Signal Fire at the Water’s Edge

by Reki Kawahara

  “So, like, if Ash just kept focusing on bringing up his bike, that machine would become an Arc-level Enhanced Armament. Is that it?”

  They looked at each other for a moment or two and then erupted in laughter at the same time. Apologies, Ash, but no matter how many missiles and machine guns and rocket launchers are added on as equipment, it’s a little beyond belief that your beloved machine would ever join the ranks of the Seven Arcs.

  Thinking about this led his brain to another thought, though, and Haruyuki furrowed his brow. But before his thinking could get anywhere, Kuroyukihime cleared her throat and turned to Akira.

  “Mmm…Sorry for the digression. In short, even if the Acceleration Research Society is planning the birth of a second Armor, there isn’t an Arc they could use as a vessel…”

  “Yes. I’m in agreement on that.”

  “And there are other elements missing. The true nature of the Armor’s strength was built up and cultivated through the long years of generations of wearers until it built up an aggregate of negative Incarnate to the point where it had a pseudospirit. That was the strength of ‘the Beast,’ as Haruyuki put it.”

  At this remark from Kuroyukihime, Haruyuki set aside what he was trying to remember and nodded deeply. “Yeah. He was really amazing. He could predict the enemy’s attack from start to finish, even Incarnate techniques, and then he’d display the attack trajectory and type of technique even in my field of view. On top of that, he learned all of the special techniques of the previous Disasters, so I could just use them as much as I wanted. Like the combo of Laser Sword after Flash Blink, seriously the strongest…” Haruyuki rattled on and on, both hands clenched tightly.

  For a while, Kuroyukihime simply stared with wide eyes before finally chuckling dryly, as though fondly exasperated. “The way you talk sounds like you are quite firmly in support of the Beast.”

  “Oh! N-no, that’s not it…”

  “But, well, I understand what you’re trying to say. It was precisely because the Beast was so strong that Chrome Disaster was strong. That’s it, hmm? In other words, even if those kids in the Society succeed in producing an Armor of Catastrophe Mark Two, with parasitic abilities and the power to control the mind, to build up the negative incarnate to that extent and raise it up until it exhibits the same level of performance as the Mark One, it will be years—and actually, we can probably assume it will take even longer when we consider that they can’t use an Arc as a vessel. Are they planning something so long-term at this late stage?” This final question was directed at Akira.

  The executive in charge of intelligence in the first Nega Nebulus didn’t answer right away, but rather turned her sepia-brown eyes toward the evening sky beyond the windows. She narrowed her eyes almost as if she could see something there, and after a few seconds, began to speak in a hushed tone. “…The aggregate of negative Incarnate. There is one other thing in the Accelerated World that description applies to. And it continues to grow even now, with every passing second…”

  “…!!”

  Haruyuki and Kuroyukihime both inhaled sharply, having finally realized what Akira meant. The negative will of hostility and hatred of many Burst Linkers, i.e., something that absorbed and accumulated negative Incarnate. The same growth logic as the Beast that lived in the Armor of Catastrophe, but much more blackly sinister.

  “…The ISS kit main body…,” Haruyuki murmured hoarsely.

  “Curren, have you…seen it?” Kuroyukihime asked. “The ISS kit main body in the Tokyo Midtown Tower?” But here she pinched her lips closed and then quickly bowed her head. “Sorry. There’s no way you could have seen it. You’re still sealed at the east gate of the Castle in the Unlimited Neutral Field…”

  “No need to apologize, Lotus. The attack on the Castle was the will of all members, including the Four Elements. And whatever the result, that night when all of us in the Legion marched toward the Castle together is a precious memory to me, even now,” Akira replied gently. Then her tone returned to normal as she continued, “…I haven’t seen the ISS kit main body myself. A Burst Linker I was guarding a little earlier equipped the kit. That kid sent me information on the kit performance and the structure of the enhancement and amplification. From that, I inferred the fact that the kits have a centralized power structure.”

  “…Um, is that person…?” Are they okay? Haruyuki’s eyes asked.

