Spica from the Meteor

Stories

## Illustrations

## Chapter 1: Spica from the Meteor

Scans: lasthm

Through the long years, the girl had drifted along the border between the Earth and the cosmos, asleep inside a stone called a star.

The stars circled the Earth and shed a blue-white light. That starlight was dreamlike, solemn, and warm.

Under the pull of Earth’s gravity, countless stars swayed gently, rocking her toward sleep like a cradle.

Around the girl drifted more stars than she could count, from pebbles to boulders so vast one had to look up to see them whole. Since an ancient age before writing itself existed, stars of every shape had kept watch over the living things on the ground below.

Under the watch of those stars, the girl was able to sleep.

Half awake, she opened her eyes a little and gazed out at the winding river of stars.

Star drew star. They pulled close, struck one another, and burst into fierce light.

In those collisions the stars fused and gave rise to larger stars. As the stars grew, the Earth’s gravity took a stronger hold on them.

At last it was the turn of the star that held her.

Drawn by gravity, the star wrapped around her became a meteor and fell.

Friction with the atmosphere stripped its surface away and dragged a long tail across the border between Earth and space.

No one noticed the meteor fall.

At the same time…

Edison Lower High School.

Shin Shirag was bent over the notebook on his desk when someone called his name. He looked up and glanced around.

An old teacher already halfway in the grave stood on the platform, brandishing his pointer. The writing on the blackboard was loose and limp. At a glance, anyone would have mistaken it for noth—

## Chapter 2: Attack and Awakening

The next morning Shin woke on the floor. There was a blanket under him, but the floor was still a little hard, and the ache of it ran through his whole body.

He sprang up and stretched long and lazy. Once his stiff muscles had pulled taut, the soreness began to ease. The last time he had felt his muscles ache like this was when he was small. He remembered losing the hair ornament his mother loved best, getting a fierce scolding from his father, and being sent to sleep a night in the stables.

He put the memory away and looked at the bed where he usually slept.

Spica was still fast asleep in her nightclothes. Her blue hair fanned across the bedding. Slender arms and legs, a willow waist a hand could circle. She was vivid enough to steal the breath, and still something he did not dare touch. A thread of morning sun came in through the window, and under it Spica’s blue hair and snow-pale skin shone.

Shin stared, gone blank, and swallowed without thinking.

He could hardly believe he had brought her home last night. Necessity had forced his hand, and even so he had spent a night alone with a beautiful girl. If his friends at school found out… The thought clenched his stomach. And yet, seeing how peacefully Spica slept, he still felt that bringing her here had been right.

“…No, no, no. This is no time to stand here gaping.”

He hurried into the bathroom to change into his usual clothes.

A jacket, a shirt, and a pair of jeans worn soft with use.

Meifang had mocked the outfit last night, but aside from the clothes being a little old, it still came together well enough. Today was no date. Even so, he was going out with a girl, and he could not look too sl—

## Chapter 3: A Hundred Years of Grudges

They had walked for several minutes when they ran into a dead end again.

They had gone up and down stairs more than once along the way, and Shin had even less idea where he was. The passage had electric lights, but none of them were on. The only light they could count on was the flashlights Meifang and the others carried.

At the wall at the end, Meifang worked at something, and the wall lifted with a clatter.

A hidden door that was not even on the map?

What startled Shin more was the factory-sized elevator beyond it. Meifang and her companions made four, and with Shin and Spica as well, all of them stepped in without feeling cramped. The only light inside was a bulb no bigger than a fingertip.

Meifang pressed the button. The clatter came again, and the elevator began to descend. Its construction was plain: a basic metal frame and handrails. Looking up, he could even see the cables that held it.

Once the elevator was moving, Meifang took her mask off again.

“Wearing this thing, I’m sweating myself stale…”

She was not exaggerating. Her forehead was covered in sweat.

The others pulled their masks off too and fanned themselves with them.

“It is so good that nothing happened to either of you!”

Meifang threw her arms wide and hugged Shin and Spica hard.

“Wah—hey, Meifang…”

She held on tight. Shin could not even move his hands.

She pressed him into the softness of her chest, and his heart picked up before he knew it.

“We’re together again. Let me hold you properly to celebrate, Shin!”

