Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume1 Chapter 1 (section)

===Part 5===

As expected, they received a lecture.

The two idiots named Quenser and Heivia were dragged to the barracks for the distinguished commissioned officers. Just like everything else, those barracks were inside the large vehicles making up the base. Three vehicles were bolted together alongside each other, creating a rectangular building about the size of a four-story building. Of course, the vehicles could be separated at any time in order to fit on a narrow path.

Quenser and Heivia were within the topmost fourth floor area of the officer barracks.

(Damn Japan-obsessed bourgeois.)

It was not simply due to the splendid interior decoration of the room that the two of them had that same thought in unison. It had a lot more to do with the fact that they were being forced to sit in the Japanese seiza style on the hard floor.

Meanwhile, their superior officer, Froleytia, was not sitting on the hard floor. The inner half of the room was raised up higher than the rest and had tatami mats laid out on it. She was sitting in front of a short-legged desk in the middle of the tatami mats. She was seated upon a zabuton cushion so soft a cat would likely never get up again once it lay down on it.

She was a beautiful woman with long silver hair.

Her hair may have been slightly dyed because the silver was tinged slightly blue.

She was tall, she was slender, and she had large breasts that greatly pushed out her uniform. The legs wrapped in black stockings that stretched down from the tight skirt of a female officer were not simply slender. They were overflowing with a streamlined beauty that somehow drew the eye. Her palely colored lips held a pipe. It was not the short, thick type of pipe loved by European detectives. Instead, it was a long, narrow Japanese kiseru that was just under 30 cm long.

Quenser did not know if it was from the type of tobacco she was smoking or if it was a scent mixed in with her hair, but he could  faintly smell sweet aroma.

“…You know why you were called here, correct?”

Her words were colder than the snowy plains outside the window when they stabbed into Quenser and Heivia’s ears.

They of course knew perfectly well why they had been called there.

They had left their snow shoveling duties to search for food outside the maintenance base zone. Since Heivia had also been firing his military rifle all over the place, it would have been odd if she had not been mad at them. It was on a level where they could easily be thrown in the detention barracks or possibly even court martialed.

“(…What are we going to do, Heivia!? This is why I told you to stop!! This was all about the rations, but I’d rather eat nothing but snow for the next three days than this!!)”

“(…Shut up, dammit!! God damn, is she really only 18? I know normal soldiers aren’t needed on the battlefield in this day and age, but I bet she could take on an Object with nothing but a clenched fist!)”

“Quenser, Heivia!”

Just by having their names called, the two straightened up in shock. Froleytia was not even looking in their direction. She was playing with a long, narrow hairpin about 20 cm long that was modeled after a Japanese kanzashi while running a pen-like object across a board on top of her desk.

The board was known as a tablet.

Quenser had thought the devices were normally used to draw using a computer, but…

“Does this interest you, Quenser?”

“Y-yes!!”

“It may not be on the same level as you two who spend all your time searching for food, but I am quite busy. It may seem like nothing compared to you desperately burying the meat and fish you caught in the snow so it would keep, but I have to remotely command an operation on a small island in the Pacific while remaining here in this Alaskan base zone.”

“U-umm…”

Quenser moved only his eyes to look at the wall to the side. The entire wall was a giant LCD monitor and it was displaying a large map of the ocean and some islands. V-like red checkmarks continued appearing in relation to how Froleytia manipulated the tablet.

“Yes, it’s actually quite simple. I make marks on this board and the giant Object on standby there fires a long distance bombardment that blows away the bases of the guerrillas. It really is simple, isn’t it? Please tell me you think so,” Froleytia said nonchalantly as she continued adding more checkmarks. “Tablets really are nice. For one thing, it seems it can read the intensity of my guts from how hard I press down it as I write. I get the feeling that the long distance operation today is going especially smoothly.”

She must have actually been quite angry as she gave her commands because a creaking noise was coming from the plastic pen-shaped tool she held.

When they imagined the bits of flesh flying through the air somewhere in the world each time she made a checkmark, Quenser and Heivia started trembling.

“As I was saying, I am quite busy commanding multiple base zones and units at once, but then some idiots decided to give me even more to deal with. …By the way, can you imagine what is going on within my heart right now?”

“Yes, ma’am!! I would very much rather not envision it though! I can tell that you are quite pissed, Froleytia!!”

“Good. I am glad I have such excellent subordinates. I do, don’t I? Nod if you agree,” Froleytia said, finally looking in their direction with a sadistic smile.

After she had finished giving her orders to the units in the Pacific and had checked that the operation was complete, her expression suddenly changed to a carefree one.

“So what did you manage to get? I’ve had just about enough of those giant edible erasers they call rations.”