Evolve (27)
"Should I just play these one by one?"
"I picked up everything I could see, but depending on the condition, some devices might be broken. Check them first."
Roxy handed me the black boxes. Not only were there top-tier black boxes, which were bait products for VVIPs, but also general-grade black boxes mixed in.
Because they were so small, usually it would take a lot of time to find them. But Roxy just picked them up as if she was collecting coins from a fountain. Roxy always showed her skills in unexpected places.
"It would be better to check these in a safer location rather than here. At least somewhere more closed off than this place."
Kanna had just spotted somewhere that looked like a supply warehouse and led us there. Meanwhile, Celestia was attempting to break the lock on the black boxes.
Even with Myosotis's authority, it was not easy to unlock these records. The reason so many Titan bases recognized her authority as the highest was because, before its downfall, Myosotis had been deeply involved with Titan.
Ships belonging to planets not so affected didn't just roll over and show their bellies at Myosotis's authentication codes. There was a definite difference in authority compared to Titan.
Still, her authority was not meaningless. Myosotis, herself, was like a certificate, ranking above clumsy authorizations.
As a result, Celestia managed to break the lock by the time we reached the storage bay.
"Hyun-woo, I did it. The recording devices are badly damaged, so this is all we can play."
Celestia told us that about half of the black boxes had lost their functionality as devices. She pulled out a cable from her bracelet and connected it to the black box. Now, it was time to play the records.
"I'll play it now."
"We'll keep watch around. Once you're done, please summarize it for us."
"Okay."
Celestia handed me the communication line. I plugged it into my bracelet. Since the black boxes didn't have speakers, this was the only way to hear the audio as well as see the video—for now, at least.
My bracelet, synchronized with the suit, started processing the data. A holographic video materialized in front of me.
「- Playing Record -
"Ahhhhh!"
"Get down! Take cover!"
Screams mixed with the sound of fierce explosions filled my ears. This was the first scene captured by a black box that had been inactive until the external impact jolted it awake.
Scarlet flames soared skyward, as if swallowing the sky. All around, bodies so horrifically mutilated that words failed me were strewn everywhere.
Security robots, unable to properly distinguish friend from foe, were suppressing anyone they saw. The Baelum Spaceport was truly a living hell.
KWAANG—
A hull, still locked onto its launchpad, ramped up its output, attempting—no, trying to escape—into space. The ship's barely-assembled energy field was just barely holding back the pureblood supremacist group's terror attack, trying desperately to secure its escape.
Having withstood the attack and managed to take off, the ship cast a deep shadow on the ground below. Those who screamed for their lives as they watched the hull; their faces were filled with despair.
Other launchpads were wrecked, and some ships had exploded. It seemed this ship was the spaceport's last escape vessel. People reached out toward the departing ship, begging it not to leave.
Maybe at least one would escape, I thought for a moment.
KWAANG—!
Suddenly, the ship exploded. Torn apart by a missile that tore through its energy shield.
Burning debris rained down. Among the crimson trails, more missiles struck like lightning.
People gave up on escaping altogether, even with ghouls rampaging through the crowd. The shuttle, recording the black box footage, shook violently. A chain of explosions among ships moored at the dock sent shockwaves that rocked the shuttle.
The world tilted—or rather, the shuttle finally lost its balance and toppled. The massive launchpad also tipped over sideways.
Human, monster, robot—it didn't matter. All were crushed under the debris. Most died, and the persistent mutants screamed as they clawed their way out.
Just then, an announcement from the control tower echoed throughout the spaceport grounds.
「As of this moment, SSTC transfers all operational authority to the Earth Government and abandons Baelum Spaceport. Remaining forces, initiate reactor protection immediately to activate security protocol. Repeating: all remaining forces are to abandon spaceport defense and prioritize reactor protection.」
Members of what appeared to be the pureblood supremacist group could be seen attacking the control tower. Following the control tower's orders, security robots ceased indiscriminate suppression and regrouped, but they were easily overwhelmed and destroyed by the supremacists.
Explosions kept ringing out from inside the control tower, as if the personnel within were resisting desperately. Angry shouts mingled with the sounds of destruction and ruin. But that didn't last long.
Eventually, the control tower fell, and there were no remaining defenders in Baelum Spaceport. The broadcast sounded again, triggered by the control AI registering that all vital signs were gone.
「Confirmed: Security protocol activation failed. As a final security measure, residual reactor energy will be rerouted to the Sky Whale power supply and ECM chaff dispersal system.」
The runway, which was only nominally in use, split open, and rows of black rectangular boxes began to rise. As sparkling white particles burst forth, I realized the black boxes were chaff dispensers.
