CHAPTER 10
Betrayers’ Choice
Special rule announcement and activation.
At the end of this message, one person will be designated from each surviving team.
The designation will be spelled out on the terminal of the chosen player.
The designation is not random but chosen for the purposes of game balance by the staff and sponsor observing the event.
Victory conditions will be altered for the chosen players.
The chosen players will leave their teams as betrayers. The betrayers will form a new team that will fight together from this point onward.
For a period of time, all weapons will be locked. Transportation will be provided to send the betrayers to the rest of their team, opening up travel to the U NKNOWN area.
Now go forth and kill. Your former comrades are now your enemies.
12:52 PM.
Every surviving player read the messages that traveled across their Satellite Scanners.
Those who were chosen to be betrayers received their notice.
SHINC’s Boss saw the message on her Satellite Scan terminal that said Congratulations. You are a betrayer. and gave her honest opinion on the news.
“…Goddammit!”
She showed the screen to her teammates.
“Aaagh! Not Boss!” wailed silver-haired Tanya, cradling her head with her arms.
“No way…” “This sucks…” “Aww…” “Hmm…”
Tohma, Anna, Sophie, and Rosa added groans of distaste.
Sophie the dwarf was especially angry. She was the second-in-command of the team, played by Kana Fujisawa, vice-captain of the gymnastics team.
“What a stupid rule! We should ignore it! Who thought of such a thing?!” she ranted. Her avatar’s face was twisted with fury, a sign of her genuine anger. As it turned out, it was the novelist, the sponsor of the event, who thought of such a thing. “I want to kill him!”
She was scary. But Boss was as implacable as a mountain.
“This is a game. And the rules are the rules,” she said coolly. “I don’t like it, of course. However, shortcuts might be one thing, but obvious cheating is not what I want to do. If I cheat at this rule, the entire audience will know, and they’ll talk about it forever.”
“…”
Sophie knew how honest and upright Boss was. She fell silent, and her expression softened.
“Well, hey! We’d be mad no matter who got chosen!”
“Yes, Tanya’s right. If anything, it’s a stroke of good fortune that I was chosen. Now I’ll be fighting against you all, but let’s just enjoy the experience!”
“Whoo-hoo! You’re the coolest, Boss!” chirped Tanya, who was desperately trying to lighten the mood.
“But,” interjected the golden-haired Anna quietly, “Boss really wanted to fight against Karen—I mean, Llenn…”
“That’s true, but I can still do that on the team of betrayers. Assuming she didn’t get chosen, too.”
“Well, I suppose you’re right…”
“Don’t whine about it! Hold your head high! I always wanted to fight against you guys! So try your best to beat me! I’m going to give you everything I’ve got!” Boss chided the other five. It sharpened their resolve.
Then the sound of buzzing insect wings filled the wasteland. It was coming from the sky—and getting louder—until her ride descended right into the midst of the six.
Naturally, the flying device showed up on the footage being shown in the pub.
“Whoa! A flying platform!” shrieked the mecha-loving members of the crowd.
It was a very odd-looking device, with a circular body about six feet across and several inches thick, four pipe legs for landing, and handholds around the center with room for one person to stand.
Its principle of flight was the same as a helicopter’s.
There were two gasoline engines inside the disc body, as well as two propellers that rotated in opposite directions. The engines powered the propellers, providing a powerful downward gust that lifted the body. By turning in opposite directions, the propellers counteracted the torque effect to keep it stabilized.
And that was what made it a flying platform. The format was originally developed and tested by the American military in the 1950s. They got it into a flyable state but could not deliver enough horsepower for it to be practical, so it quietly vanished into the annals of history.
But there was always a demand for a device that would allow an individual the act of easy flight, so with drone technology on the rise, some people said they might return to the concept soon.
The flying platform might not have worked out in real life, but thankfully, GGO was set in a virtual science-fiction world. The platform here flew like a dream, and the audience watched as the betrayer from each team stepped onto the devices and lifted up off the ground.
