novelraw Chapter 24
Chapter 24
Chapter 24
“Just kidding. Why are you so stiff, haha.”
“Huh?”
For a moment, she smacked her lips in confusion, then widened her eyes at Hughes’s joking remark that followed and laughed along.
“Ah, ahaha…….”
Of course, it was not a laugh that came from the heart.
She felt it instinctively.
That single line, passed off outwardly as a joke, carried his true intentions within it.
Meanwhile, Hughes very calmly and naturally changed the subject.
“Then I guess I’m first place. But are you going to keep me parked in the hangar?”
“Ah, I’m sorry. I’ll guide you to the quarters right away!”
It was not entirely wrong either, so Second Lieutenant Lee Hana stepped forward.
But just at that moment.
“Damn it! With my seniority, why am I going through this kind of hell?”
“Instructor, everyone can hear you. Please, that mouth…….”
“Oh? Is this insubordination?”
As they left the hangar and reached the corridor of the platform, the conversation coming from the far end of the hallway made them stop in their tracks.
“What’s going on?”
Second Lieutenant Lee Hana, who had been guiding them, tilted her head and asked, but Hughes instead looked at Philia and whispered quietly.
“You know, Philia.”
“Yes. Please speak, Instructor.”
“Did some terrorist attack happen recently at the Western Special Service Academy? Did it get raided so all the instructors except that guy died?”
“I will look into it.”
He probably thought he was whispering, but it was not actually that quiet of a voice.
Because of that, one of the two men who had been bickering as they approached them—wearing a black military uniform and with especially prominent freckles—twisted his face and turned his head.
“What are you going to look into? Hughes. And your lackey. Want me to tie you both together and throw you into hyperspace?”
“……Hah, if only my rank were higher.”
“You little shit!”
Meanwhile, John, a military policeman from the Western Special Service Academy who had been following him, shook his head and made a tired gesture to the military policemen behind him, but the other two merely avoided eye contact and said nothing.
“Haah. Right, cleaning up shit is always my job.”
In the end, John let out a sigh and stepped forward to try to settle the situation.
Was it fortunate?
At least it was not the absolute worst.
He had only seen him a few times, but he had heard that Instructor Hughes from the Eastern Special Service Academy was relatively flexible.
“I’m sorry, sir. Our Instructor Miller got a bit excited after playing too roughly in hyperspace, sir.”
However, there was one fact he did not know.
“You seem quite agitated. To speak so rudely to a fellow instructor of equal rank, not even a subordinate. If you’re all right with it, I’d like to contact the medical unit and make a counseling appointment for you.”
“……Huh?”
Even putting Hughes aside, the fact was that Philia, who had come with him, was not in her right mind either.
Looking at her, who had very politely said, ‘Why don’t you get psychiatric counseling,’ John blinked for a moment, then shook his head and took a step back.
“What? You insolent lackey!”
“Hahahahaha! Philia, not bad at all?”
“You flatter me. And Instructor Miller, if you continue hostile actions beyond this point, our military police will also have no choice but to proceed with lawful procedures.”
“What kind of provocation is that! You’re the ones who started it!”
In the end, when even John, the last line of defense, gave up, the corridor instantly turned into a complete mess.
“Uh……. Th-that. Uh?”
Naturally, Second Lieutenant Lee Hana, who had come to guide Hughes, could not hide her bewilderment at the sudden situation, and after rolling her eyes for a while, she noticed yet another oddity.
‘Why is there no guide next to Instructor Miller?’
She did not know the name well, but she was sure she had heard that the higher-ups had assigned officers to welcome the instructors and guide them to their quarters.
Yet for some reason, there was no officer assigned to guide the Eastern Special Service Academy group led by Miller and John.
“Ah, that, sir?”
“Yes?”
At that moment, John subtly approached Second Lieutenant Lee Hana, who had been deep in thought, and whispered.
“You were wondering why there’s no guiding officer, right, sir.”
“Ah, yes…….”
“It’s simple, sir. That gentleman got annoyed and kicked a container on one side of the hangar, and it collapsed and pinned him, sir.”
“Wh-what?!”
She absentmindedly thought, what kind of nonsense is this……, but when she looked at Miller rampaging about, she found herself nodding unconsciously.
“Was that officer badly hurt?”
“I heard his ribs were broken, but it’s not a serious injury, sir. What can you do. We already told him we’d compensate him from our side, sir.”
“Ah…….”
At that moment, was it just her imagination that John’s eyes looked inexplicably moist?
It seemed accidents caused by superhumans were on a different scale altogether.
But that moment of amazement was brief.
Soon regaining her senses, Second Lieutenant Lee Hana stamped her feet anxiously at the increasingly heated argument and asked John.
“Th-then if you get hurt again while fighting……?”
“Ah, that could happen, sir. How much compensation should we set if an instructor gets injured?”
“That’s not the problem here!”
However, there was no reply, and John merely rolled his eyes, listing numbers with a half-resigned expression.
In the end, just as Second Lieutenant Lee Hana was about to step in physically because she could not stand it any longer.
“Instructor! There are other instructors over there?”
From the opposite end of the corridor where Hughes and Miller were standing, another group began walking toward them.
“What is that unnecessarily bright voice?”
Miller muttered while grappling with the military police on Philia’s side, and Hughes also turned his head toward the approaching group with a face full of interest.