Fog formed, accompanied by an eerie wailing. At that moment, the black box exposed to the mist lost all function. Static filled the screen, which eventually went completely black.
- End of Record - 」
"......"
"......"
Celestia and I silently looked at each other. Rewatching the brutal chaos of the first day made me feel incredibly complicated.
Unable to speak rashly, we wordlessly agreed to watch the rest of the black box recordings. We finished going through all the remaining footage.
Though the starting points differed, all recordings were forcibly terminated by the ECM chaff. There were two new things I learned from reviewing all the footage.
The Sky Whale and the Earth Government.
The Sky Whale appeared to be some kind of weapon. I couldn't get a good look, but through the fog, sleek robots with spear-like weapons rampaged through the battlefield.
'It didn't fit the word whale at all.'
They were fighting the pureblood supremacists and the ghouls. I thought they must have wiped out all hostile lifeforms in the spaceport. The numbers were against them, but for some reason, that seemed likely.
"... Earth Government."
Celestia repeated the keyword. I was thinking the same thing. I felt on the verge of realizing something, and wanted to pursue that thought.
But since others were curious about what we'd seen, we decided to address that first. Celestia and I summarized the footage. Their shock matched ours.
"So, the sound we heard must have been the cry of this Sky Whale."
"Do you know anything about it?"
"I'm sorry, I don't."
She answered almost immediately. I was surprised because Kanna was usually as cautious as Eric, taking time to answer—but for the first time, she replied instantly.
"I have never heard of it. At the very least, it's not part of our weapon systems."
"In the footage, they say as a final security measure, they diverted energy to the Sky Whale. Since the security protocol failed, and the reactor is only made on Earth, maybe it was a test craft sent from Earth?"
Nadia's logic made sense. We needed to connect the dots with other keywords, not just latch onto one. That's how deduction works.
"A test craft... It's possible, but there are a lot of questionable parts. Why would such a craft be in the SSTC sector? How did they reach the decision to trigger the security protocol the instant the attack happened?"
We were the ones who activated the security protocol. After it was triggered at the robot production facility, the place has likely continued churning out robots even now. Right now, newly-made security robots and those infected and turned enemy are probably fighting each other even as we speak.
It was a valuable source to replenish our lacking strength, but the whole area had been taken over by the pureblood supremacists, so it was too dangerous to approach. The robot army was a huge force—but the enemy terror group was even bigger.
'If there isn't much noise, maybe they've already been wiped out.'
Ideally, the robots should have been coordinated to annihilate the threats on Titan, but most bases were captured before the security protocol could be activated, so phase 1 never reached its proper power.
Celestia continued.
"Isn't it strange? When you activate the security protocol, the signal spreads throughout Titan. Even though it failed at the spaceport, if they had succeeded, we wouldn't be standing here—because the security protocol isn't designed to save survivors, but to keep dangers from escaping. In practice, triggering it is equivalent to abandoning all of Titan."
Celestia said she couldn't understand that decision. Even though most launch pads were destroyed, there were still ways to escape Titan, as those units aren't essential for breaking atmosphere. They'd abandoned every possible means of escape.
And she concluded that, for someone to try to activate the security protocol, there must have been a high-ranking official present. That made sense, as the protocol itself was highly classified.
Kanna, who belonged to military base Keter, had even said she'd only heard of it from Edward, whom she called "captain."
Civilians like us didn't know it existed at all.
Baelum Spaceport is an important facility. If asked whether a senior official was always present, the answer would be no; it was officially a civilian spaceport.
"There was probably an Earth Government official at Baelum Spaceport. It's extremely rare for operational authority to be transferred between regions with different jurisdictions."
Once the pureblood supremacist group began their attack, the Earth Government official at Baelum Spaceport tried to activate the security protocol. That meant they were certain the situation wouldn't be easily suppressed.
'Maybe...'
I reached the conclusion that the Earth Government had expected the supremacist group might attempt something like this all along.
If that's true, why didn't they stop it? If they knew, it could have been prevented. If the group had been dismantled in advance, none of this would've happened.
But the Earth Government remained silent for a hundred years, up to this calamity.
'... Maybe only some of them knew, not all?'
It was all speculation and, in the end, just suspicion. Still, I couldn't see it as purely negative; leaked records had shown there were plenty of traitors inside the organization.
'It doesn't make sense that they completely gave up. Otherwise, they wouldn't have sent a support fleet.'
If they had truly abandoned not just Titan Colony, but all of Saturn's system, there'd be no need to weaken their forces further. There could be confusion in the middle, but that was unlikely.
