While Hope struggles with the spiritual guilt of a "e;mercy killing"e; and Kinoko grapples with a maturity she never asked for, the cyborg Teiru faces her own crisis. Having pushed her mechanical frame to the breaking point to rescue her comrades, she begins to question the very protocols that define her existence. Is she merely a tool of war, or is there something akin to a human soul beneath her chrome exterior?As a blood-red tide stains the streets of the capital and a mysterious emergency convoy closes in, the squadron must find a way to disappear into the shadows of a lavish hotel to regroup. But with the Toxic Progression evolving and the A.R. link tightening its grip on the psyche of every living soul, the Flotsam Squadron is about to learn that some prisons don't have walls...and some wars never truly end.