  “Not a word in three days.” Akira shook her head slightly. “The mental control of the ISS kit has probably increased beyond the relationship with me.” Her tone and expression were as controlled as ever, but even still, Haruyuki caught a flicker of sadness in the eyes behind the glasses.

  It was only natural. For Aqua Current, The One, the sole bodyguard in the Accelerated World, all of the newbies she accepted work from, tag-teamed with, and saved from the danger of total point loss were, in a certain sense, something like her children.

  “Three days…If it’s only been three days, then maybe if we use Lime Bell’s special attack…,” Haruyuki said unconsciously. What came to mind, of course, was the Legion Petit Paquet in the Setagaya area. This Legion was made up of Chocolat Puppeteer with her unique chocolate armor, together with her parent and her child, but the latter had been contaminated with the ISS kit.

  However, through Chocolat’s desperate cries and Lime Bell’s Citron Call Mode II—an ability to reverse time—they had been able to remove their kits and return them all the way back to the sealed-card form. In principle, it should have been possible to do the same thing for Aqua Current’s client.

  Akira stared at Haruyuki for a moment, and then quickly shook her head once more. “Thanks. But the situation can no longer be resolved by dealing with each individual terminal. Putting together all the witness information, the number of kit users is increasing by more than ten people every day. Most likely, once it surpasses a certain number, I think this will become something like a pandemic.”

  “…Then the objective of the ISS kit multiplication is to collect massive amounts of negative Incarnate and pour that into the Armor of Catastrophe Mark Two. Is that what you think, Akira…?”

  Akira pulled her jaw back slightly at the serious look on Kuroyukihime’s face. “I don’t know if that’s the entire objective. But I do think there’s no doubt this is one way of using it.”

  “Mmm. And the reason?”

  “The reason is why I appeared today in Suginami…before you and Haru, Sach.”

  Haruyuki and Kuroyukihime gasped slightly in tandem at these unexpected words and waited for the rest of the explanation.

  “‘A new metal color has appeared in the Accelerated World, unexpectedly strong, despite his parent being unknown and him not belonging to a Legion.’ Ever since I heard that rumor a week or so ago, I’ve been gathering information. I’ve sat in the Gallery myself any number of times, although I’ve been using a dummy avatar for viewing.”

  “…Wolfram Cerberus…?”

  “Yes.” Akira nodded lightly at Haruyuki’s hoarse question. “He…Everything about him, from the way he appeared, to the extraordinary strength, the fact that he’s a metal color, and even the overall air he has about him…called to mind a Burst Linker who disappeared a very, very long time ago. The Second Chrome Disaster, Magnesium Drake.”

  “…!!”

  Haruyuki gasped. He had only just heard that name the day before from Kuroyukihime over lunch break. This Burst Linker had appeared at the dawn of the Accelerated World and had become exceedingly popular, but then was suddenly swallowed up by the Armor, became the Second Disaster, and was subjugated after a great deal of blood was spilled.

  “…Did you know Drake personally, Curren?” Kuroyukihime asked.

  Akira nodded neatly. “We dueled and spoke any number of times. And because my power was water and his fire, we saw each other as rivals. This was before I joined Nega Nebulus, though.”

  She lifted her head and looked outside once more before continuing with eyes that seemed to peer into
the distant past.

  “…I didn’t get to spend very much time with my parent, so there are more than a few things Drake taught me. How to use my own power; duel techniques; mental preparation as a Burst Linker…So I saw us as rivals, but also friends. However, Drake suddenly disappeared one day, and when he came back, he had already become a different person. Wrapped in the Armor of Catastrophe, he took out a lot of Burst Linkers in normal duels, and in the Unlimited Neutral Field, too. He didn’t so much as hesitate when he burned me up with his flames, too, several times more powerful than they had been before.”

  “…Curren…” Haruyuki unconsciously called her name.

  Akira smiled at him as if to say she was okay. “This was already a long, long time ago. But this past Sunday, when I saw Wolfram Cerberus for the first time, for a moment, I thought he was Drake, although Drake was much bigger and his coloring’s different. But overall, he’s very similar. Not just his appearance, but the air about him, too. His strength: the fact that his origins are unknown. So my conjecture—no, I had a hunch. That the same thing might happen again.”