At the very least, when the support fleet departed, real-time communication via the warp gate would still have been possible.
'Did they have another motive?'
That thought struck me for a moment. Even if they assembled the fleet for support, maybe their real intentions were different.
My mind began to spin out of control, so I shook my head. This wasn't something I needed to settle right now. There was another issue first.
"Hm... We should talk about that later. Right now, we need to figure out the Sky Whale—what kind of weapon it is, what role it was assigned, and how hostile it is toward us."
"Agreed. Now that we generally understand what happened, let's discuss the rest on the way to the control tower. We probably don't have much time."
Eric brought up the outside situation. I didn't think the supremacist group was ignorant of the events at Baelum Spaceport. They might have noticed our entry into the fog zone and could even now be attacking Albatross and Griffin, waiting outside.
Agreeing with him, we resumed moving immediately.
"The Sky Whale is likely an unmanned autonomous weapon that is immune to chaff. Judging by the silhouette shown in the black box footage, there's no space for a human pilot. The only possible exception is the core, but even that part seemed to deploy itself, which means it's probably run by an internal program."
"Are you sure that's the Sky Whale?"
"I think so. Usually, 'whale' implies being huge, but the robot in the black box footage is smaller than Nadia's power loader."
"Then, that means the Sky Whale is what created the wall of fog. We can't see it now, but it's probably floating above us. If the fog wall hadn't appeared, I'd doubt it, but since it has, we have to assume it exists."
Roxy shrugged her shoulders. All of us automatically looked upward. Of course, all we could see was thick fog. A natural sense of caution set in. Even if we didn't know how, the fact was, the fog was blocking us.
"I've never seen that kind of robot before, but I know its weapon. It's similar to the polar impactor Hyun-woo used, but instead of a pile driver, it delivers a shock with a laser."
Kanna assumed the sleek unmanned weapon used a laser lance. I used the polar impactor as a weapon, but it was actually heavy mining equipment for blasting tunnels.
It's unnecessarily heavy, and without power-assist, its recoil could fracture your bones. Each shot packs a punch, and the reason only I used it so far is obvious.
In contrast, the laser lance was strictly military. I couldn't confirm it up close, but even from a glimpse, I could sense its power.
'It skewered a ghoul like a kebab.'
Charge, thrust, then use the booster pack to toss the target to the ground like garbage. Even with Kanna and the soldiers' pulse rifles, killing a ghoul took a lot of ammo—while the laser lance just tore them apart.
"If those robots killed all the mutants, then maybe they aren't likely to be hostile to us? They're unmanned, but robots can have their control authority hijacked, after all."
The reason unmanned autonomy hadn't been widely adopted was simple. If someone hacked and seized control, the machines immediately became enemies. As technology evolved, so did hacking skills.
Licorice didn't become Titan's prime broker for nothing. Behind that was her formidable hacking prowess. Even if that was a power granted by Lobelia, boosting her skill further was Licorice's own effort.
"Friend, maybe it's time to use that thing you've been saving?"
"Hmm..."
I remembered the nanorobots stored in my belt compartment. Carrot had given them to me for just such situations, but I didn't feel that confident they'd work here.
"If you find anything, report immediately. I've got a bad feeling—those robots could all be infected, for all we know."
"Ah. You have a point."
Roxy scratched his head. Everyone knew what'd happened at the robot factory. The infected power loaders weren't robots anymore, just mutants. Their circuits were too damaged to restore.
Before long, the shattered silhouette of the control tower, its upper section smashed by falling ship debris, came into view. Conversation ceased immediately.
There was also an arm sticking out from the debris, and dried-up bits of mutant organic tissue pressed flat against the walls, evidence of their presence.
Those traces led toward the control tower. At the end of that trail, we found another layer of opaque fog. To confirm things, we'd have to go inside.
When we entered, we found a robot that had butchered countless mutants, standing as if to guard the entrance. Its frame was so battered it was clearly beyond repair.
"Wait here."
I approached. Letters were engraved on the robot's chassis.
R. E. M. O. R. A. (Reactive Emergency Management and Operational Risk Assistant)
Remora. That was the name of the robot.
***
- Hull contamination: 37%. Multiple instances of circuit infection detected. Area quarantined.
- Intruder detected at Baelum Spaceport. Currently monitoring. Low hostility risk. Maintaining alert level.
- Internal intrusion detected. Additional infection and warp response.
- .......
- Threat level increasing.
- Priority command interference confirmed. Intruder eviction failed. Main system errors rising.
- Protect... the reactor... bzzzt...