"After that display of insanity, you still want to insist—"
"Just a coincidence."
Sighing, Kaname drooped onto a nearby bench. Sousuke took a seat next to her and pulled out his sports newspaper, which he had retrieved somehow before leaping from the moving train.
"And it's just a coincidence that you're going to read that paper right here?"
"Correct."
"Unbelievable." Kaname rested her elbow on her knee and her head on her hand, staring at Sousuke all the while.
Oddly enough, his behavior didn't strike her as particularly creepy. True, since he'd transferred in, he had stared at her, walked into her locker room, and followed her pretty much everywhere she went every single day. Even so, she didn't really suspect him of being a stalker.
Something was different about him.
Sousuke didn't seem to harbor any indecent feelings or have a discernibly impure motive for following her around. He looked too dignified to be a deviant.
Like an athlete before a match, he radiated determination and
So, why the hell was he following her?
"Hey, Sagara."
"Yes?"
"If I promise I won't get mad, will you at least tell me what's going on?"
"There is nothing going on, aside from a string of coincidences," he answered in his typical, business-like manner.
"Right, right," she conceded. "Well, seeing as you're here by coincidence, may I ask you something?"
Sure.
"You lived overseas for a long time, right? Were you always this weird at all your other schools?"
For a moment, Sousuke considered the question. "Yes, I suppose. Those were peaceful and uneventful days."
"Were you sad to leave your friends behind?"
"No. I still keep in touch with them via telephone and written correspondence. So, it would be inaccurate to say I've left them behind."
Kaname rolled her eyes.
"It isn't difficult."
"Is there a girl?"
"I know many girls," Sousuke did not understand where this was going at all.
"No, a
"I have no friend like that. One of my colleagues—my 'friend,' if you will— always says, 'There isn't a yak in Tibet that would be your girlfriend.'"
Kaname laughed. "Your friend is funny."
"I don't even know what that means."
"He's just saying you're really weird, Sagara."
"Weird?"
"Extremely," snickered Kaname. "But that's not necessarily bad. You just need to find a nice person who finds it endearing."
"I'll keep that in mind. You know, you seem like a nice person," he remarked.
"Stop it. Don't take it so seriously. I'm not talking about me," she protested.
"Okay. Never mind, then."
"You really are weird," joked Kaname.
For a moment during their conversation, she had felt a faint warmth, similar to how she might have felt if she'd found a stray dog whose only desire was to follow her everywhere she went. Temporarily, her loneliness was buried beneath the pleasantness.
A train rolled into the station and interrupted Kaname's thought process.
Just enough moonlight pierced the water's surface to keep the submarine cloaked in shadow.
From an outside perspective, the Tuatha de Danaan looked kind of like a shark, except it was several hundred times as large. In fact, the assault submarine was as big as a skyscraper turned on its side.
The giant submarine moved through the water quietly—very quietly.
Near the rear of the sub, one of the missile tubes opened and a missile emerged.
Kicking up a healthy, foamy spray, the Tomahawk missile erupted into the air and spread its cruising wings. Shortly thereafter, it reached a steady altitude and rocketed on toward the northern horizon.
"Launch sequence complete. Closing MVLS hatch," announced the officer in charge of the Missile Vertical Launching System.
"Excellent," declared Tessa, glancing at her command screen's safety indicators. "Now, let's dive to three-hundred thirty feet and change course to the south."
"No problem, Captain," responded Commander Mardukas, a tall, thin man, whose black-rimmed glasses and pallid, bony features made him look more like a scientist than a soldier.
"Let's go, then," urged Tessa. "Flood the main ballast tank and set the submersion angle to ten degrees. Increase speed to ten knots."
Tessa, a submariner with more than ten years of experience, gave the orders without timidity, even though she was still relatively new to the Tuatha de Danaan, inarguably the most high-tech submarine in the world.
Tessa knew that launching a cruise missile potentially could attract a lot of attention, so it would be best to vacate the area as soon as possible. They could use Mithril's spy satellite Sting to see whether they hit the target.
"Aye aye, ma'am," said the navigation officer. He echoed her orders as he performed the tasks.