  “The same thing…You mean the appearance of Chrome Disaster?”

  “Yes. Of course, I knew that Haru had sealed the Armor away. But…it was like that back then, when Drake became the Disaster. The First had been subjugated, and everyone living in the Accelerated World believed without doubt that the terrifying berserker would never again appear there. And yet…”

  “…The Armor appeared, and massive amounts of blood flowed once more…”

  Akira nodded deeply at Kuroyukihime’s hushed voice. “This is just a hypothesis, but if Wolfram Cerberus is playing the role of the one to equip the Armor like Drake did, then somewhere in the Accelerated World, there has to be the one trying to produce the armor. With that in mind, I’ve been in the Gallery as much as possible for Cerberus’s duels this week. Unfortunately, however, the timing was bad, and I didn’t get to see his duels yesterday and the day before with you, Haru.”

  “Y-you didn’t?” Haruyuki pulled his head back into himself.

  His former tag-team partner smiled faintly. “I was set on finally seeing it today, but you didn’t show up. But it seems Cerberus was also waiting for you, and today he didn’t start a single duel himself, and then after a while, he disappeared from the matching list. So I thought maybe he was going to head toward Nega Nebulus territory himself. I couldn’t decide at first, but eventually, I took a train from Nakano to Suginami. I got off at Koenji, connected globally on a bench at the station, and just in case, I turned Battle Royale standby mode on…”

  “So then you were pulled into the BR stage Cerberus initiated.”

  “Yes. But naturally, I wasn’t going to participate in the duel. I was planning to just watch Cerberus and Haru duel and then go home, as long as nothing happened. But I never dreamed she’d jump into the stage, and then interfere with the duel on top of that…”

  “…Quad Eyes Analyst…Argon Array, right?” Haruyuki asked.

  Akira assented with an unusually strong nod. “For the sake of my original objective of gathering information, I should have stayed hidden and observed her, but…When I saw her attacking you and Ash Roller with total disregard, I got so angry I could hardly stand it, and I just butted in. I couldn’t even be much help to you for all that.”

  “N-no, that’s not true at all!!” Haruyuki shouted forcefully, and he leaned forward toward the girl. “Argon Array’s laser attack had me totally pinned down. I was so frustrated I wanted to cry. I couldn’t even stand up. And then I saw you on the building, and I was so moved. My memory couldn’t have returned yet, but I just felt this strength surge up in me…It’s because you were there, Curren, that I was able to get up and fight again.” The words spilled out of Haruyuki as though from a dream, and a smile gentler than anything he’d seen on her face so far came across Akira’s lips.

  “…Silver Crow, you’ve become much, much stronger than I imagined. Seeing the player I guarded grown up into such a fine Burst Linker makes me happier than anything else. The flow of events is unexpected…but I really am glad that I could meet you again like this today…”

  The two stared at each other quietly, and Kuroyukihime’s three-point throat clearing passed between them.

  “Oh, Haruyuki, I’m really sorry I couldn’t help you when you were in that bind. At any rate, I was in the Gallery! And Akira, it sounds as though your reunion with me was an afterthought?”

  Haruyuki naturally flinched and pulled back, but Akira shifted her gaze to Kuroyukihime and giggled, with a look on her face like that of an older sister looking at her spoiled baby sister. “Sach, you haven’t changed a bit from the old days.”

  “A-are you saying that I haven’t grown?!”

  “I meant it as a compliment, of course. The Legion Master I dedicated my sword to waited for me, without anything changing. There’s no way I wouldn’t be happy about that.” She closed her mouth for a second and recomposed her face, posture, and tone into something crisp and correct. “This is surely also the guidance of the endlessly circulating water. Sach—no, Black King, Black Lotus—I, Aqua Current, from this second on this day, would like to return to Nega Nebulus. Will you allow me to?”

