The Floating Starlight Bridge

  At the unexpected proposal, Haruyuki and his friends fell into a dumbfounded silence. The first to break this quiet was Kuroyukihime.

  “I see. Interesting. There’s merit in trying. But…naturally, you aren’t offering your help free of charge?”

  “That is totally of coooooourse! The prize points for coming in first get cut up three ways! And you guys nick ’em all and it’ll totally giga suck—”

  “That’s rude, Ash.”

  On behalf of Ash Roller, who fell instantly silent at Raker’s voice, Pard cocked her head slightly to the side. “So?”

  “Of course we accept,” Kuroyukihime replied immediately, and the leopard-headed avatar responded with her usual “K” and smiled faintly.

  After Blood Leopard transformed into a beautiful four-limbed beast with the Shape Change command, the lightweight Sky Raker climbed onto her back, and then Haruyuki sat himself on the back of the American chopper that Ash Roller summoned.

  “Well then, I wish you godspeed. We will be cheering you on from here.”

  Takumu and Chiyuri nodded at Kuroyukihime’s words.

  “It’s up to you now, guys. Give this event a happy ending for all of us!”

  “You can do it, Crow, big sister Raker! And you, too, Leopard, and bike person!”

  After dropping his head momentarily, Ash Roller shouted with his usual enthusiasm, “Okay, here we goooooo! Grab on and hold! Me! Tight! Corvus, man! Aaaah, I’d rather be saying that to Master!” The roar of the engine partially drowned out this somewhat pathetic line. Ash Roller spun the rear wheel exaggeratedly before sending, almost shooting, the motorcycle sprinting up the vertical wall.

  Following them, making almost no noise, Pard started to run with Raker on her back. The large paws of the cat beast stuck firmly to the surface of the tower, looking for all the world like a cat running up the trunk of a tree.

  After they started to move, a loud sound abruptly and wholly unexpectedly poured down from above their collective heads. Cheering. The multicolored avatars of the last remaining floating spectator stand were raising their voices all at once.

  “All riiiiiight! Show us that Burst Linker spirit!”

  “You can do iiiiiit, Leopaaaaard!”

  “Crow! You totally kicked butt back there!”

  Some of the cheers were directed at Silver Crow, and Haruyuki unconsciously looked up. They had to have seen him summon the forbidden Enhanced Armament, the Armor of Catastrophe. And he had even thought, just once, of massacring the more than one hundred members of the Gallery with that power. But he heard no voices of reproach. Maybe it was just that they still hadn’t realized the truth of the matter. Either way, the cheers they flung down on them brought a warmth to Haruyuki’s heart.

  Apparently, the ascension of the spectator stands was synced to the lead shuttle; the Gallery did not chase after them. In the blink of an eye, the enormous stand and the figures of Kuroyukihime, Takumu, and Chiyuri waving below it grew distant, finally melting into the exterior panels of the gleaming silver elevator and disappearing.

  The throaty roar of the engine and the faint footfalls echoed through the space three thousand and some hundreds of kilometers above the Earth. Almost as if the massive destruction only moments earlier had never happened, the silver Hermes’ Cord stretched out endlessly, beautifully, and continued up toward the Milky Way, where the rivers of stars flowed.

  No one spoke, and there was no need to. The four headed for the peak of the tower with their own emotions and a single shared thought in their hearts. That’s what Haruyuki believed as he sat quietly, entrusting his body to the bike’s vibrations.

  Immediately before he had been discharged from this world, Rust Jigsaw had talked about a “revolution.” So that no doubt indicated that the next large-scale act of destruction would be carried out with the clear intent of his organization, the Acceleration Research Society. But no matter what kind of changes they brought about in the Accelerated World, there were definitely precious things in this world that would never change. Because here and now, the members of three enemy Legions were combining forces and aiming for a single goal.

  “As long as I keep this fact in mind, I’ll never give in to the temptation of the Armor again,” Haruyuki murmured, and no voice came back in response.

  How far did they race like this?

  Eventually, ahead of them, a row of tiny lights that were not stars popped up, creating a beautiful, shining blue ring that wrapped around Hermes’ Cord and disappeared into inky black space.

