Editing HEAVY OBJECT:Volume20 Chapter 4 (section)

===Part 9===

“Mom! Dad!”

A 12-year-old girl with her hair worn in a single long braid waved at a couple in the city. She was waring a miniskirt below a baggy sweatshirt, which at first glance gave the awkward impression she wasn’t wearing anything but the sweatshirt.

Her name was Catherine Barbotage.

Her body had been thoroughly modified as a Legitimacy Kingdom Pilot Elite, but she had since left military duty. With no family to live with, she had given up her Blueangel last name and been adopted by the Barbotage family for a second life in Paris.

It was hard to imagine how those two parents had managed to raise a serial bomber like their son. A middle-aged man called over to the girl in a calm and gentle tone.

“Catherine, I know you’re excited, but slow down and look where you’re going.”

“Eh? But you’re too slow, dad.”

It was a day off for them.

On Saturday nights, the Barbotage family might get carried away and not get to bed until the following morning, but they always went to worship at a small neighborhood church on Sunday afternoon. Catherine had trusted in her own combat skills more than prayer when bullets were flying on the battlefield, so she mostly just saw it as a pleasant stroll through the neighborhood.

(Does this mean big brother went to church on Sundays? Hm, I find that hard to imagine.)

It wasn’t celebrated as much as in the Faith Organization, but it was still carnival season. There were more people out than on the usual Sunday. The supermarkets in the area were usually closed on the weekends, but today they had their shutters up and were selling sweets and snacks until late at night.

Catherine viewed the decorative advertisements that resembled something from an Island Nation festival.

(Chocolate, huh? I wonder if big brother will be visiting us for Valentines.)

An unpopular idol was shouting something on the LCD monitor installed on a building wall. That was probably an evening variety show. The on-site reporter, who didn’t have a regular seat back at the studio, was speaking excitedly.

“This is Monica, the battlefield idol reporter who can both sing and kill! Today, I’m doing an all-you-can-eat walking report on Champs-Élysées. Yes, this is one perk of the business that only comes once a year. That’s right, it’s Valentines, the time of year when girls are surrounded by sweets. Everywhere I look I see 5-star patissiers awaiting my arrival!!”

Paris was unnaturally peaceful this afternoon. Everyone was smiling on an informational program that didn’t provide a single scrap of information about the war raging outside.

To Catherine, it felt more like a doctor hiding the prognosis from a terminal patient. Her unique senses picked up the scent of death on the air.

But the rest of the Barbotage family got all their information from TV and the newspapers, so the mother crouched down and smiled at the girl. She doted on the girl because she had always wanted a daughter.

“Oh, look, Catherine. The store is open today. How about we grab something for dinner on the way back from church?”

“I like the ginger pork you make better. And I like it with pilaf more than bread.”

Just then, Catherine spotted something out of the corner of her eye. The gentle flow of pedestrians was interrupted by a quick-moving group that had stepped out of a black bulletproof car parked on the curb. A girl wore an old-fashioned dress straight out of a fairy tale and she was surrounded by several dangerous-looking maids who looked ready to kill at a moment’s notice. The maid with an eyepatch kept her voice low as she gave some instructions.

“Hurry!! Shelter 9 will be closed soon. Sealing the door is meaningless if you aren’t inside!!”

“Karen!! I will fight too. What good is the Vanderbilt family if we nobles will not stand up when the country and its people are at risk!?”

“Do not let the belligerent atmosphere affect you. Your role is not to pick up a gun and display such one-sided righteousness. Your power lies in your philanthropy and diplomacy to cross the boundaries between world powers and bring together the world’s pacifists. And if anything were to happen to you, the people would be incensed. We might serve the Winchell family, but we do not want that. If you wish to avoid plunging the people into an endless hell of blood and bullets, then please understand the role you are meant to play. Now, Shelter 9 is this way!!”

All in all, it took less than 30 seconds.

No one paid any heed to the group that crossed the large road and vanished down a narrow alley. The Legitimacy Kingdom was all about chivalry, so that antique dress and the maid uniforms were common enough sights here in Paris.

“…”

“Catherine?”

“Mom, you go on ahead. I’m going to feed the pigeons.”

She didn’t have time to listen to her adoptive mother telling her she wasn’t supposed to feed the animals in the park.

There was a soldier here.

The person was not wearing a camo uniform and she wasn’t carrying an assault rifle or shoulder-fired missile, but the sharp look in her eyes said it all.

She was an adult woman in her late 20s or early 30s.

But a closer inspection revealed her right eye was a detailed prosthetic. This was not an ordinary model; it was designed for military spies. It moved in sync with the left eye to help her blend in and the fake pupil even dilated and constricted. It probably used magnetism.

(Based on her gait and eye movements, she must be Faith Organization. But she isn’t an ordinary soldier. Maybe an intelligence agent and maybe a commando. No, I know the answer. She isn’t using a radio and has cut off all EM signals, so the countdown has already begun. Is she going to blow up crucial infrastructure, or just throw a case of gas into the crowd? Whatever it is, she’s here to do something in Paris. If this is her final preparations before the attack, then the attack should be in less than half an hour.)

Catherine Barbotage was hesitant to swipe a gun from a passerby.

Instead, she pulled out her handkerchief, neatly wrapped that around the grip of a thick Phillips screwdriver lying on the ground, and stabbed it twice into the side of the undercover soldier as she passed by.

Catherine had made the attack, but she was the one to grimace.

She hadn’t felt it pierce flesh.

“!?”

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They both made and blocked a few quick arm and leg attacks before backing away from each other. Catherine had grabbed the collar of the woman’s blouse to throw her, but the collar had instead torn away, revealing the glint of synthetic fibers below. She recognized that formfitting material.

It was green, the Faith Organization’s color.

That was a Pilot Elite’s special suit. 

“The same as me!?” said Catherine, switching to a backhand grip on the screwdriver.

She heard several footsteps and found she was surrounded by several people. She could see four, but she assumed there had to be more in total. If all of their bodies were artificially boosted to Elite standards, then every part of them would be customized. Increased muscular strength and oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood was only the starting point. Their blood vessels, muscles, and nerves would of course be strengthened, but knowing the Faith Organization, they would have been given special traits and talents like perfect pitch, spatial cognizance, or atmospheric pressure sensing. Some of those abilities were practically occult, like sensing the weather and predicting death.

Catherine still saw the lazy Sunday afternoon out of the corners of her eyes. A small child ran around with a balloon, an old woman was taking her dog for a walk, and the Barbotage couple were watching her in ignorant confusion from a short distance away.

They were all in range of a stray bullet, so Catherine could not back down. She re-judged her distance from the enemy with screwdriver in hand.

“So you too have abandoned your humanity.” The woman did not say anything out loud, but the movements of her lips passed a death sentence. “If you had noticed before your attack, you could have fled without looking back. That might have saved your life.”

In a populated area, an opponent like this could be more dangerous than a tank or attack helicopter.

Catherine Barbotage was the same, so she knew that all too well.

But these people differed from Catherine in one key way. They felt no qualms about using guns in a safe country.