Mikoto was sitting wearily on a snowfield in Russia.
As she did, the Sister spoke to her, saying, “Have you calmed down? asks Misaka.”
“Yeah…Sorry about that. Could you explain this to me again?”
“Nu-AD1967. Launch preparations for an old Soviet strategic nuclear warhead are currently underway, says Misaka, summarizing her report.”
“Okay, wait. Wait a second. A nuclear warhead—a nuke? You mean the president of Russia gave the go-ahead on it?”
As Mikoto blanched, the Sister’s face remained expressionless. She tilted her head slightly.
“No conversations regarding adjustments are occurring on normal military channels, says Misaka, confirming with herself. In addition, there are no visible signs of wireless transmissions of nuclear launch codes, supplements Misaka. This is only a speculation, but I believe this is an act by an independent group led by a man named Nikolai Tolstoj.”
“What’s that mean…?” Mikoto frowned. “You’re telling me a Russian unit loaded a nuclear warhead into a missile without asking? But they wouldn’t be able to detonate it without the launch codes from their leader, right?”
If it didn’t work that way, they ran the risk of any old soldier with dangerous ideas pulling the trigger on the extinction of humanity. This nation had many missiles and several launch facilities; their security for it should have been airtight.
“Not necessarily, says Misaka, listening in on the communications with a troubled face.”
“You haven’t batted an eye.”
“It seems the independent unit plans to use an exchange warhead, answers Misaka in mild annoyance.” The Sister shook her head. “Have you heard the story that right after the Cold War between east and west ended, several nuclear warheads and radioactive materials flowed out of Russia, whose infrastructure had collapsed at the time? asks Misaka for confirmation.”
“Well, I guess I’ve heard the story before, but…not how much is truth and how much is just an urban legend.”
“Then what about how a large number of nuclear scientists and technical information left the country at the same time?”
“…”
“These warheads were traded with the purpose of using them, but most of them would have been actually impossible to detonate because of the lack of authentication codes, says Misaka. But exceptions exist for certain missiles. Nuclear missile security locks are set into an outer shell surrounding the nuclear matter, explains Misaka. In other words—”
“If they take out the insides, then put that into a new outer shell they created…”
“They would be able to detonate the nuclear matter, concludes Misaka. And with precisely the same power, adds Misaka.”
The Sister spoke fluidly.
It seemed like more information than she could get just by listening in on those military communications just now. Maybe she was getting intel in real time by using the Misaka network.
“After the Soviet Union collapsed, these exchange warheads cropped up in manufacturing projects at multiple sites, mainly ones with the aim of gaining independence from Russia—but when Russia’s national power recovered, they began a special military operation to aggressively hunt them down, allegedly to take responsibility for their own nukes and contribute to world peace, explains Misaka. In official records, these exchange warheads were dismantled and their densities lowered before they used them as fuel for nuclear reactors.”
“But the independent team actually saved all the ones they recovered? As nuclear weapons they could fire whenever they wanted, without the president’s permission?”
“They seem to have prepared vehicular launchers in order to fire an exchange warhead using the Nu-AD1967 at that fortress up in the sky, says Misaka, revealing their plans.”
“You’re kidding, right…?” murmured Mikoto.
No matter how incomprehensible that fortress was, and no matter how many times the man on it had returned alive from deadly battlefields, it would be horrific if anything like that detonated there.
And the damage wouldn’t stop there, either.
If that strange fortress had some sort of crazy defensive system that could even withstand nuclear explosions, it still wouldn’t end on a happy note.
The issue was the altitude of the fortress they were targeting.
“…Wasn’t America or someone researching safer, smaller-scale nuclear warheads?”
“Are you referring to the project of developing nuclear weapons with destructive scope ranges from three to five kilometers across, which would allow them to deploy nuclear weapons while also avoiding spreading the fallout into the sky? confirms Misaka. Misaka believes those were designed for destroying underground facilities.”
Right.
Even during the overheated nuclear arms race during the Cold War, there was a taboo: to restrict the ensuing fallout to below certain altitudes. It was so taboo that instead of creating one giant bomb, they created a warhead called a MIRV that would basically launch an entire rain of little nuclear bombs.
What was the reason for not spreading the fallout above a certain altitude?
What was so concerning that the great powers, who were considering even full-blown nuclear war, would nevertheless restrain themselves to absolute avoidance of doing so?
“This is a lot worse than awful…If they fire a nuclear weapon at a target so high up…!!”
“Based on the Nu-AD1967’s explosion magnitude, there is an extremely high probability that the fallout produced by attacking the floating fortress will not end in the skies, but rather be engulfed into layers of airflow, thus polluting the entire planet, says Misaka, reporting on the network’s simulated result. It is predicted that the radioactive matter will adversely affect life, and the fallout will block out the sunlight, drastically altering Earth’s environment and causing intense food shortages due to poor plant growth conditions, says Misaka with concern.”
The risk of fallout always existed, even for nuclear explosions that carried over the surface.
If one to ten thousand meters were added onto that, the level of resulting fallout would be immeasurable.
“You said they were preparing a mobile launcher, right? Do you know exactly where it is?”
“A rough position, yes. But in order to avoid damage from the nuclear explosion, they are trying to fire the missile from a spot over seventy kilometers from our current location, adds Misaka.”
“Hmm.”
Mikoto looked around, then gestured with her jaw to one place.
It was a group of Academy City vehicles. Many tanks and armored cars, transporting several powered suits, were even now on the move and firing their artillery.
“…Let’s just steal one of them or something. You know how to drive a car?”