  “Guess that’s the finish line, the top station,” Ash Roller said, slackening his cruising speed. “Managed to run a fair way thanks to the weak gravity, but this is the end of the line for this cool dude. How ’bout you, Miss Leopard?”

  “Me, too.”

  The two nodded at each other lightly and looked back over their shoulders at their respective passengers.

  “It’s up to you now, Crow,” Ash Roller said awkwardly. “And, y’know, however the chips fell back there, you had extreme guts in the battle against that rust dude. Maybe things’re gonna get for-real serious later, but don’t go getting all bummed out, got it?”

  Haruyuki nodded deeply and somehow managed to squeeze out a reply. “Th-thank you.”

  “Yup. And you better not forget our share, Corvus man!”

  “Raker.” To their right, Blood Leopard offered a very brief farewell to Sky Raker. “One thing…Welcome back, ICBM.”

  Raker stroked her back gently and replied, equally briefly, “I’m home, Bloody Kitty.”

  Once their respective farewells were finished, Haruyuki deployed the wings on his back. Thanks to the Incarnate battle with Jigsaw, his special-attack gauge was nearly charged to the maximum. He flapped his fins lightly and soundlessly rose up from the passenger seat of the motorcycle. He reached out his hand and grabbed tightly on to the outstretched hand of Raker. At this, the lightweight avatar was pulled up from Leopard’s back and drawn close to Haruyuki.

  Here, finally, the special-attack gauges of the bike and the leopard appeared to be spent; they both began to slow down rapidly. Haruyuki turned to fly backward and see them off.

  “Okay, then! You make sure you get Master there, Crow!”

  “CU.”

  Tires and legs stopped and rested momentarily on the wall before gently peeling away. Pulled by the gravity of the Earth spreading out blue far below them, Ash Roller and Blood Leopard began to drop leisurely. If this had been the real world, there would have been absolutely no air this high up, but the Accelerated World was apparently set to inflict damage from friction with the atmosphere, and an orange light encased the two avatars. Their silhouettes receded, drawing out vivid tails like falling stars, until finally they released a powerful burst of light and vanished.

  “…Thank you.” Haruyuki bowed his head deeply toward the two avatars, who had returned to the real world and once again set course for the peak of Hermes’ Cord.

  There was still a fair ways to go before the top station, colored by its blue rings. It was right on the edge of how far they could reach by combining both of their flying abilities. However, Haruyuki felt that making it to the finish line was no longer the key part of this. Three teams had joined forces and done their utmost to reach a difficult goal. That was the most valuable part of this race.

  “Let’s get going. Master, maybe on my back,” he said to the sky-blue avatar whose hand he held, and Fuko smiled quietly.

  “If that’s how it is, then please hold me in front. We are finally alone, after all.”

  “Huh?…R-right.” Flustered, he nodded and brought both arms around the back with the boosters equipped and the thin legs amputated from the knee down. Raker held on as well, wrapping her arms around his neck.

  “O-okay, here we go!” he announced to hide his embarrassment and vibrated the wings on his back.

  To curb the depletion of his special-attack gauge, he stopped at the bare minimum–strength thrust. Furthermore, there wer
en’t any other opponents to fight. The two avatars began a gentle ascent, leaving a hazy trail of silver light.

  They flew through the silent world, watched over only by the countless stars. Perhaps it was just his imagination, but it seemed like the light from the sun shining above them, off to the left, was gentler than it had been before. Only their small shadow raced along the smoothly curving surface of Hermes’ Cord.

  For a while, neither of them said anything.

  However, eventually, Fuko, her forehead buried in the right side of Haruyuki’s chest, murmured, deep-red eye lenses half closed, “This sight…I’ve seen it for so long in my dreams…But at the same time, I’ve come to fear it somewhere in my heart…”

  The infinitely rarified atmosphere still managed to bring about a bit of a breeze, ruffling her bluish-silver hair. She gently brushed away her fringe with the fingers of her right hand and continued.

