✦ ✦ ✦
Just as the attack was about to breach the warehouse, the fifty-meter, magically enhanced molecular blade sliced through the tomahawk. A large figure suddenly appeared at the warehouse entrance.
“Are you all right, Commander?” it asked.
“Ben!” Lina exclaimed.
“Lieutenant Canopus,” Vega muttered. “Are you allies with the traitor?”
“Commander Sirius isn’t a traitor, Captain Vega,” Canopus said firmly. “The parasites are playing with your mind.”
“What are you talking about?” Vega asked. “I never interacted with Randy’s group.”
“That’s not what I mean! The parasites are—”
Before Canopus could finish, Lina simultaneously deflected a high-energy laser attack and redirected the incoming tomahawk with one fluid motion.
Just then, a screeching sound echoed through the warehouse. The experimental vehicle and subject of today’s test run suddenly charged toward Lina and Vega. Reacting swiftly, they both leaped out of the way. The vehicle then veered off course and came to an abrupt stop as its right front door flung open.
“Get in, Commander!”
“Hardy?!”
Second lieutenant of Stars Team 1, Ralph Hardy Milfak, motioned Lina into the passenger seat. Without hesitation, Lina jumped into the car, and Milfak veered the driving console to the left.
This experimental vehicle was designed for both left-hand drive, as in countries such as the USNA, and right-hand drive, as in the UK. It featured a movable driving console that could veer left or right, and the front seats were seamlessly connected without a partition. There were also no pedals. As soon as Lina closed the door, Milfak sped away.
“I’m taking us out of the base!” he said.
“What?” Lina asked, puzzled by this announcement from out of the blue.
“Commander Canopus’s orders!”
At this point, Lina trusted Canopus more than anything, so she didn’t fight back. There was no time to fight back anyhow.
The vehicle they were in was shaped like a pickup truck. Suddenly, a loud thunk echoed from its rear. Adept at acceleration magic, Deneb used a pseudo-teleportation spell to leap into the truck bed.
“Wait!” she yelled.
“No can do!” a voice countered.
A young man who had been hiding in the back leaped at Deneb, causing them to tumble out together.
“Ralph!” Lina exclaimed.
She recognized the young man who had tumbled out of the truck as Ralph Algol, another second-rank lieutenant from Stars Team 1.
“We’ll have to leave Deneb to Algol,” Milfak said. “Now, hold on tight! It’s gonna be a bumpy ride!”
Lina quickly fastened her seat belt, and the pickup truck flew down the road. Once they were past the base’s fence, Milfak continued in the direction of Albuquerque. Lina felt much calmer once the base was out of sight. She turned toward Milfak.
“What in the world is going on?”
“Sometime around five in the morning, Captain Arcturus and Lieutenant Regulus of Team 3 incited a rebellion. Currently, the other known members of the rebellion include Captain Vega and Lieutenant Spica from Team 4; Captain Rigel, Second Lieutenant Bellatrix, and Second Lieutenant Alnilam from Team 6; and Lieutenant Antares and Captain Sargas from Team 11.”
“Hold on!” Lina interjected. “Char said the members of Team 6 were possessed by parasites. Tell me that was a lie.”
“Unfortunately, there is enough evidence to prove it’s true,” Milfak said. “And it’s not just Team 6. There is a strong chance the two members I just mentioned from Teams 3 and 11 have also turned into parasites.”
“I can’t believe this.”
“Lieutenant Shaula of Team 11 was the one who told us the news. She noticed Lieutenant Antares and Captain Sargas were acting strangely and reported it to Commander Canopus.”
Team 11 was proficient in mental interference magic, but Second Lieutenant Shaula had exceptional sensitivity to psion waves and a strong defense against mental interference. It was undoubtedly thanks to her abilities that she remained unaffected by the parasites and managed to detect their presence.
“But, well…,” Milfak said cautiously, “Shaula only reported to Canopus since you weren’t in your room.”
Milfak seemed to worry that Lina’s feelings might be hurt, but Lina didn’t mind. In fact, she didn’t even notice.
“After Lieutenant Algol and I received emergency summonses, Lieutenant Antares activated Hypnos Garden,” Milfak continued. “This saved us from Shaula’s Lunar Eclipse, but everyone else in the dormitory was incapacitated.”
