“Excellent, now comes our chance for retaliation.”
Koizumi carried a happy smile and commented on the current situation on the screen,
“Please have a look here, Enemies
“Enemy sighted!”
Haruhi’s excited yell was proof of Koizumi’s accurate commentary.
“Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!”
Haruhi continued to yell like a maniac, her forehead nearly hitting the screen.
The
“Oh no you don’t.”
I moved my finger and clicked, releasing all the lasers I had at
“Damn it Kyon! That’s my prey! Back off!”
Attacked from both sides, the fleet size of
Looking for her next prey, Haruhi now moved her mobile weapon discharging fleet to the side of
Now in a desperate situation,
“Hey! It’s disappearing! Wha…How is this possible!?”
Haruhi shouted, I knew the moment had finally come. Under heavy bombardment from both ends,
That was its teleportation function. Though strictly speaking, it should be called something else, since there’s no such thing as teleportation in this day and age.
However, they had fallen straight into Nagato’s elaborate trap.
“Huh? Something else’s coming out this time.”
When Haruhi asked that question, I had already stopped what I was doing.
“Wah?”
Asahina made her cute scream, blinking her eyes and staring at her screen.
“Kyon-kun, that thing I’m controlling, I don’t know where it went……”
This is because Nagato had rewritten the program as: “Once the Computer Group utilizes the teleport option, then with the exception of the
This is called “An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” Only that our cheating was much more subtle.
Right now, I guess the chaos in the room next door should be even greater than when their search mode was forcefully turned on. Because appearing on my screen was the enemy’s commanding fleet
“I guess this is what they call karma.”
The Computer Group president’s
And so,
“I don’t know what on earth’s going on, but……”
Haruhi now revealed a very exhilarated look and raised her hand,
“All forces fire at will! Cleanse the enemy’s commander in the fires of hell!”
Under her command, Haruhi, Koizumi, Nagato and I all emptied our fleets’ weaponry at the same time. Even Asahina, who shuddered at the cold voice of Nagato going, “Fire,” frantically made her first ever attack of the day on the surrounded
“I’m so sorry……” Asahina said.
The Computer Study Group president was completely taken by surprise. He probably had wanted to hide in a safe spot to enjoy the show, only to first have everyone’s search mode forcefully turned on, and then get suddenly transported right in the middle of the enemy fleet to die.
“Sigh……”
Sigh. I quickly withheld the words I was about to say. Koizumi gave me a cheeky smile. I’m going to pretend I didn’t see that.
I turned again to my screen, the president’s
Nagato never stopped keying the firing commands into her keyboard. The vessel count of
A light marching tune began to play, and the flashing words on our screens signaled that the battle had finally ended.
“YOU WIN!”
1711 hours.
Ten minutes after the battle had concluded, someone came knocking on our club room door.
Rushing in looking abashed were the guys from the Computer Study Group. The president said in a dispirited tone,
“We’ve lost, we’ve been completely beaten. We now offer our surrender. I’m terribly, terribly sorry, please forgive us. We’ve totally underestimated you, and we’ve made a mistake, a very terrible mistake.”
Standing in front of the apologetic president, whose head had bowed so low looking like a sundial, was Haruhi carrying a beaming smile. Under the watchful gaze of the Lord Haruhi, the Computer Group members quickly went pale and fell silent.
“You’ve even discovered our little tricks…… it’s true that we employed dishonest methods, but we never thought…… that the source code could be rewritten right in the midst of the battle…… it was unbelievable, but it really happened……”
The president looked wearily around the room as if entering another virtual world. Haruhi raised one of her brows and said,
“What the hell you muttering about? I have no time to hear excuses from sore losers. You still remember our agreement?”
She joyfully waved her finger, giving an indication that read Don’t think you can get away with this. Completely indulged in the joys of victory, Haruhi never felt that the battle was won too unnaturally. For this girl, a victory is a victory.
“I bet you have nothing to say right now. The desktop here is now mine, as well as those four notebook computers over there. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten ever saying that, if you did, then I’ll have to sentence you to a horrible death! Right, I think I’ll give you a smaller sentence, go run ten laps around the school field naked and shout ‘I’m being chased by little green men!’”
