86 - Volume 10 - Chapter 3.5

5

Each ward and internment camp in the Eighty-Sixth Sector was separated by antipersonnel and anti-tank minefields. Needless to say, the Eighty-Six generally weren’t allowed to move outside the wards they were appointed to, to say nothing of entering the eighty-five administrative Sectors. The only means of transportation between them were military transports that crossed the hundred kilometers from the eighty-five Sectors. The Legion had aerial superiority over the contested zones thanks to the Eintagsfliege and the Stachelschwein, and so the Republic’s unsightly metallic birds could only fly in their own limited airspace.

The transport plane’s four jet engines were currently turned off, and the hatch for its hold was hanging open. Shin was guided onto the plane by the Republic officer in charge of the flight.

He hardly had any personal belongings to take with him. He’d kept the assault rifle he carried for self-defense and the pistol he carried for suicide purposes, as well as the aluminum grave markers, which had only piled up since his first squadron, hidden in his Juggernaut. That way, they wouldn’t be confiscated.

On paper, the Processors were only Juggernaut parts, and so they and their units were treated as a set during transports. Usually, the planes carried multiple Juggernauts, but this time, the transport’s hold was excessively empty.

As he got to the ramp, Touka and the rest of the maintenance crew came to see him off. He bowed his head without looking them in the eye. Whether the crew treated him cordially like Touka did or scorned him as a god of death like others did, he would bid them farewell just the same once he changed wards and would likely never see them again.

He was used to the fact that he’d say good-bye and likely never find out if they went on to live or die. Just like he was used to being carried to his next battlefield in an unusually spacious cargo area.

Regardless of if people scorned him or were kind to him, nothing ever really changed. He’d be all alone in the end just the same.

He pursed his lips tightly. The memories of the last few days he spent here surfaced in his mind, but he silenced them. Scavengers were autonomous machines attached to each base, and just like the maintenance crew, they were considered as the property of the base. They couldn’t move outside their assigned wards.

So it couldn’t come along.

As Shin sat in the cargo hold, a Republic officer confirmed the Juggernaut was fixed in place. Neither of them spared the other a look. As weak as its armor was, the Juggernaut weighed over ten tonnes. Letting an amateur Processor handle its coupling could lead to it being poorly attached. If it came loose, it could disturb the plane’s center of gravity during takeoff. As such, the Eighty-Six weren’t trusted to handle that.

Of course, if the Eighty-Six were to do it intentionally, they’d be going down with the plane, but they were fated to die on the battlefield either way. Some were satisfied just taking some Republic soldiers down with them, so a few likely considered doing that. Meaning even the Republic soldiers, who hardly ever did their job, had to be diligent when it came to this.

The officer then raised his head and knit his brows, jerking his chin toward the open hatch behind them.

“—Hey. You’re not thinking of taking that thing along, are you?”

“…?”

Turning around, Shin saw a Scavenger standing there, its massive body blocking off the sunlight. It was an old model with soot-covered plating, but its legs alone were new. The round lens of its optical sensor flickered as if blinking.

It was that Scavenger.

“Pi.”

“…Why?”

As mentioned, Scavengers were considered the property of their base and couldn’t move to other bases. So they couldn’t follow any squadrons or Processors who were being reorganized.

As Shin gazed at it, confused, the Scavenger climbed onto the ramp and folded its four legs in one of the hold’s corners, as if making a statement that it wouldn’t move. It ignored the officer, who’d ordered it to stop and now angrily turned on Shin.

“What orders did you give it…? Don’t do anything suspicious, you damn Eighty-Six. Tell it to get off.”

But Shin was at as much of a loss as the officer was. He…or rather, the Eighty-Six as a whole didn’t have any authority over the Scavengers to begin with. And so Shin kept his gaze moving between the angry officer and the seated Scavenger.

Touka peered into the plane and said with a mocking smile, “Oh, but I thought these Scavengers were the product of your great Republic’s cutting-edge technology?”

The officer glared at her venomously as Touka raised her chin and laughed. Her blue eyes were narrowed elegantly, and her naturally red lips were curled into a smirk.

A sweet, arrogant smirk.

“I mean, we subhuman pigs could operate your superior machines. These drones were made by the most advanced technology developed by the Republic’s people, members of the superior species. Surely, you could change any orders we filthy Eighty-Six gave it. It’d be easy enough for you…right?”

Go ahead, she goaded him. Do it yourself.

“Ugh…” The officer fell silent, his face going red with humiliation and anger.

He couldn’t do it. He didn’t have that kind of authority. And maybe he even lacked the knowledge and techniques to handle a Scavenger that was acting irregularly.

But admitting he was powerless and helpless in front of Eighty-Six? In front of subhuman pigs? His pride wouldn’t allow it.

“…Fine. Do whatever you want.”

Shin looked up at the officer in surprise, who didn’t look back at him. The man bitterly approached the Scavenger and began fixing it in place, too. As the Scavenger flickered its optical sensor at the same tempo a dog might wag its tail happily with, Touka regarded Shin with a soft smile and waved good-bye.

The officer returned to the transport plane’s cockpit, leaving the Juggernaut, the child soldier who served as its Processor unit, and the Scavenger behind in the hold. A military aircraft’s hold could ferry people, but no Republic soldier wanted to share a room with an Eighty-Six.

“There’s been a change in the cargo weight. Recalculate it,” he told the copilot bitterly without sparing him a glance.

“Roger that.”

Just thinking back to that argument in the hold pissed him off.

“Those pigs, I swear to God. Fucking animals making my job harder…”

This plane could easily carry an extra ten tonnes without a problem, but that wasn’t to say it didn’t add extra work.

“This is why I can’t stand Eighty-Six. They just keep complicating our job for no reason. Those imbeciles don’t know how hard we humans work. Goddamn pigs. Livestock.”

As the officer muttered in irritation, the copilot threw a sidelong glance at him.

“You don’t have to say it over and over; we all know they’re pigs in human form… Listening to you is getting annoying,” he said.

“I know,” the officer replied ruefully, contrary to his words.

Yes, he knew, but if he didn’t say this, he wouldn’t calm down. The top brass of the military. His colleagues. The irresponsible Handlers. The ignorant citizens. His homeland had decided that the Eighty-Six were pigs in human form. Lowly, stupid, and savage. Subhumans that were an evolutionary cul-de-sac. He had to think of them that way.

God dammit, he mouthed under his breath.

He couldn’t keep up this job if he didn’t think that way. His thoughts wandered back to the child soldier. A boy in his early teens, far too young to be a soldier. And the expression he made the moment he gave him permission to keep the Scavenger on board.

He’s just a weapon’s component. Why couldn’t he just act the part and keep his emotions dead?

It was the expression of a small child, the kind you could see anywhere.

The expression of a small boy who’d been told he could keep the puppy he’d found and raised in secret.