I'm a soldier, znatchit ya... I'm a soldier, and that means...
...i otvetchik i sud'ya ...that I am both defendant and judge.
Ya stoyu na dvuh kontsah ognya I stand at both ends of the fire.
Ogibaya virazhi, Leaning into the curves,
obgonyaya smert' i zhizn', overtaking life and death,
ya begu srazit'sya s ten'yu lzhi I'm running to fight the shadow of lies.
Skol'ko b nitej ne plyol obman, No matter how tangled the web of deception is woven,
pokazhet lik sveta istina... truth will always illuminate the outline of the light...
Save your tears for the day...
...when the pain is far behind.
On your feet, come with me.
We are soldiers, stand or die.
Save your fears, take your place.
Save them for the Judgment Day.
Fast and free, follow me.
Time to make the sacrifice.
We rise or fall...
Were you able to slip through the Coast Guard's security net as planned?
Yeah. They opened up a hole for us right on time.
These are the real thing... We'll be able to mount a war with these things!
We didn't buy these to fight a war.
These weapons are to give us enough power that we won't have to fight.
Is that one of Comrade Kuze's teachings?
That's right.
I still haven't met Kuze in person,
and since I don't have net access, either, I wouldn't know.
Is he really a revolutionary?
The rumors also say that he's Japanese.
I don't know if he's a true revolutionary or not,
but he has great aspirations, and is a man of action...
...who is capable of doing what needs to be done to achieve his objectives.
Come on, let's this cargo loaded.
If you stress the high-voltage lines of the Fukuoka power grid in two places at once,
the whole network will temporarily cut out.
Safety protocols are in place to automatically provide power...
...via alternate lines in such an event,
but if a surge were then sent down those lines, it would trigger a chain reaction of overloads,
blacking out the capital, Fukuoka, in a matter of minutes.
Other cities are set up the same way.
That's on par with what I'd expect from laborers brought together to relocate the capital.
These refugees don't miss a trick, do they?
This must be his doing, both teaching them how to cause massive blackouts,
and leaking to the net that the refugees might use that technique as a terrorist act.
So I see... He's certainly the right man to lead the refugees.
You got them to abandon suicide bombings,
and are teaching them how to achieve refugee liberation using nonlethal methods.
I don't understand what you did to win over the refugees in such a short time,
but I know perfectly well what you're thinking.
I'll provide you with my very best script.
Sounds like Dejima's declared itself an autonomous region.
Think Kuze is behind it?
There's been no sign of Kuze himself, but it's a safe bet that it's him.
He's making effective use of the net to leak the refugees' intentions to the media.
Nanyou Shinbun Press is calling him the Che Guevara of the Refugee Residential District.
Just what we need, another intangible hero.
But the thing that I don't get is, he started out as one of the Individual Eleven, right?
Why did the refugees welcome the guy with open arms?
Does he really have some kind of special ability,
...like the Major and Ishikawa's investigations suggested?
To answer that, all we can do is capture him and ask him in person.
Also, the only reason we can step in here is because he's involved.
That's right.
The first order of business is to put the brakes on this situation...
...by apprehending Kuze, the man we believe to be the leader of the refugees.
We'll worry about getting the authority to challenge the CIS afterwards.
Sure is a big crowd down there, huh?
Maybe there's been an upsurge in the sense of unity among the refugees...
...as a reaction against public sentiment.
In cases like this, it's the people whose backs are up against the wall...
...that are the fastest to pull together and take action.
The fact is, the actions by our own citizenry...
...are nothing more than demonstrations against government agencies at this point.
Seems like there's a mass individualism movement,
no, more like a peace-at-any-price movement, growing in the population.
Even though this is a basically a declaration of war from the refugees...
Let us into Dejima!
Let us cross the bridge!
Batou, you and the rest go on ahead and gather information...
...on how extensively armed the refugees are.
Ishikawa and I will dive the refugee's net and rendezvous with you...
...once we've pinpointed Kuze's location.
- Roger! - Roger!
We're with Section 9. Looks like things are getting pretty ugly here.
The top brass sure don't seem to think so.
Admittedly, we're always hard up out here in the field.
More than a few of 'em are itching to hand over operational command to the Self Defense Army.
