Toaru Majutsu no Index:RailgunSS1 Chapter7

Chapter 7

The sky was blue.

Seeming to ignore the swirling emotions of all the people, the weather was completely clear. The light rising above people’s heads early that morning was so clear and bright that it made one forget that it was September.

Along the border between America and Mexico near the shore of the Pacific Ocean was the front line base of the organization named Return of the Winged One which had its main base in Central America.

In modern terms, it was something like an aircraft carrier. They had bought an old large tanker and loaded it with lots of Mixcoatls. As a disguise, a pile of iron ore lay on top of the flat metal sheet that was easily over 200 meters long, but anyone within Return of the Winged One knew that their ultimate weapon lay beneath that ore.

“Xiuhcoatl, hm?”

Xochitl stood on one end of that large metal sheet. With the sun shining on her brown skin, she looked up at the pile of iron ore that was many times taller than she was.

Next to her stood another girl.

She was Tochtli, Xochitl’s colleague.

“Apparently, the preparations are finally complete, so it can truly be activated. Now we can blow that damn research facility to smithereens. Really, this would have been so much easier if we could have done this from the beginning.”

“Yes, it’s too bad Liberal Arts City stole the spiritual item needed to act as a key. …Well, at least it’s unlikely they were able to analyze how it worked.”

As Xochitl spoke bluntly, she stared up somewhere in the sky.

Tochtli smiled while looking at her.

“Are you worried?”

“About what?”

“That girl.”

“…”

“With this thing, we can’t aim precisely. Liberal Arts City will just be turned to wreckage on the sea.”

“So?” Xochitl spat out as if she were shaking off her hesitation. “I gave her the hints she needed to make the right decision.”

A clunk sounded as the heavy metal sheet started to move.

Multiple alarms started ringing.

“They have begun to move due to the spiritual item! They’re moving, so get out of the way!!”

All of the Return of the Winged One members working on the metal sheet moved away from the pile of ore. As they watched, the black pile collapsed. With a horribly rough noise, majestic faces peered from within.

The giant weapons were over 100 meters long.

They were Return of the Winged One’s trump card.

They were Xiuhcoatl.

Like a large serpent writhing about atop the pile of ore, the four trump cards were raised up diagonally by remote control and peered down at the ocean’s surface. As she watched them, Xochitl frowned.

Flave and Over were working on Liberal Arts City’s #3 short runway.

“…So how many usable ones are left?”

“Numbers 3, 5, 7, and 8. ..It seems that electrical princess really does want to make a deal. She left only the runways that could truly be used.”

“Hey, but didn’t she blow up the hangars with something like lightning?”

“She only did that to the maintenance buildings. The buildings with actual fighters in them weren’t even scratched. You can tell she was being considerate. …It makes me wonder if she’s really an enemy.”

“Oh, do you like strong girls?”

“I hate all kids.”

The two pilots continued their offhand conversation as their fighters were towed out of the hangar. The Laveze Squadron fighters were based off of F-35s, but their additional equipment made their VTOL functionality almost entirely unusable. They used a short runway of about 700 meters to take off.

Flave spoke while looking at the uniquely-shaped stealth fighter.

“…Do you know what that princess wanted?”

“She wants all the unrelated tourists and workers to be allowed to leave on the Salmon Red lifeboats. It’s a pretty broad request. Apparently, she even wants us to board them if possible.”

“Does she really think that’s possible? Those Mixcoatls can exceed Mach 2. It’s obvious what would happen if we were just floating in the ocean in those slow ships.”

“Yes, protecting those large lifeboats in this situation may indeed be difficult.” Over toyed with the dog tags around his neck. “But it’s also a good chance to test my pride.”

“You do like strong girls, don’t you?”

Suddenly, static came from the radio placed on a nearby folding chair.

The operator’s voice reached their ears.

“Mixcoatls have been detected 20 kilometers east of the city!!”

“…Time for work.”

“And they’ve appeared in a position that cuts us off from the American mainland.”

With small smiles on their faces, Flave and Over reached over to their flight helmets.

A great gap in firepower had been created by the damage they had taken the other day. With the armaments they had on hand, they were clearly at the disadvantage. Even so, they ran over to the fighters filled with bombs and missiles that were lined up on one portion of the runway.

“The world police, huh?”

“I’m already getting used to the term, but it isn’t a bad one.”

“Everyone, please hurry.”

An announcement in English flowed through Liberal Arts City.

The woman’s voice was coming from the countless large and small televisions scattered throughout the city.

“A major fault in the structure of Liberal Arts City’s foundation has been discovered. Due to continually receiving large waves with an average of over 7 meters for a long period of time, the manmade beaches are in danger of being washed away into the ocean all at once. Depending on the specific situation, the entire manmade island could be destroyed as a result.”

There was no video.

It may have been because only the bare minimum of a transmission could be maintained, but the screen was black. Using only the speakers, the polite announcement continued.

