20 「Honor Guard」

「Area 11: Tokyo Settlement, Abandoned Construction Site. 0801 August 31, 2017.」

Hanging up and breaking her phone in half, tossing its contents aside, Marika walked over to her backpack which was beside the massive variable Knightmare frame. Kneeling down, she brushed a hand through her shoulder length light brown hair.

"Marika!" A voice called out and she immediately froze in position. "Marika! Where are you?"

It was none other than her classmate and pilot colleague Liliana Vergamon.

Reaching into the bag, she fished around until she was able to pull out a Nambu Type 94 Pistol, it was old in design, but it was a new prefabricated version supplied to her by Graham. It was untraceable, no serial number and disposable.

She fed he pistol a six round magazine and clicked it into place.

"Marika...?" The girl's voice came to a sudden stop as she walked in to the section of the construction site where the hidden Knightframe was stored. She stared at the intricate fox design. It was beautiful, elegant. Her blond locks flowed as a breeze rustled into the building. Her eyes wandered to the side however as she heard her friend stand up from a bag which was situated on the ground by the hind legs.

Liliana was unarmed in civilian clothing. She had been tracking her friends phone as she had ignored her calls several times. Thinking she had been in trouble, she was in the area when the phone itself stopped transmitting a GPS signal.

Marika stood to the side, and since she was in military fatigues, she looked relatively out of place since Marika was suppose to be going to the Military Academy. However because she stood like this, her stance kept the pistol hidden from sight as she kept it close to her thigh. It was a Thursday after all, she wasn't suppose to be up and about.

"The Academy Sergant is looking for you... What are you doing here, and who's is this?" She pointed to the machine. She had to admire the workmanship, it was bigger than the average frame too.

"It belongs the Emperor of the Neo-Japanese Empire," Marika undoubtedly raised her arm and revealed her weapon.

Emperor? Lilliana thought to herself, not knowing what she was talking about. The only thing she knew about were the terrorist groups that were active and the Black Knights. She never heard of any group calling themselves the Neo-Japanese Empire.

She paused, was she talking code? Her eyes narrowed on the gun aimed at her, she mentally shook her head. It was clearly not code.

Could this group be aligned with the Black Knights or other Terrorist groups and be waiting for the right time to show themselves? Or was it a group which was working in the shadows, waiting for the right time to strike?

"But you're Britannian," Liliana was a military Officer of the Britannian Empire, she had to take this seriously, but she needed to keep a cool head. She didn't want to die in vain, just because she made her friend's trigger finger slip. "You're not Japanese, that isn't your cause. It isn't your home."

"YOUR HOME DOESN'T TAKE YOUR BROTHER AWAY FROM YOU! YOUR HOME DOESN'T TRY TO BURY YOUR FAMILY'S REPUTATION!" Marika burst like a pressure seal under too much duress. "Go away, before I shoot you!" She cried out at Liliana, at first being unwilling to shoot her friend. She was unarmed, she wasn't trying to get closer. She was just trying to reel her back in to the tyrannical grasp of the Britannian Empire.

The Soresi family lost face when Kewell lost face directly instead of Jeremiah. Following Kewell's death however, the family lost even more of their reputation. Due to this, their move to make an expansion of their funds through marriage to a grand conglomerate fell through, leaving them in the dust.

This was why the Wings of Talleyrand moved so early against the Britannian Empire, prior to the end of the first Black Rebellion. Prior to Marika's transference into Valkyrie Squadron. This chain of events was clearly planned and laid out.

Liliana turned her head and looked at the Knightmare frame again and let out a quiet sigh staring at it now. She turned her body away from her friend and just looked at it. Not giving her friend the gaze of her eyes.

"I said leave!" Marika seemed to plead with her friend, grasping the pistol in both hands now. Just like she was taught in the academy, her stance was true, balanced. Her arms didn't sway, the weapon was light.

"The craftsmanship of this machine is beautiful, wouldn't you say?" Liliana's tone was soft and calm. Friendly and inviting. She looked at her friend with green reflective eyes, taking in the short brown hair and sky blue eyes of Marika's. "Where are you taking it?"

"It's none of your business!" Tears began to form emerge, running down her cheeks, staining her face. "I told you to leave... Why won't you leave!?" Closed her eyes and pulled the trigger, a satisfying pop sound resonated throughout the construction sight.

A lock of Liliana's golden blond hair fell to the ground, torn off by the bullet, which narrowly missed her head.

Opening one eye, she stared at her friend who was just looking at her with a stoic expression, but it was clear there was disappointment in her eyes. Yet she still didn't move, she knew her friend was hurting. She believed she could reason with her.