“What a ridiculous rule! And it’s me?!”
In the overgrown forest, MMTM’s leader’s camo-painted face broke as his expression widened so much that the whites of his eyes were extremely visible. He showed his teammates the indicator that he had been chosen.
“Yikes.” “…” “Shit.” “No way.” “Ahhh.”
Naturally, the five others in their bumpy, amorphous disguises reacted with surprise and disappointment.
After the whites of his eyes grew, the leader showed the white of his teeth, gnashing them so hard they seemed fit to crack. His shoulders trembled, not from cold, but from anger.
They’d put in all this work to win the event as a team, and now after coming this far, they were going to be split up to fight against one another. It was the most despicable rule one could imagine.
“Screw this!” he shouted, tossing his terminal aside and reaching for the pistol in the holster at his right side. Like his rifle, the M9-A1 was a Steyr. He pointed the 9 mm automatic pistol at his own temple.
“Whoa! Hang on!” shouted Summon, the biggest of the six, holding his arm back. He dropped his SCAR-L assault rifle in the process. The gun fell into the forest undergrowth.
“Don’t try to stop me! Let me die!” the man shouted, resisting.
“We are in the palace, Team Leader! We are in the palace!” Summon cried, using his size advantage to pry the pistol out of the suicidal man’s hand.
“That’s right, Leader! You don’t have to die! And what’s that ‘palace’ stuff about, Summon?” wondered Kenta. He was small, with short black hair, and used a G36K rifle. He turned toward the team leader, face covered in camo paint, and tried to console him by saying, “I get that you’re angry about the stupid rule, but if you give up, the battle’s already lost.”
“That’s right,” said Jake, the skinnier machine gunner with the HK21. “You’ve got to enjoy it to the end, even if the situation changes! Besides, they said all the weapon functions would be locked, so you can’t shoot yourself, anyway.”
“I always wanted to get into a gunfight with you!” added Lux, the man in sunglasses with the MSG90.
“Wouldn’t it be dope if we faced off against the team leader and still got the W?” said Bold, the ARX160 gunner with the black dreadlocks. They all had bright smiles and easy affectations.
“…”
The man who couldn’t kill himself had no choice but to be their enemy.
“All right… I won’t be a fool; I promise,” he said, prompting Summon to let go of his arm. He put the M9-A1 back in his holster. When he closed his eyes, the expression was very hard to read on his camo-painted face.
Nearby, a flying platform descended, nimbly avoiding branches and spraying the grass underfoot out in a spectacular display.
“…”
The team leader stepped on the odd contraption without a word, grenade-launcher STM-556 over his back, and the engine whined higher as it ascended again.
As it took him up carefully through the branches and leaves, his teammates shrank down smaller and smaller. Even as they blended into the green of the forest, he could clearly see their smiles.
“Whoo-hoo, a team of betrayers!” cheered Huey, leader of ZEMAL, as he looked at his Satellite Scanner. Arranged around him were his four teammates and their five armed shopping carts.
“Wait, so one of our team’s gonna be an enemy now? Dang, that sounds fun!” grinned Peter, the one with the tape over his nose.
“Yeah. It means we get the most beautiful gunfight you could imagine: machine gun versus machine gun!” added Max, the one with the fade.
“Whoo! I’m fired up! I’m burnin’!” roared Shinohara, the one with the M60E3.
“I just wanna fight! So who’s the traitor, huh? C’mon, raise your hand! Teacher won’t be mad,” said Huey.
“Oh…it’s me,” said Tomtom, the one in the bandana. “Look! Do you see these hallowed words?!” He proudly showed off his terminal’s screen to everyone.
“Damn, you lucky bastard!”
“I didn’t get it!”
“No fair!”
“I’m so jealous! Switch with me!” his teammates lamented. They were all envious.
“No way! I’m gonna get to kick ass!”
