Tessa opened the internal cockpit. The displays inside were all dark, which meant it had already been powered on in advance.
Otherwise, if they had waited until after delivery to start it up, that delay might have gotten them surrounded.
After all, with a rocket that large flying in, there was no way the enemy would have failed to notice it.
[Voiceprint authentication beginning. State your name, rank, and identification code.]
"Colonel Teletha Testarossa. Identification code is..."
Tessa was not an Arm Slave combat pilot, but the way she spoke did make it sound like she at least understood the procedures pretty well.
Then...
"Wah!"
Kaname cried out, because the robot had nearly fallen over.
A few more steps later, and it stumbled again.
"S-Sorry, I'm not familiar with operating it."
The result was exactly what one might expect. Just like some people are born unable to drive, she had the knowledge, but once it came to actual operation, she simply could not manage it.
"I'll take over."
"Huh?"
Tessa froze for a second, then immediately got up.
As for how to operate an Arm Slave, Mr. Kain had asked her about the controls before, though he had never personally piloted one.
Still, with how capable he was, he should be better at it than she was.
Once Mr. Kain stripped off his power armor as well, it looked as though he had just climbed out of the water. He was soaked from head to toe.
After such an intense battle, producing that much sweat would...
No, that was not sweat.
What had drenched him was blood.
Especially when he coughed something up. It looked like it even contained bits of internal organs.
Thinking about it, that was only normal. Such a horrifying explosion, even with a sturdy blast shield blocking it, could never completely stop the shockwave. The force inside must have left him with severe internal injuries.
Even with miraculous medicine like Earth Elixir, the pain caused by the wounds would not simply disappear as if nothing had happened.
In the next instant, under Mr. Kain's control, the machine was already running, heading for a cliff along the coast.
Because the cockpit had originally been designed for a single pilot, with three people crammed inside, half of Tessa and Kaname's bodies were practically pressed against him, and the blood on him was still dripping down.
At such close range, Tessa found herself staring at his face from just inches away, and she could not help drifting into a brief daze.
Mr. Kain was a very interesting person. From the way he chatted on Hyperdimension Channel, he gave the impression of being a bright, upbeat guy, the sort with an outgoing personality. Someone sociable, someone who liked joking around and throwing out quips.
Over the past few days, whenever he had free time, he had spent plenty of it chatting away on Hyperdimension Channel.
But after meeting him in person, the impression he gave was the exact opposite. He seemed stern and unsmiling, almost like the executive officer. Not someone naturally good at socializing.
Suddenly, his gaze shifted toward her, and Tessa's face instantly went stiff. The flush on her cheeks deepened even more.
Thunk!
"Ugh."
The cry did not come from just her. Kaname let one out too. Tessa had no idea why, but Kaname suddenly looked guilty, as if she had been caught staring too, just like Tessa, and was now embarrassed about it.
An instant later, as they neared the coastal cliff, they saw the TDD-1 Tuatha de Danaan surfacing on the sea below. With one last burst of speed, the machine leaped out toward the deck.
Under normal circumstances, it should have skidded forward from inertia and overshot the landing zone, but an M9 on deck was already there to receive them, and even the floodlights were concentrated on this prototype unit.
"Huh?"
Tessa stared in shock, because the ARX-7 Arbalest, which should have slammed down under enormous inertia, suddenly moved in a way that defied physics. It seemed to lose its weight entirely and touched down lightly, almost floating.
That was...
"The Lambda Driver?"
Kaname murmured in stunned disbelief, recalling the bizarre transfer they had just experienced.
Mr. Kain had actually activated the system just like that?
Was it really that easy to use?
Still, they could finally relax completely. All they had to do now was get into the submarine and leave immediately, and everything would end perfectly.
Just as Tessa was finally about to let some of the tension drain from her body, an extremely ominous sound suddenly came through the communications channel.
It was a shrill, miserable alarm.
"It's a ballistic missile. Target is the TDD-1."
The urgent report transmitted through the comms made Tessa's face turn pale at once. Mithril's reconnaissance satellite had detected an anomaly.
It had been launched from the public sea not far from here, from the joint exercise zone between South H and North America, and it was one of the most advanced ballistic missiles available.
This was a high-arc trajectory. It had already passed out through the atmosphere, swung around in outer space, and was now coming back down.
And the impact zone was here.
Tessa knew without question that this was no coincidence. It was not some malfunctioning missile going off course.
And if there was only one missile...
Then there was an eighty percent chance the warhead inside was not a conventional one.
Based on the current calculation, it would hit in thirty-five seconds.
"Mr. Kain, if possible, please take the colonel and leave!"
That was the executive officer's plea over the comms.
At this point, the chances of intercepting the missile were extremely low.
The only ones who might survive were him and her.
Of course, that was only if Mr. Kain was willing to spend ten energy coins to take her out of this world.
But if she returned, would it not still be the exact same point in time?
That made it seem meaningless. Unless she could obtain some especially powerful weapon that might let her survive after coming back.
Yet Tessa did not think about any of that.
Setting aside whether Mr. Kain would even be willing to pay such a price, she herself was not the kind of person who could abandon more than two hundred lives just so she alone could live.
"Everyone be quiet. I'm not leaving!"
Tessa raised her voice to the highest volume she could manage, overpowering the chaos on the channel.
Many of the voices were urging her to run. Even though they did not know how she was supposed to escape, if she could escape, then she should.
Besides the voices telling her to flee, there were also curses, the sounds of people colliding with one another, and screams from those being struck.
Because the crisis that had appeared so suddenly was obviously aimed at Mithril.
The traitor was not from the Fellowship. He was from the North American side.
The man had successfully transmitted the information by taking advantage of the confusion during the earlier alert.
Under normal circumstances, inside the submarine, there was almost no room for that kind of operation.
And because of the nature of his duties, it was usually difficult for him to leave the vessel.
This time, however, rescue operations had required the mobilization of a great many people, giving him an opportunity. He had also managed to contact a member of the transport aircraft sent over from Mithril's Pacific base, and successfully passed along the key operational secrets, directly exposing the submarine's confidential data.
As for how they had discovered the mole so quickly once this crisis erupted?
The man exposed himself.
Because he had never imagined that the TDD-1 would simply be targeted for outright destruction.
He had assumed they would do everything they could to seize the world's most advanced submarine.
So once he realized he was going to die too, he broke down and gave himself away.
"Sorry."
The one who suddenly apologized was Kain.
Then, in front of a number of stunned onlookers, he abruptly made a tank appear out of thin air on the deck.
It was an STC-pattern tank. With armor that thick, it could withstand a nuclear blast from this era without any problem.
Before Kaname and Tessa could even react, he immediately shoved the two of them inside and sealed them in.
And the apology was not for what he had just done to them.
It was because his interference had caused the plot to spiral out of control, a tired and powerless apology from the bottom of his heart, because he really was sorry.
He returned to the cockpit of the machine equipped with the Lambda Driver system. Looking at the countdown on the display, he saw that there were now only fifteen seconds left before impact.
And he would do everything he could to make one final attempt to salvage the situation.
Now it all came down to the Lambda Driver.
(End of Chapter)
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