I knew it... I thought. If it’s not a Russian attack, that just leaves New World. But how far have New World’s people infiltrated? Only high-ranking government officials should know that I’m here. And what’s their goal? I don’t know whether they want to kill me or get information. I suppose the most important thing is to get out of this room and find somewhere safe before—
All the lights in the room suddenly went out.
“Anton, is this a power cut?” I asked.
“Not likely. A building of this size is bound to have a backup generator. Someone shut off the lights deliberately. Stay away from the windows, Kouki. Even if the curtains are closed, snipers are still a danger. Lieutenant Colonel! What defensive capabilities does this hotel have?”
“There’s a special forces unit belonging to the Ministry of Internal Affairs in the security room on floor 30. There are also five powered suits stationed in the basement and at the front entrance. I don’t think the invaders can break in easily.”
The lieutenant colonel’s response made it sound as though we should hold out here and wait for rescue to come, but the lack of any kind of response from my personal terminal made me less sure. No matter what button I pressed, the screen remained black, and I couldn’t hear any of the faint sounds that normally came from the device while it was on standby. The only explanation was that it’d completely stopped working.
As my eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, I realized that I couldn’t see the green power LED on Anton’s terminal, or the one on the lieutenant colonel’s. I concluded that those had also stopped working.
“We’re in trouble, Anton,” I said. “The firearms held by the special forces unit downstairs and the powered suits have probably stopped working.”
“What?!”
“My terminal isn’t functioning, even though Mom worked her magic on it. Your terminal and the lieutenant colonel’s terminals have also stopped. My terminal has built-in protection against ECM. It takes more than some simple jamming to disable it. That means this must be an EMP attack. The personal identification devices that soldiers have to wear to be able to use their weapons may have been destroyed, too. It’s likely that the powered suits were disabled in the same way.”
Noa had introduced equipment to protect against EMPs based on a suggestion from Macho Man, a suggestion so expensive that Mom had been almost reluctant to allow it.
If EMP protection was almost too expensive for the world’s greatest private military with state-of-the-art equipment, then it was a certainty that any Russian forces providing security in a nation that was nowhere near as advanced wouldn’t have such equipment.
That meant we’d have to escape with, nothing to rely on, other than a small automatic handgun no different from those used almost 200 years ago.
“Now what?” I asked.
“Escape by yourself, Kouki,” Anton said. “You speak Russian, so you don’t need me to accompany you. Listen, once you’re out of the hotel, get yourself to the apartment at the address written on this piece of paper. You’ll find some friends of mine who can provide you with a false passport and enough money. Then you can—”
“W-Wait a minute! I can’t do it alone! And what’ll happen to you?”
“Kouki! There’s no time. Shut up and listen. You can take a train across the Finnish border. Avoid heading east at all costs. Finland is in the opposite direction. Make sure you buy your tickets in cash; you’ll be captured immediately if you use a credit card. Once in Finland, head for this second address. It’s a Noa safe house. You can count on them. Do you understand? Take the gun with you. Now go.”
Anton put the gun in my hand.
It felt heavy and oversized. I tucked it into my belt and hid it under my jacket.
Anton placed his hand on my head. “It’ll be fine,” he said in a soothing voice. “Back on Noa Island, you trained in shooting and urban warfare. You don’t have to fight back this time. Just keep running. It should be a breeze.”
“Okay,” I said reluctantly. “But how am I going to get out of this hotel?”
Don’t tell me I’m going to be escaping through a garbage chute. We’re on the 83rd floor. I’ll die before getting anywhere.
The lieutenant colonel moved over to me and said, “There’s a large river flowing behind this hotel. It’s 15 meters deep, and an immobile powered suit should be enough to absorb the impact. Use the emergency powered suit on this floor. Equip it manually and jump into the lake. It’s an Arakawa-type, so you can purge parts by igniting the explosives. The ignition mechanism doesn’t use any semiconductors, so it should be usable even after an EMP attack. I’ll help you get into the suit.”
The lieutenant colonel guided me as we carefully opened the door and moved out into the corridor. Then the lieutenant colonel pulled a lever hidden behind one of the paintings that were decorating the walls.
The lever must have been based on an old-style mechanism that was known for being reliable. It worked, and a powered suit stored in the wall was revealed.
“This is a Russian Military Fifth-Generation Mirage,” the lieutenant colonel said. “I would activate it for you if I could, but unfortunately that’s not possible. I hope someday I’ll have the opportunity to impress you with the performance of the activated suit.” Then he laughed at his joke in spite of the situation.
With an activated Mirage powered suit, I would have been well-armored and relatively well-protected from enemy attack. If only we could have activated it.
The lieutenant colonel used a specialty tool stored beside the powered suit to forcefully open its cockpit. Yuri and Anton helped me climb inside and fastened the seat belt around me. Then I put on the helmet with the inbuilt HUD that I wouldn’t be able to use. I gave a thumbs-up to indicate that I was ready, and then the cockpit was slowly closed from the outside.
“Mr. Arakawa, after a ten second countdown, you will be launched out of the hotel,” the lieutenant colonel warned me. “You’ll probably land in the water on your back. Brace yourself for the impact! It pains me to say so, but I don’t know the extent to which my country is cooperating with New World. Please consider every public institution to be an enemy in hiding. I know that the lieutenant has said this already, but please find some way to escape. Be safe.”
“Understood! Lieutenant Colonel, Yuri, Anton, please surrender without doing anything stupid.”
“Initiating countdown! 10... 9... 8... 7...”
“Are you listening to me?! Promise you’ll surrender!”
“3... 2... 1... launching!”
There was no response to my question, just the sound of the explosion that launched the suit. In an instant, I felt like I was floating, and then I felt the powered suit violently accelerate toward the ground, back first.
Honestly, I was scared and close to crying, but my biggest concerns were for Anton, Clare, and everyone else.
I’ll rescue all of you, no matter what. Stay safe until then...
I safely crashed into the river. I felt the intense shock of the collision, and then the powered suit sank into the water.