“Please, we can make it work! If we trade terminals, it should be fine, right? Gimme!”
“No, trade with me!”
“Hell no! I’m first!”
Tomtom pushed back against his teammates, who seemed likely to attempt ripping the device from his hands soon. Suddenly, there was the dull sound of approaching propellers.
“Oh! Is that the flying object?”
They glanced upward and caught sight of the flying platform descending toward them. It bore down and landed gently atop the street’s cracked concrete.
“Here we go. You guys ready to get your asses kicked?” Tomtom taunted. He used the cutter they brought with them from the hardware store to snip the wires holding his FN MAG inside the shopping cart.
Next, he lifted up the backpack stuffed with ammo from the cart, slung it over his shoulder, lifted the gunsling over his other shoulder, and hopped onto the flying platform.
“See ya! Let’s meet again on the battlefield!” he said as nonchalantly as if he were going to the corner store. As the machine rose up into the air, they smiled and waved back.
“I’m gonna pump you fulla lead!”
“Hang in there until we can get to you!”
“Be safe! Don’t die right away!”
“I’m tempted to shoot you down right now, but I’ll resist the urge!”
On top of a building…
“What? A team of betrayers? What is this…?”
A team of six, completely hidden behind body armor and helmets without an inch of skin showing, grumbled at their Satellite Scanners. This was Team T-S, of course.
They stood where a town had once been. With the rapid sea level rise, over half of the twenty-five-story building was now submerged. No other buildings were still above the water level now. The thick mist hid the distant terrain from view, so they were essentially marooned.
The six sci-fi soldiers sat around atop the faded tile roof, some cross-legged, others with legs splayed out.
“This sucks. A special rule that rips apart a team that’s been fighting side by side for all this time? That sucks.”
Each member had an ID number from 001 to 006 somewhere on his outfit, such as on the back of the helmet or on the shields they wore on their nondominant arms. The man who said that was 005.
“Oh, I’m the betrayer…,” murmured 002 sadly. The gun resting on his lap had the outline of a flattened fish. It was a Heckler & Koch XM8 assault rifle; the most typical-length model, known as the baseline carbine.
The X in the model name meant it was a prototype. There were talks to have the American military officially implement this gun into their armory, but that plan was eventually scrapped.
In GGO, it was a fairly popular gun, thanks to its distinctive silhouette and low-recoil precision. It used 5.56 mm ammo, with the same magazine as the G36 rifle.
This time around, he attached a suppressor to the muzzle of his XM8. That was a classic example of a pricey upgrade, but the members of T-S were the defending champions. Pitohui’s sponsor prize was quite extravagant, so they made quite a lot of cash selling off items.
This XM8, however, had yet to fire a single shot in SJ3.
“Oh, so it’s you,” said 001 lifelessly when he saw 002’s screen. The listless way he said it seemed to sum up the entire group’s attitude: “At this point, I don’t care who it is.”
Next, the man with number 004, who was a lefty with his shield on his right arm, suddenly sat up straight. “Hey! It said a flying object would be coming, right?”
“Huh? Yeah,” said 002, who was already on his feet in preparation to leave.
“Then couldn’t we all get on top of it and jump off along the way?”
“Uh…ohhh!” 002 exclaimed.
“That’s it!”
“We can do that!”
“Nice idea!” the other members chimed in.
“That’s right! There’s going to be a helicopter thing coming!” 002 said excitedly. His face was hidden behind his helmet, but it sounded like he was smiling. “So I can give you all a ride to dry land!”
“Whoo-hoo!” “Yes!” “We can still play!” “Bravo!” “All right!”
The group was delighted.
They celebrated like shipwrecked passengers suddenly catching sight of a rescue boat. The situation actually wasn’t far off from that, in fact.
They heard the sound of the approaching propellers.
They saw the flying craft coming their way.
“What is that…?”
And then a tiny flying platform that was clearly only capable of supporting one person landed next to them on the roof.