  “The other side of the sky was an impossible dream. And to make that dream come true, I sacrificed anything and everything. My fighting power…responsibility as the deputy head of Nega Nebulus…and Sacchi’s friendship. I threw everything away, committed an enormous crime, and still my hand did not reach the sky…When I understood this…perhaps I was just a little relieved. With that, I was freed from the deep delusion that had moved me. All that was left for me was to sit secreted away at the top of a tower, forgotten by everyone, and gaze out at the changes in the Accelerated World.”

  A faint smile spread across her lips, and she closed her eyes. Her expression was perfectly calm, but Haruyuki saw in the corner of her eye a very tiny particle of light, glittering like a diamond—a tear welling up.

  “My dream was too heavy for my shoulders. But even after I dropped it, unable to completely bear that weight, I could not entirely abandon it. This dream that I held in both hands like I was shielding the embers of a flame about to die out…When one day, a little crow appeared in my garden and took it over for me…You have no idea how happy I was…Now, here, I will say the thank you that I haven’t been able to all this time. Thank you, Crow—no, Haruyuki.”

  Fuko opened her eyes and lightly caressed Haruyuki’s cheek with an outstretched hand before abruptly declaring in a clipped tone, “You’ve gone to the trouble of holding me in your arms to carry me all this way, but…I don’t have the right to visit the real other side of the sky at the finish line of this race. We’ll switch places. I’ll carry you as far as I can fly. From there, please head to the finish line yourself. This is my duty after giving up on my dream, and your right as the one who has always sought the sky, with so much more strength and so much more seriously than I did…Now, Corvus. Let me down here.”

  “No.” At this instruction, Haruyuki shook his head in a gentle yet definite motion. “You’re wrong, Raker.”

  “What…?”

  “You haven’t given up on your dream. The sky you aimed for is so much higher, much, much higher than mine. I’ll prove it to you now. I…I came to this place now, to the top of Hermes’ Cord, just to tell you this.” Saying only that, Haruyuki suddenly flapped his wings with all his strength.

  The ten fins on each side were wrapped in a dazzling white light. The high-pitched ring of resonance echoed in their ears, and an intense propulsive power enveloped them. The stars on either side became long lines and flowed by. But…

  This full-power charge only lasted a few seconds.

  The sound of his wings vibrating rapidly faded, and the light also disappeared. It wasn’t that his gauge had been exhausted. Despite the fact that the fins were still fluttering fiercely, they were not generating any thrust. Finally, even their forward momentum vanished.

  “My wings can’t fly any farther than this,” Haruyuki said to the woman in his arms once they stopped ascending, grinning as he did. “The air’s too thin. My flying ability propels me forward through the vibration of those fins beating at the air. So this high up, I can wiggle them all I want, but I won’t move forward. This game really does get a little too hung up on the details, doesn’t it…”

  Fuko opened her eyes wide and listened without saying anything. Staring at her beautiful rose-red eyes, Haruyuki finally turned into sound the words he had kept warm in his heart a long, long time, all this time.

  “But…But your wings are Gale Thruster, a booster, a jet pack. In this world without air, even you…only you can fly. So why the booster…That’s because right from the start, you saw not the sky, but only something beyond that. Higher than the clouds, than the stratosphere, and higher still…You’ve been wanting the world of this star. You, this avatar…” Here, he closed his mouth for a moment, and after taking a deep breath beneath his helmet, Haruyuki told her in a shaky but clear voice, “You were born to fly in this world. Sky Raker, the one who looks out on the sky. You’ve always been a duel avatar meant to fight in space.”

  This sentence spread out in the rarified atmosphere, melted, and disappeared.

  Fuko opened her glittering red eyes even wider. But, saying nothing, she simply held tight to Haruyuki’s gaze with her own. Finally, she lightly shifted her head and looked down at her legs. Haruyuki moved his own gaze in the same direction.

  A massive blue planet sprawled there, as if supporting the steel pillar soaring up endlessly—Hermes’ Cord.

  The Earth. Illuminated by the sun from the right, it was colored with a beautiful gradation, moving from blue to indigo before sinking into black. Against this backdrop, snowy white clouds drew out complicated patterns, while the continents carved out complex edges around them.

