Logistic Hornet

The Logistic Hornet.

The Logistic Hornet (ロジスティクスホーネット, Rojisutikusuhōnetto^?) is a type of giant aircraft which acts as an airborne space launch platform. Originally developed by Melzabeth Grocery's Space Engage as an alternative to old forms of space travel, they were utilized by R&C Occultics as mobile bases for its worldwide drone-based delivery system.

Appearance

The Logistic Hornets look like giant flying wings, with V-shaped main wings five kilometers across at the front and a triangular tail wing connected at the rear, with a launch port for the craft's mass driver. Even with the gap between the two sets of wings, the craft's silhouette is said to look like a single isosceles triangle. The main pair of wings has a giant circular hole in its center, with a donut shape around it containing the mass driver. The main wing has Space Engage as well as the unit's name and number written on the underside.

The craft's aerial surveillance drones are described as looking like giant crane flies with cameras attached to their bellies.

Principles

Functioning like an airborne aircraft carrier, the Logistic Hornet has a built-in mass driver for launching spacecraft and objects into ballistic orbits from an altitude of 30 kilometers, located in the donut shape around the central hole in the main wings, with a launch port mounted on the tail wing. When activated, linear motors build up circular acceleration and then the object for launch is fired diagonally upwards from the rear launch port. The heated electromagnets are exposed to external air to cool down. The launch apparently costs less than 1% of a traditional multi-stage rocket launch, and even if limited to ballistic flight, it makes spaceflight more accessible. Launched into a ballistic orbit outside of the atmosphere, without air resistance, spacecraft can reach the opposite side of the planet in around 20 minutes. In addition to the mass driver, the craft's huge wings can be used as runways, and transport planes and drones can be hung from bottom of the craft and accelerated for launch.

Due to its immense size, the Logistic Hornet cannot use an ordinary airport for take-off and landing (likely using a wide-open expanse such as a desert or ocean, probably the ocean given company activities at Long Beach and one unit performing an ocean landing after the December 26th incident), and relies mid-air refueling in order to fly indefinitely. Given the intention of R&C Occultics for stateless mobile bases, it was speculated that an approach requiring ordinary stationary airports for refueling, such as with air tankers, would not be taken, with the considered possibility of sending up tanks attached to giant balloons to refuel from land or sea, or using gliders and launch vehicles to provide fuel and maintenance equipment in the same way as cargo deliveries.

Control Mechanisms

With its main wings being five kilometers across, there are differences in temperature, humidity, wind direction and even weather at different points along the aircraft. If these difficulties were not accounted for, the different wind strength and air resistance on different parts of the craft would cause it to 'twist' and eventually break apart. Melzabeth Grocery's solution to this problem, known as the Melzabeth Method (メルザベス・メソッド, Meruzabesu Mesoddo^?), uses an approach based on human skin, which can react on reflex without conscious thought (for example, running a fingertip down the spine making one's hairs stand on end), possibly an off-shoot of neurocomputers which come up with ideas using the same structure as a human brain. A 'spinal cord' was artificially created and delicate cutaneous receptors installed across every part of the Logistic Hornet which can react in a similar way, making aerodynamic adjustments by moving armor scales. As there are more than a million of them, if each one was thought about before a command was given it would never finish in time, and as such the system is set up to give commands without thinking. The aerial attitude control uses data taken from Melzabeth herself, controlling the giant craft's flight based on her subconscious muscle tension and center of gravity control while hang gliding.

The Logistic Hornet also houses a prototype autonomous optical neurocomputer (完全自立型の光ニューロコンピュータ, autonomous optical neurocomputer^?), referred to as Project Code: Secret (開発コード・シークレット, Kaihatsu Kōdo Shīkuretto^?) or just Secret (シークレット, Shīkuretto^?), modeled after cranial nerve connections but apparently not quite as complicated as an actual human brain. Although the equipment was built and loaded onboard the craft, in order for the optical neurocomputers to run, 256 processors had to be connected by complex parallel wiring, and this was left incomplete at launch, due to doubts and indecision amongst Space Engage and a decision to not complete it until 4/5 of the start-up employees agreed. Due to proprietary standards, outside contractors could not perform the work. According to documents found by Stiyl Magnus, Secret would allow the machines to handle accepting orders in any language, analyze and manage individualized advertisements, plan and execute sales, carry out sales analysis and map customer bases, locate likely illegal accounts and prevent mass buying/scalping, and monitor each other, allowing the Logistic Hornets to manage themselves, allowing their controllers to constantly receive huge amounts of money while just sitting around. While under R&C Occultics, the Logistic Hornets were controlled by the R Rose drone management server at the group's headquarters, an old-fashioned supercomputer which needed people to look after it and the destruction of which would shut down the global distribution infrastructure, however this vulnerability would have been eliminated if Secret was hooked up and brought online.