“………”
The six of them fell silent.
“Let’s try it anyway!” said 002, unfazed.
He slung his gun over his shoulder and gestured to the others to get up. While they stood and picked up their weapons, 002 approached the machine to examine it.
The platform was a round one not even six feet across. But while only one person could fit inside the railing ring in the middle, it looked like it had enough space for five more if they all stood on the outer rim of the device. The only drawback was that the propellers rotated inside the body, so if your foot slipped, it was possible that they’d grind it right off.
“Okay, gang! Stand on the lip of the platform! Hold tight to the railing so you don’t fall off! And I’ll get on the middle after you’re ready!”
“Got it!”
They did as he said and carefully stood on the edge of the circle, grabbing the railing to steady themselves. Once they were on, 002 stood in the middle.
“Here we go…”
Vmmm! The engine noise rose in pitch, and the propellers whirred into high gear.
“Flyyy!”
It did not fly. The pitch rose even higher.
“Flyyy!”
It did not fly. The engine seemed to be hitting its limit. It was ready to break down.
“Flyyy!”
It still did not fly.
“Huh…?”
The flying platform screamed and whirred, but it did not rise an inch off the ground. After a few seconds, the rotation of the engine slowed, and it went back into an idling state. There was an unspoken understanding that they were over its weight limit.
“Dammit!” 002 screamed, looking up to the heavens in lamentation.
“So much for that…,” 001 murmured, hopping off the edge of the flying platform. The engine rose in pitch again, but it did not change altitude.
Next, 003 hopped off and said, “Good luck!” It did not fly.
“If you last all the way to the end, we all win!” said 006 as he got off. It did not fly.
“I know you can do it!” 005 stepped off. It still did not fly.
Lastly, 004 jumped off and said, “So long!”
In the end, only 002 was left standing atop the platform. The next instant, it nimbly lifted off the ground and zoomed upward.
“Guys…guys… I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” 002 wailed with all his strength.
His face was hidden behind his helmet, but it sounded like he was crying.
“What the hell is that? Screw you!”
“Who thought up this dumbass rule?!”
“It was that incompetent writer! Just because he’s the sponsor, he gets to do this?!”
“If his avatar was right here, I would shoot him dead so fast!”
Four angry men railed against fate on a grassy field.
Their team tag was TOMS, and their common feature was that they all played agility builds. Like Llenn and Tanya, they chose to fight by moving fast enough that the enemy couldn’t hit them in the first place.
Until last year, the common meta knowledge of GGO was that agility reigned supreme, and it was still very useful, but the lowered weight limit from not having more strength gave them a clear weakness in firepower.
The squad’s clothing was clearly chosen for mobility. They wore light outdoor boots that only rose to the ankle, form-fitting tights, and shorts that ended above the knee.
On top, they wore tight-fitting long-sleeve shirts under compact combat vests lined with bulletproof armor.
The gear was all a dark, faded-brown color, a shade known as flat, dark earth. It would help them avoid sticking out against a soil setting, inside a forest, and even in the city.
Their lightweight equipment made them look like trail runners used to jogging on hiking paths. Even the ammo magazine pouches on the stomach of their vests were kept to a minimal number of four. Their style was that if they needed more ammo than that for a single battle, they’d rather disengage with the enemy and pull more out of their virtual inventory space instead.
The player’s weight limit included the inventory, so in that sense, it made no difference whether it was in the inventory or on their person—but it did change the physical size and surface area of the player. If they were going to slide through tight spots at high speed, the fewer objects jutting off your person, the better.
It was also important for them to look more agile. The power of faith would bring them good fortune in this regard.
Heavy weapons required more strength and lowered speed, so everyone in TOMS used a light, practical gun—meaning submachine guns and more compact assault rifles.
As for a precise accounting of those weapons…
Llenn was dazed. “Ah!” she said, coming to with a start and looking up to where Pitohui was rising into the sky.
