Summoning Japan to Xadia

Chapter 1: The Blue Aurora Event

"Narita Airport at night" (image) by SFCA94109 on Flickr. Link at the end of the chapter.

January 1, 2027, Friday

Chiba Prefecture, Narita, Narita International Airport, Control Tower

Midnight

Everyone cheers, clapping their hands or blowing their party horns. Including those sitting in their workstations.

"Happy New Year!"

"Welcome Twenty-Twenty-Seven!"

The tower supervisor takes off his 2027 hat. He is about to head back to his desk to gulp down the rest of his champagne when he notices an air traffic controller staring at his radar screen. A steaming bowl of Toshikoshi Soba sits untouched on his desk.

The tower supervisor knows this ATC was talking with an arriving plane just now and he is pretty sure he did not hear the ATC reply to the pilot's request for a runway.

The air traffic controller says, "This is strange..."

The tower supervisor raises an eyebrow and looks at the screen. "What is strange?"

"The planes..." The ATC points at the screen.

The tower supervisor leans down to look closer. He and the ATC could clearly see the same thing, and the tower supervisor snorts at it. "Tsk. It's probably broken—"

"We've lost contact!" A different ATC shouts.

The tower supervisor looks at that ATC. "What?"

"Mine too." It is another ATC.

And another. "They stopped responding!"

20 minutes after midnight

The ATCs started talking about the probable causes. One theorized a solar flare eruption. Another person joked it was the Chinese.

The tower supervisor looks down at the increasingly chaotic scene on the tarmac. All planes, both arriving and previously departing, queuing and blocking up the taxiways, waiting for their turn as all gates are occupied. The apron area in front of the terminal is full of ground vehicles and personnel trying to move planes in and out to the parking areas, to anywhere where there is space to spare, as quickly as possible.

He looks up at the sky full of hovering planes. An increasing number of planes are being diverted to land in nearby airports and airfields. These were the planes that maintained contact. The missing planes either stopped responding or lost contact, the only thing they have in common is that they disappeared from the radar.

But it is not the missing planes that bother him. It is the unnatural sight of the aurora lights dancing wildly through the skies with its dazzling yet haunting blue colors.

The confusion mixed with this brief moment of wonder simmers in his head. The next thing he knows, it comes out of his mouth.

"What is going on?"

Terminal 1

30 minutes after midnight

The attendant cannot believe what she is seeing. People who were supposed to pick up or drop off passengers, or go to the terminal for their flights have crowded the first floor, blocking airport personnel and swamping the stores and offices. She heard the situation in the upper floors is getting worse.

The same scene is reported everywhere in and outside the airport. People asking questions. It has come to the point where they started asking any personnel they encountered.