“Then, let’s go over the special O.V.E.R.S. packages that your IS have been equipped with.” Every checklist had been checked, every feature tuned, and now Chifuyu had summoned Houki, Ling, and Laura for a briefing.
“What about Ichika and Cecilia?” asked Houki, nervously raising her hand. The three there were already in their IS suits.
“Those two will be taking a different role in the mission. Cecilia’s IS is more suited for a different package, and doesn’t require this explanation... I’ll be explaining to Orimura directly.”
“Okay then!” called out Kagaribi Hikaruno, striking a strange pose as she made her entrance. “Let me explain my very own Output Variable Energy Reverse System package!”
Chifuyu ignored Hikaruno’s thumbs-up. It was hard to imagine them as classmates. But, then and now, Chifuyu had always paid much more attention to Tabane.
“Umm, let’s see...” continued Hikaruno. “The O.V.E.R.S. is able to amplify and shift a small source of energy to provide a massive energy output—”
As if waiting for these words, Tabane swooped in and said, “That’s just like Akatsubaki’s Kenran Butou! What a coincidence! It’s almost like—”
“Almost like I copied from the Akatsubaki.” Hikaruno defanged Tabane’s sudden glare with a flat admission. “Ugh...”
There was no reason for the three IS Academy students to know this, but it was the first step in the focus of Kagaribi Hikaruno’s current project: the Mass-Produced Akatsubaki Plan. But she’d been seen through. Not like it was difficult.
“You’re twelve thousand years too early to sneak something like that by me,” Tabane chuckled smugly.
“...If I may proceed?”
“Ohh, of course, Chichan!” Tabane saw an opportunity to sneak a hug and dove in, only to be silenced by Chifuyu’s fist.
“The mission will require the O.V.E.R.S.-equipped IS to link. In order to synchronize output levels, the Akatsubaki will be equipped with one as well,” Chifuyu went on. “Ms. Yamada and Kanzashi will provide backup. Dunois’s IS is still unstable, so for this mission she will be held in reserve on Earth along with Tatenashi.”
‘On Earth’ silenced the pilots.
“The theater of operation will be...” Chifuyu pointed a finger straight up. “Space.”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Haah... Haaah...” Ichika and Cecilia chased Chelsea through the crowded streets for nearly 20 minutes and were out of breath.
“Wow, she’s fast.”
“We’ve almost got her. This is a—”
It was a dead end. Something which Chelsea knew as well.
“Now we’ve got you.”
Chelsea turned around slowly, a rapier in each hand.
“I knew you’d catch me eventually, Cecilia Alcott. Now, shall we settle this?”
She tossed one of the rapiers to Cecilia, who nimbly snatched it from the air into a duelist’s stance.
“If I prevail, you’ll tell me everything.”
“Very well! And if I win... Ichika is mine!” Chelsea’s self-satisfied chuckle at the idea set Cecilia’s teeth on edge.
“Are you making fun of me?!”
“Of course not. Quite the opposite, in fact. Are you just afraid you can’t win?”
Cecilia, her gorge rising, sprung to the attack, but her enraged flailing was simply batted away as Chelsea brought the point of her blade to her neck.
“Point. Shall we go to best of seven?”
“Ugh...!”
Ichika, not sure what to do, tried to calm Cecilia, “Cecilia! You need to cool down!”
“I know, but...!” She took a deep breath, and her eyes shone the calm blue of the ocean. “En garde!”
“Come!”
A quick thrust turning to a cut. Chelsea stepped back to evade, but Cecilia deftly followed and, with a quick side-stroke, cleanly sliced open Chelsea’s blouse.
“And now we’re even.”
“I appreciate the challenge.” Rebuttoning her jacket over the tear, Chelsea raised her sword again. Cecilia, likewise, came to the ready a pace away. “Shall I lead this time?”
With a sudden deep breath, Chelsea darted forward, inside Cecilia’s reach, before bringing her blade up sharply, cutting a slit up the side of Cecilia’s skirt as if delivering a riposte to the assault on her own dignity. Cecilia’s thigh, pale in the chill wind, thrust through the tear.
“Two.”
“This isn’t finished yet!” With the slit, though, came newfound mobility, and Cecilia moved like a flash, lopping off a lock of Chelsea’s hair. “And my second as well. Perhaps you should focus?”
“I appreciate your concern.” Chelsea’s eyes narrowed, as if she was finally taking the fight seriously. At the same time, Cecilia took her own advice, and soon they were caught in a flurry of thrusts and ripostes. An intricate waltz of steel on steel. All Ichika could do was nervously gulp as he watched them alternately dance like butterflies and sting like bees.
Blades flashed as they missed by the narrowest of margins, cutting away at the combatants’ clothes yet failing to draw blood. It was as if, to continue the butterfly metaphor, they were both undergoing metamorphosis, cutting each other out of their cocoons. But eventually, someone had to slip. And it was Cecilia.
“Three. Checkmate.”
“Ugh...”
The flaw was in her shoes. While Chelsea was wearing sturdy, functional boots, Cecilia had on a pair of high heels, and was unstable enough on her feet that she couldn’t land a firm blow.
“Enough of this!” Cecilia, at the end of her rope, slid off her heels and kicked them to the side. “Ichika.”
“Eh?”
“Tell absolutely no one what happened here.” Her voice was deadly serious. He had only a moment to wonder what she meant before she kicked off the tattered remnants of her skirt and stood, stripped down to her lingerie.