The TV broadcast framed it as shocking footage—it was the moment Rito shot the Actaeon girl. That moment alone, with no context. It’d been pulled from the armored infantryman’s optical sensor. As Raiden got to his feet, shocked by how the army let this leak, the newscaster continued his report with misguided outrage and elation.
Video evidence of the Strike Package—of Eighty Six—killing an innocent. Divisive evidence that they, too, were enemies.
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The Eighty-Six were humankind’s archenemy.
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They willingly became Legion, joining the ranks of the murder machines.
They colluded with the Legion as wiretaps.
They turned into Actaeon, killing countless innocent civilians across the Federacy.
And in the midst of combat, they killed civilians. They’d likely killed countless Federacy soldiers thus far. And that’s why the Federacy started losing one battle after another as soon as they appeared.
We lost because of them.
They’re traitors. They turned their backs on humankind, becoming animals intent on hunting us down. The biggest sinners of them all.
…They’re the ones who killed Rito.
It was a Federacy soldier who took his life, and yet the Republic people intentionally overlooked that fact and made themselves the victims. Just like the Republic people, they painted themselves the victims while remaining willfully ignorant of their own crimes.
“…Is this some kind of sick joke?”
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Each front’s chief of staff and vice commander—including the western front’s chief of staff, Willem Ehrenfried—were dismissed from their posts one after another. The same reason was given every time: insubordination. All of them were promising generals, either subordinate to or seen as the future successors of their front’s supreme commander.
After pushing away their most promising successors, every single front HQ gave the order.
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“Since I’m the Queen of the Eighty-Six, you’re keeping me here in the capital as a hostage so they stay in line. To coerce them to obey the Federacy military’s will, though they’re bound to feel outraged, resentful, and even inclined to rebel.”
With the Eighty-Six becoming both an outlet for the people’s frustration at defeat, and targets of their suspicion and distrust, they could no longer return to the Federacy, nor could they fight alongside Federacy soldiers.
“To keep the Eighty-Six from betraying or opposing you. To ensure they remain your weapon for fighting the Legion, like they have until now. That’s why you’re holding me hostage.”
✦ ✦ ✦
“…Li’l Reaper.”
He was still annoyed by that nickname even now, but he was used to it. Hearing Shiden call him, Shin turned to her, his eyes fed up as ever. Shiden, however, wasn’t looking at him; instead, she was peering dubiously out the window, at the eastern sky.
“Are those transport planes? Is it just me, or are they different from the ones we usually see?”
It wasn’t even a question of if they were different, since there were no flights scheduled that day. There was no sign of busywork on the base’s runway, meaning they hadn’t received updates on any emergency landings, either.
Shin approached the window, becoming suspicious. The planes really were different, not just in terms of model, but in sheer numbers, too. They flew in a formation of ten aircraft, coming in from the east, where the bases around Sankt Jeder would be.
It seemed they had no business in Rüstkammer, and they were rotating from a good distance away, their flanks turned. The doors to their elongated fuselage opened outward. Shin recognized this structure. These weren’t cargo planes; they were bombers. They had the same mechanism as the bombers that’d gone on a suicide attack on the United Kingdom’s snowy battlefield.
…What were bombers doing there?
Were they preparing to drop bombs so far behind their own army’s front line?
But then a moment later, it dawned on him. And the realization made his every pore open and every hair on his body stand on end.
“—Colonel!”
He connected with Grethe, too annoyed to fiddle with the Para-RAID’s settings. Normally, he wouldn’t contact Grethe directly, instead deferring to her aide to inform her he was looking for her, but now wasn’t the time.
“Captain Nouzen?! Is it the Legion…?”
“No, but this is urgent! Have the entire unit and all the Vargus units called back! Right away!”
She associated the urgency of his words and his direct call with his ability, but Shin cut her off. The fact that she trusted him enough to listen to him despite her confusion was something Shin was sincerely grateful for. They were also lucky that the intermittent Legion attacks that had lasted since their retreat died down last night. This gave the Strike Package time to gather, and Shin wanted to avoid the unit members having to see this in the middle of battle.
“I’ll handle recon in the meanwhile—please take control of the unit as brigade commander before they start speculating or splitting off because of misinformation!”
There were a lot more people this time around compared with back then. Keeping everyone gathered would take experience, skill, and know-how. Being late to handling the initial reaction was something they had to avoid.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Shiden, who had noticed what he was saying and turned around. She was shouting into the Para-RAID—“gather, group up, tell the others”—while ordering researchers and civilian workers who didn’t have RAID Devices to run. Even the slightest loss of information, even a single person unwilling to share intelligence and work together, could be fatal for what was about to come.
There came the signal for the unscheduled approach of aircraft… He could feel Grethe leave her desk, likely having been informed by the runway’s command tower. He could hear her gasp in disbelief upon looking out the window as she, too, realized what was happening.
“We’re being cut off from the Federacy mainland. The western front… All the Federacy’s fronts are about to be made into the Eighty-Sixth Sector!”
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The metallic birds unleashed their explosive entrails. Bombs fell from the sky, raining over the rear of the front line. They plummeted, sticking into the land. They didn’t explode, and this was because they weren’t meant to be dropped down on enemies from overhead.
Dissemination mines.
A weapon that triggered upon detecting a human, a vehicle, or a tank—and, in so doing, hindered the coming and going of military units. And countless of them had been released and laid far behind the Strike Package’s home base at Rüstkammer, the Vargus people’s barracks in Fortrapide City, and the Harutari reserve line.
Just as the Republic once set up walls and minefields to ensure the Juggernauts and their “Processor units” wouldn’t be able to retreat from the battlefield.
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Only once the first layer of lines was set—and the western front’s army and all Federacy front armies were blocked from retreating—was the order relayed. As all the unit members stood before her, Grethe did not hide it from them.
Going forward, the Strike Package was to defend the Rüstkammer base to the bitter end. They were not allowed to retreat. The same order was handed down to all units across all fronts. This, of course, led to an outburst of anger and discontent, but with the minefield trapping them on the battlefield, their complaints wouldn’t reach the other side.
They could not return to their peaceful homes.
They would have to fight off the Legion’s invasion to protect the people who cut them off, and the soldiers on the battlefield had no way to survive but to obey their orders and fight. The other side had control of their supplies and way out, while the Legion were charging at them from before their eyes. They didn’t have the means or chance to rebel against their distant homeland.
Their forward path was closed off by the Legion—their backs fenced off by the malice of humankind.
✦ ✦ ✦
This situation was no different from the Republic battleground once called the Eighty-Sixth Sector.