"Angely i demony kruzhili nado mnoj, rassykhali ternii i vechnye puti." "Ne znaet shast'je tol'ko tot, kto jevo zova ponjat' ne smog." "Naljubuites', naljubuites'." "Aeria gloris, aeria gloris." "Naljubuites', naljubuites'." "Aeria gloris, aeria gloris." "I am calling, calling now, spirits rise and falling." "Soboj ostat'sja dol'she." "Calling, calling, in the depths of longing." "Soboj ostat'sja dol'she." "Naljubuites', aeria gloris." "Car Inspection" "Mr. Aramaki." "I'm sorry for asking you to go to all this trouble." "A death threat was made against Vice Foreign Minister Jin, so that puts the matter under our jurisdiction." "Besides, you provided us with vital information on that other incident not too long ago." "The Vice-Minister has arrived at Kagoshima on schedule." "He's waited five years for this." "His visitation to the memorial for the war dead has finally been approved, making Vice-Minister Jin the first dignitary from my goverment to visit it." "Mr. Aramaki, I ask that you resolve this situation as best you can." "I understand." "I leave him in your hands, then." "Batou, I'm giving you command authority on the scene for a while." "What's up, got some personal business to attend to at an important time like this?" "I'll be back by tonight." "Saito, Paz, Borma, you're with Batou." "As for the death threat angle, stay in constant contact with the Major and get it resolved." "So, where you headed?" "It's the seventh anniversary of a friend's death." "Assassination Duet" "You're late." "Lots of people who missed Tsujisaki were here until a minute ago." "I see." "I'm sorry." "There weren't any effective treatments for cyberbrain sclerosis back then." "It's the ones you know you'll miss the most who leave you the soonest." "Yeah." "Of the three of us, it was Tsujisaki that Colonel Tonoda had his eye on." "I feel bad about that incident with the Colonel, I really do." "I did exactly as the Colonel taught me to do." "That sounds like you." "Yes, that's right." "All right." "I'll come back at once." "Sorry, but I need to go." "I understand." "Tsujisaki Family" "Wait, aren't you Tsujisaki's..." "Yes, I'm Saori." "I'm sure my father would be happy that you came, Mr. Aramaki." "He said that you put yourself at his disposal for my mother's funeral, too." "You were still in school back then, weren't you?" "As I recall, you had a younger brother who was in grade school, didn't you?" "Yes." "Mr. Aramaki, there's something I'd like to discuss with you..." "What would that be?" "It's about my bother, Yu." "Lately, he's suddenly started to resemble our late father." "I see you've raised him into a fine young man." "He's the very image of Tsujisaki when he was young." "No, that's not what I meant." "Not just physically." "His voice and the way he talks is just like him, too." "And you believe that's some sort of problem?" "Lately, my brother has been constantly accessing military-related news sites on the net that he had never showed any interest in before." "And I'm sometimes woken up by noises at night, and when I go to the living room," "I find him there, reading our father's books with an intense expression on his face." "It happens every night." "I have no idea when he sleeps." "Now that you mention it, no one knew when Tsujisaki slept, either." "Yes." "Once, I called out to him because I was worried, and my brother turned to me and said," ""Oh, you're still up, Saori?"" "And that's not all of it." "It seems like he's in constant contact with someone these days." "But no matter what I do, he won't tell me who it is." "There's even been a steady stream of large packages arriving for him from overseas." "You don't think Yu's gotten mixed up in something, do you?" "Please." "I'd like you to look into what's behind these sudden changes in him." "I'm sorry, but I can't use the authority of my office for personal reasons." "I can listen to what you have to say, but from what you've told me, I don't think I can be of any help." "Yes, of course." "Please forgive me." "I had heard that you were my father's best friend, so I couldn't help it." "Tsujisaki and I weren't best friends." "We were just war buddies." "Yeah, I know." "Sure, I'll do that." "Geez, I said I'd do it." "I know, I know..." "Chinese Vice-Minister of Foreign Affairs Jin, having arrived in Japan today, is scheduled to visit the Kagoshima War Dead Memorial tomorrow." "Because it is not just Japanese citizens who are interred at the memorial, but also many Chinese who resided in Okinawa at the time, the Chinese government has long wished to make a visit there, and now, having obtained special permission from the Japanese government," "the Vice-Minister's trip to Japan has become a reality as a courtesy visit." "Furthermore, because many Japanese are demonstrating in protest of this visit, the police seem to be stepping up security." "The Big Man's just doing that to try to get on TV." "Must be nice." "Here we are, diligently