“Ugh, it sucked,” Chidori Kaname whispered in disgust. Her dark brown eyes searched vacantly for something in the blue sky above. The black hair that hung down her back swayed limply with each step she took. She repeated: “Ugh, it just sucked.”
It was Monday, and she was part of a crowd of students on their way to school. Tokiwa Kyoko, the classmate who was walking beside her, chimed in. “This again? You been moaning all morning, Kana-chan. Was he really that bad?”
“I mean, he just kept going on and on about nothing...” They were talking about a boy she had gone on a date with yesterday. “I agreed to go out with the guy. Couldn’t he have put together a conversation with a little more depth?”
Who cares if your dad’s a designer, or you have a friend who’s a J-Leaguer? Who cares? What about you? she had ended up thinking.
“Hmm, fair enough,” her classmate agreed, deciding it was too much trouble to do otherwise.
“The life of Zhuge Liang, pollution in the West Pacific, religious strife in the Middle East...”
“Hmm, fair enough.”
“You can’t ‘fair enough’ your way out of this, Kyoko!” Kaname objected. “You’re the one who introduced us!”
“Well, he asked me to.”
“So? If someone asked you to auction me off in Macau, would you do that too?”
“Hmm, fair enough.”
Kaname groaned. “You’re such a bitch... Huh?” She had noticed a line of students out the front gate. “Oh, God, a bag check...” Her mood sank. The noncurricular guidance teachers were checking the pockets and bags of every student heading into the building.
“Hey, it is... Wait, Kana-chan, you’re not carrying anything dangerous, are you?”
“Uh? Well, not dangerous, but...” The problem was that her bag was full of strange books, like Murphy’s Laws of Success, History Edition — You Can Live Like Zhuge Liang! and So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish, and Miracles of Archaeology: Did the Moai Write the Dead Sea Scrolls?! and such. (She had borrowed them from another friend, and she was bringing them in to return them.)
“So, what’s the big deal? If you had a machine gun or a bomb, that might be a reason to freak...”
“What kind of weirdo would bring in something like that?” she laughed, then paused. “Hmm?”
Beyond the gate, at the head of the line, a crowd had formed. She could hear the sounds of an argument.
“What’s that all about?” In the spirit of curiosity, Kaname and Kyoko approached and peered through the crowd to see what was going on.
Their homeroom teacher, Kagurazaka Eri, was apparently grilling a student. “You think we’ll tolerate this kind of attitude your first day here?”
“No, I...”
“You’re not going inside until you show me your bag!”
“But...” It was a boy. He seemed to be trying hard to stay cool, but couldn’t completely hide his distress. His eyes darted all around, suggesting unease with the attention he was getting.
“Who’s that?” Kaname whispered. “I’ve never seen him before...”
He was wearing the same high-collared uniform as the other boys, but there was something strange about him. He was handsome enough, but Kaname’s real first impression of him was “grim.” He had disheveled black hair; his mouth was in a tight frown, with the air of someone on constant alert. He seemed skinny at a glance, but he carried himself like a practitioner of judo or some other rough sport.
“Show it to me! Now!” The teacher grabbed the student’s hand and snatched his bag away.
“Ah...”
“Don’t tell me... You’ve got cigarettes, don’t you?” She opened the bag and rummaged around inside. She pushed aside textbooks, and notebooks, and...
At the very bottom, she found an Austrian machine pistol with three 34-round magazines. There was also a cylinder of plastic explosives with a detonator, a stun grenade, a miniature camera, piano wire—
“This has to be a joke,” she said after a pause.
“What?” The boy looked distraught.
“You can’t bring toys like these to school. I’m confiscating them.”
He blinked. “What?”
“Go on, wait for me in the office!” the teacher ordered. “It’s almost time for homeroom!”
The student just stared at her. The onlookers dispersed, laughing. Kaname mustered her most disgusted tones to say, “Ugh, a military geek. Gag me...”
Kyoko laughed. “I don’t know, he seems hilarious to me...”
Kyoko’s prediction would turn out to be right. Sagara Sousuke had grown up on battlefields. He had traveled all over the world... but tragically, here in this microcosm known as high school...
He was an idiot out of his element.
I can’t believe they searched our belongings... Sousuke thought as he followed Ms. Kagurazaka down the quiet hallway.
His first thought—when the noncurricular guidance teacher first asked him to show her his bag—was, have I failed in my mission already?! His second thought—after his weapons were discovered and confiscated—was, I suppose now they’ll take me to the basement for interrogation. (He was unaware that most schools didn’t have basement interrogation rooms.)
But as it turned out, that kind of inspection was an everyday occurrence at this school.
Does that mean students regularly try to smuggle in guns and explosives? Sousuke wondered. It’s hard to imagine, but... If students regularly brought firearms to school, it would make his bodyguard duties that much harder; a passing member of the volleyball club could whip out a submachine gun and start firing at any moment.
