“I thought they would complain more about getting inside of the airplane, but as soon as they saw it, they almost ran towards it,” said Miue, an eyebrow slightly perked up as he observed M5 and M3 animatedly discussing about the new place where they were currently inside of. Murayama stood beside him in front of the large cargo door that was being prepared to be closed. “I guess they really do have the mentality of brats when it comes to these sorts of things.”

“Can you blame them for it, though?” pointed out Murayama, giving a quick shrug with his shoulders as he made a hand sign to Hisaka and James so that they could start the procedures to close the large and heavy door. “I bet they only heard about airplanes and never actually saw one in real life. If something you thought impossible suddenly appeared before your eyes, you would have the same reaction as them. Even if you’re not a brat.”

“I highly doubt that,” denied Miue, a deep frown appearing in his features. “I always thought that super soldiers were only shounen manga bullshit but look at what we have right in front of our eyes... And I definitely didn’t start fangirling in a fucking annoying way when I saw them!”

You’re not even a shounen manga fan, why the hell would you fangirl about them?, wanted to ask Murayama, but he simply remained silent and continued to keep an eye on the Ms, a certain impatience starting to crawl inside of him as the doors closed. He simply felt the need to put an early stop to what he could already imagine being a super awkward trip for everyone there, except for the targets themselves.

“I’ll be right back,” sighed Murayama, dropping his arms to the sides of his body while walking in the cushioned seats’ direction. One of his hands hovering on top of his handgun, he quickly motioned over to M0, M1’s arms wrapped around his waist as he sat down on his lap instead of taking his own seat. Murayama figured that now would be a good opportunity to approach both of them, seeing as M1 was distracted by his ongoing discussion with M4 about something (also) related to the airplane. “I told you in the humvee that I wouldn’t let you continue with your flirting in—”

Murayama came into a full stop all of a sudden, both in his words and on his steps. His body was completely paralyzed, not even a muscle daring to twitch a fraction of a millimetre as a loud alarm of imminent danger rang noisily in his head. His throat had become as dry as a desert and his heart thundered against his ribcage, a cold sweat moistening his skin.

M0 was staring at him. Simply expressionlessly staring over in his direction, his grey eyes locked on his own. But Murayama never felt so close to being killed in his whole life, even with over ten years of military service under his belt. That blank stare, in particular, was as dangerous as being threatened by a knife against one's throat and definitely far scarier than all the glares that M1 had sent his way up until then, eyes glowing crimson red or not.

It was simply deadly.

“N-Never mind...” weakly said Murayama, his eyes readily averting M0’s. He slowly moved further away from the couple, as if any rash or quick movement would wake up a dormant beast inside of a cave.

As soon as he returned to beside his second-in-command, Murayama hesitantly took another glance in M0’s direction. He had pretty much nestled against M1’s lap, the side of his head leaned on his shoulder and eyes and ears focused on the conversation between M1 and M4.

“This is fucked up as hell...” mumbled Murayama after having released a sigh. He shifted his gaze back to Miue and heaved yet another long sigh when he saw him looking over in his direction with an eyebrow slightly arched. “Don’t even ask... Is everything ready?”

“I can send the order to lift off any time now,” answered Miue, knowing better than start questioning the actions of his commander. “Tou and En are ready whenever we’re ready.”

“Good. Go for it, then,” acknowledged Murayama with a sharp nod of his head, observing for a couple of seconds afterwards as Miue started walking over to the cockpit. He then clapped his hands the loudest possible to gather everyone’s attention on him. “We're about to depart. I advise everyone, including you, Ms, to fasten your belts. It’s a safety measure that everyone has to follow and it’s only needed for a couple of seconds until we're up in the air. After that, you can walk around as much as you want.”

“I believe that such won’t be necessary for us, Yamase,” suddenly said M1, a mischievous smirk on his features as he pulled M0 closer to himself. “It would be impossible for me and M0 to use the safety belt. But I'm sure that a little bit of shaking won’t affect us much.”

“Suit yourself, then. But don’t tell me that I didn’t warn you afterwards,” acknowledged Murayama with an unworried shrug of his shoulders. “Anyway, the rest of you! Put the safety belts on! If you don’t know how to do it, ask one of us to give you a hand on it.”

The following five minutes were the noisiest minutes of the entire mission, with M5 releasing excited shrieks and arguing back and forward with M3, who was trying to put on a cool façade even though he was just as excited – if not even more. M2 continuously complained about how small the seat was for his big frame and M4 seemed in a completely bad mood, a deep frown on his features. The ones who were the quietest were M1 and M0, who simply talked in hushed voices with one another, completely in their own little world. If they were to keep it as just that and didn’t border the line of ‘indecent exposure’, Murayama would remain leisurely sat down on his seat too.

In contrast to those hellish and messy minutes, the next following ones after the airplane took off were of complete silence. The Ms were absolutely fascinated with the landscape they could observe through the small round windows of the aircraft, clear as day on their facial expressions that it was a completely unknown world to them.