Haruhi’s unreasonable demands now made the members of the Computer Study Group droop their heads even lower. I don’t know if I should pity them, or whether it’s jus
t the atmosphere being too tense……
“Ah…… yes, I’ll go brew some tea for everyone.”
The ever understanding Asahina now stood up and walked towards the kettle, while Koizumi smiled sardonically and helped take out some paper cups. Nagato continued to sit in her steel chair, looking emotionlessly at the dejected and broken guys now standing in a row in front of Haruhi.
As Haruhi enthusiastically made her speech, one of the members, the president that is, walked slowly towards me.
“Hey,” he whispered to me, “Who was that person? With such elite hacking skills, they could go anywhere in the world…… actually, I think I’ve guessed who it is……”
Nagato lifted her head to look at me, while the president turned to look at Nagato.
Oh well. Even an outsider can tell that Nagato is the brightest of us all.
“I need to talk to you.”
The president said to Nagato,
“Whenever you’re free, would you mind coming over to the Computer Study Group to hang out…… I mean, help out occasionally?”
He began his persuasion. A while ago, he was still looking like a dead fish being left to dry in the sun, and now he was suddenly back to life again. This usually happens to people who have surrendered completely, when they quickly throw all dignity out of the window.
Nagato now looked as though she’d had a motor installed inside of her. First she looked at the president, then turned to look at me… giving me a questioning gaze.
Nagato now looked as though she’d had a motor installed inside of her. First she looked at the president, then turned to look at me. She didn’t say anything, and just stared at me with those dark crow-like pupils, giving me a questioning gaze.
“……”
What’s she doing? Transmitting telepathic waves? Or does she want me to decide for her? You’re putting me in a difficult position with that expression of yours (though there’s no expression at all). He was asking you, surely you could decide on your own? It ought to be like that.
As learned from Nagato, I tried to reply with a speechless gaze……
“Hey! What do you think you’re doing?”
Haruhi now came and interfered,
“Our Yuki’s not for you to borrow so easily! You’ll have to ask me first!”
Haruhi sure has a talent for eavesdropping, she had heard everything that was being said. Looking at her with her hands on her hips, I even wanted to commend her.
“Now listen up! This silent girl is an irreplaceable member of the SOS Brigade. I laid claim to her first, so she’s not going anywhere!”
In the beginning, you actually laid claim to the Literature Club room, not Nagato.
“What difference does it make? I wanted both the club room and Yuki from the beginning. Everything in this club room, even a stale bottle of coke, is mine and is not for sale!”
Mine, all mine! Haruhi puffed up her sailor uniform and proclaimed her sovereignty over the room fearlessly.
“Umm, hold it,”
I gave it some consideration and finally said.
I may not look it, but I’m confident that I understand Nagato’s expressions better than anyone else. After all, I actually met Nagato three years ago. Though Nagato has been flawless in withholding all emotions, I’ve still felt that she isn’t entirely emotionless. I noticed it when she was stuck in the endless summer vacation, and I felt it as well during this showdown. Oh yeah, I’ve nearly forgotten, it was the same during our time in the public library as well.
Even Nagato would have things that she is fond of.
Come to think of it, during our
I would think Nagato gets tired of observing Suzumiya Haruhi all day. Even alien-created living humanoid interfaces need to take a break occasionally.
“Go ahead and do whatever you please.”
Today, I decided to take the president’s side.
“You like computers, right? Then, whenever you feel like it, go play with them as much you want. Even if it’s just helping them detect bugs in their own developed games, I’m sure they’ll be very grateful. And you probably have a better chance of getting in touch with advanced gaming tools if you go there.”
Nagato remained silent, but I noticed a slight shaky movement in her face. She seemed to be asking me whether it was actually fine or what she should do. Her dark candy-like eyes revealed the same sort of hesitation shown when not knowing which move to make in a chess game.
It felt like she considered this for a long time, when in fact it only took three blinks of her eyes to decide.
“……I see.”
Before I asked what she had decided, she mechanically nodded her head and looked at the president, and said without changing the tone of her voice,
“I can come occasionally.”
Of course, Haruhi was bound to complain.
