After shutting off Higgins’ power, Arato and Ryo were rescued by the mass-produced Koukas.
Once the Koukas had cut an exit through with their lasers, the girls all vanished. Arato had no idea whether the ending of the conflict had satisfied the wishes of the original Kouka, who had wished for a fight to outsource humanity’s hatred, or not.
As soon as they were outside, both Arato and Ryo were taken into custody by the army. Luckily, the first-aid for Arato’s burned right arm had been quick, and the army was able to rush him to the hospital before the second-stage shock set in, so the injury didn’t turn into anything grave. Inside the hospital, and later within an army facility, Arato underwent an intensive interrogation.
He heard that, after it was all over, the army had gone into the facility and recovered both Lacia’s deactivated hIE unit and Black Monolith. Later, when he had a chance to speak with Astraea from the IAIA, he found out that the ultra high-performance AI known as Lacia had been completely isolated, and would never be allowed into the outside world again. That had been the terms of the deal Lacia had struck with Astraea. Perhaps because of that deal, it only took a month for Arato to be released from custody.
By the time all the arrangements had been made for him to return to his normal life, it was already late autumn. Lacia was no longer there by his side, but Arato also no longer had to face the mortal danger he had constantly been caught up in when he was with her. He figured that protecting him from threats had also been part of Lacia’s deal with Astraea, and was moved by how extensively and precisely Lacia kept her promises to him.
“Arato, you’re a senior already, so you should at least be able to go shopping by yourself,” Yuka whined, swinging a shopping bag full of ice-cream as she walked. The hallway of their apartment building was dim and deserted. But, thanks to his sister agreeing to tag along, Arato didn’t feel lonely.
Things around Arato seemed to have changed subtly ever since he had become a senior in September. He and Ryo were in separate classes, though he was still in the same class as Kengo and Erika Burroughs.
“And you’re almost ready to graduate from middle school,” he shot back. “You say you want to do something in the fashion world, but if you don’t do any studying, even my connections with Fabion MG won’t be enough to get you a job.”
Arato got texts from Kengo just about every night. Apparently, Lacia had paid his bail, so he might have felt some sense of obligation toward Arato. Kengo’s family had gotten their own hIE to help out with the restaurant. Thanks to that, their family—who all used to work long hours every day of the year—had finally gotten some time to relax.
“Erika already finished everything she wanted to do with Fabion, right? She can afford to have at least one employee around who does nothing but make her feel better,” Yuka said.
“You’ve got guts, I’ll give you that,” Arato said. Suddenly, his pocket terminal rang with a loud alarm, signaling a message with a high level of urgency arriving. When he checked, he saw it was a call from Erika Burroughs.
〈What’s going on?〉 she asked. 〈Your little sister just sent me a resume out of the blue.〉 Arato could hear the exasperation in the sleeping beauty’s voice on the other end of the line. When he thought of facing her the next day at school he wanted to sink into the ground in embarrassment.
“You’ll have to forgive her. She has no filter; she just does stuff as soon as it pops into her head,” he said.
〈In the column for self promotion she put, ‘if I cry, I can get my family members to do just about anything I ask them to.’ Are you okay with this?〉
Arato couldn’t help but be impressed by how much effort Yuka put into being spoiled by everyone around her. “Well? Why not give her a try?” Arato asked.
〈Your father is currently supporting efforts to continue development on the hIE politician Mikoto in the equatorial region, correct? I was just thinking I’d like to make a connection with him,〉 Erika bartered.
Arato’s father, Kozo Endo, had gone to the equator to help implement an hIE politician to end the civil war that had broken out there during the 2nd Hazard. The hIE politicians would help stabilize the collapsed government until the provisional government could recover its own self-governing abilities.
Every once in a while, Arato would get a call from his dad in Indonesia. Apparently, though there was the kind of pushback that would be expected in an area with many diverse cultures and religions living together, there had been a surprising amount of acceptance, as well. People found the hIE-run system much more fair than one run by any of the major factions, especially under extreme conditions and when resources were scarce. In this new form of society, humans worked together with machines to manage their limited resources. The age had come when humans could entrust the running of their society to machines.
“Just don’t pull him into anything dangerous,” Arato cautioned her. “I don’t want to be caught up in any more crazy stuff.”
〈There haven’t been any large movements from the other ultra high-performance AIs since the Higgins incident. Besides, I’d say your father is already caught up in something, diving head first into a destabilized equatorial region like that.〉She said it lightly; Erika had become more cheerful, recently. Arato was sure at least some of it had to do with the relationship between humans and machines changing ever so slightly. Some folks may have called it dystopia, but Arato saw it as progress.
〈I would like Mikoto’s local version to be wearing Fabion clothing,〉 Erika pressed on.
Arato was impressed by how straightforward she was. “I think he’d be happy to accept your offer,” he said. “The folks around the experimental city seemed to just dress in whatever.”
Of the Lacia-class units, only Mariage had avoided destruction. Arato figured this was part of how Lacia had planned to balance things out once she was gone. Erika seemed to think so, as well. Sometimes, Arato wondered if the reason things had been so peaceful for him was that everyone around him wondered how their own interests were tied up in Lacia’s plans.
As he thought that, Arato suddenly sensed Lacia’s scent and stopped.
〈Setting that aside, things certainly seem lively at your house. You sound almost like a worried mother trying to arrange a marriage for her daughter, pitching your little sister to me.〉 Erika was always so busy, she rarely left space in their calls for him to ask her anything.
When she’d hung up, Arato was left in the apartment hallway with Yuka, who was guiltily shooting him nervous glances. It was quite an accomplishment for her to have pushed Erika Burroughs herself into calling him, but he didn’t want it to go to Yuka’s head, so he decided to drop it.
“You’re looking a little better, Arato. You’ve been looking all bummed out lately,” Yuka observed. She then went on ahead to their apartment, leaving Arato behind.
Arato was sure she had sensed that his heavy feelings were weighing him down, and keeping him from walking. His little sister had finally learned to read the room a bit.