You guys are here as part of that, right?
We're just here on an independent op.
Must be nice to be able to do your jobs with no strings attached. I'm jealous.
Maybe, but we gotta pull our own asses out of the fire.
We'll start off by hacking a refugee's brain.
Kuze's cyberbrain seems to be open to the refugees at all times.
We won't need any backup until we get close to his Ghost Line.
Understood.
A cursory investigation has turned up no connections, such as a money trail,
between Chief Cabinet Secretary Takakura and Poseidon Industrial.
I see.
Will we make it to the meeting on time?
There don't seem to be any traffic holdups at the moment.
Chief, about that Foreign Affairs Ministry official you were scheduled to meet today...
What is it? Has there been any news about him?
Yes, sir. The Niihama police bureau just issued a statement through Kyodo News...
...saying that he was hit by a train and killed at the subway station.
What do you suppose this means, sir?
It would seem that there are some huge ripples hidden behind the Security Treaty, too...
Take us back to headquarters.
Understood.
The place is a lot more active than I'd heard.
The refugees have been building up this high-rise slum for more than 20 years.
They're not totally out of line, calling this place their castle.
We'll split into two groups from here.
I'll take Azuma and Yano with me.
Your team will be Paz, Borma, Saito, and Togusa.
Catching Kuze is gonna be a whole lot harder...
...depending on how many weapons they've stockpiled,
whether there's a militia, and whether they've got an organized chain of command.
Got it. We'll check out the opium dens.
If they have a militia put together, I bet there's gonna be a lot more people hitting the pipes.
Okay, my team will check with black-market dealers to track the flow of weapons.
Got it.
Now, then... What would the shortest route to reach Kuze be?
Major!
I found a duty roster for a police station inside Dejima that says...
...that a police officer with a full prosthetic body, and a female one at that, is on duty right now!
All right, good work. Give me a visual.
Okay!
They sure seem bored.
Maybe they're on alert against terrorist attacks.
Okay, we're going to borrow this woman's cyberbrain.
- Roger! - Roger!
It's creeping me out, that guy sitting out there like that...
Careful, he can hear you.
Hey, that reminds me. Did you get your right arm's control system reinitialized?
Trust me, never upgrade your control system.
HQ calling Patrol Zone 26. Respond!
You okay?
He should do nicely.
Hey, what's up?
Found it! He seems to be linked with Kuze as we speak!
Good. We'll follow this route and pinpoint Kuze's location.
Roger!
I swear, these cyborgs are all nuts...
A barrier maze?
He's using zoning to only allow access to refugees?
No way to pinpoint his location right now...
The route is fixed, so I think that he's somewhere in Dejima, ma'am.
Hey! That must be it!
Gosh, there sure are a lot of refugees accessing him...
Even so, I don't see any particularly obvious barriers aside from the filtering.
Orders, ma'am?
Okay, we'll dive in before the enemy knows we're here.
Prep a full sensorium mask. Our target is Kuze's visual field.
We'll use his field of view to pinpoint his location.
The Individual Eleven file, huh?
I see it. But our priority right now is finding out where Kuze is.
Ishikawa, I want you to trace the net back from Gate 5...
...and find out what factor draws the refugees to Kuze.
I'm on it.
Tachikoma! Inject mask array. I'll cross his Ghost Line using my Chroma file.
What the...?
What's with this oppressive memory matrix?
Major! You have to hurry! Your full-sensorium mask is degrading rapidly!
I wouldn't do that if I were you.
If you link any deeper with me, you'll die.
He can see through my sensorium mask already?
Attack barriers won't work on me!
That's not what I meant.
I meant that if you link with my consciousness, it will make you miserable.
That's it?
Major?
Tachikoma! What happened?! Pull out of there now!
Roger!
Major, snap out of it! Major!
Tachikoma! Was it an attack barrier?
I don't know, but I didn't detect any form of viruses or attack barriers!
It isn't having any effect on us A.I.s.
Do you suppose it was a hallucinogen or stimulant or something like that?
I don't see how anything like that would work on the Major...
Hey! Major?
You okay?
What happened? What did you see?
A delusion...
Forget it, it's nothing.
The important thing now is to use the data I stole from him to pinpoint where he's hiding.