  Kuroyukihime blinked several times, clearly caught off guard by the sudden declaration. But soon enough, her jet-black eyes sparkled, and she stood up forcefully from the sofa. She walked around the glass table to stand before Akira and extended her right hand. When Akira took it and stood up, Kuroyukihime stared into the sepia-brown eyes at the same height as her own and murmured, “Of course. Of course I will…Welcome home, Curren.”

  “…Glad to be back, Lotus.”

  And then the two of them simultaneously took another step forward and wrapped their arms tightly around each other.

  Haruyuki didn’t weep and sob like he had two months earlier when Kuroyukihime had embraced Fuko Kurasaki at the Shinjuku Southern Terrace, but he did indeed clearly feel their hearts touching, resonating, and spreading out to fill the room with waves of warm light.

  June 27, 2047. Two years and ten months since the destruction of the former Legion. Following in the steps of the wind, Sky Raker, and fire, Ardor Maiden, another of the Four Elements, water, Aqua Current, had made it home to Nega Nebulus.

  4

  Two days later—Saturday, June 29, three PM.

  Haruyuki was inside the animal hutch standing behind the second school building at Umesato Junior High, neatly scrubbing the water-covered floor with a deck brush. Normally, the floor was covered in sheets with a water-resistant coating, so at a glance, it wasn’t dirty, but to maintain the health of the master of the hutch, he had decided to clean the floor once a week.

  That master, aka the northern white-faced owl Hoo, was on the left perch tree in his usual position, turning his head around from time to time. It wasn’t as though he was particularly monitoring Haruyuki’s work; he was probably sensing the atmosphere filling up and rising from the entire school. Because the following day, Sunday, was finally the day of the Umesato school festival.

  The brass band was in the middle of its final dress rehearsal onstage in the gym, and frenzied voices echoed from the team building the school festival gate in the front yard. Meanwhile, the calls of people practicing an original dance on the grounds on the other side of the second school building reached out to him faintly from the distance.

  This was Haruyuki’s second school festival, and he didn’t hate the idea of it, as something he didn’t get to have in elementary school. But for all that, he was taking part in a rather subdued group again this year—the class in charge of the exhibit with the stiff-ish theme of “Koenji Thirty Years Ago.” His class had finished its preparations early, about an hour earlier. All that was left was to simply upload the AR display files Haruyuki was in charge of to the local net the following morning and activate them.

  Chiyuri’s track-and-field team was doing a crepe booth, and Takumu’s kendo team was presenting a c
ostumed dance, so they were both still getting ready. They were supposed to be finished after four to make it in time for the Territories in the evening (naturally, not part of the school festival, but in the Accelerated World), but in the worst case, the Legion might have to defend Suginami without the two of them, so it could be down to only the remaining four members.

  …No, not four. Five.

  Two days before, on Thursday, they had welcomed a long-awaited new Legion member to Nega Nebulus, bringing their total membership up to seven.

  Alongside this thought, something warm started to well up in Haruyuki’s heart, but that quickly sank back down somewhere deep inside, because he remembered the duel after school the day before. Or rather, the duel that hadn’t happened after school that day.

  Haruyuki had no sooner finished feeding Hoo the previous day than he was flying out of school and heading for Nakano Area No. 2 by himself to duel Wolfram Cerberus. He was going to exchange blows to his heart’s content with Cerberus this time for sure, in a normal duel with no interruptions, and call him out one more time. To say, Come with me. To say, Be my comrade—my friend.

  But despite the fact that Cerberus had been dueling in Naka-2 every day, for some reason he had never shown up the day before, no matter how many hours Haruyuki waited. Instead, Haruyuki was caught by Kuroyukihime and Fuko, who’d come to check on him, and the two of them ended up staying over at the Arita house, which was, of course, fun, but when dawn came, this feeling of regret he could do nothing about came back to life. Or rather, it was more than regret—closer to unease. What if Cerberus never appeared again? Or what if, when he did show up, some kind of decisive change had visited him?

  With these complicated thoughts in mind, he moved the deck brush diligently. Sksh, sksh, sksh.

  UI> WHICH IS IT?

  Cherry-pink text flowed across the ad hoc chat window open in his field of view.