“We were the ones who won, why do we have to lend our most important member to them? Nagato’s loan is expensive, I tell you! Yes, 1000 yen per minute!”
If it’s only 1000 yen per minute, then I’m willing to pay.
“Commander Suzumiya.”
Finished drinking his warm tea, Koizumi now approached Haruhi with a relaxed smile,
“Your Excellency, sometimes it’s important to show mercy to the vanquished. Besides occasionally showing off their might, having a generous spirit is also a pre-requisite to becoming a great leader.”
“Hmm? Really?”
Haruhi’s mouth now resembled a duck’s beak……
“All right then. If Yuki feels okay about it…… However! I’m not returning the notebook computers to you. Oh, and……”
Stopping halfway, Haruhi suddenly thought of something. Haruhi stared at the president and gave a gleeful smile. She sure has a lot of expressions.
“The vanquished have to listen to whatever the victor says. That’s the cruelty of war.”
She snatched the tea from the tray which Asahina had quietly brought over (I think it was called “Karigane”) and swallowed it in one gulp. She then said,
“From now on, you’re to swear absolute allegiance to me. I will treat you well, since I only merit people in terms of their ability. As long as you work hard, I’ll promote you into proper members of the brigade as well. Let’s say……ah yes, let’s say if we have to face off with the Student Council, you’ll have to stand by to receive my commands. Until then, you’re just preparatory members.”
At this rate, does she plan to assimilate the whole school into the SOS Brigade? But Haruhi was too joyful to pay any attention to my worries,
“Koizumi-kun, go prepare a treaty.”
“Understood, Your Excellency.”
Koizumi gave the cunning smile of a powerful regent pretending to obey the commands of the young emperor he had installed, and sat in front of his newly acquired notebook computer and began typing away.
A few days later, the scenery in the club room remained unchanged, save for the increase of a few unused notebook computers.
Dressed in her maid costume, Asahina wiped the room clean with a mop then went to the kettle to boil some hot water; Koizumi was playing board games on his own; and Nagato sat in her corner quietly reading her book. Before Haruhi talked, we all enjoyed this brief moment of peace.
In this normal scene in the SOS Brigade club room after school, sometimes, very rarely, t
he bookworm alien would be missing from the room. Whenever I noticed she’d gone missing, she would quietly return a few minutes later to read her book. Personally speaking, I feel Nagato is the true master of this room.
“……”
Reading a foreign detective novel in its original language, Nagato didn’t seem to have changed a lot on the outside. It was hard to say about the inside…… not even I would know that.
As usual, Nagato would spend most of the time here in this room. Occasionally like an unpredictable breeze, she would float over to the room next door, and that was enough.
“Kyon-kun, here’s your tea. This time I’m trying Chinese tea. Hee hee……how is it?”
I received my teacup from the gently smiling Asahina. After tasting the tea, I realized my tastebuds were being given a sensation that was similar to that of the other tea leaves that she had brewed. As long as it’s served by you, even wheatgrass juice will taste like wine to me.
While thinking of what words to use in my reply as Asahina awaited my response, I pondered; I don’t suppose I’ll get dragged into any strange events any more.
It was just before Christmas and the winter vacation that I found out how wrong I was.
When Suzumiya Haruhi disappeared, I realized I was terribly mistaken.
Prologue — Winter
My thoughts on Suzumiya Haruhi, needless to say, are like describing patterns of a patchwork carpet. However, should I attempt to describe this individual using words and phrases that I can understand, it would be the following warning:
Here is the person that can’t be allowed anywhere near the ICBM launch controls in the whole of Japan.
Normally, a high school girl has close to zero chance of owning such an item, but anytime when you pull this woman into the fray, even the next-to-impossible becomes impossible-to-avoid. Either that or the two would cancel out, leaving behind nonstop chaos that she is somehow immune to. To her the matter would just be an issue of two choices, choose one. That person might not be as evil as the timed-explosive that starts its countdown without being set, but she is more radioactive than a nuclear reactor meltdown. Experience dictates, however, that even if containment of the gremlin is impossible, as long as you set her on ‘vibration mode,’ no matter how big a leak she springs up, the leak can be mended.
Volume 5 - The Rampage of Suzumiya Haruhi Page 11