The Rampage of Haruhi Suzumiya by Nagaru Tanigawa Page B

council president. To be honest, I was getting nervous about Haruhi’s decision to run for the office, but it appeared that Haruhi had formed the odd impression that the student council was the sworn enemy of minor student associations, so she wasn’t interested in infiltrating their organization and taking over as the mastermind who pulls the strings in this school conspiracy.
    In fact, she was more interested in taking down said mastermind—if one even exists.
    They’ve been kind enough to pretend that the SOS Brigade, a mockery of a student association, doesn’t exist. Haruhi should have been more appreciative and understood the position we were in, but instead, she was geared up to fight. Though at the moment, I had no idea how she intended to fight them.
    However, my expectation-slash-premonition was completely off the mark, as the next challenge didn’t come in the form of assassins sent by the student council.
    It came from our neighbors, seeking vengeance.

THE DAY OF SAGITTARIUS
    All I could see was the dark expanse of space.
    It was as dark as if I’d wandered into the Horsehead Nebula with a blindfold on: there wasn’t a single speck of starlight to be found. Quite frankly, this might be just a half-assed attempt at drawing a background. And here I was, hoping for some kind of flashy special effects. Well, I’m sure that even the empty void of space has its own concerns to deal with. Something along the lines of budget or technical/time constraints.
    “Can’t see a thing.”
    I muttered to no one in general. My display’s been showing a black screen the entire time. I have to wonder if my monitor’s broken.
    As I pondered my current location in deep space, a dot of light appeared on the bottom of my empty screen and began to advance, forcing me to comment.
    “Hey, Haruhi. Shouldn’t you stay back a little more? Your flagship’s a little too far up.”
    Haruhi’s reply came as follows.
    “Operations Officer, address me as ‘Your Excellency.’ As chief of the SOS Brigade, I hold the same rank as a general field marshal. I’m top dog here.”
    I didn’t even get a chance to make a wisecrack about her use of “Operations Officer” and “Your Excellency” before someone else spoke up.
    “Your Excellency, Intelligence Officer Nagato has reported that the enemy armada is behaving suspiciously. Your orders?”
    Koizumi delivered his status report and Haruhi gave her reply.
    “It doesn’t matter. We simply charge!”
    A typical Haruhi order, but nobody would ever follow it. Hell, nobody did, since we all knew that a frontal assault would get us torn apart like the Takeda cavalry at Tanegashima.
    Asahina had a worried look on her face as she raised her hand.
    “Um…What am I supposed to do…?”
    “Mikuru, you’ll only get in the way, so have your supply fleet go off somewhere else, since I’m not expecting anything from you. Kyon, you join Yuki and Koizumi in taking out their vanguard. And then I’ll deliver the coup de grace. With style!”
    I really want somebody to stop her.
    I looked back at my monitor to check on the position of my fleet, part of the SOS Brigade Space Force. The fifteen thousand vessels under my command, dubbed the by Haruhi, were currently advancing toward the front lines in a position directly behind the . The was flanking mine, while our consistent and steady bastion the was way ahead of us, scouting enemy movements. When I looked around for the , which included the supply ships, I found that her shaky operation had left her lost from the beginning of the battle.
    “Wah—Which way am I supposed to go?”
    Asahina was practically squealing in bewilderment as she bumbled around like usual.
    Any direction works. Just chill behind us, please. These ships may only exist on a screen, but I still don’t want to see harm done to something with your name on it.
    Suddenly the