R&C Occultics

R&C Occultics had no interest in space travel and the original intentions for the Logistic Hornet, instead using it as the cornerstone of the global delivery system supporting its online shopping network. As the group did not want to let distribution centers and shipping routes reveal the location of its headquarters, it focused on unmanned distribution using drones and mobile aerial bases which did not belong to any particular country rather than obvious stationary ones on the ground. The twelve craft, on standby at various positions around the world at an altitude of 30 kilometers, acted as mobile delivery bases, receiving and dispatching products via drones (which carried products to individual addresses), as well as recharging and performing maintenance on the drones. Spacecraft launched by the mass drivers were used to carry cargo containers between the Logistic Hornets. Ground cargo (and possibly fuel and maintenance equipment) sent to the Logistic Hornets was launched using unmanned gliders from mobile launch vehicles (similar to ones which launch ballistic missiles) to keep costs down and maintaining the focus on mobile facilities.

Othinus noted symbolism in the name of the craft and its function as a tool flying around the world for the massive IT company - a rose representing the organization, nectar hidden within the flower being knowledge, and hornets buzzing around the flower for experts seeking hidden knowledge.

While under the control of R&C Occultics, the Logistic Hornets were also utilized as a meteorological weapon, given their immense cargo capacity and global coverage. In order to manipulate weather conditions, a large amount of naphtha or liquid nitrogen is loaded onto hundreds or thousands delivery drones which are flown towards precisely-calculated aerial coordinates, under guidance from the group control system normally used to prevent collisions, and then self-destructed. This releases their contents to rapidly heat or cool the high altitude air, and through this temperature manipulation, changing air density and controlling atmospheric pressure, it can manipulate the wind. The mass driver was sometimes used in launches for this purpose, as the scale on which the manipulation has to be carried out to control the weather means that areas of 50 or sometimes even 100 kilometers have to be covered. During the Los Angeles Mass Disappearance, the Logistic Hornets were used to create sandstorms and other meteorological phenomena to boost the effectiveness of Citrinitas's sand-based magic, aiding it in swallowing up the entire population of Los Angeles, and dropped temperatures in the city to minus 20 degrees.

Chronology

Souyaku Toaru Majutsu no Index

Los Angeles Arc

Main article: Los Angeles Arc

Early on December 26th, when Anglican and Academy City forces launched Operation Overlord Revenge to destroy R&C Occultics, the Logistic Hornets were used to manipulate meteorological conditions around Los Angeles, dropping temperatures to -20 degrees and causing a giant sandstorm to engulf the city, causing the entire population to be swallowed up by Citrinitas's sand and disappear.

When Kanzaki Kaori fought Citrinitas before R&C Occultics HQ, Logistic Hornet 06 used a liquid nitrogen payload launch to cause a giant tornado which engulfed Kanzaki and got sand on her before she could react, leading to her disappearance - though not before she saw the craft and the words written on it, and relayed those words to Stiyl Magnus. When Kamijou Touma and Othinus were travelling to Long Beach, they observed one of the Hornets using its mass driver to launch a naphtha payload into the distance. Surveillance drones were launched to film Citrinitas's actions for the purposes of framing Melzabeth Grocery.

During the final battle with Citrinitas, the Logistic Hornets were again used to stir up a city-engulfing sandstorm, but Stiyl managed to use a giant Innocentius, prepared in advance as a countermeasure after what happened to Kanzaki, to disrupt their meteorological control and collapse the sandstorm. In response, Citrinitas commanded one of the craft to crash itself onto Stiyl. However, the Logistic Hornet acted on what it had learned from Melzabeth and rejected the commands, leading to Citrinitas's defeat and the end of the abnormal weather conditions in the city.

Following the battle, the twelve craft were neutralized, with the last one landing in the South Atlantic.

Post-Handcuffs Arc

Main article: Post-Handcuffs Arc

On December 29th, the Logistic Hornets were still floating in the ocean. After being contacted by Kamijou Touma for help in repairing Ladybird, Melzabeth Grocery made use of a wireless network connection and the Secret autonomous optical neurocomputer to substitute for the original cellulose nanofiber brain and get the android running again, eliminating the cruel need for Ladybird to consume brains in the process.