“Llenn! I’m going to come looking for you first! So look forward to that! I’m not going to die right off the bat! Make sure you beat me before you beat SHINC! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” she shouted with a loud laugh, combining a dazzling smile with violent threats. The platform took her off into the cloudy sky.
“Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha—”
Eventually, her voice cut out of the comm signal in their ears. Whether she had turned it off herself or it stopped functioning because they were no longer teammates, no one on the ground could say.
Down in the grass, Llenn practically screamed, “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!”
“Ooh-hoo! We get to fight Pito again! Yippee!” chattered Fukaziroh, whose gamer’s soul was thrilled by this development.
Always the calm and measured one, M said, “This is a dangerous foe to deal with… Now we need to think of some strategies for the three of us…”
“Bwa-ha-ha! This is so fun! I’m flying!” Pitohui said, enjoying her virtual flight and bubbling with anticipation about a future duel with Llenn. She had the KTR-09 slung over her back and spread her arms in a flying pose.
The platform was entirely autonomous. It flew all on its own no matter what the rider did or how it tried to affect the balance. Once they were on it, there was nothing to do. Of course, the real-life prototypes in the 1950s could not do any of this, but that was just some good old GGO magic.
Once she reached about five hundred yards in height, there were only clouds above, but the view below was excellent. In the distance, the sea and shoreline were visible, so she could tell which way she was going: toward the Unknown area at the center of the island.
Soon there was a little dot that came into view on the right side of the direction she was traveling. It grew larger and larger until she could make out its form—another flying disc with a person on top of it.
“Oh, one of my ‘companions,’ eh? Maybe I should shoot them down,” Pitohui muttered, for some reason, prepping her KTR-09. But when she put her finger on the trigger, no bullet circle appeared; the weapon was still locked.
“Ah well. I’ll have plenty of chances to kill them,” she said menacingly, lowering her gun.
On the screens in the bar, all six flying platforms were shown in close-up. It was easy to tell who was riding on them, naturally.
SHINC’s Boss, with her silenced Vintorez.
MMTM’s leader, with an STM-556 with attached grenade launcher.
ZEMAL’s bandana man, equipped with an FN MAG machine gun.
T-S’s 002, with the prototype XM8 assault rifle.
TOMS’s MP7AI shooter, though few people knew much about that team.
“It’s that chick!”
And lastly, Pitohui, with the KTR-09 assault rifle, among many other weapons.
“Holy crap, man! That’s an amazing party.”
“And they’re all gonna be one team now…?”
“Do they seem super-tough to you, too? Especially after messing up the balance of the teams who lost members.”
“But the devs and the sponsor are the ones watching the match and picking them out, right?”
“You know how messed up that sponsor is. He probably picked them hoping that the betrayers would win, right?”
“I think it would be dope if they were fighting against everyone else together.”
“I wanna see that!”
As the crowd raved and buzzed, the six flying platforms made their way toward the center of the island—toward the mysterious place surrounded by impenetrable mist, represented on the map only by a block that read UNKNOWN.
There was an unnatural wind blowing through the world of Squad Jam 3, a gust stronger than any felt previously.
It caused the flying platform carrying ZEMAL’s Tomtom to rock, and he grabbed the railing and shrieked, “Aieee!”
It was a strong enough gale that it blew away the unnatural mist in an unnatural fashion. The mist had been blocking any visibility beyond a mile, but now it cleared up at a rate that was simply impossible in real physics. It was like a veil being swept aside.
And before the eyes of the six players on flying platforms—and the crowd watching on the screens—and atop a distant hill for Llenn and the other players left behind on the fields of the island…
…they saw something.
A ship.
It was a ship that was hidden in the Unknown area.
A deluxe cruise ship, right in the middle of the island, resting atop the gentle crest of the hill there.
The ship was tremendous in size: 1,600 feet long, three hundred feet wide, and about three hundred feet tall above the waterline. The bottom part of the ship was embedded in the earth, so it was probably closer to 330 when counting that—and even more with the mast and antenna.