Get to it!
Understood.
This guy is tough...
He's on that ship right now...
And I know him, damn it!
It's me.
That you, Kuze? Something happen?
I'm sorry, but there's a good chance that you'll be raided...
...by the police or a military special ops unit soon.
But there's no need for you to fight them.
Hide the weapons and avoid combat as much as possible.
Don't throw your lives away.
Just a friendly word of advice. You oughta switch to these eyes here.
I can see why. You've got good stuff.
Nice, huh?
I bet you thought that you wouldn't be able to buy organic parts in Dejima,
but the fact is, if you shell out enough money, you can get your hands on just about anything.
Hey, buddy. Spare a hit?
Cut it out, man.
Yeah, so I see. So, did Kuze come here for a body-swap, too?
I never did a body-swap for him.
I couldn't track down another special prosthetic body like the one he has.
I only replaced the skin.
How about the face?
He had the face made by some face artist or other.
It was a one-off with a mouth that could hardly move, though...
I'm surprised he knew somebody like that.
A guy like him, I'm sure people would gladly make a face for him.
Heck, I'd offer to do it if he came to me.
How does he draw people to him like that?
Beats me. Maybe we were just struck by the scope of his ambitions.
The scope of his ambitions?
Batou.
What's up?
We have Kuze's location.
It's a camouflaged harbor on the northeast edge of Dejima.
There's a retrofitted fishing boat anchored there.
He's probably aboard that boat.
That's not like you.
The men have been obsessing over weapons.
You're not 100% sure?
Business has dried up lately.
He spotted me at the last minute.
We're currently circling above the harbor.
He hasn't gone anywhere yet. We'll nab him before he escapes.
Meet up with us at the harbor ASAP.
Roger!
Let's move!
The deal's been made.
Tomorrow, we will have hope at long last.
Seriously?
I knew you could do it.
We have a chance now!
It's a revolution!
A-Are you Kuze?
That's right.
Are you... You're one of the Individual Eleven, aren't you?
How can you be one of us? You're the man who killed Densetsu, aren't you?!
Hey.
As you say, I'm one of the Individual Eleven.
Then why has everyone accepted you?
Just listen! He has...
If you can't trust me, that's fine.
People are fundamentally incapable of understanding one another.
For now, it's enough that you realize that you can't understand me.
My role in this is to guide you to the same place I am now.
But that can only be expressed through actions, not words.
If you still aren't convinced after you've seen those actions,
you will still have the option to back out of your own free will.
What the hell?
Major, there's three of those ships in here!
They've probably retrofitted them with identical exteriors...
...to make it easier to slip through the Coast Guard's patrol net.
Our target is on one of those three.
"One of them"?
I think she was attacked by something while she was hacking Kuze's eyes.
Whoa, are you okay?
Yes.
We'll check out the boats, one two-man cell each. We'll go in under optical camouflage.
Batou and Togusa. Paz and Borma.
Saito and me.
Ishikawa, Azuma, and Yano, you're on backup.
Tachikoma, keep watch from above.
No sign of him.
Nobody here, either.
A transponder?
Look out!
It's a damn ambush?!
You came here... to capture Kuze?
What the hell?!
You bunch of idiots...
Kuze will never be caught by the likes of you...
He's the real thing... He's a hero.
Why did they engage them?
I told them not to throw their lives away...
Major, what the hell is going on around here?
You've never screwed up like this!
Kuze's not here,
and we just lost one of our rookies to an ambush by a bunch of armed refugees!
I'm sorry.
Kuze was never here in the first place.
He's securing a deal with the Russian Mafia for plutonium.
He's in Etorofu.
Finding out a galaxy...
...of planets and stars within me...
Listening to each of them...
...singing the same silent melody...
I've never seen such beauty...
In possibility...
No speck of doubt or fear...
Wake up!
I hear a voice,
hear a voice calling out to me...
I see inside,
see the light now ever holding me...
All the truth, all I need...
...to make of this reality, it's inside...
The beauty within the shell...
I hear a voice,
hear a voice calling out to me...
I see inside,
see the light now ever holding me...
All the truth, all I need...
...to make of this reality, it's inside...
Right here within the shell...