Then again, Kurz Weber had the M9 Gernsback waiting in the copse behind the school. Sousuke had a miniature transceiver disguised as a watch—one call, and backup could be there in ten seconds.
“Uruz-6, what’s your status?” he whispered to his comrade through the transceiver.
“Hungry. Want booze,” Kurz replied into Sousuke’s earpiece. Only morning, yet already brimming with complaints.
But I suppose my infiltration was successful, at least... Sousuke consoled himself.
Kagurazaka Eri, the teacher leading him down the hall, was in her mid-twenties. Her hair was done in a short bob, and she wore a trim gray skirt suit.
“Ma’am?” he asked eventually.
“Yeah?”
“That gun you confiscated...”
“Oh, you’ll get it back... at the end of the term,” Eri responded with a slightly teasing air.
“No, it’s not that... I wanted to warn you. There’s a shot loaded in the chamber. You need to not touch the trigger under any circumstances.”
“Oh, really?” she deadpanned.
“It’s an extremely lethal splat bullet,” he told her seriously. “An accidental discharge would be fatal. Please.”
“I get it,” Eri sighed. “Calm down.”
You don’t get it and I can’t calm down, Sousuke thought. But he just shook his head in silence.
When Kaname and Kyoko saw Eri lead Sagara Sousuke into the room, they flew into a conversation of silent gestures.
“Hey! It’s him!”
“The firearm geek!”
The students buzzed, and the teacher raised her voice over the din. “Okay, quiet down! It’s time to meet your new classmate!” She slapped the blackboard with the attendance roll, sending the students of class 2-4 into temporary attention mode. “All right, Sagara-kun. Introduce yourself.”
“Right.” Sousuke took a step forward and struck an ‘at ease’ posture: chest out, shoulders back. “I am Sergeant Sagara Sousuke,” he announced in a clear, resonant voice. Then he realized his mistake, and his face went pale.
“Sergeantsaga Rasousuke?”
“I think it’s one long title, like Hashiba-Chikuzen-no-Kami-Hideyoshi.”
“Sergeant... like a drill sergeant? The army trainer guys?”
Nobody seemed to take the statement very seriously.
“Quiet!” Eri barked. “He’s not done yet! And Sagara-kun, stop fooling around!”
“I... I’m sorry...” He’d never felt this kind of nervousness before. One careless word could condemn his mission to failure. The very thought of it brought beads of sweat to his forehead. “Sagara Sousuke. That is who I am. Please forget the ‘Sergeant’ part. That is all.” Then, he fell silent.
After a pause, Eri asked, “Is that it?”
“Yes. That is it.”
She turned back to the students. “Any questions?”
“Me! Hey Sagara-kun, where do you come from?” one student asked.
“Many places,” he answered. “Afghanistan, Lebanon, Cambodia, Iraq... I’ve never stayed in one place for very long.”
A hush fell over the class, and Eri spoke up to fill the awkward silence. “What Sagara-kun is saying is... he’s lived overseas for most of his life. You were in the United States until recently, weren’t you?”
“That’s right,” Sousuke confirmed. She had likely read his transfer form, which listed his prior residence as ‘Fayetteville, North Carolina, USA.’ It was untrue, of course—He had chosen that location because he knew someone who lived near there, which would make it easier to keep his story straight.
Another student raised a hand. “What are your hobbies?”
Before Sousuke could respond, someone else interrupted, “Model guns, right?” which caused the room to break out in laughter.
“No,” Sousuke corrected, “fishing and reading.” That part was true: he typically spent his free time at Mithril’s West Pacific base, fishing while reading munitions manuals. If it was raining, he’d bring an umbrella, and lock himself up in his own little world... It was a little depressing, really.
“What kind of books do you read?” someone in the back asked. This time, Sousuke’s eyes lit up.
“Mostly technical manuals and trade magazines. I frequently read Jane’s Fighting Ships, and I enjoy Soldier of Fortune, as well as Arm Slave Monthly from Harris Publishing.” He paused to think for a moment. “Oh, and I’ve read the Japanese publication AS Fan. I’m impressed by the level of information they get access to... It’s a good magazine. These days, I’ve been more interested in maritime matters, though. I recently acquired the latest ten publications from the Naval Institute Press...”
Silence.
Sousuke trailed off, and looked down at his fingernails. “Forget all that,” he said at last.
But nobody even remembered it.
Another girl raised her hand. “Um, do you have a favorite musician?”
This was a hard one; Sousuke hardly ever listened to music. Then he suddenly recalled the CDs that Master Sergeant Mao had gathered up on the submarine before they deployed. And so, he proclaimed with confidence:
“Itsuki Hiroshi and SMAP.”