“Earth, the third planet of the Solar system... A radius of approximately 6,370 km... Surface area of land of 148,940,000 km2 and 361,132,000 km2 of water...” softly mumbled M0, his chest tightly pressed against M1’s and hands clutching at his shoulders as he craned his head forward in the small window’s direction. His grey eyes surveying every little thing he could see from above. “Japan... Total area of 377,972 km2, a percentage of 0.8 of water... An approximate total of 65,967,000 of population after a massive decrease due to the current war and shortage of food and drinkable water... The official capital is Tokyo but the government changed its base to Gifu for its central location and large intersections of crossroads... The population restored the Sengoku period saying ‘control Gifu and you control Japan’ because of it... Due to the brightness of the lights, the stars can’t be seen during the night in the major cities... Its most well known time of the year is Spring, due to the cherry blossoms... It used to possess over 90,000 species of wildlife, though highly reduced now due to the war... It possesses 110 active volcanoes, Mount Fuji is one of them... The Japanese archipelago constitutes of 47 prefectures and—“

M0 suddenly jumped from M1’s lap and firmly stood up on the floor of the aircraft, almost instantly turning around on his heels and giving a short run towards the large and heavy door of the airplane. With another quick jump, he wrapped his hands around the straps on the ceiling and suspended his body in the air.

“What the hell are you doi—“ started admonishing Murayama, his brows getting creased in a frown. However, when he saw M0’s small body starting to swing in the air just the slightest, he had a pretty good idea of what he was about to do. Murayama immediately took off his safety belt and got up from his seat. “M0, don’t you dare to—“

Bam! As soon as M0’s feet connected with the straight metal surface, the door was ripped out of its hinges and fell through the sky, a furious wind blowing inside of the aircraft now that it was fully exposed to the outside. With another quick motion of back and then forward to his body, M0 released the straps and his body also disappeared through the large opening in the airplane’s body.

“Argh, fuck my life...” cursed Murayama when all of the occupants of the airplane heard the soft thud coming from the roof of the aircraft. He took a hold of his seat with one of his hands to stabilize his body against the strong wind and looked up to the ceiling of the airplane. His mouth readily opened to admonish M0, who he knew painfully well that would be able to hear him even with their different positions. “So a window is too freaking small for you, huh, M0? Getting a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III’s door fixed is something way above the budget we were given for this mission, especially because we don’t fucking know where it fell on! Get your ass back here and sit down on a chair all by yourself! I may not be your fucking father but I swear that I will ground you for life!!”

“’The information you are going to get is enough to pay for everything’ and ‘I’m not acquainted with the word ‘ground’ in that sentence’s context’ is what M0 said,” announced M3, trying his best to not break into a laughing attack, much like it had happened with M5. He quickly took his safety belt off and got up on his feet, cracking his neck loudly. “This is why M0 is my best friend. Things never get boring with him around!”

“Eh~ Not fair! M0 is my best friend too!” complained M5, also getting up from his seat after having unfastened the belt strapped around his waist.

The two of them exchanged a knowing glance and smirk with one another and set off in a quick run at the same time, both of them jumping to grab the straps on the ceiling and propel their bodies out of the aircraft and onto its roof, much like M0 had done.

“All of this insanity is making me sick in the head...” groaned Murayama, dropping his body back down to his seat and resting his head on his open hand, the elbow propped into the armrest giving some support to his position as he also saw M4 and M2 go through the same motions and movements as the other three Ms. Apparently, all of the other soldiers were still too taken aback by the door wrecking to show any proper reaction to what they were seeing.

“This is not insanity, Yamase. It’s freedom,” corrected M1, also getting up from his seat and leisurely walking to the hole in the airplane’s wall. “None of us is restricted by the rules of your society. We do not possess someone telling us what to do and how we should act, like you soldiers do. We do not possess a country that we have obligations with, like all citizens do. We do not possess anything at all except ourselves. But out of all the beings on this planet, we are the ones who hold more freedom. Tell me, Yamase, though human society preaches about the freedom that you possess, aren’t all of those rules, laws, common sense and taboos something that heavily takes freedom away from all of you? Do you consider yourself to have the freedom that you always wished for? Or is your mind and wishes moulded in conformity with what human society dictates and believes in?”

“That’s...” hesitantly started Murayama, his eyes open in surprise and shock at that sudden speech.

“The fact that you didn’t give me a clear answer right away tells me that you don’t,” interrupted M1, giving a quick jump and getting suspended in the air with the help of the straps. “You are all nothing but lapdogs to your own flesh and blood, being mind-controlled into being what you were designed to be. Who are the machines now?”

With a quick swing of his body, M1 also disappeared outside of the aircraft and a sixth soft thud was heard from up above on the roof. His words were left simmering in deep and heavy silence.

Human society never seemed as obscure and messed up as of now, the words of a mass murder machine, a human genetically modified to kill by humans themselves, finally making them realize how lacking and empty their freedom was.