There was a bulbous bow at the bottom of the front end of the ship to minimize water resistance, but it was buried underground at this moment. In fact, the body of the ship was embedded in the soil in perfect balance, maintaining an almost entirely even keel from side to side and fore to aft. The ground even went right up to the waterline, so it looked as though it was cruising on a sea of green.
The body of the ship was white, but it had faded with age, turning parts of it cream or gray. There were also dirty brown spots and some noticeable vertical red streaks that were probably rust.
On the sides hung countless balconies from all the cabins. By counting the levels of windows and balconies, one could arrive at the conclusion that the ship had twenty decks in all.
“Yowza! It’s huge!” Pitohui cheered.
“What an enormous ship,” said Boss.
“So they want us to fight on this,” murmured MMTM’s leader, when he caught sight of the tremendous vessel from above.
“The final stage!”
“Whoa, that’s big!”
“Ah! A ship!”
“Oh, I knew that. The middle of an island? Gotta be a ship.”
“You were the guy who said earlier ‘It can’t be anything other than an airship,’ right?”
The audience in the pub was also oohing and aahing over the enormous cruise ship. At last, the Unknown area had been revealed. The aerial camera caught the ship at an angle, so they could see its details quite clearly.
There was a wide, flat space at the prow of the ship, with a circle painted green, and in the middle, though faded and missing at parts, was clearly an H. This was the helipad.
Behind that was the upper body of the ship, rising like a mountain. Glass windows lined the smooth incline. Since it was a ship, the tallest deck featured the bridge, where it jutted out with curved glass for visibility.
Moving toward the rear of the ship were the stacks of decks, balconies, and windows. Many were broken. Had the ship hit something at some point? Some of the balconies were notably crushed.
“The cabins seem pretty torn up.”
“Well, this ship would be from before the big war.”
“In that sense, it’s remarkably well preserved.”
The lower promenade deck on the sides of the ship—where there were no cabins, just walkways—featured a number of lifeboats with bright-yellow tops for visibility. There were many of them, since they were meant to hold all the passengers, which was a considerable amount. The lifeboats were packed end to end all along the sides of the cruise ship. They were like aphids crowded on a leaf, as unsavory as it was to say.
Their paint was also damaged with age, but the boats themselves were all intact and seemed usable.
The cameras switched to an angle directly over the ship, traveling from the prow toward the stern. They passed over a wide space in the middle.
It was built in such a way that the cabins ran along the sides of the ship, while a courtyard of sorts opened up in the middle where the sun could reach. This area was about two-thirds the ship’s length, so over a thousand feet long—and a good 160 feet across.
Given the size of the deck space, there were many different features there. It was hard to make out details from the overhead shot, but viewers could see what looked like a park, some foot paths, and some freestanding carts.
On top of the cabin areas on either side were pools and Jacuzzis full of muddy, rancid water. There was even a filthy basketball court, as well as some jutting smokestacks. Some bridges crossed over between the port and starboard sides here and there. Above that was the tallest point on the ship, an observation deck.
The aerial view continued scrolling, and the ship kept going. And going and going.
“That thing is enormous.”
“It’s like an apartment complex.”
“It’s bigger than my whole hometown.”
A minute or so after it started, the camera finally scrolled to the ship’s stern. It was a wide, flat, open space connected to the internal courtyard, with a half-circle stage set slightly lower at the end. It was a large stage with rows of descending benches for an audience to sit upon.
Behind the stage was a wide deck for watching the trail in the water behind the ship. Because there were only waves behind that point, there was a tall and sturdy railing running along it.
It was a gorgeous behemoth of a ship.
The audience could easily imagine it in its glory days, pristine and shining as it kicked up wake behind it.
It probably hosted countless memories, with thousands of passengers—friends, families, lovers—having the time of their lives on its many decks.
Others probably watched the cruise ship from the shore, dreaming of the day that they, too, could travel the world in luxury.
