial ships for the past few months. It also hosted the warehouses in which they stored their supplies, ammunition, and plundered goods.
The north shore, meanwhile, was a treacherous cliff constantly pounded by waves. Sousuke was supposed to climb the rock face here, to
