Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume15 Chapter 2 (section)

===Part 11===

“Tell me if you get tired. I’m freed from the earth’s gravity, so I can’t tell when we’ve been walking too much. 636. It was for times like this that I expanded the number of unmanned taxis and had New York’s subway cleaned up a fair bit.”

“…Are you planning to bring that ring on a taxi or train?”

“That…might be a good idea. 984. The driver or station attendant helping me in would be watching as my toes wiggled. Would that break the spell over them? They might realize it isn’t normal. Heh heh heh heh heh.”

That had been a mistake. One careless statement had brought out the perversion that was usually masked by the girl’s calm mood. It was scary that she was also an Elite.

While the Martini monsters named Wraith and Melly discussed matters, they entered Central Park.

Manhattan was normally lined with towering skyscrapers, but a rectangular area had been cut out of the city for a giant green park nearly 4 kilometers long.

Except there was no sign of that anymore.

A slit had opened in the center of the ground and then the park opened upwards like double doors. And a giant diagonal tower stuck out from that massive rectangular hole. Two barrels of different sizes were stacked on top of each other like an assault rifle with a grenade launcher attached below.

The black-uniformed girl grimly narrowed her eyes.

“The electromagnetically-launched reactor cannon.”

“Really conspicuous, isn’t it? 439. The Manhattan 000 actually has 44 different main cannon systems, but everyone focused on this one. It’s like they don’t even try to imagine what’s hidden behind that bright backlight.”

The desire for this Object to be a one-trick pony may have narrowed people’s vision.

With her game system directly linked to the Manhattan 000, Melly moved the large ring her butt sank inside of to carry her alongside Central Park and the giant opening within. Uptown, Upper East Side, Madison Avenue. This area had a high density of floral security cameras and every bag or piece of children’s clothing sold there was as expensive as a piece of art. The brown girl must have been somehow stimulated by this luxurious atmosphere because she desperately pursed her lips and trembled within her two-piece surgical gown made of crimson paper. With Central Park rising up with rows of buildings on either side, there was no sunlight. There was a pond and a museum clinging to the side of that “wall”, so it had to look like a surreal outdoor art exhibit.

Either she wanted to fiddle with something or she just liked how it felt in her hands because Melly rubbed her thumbs against the analog sticks on either side of the game system.

“Right, right. That’s right, Wraith. I wanted to ask you something since you’ve been all over the world. 948. Do you know a journalist named Royce?”

“What about them?”

“095. I’ve collected them.”

“…You’re attacking the press now? That is the lowest form of information warfare.”

“The press…! Yes, yes, that has such a wonderful ring to it. 707. It has such a formally dangerous sound so different from having your secrets revealed on the internet. Eh heh heh heh heh.”

She must have been leaving the calculations to the extraordinary Object because the ring hopped up lightly along with the paper surgical gown girl inside. Wraith watched with cold eyes.

It did not matter that the AI network, that’s hardware could be located anywhere, was functioning properly if its observer was broken.

Wraith recalled the method of breaking the Martini Series that Piranirie had mentioned. Melly was an old acquaintance, but she felt an eerie pressure from the very existence of the Ragnarok Script that had driven Piranirie mad with active self-denial. If Wraith was asked if she could place her full trust in this girl, she would have difficulty nodding.

After all, she could not even trust herself.

“Anyway, I didn’t mean to do this. He had the misfortune of being on the seam when Central Park opened. 779. To be blunt, he fell down into the classified zone…the main cannon’s storage space. He landed on a catwalk, so it wasn’t a long drop, though.”

“…”

Seeing Wraith’s indescribably uncertain expression, Melly gently sighed in just her two-piece surgical gown made of crimson paper. As if to say she had felt the exact same way. After breathing a heated breath on her game screen, she lightly rubbed the screen on the oil paper covering her chest and showed Wraith the screen of that game system that was like the evolved form of a tablet.

“This is the bearded man in question. 153. To be honest, he’s not my type. Although having your secrets revealed by someone who isn’t your type might be a decent situation…”

“Keep this up and I really will hate you.”

The screen seemed to display a video file.

An ordinary middle-aged man was looking around anxiously. He looked like the kind of person who cared for his family so much he forgot to look after his own life. He probably worked hard, paid his taxes, used up his bonus and paid leave over the holidays prepared by the higher ups, and got caught in traffic.

“Please let me contact my family. I beg you. I am a journalist, so I understand how your rules work to an extent. I will keep your secrets. I will not tell anyone about this. You can monitor my every move if you wish. Just let me tell that girl that I am safe. This isn’t like those online journalists who pursued the legends banned by the Faith Organization. None of this is necessary here. Please, meeting in Central Park was that girl’s idea. If I remain missing, she might blame herself. Since I am perfectly safe, there is no reason for her to harm herself like that, is there? Just let me fulfill my duty as her father.”

Of course, those Information Alliance geniuses were not emotional enough fools to judge someone based on their appearance alone. Detailed data on his breathing, pulse, perspiration, eye movement, and facial muscle movement was provided with the footage.

After reading the data, Wraith could only respond with a quiet look.

“…Well, this is troubling. He’s nothing more than a good person. Even if this is a stressful situation, 220 is high for the top blood pressure number. I’m worried about his bad cholesterol.”

They also looked through his past educational and employment history, his bank account data, his search history, his online purchase history, and his statements on social media and message boards, but it all came up clean. In fact, it was so clean that they wondered if this was an alternate account for living a double life.

“This was bad luck for everyone involved. If he was a wolf in sheep’s clothing and I had even one reason to abandon him, I was planning to detain him or shoot him, but I have to save such an honest person. 600. I’m going to release him and send him to one of the shelters. The military exists to protect the people, after all.”

The brown girl breathed a heavy sigh as she explained that.

…At first glance, she seemed to be a normal and sensible person (if you ignored certain unusual proclivities), but she was the Martini in charge of New York’s defense as well as the Pilot Elite. That meant she was the culprit who had fired the electromagnetically-launched reactor cannon on an Information Alliance maintenance fleet. There was also the Ragnarok Script. Active self-denial could be steering her full speed away from the safe choice. Making a hasty decision would be dangerous.

During the fight against Piranirie, it was revealed that Capulet could not “see” New York because its residents hated the surveillance cameras and email spying. The AI itself was pure, but if the Martini Series meant to check on it had gone insane, there was a fear that Capulet would lose its accuracy.

Wraith rationally observed the girl and hid her rational mindset with an indifferent smile.

“Is there some kind of problem with postponing a decision on this mere evacuee?”

“It looks like he’s going to die of an ulcer or helicobacter pylori before I got around to it. But if you don’t know him, I guess we’ll have to rely on the family member Mr. Royce keeps talking about. 657.”

“His daughter, huh? Is she in Manhattan?”

“100. Yes, fortunately for his stress levels. And this might surprise you. Okay? To use an Island Nation idiom, it’s like a kite giving birth to a hawk.”

“?”

“She’s the Pilot Elite of the Second Generation Gatling 033. 710.”

“…The Juliet’s?”

Wraith’s voice dropped in tone.

Melly nodded and narrowed her eyes with her butt inside the large ring.

“The one that shared Capulet’s development history. They were working on an AI network from a different angle than our Martini Series. This man is an indisputably good person and he’s connected to a VIP. I have no excuse to continue holding him in protective custody. 890. Even if this was an unfortunate accident, it will cause a lot of trouble.”