So why was it stuck in the ground in a place like this? The camera switched to the side of the prow, as if offering an answer.
There, written in a graceful English font on the side of the ship, was its name: CONQUEROR OF THE SEVEN SEAS. Except that it had a huge X drawn over it. Below that point, a new name had been scrawled. It was sloppy and ugly, clearly painted by hand.
The new name of the ship was There Is Still Time.
“Ah, I get it. That’s some GGO set dressing. Would’ve happened after the big apocalyptic war.”
“Brutal, as always.”
The audience members commented one after the other, understanding the environmental storytelling at play.
GGO was set on an Earth in the far future, after humanity engaged in an ultimate war with nuclear weapons—and probably things even worse than that. The environment was destroyed, and even the few humans who survived eventually died out in the generations after the war.
The people on Earth now—the players of GGO—were the ones who returned to the empty planet from space on the Space Battle Cruiser Glocken.
Among the players of GGO, there were more than a few who said, “I can’t get enough of this postapocalyptic Earth. Honestly, I’d have fun without shooting a single gun here.” They enjoyed taking in the conflicting feelings of familiar man-made settings that were decayed and destroyed. They were like urban explorers who got a kick out of exploring abandoned buildings that nature had reclaimed.
These folks formed squadrons with like-minded individuals who dedicated themselves to exploring the world that had been built for them. They’d go out on expeditions, enjoying the remote locales, and sell the items they found—usually guns or gun designs—for cash to fund the next expedition.
They would carry around guns, too, of course, but not to aggressively attack monsters and other players, merely to defend themselves if needed. They didn’t see themselves as soldiers, but as explorers.
In the present day of 2026, there was a good variety of VR games out there, but only GGO featured this kind of postapocalyptic setting, especially one set so many years after its downfall.
So the overwhelming scope of its ruination was like ambrosia to the people, whether American or Japanese, who were drawn to that vibe.
And to keep those people interested and live up to their expectations, GGO’s environmental designers poured tons of effort into their work, filling them with details. Such as the ruined church with the shining wedding dress inside it that Pitohui once told Llenn about.
This ship, too, had a dark past.
It carried people who somehow survived the apocalyptic war and sought refuge somewhere else, a brand-new safe land where they could live.
They were the ones who rechristened the Conquerer of the Seven Seas, giving it a name full of hope, telling its passengers that there was still time for humanity.
It probably started sailing the seas with thousands, if not tens of thousands, of refugees crammed into its cabins. They must have believed that there was a new paradise awaiting them somewhere.
But something happened, perhaps a tectonic shift or a huge tsunami. The ship went aground atop this mountain and never sailed again.
In fact, perhaps this place was the new world they sought.
Whatever happened to those passengers after that point was unclear. The only thing anyone knew for certain was that they were long dead.
“What a gorgeous, sad setting…”
“And now that we’ve come back from space, we’re gonna go and fight it out there!”
“Ah, the tragic nature of man…”
“Let’s make a toast and offer a prayer for those who died…and those who are about to die!”
The battle-loving companions raised their glasses toward the ceiling of the pub.
While the audience enjoyed their mock memorial, Pitohui’s flying platform was close enough to the ship now that she, too, could read its hull.
“Oh? Ah, that must be her name.”
The prow was pointed straight south, so her path toward the ship took her right past the writing.
“There Is Still Time? Ah, I get it!” she said as the ship grew larger and larger with proximity. “Pfft! Ha-ha-ha! And after all that pointless effort, they all died anyway! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! If you’re going to die, at least go out in a blaze of glory against your enemies! Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”
She laughed long and loud.
“Guess I’ll keep the killing going, then!”
The flying platform descended toward the heliport on the fore of the ship, carrying a woman with the straightforward personality of some god of chaos and disaster. The other five platforms were in view, too, arriving from other directions.
They headed down to the setting of the final battle of third Squad Jam.
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