“Instructor? Can’t you hear me~?”
“……Hah, please be quiet.”
However, when Hughes saw the man standing at the head of the group slowly approaching from the far end of the corridor, his expression twisted beyond measure.
Miller, too, seemed to know something; upon seeing Hughes’s expression, he shut his mouth with a deflated look.
“…….”
How long did that strange silence last?
At last, they reached the spot where the instructors were standing and came to a halt.
Hughes spoke with a genial smile, as if his face had never been twisted at all.
“Well then, I never expected Central to send you, Jin Crow.”
If one ignored the expression he had shown just moments ago, it was a line that even felt friendly.
Because of that, the others’ gazes shifted to Jin Crow.
Especially Second Lieutenant Lee Hana, who stared at him with sparkling eyes.
‘The instructor who came out of the Central Special Service Academy that I’d only heard about by word of mouth. What kind of atmosphere is that…….’
Instructor Hughes and Instructor Miller.
Both of them also did not have bad looks or physiques.
No, rather, they were outstanding.
However, Jin Crow, putting aside his outstanding appearance, had an atmosphere that subtly pressured people.
Gulp-.
To the point that one would unconsciously swallow dry saliva.
“……Yeah.”
And at that moment, Jin Crow, who had swept his gaze over them once, finally opened his mouth and replied to them.
“How long are you planning to block the way?”
At the completely unexpected response, the military police doubted their ears for a moment, but the red-haired woman standing behind Jin Crow stepped forward and waved her hand toward them.
“Move aside, yap-yap.”
For an instant, the military police looked at her irritably, but as soon as they noticed the major’s insignia on her shoulder, they had no choice but to step aside without a word.
“I’ve cleared the way, Instructor.”
“Let’s go, Second Lieutenant Antonio.”
“Yes, Instructor.”
“Hey~. Are you ignoring me?”
Jin Crow moved away without caring what she chattered about behind him, and the atmosphere among those who remained began to turn quite strangely.
Meanwhile, Second Lieutenant Lee Hana rolled her eyes, then asked John standing beside her.
“Wh-what was that?”
“……I’d only heard rumors about him, but he’s even more terrifying than I thought.”
Unlike her, who could not even grasp what was going on, John seemed to roughly know who the man who had just passed by was.
“That kills the mood. Let’s go, John.”
“Understood, sir.”
Of course, before he could explain that, Instructor Miller shouted, so there was no chance to hear it.
After they left as well, all that remained in the corridor were Hughes and the others from the Eastern Special Service Academy, and Second Lieutenant Lee Hana, who had been dispatched to guide them.
“…….”
“H, haha.”
Looking at Captain Philia’s stiffened expression and Hughes laughing hollowly, she thought.
‘……So what exactly is going on here?’
For no reason, her head felt complicated.
The reason the Central Special Service Academy, the Western Special Service Academy, and the Eastern Special Service Academy all arrived at similar times was simple.
All of them were attacked by the Red Hand immediately after entering hyperspace, and as a result, their ships were damaged and they received assistance from the 17th Fleet.
It was not that strange.
Protecting a ship without damage against terrorists who had even resolved themselves to suicide was not as easy as one might think.
Kugugugugung-.
However, there was exactly one exception.
A group of people disembarked from an armored cruiser that had docked at Hangar No. 56, and a lieutenant who had been waiting in advance in the hangar hurriedly raised a salute.
“Loyalty!”
“Instructor, this way.”
However, not a single one of those who got off the cruiser paid the lieutenant any attention.
It was only natural.
Because all of their attention was focused on a very small girl in a black military uniform.
“……Haaam.”
It was as if a small doll had been propped up.
An appearance that was, at most, that of a lower-grade elementary school student, making even the small-sized uniform look big on her.
Because of that, it was no wonder the lieutenant rolled her eyes with a bewildered look.
‘Such a small child…….’
Of course, she had heard about her.
Moreover, she had been roughly briefed on what had happened when they were attacked in hyperspace.
Even so, the cognitive dissonance with her outward appearance was not something that could be resolved immediately just by mental preparation.
However, that lieutenant’s hesitation did not last very long.
“Haaam.”
“Lieutenant, is there perhaps some problem?”
As she rubbed her sleepy eyes, the man standing beside her asked the lieutenant.
A man in a white military uniform with glasses.
He looked strict at a glance, but his tone and behavior were polite. At his question, the lieutenant quickly pulled herself together and replied.
“I will guide you to your quarters. Please follow me.”
She immediately started walking.
Then the man in the white uniform pushed up his slightly slipped glasses and spoke to the instructor rubbing her sleepy eyes.
“I will escort you, Instructor Yudis.”
“Mmng, Dido.”
The two military policemen who had been following stayed behind in the hangar, while the lieutenant who came out alone for guidance was followed by the two of them.
Thus, right after they left the hangar.
The military policemen who had remained silently in front of the armored cruiser reentered the ship and murmured into the watch-linked communicator.
“This is Second Lieutenant Hansello of the Northern Special Service Academy military police. Requesting support.”
At that moment, Hansello, the military policeman, raised his head at the thick smell of blood that stung his nose and unconsciously shuddered.
‘……So they really are an executioner.’
What his gaze finally reached were over a hundred red uniforms, their heads severed and impaled on unknown skewers, displayed in the hangar.