tracking down the leads on the death threat." "Any likely suspects?" "Yeah." "Look, about that..." "We just got this piece of information." "This is the assassin who's targeting Vice-Minister Jin?" "If we work backwards from the Vice-Minister's activity schedule, we can conclude that the most effective means of assassination would be sniping," "Based on some digging we did along those lines, we found signs that a single, high-accuracy sniper rifle was carefully disassembled and brought into the country via the Etorofu Route." "From there, we tracked down the recipient of the packages." "That's the guy who came to get them from P.O. Boxes scattered around town." "I'm running a name match off of the picture, but it'll be another two hours or so before we can get a positive I.D." "Have you determined who our criminal is yet?" "We don't have anything positive yet, but circumstantial evidence says this guy is our most likely candidate." "You know him?" "Yu Tsujisaki." "Son of the late GSDF Colonel Hideo Tsujisaki, former chief of the Ground Self-Defense Forces's Investigations Section." "Look, I'll do it." "I know." "Vice Foreign Minister Jin Visits War Dead Memorial" "Vice Foreign Minister Jin Visits War Dead Memorial It has to be me that does it." "He's Mom's..." "He's Ritsuko's killer." "Isn't that right, Yu?" "Don't make a sound." "Looks like we're too late, Major." "His room's empty." "Sorry for bothering you so late at night." "Ishikawa." "He's anticipating our moves." "Check the monitoring systems of all traffic agencies immediately." "Roger." "Who are..." "I work for Aramaki." "For Mr. Aramaki?" "That's right." "To make a long story short, we're here to take your brother, Yu Tsujisaki, into custody." "Into custody?" "Yu?" "He's already gone." "Knock before you come in." "This is a lady's room." "Sorry about that." "Major, I found this on his desk." "What's Yu done?" "You've heard that Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Jin is in Japan now, right?" "A threat was made on the Vice-Minister's life, and the name at the top of the suspect list is your little brother." "I can't believe it..." "We don't know what his motives are, but we've confirmed that he's repeatedly snuck into a data library inside the Ground Self-Defense Army that was left by Col. Tsujisaki." "Those tracks began the day after his birthday and continued until yesterday." "The fact that he wasn't detected until now probably means that he went inside after properly unlocking the administrative barrier." "I had no idea Yu was doing something like that..." "When did your brother start using a portable terminal?" "On Yu's 16th birthday, the terminal our father used to use when he was alive was delivered here, addressed to Yu." "Once when Yu was little, he kept pestering our father for his terminal." "He promised to hand it down to Yu once he became a man." "The administrative barrier's password must have been hidden in the terminal." "We tried to trace his path into that library ourselves, but the code was so complex that it will take several more hours to unlock it." "For the time being, only your brother knows what he saw in there." "Ever since it came, Yu's been obsessed with it." "He doesn't tell me anything..." "And where could he have gone at this hour?" "If he isn't here, it's probably safe to assume that he's moved his assassination plan into its final stage." "Please, I beg you!" "Stop my brother!" "Don't let him become a killer!" "That's why we're here." "Major." "Find something?" "At the moment, there's nobody resembling him on any train station or airport monitors." "But there's one thing that's bothering me about Col. Tsujisaki." "About Col. Tsujisaki?" "I heard this back when I was a civilian contractor for the military." "Our Chief, GSDA Intelligence Chief Kubota, and Colonel Tsujisaki were known as the Tonoda School Triumvirate." "Of the three, Col. Tsujisaki was especially popular, and was especially valued for his training of new recruits." "Sniping, explosives disposal, close-quarters combat..." "Even weapons procurement and infiltration methods." "They say he taught all forms of tactics, and had trained several of our best and brightest." "This next bit is just a hypothesis, but if we consider Yu Tsujisaki's actions thus far, as well as the meticulousness that indicates he's anticipating our moves..." "Put those facts together, and..." "If what his father left in that library is combat theory he accumulated over the years, then Yu Tsujisaki succeeded in secretly obtaining that information using a password that had been left in that portable terminal." "In other words, you're saying that right now, Yu Tsujisaki is sharing his head with an assassin who was trained by top-rated intelligence operatives?" "I don't have any proof, but considering how skillfully he's been able to evade our pursuit," "I'd say it's a strong possibility." "Batou, this goes without saying, but don't treat him