Antares’s Hypnos Garden was a type of exotype magic that induced sleep within a particular area. Since it targeted a wide range at once, it wasn’t particularly powerful. In other words, it couldn’t put soldiers in a worked-up state to sleep. However, it was effective at preventing people from waking up and at inducing sleep in those who had recently waken up or were fatigued.
Second Lieutenant Shaula’s Lunar Eclipse was a defensive magic that utilized mental interference magic—known as “lunar magic” in the USNA—to disrupt the target’s psychological perception and render their attacks ineffective. It was undoubtedly thanks to this spell that Shaula had avoided being invaded by a parasite.
“So what now?” Lina asked apprehensively.
She was used to relying on the Stars’ backup for every operation, but that was clearly impossible now. At this rate, she worried about having to face a satellite-class magician without any equipment or funding.
As if in response to her worries, a notification sounded from Milfak’s breast pocket. He switched the vehicle to autopilot and pulled out his device.
His fingers flew across the device’s screen as if deciphering a complex encryption. After finally cracking the code, he read the message with a stern expression. Once he was done, he handed the device to Lina.
“Orders from Colonel Balance.”
As soon as Lina took the terminal, Milfak went back to driving.
“After learning about the attack by Team 3, Canopus immediately consulted Colonel Balance for advice,” he explained.
Lina took a deep breath and looked down at Milfak’s terminal. As she read the colonel’s email, her eyes became as round as saucers. Balance’s orders were for Lina to seek exile in Japan under the Yotsuba family’s protection.
“She wants me to go to Japan?!” Lina exclaimed. “But why?”
She couldn’t fathom why she had to leave the States and go all the way to Japan.
“She probably worries you’ve become the target of a conspiracy,” Milfak explained. “I doubt anyone in the Stars would go as far as assassinating a strategic magician, but there may be factions interested in manipulating you for their own purposes.”
Lina suddenly recalled the military aircraft she found aboard the Enterprise.
Those magicians were being forced to use magic as a power source and treated as mere cogs in the military system, she thought. Are there people who think of me as a piece of machinery, too?
Given the current state of the world, losing Heavy Metal Burst was almost tantamount to national suicide. Brainwashing Lina into a more compliant pawn, however, could definitely prove valuable from a military standpoint.
“But wouldn’t my fleeing to Japan make me a deserter?” Lina asked.
“I don’t think you have to worry about that, Commander. Take a look at the attached file.”
Lina quickly turned back to the terminal. Like the email, the attached file was also heavily coded. The contents consisted of an official order to infiltrate Japan for a clandestine audit of the military attaché stationed there.
“She’s giving me an official order?!” Lina gasped.
“Colonel Balance did her best to facilitate your escape within the scope of her authority,” Milfak said.
Balance was second-in-command in the audit department overseeing military misconduct. While fraught with technicalities, sending Lina to Japan for the sake of military officers working at the embassy and consulate could arguably—albeit just barely—fall within her authority.
“You can hold on to that terminal,” Milfak continued. “Don’t worry. It doesn’t contain any of my personal information. I use the same password as Team 1.”
As Stars commander, Lina had been granted permission to censor each team’s information documents. Most people, however, ignored her authority, and Lina never brought it up as an issue. Only Canopus and Capella from Team 5 ever faithfully reported to Lina each time they changed their passwords.
“I put your passport, credit cards, debit cards, and various other equipment for the undercover mission in the carrier bag on the back seat,” Milfak said. “Since you’ll be traveling, you won’t find any armed devices. Also, I didn’t have time to provide a change of clothes, so please purchase those at the airport when we arrive. Colonel Balance already purchased your flight tickets.”
Lina looked down at the terminal again. Sure enough, her virtual ticket had been forwarded to her.
“I’m driving us directly to the Albuquerque airport,” Milfak told her. “Captain Canopus is holding the Stars off, so I don’t think anyone is tracking us, but I’m using an anti-detection shield just in case. As an extra precaution, I suggest refraining from using magic until you reach your destination.”
“All right.”
Milfak’s anti-detection magic was top-notch among the Stars. Even the tracking experts in Team 6, the Orion Team, would find the vehicle difficult to detect.
✦ ✦ ✦
Lina arrived safely in Japan on the afternoon of June 17, local time. She immediately called the number Balance had given her and was quickly put in the care of the Kuroba family, one of Maya’s strongest allies.
Meanwhile, at the Stars base, Canopus, Algol, and Shaula had been sentenced in an informal trial to a military prison for magicians on Midway Island. Rather than returning to the base, Milfak escaped to the West Coast.