  Fuko raised her right hand lightly and pointed at the border between the right half of the lazy arc of the planet and the inky black of space.

  Straining his eyes, Haruyuki saw a thin light blue veil there, wrapping up the Earth’s surface as if to protect it from the chill of space. Compared with the scale of the planet and space, this glittering was extremely modest.

  “…That ephemeral sky-blue line…” Fuko’s whisper caressed Haruyuki’s consciousness like thought itself. “That’s all of it, the sky that I’ve aimed for, dreamt of, occasionally hated…and then given up on…”

  This time, a large tear really did spill from her sunset eyes, falling to drift idly in empty space. Eventually, that drop of water was pulled down by the minuscule tug of gravity, to return to the blue oceans of the planet it came from.

  Fuko looked up at Haruyuki again, raised her left hand, wrapped both her arms around Silver Crow’s neck, and squeezed tightly, fiercely. Words played in his ear, engraving themselves into his mind.

  “Thank you, Corvus. It’s so wonderful that I could come here…that I could see this sight. I finally understand it now: The reason my legs remain gone…is not because of my attachment, but rather my fear. I was afraid that if I knew the size of the sky…my dream would end. But there’s no need for that to happen. Because…”

  Unconsciously, Haruyuki also gave voice to the words that came next.

  “This world is infinite.”

  Fuko laughed softly in his ear and abruptly planted her lips on the side of his helmet. Like this, she slid over to his mouth before pulling away slowly.

  “Huh! Ah! Um!” Forcefully enough to ruin the whole moment, Haruyuki shook his head frantically, and Raker’s smile changed into something playful.

  “It was through your helmet, so I’m sure Sacchi will forgive it.” Regaining her usual cool, she said firmly, “Really, thank you, Corvus. I’m…going now.”

  “Right!!” Nodding decisively, Haruyuki supported her body with both hands, letting it flow gently in space. Raker stretched out a finger to stroke his arm, touch his hand, and pull away. They nodded at each other wordlessly, and then the sky-blue avatar turned her face to the peak.

  The blue rings coloring the top station of Hermes’ Cord, now only a scant distance away, could be seen perfectly clearly now. Along with the artificial lights glittering faintly beyond it. There was no doubt that it was the station in geostationary orbit, floating of
f thirty-six thousand kilometers in the distance.

  Fuko brought her slim hands down to her sides and lit a tiny flame in the jet opening of the streamlined Enhanced Armament attached to her back, Gale Thruster. Due to the almost total lack of gravity here, even with this hint of thrust, her avatar began to slowly ascend. Without looking back, Sky Raker gradually picked up speed. Growing distant. And more distant.

  And then, Haruyuki was sure he saw it.

  Particles of blue light collecting, condensing, and drawing out a beautiful line at the ends of Raker’s legs, where they had been amputated. This surface, transparent like glass, gradually took on the same color as the main body of the avatar from the knees down. Modest calves, long and slender shins stretching out. Heels equipped with wedge lifts and pointed toes. All of this shone and sparkled in the sun.

  “…Ah, ah…” A quiet voice escaped from Haruyuki’s throat. At the same time, a hot liquid filled his eyes.

  In the center of his vision, blurred, too, with the light of the stars, Sky Raker, now returned to her original form finally, after three years—no, after many times that in the Accelerated World—pierced the inky dark and flew forward. As if she were dancing, as if she were swimming, she soared endlessly upward, graceful in her acceleration.

  Here, finally, the energy that had allowed Haruyuki to continue hovering against the pull of gravity was exhausted.

  Fighting against the virtual gravity that tried to pull his avatar gently downward, Haruyuki reached his right hand out as far as he could. Between his outstretched fingers, the light of the thrusters became a large blue star, drawing out the shape of a cross.

  11

  “The previous Chrome Disaster’s…‘wire’…?”

  The glass that was halfway to her mouth stopped moving abruptly, and Kuroyukihime repeated Haruyuki’s words, taken aback.

  “Yeah…That’s all I can think of anymore…” Haruyuki nodded, almost hanging his head, after looking in turn at the equally speechless Fuko, Takumu, and Chiyuri.