any differently because he's the son of an old friend of mine." "Protecting Vice-Minister Jin is our top priority." "Put everything else from your mind." "That's what I had in mind all along..." "Even so, Chief, we'll do all we can to save him." "But if worst comes to worst..." "Of course." "Chief Aramaki, you have a cyber-comm transmission from the GSDA from the GSDA using code 839-0852." "That's an old GSDF encryption..." "Decrypt it and patch it through to me." "It's been a long time, Aramaki." "Tsujisaki...!" "What's the meaning of this?" "At first, I had no intention of doing anything." "I only wanted to tell me the truth." "A truth that I want posterity to know." "To tell me that, I overwrote my memories into my cyberbrain." "I never suspected that it would turn me into an assassin." "What did you hide in that data library?" "The truth about Okinawa." "All I want is to hand it down to future generations." "But when I learned the truth, I also learned the truth behind Mom's death, and all I wanted after that was revenge." "It was a miscalculation on my part." "I had no intention of carrying out an assassination." "But I can't stop this thirst for revenge in my heart." "You want revenge after all this time?" "That's not like you." "I think so, too." "Who I am right now is both Hideo Tsujisaki and Yu Tsujisaki." "These memories that are blending together are conveyed to my will, and my thoughts drive my actions." "Or perhaps it's the other way around." "It's possible that once this is over," "I might become some entirely different person who isn't even me, either." "Do you intend to turn your son into a killer?" "If at all possible, I'd rather not." "But nobody can stop me, not anymore." "It must be Yu's youth that's making me do this." "Take care of Saori." "I suppose I have no choice but to get my revenge, after all." "Tsujisaki..." "I'm sorry, Aramaki." "Crap, I'm not getting any hits on his ID code, either..." "Can't we do anything to slow down the regular grave visitors at the entrance?" "Vice-Minister Jin requested that he be allowed  to pay his respects to the war dead along with as many of his countrymen as possible." "Still, it's about the same as saying, "Hi there, please kill me."" "However this turns out, I can see that it's gonna be one hell of a performance." "Saito." "Can't you pinpoint his firing position?" "He's carrying an ultra-long-range sniper rifle." "Even if he's taken it apart to carry it around, it should still stand out." "If he's going to snipe, where I'm at right now is probably the best position." "Anywhere else, and he'd have to worry about the wind from the sea and all those awnings." "He'd never get a clean shot." "Geez, fishing on a day like this?" "Borma!" "Forget it." "All clear over here, too." "According to the schedule, the laying of the wreath is next, huh?" "This is his perfect chance to get him away from that security detail that's been on him like glue." "Where is he...?" "Where's he gonna come at him from...?" "We found the weapon!" "What about him?" "There's no sign of the boy himself." "What we found was the sniper rifle and a schoolboy whose uniform was stolen!" "The sniping was a fake-out?" "!" "You were here the whole time, Major?" "Using Col. Tsujisaki's files, we figured out his plan at the last second." "It said that the surest method of assassination is to get right next to your target without giving any thought to escape." "An assassin with a one-way ticket, huh?" "What the...?" "!" "Vice Foreign Minister Jin left for home yesterday afternoon, having completed everything on his itinerary." "There are risks that go along with it." "But we couldn't find any way other than further overwriting his cyberbrain with the memory of succeeding in the assassination." "And I'm sorry, but even if he wakes up, he might not remember you, and it's possible that he's become someone else entirely, someone who's neither your brother nor your father." "I don't mind." "Just so long as Yu is alive and with me." "If you need anything, feel free to reach me at this number." "Thank you very much." "Using the information he left behind as a base, the son restored his father's memories, and the two personalities tried to coexist." "But the end result was interference with each other." "But I think Col. Tsujisaki's memories have vanished because of this procedure." "And it might be a slim chance, but there's even the possibility that he might turn back into the boy Yu Tsujisaki." "True." "But this means that at my age, I'll have to endure the loss of my friend a second time." "I thought he was just a war buddy." "Yes, of course." "Tachikoma..." "Tachikomatic Days!" "Very well, we've made it to Tachikoma Paradise!" "Now, let's sound off for roll call to make sure we're all here!" " Yeah!" " Yeah!" "One!" "Two!" "Three!" "Four!" "Five!" "Six!" "Huh?" "Somebody here isn't quite right." "Hm?" "Huh?" "Hm?" "Huh?" "Ahem." "Uh..." "Is something weird about me?"