“Wh-what are you suddenly doing…”

He was glad someone had come to save him, and gladder still that they were people he knew. That eased him…

## Chapter 4: The Future of the Boy and the Girl

Several hours later.

Spica appeared on an upper floor of the Edison Pillar. She was taken into a lavishly furnished room. In place of windows, the walls were hung with oil paintings of the sky. The carpet was deep enough to swallow an ankle. Antiques stood everywhere one looked. In the center of the room was a great canopied bed. The luxury had been carried as far as it would go.

At first Spica was shut in the room alone. Then several maids came and led her to the bath, stripped her clothes from her by force, and washed her body and her hair. After the bath they combed her hair, trimmed her nails, and applied a makeup that stopped just short of too much. At the end they dressed her in a thin silk evening gown. The clothes the Meteor Strike Corps had given her had, she was told, all been thrown away. Only the red ribbon Shin had bought her stayed with her, kept against her skin, so it was not taken. The maids had meant to throw the ribbon away as well, but they could not overcome her, and in the end they tied it into a bow in her hair.

When her dressing was finished, Spica was led out of the room.

The corridor walls were smooth white building material. There was not a single window on either side, and yet the lighting was plentiful, bright as day. David and his private soldiers were waiting in the corridor. David’s brow was tight. The soldiers were all smiling, as if they were waiting for something. When they saw Spica, they could not help a soft catch of breath.

Dressed with such care by the maids, Spica was more beautiful still. Long lashes, deep blue eyes, skin white with a flush of rose beneath it, blue hair smooth and shining, every strand as if it had been cut from a meteor. Her slender figure, set off by the close-fitting silk evening gown…

## Epilogue

Some time after the incident, the Jackal, Jack Edison, took office as the new head of the Edison Company, and with that the Center turned a new page.

Once in office, the Jackal set about changing the Edison Company’s structure at the root. Every unlawful gain the company had taken in was gathered and put toward the poverty and the pollution of the lowest level. After the revolution, the Jackal was still pressing those fundamental reforms forward.

Richard yielded his place to his son and resigned. Now every side was calling him to account, and he spent each day under questioning. The company’s former regime of misrule had made him a target for all, and his days were hard. But with the burden set down, his mood had grown lighter instead… At least, that was how it looked to the Jackal.

Richard’s wife, Mary Edison, disappeared not long after the incident settled. Rumor said she had fled to another city and thrown herself on a lover. Once she had escaped to another city, it was difficult for the Jackal to interfere any further… and the Jackal did not feel it was necessary to bring her back on purpose.

The Jackal’s younger brother, David Edison, vanished as Mary had. About his whereabouts, though, not half a rumor circulated. The Jackal supposed he had left the Center and gone traveling somewhere. Whether he would come back for revenge, no one knew either.

And so the Edison Company changed. The whole Center, and the lowest level above all, was steeped in the joy of victory. Food, supplies, and new meteor engines were hauled down to the lowest level one after another. The lowest level was brighter now than it had ever been. None of the residents had imagined that the Edison Company, once their enemy…

## Afterword

First, about this book, *Spica from the Meteor*.

When I finish an interesting novel or manga, I usually write a line for the people around me: this part and that part are what make it attractive, I think you will like it too, you should read it. I am very bad at clear, orderly explanatory prose. So when I write novels I like to bring in influences from other works, and perhaps things I once studied. This newly begun series, *Spica from the Meteor*, is likewise poured full of essence drawn in from elsewhere.

The series began with a single idea. If the old legend is true, that people become stars after they die, what then? On top of that I added the things I love best: an enormous city, machines that fly through the sky, and the rest. Then I remembered the biographical manga of great figures I read in elementary school, thought, that person is so cool, and added great figures to the foundation. Things you have lived through, novels and manga you have read, leap out and hand you an idea at the moment you have long forgotten them… That is the pleasure of making something.

While I am at it: a lot of readers are probably wondering why it is not yuri this time. That is because the Goddess of Yuri (the loli crone) once scolded me and spurred me on: “Ryunosuke Usazuki… a novice like you is still a little early to make a living off yuri. Survive in this business first.” Even so, if it is for the sake of yuri, I, Ryunosuke Usazuki, will strike down even a god to show you. So new characters will appear in the next volume. Please look forward to it.…