"So... He's more than just your Emperor, huh?" Her stoic expression seemed to vanish, being taken over by a smile that would comfort just about anyone in distress. "Let me guess... He listened to everything you had to say. Only gave feed back when you asked for it. Gave you advise..."

Marika gulped and nodded, but she didn't lower the gun. She wouldn't make such an idiotic mistake, she was still alert and she wasn't going to let her guard down.

"And since you claim he is to be the Emperor of this fictional nation, he's Japanese?"

"...He wore an Ashford Academy uniform." Marika admitted, feeding a piece of vital information which made the list of people it could possibly be, to a very small in number of suspects. Yet the fact that she had fed this information to her, made Liliana cautious.

There were two known individuals who were attending Ashford Academy which were Japanese. One of them was European Japanese and the other was a pureblooded Japanese. The pureblood was a member of the military, the other was an unknown private citizen backed by the Six Houses of Kyoto.

"Were you ordered to give me that information should you be asked?" Liliana turned toward and took a step towards her friend, completely dismissing the weapon pointed at her.

Pop, the gun was fired again when she attempted to get closer to Marika.

Liliana scrunched up her nose and winced heavily at the heated feeling coming from her right arm, her dominate side.

"I told you to leave, please leave." She didn't answer the question, Marika just kept telling her to leave. When Liliana took another step forward, she shot the left arm, disabling it. "Stop it!" Marika cried at Liliana, "Stop coming closer!"

Pop! Liliana fell to one knee, a casual smile across her lips amidst all the pain. "So you're going to kill me for your heretic Emperor? Area 11 is under the rule of our Holy Britannian Empire, the only true Emperor."

It appeared that Liliana was under the impression that her friend wouldn't kill her, simply because they were friends. Close friends and colleagues which worked under Viceroy Cornelia.

"No," Marika responded as she straightened herself out emotionally, her demeanor being forcibly cold. "You'll be killing yourself, you were warned, so your life is forfeit."

Liliana grunted in pain, her eyes going wide. "What... W-wait!"

Pop, pop! A bullet to the collar and a bullet to the head. Liliana collapsed to the side and Marika dropped the gun with shaky hands. Taking in an unsteady inhale, she then pursed her lips as she exhaled, now was not the time to get sentimental.

Without a second thought, she grabbed the bag, slung it over her shoulder and walked beneath the fox's torso. As she did so, she was scanned by a blue external laser grid.

"User A53-32D-2035X identified." A robotic voice sounded, "Welcome on board, Marika Soresi." A portion of the torso would lower down, similar to that of an elevator lift. Stepping onto it, the torso would close.

Marika found herself inside of a troop carrier like interior. It could carry up to what looked to be twelve people and a small armory. There was a single circular hatch at the end of the section between the front two legs. Walking over, another scanning grid passed over her.

"Blackfox, Honor Guard Pilot, A53-32D-2035X recognized." The hissing of magnets releasing could be heard, white steam escaping into the hold. Then the hatch opened on its own outwardly, revealing a padded cockpit surrounded by a 360º holographic interface.

Stepping inside, she looked over the interface and placed her bag into the compartment on the back of the pilot's chair. Sitting down, she strapped herself in causing all of the holographic screens to light up and boot.

The central screen in front of her appeared, asking for the activation phrase, derived from the PIN activation number. She tensed up slightly and looked at the piece of paper she had taken earlier from the hidden compartment.

Closing her eyes she imagined a phone, the letters and numbers. "Delta Darker Darker Charlie Phi Seven Phi Nine," she spoke this code aloud based on all the numbers, this was all spelled out. Opening her eyes, she her a beep sound as it was accepted.

"First time start up complete for Pilot Blackfox. First mission parameters accepted. Autopilot engaged. Operations Manual opening. Enjoy the ride, Marika Soresi. Hope you're not susceptible to motion sickness. Virtual Intelligence entering sleep mode."

The 360º view appeared all around her as the variable frame began to move on its own. Stealth mode activated almost immediately, making it virtually unseen. It was clear this frame was designed by Graham, and of course it appears that the resources were coming from NAC「Six Kyoto Houses」 as the operating system had a transparent logo in the righthand corner of the main feed.

Looking over the operations manual which had appeared, it showed that many of the systems were automated. The controls ranged from simple to complicated, it was highly customizable. It could be based simply on the movement of the hands, or there were physical inputs such as joysticks consoles and keyboards.

Everything within the frame seemed to follow a steady color scheme as well. Black and a neon light blue which were often fixed neon lights.

When she looked at the exterior feed, she had quickly noticed that the Blackfox Knightmare frame was flying. It wasn't on the ground anymore and she wasn't necessarily feeling the movement either. It was as if the whole room had its own center of gravity. Inertia from outside was completely nullified.