“A few hours ago, a tropical cyclone appeared at a point 40 kilometers southwest of Liberal Arts City. There is a danger of it becoming a hurricane.”

Those in their hotel rooms, those playing on the beaches, and those shopping in the malls heard the announcement in various ways from the large exhibition screens on the walls of buildings to the small monitors of their cell phones.

“There is a possibility that this hurricane would damage Liberal Arts City’s foundation, but there is no guarantee that would capsize the island even then. However, the lifeboats will be leaving in two hours. Anyone who chooses to leave for the mainland should hurry as quickly as they can. As for the various locations of the Salmon Red lifeboats…”

After reading through the entire script, the blonde-haired, huge-breasted genius girl Beverly Seethrough turned off the microphone.

“Was that good?”

“Yes, thank you. We know we should not have gotten you involved in this, but Saten-san and I cannot speak English…”

Uiharu bowed in thanks.

They were in a management office for the officials on one of the beaches. Normally, the facility would be used for lifeguard-like duties of ensuring the safety of the swimmers, but none of the officials were there. It seemed most of the personnel had been sent out for the battle.

Uiharu had used the computer there to hack into the local cable broadcast in order to make that pirate broadcast over the city’s televisions.

The other girl there, Saten Ruiko, looked out the office’s window.

“But I hope everyone heads to the lifeboats after hearing that…”

“Yes. No matter how many times we send that out, it will be meaningless if they do not believe it,” agreed Uiharu in a worried voice.

However, Beverly puffed her chest up proudly.

“You don’t need to worry about that.”

“?”

“Miss unfashionable flower print one piece, you couldn’t tell because you don’t know English, but I did not read off the script verbatim. I rearranged it as I saw fit and ad-libbed some of it.”

“Y-you did?”

Uiharu looked puzzled because she was not quite sure what Beverly meant.

“Yes,” Beverly nodded. “It’s important to remember that I’m a film director. I’m an expert in the techniques needed to make a work that draws in viewers, secures them, and remains in their hearts. In other words,” she paused for a second, “there is no one out there whose heart I did not grasp with the words I came up with.”

A tremendous roar made the windows shake.

Uiharu and Saten’s eyes widened in shock as they saw all the men, women, adults, and children that had been on the beach running in the same direction. Their faces were anything but calm. In fact, they seemed quite panicked as they ran as quickly as they could.

“The trick is not to force them. If you leave the final decision up to them, it robs them of the ability to just optimistically assume someone will do something about it. Once you create an implied divide between the group that will be saved and the group that will not, they will want to be in the winning group. This method is especially effective in America.”

The officials who had been on the beach yelled something.

The officials had not publicly announced the existence of the Salmon Red lifeboat docked there. They would not be willing to let all those tourists in, so they would likely try to stop them. However, those efforts were pointless. When that many people were charging in a single direction, there was no way of stopping them.

Saten’s mouth flapped open and closed.

“Wah wah wah wah wah!! This has gotten out of hand!!”

“Okay, one more push. …Kyaaahhh!! The asphalt is cracking!!”

“Beverly-san, that’s too much!! With the provocation from that scream, the officials are being swallowed up!!”

Uiharu was worried that they might use riot control guns, but they were at the disadvantage against the Mixcoatls and Mikoto had already gone on her rampage. Mikoto had suggested the announcement strategy because she had doubted they would waste their precious fighting force on something like that.

They might deal with an intruder or two, but intruders numbered in the tens of thousands were a different story altogether.

The Salmon Red lifeboats were in classified areas, but those areas had little to do with the research Liberal Arts City was doing on psychic powers development using a different system from Academy City. If they compromised when it came to the lifeboats, they would not need to fight the crowds of people, so they were unlikely to put up a thorough resistance.

At any rate, it seemed Beverly’s skills as a film director had succeeded in grasping the hearts of the tourists across Liberal Arts City. In that case, Uiharu and the others had no reason to stay there.

“Okay, Saten-san. You too, Beverly-san. We need to head for the nearest lifeboat.”

Saten voiced her agreement, but no one heard it.

The tremendous roar of a fighter engine drowned out her voice.

Their eardrums shook. Saten covered her ears with her hands and crouched on the ground while Beverly looked out the window with tears in her eyes. Uiharu looked outside, too. Fighters were continuously cutting across the blue sky as they flew at low altitude after taking off from the runways.

Uiharu spoke to Beverly as she lent a hand to Saten who was still crouching down on the ground.

“Hurry to the lifeboat!! We have no idea when the battle will reach the city!!”

“Y’know, I now know that isn’t a show, but I still haven’t been told who is attacking and from where.”

Beverly seemed to want something in return for her help, but they did not have time to explain everything there. In fact, it was doubtful if the concept of psychic powers development using a different system from Academy City could be explained easily to someone from outside Academy City.

At any rate, they had to think about ensuring their safety first, so Uiharu pulled on Saten’s arm and left the management office along with Beverly.

Finally, Saten said something.

“I wonder if Xochitl is coming…”